Lactantius, Divine Institutes 1.8
So many and such weighty witnesses confirm that the world is governed by the power and providence of one God. Plato declares in the Timaeus that this God's power and majesty are so great that no one can conceive them in mind or express them in words, because the power is excessive and inestimable. If anyone still doubts whether anything is difficult or impossible for God, consider: he devised such great and wondrous works by providence, established them by virtue, perfected them by reason, now sustains them by spirit, and moderates them by power — a being incomprehensible, ineffable, and known adequately to no one but himself.
When I reflect often on such majesty, those who worship gods sometimes strike me as so blind, so unthinking, so foolish, and not much different from mute beasts. They believe that beings born from the union of male and female can possess some divine majesty and virtue, even though the Erythraean Sibyl says, 'No man formed from the thighs and womb of a woman can be God.' Since this is true, it follows that Hercules, Apollo, Bacchus, Mercury, and Jupiter himself — along with the rest — were men, because they were born of two sexes.
What could be more remote from God than the very work he gave mortals for propagating offspring, a work that cannot exist without bodily substance? If the gods are immortal and eternal, what need is there for another sex — namely, to generate? What need is there for progeny, since they lack no succession, being forever? In humans and other animals, the diversity of sex, union, and generation serves no other purpose than to preserve all kinds of living things by mutual succession, because they are subject to mortality. But for God, who is eternal, neither another sex nor succession is necessary.
Someone will object: 'So that he may have ministers or those over whom he can rule.' Then what need is there for the female sex, since God, who is omnipotent as he is called, can procreate sons without the use or work of a woman? If he has granted certain small animals the ability to be born from leaves and sweet herbs and to gather them with their mouths, why would anyone think that God himself cannot generate except by the mixture of another sex?
Therefore, no one is so thoughtless as not to understand that those whom the ignorant and foolish call and worship as gods were mortals. 'How, then,' someone asks, 'were they believed to be gods?' Precisely because they were the greatest and most powerful kings, and on account of the merits of their virtues, or gifts, or discovered arts. Since they were dear to those they ruled, they were consecrated to memory. If anyone doubts this, let him consider their deeds and actions, which both ancient poets and historians have handed down.
Latin
His igitur tot ac tantis testibus conprobatur unius dei potestate ac prouidentia mundum gubernari, cuius uim maiestatemque tantam esse dicit in Timaeo Plato, ut eam neque mente concipere neque uerbis enarrare quisquam possit ob) nimiam et inaestimabilem potestatem. dubitet uero aliquis an quicquam difficile aut inpossibile sit deo, qui tanta tamque mirifica opera prouidentia excogitauit, uirtute constituit, ratione perfecit, nunc autem spiritu sustentet, potestate moderetur, inexcogitabilis ineffabilis et nulli alii satis notus quam sibi? unde mihi de tanta maiestate saepius cogitanti qui deos colunt interdum uideri solent tam caeci, tam incogitabiles, tam excordes, tam non multum a mutis animalibus differentes, qui credant eos qui geniti sint maris ac feminae coitu aliquid maiestatis diuinaeque uirtutis habere potuisse, cum Sibylla Erythraea dicat: ou οὐ δύνατ' ἀνδρὸς ἑϰ μηρῶν μήτρας τε θεὸς τετυπωμένος εἶναι. quod si est uerum, sicuti est, apparet Herculem Apollinem Liberum Mercurium Iouemque ipsum cum ceteris homines fuisse, quoniam sunt ex duobus sexibus nati. quid est autem a deo tam remotum quam id opus, quod ipse ad propagandam subolem mortalibus tribuit et quod sine substantia corporali nullum potest esse? dii ergo si sunt inmortales et aeterni, quid opus est altero sexu — nimirum ut generent? ipsa progenie quid opus est, cum successione non egeant qui semper sunt futuri? nam profecto in hominibus ceterisque animantibus diuersitas sexus et coitio et generatio nullam habet aliam rationem nisi ut omnia genera uiuentium, quoniam sunt condicione mortalitatis obitura, mutua possint successione seruari, deo autem, qui est sempiternus, neque alter sexus neque successio necessaria est. dicet aliquis ut habeat uel ministros uel in quos possit ipse dominari.' quid igitur sexu opus est feminino, cum deus, qui est omnipotens ut uocatur, sine usu et opera feminae possit. filios procreare? nam si quibusdam minutis animalibus id praestitit, ut sibi e foliis natos et suauibus herbis ore legant, cur existimet aliquis ipsum deum nisi ex permixtione sexus alterius non posse generare? illos igitur quos inperiti et insipientes tamquam deos et nuncupant et adorant, nemo est tam inconsideratus quin intellegat fuisse mortales. 'quomodo ergo' inquiet aliquis 'dii crediti sunt?' nimirum quia reges maximi ac potentissimi fuerunt, ob merita uirtutum suarum aut munerum aut artium repertarum, cum cari fuissent iis quibus inperitauerant, in memoriam sunt consecrati. quod si quis dubitat, res eorum gestas et facta consideret, quae uniuersa tam poetae quam historici ueteres prodiderunt.