_Fr. Corn._ Indeed? you accursed Trinitarian; if you would read the symbol[309] of Athanasius, you would read of God the Father, and of God the Son, and of God the Holy Ghost, which three persons are therein called one true God, of whom the Father is the first person in the Godhead; the Son is the second person in the Godhead, and the Holy Ghost is the third person in the Godhead; and these three persons constitute the holy Trinity, that they do. Do you understand now, you Trinitarian, eh?
[309] Creed.
_Herm._ I have not studied the symbol of Athanasius; for it is enough for me, that I believe in the living God, and that Christ is the Son of the living God, as Peter believed (Matt. 16), and in the Holy Ghost, which is shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, as Paul writes in the third chapter of his epistle to Titus.
_Fr. Corn._ Indeed? you are certainly fine fellows, that God should shed his Holy Spirit upon you who will not believe that the Holy Ghost is also God himself. But this heresy you pick up and study in the devilish books of that accursed Erasmus of Rotterdam, who in his preface to the books of St. Hilary writes, that St. Hilary, at the end of his twelfth book, says, that the Holy Ghost is nowhere in the holy Scriptures called God, but that we have become so presumptuous as to dare call the Holy Ghost God, which the ancient teachers of the church did not dare do. In like manner this wicked Erasmus is also a great enemy of the divinity of Christ. Ah, bah! would you follow this damned Trinitarian, eh?
_Herm._ We follow neither Erasmus nor Hilary, but we follow the holy Scriptures, as Hilary and Erasmus herein do.
_Fr. Corn._ Though the holy Scriptures nowhere call the Holy Spirit God, what matters it? The Holy Ghost himself has inspired our mother the holy Roman Catholic church, to call him God, as appears from the symbol of Athanasius, see. But in good faith, if you believe the holy Scriptures, why then will you not believe in the divinity of Christ, eh?
_Herm._ That be far from us, that we should not believe in the divinity of Christ, that he is divine and heavenly, and not earthly, as you people believe; therefore we are put to death by you.
_Fr. Corn._ * * * Bah, we put you to death, because you people will not believe, that Christ assumed the seed of Mary his blessed mother, see.
_Herm._ We believe that the word became flesh, as John writes in the first chapter of his gospel. _Fr. Corn._ Bah, now I have got you well cornered; for God was the word. And if God became flesh, why then would you bite into my trap, because I say, God’s flesh, God’s body, and God’s blood, eh?
_Herm._ We too believe that God was the word; but would you then therefrom understand, that the living God (of whom Christ is the Son) became himself flesh? this were certainly contrary to the entire holy Scriptures.
_Fr. Corn._ Yet Christ says, John 10:30; “I and my Father are one.” Again, John 14:9: “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” Bah, where are you now, eh?
_Herm._ Christ also says (John 17:21–23): “That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one.” Again (Acts 4:32): “The multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul.” Again, Paul to the Galatians (3:8) says: “For ye are all one in Christ Jesus.” Again (Ephesians 5:31,32): “For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery.”