İlahi İsimler: İyi ve Güzel Üzerine

Let us come to the title "Good," already mentioned in our discourse, which the theologians ascribe pre-eminently and exclusively to the super-divine Deity. I conjecture they do this by calling the supremely divine subsistence "Goodness," and because the Good, as essential Good, by its very being, extends its goodness to all things that exist. For, just as our sun—not by calculating or choosing, but by its very being—enlightens all things able to partake of its light according to their own capacity—so too the Good sends to all things that exist the rays of its whole goodness, according to their capacity. By reason of these rays, all intelligible and intelligent essences, powers, and energies subsist. By reason of these, they exist and have their life, continuous and undiminished, purified from all corruption, death, matter, and generation. While aspiring to the Good, they have both existence and "good existence"; and being conformed to It, as far as is attainable, they become patterns of goodness and impart to those beneath them the gifts that have passed through to them from the Good.