OF THE ENMITY 1 OF THE SPIRIT AND OF THE BODY, AND OF THEIR CURE AND REMEDY 1. Everything is in itself a senseless, and as a dead thing or being; it is only a manifestation of the spirit, which is in the body: The spirit is signed with the body; 2 whatever the spirit is in itself in an incomprehensible [imperceptible] operation, the same is the body in the comprehensible and visible working. There is one form of the seven forms of nature superior and chief; the other hang to it, and give their signs also, according as each of them is strong in the essence; and as the forms stand in their order in each thing, so they sign the body of every thing and creature in its generation [or kind]: This is the manifestation of the divine wisdom in the expressed word of love and anger. 2. There is not anything but it has its soul in it according to its property, and the soul is a kernel to another body: Whatever lives and grows has its seed in it; God has comprehended all things in his word, and spoken them forth into a form, as the will had formed 3 itself in the desire, the expressed word is a platform of the speaking, and has again the speaking in it; this same speaking is a seed to another image according to the first, for both work, viz. the speaking, and the spoken [word]. 3. The speaking works in itself, viz. in the eternity, and the spoken also in itself, viz. in the time; the speaking is the master, and the spoken is the instrument; the speaking makes the nature of eternity, and the spoken makes the nature of time; each makes in its comprehension two properties, viz. light and darkness, wherein the element of all beings consists, which in the expressed word operates itself into four elements, but in the speaking word there is but one: The element in itself is neither hot nor cold, also neither dry nor moist; but it is a lubet, viz. a desiring will, wherein the divine wisdom makes the different 4
4. This watch-work consists of seven forms, or properties (as is before mentioned), which make in themselves a threefold spirit, viz. a vegetative, sensitive, and rational: The vegetative consists in the four elements; the sensitive in the seven forms of nature, and the reasoning power in the constellation; but the understanding proceeds only from God, for it rises out of the eternal nature; all life whatever, which has its limit in the expressed word, consists in Sal, Sulphur, and Mercury; for therein consist the seven properties of every life of this world; and also the spirit of vegetation, sensation, and reason. 5. Sulphur is the mother of all spirituality and corporality; Mercury manages the dominion therein; and Sal is the house of its habitation, which Mercury itself makes in Sulphur: Reason arises in the oil of the Sulphur, whereinto the constellation gives its desire, viz. the essence of its property, from whence immediately the senses and thoughts arise; but the understanding proceeds from the oil of the element, viz. in the free lubet in the speaking Mercury. 6. Now then, seeing it is very necessary for us poor children of Eve to know from whence the disease and enmity of our life arise, and what that is in us which makes us our own enemies,. and vex, perplex, and plague us in ourselves; much more necessary it is to know the cure, whereby we may cure ourselves in our self-hood, and bring ourselves into the limit of rest. 2 7. This we will delineate and declare, if there be any one that has a mind to enter upon it, and truly prove and try it; and we will set forth from whence evil and good arise originally, and how they arise, and give occasion to the understanding searcher to seek: And we will shew how the will to evil and good arises, and how the evil is the death of the good, and on the contrary the good the death of the evil. 8. When we consider what the mercurial life is, then we find that it consists in Sulphur; for Sulphur is a dry hunger after matter, which makes an austere impression, and in its austere impression it has the fire, and also in its impression the oil, from whence the life burns. Now the impression makes coldness, and
9. Now there is a twofold dying in Sulphur, from whence also a twofold life is generated; First, the impression or desire does draw in, contract, enclose, make hard, cold, thick; and the hardness, viz. the enclosed, causes a death in the enclosed being, and yet in that spirit there is no death, but a pricking, raging, and anxious cold fire-life, which is generated with the impression, and is the life of the darkness. 10. Secondly, in the same anguish, in the austere desire, the hot fire is generated, which consumes the substance, which the coldness, viz. the impression of the desire to nature makes: Thus there remains in the fire the contention betwixt the cold and heat; the cold will have its life according to its property, and in that it strives for life, it enkindles the heat in its impression, and immediately the heat deprives the cold of its might, and consumes the cold substance, and then also the fire-spirit cannot subsist; for unless it has substance it goes out, therefore it must continually, and without intermission, die in itself in the fiery anxious desire: So long as it has the cold's substance to live upon, its life arises, and yet it is nothing but a constant dying and consuming, and in its devouring is the greatest hunger after substance; this same [hunger] passes forth through and with the devouring out of the dying of the fire, and dwells in the nothing, yet it may not be a nothing, and also it cannot be a nothing, therefore it draws the fire again into itself; for its own desire is bent towards its mother: But seeing it is once dead to the fire-source, it cannot die any more in the fire of the heat or cold, but it continually proceeds forth from the fire, and the fire draws it again continually into itself, and so it is the life of the fire; and this is the air, which in the fire is rightly called wind, by reason of the strength and force; and in that which is proceeded forth 2 it is properly called air, by reason of its life of meekness. 11. And in the dying of the fire we are to understand the oil, whence the fire receives its shining light, in which the true life is understood; for that which proceeds forth in the fire-death with the desire to be delivered and freed from the fire-source, that is
13. But seeing the eternal lubet to nature introduces itself with nature into a desire; thereupon this desire cannot die either in the cold or heat, for it takes its origin neither in the heat or cold, but in the nothing; and so it is, after it proceeds from the dying in the fire, again desiring, namely of its own property, and impresses itself, for in the fire it has taken the impression. 14. Now it cannot conceive anything in its impression but an essence according to its desire, which is now water; understand according to the dark impression's property it is water, and according to the fire it is oil; and that which in the cold impression is wholly enclosed in the hardness, as a conception according to the wrath's property, is earth. 15. Thus the wrathful fiery desire draws continually the same air, water, and oil into itself, and devours it, and so the fire-wrath is changed in the air, and oil, and water, into a shining light; for the nothing desires nothing else but power and lustre, and so it makes itself manifest, and brings itself into essence: And the spirit which proceeds forth out of the fire burning in the oil, viz. in the light from the fire and light, gives reason and understanding; for it has originally taken its rise in the nothing, and was the desire to nature; and has brought itself through all the properties of nature, through heat and cold, through the dying in the fire through the light, and dwells again in the nothing. 16. It is a prover and knower of all the properties, for it is generated through all, and proceeded forth from all; it is as a Nothing, and yet has all things, and passes through heat and cold, and yet none of them apprehend it; as we see that the life of the creature dwells in heat and cold, and yet the right life is neither hot nor cold. 17. Now therefore understand us right: This birth in the eternity is spiritual, but in the time it is material; for I cannot say of God that he is darkness and fire, much less air, water, or earth; but in his eternal desire he has so formed himself with 18. Now the expressed word, viz. the eternal nature's property is understood in Sulphur, for therein is the sevenfold wheel of the birth, which in the spirit, viz. in the first conception to nature, is a constellation, and divides itself out of the constellation in its own peculiar birth into seven properties, and out of the seven properties into four elements. 19. This constellation is a chaos, wherein all things lie, but hidden; and it is the first body, but spiritual; and the sevenfold wheel is the first explication [or working forth] of the chaos, and makes the second body, viz. the reason; the second manifests the first, and it is also a spiritual body; the third body is elementary, a cabinet of both the first, and is a visible tangible body. 20. The first body, viz. the chaos, or the first constellation, seeing it is spiritual, is the word expressed out of the eternal conception; the same has again its speaking in itself, which is the mercurial wheel in the Sulphur with the seven forms, which speaks forth again from itself the four elements. 21. Thus the one proceeds forth from the other; the first before the chaos is the lubet of eternity in the abyss, which takes in itself a will to its own manifestation; this is all God; and the will conceives in itself a desire in the lubet; this is the chaos, or first astrum, 1 wherein consists the eternal nature, which with the desire to nature introduces itself into seven forms, as is before mentioned, and so manifests the chaos, viz. the eternal hidden wisdom of God; and with the desire in the mercurial wheel the element is formed, being a spiritual body of the mercurial life. 22. Now all this is twofold, viz. the desire makes in itself in its impression the darkness, wherein is the strong might of the enkindling of nature, and it is painful; and the free lubet to the desire makes in itself through the enkindling of the desire light and pleasing motion; the light is the power and lustre, and the element is its body, or essence; whereas yet it is only spiritual: Thus the fire-desire is a joyfulness in the free lubet, and in the darkness it is an aching painful source. 23. Out of this whole essence man was created to the image
24. His desire in the beginning was bent [inclined] into the liberty of God, viz. into the element, where he was resigned in God; and then God's love-will ruled him with the free lubet's property, but he departed out of the free lubet of God, out of the resignation into a self-will, which he forged in the centre to nature, from whence the pain and torture arise, viz. heat and cold, so also astringency, sour bitterness, and all the properties of the dark impression. 25. Even there he fell into the eternal death, viz. into the dying source, in which the mercurial life in the Sulphur rules in the poison, where one form in the mercurial sphere does envy, hate, annoy, and destroy the other, where there is meer anguish, aching, tormenting, and enmity; for the free lubet was quenched in him, wherein the holy element, viz. the divine body consists, and there arose in the same pure element the four elements of the outward source; there the image of God was cursed, which is nothing else but that God's love-will, which ruled in the image of his likeness, withdrew from man, and so man fell into the dominion of nature: And seeing the four elements have a temporal beginning and end, and must again enter into the end, therefore also the human body, which is now become wholly earthly in the four elements, must fall again into the four elements, and be destroyed therein: And therefore now we are to consider of his cure and restoration, how he may again be delivered from death, and be again introduced with the body into the pure element, and with the spirit into the dominion of God's will. 26. Now there is no other remedy but that he with the spirit which arises in the chaos, and was inspired by God's will-spirit into the created image, does again depart out of his self-hood, viz. out of his natural will, and resign himself up fully and freely into the first will, which in the beginning formed him into an image: He must wholly die to his self-hood in himself in the death of the dark impression (as far as he lives therein to his own will in the self-desire of the outward life of the four elements) and cast himself with total resignation into God's will, viz. into God's mercy, that he may no longer live and will to himself, but
28. And that the own will of the soul might be able to do this, viz. that it might break itself off from its self-hood, and willingly enter into the death of its self-hood, and become a nothing in its self-hood, the free will of God, viz. the eternal lubet to the chaos of the soul, which is the eternal Mercury in the power of the majesty, is again entered into the disappeared image of God proceeded from the pure element, viz. into the virgin-like life, and draws the will of the soul to itself, and gives it again out of love and grace the heavenly corporality of the pure element for food, and the water in that element in the tincture of the fire and light, viz. of the eternal life, for drink: And it has incorporated itself in the humanity, and freely tenders itself to all souls with full desire: That soul which dies to its self-hood, and brings its hunger again into God's mercy, may enjoy this food, whereby it again becomes the first creature in God's love. 2 29. Now we are to consider how the poor soul captivated in God's anger, being void of the heavenly food, lives in mere anguish, and distress, and restless pain; as the outward earthly body in its properties lives in its hunger in mere anguish, distress, and oppressing pain, unless the soul with the pure element does so overpower and keep it under, that it does not fully domineer
31. And now to know how this may be brought to pass, we must consider the generation in Sulphur, from whence joy and sorrow do arise; for the poisonful Mercury may not otherwise be resisted, and also nothing can resist it, but its own mother which brings it forth, in whose womb it is couched: As nothing can resist the cold but the heat only, and yet the heat is the cold's son; so also the poisonful Mercury must be resisted with its own child, which he himself generates in his mother's womb out of heat and cold out of himself. 32. As the love proceeding from the heart of the Father, which is his Son, withstands the anger of the Father, whereby the Father is merciful; so likewise it is in the expressed word or Mercury. 33. Now understand it thus: I do not mean that the cold poison of Mercury should be, or could be resisted with the enkindled heat; no, but if the cold poison be enkindled, then the remedy must be from the same likeness; but it must be first freed from the coldness, viz. from the enflamed cold wrath, and brought into meekness, and then it does also still and appease the hunger of the cold's desire in the disease of the body: For if enkindled heat be administered to the enkindled
35. The raw opposite body does not belong to the cure, but its oil, which must be mollified with its own love, understand with a meek essence, which also belongs to the same property; for the seven forms of nature are only one in the centre: Therefore that oil must be brought so far in the wheel, till it enters into its highest love-desire, and then it is rightly fit for cure; for there is nothing so evil but it has a good in it, and that very good resists its evil [or poisonful malignity]. 36. Thus also in the same sickness it may withstand the enkindled wrath in the body; for if the cold poison be enkindled in the body, then its good falls into faintness; 3 and if it cannot obtain the likeness of its essence for its help, it remains in faintness; and then the enkindled wrath also does immediately consume itself, and falls also into faintness; and so the natural death is in both, and the moving life in the body ceases; but if it attains the likeness, 4 then it gathers strength again, and the enkindled hunger of the disease must cease. 37. In like manner also we are to consider of the heat, which needs no cold property, but the likeness; yet it must be first freed from the wrath of the same likeness, and brought into its own highest joy and good, so that this likeness does not effectually 5 operate either in heat or cold, but in its own love-desire,
39. Now Mercury is the wheel of motion, and a stirring up of the cold and heat; and in this placeit is only a painful aching source in heat and cold, viz. a cold and hot fiery poison-anguish, and forces forward as a wheel, and yet it is a cause of joy, and all life and motion; but if it shall be freed from the anguish, and introduced into the joy, then it must be brought forth through death. 40. Now every sickness and malady is a death's property; for Mercury has too much enkindled and enflamed himself either in heat or cold, whereby the essence or flesh, which he has attracted to himself in his desire, viz. in his mother in the Sulphur, is burnt, whereby the earthliness arises both in the water and flesh: Even as the matter of the earth and stones, viz. the grossness of the same, is nothing else but a burnt Sulphur, and water in Mercury is his property, where the salniter in the flagrat of the mercurial wheel, from whence the manifold salts arise, is burnt [or too vehemently enflamed], from whence come the stink and evil taste. 41. Otherwise if the Mercury did so effectually operate therein in the oil of Sulphur, that he might be brought through the death of the impression from the heat and cold, then the earth would be again in paradise, and the joy-desire would again spring [or bloom afresh] through the anguish of the cold's impression: And this is the cause that God laid the curse upon the earth; for the mercurial wheel was deprived of its good (viz. the love-desire, which arises in the eternal liberty, and manifests itself with this mercurial wheel through cold and heat,
47. That which thou desirest should happen to the body, the same must first happen to that which shall cure the body: To the cure of a foul sickness there belongs a foul brimstone, and so to a cold or hot sickness the like is to be understood; for look in what degree of the fire or cold Mercury is enkindled, and in what form among the seven properties of nature; that is, what salt soever among the seven salts is enkindled, such a salt belongs to the cure: For sickness is nothing else but an hunger; now the hunger desires nothing else but its likeness; but now the property of that life, which in its beginning of its rise stood in joy, is the root; and the sickness is its immoderate enkindling, whereby the order [or temperature] is broken and divided: Thus the root desires in its hunger the likeness, but the inflammation has taken it away; now the inflammation is stronger than the root, therefore the hunger of the inflammation must be appeased, and that which itself is must be administered to it. 48. But as God cured us with his love, and restored to us the salvation of the soul, when we had enkindled the same in the poisonful Mercury of his anger; in like manner also this likeness must be first cured and circulated in the mercurial wheel, and freed from the heat and cold; indeed not taken away from them (this cannot be, and it were also unprofitable), but it must be brought into his highest joy, and then it will make such a
52. Though we men have not full power to do it in self-might, yet it may be done in God's permission, who has again turned
162:1 Contrary will, contrariety. 162:2 Or signs and marks itself in the body. 162:3 Or comprehended, or conceived. 162:4 Colours of distinction. 163:1 Element. 163:2 Into the desired end or perfection of rest. 164:1 Thus now. 164:2 In the outward principle in the expressed formed word. 166:1 Constellation. 167:1 Sphere. 168:1 Or in which the soul in the resigned will does again enkindle by its desire the true life in God's will-spirit, viz. in the eternal light or liberty. 168:2 Such a creature as it was at first, before it fell. 169:1 Source. 170:1 Equal essence. 170:2 Or departure. 170:3 Into a swoon, or impotency. 170:4 Or assimulate. 170:5 Or vehemently, by force. 171:1 Stirring, active. 172:1 Enraged. 172:2 With their bestial lustful excess or disorder. 173:1 Seething. 173:2 Mortifying. 173:3 Seething. 174:1 Seething. 175:1 Or put his mercy into us.
Footnotes
