De Consideratione

27. What is God? Length, breadth, height, and depth. ‘What?’ you say. ‘You do, after all, profess to believe in the fourfold Godhead which was an abomination to you.’ Not in the least. I abominated, and still abominate it. I may have seemed to express a number of things: I really indicated one. God is designated One to suit our comprehension, not to describe His character; His character is capable of division, He Himself is not. The words are different, the paths are many, but one thing is signified; the paths lead to one Person. No divisions of the Substance are expressed in that fourfold enumeration; no dimensions, such as we contemplate in bodily structures; no distinction of Persons, such as we adore in the Trinity; there is no enumeration of ‘properties’ such as we confess to be inherent in the Persons, though they are no way distinguishable from the Persons. Moreover, in God each of these is what the four are all together; and the four are just what each one is. We cannot attain to the full conception of the simplicity of God; hence it is that while we strive to apprehend the Unity, it presents itself to us as fourfold. This is the result of our seeing darkly as in a mirror, the only way for the present of seeing God at all. But when we shall see face to face, we shall see Him as He is.¹ When that blessed time shall come, the poor, weak blade of our intellect, however hard it may strike, will not recoil, or be broken to shivers. It will rather concentrate itself, and will conform itself to His unity, or rather to that Unity, so that we shall have one face corresponding to His one face. For 'we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is'. Blessed Vision! well might he sigh for it who said, 'My face hath sought thee: thy face, O Lord, will I seek.'² And as our business is still to seek Him, let us for the present, inasmuch as we are weak and faint, and sorely need such a conveyance, let us mount this four-horse chariot,³ if haply we may thus lay hold of that for which we have been laid hold of, that is to say, the plan and working of the vehicle itself. For this admonition have we from the charioteer himself, who was the first to show us the chariot—that we strive to 'comprehend with all saints what is the length, and breadth, and height, and depth'.⁴ 'Comprehend', he says, not 'know': so that, not content with the curiosity of knowledge⁵ we may with all eagerness look for the fruit. The fruit is not to be found in knowledge, but in comprehension.⁶ Besides, 'to him who knoweth to do good, and doeth it not,'⁷ as a certain one tells us, 'it is sin'; Paul also elsewhere says, 'So run that ye may comprehend.’⁸ I will point out lower down the meaning of comprehending.

28. What then is God? He is length, I say; and what is length? It is eternity. This is so long that it has no end either in place or time. He is also breadth. And what is breadth? It is love. What bounds shall we set to the love of God, who hateth none of those things which He hath made? In fact, ‘He maketh his sun to rise upon the good and the bad, and sendeth rain upon the just and unjust.’⁹ So then there is room in the Divine bosom for God’s enemies also. And not satisfied with this, God’s love compasses the infinite. It exceeds not only affection, but knowledge as well, for the Apostle goes on to speak of ‘knowing the love of Christ which passeth knowledge’.¹⁰ What more shall I say? It is eternal; or, to go a step further, I may perhaps say that it is eternity. You see that the breadth is as great as the length. Would that you saw not only that they are equal, but that they are identical; that they are one and the same thing; no less one than two, no more two than one! God is eternity, God is love; He is length without extension, breadth without distension. In both cases alike He exceeds the narrow limits of space and time, but in virtue of His unfettered nature, not through the vastness of His substance. In such wise He is immeasurable¹¹ who hath made all things by measure; and although He be immeasurable, His very immensity must be thus ‘measured’.¹²

29. Once more, what is God? He is height and depth. In the one He is above all things, in the other He is below all things. It is clear that in the Godhead there is no halting inequality; the Godhead stands firmly fixed, immovably self-consistent. Consider 'height' as corresponding to the Divine power, 'depth' to the Divine wisdom. There is a correspondence no less between these two than between the former two, if we perceive that this 'height' is unapproachable, this 'depth' unsearchable. Paul marvelled as he cried aloud, 'O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!' ¹³ We too, as we contemplate both these attributes in God, and their perfect unity with God, may with Paul exclaim, 'O powerful wisdom, reaching from one end of the world to the other with full strength! O wise power, ordering all things sweetly!' ¹⁴ The thing is one, the effect is manifold, the operations are diverse. And that one thing is 'length' because it is eternity; 'breadth' because it is love; 'height' because it is majesty; 'depth' because it is wisdom.