download PDF version: 38.1MB - Global Grey

APPENDIX OF ADDITIONAL DOCUMENTS.
By an error of transcription the preface to the " Fama
Fraternitatis " was omitted from the text of the present
revised version. It is addressed to " the wise and under-
standing reader."
Wisdome (sayeth Solomon) is a treasure unto men that
never faileth, for she is the breth of the power of God and
an inherence flowing from the glory of the Almighty ; she
is the brightness of the everlasting light, the unspotted
mirror of the power of God, and the image of His goodness.
She teacheth civility with righteousness and strength, she
knoweth things of old, and conjectureth aright what is to
come ; she knoweth the subtleties of speaches and can
expound darke sentences ; she foreseeth signes and wonders,
with the advent of seasons and times. With this treasure
was our first father Adam before his fall fully indued ;
hence
it doth appear that after God had brought before him all
the creatures of the field and the fowls under the heavens,
he gave to everyone of them theyr proper name, accordinge
to their Nature.
Although now, through the sorrowfull fall into sinn, this
excellent Jewell wisdome hath bene lost, and mere darkness
and ignorance is come into the world, yet, notwithstanding,
the Lord God hath sometimes hetherto bestowed and
made manifest the same to some of his friends ; the wise
Kinge Solomon doth testifie of himself that he upon his