Arnobius

“ Or is there any truer religion—one more serviceable, [3] powerful, and right—than to have learned to know the supreme God, to know how to pray to God Supreme, who alone is the source and fountain of all good, the creator, [4] founder, and framer of all that endures, by whom all things on earth and all in heaven are quickened, and filled with the stir of life, and without whom there would assuredly be nothing to bear any name, and have any substance? ”

“ Give a true judgment; [5] and, looking round on all these things which we see, any one will rather doubt whether all the other gods exist, than hesitate with regard to the God whom we all know by nature, whether when we cry out, O God, or when we make God the witness of wicked deeds, [6] and raise our face to heaven as though He saw us. ”

“ But indeed, some one will say, He deserved our hatred because He has driven religion [1] from the world, because He has kept men back from seeking to honour the gods. [2] Is He then denounced as the destroyer of religion and promoter of impiety, who brought true religion into the world, who opened the gates of piety to men blind and verily living in impiety, and pointed out to whom they should bow themselves? ”