250 On the right side of Love stands the Beloved, and on the left side is the Lover; and thus he cannot reach the Beloved unless he pass through Love. And before Love stands the Beloved, and beyond is the Lover; so that the Lover cannot reach Love unless his thoughts and desires have first passed through the Beloved. 251 The Beloved clothed Himself in the garment of His Lover, that he might be His companion in glory for ever. So the Lover desired to wear crimson garments daily, that his dress might be like that of his Beloved. 252 ‘Say, O Fool, what did thy Beloved before the world was?’ He answered: ‘My Beloved loved, because of His manifold properties, eternal, personal, and infinite, in which are Lover, Love and Beloved.’ 253 The Lover wept and was sad, when he saw how the unbelievers were losing his Beloved through ignorance; but he rejoiced in the justice of his Beloved, who punishes those that know Him and are disobedient. Which, think you, was greater, his sorrow or his joy? And was his joy greater when he saw his Beloved honoured than his sorrow at seeing Him despised? 254 The Lover contemplated his Beloved in all the variety and harmony of His virtues; and again in the contrariety between virtue and vice; and again in His Being and perfection, which have greater harmony between themselves than non-existence and imperfection. 255 The variety and harmony which the Lover found in the Beloved revealed to him His secrets, to wit, His plurality and unity, to the greater concordance of essence without contrariety. 256 They said to the Lover: ‘Corruption is contrary to being, as generation, which is opposed to it, is the contrary of non-existence. If it were eternally corrupting and corrupted, it would be impossible that non-existence or end should harmonise with corruption.’ By these words the Lover saw in his Beloved the principle of eternal generation. 257 If that which increases the love of the Lover for his Beloved were falseness, that which diminished it would be truth. And if this were so, it would follow that there would be a want of the great and the true in the Beloved, and that there would be harmony in Him between the false and the mean. 258 The Lover praised his Beloved, and said that if in Him were the greatest degree of perfection and the greatest possible freedom from imperfection, his Beloved must be simple, pure and present in essence and operation. And while the Lover praised his Beloved thus, there was revealed to him the Trinity of his Beloved. 259 In the numbers 1 and 3 the Lover found greater harmony than between any others, because by these numbers every bodily form passed to existence from non-existence. And the greatest harmony of number, the Lover thought, was in the Unity and the Trinity of his Beloved.