Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume VIII/Pseudo-Clementine Literature/The Clementine Homilies/Homily X/Chapter 14

Chapter XIV.&#8212;Polytheistic Illustration.

&#8220;Again, the terrible serpent suggests this supposition to you, to think and to say that very thing which most of you do say; viz., We know that there is one Lord of all, but there also are gods.&#160; For in like manner as there is one C&#230;sar, but he has under him procurators, proconsuls, prefects, commanders of thousands, and of hundreds, and of tens; in the same way, there being one great God, as there is one C&#230;sar, there also, after the manner of inferior powers, are gods, inferior indeed to Him, but ruling over us.&#160; Hear, therefore, ye who have been led away by this conception as by a terrible poison&#8212;I mean the evil conception of this illustration&#8212;that you may know what is good and what is evil.&#160; For you do not yet see it, nor do you look into the things that you utter.