5
For by the greatness and beauty of the creation, proportionately the Maker of them is seen.
6
But yet for this they are the less to be blamed; for they perhaps err, seeking God and desirous to find Him.
7
For accustomed to dwelling among His works, they search Him out diligently and believe their sight, because the things are beautiful that are seen.
8
However, neither are they to be pardoned.
9
For if they were able to know so much that they could contemplate the world, how did they not sooner find out the Lord thereof?
10
But miserable are they, and in dead things is their hope, who called them gods which are the works of men's hands, gold and silver, artfully wrought, and resemblances of beasts or a stone good for nothing, the work of an ancient hand. Œ
11
Now a carpenter who felleth timber, after he hath sawn down a tree meet for the purpose, and taken off all the bark skillfully round about, and hath wrought it handsomely and made a vessel thereof fit for the service of man's life;
12
and, after spending the refuse of his work to dress his meat, hath filled himself;
13
and, taking the very refuse among those which served to no use (being a crooked piece of wood and full of knots), hath carved it diligently when he had nothing else to do, and formed it by the skill of his understanding, and fashioned it to the image of a man;
14
or made it like some vile beast, laying it over with vermilion, and with paint coloring it red and covering every spot therein;
15
and, when he had made a convenient room for it, set it in a wall and made it fast with iron