Why105    Macrina’s answer must begin here, though the Paris Editt. take no notice of a break. Krabinger on the authority of one of his Codd. has inserted φησὶν ἡ διδάσκαλος after προνοητέον, either we must plan to keep the soul absolutely untouched and free from any stain of evil; or, if our passionate nature makes that quite impossible, then we must plan that our failures in excellence consist only in mild and easily-curable derelictions. For the Gospel in its teaching distinguishes between106    distinguishes between. The word here is οἶδεν, which is used of “teaching,” “telling,” after the fashion of the later Greek writers, in making a quotation. a debtor of ten thousand talents and a debtor of five hundred pence, and of fifty pence and of a farthing107    of a farthing. No mention is made of this in the Parable (S. Matt. xviii. 23; S. Luke vii. 41). The “uttermost farthing” of S. Matt. v. 26 does not apply here., which is “the uttermost” of coins; it proclaims that God’s just judgment reaches to all, and enhances the payment necessary as the weight of the debt increases, and on the other hand does not overlook the very smallest debts. But the Gospel tells us that this payment of debts was not effected by the refunding of money, but that the indebted man was delivered to the tormentors until he should pay the whole debt; and that means nothing else than paying in the coin of torment108    διὰ τῆς βασάνου. Of course διὰ cannot go with ὀφειλὴν, though Krabinger translates “per tormenta debita.” He has however, with Oehler, pointed the Greek right, so as to take ὄφλημα as in opposition to ὀφειλὴν the inevitable recompense, the recompense, I mean, that consists in taking the share of pain incurred during his lifetime, when he inconsiderately chose mere pleasure, undiluted with its opposite; so that having put off from him all that foreign growth which sin is, and discarded the shame of any debts, he might stand in liberty and fearlessness. Now liberty is the coming up to a state which owns no master and is self-regulating109    a state which owns no master and is self-regulating, &c. He repeats this, De Hom. Opif. c. 4: “For the soul immediately shows its royal and exalted character, far removed from the lowliness of private station, in that it owns no master, and is self-governed, swayed autocratically by its own will,—for to whom else does this belong than to a king?” and c. 16: “Thus, there is in us the principle of all excellence, all virtue, and every higher thing that we conceive: but pre-eminent among all is the fact that we are free from necessity, and not in bondage to any natural force, but have decision in our power as we please: for virtue is a voluntary thing, subject to no dominion:” and Orat. Catech. c. 5: “Was it not, then, most right that that which is in every detail made like the Divine should possess in its nature a self-ruling and independent principle, such as to enable the participation of the good to be the reward of its virtue?” It would be possible to quote similar language from the Neoplatonists (e.g. Plotinus vi. 83–6): but Gregory learnt the whole bearing and meaning of moral liberty from none but Origen, whose so-called “heresies” all flowed from his constant insistence on its reality.; it is that with which we were gifted by God at the beginning, but which has been obscured by the feeling of shame arising from indebtedness. Liberty too is in all cases one and the same essentially; it has a natural attraction to itself. It follows, then, that as everything that is free will be united with its like, and as virtue is a thing that has no master, that is, is free, everything that is free will be united with virtue. But, further, the Divine Being is the fountain of all virtue. Therefore, those who have parted with evil will be united with Him; and so, as the Apostle says, God will be “all in all110    This (1 Cor. xv. 28) is a text much handled by the earlier Greek Fathers. Origen especially has made it one of the Scripture foundations upon which he has built up theology. This passage in Gregory should be compared with the following in Origen, c. Cels. iv. 69, where he has been speaking of evil and its origin, and its disappearance: “God checks the wider spread of evil, and banishes it altogether in a way that is conducive to the good of the whole. Whether or not there is reason to believe that after the banishment of evil it will again appear is a separate question. By later corrections, then, God does put right some defects: for although in the creation of the whole all the work was fair and strong, nevertheless a certain healing process is needed for those whom evil has infected, and for the world itself which it has as it were tainted; and God is never negligent in interfering on certain occasions in a way suitable to a changeful and alterable world,” &c. “He is like a husbandman performing different work at different times upon the land, for a final harvest.” Also viii. 72: “This subject requires much study and demonstration: still a few things must and shall be said at once tending to show that it is not only possible, but an actual truth, that every being that reasons ‘shall agree in one law’ (quoting Celsus’ words). Now while the Stoics hold that when the strongest of the elements has by its nature prevailed over the rest, there shall be the Conflagration, when all things will fall into the fire, we hold that the Word shall some day master the whole of ‘reasoning nature,’ and shall transfigure it to its own perfection, when each with pure spontaneity shall will what it wishes, and act what it wills. We hold that there is no analogy to be drawn from the case of bodily diseases, and wounds, where some things are beyond the power of any art of healing. We do not hold that there are any of the results of sin which the universal Word, and the universal God, cannot heal. The healing power of the Word is greater than any of the maladies of the soul, and, according to the will, He does draw it to Himself: and so the aim of things is that evil should be annihilated: whether with no possibility whatever of the soul ever turning to it again, is foreign to the present discussion. It is sufficient now to quote Zephaniah” (iii. 7–13, LXX.).”; for this utterance seems to me plainly to confirm the opinion we have already arrived at, for it means that God will be instead of all other things, and in all. For while our present life is active amongst a variety of multiform conditions, and the things we have relations with are numerous, for instance, time, air, locality, food and drink, clothing, sunlight, lamplight, and other necessities of life, none of which, many though they be, are God,—that blessed state which we hope for is in need of none of these things, but the Divine Being will become all, and instead of all, to us, distributing Himself proportionately to every need of that existence. It is plain, too, from the Holy Scripture that God becomes, to those who deserve it, locality, and home, and clothing, and food, and drink, and light, and riches, and dominion, and everything thinkable and nameable that goes to make our life happy. But He that becomes “all” things will be “in all” things too; and herein it appears to me that Scripture teaches the complete annihilation of evil111    But, when A. Jahn, as quoted by Krabinger asserts that Gregory and Origen derived their denial of the eternity of punishment from a source “merely extraneous,” i.e. the Platonists, we must not forget that Plato himself in the Phædo, 113 F (cf. also Gorgias, 525 C, and Republic, x. 615), expressly teaches the eternity of punishment hereafter, for he uses there not the word αἰ& 240·ν or αἰωνίος, but οὔποτε. They were influenced rather by the late Platonists.. If, that is, God will be “in all” existing things, evil; plainly, will not then be amongst them; for if any one was to assume that it did exist then, how will the belief that God will be “in all” be kept intact? The excepting of that one thing, evil, mars the comprehensiveness of the term “all.” But He that will be “in all” will never be in that which does not exist.

_Μ. Ὥστε προνοητέον ἢ καθόλου τῶν τῆς κακίας μολυσμάτων φυλάξαι τὴν ψυχὴν ἀμιγῆ τε καὶ ἀκοινώνητον: ἢ εἰ τοῦτο πάντη ἀμήχανον διὰ τὸ ἔμπαθες τῆς φύσεως ἡμῶν, ὡς ὅτι μάλιστα ἐν μετρίοις τισὶ καὶ εὐθεραπεύτοις εἶναι τὰ τῆς ἀρετῆς ἀποτεύγματα. Οἶδε γὰρ ἡ εὐαγγελικὴ διδασκαλία καὶ μυρίων ὀφειλέτην τινὰ ταλάντων, καὶ πεντακοσίων δηναρίων, καὶ πεντήκοντα, καὶ κοδράντου τινὸς, ὅπερ τὸ ἔσχατόν ἐστιν ἐν νομίσμασι: τὴν δὲ τοῦ Θεοῦ δικαίαν κρίσιν διὰ πάντων διεξιέναι, καὶ τῷ βάρει τοῦ ὀφλήματος συνεπιτείνουσαν τὴν ἀνάγκην τῆς ἀπαιτήσεως, καὶ οὐδὲ τῶν σμικροτάτων ὑπερορῶσαν. Τὴν δὲ ἀπόδοσιν τῶν ὀφλημάτων τὸ Εὐαγγέλιον εἶπεν οὐκ ἐκ χρημάτων διαλύσεως γίνεσθαι, ἀλλὰ παραδίδοσθαι τοῖς βασανισταῖς τὸν ὑπόχρεων, ἕως ἂν, φησὶν, ἀποδῷ πᾶν τὸ ὀφειλόμενον: ὅπερ οὐδὲν ἕτερόν ἐστιν, ἢ διὰ τῆς βασάνου τὴν ἀναγκαίαν ὀφειλὴν ἀποτίσαι, τὸ ὄφλημα τῆς τῶν λυπηρῶν μετουσίας, ὧν παρὰ τὸν βίον ὑπόχρεως ἐγένετο, ἀμιγῆ τε καὶ ἄκρατον τοῦ ἐναντίου τὴν ἡδονὴν ὑπὸ ἀβουλίας ἑλόμενος, καὶ οὕτως, ἅπαν ἀποθέμενος τὸ ἀλλότριον ἑαυτοῦ, ὅπερ ἐστὶν ἡ ἁμαρτία, καὶ τὴν ἐκ τῶν ὀφλημάτων αἰσχύνην ἀποδυσάμενος, ἐν ἐλευθερίᾳ τε καὶ παῤῥησίᾳ γένηται. Ἡ δ' ἐλευθερία ἐστὶν ἡ πρὸς τὸ ἀδέσποτόν τε καὶ αὐτοκρατὲς ἐξομοίωσις, ἡ κατ' ἀρχὰς μὲν ἡμῖν παρὰ Θεοῦ δεδωρημένη, συγκαλυφθεῖσα τῇ τῶν ὀφλημάτων αἰσχύνῃ. Πᾶσα δ' ἐλευθερία μία τίς ἐστι τῇ φύσει καὶ πρὸς ἑαυτὴν οἰκείως ἔχει. Ἀκολούθως οὖν πᾶν τὸ ἐλεύθερον τῷ ὁμοίῳ συναρμοσθήσεται: ἀρετὴ δὲ ἀδέσποτον. Οὐκοῦν ἐν ταύτῃ γενήσεται πᾶν τὸ ἐλεύθερον, ἀδέσποτον γὰρ τὸ ἐλεύθερον.
Ἀλλὰ μὴν ἡ θεία φύσις ἡ πηγὴ πάσης ἐστὶ τῆς ἀρετῆς. Ἐν ταύτῃ ἄρα οἱ τῆς κακίας ἀπηλλαγμένοι γενήσονται, ἵνα, καθώς φησιν ὁ Ἀπόστολος, ὁ Θεὸς τὰ πάντα ἐν πᾶσιν. Αὕτη γὰρ ἡ φωνὴ σαφῶς μοι δοκεῖ βεβαιοῦν τὴν προεξητασμένην διάνοιαν, ἡ λέγουσα, καὶ εἰς πάντα γενέσθαι τὸν Θεὸν, καὶ ἐν πᾶσι. Τῆς γὰρ ἐν τῷ παρόντι ζωῆς ποικίλως τε καὶ πολυειδῶς ἡμῖν ἐνεργουμένης, πολλὰ μέν ἐστιν ὧν μετέχομεν, οἷον χρόνου καὶ ἀέρος καὶ τόπου, βρώσεώς τε καὶ πόσεως, καὶ σκεπασμάτων, καὶ ἡλίου, καὶ λύχνου, καὶ ἄλλων πρὸς τὴν χρείαν τοῦ βίου πολλῶν, ὧν οὐδέν ἐστιν ὁ Θεός: ἡ δὲ προσδοκωμένη μακαριότης μὲν οὐδενός ἐστιν ἐπιδεὴς, πάντα δὲ ἡμῖν καὶ ἀντὶ πάντων ἡ θεία γενήσεται φύσις, πρὸς πᾶσαν χρείαν τῆς ζωῆς ἐκείνης ἑαυτὴν ἁρμοδίως ἐπιμερίζουσα. Καὶ τοῦτο δῆλόν ἐστιν ἐκ τῶν θείων λόγων, ὅτι καὶ τόπος γίνεται ὁ Θεὸς τοῖς ἀξίοις, καὶ οἶκος, καὶ ἔνδυμα, καὶ τροφὴ, καὶ πόσις, καὶ φῶς, καὶ πλοῦτος, καὶ βασιλεία, καὶ πᾶν νόημά τε καὶ ὄνομα τῶν πρὸς τὴν ἀγαθὴν ἡμῖν συντελούντων ζωήν. Ὁ δὲ πάντα γινόμενος καὶ ἐν πᾶσι γίνεται. Ἐν τούτῳ δέ μοι δοκεῖ τὸν παντελῆ τῆς κακίας ἀφανισμὸν δογματίζειν ὁ λόγος. Εἰ γὰρ ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς οὖσιν ὁ Θεὸς ἔσται, ἡ κακία δηλαδὴ ἐν τοῖς οὖσιν οὐκ ἔσται. Εἰ γάρ τις ὑπόθοιτο κἀκείνην εἶναι, πῶς σωθήσεται τὸ ἐν πᾶσι τὸν Θεὸν εἶναι; Ἡ γὰρ ὑπεξαίρεσις ἐκείνης, ἐλλιπῆ τῶν πάντων ποιεῖ τὴν περίληψιν. Ἀλλ' ὁ ἐν τοῖς πᾶσιν ἐσόμενος, ἐν τοῖς μὴ οὖσιν οὐκ ἔσται.