"

The point, however, with which we are now concerned is, _that whilst
they believed in one supreme, uncreated, eternal God, they at the same
time recognized the existence of a plurality of generated deities who
owe their existence to the power and will of the Supreme God, and who,
as the agents and ministers of His universal providence, preside over
different departments of the created universe_. They are at once
Monotheists and Polytheists--believers in "one God" and "many gods."
This is a peculiarity, an anomaly which challenges our attention, and
demands an explanation, if we would vindicate for these philosophers a
rational Theism.

Now that there can be but one infinite and absolutely perfect Being--one
supreme, uncreated, eternal God--is self-evident; therefore a
multiplicity of such gods is a contradiction and an impossibility. The
early philosophers knew this as well as the modern. The Deity, in order
to be Deity, must be one and not many: must be perfect or nothing. If,
therefore, we would do justice to these old Greeks, we must inquire what
explanations they have offered in regard to "the many gods" of which
they speak. We must ascertain whether they regarded these "gods" as
created or uncreated beings, dependent or independent, temporal or
eternal We must inquire in what sense the term "god" is applied to these
lesser divinities,--whether it is not applied in an accommodated and
therefore allowable sense, as in the sacred Scriptures it is applied to
kings and magistrates, and those who are appointed by God as the
teachers and rulers of men. "_They are called gods_ to whom the word of
God came."[184] And if it shall be found that all the gods of which they
speak, save _one_, are "generated deities"--dependent beings--creatures
and subjects of the one eternal King and Father, and that the name of
"god" is applied to them in an accommodated sense, then we have
vindicated for the old Greek philosophers a consistent and rational
Theism. In what relation, then, do the philosophers place "_the gods_"
to the one Supreme Being?

_Thales_, one of the most ancient of the Greek philosophers, taught the
existence of a plurality of gods, as is evident from that saying of his,
preserved by Diogenes Laertius, "The world has life, and is full of
gods."[185] At the same time he asserts his belief in one supreme,
uncreated Deity; "God is the oldest of all things, because he is unmade,
or ungenerated."[186] All the other go