Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. II (the Corpus Hermeticum) — G. R. S. Mead (1906)
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And such a soul when from the body freed, if it have fought the fight of piety — the fight of piety is to know God and to do wrong to no man — such soul becomes entirely mind.
Whereas the impious soul remains in its own essence, chastised by its own self, and seeking for an earthy body where to enter, if only it be human.
For that no other body can contain a human soul ; nor is it right that any human soul should fall into the body of a thing that doth possess no reason. For that the law of God is this : to guard the human soul from such tremendous outrage.3
, i.e. in its economy.
3 This paragraph is quoted by Stobaeus, Phys., xli. 49 (G. i.
430, 431 ; W. 417, 15 ff.). For the idea, cf. P. S. A., xxxii. 2.
20. Tat. How father, then, is a man's soul chastised ?
Her. What greater chastisement of any human
soul can there be, son, than lack of piety ?
What fire has so fierce flame as lack of piety ?
What ravenous beast so mauls the body as lack
of piety the very soul I
Dost thou not see what hosts of ills the impious soul doth bear ?
It shrieks and screams : I burn ; I am ablaze ; I know not what to cry or do ; ah, wretched me, I am devoured by all the ills that compass me about ; alack, poor me, I neither see nor hear !
Such are the cries wrung from a soul chastised ; not, as the many think, and thou, son, dost suppose, that a [man's] soul, passing from body, is changed into a beast.
Such is a very grave mistake, for that the way a soul doth suffer chastisement is this :
21. When mind becomes a daimon, the law requires that it should take a fiery body to execute the services of God ; and entering in the soul most impious it scourgeth it with whips made of its sins.
And then the impious soul, scourged with its sins, is plunged in murders, outrage, blasphemy, in violence of all kinds, and all the other things whereby mankind is wronged.1
1 Of. P. S. A ., xxv. 4 and xxviii. 1.
But on the pious soul the mind doth mount and guide it l to the Gnosis' Light. And such a soul doth never tire in songs of praise [to God] and pouring blessing on all men, and doing good in word and deed to all, in imitation of its Sire.2
22. Wherefore, my son, thou shouldst give praise to God and pray that thou mayst have thy mind Good [Mind]. It is, then, to a better state the soul doth pass ; it cannot to a worse.
Further 3 there is an intercourse * of souls ; those of the gods have intercourse with those of men, and those of men with souls of creatures which possess no reason.
The higher, further, have in charge the lower ; the gods look after men, men after animals irrational,5 while God hath charge of all ; for He is higher than them all and all are less than He.
Cosmos is subject, then, to God, man to the Cosmos, and irrationals to man. But God is o'er them all, and God contains them all.
God's rays, to use a figure, are His energies ; the Cosmos's are natures ; the arts and sciences are man's.6
1 Cf. C. H., iv. (v.) 11 ; vii. (viii.) 11 ; ix. (x.) 10 ; R. 23, n. 5.
2 Namely, the Good.
3 From here to the end is quoted by Stobaeus, Phys., I. xxxix. 8
(G. i. 305-307 ; W. 303, 14 ff.).
4 Kotvuvia. Cf. P. S. A.j xxiii. 1.
5 Cf. P. S. A., v. 1. 6 Of. Ex. viii. 1.
The energies act through the Cosmos, thence through the nature-rays of Cosmos upon man ; the nature-rays [act] through the elements ; man [acteth] through the sciences and arts.
23. This is the dispensation * of the universe, depending from the nature of the One, pervading [all things] through the Mind, than which2 is naught diviner or of greater energy ; and naught a greater means for the at-oning men to gods and gods to men.
He, [Mind,] is the Good Daimon. Blessed the soul that is most filled with Him, and wretched3 is the soul that's empty of the Mind.
Tat. Father, what dost thou mean, again ?
Her* Dost think then, son, that every soul hath the Good [Mind]? For 'tis of Him we speak, not of the mind in service 5 of which we just were speaking, the mind sent down for [the soul's] chastisement.
24. For soul without the mind " can neither speak nor act."6 For oftentimes the mind doth leave the soul, and at that time the soul nor sees compare § 19.
2 Sc. the Mind.
3 /ca/coSafyiav, as opposed to 6 ayaObs SaifjLwv. It is impossible to reproduce the original word-play in translation.
4 Stobaeus (Gaisford) here reads " A." — that is, Asclepius.
5 rov virripertKov, compare § 21, "the services of God" (T&S rov 0eoO vwnpeff(as) ; that is to say, Hermes speaks of the Universal Mind and not of the mind in man.