64 HERMES TRISMEGISTUS. 



20. Tat. How then is the human soul punished, O 

 Father ? 



Hermes. And what is a greater punishment of a human 

 -Soul, Child ! than the impiety ? and what sort of fire has 

 so great a flame as this impiety? and what kind of de- 

 vouring wild beast thus maltreats the body so much, as 

 this impiety the very Soul ? Or seest thou not, how many 

 evils the impious Soul suffers ? shouting and crying out, 

 " I am burned, I am consumed ; what I may say, what I 



meaning that she has studied true philosophy, the practice of death ; 

 that soul herself invisible, departs to the invisible world, to the 

 Divine, immortal, and rational. Thither arriving she is secure of bliss 

 and is released from the errors and follies of men, their fears and 

 wild passions and all other human ills, and ever dwells, as they say 

 of the initiated, in company with the Gods. But the soul, which has 

 been polluted and impure at the time of her departure and always the 

 servant of the body, enamoured and fascinated by it and by its desires 

 and pleasures, until she believes that Truth exists only in a bodily 

 form which a man may use for the purposes of his lusts, and is 

 accustomed to hate and fear and avoid the intellectual principle, 

 which to the bodily eye is invisible and can only be attained by 

 philosophy, do you suppose that such a soul will depart pure 

 and unalloyed 1 She is held fast by the corporeal, which is heavy 

 and earthy. They are dragged down again to the visible, to the 

 tombs and sepulchres, compelled to wander about such places in 

 payment of the penalty of their former evil ways. The craving after 

 the corporeal never leaves them, and they are imprisoned finally in 

 another body, imprisoned in the same natures which they had in 

 their former lives. Men who have followed after gluttony and wan- 

 tonness and drunkenness pass into apes and animals of that sort: 

 those who have chosen injustice and tyranny into wolves and hawks 

 and kites, according to their several natures and propensities. Some 

 may be happier than others who have practised civil and social virtues, 

 such as temperance and justice, although not acquired by philosophy. 

 They may pass into some quiet and social nature like their own, such 

 as bees, wasps, or ants, or back into the form of men. But he who 

 is a philosopher and lover of learning, who is entirely pure at depart- 

 ing, is alone permitted to attain to the Divine nature. This is why 

 the true votaries of philosophy abstain from all fleshly lusts, and 

 refuse to give themselves up to them. They who have any care of 

 their own souls, say farewell to all this ; they will not walk in the ways 

 of the blind, and when philosophy offers purification and relief from 

 il, they turn and follow it." 



