Page:Ante-Nicene Christian Library Vol 6.djvu/122

116 does not know what this toil is, and what this prodigy is that revolves in heaven. The heretics, however, wishing by means of this account of the stars to establish their own doctrines, [and] with more than ordinary earnestness devoting their attention to these [astronomic systems], assert that Engonasis is Adam, according to the commandment of God as Moses declared, guarding the head of the Dragon, and the Dragon [guarding] his heel. For so Aratus expresses himself:

And [Aratus] says that [the constellations] Lyra and Corona have been placed on both sides near him (now I mean Engonasis), but that he bends the knee, and stretches forth both hands, as if making a confession of sin. And that the lyre is a musical instrument fashioned by Logos while still altogether an infant, and that Logos is the same as he who is denominated Mercury among the Greeks. And Aratus, with regard to the construction of the lyre, observes:

It consists of seven strings, signifying by these seven strings