THE VISION AND THE VOICE
them from their feet and cast them down through the abyss,
for this Aethyr is holy ground.
Herein no forms appear, and the vision of God face to face,
that is transmuted in the Athanor called dissolution, or
hammered into one in the forge of meditation, is in this place
but a blasphemy and a mockery.
And the Beatific Vision is no more, and the glory of the
Most High is no more. There is no more knowledge. There
is no more bliss. There is no more power. There is no more
beauty. For this is the Palace of Understanding: for thou art
one with the Primeval things.
Drink in the myrrh of my speech, that is bruised with the
gall of the roc, and dissolved in the ink of the cuttle-fish, and
perfumed with the deadly nightshade.
This is thy wine, who wast drunk upon the wine of Iacchus.
And for bread shalt thou eat salt, O thou on the corn of Ceres
that didst wax fat! For as pure being is pure nothing, so is
pure wisdom pure ,* and so is pure understanding silence,
and stillness, and darkness. The eye is called seventy, and
the triple Aleph whereby thou perceivest it, divideth into
the number of the terrible word that is the Key of the Abyss.
I am Hermes, that am sent from the Father to expound all
things discreetly in these the last words that thou shalt hear
before thou take thy seat among these, whose eyes are sealed
up, and whose ears are stopped, and whose mouths are clenched,
who are folded in upon themselves, the liquor of whose bodies
is dried up, so that nothing remains but a little pyramid of
dust.
And that bright light of comfort, and that piercing sword
* T suppose that only a Magus could have heard this word.
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