however, as you say, the Son came into being for the purpose of making the things after Him, and yet the Father is seen to work even after the Son, you must hold even in this light the making of such a Son to be superfluous. Besides, why, when He would create us, does He seek for a mediator at all, as if His will did not suffice to constitute whatever seemed good to Him? Yet the Scriptures say, ‘He hath done whatsoever pleased HimS,’ and ‘Who hath resisted His will®?’ And if His mere will7 is sufficient for the framing of all things, you make the office of a mediator superfluous; for your instance of Moses, and the sun and the moon has been shewn not to hold. And here again is an argument to silence you. You say that God, willing the creation of originated nature, and deliberating concerning it, designs and creates the Son, that through Him He may frame us; now, if so, consider how great an irreligion® you have dared to utter.
30. First, the Son appears rather to have been for us brought to be, than we for Him; for we were not created for Him, but He is made for us?; so that He owes thanks to us, not we to Him, as the woman to the man. ‘For the man,’ says Scripture, ‘was not created for the woman, but the woman for the man.’ Therefore, as ‘the man is the image and glory of God, and the woman the glory of the man’,’ so we are made God’s image and to His glory; but the Son is our image, and exists for our glory. And we were brought into being that we might be; but God’s Word was made, as you must hold, not that He might be'; but as an instrument? for our need, so that not we from Him, but He is constituted from our need. Are not men who even conceive such thoughts, more than insensate? For if for us the Word was made, He has not precedence 3 of us with God; for He did not take counsel about us having Him within Him, but having us in Himself, counselled, as they say, concerning His own Word. But if so, perchance the Father had not even a will for the Son at all; for not as having a will for Him, did He create Him, but with a will for us, He formed Him for our sake; for He designed Him after designing us; so that, according to these irreligious men, henceforth the Son, who was made as an instrument, 1s superfluous, now that they are made for whom He was created. But if the Son alone was made by God alone, because He could endure it, but we, because we could not, ee ee ee ee ee ee 8 Notes on § 58, and de Decr. x, , Oe Gor sth 94 Gh 2 opyavov, supr. i. 26, n. 5, were made by the Word, why does He not first take counsel about the Word, who could endure His making, instead of taking counsel about us? or why does He not make more of Him who was strong, than of us who were weak? or why making Him first, does He not counsel about Him first? or why counselling about us first, does He not make us first, His will being sufficient for the constitution of all things? But He creates Him first, yet counsels first about us; and He wills us before the Mediator; and when He wills to create us, and counsels about us, He calls us creatures; but Him, whom He frames for us, He calls Son and proper Heir. But we, for whose sake He made Him, ought rather to be called sons; or certainly He, who is His Son, is rather the object of His previous thoughts and of His will, for whom He makes all us. Such the sickness, such the vomit# of the heretics.
CHAPTER XVII INTRODUCTION TO PROVERBS Viil. 22 CONTINUED.
Contrast between the Father’s operations immediately and naturally in the Son, instrumentally by the creatures; Scripture terms illustrative of this. Explanation of these illustrations; which should be interpreted by the doctrine of the Church; perverse sense put on them by the Arians, refuted. Mystery of Divine Generation. Contrast between God’s Word and man’s word drawn out at length. Asterius betrayed into holding two Unoriginates; his inconsistency. Baptism how by the Son as well as by the Father. On the Baptism of heretics. Why Arian worse than other heresies.
31. Bur the sentiment of Truth®* in this matter must not be hidden, but must have high utterance. For the Word of God was nct made for us, but rather we for Him, and ‘in Him all things were created*.’ Nor for that we were weak, was He strong and made by the Father alone, that He might frame us by means of Him as an instrument; perish the thought! it is not so. For though it had seemed good to God not to make things originate, still had the Word been no less with God, and the Father in Him. At the same time, things originate could not without the Word be brought to be; hence they were made through Him,—and reasonably. For since the Word is the Son of God by nature proper to His essence, and is from Him, and in Him3, as He said Himself, the creatures could not have come to be, except through Him. For as the light enlightens all things by its radiance, and without its radiance nothing would be illuminated, so also the Father, as by 4 &uerou Kat vavTior; vavTiat sea-sickness; Epictetus, in a somewhat similar sense, ‘There is great danger of pouring forth straightway, what one has not digested.’ Buchiria. 46, DISCOURSE II.
ee a hand 4, in the Word wrought all things, and without Him makes nothing. For instance, God said, as Moses relates, ‘Let there be light,” and ‘Let the waters be gathered together,’ and ‘let the dry land appear,’ and ‘Let Us make man5;’ as also Holy David in the Psalm, ‘ He spake and they were made; He commanded and they were created 6’ And He spoke’, not that, as in the case of men, some under-worker might hear, and learning the will of Him who spoke might go away and do it; for this is what is proper to creatures, but it is unseemly so to think or speak of the Word. For the Word of God is Framer and Maker, and He is the Father’s Will’. Hence it is that divine Scripture says not that one heard and answered, as to the manner or nature of the things which He wished made; but God only said, ‘Let it become,’ and he adds, ‘ And it became;’ for what He thought good and coun. selled, that forthwith the Word began to do and to finish. For when God commands others, whether the Angels, or converses with Moses, or commands Abraham, then the hearer answers; and the one says, ‘Whereby shall I know9?’ and the other, ‘Send some one else’;’ and again, ‘ If they ask me, what is His Name, what shall I say to them*?’ and the Angel said to Zacharias,.‘ Thus saith the Lord’?;’ and he asked the Lord, ‘O Lord of hosts, how long wilt Thou not have mercy on Jerusalem?’ and waits to hear good words and comfortable. For each of these has the Mediator'3 Word, and the Wisdom of God which makes known the will of the Father. But when that Word Himself works and creates, then there is no questioning and answer, for the Father is in Him and the Word in the Father; but it suffices to will, and the work is done; so that the word ‘ He said’ is a token of the will for our sake, and ‘It was so,’ denotes the work which 4 ds dca xerpds. vid. sufr. p. 155, note6 And so in Orat. iv. 26, a. de Incarn. conti. Arian, 12. a. Kpatord XEip TOU TaTpds, Method. de Creat. ap. Phot. cod. 235. p. 937- Iren. Her. iv. 20, n. x. v. 1 fin. and. 5. n. 2. and 6. n. 1. Clement. Protrept. p. 93. (ed. Potter.) Tertull. contr. Hermog. 45. Cypr. Testim. ii. 4. Euseb. in Psaim cviii. 27. Clement. Recogn. viii. 43. Clement. How. xvi. 12, Cyril. Alex. frequently, e.g. 7 Joan. pp. 876, 7. Thesaur. p- 154. Pseudo-Basil. xetp Snucoupy:kn, contr. Hunom. v. p. 297. Job. ap. Phot. 222. p. 582. and August. 77 Joann. 48, 7. though he prefers another use of the word.
7 Vid. de Decr. 9. contr. Gent. 46. Iren. Her. ili. 8. n. 3. Origen contr. Cels. ii. 9. Tertull. adv. Prax. 12. fin. Patres Antioch. af. Routh t. 2. p. 468. Prosper iz Psalm. 148. (149.) Basil. de Sf. S. n. 20. Hilar. Trim. iv. 16. vid. SUupr. § 22, note. Didym. de Sf. S. 36. August. de Trin. i. 26. On this mystery vid. Petav. 7rin. vi. 4. A } 8 Bovayj. And so BovAyats presently; and aaa Bovdn, supr. 2. and Orat. iii. 63. fin. and so Cyril Tes. p..54, who uses it expressly (as it is always used by implication), in contrast to the kara BovAnow of the Arians, though Athan. uses kara ro BovAnua, e.g. Orat. iii. 31. where vid. note; abrds Tov marpos GeAnwa. Nyss. contr. Eunom. xii. p. 345. The principle to be observed in the use of such words is this; that we must ever speak of the Father’s will, command, &c., and the Son’s fulfilment, assent, &c., as one act. vid. notes on Ovat, iii. 11 and 15. 7zfr. (Cf. p. 87. note 2.]
9 Gen. xv. 8. 10 Ex. iv. 13. mr Tb ill. 13.
6 Ps, clxviii. 5.
is done through the Word and the Wisdom, in which Wisdom also is the Will of the Father. And ‘God said’ is explained in ‘the Word,’ for, he says, ‘Thou hast made all things in Wisdom;’ and ‘ By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made fast;? and ‘ There is one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by Him®.’
32. It is plain from this that the Arians are not fighting with us about their heresy; but while they pretend us, their real fight is against the Godhead Itself. For if the voice were ours which says, ‘ This is My Son?,’ small were our complaint of them; but if it is the Father’s voice, and the disciples heard it, and the Son too says of Himself, ‘ Before all the mountains He begat me3,’ are they not fighting against God, as the giants+ in story, having their tongue, as the Psalmist says, a sharp sword 5 for irreligion? For they neither feared the voice of the Father, nor reverenced the Saviour’s words, nor trusted the Saints, one of whom writes, ‘Who being the Brightness of His glory and the Expression of His subsistence,’ and ‘ Christ the power of God and the Wisdom of God®; and another says in the Psalm, ‘With Thee is the well of life, and in Thy Light shall we see light,’ and ‘Thou madest all things in Wisdom7;’ and the Prophets say, ‘And the Word of the Lord came to me®;’ and John, ‘In the beginning was the Word; and Luke, ‘As they delivered them unto us which from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word9;’ and as David again says, ‘He sent His Word and healed them'*®.’? All these passages proscribe in every light the Arian heresy, and signify the eternity of the Word, and that He is not foreign but proper to the Father’s Essence. For when saw any one light without radiance? or who dares to say that the expression can be different from the subsistence? or has not a man himself lost his mind™ who even entertains the thought that God was ever without Reason and without Wisdom? For such illustrations and such images has Scripture proposed, that, considering the inability of human nature to comprehend God, we might be able to form ideas even from these however poorly and dimly, and as far as is attainable’. And as the creation contains 1 Ps, civ. 243 xxxiii. 6; 1 Cor. vili. 6. 2 Vid. Matt. Xvi. 5. 3 Prov. viii. 25, LXX.: 4 ToVs pudevopevous ylyavras, vid. supr. de Decr. fin. Also as rovs ylyavras, Orat. ili. 42. In Hist. Arian. 74. he calls Constantius a ylyas. ‘The same idea is implied in the word @copaxos so frequently applied to Arianism, as in this sentence.
1 Vid. p. 150, n. 6, also Gent. 40 fin. where what is here, as commonly, applied to the Arians, is, before the rise of Arianism, applied to unbelievers. j ‘a abundant matter for the knowledge of the being of a God and a Providence (‘for by the ‘greatness and beauty of the creatures proportionably the Maker of them is seen *3’), and we learn from them without asking for voices, but hearing the Scriptures we believe, and surveying the very order and the harmony of all things, we acknowledge that He is Maker and Lord and God of all, and apprehend His marvellous Providence and governance over all things; so in like manner about the Son’s Godhead, what has been above said is suffcient, and it becomes superfluous, or rather it is very mad to dispute about it, or to ask in an heretical way, How can the Son be from eternity? or how can He be from the Father’s | Essence, yet not a part? since what is said to be of another, is a part of him; and what is divided, is not whole.
33. These are the evil sophistries of the heterodox; yet, though we have already shewn their shallowness, the exact sense of these passages themselves and the force of these illustrations will serve to shew the baseless nature of their loathsome tenet. For we see that reason is ever, and is from him and proper to his essence, whose reason it is, and does not admit a before and an after. So again we see that the radiance from the sun is proper to it, and the sun’s essence is not divided or impaired; but its essence is whole and its radiance perfect and whole, yet without impairing the essence of light, but as a true offspring from it. We understand in like manner that the Son is begotten not from without but from the Father, and while the Father remains whole, the Expression of His Subsistence is ever, and preserves the Father’s likeness and unvarying Image, so that he who sees Him, sees in Him the Subsistence too, of which He is the Expression. And from the operation of the Expression we understand the true Godhead of the Subsistence, as the Saviour Himself teaches when He says, ‘The Father who dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works?’ which I do; and ‘I and the Father are one,’ and ‘I in the Father and the Father in Me3,’_ Therefore let this Christ-opposing heresy attempt 41,n.1. Ln illud Omnia 3 fin. vid. also 6. Aug. Confess. xiii. 11. And again, Tyzz. xv. 39, And S. Basil contr. Zunom. ii. 17.
13 Wisd. xili. 5.
t The Second Person in the Holy Trinity is not a quality of attribute or relation, but the One Eternal Substance; not a part of the First Person, but whole or entire God; nor does the generation impair the Father’s Substance, which is, antecedently to it, whole and entire God. Thus there are two Persons, in Kach Other ineffably, Each being wholly one and the same Divine Substance, yet not being merely separate aspects of the Same, Each being God as absolutely as if there were no other Divine Person but Himself. Such a statement indeed is not only a contradiction in the terms used, but in our ideas, yet not therefore a contradiction in fact; unless indeed any one will say that human words can express in one formula, or human thought embrace in one idea, the unknown and infinite God. Basil. cont). Enn. i. 10. vid. infr, § 38, n. 3- 2 John xiv. 10, 3 John x. 30, first to divide‘ the examples found in things originate, and say, ‘Once the sun was without his radiance,’ or, ‘Radiance is not proper to the essence of light,’ or ‘It is indeed proper, but it is a part of light by division; and then let it divide Reason, and pronounce that it is foreign to mind, or that once it was not, or that it was not proper to its essence, or that it is by division a part of mind. And so of His Expression and the Light and the Power, let it do violence to these as in the case of Reason and Radiance; and instead let it imagine what it wills, But if such extravagance be impossible for them, are they not greatly beside themselves, presumptuously intruding into what is higher than things originate and their own nature, and essaying impossibilities °?
34. For if in the case of these originate and irrational things offsprings are found which are not parts of the essences from which they are, nor subsist with passion, nor impair the essences of their originals, are they not mad again in seeking and conjecturing parts and passions in the instance of the immaterial and true God, and ascribing divisions to Him who is beyond passion and change, thereby to perplex the ears of the simple? and to pervert them from the Truth? for who hears of a son but conceives of that which is proper to the father’s essence? who heard, in his first catechising?, that God has a Son and has made all things by His proper Word, but understood it in that sense in which we now mean it? who on the rise of this odious heresy of the Arians, was not at once startled at what he heard, as strange3, and a second sowing, besides that Word which had been sown from the beginning? For what is sown in every soul from the beginning is that God has a Son, the Word, the Wisdom, the Power, that is, His Image and Radiance; from which it at once follows that He is always; that He is from the Father; that He is like; that He is the eternal offspring of His essence; and there is no idea involved in these of creature or work. But when the man who is an enemy, while men slept, made a second sowing 4, of ‘He is a creature,’ and ‘There was once when He was not,’ and ‘How can it be?’ thenceforth the wicked heresy of Christ’s enemies rose as tares, and forthwith, as bereft of every 1 Cf. p. 69, notes 7 and 8. Sy De eC zeuleoe 3 He here makes the test of the truth of explicit doctrinal statements to lie in their not shocking, or their answering to the religious sense of the Christian.
4 Vid. supr. de Decr. 2. n. 6, Tertullian de Carn. Christ. 17. S. Leo, as Athan. makes ‘seed’ in the parable apply peculiarly to Jaith in distinction to obedience. Serm. 69. § init.
© In illud Omn. 6. init. 2 De Decr.7, 0.23; De Syn.
DISCOURSE Hl.
right thought, they meddle5 like robbers, and venture to say, ‘How can the Son always exist with the Father?’ for men come of men and are sons, after a time; and the father is thirty years old, when the son begins to be, being begotten; and in short of every son of man, it is true that he was not before his generation. And again they whisper, ‘ How can the Son be Word, or the Word be God’s Image? for the word of men is composed of syllables ®, and only signifies the speaker’s will, and then is over? and is lost.’
35. They then afresh, as if forgetting the proofs which have been already urged against them, ‘ pierce themselves through *’ with these bonds of irreligion, and thus argue. But the word of truth? confutes them as follows:—if they were disputing concerning any man, then let them exercise reason in this human way, both concerning His Word and His Son; but if of God who created man, no longer let them entertain human thoughts, but others which are above human nature. Forsuch as he that begets, such of necessity is the offspring; and such as is the Word’s Father, such must be also His Word. Now man, begotten in time, in time 3 also himself begets the child; and whereas from nothing he came to be, therefore his word+ also is over and continues not. But God is not as man, as Scripture has said; but is existing and is ever; therefore also His Word is existing and is everlastingly with the Father, as radiance of light. And man’s word is composed of syllables, and neither lives nor operates anything, but is only significant of the speaker’s intention, and does but go forth and go by, no more to appear, since it was not at all before it was spoken; wherefore the word of man neither lives nor operates anything, nor in short is man. And this happens to it, as I said before, because man who begets it, has his nature out of nothing. But God’s Word is not merely pronounced, as one miay say, nor a sound of accents, nor by His Son is meant His command ®; but as radiance of light, so is He perfect offspring from perfect 7. Hence He is God also, as being God’s Image; for ‘ the Word was God 8,’ says Scripture. And man’s This can scarcely be, as Newman suggests, The Latin translates ‘ cir- 1 Vid. x Tim.
5 meprepydcovrar. an error of the press for wepeépxovrat. cumire coeperunt.
6 Orat. iv. 1.
26 rhs GAnBeias Adyos éAéyxet, This and the like are usual forms of speech with Athan. and others. In some instances the words dA7Geva, Adyos, &c., are almost synonymous with the Regula Fidei; vid. rapa thy adjndevay, 77i/r. 36. and Origen de Princ. Pref.
4 For this contrast between the Divine Word and the human which is Its shadow, vid. also Ovat. iv. 1. circ. fin. Iren. Her. ii. 13. n. 8. Origen. iz Joan. i. p. 25. e. Euseb. Demonstr. v. 5- p. 230. Cyril, Cat. xi. 10. Basil, How. xvi. 3. Nyssen contr. Lunom. xii. p. 350- Orat. Cas. i. p. 478. Damasc. /. O. i. 6. August. i Psalin xliv. 5. 5 Vid. Sevag. i. 28, a. 6 §31,n. 7.
7 mémavtat, Orat. iv. 2.
words avail not for operation; hence man works not by means of words but of hands, for they have being, and man’s word subsists not. But the ‘ Word of God,’ as the Apostle says, ‘is living and powerful and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight; but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do’ He is then Framer ofall, ‘ and without Him was made not one thing,’ nor can anything be made without Him.
36. Nor must we ask why the Word of God is not such as our word, considering God is not such as we, as has been before said; nor again is it night to seek how the word is from God, or how He is God’s radiance, or how God begets, and what is the manner of His begetting?. For a man must be beside himself to venture on such points; since a thing ineffable and proper to God’s nature, and known to Him alone and to the Son, this he demands to be explained in words. It is all one as if they sought where God is, and how God is, and of what nature the Father is. But as to ask such questions is irreligious, and argues an ignorance of God, so it is not holy to venture such questions concerning the generation of the Son of God, nor to measure God and His Wisdom by our own nature and infirmity. Nor is a person at liberty on that account to swerve in his thoughts from the truth, nor, if any one is perplexed in such inquiries, ought he to disbelieve what is written. For it is better in perplexity to be silent and believe, than to disbelieve on account of the perplexity: for he who is perplexed may in some way obtain mercy?, because, though he has questioned, he has yet kept quiet; but when a man is led by his perplexity into forming for himself doctrines which beseem not, and utters what is unworthy of God, such daring incurs a sentence without mercy. For in such perplexities divine Scripture is able to afford him some relief, so as to take rightly what is written, and to dwell upon our word as an illustration; that as it is proper to us and is from us, and not a work external to us, so also God’s Word is proper to Him and from Him, and is not a work; and yet is not like the word t Eusebius has some forcible remarks on this subject. As, he says, we do not know how God can create out of nothing, so we are utterly ignorant of the Divine Generation. It is written, He who believes, not he who knows, has eternal life. The sun’s radiance itself is but an earthly image, and gives us no true idea of that which is above all images. Zce/. Theol. 1. 12. So has S. Greg. Naz. Ovat. 29. 8. vid. also Hippol. zz Noe. 16. Cyril, Cat. xi. 11, and 19. and Origen, according to Mosheim, Axze Const. p. 6x9. And instances in Petav. de Trin. v. 6. § 2. and 3.
2 Cf. August. ZY. 43. init. vid. also de Baft. contr. Don. iv. 23 SM We en ee Ven A os ae ne of man, or else we must suppose God to be man. For observe, many and various are men’s words which pass away day by day; because those that come before others continue not, but vanish. Now this happens because their authors are men, and have seasons which pass away, and ideas which are successive; and what strikes them first and second, that they utter; so that they have many words, and yet after them all nothing at all remaining; for the speaker ceases, and his word forthwith is spent. But God’s Word is one and the same, and, as it is written, ‘The Word of God endureth for ever3,’ not changed, not before or after other, but existing the same always. For it was fitting, whereas God is One, that His Image should be One also, and His Word One, and One His Wisdom ¢.
37. Wherefore I am in wonder how, whereas God is One, these men introduce, after their private notions, many images and wisdoms and words 5, and say that the Father’s proper and natural Word is other than the Son, by whom He even made the Son 6, and that He who is really Son is but notionally 7 called Word, as vine, and way, and door, and tree of life; and that He is called Wisdom also in name, the proper and true Wisdom of the Father, which coexist ingenerately ® with Him, being other than the Son, by which He even made the Son, and named Him Wisdom as partaking of it. This they have not confined to words, but Arius composed in his Thalia, and the Sophist Asterius wrote, what we have stated above, as follows: ‘Blessed Paul said not that he preached Christ, the Power of God or the Wisdom of God, but without the addition of the article, ‘God’s power’ and ‘God’s wisdom9,’ thus preaching that the proper Power of God Himself which is natural to Him, and co-existent in Him ingenerately, is something besides, generative indeed of Christ,and creative of the whole world, concerning which he teaches in his Epistle to the Romans thus,—‘ The invisible 3 Vid. Ps. cxix. 89.
4 Vid. supr. 35. Orat. iv. x. also presently, ‘ He is likeness and image of the sole and true God, being Himself also,’ 49. pdvos év wovw, Ovat. ili. 21. 6Aos OAov cikov. Serap. 1. 16, a. ‘The Offspring of the Ingenerate,’ says S. Hilary, ‘is One from One, True from True, Living from Living, Perfect from Perfect, Power of Power, Wisdom of Wisdom, Glory of Glory.’ de Tyin. ii. 8. rédevos TéAcLOV yeyevnKeV, TvEDpa TYEdLa. Epiph. Her. p. 495. © As Light from Light, and Life from Life, and Good from Good; so from Eternal Eternal. Nyss. contr. Zunom. i. p. 164. App.
5 modAoi Aoyou, vid. de Decry. 16, n. 4. 7nfr. 39 init. and ovs’ é« Toy els, Sent. D. 25. a. also Ep. Ag. 14. c. Origen in Joan. tom. li. 3. Euseb. Demmonstr. v. 5. p. 229 fin. contr. Marc. p. 4 fin. contr. Sabell. init. August. im Joan. Tract. i. 8. also vid. Philo’s use of Adyo. for Angels as commented on by Burton, Bampt. Lect. p. 556. ‘The heathens called Mercury by the name of Adyos. vid. Benedictine note f. in Justin, Af, i. 27.
6 This was the point in which Arians and [Marcellus] agreed, vid. izfr. Orat. iv. init. also §§ 22, 40, and de Decr. 24, n. 9, also Sent D. 25. Ep. 4g. 14 fin. Epiph. Her. 72. p. 835. b.
7 That is, they allowed Him to be ‘really Son,’ and argued that He was but ‘notionally Word. vid. § 19, n. 3.
8 ayevvytws, vid. Kuseb. Bccl. Theol. p. 106. d.
things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal Power and Godhead.’ For as no one would say that the Godhead there mentioned was Christ, but the Father Himself, so, as I think, ‘ His eternal Power and Godhead also is not the Only Begotten Son, but the Father who begat Him™.’ And he teaches that there is another power and wisdom of God, manifested through Christ. And shortly after the same Asterius says, ‘ However His eternal power and wisdom, which truth argues to be without beginning and ingenerate, the same must surely be one. For there are many wisdoms which are one by one created by Him, of whom Christ is the firstborn and only-begotten; all however equally depend on their Possessor. And all the powers are rightly called His who created and uses them:—as the Prophet says that the locust, which came to be a divine punishment of human sins, was called by God Himself not only a power, but a great power; and blessed David in most of the Psalms invites, not the Angels alone, but the Powers to praise God.’ 38. Now are they not worthy of all hatred for merely uttering this? for if, as they hold, He is Son, not because He is begotten of the Father and proper to His Essence, but that He is called Word only because of things rationalt, and Wisdom because of things gifted with wisdom, and Power because of things gifted with power, surely He must be named a Son because of those who are made sons: and perhaps because there are things existing, He has even His existence, in our notions only3. And then after all what is He? for He is none of these Himself, if they are but His names+: and He has but a semblance of being, and is decorated with these names II Oy. i. 11, 0. 7. I doyexd, vid. HA. Ag. 13 fin.
2 Of course this line of thought consistently followed, leads to a kind of Pantheism; for what is the Supreme Being, according to it, but an ideal standard of perfection, the sum total of all that we see excellent in the world in the highest degree, a creation of our minds, without real objective existence? The true view of our Lord’s titles, on the other hand, is that He is That properly and in perfection, of which in measure and degree the creatures partake from and in Him. Vid. supx. de Decr. 17, 0. 5.