Note 7 — Chapter X · THE MYSTERY OF PROVIDENCE, AND CREATION OUT OF NOTHING.

In Clemens Alex. (Coh. ad Gentes) there is an interesting passage. It runs in the Latin translation (the bad Augsburg edition, 1778) thus:—“At nos ante mundi constitutionem fuimus, ratione futuræ nostræ productionis, in ipso Deo quodammodo tum præexistentes. Divini igitur Verbi sive Rationis, nos creaturæ rationales sumus, et per eum primi esse dicimur, quoniam in principio erat verbum.” Yet more decidedly, however, has Christian mysticism declared the human nature to be the creative principle, the ground of the world. “Man, who, before time was, existed in eternity, works with God all the works that God wrought a thousand years ago, and now, after a thousand years, still works.” “All creatures have sprung forth through man.”—Predigten, vor u. zu Tauleri Zeiten (Ed. c. p. 5, p. 119). ↑