Gregory of Nyssa Quotes

The man of half-grown intelligence, when he observes an object which is bathed in the glow of a seeming beauty, thinks that that object is in its essence beautiful, no matter what it is that so prepossesses him with the pleasure of the eye. He will not go deeper into the subject. But the other, whose mind's eye is clear, and who can inspect such appearances, will neglect those elements which are the material only upon which the Form of Beauty works; to him they will be but the ladder by which he climbs to the prospect of that Intellectual Beauty, in accordance with their share in which all other beauties get their existence and their name.

The good and eatable fish are separated by the fishers' skill from the bad and poisonous fish, so that the enjoyment of the good should not be spoilt by any of the bad getting into the "vessels" with them. The work of true sobriety is the same; from all pursuits and habits to choose that which is pure and improving, rejecting in every case that which does not seem likely to be useful, and letting it go back into the universal and secular life, called "the sea" (Matthew 13:47-48), in the imagery of the Parable.

'I got me slaves and slave-girls.' For what price, tell me? What did you find in existence worth as much as this human nature? What price did you put on rationality? How many obols did you reckon the equivalent of the likeness of God? How many staters did you get for selling that being shaped by God? God said, Let us make man in our own image and likeness. If he is in the likeness of God, and rules the whole earth, and has been granted authority over everything on earth from God, who is his buyer, tell me? Who is his seller? To God alone belongs this power; or, rather, not even to God himself. For his gracious gifts, it says, are irrevocable. God would not therefore reduce the human race to slavery, since he himself, when we had been enslaved to sin, spontaneously recalled us to freedom. But if God does not enslave what is free, who is he that sets his own power above God's?

If a single luminary can occupy everything alike that lies beneath it with the force of light, and, more than that, can, while lending itself to all who can use it, still remain self-centred and undissipated, how much more shall the Creator of that luminary become “all in all,” as the Apostle speaks, and come into each with such a measure of Himself as each subject of His influence can receive!

One of two probations must be the inevitable fate of him who has had the longer lease of life; either to combat here on Virtue’s toilsome field, or to suffer there the painful recompense of a life of evil.

Just as, in the case of the sunlight, on one who has never from the day of his birth seen it, all efforts at translating it into words are quite thrown away; you cannot make the splendour of the ray shine through his ears; in like manner, to see the beauty of the true and intellectual light, each man has need of eyes of his own; and he who by a gift of Divine inspiration can see it retains his ecstasy unexpressed in the depths of his consciousness; while he who sees it not cannot be made to know even the greatness of his loss. How should he? This good escapes his perception, and it cannot be represented to him; it is unspeakable, and cannot be delineated. We have not learned the peculiar language expressive of this beauty. … What words could be invented to show the greatness of this loss to him who suffers it? Well does the great David seem to me to express the impossibility of doing this. He has been lifted by the power of the Spirit out of himself, and sees in a blessed state of ecstacy the boundless and incomprehensible Beauty; he sees it as fully as a mortal can see who has quitted his fleshly envelopments and entered, by the mere power of thought, upon the contemplation of the spiritual and intellectual world, and in his longing to speak a word worthy of the spectacle he bursts forth with that cry, which all re-echo, "Every man a liar!" I take that to mean that any man who entrusts to language the task of presenting the ineffable Light is really and truly a liar; not because of any hatred on his part of the truth, but because of the feebleness of his instrument for expressing the thing thought of.

Virtue is achieved by its seekers not without a struggle; nor is abstinence from the paths of pleasure a painless process to human nature.

Paul ... calls the process of shifting away from material matters and toward spiritual matters a “turning to the Lord” and “taking away of a veil.” In all the different tropes and terms for the theoria-meaning, Paul instructs us in a single form of teaching: it is not necessary always to remain in the letter, on the grounds that the immediately apparent meaning of the things said in many instances causes us harm in the pursuit of the life of virtue. But it is necessary to pass over to the incorporeal and spiritually intelligible reading with insight, with the result that the more corporeal meanings are converted to an intellectual sense and meaning, in the same way that the dust of the more fleshly significance of what is said is “shaken off.” This is why Paul says, “the letter kills, but the spirit gives life,” since oftentimes with biblical narrative, it will not provide us with examples of a good life if we stop short at the simple events.

As virtue is a thing that has no master, that is, is free, everything that is free will be united with virtue.

The love of gain, which is a large, incalculably large, element in every soul, when once applied to the desire for God, will bless the man who has it.

Every concept that comes from some comprehensible image, by an approximate understanding and by guessing at the Divine nature, constitutes an idol of God and does not proclaim God.

ἐπειδὴ δέ τισι τῶν ἐκκλησιαστικῶν παρίστασθαι τῇ λέξει τῆς ἁγίας γραφῆς διὰ πάντων δοκεῖ καὶ τὸ δι' αἰνιγμάτων τε καὶ ὑπονοιῶν εἰρῆσθαί τι παρ' αὐτῆς εἰς ὠφέλειαν ἡμῶν οὐ συντίθενται, ἀναγκαῖον ἡγοῦμαι πρῶτον περὶ τούτων τοῖς τὰ τοιαῦτα ἡμῖν ἐγκαλοῦσιν ἀπολογήσασθαι, ὅτι οὐδὲν ἀπὸ τρόπου γίνεται παρ' ἡμῶν ἐν τῷ σπουδάζειν ἡμᾶς παντοίως θηρεύειν ἐκ τῆς θεοπνεύστου γραφῆς τὸ ὠφέλιμον·

With the eye in a natural state sight follows necessarily ... In the same way the life of blessedness is as a familiar second nature to those who have kept clear the senses of the soul.

Now those who take a superficial and unreflecting view of things observe the outward appearance of anything they meet, e.g. of a man, and then trouble themselves no more about him. The view they have taken of the bulk of his body is enough to make them think that they know all about him. But the penetrating and scientific mind will not trust to the eyes alone the task of taking the measure of reality; it will not stop at appearances, nor count that which is not seen among unrealities. It inquires into the qualities of the man's soul.

As, when one torch has been fired, flame is transmitted to all the neighbouring candlesticks, without either the first light being lessened or blazing with unequal brilliance on the other points where it has been caught; so the saintliness of a life is transmitted from him who has achieved it, to those who come within his circle.