A Source Book for Ancient Church History - Mirrors

384 A Source Book for Ancient Church History[351]but existing and subsisting in truth, both Father truly existingand subsisting, and a Son, truly substantial and subsisting, anda Holy Ghost subsisting and really existing do we acknowledge,said they, and that neither had they said there were three Godsor three beginnings, nor would they at all tolerate such as saidor held so, but that they acknowledged a Holy Trinity, but oneGodhead and one beginning, and that the Son is co-essential withthe Father, as the Fathers said; and the Holy Ghost not a creature,nor external, but proper to, and inseparable from, the essence ofthe Father and the Son.§ 6. Having accepted, then, these men's interpretation of theirlanguage and their defence, we made inquiry of those blamedby them for speaking of one subsistence, whether they use theexpression in the sense of Sabellius, to the negation of the Sonand Holy Ghost, or as though the Son was non-substantial, or theHoly Ghost without subsistence. But they in their turn assuredus that they neither said this nor had ever held it, but, “we usethe word subsistence thinking it the same thing to say subsistenceor essence.” 121 But we hold there is One, because the Sonis of the essence of the Father and because of the identity ofnature. For we believe that there is one Godhead, and that thenature of it is one, and not that there is one nature of the Father,from which that of the Son and of the Holy Ghost are distinct.Well, thereupon, they who had been blamed for saying that therewere three subsistences agreed with the others, while those whohad spoken of one essence, also confessed the doctrine of theformer as interpreted by them. And by both sides Arius wasanathematized as an adversary of Christ, and Sabellius, and Paulof Samosata as impious men, and Valentinus and Basilides asaliens from the truth, and Manichæus as an inventor of mischief.And all, by God's grace, and after the above explanations, agreedtogether that the faith confessed by the Fathers at Nicæa is better121 Hypostasis or ousia; cf. the Nicene definition, § 63, g.