As above, so below. As within, so without. Originated by Hermes TRISMEGISTUS! - Hermes Trismegistus

I long to learn the things that are, and comprehend their nature, and know God. This is, I said, what I desire to hear. ~ Hermes Trismegistus.

Whether the real setting and dating of the Hermetic tradition in late antiquity are, in fact, irrelevant to its reception in the Renaissance is an interesting hermeneutic question that cannot be answered here. In any case and for many other reasons, Yates’s views on the Hermetica became famous for some, notorious for others, especially when, in a 1968 article, she made Hermes a major figure in the preliminaries to the scientific revolution, just two years after J.E. McGuire and P.M. Rattansi had connected Newton’s physics with the ancient theology theme so closely associated with Hermes.

This cosmos is large, then, and no body is larger?” “Agreed.” “And is it densely packed? For it has been filled with many other large bodies or, rather, with all the bodies that exist.” “So it is.” “But is the cosmos a body?” “A body, yes.” “And a moved body?” [3] “Certainly.” “The place in which it moves, then, how large must it be, and what is its nature? Is it not larger by far so as to sustain continuity of motion and not hold back its movement lest the moved be crowded and confined?