e God,
what son of earth shall skill to comprehend it, save he to whom he
himself shall reveal it, in so far as he will, as he hath revealed it,
to his Prophets and Apostles? But we learn it, so far as in us lieth,
by their teaching, and from the very nature of the world. For the
Scripture saith, 'The heavens declare the glory of God, and the
firmament sheweth his handiwork;' and, 'The invisible things of him
from the creation Of the world are clearly understood by the things
that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.'

"Even as a man, beholding an house splendidly and skilfully builded, or
a vessel fairly framed, taketh note of the builder or workman and
marvelleth thereat, even so I that was fashioned out of nothing and
brought into being, though I cannot see the maker and provider, yet
from his harmonious and marvellous fashioning of me have come to the
knowledge of his wisdom, not to the full measure of that wisdom, but to
the full compass of my powers; yea I have seen that I was not brought
forth by chance, nor made of myself, but that he fashioned me, as it
pleased him, and set me to have dominion over his creatures, howbeit
making me lower than some; that, when I was broken, he re-created me
with a better renewal; and that he shall draw me by his divine will
from this world and place me in that other life that is endless and
eternal; and that in nothing I could withstand the might of his
providence, nor add anything to myself nor take anything away, whether
in stature or bodily form, and that I am not able to renew for myself
that which is waxen old, nor raise that which hath been destroyed. For
never was man able to accomplish aught of these things, neither king,
nor wise man, nor rich man, nor ruler, nor any other that pursueth the
tasks of men. For he saith, 'There is no king, or mighty man, that had
any other beginning of birth. For all men have one entrance into life,
and the like going out.'

"So from mine own nature, I am led by the hand to the knowledge of the
mighty working of the Creator; and at the same time I think upon the
well-ordered structure and preservation of the whole creation, how that
in itself it is subject everywhere to variableness and change, in the
world of thought by choice, whether by advance in the good, or
departure from it, in the world of sense by birth and decay, increase
and decrease, and change in quality and motion in space. And thus all
things proclaim, by voi