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of that which is beautiful by nature, remaining completely unmoved in communion with it, and with unveiled face reflecting as in a mirror the glory of God; from the luminous brightness within it, beholding the divine and unapproachable glory.

52. Let us renounce, as much as we can, the pleasure and pain of the present life, and we will be completely freed from every contrivance of the passions and from demonic malice. For because of pleasure we love the passions, and because of pain we flee from virtue.

53. Since all evil is naturally destroyed by the same means that brought it into being, man finds through experience itself that pain is in every case the successor of all pleasure. He directs his whole impulse towards pleasure and his whole aversion towards pain, striving for the one with all his strength, and struggling with all haste against the other, thinking, which was impossible, to separate these from each other by such a method, and to keep his self-love attached only to pleasure (1200), completely inexperienced of pain, being ignorant, as it seems, on account of passion, that pleasure can never exist without pain. For the toil of pain is blended with pleasure, even if it seems to escape the notice of those who have it, because of the dominance of pleasure in the passion; since what is dominant is always by nature more apparent, it conceals the sensation of what lies alongside it. Therefore, by laying claim to pleasure on account of self-love, and by striving again to flee pain for the same reason, we devise the countless generations of the destructive passions.

54. A person is ignorant of the experience of the senses with respect to pleasure and pain, when he binds, or rather cleaves, his mind to God who is truly beloved and lovely and desired, having become free from bodily attachment.

55. Just as one cannot otherwise serve God purely without thoroughly purifying the soul, so too one cannot serve creation without caring for the body. Insofar as man, performing a corrupting service with the body and becoming self-loving through it, had pleasure and pain working unceasingly, always eating of the tree of disobedience, which contained the knowledge of good and evil mixed together at the same time in sensation through experience. And perhaps someone who says that the visible creation is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil will not err from the truth; for partaking of it naturally produces pleasure and pain.

56. Where reason does not prevail, the power of the senses naturally supervenes, in which the power of sin is somehow mixed, drawing the soul down through pleasure towards pity for its kindred flesh according to substance. By which, having handed over to it as a natural task the passionate and pleasure-seeking care of the flesh, it leads it away from the life according to nature and persuades it to become a creator of non-subsistent evil.

57. Evil for an intelligent soul is the forgetting of the good things according to nature, which arises from a passionate attachment to the flesh and the world. Reason, acting as a general according to spiritual knowledge, makes this disappear, by investigating the origin and nature of both the world and the flesh, and driving the soul towards its kindred region of intelligible things. To which the law of sin makes no passage, no longer having sensation as a bridge to convey it to the mind, since sensation's attachment to the soul has already been dissolved, and it has been cast back among perceptible spectacles, of which the mind, having passed beyond their relation and nature, is not at all sensible.

58. (1201) Just as reason, when it masters the passions, makes the senses an instrument of virtue, so also the passions, when they master reason, shape the senses towards sin. And it is necessary to watch soberly and to meditate on how the soul the good

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ἔχοντος φύσει καλοῦ, παντάπασιν αὐτῷ συνδιαμένων ἀκίνητος, καί ἀνακεκαλυμμένῳ προσώπῳ τήν δόξαν τοῦ Θεοῦ κατοπτριζόμενος· ἐκ τῆς ἐν αὐτῷ φωτοειδοῦς λαμπρότητος, τήν θείαν καί ἀπρόσιτον δόξαν θεώμενος.

νβ΄. Τήν ἡδονήν τῆς παρούσης ζωῆς καί τήν ὀδύνην, ὅση δύναμις, ἀρνησώμεθα, καί πάσης παθῶν ἐπινοίας καί δαιμονιώδους κακουργίας παντελῶς ἀπαλλαγησόμεθα. ∆ιά γάρ τήν ἡδονήν ἀγαπῶμεν τά πάθη, καί διά τήν ὀδύνην φεύγομεν τήν ἀρετήν.

νγ΄. Ἐπειδή πᾶσα κακία πέφυκε τοῖς συνιστῶσιν αὐτήν συμφθείρεσθαι τρόποις, εὑρίσκων δι᾿ αὐτῆς τῆς πείρας ὁ ἄνθρωπος, πάσης ἡδονῆς εἶναι πάντως τήν ὀδύνην διάδοχον, πρός μέν τήν ἡδονήν, τήν ὅλην ἔσχεν ὁρμήν· πρός δέ τήν ὀδύνην, τήν ὅλην ἀποφυγήν· τῆς μέν, κατά πᾶσαν ὑπεραγωνιζόμενος δύναμιν· τῆς δέ, κατά πᾶσιν σπουδήν καταγωνιζόμενος, οἰόμενος, ὅπερ ἀμήχανον ἦν, διά τῆς τοιαύτης μεθοδείας, ἀλλήλων ταύτας διαστῆσαι , καί μόνῃ τῇ ἡδονῇ (1200) συνημμενην τήν φιλαυτίαν ἔχειν παντελῶς ὀδύνης ἀπείρατον, ἀγνοήσας ὑπό τοῦ πάθους, ὡς ἔοικεν, ὡς οὐκ ἐνδέχεταί ποτε χωρίς ὀδύνης εἶναι τήν ἡδονήν. Ἐγκέκραται γάρ τῇ ἡδονῇ τῆς ὀδύνης ὁ πόνος, κἄν λανθάνειν δοκῇ τούς ἔχοντας, διά τήν κατά τό πάθος τῆς ἡδονῆς ἐπικράτειαν· ἐπειδή δέ τό ἐπικρατοῦν, ἀεί διαφαίνεσθαι πέφυκε, καλύπτον τοῦ παρακειμένου τήν αἴσθησιν. Ἡδονῆς οὖν διά τήν φιλαυτίαν ἀντιποιούμενοι, καί ὀδύνην διά τήν αὐτήν αἰτίαν πάλιν φεύγειν σπουδάζοντες, τάς ἀμυθήτους τῶν φθοροποιῶν παθῶν ἐπινοοῦμεν γενέσεις.

νδ΄. Ἀγνοεῖ τις τήν καθ᾿ ἡδονήν καί ὀδύνην τῆς αἰσθήσεως πεῖραν, ὅταν τῷ Θεῷ τῷ ὄντως ἀγαπητῷ καί ἐραστῷ καί ἐφετῷ προσδήσῃ, μᾶλλον δέ κολλήσῃ τόν νοῦν, τῆς σωματικῆς γενόμενον ἐλεύθερον σχέσεως.

νε΄. Ὥσπερ οὐ δύναταί τις ἄλλως λατρεύειν τῷ Θεῷ καθαρῶς, μή τήνψυχήν ἄρδην ἐκκαθαίρων· οὕτως οὔτε τῇ κτίσει λατρεύειν, μή τό σῶμα περιποιούμενος· καθ᾿ ὅ σῶμα τήν φθοροποιόν ἐπιτελῶν λατρείαν ὁ ἄνθρωπος, καί κατ᾿ αὐτό γενόμενος φίλαυτος, ἡδονήν εἶχεν ἀπαύστως καί ὀδύνην ἐνεργουμένην, ἐσθίων ἀεί τό ξύλον τῆς παρακοῆς, τό καλοῦ τε καί κακοῦ, κατά ταὐτόν μεμιγμένην κατά τήν αἴσθησιν διά τῆς πείρας ἔχον τήν γνῶσιν. Καί τάχα ξύλον εἶναι γνωστόν καλοῦ καί πονηροῦ, τήν φαινομένην κτίσιν εἰπών τις, οὐχ ἁμαρτήσει τῆς ἀληθείας· ἡδονῆς γάρ καί ὀδύνης ποιητικήν ἔχει φυσικῶς τήν μετάληψιν.

νστ΄. Ἔνθα λόγος οὐ κρατεῖ, τό κατ᾿ αἴσθησιν πέφυκεν ἐπιγίνεσθαι κράτος, ἐν ᾧ τῆς ἁμαρτίας πέφυρταί πως ἡ δύναμις, πρός οἶκτον τῆς συγγενοῦς σαρκός καθ᾿ ὑπόστασιν, τήν ψυχήν δι᾿ ἡδονῆς ὑποσύρουσα· καθ᾿ ἥν ὡς ἔργον αὐτῇ φυσικόν ἐγχειρίσασα τήν ἐμπαθῆ καί καθήδονον τῆς σαρκός ἐπιμέλειαν, ἀπάγει τῆς κατά φύσιν ζωῆς, καί πείθει τῆς ἀνυποστάτου κακίας γενέσθαι ταύτην δημιουργόν.

νζ΄. Κακία ἐστί ψυχῆς νοερᾶς, ἡ λήθη τῶν κατά φύσιν καλῶν, ἥτις ἐκ τῆς περί τήν σάρκα τε καί κόσμον, ἐμπαθοῦς ἐπιγίνεται σχέσεως, ἥν ἀφανίζει στρατηγῶν ὁ λόγος κατ᾿ ἐπιστήμην πνευματικήν, τήν τε τοῦ κόσμου καί τῆς σαρκός διερευνώμενος γένεσίν τε καί φύσιν, καί πρός τήν συγγενῆ τῶν νοητῶν χώραν τήν ψυχήν ἐλαύνων· πρός ἥν οὐδεμίαν ὁ νόμος τῆς ἁμαρτίας ποιεῖται διάβασιν, οὐκ ἔχων καθάπερ γέφυραν πρός τόν νοῦν διαβιβάζουσαν αὐτόν ἔτι τήν αἴσθησιν, διαλυθεῖσαν ἤδη πρός τήν ψυχήν κατά τήν σχέσιν, καί τοῖς αἰσθητοῖς ἐναποῤῥιφεῖσαν θεάμασιν, ὧν διαβάς τήν σχέσιν καί τήν φύσιν ὁ νοῦς παντελῶς οὐκ αἰσθάνεται.

νη΄. (1201) Καθάπερ ὁ λόγος κρατῶν τῶν παθῶν, ἀρετῆς ὄργανον ποιεῖται τάς αἰσθήσεις· οὕτω καί τά πάθη κρατοῦντα τοῦ λόγου, μορφοῦσι τάς αἰσθήσεις πρός ἁμαρτίαν. Καί χρή νηφόντως σκοπεῖν τε καί μελετᾷν, πῶς ἡ ψυχή τήν καλήν