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having received from God the power to act, it will act; (395) otherwise a man will not be able in life to accomplish anything at all or even to begin to will it. For behold, I say to you again what I also said before: just as it is never possible for any of the aforementioned tools to be moved of itself to an action or to do anything without the hand of a man, who lifts it and makes something through it, so also man without the divine hand is not able to think or to do anything good. For behold, the Logos, the craftsman, fashioned me as he himself willed, and placed me in the world. How then, tell me, will I be able to think or do or in any way accomplish anything without divine strength? He who has graciously given me a mind, such as he certainly willed, he himself also gives me to think whatever he knows is expedient, and provides me the power to do what he wills. If then I do these things, he will surely give more, and will lovingly grant me to think more perfect things; but if I should despise even the few things entrusted to me, I will justly and truly suffer their loss from God who gave them and I will become inactive, a useless tool, as one not willing to perform the commands of the creator, but having given myself over to sloth and indolence; and for this reason I have been cast from the hands of the Master, having employed disobedience and insubordination toward him, I have been cast out of the true paradise, having become far from God and from the hands of the holy ones. The all-wicked serpent, therefore, finding me lying there and wholly given over to idleness in good things, craftily misused me for all dishonorable deeds, in which, taking pleasure and rejoicing, I was consumed, (396) for which I ought to have been grieved and to lament and weep, because from those things which I was created to do, I, wretched one, willingly departed, and of my own free choice I gave myself over to all things contrary to nature, having fallen most miserably into the profane hands of the enemy, by whom I was completely held and moved, and not being strong enough to stand against him, wretched one that I am—for how could I have resisted, being dead? an instrument of all evil, of all lawlessness

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τό ἐνεργεῖν ἀπό Θεοῦ ἔλαβεν, ἐνεργήσει, (395) ἄλλως δέ οὐ δυνήσεται ἄνθρωπος ἐν τῷ βίῳ ὅλως τι διαπράξασθαι ἤ τήν ἀρχήν θελῆσαι. Ἰδού γάρ, αὖθις λέγω σοι ἅπερ καί πρῴην εἶπον˙ ὥσπερ οὐκ ἔξεστί ποτε τῶν εἰρημένων πάντων ἐργαλεῖον ἀφ᾿ ἑαυτόῦ κινηθῆναι πρός πρᾶξιν ἤ ἐνεργῆσαί τι ἄνευ χειρός ἀνθρώπου, τοῦ αἴροντος καί δι᾿ αὐτοῦ κατασκευάζοντός τι, οὕτως οὐδέ ὁ ἄνθρωπος ἄνευ χειρός τῆς θείας ἐννοῆσαί τι δύναται ἀγαθόν ἤ ποιῆσαι. Ἰδού γάρ, ὁ τεχνίτης με κατεσκεύασε Λόγος, οἷον αὐτός ἠθέλησε καί ἔθηκεν ἐν κόσμῳ. Πῶς οὖν, εἰπέ, δυνήσομαι φρονῆσαι ἤ ποιῆσαι ἤ ὅλως ἐνεργῆσαί τι θείας ἰσχύος ἄνευ; Ὁ νοῦν μοι χαρισάμενος, οἷον ἤθελε πάντως, αὐτός καί δίδωσι φρονεῖν ὅσα συμφέρειν οἶδε, καί ἐνεργεῖν παρέχει μοι δύναμιν, ἅπερ θέλει. Εἰ οὖν αὐτά ποιήσαιμι πλείονα πάντως δώσει, καί τελεώτερα φρονεῖν παράσχει φιαλνθρώπως˙ εἰ δέ καταφρονήσαιμι καί αὐτῶν τῶν ὀλίγων τῶν καταπιστευθέντων μοι, τήν στέρησιν δικαίως ὄντως καθυποστήσομαι παρά Θεοῦ τοῦ δόντος καί ἄπρακτος γενήσομαι, ἄχρηστον ἐργαλεῖον, ὡς μή θελήσας ἐντολάς ἐργάσαθαι τοῦ κτίστου, ἀλλ᾿ ὀκνηρίᾳ ἐμαυτόν ἐκδούς καί ῥαθυμίᾳ˙ καί διά τοῦτο ἔρρμμαι τῶν χειρῶν τοῦ ∆εσπότου, ἀπειθείᾳ τῇ πρός αὐτόν καί ἀνυποταξίᾳ χρησάμενος ἐκβέβλημαι τοῦ ὄντως παραδείσου, μακράν γενόμενος Θεοῦ καί χειρῶν τῶν ἁγίων. Εὑρών λοιπόν με κείμενον ὁ παμπόνηρος ὄφις καί τῇ ἀργίᾳ τῶν καλῶν προδεδομένον ὅλον, δολίως κατηχρείωσε πᾶσιν ἔεργοις ἀτίμοις, οἷσπερ ἐνηδυνόμενος καί χαίρων ὠπτανόμην, (396) ἀνθ᾿ ὧν λυπεῖσθαί με ἐχρῆν καί θρηνεῖν τε καί κλαίειν, ὅτι πρός ἅπερ ἔκτισμαι ἐνεργεῖν, ἑκουσίως ἀπέστην ὁ ταλαίπωρος, καί αὐτοπροαιρέτως τοῖς παρά φύσιν ἅπασιν ἐμαυτόν ἐξεδόμην, χερσί βεβήλοις τοῦ ἐχθροῦ ἐμπεσών παναθλίως, ὑφ᾿ οὗπερ καί κρατούμενος καί κινούμενος ὅλως, καί ἀντιστῆναι πρός αὐτόν μή ἰσχύων, ὁ τάλας, πῶς γάρ καί ἀντιστήσεσθαι εἶχον νεκρός ὑπάρχων; πάσης κακίας ὄργανον, πάσης παρανομίας