Corpus Hermeticum 14: The Discourse of Hermes to Ammon · 3 of 3 · tr. G.R.S. Mead
Section 1c
Footnotes 257:1 εὖ φρονεῖν.
I do not know the exact meaning of this expression.
Everard translates “to be truly wise”; Parthey, “ recte sapere ” following Patrizzi; Ménard, “ sagesse ”; Chambers, “to be rightly wise.” I would suggest that εὖ φρονεῖν was the form used among these disciples of the Inner Way for the usual χαίρειν.
Instead of wishing one another happiness, they wished each other wisdom, good thought, right thinking, good health of soul.
257:2 θεωρία.
258:1 That is to say, more fully and profoundly, as to one more advanced in the mystic science.
259:1 Cf.
C.
H.
, xvi.
18.
260:1 τῶν ἐν μυχῷ.
I do not know what is the exact meaning of this expression.
Everard translates “things that are in darkness or secret”; Parthey, “ quæ sunt in abdito ”; Ménard, “ dans les profondeurs ”; Chambers, “those in secrecy.” I suggest that the technical term μυχός, signifying generally a shut-in or locked-up place ( conclave , as Damascius translates it), is to be referred, along the line of Platonic and Pythagorean tradition, to Pherecydes.
Porphyry ( De Antro Nymph.
, C.
31) tells us that the synonyms “μυχοί (chambers?), recesses (or pits), caverns, doors, gates” were used by Pherecydes as symbolical expressions to signify “the geneses and apogeneses of souls,” whatever these terms may mean exactly.
The “birth” and “decease” of a soul, in this connection, presumably mean its coming into the world of genesis out of the womb of the World-soul, and its reception back again into the bosom of the great Mother.
If this be so, our text would seem to indicate that things are in two states,—in a state of change (that is, in the active condition), and again in a passive condition, in the state which Indian philosophers call laya or pralaya.
See for the μυχοί of Pherecydes Sturz’s Pherecydis Fragmenta , pp.
43 ff.
(Leipzig, 1824).
260:2 Or genesis.
261:1 From here to the end of the sermon, with the exception of the final sentences of § 7 and § 10, and the third sentence of § 9, and with a few very slight verbal variants, is quoted by Cyril, Contra Julianum , ii.
64 (Migne, col.
598 D).
261:2 Cf.
C.
H.
, xvi.
18.
262:1 Or genesis.
263:1 This sentence, which appears to be very tautological, is omitted by Cyril.
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.
[auto] The passage explicitly draws a parallel between human planting and God sowing principles ('In just the selfsame way'), embodying the 'as above, so below' axiom.
The Stoic and Plotinian doctrine that all parts of the cosmos are bound by hidden affinities, so that a movement in one part resonates through the whole; the metaphysical basis for astrology, magic, and divination.
The parallel between human planting and divine sowing implies a resonant connection between human and cosmic levels.
A chain of divine beings or principles flowing downward from a single transcendent source (the One or the Father), each level less perfect than the one above.
God sows principles in distinct realms (Heaven, Earth, Universe), suggesting a structured flow of divine attributes.
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.
The analogy of the man planting trees mirrors God sowing in the universe, presenting the human action as a reflection of cosmic divine action.