God visible through all things: the close of Mind to Hermes
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Nous — οὐδὲν γὰρ δύνασαι τῶν καλῶν καὶ ἀγαθῶν, φιλοσώματος καὶ κακὸς ὤν, νοῆσαι· ἡ γὰρ τελεία κακία τὸ ἀγνοεῖν τὸ θεῖον, τὸ δὲ δύνασθαι γνῶναι καὶ θελῆσαι καὶ ἐλπίσαι ὁδός ἐστιν εὐθεῖα, ἰδία τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ, καὶ φέρουσα, καὶ ῥᾳδία· ὁδεύοντί σοι πανταχοῦ συναντήσει, πανταχοῦ ὀφθήσεται, ὅπου τε καὶ ὅτε οὐ προσδοκᾷς, γρηγοροῦντι, κοιμωμένῳ, πλέοντι, ὁδεύοντι, νυκτός, ἡμέρας, λαλοῦντι, σιωπῶντι· οὐδὲν γάρ ἐστιν ὃ οὐκ ἔστιν εἰκὼν τοῦ θείου.
Hermes — Ἀόρατος ὁ Θεός;
Nous — Εὐφήμησον. καὶ τίς αὐτοῦ φανερώτερος; δι᾿ αὐτὸ τοῦτο πάντα ἐποίησεν, ἵνα διὰ πάντων αὐτὸν βλέπης. τοῦτό ἐστι τὸ ἀγαθὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ, τοῦτο δὲ αὐτοῦ ἀρετή, τὸ αὐτὸν φαίνεσθαι διὰ πάντων. οὐδὲν γὰρ ἀόρατον οὐδὲ τῶν ἀσωμάτων· νοῦς ὁρᾶται ἐν τῷ νοεῖν, ὁ θεὸς ἐν τῷ ποιεῖν. ταῦτά σοι ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον πεφανέρωται, ὦ τρισμέγιστε, τὰ δὲ ἄλλα πάντα ὁμοίως κατὰ σεαυτὸν νόει καὶ οὐ διαψευσθήσῃ.
For you can understand nothing of beautiful and good things while you are body-loving and bad. Complete evil is ignorance of the divine; but to be able to know, to will, and to hope is a straight road proper to the Good, carrying you and easy. As you travel, it will meet you everywhere; everywhere it will be seen — where and when you do not expect it: waking, sleeping, sailing, walking, by night, by day, speaking, and being silent. For there is nothing that is not an image of the divine. Hermes asks, ‘Is God invisible?’ Nous answers: ‘Speak reverently. What is more manifest than he? For this very reason he made all things, so that you might see him through all things. This is the Good of God, and this his virtue: that he appear through all things. For nothing is invisible, not even incorporeal things. Mind is seen in thinking, God in making. These things have been made manifest to you so far, O Trismegistus; understand all the rest similarly for yourself, and you will not be mistaken.’
Nous closes the eleventh treatise by turning the exercise back into ethics. A body-loving and bad person cannot understand beautiful and good things; complete evil is ignorance of the divine. But the ability to know, to will, and to hope is a straight and easy road proper to the Good, meeting the traveler everywhere — waking, sleeping, sailing, walking, by night and by day, speaking and silent — because nothing exists that is not an image of the divine. Hermes asks whether God is invisible. Nous rebukes the question: God made all things so that Hermes might see him through all things. Even incorporeal things are not invisible: mind is seen in thinking, God in making. The rest Hermes must understand similarly for himself.
The treatise ends by refusing any split between metaphysics and moral life. The obstacle to understanding God is not that God is hidden behind the world; it is the soul's own condition when it is φιλοσώματος, in love with the body as its limit and measure. 'Complete evil' is not a spectacular crime but ignorance of the divine. Conversely, the first opening toward the Good is humble and active: to be able to know, to will, and to hope. That road does not require fleeing the world, because it meets the traveler everywhere — awake or asleep, at sea or on the road, speaking or silent.
Hermes' last question, 'Is God invisible?', lets Nous state the whole Hermetic answer in one stroke. God is not one visible object among others, but neither is he absent from visibility. He made all things so that he might be seen through all things. Even incorporeal realities are visible in their acts: mind is seen in thinking, God in making. The close therefore sends Hermes back to practice rather than to possession. Enough has been shown; now he must understand the rest 'by himself.' The divine image is everywhere, but it has to be read by a mind no longer contracted into fear of the body.
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