Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. II (the Corpus Hermeticum) — G. R. S. Mead (1906)
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8. Of this I'll give thee here on earth an instance, which the eye can see. Eegard the animals down here, — a man, for instance, swimming! The water moves, yet the resistance of his hands and feet give him stability, so that he is not borne along with it, nor sunk thereby.
1 Sc. Ursa Major and Ursa Minor.
Asc. Thou hast, Thrice-greatest one, adduced a most clear instance.
Her. All motion, then, is caused in station and by station.
The motion, therefore, of the cosmos (and of every other hylic animal l) will not be caused by things exterior to the cosmos, but by things interior [outward] to the exterior — such [things] as soul, or spirit, or some such other thing incorporal.
Tis not its body that doth move the living thing in it ; nay, not even the whole [body of the universe a lesser] body e'en though there be no life in it.2
9. Asc. What meanest thou by this, Thricegreatest one ? Is it not bodies, then, that move the stock and stone and all the other things inanimate ?
Her. By no means, 0 Asclepius. The something-in-the-body, the that-which-moves the thing inanimate, this surely 's not a body, for that it moves the two of them — both body of the lifter and the lifted ? So that a thing that's lifeless will not move a lifeless thing. That which doth move [another thing] is animate, in that it is the mover.
Thou seest, then, how heavy laden is the soul, for it alone doth lift two bodies. That things, moreover, moved are moved in something as well as moved by something is clear.
1 That is, living material organism.
2 That is, in the lesser body.
10. Asc. Yea,1 0 Thrice-greatest one, things moved must needs be moved in something void.2
Her. Thou sayest well, 0 [my] Asclepius ! 3 For naught of things that are is void. Alone the ' ' is-not " 's void [and] stranger to subsistence. For that which is subsistent can never change to void.4
Asc. Are there, then, 0 Thrice-greatest one, no such things as an empty cask, for instance, and an empty jar, a cup and vat, and other things like unto them?
Her. Alack, Asclepius, for thy far-wandering from the truth ! Think'st thou that things most full and most replete are void ?
11. Asc. How meanest thou, Thrice-greatest one?
Her. Is not air body ?
Asc. It is.
1 For a criticism of Parthey's text of the following three paragraphs, see R., pp. 209, 300. Parthey had uncritically conflated the text of our Corpus and the readings of Stobaeus, in ignorance that he had before him two different recensions of the same text. I follow Reitzenstein.
2 Cf. P. S. A., xxxiii. 1.
3 From here to the end of § 12 is quoted by Stobseus, Phys., xviii. 3 ; G. pp. 149-150 ; W. 158, 13 ff.
4 The variant in Stobaeus reads : " No single thing of things that are is void by reason of the [very nature of] subsistence. The 'is' could not be 'is' were it not full of subsistence [itself]." The rest of the variants need not be noted in
ranslation.
Her. And doth this body not pervade all things, and so, pervading, fill them? And " body " ; doth body not consist from blending of the " four " ? Full, then, of air are all thou callest void ; and if of air, then of the " four/' l
Further, of this the converse follows, that all thou callest full are void — of air ; for that they have their space filled out with other bodies, and, therefore, are not able to receive the air therein. These, then, which thou dost say are void, they should be hollow named, not void ; for they not only are, but they are full of air and spirit.
12. Asc. Thy argument (logos), Thrice-greatest one, is not to be gainsaid ; air is a body. Further, it is this body which doth pervade all things, and so, pervading, fill them. What are we, then, to call that space in which the all doth move?
Her. The Bodiless, Asclepius.
Asc. What, then, is Bodiless ?
Her. 'Tis Mind and Reason (Logos), whole out of whole, all self-embracing, free from all body, from all error free, unsensible to body and untouchable, self stayed in self, containing all, preserving those that are, whose rays, to use a
1 The physical elements — earth, air, water and fire — were supposed to be severally combinations of the Primal Elements, Earth, Air, Water and Fire, one Element dominating in each. Thus our air would consist of a proportion of all four Great Elements, but would have Air predominant in it ; and so for the rest.
likeness, are Good, Truth, Light beyond light, the Archetype of soul. Asc. What, then, is God ?