I had advanced half a League, through a Forest of Jessamines and Myrtles, when I perceived something that stirred, lying in the .Shade: It was a Youth, whose Majestick Beauty forced me almost to Adoration. He started up to hinder me; crying, “It is not to me but to God that you owe these Humilities.” “You see one,” answered I, “stunned with so many Wonders that I know not what to admire most; for coming from a World, which without doubt you take for a Moon here, I thought I had arrived in another, which our Worldlings call a Moon also; and behold I am in Paradice at the Feet of a God, who will not be Adored.” “Except the quality 30 of a God,” replied he, “whose Creature I only am, the rest you say is true: This Land is the Moon, which you see from your Globe, and this place where you are is [. . .]” 31
“Now at that time Man’s Imagination was so strong, as not being as yet corrupted, neither by Debauches, the Crudity of Aliments, nor the alterations of Diseases, that being excited by a violent desire of coming to this Sanctuary, and his Body becoming light through the heat of this Inspiration; he was carried thither in the same manner, as some Philosophers, who having fixed their Imagination upon the contemplation of a certain Object have sprung up in the Air by Ravishments, which you call Extasies. The Woman, who through the infirmity of her Sex was weaker and less hot, could not, without doubt, have the imagination strong enough to make the Intension of her Will prevail over the Ponderousness of her Matter; but because there were very few [. . .] the Sympathy which still united that half to its whole, 32 drew her towards him as he mounted up, as the Amber attracts the Straw, [as] the Load-stone turns towards the North from whence it hath been taken, and drew to him that part of himself, as the Sea draws the Rivers which proceed from it. When they arrived in your Earth, they dwelt betwixt Mesopotamia and Arabia:33 Some People knew them by the name of [. . .], 34 and others under that of Prometheus, whom the Poets feigned to have stolen Fire from Heaven, by reason of his Offspring, who were endowed with a Soul as perfect as his own: So that to inhabit your World, that Man left this destitute; but the All-wise would not have so blessed an Habitation, to remain without Inhabitants; He suffered a few ages after that [. . .] 35 cloyed with the company of Men, whose Innocence was corrupted, had a desire to forsake them. This person, 36 however, thought no retreat secure enough from the Ambition of Men, who already Murdered one another about the distribution of your World; except that blessed Land, which his Grand–Father 37 had so often mentioned unto him, and to which no Body had as yet found out the way: But his Imagination supplied that; for seeing he had observed that [. . .] he filled Two large Vessels which he sealed Hermetically, and fastened them under his Armpits: So soon as the Smoak began to rise upwards, and could not pierce through the Mettal, it forced up the Vessels on high, and with them also that Great Man. 38 When he was got as high as the Moon, and had cast his Eyes upon that lovely Garden, a fit of almost supernatural Joy convinced him, that that was the place where his Grandfather had heretofore lived. He quickly untied the Vessels, which he had girt like Wings about his Shoulders, and did it so luckily, that he was scarcely Four Fathom in the Air above the Moon, when he set his Fins a going; 39 yet he was high enough still to have been hurt by the fall, had it not been for the large skirts of his Gown, which being swelled by the Wind, gently upheld him till he set Foot on ground. 40 As for the two Vessels, they mounted up to a certain place, where they have continued: And those are they, which now a-days you call the Balance.
“I must now tell you, the manner how I came hither: I believe you have not forgot my name, 41 seeing it is not long since I told it you. You shall know then, that I lived on the agreeable Banks of one of the most renowned Rivers of your World, where amongst my Books, I lead a Life pleasant enough not to be lamented, though it slipt away fast enough. In the mean while, the more I encreased in Knowledge, the more I knew my Ignorance. Our Learned Men never put me in mind of the famous Mada 42 but the thoughts of his perfect Philosophy made me to Sigh. I was despairing of being able to attain to it, when one day, after a long and profound Studying. I took a piece of Load-stone about two Foot square, which I put into a Furnace; and then after it was well purged, precipitated and dissolved, I drew the calcined Attractive of it, and reduced it into the size of about an ordinary Bowl. 43 “After the Preparations, I got a very light Machine of Iron made, into which I went, and when I was well seated in my place, I threw this Magnetick Bowl as high as I could up into the Air. Now the Iron Machine, which I had purposely made more massive in the middle than at the ends, was presently elevated, and in a just Poise; because the middle received the greatest force of Attraction. So then, as I arrived at the place whither my Load-stone had attracted me, I presently threw up my Bowl in the Air over me.” 44 “But,” said I, interrupting him, “How came you to heave up your Bowl so streight over your Chariot, that it never happened to be on one side of it?” “That seems to me to be no wonder at all,” said he; “for the Load-stone being once thrown up in the Air, drew the Iron streight towards it; and so it was impossible, that ever I should mount sideways. Nay more, I can tell you, that when I held the Bowl in my hand, I was still mounting upwards; because the Chariot flew always to the Load-stone, which I held over it. But the effort of the Iron to be united to my Bowl, was so violent that it made my Body bend double; so that I durst but once essay that new Experiment. The truth is, it was a very surprizing Spectacle to behold; for the Steel of that flying House, which I had very carefully Polished, reflected on all sides the light of the Sun with so great life and lustre, that I thought my self to be all on fire. 45 In fine, after often Bowling and following of my Cast, I came, as you did, to an Elevation from which I descended towards this World; and because at that instant I held my Bowl very fast between my hands, my Machine, whereof the Seat pressed me hard, that it might approach its Attractive, did not forsake me; all that now I feared was, that I should break my Neck: But to save me from that, ever now and then I tossed up my Bowl; that by its attractive Virtue it might prevent the violent Descent of my Machine, and render my fall more easie, as indeed it happened; for when I saw my self within Two or three hundred fathom of the Earth, I threw out my Bowl on all hands, level with the Chariot, sometimes on this side, and sometimes on that, until I came to a certain Distance; and immediately then, I tossed it up above me; so that my Machine following it, I left it, and let my self fall on the other side, as gently as I could, upon the Sand; insomuch that my fall was no greater than if it had been but my own height. I shall not describe to you the amazement I was in at the sight of the wonders of this place, seeing it was so like the same, wherewith I just now saw you seized, [46You shall know then, that on the morrow I met with the Tree of Life, by the means of which I have kept my self from growing old; it straightway consumed the Serpent 47 and made him to vanish away in smoke.”
At these words: “Venerable and holy patriarch,” said I to him, “I am eager to know what you understand by that Serpent which was consumed.” He, with face a smiling, answered me thus: . . . 48
“The Tree of Knowledge is planted opposite; its fruit is covered with a Rind which produces Ignorance in whomsoever hath tasted thereof; yet this Rind preserves underneath its thickness all the spiritual virtues of this learned food. God, when he had driven Adam from this fortunate country, rubbed his gums with this same Rind, that he might never find the way back again; for more than fifteen years thereafter he did dote, and did so completely forget all things, that neither he nor any of his descendants till Moses ever remembered even so much as the Creation; but what Power was left of this direful Rind at last passed away through the warmth and brightness of that great Prophet’s genius.
I happily met with one among these apples, which through ripeness was despoiled of its skin; hardly had my mouth watered with it, when Universal Knowledge penetrated my being, I felt as it were an infinite number of Eyes fix themselves in my head, and I knew the means of speaking with the Lord.
“When I have since reflected on these miraculous events, I have judged that I could in no wise have overcome, by any occult powers of a simple natural body, the vigilance of that Seraph whom God has ordained to guard this Paradise; but since he is pleased to use second causes, I imagined that he had inspired me to find this means of entering there; even as he thought good to take of the ribs of Adam to make him a wife, though he could form her of Earth, as well as he did Adam.
“I remained long in this Garden, walking about alone; but in fine, since the angel that was Keeper of the Gate seemed to me to be in chief my Host here, I was taken with the desire to salute him. Jn an hour’s journey I came to a place where a thousand Lightnings mingled together in one blinding light that served but to make Darkness visible. I was not yet fully recovered from this dazzlement, when I saw before me a beautiful Young man. ‘I am,’ said he, ‘the Archangel whom you seek, I have but now read in God that he had inspired you with the means of coming here, and that he willed you should here expect his pleasure.’ He talked with me of many things, and told me among the rest:
“That the light wherewith I had been amazed was nothing fearful, but that it appeared almost every evening when he went his rounds, seeing that to avoid sudden attack from the Evil Spirits, which may enter secretly at any place, he was constrained mightily to swing his Flaming Sword in circles, all about the bounds of the Earthly Paradise; and that the light I had seen was the lightnings which the steel of it gave forth. ‘Those also which you perceive from your Earth,’ he added, ‘are of my creation. And if sometimes you see them at a great distance, it is because the clouds of some distant region hold themselves in such disposition as to receive an impression of these unbodied fires, and reflect them to your eyes; just as clouds otherwise disposed may prove themselves fit to make the Rainbow.’
“I will not instruct you further in these matters, since to be sure the Apple of Knowledge is not far from hence; whereof as soon as you have eaten, you will know all things even as I. But see you make no mistake, for most of the Fruits that hang from that Plant are encased in a Rind, whose taste will abase you even below man; while the part within will make you mount up to be even as the Angels.”
Elijah had come to this point of the teachings of the Seraph, when a little short man came up with us; “This is that Enoch of whom I told you,” said my guide to me apart; and even while he finished the words, Enoch offered us a basketful of I know not what fruits, like to Pomegranates, which he had but discovered that same day in a distant coppice. I took some and put in my pockets, as Elijah bade me. Here-upon Enoch asked him who I might be. “That is a matter,” answered my guide, “to entertain us at more leisure; this evening when we have withdrawn he shall tell us himself of the miraculous particulars of his journey.”
With these words we arrived beneath a sort of Hermitage, made of palm-branches skilfully inter-laced with myrtle and orange-branches. There I saw, in a little nook, great piles of a kind of floss-silk, so white and so delicate that one might take it for the virgin Soul of the snow; and I saw distaffs lying here and there; whereupon I asked my guide what use they served. “To spin,” he answered me; “when the good Enoch would relax his mind from meditation, he applies himself sometimes to dressing this Lady-distaff, sometimes to weaving the cloth from which they make Shifts for the eleven thousand Virgins. Surely in your world you have met with that something white, which flutters on the winds in Autumn about the season of the Winter-sowings. Your peasant-folk call it Our Lady’s Cotton, but it is no other than the Flock that Enoch purges his Linen of, when he cards it.”
We made little delay there, and but barely took leave of Enoch, whom this cabin served for his Cell; in truth what made us leave him so soon was this: that he said some prayer there every six hours; and it was at least that time since he had finished the last one.
As we went forward, I begged Elijah to finish that history which he had begun, of the Assumptions or Translations; and I said, that he had come, I thought, to that of Saint John the Evangelist.
Then said he to me: “Since you have not the patience, to wait till the Apple of Knowledge teach you all these things better than I can, I will even tell you. Know then that God”
At this word, in some way I know not how, the Devil would have his Finger in that pie; or howsoever it came about, so it was that I could not for-bear Interrupting him with raillery.
“I remember that case,” said I: “God heard one day that the Soul of the Evangelist was so loosed from his Body, that he no more kept it in but by shutting his teeth hard; and at that moment the hour when he had fore-seen that he should be translated hither was almost past; so having no time to get him a machine made ready for coming, He was constrained to make him suddenly be here, without having time to bring him.”
During all my discourse Elijah bent upon me such a look, as would have been fit to kill me, had I then been capable of dying from aught but Hunger. “Thou Wretch,” said he, and drew back in horror, “thou hast the insolence to rail at Holy Things! Surely thou shouldst not go unpunished, were it not that the All-wise determines to spare thee as a marvellous example of His long-suffering, a witness to the Nations. Get hence, thou Blasphemer, go thou and publish in this little World, and in the other (for thou art predestined to return thither), the unforgetting Hatred that God bears to Atheists.”
Hardly had he finished this Curse, when he seized me roughly to drag me toward the Gate. When we were arrived beside a great Tree whose branches bent almost to Earth with the burden of their Fruit, “Here,” said he, “is that Tree of Knowledge where thou shouldst have got Enlightenment inconceivable, but for thy Infidelity.”
At that word I feigned to swoon with weakness, and letting my self fall against a low branch I handily filched an Apple from it. And in but a few strides more I was set down outside of that delicious Garden.
In that moment, being so violently pressed by Hunger, that I even forgot I was in the grip of the angry Prophet, I drew from my pocket one of those Apples I had filled it with, wherein I buried my teeth as deep as I could. But so it was, that in place of taking one of those Enoch had given me, my hand fell on that very Apple I had plucked from the Tree of Knowledge, which for my misfortune I had not freed of its Rind.]
Scarcely49 had I tasted it, when a thick Cloud overcast my Soul: I saw no body now near me; and in the whole Hemisphere my Eyes could not discern the least Tract of the way I had made; yet nevertheless I fully remembered every thing that befel me. When I reflected since upon that Miracle, I fanced that the skin of the Fruit which I bit had not rendered me altogether brutish; because my Teeth piercing through it were a little moistened by the Juyce within, the efficacy whereof had dissipated the Malignities of the Rind. I was not a little surprised to see my self all alone, in a Country I knew not. It was to no purpose for me to stare and look about me; for no Creature appeared to comfort me.
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