The Word at Work in All Things

The holy Word of the Father, then, almighty and all-perfect, has united himself with the universe and unfolded his own powers everywhere. He has given light to all things, both seen and unseen, and holds them together and binds them to himself, leaving nothing empty of his own power. On the contrary, he gives life to all things everywhere and sustains them, each one singly and all together. He mingles in one the basic elements of everything the senses perceive, namely heat and cold and wet and dry, and makes them not conflict but form one harmonious whole. Because of him and his power, fire does not fight with cold, nor wet with dry. Elements opposed to one another combine as if they were friends and brothers, give life to the things we see, and form the elements by which bodies exist. Obeying him, God the Word, things on earth have life and things in the heaven have their order. Because of him all the sea and the great ocean move within their proper bounds, while, as we said above, the dry land grows grass and is clothed with all kinds of different plants. And, not to spend time listing particulars where the truth is obvious, nothing exists or happens that has not been made by him and through him and does not stand by him. As the Theologian also says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him, and without him nothing was made.” [a]

Suppose some musician tuned a lyre, and by his art fitted the high notes to the low and the middle notes to the rest, and produced a single tune as the result. In the same way the Wisdom of God handles the universe like a lyre. He fits things in the air to things on the earth, and things in the heaven to things in the air, joins parts into wholes, and moves them all by his nod and will. So he produces, well and fittingly, the oneness of the universe and of its order, while he himself remains unmoved with the Father and moves all things by his ordering work, as seems good to his own Father for each. For what is wonderful in his Godhead is this: by one and the same act of will he moves all things at once, not one after another but all together, both straight and curved, things above, below and in between, wet, cold, warm, seen and unseen, and he orders each according to its own nature. At his single nod, what is straight moves as straight, what is curved moves as curved, and what is in between follows its own movement. What is warm receives warmth, and what is dry receives dryness, and all things, each according to its own nature, are given life and order by him. And so he produces a marvelous and truly divine harmony.