{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/003/0030499.htm","path":"chr/ecf/003/0030499.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/003/0030499.htm","text":"Chapter XXX.\u2014Another Passage in the Sacred History of the Creation, Released from the Mishandling of Hermogenes.\nThe following words will in like manner apparently corroborate the conjecture of Hermogenes, \u201cAnd darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the water;\u201d 6426 as if these blended 6427 substances, presented us with arguments for his massive pile of Matter. 6428 Now, so discriminating an enumeration of certain and distinct elements (as we have in this passage), which severally designates \u201cdarkness,\u201d \u201cthe deep,\u201d \u201cthe Spirit of God,\u201d \u201cthe waters,\u201d forbids the inference that anything confused or (from such confusion) uncertain is meant. Still more, when He ascribed to them their own places, 6429 \u201cdarkness on the face of the deep,\u201d \u201cthe Spirit upon the face of the waters,\u201d He repudiated all confusion in the substances; and by demonstrating their separate position, 6430 He demonstrated also their distinction. Most absurd, indeed, would it be that Matter, which is introduced to our view as \u201cwithout form,\u201d should have its \u201cformless\u201d condition maintained by so many words indicative of form, 6431 without any intimation of what that confused body 6432 is, which must of course be supposed to be unique, 6433 since it is without form. 6434 For that which is without form is uniform; but even 6435 that which is without form, when it is blended together 6436 from various component parts, 6437 must necessarily have one outward appearance; 6438 and it has not any appearance, until it has the one appearance (which comes) from many parts combined. 6439 Now Matter either had those specific parts 6440 within itself, from the words indicative of which it had to be understood\u2014I mean \u201cdarkness,\u201d and \u201cthe deep,\u201d and \u201cthe Spirit,\u201d and \u201cthe waters\u201d\u2014or it had them not. If it had them, how is it introduced as being \u201cwithout form?\u201d 6441 If it had them not, how does it become known? 6442","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol III: Tertullian: Part II: Anothe...","type":"page"}