The Commentary of Hierocles upon the Golden Verses of Pythagoras

resplendent light; in like manner, a soul, that is still destitute of virtue, cannot fix its view on the beauty and splendor of truth; nor is it lawful for impurity to touch the things that are pure.

Practical philosophy is the parent of virtue, and contemplative of truth, as we are taught by these very verses of Pythagoras, where practical philosophy is called Human Virtue, and where the contemplative is celebrated under the name of Divine Virtue: for, after having finished the precepts of civil virtue in these words; "Take care to practise all these things, meditate on them well; you ought to love them with all your heart;" he adds, "It is they that will put you in the way of divine virtue, and make you walk in the footsteps of God."

The first step therefore to the divine nature, is to ascend to the dignity of the human. Now, that which makes a man good, is civil virtue; but that which deifies him, are those sciences which advance him to the divine. According then to the rules of order, little things must precede the greater, if we would make any progress. And this is the reason why in these verses of Pythagoras, moral institutions have the first place, to