Lumen de Lumine

To understand this Maxime, you must know there are three supreme Lights or Sephiroths, which the Cabalist cals, Sedes una, in quâ sedet Sanctus, Sanctus Sanctus, Dominus Deus Sabaoth. This third Light from whence the souls descend, is בינה Binah, the last of the three sephiroths, and it signifies the Holy Ghost. Now that you may know in what sense this Descent proceeds from that Blessed spirit, I will somewhat inlarge my Discourse, for the Cabalists are very obscure in the point. Spirare (say the Jews) Spiritus Sancti proprium est, to Breath is the proprietie of the Holy Ghost. Now we read that God breathed into Adam the Breath of Life, and he became a living soule. Here you must understand that the third Person is the last of the three, not that there is any Inequality in them, but it is so in order of Operation, for he applies first to the Creature, and therefore works last. The meaning of it is this: The Holy Ghost could not breath a soule into Adam, but he must either receive it, or have it of himself. Now the truth is he receives it, and what hee receives, that hee breaths into Nature. Hence this most holy spirit is styl’d by the Cabalists Fluvius egrediens è Paradiso, because he breaths as a River streames. He is call’d also Mater Filiorum, because by this Breathing he is as it were delivered of those souls, which have been conceived Ideally in the second Person.