(3) Again, therefore, the phasmata of the Gods are entirely immutable, according to magnitude, morphe,[A] and figure, and according to all things pertaining to them; those of archangels approximate to those of the Gods, but fall short of the sameness of them; those of angels are subordinate to these, but are immutable; and those of dæmons are at different times seen in a different form, and appear at one time great, but at another small, yet are still recognized to be the phasmata of dæmons. Moreover, those of such archons as are leaders are immutable; but those of such as are material are multiformly changed; those of heroes are similar to those of dæmons; and those of souls imitate in no small degree the dæmoniacal mutation. Farther still, order and quiet pertain to the Gods; but with archangels, there is an efficacy of order and quiet. With angels, the adorned and the tranquil are present, but not unattended with motion. Perturbation and disorder follow the dæmoniacal phasmata; but spectacles attend the archons, conformable to each of the particulars which we have already mentioned; the material archons, indeed, being borne along tumultuously; but those of a leading characteristic, presenting themselves to the view, firmly established in themselves. The phasmata of heroes are subject to motion and mutation; but those of souls resemble, indeed,

(42) Timaeus: he shall be changed every time, according to the nature of his wickedness, into some bestial form after the similitude of his own nature; nor in his changings shall he cease from woes until he yields himself to the revolution of the Same and Similar that is within him, and dominating by force of reason that burdensome mass which afterwards adhered to him of fire and water

(1) In order, therefore, that from an abundance of arguments we may contend against the objection which is now adduced, we will grant, if you please, the contrary to what we have asserted, viz. that certain unjust things are performed in this business of invocations. That the Gods, however, are not to be accused as the causes of these is immediately manifest. For those that are good are the causes of good; and the Gods possess good essentially. They do nothing, therefore, that is unjust. Hence other causes of guilty deeds must be investigated. And if we are not able to discover these causes, it is not proper to throw away the true conception respecting the Gods, nor on account of the doubts whether these unjust deeds are performed, and how they are effected, to depart from notions concerning the Gods which are truly clear. For it is much better to acknowledge the insufficiency of our power to explain how unjust actions are perpetrated, than to admit any thing impossible and false respecting the Gods; since all the Greeks and Barbarians truly opine the contrary to be the case with divine natures. After this manner, therefore, the truth respecting these particulars subsists.

(1) You adduce, however, as a thing by no means to be despised, “ the artificers of efficacious images .” But I should wonder if these were admitted by any one of the theurgists who survey the true forms of the Gods. For why should any one exchange truly existing beings for images, and descend from the first to the last of things? Or do we not know that all things effected by an adumbration of this kind, have an obscure subsistence, are the phantasms only of that which is true, and appear to be good, but in no respect are so? Other things, also, of this kind that accede, are borne along in a flowing condition of being; but obtain nothing genuine, or perfect, or manifest. But this is evident from the mode of their production: for not divinity, but man is the maker of them. Nor are they produced from uniform and intelligible essences, but from matter, which is assumed for this purpose. What good, therefore, can germinate from matter, and from the material and corporeal-formed powers which are in bodies? Or is not that which derives its subsistence from human art, more imbecile than men themselves, who impart existence to it? By what kind of art, likewise, is this image fashioned? For it is said, indeed, to be fashioned by demiurgic art; but this is effective of true essences, and not of certain images. Hence the image-producing art is distant by a great interval from the seminal production of realities. Besides, neither does it preserve a certain analogy with divine fabrication.

(1) The elementary teaching, then, of this the perfecting service, through the things done over the Divine Muron, shews this, in my judgment, that, that which is holy and of sweet savour in the minds of devout men is covered, as with a veil, since it Divinely enjoins upon holy men to have their beautiful and well-savoured assimilations in virtue to the hidden God not seen for vain glory. For the hidden comeliness of God is unsullied, and is sweet beyond conception, and manifested for spiritual contemplation to the intellectual alone, through a desire to have the unsullied images of virtue in souls of the same pattern. For by looking away from the undistorted and well imitated image of the Godlike virtue to that contemplated and fragrant beauty, he thus moulds and fashions it to the most beautiful imitation. And, as in the case of sensible images, if the artist look without distraction upon the archetypal form, not distracted by sight of anything else, or in any way divided in attention, he will duplicate, if I may so speak, the very person that is being sketched, whoever he may be, and will shew the reality in the likeness, and the archetype in the image, and each in each, save the difference of substance; thus, to copyists who love the beautiful in mind, the persistent and unflinching contemplation of the sweet-savoured and hidden beauty will confer the unerring and most Godlike appearance. Naturally, then, the divine copyists, who unflinchingly mould their own intellectual contemplation to the superessentially sweet and contemplated comeliness, do. none of their divinely imitated virtues "to be seen of men, as the Divine text expresses it; but reverently gaze upon the most holy things of the Church, veiled in the Divine Muron as in a figure. Wherefore, these also, by religiously concealing that which is holy and most Divine in virtue within their Godlike and God-engraved mind, look away to the archetypal conception alone; for not only are they blind to things dissimilar, but neither are they drawn down to gaze upon them. Wherefore, as becomes their character, they do neither love things, merely seeming good and just, but those really being such; nor do they look to opinion, upon which the multitude irrationally congratulate themselves, but, after the Divine example, by distinguishing the good or evil as it is in itself, they are Divine images of the most supremely Divine sweetness, which, having the truly sweet within itself, is not turned to the anomalously seeming of the multitude, moulding Its genuineness to the true images of Itself.

(1) Why, therefore, does the maker of images, who effects these things, desert himself, though he is better than these images, and consists of things of a more excellent nature, and confide in inanimate idols, which are inspired with the representation alone of life, contain a renovated harmony, and which is externally multiform, and are in reality diurnal? Shall we say that something genuine and true is inherent in them? Nothing, however, which is fashioned by human art is genuine and pure. But you will say, that simplicity and uniformity of energy predominate in the whole of their composition. This is very far from being the case. For the idol, according to its visible composition, is mingled from all-various and contrary qualities. Shall we say then, that a certain pure and perfect power is manifest in them? By no means. For a thing of this kind possesses an adventitious multitude of effluxions, collected from many places, and which shows itself to be imbecile and evanescent. But if these particulars, which we have enumerated, are not found to take place in images, is stability present with them, as it is said to be [by the patrons of these images]? By no means, likewise, is this the case. For these idols are extinguished with much greater rapidity than the images which are seen in mirrors.

(1) Good, O Asclepius, is in none else save in God alone; nay, rather, Good is God Himself eternally. If it be so, [Good] must be essence, from every kind of motion and becoming free (though naught is free from It), possessed of stable energy around Itself, never too little, nor too much, an ever-full supply. [Though] one, yet [is It] source of all; for what supplieth all is Good. When I, moreover, say [supplieth] altogether [all], it is for ever Good. But this belongs to no one else save God alone. For He stands not in need of any thing, so that desiring it He should be bad; nor can a single thing of things that are be lost to him, on losing which He should be pained; for pain is part of bad. Nor is there aught superior to Him, that He should be subdued by it; nor any peer to Him to do Him wrong, or [so that] He should fall in love on its account; nor aught that gives no ear to Him, whereat He should grow angry; nor wiser aught, for Him to envy.

(2) Wherefore it stands to reason, that the ideas entertained of God by wicked men must be bad, and those by good men most excellent. And therefore he who is in soul truly kingly and gnostic, being likewise pious and free from superstition, is persuaded that He who alone is God is honourable, venerable, august, beneficent, the doer of good, the author of all good things, but not the cause of evil. And respecting the Hellenic superstition we have, as I think, shown enough in the book entitled by us The Exhortation, availing ourselves abundantly of the history bearing on the point. There is no need, then, again to make a long story of what has already been clearly stated. But in as far as necessity requires to be pointed out on coming to the topic, suffice it to adduce a few out of many considerations in proof of the impiety of those who make the Divinity resemble the worst men. For either those Gods of theirs are injured by men, and are shown to be inferior to men on being injured by us; or, if not so, how is it that they are incensed at those by whom they are not injured, like a testy old wife roused to wrath?

(4) [Sidenote A: Morphe pertains to the colour, figure, and magnitude of superficies.] the heroic, but at the same time are less than these. In addition also to these peculiarities, divine beauty, indeed, shines with an immense splendour as it were, fixes the spectators in astonishment, imparts a divine joy, presents itself to the view with ineffable symmetry, and is exempt from all other species of pulchritude. But the blessed spectacles of archangels have indeed themselves the greatest beauty, yet are not so ineffable and admirable as those of the Gods. Those of angels divide, in a partible manner, the beauty which they receive from archangels. But the dæmoniacal and heroical self-visive spirits, have both of them beauty in definite forms, yet the former is adorned in reasons which define the essence, and the latter exhibits fortitude. The phasmata of archons may be divided in a twofold respect. For some of them exhibit a beauty which is spontaneous, and of a ruling characteristic; but others, an elegance of form which is fictitious and renovated. And the phasmata of souls are, indeed, adorned in definite reasons, but these reasons are more divided than those in heroes, are partibly circumscribed, and are vanquished by one form. If, however, it be requisite to define all of them in common, I say that each participates of beauty according to its arrangement, the peculiar nature which it possesses, and its allotment.

(2) In souls, however, which rule over bodies, and precedaneously pay attention to them, and which, prior to generation, have by themselves a perpetual arrangement, essential good is not present, nor the cause of good, which is prior to essence; but to these a certain participation and habit, proceeding from essential good, accedes; just as we see that the participation of beauty and virtue is very different [in these souls] from that which we behold in men. For the latter is ambiguous, and accedes to composite natures as something adventitious. But the former has an immutable and never failing establishment in souls, and neither itself ever departs from itself, nor can be taken away by any thing else. Such, therefore, being the beginning and end in the divine genera, conceive two media between these extreme boundaries, viz. the order of heroes, which has an arrangement more elevated than that of souls, in power and virtue, in beauty and magnitude, and in all the goods which subsist about souls, and which, though it entirely transcends the psychical order, yet, at the same time, is proximately conjoined to it, through the alliance of a similar formed life. But the other medium, which is suspended from the Gods, though it is far inferior to them, is that of dæmons, which is hot of a primarily operative nature, but is subservient to, and follows the beneficent will of the Gods.

(3) He says, accordingly, in The Laws: "God indeed, as the ancient saying has it, occupying the beginning, the middle, and the end of all things, goes straight through while He goes round the circumference. And He is always attended by Justice, the avenger of those who revolt from the divine law." You see how he connects fear with the divine law. He adds, therefore: "To which he, who would be happy, cleaving, will follow lowly and beautified." Then, connecting what follows these words, and admonishing by fear, he adds: "What conduct, then, is dear and conformable to God? That which is characterized by one word of old date: Like will be dear to like, as to what is in proportion; but things out of proportion are neither dear to one another, nor to those which are in proportion. And that therefore he that would be dear to God, must, to the best of his power, become such as He is And in virtue of the same reason, our self-controlling man is dear to God. But he that has no self-control is unlike and diverse." In saying that it was an ancient dogma, he indicates the teaching which had come to him from the law. And having in the Theaoetus admitted that evils make the circuit of mortal nature and of this spot, he adds: "Wherefore we must try to flee hence as soon as possible. For flight is likeness to God as far as possible. And likeness is to become holy and just with wisdom." Speusippus, the nephew of Plato, says that happiness is a perfect state in those who conduct themselves in accordance with nature, or the state of the good: for which condition all men have a desire, but the good only attained to quietude; consequently the virtues are the authors of happiness. And Xenocrates the Chalcedonian defines happiness to be the possession of virtue, strictly so called, and of the power subservient to it. Then he clearly says, that the seat in which it resides is the soul; that by which it is effected, the virtues; and that of these as parts are formed praiseworthy actions, good habits and dispositions, and motions, and relations; and that corporeal and external objects are not without these. For Polemo, the disciple of Xenocrates, seems of the opinion that happiness is sufficiency of all good things, or of the most and greatest. He lays down the doctrine, then, that happiness never exists without virtue; and that virtue, apart from corporeal and external objects, is sufficient for happiness. Let these things be so. The contradictions to the opinions specified shall be adduced in due time. But on us it is incumbent to reach the unaccomplished end, obeying the commands - that is, God - and living according to them, irreproachably and intelligently, through knowledge of the divine will; and assimilation as far as possible in accordance with right reason is the end, and restoration to perfect adoption by the Son, which ever glorifies the Father by the great High Priest who has deigned to call us brethren and fellow-heirs. And the apostle, succinctly describing the end, writes in the Epistle to the Romans: "But now, being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life." And viewing the hope as twofold - that which is expected, and that which has been received - he now teaches the end to be the restitution of the hope. "For patience," he says, "worketh experience, and experience hope: and hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit that is given to us." On account of which love and the restoration to hope, he says, in another place, "which rest is laid up for us." You will find in Ezekiel the like, as follows: "The soul that sinneth, it shall die. And the man who shall be righteous, and shall do judgment and justice, who has not eaten on the mountains, nor lifted his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, and hath not defiled his neighbour's wife, and hath not approached to a woman in the time of her uncleanness (for he does not wish the seed of man to be dishonoured), and will not injure a man; will restore the debtor's pledge, and will not take usury; will turn away his hand from wrong; will do true judgment between a man and his neighbour; will walk in my ordinances, and keep my commandments, so as to do the truth; he is righteous, he shall surely live, saith Adonai the Lord." Isaiah too, in exhorting him that hath not believed to gravity of life, and the Gnostic to attention, proving that man's virtue and God's are not the same, speaks thus: "Seek the Lord, and on finding Him call on Him. And when He shall draw near to you, let the wicked forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his ways; and let him return to the Lord, and he shall obtain mercy," down to "and your thoughts from my thoughts."' "We," then, according to the noble apostle, "wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.

(6) First of all, idols are to be rejected. Such, then, being the case, the Greeks ought by the Law and the Prophets to learn to worship one God only, the only Sovereign; then to be taught by the apostle, "but to us an idol is no, thing in the world," since nothing among created things can be a likeness of God; and further, to be taught that none of those images which they worship can be similitudes: for the race of souls is not in form such as the Greeks fashion their idols. For souls are invisible; not only those that are rational, but those also of the other animals. And their bodies never become parts of the souls themselves, but organs - partly as seats, partly as vehicles - and in other cases possessions in various ways. But it is not possible to copy accurately even the likenesses of the organs; since, were it so, one might model the sun, as it is seen, and take the likeness of the rainbow in colours.

(1) Hermes, the God who presides over language, was formerly very properly considered as common to all priests; and the power who presides over the true science concerning the Gods is one and the same in the whole of things. Hence our ancestors dedicated the inventions of their wisdom to this deity, inscribing all their own writings with the name of Hermes. If, therefore, we participate of a portion of this God, adapted and commensurate to our powers, you do well to propose your theological doubts to the priests, as friends, and to make these doubts known to them. I also very properly conceiving that the epistle sent to my disciple Anebo was written to me, shall give you a true answer to your inquiries. For it would not be becoming, that Pythagoras and Plato, Democritus and Eudoxus, and many other of the ancient Greeks, should have obtained appropriate instruction from the sacred scribes of their time, but that you who are our contemporary, and think conformably to those ancients, should be frustrated of your wish by those who are now living, and who are called common preceptors. I, therefore, thus betake myself to the present discussion; and do you, if you please, conceive that the same person to whom you sent the letter returns you an answer. Or, if it should seem fit to you, admit it to be me who discourses with you in writing, or some other prophet of the Egyptians, for this is of no consequence. Or, which I think is still better, dismiss the consideration whether the speaker is an inferior or a superior character, but direct your attention to what is said, so as readily to excite your mind to survey whether what is asserted is true or false.

(4) But the other, magnanimous, at whose desire I had remained, did not his aspect change, Neither his neck he moved, nor bent his side. "And if," continuing his first discourse, "They have that art," he said, "not learned aright, That more tormenteth me, than doth this bed. But fifty times shall not rekindled be The countenance of the Lady who reigns here, Ere thou shalt know how heavy is that art; And as thou wouldst to the sweet world return, Say why that people is so pitiless Against my race in each one of its laws?" Whence I to him: "The slaughter and great carnage Which have with crimson stained the Arbia, cause Such orisons in our temple to be made." After his head he with a sigh had shaken, "There I was not alone," he said, "nor surely Without a cause had with the others moved. But there I was alone, where every one Consented to the laying waste of Florence, He who defended her with open face." "Ah! so hereafter may your seed repose," I him entreated, "solve for me that knot, Which has entangled my conceptions here.

(7) "I am Aglaurus, who became a stone!" And then, to press myself close to the Poet, I backward, and not forward, took a step. Already on all sides the air was quiet; And said he to me: "That was the hard curb That ought to hold a man within his bounds; But you take in the bait so that the hook Of the old Adversary draws you to him, And hence availeth little curb or call. The heavens are calling you, and wheel around you, Displaying to you their eternal beauties, And still your eye is looking on the ground; Whence He, who all discerns, chastises you."

(1) The perfect life of man falls short indeed of the life of God, because it is not self-perfect, but surpasses that of irrational animals, because it participates of virtue and felicity. For neither is God in want of external causes; since being naturally good and happy, he is perfect from himself; nor any irrational animal. For brutes being destitute of reason, they are also destitute of the sciences pertaining to actions. But the nature of man partly consists of his own proper deliberate choice, and partly is in want of the assistance derived from divinity. For that which is capable of being fashioned by reason, which has an intellectual perception of things beautiful and base, can erectly extend itself from earth, and look to heaven, and can perceive with the eye of intellect the highest Gods,—that which is capable of all this, participates likewise of assistance from the Gods.

But in consequence of possessing will, deliberate choice, and a principle of such a kind in itself as enables it to study virtue, and to be agitated by the storms of vice, to follow, and also to apostatize from the Gods,—it is likewise able to be moved by itself. Hence it is a partaker of praise and blame, honor and ignominy, partly from the Gods and partly from men, according as it zealously applies itself either to virtue or vice. For the whole reason of the thing is as follows: Divinity introduced man into the world as a most exquisite animal, to be reciprocally honored with himself, and as the eye of the orderly distribution of things . Hence also man gave names to things, becoming himself the character of them.

He likewise invented letters, procuring through these a treasury of memory. And he imitated the established order of the universe, co-harmonizing by judicial proceedings and laws the communion of cities. For no work is performed by men more decorous to the world, or more worthy of the notice of the Gods, than the apt constitution of a city governed by good laws, and an orderly distribution of laws and a polity. For though each man himself by himself is nothing, and is not himself by himself sufficient to lead a life conformable to the common concord, and apt composition of a polity, yet he is well adapted to the whole and to the perfect system of society. For the life of man is the image of a lyre accurately [harmonized,] and in every respect perfect.

For every lyre requires these three things, apparatus, apt composition, and a certain musical contrectation. And apparatus indeed, is a preparation of all the appropriate parts; viz. of the chords, and of the instruments which co-operate with the well-sounding and striking of the lyre. But the apt composition is the commixture of the sounds with each other. And the musical contrectation is the motion of these conformably to the apt composition. Thus also human life requires these same three things. Apparatus, indeed, which is the completion of the parts of life. But the parts of life are the goods of the body, of riches, renown, and friends. The apt composition is the co-arrangement of these according to virtue and the laws.

And the musical contrectation is the commixture of these conformably to virtue and the laws; virtue sailing with a prosperous wind, and having nothing externally resisting it. For felicity does not consist in being driven from the purpose of voluntary intentions, but in obtaining them; nor in virtue being without attendants and ministrant aids; but in completely possessing its own proper powers which are adapted to actions. For man is not self-perfect, but imperfect. And he becomes perfect, partly from himself, and partly from an external cause. He is likewise perfect, either according to nature, or according to life. And he is perfect indeed according to nature, if he becomes a good man. For the virtue of each thing is the summit and perfection of the nature of that thing.

Thus the virtue of the eyes is the summit and perfection of the nature of the eyes; and this is also true of the virtue of the ears. Thus too, the virtue of man is the summit and perfection of the nature of man. But man is perfect according to life, when he becomes happy. For felicity is the perfection and completion of human goods. Hence, again, virtue and prosperity become the parts of the life of man. And virtue, indeed, is a part of him so far as he is soul, but prosperity so far as he is connected with body. But both are parts of him so far as he is an animal. For it is the province of virtue to use in a becoming manner the goods which are conformable to nature; but of prosperity to impart the use of them.

And the former, indeed, imparts deliberate choice and right reason; but the latter, energies and actions. For to wish what is beautiful in conduct and to endure things of a dreadful nature, is the proper business of virtue. But it is the work of prosperity to render deliberate choice successful, and to cause actions to arrive at the [desired] end. For the general conquers in conjunction with virtue and good fortune. The pilot sails well in conjunction with art and prosperous winds. The eye sees well in conjunction with acuteness of vision and light. And the life of man becomes most excellent through virtue itself, and prosperity.

(38) But now, nothing corrupts, [or is transitory,] but only the Spirit in the Will, and its Body in the Fiat; and the Figure remains eternally in the Shadow. And this Figure could not thus have been brought to Light and to Visibility; that it might subsist eternally, if it had not been in the Essence; but now it is also incorruptible, for in the Figure there is no Essence: The Center in the Source is broken asunder, and gone into its Ether, [Receptacle, or Air;] and the Figure does neither Good nor Evil, but it continues eternally to the [Manifestation of the] Deeds of Wonder, and the Glory of God, and for the Joy of the Angels.

(4) Will not, therefore, he who surveys this conspicuous statue of the Gods, thus united to itself, be ashamed to have a different opinion of the Gods, who are the causes of it, so as to introduce among them sections, and separations, and corporeal-formed circumscriptions? I, indeed, should think, that every one would be thus disposed. For if there is no ratio, no habitude of symmetry, no communion of essence, nor a connexion either in capacity or in energy, between that which is adorned and the adorning cause; if this be the case, there will neither be found in the world a certain extension according to interval, nor local comprehension, nor partible interception, nor any other such like connascent equalization in the presence of the Gods [with mundane natures]. For in things which are of a kindred nature, according to essence and power, or which are, in a certain respect, of the same species, or homogeneous, a certain comprehension, or conservation, may be discovered. But in such things as are entirely exempt from all mundane wholes, what opposing circumstance, or transition through all things, or partible circumscription, or local comprehension, or any thing else of this kind can justly be perceived? I think, therefore, that the several participants of the divinities are of such a nature, that some partake of them etherially, others aerially, and others aquatically; which also, the art of divine works perceiving, employs adaptations and invocations, conformable to such a division. And thus much concerning the distribution of the more excellent genera into the world.

(2) These assertions, therefore, are unworthy of the conceptions which we should frame of the Gods, and foreign from the works which are effected in theurgy. But an investigation of this kind suffers the same thing as the multitude suffer, about the fabrication of the universe and providence. For not being able to learn what the mode is in which these are effected, and refusing to ascribe human cares and reasonings to the Gods, they wholly abolish the providential and fabricative energy of divinity. As, therefore, we are accustomed to answer these, that the divine mode of production and providential inspection is very different from that which is human, and which it is not proper wholly to reject through ignorance, as if it had not from the first any subsistence; thus, also, it may be justly contended against you, that all prediction, and the performance of divine works, are the works of the Gods, as they are not effected through other and these human causes, but through such as are alone known to the Gods.

(12) Seeing then God is all in all, and has created Man to his Image and Similitude, to live with him eternally in his Love, Light, Joy and Glory, therefore we cannot say, that he was merely created out of the Corruptibility of this World, for therein is no eternal perfect Life, but Death, and Perplexity, Anguish, and Necessity; but as God dwells in himself, and goes through all his Works incomprehensibly to them, and is hindered by nothing, so was the Similitude before him out of the pure Element; it was indeed created in this World, yet the Kingdom of this World should not comprehend that [Image,] but the Similitude (Man) should mightily, and in perfect [Power or] Virtue, rule through the Essences (with the Essences out of the pure Element of the paradisical holy Limbus) through the Dominion of this World.