What is This God?

And what is this God?

I asked the earth and it answered: "I am not He" and all things that are in the earth made the same confession.

I asked the sea and the deeps and the creeping things, and they answered: "We are not your God; seek higher."

I asked the winds that blow, and th ewhole aor with all that is in it andwered, "Anaximenes was wrong; I am not God."

I asked the heavens, the sun, the moon, the stars, and they answered: "Neither are we God whom you seek."

And I said to all the things that throng about the gateways of the senses: "Tell me of my God, since you are not He. Tell me something of Him."

And they cried out in a great voice: "He made us."

My question was my gazing upon them, and their answer was their beauty.

Augustine, Confessions, 10 vi, trans F J Sheed.