Anf-03 v.v.xviii Pg 15
See Prov. viii.
Let Hermogenes then confess that the very Wisdom of God is declared to be born and created, for the especial reason that we should not suppose that there is any other being than God alone who is unbegotten and uncreated. For if that, which from its being inherent in the Lord6304 6304 Intra Dominum.
was of Him and in Him, was yet not without a beginning,—I mean6305 6305 Scilicet.
His wisdom, which was then born and created, when in the thought of God It began to assume motion6306 6306 Cœpti agitari.
for the arrangement of His creative works,—how much more impossible6307 6307 Multo magis non capit.
is it that anything should have been without a beginning which was extrinsic to the Lord!6308 6308 Extra Dominum.
But if this same Wisdom is the Word of God, in the capacity6309 6309 Sensu.
of Wisdom, and (as being He) without whom nothing was made, just as also (nothing) was set in order without Wisdom, how can it be that anything, except the Father, should be older, and on this account indeed nobler, than the Son of God, the only-begotten and first-begotten Word? Not to say that6310 6310 Nedum.
what is unbegotten is stronger than that which is born, and what is not made more powerful than that which is made. Because that which did not require a Maker to give it existence, will be much more elevated in rank than that which had an author to bring it into being. On this principle, then,6311 6311 Proinde.
if evil is indeed unbegotten, whilst the Son of God is begotten (“for,” says God, “my heart hath emitted my most excellent Word”6312 6312
Treasury of Scriptural Knowledge, Chapter 8
VERSE (8) - Ps 12:6 Isa 45:23; 63:1
