Tractatus de placitis Manichaeorum

 upon matter, which will be mixed with it throughout for the death of matter will be the separation of this power from it at some later time. Thus, th

 a rebellion of matter against God. But I would not say that these things are insufficient to persuade those who approach the argument without examinat

 will subsist, the mover and the moved for which of them, then, does he vote, that we may posit that one first with God?

 will be separated. For there is one place for the heavy, and another for the intermediate, and for the light, for to the one belongs the above, to ano

 to God, when they say he arranged the plot against matter, because it desired the beautiful. With what that he had did God wish to punish matter? For

 13 And what things does he say are evils? For concerning the sun and the moon, he leaves out nothing but concerning the heaven and the stars, if he s

 it requires nourishment. For those living things that were immortal have been set free from decay and growth, such as the sun and moon and stars, alth

 18 For the wise thing said by them is this, that just as we see that when the soul is separated from the body the body itself is destroyed, so too whe

 the divine power, if indeed it is subject to passion and divisible throughout its whole self, and one part of it becomes sun, and another, moon? For t

 is heavy, nor is it possible for it to reach the moon at all. What reason is there for that which first arrives at the moon not to be sent up immediat

 For thus the world is worse than the creator and than the artisans, as many as are their works. If therefore man is the work of matter, he is certainl

 to use a worse way of life, how is it reasonable? and if the divine power is greater in these things, what use are such things for nourishment, since

 the word finds to be altogether, or the last of all things and able with difficulty to arrive at a spurious notion. But is the lightless fire indeed g

the word finds to be altogether, or the last of all things and able with difficulty to arrive at a spurious notion. But is the lightless fire indeed greater than the matter destined to be laid waste by the divine power, or less? But if it is less, how will it overcome the greater? But if it is greater, it will be able to lead it back to itself, being of the same nature, yet it certainly does not destroy it, just as the Nile does not destroy the bays cut off from it.

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παντάπασιν οὖσαν ὁ λόγος εὑρίσκει ἢ τὸ πάντων ἔσχατον καὶ μόγις εἰς ἔννοιαν νόθον ἀφικνεῖσθαι δυνάμενον. ἀλλὰ γὰρ τὸ πῦρ τὸ ἀφεγγὲς ἆρά γε πλέον ἐστὶν τῆς μελλούσης ἐρημωθήσεσθαι ὕλης ὑπὸ τῆς θείας δυνάμεως ἢ ἔλαττον; ἀλλ' εἰ μὲν ἔλαττον, πῶς καταγωνιεῖται τὸ πλέον; εἰ δὲ πλέον, ἐπανάγειν μὲν αὐτὸ πρὸς αὑτὸ δυνήσεται τῆς αὐτῆς ὂν φύσεως, οὐ μὴν διαφθείρει γε αὐτό, ὥσπερ οὐδὲ ὁ Νεῖλος τοὺς ἀπ' αὐτοῦ ἀποτεμνομένους κόλπους.

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