Note (return) — Chapter IV
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Thales, one of the most ancient of the Greek philosophers, taught the existence of a plurality of gods, as is evident from that saying of his, preserved by Diogenes Laertius, "The world has life, and is full of gods." 185 At the same time he asserts his belief in one supreme, uncreated Deity; "God is the oldest of all things, because he is unmade, or ungenerated." 186 All the other gods must therefore have been "generated deities," since there is but one unmade God, one only that had "no beginning." 187