Gregory of Nyssa: “'Who hath known the mind of the Lord?' the apostle asks; and I ask further, who has understood his own mind?[...]"

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“'Who hath known the mind of the Lord?' the apostle asks; and I ask further, who has understood his own mind? Let those tell us who consider the nature of God to be within their comprehension, whether they understand themselves – if they know the nature of their own mind. […] The image [εἰκόνα] is properly an image so long as it fails in none of those attributes which we perceive in the archetype; […] therefore, since one of the attributes we contemplate in the Divine nature is incomprehensibility of essence, it is clearly necessary that in this point the image should be able to show its imitation of the archetype. For if, while the archetype transcends comprehension, the nature of the image were comprehended, the contrary character of the attributes we behold in them would prove the defect of the image; but since the nature of our mind, which is the likeness of the Creator, evades our knowledge, it has an accurate resemblance to the superior nature[...] ” (De Opificio Hominis, XI.2, Schaff, p. 396)

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"[...]we ought narrowly to scrutinize our Father's characteristics, that by fashioning and framing ourselves to the likeness of our Father[...]"

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"[...]after the grace bestowed we are called His children. And therefore we ought narrowly to scrutinize our Father's characteristics, that by fashioning and framing ourselves to the likeness of our Father, we may appear true children of Him Who calls us to the adoption according to grace." (On the Baptism of Christ, NPNF, pp. 523-524)
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"[...]when human nature is liberated from the double composition, and returns perfectly to the good, having become simple and impossible to represent and truly one , then that which appears will be the same as that which is hidden[...]"

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"Since then, it is believed that the divine nature ( τό θεῖον) is simple ( ἁπλοῦν), free from composition (ἀσύνθετον) and impossible to represent (ἀσχημάτιστον), when human nature ( τό ἀντθρώπινον) is liberated from the double composition, and returns perfectly ( ἀκριβῶς) to the good, having become simple and impossible to represent and truly one ( ώς αληθῶς ἕν γενομενον), then that which appears will be the same as that which is hidden, and that which is hidden the same as that which appears, then truly is carried to accomplishment the beatitude and such man are truly called sons of God, proclaimed blessed according to the promise of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for eternity. Amen" (Gal 1.5, Heb 13.21 and 2 Tm 4.18) (On the Beatitudes, GNO VII/2, 160, tr. Maspero, 2007, p. 73)
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"[...]man was brought into the world last after the creation, not being rejected to the last as worthless, but as one whom it behoved to be king over his subjects at his very birth."

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"[...] man was brought into the world last after the creation, not being rejected to the last as worthless, but as one whom it behoved to be king over his subjects at his very birth. And as a good host does not bring his guest to his house before the preparation of his feast, but, when he has made all due preparation, and decked with their proper adornments his house, his couches, his table, brings his guest home when things suitable for his refreshment are in readiness,—in the same manner the rich and munificent Entertainer of our nature, when He had decked the habitation with beauties of every kind, and prepared this great and varied banquet, then introduced man, assigning to him as his task not the acquiring of what was not there, but the enjoyment of the things which were there; and for this reason He gives him as foundations the instincts of a twofold organization, blending the Divine with the earthy, that by means of both he may be naturally and properly dispos...
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