Commentary on Plato's Symposium

[...] noble, and divine; and this will suffice regarding the oration of Phaedrus. We shall come to Pausanias. Second Oration.

God is good, beautiful, and just, the beginning, the middle, and the end. Chap. I.

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The Pythagorean followers of Pythagoras philosophers hold that the measure of all things is ternary. I think for this reason: because God governs them with the number three, and things themselves are completed in this number. Moved by this, Vergilius Virgil said, "God rejoices in the odd number." original: "Numero deus impare gaudet" And certainly, the highest God firstly creates all things, secondly draws them to Himself, and lastly makes them perfect. Firstly, all things emerge from this eternal source while they are born. Then, they return to it while they seek their first origin. Lastly, they become perfect after they have returned to their beginning. Orpheus a legendary musician and sage of antiquity divined this, calling Jupiter the supreme deity the beginning, the middle, and the end of the universe: the beginning, in that He creates; the middle, because He draws the created things to Himself; the end, for the perfection that He gives to things returned unto Him. From this, we can call the great King of all—as is often read in the works of Plato—good, beautiful, and just. I say good, by creating; beautiful, by enticing; just, by giving perfection to each according to their merits. Beauty, whose property is to entice, is placed between the good and the just. It issues from goodness and runs toward justice.

In what way divine beauty gives birth to love. Chap. II.