acknowledged truth, that what is hurtful is an evil.  The smoke in that region did not hurt bipeds:  it produced them, and nourished and sustained them without injury in their birth, their growth, and their rule.  But now, when the evil has some good mixed with it, the smoke has become more hurtful, so that we, who certainly are bipeds, instead of being sustained by it, are blinded, and suffocated, and killed by it.  Could the mixture of good have given such destructiveness to evil elements?  Could there be such confusion in the divine govern- ment? 17.  In the other cases, at least, how is it that we find that congruity which misled your author and induced him to fabricate falsehoods?  Why does darkness agree with serpents, and waters with swimming creatures, and winds with flying creatures, though the fire burns up quadrupeds, and smoke chokes us?  Then, again, have not serpents very sharp sight, and do they not love the sunshine, and abound most where the calmness of the air prevents the clouds from gathering much or often?  How very absurd that the natives and lovers of darkness should live most comfortably and agreeably where the clearest light is enjoyed!  Or if you say that it is the heat rather than the light that they enjoy, it would be more reas- onable to assign to fire serpents, which are naturally of rapid motion, than the slow-going asp.168  Besides, all must admit that light is agreeable to the eyes of the asp, for they are compared to an eagle’s eyes.  But enough of the lower animals.  Let us, I pray, attend to what is true of ourselves without persisting in error, and so our minds shall be disentangled from silly and mischievous falsehoods.  For is it not intolerable perversity to say that in the race of darkness, where there was no mixture of light, the biped animals had so sound and strong, so incredible force of eyesight, that even in their darkness they could see the perfectly pure light (as you represent it) of the kingdom of God? for, according to you, even these beings could see this light, and could gaze at it, and study it, and delight in it, and desire it; whereas our eyes, after mixture with light, with the chief good, yea, with God, have become so tender and weak, that we can neither see anything in the dark, nor bear to look at the sun, but, after looking, lose sight of what we could see before. 18.  The same remarks are applicable if we take corruption to be an evil, which no one doubts.  The smoke did not corrupt that race of animals, though it corrupts animals now.  Not to go over all the particulars, which would be tedious, and is not necessary, the living creatures of your imaginary description were so much less liable to corruption than animals are now, that their abortive and premature offspring, cast headlong from heaven to earth, both lived and were productive, and could band together again, having, forsooth, their ori- ginal vigor, because they were conceived before good was mixed with the evil; for, after this mixture, the animals born are, according to you, those which we now see to be very feeble and easily giving way to corruption.  Can any one persist in the belief of error like this, unless 168   [The text has asinum in this sentence but aspidem in the next.  The former is a mistake.—A.H.N.] 125 The Manichæan Fictions About Things Good and Evil are Not Consistent with…