Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. II (the Corpus Hermeticum) — G. R. S. Mead (1906)

But it is fated too, that he who doeth ill, shall suffer. And for this cause he doth it — that he may suffer what he suffereth, because he did it.

6. But for the moment, [Tat,] let be the teaching (logos) as to vice and Fate, for we have spoken of these things in other [of our sermons] ; but now our teaching (logos) is about the Mind : — what Mind can do, and how it is [so] different, — in men being such and such, and in irrational lives [so] changed ; and [then] again that in irrational lives it is not of a beneficial nature, while that in men it quencheth out the wrathful and the lustful elements.

Of men, again, we must class some as led by reason, and others as unreasoning.

7. But all men are subject to Fate, and genesis and change, for these1 are the beginning and the end of Fate.

And though all men do suffer fated things, those led by reason (those whom we said the Mind doth guide) do not endure like suffering with the rest ; but, since they've freed themselves from viciousness, not being bad, they do not suffer bad.

Tat How meanest thou again, my father?
Is not the fornicator bad ; the murderer bad ;
and [so with] all the rest ?

Her. [I meant not that;] but that the

1 Sc. genesis and change.

Mind -led man, my son, though not a fornicator, will suffer just as though he had committed fornication, and though he be no murderer, as though he had committed murder.

The quality of change he can no more escape than that of genesis.

But it is possible for one who hath the Mind, to free himself from vice.

8. Wherefore I've ever heard, my son, Good Daimon also say — (and had He set it down in written words, He would have greatly helped the race of men ; for He alone, my son, doth truly, as the First-born God, gazing upon all things, give voice to words (logoi) divine) — yea, once I heard Him say :

" All things are one, and most of all the bodies which the mind alone perceives. Our life is owing to [God's] Energy and Power and Mou. His Mind is Good, so is His Soul as well. And this being so, intelligible things know naught of separation. So, then, Mind, being Kuler of all things, and being Soul of God, can do whate'er it wills."

9. So do thou understand, and carry back this word (logos) unto the question thou didst ask before, — I mean about Mind's Fate.

For if thou dost with accuracy, son, eliminate [all] captious arguments (logoi), thou wilt discover that of very truth the Mind, the Soul of God, doth rule o'er all — o'er Fate, and Law, and all things else ; and nothing is impossible to it, — neither o'er Fate to set a human soul,1 nor under Fate to set [a soul] neglectful of what comes to pass. Let this so far suffice from the Good Daimon's most good [words].2

Tat. Yea, [words] divinely spoken, father mine, truly and helpfully. But further still explain me this.

10. Thou said'st that Mind in lives irrational worked in them as [their] nature, co-working with their impulses.

But impulses of lives irrational, as I do think, are passions.

Now if the Mind co-worketh with [these] impulses, and if the impulses of [lives] irrational be passions, then is Mind also passion, taking its colour from the passions.

Her. Well put, my son ! Thou questionest right nobly, and it is just that I as well should answer [nobly].

11. All things incorporal when in a body are subject unto passion, and in the proper sense they are [themselves] all passions.

For every thing that moves [another] is incorporal ; while every thing that's moved is body.

1 Of. Lack, D. /., ii. 15.

2 The critical text of this paragraph is given R. 78.

Incorporate are further moved by Mind, and movement's passion.

Both, then, are subject unto passion — both mover and the moved, the former being ruler and the latter ruled.

But when a man hath freed himself from body, then is he also freed from passion.

But, more precisely, son, naught is impassible, but all are passible.

Yet passion differeth from passibility ; for that the one is active, while the other's passive.

Incorporate l moreover act upon themselves, for either they are motionless 2 or they are moved ; but whichsoe'er it be, it's passion.

Bat bodies are invariably acted on, and therefore are they passible.

Do not, theD, let terms trouble thee ; action and passion are both the selfsame thing. To use the fairer sounding term, however, does no harm.

12. Tat. Most clearly hast thou, father mine, set forth the teaching (logos).

Her. Consider this as well, my son ; that these two things God hath bestowed on man beyond all mortal lives — both mind and speech