De docta ignorantia

It will readily be inquired consequently unto these things, of what nature the contracted maximum itself ought to be. For after it is necessarily one, as the absolute unity is the absolute maximality, and with this contracted unto this or that; first indeed it is manifest that the order of things necessarily demands that some things be of inferior nature in comparison with others, as are those which lack life and intelligence, some of superior nature, which are intelligence, and some in the middle. If therefore the absolute maximality is the entity of all things most universally, so that it is not more of one than of another, it is clear that what is more common to the universality of beings is associable with this maximum of his. For if that inferior nature itself is considered, and one of such beings is elevated unto maximality, it will be God and that, as is given in the example of the maximal line. For since it is infinite through absolute infinity, and maximal through maximality, necessarily that to which the maximal is united will be God through maximality, and will remain a line through contraction, and thus will be in act all that can come from a line. But a line includes neither life nor intellect. How then could a line be assumed unto the maximal degree itself, if it does not attain the fullness of natures? For it would be a maximum than which a greater could be, and it would lack perfections. Likewise must be said of the supreme nature, which does not embrace the inferior, except in such a way that the union of the inferior and superior is greater than the separation. But to the maximum, with which the minimum coincides, it belongs so to embrace one thing that it does not dismiss another, but all things at once. Hence the middle nature, which is the middle of the connection of the inferior and superior, is alone that which can conveniently be elevated unto the maximum by the power of the infinite maximal God. For since it enfolds within itself all natures, as the supreme of the inferior and the lowest of the superior, if it ascends according to all of itself unto union with maximality, it is established that all natures and the whole universe have arrived in it in every possible way unto the highest degree.

But the human nature is that which is elevated above all the works of God, and made a little less than the angels, enfolding the intellectual and sensible nature, and constraining all things within itself, so that it is reasonably called the microcosm or little world. Hence it is that which, if elevated into union with maximality, would be the fullness of all perfections of the universe and of singulars, so that in that humanity every highest would attain its degree. But humanity exists only contractedly in this or that. Hence if it were not possible for more than one true man to ascend unto union with maximality, and this one would certainly be man in such a way that he is God, and God in such a way that he is man, the perfection of the universe, holding primacy in all things, in whom the least, greatest, and middle natures united unto the absolute maximality would coincide, so that he himself would be the perfection of all, and all things, as they are contracted, would rest in him as in their perfection, whose measure would be of man and of angel, as John says in the Apocalypse, and of singulars, since he would be the universal contracted entity of singular creatures through union with the absolute entity, which is the absolute entity of universals, through whom all things would receive the beginning of contraction and the end through him, who is the contracted maximum, would proceed from the absolute maximum into contracted being, and would return into the absolute through the mediation of the same as through the principle of emanation and the end of reduction. But God, as he is the equality of being all things, is the creator of the universe, since it is created toward him. The supreme and maximal equality of being all things absolutely, therefore, is that to which the nature of humanity itself would be united, so that God himself through the assumed humanity would thus be all things contractedly in that humanity, just as he is the equality of being all things absolutely. That man, therefore, since he would subsist in the maximal equality of being itself through union, would be the Son of God, as the Word, in whom all things were made, or the equality itself of being, which is called the Son of God, according to what was shown before; nor would he cease to be the son of man, just as he would not cease to be man, as will be said below. And since to the best and most perfect God these things are not repugnant, which can come about through him without his variation, diminution, or lessening, but rather befit the immense goodness, that all things be created by him and toward him in the best and most perfect congruous order, and then, when with this way removed all things could not be more perfect, no one except one denying either God or the best itself will be able rationally to dissent from these things. For all envy is banished far from him who is supremely good, whose operation cannot be defective, but as he himself is maximal, so too his work, as much as this is possible, approaches the maximum. But the maximal power is not terminated except in itself, since nothing is outside it, and it is infinite. In no creature, therefore, is it terminated, but, any being given, that infinite power can create a better and more perfect one. But if man is elevated unto the unity of that power itself, so that he is not a man subsisting in himself as a creature, but in unity with the infinite power, that power is not terminated in the creature, but in itself. But this is the most perfect operation of the maximal infinite and interminable power of God, in which it cannot fail; otherwise neither creator nor creature would be — for what would a creature be, contracted from the absolute divine being, if that contraction were not unitable to it? — through which all things, as they are from him who is absolutely, exist contractedly, and they, as they are contracted, are from him, to whom contraction is supremely united, so that first there is God the creator; second God and man, with the created humanity supremely assumed into the unity of himself, as the universal contraction of all things hypostatically and personally united unto the equality of being all things, so that thus through the most absolute God, by means of the universal contraction, which is humanity, in the third place all things proceed into contracted being, so that thus they can be unto that which they are in the better order and way. But this order must not be considered temporally, as though God preceded in time the firstborn of the creature, or that the firstborn, God and man, preceded the world in time, but by nature and the order of perfection above all time, so that he, existing prior to all with God above time, in the fullness of time, with many revolutions past, would appear to the world.