Chapter II.
The words, “All things were made by Him,”
are not a proof that the Holy Spirit is included amongst all things,
since He was not made. For otherwise it could be proved by other
passages that the Son, and even the Father Himself, must be numbered
amongst all things, which would be similar irreverence.
27.
This
seems,
gracious Emperor, to be a full account of our right feeling, but to the
impious it does not seem so. Observe what they are striving
after. For the heretics are wont to say that the Holy Spirit is
to be reckoned amongst all things, because it is written of God the
Son: “All things were made by Him.”
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28. How utterly confused is a course of argument
which does not hold to the truth, and is involved in an inverted order
of statements. For this argument would be of value for the
statement that the Holy Spirit is amongst all things, if they proved
that He was made. For Scripture says that all things which were
made were made by the Son; but since we are not taught that the Holy
Spirit was made, He certainly cannot be proved to be amongst all things
Who was neither made as all things are, nor created. To me this
testimony is of use for establishing each point; firstly, that He is
proved to be above all things, because He was not made; and secondly,
that because He is above all things, He is seen not to have been made,
and is not to be numbered amongst those things which were made.
29. But if any one, because the Evangelist
stated that all things were made by the Word, making no exception of
the Holy Spirit (although the Spirit of God speaking in John
said: “All things were made by Him,” and said not we
were all things which were made; whilst the Lord Himself distinctly
showed that the Spirit of God spoke in the Evangelists, saying,
“For it will not be you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father
that speaketh in you”),
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yet if any one,
as I said, does not except the Holy Spirit in this place, but numbers
Him amongst all, he consequently does not except the Son of God in that
passage where the Apostle says: “Yet to us there is one God
the Father, of Whom are all things, and we by Him.”
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But that he may know that the Son
is not amongst all things, let him read what follows, for when he
says: “And one Lord Jesus Christ, by Whom are all
things,”
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he certainly
excepts the Son of God from all, who also excepted the
Father.
30. But it is equal irreverence to detract from
the dignity of the Father, or the Son, or the Holy Spirit. For he
believes not in the Father who does not believe in the Son, nor does he
believe in the Son of God who does not believe in the Spirit, nor can
faith stand without the rule of truth. For he who has begun to
deny the oneness of power in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit
certainly cannot prove his divided faith in points where there is no
division. So, then, since complete piety is to believe rightly,
so complete impiety is to believe wrongly.
31. Therefore they who think that the Holy
Spirit ought to be numbered amongst all things, because they read that
all things were made by the Son, must needs also think that the Son is
to be numbered amongst all things, because they read: “All
things are of God.”
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But,
consequently, they also do not separate the Father from all things, who
do not separate the Son from all creatures, since, as all things are of
the Father, so, too, all things are by the Son. And the Apostle,
because of his foresight in the Spirit, used this very expression, lest
he should seem to the impious who had heard that the Son had said,
“That which My Father hath given Me is greater than
all,”
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to have
included the Son amongst all.
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S.
John i. 3
.
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S.
Matt. x. 20
.
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1 Cor. viii. 6
.
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1 Cor. viii. 6
.
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2 Cor. v. 18
.
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S.
John x. 29
.