(35) For when men speak of the mercy of God the Father, they speak of his power, of his fountain spirits, of the qualities which are in the Salitter, out of which his most richly loving Heart or Son is generated. Observe here:

(7) But further, Almighty God is celebrated as justice, as distributing things suitable to all, both due measure, and beauty, and good order, and arrangement, and marking out all distributions and orders for each, according to that which truly is the most just limit, and as being Cause for all of the free action of each. For the Divine Justice arranges and disposes all things, and preserving all things unmingled and unconfused, from all, gives to all existing beings things convenient for each, according to the due falling to each existing thing. And, if we speak correctly, all those who abuse the Divine Justice, unconsciously convict themselves of a manifest injustice. For they say, that immortality ought to be in mortals, and perfection in the imperfect, and imposed necessity in the free, and identity in the variable, and perfect power in the weak, and the temporal should be eternal, and things moveable by nature, unchangeable, and that temporary pleasures should be eternal; and in one word, they assign the properties of one thing to another. They ought to know that the Divine Justice in this respect is really a true justice, because it distributes to all the things proper to themselves, according to the fitness of each existing thing, and preserves the nature of each in its own order and capacity.

(4) Now the excellence of knowledge is evidently presented by the prophet when he says, "Benignity, and instruction, and knowledge teach me," magnifying the supremacy of perfection by a climax. He is, then, the truly kingly man; he is the sacred high priest of God. And this is even now observed among the most sagacious of the Barbarians, in advancing the sacerdotal caste to the royal power. He, therefore, never surrenders himself to the rabble that rules supreme over the theatres, and gives no admittance even in a dream to the things which are spoken, done, and seen for the sake of alluring pleasures; neither, therefore, to the pleasures of sight, nor the various pleasures which are found in other enjoyments, as costly incense and odours, which bewitch the nostrils, or preparations of meats, and indulgences in different wines, which ensnare the palate, or fragrant bouquets of many flowers, which through the senses effeminate the soul. But always tracing up to God the grave enjoyment of all things, he offers the first-fruits of food, and drink, and unguents to the Giver of all, acknowledging his thanks in the gift and in the use of them by the Word given to him. He rarely goes to convivial banquets of all and sundry, unless the announcement to him of the friendly and harmonious character of the entertainment induce him to go. For he is convinced that God knows and perceives all things - not the words only, but also the thought; since even our sense of hearing, which acts through the passages of the body, has the apprehension [be longing to it] not through corporeal power, but through a psychical perception, and the intelligence which distinguishes significant sounds. God is not, then, possessed of human form, so as to hear; nor needs He senses, as the Stoics have decided, "especially hearing and sight; for He could never otherwise apprehend." But the susceptibility of the air, and the intensely keen perception of the angels, and the power which reaches the soul's consciousness, by ineffable power and without sensible hearing, know all things at the moment of thought. And should any one say that the voice does not reach God, but is rolled downwards in the air, yet the thoughts of the saints cleave not the air only, but the whole world. And the divine power, with the speed of light, sees through the whole soul. Well! Do not also volitions speak to God, uttering their voice? And are they not conveyed by conscience? And what voice shall He wait for, who, according to His purpose, knows the elect already, even before his birth, knows what is to be as already existent? Does not the light of power shine down to the very bottom of the whole soul; "the lamp of knowledge," as the Scripture says, searching "the recesses"?

(1) HERE I must encounter with the proud and seeming conceited Wise, who does but grope in the Dark, and knows or understands nothing of the Spirit of God, and must comfort both him, and also the desirous longing Reader who loves God, and must show them a little Door to the heavenly Essence; and show them in what Manner they should understand these Writings, before I come to the Chapter itself.

(1) NEVERTHELESS, somewhat of this subtlety shall I tell thee as me think. Prove thou and do better, if thou better mayest. Do that in thee is, to let be as thou wist not that they press so fast upon thee betwixt thee and thy God. And try to look as it were over their shoulders, seeking another thing: the which thing is God, enclosed in a cloud of unknowing. And if thou do thus, I trow that within short time thou shalt be eased of thy travail. I trow that an this device be well and truly conceived, it is nought else but a longing desire unto God, to feel Him and see Him as it may be here: and such a desire is charity, and it obtaineth always to be eased.

(40) Now the chaste Virgin ought to be bent into the Heart of God, and to have no Imagination to lust after the Beauty of the comely young Man; but yet the young Man was kindled with Love towards the Virgin, and he desired to copulate with her; for he said, thou art my dearest Spouse [or Bride,] my Paradise, and Garland of Roses, let me into thy Paradise: I will be impregnated in thee, that I may get thy Essence, and enjoy thy pleasant Love; how willingly would I taste of the friendly Sweetness of thy Virtue [or Power?] If I might but receive thy glorious Light, how full of Joy should I be?

(5) Then will He sometimes peradventure send out a beam of ghostly light, piercing this cloud of unknowing that is betwixt thee and Him; and shew thee some of His privity, the which man may not, nor cannot speak. Then shalt thou feel thine affection inflamed with the fire of His love, far more than I can tell thee, or may or will at this time. For of that work, that falleth to only God, dare I not take upon me to speak with my blabbering fleshly tongue: and shortly to say, although I durst I would do not. But of that work that falleth to man when he feeleth him stirred and helped by grace, list me well tell thee: for therein is the less peril of the two.

(2) And all this is after the disposition and the ordinance of God, all after the profit and the needfulness of diverse creatures. For some creatures be so weak and so tender in spirit, that unless they were somewhat comforted by feeling of such sweetness, they might on nowise abide nor bear the diversity of temptations and tribulations that they suffer and be travailed with in this life of their bodily and ghostly enemies. And some there be that they be so weak in body that they may do no great penance to cleanse them with. And these creatures will our Lord cleanse full graciously in spirit by such sweet feelings and weepings. And also on the tother part there be some creatures so strong in spirit, that they can pick them comfort enough within in their souls, in offering up of this reverent and this meek stirring of love and accordance of will, that them needeth not much to be fed with such sweet comforts in bodily feelings. Which of these be holier or more dear with God, one than another, God wots and I not.

(2) And if he ask thee, “What is that God?” say thou, that it is God that made thee and bought thee, and that graciously hath called thee to thy degree. “And in Him,” say, “thou hast no skill.” And therefore say, “Go thou down again,” and tread him fast down with a stirring of love, although he seem to thee right holy, and seem to thee as he would help thee to seek Him. For peradventure he will bring to thy mind diverse full fair and wonderful points of His kindness, and say that He is full sweet, and full loving, full gracious, and full merciful. And if thou wilt hear him, he coveteth no better; for at the last he will thus jangle ever more and more till he bring thee lower, to the mind of His Passion.

(1) Moreover, you inquire, and at the same time doubt, “ how it comes to pass that the Gods do not hear him who invokes them, if he is impure from venereal connexions; but, at the same time, they do not refuse to lead any one to illegal venery .” You have, indeed, a clear solution of these things from what has been before said; if they are done contrary to [human] laws, but are effected according to another order and cause more excellent than laws. Or if it happens that things of this kind are conformable to the mundane harmony and friendship, yet produce a conflict in parts through a certain sympathy. Or if the communication of good, which is beautifully imparted, is perverted by those that receive it to the contrary.

(30) We must consider in the Virtue [or Power] of the Virgin, that the Will first is threefold, and each in its Center is fixed [stedfast or perfect] and pure, for it proceeds out of the Tincture. In the first Center there springs up between the Parents of the Child the Inclination [or Lust,] and the bestial Desire to copulate; this is the outward elementary Center, and it is fixed in itself. Secondly, there springs up, in the second Center, the inclinable Love to the Copulation; and although they were at the first Sight angry and odious one to another, yet in the Copulating the Center of Love springs up, and that only in the Copulating; for the one pure Tincture receives [or catches] the other, and in the Copulating the tMass receives them both.

(13) In the first place, everyone of man's faculties has its appropriate function which it delights to fulfill. This holds good of them all, from the lowest bodily appetite to the highest form of intellectual apprehension. But even a comparatively low form of mental exertion affords greater pleasure than the satisfaction of bodily appetites. Thus, if a man happens to be absorbed in a game of chess, he will not come to his meal, though repeatedly summoned. And the higher the subject-matter of our knowledge, the greater is our delight in it; for instance, we would take more pleasure in knowing the secrets of a king than the secrets of a vizier. Seeing, then, that God is the highest possible object of knowledge, the knowledge of Him must afford more delight than any other. He who knows God, even in this world, dwells, as it were, in a paradise, "the breadth of which is as the breadth of the Heavens and the Earth," a paradise the fruits of which no envy can prevent him plucking, and the extent of which is not narrowed by the multitude of those who occupy it.

(13) This [Image] is not the Heart of God, but it reaches into the Heart of God, and it receives Virtue, Light and Joy from the Heart and Light of God. For it is in the eternal Will of the Father, out of which he [the Father] continually generates his Heart and Word from Eternity; and ehis Essences, which, in the Element of his Body, viz. [in the Element] of Ignorance in the eternal Wonders of God now breathed into him, they (in respect of the high triumphing Light, out of the Heart and Light of God) were Paradise; his Meat and Drink was Paradise, out of the Element, in his Will; whereby then he drew the Virtue of the eternal Wonders of God into him, and generated the Noise [Voice] Sound, or the eternal Hymn of the eternal Wonders of God, out of himself before the Will; and all this stood before the chaste, high, noble, and blessed Virgin, the divine Wisdom, in a pleasant Sport, and was the right Paradise.

(1) IF we consider ourselves in the noble Knowledge, which is opened to us in the Love of God, in the noble Virgin of the Wisdom of God, (not for our Merit, Honesty, [Virtue,] or Worthiness, but merely of his own Will, and original eternal Purpose) even in those Things which appear to us in his Love, then we must needs acknowledge ourselves to be unworthy of such a Revelation; and seeing we are Sinners, we are deficient in the Glory that we should have before him.

(59) But when the bitter flash, together with the astringent quality and the fire-spirit, tasteth this meekness, there is nothing else then but a mere longing, desiring and replenishing, a very gentle, pleasant tasting, wrestling, kissing and lovebirth: For the severe births of all the qualifying or fountain spirits become, in this [inter]penetration very gentle, pleasant, humble and friendly, and the very Deity rightly subsisteth therein.

(64) Now God has no malicious Soul [to be] in the Love, but in the Anger; and he is the Searcher of the Hearts, and knows well what is in Man, and what he will do, even while [Man] is in the Seed, and will not cast the Pearl before Swine; and yet the false [or evil] Seed is not [come] out of his Will and Purpose, else he must also have willed the Devil to be a Devil.

(16) The Knowledge that is in the infinite God is various and manifold, but every one should rejoice in the Gifts and Knowledge of another, and consider, that God will give such superabundant Knowledge in the paradisical World, of which we have here (in the Variety and Difference of Gifts) but a Type: Therefore we must not wrangle nor contend about Gifts and Knowledge; for the Spirit gives to every one according to his Essence in the wonderful God, to express that [Gift he has] after his own Form [or Manner;] for that [Form] in the Perfection of Love in Paradise will be a very inward hearty Sport of Love, where every one shall speak from his Knowledge of the great Wonders of the tholy Birth.

(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.

(1) In the first place, it is requisite to know this, that the good man is not immediately happy from necessity; but that this is the case with the man who is both happy and good. For the happy man obtains both praise and the predication of blessedness; but the good man far as he is good obtains praise alone. The praise also arises from virtue; but the predication of blessedness from good fortune. And the worthy man, indeed, becomes such from the goods which he possesses; but the happy man is sometimes deprived of his felicity. For the power of virtue is perfectly free, but that of felicity is subject to restraint. For long-continued diseases of the body, and deprivations of the senses, cause the florishing condition of felicity to waste away.

God, however, differs from a good man in this, that God indeed not only possesses virtue genuine and purified from every mortal passion, but his power also is unwearied and unrestrained, as being adapted to the most venerable and magnificent production of eternal works. Man indeed, by the mortal condition of his nature, not only enjoys this power and this virtue in a less degree; but sometimes through the want of symmetry in the goods which he possesses, or through powerful custom, or a depraved nature, or through many other causes, he is unable to possess in the extreme a good which is perfectly true.

(1) The multitude, also, are accustomed to doubt in common the very same thing concerning providence, viz. why certain persons are afflicted undeservedly, as they have not done any thing unjustly prior to their being thus afflicted. For neither here is it possible to understand [perfectly] what the soul is, and its whole life, how many offences it has committed in former lives, and whether it now suffers from its former guilt. In this life, also, many unjust actions are concealed from human knowledge, but are known to the Gods, since neither is the same scope of justice proposed to them as to men. For men, indeed, define justice to be the soul’s performance of its own proper business, and the distribution of desert, conformably to the established laws, and the prevailing polity. But the Gods, looking to the whole orderly arrangement of the world, and to the subserviency of souls to the Gods, form a judgment of what is just. Hence the judgment of just actions with the Gods is different from what it is with us. Nor is it wonderful, if we are unable, in most things, to arrive at the supreme and most perfect judgment of more excellent natures.