in sentiment, should remain in your own thoughts, and be laid up in the secret depths of the mind. Let your mutual friendship remain unshaken; and be firm in your belief of the truth, and your obedience to God and his law. Return to mutual love and charity. Restore to the whole people their accustomed harmony. Purify your own hearts, and renew your former acquaintance and familiarity. It often happens that friendship is more pleasant when enmity is followed by reconciliation. Enable me again to enjoy quiet days, and nights undisturbed by solicitude, that in future the pleasure of the pure light, and the happiness of a tranquil life may be reserved for me. Otherwise, I cannot but sigh and lament, and be dissolved in tears; nor can I pass without great disquietude the remainder of my days. For how can I look for repose, while the people of God, who serve the same Master as myself, are torn asunder by an iniquitous and fatal contention? That you may comprehend the excess of my grief on account of this affair, I ask your attention to what I am going to say. Arriving lately at Nicomedia, I had determined to proceed immediately to the East. When I was hastening towards you, and had already performed the greater part of my journey, the news of your differences changed my resolution, lest I should be compelled to behold that with my eyes, of which I thought I could hardly bear the recital. Open therefore to me, by your agreement, a way into the East, which has been closed against me by your contentions. Permit me, as speedily as possible, to behold you and all others of the people happy and rejoicing, and to render, with you, due thanks to God for the common agreement and liberty of all.

4*

C.

Letter of Arius to Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia.

To the most esteemed Lord, a faithful man of God, the orthodox Eusebius, Arius, unjustly persecuted by Pope* Alexander for the sake of truth, which overcomes all things, and which you also defend, greeting in the Lord.

My father Ammonius being about to visit Nicomedia, I thought it my duty to salute you by him; and at the same time to make known to you, as being naturally charitable and affectionate in your disposition towards the brethren, for the love of God and of his Christ, that we are vehemently opposed and persecuted, and every engine is set in motion against us by the bishop; so that he has even expelled us from the city as atheists, because we do not assent to such declarations as follow, publicly uttered by him. God is always, the Son is always. The Father and the Son are co-existent. The Son, unbegotten, co-exists with God, and is always begotten; without being begotten, he is begotten: † nor does God precede the Son in thought, nor by a single moment. Always God, always the Son. From God himself the Son exists. Because Eusebius, your brother, bishop of Cesarea, and Theodotus and Paulinus, Athanasius, Gregorius and Aetius, and all the bishops of the East, affirm, that God, who is without a beginning, existed before the Son, they have

* In the earlier ages of the Church, the title of Pope, or father, was the common appellation of the bishops. But when the bishop of Rome afterwards usurped a spiritual supremacy over his brethren, this title, and some others, once bestowed indiscriminately on prelates, as such, being exclusively appropriated to him, acquired, of course, an additional emphasis.

+ There appears to have been some confusion of ideas in the mind of the bishop, if his words are correctly reported by Arius. It is probable that this passage is intended to express what is called the "eternal generation" of the Son, a phrase, however, which, itself, may not be considered as remarkably perspicuous. Possibly the original may, to some readers, be more clear than the translation. It is therefore added συνυπάρχει αγεννήτως ο υιος τῷ θεῷ, αειγεννής εστιν, αγεννητογενής εςτιν.

been condemned, with the exception only of Philogonius, Hellanicus and Macarius, heretical men, and uninstructed in the faith; who say, one, that the Son is an effusion; another, that he is a projection; and another, that, like the Father, he is unbegotten. We could not listen, indeed, to such impieties, although the heretics should threaten us with a thousand deaths. But what we ourselves say and think, we have already declared, and now declare, that the Son is not unbegotten, nor in any manner a part of the unbegotten, or of any matter subject to him; but in will and design he existed before all times and ages, perfect God, the only begotten, unchangeable; and that he existed not, before he was begotten, or created, or determined, or established, for he was not unbegotten. We are persecuted, because we have said that the Son has a beginning. But God is without a beginning. On this account we are persecuted, and because we said that he is of things not existing. Thus we have said, because he is not a part of God, nor of any subjected matter. On this account we are persecuted. You know the rest. I hope that you are in health in the Lord, and that you remember our troubles, thou true disciple of Lucian, and truly pious man, as your name imports.

D.

Letter of Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia, to Paulinus, Bishop of Tyre.

To my Lord Paulinus, Eusebius greeting in the Lord.

The zeal of my Lord Eusebius for the truth has not been concealed, but has reached even to us, nor has your silence, my Lord, on the same subject, been unnoticed. We naturally rejoiced on account of my Lord Eusebius, but were grieved

much by your reserve, considering the silence of so eminent a man as our own defeat. Wherefore, I exhort you, knowing as you do, how unbecoming it is in a wise man to think differently from others, and yet to suppress the truth, to exert your mental faculties, and commence writing on this subject, which would be useful both to yourself and your hearers, especially if you follow in the footsteps of scripture, and endeavor to write according to its words and meaning. We have never heard, my Lord, of two beings unbegotten, nor of one divided into two; nor have we learnt or believed that he could suffer any thing corporeal, but that there is one unbegotten, and another truly from him, and not made of his substance, by no means partaking of his nature, nor being of his substance, but altogether different in nature and in power, yet made in the perfect likeness of the nature and power of his Creator. We believe not only that his origin cannot be explained in words, but that it cannot be comprehended, we will not say by the understanding of man only, but by that of any beings superior to man. And we say this, not from our own reasonings, but instructed by the scriptures. That he is created and established, and begotten in the substance, (γεννητον τη ουσια) in an immutable and inexplicable nature, and in the resemblance which he bears to his Maker, we learn from the very words of the Lord, who says "God created me in the beginning of his ways, and formed me before the world, and begat me before all the hills." If then he was from him, that is, of him, as it were a part of him, or an emanation of the substance, he could not then be said to have been created or established. Nor can you indeed, my Lord, be ignorant of this. For that which is from an unbegotten being cannot be created nor founded by another or by the same, being from the beginning unbegotten. But if, because he is said to be begotten, it seems to be intimated, that he is derived from the substance of the Father, and has therefore a sameness of nature, we know that the scripture does not say that he alone was begotten, but also other things which differ altogether from

him in their nature. For it also says concerning men, "I have begotten sons and exalted them; but they have despised me," and, "thou hast forsaken God who begat thee." And of other creatures it says, "who is he that hath begotten the drops of dew?" This is not saying, that the nature of the dew is divine, but that all things which are made, proceed from the will of God. For nothing exists of his substance; but all things being made according to his pleasure, every thing exists in the manner in which it was made. For he is God, but those things which resemble him, are made so by the Word, according to his will, since all things are of God. And all things which are by him, are made by the Deity, for all things are of God. When you shall have read this letter, and have polished it according to the grace which you have received of God, write as soon as possible to my Lord Alexander. If you will take this trouble, I doubt not you will persuade him. Salute all the brethren in the Lord. May the divine favor preserve your health, and enable you to pray for us.

E.

Letter of Eusebius Pamphilus to the Church of Cesarea.

It is probable, beloved, that you have already learnt from another source, what has been done respecting the ecclesiastical faith in the great Council convened at Nice, as common fame usually outruns an accurate report of facts. But as a rumor of this kind may have represented things differently from what they actually were, we have thought it necessary to send you, first, the form of faith proposed by us, and afterwards that which was set forth by the bishops, who made some additions to ours. Our own form, then, which was read in the presence of the em