Greeks with this special object, for it brought the Greek nation to
Christ as the Law brought the Hebrews."[862] "Philosophy was given as a
peculiar testament to the Greeks, as forming the basis of the Christian
philosophy."[863] Referring to the words of Paul, Origen says, the
truths which philosophers taught were from God, for "God manifested
these to them, and all things that have been nobly said."[864] And
Augustine, whilst deprecating the extravagant claims made for the great
Gentile teachers, allows "that some of them made great discoveries, so
far as they received help from heaven; whilst they erred as far as they
were hindered by human frailty."[865] They had, as he elsewhere
observes, "a distant vision of the truth, and learnt, from the teaching
of nature, what prophets learnt from the spirit."[866] In addressing the
Greeks, Theodoret says, "Obey your own philosophers; let them be your
initiators; for they announced beforehand our doctrines." He held that
"in the depths of human nature there are characters inscribed by the
hand of God." And that "if the race of Abraham received the divine law,
and the gift of prophecy, the God of the universe led other nations to
piety by natural revelation, and the spectacle of nature."[867]

[Footnote 861: "First Apology," ch. xlvi.]

[Footnote 862: "Stromata," bk. i. ch. v.]

[Footnote 863: "Stromata," bk. vi. ch. viii.]

[Footnote 864: "Contra Celsum," bk. vi. ch. iii.]

[Footnote 865: "De Civitate Dei," bk. ii. ch. vii.]

[Footnote 866: Sermon lxviii. 3.]

[Footnote 867: See Smith's "Bible Dictionary," article "Philosophy;"
Pressense, "Religions before Christ," p. II; Butler's "Lectures on
Ancient Philosophy," vol. ii. pp. 28-40.]

In attempting to account for this partial harmony between Philosophy and
Revelation, we find the Patristic writers adopting different theories.
They are generally agreed in maintaining some original connection, but
they differ as to its immediate source. Some of them maintained that the
ancient philosophers derived their purest light from the fountain of
Divine Revelation. The doctrines of the Old Testament Scriptures were
traditionally diffused throughout the West before the rise of
philosophic speculation. If the theistic conceptions of Plato are
superior to those of Homer it is accounted for by his (hypothetical)
tour of inquiry among the Hebrew nation, as well as his Egyptian
investigations. Others maintained that the similarity of v