That God Is Hidden, Yet Most Manifest

In the fifth book of Ficino's Pimander, Hermes addresses Tatius with a paradox: the hidden is the most manifest of all. Phantasia sees only what is born; the unbegotten lies beyond its reach, yet shines through everything. Hermes walks his son through three proofs — the order of the stars and the question of who governs them; the wish that Tatius could fly to behold the world's whole frame; and the human body itself, whose organs ask who made them. Then comes the great rebuke of blind men who would deprive the art of its artificer; and finally a hymn of praise that dissolves into God himself: Hermes confesses that in praising God he becomes another, for God is whatever he is, whatever he does, whatever he says.

This translation renders Book V from Ficino's Latin as preserved in the 1505 Lefèvre d'Étaples edition. The underlying text is designated Corpus Hermeticum V in modern scholarship.

TRISMEGISTUS: I shall conduct one more discourse with you, O Tatius — lest the chief name be lacking to you, and lest you remain ignorant of what to many seems hidden, yet is plain. For if nothing were plain, nothing would exist at all. Whatever presents itself to sight: born. What lies hidden: eternal. Nor does it need to appear, seeing it never ceases to be. It sets the rest before the eyes; but itself remains secret, as that which enjoys sempiternal life. For phantasia turns only around things that are born — and nothing exists in phantasia beyond generation. But that one thing, unbegotten, is incomprehensible to phantasia. Yet through it all things shine: it gleams again through all things and in all things. And it appears most of all to those to whom it has chosen to give knowledge.

You therefore, O my son Tatius, first with pious prayers beseech the lord — the one Father, One, and the source of the One — that you may be worthy of his mercy. So at last may you be able to know God so greatly. If even one ray of his intelligence benignly shines on your intellect. For intellection alone perceives what is hidden. And so if you look with the eyes of the mind, O Tatius — he, believe me, shall be plain to you.

God, free of all envy, shines everywhere in each single part of the world; and through God he makes himself so known that not to understand him only, but even to touch him with the hands themselves, as I might say, is permitted. For he converses everywhere with our eyes, impresses and stamps his image on all things. But if he still lies hidden from you in each thing: where then will you find yourself, or find him?

Therefore, when you wish to see God: look up at the order of the stars. Who now maintains their perpetual order? For every order of number is bounded by its proper limits. The Sun — most excellent god of the celestial gods. The other celestials obey the Sun as to a prince and king. The Sun, vast as it is — greater than earth and sea together — yet endures countless smaller stars revolving above itself. Whom does it fear? Whom does it reverence?

TRISMEGISTUS: O my son, diverse are the motions of the different stars. Who assigns the measure of motion to each?

TATIUS: Arcturus, ever revolving perpetually around the same pole, drawing the known machine of the world along its path.

TRISMEGISTUS: Who uses this instrument? Who has circumscribed the sea within its limits? Who steadies the weight of the earth and balances it in the middle? There is certainly someone, O Tatius — author and lord of these things. For to maintain place or number or measure without the virtue of an author: that is impossible. Order cannot arise from disorder; disorder requires a lord who may give order.

Would that you were given, O my son, the power — winged and borne aloft — to fly up into the heights of the air; and stationed in the region midway between heaven and earth, you would look upon the earth's solidity, the sea's diffusion, the flow of rivers, the breadth of the air, the swift and intense speed of fire. O most happy spectacle! O most blessed vision, my son! With one gentle sweep of light you would comprehend the whole world; you would behold the immobile maker amid all motion, and see the hidden one also as most plain.

But if through even the fragile things that the earth sustains, and through the depths covered by water, you would investigate God the artificer — come, my son, look around at the making of the human body, and learning from this ask: who fashioned so beautiful an image? Who painted the eyes? Who shaped the nostrils and the ears? Who stretched the lips of the mouth? Who stretched and bound the nerves? Who irrigated the veins? Who consolidated the bones into solidity? Who wrapped flesh in a thin skin? Who separated fingers and joints? Who spread the foundation of the feet? Who made the pores and opened the channels? Who gathered and compressed the spleen? Who pressed the pyramid form upon the heart? Who covered the lobes of the liver? Who sculptured the passages of the lungs? Who gave the belly its spacious breadth? Who shaped the honored members of the body in the open? Who placed the shameful parts utterly in darkness, and willed that they lie hidden from the eyes of those who see? You see how many works of divine art are shown in one material — each beautiful, rightly proportioned, distinct in its proper offices. Who fashioned each one? What mother, what father? Was it not this invisible God himself who worked all things by his own will? And if no one would dare to assert that a statue and an image were made without sculptor and painter — shall we suppose that this marvelous constitution of the world was constituted without a maker?

O blind little man! O most impious! O buried under deep darkness of ignorance! Take care, take care, I say, O my son Tatius: never deprive the art of its artificer. Rather, invoke God with his proper name, and understand it to be his own property that he is Father. And if you compel me to say something bolder: I shall say that his essence is to conceive and make each individual thing. Just as nothing can be made without a maker, so it is impossible for God to exist unless he always does all things — in heaven, in air, in earth, in the sea, in the whole world, in every single part of the world, both in what is and in what is not. Nothing exists in all of nature that he himself is not. He is what things are; he is also what things are not. What things are: he has led out into the light. What things are not: he conceals in himself.

This God — better than any name. Hidden, yet most manifest of all. Visible to the mind. Full of eyes. Incorporeal, yet multi-bodied, as I might say. For nothing in bodies exists that he himself is not; he alone exists in all form. He has moreover all names, because he is the one Father. And he has no name, because he is the Father of all.

What then shall I praise in you — you who are set above me, or below me? Where shall I turn my steps to praise you — above or below, within or without? For is there any mode, any place around you, anything at all from all things? In you are all things; from you are all things; you give all things; yet you receive nothing. You have all things; and what you do not have — that itself is nothing.

When shall I praise you, Father? Your time and moment we cannot grasp. In what thing most of all shall I sing your praises? In what you have created, or rather in what you have not created? In those things that you have rescued from darkness into light — or in those still lying hidden in your secret? Through what finally shall I dedicate hymns to you? Shall I remain myself in such praise — or be made into another?

For you are whatever I am. You are whatever I do. You are whatever I say. For you are all things, and nothing else exists but you. What then are you not yourself? You are every begotten thing. You are the wise Father, the God who fashions, the Good who accomplishes — making all things good. For of all matter the finest is air; air's soul is the soul; the soul's mind; and mind's end is God.

Colophon

Translated from Ficino's Latin Pimander as preserved in the 1505 Lefèvre d'Étaples edition: Contenta in hoc volumine. Pimander. Mercurij Trismegisti liber De sapientia et potestate dei. Asclepius. Eiusdem Mercurij liber De voluntate divina. Item Crater Hermetis a Lazarelo Septempedano (Rome, 1505). Digital text from the Internet Archive, identifier bub_gb_SbGbIvDI0ekC, held by the National Central Library of Rome. Public Domain Mark 1.0.

This is Book V of Ficino's Pimander — the text Ficino designates Mercurii ad Tatium filium suum. Quod deus lates simulac patens est, corresponding to Corpus Hermeticum V in modern scholarship. G. R. S. Mead's 1905 English was not consulted; translation is derived independently from Ficino's Latin. The underlying Greek Hermetica (Nock-Festugière critical edition) was not consulted.

Compiled and formatted for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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Source Text: Mercurii ad Tatium Filium Suum — Quod Deus Lates Simulac Patens Est — Liber V

Latin source text from Ficino's Pimander as preserved in the Lefèvre d'Étaples 1505 edition, accessed via the Internet Archive (identifier: bub_gb_SbGbIvDI0ekC). Transcribed from the OCR text with corrections for long-s rendering (ſ → s), hyphenated line-breaks rejoined, and obvious OCR splits resolved.

Nunc praeterea sermonem apud te transigam o Tati, ne praecipuum nomen tibi desit: neve ignores id quod plurimis occultum videtur esse, perspicuum. Nam si nullo pateat, nihil utique erit. Quodcumque se offert aspectui: genitum; quod vero latet: sempiternum. Nec enim opus est ut appareat, quandoquidem esse nunquam definit. Ante oculos quidem id reliqua ponit; ipsum vero secretum manet, utpote quod vita fruitur sempiterna. Etenim phantasia solum circa ea quae genita sunt versatur, in qua praeter generationem nihil existit. At unicum id ingenitum; incomprehensibile phantasiae. Cum vero per ipsum cuncta clarescant: per omnia rursus atque in omnibus fulget. Hisque praesertim apparet: quibus ipse notitiam communicare voluit.

Tu igitur o fili mi Tati in primis piis precibus obsecra dominum patrem unum, unum, et a quo unus, ut sis illius misericordia dignus; sic tandem deum tantopere poteris. Si vel unus dumtaxat illius radius intelligentiae tuae benigne refulserit. Sola siquidem intellectio latens latentia perspicit. Itaque si mentis oculis inspexeris o Tati: ille tibi (crede mihi) patebit.

Deus sane totius expers invidiae in singulis mundi particulis ubique splendet; atque a deo se notum praestat ut non intelligere modo, sed manibus etiam ipsis (ut ita dixerim) liceat attractare. Nam undique nostris oculis conversat, deque obiicit et inculcat imaginem. Quod si in singulis te latet: quo te aut teipsum vel eum invenies?

Denique cum deum videre volueris: suspice syderum ordinem reliquorum. Quis age perpetuam horum servat ordinem? Ordo quidem omnis numeri: loci similibus terminatur. Sol deus deorum caelestium praestantissimus. Soli caelites reliqui veluti principi regique parent. Sol tantus, terra simul amplior atque mari; minores tamen supra se stellas innumeras converti patitur. Quem timetis, quem veretur? O fili, diversorum syderum sunt motus. Quis mensuram singulis motionis assignat? TAT. Arcturus circa idem semper perpetuo vertens notamque trahens mundi machinami. TRISME. Quis hoc utitur instrumento? Quis mare suis finibus circumscripsit? Quis terrae pondus sistit ac librat in medio? Est certe aliquis o Tati, horum auctor ac dominus. Etenim locum vel numerum, vel mensuram servare absque auctoris virtute: impossibile est. Ordo fieri a deformitate nequit; eget autem deformitas domino qui ordinem praebeat.

Utinam tibi daret o fili facultas: ut ala adminiculo in sublime aeris plagam volares, mediaque inter caelum ac terram regione sortitus, conspiceres terrae quidem soliditatem, maris diffusionem, fluxum fluminum, aeris amplitudinem, ignis arctam celeritatem. O felicissimum fili spectaculum! O beatissimam visionem! Siquidem uno luminum motu leve mundi totius comprehenderes: immobilemque factorem concitum, latentemque perque perspicuum cerneres.

Quod si per ea etiam quae terra sustinent fragilia, et aquae profunditate conduntur, deum artificem investigare volueris: age fili, circumspice humani corporis opificium, cuius admonitione perdisce: quis tam pulchrae imaginis conditor? Quis oculorum pictor? Quis nares auresque torsit? Quis labia distendit oris? Quis nervos tetendit atque ligavit? Quis irrigavit venas? Quis ossa congeluit solida? Quis carne pellicula tenui circumtexit? Quis digitos articulosque discrevit? Quis fundamenta pedum extendit? Quis perforavit poros atque meatus aperuit? Quis splenem coegit atque compressit? Quis pyramidem impressit cordi figuram? Quis iecori porro texit fibras? Quis pulmonis sculptit fistulas? Quis alvo capacem amplitudine tradidit? Quis honoranda corporis membra in propatulo figuravit? Quis obscena in obscuro prorsus addidit, eaque aspectu cernentium voluit secreta iacere? Vide quot divinae artis opera in una materia demonstrantur — singulaque pulchra recteque dimensa, nec non propriis invicem officiis differentia. Quis singula finxit? Qualis mater, qualis pater? Nonne haec ipse ille invisibilis deus: cuncta propria voluntate molitus est? Et cum statuam et imaginem absque fabro et pictore fieri nullus asserere audeat: miram mundi huius constitutionem sine conditore constitutisse putabimus?

O caecum homunculum! O nimis impium! O profundis obrutum ignorantiae tenebris! Cave, cave inquam o fili mi Tati: ne unquam artificium prives artifice. Quinimo congruo deum nomine praeinvocato, patremque esse proprium eius existimato. Quodsi me quiddam audacius proferire coegeris: huius essentiam esse dicam, concipere ac facere singula. Quemadmodum sine factore fieri quicquam nequit: ita deum existere semper nisi semper agat omnia impossibile est — in caelo videlicet, aere, terra, mari, in toto mundo, in qualibet particula mundi, tum in eo quod est, tum in eo quod non extat. Nihil est in omni natura quod ille ipse non sit. Est ille siquidem quae sunt; est etiam quae minime sunt. Quae quidem sunt: deduxit in lucem. Quae non sunt: occulit in seipso.

Hic deus nomine melior. Hic occultus, hic rursus omnium patentissimus. Hic menti conspicuus. Hic plenus oculis. Hic incorporeus, hic (ut ita dixerim) multicorporeus. Nam nihil in corporibus est quod ipse non sit; omnia enim specie solus existit. Nomina insuper habet omnia: quoniam unus est pater. Nomen vero nullum habet: quoniam pater est omnium. Quid ergo te laudabo: supra te an infra te positum? Quo vertan gressus ut te laudem: supra ne an infra, intus an extra? Num modus, an locus circa te: aliud quiddam ex omnibus? In te autem omnia; abs te omnia; praebes omnia; nihil denique suscipis. Omnia quidem habes: quod autem non habes, id ipsum nihil. Quando vero laudabo te pater? Tempus et momentum tuum capere non valemus. Qua potissimum in re laudes cantabo tuas? Num in his quae creaveris; an in illis quae non creaveris potius? Num in his forte qua in luce e tenebris eruisti; an in his quae latent adhuc arcano? Per quid tandem hymnos tuos dicabo? Num quid in laudatione tali ego ipse mei iuris existam; an potius alter efficiar? Ipse enim es quidquid ego sum. Ipse es quidquid agam. Ipse es quidquid denique dico. Ipse enim es omnia, neque aliud praeter te quicquam. Quid sane non es ipse? Ipse omne quidquid genitum. Es quidem intelligens pater; fabricans deus; efficiens Bonum; bona faciens omnia. Materiae nanque purissimae aer; aeris anima; animae mens; mentis denique deus.

Source Colophon

Latin source text drawn from Contenta in hoc volumine. Pimander. Mercurij Trismegisti liber De sapientia et potestate dei (Rome: Lefèvre d'Étaples, 1505), digitized by the National Central Library of Rome and made freely available on the Internet Archive (identifier: bub_gb_SbGbIvDI0ekC). Public Domain Mark 1.0. OCR text corrected for long-s rendering (ſ → s) and standard Latin abbreviations expanded.

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