[3710] Isa. viii. 19.
[3711] i.e. the Phoenix. Hdt., ii. 37.
[3712] John iv. 24.
[3713] Rom. viii. 26.
[3714] 1 Cor. xiv. 15.
[3715] John i. 2.
[3716] "Similarly it is clear concerning the Angels, that they have a being incapable of change, so far as pertains to their nature, with a capacity of change as to choice, and of intelligence and affections and places, in their own manner" (S. Thomas Aq., Summa, I., x., 5).
[3717] Homer, Il., xiv., 189.
[3718] Jer. x. 16.
[3719] Petavius praises this dictum, De Trin., IV., xiii., 9.
[3720] sunarithmeitai, as when you say Three Gods, or Three Men, and the like, as you do when you reckon up things of the same sort. On the other hand, you must use the plural number in reckoning up things which differ in kind.
[3721] Prov. xxx. 29, 30. 31.
[3722] Exod. xxxvii. 7.
[3723] This is the famous passage of the Witnesses in 1 John v. 8. In some few later codices of the Vulgate are found the words which form verse 7 of our A.V. But neither verse 7 nor these words are to be found in any Greek ms. earlier than the Fifteenth Century; nor are they quoted by any Greek Father, and by very few and late Latin ones. They have been thought to be cited by S. Cyprian in his work on the Unity of the Church; and this citation, if a fact, would be a most important one, as it would throw back their reception to an early date. But Tischendorf (Gk. Test., Ed. viii., ad. loc.) gives reasons for believing that the quotation is only apparent, and is really of the last clause of verse 8.
[3724] i.e. Though the things referred to many differ essentially, yet if the name by which they are known is the same, one utterance of it with one numeral is enough to express a collection of them all.
[3725] var. lect., receiving.
[3726] Isa. xli. 4.
[3727] Ib. xliii. 10.
[3728] Heb. xii. 26.
[3729] Referring to the earthquake at the giving of the Law on Mt. Sinai (Heb. xiii.), and to the prophesy of Haggai (ii. 6), with reference to the Incarnation. The third great earthquake is that of the end of the world (Heb. xii. 26).
[3730] Acts xvi. 3.
[3731] Ib. xxi. 26.
[3732] Galat. vii. 7-17.
[3733] Theology is here used in a restricted sense, as denoting simply the doctrine of the Deity of the Son or Logos. It is very frequently used in this limited sense; examples of which may readily be found in Gregory of Nyssa, Basil, Chrysostom, and others. A similar use occurs in Orat. XXXVIII., c. 8, in which passage theologia is contrasted with oikonomia, the doctrine of our Lord's Divinity with that of the Incarnation.
[3734] Ps. lxxxiv. 7, and 2 Cor. iii. 18.
[3735] John xiv. 16, 17.
[3736] John xvi. 7.
[3737] Ib. xvi. 8.
[3738] Ib. xvi. 12.
[3739] Ib. xiv. 26.
[3740] Perhaps S. Gregory Thaumaturgus is meant. He was born about a.d. 210. The date of his death is uncertain, but was probably not before 270. He was Bishop of Neocæsarea in Pontus. Amongst his works was an Exposition of the Faith, which he is said to have received by direct revelation, and in it the words in the text were contained. S. Gregory in another Oration refers to the closing sentences as the substance of the Formula itself: "There is nothing created or servile in the Trinity, nor anything superinduced, as though previously non-existing and introduced afterwards. Never therefore, was the Son wanting to the Father, nor the Spirit to the Son; but there is ever the same Trinity, unchangeable and unalterable"(Reynolds, in Dict. Biog.).
[3741] Job iii. 9.
[3742] Luke i. 35; iii. 22; iv. 1.
[3743] Luke iv. 1, 18.
[3744] Acts ii. 4.
[3745] v. l. Yea, even disorder.
[3746] Viz.:--where we are told that Blasphemy against Him hath never forgiveness.
[3747] As in the case of the Centurion Cornelius, Acts x. 9.
[3748] i.e. in Confirmation.
[3749] Matt. xii. 31.
[3750] Acts v. 3, etc.
[3751] As before in the case of the Son. See above, Theol., iii. 18.
[3752] Elias Cretensis says that the Eye in this passage is not to be understood of the member of the body so called, but as the Eye or the centre of a spring, the point from which the water flows.
Oration XXXIII.
Against The Arians, and Concerning Himself.
Delivered at Constantinople about the middle of the year 380.
I. Where are they who reproach us with our poverty, and boast themselves of their own riches; who define the Church by numbers, [3753] and scorn the little flock; and who measure Godhead, [3754] and weigh the people in the balance, who honour the sand, and despise the luminaries of heaven; who treasure pebbles and overlook pearls; for they know not that sand is not in a greater degree more abundant than stars, and pebbles than lustrous stones--that the former are purer and more precious than the latter? Are you again indignant? Do you again arm yourselves? Do you again insult us? [3755] Is this a new faith? Restrain your threats a little while that I may speak. We will not insult you, but we will convict you; we will not threaten, but we will reproach you; we will not strike, but we will heal. This too appears an insult! What pride! Do you here also regard your equal as your slave? If not, permit me to speak openly; for even a brother chides his brother if he has been defrauded by him.
II. Would you like me to utter to you the words of God to Israel, stiff-necked and hardened? "O my people what have I done unto thee, or wherein have I injured thee, or wherein have I wearied thee?" [3756] This language indeed is fitter from me to you who insult me. It is a sad thing that we watch for opportunities against each other, and having destroyed our fellowship of spirit by diversities of opinion have become almost more inhuman and savage to one another than even the barbarians who are now engaged in war against us, banded together against us by the Trinity whom we have separated; with this difference that we are not foreigners making forays and raids upon foreigners, nor nations of different language, which is some little consolation in the calamity, but are making war upon one another, and almost upon those of the same household; or if you will, we the members of the same body are consuming and being consumed by one another. Nor is this, bad though it be, the extent of our calamity, for we even regard our diminution as a gain. But since we are in such a condition, and regulate our faith by the times, let us compare the times with one another; you your Emperor, [3757] and I my Sovereigns; [3758] you Ahab and I Josias. Tell me of your moderation, and I will proclaim my violence. But indeed yours is proclaimed by many books and tongues, which I think future ages will accept as an immortal pillory for your actions and I will declare my own.
III. What tumultuous mob have I led against you? What soldiers have I armed? What general boiling with rage, and more savage than his employers, and not even a Christian, but one who offers his impiety against us as his private worship to his own gods? [3759] Whom have I besieged while engaged in prayer and lifting up their hands to God? When have I put a stop to psalmody with trumpets? or mingled the Sacramental Blood with blood of massacre? What spiritual sighs have I put an end to by cries of death, or tears of penitence by tears of tragedy? What House of prayer have I made a burialplace? What liturgical vessels which the multitude may not touch have I given over to the hands of the wicked, of a Nebuzaradan, [3760] chief of the cooks, or of a Belshazzar, who wickedly used the sacred vessels for his revels, [3761] and then paid a worthy penalty for his madness? "Altars beloved" as Holy Scripture saith, but "now defiled." [3762] And what licentious youth has insulted you for our sake with shameful writhings and contortions? O precious Throne, seat and rest of precious men, which hast been occupied by a succession of pious Priests, who from ancient times have taught the divine Mysteries, what heathen popular speaker and evil tongue hath mounted thee to inveigh against the Christian's faith? O modesty and majesty of Virgins, that cannot endure the looks of even virtuous men, which of us hath shamed thee, and outraged thee by the exposure of what may not be seen, and showed to the eyes of the impious a pitiable sight, worthy of the fires of Sodom? I say nothing of deaths, which were more endurable than this shame.
IV. What wild beasts have we let loose upon the bodies of Saints,--like some who have prostituted human nature,--on one single accusation, that of not consenting to their impiety; or defiled ourselves by communion with them, which we avoid like the poison of a snake, not because it injures the body, but because it blackens the depths of the soul? Against whom have we made it a matter of criminal accusation that they buried the dead, whom the very beasts reverenced? And what a charge, worthy of another theatre and of other beasts! What Bishop's aged flesh have we carded with hooks in the presence of their disciples, impotent to help them save by tears, hung up with Christ, conquering by suffering, and sprinkling the people with their precious blood, and at last carried away to death, to be both crucified and buried and glorified with Christ; with Christ Who conquered the world by such victims and sacrifices? What priests have those contrary elements fire and water divided, raising a strange beacon over the sea, and set on fire together with the ship in which they put to sea? [3763] Who (to cover the more numerous part of our woes with a veil of silence) have been accused of inhumanity by the very magistrates who conferred such favour on them? For even if they did obey the lusts of those men, yet at any rate they hated the cruelty of their purpose. The one was opportunism, the other calculation; the one came of the lawlessness of the Emperor, the other of a consciousness of the laws by which they had to judge.
V. And to speak of older things, for they too belong to the same fraternity; whose hands living or dead have I cut off--to bring a lying accusation against Saints, [3764] and to triumph over the faith by bluster? Whose exiles have I numbered as benefits, and failed to reverence even the sacred colleges of sacred philosophers, whence I sought their suppliants? Nay the very contrary is the case; I have reckoned as Martyrs those who incurred anger for the truth. Upon whom have I, whom you accuse of licentiousness of language, brought harlots when they were almost fleshless and bloodless? Which of the faithful have I exiled from their country and given over to the hands of lawless men, that they might be kept like wild beasts in rooms without light, and (for this is the saddest part of the tragedy) left separated from each other to endure the hardships of hunger and thirst, with food measured out to them, which they had to receive through narrow openings, so that they might not be permitted even to see their companions in misery. And what were they who suffered thus? Men of whom the world was not worthy. [3765] Is it thus that you honour faith? Is this your kind treatment of it? Ye know not the greater part of these things, and that reasonably, because of the number of these facts and the pleasure of the action. But he who suffers has a better memory. There have been even some more cruel than the times themselves, like wild boars hurled against a fence. I demand your victim of yesterday [3766] the old man, the Abraham-like Father, whom on his return from exile you greeted with stones in the middle of the day and in the middle of the city. But we, if it is not invidious to say so, begged off even our murderers from their danger. God says somewhere in Scripture, How shall I pardon thee for this? [3767] Which of these things shall I praise; or rather for which shall I bind a wreath upon you?
VI. Now since your antecedents are such, I should be glad if you too will tell me of my crimes, that I may either amend my life or be put to shame. My greatest wish is that I may be found free from wrong altogether; but if this may not be, at least to be converted from my crime; for this is the second best portion of the prudent. For if like the just man I do not become my own accuser in the first instance, [3768] yet at any rate I gladly receive healing from another. "Your City, you say to me, is a little one, or rather is no city at all, but only a village, arid, without beauty, and with few inhabitants." But, my good friend, this is my misfortune, rather than my fault;--if indeed it be a misfortune; and if it is against my will, I am to be pitied for my bad luck, if I may put it so; but if it be willingly, I am a philosopher. Which of these is a crime? Would anyone abuse a dolphin for not being a land animal, or an ox because it is not aquatic, or a lamprey because it is amphibious? But we, you go on, have walls and theatres and racecourses and palaces, and beautiful great Porticoes, and that marvellous work the underground and overhead river, [3769] and the splendid and admired column, [3770] and the crowded marketplace and a restless people, and a famous senate of highborn men.