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within the soul of man should receive its graving and stamp from the divine Word, since the God before the Word is high above all of mere rational nature; and to him above the Word, subsisting as he is with the most excellent and specially pre-eminent semblance, there were no manner of right for a created being to be exactly likened." (Euseb. Fragm. Præp. Ev. VII. 13; Quæst. in Gen. ii. § 62, Armenian version.)

"Even though there prove to be no one as yet sufficiently deserving to be called by the name of Son of God, let him nevertheless strive earnestly to be ascribed to his firstborn Word, the eldest angel; nay, an archangel of many a name; for he is addressed as Arche [origin, beginning], as Name of God, as Word, as the Man according to the Image, as He that sees Israel . . . . . For although we may not yet have become worthy of being reckoned the children of God, yet no doubt we may be sons of His eternal image, the most Sacred Word, for the eldest Word is the image of God." (De Confus. Ling. § 28.)

The expression "the Man according to the image" is explained in the following; it means the standard, pattern, or ideal man :

"There is a vast difference between man as at present moulded, and man as originally brought into being after the image of God. For man as now formed is perceptible to external sense, partaking of qualities, subsisting of body and soul, man or woman, by nature mortal. But man made after the divine image is, as it were, an idea, or an element, or a seal, perceptible by mind, bodiless, neither male nor female, incorruptible by nature

By the expression, God breathed into man's face the breath of life,' is meant nothing else than the Divine Spirit proceeding from that blessed and happy nature,

being sent to take up its remote habitation here, for the benefit of our race, in order that, although man is mortal as regards his visible part, he may be immortal at least as regards that which is unseen." (De Mund. Opif. § 46.)

"We shall at least be simply within right in affirming that the Artificer [Demiurge] who wrought the Universe is like for like with the Father of the thing produced; while the Mother is the knowledge appertaining to the Creator, with whom God united, not as a man unites, and sowed the seed of genesis.

"And she received unto herself the seed of God, and when her throes came to accomplishment, she brought forth her only and well-beloved son, perceptible to the external senses, namely this very Kosmos.

Wisdom, at all events, is introduced alongside of any one of those that form the divine company, speaking of herself after this

manner:

'Me did God get to himself as the first of the first among his own works,

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And before the cycle of time my foundations he laid' [Prov. viii. (De Ebriet. § 8.) The expressions of endearment"only son," first-born," "wellbeloved," used in reference to the Word or to the Kosmos, show how ready was the oriental mind to affectionately personify an attribute of Deity, and so to enwrap it in the language of love rather than the language of metaphysics. Concurrent with this tendency was the disposition to regard an angel or a mortal engaged unselfishly upon. some divine work as a vicegerent of God, and within the limits of that office, as very God in manifestation. Even the generosity of a superior in rank is accounted as a subordinate godhood.

In the address of Joseph to his brethren, after their father's decease, Philo makes him say: "If all things which I did were done well and kindly for my father's sake, I will adhere to the same course now that he is dead. But in my judgment no good man is dead, but will indeed live for ever without waxing old, in an immortal nature which is no longer bound up in the body's necessities. And why should I remember only the father who was born? We have the uncreate, the incorruptible, the eternal, who oversees all things and gives ear to all people even when they are silent, who always beholds the things which lie in the recesses of the mind, upon whom I call as a witness of my conscience that my reconciliation is sincere. For I (and marvel not at my words) am in the place of God (Gen. 1. 19), who has changed your evil designs into an abundance of good things." (De Josepho, § 43.)

In another chapter of the same book we find:

"Be not cast down; I give you a complete amnesty for all the things which you have done to me. Do not deem that you need anyone else as a paraklete." (De Josepho, § 40.)

The higher the mission, the more attractive becomes his concep

tion:

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Angels are the servants of God, and are considered actual gods by those who are in toils and slaveries." (De Profugis. § 38.)

We may call to mind in relation to this subject, the reply of Jesus to an allegation of blasphemy:

"Is it not written in your law, I said, ye are gods? If he called them gods, unto whom the Word of God came, and the scripture cannot be made void; say ye of him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest, because I said, I am God's son." (John x. 34.)

(To be continued.)

Erratum, page 395. It was Philo's nephew, not his son, who married king Agrippa's daughter.

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