Ephesians 1:23

I am accustomed in my prescription against all heresies, to fix my compendious criterion (of truth) in the testimony of time ; claiming priority therein as our rule, and alleging lateness to be the characteristic of every heresy. This shall now be proved even by the apostle, when he says: “For the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, whereof ye heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel; which is come unto you, as it is unto all the world.” For if, even at that time, the tradition of the gospel had spread everywhere, how much more now! Now, if it is our gospel which has spread everywhere, rather than any heretical gospel, much less Marcion’s, which only dates from the reign of Antoninus, then ours will be the gospel of the apostles. But should Marcion’s gospel succeed in filling the whole world, it would not even in that case be entitled to the character of apostolic. …

To understand what the apostle means when he says that we shall all come to a perfect man, we must consider the connection of the whole passage, which runs thus: “He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that He might fill all things. And He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: till we all come to the unity of the faith and knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the age of the fullness of Christ: that we henceforth be no more children, tossed and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in Him in all things, which is the Head, even Christ: …

He did not say, I and they are one thing; although, in that He is the head of the church which is His body, He might have said, and they are, not one thing, but one person, because the head and the body is one Christ; but in order to show His own Godhead consubstantial with the Father (for which reason He says in another place, “I and my Father are one”), in His own kind, that is, in the consubstantial parity of the same nature, He wills His own to be one, but in Himself; since they could not be so in themselves, separated as they are one from another by divers pleasures and desires and uncleannesses of sin; whence they are cleansed through the Mediator, that they may be one in Him, not only through the same nature in which all become from mortal men equal to the angels, but also through the same will most harmoniously conspiring to the same blessedness, and fused in some way by the fire …

Whosoever, then, supposes that any man or any men (except the one Mediator between God and man) have ever lived, or are yet living in this present state, who have not needed, and do not need, forgiveness of sins, he opposes Holy Scripture, wherein it is said by the apostle: “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, in which all have sinned.” And he must needs go on to assert, with an impious contention, that there may possibly be men who are freed and saved from sin without the liberation and salvation of the one Mediator Christ. …

8. But now if we turn our attention to ourselves, if we think of His Body, how that we are even He. For if we were not He, “Forasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of Mine, ye have done it unto Me,” would not be true. If we were not He, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?” would not be true. So then we are He, in that we are His members, in that we are His Body, in that He is our Head, in that Whole Christ is both Head and Body. Peradventure then He foresaw us that we were not to keep the feast days of the Jews, and this is, “I go not up to this feast day.” See neither Christ nor the Evangelist lied; of the which two if one must needs choose one, the Evangelist would pardon me, I would by no means put him that is true before the Truth Himself; I would not prefer him that was sent to Him by whom he was sent. …

He no longer speaks of works, but he rouses them to greater things. For when he was speaking of vice, he mentioned the works of it: but when of virtue, he speaks not of works, but of arms, to show that virtue putteth him that is possessed of it into complete safety, and complete brightness. And even here he does not pause, but leading his discourse on to what was greater, a thing far more awestriking; he gives us the Lord Himself for a garment, the King Himself: for he that is clad with Him, hath absolutely all virtue. But in saying, “Put ye on,” he bids us be girt about with Him upon every side. As in another place he says, “But if Christ be in you.” ( Rom. viii. 10 .) And again, “That Christ may dwell in the inner man.” ( Eph. iii. 16, 17 , al. …

Observe how in his accusing of the one he thrusts through the other, by first giving the solution, and then the objection. For such a solution is not suspected, and the hearer accepts it the rather, that the speaker is not making it his aim. For in that case indeed he would make a point of not coming off worsted, but in this, not so. “For in Him dwelleth,” that is, for God dwelleth in Him. But that thou mayest not think Him enclosed, as in a body, he saith, “All the fullness of the Godhead bodily: and ye are made full in Him.” Others say that he intends the Church filled by His Godhead, as he elsewhere saith, “of Him that filleth all in all” ( Eph. i. 23 .), and that the term “bodily” is here, as the body in the head. …

The Lord has said to his prophet “See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms to root out and to pull down and to destroy and…to build and to plant.” In every age he bestows the same grace upon his church, that His Body may be preserved intact and that the poison of heretical opinions may nowhere prevail over it. And now also do we see the words fulfilled. For the church of Christ “not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing” has with the sword of the gospel cut down the Origenist serpents crawling out of their caves, and has delivered from their deadly contagion the fruitful host of the monks of Nitria. I have compressed a short account of my proceedings (it was all that time would allow) into the general letter which I have addressed indiscriminately to all. …

4. I am aware then that anarchy and disorder cannot be more advantageous than order and rule, either to other creatures or to men; nay, this is true of men in the highest possible degree, because the interests at stake in their case are greater; since it is a great thing for them, even if they fail of their highest purpose, to be free from sin, to attain at least to that which is second best, restoration from sin. Since this seems right and just, it is, I take it, equally wrong and disorderly that all should wish to rule, and that no one should accept it. For if all men were to shirk this office, whether it must be called a ministry or a leadership, the fair fulness of the Church would be halting in the highest degree, and in fact cease to be fair. …

99. Who, in fine, is the man who, although he has never applied himself to, nor learnt to speak, the hidden wisdom of God in a mystery, although he is still a babe, still fed with milk, still of those who are not numbered in Israel, nor enrolled in the army of God, although he is not yet able to take up the Cross of Christ like a man, although he is possibly not yet one of the more honorable members, yet will joyfully and eagerly accept his appointment as head of the fulness of Christ? No one, if he will listen to my judgment and accept my advice! This is of all things most to be feared, this is the extremest of dangers in the eyes of everyone who understands the magnitude of success, the utter ruin of failure.

Let such men be rejected by the holy members of Christ’s Body, and let not catholic liberty suffer the yoke of the unfaithful to be laid upon it. For they are to be reckoned outside the Divine grace, and outside the mystery of man’s salvation, who, denying the nature of our flesh in Christ, gainsay the Gospel and oppose the Creed. Nor do they perceive that their blindness leads them into such an abyss that they have no sure footing in the reality either of the Lord’s Passion or His Resurrection: because both are discredited in the Saviour, if our fleshly nature is not believed in Him. …