In the first place, while wisdom addresses everyone, it warns the simple to understand subtlety and the unlearned to apply their heart, in order that the zealous and attentive reader may evaluate the meanings of words that are distinct and different. It teaches, therefore, that all things are to be done, understood, praised and grasped according to its methods and plans.

When the educator says in one of the passages of Solomon’s work, O men, to you I call, and my voice is to the sons of men. Hear, for I will speak of great things, and the rest of the passage, he is making use of persuasion—persuasion to something that is useful. Since advice is called for when there is a question of free acceptance or rejection, he is here advising what will lead to salvation. . . . There are three possible methods of giving advice. The first is to take examples from times gone by, such as the punishments the Jews met with after they had worshiped the golden calf,^[1] or when they had committed fornication,^[2] or after similar misdeeds. The second method is to call attention to some conclusion drawn from present events, as a conclusion readily grasped by the mind, such was the answer given by the Lord to those who asked him, Are you the Christ, or should we look for another? Go, he said, report to John that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the dead rise, and blessed is he who is not scandalized in me.^[3] . . . Finally, the third method of advice is drawn from future events, in which things that are to come put us on our guard; an example is that saying that those falling into sin will be put forth into the darkness outside, there will be weeping and the gnashing of teeth,^[4] and sayings of the same import. Therefore, it can be clearly seen that the Lord calls humankind to salvation by using progressively every kind of treatment.

Those among us who are ambassadors of Christianity sufficiently declare that they are debtors to Greeks and barbarians, to wise men and fools (for they do not deny their obligation to cure the souls even of foolish persons), in order that as far as possible they may lay aside their ignorance and endeavor to obtain greater prudence, by listening also to the words of Solomon: O fools, be of an understanding heart, and Whoever is the most simple among you, let him turn unto me.^[1] Wisdom exhorts those who are empty of understanding in the words, Come, eat of my bread, and drink of the wine which I have mixed for you. Forsake folly that you may live, and correct understanding in knowledge.^[2]

For my mouth will utter truth; wickedness is an abomination to my lips. Therefore, they who do not hold the truth of the faith in heart and mouth do not receive salvation in baptism. Because of this, although they have the appearance of piety which consists in the sacrament of baptism, by refusing the power of piety they receive neither life nor salvation.

[Jesus] spoke all things in parables, and without a parable he spoke nothing [to the apostles];^[1] and if all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made,^[2] consequently also prophecy and the law were by him and were spoken by him in parables. But all things are right, says the Scripture, before those who understand, that is, those who receive and observe, according to the church’s rule of faith, the exposition of the Scriptures explained by him. And the church’s rule is the concord and harmony of the law and the prophets in the covenant delivered at the coming of the Lord. Knowledge is then followed by practical wisdom and practical wisdom by self-control, for it may be said that practical wisdom is divine knowledge and exists in those who share in God’s life, while the self-control that is mortal, which is present in those who philosophize, is not yet wise.

That which John calls an eternal gospel,^[1] which would properly be called a spiritual gospel, clearly presents both the mysteries presented by Christ’s words and the things of which his acts were symbols, to those who consider all things face to face concerning the Son of God himself. Consistent with these matters, we understand that just as one is a Jew outwardly and circumcised, there being both an outward and inward circumcision, so it is with a Christian and baptism.

Accept discipline, not silver, so that at a time of calamity or physical illness or domestic trouble, you would think nothing at all perverse of God, but accept the blows meted out by him with great patience as though you were being castigated for your sins. Thus, conscious of being disciplined, say, I will bear the wrath of the Lord because I have sinned against him.^[1]

It is written that wisdom is better than stones of costly price; and all precious things are not comparable to her. For the wisdom that comes from above, from God, is an incomparable blessing. When we attain to it by means of the holy Scripture, which is inspired of God, and gain the divine light to dwell in our minds, we then advance without wandering, and we come toward whatever is useful for our spiritual profit. Come, therefore, and let us now also scrupulously examine the meaning of the Gospel lessons.

Those whom it calls kings are the apostles and other saints, like the lawmakers and authors of both Testaments and the subsequent writers of the church. They have learned first how to rule themselves, and then the church that was put under their care. Those whom it calls rulers are governors and other powerful leaders of the faithful. But none of these would have anything were it not through wisdom, for he says, Without me, you can do nothing.^[1]

If you have followed me closely, you can see that Scripture declares that the Son was begotten of the Father before all creatures, and everybody will admit that the Son is numerically distinct from the Father.

O Lord Almighty, you have created the world by Christ, and . . . you have also appointed festivals for the rejoicing of our souls, that we might come into the remembrance of that wisdom which was created by you; how he submitted to be made of a woman on our account; he appeared in life, and demonstrated himself in his baptism; how he that appeared is both God and man; he suffered for us by your permission, and died, and rose again by your power: on which account we solemnly assemble to celebrate the feast of the resurrection on the Lord’s day and rejoice on account of him who has conquered death and has brought life and immortality to light.

[The Son] is the first offspring of the Father. I do not mean that he was created, for, since God is eternal mind, he had his Word within himself from the beginning, being eternally wise.^[1] Rather did the Son come forth from God to give form and actuality to all material things, which essentially have a sort of formless nature and inert quality, the heavier particles being mixed up with the lighter. The prophetic Spirit agrees with this opinion when he says, The Lord created me as the first of his ways, for his works.

Indeed we say that the Holy Spirit himself, who inspires those who utter prophecies, is an effluence from God, flowing from him and returning like a ray of the sun. Who, then, would not be astonished to hear those called atheists who admit God the Father, God the Son and the Holy Spirit, and who teach their unity in power and their distinction in rank? … We affirm, too, a crowd of angels and ministers, whom God, the maker and creator of the world, appointed to their several tasks through his Word. He gave them charge over the good order of the universe, over the elements, the heavens, the world, and all it contains.

This power and disposition of the divine intelligence is set forth also in the Scriptures under the name of sophia, wisdom, for what can be better entitled to the name of wisdom than the reason or the Word of God? Listen therefore to wisdom herself, constituted in the character of a Second Person: At the first the Lord created me as the beginning of his ways, with a view to his own works, before he made the earth, before the mountains were settled; moreover, before all the hills he begat me—that is to say, he created and generated me in his own intelligence. . . . By proceeding from himself he became his first-begotten Son, because begotten before all things;^[1] and his only-begotten also, because alone begotten of God, in a way peculiar to himself, from the womb of his own heart.

Since all things were made by the wisdom of God, it follows that when God made both the heaven and the earth in principio, that is to say in the beginning, he made them in his wisdom. If, indeed, beginning had a material signification, the Scripture would not have informed us that God made so and so in principio, at the beginning, but rather ex principio, of the beginning, for he would not have created in, but of, matter. When wisdom, however, was referred to, it was quite right to say, in the beginning.

First we must know this, that in Christ there is one nature, his deity, because he is the only-begotten Son of the Father, and another human nature, which in very recent times he took upon him to fulfill the divine purpose. . . . He is called wisdom, as Solomon said. . . . He is also called firstborn, as the apostle Paul says: who is the firstborn of all creation.^[1] The firstborn is not, however, by nature a different being from wisdom but is one and the same. Finally, the apostle Paul says, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.^[2]

If he is an image of the invisible God,^[1] he is an invisible image, and I would dare to add that as he is a likeness of the Father there is no time when he did not exist. . . .Let the man who dares to say There was a time when the Son was not understand that this is what he will be saying: Once wisdom did not exist, and word did not exist, and life did not exist.

But if someone is able to comprehend an incorporeal existence comprised of the various ideas which embrace the principles of the universe, an existence which is living and animate, as it were, he will understand the wisdom of God which precedes all creation, which appropriately says of herself, God created me the beginning of his ways for his works. It is because of this creation that the whole creation has also been able to subsist, since it has a share in the divine wisdom according to which it has been created, for according to the prophet David, God made all things in wisdom.^[1]

Many creatures, on the one hand, have come into existence by participation in wisdom, while they do not apprehend her by whom they have been created. Very few, however, comprehend not only the wisdom concerning themselves, but also that concerning many beings, for Christ is all wisdom.

But each of the wise participates in Christ to the extent that he has the capacity for wisdom, insofar as Christ is wisdom, just as each one who possesses power has obtained greater power to the extent that he has shared in Christ, insofar as Christ is power.

What must we say of wisdom which God created as the beginning of his ways for his works? Her Father rejoiced at her, rejoicing in her manifold spiritual beauty which only spiritual eyes see. Wisdom’s divine heavenly beauty invites the one who contemplates it to love.

Solomon says, You have made me above your ways. For, concerning spiritual generation, he immediately adds, He has begotten me before all things.^[1]

The divine and perfect essence existing before things begotten, the rational and firstborn image of the unbegotten nature, the true and only-begotten Son of the God of the universe, being one with many names, and one called God by many titles, is honored in this passage under the style and name of wisdom, and we have learned to call him Word of God, light, life, truth, and, to crown all, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.^[1] Now, therefore, in the passage before us, he passes through the words of the wise Solomon, speaking of himself as the living wisdom of God and self-existent, saying, I, wisdom, have dwelt with counsel and knowledge, and I have called upon understanding, and that which follows. He also adds, as one who has undertaken the government and providence of the universe: By me kings reign, and princes decree justice. By me princes become great. Then saying that he will record the things of ages past, he goes on to say, The Lord created me as the beginning of his ways for his works, he established me before time was. By which he teaches both that he himself is begotten, and not the same as the unbegotten, one called into being before all ages, set forth as a kind of foundation for all begotten things. And it is probable that the divine apostle started from this when he said of him: Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature, for all things were created in him, of things in heaven and things in earth.^[2] For he is called firstborn of every creature, in accordance with the words The Lord created me as the beginning of his road to his works. And he would naturally be considered the image of God, as being that which was begotten of the nature of the unbegotten. And, therefore, the passage before us agrees when it says, Before the mountains were established, and before all the hills, he begets me.^[3]

Hence we call him only-begotten Son, and the firstborn Word of God, who is the same as this wisdom.

If, therefore, the Word began to exist at the time he passed through the mother’s womb and wore the bodily framework, it is clear that he was born of a woman. But if God the Word was from the very beginning with the Father, and we say that all things were made through him,^[1] then the one who is and is the cause of all things that are made was not born of a woman but is, by nature, God, self-sufficient, unlimited and incomprehensible. But from a woman was born a human being, who was implanted in the virgin’s womb by the Holy Spirit.

For the human being who died rises up on the third day; but when Mary strives with longing to touch his holy limbs, he objected and says to her, Do not touch me, for I have not yet ascended to my Father; go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, my God and your God.’ ^[1] God the Word, who comes from heaven and lives in the bosom of the Father, did not utter the phrase I have not yet ascended to my Father. The Wisdom that embraces all things that exist did not say it either; this was spoken by the very human being who was formed out of all kinds of limbs, who had been raised from the dead, and who after death had not yet ascended to his Father but reserved for himself the firstfruit of his passage.

Since wisdom is already eternal, it is not subjected to time. The beginning, then, is yoked together with created things. But having existed before creation as wisdom, the Son of God—even though, he says, The Lord created me—this assertion [The Lord created me] must be understood as referring not to substance but to his relationship toward creatures. For [wisdom] says that its works were at the beginning of the creative and providential ways of God, that is, a cause, introducing still another way of speaking. The Son of God was made man when he assumed the form of a servant. He is eternal before the ages, as he is God the Word. It says he was created because he was born of Mary and was made flesh. For those desiring to walk like God and with God, consult this teacher, an example of perfect life, who gives his teaching to those who follow him. The fact that the word to create does not mean everywhere to make substance is confirmed by David, who says, Create in me a pure heart, O God.^[1] He asks for such a creation not as if he does not have a heart; but since he had polluted it, he desires to have it back pure. Also Paul, when he speaks about creating out of the two a single new man,^[2] does not mean from [two] human substances but rather the unity that results from concord. And so the interpreters proclaimed, He created me.

Hereby we are brought to understand that the prophecy of the incarnation, The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works, means that the Lord Jesus was created of the Virgin for the redeeming of the Father’s works. Truly, we cannot doubt that this is spoken of the mystery of the incarnation, forasmuch as the Lord took upon him our flesh, in order to save the works of his hands from the slavery of corruption, so he might, by the sufferings of his own body, overthrow him who had the power of death. For Christ’s flesh is for the sake of things created, but his Godhead existed before them, seeing that he is before all things, while all things exist together in him. His Godhead, then, is not by reason of creation, but creation exists because of the Godhead.

The phrase created me refers not to the divine and the uncompounded but, as has been said, to that which had been assumed, in accordance with the divine plan, from our created nature.

In their eyes [of the Arians] the following is only too ready to hand: The Lord created me at the beginning of his ways with a view to his works. How shall we meet this? Shall we bring an accusation against Solomon or reject his former words because of his fall in afterlife? Shall we say that the words are those of wisdom herself, as it were of knowledge and the creator-word, in accordance with which all things were made? For Scripture often personifies many even lifeless objects; as, for instance, the sea said so and so;^[1] and, the heavens declare the glory of God; and again a command is given to the sword; and the mountains and hills are asked the reason of their skipping.^[2] We do not allege any of these, though some of our predecessors used them as powerful arguments. But let us grant that the expression is used of our Savior himself, the true wisdom. Let us consider one small point together. What among all things that exist is unoriginate? The Godhead. For no one can tell the origin of God, that otherwise would be older than God. But what is the cause of the manhood, which for our sake God assumed? It was surely our salvation. What else could it be? Since, then, we find here clearly both the created and the begets me, the argument is simple. Whatever we find joined with a cause we are to refer to the manhood, but all that is absolute and unoriginate we are to reckon to the account of his Godhead.

They attempt by a distortion of the sense and meaning to maintain that God was created rather than born because it was said, The Lord created me for the beginning of his ways, for his works, so that he belongs to the common order of created things, although in a higher class of creation, nor does he enjoy the glory of the divine birth, but the power of a mighty creature.

^[1] Salvation proceeds from the Savior, just as illumination does from the light. The salvation, then, which was from the Savior, being created new, did, as Jeremiah says, “create for us a new salvation,”^[2] and as Aquila renders The Lord created a new thing in woman, that is, in Mary. For nothing new was created in woman, save the Lord’s body, born of the Virgin Mary without intercourse, as also it says in the Proverbs in the person of Jesus, The Lord created me, a beginning of his ways for his works. Now he does not say created me before his works, lest any should take the text of the deity of the Word.

Each text then which refers to the creature is written with reference to Jesus in a bodily sense. For the Lord’s humanity was created as a beginning of ways, and he manifested it to us for our salvation. For by it we have our access to the Father. For he is the way^[3] which leads us back to the Father. And a way is a corporeal visible thing, such as is the Lord’s humanity. Well, then, the Word of God created all things, not being a creature but an offspring. For he created none of the created things equal or like unto himself. But it is the part of a Father to beget, while it is a workman’s part to create. Accordingly, that body is a thing made and created which the Lord bore for us, which was begotten for us,^[4] as Paul says, wisdom from God, and sanctification and righteousness, and redemption, while yet the Word was before us and before all creation, and is, the wisdom of the Father.

Let them tell us, from what teacher or by what tradition they derived these notions concerning the Savior? We have read in the Proverbs, they will say, The Lord created me a beginning of his ways unto his works. This Eusebius and his fellows used to insist on, and you write me word, that the present men also, though overthrown and confuted by an abundance of arguments, still were putting about in every quarter this passage, and saying that the Son was one of the creatures, and reckoning him with things originated. But they seem to me to have a wrong understanding of this passage. . . . If then Son, therefore not creature; if creature, not Son; for great is the difference between them, and Son and creature cannot be the same, unless his essence be considered to be at once from God and external to God.

The Lord created me in the beginning of his ways for his works.. . . He is called also in the Scriptures servant, and son of a handmaid, and lamb and sheep, and it is said that he suffered toil and thirst and was beaten and has suffered pain. But there is plainly a reasonable ground and cause why such representations as these are given of him in the Scriptures. It is because he became man and the Son of man, and took upon him the form of a servant, which is the human flesh, for the Word, says John, was made flesh.^[1] And since he became man, no one ought to be offended at such expressions, for it is proper to man to be created and born and formed, to suffer toil and pain, to die and to rise again from the dead. And as, being Word and wisdom of the Father, he has all the attributes of the Father, his eternity, and his unchangeableness, and the being like him in all respects and in all things. And [he] is neither before nor after, but coexistent with the Father. And [he] is the very form of the Godhead, and is the creator and is not created (for since he is in essence like the Father, he cannot be a creature but must be the creator, for he himself has said, My Father works hitherto, and I work.^[2]) So being made man, and bearing our flesh, he is necessarily said to be created and made, and that is proper to all flesh.

The fact is, then, that the Word is not from things created but is rather himself their creator. For this reason did he assume a body created and human: so that, having renewed it as its creator, he might deify it in himself and thus might introduce all of us in that likeness into the kingdom of heaven. A man would not have been deified if joined to a creature, nor if the Son were not true God; neither would a man have been brought into the Father’s presence if he had not been the Father’s natural and true Word who had put on the body. Since we could have had nothing in common with what is foreign, we would not have been delivered from sin and from the curse if that which the Word put on had not been natural human flesh. So also, the man would not have been deified if the Word which became flesh had not been by nature from the Father and true and proper to him.

The union, therefore, was of just such a kind, so that he might unite what is man by nature, to him who is in the nature of the Godhead, thereby assuring the accomplishment of salvation and his deification. Let those, therefore, who deny that the Son is by nature from the Father and proper to his essence, deny also that he took true human flesh from the ever-virgin Mary. In neither case would it have been profitable to us men: if the Word were not by nature true Son of God, or if the flesh which he assumed were not true flesh.

Although the Word did indeed become flesh, it is to the flesh that affections are proper; and although the flesh bears divinity in the Word, it is to the Word that grace and power belong. He performed the Father’s works, then, through the flesh; but nonetheless the affections of the flesh were exhibited in him. Thus, he inquired and then raised Lazarus; he chided his mother, saying, My hour is not yet come;^[1] and immediately he turned the water into wine. Indeed, he was true God in the flesh, and he was true flesh in the Word. Out of his works, therefore, he made known both his own Father, and himself, the Son of God. By the affections of the flesh he demonstrated that he bore a true body and that it was proper to him.

The Lord is God’s true and natural Son, and he is known to be not just eternal but one who exists concurrently with the eternity of the Father. There are things which are called eternal of which he is the creator, for in Psalm 23 it is written, Lift up your gates, O rulers, and be lifted up, O everlasting doors.^[1] It is apparent, though, that these everlasting doors also came into being through his agency. But if he is himself the creator of the things which are everlasting, which of us can any longer doubt that he is more noble than these everlasting things and that he is made known as Lord not so much from his being eternal as from his being the Son of God? Being Son, he is inseparable from the Father, and there was never a when when he did not exist. He always existed. Moreover, since he is the image and radiance of the Father, he also possesses the Father’s eternity. . . .

What is the basic meaning and purport of holy Scripture? It contains, as we have often said, a double account of the Savior. It says that he has always been God and is the Son, because he is the Logos and radiance and wisdom of the Father. Furthermore, it says that afterwards for us he took flesh of the Virgin Mary, the bearer of God, and became man.

According to the form of God it was said, Before all the hills he has begotten me,^[1] that is, before all the most exalted creatures, and, Before the morning star I have begotten you,^[2] that is, before all the ages and temporal things. But according to the form of a slave it was said, The Lord created me in the beginning of his ways. Because according to the form of God he said, I am the truth, and according to the form of a slave, I am the way. For since he himself, the firstborn of the dead,^[3] has laid out the road for his church to the kingdom of God, to eternal life, of which he is the head even to the extent of giving immortality to the body. He was, therefore, created in the beginning of the ways of God for his works.

The beginning of his ways is the head of the church, which is Christ incarnate, through whom there was to be given us an example of living, that is, a certain way by which we might reach God. . . . So the Word by which all things were made was created man in the beginning of his ways.

The Lord’s ways are his works, through contemplation of which man has arrived at faith or knowledge of him. For his invisible nature was seen by the rational creatures of the world through what he had made.^[1] His ways are the illuminations through which he showed himself both to angelic spirits and to human minds. He possessed^[2] wisdom at the beginning of his ways because he had the Son with whom he arranged all things at the beginning of the nascent created order. Yet, lest anyone think that the Son began to exist at the beginning of his ways or at any other time, it adds vigilantly, . . . In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God; all things were created through him.^[3] Let them perish, therefore, who deny that the power of God and the wisdom of God,^[4] clearly Christ, was begotten by the Father himself from the beginning and indeed before any beginning that could be thought or expressed. In another translation, this passage begins, The Lord created me at the beginning of his ways in his works. The fathers understand this saying to be about the Lord’s incarnation, maintaining that by the grace of a certain mystery it said the Lord created me, and not the Father created me. The flesh, they say, acknowledges the Lord, glory indicates the Father, creation confesses the Lord, and charity knows the Father who is the beginning.^[5] It could also read in the beginning of his ways; for he himself said, I am the way,^[6] because he began the journey of his church to the kingdom of God, to eternal life, when he rose from the dead. It adds in his works because he was born from a virgin for the purpose of redeeming the works of the Father, receiving flesh to liberate the Father’s works from slavery to corruption, for the flesh of Christ exists for the sake of his works, whereas his divinity precedes them.

Ignorance of prophetic diction and lack of skill in interpreting Scripture has led them into a perversion of the point and meaning of the passage, The Lord created me for a beginning of his ways for his works. They labor to establish from it that Christ is created rather than born, as God, and hence partakes the nature of created beings, though he excel them in the manner of his creation and has no glory of divine birth but only the powers of a transcendent creature. We in reply, without importing any new considerations or preconceived opinions, will make this very passage of wisdom display its own true meaning and object. We will show that the fact that he was created for the beginning of the ways of God and for his works, cannot be twisted into evidence concerning the divine and eternal birth, because creation for these purposes and birth from everlasting are two entirely different things. Where birth is meant, there birth, and nothing but birth, is spoken of; where creation is mentioned, the cause of that creation is first named. There is a wisdom born before all things, and again there is a wisdom created for particular purposes. The wisdom which is from everlasting is one, the wisdom which has come into existence during the lapse of time is another.

Since the heretics, reading the next verse, take a perverse view of that also, because it is written, He founded me before the world, namely, that this is said of the Godhead of the Word and not of his incarnate presence, it is necessary, explaining this verse also, to show their error.

It is written, The Lord in Wisdom founded the earth;^[1] if then by wisdom the earth is founded, how can he who founds be founded? Indeed, this too is after the manner of proverbs. . . .

He says not, Before the world he founded me as Word or Son, but simply, He founded me, to show again, as I have said, that not for his own sake but for those who are built upon him does he here also speak, after the way of proverbs.

[Solomon] says, He laid down both the cause and foundation of creation. Also it is written, He created all things in himself, and he is before all things.^[1] And the Lord says as well, I am the beginning of the creation of God.^[2] Indeed, desiring to be the foundation of the church, he submitted to becoming human so that the church might be constituted firmly in him. Desiring to give existence to creation, he adjusted himself to its rule by introducing the relationship we mentioned above, when he was made the beginning and cause of future things. However, it says, even if he was created according to these things, still God begat me before everything, the very one who is his Son.

He who was established before time was already begotten, not only before the earth but also before the mountains and the hills. And because wisdom is certainly referring to itself in this passage, it says more than is heard.

Let us consider [that] our Savior is a reflection of glory.^[1] The reflection of glory has not been begotten just once and no longer begotten. But just as the light^[2] is an agent of reflection, in such a way the reflection of the glory of God is begotten. Our Savior is the wisdom of God.^[3] But the wisdom is the reflection of everlasting light.^[4] If then the Savior is always begotten—because of this he also says, Before all the hills he begets me (and not Before all the hills he has begotten me, but Before all of the hills he begets me)—and the Savior is always begotten by the Father, and likewise also if you have the Spirit of adoption,^[5] God always begets you in him according to each work, according to each thought. And may one so begotten always be a begotten son of God in Christ Jesus, to whom is the glory and the power for the ages of ages. Amen.^[6]

Whether he is eternally begotten or not, I do not yet say, until I have looked into the statement, Before all the hills he begets me more accurately. But I cannot see the necessity of their conclusion. For if, as they say, everything that is to come to an end had also a beginning, then surely that which has no end had no beginning. What, then, will they decide concerning the soul or the angelic nature? If it had a beginning, it will also have an end; and if it has no end, it is evident that according to them it had no beginning. But the truth is that it had a beginning and will never have an end. Their assertion, then, that that which will have an end had also a beginning, is untrue.

Learn also that the Father was with him, and he with the Father, when all things were being made. Wisdom says, When he was preparing the heavens I was with him, when he was making the fountains of waters. And in the Old Testament the Father . . . showed that the Son was to be worshiped with himself as the maker of all things. As, then, those things are said to have been created in the Son, of which the Son is received as the Creator, so too when God is said to be worshiped in truth by the proper meaning of the word itself often expressed after the same manner it ought to be understood, that the Son too is worshiped. So in like manner is the Spirit also worshiped because God is worshiped in Spirit. Therefore the Father is worshiped both with the Son and with the Spirit, because the Trinity is worshiped.

This Wisdom uttered made the sky,

The sky and light and all besides;

All by the Word’s almighty power

Were fashioned, for the Word was God. HYMNS

We can therefore imagine no moment whatever when that power was not engaged in acts of well-doing. Whence it follows that there always existed [in God’s wisdom] objects for this well-doing, namely, God’s works or creatures, and that God, in the power of his providence, was always dispensing his blessings among them by doing them good in accordance with their condition and deserts. It follows plainly from this, that at no time whatever was God not creator, nor benefactor, nor providence. . . .

God the Father always existed, and he always had an only-begotten Son, who at the same time, according to the explanation we have given above, is called wisdom. This is that wisdom in whom God delighted when the world was finished, in order that we might understand from this that God ever rejoices. In this wisdom, therefore, who ever existed with the Father, the creation was always present in form and outline, and there was never a time when the prefiguration of those things which hereafter were to be did not exist in wisdom.

We have that general seemliness; for God made the beauty of this world. We have it also in its parts; for when God made the light, and marked off the day from the night, when he made heaven, and separated land and seas, when he set the sun and moon and stars to shine upon the earth, he approved of them all one by one. Therefore this comeliness, which shone forth in each single part of the world, was resplendent in the whole, as the book of Wisdom shows, saying, I existed, in whom he rejoiced when he was glad at the completion of the world. Likewise also in the building up of the human body each single member is pleasing, but the right adjustment of the members all together delights us far more. For thus they seem to be united and fitted into one harmonious whole.

Man in paradise was capable of self-destruction by abandoning justice by an act of will; yet if the life of justice was to be maintained, his will alone would not have sufficed, unless he who made him had given him aid. But, after the fall, God’s mercy was even more abundant, for then the will itself had to be freed from the bondage in which sin and death are the masters. There is no way at all by which it can be freed by itself, but only though God’s grace, which is made effectual in the faith of Christ. Thus, as it is written, even the will by which the will itself is prepared by the Lord so that we may receive the other gifts of God through which we come to the Gift eternal—this too comes from God.