[1] See Hans-Joachim Klimkeit, Gnosis on the Silk Road (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1993).

[2] See Tulka Thondup Rinpoche, Hidden Teachings of Tibet (London: Wisdom, 1986).

[3] See Frances Yates, The Art of Memory (Chicago: ; and Jonathan Spence, The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci

[4] Thomas Cleary, trans., The Flower Ornament Scripture: a Translation of The Avatamsaka Sutra (Boston: Shambhala, 1993).

[5] See Lao Tzu, The Way of Life, trans Witter Bynner (New York, 1944) , particularly the eleventh saying: "...The use of clay in moulding pitchers / Comes from the hollow of its absence; / Doors, windows, in a house, / Are used for their emptiness: / Thus we are helped by what is not / To use what is."

[6] See the I Ching, hexagrams 4 (Youthful Folly) and 29 (the Abysmal).

[7] See Hans Jonas, The Gnostic Religion (Boston: Beacon, 1958), pp.206-238. Note especially the following apocalyptic passage from the Kephalia: "At the end, when the cosmos is dissolved, the...Thought of Life shall gather himself in...His net is his Living Spirit, for with his Spirit he shall catch the Light and the Life that is in all things."

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