evil is not a
thing in itself, but exists only because of human ignorance, is one that
must commend itself to the truly religious and philosophical mind. Thus
evil is not a fixed quantity in itself, it depends on the internal
attitude each man holds with regard to externals as to whether they are
evil or no.

For instance, it is not evil for an animal or savage to kill, for the
light of the higher law is not yet flaming brightly in their hearts.
That only is evil if we do what is displeasing to the Self. This may
perhaps throw some light on the Simonian dogma of action by accident
(_ex accidenti_), or institution ([Greek: thesei]), as opposed to action
according to nature (_naturaliter_ or [Greek: phusei])--evidently the
same idea as the teaching of Heracleitus to act according to nature
([Greek: kata phusin]) which he explains as according to the
Unmanifested Harmony which we can hear by straining our ears to catch
that still small voice within, the Voice of the Silence, the Logos or
Self. Simon presumably refers to this in the phrase "the things which
sound within" ([Greek: ta enaecha]), an idea remarkably confirmed by
Psellus,[129] who quotes the following Logion:

When thou seest a most holy, formless Fire shining and bounding
throughout the depths of the whole Cosmos, give ear to the Voice of
the Fire.

This brings us to a consideration of the teachings of Simon with regard
to the Lesser World, the Microcosm, Man, and to the scheme of his
soteriology. Evidently Simon taught the ancient, immemorial doctrine
that the Microcosm Man was the Mirror and Potentiality of the Cosmos,
the Macrocosm, as we have already seen above. Whatever was true of the
emanation of the Universe, was also true of Man, whatever was true of
the Macrocosmic Aeons was true of the Microcosmic Aeons in Man, which
are potentially the same as those of the Cosmos, and will develop into
the power and grandeur of the latter, if they can find suitable
expression, or a fit vehicle. This view will explain the reason of the
ancients for saying that we could only perceive that of which we have a
germ already within us. Thus it is that Empedocles taught:

By earth earth we perceive; by water, water; by aether, aether;
fire, by destructive fire; by friendship, friendship; and strife by
bitter strife.

And if the potentiality of all resided in every man, the teaching on
this point most forcibly has been, _Qui se cognoscit,