Miscellanies 7.3.16

Pious, then, is the one who knows, who cares first for himself and then for his neighbors, so that we may become as good as possible. For a son pleases a good father by showing himself worthy and like his father, and so does a subject please a ruler; for believing and obeying are in our power. As the cause of evils one might suppose the weakness of matter, the involuntary impulses of ignorance, and the irrational compulsions that come from lack of learning. The one who knows, having risen above these through learning, as above wild beasts, imitates the divine purpose and does good, as far as he can, to those human beings who are willing. And if he is ever appointed to rule, like Moses, he will lead for the salvation of those he rules, and will tame what is savage and unpersuadable by honoring the best and punishing the wicked, with punishment rationally enlisted in the service of education. For the soul of a righteous human being is above all a divine statue, resembling God; in it, through obedience to the precepts, the leader of all, mortals and immortals, is enshrined and set up, king and begetter of good things, who is truly law, ordinance, and eternal Word, the one Savior both for each individually and for all in common. He is the truly only-begotten, the “imprint of the glory” of the Father, King of all and Almighty, who stamps on the one who knows the perfect contemplation according to his own image, so that there is now a third divine image, made as far as possible like the second cause, like the true Life, through which we live the true life; as though we were describing the pattern of the one who knows as it comes to be in us, occupied with things that are firm and wholly unchangeable.