(6) The father of all perfection in ye whole world is here.

(36) Wherefore also he who holds converse with God must have his soul immaculate and stainlessly pure, it being essential to have made himself perfectly good.

(2) And if, in doing good, he be met with anything adverse, he will let the recompense pass without resentment as if it were good, he being just and good "to the just and the unjust." To such the Lord says, "Be ye, as your Father is perfect." To him the flesh is dead; but he himself lives alone, having consecrated the sepulchre into a holy temple to the Lord, having turned towards God the old sinful soul.

The perfect human can be neither grasped nor seen. What is seen can be grasped. No one can obtain this grace without putting on perfect light and becoming perfect light. Whoever puts on light will enter [the place of rest]. This is perfect [light, and] we [must] become [perfect humans] before we leave [the world]. Whoever obtains everything [but does not separate] from this world will [not] be able [to attain] that realm but will [go to the] middle place, for that one is not perfect. Only Jesus knows the fate of that person.

(1) Here I find perfection apprehended variously in relation to Him who excels in every virtue. Accordingly one is perfected as pious, and as patient, and as continent, and as a worker, and as a martyr, and as a Gnostic. But I know no one of men perfect in all things at once, while still human, though according to the mere letter of the law, except Him alone who for us clothed Himself with humanity. Who then is perfect? He who professes abstinence from what is bad.

(2) Moreover, of perfect men there are two differences. For some of them are naturally perfect; but others are perfect according to life. And those indeed alone that are good, are naturally perfect. But these are such as possess virtue. For the virtue of the nature of every thing is a summit and perfection. Thus the virtue of the eye is the summit and perfection of the nature of the eye. But the virtue of man is the summit and perfection of the nature of man. Those also are perfect according to life, who are not only good, but happy. For felicity, indeed, is the perfection of human life. But human, life is a system of actions: and: felicity gives completion to the actions.

Virtue also and fortune give completion to actions; virtue, indeed, according to use; but good fortune according to prosperity. God therefore is neither good through learning virtue from any one, nor is he happy through being attended by good fortune. For he is good by nature, and happy by nature, and always was and will be, and will never cease to be, such; since he is incorruptible, and naturally good. But man is neither happy nor good by nature, but requires discipline and providential care. And in order to become good, indeed; he requires virtue; but in order to become happy, good fortune. On this account, human felicity summarily consists of these two things, viz. of praise, and the predication of beatitude.

Of praise indeed, from virtue; but of the predication of beatitude, from prosperity. It possesses virtue therefore, through a divine destiny, but prosperity through a mortal allotment. But mortal are suspended from divine concerns, and terrestrial from such as are celestial. Things subordinate, also, are suspended from such as are more excellent. And on this account, the good man who follows the Gods is happy; but he who follows mortal natures is miserable. For to him who possesses wisdom, prosperity is good and useful. It is good, indeed, through his knowledge of the use of it; but it is useful, through his co-operating with actions. It is beautiful, therefore, when prosperity is present with intellect, and when sailing as it were with a prosperous wind, actions are performed looking to virtue; just as a pilot looks to the motions of the stars. For thus, he who does this will not only follow God, but will also co-arrange human with divine good.

(29) We praise you eternally, we praise you, we who are saved, who are perfect beings, who are perfect because of you, who have become perfect with you.

(1) So much then on these matters; but let us now at last, with your good pleasure, approach the most difficult subject in the whole discourse. For the Word of God predicates everything, singly and collectively, respecting the Cause of all, and extols Him both as Perfect and as One. He is then perfect not only as self-perfect, and solitarily separated within Himself, by Himself, and throughout most perfect, but also as super-perfect, as beseems His pre-eminence over all, and limiting every infinitude, and surpassing every term, and by none contained or comprehended; but even extending at once to all, and above all, by His unfailing gratuities and endless energies. But, on the other hand, He is called perfect, both as without increase, and always perfect, and as undiminished, as pre-holding all things in Himself, and overflowing as beseems one, inexhaustible, and same, and super-full, and undiminished, abundance, in accordance with which He perfects all perfect things, and fills them with His own perfection.

[It] was [necessary for Jesus] to go down into the water [in order to perfect] and purify it. [So also] those who are [baptized] in his name [are perfected]. For he said, “[Thus] shall we perfect all righteousness.”

The perfect majesty is at rest in the ineffable light, in the truth of the mother of all these, and all of you that attain to me, to me alone who am perfect, because of the word. For I exist with all the greatness of the spirit, which is a friend to us and our kindred alike. Since I brought forth a word to the glory of our father, through his goodness, as well as an imperishable thought, that is, the word within him, it is slavery that we should die with Christ, with imperishable and undefiled thought. This is an incomprehensible marvel, the writing of the ineffable water, which is the word from us: I am in you and you are in me, just as the father is in you in innocence.

(3) A perfected man said: 'For seventy years I have worked on myself and I am now in ecstasy, contentment, and felicity, G

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and in this state I participate in the Sovereign Majesty and am united with Divinity itself. As for you, while you are occupied with looking for the faults of others, how will you be able to taste the joy of the unseen world? If you look for faults with a searching eye, how will you be able to see the things of the inner world? You would split a hair for the faults of others, but to your own faults you turn a blind eye. Acknowledge your own faults, then, guilty though you be, God will have mercy on you.'

(17) Let the specimen suffice to those who have ears. For it is not required to unfold the mystery, but only to indicate what is sufficient for those who are partakers in knowledge to bring it to mind; who also will comprehend how it was said by the Lord, "Be ye perfect as your father, perfectly," by forgiving sins, and forgetting injuries, and living in the habit of passionlessness. For as we call a physician perfect, and a philosopher perfect, so also, in my view, do we call a Gnostic perfect. But not one of those points, although of the greatest importance, is assumed in order to the likeness of God. For we do not say, as the Stoics do most impiously, that virtue in man and God is the same. Ought we not then to be perfect, as the Father wills? For it is utterly impossible for any one to become perfect as God is. Now the Father wishes us to be perfect by living blamelessly, according to the obedience of the Gospel.

(5) Come, grant him to be like one of thy followers, for he is even as thou art

(4) If in perfection tempered were the wax, And were the heaven in its supremest virtue, The brilliance of the seal would all appear; But nature gives it evermore deficient, In the like manner working as the artist, Who has the skill of art and hand that trembles. If then the fervent Love, the Vision clear, Of primal Virtue do dispose and seal, Perfection absolute is there acquired. Thus was of old the earth created worthy Of all and every animal perfection; And thus the Virgin was impregnate made; So that thine own opinion I commend, That human nature never yet has been, Nor will be, what it was in those two persons. Now if no farther forth I should proceed, 'Then in what way was he without a peer?' Would be the first beginning of thy words. But, that may well appear what now appears not, Think who he was, and what occasion moved him To make request, when it was told him, 'Ask.' I've not so spoken that thou canst not see Clearly he was a king who asked for wisdom, That he might be sufficiently a king;

(12) Even if you are not capable of practice, do work for My sake; By doing work for my sake also, you shall attain perfection.

(3) You, unborn, from you come the eternal ones and eternal realms, the all-perfect ones, who are established, and the perfect beings.

(4) Thus I will declare forth this world's best (being). From (the insight of His) Righteousness Mazda, who hath appointed these (things) , hath known (what He utters to be true; yea, I will declare) Him the father of the toiling Good Mind (within us). So is His daughter through good deeds (our) Piety. Not to be deceived is the all-viewing Lord.

(7) For "the fear of the Lord," it is said, "is the beginning of wisdom." But the perfect man, out of love, "beareth all things, endureth all things," "as not pleasing man, but God." Although praise follows him as a consequence, it is not for his own advantage, but for the imitation and benefit of those who praise him.

(43) Further mark ye; that when the True Love and True Light are in a man, the Perfect Good is known and loved for itself and as itself; and yet not so that it loveth itself of itself and as itself, but the one True and Perfect Good can and will love nothing else, in so far as it is in itself, save the one, true Goodness. Now if this is itself, it must love itself, yet not as itself nor as of itself, but in this wise: that the One true Good loveth the One Perfect Goodness, and the One Perfect Goodness is loved of the One, true and Perfect Good. And in this sense that saying is true, that “God loveth not Himself as Himself.” For if there were ought better than God, God would love that, and not Himself. For in this True Light and True Love there neither is nor can remain any I, Me, Mine, Thou, Thine, and the like, but that Light perceiveth and knoweth that there is a Good which is all Good and above all Good, and that all good things are of one substance in the One Good, and that without that One, there is no good thing. And therefore, where this Light is, the man’s end and aim is not this or that, Me or Thee, or the like, but only the One, who is neither I nor Thou, this nor that, but is above all I and Thou, this and that; and in Him all Goodness is loved as One Good, according to that saying: “All in One as One, and One in All as All, and One and all Good, is loved through the One in One, and for the sake of the One, for the love that man hath to the One.” Behold, in such a man must all thought of Self, all self-seeking, self-will, and what cometh thereof, be utterly lost and surrendered and given over to God, except in so far as they are necessary to make up a person. And whatever cometh to pass in a man who is truly Godlike, whether he do or suffer, all is done in this Light and this Love, and from the same, through the same, unto the same again. And in his heart there is a content and a quietness, so that he doth not desire to know more or less, to have, to live, to die, to be, or not to be, or anything of the kind; these become all one and alike to him, and he complaineth of nothing but of sin only. And what sin is, we have said already, namely, to desire or will anything otherwise than the One Perfect Good and the One Eternal Will, and apart from and contrary to them, or to wish to have a will of one’s own.

(147) I do not write this for my own praise, but to that end that the Reader may know wherein my knowledge stands, that he might not seek that from me which I have not, or think me to be what I am not.