For there is also another further question which you ask, as to how we should understand the statement made by Gregory the Theologian in the 2nd peace-making homily about the Holy Trinity in the following words: «A perfect Trinity of three perfect ones, Unity having been moved on account of wealthiness, while duality was passed over on account of the material and the form of which bodies consist, and a Trinity was fixed on account of perfection, for it first passes the composition of a duality, in order that the Godhead may not remain narrow, nor be diffused into infinitude; for the one is mean, and the other disorderly, and the one is utterly Jewish, and the other heathen and polytheistic». This abominable notion must therefore first be removed from our mind, that we should not think that the Father first existed in his own sole hypostasis, and was moved as if by some afterthought to put forth another hypostasis, that of the Son, and similarly further conceived the thought of putting forth a third hypostasis also from himself, that of the Spirit, in order that he might exist in a Trinity. On this theory it will result that the Son and the Holy Spirit are not ever-existing but were afterwards added to the Father, and we shall give occasion for the blasphemy of Arius who says, «There was once when the Son and the Holy Spirit were not». But this is abominable; for one who was acquired later and came into being afterwards is not God; for the Holy Trinity is of equal everlastingness, and it is therefore understood and acknowledged to be one God truly in three hypostases. The words used by the doctor we should therefore understand in the same way as that which is stated in Wisdom, «From the greatness and beauty of created things the causer of their birth is inferentially seen» ; and from formed creation and this visible world we may conceive not only of the wisdom and power of him who created them, but also of the very peerlessless of his Godhead in regard of creation, and its distance in all points and lack of similarity. We see that all the bodies which make up the world are composed of material and form, and arise from a duality; but what material and form are we will state in the form of an example. For instance the potter's material for the craft is the clay, but he adds the form to the material , that is to say, that which belongs to the fashioning of the vessel that is being manufactured, a jar or a pot or anything of the kind. But in this case the potter is the maker of the form only, and he borrows the material . But God, the Maker of all and perfect in craftsmanship, both brought the material of every body from that which did not exist and added the form; and, if you speak of fire or of earth, or of air or of water, or of the sky and the sun and the moon and the other stars, he both formed the material of all of them out of non-existent things, and the form was devised for them in different ways at the moment that they came into being, and he is both the Maker and the adorner of the shapeless material of the bodies, in that he differentiated it into the various forms of the bodies. And this Wisdom also states, when it declares concerning Pharaoh and the Egyptians, who were vexed by the serpent and the vile reptile: «For neither was thine almighty hand, which created the world out of shapeless material, at a loss to send against them either a multitude of wolves or fierce lions» . Therefore our mind, seeing that the bodies in this tangible world consist as we have said of material and form, and that they arise from a duality, and being instructed by the sacred Scriptures that there is one Godhead in a Trinity, wonders and is amazed at the profoundness of the theology, since it sees a corresponding fact in creation, and is as it were initiated into a mystery and learns from creation the inaccessibility of the Trinity and its lack of likeness to and community with creation, and reflects in itself and says: The reason then why the Godhead does not exist in one hypostasis is that it may not be inferior to the bodies, falling short in the restriction of number. And it does not again exist in a duality, because it shuns similarity to the bodies, which arise from a duality, but it only appears in a Trinity and as plural, which is admirable; for in the Trinity is completed the unique number which follows two. Therefore also, when Moses said to him, «Show me thyself, let me see thee plainly», he refused this, saying, «Thou wilt not be able to see my face, for a man shall not see my face and live»; but he added, «Thou shalt see my back parts, but my face shall not be seen by thee» ; signifying that by the very essence and by the sight, as one may say, of the face no man can comprehend God, but from his back parts a man shall know the things that pertain to him. out his back parts are created things which came into being afterwards, through which he is inferentially seen as the causer of their birth, as our father the Theologian himself also said in the 2nd theological homily: «These are God's back parts, all things which, being after him, make him known, like the shadows and reflexions of the. sun upon waters, which show the sun to weak eyes, because they cannot look at it, since by the purity of the light it overcomes the perception» . And therefore in the passage now before us for interpretation he applied the expression 'movement of the Unity towards a duality' to the everlasting birth of the Son from the Father, and 'passing over of the duality' to the procession of the Holy Spirit which is timeless and thereby without beginning, and by means of the words used as we have said he gave a philosophical explanation in mysterious and divine fashion of the lack of community in the Trinity towards bodies which exist in a duality. The passage contained in the homily entitled 'of Lights' which says, «But where there is purification there is shining, and shining is the completion of love, to those who desire things that are great, or that which is great, or beyond what is great», is plain and contains nothing difficult of comprehension. What he said is, «Where there is purification of the soul by means of virtues, there is the shining of knowledge, which raises and uplifts to the satisfaction of divine love». But the satisfaction of love is the end of things delightful and pleasing, which is God, who exists and is made known in things that are great, and in that which is. great, and beyond that which is great; in things that are great in the three hypostases which are equal in power and of which none is in anything inferior to the others in power and in equality in all things, except that they are distinct in the matter of non-generation and generation and procession, in the unconfused individualities which stamp each of the hypostases; in that which is great, because he is one and the same and because of the Unity of the Godhead; and beyond that which is great, because he is not limited by size and quantity. For, in. that we employ the poverty of names that exists among us, we name God great, when he is more than great. Therefore also the Psalmist said: «Great is the Lord and very admirable; and there is no end to his greatness». For all greatness is limited, but the Godhead cannot be limited, and is not limited by any boundary.