Chapter VIII.—On His Own Principles, Hermogenes Makes Matter, on the Whole, Superior to God.

Nay more,71    Atquin etiam. he even prefers Matter to God, and rather subjects God to it, when he will have it that God made all things out of Matter.  For if He drew His resources from it72    Ex illa usus est. for the creation of the world, Matter is already found to be the superior, inasmuch as it furnished Him with the means of effecting His works; and God is thereby clearly subjected to Matter, of which the substance was indispensable to Him. For there is no one but requires that which he makes use of;73    De cujus utitur. no one but is subject to the thing which he requires, for the very purpose of being able to make use of it. So, again, there is no one who, from using what belongs to another, is not inferior to him of whose property he makes use; and there is no one who imparts74    Præstat. of his own for another’s use, who is not in this respect superior to him to whose use he lends his property. On this principle,75    Itaque. Matter itself, no doubt,76    Quidem. was not in want of God, but rather lent itself to God, who was in want of it—rich and abundant and liberal as it was—to one who was, I suppose, too small, and too weak, and too unskilful, to form what He willed out of nothing. A grand service, verily,77    Revera. did it confer on God in giving Him means at the present time whereby He might be known to be God, and be called Almighty—only that He is no longer Almighty, since He is not powerful enough for this, to produce all things out of nothing. To be sure,78    Sane. Matter bestowed somewhat on itself also—even to get its own self acknowledged with God as God’s co-equal, nay more, as His helper; only there is this drawback, that Hermogenes is the only man that has found out this fact, besides the philosophers—those patriarchs of all heresy.79    They are so deemed in the de Præscript. Hæret. c. vii. For the prophets knew nothing about it, nor the apostles thus far, nor, I suppose, even Christ.

CAPUT VIII.

Atquin etiam praeponit illam Deo, et Deum potius subjicit materiae, cum vult eum de materia cuncta fecisse. Si enim ex illa usus est ad opera mundi, jam et materia superior invenitur, quae illi copiam operandi subministravit, et Deus subjectus materiae videtur, cujus substantiae eguit. Nemo enim non eget eo de cujus utitur: nemo non subjicitur ei cujus eget, ut possit uti: sic et nemo de alieno utendo non minor est eo de cujus utitur. Et nemo qui praestat de suo uti, non in hoc superior est eo cui praestat uti. Itaque materia ipsa quidem Deo non eguit, sed 0204C egenti se Deo praestitit , divitem et locupletem et liberalem minori, opinor, et invalido et minus idoneo de nihilo facere quae velit. Grande revera beneficium Deo contulit, ut haberet hodie per quem Deus cognosceretur, et omnipotens vocaretur: nisi quod jam non omnipotens, si non et hoc potens, ex nihilo omnia proferre. Sane et sibi praestitit aliquid materia, ut et ipsa cum Deo possit agnosci coaequalis Deo, imo et adjutrix: nisi quod solus eam Hermogenes cognovit, et haereticorum patriarchae philosophi. Prophetis enim et apostolis usque adhuc latuit, puto et Christo .