Text: G.R.S. Meade also demonstrates that "the song remains the same." www.primenet.com/~subru/Orphic.html#anchor17217 (an excerpt) ÆTHER, CHAOS AND NIGHT Next come Æther and Chaos, Spirit-Matter, the Bound and Infinity of Plato (Proc., Tim., ii. 117), the Purusha-Prakriti of the Sânkhya. Orpheus calls this Æther the Mighty Whirlpool (Simplicius, Ausc., iv.123); called Magna Vorago by Syrianus (Metaph., ii.33a). And Proclus (Tim., ii.117), speaking of Chaos, says: 'The last Infinity, by which also Matter is circumscribed--is the Container, the field and plane of ideas. About her is "neither limit, nor foundation, nor seat, but excessive darkness".' This is the Mûlaprakriti or Root-Matter of the Vedântins, and Æther is the so-called first Logos, Æther-Chaos being the second. 'And dusky Night comprehended and hid all below the Ether; [Orpheus thus] signifying that Night came first.' (Malela, iv.31; Cedrenus, i.57, 84.) Then comes the Dawn of the First Creation. In the Unaging Time, Chaos, impregnated by the whirling of Æther, formed itself into THE COSMIC EGG Apion (Clement, Homil., VI.iv.671) writes that: 'Orpheus likened Chaos to an egg, in which the primal "elements" were all mingled together. . . . This egg was generated from the infinitude of primal matter as follows. [The first two principles were] primal matter innate with life, and a certain vortex in perpetual flux and unordered motion--from these there arose an orderly flux and interblending of essences, and thus from each, that which was most suitable to the production of life flowed to the centre of the universe, while the surrounding spirit was drawn within, as a bubble in water. Thus a spherical receptacle was formed. Then, impregnated in itself by the divine spirit which seized upon it, it revolved itself into manifestation--with the appearance of the periphery of an egg.'

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