THE TWO HEAVENS IN MAN
There are two heavens in men; the one is Luna Cebrum, but in the heart of man is the true Microcosmic heaven. Yea, the heart of man is the true heaven of an immortal being, out of which the soul has never yet come, which new Olympus and heaven the Christ Spirit has chosen for
His dwelling place in man.
THE ARCANA
Only what is incorporeal and immortal, what is endowed with eternal life, what stands above all natural things and remains unfathomable to man, can rightly be called an arcanum. . . . Like the divine curative powers, it has power to change us, to renew us, and to restore us. . . . And although the arcana are not external and although they do not constitute a symphony to the divine essence, they must be considered heavenly as compared with us mortals, for they can preserve
our bodies and by their influences achieve marvels in us that reason cannot fathom. . . . The arcanum is the entire virtue of a thing, multiplied a thousandfold. . . . Up until the present epoch,
which is still young, only four arcana have come to our knowledge. . . . The first arcanum is the prima materia, the second the lapis philosophorum, the third the mercurius vitae, and the
last the tinctura. . . . The prima materia can consume a man's old age and confer a new youth upon him--thus a young herb from a new seed grows in a new summer and a new year. . . . The second arcanum, the lapis philosophorum, purifies the whole body and cleanses it of all its filth by developing fresh young energies. . . . Mercurius vitae, the third arcanum, has a purifying action; like a halcyon, which puts on new feathers after molting, it can remove the impurities from
man--down to the nails and the skin--and make him grow anew. Thus it renovates the old body. . . . Tinctura, the last arcanum, is like the rebis--the bisexual creature--which transmutes silver and
the other metals into gold; it "tinges," i.e., it transforms the body, removing its harmful parts, its crudity, its incompleteness, and transforms everything into a pure, noble, and indestructible being.
Here on earth the celestial fire is a cold, rigid, and frozen fire. And this fire is the body of gold. Therefore all we can do with it by means of our own fire is to dissolve it and make it fluid, just as
the sun thaws snow and ice and makes them liquid. In other words, fire has not the power to burn fire, for gold itself is nothing but fire. In heaven it is dissolved, but on earth it is solidified. . . . God
and nature do nothing in vain, or without a purpose. The place of all things indestructible is not subject to time, it has no beginning or end, it is everywhere. Those things are efficacious when all hope has been given up, and they may accomplish miraculously what is considered impossible, what looks hopeless, absurd, or even desperate. But to write more about this mystery is forbidden and further revelation is the prerogative of the divine power. For this art is truly a gift of God. Wherefore not everyone can understand it. For this reason God bestows it upon whom He pleases, and it cannot be wrested from Him by force; for it is His will that He alone shall be honored in it and that through it His name be praised for ever and ever.
MAN: THE DIVINE BOOK
The book in which the letters of the mysteries are written visibly, discernibly, tangibly, and legibly, so that everything one desires to know can best be found in this self-same book, inscribed by the
finger of God; the book compared with which, if it is properly read, all other books are nothing but dead letters--know that this book is the book of man, and should not be sought anywhere but in man alone. Man is the book in which all the mysteries are recorded; but this book is interpreted by God.
If you would gain understanding of the whole treasury that the letters enclose, possess, and encompass, you must gain it from far off, namely, from Him who taught man how to compose the letters. . . . For it is not on paper that you will find the power to understand, but in Him who put the words on paper.
Man is born of the earth, therefore he also has in him the nature of the earth. But later, in his new birth, he is of God and in this form receives divine nature. Just as man in nature is illumined by the
sidereal light that he may know nature, so he is illumined by the Holy Ghost that he may know God in His essence. For no one can know God unless he is of divine nature, and no one can know nature unless he is of nature. Everyone is bound to that in which he originates and to which he must at some time return.
The light of nature is a steward of the Holy Light. What harm comes to the natural tongue because the fiery tongue has spoken? Or how does the fiery tongue offend against the natural one? It is the
same as with a man and a woman, who both give birth to a child; without both this could not be. Similarly, both lights were given man, to dwell within him.
How marvelously man is made and formed if one penetrates into his true nature . . . and it is a great thing--consider for once, that there is nothing in heaven or in earth that is not also in man. . .
. In him is God who is also in Heaven; and all the forces of Heaven operate likewise in man. Where else can Heaven be rediscovered if not in man? Since it acts from us, it must also be in us.Therefore it knows our prayer even before we have uttered it, for it is closer to our hearts than to our words. . . . God made his Heaven in man beautiful and great, noble and good; for God is in His Heaven, i.e., in man. For He Himself says that He is in us, and that we are His temple.
Thoughts are free and subject to no rule. On them rests the freedom of man, and they tower above the light of nature. For thoughts give birth to a creative force that is neither elemental or sidereal. . . . Thoughts create a new heaven, a new firmament, and a new source of energy, from which new arts flow. . . . When a man undertakes to create something, he establishes a new heaven, as it were, and from it the work that he desires to create flows into him. . . . For such is
the immensity of man that he is greater than heaven and earth.
THE BOOK OF NATURE
He who would read and understand the Book of Nature must walk its pages with his feet.
THE INNER STARS OF MAN
The inner stars of man are, in their properties, kind, and in nature, by their course and position, like his outer stars, and different only in form and in material. For as regards their nature, it is the
same in the ether and in the microcosm, man. . . . Just as the sun shines through a glass--as though divested of body and substance--so the stars penetrate one another in the body. . . . For the sun
and the moon and all planets, as well as all the stars and the whole chaos, are in man. . . . The body attracts heaven . . . and this takes place in accordance with the great divine order. Man
consists of the four elements, not only--as some hold--because he has four tempers, but also because he partakes of the nature, essence, and properties of these elements. In him there lies the "young heaven," that is to say, all the planets are part of man's structure and they are the children of the "great heaven" which is their father. For man was created from heaven and earth, and is therefore like them!
Consider how great and noble man was created, and what greatness must be attributed to his structure! No brain can fully encompass the structure of man's body and the extent of his virtues; he can be understood only as an image of the macrocosm, of the Great Creature. Only then does it become manifest what is in him. For what is outside is also inside; and what is not outside man is not inside. The outer and the inner are one thing, one constellation, one influence, one
concordance, one duration . . . one fruit. For this is the limbus, the primordial matter which contains all creatures in germ, just as man is contained in the limbus of his parents. The limbus of Adam was heaven and earth, water and air; and thus man remains like the limbus, he too contains heaven and earth, water and air; indeed, he is nothing but these.
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