The Trinity

Book II

BOOK TWO Preface i\1HEN MEN SEEK AFTER GOD and direct their mind to the understanding of the Trinity, according to the capacity of human weakness, they learn by experience of the wearisome difficulties that this requires, whether from the eye of the mind trying to look into the inaccessible light, or from the manifold and various modes of speech in the sacred books (where our soul, it seems to me, is only being sorely tried in order that it may find sweetness after it has been glorified by the grace of Christ); when these men have removed all ambiguity, and have arrived at some certitude, they ought most readily to forgive those who go astray in the investigation of so profound a secret. But there are two things that are most difficult to tolerate in human error: taking something for granted before the truth becomes known, and when it has become known, defending the falsehood that was taken for granted. If God, as I pray and hope, shall defend and protect me with the shield of His good willi and the grace of His mercy from these two defects, which are very much opposed to the discovery of the truth and to the handling of the divine and sacred books, I shall not be sluggish in seeking after the substance of God, whether through His Scripture or through His creature. For both of them are proposed for our consideration in order that 1 Cf. Ps. 5.15. 51 52 SAINT AUGUSTINE He Himself may be sought, He Himself may be loved, who inspired the one and created the other. Nor shall I be timid in expressing my opinion, and I shall be more eager to have it examined by upright men, than I shall fear its being lorn to pieces by the evil-minded. For charity, most beautiful and most modest, graciously accepts the dovelike eye, but the most cautious humility either avoids the dog's tooth or the most solid truth blunts it. And I shall be more desirous of being criticized by anyone at all, rather than praised by one who errs or who flatters. The lover of truth has to fear no man's censure, for he who will correct him will be either an enemy or a friend. If any enemy, therefore, reviles him, he must be endured, but a friend, if he errs, must be taught; if he teaches, he must be heard. But he who praises and also errs confirms the error, and he who flatters lures one into error. Therefore: 'The just man will correct me with mercy and reprove me, but the oil of the sinner shall not anoint my head.'2 Chapter 1 (2) Wherefore, with regard to our Lord Jesus Christ, we hold most firmly to what has been disseminated through the Scriptures, and shown to be, as it were, a canonical rule by the learned Catholic interpreters of these same Scriptures, namely, that the Son of God is understood to be equal to the Father according to the form of God in which He is, and less than the Father according to the form of a slave that He has received .1 In this form He has been found to be not only less than the Father but of the Holy Spirit as well, and not only that, but He has been found to be even less than Himself, not of Himself who was, but of Himself who is, because by the form of a slave which He received, He did not lose the form 2 Cf. Ps. 140.5. I Cf. Phil. 2.6-7. BOOK TWO 53 of God, as the statements of the Scriptures, cited in the preceding book, have taught. Still some things in the divine utterances are so expressed as to make it doubtful to which rule they are to be referred, whether to that whereby we understand that the Son is less in the creature that He has assumed, or to that whereby we understand that the Son is certainly not less than but equal to the Father, and yet that He is from Him, God of God, light of light. For we indeed speak of the Son as God of God, but of the Father as God only, not as of God. Hence, it is evident that the Son has another of whom He is, and to whom He...