who held the plurality to be merely modal or phenomenal. It thus led to the use of another term, of which it is necessary to trace the history.

The term ousia in most of its senses had come to be convertible with two other terms, hypostasis (vróσTασIS) and hyparxis (vapğıs). The latter of these played but a small part in Christian theology, and may be disregarded here.2 The term hypostasis is the conjugate of the verb iporával, which had come into use as a more emphatic form than elva. It followed almost all the senses of ousia. Thus it was contrasted with phenomenal existence not merely in the Platonic but in the conventional sense; e. g. of things that take place in the sky, some are appearances, some have a substantial existence, κα0' iπÓOTαOW.3 It also, like ousia, is used of that which has an actual as compared with a potential existence; also of that which has an objective existence in the world, and not merely exists in the thinking subject.5 Hence when things came into being, οὐσία was said ὑφιστάναι. Moreover, in one of its chief uses, namely that in which it designated the permanent element in objects of thought, the term

1 It was expressly rejected at the Council of Antioch in connection with Paul of Samosata; and Basil, Ep. 9, says that Dionysius of Alexandria gave it up because of its use by the Sabellians: cf. Ep. 52 (300).

2 It is found, e.g., in Athan. ad Afr. episc. 4, vol. i. 714, ỷ ràp ὑπόστασις καὶ ἡ οὐσία ὕπαρξίς ἐστι. The distinction is found in Stoical writers, e.g. Chrysippus says that the present time vrápxe, the past and future píoravтal. Diels, Doxogr. Græci. 462. 1.

8 Diels, ibid. 372; cf. 363, where it is contrasted with pavraoía. 4 Sext. Empir. p. 192, § 226.

5 Diels, 318.

6 Ib. 469. 20 : sp κατὰ τὴν τῆς οὐσίας ὑπόστασιν, p. 462, 26.

ουσία had sometimes been replaced by the term ὑπόστασις.1 When, therefore, the use of ousia in its Neo-Platonic sense prevailed, there arose a tendency to differentiate the two terms, and to designate that which in Aristotle had been πρώτη ουσία by the term ὑπόστασις. This is expressed by Athanasius when he says: "Ousia signifies community," while "hypostasis has property which is not common to the hypostases of the same ousia ;"2 and even more clearly by Basil.3

There was the more reason for the growth of the distinction, because the term homoousios lent itself more readily to a Sabellian Christology. This was anticipated by Irenæus in his polemic against the Valentinian heresy of the emission of Eons, Ousiai, in the sense of genera and species, might be merely conceptions in the mind: the alternative was that of their having an existence of their own. So that hypostasis came in certain schools

1 Epict. 1. 14. 2.

2 Ath. Dial. de Trin. 2: ovoía Tv Kоwórηra onμalve, while ὑπόστασις ἰδιότητα ἔχει ἥτις οὐκ ἐστι κοινὴ τῶν τῆς αὐτῆς οὐσίας ὑποστάσεων. He elsewhere identifies it with Tрóσwπоv in Ath. et Cyril. in Expos. orthod. fid.: imóσraois éσtiv ovoía perá tivwv idiwμάτων ἀριθμῷ τῶν ὁμοειδῶν διαφέρουσα· τουτέστι πρόσωπον ὁμοούσιον. Still the identity of the two terms was allowed even after they were tending to be differentiated: cf. Athan. ad Afr. Ep. 4, vol. i. 714, ǹ dè ὑπόστασις οὐσία ἐστι καὶ οὐδὲν ἄλλο σημαινόμενον ἔχει ἢ αὐτὸ τὸ ὄν. So ad Antioch, 6. (i. 617), he tolerates the view that there was only one vooraσis in the Godhead, on the ground that iróσraois might be regarded as synonymous with ovoía. Cf. objection at Council of Sardica, against three vooráσes in the Godhead, instead of one TóσTaσis, of Father, Son and Spirit.

3 Cf. Harn. Dogm. 693.

4idíav iπóσтαow, Sext. Empir. de Pyrrh. 2. 219.

of thought to be the term for the substantia concreta, the individual, the ovσía aтoμos of Galen.1 The distinction, however, was far from being universally recognized. The clearest and most elaborate exposition of it is contained in a letter of Basil to his brother Gregory, who was evidently not quite clear upon the point.2 The result was, that just as vooraσis had been used to express one of the senses of ovcía, so a new term came into use to define more precisely the sense of vóσraσis. Its origin is probably to be traced to the interchange of documents between East and West, which leading to a difficulty in regard to this use of vπóσтασis, ended in the introduction of a third term.

So long as ovcía and vπóσтaris had been convertible terms, the one Latin word substantia, the etymological equivalent of TóσTaσis, had sufficed for both. When the two words became differentiated in Greek, it became advisable to mark the difference. However, the word essentia, the natural equivalent for ovcía, jarred upon a Latin ear. Consequently substantia was claimed for οὐσία, while for ὑπόστασις a fresh equivalent had to be sought. This was found in persona, whose antecedents be those of "a character in a play," or of "person' may in the juristic sense, a possible party to a contract, in which case Tertullian may have originated this usage." 2 Ep. 210; Harn. Dogm. 693.

1 Ed. Kühn, 5. 662.

3 Cf. Quintilian, who ascribes it in turn to Plautus and to Sergius Flavius, 2. 14. 2; 3. 6. 23; 8. 3. 33: Seneca, Ep. 58. 6, to Cicero, and more recently Fabianus. For substantia, cf. Quint. 7. 2. 5, “nam et substantia ejus sub oculos cadit."

4 Cf. Harnack, 489, 543; for its use by Sabellius, &c., ib. 679; also Orig. de princ. 1. 2. 8.

Such Western practice would tend to stimulate the employment of the corresponding Greek term πρόσωπον, whose use hitherto seems to have been subordinate to that of TóσTaois. And, finally, the philosophic terms puois and natura came into use. In the second century φύσις had been distinct from οὐσία and identical with Reason.2 But in the fourth century it came to be identified with ovcía,3 and afterwards again distinguished from it, whereas the Monophysites identified it with vπóσTασis.

To sum up, then. We have in Greek four terms, ovσía, ὑπόστασις, πρόσωπον, φύσις, and in Latin three, substantia, persona, natura, the two series not being actually parallel even to the extent to which they are so in appearance. Times have changed since Tertullian's loose and vague usage caused no remark; when Jerome, thinking as a Latin, hesitates to speak of Tpeis vπоσтάσes, by which he understood tres substantias, and complains that he is looked upon as a heretic in the East in consequence. There is a remarkable saying of Athanasius which is capable of a wider application than he gave it: it runs

1 E.g. Ath. et Cyr. in Expos. orth. fid., imóσraois = πрóσшжν Sμоovolov. In Epictetus, 1. 2. 7, 14, 28, it denotes individuality of character, that which distinguishes one man from another.

2 In Ath. ad. Ant. 7. 25, ỷ тà öλa dioikovσa púous is distinguished from ουσία τῶν ὅλων : 30 7. 75, ἡ τοῦ ὅλου φύσις ἐπὶ τὴν κοσμοποιΐαν wpμnσev. For púous in Philo, see Leg. All. 3. 30 (i. 105).

3 Leontius of Byzantium says that both οὐσία and φύσις = είδος, Pat. Grac. lxxxvi. 1193.

4 E.g. adv. Prax. 2 (E. T. ii. 337), where he makes the distinctions within the oeconomia of the Godhead to be gradu, forma, specie, with a unity of substantia, status, potestas; cf. Bp. Kaye, in E. T. ii. P. 407.

as follows: "They seemed to be ignorant of the fact that when we deal with words that require some training to understand them, different people may take them in senses not only differing but absolutely opposed to each other."2 Thus there was an indisposition to accept ovoía. The phrase was not understanded of the people. A reaction took place against the multiplicity of terms; but the simple and unstudied language of the childhood of Christianity, with its awe-struck sense of the ineffable nature of God, was but a fading memory, and on the other hand the tendency to trust in and insist upon the results of speculation was strong. Once indeed the Catholic doctrine was formulated, then, though not till then, the majority began to deprecate investigations as to the nature of God.

But I do not propose to dwell upon the sad and weary history of the way in which for more than a century these metaphysical distinctions formed the watchwords of political as well as of ecclesiastical parties—of the strife and murder, the devastation of fair fields, the flame and sword, therewith connected. For all this, Greek philosophy was not responsible. These evils mostly came from that which has been a permanently disastrous fact in Christian history, the interference of the State, which gave the decrees of Councils that sanction which elevated 1 De Sententia Dionys. 18, quoted in Dict. of Christ. Biog. under Homoousios.

2 Thus the Roman Dionysius, in a fragment against the Sabellians (Routh, Reliq. iii. pp. 373, 374), objects to the division of the μovapxía into τρεῖς δυνάμεις τινὰς καὶ μεμερισμένας ὑποστάσεις καὶ θειότητας τρεῖς.

3 ȧyvoоúμevov vπо Tv λa@v, Athan. de Synod. 8 (i. 577).