Page:Ante-Nicene Christian Library Vol 3.djvu/326

314 shall be according to reason, the cause and origin of ignorance shall be inquired into, as well as of every sin. For he who is unwilling to know how he may attain to life, and prefers to be in ignorance lest he thereby be made guilty, from this very fact is judged as if he knew and had knowledge. For he knew what it was that he was unwilling to hear; and the cunning obtained by the artifice of the serpent will avail him nothing for an excuse, for he will have to do with Him to whom the heart is open. But that you may know that ignorance of itself brings destruction, [I assure you that] when the soul departs from the body, if it leave it in ignorance of Him by whom it was created, and from whom in this world it obtained all things that were necessary for its uses, it is driven forth from the light of His kingdom as ungrateful and unfaithful.

"Again, the wicked serpent suggests another opinion to men, which many of you are in the habit of bringing forward,—that there is, as we say, one God, who is Lord of all; but these also, they say, are gods. For as there is one Cæsar, and he has under him many judges,—for example, prefects, consuls, tribunes, and other officers,—in like manner we think, that while there is one God greater than all, yet still that these gods are ordained in this world, after the likeness of those officers of whom we have spoken, subject indeed to that greater God, yet ruling us and the things that are in this world. In answer to this, I shall show you how, in those very things which you propose for deception, you are confuted by the reasons of truth. You say that God occupies the place of Cæsar, and those who are called gods represent his judges and officers. Hold then, as you have adduced it, by the example of Cæsar; and know that, as no one of Cæsar's judges or administrators, as prefects, proconsuls, generals, or tribunes, may lawfully take the name of Cæsar,—or else both he who should take it and those who should confer it should be destroyed together,—so also in this case you ought to observe, that if any one give the name of God to any but Himself, and he accept it, they shall partake one and the same destruction, by