On the Creation of the World (149-150)

Accordingly, Moses says, that God brought all the animals to man, wishing to see what names he would give to each. Not because he was in doubt, for nothing is unknown to God, but because he knew that he had formed in mortal man a rational nature capable of moving of its own accord, in order that he might be free from all participation in vice. But he was now trying him as a master might try his pupil, stirring up the disposition which he had implanted in him; and moreover exciting him to a contemplation of his own works, that he might extemporise them names which should not be inappropriate nor unbecoming, but which should well and clearly display the peculiar qualities of the different subjects.

For as the rational nature was as yet uncorrupted in the soul, and as no weakness, or disease, or affliction had as yet come upon it, man having most pure and perfect perceptions of bodies and of things, devised names for them with great felicity and correctness of judgment, forming very admirable opinions as to the qualities which they displayed, so that their natures were at