pericardial blood being poured around the outer surface, and a change has occurred, through both suffering and activity, and of the quality concerning color. But if they say that matter, through its mixture with and consumption by God, as they are fond of mythologizing, has become a body, their blasphemy will not help them at all; for a brief and true argument will overturn the lie. For how did a union of opposites, as they themselves say, and of unmixable things, occur without a craftsman bringing them to composition? And how has the mixture of incorporeal things made a body? For just as a convergence of many irrational things would not produce a rational one, so the conjunction of God and matter, both being incorporeal, would not bring about the nature of a body. 5. But if, changing their argument, they should say that matter is a body, in this way too their clever contrivance against the church will be overturned; for every body, being composite, is alien to uncreated things, being numbered among created things. For of every composition there is a creator as cause, and thus the beginningless matter revered by the madmen will be shown not only to be created, but also to have a beginning, having obtained its being from another. But if they should say that matter is incorporeal, but potentially a body, it must be known that the term 'potentially' is found in the case of possible things, such as water being potentially hot, a child potentially a grammarian; for it is possible for the water to be heated and for the child to be a grammarian. But for an incorporeal thing to become a body is among the impossible things. How then is the incorporeal matter, according to them, to be supposed a body in potentiality? 6. And let these things be said briefly; for it is not possible to linger on the proofs, as another inquiry is pressing. For they say that light and darkness are both uncreated and co-eternal, existing and living; for the hierophants of Manes, not understanding the nature of each, have fallen into the abyss of destruction, positing darkness as a certain power opposed to God. For they say: If He is light, its enemy would be darkness, not having come from it; for none of the opposites has its constitution from its opposite; therefore darkness will be eternal, there being no creator of it. For God, being light and good, is not the creator of darkness. These things are the offspring of some demon; with these Satan ensnares the more simple and trips them up in their reasonings, whenever, despising the teaching of Christ, they heap up for themselves teachers from the crossroads, having itching ears, and turn their hearing away from the truth and are turned aside to myths, as the divine apostle says. But you, being a soldier of the court of Christ, defend yourself against those who approach, striking them down with your arguments. 7. For with one single voice he will cause a rout of the adversaries, crying out brightly such things as these: Let someone demonstrate the existence of darkness itself, and then he will have a just cause for his error. But they could not speak of a substance of darkness, neither pre-cosmically eternal, nor having come into existence later. But if they would be willing to gaze at all upon the light of truth, and not to speak as sons of darkness, they will find that darkness is not | a thing subsisting in itself, but "6some unilluminated air or a place shaded by the blocking of a body"6 or, to put it simply, "6a place deprived of light"6, as the great Basil also said, who expounded the creation of the universe with precision according to the prophecy of Moses. Darkness, therefore, must be defined as the lightlessness of the air by the privation of light, not subsisting in substance; that which therefore does not subsist in itself, how do those of the maddened heresy compel us to deify? 8. For that darkness does not at all have its own existence will be demonstrated even more clearly through the things that now happen in each case; for three things must first come together for darkness or shadow to occur: light, a body, and an unlit place,

περικάρδιον αἷμα περὶ τὴν ἔξωθεν ἐπιφάνειαν διαχέοντος, καὶ μεταβολὴ γέγονεν, διὰ πά- θους τε καὶ ἐνεργείας, καὶ τῆς περὶ τὸ χρῶμα ποιότητος. Εἰ δὲ τὴν ὕλην διὰ τῆς πρὸς τὸν θεὸν συγκράσεώς τε καὶ καταπόσεως, ὡς αὐτοῖς φίλον ἐστὶ μυθοποιεῖν, σῶμα γενέσθαι φασίν, οὐδὲν αὐτοὺς ὠφελήσει τὸ βλάσφημον· σύντομος γὰρ καὶ ἀληθὴς λόγος ἀνατρέψει τὸ ψεῦδος. Πῶς γὰρ τῶν ἐναντίων, καθὼς αὐτοί φασι, καὶ ἀμίκτων γέγονε σύνοδος ἄνευ τεχνίτου τοῦ ταῦτα πρὸς σύνθεσιν ἄγοντος; Πῶς δὲ τῶν ἀσωμάτων ἡ κρᾶσις σῶμα πεποίηκεν; Ὡς γὰρ οὐκ ἂν λογικὸν ποιήσειε πολλῶν ἀλόγων συνδρομή, οὕτως οὐκ ἂν θεοῦ τε καὶ ὕλης, ἀσωμάτων ὄντων, ἡ συνάφεια σώματος φύσιν ἀποτελέσειεν. 5. Εἰ δὲ μεταβάλλοντες τὸν λόγον σῶμα τὴν ὕλην φήσουσιν εἶναι, καὶ οὕτως ἀνατραπή- σεται τὸ σοφὸν αὐτοῖς κατὰ τῆς ἐκκλησίας μηχάνημα· πᾶν γὰρ σῶμα σύνθετον ὑπάρχον, ἀλλότριον ὑπάρχει τῶν ἀγενήτων, τοῖς γενητοῖς συναριθμούμενον. Πάσης γὰρ συνθέσεως αἴτιος ὑπάρ- χει δημιουργὸς καὶ οὕτως οὐ μόνον γενητή, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀρχὴν ἔχουσα ἡ πρεσβευομένη παρὰ τοῖς μανεῖσιν ἄναρχος ὕλη δειχθήσεται, ἐξ ἑτέρου τὸ εἶναι λαχοῦσα. Εἰ δὲ λέγοιεν ἀσώματον μὲν εἶναι τὴν ὕλην, δυνάμει δὲ σῶμα, ἰστέον ὡς τὸ δυνάμει ἐπὶ τῶν ἐνδεχομένων εὑρίσκεται, οἷον τὸ ὕδωρ δυνάμει θερμόν, τὸ παιδίον δυνάμει γραμματικόν· ἐνδέχεται γὰρ τὸ ὕδωρ θερμαίνεσθαι καὶ τὸ παιδίον εἶναι γραμματικόν. Ἀσώματον δὲ σῶμα γενέσθαι τῶν ἀδυνάτων. Πῶς οὖν δυνάμει σῶμα τὴν κατ' αὐτοὺς ἀσώματον ὕλην ὑποληπτέον; 6. Καὶ ταῦτα μὲν συντόμως εἰρήσθω· οὐ γὰρ οἷόν τε διατρίβειν ταῖς ἀποδείξεσιν, ἑτέρας ζητήσεως κατεπειγούσης. Φῶς γὰρ καὶ σκότος εἶναί φασιν ἄμφω ἀγένητά τε καὶ συναΐδια, ὑπάρχοντά τε καὶ ζῶντα· ἑκάτερον γὰρ οὐχ ὡς ἔχει φύσεως καταλαβόντες οἱ τοῦ Μάνεντος μυσταγωγοί, πρὸς τὸ βάραθρον ἐκπεπτώκασι τῆς ἀπωλείας, ἀντικειμένην τῷ θεῷ δύναμίν τινα τὸ σκότος ὑποστησάμενοι. Φασὶ γάρ· Εἰ φῶς ἐστι, τὸ τούτου πολέμιον σκότος ἂν εἴη, οὐκ ἐξ αὐτοῦ γεγονός· οὐδὲν γὰρ τῶν ἐναντίων παρὰ τοῦ ἐναντίου τὴν σύστασιν ἔχει· ἀΐδιον οὖν ἔσται τὸ σκότος, μὴ ὄντος δημιουργοῦ. Ὁ γὰρ θεός, φῶς καὶ ἀγαθὸς ὑπάρχων, οὐκ ἔστι τοῦ σκότους δημιουργός. Ταῦτα δαίμονός τινος ὑπάρχει κυήματα· τούτοις ὁ Σατανᾶς τοὺς ἁπλουστέρους σαγηνεύει καὶ ὑποσκελίζει τοῖς λογισμοῖς, ὅταν τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ διδασκαλίας ὑπερορῶντες ἑαυτοῖς ἐκ τριόδων ἐπισωρεύσωσι διδασκάλους, κνηθόμενοι τὴν ἀκοήν, καὶ ἀπὸ μὲν τῆς ἀληθείας τὴν ἀκοὴν ἀποστρέψωσιν, ἐπὶ δὲ τοὺς μύθους ἐκτραπήσωνται, ὥς φησιν ὁ θεῖος ἀπόστολος. Σὺ δὲ τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ στρατιώτης ὑπάρχων αὐλῆς, ἀμύνου τοὺς προσιόντας κατακοντίζων τοῖς λόγοις. 7. Μίᾳ γὰρ καὶ μόνῃ φωνῇ τροπὴν ποιήσει τῶν ἀντιπάλων, λαμπρῶς τοιαῦτα βοῶν· Ἀποδειξάτω τις τοῦ σκότους τὴν ὕπαρξιν αὐτοῦ καὶ τότε δικαίαν σχήσει τῆς πλάνης τὴν ἀφορμήν. Ἀλλ' οὐκ ἂν ἔχοιεν σκότους ὑπόστασιν εἰπεῖν, οὐκ ἀϊδίως προκόσμιον, οὐχ ὕστερον ὑποστᾶσαν. Εἰ δὲ ὅλως πρὸς τὸ τῆς ἀληθείας φέγγος ἀτενίζειν ἐθέλοιεν, ἀλλὰ μὴ ὡς σκότους υἱοὶ διαλέγεσθαι, εὑρήσουσι τὸ σκότος οὐ | πρᾶγμα καθ' ἑαυτὸ ὑφεστός, ἀλλ' "6ἀέρα τινὰ ἀφώτιστον ἢ τόπον ἐξ ἀντιφράξεως σώματος σκιαζόμενον"6 ἢ ἁπλῶς εἰπεῖν "6τόπον φωτὸς ἐστερημένον"6, ὡς καὶ ὁ μέγας εἶπεν Βασίλειος, ὁ τὴν τοῦ παντὸς κτίσιν ἐπ' ἀκριβείας κατὰ τὴν τοῦ Μωϋσέως προφητείαν ἐξηγησάμενος. Σκότος οὖν ὁριστέον τὸ ἀφεγγὲς τοῦ ἀέρος στερήσει φωτός, οὐκ οὐσίᾳ ὑφεστηκός· ὃ οὖν οὐχ ὑφέστηκε καθ' ἑαυτό, πῶς θεοποιεῖν ἡμᾶς οἱ τῆς μανείσης αἱρέσεως ἀναγ- κάζουσιν; 8. Ὅτι γὰρ οὐδὲ ὅλως τὸ σκότος ἰδιάζουσαν ἔχει τὴν ὕπαρξιν, καὶ διὰ τῶν νυνὶ παρ' ἕκαστα γινομένων ἕτι σαφέστε- ρον ἀποδειχθήσεται· τρία γὰρ δεῖ πρότερον συνδραμεῖν εἰς τὸ σκότος ἤτοι σκιὰν ἐπισυμβῆναι, τὸ φῶς, τὸ σῶμα, τὸν ἀλαμπῆ τόπον,