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4. Behold again, and see if thou canst. Thou certainly dost not
love anything except what is good, since good is the earth, with the
loftiness of its mountains, and the due measure of its hills, and the
level surface of its plains; and good is an estate that is pleasant and
fertile; and good is a house that is arranged in due proportions, and
is spacious and bright; and good are animal and animate bodies; and
good is air that is temperate, and salubrious; and good is food that
is agreeable and fit for health; and good is health, without pains or
lassitude; and good is the countenance of man that is disposed in fit
proportions, and is cheerful in look, and bright in color; and good
is the mind of a friend, with the sweetness of agreement, and with the
confidence of love; and good is a righteous man; and good are riches,
since they are readily useful; and good is the heaven, with its sun,
and moon, and stars; and good are the angels, by their holy
obedience; and good is discourse that sweetly teaches and suitably
admonishes the hearer; and good is a poem that is harmonious in its
numbers and weighty in its sense. And why add yet more and more?
This thing is good and that good, but take away this and that, and
regard good itself if thou canst; so wilt thou see God, not good by a
good that is other than Himself, but the good of all good. For in
all these good things, whether those which I have mentioned, or any
else that are to be discerned or thought, we could not say that one was
better than another, when we judge truly, unless a conception of the
good itself had been impressed upon us, such that according to it we
might both approve some things as good, and prefer one good to an
other. So God is to be loved, not this and that good, but the good
itself. For the good that must be sought for the soul is not one above
which it is to fly by judging, but to which it is to cleave by loving;
and what car this be except God? Not a good mind, or a good angel,
or the good heaven, but the good good. For perhaps what I wish to
say may be more easily perceived in this way. For when, for
instance, a mind is called good, as there are two words, so from
these words I understand two things one whereby it is mind, and
another whereby it is good. And itself had no share in making itself a
mind, for there was nothing as yet to make itself to be anything; but
to make itself to be a good mind, I see, must be brought about by the
will: not because that by which it is mind is not itself anything
good; for how else is it i already called, and most truly called,
better than the body? but it is not yet called a good mind, for this
reason, that the action of the will still is wanted, by which it is to
become more excellent; and if it has neglected this, then it is justly
blamed, and is rightly called not a good mind. For it then differs
from the mind which does perform this; and since the latter is
praiseworthy, the former doubtless, which does not perform, it is
blameable.
But when it does this of set purpose, and becomes a good mind. it yet
cannot attain to being so unless it turn itself to something which
itself is not. And to what can it turn itself that it may become a
good mind, except to the good which it loves, and seeks, and
obtains? And if it turns itself back again from this, and becomes not
good, then by the very act of turning away from the good, unless that
good remain in it from which it turns away, it cannot again turn itself
back thither if it should wish to amend.
5. Wherefore there would be no changeable goods, unless there were
the unchangeable good. Whenever then thou art told of this good thing
and that good thing, which things can also in other respects be called
not good, if thou canst put aside those things which are good by the
participation of the good, and discern that good itself by the
participation of which they are good (for when this or that good thing
is spoken of, thou understandest together with them the good itself
also): if, then, I say thou canst remove these things, and canst
discern the good in itself, then thou wilt have discerned God. And
if thou shalt cleave to Him with love, thou shalt be forthwith
blessed. But whereas other things are not loved, except because they
are good, be ashamed, in cleaving to them, not to love the good
itself whence they are good. That also, which is a mind, only
because it is a mind, while it is not yet also good by the turning
itself to the unchangeable good, but, as I said, is only a mind;
whenever it so pleases us, as that we prefer it even, if we understand
aright, to all corporeal light, does not please us in itself, but in
that skill by which it was made. For it is thence approved as made,
wherein it is seen to have been to be made. This is truth, and simple
good: for it is nothing else than the good itself, and for this reason
also the chief good. For no good can be diminished or increased,
except that which is good from some other good. Therefore the mind
turns itself, in order to be good, to that by which it comes to be a
mind. Therefore the will is then in harmony with nature, so that the
mind may be perfected in good, when that good is loved by the turning
of the will to it, whence that other good also comes which is not lost
by the turning away of the will from it. For by turning itself from
the chief good, the mind loses the being a good mind; but it does not
lose the being a mind. And this, too, is a good already, and one
better than the body. The will, therefore, loses that which the will
obtains. For the mind already was, that could wish to be turned to
that from which it was: but that as yet was not, that could wish to be
before it was. And herein is our [supreme] good, when we see
whether the thing ought to be or to have been, respecting which we
comprehend that it ought to be or to have been, and when we see that
the thing could not have been unless it ought to have been, of which we
also do not comprehend in what manner it ought to have been. This good
then is not far from every one of us: for in it we live, and move,
and have our being.
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