The Book of the Concord of the Koran or Law of Muhammad and the Evangelists

A large decorative woodcut initial 'Q' set in a square frame, embellished with intricate foliage and scrolled vine patterns.

When in previous years I was thinking about the account to be rendered to God for my past life, and was meditating on offering to divine providence—the giver of all things—at least some tithes from that variety of languages and disciplines of which I had conceived at least some taste or knowledge, it came to mind that I could in no way better prove myself to the first cause than by using the same diligence with which I had pursued the arguments of human philosophy in the true scope of religion, as I was teaching from nature. Nor do I acknowledge in myself so much goodness or learning that I would have dared or thought to undertake this task by myself. For unless God (and I do not fear to confess what cannot be hidden from God) had led me from the most depraved fluctuation of the courtly mask into this more tranquil reflection of mind, and had performed what He suggested, undoubtedly, although I had long meditated on this subject matter which I presented in the first book, I was thinking of nothing less than this matter when I began. I will say, therefore, and I do so freely, having called Iesum Christum Jesus Christ to witness that I do not lie: because of my most wicked life, the horrible appearance of divine judgment was once and again before my eyes, with Jesus Christ demanding an account of my past life before I descended to this subject matter. And indeed, the brevity of a tight time has caused me to believe that I was helped by a certain divine favor in writing it. For I collected the work of the four books On the Concordance of the World from commentaries, a volume slightly smaller in bulk than Augustini de ciuitate dei Augustine's City of God, and at least twice the works of Lactantij opera Lactantius,