"As man now is, God once was..."

One early LDS leader proclaimed, "As man now is, God once was. As God now is, man may be" (Lorenzo Snow). Latter-day Saints speak of man as a god in embryo”

Also in the second century, Saint Clement of Alexandria wrote, "Yea, I say, the Word of God became a man so that you might learn from a man how to become a god." (Clement of Alexandria, Exhortation to the Greeks, 1.)-almost a paraphrase of Lorenzo Snow's statement. Clement also said that "if one knows himself, he will know God, and knowing God will become like God.... His is beauty, true beauty, for it is God, and that man becomes a god, since God wills it. So Heraclitus was right when he said,'Men are gods, and gods are men.'"( Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor, 3.1 See also Clement, Stromateis, 23.)

This very theme of "God became man so man could be come god," runs through all the writings of the Church Fathers.