For that God is never in any way the cause of evil may be proved by many arguments; but at present we shall only adduce what Plato[40] says: viz. “that as it is not the province of what is hot to refrigerate, but the contrary; so neither is it the province of that which is beneficent to be noxious, but the contrary.” Moreover, God being good, and immediately replete from the beginning with every virtue, cannot be noxious, or the cause to any one of evil; but on the contrary, must impart every good to those who are willing to receive it; bestowing on us, also, such media[41] as are according to nature, and which are effective of what is conformable to nature. But there is only one cause of evil[42]. HOW WE OUGHT TO CONDUCT OURSELVES TOWARDS OUR COUNTRY. After speaking of the Gods, it is most reasonable to show, in the next place, how we should conduct ourselves towards our country. For, by Jupiter, our country is as it were a certain secondary God, and our first and greatest parent. Hence he who gave a name to the thing did not rashly denominate it πατρις, _patris_; this word being derived from πατηρ, _pater_, _a father_; but pronounced with a feminine termination, in order that it might be as it were a mixture of _father and mother_. This reason, also, proclaims that our country is to be honoured equally with our two parents; so that we ought to prefer it to either of them taken separately, and not to honour the two more than it; but to pay an equal portion of respect to each. There is, likewise, another reason, which exhorts us to honour it more than our two parents conjointly; and not only to honour it beyond these, but also to prefer it to our wife, children, and friends; and, in short, after the Gods, to all other things.