God The Holy Ghost part 81.

By Henry Aloysius Barry

CHAPTER XIX. THE ORDER OF PERSONS.

The baptismal formula, the motto carved on the portals of the kingdom of Christ by our Lord Himself, reads in this way:—"In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost." The Ecclesiastic Doxology re-echoes this dictamen—"Be glory given to the Father and the Son and to the Holy Ghost, this day and for aye." St. John's declaration preserves this arrangement: —"There are Three Who give testimony in heaven, the Father, the Word and the Holy Ghost, and these Three are One." (i, John v, 7.) These facts set forth such an order of persons as brooks no divergence from what is so clearly built on the deepest harmonies of Godhead as it is in its eternal rhythm. One would, by inverting this order of divine relations, be guilty of serious error. Were one, for example, to put the Holy Ghost first in order it would imply that the Holy Ghost is the One that begets. The Holy Ghost belongs in third place, in view of the relationship of procession. There is a difference in the matter of relationship but no difference in point of substance in the Trinity. There is a difference of persons but not of nature. Fatherhood is the First Person; Sonship is the Second Person and Spiration is the Third Person. There is, however, no superiority among the Three, no dependency, no inequality of years, of dignity or perfection. In the olden days, Catholics were marked out from the Arians, as Nicephorus informs us. Some Arians piped, "Glory to the Father in the Son," with the view to relegating the Son to an obscure and secondary place. Others skirled "Glory to the Father through the Son in the Holy Ghost." But such as made the true profession of consubstantiality carolled "Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost." The Council of Nice made an addition to these words of the following versicle, "as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, one God world without end." (March. Hort, past. to. iv lect.)

There is equality in the Trinity. The sense in which One of the Three is greater than Another is in that of 'cause', of principle or origin, that is to say, inasmuch as one proceeds from Another. St. Basil remarks upon the order of the Trinity, "Those who shift this order about, seeing that it has been handed down to us by our Lord, must discontinue the practice because they are in open war with the truth. Stable and incorrupt must we preserve this order of persons which we have received from our Lord's own lips." Theodoret also makes the observation: —"The order of names does not teach us that there is any difference in the matter of dignity and nature." St. Athanasius sympathetically agrees: —"therefore the Son Himself did not allege, 'the Father is better than I,' lest someone should fancy that His nature is not the same, but, 'greater than I,' said he, not by any greatness or age, but simply that He was begotten by the Father." St. Gregory Nazianzen queries in this style:—"What lacketh the Spirit of being the Son? We admit that He lacketh naught, for, God could not be lacking in aught. The difference, however, of what I might call Their manifestation and of Their mutual relationship, has created different names for Them." (Orat. xxxvii.)

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By Henry Aloysius Barry

Gregory Theolog elegantly observes that this "Unity, progressing from principle to duality, stops at Trinity." "Rightly considered, these views will be found to coalesce with the Greek and Latin Doctors on the procession of the Holy Ghost and to coalesce in one faith." (J. B. Fournals, Editor of Petav.) Lequien, the most learned commentator of St. John Damascene, vindicates this Father from discordancy and contends with vigor and logic that He is easily explained. The so-called Greeks distort the teaching of the Fathers. They twist the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son and from both in such a way as to restrict the meaning of it to two alternatives, namely, the temporal mission or that the gifts of the Holy Ghost, to the exclusion of His Person, are said to be from the Father and the Son. We have already disproved this perversion of the Fathers. The procession of the Holy Ghost therein recorded points to the eternal immanent res although the mission of the Holy Ghost is a fruit of His procession from the Father and Son and created gifts are also in the light of a consequence from the Father and Son and the Holy Ghost. By the procession from the Father and Son is meant the Third Person. St. Epiphanius says, —"The Father is Light, the Son is Light of Light, the Spirit is of the Two."

The so-called Greeks admit the procession of the Holy Ghost hypostatically speaking as far as the Father is concerned. In the case of the Son, they say it is not thus, but that the Holy Ghost is of His substance. The result of this position would be to make the Holy Ghost co-substantial, and they explain this in such a way as to repudiate the substance of the Son a quo as a principle of procession whence the Holy Ghost is, but rather make it a formal cause of the Holy Ghost's being of the same substance as the Son. Now when the Fathers of Nice said, simply, that "the Son is of the Father," the Allans took occasion therefrom to make these words harmonize with their error which was that the Son was created. To oppose this heresy the Fathers constructed a most effective formula, namely, that He was "of the substance of the Father." Here was expressed the communication of Essence and co-substantiality of the Son to the Father. What the Arians did with the order of the Son to the Father the Pneumatomachi attempted with the order of the Holy Ghost. The Fathers expressed in the same way as Nice had done in the Arian heresy the relationship of the Holy Ghost to the Son. They defined this procession as the communication of the same nature and substance thus: The Holy Ghost is of the substance—of the very substance—of the Father and Son. So in this case, as at Nice, the principium quod, namely, the "producing" person—in spiration the Father and Son —and also the principium quo is expressed, namely, the essence by the communication of which the spiration is brought about.

The formal cause, consequently, whereby the Holy Ghost is God is the very one communicated nature of the Father and the Son. The so-called Greeks call attention to the particular verbs, by which the orthodox Fathers have expressed the mode of the Holy Ghost emanating from or by the Son. They allege that these verbs have not a notional sound but rather a less intimate character. They say that these words assert the contrary of internal procession and rather impress one that they can only mean the external mission of the Holy Ghost or His gifts. As a matter of fact, the Fathers make use of the same verbs to express the generation of the Son and the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father.

St. Basil says:— "The spirit of God shining forth from God." Moreover in contexts where the Fathers use such words as "shine forth from" the Father and Son or both, where the verb, as far as the Father is concerned, can express no other meaning than the eternal procession, the same cannot hold good as otherwise understood in regard to the Son.

St. Cyril proves that the Holy Ghost is divine in essence, because, "He proceedeth from the Father and Son." The Greek Fathers most clearly have employed these words as immediately significative of the eternal immanent procession. Another subterfuge of the enemy is the interpretation of the Lord's words where He says the Holy Ghost "Shall receive of Mine." They would have it, "He shall receive of My Father." The proprieties of grammar disown such a reading. The Phocians allege with sophistic artifice that whatever is in the Trinity is either common to all or peculiar, hence, spiration is peculiar to the Father or common to the Three Persons—which would, they say, according to Latin doctrine, make the Holy Ghost proceed from Himself. Photius comments on this sophistic quandary to the effect that it outdoes the monstrous fables of the Gentiles themselves. St. Thomas says:—"Opposite relations are persons, and there are two persons just as there are two relations, but relations which in the same person are not in opposition are indeed two relations or peculiarities (proprietates), but not two persons, nay, one person." (1. Dist. 33, a. 2, ad one.) A spirator does not mean a person distinct from the father and son; it signifies one spirative force or one act and one relationship of spiration common to two persons and in a confused way signifies those persons whose act and relationship the spiration is. Spiration is really the same as paternity and sonship, and differs therefrom only "ratione." Fatherhood and sonship include spiration; it enters into either intestinally. Theologians say:—Supposing the real identity of spiration with the fatherhood and sonship and the distinction "ratione," that the constitution—the make-up—of the father and son in the fullest conception of the thing, means the formal "ratio" of fatherhood and sonship inasmuch as both embrace the act of spiration.

The so-called Greeks, in view of the Nature of the Trinity, say that if the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and Son there must be Two Principles of the Holy Ghost and, accordingly, either each Principle is perfect, in which case there would be Two Processions, or, if there be but One Procession from the Two Principles, the Father is insufficient and an imperfect Principle, and the Son is called in to take a hand in the matter. If then the Father and Son are One Principle, this reduces them to One Person, and thus, the heretics say, the Latins contract the Sabellian fault. The matter of all these objections is that the objectors are suffering from a sort of gastritis and their objections are very much on a par with the belchings which are characteristic of such infirmity.

St. Augustine remarks, substantially, that if the spirative force cannot be common to the two and be numerically one without confounding persons and destroying the distinction of generation of son from father, or if the spirative force cannot be in two distinct persons without being in each imperfect or without again the persons being divided and there being two spirators and two principles, then these things must be predicable of the creative force and the power of mission as well. That is to say, there cannot be one —in number—force and action of creation and of mission in distinct persons without thereby destroying by that unity distinction of persons. Or if the persons remain distinct, either this force will be imperfect in each or so separated as to have them turn out as many principles of creation or mission as there are persons creating and sending. The Photian contention is, therefore, not only heretical, but very inconsistent in its method of antagonizing the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son as from One Principle.

The Pneumatomachi, and, after them, the Phocians, in assuming the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father, conclude that if He proceeds, besides, from the Son and by the Son, as Catholic theology maintains, then the Holy Ghost must be a Grandson and the First Person a Grandfather. Thin idea supposes that the Persons are divided so that first of all the Father generates the Son and then the Son alone "generates" the Holy Ghost. As a matter of fact, the divine Persons create by a creative act numerically one; so, the Father and Son are One in number in the spirative act and therefore as one Principle— breathe —or breathes forth the Holy Ghost. St. Epiphanius says: "There is no Grandfather nor Grandson about it; the Holy Ghost is from the same substance of the Father and Son."

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By Henry Aloysius Barry

The so-called Greeks quote St. John Damascene to sustain their cause. They found their argument on the words: "we say that the Holy Ghost is of the Father and the Spirit of the Father; but we do not say that the Holy Ghost is of—from —the Son, though we call Him the Spirit of the Son." As a matter of fact, St. John has clearly expressed himself on the procession dia, through the Son, so as to set forth what is consistent with the other Fathers—"the Spirit is the Spirit of the Son, not that He proceeds from Him but through Him from the Father; only the Father is the cause." (primordial.) The saint wishes to convey the idea —"through" the Son that the Son is the principium of the Holy Ghost by the spirative force communicated to the Son. St. Thomas puts St. John Damascene on the catalogue of the so-called Greeks on this point. St. Thomas says, "the allegation that the Holy Ghost does not proceed from the Son was first introduced by the Nestorians, as appears from a certain symbol of the Nestorians condemned by the synod of Ephesus. Theodoret Nestorian followed this error and after Mm many others among whom was Damascene, wherefore, in this matter his opinion is not to be followed." (I. Quest xxxvi. art. 2, respond. 3.) Taking a gloomy view of St. John Damascene's testimony, we must remember as yet there was no solemn definition of the Church on the point. Suppose for one reason or another, say, for example, he had not sufficiently compared the views of the Eastern Doctors and was so led into an error, more material after all than real, inasmuch as the Fathers have frequently said that the Holy Ghost proceeds dia, through the Son—in any case he is only one doctor against a host and could not, of course, count against overwhelming opposition. Franzlein is of the opinion that if St. Thomas could have had the advantage of subsequent demonstrations of Greek theologians such as Beccus, Demetrius, Cydonius, Bessario and the rest he would not so easily have admitted that St. John Damascene was discordant. Many places in the saint's writings tell us that the Holy Ghost proceeds by the Son in such a way as to be the opposite of the Eutychian heresy, which held as blasphemous the Cyrilian definition that the Holy Ghost has His existence from the Father by the Son. The saint is far from inculcating any other production by the Son save the natural and most divine. "It remains to be explained in what sense Damascene and other Greek Doctors have taught that the Holy Ghost has not His existence perfilium, whilst with united voices they proclaim that the Father produces the Holy Ghost by the Son or that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son. They therefore deny that the Holy Ghost exists by the Son. (1) By any special action as distinct from the paternal; (2) Lest the Spirit would be taken in the sense in which Eunomius understood it, namely, a created thing and effect; (3) Lest the Spirit by this procession from the Son, as was understood by Apollonius, would be held as less than the Son; (4) Or finally lest the Son would be considered the primordial cause of the Spirit. On the other hand, they teach that the Holy Ghost progresses by the Son so that the Son is regarded as not without part in that natural action whereby the Father pours forth the Spirit and that the Divine Nature, by origin communicated to the Son before the Holy Ghost, will retain its natural fecundity in the Son, which begins from the Father Who alone is the Fount, the Virtue, the Well, the Principle, and therefore is called the Author of the Holy Ghost.

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By Henry Aloysius Barry

Unity of principle is not so explicitly set forth in the "dia" or "through the Son," but is rather contained in the consideration of the subject —God the Father and God the Son. The Fathers of the West in the "from the Father and the Son" directly insist upon the unity of essence and of spiration as against the Arians and include" distinguishing of persons as against the Sabellians. The Easterns in their more frequently employed formula—"from the Father 'by' the Son,"— directly give expression to distinctiveness and order of persons so as to counteract Sabellianism and the Arian calumny, more than once tried, of confounding the persons, and, at the same time, they "include" A unity of principle as against the heresy of the Arians.

The Eastern Fathers have used the "from the Father and the Son" and likewise the Latins have taken up the "from the Father by the Son." These latter with as much eloquence build the procession "principally" from the Father in the same sense as the Oriental Fathers speak of the Father as the "primordial principal." That is to say, although the Son is abintra a principal, He is not without-principle. The Holy Ghost abintra is not the principle of any other person. St. Gregory Nazianzen says:—"Without principle, also principle, and He Who is with principle is one God. The name, 'without principle' belongs to the Father. 'Principle' means the Son's and He, to Whom is given the name, 'with principle' is the Holy Ghost. One nature is in the three; namely God. The union, however, consists of the Father from Whom and to Whom they are related, Who proceed according to order." (Or. xlii, al. 32, n. 15.) The very contexts and the manner of teaching the procession of the Holy Ghost, "from" the Father "through" the Son being considered, all doubt on the meaning and consent of the East with the West is extinguished, for they directly avow that "through" the Son is pertinent to the immanent and eternal procession and is not merely a reference to the "mission ad extra." This appears from the fact that they say that the Holy Ghost proceeds by the Son "essentially" 'according to essence" "by nature" "naturally". They tell us that this procession of the Holy Ghost "from" the Father "by" the Son is the communication of nature from the Father by the Son. Says St. Athanasius: "We shall find such relationship of the Holy Ghost to the Son as the Son has to the Father, and as the Son says, 'all that the Father has, is Mine,'" (assuredly by immanent origin of the Son from the Father) so also shall we find all these by the Son in the Spirit." (for kindred reasons, by immanent origin) (Eph. iii, ad. Seraph, n. 1.) St. Basil says:— "Natural goodness and essential sanctity and royal dignity flow from the Father through the Son into the Holy Ghost." (De Spirit Sanct, c. xviii, n. 47 j Says St. Cyril: "Since the Spirit proceeds naturally 'through the Son' as His own Spirit, He is said (in Holy Writ) to receive all that the Son has in perfection." (In Jo. p. 929930.) A fragment of a letter alleged to be from the quill of St. Maximus, martyr of the seventh century,is shown to the effect that he—apparently— scouts the procession "from the Son,"— "Filioque!" The genuineness of this epistle has been questioned by both Latins and Greeks. The so-called Greeks produced it in the Council of Florence. Granting its genuineness, St. Maximus, after all, only seems to deny that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Son—Filioque" —for, he confesses that this is demonstrated by the Fathers. He says, however, that it is not thence denied that the Father alone is the primordial fount of the Trinity and that if you consider the formula of the order of Persons, wherein the Holy Ghost is said to proceed from the Father and the Son, it has the same meaning as the other formula, wherein He is said to proceed dia or through the Son. (Pet. p. 407 Franz, p. 575.)

God The Holy Ghost part 77.

By Henry Aloysius Barry

CHAPTER XVIII. CATHOLIC IDEA OF "THROUGH THE SON."

The so-called Greeks are constrained to admit that the Holy Ghost proceeds "from the Father through the Son," but they mangle this statement in such a way as impresses one with their insincerity. The particle or preposition "through," designates an efficient cause with sub-ordination to the more principal cause, but, in the divine realm there is, and can be, no subordination excepting that of origin. In the language of Holy Writ and the Church works ad extra are said to be from the Father through the Son; where though there is one nature and hence one principle quo of operation and one indistinct operation, distinction between persons, however, is so indicated as that nature, one, in number, and the working power and operation is communicated by the Father to the Son. Though it can be said that apart and alone or by Himself, all things are created by the Father,— per patrem, and all things are created by the Son,— a filio, it is absurd to assert that He does so "through" the Son, because the 'through' signifies not only causality but communication of nature and operative power from one person to another. St. Basil sustains this meaning as against the Arians—"because the Father creates through the Son, this does not insinuate imperfection in the Father's will (or the substantial will which is the Divine Essence), so that the particle 'through' contains the confession of a primordial cause." (De. Sp. Sanct. c. 8. n. 21.) (Franz p. 530.)

St. Chrysostom explains the "all things were made by Him," and shows that the particle or preposition dia, that is to say "through" does not signify "diminution", as the Arians alleged, but rather expresses one dignity of creative operation on the part of Father and Son—"If herein, we find 'by Him', this is so for no other reason than that one should not think that the Son is unbegotten." (In Joan. Horn, v.) St. Cyril speaks directly of the Holy Ghost and says that the meaning of the Father's sending the Holy Ghost "through" the Son is unity of principle in mission —Father and Son—with a distinction observed between the Father generating and the Son generated. "The Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father. The Father by Himself does not give the Paraclete or Holy Ghost, but, the Son by Himself doth give, nay, the Holy Ghost is given to the' saints from the Father, through the Son; and, therefore, whilst the Father is said to give, the Son giveth through Whom are all things; whilst the Son is said to give, the Father giveth from Whom are all things." (In Joan. p. 810.) 'From'the Father signifies the principle of spiration, so, also, on the other hand, 'through' 1 the Son signifies the same principle with the further signified distinguishing of persons in Father and Son, that namely the virtue and act of spiration is communicated by the Father to the Son, and so the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father through the Son. As in creation by the Father through the Son, there is not one cause and another, but one, two Persons, and at the same time the origin of the Son from the Father are signified. For similar reason in the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father through the Son, one principle of procession is exhibited, because as there is one essence so is there one spirative force, but there are two Persons shown, of Whom the essence is in the formal manner also of spirative force, though in such a way as that the Father is principium without principium, the Son is not principle without principle, but, with the Father one principle of the Holy Ghost as He is one with the Father, God and Creator inasmuch as by generation He has all things that are the Father's communicated —except Fatherhood—and thence also the spirative force. Neither are the Father and Son distinguished from each other more by spiration than Godhead or absolute attributes inasmuch as there is no other distinction between them than the formal relationship of Paternity and Sonship." (Franz, p. 532.) At heart there is no difference between the Holy Ghost proceeding from the Father "through the Son" and "Filioque " from the Son. In the latter, unity of principle is better expressed, whilst the order of origin between the Father and Son is not so explicitly set forth as regards the spiration itself, namely that it is communicated "by" the Son. In the prior method of expression—'through the Son,'—direct significance is made of the order of origin between the two persons spirating; that, namely, the Father is the primordial font from whom the spirative force, just as the essence, is communicated to the Son.

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By Henry Aloysius Barry

Obedience is the perfection of freedom. Our Lord came down from heaven to do the will of Him Who sent Him. He was obedient unto death. We know our Lord's teachings as they are made clear to us by those who were sent to teach all nations and preach the Gospel to every creature. There can be no ground for dispute on the truths, which the Infallible Church, divinely charged in the matter, proposes to our assent. To conform, then, our judgments and lives to such in a more cultured obedience secures to us true liberty, which rightly assumes creatureship on the one hand and the dominance of God and a divine authority on the other.must be rejected as, at heart, erroneous. To conform to them with inward assent, that is, with judgment and will, is Catholic duty. The divine authority of the Church is not reared by the consent of men; it is built upon God; rather, it is God

Himself. In the revealed truths expounded by the Church, human judgment and free will must bend the knee and make a renunciation of themselves, that is to say, they have found, on these points, the right and the truth, the way and the life. Their quest is at an cud, in so far as these truths are concerned. "I am the way," says Pope Leo XIII. "Wherefore if the truth be sought by the human intellect, it must first of all submit it to Jesus Christ and securely rest upon His teaching, since, therein truth itself speaketh. There are innumerable and extensive fields of thought, properly belonging to the human mind, in which it may have full scope for its investigations and speculations and that not only agreeable to its nature, but even by a necessity of its nature. But what is unlawful and unnatural is that the human mind should refuse to be restricted within its proper limits and, throwing aside its becoming modesty, should refuse to acknowledge God's teaching. This teaching upon which our salvation depends is entirely about God and the things of God. No human wisdom has invented it, but the Son of God hath received it and drunk it in entirely from His Father—hence this teaching necessarily embraces many subjects which are not indeed contrary to reason— for that would be an impossibility—but so exalted that we can no more attain them by our own reason than we can comprehend God as He is in Himself. If there be so many things hidden and shielded by nature, which no human ingenuity can explain, yet which no man in his senses can doubt, it would be an abuse of liberty to refuse to accept those which are entirely above nature, because their essence cannot be discovered. To reject dogma is simply to deny Christianity. Our intellect, must bow humbly and reverently, "unto the obedience of Christ." (Encycl. Holy Year, 1900.)

How would the world fare at the hands of fanatics and dreamers, of feeble-minded and uneducated ranting demagogues? The divine Supremacy, the Papacy, tames the erring judgment, prunes and directs the free will by supplying it with the rules of spiritual science.

Republics are essentially built on the consent of the governed. This is very good for temporal states, but with religion it is different. Our Lord says, "You have not chosen Me, I have chosen you." Revelation and revealed .authority must be respected by individuals and nations. No institution can antagonize it and see success written on its horizon. The individual who is out of tune with it cannot have the peace of the Holy Ghost. There is independence, but there is no such thing as one's evading authority of one kind or another. It is essential in the world. You may vote for a president of these United States; a permanent rector may vote for an Ordinary—subject of course to Rome's final decision—this is democracy, this is republican so to speak, but anterior to all is (rod. He created us, He preserves us and He redeemed us. He is, and must be, by His very Godhead and Redemptionship, our Ruler and Teacher, and, we must obey Him in our conscience and in His revealed Voice, His Church. "If he will not hear the Church let him be to Thee as the heathen and the publicans." "The test of the spiritual man is his conformity to the mind of the Church." "The presence of the Holy Ghost in the Church, is the source of its infallibility."

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Next in the order of witnesses we have Didymus, whose three very erudite volumes have been done into the Latin tongue by St. Jerome. He says:—"He shall not speak of Himself; that is to say, without Me and the wishes of the Father, because He is not inseparable from Mine and the Father's will, because He is not of Himself, but of the Father and Me. His very substance is of the Father and Me." It is interesting to consider the interpretation of the words, "He shall receive." They are clear, orthodox and in exact harmony with the reading of St. Athanasius. Didymus says: —"we must understand what it means to 'receive,' in connection with the divine nature. Just as the Son by giving does not part with what He gives, nor is it at any loss that He giveth to others; likewise the Holy Ghost receiveth not what before He had not, for if He were to receive what He had not before, after the gift had been transferred the giver would become empty and cease to have what he had given. As we observed before in arguing on incorporeal natures so do we in the present instance understand that the Holy Ghost receives what had been His by nature and does not mean a giver and a taker, but signifies one substance. Inasmuch as the Son also is said to receive from the Father the wherewithal of His substance, neither is the Holy Ghost aught else in substance but such as is given Him by the Son."

These words avow in clear accents the Latin Dogma. The schismatic ruse is but an endeavor to read into the procession of the Holy Ghost the idea of temporal communication— works ad extra, in time—of the Holy Ghost and the gifts of the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son in the capacity of minister or servant and not the immanent and eternal procession of the Holy Ghost. The Fathers repudiate this idea and sustain the orthodox idea of the substantial production.

The Holy Ghost eternally receives from the Son in conjunction with future effect in time, the inspiration of the Apostles or the receiving, in the matter of the doctrine of Christ, the assistance of the Church. Christ bestows the Holy Ghost, not as a thing aloof from, and outside of, Himself, but, something, on the contrary, His very own and of Himself. St. Cyril says, "Since Christ brings forth the law, the Spirit of Himself as being in Him and naturally existent of Him brings forth the law." (Thesaurus.) Now to exist naturally from any one is the same as having one's origin from such a one; it is the same as being produced by Him. Hence the Holy Ghost 'receiving' of Christ does not "participate" in Christ. "By no means," says St. Cyril, "far from it to my mind. How can He Who is in Him and of Him and Whose own He is participate in Him, just as if He were to be sanctified by some external bond, and how is He to be, according to nature, outside Him, of Whose very Self we say He is." (Dial, vii de. Trinit.) The Greek affair has its side lights.

It is an established fact that the words of St. Gregory Nazianzen and St. Basil have been tampered with by the so-called Greeks, but, authentic copies of the Fathers furnish the reverse of comfort to the enemies of the "Filioque." Cardinal Bessario found in the monastery of Christ the Saviour what he remarks as being "a source of tears and wonder. In a most ancient edition some one with a bold mind and still bolder hand had used an iron instrument to erase the parchment. But the thing miscarried, for since a space was left unfilled in, the very syllables half appearing revealed the audacity of the proceeding and clearly expressed the very truth." A similar fraud was detected in the Council of Florence when Joseph Methonensus disproved Marcus Ephesinus. Holy Writ compares the Holy Ghost to the waters and God to the fountain—particularly so St. John, (vii, 38, iv, 13,) and the Prophet David (in Ps.xxxv, 10.) St. Athanasius takes occasion therefrom to remark as follows:—"David knew that the Son with the Father is the Fount of the Holy Ghost." And by Jeremias the Son says, 'This people have done Me two wrongs, they have abandoned Me, the Fount of Life." St. Chrysostom says, "The Saviour thereby shows that He is Himself the Fount of Life, the Holy Ghost, the Living Waters." The substantial emanation of the Holy Ghost from the Son,— in other words the procession—is amply set forth in such kindred words as "flow forth"—proceed, "go forth from," "buist forth from," "own Spirit of Jesus Christ," "breath," "vapor," "odor of flowers"—all of which militate for the substantial procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son. Let us repeat the words; "From Me," (that is the Son,) "the Spirit proceeds. I say from Me, I mean also from the Father; what is Mine is the Father's. This is how you are to understand the Word He shall receive of Mine." Another cavil of the schismatics is asserting that what the Holy Ghost receives from the Son He receives because the Son is in the Father. This is not so. The Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son, that is, receives from the Father and Son what is in the Father and Son as formally Father and Son. The heretical interpretation would impair the directness and perfection, aye, the real procession itself, of the Holy Ghost from the Son. As a matter of fact, "all things that are the Father's," (except alone the formal idea of Father) "are in identical number the Son's. Our Lord teaches that among all these things common to the Father and the Son is contained the virtue and act of communicating all things to the Holy Ghost, that is, of spirating the Holy Ghost by the communication of essence together with all its absolute perfections." (Franz. De Deo Uno et Trino, p. 455.) "The Father has the virtue of principle so that the Holy Ghost receives what is the Father's, therefore, also, the virtue of principle is Mine also so that the Holy Ghost receives of Mine." (Fulgentius Contra. Fabian.) In reply to the schismatics who scoff at the internal procession as being understood when a divine Person is sent and receives, it is to be said that, "whatever and howsoever One divine Person" (of Whom there is but one nature,) "may be said to accept or rather receive from another divine Person, such a thing cannot be conceived without perverting the whole mystery unless internal procession is supposed. For, God cannot accept to Himself from another only inasmuch as one Person is relative to another Person, by origin. But this origin takes place by the communication of the divine nature itself." (Franz, p. 457.) With divine Persons action means the divine essence, (with respect ad extra?) like-wise the communication of operation from one person to another is nothing less than the communication of the divine essence or nature. The Holy Ghost "receiving" from the Son can only be understood in the sense that the Son is the principium of procession communicating essence. The theologic consideration of the present truth has its message in our practical life. We see more and more the reason why we ought to cling to the Church and set the highest possible value on her infallible magisterium. We are thereby convinced of the disabilities of the human mind and of how, without the sure light of faith, the most skilled in human wisdom and the most finished in culture should go astray and be baffled. We find this to be true not only in connection with the revealed truth in its broader outline, but, also, in the component elements of its most august but intricate mechanism, that is to say, in all the lights and shades of the revealed economy. Church Dogmas are not mere assertions; they are divine assertions; and these form the laws and principles, without which, there is no religious liberty.