9. Justly, therefore, do we convict them of having departed far and wide from the truth. For if the Saviour formed the things which have been made, by means of him (the Demiurge), he is proved in that case not to be inferior but superior to them, since he is found to have been the former even of themselves; for they, too, have a place among created things. How, then, can it be argued that these men indeed are spiritual, but that he by whom they were created is of an animal nature? Or, again, if (which is indeed the only true supposition, as I have shown by numerous arguments of the very clearest nature) He (the Creator) made all things freely, and by His own power, and arranged and finished them, and His will is the substance [3257] of all things, then He is discovered to be the one only God who created all things, who alone is Omnipotent, and who is the only Father rounding and forming all things, visible and invisible, such as may be perceived by our senses and such as cannot, heavenly and earthly, "by the word of His power;" [3258] and He has fitted and arranged all things by His wisdom, while He contains all things, but He Himself can be contained by no one: He is the Former, He the Builder, He the Discoverer, He the Creator, He the Lord of all; and there is no one besides Him, or above Him, neither has He any mother, as they falsely ascribe to Him; nor is there a second God, as Marcion has imagined; nor is there a Pleroma of thirty Æons, which has been shown a vain supposition; nor is there any such being as Bythus or Proarche; nor are there a series of heavens; nor is there a virginal light, [3259] nor an unnameable Æon, nor, in fact, any one of those things which are madly dreamt of by these, and by all the heretics. But there is one only God, the Creator--He who is above every Principality, and Power, and Dominion, and Virtue: He is Father, He is God, He the Founder, He the Maker, He the Creator, who made those things by Himself, that is, through His Word and His Wisdom-- heaven and earth, and the seas, and all things that are in them: He is just; He is good; He it is who formed man, who planted paradise, who made the world, who gave rise to the flood, who saved Noah; He is the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of the living: He it is whom the law proclaims, whom the prophets preach, whom Christ reveals, whom the apostles make known [3260] to us, and in whom the Church believes. He is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ: through His Word, who is His Son, through Him He is revealed and manifested to all to whom He is revealed; for those [only] know Him to whom the Son has revealed Him. But the Son, eternally co-existing with the Father, from of old, yea, from the beginning, always reveals the Father to Angels, Archangels, Powers, Virtues, and all to whom He wills that God should be revealed.
[3245] Ps. civ. 2, 4.
[3246] Isa. xl. 12, 22.
[3247] Irenæus was evidently familiar with Horace; comp. Ars. Poet., 300.
[3248] Matt. vii. 7.
[3249] The punctuation is here doubtful. With Massuet and Stieren we expunge "vel" from the text.
[3250] Or, "the Scriptures of the Lord;" but the words "dominicis scripturis" probably here represent the Greek kurion graphon, and are to be rendered as above.
[3251] 2 Cor. xii. 2, 3, 4.
[3252] "Inciperet fieri;" perhaps for "futurus esset," was to be.
[3253] "Quartum coelum;" there still being, according to their theory of seven heavens, a fourth beyond that to which St. Paul had penetrated.
[3254] 2 Cor. xii. 3, defectively quoted.
[3255] This is an exceedingly obscure and difficult sentence. Grabe and some of the later editors read, "uti neque non corpus," thus making Irenæus affirm that the body did participate in the vision. But Massuet contends strenuously that this is contrary to the author's purpose, as wishing to maintain, against a possible exception of the Valentinians, that Paul then witnessed spiritual realities, and by omitting this "non" before "corpus," makes Irenæus deny that the body was a partaker in the vision. The point can only be doubtfully decided, but Massuet's ingenious note inclines us to his side of the question.
[3256] "Præstat dignis:" here a very ambiguous expression.
[3257] That is, as Massuet notes, all things derive not only their existence, but their qualities, from His will. Harvey proposes to read causa instead of substantia, but the change seems needless.
[3258] Heb. i. 3.
[3259] That is, Barbelos: comp. i. 29, 1.
[3260] "Tradunt;" literally, hand down.