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man, insomuch as He Himself became man. For the one who became man without sin, it is clear that without change into divinity, will deify nature; and He will raise it up through Himself as much as He lowered Himself for man. Teaching this mystically, the great Apostle says that in the ages to come, the surpassing richness of God's goodness towards us will be shown.

1.63 (ξγ΄) Reason, by presiding over anger and desire, creates the virtues; and the intellect, by attending to the principles, gathers the unerring knowledge of created things. When, therefore, reason, after the rejection of opposites, finds that which is lovable according to nature, and the intellect, after the traversing of things knowable, apprehends the Cause beyond the substance and knowledge of beings, then the state of deification according to grace supervenes, leading reason away from natural discrimination, where there is nothing to be discriminated; and causing the intellect to cease from its natural intellection, where there is nothing to be known, and making, by the identity of its stasis, a god of the one who is deemed worthy of divine participation.

1.64 (ξδ΄) The soul, corroded by the filth of pleasure, is cleansed by affliction, which completely strips from it its relation to material things, as it learns the harm of its friendship with them; for which reason God, according to a just judgment, permits the devil to oppress men with torments.

1.65 (ξε΄) Pleasure and pain, desire and fear, and the things that follow them, were not originally co-created with the nature of men; otherwise, they would have contributed to the definition of nature. I say this, having learned from the 1205 great Gregory of Nyssa, that on account of the fall from 15∆_052 perfection, these were introduced, adhering to the more irrational part of nature; through which, instead of the blessed and divine image, immediately with the transgression, the likeness to irrational animals became manifest and evident in man. For it was necessary, the worth of reason having been covered by the marks of irrationality which it had drawn upon itself, that human nature be justly punished; with God wisely managing man so that he might come to an awareness of the nobility of reason.

1.66 (ξστ΄) The passions also become good in the zealous, whenever we wisely detach them from bodily things and employ them for the acquisition of heavenly things; for example, when we make desire an appetitive movement of the intellectual yearning for divine things; and pleasure, the harmless gladness of the mind's alluring activity upon the divine gifts; and fear, a precautionary care against the future punishment for transgressions; and pain, a corrective repentance for a present evil. And to speak concisely, like the wise physicians who remove an existing or planned injury from the body of a destructive beast, the viper, we use these passions for the removal of present or expected evil, and for the acquisition and protection of virtue and knowledge.

1.67 (ξζ΄) The law of the first Covenant, through practical philosophy, cleanses nature from all defilement. The law of the New, through contemplative mystagogy, raises the intellect gnostically from bodily things to the kindred spectacles of intelligible realities.

1.68 (ξη΄) The divine Scripture calls those who are being introduced, and are somewhere at the gateways of the divine court of the virtues, the fearful; those who have acquired a commensurate state of the principles and ways of virtue, it knows to name the progressing; 15∆_054 and those who according to it have already gnostically reached the summit of the manifestive truth of the virtues, it addresses as the perfect. Therefore,

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ἄνθρωπον, ὅσον αὐτός γέγονεν ἄνθρωπος. Ὁ γάρ χωρίς ἁμαρτίας γενόμενος ἄνθρωπος, δῆλον ὅτι χωρίς τῆς εἰς θεότητα μεταβολῆς, τήν φύσιν θεοποιήσει· καί τοσοῦτο ἀναβιβάσει δι᾿ ἑαυτόν, ὅσον αὐτός διά τόν ἄνθρωπον ἑαυτόν κατεβίβασεν. Ὅπερ μυστικῶς διδάσκων ἑαυτόν ὁ μέγας Ἀπόστολος, φησίν, ἐν τοῖς αἰῶσι τοῖς ἐπερχομένοις, τόν εἰς ἡμᾶς ὑπερβάλλοντα πλοῦτον τῆς τοῦ Θεοῦ χρηστότητος δειχθήσεσθαι.

1.63 (ξγ΄) Τοῦ μέν θυμοῦ καί τῆς ἐπιθυμίας ἐπιστατῶν ὁ λόγος, ποιεῖ τάς ἀρετάς· ὁ δέ νοῦς τοῖς λόγοις ἐπιβάλλων, τῶν γεγονότων τήν ἄπταιστον συλλέγεται γνῶσιν. Ὅταν οὖν ὁ λόγος μετά τήν τῶν ἀντικειμένων ἀποβολήν, εὕρῃ τό κατά φύσιν ἑραστόν, καί ὁ νοῦς μετά τήν τῶν γινωσκομένων διάβασιν λάβηται τῆς ὑπέρ οὐσίαν καί γνῶσιν τῶν ὄντων Αἰτίας, τηνικαῦτα τό τῆς θεώσεως κατά χάριν ἐπιγίνεται πάθος, τόν μέν λόγον ἀπάγον τῆς φυσικῆς διακρίσεως, ἔνθα τό διακρινόμενον οὐκ ἔστι· τόν δέ νοῦν καταπαῦον τῆς κατά φύσιν νοήσεως, ἔνθα μή ἔστι τό γινωσκόμενον, καί ποιοῦν τῇ κατά τήν στάσιν ταὐτότητι θεόν, τόν ἀξιούμενον τῆς θείας μεθέξεως.

1.64 (ξδ΄) Κατιωθεῖσαν τήν ψυχήν τῷ ῥύπῳ τῆς ἡδονῆς, ἀποκαθαίρει πόνος, καί ἀφηλοῖ παντελῶς αὐτῆς τήν σχέσιν τῶν ὑλικῶν, τῆς πρός αὐτά φιλίας τήν ζημίαν μεταμαθοῦσαν· δι᾿ ἥν αἰτίαν ὁ Θεός συγχωρεῖ τῷ διαβόλῳ, κατά κρίσιν δικαίαν τούς ἀνθρώπους βασάνοις καταπιέζειν.

1.65 (ξε΄) Ἡδονή καί λύπη, ἐπιθυμία καί φόβος, καί τά τούτοις ἑπόμενα, τῇ φύσει τῶν ἀνθρώπων προηγουμένως οὐ συνεκτίσθη· ἐπεί καί εἰς τόν ὅρον ἄν συνετέλουν τῆς φύσεως. Λέγω δή παρά τοῦ 1205 Νυσαέως μεγάλου Γρηγορίου μαθών, ὅτι διά τήν τῆς 15∆_052 τελειότητος ἔκπτωσιν, ἐπεισήχθη ταῦτα, τῷ ἀλογοτέρῳ μέρει προσφυέντα τῆς φύσεως· δι᾿ ὧν, ἀντί τῆς μακαρίας καί θείας εἰκόνος, εὐθύς ἅμα τῇ παραβάσει, διαφανής καί ἐπίδηλος ἐν τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ γέγονεν ἡ τῶν ἀλόγων ζώων ὁμοίωσις. Ἔδει γάρ τῆς ἀξίας τοῦ λόγου καλυφθείσης, ὑφ᾿ ὧν ἐπεσπάσατο τῆς ἀλογίας γνωρισμάτων, ἐνδίκως τήν φύσιν τῶν ἀνθρώπων κολάζεσθαι· σοφῶς εἰς συναίσθησιν τῆς λογικῆς μεγαλονοίας ἐλθεῖν οἰκονομοῦντος τοῦ Θεοῦ τόν ἄνθρωπον.

1.66 (ξστ΄) Καλά γίνεται καί τά πάθη ἐν τοῖς σπουδαίοις, ὁπηνίκα σοφῶς αὐτά τῶν σωματικῶν ἀποστήσαντες, πρός τήν τῶν οὐρανίων μεταχειριζώμεθα κτῆσιν· οἷον, ὅτε τήν μέν ἐπιθυμίαν, τῆς νοερᾶς τῶν θείων ἐφέσεως ὀρεκτικήν ἐργασόμεθα κίνησιν· τήν ἡδονήν δέ, τῆς ἐπί τοῖς θείοις χαρίσμασι τοῦ νοῦ θελκτικῆς ἐνεργείας εὐφροσύνην ἀπήμονα· τό δέ φόβον, τῆς μελλούσης ἐπί πλημμελήμασι τιμωρίας προφυλακτικήν ἐπιμέλειαν· τήν δέ λύπη, διορθωτικήν ἐπί παρόντι κακῷ μεταμέλειαν. Καί συντόμως εἰπεῖν, κατά τούς σοφούς τῶν ἰατρῶν, σώματι φθαρτικοῦ θηρός τῆς ἐχίδνης, τήν οὖσαν ἤ μελετωμένην ἀφαιρουμένους λώβησιν, τοῖς πάθεσι τούτοις πρός ἀναίρεσιν χρώμενοι παρούσης κακίας ἤ προσδοκωμένης, καί κτῆσιν καί φυλακήν ἀρετῆς τε καί γνώσεως.

1.67 (ξζ΄) Ὁ μέν τῆς πρώτης ∆ιαθήκης νόμος, διά τῆς πρακτικῆς φιλοσοφίας, παντός μολυσμοῦ τήν φύσιν ἀποκαθαίρει. Ὁ δέ τῆς Καινῆς, διά τῆς θεωρητικῆς μυσταγῳγίας, ἀπό τῶν σωματικῶν πρός τά συγγενῆ τῶν νοητῶν θεάματα, τόν νοῦν γνωστικῶς ἀναβιβάζει.

1.68 (ξη΄) Ἡ θεία Γραφή, τούς μέν εἰσαγομένους, καί ἐπί τά προπύλαιά που τυγχάνοντας τῆς θείας αὐλῆς τῶν ἀρετῶν, φοβουμένους καλεῖ· τούς δέ κτησαμένους σύμμετρον ἕξιν τῶν κατ᾿ ἀρετήν λόγων τε καί τρόπων, οἶδεν ὀνομάζειν προκόπτοντας· 15∆_054 τούς δέ κατ᾿ αὐτήν γνωστικῶς ἤδη γεγενημένους τῆς τῶν ἀρετῶν ἐκφαντικῆς ἀληθείας τήν κορυφήν, προσαγορεύει τελείους. Ὁ τοίνυν