4. I blush so to write to you, for the men
thus guilty are of my own blood; The
allusion is supposed to be to Atarbius. cf. Letter
lxv. and I groan
for my own soul, in that, like boxers fighting two men at once, I can
only give the truth its proper force by hitting with my proofs, and
knocking down, the errors of doctrine on the right and on the
left. On one side I am attacked by the Anomœan: on the
other by the Sabellian. Do not, I implore you, pay any attention
to these abominable and impotent sophisms. Know that the name of
Christ which is above every name is His being called Son of God, as
Peter says, “There is none other name under heaven given among
men, whereby we must be saved.”
Acts iv. 12. And as to the words “I came in
my Father’s name,” it is to be understood that He so says
describing His Father as origin and cause of Himself. cf.
De Sp. S. § 44, p. 27. And if it is said “Go and
baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Ghost,” we must not suppose that here one name is delivered to
us. For just as he who said Paul and Silvanus and Timothy
mentioned three names, and coupled them one to the other by the word
“and,” so He who spoke of the name of Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost, mentioned three, and united them by the conjunction, teaching
that with each name must be understood its own proper meaning; for the
names mean things. And no one gifted with even the smallest
particle of intelligence doubts that the existence belonging to the
things is peculiar and complete in itself. For of Father, Son,
and Holy Ghost there is the same nature and one Godhead; but these are
different names, setting forth to a us the circumscription and
exactitude of the meanings. For unless the meaning of the
distinctive qualities of each be unconfounded, it is impossible for the
doxology to be adequately offered to Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost.