أعمال فيلون الإسكندري، المجلد الأول (يونج)

ButMoses, who had early reached the very summits of philosophy,* and who had learnt from the oracles of God the most numerous and important of the principles of nature, was well aware that it is indispensable that in all existing things there must be an active cause, and a passive subject ; and that the active cause is the intellect of the universe, thoroughly unadulterated and thoroughly unmixed, superior to virtue and superior to science, superior even to abstract good or abstract beauty; while the passive subject is something inanimate and incapable of motion by any intrinsic power of its own, but having been set in motion, and fashioned, and endowed with life by the intellect, became transformed into that most perfect work, this world. And those who describe it as being uncreated, do, without being aware of it, cut off the most useful and necessary of all the qualities which tend to produce piety, namely, providence : for reason proves that the father and creator has a care for that which has been created ; for a father is anxious for the life of his children, and a workman aims at the duration of his works, and employs every device imaginable to • This is in accordanoe with the description of him in the Bihlc where he is represented as being learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians. i ON THE CREATION OF THE WORLD. 3 ward off everything that is pernicious or injurious, and is desirous by every means in his power to provide everything which is useful or profitable for them. But with regard to that which has not been created, there is no feeling of interest as if it were his own in the breast of him who has not created it.…