Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol III:
Tertullian: Part I: Elucidations.

Elucidations.

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I.

(Recognition of the Supreme God, cap. ii., p. 176.)

The passage referred to in the note, begins thus in Jowett’s rendering:  “The Ruler of the Universe has ordered all things with a view to the preservation and perfection of the whole etc.”  So, in the same book: “Surely God must not be supposed to have a nature which he himself hates.” Again:  “Let us not, then, deem God inferior to human workmen, who in proportion to their skill finish and perfect their works…or that God, the wisest of beings, who is willing and able to extend his care to all things, etc.” Now, it is a sublime plan which our author here takes up, (making only slight reference to the innumerable citations which were behind his apostrophe to the soul if any one should dispute it) to bid the soul stand forth and confess its consciousness of God.

p. 180 II.

(Dæmons, cap. vi. p. 176.)

Those who would pursue the subject of Demonology, which Tertullian opens in this admirable treatise, should follow it up in a writer whom Tertullian greatly influenced, in many particulars, even when he presents a remarkable contrast. The Ninth Book of the City of God is devoted to inquiries which throw considerable light on some of the startling sayings of our author as to the heathen systems, and their testimony to the Soul’s Consciousness of God and of the great enemy of God and the inferior spirit of Evil.