Iliaste, the purveyor

Meaning

Iliaste is the purveyor of the materials needed for generation. The definition is unusually direct: the historical marginal explanation says that it supplies those materials, while Archee is the natural fire or heat that digests and acts upon them. The two are called instruments of formation, preservation and increase. Iliaste should therefore not be treated as another name for the digestive fire.

The surrounding personification places both instruments within Demogorgon, the universal progenitor and steward of natural life. The body prose associates Iliaste with distributing specific forms, but the margin identifies its material-provision office. Both statements belong to the same explanation and should remain visible. Above this natural administration stands God’s creative thought: the distinction between divine source, steward and instruments is not erased by the breadth of Demogorgon’s powers. Although enclosed in brackets in the reading edition, these definitions reproduce historical marginalia rather than the modern editor’s independent theory.