CONTRA FATUM

"Hope always draws the soul from the beauty which is seen to what is beyond, always kindles the desire for the hidden through what is constantly perceived. Therefore, the ardent lover of beauty, although receiving what is always visible as an image of what he desires, yet longs to be filled with the very stamp of the archetype." (Life of Moses, Ferguson, §231)

“The other class of spiritual substance [i.e. the soul] has been brought into being by creation; thus it constantly looks towards to the first Cause, and is preserved in existence by a continual participation in transcendent Being. Thus in a certain sense, it is constantly being created, ever changing for the better in its growth in perfection; along these lines no limit can be envisaged, nor can its progressive growth in perfection be limited by any term.” (Cant., Or. 6, Musurillo, pp. 196-7)

“For although what is ever being grasped is always greater than what was previously grasped, it does not put a limit on our final goal; rather, for those who are rising in perfection, the limit of what was discovered becomes the beginning for the discovery of loftier things. Thus they never stop rising, moving from one new beginning to the next, and the beginning of ever greater graces is never limited of itself. For the desire of those who thus rise never rests in what they can already understand; but by an ever greater and greater desire, the soul keeps rising constantly to another which lies ahead, and thus it makes its way through ever higher regions towards the Transcendent.” (Cant., Or. 8, Musurillo, p. 213)

Καὶ τοῦτό ἐστιν ὄντως τὸ ἰδεῖν τὸν Θεὸν τὸ μηδέποτε τῆς ἐπιθυμίας κόρον εὑρεῖν. ”This truly is the vision of God: never to be satisfied in the desire to see him.” (De Vita Moysis, TLG 2017.042, 239)