5. THE UNITY OF GOD. As the acknowledgment of God from a knowledge of God is the very essence and soul of the entire contents of theology, it is necessary that the unity of God should be the first thing treated of. This shall be set forth in order in the following sections:
(1) The entire Holy Scripture, and the doctrines therefrom of the churches in the Christian world, teach that God is one. (2) There is a universal influx [from God] into the souls of men of the truth that there is a God, and that He is one. (3) For this reason there is in all the world no nation possessing religion and sound reason that does not acknowledge a God, and that God is one. (4) Respecting what the one God is, nations and peoples have differed and still differ, from many causes. (5) Human reason can, if it will, perceive and be convinced, from many things in the world, that there is a God, and that He is one. (6) If God were not one, the universe could not have been created and preserved. (7) Whoever does not acknowledge a God is excommunicated from the church and condemned. (8) With the man who acknowledges several Gods instead of one, there is no coherence in the things relating to the church. These propositions shall be unfolded one by one.