the safe security of those who go toward Him, and the reaching out of a hand to those who go forth. The brightness of the illuminated. The principality of perfection itself for those who are being perfected. The supreme divinity which they take into everything. Also, for those who become simple, He is simplicity itself. For those who come together into one, He is likewise unity. ¶ By the reason of the universal principle, a certain principle above a principle, above a principle. ¶ Also, the hidden, beneficent distribution as far as is right. And (to say it in summary) the life of the living, the essence of those that exist. The principle and cause of all life and essence, producing and preserving all things for the sake of His own goodness.

¶ Why God is called by many names, why unity, why trinity, cause, wisdom, beauty, kindness, and other things likewise.

The names that are added as adjectives

which are attributed to God by the sacred writings, were not invented to signify the nature of God itself. For since it is unique and simple, if it were to be named, it would have to be named by a unique name. But they were instituted so that they might declare the many and various good things flowing most lavishly from the divine goodness. Indeed, if anything is signified about God besides the procession from Him, they surely say what God is not.

¶ Therefore, where God is called the One, or unity, or the monad, first, it is signified through these that there are not many gods, but one. Likewise, that the one God is not composite but most simple. Again, that the most simple God is not divisible. And thus it is said what God is not. Then, through such appellations, it is signified that unity proceeds from the divine unity. For singularity, simplicity, and indivisibility, wherever they exist in things, proceed from the first singularity, simplicity, and indivisibility: but the difference is that when it falls upon some singular and unique thing, it has this alone. But he who has the one God already possesses all things. Furthermore, things that are primarily simple are destined for composition. Divine simplicity dominates over compositions. Finally, we arrive at the indivisible in things, as if to a point and unity, by dividing little by little or by diminishing in any way. But one arrives at the divine indivisibility as if at the maximum. Where virtue meets with infinite unity, it is immense. ¶ And to speak in summary: just as a man is one man because his body is one thing, and his soul is one thing, so he has it from God, just as they have had it from the same, so that they might simply exist: and be a man, a body, and a soul. The parts of the body, both human and worldly, naturally repugnant among themselves, were at last granted by the first unity so that they might be reconciled in one form; for the same reason, the discordant powers, affects, and motions of the soul are at last settled and pacified by dissent, and the whole soul lives under one form of intelligence. ¶ But who would not see that the union of all things depends upon the first principle? For insofar as all things are from the same, and from that same most simple and absolutely indivisible thing, and are entirely uniform according to Him: in that same degree are they conformable to one another and flow together into the same, as if into an end, which also turns toward itself as if it were the principle; and by turning toward the same, it makes all things that it has produced to be the same among themselves. ¶ Therefore, as we have proven in our theology, generation pertains to the fecundity of nature: and that which is interior [is] before that which is exterior. And the more excellent nature is, the more interiorly it generates offspring for itself. Therefore, the first nature generates the interior from God so that the nature of the generator and the generated may be one. It is also the same of mutual love. The truth of generation and production demands that these three persons exist. Meanwhile, the unity of the infinite principle ensures that the nature is one. Conversely, in us, in whom one person consists of three natures: soul, body, and spirit. What we call a person in Latin is called an hypostasis a distinct individual existence or essence in Greek. This we ought not to interpret as substance: but as a supposition, or subsistent, or existent. Or subsistence or existence. Conclude thus. Nature is commonly of the prior and simpler [things] through the person. If, therefore, a person often preserves its unity in a multitude of natures, much more does the most convenient nature know how to preserve its singular unity in the number of persons. And what is possible by reason and at the same time most convenient, God fulfills in Himself. ¶ The divine trinity