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I mean a more suitable reason, not the one from artifice in speech according to eloquence, elegantly enchanting for the pleasure of hearing, which even wicked men who practice it could exercise, but the one which nature possesses essentially and without learning according to disposition, hidden for both the unerring contemplation of beings and the apprehension of the truth in all things, which the Holy Spirit of God, when it has been well-formed by the virtues, 14Β_020 is naturally led to live with and to fashion into a divine image of His beauty according to likeness, lacking in nothing by grace that naturally belongs to the Godhead (for it is an instrument knowledgeably gathering the whole manifestation of the divine goodness that flashes forth intelligibly in beings, through which, entering into the magnificent work of beings, it both brings and is brought to the originating cause of beings those who have directed wholly to it the entire impulse of the desire inherent in them by nature, being in no way at all overcome by any of the things after the cause), which we, by cherishing, become conquerors of all wicked passions, enslaved to nothing contrary to nature, and are shown to be agents of all the divine virtues, scraping away, obviously, with every good thing the soul's material shame for the sake of spiritual beauty; for where reason prevails, the power of sense perception naturally ceases, in which the power of sin is somehow mixed, dragging the soul through pleasure toward pity for the kindred flesh according to hypostasis; by which, having entrusted to it as a natural work the passionate and pleasure-driven care of the flesh, it leads it away from the life according to nature and persuades it to become a creator of unsubstantial evil; for evil is the forgetting of the natural goods by the intellectual soul, which comes from the passionate relation to the flesh and the world, which reason, acting as a general, makes disappear, and according to spiritual knowledge, investigating both the genesis and nature of the world and of the flesh, and driving the soul towards the kindred region of intelligible things, to which the law of sin makes no passage, no longer having sense perception as a bridge to convey it to the intellect, since perception has already been dissolved in its relation to the soul and cast away among sensible spectacles, of whose relation and nature the intellect, having passed beyond, is not at all aware.

Knowing this, as I said, I thought it necessary to give another sort of help to the present discourse of this treatise, namely the writing of the scholia 14Β_022 set forth in the frontispieces, both completing the discourse toward beauty and providing a sweeter feast in the thoughts for those who will read it and becoming a clarification of simply all the meaning contained in the treatise. For after the publication, having read the whole treatise, and having found some places needing clarification, others the addition of meaning, and others some moderate annotation upon the text as published, I made, as I said, this writing of the scholia, fitting the appropriate thought to each place.

Therefore I ask all who will read or even transcribe it to read also the external writing of the scholia and to set it alongside according to each annotation, so that the discourse may be complete in every way, not at all mutilated by anything being neglected.

SCHOLIA 1. Scholia are called things taken from Scripture and found in a way

outside the book like frontispieces, whose exposition has an internal connection. But specifically, hymnology is called scholia, that is, the formal discourses.

2

ἁρμοδιώτερον φημὶ δὲ λόγον, οὐ τὸν ἐκ τέχνης ἐν προφορᾷ κατ᾽ εὐγλωττίαν πρὸς ἀκοῆς ἡδονὴν κομψῶς γεγοητευμένον, ὃν ἀσκεῖσθαι καὶ μοχθηροὶ δύναιντ᾽ ἂν ἄνδρες ἐπιτηδεύοντες, ἀλλ᾽ ὃν ἡ φύσις οὐσιωδῶς καὶ δίχα μαθήσεως κατὰ διάθεσιν ἔχει κρυπτόμενον πρός τε τὴν ἄπταιστον τῶν ὄντων διάσκεψιν καὶ τῆς ἐν ὅλοις ἀληθείας διάληψιν, ὃν καὶ τὸ Πνεῦμα τοῦ Θεοῦ τὸ ἅγιον, καλῶς ταῖς ἀρεταῖς διαπλασθέντα, 14Β_020 πρὸς συμβίωσιν πέφυκεν ἄγεσθαι καὶ θεῖον ἄγαλμα τῆς καθ᾽ ὁμοίωσιν ὡραιότητος αὐτοῦ κατασκευάζειν μηδενὶ τῶν προσόντων φυσικῶς τῇ θεότητι κατὰ τὴν χάριν λειπόμενον (ὄργανον γάρ ἐστιν ὅλην ἐπιστημόνως συλλεγόμενον τὴν νοητῶς ἐν τοῖς οὖσι ἀπαστράπτουσαν τῆς θείας ἀγαθότητος ἔμφασιν, δι᾽ ἧς, ἐμβατεύων τῇ τῶν ὄντων μεγαλουργίᾳ, πρὸς τὴν γενέτην φέρει τε καὶ φέρεται τῶν ὄντων αἰτίαν τοὺς αὐτῷ διόλου ποιώσαντας τὴν ὅλην ὁρμὴν τῆς ἐνούσης αὐτοῖς κατὰ φύσιν ἐφέσεως, μηδενὶ τῶν μετὰ τὴν αἰτίαν παντελῶς κρατουμένους), ὃν ἡμεῖς περιέποντες πάντων μὲν καθιστάμεθα τῶν πονηρῶν παθῶν πανδαμάτορες, μηδενὶ τῶν παρὰ φύσιν δουλούμενοι, πασῶν δὲ τῶν θείων ἀναδεικνύμεθα πράκτορες ἀρετῶν, παντὶ δηλονότι καλῷ τὸ κατὰ τὴν ὕλην αἶσχος τῆς ψυχῆς πρὸς κάλλος πνευματικὸν ἀποξέοντες· ἔνθα γὰρ λόγος κρατεῖ, τὸ κατ᾽ αἴσθησιν πέφυκεν ἀπογίνεσθαι κράτος, ἐν ᾧ τῆς ἁμαρτίας πέφυρταί πως ἡ δύναμις, πρὸς οἶκτον τῆς συγγενοῦς καθ᾽ ὑπόστασιν σαρκὸς τὴν ψυχὴν δι᾽ ἡδονῆς ὑποσύρουσα· καθ᾽ ἥν, ὡς ἔργον αὐτῇ φυσικὸν ἐγχειρίσασα τὴν ἐμπαθῆ καὶ καθ᾽ ἡδονὴν τῆς σαρκὸς ἐπιμέλειαν, ἀπάγει τῆς κατὰ φύσιν ζωῆς καὶ πείθει τῆς ἀνυποστάτου κακίας αὐτὴν γενέσθαι δημιουργόν· κακία γάρ ἐστι ψυχῆς νοερᾶς ἡ λήθη τῶν κατὰ φύσιν καλῶν, ἥτις ἐκ τῆς περὶ τὴν σάρκα τε καὶ κόσμον ἐμπαθοῦς ἐπιγίνεται σχέσεως, ἣν ἀφανίζει στρατηγῶν ὁ λόγος, καὶ κατ᾽ ἐπιστήμην πνευματικὴν τήν τε τοῦ κόσμου καὶ τῆς σαρκὸς διερευνώμενος γένεσίν τε καὶ φύσιν, καὶ πρὸς τὴν συγγενῆ τῶν νοητῶν τὴν ψυχὴν χώραν ἐλαύνων, πρὸς ἣν ὁ νόμος τῆς ἁμαρτίας οὐδεμίαν ποιεῖται διάβασιν, οὐκ ἔχων καθάπερ γέφυραν πρὸς τὸν νοῦν διαβιβάζουσαν αὐτὸν ἔτι τὴν αἴσθησιν, διαλυθεῖσαν ἤδη πρὸς τὴν ψυχὴν κατὰ τὴν σχέσιν καὶ τοῖς αἰσθητοῖς ἐναπορριφεῖσαν θεάμασιν, ὧν διαβὰς τὴν σχέσιν καὶ τὴν φύσιν ὁ νοῦς παντελῶς οὐκ αἰσθάνεται.

Τοῦτο, καθάπερ ἔφην, εἰδώς, δεῖν ᾠήθην ἑτέραν τινὰ τῷ παρόντι λόγῳ τῆσδε τῆς συγγραφῆς δοῦναι βοήθειαν τὴν τῶν 14Β_022 παρατεθέντων ἐν τοῖς μετωπίοις σχολίων γραφήν, αὐτόν τε πρὸς κάλλος συμπληροῦσαν τὸν λόγον καὶ τοῖς ἐντευξομένοις ἡδυτέραν τὴν ἐν τοῖς νοήμασι παρεχομένην ἑστίασιν καὶ πάσης ἁπλῶς γινομένην τῆς ἐμφερομένης τῇ συγγραφῇ διανοίας σαφήνειαν. Μετὰ γὰρ τὴν ἔκδοσιν ἀναγνοὺς τὴν ὅλην πραγματείαν, εὑρών τέ τινας μὲν τόπους δεομένους σαφηνείας, τινὰς δὲ προσθήκης διανοίας, καὶ ἄλλους μετρίας τινὸς ἐπὶ τῷ κειμένῳ κατὰ τὴν ἔκδοσιν ἐπενθυμήσεως, ταύτην ἐποιησάμην, ὡς ἔφην, τὴν τῶν σχολίων γραφήν, ἁρμόσας ἑκάστῳ τόπῳ τὸ προσῆκον ἐνθύμημα.

∆ιὸ παρακαλῶ πάντας τοὺς ἐντευξομένους ἢ καὶ μεταγράψοντας καὶ τὴν τῶν σχολίων ἔξωθεν ἀναγνῶναι καὶ παραθέσθαι γραφὴν κατὰ τὴν ἑκάστου σημείωσιν, ἵν᾽ ἄρτιος ᾖ κατὰ πάντα τρόπον ὁ λόγος, μηδενὶ παρημελημένῳ παντελῶς κολοβούμενος.

ΣΧΟΛΙΑ 1. Σχόλια λέγονται τὰ λαμβανόμενα ἐκ τῆς Γραφῆς καὶ εὑρισκόμενα τρόπῳ

τινὶ ἔξωθεν τοῦ βιβλίου ὡς προμετωπίδες, ὧν ἡ ἔκθεσις ἔχει ἐσωτερικὴν συνάφειαν. Ἰδίᾳ δὲ σχόλια λέγεται ἡ ὑμνολογία, τουτέστιν οἱ ἐπίσημοι λόγοι.