Note (return) — Chapter XI

Philosophy is the love of wisdom. Now wisdom (σοφία) is expressly declared by Plato to belong alone to the Supreme Divinity, 664 who alone can contemplate reality in a direct and immediate manner, and in whom, as Plato seems often to intimate, knowledge and being coincide. Philosophy is the aspiration of the soul after this wisdom, this perfect and immutable truth, and in its realization it is a union with the Perfect Wisdom through the medium of a divine affection, the love of which Plato so often speaks. The eternal and unchangeable Essence which is the proper object of philosophy is also endowed with moral attributes. He is not only "the Being," but "the Good" (τὸ ἀγαθόν), and all in the system of the universe which can be the object of rational contemplation, is an emanation from that goodness. The love of truth is therefore the love of God, and the love of Good is the love of truth. Philosophy and morality are thus coincident. Philosophy is the love of Perfect Wisdom; Perfect Wisdom and Perfect Goodness are identical; the Perfect Good is God; philosophy is the "Love of God." 665 Ethically viewed, it is this one motive of love for the Supreme Wisdom and Goodness, predominating over and purifying and assimilating every desire of the soul, and governing every movement of the man, raising man to a participation of and communion with Divinity, and restoring him to "the likeness of God." "This flight," says Plato, "consists in resembling God (όµοίωσιϛ Θεῷ), and this resemblance is the becoming just and holy with wisdom." 666 "This assimilation to God is the enfranchisement of the divine element of the soul. To approach to God as the substance of truth is Science; as the substance of goodness in truth is Wisdom, and as the substance of Beauty in goodness and truth is Love." 667