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or fly, like a beautiful sparrow, and pass over all the snares! Consider holy love as wings, without which you can go nowhere; imitate a colt carrying the creator, become also an ox pulling a divine plough and cutting a sweet furrow of the word. Imitate all things except for their opposites. The fox is evil, living in hypocrisy, being one thing and showing another, for by pretense it dies, in order to seize something; the bear is terrible; for if it gets hold of a sword somewhere, it does not stop scraping its wound, until it dies from it; the pig is evil, eating insatiably; the asp is evil, for it stops its ears; evil things are evil, which if you wish to investigate and if you hasten to flee, dear soul, you will truly find the true wisdom. For walking on the path you will come to better things and along with all things you will learn yourself and then you will surely say to me when I ask: The Word, which you speak, I also receive it! It is also in you, and it passes over to me; or does it leave you empty of the word? You will say: I know that it also came to me and it is whole with you, just as before. How then, being separated from you, did it come to me (162) and it remains whole in you without being separated from you? Tell me this and leave God alone for now, lest all creation tremble and fall and shatter your thick flesh and crush your carnal soul and make your mind fire-consumed, yours which treads on emptiness for no useful purpose. For neither in reality nor in thought is the indivisible divided from the word; for one who is shut inside a house, but has his mind wandering outside, has not been left mindless in the house, but is with it also entirely outside. What then will you name this separation? Will you indeed say it is a reality or will you say it is a concept? If a concept, how is he wholly outside, but if a reality, how is he inside the house? And yet what is this example in relation to the Word which is beyond mind and thought? For the Word, sent forth from the Father, came down and dwelt whole in the womb of the Virgin

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ἤ πετάσθητι, ὥσπερ καλόν στρουθίον, καί ὑπέρβηθι τάς παγίδας ἁπάσας! Πτέρυγας νόει τήν ἁγίαν ἀγάπην, ἧς ἄνευ οὐδαμοῦ διαβήσῃ˙ μίμησαι πῶλον βαστάζοντα τόν κτίστην, γενοῦ δέ καί βοῦς ἕλκων ἄροτρον θεῖον καί γλυκεῖαν αὔλακα τέμνων τοῦ λόγου. Πάντα μίμησαι δίχα τῶν ἐναντίων. Κακόν ἀλώπηξ, ὑποκρίσει βιοῦσα, ἕτερον οὖσα καί ἄλλο δεικνυμένη, προσποιήσει γάρ θνῄσκει, ἵν᾿ ἁρπάσῃ τι˙ δεινόν ἡ ἄρκτος˙εἴ που ξίφει γάρ λάβῃ, οὐ παύεται ξέουσα τό τραῦμα ταύτης, ἕως ἄν αὕτη ἐκ τούτου ἀποθάνῃ˙ κακόν ὁ χοῖρος ἀκορέστως ἐσθίων˙ κακόν ἡ ἀσπίς˙ βύει καί γάρ τά ὦτα˙ κακά τά κακά, ἅ εἰ ἐρευνᾶν θέλεις καί εἰ ἐκφυγεῖν, φίλη ψυχή, σπουδάσεις, εὑρήσεις ὄντως τήν ἀληθῆ σοφίαν. Ὁδῷ βαδίζων ἔλθεις γάρ πρός τά κρείττω καί μετά πάντων σεαυτόν καταμάθεις καί ἐρωτῶντι τότε μοι πάντως φράσεις˙ Λόγον, ὅν λαλεῖς, κἀγώ αὐτόν λαμβάνω! Ἔστι καί ἐν σοί, μεταβαίνει καί πρός με˙ ἤ καταλιμπάνει σε κενόν τοῦ λόγου; Ἐρεῖς˙ Οἶδα, ὅτι καί πρός με ἦλθε καί ὅλος ἐστί μετά σοῦ, ὥσπερ πρῴην. Πῶς οὖν ἀπό σοῦ χωρισθείς πρός με ἦλθε (162) καί ὅλος μένει ἐν σοί μή χωρισθείς σου; Εἰπέ μοι τοῦτο καί τόν Θεόν νῦν ἔα, μή σύμπασα τρομάσῃ κτίσις καί πέσῃ καί συνθραύσῃ σου τήν σάρκα τήν παχεῖαν καί συντρίψῃ σου τήν ψυχήν τήν σαρκώδη καί τόν νοῦν πυρίκαυστον τόν σόν ποιήσῃ, τόν εἰς μηδέν χρήσιμον κενεμβατοῦντα. Καί γάρ οὐδέ πράγματι οὐδ᾿ ἐπινοίᾳ τό ἀμέριστον μερίζεται τοῦ λόγου˙ ὁ γάρ ἐν οἴκῳ ἔνδοθεν κεκλεισμένος, ἔξω δέ τόν νοῦν περιπολοῦντα ἔχων οὐ κατελείφθη ἄνους ἐν τῇ οἰκίᾳ, ἀλλά μετ᾿ αὐτοῦ καί ἔξω πάντως ἔστι. Τόν οὖν χωρισμόν τοῦτον τί ὀνομάσεις; Πρᾶγμα δή λέξεις ἤ ἐπίνοιαν εἴπῃς; Εἰ ἐπίνοιαν, πῶς ὅλος ἔστιν ἔξω, εἰ δέ πρᾶγμα τι, πῶς ἔνδον τῆς οἰκίας; Καίτοι τί ἐστί τό παράδειγμα τοῦτο πρός τόν ὑπέρ νοῦν καί διάνοιαν Λόγον; Ἐκ γάρ τοῦ Πατρός ἀποσταλείς ὁ Λόγος κατῆλθε καί ἐν γαστρί ἐνῴκησεν ὅλος τῇ τῆς Παρθένου