Tractates on the Gospel of John

⁸ Wherefore, whoso names the Father and the Son ought thereby to understand the mutual love of the Father and Son, which is the Holy Spirit. And perhaps the Scriptures on being examined (I do not say that I am able to show you this today, or as if another proof cannot be found)—nevertheless, the Scriptures, perhaps, on being searched, do show us that the Holy Spirit is charity. And do not count charity a thing cheap. How, indeed, can it be cheap, when all things that are said to be not cheap are called dear (chara)?

Therefore, if what is not cheap is dear, what is dearer than dearness itself (charitas)? The apostle so commends charity to us that he says, “I show unto you a more excellent way. Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I have become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I know all mysteries and all knowledge, and have prophecy and all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I distribute all my goods to the poor, and give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profits me nothing.” How great, then, is charity, which, if wanting, in vain have we all things else; if present, rightly have we all things!

Yet the Apostle Paul, setting forth the praise of charity with copiousness and fullness, has said less of it than did the Apostle John in brief, whose Gospel this is. For he has not hesitated to say, “God is love.” It is also written, “Because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given us.” Who, then, can name the Father and the Son without thereby understanding the love of the Father and Son? Which when one begins to have, he will have the Holy Spirit; which if one has not, he will not have the Holy Spirit.

And just as your body, if it be without spirit, namely your soul, is dead; so likewise your soul, if it be without the Holy Spirit, that is, without charity, will be reckoned dead. Therefore “The water-pots contained two metretæ apiece,” because the Father and the Son are proclaimed in the prophecy of all the periods; but the Holy Spirit is there also, and therefore it is added, “or three apiece.” “I and the Father,” says He, “are one.” But far be it from us to suppose that where we are told, “I and the Father are one,” the Holy Spirit is not there.

Yet since he named the Father and the Son, let the water-pots contain “two metretæ apiece;” but attend to this, “or three apiece.” “Go, baptize the nations in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” So, therefore, when it says “two apiece,” the Trinity is not expressed but understood; but when it says, “or three,” the Trinity is expressed also.