The false goods we cannot flee — the hardest thing is that we need them
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Hermes — ὅθεν οἱ ἀγνοοῦντες καὶ μὴ ὁδεύσαντες τὴν περὶ τῆς εὐσεβείας ὁδόν, καλὸν καὶ ἀγαθὸν τολμῶσι λέγειν ἄνθρωπον, μηδὲ ὄναρ θεασάμενον εἴ τί ἐστιν ἀγαθόν, ἀλλὰ παντὶ κακῷ προειλημμένον, καὶ τὸ κακὸν πιστεύσαντα ἀγαθὸν εἶναι καὶ οὕτως αὐτῷ χρώμενον ἀκορέστερον καὶ φοβούμενον αὐτοῦ στερηθῆναι, πάντα δὲ ἀγωνιζόμενον, ἵνα μὴ μόνον ἔχῃ ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐπαύξῃ. τοιαῦτα τὰ ἀνθρώπεια ἀγαθὰ καὶ τὰ καλά, ὦ ᾿Ασκληπιέ, ἃ οὔτε φυγεῖν δυνάμεθα οὔτε μισῆσαι· τὸ γὰρ πάντων χαλεπώτατον, ὅτι χρείαν αὐτῶν ἔχομεν καὶ ζῆν τούτων χωρὶς οὐ δυνάμεθα.
Whence those who are ignorant and have not travelled the road of piety dare to call a man beautiful and good, though he has not even in a dream beheld whether anything is good, but is preoccupied by every evil, and believes the evil to be good, and so uses it insatiably, and fears to be deprived of it, and struggles in every way not only to have but to increase it. Such, Asclepius, are the human goods and beautiful things — which we can neither flee nor hate; for the hardest of all is that we have need of them, and cannot live without them.
Whence those who are ignorant and have not travelled the road of piety dare to call a man beautiful and good, though he has not even in a dream beheld whether anything is good, but is preoccupied by every evil, and believes the evil to be good, and so uses it insatiably, and fears to be deprived of it, and struggles in every way not only to have but to increase it. Such, Asclepius, are the human goods and beautiful things — which we can neither flee nor hate; for the hardest of all is that we have need of them, and cannot live without them.
The treatise ends where its logic must — on the human predicament, drawn without consolation. Those 'ignorant (ἀγνοοῦντες)' and untravelled on 'the road of piety (τὴν… εὐσεβείας ὁδόν)' — the very road VI.5 named — misapply the highest words: they 'dare to call a man beautiful and good (καλὸν καὶ ἀγαθόν)' who has 'not even in a dream beheld (μηδὲ ὄναρ θεασάμενον)' what the good is. The portrait that follows is a small, exact anatomy of addiction to false goods: 'preoccupied by every evil (παντὶ κακῷ προειλημμένον),' he 'believes the evil to be good,' 'uses it insatiably (χρώμενον ἀκορέστερον),' 'fears to be deprived of it,' and 'struggles not only to have but to increase it (μὴ μόνον ἔχῃ ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐπαύξῃ).' The reveal layer keeps the verbs of craving in a row — believe, use, fear-to-lose, fight-to-increase — because they map the whole motion of a life spent on counterfeits.
And then the last sentence, which refuses the easy exit. These 'human goods and beautiful things (τὰ ἀνθρώπεια ἀγαθὰ καὶ τὰ καλά)' are not simply to be renounced: 'we can neither flee them nor hate them (οὔτε φυγεῖν δυνάμεθα οὔτε μισῆσαι).' Why not? 'For the hardest of all (τὸ πάντων χαλεπώτατον) is that we have need of them, and cannot live without them (χρείαν αὐτῶν ἔχομεν καὶ ζῆν τούτων χωρὶς οὐ δυνάμεθα).' It is a startlingly honest close for a treatise so absolute about the Good's absence from the world: the embodied soul is bound to the very goods it now knows to be false, dependent for life itself on what is not the Good. The tragedy is not that we love the wrong things but that we cannot stop needing them — which is exactly why the one road out is not flight from the world but 'piety with knowledge,' the mind's ascent (as CH IV bade) while the body remains where it must. CH VI leaves the reader with the ache that makes the rest of the Hermetica necessary.
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