Section VII.

VII.

But some treat the Holy Trinity²⁹⁵ in an awful manner, when they confidently assert that there are not three persons, and introduce (the idea of) a person devoid of subsistence.²⁹⁶ Wherefore we clear ourselves of Sabellius, who says that the Father and the Son are the same. For he holds that the Father is He who speaks, and that the Son is the Word that abides in the Father, and becomes manifest at the time of the creation,²⁹⁷ and thereafter reverts to God on the fulfilling of all things. The same affirmation he makes also of the Spirit. We forswear this, because we believe that three persons—namely, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—are declared to possess the one Godhead: for the one divinity showing itself forth according to nature in the Trinity²⁹⁸ establishes the oneness of the nature; and thus there is a (divinity that is the) property of the Father, according to the word, “There is one God the Father;”²⁹⁹ and there is a divinity hereditary³⁰⁰ in the Son, as it is written, “The Word was God;”³⁰¹ and there is a divinity present according to nature in the Spirit—to wit, what subsists as the Spirit of God—according to Paul’s statement, “Ye are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.”³⁰²