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Therefore, according to the six stages of ascension into God, there are

six stages of the soul's powers by which we mount from the depths to the

heights, from the external to the internal, from the temporal to the

eternal - to wit, sense, imagination, reason, intellect, intelligence, and

the apex of the mind, the illumination of conscience ("Synteresis"). These

stages are implanted in us by nature, deformed by sin, reformed by grace,

to be purged by justice, exercised by knowledge, perfected by wisdom.