{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p class=\"c006\">But let us look at what Celsus next with great ostentation\r\nannounces in the following fashion: “And again,” he says,\r\n“let us resume the subject from the beginning, with a larger\r\narray of proofs. And I make no new statement, but say what\r\nhas been long settled. God is good, and beautiful, and blessed,\r\nand that in the best and most beautiful degree.<a id=\"r525\"></a><a class=\"c008 pginternal\" href=\"#f525\"><sup>[525]</sup></a> But if he\r\ncome down among men, he must undergo a change, and a\r\nchange from good to evil, from virtue to vice, from happiness\r\nto misery, and from best to worst. Who, then, would make\r\nchoice of such a change? It is the nature of a mortal, indeed,\r\nto undergo change and remoulding, but of an immortal to remain\r\nthe same and unaltered. God, then, could not admit of\r\nsuch a change.” Now it appears to me that the fitting answer\r\nhas been returned to these objections, when I have related\r\nwhat is called in Scripture the “condescension”<a id=\"r526\"></a><a class=\"c008 pginternal\" href=\"#f526\"><sup>[526]</sup></a> of God to\r\nhuman affairs; for which purpose He did not need to undergo a\r\ntransformation, as Celsus thinks we assert, nor a change from\r\ngood to evil, nor from virtue to vice, nor from happiness to\r\nmisery, nor from best to worst. For, continuing unchangeable in\r\nHis essence, He condescends to human affairs by the economy\r\nof His providence.<a id=\"r527\"></a><a class=\"c008 pginternal\" href=\"#f527\"><sup>[527]</sup></a> We show, accordingly, that the Holy Scriptures\r\nrepresent God as unchangeable, both by such words as\r\n“Thou art the same,”<a id=\"r528\"></a><a class=\"c008 pginternal\" href=\"#f528\"><sup>[528]</sup></a> and “I change not;”<a id=\"r529\"></a><a class=\"c008 pginternal\" href=\"#f529\"><sup>[529]</sup></a> whereas the\r\ngods of Epicurus, being composed of atoms, and, so far as\r\ntheir structure is concerned, capable of dissolution, endeavour to\r\nthrow off the atoms which contain the elements of destruction.\r\nNay, even the god of the Stoics, as being corporeal, at one\r\ntime has his whole essence composed of the guiding principle<a id=\"r530\"></a><a class=\"c008 pginternal\" href=\"#f530\"><sup>[530]</sup></a>\r\nwhen the conflagration [of the world] takes place; and at\r\nanother, when a rearrangement of things occurs, he again becomes\r\npartly material.<a id=\"r531\"></a><a class=\"c008 pginternal\" href=\"#f531\"><sup>[531]</sup></a> For even the Stoics were unable distinctly\r\n<span class=\"pageno\" id=\"Page_175\">175</span>to comprehend the natural idea of God, as of a being\r\naltogether incorruptible and simple, and uncompounded and\r\nindivisible.</p>","headings":["The writings of Origen, Vol. 2 of 2","BOOK IV.","Chapter XIV."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg70693-paragraph-233"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"b356118c6d19112b11f00a17c1b2c7dad40573ce930b322fdfa62de3a3038338","edition_title":"The writings of Origen, Vol. 2 (of 2)","edition_translators":["Frederick Crombie","W. H. Cairns"],"edition_year":1872,"explicit_reference_candidates":[],"headings":[],"id":"pg70693-f525","license_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html","public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"original-editor-translator-note","review_required":["work and recension attribution","original-work chronology","Bible reference numbering and citation kind","English edition rights and attribution"],"review_status":"needs_review","rights_evidence":"Project Gutenberg metadata: Public domain in the USA. Existing 1872 English edition; listed translators died 1889 and 1872. Electronic transcription subject to Project Gutenberg reuse terms.","source_anchor":"f525","source_ebook":70693,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\" id=\"f525\">\n<p class=\"c007\"><span class=\"label\"><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#r525\">525</a>. </span><span lang=\"grc\">Ὁ Θεὸς ἀγαθός ἐστι, καὶ καλὸς, καὶ εὐδαίμων, καὶ ἐν τῷ καλλίστῳ καὶ\r\nἀρίστῳ.</span></p>\n</div>","source_sha256":"76ed9a9fd752c1d5095189e38fe3dcbbea0fd23d6be719db17360e4da14552fa","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/70693/pg70693-images.html#f525","text_sha256":"69f2f57c7b2f06669f0074c0ab4bcf1e8ffd2363de136f68ed157625ceab7ef0","verified":false,"work_id":null}