Indeed, before the transgression all things were under his power. For God set him as ruler over all things on the earth and in the waters. Even the serpent In this John does not follow Basil in his De Paradiso. was accustomed to man, and approached him more readily than it did other living creatures, and held intercourse with him with delightful motions Basil, Hom. de Parad.. And hence it was through it that the devil, the prince of evil, made his most wicked suggestion to our first parents Gen. iii. 1.. Moreover, the earth of its own accord used to yield fruits, for the benefit of the animals that were obedient to man, and there was neither rain nor tempest on the earth. But after the transgression, when he was compared with the unintelligent cattle and became like to them Ps. xlix. 12., after he had contrived that in him irrational desire should have rule over reasoning mind and had become disobedient to the Master’s command, the subject creation rose up against him whom the Creator had appointed to be ruler: and it was appointed for him that he should till with sweat the earth from which he had been taken.