4. For the name of the Father, with the very
utterance of the title, suggests the thought of the Son: as in
like manner one who names the Son thinks straightway of the Father
also Compare Athanasius
(de Sententiâ Dionyssi, § 17): “Each of
the names I have mentioned is inseparable and indivisible from that
next to it. I spoke of the Father, and before bringing in the
Son, I designated Him also in the Father. I brought in the Son,
and even if I had not previously mentioned the Father, in any wise He
would have been presupposed in the Son.”. For if a Father, He is
certainly the Father
of a Son; and if a Son, certainly the Son of a Father. Lest
therefore from our speaking thus, In One God, the
Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, and of All Things Visible
and Invisible, and from our then adding this also, And in One Lord Jesus Christ, any one should irreverently
suppose that the Only-begotten is second in rank to heaven and
earth,—for this reason before naming them we named God the Father, that in thinking of the Father we might at
the same time think also of the Son: for between the Son and the
Father no being whatever comes.