The Red Book

Great is the power of the way. In it Heaven and Hell grow together, and in it the power of the Below and the power of the Above unite. The nature of the way is magical, as are supplication and invocation; malediction and deed are magical if they occur on the great way. Magic is the working of men on men, but your magic action does not affect your neighbor; it affects you first, and only if you withstand it does an invisible effect pass from you to your neighbor. There is more of it in the air than I ever thought.
However, it cannot be grasped. Listen:

The Above is powerful,
The Below is poweiful,
Twofold power is in the One.
North, come hither,
West, snuggle up,
East,flow upward,
South, spill over.
The winds in~between bind the
cross. The poles are united by the
intermediate poles in~between.
Steps lead from above to below.
Boiling water bubbles in
cauldrons. Red~hot ash envelops
the round floor. 
Night sinks blue and deep from
above, earth rises black from
below. 
A solitary is cooking up healing potions.
He makes ojfering to the four winds.
He greets the stars and touches the earth.
He holds something luminous in his hand.
Flowers sprout around him and the bliss of a new spring kisses all his limbs.
Birds fly around and the shy animals of the forest gaze at him.
He is far from men and yet the threads of their fate pass through his hands.
May your intercession be meant for him, so that his medicine grows ripe and strong and brings healing to the deepest wounds.
For your sake he is solitary and waits alone between Heaven and earth, for the earth to rise up to him and for Heaven to come down to him.
All peoples are still far off and stand behind the wall of darkness.
But I hear his words, which reach me from afar.
He has chosen a poor scribe, someone hard of hearing, who also stutters when he writes.
I do not recognize him, the solitary. What is he saying? He says: ({I suffer fear and distress for the sake of man.”
I dug up old runes and magical sayings for words never reach men. Words have become shadows.

Therefore I took old magical apparatuses and prepared hot potions and mixed in secrets and ancient powers, things that even the cleverest would not guess at.
I stewed the roots of all human thoughts and deeds.
I watched over the cauldron through many starry nights. The brew ferments forever.

I need your intercession, your kneeling, your desperation and your patience. I need your ultimate and highest longing, your purest willing, your most humble subjugation.

Solitary, who are you waiting for? Whose help do you require?

There is none who can rush to your aid, since all look to you and wait for your healing art.
We are all utterly incapable and need help more than you.

Grant us help so that we can help you in return.
The solitary speaks: ({Will no one stand by me in this need?

should I leave my work to help you so that you can help me again?

But how should I help you, if my brew has not grown ripe and strong?

It was supposed to help you. What do you hope from me?
Come to us! Why are you standing there cooking up marvels?

What can your healing and magical potion do for us? Do you believe in healing potions?
Look at life, behold how much it needs you! 
The solitary speaks: {{Fools, can you not keep watch with me for an hour,246 until the difficult and long lasting achieves completion and the juice has ripened?
Just a little longer and fermentation will be complete.

Why can’t you wait? Why should your impatience destroy the highest opus?
What highest opus? We are not alive; cold and numbness have seized us.

Your opus, solitary one, will not be finished for aeons, even if it advances day after day.
The work of salvation is endless.

Why do you want to wait for the end of this work?

Even if your waiting turned you into stone for endless ages, you could not endure till the end. And if your salvation came to its end, you would have to be saved from your salvation again.

The solitary speaks: ({What smooth~tongued lamentation reaches my ears!
What whining! What foolish doubters you are! Unruly children! Persevere, it will be accomplished after this night!”
We will not wait a single night longer; we have persevered long enough.
Are you a God, that a thousand nights are as one night to you?
For us, this one night would be like a thousand nights.
Abandon the work of salvation, and we will be saved. What stretch of ages are you saving us for?
The solitary speaks:
({You embarrassing human swarm, you foolish bastard of God and cattle, I’m still lacking a piece of your precious flesh for my mixture. Am I truly your most valuable piece of meat?
Is it worth my while to come to the boil for you?
One let himself be nailed to the cross for you.
One is truly enough. He blocks my way.
Therefore neither will I walk on his ways, nor make for you any healing brew or immortal blood potion, but rather I will abandon the potion and cauldron and occult work for your sake, since you can neither wait for nor endure the fulfillment.
I throw down your intercession, your genuflection, your invocations.
You can save yourselves from both your lack of salvation and your salvation!
Your worth rose quite high enough because one died for you.
Now prove your worth by each living for himself.
My God, how difficult it is to leave a work unfinished for the sake of men!
But for the sake of men, I abstain from being a savior.
Lo! Now my potion has completed its fermentation.
I did not mix a piece of myself into the drink, but I did slice in a piece of humanity, and behold, it clarified the murky foaming potion.
How sweet, how bitter The form of the One it tastes! becomes double.
The Below is weak, North, rise and be gone,
The Above is weak, West, retire to your place,
The ash turns gray beneath its ground.
East, spread yourself, South, die down. The winds in between loosen the crucified.
The far poles are separated by the poles in~between.
The levels are broad ways, patient streets.
Night covers the sky and far below lies the black earth.
The bubbling pot grows cold.
Day approaches, and above the clouds a distant sun.
No solitary cooks healing potions.
The four winds blow and laugh at their bounty.
And he mocks the four winds.
He has seen the stars and touched the earth.
Therefore his hand clasps something luminous and his shadow has grown to Heaven.

The inexplicable occurs.

You would very much like to forsake yourself and defect to each and every manifold possibility.

You would very much like to risk every crime in order to steal for yourself the mystery of the changeful. But the road is without end. ~Carl Jung, Red Book, Pages 308-309.