§ 1.
Now that God is the Artificer1 of the world, themselves also hold, who in many ways contradict Him, yet confess Him, calling Him Artificer,2 and using the term Angel3. Not to mention that all the Scriptures cry aloud, and the Lord teaches, that This is Our Father which is in Heaven,4 and not another: as we shall shew in the progress of our discourse. But for the present that witness is enough, which they bear who contradict us: all men in effect agreeing herein: first the ancients, both keeping especially this persuasion by tradition from the first-made Man, and honouring with hymns One God, Maker of Heaven and Earth, then the rest who came after them, receiving from God’s Prophets the commemoration of the same: and lastly the Gentiles learning it from the Creation itself. For the Creation of itself points to Him Who created it, and the thing made gives intimation of Him Who made it, and the world manifests Him Who set it in order. Moreover, the whole Church in all the world hath received this tradition of the Apostles.
§ 2.
It being then agreed concerning this God as we have said,5 and testimony given by all to His existence; doubtless that other, the Father whom they devise, hath no settled being, nor any to witness him: Simon the Sorcerer first affirming himself to be the God over all, and the world to be made by his Angels; and his followers afterwards, as we shewed in the first book, in their diverse opinions propagating impious and irreligious doctrines against the Creator: and these being their disciples, make their adherents worse than Gentiles.6 For they, serving as they do the Creature more than the Creator,7 and them which are not Gods, do nevertheless give the first place in Deity to the God Who made this Universe. But these, denominating Him “the fruit of Decay,” and calling Him Animal, and ignorant of the Power which is above Him: affirming too that in the saying, I am God, and besides Me there is no other God, He lieth (while themselves are the liars): associating Him with all that is bad, and feigning that there is one (which there is not) above Him:—these are convicted by their own statement of blaspheming Him Who is really God, and feigning him to be God who is not, to their own condemnation. And they who call themselves perfect, and say they have exact knowledge of all things, are found worse than the Heathens, and more blasphemous in their way of thinking, even of their own Maker.