Thrice-Greatest Hermes, Vol. III — G. R. S. Mead (1906)
The text is shown on its own: no facing layer is held for this issue.
6. Of this great interval there are 4 main divisions and 60 spaces, the divisions consisting respectively of 4, 8, 16 and 32 sub-spaces. Above the second division from below there is no motion of the " air " ; the " wind," or " moving air " belt, belongs properly to this second division, but has also authority over the first or lowest division, which extends from the earth-surface to the tops of the highest mountains.
7. Besides these 4 divisions and 60 spaces, there is a further ordering into 12 " intervallic " divisions.1
8. All is arranged by measure and harmony, and after death every soul goes to the space of its desert, ascending and descending according to an unerring law of Providence.
9. To carry out this economy there are two ministers of Providence, the warder and the conductor of souls. The one watches over souls who are out of body, and the other brings them back to suitable bodies. These bodies are made by nature in exact correspondence with their former deeds and characters ; in this nature is aided by the energies of experience and memory (9-11).
12. The nature of the soul is conditioned by its habitat in the air-spaces or zones ; and this is especially 1 See Comments on K. K.y 10.
the case with those of the regal type. The names of some of these royal souls and their offices are given.
13. In brief all is ordered from above ; the source of all is above in the soul-spaces, and as all souls come thence, so will all return thither.
14. How this is effected is explained as being conditioned by a certain link between soul and body, a sort of quintessence, or exhalation, or vapour, of the blend of sub-elements which compose the body (14-20).1 It is a sort of etheric link between soul and body ; it circulates in the body, but also shares with the soul, which is not thought of as being in the body, but as a sphere enveloping the body ; or at any rate the body is in the soul, and not the soul in the body. Health is said to depend upon the maintenance of the due proportion of the " vapours " 2 of this " etheric double " (18).
Not only so, but the increase of vitality or intensity in these elements in the "vapour," is the means of remembering symbolic dreams and passing into a state of ecstasy; finally it is the fiery element of this " vapour " which dissolves this " spirituous body " (19).
It is by means of this link that changes are effected from soul to body, and from body to soul (20) ; and here, unfortunately, Stobaeus ends his excerpt.
TITLE AND ORDERING
The " Sermon of Isis to Horus " extract is, in both style and context, so similar to the K. K. excerpts that we might almost take it to be part and parcel of the very same treatise ; but if this had been the case, Stobaeus, following his custom, would have presumably headed it with a simple "from the same." He may, however, have made a mistake, for that the good Joannes sometimes nods, may be seen from the short Excerpt xxi., which he says is also taken from "The [Sermon] of Isis to Horus " l ; but this cannot be the case, since Isis is here addressing a certain king as her pupil, and not Horus.
1 This bears a curious resemblance to the prdnamaya kosha, or " vital sheath," of the Vedantins.
2 Vedantic prancCs, of which there are five.
Moreover, at the very beginning of our excerpt Horus distinctly states that Isis has already explained to him "the details of God's wondrous soul-making," and thanks her " for being made initiate by word of mouth into the vision of the soul," — all of which is a precise reference to the contents of the K. K. excerpts. I am, therefore, inclined to think that not only is it a further tractate of instruction following immediately on K. K., but that even if it were supposed to be part and parcel of the same sermon, and that "The [Sermon] of Isis to Horus " was simply a sub-title or alternative title of the "Virgin of the World/' the hypothesis could not be easily set aside.2
In any case it is quite certain that S. I. H. belongs to precisely the same type as K. K. ; and that it pertains to the same special class of Trismegistic literature, and to a somewhat similar type as the treatise from which Cyril quotes Fragg. xix., xx., xxi., in which Osiris figures as the disciple of the Good Daimon, Trismegistus.
THE BOOKS OF Isis AND HORUS
Here also, as in K. K., Isis comes forward as " initiated into the nature that transcendeth death," her "feet