has had it _ab initio_, from the very beginning of time.[541] On
the other hand this same Son is only a part and offshoot; the Father is
the whole; and in this the mystery of the economy consists. What the Son
possesses has been given him by the Father; the Father is therefore
greater than the Son; the Son is subordinate to the Father.[542] "Pater
tota substantia est, filius vero derivatio totius et portio".[543] This
paradox is ultimately based on a philosophical axiom of Tertullian: the
whole fulness of the Godhead, i.e., the Father, is incapable of entering
into the finite, whence also he must always remain invisible,
unapproachable, and incomprehensible. The Divine Being that appears and
works on earth can never be anything but a part of the transcendent
Deity. This Being must be a derived existence, which has already in some
fashion a finite element in itself, because it is the hypostatised Word
of creation, which has an origin.[544] We would assert too much, were we
to say that Tertullian meant that the Son was simply the world-thought
itself; his insistance on the "unius substantiae" disproves this. But no
doubt he regards the Son as the Deity depotentiated for the sake of
self-communication; the Deity adapted to the world, whose sphere
coincides with the world-thought, and whose power is identical with that
necessary for the world. From the standpoint of humanity this Deity is
God himself, i.e., a God whom men can apprehend and who can apprehend
them; but from God's standpoint, which speculation can fix but not
fathom, this Deity is a subordinate, nay, even a temporary one.
Tertullian and Hippolytus know as little of an immanent Trinity as the
Apologists; the Trinity only _appears_ such, because the unity of the
substance is very vigorously emphasised; but in truth the Trinitarian
process as in the case of the Gnostics, is simply the background of the
process that produces the history of the world and of salvation. This is
first of all shown by the fact that in course of the process of the
world and of salvation the Son grows in his sonship, that is, goes
through a finite process;[545] and secondly by the fact that the Son
himself will one day restore the monarchy to the Father.[546] These
words no doubt are again spoken not from the standpoint of man, but from
that of God; for so long as history lasts "the Son continues in his
form." In its point of departure, its plan, and its details this whole
exposition is n