_Son._ There were a few things but not many. I have heard it quoted from Lucifer’s words that he intended to set his throne as high as that of God; but the answer that God gave to this I had never heard interpreted before, but now you have explained it.
_Father._ Let me ask again: who do you suppose it was that, standing by, heard Lucifer’s boastful and treacherous words and quoted them afterwards?
_Son._ I have never heard his name spoken and I am not sure that they were told by any one who heard them at the beginning.
_Father._ But this you shall know of a surety, that if Lucifer’s words have been quoted by one who heard them in the beginning, he surely must have heard those replies of God also, which I have just given; and he could have reported both speeches, had he wished, since he heard either both or neither. But if he reported Lucifer’s treacherous boasting as he divined it, he surely could have thought out God’s truthful statement of his vengeance in the same way; for either both or neither would be true. For at the very moment when Lucifer transgressed, whether in thought or in words, God had already purposed all the vengeance that was to befall him from the first hour to the last. So great and all-sufficient are God’s thoughts and wisdom, that the vision of the divine foresight sees in the twinkling of an eye all the events that shall come to pass from the first hour to the very last. But He withholds in divine patience all the things that He intends shall come to pass, until suitable times appear; and He will let everything happen as He has purposed it heretofore. Now if God should have endowed any one with such great insight and wisdom that he could know all the thoughts of God and should report them as if God had disclosed them in word or speech, he would by no means be telling falsehoods; for all that God has purposed has been told him in his thoughts, whether his lips have spoken about them or not. The apostle Paul tells us that God has given men his Holy Spirit with a definite office and activity: some receive a spirit of prophecy, some a spirit of knowledge and wisdom, some a spirit of eloquence, some a spirit of understanding, and some a spirit of skill;[297] some have these gifts in large measure, others in less; some enjoy one of these gifts, others two, still others three, while some have all, each one as God wills to endow him.