Hippolytus

“ And that all things are subject unto him, and that he is good, and that he has all things in himself, as in the horn of the one-horned bull; [7] so as that he imparts beauty and bloom to all things that exist according to their own nature and peculiarity, as if passing through all, just as (“the river) proceeding forth from Edem, and dividing itself into four heads.” ”

“ But if any one, he says, is blind from birth, and has never beheld the true light, “which lighteneth every man that cometh into the world,” [14] by us let him recover his sight, and behold, as it were, through some paradise planted with every description of tree, and supplied with abundance of fruits, water coursing its way through all the trees and fruits ”

“ And (he states) that to him alone—that is, Naas—is dedicated every shrine and every initiatory rite, and every mystery; and, in general, that a religious ceremony could not be discovered under heaven, in which a temple (Naos) has no existence; and in the temple itself is Naas, from whom it has received its denomination of temple (Naos) . And these affirm that the serpent is a moist substance, just as Thales also, the Milesian, (spoke of water as an originating principle,) and that nothing of existing things, immortal or mortal, animate or inanimate, could consist at all without him. ”