Eusebius’s Letter to Paulinus of Tyre

“To my lord Paulinus, Eusebius sends greetings in the Lord. “The zeal of my lord Eusebius for the cause of the truth, and also your silence about it, have reached our ears. So while we rejoiced at the zeal of my lord Eusebius, we are grieved over you, because even the silence of such a man looks like a defeat for our cause. “It is not fitting for a wise man to hold a different opinion from others and to keep silent about the truth. So I urge you to stir up within yourself the spirit of wisdom to write, and at last to begin what may be profitable to yourself and to others, especially if you are willing to write in keeping with Scripture and to follow the track of its words and its intent. [a]

“We have never heard that there are two unbegotten beings, nor that one has been divided into two, nor have we learned or believed that it has ever undergone any change of a bodily kind. But we affirm that the unbegotten is one, and that there is also one who exists in truth through him, yet was not made out of his substance and does not share at all in the nature or substance of the unbegotten. He is entirely distinct in nature and in power, and was made in perfect likeness, both of character and of power, to his maker. “We believe that the manner of his beginning cannot be expressed in words, or even in thought, and is beyond the understanding not only of human beings but also of all beings above them. We put forward these opinions not as drawn from our own imagination but as derived from Scripture. From it we learn that the Son was created, established, and begotten in the same substance and in the same unchangeable and inexpressible nature as the Maker; and so the Lord says, ‘God created me in the beginning of his way; I was set up from everlasting; before the hills I was brought forth.’ [b]

“If he had been from him or of him, as a portion of him, or by an outflow of his substance, it could not be said that he was created or established; and of this you, my lord, are certainly aware. For what is of the unbegotten could not be said to have been created or founded, either by him or by another, since it is unbegotten from the beginning. “But if his being called begotten gives any ground for believing that, having come into being from the Father’s substance, he also has likeness of nature from the Father, we reply that the Scriptures do not speak of him alone as begotten. They speak in the same way of beings entirely unlike him by nature. For of human beings it is said, ‘I have begotten and brought up sons, and they have rebelled against me’; and in another place, ‘You have forsaken God who begot you’; and again it is said, ‘Who begot the drops of dew?’ “This expression does not mean that the dew shares in the nature of God, but simply that all things were formed according to his will. There is indeed nothing that is of his substance, yet everything that exists has been called into being by his will. He is God; and all things were made in his likeness, and in the future likeness of his Word, being created by his free will. All things were made through him by God. All things are of God. [d]

“When you have received my letter and have revised it according to the knowledge and grace God has given you, I beg you to write as soon as possible to my lord Alexander. I am confident that if you write to him, you will succeed in bringing him over to your opinion. Greet all the brothers in the Lord. May you, my lord, be preserved by the grace of God, and be moved to pray for us.”

This is how they wrote to one another, to supply each other with weapons against the truth. And so, when the blasphemous teaching had been spread through the churches of Egypt and of the East, disputes and quarrels arose in every city and in every village over teachings about God. The common people looked on and became judges of what was said on either side; some applauded one party, and some the other. These were scenes fit for the tragic stage, worth shedding tears over. For it was not as in days gone by, when the church was attacked by strangers and enemies. Now people of the same country, who lived under one roof and sat down at one table, fought one another, not with spears but with their tongues. And what was sadder still, those who took up arms against one another in this way were members of one another and belonged to one body. [e]