Such is the idea that they make for themselves of the divine work.  The form of the world is due to the wisdom of the supreme Artificer; matter came to the Creator from without; and thus the world results from a double origin.  It has received from outside its matter and its essence, and from God its form and figure. cf. Cudworth, Int. Syst. iv. 6, and remarks there on Cic., Acad Quæst. i. 6.  Arist. (Metaph. i. 2) says Θεὸς γὰρ δοκει τὸ αἴτιον πασιν εἰναι καὶ ἀρχή τις, but does this refer only to form?  They thus come to deny that the mighty God has presided at the formation of the universe, and pretend that He has only brought a crowning contribution to a common work, that He has only contributed some small portion to the genesis of beings:  they are incapable from the debasement of their reasonings of raising their glances to the height of truth.  Here below arts are subsequent to matter—introduced into life by the indispensable need of them.  Wool existed before weaving made it supply one of nature’s imperfections.  Wood existed before carpentering took possession of it, and transformed it each day to supply new wants, and made us see all the advantages derived from it, giving the oar to the sailor, the winnowing fan to the labourer, the lance to the soldier.  But God, before all those things which now attract our notice existed, after casting about in His mind and determining to bring into being time which had no being, imagined the world such as it ought to be, and created matter in harmony with the form which He wished to give it. Gen. ii. 5, “every herb of the field before it grew.”  There seems here an indication of the actual creation, ποίησις, being in the mind of God.  He assigned to the heavens the nature adapted for the heavens, and gave to the earth an essence in accordance with its form.  He formed, as He wished, fire, air and water, and gave to each the essence which the object of its existence required.  Finally, He welded all the diverse parts of the universe by links of indissoluble attachment and established between them so perfect a fellowship and harmony that the most distant, in spite of their distance, appeared united in one universal sympathy.  Let those men therefore renounce their fabulous imaginations, who, in spite of the weakness of their argument, pretend to measure a power as incomprehensible to man’s reason as it is unutterable by man’s voice.