Fetching
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1ssances primitives de l’homme. La première i pour objet les choies Divines & n’a que quant Lettres pour tout alphabet ; la fécondé en a vingtdeux & s’applique aux productions , soit intellectuelles , soit temporelles du grand Principe : îe même crime a privé l’homme de ces deux langues. S’il y avoit une nouvelle prévarication , il se formeroit pour lui une troisieme langue qui auroit quatre-vingt-huit Lettres y & qui le reculeroit encore plus de son terme.” ,, J’ajouterai qu’il y a des langues faulTes & opposées aux trois dont je viens de parler. Celle qui correspond à la langue Divine ^ a un alphabet de deux lettres ; celle qui correspond à la fécondé , en a cinq ; enfin , s’il y avoit une nouvelle prévarication, la langue fausse qui l’accompagneroit, auroit cent dix lettres dans son alphabet.” ,, La connoissance des deux langues pures que l’homme acquiert à sa séparation d’avec les objets terrestres , doivent produire sur lui des effets plus satisfaisans que tout ce que nous pouvons éprouver ici-bas: elles doivent étendre ses jouissances , comme ayant une aCtion plus vivante que les objets de la Nature visible. Mais aulïi , s’il doit encore éprouver des suspensions dans sa marche , ces obstacles deviennent plus douloureux pour lui , parce qu’à mesure qu’une force approche de son centre f sa tendance augmente f Na t v r s zi & le choc des résistances devient plus violent. ’*
2Cependant il est inévitable pour l’homme qu’il fu biffe des suspensions , en parcourant les nouveaux degrés de sa réhabilitation ; puisqu’ils ne sont que la continuation de cette barrière terrible qui le sépare de la grande lumière , & que la terre n’est que le premier de tous les degrés. Or y s’il y a un espace entre la prison de l’homme &son lieu natal y il est indispensable qu’il le parcoure , & qu’il en éprouve successivement toutes les allions. Si un voyageur agile & curieux arrivoit au pied d’un grouppe de montagnes entassées les unes sur les autres , & qu’il voulût porter ses pas jusqu’au sommet de la derniere , cachée dans les nues ; il faudroit , qu’après avoir gravi sur la première de ces montagnes , il cessât de monter, & allât horizontalement gagner le pied de la fécondé , pour la franchir à son tour , & ainsi de fuite , jusqu’à ce qu’il fût arrivé au terme de ses desirs. Image sensible de la régénération de l’homme, où l’on voit de plus la Sagesse bienfaisante accompagner ses pas , pendant qu’il subie les loix de la justice ; car y lors même que par les differentes suspensions , elle paroît retarder nos jouissances , elle ne se propose que de ménager nos forces , & de nous donner le temps de les renouveler & de les accroître. L'homme ne peut parcourir les régions fixes Isci & Tableau
3& réelles de purification , sans acquérir un® existence plus active, plus étendue, plus libre; c’est- à-dire , sans respirer un air plus pur , & découvrir un horifon plusvafle , à mesure qu'il approche du sommet desiré ; comme nous voyons que plus les principes des corps se simplifient , plus ils acquièrent de vertus ; &: comme l’air grossier , qui dégagé des substances matérielles , remplit un espace si prodigieux relativement à celui qu’il occupoit dans les corps, que l’imagination en est presque effrayée. Au reste, comme les vérités fixes & réelles que l’homme peut atteindre à la mort , tiennent à l’ordre intesse&uel , qui est; le seul vrai ; il n’est pas étonnant que , tant que nous sommes ensevelis dans notre matière , qui est relative & apparente, nous ne nous appercevions pas toujours de ces travaux des autres hommes , déjà séparés de leurs corps , quoique la seule lumière de l’intelligence nous en démontre évidemment la nécessité ; & le même exemple du voyageur peut encore nous servir d’indice sur cet objet ; car ceux qui demeurent au pied de la montagne } le perdent de vue, lorsqu’il est parvenu à une certaine hauteur , & ne peuvent cependant former aucun doute sur son élévation & sur son existence , quoique leurs yeux corporels ne le puilfentplus fuivx» dans la marche. iï A T U R 2 £. '* I i
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
1ments of man. The first has for object things Divine & has only sixteen Letters for its whole alphabet; the second has twenty-two & applies to the productions, whether intellectual or temporal, of the great Principle: the same crime deprived man of these two languages. If there were a new prevarication, there would be formed for him a third language which would have eighty-eight Letters, & which would set him back still further from his term." ,, I shall add that there are languages false & opposed to the three of which I have just spoken. The one which corresponds to the Divine language has an alphabet of two letters; that which corresponds to the second has five; in short, if there were a new prevarication, the false language which would accompany it would have a hundred and ten letters in its alphabet." ,, The knowledge of the two pure languages which man acquires at his separation from terrestrial objects must produce upon him effects more satisfying than all we can experience here below: they must extend his enjoyments, as having an action more living than the objects of visible Nature. But also, if he must still undergo suspensions in his march, those obstacles become more grievous for him, because in proportion as a force approaches its centre, its tendency increases, Na t v r s zi & the shock of the resistances becomes more violent. '*
2Nevertheless it is inevitable for man that he should undergo suspensions in traversing the new degrees of his rehabilitation; since they are but the continuation of that terrible barrier which separates him from the great light, & since the earth is but the first of all the degrees. Now, if there is a space between the prison of man & his native place, it is indispensable that he traverse it, & that he undergo successively all its actions. If a traveller agile & curious arrived at the foot of a group of mountains heaped one upon another, & wished to carry his steps to the summit of the last, hidden in the clouds, it would be necessary that, after having climbed the first of those mountains, he should cease to mount, & should go horizontally to gain the foot of the second, to cross it in its turn, & so on, until he had arrived at the term of his desires. A sensible image of the regeneration of man, where one sees moreover beneficent Wisdom accompany his steps while he undergoes the laws of justice; for, even when by the different suspensions she appears to retard our enjoyments, she proposes only to husband our forces, & to give us the time to renew & to increase them. Man cannot traverse the fixed regions Isci & Tableau
3& real regions of purification without acquiring an existence more active, more extended, more free; that is to say, without breathing a purer air, & discovering a vaster horizon, in proportion as he approaches the desired summit; as we see that the more the principles of bodies simplify themselves, the more virtues they acquire; & as the gross air, which, disengaged from material substances, fills a space so prodigious relatively to that which it occupied in bodies, that the imagination is almost affrighted at it. For the rest, as the truths fixed & real which man may attain at death hold to the intellectual order, which is the only true one, it is not astonishing that, so long as we are buried in our matter, which is relative & apparent, we do not always perceive those labours of other men, already separated from their bodies, although the light of intelligence alone demonstrates the necessity of them to us evidently; & the same example of the traveller may yet serve us as an indication upon this object; for those who remain at the foot of the mountain } lose him from sight when he has come to a certain height, & can nevertheless form no doubt upon his elevation & upon his existence, though their corporeal eyes can no longer follow him in his march. iï A T U R 2 £. '* I i
Our translation, period-faithful. Citable as our translation, never as the source.
PROVENANCE OF THE COPY SCANNED. The volume carries the bookplate of Sidney Edward Bouverie-Pusey, printed above the title page and here trimmed out of the reading text along with the scanner debris around it. It is recorded rather than discarded: it says whose copy of the 1782 Tableau naturel this archive is reading from, which is a fact about the artefact even though it is not a fact about the book.