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| To Amphilochius, in reply to certain questions.
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Letter CCXXXIII.2950
To Amphilochius, in reply to certain questions.
I. I know that I
have myself heard of this, and I am aware of the constitution of
mankind. What shall I say? The mind is a wonderful thing,
and therein we possess that which is after the image of the
Creator. And the operation of the mind is wonderful; in that, in
its perpetual motion, it frequently forms imaginations about things
non-existent as though they were existent, and is frequently carried
straight to the truth. But there are in it two faculties; in
accordance with the view of us who believe in God, the one evil, that
of the dæmons which draws us on to their own apostasy; and the
divine and the good, which brings us to the likeness of God.
When, therefore, the mind remains alone and unaided, it contemplates
small things, commensurate with itself. When it yields to those
who deceive it, it nullifies its proper judgment, and is concerned with
monstrous fancies. Then it considers wood to be no longer wood,
but a god; then it looks on gold no longer as money, but as an object
of worship.2951
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Basil’s word may point either at the worshippers of a golden
image in a shrine in the ordinary sense, or at the state of things
where, as A. H. Clough has it, “no golden images may be
worshipped except the currency.” | If on the
other hand it assents to its diviner part, and accepts the boons of the
Spirit, then, so far as its nature admits, it becomes perceptive of the
divine. There are, as it were, three conditions of life, and
three operations of the mind. Our ways may be wicked, and the
movements of our mind wicked; such as adulteries, thefts, idolatries,
slanders, strife, passion, sedition, vain-glory, and all that the
apostle Paul enumerates among the works of the flesh.2952
Or the soul’s operation is, as
it were, in a mean, and has nothing about it either damnable or
laudable, as the perception of such mechanical crafts as we commonly
speak of as indifferent, and, of their own character, inclining neither
towards virtue nor towards vice. For what vice is there in the
craft of the helmsman or the physician? Neither are these
operations in themselves virtues, but they incline in one direction or
the other in accordance with the will of those who use them. But
the mind which is impregnated with the Godhead of the Spirit is at once
capable of viewing great objects; it beholds the divine beauty, though
only so far as grace imparts and its nature receives.
2. Let them dismiss, therefore, these
questions of dialectics and examine the truth, not with mischievous
exactness but with reverence. The judgment of our mind is given
us for the understanding of the truth. Now our God is the very
truth.2953
So the
primary function of our mind is to know one God, but to know Him
so far as the infinitely great can be known by the very
small. When our eyes are first brought to the perception of
visible objects, all visible objects are not at once brought into
sight. The hemisphere of heaven is not beheld with one
glance, but we are surrounded by a certain appearance, though in
reality many things, not to say all things, in it are
unperceived;—the nature of the stars, their greatness, their
distances, their movements, their conjunctions, their intervals,
their other conditions, the actual essence of the firmament, the
distance of depth from the concave circumference to the convex
surface. Nevertheless, no one would allege the heaven to be
invisible because of what is unknown; it would be said to be
visible on account of our limited perception of it. It is
just the same in the case of God. If the mind has been
injured by devils it will be guilty of idolatry, or will be
perverted to some other form of impiety. But if it has
yielded to the aid of the Spirit, it will have understanding of
the truth, and will know God. But it will know Him, as the
Apostle says, in part; and in the life to come more
perfectly. For “when that which is perfect is come,
then that which is in part shall be done away.”2954
The judgment of the mind is,
therefore, good and given us for a good end—the perception
of God; but it operates only so far as it can.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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