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52. He calls the first dispassion the movement of the body untouched in activity by sin; and the second, the complete casting out from the soul of passionate thoughts, through which the movement of the passions according to the first dispassion withers away, since it does not have passionate thoughts to ignite it to activity; and the third, the complete stillness of desire with regard to the passions, through which the second naturally comes to be, being established by the purity of thoughts; and he calls the fourth dispassion, the complete putting aside from the mind of all sensible images, according to which the third has received its genesis, not having the images of sensible things forming for it the icons of the passions.

53. (1284) For every practical man, the reason and the mind labor like a male and female servant, both devising and creating the ways of action according to virtue, and having, as it were, all their power set in array against the spirits of wickedness which oppose the practical life; and having fulfilled the practical philosophy, which the number six of the years signified; for it is said that the number six signifies practical philosophy; they are released free for the spiritual, that is, returning to the contemplation of the kindred principles in existing things, both reason and mind.

54. A foreign male servant and female servant are anger and desire; whom the contemplative intellect yokes continually to the dominion of reason, for the service of the virtues, through courage and temperance, not giving them at all release unto freedom, until the law of nature is completely swallowed up by the law of the spirit, just as the wretched death of the flesh by infinite life, and the entire image of the beginningless kingdom is purely shown, having the entire form of the archetype through imitation; according to which the contemplative intellect, having come into being, makes free both anger and desire; transforming the one toward the pure pleasure of divine love and its undefiled charm; and transferring the other to a spiritual zeal and a fiery perpetual motion and a temperate madness.

55. An image of the beginningless kingdom is the unchangeability of the intellect concerning true knowledge, and the incorruptibility of the senses concerning virtue; of the soul and of the body, according to the transformation of the senses in spirit toward the intellect, being bound to one another by the divine law of the spirit alone, according to which they have the ever-moving and ever-living and penetrating energy of the Logos; in which all unlikeness to the Divine is completely absent.

56. They say that pleasure is desire in act, since it is a present good, according to its definition; and that desire is pleasure not in act, since it is a future good, according to its definition; and anger, a movement practicing madness, and madness, anger in act. Therefore, he who has subjected these powers to reason will find that desire (1285) becomes pleasure for him, according to the undefiled union of the soul with the Divine in grace; and anger, a pure zeal, which guards the pleasure related to the Divine, and a temperate madness, which completely transports the soul's desiring and charming power away from created beings. Therefore, as long as the world lives in us, and the soul's voluntary relation to material things, one must not grant freedom to these powers, lest, having been mixed with sensible things as with kindred things, they make war on the soul, and take it captive to the passions, as the Babylonians once did to Jerusalem. For the age during which the law commanded the foreign servants to serve, the Logos signified the soul's dispositional relation to this world, that is, to the present life, showing forth the intelligible things through the things recorded in history.

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νβ΄. Πρώτην ἀπάθειαν λέγει, τήν πρός ἁμαρτίαν τοῦ σώματος κατ᾿ ἐνέργειαν ἀνέπαφον κίνησιν· δευτέραν δέ, τήν κατά ψυχήν τῶν ἐμπαθῶν λογισμῶν τελείαν ἀποβολήν, δι᾿ ἧς τῶν παθῶν ἀπομαραίνεται κατά τήν πρώτην ἀπάθειαν κίνησιν, ἐξάπτονας αὐτήν πρός ἐνέργειαν οὐκ ἔχουσα τούς ἐμπαθεῖς λογισμούς· τρίτην δέ, τήν περί τά πάθη τελείαν τῆς ἐπιθυμίας ἀκινησίαν, δι᾿ ἥν καί ἡ δευτέρα γίνεσθαι πέφυκε, τῇ τῶν λογισμῶν καθαρότητι συνισταμένη· τετάρτην δέ λέγει ἀπάθειαν, τήν κατά διάνοιαν πασῶν τῶν αἰσθητῶν φαντασιῶν τελείαν ἀπόθεσιν καθ᾿ ἥν ἡ τρίτη τήν γένεσιν εἴληφεν, οὐκ ἔχουσα τάς φαντασίας τῶν αἰσθητῶν εἰδοποιούσας αὐτῇ τῶν παθῶν τάς εἰκόνας.

νγ΄. (1284) Παντί πρακτικῷ, παιδός καί παιδίσκης δίκην, ὁ λόγος καί ἡ διάνοια μοχθοῦσι, τούς κατ᾿ ἀρετήν τῆς πράξεως τρόπους ἐπινοοῦντές τε καί δημιουργοῦντες, καί οἷον πᾶσαν ἑαυτῶν κατά τῶν ἀντικειμένων τῇ πρακτικῇ πνευμάτων τῆς πονηρίας τήν δύναμιν ἔχοντες ἀντιτεταγμένην· πληρώσαντες δέ τήν πρακτικήν φιλοσοφίαν, ἥν ὁ ἕκτος τῶν ἐνιαυτῶν παρεδήλωσεν ἀριθμός· εἴρηται γάρ ὅτι ὁ ἕξ ἀριθμός, τήν πρακτικήν σημαίνει φιλοσοφίαν· ἐλεύθεροι πρός τήν πνευματικήν ἀπολύονται, δηλονότι τῶν ἐν τοῖς οὖσι συγγενῶν λόγων θεωρίαν ἐπανερχόμενον, ὅ τε λόγος καί ἡ διάνοια.

νδ΄. Ἀλλόφυλος παῖς ἐστι καί παιδίσκη, ὁ θυμός καί ἡ ἐπιθυμία· οὕς ὑποζεύγνυσι διά παντός τῇ δεσποτείᾳ τοῦ λόγου, πρός ὑπηρεσίαν τῶν ἀρετῶν, δι᾿ ἀνδρίας καί σωφροσύνης ὁ θεωρητικός νοῦς, μή διδούς αὐτοῖς παντελῶς τήν πρός ἐλευθερίαν ἄφεσιν, ἕως ἄν καταποθῇ τῷ νόμῳ τοῦ πνεύματος τελείως ὁ τής φύσεως νόμος, καθάπερ ὑπό ζωῆς ἀπείρου, σαρκός δυστήνου θάνατος, καί πᾶσα δειχθῇ καθαρῶς ἡ τῆς ἀνάρχου βασιλείας εἰκών, πᾶσαν ἔχουσα τοῦ ἀρχετύπου διά μιμήσεως τήν μορφήν· καθ᾿ ἥν γενόμενος ὁ θεωρητικός νοῦς, ἐλευθέρους ποιεῖται τόν τε θυμόν καί τήν ἐπιθυμίαν· τήν μέν, πρός τήν ἀκήρατον τοῦ θείου ἔρωτος ἡδονήν καί τήν ἄχραντον θέλξιν μετασκευάζων· τήν δέ, πρός ζέσιν πνευματικήν καί διάπυρον ἀεικινησίαν καί σώφρονα μανίαν μεταβιβάζων.

νε΄. Ἀνάρχου βασιλείας ἐστίν εἰκών, ἡ τοῦ νοῦ περί τήν ἀληθῆ γνῶσιν ἀτρεψία, καί ἡ τῆς αἰσθήσεως περί τήν ἀρετήν ἀφθαρσία· τῆς ψυχῆς καί τοῦ σώματος, κατά τήν ἐν πνεύματι πρός τόν νοῦν τῆς αἰσθήσεως μεταποίησιν, μόνῳ τῷ θείῳ νόμῳ τοῦ πνεύματος ἀλλήλοις συνδεδεμένων, καθ᾿ ἥν τήν ἀεικίνητον τοῦ λόγου καί ζῶσαν διαπαντός ἔχουσι διικνουμένην ἐνέργειαν· ἐν ᾗ πᾶσα παντελῶς ἄπεστι πρός τό Θεῖον ἀπέμφασις.

νστ΄. Ἐνεργουμένην ἐπιθυμίαν φασίν εἶναι τήν ἡδονήν, εἴπερ παρόν ἀγαθόν, κατά τόν αὐτῆς ἐστιν ὁρισμόν· ἀνενέργητον δέ ἡδονήν, τήν ἐπιθυμίαν, εἴπερ μέλλον ἀγαθόν, κατά τόν αὐτῆς ἐστιν ὁρισμόν· τόν δέ θυμόν, μανίας μελετωμένην κίνησιν, καί τήν μανίαν θυμόν ἐνεργούμενον.Ὁ γοῦν ταύτας ὑποτάξας τῷ λόγῳ τάς δυνάμεις, εὑρήσει, τήν μέν ἐπιθυμίαν, (1285) αὐτῷ γινομένην ἡδονήν, κατά τήν ἐν χάριτι πρός τό Θεῖον τῆς ψυχῆς ἄχραντον συμπλοκήν· τόν δέ θυμόν, ζέσιν ἀκήρατον, τῆς περί τό Θεῖον ἡδονῆς φρουρητικήν, καί σώφρονα μανίαν, τῆς κατά τήν ἔφεσιν τῆς ψυχῆς θελκτικῆς δυνάμεως ἀπό τῶν ὄντων τελείως ἐκστατικήν. Οὐκοῦν ἕως ἐν ἡμῖν ὁ κόσμος ζῇ, καί ἡ πρός τά ὑλικά τῆς ψυχῆς ἑκούσιος σχέσις, οὐ δεῖ ταύταις παρέχειν ἐλευθερίαν ταῖς δυνάμεσι, μήπως μιγεῖσαι τοῖς αἰσθητοῖς ὡς ὁμοφύλοις, πολεμήσωσι τήν ψυχήν, καί λάβωσιν αὐτήν δορυάλωτον γεγενημένην τοῖς πάθεσιν, ὡς πάλαι τήν Ἱερουσαλήμ, οἱ Βαβυλώνιοι. Τόν γάρ αἰῶνα καθ᾿ ὅν τούς ἀλλοφύλους παῖδας δουλεύειν ὁ νόμος ἐκέλευσε, τήν πρός τόν κόσμον τοῦτον, ἤγουν τήν παροῦσαν ζωήν, γνωμικήν τῆς ψυχῆς ἐσήμανε σχέσιν ὁ λόγος, διά τῶν ἱστορουμένων παραδεικνύς τά νοούμενα.