על הנטיעה ב׳Concerning Noah's Work as a Planter 2
א׳
1[5] We must consider, therefore, where He caused its roots to strike, and on what it rests as a statue on its pedestal. It is unlikely that any material body has been left over and was moving about at random outside, seeing that God had wrought up and placed in orderly position all matter wherever found.
ב׳
2[6] For it became the greatest artificer to fashion to full perfection the greatest of constructions, and it would have come short of full perfection, had it not had a complement of perfect parts. Accordingly this world of ours was formed out of all that there is of earth, and all that there is of water, and air and fire, not even the smallest particle being left outside.
ג׳
3[7] It follows that outside there is either empty space or nothing at all. If there is empty space, how comes it that a thing that is full and dense and heaviest of all existences does not sink down by sheer weight, having nothing solid external to it to hold it up? This would seem to be of the nature of a phantom, since our understanding ever looks for a material basis, which it expects everything to have, even if it be but an empty thing, but above all the world, since it is the largest of material bodies, and holds in its bosom as parts of itself a mass of other material bodies.
ד׳
4[8] Let anyone then, who would fain escape the confusion of face, which we all feel when we have to leave problems unsolved, say plainly that no material thing is so strong as to be able to bear the burden of the world; and that the everlasting Word of the eternal God is the very sure and staunch prop of the Whole.
ה׳
5[9] He it is, who extending Himself from the midst to its utmost bounds and from its extremities to the midst again, keeps up through all its length Nature’s unvanquished course, combining and compacting all its parts. For the Father Who begat Him constituted His Word such a Bond of the Universe as nothing can break.
ו׳
6[10] Good reason, then, have we to be sure that all the earth shall not be dissolved by all the water which has gathered within its hollows; nor fire be quenched by air; nor, on the other hand, air be ignited by fire. The Divine Word stations Himself to keep these elements apart, like a Vocal between voiceless elements of speech, that the universe may send forth a harmony like that of a masterpiece of literature. He mediates between the opponents amid their threatenings, and reconciles them by winning ways to peace and concord.
