did He beget Him less, and add to Him to complete His Form, that He might make Him
equal? If he had done this, He would have given it to one in need. But I have told you already
what ye ought most firmly to hold fast, that is, that All That the Son is, the Father gave Him,
gave Him, that is, by His Birth, not as in need of ought. If He gave it to Him by His Birth,
and not as in need, then doubtless He both gave Him equality, and in giving Him equality,
begat Him equal. And although the One be One Person, and the Other Another; yet is not
the One one thing, and the Other another; but What the One is, That the Other also. He
who is the One, is not the Other; but What the One, That too the Other.
3. “He Who sent Me,” saith He, ye have heard it; “He Who sent Me,” saith He, “He gave
Me a commandment what I should say, and what I should speak; and I know that His
commandment is life everlasting.”4178 It is John’s Gospel, hold it fast. “He Who sent Me,
He gave Me a commandment what I should say, and what I should speak; and I know that
His commandment is life everlasting.” O that He would grant me to say what I wish! For
my poverty and His abundance straiteneth me. “He,” saith He, “gave Me a commandment,
what I should say, and what I should speak; and I know that His commandment is life
530
everlasting.” Search in the Epistle of this John the Evangelist for what he hath said of Christ.
“Let us believe,” he says, “His True Son Jesus Christ. This is the True God and Everlasting
Life.”4179 What is, “The True God, and Everlasting Life”? The True Son of God is the “the
True God, and Everlasting Life.” Why did He say, “On His True Son”? Because God hath
many sons, therefore was He to be distinguished, by adding that He was the True Son. Not
by simply saying that He is the Son; but by adding, as I have said, that He is the True Son;
therefore He was to be distinguished, because of the many sons which God hath. For we are
sons by grace, He by Nature. We made by the Father through Him; He Himself That Which
the Father is; are we too That Which God is?
4. But some man coming across us, knowing not what he is saying, says, “For this reason
was it said, “I and My Father are One;4180 for that They have with One Another an agreement
of will, not because the Nature of the Son is the Very Same as the Nature of the Father. For
the Apostles too (now this is what he said,4181 not I), for the Apostles too are one with the
Father and the Son.” Horrible blasphemy! “And the Apostles,” says he, “are one with the
Father and the Son, in that they obey the will of the Father and the Son.” Has he dared to
say this? Let Paul then say, “I and God are one.” Let Peter say it, let every one of the Prophets
say, “I and God are one.” They do not say it; God forbid they should. They know that they
4178 John xii. 49, 50.
4179 1 John v. 20.
4180 John x. 30.
4181 Maximinus in his Conference with St. Augustin, and St. Augustin in his Answer, B. ii. cont. Maxim.
ch. 22.
1094
On the words of the Gospel, John xii. 44, ‘He that believeth on me, believeth…