(2) So, then, although it may do good to few alone, ’tis proper to develope and explain this thesis:—wherefore Divinity hath deigned to share His science and intelligence with men alone. Give ear, accordingly! When God, [our] Sire and Lord, made man, after the Gods, out of an equal mixture of a less pure cosmic part and a divine,—it [naturally] came to pass the imperfections of the cosmic part remained commingled with [our] frames, and other ones [as well], by reason of the food and sustenance we have out of necessity in common with all lives ; by reason of which things it needs must be that the desires, and passions, and other vices, of the mind should occupy the souls of human kind.

(6) In general, then, an unworthy opinion of God preserves no piety, either in hymns, or discourses, or writings, or dogmas, but diverts to grovelling and unseemly ideas and notions. Whence the commendation of the multitude differs nothing from censure, in consequence of their ignorance of the truth. The objects, then, of desires and aspirations, and, in a word, of the mind's impulses, are the subjects of prayers. Wherefore, no man desires a draught, but to drink what is drinkable; and no man desires an inheritance, but to inherit.

(8) But some one may say, it is not the mark of justice to leave pious men without assistance, when they are ground down by evil men. To which we must reply, that, if those whom you call pious do indeed love things on earth, which are zealously sought after by the earthly, they have altogether fallen from the Divine Love. And I do not know how they could be called pious, when they unjustly treat things truly loveable and divine, which do not at once surpass in influence in their estimation things undesirable and unloveable. But, if they love the realities, they who desire certain things ought to rejoice when they attain the things desired. Are they not then nearer the angelic virtues, when, as far as possible, by aspiration after things Divine, they withdraw from the affection for earthly things, by being exercised very manfully to this, in their perils, on behalf of the beautiful? So that, it is true to say, that this is rather a property of the Divine Justice--not to pamper and destroy the bravery of the best, by the gifts of earthly things, nor, if any one should attempt to do this, to leave them without assistance, but to establish them in the excellent and harsh condition, and to dispense to them, as being such, things meet for them.

(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.

(11) We will now explain, in detail, to the best of our ability, certain works of God, of which we spoke. For I am not competent to sing all, much less to know accurately, and to reveal their mysteries to others. Now whatever things have been sung and ministered by the inspired Hierarchs, agreeably to the Oracles, these we will declare, as far as attainable to us, invoking the Hierarchical inspiration to our aid. When, in the beginning, our human nature had thoughtlessly fallen from the good things of God, it received, by inheritance, the life subject to many passions, and the goal of the destructive death. For, as a natural consequence, the pernicious falling away from genuine goodness and the transgression of the sacred Law in Paradise delivered the man fretted with the life-giving yoke, to his own downward inclinations and the enticing and hostile wiles of the adversary--the contraries of the divine goods; thence it pitiably exchanged for the eternal, the mortal, and, having had its own origin in deadly generations, the goal naturally corresponded with the beginning; but having willingly fallen from the Divine and elevating life, it was carried to the contrary extremity,--the variableness of many passions, and lead astray, and turned aside from the strait way leading to the true God,--and subjected to destructive and evil-working multitudes--naturally forgot that it was worshipping, not gods, or friends, but enemies. Now when these had treated it harshly, according to their own cruelty, it fell pitiably into danger of annihilation and destruction; but the boundless Loving-kindness of the supremely Divine goodness towards man did not, in Its benevolence, withdraw from us Its spontaneous forethought, but having truly participated sinlessly in all things belonging to us, and having been made one with our lowliness in connection with the unconfused and flawless possession of Its own properties in full perfection, It bequeathed to us, as henceforth members of the same family, the communion with Itself, and proclaimed us partakers of Its own beautiful things; having, as the secret teaching holds, loosed the power of the rebellious multiplicity, which was against us; not by force, as having the upper hand, but, according to the Logion, mystically transmitted to us, "in judgment and righteousness." The things within us, then, It benevolently changed to the entire contrary. For the lightless within Our mind It filled with blessed and most Divine Light, and adorned the formless with Godlike beauties; the tabernacle of our soul It liberated from most damnable passions and destructive stains by a perfected deliverance of our being which was all but prostrate, by shewing to us a supermundane elevation, and an inspired polity in our religious assimilation to Itself, as far as is possible.

(12) But, inasmuch as the Divine Being is source of sacred order, within which the holy Minds regulate themselves, he, who recurs to the proper view of Nature, will see his proper self in what he was originally, and will acquire this, as the first holy gift, from his recovery to the light. Now he, who has well looked upon his own proper condition with unbiassed eyes, will depart from the gloomy recesses of ignorance, but being imperfect he will not, of his own accord, at once desire the most perfect union and participation of God, but little by little will be carried orderly and reverently through things present to things more forward, and through these to things foremost, and when perfected, to the supremely Divine summit. An illustration of this decorous and sacred order is the modesty of the proselyte, and his prudence in his own affairs in having the sponsor as leader of the way to the Hierarch. The Divine Blessedness receives the man, thus conducted, into communion with Itself, and imparts to him the proper light as a kind of sign, making him godly and sharer of the inheritance of the godly, and sacred ordering; of which things the Hierarch's seal, given to the proselyte, and the saving enrolment of the priests are a sacred symbol, registering him amongst those who are being saved, and placing in the sacred memorials, beside himself also his sponsor,--the one indeed, as a true lover of the life-giving way to truth and a companion of a godly guide, and the other, as an unerring conductor of his follower by the Divinely-taught directions.

(10) "We must therefore put on the panoply of God, that we may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil; since the weapons of our war fire are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down reasonings, and every lofty thing which exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity unto the obedience of Christ," says the divine apostle. There is need of a man who shall use in a praiseworthy and discriminating manner the things from which passions take their rise, as riches and poverty, honour and dishonour, health and sickness, life and death, toil and pleasure. For, in order that we may treat things, that are different, indifferently, there is need of a great difference in us, as having been previously afflicted with much feebleness, and in the distortion of a bad training and nurture ignorantly indulged ourselves. The simple word, then, of our philosophy declares the passions to be impressions on the soul that is soft and yielding, and, as it were, the signatures of the spiritual powers with whom we have to straggle. For it is the business, in my opinion, of the malificent powers to endeavour to produce somewhat of their own constitution in everything, so as to overcome and make their own those who have renounced them. And it follows, as might be expected, that some are worsted; but in the case of those who engage in the contest with more athletic energy, the powers mentioned above, after carrying on the conflict in all forms, and advancing even as far as the crown wading in gore, decline the battle, and admire the victors.

(3) But to pass over the mystical things there, both as forbidden to the multitude and as known to thee, when it was necessary to communicate to the multitude, and to bring as many as possible to the sacred knowledge amongst ourselves, he so excelled the majority of sacred teachers, both by use of time and purity of mind, and accuracy of demonstrations, and by his other sacred discourses, that we should scarcely have dared to look so great a sun straight in the face. For we are thus far conscious in ourselves, and know, that we may neither advance to understand sufficiently the intelligible of Divine things, nor to express and declare the things spoken of the divine knowledge. For, being far removed from the skill of those divine men, as regards theological truth, we are so inferior that we should have, through excessive reverence, entirely come to this--neither to hear nor to speak anything respecting divine philosophy, unless we had grasped in our mind, that we must not neglect the knowledge of things divine received by us. And to this we were persuaded, not only by the innate aspirations of the minds which always lovingly cling to the permitted contemplation of the supernatural, but also by the most excellent order itself of the Divine institutions, which prohibits us, on the one hand, from much inquisition into things above us, as above our degree, and as unattainable; yet, on the other hand, persistently urges us to graciously impart to others also whatever is permitted and given to us to learn. Yielding then to these considerations, and neither shirking nor flinching from the attainable discovery of things Divine, but also not bearing to leave unassisted those who are unable to contemplate things too high for us, we have brought ourselves to composition, not daring indeed to introduce anything new, but by more easy and more detailed expositions to disentangle and elucidate the things spoken by the Hierotheus indeed. Next: Caput IV. Sacred Texts | Christianity « Previous: The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite: On Divine Names: C... Index Next: The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite: On Divine Names: C... » Sacred Texts | Christianity

(13) Yet it is not possible to hold, conjointly, qualities thoroughly opposed, nor that a man who has had a certain fellowship with the One should have divided lives, if he clings to the firm participation in the One; but he must be resistless and resolute, as regards all separations from the uniform. This it is which the teaching of the symbols reverently and enigmatically intimates, by stripping the proselyte, as it were, of his former life, and discarding to the very utmost the habits within that life, makes him stand naked and barefoot, looking away towards the west, whilst he spurns, by the aversion of his hands, the participations in the gloomy baseness, and breathes out, as it were, the habit of dissimilarity which he had acquired, and professes the entire renunciation of everything contrary to the Divine likeness. When the man has thus become invincible and separate from evil, it turns him towards the east, declaring clearly that his position and recovery will be purely in the Divine Light, in the complete separation from baseness; and receiving his sacred promises of entire consort with the One, since he has become uniform through love of the truth. Yet it is pretty evident, as I think, to those versed in Hierarchical matters, that things intellectual acquire the unchangeableness of the Godlike habit, by continuous and persistent struggles towards one, and by the entire destruction and annihilation of things contrary. For it is necessary that a man should not only depart from every kind of baseness, but he must be also bravely obdurate and ever fearless against the baneful submission to it. Nor must he, at any time, become remiss in his sacred love of the truth, but with all his power persistently and perpetually be elevated towards it, always religiously pursuing his upward course, to the more perfect mysteries of the Godhead.

(3) The holy consecration, then, which we are now extolling, is, as I said, of the perfecting rank and capacity of the Hierarchical functions. Wherefore our Divine Leaders arranged the same, as being of the same rank and effect as the holy perfecting of the Synaxis, with the same figures, for the most part, and with mystical regulations and lections. And you may see in like manner the Hierarch bearing forward the sweet perfume from the more holy place into the sacred precincts beyond, and teaching, by the return to the same, that the participation in things Divine comes to all holy persons, according to fitness, and is undiminished and altogether unmoved and stands unchangeably in its identity, as beseems Divine fixity. In the same way the Psalms and readings of the Oracles nurse the imperfect to a life-bringing adoption of sons, and form a religious inclination in those who are possessed with accursed spirits, and dispel the opposing fear and effeminacy from those possessed by a spirit of unmanliness; shewing to them, according to their capacity, the highest pinnacle of the Godlike habit and power, by aid of which they will, the rather, scare away the opposing forces, and will take the lead in healing others; and, following the example of God, they will, whilst unmoved from their own proper gifts, not only be active against those opposing fears, but will themselves give activity to others; and they also impart a religious habit to those who have changed from the worse to a religious mind, so that they should not be again enslaved by evil, and purify completely those who need to become altogether pure; and they lead the holy to the Divine likenesses, and contemplations and communions belonging to themselves, and so establish those who are entirely holy, in blessed and intelligible visions, fulfilling their uniform likeness of the One, and making them one.

(1) What can it be that has brought the souls to forget the father, God, and, though members of the Divine and entirely of that world, to ignore at once themselves and It?

The evil that has overtaken them has its source in self-will, in the entry into the sphere of process, and in the primal differentiation with the desire for self ownership. They conceived a pleasure in this freedom and largely indulged their own motion; thus they were hurried down the wrong path, and in the end, drifting further and further, they came to lose even the thought of their origin in the Divine. A child wrenched young from home and brought up during many years at a distance will fail in knowledge of its father and of itself: the souls, in the same way, no longer discern either the divinity or their own nature; ignorance of their rank brings self-depreciation; they misplace their respect, honouring everything more than themselves; all their awe and admiration is for the alien, and, clinging to this, they have broken apart, as far as a soul may, and they make light of what they have deserted; their regard for the mundane and their disregard of themselves bring about their utter ignoring of the divine.

Admiring pursuit of the external is a confession of inferiority; and nothing thus holding itself inferior to things that rise and perish, nothing counting itself less honourable and less enduring than all else it admires could ever form any notion of either the nature or the power of God.

A double discipline must be applied if human beings in this pass are to be reclaimed, and brought back to their origins, lifted once more towards the Supreme and One and First.

There is the method, which we amply exhibit elsewhere, declaring the dishonour of the objects which the Soul holds here in honour; the second teaches or recalls to the soul its race and worth; this latter is the leading truth, and, clearly brought out, is the evidence of the other.

It must occupy us now for it bears closely upon our enquiry to which it is the natural preliminary: the seeker is soul and it must start from a true notion of the nature and quality by which soul may undertake the search; it must study itself in order to learn whether it has the faculty for the enquiry, the eye for the object proposed, whether in fact we ought to seek; for if the object is alien the search must be futile, while if there is relationship the solution of our problem is at once desirable and possible.

(3) Wherefore, the Divine Institution of sacred Rites, having deemed it worthy of the supermundane imitation of the Heavenly Hierarchies, and having depicted the aforesaid immaterial Hierarchies in material figures and bodily compositions, in order that we might be borne, as far as our capacity permits, from the most sacred pictures to the instructions and similitudes without symbol and without type, transmitted to us our most Holy Hierarchy. For it is not possible for our mind to be raised to that immaterial representation and contemplation of the Heavenly Hierarchies, without using the material guidance suitable to itself, accounting the visible beauties as reflections of the invisible comeliness; and the sweet odours of the senses as emblems of the spiritual distribution; and the material lights as a likeness of the gift of the immaterial enlightenment; and the detailed sacred instructions, of the feast of contemplation within the mind; and the ranks of the orders here, of the harmonious and regulated habit, with regard to Divine things; and the reception of the most Divine Eucharist, of the partaking of Jesus, and whatever other things were transmitted to Heavenly Beings supermundanely, but to us symbolically. For the sake, then, of this our proportioned deification, the philanthropic Source of sacred mysteries, by manifesting the Heavenly Hierarchies to us, and constituting our Hierarchy as fellow-ministers with them, through our imitation of their Godlike priestliness, so far as in us lies, described under sensible likeness the supercelestial Minds, in the inspired compositions of the Oracles, in order that It might lead us through the sensible to the intelligible, and from inspired symbols to the simple sublimities of the Heavenly Hierarchies.

(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?

(5) Necessarily, then, the first leaders of our Hierarchy, after having been filled themselves with the sacred gift, from the superessential Godhead, and sent, by the supremely Divine Goodness, to extend the same gift successively, and, as godly, earnestly desiring themselves the elevation and deification of those after them, presented to us--by their written and unwritten revelations--in accordance with their sacred injunctions, things supercelestial, by sensible images, the enfolded, by variety and multitude, and things Divine, by things human, and things immaterial, by things material, and the superessential, by things belonging to us. Nor did they do this merely on account of the unhallowed, to whom it is not permitted even to touch the symbols, but because our Hierarchy is, as I said, a kind of symbol adapted to our condition, which needs things sensible, for our more Divine elevation from these to things intelligible. Nevertheless the reasons of the symbols have been revealed to the Divine initiators, which it is not permitted to explain to those who are yet being initiated, knowing that the Lawgivers of things divinely transmitted deliberately arranged the Hierarchy in well-established and unconfused ranks, and in proportionate and sacred distributions of that which was convenient to each, according to fitness. Wherefore trusting in thy sacred promises (for it is a pious duty to recall them to thy recollection) -- that, since every Hierarchical sacred word is of binding force, thou wilt not communicate to any other but those Godlike initiators of the same rank with thyself, and wilt persuade them to promise, according to hierarchical regulation, to touch pure things purely, and to communicate the mysteries of God to the godly alone, and things perfect to those capable of perfection, and things altogether most holy to the holy, I have entrusted this Divine gift to thee, in addition to many other Hierarchical gifts.

(4) In fine, He hath made man both good and able to share in immortal life,—out of two natures, [one] mortal, [one] divine. And just because he is thus fashioned by the Will of God, it is appointed that man should be superior both to the Gods, who have been made of an immortal nature only, and also to all mortal things. It is because of this that man, being joined unto the Gods by kinsmanship, doth reverence them with piety and holy mind; while, on their side, the Gods with pious sympathy regard and guard all things of men. XXIII

(2) All such things, then, are alien from man,—even his body. So that we can despise not only what we long for, but also that from which the vice of longing comes to us. For just as far as the increase of reason leads our soul, so far one should be man; in order that by contemplating the divine, one should look down upon, and disregard the mortal part, which hath been joined to him, through the necessity of helping on the lower world.

(4) "O manhood mine, why dost thou vanish so?" I said within myself; for I perceived The vigour of my legs was put in truce. We at the point were where no more ascends The stairway upward, and were motionless, Even as a ship, which at the shore arrives; And I gave heed a little, if I might hear Aught whatsoever in the circle new; Then to my Master turned me round and said: "Say, my sweet Father, what delinquency Is purged here in the circle where we are? Although our feet may pause, pause not thy speech." And he to me: "The love of good, remiss In what it should have done, is here restored; Here plied again the ill-belated oar; But still more openly to understand, Turn unto me thy mind, and thou shalt gather Some profitable fruit from our delay. Neither Creator nor a creature ever, Son," he began, "was destitute of love Natural or spiritual; and thou knowest it. The natural was ever without error; But err the other may by evil object, Or by too much, or by too little vigour.

(4) It is, then, possible to frame in one's mind good contemplations from everything, and to depict, from things material, the aforesaid dissimilar similitudes, both for the intelligible and the intelligent; since the intelligent hold in a different fashion things which are attributed to things sensible differently. For instance, appetite, in the irrational creatures, takes its rise in the passions, and their movement, which takes the form of appetite, is full of all kinds of unreasonableness. But with regard to the intelligent, we must think of the appetite in another fashion, as denoting, according to my judgment, their manly style, and their determined persistence in their Godlike and unchangeable steadfastness. In like manner we say, with regard to the irrational creatures, that lust is a certain uncircumspect and earthly passionate attachment, arising incontinently from an innate movement, or intimacy in things subject to change, and the irrational supremacy of the bodily desire, which drives the whole organism towards the object of sensual inclination. But when we attribute "lust" to spiritual beings, by clothing them with dissimilar similitudes, we must think that it is a Divine love of the immaterial, above expression and thought, and the inflexible and determined longing for the supernally pure and passionless contemplation, and for the really perpetual and intelligible fellowship in that pure and most exalted splendour, and in the abiding and beautifying comeliness. And 'incontinence' we may take for the persistent and inflexible, which nothing can repulse, on account of the pure and changeless love for the Divine beauty, and the whole tendency towards the really desired. But with regard to the irrational living beings, or soulless matter, we appropriately call their irrationality and want of sensible perception a deprivation of reason and sensible perception. And with regard to the immaterial and intelligent beings, we reverently acknowledge their superiority, as supermundane beings, over our discursive and bodily reason, and the material perception of the senses which is alien to the incorporeal Minds. It is, then, permissible to depict forms, which are not discordant, to the celestial beings, even from portions of matter which are the least honourable, since even it, having had its beginning from the Essentially Beautiful, has throughout the whole range of matter some echoes of the intellectual comeliness; and it is possible through these to be led to the immaterial archetypes--things most similar being taken, as has been said, dissimilarly, and the identities being denned, not in the same way, but harmoniously, and appropriately, as regards the intellectual and sensible beings.

(1) Now of that dual nature,—that is to say of man,—there is a chief capacity. [And that is] piety, which goodness follows after. [And] this [capacity] then, and then only, seems to be perfected, if it be fortified with virtue of despising all desires for alien things. For alien from every part of kinship with the Gods are all things on the Earth, whatever are possessed from bodily desires,—to which we rightly give the name “possessions,” in that they are not born with us, but later on begin to be possessed by us; wherefore we call them by the name possessions.

(3) We must, then, in my opinion, pass within the All Holy Mysteries, after we have laid bare the intelligible of the first of the votive gifts, to gaze upon its Godlike beauty, and view the Hierarch, divinely going with sweet fragrance from the Divine Altar to the furthermost bounds of the holy place, and again returning to it to complete the function. For the Blessedness, supremely Divine above all, even if, through Divine goodness, It goes forth to the communion of the holy who participate in It, yet It never goes outside its essential unmoved position and steadfastness; and illuminates all the Godlike in due degree, being always self-centred, and in nowise moved from its own proper identity; so, too, the Divine initiation (sacrament) of the Synaxis, although it has a unique, and simple, and enfolded Source, is multiplied, out of love towards man, into the holy variety of the symbols, and travels through the whole range of the supremely Divine description; yet uniformly it is again collected from these, into its own proper Monady, and unifies those who are being reverently conducted towards it. In the same Godlike manner, the Divine Hierarch, if he benignly lowers to his subordinates his own unique Hierarchical science, by using the multiplicities of the holy enigmas, yet again, as absolute, and not to be held in check by smaller things, he is restored to his proper headship without diminution, and, when he has made the intellectual entry of himself to the One, he sees clearly the uniform raisons d'être of the things done, as he makes the goal of his philanthropic progress to things secondary the more Divine return to things primary.