Sophia: … I have already told you that in manifesting itself the substance cannot cease to be what it is; it cannot leave its absolute state. Do you believe that it is diminished by action and manifestation? When you act, when you manifest yourself, do you cease to be what you are, do you leave your state as psychic agent and, in manifesting yourself materially, do you yourself become matter? In producing objective phenomena, do you lose your subjective being? So? Do you really think that the absolute substance is less powerful than you are? When it realizes itself, the substance does not lose its absolute state, but rather acquires a relative state. Without ceasing to be infinite, it becomes definite as well; and that is true infinity, the true absolute. You comprehend that by its very definition the absolute principle cannot be deprived of anything, cannot lack anything in itself. If it were only infinite and absolute, then it would lack relativity and finitude; it would be imperfect. Thus, in order to be that which it is, it must also be the opposite of itself, or, it must be the union of itself and of its opposite. In order to be truly absolute and infinite, it must also be the principle of relativity and finitude.

Philosopher: What you're saying isn't new to me. I've already learned it from a great philosopher, and have always felt the truth of that reasoning.

Even more, the idea of the absolute substance as affirming itself in its self-denial, and as revealing the great principle of the unity of opposites, has always delivered me into a sort of mystical enthusiasm.

Sophia: And do you know why? Because this idea is merely the logical expression of the great moral and physical reality, of love. In loving, you deny yourself (because there is no love without self-denial), you affirm another, you give yourself to that other, and nevertheless you do not lose your own being. On the contrary, you affirm your being to a higher degree, you elevate yourselves to a new perfection. Thus, when you say that absolute substance as such, analytically, by its very definition, is the union of itself and its negation, you merely repeat in an abstract form the definition of our great apostle: God is love (1 John 4:8).

Because the absolute principle by necessity is love, then love is the nature of the absolute principle. As the striving toward the opposite of the absolute principle, that is, toward being (because the absolute principle as such is above being), love is the principle of plurality, because the indispensable condition of being is plurality. But we have already said that the absolute principle cannot lose its own state when passing into its opposite. It cannot cease to be the absolute, as such. On the contrary, in positing, producing or positively separating out its opposite, it affirms itself as such. Thus, the absolute substance, necessarily and for all eternity, divides itself into two poles: one, the principle of absolute unity affirmed as such, the principle of freedom in relation to all form, to all manifestation and to all being; and the other, the principle or the productive force of multiple being and of phenomenal forms. We have already recognized this latter as love. It is easy to find an analogy in our own inner selves. …