Corpus Hermeticum 5: The Discourse of Hermes to Asclepius · 2 of 3 · tr. G.R.S. Mead
Section 1b
Would that it were possible for thee to get thee wings, and soar into the air, and, poised midway 'tween earth and heaven, behold the earth's solidity, the sea's fluidity (the flowings of its streams), the spaciousness of air, fire's swiftness, [and] the coursing of the stars, the swiftness of heaven's circuit round them [all]!
Most blessed sight were it, my son, to see all these beneath one sway - the motionless in motion, and the unmanifest made manifest; whereby is made this order of the cosmos and the cosmos which we see of order.
6.
If thou would'st see Him too through things that suffer death, both on the earth and in the deep, think of a man's being fashioned in the womb, my son, and strictly scrutinize the art of Him who fashions him, and learn who fashioneth this fair and godly image of the Man.
Who [then] is He who traceth out the circles of the eyes; who He who boreth out the nostrils and the ears; who He who openeth [the portal of] the mouth; who He who doth stretch out and tie the nerves; who He who channels out the veins; who He who hardeneth the bones; who He who covereth the flesh with skin; who He who separates the fingers and the joints; who He who widens out a treading for the feet; who He who diggeth out the ducts; who He who spreadeth out the spleen; who he who shapeth heart like to a pyramid; who He who setteth ribs together; who He who wideneth the liver out; who He who maketh lungs like to a sponge; who He who maketh belly stretch so much; who he who doth make prominent the parts most honorable, so that they may be seen, while hiding out of sight those of least honor?
7.
Behold how many arts [employed] on one material, how many labors on one single sketch; and all exceeding fair, and all in perfect measure, yet all diversified!
Who made them all?
What mother, or what sire, save God alone, unmanifest, who hath made all things by His Will?
8.
And no one saith a statue or a picture comes to be without a sculptor or [without] a painter; doth [then] such workmanship as this exist without a Worker?
What depth of blindness, what deep impiety, what depth of ignorance!
See, [then] thou ne'er, son Tat, deprivest works of Worker!
Nay, rather is He greater than all names, so great is He, the Father of them all.
For verily He is the Only One, and this is His work, to be a father.
9.
So, if thou forcest me somewhat too bold, to speak, His being is conceiving of all things and making [them].
And as without its maker its is impossible that anything should be, so ever is He not unless He ever makes all things, in heaven, in air, in earth, in deep, in all of cosmos, in every part that is and that is not of everything.
For there is naught in all the world that is not He.
He is Himself, both things that are and things that are not.
The things that are He hath made manifest, He keepeth things that are not in Himself.
10.
He is the God beyond all name; He the unmanifest, He the most manifest; He whom the mind [alone] can contemplate, He visible to the eyes [as well]; He is the one of no body, the one of many bodies, nay, rather He of every body.
Naught is there which he is not.
For all are He and He is all.
The Hermetic axiom that the structure of the cosmos is reflected at every scale — 'as above, so below; as within, so without' — making each level a legible map of the others.
The human body is presented as an image reflecting the divine art that orders the cosmos, hinting at structural reflection.
A secondary creator deity—often ignorant or malevolent—responsible for fashioning the material world, distinct from the supreme transcendent God.
The text describes a divine 'Worker' or 'Maker' fashioning matter, though it identifies this figure with the One God rather than a distinct secondary deity.
Pronoia — the doctrine that the divine actively orders the unfolding of the cosmos and human affairs toward intelligible ends, against pure chance or blind necessity.
[auto] The passage focuses heavily on the 'order of the cosmos', 'number, place and measure', and all things being beneath 'one sway' orchestrated by God.
Augustinian and Plotinian doctrine that evil has no positive being of its own but is a lack, distortion, or absence of the good — denying ontological dualism while preserving moral seriousness.
The 'orderless' is described as lacking something and being beneath a lord, framing disorder as a lack of order.
The human being as a small-scale image of the entire cosmos; the body, soul, and intellect mirroring the structure of the heavens and the divine — distinct from correspondence in that it makes the human the privileged mirror.
[auto] The passage details the human body as a 'godly image' fashioned by the same divine art that orders the cosmos, linking the human to the universal structure.