§ 10.
This being established, if it is asked, “What then is God?” I answer that the word imports that universal Being “in whom,” as St. Paul says, “we live, and move, and have our being.[3]” This opinion conveys no unworthy notions of the Divinity, for if all things are in God, all things must necessarily flow from his essence, and consequently be of such essence as he himself; for it is impossible to conceive that beings entirely material should be maintained and comprehended in a Being who is not so. This opinion is not new. Tertullian, one of the most learned of the Christian fathers, maintained in his discourse against Appelles, that whatever is not corporeal is nothing; and in that against Praxeas that every Existence is a body. He adds, “who will deny that God is a body, although God is a Spirit[4]?” It is of importance to observe that this doctrine was not condemned in any of the four first Œcumenical or General Councils of the Christian Church.[5]