John the Deacon of Adrianople

. 1023 THEODORI AGALLIANI 1024 and the processions of God’s providence over all things.” And speaking of the will of God regarding the creatures, Damascene says: “The eternal and everlasting generation and procession is a work of the divine nature, but creation is a work of the divine will.” And the Fifth Ecumenical Council speaks thus: “God,” says Origen, “in coming from not creating to creating, was by all means turned from one thing to another; but we say that He was not turned according to nature, but according to action; or rather, not even according to that, for He always had the power to create and to fashion; but such power was brought into action because He willed it.” Does this man not agree with these Fathers, whose own definitions regarding creatures he applies to the procession of the Holy Spirit? For when he says that when the Father brings forth the Spirit, the will that accompanies the essence—an origin and power through the action of projection, or breathing—becomes the productive cause of the hypostasis of the Holy Spirit. But the absurdities—or rather, the blasphemies—arising from this are manifest to all, and there is no need for many words; he also divides the will, insofar as it is an origin of certain things, dividing it into an autonomous one and a constrained one, saying I know not what regarding each—for proceeding further he says, “Not as an autonomous origin, but as a necessary and natural power and origin,” and then he adds: ARGYROPOULOS. Hence the divine Spirit is called love by the theologians; for the power of love is will. AGALLIANOS. Well then did we speak, or rather the theologians, that the creation of the God of all, who is immobile, with regard to the creation, is His will, which is not ^{B C} chap. of the book *On the Trinity*: “Laughable,” he says, “is the dialectic of Eunomius, from which the Eunomian heretics have sprung up. Who, not able to understand, or not willing to believe, that the only-begotten Word of God, through whom all things were made, is Son of God by nature—that is, begotten from the essence of the Father—said He was Son not of the nature or essence, but of the will of God; wishing, clearly, to testify to a will inherent in God, in accordance with which He begat the Son.” How then would he himself, mocking the heretics who say these things, fall into the same errors? For he would surely be more laughable. And what he says regarding memory and will, he contends does not derive from Scripture, but that he gathers it from his own mind by a certain intuitive reasoning from the created image of God, which is man, delivering a certain conjecture regarding the uncreated God as he proceeds. For in the same chapter which we just mentioned, he says thus: “But regarding the creation which God made, whenever we were able, we instructed those who demanded a word concerning such matters, so that His invisible things are understood and seen through the things that have been made as much as they are able, and especially through the rational or intellectual creation, which was made according to the image of God, through which, as through a mirror, as much as they are able—if they are able—to see God the Trinity in our memory, and in the understanding and in the will. These three, being naturally established in the same mind from God, each one vividly contemplates, and how great it is in him, where the eternal and immutable essence is also naturally meant to be remembered, and seen, and desired. For it is remembered through memory, it is seen through the understanding, it is embraced through love, [and] he entirely finds [that it] is separated from the divine hypostases; for it is a common action and one power, the creative [power]. Behold, the divine Spirit is called love, it has will as a power productive of itself; and the Latins will never wash off this filth of calling the Holy Spirit a creature, since they also suppose it to be brought forth from the will of God. ARGYROPOULOS. He says that the things said are in agreement with the voices of those who theologize, and no less with the things said by the holy Augustine in his book *On the Trinity*, in which he called memory the generative power and will the pneummatic [power]. AGALLIANOS. Alas for this calumny! And which of the theologians handed down these voices with which the things said agree? None, surely. For he slanders the most blessed Augustine, as calling the memory and the will of the Father powers, the one generative, and the will pneumatic. For it has not been found anywhere in his writings, as far as we know, that these things are said in such a way, but rather the entire opposite. For he also agrees with the rest of the saints of the ^D For both the memory of man, and especially that which the beasts do not have—that is, according to which intelligible things are contained in such a way that they do not reach it through the senses of the body—has in this image of the Trinity, according to its own measure, an incomparably dissimilar, yet nonetheless some sort of, likeness of the Father. And further, the understanding of man, which is fashioned from thence through the purpose of the reasoning mind, whenever what is known is spoken, and not of any tongue, but of the heart in which the Word is, has in its own great dissimilarity also some likeness of the Son. And indeed, the love of man, proceeding from knowledge and joining the memory and the understanding, as if common to the Father and to the begotten, whence it is perceived as being neither Father nor begotten, has in this image, even if very dissimilar, some likeness of the Holy Spirit.” And again: “But regarding the Holy Spirit, I have demonstrated nothing in this enigma which would seem to be like Him, except for our will, or love, or charity, which is a stronger will.” And in the 21st again: “This name fits the Holy Spirit, just as love; and what is love other than…”

nature’s natural movement toward the good?”

PRAISE OF JOHN PALAEOLOGUS

The lion, the roaring beast, by breathing out a roar, is wont to strike fear, as one fearsome, into the races of all living things. “The lion,” it says, “shall roar, and who shall not tremble?” For which of these, when cowed, does not dread this trembling, or run to flight and dens and hiding-places? ^A

His radiant [presence] transformed your cheerfulness, alas for the misery! The great Ister saw you sailing upon him, stretched out smooth backs, gave no thought to the surge, neither of the tumultuous, grievous, and rough swell; with gentle currents, he welcomed you, the mild one, and received you into his embrace with these made tame, and without a wind he bore the vessels of your power, as if imitating the marks and minds of sentient beings, acting thus like another loyal and good servant, and prudently fearing, as I think, your ^B depths.

Since it can neither hide its own voice, nor altogether endure the trembling from that [roar]. But you, pouring forth a roar from the mouth of your serenity, the most gentle one, the one who has been rendered tranquil, you speak to all with this, and address them with gentleness, and you strike away far from them every panic. Those who turn to you, their gentle master, enjoy ten thousand blessings.

The bird-king, having fixed his nest according to his custom in a tree of good foliage, shaded by its trunks, knows how to gather there the refuse for his sparrows, setting the nests under his nest; as he preserves them outside of harm by his own shelter, and by the fear which all birds naturally have for him; for neither was a hostile serpent, nor a debt-collecting bird, nor any other thing of the rapacious and active birds, of those biting from the beak, of those tearing from the claws, ^C ever able to approach them, or to press them at all. But having extended the wings of the power that is yours, like unfledged chicks you warm the Roman Land, covering it in your own way, and shame the destroyers, like the great bird-king his own hiding-places.

The bright Morning Star—arising from Theman, as it was commanded by the word of the Lord, and bringing the day with torches until the very evening, until the lightless sunsets—ends his course, and again begins his course from the east, and again ends the course until the same sunsets. ^D And the long struggles, the courses and the labors, which you sustain most steadfastly on behalf of the subjects, or rather to speak more truly, on behalf of the Christians, in heat, and in cold, and wrestling against violent forces, not sparing, O sovereign lord, your body, nor your flesh, truly despising life itself excessively, and hastening most powerfully, as one sympathetic by nature, to rescue the bright Roman Land from the lawless beast, having fallen everywhere into grievous nooses.

Neither did physical luxury, and grace, and ease drag you, nor charm you, nor soften you. For to fight brilliantly on behalf of the subjects, to carry powerful arms, to run risks entirely by land and by sea, and by every country, you deem luxury, and a boast, and an extraordinary grace. A shield is a blanket to you, when you look toward sleep, and a breastplate a covering instead of the purple, instead of a holy cowl a helmet of iron, instead of silken sandals leggings again; and you bear these for us, as one sympathetic by nature.

The neighbors of the Ister saw the deeds done by you: Scythians, Moesians, and Triballians together with those from the Rhos, all at once, the greatest ones, foreigners, generals, satraps, commanders of divisions, fell before your power, and slavishly approached, bent the knee to you, offered the loyal worship of slaves, applauded with pæans, shouted out in high spirits, and did the rest of their own duties before you, the Ausonian ruler, just as the law directs a servant to perform before a master. The lord of the Moesians knows the nature of your mind, and seeing this, he shows it always as a decree of God, fulfilling the order of his master, like a loyal servant.

But you, lightless, unillumined, running from Byzantium, and making the impulses of your course toward the west (for thus the gloom of events has placed you, shedding darkness upon us from an hidden storm, and hiding your radiance; and the light-bearing [quality] of your power, like the brightness of the sun or the denseness of the clouds) like a Morning Star shining upon the land of the Ausonians, a joyous sun arise from the west, brightly flashing with the gleams of events, like another giant straightway running earthward; even if the multitude of the many and grievous failings, and their weighty counsels that are beyond mind and wits, and the strongest part of their quick-wittedness has been set. The divine, the illustrious, the king of the Paeonians knows, he admired the all-delightful and strange quality of your beauty, he admired the altogether elect quality of your nature, he admired the altogether excellent quality of your knowledge, he received you with outstretched hands, the one of the Word, even if some cloud flowing in again from transgressions changed your bright onsets all at once.

Come forth from the graves, O David, running more mystically, and hither to a second light of burial, fleeing the evening. Now strike the psaltery again and the harp.

^A and to preach there? And these things, while David the prophet hears daily, saying: "And in Hades who will acknowledge Thee?" But in addition to what has been said, O most holy man, I wish you to know for your information what that chronicler George Cedrenus says concerning Judas. For he says that Judas, being often exhorted by the apostles to draw near and repent, did not wish to; wherefore, having also heard that Christ was taken up, he became so puffed up that he even burst in the middle. And concerning this vain talk, it is thus; but that the wretch despaired of his own salvation, not indeed hoping to find a place for salvation, and resorted to the end of hanging, the great Athanasius has also clearly demonstrated this in his chapters addressed to Antiochus, saying thus: "There is nothing worse than despair, gripped by which Judas hanged himself." If these things are so, when then did Judas walk about the world as a great example of impiety according to that historian Papias? Learn then from this, O sacred head, not to read the God-inspired Scripture cursorily, but searchingly. For on this account the Lord also said: "Search the Scriptures, for they bear witness concerning Me." It is clear, therefore, from this that if we do not search, we shall not find Christ, that is to say, the Truth itself. For Christ is Truth, and Christ is the truth.

NOTICE REGARDING THE FOLLOWING EPISTLE

The reading of the lives of the saints, and of the blessed passing of the same, and of their migration to heaven, impels the soul to desire the kingdom of heaven and those most joyful rewards which God has prepared for those who truly worship Him. Yet this most sweet hope is not slightly infringed, or at least weakened, by the most pernicious and false opinion of certain Greeks, that the rewards (and therefore also the punishments) of souls are to be deferred until the consummation of the world and the resurrection of the bodies. A palmary error, surely, and long since condemned by the Apostolic See and by the ecumenical Council of Florence; which, however, Thomas Burnet the Englishman attempted to renew; against whose man's immediately importunate lucubration our great Muratori cut the nerves. In various writings of the Greeks which we have published sparingly, we have again and again demonstrated to the readers places which favor the truth of this dogma. And indeed, in volume VII of the *Scriptores Veteres*, we also printed a Latin booklet by an ancient anonymous author against the error of the Greeks.

But now, among the Vallicellian papers of Leo Allatius, we have also observed some letters or sermons of Michael Glycas, that is, excellent disputations of a Greek man against his own countrymen; in which, with many arguments and many testimonies of the Fathers and of ecclesiastical authors, he contends and demonstrates that the rewards of souls released from their bodies are not deferred; likewise their intercession before God for us, the knowledge and care they have for our affairs, and altogether the connection of the saints among themselves, namely, the communion of the blessed with us who still wander upon the earth. From the three letters of Glycas transcribed by Allatius, therefore, we commit the last, longer and more excellent one, to the press: omitting the former ones, of which Allatius himself produced certain parts or fragments in his dissertation on the ecclesiastical books of the Greeks. Indeed, before the writing of Glycas which we have chosen, we have placed a certain other fragment of an anonymous author; which the same Allatius noted that he had transcribed from Vatican Palatine codex 146, f. 60, b; in which fragment the aforementioned dogma is likewise excellently defended.

OF AN UNKNOWN AUTHOR, WHETHER SOULS ARE IN HEAVEN

^A departs, dwells in the royal courts in heaven. There are two elements in the whole of creation divided for the conduct of rational nature: earth and heaven. The earth is the place of those who have been allotted life in the flesh, while heaven is for the incorporeal; it is therefore absolutely necessary that we live our life somewhere. As long as we are not transplanted from the earth, we all remain on the earth; but if we depart from here, we shall be moved to heaven." And not only do the souls recognize one another, but—what is better—they even know each other more than they did when living together in this life; indeed, rejoicing together, they enjoy the fruition of that ineffable and blessed and inconceivable splendor of visions. That souls are active after the separation of the body, the great herald Athanasius teaches us; he speaks thus in his discourse against idols: ^B "If the body is moved by the soul, it follows that the soul is moved by itself, and consequently after the burial of the body it is moved again by itself; for it is not the soul that dies, but it is the body that dies through the soul’s departure. For if they are of one nature, so are their operations; and those whose work is equal, to them belongs the same reward."

2. Indeed, according to the angels, having been released from the bodily bond, [the soul] ascends and descends, and is sent for the benefit and utility of others, as it is holy and good. Every righteous soul dances with the angels and rejoices with them; and to dance with the angels is a form of active operation, not of inactivity; for the souls of the saints are directed toward the goal of true service ^C equal to that of the angels. The service of the angels is unceasing praise to God, and ministering, and serving, and being sent, and helping those in need, and guiding the straying by the hand. Yet neither the holy angels nor the souls of the saints ever make appearances without God's command; but indeed, this applies even to those who have sinned more gravely than to be beyond pardon. For the man who is destitute of charity, but full of hardness of heart, being held to account for the debts he owed, would by no means ignore the care of his brothers, so that, returning from wickedness to virtue, he might rescue those of his own blood and ^D from the punishment that awaits them. For even if they pay the penalty for what they owe, it does not mean that their knowledge is turned into folly as a punishment; for those whose knowledge they possessed securely while in the flesh would not only appear less in light of their previous understanding, but would be advanced to a more accurate perception. And those with whom they shared in evil deeds, they are able to remember along with them in their deliberations. Yet a slave does not set a slave free, nor can a dead man bring one to life. But if a man who is asleep carries the images of his daily cares in his dreams, and remembers the things he has done, as seems to the great Basil, and in his dreams his soul talks of these things with others and with itself; and if, once awake, he recalls to memory what was presented to his eyes in sleep, much more so does the soul, after the death of the body, released from its bonds and immune to its pains, more clearly possess a memory of itself and a greater knowledge.

^A

3. And there are three choirs: the first is the triadic order, Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim; these are places of rest; where the water of rest is God, sitting upon a throne of glory, and rendering hundredfold rewards to those who have borne the fruit of the hundredfold measure. The second order, Dominions, Virtues, and Powers; these are the verdant places of refreshment, where the gentle grace of the Holy Spirit extends innumerable rewards to those who have borne the fruit of the sixtyfold measure. The third order, Principalities, Archangels, Angels; these are the radiant places of divinity, where the tabernacle of rest is, and new heavens and a new earth; here the Sun of righteousness, Christ our God, bestowing crowns of righteousness, grants to those who have borne the fruit of the thirtyfold measure of ministry their reward; for a holy man, according to this hierarchy and order, earns among the celestial virtues a place in his own proper merit; one who occupies a place in the ecclesiastical hierarchy, and after this life is lifted up to it, and becomes an heir of this state, obtains the place itself, the domicile of the light of God’s rest; and rising after death to that place, and being joined to it, he rests, finding that place to be a luminous rest in God. ^B

4. The souls of sinners, full of darkness, and filth, and dung, are defiled by the angels who are ministers of wrath; and enwrapped in that darkness, against their will and with trembling and fear and dread, they are pushed into the depths of Hades and into dark prisons, and handed over to unclean spirits who are their guards. Here the prince of eternal darkness is enclosed with his own associates. It is necessary to know that mystic rites and sacrifices offered for those who have committed the sin unto death are in vain; but they greatly benefit those who have not committed such sins. Mortal sin is unbelief, and despair, an unrepentant heart, and blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, and denying Christ, and to die as a heretic in some heresy. ^C

5. But it is necessary to know this also, that the forty days of ancient mourning are divided in three ways by the apostles: in the third, in the ninth, and in the fortieth. Thus also the Lord, after His three-day resurrection, showed Himself to the disciples, the doors being shut, and breathed on them saying: Receive the Holy Spirit. And after eight days, behold again, after the resurrection, within eight days, He appeared to them anew. The Evangelist says that He did not count the day of the resurrection, which is included, but they are counted as nine. According to this method, therefore, we perform the memorials of those who have fallen asleep on the ninth day from the burial; likewise also the forty days, since on the fortieth day the Lord was taken up. ^D

973 ESALE CYPRII DE PROCESSIONE SPIRITUS SANCTI 974

^D Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father. I ask you, and answer, not contentiously and ignorantly, but with reason and prudence. Is the Paraclete whom the Son sends someone else, and the Spirit who proceeds from the Father someone else, or are they one and the same? Next, why is the Spirit of truth called Spirit? I pass over indeed that, *He will glorify me, for he will take of mine, and will declare it to you* [John xvi, 14]; and, *All things that the Father hath are mine* [ibid. 15]. For this reason I said, *He will take of mine, and will declare it to you*. And in the sixteenth chapter he says: *But the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name* [John xiv, 26]. Behold, the Father also sends, not grace, but the Paraclete, and the Holy Spirit. And that, *He that seeth me seeth the Father* [John xiv, 9]. And in the Apocalypse: *He showed me a river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb* [Apoc. xxii, 1]; and again, *I saw a two-edged sharp sword, proceeding out of the mouth of Christ* [Apoc. i, 16].

^B These things all I pass over, and others similar because of their number. You say, however, that the Father is the sole fountain of the supersubstantial Godhead. And we confess this even better than you, and more theologically. We confess, however, that the Son is also a fountain of the Holy Spirit, following the great Athanasius, and Gregory the Theologian, and John Chrysostom. For the first, in his discourse on the Incarnate Economy, says: "For he knows the Son standing with God the Father, the fountain of the Holy Spirit." And Gregory, in the discourse on the Holy Spirit, ^C calls the Father the eye, the Son the fountain, and the Holy Spirit the river. And the golden-mouthed John, in the discourse on the mystery of baptism, "For this reason," he says, "the Savior shows himself to be the fountain of life, and the Holy Spirit to be living water." As for what you put in the fourth place, it moves me to laughter. For you say, "The Holy Spirit proceeds, and nothing more." Do we deny that he proceeds? The Holy Spirit is also said to be from the Father. Add the rest: "And it is attested that he is from the Son." For it is not the Damascene, but Gregory of Nyssa, who says this in his interpretation of the *Our Father*, which is rather in favor of the truth, and against you, just as are all the other things. Therefore, it seems to me supererogatory and futile to answer you on each point individually. For preach these things to the smiths, the cup-bearers, the furriers, ^D and other sordid craftsmen. These, naturally, will admire you and praise you, as they do not know what you are saying. But those who understand consider these things to be the arrows and babblings of infants. Nevertheless, though, O acutely-minded theologian and master, tell me this: Why do all the saints say, "Everything that the Father has, the Son also has, except for begetting, except for producing, except for being Father"; and no one has said, "excepting also, sending forth"? Why do all the saints say that the Father gives everything to the Son in begetting? And you say "not everything"? If, therefore,

^A everything is according to you, then he is not consubstantial with the Father; which is far from being able to enter the mind of any Christian. These few things, then, out of many, I have said to you. But you, going through the sayings of the Fathers, diligently examine them, and zealously seek out their meaning, and learn these things from those who know, lest you incur laughter, whether in writing or speaking. For you see that whatever authorities you have recorded in writing are all against you rather than for you. And if you have a desire to grasp the truth of my words with your own hand, come to me, and you will see; if not, I will come to you, and I will argue from your own books, and, God helping, I will demonstrate the truth. For the doorkeeper will open, I am not mistaken, the door of the sheepfold, because we do not climb in from elsewhere like thieves; and ^B he will reveal to us what is hidden therein. Would that he might for you as well!

NOTICE ON HILARION THE MONK

DIALECTICAL DISCOURSE OF HILARION THE MONK CONCERNING THE MYSTICAL BREAD OF THE GREEKS AND THE AZYME OF THE LATINS

^A When I was discerning the mystical bread of the Greeks and the azyme of the Latins, a certain discourse or exposition of Nicetas, a most learned Father among the Greeks, was shown to me, in which he ran through many arguments concerning azymes during the Lord’s Supper, directed against the Latins: "On that Thursday there was no azyme, since the moon was on its thirteenth day. For on its fifteenth day it was prescribed by law that the Azymes should take place. And for this reason, the divine Luke and the other evangelists among the apostles say: 'Taking bread and giving thanks, he broke bread,' that is, common bread and not azyme; for it was not yet time." These are the words of Nicetas. And in another place: "If, however, Christ was sacrificed and crucified on the fourteenth day of the moon, on the day of Preparation [Friday], but on the Sabbath there was the feast of Azymes, when did he eat the azymes, and when did he hand it down to the apostles to do in the New Testament?" and the rest.

I, for my part, would say that I am greatly astonished that these things were set forth by Nicetas, a man certainly educated and learned. For he clearly declares two things contrary to the Gospels and to the words of the Law regarding the eating of the lamb, that is to say, and the Paschal time—namely, that it was on the Sabbath and not on the Friday. All these things we can easily demonstrate to be false and to contain no truth. And the first point, to say that Christ, while eating the lamb, did not eat the azymes, is wrapped in contradiction. For never in the Law did God give a commandment regarding the Paschal lamb without also mentioning the Azymes. For to Moses and Aaron he spoke as follows: *Let every man take a lamb according to their families and their houses, a lamb perfect, a male, one year old, from the lambs and the kids; and the whole multitude shall sacrifice it, and they shall eat the flesh in that night roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with bitter herbs* [Exod. xii, 3-8]. And infra, much more clearly: *On the fourteenth day of the first month at evening, you shall eat azymes until...*

the twenty-first day of the month at evening. Seven days leaven shall not be found in your houses. Everyone who eats that which is leavened, that soul shall be cut off from the assembly of the sons of Israel* [Exod. xii, 18-19]. These are the words of divine law to the lawgivers. If, therefore, Christ ate the lamb according to the prescription of the law, how shall it be said that He did not eat azymes? And in the New Testament, the Evangelist Matthew: *On the first day of the Azymes, the disciples came to Jesus, saying to Him: Where do You want us to prepare for You to eat the Pascha?* [Matth. xxvi, 17]. And Mark: *On the first day of the Azymes, when they sacrificed the Pascha, the disciples of His say to Him: Where do You want us to go, and prepare for You, that You may eat the Pascha?* [Marc. xiv, 12]. And Luke: *It was, moreover, the day of the Azymes, on which the Pascha had to be sacrificed, and He sent Peter and John, saying: Going, prepare for us the Pascha, that we may eat* [Luc. xxii, 7-9]. Which Theophylact, Archbishop of Bulgaria, a Greek interpreter, explains in this manner: "The evangelist names the 'first of the Azymes' as one preceding the Parasceve, and on which at evening they ate azymes."

See therefore, beloved Greeks, that it is gathered most openly both from the old law and from the New Testament, how Christ, when He ate the lamb, also ate the azymes. To these we may add the custom of the Jews, who always ate azymes on the evening of the fourteenth moon. But if you refute the Latins from the appellation of bread—that indeed, Christ, taking bread and giving thanks, broke it—I say that every leavened thing is bread. And when someone says "bread," he denotes both, both azyme and leavened. And by what reason do some foolishly and irrationally assert that azyme is not bread, taking arguments from a certain new etymology of bread? Namely, that *artos* (bread) is so called because it contains in itself the *arsin* (lifting/rising) of the leaven; but azyme, not having this lifting, cannot be called bread. These etymologies are trifles. We, however, not without reason, and as befits philosophers, declare the pure matter: that bread is a genus, and is divided into its species, azyme and leavened, just as an animal is divided into man and horse, and the genus is predicated univocally of its species. And just as man and horse admit the name and definition of animal—the name, because both are animals; the definition, because both are animate and sensible essence—in no other way do azyme and the leavened pertain to bread. For they share the same name, in that both are bread, and the definition, in that both are said to be the essence of wheat and bread. Besides, who will correctly call leaven the perfection of bread, which corrupts the very bread itself? For Paul says: *Do you not know, brothers, that a little leaven corrupts the whole mass?* [1 Cor. v, 6]. Furthermore, from the Mosaic law, in which it is written, *On the fourteenth day of the first month at evening, the Pascha to the Lord, and on the fifteenth day of the month, this shall be a festive day of the Azymes to the Lord. ^A I speak according to the custom of those who apply themselves to philosophy, always naming... ^{B C D}

not to touch upon things beyond comprehension at all, but in these matters to confess one's defeat, and to say with the divine David: "Thy knowledge is become wonderful from me; it is strengthened, we cannot attain unto it." For to the saints who have fallen asleep in Christ, supernatural gifts have been imparted; and they hearken to us ^A when we pray, and stand by those in affliction for the sake of consolation, as has been said from above. For if those who, like me, have spent their lives slothfully are yet made aware of the good deeds performed here on their behalf, as we are taught by the sacred Scriptures, how much more so are those who have served the debts in Christ Himself? Hence it is that the Theologian Gregory, in his funeral oration for his sister, said these things among others: "Receive the present discourse, O blessed one; for God has granted to those like you, that they should enjoy such things."

11. But if these things are so, whence do we derive the authority ^B to deprive the departed souls of the saints of such grace? And this, while Peter, the chief of the apostles, says that God has bestowed good things upon men, which even the angels desire to look into. And what need is there to say much? For if we heard concerning some saints still remaining in this life that, through their prayer, even some who had ended their lives in impiety were delivered from eternal punishment, what stands in the way that they, having changed their life and having become, as it were, closer to God, should not do the same for those who have gone before, and possess the same energy and power—not to mention a much greater one, because of the laying aside of this flesh? ^C Let us not, therefore, oppose the patristic traditions, nor let us curiously inquire how these things can be; for these things were written, not that we might be overly inquisitive, but that we might believe, and that by believing we might have eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

EPISTOLA XIX.

Prayers for the dead and alms are not in vain.

That one should not waver at all regarding the good deeds performed by some—on behalf of the pious, indeed, but also for sinners—let the disciples of Christ and the apostles persuade us, before all others, who ordained that the third, ninth, and fortieth day—and indeed also the annual—memorials be performed in common for the dead. For if the divine Gregory of Nyssa, following the holy apostles, ^D is found saying thus: "Nothing is handed down by the disciples of Christ without reason nor without gain, but the matter is entirely profitable, to make a memorial during the divine liturgical service for those of the faithful who have fallen asleep," then how much more does it behoove us to follow without questioning. For if, as we have said, we are not forbidden to offer sacrifice on behalf of those who have died in sins, and the great Basil, in the third prayer which is said on the day of Pentecost, clearly teaches it, so to God...

who at that very feast and saving day grants us to accept expiatory supplications on behalf of those who have descended into Hades, providing great hopes, and rest to those who are held by their oppressors. And if the dead shall not praise you, O Lord, nor shall those who are in Hades present themselves with boldness to bring sacrifice to you, but we who are living intercede for their souls. ^A And if one should say to me: "If it were the case that sacrifices were offered for all of the dead to God, and generally, that all would attain salvation, you have here the great Dionysius who puts this opinion aside," and he makes clear which ones of those who have departed life in sins are forgiven, and which are not. For, in going through the lives of those who have departed, he says: "If there were some light things, they have benefit on account of the good deeds which are done for them; but if they were heavy and excessive," he concludes that God stands against them. Added to this, the great Epiphanius in *Panarion* also has things to this effect: "Prayers of the pious are useful for the departed, if great crimes do not hinder."

And these indeed hand down these things. But John of Damascus presents these same things more openly, showing, from this point forward, which of the transgressions can easily be forgiven, and which cannot be forgiven at all, saying in his discourse, *On Those Who Have Fallen Asleep*: "Those who, together with other inhumanity and cruelty, were entirely unmerciful, and were not moved by the entreaties of those who were in need, but even robbed them—truly these will not be helped; for God, as the great Dionysius says, has closed himself against them." ^B Whosoever were of a good conscience, but yet, on account of premature death, did not reach the completion of divine laws for themselves, these will benefit most from the prayers made on their behalf. Yet, no less, the divine Chrysostom adds to this topic, saying: "You did not attain in your life to set all things regarding your soul in order, yet even at the end of life you can command your own people following your death to give you help through good works—I mean through almsgiving—and thereby render the Savior propitious to you; for these are pleasing and acceptable to Him." And if the great Basil somewhere says: "Be not deceived, God is not mocked; do not bring a dead man to the altar, offer your sacrifice for the living," he does not mean this as a prohibition, nor consequently that good works are to be neglected for the dead. For know that he is directing this speech against those who are greedy, ^C unyielding, and completely inhuman, and that it is clear which ones this divine man is addressing: one with a heart of stone. Therefore he did well, for if he had not used stronger language, he would never have, at that time, fed those who were perishing from famine.

[LATIN COLUMN]

And what necessity is there to say that Christ was one day early on account of the crucifixion that was to happen on the day of Prepare-day [Friday]? Since holy Luke stands against this, writing thus of the fifth feria [Thursday]: "It was the day of Azymes when the Pasch ought to be sacrificed." For by saying "ought," he reveals the necessity of the law, and not the free will of Christ. Let us conclude, therefore, from the opinion and sentiment of the learned Latin theologians, that Christ was fixed to the cross on the very day of the Pasch, that is, on the Parasceve, when he had decided to suffer, and to sacrifice himself as the true Lamb at the time of the typical lamb, and according to astronomers, on that same Parasceve occurred the fifteenth moon from the vernal equinox. The translation of the Pasch to the Sabbath, however, happened from the ancient custom of the Jews, who, perceiving the difficulty between these two solemnities, at which time food could not be prepared, joined two feast days into one Sabbath; and for this reason John wrote: "For that day of the Sabbath was great," as if to imply that it was a double feast day. And this we can likewise learn from the Jews themselves, who never celebrate the Pasch on the day of the Parasceve. And about the azymes, and the Paschal sacrifice, these things suffice. And these things I have written to you, most friendly Greeks, not disparaging your bread—for which, being worshipped, I have as much reverence as our own azymes—but explaining that you are not acting well, nor as a Christian, while you injure and treat with contempt the azymes of the Latins. For in both, as has been said, the true Christ is contained. Being admonished, therefore, lovingly, cease from audacity and slander in the future.

NOTICE OF JOANNES ARGYROPHILUS

Most say that he set out for Italy, and specifically that this happened when Constantinople was captured by the Turks in the year 1453. Paulus Jovius, however, after having written that Theodore Gaza fled to Italy when Amurath was shaking all of Greece with his victorious arms, reports that Argyrophilus was also ejected from Greece by the same Turkish onset, and by this very fact seems to signify that he had crossed into Italy before the capture of Constantinople. Nic. Comn. Papadopoli relates that he came to Italy a second time, and that upon his first arrival he was sent by Bessarion to Padua, where he learned the Latin letters in the gymnasium of that city and was occupied with Aristotle; then, however, he returned to Constantinople, stayed there for some years, and before the city was conquered by the Turks, migrated to Italy and fixed his residence there. A most ample field for displaying the riches of his learning fell to Argyrophilus at Florence. For Cosmas Medici, who flourished above all others in that city by both wealth and authority, so that he was proclaimed father of the fatherland by public decree, followed men of letters with the highest love and fostered them with incomparable munificence; he received him most honorably, and gave him as a tutor to his son Peter and his grandson Lorenzo, who held him in the place of a parent. Moreover, he gave him the power to teach the Aristotelian philosophy, to which he was addicted, and to explain Greek authors to the studious youth in public lectures. Argyrophilus performed the assigned duty with great praise; and he not only imbued Lorenzo Medici, as yet but a boy, with dialectics and that part of philosophy which concerns morals, but he also taught very many Italians who, to use the words of Cortesius, compelled by the admirable fame of his learning, had surrendered themselves to his discipline. From the number of auditors he had at Florence, the same Cortesius produces Donatus Acciaiolus and Matthæus Palmerius. Among his disciples, however, he who holds first place, and who shone forth more brightly from that source in every kind of Greek and Latin learning, is Angelus Politianus. He explicitly professes that that Byzantine Argyrophilus was once his preceptor in philosophy, and adds that he was held to be most erudite, not only in Latin letters, but also in the decrees of wisdom and all the disciplines which are called cyclic by Martianus. There exist two Greek epigrams of this same Politianus in praise of this preceptor of his, written in the ninth year of his age. How much he valued the knowledge of Greek letters in this most excellent disciple of his can be understood from the fact that Scipio Carteromachus testifies that he himself saw Politianus writing in Greek, which was often a source of admiration to Joannes Argyrophilus. After he had for a sufficiently long time discharged the office of teacher of philosophy and Greek letters at Florence, and had been distinguished in both authority and favor with Cosmas Medici, and subsequently with his son Peter and grandson Lorenzo, to whom he also dedicated certain books of Aristotle translated by himself into Latin, because a grave pestilence was falling upon that city and devastating Etruria, around the year 1475.

JOANNES ARGYROPULUS. — NOTITIA.

Argyropulus moved to Rome, and there he undertook the task of teaching Greek letters, and especially the philosophy of Aristotle. In that city, and indeed in the Vatican, Johannes Reuchlin, our countryman, heard Argyropulus lecturing publicly; having already had his grounding in Greek letters at Basel from Andronicus Contoblacus, and then at Paris from Hieronymus Spartiate. They say that when Reuchlin, at Argyropulus’s own command, recited and interpreted a part of a certain Thucydidean speech, Argyropulus not only marveled that he had pronounced the words fluently, but had also explored their meaning altogether excellently, and exclaimed to the men of high standing who were present: "Alas, Greece has flown across the Alps into our exile," in much the same manner as the orator Apollonius once, having heard Cicero declaiming at Rhodes, affected by admiration as much as by grief, said that he had transferred Greek letters and eloquence to the Romans. In his old age at Rome, Argyropulus also had a student from among our own, Jacob Questeberg of Friberg, who learned from him not only the Greek language, but also grasped the rudiments of philosophy.

Worn out by old age, Argyropulus died at Rome, when, as Jovius relates, he had fallen into a fever from an immoderate consumption of watermelons, leaving behind a son, Isaac, a musician noble and famous. As for the year of his death, writers do not agree among themselves, nor does it seem capable of being defined with certainty.

Argyropulus was of an altogether outstanding natural talent and of famous learning and scholarship in Greek letters, being most skilled above all in the Aristotelian philosophy. For this reason, those who knew him more closely, and who were the most suitable judges and assessors, vied with one another in extolling him with great praises. Among these, first and foremost, is Francesco Filelfo, in his letters of recommendation written to Th. Francus from Milan in the year 1461, and [Reuchlin] himself, in his work on the Hebrew language, book 1, page 20, where he expounds upon the teachers he had in learning the Greek language: "I did not receive the Greek language from the Ionians, nor anywhere in Greece, but first at Basel from Andronicus Contoblacus, then at Paris from Georgius Hieronymus Spartiate, afterwards at Rome from Argyropulus the Byzantine, who was lecturing publicly on Thucydides under Pope Sixtus IV, and finally at Florence and Milan from Demetrius Chalcocondyles, receiving it bit by bit, as if it were crumbs falling from the master's table."

[The remainder of the page consists of bibliographic notes, citations, and critical commentary regarding the biographical timeline of Argyropulus and his students.]

^A Verily, if you hand over to the infidels all the wealth of the world, as the disciples of Christ say, it will be of no benefit to them. And if this is the case, what must be said about the prayers that are offered for them? For what the prayers of the poor cannot effect for the sake of earthly things, the prayer of a just man has achieved miraculously. For the great Gregory, surnamed Dialogus, did not yield to the requests made to him for the remission of the sins of the emperor Trajan, who had ended his life in impiety. But the great martyr Thecla, when she was entreated for a certain Greek woman, Falconilla by name, snatched her from eternal punishments. Macarius, too, meeting on the path the skull of the arch-priest of the idols, which was drying up, and inquiring about the things he wished to learn from it, heard the truth of the Word which, at that time, God had breathed into it; ^B for if, when we perform the sacrifices for the dead, we then perceive little consolation, we are indeed feeble. Even the emperor Maurice, having fallen into a sin greater than that which could be forgiven him—for he gave up an army of ten thousand men to be slaughtered by the barbarians—escaped eternal punishment through the prayers of the holy men.

EPISTOLA XXI. (Frag.)

EPISTOLA XXII. (Frag.)

For when later, at the time of the Passion, the Lord said, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit," the souls of the just were then granted an ascent to the heights; for Christ did not die for them gratuitously. The souls of the sinners, however, remain as they were before in the lower places. And this is evident from those things which he treats in the narrative of the Dormition of the most holy Theotokos. For even Andreas of Crete, as he says, [speaks] of all men, and of the just also.

the souls of the saints pass through the joyless place of Hades, and they are not detained, except for those who, through the ease of life, have drawn upon themselves the death that comes through sin. Thus, the souls of the saints will indeed pass through the gates of Hades. For the disciple is not above his master. However, they will not be held fast as before, when sin reigned together with death. But they shall pass through so that they may be initiated into the mysteries accomplished there by the Lord beyond nature, how He conquered, and how He rose, having shattered those bars. This very thing the Theologian Gregory also implies in his oration on Pascha, and says as follows: "If He descends into Hades, descend with Him. Know also the mysteries of Christ there, and what is the economy of the double descent." ^B

EPISTOLA XXIII. To Constantine Palaiologos. That those should not be heeded who rashly opine that Paul is one of the twelve disciples of Christ.

Regarding the question you propose concerning the blessed Paul, most noble man, as to whether he was co-opted into the college of the twelve disciples of Christ, you ought to know that this great Apostle is outside this number of twelve. For his calling occurred long after, as I know, both the ascension of our Savior and the very descent of the most Holy Spirit; that is to say, after he had persecuted the Church of Christ, after he had consented to the killing of the protomartyr Stephen, and after he had received letters from the high priests and had gone out against the Christians. ^C For at that time that mystical lightning flashed around him in the middle of the road; at that time also he heard a voice from above saying thus: "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"; and at that time he was also blinded in the lamps of his body. Hence it is that he is sent to Ananias, and receives baptism from him. Moreover, all these things happened long after the arrival of the Holy Spirit. And what need is there to say much? Read the book of the Acts. For it mentions by name the twelve disciples of Christ, who, through the arrival of the Holy Spirit, had received that wondrous gift of tongues; and you will not find Paul there, but Peter, and Andrew, and John, and James his brother, Matthew, Philip, ^D Bartholomew, Simon the Zealot, James of Alphaeus, and Judas his brother, Thomas, and that Matthias, who, although he was previously of the number of the seventy disciples, was nevertheless elected by lot by Peter in place of Judas the traitor, together with the eleven, as the divinely-inspired Luke records. These twelve men, then, who have been mentioned, and they alone, received at that time and first the grace of the All-Holy Spirit. Hence, therefore, we say that the blessed Paul is outside this number of twelve. But those who say that this man is also one of the twelve...

EPISTOLA XXIV.

^A and let them show the one who has fallen, and again, whence he fell, and let them cease calling Paul one of the twelve. For if he did not go out from there, if he did not again become one of the eleven, how did the blessed one enter? By what manner was he numbered with the choir of the twelve? Do not, therefore, lightly accept what is introduced by some as true in this way, even if it is supported by the writings of the Fathers. For since each of the disciples finished his own course, since he kept the faith even to his end, and the memorials drawn up for their sake by Dorotheus, bishop of Tyre and martyr, testify to this, how then can we speak of anyone being cast out of the choir, such that Paul entered in his place? If that wretch fell from the choir, and left his rank to another, the Iscariot—concerning whom it is written in the Psalms, "And let another take his office"— ^B nevertheless, even if Paul is not counted in the number of the twelve, his honors are not on that account diminished, nor is he rendered inferior to the other disciples. Far be it. Even if the Lord chose those twelve first, and honored them with the greatest of dignities; even if He promised that they would sit upon twelve thrones, and will be His companions on that day, because they have remained with Him; yet we have it elsewhere, that the Lord Himself, when the sons of Zebedee sought the right and left throne, said to them: "It is not mine to give this, but for whom it has been prepared by my Father." Therefore, if that honor is not given by grace, but according to struggles, and the one who strives as Paul did will be found a consort and participant of the twelve-fold honor, do not marvel. And why say many things? If no one toiled more than Paul, it is plain that no one is greater than Paul ^C among those who stand there, as the gold-tongued John says. Learn, therefore, from this, that Paul is a consort and participant of that ineffable glory which the twelve first disciples of Christ attained, and that he is not filling the number of those, as the argument has already made known.

EPISTOLA XXV.

^D To Andronicus Palaeologus.—Concerning the Feast of Lights. On the solemnity of the Nativity of Christ, he might be more worthy (1).

If you, O most noble man, among others, have heard the theologian Gregory calling the day of Lights more splendid than the day of Christ's nativity—which the gold-tongued John extols to such a degree that he calls it the metropolis of all the feasts of Christ—do not marvel at this, nor think that the interpreters of the Spirit are at variance with one another. For if you apply your mind, you will find in one sense that one praises the birth because of the tongue, and in another that the theologian again calls the day of Lights more glorious. For the divine John, looking to the same ineffable economy of God, and [rest of page content missing]

producing, nor are they produced: for this is proper to the hypostasis; for they are neither perfections nor faculties, since these things are in the hypostasis and with the ^A hypostasis. And they are called by theologians, the one generative, and the other productive faculty; and for this reason the product of the former is called offspring and Son, and the product of the latter is called projection and Spirit. For things which are from principles must, in those which are of the same kind, resemble their own proper principles, and from them also derive their name.

γ. Since both of those which are produced are said to be from the essence of the Father, but He Himself neither generates nor is generated, nor yet projects nor is projected, as the theologians say, it is necessary that the essence of both be such a principle whereby the Father produces both, the Son and the Holy Spirit. ^B Otherwise, as they are of the same essence, both the things produced by the producer and the things produced [in relation] to one another could not exist otherwise than from the essence of the Father, as from a principle and a faculty; which neither produces nor is produced, nor in that which is "from something," nor in that which is defined "in relation to something," existing namely in the Father and in the Son and in the Spirit, and as a principle and as a species, in so far as it is bestowed. But yet, the hypostasis of the Father being one when He produces the persons, and the essence being again one and the same principle and ^C faculty, the things produced would be in all ways and entirely the same. Or rather, the produced person would be one in reality, if there were not other things joined to the essence, through which the faculties—by which the Son and the Spirit are produced—might in some way differ. And these [faculties] would be mind and will: the former, being together with the essence a principle and faculty through the energy of generation, is productive of the Son (for which reason the Son of God has been named 'Word' by the theological thunder; for the word is the offspring of the mind); and the latter, the will, being together with the same essence a principle and faculty ^D through the energy of projection, or spiration, is productive of the hypostasis of the Holy Spirit, not as a free-willed principle, but as a necessary and natural faculty and principle (for which reason the divine Spirit is called 'Love' by those treating theology; for the faculty of love is the will). And what we have said harmonizes with the voices of the theologians, and no less with those things said by the holy Augustine in his book *On the Trinity*, in which he called both the generative faculty memory, and the spirative faculty will.

δ. It is evident, therefore, from what has been said, that the Father is the fount of Deity, and the sole cause, and the sole source of the supersubstantial Deity, and the sole Begetter at once and Projector, and whatever else the school of the theologians has named Him; not only because He possesses the aforementioned faculties and fruitfulnesses from no one, but because He alone among divine things is the sole producer. For He alone is the producer by the aforementioned faculties, as a fount and principle and cause, and

whatever else any one might imagine in such a matter and likeness, He produces. It is also clear that the two aforementioned faculties are altogether the divine essence, and [all] that is attributed to God—mind and will. Mind, then, and will are perfections. But since the two persons who are produced, the Son and the Divine Spirit, are, the one indeed proceeds from the Father, as Father, and so is referred to Him by sonship: for the Son is of the Father, just as the Father also is called Father of the Son; but the other, again, proceeds from the same Father, not as Father, but as producer, of course, and as one who puts forth, and as one who breathes, and as many things as happen to be of similar power. And for this reason, the Divine Spirit is referred to Him by procession. For the issue is called of the producer, just as the producer is the producer of the issue. Just as, therefore, ^A the Father is conceived before the producer, not according to eternity—for in that respect Father and producer are contemporaneous, existing as such from all eternity—but according to the power and the act of bringing forth. For He brings forth the Son before the Spirit, being already understood to exist by the property toward the Son, namely by paternity; so also the Son, again, is conceived before the Spirit, not because they are not at the same time and coternally [with each other]; for in this way the three persons are altogether and coternally [existent], and in no way is one before another; but because to be begotten is by the nature of the matter before being put forth, and to beget is before putting forth, by which the Father is conceived before the producer. And this is altogether the order of the divine hypostases, rising also from the fount-like principle of the Father, according to which the Father is ^B before both, and the Son is before the Divine Spirit; and these things [exist] at the same instant of eternity, the Father, the Son, and the Divine Spirit being together.

5. But further, it is just to add to the things already said, as it is most theological, that the Father brings forth each of the divine persons, equal to Himself in all respects and altogether similar in the same perfections in number. For all things that reside in the Father without paternity, and all things that correspond to the divine paternity, even without paternity and breathing taken together, and as many as correspond to them in common—theological discourse ^C hands down that these are common also to those from the Father. For those things themselves, that is to say, paternity, and paternity together with breathing, and as many things as follow upon paternity, and the relations again of paternity and breathing, are mere relations, not perfections, just as also sonship is, and the breathing in the Spirit; and for this reason these are properties, each belonging to one only of the persons, [a property] which in no way is moved or transformed. But apart from these, all things are the same in number, common to the three, so that the Son is God equal and similar to God the Father in the same respects, and ^D the Spirit is God to God the Father and to the Son; and for this reason there is one God in three, by the same and one essence, and by the same perfections, with the mode alone being in some way altered, such that in the Father these are as in a fount, and are without beginning, and without cause, and are not given by any other, but in the Son and Spirit...

they are given by another, that is, by the Father, not indeed as from a fount, nor without beginning and cause. For the Father alone is the fount of the supersubstantial divinity, and He alone is cause and causator, because He alone is without cause and without beginning. For He Himself is not from any other, so that He too might be in some way caused, and that the things that are in Him might be from some other and not without beginning and, as it were, in a fount. Since He alone is the principle of the Son and of the Spirit, without beginning and without cause, as we were saying.

6 The Father, therefore, in bringing forth the Son, imparts to Him the divine essence and all its perfections, so that He also imparts the power of generation and of procession simultaneously. For the persons being of the same essence also have the same perfections, as was shown; and both intellect and will are perfections. Moreover, who does not know that intellect and will are entirely and in every way the same in the Father and the Son and the Spirit? But indeed, when the Son was being brought forth from the Father as Father, the Holy Spirit is not understood as being brought forth from the Father as Producer. For the Father is pre-conceived as Father, before the Producer as he is Producer, as was stated. Furthermore, with the paternity subsisting—being one property—supporting the paternal hypostasis, just as the Son is supported by filiation and the Spirit by procession, there could not be both paternity and the procession that is in the Father simultaneously. For paternity will be pre-conceived before that which is in the Father—or, to say the same thing, before the active procession. Wherefore the Son also, when the Father as Producer brings forth the Holy Spirit, possessing the same power from the Father through generation—namely, the productive power—will be co-conceived with the Father in regard to the procession of the Spirit, which is one from the Father through the Son, namely by one power and one principle, that which is in the Father and the Son; in the former, indeed, as in a fount and without beginning and not from another, but in the Son, being given through generation from the Father, as from a principle without beginning and a fount and a cause, from which both the Son and the Holy Spirit forth-proceed. Hence, the Holy Spirit is reasonably said to proceed from the Father through the Son, according to the knit-together theology. For He is not from the Father alone, lest the Son be thought unlike Him, not possessing the same perfections as the Father, and for this reason not consubstantial—which is in no way different from the heresy of Arius, which alienates the Son from the divine nature of the Father; for those whose powers are different, their essences also would be different. Nor, again, is He from the Son, lest the Son in turn be thought a principle without beginning, and thence again be alien to the paternal essence and nature; and besides, lest the Holy Spirit be thought a grandson of the Father, and the Son once more a son of the Son of God; for thus the Son might again be a Father. And besides, lest one should think that something belongs to the Son as a power productive of the Holy Spirit, which is not the same in number as that which is in God and Father. For this would also introduce once again the unlikeness of essence, and these things are all impious and atheistic.

^A And that this is so, even the Theologian Gregory indicates, setting it forth word for word thus: "But these things are not a second regeneration, nor a restoration to the ancient state, even if we seek it with many sighs and tears, from which a scar eventually comes, though with difficulty according to my own account and discourse." For it comes, and we believe it. But if we desire to escape the scars, I would certainly wish, when he himself also shows kindness, that he would not display this to us without the labor of stripes and wounds, which come from sin, to health. I very much think that it is a sacred garment, which is for salvation, and a profession of repentance, and a symbol of mortification; but it cannot itself by itself grant forgiveness, unless labors and fountains of tears and works of virtue follow it. For if it were with difficulty led to a scar, as the aforesaid man said, what must be said if we are to use them, owing to the inconveniences and straits of time, and the lack of facility? Are they not merciful, therefore, the Lord? But yet, for those calling upon His mercy with exceeding labor there is work. And this is what the divine psalmist David noted, signifying the toil of repentance: "My soul was humbled in fasting, and my flesh was changed because of the oil." And again: "Since I kept silent, my bones grew old from my crying all the day." ^B Therefore, the most holy Ephrem rightly declared: "The monk is not constituted by the tonsure and the habit, but by the heavenly way of life and the divine institution." By which he warns us, on account of our slippery nature, that this habit should be held with great wonder, as it was to the great Pachomius, by an angel. Why? Lest it check those coming to repentance like a rein, and not permit them at all to turn back to the former state. He expressed this with these manifest words: "Monk, consider the habit with which you are clothed, and know that you have departed from this world, and are wholly drawn to spiritual work." The most holy John, author of the Scale, rebuked this, saying: "Let the labor of mourning excite you, and the habit itself yours. For all who mourn for the dead clothe themselves in black garments. Therefore, on account of our slippery nature, the sacred habit is offered as a mystery. For if it were not so, those who might desire the monastic life would not have need of it." ^C And he shows that the great Antony, the most divine Paul the Theban, and all the rest who have put on the monastic habit, even without this habit, while bearing their soul and body, attained to absolute perfection and the summit of holiness.

Wherefore true repentance will not be the black cloak, the casting off of hair, but a turning to the Lord, and not a correct despising of the former evils, abstaining from them, and after that a loving of tears. "For my child," he says, "you have sinned; do not add further, but pray for your former sins"; for it is not enough for repentance ^D that he should be the one to use them, due to the pressure of the time and the straits: for the Lord is merciful, but he also has need of much toil by those calling upon Him for mercy. And this is that which the Godly David said of the repentance that is toilsome: "My soul was humbled in fasting, and my flesh was changed because of the oil." And again: "Since I kept silent, my bones grew old from my crying all the day long." Rightly, therefore, the most holy Ephrem said that the monk is not constituted by the tonsure and the habit, but by the heavenly manner of life, and the divinely inspired way of life. "For," he says, "he gives us to understand that such a habit is slippery for us, and he describes the great Pachomius as taught by an angel in a wonderful way." For what cause? "To curb those coming to repentance like a rein, and not to permit them at all; but rather to be insistent upon their turning back." And this is entirely reasonable, as he who said, "Monk, behold the scheme which you have put on, and know how you depart from this world, and are wholly drawn to spiritual work." Also, the most holy John of the Ladder said: "Let him apply himself to the work of mourning, and this itself is the garment. For all who mourn for the dead clothe themselves in black. Therefore, for the sake of our slipperiness, the sacred rite of the garment is given." For if this were not so, those who desire to be monastics would not have accepted the need for it. And see the great Antony, the most divine Paul the Theban, and those who at that time were monastics, that even without this scheme, as being those who had their soul at the highest peak, they reached the highest summit of holiness.

True repentance therefore is not a black cloak and the casting off of hair, but to turn to the Lord, and to condemn evil, and to love what is good, and, after this, to shed warm tears for one’s sins. "For my child," he says, "you have sinned; do not add further, but pray for your former sins." For it is not sufficient for repentance...

as the golden-tongued Chrysostom says, merely to cease from sin, but it is necessary that fruits worthy of repentance be produced, since for those who are wounded it is not enough merely to extract the arrow, but one must also soothe the wound with appropriate medicinal plasters. ^A Confirming this repentance, the author of the *Scala* also used to say: "Repentance is a reconciliation with God through the exercise of good works which are contrary to the sins." From this it appears that this habit alone, without great labor and the exercise of virtues, by no means grants the remission of sins. If these things are so, and if it does not immediately offer the forgiveness of iniquities to those who come to it voluntarily (for how would it, as we require so many tears afterwards, so that we may be made equal to the fountain of baptism according to the great Gregory, who is so profound in treating theological matters?), by what reasoning will it grant the remission of transgressions to those who flee to it, as I may say, against their will and by force? I am indeed doubtful, lest the tradition of this habit be entirely disadvantageous and inappropriate for such people. ^B For I do not grasp what he can do, who is clothed in it while he is drawing his final breath. For he is prepared for the struggle, but is hindered by his hands; he is fortified with the full armor, but the time for battle has passed; he promises to remain in solitude, but he is snatched away by force from these human affairs; he promises obedience to the superior, but the tyranny of death does not grant it; he professes to renounce his wife and children, and immediately lays down his soul. He protests that he is not coming to the habit by force, but a pleurisy pressing upon him forces him, even against his will, to cut his hair; he bestows his possessions to those in need, which he is unwillingly abandoning here; and he professes many other things, such as being disgraced, suffering injuries, and the like, but he performs nothing from these, because the end of his life, in which the rewards are prepared, is narrowed for him and is shorter than is fitting; but such a man, ^C as I suspect, receives nothing. For to him who makes promises, as has been said, but does not perform them, royal gifts are by no means granted. Therefore, we do not safely apply to these people the parable in the Gospels of the vineyard and of those who were called into it; for it does not represent the image of those who profess to be pious, yet run to repentance at the moment of death, as it seems to them. For even though those who arrived at the eleventh hour received the same reward as those who had previously expended labor, nevertheless, a ready and prompt operation provided them with an equal reward. For when they excused themselves for their own idleness, saying, "No one has hired us," * they clearly showed that if they had been called earlier, they would have immediately run off into the vineyard. Nevertheless, even those called about the eleventh hour followed the one calling them very promptly and without any hesitation, and for this reason they had no smaller reward than those who had been called earlier. If these things are so, what defense shall we have? Can we say as they did, "No one has hired us," no one...

has preached the truth to us? ^A nor any other thing absurd or impossible follows upon this. For in the one productive power, the persons, that is, the hypostases, are divided—Father and Son—just as in the one essence there are Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They do not exist as two producers, but as one; yet they are two who produce, differing only in their mode of operation. For the former refers to the power, which is one, and not a plurality in each, and therefore the producer is altogether one; but the latter refers to the hypostases as effectively distinguished. And for this reason, very theologically, we say that there are two who produce. This is the piety of the Roman Church, which is the same as saying the piety of the universal faith regarding the procession of the Holy Spirit. In such dogmas have we been nurtured and instructed; we follow not sophisms, as some slanderously claim, nor the persuasive words of wisdom, nor naked human thoughts, but the theologians of the Church and whatever they have uttered from God. ^B Hence, it is possible through these passages even to think that the saints speak in harmony with themselves, and do not differ regarding the same things—which is what those who are ignorant of theological wisdom suffer, either by transfixing the proclamations of the saints with an obelus, or by adulterating them with forgeries, or by denying them, or by interpreting them wrongly, unwittingly, and just as they please.

^C But may you not suffer such a thing, you whom I truly deem happy in all other respects, and especially in your precision regarding piety and the correctness of orthodox dogmas. Rather, having weighed with precision what is brought forward by both sides, follow those who treat theological matters with reason, rather than the unskilled who, with ignorance, offer no account that could be considered reasonable, but who rather evade judgment, cover up the truth, and destroy the race of the Greeks by both their deeds and their words. I wished to extend the present discourse and to write much more to you about these same things, but I deemed these sufficient for the present for your inquiring soul, being able to perceive the many from the very few. In the time that follows, if you should command it, we shall discuss theology more thoroughly, ^D going through the dogmas of theology with greater precision. For I must surely obey you, as a father and guardian of the race.

EPISTLE OF JOANNES ARGYROPULUS TO DOMINICUS ROBOREUS, CARDINAL OF TURIN

In the Turin codex 433 (Pasini, *Cod. Taurin.*, p. 102) is the work of Aristotle *De Anima*, translated by Joannes Argyropulus with a final, more elegant revision for the sake of Dominicus Roboreus, Cardinal of Turin. On the front of the whole work is a most elegant epistle of Argyropulus to Cardinal Roboreus, for whose sake he had undertaken this more accurate interpretation. It will not be useless to submit the whole of it here, inasmuch as it commends the cardinal’s wonderful inclination toward letters and the sciences.

Joannes Argyropulus to Dominicus Roboreus, Cardinal of Turin, wishes eternal health and happiness.

My love and highest benevolence toward you, most wise Father, compel me by their own best right to do this: which if I did not do, there would surely be no man who would not think that I either did not know or was neglecting and slighting my duty and office, both of which would show a not mediocre shame.

^A For there is no one who does not know what love implies, what benevolence demands. It is indeed the mark of a man who is too dull and too senseless not to know what the reason of benevolence requires, and to neglect or set aside what springs from the depths of love is truly the mark of one who is pleased and displeased by the same things, and who, even in the greatest and most honorable matters, fails of his own accord. I pass over narrating the merits and mutual rights of benevolence and mutual love, for if anyone should fail to respond to these to the extent of his powers, he would not unjustly be held liable for the crime of ingratitude or injustice—things from which human uprightness and noble character seem to recoil above all else.

You have established such a course of life for yourself most beautifully, that with your domestic and family affairs disposed of well and elegantly, you live in part for the duty and office of a high magistracy for the sake of other men, and in part satisfy yourself in your studies of literature and most noble doctrines, having embraced both supreme manners of living. In this, you have also taken me as your companion and associate, not unaware that the studies to which we apply ourselves can be done more expeditiously, accurately, and well in this way. I, who have always thought that all human affairs, when the best end is removed, are vain and matters to be held of no account—he whose settled opinion it was that a man who has embraced either manner of life, if deprived of both eyes, is like a body lacking one, like a one-eyed man, while he who is endowed with both has the more excellent sight from the right and the inferior from the left, and he who is deprived of both is entirely akin to the blind—to whom our most holy religion, divinely offered to us, is also exceedingly pleasing in this respect, because it endeavors by its most beautiful laws and institutions to render men adorned and perfected in both manners of living, both according to nature and to their Maker; ^B who finally, setting aside honesty and the studies of wisdom, finds nothing to delight in; what, I ask, should I do towards you? What should I perform that would be most accommodating to both of us, whether urged by the present, pressing, and fitting love, or moving as both our life’s institution and nature itself dictates, and as if commanded by right reason? Would it not be everything that you desire, provided only that the opportunity is available to us, so that we may not seem inept or utterly ignorant of reason by offering things other than those which are necessary? Would it not be everything that can lead you to the easy attainment of man's desired goal, to which you are already proceeding with all study and effort?

Furthermore, to assist your most excellent and honorable studies with my strength and to give you frequent service, having neglected and set aside other matters, I considered it worth the effort; and I thought that the ways and paths by which one proceeds straight to human happiness and blessedness ought to be demonstrated to you. I decided that, together with you, the writers and authors of the liberal arts ought to be read and perused by me. I believed that all the truth enclosed in them ought to be summoned into the light. Finally, I judged that the formulas and reasons for the faculty of disputation ought to be tasted and not neglected, without which I considered the investigation and perception of truth ought to be neglected—which indeed will certainly confer upon us no small benefit for that toward which we strive with all our might. I mean, to translate more elegantly and offer to you some of the works of Aristotle, that most excellent philosopher of ours and supreme craftsman—those works which in my judgment are the sole fountains of all good things, from which human ends emanate—taking the beginning especially from where the science of the soul is handed down. By this, clearly, we can perceive not only the nature of all other living creatures but also our own most exactly, and the origins, causes, principles, and fountains of human happiness. ^C For, as it does not escape you, we have long since determined that both are not unjustly of concern to us: I mean the knowledge of things—both those which have need of no service of ours, and those of which we are the authors, and which are placed under our power—and the elegance of language: the method of speaking, the choice of words, the ornament, grace, and abundance, so that things and their meanings may be convenient and accommodated to the diction, and the diction to things and meanings, if meanings are to be accommodated to speeches, as both their reason and nature, and the institution of wise men, seek, demand, and require. For those are not to be proposed to us as examples who use ornamentation of words without knowledge of things, or who are endowed with science without skill in the art of speaking. It is truly a matter of marked disgrace to speak both vainly and depravedly, although the latter, perhaps by fortune of inability or by reason of sloth, is the second to be avoided. Let us join together those things which must be joined—for no one can ever join those things which cannot be joined without their own disgrace—and let us not separate wisdom from elegance, charm, and the grace of words and speech.

Therefore, this labor, in my opinion, being not dishonorable, not useless, not unpleasant, and not dissenting from or abhorring our common purpose or our mutual benevolence, I have deemed, decided, and defined ought to be given by me to you as if by a certain law, persistent and frequent, and, indeed, such that unless the necessity of nature intervene, no force can take it from us. ^D Since these things are so, set yourself to read with good fortune the work of Aristotle on the soul, which has been translated by us for your sake—having been polished with the latest emendation more elegantly, as the subject matter allows and the rule of interpreting prescribes (for in such matters a wide field is not granted). You will have us also in this reading and perceiving, since we have so willed and established it, as companions, helpers, and guides, not indeed sluggish, not inert, not slothful, but most prompt for undergoing every labor, the fruit of which is the end to be attained by you, for which nature brought you forth, and for which God, the Maker of all things, adorned you with so many great powers and faculties. Farewell, more than half of my soul, and persuade yourself that no one is dearer to me than you.

THEODORUS AGALLIANUS AGAINST JOANNES ARGYROPOULUS

EXCERPT from the preface of DOSITHEUS, Patriarch of Jerusalem. (Taken from the volume *Tomo Agapes* edited in the press at Jassy in Moldovachia, 1698 fol.)

The twelfth writing is that of Theodorus Dikaiophylax Agallianus, who is called Hieromnemon in the *Katallage* [Reconciliation], because he held a different office when he wrote that work, and another office when he wrote the present one. He also wrote other works of this kind, which we shall print, God willing, in another volume later on. It should be known that this Joannes Argyropulus wrote certain discourses in favor of the Council of Florence, and he wrote a letter to the Grand Duke, which Agallianus refutes, demonstrating that Argyropulus is not only blasphemous and audacious, but also unlearned. From this it becomes clear that everything that Argyropulus wrote elsewhere regarding the Council of Florence is falsely fabricated and far from the truth. Moreover, in the aforementioned letter, he wrote very blasphemously in favor of the Council of Florence, confirming its most audacious decree; and see how Agallianus refutes him.

REFUTATION by the most honorable Theodorus Agallianus, Dikaiophylax of the Great Church, of the book of Joannes Argyropulus in defense of the Latin dogma.

...whom I and anyone else who thinks rightly would justly count equal [to the ancients], if they were able, or were willing—which is worse—to understand neither the voice nor the theology nor the purpose, but chose to be the cause of spiritual ruin for themselves and for all of us who follow, which some furies-driven or envious person, or rather one who would boast of having fallen away from his senses, might claim. Many thanks to the all-excellent and wise Argyropulus, that he has also delivered us from fear by signifying, in what he writes to the admirable Grand Duke, the opinion of the Roman Church, and how it will concur in mind, and in what manner it will unite with the Church of the East in the questions concerning the procession of the Holy Spirit, so that the Son is also considered and proclaimed the principle and cause of the Holy Spirit, as that [Church] teaches, taking this as a point of origin; as if it were something acknowledged, although it has been contradicted and refuted by many noble arguments by many of those who have shone no less in wisdom or holiness in the churches of the East; dragging the things of the saints, and reframing them toward such a mind, and writing these things to such and so great a man, who possesses much of the knowledge in such matters, as he himself testifies, condemning, as I think, not only him, but us all who follow such teachers, and even the wise and holy men before us. This fear troubled me greatly and bridled my soul: that there might be some who say they can demonstrate that the Latin dogma is found in the saints, or rather, who insist and claim that such is the truth; and that we do not understand [the truth], being carried along by irrationality and other passions, so that I did not trust my own knowledge of such matters, which I had gathered over a long time of studying such things, and I suspected the accounts of others who discourse on such things, and, so to speak, I feared no small fear: if it were as they themselves say, and I, being unable to understand it from my own resources, and following others, was not correctly...

1013 REFUTATION OF ARGYROPULOS. 1014: not only of those whose right-thinking is known to him, but also of those who do not hold such views, in order that he may select the good from all, like the wise bee; I would not call this graceful myself, as one might say, but rather noble and admirable, and truly characteristic of a learned soul. Whence it is for me, having dismissed the matters concerning these things, to proceed already to those that are more theological, not doing this out of curiosity, either now or at any other time—for this happens to be, above all, a matter of necessity—nor negligently; for if anything is worthy of perfect attention, this is it, unless perhaps one should say it is meddlesome to theologize, or even more meddlesome to theologize, if one calls him who speaks or is going to speak nothing necessary, unworthy of sacred theology. What then do the affairs of theology say? Had I been found departing from the correct opinion, or rather should I share with others concerning these things, not even being deceived in the greatest matter. But now, having beheld in these things the full strength of the argument, and having discerned that the hope of the union of the Churches is at risk on these points—since indeed for this reason some think the wiser men will be drawn in, for they believe that those who are not such are perhaps more easily taken—we wondered how wise men, well-endowed with intellect and education, and appearing to have advanced by the experience of theology, attempt to judge and weigh the faith and the theology of the Fathers by such things, either deceiving themselves or thinking that others will easily be persuaded by them. But I have been freed, as I said, from fear, better established in the ancestral glory. For it is as if the character of opponents, when tested, makes those who differ with them more steadfast or even more noble. And he who touches upon a refutation of any kind might perhaps appear to do so while possessed by some passion, by which he distorts and misinterprets things that are well-established, and clings to more rotten ones, and drinks with this alone as his goal: how he might seem to overcome the antagonist sufficiently; I, however, deem this to be unseemly and unjust in any matter whatsoever. For it is a condemnation of the truth and a corruption of the conscience, not least in those things where discourses concerning the faith occur, which is a new matter, and the greatest, and the head of all. I consider it impious and profane not to pass judgment on these things with an impassive and pure [mind].

ARGYROPULOS. ^A And the theological outlines and principles, of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, being one in essence, distinguished according to the idioms [properties]... [Distinguished by] the idioms of the three persons existing in the Divine...

AGALLIANOS. ^B The fundamental principle, as pious and true and most theological, is the most true start and hypothesis of the faith, even if what is built upon it were to be imposed in accordance with those [principles] of the architects, and those which we are commanded to follow. For he says the divine persons are to be distinguished by their idioms. It is good, therefore, to ask the theological Fathers: what are the idioms of the persons which also distinguish the persons, and are of such a nature that they do not change, and are named impassible and uncommunicable? For this would be a Lydian stone, not to guess, but [to test] against any other human [argument] of those who frame these words. Therefore, I call upon the truth itself as my witness in these matters, that I am coming to speak of as many things as my conscience clearly dictates to me, having learned them from the wise and holy men who preceded me, and from the common teachers of piety and the principles of the faith; or rather I should say, I will not even render the verdict from my own tribunal. But having merely laid these before the writings of the saints, and having examined the sense of these against theirs, I will set up as judges those who are fair-minded and who will pass through the present matters impassibly; whom I ask not to pay attention to the wording, which is simple, but to examine the sense and seek the truth. I also offer thanks for the praises bestowed upon the most glorious great Doukas, together with all the others; for we all together owe thanks to such a man, being as he is zealous in common and beneficial matters, and each one of us individually [owes thanks] because of his goodwill toward each, having offered himself as a common storehouse of good and of all need and assistance to each one; but these praises of him, I too confess, are few in comparison to the many and great things that befit him, and [I confess that I have treated] them with extreme restraint, and having touched upon them as it were with the tips of my fingers, so that the present time might be surrendered to the brevity [of the task], and because perhaps the season for more complete praises has not yet arrived; for for the good, all time is open for praise. But the grace of his virtues is that he is able not only to attend to dogmas... ^D ...the sequence [of the argument], showing both the counterfeit and the sincere. For if he maintains that position, he will reserve the beginning and the cause within the Godhead solely for the Father, as the Father's own idiom; but if he legislates [them as] common to the Father and the Son, he will entirely disturb the theological outlines. For immediately, the Theologian Gregory says: "The idioms [are signs] of the Father, as the Unbegotten and the Principle, being conceived and called [as such]." And the holy Dionysius: "The Father is the sole source of the super-essential Godhead." And Cyril: "If fruit-generation, or rather God-generation, is a mark of the hypostasis of the Father, it is entirely a natural idiom of His." And the great Basil: "The unbegottenness and being called Father is the idiom of the Father." Expanding on this, Gregory says: "This is the Father: Begetter and Producer. And it is the idiom of the Son to be called Son, and to be begotten from the Father. And it is the idiom of the Spirit to be called Holy Spirit, and to proceed from the Father." But let these things, as I said, be laid down as if they were a square and a rule, from which it will be clear what fits his subsequent conclusions; but what is it that follows?

ARGYROPULOS. The Father brings forth the One, but generates the Two, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

AGALLIANOS. From which of the theologians have you heard, man, this [terminology]...

compassionate toward our weaknesses, and not as a legislator, ^A providing what is fitting, second marriage is granted, as is evident from what he himself, the very great [Apostle], said: "I wish all to be as I am myself in continence." For this reason, also discussing the subject of a second [marriage], he said: "I say it, and not the Lord." From this, therefore, the first marriage is clearly shown to be lawful, since the Church also has taken one husband, Christ, and not two, and so on.

EPISTLE XXVIII.

As for what we are about to say, pay attention and listen with great sobriety. The race of the Hebrews celebrated three most magnificent ^B festivals each year; and may the divine Scripture convince us of this, when it says: "Three times a year every male shall appear before your God," at which time the sheep was sacrificed, when Pentecost fell for them, and when the feast of Tabernacles arrived. Three times already we also, in accordance with their custom, celebrate feasts throughout the year. For when the Lord said to the Jews: "The kingdom shall be taken from you, and it shall be given to the nations," then the bright things of the Hebrews fell away and passed over to us. ^C But they used to hold their feasts in memory of the events that had occurred to them in Egypt and the wilderness; we, however, do so in memory of Christ himself. Just as the Lord himself, when he was establishing the mysteries of the New Testament, had commanded, saying: "Do this in my remembrance." For they, while celebrating, ate the lamb; we, however, eat Christ himself, truly the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world. That our practices do not run counter to Jewish customs, even if they differ in manner, Paul transmits, saying: "The old things have passed away, behold, all things have become new." And this is further evident from the following. Twice in the week the Jews used to fast; twice already we also fast according to the apostolic tradition. ^D However, they [fasted] on the second and fifth days; we, however, on the Wednesday and Friday, even though we owe [it] much more than they. "For if," he says, "your righteousness does not exceed that of the Pharisees and Scribes, you will not enter into the kingdom of heaven." And what need is there to say more and to enumerate them one by one? Among them was circumcision, among us the divine laver; among them the Ark, among us the Virgin; among them the rod of Aaron, among us the wood of the Cross flowers; among them was the lamb, among us Christ himself. And this is what the most celebrated [Father] said when discussing theological matters: "The letter departs, the spirit receives increase; the shadows fly past, the truth arrives." From this, therefore, learn that there are also three most magnificent festivals among us, just as there were among them, indeed, festivals. For among them oxen and sheep were...

REFUTATION OF ARGYROPULOS

1017 ^A nourished by undistorted conceptions, I think he would desire to resemble it, as he does in regards to being distinguished. So too would he gainsay this: that all divine attributes belong to the whole Godhead according to the perfect divine reason. But as for those things which appertain to the hypostases—or rather to such hypostases—they are altogether incommunicable and unmingled, as properties, with no inversion or any commonality at all being introduced among them, says the same Dionysius. For how could a property remain if it were moving and changing? The theologians of the Church have not handed down to us any intermediate position regarding these things; rather, this new theology of his, looking to what it falls into from both sides—if indeed it confesses it, or even understands it—in order not to declare the Spirit to be of a different essence (if he were to call these powers essential, without the Spirit itself participating in some such productive power), nor yet to fall into the dyarchy by calling them hypostatic: he sets these things, as it were, in a middle ground, but grants neither attribute to them, until he names them ^B "principles" and "fecundities" common to the Father and the Son, though not to the Spirit. He is contrary to the teachers even in this, who call what is common to the Father and the Son common also to the Spirit.

ARGYROPULOS: Or common to the Spirit as well, but in the former cases with the energy, while in the latter without the energy.

AGALLIANOS: Has any man heard anything more monstrous than this?

ARGYROPULOS: And he says they are "principles" and "fecundities" that neither produce nor are produced; for each of these is a property of a hypostasis.

AGALLIANOS: And what is this great zeal to devise "powers," and to name them "principles" and "fecundities," and all that no theologian has ventured, if indeed the property of a hypostasis is to bring forth or to proceed? And how are there not as many principles as there are producing hypostases? Or what power do these invented powers have to blend the hypostases blamelessly—a thing which not even Sabellius was able to devise, on which account he might have been innocent of the condemnation? Thus, this kind of invention of "powers" delivers to us a way that is newer and unheard-of by the saints; as if one might say the Son was begotten through the one power of the Father, and then having laid hold of the other one of His, He brings forth the Holy Spirit through it, along with the Father, lagging behind in generation and not even participating in any of the powers—as if that were sufficient by word alone, being co-eternal, timeless, and neither being said to be of the other. And he does not observe how these things are shown from the positions to be in agreement with the arguments, but rather that the opposite is concluded by them.

If he said the powers were distinguished, he should also have added the mode of the distinction. For then we would have been able to recognize in what genus of distinction he places the distinction of the powers, as if he were distinguishing them ^C factually from the argument. For he says that the persons being distinguished are brought forth through them. Perhaps, therefore, by the mode of the distinction—since he also pre-conceives the generative as prior to the projective, as it is there also clearly prior—just as he says the begotten is prior to the proceeding. If he wishes to say something else, he will give little aid to his argument. He says they are principles, and powers, and fecundities. Let someone of the saints be brought forward who says these things—"principles" and "fecundities." But there is none. Yet he himself, proceeding as if in repentance, will say that the essence of the Father is the principle and the power of the production of the divine persons. Then, as if fearing the theologians, who declare that the essence neither produces nor proceeds, he will say that it resides with the essence, and other things that differentiate the powers.

ARGYROPULOS: These would be mind and will.

AGALLIANOS: I know not from where he took this. For if he wishes the power to be the same as the essence, he will call the one essence the principle, just as he calls the principles and powers essences. But if he does not wish this, he asserts that the essence defined in the Father is the principle of the persons proceeding from Him. But as for these "powers" and "fecundities" which he says reside with the essence, and which he calls "mind" and "will"—in a novel way, as properties viewed upon the essence, in order that this, along with the property, might be a hypostasis, a productive principle—by what necessity will he demonstrate that these properties are recognized by the Son, but not by the Spirit? I think that even having labored much, he will not show it, but will only lay down many things that are rotten and dangerous, and unknown to the usage of the theologians. And what saint ever spoke of "fecundities"? We have learned of a "fountal Deity," perhaps—and of the Father as the sole fount, and root, and cause, and begetter of God, with the theologians putting these forward in the singular, since all piously place one fecundity in the Father, and one productive power according to the mode of habit; it is divided only by the comparison towards the things produced, according to the reason of energy. For the Areopagite says at once, regarding the Trinity, on account of the most fecund manifestation of the super-essential, "from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named"—which Maximus, explaining it, says is "fecundity," the paternal progression beyond conception, unto the manifestation of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. And again, Dionysius: "That the whole Godhead has the mastery of all," regarding the begetting Deity, or the material, I cannot even say. Wherefore, even by the disjunctive he shows that he does not wish the "begetting" to belong to the Son at all. And the great Athanasius: "The Father is the sole unbegotten and sole fount of Deity." And the theologian Gregory: "Into one cause, the Father, the Son and Spirit are referred." And Cyril: "How is it not life, having its root and as it were a fount, the natures of the God beyond all begotten things?" And again: "If a characteristic of the Father's..."

JOANNIS DIACONI HADRIANOPOLEOS (OF JOHN THE DEACON OF ADRIANOPLE)

IN LAUDEM JOANNIS PALEOLOGI — CARMEN POLITICUM

ARGUMENTUM

Now, the order of our discourse would demand that we should say something about the author himself; but since no mention of him occurs in the writers Cave, Oudin, and Fabricius (for which reason we were the more willing to bring into the light the work of an author previously unknown), we shall touch upon a few things regarding the dignity in which he shone in the Church of Adrianople. The office of steward, or dispenser, of the Church, therefore, was to have the administration of ecclesiastical affairs and sacred funds, and to distribute and dispense them to individual faithful of Christ according to the judgment of his own bishop, and to perform all those things which Isidore, in a certain epistle to...

^A Leudefred, Bishop of Córdoba, discusses more extensively. This office in the earlier centuries of the Church belonged only to presbyters, as is manifest from various councils. For in the Council of Ephesus, act VI, occurs Charisius, presbyter and oikonomos of the holy church of the city of Philadelphia. Likewise, in the Council of Chalcedon, act III, Proterius is "presbyter and oikonomos of the great city of Alexandria." As Greece grew older, this office was transferred also to deacons, and it was the first dignity among those five held by those who were known as the *exokatakoiloi*; these were the great oikonomos, the great sakellarios, the great chartophylax, the chartophylax, and the sakellarios. Their rights and privileges are reviewed by Du Cange in the *Glossarium mediae et infimae Graecitatis*, Vol. I, p. 409 sqq., who also records there various opinions of writers concerning the etymology of this name, p. 411.

The name of Polycarp, too, the prelate of the church of Hadrianopolis, by whose command the poem was composed, is as unknown to writers as that of Joannes Diaconus, and was omitted in Michael Le Quien’s *Oriens Christianus*, Vol. I, p. 1171 sqq., where he enumerates the bishops of Hadrianopolis. Perhaps, however, he is the twenty-second bishop of that church, and indeed the very person on whose behalf George, Bishop of Synnada, is read to have subscribed at the Synod of Constantinople held in the temple of St. Sophia around the year 1440, in which the Greeks abjured the union sanctioned at Florence with the Latins. For Allatius, in his *Addenda* to the third book *De Consensu*, col. 1387—where he reports the *hypographai* of the individual patriarchs, metropolitans, and others who had been present at that synod—has this to say concerning our subject: "George of Synnada, holding also the opinion of the blessed Bishop of Rhodes, and of Hadrianopolis, and of Menas of Mitylene." This conjecture might not seem entirely alien to reason to anyone, if the time of the aforementioned abjuration by the Greeks is compared with the poem completed at that time, in which the poet points to the return of John Palaiologos to the Orient.

Regarding the city of Hadrianopolis, it should be noted that many cities are called by this name, as can be seen among geographers, who place one in Paphlagonia of the Pontic diocese, another in Caria of the Asian diocese, a third in Pamphylia, and a fourth in Pisidia of the same diocese. Ours, however, is distinct from these, since it pertains to the Thracian diocese and is the capital of the province of Haemimontus. This city, once called Orestias after Orestes, its founder as they say, afterwards took the name Hadrianopolis from its restorer, Hadrian Augustus. It lies on the river Hebrus at 53° 50' longitude, 43° 20' latitude; and before the capture of Constantinople—from which it is distant 130 miles—it was the royal city of the Turks, as Leunclavius testifies. Regarding this, Phil. Cluverius in his *Introductio Geographica*, lib. IV, cap. 15, p. 459 (Amstelod. edition), has this: "Hadrianopolis holds the second place among the Thracian cities after Constantinople; it is called Endrem by the Turks; it is indeed great and vast, yet not surrounded by walls, and built with common buildings." See Mich. Ant. Baudrand in his *Lexicon Geographicum*, Christoph. Cellarius' *Notitia Orbis Antiqui*, p. 1080, and Crusius in *Turco-Graecia*, p. 336. With these premises, let us proceed to the poem itself:

POLITICAL POEM OF JOHN THE DEACON

Of that humble oikonomos of Orestias, ^A And deacon of that same blessed church, Named John, I call to mind his title, A work of great longing for the divine crowned one, Palaiologos the steadfast and the grace-named, Who by his graces stirred the currents of the sea, Arranged by the commands of the shepherd Of Orestias, the brilliant and noble Polycarp.

If I had steadfast lungs, a chest of bronze, ^B And mouths with many tongues, and piercing bores, Or rather, if in truth every part were a mouth, Truly, both this vast axis, the moist earth, and the rest Which of existing things has achieved structure from the Creator, Would I wish to weave together for you, singing praises,

^A having breathed a roar, the beast of roaring is Want to strike fear, as it is fearful, into all kinds of living things. A lion, he says, will roar, and who will not tremble? For what among these, when it shrinks away and trembles at this, does not run to flight and into crevices and hiding places? Since it can neither endure its sound, nor even bear the tremor that comes from it. But you, though pouring a roar from your calm mouth, being most gentle, most tranquil in nature, speak with this to all, and address them mildly, and smite away all terror from them from afar. Those who turn to you, their gentle master, enjoy myriads of blessings.

Like the bird-sovereign ^B who has fixed his nest upon a tree with shady foliage, roofed by its trunks, knows how to gather the litter of sparrows underneath this nest, setting the nestlings—how he keeps them outside of harm under his protection, and by the natural trembling of all birds toward him; for neither a malevolent snake, nor a bird that is a debtor, nor anything else from [those] that are rapacious and predatory birds, those biting with their beaks, those with snatching talons, ever drew near to them, ever harmed them entirely. But extending the wings of the power that is yours, like flightless hatchlings you cherish the Romais, shielding it as it pertains to you, and putting to shame the destroyers, just as the great bird-sovereign does for the nestlings beneath him.

The bright Morning Star, rising from Thaiman, just as it had been commanded by the word of the master, and lighting up the day until evening, finishes its course [as far as] the sunless settings, and again starts its course from the east, and again finishes its course until the same settings. And seeing this, he shows it completely as a limit of God, fulfilling the master’s command as a loyal servant. But you, lightless, unilluminated, running from Byzantium, and making the impulses of your course toward the evening (for thus indeed has the cloud of affairs placed you, pouring darkness over us from an hidden storm, and hiding your light-bearing and beam-shining power, just as the density of clouds does the brightness of the sun) like a morning star shining upon the land of the Ausonians, ^D as a joyful sun you rise again from the west, all-shining, flashing with the rays of [your] deeds, another giant opposite, running the path on earth; even if the multitude of many and harsh [falls]!

^A It has changed your brightness, alas for the misfortune! The great Ister saw you having sailed across it, it spread out its calm back, it did not remember the wave, nor the turbulent, troublesome swell from the high seas; with gentle streams it greeted you, the gentle one, and received them into its bosom, making them tame, and the windless air bore the transport ships of the power, as if mimicking the signs and intelligence of rational beings, acting in these things as another loyal and good servant, and mindfully fearing, as I think, your [middle limbs / threats], since it could not even contain its sound, nor even endure at all the trembling that comes from it.

^B And of the long struggles, [you bear] the races and the toils, which you endure very steadfastly for the sake of your subjects, or rather to speak more truly, for the sake of the Christians, in summer and winter, and struggling against violent forces, not sparing [your] body, supreme sovereign, nor [your] flesh, truly despising life itself strangely, and hastening that you might strongly, as one sympathetic by nature, rescue the bright Romais from the lawless beast, having fallen everywhere into grievous snares. Neither did any bodily luxury, nor grace, nor ease drag you, nor charm you, nor soften you. For to stand brilliantly for the subjects, to bear powerful arms, to be in danger entirely by land and sea, and on every soil, you consider luxury, and boast, and singular grace. A carpet is your shield when you look toward sleep, and a breastplate is a covering instead of the purple, ^C instead of a holy veil, a helmet of iron, instead of silken sandals, greaves again; and these you bear for our sake, as you are sympathetic by nature.

Istrian-neighbors saw the things being done by you, Scythians, Mysians, and Triballians along with those from Rus in a crowd, the greatest [among them], strangers, generals, satraps, commanders, fell before your power, and approaches slavishly; they bent the knee to you, they offered the faithful reverence of slaves, they applauded with paeans, they shouted with fervor, and they have done the rest of their affairs [as subjects] to you, the Ausonian-ruler, just as it is the law to perform for a servant to a master. The ruler of the Mysians knows the [power] of your mind, and also their counsels that are profound, above mind and [intellect], and the best of their shrewdness has been placed. The divine, the renowned, the king of the Paeonians knows, he marveled at the all-delightful and strange beauty of yours, he marveled at the all-chosen nature of yours, he marveled at the all-exceptional knowledge of yours, with upturned hands he received you, the [word] of the discourse, even if again some cloud flowing in from sins has changed your bright onsets at once. David coming forth from the graves, running more mystically, and hither, a light toward a second evening, fleeing the burial. Now he stirs the psaltery again and the lyre.

^A Your radiance has been changed—alas for this misfortune! The great Ister saw you sailing across it, It spread out its calm back, mindful not of the surge, Nor of the turbulent, oppressive, and three-fold swelling of the sea; With gentle streams it greeted you, the mild one, And received you into its bosom, making them tame; And windless it bore the transports of your imperial power, As if it had taken on the marks and mind of sensible beings, Like another noble and good servant doing these things, And sensibly fearing, as I imagine, your avengers. ^B Since it cannot even endure the sound of that voice, Nor withstand the terror arising from it altogether. But you, pouring forth a roar from your calm mouth, Most gentle one, you who are appeased, You converse with all with this, and address them mildly, And you banish every terror far away from them. Those who turn to you, their gentle master, Enjoy myriads of benefits. The bird-ruler, having fixed its nest above, In a tree with dense shade and thick foliage, Knows how to gather here the heap of fledglings, Fixing the nests beneath its own nest; So that it keeps them outside of harm by its own protection, And by the natural trembling of all birds toward it; For it is neither a hostile serpent, nor a bird of prey, ^C Nor any other thing from among the rapacious and predatory birds, Those that are biting with their beaks, or snatching with their talons; It did not approach them at all, nor oppress them in the slightest. But spreading its wings over the power that is yours, You warm the Roman land like flightless fledglings, Sheltering it with your own, and putting the destroyers to shame, As the great bird-ruler does the nests beneath it. The Phosphoros, the bright one, rising from Theman, As it was ordered by the word of the Master, And lighting the day until its very evening, Ends its course at the setting of the light, And again from the east begins the course, And again to the same settings it ends its course. And the paths and the labors of the long struggles, Which you bear most patiently on behalf of your subjects, Or to speak more truly, on behalf of the Christ-named, ^D In summer and winter, and struggling against fierce violence, Not sparing the body, O self-ruler, nor the flesh, Despising life itself as truly and strangely as you do, And hastening with all your might, being sympathetic by nature, To rescue the bright Roman land from the lawless beast, Which has fallen everywhere into grievous snares. Neither did any bodily luxury, nor grace, nor sloth drag you down, nor entice you, nor soften you. For to fight brilliantly on behalf of the subjects, To bear mighty arms, to be in danger entirely By land and by sea, and upon every shore— This you consider luxury, and boasting, and extraordinary grace. A shield is a carpet for you, when you look toward sleep, And a breastplate is a cloak in place of the purple, In place of a holy veil, a helmet of iron, In place of silk sandals, greaves once again; And these you bear for us, as you are sympathetic by nature. The neighbors of the Ister saw the deeds done under you, Scythians, Moesians, and Triballians, with those from Rhos in a throng, The greatest, strangers, generals, satraps, commanders of companies, Fell prostrate before your power, and approached as slaves, They bent the knee to you, offered the faithful reverence of slaves, They clapped, they shouted with zeal, And they have done other things in your regard, O Auson-ruler, As is the custom for a servant to fulfill to a master. The ruler of the Moesians knows the power of your mind, And seeing this, he shows the bounds of God at all times, Fulfilling the command of the Master, like a good servant. But you, lightless and unillumined, running from Byzantium, And making the impulses of your course toward the west (For so the darkness of things has placed you, Pouring gloom upon us from a hidden storm, And hiding your light-bearing and radiance of power, Like the brightness of the sun, or the density of the clouds), Shining like the Phosphoros into the land of the Ausonians, As the cheerful sun you rise from the west, All-brilliant, flashing with the rays of events, Another giant, directly running over the path; Even if the multitude of many and grievous failings, And their counsels, which are heavy and beyond mind and sense, And their setting is the best of their acuteness. The divine and glorious king of the Paeonians knows, He admired the pleasant and strange quality of your beauty, He admired the pre-eminent quality of your nature, He admired the set-apart quality of your knowledge, With upturned hands he received you, the word of the Word, Even if again some cloud flowing in from sins, Suddenly changed your bright impulses. David went forth from the tombs running more mystically, And hither, the light, having fled the evening of the burial. Now he stirs the psaltery again and the lyre,

^A And clearly confuse the soul with the tremor of your wrath. Whom the scorching fire shall consume out of the whirlwind, And burn up the fruit of these—the end of them. For from the descendants of their children, as seeds, Because they inclined against me most grievous and evil things, They reasoned thoughts toward themselves which shall not stand. The God who makes the foolish turn as to the simple, And changing their form among those remaining. Do not, O God, be silent, nor grow weary. For the enemies of the emperor have raged against this, They indeed have lifted up their heads, they who hate him, And with craftiness have plotted against those who are hostile to them. Do away with them like Midian and Sisera, And destroy them at Endor at once, In your pattern of the wrath and of the total ruin, And yours, O Most High, just as the former ones Oreb and Zeeb, and Zebah and Zalmunna the second. Make them as a wheel driven by the wind, And again as reed shaken by the breezes, As a thicket consumed by a fire that is raging, And pursue them with the tempest of your wrath. Fill their faces with shame and dishonor, And may all be put to shame until many years, Grant to them the judgment and the righteousness, As a descendant chosen of godly kings. Give to them the good of his own heart, For I know this one is good from the inner works, And fulfill all the will of his heart. ^C Send safely for him the rod of your power, So that in the midst of his enemies he may rule. In his days may the light of Themis shine, And again the multitude of the good of the peace that is hoped for. May they fall before his face at once, Showing, indeed, that the base and the wicked are in their hearts, And may all those who rule bring gifts to him, Every nation may bend the knee to him, May your name be honorable among these, And may you bless him through all the day, And may the whole fullness of the nations call him blessed. To the Trinity, the praise in every silence. If a mouth of evil is opened against him, And a tongue speaks guile again against him, ^D And words of insult surround with hatred, And they wage war unsparingly against him out of envy, Instead of loving, they slandered him godlessly. And he, praying, bears the afflictions from them— Instead of good, they do the worst against him, Instead of love, they hate him exceedingly. Let the condition of the sinners be against those who treat him unjustly, And may the devil stand at the right hand of these. In the time of judgment, may they be condemned of their own, And may their every prayer be for sin. May their children be made fatherless, May the day again, unluckily, reproach those after them, And may time make their wives widows.

REFUTATION OF ARGYROPOULOS

ARGYROPOULOS. He says it is manifest that the two aforementioned powers are altogether the divine essence, and what is attributed to God, intellect and will. And intellect and will therefore are perfections.

AGALLIANOS. And whence is this manifest, and which of the theologians formulated these things? But let this part also be refuted, since it touches upon another treatise; let it be passed over for now, and let us consider what follows.

ARGYROPOULOS. Two persons being produced, the Son and the divine Spirit, the one proceeds from the Father as Father, for which reason he is also referred to Him by sonship; for He is the Son of the Father, just as the Father is called the Father of the Son. But the other, again, proceeds from the same Father, not as Father, but as producer, of course, and projecting and breathing, and as many things as happen to be of the same power.

AGALLIANOS. Since, in the manner of a deduction, although in no way is it ^B necessarily presupposed that the Son is the cause of the Spirit—for in this way the Father would also be presupposed as the cause of the producer—if these things differ even more dimly in the Father, or the Son and the Spirit who are brought forth, it makes no difference. For in whatever category of distinction they might be placed, the Father will be the cause of the producer in the Father. But this is impossible; therefore, neither is that necessary. For if the Father is presupposed before the Son as His cause, it is not necessary that the Son also be presupposed because of the cause; for there is no necessity that makes this so; for if there were, the ancient theologians would have known it. And it is clear from the holy Basil, who says regarding the Son in relation to the Father: "How could the Son be presupposed before His own cause?" but regarding the Spirit in relation to the Son, he does not give the same argument. For if he thought this, he would have said it. But what does he say? "How could the immediate relationship of the Son to the Father be severed?" And again in the letter *To the Canonical Letters*: "But not even is the Spirit before the Only-Begotten, clearly; for there is nothing between the Son and the Father." And the Theologian Gregory, fearing to prefer the Father to the Son because of the *archē*, lest he declare Him to be an *archē* of lesser things, adds: "I wish," he says, "the Son to be preferred to the Spirit as Son, but not indeed as an *archē* and he also." For what prevented him, if he thought this, from saying: "as an *archē* and he also with the Father," and he was not taught this by the Father? Whence it is clear that the theologians neither thought the Son to be a cause, nor did they believe for this reason that He was declared before the Spirit. Since, however, there had to be some order in the declaration of the divine names, it was more likely that the Son should be placed before the Spirit, for many other reasons, and because their common *archē* is designated by the name referred to the Son, namely, the fatherly one. And it is clear from the saints, as they call Him Son, and [say] there is nothing between the Son and the Father, and such like, but as a cause, in no way; for this did not seem [right] to the saints, and all of them testify this to the Father alone.

ARGYROPOULOS. Therefore, as for the producer, the Father is presupposed, in accordance with His eternal existence, for according to that He is Father and producer co-eternally, being such, but according to the ability and to bring forth—for He brings forth the Son before the Spirit, already being understood to exist—I having just concluded the [arguments] of the Christians regarding the Son in the peculiarity of the fatherhood: thus he also has set down principles, and these with a change and addition according to his own interest, or, to say it more truthfully, he takes them on to his own detriment, that the Son proceeds from the Father as He is Father, but the Spirit proceeds from the Father ^C as He is producer, even if he [does so] simply, but because he indicates it by the word, and he suffers countless such things in these words. Then he adds that the Father is presupposed before the producer, so that he may show the Son also presupposed, and the Son, again, is presupposed before the Spirit.

AGALLIANOS. And by what necessity did it appear, or by which of the theologians was it demonstrated that the Father is presupposed before the producer? But if [it is] because the Son is presupposed before the production, if the Son is not presupposed necessarily as a cause, how from the generator being presupposed before the producer will the Son necessarily be the cause of the generated? For on account of this he...

: : : ! : F ; ; 1033 REFUTATIO ARGYROPULI. 1034 ^A and the preconceptions and the orders ^B towards the begetter, alongside the producer, he posits; and if it is not possible, either for the moving power to be one in the Father, or for the begetter and producer to be one because the power is preconceived before the power, so that from this the preconception of the proceeding persons might follow, and the order within them, how shall the Father and the Son be one principle of the Spirit, in those things where the producing and the principle and such things are of the realm of preconception? For they would not deny the power in the Father to be preconceived before the one in both, if indeed they would not deny the Father altogether to be preconceived before the Son. ^C Then if one understands "Father" as "the cause," it is preconceived at that time before the producer, and it is also therefore preconceived before the begetter, just as the more common things are preconceived before the less common in the more perfect activity of the mind. *Contrariwise*, or it falls into the less perfect, and from this there would not be any necessity that the Son also be a cause of the Spirit; for at once he will be begetter and producer, as distinct things, and at once Son and Spirit, not through the order of cause with the Son being previewed by preconception, as we have said. But if one understands "Father" as "the one begetting," how is the Father preconceived before the producer? For if indeed in the way the Father is spoken of in relation to the Son, in this same way the producer is also preconceived before the begetter, in the way he is also spoken of in relation to the production. And from this there is no necessity toward the Son being prior, as he himself claims. But if these are understood as certain states or activities having this order in the Father—for they are not preconceived as they are in the Father, but rather they are spoken of as in relation to the things that proceed—what could be more absurd than this? ^D For without many other things that follow, just as the difference between begetting and producing in the Father—being in the weaker genus of distinctions, and according to the Latins, shining forth more strongly in those things that are brought forward, as they are actually distinguished—in this way, too, the preconception would no longer be the same in the begetter and producer and Son and production, but it will be much stronger than that other, and it would no longer be a preconception so much as some other sort of leading-on of forbidden things, which he himself also seems to desire. Or what does he want, that the Father brings forth the Son prior to the Spirit, and that he exists by the property relative to the Son before he produces the Spirit? For thus he clearly claims. But who, having heard these things, would not immediately think of all the Arians? For what else did those men say, other than that God brought forth the Son first, then the Spirit, and some that the Son brought this forth? For they did not simply place the difference in time; for they said the Son was begotten from eternity, and the Spirit proceeded not in this universe. But by positing such preconceptions not piously, they of necessity also introduced a difference according to substance. But if they knew how one ought to speak of the preview and the preconception, and how that of being set before, and how "prior" is in no way truly to be understood or spoken of concerning divine things, one would not fall into such things, such as saying that the begetting is later than those things which come from the unbegotten. For let it be granted that the begetter is preconceived before the producer; but not the Son, because of this, before the producer, so that the producer or the producing might be common to the Father and the Son, but rather both causes, even if we should grant them to have some order among themselves, or that such causes alone are preconceived before the caused, it would be more reasonable for us, taking our conception concerning them insofar as it lies within us from the order of the persons brought forward according to them, while believing there is no necessity there that it be the case as our preconception presupposes—for the mode and order of those divine processions is ineffable and beyond thought, as we hear the theologians saying, and that to seek concerning these things is the property of heretics, as [the Church] of the ecumenical [councils] has declared. In this way we shall not partake of the insanity of Arius and Eunomius. For Eunomius himself, setting out as if from certain ill-posited preconceptions, transferred the distinction according to the account of the cause and the mode of the three hypostases in the unity of nature over into a difference in nature, and spoke riskily of the previews and pre-enumerations from the account of the cause, which render the non-confused nature of the hypostases as a rising or falling of ranks and natures; he was composing certain degrees of natures as ranks or processions, which Gregory of Nyssa, striking him down, says: "If he who previews the Father of the Son solely by the account of cause were positing a temporal impression of the hypostasis of the Only-Begotten, the account of the indivisibility regarding the Son held by us would naturally be in danger." Then he adds: "The same account applies for us also regarding the Spirit, having the difference solely in the order; for just as the Son is joined to the Father, and having his being from Him, does not lag behind in existence, so again the Holy Spirit is held by the Only-Begotten, with only the hypostasis of the Spirit being previewed by preconception according to the account of the cause, so that with the account of the cause excluded, the Holy Trinity has nothing in disagreement with itself. For at least the account of the cause is previewed in each of the persons solely by conception, and the divine persons are declared, for He himself is the one giving the properties by which they are distinguished, or this very receiving of everything from the Father along with the nature, that is, the property relative to Him, with the ineffable difference of modes, also distinguishes them from one another. And the Father is distinguished from those from Him according to cause and caused, as the same Gregory claims, saying: 'We do not deny the difference according to cause and caused, in which alone we grasp that one thing is distinguished from another, but that from the cause it is distinguished by another difference, and not by the same one.' For he says we understand another difference, which he here calls the account of the cause. To which Justinus also, having arrived, spoke in agreement, that as the Son is from the Father, so also the Holy Spirit is from the Father, except that through the mode