This treatise and that which in the editions of Athanasius immediately precedes it, the contra Gentes, were often counted as two parts of a single work. The two books belong to the earlier years of Athanasius: the Arian controversy which broke out about 319 has left no trace upon them. The Contra Gentes leaves the reader face to face with this necessity of restoration by the Divine Word as the remedy for corrupt human nature. How this necessity is met in the Incarnation is shown in the pag...