The beautiful and good are parts of God — which the eye cannot see
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Hermes — κἀγὼ δὲ χάριν ἔχω τῷ θεῷ, τῷ εἰς νοῦν μοι βαλόντι κἂν περὶ τῆς γνώσεως τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ, ὅτι ἀδύνατόν ἐστιν αὐτὸ ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ εἶναι. ὁ γὰρ κόσμος πλήρωμά ἐστι τῆς κακίας, ὁ δὲ θεὸς τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ, ἢ τὸ ἀγαθὸν τοῦ θεοῦ… αἱ γὰρ ἐξοχαὶ τῶν καλῶν περὶ αὐτοῦ εἰσι τὴν οὐσίαν· φαίνονται καὶ καθαρώτεραι καὶ εἰλικρινέστεραι τάχα που καὶ αὐταὶ αἱ οὖσαι ἐκείνου. τολμητέον γὰρ εἰπεῖν, ὦ ᾿Ασκληπιέ, ὅτι ἡ οὐσία τοῦ θεοῦ, εἴγε οὐσίαν ἔχει, τὸ καλόν ἐστι, τὸ δὲ καλὸν καὶ ἀγαθὸν ἐν οὐδενὶ ἔστι καταλαβέσθαι τῶν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ· πάντα γὰρ τὰ ὀφθαλμῷ ὑποπίπτοντα εἴδωλά ἐστι καὶ ὥσπερ σκιαγραφίαι· τὰ δὲ μὴ ὑποπίπτοντα, μάλιστα δὲ ἡ τοῦ καλοῦ καὶ τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ… καὶ ὥσπερ ὀφθαλμὸς οὐ δύναται τὸν θεὸν ἰδεῖν, οὕτως οὐδὲ τὸ καλὸν καὶ τὸ ἀγαθόν. ταῦτα γὰρ μέρη τοῦ θεοῦ ἐστιν ὁλόκληρα, ἴδια αὐτοῦ μόνου, οἰκεῖα, ἀχώριστα, ἐρασμιώτατα, ὧν ἢ αὐτὸς ὁ θεὸς ἐρᾷ ἢ αὐτὰ τοῦ θεοῦ ἐρᾷ.
And I too give thanks to God, who cast into my mind even the knowledge of the Good — that it is impossible for it to be in the cosmos. For the cosmos is a fullness of vice, and God of the Good (or the Good of God). For the excellences of the beautiful are about his essence; they appear even purer and more unmixed, perhaps, than they are of him. One must dare to say, Asclepius, that the essence of God — if he has an essence — is the beautiful; and the beautiful and good is in none of the things in the cosmos to be grasped, for all that falls under the eye are images and, as it were, shadow-paintings, while the things that do not fall under it, especially the essence of the beautiful and the good … And as the eye cannot see God, so neither the beautiful and the good. For these are whole parts of God, proper to him alone, native, inseparable, most lovable — which either God himself loves, or they love God.
And I too give thanks to God, who cast into my mind even the knowledge of the Good — that it is impossible for it to be in the cosmos. For the cosmos is a fullness of vice, and God of the Good (or the Good of God). For the excellences of the beautiful are about his essence; they appear even purer and more unmixed, perhaps, than they are of him. One must dare to say, Asclepius, that the essence of God — if he has an essence — is the beautiful; and the beautiful and good is in none of the things in the cosmos to be grasped, for all that falls under the eye are images and, as it were, shadow-paintings, while the things that do not fall under it — especially the essence of the beautiful and the good … And as the eye cannot see God, so neither the beautiful and the good. For these are whole parts of God, proper to him alone, native, inseparable, most lovable — which either God himself loves, or they love God.
The treatise turns from indictment to gratitude. Hermes 'gives thanks (χάριν ἔχω)' for the very insight that has darkened the picture — the knowledge that the Good cannot be here — because to know where the Good is not is already to be turned toward where it is. The antithesis is stated with a great word: 'the cosmos is a fullness of vice (πλήρωμα… τῆς κακίας), and God of the Good.' πλήρωμα, the 'fullness' that Gnostics and Paul would make a technical term for the divine plenitude, is here applied first to the world's brim-full evil, then to God's brim-full good — two opposite totalities.
Then the boldest predication in the Corpus, ventured with a scruple that the interlinear preserves: 'one must dare to say (τολμητέον… εἰπεῖν)… that the essence of God, if he has an essence (εἴγε οὐσίαν ἔχει), is the beautiful (τὸ καλόν).' God's very being is Beauty — the Platonic Form of the Beautiful identified with the divine essence. And like God, this beauty is invisible: what 'falls under the eye (ὀφθαλμῷ ὑποπίπτοντα)' are only 'images and, as it were, shadow-paintings (εἴδωλα… ὥσπερ σκιαγραφίαι)' — a direct borrowing of Plato's cave and its σκιαγραφία, the trompe-l'œil that fools the sense. As the eye cannot see God, so it cannot see the beautiful-and-good, for these are not objects in the world but 'whole parts of God (μέρη τοῦ θεοῦ… ὁλόκληρα)' — parts that are somehow entire, belonging to him alone. The section ends on a note of extraordinary tenderness, and the reveal layer lets it ring: these are 'most lovable (ἐρασμιώτατα), which either God himself loves, or they love God (ἢ αὐτὸς ὁ θεὸς ἐρᾷ ἢ αὐτὰ τοῦ θεοῦ ἐρᾷ).' The austere argument that the Good is nowhere here resolves into a circle of love within the divine — God and his own beauty in mutual ἔρως. (Two lacunae in the text are marked.)
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Corpus Hermeticum CH6.4 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/hermetica/CH6.4/