Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. II (the Corpus Hermeticum) — G. R. S. Mead (1906)
The text is shown on its own: no facing layer is held for this issue.
1 That is to say, presumably, in the General Sermons.
2 Lit. of this. 3 ftrapfi*. Of. G. H., xvi. 4.
4 Lit. both with regard to seed and nourishment.
6 Lit. taking.
else than Him alone who taketh naught,1 but wills all things to be ; I will not, Tat, say makes.
For that the maker is defective for long periods (in which he sometimes makes, and sometimes doth not make) both in the quality and in the quantity [of what he makes] ; in that he sometimes maketh them so many and such like, and sometimes the reverse.
But "God and Father and the Good" is
[cause] for all to be. So are at least these
things for who can see.
4. For It doth will to be, and It is both Itself and most of all by reason of2 Itself. Indeed all other things beside are just because of It ; for the distinctive feature of the Good is " that it should be known." Such is the Good, 0 Tat.
Tat. Thou hast, 0 father, filled us so full3 of this so good and fairest Sight, that thereby my mind's eye hath now become for me almost a thing to worship.
For that the Vision of the Good doth not, like the sun's beam, fire-like blaze on the eyes and make them close ; nay, on the contrary, it shineth forth and maketh to increase the seeing 4 of the eye, as far as e'er a man hath the capacity to hold the inflow of the radiance that the mind alone can see.
1 Of. G. H., ii. (iii.) 16 : " The Good is He who gives all things and naught receives."
2 Lit. for.
3 eV\TJp&><ras, — reminding us of TTX^PW/AO. 4 Lit. light.
Not only does it come more swiftly down to us, but it does us no harm, and is instinct with all immortal life.
5. They who are able to drink in a somewhat more than others of this Sight, ofttimes from out the body fall asleep into this fairest Spectacle, as was the case with Uranus and Cronus, our forebears.1 May this be our lot too, 0 father mine !
Her. Yea, may it be, my son! But as it is, we are not jet strung to the Vision, and not as yet have we the power our mind's eye to unfold and gaze upon the Beauty of the Good- Beauty that naught can e'er corrupt or any comprehend.
For [only] then wilt thou upon It gaze when thou canst say no word concerning It. For Gnosis of the Good is holy silence and a giving holiday to every sense.
6. For neither can he who perceiveth It, perceive aught else ; nor he who gazeth on It, gaze on aught else ; nor hear aught else, nor stir his body any way. Staying his body's every sense and every motion he stayeth still.
And shining then all round his mind, It shines through his whole soul, and draws it out of body, transforming all of him to essence.
1 See Lact, D. Institt., i. 11 ; P. S. A., xi. 4, xxxvii. 3 ; and Ex. i. 4.
For it is possible, my son, that a man's soul should be made like to God, e'en while it still is in a body, if it doth contemplate the Beauty of the Good.
7. Tat. Made like to God ! What dost thou, father, mean ?
Her. Of every soul apart are transformations, son.
Tat. What meanest thou ? Apart !
Her.1 Didst thou not, in the General Sermons, hear that from One Soul — the All-soul — come all these souls which are made to revolve in all the cosmos, as though divided off?
Of these souls, then, it is that there are many changes, some to a happier lot and some to [just] the contrary of this.
Thus some that were once creeping things change into things that in the water dwell, the souls of water things change to earth- dwellers, those that live on the earth change into things with wings, and souls that live in air change into men, while human souls reach the first step of deathlessness changed into daimones.
And so they circle to the choir of the Inerrant Gods ; for of the Gods there are two choirs, the one Inerrant, and the other Errant. And this is the most perfect glory of the soul.
1 From here to end of § 8 is quoted by Stobaeus, Phys., I. xli. 48 (G. i. 429, 430 ; W. 416, 18 ff.).
8. But if a soul on entering in the body of a man persisteth in its vice,1 it neither tasteth deathlessness nor shareth in the Good; but speeding back again it turns into the path that leads to creeping things. This is the sentence of the vicious soul.
And the soul's vice is ignorance.2 For that the soul who hath no knowledge of the things that are, or knowledge of their nature, or of Good, is blinded by the body's passions and tossed about.