8. Since then, as says the Lord in the
Gospels,
John xiv. 9. he that hath seen
the Son sees the Father also; on this account he says that the
Only-begotten is the express image of His Father’s person.
That this may be made still plainer I will quote also other passages of
the apostle in which he calls the Son “the image of the invisible
God,”
Col. i. 15. and again
“image of His goodness;” This phrase is
not in the Epistles, nor indeed does the substantive ἀγαθότης occur in
the N.T. at all. “Image of his goodness” is taken
from Wisdom vii.
26, and erroneously
included among the “words of the Apostle.” not because
the image differs from the Archetype according to the definition of
indivisibility and goodness, but that it may be shewn that it is the
same as the prototype, even though it be different. For the idea
of the image would be lost were it not to preserve throughout the plain
and invariable likeness. He therefore that has perception of the
beauty of the image is made perceptive of the Archetype. So he,
who has, as it were mental apprehension of the form of the Son, prints
the express image of the Father’s hypostasis, beholding the
latter in the former, not beholding in the reflection the unbegotten
being of the Father (for thus there would be complete identity and no
distinction), but gazing at the unbegotten beauty in the
Begotten. Just as he who in a polished mirror beholds the
reflection of the form as plain knowledge of the represented face, so
he, who has knowledge of the Son, through his knowledge of the Son
receives in his heart the express image of the Father’s
Person. For all things that are the Father’s are beheld in
the Son, and all things that are the Son’s are the
Father’s; because the whole Son is in the Father and has all the
Father in Himself. cf.
John xiv. 11. Thus the
hypostasis of the Son becomes as it were form and face of the knowledge
of the Father, and the hypostasis of the Father is known in the form of
the Son, while the proper quality which is contemplated therein remains
for the plain distinction of the hypostases.