Page:The Nestorians and their rituals, volume 2.djvu/412

384 each other in substance, and in what appertains thereto; when they would be contrary the one to the other, and destructive the one of the other. But existence could not exist between two opposing makers, nor could a perfect work proceed from them.—Or they must be alike in substance, and distinct in what appertains thereto, each one having an appropriate quality by which he is distinguishable from his associates; when they would all be compounded of the things in which they are alike, and of those in which they are distinguishable. But every compound thing is made, and must have a maker and compounder; hence results the truth of that declaration: "The our  is One ; and though there be gods many and lords many, to us there is but one ."

Everything that exists must be either eternal or temporal; and everything temporal has a cause and maker, and time and maker must be pre-existent to it. But that the cause of all things is without a cause, and that the Maker of all things has no maker, every right and unprejudiced mind is assured of, because it is natural to it so to judge. It results, then, that the Self-existent is the Creator, and the Eternal, anterior to time, because He Himself created time. For time is a reckoning of the motions of bodies, and as we have already proved that He is the Creator of these, therefore He is eternal, and without beginning. Now that which has no beginning, can be reachable by no end, and must possess of these two opposite extremes whatsoever is the most high and the most glorious, as truth, light, and life, and must be the Best, the Wisest, the Almighty.

Every thing comprehensible is comprehended either by the senses, or by the mind; and that which is comprehended by