The Word 4, no. 6 (March 1907), 372-377. [1]
“I will utter things which have been secret from the foundation of the world.”
—Math, xiii., 35.
John Pordage, Dr. Med., was one of the greatest mystics in England during the sixteenth century. As a mystic he occupied the same position in England as Jacob Boehme did in Germany, and lived contemporaneous with Boehme. The writings of Boehme, however, differ in some respects from those of Pordage; for while Boehme was an illiterate shoemaker, and therefore not always perfect in the expression of his thoughts, Pordage was an educated physician and occupied a high position as a theologian and clergyman. His attention was called to the investigation of spiritual things by certain manifestations of occult powers which took place at his home. Besides other apparitions, there appeared to him a devil in the form of a dragon, with which he had to battle for two hours. The dragon was so materialized and visible that it was also seen by Dr. Pordage’s wife, who was present during the fight. Pordage conquered; but then a series of manifestations and tribulations began which lasted for several months. Hosts of such demons appeared and were not only seen by Pordage and his family, but also by all the neighbors and visitors. They were all tormented by the most disagreeable stenches, by horrible and disgusting sights, insupportable noises, yells and screams and painful sensations of various kinds. But at last the trouble ceased, and then began a period of interior divine illumination for Pordage, the results of which he has laid down in his books.[2]
I am not acquainted with any of the writings of Dr. Pordage in English, and do not know that any such exist at this time; but I have in my possession a very rare work in three heavy volumes, being a German translation of his writings, taken from his manuscripts, and which has never been published in English. The title of the book is as follows:
True and Divine
Metaphysica;
or,
Wonderful and Experimental Science of Invisible and Eternal
Things, Namely, of Such
Invisible Worlds
as
Divine, Eternal and Angelic Realms, Hell and Paradise, Their
Inhabitants, Government, Bodily Shapes, Speech,
Occupations and Other Mysterious Things.
By
John Pordage, Dr. Medic.
Frankfort and Leipzig, MDCCXV.
Were we to do justice to this work, it would be necessary to translate the three volumes from beginning to end, as they contain a great deal of information and the most interesting details, such as have in part been corroborated by recent investigations in the psychic realm and also a great deal more; but time, space and financial considerations permit us at present to give only a few extracts.
Dr. Pordage did not arrive at his scientific knowledge by book-learning or by logical speculation, but by direct interior perception and divine illumination. He says:
“The holy ghost guided my own spirit, after the separation from my mortal body and from its sinful soul into the stillness of eternity. There I stood with my own eternal spirit, as an individual spirit among innumerable individual spirits such as are in the most holy sanctuary. There I saw, heard, tasted and felt all that which I have written concerning the first and primeval world or principle of eternity.
“During this change I recognized two men within myself, namely, an external and an internal man. The inner man lives invisibly within the external one. My external self was mortal, but the internal self was immortal; and, moreover, I knew that the external man[3] had for its dwelling the carnal body[4] and was in possession of a mortal soul[5] but the internal eternal man had an eternal soul,[6] quite different from the mortal soul, and could not die. These two souls lived one within the other, as though they were only one soul. They were, nevertheless, two souls, but the external did not know the internal soul.
“Furthermore, I perceived that the external man had an external mortal spirit,[7] which belonged to him and which he had received from the spirit of this (external) world. It was born only for this world, and doomed to die within a certain time, according to its astral constellations. Furthermore, I saw clearly that the eternal soul of my inner man had an eternal immortal spirit,[8] born in eternity[9]; that it was descended from eternity, and consequently immortal. I then clearly saw that this eternal spirit is hidden within the temporal and mortal spirit, living within the same as if they both were only one spirit, although they both differ from each other; and the mortal spirit cannot comprehend the immortal one, although the latter lives and is active within the former.
“The outward spirit belonging to the external man is nothing more than the rational spirit, but the eternal spirit belonging to the inner man is the understanding within the rational spirit. The physical body is divested of its clothes at bedtime, so the rational spirit may divest itself of the visible form of flesh at the time of death; likewise the eternal spirit, when passing from this world into eternity, always divests itself of the rational spirit and leaves it in the lower world.
“Within the realm of eternity all things are perceived, known and understood in their own essence, such as they are in reality. The eternal spirit has its own understanding within its own mind, and within the mind its own faculty of seeing, its own eye and perception. This spiritual seeing takes place by means of the spirit of faith uniting itself with the understanding of the eternal spirit and illuminating the mind with a light which cannot err, but which dwells, lives and moves within the eternal mind and reveals to it everything.”[10]
It is not necessary for man’s salvation that he should have a correct intellectual conception of spiritual things. The knowledge of the brain is derived only from images, not from a true understanding of the essence of things, but the knowledge of the heart (the soul) is essential. Pordage illustrates this truth by the following fable:
“Let us suppose two men bom in a very deep, dark mine in the earth. They had never seen daylight, as they could not come to the surface of the earth without climbing up a high and dangerous ladder. One of the men was very poor and ignorant and led a life of such misery that he often wished to be released from it; the other was rich and learned and provided with all the comforts.
“There came a time when a spirit appeared to the poor man and told him of the sun, and praised his beauty. Thereupon the poor man, in his ignorance, imagined the sun to be a rich, noble and benevolent person, able to do a great deal of good, and his heart became filled with love for the sun and the desire to reach him. Consequently he began to ascend the high ladder in spite of all dangers. Thus he finally got out of the dark hole and entered the glorious sunshine.
“But the rich man was instructed, and knew that the sun was only a large, luminous ball, giving life and warmth and beauty to all beings, and that by means of his light one could see many wonderful things. In fact, this man had a fairly correct theoretical knowledge of certain qualities of the sun, but although he would liked to have seen it his desire was not sufficiently great to induce him to attempt the ascent of the ladder. He thought of all manner of difficulties, and he was not certain that he might not fall down and break his neck; and he argued that even if he were to succeed he would not be sufficiently rewarded for his trouble. He had neither faith (confidence) nor love, and was satisfied with his scientific hypothesis. He even thought that his science was more perfect than the knowledge of those who had seen the sun. Moreover, he was well satisfied with the comfort he had, and did not wish to part from it. Thus the learned rich man remained and died in his deep, dark mine, while the poor ignorant man enjoyed the light of the sun, although his first theory about it was quite erroneous.[11]
“Not within our imagination, our fancy, or intellectual conception, is to be found our means for uniting ourselves with the divine spirit, but this may be accomplished by the power of love and faith. One cannot really love a thing unless he believes it to be good or excellent within his own heart. Thus it is knowledge of the heart, and not that of the brain, which is necessary for the purpose of loving, and without which there can be no love. Experience teaches that one may have in one’s brain a very high opinion of qualities of a thing without loving that thing, as may be shown by the example of godless scientists, theologians, and devils, who perhaps have a great deal of brain knowledge regarding God, but no love to him within the heart. For the purpose of loving a thing it is sufficient that the heart believes in its goodness, and it is not necessary that the brain should know all its qualities or that the imagination should correspond to its true condition. The danger lies solely in the wrong application of our imagination, whether true or false.
“Without heart knowledge, all scientific brain knowledge concerning divine things is not only useless, but often injurious, for the following reasons:
“1. We waste the time which might be employed far more usefully by loving God and entertaining him in our heart, this being most necessary for the attainment of divine illumination.
“2. We fill our minds with images which stick to everything that the divine light would reveal to us, perverting the divine light and causing us to think of it in other forms.
“3. These imaginations give to our minds a certain propensity to reject all that is not in, harmony with our preconceived notions. This has been the tendency of all the (merely) learned men from the beginning of the world unto the present day.
“4. Wrong imagination causes our heart to become blown up with vanity and makes us believe that we have very high knowledge, while in reality we know nothing that is real.
“So this imaginary knowledge causes us to lose the grace of God and throws us back into eternal darkness.
“Whenever you read, or hear, or discover something in your mind, you ought not to detain yourself a long time or to waste labor and time to consider and examine the same; but you ought to look within your heart and see whether such a thing will increase or kindle therein the true love of God. If you find an increase of power within yourselves, you ought to gratefully accept it from God; for it is surely from God, the originator of all good thoughts. One ought never to quarrel or dispute with other persons about any differences of opinion, and surely not persecute them on that account; but it is to our own advantage to give credit to such persons as are known to be trustworthy and honest if they communicate to us the result of their spiritual experience, and use their knowledge for your progress in divine love.[12]
“There will hardly be one man among ten thousand who may truthfully say that he really knows that the books of the holy scriptures were actually written by the persons whose names are attached to them, and that these people were really disciples of Christ and prophets of God; that Jesus of Nazareth actually said all the things which are attributed to him; that the writers were so perfectly controlled by the holy ghost as not to miss one word; that these books themselves were transmitted to us without any interpolations or mistakes, and, finally, that the translation of them render the exact meaning of the originals. It is, however, certain that everybody may find within the Bible, in general, a spirit of that wisdom which comes from God and leads us back to God, and consequently that all of those teachings have a divine origin.”[13]
There is only one truth which is the kernel and spirit of every religious system, but the forms in which it manifests usually differ from each other. Theology deals with the external forms and shells; real Theosophy is the realization of the spirit contained in them. The outward shells are not to be rejected before the kernel is discovered, as otherwise we reject the kernel with them; but our object is to penetrate through the shell to the kernel, through the exterior into the interior, and by the power of the divine light of love and intelligence seek to discover the divine secrets within the heart.
[1] John Pordage. Franz Hartmann, M.D. The Word 4, no. 6 (March 1907), 372-377 [This article was reformatted from the original, but with the content unchanged other than fixing minor typos, by Robert Hutwohl, ©2025]
[2] The above sketch of the life of Pordage ought to be more complete, but unfortunately his biography is not at present accessible to me, and I am therefore writing from memory.
[3] Linga sharira. [Liṅga śarīra.] astral body, later after H. P. Blavatsky died, called the etheric body or double.
[4] Sthula sharira [Stūla śarīra], physical body.
[5] Kama [kāma], desire.
[6] Buddhi Manas, spiritual mind.
[7] Kama manas [Kāma manas], animal soul.
[8] Buddhi, spiritual soul.
[9] Atma [Ātma], spirit
[10] Vol. I, page 545.
[11] Vol. I, page 53.
[12] Vol. I., page 70.
[13] Vol. I., page 82.