(9) Yea, ye do wrong and defraud," manifestly by praying against those who transgress in ignorance, and deprive of the philanthropy and goodness of God, as far as in you lies, those against whom you pray, "and these your brethren," -not meaning those in the faith only, but also the proselytes. For whether he who now is hostile shall afterwards believe, we know not as yet. From which the conclusion follows clearly, if all are not yet brethren to us, they ought to be regarded in that light. And now it is only the man of knowledge who recognises all men to be the work of one God, and invested with one image in one nature, although some may be more turbid than others; and in the creatures he recognises the operation, by which again he adores the will of God.

(32) Behold, out of what are the Turks grown? Out of thy perverse Sense; when they saw that thou regardest nothing but thy Pride, and didst only contend and dispute about the Temple of Christ, that it must stand only upon Man's Foundation and Inventions, then Mahomet came forth, and found an Invention that was agreeable to Nature. Because those other followed after Covetousness, and fell off from the Temple of Christ, as also from the Light of Nature, into a Confusion of Pride, and all their Aim was, how the Antichristian Throne might be adorned, therefore he also made Laws and Doctrines [raised] from Reason.

(108) The Father, then, and Maker of all things is apprehended by all things, agreeably to all, by innate power and without teaching, - things inanimate, sympathizing with the animate creation; and of living beings some are. already immoral, working in the light of day. But of those that are still mortal, some are in fear, and carried still in their mother's womb; and others regulate themselves by their own independent reason. And of men all are Greeks and Barbarians. But no race anywhere of tillers of the soil, or nomads, and not even of dwellers in cities, can live, without being imbued with the faith of a superior being. Wherefore every eastern nation, and every nation touching the western shore; or the north, and each one towards the south, - all have one and the same preconception respecting Him who hath appointed government; since the most universal of His operations equally pervade all. Much more did the philosophers among the Greeks, devoted to investigation, starting from the Barbarian philosophy, attribute providence to the "Invisible, and sole, and most powerful, and most skilful and supreme cause of all things most beautiful; " -not knowing the inferences from these truths, unless instructed by us, and not even how God is to be known naturally; but only, as we have already often said, by a true periphrasis." Rightly therefore the apostle says, "Is He the God of the Jews only, and not also of the Greeks? " - not only saying prophetically that of the Greeks believing Greeks would know God; but also intimating that in power the Lord is the God of all, and truly Universal King. For they know neither what He is, nor how He is Lord, and Father, and Maker, nor the rest of the system of the truth, without being taught by it. Thus also the prophetic utterances have the same force as the apostolic word. For Isaiah says, "If ye say, We trust in the Lord our God: now make an alliance with my Lord the king of the Assyrians." And he adds: "And now, was it without the Lord that we came up to this land to make war against it?" And Jonah, himself a prophet, intimates the same thing in what he says: "And the shipmaster came to him, and said to him, Why dost thou snore? Rise, call on thy God, that He may save us, and that we may not perish."' For the expression "thy God" he makes as if to one who knew Him by way of knowledge; and the expression, "that God may save us," revealed the consciousness in the minds of heathens who had applied their mind to the Ruler of all, but had not yet believed. And again the same: "And he said to them, I am the servant of the Lord; and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven." And again the same: "And he said, Let us by no means perish for the life of this man." And Malachi the prophet plainly exhibits God saying, "I will not accept sacrifice at your hands. For from the rising of the sun to its going down, My name is glorified among the Gentiles; and in every place sacrifice is offered to Me." And again: "Because I am a great King, saith the Lord omnipotent; and My name is manifest among the nations." What name? The Son declaring the Father among the Greeks who have believed.

(1) We will exchange, therefore, this division for the doubt which may be adduced by you against the present opinion. “ For ,” it may be said by you, “ how, conformably to what we assert, can the sun and moon, and the visible natures in the heavens, be Gods, if the Gods are alone incorporeal? ” To this we reply, that the celestial divinities are not comprehended by bodies, but contain bodies in their divine lives and energies; that they are not themselves converted to body, but they have a body which is converted to its divine cause; and that body does not impede their intellectual and incorporeal perfection, nor occasion them any molestation by its intervention. Hence it does not require an abundant attention, but follows the divinities spontaneously, and after a certain manner, self-motively, not being in want of manual direction; but, through an anagogic tendency, being itself uniformly coelevated by itself, to the one of the Gods.

(1) Nor is that which so greatly disturbs you, and for which you so strenuously contend, attended with any difficulty, I mean abstinence from animals, if it is rightly understood. For those who worship the Gods do not abstain from animals, lest the Gods should be defiled by the vapours arising from them. For what exhalation from bodies can approach those who, before any thing material can come into contact with their power, intangibly amputate matter? Nor is it the power of the Gods only that abolishes all bodies, and causes them to vanish, without any approximation to them; but a celestial body, also, is unmingled with all the material elements; nor does it receive into itself any thing extraneous, nor impart any portion of itself to things of a foreign nature.

(1) The difference which separates “ Gods from dæmons by the corporeal and incorporeal ,” is the next thing that follows in what you have written; this being much more common than the former difference, and yet it is so far from expressing the peculiarities of their essence, that it does not afford a conjectural knowledge of them, nor of any accidents which pertain to them. For neither is it possible from these things to apprehend whether they are animals or not, and whether they are deprived of life, or are not at all in want of it. Farther still, neither is it easy to conjecture how these names are predicated, whether in common, or of many different things. For if in common, it is absurd that a line and time, God and dæmons, fire and water, should be under the same incorporeal genus. But if of many things, what reason is there when you speak of the incorporeal, that you should rather manifest by it Gods than points; or when you speak of the corporeal, that you should not be thought to speak of the earth rather than of dæmons? For neither is this very thing defined, whether Gods and dæmons have bodies, or are carried in bodies, as in a vehicle, or use them, or comprehend them, or are alone the same with body. But, perhaps, it is not proper to examine this distinction very minutely. For you do not propose it as your own decision, but you exhibit it as the opinion of others.

(93) Therefore, ye Turks and other superstitious People, you should observe and understand rightly, why Christ gave us such Laws, as command us not to be revengeful; and that when any strike us on the one Cheek, we should present the other to him; and so further, that we should bless them that curse us, and do well to them that hate us and hurt us. Understand you this?

(2) Then he adds: "Worship this God not as the Greeks," - signifying plainly, that the excellent among the Greeks worshipped the same God as we, but that they had not learned by perfect knowledge that which was delivered by the Son. "Do not then worship," he did not say, the God whom the Greeks worship, but "as the Greeks," - changing the manner of the worship of God, not announcing another God. What, then, the expression "not as the Greeks" means, Peter himself shall explain, as he adds: "Since they are carried away by ignorance, and know not God" (as we do, according to the perfect knowledge); "hut giving shape to the things of which He gave them the power for use - stocks and stones, brass and iron, gold and silver - matter; - and setting up the things which are slaves for use and possession, worship them. And what God hath given to them for food - the fowls of the air, and the fish of the sea, and the creeping things of the earth, and the wild beasts with the four-footed cattle of the field, weasels and mice, cats and dogs and apes, and their own proper food - they sacrifice as sacrifices to mortals; and offering dead things to the dead, as to gods, are unthankful to God, denying His existence by these things." And that it is said, that we and the Greeks know the same God, though not in the same way, he will infer thus: "Neither worship as the Jews; for they, thinking that they only know God, do not know Him, adoring as they do angels and archangels, the month and the moon. And if the moon be not visible, they do not hold the Sabbath, which is called the first; nor do they hold the new moon, nor the feast of unleavened bread, nor the feast, nor the great day." Then he gives the finishing stroke to the question: "So that do ye also, learning holily and righteously what we deliver to you; keep them, worshipping God in a new way, by Christ." For we find in the Scriptures, as the Lord says: "Behold, I make with you a new covenant, not as I made with your fathers in Mount Horeb." He made a new covenant with us; for what belonged to the Greeks and Jews is old. But we, who worship Him in a new way, in the third form, are Christians. For clearly, as I think, he showed that the one and only God was known by the Greeks in a Gentile way, by the Jews Judaically, and in a new and spiritual way by us.

(12) Again, David expressly (or rather the Lord in the person of the saint, and the same from the foundation of the world is each one who at different periods is saved, and shall be saved by faith) says, "My heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced, and my flesh shall still rest in hope. For Thou shalt not leave my soul in hell, nor wilt Thou give Thine holy one to see corruption. Thou hast made known to me the paths of life, Thou wilt make me full of joy in Thy presence." As, then, the people was precious to the Lord, so also is the entire holy people; he also who is converted from the Gentiles, who was prophesied under the name of proselyte, along with the Jew. For rightly the Scripture says, that "the ox and the bear shall come together." For the Jew is designated by the ox, from the animal under the yoke being reckoned clean, according to the law; for the ox both parts the hoof and chews the cud. And the Gentile is designated by the bear, which is an unclean and wild beast. And this animal brings forth a shapeless lump of flesh, which it shapes into the likeness of a beast solely by its tongue. For he who is convened from among the Gentiles is formed from a beastlike life to gentleness by the word; and, when once tamed, is made clean, just as the ox. For example, the prophet says, "The sirens, and the daughters of the sparrows, and all the beasts of the field, shall bless me." Of the number of unclean animals, the wild beasts of the field are known to be, that is, of the world; since those who are wild in respect of faith, and polluted in life, and not purified by the righteousness which is according to the law, are called wild beasts. But changed from wild beasts by the faith of the Lord, they become men of God, advancing from the wish to change to the fact. For some the Lord exhorts, and to those who have already made the attempt he stretches forth His hand, and draws them up. "For the Lord dreads not the face of any one, nor will He regard greatness; for He hath made small and great, and cares alike for all."

(14) "Wherefore," he says, "ye are justified in the name of the Lord." Ye are made, so to speak, by Him to be righteous as He is, and are blended as far as possible with the Holy Spirit. For "are not all things lawful to me? yet I will not be brought under the power of any," so as to do, or think, or speak aught contrary to the Gospel. "Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats, which God shall destroy," - that is, such as think and live as if they were made for eating, and do not eat that they may live as a consequence, and apply to knowledge as the primary end. And does he not say that these are, as it were, the fleshy parts of the holy body? As a body, the Church of the Lord, the spiritual and holy choir, is symbolized. Whence those, who are merely called, but do not live in accordance with the word, are the fleshy parts. "Now" this spiritual "body," the holy Church, "is not for fornication." Nor are those things which belong to heathen life to be adopted by apostasy from the Gospel.