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Not wishing for the heretics to be afflicted, nor rejoicing in their ill-treatment, I write these things, may it not be so, but rather rejoicing and exulting in their conversion. For what is more delightful to the faithful than to see the scattered children of God gathered into one? Nor am I advising you to prefer harshness to philanthropy; may I not be so mad; but with attention and testing to do and to work good things for all people, and becoming all things to all, as each of you needs, I beseech; only in regard to helping heretics in any way for the establishment of their mind-corrupting opinion, I both wish and pray that you be completely hard and unyielding. For I, for my part, define misanthropy, and a separation from divine love, as the attempt to give strength to error for the greater corruption of those who have been preoccupied by it.

EXPOSITION OF THE ORTHODOX CONFESSION

Exposition of the orthodox confession. But before all and above all things, to be sober and watchful and to observe the

assaults of the thieves, lest having been plundered by them we be unaware; but we shall guard rather the great and first 15Β_166 medicine of our salvation; I speak of the good inheritance of the faith, confessing it with soul and mouth with boldness, as the Fathers taught us. They, following those who from 0468 the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word, the one of the holy and consubstantial, immaculate and blessed Trinity, the Son of God, God the Word, the radiance of the glory and the character of the paternal hypostasis, the creator of all visible and invisible creation, the infinite, the indefinite, the invisible, the incomprehensible, the inconceivable, who made and sustains all things by the mere inclination of his will; him, immeasurable in goodness, they said became incarnate for us, and was made flesh from the holy, all-glorious, ever-virgin Mary, the one who is properly and in truth the Theotokos; uniting to himself hypostatically flesh from her, which is consubstantial with us, ensouled with a rational and intelligent soul, not having pre-existed even for the twinkling of an eye, but in God the Word himself both receiving its being and its hypostasis; and that he, being perfect God, became perfect man; neither putting aside being God because he became man, which he was not; nor being hindered from becoming what he was not, man, because he remained what he was and is, God; but being this, he also became that, verifying both, the divine and human being confirmed together by divine miracles and human sufferings. And according to his own nature and essence with respect to the Father, he is uncreated, invisible, uncircumscribable, unchangeable, immutable, impassible, incorruptible, immortal, creator of all things; but according to the nature of his flesh, which is also yours, the same one is created, passible, circumscribable, containable, mortal; the same one, but not in the same respect, because of the things from which and in which he has his being; the same one consubstantial with God the Father according to the divinity, and the same one consubstantial with us according to the humanity; double in nature, that is, in essence; because being the mediator between God and men, it was necessary for him to properly preserve 15Β_168 the natural affinity to those mediated, by being both; so that in truth itself, in himself and through himself, having joined the earthly things to the heavenly, he brought the material nature of men, which had been made hostile by sin, to God the Father, saved, beloved, and deified; not by an identity of essence, but by the ineffable power of the incarnation; that he might make us also partakers of the divine nature, through his holy flesh which is from us, as a first-fruit. Wherefore the same one is both God and man, in reality

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Οὐ θέλων δέ τούς αἱρετικούς θλίβεσθαι, οὐδέ χαίρων τῇ κακώσει αὐτῶν, γράφω ταῦτα, μή γένοιτο, ἀλλά τῇ ἐπιστροφῇ μᾶλλον χαίρων καί συναγαλλόμενος. Τί γάρ τοῖς πιστοῖς τερπνότερον, τοῦ θεᾶσθαι τά τέκνα τοῦ Θεοῦ τά διεσκορπισμένα, συναγόμενα εἰς ἕν. Οὔτε ὑμῖν τοῦ φιλανθρώπου τό ἀπηνές παραινῶν προτιθέναι· μή οὕτω μανείην· ἀλλά μετά προσεχείας καί δοκιμασίας ποιεῖν τε καί ἐνεργεῖν τά καλά εἰς πάντας ἀνθρώπους, καί πᾶσι πάντα γινομένους, καθώς ἕκαστος ἐπιδεῖται ὑμῶν, παρακαλῶν· πρός μόνον τό καθοτιοῦν αἱρετικοῖς συνάρασθαι εἰς σύστασιν τῆς φρενοβλαβοῦς αὐτῶν δόξης, σκληρούς παντελῶς εἶναι ὑμᾶς καί ἀμειλίκτους βούλομαί τε καί εὔχομαι. Μισανθρωπίαν γάρ ὁρίζομαι ἔγωγε, καί ἀγάπης θείας χωρισμόν, τό τῇ πλάνῃ πειρᾶσθαι διδόναι ἰσχύν εἰς περισσοτέραν τῶν αὐτῇ προκατειλημμένων φθοράν.

ΕΚΘΕΣΙΣ ΟΡΘΗΣ ΟΜΟΛΟΓΙΑΣ

Ἔκθεσις ὀρθῆς ὁμολογίας. Πρό δέ πάντων καί ἐπί πᾶσι, νήφειν τε καί ἀγρυπνεῖν καί παρατηρεῖσθαι τῶν

κλεπτῶν τάς ἐφόδους, ἵνα μή συληθέντες ὑπ᾿ αὐτῶν λάθωμεν· φυλάξομεν δέ μᾶλλον τό μέγα καί πρῶτον 15Β_166 τῆς σωτηρίας ἡμῶν φάρμακον· τήν καλήν λέγω τῆς πίστεως κληρονομίαν ὁμολογοῦντος ψυχῇ τε καί στόματι μετά παῤῥησίας, ὡς οἱ Πατέρες ἡμᾶς ἐδίδαξαν. Οἵτινες τοῖς ἐξ 0468 ἀρχῆς αὐτόπταις καί ὑπηρέταις γενομένοις τοῦ Λόγου ἑπόμενοι, τόν ἕνα τῆς ἁγίας καί ὁμοουσίου, ἀχράντου τε καί μακαρίας Τριάδος τόν Υἱόν τοῦ Θεοῦ Θεόν Λόγον τό ἀπαύγασμα τῆς δόξης καί χαρακτῆρα τῆς πατρικῆς ὑποστάσεως, τόν πάσης ὁρατῆς τε καί ἀοράτου κτίσεως δημιουργόν, τόν ἄπειρον, τόν ἀόριστον, τόν ἀόρατον, τόν ἀκατάληπτον, τόν ἀπερινόητον, τόν πάντα μόνῃ ῥοπῇ τοῦ θελήματος καί ποιήσαντα καί συνέχοντα· τόν ἀγαθότητι ἄμετρον, ἔφασαν ἐνανθρωπῆσαι δι' ἡμᾶς, καί σαρκωθῆναι ἐκ τῆς ἁγίας πανενδόξου ἀειπαρθένου Μαρίας, τῆς κυρίως καί κατ᾿ ἀλήθειαν Θεοτόκου· σάρκα ἐξ αὐτῆς ἑνώσαντα ἑαυτῷ καθ᾿ ὑπόστασιν τήν ἡμῖν ὁμοούσιον, ἐψυχωμένην ψυχῇ λογικῇ τε καί νοερᾷ οὐδ᾿ ὡς ἐν ῥιπῇ ὀφθαλμοῦ προϋποστᾶσαν, ἀλλ᾿ ἐν αὐτῷ τῷ Θεῷ καί Λόγῳ, καί τό εἶναι καί τό ὑποστῆναι λαβοῦσαν· καί τέλειον ὄντα Θεόν γενέσθαι τέλειον ἄνθρωπον· μήτε τό Θεός εἶναι ἀποθέμενον διά τό γενέσθαι ἄνθρωπον, ὅπερ οὐκ ἦν· μήτε κωλυθέντα γενέσθαι ὅπερ οὐκ ἦν, ἄνθρωπον, διά τό μεμενηκέναι ὅπερ ἦν καί ἔστι, Θεός· ἀλλά τοῦτο ὄντα, κἀκεῖνο γενέσθαι, ἑκάτερόν τε ἀπαληθεύοντα, τό θεῖον ὁμοῦ καί ἀνθρώπινον πιστοῦσθαι θαύμασι θείοις καί παθήμασιν ἀνθρωπίνοις καί κατά μέν τήν ἑαυτοῦ πρός τόν Πατέραν φύσιν τε καί οὐσίαν, ἄκτιστον, ἀόρατον, ἀπερίγραφον, ἀναλλοίωτον, ἄτρεπτον, ἀπαθῆ, ἄφθαρτον, ἀθάνατον, δημιουργόν τῶν ἁπάντων· κατά δέ τήν τῆς σαρκός αὐτοῦ φύσιν καί ὑμετέραν, τόν αὐτόν κτιστόν, παθητόν, περιγραπτόν, χωρητόν, θνητόν· τόν αὐτόν μέν, οὐ κατά τό αὐτό δέ, διά τά ἐξ ὧν καί ἐν οἷς τό εἶναι ἔχει· ὁμοούσιον τόν αὐτόν τῷ Θεῷ καί Πατρί κατά τήν θεότητα, καί ὁμοούσιον ἡμῖν τόν αὐτόν κατά τήν ἀνθρωπότητα· διπλοῦν τήν φύσιν, ἤτοι τήν οὐσίαν· διά τόν μεσίτην ὄντα Θεοῦ καί ἀνθρώπων, δεῖν κυρίως ἀποσώζειν 15Β_168 τήν πρός τά μεσιτευόμενα φυσικήν οἰκειότητα, τῷ ὑπάρχειν ἀμφότερα· ὅπως αὐτῇ τῇ ἀληθείᾳ ἐν ἑαυτῷ καί δι᾿ ἑαυτοῦ, συνάψας τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις τά ἐπίγεια, τήν ὑλικήν τῶν ἀνθρώπων φύσιν, τήν ἐκ τῆς ἁμαρτίας πολεμωθεῖσάν, τῷ Θεῷ καί Πατρί προσαγαγών σωθεῖσαν, φιλωθεῖσάν τε καί θεωθεῖσαν· οὐκ οὐσίας ταυτότητι, ἀλλά δυνάμει ἀῤῥήτῳ τῆς ἐνανθρωπήσεως· θείας κοινωνούς φύσεως, διά τῆς ἐξ ἡμῶν ἁγίας αὐτοῦ σαρκός, ὡς ἀπαρχῆς καί ἡμᾶς ἀπεργάσηται. ∆ιό καί Θεός ὁμοῦ καί ἄνθρωπος ὁ αὐτός, πράγματι