ANTHROPOSOPHIA THEOMAGICA Or A Discourse of the Nature of Man and his state after death Grounded on his Creator's ProtoChimistry and verifi'd by a practicall Examination of Principles in the Great World By Eugenius Philalethes Dan Many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased Zoroaster in Oracul Audi Ignis Vocem LONDON Printed by T. W For H. Blunden at the Castle in Corn-hill 1650. Illustrissimis vere Renatis Fratribus R. C. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Eclesiae in tumultuoso hoc Saeculo Apostolis Pacificis Salutem â Centro Saluris QUum in summum Altare summo tanrum Pontifici Jus sit audens nimis hoc Libum nec sine sacrilegio Vobis obtrudi videatur habet pietas suos Cancellos Qui accedit injussus Adaciae non Obsequii reus est Allusit Istis olim Poetarum illa gigantomachia quae Coelum etiam expugnare moliebatur Nec desunt hac nostra AEtate fatui quidam palustres Igniculi qui Stellas se somniant soli a latere creduntur Absit Engenio fastus iste Climax ambitionis Hoc est imponere Pelion Ossae Ego Fratres Nobilissimi in Sacrarii vestibulo nec ad Aram Ear hoc meum Sed in Limine modestius expono Vellem si mihi in Censum accedissent Talia vobis offerre Quae saecula Posterique possint Arpinis quoque comparare Chartis Sed non est quod desperem Prodeant forsan in Novissimis Qui faculam hanc meam praferent vel Solibus tusculanis At que hac quidem ratione Marci Tullii Collega sum quod in eandem Immortatem tendit noster Consulatus Peragravi Ego Quod Apes factitant non illo Quintiliani in Area venenata Floscuculos Coelestes libaturus Qui suavia sua ex Aromatum Montibus attraxerunt Si quid mihi Mellisicii est Ego vobis Favum hunc alveare Solent tamen Rosae in aliquorum sinu sordescere sordescet forsan hic noster Manipulus quoniam meae Messis est Fateor Errata Eugenii sunt Caetera Veritatis Sed quorsum hoc Veritati Testimonium Vobis etiam astantibus Quibus in propatulo est triplex illud Spiritus Aquae sanguinis Martyrium Supervacanea est haec non auxiliaris Vocula Qui silet ad Coelum sapit Accipite ergo F. Illustrissimi Quadrantem hunc meum non Qualem Vobis offerre Debui sed Qualem potui Mens mihi pro Munere est Hoc etiam praefari voluit paupertas Nolite Rem ipsam expendere sed Obsequium Oxonii 48. Oratoris Vestri E. P. Errata Pa. li Read Second part Pa. li Read 2 18 rambl'd 3 10 whereon 9 29 Demoniū 4 29 Finihaebi◠12 3 paulo post 21 5 Iodims 29 26 this fire 40 17 ad dextra◠64 13 I carve 48 20 per misto◠The Author to the Reader I Look on this life as the Progresse of an Essence Royall The Soul but quits her court to see the countrey Heaven hath in it a Scaene of Earth and had she bin contented with Ideas she had not travelled beyond the Map But excellent patterns commend their Mimes Nature that was so fair in the type could not be a slut in the Annglyph This makes her ramble hither to examine the Medall by the Flask but whiles she scanns their Symmetrie she formes it Thus her descent speaks her Original God in love with his own beauty frames a Glasse to view it by reflection but the frailety of the matter excluding Eternity the composure was subject to dissolution Ignorance gave this release the Name of Death but properly it is the Soules Birth and a Charter that makes for her Liberty she hath severall wayes to break up house but her best is without a disease This is her mysticall walk an Exit only to return When she takes air at this door it is without prejudice to her tenement The Magicians tell me Anima unius Entis egreditur aliud ingreditur Some have examin'd this and state it an Expence of Influences as if the Soul exercised her Royalty at the eye or had some blinde Jurisdiction in the pores But this is to measure Magicall Positions by the slight superficial strictures of the common Philosophy It is an age of Intellectuall slaveries If they meet any thing extraordinary they prune it commonly with distinctions or dawb it with false Glosses till it looks like the Traditions of Aristotle His followers are so confident of his principles they seek not to understand what others speak but to make others speak what they understand It is in Nature as it is in Religion we are still hammering of old elements but seek not the America that lyes beyond them The Apostle tells us of leaving the first principles of the Doctrine of Christ and going on to perfection Not laying again the foundation of Repentance from dead works and of faith towards God of the Doctrine of Baptism and laying on of Hands of Resurrection and the eternall Judgement Then he speaks of Illumination of Tasting of the Heavenly gift of being partakers of the Holy Ghost of Tasting of the good word of God and tho powers of the world to come Now if I should question any Sect for there is no Communion in Christendom whither these later Intimations drive They can but return me to the first Rudiments or produce some emptie pretence of spirit Our Naturall Philosophers are much of a Cast with those that step into the prerogative of Prophets and Antedate events in configurations and motions This is a consequence of as much reason as if I saw the Suede exercising and would finde his Designes in his postures Friar Bacon walk'd in Oxford between two steeples but he that would have discovered his Thoughts by his steps had been more his Fool then his Fellow The Peripateticks when they define the Soul or some Inferior Principle describe it onely by outward circumstances which every childe can do but they state nothing Essentially Thus they dwel altogether in the Face their Indeavours are meer Titillations their Acquaintance with Nature is not at the heart Notwithstanding I acknowledge the Schoolmen ingenious They conceive their Principles irregular and prescribe rules for Method though they want Matter Their Philosophie is like a Church that is all discipline and no Doctrine For bate me their prolegomena their form of Arguing their Reciting of Different Opinions with severall other digressions and the substance of these Tostati will scarce amount to a Mercury Besides their Aristotle is a Poet in text his principles are but Fancies and they stand more on our Concessions then his Bottom Hence it is that his followers notwithstanding the Assistance of so many Ages can fetch nothing out of him but Notions And these indeed they use as He sayeth Lycophron did his Epithets Non ist Condimentis sed ut Cibis Their Compositions are a meer
In blind Intrenchments and there worke Their owne darke Prisons to repaire Heaving the Earth to take in Aire So view my fetterd Soule that must Struggle with this her Load of Dust Meet her Addresse and add one Ray To this mew'd Parcell of thy Day She would though here imprson'd see Through all her Dirt thy Throne and Thee Lord guide her out of this sad Night And say once more Let there be Light It is Gods own positive truth In the Beginning That is In that dead silence In that horrible empty Darknes when as yet nothing was fashioned then saith the lord did I consider those things and they all were made through me alone and through non other By me also shall they be ended and by none other That Meditation forerunns every Solemne Worke is a thing so well knowne to man that he needs no further Demonstration of it then his owne Practice That there is also in God something Analogicall to it from whence Man derived this Customary Notion of his As it is most agreeable to Reason so withall is it very sutable to Providence Dij saith I amblicus concipiunt in se totum opus antequam parturiunt And the Spirit here to Esdras Then did I consider these things He consider'd them first and made them afterwards God in his AEternall Idea foresaw That whereof as yet there was no Materiall Copy The goodnes and Beauty of the one mov'd him to create the other and truly the Image of this Prototype being imbosom'd in the Second made Him so much in love with his Creature that when Sin had defac'd it He restor'd it by the suffering of that Patterne by which at first it was made Dyonisius the Areopagite who liv'd in the Primitive Times and received the Mysteries of Divinity immediately from the Apostles stiles God the Father sometimes Arcanum Divinitatis somtimes Occultum illud Super substantiale and elsewhere he compares him to a Roote whose Flowers are the Second and Third Person This is true For God the Father is the Basis or supernaturall Foundation of his Creatures God the Son is the Patterne in whose expresse Image they were made And God the Holy Ghost is Spiritus Opifea or the Agent who fram'd the creature in a just symmetrie to his Type This Consideration or type God hath since used in the performance of inferiour works Thus in the Institution of his Temple he commands Moses to the Mount where the Divine Spirit shews him the Idea of the future Fabrick And let them make me a Sanctuary that I may dwell amongst them according to all that I shew thee after the patterne of the Tabernacle the pattern of all the Instruments thereof even so shall you make it Thus the Divine mind doth instruct us porrigendo Ideas quadam extensione fui extra se and sometimes more particularly in dreames To Nebuchadnezzar he presents a Tree strong and high reaching to the Heavens and the sight thereof to the ends of the Earth To Pharaoh he shews seven Ears of Corne To Joseph he appears in sheafes and then resembles the Sun Moon and Stars To conclude he may expresse himselfe by what he will for in him are innumerable eternall Prototypes and he is the true Fountaine and Treasure of Forms But that we may come at last to the scope proposed God the Father is the Metaphysicall supercelestiall Sun The second Person is the light and the Third is Amor igneus or a Divine heate proceeding from Both Now without the presence of this Heate there is no Reception of the Light and by Consequence no Influx from the Father of Lights For this Amor is the Medium which unites the Lover to that which is beloved probably t is the Platonicks Daemon magnus Qui conâ—ungit nos spirituum praefecturis I could speak much more of the Offices of this Loving spirit but these are Magnalia Dei Naturae and require not our Discusse so much as our reverence Here also I might speak of that supernaturall Generation whereof Trismegistus Monas gignit Monaden in se suum reflectit Ardorem But I leave this to the Almighty God as his own Essentiall Centrall mystery It is my onely Intention in this place to handle Exterior Actions or the Processe of the Trinity from the Center to the Circumference And that I may the better do it you are to understand that God before his work of Creation was wrapp'd up and contracted in himself In this state the Egyptians stile him Monas solitaria and the Cabalists Aleph tenebrosum But when the decreed Instant of Creation came then appeared Aleph Lucidum and the first Emanation was that of the holy Ghost into the bosom of the matter Thus we read that Darknesse was upon the face of the deep and the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters Here you are to observe that notwithstanding this processe of the third person yet was there no Light but darknesse on the face of the deep Illumination properly being the Office of the second wherefore God also when the matter was prepared by Love for Light gives out his Fiat Lux which was no Creation as most think but an Emanation of the Word in whom was life and that life is the light of Men This is that light whereof Saint John speaks that it shines in the darknesse and the darknesse comprehended it not But lest I seem to be singular in this point I will give you more evidence Pimandras informing Trismegistus in the work of the Creation tells him the self-same thing Lumen illud Ego sum Mens Deus Tuus antiquior quam natura humida quae ex umbra effulsit And Georgius Venetus in his Book de Harmonia mundi Omne quod vivit propter inclusum calorem vivit Indè colligitur Caloris naturam vim habere in se vitalem in Mundo passim diffusam imo omnia ex Igne facta esse testatur Zoroastres dum ait Omnia sub I gne uno genita sunt I gne quippe illo quem Deus Igneae essentiae Habitator ut Plato ait messe jussit materiae Coeli Terrae jam creatae rudi informi ut vitam praestaret formam Hinc illis product is statim subintulit Opifex sit Lux pro quo Mendosae Traductio habet Fiat lux Non enim facta est Lux sed Rebus adhuc obscuris communicata insita ut in suis Formis Clarae splendentes furent But to proceed No sooner had the Divine Light pierced the Bosom of the Matter but the Idea or Pattern of the whole Material World appeared in those primitive waters like an Image in a Glasse by this Pattern it was that the Holy Ghost fram'd and modelled the Universal Structure This Mystery or appearance of the Idea is excellently manifested in the Magicall Analysis of Bodies For he that knows how to imitate the Proto-Chymistrie of the Spirit by
Separation of the Principles wherein the Life is Imprisoned may see the Impresse of it Experimentally in the outward naturall vestiments But lest you should think this my Invention and no Practicall Trueth I will give you another Mans testimony Quid quaeso dicerent biâ—tanti Philosophi saith one is Plantam quasi Momentonasci in vitreo vase viderent cum suis ad Viuum Coloribus rursum interixe renasci idque quoties quando luheret Credo Daemonium Arte Magica inclusum dicerent illudere sensibus humanis They are the words of Doctor Marci in his Defensio Idearum Operatricium But you are to be admonished there is a twofold Idea Divine and Naturall The Naturall is a fiery invisible created Spirit and properly a meer Inclosure or vestiment of the true One Hence the Platonicks called it Nimbus Numinis Descendentis Zoroaster and some other Philosophers think it is Anima Mundi but by their leave they are mistaken there is a wide difference betwixt Anima and Spiritus But the Idea I speak of here is the true primitive exemplar one and a pure Influence of the Almighty This Idea before the Coagulation of the seminall principles to a grosse outward Fabrick which is the End of Generation impresseth in the Vitall Ethereall Principles a Modell or Pattern after which the Body is to be framed and this is the first inward production or Draught of the Creature This is it which the Divine Spirit intimates to us in that Scripture where he saith That God Created every plant of the field before it was in the ground and every herb of the field before it grew But notwithstanding this presence of the Idea in the Matter yet the Creation was not performed Extramittendo aliquid de Essentiâ Ideae for it is God that Comprehends his Creature and not the Creature God Thus farre have I handl'd this primitive supernaturall part of the Creation I must confesse it is but short in respect of that which may be spoken but I am confident it is more then formerly hath been discovered Some Authors having not searched so deeply into the Centre of Nature others not willing to publish such Spiritual mysteries I am now come to the gross work or mechanicks of the Spirit namely the separation of severall substances from the same Masse but in the first place I shal examine that Lymbus or Huddle of Matter wherein all things were so strangely contained It is the opinion of some men and those learned That this sluggish empty Rudement of the Creature was noe created thing I must confesse the Point is obscure as the thing it selfe and to state it with Sobriety except a man were illuminated with the same Light that this Chaos was at first is altogether impossible For how can wee judge of a Nature differrent from our owne whose Species also was so remote from any thing now existent that it is impossible for Fancy to apprehend much more for Reason to define it If it be created I conceive it the Effect of the Divine imagination acting beyond it selfe in Contemplation of that which was to come and producing this Passive darkenesse for a Subject to worke upon in the Circumference Trismegistus having first exprest his Vision of Light describes the Matter in its primitive state thus Et paulo post saith he Tenebrae deor sum ferebantur partim trepidandae ac tristes effectae tortuosae terminatae ut maginarer me vidisse commutatas Tenebras in humidam quandam Naturam ultra quam dici potest agitatam velut ab igne fumum evomere ac sonum aliquem edere inenunciabilem lugubrem Certainly these Tenebrae he speakes of or Fuliginous spawne of Nature were the first created Matter for that Water we read of in Genesis was a Product or secondary Substance Here also he seemes to agree further with the Mosaicall Tradition For this Fumus which ascended after the Transmutation can be nothing else but that Darknesse which was upon the Face of the Deepe But to expresse the particular Mode or way of the Creation you are to understand that in the Matter there was a horrible confused Qualme or stupifying spirit of Moysture Cold and Darknesse In the opposite Principle of Light there was Heate and the Effect of it Siccitie For these two are noe Elementall qualities as the Galenists and my Peripateticks suppose But they are if I may say so the Hands of the divine Spirit by which He did worke upon the Matter applying every Agent to his proper Patient These two are Active and Masculine Those of Moysture and Cold are Passive and Faeminine Now assoone as the holy Ghost and the Word for it was not the one nor the other but both Mens opifex una cum Verbo as Trismegistus hath it I omit that Speech Let us make man which effectually prooves their Union in the Worke had applyed themselves to the Matter there was extracted from the Bosome of it a thinne Spiritualt Caelestiall substance which receiving a Tincture of Heat and Light proceeding from the Divine Treasuries became a pure sincere innoxious Fire Of this the Bodyes of Angells consist as also the Empyraeall Heaven where Intellectuall Essences have their Residence This was primum Matrimonium Dei Naturae the First and best of Compositions This Extract being thus soiled above and separated from the Masse retaind in it a vast portion of Light and made the first Day without a Sun But the Splendour of the Word expelling the Darkenes downwards it became more setl'd and compact towards the Centre and made a Horrible thick Night Thus God as the Hebrew hath it was betweene the Light and the Darknesse for the Spirit remained still on the Face of the Inferior portion to extract more from it In the second separation was educed Aer agilis as Trismegistus calls it a Spirit not so refined as the former but vitall and in the next degree to it This was extracted in such abundance that it fill'd all the space from the Masse to the Empyraeall heaven under which it was condens'd to a water but of a different constitution from the Elementall and this is the Body of the Inter-stellar skie But my Peripatericks following the Principles of Aristotle and Ptolomie have imagin'd so many wheeles there with their smal diminutive Epicycles that they have turn'd that regular Fabrick to a rumbling Confused Labyrinth The Inferior portion of this second Extract from the Moon to the Earth remained Air still partly to divide the inferior and superior waters but chiefly for the Respiration and Nourishment of the Creatures This is that which is properly called the Firmament as it is plain out of Esdras On the Second Day thou diddst create the Spirit of the Firmament for it is Ligamentum totius Naturae and in the outward Geometricall Composure it answers to Natura media for it is spread through all Things hinders Vacuity and keeps all
Cui vel nulla dedit nec dabit ulla Parem Great glorious Pen-Man whom I should not name Left I might Seem to measure Thee by Fame Natures Apostle and her Choice High Priest Her Mysticall and bright Evangelist How am I rapt when I contemplate Thee And winde my self above All that I see The Spirits of thy Lines infuse a Fire Like the Worlds Soul which makes me thus aspire I am unbodi'd by thy Books and Thee And in thy Papers finde my Exstasie Or if I please but to descend a strain Thy Elements do skreen my Soul again I can undresse my Self by thy bright Glasse And then resume th' Inclosure as I was Now I am Earth and now a Star and then A Spirit now a Star and Earth agen Or if I will but ramasle all that be In the least moment I ingrosse all Three I span the Heav'n and Earth and things above And which is more joyn Natures with their Iove He Crowns my Soul with Fire and there doth shine But like the Rain-bow in a Cloud of mine Yet there 's a Law by which I discompose The Ashes and the Fire it self disclose But in his Emrald still He doth appear They are but Grave-clothes which he scatters here Who sees this Fire without his Mask his Eye must needs be swallow'd by the Light and die These are the Mysteries for which I wept Glorious Agrippa where thy Language slept where thy dark Texture made me wander far Whiles through that pathles Night I trac'd the star But I have found those Mysteries for which Thy Book was more then thrice-pil'd o're with Pitch Now a new East beyond the stars I see where breaks the Day of thy Divinitie Heav'n states a Commerce here with Man had He but gratefull Hands to take and Eyes to see Hence you fond School-men that high trueths deride And with no Arguments but Noyse and Pride You that damn all but what your Selves invent And yet finde nothing by Experiment Your Fate is written by an unseen Hand But his Three Books with the Three Worlds shall stand Thus far Reader I have handl'd the Composure and Royalty of Man I shall now speake something of his Dissolution and close up my Discourse as he doth his Life with Death Death is Recessus vitae in Absconditum not the Annihilation of any one Particle but a Retreat of hidden Natures to the same State they were in before they were Manifested This is occasioned by the Disproportion and inequality of the Matter For when the Harmony is broken by the Excesse of any one Principle the vitall Twist without a timely Reduction of the first Vnity Disbands and unravells In this Recesse the severall Ingredients of Man returne to those severall Elements from whence they came at first in their Accesse to a Compound For to thinke that God creates any thing ex nihilo in the worke of Generation is a pure Metaphysicall Whymsey Thus the Earthly parts as we see by experience returne to the Earth the Coelestiall to a Superiour heavenly Limbus and the Spirit to God that gave it Neither should any wonder that I affirme the Spirit of the living God to be in Man when God himselfe doth acknowledge it for his own My spirit saith he shall not alwaies be sheathed for so the Hebrew signifies in man for that he also is flesh yet his dayes shall be an hundred and twenty yeares Besides the breathing of it into Adam proves it proceeded from God and therefore the Spirit of God Thus Christ breathed on his Apostles and they received the Holy Ghost In Ezechiel the Spirit comes from the Foure Winds and Breathes upon the Slaine that they might live Now this Spirit was the Spirit of Life the same with that Breath of Life which was breathed into the First Man and he became a Living Soule but without doubt the Breath or Spirit of Life is the Spirit of God Neither is this Spirit in Man alone but in all the Great World though after an other manner For God breathes continually and passeth through all things like an Aire that refresheth wherefore also he is called of Pythagor as {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Animatio universorum Hence it is that God in Scripture hath severall names according to those severall Offices he performes in the Preservation of his Creature Quin etiam saith the Areopagite in mentibus ipsum inesse dicunt atque in Animis in corporibus in Caelo esse atque in Terra ac simul in seipso Eundem in Mundo esse circa mundum supra mundum supra Caelum superiorem Essentia Solem Stellam Ignem Aquam Spiritum Rorem Nebulam Ipsum Lapidem Petram Omnia esse quae sunt nihil eorum quae sunt And most certaine it is because of his secret passage and Penetration through all that other simile in Dionysius was given him Adam etiam saith he quod omnium vilissimum esse magis absurdum videtur Ipsum sibi vermis speciem adhibere ab ijs Qui in rebus Divinis multum diuque ver sati sunt esse traditum Now this Figurative kind of speech with its variety of Appellations is not only proper to Holy Writt but the AEgyptians also as Plutarch tells me call'd Isis or the more secret part of Nature Myrionymos and certainely that the same thing should have a Thousand Names is no newes to such as have studied the Philosophers Stone But to returne thither whence we have digressed I told you the severall Principles of Man in his Dissolution part as sometimes Friends doe severall wayes Earth to earth as our Liturgie hath it and Heaven to Heaven according to that of Lucretius Cedit item reâ—â—â— de Terrâ quod fuit ante In Terram quod missum est ex AEtheris Oris Id rursum Coeli sulgentia Templa receptant But more expresly the Divine Virgil speaking of his Bees His Quidam signis atque baec Exempla secuti Esse Apibus partem Divinae Mentis Haustus AEthereos dixere Deum namque ire per Omnes Terrasque Tractusque Maris Coelumque profundum Hinc Pecudes Armenta Viros Genus omne Ferarum Quemque sibi tenues Nascentem arcessere Vitas Scilicet huc reddi deindè ac resolut a referri Omnia nec Morti este locum Sed Viva volare Syderis in Numerum atque alto Succedere Coelo This Vanish or ascent of the inward Ethereall Principles doth not presently follow their separation For that part of man which Paracelsus calls Homo Sydereus and more appositly Brutum hominis but Agrippa Idolum and Virgil AEthereum sensum atq Aurai Simplicis Ignë This Part I say which is the Astral Man hovers sometimes about the Dormitories of the Dead and that because of the Magnetism or Sympathie which is between him and the Radical vital moysture In this Idolum is the seat of the Imagination and it retaines