De Spiritu Sancto Libri Duo

BOOK ONE. THE HOLY SPIRIT IS TO BE UNDERSTOOD ENTIRELY FROM THE HEAD OF THE FAITH, THAT IS, FROM THE CREED. The Catholic faith, throughout the whole world, was spread by the patriarchs and prophets and the dispensers of grace, with the Holy Spirit instilling it. Apostolic solicitude and perfection, just as it had expanded it through the sacred pages, so too did it gather it into the salutary song of the Creed with wonderful brevity, and, like scattered species of remedies, arranged it into one body, and, as if from countless aromatics, compounded a precious ointment, whose fragrance filled all the ends of the earth with the power of spiritual fragrance, so that in the very consensus of the whole world the power of truth might appear. And because it is necessary that, for those who err as if they were little children and ignorant, we repeat the first elements of Christian tradition, in this perfection of the Creed both unity is clearly opened and trinity, while the confession repeated three times renders one obedience of belief to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. In these words, the sacred number of three hundred and eighteen priests also condemned the emerging error of Arius and Macedonius, saying: I believe in God the Father, I believe in His only Son our Lord, I believe also in the Holy Spirit. For although the frailty of a few deviated from this number, the mystery of the universal number did not dissolve. And we said it is a sacred number because three hundred, in the air or in Greek calculation, shows the sign of the cross, while eighteen shows the adorable name of Jesus.

In this number and mystery, therefore, in which also holy Abraham triumphed over countless nations, the piety of the elders confounded the enemy of the faith under the one preaching of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Hence it is also to be understood that those who blaspheme against the Holy Spirit under eternal damnation were either baptized without the completion of the Creed or lied to themselves in that very Creed and font, before which every man, renouncing the devil, confesses: "I believe in the Holy Spirit." "I believe," I say, "and in the Holy Spirit." Let us recognize the privilege of the word itself. You can believe any man, but you must know that you owe belief in only that majesty. But even this is one thing: to believe God, another: to believe in God. That God exists is said to be believed even by the devil, according to the Apostle: for even demons believe and tremble. But to believe in God is not proven except by one who has piously hoped in Him. Therefore, to believe in God is to seek Him faithfully and to pass over into Him with complete love. So I believe in Him, that is to say: I confess Him, I worship Him, I adore Him, I deliver and transfer my whole self into His right and dominion. In the reverence of this profession, all the observances due to the divine name are contained.

II. That We Ought to Believe in the Holy Spirit Not as in the Church, but with the Preposition Removed, We Must Believe in the Catholic Church. But you object and say that in this word God cannot immediately be shown, by which we say: I believe in the Holy Spirit, because it follows: I believe in the holy Catholic Church. First, I do not know how Macedonius dares to name the Catholic Church, who, excluded from the Catholic Church, stripped of salvation, has been made one of those of whom it is said: the impious will walk in a circle. Therefore you say: I believe in the holy Catholic Church. What are you trying to do by inserting a tiny, that is, a syllable, to weave a vast darkness? We believe the Church as the mother of regeneration, not believe in the Church as in the author of salvation. For when the whole Church confesses this concerning the Holy Spirit, can the Church also believe in itself? Therefore, since the doctrine of the aforementioned fathers, celebrated throughout the whole world, confirms that it is necessary to believe specifically in the Trinity alone, either remove this syllable from the name of the Church, or certainly assert by manifest profession that you believe in the Church, teach by testimonies, convince by divine oracles, setting aside the presumption of your words.

Let us take up from the sacred volumes of every kind what is to be believed, from whose source the very series of the Creed itself is derived. He who believes in the Church believes in a man. For man did not come from the Church, but the Church began to exist from man. Withdraw, therefore, from this persuasion of blasphemy, that you should think you must believe in some human creature, since it is not at all to be believed in an angel or an archangel. For these things which follow in the Creed after the name of the Holy Spirit look back to the conclusion of the Creed with the preposition removed, so that we believe in God the holy Church, the communion of saints, the remission of sins, the resurrection of the flesh, eternal life—that is, that we confess these things to be disposed by God and to consist in God. For the inexperience of some has dragged and snatched this preposition from the nearest and neighboring sentence into the following one and imprudently added it superfluously. But in none of the canonical writings, on which the text of the Creed depends, do we receive that we ought to believe in the Church as in the Holy Spirit and the Son. And therefore concerning the Holy Spirit, since every creature is alien to this honor, He in whom we are commanded to believe is God. Which word the voice of the Lord Savior specially assigns to the divinity, saying thus: "Believe in God, and believe in me," and again: "He who believes in me does not believe in me, but in Him who sent me.

III. THAT CHRIST WAS NOT BEGOTTEN BY THE HOLY SPIRIT AS BY A GOD, BUT WAS CREATED. Since, however, the Catholic Church confesses: conceived by the Holy Spirit, the Macedonians are to be asked at this point whether they consider the Holy Spirit to be the creator or the father of the Redeemer. If they should happen to answer "the father," since they have already said in the beginning of the Creed: I believe in God the Father Almighty, they will confusedly confess that he has two fathers. But if they assert "the creator," as the truth holds, they will be compelled, of necessity along with us, to proclaim him the Lord of the universe. And therefore, through the prophet Isaiah, as through his own trumpet and from his own temple, he speaks, while he would prefigure the two substances in Christ: "Drop down, O heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain down the just one; let the earth open and bring forth the Savior; I, the Lord, created him." For the man assumed from Mary was an operation of the Holy Spirit, not a portion, nor was he begotten by him, but created. He was conceived by power, not by substance; by operation, not by participation; by virtue, not by kind.

IV. ON THE UNITY TO BE ASSERTED BY PROPHETIC TESTIMONIES. The Catholic faith venerates a threefold majesty under the confession of one divinity. Receive one divinity from the sacred volumes: Hear, O Israel: the Lord your God is one God; and: You shall adore the Lord your God and serve him alone; and again: I am the Lord, and there is no God besides me; and in the Psalms: Doing wondrous things, you are the only God; likewise: You alone are the highest in all the earth. Also through Isaiah: The God of Israel, who sits upon the Cherubim, you are the only God of all the kingdoms of the earth; likewise: I am the Lord, the first and the last I am; likewise: I am the Lord, this is my name. I will not give my glory to another. But that you may know this testimony pertains to Christ—that is, the first and the last—he said of himself in another place: I am the beginning, which I also speak to you; likewise: Before me there was no God, and after me there will be none. I am the Lord, and there is no savior apart from me, which pertains especially to Christ, the savior of the human race; likewise: Thus says the Lord, your redeemer and your molder from the womb: I am the Lord, making all things, stretching out the heavens, alone establishing the earth, and no one with me.

which pertains properly to Jesus, the maker and redeemer, of whom the evangelist records: all things were made through him and without him nothing was made; likewise: there is no God apart from me and no savior besides me; likewise: I am the first and I am the last, and my hand founded the earth and my right hand measured the heavens, as Jesus Christ elsewhere clearly asserts concerning himself, saying: I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. In these testimonies the Holy Spirit is also contained, in which the unity of the divine substance concerning the Holy Spirit is to be confessed in such a way that the distinct property and undivided plurality of persons is also believed to be present in them. V. ON THE TRINITY, OR THAT EVEN THE LIBERAL DISCIPLINES UNDERSTOOD THREE PERSONS. Thus by the words of God we have shown one divinity; now let us teach three in one divinity: three names but not three kingdoms, three appellations but not three powers, three essences or subsistences but not three substances. It is evident that even secular wisdom understood that the multitude of all ages is contained within the rationale of three persons. What are these three? That is: I, you, he.

Therefore, as we have said, that there are only three persons in reality, even the liberal studies, borrowing from spiritual disciplines, have perceived, and it clearly appeared to them that neither does the second person satisfy perfection nor can the third be transcended, because duality, being half-full, argues for a third number, as fullness tends, while quaternity is rejected by perfection consummated in three. Having thus transmitted these matters with a light mention, let us rather assert, by sacred testimonies, that the Trinity subsists in unity. But you say: why do you set before me the words 'unity' and 'trinity,' which you do not find in canonical reading? It is no wonder if one who does not merit to enter the inner sanctuaries of salvation shudders and flees even the door of truth. For what is so near, so natural, so proper, as that from 'one' unity, from 'three' trinity is named by the catholic definitions of the fathers? Words are not to be examined in themselves, which depend on preceding matters, nor is it a sound consequence that they be judged foreign, which arise from 'one' and 'three,' that is, from the property of a manifest beginning. Note that neither of these terms is presumptuous, but derivative. These terms, which antiquity from the time of the primitive church discovered, authority brought forth, and a long age confirmed.

VI. When the Son is called the Face of the Father, he is acknowledged as coeternal with the Father. Receive the Trinity from the sacred volumes: in the beginning God made heaven and earth, and the Spirit of God was borne over the waters. The Father is the author, the Son is a coeternal beginning, the Holy Spirit is spread over the waters. The eminence of the ruler was borne over the waters even then, I believe, prefiguring the gifts of baptism. In the making of man as well, the work is shown to be not of one person but of three persons by the threefold repetition of the deity. For we read thus: and God said, let us make man in our image and likeness. Note the sentence, simple in its proposition, multiple in its response. And God said, let us make man. What else is this, except that the substance of unity speaks and the power of the Trinity works? Observe how the name of God is invoked three times in the creation of man. For we have it thus in Genesis: and God said, let us make man, and again: God created man, and thirdly: God blessed him. God said, God made, God blessed. On account of the three persons, one divinity is repeated three times. In this place, understand clearly the mystery of unity as well. Behold, the image of God and likeness is given to each man by three and yet is recognized as one. God said, let us make. Pay close attention, while one.

over the waters. He does not say "to our images and likenesses," or certainly "to my image and likeness," but commends unity by singularity, trinity by plurality. Thus, in saying "let us make according to our [image]," the number of persons is unfolded, while in speaking singularly "to the image and likeness," the undivided deity is gathered into one substance. When God appeared to Abraham at the entrance of the tent and miraculously presented himself as three from one to his eyes, Abraham, conscious of the majesty, worshipped the one in the three. In the Psalms also, the unity is designated in its persons absolutely: "Do not cast me away from your face," he says, "and do not take your Holy Spirit from me." Behold, the prophet, supplicating the Father, fears the offense of the Holy Spirit no less than that of the Father and the Son. "Do not cast me away from your face," he says. The Son is understood as both the image of the Father and the face of the Father. And therefore we read: "Philip, he who sees me sees also the Father," and likewise: "Where shall I go from your Spirit, and where shall I flee from your face?" Take note, unbeliever, of the mystery of the Trinity in this perfect confession. The prophet speaks to the Father, confesses the Son as the face of the Father, and bears witness to the Holy Spirit diffused through all things. Concerning the Son, the Lord also speaks to Moses: "My face will go before you." This name, that is, "face," pertains both to the unity of substance and to the coeternity of majesty.

But they think him lesser because he was born: what is it for God to be born from God, except to have naturally proceeded from God? But you say: if he is from him, he is younger than him. Behold, an arm is born from the body, and a face from its own head, yet the face is not younger than its head, nor is the arm proven to be later than its own body. Therefore, if any head was ever older than its own face, then presume to assert that the Father is older than his image, which consists in the perfect likeness and equality of Christ. Thus the Son knows no separation from the Father either in power or in time, just as a face cannot be separated from the head, nor can it ever be found younger than its own head. VII. THAT THE SPIRIT OF THE FATHER IS HIMSELF THE HOLY SPIRIT. But you say: show me that the Holy Spirit subsists in his own essence. Wherever or whenever I read either "the spirit of the Father" or "my spirit" or "the spirit of God," I see, you say, that it must be referred not to the person of the Holy Spirit, but to that of the Father. First, from this they heap up the blasphemy of their impiety, when they claim that the Holy Spirit of God must be believed to be either a creature or certainly the Father himself. Rightly does one who does not confess the Holy Spirit, with confused mind, fall even to the insult of the Father. Assuredly, if he is a creature, he cannot pertain to the substance of the Father. But if you think him to be the Father's power, how do you presume to humble him to the injury of being a creature?

But we will demonstrate by clear testimonies that the Spirit of God is not said of the Father, but properly of the Holy Spirit. We read in Isaiah that the Spirit of the Lord, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and fortitude, the spirit of knowledge and piety, descended upon the Lord Jesus. Concerning this Spirit of the Lord, therefore, who descended upon the Savior in a sacred descent, the Son says through Isaiah: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me," and the evangelist Matthew says: "Behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending upon him like a dove." Moreover, that this Spirit of God, which the Savior received at his baptism, is manifestly the Holy Spirit, the evangelist Luke taught, saying: "Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan." We read in the prophet Joel: "In those days I will pour out from my Spirit upon all flesh." That what he says, "from my Spirit," is said of the Holy Spirit is manifest, because when the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles on the sacred solemnity of Pentecost, the apostle Peter then took up this testimony from the prophet.

To this end, the Gospels have taught, with diverse wording but with harmonious truth, that the Spirit of the Father is itself the Holy Spirit. For when Matthew said: "For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you," Mark plainly expounded that this Spirit of the Father is the Holy Spirit, saying: "What is given to you in that hour, that you speak. For it is not you who are speaking, but the Holy Spirit." And Luke similarly demonstrated that this Spirit of God is the Holy Spirit, saying: "Do not be anxious as to how or what you say. For the Holy Spirit will teach you in that hour what you ought to say." Therefore, according to these things, whenever you read either "Spirit of the Father" or "Spirit of God," you must, with error set aside, acknowledge that it is to be referred specifically to the Holy Spirit. Likewise, Isaiah also numbers the Holy Spirit as one in the glory of the Trinity when he says: "I saw the Lord sitting upon a high throne, and the Seraphim were standing and crying out to one another: 'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts.'" And in what follows he says: "And I heard the voice of the Lord saying: 'Go and say to this people: You will hear with your ears and not understand, and you will see with your eyes and not see.'

Here, the Lord of Hosts, who was seen by the prophet in an assumed form or who spoke in the prophet—who He was, Paul shows in the Acts of the Apostles, saying: “Well did the Holy Spirit speak through the prophet Isaiah to our fathers: ‘Hearing, you will hear and not understand, and seeing, you will see and not perceive.’” Let us at least believe Paul, the most celebrated herald of the truth, that it was the Holy Spirit who was that Lord of Hosts whom Isaiah saw and who spoke through Isaiah. But because the thrice-repeated “Holy, Holy, Holy” resounds, let us see whether this honor refers to the whole Trinity. When Isaiah says, “I saw the Lord of Hosts,” he is recognized to be preaching the Father to the Jews. The evangelist John is clearly proven to assert the Son, speaking thus: “For this reason they could not believe in Jesus, because Isaiah said: ‘He blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts.’ This Isaiah said when he saw the glory of the Son of God and spoke about him.” Moreover, when the same Isaiah says, “And I heard the voice of the Lord saying: ‘Go and tell this people: Seeing, you will see and not perceive,’” this Lord the apostle Paul, as we have said, confirms to be the Holy Spirit. You see, therefore, that “Holy, Holy, Holy”—this voice celebrates the whole Trinity, and just as in these three words there is no dissimilarity, no difference, so in the power of the Trinity there can be no distance.

VIII. ON THE FINGER OF GOD. But you say: from this the Holy Spirit is clearly recognized as lesser, because he is called the finger of God. It is not so. But when you hear it said of the Holy Spirit: "If I cast out demons by the finger of God," you should know that not a diminution of glory, but the unity of substance is demonstrated, nor a discrepancy of honor, but a concord of operation. What then? Because the Holy Spirit is sometimes called the finger of God, is he therefore believed to be lesser than the Son and the Father? Flee the error of this persuasion, and see that sometimes in this designation of "finger" it comprehends both the Father and the Son. Let us remember that it was not said of one finger, when we read: "For I shall see your heavens, the work of your fingers." But you say that in "fingers" only the Son and the Holy Spirit are signified under a certain duality. Lest you attempt to assert this of two persons, in another place Isaiah speaks of the Trinity by the number of three fingers, saying: "Who has suspended the mass of the earth with three fingers?" What is more evident concerning the unity of the Trinity, what clearer? Does he not here balance the equality of a single power in three fingers under the scale of a certain mystery? Therefore, as has been said, since you are already instructed about the fellowship of operation, do not doubt the parity of power. Thus, in saying: "Who has suspended the mass of the earth with three fingers," he wished to speak specifically of the cooperation of power and of the unity of substance, which is shown to be one and the same in three fingers.

Nevertheless, in the prophet Isaiah, note the proper person of the Holy Spirit under the distinction of the Trinity, where the Son, speaking of himself, says: "I am the first and I am the last," and consequently added: "And now the Lord has sent me and his Spirit." Therefore, one in person is God the Father, another is the Spirit of God the Father. Thus, while the Son is read as being sent by the Father and the Holy Spirit, under the name of three persons the Holy Spirit is clearly revealed to subsist in himself, just as in another place the same prophet distinguishes the essence of the Trinity: "Behold my servant, I will receive him, my beloved, my soul was pleased with him, I have given my Spirit over him." The Father calls the Son his beloved servant, over whom he gave his Spirit, concerning which Jesus Christ testifies with his own voice: "The Spirit of the Lord is over me." And so that the evangelical saying may also be clear to the Gentiles: "Go," he says, "baptize all nations in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," where under three persons it asserts one work and one name, an undivided majesty. We have, as was said according to Luke: "And when Jesus was baptized, the heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove, and a voice came from heaven: 'You are my beloved Son, in you I am pleased.'" Therefore, the Son is in the body, the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, the Father is declared in the voice. But in this passage, the form in the dove is to be understood as a passing appearance, not a persisting substance.

IX. The Divinity of the Holy Spirit is not harmed by the fact that He appears neither unbegotten nor begotten. But amid these things, while we demonstrate the proper person of the Holy Spirit and confess the Father as unbegotten, and recognize the Son as only-begotten, you ask of me whether the Holy Spirit is to be confessed as unbegotten, or begotten, or something else. The holy Scriptures speak concerning the power and divinity of the Holy Spirit; but whether He ought to be called begotten or unbegotten, they do not speak. See what darkness unbelief makes for itself. You do not wish to know what God did not wish to be unknown, and you wish to know what He did not command to be inquired into. He did not say "begotten," lest you believe Him to be the Son; He did not say "unbegotten," lest you think Him the Father; but for the distinction of essence, He testified that He proceeds from the Father, as we read: "the Paraclete, who proceeds from the Father." Since these things are so, at least thus recognize that the Holy Spirit has His own person. That He is a third besides the two, the diversity of name proves; that He is not third in order or rank, the unity of majesty shows. For He who proceeds from the inner parts of God is proven to be not a creature of God, but the substance of God. Do not scrutinize how He is God, whom it is manifest is God. Here the reason lies hidden, the truth does not lie hidden. Why do you ask how He is the companion and equal of the King, when it is established that He is of the royal honor and lineage? The inquiry about the name is superfluous where there is no doubt about the sublimity.

Therefore, because the Holy Spirit proceeds from both, it says: “But he who does not have the spirit of the Lord is not his,” and in another place: “He breathed and said: Receive the Holy Spirit.” You ask whether He is unbegotten or begotten. The sacred Scriptures have sung nothing about this; it is impious to break into divine silences. What God did not believe should be indicated in His Scriptures, He did not wish you to question or to know with superfluous curiosity. He judged that what pertains to your salvation should reach your conscience. What we ought to believe about the Holy Spirit, let us consult the sacred Scriptures. For this very thing, that He says the Son is begotten—would you dare to say it unless you had learned it from heavenly testimony in the Scriptures? Or would you presume to assert that Christ the Lord was either born of a virgin or begotten from the equal and coeternal Father, unless you had taken it from reading, unless you had questioned the divine voices about God? And therefore, how you ought to think about the Holy Spirit, you must return to the apostles and the Gospels, with which and in which you do not doubt that God has spoken.

So, to return to your superfluous proposition: is the glory or substance of the Holy Spirit at stake in whether He is proven to be unbegotten or begotten? For neither does it detract anything from the Son that He is not read to be unbegotten, nor from the Father that He is not held to be begotten. In such expressions, there is a property of appellation, not a diversity of power or majesty. "Begotten" and "unbegotten" are a difference of person, not of nature. Therefore, when you have either spoken or heard about "begotten" and "unbegotten" things that are useless, unnecessary, and suitable only for calumnies, will you be content to stop at this point? Certainly, you will still ask whether He is God. But when you have accepted from what is read that He is God, you will then have nothing to ask, because when you begin to know strong and perfect things, you will not need to inquire into empty and vain ones. Therefore, where the reason of utility and the fullness of truth are understood to be, there let salutary intention direct itself.

X. THE HOLY SPIRIT AS THE BESTOWER OF PERFECT CHARISMS. The Holy Spirit is the bestower and dispenser of heavenly charisms and of sanctifications, as even the very rationale of His name attests. His magnificence, moreover, is also manifested in the Old Testament. For there His grace was granted only to certain individuals, that is, to the patriarchs and likewise to the prophets and to the saints and the elect, so that through the perfection of the gifts themselves I might understand the dignity of the giver. But as is most clearly discerned in the Holy Scriptures, the Father Himself works some things by Himself, other things specifically through the Son, and other things through the Holy Spirit, albeit under the privilege of common power. What we are seems to be referred properly to the Father, in whom, as the Apostle said, we live and move and have our being. But that we are capable of reason and wisdom and justice is attributed specifically to Him who is reason and wisdom and justice, that is, to the Son. However, that we are called and regenerated, and regenerated we are renewed, and renewed we are sanctified, is evidently ascribed by the divine Scriptures to the person of the Holy Spirit.

But these things the sacred page speaks of under the distinction of the undivided Trinity in such a way that, however much diversity of work appears in the individual persons, the unity of will nevertheless remains in the three. Therefore both pagans and catechumens participate in the dispensation of the Father and the Son, but not easily in the sanctification and infusion of the Holy Spirit, unless they have already obtained baptism, been purified and made spiritual, and even become apostolic and apostles, and prepared with their whole spirit for martyrdom. And amid these things, will He still be judged a creature by the impious, He who, within the undivided Trinity, obtains the more magnificent and more perfect gifts in the ordering of human salvation? But perhaps you say: the Holy Spirit is greater, whose works are greater and nobler. It is not so. For it is the custom of the Trinity that, to whichever person it entrusts the office of administering a matter, to that person it ascribes the effect of the completed work; and thus the work may be diverse, but the purpose is common. And if there is a special deed in each individual, the general plan remains in the three; and therefore, although they have a distinct task in operation, they nevertheless hold a single consensus in ordination.

After the ascension of the Lord, the Holy Spirit is described as descending to accumulate and fulfill his benefits, concerning whom the Savior himself speaks through the Gospel of John: "That Spirit of truth, whom the Father will send in my name." "He will send," he says, "the Father in my name," evidently concerning the Trinity. Of which creature have we ever read or heard that it came into this world in the name of God? Therefore this one, concerning whom Christ the Lord God says, "Unless I go, the Paraclete will not come to you," is undoubtedly God, who is sent in the place of God to confirm the gifts of God. In these two statements, under the distinction of the Trinity, the person even of the Holy Spirit is absolutely declared. Not undeservedly, therefore, is it also referred to the equality of divinity that, just as the Son, so also the Holy Spirit is called Paraclete in the Scriptures. And how will we be able to prove this? Surely from the authority of the apostle John, when he says: "If anyone," he says, "of us has sinned, we have a Paraclete before the Father, Jesus Christ, and he himself is the propitiation for our sins." "Paraclete," that is, advocate, which pertains to the person of the Son, or also comforter, which pertains to the Holy Spirit, one utterance of the Greek word signifies both. In the Gospel of John we have: "And I," he says, "will ask the Father, and he will give you another Paraclete." Another Paraclete, that is, of similar power, of equal glory, and of the same nature.

and another Paraclete: if you think the Holy Spirit is one of the creatures, it is unworthy that, when the same Spirit descends, a creature should confirm the benefits which the Creator conferred, and that, as if the power of the maker were ineffectual, the effect of an unfinished work should be reserved for some creature, however excellent. Therefore you slander the Holy Spirit as a creature with reproach, to whom the Son of God, by divine testimony, equated himself from his own oracle. And another Paraclete: here recognize, in a twofold sense, both the distinction of persons and the equality of substance. Perhaps you will object here: Christ seems to have equated himself with the Holy Spirit under the name of Paraclete, who is certainly the material of God’s work and a creation, because Jesus himself is proven to have been created from Mary. This argument is as faithless as it is weak. For if you think Christ was likened to the Paraclete according to his human nature, not even this agrees with the truth. For, being a little less than the angels and made one of us, he could not be compared to a first, celestial, and, as you claim, more excellent creature. But if Christ spoke this according to his divine form, it is certain that a creation ought not to have been compared to the maker. And thus, if a man equates himself to this more excellent creature, it is the pride of a lesser; if a god, it is an injury to a greater.

Since, therefore, this comparison is not recognized to hold for itself in the condition of a creature, it remains that each be believed to be God and that the equality of divinity be compared mutually. For when the Savior speaks through John: "And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Paraclete, the Spirit of Truth, whom this world cannot receive, who can be given to the whole world," He is manifestly God of the world. Here also recognize the threefold Trinity. The Father is the one who is indicated as to be asked, the Son is the one who is understood as about to ask, the Holy Spirit is the one who is promised as to be sent by the Father. Note that the person of the Holy Spirit is not so much associated with kindred creatures, as you assert, but is joined to the Trinity in all works and equaled in powers. XI. IN THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES THE AFFIRMATION OF THE TRINITY IS REPEATED, WHERE CHRIST IS ALSO ASSERTED TO HAVE BEEN SENT AGAINST THE NOVATIANS FOR GIVING PENANCE. In the Acts of the Apostles, Peter, discoursing about the Lord Jesus, says thus: "Therefore, exalted by the right hand of God and having received the promise of the Holy Spirit from the Father, He poured forth this one whom you see and hear." In the right hand the Son is designated, in God the Father, in the property of His name the Holy Spirit. And in what follows we read: "Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said: 'In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, in this one he stands before you sound.'" Observe here also the expressed distinction of the Trinity.

Peter in himself bears the Holy Spirit, the Son dying in the flesh, and the Father speaking, who raises him up. The apostolic oracle is nonetheless repeated there: "And now," he says, "Lord, look upon their threats," and: "They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with confidence." Note also in this passage that the Holy Spirit is contained within the Trinity. In the prayer, the Father is invoked; in the word of God, the Son is recognized; in the steadfastness of the apostles, the fire of the Holy Spirit is at work. "They were all filled with the Holy Spirit." It is a mark of manifest majesty to be able to pour many things simultaneously into the subtlety of the incorporeal divinity and to remain whole without diminishment. Likewise, when the apostles had said of Jesus: "This one God has exalted as prince and savior with his right hand to give repentance in Israel for the remission of sins," he says: "We are witnesses of these things, and the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to all who are obedient to him." Understand here that, under the order of the Trinity, the Son is sent by the Father not only to preach but to give repentance, and that the Holy Spirit is poured into those who are obedient, rewarding that obedience.

Stephen is filled with the Holy Spirit at the moment of his passion, and with the gates of justice opened to him, the Son is revealed at the right hand of the Father, just as he himself, filled with the Holy Spirit, declares: "Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God." See how, under the spectacle of the Trinity, he was consuming the gifts of the passion. Peter addresses the centurion Cornelius, saying: "Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed him with the Holy Spirit." God anointed, that is, power filled, blessing poured in, divinity penetrated. "How God anointed him with the Holy Spirit." Here three things clearly exist through their own properties: the gift, the giver, the recipient; the anointer, the anointed, the ointment, just as in another place divine speech says: "Your God anointed you with the oil of gladness." In the assumed man, God is anointed and God anoints, and under the descent of the heavenly dove, the power of the Father is recognized. It is not lawful that this Holy Spirit, by whom the Son of Man Christ, already full as Son of God, is filled, be believed to be anything other than God. For if it were a creature, how could it penetrate an incorporeal nature that penetrates all things? For the Trinity is self-contained, as we have: "I in the Father and the Father in me," and again: "The Spirit searches even the depths of God," and likewise: "The Spirit who proceeds from the Father." Unless this Holy Spirit were from the Father and naturally infused, dwelling in the Father's interior, it could not proceed from the Father.

But you ask whether the Spirit always proceeds from the Father. Always with him, always from him, just as heat from fire, so it is brought forth without interruption, so that it knows how to come forth, but does not know how to be separated. For if the procession of the Holy Spirit were not everlasting, the substance would seem to be local. If the incorporeal and self-contained brightness does not penetrate each other without mixture of itself, then the divinity will be confused with earth. For mixture destroys the property of the triune essence, but mutual infusion reveals a distinct essence, which can be seen as intermediate between substance and persons. It pertains to substance that it subsists; it pertains to the persons that each one subsists in its own way. Paul addresses his disciples, saying: "I did not shrink from announcing to you the whole counsel of God. Attend to yourselves and to the whole flock, in which the Holy Spirit has placed you as bishops to rule the Church of God, which He acquired with His own blood." How clearly the whole Trinity is designated in its persons. He announces the counsel of God the Father, he confirms that bishops are ordained by the Holy Spirit, and he demonstrates God also as Christ, by whose blood the Church was acquired.

Also to the Romans the Trinity is set forth under the proper names: for if his Spirit, who raised Jesus Christ, dwells in you, he who raised Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit dwelling in you. The Father raises, the Son is raised, and because of the dwelling Spirit, life is promised to the mortal bodies that are to be raised. And in what follows: you, however, are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not his. When he says the Spirit of God and consequently the Spirit of Christ, note that here he designates the person of Christ under the appellation of God. Or if here he signifies the Father, whose Spirit it is, under the name of God, behold, here the Holy Spirit is declared to be the Spirit of both the Father and the Son by the unity of substance, and is rightly understood to proceed from both, and is seen to have a distinct person in the bond of the Trinity, and it is shown that whoever does not have the Holy Spirit does not have Christ either. Therefore the Holy Spirit is God; if he is denied, Christ is also denied, and because he said: no one comes to the Father except through me, whoever is empty of the Holy Spirit is not of Christ and has lost the way by which one reaches the Father.

XII. IT IS THE PROPERTY OF GOD TO SANCTIFY THE CREATURE. To the Corinthians, first: "And you indeed were these things, but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God." Behold, here also under "our God," that is, under the mention of the Father, the Holy Spirit sanctifies the faithful of Corinth with Christ cooperating. No creature whatsoever can sanctify another; the bestowal of sanctification is solely the munificence of majesty. In this passage, in the name of Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God, recognize the three persons. To the Corinthians, second: "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit with all of you." Grace of Christ, love of God, communion of the Holy Spirit—these have clearly expressed the three persons. Likewise, to the Corinthians, second: "But he who confirms us with you in Christ, and he who anointed us, God, and he who sealed us and gave the pledge of the Spirit in our hearts." See in the works the unity of the undivided Trinity. The Father confirms and seals us through Christ, and, about to give himself, he already gives in the present through himself the pledge, the Holy Spirit. In earthly transactions, the amount of the earnest money is a certain portion of that contract for which it intervenes; but the nature of a pledge exceeds the value of the thing for which it seems to be deposited. Here, however, the pledge, because it cannot be set above majesty, must necessarily be equal to it.

For the perfect cannot be surpassed; therefore the Father bestows the pledge of the Holy Spirit on behalf of himself. Let nothing, then, in the Holy Spirit be thought half-full, because it is compared to fullness. For what is given in place of God as a pledge is not permitted to be believed to be anything other than God. Likewise to Titus: "He has saved us through the laver of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, which he has poured out abundantly upon us through Jesus Christ." Behold, even here, under a manifest Trinity, the Father pours forth the abundance of the Holy Spirit through the Son, and—what is especially to be noted—he ascribes to the Holy Spirit himself the power of regeneration and renewal. Peter also, in his epistle, explains the inseparable Trinity of persons, saying: "According to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, in the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ, may grace and peace be multiplied to you." In foreknowledge the Father is shown, in sanctification the Holy Spirit, in the sprinkling of blood Christ.

XIII. THAT THE HOLY SPIRIT IS NOT LOCAL. Let us demonstrate that the Holy Spirit is God from his powers and works. Every creature, just as it is subject to the beginnings of time, so also does it recognize itself as local, circumscribed by definite spaces and boundaries. The Holy Spirit is confined by no limits as a created thing would be; it is necessary that he be considered God by virtue of the very freedom of his diffused majesty. The voice of the Lord and Savior to the apostles is: “The Father will give you,” he says, “the Spirit of truth, who will be with you forever.” If he is local and was to remain perpetually in them, he certainly could not be elsewhere. Let us see whether his nature is determined by local boundaries. The Lord says to the apostles: “You will receive the power of the Holy Spirit coming upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.” After his ascension, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and divided tongues as of fire appeared to them, and it sat upon each one of them.

Let us see why the diverse blessings of tongues were first granted, namely that the peoples of the faithful might be made fit for instruction by them. But that He is recorded to have sat upon each one individually, the reason for this is that it be understood that through the plural He was not divided, but remained whole in each one, as is the custom with fires. For fire, once kindled, has this nature, as we know: that however many have looked to it, however many have looked to the lock of purple splendor, to that many it imparts the use of its light, to that many it bestows the ministry of its gift, and yet itself remains in its integrity. Thus the power of the Holy Spirit, however much it flows forth, however much the grace of divine bounty overflows into many, just as it is proven to receive no measure, so it feels no expenditure. Observe God from the dignity of His works. The apostles, filled with the Holy Spirit, about to dispense the treasures of salvation throughout the whole world, carry this heavenly gift within themselves, and transfer it to others by the laying on of hands. The gain of the receiver is transacted without loss to the giver; He is given whole to believers and is possessed whole by those who give; the whole world is filled by His infusion, He is spread without attenuation, He is scattered without division.

On that most sacred night of regeneration, from east to west, from sunrise to sunset, from the north and the sea, everywhere the same Spirit, one and full, works, is believed to be present through invocation in all things, is perceived through blessing, countless multitudes are washed by one baptism and, as the apostle said, are given to drink of one Spirit, are reborn into the one lap of the adopter. And therefore God says: In those days I will pour out from my Spirit upon all flesh [note that he said: I will pour out from my Spirit] and he did not say: I will pour out my Spirit, that is: I will dispense only so much of it as the world can receive. You see that it proceeds from the Father yet is not separated from the Father, is sent forth and not lost, is poured out and retained, and in that it is read to be poured out, the greatness of its fullness is declared. The book of the sacred volume of Genesis testifies at its beginning: And the Spirit of the Lord was borne over the waters. It was borne, it says, over the waters. The word itself seems to indicate the abundance of the one filling all things and the preeminence of the one ruling. The prophet also celebrates this magnificence of His, not circumscribed by any spatial intervals, with equal testimony, saying: Whither shall I go from your Spirit?

This is, where I might hide myself from his sight, whom I do not doubt is present in all things, that is, within and without, whose eye I dread penetrating the abyss within the secret of my breast, whose presence I know all things he has created lie subject to, concerning whom, because he is a consuming fire, I clearly understand that it is said: "There is none who can hide himself from his heat," whose ineffable magnitude enters, fills, and exceeds the depths of the underworld, the expanse of the waves, the stretch of the lands, the heights of the heavens. He is said to be sent by the Father and the Son, and to proceed from their substance, and is known to perform one work with them, and for that reason the Son says of him: "The Paraclete, who proceeds from the Father." He did not say "was created by the Father," but "proceeds from the Father," that is, from the partnership of paternal power and from the property of nature. But from that very expression, when he is said to proceed from the Father, it is shown that he does not have a beginning with the Father. What is it, then, that the Son is said to be born from God the Father and the Holy Spirit is signified to proceed? If you ask what difference there is between being born and proceeding, it is clearly this: that the one is born from one, the other proceeds from both. Therefore, that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father shows three privileges of divinity in him, that is, that he subsists in his own person, endures without any interval of time, and is proven to exist entirely from the substance of the Father.

Since, therefore, it is spoken of as proceeding, by the very property of speech it is understood not to be circumscribed by any laws of time, but to lack beginning and end. And because we read: "I am who I am," and "He who is sent me," this similarly indicates and proceeds. For "to be" and "to proceed" are an expression of one and the same eternity. Therefore, this procession itself, touching neither a first nor a last, is understood to be subject to no beginning or end. Let us not, then, believe it to be local because we learn from reading that he is sent by the Father; for we also read of the Father and the Son that they descend and come as if by some motion. Let us see where. "I," he says, "and my Father will come and will make our abode with him." And again, when the giants were striving to erect a tower into the sky, the person of the Father speaks out: "Come, let us descend and confound their tongues." Here, therefore, through the sounds of our words, the efficacies of things are demonstrated to our senses. But divine power does not suffer local motion, which neither arrives by an active course nor departs by a receding flow. For he who exceeds all things, whither does he withdraw? We have learned from sacred reading concerning the Holy Spirit: "But the Church had peace throughout all Judea, walking in the fear of God and being filled with the consolation of the Holy Spirit.

And how among these things does anyone presume to assert that He is a local creature, who is proved to fill the church of infinite multitude, so that it is manifest that what the apostle says pertains to Him: "father of mercies and God of all consolation"? We have in the psalm: "The rush of the river gladdens the city of God." What is this rush of the river? That, no doubt, of which the Lord says through John: "He who believes in me, rivers of living water will flow from his womb." These things the Lord Jesus says about the Spirit, whom those believing in Him were to receive. Behold the magnificence of majesty. Thus on earth it is bestowed upon the church of God, yet in the heavens it gladdens the city of God. The city of God, that is, the citizens of the heavenly realms, the peoples of the supernal host, the principalities, powers, and dominions, it irrigates with ineffable joys for the consciousness of eternal blessedness and inebriates more abundantly with an overflowing abundance of gladness, it rouses the harmony of heaven in the exultation of its rushing sanctification. If you think that such great things are given through some creature, you leave nothing proper to divine power. If, I say, you consider that such great things are given through some creature, you do injury to the angels and archangels, to whom you consider that such great and such things are bestowed through a fellow servant.

BOOK TWO THAT NO RATIONAL CREATURE CAN BE POURED INTO A KINDRED CREATURE. We read of the profuse outpouring of the Holy Spirit: "But Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan." Who, then, unless he were of the same fullness, could fill the one who fills all things? Of the apostles, the divine word reports: "And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with confidence," and shortly after: "since the grace of the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the nations." He is said to fill entire nations and is perceived to remain inexhausted and full in Himself. If the Holy Spirit is created, of which angel or archangel has it ever been read that He poured Himself into any soul, received inwardly? Tell me, if you have ever read of any power and virtue among creatures that could fill and possess many at once and, what is more, remain undiminished and undivided. It is impossible for a spiritual and rational creature ever to be able to be poured into a nature kindred to itself. Thus a material thing does not know how to penetrate a material substance. Only God, in whom the Holy Spirit is understood, simple, subtle, and pure, glides into a created being, whether angelic or human, by the power of incorporeal divinity, which alone, as the penetrator of its own work, enters the hidden places of the human heart. But any celestial creature whatsoever cannot so infuse or fill a man as to be able to know the secrets of human thought.

And therefore we read only of God: "Who alone knows the hearts of men," and again: "For He Himself knows the hidden things of the heart." If knowing the hidden things of man is proper to divinity, how much more is it the distinctive mark of the highest majesty in the person of the Holy Spirit to scrutinize the depths of God. This privilege is owed to the Author alone, that He may enter the secret of consciences. But soul can be joined to soul, or angel to angel; it cannot be poured into another, because these kinds of creatures are capable only of the Holy Spirit, that is, of God alone, since they are vessels of their own potter; they can be filled only by Him by whom they were made from nothing and without whom they are felt to be empty. Thus the substance of the soul, as a material thing, utterly does not know how to be poured into another rational creature. For compared to the grossness of the outer man, the soul can be called incorporeal; but when referred to its Author, to whom its own matter and palpable creation are comprehensible, by whom it can be enclosed within a body and bound and consigned to perpetual fire, as we read: "that they may go into the eternal fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels," to this Author, without doubt, by the right of the maker, it is corporeal.

But perhaps you say: it is clear that even the importunate violence of demons often pours itself into men whom it has taken to tempt. It is not so. For they can enter the hiding places of the body, but they cannot approach the inner recesses of the soul. Therefore it must be known that the deceitful subtlety of spiritual wickednesses disturbs with its attack those places of the members which are sometimes wearied by an excess of wine or by the inflammation of fevers. Thus the hostile temptation knows how to creep into the senses of the soul through malice, but it does not know how to flow into the recesses of the soul by nature. And therefore unclean spirits of this kind do not seize human minds and hearts by an infusion of natures, but conceive them by the depravity of wills. It is therefore clear that they cannot penetrate the substances of souls, whose consciences they cannot know. But if it sometimes happens that demons know, it is from the betrayal of complicity, not from the power of nature.

Only divine power, therefore—which is also in the Holy Spirit—mingles with rational creatures, being both infused into them and poured around them, just as it especially rested, with an overflowing grace, in that body of the Lord’s man taken from the mother Mary, just as the Son of God himself says of himself: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me.” If, therefore, the Holy Spirit were of a created and subject condition, as they say, it would be as impossible as it would be unworthy of God for that creature to fill the soul or body in which the Son of God, that is, God, already dwelt, in which, as the Apostle says, the fullness of divinity already dwelt corporally. If the Holy Spirit is a creature, how can corruption possess incorruption, and a fragile condition possess one capable of majesty? If the Holy Spirit is one from the common crowd of creation, how does a creature with the creator—that is, with the Son of God as an equal—a slave with the Lord, presume a shared lodging in the soul of the Savior and, as if the author were not sufficient in it, does the servant of the author approach the summit of sanctity? It is not so. But the heavenly college recognizes a companion for itself in the temple; nor is it a wonder if, in that illustrious soul of a blessed body, the Son and the Holy Spirit share one dwelling, for whom it is established that even heaven is common.

II. Whether, According to the Opinion of the Unlearned, the Holy Spirit, Like the Son, Was Incarnate, Because He Also Came Upon Mary, or Whether Only the Son Was Begotten of the Virgin. But it is said: if the Holy Spirit dwelt in the body and soul of the Redeemer, then the Spirit Himself will seem to have undergone incarnation. This is not so. For before the beginnings of creation, the sacred body of Mary is filled by the Holy Spirit, and at the beginnings of creation, the Son of the Virgin is conceived with the Holy Spirit cooperating, but He is poured into the person of the Son specifically, to be possessed for nine months and to proceed into the light with Him; the person of the Holy Spirit, however, did not receive that temporal fellowship within the secret of the virginal womb. Therefore, the man whom the Son of God assumed at the very beginning, the Holy Spirit entered not as the assumer but as the sanctifier; within him, just as He conducted Himself as Christ’s companion, so Christ conducted Himself as His author. For the Son is born, the Holy Spirit is infused. The soul or flesh of the Son of the Virgin can be called personally and specifically that of the Son of God, but the soul or flesh of the Holy Spirit cannot be called so in any way. In that which the Son of God, that is, the God of glory, is said to have been crucified, the Holy Spirit can in no way be said to have suffered in it. Therefore, there is a diversity of works, not a diversity of substances.

For just as we cannot say that the Father descended in the form of a dove, or that the Son spoke in the Father’s voice when He said, “This is my Son,” so too we cannot assert that the Holy Spirit was either born of a virgin, or specially dwelt in the flesh of the Redeemer, or was crucified in His passion, or restored to the body in His resurrection, or exalted to the heavens in His ascension. These things necessarily pertain to the work and person of the Son; they are not fitting to be ascribed to the Holy Spirit, even if the unity of will is preserved. Among these things, Macedonius asserts that the Holy Spirit is a creature. Whence it will be seen, let him begin, provided he presumes nothing by his own words and does not transgress the orbit of sacred law with a disputation alien to the holy pages, but let him bring forth authority throughout from testimonies, if he can, which may prevail against the faith of the whole world both in number and in power. Great, without doubt, allegations and copious and very evident proofs are needed, for anyone to convince that he is one among the number of creatures, whom all the kingdoms of the earth celebrate with the Father and the Son as of the same honor and glory, whom the Catholic Church, regenerated in the same, recognizes as her Creator. And rightly, since she perceives him as her Restorer, she does not hesitate to believe him to be her Author.

III. THE OBJECTION OF MACEDONIUS, BY WHICH HE IMPIOUSLY ASSERTS THE HOLY SPIRIT TO BE A MORE EXCELLENT CREATURE. You say, I assert, that it is a creature, but more excellent than all creatures. We have already stated beforehand that we should arrange our discourse not by our own persuasions, but by catholic oracles. Therefore, as we treat of God, let the prophet, the apostle, the evangelist answer. You say it is a creature more excellent than all creatures. Show in which books you have read these words concerning the Holy Spirit. Not, I think, in the old, nor will you teach them in the new. Since, therefore, you are unable to produce them, while you do not explain your own, you confirm ours; while you do not prove it a creature, you demonstrate it to be the Creator, even with us silent. And so, since this assertion of yours does not pertain to catholic understanding, and does not belong at all to Christian teaching, recognize it as a device of the devil, who, when he sees the house of the soul empty of the Holy Spirit, as a contrary spirit with a dread retinue of sevenfold wickedness, invades it. For he who shuts out the Holy Spirit receives the devil. In the devil was that which you call a more excellent creature; he who, shining with celestial brightness, conscious of the gift, ignorant of the giver, saw that he had it, but did not know he had received it, and therefore lost the glory which, in his blessedness, he did not understand, and in his pride lost it, saying thus: I shall ascend above the clouds of the stars, I shall place my throne upon the thrones, and I shall be like the Most High.

Therefore, as I see it, it had no superior among creatures, saw no intermediate between itself and God, by whose rivalry it might be roused with the goad of pride, and so, beholding none standing before it in the order of the heavenly host, it presumed to equal the Lord of the universe itself. But if it had detected any more excellent than itself in the celestial rank, impatient of a greater, it would have attempted to compare or prefer itself to that one. There are two in the heavens: the one who rules and those who are ruled, the creator and the creature. No third kind existed in the middle of these, which would be greater than the second and inferior to the highest. A more excellent creature can perhaps be said of the archangels, although they excel others more in rank than in nature. But even the archangels serve the Holy Spirit, one of whom, as a minister, announced His coming to the blessed Mary. But you say: "Behold, where the prophet Amos clearly designates the Holy Spirit as a creature, saying thus: 'Behold, I am the one who fashions the thunder and creates the spirit.'" First, the bare name "spirit" can by no means be referred to the person of the sanctifying Spirit unless you add either "Spirit of God" or "Holy Spirit" or "the Spirit blows where it wills"—that is, unless you add the dignity either of the work or of the proper name. Then, if you consider the order of the reading, it shows that this more excellent creature, as you assert, is too lowly, for it describes it as created after the thunder.

Hence it was inconsistent that, according to your understanding, this principal work of God should be placed after or associated with an irrational and insensible element. It is unworthy to believe this, not only of an angel, but of any righteous person. Therefore, it seems more reasonable and fitting that after the thunderclaps we understand the winds to be signified, as in the Psalms: "the spirits of the storms, which make his word," or: "sulphur of the spirits of the storms," or: "with a violent spirit shattering the ships of Tarshish." The word "spirit" is understood in various ways when it is not specifically designated with its own privileges. But setting these aside, inquire into the truth of the Hebrew translation, and there you will detect the confutable error of your persuasion. For you will find it stated there absolutely: "Behold, I am forming mountains and creating the wind." See how nakedly and how emptily you have believed words against God. See with what great argument you have armed yourself against the power of majesty. And after these things, do you not fear to cling to such a weak branch, when you hang over such a dreadful precipice?

IV. MACEDONIUS, ASSERTING A DUALITY, DENIES THAT THE HOLY SPIRIT HAS A PROPER PERSON. Next you introduce a duality and say that the Holy Spirit does not have a proper person, nor do you perceive that you have lost the grace of regeneration, you who aim an offense at the Regenerator, whom divine truth declares to be united with the Father and the Son in a communion of majesty and power, speaking thus: "Go, baptize all nations in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." "In the name," it says, "of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." The singularity of the name speaks of unity, but the diversity of the appellations speaks of the Trinity. Therefore, one in name, but not one in the distinction of persons. What is the prerogative of one name in three, if not the undivided concord of the Godhead? Make a distinction, if you can, where, with God himself attesting this, you find nothing except the one. You hear "three," lest Sabellian impiety confound and confuse the unity; you hear "one," lest Arian perversity divide the Trinity; you hear "Holy Spirit," so that the expressed property of a distinct name may pierce Macedonius. Therefore, it is not the work of a creature, but the incommunicable work of the Creator, where the abolition of sins and immunity are dispensed. Yet in this indissoluble embrace of majesty, in the property of person, the Father is one, the Son is another, the Holy Spirit is another, but in divinity they are not something else; for if He were not God, He could not have a proper person alongside the Father and the Son.

Finally, when the Word passes into flesh and God puts on the appearance of a man, and his tabernacle is made around him, and he wraps his splendor in the darkness of our fragility, and places darkness as his hiding place, there is indeed a double substance of God and man, but nevertheless one person. Why is this? Because, when God, taking the form of a servant, is joined to the servant, the humility of the lesser is hidden within the reverence of the greater, and is consumed, emptied by the light of the superior, and thus humanity does not obtain the property of a person, with the divinity overshadowing or standing out. Therefore, equality of persons can exist there where equality of merits and dignities stands; and so you should know that the Holy Spirit possesses the one privilege of majesty with the Father and the Son, whom you see obtaining the proper right of a person. But if someone objects and says: if in Christ, God and man alike, we speak of two substances, why do we not believe in two persons by a similar reasoning? It is not so. For he who makes two persons in Christ introduces the impiety of a quaternity, which the nature of things does not at all admit. From two rational and diverse substances, especially of God and man, of creator and creature, one cannot be made; but from two persons one can be made, just as we read that the head and the body, Christ and the Church, hold one person: for they will be, it says, two in one flesh.

And just as among us men the son of a householder has no place of his own person next to the father, or a slave next to the master, so in God and man there is indeed a twofold substance, but not a twofold person, because a person can consume a person, but a substance cannot consume a substance, since a person is a matter of law, a substance a matter of nature. At this point it seems necessary that we affirm, by testimonies, one person and two substances in Christ, who is equally God and man. Give one person in the Redeemer of God and man, which person the apostle speaks of: for if they had known the wisdom of God, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory. If you ask how the inviolable could suffer and the incomprehensible be crucified, the unity of person makes it so that what man endured, God is believed to have endured. Likewise, when the evangelist records: no one ascends into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of man, who is in heaven, how does he assert that the Son of man, before the passion or resurrection or the day of ascension, both descended from heaven and remained in the heavens, unless this is resolved by the unity of person through the reason of truth? Just as in another place the person of the head and the body is united, when it is read: I was hungry and you gave me to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me to drink. What does the unity of person do here? Man is fed and God is refreshed, the foot is warmed and the head testifies that it feels the warmth.

He says therefore: "They would never have crucified the Lord of glory," and on the other hand: "No one ascends into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven." See how, for the sake of the unity of the person, human and divine things are mingled with divine and human. God is crucified, and the man is recorded as descending from heaven and remaining in heaven. ... Since this is so, let us discern from the sacred volumes the distinction of the twofold substance. Thus the blessed Moses says: "You shall eat the head with the feet, and you shall devour its entrails." In the feet let us believe in the humanity, and in the head the majesty. Thus it happens that, while we come to know these things hidden within the letter by the searching of faith, we consume the entrails of the lamb, that is, the hidden mysteries. For the zeal for searching is understood as the eagerness for devouring, just as in another place the same revealer of the sacraments intimates the resolution of the twofold substance, saying: "Foxes have holes, and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head." That is: deceitful heresies and shadowy or airy powers have set up a seat for themselves in human hearts by deep domination, but the hearts of the unfaithful, who see me as a man in the flesh, do not believe that God lies hidden within the man. For "holes" and "nests" do not designate transient and momentary dwellings, but those founded in lasting and secure possession, which multiply the serpentine nourishments of vices.

The apostle also clearly distinguished two substances, once the obscurity of the mystery was removed, speaking thus: "Our fathers, from whom Christ according to the flesh, who is God blessed above all things forever." But you say: the apostle confesses only two persons in the volume of his works, as he speaks to the Corinthians: "Paul, called apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God," and to the Galatians: "Paul, apostle not by men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead," and again: "One God the Father, from whom are all things and we in him, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and we through him." According to these, you say that no mention is made of the Holy Spirit. To speak briefly, you have forgotten that the apostle, filled with the Holy Spirit, preached these things to the peoples concerning the Father and the Son, with the Spirit himself inspiring. Therefore, when he spoke of the operation of the Father and the Son, the one who dictated what was to be spoken was not absent, according to that saying: "And no one says 'Lord Jesus' except in the Holy Spirit." Whoever, therefore, is to believe or confess or preach Christ, you see that he must first have the Holy Spirit within himself. So do not let this burden your faith, that sometimes mention is made of the Father and the Son without commemoration of the Holy Spirit. For often, with the name of the Father suppressed, the operation of the Son and the Holy Spirit is preached.

Saint Ananias said to Paul: "Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road by which you were coming, sent me so that you might see and be filled with the Holy Spirit." Here the connection of two persons is clearly shown. Behold, Paul, blinded by Christ, is convicted; illuminated by the Holy Spirit, he is filled, and no mention of the Father is inserted here. Likewise, when Paul asked some of the disciples: "In what were you baptized?"—those who, after the Lord's ascension, were known to have been baptized in the baptism of John, after the baptism of the Trinity had been preached, and when even that mystery in which John was accustomed to baptize, that is, "in the one who is to come," was proven to have been omitted in their baptism, the apostle Paul saying to them: "John indeed baptized, but in the one who is to come," that is to say: "You were not baptized in that way." When Paul asked them: "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?"—which, after the Savior's baptism, was certainly to be confessed by those duly baptized through the imposition of hands—they replied: "We have not even heard whether the Holy Spirit exists." Upon hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied. Note that, when they are baptized in the name of Jesus, they later receive the Holy Spirit and the prophetic power through the invocation of the Paraclete. Truly, He is God who, after the gift of God, adds an increase to fullness.

Behold, in baptism two persons are signified; the Father is not read to have been invoked, but yet, as must be believed, He works with the Son and the Holy Spirit in the unity of power and divinity, whom the sacred reading was silent about, not denied. When, therefore, the Holy Spirit had come upon them, then they spoke in tongues and prophesied. See how great the power of the Holy Spirit is. In baptism, the remission of sins is granted; in the coming of the Holy Spirit, the gifts of virtues are conferred, and by the confirmed, the miracles of signs are celebrated. But those alien to the truth are accustomed to cavil even about syllables. For since we know it is said absolutely concerning the Trinity: that all things are from Him and through Him and in Him, they assert that "from Him" is more than "through Him," and likewise that this preposition, that is "through," is of greater prerogative than "in Him." But if they think that "in Him" is said of the Holy Spirit with a diminution of power, let them hear the magnificence of this preposition and accept that, even according to their own assertion, it is to be understood of the Holy Spirit. "In Him," it says, "we live and move and have our being." And rightly we live and move and have our being in Him, in whom we have been renewed and regenerated.

But we also recognize that it is to be referred through him even to the Holy Spirit, as you have: to some, indeed, through the Spirit is given the word of wisdom, to others the word of knowledge; likewise, to the Hebrews: who through the Holy Spirit offered himself immaculate to God; and again: the love of God is diffused in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who is given to us. For even if we understand it of the Father, we find that it is said similarly from him and from the Holy Spirit quite often, as we have in the Gospel of John: what is born from flesh is flesh, and what is born from spirit is spirit; and in the conclusion of the chapter: thus is everyone, he says, who is born from the spirit. Thus, therefore, it does not prejudice the Holy Spirit when, with his name suppressed, the works of the Father and the Son are commemorated, just as the Father and the Son are not denied when the work or power of the Holy Spirit is specifically asserted, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles: you will be baptized by the Holy Spirit not many days from now; and as is contained in the Gospel concerning the singular person of the Holy Spirit: unless someone is reborn from water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. In this passage, are the Father and the Son, because they are not named at all, believed to have been absent from such a great and divine gift? It is not so. For without doubt, with the Holy Spirit, with whom they share one substance, they are joined in mysteries and benefits; and if not by mention, yet by the unity of piety and work they are present.

Fifth Objection: That passage which we read, "Unless someone has been reborn from water and the Holy Spirit," testifies that water and the Holy Spirit are equally a creature. But you say: the Holy Spirit is so much a creature that it seems to be joined to the element of water, which is placed here in the first place and order, according to the gospel saying mentioned above: "Unless someone has been reborn from water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God." It is clear that the one who says these things is ignorant not only of the divine power in the Holy Spirit, but also of the very rationale of baptism. The Apostle, however, says: "But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Christ." But how we can either die or rise with Christ, if you ask, pay attention. All of us who are immersed in the sacred font imitate the death and burial of the Redeemer, as the same Apostle says: "Do you not know that all of us who are baptized in Christ are baptized in his death?" For we are buried together with Christ through baptism into death. For just as he was placed in the tomb by a three-day death, so we, placed within the bosom of water, that is, within the bosom of a kindred creature, by a threefold immersion, while we descend, we are buried; while we emerge, we are raised up. Through water, therefore, the imitation of burial is celebrated; through the Holy Spirit, the truth of life and the hope of eternal salvation are conferred.

Finally, let the invocation of the Holy Spirit be removed, and let us see whether the mere infusion of that water can be of any benefit by itself. Therefore, it is a creature, which imitates the office of burying; it is God, who bestows the benefit of being reborn. Whom you therefore perceive as the parent of restoration, recognize him as the author of resurrection as well. Concerning this, the prophet prophesies and speaks thus to the Father: "Send forth your Spirit, and they will be created, and you will renew the face of the earth." What difference is there between the operation of water and that of the Holy Spirit? Through water we seem to be led down into the tomb; through the Holy Spirit we are proven to be prepared for the kingdom. VI. WHERE IT IS ASKED WHETHER THE TITLE "HOLY SPIRIT" IS CONSIDERED A SURNAME OR A NAME. But among these matters, you believe it should be inquired whether the appellation "Holy Spirit," whom it is necessary also to call God, is a name or perhaps a surname. But recognize that what among men we are accustomed to add to a name does not befit the majesty of God, in whose name whatever exists is by no means additional, but without doubt naturally eternal. Even grammatical doctrine calls some names common, that is, appellative, and others special, that is, proper. Let us see if in our case we can find something similar here. Give in God a special or proper name, that is, Father and Son and Holy Spirit. These are so proper that neither can "Father" be said of the Son, nor is "Holy Spirit" easily read of the Father.

Likewise, give the proper: unbegotten, begotten, proceeding from both. Again, give the general and common name: majesty, immensity, fullness, one, only God. But when you hear "one," it is not that number begins here, but that infinite perfection is gathered. What is "one," if not an incommunicable name, which admits neither a later nor a prior? What is "one," if not a simple, uncomposed, and undivided substance? What is "one," if not unchangeable and equal and always the same, which can never be different from itself? And thus the common appellation speaks of unity, the proper of trinity. Therefore, when you have said Father, Son, Holy Spirit, you have specifically explained the persons of each; when you have said one God, you have demonstrated the common substance of the Trinity, the common glory. Here, then, ignorance has woven for itself a night of error, while, with the word of majesty suppressed, it esteems the Holy Spirit only in that name which, as we have said, is proper to him rather than in that which is common to him with the Father and the Son.

VII. THAT THE HOLY Spirit Specifically Fills the Prophets and Is Likewise to Be Believed and Called God, as Evident Testimonies Prove. Since through Moses and David and Isaiah or other prophets the Holy Spirit is reported to have spoken specifically, the divine word declares that God has spoken, as is frequently stated in the volume of the Pentateuch: "The Lord spoke," it says, "to Moses, saying." Let us inquire more carefully whether the Holy Spirit speaks specifically in the prophets. We have, as we mentioned above, in the Acts of the Apostles, with Paul rebuking the Jews: "Well," he says, "the Holy Spirit spoke through Isaiah to our fathers: you will hear with your ears and not understand." In the same reading: "Brothers, it is necessary that the scripture be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit foretold through the mouth of David." And in the epistle of Peter we read: "For prophecy was never brought forth by human will, but the holy men of God spoke by the Holy Spirit." Let us recognize that prophetic grace evidently pertains to the power of the Holy Spirit. And from the psalm of David we read thus to the Hebrews: "Wherefore, as the Holy Spirit says: today if you hear his voice," and so on. And here it is most clearly testified that the Holy Spirit spoke through David.

Let us see, however, whether that one through whom every prophecy is recorded as inspired is God. Luke asserts that the Lord God is the one who spoke through the prophets, saying thus: “Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, because he has visited and made redemption for his people,” and he added: “as he spoke through the mouth of the saints who are his prophets from ages past.” Absolutely, that the Holy Spirit, who had inspired the prophets, is the Lord and God of Israel is celebrated by the evangelical oracle. And in what follows, Simeon, filled with the Holy Spirit: “I have received,” he says, “a response from the Holy Spirit that I would not see death unless I first saw the Christ of the Lord.” Upon seeing him and taking him into his arms in an embrace, he blessed God, that is, the one from whom he seemed to have received the response; he blessed God and said: “Now you dismiss, Lord, your servant in peace.” Behold, he absolutely calls the Holy Spirit Lord and God, by whose word and response he had received that he would see Christ. You see that it is to be understood specifically of the Holy Spirit when it is said in the prophets: “The God of gods, the Lord, has spoken,” and: “Let me hear what the Lord God speaks in me.” Here you will vow that this name, that is, Lord God, is to be referred to the person of the Holy Spirit, who spoke in David, or certainly in one God recognize the will of three, the power of three, the substance of three, because when you say “Father,” one person is understood; when you say “God,” the whole Trinity is designated.

We also find in the Acts of the Apostles that it is undoubtedly God who foretold the passions of Christ through the prophets. For it says thus: “But God, who foretold through the mouth of all the prophets that His Christ would suffer, thus fulfilled His Christ,” that is, infused with the charism of His anointing, and again: “which God spoke through the mouth of His saints from the time of the prophets.” It says “which God spoke through the mouth of His saints,” and “His saints” because sanctification pertains properly to the Holy Spirit. We read in Isaiah: “Do I not fill heaven and earth, says the Lord?” Who is this Lord who says through Isaiah that He fills heaven and earth, if not the Holy Spirit, who infused Isaiah himself with prophetic power and the spirit of truth? Therefore, just as through the prophetic dispensation, so also the grace of second birth the will of the Trinity assigns especially to the Holy Spirit, as it says in John: “What is born from flesh is flesh, and what is born from spirit is spirit.” And in another place the power of renewing man is described as belonging to the Holy Spirit: “But you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now,” and, as was said above: “unless someone is reborn from water and the Holy Spirit,” and to Titus: “He saved us,” it says, “through the bath of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.

Let us see who this is whose children we become through the grace of adoption: “He gave them,” it says, “the power to become sons of God,” and again: “who were born not from blood nor from the will of the flesh, but from God.” You see most clearly that this Holy Spirit, in whom we are reborn, is God, by whose paternity we are granted. He himself elsewhere assigns this more clearly than light: “I will be,” he says, “a father to them, and they will be to me sons and daughters,” says the omnipotent Lord—rightly omnipotent, who erases the bond of sin, who loosens the chains of consciences, and strips the man believing in him of the foulness of corrupted nature and adorns him with the garment of innocence, the beauty of justice, the stole of immortality, and enrolls his sons in angelic state by his pious paternity. Let no one deem the Holy Spirit to be associated with creatures. He is beyond the condition of servitude, who can grant eternal freedom. For the apostle says: “You have not received the spirit of servitude again in fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption.” And the Spirit himself bears witness to our spirit that we are sons of God. Undoubtedly he is God, who through the remission of sins makes men sons of God.

It is established that every creature, even of angels and archangels, was subject to sin, yet their obedience, solicitude, and love toward God were founded by the ruin of the transgressors. Humility, subjection, and stability were confirmed, and the recognition of fragility was established. The Holy Spirit, unless He were free before all others, could not make free men out of slaves. For if He were a creature, however much grace of sanctity God might confer upon Him, the consciousness of being a debtor would still remain. And therefore it says: No one can grant forgiveness of sins except God alone. Whoever that person is, let him choose which he prefers: either let him confess that the Holy Spirit, who grants forgiveness of sins, is in every respect God, or, if he does not believe that pardon for sins can be granted through Him, he has nullified in himself the benefit of regeneration and the sacrament of baptism. Therefore, it is the sole prerogative of God to absolve the entangled, to restore the corrupted, to cleanse the stained. And so, conscious of our weakness and of His majesty, we proclaim to Him with a groan: "I have sinned against You alone," that is, You who alone are not bound by the law of sin, who alone are alien from it not actually but naturally, and therefore You alone can absolve debtors, You who alone are immune from debts, You who have what You possess not borrowed from elsewhere, but are full from Your own. For no one gave to You first, nor are You watered by virtues derived from elsewhere, nor is there any transfusion into You from some other source, but You Yourself are the source of Your own river and Your own glory.

Your nature is such that, just as it knows no beginning, so it has received nothing from a prior state. VIII. WHERE IT IS SHOWN THAT THE TEMPLE OF GOD IS THE TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. Sacred Scriptures define the Holy Spirit as properly the inhabitant of the human heart: "The Father will give you another Paraclete," it says, "that he may remain with you forever," and to the Corinthians: "He will give life even to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit dwelling in you," and therefore we rightly understand what is written about the Holy Spirit: "The kingdom of God is within you." The kingdom is certainly of God, for those who prepare themselves for it merit being a temple of God, not of a creature. Hear through the apostle the voice of our inhabitant: "You are," he says, "the temple of the living God, and the Spirit of God dwells in you," and in another place: "As God says: I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God." Behold, he himself who inhabits the temple of the human heart declares himself to be God. Ananias, among those who, honoring God, sold their possessions from their just labors and placed them before the feet of the apostles, is known to have promised a vow to God and is convicted of having lied to the Holy Spirit, as the apostle Peter says: "Ananias, why did Satan tempt your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit?" and he added subsequently: "You have not lied to men, but to God." What is this? He sins against the Creator, and yet Scripture mitigates his sin so as to adjudge him guilty of an offense against a creature, according to the sense of impiety, and to condemn him as a lesser debtor for an insult to the greater.

It is not so. He is clearly endowed with divine power, against whom the offense of sacrilege is charged, of whom in another place it says: "But he who has blasphemed against the Holy Spirit will have no remission, neither in this age nor in the future." Therefore, when by transgression he has tempted God, he is said to have deceived the Holy Spirit. For this reason, recognize one cause, one glory, one reverence of the Holy Spirit and of God. And so, in the following discourse, he concluded most clearly concerning the Holy Spirit: "You have not," he says, "lied to men, but to God." When Peter was speaking to Cornelius, the faithful from the circumcision who had come with Peter were astonished, because the grace of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even upon the Gentiles. You see that the Holy Spirit conferred grace not from another's, but from his own. If you ask who it is that gave the grace, he accordingly taught, saying: "Therefore, if God gave them the same grace." He who above was declared the giver of grace as the Holy Spirit, here he specifically declared him as God. There by a proper name, here by a common name, the repeated confession is proven. But when he says: "And the grace of the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the Gentiles," he himself is the God of nature, who is the author of grace. It belongs to God alone to bestow from his own the gifts of charismata, so that the Apostle may seem to have said of him: "I labored more abundantly than all of them. Not I, however, but the grace of God with me." Rightly is he pronounced God, who is the dispenser of grace and of human salvation. And Peter adds: "Who was I, that I could hinder God?

that God, indeed, who poured Himself out upon the nations or upon Cornelius with the force of a flooding grace. IX. WHERE, AGAINST THE NOVATIANS, GOD GAVE PENANCE FOR LIFE TO THE GENTILES, AND THAT GOD IS UNQUESTIONABLY THE HOLY SPIRIT, AS IS SHOWN BY THE VERY ORDER OF THE READING. Observe how, in the person of the Holy Spirit, who suddenly filled Cornelius and his companions, the name of God is celebrated with manifold testimony: "When they heard this," it says, "they fell silent and glorified God, saying: 'Therefore God has given penance for life even to the Gentiles.'" In this passage, it must be noted against the Novatians that He is said to give penance, which He certainly bestows only through the ministry of His servants. Therefore, when it says: "Who was I, that I could forbid God?" and again: "Therefore God gave penance for life to the Gentiles," what interpretation is to be expected in such manifest matters, which would not satisfy even the ignorant or the unbeliever, given the repeated confession of the divine name at the advent of the Holy Spirit?

X. WHERE, IN FIRST CORINTHIANS, THE HOLY SPIRIT IS DECLARED TO BE GOD BY THE DISTRIBUTIONS OF THE GIFTS. Take up the letter to the Corinthians, which alone can suffice for asserting the divinity of the Holy Spirit. He says through the letter to the Hebrews: God bearing witness by signs and wonders and various gifts and distributions of the Holy Spirit according to His own will. Let us ask the Apostle himself whether this distributor of charisms is one of the creatures. We have in First Corinthians: I make known to you that no one speaking in the Spirit of God says anathema to Jesus. And no one can say Lord Jesus except in the Holy Spirit. Note how here he has most absolutely designated the Spirit of God as the Holy Spirit. Concerning the Holy Spirit, whom in the preceding sentence he proposed as the Spirit of God speaking, observe what follows, how manifestly they testify that He is God and Lord: The divisions of graces, he says, are the same Spirit, and the divisions of ministries are the same Lord, and the divisions of operations are the same God. As if the blessed Apostle had been consulted about the divinity of the Holy Spirit, he clearly, concerning whom he had said: the same Spirit, adds concerning Him: the same God, who works all things in all. He could not work all things if He were one among all. Here recognize the Holy Spirit, whether expressed clearly in His own name as well as in Lord and God, or certainly acknowledged as associated with the Trinity.

But here, in the divisions of gifts, the divine discourse is understood to have designated the Holy Spirit, because above we have received that the grace of distributions pertains to the Holy Spirit by a special dispensation. For what it said: "the same Lord, the same God," in the following chapter it shows is to be referred to the Holy Spirit, saying: "To one indeed is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith in the same Spirit, to another the grace of healings in one Spirit, to another the operation of virtues, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another the kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of speeches." But all these things one and the same Spirit works, dividing to each as he wills. Subject to none, he is the heavenly Lord, who bestows heavenly gifts by his own will and from the right of his own power. XI. IT IS TO BE NOTED THAT JUST AS IT SAYS ONE GOD, SO IT SAYS ONE HOLY SPIRIT, WHICH COULD IN NO WAY BE SAID OF A PLEBEIAN CREATURE, OR THAT HE DIVIDES TO EACH AS HE WILLS.

You see that just as there is one Father and one Son, so also there is one Holy Spirit, as he consequently assigns: for we have been watered in one spirit. Here, if it were about the common people or a multitude of creatures, it could not at all be called one. And when you have here: to another, he says, faith is given in the same spirit, who bestows this faith, the same apostle declared to the Corinthians, saying: and to each one as God has divided the measure of faith. You see that he undoubtedly pronounces this divider of faith to be God. Although in such manifold and great generosity of gifts the very magnificence of the work speaks of the power of the author, yet he concluded thus concerning it: but all these things one and the same spirit works, dividing to each as he wills, just as in another place: the spirit blows where it wills, and again: and by the distributions of the Holy Spirit according to his own will. Here, therefore, there is not the ministry of subject servitude, but the free choice of power, and in the distributions of heavenly goods there is the inexhaustible piety of supreme generosity. As for what he says: and by the distributions of the Holy Spirit, whether this distributor, that is, divider, is God, he taught to the Corinthians, saying: and the divisions of operations are, but the same is God. We read in the Acts of the Apostles: attend, he says, to yourselves and to the whole flock, in which the Holy Spirit has placed you bishops to rule the church of God.

him who placed bishops in the church, the vessel of election declares to be God, speaking to the Corinthians thus: "God placed certain ones in the church." What God, if not the Holy Spirit, whose office the distribution of graces reveals, as the following discourse continues: "God placed in the church," he says, "first apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers, then powers, next gifts of healings, assistances, governances, kinds of tongues." "God placed certain ones in the church," he says. That he here called the Holy Spirit "God," the very dispensation of sanctifications and powers, which pertains to the Holy Spirit, makes manifest. For he himself enriches the mouths of prophets, dispenses the remedies of healings, multiplies the ornaments of charisms; by his flowing into the apostles, the miracles of signs and the diverse kinds of tongues proclaimed him to be the God of the universe. XII. WHERE HE SAYS THAT THOSE WHO HAVE BECOME A TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT OUGHT TO PROGRESS SO AS TO MERIT CARRYING GOD IN THEIR BODY.

Thus the apostle says to the Corinthians: "Do you not know that your bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit?" That the temple of the Holy Spirit is the temple of God, the preceding passages of the same epistle clearly suggest, when they say: "Do you not know that you are a temple of God and the Holy Spirit dwells in you?" And: "And the Holy Spirit," it says, "dwells in you." Who would doubt that they are the temple of that God whose dwelling-place they are proven to be? And when he had said: "Do you not know that your bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit," he concluded the passage with this lucid truth: "Glorify," he says, "and carry God in your body." Therefore, he who diligently prepares a temple of purity for the Holy Spirit in his heart, through chastity and mortification of the flesh, carries God in his body, and it is necessary that he bodily carry him by whom we are spiritually possessed. For this reason, whom you deem worthy of a temple, know that he is to be adored with divine honors, celebrated with vows, and cultivated with sacrifices. Therefore, the teacher of the Gentiles speaks to the universal church: "Do you not know that you are a temple of God and the Holy Spirit dwells in you?" This is possible for no creature, but is the distinctive mark of divine majesty, that it fills peoples individually through each one and yet remains in the immensity of its fullness. It is, I say, the singular and proper nature of the divine to be present in all places, to enter into all things, to contain all things.

It is, I say, peculiar to God to strip the sons of perdition of the debts of nature, to renew them with purified consciences, to make them sons of God, and to raise them up into the glory of the heavenly kingdom.