Diotimos Library · Esotericism & Spirituality Collection · Bilingual Edition
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The Way of Truth
German & Latin
1619 pp. 246–247 · scans ER250, ER251Was aber heutiges tages die Sophisten handlen, ist nichts dann Geld vnnd die Zeit verliehren. Du solt auch nichts gedencken, daß du einen gründlichen Verstand aus der Philosophorum Sprüchen fassen werdest, denn sie sein solche gewesen, so dich auff das außwendige weisen, vnnd die wahre innerliche Essentia verbergen, ja sie geben dir die Kleyen, vnnd von dem außgebeutelten Mehl backen sie Brodt. Siehe nun was wirst du auß der groben Kleyen machen? Also thun sie mit jhren Sprüchen, weisen dich auff wege, die sie nimmermehr gedencken zu wandern. Darumb rathe ich dir, daß du bey zeiten abstehest von solchem verderbten Grundt, sonst wirstu die Apotheker reich machen, vnnd dich vnnd die deinen in Armut bringen, ja auch durch deine vergifftige schwartze Dämpfe des Schwefels vnnd Quecksilbers, vnnd der Stäncke der Marcasiter vnnd Salien, da du mit vnbeschreiblichen gefehrliche Kranckheiten auff dich laden, dann solche Sachen alle der waren Kunst zu wider sein.
The Sophic Hydrolith: The Way of Truth
1619 pp. 246–247 · scans ER250, ER251What the sophists practise today is nothing but a loss of money and time. Do not imagine that you will acquire a thorough understanding from the philosophers’ sayings. These men directed you to the outward appearance while concealing the true inward essence. They give you the bran and bake bread from the sifted flour themselves. Consider what you will make from coarse bran! This is how they deal with you through their sayings: they direct you along paths they themselves never intend to tread. I therefore advise you to abandon such a corrupt foundation in good time. Otherwise you will enrich the apothecaries and bring yourself and your family into poverty. Moreover, through your poisonous black vapours of sulphur and quicksilver and the stench of marcasites and salts, you will burden yourself with indescribably dangerous illnesses, for all these things oppose the true art.
Socrates
Reading The Sophic Hydrolith · The Way of Truth · The Way of Truth · Unit 17
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
The anonymous Water Stone of the Wise of 1619, with German text, a new English translation, 240 annotations, three companion treatises from the original volume, two separately identified responses of 1661, and the complete supplied study apparatus.
Historical Text and Translation
Anonymous, Wasserstein der Weysen. Frankfurt: Lucas Jennis, 1619. The governing e-rara copy belongs to the Stiftung der Werke von C. G. Jung, Zürich (DOI 10.3931/e-rara-8968). The work is traditionally attributed to Johann Siebmacher; this remains an attribution, not a name printed in the anonymous witness. The separately sourced First and Second Responses use the 1661 Wolfenbüttel witness, qun-642-1s, pp. 200–206.
About Diotimos Editions
This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.
Rights
Historical texts printed in 1619 and 1661 are in the public domain. The supplied 2026 German reading text, new English translation, introduction, notes and complete study apparatus are published with the site owner’s authorization. The original triangle is credited to the Stiftung der Werke von C. G. Jung, Zürich, and e-rara, Public Domain Mark.
- Governing historical witnesse-rara: 1619 witness
- Separately identified later response sourceHerzog August Bibliothek: 1661 responses
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