"The people of the church are a single concise proclamation of our teaching, an inscription intelligible to all ( 2Co 2:2-3). These people sincerely worship the Trinity. Any one of them would sooner be separated from his own life, than to separate one of these three persons from the Godhead. The people of the church are of one mind, of equal zeal, and united to one another, to us and to the Trinity by unity of doctrine ( Acts 2:42; 1Co 1:10)....

 

"Let us then bid farewell to all contentious shifting and balancing of the truth on either side,  like the Sabellians, who attack the Trinity in the interest of the unity, and thus destroy the distinction by a wicked confusion. Nor, like the Arians, attack the unity in the interest of the Trinity, and by an impious distinction overthrow the oneness. For our object is not to exchange one evil for another, but to ensure our recognition of what is good. These are the playthings of the wicked one, who is ever swaying our fortunes toward evil. But we, walking along the royal road which lies between the two extremes, which is the seat of the virtues, as the authorities say, believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, as one substance and glory; in whom also baptism has its perfection, both in name and essence (you who have been baptized know this!). It is a denial of atheism and a confession of the Godhead. Through it we are regenerated, acknowledging the unity in the essence and in the undivided worship, and the Trinity in the hypostases or persons (some prefer the term "persons").

 

"Do not let those who are contentious on these points utter their scandalous taunts, as if our faith depended on terms and not on the realities themselves. For the question is, what do you mean when you assert the three hypostases? Do you imply three different essences when you use this term? I am assured that you would loudly shout against those who do. For you teach that the essence of the three is one and the same. What do you mean, who assert the three persons? Do you imagine a single compound sort of being, with three faces, or of an entirely human form? God forbid! You too will loudly reply that he who thinks thus, will never see the face of God, whatever it may be like. What is the meaning of the hypostases of the one party, of the persons of the other, to ask this further question? They are three, who are distinguished not by natures, but by properties. That is correct. How could men agree and harmonize better than you do, even if there is a difference between the syllables you use? You see what a reconciler I am, bringing you back from the letter to the sense."