CHAPTER 6

That from the First Constitution of the Universe the Christ of God has been the Invisible Guardian of Godly Souls.

THUS, then, as the one sun among things visible lights the whole Cosmos of sense, so also among the things of thought the one perfect Word of God gives light to the immortal and unembodied powers, the myriad existences of mind and reason, like stars and founts of light. And since it behoved that the law over all through the Universe, and the Word of God in all and reaching through all, should be one, so that in Him the likeness to the Father even in all respects might be preserved, in virtue, in power, in essence, in the number of the Monad and the Unit, since the essence of things about to be begotten would be of many forms and many kinds, subject through weakness of nature to many changes and variations, one at one time, another at another, and would fail of the highest power of the Father through the exceeding greatness of His nature inexpressible and infinitely vast to all, and fated for ever being itself but a begotten thing to be unable to mingle with the unbegotten and incomprehensible Godhead, or to look up and gaze upon the unspeakable flashings pouring out from the eternal light, it was above all necessary that the Father all-good and the Saviour of the Universe, that the nature of things soon to be might not in exile from His fellowship be deprived of the greatest good, should interpose the divine, all-strong, and all-virtuous power of His only-begotten and first-born Son. For though He was in the most certain and the closest association with the Father, and equally with Him rejoiced in that which is unspeakable, yet He could descend with all gentleness, and conform Himself in such ways as were possible, to those who were far distant from His own height, and through their weakness crave amelioration and aid - 174 - (d) from a secondary Being, that they might behold the flashings of the sun falling quietly and gently on them, though they are not able to delight in the fierce might of the sun because of their bodily weakness.

Suppose, as the hypothesis of an argument, that the sun all-glowing came down from heaven and lived among men, it would be impossible for anything on earth to remain uhdestroyed, for everything alive and dead would be destroyed together by the rushing stroke of light, swiftly enough would he make blind the eyes of those that see, being far more the source of harm and destruction than of (155) usefulness to all, not that it is his nature so to be, but that he would become such to those who would be unable from their own weakness to support his surpassing glare.

Why, then, are you surprised to learn the like about God (Whose work is the sun, and the whole heaven, and the Cosmos)? That it is impossible for any that exist to have fellowship in His unspeakable and inexplicable Power and Essence save for One alone, Whom the Father Himself in His Foreknowledge of the Universe established before all things, so that the nature of begotten things might not altogether through their own lack of energy and strength fall away, being severed from the Father's (b) unbegotten and incomprehensible Essence, but might endure and increase and be nourished, enjoying that mediated supply, which the Only-begotten Word of God ceases not to provide to all, and passing everywhere and through all provides for the salvation of all equally, whether they have reason or not, whether they be mortal or immortal, of heaven or of earth, both divine and invisible powers, and, in a word, of all things whatsoever that shared in being through His agency, and far more peculiarly still of those who possess reason and thought, for which things' sake (c) He does not at all despise the human race, but rather honours and cares for it, for the sake of the kinship and connection of their reason with Himself, inasmuch as it was said in the holy oracles that they were formed after His likeness. Yea, He, as being the Word of God, made - 175 - His own image, all that is of thought and reason, the foundation of His own creation from the beginning, and set man, therefore, in a kingly and ruling relation to all living things on earth, and sent him forth free and with the power of undetermined choice between his good and evil inclinations. But man using his free-will badly, turning (d) from the right road, went wrong, caring neither for God nor Lord, nor distinguished between holy and unholy, with all manner of rude and dissolute actions, living the life of the irrational beasts. Then surely the All-Good, the King of kings, the Supreme, God Almighty, that the men on earth might not be like brute beasts without rulers and guardians, set over them the holy angels to be their leaders and governors like herdsmen and shepherds, and set over all, and made the head of all His Only-begotten and Firstborn Word. He gave Him for His own portion the angels (156) and archangels, and the divine powers, and the immaterial and transcendent spirits, yea, verily, of things on earth as well the souls among men beloved by God, called by the names of the Hebrews, Jacob and Israel.