Both the Sibyl and Hystaspes declared that there would be a destruction of corruptible things by fire. And the philosophers called Stoics teach that even God himself is resolved into fire, and again say that the world comes into being by a process of change; but we conceive of God, the Maker of all, as something better than the things that change. If, then, we say in some respects things similar to those held in honor among you—the poets and philosophers—and in some respects say things greater and divine, and we alone with proof, why are we unjustly hated above all others? For in saying that all things were ordered and made by God, we shall seem to be uttering the doctrine of Plato; and in saying that there will be a conflagration, that of the Stoics; and in saying that the souls of the unjust, even after death, are in a state of perception and are punished, while those of the worthy, freed from punishments, fare well, we shall seem to be saying the same as the poets and philosophers; and in saying that one ought not to worship the works of men's hands, we say the same as Menander the comic poet and those who said these things; for they declared the craftsman to be greater than the thing fashioned.