37. For, amid the three infirmities in
regard to theology, atheism, Judaism, and polytheism, one of which is
patronised by Sabellius the Libyan, another by Arius of Alexandria, and
the third by some of the ultra-orthodox among us, what is my position,
can I avoid whatever in these three is noxious, and remain within the
limits of piety; neither being led astray by the new analysis and
synthesis into the atheism Atheism.
This term is used of Sabellianism xviii. 16. xx. 6. xxi. 13. xliii. 30,
in the sense in which it is here explained. Cf. Petav. de Trin.
I. vi. 3, sqq. of Sabellius, to
assert not so much that all are one as that each is nothing, for things
which are transferred and pass into each other cease to be that which
each one of them is, of that we have an unnaturally compound deity,
like those mythical creatures, the subject of a picturesque
imagination: nor again, by alleging a plurality of severed
natures, according to the well named madness Madness of
Arianism, xxi. 13. xxxiv. 8. xliii. 30. This term is applied in a
letter of Constantine after the Council of Nicæa. It is
called Judaism also Orat. xx. 6 as frequently by S. Athanasius.
Cf. Petav. de Trin. I. ix. 8. of
Arius, becoming involved in a Jewish poverty, and introducing envy into
the divine nature, by limiting the Godhead to the Unbegotten One alone,
as if afraid that our God would perish, if He were the Father of a real
God of equal nature: nor again, by arraying three principles in
opposition to, or in alliance with, each other, introducing the Gentile
plurality of principles from which we have escaped?