De decretis Nicaenae synodi

Of Saint Athanasius: that the synod at Nicaea, having seen the craftiness of those around Eusebius, set forth fittingly and piously the definitions against the Arian heresy. You did well to inform me of the inquiry you conducted with those who champion the doctrines of Arius, among whom were some of the companions of Eusebius and also many of the brethren who hold to the church's teaching. I therefore approved your Christ-loving vigilance, which ably refuted the impiety of the heresy, but I marveled at their shamelessness, because, although the Arian arguments were shown to be unsound and vain, and they themselves were condemned by all for their entire wickedness, nevertheless even after this they muttered like the Jews, saying: "Why did those who assembled at Nicaea write unwritten expressions, 'from the essence' and 'homoousios'?" You, being a learned man, demonstrated that they were talking nonsense no less when they put on such airs. But they do nothing foreign to their own evil-mindedness in fabricating pretexts. For they are variegated and changeable in their opinions, like chameleons in their colors, and when refuted they blush, when examined they are at a loss, and then, growing shameless, they make excuses. If someone refutes them even in these matters, they persist until they devise things that do not exist and, as it is written, "think vain thoughts," only so that they may continue in their impiety. Such a contrivance is nothing other than a clear sign of their irrationality and an imitation, as I said before, of Jewish malignity.

For indeed, being refuted by the truth and unable to look it in the face, they would make excuses, saying: "What sign do you perform, that we may see and believe you? What work do you do?"—and yet so many signs had occurred that even they themselves would say: "What are we to do, since this man performs many signs?" For the dead were raised, the lame walked, the blind recovered sight, lepers were cleansed, water became wine, and five thousand were filled from five loaves. And all marvelled and worshipped the Lord, confessing that the prophecies were fulfilled in him and that he was God the Son from God; but the Pharisees alone, even though the signs were more manifest than the sun, nevertheless again grumbled like ignorant men and said: "Why do you, being a man, make yourself God?"—foolish and truly blind in mind. They ought rather to have said the opposite: "Why have you, being God, become man?" For the works showed him to be God, so that they might worship the Father's goodness and marvel at his economy for our sake. This they neither said, nor did they wish to see what was happening. Or they did see—for of necessity they had to see these things—but again they grumbled, changing their complaint: "Why do you heal the paralytic on the Sabbath, and why do you make the man blind from birth see at that time?" This again was merely a pretext and a grumbling. For on the other days as well, when the Lord healed every disease and every infirmity, they customarily found fault and preferred to suspect him of godlessness, calling him Beelzebul, rather than deny their own wickedness.

But even so, while the Savior was displaying his divinity in many ways and in many forms and proclaiming the Father to all, those men, no less, as if kicking against the goads, kept talking nonsense in opposition, so that, as the divine proverb says, by inventing pretexts they might separate themselves from the truth. Thus the Jews of that time, acting wickedly in such a manner and denying the Lord, were justly excluded from the laws and from the promise to the fathers. And the Arians now, Judaizing, seem to me to suffer the same as Caiaphas and the Pharisees of that time; for seeing that their heresy has no reasonable basis, they invent pretexts, asking, "Why is this written and not that?" And do not be surprised if they now contrive such things; for soon they will turn to insults, and after that they will threaten with the cohort and the chiliarch; for in these lies their apparent support for their evil doctrine. For denying the Word of God, they are naturally bereft of all reason. Knowing this, I would have answered nothing to those who asked. But since your disposition required knowledge of what was done at the council, I did not delay; rather, I have immediately set forth what happened then, showing briefly how much the Arian heresy lacks pious understanding and only fabricates pretexts. And consider for yourself, beloved, whether this is not so. If they are confident in the evils they have themselves devised, with the devil having sown their evil-mindedness in them, let them defend themselves concerning the charges for which they were shown to be heretics, and then let them blame, if they can, the decisions made against them.

No one convicted of murder or adultery has, after the verdict, any right to blame the judge’s decision, asking why he spoke this way and not that. For this does not free the convicted man, but rather increases his charge because of his rashness and audacity. Therefore, these men too must either show that their own opinion is pious—for they were accused and convicted, not having complained beforehand; and it is just for those accused to do nothing other than defend themselves—or, if their conscience is foul and they see themselves as impious, let them not blame what they do not understand, lest they incur both a double charge of impiety and a reproach of ignorance. Instead, let them examine the matter with a love of learning, so that, recognizing what they previously did not know, they may wash away their impious ears with the stream of truth and the doctrines of piety. For thus it happened at the Council of Nicaea with those around Eusebius. As they persisted in impiety and attempted to fight against God, their own statements were full of impiety, while the assembled bishops—there were more or less three hundred—gently and humanely demanded that they give an account and pious proofs concerning what they said. But when, merely by speaking, they were condemned and were at odds among themselves, seeing the great difficulty of their own heresy, these men stood speechless and through their silence confessed the shame of their vainglory. The bishops therefore, having removed the terms devised by them, set forth in opposition to them the sound and ecclesiastical faith as follows:

All having subscribed, even those around Eusebius subscribed to these very words which they now accuse—I mean the phrase "from the essence" and "homoousios," and that the Son of God is neither a creature nor a creation nor among things that have come into being, but the Word is a generation from the essence of the Father. And what is remarkable, Eusebius of Caesarea in Palestine, though denying it the day before, nevertheless later subscribed and wrote to his own church, saying that this is the faith of the Church and the tradition of the Fathers, and he clearly showed to all that previously they were mistaken and vainly contended against the truth. For even if he was then ashamed to write with these expressions and made his apology to the church as he wished, yet through his letter, by not denying the homoousios and the phrase "from the essence," he clearly intends to signify this. And he suffered something terrible: for in defending himself, he thereafter accused the Arians, because having written "the Son was not before he was begotten," they did not wish him to exist even before his birth in the flesh.

And this Acacius knows, unless he too, now fearing because of the times, is pretending and denying the truth. I have therefore appended the letter of Eusebius at the end, so that from it you may know the ingratitude of the Christ-fighters and especially of Acacius towards their own teachers. How then do these men not do wrong, even if they only think of contradicting such a great and ecumenical council? How do they not break the law, daring to oppose the well-established definitions against the Arian heresy, which are attested by those who formerly taught them to be impious? And if, after subscribing, those around Eusebius changed and, like dogs, returned to their own vomit of impiety, how are not those who now contradict even more worthy of hatred, because they pour out the freedom of their own soul to others and wish to have these men as leaders of the heresy—men who, as James said, are "double-minded and unstable in all their ways," and who have not one fixed opinion, but change at different times, now praising what they say, soon after blaming what they have said, and again praising what they previously denounced? This, as the Shepherd has said, is an offspring of the devil, and is rather a mark of hucksters and not of teachers. For it is, as the fathers have handed down, truly a sign of teaching and of true teachers to confess the same things to one another and not to dispute either with themselves or with their own fathers. For those who are not disposed in this way would be called wicked rather than true teachers.

Greeks, at any rate, not confessing the same things, but also disputing with one another, do not have true teaching; but the saints, who are truly heralds of the truth, both agree with one another and do not differ among themselves. For even if they lived in different times, they all hasten to the same goal, being prophets of the one God and proclaiming the same Word harmoniously. What Moses taught, Abraham observed; what Abraham observed, Noah and Enoch knew, discerning clean and unclean and becoming pleasing to God. And Abel likewise bore witness, knowing these things which he had learned from Adam, who himself learned from the Lord, who at the consummation of the ages, coming to abolish sin, said: "I do not give you a new commandment, but an old commandment, which you have heard from the beginning." For this reason, the blessed Apostle Paul, who learned from him, when establishing ecclesiastical matters, did not even wish deacons to be double-tongued, let alone bishops, and rebuking the Galatians, he declared universally: "If anyone evangelizes you contrary to what you received, let him be anathema, as I have said before, and I say again: even if we or an angel from heaven evangelizes you contrary to what you received, let him be anathema." Since the apostle says these things, let these men either anathematize those around Eusebius who change and say things different from what they subscribed, or if they know that they subscribed correctly, let them not murmur against such a great council.

If they do neither this nor that, it is clear that they themselves are carried about by every wind and wave, and are drawn not by their own opinions but by those of others. Being such, they are not credible even now when they put forward such pretexts, but let them cease accusing what they do not know; perhaps, not even knowing how to distinguish, they simply "call the bad good, and the good bad, and think the bitter sweet, and the sweet bitter." Indeed, they wish to maintain what has been judged evil and rejected, and they force themselves to slander what has been well defined. It would have been proper, then, for us no longer to make any defense against these things and to respond to their vain pretexts, and for them no longer to be contentious, but to agree to what the leaders of their heresy subscribed, knowing that the subsequent change of those around Eusebius is suspicious and malicious. But to subscribe after being able to offer even the briefest defense shows that the Arian heresy is truly impious. For they did not subscribe earlier unless they had condemned it; and they did not condemn it earlier unless, being at a loss from all sides, they were ashamed; so that the change is a proof of their contentiousness toward impiety. Therefore, as has been said, it would have been proper for these also to keep quiet. But since they are clever in shamelessness, and perhaps think that they themselves are more able than those others to champion this diabolical impiety.

Although I have already dealt with them in the earlier letter written to you, using a more extensive refutation against them, nevertheless, let us now also examine these men, just as we did those, concerning each of their statements. For it will be shown no less now that their heresy is not sound, but rather something demonic. They say, then, just as it seemed to those others, and they have dared to assert: "The Father was not always, the Son was not always; for the Son did not exist before he was begotten, but he himself came into being from non-existence; therefore God was not always Father of the Son, but when the Son came into being and was created, then God was called his Father. For the Word is a creature and a product, and is foreign and unlike in essence to the Father; the Son is neither by nature and truly the Word of the Father, nor is he his only and true wisdom, but being a creature and one of the products, he is called Word and wisdom by misuse. For he himself came into being by the Word that is in God, just like all things; therefore the Son is not true God." But I wish first to ask these men this: what is a son at all, and of what is this name indicative, so that they themselves might thus be able to understand what is said by them? For divine Scripture signifies to us a twofold meaning from this name: one concerning what Moses says in the Law: "If you listen to the voice of the Lord your God, to keep all his commandments, as many as I command you today, to do what is good and pleasing before the Lord your God, you are sons of the Lord our God," just as John says in the Gospel:

All who received him, he gave them authority to become children of God." But there is another sense, according to which Isaac is the son of Abraham, and Jacob the son of Isaac, and the patriarchs the sons of Jacob. Now according to which of these do these men suppose the Son of God to be, that they mythologize such things about him? For I know well that they will run together into the same impiety as those around Eusebius. If, then, according to the first sense, such as those who acquire the grace of the name by improvement of character and receive authority to become sons of God (for that is what those men also said), he would seem to differ in no way from us, nor would he be only-begotten, having himself obtained the appellation of son by virtue. For even if, as they say, having been foreknown that he would be such, he anticipates and receives both the name and the glory of the name at the moment of his generation, yet he will differ in no way from those who receive the name after their deeds, so long as he too is attested to be a son in this way. For Adam, anticipating the grace and being placed in paradise at the moment of his generation, differed in no way either from Enoch, who after a time from his birth, having pleased God, was translated, or from the apostle who was himself snatched into paradise after his deeds, nor even from the thief who at some time, through his confession, received a promise that he would be in paradise immediately. But, being pressed in these matters, they will perhaps say, what they have often said and been ashamed of: "We consider the Son to have more than the others, and for this reason to be called only-begotten, because he alone was made by God alone, while all other things were created by God through the Son.

Who then suggested this foolish and novel notion to you, that you might say: "The father alone personally produced the son, but all other things came into being through the son as through a subordinate"? For if, on account of weariness, God was content to personally produce only the son, but not the rest, it is impious to think such things about God, especially for those who have heard Isaiah saying: "Eternal God, God who fashioned the ends of the earth, will not hunger nor grow weary, nor is there any discovery of his wisdom." For rather he himself gives strength to the hungry and through his own word gives rest to the weary. But if, as something lowly, he deemed it unworthy to personally produce the things after the son, this too is impious. For there is no arrogance in God, who indeed goes down with Jacob into Egypt, and through Abraham corrects Abimelech for the sake of Sarah, speaks mouth to mouth with Moses, a human being, and goes down to Mount Sinai, and secretly fought alongside the people against Amalek. Yet you lie even in saying this: "For he made us, and not we ourselves"; he himself is the one who through his own word made all things, both small and great, and it is not possible to divide creation so as to say this is of the father, this of the son, but it is of one God, using his own word as a hand and making all things in it, and this God himself showed, saying: "My hand made all these things." And Paul, having learned this, taught: "There is one God from whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ through whom are all things.

He himself, then, always and now says that the sun rises, and commands the clouds to rain upon one region, while where it does not rain, that region is dried up. And he commands the earth to yield its fruits, and fashions Jeremiah in the womb. If he does these things now, it is not doubtful that in the beginning he did not deem it unworthy to make all things himself through the Word; for these are parts of the whole. But if, because the other creatures could not bear the work of the unmixed hand of the Unbegotten, the Son alone was made by God alone, and the others came into being as through a subordinate and helper of the Son—for Asterius the sacrificer wrote this, and Arius, having transcribed it, gave it to his own followers, and henceforth the senseless ones use this phrase like a broken reed, ignorant of its rottenness—if, then, it was impossible for the generated things to bear the hand of God—and according to you the Son is one of the generated—how could he himself come to be from God alone? And if, in order that the generated things might come into being, there was need of a mediator, and the Son is, according to you, generated, then there should have been some mediator before him, so that he might be created. And since that mediator would also be a creature, it follows that he too would need another mediator for his own constitution. And if one should conceive of another, he will conceive of that one's mediator beforehand, so as to fall into an infinite regress. Thus, with the mediator always being sought, creation itself will not be able to subsist, because, as you say, none of the generated can bear the unmixed hand of the Unbegotten.

If, seeing the absurdity of this, you begin to say that the Son, being a creature, has become capable of being generated by the Unbegotten, then necessarily all other created things were also capable of being ministered by the Unbegotten; for according to you, He is a creature just like all these things. And thus the generation of the Word is superfluous according to your impious and foolish notion, since God is self-sufficient to do everything Himself, and all created things are able to bear the unmixed hand of God. But since their such folly is senseless, let us see whether this saying of the impious, this sophism, does not appear even more irrational than their other statements. Adam alone was made by God alone through the Word. But would anyone say that Adam has something more than all men or differs from those after him, if he alone was made and fashioned by God alone, while we are all born from Adam and are constituted by succession of the race, until he alone was formed from earth, and, not existing before, later came to be?

If someone should grant even more to the first-formed man because he was deemed worthy of God's hand, let such a one reckon that the advantage is in honor and not in nature. For he came into being from earth, just as all do; and the hand that then molded Adam is the same that now and always molds and constitutes those after him. And God himself says to Jeremiah, as I said before: "Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you." And concerning all things he said: "My hand made all these things." And again through Isaiah he says: "Thus says the Lord who ransoms you and forms you in the womb: I am the Lord who accomplishes all things; I alone stretched out the heaven and made the earth firm." And David, knowing this, sang: "Your hands made me and formed me." And the one in Isaiah who says: "Thus says the Lord who formed me from the womb a servant to himself" signifies this. Therefore, in nature we differ nothing, even if he precedes in time, since we are all constituted and created by the same hand. If then, O Arians, you think thus also concerning the Son of God, that he too subsisted and came into being in this way, then according to you he will differ in nature from none of the others, since he too was not and came to be, and the grace of the name was co-created with him from virtue. For he too is one, according to what you say, of those concerning whom the Spirit says in the Psalms: "He spoke, and they came into being; he commanded, and they were created." Who then is he to whom God gave the command, that this one also might be created? For there must be a Word to whom God gives command and in whom the creations are created.

But you would not be able to show another Logos besides the one you deny, unless you should again devise some notion. "Yes, indeed," they will say, "we have found one; we once heard it from those around Eusebius: 'For this reason we consider that the Son of God has more than the others and is called only-begotten, because he alone partakes of the Father, while all other things partake of the Son.'" They have already grown weary, changing and altering their phrases like colors, but they will be shown nevertheless to be like those who talk idly from the earth and wallow in their own notions as in mire. For if that one is the Son of God, and we are called sons of the Son, their fabrication would be plausible; but if we also are called sons of God, of whom he himself is Son, then clearly we also partake of the Father, who says, "I have begotten sons and raised them up." For if we did not partake of him, he would not have said, "I have begotten"; but if he himself begot, he is our father, not another. And it makes no difference again if that one has more and was made first, while we have less and were made later, as long as we all partake of the same and are called sons of the same father. For the more and the less do not indicate a different nature; rather, the practice of virtue adds this to each. And one is set over ten cities, another over five; and some sit "on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel," while others hear, "Come, the blessed ones of my father," and, "Well done, good and faithful servant.

So those who hold such opinions naturally imagine that God the Father is not always the father of such a son, nor is such a son always, but that he has become a creation from non-existence and did not exist before being begotten; for this one is different from the true Son of God. Since it is not pious for them to say these things any longer—for this opinion rather belongs to the Sadducees and to the man of Samosata—it remains, according to the other sense, in which Isaac is the son of Abraham, to say that the Son of God also exists in that way; for nature knows that which is naturally begotten from something and not acquired from outside as a son, and this is the meaning of the name. Is the generation of the Son, then, anthropopathic? For perhaps according to them, and they themselves will wish to object this, not knowing. By no means. For God is not as man, since men are not as God. For men were created from matter, and that matter is passive, but God is immaterial and incorporeal. If the same words are sometimes used in the divine scriptures concerning God and men, yet it is for discerning men, as Paul instructed, to attend to the reading and thus to distinguish and to discern the writings according to the nature of each of the meanings, and not to confuse the sense, so as not to understand things of God in a human way nor ever to reason about things of men as concerning God. For this is to mix wine with water and to cast alien fire upon the altar with the divine fire. For God also creates, and the term "to create" is used of men as well.

And God exists, while men are also said to exist from God and to have received this. Is it then that God creates as men do? Or does He exist as a man does? Far from it. We take the terms in one way for God and understand them differently for men. For God creates by calling non-existent things into being, needing nothing, while men work upon pre-existing matter, having first prayed and received the knowledge of making from God who fashioned all things through His own Word. Again, men, unable to exist by themselves, are in a place, being contained and constituted in the Word of God, while God exists by Himself, containing all things and contained by nothing, and is in all things according to His own goodness and power, yet outside all things again according to His own nature. Just as men do not create in the same manner as God creates, nor do men exist as God exists, so the generation of men is one thing and the Son from the Father is another. For the offspring of men are in some way parts of those who beget them, since the nature of their bodies is not simple but fluid, and composed of parts. Men give off something when begetting, and again what is introduced from food flows into them; for this reason men become fathers of many children at different times. But God, being indivisible, is the Father of the Son indivisibly and impassibly.

For there is neither an effluence from the incorporeal, nor does any influx occur into Him as in the case of men; but being simple in nature, He is father of one and only Son. For this reason He is only-begotten and alone is in the bosom of the Father, and the Father shows Him alone from Himself, saying: "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." This is the Word of the Father, in whom it is possible to conceive the impassibility and indivisibility of the Father. For even the word of men is not generated by passion and division, much less that of God. Therefore He Himself sits at the right hand of the Father as Word; for where the Father is, there also is His Word; but we stand judged by Him as creatures. And He Himself is worshipped because He is the Son of the worshipped Father, while we worship and confess Him as Lord and God because we are creatures and other than He. These things being so, let anyone who wishes consider them, and let someone refute them, if it is lawful to say that which is from God and His own offspring is from non-existence, or if it has any reason at all to enter into anyone's thought, that that which is from God has accrued to Him, so that one might dare to say that the Son is not eternal. For in this again the generation of the Son has surpassed and transcended human notions. For we become fathers of our own children in time, since we ourselves, not existing before, later came to be; but God, being always, is always father of the Son. And the generation of the former has its assurance from things that exist similarly.

Since “no one knows the Son except the Father, nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and to whomsoever the Son reveals him,” for this reason the saints, to whom the Son revealed himself, have given us a certain image from visible things, saying: “He who is the radiance of the glory and the character of his hypostasis”; and again: “For with you is the source of life; in your light we shall see light”; and when the Word reproaches Israel, it says: “You have abandoned the source of wisdom”; and this is the source that says: “They have abandoned me, the source of living water.” And the example is small and very dim in relation to what is desired, yet it is possible from it to conceive more than human nature and not to think that our generation and that of the Son are equal. For who can even reason that the radiance did not exist at some time, so as to dare to say that the Son is not always, or that the Son was not before he was begotten? Or who is able to separate the radiance from the sun, or to conceive of the source ever being bereft of life, so as to say in madness that the Son who says “I am the life” is from non-existence, or that he who says “He who has seen me has seen the Father” is alien to the Father’s essence? For the saints, wishing us to think in this way, have given such examples, and it is absurd and very impious, when the Scripture has such images, for us to think about the Lord from other things that are neither written nor have any meaning for piety. Therefore, let them now say, whence then did they learn, or who handed down to them, that they began to suppose such things about the Savior? “We have read,” they will say, “in Proverbs.

The Lord created me at the beginning of his ways for his works.” For even the partisans of Eusebius seemed to say this, and you yourself indicated in writing that, although they were refuted by many proofs and were condemned, they nevertheless kept carrying this text up and down, saying that the Son is one of the creatures and counting him among the generated things. But this too, it seems to me, they have not understood well; for it has a pious and very correct meaning, which, if they themselves had understood, they would not have blasphemed the Lord of glory. For let them compare the preceding statements with this text, and they will see that there is a great difference between them. For who does not see, having a correct understanding, that things which are created and made are external to the maker, whereas the Son, as the argument showed earlier, exists not externally but from the Father who begets him? For a man builds a house, but begets a son, and no one would reverse this and say that the house and the ship are begotten by the builder, or that the son is created and made by the same, nor again that the house is an image of the builder, but the son is unlike the begetter. Rather, one will confess that the son is an image of the father, and that the house is a product of craft, unless someone is sick in mind and has lost his senses. Indeed, more than all, divine Scripture, knowing the nature of each, says concerning created things through Moses: “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth”; but concerning the Son, it indicates not another, but the Father himself speaking:

From the womb before the morning star I gave birth to you"; and again: "You are my son, I have given birth to you today"; and the Lord himself says about himself in Proverbs: "Before all the hills he gives birth to me"; and concerning things that are generated and created, John says: "All things came to be through him"; but concerning the Lord, he proclaims in the Gospel: "The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, that one expounded." If then he is Son, he is not a creature; if he is a creature, he is not Son; for the difference between them is great. And he could not be both Son and creature, lest his essence be thought to be both from God and from outside God. Is this saying then written in vain? For again those men buzz around like a swarm of gnats. No, it is not written in vain, but indeed very necessarily. For he is said to be created, but when he became man; for that is proper to man. And one who does not treat reading as a secondary matter, but also considers the time and the persons and

the need of the written words, examining and thus distinguishing and understanding the readings. He will therefore find and know the occasion of this saying, that the Lord, always existing, later at the consummation of the ages became man, and being son of God became also son of man. And he would understand the need, that wishing to abolish our death, he took for himself a body from the virgin Mary, in order to offer this as a sacrifice on behalf of all to the Father, and "free all of us, who through fear of death were throughout life guilty of bondage." The speaker is the Savior himself, and it is said then, when after taking the body he says: "The Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works." For just as it befits him, being son of God, to exist eternally and to be in the bosom of the Father, so also for him become man, the utterance "the Lord created me" is fitting. For it is then said about him: and he hungered, and he thirsted, and he inquired where Lazarus lay, and he suffered, and he rose. And just as hearing him called Lord and God and true light, we understand him to be from the Father, so it is right, hearing "created" and "servant" and "suffered," not to attribute these to the divinity—for that is improper—but to measure them by the flesh which he wore for our sake. For these are proper to that flesh, and the flesh itself is not another's, but belongs to the Word. And if one wishes to learn also the usefulness from this, he will find this too:

For the Word became flesh," so that he might offer this on behalf of all, and that we, partaking of his Spirit, might be able to be deified; otherwise we would not have attained this, unless he himself had put on our created body. For thus we have come to be called men of God and men in Christ. But just as we, receiving the Spirit, do not lose our own substance, so the Lord, having become man for our sake and bearing a body, was no less God; for he was not diminished by the envelopment of the body, but rather deified it and rendered it immortal. These things, then, are sufficient to expose the heresy of the Arians. For, as the Lord has granted, from what they themselves said they were refuted as impious. Come now, let us also put forward and demand that they themselves answer; for it is time, now that they are at a loss in their own arguments, to be questioned by us. Perhaps even thus, being shamed, they may look up from where they have fallen, the evil-minded ones. We have learned from the divine Scriptures, as we said before, that the Son of God is himself the Word and the Wisdom of the Father. For the Apostle says: "Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God"; and John, having said, "And the Word became flesh," immediately added: "And we beheld his glory, glory as of an only-begotten from a father, full of grace and truth"; so that the Word, being the only-begotten Son, in this Word and Wisdom both heaven and earth and all things in them were made.

And we have learned from Baruch that God is the source of this wisdom, when Israel was accused because "it abandoned the source of wisdom." If, therefore, they deny the writings from that source, being alien even to the name, they would fittingly be called by all atheists and Christ-fighters; for they have so named themselves. But if they agree with us that the words of Scripture are divinely inspired, let them dare to say openly what they think secretly, that God was once without reason and without wisdom, and in their madness say: "There was a time when he was not" and "Before being begotten, Christ was not"; and again let them declare that the source did not produce wisdom from itself, but acquired it from outside itself, so that they may also dare to say: "The Son came into being from non-existence." For this no longer shows that source to be a source, but rather some cistern, as if it took water from outside and used the name of source. How full of impiety this is, I think no one with even a small amount of perception would doubt. But since they mutter and say that Word and Wisdom are only names of the Son, it is necessary to ask them: if these are only names of the Son, then he himself would be something other than these. And if he is better than the names, it is not holy for the better to be signified by the lesser; but if he is lesser than the names, he certainly also has the reason for the more excellent appellation; this again signifies his progress, and this impiety is no less than the former. For the one who is in the Father, in whom the Father also is, the one who says:

I and the Father are one," whom also "he who has seen has seen the Father," to claim that he is improved by something external surpasses all madness. But falling short of these things and, like those around Eusebius, being constrained by great perplexity, they have this remaining, which Arius also in his songs and in his own Thalia mythologizes as if in perplexity: "God speaks many words." Which of them, then, do we call son and only-begotten word of the Father, senseless ones who are everything rather than Christians? For first, speaking such things about God, they almost suppose God to be a human being, speaking thus and replacing the former words with later ones, as if the one word from God were not sufficient to fill the whole creation from the Father's will and its providence. For him to speak many words is a weakness of all things, each lacking the need of the other, but for God to use one word, as indeed is true, this shows both the power of God and the perfection of the word from him and the pious understanding of those who think thus. Would that these men, even from what they now say, might be willing to confess the truth. For if they once grant that God utters words, they know him altogether as father. And knowing this, let them consider that, not wishing to give one word of God, they imagine him to be father of many. And they do not wish to deny altogether that there is a word of God, but they do not confess that this is the son of God. This is ignorance of the truth and inexperience of the divine scriptures.

For if God is Father of the Word, why should not the begotten one also be Son? And who would be Son of God again but his Word? For there are not many Words, so that each would be deficient, but the Word is one, so that it alone is perfect, and because God is one, his image also must be one, which is the Son. For the Son of God, as can be learned from the Scriptures themselves, is the Word of God and the Wisdom and the Image and the Hand and the Power; for the offspring of God is one, and these are the marks of his generation from the Father. For if you say "Son," you have indicated what is from him by nature; if you consider "Word," you again think of what is from him and his indivisibility; and speaking of "Wisdom," you no less conceive of what is not external, but from him and in him; and if you name "Power" and "Hand," you again speak of what is proper to his essence; and saying "Image," you signify the Son. For what would be like God except the offspring from him? Assuredly, what has come to be through the Word has been founded in Wisdom; and what has been founded in Wisdom has all been made by the Hand and has come to be through the Son. And we have this faith not from outside, but from the Scriptures. For God himself says through the prophet Isaiah: "My hand founded the earth, and my right hand made the heaven firm," and again: "And under the shadow of my hand I will shelter you, with which I set the heaven and founded the earth." And David, learning this and knowing that the Hand itself is the Wisdom, sang: "You have made all things in wisdom.

The earth was filled with your creation; as also Solomon, receiving from God, said: "God founded the earth with wisdom." And John, knowing that the hand and the wisdom are the Word, proclaimed: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. This one was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be." And the apostle, seeing that the hand, the wisdom, the Word himself is the Son, says: "In many ways and in many forms, God having long spoken to the fathers through the prophets, in these last days spoke to us through a Son, whom he appointed heir of all things; through whom he also made the ages," and again: "One Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him." And again, knowing that the Word, the wisdom, the Son himself is the image of the Father, he says in the Epistle to the Colossians: "Giving thanks to God and Father, who has qualified us for the portion of the inheritance of the saints in the light; who has delivered us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, in whom we have redemption, the remission of sins; who is the image of the invisible God, firstborn of all creation, because in him all things were created, both those in the heavens and those on the earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things through him and for him have been created, and he is before all things, and all things consist in him." For just as through the Word, so also, since he is his image, all things were created in him.

Thus, one who thinks in this way about the Lord will not stumble over the stone of stumbling, but will rather proceed toward the radiance opposite the light of truth. For this is truly the mind of piety, even if these men burst themselves with contentiousness, revering neither God nor being ashamed of the refutations from the proofs. Now, those around Eusebius, when examined in this way at that time, through many arguments and having condemned themselves, as I said before, subscribed, and after changing their minds, they kept quiet and withdrew. But since these men, acting insolently in their impieties and dizzy with confusion concerning the truth, attempt nothing other than to slander the council, let them tell us from what scriptures they learned or from which of the saints they heard the little phrases they have collected for themselves: "from non-existents," and "he was not before he was begotten," and "there was a time when he was not," and "changeable," and "pre-exist," and "by will," with which they playfully mythologize against the Lord. For the blessed Paul says in the Epistle to the Hebrews: "By faith we understand that the ages were fitted together by the word of God, so that what is seen did not come from things that appear." But the Word has nothing in common with the ages; for he himself is the one who pre-exists before the ages, through whom the ages also came into being. And in the Shepherd it is written, since they also bring this forward, although it is not from the canon: "First of all, believe that there is one God, who created, arranged, and made all things from non-being into being." But again, this has nothing to do with the Son.

For he speaks concerning all things that have come into being through him, of which he himself is distinct. For it is not possible to number the creator among the things created by him, unless one, being deranged, would say that the architect is the same as the buildings constructed by him. Why, then, having themselves invented unwritten expressions for impiety, do they accuse those who use unwritten expressions for piety? For impiety is altogether forbidden, even if one attempts to clothe it in various words and plausible sophisms; but piety is acknowledged as holy by all, even if one uses unusual expressions, as long as the speaker has a pious intention and through them wishes to signify piously what he has understood. Now, the aforementioned lowly phrases of the Christomachs have been shown by the argument, both then and now, to be full of every impiety; but if one examines accurately what was written and defined by the synod against them, he will certainly find in them the meaning of the truth contained, especially if he inquires with a love of learning and hears the reason for such expressions, which is reasonable; for it is this.

The synod, wishing to remove the Arian expressions of impiety and to write the acknowledged phrases of the Scriptures—that the Son is not from non-existence but from God, and that he is Word and Wisdom, not a creature nor a creation, but a proper offspring from the Father—those around Eusebius, dragged by their long-standing evil opinion, wanted the phrase "from God" to be common to us and to the Word of God, and that he differs in no way from us in this, because it is written: "One God from whom are all things," and again: "The old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new; and all things are from God." But the fathers, having observed their cunning and the evil artifice of their impiety, were compelled thereafter to speak more clearly the phrase "from God" and to write "that the Son is from the substance of God," so that the phrase "from God" might not be considered common and equal for the Son and for created things, but that all other things are creatures, and only the Word is believed to be from the Father. For even if all things are said to be from God, yet it is said in a different way than the Son is. For creatures, because they do not have their generation in vain, nor spontaneously, nor by chance, according to those who speak of a combination of atoms and homoeomeries, or as some heretics say there is another creator, or as others again say that the constitution of all things is by certain angels, but because, God existing, all things have come into being from him through the Word, not existing before, for this reason the phrase "from God" is said.

But the Word, since it is not a creature, is said and is alone from the Father; and the sign of such a meaning is that the Son is from the essence of the Father, for this belongs to none of the generated things. Indeed, Paul, when speaking of all things as from God, immediately added: "and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things," in order to show to all that the Son is different from all things that have come from God; for the things that have come from God have come into being through the Son. And he said these things for the sake of the creation that came from God, and not because all things are from the Father as the Son is. For neither are all things as the Son is, nor is the Word one of all things; for he is Lord and creator of all things. For this reason, the holy synod said more clearly that he is from the essence of the Father, so that the Word might be believed to be other than the nature of generated things, being alone truly from God, and so that no pretext for deception might remain for the impious. This, then, is the reason for the phrase "from the essence" having been written.

When the bishops again said that it was necessary to write that the Word is true power and image of the Father, like and unvarying in all things with the Father, and unchangeable and eternal and indivisibly in him—for he never was not, but the Word always existed eternally with the Father as the radiance of light—those around Eusebius endured it, not daring to contradict because of the shame they had from being refuted, but they were again caught murmuring among themselves and nodding with their eyes, saying that both the term "like" and "eternal" and the name "power" and "in him" are again common to us and the Son, and that it does not trouble them to agree to these. For "like," because it was written about us: "Man is an image and glory of God exists"; and "eternal," because it is written: "For we who are living are eternal"; and "in him," because "in him we live and move and are"; and "unchangeable," because it is written: "Nothing will separate us from the love of Christ"; and concerning "power," because both the caterpillar and the locust are called power and great power, and often it is written about the people, as: "The whole power of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt," and there are other heavenly powers; for "the Lord," it says, "of

of powers with us; our helper is the God of Jacob." For such things Asterius the so-called sophist, having learned from them, wrote, and Arius himself, having learned from him, as has been said. But the bishops, observing in this the hypocrisy of those men and that, as it is written, "in the hearts of the impious there is deceit contriving evils," were compelled again to gather from the Scriptures the meaning and, what they had said before, to state and write more clearly, that the Son is homoousios with the Father, so that they might signify not only that the Son is like, but that he is the same in likeness from the Father, and show that the Son's likeness and unchangeableness is different from the imitation spoken of in us, which we acquire from virtue through the keeping of the commandments. For things of bodies that are like each other can somehow be separated and become far from one another, as are the sons of men in relation to their begetters, as is written about Adam and Seth born from him, who was like him "according to his form." But since the generation of the Son from the Father is different from the nature of men, and he is not only like but also indivisible from the Father's substance, and he and the Father are one, as he himself has said, and the Word is always in the Father and the Father in the Word, as the radiance is to the light—for this the term signifies—therefore the council, understanding this, rightly wrote homoousios, so as to overturn the malice of the heretics and show that the Word is different from generated things.

For having written this, they immediately added: “But those who say that the Son of God is from non-existence, or is created, or changeable, or a work, or from another substance, these the holy and catholic church anathematizes.” And having said these things, they clearly showed that the phrase “from the substance” and the term “homoousios” are destructive of the impious notions, which are: creation, work, generated, changeable, and “he was not before he was begotten.” For he who holds these opinions opposes the synod, while he who does not hold the opinions of Arius necessarily holds those of the synod and rightly understands them, seeing how the radiance relates to the light, and from this taking the image of the truth. Therefore, if these men also plead that the terms are foreign, let them accept the meaning according to which the synod wrote thus, anathematizing what the synod anathematized, and then, if they can, let them find fault with the words. But I know well that once they accept the meaning of the synod, they will certainly also accept the words of that meaning. But if they wish to find fault even with this meaning, it is clear to all that they are speaking vainly about those matters and are only devising pretexts for themselves for impiety. This, then, is the pretext concerning such terms. But if they again murmur that these terms are not in Scripture, let them be cast out at once as talking idly and not being sound in mind; and let them blame themselves in this matter also, because they were the first to provide such a pretext, having begun to fight against God from unwritten sources.

Let it be known, however, if anyone is a lover of learning, that even if the words are not thus found in the Scriptures, yet, as has been said before, they contain the meaning of the Scriptures, and when uttered they signify this to those whose hearing is whole for piety. It is for you to consider this, and for the unlearned to listen. It has been shown in the foregoing, and it is true to believe, that the Word is from the Father and is his own and natural offspring. For from what other source could one conceive the Son, who is the wisdom and the Word, in whom all things have come to be, except from God himself? Yet we have learned this also from the Scriptures, the Father saying through David: “My heart brought forth a good word,” and “From the womb before the morning star I begot you,” and the Son showing concerning himself to the Jews: “If God were your father, you would love me; for I came out from the Father,” and again: “Not that anyone has seen the Father, unless he who is from God has seen the Father,” and indeed also: “I and the Father are one,” and “I am in the Father, and the Father is in me” is equivalent to saying: I am from the Father and inseparable from him. And John also, saying: “The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, that one expounded,” said this having learned it from the Father. For what else does “in the bosom” signify than the genuine generation of the Son from the Father?

If, then, one considers God to be composite, as having accident in substance, or to have some external covering and to be concealed, or to have something around Him that completes His substance, so that when we say "God" or name "Father" we do not signify His invisible and incomprehensible substance itself, but something about Him, let them blame the synod for writing that the Son is from the substance of God, but let them understand that they blaspheme in two ways by thinking thus. For they introduce God as something corporeal and falsely claim that the Lord is not the Son of the Father Himself, but of the things around Him. But if God is simple, as indeed He is, then clearly when we say "God" and name "Father," we name nothing as around Him, but signify His substance itself. For even if it is not possible to comprehend what the substance of God is, yet we, understanding only that God exists, and with Scripture signifying Him in these terms, wishing to signify no other than Him, say "God" and "Father" and "Lord." When, then, it says, "I am the one who is," and "I am the Lord God," and wherever Scripture says "the God," we, reading, understand that nothing other than His incomprehensible substance itself is signified, and that He is what they say. Therefore, let no one be astonished hearing that the Son of God is from the substance of God, but rather let them accept the fathers, who purified the mind and, more clearly and as if by comparison, wrote "from the substance" instead of "from God.

They considered it the same thing to say "from God" and to say "from the substance of God" that the Word is, since "God," as I said before, signifies nothing other than the substance of that which exists. If, then, the Word is not from God as a genuine son would be from a father by nature, but as creatures are said to be from God because they have been created, and He Himself is said to be from God as all things are, then He is neither from the substance of the Father nor is He Himself a son according to substance, but by virtue, as we who are called sons by grace. But if He alone is from God as a genuine son, as indeed He is, then it would be fittingly said that the Son is also from the substance of God. For indeed the example of light and radiance has such a meaning. For the saints have not said that the Word is to God as fire kindled from the heat of the sun, which is also accustomed to be extinguished again—for that would be an external work and a creature of the maker—but they all proclaimed Him to be radiance, in order to show the property, indivisibility, and unity with the Father that comes from the substance. For in this way His being unchangeable and immutable will truly be preserved; for how could He be such otherwise, unless He is a proper offspring of the Father's substance? For it is necessary to preserve identity with His own Father in this as well. Thus, the Word having appeared pious, it would be consistent for the Christomachians not to be shocked at the term "homoousios," since this expression also has a sound meaning and demonstration.

For if we say that the Word is from the substance of God (for let the expression be admitted even by them), what else would this be than that which is truly and eternally of the substance from which he has also been generated? For it is not of a different form, so that something foreign and unlike the substance of the father might be mixed in, nor is it simply similar from without, so that it might appear according to another or altogether of a different substance, like gleaming bronze and gold and silver and tin. For these are foreign and of different nature from one another and are separated in nature and power; and neither is bronze proper to gold, nor is the dove from the pigeon, but they are considered similar, yet are of different substance from one another. If, then, the Son is likewise, let him be a creature like us and not homoousios; but if he is Son, Word, Wisdom, Image of the Father, Radiance, he would reasonably be homoousios. For if he is not from God, but is shown to be like a foreign instrument of different nature and different substance, then the council has written well and understood correctly. Let every corporeal reasoning be removed again in these matters, and having transcended all imagination of sense perception, let us conceive with pure intellection and with the mind alone the genuineness of the Son toward the Father, the properness of the Word toward God, and the unvarying likeness of the radiance to the light. For just as "offspring" and "son" are not human, but are spoken and exist as is fitting for God, in the same way, when we hear the expression "homoousios," let us not fall into human sense perceptions and conceive of divisions and separations of the divinity.

But as we think of incorporeal things, let us not divide the unity of nature and the identity of light. For this is proper to the Son in relation to the Father, and this shows that God is truly the Father of the Word. Again, the example of light and radiance is necessary for this. Who would dare to say that the radiance is foreign and unlike the sun? Or who, looking thus at the radiance in relation to the sun and the identity of light, would not confidently say: truly the light and the radiance are one, and this is shown in that, and the radiance exists in the sun, so that one who sees this also sees that? And how would those who believe and see rightly call such unity and natural property except "homoousion" and "offspring"? And what would one properly and fittingly understand the offspring of God to be except Word and Wisdom and Power, which it is not pious to say is foreign to the Father, nor is it lawful even to imagine that it does not exist eternally with the Father? For by this offspring the Father has made all things, and extending his providence over all things through it, he shows his love for humanity. And thus he and the Father are one, as has been said, unless the evil-minded, daring again, should say that the substance of the Word is different and that the light from the Father in him is something else, so that the light in the Son is one with the Father, but the Son himself is foreign in substance, as a creature. But this is plainly the opinion of Caiaphas and of Samosatenus, which the Church cast out, and these men now pretend, and therefore they have been shown to be heretics, having fallen from the truth.

For if it partakes at all of the light from the Father, why is it not rather itself that which is partaken, so that nothing intermediate between it and the Father may be found? For if it is not so, then it is no longer shown that all things have come to be through the Son, but through that of which he himself partakes. But if this is the Word, the wisdom of the Father, in whom the Father is revealed and known and creates, and without whom the Father does nothing, it is clear that this is that which is from the Father; for all created things partake of him, partaking of the Holy Spirit. Being thus, he will not be from non-existent things nor a creature at all, but rather a proper offspring from the Father, as the radiance from light. Now those who assembled at Nicaea, having this meaning, wrote such expressions. And that they did not invent these for themselves, devising them, since they also allege this, but received them from those before them and spoke them, come, let us refute this also, so that not even this pretext may remain for them. Learn then, O Christ-fighting Arians, that Theognostus, a learned man, did not shrink from saying "from the essence." For writing about the Son in the second book of his Hypotyposes, he spoke thus: "The substance of the Son is not something introduced from outside nor was it brought in from non-existent things, but it grew from the substance of the Father, as

of light the radiance, as of water the vapor. "For neither the radiance nor the vapor is the water itself or the sun itself, nor is it alien," and neither is the Son's essence the Father himself nor alien, but an emanation "from the Father's essence, the Father's essence having undergone no division. For just as" the sun remains the same and is not diminished by the rays poured forth from it, so neither did the essence "of the Father undergo any alteration, having the Son as an image of itself." Now Theognostus, having examined the earlier matters as in an exercise, later set forth his own opinion in this way. But Dionysius, who became bishop of Alexandria, writing against Sabellius, expounding at length the incarnation of the Savior and from it refuting the Sabellians, that it is not the Father who became flesh, but his Word, as John said, since he was suspected of calling the Son a creation and a generated being and not consubstantial with the Father, writes to his namesake Dionysius, the bishop of Rome, defending himself, asserting that this is a false accusation against him. For he affirmed that he had not called the Son a creation, but also that he confessed him to be consubstantial. His statement runs thus: "And in another letter I wrote, in which I refuted also the charge they bring against me, which is false, that I do not say that Christ is consubstantial with God. For even if I say that I have not found this name anywhere in the holy scriptures, yet my subsequent arguments, which they have passed over in silence, are not discordant with this meaning.

For I set forth human offspring as clearly being of the same kind, stating that parents are only "different from their children, because they are not themselves the children, nor is it necessary that either parents" exist or children. And the letter, as I said before, due to circumstances "I do not have to produce; but if so, I would send you the very words of that time, or rather even the entire" copy; which, if I can obtain, I will do. I know and remember that I added "more analogies from kindred things: for I also said that a plant growing from a seed or from" a root is different from that from which it sprouted, and is certainly of the same nature as it. "And I said that a river flowing from a spring has taken a different name; for neither is the" spring called a river nor the river a spring, and both exist, and the "river is the water from the spring." But that the Word of God is not a product nor a creation, but a proper and inseparable offspring of the Father's essence, as the great council wrote, behold, even Dionysius, the bishop of Rome, writing against those who hold the opinions of Sabellius, inveighs against those who dare to say these things and speaks thus: "Next I would fittingly speak also" against those who divide and cut up and abolish the most solemn proclamation "of the church of God, the monarchy, into three certain powers and divided hypostases" and three divinities. For I have learned that there are some among you who are catechists "and teachers of the divine word who are instructors of this opinion, who diametrically," so to speak, are opposed to the opinion of Sabellius.

For one blasphemes by saying that the Son is the Father and vice versa, while the others in a certain way proclaim three gods, dividing the holy Monad into three hypostases completely separate from one another. For the divine Word must be united with the God of the universe, and the Holy Spirit must dwell and abide in God. And the divine Trinity must necessarily be summed up and gathered into one, as into a kind of summit, I mean the God of the universe, the Pantocrator. For the teaching of the vain-minded Marcion, the cutting and division of the monarchy into three principles, is a diabolical invention, and not that of the true disciples of Christ and of those who are pleased with the Savior's teachings. For these clearly know that the Trinity is proclaimed by divine Scripture, but that neither the Old nor the New Testament proclaims three gods. Nor would one less blame those who hold that the Son is a creation and think that the Lord has come into being like one of the things that are actually created, while the divine oracles attest to him a generation that is fitting and proper, but not some fashioning and making. Therefore it is no ordinary blasphemy, but the greatest, to say in a certain way that the Lord is handmade. For if the Son has come into being, there was when he was not; but he always was, if indeed he is in the Father, as he himself says, and if Christ is Word and Wisdom and Power. For the divine Scriptures say that Christ is these things, as you know; and these, being powers of God, are so. If therefore the Son has come into being, there was when these were not; there was therefore a time when God was without these.

This is most absurd. And why should I discourse further with you about these matters, men who are spirit-bearing and clearly know the absurdities that arise from calling the Son a creation? To which absurdities, it seems to me, the founders of this opinion have not paid attention, and because of this have completely missed the truth, having interpreted otherwise than the divine and prophetic scripture intends the phrase "the Lord created me as the beginning of his ways." For the meaning of "created" is not one, as you know; for "created" here must be understood in the sense of "appointed" to the works that have come into being by him, which works have come into being through the Son himself. But "created" would not now be said in the sense of "made"; for "to create" differs from "to make." Did not your own father acquire you and make you and create you? So Moses says in the great ode in Deuteronomy. To whom one might say: O reckless men, is the firstborn of all creation, who was born from the womb before the morning star, who spoke as Wisdom, "Before all hills he begets me," a creation? And in many places of the divine scriptures one would find the Son spoken of as having been begotten, not as having come into being. By which they are clearly refuted, who, supposing falsehoods about the Lord's generation, dare to call his divine and ineffable generation a making.

Neither, therefore, should one divide the wondrous and divine monad into three deities, nor hinder the dignity and surpassing greatness of the Lord by creation, but believe in God the Father Almighty, and in Christ Jesus his Son, and in the Holy Spirit, and that the Word is united with the God of all. For I, he says, and the Father are one; and I am in the Father, and the Father is in me. For thus both the divine Trinity and the holy proclamation of the monarchy would be preserved. And concerning the Word’s eternal coexistence with the Father, and that he is not from another substance or hypostasis, but is the Father’s own offspring, as those at the synod have said, let you again hear also from the industrious Origen. For what he wrote as inquiring and exercising, let no one accept as his own opinion, but as that of those contending in disputation; but what he declares without hesitation, that is the opinion of the industrious man. After the statements made as in exercise against the heretics, he himself immediately adds his own words, saying thus: “If there is an image of the invisible God, it is an invisible image; and I would venture to add that, being also a likeness of the Father, there was never a time when it was not. For when did God, who according to John is called light—for God is light—not have a radiance of his own glory, so that one might dare to assign a beginning to the Son, who previously did not exist? And when did the image, the character, the Word that knows the Father, of the ineffable, unnameable, and unspeakable hypostasis of the Father, not exist? For let him who dares and speaks consider.

There was a time when the Son was not," "that they will also say that Wisdom was not at some time, and Word was not, and Life was not." And again in other works he speaks thus: "But it is not lawful nor without danger, given our weakness, to deprive God, as far as we are concerned, of the only-begotten Word who always coexists with him, 'who is Wisdom in which he rejoiced; for thus he will not be thought to rejoice always.'" Behold, we demonstrate that such an understanding has been transmitted from fathers to fathers, but you, O new Jews and disciples of Caiaphas, what fathers of your own words can you point to? But you would name none of the prudent and wise; for all turn away from you, except the devil alone. For he alone has become the father of such apostasy for you, he who sowed this impiety in you from the beginning and has now persuaded you to revile the ecumenical council, because they have written not your doctrines but those which the original eyewitnesses and servants of the Word handed down. For the faith which the council confessed in writing is that of the catholic church. Defending this, the blessed fathers wrote thus and condemned the Arian heresy; for this reason especially they attempt to slander the council. For it is not the words themselves that grieve them, but that in these words they were shown to be heretics and more audacious than other heresies.

Indeed, when their little phrases were shown to be base at that time and always easily refuted as impious, they then borrowed from the Greeks the term "unoriginate," so that under the pretext of this name they might again number the Word of God among the generated and the creatures, through whom these very generated things have come into being. So shameless are they toward impiety and contentious toward blasphemies against the Lord. If, then, they are so shameless in ignorance of the term, they ought to learn from those who gave it to them that even what they call "mind from the good" and "soul from the mind," although knowing from what they come, they nevertheless did not fear to call even these "unoriginate," knowing that in saying this they do not diminish the first from which these naturally proceed; and they should either speak thus themselves or not speak at all about things they do not know. But if they think they know, it is necessary to ask them, especially since the term is not from the divine Scriptures, but they contend by speaking without written authority. For I have explained the cause and the meaning according to which the council used "from the substance" and "homoousios" in agreement with what is said in the Scriptures about the Savior and with what the fathers before them set forth and wrote. And let them themselves answer, if indeed they can, how they found this unwritten term, or with what meaning they call God "unoriginate." For I have heard that the term has various significations.

For they say that "unoriginate" is said in three senses: first, of that which has not yet come to be but is capable of coming to be; second, of that which neither exists nor is capable of coming into being; and third, of that which exists but is neither generated nor has had a beginning of existence, but is eternal and imperishable. Perhaps, then, they will wish to pass over the first two meanings because of the absurdity arising from them; for according to the first, things that are already coming to be and those expected to come to be will be unoriginate; the second has even more absurdity than this. They will then resort to the third meaning, calling the unoriginate according to it. But even in saying this, they are no less impious. For if they say that that which has no beginning of existence and is neither generated nor created, but is eternal, is unoriginate, and that the Word of God is the opposite of these, who does not see the craftiness of the God-fighters? Who would not stone them, thus raving? For since they are ashamed to still bring forward the first of their own little fables, on account of which they were condemned, the wretches have contrived to signify them again in another way through the name of the "unoriginate," as they call it. For if the Son is among the generated, it is evident that he too has come to be from non-existence, and if he has a beginning of existence, then he was not before he was begotten, and if he is not eternal, there was a time when he was not. Therefore, while holding these opinions, they ought again to signify their own heterodoxy in their own words, and not by the term "unoriginate.

that which exists without having a beginning. But they do not do this, the malicious ones, but do everything according to their father the devil with cunning. For just as he attempts to deceive by means of alien garments, so they have devised to use the term "unoriginate" in order that, while pretending to speak well of God, they may keep hidden their blasphemy against the Lord and signify it to others under a veil. But even this sophism of theirs having been detected, what else, pray, is left for them? Let them say. We have found, say the villains, and adding to their previous statements they say, that "unoriginate" is that which has no cause for its being, but is itself the cause for generated things coming to be. Ungrateful and truly deaf to the Scriptures, who do everything and say everything not for the honor of God, but for the dishonor of the Son, not knowing that he who dishonors the Son dishonors the Father. For first, even if they name God in this way, the account of generated things is not shown. For the essence of the Father, as a offspring, is again thus eternally with him. For this name does not remove the nature of the Word, nor again does "unoriginate" have its signification in relation to the Son, but in relation to the things that have come to be through the Son.

Just as someone who addresses an architect and calls him the builder of a house or a city does not include in this name the son begotten from him, but, indicating by his skill in works and his knowledge that he is not such as the things produced by him, calls him builder, while knowing the nature of the maker, he knows that the one begotten from him is other than these, and calls him father because of the son, and creator and maker because of the works. In the same way, one who speaks thus of God as unbegotten names him from his works, indicating not only that he is not begotten, but also that he is the maker of begotten things; yet he knows that the Word is other than these and is the sole proper offspring of the Father, through whom all things have come to be and consist. For indeed, when the prophets call God almighty, they did not invoke him thus because the Word is one of all things—for they knew that the Son is other than the begotten and all things, and that he himself holds sway according to the likeness of the Father—but because he himself holds sway over all things which he has made through the Son, and he has given authority over these to the Son, and having given it, he himself again rules over all things through the Word. Again, when they call God lord of the powers, they did not say this because the Word is one of these powers, but because he is father of the Son, and lord of the powers that came to be through the Son. For indeed, the Word himself, being in the Father, is lord of all these and holds sway over all; for all that the Father has belongs to the Son.

Just as this has such a meaning, so whoever wishes to call God unbegotten, let him do so, if it once seems good to him, but not because the Word is among the things that are begotten, but because, as I said before, God is not only not begotten, but is also the maker of begotten things through his own Word. For even when the Father is spoken of in this way, the Word is again the image and consubstantial with the Father; and being his image, he would be other than the begotten things and all things. For of that of which he is the image, he also has the property and likeness, so that the one who says the Father is unbegotten and almighty understands in the unbegotten and almighty also his Word and his wisdom, which is the Son. But these wonderful men, easily inclined to impiety, not caring for the honor of God, devised the name "unbegotten" for the sake of their malice against the Savior; for if they had cared for honor and good repute, it would have been better, and this was preferable, for them to know and call God Father, rather than to name him in that way. For when they call God unbegotten, they derive him from things that have come to be, as I said before, making him only a maker.

they say, in order to signify the Word as a product according to their own pleasure. But he who calls God Father immediately signifies the Son in him as well, and will not be ignorant that, since the Son exists, all things that have come into being were created through the Son. Therefore, it would be more true to signify God from the Son and to call him Father than to name him from his works alone and to call him unbegotten. For the former signifies the works that have come into being from the will of God through the Word, while the name Father makes known the proper offspring from his own essence. And to the extent that the Word differs from things that are generated, to that extent and more would calling God Father differ from calling him unbegotten. For the latter is unwritten and suspicious, having a varied meaning, while the former is simple, written, more true, and signifies the Son alone. And the term unbegotten is found among the Greeks who do not know the Son, whereas the term Father was known and granted by our Lord. For knowing of whom he is the Son, he said: "I am in the Father and the Father is in me," and "He who has seen me has seen the Father," and "I and the Father are one." And nowhere does he himself appear to call the Father unbegotten, but even when teaching us to pray, he did not say: "When you pray, say 'Unbegotten God,'" but rather: "When you pray, say 'Our Father who art in heaven.'" And the summary of our faith he wished to tend toward this: for he commanded us to be baptized not in the name of unbegotten and begotten, nor in the name of uncreated and creature, but in the name of Father and Son and Holy Spirit.

For thus being perfected we are truly adopted as sons, and when we say the name "Father," we recognize from this name also the Word that is in the Father. But if he wishes to call our Father his own Father, we must not for this reason extend ourselves to the Son in respect of nature. For this too is said by us on account of him. Since the Word took upon himself our body and became among us, accordingly, on account of the Word in us, God is also called our Father. For the Spirit of the Word in us names his own Father as ours; this is the meaning of the Apostle when he says: "God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba, Father.'" But perhaps, having been refuted by the name "unoriginate," and being wicked in character, they will also wish to say themselves: "It was necessary that concerning our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ the things written about him be stated from the Scriptures, and that no unwritten expressions be introduced." Yes, it was necessary, I myself would say, for the marks of truth are more precise from the Scriptures than from other sources; but the malice and cunningly shifting impiety of those around Eusebius compelled the bishops, as I said before, to set forth more clearly the words that overturn their impiety. And the things written by the council have been shown to have a correct meaning, while the arguments of the Arians have been revealed as both unsound and their character wicked.

For the name "unbegotten" also, having its own meaning and being capable of being piously uttered, they again, according to their own thought, name it as they wish, to the dishonor of the Savior, so that, like giants, they may strive only to fight against God. But neither did those who uttered those little arguments remain uncondemned, nor could they, though the term "unbegotten" can be used well and piously, escape notice when they themselves thought wickedly; for they were put to shame in all things, and their heresy was pilloried everywhere. These things, as I was able, I have recounted, having recalled what was then done in the synod; but I know that the contentious among the Christ-fighters will not wish to change even after hearing these things, but will run about again seeking other pretexts, and after these will devise still others. For according to the prophetic saying, "If the Ethiopian will change his skin and the leopard its spots," so they, having learned to be impious, will wish to think piously. But you, beloved, having received this, read it to yourself, and if you judge it to be good, read it also to the brothers who were then present, so that they too, learning these things, may accept the zeal for truth and the precision of thought of the synod, and condemn the audacity of the Christ-fighting Arians and their vain pretexts, which they have practiced devising for the sake of their impious heresy; because glory, honor, and worship are due to God and Father together with his co-eternal Son and Word, together with the all-holy and life-giving Spirit, now and for the unending ages of ages. Amen.

Eusebius of Caesarea, the Arian-minded, letter to those of his own parish. The matters concerning the ecclesiastical faith that were transacted at the great synod convened at Nicaea, it is likely, beloved, that you have learned from elsewhere as well, since rumor is accustomed to outrun the precise account of what is done. But so that the truth may not be reported to you differently from such hearsay, we have necessarily sent to you first the writing concerning the faith that was proposed by us, and then the second, which they published after adding supplements to our own words. Now the document from us, read in the presence of our most God-beloved emperor and declared to be both good and approved, is as follows: "Just as we received from the bishops before us, both in the first catechesis and when we received the bath, and just as we have learned from the divine scriptures, and as in the presbyterate and in the episcopate itself we both believed and taught, so also now, believing, we present our faith to you; and it is this: We believe in one God, Father, Pantocrator, the maker of all things visible and invisible, and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God, God from God, light from light, life from life, only-begotten Son, firstborn of all creation, born from the Father before all ages, through whom all things came to be.

learned, from other sources, what was done concerning the ecclesiastical faith at the great synod convened at Nicaea. For since the teaching of the Arians, which was condemned, was not simply a matter of a few, but had spread to many, the blessed council, having gathered from all sides, decreed that the faith should be set forth in writing, so that all might know the truth and the error might be exposed. And the faith set forth is as follows: We believe in one God, Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, that is, from the substance of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made, both those in heaven and those on earth; who for us men and for our salvation came down and was made flesh, and lived among men, and suffered, and rose again on the third day, and ascended to the Father, and will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead. And we believe in one Holy Spirit. Believing each of these to be and to exist, Father truly Father, Son truly Son, and Holy Spirit truly Holy Spirit, as also our Lord, sending his own disciples to preach, said: "Go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." Concerning these things we affirm that they are so, and that we think thus, and that we have always held thus, and that we will contend for this faith until death, anathematizing every godless heresy. We testify that we have always thought these things from the heart and soul, from the time we first knew ourselves, and that we now think and speak them in truth before the God Almighty and our Lord Jesus Christ, being able to show by proofs and to convince you that even in past times we believed and preached thus. "When this faith was set forth by us, there was no place for contradiction, but our most God-beloved emperor himself first testified that it contained the most correct teaching. And thus he himself thinks

He agreed and commanded all to consent to this, to subscribe to the decrees, and to concur with these very things, with only one word being added, that of homoousios, which he himself interpreted, saying: that the Son is not called homoousios according to the passions of bodies, nor did he subsist from the Father by division or by any severance; for the immaterial, intellectual, and incorporeal nature cannot undergo any bodily passion, but such things must be understood by divine and ineffable words. And our most wise and most pious emperor philosophized thus. But those who, on the pretext of the addition of homoousios, have composed this document: [The faith dictated at the synod.] "We believe in one God, Father, Pantocrator, maker of all things visible and invisible, and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, only-begotten, that is, from the substance of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made, homoousios with the Father, through whom all things came to be, both those in heaven and those on earth, who for us men and for our salvation came down and was incarnate, became man, suffered and rose on the third day, ascended into the heavens, and is coming to judge the living and the dead. And in the Holy Spirit. Those who say 'there was a time when he was not' and 'before being begotten he was not' and that 'he came to be from non-existence' or who affirm that the Son of God is from another hypostasis or substance, or that he is created, or changeable, or alterable, the catholic church anathematizes.

And when this document had been dictated by them, we did not leave unexamined how they had spoken the phrases "from the substance of the Father" and "homoousios with the Father." Therefore questions and answers were stirred up from this, and the argument tested the meaning of what had been said. And indeed, the phrase "from the substance" was acknowledged by them to be indicative of being from the Father, but not as being a part of the Father. And in this we also thought it right to agree with the meaning of the pious teaching, which dictates that the Son is from the Father, but not as being a part of his substance. Therefore we also assented to the meaning, not rejecting the term homoousios, since the goal of peace lay before our eyes and we did not wish to fall away from the correct meaning. In the same way, we also accepted "begotten and not made," since they said that "made" is a common term for the rest of the creatures that came into being through the Son, none of which the Son resembles; therefore he is not a creation similar to those that came into being through him, but is of a substance superior to every creation, which the divine oracles teach was begotten from the Father, the manner of the begetting being inexpressible and inconceivable to every created nature. And thus the argument establishes that "the Son is homoousios with the Father," not in the manner of bodies nor similarly to mortal animals, for neither by division of the substance nor by severance, nor by any passion or change or alteration of the Father's substance and power.

For of all these things the unbegotten nature of the Father is different. And the phrase "homoousios with the Father" is indicative that the Son of God bears no resemblance to created beings, but is assimilated in every way only to the Father who begot him, and that he is not from some other hypostasis or substance, but from the Father. And when this had been interpreted in this manner, it seemed good to assent to it, since we knew that some ancient and learned and distinguished bishops and writers had used the term homoousios in their theology of the Father and Son. So let these things be said concerning the faith that was set forth, to which we all agreed, not without examination, but according to the interpretations given, examined in the presence of the most pious emperor himself, and agreed upon with the stated reasonings. And the anathema that was set forth by them after the faith we considered to be unobjectionable, because it prevents the use of unwritten phrases, on account of which almost the whole confusion and disorder of the church has arisen. Since at any rate no divinely inspired scripture uses the phrases "from non-existence" and "there was a time when he was not" and the subsequent expressions, it did not seem reasonable to say and teach these things. And since this also seemed good, we agreed, especially because even in the time before this we were not accustomed to use these expressions. Moreover, the anathematizing of the phrase "before he was begotten he was not" was not considered out of place, because it is confessed by all that the Son of God existed before his birth in the flesh.

Now our most God-beloved emperor was establishing by argument that, according to his divine generation, he exists before all ages, since even before being generated in actuality he was potentially in the Father in an unbegotten manner, the Father always being Father, just as he is always King and always Savior, being everything potentially, and always remaining the same and in the same state. We have necessarily sent you these things, beloved, making clear to you the judgment of our examination and agreement, and how reasonably we resisted then and up to the very last hour, when the writings composed differently offended us, and then how without contentiousness we accepted what did not cause pain, when, as we examined the meaning of the words in good conscience, it appeared to concur with what we ourselves had confessed in the previously set forth faith. {Deposition of Arius and those with him by Alexander, Archbishop of Alexandria.} Alexander to the presbyters and deacons of Alexandria and the Mareotis, present to those present, beloved brothers in the Lord, greetings. Although you have already subscribed to what I wrote to those around Arius, urging them to renounce impiety and be persuaded by the sound and catholic faith, and you have shown your own right intention and the harmony of the catholic church in doctrines, nevertheless, since I have also written to my fellow ministers everywhere concerning those around Arius, I have deemed it necessary to gather you, the clergy of the city, and to summon you from the Mareotis.

especially because from among you, Chares and Pistus, presbyters, and Sarapion, Parammon, Zosimus, and Eirenaius, deacons, followed those around Arius and were content to be deposed with them; so that you may also now know what is written, and demonstrate your own agreement in these matters, and become of one vote with the deposition of those around Arius and those around Pistus. For it is fitting that you know what is written by me, and that each of you hold it in your heart as if written by him. Copy. To the beloved and most honored fellow ministers everywhere in the catholic church, Alexander in the Lord sends greetings. Since the catholic church is one body, and there is a command in the divine scriptures to preserve the bond of concord and peace, it is fitting that we write and signify to one another what is done by each, so that if one member suffers or rejoices, we either suffer together or rejoice together with one another. In our parish, therefore, men have now come forth, lawless and Christ-fighters, teaching apostasy, which one might reasonably suspect and call a forerunner of the Antichrist. And I wished to consign such a matter to silence, so that the evil might be consumed only among the leaders and not, passing into other places, defile the ears of some innocent ones. But since Eusebius, now in Nicomedia, thinking that the affairs of the church rest upon him, because he left Berytus and cast his eyes upon the church of the Nicomedians and has not been avenged against him, he also champions these

of the apostates and attempted to write everywhere commending them, so as to draw some ignorant persons into this most shameful and Christ-fighting heresy, I was compelled, knowing what is written in the law, no longer to be silent, but to report to all of you, so that you may know both those who have become apostates and the wretched statements of their heresy, and, if Eusebius writes, you may not pay attention. For he, wishing to renew through these things his old malice, which had been silenced by time, pretends to write on their behalf, but in fact shows that he does this in his own interest. Now those who have become apostates are Arius, Achilleus, Aithales, Carpones, another Arius, and Sarmates, once presbyters; and Euzoius, Lucius, Julius, Menas, Helladius, and Gaius, once deacons; and with them Secundus and Theonas, once called bishops. And what they have invented and say contrary to the Scriptures are these things: God the Father was not always; there was a time when God the Father was not. The Word of God was not always, but came into being from non-existence. For the God who is made the one who is not from non-existence. Therefore there was a time when he was not. For the Son is a creature and a product. He is neither like the Father in essence, nor is he the true and natural Word of the Father, nor is he his true wisdom, but he is one of the products and created things, and is called Word and wisdom only by abuse of language, being himself created by the Word of God and the wisdom in God, by which God has made all things, including him.

Therefore he is mutable and alterable in nature, like all rational beings. The Word is foreign, alien, and separated from the essence of God, and the Father is ineffable to the Son. For the Word neither knows the Father completely and accurately, nor is he able to see him perfectly. Indeed, the Son does not even know his own essence as it is. For he was made for our sake, so that God might create us through him as through an instrument. And he would not have subsisted if God had not wished to make us. At any rate, someone asked them whether the Word of God could be changed as the devil was changed, and they were not afraid to say that he can; for he is of a mutable nature, being generated and created. Saying these things, those around Arius and being shameless about them, both themselves and those who followed them, we, together with the bishops of Egypt and Libya, nearly a hundred in number, assembled and anathematized. But those around Eusebius accepted them, eager to mix falsehood with truth and impiety with piety. But they will not prevail; for truth conquers, and there is no communion of light with darkness, nor concord of Christ with Beliar. For who has ever heard such things? Or who, hearing them now, is not astonished and stops his ears to prevent the filth of these words from touching his hearing? Who, hearing John say, "In the beginning was the Word," does not condemn those who say, "There was a time when he was not"? Or who, hearing in the Gospel "only-begotten Son" and "through him everything came to be," will not hate those who declare that he is one of the creatures?

How can he be one of the beings that came into existence through him, or how can he be only-begotten if he is counted among all things according to them, if indeed he himself is a creature and a product? How could he be from non-existent things when the Father says, "My heart has brought forth a good word" and "I gave birth to you from the womb before the morning star"? Or how is he unlike the essence of the Father, being the perfect image and radiance of the Father and saying, "He who has seen me has seen the Father"? How, if the Son is word and wisdom of God, was there ever a time when he was not? For it is equivalent to saying that God was once without word and without wisdom. How is he mutable and alterable who says through himself, "I am in the Father and the Father is in me" and "I and the Father are one," and through the prophet, "See me, that I am and have not changed"? For even if one can refer the saying to the Father himself, yet it would be more fittingly said now concerning the Word, that even having become man he has not changed, but as the apostle said, "Jesus Christ yesterday and today the same and for the ages." Who then persuaded them to say that he came into being for our sake, although Paul writes, "for whom are all things, and through whom are all things"? As for their blasphemy that the Son does not fully know the Father, one should not be surprised. For having once set out to fight against Christ, they distort even his own words when he says, "As the Father knows me, so I know the Father." If then the Father knows the Son partially, it is clear that the Son also does not know the Father fully.

If it is not lawful to say this, but the Father knows the Son perfectly, then clearly, as the Father knows his own Word, so also the Word knows his own Father, whose Word he is. Saying these things and unfolding the divine Scriptures, we often refuted them, and again, like chameleons, they changed, contending to draw to themselves the written saying, "When a godless man goes into the depth of evils, he despises." Many heresies indeed arose before them, which, having dared more than necessary, fell into folly. But these, through all their own phrases, having attempted to destroy the divinity of the Word, justified those earlier heresies by themselves, becoming nearer to the Antichrist. Therefore they were denounced and anathematized by the Church. We grieve, then, over the ruin of these, and especially because, having once learned the teachings of the Church, they have now fallen away; but we are not surprised. For Hymenaeus and Philetus suffered this, and before them Judas, who followed the Savior, for later he became a traitor and apostate. And concerning these very ones, we have not remained untaught, but the Lord foretold, "Beware lest anyone lead you astray. For many will come in my name, saying, 'I am he, and the time has come,' and they will lead many astray. Do not follow them." And Paul, having learned this from the Savior, wrote, "That in later times some will depart from the sound faith, heeding deceiving spirits and teachings of demons that turn away from the truth.

Therefore, since our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ himself commanded and through the apostle indicated concerning such matters, we, having become firsthand hearers of their impiety, have anathematized them, as we previously stated, having demonstrated them to be alien to the catholic church and faith. We have also made known to your piety, beloved and most honored fellow ministers, that you should neither receive any of them if they should be so rash as to come to you, nor be persuaded by Eusebius or anyone else writing about them. For it is fitting that you, being Christians, turn away from all who speak and think against Christ as enemies of God and corrupters of souls, and not even so much as greet such persons, lest we ever become sharers in their sins, as the blessed John commanded. Greet the brothers among you. Those with me greet you. {Presbyters of Alexandria.} Colluthus, presbyter: I am in agreement with what has been written and with the deposition of Arius and those who impiously joined him. Alexander, presbyter: likewise. Dioscorus, presbyter: likewise. Dionysius, presbyter: likewise. Eusebius, presbyter: likewise. Alexander, presbyter: likewise. Neilaras, presbyter: likewise. Harpocration, presbyter: likewise. Agathus, presbyter. Nemesius, presbyter. Longus, presbyter. Silvanus, presbyter. Peroüs, presbyter. Apis, presbyter. Proterius, presbyter. Paul, presbyter. Cyrus, presbyter: likewise. {Deacons.} Ammonius, deacon: likewise. Macarius, deacon. Pistus, deacon: likewise. Athanasius, deacon.

Eumenes, deacon. Apollonius, deacon. Olympius, deacon. Aphthonius, deacon. Athanasius, deacon. Macarius, deacon. Paul, deacon. Peter, deacon. Amyntianus, deacon. Gaius, deacon. Alexander, deacon. Dionysius, deacon. Agathon, deacon. Polybius, deacon. Theonas, deacon. Mark, deacon. Comodus, deacon. Serapion, deacon. Nilus, deacon. Romanus, deacon, likewise. {Presbyters of Mareotes.} Apollonius, presbyter: I am in agreement with the written documents and with the deposition of Arius and of those who impiously sinned with him. Ingenius, presbyter, likewise. Ammonius, presbyter. Dioscorus, presbyter. Sostras, presbyter. Theon, presbyter. Tyrannus, presbyter. Copres, presbyter. Ammonas, presbyter. Horion, presbyter. Serenus, presbyter. Didymus, presbyter. Heracles, presbyter. Boccon, presbyter. Agathus, presbyter. Achillas, presbyter. Paul, presbyter. Thalalaeus, presbyter. Dionysius, presbyter, likewise. {Deacons.} Sarapion, deacon, likewise. Justus, deacon, likewise. Didymus, deacon. Demetrius, deacon. Maurus, deacon. Alexander, deacon. Mark, deacon. Comon, deacon. Tryphon, deacon. Ammonius, deacon. Didymus, deacon. Ptollarion, deacon. Seras, deacon. Gaius, deacon. Hierax, deacon. Mark, deacon. Theonas, deacon. Sarmates, deacon. Carpon, deacon. Zoilus, deacon, likewise.

Copy of the letter of the synod in Nicaea against Arius and those with him. To the holy and great Church of the Alexandrians by the grace of God, and to the beloved brothers throughout Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis, the bishops assembled in Nicaea and constituting the great and holy synod send greetings in the Lord. Since the great and holy synod was convened in Nicaea by the grace of God and the most pious Emperor Constantine, who gathered us from various provinces and cities, it seemed entirely necessary that letters be sent from the sacred synod to you as well, so that you might know what matters were raised and examined, and what was decided and confirmed. First of all, then, the matters concerning the impiety and lawlessness of Arius and those with him were examined in the presence of the most pious Emperor Constantine. And it was decided by unanimous vote that his impious opinion and the words and blasphemous terms he used in blaspheming the Son of God be anathematized—he who said that he is from non-existence, and that before being begotten he did not exist, and that there was a time when he was not, and who asserted that the Son of God is receptive of evil and virtue by his own free will, and called him a creature and a product. The holy synod anathematized all this, not even deigning to hear his impious opinion and his folly and blasphemous words. And as for what outcome befell that man, you have either heard or will hear of it, so that we may not seem to trample upon a man who has received a fitting recompense for his own sin.

So great was his impiety that it even infected Theonas from Marmarica and Secundus from Ptolemais, for they too incurred the same fate. But since the grace of God has freed Egypt from that evil belief and blasphemy, and from the persons who dared to cause division and schism among the people who had long been at peace, what remained was the matter concerning the rashness of Melitius and those ordained by him. And regarding this part, we make known to you, beloved brothers, what the synod decided. It was therefore decided that Melitius, though the synod was moved by a more humane consideration—for according to strict justice he was worthy of no leniency—should remain in his own city and have no authority either to appoint or to ordain, nor to appear in any other region or city on this pretext, but should retain only the bare title of his rank. As for those appointed by him, after being confirmed by a more mystical ordination, they were to be admitted to communion on these terms: that they should have the honor and perform the liturgy, but be second in every respect to all those in each parish and church who are under the authority of our most honored brother and fellow minister Alexander [who have been appointed], so that they have no authority to appoint those who please them, or to submit names, or to do anything at all without the consent of the bishop of the catholic church.

those under Alexander, who by the grace of God and your prayers were found in no schism but remained unstained in the catholic and apostolic church, are to have authority to appoint and select names of those worthy of the clergy and generally to do everything according to ecclesiastical law and ordinance. And if any of those in the church should happen to pass away, then those recently admitted are to advance to the honor of the deceased, provided they appear worthy and the people choose them, with the bishop of Alexandria also concurring and confirming. This was conceded to all others, but in the case of Melitius himself, the same was not deemed appropriate on account of his long-standing disorderliness and the rash and hasty nature of his judgment, so that no authority or power might be given to a man capable of repeating the same disorders. These are the special and distinctive matters for Egypt and the most holy church of Alexandria. And if anything else was either canonized or decreed in the presence of our lord and most honored fellow minister and brother Alexander, he, being present and a participant in the events, will report to you more precisely. We also bring you good news concerning the agreement on the holy Pascha, that by your prayers this matter too was accomplished, so that all the brothers in the East who previously celebrated with the Jews now celebrate in harmony with the Romans, with you, and with all of us who from ancient times have kept the Pascha with you.

Rejoicing, therefore, at the successes and at the common peace and harmony and at every heresy being cut off, receive with greater honor and more abundant love our fellow minister, your bishop Alexander, who delighted us with his presence and at this age undertook such labor for the sake of peace also among you. And pray for all of us, that what has seemed good may remain firm through the almighty God and through our Lord Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit, to whom is glory for ever and ever. Amen. The bishops who assembled at Nicaea were nearly three hundred, condemning the Arian heresy and deposing those around Arius. Then they set forth in writing the ecclesiastical faith for the refutation of every heresy. The things set forth at Nicaea, the following were decreed. We believe in one God, Father, Almighty, maker of all things visible and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father as only-begotten, that is, from the substance of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, begotten not made, consubstantial with the Father, through whom all things came to be, both those in heaven and those on earth, who for us humans and for our salvation came down and was incarnate, became man, suffered and rose on the third day, ascended into the heavens, and is coming to judge the living and the dead; and

in the Holy Spirit. And those who say "there was a time when he was not" or "he was not before he was begotten" or "he came to be from non-existence" or who claim that the Son of God is from another hypostasis or substance, or that he is created, or mutable, or alterable—such persons the Catholic and Apostolic Church anathematizes. Constantine Augustus to the Catholic Church of the Alexandrians. Rejoice, beloved brothers. We have received perfect grace from divine providence, so that, freed from all error, we may acknowledge one and the same faith. Nothing is left for the devil against us; everything he might have contrived and attempted has been uprooted from its foundations. Those dissensions, those schisms, those tumults, and those deadly poisons of discord, so to speak, have been vanquished by the splendor of truth, by God's command. Therefore we all worship one God and believe him to exist even in name. And that this might come to pass, by God's prompting I summoned to the city of Nicaea most of the bishops, with whom, as one of you, I myself—rejoicing exceedingly to be your fellow servant—undertook the examination of the truth. Everything that seemed to give rise to doubt or occasion for dissension has been refuted and thoroughly investigated; and may divine majesty spare us, how great and how terrible were the blasphemies some uttered improperly concerning our Savior, concerning our hope and our life, speaking and professing to believe the opposite of the divinely inspired Scriptures and the holy faith.

Of the three hundred and more bishops, admired for their prudence and acumen, affirming one and the same faith—which is in truth the precise faith of the divine law—only Arius was detected as having been overcome by diabolical energy and as having first sown this evil among you, and then among others, with impious intent. Let us therefore accept the judgment which the Almighty has provided; let us return to our beloved brothers, from whom some shameless servant of the devil has separated us; let us go with all haste to the common body and our genuine members. For this befits your acumen, faith, and piety, that, once that error has been refuted—the error of him who has been shown to be an enemy of the truth—you may return to divine grace. For what pleased the three hundred bishops together is nothing other than the judgment of God, especially since the Holy Spirit, dwelling in the minds of such and so great men, illuminated the divine will. Therefore let no one doubt, let no one delay, but let all eagerly proceed on the most true path, so that, as soon as I come to you, I may together with you offer the thanks due to the all-seeing God, because, having displayed the pure faith, he has restored to us the love for which we prayed. And in another hand: May God preserve you, beloved brothers. {Copy of what Syncletius and Gaudentius, magistriani, brought.} Victor Constantius Maximus Augustus to the bishops and peoples. Having imitated the wicked and impious, Arius deserves to suffer the same dishonor as they.

Just as Porphyry, the enemy of piety, composed certain lawless treatises against religion and received a fitting reward—such that he himself became infamous for all subsequent time and filled with the greatest ill repute, while his impious writings were obliterated—so now it has seemed good that Arius and those who share Arius's opinion be called Porphyrians, so that those whose ways they imitate may also bear their name. In addition to this, if any treatise composed by Arius should be found, it is to be handed over to the fire, so that not only the evil of his teaching might be destroyed, but also that no memorial of him should remain at all. I further declare that if anyone is discovered to have hidden a treatise composed by Arius and does not immediately bring it forward and consume it with fire, that person shall suffer the penalty of death. For if caught in the act of this offense, he will undergo capital punishment. And by another hand: May God protect you, beloved brothers.

Constantinus Augustus to Arius and those with him, the Arians. A wicked interpreter is outright an image and a statue of the devil. For just as terrible sculptors fashion him as a bait for deception, contriving for him a certain comeliness of beauty, though he is utterly foul by nature, so that he might destroy wretched men by offering them error as a drink, so this man, I think, would act in the same way, to whom this alone seems worthy of effort: to cast forth unsparingly the poisons of his own audacity. Therefore he introduces a new faith, one that has never appeared since men came to be, a faith of unbelief; and so that saying, long ago articulated by divine utterance, that they are faithful to evil, appears in no way discordant with the truth. But why should one say that he, having lost the grace of deliberation, no longer desires to find any relief or assistance? What then do I say, O Christ, O Christ, O Lord, O Lord? Why does this impious band of robbers wound us day by day? A terrible, violent boldness stands opposite, gnashes its teeth, braying, misshapen by dishonor and pierced all around by every kind of accusation. This boldness, indeed, tossed about in the law and in the proclamation concerning you as if by storms and triple waves of evils, belches forth destructive words, and by writing them, reveals those which you, co-existing with the eternal father of your own source, never defined in the knowledge concerning yourself.

She altogether gathers and heaps up certain terrible and lawless impieties, now brandishing her tongues, now again exulting in the zeal of the wretched, whom she, being present with impunity, deceives and corrupts. I wish now to examine the nature of her leader. For what does he say? "Either we hold," he says, "what we have already become masters of, or let it be as we ourselves wish." These things too have fallen, have fallen, being refuted. "By deceit," he says, "or by the cunning of villainy." It makes no difference. He considers only that which has flowed into him through evil contrivance to be venerable. "We have multitudes," he says. I myself shall advance a little further, so that I may become a spectator of the wars of madness. I myself, I said, shall advance, I who am accustomed to put an end to the wars of the foolish. Come then, Ares, Arius, there is need of shields. Do not you do this, we beseech you. Let the company of Aphrodite at least restrain you. But indeed, just as you seem to be most excellently trained with the crowds, so ought you to have been zealous in piety concerning Christ. Behold, again I come as a suppliant, and though I am strong with weapons in full force, I do not wish to fight, but, fortified by the faith of Christ, I wish to heal you and to cure the others. What then do you say to do these things, which are not fitting to your character? But with what kind of quietness, tell me, or with what abundance are you invested, or rather to what rashness have you been driven? O boldness worthy of being struck down by thunderbolts! For hear what he has recently declared to me, writing with a pen dripping venom. "Thus," he says, "we believe.

Then, I think, adding some things—I know not what—in a rather pompous and exceedingly precise manner, as he proceeds further, he did not pass over any of the terrible things in silence, but, as one might say, opened up the whole treasure chest of madness. "We are being driven away," he says, "and they are taking away our freedom to be received." But these things are nothing to the point; pay attention to what follows, for I will use his own words. "We beg," he says, "that if the bishop of Alexandria persists in the same opinion, we be granted henceforth the freedom, according to the ordinance of the law, to perform the lawful and indispensable services to God." O what terrible shamelessness, which it is fitting to refute with zeal for the truth! For what was pleasing to him, he depicted with the brevity of his phrasing. What do you say, you wretch? Are you contriving to build a plausible schism for us with the rottenness of your broken mind, and are you eager to destroy those who have clung to you for evil? "What then," you say, "shall I do, if no one deems me worthy to be received?" For this you often cry out from your unholy throat. But I, on the contrary, ask you: Where have you shown a clear sign and testimony of your own mind? Which you ought to have unfolded and made clear to both divine and human things. And especially since venomous reptiles naturally become more savage at that time when they perceive themselves to be entrenched in the recesses of their lairs. But that is very clever of him, to studiously feign silence, as if under some mask of modesty.

By the art of your outward appearance you present yourself as tame and gentle, but you have escaped the notice of the many, filled as you are within with countless evils and plots. Ah, what wretchedness! As the Evil One has willed, so Arius has established for us a workshop of lawlessness. Now tell me, having come forward, the mark of your faith, and do not by any means keep silent, O you who have a twisted mouth and a nature prone to wickedness: do you say "one God"? You have me as a fellow voter; think thus. Do you affirm that his Logos is without beginning and without end? I accept this; believe thus. If you weave in anything further, I reject it; if you stitch together anything toward impious separation, I declare that I neither see nor understand it. If you take up "the strangeness of the body for the economy of the divine energies," I do not reject it. If you say "the spirit of eternity has come to be in the preeminent Logos," I accept it. Who knew the Father, if not the one who came from the Father? Whom did the Father know, if not the one whom he eternally and without beginning begot from himself? You think it necessary to subordinate a "foreign hypostasis," believing wickedly, I suppose, but I know that the fullness of the power that is supreme and extends over all is one substance of Father and Son.

If, then, you remove from that one from whom not even in the thought of the babbling has anything ever been able to be separated, and you fashion characters of addition and altogether define marks of inquiries for that one to whom he has given from himself the whole of eternity, and the incorruptible concept, and through himself has allotted the faith of immortality and of the church—then cast down, cast down this foolish lawlessness, O you who are refined and sweet-voiced and who sing out evils to the disbelief of the foolish. Fittingly, then, the Evil One has overthrown you with his own wickedness, and to some perhaps such a thing seemed pleasant (for you have pretended yourself to be so refined), but the evil is altogether destructive. Come then, having ceased from your occupation with absurdities, listen, O demonic Arius. For I am speaking to you. Do you not perceive that you have been publicly banished from the church of God? You are lost, be well assured, unless, looking to yourself, you condemn your present folly. But you will say that crowds cooperate with you and lighten your cares. Then listen, holding your ears a little, O impious Arius, and understand your own folly. And you, O God, guardian of all, be gracious to what is said, if it pertains to faith. For I, your servant, having your providence propitious, will clearly demonstrate from both Greek and Roman writing, very ancient, the madness of Arius before three thousand

which was foretold and proclaimed by the Erythraean Sibyl. For she said: "Woe to you, Libya, lying in coastal regions; for a time will come for you when, together with your people and your daughters, you will be compelled to undergo a terrible, savage, and utterly grievous struggle, from which a criterion of faith and piety will be given to all, but for you it will incline toward utter destruction. For you have dared to tear up the receptacle of the heavenly flowers and to rend it with a bite, and indeed to defile it with iron teeth." What then, O villain? Where on earth do you now confess yourself to be? There, evidently. For I hold your letters, which you inscribed to me with the pen of madness, in which you claim that the entire Libyan people is in agreement with you for salvation, as you say. But if you deny that these things are so, I call upon God as witness now, that I will send the most ancient book of the Erythraean Sibyl, composed in the Greek tongue, to Alexandria, so that you might perish the sooner. Then are you sinless, O two-horned one? Then have you not clearly perished, O wretched one, surrounded by such a terrible evil? We know, we know your undertaking; what concern, what fear troubles you? It has not escaped us; O miserable and wretched one, O the dullness of your mind, who do not even lament the sickness and helplessness of your own soul; O impious one, who undermine the truth with various arguments and, being such, are not ashamed to blame us and now to refute, as you think, and now again to admonish; O one who excels in faith and words, from whom the wretched ones strive to procure help for themselves.

And yet one ought not even to associate with such a man, nor address him at all, unless someone supposes that in his specious words lies the hope of living rightly for the moderate. But this is not so, far from it; truly, O the folly of you who mix with him! What madness compelled you to endure the harshness of his tongue and his countenance? Enough; but now I will proceed in my speech against him: O you, foolish in soul, glib in tongue, faithless in mind, grant me not some vast and horseracing plain of discourse, but at least a well-defined circle, not only sound but firm and solid in nature, O impious, wicked, and dissembling one! For I am driven to say these things; rather, having already bound a noose around you and fettered you with my speech, I will set you in the midst, so that the whole people may learn your baseness. And now I will proceed to the matter itself. The hands are washed, presumably; let us approach the prayers; invoke God then. But rather, pausing a little, tell me, O crafty one, what God will you call upon for help? But indeed I cannot keep still. O Lord, who holds authority over all things, O Father of solitary power, through this impious man, your church suffers reproaches, bruises, and indeed wounds and pains. Arius already fittingly and quite aptly assigns a place for you, upon which, I think, sitting, he has procured and holds for himself a synod or a son, your Christ, your offspring from you, the leader of our aid, by the law of position. Hear, I beseech you, this marvelous faith.

You think that the Lord is moved in a motion according to place. You dare to circumscribe him around the appointed throne. For where is your presence not? Or where do all not perceive your energy from the laws that extend from you over all things? For you yourself encompass all, and it is not lawful to conceive of any place or anything else outside you. Thus your power with energy is infinite. Do you then listen, O God, and do you, all the people, pay attention. For this shameless and worthless man, who has driven equally to the extreme of depravity and lawlessness, pretends piety. "Away," he says, "I do not wish to seem to involve God in the passion of insults." And for this reason I suppose and fabricate wonderful things for the faith, that God, having made the substance of Christ newly born and newly created, prepared help for himself, as it seems to me. "For whatever," he says, "you remove from him, you have made him lesser." Then, O destroyer and ruinous one, is this faith for you? Do you take on hypothesis and fiction the one who condemned the fictions of the nations? Do you call him imported and as a servant of duties the one who, without thought and reasoning, accomplished all by coexisting with the Father's eternity? Apply now, if you dare, apply, I say, to God both being pious and hoping for what will happen, and further thinking, reasoning, considering, declaring opinion and articulating, and altogether being pleased, laughing, being grieved. What then do you say, O most wretched of the wretched, O arch-schemer of evil itself?

Understand then, if you can, how in this very craftiness of yours you are caught being depraved. "Christ," he says, "suffered for us." But I have already said beforehand that he was sent in the form of a body. "Yes," he says, "but I fear lest we seem to diminish him in some respect." Then, O mediator of beasts, in saying these things do you not rave and clearly rage? For behold, the cosmos itself is a form, that is, a shape, and the stars are set forth as characters, and the spirit of this spherical cycle is entirely a form of beings and like a shaping. And yet God is present everywhere. Where then are the insults in God? Or in what respect is God diminished? O patricide of gentleness, reason then from this as evidence and consider, if it seems to be a fault that God is present in Christ. He therefore perceived the dishonor of the argument and inflicted punishment without delay. Apart from these things, every day, of course, sins occur in the world. And yet God is present and the judgments are not delayed. What then is diminished by this, if the magnitude of his power perceives all things everywhere? Nothing, I think. For the mind of the cosmos is through God; through him is all continuance. Through him is all justice. And the faith of Christ is from him without beginning. And the whole law of God is Christ, having through him the infinite and the unending. But you, thinking according to yourself, appear—O of madness indeed!—turn now to your own destruction the sword of the devil.

See then, all see, how he already utters mournful cries, caught in the viper's bite, how his veins and flesh, seized by the venom, stir up terrible pains, how his whole body has wasted away, shriveled—full of drought and filth and lamentations and pallor and shuddering and countless evils, and has become dreadfully parched—how the thicket of his hair is hideous and squalid, how he is altogether half-dead and already failing in his gaze, how his face is bloodless and melted away by anxiety, how all things have rushed together upon him—frenzy, madness, and vanity—and have made you, due to the chronic nature of your affliction, wild and beastly. At once, not even perceiving the evil in which he finds himself, he says, "I am lifted up with pleasure and leap, bounding with joy, and I take wing." And again, quite arrogantly, he says, "Alas, we are undone." This indeed is true: for to you alone has vice lavishly supplied its own zeal, and what was bought at great price, it has given you most easily. Come now, tell me, where are your solemn precepts? Wash yourself, if possible, in the Nile, O man full of absurd insensibility; yet you have striven to disturb the whole world with your impieties. Do you understand that I, the man of God, already know everything? But I am at a loss whether I should stay or go; for I can no longer look at him, and I am ashamed of the sin, O Arius, O Arius. You have set us in the light, but you have cast yourself into darkness, O wretch. This has turned out to be the end of your labors. But I return again to that point.

You say that a crowd of those who wander about you exists. It is likely, I think, and do receive them, receive them, I say. For they have given themselves over to be devoured by wolves and lions. Yet each of these, pressed by the addition of ten chapters and the completions of these, will immediately sweat profusely, unless he runs as quickly as possible to the saving church and takes up again the peace of love by the affection of concord. For they will no longer be deceived by you, who are condemned by a wicked conscience, nor will they endure to be utterly destroyed, entangled in your foul inquiries. Your sophistries are clear and known to all for the future time. And indeed you yourself will be able to accomplish nothing, but you will vainly put on a show, feigning fairness and gentleness of words and externally placing a mask of simplicity, so to speak. Your entire artifice will be vain. For truth will immediately surround you. The rain of power, so to speak, will immediately extinguish your flames. And indeed your companions and those of like mind, already implicated in the plan, will be seized by the cares of public liturgies, unless they as quickly as possible, fleeing from association with you, exchange for the incorruptible faith. But you, iron-minded man, give me a sign of your choice, whether you trust yourself and are strengthened by the steadfastness of faith and have a wholly pure conscience. Come to me, come, I say, to a man of God. Believe, I will investigate the secrets of your heart by my own inquiries; and if something mad should seem to be present, I will heal you, having called upon divine grace, more beautifully than an example.

If you should prove sound in soul, having recognized the light of truth in yourself, I will be grateful to God and to you, and I will rejoice with myself in piety. And in another hand: May God protect you, beloved brothers. These things were brought by Syncletius and Gaudentius, magistriani, when Paterius was prefect of Egypt, and were read in the palace. {Against Eusebius and Theognis.} Constantine Augustus to the Catholic Church of the Nicomedians. You all know accurately, beloved brothers, that the Lord God and Savior Christ is clearly both Father and Son: Father, I mean, without beginning, without end, parent of his own age; Son, that is, the will of the Father, which is neither conceived through any thought nor apprehended for the perfecting of his works through any elaborate substance. For whoever thinks this and will think this will have untiring endurance for every kind of punishment. But indeed, the Son of God, Christ, the creator of all things and the provider of immortality itself, was born, as far as pertains to the faith which we have believed—was born, or rather came forth, he who always is in the Father, for the ordering of the things generated by him—was born, then, by an indivisible procession; for the will is both fixed in its own dwelling and does and administers those things which require different care according to the quality of each. What, then, is between God and Father and Son? Nothing, clearly. For this completion of things has received the command of the will by perception, and has not separated the will, divided from the substance of the Father.

What follows from these things: who is it that has feared the passion of Christ, my master, more out of shame than folly? Does the divine then suffer, when the dwelling of the holy body hastens toward recognition of its own sanctity, or does that which is separated from the body fall under touch? Has not that which is removed from the lowliness of the body stood apart? Do we not live, even if the nobility of the soul summons the body to death? What then has the blameless and sincere faith here seized that is worthy of doubt? Or do you not see that God chose a most holy body, through which he was about to manifest the proofs of faith and the examples of his own virtue, and to shake off the already confused destruction of the human race by a ruinous error, and to give a new teaching of religion, and by the example of purity to cleanse the actions unworthy of the mind, and then to dissolve the torment of death and to proclaim in advance the rewards of immortality? But you, whom the communion of love henceforth makes it fitting for me to address as brothers, you are not ignorant of me, your fellow servant; you are not ignorant of the fortress of your salvation, the care of which I have genuinely undertaken, and through which we have not only fought down the weapons of our enemies, but have also confined them while still living in soul, so as to reveal the true faith of philanthropy. But I rejoiced in these good things, especially on account of the renewal of the inhabited world. For it was truly worthy of wonder to have brought so many nations into concord, which shortly before were said to be ignorant of God.

But what were these nations to know, which had taken up no concern for contentiousness? What then do you think, beloved brothers, that I am accusing you yourselves? We are Christians, and we are divided in a pitiable disposition. Is this, then, our faith, is this the teaching of the most holy law? But what is the cause for which the destruction of the present evil has been stirred up? Oh, the absurdity, oh, the excess of hatred surpassing every magnitude of indignation. What is the terrible nature of this band of robbers that has been revealed, which denies that the Son of God has come forth from the undivided substance of the Father? Is not God everywhere, although we perceive him always present to us? Is it not through his power that the good order of the universe has been established, although it is deprived of the separation of division? Has something then been done by you? Beloved brothers, learn now, I beg you, the torments of the present grief: you professed to be confessors of him whom you deny to be God, this your all-destructive teacher persuading you. I implore you, who is it that has taught such an innocent multitude these things? Eusebius, evidently, the fellow initiate of tyrannical cruelty. For that he has become a refugee of the tyrant everywhere, it is possible to see from many sources. On the one hand, the murders of the bishops bear witness to this—but of the true bishops—on the other hand, the most grievous expulsion of Christians proclaims it explicitly.

I will say nothing now about the outrages committed against me, through which, especially when the gatherings of the opposing parties were contrived, this man both sent spies against me and all but contributed armed services to the tyrant. Nor should anyone think me unprepared for the demonstration of these things. For there is precise proof that the presbyters and deacons who accompanied Eusebius were manifestly apprehended by me. But I pass over these things, which have been brought forward by me not now for the sake of indignation, but for their shame. That one thing alone I fear, that one thing I consider: that I see you being called to a share in the accusation. For through the conduct and perversion of Eusebius you have taken up a conscience separated from the truth. But there is a remedy not slow, if indeed, taking a faithful and upright bishop now at least, you look to God, which is in your power at present and ought long ago to have depended on your judgment, had not the aforementioned Eusebius, together with a whirlwind of those gathered with him, come here and shamelessly thrown the correctness of order into confusion. But since it is fitting to say a few things about this Eusebius to your love, your forbearance remembers that a synod took place in the city of Nicaea, at which I myself was present, as was fitting for the service of my conscience, desiring nothing other than to work for harmony among all and, above all, to refute and cast off

This matter, which had its beginning through the folly of Arius of Alexandria, was immediately strengthened by the improper and destructive zeal of Eusebius. But this same Eusebius, most beloved and honored ones, with what a rush do you suppose he was overcome by his own conscience, and with what shame did he persist in his falsehood refuted from all sides, sending various persons to me to plead on his behalf, and requesting from me some assistance, so that he might not be expelled from his existing honor after being convicted of such a great offense? God himself is my witness to this, who continues to be benevolent to me and to you, since that man also turned me around and improperly abducted me, which you will also recognize. For everything was done then just as he desired, concealing every possible evil in his own mind. But recently, to pass over the rest of his perversity, hear, I beg you, what he did especially with Theognius, whom he has as a partner in folly. He had ordered that certain Alexandrians of our faith who had withdrawn here be sent away, since through their service the torch of discord was kindled. But these good and noble bishops, whom the truth of the council had once preserved for repentance, not only received those men and secured them among themselves, but also shared with them the malice of their ways. Therefore, I decided to do this concerning these ungrateful men: I ordered that they be seized and exiled as far as possible.

Now it is yours to look toward God with that faith which has always existed, is established, and ought to be, and to act so that we may rejoice in having bishops who are pure, orthodox, and benevolent. But if anyone dares, whether in memory of those corrupters or in praise, to be thoughtlessly inflamed, he will immediately be checked in his own audacity through the agency of the servant of God, that is, me. Victor Constantinus Augustus to Theodotus. How great the force of divine wrath naturally is, and from what Eusebius and Theognis have suffered, it is easy for you also to learn, who, outraging the most holy religion, defiled the name of the savior God by the conspiracy of their own band of brigands, even after receiving pardon. For when, especially after the unanimous agreement of the council, they ought to have corrected their former error, they were then caught persisting in the same outrages. For this reason, therefore, divine providence thrust them away from its own people, since it could not bear to see innocent souls being corrupted by the folly of a few. And now it has exacted a fitting penalty from them, and will take a greater one for all future time. I considered it necessary that this be made known to your sagacity, so that if any evil counsel of such men, as I for my part do not think, has settled in your purpose, you may remove it from your soul and be eager to offer a pure mind, as is fitting, and sincere devotion and unblemished faith to the savior God. For this is proper for one to do who intends to be deemed worthy of the rewards of eternal life. And by another hand.

May God protect you, beloved brother.