Jerome

ON ST. JEROME, PRIEST AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH,

AND DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH, AT BETHLEHEM.

More probably in the year CDXIX.

HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

Jerome, priest and doctor of the Church, at Bethlehem. (S.)

BHL Number: 3876, 3878

BY J. S.

§ I. The general idea of this Commentary.

In Sulpicius Severus, book 1 of the Dialogues chap. 9, Posthumianus, who had spent six months with St. Jerome, As St. Jerome while living had many enemies, testifies that he was hated by heretics, and was an object of admiration and love to all good men. That this assertion of Posthumianus is most true, no one will be able to be ignorant who has diligently read through the Works of the most holy Doctor. But if anyone shall consider that the perverse doctrines of Jovinian and Vigilantius, which St. Jerome sharply refuted and still goes on refuting in his writings, were revived in later centuries, he will not marvel that Jerome is even now hated by all those who prefer to have Jovinian, Vigilantius and other heretics as their leaders rather than the holy Fathers of the Church. Of these therefore, as of open enemies, we could easily despise the judgments, did they not craftily conceal the cause of their hatred, and seek other things in the Works of St. Jerome, that they might be able to cast some stains upon that greatest of Men, and so draw others to their party against the reputation of a most upright Doctor.

[2] For, just as Jerome while living had not only heretics as adversaries and detractors, so even now he has not a few but also many others, so at this time I find not a few who irreverently and unmercifully carp at his deeds and writings, and by assertions no less false than odious strive to stain the Saint's reputation. Among these those seem to stand out who are wont to gnaw at the authority of the Roman Pontiff. Whether perhaps those magnificent eulogies displeased them by which he frequently celebrates the Roman faith praised by the Apostolic mouth, by which he extols the chair of St. Peter, by which he removes from the Roman See every error in articles of faith and vindicates for it the uncorrupted inheritance of the Fathers, I cannot say for certain. But at least I see that these things are wrapped by them in deep silence. Whether perhaps they were more offended that St. Jerome asserts in the clearest words the necessity of communicating with the Roman Church, that he calls profane and excludes from all hope of salvation all those who withdraw themselves from the communion of the Roman Pontiff, I shall leave to others to consider. This, however, I do not hesitate to assert, that from the Works of St. Jerome themselves, diligently read through, an idea of the holy Doctor has been impressed upon me altogether other than that which some writers have striven to impress.

[3] Erasmus once saw, who published St. Jerome's Works and wrote his Life, he has unjust detractors, that the judgments of certain men about St. Jerome's character were unjust. The same judged other editors of his Works, and by name John Martianay, who held the general idea given by a recent writer about Jerome's character to be a bristling phantom, not a true idea. I was likewise astounded, I confess, and shuddered at the general idea which Tillemont gave in vol. 12, art. 1, concerning St. Jerome, even though he discourses on both sides, and seems in some fashion to soften some things more sharply reproved by others, and even mixes in a very little about the Saint's virtues. In this at least I rejoice, that Tillemont acknowledged that St. Jerome had a solid humility: but I little grasp how with that foundation of the virtues he joins certain vices which can scarcely be joined with solid humility, and take their origin from pride, especially since he asserts those vices without any suitable proof. But I shall presently examine Tillemont's assertions. Concerning Jerome's other censors, who chiefly accuse the Saint of excessive sharpness of style, it seems that it must be said in general that they themselves have fallen into that very fault which perhaps undeservedly they reprove in Jerome, and which they certainly exaggerate much beyond the truth. I shall readily believe that that sharpness is bandied about by many who have not examined the matter itself, but have shown themselves credulous toward the censures of others, or have read only a very few of the Saint's little Works.

[4] and most frivolous censors. But judgments about men famous for holiness, such as St. Jerome is above all, are not so easily to be borne; rather all things must be weighed maturely, the circumstances of each matter being considered. For if we rashly condemn all sharpness of style, we shall condemn the Prophets, the Apostles, John the Baptist, nay even Christ the Lord, who, although he was the gentlest of men, judged that Pharisaic pride must from time to time be confounded with sharper words, and by his own example taught most clearly, being unable to be deceived, that not all sharpness of words is contrary either to sweetness or to gentleness or to charity. Wherefore it must be diligently considered against whom St. Jerome used a sharper style, on what occasions he judged that he must fight with a somewhat stinging pen, to what end he struck his adversaries the more harshly, how great a profit he brought to the Church by a more vehement conflict. For if all these things be weighed by mature examination, if sharpness of style appear rarely in Jerome's Works, account being taken of their multitude, perhaps that vehemence, of whatever sort it be, will no more seem liable to censure than the fortitude of a soldier keeping enemies from his country with an iron arm; than the solicitude of a father calling back a rebellious son to good sense with hard blows; than the prudence of a skilled physician cutting away rotten members lest the neighboring ones be infected.

[5] The faults observed It pleases me to transfer briefly hither all the things which Tillemont in St. Jerome art. 1 judged to be not undeservedly reproved, or himself observes as deserving reproof. First he says that St. Jerome in his writings goes astray frequently enough, and assigns as his whole proof a most trifling lapse of memory,

assigned in Cotelier vol. 2 p. 260, namely that he is believed to have cited the words of Theophilus of Antioch for the words of St. Ignatius, bishop of the same city. It is not even certain that St. Jerome's memory slipped there. But it is far most certain that from a slight lapse of memory it is wrongly inferred that the Saint goes astray frequently enough in writing; nor is that rightly to be said, even if other trifles of that kind could be brought forward. The second accusation, and a graver one, is that from Origen he inserted various things contrary to the truth into his Work, and there is praised, forsooth, the excellent Work of Dupin, which we do not wish even to name in our Work. But neither Dupin nor Rufinus are suitable witnesses for branding Jerome with that mark; rather the Works of St. Jerome themselves should have been consulted, and the passages which Rufinus objected examined: for by this examination it will sufficiently appear that no errors of Origen were ever approved by Jerome, but recited only in such a way that it is abundantly clear that Jerome was a stranger to them. But these things will come to be disputed at greater length in their own places against Tillemont, the defender of Rufinus.

[6] The third accusation is that St. Jerome spoke ill of St. John Chrysostom. against St. Jerome But this opinion of various men, which has much harmed St. Jerome's reputation among the moderns, I have already refuted in St. Chrysostom at XIV September, and I do not think it even probable. The fourth is that he did not with the same fairness with which St. Augustine did it distinguish in wicked men the good which they had from the evil. Tillemont says this without any proof: the whole series of events will prove the contrary. Tillemont's fifth accusation is: Whoever had him (Jerome) as an adversary was almost always the vilest of men. He praises Noris, who certainly does not have those words in the place assigned in the margin. But even if he did have them, the authority of a modern writer would prove nothing, since the facts will cry out against it: for if he sometimes despised the enemies of the Church, he did so for a just reason, as will be proved. The sixth accusation is that Jerome boasted too much of his eloquence. It is a frivolous calumny of Rufinus, because St. Jerome sometimes brings in the words of poets and other gentile writers. But I shall show against the absurdities of Rufinus that he did this for a praiseworthy reason.

[7] The seventh accusation is that of Palladius, likewise an enemy, casting envy upon Jerome. are weighed by Tillemont To Palladius, whom he ought to have omitted as an enemy, Tillemont comes with aid in his own words, and determines that the Saint was of a somewhat bitter and morose disposition, which displeased many. Nay, he even says that he was easily angered, and forgave with difficulty those by whom he believed himself injured. But through the whole course of this Commentary I shall show that Jerome's character was most gentle; but a stranger to all flattery, and free to speak the truth, and ready to mock with lively jest enemies who deserved far graver things. Hence, as Posthumianus, already praised, testifies, all good men admire and love him. Hence a little later the same Posthumianus says: Had it not been fixed in my mind and promised with God as witness to go to the desert I had proposed, I should not have wished to depart from so great a Man for even a brief point of time. Hence from Italy, Gaul, Spain, Africa, and other regions not a few hastened to see Jerome, as will be said in their places. Let me here say in a word that, from Jerome's Works which I have read, and from what others wrote about him, my opinion of the Saint's disposition is altogether other, and Tillemont's censure seems most unjust.

[8] and are weighed; But the comparison of the same Tillemont between Jerome and Rufinus seems so ridiculous, and so alien even from every appearance of truth, that I scarcely believe my eyes that he could write what I read in print. For, he says, if it (solid virtue) consisted solely in an even and uniform life in which few faults are committed, there would be reason for preferring Rufinus. And then again he attributes much moderation to Rufinus, nowhere to Jerome. But this criticism seems to me altogether such as it would be if someone preferred a snake biting silently to a dog barking before his master's doors against nocturnal thieves. If Tillemont had preferred to follow the judgments of the ancients, and by name of St. Augustine, rather than of recent heretics, he would have attributed moderation to Jerome, and railings to Rufinus. Certainly Augustine, in Letter 110 among the Hieronymian letters, having read St. Jerome's Apology against Rufinus, says: And indeed how much you restrain yourself, and how much you hold back the stings of your indignation, so as not to render railing for railing, is sufficiently evident in your letters. In the same Letter again toward the end: Wherefore what prudent man would not see how tolerably you too bear the now incredible enmities of one once most friendly and most familiar, with your conscience consoling you, etc. But these things will be set out more at large in their place, and it will be clearly proved from the writings of Jerome and Rufinus themselves that Rufinus omitted nothing by which he might blacken Jerome's reputation; but that Jerome, as a generous Athlete superior in his cause no less than in eloquence, spared Rufinus in other matters; yet ought not to have spared him in the cause of the faith, lest the heresy of the Origenists take greater increase.

[9] and other matters are touched upon in general. I pass over other things which Tillemont says in general about St. Jerome's faults; I likewise pass over those few things which he meagerly touched upon concerning his virtues: for to accuse a Saint with many words and to defend him with few, timidly and coldly, seems to me a betrayal, not a defense. Nor did he repair that defect after relating St. Jerome's death in art. 143, where he says that he leaves to others the care of gathering the eulogies with which illustrious men vied in adorning the Saint. This could be excused if he had done the same generally about others, if he had not been more generous toward Rufinus, Jerome's adversary, if at least through the course of his labor he had faithfully inserted in their places the honorable eulogies of the ancients: but in this respect too I find him sometimes failing. Finally I pass over in this place all the other things objected, whether by heretics or by Catholics, against the character or the doctrine of St. Jerome; but I shall mention and examine in their places each of those which have any appearance. Meanwhile let me say frankly that, because of so many objections, not to say calumnies, I not only wished to read through the Works of St. Jerome before I began to write this Commentary; but that I also diligently considered most of the writings of the moderns about Jerome, and from time to time compared them with some of the Saint's writings, before I formed any judgment whatever about the Saint's character: and yet I have found no stain in the holy Doctor after his baptism; no saying or deed of his which cannot be defended as praiseworthy, or at least excused as commendable for its good intention. And that the reader may be able to understand this the more clearly, I shall try to assign, for each of the deeds which could in any way give occasion to detractors, the reasons by which he could have been moved to act thus.

§ II. The chief documents concerning St. Jerome, both the older and also the more recent.

[The Life is to be gathered chiefly from Jerome himself and from other contemporaries.] Now it pleases me to enumerate in a few words the chief documents from which the Life of St. Jerome is to be drawn. Since there is no Life sufficiently ancient or sufficiently accurate, as will presently appear from the enumeration of many, the deeds and virtues of that most holy Man must be gathered from his own Works, not because he vainly celebrates his own praises, but because he frequently indicates at what time he wrote some book or Letter, and not rarely also briefly suggests something about his own doings; moreover because in admonishing or exhorting others he not obscurely suggests his own sentiments, and finally because the writings themselves are the greatest part of his deeds and labors. St. Augustine also brings some help toward gathering St. Jerome's Life, both because he wrote several Letters to him, and because he not rarely praises him in his other Works. There are added in their Letters St. Paulinus, Theophilus of Alexandria, St. Innocent the Pope, Sulpicius Severus in the Dialogues, St. Prosper in his Chronicle, and several others contemporary or nearly so, of whom mention will be made in their places. Nor will it be permissible to pass over the writings of Rufinus against St. Jerome, printed with the Hieronymian works, that from them it may more clearly appear how bitterly and at the same time how frivolously he inveighed against St. Jerome, and how great a necessity of answering he imposed upon St. Jerome. And I shall constantly use the latest Verona edition of St. Jerome's Works, divided into ten volumes; yet I shall consult and praise three others which I have at hand, where it shall seem worth the trouble.

[11] Three plainly insipid writings concerning St. Jerome were once circulated, Three writings concerning St. Jerome are spurious, which at length by the common consent of the learned were utterly rejected as supposititious offspring. Yet John Martianay published them in vol. 5 of St. Jerome's Works among the supposititious pieces, col. 449 and following, and prefixed a brief censure to each. The first of those writings was published under the name of St. Eusebius of Cremona, who was St. Jerome's disciple, or at least a familiar, as though it were a Letter of Eusebius written to Damasus bishop of Porto: On the death of St. Jerome. The second falsely bears St. Augustine's name, and is given as a Letter of St. Augustine bishop of Hippo to Cyril bishop of Jerusalem, on the magnificent deeds of blessed Jerome. The third was forged under the name of Cyril bishop of Jerusalem, on the miracles of Jerome, to holy Augustine bishop of Hippo. We have these same writings printed in the fifteenth century or at the beginning of the sixteenth, but neither the year nor the place of printing was added. We also have copies of them from various codices, sent to our Elders, and I see that nearly the same are inserted in one of our codices, with a beginning, however, prefixed from some other Life. But all those things are utterly useless, and it will be enough to instruct readers to beware of those fraudulent wares: which the recent biographer, to be mentioned below, did not sufficiently do.

[12] The most eminent Baronius at the year 420 num. 43 declares his indignation against impostors of that kind, as Baronius has already observed, and judges that there were three different ones: but from the similarity of style it becomes more probable that the same man wished under three different names to mock the simplicity of readers. Indeed, as I think, he says, just as an Asian priest once did, who out of love for Paul, as we said from Tertullian, forged the Journeys of Paul and Thecla, so these men too out of love for Jerome have invented very many things; themselves indeed worthy that they should be subjected by the Church to the same sentence and penalty which that man was then justly compelled to undergo. For the candor of ecclesiastical truth has always turned away from, and the modesty of Christian simplicity has shuddered at, everything feigned, and has rejected everything which it perceived to be invented: and sincere faith has utterly execrated, and always pursued with sharp hatred, and restrained with severe discipline, every falsehood together with its author. Then he observes that those supposititious Lives were probably forged because none was extant in writing; and thus he continues: Wherefore different men, according to the diversity of their wit, devised different inventions, when they wrote Letters under the name either of Eusebius, or of Augustine, or of Cyril bishop of Jerusalem, in which they might set down deeds invented and devised according to each one's own mind. And lest there should be any place for doubting, they introduced them

as persons whom they themselves, though erring, thought to have lived in those times. But by these very things they were detected as liars and impostors, by which they strove to seem truthful. For who (I pray you), hearing the name of Cyril bishop of Jerusalem referred to these times, whom it is established by St. Jerome's own assertion to have died thirty years before, would not straightway in indignation shake them off? So Baronius.

[13] they seem to be of the same impostor, And that argument which he draws from the age of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, who died more than thirty years before St. Jerome, not only shows that the Letter forged under his name is lying, but also the Letter falsely ascribed to St. Augustine, since this is read as addressed to the same Cyril, and finally the Letter of the pretended Eusebius to Damasus, in which St. Jerome's death is feigned to have been revealed to St. Cyril as he prayed in his cell. From that anachronism of more than thirty years, which has place equally in all of them, it becomes most likely that it was the same play-actor who wished to represent the persons of Eusebius, Augustine and Cyril. For although he invented some things under the name of Eusebius, others under the name of Augustine, others again under the name of Cyril, in all of them he makes Cyril survive Jerome, so that this most shameful anachronism, into which no one even moderately acquainted with St. Jerome's deeds and with the history of that time could easily fall, leaves scarcely any doubt that it is one and the same impostor who assumed three persons in order to mock an unlearned posterity. The style, everywhere the same, abundantly confirms this conjecture, as Martianay already saw and observed, who also attributes other supposititious little Works to him. Before the Letter of the pretended Eusebius he expresses his censure in these words: The same fluency, the same erudition, the same charm of speech. That is ridiculous, that the man could not vary the figure of his diction even a little. He puts the same shoe, as they say, on every foot. With this craftsman all use the same character: Jerome, Augustine, Cyril, Eusebius, and Ambrose: with this man, I think, Tully himself would stammer, etc. The same he observes before the Letter attributed to Augustine, in these words: This play-actor of ours has changed the person, but could not change the voice and gesture. Finally, before the writing of pseudo-Cyril on the Miracles: The same style here too, the same heart, the same madness: he is always like himself, under whatever title the actor of this play comes forth in disguise.

[14] Baronius also pointed out some other errors in the said Letters, who mixed with them many errors and open falsehoods, namely that in them the Saint is said to have fled from Rome in a woman's dress, that he is said to have set out from the City to Constantinople, that he is asserted to have known also the languages of the Chaldeans, Persians and Medes, whereas he perhaps understood the first in some fashion, but not the other two; that he is affirmed to have preserved his virginity unstained at all times, whereas Jerome himself confesses the contrary; that the impostor by his own ignorance makes Jerome himself a monothelite heretic; that he lays down that Silvanus was archbishop of Nazareth, whereas it happened very long afterward that Nazareth was an episcopal church. And he adds: Who therefore would bear such impostures with an even mind? To these could be added very many other errors, nor could it be proved with difficulty that everything in that whole medley of writings was so improbably invented that plainly nothing is found in them worthy of any credit, unless it becomes known from other writings. Prudently therefore does the aforesaid Martianay admonish: Fabrications of this kind are to be rejected by Christians. Prudently he calls the man a pettifogger, born for nothing but to waste paper.

[15] I should have indicated these things in fewer words, had not in our times also a certain writer of an Italian Life of St. Jerome corrupted and foully contaminated his whole Work with those insipid fictions. so that a recent writer wrongly wished to draw from them. For that new biographer, whose little Work was printed at Venice in the year 1746, believed that he had done enough for his duty in that he confessed in book 1 chap. XI that the Letters which were forged under their names are neither Augustine's nor Cyril's; and even so he wished to insert into his little Work the fictitious visions and very many equally fictitious miracles. The reason for acting thus is frivolous, namely that from the falsity of the title or of the persons to whom those Letters are attributed there does not follow the falsity of the things which are narrated in them. This indeed is true if someone wished to use a fictitious name so as not to make his true name manifest to the world. But if someone falsely claims to be St. Cyril, St. Augustine, St. Eusebius, and feigns that he saw everything, or learned it partly from eyewitnesses, partly from others most worthy of credit, which he writes in disguise, how will he not be guilty of manifold falsehood? But if he is openly a liar, who can prudently believe him, especially if he has cast upon paper many things defiled with open errors, and all of them expressed in an improbable manner, as that lying play-actor did who wished to act the persons of Eusebius, Augustine and Cyril? Moreover Baronius not only censured those Letters as works of a false name; but he calls them falsehoods to be hissed off, and says they were thrust in by the unskilled and by impostors; and that they are altogether such as the candor of ecclesiastical truth has always turned away from … such as the modesty of Christian simplicity has always shuddered at, such as sincere faith has always execrated. Concerning the time at which those fictions first appeared I shall say more below.

[16] A certain Life of St. Jerome, older, as it seems, than all the rest, The Life of St. Jerome, which Mabillon believed was written by Gennadius, Mabillon first published in vol. 4 of the Analecta, where at p. 193 he writes the following about it: The above Life of Jerome, which was written by a most ancient author, first offered itself to us in two very old codices, one of Luxeuil, the other of Saint-Gall. And afterward we found the same in certain royal codices. It were to be wished that the author had descended more to the particular deeds of so great a Doctor. But what ancient times have brought, it is enough for us to have reaped. We reported a brief eulogy of Jerome in vol. 2 of the Analecta from Gennadius, whom we judge to be the author of this Life, as also of the abridgment. Martianay reprinted it in vol. 5 in the first place from three other manuscripts, collated with Mabillon's two, and after the Life he gave variant readings. We have the same Life in two of our own manuscript codices, one very old, the other likewise on parchment, but less ancient. And what Mabillon conjectures about Gennadius as the author does not displease Martianay, but he says that it seems likely to him, both because of the character of the style, and because of the silence in the case of Rufinus of Aquileia, whom Gennadius favored more earnestly.

[17] it is defiled with many errors, But little favor is given to this conjecture by what he rightly observes about the author's errors, in these words: Whoever moreover was the author of this Life, he was little exercised in Hieronymian history and Works: nor were it to have been wished that he had descended to certain particular deeds of Jerome, because he teems with very many errors of chronology and history; as when he says that Jerome was ordained priest at Rome at twenty-nine years of age. That both of these are false no one is ignorant who has more accurately learned the affairs and Works of Jerome. These things, I say, said about the errors inserted into the said Life leave the opinion about Gennadius as the author not sufficiently probable, especially since there are added other errors also into which it can with difficulty be believed that Gennadius fell. For Gennadius flourished in the same century in which St. Jerome died, nor did he lack sufficient learning for relating the Life of any Saint much better. For the author of the Life errs not only when he says that Jerome was ordained priest at Rome, and when he says he was ordained at the age of twenty-nine years; but he errs a third time when he brings him, departing from Rome, to Constantinople, whereas from Jerome himself he could have learned the contrary. He errs a fourth time when, after all the aforesaid, he sends Jerome to the desert places and detains him in them for four years: for these things had been done long before. He errs a fifth time when he brings in an intercourse between Jerome living at Bethlehem and St. Damasus, who had died before Jerome departed from Rome into Palestine. He errs a sixth time when he attributes to Jerome some little Works never written by him. He errs a seventh time when he seems to attribute fifty-six years to his dwelling at Bethlehem, whereas he dwelt there only about thirty-four years.

[18] nor does it seem to be Gennadius', There are added other things which will be examined in the course of this work: for I wished only to enumerate the certain errors. And yet it is not credible that Gennadius, nearly contemporary with Jerome, and the writer of many books, who without doubt had read many of St. Jerome's little Works, fell into so many and so gross errors. And what Martianay says about the style cannot be approved by me: for Gennadius' style is much better and purer than is the style of the said biographer, who from time to time mixes into the Life some things hardly Latin, and everywhere brings forth speech less elegant than is Gennadius' diction. The Life is also too meager to seem worthy of a nearly contemporary author. Moreover Gennadius wrote no Life, so far as we know; and in the Catalogue of writers chap. 17 he clearly declares that he stood on Rufinus' side against Jerome, so that by this reason alone it becomes altogether incredible that the said Life of St. Jerome was written by Gennadius. Wherefore, since no codex attributes it to Gennadius, I scarcely grasp whence the learned Mabillon was led into that opinion. For it appears to me altogether improbable, since it lacks all testimony, and the countless defects of the said Life suggest a later author, or at least one less learned than Gennadius was. Nevertheless I judge that this is the first Life of St. Jerome, and was written either in the sixth century or later. Some authority may be attributed to the said Life in those things which are credible, when a greater authority does not stand in the way. Yet I do not think I should be doing anything worth the trouble if I reprinted it for the very few things it contains: for these can easily be inserted into the Commentary and examined in their places.

[19] Another doubt again arises concerning the eulogy of St. Jerome Likewise another eulogy of Jerome does not seem to be Gennadius'. which Mabillon published in vol. 2 of the Analecta from a Corbie codex, in which it is the first chapter of the Catalogue of illustrious men which Gennadius compiled after St. Jerome. Tillemont in vol. 12, Note 1 on St. Jerome, does not judge that eulogy to be Gennadius', and brings various reasons for his opinion. Vallarsi in the Verona edition gave Gennadius' Catalogue in vol. 2 col. 951, and Jerome's eulogy in distinct type. He alleges his reason in the Annotations in these words: It was very nearly the case that I cut away entirely that whole little chapter about Jerome which Martianay and Fabricius prefix to Gennadius' Catalogue. Certainly it did not come from Gennadius' Catalogue, nor is it found in any manuscripts, nor has it befallen us to find it; if you except the single Corbie one, which the Benedictine fathers, Mabillon and Martianay, report to be written in Merovingian letters, as they pleased to call them; and another, Martinianus' copy, from which a hundred and fifty years ago Suffridus Petri read it: who, however, using better counsel, not as though

Gennadius' first little chapter, but presented it in a Letter to the reader, or Prologue. For the rest, it is neither found in other published books, nor was it known to ancient writers, nor read by Trithemius himself. We separate it by italic type from the Work itself, intending to examine elsewhere what fables it relates. I cannot but agree with Tillemont and Vallarsi that that eulogy by no means seems to be Gennadius', both because it is written in a style even worse than the Life just now denied to him, and because it contains various errors, and because it does not enumerate Jerome's writings after Gennadius' manner, but says only some things about them in general, and these no less about the writings enumerated by Jerome himself than about later ones, nay speaks almost of these alone, so that Tillemont rightly says that in that eulogy are found all the things which Gennadius ought to have omitted, and all the things which he ought to have recounted are omitted.

[20] Another Life of St. Jerome Martianay published in vol. 5 col. 508, Another Life published by Martianay, as being of an uncertain author, and not sufficiently answering to the merits of our holy Doctor. We have the same Life in three of our manuscript codices, and in another, separately, the fable inserted into the said Life about the lion healed by St. Jerome. We have also a copy of the same Life from a Trier codex. Baronius saw that Life: for at the year 420 num. 28 he refutes some errors inserted into it. But he did not know the author, though he pointed him out doubtfully from Peter the Deacon, who in his little Work on the Illustrious men of Monte Cassino chap. 4 has it thus: Sebastian, a monk of Blessed Benedict, describing the Life of Jerome the excellent doctor, delivered it to be read in the churches: in which he shows most clearly enough what his training was from boyhood, what his study in youth, what his knowledge in old age. John Baptist Marus, who published at Rome the aforesaid little Work of Peter the Deacon with Annotations, observes in these from Wion and Vossius that the Life written by Sebastian does not seem to be that of St. Jerome doctor of the Church, but that of St. Jerome a disciple of St. Benedict. But we do not know that holy Jerome, disciple of St. Benedict; nor do we grasp for what reason he would have been honored with the title of excellent doctor, so that that annotation becomes improbable.

[21] it has as its author Sebastian, a monk of Monte Cassino, Moreover every doubt about the author of that Life is removed by Erasmus Gattola in the History of the abbey of Monte Cassino, where in the first Benedictine Century, which he extends to the year 600 of the Christian era, at p. 12 he writes thus: There also flourished Sebastian (in that century, as he judges), a disciple of St. Benedict, author of the Life of St. Jerome doctor of the Church, as is established from the manuscript codices of our library, marked num. 147 and 148, which is also found in the manuscripts of Subiaco and Rieti; so that hence you may see that the most learned John Gerard Vossius was deceived in denying that Life to Sebastian, book 3 on the Latin Historians chap. 3, when he asserts that the Life of St. Jerome, a pupil of St. Benedict, was consigned to writing by him. And presently: The Life begins: I do not doubt that most people know the illustrious men, etc. This is plainly the beginning in Martianay, as also in our manuscripts, and very many other things which Gattola recites are found in them, so that now every doubt about the author of that Life seems removed. But whether Sebastian flourished before the year 600, as Gattola fixes his age, does not seem equally certain. For the order of Peter the Deacon indeed suggests it; but his authority does not make the matter altogether certain. Yet it matters little whether Sebastian was of the sixth century or later; since at least he was too far removed from St. Jerome's age to have been able to have other documents than the writings of the holy Doctor or of others about his deeds.

[22] but because of the errors inserted into it, it is not to be reprinted. And so neither does this Life seem to be worth reprinting, since it is stained with even more errors than the preceding one. Some errors the aforesaid Baronius has already brought forward, namely that St. Jerome is said to have been ordained priest at Rome, and indeed a Cardinal, as the author adds; that he is asserted to have preserved his virginity; that he wrote many things or corrected the sacred Scriptures under Pope Liberius, whereas these things were done under Damasus; that the author calls Julian, St. Augustine's adversary, a Manichee, whereas he was a Pelagian, opposed to the Manichees; and finally that he relates at length the fable about the lion cured by St. Jerome, which Baronius observes is related in the Spiritual Meadow concerning St. Gerasimus the abbot. The whole matter, which was wrongly transferred to Jerome by the writer's error, will be examined toward the end of this Commentary. I find also other errors, chiefly chronological, and these partly adopted from the first Life, in the same Life: but what has been cited suffices for the prudent reader to see that it is with good reason not reprinted by us.

[23] A third Life composed from the Saint's Writings: but stained with gross errors. Another Life of St. Jerome again Martianay published in vol. 5 col. XI, as composed from the writings of St. Jerome, and likewise from the writings of SS. Augustine, Damasus, Gregory, Gelasius and others. The same is contained in one of our codices, but that a less ancient one. The Life itself is not ancient, nor can it have any merit except from the diligence and criticism of its author. But his diligence is certainly greater than that of the preceding ones, since he gathered much more from the Works of St. Jerome and of other ancients. But his criticism is not accurate enough, since he adopted many errors from the earlier Lives, and added some of his own. From others he makes the priest a Cardinal, and that under Pope Liberius: which is a double error. A third and that a manifold one he himself adds, when he makes Pope Liberius an Arian and, with the emperor Constantius, a persecutor of the Church, and St. Jerome with St. Paula opposing themselves to them: for Paula was a girl when Constantius died, while Jerome as a youth was giving his attention to Grammar. He adds fourthly the empty fiction that St. Jerome's enemies placed a woman's garment near his bed. Finally, to be brief, the whole chronological order is disturbed, and almost nothing is placed in its own position, and not even the stale fable of the lion is passed over. Wherefore, although the author reports many things about St. Jerome's Works and cites many passages of his, yet, since he lacks order and chronology, he cannot profit toward acquiring a clear understanding of the Saint's deeds. To this writer, who perhaps wrote in the twelfth or thirteenth century, I judge that the supposititious Letters published under the names of Eusebius, Augustine and Cyril were not yet known, since he makes no mention of them.

[24] But in the fourteenth century a lengthy Work about St. Jerome was written by Joannes Andreae, The lengthy Work of Joannes Andreae, in which the preceding fables are adopted. the most celebrated jurist of Bologna, in whom I find those supposititious wares adopted as genuine. We have the Work of Joannes Andreae in manuscript in a moderately thick codex, which it fills entirely. We have the same printed at Basel, while Leo X held the Pontificate and Maximilian I ruled, that is, in the year 1514, as is said at the end. The title prefixed to the printed Work is this: The Hieronymianus, touching upon the culled flowers of the life, death, prodigies, sayings and writings of the divine Jerome (as the following Prologue indicates), divided principally into four parts, most studiously compiled by the most famous doctor of decrees, D. Joannes Andreae. The author, most well known by his juridical writings, flourished in the fourteenth century, and died at Bologna in the year 1348, and published his Work not many years before his death, as I shall afterward prove. He himself gives his name in the Prologue; and hands down the division of the Work into four parts, namely he directs the first part to the increasing of St. Jerome's cult, especially among the Italians; in the second part he says he will give the Saint's deeds, death and miracles, in the third the eulogies of illustrious men, and in the fourth finally canons drawn from the writings of St. Jerome. The second part would be conducive to our purpose, if Joannes Andreae had possessed historical criticism as well as the knowledge of the laws. But that distinguished jurist adopts almost all the faults of the preceding Lives, adds some errors from Vincent of Beauvais, James of Voragine and others, and finally inserts into his work all the fables forged under the venerable names of Eusebius, Augustine and Cyril, so that it seems superfluous to say more about his lengthy Work. Yet it will be useful to us for the Saint's posthumous glory, since he brings forward many things done in his own time.

[25] Nor is it necessary to observe many things about Vincent of Beauvais and James of Voragine just mentioned. [Other Writers: in the fourteenth century the Letters of Cyril and the others were first brought forward,] The first gathered many moral precepts from St. Jerome's writings; of the Saint's deeds he gave fewer, and those defiled with errors, such as James of Voragine also has. Nevertheless among these writers of the thirteenth century I do not yet find the fables of the pretended Eusebius, Augustine and Cyril; so that these seem to have been brought forward in the later thirteenth or the early fourteenth century: for the aforesaid writers would not have avoided such things, so far as one may gather from their writings. Peter Calo, of the Order of Preachers, did not abstain from them, as is established from the copy which I have at hand. And the aforesaid Calo wrote about the beginning of the fourteenth century; and in the same century after its middle Peter de Natalibus, to whom Calo's Work was a guiding light, wrote a Catalogue of the Saints, in which he handed down a Life of St. Jerome more compendious than accurate, adopting most of the errors of his predecessors and the fables of the forged Letters. From what has been said it is gathered that from nearly the beginning of the fourteenth century those fabulous Letters began to be published and praised, and in the same century I judge that our codex was written, in which I find them subjoined after the beginning of another Life. And since they appear in none of our older codices, nor do they seem to have been known to Vincent of Beauvais or to James of Voragine or to any other, so far as I have been able to find, before Peter Calo, I not undeservedly suspect that the said Letters were not commonly known before the thirteenth century was nearly ended. Yet perhaps they were forged much earlier, since they could have been long concealed, so that afterward they might appear as ancient.

[26] which a recent writer defends against Baronius, And these things about the lesser antiquity of those inventions I have believed should be observed, because I cannot yet say what Tillemont said already in his own time, that those Letters are utterly abandoned by all who are in any degree skilled in history, as being full of fables, falsity and ignorance. But this indeed will be so in France, I think; but elsewhere I still find defenders of those fables. In the year 1752 there appeared a lengthy Latin Work about St. Jerome, divided into two parts, of which the first presents a very long Dissertation on the Native soil of St. Jerome, the second the Life of that same holy Doctor. The author is the very reverend father Joseph Bedekovich, definitor general of the Order of the Brothers Hermits of St. Paul the first hermit. This new writer in the Life chap. 25 undertook to defend those Letters against Baronius, Because, he says, several writers of the gravest note, such as Peter de Natalibus in the Catalogue of the Saints, Marcus Marulus

in the Christian Palestra, have used these Letters. And presently he says that he will use those Letters, which, he says, the authority of Baronius alone does not seem sufficiently to annul by its own force. This is true, if the authority of Baronius alone be regarded; but the reasons alleged by Baronius, to which many others can be added, abundantly show that the Letters are lying. Meanwhile the aforesaid writer attempted to answer only one argument of Baronius, the rest being passed over, namely the argument about Cyril having died thirty years before Jerome. He thinks, first, that the name of Cyril could have been written for the name of Praylius; secondly, that the Letter is perhaps Cyril of Alexandria's; thirdly, that at least the Letter of Eusebius can be admitted, and indeed that Cyril of Jerusalem was perhaps alive when Jerome died. Finally he sets against Baronius Marcus Marulus and Laurentius Beyerling, as he writes, and believes them no less celebrated than Baronius.

[27] but they are such that they can by no means be defended. I wish nothing to be taken from the aforesaid writers, but I judge that I do them no injury if I have believed Baronius, who examined the said Letters, or rather Baronius' reasons, more than any others who without any examination have cited something from them. But what that most recent writer devised about the name of Praylius perhaps put for Cyril's, or about Cyril of Alexandria, is improbable: for the name of Cyril recurs so often in all three Letters, and so openly is he feigned to be the Jerusalemite, not only by the words but also by the very circumstances of the matters, that whoever weighs them with a critical eye can find in those letters neither a name corrupted by copyists nor Cyril of Alexandria. Moreover, if the religious author had considered that the style of all those Letters is that of a Latin man, whereas both Cyril and Praylius were probably not acquainted with the Latin tongue; that in the Letter attributed to St. Augustine the style of that holy doctor is not recognized; but that the same method of writing is found in all three; if he had added the open errors and the other incredible things asserted in them, and finally the silence of many centuries about them, he would, I think, have abstained from defending Letters which St. Jerome himself, were he living, would censure sharply. But I have already said more about these things than those stale inventions deserve, which by no wit, by no eloquence could be made probable again.

[28] I come to the moderns, who have attempted to relate the excellent deeds of St. Jerome from his own writings The Life written by Erasmus, and from other ancient documents, the little fables being passed over. Of these the first who became known to me was Erasmus, who gathered more about St. Jerome's deeds than any of his predecessors, and related them in a better order. Of St. Jerome's learning and eloquence Erasmus thought so magnificently that he believed he should be preferred to absolutely all the holy Fathers, both Latin and Greek. Of the same Doctor's character he passed a far juster judgment, when he asserted that nothing was ever more humane or more courteous than he, than certain more recent writers who seem to have considered Jerome only from a few little Works in which he used a sharper style: but that this sharpness of style was not without just reasons Erasmus rightly observed, and we shall prove it in its places. Nevertheless that Life is not free from some errors, both historical and chronological; nor is this to be wondered at, since Erasmus wrote before chronology and history had been brought by the study of many to that perfection to which they afterward came, even though even at this time many things remain to be corrected.

[29] In the same sixteenth century in which Erasmus had written the Life of St. Jerome another by Marianus Victorius. and had published his Works, another edition of the Works was prepared by Marianus Victorius bishop of Rieti, and he prefixed to it another Life of St. Jerome, carefully composed. This Baronius preferred at the year 420 num. 50, and persuades readers not to seek the deeds of St. Jerome from any other source; with those things corrected, however, he says, which our Annals have above suggested to you as rightly to be corrected. I doubted for a while whether I should insert into our Work the said Life of Jerome, which in my judgment also is to be preferred to all the rest. But since all the Saint's deeds must be sought abundantly from the same sources from which Erasmus and Victorius drew, I believed it superfluous to reprint either Life.

[30] After Erasmus and Victorius, Baronius gathered much about the deeds of St. Jerome, Many things about Jerome examined by Baronius and Tillemont. and, having examined them, inserted them into his Annals. The most learned Cardinal seems to have had a plainly just opinion about Jerome's sanctity and about Rufinus' machinations (as did Erasmus and Victorius also), and to have rightly corrected not a few of their errors. He also examined far more about St. Jerome than the aforesaid biographers related, so that he will be of use to us in many things. Nevertheless, if in the course of this work anything in the chronology or in other opinions of that most eminent man shall seem to need correcting, we shall do it with our accustomed freedom, as Baronius himself did concerning others. After Baronius many have examined St. Jerome's deeds, some at greater length, some more briefly, some all of them, others only a few, each according to his own plan. It would be long to weave a catalogue of them all, and still more to set forth how great are the merits or the faults of each in these matters. Of the French I shall weigh almost only Tillemont, who everywhere employed greater diligence in gathering and examining the deeds of illustrious men, or at least inquires into more things in detail than most others; and he always has many followers. For these reasons we are wont to cite Tillemont more frequently than the rest, and, where need is, to correct him; as will again be done in this Commentary, because he has shown himself more unfair to St. Jerome than is just, and seems to defend and praise Rufinus with frivolous reasons in order to depress Jerome: on which occasion he has fallen into very many errors, to be made manifest in the course of this work.

[31] The Life written by Martianay, another by Dolci. At nearly the same time the Life of St. Jerome was written in French by John Martianay, a French Benedictine, who also saw to the printing of a new edition of St. Jerome's Works in five volumes. This Life, printed at Paris in the year 1706, is far better than Tillemont's collection is, because the learned author had conceived a just idea of St. Jerome's character and virtues, such as Erasmus, Victorius and Baronius had, and impresses such upon his readers; but Tillemont presented a deformed picture, and not rarely attempted to defend that deformity of his picture by adopting Rufinus' calumnies; so that I do not hesitate to declare that his whole collection about Jerome seems utterly corrupted by that grave error. In the year 1750 there appeared again another Life of St. Jerome, written in the Latin tongue, whose title is The Greatest Jerome the writer of his own Life, or a Commentary on the character, learning, and deeds of the divine Jerome… The author, Sebastian Dolci, of the Order of Minors of St. Francis, a native of Ragusa, strove to examine diligently the deeds of St. Jerome and to recall them to chronological order: he had a just opinion of St. Jerome's character, and undertook not only to relate but also to prove his deeds. Him therefore I shall consult everywhere, and shall frequently examine his chronological opinions, in which he not rarely departs from his predecessors.

[32] several other Lives, of almost no use to us. There remain to be briefly indicated some Lives of St. Jerome, of which our use will be smaller. In the year 1595 there was printed at Madrid a very lengthy Spanish Life of St. Jerome, whose author is Joseph de Sigüenza, a Religious of the Hieronymite Order in Spain. This writer is most attentive to everything which seems to increase St. Jerome's praise, but from time to time against the truth, as when he contends that virginity was perpetually preserved by Jerome, when he attributes the Cardinalitial dignity to him, when he exaggerates some deeds beyond the truth, when he defends the fable of the healed Lion. For these reasons, and above all because the writer nowhere cites the very words of the ancient writers, I judge that Life utterly useless for our purpose. Nor shall I say more about the Italian Life already mentioned, which Joseph Renato published in the year 1746, because I have already given notice that many fabulous things from the supposititious Letters have been inserted into it. By the same bad counsel the Latin Life is likewise corrupted, which I have already noted was printed in the year 1752; nor does it please me to add more about it here. Finally in the year 1752 Joseph Swinger, doctor of sacred theology of the Society of Jesus, published an Apology of St. Jerome against Jean Le Clerc, the most notorious detractor of the holy Fathers. That Apology is written most modestly, and alleges suitable reasons by which the sharpness, whatever it be, of Jerome's style can not only be excused but even approved. I shall praise several writers where the passage shall require it.

§ III. The native land of St. Jerome is investigated.

The Saint born at Stridon on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia: Of his father and his native land Jerome in the book on Illustrious men chap. 135 speaks thus: Jerome, born of his father Eusebius, of the town of Stridon, which, overthrown by the Goths, was once the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia. This passage has exercised the wits of many and has given birth to various opinions, since some have assigned Stridon to Istria, others to Dalmatia, others to Pannonia. Baudrand in his Geographical Lexicon judges that Stridon is not distinguished from Sidrona, which Ptolemy called a city of Liburnia, and that it was toward the borders of Pannonia taken in a wide sense in St. Jerome's time. He adds the following: Afterward it was to some extent restored, and is now called Strigoum by the inhabitants, in Dalmatia, as Marcus of Spalato writes in his Dissertation, which is reported in the History of John Lucius on the Kingdom of Dalmatia, where he also refutes the opinion of Blondus, who had written that Stridon, St. Jerome's native place, is in Istria, and is now called Sdrigna. Cellarius in his ancient Geography vol. 1 p. 359 doubts whether Ptolemy's Sidrona can be held for the Stridon that was St. Jerome's native land. Tillemont in Note 2 judges that Stridon was on the borders of Dalmatia and Pannonia in such a way that, according to the varying extension of the provinces, it was sometimes reckoned to Pannonia, sometimes to Dalmatia. Among the bishops of the council of Nicæa, in vol. 2 of the Councils col. 54, there is read as a subscriber Domnus of Stridon, assigned to Pannonia, and distinguished from the bishops of Dalmatia who precede, as Tillemont has already observed.

[34] To these some have added open errors, and so have made the inquiry far more difficult. but Blondus wrongly assigns Stridon to Istria, First Blondus erred, who wished to include Stridon in Istria, since it is certain that the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia was not in Istria. And yet Stridon was once the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia. It cannot therefore be in Istria, which was always a notable distance away from the bounds of Pannonia. John Baptist Goyneus wrote a little Work on the Situation of Istria, published in the Thesaurus of the antiquities of Italy vol. 6, part 4, in which at chap. 4 he grows angry with wonderful sharpness of words against those who deny that Jerome is to be assigned to Istria. But with one solid reason, if he had been able to bring it forward, he would have accomplished more for his Italians against the barbarians, as he calls them, than with six hundred insults. For all will rightly despise those empty angers unsupported by reasons, and will receive them with a laughter by no means barbarous. Wherefore he would have done better

Goyneus, if he had taught us what sort of place Sdringa now is, which Blondus calls a little town. He would have inquired more rightly how much credit that assertion of Blondus deserves: But there is to be seen at Sdrigna, or Stridon, the sepulcher of the aforesaid Eusebius, father of St. Jerome, well known both by a report handed down through successions of ages, and by letters carved on a leaden plate found in it, as they say.

[35] nor is Jerome rightly said to have been born in Istria. Goyneus, living in Istria, could and ought to have inquired about the truth of these things. But he says coldly, If those things are true which Blondus hands down about the monument of Eusebius his father. For by what reason shall we, who are far distant, believe them true, when he doubts of their truth? Certainly the authority of Blondus alone does not make that matter certain. Moreover, if in Blondus' time some monument had indeed been shown as the sepulcher of St. Jerome's father, how should we not suspect that that opinion was rather a popular tradition, which Blondus had adopted, than a well-ascertained truth? Even if we knew for certain that the sepulcher of a certain Eusebius had been in Istria, that would profit little toward claiming St. Jerome's birth for it against the clear testimony of the Saint himself. The Saint testifies that he was born on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia, not in Italy, not in Istria. And he was ignorant neither of Italy nor of Istria, being most skilled in geography. In vain therefore did Blondus, in order to make so great a Man plainly Italian, as he confesses, seek his father's sepulcher in Istria. For if the sepulcher of some Eusebius was there, it was probably of another Eusebius.

[36] Neither was he born in present-day Dalmatia. No more is St. Jerome's native land to be sought in present-day Dalmatia, circumscribed by far narrower bounds than was the Dalmatia of old, which extended as far as the borders of Pannonia, as his own words make manifest. Wherefore those plainly erred who sought St. Jerome's native land near Scardona or near Salona on the Adriatic sea. Yet it does not please me to investigate more laboriously by what limits Dalmatia was once circumscribed, since only the borders of Dalmatia and Pannonia, if they can be found, pertain to our purpose. But Pannonia, which had on the North the Danube known to all, on the West Noricum, on the East Mysia, on the South Dalmatia, is extended by some farther to the South, by others less far. Cellarius in his ancient Geography extends Pannonia to the South beyond the Save, and thus includes in it part of present-day Bosnia and Croatia. Others seem to extend Pannonia only as far as the Save, and thus assign present-day Slavonia to Pannonia.

[37] The limits of Pannonia and Dalmatia are fixed in different ways: Finally some moderns contend that Pannonia in St. Jerome's time was not extended to the South beyond the river Drave, so as to exclude present-day Slavonia entirely and assign it to Dalmatia. The first opinion, which extends Pannonia beyond the Save toward the mountains of Dalmatia and Liburnia, does not seem proved by certain arguments, even though it is otherwise that of learned geographers. The second, which assigns the whole of present-day Slavonia, which was at one time called Savia, to ancient Pannonia, is altogether certain for some centuries; but it does not become equally manifest that that region which lies between the Save, the Drave and the Danube was always reckoned to Pannonia. Hence arose the third opinion, whose patrons contend that Pannonia was at one time bounded on the South by the Drave, but that Dalmatia taken in a wide sense extended as far as the Drave, and below the confluence of the Drave and the Danube as far as the Danube.

[38] these can suit Ptolemy's Sidrona in Liburnia, The first and second of the opinions reported somewhat favor the view of those who judge that St. Jerome's native land was that city which Ptolemy, treating of Liburnia, enumerates among the inland places of Liburnia, and calls Sidrona. For St. Jerome, in placing his native land on the borders of Pannonia and Dalmatia, seems under Dalmatia taken in a wide sense to comprehend Liburnia, and for that reason a city of inland Liburnia could be on the borders of Pannonia. Nevertheless that matter remains altogether uncertain, since the difference between the names Stridon and Sidrona is considerable enough; and since Ptolemy does not say that Sidrona was on the border of Pannonia, but sets it some distance away from the limits. Moreover no one knows how to state with certainty the present-day name of Sidrona: or at least this does not favor that opinion: for by some it is now called Blanda, by others Belas.

[39] Moreover I do not see any tradition or memory alleged about Jerome having been born in those places. The mere similarity of name, but that opinion is plainly uncertain. and that not great, is brought forward for establishing Sidrona as St. Jerome's native land. From such a similarity of name others wished to make Stridon out of Scardona, against Jerome's open declaration, since Scardona was far distant from the bounds of Pannonia. Wherefore it must be said that that opinion about Sidrona is utterly uncertain; even though it could be true according to geography, if Pannonia was by others extended farther to the South beyond the Save than Ptolemy extends it; for thus it could have been on the border of Pannonia; or if Sidrona was nearer the Save than it is placed in Ptolemy's map. I do not wonder therefore that geographers inclined to that opinion, so as to believe, or at least to suspect, that Stridon is not to be distinguished from Sidrona; nor yet is the foundation of that opinion solid.

[40] Another place, for some centuries at least, is assigned, which not a few writers, Others believe St. Jerome's native land to be Stridova, and especially Hungarians, would have to be St. Jerome's native land. It is situated near the borders of three provinces, namely Croatia, Styria and Hungary, between the rivers Drave and Mur, which meet a little lower down. The town which is now in that place is called Stridova, Strigova, or also Stridovo, Strigovo, and Strigna, according to the various dialects of the neighboring peoples. The region is called the island, or the island of the Mur, in the Topography of Hungary rendered into Latin in the year 1718, or Muro-Dravana in Bedekovich, who wrote a volume of considerable bulk in order to make present-day Stridova agree with Stridon, and to reconcile geography with his own opinion and with that of many others who had good knowledge of the place. Others also have written about Stridova; but not without errors. Tillemont in art. 2, with others, assigns it to Styria, whereas it is in the county of Zala in Hungary, and at other times was in that of Varasdin in Croatia, and in the bishopric of Zagreb. The Muro-Dravan island, which according to all the geographical maps I have consulted is rather a peninsula, formed by the Mur and the Drave meeting lower down and by some streams discharging themselves higher up into each river about the borders of Styria, Bedekovich describes at large in chap. 50, a geographical map being also added. Then in chap. 51 he inquires by what peoples it was inhabited; and in chap. 52, what lords it had at different times. Presently in chap. 53 he strives to show that the people is Slavonic, not Hungarian, and recites various documents by which he shows that it was once in the county of Varasdin in Croatia, and testifies that the Slavonic tongue is used in the island, not the Hungarian. Then he disputes many other things also, in no way pertaining to our purpose.

[41] Concerning the town itself the aforesaid author writes thus in chap. 60: The town of Stridon, now a village on the borders of Hungary, Croatia and Styria, which in the Latin idiom is called Stridon, in the Slavonic, according to the various dialect of the surrounding people, Stridovo, Strigovo and Strigna, is situated, as we observe with our eyes, in a valley among hills planted with vines. The same author observed in chap. 44 that Stridon is scarcely half an hour's journey distant from the river Mur. Nor is it farther distant from the border of Styria according to the map which he gave. In John Baptist Homann's new map of Styria Stridova, the native land of St. Jerome doctor of the Church, is marked more toward the Drave. But Bedekovich is rather to be believed, who could delineate a small tract more exactly, than Homann, who assigns the place only on account of neighboring Styria. The town has a parish church dedicated to St. Mary Magdalen, under which are also the peoples of the neighboring villages, as the author sets forth at length. But, as he confesses, it is a small town, consisting of scarcely thirty houses, and those low, thatched with straw, yet neat, etc. The author also reasons much about the bishopric of Stridon, which becomes likely from the subscriptions of the council of Nicæa, and could have come to an end when the city was overthrown in St. Jerome's time.

[42] where a chapel to the Saint was built on a hill, And he proceeds in chap. 61 to investigate the very place of St. Jerome's birth, and confesses that it is not known from any writings of the ancients. Then he says from tradition that the Saint was born in that place on which a church was set in his honor. And the church is placed on a little hill over against the parish church. Therefore it must be inferred that St. Jerome's paternal house, in which he was born, stood on that same little hill. To prove this he cites from the Topography of Hungary the following words: Stridova, the native soil of St. Jerome, inasmuch as the church set upon a little hill in his honor is continually celebrated by many companies of pilgrims, brought thither even from more remote parts of Hungary, and by very many prodigies. He adds another witness concerning the Saint's chapel set on a small hill, from whose base a spring of healing water flows forth. Concerning the spring he himself adds: And to it there is as great a concourse of all the companies of pilgrims brought hither as there is to the church, for no other cause than that they may with devotion to St. Jerome drink of that healing water, and carry it home in small vessels, and by drinking here, and by their sick at home drinking, make them sound of their infirmities, especially — which is a marvel — of feverish ones. And since thousands upon thousands of men have testified from time immemorial that they experienced the benefit of this water, even to this day all those who come for the sake of health declare this little spring, which gushes forth as many Hieronymian graces as drops of water, to be a fountain of graces.

[43] which is said to have been built in the year 1448: To these there is added, says the author, an ancient wooden beam which in the shapes of Gothic characters presented the following words carved upon it: Here was born St. Jerome, doctor of the church. This beam was placed under the flooring of the vestibule or porch, put together of solid oaken timbers, of that same church which Frederick, count of Cilli, in the year of Christ MCDXLVIII had caused to be raised in this place in honor of St. Jerome. But whether this vestibule or porch was erected before or afterward has not come to our knowledge. Then the author discourses somewhat, that he may persuade by a likely reason that that vestibule was older than the church built in the year 1448; and he teaches that the church in the sixteenth century was given to his own order of St. Paul the hermit, and at last in our own century, when it had suffered much from earthquakes, was wholly cast down and rebuilt from the foundations. And from the ancient foundations found on this occasion he suspects that a larger church once stood there. But, passing over all these things for the sake of brevity, I only observe that the tradition about St. Jerome having been born there at least flourished from the year

1448, in which that church was built. But from the letters of Pope Nicholas V, which the aforesaid Bedekovich recites in chap. 44, it is gathered that the said tradition was already old in the year 1447, in which the supreme Pontiff's letters were given.

[44] but from the Pontifical letters of the year 1447 it is gathered, Wherefore I transfer hither the greater part of them: Nicholas, Bishop, servant of the servants of God, to all the faithful of Christ who shall inspect the present letters, greeting, etc. God, glorious in his Saints and rejoicing in their glorification, is the more pleasantly delighted in the veneration of blessed Jerome his confessor, in that he, as a bright burning lamp set upon a candlestick in the house of the Lord, the darkness of errors being put to flight, illuminated by his merits our kindly mother the Church more excellently than the rest. Since therefore, as we have learned, our beloved son the noble man Frederick, count of Cilli, Ortenburg and Zagorje, and ban of the kingdom of Slavonia, taking thought for his own salvation, and desiring to lay up treasure in heavenly things, on account of the singular affection of devotion which he himself and other faithful of Christ of those parts bear toward Blessed Jerome the confessor, as toward a chief star shining upon the Church, has caused the church or cure of St. Jerome of Stridon, of the diocese of Zagreb, which was once that Saint's paternal house, and in which he was nourished and brought up, to be notably built and erected from the goods entrusted to him from above, and has solemnly endowed it: we, desiring that the said church be frequented with fitting honors, and duly preserved in its structures and buildings, and that the devotion of the faithful be more amply increased, and that the faithful themselves may the more gladly flock to it for devotion's sake, and may the more readily stretch forth helping hands to its preservation, the more they shall have perceived themselves filled thereby with the gift of heavenly grace, being inclined to the supplications of the aforesaid count in this matter, trusting in the mercy of almighty God and in the authority of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, mercifully relax five years and as many quarantines of the penances enjoined upon them to all who are truly penitent and have confessed, who shall devoutly visit the aforesaid church yearly on the feast of Blessed Jerome, and shall stretch forth helping hands to its preservation, the present letters to be valid in perpetual times to come, etc.

[45] The Pontifical Letter, which I have given from the Topography of Hungary, that the tradition about Jerome being born there was already old then, because it is sprinkled with some faults in Bedekovich, is noted as given at Rome at St. Peter's in the year of the Lord's Incarnation one thousand four hundred and forty-seven, on the fourth of the Ides of November, in the first year of our Pontificate (that is, of Nicholas V). To win credit for the Letter the author there prefixes this: And this Letter was extracted in the year of Christ MDCXCVIII at Rome from the archive of the supreme Pontiff with his permission, and with the inspection and approval of the Master of the sacred palace, by the labor and industry of the Reverend Father Martin Czeles of the Society of Jesus, penitentiary there at St. Peter's, as the subscription of the most eminent Cardinal Leopold von Kollonitz, archbishop of Esztergom, with the appending of his own seal, testifies. And now from the said Letter it becomes certain that the tradition about St. Jerome being born there is very old. For if in the year 1447 the supreme Pontiff asserts this without doubt in his letters, as we hear him asserting, it is not credible that that opinion was born a little before.

[46] The Letter itself also, if it be rightly weighed, seems to suggest and that a church had been built there to the Saint long before. that the church of St. Jerome was not then built, but only notably restored: for it is not said that a new church was built and dedicated to St. Jerome, but that the church or cure, that is, the parish, of St. Jerome was notably built, erected and endowed. And the word notably does not suit the foundation of a new parish, of which it would better be said recently or newly; but rather a restoration and an increase of revenue, especially since it is called the church or cure of St. Jerome, nor is it said to have been recently dedicated to him. Wherefore I judge that the church was much more ancient; but that it was renewed by the count and increased in revenue. And so, if we regard tradition alone, Stridova seems to prevail over the other places to which St. Jerome's birth is attributed. For this view also the consent of the neighboring peoples, and indeed of Hungarian and Illyrian writers, seems to be greater than it is for any other.

[47] On the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia Wherefore it must at least briefly be inquired whether geography can be reconciled with a sufficiently proved tradition. For it cannot be denied that popular traditions of that kind, even though they be to some extent old, frequently deceive, since not rarely they have taken their beginning from a conjecture which, being accepted, passed little by little into a tradition. But in order that the said tradition be reconciled with St. Jerome's words and with sound geography, it is only necessary that it be able to be proved that that Muro-Dravan island in which Stridova is was, either in St. Jerome's time or in some other century before Jerome, on the border of Pannonia and Dalmatia. For since Jerome says of the overthrown town of Stridon, it was once the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia, those words can be expounded either of St. Jerome's time, in which it was overthrown about the year 380, or of a past time, so that the words are true whether they look to Jerome's own age or to a time several centuries past. Yet even so it will be difficult to show that the Muro-Dravan island was ever on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia, at least before St. Jerome's times or while he was living. Bedekovich has indeed discoursed very much in order to extend Dalmatia as far as the Drave; nor yet do I perceive that he has proved it for the time with which we must deal. Yet it pleases me to attempt the same more briefly, that the studious reader may be able to pass judgment on the whole matter.

[48] Stridova was not so in St. Jerome's time; but under Augustus, What we seek cannot be found in St. Jerome's time. For Sextus Rufus, who wrote his Breviary for Valentinian Augustus while Jerome was living, concerning the victories and provinces of the Roman people, in chap. 8 enumerates the provinces of Illyricum taken in a wide sense thus: Illyricum has seventeen provinces: two of the Norici, two of the Pannonias, Valeria, Savia, Dalmatia, Mœsia, two of the Dacias. And in the diocese of Macedonia there are seven: Macedonia, Thessaly, Achaia, the two Epiruses, Prævalis and Crete. There was therefore at that time Savia, which is now called Slavonia, and was once of Pannonia, as also Valeria, lying between the Pannonias and Dalmatia. Wherefore we must seek a time in which that division had not been made, and in which Dalmatia extended as far as the Drave. If at any time this happened, I judge that it must be sought altogether under the rule of Augustus: namely, when Dalmatia had been subdued and made a province of the Roman empire, I believe that there was added to the province of Dalmatia whatever in Pannonia had been subdued by the Romans, that is, the cities situated on the Save, and the whole tract between the Save and the Drave. For it is established that the Dalmatians were subdued by the Romans before the Pannonians; and that these brought help to Dalmatia against the Romans, and on that occasion lost part of their dominion, when all Dalmatia was subdued. That part therefore of Pannonia which had been occupied by the Romans seems to have gone to subdued Dalmatia, just as Liburnia was included in that province, and indeed Japydia also, which together with Dalmatia strictly so called constituted under the Romans the one province of Dalmatia.

[49] when through wars a part of Pannonia Dio Cassius in book 49 at the year 719 from the founding of the City first teaches that the Liburnian Japydes with others stirred up war against the Romans, and that Augustus himself set out against the Japydes, and was gravely wounded. And when these had been conquered, he led his army into the Pannonias, though he had never been injured by them, nor did he allege any crime. And when he had said where the Pannonians dwelt, namely by the river Ister from Noricum as far as European Mysia, neighbors of the Dalmatians, and had set forth their manners, he relates that at the city of Siscia, which was situated on the Save, Augustus was again wounded, but that Siscia was afterward captured. Thus, these having been received into Cæsar's power, the rest of Pannonia also accepted the conditions of peace. This is the Dalmatian war which, as Suetonius testifies in book 2 chap. 20, Augustus waged in person, and in which he also received wounds. But in the same year the Pannonians revolted from the Romans, and with them a rebellion of the Dalmatians arose. But, as Dio has it, the Pannonians were again received; the Dalmatians, however, were subdued with difficulty. Then he subjoins: And thereafter Dalmatia, as one which always needed arms both on its own account and because of the nearness of Pannonia (in Greek, of the Pannonians), was committed to Augustus' keeping. From these things it is gathered that at that time it was made a province of the Romans, and that there was annexed to it whatever had been subdued in Pannonia.

[50] But now, if we attend to what is recorded as related at the year 743 from the founding of the City, was added to the Dalmatia of the Romans, and likewise consider other things, we shall scarcely be able to doubt that the Dalmatian province of the Romans extended at that time almost as far as the Drave; and that the Muro-Dravan island was on the border of the province of Dalmatia and of Pannonia, which thus far was free. For when the fortified city of Siscia on the Save had been stormed by Augustus, peace was given to the Pannonians by Augustus; but without doubt after the Roman manner, so that the conquered lost a broad tract of land. Certainly Sirmium, which was situated beyond the Save, was held by a Roman garrison, as Dio testifies in book 55, when at the year 759 a new war arose between the Romans and the allied Dalmatians and Pannonians. And this war, which the two Batos, one a Dalmatian, the other a Pannonian, stirred up, continued for a whole three years, and was at last ended, the Dalmatians being partly subdued, partly pacified; and the Pannonians being brought back to peace, as may be seen at greater length in Dio. But again in the following year war broke out afresh in Dalmatia properly so called between the Romans and the Dalmatians, as Dio relates in book 56, and then at last the Dalmatians were wholly overcome.

[51] Whether the Pannonians also who dwelt between the Drave and the Danube and perhaps it was on the border of both. came at the same time into the power of the Romans, I do not find in Dio: for he does not write that even a single city beyond the Drave was occupied by the Romans. Yet various writers assert in general that Pannonia was subdued by Augustus. Among these Sextus Rufus has it thus: Bato king of the Pannonians being subdued, the Pannonias came into our dominion. Suetonius in book 2 chap. 21 also reckons Pannonia among the provinces tamed by Augustus. But in book 3 chap. 9, setting forth the deeds of Tiberius, he says only: In the Pannonian war he subdued the Breuci and the Dalmatians. But whichever is the truer, whether all the Pannonians submitted themselves to the Romans by the peace just mentioned, or a great part between the Drave and the Danube remained free, I have in some fashion assigned a notable time at which the Muro-Dravan island seems to have been on the border of the dominion of the Pannonians and of the Dalmatian province of the Romans. If anyone should be unwilling to admit this exposition, and should believe that it was not in this sense on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia

that Stridon was, but rather between Pannonia and Dalmatia strictly so called, I shall not contend pugnaciously for an uncertain opinion; but I shall gladly admit whatever opinion, provided it appear truer or more certain.

[52] Moreover that his native land was afterward most foully laid waste St. Jerome declares in vol. 6 col. 676, writing on Sophonias, in these words: For even brute animals feel the wrath of the Lord: and that, when cities are laid waste and men slain, a solitude and a scarcity of beasts also, and of birds and fishes, comes about, Jerome's native land was laid waste before the year 392, Illyricum [*] is witness, Thrace is witness, witness is the soil in which I was born, where, except for the sky and the earth and the growing brambles and the thickets of the woods, all things have perished. These things St. Jerome wrote in the year 392. And from this observation it again becomes most certain that Stridon was not in Istria, to which the Goths did not come, at least before the year 400, in which Alaric advanced toward Italy. Whether he then penetrated into Istria I do not inquire, because it does not pertain to our purpose. But if Stridon was in that place where we have taught that Stridova now is, that town will have been destroyed by the Goths after the emperor Valens had been conquered by them near Adrianople in Thrace in the year 378, and burned in his flight. For after that notable victory the Goths, when they had tried some cities in Thrace in vain and had plundered that region, spread out in a flood through the Northern provinces, which they traversed at will as far as the roots of the Julian Alps, as Ammianus testifies in book 31. And Zosimus in book 4 p. 751 looks to the same times when he says that the places of Mysia … and of Pannonia were harassed by the barbarians.

[53] which suits Stridova, not Istria. Of the same time St. Jerome speaks, yet in such a way as to include certain other preceding and subsequent devastations by other barbarians, in the Epitaph of Nepotian, or Letter 60, when he says: It is twenty years and more that between Constantinople and the Julian Alps Roman blood is daily shed. Scythia, Thrace, Macedonia, Dardania, Dacia, Thessaly [*], Achaia, the Epiruses, Dalmatia, and all the Pannonias the Goth, the Sarmatian, the Quadus, the Alan, the Huns, the Vandals, the Marcomanni lay waste, drag off and plunder. By the words and the Julian Alps Istria is again excluded, but the Muro-Dravan island is included by those words, And all the Pannonias. Wherefore neither historical nor geographical reasons can be reconciled with the opinion of those who would have St. Jerome born in Istria; but the historical ones are very well reconciled with the tradition of the inhabitants of the Muro-Dravan island; nor does geography so oppose it that that opinion cannot be held as probable. If I do not dare to call it certain, that is because from a popular tradition alone no certain argument is drawn.

* Mss. Illyricus

* al. Thessalonicaur, faultily.

§ IV. The year of Jerome's birth is investigated, and is fixed with St. Prosper about the year 331.

From Prosper and the first Life the Saint was born in the year 331: About the year of his birth writers disagree no less than about St. Jerome's native land; and this arises chiefly from the holy Doctor's own words, who frequently attributes to himself boyhood or youth when speaking of those times at which he had certainly reached a more or less mature age. St. Prosper in the Chronicle, under the consuls Bassus and Albavius, that is, in the year 331, has: Jerome is born. But the same writer at the year 420, in which he asserts that he died, says that he died in the ninety-first year of his age, on the day before the Kalends of October. And this number of years suggests that Jerome was born in the year 329 or 330, so that an error seems to have crept into one or the other passage. If perhaps Prosper wrote eighty-ninth, and from this some copyist formed ninety-first, the passages cited will agree with each other. This suspicion is favored by the first Life in Martianay, which about the Saint's age has it thus: He filled the whole time of his life with LXXXVIII years and six months. For in the said Life, as also in the other two in Martianay, the Saint's death is fixed in the XII [*] year of the emperor Theodosius, so that eighty-eight years bring the Saint's birth down to the year 331 assigned by Prosper. Whether St. Jerome's year of death is made as certain from the faulty passage of St. Prosper as it has been received by the common consent of more recent writers, we shall examine in its place. Meanwhile it is certain that the first Life agrees with the first passage of St. Prosper for fixing St. Jerome's birth in the year 331, as Martianay has already observed in the Life chap. 2, where he maintains that view.

[55] There are certainly not lacking arguments which can be brought for that epoch: this view is made very likely by several but it also suffers its own difficulties, and for that reason many make St. Jerome ten or twelve years younger, and others even fourteen. No weak argument for St. Prosper's epoch is drawn from a comparison of the age of St. Jerome and St. Augustine. For St. Augustine was born in the year 354, as was said at XXVIII August in St. Augustine. And Jerome asserts so great a difference of age that he could have been Augustine's father in years, and professes himself an old man, while he attributes a flourishing age to Augustine. In Letter 405 (otherwise 92) he speaks thus at the end: Farewell, my dearest friend, in age my son, in dignity my father. He wrote this about the year 403, when Augustine was not far from the fiftieth year of his age, and Jerome, according to Prosper's epoch, numbered about seventy-two years, so that he could rightly speak thus. But if he had been only sixty, as follows from the opinion of Baronius and Tillemont, or even less than sixty, as the epoch of others has it, for what reason would he so address a bishop of nearly fifty? In the same Letter he says: Cease to provoke an old man hiding in his cell. But if you wish either to exercise or to display your learning, seek young men both eloquent and noble, of whom there are said to be very many at Rome, who can and dare to engage with you, and to draw the yoke with a bishop in the disputation of the holy Scriptures. I, once a soldier, now a veteran, ought to praise both your victories and those of others, not myself to fight again with a worn-out body. I indeed do not grasp how a man of sixty would have written these things and others in which in the same Letter he attributes old age to himself, to a man of nearly fifty.

[56] In Letter 102 (otherwise 91) he says to Augustine: It remains sayings of the Saint. that you love one who loves you, and that you, a young man, do not challenge an Old man in the field of the Scriptures. In Letter 112, written in the year 404 or 405, he says that he is of the last age and almost decrepit. And at the end: I ask at the end of the Letter that you do not compel an old man at rest, and long since a veteran, to serve as a soldier, and again to put his life in peril. Do you, who are a young man and set on the pontifical height, teach the peoples, etc. Augustine was fifty when he is called a young man by Jerome; by what right then would he have called himself of the last age and almost decrepit, for what reason an old man and long since a veteran, if he had been scarcely more than sixty when he was writing those things and many others of that kind? Wherefore I cannot rest in the reasons of those who make St. Jerome much younger in age. For in the second Apology against Rufinus also, which was composed in the year 402, in which his adversaries do not yet attribute sixty years to Jerome, he frequently mentions his own and Rufinus' old age, and in other Works also written about the same times. There is added St. Augustine, who testifies that St. Jerome lived to a decrepit age. I shall give the words after relating his death. But his age would not have been decrepit if, as the adversaries would have it, he had died some years short of eighty, and had departed at nearly the same age as Augustine. Wherefore there come to be examined the reasons for which Baronius, Tillemont, and others who followed them believed that one must depart so far from Prosper without the testimony of any ancient writer, nay against the consent of all the ancients concerning St. Jerome's great old age.

[57] The first objection against our view Tillemont, who gathered Baronius' reasons, takes his first argument from the Commentaries on Habakkuk, vol. 6 chap. 660, where the Saint reports a saying of a gentile about the death of the emperor Julian, slain in the year 363. And he speaks thus about himself: While I was still a boy, and was being exercised in the school of Grammar, etc. Baronius at the year 372 judges that St. Jerome was then in about the twentieth year of his age. But a man is not called a boy in the ordinary manner of speaking if he has reached the twentieth year of his age. In that view therefore the difficulty of the passage cited is scarcely less than in the epoch of the ancients, according to which Jerome was thirty-two years old at that time. Let us hear therefore what Baronius answers for himself: It will be easy, he says, for one to slip into a thousand errors and to be carried in different directions who has by no means considered the tropes and figures in the speech of that same St. Jerome. If therefore the Saint used tropes and figures, as Baronius teaches by various examples, that passage is objected in vain. For if he said, I was an infant, when he was already thirty years old, as Baronius observes, we ought not to marvel that he said, While I was still a boy, etc., when he probably numbered thirty-two years. It must rather be inquired on what occasions the Saint uses tropes of this kind. This therefore I shall say, as it seems to me. It belongs to boys to be instructed in the precepts of Grammar, and for that reason, I think, Jerome said that he had been a boy at that time, because he was even then engaged in boyish studies. So in the Preface on Obadiah, of the time at which as a younger man he had attempted to expound Obadiah, he says: I was an infant, I did not yet know how to write, etc., not in age, or in ignorance of forming characters; but in the knowledge of the Scriptures and in the ability to expound them rightly.

[58] is examined and solved. But, someone will say, is it credible that Jerome was occupied with the studies of Grammar up to the age of thirty-two years? I answer that this does not seem incredible, if it be rightly understood, as Baronius also understood it. For by Grammar he designates all profane literature, namely not only the precepts of speaking or writing Latin, but also poetry, rhetoric, philosophy, geography, history, and the other profane sciences with which youth is imbued for writing or speaking subtly and elegantly. To these arts in the same century SS. Basil and Nazianzen also clung even longer, to whom nevertheless Jerome is in no way inferior, so that it is not to be wondered at if he was thirty-three or thirty-four years old before he turned his mind to the studies of theology and of sacred Scripture. How many philosophical, dialectical and historical Works, besides poetical and rhetorical ones, he must have read most diligently and frequently turned over, his own Works clearly testify. And most of these Jerome learned under the discipline of masters, as we shall see below. Wherefore if anyone has learned in any degree by experience how widely the knowledge of those arts extends, and has perceived by the studious reading of the Hieronymian Works how greatly he excelled in them, he will by no means marvel that he was engaged in them

after the thirty-second year of his age.

[59] Tillemont's second argument is such that this alone makes our view certain. Another argument of Tillemont is such, Jerome in Letter 68 (otherwise 33) relates that St. Antony came to Alexandria to refute the Arians, and of this matter he says: Which happened in the times of my infancy. Jerome therefore was an infant in age when Antony came there for the reason stated. And St. Athanasius was then present at Alexandria, who escorted the Saint as he returned, as he himself testifies in the Life. About these things Tillemont agrees. But he asserts gratuitously that that arrival of St. Antony happened in the year 355. For from the Life of St. Antony, written by St. Athanasius, it is clearer than light that the Arians were refuted by Antony at Alexandria before the death of Constantine the Great. Certainly in the Life of St. Antony in St. Athanasius, vol. 2 p. 847, Antony's deeds at Alexandria are related at num. 69 and following. And then after other things at num. 81 St. Athanasius says: Moreover Antony's fame reached even to the emperors. For when Constantine Augustus had learned these things, and likewise his sons Constantius and Constans, the Augusti, they wrote to him as to a father, greatly desiring to receive letters from him in return. He adds that St. Antony, at the urging of the monks, wrote back. The editor of St. Athanasius observes in the margin that Antony's Alexandrian deeds happened between the year 326 and 335. Among us, in vol. 2 of January p. 110, it is said: This was done about the year of Christ CCCXXX or a little after. Tillemont in vol. 7, Note 8 on St. Antony, confesses that the fact must be fixed at the time at which it has been fixed among us, if St. Athanasius observed the order of time in narrating, and that that order is altogether natural.

[60] What then does he object? First, Theodoret, who says that Antony came under Constantius. that it utterly overthrows his own view and confirms ours. But, as he himself confesses, the authority of Theodoret in these matters is slight, who in book 4 chap. 24 touches the fact lightly and out of order, and perhaps Constantio is read by a copyist's error for Constantino, a single letter being omitted. Secondly he says that Jerome was not yet born. But this is the very thing in question: nor ought Tillemont to have used a vicious circle, so as to prove each of two uncertain things from the other, namely the time of St. Antony's arrival from St. Jerome's birth-date, and again the birth-date from the time of the arrival. For this is not to prove, but to walk in a circle, and to fall from error into error. He objects thirdly that Didymus, with whom St. Antony then dealt, was in the year 335 only twenty-six years old, or perhaps twenty-two. But little reasonings of this kind can do nothing against open truth. St. Antony could marvel at a young man most learned for his age, and admonish him not to grieve over his lost bodily eyes, but rather to rejoice in the sharpness of his mind. For the authority of St. Athanasius, who had St. Antony's deeds ascertained by diligent inquiry and wrote them down with equal diligence, who had seen St. Antony at Alexandria and had accompanied him on his return, leaves no doubt that Antony was at Alexandria a notable time before the death of Constantine, and before St. Athanasius' first exile, to which he was sent in the year 335, so that St. Antony's arrival at Alexandria seems to be fixed between this year and 331. St. Prosper in his Chronicle refers Constantine's Letter to St. Antony to the year 335. And since Antony came to Alexandria before that, this perhaps happened in the year 334 or 333. In whatever year he came between 331 and 335, Jerome was then an infant according to our view, which has a most solid foundation in the words of Jerome given above.

[61] Tillemont's third objection has something of appearance, nothing of difficulty. In Letter 120 to Hedibia St. Jerome writes the following: The third objection has no difficulty, Your forebears Patera [*] and Delphidius, of whom the one, before I was born, taught rhetoric at Rome; the other, when I was already a young lad, made all the Gauls illustrious by his talent in prose and verse, etc. And yet, says Tillemont, Paterius was teaching at Rome one year before the death of Constantine, that is, in the year 336, according to Jerome's own Chronicle. In fact St. Jerome says that in that year (not in the year 339, as others have said): Patera the rhetorician teaches most gloriously at Rome. But Jerome does not say that he then first began to teach. What prudent man would believe that Patera or Paterius taught for one year only? Perhaps Paterius had already taught for ten years, or even twenty, when he had won so great a name for himself and was adorned with some singular honor. So of Libanius the rhetorician of Antioch he makes mention only at the year 369, even though he had taught before in other places, and had been famous at Antioch from the year 354, as Tillemont himself teaches about Libanius in vol. 4 of the Emperors, in Julian, art. 36. The poet Ausonius in Poem 4 on the Professors celebrates Attius Patera, of whom we treat, and sufficiently declares that he was too old for it to be credible that he only began to teach at Rome about 336. For addressing him he says: Yet because you flourished in the age next before, and I as a young man saw you an old man. But Ausonius, who as a young man saw Patera an old man, was himself already an old man in the year 379, as I observed at XXVIII September in St. Exuperius num. XI, so that he was probably not a young man after 336, or at any rate not much after; and since Patera was then an old man, he perhaps taught not only before the year 331, in which we believe Jerome was born, but even ten, twenty or more years before.

[62] as neither does another added to it by Dolci. From Delphidius the rhetorician, who was the son of the said Paterius, Dolci likewise takes an argument in the Life, because concerning him St. Jerome has in the Chronicle: Alcimus and Delphidius, rhetoricians, teach most flourishingly in Aquitaine; which he says is placed at the year 360, whereas it is rather at the year 355, in which according to us Jerome was twenty-four years old. But Jerome, praised above, says of Delphidius, When I was already a young lad he made all the Gauls illustrious by his talent in prose and verse. And this he did long before the designated time of his teaching, as is again clear from the aforesaid Ausonius, who after Patera celebrates Delphidius in his fifth Poem, whom he praises first for the poetic art, saying: You, having begun almost from the very cradle, a noble poet of the God: then for the oratorical art in defending clients: thirdly for the hatred which he incurred by accusing the powerful, and fourthly and finally for the office of teaching. Which last office of Delphidius he enumerates after the rest, saying: Soon thereafter a Rhetor, but not surviving long, as he subjoins. But let us see at about what time he assumed the part of accuser. Among others Delphidius accused Numerius, prefect of Narbonese Gaul, as Ammianus has it in book 18 chap. 1. And this happened at the beginning of the year 359, as Tillemont also observes in Julian, then Cæsar, art. 8. And now, if we consider that this was probably not Delphidius' first accusation; and that before the accusations there had preceded defenses, and that Delphidius' poems were the earliest of all; we shall easily see that the time designated by Jerome, at which Delphidius was making the Gauls illustrious in prose and verse, must be fixed between the year 340 and 350, and that St. Jerome according to our view was a young lad; but not so according to the view of our adversaries, according to which he was then an infant or a little boy. Tillemont was unwilling to use that argument, which in fact favors us.

[63] Tillemont objects fourthly the words of St. Jerome on Isaiah book 5 chap. 15: The fourth proves nothing at all. I heard a certain man of Areopolis, but the whole city too is witness, that in a great earthquake in my infancy, when the seas passed the shore of the whole world, on the same night the walls of that city fell down. This again Tillemont attempts with vain labor to draw to his own opinion, saying that the Saint speaks of the earthquake which happened in the year 365. The same Baronius judged, nor yet did he use that argument, because he believed that Jerome was then twenty-two years old and had spoken figuratively. Indeed, who would prudently believe that Jerome used a proper mode of speech if he is treating of the calamity of the year 365, which is related more at large by Ammianus in book 26 chap. 10? For infancy cannot be extended to twenty-two years, as the Verona editors have already observed at the passage cited. And they judge that Jerome designates the earthquake of the year 344, in which Jerome himself writes in the Chronicle that Neocæsarea in Pontus was overthrown. But that earthquake seems to have been only in a few places. But Jerome treats of a more general earthquake, in which both the sea passed the shores and the walls of the city of Areopolis in Arabia fell down. Nearer to St. Jerome's infancy, and more dreadful and longer-lasting, were the earthquakes of the year 341, which again Jerome himself noted in the Chronicle, and other writers also. Jerome was then about ten years old, nor would it be to be wondered at if he called that age infancy. Theophanes relates various earthquakes not only in that year, but also in the four following ones; and another at the year 333. Which of them all Jerome designated we do not know: but all of them suit our opinion well enough.

[64] Tillemont objects fifthly, from Letter 52 (otherwise 2) to Nepotian, these words: The fifth and sixth When I was a young man, nay almost a boy, and was restraining the first impulses of a wanton age by the harshness of the desert, I wrote to your uncle holy Heliodorus an exhortatory Letter, etc. And the Letter to Heliodorus of which he speaks was written in the year 375, when according to Tillemont's view he was about thirty-three years old, according to us forty-four. I join to this Tillemont's sixth objection, because the difficulty is nearly the same. St. Jerome wrote against Helvidius in the year 383 or 384, when his adversaries attribute to him more than forty years. Nevertheless in book 13 on Ezekiel chap. 44 he speaks thus of that little Work: On which little question I know that I wrote at Rome against Helvidius, a heretic of that time, in my youth a not large book. I marvel indeed that these things were objected by Tillemont, since they conflict in appearance with his chronology as much as with ours. For he is not almost a boy who is thirty-three years old; nor is he in youth who is more than forty. And so it must be considered in what sense the Saint called himself almost a boy and a young man: namely in that sense in which, in the words to be given at num. 67, he called himself an infant when he first attempted to write on Obadiah.

[65] All these things are referred to the knowledge of the sacred Scriptures, are solved. or to the ability of writing about sacred things. He was an infant in sacred Letters when before his solitary life he attempted to write on Obadiah; a young man, nay almost a boy, for giving precepts of right living, as the Saint certainly meant in his humility,

when from the desert he wrote to Heliodorus; again he was in his youth for writing about sacred things against heretics, when at Rome he wrote against Helvidius. And so, when Jerome speaks thus, he does not look to his own age, but to the progress which he had made in sacred studies when he composed the aforesaid writings. Unless this be understood in this or a like sense, in what way shall we understand the words by which in the Letter to Nepotian that is objected he makes himself an old man? Now, he says, with hoary head and brow furrowed with wrinkles, etc. And at num. 4: Hear a brother in office, a father in old age. And the Letter was written about 394. Therefore, if he was almost a boy in the year 375, if he was a young man about 384, in what way at last was he an old man in the year 394? For a young man does not become an old man in ten years. Wherefore the objections given by no means conflict with our view, but rather the hoary head and the wrinkled brow favor it, unless these too are to be expounded in the same sense.

[66] Another objection of Baronius, There remains to be examined the argument which Baronius took from the Preface on the prophet Obadiah, and which Tillemont did not disapprove. I confess that I do not understand for what reason it ought to be called an argument, and not rather a passage ill understood. Baronius wishes to hammer out of that Preface that St. Jerome first wrote on Obadiah when he was thirty years old, and then after another thirty years composed the Commentary on Obadiah extant today: For as many years old as he was, he says, when he had already elaborated the earlier one, just so many years having afterward elapsed (as he says) he worked out the later. If Jerome said all this, it would be utterly contrary to Baronius' view. For he did not write the second Commentary on Obadiah about the year 402, as Baronius would have it, but in the year 394 or 395, as I shall prove from the Saint's own words at num. 574. And so he would have written the first about 365, and would have been born about 335, which comes nearer to our view than to Baronius'. But of all the things which Baronius believed he had found in Jerome's words, I find nothing but one, and that ambiguous. This one thing, which can be expounded in Baronius' sense, is had from those words of Jerome: Nor do I deny that through these thirty years I have sweated in his work and labor. He speaks of the work of the Lord, that is, of the understanding and exposition of the sacred Scriptures. Baronius believes that thirty years are designated after Obadiah was expounded the first time. This exposition of the passage, which cannot stand in the way of our opinion, will be examined in the place just mentioned.

[67] which does not even bear But by no word does Jerome hint that he was thirty years old when he first attempted to write on Obadiah. He everywhere suggests that he was then a young man, and lately come out of the school of the rhetoricians, and an infant in sacred Letters. This is that time, he says, my Pammachius, sweeter to me than this light, at which, having come out of the school of the rhetoricians, we were being carried in different pursuits, when I and my dearest Heliodorus were alike striving to inhabit the solitude of Chalcis; what I thought lay hidden (the little Work on Obadiah) has been published. I was an infant, I did not yet know how to write: my hand tottered, my joints trembled. These things certainly designate no number of years. At the beginning he declares his infancy in sacred studies in many words, beginning thus: When I was a little one, I spoke as a little one, I was wise as a little one, I thought as a little one: after I became a man, I put away the things of a little one. If the Apostle makes progress, and daily forgetting the things that are past, stretches himself to the things before: … how much more ought I, who have not yet come to the age of the perfect man and to the measure of Christ, to deserve pardon, in that in my youth, stirred by the ardor and zeal of the Scriptures, I interpreted allegorically the prophet Obadiah, whose history I did not know. From the words cited, I have not yet come to the age of the perfect man and to the measure of Christ, Baronius suspects that an age less than the age of Christ is elicited, that is, thirty years, on account of a passage presently to be cited. But by those words St. Jerome does not look to the past time at which he had written, but to the present at which he writes these things: for he does not say I had not yet come, but I have not yet … come, suggesting that he makes progress with the Apostle, but is not perfect. The whole reasoning is such. The Apostle confesses that at one time he was a little one in knowledge, and that he always makes progress; how shall I, who have not yet attained perfect knowledge, not be worthy of pardon, if in my youth I erred in expounding Obadiah? Jerome's own exposition of the words of the Letter to the Ephesians chap. 4 v. 13, Until we all meet in the unity [*] of faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the age of the fullness of Christ, makes the explanation given certain. For Jerome himself in vol. 7 of the Works col. 616 and following expounds the passage cited of perfect virtue and knowledge.

[68] Again in the said Preface Jerome speaks thus: upon the Saint's age. I hoped that what I had written lay hidden in my little book-cases, and I had vowed to the flames the first rashness of my poor wit, when suddenly a copy is brought from Italy by a certain young man of as many years as I too had once been when I wrote it, praising my little Work. These words signify nothing but that the little Work was brought to Jerome by a certain young man of as many years old as he himself had been when he had written it. Hence he subjoins: I confess, I marveled that however badly a man may have written, he finds a reader like himself. Baronius from those words says that the little Work was brought to him so many years afterward. But this is not in Jerome, who says nothing about the time at which it was brought, but solely compares his own age when he wrote it with the age of the man who brought it. Nothing therefore can be had from that Preface about the year of St. Jerome's birth. Other arguments against St. Prosper's view and ours Baronius and Tillemont have not brought forward. Yet Dolci added one in the Life, which I shall briefly examine.

[69] St. Jerome had a brother Paulinianus, ordained priest by St. Epiphanius in Palestine, Another objection is likewise solved: as we shall say in its place. Paulinianus was certainly much younger than Jerome, and Dolci, who is little accurate in casting up his reckonings, even exaggerates that difference of age, unless perhaps they be errors of printing. The year of Paulinianus' birth becomes known in some fashion from Letter 82 (otherwise 62) to Theophilus of Alexandria, in which Jerome has it thus: Moreover his age (Paulinianus') is known to your beatitude also, and since he has now reached the space of thirty years, I think it is not to be reproved in this. That Letter, as I shall show in its place, was given at the end of the year 396. Paulinianus therefore was born about the year 367, and was about thirty-six years younger than Jerome according to our opinion. This would be to be wondered at if Paulinianus were of the same mother. But from so great a difference of age we easily conjecture that he was born of another wife. And in this way we shall not wonder if the same father, at twenty or twenty-five years of age, begot Jerome, and afterward in the fifty-sixth or sixty-first year of his age Paulinianus. I know boys still living born of a father of seventy, so that there is no difficulty in that argument.

[70] And so no argument has been brought by our adversaries which, if it be rightly weighed, suffers difficulty or compels us to depart from the view of St. Prosper, with whom the older Lives agree. The authority of St. Prosper is confirmed by all the sayings of Jerome about his great age, and our view is briefly confirmed. as also by those of Augustine and of others, and still more by the comparison given between the age of Jerome and Augustine. And what Jerome says, that in the times of his infancy St. Antony came to Alexandria, is such that no prudent doubt remains that Jerome was born before the year 335. Wherefore the view of St. Prosper, which I began to examine in doubt, having considered the slightness of all the objections, I would dare to assert as sufficiently ascertained in such a way that it is at least very near the true year of his birth, if perhaps the Saint was not born in that very year 331. For the rest, I believed that this question should be treated more at length, because I have found the opposing arguments of Baronius and others refuted nowhere. Many sayings of the Saint could be added, since about the end of the fourth century and the beginning of the fifth he frequently mentions his old age: but these I have believed less necessary.

* i. e. 419

* al. ostendere

* al. Paterius

* Hier. unitate

§ V. His parents, brother, sister, maternal aunt: his studies in his native land and at Rome: his journey into Gaul: his baptism received at Rome.

The Saint had Catholic parents, who were also rich That he was born of Christian parents Jerome himself testifies in the Preface on Job, rendered into Latin from the Hebrew, vol. 9 col. [ ], writing: How much more I, a Christian, born of Christian parents, and bearing the standard of the cross on my brow, etc. In Letter 82 (otherwise 62) he says of himself and his brother Paulinianus: We … from our very cradles, so to speak, were nourished with Catholic milk. He had therefore parents not only Christian, but also Catholic. His father's name was Eusebius, as he teaches in the book on Illustrious men chap. 135: his mother's name he nowhere expresses, nor that of his sister, of whom mention will be made. His brother Paulinianus has already been mentioned, and will recur in various places. He had a maternal aunt Castorina, to whom there is extant one Letter to be reported below. Whether the Saint was sprung of an illustrious family is not established for certain. Yet it is most likely that he was born at least in an honorable station, and that his parents' wealth was ample enough. Certainly Jerome's Roman studies, which we shall see were long-lasting, and his very many journeys through the Gauls and other regions, which we shall relate, clearly show that much money was spent for Jerome's education, so that it must be said that his parents did not lack wealth.

[72] and noble, becomes most likely from various considerations. The conjecture about St. Jerome's wealth and honorable family gains strength from Bonosus, his companion, with whom he was brought up. For in Letter 3 (otherwise 41) to Rufinus the monk, about Bonosus, who had undertaken the solitary life, he speaks thus to God: Thanks be to you, Lord Jesus, that on your day I have one who can pray for me. You yourself know (for the hearts of each lie open to you …) how I and he alike grew up from tender infancy to a flourishing age, how the same bosoms of nurses, the same embraces of bearers cherished us: and how, after our Roman studies, when we enjoyed the same food and the same lodging on the half-barbarous banks of the Rhine, I first began to wish to reverence you. The same nurses, the same bearers, the same studies at Rome, the same food by the Rhine, the same lodging, and finally their living together in boyhood, youth and early manhood clearly suggest that the parents of Jerome and Bonosus were alike in wealth, and make it likely that they were born of no dissimilar stock. And what Bonosus' condition was, Jerome

declares in the same Letter at num. 4, when he praises the greatness of soul with which he had left all things, in these words: Let the miracles feigned with falsehoods, in Greek style as in Roman, give place to this truth. Behold, a boy trained with us in the honorable arts of the world, who had wealth in abundance and preeminent standing among his equals, having despised his mother, his sisters, and a brother most dear to him, has settled, like some new dweller in paradise, upon an island shipwrecked amid the sounding sea, where rough crags and bare rocks and solitude are a terror. Let this suffice about St. Jerome's family, to which at least wealth was not lacking, and probably not nobility of birth either.

[73] As a boy he was diligently trained in his father's house, as is gathered from book 1 against Rufinus, Severely educated in his father's house, he there began his studies, where at num. 30 he addresses him thus: Which of us does not remember his own infancy? I certainly, that I may move you, a most severe man, to laughter, … remember that as a boy I ran about through the little cells of the servants, that I spent a holiday in games, and was dragged a captive from my grandmother's bosom to a raging Orbilius. These words show that Jerome was severely brought up and imbued with the rudiments of the art of Grammar at Stridon under the discipline of a pedagogue, whom for his severity he calls an Orbilius, from the famous grammarian Orbilius of Benevento, who is called by Horace a plier of the rod. Whether the things which as an old man he sometimes recalled in his sleep happened likewise at Stridon or afterward at Rome cannot be stated for certain. Certainly to the words given he subjoins the following: And that you may marvel the more, now with hoary and balding head I often seem to myself in my dreams to have long hair and, having put on the toga, to be declaiming a little controversy before the rhetorician. And when I have awakened, I congratulate myself on being freed from the peril of speaking. In the Preface on Job already praised he has it thus about the studies of his boyhood and youth: And in the Latin tongue we were worn down almost from the very cradle among grammarians and rhetoricians and philosophers. Such things perhaps the Saint began in his native land and afterward completed at Rome. But at what age he was sent to the Roman studies I nowhere find. For even though he sometimes calls himself a boy, at other times a young lad, while he was studying at Rome, from that manner of speaking his age does not become sufficiently known.

[74] But whether he set out for Rome at a tender age or when nearly twenty years old, and continued them at Rome, where he often visited the tombs of the martyrs. it is certain that Jerome studied at Rome for several years, and there made wonderful progress in the humane letters. On the Letter to the Galatians book 1 chap. 2 Jerome speaks thus of his Roman exercises: Several times, when as a young lad I was declaiming controversies at Rome, and was exercising myself with feigned suits for real contests, I used to run to the tribunals of the judges, and I saw the most eloquent of the orators contending among themselves with such bitterness that, their business being often left aside, they turned to personal insults, etc. Of the things which, besides his studies, he did at Rome, he records this on Ezekiel book 12 chap. 40: When I was a boy at Rome and was being trained in liberal studies, I was wont with others of the same age and purpose on Sundays to go about the tombs of the Apostles and the martyrs, and frequently to enter the crypts, which, dug deep into the earth, have on either side of those who enter the bodies of the buried along the walls, and all things are so dark that that prophetic saying is almost fulfilled: Let them go down alive into hell, etc. These things suggest that piety toward the Apostles and the martyrs flourished in the young Jerome.

[75] Jerome's chief master in grammatical studies was Donatus, His teacher there was Donatus, whom he mentions on various occasions. On Ecclesiastes chap. 1 he says, My teacher Donatus. Against Rufinus book 1 num. 16 he again names Donatus his teacher, and at the same time suggests that he had read very many little Works of the liberal studies, addressing Rufinus thus: I think that as a boy you read the Commentaries of Asper on Virgil and Sallust, of Vulcatius on the Orations of Cicero, of Victorinus on his Dialogues, and those of my teacher Donatus on the comedies of Terence, and likewise on Virgil, and those of others on others, namely on Plautus, Lucretius, Flaccus, Persius and Lucan. He himself as a boy, or rather as a lad or a young man, had most probably read all these: for otherwise he would not say these things to Rufinus. In the Chronicle at the year 354 he has it thus: Victorinus the rhetorician, and Donatus my grammarian, are held distinguished at Rome: of whom Victorinus even deserved a statue in the forum of Trajan. And so about Donatus as his teacher in grammatical studies there is no doubt.

[76] not Victorinus. Others have wished to give Victorinus also to Jerome as his teacher in rhetoric, the first Life leading the way with these words: In the art of grammar indeed he had Donatus as his teacher, but in rhetoric Victorinus the orator. It does not indeed seem to be doubted that St. Jerome was already studying at Rome while Victorinus was still teaching rhetoric there, and so could sometimes have heard him teaching. Nevertheless he nowhere names him his master or teacher, although he has mentioned Victorinus not only in the two passages already cited, but also in the book on Illustrious men chap. 101, where the passage above all required that he should call him his master, if he really had been. Wherefore, since in the two passages where he commemorates Donatus and Victorinus together he calls Donatus his teacher or his grammarian, and is silent about Victorinus, it must be said that this man was not Jerome's teacher, but that Donatus alone was known among the masters of the liberal arts. In the Preface to the Commentaries on the Letter to the Galatians St. Jerome again mentions Victorinus thus: Not that I am ignorant that Caius Marius Victorinus, who taught rhetoric at Rome when I was a boy, published Commentaries on the Apostle. And here, as the editor Vallarsi observes, it was at one time even printed me puerum for me puero; and hence he believes it came about that some held Victorinus for Jerome's master.

[77] He was still at Rome in the year 363, and there he gathered a library, Jerome had not yet departed from Rome in the year 363, in which Julian the apostate was slain, as is clear from the Saint's words given at num. 57. He was then about thirty-two years old, so that he said not undeservedly at num. 73: We were worn down among grammarians and rhetoricians and philosophers; for perhaps he spent more than twenty years in learning those arts most perfectly. This will seem wonderful to those who do not understand the whole extent of those arts. But those who have imitated Jerome's diligence at least in part, as I have already begun to say at num. 58, and have attentively turned over Jerome's own Works, will easily perceive that so great a profane learning as he had cannot be acquired in a few years; nay, they will marvel that so many little Works of profane writers could have been read by Jerome, especially since he did not turn them over once or lightly, but committed many of them to memory, and certainly procured for himself from the books then chiefly read a perfect and copious material for writing on every profane science. And that he might have to hand several writers of that kind, he gathered a library for himself, as he himself testifies in Letter 22 to Eustochium, where at num. 30 he writes this: When many years ago, for the kingdom of heaven's sake, I had cut myself off from home, parents, sister, kinsmen, and, what is harder than these, from the habit of more dainty food, and was setting out for Jerusalem to serve as a soldier, I could by no means do without the library which I had made for myself at Rome with the greatest zeal and labor. Thus indeed at that time he wished to turn over and understand all the profane writers, namely grammarians, poets, orators, geographers, historians, dialecticians, logicians, natural philosophers, and the various teachers of moral philosophy; just as afterward he read almost all the interpreters of sacred Scripture and the writers of theological science.

[78] The young Jerome knew without doubt that saying of Horace: and he learned all manner of profane sciences. To know is the beginning and source of writing rightly. He understood that for this the precepts of grammar and rhetoric alone do not suffice; but that a knowledge of very many things is also necessary. For just as for an architect, however skilled, the art itself does not suffice for constructing some beautiful building, unless he have to hand an abundance of precious stones and timbers with which he may elegantly adorn the structure; so neither will any orator or writer display in writing a copious and varied eloquence, unless with the laws of the art itself he have joined a knowledge of very many things, whereby he may both vary his discourse in its place and discourse copiously on any matter. Wherefore Jerome with great talent and diligent study wished to learn thoroughly whatever grammar brings for writing correctly, whatever dialectic suggests for reasoning subtly, whatever rhetoric teaches for speaking ornately, whatever the fables of the poets, the manifold opinions of the philosophers, the variety of ancient histories abundantly supply for coloring a discourse beautifully, distinguishing it elegantly, strengthening it fitly, extending and amplifying it copiously. It is no wonder therefore that the young Jerome spent much time on those studies. Only those will be able to wonder at this who either have not read St. Jerome's Works, or have not been able to understand how great an abundance of all the liberal sciences, and what variety of most perfect eloquence, lies hidden in them.

[79] But now, before I proceed to the baptism received at Rome, Jerome confesses that he fell in his youth; it pleases me to examine the assertion of certain moderns who have wished that virginity was always preserved unstained by Jerome. But we, so far as may be, neither wish true praise to be snatched from Jerome, nor can bear to attribute false praise to him. Jerome himself refutes that opinion in several places. In Letter 7 (otherwise 43): You yourselves know, he says, the slippery path of youth, in which I too have fallen, and which you do not pass without fear. In Letter 14 (otherwise 1) to Heliodorus num. 6 he suggests the same in these words: And this I forewarn, not with ship or cargo intact, nor as a skilled sailor unacquainted with the waves; but as one lately cast on the shore by shipwreck, I announce with timid voice to those about to sail. In that tide (in the world) the Charybdis of luxury swallows up safety. There, with a maiden's face, Scylla-like lust smiles and allures to the wrecking of chastity, etc. Still more clearly he denies that he is a virgin in Letter 48 (otherwise 50) to Pammachius, that is, in the Apologetic book for the books written against Jovinian. For thus he has it at num. 20: But I extol virginity to heaven, not because I have it, but because I marvel the more at what I do not have. It is an ingenuous and modest confession to proclaim in others that which you yourself lack. Is it that, because I cling to the earth with a heavy body, I do not marvel at the flight of birds? etc. Something like this he again suggests in Letter 125 (otherwise 4) to Rusticus, so that we cannot rightly doubt of some fall before his baptism was received.

[80] Nevertheless Jerome in some fashion hints, writing to Pammachius, that he did not fall after baptism, when he says: but of a grave fall after baptism there is no evidence. The first virginity is from birth, the second virginity from the second birth, that is, from baptism. This second, as it were, virginity the Saint probably had, since he said that he had fallen on the slippery path of youth. Nor is this conjecture hindered by the fact that that most humble Man frequently

calls himself a sinner, or seems to attribute various offenses to himself. In Letter 18 (otherwise 122 and 123) to Damasus num. XI he speaks thus: But would that I too might be pricked with compunction, and after compunction be made worthy of the vision of God, since I am a man and have not clean lips, and dwell also in the midst of a people having unclean lips. Isaiah, as a just man, had sinned only in speech: therefore he had his lips alone unclean, not his conscience. But I, because I both see with my eyes unto concupiscence, and am scandalized by hand and by foot, and offend in every part of my members, have all things unclean: and because, having once been baptized in the spirit, I have again defiled my tunic, I need the purging of a second baptism, that is, of fire. He seems to accuse himself still more gravely in Letter 2 (otherwise 38) to Theodosius, whose prayers and those of the monks subject to him he entreats. He calls himself a head beset with every crime. He says: I am that prodigal son who, having squandered the whole portion which the Father had entrusted to me, have not yet cast myself at my Begetter's knees: I have not yet begun to drive away from me the blandishments of my former wantonness. But all these things seem to be the words of a Man not yet free from temptations, who in his humility vehemently accuses his past life.

[81] The Saint was baptized at Rome, That St. Jerome was baptized at Rome he himself suggests in two Letters to St. Damasus. In the earlier, which is 15 (formerly 57), he speaks thus: Therefore I judged that the Chair of Peter and the faith praised by the Apostolic mouth must be consulted by me: seeking now food for my soul from that source whence formerly I received the garments of Christ. Again in the following Letter to Damasus: I therefore, as I have already written before, having received the garment of Christ in the Roman city, am now held on the barbarous frontier of Syria. That by the garments of Christ baptism is designated, because the baptized were clothed in white garments, anyone will easily perceive, so that it is not necessary to refute at greater length a certain inscription which Dolci says in chap. 4 that he saw on the island of Grado, as though St. Jerome had been baptized there: which opinion he himself also believed should be refuted rather by laughter than by many words. But about the time at which he received baptism at Rome there is not equal certainty. Baronius at the year 372 num. 40 says that he was baptized at a mature age, but before he set out for Gaul. Tillemont in art. 3 judges that his baptism was later than the Gallic journey; nor is that opinion without probability, yet I do not think it certain. Tillemont's reason is drawn from the words given at num. 72: And when after our Roman studies we enjoyed the same food and the same lodging on the half-barbarous banks of the Rhine, so that I first (that is, before Bonosus) began to wish to reverence you. He judges, namely, that it does not suit St. Jerome's glory if we say that he was first baptized and then wished to worship God.

[83] and having journeyed into Gaul, he resolved there to serve God more perfectly, But that reason by no means makes the matter certain: for he could have received baptism before, and worshiped God in a way common to many, and afterward conceived the purpose of worshiping God more perfectly in the solitary life, since he seems to have conceived that thought in Gaul, as Tillemont confesses. And so it is uncertain to me whether he was baptized at Rome before the journey into Gaul, or whether after the said journey he returned to Rome to receive baptism there. This is certain from the words already given, that Jerome after his Roman studies was in Gaul by the Rhine with his companion Bonosus. Whether he had other companions of his journey there I cannot say for certain. To Niceas, a subdeacon of Aquileia, he afterward wrote in Letter 8 (otherwise 42): Amid the delights of your native land and the journeys we had in common, sigh sometimes. But whether Niceas journeyed with Jerome into Gaul or to other places I nowhere find. It can also be doubted whether Jerome had not been in Gaul even before this, whether for the sake of studies or to survey the region. Certainly in book 2 against Jovinian num. 7 he says: Since I myself as a young lad saw in Gaul the Atticoti [*], a British people, feeding on human flesh. If in this passage he called himself a young lad in age, he may perhaps have been in Gaul before his Roman studies, or in the time of his studies have journeyed from Rome into Gaul. Yet this is uncertain, since from time to time he calls himself a young lad in another sense, as we have already seen.

[83] And on this journey of which we treat he was not idle in Gaul with Bonosus. and there he copied a book of St. Hilary. Rufinus For at Trier he copied with his own hand two rather lengthy Works of St. Hilary, as he has it in Letter 5 (otherwise 6) to Florentius, whom he asks to convey them to him from Rufinus in these words: I ask that you also convey to me the Interpretation of the Psalms of David, and the very lengthy book of holy Hilary on the Synods, which I had copied for him with my own hand at Trier. This copying of books of that kind suggests that Jerome had even then turned his mind to sacred studies: and hence we can conjecture that several books of that kind were copied by him on that journey; and that that journey was not short, on which he was both at Trier and by the Rhine and without doubt in many other cities of Gaul. Moreover, from the words just cited it is gathered that Jerome and Rufinus were already friends at that time. From Letter 3 (otherwise 41) to Rufinus it is likewise gathered that their friendship was old, and certainly begun before Jerome set out for the East. For, wishing to see him, he says: How I would now bind your neck in close embraces, how I would fix my lips upon that mouth which once either erred or was wise along with me! But these things can be understood of the time at which we shall see that they dwelt together at Aquileia: nor is it necessary to say that Rufinus studied with Jerome at Rome, since Jerome could frequently have seen Rufinus either at Aquileia or in his native land, when while studying at Rome he from time to time made excursions to visit his parents, as it is most likely he did.

[84] That Jerome was known to Rufinus even before his conversion knew him even at that time. is clear also from Rufinus' Invectives book 2 num. 7, where he says: For before he was converted he, together with me, was utterly ignorant both of Greek letters and of the language. These words indeed suggest that the young Jerome was known to Rufinus. But it is by no means to be inferred from them that Rufinus gave his attention to studies with him at Rome, which is not even likely, since it is known from no passage, and Rufinus had scarcely tasted the oratorical art with his outermost lips in his youth, as Jerome says of him in book 1 against Rufinus num. 3. But from Rufinus' words given there arises another doubt, namely whether St. Jerome was ignorant of the Greek tongue when he departed from Rome. Rufinus indeed asserted this, in order by a ridiculous argument to make St. Jerome guilty of perjury. But so great is Rufinus' levity in asserting more than he knew against St. Jerome that he does not deserve credit. Nay, Rufinus' very reasoning shows that the young Jerome's studies and knowledge were little known to Rufinus. I shall set out the matter briefly.

[85] Jerome already knew the Greek tongue, Jerome, when he had learned from his Roman friends that his books against Jovinian were being traduced by an unskilled man as defiled with errors, in Letter 50 (otherwise 51) to Domnio, after he had observed that the unlearned man had not even read the dialectical Works of Aristotle, and yet reasoned thus among the unskilled, adds ironically about himself: Foolish I, who thought that I could not know these things without the philosophers… In vain then did I translate the Commentaries of Alexander: to no purpose did a learned master introduce me to logic through the εἰσαγωγή of Porphyry, etc. From this passage Rufinus takes occasion for calumny. And in order to prove that the Works of Alexander of Aphrodisias and of Porphyry, gentile writers, were read by Jerome after his conversion, he rashly asserts that the Greek tongue was formerly unknown to him. But Jerome clearly says that he was introduced to logic by a learned master through the Isagoge of Porphyry. He read therefore that dialectical Work of Porphyry when he was under a learned master, when he was striving to learn logic, and consequently when he was studying at Rome: for afterward he did not learn logic or dialectic under a master, but gave himself to sacred studies. This he himself testifies in book 1 against Rufinus num. 30, writing thus: The elements of dialectic taught me the seven modes of conclusions, what ἀξίωμα signifies, which we can call a PROPOSITION; how without a verb and a noun no sentence is made, the steps of the sorites, the subtleties of the liar, the frauds of sophisms. I can swear that after I went out from the school I never read these things at all.

[86] before he departed from his Roman studies, And so there is no doubt that Jerome diligently turned over at Rome the dialectical Works of Alexander and Porphyry, since in them he sought nothing but the art of reasoning rightly, which afterward he did not need to learn further; and since he used a learned master for understanding Porphyry's Isagoge. Wherefore, if those Works did not yet exist in Latin, as Rufinus judged, Jerome knew the Greek tongue while he was studying at Rome, and probably learned it there. This is most likely from other considerations also, so that I cannot doubt of the matter: for we know that Jerome gave his attention to polite letters for so long a time in his native land and at Rome that leisure could not have been lacking for learning the Greek tongue. We know that so many Greek writers were read by him, especially at that time, that it is not likely that all their Works had been rendered into Latin. Moreover it is established that the Greek tongue was afterward known to Jerome, since he translated many things from the Greek speech into Latin. And yet we find no time at which he could have learned afterward so difficult a language; not on the Gallic journey, not at Aquileia, which Rufinus would have known; not in the desert of Chalcis, where he began to learn Hebrew, when he already knew Greek, as is clear from his having heard Apollinaris before his departure to the desert.

[87] as is shown by various reasons. There remains therefore no time at which Jerome could have learned the Greek tongue after his Roman studies, except the journey into the East. But a most copious language is not so easily learned that this journey could have sufficed for Jerome to learn it. And so it must necessarily be said that Jerome in his boyhood or youth was imbued with Greek letters as well as Latin; with Latin most perfectly; with Greek so far as to understand Greek writers, yet not to write in Greek. There is added Jerome's own silence. For he frequently speaks of the very great labor with which in his manly age he learned the Hebrew tongue, never of the Greek, which nevertheless, being far more copious, requires much more labor and time, as all will acknowledge who have wished to learn both. Wherefore I would dare to call Rufinus' assertion altogether improbable, nor yet do I on that account accuse him of open falsehood. He could have suspected, when they dwelt together at Aquileia, that Jerome, because he neither spoke Greek nor boasted of his knowledge of that tongue before his companions, knew either little or nothing of Greek

knew. And how slight a suspicion would suffice for Rufinus to assert something against St. Jerome, his countless calumnies prove, and the very passage objected proves, when with wonderful stupidity he strives to prove from Jerome's words that Porphyry was read by him after his conversion: for the words themselves clearly show that the time when he studied at Rome is meant. With the same levity at num. 12 the shameless calumniator objects that not Christ but Barabbas was chosen by Jerome, because forsooth the Saint used a Jewish master, Baraninas, for learning the Hebrew tongue. If he wished with such childish quibbling to calumniate a praiseworthy deed, for what reason shall we marvel if he asserted several uncertain and false things?

[88] From the words cited above, I translated the Commentaries of Alexander, He did not render Alexander's Commentaries into Latin. another doubt arises. For Tillemont in art. 10 and others expound those words of a translation into the Latin tongue. But Vallarsi in the general Preface num. 31 contends that the words must be expounded of a reading frequently repeated. He brings various reasons. First, to translate is the same, he says, as to turn over with the hand or to unroll, and the whole context of the Letter suggests this sense. Secondly, Jerome does not add what he translated from those Commentaries, nor is it likely that all Alexander's Works were rendered by him into Latin. Thirdly, Rufinus objects not a translation but a reading. These things may be seen set out at greater length in Vallarsi. To me certainly it is not probable that Jerome rendered those Works into Latin while he was at Rome in his studies, and still less afterward. This one thing perhaps he did, that, not content with a diligent reading, he made for himself certain selections from those Works in Latin. For it can scarcely be doubted that Jerome chose out various things for himself from the chief writers, especially when he did not put whole volumes of theirs into his library.

* al. Scotos

§ VI. St. Jerome's stay at Aquileia: a review of the friends known to Jerome before his journey into the East: his first Letter written.

The Saint was at some time at Athens, perhaps after seeing Gaul: Just as we do not know in what year St. Jerome came into Gaul, and how long he stayed there, so we cannot designate the year in which he began to dwell at Aquileia, nor say whether he set out thither immediately after the Gallic journey. This is plainly certain, that in the year 363 Jerome was still studying at Rome, and therefore at least did not set out for Gaul after his Roman studies except near the end of the year 363 or in one of the following years. After the Gallic journey, on which it is likely enough that he surveyed almost the whole of it, he could also have journeyed to other regions, or have returned into Italy or to his native land. Perhaps he also set out at that time for Greece from a love of seeing and learning much. Certainly he was at some time at Athens, since on Zechariah book 2 chap. 12 he writes thus: In the citadel of the Athenians beside the image of Minerva I saw a bronze sphere of very heavy weight, which for the feebleness of my poor body I could scarcely move. And when I asked what it meant, it was answered by the inhabitants of that city that by that mass the strength of the Athletes was tested, and that no one went down to the contest before it was known from the lifting of the weight who should be matched with whom. Some believe that the Saint was at Athens when he returned from the East to Rome. But I do not see by what course of journey he would have been brought to Athens. I should therefore prefer to believe that he set out for Greece either from Italy or from his native Pannonia, just as he journeyed into Gaul, for the sake of surveying and learning much.

[90] he dwelt for some time at Aquileia with Rufinus: After several journeys St. Jerome began certain rudiments of the monastic life at Aquileia, where he seems to have been about the year 370. Yet again it is not known how many years he dwelt at Aquileia, nay even whether he spent some years or only part of some year there. But from the friends to whom he was joined at Aquileia it becomes certain that the Saint dwelt at Aquileia for some time. Certainly Rufinus was dwelling there when Jerome was torn from him and set out for the East. For in book 1 of the Invectives num. 3 Rufinus speaks thus of himself: I, as both he himself and all know, nearly thirty years ago, being already placed in a monastery and regenerated by the grace of baptism, received the seal of faith through the holy men Chromatius, Jovinus and Eusebius, bishops of the highest repute and most approved in the Church of God, of whom the one was then a priest of Valerian of blessed memory, another an archdeacon, another a deacon, and at the same time was to me a father and a teacher of the creed and of the faith. This Rufinus wrote in the year 401, as we shall see in its place. He was therefore in the monastery of Aquileia before the year 373, in which we shall see that Jerome departed. And he departed from Rufinus, torn away by some unexpected storm, as he writes in Letter 3 to him in these words: After a sudden whirlwind tore me from your side: after an impious wrenching away drew me apart as I clung with the glue of charity. Then a dark rainstorm stood over my head: then were seas on every side and sky on every side. Jerome therefore was dwelling at Aquileia with Rufinus in the year 372 or 373, when by some sudden persecution, about which I shall give my conjecture below, he was forced to flee, and sailed to the East.

[91] and there he had several friends, Besides Rufinus, St. Jerome won for himself other friends at Aquileia, namely the three named above, Chromatius afterward bishop of Aquileia, Eusebius his brother, and Jovinus, afterward likewise bishops of cities unknown to us. Jerome also knew there the mother and sisters of Chromatius; as also Niceas the subdeacon and Chrysogonus the monk, to whom we shall see him afterward writing. There is added Innocentius, who was Jerome's companion on his journey. For since the Saint departed suddenly, we must say that the said companion of his journey dwelt with him at Aquileia when he committed himself thence to the sea. Perhaps Bonosus too, his old comrade, dwelt with Jerome at Aquileia. Yet this is uncertain, since he seems before Jerome's journey to have embraced the solitary life on an island. Heliodorus also could have dwelt there with Jerome. But certainly Florentius was not among the friends known to him at Aquileia, whom Baronius reckons among them at the year 372 num. 42: for Jerome had not seen Florentius when he wrote to him, as he was staying at Jerusalem, Letter 4, to be mentioned in §7.

[92] St. Jerome had some friends in other places also. At Rome St. Pammachius was known to him in his studies, as is clear from Letter 66 (otherwise 26) to Pammachius, as also Pammachius at Rome, and others in several places. to whom about that time he speaks thus at num. 9: Well known too is that saying of Cato: "Quickly enough, if well enough." At which we once as young lads laughed, when it was uttered by a finished orator in a little preface. I think you remember our mutual error, when the whole Athenæum resounded with the voices of the scholars: "Quickly enough, if well enough." Of their old friendship he makes mention again in the Preface to Obadiah: This is that time, my Pammachius, sweeter to me than this light, at which, having come out of the school of the rhetoricians, we were being carried in different pursuits, when I and my dearest Heliodorus were alike striving to inhabit the solitude of Syrian Chalcis. [*] The friendship between Jerome and Pammachius grew much after Jerome afterward stayed some years at Rome, as will be indicated in its places. St. Jerome knew also at Concordia, which seems to be Rufinus' native place, Paul, an old man nearly a hundred years old, to whom we shall see him writing most affectionately. He knew at Æmona the consecrated virgins, of whose silence he will afterward complain in a friendly way. He knew Julian the deacon, to whom he had commended the care of his sister, as will afterward be said at greater length. And concerning this Julian the Verona editor observes this on Letter 6: All the manuscripts with wonderful consent make this Julian a deacon of Aquileia. But I do not at all doubt that he is the same to whose admonitions Jerome credits his sister's conversion … Whence it is gathered that he was not far from the holy Doctor's native land. The Letter itself, to be given in §8, rather suggests a deacon of Stridon, not of Aquileia. There was also a certain monk Antony then known to Jerome, to whom there is extant a Letter of less certain date.

[93] One of Jerome's Letters which have come to our knowledge The first Letter, I judge to have been written at Aquileia in the year 371 or 372, namely the first in the Verona edition (otherwise 49), on the woman struck seven times. The Saint wrote it at the request of Innocentius, after a notable leisure, namely from the study of eloquence, as he himself suggests, beginning thus: You have often asked me, dearest Innocentius, that I should not be silent about the miracle of that matter which had happened in our age. And when I modestly and truly, as I now find, refused, and distrusted my ability to accomplish it; whether because all human speech is inferior to heavenly praise; or because leisure, like a kind of rust of the wit, had dried up the small faculty, such as it was, of my former eloquence: you on the contrary asserted that in divine matters one ought not to look at possibility but at the will; and that words could not fail him who had believed in the Word. What then shall I do? What I cannot fulfill, I dare not refuse. I am set as an untrained Passenger upon a merchant ship, and I, a Man who have not yet handled an oar on a lake, am entrusted to the crashings of the Euxine sea, etc. So many excuses show that this is St. Jerome's first little Work; and those words in particular, Who have not yet handled an oar on a lake, seem to prove that it is Jerome's first little Work, excepting, however, familiar letters, of which he had without doubt written several before; but none of them has come down to us. The leisure too, by which his eloquence had in some fashion been dried up, suits his stay at Aquileia: for between this and the Roman studies of eloquence there intervened a long journeying and sacred study.

[94] There is added the very history of which he treats, and Innocentius, to whom he writes, or the history of the woman struck seven times, and finally Evagrius, whose praises he commemorates at the end. For all these things suggest that the history was written in Italy rather than in the East. The history had happened very lately at Vercelli, and is set forth in this summary as a title: Jerome at the prayers of Innocentius relates the history of a certain miracle which had happened at Vercelli in Liguria in his own age. A certain woman falsely accused of adultery by her husband, and a young man denounced along with her, are tortured to elicit the truth. He, being impatient, confesses what he had not committed; she, steadfastly denying, cannot by any force be brought to confess a crime not committed. Both are led to execution, and the young man indeed is slain; but the woman, though struck several times, cannot die. At last, when she seemed to have fallen to death, the corpse, being taken up, comes to life again: and when she was sought again for execution, Evagrius obtained pardon for her from the emperor by his prayers. First, since the history happened in Italy, it is not likely that an account of it was sought in the East by Innocentius, or written by Jerome.

[95] it seems to have been written at Aquileia, Secondly, Innocentius indeed set out with Jerome for the East, but having died at Antioch

before Jerome had reached the desert, as I shall say at num. 102, while Jerome himself fell gravely ill there. And so, since that history was written while Innocentius was alive and at his request, it could not have been written in the desert, nor at Antioch, where Jerome himself was sick. That it was written on the journey itself is by no means likely, since the trouble of the journey is not alleged among his excuses. It remains therefore that we say with the Verona editor that it was written in Italy: for what has been said about Evagrius also confirms this view. And that Evagrius was one of St. Jerome's chief friends at that time, and a few things about him must here be noted. Evagrius was a priest of Antioch, sprung of the illustrious stock of Pompeianus the general, as Jerome observes in his translation of the Chronicle of Eusebius at the second year of the emperor Aurelian. He had come into the West with St. Eusebius bishop of Vercelli, when the latter returned into Italy from exile after the synod of Alexandria. And Evagrius returned to the East in the year 373. These last points are gathered from St. Basil's Letter 138 (otherwise 8) to St. Eusebius of Samosata, to whom he writes this: The priest Evagrius, son of Pompeianus of Antioch, who once had set out for the West with blessed Eusebius, has now returned from Rome, seeking a letter from us, etc. Evagrius came, that is, to Cæsarea while he was returning to Antioch.

[96] when Evagrius, Jerome's friend, was in the West. And what good he did in the West, Jerome in the aforesaid Letter touches upon thus toward the end: See whither the order of events has drawn me. For now we have come to the name of our Evagrius: whose labor for Christ, if I should think that it can be told by me, I should be unwise; if I should wish to be altogether silent, with my voice bursting forth into joy, I could not be. For who could sing with worthy proclamation that Auxentius (the Arian bishop), brooding over Milan [*], was by this man's watchfulness buried almost before he was dead? that the Roman Bishop (Damasus), already almost entangled in the snares of a faction (the Ursinian schism), both conquered his adversaries and did not harm the vanquished?… I am content with the end of the present matter only. He purposely approaches the Emperor (Valentinian), wearies him with prayers, softens him by his merit, wins him by his solicitude, that the woman who had been restored to life (the woman struck seven times) he might restore to liberty. So Jerome about Evagrius, whose deeds against Auxentius the Arian and on behalf of Damasus the Roman Pontiff I do not here set forth more at large. But I only observe that Jerome could have said far more about Evagrius' merits if he had written in the East, since there he did many things for Jerome and his companions. And so from his silence about Evagrius' benefits it is also gathered that that first little Work of Jerome's was written before the Eastern journey.

[97] Nay rather, I have a strong suspicion that from that same little Work there arose that sudden whirlwind From it perhaps arose the storm on account of which he departed for the East. which tore Jerome from Rufinus and his other friends at Aquileia. For if anyone should wish to turn over the history as it was most freely written by the young and eloquent Jerome, he will easily see that from it there could have arisen the enmities of powerful men against the Writer. He declares the woman innocent, and relates that she was most cruelly tortured at the command of the consular and condemned on the false confession of another, in such a way that the consular's cruelty and injustice is set before the eyes of all no less than the woman's constancy and innocence. No less graphically is set forth the case of the two executioners, of whom the first had tried four times to cut off the woman's head, the second had struck her three times to that end, their attempts being frustrated by a miracle, and the woman's return as it were to life after she had seemed to die, and her being hidden until her liberty was obtained from the emperor through Evagrius. To be brief, the whole history is such that the consular, if he saw it, could not but be covered with the greatest shame, and blaze up against the Writer, and seek vengeance for his cruelty, whether by the laws or in any other way. Wherefore I strongly suspect that Jerome withdrew himself from Italy from fear of the angry consular or of his kinsmen. And this conjecture is strengthened by the companions who departed with him, namely Innocentius, who had induced Jerome to write, and Evagrius, who had obtained for the woman either pardon or at least liberty from the emperor: for these too could fear the indignation of an angry man.

* al. volebamus

* al. Mediolanis

§ VII. St. Jerome's journey from Aquileia to Antioch: the companions of his journey: the Saint's illness at Antioch: the death of Innocentius: the arrival and return of Heliodorus: the Saint's wonderful dream: the calumnies of Rufinus refuted: three Letters written: Apollinaris heard.

Jerome by sea into Thrace, and thence by land into Syria That Jerome departed from Aquileia because of a sudden persecution, about which I have given my conjecture, we have already seen. This reason for departing alone suggests that he did not set out thence for his native land, since in it he would have been exposed to no less danger. But the Saint's own words about his departure also make it manifest that he departed by sea. For in the aforesaid Letter 3 to Rufinus he has it thus about the journey: After a sudden whirlwind tore me from your side: after an impious wrenching away drew me apart as I clung with the glue of charity, "then a dark rainstorm stood over my head: then were seas on every side and sky on every side." By the words of Virgil which he gives he signifies a voyage by sea. And whither he sailed the following words about the journey suggest in some fashion: At last, as I wandered in the uncertainty of my pilgrimage, when Thrace, Pontus and Bithynia, and the whole journey of Galatia and Cappadocia, and the land of the Cilicians with its burning heat had broken me, Syria met me like a most trusty harbor meeting a shipwrecked man. Of the provinces which after his voyage he crossed or touched, the first named is Thrace, so that the voyage seems to have been directed to some harbor of Thrace, perhaps Constantinople. Thence, having crossed the Bosphorus, he set out by a land journey through Bithynia (which is also called by Ptolemy Pontus and Bithynia), Galatia, Cappadocia and Cilicia into Syria.

[99] he sets out with Innocentius and Evagrius That Innocentius, whom we shall see died at Antioch, was St. Jerome's companion on this journey there is no doubt. About Evagrius likewise it is not to be doubted, since he calls those two his two eyes. Some add Heliodorus; but with less probability. For Heliodorus seems to have followed by another way, in order to dwell in the desert with Jerome: which, however, having changed his purpose, he afterward did not do. So far as I can gather from comparing Jerome's Letters, Heliodorus sailed to Jerusalem, and thence came to Jerome at Antioch, and, his purpose being changed, returned to his native land, as I shall show below at greater length. So Rufinus not long after St. Jerome's departure crossed into Egypt to visit the solitaries there. Moreover the words of St. Basil, given at num. 95, show that the priest Evagrius, whom the Saint names as one of his two eyes, treated with Basil at Cæsarea in Cappadocia about the affairs of Antioch.

[100] [in the year 373: on the journey he sees the monastery of St. Theodosius in Cilicia:] And from this conversation of Basil and Evagrius, which is fixed in the year 373, Tillemont in art. 4 rightly further deduces that St. Jerome departed for the East in that same year 373, and came to Antioch. On the same journey St. Jerome saw St. Theodosius the abbot and his monastery surnamed On the Crag, of which we have treated at XI January p. 677 and following. That monastery was in Cilicia beside the town of Rhosus, as may be seen there. That Jerome was there is clear from his second Letter, to be partly recited below, in which he declares his desire of living in that monastery. On this journey therefore he will have reached Antioch before the winter of the year 373, since he complains above of the burning heat of Cilicia; and the journey from Cilicia to Antioch is not long. Of Ancyra the metropolis of Galatia, which he saw, the Saint makes mention in the Prologue of book 2 on the Letter to the Galatians: and this will have happened on the same journey.

[101] he carries his library with him. On that journey also St. Jerome carried with him the library which he had procured at Rome, as we have from Letter 22 to Eustochium. When many years ago, he says at num. 30, for the kingdom of heaven's sake I had cut myself off from home, parents, sister, kinsmen, and, what is harder than these, from the habit of more dainty food, and was setting out for Jerusalem to serve as a soldier, I could by no means do without the library which I had made for myself at Rome with the greatest zeal and labor. From these same words it is clear that the Saint wished to set out for Jerusalem, but we shall see that that purpose was changed. This is confirmed from Letter 5 (otherwise 6) to Florentius, where he says: On reading which (letters) my mind was so rekindled to set out for Jerusalem that it almost harmed my purpose, namely of dwelling in the desert of Chalcis, from which the Letter was written. Tillemont in Note 6 cannot believe that Jerome wished to set out for Jerusalem, and that on account of the words cited. But without just reason he cites that passage, in which the second purpose is treated. He first desired to go to Jerusalem, as he says in the Letter to Eustochium: but at Antioch he was seized, as we shall see, with a grave illness, and lost his companion Innocentius, so that at last he had only Evagrius. The friendship and favor of this man brought it about, I think, that he was unwilling to depart farther from Antioch, so that he might have in a foreign region some solace and help, which was highly necessary for one weakened by many illnesses. By Florentius' Letter his mind was rekindled to go to Jerusalem; but he restrained himself by his purpose of dwelling in the desert.

[102] After setting forth the journey in the Letter to Rufinus, he relates what happened to him in Syria, that is, at Antioch, While Jerome was ill at Antioch, Innocentius in these words: Where I, having experienced whatever of diseases there could be, lost one of my two eyes. For a sudden burning of fevers carried off Innocentius, a part of my soul. Now I enjoy our Evagrius as my one and whole light, to whom, always weak, I have been added as a burden to his labor. Innocentius therefore died in the year 373 or 374, before St. Jerome had recovered from his long illnesses. Tillemont in Note 8 inquires into the year of Innocentius' death, and producing errors out of errors, as it certainly seems to me, contends that Innocentius did not die before the year 375. On this reckoning Jerome would have stayed at Antioch with Evagrius for almost two whole years, namely from the year 373 until well into 375.

[103] For after Innocentius there died there also Hylas, and Hylas die; as Jerome subjoins in these words: There was with us also Hylas, the servant of holy Melania [*], who by the purity of his manners had washed away the stain of servitude: and he tore open a scar not yet closed over. After Hylas' death Jerome continued ill, and was not yet restored to health when he was writing that Letter; and thus we should easily come down to the end of the year 375, and even to the following one, if the rest of Tillemont's views about the time of Rufinus' journey were to be admitted. But Tillemont's reason by no means presses, drawn from Letter 1 on the Woman struck seven times, in which Jerome says that Auxentius the Arian was by Evagrius' labor buried almost before he was dead. For he believes that this was written

could not have been written before the death of Auxentius. But since Auxentius had been condemned and deprived of the communion of Catholics, he could be said to be almost buried, even though he was not yet dead. And certainly Jerome could not have written that Letter in the East before the death of Innocentius, as has already been proved.

[104] While Jerome, sick, or at any rate weak and languid, continued to live at Antioch with Evagrius, and Heliodorus came thither from Jerusalem. his friend Heliodorus came to him, and announced to Jerome that Rufinus had come into Egypt, which, however, he could not state for certain. This again we have from Letter 3 to Rufinus num. 2, where he has it thus: The first happiness of unlooked-for joy (at Rufinus' coming) was announced to me by brother Heliodorus. I did not believe that certain which I desired to be certain, especially since he said that he too had heard it from another, and the novelty of the thing took away credit from the report. And that Heliodorus came from Jerusalem to Jerome is gathered from Letter 4 (otherwise 5), which was written at the same time to Florentius, who was living at Jerusalem. For he praises him for having helped Heliodorus, in these words: The need of brother Heliodorus helped by you can loose even the mouths of the dumb. With what thanks, with what proclamation did he report the discomforts of his pilgrimage comforted by you? So that I, that slowest of men, whom an intolerable languor consumes, have with winged feet, as they say, greeted you, and even embraced you, in the gesture and desire of charity. From the help which Florentius furnished to Heliodorus at Jerusalem it is clear that he was at Jerusalem before he came to Jerome. And that he was not at Antioch with Jerome from the beginning I have already observed from the words about Innocentius' death, Of my two eyes I lost one. From what follows about Evagrius, Now I enjoy our Evagrius as my one and whole light, it is again gathered that Heliodorus had departed before Jerome wrote those Letters together: for otherwise Heliodorus would have been the other eye, as Innocentius had been before.

[105] But he, while Jerome vainly tries to detain him, departs again That it had been Heliodorus' purpose to dwell in the desert with Jerome, but that he drew back from that purpose, perhaps on account of Innocentius' death and Jerome's persistent languor, or for some other cause, we have from Letter 6 (otherwise 73) to Julian the deacon, to whom he writes this: The holy brother Heliodorus was here, who, when he wished to dwell in the desert with me, went away, put to flight by my sins. Yet the Saint labored much to keep Heliodorus with him. For he begins Letter 14 (otherwise 1) to Heliodorus, afterward written, thus: With how great love and zeal I strove that we might dwell together in the desert, the breast conscious of our mutual charity knows. With what laments, with what grief, with what groaning I followed you as you went away, these letters too are witnesses, which you see blotted with tears. But you, like a spoiled little child, soothed with blandishments your contempt of one who begged, and I, being incautious, knew not what then to do. Should I be silent? But what I ardently desired I could not moderately dissemble. Should I entreat more earnestly? But you were unwilling to hear, because you did not love in like manner. The one thing it could do, spurned charity has done. Him whom it could not keep when present, it now seeks when absent. Since therefore you yourself, as you went away, had asked that after I had migrated to the desert places I should send you an invitation in writing, and I had promised that I would do so; I invite you: hasten now, etc. These things show not only that Heliodorus drew back from his purpose, but also that he went away before Jerome had migrated to the deserts, because he continued ill. And on account of this illness he either gave Heliodorus, as he departed, no letters to their friends, or very short ones which have not been preserved. Tillemont in Note 7 discourses about Heliodorus, and strives to make two men out of one, but on no other ground than that he has not well arranged Heliodorus' journeys.

[106] in the year 374, while Jerome was still ill. But now, since Heliodorus and Rufinus set out for the East only after St. Jerome's departure, and the one had come into Egypt, the other had been at Jerusalem and thence had come to Antioch, Heliodorus' return to the West cannot be fixed before the year 374. Nevertheless, while he was at Antioch, where probably he did not stay long, the Saint continued gravely ill. For in Letter 6 to Julian he cites Heliodorus as a witness of his illness, and speaks of it thus: A continual sickness both of body and a grief of soul so consumed me that, with death threatening, I was scarcely mindful even of myself. And that you may not think this false, I shall after the arguments call witnesses, in the manner of an orator. The holy brother Heliodorus was here, etc. And now that grave and long-lasting illness leads us to another fact which without any doubt happened at Antioch, not in the desert, as others have believed, and Tillemont following them in art. 9.

[107] In the year 374, in Lent, at Antioch, not in the desert, I speak of the famous dream in which the Saint was gravely rebuked for his excessive reading of profane writers, and on account of which he afterward began to abstain from reading Cicero, the poets, and other similar profane writers whom he used to read for the sake of eloquence. By no word does he suggest that he was in the desert when this happened. On the contrary he says, or at least suggests, that it happened at that time at which he was still thinking of going to Jerusalem. And he seems to have been of that mind while living at Antioch, until he chose to dwell in the desert of Chalcis. Moreover, writing on the Letter to the Galatians, in the Preface of the third book he says to Paula and Eustochium: For you yourselves know that it is more than fifteen years since Tully, since Maro, since any author whatever of gentile letters came into my hands; and if by chance anything from them creeps in while we speak, we recall it as an old dream through a mist. In the Preface of the second book also he says: It is now many years since we ceased to read these things. But we shall show in its place that the exposition of the Letter to the Galatians can by no means be fixed later than the year 389. Wherefore that dream of Jerome's cannot be placed after the year 374. And since the illness in which it was presented grew worse about the middle of Lent, it becomes most certain that the Saint was not yet at that time in the desert, and consequently that the dream must be fixed at Antioch in Lent of the year 374. The most grave illness itself, which he asserts in narrating the dream, confirms the time, since he does not seem to have suffered so grievously in the desert.

[108] And about it in Letter 22 to Eustochium num. 30, the Saint had a wonderful dream, where he had said that he could not do without his library even though he was setting out for Jerusalem to serve as a soldier, Jerome writes the following: And so I, wretched man, used to fast in order to read Tully. After the frequent vigils of the nights, after the tears which the recollection of past sins drew from my inmost heart, Plautus was taken into my hands. If at any time, returning to myself, I began to read the Prophets, the unpolished speech made me shudder. And because with blind eyes I did not see the light, I thought the fault was not of my eyes but of the sun. While the ancient serpent [*] thus mocked me, about the middle of Lent a fever, poured into my marrow, invaded my exhausted body: and without any rest (which is incredible even to tell) so devoured my unhappy limbs that I scarcely clung to my bones. Meanwhile my funeral is prepared, and the vital warmth of the soul, my whole body being now cold, throbs only in my little breast that alone remains warm: when suddenly, being caught up in spirit, I am dragged to the tribunal of the Judge, where there was so much light, and so much brightness from the radiance of the bystanders, that, cast upon the ground, I did not dare to look up. Being asked about my condition, I answered that I was a Christian. And he who presided said: You lie, you are a Ciceronian, not a Christian: for where your treasure is, there is your heart also. Straightway I fell silent, and amid the stripes (for he had ordered me to be beaten) I was tormented more by the fire of conscience, turning over with myself that verse: "But in hell who shall confess to you?"

[109] Yet I began to cry out, and wailing to say: Have mercy on me, Lord, by which he was deterred from reading profane books, have mercy on me. This voice resounded amid the scourges. At last those who stood by, falling at the knees of him who presided, prayed him to grant pardon to my youth and to allow a place of repentance for my error, purposing thereafter to exact the torment if ever I should read books of gentile letters. I, being bound in so great a strait, would have wished to promise even greater things, and began to swear, and calling upon his name, to say: Lord, if ever I possess secular books, if I read them, I have denied you. Being dismissed upon these words of my oath, I return to the upper world, and, while all marveled, I open my eyes, so bathed with a shower of tears that from my grief I would have won credit even with unbelievers. Nor indeed had that been a slumber, or the empty dreams by which we are often deluded. Witness is that tribunal before which I lay: witness the sad judgment which I feared: so may it never befall me to come into such a trial. I confess that I had bruised shoulders, that I felt the blows after my sleep, and that thenceforth I read divine things with as great zeal as I had not before read mortal things. These things about himself the most humble Jerome relates in order to deter the holy virgin Eustochium from reading gentile books, especially the poets, who certainly, since they are wont to mix many obscene things with the rest, do not suit a virgin. Hence at num. 29 he prefixes this admonition: Do not wish to seem very eloquent, or to sport with meter, gay with lyric songs. And presently: What has Horace to do with the Psalter? Maro with the Gospels? Cicero with the Apostle? etc.

[110] which he also dissuaded others, and Pope Damasus himself, from doing. Nor did Jerome dissuade only virgins from reading the poets and other gentile writers, but learned men also. In Letter 21 (otherwise 146) to Damasus the Roman Pontiff, who was himself a poet, but a Christian and pious one, treating of the husks with which the prodigal son desired to fill his belly, he speaks thus: But we can interpret the husks otherwise also. The food of demons is the songs of the poets, worldly wisdom, the pomp of rhetorical words. These delight all by their sweetness, and while they captivate the ears with verses running in sweet measure, they penetrate the soul also and bind fast the inward parts of the breast. But when they have been read through with the greatest zeal and labor, they bestow upon their readers nothing else but an empty sound and a noise of words: there is found there no fullness of truth, no refreshment of justice. And then, when he had brought forward more from the sacred Letters, and had observed that the Apostle under other words as it were says: Do not read the philosophers, the orators, the poets; nor rest in reading them; against priests too fond of such writers he brings forth these words of reproof: But now we see even the priests of God, leaving aside the Gospels and the Prophets, reading comedies, singing the amatory words of bucolic verses, holding Virgil: and making that a crime of pleasure in themselves which in boys is of necessity. By name he gravely reproves the rashness of those who prefer to seem Latins rather than Christians, when they take up forms of swearing by the gods of the gentiles. Far be it, he says, that from a Christian mouth there should sound: Jupiter almighty;

and by Hercules, and by Castor, and the rest, monsters rather than deities. [*] These things the Saint wrote about them after many years.

[111] From the said dream Rufinus ridiculously accused Jerome of perjury: Nevertheless from the passage cited above Rufinus snatched the occasion of a grave calumny, when with laborious disputation he attempted to make St. Jerome guilty of perjury; as though he had promised on oath that he would not thereafter read the books of the gentiles, and had not kept that promise. I marvel the less at Rufinus, since here, because he could find nothing of solid accusation, and even so, being an angry man, preferred to accuse another than to defend himself, he everywhere brings forth great trifles with great effort. And Jerome sufficiently refuted Rufinus' reasonings, even though he answered only briefly. For he observes first that he had promised for the future, and suggests that he thereafter did not read books of that kind; but that he had not forgotten all those things which he had read before. The second answer is that it was a dream, and that from a dream no obligation arises. But yet, he says, let him who makes a crime of a dream hear the voices of the prophets, that dreams are not to be believed, since neither does the adultery of a dream lead me to Tartarus, nor does the crown of martyrdom lift me to heaven. And when Rufinus, after Jerome's answer had been given, repeated the ridiculous calumny in his letters, Jerome in book 3 num. 32 received the man with laughter, and answered nothing further except that the promise was that of a sleeper.

[112] But Tillemont in art. 9 imagines for himself a great difficulty in a matter of nothing, whom Tillemont vainly succors; since the dream was real, and not only strives from Rufinus to prove that Jerome did not abstain from reading the books of the gentiles; but also does not dare to agree with Jerome that it was a dream in which all these things were transacted; and at last he not obscurely deserts Jerome as though he were stuck in the mire of perjury. He deplores, namely, the misery of human frailty, and suggests that Jerome from a defect of humility was unwilling to acknowledge his sin. But into errors of this kind that author frequently fell, because he read the ancient writers without sufficient dialectical and theological knowledge. Certainly there can be no doubt that all these things happened to Jerome while sleeping, as he himself easily repeats ten times in different words in books 1 and 3 against Rufinus. For from the very passage which is objected the same is clearly understood. The Saint confesses that he felt the blows after sleep. Who therefore would doubt that he was struck with blows in sleep, and that all these things happened to him as he slept? The Saint was lying in bed with his eyes closed like a dying man, as is clear from those words: And while all marveled, I open my eyes. How then, cast upon the ground, did he not dare to look up, how did he begin to cry out and to swear, unless because those and all the rest so passed in his imagination as is wont to happen to those who dream? Wherefore it cannot be doubted that everything happened in sleep, as Jerome so often repeats against Rufinus, and declares in the very passage objected.

[113] But, you will say, why then does he say: Nor indeed had that been a slumber, in which the Saint said that he was divinely corrected and admonished, or the empty dreams by which we are often deluded? I answer that Jerome spoke thus because he believed that the dream was sent by God, and that in it he had been rebuked and admonished to abstain from reading the books of the gentiles, or at least to temper his excessive appetite for reading those books. He denies that it was an empty or a natural dream; but that it was a dream, and that in it he was corrected and admonished, he does not deny. So in book 3 against Rufinus num. 32 he answers: I am guilty of a great crime if I told the girls and virgins of Christ that secular books are not to be read, and that, being admonished in dreams, I promised that I would not read them. And below: I report that I was humbly reproved, etc. So St. Joseph, Mary's spouse, in Matth. 2 v. 13 is admonished by an angel in dreams to flee into Egypt. So Abimelech king of Gerar in Gen. 20 v. 3 is admonished through a dream to restore his wife Sara to Abraham. So to Joseph the patriarch many things were signified through a dream about his future greatness: and many things were shown in sleep to Pharaoh the king of Egypt, many to king Nabuchodonosor, and to many others. And so, when Jerome says above, Nor indeed had that been a slumber or empty dreams, he denies that the dream was empty, or arisen from a merely natural cause, and signifying nothing; but both there and afterward to Rufinus he declares that by that dream he was rebuked for excessive reading of the books of the gentiles. But in both places again he suggests that everything happened to him as he slept. For in the first exposition, in order to prove that the dream was not empty, though a dream, he says that after sleep he had … bruised … shoulders, that he felt the blows; just as someone who had injured himself in a dream would have said: On waking I saw blood flowing copiously. And afterward about that dream he says: I report that I was humbly reproved; and he confesses that, being admonished in dreams, he promised not to read the books of the gentiles, but he does not say that he promised or swore otherwise than in sleep.

[114] nor yet that he was bound by any promise. Wherefore most empty is Tillemont's objection, who wished to bring in Jerome as one lying and unwilling to yield to the truth. But if he also believed that Jerome was no less bound to perform those things which he had promised in sleep, or rather to keep those things which he had dreamed that he promised, he has certainly followed a wonderful theology. Certainly that was not Jerome's view when he answered Rufinus in book 3 chap. 32: Now let it suffice to have said briefly that you demand from a sleeper what you never performed waking. And in book 1 num. 31 he says: Neither does the adultery of a dream lead me to Tartarus, nor does the crown of martyrdom lift me to heaven; namely because the things which are done in sleep are done without freedom of will. Nevertheless Jerome thereafter abstained from reading the books of the gentiles, as we have already seen; because he judged that he had been admonished by that dream to do so. And if perhaps he afterward read again some books of the gentiles, as Rufinus and Tillemont contended, he did this without doubt because he sufficiently understood that he had been reproved for too assiduous a reading of the gentiles, not for a moderate use, which was common to almost all the holy Fathers. Certainly St. Augustine, who probably was not ignorant of that reproof of Jerome in sleep, did not on that account abstain from the books of the gentiles, which in the books on the City of God he most frequently brings forward and refutes; and in many other places.

[115] Rufinus' arguments Yet let us hear Rufinus' objections themselves. He objects first in book 2 num. 5 that there is scarcely a page of Jerome's where he does not say: But our Tully, but our Flaccus, but Maro. The exaggeration is monstrous: for almost all the Hieronymian little Works are full of the words of sacred Scripture: yet from time to time in some of them something from the poets is inserted. And when he says our Tully, he signifies solely that the writer is a Latin, as is likewise done from time to time about Horace. He says secondly that Chrysippus and Aristides, Empedocles, and other Greeks, and even the books of Pythagoras, are cited by Jerome. These are Rufinian trifles: for the things which Jerome sometimes brings forward about them he could easily produce either from his faithful memory, as he says he did, or at least from his own excerpts. Thirdly he objects the words given at num. 85 about the reading of Porphyry's Isagoge and Alexander's Commentaries. But these he had read at Rome, when he was learning logic. Rufinus, however, says: Nor can he argue that he learned these things before. For before he was converted he, together with me, was utterly ignorant both of Greek letters and of the language. After the oath all these things, etc. But Tillemont, who elsewhere adopted the objection, confesses in art. 10 that it can with difficulty be believed that the Greek tongue was then unknown to Jerome. But to me the thing is plainly incredible, or rather openly false. And it is abundantly certain that Jerome learned logic at Rome from the authors cited, and that with the help of a learned master.

[116] against St. Jerome This objection of Rufinus alone, which he hurls as a most powerful weapon against St. Jerome with lengthy words and wonderful confidence, abundantly shows with how great rashness he calumniated the sayings and deeds of that holy Man. For he rises against Jerome with such impudence of words as though he had proved a grave crime by solid reasoning; whereas nevertheless he has woven nothing but spiders' webs, and the whole argument is unworthy of a man even moderately learned. For both propositions from which he deduces the crime are false. The oath asserted is false: for he did not swear who dreamed that he had sworn. The asserted reading of Porphyry and Alexander after the dream about the oath is false, since Jerome spoke most clearly of the time at which he was learning logic at Rome. Wherefore I frankly declare that by that argument alone Rufinus has with me detracted more from his own honor than he has injured St. Jerome's reputation by all his invectives. For he here clearly betrays his rashness in asserting things in a manifest matter, so that from this we may gather how little or no credit he deserves when he asserts other things less well ascertained.

[117] Rufinus' last objection perhaps has something of truth, prove nothing at all. but it is most empty. The monks, as he asserts in book 2 num. 8, on the Mount of Olives copied very many of Cicero's Dialogues for him, and received an ample reward for their labor. Rufinus himself saw a codex written by Jerome, in which was one Dialogue of Cicero, and that same one in Greek by Plato. The inept calumniator adds: But why do I linger so long on a matter which is clearer than light? Since … not long ago he still discharged the duties of a Grammarian, and expounded his Maro, and the comic and lyric and historical authors, to little boys entrusted to him to learn the fear of God, that is to say, that he might become a teacher of the gentile authors, whom, had he only read them, he had sworn that he would deny Christ. I do not examine whether all these things are true, and not at least exaggerated beyond the truth. For this is certain, that in all those things there is nothing worthy of reproof.

[118] St. Jerome abstained for at least fifteen years from all reading of those books prove. for whose excessive reading he judged that he had been reproved by a divine dream, and perhaps also for his whole life did not thereafter read them for his own use. But if afterward that most humble Man wished also to instruct boys, and in the reading of the books of the gentiles (which in boys is of necessity, as he says at num. 110) to direct them to the right learning of the Latin and Greek tongue, and to put into their hands the better and less dangerous ones, and finally to expound some of the more obscure things in them, what would even the severest Cato think worthy of reproof in a deed so praiseworthy? For what Rufinus boasts about the oath is a bugbear for boys, not an argument worthy of a man: nor would Rufinus himself, I think, if he had dreamed that he had sworn that he would not eat for ten days, have preferred to die of hunger rather than, against an imaginary oath, to take food after his custom

to take. If anyone should think these things disputed at greater length than was necessary, let him consider that in later centuries new Rufinuses have risen against St. Jerome.

[119] At the time when St. Jerome was languishing at Antioch after his illness, The Saint writes to St. Theodosius the abbot, most humbly he wrote three Letters, namely the second, third and fourth of the Verona edition. The Saint was burning with the desire of embracing the monastic or solitary life, but he had not yet chosen the place to which he should betake himself; and the languor left by his illnesses compelled him to defer his purpose. Letter 2 (otherwise 38) to Theodosius the abbot and the other anchorites in Cilicia, whom he had seen on his journey in the year 373, is perhaps the first of the three, and certainly written at Antioch, because the Saint was hesitating in doubt about his manner of life. I transfer it hither entire, because it proves Jerome's wonderful humility. How I could wish now, he says, to be present at your assembly: and, though these eyes do not deserve to behold it, to embrace with all exultation that admirable fellowship. I should behold a desert more pleasant than any city. I should see places deserted by inhabitants beset with companies of Saints, as though after some likeness of paradise. But because my offenses have brought it about that a head beset with every crime should not be admitted [*] to the fellowship of the blessed; therefore I beseech you (since I do not doubt that you can obtain it) that you free me by your prayer from the darkness of this world. And, as I had said before when present, so now by letters I do not cease to declare my desire, since my mind is carried away with all eagerness to that pursuit. Now it is for you that the effect should follow the will.

[120] declaring his desire of embracing the monastic life. It is mine to will: it belongs to your entreaties that I should both will and be able. I am as a sick sheep straying from the whole flock. And unless the good Shepherd shall carry me back to his own folds upon his shoulders, my steps will falter, and in the very effort the footsteps of one who rises will fall. I am that prodigal son who, having squandered the whole portion which the Father had entrusted to me, have not yet cast myself at my Begetter's knees: I have not yet begun to drive away from me the blandishments of my former wantonness. And because a little while ago I have not so much ceased from vices as begun to wish to cease, now the devil binds me with new nets: now, setting new hindrances before me, he surrounds me with seas on every side and sea on every side: now, placed in the midst of the element, I neither wish to go back nor am able to go forward. It remains that by your prayer the breeze of the Holy Spirit should carry me forward, and bring me on to the harbor of the desired shore. These things the Saint probably wrote before he learned of Rufinus' coming into Egypt, that is, before the two following Letters, given at the same time; nay perhaps even before the dream related above, that is, at the beginning of the year 374: whatever the case, certainly before his departure to the desert.

[121] He writes to Florentius staying at Jerusalem, adding letters to Rufinus, About the middle of the summer of the year 374 St. Jerome wrote to Rufinus, whom he had learned had come into Egypt, and at the same time gave another Letter to Florentius staying at Jerusalem, that he might see to the delivery of the one addressed to Rufinus. In both he makes manifest an admirable charity, kindness, and the highest humility. First I shall treat of the Letter to Florentius, whom, as is gathered from its beginning, Jerome came to know through the benefits bestowed on Heliodorus: which beginning is this: How great a report of your beatitude has filled the various mouths of peoples you will be able to judge from this, that I begin to love you before I know you. For as the Apostle says, "the sins of some men are manifest, going before to judgment"; so on the contrary the fame of your love is so spread abroad that not so much is he to be praised who loves you, as he is thought to commit a crime who does not love you… The need of brother Heliodorus helped by you can loose even the mouths of the dumb, … so that I, that slowest of men, whom an intolerable languor consumes, have with winged feet, as they say, greeted you, and even embraced you, in the gesture and desire of charity. I congratulate you therefore, and pray that the Lord may deign to knit together our nascent friendship. And because brother Rufinus, who is reported to have come from Egypt to Jerusalem with holy Melania, is joined to me with an indivisible charity of brotherhood, I ask that you may not be reluctant to deliver to him my Letter joined to this Letter of yours. Rufinus had not yet come to Jerusalem, nor does Jerome seem to have heard anything but an uncertain report about him. For this cause he directs the Letter to Florentius.

[122] whom he praises much, humbly abasing himself; But how sincerely he loved Rufinus, and how modestly he thought of himself, is gathered from the following: Do not judge us by his virtues: in him you will behold the marks of sanctity expressed: and I, ashes and the vilest part of clay, and already turning to embers, hold it enough if the weakness of my eyes can bear the splendor of his manners. He has just washed himself (baptism having lately been received) and is clean, and whitened as snow: I, stained with all the filth of sins, day and night await with trembling to pay the last farthing. But yet, because the Lord looses those who are in fetters, and his words rest upon the humble and trembling, perhaps he may say even to me, lying in the sepulcher of my crimes: Jerome, come forth. The holy priest Evagrius greets you much, and we with joined homage greet brother Martinianus, whom, desiring to see, I am bound by the chain of my languor. Farewell in Christ. From his desire of seeing brother Martinianus, who was doubtless a solitary, it is gathered that St. Jerome even then desired to embrace the solitary life in Palestine, or at least hesitated in doubt about the place. But whether that Martinianus is St. Martinianus the anchorite in Palestine, who lived at that time, as may be seen among us in his Life at XIII February, or some other, I cannot state for certain. But it is likely that the said Saint is designated.

[123] Just as he here celebrates Rufinus with great praises, To Rufinus he sets forth his desire of seeing him, so in Letter 3 to Rufinus he declares no common desire of seeing him. For he begins in this manner: That God bestows more than is asked, and often grants those things which neither eye has seen nor ear heard, nor have they ascended into the heart of man, although I had known it before from the mystery of the sacred volumes; yet in my own case I have now proved it, dearest Rufinus. For I, who believed my prayers bold enough if by an exchange of letters we should feign to ourselves an image of presence, hear that you are penetrating the secret places of Egypt, visiting the choirs of monks, and going about a heavenly household upon earth. Oh if now the Lord Jesus Christ would suddenly grant me either Philip's translation to the eunuch or Habakkuk's to Daniel, how I would now bind your neck in close embraces, how I would fix my lips upon that mouth which once either erred or was wise along with me! But because I deserve not so much that you should come to me thus, as that I should go to you thus, and frequent illnesses have broken a poor body weak even when it is sound, I send these letters as my substitutes and as messengers to meet you, that they may bring you, bound in the bond of love, all the way to me.

[124] Presently he sets forth in what way he received the news of his coming, and exhorts him to a constant friendship: first through Heliodorus, then through an Alexandrian monk, and at last through many travelers. But here, he says, I loosed all the reins of belief, and then I truly grieved that I was sick. And had not the strength of my wasted body hindered me as with a fetter, neither the heat of midsummer, nor the sea ever uncertain for those who sail, could have withstood me as I went with pious haste. Believe me, brother, not so does the sailor tossed by a storm look out for the harbor, not so do thirsting fields long for showers, nor so does an anxious mother, sitting on the curving shore, await her son. After many things about his journey and other matters, at the end he exhorts him to a constant friendship in these words: But to return to the point from which I had departed, I beseech you that your mind may not lose along with your eyes a friend who is long sought, scarcely found, and with difficulty kept. Let whoever will [*] gleam with gold; and let metals glitter in their gaudy dishes from their pomp of burdens. Charity cannot be bought. Love has no price. A friendship which can come to an end never was true. So Jerome, the most sincere cultivator of friendship. But that Rufinus' friendship was equal I can detect by no sign; nay, we cannot even prove that he ever answered these letters of St. Jerome.

[125] he celebrates the monastic life of Bonosus, In the same Letter he relates to Rufinus and wonderfully celebrates the monastic life of Bonosus, which he had probably learned from Heliodorus. Your Bonosus, he says, nay mine, and, to speak more truly, ours, is now climbing the ladder foreshown to Jacob as he dreamed: he carries his cross; he neither thinks of the morrow nor looks behind him. He sows in tears, that he may reap in joy… He has settled, like some new dweller in paradise, upon an island shipwrecked amid the sounding sea, where rough crags and bare rocks and solitude are a terror. There no husbandman, no monk, not even that little Onesimus whom you know, whom he enjoyed in a kiss as a brother, clings to his side as a companion in so great a wilderness. There alone, nay now, with Christ accompanying him, not alone, he sees the glory of God, which even the Apostles did not see save in the desert. He does not indeed behold turreted cities; but he has given his name to the roll of the new city. His limbs are rough with deforming sackcloth; but so shall he the better be caught up in the clouds to meet Christ. He enjoys no pleasantness of channeled waters; but from the Lord's side he drinks the water of life. Set these things before your eyes, sweetest friend, and turn yourself wholly in mind and thought to the presence of the matter, etc.

[126] hinting that he desires it himself. He adds more about Bonosus, and clearly declares his desire of following him, addressing God thus: Remember, I pray, that this warrior of yours was once a raw recruit with me… Let him enjoy the crown of virtue, and, robed for his daily martyrdoms, let him follow the Lamb… To me grant that I may be able to lift my head among the heels of the Saints; that, since I wished it (and indeed first, as he said before) and he accomplished it, you may pardon me, because (on account of illness) I could not fulfill it, and may bestow on him the reward which he deserves. These things abundantly declare what manner of life St. Jerome was meditating while sick in the year 374.

[127] He hears Apollinaris expounding the Scriptures. Meanwhile, when the severity of his illness had in some degree abated, he pursued the study of sacred Scripture, and heard Apollinaris of Laodicea, whose fame for learning was great, teaching at that time. Apollinaris was indeed the founder of a new heresy, which was even then beginning to become known, but the heresiarch himself had not yet become known. Wherefore Tillemont in art. 5 rightly observes that Apollinaris was heard by Jerome during this stay at Antioch, since Apollinaris' heresy seems to have become known before the Saint returned from the desert to Antioch. Of having heard Apollinaris in his youth Jerome speaks thus in Letter 84 (otherwise 65) to Pammachius and Oceanus num. 3: While I was a young man, I was carried by a wonderful ardor of learning, nor according to

the presumption of certain men did I teach myself. I heard Apollinaris of Laodicea frequently at Antioch, and reverenced him: and while he was instructing me in the holy Scriptures, I never took up his contentious doctrine concerning the mind. What he says concerning the mind is the same as concerning the understanding. For Apollinaris deprived Christ of a human mind, and would have it that the Divinity was to Christ in place of a mind. Jerome likewise reckons Apollinaris among his masters in book 1 against Rufinus num. 13.

* al. Melaniæ

* al. hostis

* al. nomina

* al. inferretur

* al. quilibet

§ VIII. The Saint inhabits the desert: thence he writes to Florentius: afterward he sends many Letters to his friends at Aquileia and to others in the West.

The Saint began to inhabit the desert probably in the year 374: In what year and month St. Jerome departed from Antioch to the desert we cannot determine for certain. He continued to stay at Antioch, and was languishing after midsummer of the year 374, when he wrote to Rufinus, so that it would not be to be wondered at if he did not depart to the desert before the year 375. Nevertheless it is more probable that he departed before the end of the year 374: for he was already in the desert when he received the answer of Florentius, who was living at Jerusalem, to his earlier letters given after midsummer. But he would probably have received Florentius' answer at Antioch if he had remained there until the year 375. Yet he perhaps wrote no Letters from the desert before the year 375. For when he was writing to Florentius he had already received letters from the West. And his friends at Aquileia and other Westerners near them seem to have sent letters to Jerome after the return of Heliodorus, who certainly did not reach Aquileia before the advanced summer of the year 374: for in that same year, perhaps at the beginning of the summer, he had departed from Syria. Everything therefore suggests that the Letters of Jerome of which we shall presently treat should be referred rather to the year 375 than to 374.

[129] The first of them seems to be the fifth (otherwise 6) to Florentius, Thence he writes to Florentius about his purpose of not leaving the desert, to whom he had written also at Antioch. The Saint begins thus: To me, staying in that part of the desert which next to Syria borders on the Saracens, the writings of your love have been brought. On reading which my mind was so rekindled to set out for Jerusalem that it almost harmed my purpose, though it profited my charity. Now therefore, as best I can, I present you letters in my stead: and, though absent in body, yet in love and spirit I come, earnestly entreating that neither length of time nor distance of places may tear apart our nascent friendships, which have cohered with the glue of Christ; nay rather let us bind them fast with mutual Letters. Let them run between us, let them meet one another, let them speak with us. Charity will lose not much if it converses with itself in such discourse. But brother Rufinus, as you write, has not yet come; and if he shall come, it will not much profit my desire, since I shall now not see him. For he is separated from me by so long an interval that he cannot make an excursion hither; and I am confined by the bounds of the solitude I have taken up, so that it has now begun not to be permitted me to do what I wished; namely the journey to Jerusalem. For he had now chosen for himself the place of the solitary life, about which he had long hesitated in doubt, and had resolved not to depart from it.

[130] The Saint subjoins: For this reason I also beseech, and I ask you very much to request, and asking that he see to some books being sent to him. that he may grant you for copying the Commentaries of blessed Rheticius bishop of Autun, in which he discoursed with a lofty utterance on the Song of Songs. There has also written to me a certain Paul [*], an old man from the native place of the aforesaid brother Rufinus, that his own codex of Tertullian is with him, which he vehemently demands back. And for this reason I ask that you order those books which the subjoined List will teach you that I do not have to be written out on paper by a copyist's hand. I ask also that you convey to me the Interpretation of the Psalms of David, and the very lengthy book of holy Hilary on the Synods, which I had copied for him with my own hand at Trier. You know that this is the food of the Christian soul, if it meditate in the Law of the Lord day and night. Others you receive with hospitality, cherish with solace, help with means. If you shall have furnished me what I ask, you have bestowed all things. And since, by the Lord's bounty, we abound in many codices of the sacred library, command in turn whatever you wish, and I will send it. And do not think it a burden to me if you order. I have pupils who serve the copyist's art. Nor indeed do I promise a favor for that which I ask. Brother Heliodorus (when he had come from Jerusalem to Antioch) indicated to me that you inquire into many things of the Scriptures, and do not find them, etc. I omit the rest, as less conducive to our purpose. He says nothing about his illness in this Letter. He had been healed, I think, before he betook himself to the desert. On account of the Letter of Paul of Concordia mentioned above, which was probably brought together with the Letter of St. Chromatius and the others, we have preferred to refer this Letter to the year 375 rather than to the preceding one.

[131] To Julian the deacon he commends the care of his sister, Then in the same year we strongly suspect that Jerome wrote eight or nine Letters at the same time to his friends at Aquileia and to other Westerners, although it cannot be proved by any certain argument that all were sent together. Some of them had written first to Jerome, namely Julian the deacon; Chromatius, Jovinus and Eusebius of Aquileia had sent one Letter together, and another Paul, the old man of Concordia. And so I shall first treat of the letters written back to them. In Letter 6 (otherwise 73) to Julian the deacon, by whom he had been reproached for his silence in letters, he alleges as an excuse the illness from which he had suffered at Antioch, and cites Heliodorus as a witness of the illness. Then he answers him the following about his sister and other matters: I rejoice that my sister, your daughter in Christ, is, as you are the first to announce, persevering in what she had begun. For here, where I now am, I do not know not only what is done in my native land, but even whether my native land still stands. And though an Iberian viper tear me with a sinister mouth, I shall not fear the judgment of men, since I shall have God as my judge; according to that which a certain man [*] says: "If the broken world should fall in, its ruins will strike him undismayed." Wherefore I ask that, mindful of the Apostolic precept in which he teaches that our work ought to endure, you both prepare for yourself a reward from the Lord in her salvation, and make me the more glad with frequent discourses about our common glory in Christ. Whom he designates by those words an Iberian viper is not established. By the word viper is certainly designated a most wicked man, or one meditating evil. Some think that Lupicinus bishop of Stridon is designated. I rather suspect that it is the same man on whose account Jerome set out from Aquileia for the East.

[132] and likewise to Chromatius, Jovinus and Eusebius, Moreover he shows no small care for his sister, who had fallen in her youth, also in Letter 7 (otherwise 43) to Chromatius, Jovinus and Eusebius, clerics of Aquileia, given at the same time. For thus he has it at num. 4: My sister is the fruit of holy Julian in Christ. He planted, do you water: the Lord will give the increase. Jesus bestowed her on me in place of that wound which the devil had inflicted, restoring her alive for one that was dead. For her I (as the gentile poet says) fear all things, even those that are safe. You yourselves know the slippery path of youth, in which I too have fallen, and which you do not pass without fear. Now that she is above all entering upon it, she must be propped by the precepts of all, must be sustained by the solaces of all, that is, must be strengthened by frequent letters of your sanctity. And, because charity bears all things, I beseech you that you also require letters from father Valerian (namely the bishop of Aquileia) to comfort her. You know that girls' minds are for the most part strengthened by these things, if they understand that they are a care to their elders. For in my native land the household deity of rusticity [*] is the belly, and men live for the day; and he is the holier who is the richer. To this dish (according to the proverb worn in the speech of the people) there has come a fitting lid, the priest Lupicinus. This man is otherwise unknown, but he is by no means praised in what follows, which for brevity's sake I omit.

[133] These things about the care of his sister being premised, I subjoin the beginning of the Letter, with whom he was joined in great friendship: from which it is gathered with how great a charity our Saint was joined to St. Chromatius and to Jovinus and Eusebius: Paper ought not to divide those whom mutual love has joined: nor are the duties of my discourse to be parceled out to each of you singly, since you so love one another that charity joins three no less than nature has associated two (the brothers Chromatius and Eusebius): nay rather, if the condition of the matter allowed, I would enclose your undivided names under a single stroke of the pen, since your letters too so provoke me that I thought both three in one and one in three. For after they were brought to me, holy Evagrius forwarding them, into that part of the desert which draws a vast frontier between the Syrians and the Saracens, I so rejoiced that I surpassed that day of Roman felicity on which the columns of Hannibal first fell in Marcellus' battle at Nola after the fight at Cannæ (it was the first victory over Hannibal). And although the aforesaid brother (Evagrius) often visits me, and cherishes me as his own heart in Christ: yet, being separated from me by a long space (inasmuch as he dwells at Antioch), he has left me by his departing a longing no less than the gladness he brought by his coming. Now I converse with your letters, I embrace them, they speak with me, they alone here know Latin. For here one must either learn a barbarous half-speech or be silent. As often as the impressed traces of a known hand bring back to me faces most dear, so often either I am not here, or you are here. He adds other like things, and complains in a friendly way of the brevity of their letters.

[134] Again in this Letter the Saint shows a profound humility, the Saint's humility, comparing himself with Bonosus. when he compares himself with Bonosus, about whom they had written, in these words: Bonosus, as you write, because he is a son of ἰχθύος, that is, of the fish, seeks watery places. We, foul with our former contagion, like basilisks and scorpions, follow after all that is dry. He now treads upon the serpent's head: we are still food for the serpent that eats earth by the divine sentence. He can now climb the highest Psalm of the Degrees: while we still weep on the first ascent, I know not whether it may ever befall us to say: "I have lifted up my eyes to the mountains: whence shall come help to me." He, sitting amid the threatening waves of the world in the safe bosom of the island, that is, of the Church, after the example of John perhaps already devours the book: I, lying in the sepulcher of my crimes and bound with the chains of my sins, await the Lord's cry from the Gospel: Jerome, come forth. Bonosus, I say, because, according to the Prophet, all the strength of the devil is in the loins, has carried his girdle across the Euphrates, where, hiding it in the hole of a rock, and afterward finding it rent, he has sung: Lord, you have possessed my reins. You have broken my bonds, I will sacrifice to you a victim of praise. But me [*] Nabuchodonosor has carried to Babylon, that is,

to the confusion of my mind, and has led me in chains: there he laid upon me the yoke of captivity: there, fastening an iron ring in my nostrils, he bade me sing of the songs of Sion. To whom I said: The Lord looses those who are in fetters, the Lord enlightens the blind. To end briefly the comparison I have begun, I beg for pardon, he awaits a crown. Thus far the most humble Dweller in the desert, suggesting in various ways that he is not yet free from temptations and the enticements of the flesh: which he will afterward explain more fully. In the same Letter he extols with wonderful praises and salutes the whole household of St. Chromatius.

[135] He writes to Paul of Concordia, asking I can scarcely doubt that at the same time Letter 10 (otherwise 21) was sent to Paul, an old man nearly a hundred years old, dwelling at Concordia, which was a city of Italy not very far distant from Aquileia. For that Jerome had received Paul's letters at the beginning of his solitary life we have seen above in the Letter to Florentius. Yet the Letter itself does not contain such clear marks of the time at which it was written. But the Life of St. Paul the first hermit, which St. Jerome places first of all in the Catalogue of his writings, was sent together with this Letter to Paul, and was at least written in the desert, as we shall presently prove. And so, whether the Letter to Paul was written at the same time as the rest, as is more probable, or some months, or even a whole year, later, which is not altogether certain to me, I shall treat of it here. At the beginning he commends Paul's vigorous old age and piety. Then he begs some things of him in return for his praises, as he wittily says, in these words: And lest you think that what I ask for is a small matter; you shall ask for the pearl of the Gospel; The words of the Lord, chaste words, silver tried by fire, proved of the earth, purified seven times, namely the Commentaries of Fortunatianus (who had been bishop of Aquileia and had written on the Gospels); and, for the sake of knowing the persecutors, the History of Aurelius Victor, and at the same time the Letters of Novatian, that while we learn the poisons of a schismatic man, we may the more gladly drink the antidote of the holy martyr Cyprian.

[136] some books which he might read, From these things it is clear that St. Jerome in the desert read not only sacred Scripture and its interpreters, but also other books useful for drawing in ecclesiastical learning. For the rest, I observe briefly that the History of Aurelius Victor is asked for by Jerome. And yet Aurelius Victor, who wrote under Constantius, was a gentile. And so St. Jerome did not judge that he had been admonished by God in that dream, of which we treated in §7, that he should read absolutely no books of the gentiles for any cause whatever; but only that he should abstain from reading those which occupy the mind for the sake of delight rather than of profit, by the sweet modulation of songs or the pomp of rhetorical words, and call it away from more useful studies. Tillemont in art. 9 wished to help Rufinus, who had forgotten that passage, with a new argument drawn from the History of Aurelius Victor which was asked for, as though he had believed that the reading of it was unlawful for Jerome after the imaginary oath in his dream. But Jerome himself judged otherwise, and all theologians will judge otherwise.

[137] and sending him the Life of St. Paul the first hermit, And the Saint subjoins in the aforesaid Letter: We have sent you meanwhile yourself to yourself, that is, to Paul the old man Paul the elder, in which, for the sake of the simpler folk, we labored much in lowering our style. But I know not how it is that, even if a flagon be full of water, it yet keeps the same odor with which it was imbued when it was new. If this little gift shall please you, we have other things also laid up, which will sail to you with very many Eastern wares, if the Holy Spirit shall breathe. These last words certainly prove that this Life was sent from the East together with the Letter, since he promises Eastern wares. Moreover both this promise and the request for books suggest that the Letter and the Life were written before Jerome was thinking of his departure: for he would not have asked that books be sent to him into the East if he had thought that he must soon depart. From the Catalogue of Writings also, which he gives in the book on Illustrious men chap. 135, the Life of St. Paul seems to have been written before the Letter to Heliodorus. For he enumerates first of all the Life of Paul the monk, then the book of Letters, and in the third place the exhortatory Letter to Heliodorus. And this exhortatory Letter was certainly written at the beginning of the eremitical life. Wherefore it seems altogether to be said that St. Jerome's first little Work in the desert was the Life of St. Paul the hermit.

[138] Of its having been written by him the Saint makes mention in the Chronicle at the year 359 in these words: which he wrote Antony the monk dies in the desert in the hundred and fifth year of his age, having been wont to relate many things to the many who came to him about a certain Paul of Thebes, a man of wonderful blessedness: whose end we have set forth in a short little book. This Life obtains the first place of the second volume in the Verona edition. In the Prologue St. Jerome observes that St. Paul was the first hermit, and adds that the Life of St. Antony had already been written, in Greek style as in Roman, namely in Greek by St. Athanasius, whose work Evagrius, Jerome's friend, turned into Latin. Then he says: I have determined to write a few things about Paul's beginning and end, rather because the matter had been omitted than in reliance on my talent. At num. 6 he speaks of the monks whom he had seen in his own desert. I call Jesus and his holy angels to witness that in that part of the desert which next to Syria borders on the Saracens I both have seen and see monks, of whom one, shut up for thirty years, lived on barley bread and muddy water, another in an old cistern … was sustained on five dried figs a day.

[139] This passage, because it is read differently in the manuscripts, in the desert: Tillemont turns about in Note 13 for the epoch of the Life's writing. As this passage is printed, both have seen … and see, it certainly suggests that Jerome wrote in the desert; and this is declared still more where, instead of the words lived and was sustained, there is read lives and is sustained, as is also the case in some manuscripts. But however it is to be read, that passage cannot prevail against the arguments already given. Let Jerome have said only that he had seen the monks, let him have said of the one lived, of the other was sustained; these by no means signify that Jerome was not in the desert, or that those monks were not living, when he was writing those words. For since the desert stretched very widely, the Saint neither visited each of the monks daily, nor could he; but lived apart from them in his own cell. He looks therefore to the time at which he saw them; and for that reason he says he had seen, he says lived, he says was sustained; but he by no means signifies that he had departed from the desert or that they had died.

[140] At the end of this Life the holy Writer rises sharply against the mad lovers of worldly things, in it he gravely censures worldly pursuits. concluding thus: I wish at the end of my little Work to ask those who do not know their own patrimonies, who clothe their houses with marbles, who stitch the estates of villas upon a single thread; what did this half-naked old man ever lack? You drink from a jewel, he satisfied nature with the hollow of his hands. You weave gold into your tunics, he did not have the garment even of the meanest of your slaves. But on the contrary paradise lies open to that poor man, while hell shall receive you who are gilded. He, though naked, yet kept the garment of Christ: you, clothed in silks, have lost the raiment of Christ. Paul lies covered with the meanest dust, to rise again in glory: you are pressed by sepulchers laboriously wrought in stone, about to burn with your riches. Spare yourselves, I pray: spare at least the riches which you love. Why do you wrap even your dead in gilded garments? Why does ambition not cease amid mourning and tears? Or do the corpses of the rich not know how to rot save in silk? I beseech you, whoever you are who read these things, to remember Jerome the sinner; who, if the Lord gave him the choice, would far rather choose Paul's tunic with his merits than the purple of kings with their punishments. Thus far St. Jerome.

[141] He writes to Niceas the subdeacon, At the same time at which St. Jerome wrote the Letters already related, the eighth (otherwise 42) also seems to have been given, to Niceas the subdeacon of Aquileia. He was an old friend of the Saint, whom he exhorts with courteous expostulation to continue their friendship by letters. Omitting the first part of the Letter, I subjoin the latter: Behold, he says, the blessed Chromatius, with holy Eusebius, his brother no more by nature than by equality of manners, has challenged me with the service of letters. You, only lately going away from us, rather rend than unstitch our recent friendship: which Lælius in Cicero prudently forbids. Unless perhaps the East is so hateful to you that you fear to let even your letters come hither. Awake, awake, rouse yourself from sleep, grant one little sheet of paper to charity. Amid the delights of your native land and the journeys we had in common, sigh sometimes. If you love me, write to one who entreats: if you are angry, write even though angry. I shall have this too as a great solace of my longing, if I receive the letters of a friend even when he is indignant. From the words cited Tillemont in art. XI judges that Niceas set out with St. Jerome for the East and returned thence. But since Jerome enumerated the companions whom he had at Antioch in the Letter to Rufinus, and neither there nor in any other place makes mention of Niceas, I should think that the Saint's words, You, only lately going away from us, etc., are not so to be understood, as though Niceas had been in the East; but of his silence, in that he had not sent letters, as Chromatius and the others had done.

[142] who is not otherwise known. Moreover the aforesaid Tillemont in various places, and by name in vol. 10, believes this Niceas to be the same as St. Nicetas bishop of the Dacians, of whom we have treated from St. Paulinus at VII January, and disputed again at XXII June. Others have wished that Niceas was bishop of Aquileia and St. Chromatius' successor, as may be seen in our Work at XXII June. For neither opinion do I find so solid a foundation that from a similarity of name, such as it is, I should dare to defend either. There is extant a Letter of St. Leo the Pope to Nicetas bishop of Aquileia, and it is fixed at the year 458. But it is utterly improbable that Niceas, with whom St. Jerome journeyed in his youth, survived to that year. This indeed is less improbable of the Nicetas whom St. Paulinus celebrates, and whom Gennadius seems to commemorate in the Catalogue of writers chap. 22, where he is called Niceas bishop of the city of Romaciana, and is said to have published various writings. Nevertheless many things would first have to be proved before we could with sufficient probability confound St. Nicetas, bishop of the city of Romatiana, with Niceas of Aquileia, about whom I find nothing further in St. Jerome's Works; just as I read neither in Gennadius nor in Paulinus that the Apostle of the Dacians was of the clergy of Aquileia.

[143] In three other Letters of the same time, as it seems, St. Jerome complains of the silence of his friends, namely the ninth, The Saint likewise writes to Chrysogonus, to the virgins of Æmona, the eleventh and the twelfth. The ninth (otherwise 44) was given to Chrysogonus, a monk of Aquileia, which he begins thus: What my affection toward you is, Heliodorus, dearest to us both,

could faithfully announce to you. The return of Heliodorus was therefore known when the Saint wrote these things. Then he expostulates about not having received letters from him, and says at the end: Since you ought to have written this very thing, that you had nothing to write. That Chrysogonus afterward attached himself to Rufinus against St. Jerome, as we shall say in its order. Letter XI (otherwise 39) was given to the virgins of Æmona, probably known to the Saint because they were not very far distant from his native land. Of them he complains in these words: But pardon, I beseech you, one who grieves: for I speak as one injured, I speak weeping and angry; you have not rendered so much as a single stroke of the pen to one who so often paid you this service. Presently that most humble Man compares himself with darkness, with sinners, with the straying little sheep, with the prodigal son; but he adds that the Lord pardoned all these, as also Peter when he denied; and that detractors are not to be believed, because the envy of men judges in one way, Christ in another. This Letter is not proved with certainty to have been given from the desert or from the East: for the Saint could have written all these things at Aquileia also.

[144] The twelfth, to Antony the monk (otherwise 45), is of the same purport, and to Antony the monk. and is fixed at the same time in the Verona edition. Yet since Jerome suspected — he who had already sent, unless I am mistaken, ten letters full both of courtesy and of entreaties — that so persistent a silence could arise from arrogance, he briefly sets forth how great a good humility is, how great a loss pride is. And he concludes the Letter in these words: Believe me, if the modesty of my pen did not forbid, I, being so much injured, would heap up such things that you would begin to write back to me at least in anger. But since to be angry is human, and not to do an injury is Christian, returning to my old custom, I again pray that you may both love one who loves you, and, as a fellow servant, impart speech to a fellow servant. This Letter again has no certain marks of time. Tillemont in art. 3 suspects that that Antony was a Roman monk, and that mention is made of him in Letter 22 to St. Eustochium num. 28, where a perverse monk is censured, called in some editions Antony. But in the latest editions he is called Antimus, and is described in such a way that it does not become likely that St. Jerome ever wrote to him.

[145] I come to Letter 13 (otherwise 36), given by Jerome to his maternal aunt Castorina. He strives by letters to appease his aunt Castorina: She was angry with Jerome, we know not for what cause, perhaps because the Saint preferred to serve God alone rather than to bear in his father's house the care of his family. Whatever was the cause of the hatred or anger, the Saint had already striven to appease her by other letters when he wrote these. He briefly sets forth in this Letter the most manifest peril and evil of hatred, and alleges his reason in these words: Namely that, our old rancor being laid aside, we may prepare for God a clean dwelling of the heart. And below: I pray therefore, what I had asked also a year ago in my earlier letters, that we may have the peace which the Lord left us, and that Christ may behold both my desire and your mind … But if you, which far be it, shall be unwilling: I shall be free. This letter of mine, when it has been read, shall absolve me. This too could have been written at Aquileia, and the other preceding one, which has been lost. Or both could have been sent from the East, this one with the rest, the earlier one at the departure of Heliodorus. Since the matter is uncertain concerning the three just related, I have followed the Verona editor, who arranged St. Jerome's Letters in a better order than anyone had done before.

[146] He exhorts Heliodorus by a long Letter to the monastic Life, There remains the Letter to Heliodorus, which was most certainly written from the desert, and is to be referred with the others to the year 375. It is now the fourteenth (otherwise 1), and has been praised several times above. The Saint exhorts Heliodorus to embrace the monastic life, and gives free rein to his eloquence. For this cause in Letter 52 (otherwise 2) to Nepotian he wrote the following about that Letter: When I was a young man, nay almost a boy (namely in sacred studies), and was restraining the first impulses of a wanton age by the harshness of the desert, I wrote to your uncle holy Heliodorus an exhortatory Letter, full of tears and complaints, and such as would show the affection of a forsaken comrade. But in that Work we sported according to our age, and, with the studies and teachings of the rhetoricians still warm in us, we painted some things with a scholastic flourish. So he speaks there about that Letter, as he explains at num. 4, lest Nepotian should again require boyish declamations, little flowers of sentences, allurements of words, and, at the ends of the several chapters, certain pointed and briefly concluded phrases which stir up the applause and shouts of hearers. The elder Jerome preferred, namely, to attend rather to the gravity and wisdom of the admonitions which he gave than to the elegance and neatness of his periods. Nevertheless he himself also esteemed that eloquent Letter highly, since both in the catalogue of his own writings he enumerates it by name, as few others; and in Letter 77 (otherwise 30) about Fabiola he says: She knew by heart the book by which as a young man I once exhorted Heliodorus to the desert.

[147] and in it sets forth the difficulties and gains of that life. It pleases me to recite one passage from that Letter, because from it both the difficulties of the solitary life and St. Jerome's sentiments may in some fashion become known. O desert, he says, blooming with the flowers of Christ! O solitude, in which are born the stones of which in the Apocalypse the city of the great King is built! O wilderness rejoicing in a more familiar nearness to God! What are you doing in the world, brother, you who are greater than the world? How long do the shadows of roofs press you? How long does the prison of smoky cities shut you in? Believe me, I behold I know not what of light. It pleases me, the burden of the body being cast off, to fly up to the pure brightness of the air. Do you fear poverty? But Christ calls the poor blessed. Are you frightened by labor? But no athlete is crowned without sweat. Do you think of food? But faith does not fear hunger. Do you fear to bruise upon the bare ground limbs wasted with fastings? But the Lord lies with you. Does the unkempt hair of a squalid head make you shudder? But your head is Christ. Does the boundless vastness of the desert terrify you? But do you walk in paradise with your mind. As often as you shall have ascended thither in thought, so often you will not be in the desert. Is the skin drawn rough for want of baths? But he who has once been washed in Christ has no need to wash again. And, that you may briefly hear the Apostle answering all things, "The sufferings of this world," he says, "are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, which shall be revealed in us." You are a delicate man, brother, if you wish both to rejoice here with the world and afterward to reign with Christ.

* Concordiensis

* Horatius

* al. rufticitas

* al. verus

§ IX. The desert in which the Saint lived is described: his austere life and occupations: the temptations by which he is afflicted: he learns the Hebrew tongue: he copies out the Hebrew Gospel: he comments on the prophet Obadiah.

The Saint's dwelling was in the solitude of Chalcis, From the Saint's earlier Letters in the desert, which we have reviewed, we have nothing about the place of his dwelling, except that the Saint stayed in that part of the desert which next to Syria borders on the Saracens; or which draws a vast frontier between the Syrians and the Saracens. But in the Preface on Obadiah the Saint calls it the solitude of Syrian Chalcis. And Chalcis is the metropolis of that region in Syria which from its metropolis is called Chalcidene, and it is situated between Antioch and the Antiochene territory and the very well-known river Euphrates; but it does not extend as far as this, so that it is all inland and dry, and watered by no rivers of any note. In Letter 15 to Damasus he says: And because for my crimes I have migrated to that solitude which bounds Syria with the adjoining border of Barbary. By Barbary he understands the region then inhabited by the Saracens, so far as I can conjecture, because above he joins Syria to the Saracens. And so either the Saint extends that desert so widely as to comprehend also the Palmyrene solitude, to which desert Arabia adjoins; or the Saracens at that time had extended themselves into the Palmyrene solitude. Nevertheless St. Jerome's dwelling was not distant from Antioch by so great an interval, but seems to have been near the village of Maronia, the possession of which had at that time devolved upon Evagrius the priest, St. Jerome's supporter.

[149] Certainly the holy Doctor in vol. 2 of the Works col. 41, in the Life of St. Malchus, writes this: and near the village of Maronia, Maronia [*] is a not large little village about thirty miles distant to the East from Antioch the city of Syria. This, after many owners or patrons, while I as a young lad was staying in Syria, devolved upon the possession of father Evagrius (for he was a bishop when the Saint was writing those things). Whom I have now named for this reason, that I might show whence I knew what I am about to write. For there was dwelling in that place an old man Malchus, about whom wonderful things were told, and the Saint there questioned Malchus about his life. And Malchus in his younger days had inhabited the desert of Chalcis, as is said at num. 3. Then he was captured by the Saracens, and being freed from captivity by flight, since his abbot had meanwhile died, he came to Maronia, and there gave himself to the monks, as is related at the end. And from these things we have it that the desert near the village of Maronia was already inhabited by monks before St. Jerome. And that St. Jerome dwelt in that same desert everything altogether suggests. For he both questioned Malchus there, and had before heard wonderful things about him from the inhabitants, and Maronia was Evagrius' possession, so that without doubt he would make an excursion to Maronia when he was to visit Jerome, whom, as was said at num. 133, he often visited.

[150] Cellarius in his ancient Geography vol. 2 p. 263, among the towns of Chalcidene which are obscure, enumerates a town called Maronias by Ptolemy; but he judges which is not to be distinguished from Ptolemy's Maronia. that it is other than Jerome's Maronia. But I do not find a suitable reason for this distinction. For both Jerome's Maronia is called Maronias in the manuscripts, as the Verona editor testifies; and a town which was obscure in Ptolemy's time could in Jerome's time be a not large little village. Certainly the two centuries by which Jerome is later than Ptolemy suffice for this; both because many wars were waged in those parts between the Romans and the Persians, and above all on account of the nearness of the Saracens, who were wont to lay much waste and to lead travelers away into captivity. Nor is it necessary to place Ptolemy's Maronia more than thirty miles from Antioch; although in his map it is farther distant than Chalcis, being more remote to the South toward Palmyra. For neither does Chalcis seem to have been a full thirty miles from Antioch, so that it must be farther distant: nor do we attribute so great authority to Ptolemy's maps for the situation of places that it would be necessary to invent a second Maronia if in his map it seemed to be a little farther distant. Let this suffice about the desert which St. Jerome inhabited.

[151] The Saint's austere life there, What manner of life the Saint led there, how

solitary, how austere and hard, is gathered in part from the words given at num. 147. In Letter 22 to St. Eustochium he speaks more freely of the life he led there. Presently I shall cite the whole passage. Meanwhile I excerpt a few things to be weighed. A solitude burnt up by the heats of the sun furnished a rough dwelling to the monks. His deformed limbs were rough with sackcloth, and his squalid skin had taken on the hue of Ethiopian flesh, having contracted, that is, a blackness from the excessive heat of the sun. Upon the bare ground (when about to take sleep) he bruised his bones that scarcely clung together (from leanness). Instead of the society of men, he was the companion only of scorpions and wild beasts. As he repented of his past sins, tears flowed daily from his eyes, daily groans burst from his breast. His face was pale with fastings, … and he subdued his rebelling flesh by weeks of abstinence; and so great was the strictness of those monks in food and drink that even the sick used cold water, and to have taken anything cooked was accounted luxury. Crying out to the Lord, he frequently joined day with night; and wherever he beheld hollows of valleys, rough places of mountains, precipices of rocks, there he chose the place of his prayer. And so he says not undeservedly: I, who from fear of hell had myself condemned me to such a prison. For whether we consider the very great heats of Syria, to which he was not accustomed; or the extreme solitude, which the wild beasts made the more dreadful; or the hardness of his bed and clothing, which brought no small trouble to a poor body exhausted by illnesses; or the utmost frugality of the meanest food and drink, and the almost perpetual fastings by which even robust bodies are weakened; it must be said that the life of the penitent Jerome was on every side most hard. The other troubles which the Saint suffered in the desert we shall relate below.

[152] which the lack of companions made more troublesome Meanwhile let us consider further his manner of living in the desert. Jerome lacked those solaces which most other monks could enjoy from mutual converse. Perhaps there was no one present with whom he could speak, because perhaps none of the monks knew the Latin or the Greek tongue. For here, says the Saint in Letter 7, one must either learn a barbarous half-speech (namely Syriac) or be silent. Evagrius indeed often visited the Saint, but, being separated by a long space, inasmuch as he dwelt at Antioch, where he was a priest and afterward was made bishop, he could not remain so long with Jerome, nor visit him so often, that Jerome did not for whole weeks, and sometimes probably for months, have no one with whom he could hold any conversation, at least at the beginning. Yet the words written to Florentius in Letter 5 may be objected: I have pupils who serve the copyist's art, namely in copying out books. But these were probably at Antioch, when the Saint was not using their labor, and Jerome's library itself probably remained either at Antioch or at Maronia, and from it the Saint could receive the books which he wished, by the help of Evagrius, who also forwarded his letters.

[153] Moreover, that the Saint might accommodate himself to the manners of the monks, He lives by the labor of his hands, and gives himself to sacred studies: he labored daily with his own hands. For thus he has it in Letter 17 (otherwise 77) to Marcus the priest: I have snatched nothing from anyone, I receive nothing in idleness. Daily by our hand and our own sweat we seek our food, knowing that it was written by the Apostle: "But he who does not work, let him not eat." These things the Saint wrote after he had dwelt some years in the desert and was being forced to depart. He will then have had some companions, in whose name as well as his own he speaks, and whom he says are departing. But it is unknown who they were, nor had he had them from the beginning. For of his first companions Innocentius and Hylas had died, and Heliodorus had departed, nor did he ever return to the East. Evagrius was a friend and supporter, not a companion in the desert. For the rest, that the Saint gave his attention also to sacred studies in the desert is clear enough from the books which he strove to gather. This is drawn no less certainly from the words of Letter 22 to Eustochium, where, after relating his dream, he observes that he thenceforth read divine things with as great zeal as he had not before read mortal things.

[154] That the holy Hermit was not free from troublesome imaginations he is afflicted with temptations, and thoughts inciting to lust he ingenuously confesses in the often-praised Letter 22 to Eustochium num. 7, writing thus: O how often, when set in the desert, and in that vast solitude which, burnt up by the heats of the sun, furnishes a rough dwelling to monks, did I think that I was present amid the delights of Rome. I sat alone, because I was filled with bitterness. My deformed limbs were rough with sackcloth, and my squalid skin had taken on the hue of Ethiopian flesh. Daily tears, daily groans, and, if ever sleep coming upon me overcame my resistance, I bruised upon the bare ground my bones that scarcely clung together. Of food and drink I say nothing, since even sick monks use cold water, and to have taken anything cooked is luxury. I therefore, who from fear of hell had myself condemned me to such a prison, the companion only of scorpions and wild beasts, was often present amid the choirs of girls. My face was pale with fastings, and my mind burned with desires in a cold body, and before a man already dead beforehand in his own flesh the fires of lusts alone boiled up. And so, destitute of all help, I lay at the feet of Jesus, I watered them with tears, I wiped them with my hair, and I subdued my rebelling flesh by weeks of abstinence.

[155] I do not blush to confess the misery of my unhappiness: and is refreshed with heavenly consolations. nay rather I lament that I am not what I was. I remember that, crying out, I frequently joined day with night, and did not cease from beating my breast until, at the Lord's rebuke, tranquillity returned. I even dreaded my very cell, as though conscious of my thoughts. And, angry with myself and stern, I entered the deserts alone. Wherever I beheld hollows of valleys, rough places of mountains, precipices of rocks, there was the place of my prayer, there the workhouse of my most wretched flesh. And, as the Lord himself is my witness, after many tears, after eyes fixed upon heaven, I sometimes seemed to myself to be present among the ranks of the angels, and glad and rejoicing I sang: "After you, in the odor of your ointments, we shall run." These things show that the holy Anchorite was not only assailed by temptations in thought and imagination, but that after sharp contests and palms won he also sometimes abounded in heavenly consolations. But that most humble Man speaks of these very briefly; of his temptations, however, at greater length, that he might instruct for the battle a Virgin lately converted, and make her cautious and diligent in removing everything by which virginity could suffer harm.

[156] That he might the better overcome temptations, with great labor In Letter 125 (otherwise 4), which as an Old man he wrote for the instruction of Rusticus the monk, he again speaks of his temptations, and at the same time teaches what remedy he used for freeing himself from those troublesome thoughts. When I was a young man, he says at num. 12, and the wastes of the solitude walled me in, I could not bear the incitements of vices and the ardor of nature. And when I broke it by frequent fastings, my mind nevertheless burned with thoughts. To tame it I gave myself as a pupil to a certain brother who had come to the faith from among the Hebrews, so that, after the subtleties of Quintilian, the rivers of Cicero, the gravity of Fronto and the smoothness of Pliny, I might learn the alphabet and meditate hissing and panting words. What labor I spent there, what difficulty I endured, how often I despaired, and how often I left off and by my eagerness to learn began again, my own conscience is witness, both mine, who suffered it, and that of those who lived their life with me. And I give thanks to the Lord that from the bitter seed of letters I pluck sweet fruits. Of the master whom he used in the desert he makes mention in Letter 18 (otherwise 142 and 143) num. 10 in these words: There is a certain man from whom I rejoice to have learned many things, and who has so polished the speech of the Hebrews that among their scribes he is accounted a Chaldean. Of the same he makes mention again at num. 15.

[157] he learns the Hebrew tongue, Moreover, even though St. Jerome derived the first reason for learning the Hebrew tongue from his temptations, there was not lacking another reason also by which, being impelled, he undertook that labor and long continued it. For in the Preface to Isaiah translated from the Hebrew, vol. 9 col. 685, desiring the reward of his labor from God, he says: Who (God) knows that for this reason I sweated in the learning of a foreign tongue, that the Jews might not any longer insult his churches about the falsity of the Scriptures. This was the chief reason for translating the Scriptures from the Hebrew source, as will be said in its places; and the same impelled Jerome to use not one but several masters for acquiring a perfect understanding of the Hebrew tongue, and for bravely overcoming all the weariness, which was not small, that came upon him.

[158] and overcomes the weariness of that labor. In the Preface to his version of Daniel, vol. 9 col. [ ], he speaks thus of the difficulties which he suffered: Finally I too as a young lad, after the reading of Quintilian and Tully and the flowers of rhetoric: when I had shut myself up in the treadmill of this tongue, and with much sweat and much time had scarcely begun to sound its panting and hissing words, and, as though walking through a crypt, beheld a rare light from above, I struck at last upon Daniel, and was affected with so great a weariness that in a sudden despair I wished to despise all my old labor. But, a certain Hebrew exhorting me and frequently urging upon me in his own tongue that saying, "Persistent labor conquers all things"; I, who seemed to myself a smatterer among them, began again to be a Chaldean pupil. And, to confess the truth, even to the present day I can read and understand the Chaldean speech better than I can pronounce it. For the rest, at that time the Saint attained so great a knowledge of the Hebrew tongue that afterward, when he was living at Rome, in his Letters to Damasus, to Marcella and Paula, he frequently recited Hebrew texts, and from them elucidated difficult passages. Nevertheless he afterward used another master also, before he began to translate the sacred Scripture from Hebrew into the Latin tongue, as we shall see in its place.

[159] While the Saint continued to dwell in the desert, where he had acquired a sufficient knowledge of the Hebrew tongue, At that time he seems to have copied out the Hebrew Gospel. he perhaps copied out the Hebrew volume of Matthew which the Nazaræans of Berœa used. For the desert which the Saint inhabited was not far distant from Berœa of Syria, so that some copy could easily be conveyed to Jerome's cell and there copied out by him. This was a fitting exercise for one learning the Hebrew tongue, nor do I find any time at which its being copied by Jerome is equally likely. And of that Gospel which he copied out Jerome himself in the book on Illustrious men chap. 3 has it thus: Moreover the Hebrew original (of Matthew's Gospel) is kept to this day in the library at Cæsarea, which Pamphilus the martyr most studiously put together. To me also there was granted by the Nazaræans, who in the city of Berœa in Syria use this volume, the opportunity of copying it. I briefly observe that Jerome does not say that he copied out that very exemplar which was kept in the library at Cæsarea. The same Gospel is praised by Jerome in the same place, chap. 2, in these words: The Gospel also which is called According to the Hebrews, and which was lately translated by me into the Greek and Latin tongue, etc. In several other places St. Jerome teaches that that Gospel, as received from the Nazaræans of Berœa,

he had first copied out, and afterward rendered by himself into Latin and Greek, as I have set forth at greater length at XXI September in St. Matthew §3. Here let it suffice to have said that it was probably copied out by Jerome in the desert. But of the translation made later we shall treat elsewhere. Certainly he already had the Hebrew when about the year 383 he wrote to Damasus Letter 20, in which he praises it. But of his own translation he began to speak later.

[160] More doubtful is the time at which he first attempted to expound Obadiah. The Saint's first Commentary on Obadiah Baronius at the year 372 num. 55 judges that the first Commentary on Obadiah was written in the year 372 or 373, and that Jerome was then thirty years old, and that after another thirty years the second Commentary on Obadiah, which we have, was elaborated by him. Tillemont in art. 6 partly follows Baronius' conjectures, partly accommodates them to his own chronology, and places the Commentary as written at Antioch, when Jerome and Heliodorus were there together. This arrangement is certainly better than that of Baronius, who first brings Heliodorus with Jerome to the desert, in which Heliodorus never was, as has already been said. Nevertheless to me, to declare my opinion briefly, that first Commentary seems to have been written in the desert, after Heliodorus had gone away and had now long since returned to the West. And that the Saint was not then thirty years old I have already proved at num. 66; and that the second Commentary was no more written thirty years later I shall likewise prove in its place. But here it will suffice to show from the very words cited by Baronius and Tillemont that the Commentary seems to have been written neither in Heliodorus' presence nor at Antioch, but in the desert of Chalcis and in Heliodorus' absence.

[161] It does not seem to have been written at Antioch, The words of Jerome from which the time of the writing of that Commentary is gathered are in the Preface to Obadiah, where the Saint frequently repeats in different ways that he was a young man when he composed it. But that general assertion about his youth, his adolescence and almost boyhood profits nothing toward fixing the Commentary at Antioch rather than in the desert. He therefore assigns the time more closely in these words: This is that time, my Pammachius, sweeter to me than this light, at which, having come out of the school of the rhetoricians, we were being carried in different pursuits, when both I and my dearest Heliodorus were alike striving to inhabit the solitude of Syrian Chalcis. What is said about the different pursuits of Pammachius and Jerome profits nothing, since it extends very widely. The only thing therefore to be inquired is at what time Jerome and Heliodorus were alike striving to inhabit, not any desert whatever, but by name the solitude of Syrian Chalcis. Tillemont judged, I think, that that was Jerome's and Heliodorus' wish when they were together at Antioch with Evagrius. But as long as Heliodorus stayed with Jerome at Antioch, the Saint was gravely ill. By what reason then does it become credible that he then began to write on sacred Scripture? Moreover the Saint does not seem to have chosen the place of his dwelling in the desert until long after Heliodorus' departure. For he hesitated in doubt about the place, and desired either to go to the monastery of Theodosius the abbot in Cilicia, or to Jerusalem, as is clear from the second and the fifth Letter. Heliodorus also, while he was at Antioch, did not yet wish to inhabit the desert with Jerome, but, though Jerome vainly desired to keep him, he returned to his native land, as Letter 14 testifies. Wherefore St. Jerome does not seem to assign that time to his little Work; nor any that preceded it.

[162] but in the desert of Chalcis. But he speaks of the time at which he was inhabiting the desert and was hoping that Heliodorus would come thither; of the time, I say, at which he was inviting Heliodorus, and the other was promising that he would come. And Jerome invited Heliodorus by Letter 14, given in the year 375, as Heliodorus had asked on going away, and as he had promised him when departing. Heliodorus desired, so far as appears, to live with Jerome in the desert; but he was held back by reverence for his parents and by the care of his widowed sister and his little nephew. This was Nepotian, the son of his widowed sister, for whose salvation, lest he should be plunged in the perils of the world, Heliodorus was anxious. Hence Jerome wrote him a most forceful Letter, as he probably desired, that he should come, disregarding his parents' prayers, that he should come, though a little nephew hung upon his neck. And that on account of this nephew and his mother the eremitical life was deferred by Heliodorus, Jerome himself declares in Letter 60 (otherwise 3) to Heliodorus, that is, in the Epitaph of Nepotian, who is that very nephew of Heliodorus. For he addresses him thus at num. 3: Another perhaps would write that for his salvation you left the East and the desert; and that you allured me, your dearest comrade, with the hope of your return, that first, if it could be done, you might preserve your widowed sister with her little one; and then, if she should reject your counsel, at least your sweetest nephew. For this is that one about whom I once prophesied to you: "Though a little nephew hang upon your neck." From these things it becomes certain that Jerome had hope of Heliodorus coming to the desert, and that he had given promises, and probably had even attempted to free himself from domestic affairs and to come to Jerome in the desert of Chalcis. At that time therefore Jerome seems to have written the little Work on Obadiah, which was lost, because it displeased its Author.

[163] Of that first attempt upon sacred Scripture the Saint speaks most humbly, Of that little Work, which was lost, Jerome afterward spoke most humbly. saying that it was the Work of a boyish talent. And he sets forth the occasion thus: My mind was burning with mystical understanding, and because I had read that all things are possible to believers, I did not know that there are different charisms. I knew the letters of the world, and therefore I thought that I could read a sealed book. Foolish I: the four and twenty elders, holding in their hands vials and harps, and the four living creatures full of eyes, rise from their throne, confess their unskillfulness, sing glory to the Lamb and to the Rod from the root of Jesse, and I thought that I could do what I believed: I, in whose hand the word of God was not, nor could I say: "From your commandments I have understood." Nor did I remember that beatitude of the Gospel: "Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God." Not yet had the coal taken from the altar purged my lips. Not yet had the error of my old ignorance been circumcised by the fire of the Holy Spirit, and I spoke boldly to the Lord: "Behold me, send me." Presently he adds in what manner that little Work afterward came forth: I hoped that what I had written lay hidden in my little book-cases, and I had vowed to the flames the first rashness of my poor wit, when suddenly a copy is brought from Italy by a certain young man of as many years as I too had once been when I wrote it, praising my little Work. I confess, I marveled that, however badly a man may have written, he finds a reader like himself. He was proclaiming it, I was blushing: he was bearing to heaven, as it were, its mystical meanings; I with bowed head was prevented from confessing my shame.

[164] Yet he does not condemn the little Work as defiled with errors, Jerome afterward spoke. but only as the less perfect offspring of a beginner; since he subjoins: What then? Do we condemn the things in which we sported as boys? By no means. For we know that in the tabernacle of God both gold and goats' hair were alike offered. We read in the Gospel that the poor widow's two mites were more approved than the substance of the rich. And then we gave what we had, and now, if nevertheless we have made some progress, we render to the Lord what is his. For by his grace I am what I am. Nor do I deny that through these thirty years I have sweated in his work and labor. Thus that most humble Man spoke about his first attempt upon the Scriptures, when he was publishing his second Commentary on Obadiah. But that first one he did not enumerate in the Catalogue of his books. Vallarsi in the General Preface prefixed to St. Jerome's Works, p. XII, says that the second Commentary belongs to the year 396, and from this he argues that that earlier one, the reckoning (namely of thirty years) being subtracted, must be assigned to the year CCCLXVI or thereabouts. But about the year 366 he was not thinking of inhabiting the desert of Chalcis with Heliodorus: nor does Jerome say that the second was written thirty years after the first. The Saint says only that he had given himself to sacred studies for thirty years before he wrote it. And when he composed the first, he had already devoted some years to those same studies, and had without doubt made no small progress in them: for otherwise he would not have attempted to expound a prophet. Yet afterward he saw that he had not been sufficiently skilled at that time to attempt an explanation of a prophet, and in his humility he exaggerated that defect of skill, such as it was, when he was able to substitute better things for the earlier ones.

* al. Maronias

§ X. On account of the dissensions of the church of Antioch the Saint is harassed in the desert, and on this account writes two Letters to Pope Damasus, and another to Marcus the priest.

Since on the occasion of Meletius the church of Antioch had been divided. When St. Jerome had lived a notable time in the desert, he began to be harassed by many troubles, on account of which he wrote two Letters to St. Damasus the Pope. That the studious reader may understand the origin of these difficulties, a few things must be premised about the divisions of the church of Antioch, which arose on the occasion of the Arians. After the Arians had held the church of Antioch under the emperor Constantius through several Arian bishops, they transferred Meletius to it, because they judged that he would not be opposed to their heresy. But Meletius disappointed the hope of the Arians, and professed himself a Catholic; for which cause not long after he was cast into exile by Constantius and the Arians, but after Constantius' death under Julian he returned to his own church, like the other exiled bishops everywhere. Yet Meletius' Catholic profession had not had the same effect in the minds of all the Catholics of Antioch. A great part straightway accepted and reverenced him as a Catholic for their bishop; although he had not shrunk from communion with the Arians, and had been promoted chiefly by their agency. Another part (who were called Eustathians, because, when St. Eustathius the Catholic bishop of Antioch had formerly been expelled, they had never been willing to communicate with the Arian bishops substituted in his place) refused to acknowledge Meletius, because he had been promoted by the Arians, and because perhaps they held his faith suspect; and thus they were divided from their bishop and from the rest of the Catholics.

[166] and there were two Catholic bishops, and Vitalis was added as well: In the year 362 that dissension grew, when Lucifer of Cagliari, returning from exile, came to Antioch. For he ordained Paulinus as bishop for the Eustathian Catholics, so that there were now two bishops of Antioch, both Catholic, and each had a part of the Catholics. Each also had churches favoring him. Most of the Easterners held Meletius for bishop; but the Westerners with the Roman Pontiff, and the Egyptians with the patriarch of Alexandria, favored Paulinus more. To these Catholics there was added Vitalis the Apollinarist, who had long concealed his heresy, and about the year 377 was ordained bishop by Apollinaris the heresiarch. These three boasted that the Roman Pontiff communicated with them, which was certainly true of Paulinus. But the other two do not seem to have been admitted to the communion of the Roman Pontiff as bishops of Antioch, but Vitalis only as a priest, so long as his heresy lay hidden, had been received; and Meletius' episcopate the Roman

Pontiffs do not seem altogether to have approved on account of Paulinus; nor yet utterly to have disapproved it, until at last some concord was entered into between Paulinus and Meletius. Besides the three mentioned, the bishop of the Arians at Antioch was Euzoius, but Jerome knew that this man was a heretic.

[167] and a grave altercation was rife, Another controversy at the same time was agitating the East, and probably took its strength from the discord about the episcopate of Antioch. That controversy, since it was about words rather than about doctrine, St. Athanasius had once settled, or at least had attempted to settle, but among the Antiochenes it had certainly broken out afresh, as is clear from the words of Jerome to be given below. Meanwhile, what the controversy was, St. Gregory Nazianzen will teach in Oration 21 on St. Athanasius, whom he praises for having settled it. For when he had observed that great contentions and dissensions sometimes arise from a mere struggle about words which tend to the same sense, he cites this very controversy as an example, writing thus: For when one essence and three hypostases were piously spoken of by us, of which the former declares the nature of the Divinity, the latter the properties of the three Persons; and while these were indeed understood in the same way among the Romans, yet, on account of the narrowness of that tongue and the poverty of its words, they could not distinguish HYPOSTASIS from ESSENCE, and it had thus come about that in place of it, lest they should seem to admit three substances, they introduced the word Persons; what at last happened? A ridiculous thing indeed, or rather a pitiable one. That slight and meager altercation about the sound of words presented the appearance of a different faith. Hence then both Sabellianism on account of the three Persons (three Hypostases, that is, not being admitted) and Arianism on account of the three Hypostases (as if there had been three different substances), each of which a stubborn zeal for contention had fabricated.

[168] Then, having related the peril of schism, he sets forth thus the remedy applied by St. Athanasius: whether one hypostasis should be spoken of, or three hypostases, Having gently and kindly summoned both parties, and having diligently and accurately weighed the sense of their words, after he found them in agreement (in doctrine), and in no way at variance with one another as to doctrine, he so settled the business that, conceding the use of the names, he bound them by the realities. St. Athanasius, that is, permitted them to say three Hypostases, provided they preserved the unity of substance, or one Hypostasis, provided they admitted three Persons truly subsisting. But that not all steadily acquiesced in this settlement, and that the monks of the Meletian party renewed the calumny of Sabellianism against those who spoke of one Hypostasis, becomes most certain from the words of St. Jerome to be given. That the manner of speaking of those who said three Hypostases was likewise suspect to Jerome I do not at all wonder, since the Arians too could speak thus, and those men imitated the Arians in accusing the Catholics who said one Hypostasis and admitted three Persons truly subsisting. I am accused of Sabellian impiety, says Jerome in Letter 17, when with unwearied voice I proclaim three subsisting, true, entire and perfect Persons: if by Arians, deservedly; if by the orthodox, then those who censure such a faith have ceased to be orthodox. That these were of the Meletian party is gathered from the fact that the same calumny was brought forward about Paulinus. But neither Meletius himself nor Paulinus ever seems to have accused the other of heresy. But Vitalis, who had no right to the episcopate of Antioch, accused Paulinus of Sabellianism, probably in order to draw his flock to himself.

[169] St. Jerome, since the church of Antioch was thus divided, Jerome consults St. Damasus by letter, and the monks showed him much trouble because he did not say three Hypostases, had recourse by letter to St. Damasus the supreme Pontiff, and asked first with which of the bishops of Antioch he ought to communicate, since meanwhile he had abstained from the communion of all. The Letter is 15 (otherwise 57), which I shall recite in parts. First the Saint declares how greatly he esteems the Apostolic See, beginning thus: Since the East, shattered by the ancient fury of its peoples among themselves, tears piecemeal into fragments the Lord's undivided tunic woven from above; and foxes lay waste the vineyard of Christ, so that among the broken cisterns which hold no water it can with difficulty be understood where is the sealed fountain and that enclosed garden; therefore I have judged that the Chair of Peter and the faith praised by the Apostolic mouth must be consulted by me, seeking now food for my soul from that source whence formerly I received the garments of Christ. Nor indeed could so great a waste of the liquid element and the length of lands lying between keep me from the search for the precious pearl. "Wherever the body shall be, thither shall the eagles be gathered." The patrimony having been squandered by evil offspring, with you alone is the uncorrupted inheritance of the Fathers preserved. There the earth with fruitful soil renders the purity of the Lord's seed with a hundredfold fruit. Here the grain buried in the furrows degenerates into tares and wild oats. Now in the West the Sun of justice rises; but in the East that Lucifer who had fallen has set his throne above the stars. You are the light of the world, you the salt of the earth, you vessels of gold and silver: here vessels of clay or of wood await the iron rod and the eternal burning.

[170] with which of the three he ought to communicate, Then he excuses his own lowliness, and sets forth with whom he has meanwhile communicated, since he was uncertain about the Antiochenes, continuing thus: Although therefore your greatness terrifies me, yet your kindness invites me. From the Priest I, the Victim, beg salvation; from the Shepherd I, the Sheep, beg protection. Let envy depart: let the ambition of Roman eminence withdraw; I speak with the successor of the Fisherman and the disciple of the Cross. I, following no one as first save Christ, am joined in communion with your Beatitude, that is, with the Chair of Peter. I know that the Church was built upon that Rock. Whoever eats the lamb outside this House is profane. If anyone shall not have been in the Ark of Noah, he shall perish when the flood reigns. And because for my crimes I have migrated to that solitude which bounds Syria with the adjoining border of Barbary, nor can I always seek the Holy One of the Lord from your Sanctity across so many intervening spaces: therefore I here follow your colleagues the Egyptian confessors, and hide as a little Boat under the merchant ships. I do not know Vitalis, I reject Meletius, I am ignorant of Paulinus. Whoever gathers not with you scatters; that is, he who is not Christ's is Antichrist's.

[171] communicating meanwhile with the exiled bishops; Tillemont in art. 16 and 17 with wonderful silence passes over all the words of Jerome by which the necessity of communicating with the Roman Church is most openly declared, as also all those in which the uncorrupted inheritance of the Fathers is said to be preserved in the Roman Church, although he treats of these Letters to Damasus. But Tillemont's opinion about the necessity of communion with the Roman Church was different, and it has been refuted among us in the History of the patriarchs of Constantinople before vol. 1 of August p. 48. Nevertheless he ought not to have suppressed Jerome's sentiments about the Roman Church, especially since he studiously inserted into his own Works whatever the same Saint at any time brought forward about the pride or other vices of the city of Rome. For by that manner of writing he makes it manifest to prudent men that he studied to gather whatever seemed conducive to depressing the authority of the Roman Church, but not rarely omitted the illustrious testimonies of the holy Fathers about the authority of that same Church. And who those Egyptian confessors were with whom St. Jerome says he communicated is gathered from Theodoret book 4 chap. 22, where he has it that Bishops of Egypt to the number of eleven, who are much praised, were by the agency of the Arians banished through the count Magnus to Diocæsarea, a city which is inhabited by the Jews, the slayers of the Lord. The habitation of the Jews suggests that the Diocæsarea to which the bishops of whom we treat were banished was in Galilee. To three of those bishops St. Basil wrote his Letter 265 (otherwise 293), namely to Eulogius, Alexander and Harpocration, exiled bishops of Egypt; whom he praises, and says that they are established in the midst of Palestine. And so I judge with Vallarsi in his Annotations, and with several others, that St. Jerome communicated meanwhile with those bishops of Egypt.

[172] About the second question Jerome addresses Damasus in these words: he sets forth to him how much he suffers, because he feared Now therefore, alas! after the Nicene faith, after the Alexandrian decree (namely of the year 362) with the West joined likewise, a new name of three Hypostases is demanded of me, a Roman man, by the offspring of the Arians, the Campenses. Who, I ask, of the Apostles handed these things down? What new Paul, teacher of the nations, has taught these things? We ask what they judge three hypostases can be understood to mean: they say three subsisting persons. We answer that we so believe. The sense does not suffice, they demand the very name; because I know not what of poison lies hidden in the syllables. We cry out: if anyone does not confess three hypostases as three enhypostata, that is, three subsisting persons, let him be anathema. And because we do not learn their words by heart, we are judged heretics. But if anyone, understanding Hypostasis as Usia, does not say one hypostasis in three persons, he is a stranger to Christ: and under this confession we are branded together with you with the cautery of Union. It must here be observed that the passage was formerly printed in a different way: for the words by the offspring of the Arians, the Campenses, it was printed by the prelate of the Arians and the Campenses.

[173] But I can scarcely doubt that the Verona edition, which I have given, is genuine. to say three hypostases, as the Meletian monks wished, For that it was monks by whom he was thus pressed Jerome suggests in the two following letters, especially in Letter 17, where he most clearly censures the monks for that cause. But that Meletius demanded it he nowhere suggests: nor could Meletius do this, since Jerome abstained from his communion. He means therefore the Meletians, who were called Campenses, because they had long been forced to hold their assemblies in the fields. And he calls them the offspring of the Arians, not only because Meletius had been made bishop by the Arians, but because the Meletians had not shrunk so much from communion with the Arian bishops who had sat at Antioch before Meletius as the Eustathians had, who had always separated themselves from the Arians. Martianay on this Letter also observes that in several manuscript codices there is read, by the offspring of the Arians, the Campenses. This therefore seems to be the true reading, and thus Jerome does not call Meletius the bishop of the Arians, as Tillemont would have it in art. 17; but he calls the Meletians or Campenses the offspring of the Arians, because many of them had communicated with the preceding Arians. The bishop of the Arians at Antioch was another man: but neither of him does the Saint speak.

[174] Here he continues thus: Decree, I beseech you, and how suspect to himself was if it please you, and I shall not fear to say three Hypostases. If you command, let a new faith be framed after the Nicene, and let us the orthodox confess in words like those of the Arians. So Jerome speaks confidently, because he knew that nothing would be decreed by the Roman Pontiff which was contrary to the orthodox faith. For he held in strong suspicion that manner of speaking which the Arians in fact used, and by which they separated the Father in substance from the Son, and the Holy Spirit from both. And when he had set forth that perverse sense of the Arians, he subjoins: Far be this from the Roman faith: let not the religious hearts of the peoples drink in so great a sacrilege. Let it suffice us to say one substance, three Persons subsisting, perfect, equal, coeternal.

Let three Hypostases be passed over in silence, if it please you, and let one be held. It is not a matter of good suspicion when words disagree in the same sense. Let the belief mentioned suffice us. Thus Jerome declares his suspicion, although he knew that their interpretation was Catholic.

[175] that manner of speaking was, And presently again: But believe me, poison lies hidden under the honey (of the Catholic interpretation): an angel of Satan has transfigured himself into an angel of light. They interpret Hypostasis well, and when I say that I hold that which they themselves set forth, I am judged a heretic. Why do they so anxiously cling to one word? Why do they lurk under ambiguous speech? If they believe as they interpret, I do not condemn what they retain. If I believe as they pretend to think, let them permit me also to speak their sense in my own words. All these things show Jerome's strong suspicions, and that they were not without foundation, both because they so stubbornly, against the concord once decreed by St. Athanasius, refused to admit Jerome's Catholic exposition of one Hypostasis or substance, and because many of them had formerly communicated with the Arians.

[176] yet ready to acquiesce in the judgment of Damasus: Nevertheless so great was Jerome's confidence in the Apostolic See that he commits the whole matter to the judgment of St. Damasus. Or, if you think it right, he says, that we ought to say three Hypostases with their interpretations, we do not refuse. And below: Wherefore I beseech your Beatitude by the Crucified salvation of the world, by the consubstantial Trinity, that authority be given me by your Letters either for keeping silence about the Hypostases or for speaking of them. And lest perhaps the obscurity of the place in which I live should mislead the bearers of the letters, deign to send your writings to Evagrius the priest, whom you know very well. At the same time also signify with whom at Antioch I ought to communicate; because the Campenses, joined with the heretics of Tarsus, seek nothing else than that, supported by the authority of your communion, they may preach three Hypostases in the old sense (he suggests the Arian sense).

[177] an observation about the men of Tarsus. By the heretics of Tarsus St. Jerome does not understand the followers of Silvanus of Tarsus, as the Verona editor would have it. For Silvanus of Tarsus had long been dead when Jerome wrote those things, and that in the Catholic faith which he had professed at Rome, as is gathered from his constant friendship with St. Basil, who frequently praises Silvanus of Tarsus in his Letters and even calls him Blessed after his death in Letter 244 (otherwise 82). But that after Silvanus' death the church of Tarsus was occupied by the Arians St. Basil laments in Letter 34 (otherwise 5). Since, however, not all the men of Tarsus followed the Arian bishop, as is gathered from Basil's Letters 113 and 114 (otherwise 203 and 204), but some remained Catholic under priests, perhaps those men of Tarsus who conspired with the Meletians were also Catholic, and falsely suspected of heresy.

[178] Again he asks with whom he ought to communicate. After this first Letter, no answer having yet been received, Jerome sent another to Damasus, shorter indeed, but most urgent, that he might learn the Pontiff's mind. This is Letter 16 (otherwise 58), which he begins most humbly, in order to move Damasus to answer. Then he sets forth the matter thus: I therefore, as I have already written before, having received the garment of Christ in the Roman City, am now held on the barbarous frontier of Syria. And lest you think that this was another's judgment upon me, I myself determined what I deserved. But, as the gentile poet says: "He changes his sky, not his mind, who runs across the sea": so the unceasing enemy has followed me at my back, so that I now suffer greater wars in the solitude. For here the Arian madness, propped by the supports of the world, rages. Here the Church, rent into three parts, hastens to snatch me to itself. The old authority of the monks dwelling round about rises against me. I meanwhile cry out: If anyone is joined to the Chair of Peter, he is mine. Meletius, Vitalis and Paulinus say that they cleave to you. I could believe it if one alone asserted it. But now either two lie, or all. Therefore I beseech your Beatitude by the Cross of the Lord, by the necessary glory of our faith, the passion of Christ, that, as you follow the Apostles in honor, you may follow them also in merit: so may you sit on a throne to judge with the twelve: so may another gird you when old, with Peter: so may you obtain citizenship of heaven with Paul, as you signify to me by your letters with whom in Syria I ought to communicate. Do not despise a soul for which Christ died. Here he asks nothing further about one or three Hypostases.

[179] These Letters seem to have displeased Tillemont much. Tillemont wrongly denies that on account of the hypostases, For on account of them he carps at the Saint in many things without just reason. First, in art. 17, he cannot believe that the Meletians did not acquiesce in Jerome, who admitted three subsisting Persons in that sense in which they set forth three Hypostases. But this indeed is to make Jerome suspect of an open falsehood, nay even of a falsehood before one to whom the whole matter was thoroughly known. For that importunate contention of the Meletian monks he described not only to Damasus, who was far away, but also in Letter 17 (otherwise 77) to Marcus the priest, to whom he speaks thus at the end: For the rest, I have as witnesses of my faith your ears, and those of the blessed brother Zenobius, whom with you all of us who are here greet much. And he had already said to him before: Before I speak with you about my faith, which you know very well, I am compelled to cry out against the barbarity of this place in a well-known verse: What kind of men is this? etc. Which things, he says, we have taken from a gentile poet for this reason, that he who does not keep the peace of Christ may at least learn peace from a heathen. Let us now see whether these are not nearly the same things of which the Saint complains to Marcus.

[180] I am called a heretic, he says, when I preach a consubstantial Trinity. although he confessed three subsisting persons, I am accused of Sabellian impiety, when with unwearied voice I proclaim three subsisting, true, entire and perfect Persons. If by Arians, deservedly. If by the orthodox, then those who censure such a faith have ceased to be orthodox. Or, if it please them, let them condemn me as a heretic with the West, as a heretic with Egypt, that is, with Damasus and Peter (of Alexandria). Why do they accuse one man, excepting his companions? If a stream flows thinly, it is not the fault of the channel, but of the spring. I am ashamed to say it: from the caverns of our cells we condemn the world. Rolled in sackcloth and ashes, we pass sentence upon bishops. What does a kingly mind do under a penitent's tunic? Chains, squalor and long hair are not the signs of a diadem, but of weeping. Let them permit me, I pray, to say nothing. Etc.

[181] Jerome was harassed by the monks. And presently: One corner of the desert is not granted me. Daily my faith is demanded of me, as though I had been born again without faith. I confess as they wish: it does not please them. I subscribe, they do not believe. One thing only pleases them, that I should withdraw hence. Now, now I yield: they have torn from me a part of my soul, my dearest brethren. Behold, they wish to depart, nay they depart, saying that it is better to dwell among wild beasts than with such Christians: and I myself, did not both the weakness of my body and the harshness of winter hold me back, would even now flee. Nevertheless, until the spring season comes, I beseech that the lodging of the desert may be granted me for a few months. Or, if this seems too slow, I depart. The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. Let them ascend to heaven alone, let Christ have died for them alone, let them have it, possess it, glory in it. But far be it from me to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world. Either these things are more exaggerated, which is not credible, since he writes to a well-instructed man, or the things which he wrote to Damasus are free from all exaggeration.

[182] He likewise carps wrongly at the Saint for other things, But again the learned Tillemont, more devoted to learning than to St. Jerome, rises up and says that the complaints which Jerome makes about the excessive contention of the monks fall back upon himself, since he attempted to persuade Damasus that one Hypostasis alone should be spoken of, and held three Hypostases suspect. I answer that the observation is empty: for by no word did Jerome attempt to persuade Damasus that the manner of speaking of those Greeks who in a sound sense said three Hypostases should be condemned; but he only labored that the Latins, the Egyptians, and others who said one Hypostasis, also in a sound sense, should not be compelled to speak in another way, and thus he agreed with Athanasius, or rather with the council of Alexandria. And that Jerome held suspect in his adversaries that contention about saying three Hypostases was not without reason, since it was put forward by the offspring of the Arians, and was the speech of the Arians, used indeed by many Greek Catholics, yet not by all, as neither by the Egyptians or the Latins. Thirdly Tillemont carps at Jerome because he seems vehemently opposed to Meletius, and indeed more than to Vitalis the heretic. I answer that Vitalis' heresy was not yet known at that time to St. Jerome, but that it was known to all that Meletius had formerly communicated with the Arians and had been promoted by them to the episcopate; and therefore it would not be to be wondered at if the Saint shrank at that time more from Meletius than from Vitalis, whose heresy became known afterward.

[183] whereas Jerome did injury to no one, Nevertheless he does not call Meletius the bishop of the Arians, nor does he mean Meletius, as the Verona editor wrongly believed, when he says, For here the Arian madness, propped by the supports of the world, rages: for presently there is set against it the Church rent into three parts, and one of these parts is attributed to Meletius. And by the church he understands the Catholics of Antioch, or those whom, being placed in the desert, he believed Catholic. And when he says, I reject Meletius, he declares that he does not adhere to him who was the first of the three to be ordained, just as many others did not adhere to him, because he had been a friend of the Arians and had been promoted by the Arians. And so in all these things St. Jerome behaved laudably, and wished to follow the judgment of the supreme Pontiff, so as to communicate with that one of the three with whom he should decree that communion should be held. Meanwhile he also preserved charity toward those by whom he was harassed. For, being asked by Marcus the priest about his faith, he answered by the Letter already praised, although otherwise he had believed that he should keep silence after his faith had been so often declared, and he gives this reason for his answer: But because charity overcomes all things, and affection conquers my purpose (of keeping silence), I do not so much render like for like to those who do me injury as answer you who ask. For among Christians, not he who suffers, as a certain man says, but he who does an insult is wretched. These things on account of the complaints about the monks already related.

[184] But toward the end he answers further thus to the question about his faith: and had set forth his faith very often, But as to what you deigned to write about the faith, I gave to holy Cyril my faith set down in writing. He who does not so believe is a stranger to Christ. But this profession of faith, which is probably short, is not now extant. For that which has been published under the name

of St. Jerome as a lengthy Explanation of the faith to Cyril is everywhere held by the learned to be supposititious, and rightly, nor does it explain that article about the hypostasis or hypostases on account of which Jerome was suspected, nor is it of the Hieronymian style. It is asked also who that Cyril was to whom Jerome sent his faith set down in writing. Some point to St. Cyril of Jerusalem, who is known to have been at that time in exile, as having been expelled from the see of Jerusalem.

[185] But the matter is plainly uncertain, both because the name of Cyril was common enough, and in a writing to a Cyril not sufficiently known. so that there could be several bishops of that name, and because Jerome does not seem to have thought well of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, if those things are his which are read in the Chronicle at the year 352. But on account of the many interpolations of the Hieronymian Chronicle it again seems uncertain whether St. Jerome wrote those things about Cyril: for in a very ancient Vatican codex from the library of the queen of Sweden nothing is said to be found of those things which are read in the printed Chronicles of Jerome about Cyril. Jerome also injures Cyril by no word at all in the book on Illustrious men chap. 112, where he praises him with a brief eulogy. And so, just as it is uncertain whether Jerome then thought well or ill of Cyril of Jerusalem, so it seems still more doubtful whether he set forth his faith to him or to another.

[186] It remains to investigate at what time those later Letters of Jerome from the desert to Damasus and to Marcus the priest were written, [It is not certainly established in what year the Saint began to be thus harassed,] and of what place Marcus was a priest. Baronius relates the vexations which St. Jerome suffered in the desert at the year 378, from the Letter to Marcus. Tillemont fixes the first Letter to Damasus in the year 376, the other in the year 377, to which he likewise refers the Letter to Marcus. Vallarsi in the preface of the Verona edition says that those three Letters were written between the end of the year 376, in which Vitalis was made bishop, and the beginning of 379, in which the Egyptian confessor bishops were sent back to their sees: and he believes that the earlier one to Damasus was written as the year 376 was passing or at the beginning of the next, the other in the year 377, but the Letter to Marcus at the end of the year 378 or the beginning of 379, since it was written in the time of winter. This chronology of Vallarsi certainly cannot stray many years from the truth: yet I should scarcely believe that the Letter to Marcus is two years later than the first to Damasus: for thus Jerome would have been harassed in this way for more than two years. I should therefore prefer to conjecture that all three were written within the space of one year. But whether the Letter to Marcus is the last of the three, or the middle one between the two to Damasus, is not clear from any indication. No more certain does it seem whether that vexation of St. Jerome began in the year 376, or 377, or even 378: for perhaps it was not prolonged beyond a year, St. Jerome probably withdrawing to Antioch.

[187] Perhaps all that vexation of St. Jerome only began after the return of Meletius from exile. it is probable that the vexation began after Meletius' return in the year 378: For in both Letters to Damasus Jerome speaks of Meletius as though he had been at Antioch. And Meletius returned from his last exile after the death of the Arian emperor Valens, that is, after the middle of the year 378. For the emperor Gratian, having quickly learned of the slaying of Valens, which happened on the IX day of August, straightway, as Theodoret testifies in book 5 chap. 1 and 2, gave a law that all the Catholic bishops whom Valens had banished should return to their churches. And so by force of this law, which without doubt was straightway carried into the East, Meletius could already in the month of September or October return to Antioch. And by this return of Meletius the zeal of the different parties was probably inflamed, so that the monks who were Meletians then began to press St. Jerome, because they understood that he did not communicate with Meletius. But if that vexation of Jerome began only at that time, he will have written to Damasus as the year 378 was running to its end, and again in the following year, before he returned from the solitude to Antioch, and between these two the Letter to Marcus the priest will have fallen in the middle.

[188] but by no means certain. That chronology would seem to me most probable, were it not that in the earlier Letter to Damasus Jerome says: Here I follow your colleagues the Egyptian confessors; and in the other: Here the Arian heresy, propped by the supports of the world, rages. For the Arians had the supports of the world through Valens, so that he seems not yet to have died; and the Egyptian confessors could, as well as Meletius, return to their sees by the laws of Gratian. These things, I confess, hinder me from judging that the chronology given should be preferred to that of Vallarsi. Yet it could be said that even after the death of Valens protectors of the Arian heresy were not lacking, and that Jerome says, I follow the Egyptian confessors, because he had followed them, and they had not yet departed when he first wrote to Damasus: and that he inquired so earnestly about the communion to be embraced because he knew that they would shortly depart. Whatever at last be the case about the occasion and the time at which the monks so harassed Jerome, I do not doubt that the Saint on that account left the desert, whether compelled by the monks or urged by Pope Damasus.

[189] Marcus the priest, to whom the Saint wrote, St. Jerome asked, in writing to Marcus, that the lodging of the desert might be granted him for a few months, namely until the spring season came. What Marcus answered we do not know. But about Marcus himself Vallarsi noted this: The old printed editions make this Marcus a priest of Celeda. But the manuscripts for the most part a priest or bishop of Chalcis. But it is most likely that Teledensis ought to be read, as other codices have it: since Teleda in the region of Chalcis was a large town, not far from which the monastery of St. Eusebius was, as we learn from Theodoret in the Lives of the Fathers chap. 4; and so a priest of that place could be acquainted with the faith of the people of Chalcis. Tillemont suspects the same in art. 18. Of St. Eusebius, whose monastery was near the village of Teleda on Mount Coryphe, we have treated among us from Theodoret at XVIII January. And Teleda is there at num. 3 called a very large village and most thickly peopled. But the situation of Mount Coryphe, on which both that village and the monastery of St. Eusebius were, is placed at num. 2 to the East of Antioch and to the West of Berrhœa, so that Mount Coryphe and the village of Teleda seem to have been nearly between Antioch and Berrhœa, and nearer to the said cities than to Chalcis, in whose desert Jerome was living. Wherefore that opinion seems to me uncertain.

[190] probably administered the sacred rites to the monks. Martianay, both in the Life and in the Annotations to the Letter, judges that he was a priest of Chalcis, as is read in most manuscripts, or even a bishop. But that Marcus was bishop of Chalcis I cannot judge, since Theodoret in book 5 of his History chap. 4 relates that Eusebius was in those times consecrated bishop of Chalcis by St. Eusebius of Samosata. I rather believe therefore that Marcus was a priest who presided over the monks of the desert of Chalcis, or at least performed the sacred ministries for them. The same man could be a priest of the church of Chalcis and deputed by the bishop to the care of the monks.

[191] Although no answer of Damasus to St. Jerome's questions is extant, Damasus probably answered Jerome: yet we cannot doubt that Damasus answered and bade Jerome communicate with Paulinus. It is likely also that Damasus persuaded Jerome to leave the desert, unless he had already done so, compelled by the importunate troubles of the monks, before he received Damasus' letters, which he could receive through Evagrius either at Antioch or in the desert. But what Damasus answered about saying one or three Hypostases is likewise unascertained. But again it is likely that Damasus answered that each might be permitted to speak after his own manner, and to say either one or three Hypostases, provided a right interpretation and an orthodox sense were added.

[192] For the rest, we judge it more probable that Jerome did not come from the desert to Antioch before the year 379 had begun; The Saint leaves the desert: how long he lived there. but that in this year he both came to Antioch and stayed there at least some months. Thus far we have treated of St. Jerome's solitary life in the desert of Chalcis, and we have extended it beyond four years, namely from the year 374 as it ran to its end until the beginning of the year 379, and perhaps until the spring season of the same year. Baronius at the year 372 believed that Jerome set out for Syria from the year 370, and in the year 371 began to dwell in the desert, but he did not attend to the time at which Evagrius the priest, with whom Jerome was, was at Cæsarea with St. Basil. Pagi at the same year num. 4 says that St. Jerome's solitary life must be fixed in the year 367 or 368. But from a manifest error he fell into this second error. Baronius at the year 372 rightly observes that St. Theodosius the abbot, to whom St. Jerome wrote, flourished at that time. But Bolland at XI January treated of St. Theodosius the abbot On the Crag at p. 677, and there fixed his death about the year 412. But Pagi, intending to correct both, contends that St. Theodosius died before the year 370, because about Helladius his successor Theodoret writes in the same place: And Helladius that admirable man received the charge of the flock, who indeed remained in those places for sixty continuous years, and then was divinely chosen as bishop of the Cilicians. The sixty years during which Helladius is said to have dwelt in the monastery, partly as a monk, partly as an abbot, Pagi wished to explain of his presidency alone, and thus he takes away a space of nearly forty years from the life of St. Theodosius, and brings Jerome to the desert six or seven years earlier than he ought.

* Græce sed

* al. auctoritas

* al. differminat

* al. edicimus

* al. Crucifixum

* al. homousion

§ XI. The Saint comes to Antioch, where he is ordained priest: there he writes the Dialogue against the Luciferians.

Jerome did not go straightway from the desert to Jerusalem, The most eminent Baronius at the year 378 num. 62 judges that St. Jerome, when he departed from the desert, set out for Jerusalem. Marianus Victorius believed that the Saint went to Jerusalem before he began the solitary life in the desert of Chalcis. But Tillemont in Note 6 disputes at length to prove that St. Jerome was never at Jerusalem before the death of St. Damasus. I should not indeed wish to adopt all his reasonings, yet that view seems true, as I shall try to prove in a few words. St. Jerome against Rufinus book 3 num. 22 sets forth his journeys, by which after the death of Damasus, having left Rome, he migrated into Palestine. From these I bring hither what he says about his coming to Antioch and Jerusalem: I came, he says, to Antioch, where I enjoyed the communion of the pontiff and confessor Paulinus, and escorted by him, in the middle of winter and in the severest cold, I entered Jerusalem. I saw many wonders, and things which before to me

report had brought, I verified by the judgment of my eyes. These words clearly suggest that Jerome had not been at Jerusalem before. For he would not say that he then verified by the judgment of his eyes what before he had only heard by report, if he had previously been at Jerusalem. So open is that indication that the Saint had not been there before, that we cannot say that he was there earlier without a clear testimony from himself. And yet nowhere in his writings does Jerome declare that he was at Jerusalem before he came thither to fix a settled seat in Palestine. For the passages cited by Baronius are most easily expounded in another sense, and must necessarily be so expounded. We shall examine them one by one when we see the Saint departing from Rome.

[194] but to Antioch, where by Paulinus And so it was not to Jerusalem, even though he had formerly desired to see it, that he set out from the desert, but the Saint returned to Antioch, probably to Evagrius, Paulinus' priest and St. Jerome's own chief friend. And that St. Jerome was ordained priest at Antioch at that time many things certainly make most likely. For that he was consecrated by Paulinus the Saint himself declares in the book against John of Jerusalem vol. 2 col. 451, addressing the said John thus: Suppose that you ordained him (Paulinianus, Jerome's brother); you will hear from him the same thing which the bishop Paulinus of holy memory heard from me, a poor wretched man. Did I ask you to ordain me? If you bestow the priesthood in such a way as not to take the monk from us, you will see to your own judgment. But if under the name of a priest you take from me that for which I forsook the world: I have what I always had: you have suffered no loss in the ordination. From these things we have, first, that Jerome was ordained by Paulinus the bishop. He does not indeed call him bishop of Antioch, nor yet shall we with reason doubt that he was of Antioch. For not only has no other Paulinus become known by whom Jerome could be ordained about that time; but he was afterward most friendly with this same Paulinus: for with him and St. Epiphanius he set out for Rome, and returning to the East he was received by Paulinus at Antioch and escorted to Jerusalem, and as often as he speaks of Paulinus of Antioch he does it with the highest honor.

[195] he was ordained priest Moreover that he was a priest of the church of Antioch St. Jerome suggests clearly enough in the aforesaid book against John of Jerusalem, when a little before the words given he says: If you say these things about me and about the priest Vincentius, you have slept a long enough time, who now, being aroused after thirteen years, say these things. For on this account both I left Antioch and he Constantinople, most celebrated cities, not that we might praise you preaching among the peoples, but that in the fields and in solitude, weeping for the sins of our youth, we might turn Christ's mercy toward us. The thirteen years, after which John of Jerusalem began to be troublesome to St. Jerome, designate the time at which, having set out from Rome with Vincentius the priest and others, he passed through Antioch and came into Palestine. From that passage therefore it is rightly gathered that Jerome was a priest of the church of Antioch, and Vincentius of that of Constantinople. For Jerome could say that Antioch was forsaken by him on no other title than that he could have served there as a priest if he had desired; but he would rather have said that his native land was forsaken by him, or at any rate Rome, where he had dwelt much longer than at Antioch. There is added the comparison between himself and his brother Paulinianus, who also had been ordained priest against his will, and therefore was no more compelled to leave the monastic life in order to serve the bishop by whom he had been ordained than was Jerome to minister in the church of Antioch.

[196] But that St. Jerome was consecrated at that time after he had left the desert. at which after his dwelling in the desert he was at Antioch is indeed nowhere openly said; yet it is gathered from his preceding and following life. Certainly he was not a priest as long as he lived in the desert, nor was he consecrated there, since he did not dare to communicate with any of the three who called themselves bishops of Antioch. But from other sources it is gathered that St. Jerome was a priest when after a few years he was living at Rome. For Rufinus in the Letter on the adulteration of the books of Origen (in Martianay vol. 5 col. 253) says that Damasus committed the publication of the ecclesiastical faith, to be subscribed by the Apollinarists, to a certain friend of his, a priest, a most eloquent man. And since by these words he designates Jerome, as will be said in its place, it must be said that Jerome was a priest when he was at Rome with Paulinus of Antioch and St. Epiphanius of Salamis. This Jerome himself suggests in the Letter to Eustochium, written at Rome in the year 384, when at num. 28 he says: There are others (I speak of men of my own order) who seek the priesthood and the diaconate for this reason, that they may see women more freely. And so, since he was ordained by Paulinus of Antioch, and therefore it is not credible that he was ordained in any other city than that of Antioch, from which he afterward set out for Constantinople and Rome, the ordination can probably be fixed at no other time than that at which, after the desert, he stayed at Antioch, nor be tied to any year more fitly than to 379.

[197] From Jerome's priesthood just related Baronius at the year 378 num. 65 refutes the opinion of those From this ordination those are refuted who make St. Jerome who in the middle and later age said that the Saint was a Cardinal priest of the Roman Church. That opinion Alphonsus Ciaconius had attempted to urge in a separate little Work, and for that reason, I think, Baronius judged that the truth must be investigated, although he does it more briefly and does not name Ciaconius. But Baronius' brevity, who did not take care to show the levity of Ciaconius' arguments, seems to have brought it about that afterward several writers wished to attribute the Cardinalitial dignity to Jerome, and repeated arguments plainly useless for the purpose, because they were less imbued with historical criticism. For in truth for St. Jerome's Cardinalitial dignity no argument is brought forward which can seem valid to a historical critic. Ciaconius' treatise is indeed rather lengthy, and brings forward both more words and more names of writers favoring him than can be laboriously examined and refuted one by one, unless a whole little Work of considerable bulk be written: but, since all the arguments are most trifling, most will be sufficiently refuted by a general answer, and others will fall by a brief examination; and so it will not be necessary to weave a very lengthy disputation.

[198] Rightly at the beginning of his Treatise, which we have printed at Venice in the year 1583, a Cardinal of the Roman Church Ciaconius observes that for this controversy theologians or philosophers are not to be consulted, nor astronomers or geometers; but historiographers, or writers who have inserted histories into their Works. Yet I could wish that he had added another observation, namely that one must likewise abstain from spurious writings which have been forged under the venerable names of the holy Fathers; and that the lengthy catalogues of recent writers who lacked historical criticism are not to be greatly esteemed. For on this principle St. Cyril of Jerusalem, St. Eusebius of Cremona, St. Petronius of Bologna, and the St. Augustine to the Brethren in the Desert were to be omitted. For these are bare names; nor ought those supposititious little Works which falsely bear the names of the said Fathers to have authority in the present controversy, whatever Ciaconius may attempt to urge with allurements of words, which need no answer. To the supposititious documents which I have just enumerated Ciaconius adds five or six writers of the middle age who flourished in the thirteenth century or later. But to give credit, about matters of the fourth century in which some would have Jerome created Cardinal by Liberius, others by Damasus, to men writing without the authority of the ancients, will not be the part of a prudent critic, especially since grave reasons, presently to be enumerated, stand in the way. Still less can writers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, whom he subjoins, persuade us of so great a matter.

[199] by some trifling arguments After the writers, of whom none at all has notable authority for so ancient a matter, Ciaconius proceeds to conjectures. And he observes that he was ordained by Paulinus of Antioch, which is a true observation. But since Ado says that he was a priest of the Roman Church, he conjectures that he was afterward promoted to the Cardinalate. But we deny that Jerome was a priest of the Roman Church: for it did not belong to Paulinus of Antioch to ordain Roman priests. Wherefore Ciaconius could bring in Ado among the writers favoring him: for we should not deny that Jerome was a Cardinal if we believed him a Roman priest. But that was the conjecture of Ado, or of another, who did not consider the opposing arguments, chiefly to be drawn from his ordination by Paulinus. Ciaconius takes his second conjecture from those words of Jerome on chap. 3 of Isaiah: We too have in the Church our senate, the assembly of the priests. But any Christian can speak thus: for Jerome does not say that he is of that senate. Then by the assembly of the priests he does not understand the Roman priests alone, but he attributes an assembly of priests to every bishop as a senate.

[200] some Greater suspicion about Jerome's Cardinalate may be raised by his words in Letter 123 (otherwise XI) to Ageruchia, where he says: Many years ago, when I was assisting Damasus, Bishop of the city of Rome, with the ecclesiastical papers, and was answering the synodical consultations of the East and of the West, etc. For the words cited altogether prove that St. Jerome was secretary to St. Damasus the Pope; and from that ministry it would become credible that he was also numbered among the Roman priests or Cardinals; were it not that the ordination already received at Antioch stands in the way. Jerome the priest assisted Damasus, as we shall see below, in great affairs of the Church. Damasus loved Jerome, and greatly esteemed his talent and learning. St. Jerome was then everywhere held worthy of the high priesthood, that is, of the episcopate. All these things make manifest that the Saint stood in such a position with Damasus, and with the Roman people while Damasus lived, that he could have been promoted to greater dignities if he himself had desired it. But the Saint was unwilling to be bound to any church, but to live the monastic life, and therefore he had said to Paulinus, when he was consecrated: If you bestow the priesthood in such a way as not to take the monk from us, you will see to your own judgment, etc. This therefore will have been the reason why Damasus indeed used Jerome's labor, and yet did not promote him to the episcopate or bind him to the Roman Church.

[201] Ciaconius objects fourthly the words of St. Augustine from Letter 116 (otherwise 97) to Jerome, trifling ones where Augustine says: For although according to the titles of honors which the usage of the Church has now obtained, the episcopate is greater than the priesthood; yet in many things Augustine is less than Jerome. Then he praises some writers who judge that Augustine confesses himself less in dignity because Jerome was a Cardinal priest; and he adds his own vote to theirs. But they stray very far from the mind of Augustine, and indeed of Jerome. For Augustine, in bringing forward what has been cited, looked to those words of Jerome from Letter 105 (otherwise 92) to Augustine: Farewell, my dearest friend, in age my son, in dignity my father. By these words certainly Jerome asserts that Augustine is less in age, but greater in dignity. That he was greater in dignity, because the episcopate is greater than the priesthood, the most humble Augustine could not deny, yet in many things

he affirms himself less than Jerome, as indeed he could say, or at least judge, that he was truly less in age, in eloquence, in skill in languages, in knowledge of sacred Scripture, and in all learning both sacred and profane, at the time at which he was writing, being nearly fifty years old. And so from the passage cited nothing is had for Jerome's Cardinalate.

[202] No more rightly does Ciaconius bring forward Jerome's words from Letter 45 (otherwise 99) to Asella, wished to make him. where he says: Before I knew the house of holy Paula, the zeal of the whole City resounded in my favor. In the judgment of almost all I was adjudged worthy of the high priesthood. For it is not necessary to understand by the high priesthood the Roman Pontificate, as that author believed, attending more to the present usage of speech than to the sense of Jerome's words. Gratuitously therefore he says that the Romans wished Jerome to be chosen Pontiff after the death of Damasus. Yet if that had been the Romans' desire, from it again it would not rightly be gathered that Jerome was a Roman Cardinal. For no law forbade the promoting of a priest or deacon of another church to the supreme Pontificate. Ciaconius also objects painted panels, because in them St. Jerome is displayed clothed in Cardinalitial ornaments. But we do not wonder that painters straightway consented to that opinion where it was born, just as they everywhere consent to other opinions openly fabulous. I now omit all the arguments which Ciaconius tries to refute, and shall cite only a few things against that opinion born in the middle age, and eagerly adopted in later centuries, but at last rejected by the better critics after Baronius.

[203] If St. Jerome had been a Cardinal, he would have had at Rome some church committed to his care, Moreover from his doings at Rome that is, a Cardinalitial title. But nowhere did he utter a word about his church. In those things which he wrote at Rome for nearly three years he nowhere makes mention of a church in which he ought to have ministered. If anyone should wish only to read Letter 45 to Asella, which the Saint wrote as he was departing from Rome, he will see that Jerome did almost nothing at Rome which his adversaries did not carp at, but that the adversaries neither objected anything about a church ill administered, nor did Jerome refute such a charge. Almost everything which he did and suffered at Rome he touches upon in that Letter. He says that he frequently dealt with virgins, that he discoursed on the divine books to some, that he frequented St. Paula's house, and that on that occasion he was assailed with many calumnies. But nothing about Scriptures expounded in church, nothing about Sacraments administered, nothing about a people instructed, nothing about a church committed to him by Damasus, nothing about such a church left behind. The same silence about all these things reigns in the Letters which Damasus wrote to Jerome while he was living at Rome, the same again in Rufinus' Invectives, and in absolutely all the ancient writings. But if Jerome, departing from Rome never to return thither, had left a church committed to him, Rufinus would certainly have found matter for accusation.

[204] and in Palestine it is proved Let us now weigh the argument which Baronius used at the year 378. John of Jerusalem contended that Jerome, Vincentius, and Paulinianus Jerome's brother, all priests, ought to be subject to him as bishop. Jerome answers in the book against John num. 41 that he had forsaken Antioch, Vincentius Constantinople, in order to lead the monastic life, but that Paulinianus was living in Cyprus and was subject to the bishop by whom he had been ordained, St. Epiphanius. And this is the same as if he had said, my bishop is the bishop of Antioch, Vincentius' the bishop of Constantinople, Paulinianus' the bishop of Salamis in Cyprus. But if Jerome had been a Cardinal or a Roman priest, he ought to have said that Rome was forsaken by him, not Antioch, and by that title to prove that he was not subject to the church of Jerusalem. Jerome's second answer is that he wished to remain a monk and to be bound as a priest to no church. Suppose that you ordained him (Paulinianus), he says to John of Jerusalem; you will hear from him the same thing which the bishop Paulinus of holy memory heard from me, a poor wretched man: Did I ask you to ordain me? If you bestow the priesthood in such a way as not to take the monk from us, you will see to your own judgment. But if under the name of a priest you take from me that for which I forsook the world (namely the monastic life), I have what I always had (that is, even so I shall remain a monk); you have suffered no loss in the ordination.

[205] that he was not a priest of the Roman Church. St. Jerome therefore, that most keen defender of his own liberty, was unwilling to be torn by his ordination from the monastic life, or to be assigned to the ministries of the church of Antioch. By what reason then shall we believe that he was afterward assigned to the ministries of the Roman Church, especially since we have no suitable witness, but the Saint's words and deeds suggest the very contrary? So averse was Jerome from discharging the priestly office that he would not undertake the sacred ministries even for the monks over whom he presided, as St. Epiphanius testifies in the Letter which is 51 (otherwise 60) among the Hieronymian letters, where he gives the reason for Paulinianus' ordination in these words: For when I had seen that a multitude of holy brethren was established in the monastery, and that the holy priests Jerome and Vincentius, from modesty and humility, were unwilling to perform the Sacrifices due to their name, and to labor in that part of the ministry which is the chief salvation of Christians, etc. These things being observed, Baronius argues thus: Since he altogether confesses himself free, and testifies that he never wished to be bound by the bond of a title; see how it can stand that he himself was created a Cardinal priest by Damasus. Grant then a Cardinal priest without a title, and those who doubt of these things will acquiesce in those who say that Jerome was ordained a Cardinal priest by Damasus: for by ancient usage Cardinal priest and title are correlatives and signify with reference to one another, so that the one cannot be without the other. Thus far Baronius. But let us return from this digression to our road.

[206] The little Work against the Luciferians was written by Jerome during that stay at Antioch, He writes the Dialogue against the Luciferians, as Tillemont judges in art. 18 and Note 14, and that opinion seems to me more probable than that of Baronius, who believed the said little Work was composed at Rome in the year 382. Certainly Jerome himself in the book on Illustrious men chap. 135, enumerating his own writings, places the Altercation of a Luciferian and an Orthodox immediately after those which we have already seen were composed in the desert, and before the Chronicle, which he wrote at Constantinople before he came to Rome. And since he everywhere enumerates his writings in the order in which they were written, and there is here no reason for departing from it, that chronology seems altogether to be embraced. For the occasion of writing also, which I shall presently set forth, persuades that that little Work was written at Antioch rather than in any other city. Moreover at num. 20 he says of the council of Nicæa: There still survive men who were present at that synod. And the council of Nicæa was held in the year 325, so that for this reason also the work is rather to be believed written about the year 379, in which we believe Jerome was at Antioch, than some years later. It now pleases me to investigate on what occasion St. Jerome seems to have written that Dialogue.

[207] The long dissension between Meletius and Paulinus, by which the church of Antioch was divided, or Altercation, whose occasion is set forth: was removed by a friendly settlement in the year 379, as is believed, and it was determined that each should govern his own flock until death; but that after the death of either, whichever survived should alone preside over the whole church of Antioch. Concerning this pacification of the Catholics of Antioch, what was said at XII February in St. Meletius §8 may be seen, where it was also observed that the Luciferians, who were with Paulinus, were offended at the reception of Meletius' communion. Of the same settlement between Meletius and Paulinus I treated at XXIII September in St. Liberius §13, and there I attempted to prove that at that time the opinion of Lucifer of Cagliari, who had been unwilling that bishops at any time infected with the heresy or communion of the Arians should be received by the Church in their own grades, and who had long been dead, degenerated into schism, the Luciferians stubbornly breaking the peace. This indeed Socrates and Sozomen attribute as the beginning of the schism of the Luciferians, when they say that the Luciferians on account of Meletius' reception withdrew from the rest, that is, were divided by schism not only from the Meletians, but also from the remaining flock of Paulinus, or from all the Catholics. For this cause therefore will have arisen the altercation which Jerome relates and sets forth.

[208] The very beginning of the Work favors the conjecture given. For the Saint begins thus: from which it is gathered that the schism had then recently arisen, It happened very lately that a certain follower of Lucifer, contending with odious loquacity against another nursling of the Church, practiced a currish eloquence. For he asserted that the whole world was the devil's, and, as it is now familiar to them to say, that the Church had been made a brothel. But the other on the contrary, reasonably indeed, but in an unsuitable place and time, defended that Christ had not died without cause, nor had the Son of God come down for the sake of the sheepskins of the Sardinians alone. What more? When the lights now lit in the streets broke up the audience and the circle, and night interrupted the disordered disputation, they withdrew, having almost spat in one another's faces. Yet with this determined by those who were present, that they should meet early in the morning in a private portico. And when all had come together there according to agreement, it seemed good that the speech of each should be taken down by shorthand writers. Upon this I observe that those schismatic or heretical sayings, that the whole world was the devil's, and that the Church had been made a brothel, which were brought forward on account of the reception of lapsed bishops in their dignities, are reported by Jerome as new, as he suggests by those words, as it is now familiar to them to say. But that this was Lucifer's own opinion the Saint nowhere says or suggests.

[209] and that Lucifer was not held by Jerome for a schismatic; Moreover in the whole little Work he nowhere calls the Luciferians schismatics, perhaps because they had not yet been condemned by the Church; but at num. 19 he calls them excessively religious, and at num. 20 he attacks their opinion by the example of the council of Nicæa, in which some Arian bishops were received after subscribing the definition of the faith, speaking thus: I marvel that certain men, and certainly followers of the Nicene faith, are of so great hardness that they think that three confessors returning from exile ought not to have done of necessity, for the salvation of the whole world, what so many and such men (in the council of Nicæa) did of their own will. Of Lucifer, long dead, he also speaks modestly and honorably, disapproving nevertheless that, the care of the other churches being left aside, he had withdrawn to his own; and about his opinion he subjoins the following: There is one thing which even at present I shall steadfastly say, that he disagrees with us in words, not in things; since he receives those who obtained baptism from the Arians. And this argument Jerome uses throughout the whole little Work against the Luciferians, that they cannot disapprove the reception of bishops repenting of their lapse, since they admitted as penitents those who had been baptized by the Arians. In this sense at num. 14 he says under the name of the Orthodox to the Luciferian: We agree in faith, we agree in receiving heretics, let us agree also in assembling together.

[210] but that Hilary the deacon had withdrawn from the Church, In the same little Work, however, St. Jerome refutes the error of Hilary the deacon, who had even endured exile for the faith, but had fallen into this error, that he was unwilling to receive those baptized by the Arians without a new baptism. And this error, and Hilary himself, Jerome disapproves much more vehemently, writing thus at num. 21: Hilary, since as a deacon he withdrew from the Church, and is alone, as he thinks, the multitude of the world, can neither consecrate the Eucharist, having no bishops or priests, nor confer baptism without the Eucharist. And since the man is now dead, with the man his sect likewise perished, because after himself a deacon could ordain no cleric. You see, I think, reader, that it is said of Hilary that he withdrew from the Church, and that those who adhered to him are called a sect. And as it is here said, and is alone, as he thinks, the multitude of the world, so in the same sense at num. 25 he is called a Deucalion of the world. And since St. Cyprian had been in a like error, as St. Jerome observes at num. 23, against the followers of Hilary he writes thus at num. 25: But if those who were trained by Hilary, and have begun to be sheep without a shepherd, should wish to bring forward from the Scriptures those things which blessed Cyprian left in his Letters about the rebaptizing of heretics, let them know that he published these things without an anathema upon those who had been unwilling to follow him. Since indeed he remained in the communion of those who had gone against his opinion, etc. But the mind of Hilary the deacon and of his followers, who withdrew from the Church, does not seem to have been the same. The Luciferians likewise, when St. Jerome was writing against them, began to withdraw from the Church, having fallen into schism, although Lucifer himself does not seem to have gone so far.

[211] on whose occasion the Saint gives excellent admonitions. Wherefore he adds to them at num. 27 excellent admonitions, which will profit much all heretics and schismatics who shall be willing with a docile mind to embrace the truth, writing thus: I shall set before you briefly and openly the judgment of my mind, that one must remain in that Church which, founded by the Apostles, endures to this day. If anywhere you hear those who are called Christ's named not from the Lord Jesus Christ but from some other, as for instance Marcionites, Valentinians, Montenses or Campitæ: know that it is not the Church of Christ, but the synagogue of Antichrist. For from this very thing, that they were established afterward, they show that they are those whom the Apostle foretold would come. Nor let them flatter themselves if they seem to themselves to affirm from chapters of the Scriptures what they say, since the devil too spoke some things from the Scriptures, and the Scriptures consist not in the reading but in the understanding. Otherwise, if we follow the letter, we too can compose for ourselves a new doctrine, so as to assert that those are not to be received into the Church who are shod and have two tunics. Thus far St. Jerome, by whom we know of no other writings at Antioch at that time.

§ XII. The Saint, having set out for Constantinople, hears there St. Gregory Nazianzen: some little Works written there.

Having set out for Constantinople, he hears Nazianzen In the year 379 or 380 St. Jerome set out for Constantinople, chiefly for this cause, that he might hear St. Gregory Nazianzen, who had been sent thither to restore the Catholic faith in that church, infected by the Arians. Of St. Gregory Nazianzen as his former master in the sacred Scriptures St. Jerome makes mention in Letter 50 (otherwise 51) to Domnio, where, censuring an unskilled declaimer, he enumerates his various masters in various disciplines, and speaks ironically of Nazianzen and others thus: And, to despise human things, without cause did I have Gregory Nazianzen and Didymus as my catechists in the holy Scriptures: my learning of the Hebrews profited me nothing, and my daily meditation from youth to this age in the Law, the Prophets, the Gospels and the Apostles. Nazianzen he also praises in book 1 against Jovinian in these words: And my teacher Gregory Nazianzen, etc. Of the same he speaks again in book 1 against Rufinus num. 13, writing thus: Could I not in that Letter name Gregory, a most eloquent man? Who among the Latins is his equal? In whom as my master I glory and exult. He was forty-eight or forty-nine years old when he began to hear Nazianzen, but much older still when for the same cause he set out to Didymus, as we shall see in its place. So great was the Man's ardor for perfecting himself in the knowledge of the sacred Scriptures.

[213] And he heard Nazianzen both teaching publicly in church, both teaching publicly and privately, and in private meetings he set before him his own doubts. This is clear from what he relates in Letter 52 (otherwise 2) to Nepotian, where he has it thus: My former teacher Gregory Nazianzen, being asked by me to explain what the Sabbath δευτερόπρωτον in Luke, that is, the second-first, meant, elegantly jested, saying: I will teach you about this matter in church, in which, with all the people applauding me, you will be compelled unwillingly to know what you do not know. Or at any rate, if you alone keep silence, you alone will be condemned of folly by all. So Nazianzen probably answered, wittily laughing at the levity of the people, that he might first examine a difficult question. But that answer at the same time shows that Nazianzen was heard by Jerome both privately and publicly. On the Letter to the Ephesians chap. 5 v. 32 the Saint again suggests that he dealt privately with St. Gregory about the Scriptures. For he says: Gregory Nazianzen, a very eloquent man and thoroughly learned in the Scriptures, when he was discussing this passage with me, used to say, etc. Hence in the book on Illustrious men chap. 117 he says: Gregory, first bishop of Sasima, then of Nazianzus, a most eloquent man, my teacher, from whom expounding the Scriptures I learned, etc. How greatly Nazianzen esteemed Jerome, as also St. Gregory of Nyssa, is gathered from the eulogy of Nyssen in the same place, chap. 128. Gregory bishop of Nyssa, he says, brother of Basil of Cæsarea, a few years ago read to me and to Gregory Nazianzen his books against Eunomius. This will have happened in the year 381, when Nyssen was at Constantinople at the council.

[214] and there he stayed two years or nearly three. St. Jerome also began at Constantinople to write some little Works, that he might exercise his talent for greater things, as is gathered from the Commentaries on Isaiah book 3, where he has it thus: About this vision, about thirty years ago, when I was at Constantinople and was being trained in the studies of the holy Scriptures with that most eloquent man Gregory Nazianzen, then bishop of that city, I know that I dictated a brief and hasty treatise, both that I might take a trial of my poor talent and that I might obey friends who bade me. Of this little Work, which perhaps is not the first, I shall treat below. Meanwhile I observe that from this passage it becomes manifest that Nazianzen was heard by Jerome at Constantinople. And Nazianzen was at Constantinople for three years, as he himself says in the Oration on the Bishops vol. 2 p. 302, namely from the end of the year 378 or the beginning of 379 until well on in the year 381. And Jerome will have come to Constantinople in the year 379 or 380, and so Jerome will have stayed at Constantinople with Nazianzen at least one year and some months, nay will have been with him for nearly two years, if he came before the winter of the year 379. He could also have remained for nearly a whole year after his withdrawal, so that he was at Constantinople at least two years and perhaps nearly three.

[215] There he translates and continues the Chronicle of Eusebius, The first work of Jerome of those which he composed at Constantinople we judge to have been the Chronicle, partly rendered into Latin from the Greek of Eusebius, partly enlarged and continued to the year 378. When St. Jerome speaks of it, he everywhere says that the Chronicle of Eusebius was translated by him. On the ninth chapter of Daniel he says: Which passage the diligent reader will be able to find more fully set forth in the Chronicle of that same Eusebius, which many years ago we turned into the Latin tongue. In the preface to the book on the Situation and names of Hebrew places he calls them Eusebius' Canons of the Times, which, he says, we published in the Latin tongue. In the Catalogue of his own writings, which he gives in the book on Illustrious men chap. 135, after the book against the Luciferians, of which we have treated before, he enumerates the Chronicle in these words: A Chronicle of universal history. But in Letter 57 (otherwise 101) he again speaks only of the translation, saying: When I was turning the Chronicle of Eusebius of Cæsarea into Latin, etc. Of his translation he already makes mention in Letter 18 (otherwise 142), that is, in the little Work on the Vision of Isaiah, which was written at Constantinople, as is clear from the words given above at num. 214, when he assigns the time of the vision and subjoins this: As will be able to be manifest to those who shall wish to read the book of the Times, which we translated into the Latin tongue from the Greek speech. From these things we have nothing about the time at which he began to translate the Chronicle of Eusebius.

[216] But from the last passage it becomes certain that St. Jerome's Latin Chronicle was at least not written later. finished in the year 380 or 381: And the order in which it is enumerated among Jerome's Works suggests that it fell between the book against the Luciferians published at Antioch and the translation of Origen's Homilies presently to be mentioned. Moreover, since toward the end of the Chronicle the death of the emperor Valens, slain in the year 378, is related, and toward the end of the Preface mention is made of the reign of Theodosius, promoted at the beginning of the following year, the Chronicle cannot at least have been finished before the year 379. But if we consider the last words of the preface, in which he indicates why he wrote nothing about the time of Gratian and Theodosius, we shall not believe that the Chronicle was finished before the year 380 or 381. Content with this end, he says, I have reserved the remaining time of Gratian and Theodosius for the pen of a fuller History: not that I feared to write freely and truly about the living: for the fear of God expels the fear of men; but because, with the barbarians still raging in our land, all things are uncertain. Thus he could speak in the year 380 or at the beginning of the next, after Theodosius had begun to make his rule illustrious by various battles against the barbarians. But he does not seem likely to have spoken thus as soon as in the year 379 he had learned that the empire had been conferred upon Theodosius. Wherefore I judge that the Chronicle of Eusebius was thus in the year 380 rendered into Latin by Jerome, and supplemented and continued, in such a way that perhaps it was begun in the desert from the year 376, but probably finished in the year 381. Concerning the time at which it seems to have been begun, consult what is to be said in §32.

[217] Besides the usefulness of the Work, which the Saint wished to make common to the Latins, for what cause he undertook that labor, Jerome was probably stirred to undertake that labor in order that, after the manner of the ancients, he might exercise his style in translating Greek works, and might acquire a greater knowledge of the ancient histories. He begins the Preface, addressed to Vincentius, afterward his companion in Palestine, as the learned everywhere conjecture, and to Gallienus, otherwise unknown, in this manner: It was that old custom of eloquent men, that for the sake of exercising their talent they should render Greek books in the Latin tongue. This likewise

suggesting that he would do, he sets forth the difficulty of translation, and subjoins: And so, my dearest Vincentius, and you, Gallienus, part of my soul, I beseech you that whatever there is of this hasty Work you may read over with the mind of friends, not of judges; especially since, as you know, I dictated it to a shorthand writer most swiftly, and the difficulty of the matter is attested even by the documents of the divine volumes, which, published by the seventy translators, do not keep the same savor in the Greek speech. By these words, and still more by the several that follow, he suggests that he had already at that time read the Hebrew Scriptures. Then he teaches by what distinctions of lettering he provided for the convenience and profit of readers, as may be read there.

[218] Finally he declares that he inserted some new things among those of Eusebius, and in what manner he partly translated, partly enlarged it. of which he gives notice, so that readers may both assign the credit of the Greek matter, he says, to its own author (Eusebius), and may know that what we have inserted as new has been drawn from other most approved men. For it must be known that I have used in part the office both of a translator and of a writer, because I both rendered the Greek most faithfully, and added some things which seemed to me to have been passed over, chiefly in Roman history, which Eusebius, the founder of this book, seems to me not so much to have been ignorant of, being most learned, as, writing in Greek, to have touched upon lightly as of little necessity to his own people. And so from Ninus and Abraham to the capture of Troy it is a pure Greek translation. From Troy to the twentieth year of Constantine very many things are now added, now intermingled, which we most carefully excerpted from Tranquillus and the other illustrious historians. But from the aforesaid year of Constantine to the consulship of the augusti Valens for the sixth time and Valentinian for the second, the whole is my own. Thus far Jerome about his own Work. The Saint himself not rarely praised it, as we have already seen, and Augustine and other ancients praised it. It is also very well known in our times, and frequently printed and reprinted.

[219] That Chronicle was interpolated in the manuscripts. But by the unfair license of copyists it has suffered many interpolations and corruptions, and for that reason it cannot at this time have as great authority as it would deserve if it were extant pure, as it was written by Jerome. And the History of the times of Gratian and Theodosius, which the Saint seems to promise, he never wrote, so far as we know, because he was always most fully occupied with explanations of sacred Scripture, with the refutation of heretics, and with other pious Works of that kind. For the rest, not a few other things about the Chronicle of Eusebius and Jerome can be examined; but these would lead me further than is right from the deeds of St. Jerome. Wherefore I refer curious readers to the eighth volume of the Verona edition, which contains the Chronicle with a lengthy preface by the learned editor and most ample Annotations. They will also perceive that in later centuries that happened which Jerome foresaw and foretold in his preface, writing thus: Nor am I ignorant that there will be many who, with their usual appetite for detracting from everyone — which no one can avoid save one who writes nothing at all — will fix their native tooth upon this volume. They will calumniate the dates, they will change the order, they will find fault with the facts, they will winnow the syllables. And, as generally happens, they will refer the negligence of copyists to the authors. And among the detractors of the Hieronymian Chronicle Scaliger holds no lowest place, but him too the Verona editor most frequently refutes.

[220] He translates fourteen Homilies of Origen on Jeremiah, In the often-praised catalogue of his own Works St. Jerome enumerates after the Chronicle, Twenty-eight Homilies of Origen on Jeremiah and Ezekiel, which, he says, I translated from Greek into Latin. Of these fourteen are on Jeremiah, as many on Ezekiel. All of them, previously printed only among the Works of Origen, the diligent Verona editor inserted into the collection of St. Jerome's Works, vol. 5 from col. 741, where our Jerome prefaces thus to Vincentius the priest: It is indeed a great thing, my friend, that you ask, that I should make Origen Latin, and should give to Roman ears also a man who, in the judgment of Didymus the seer, is the second teacher of the churches after the Apostle [*]. But being tormented, as you yourself know, with pain of the eyes, which I contracted by excessive and impatient reading, and by the lack of shorthand writers, since my poverty has taken away this help also; I am not able to fulfill so ardently as you desire what you rightly desire. And so, after the fourteen Homilies on Jeremiah, which I translated long ago in a confused order, I have also dictated at intervals these fourteen on Ezekiel, taking great care that the translation should preserve the idiom of the aforesaid man in the simplicity of speech which alone profits the churches, all splendor of the rhetorical art being despised. For we wish to praise the matter, not the words. And presently, after some things about the Works of Origen, he says: I know that you desire that I should translate every kind of his composition: I have set forth the cause why I cannot do it. This, however, I promise, that if, at your prayer, Jesus shall restore my health, I shall translate, I will not say all — for to have said this would be rash — but very many, on that condition which I have often established with you, that I supply the voice, you the shorthand writer. So the Saint.

[221] And that these Homilies were translated at Constantinople is gathered from the order already mentioned and as many on Ezekiel. in which the Saint enumerated them among his Works, namely between the Chronicle and the little Work on the Vision of Isaiah presently to be mentioned, and therefore about the year 381. This order is also favored by Vincentius, to whom he inscribed both the Chronicle and these Homilies. The pain of the eyes from which he suffered was probably contracted in supplementing and continuing the Chronicle of Eusebius. For he says that it was contracted by excessive reading. And much reading of various books was necessary for one supplementing the Chronicle, and still more for one continuing it. Yet he did not translate the Homilies on Jeremiah and those on Ezekiel at exactly the same time, since he says that the former were translated long ago. We can therefore conjecture that the former were rendered into Latin either before the Chronicle, or before the continuation of the Chronicle, and the rest after the Chronicle was finished, and that at that time they were all published together. But what Tillemont suspects in art. 14, that the later fourteen on Ezekiel were not translated until after the year 386, that is, after he had seen Didymus at Alexandria, because he mentions him in the Preface, is by no means probable, as the Verona editor Vallarsi has already observed. For since Didymus flourished with a great fame for learning and had published various little Works, it was not necessary for Jerome to see him before he spoke of him. For the rest, the things which Rufinus objected against Jerome on account of that translation and of the praise given to Origen will be examined with others in that place where we shall refute the calumnies of Rufinus adopted by some moderns.

[222] After the said Homilies St. Jerome places the treatise on the Seraphim. He writes the little Work on the Seraphim, And the little Work on the Vision of Isaiah is meant, which he says he wrote at Constantinople in the words given at num. 214. He alleges there these reasons for writing it: Both that I might take a trial of my poor talent and that I might obey friends who bade me. Who those friends were he does not say. But probably they were living at Constantinople. Meanwhile that little Work was published among the Letters, and was formerly indeed torn apart into two Letters to Damasus, which were 142 and 143 among the Hieronymian letters. Martianay in his edition joined the little Work together and published it in vol. 3 after the Commentaries on Isaiah, leaving it, however, with the title of a Letter to Damasus. Vallarsi in his Verona edition likewise published the treatise joined together in vol. 1 as Letter 18 to Damasus. But in the Annotations he suggests from Sixtus of Siena that it does not seem to be a Letter to Damasus; and he testifies that in Vatican codex 215, which formerly was the queen's, this title is prefixed: Here begins the brief and hasty treatise of Blessed Jerome on the Seraphim which are read of in the vision of Isaiah, which at Constantinople, while still a disciple of that most eloquent man Gregory Nazianzen, he published as a trial of his own understanding and at the request of friends, to which he gave the title on the Seraphim. In the whole Treatise there is nothing which has the appearance of a Letter; nothing which suggests that the little Work was inscribed to Damasus. I should therefore prefer to judge that it was written for the benefit of Vincentius the priest and of other friends.

[223] Jerome himself calls it a book, not a letter, when in Letter 84 (otherwise 65), given to Pammachius and Oceanus in the year 399, to be fixed in the year 380 or 381, he observes that in it he corrected a perverse interpretation of Origen, writing thus: In the passage of Isaiah in which two seraphim are described crying out, when he (Origen) interpreted them as the Son and the Holy Spirit, did I not change that detestable exposition into the two testaments? The book is in men's hands, published twenty years ago. Wherefore it may be conjectured that that little Work was afterward communicated by Jerome to Damasus while he was at Rome, and that thence arose the inscription to Damasus. For from Damasus' Letter to Jerome, now 35 (formerly 124) among the Hieronymian letters, it is abundantly clear that Damasus had also read the writings which Jerome had elaborated in the desert. And so, says Damasus, since, when the letter-carrier was sent back to me, you said that you had no letters left, except those which you had once dictated in the desert, which I read and copied out with all eagerness, etc. For the rest, we believe that that little Work was written in the year 380 or 381, although thus the twenty years down to Letter 84, given in the year 399, would not be full. For since the Saint uses a round number, he does not seem to have reckoned the time so strictly that it is necessary to say twenty full or nearly full years. Yet I confess that it could be dated from the year 379.

[224] in which he also corrects a perverse interpretation of Origen, And what he says above about the corrected interpretation of Origen is read thus in the Work itself: Certain men before me, both Greeks and Latins, expounding this passage, interpreted the Lord sitting upon the throne as God the Father, and the two seraphim which are declared to stand on either side as our Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. To whose authority, although they are most learned, I do not assent. For it is much better to bring forth true things rustically than false things eloquently, etc. That the Saint did not write with his own hand, but dictated at intervals, and was even then suffering in his eyes, the following words at num. 16 show: Let it suffice to have dictated thus far; because a discourse which is not polished by the pen of one's own hand, since it is of itself unpolished, becomes much more troublesome if it doubles the weariness of itself by its length, so that we, tormented by pain of the eyes, may apply ourselves only to our ears and tongue. These words perhaps gave occasion for dividing the little Work into two; but that was not St. Jerome's mind, who only dictated the little Work on different days, that he might better meditate what was to be dictated.

[225] and shows much humility. The Saint displays much Christian humility in the same little Work. For at num. 3 he speaks thus: He who is a sinner and like me sees the Lord sitting in the valley of Josaphat; not on a hill, not on a mountain; but in a valley, and in the valley of judgment. But he who is just and like Isaiah sees him sitting upon a high and lifted-up throne. Again at num. XI: But would that I too might be pricked with compunction, and after compunction be made worthy of the word of God, since I am a man, and have not clean

lips, and dwell also in the midst of a people having unclean lips. He subjoins more, already recited at num. 80. Likewise at num. 6 he humbly begs for prayers in these words: Since these things stir up no small dust, and at the very first glance present the difficulty of interpretation, let us together entreat the Lord that to me also a coal may be sent from the altar, so that, all the filth of my sins being wiped away, I may first be able to behold the sacraments of God, and then to relate what I shall have seen. Thus far about his writings at Constantinople. Baronius at the year 372 num. 61 believes that the Homilies of Origen were translated in the desert, because the Saint in book 2 against Rufinus num. 23 says that he translated them in his youth. But by this manner of speaking he designates his youth in sacred studies, and extends it in various places very far.

* al. Apostolos

§ XIII. The Saint comes to Rome: he is secretary to St. Damasus the Pope: he writes some little Works on sacred Scripture at Damasus' request.

St. Jerome comes to Rome with Paulinus and Epiphanius, After St. Jerome had been two years, or perhaps three, at Constantinople, he came to Rome in the year 382 as it drew to its close. But we do not know whether in that very year 382 he set out straight from Constantinople to Rome, or whether he departed from Constantinople in the year 381 and returned to Antioch to Paulinus the bishop, with whom he afterward came to Rome. Baronius at the year 382 num. 2 judges that Jerome did not return to Antioch; but, having been advised by a letter of Damasus (the Pope) that he should come to Rome, undertook the journey through Greece, and at that time wished to visit Athens. St. Jerome was certainly at Athens, as was said at num. 89, but it is uncertain at what time he went thither. For as in his youth he traversed Gaul, so he could in his youth have traveled through Greece also, which is no farther distant from his native Pannonia. I should therefore prefer to conjecture either that he returned into Syria, and thence set out with Paulinus and Epiphanius for Rome in the year 382, or that he remained at Constantinople until they should come, if perchance Paulinus and Epiphanius wished to pass through it, in order to set out for Rome by a land journey. However it be, Jerome in Letter 127 (otherwise 6) suggests that he set out for Rome with the aforesaid bishops, writing thus: Finally, when ecclesiastical necessity had drawn me too to Rome with the holy Pontiffs Paulinus and Epiphanius: of whom the one governed the church of Antioch in Syria, the other that of Salamis in Cyprus. These words suggest that the Saint made at least part of the journey with the aforesaid bishops, and that he was either summoned with them by Damasus, or asked by Paulinus, chiefly on whose account the council was to be gathered at Rome.

[227] For the ecclesiastical necessity of which Jerome speaks where, on account of the Antiochene division, had arisen chiefly from the death of St. Meletius, who died in the year 381 about June at the council of Constantinople. By that death the division of the church of Antioch could have ceased altogether, if the administration of the whole church had been left to Paulinus, who survived; as I have already observed at num. 207 had been agreed between Meletius and Paulinus. St. Gregory Nazianzen, lately confirmed in the see of Constantinople, vehemently insisted that the said compact should be kept, and that no bishop should be substituted in Meletius' place, the care of the whole church being left to Paulinus. But so great was the rivalry of most of the Easterners, who had stood for Meletius, against the Westerners, together with the Egyptians who adhered to Paulinus, that they preferred to continue and exasperate the Antiochene division by electing Flavian in Meletius' place. Nazianzen bore this most ill, and for that reason began to think of laying down his episcopate, as he himself suggests in Poem 1 on his own Life, vol. 2 p. 26; and, other causes also being added, not long after he obtained leave to abdicate his episcopate and to depart, as in fact he departed.

[228] The election of Flavian displeased no less St. Damasus, St. Ambrose, and all the bishops of the West, because it continued the Antiochene division. For this cause therefore a general council was proclaimed to be celebrated at Rome under Damasus. increased by the election of Flavian, a council had been proclaimed, And since St. Jerome could have learned much about these matters at Antioch and at Constantinople, and had become famous for his learning and integrity, St. Damasus wished to use his labor in that council. And so to this end he came to Rome with Paulinus and Epiphanius in the year 382. And that he came after the month of August, or at any rate after the beginning of August, is gathered from his own words: for at his departure he said that he had lived at Rome nearly three years. And he departed in the month of August of the year 385. For the said council Damasus seems to have used Jerome's labor chiefly, and of the time of that council Jerome seems chiefly to speak in Letter 123 (otherwise XI) to Ageruchia, where he says: Many years ago, when I was assisting Damasus bishop of the city of Rome with the ecclesiastical papers, and was answering the synodical consultations of the East and of the West, etc. Not a few things certainly had to be written and dispatched both before the council, and while the bishops were gathered, and when the consultations of the bishops were ended. And that Jerome applied his labor in composing those writings is gathered from the words of Rufinus to be given.

[229] to which many Western bishops come together, Of the bishops summoned to that council Jerome speaks in the Epitaph of St. Paula, that is, in Letter 108 (otherwise 27), writing thus of St. Paula: And when imperial letters had drawn to Rome the bishops of the East and of the West on account of certain dissensions of the churches, she (Paula) saw admirable men and pontiffs of Christ, Paulinus bishop of the city of Antioch, and Epiphanius of Salamis in Cyprus, which is now called Constantia: of whom she even had Epiphanius as her guest; and Paulinus, who was staying in another's house, she possessed by her kindness as though her own. Bishops of the East and of the West are indeed said here to have been summoned, but that the greater part of the Easterners did not come I shall presently say. Meanwhile about the time of the council I observe that it seems to have been celebrated toward the end of the year 382, since Jerome with Paulinus and Epiphanius certainly did not come before August, as was proved above, and probably after August; while Paulinus and Epiphanius did not depart from Rome before the year 383, as is gathered from the following words of Jerome, in which he says that they departed when the winter was over and the sea open. At that council were St. Ambrose and many Western bishops. Perhaps some Egyptians came to it who stood for Paulinus: whose coming, however, can be proved by no ancient monument.

[230] but the Easterners excuse themselves by three legates. But the greater part of the Easterners, who had substituted Flavian for Meletius as bishop of Antioch, met again at Constantinople in the summer of the year 382, as Theodoret relates in book 5 chap. 8. And when they had learned there that they were being summoned to the Roman council, they wrote a lengthy letter, which Theodoret recites in chap. 9, and sent it to Rome by three bishops, Cyriacus, Eusebius and Priscianus. And in this Letter they modestly suggest that they will not come, and bring forward many excuses, set forth their orthodox faith, and declare the election of Nectarius for the church of Constantinople, of Flavian for that of Antioch, and the confirmation of St. Cyril for that of Jerusalem, in such words that it sufficiently appears that the Easterners were of such a mind that they were unwilling to desert Flavian's party. For this reason probably, lest the East should be divided from the West by schism, nothing seems to have been accomplished in the Roman council for assigning the church of Antioch to Paulinus alone: for the division was continued for many years. If the Roman council answered the Easterners' aforesaid letter, it did so by the labor of St. Jerome. Certainly in that same council a formula of faith was written by St. Jerome, which was to be accepted by the Apollinarists in order that they might be received by the Catholic Church.

[231] On this occasion Rufinus in the Apology for Origen, What befell St. Jerome with the Apollinarists in Martianay vol. 5 of the Works of Jerome col. 353, relates the following: Bishop Damasus, when deliberation was being held about receiving the Apollinarians, committed the drawing up of a statement of the ecclesiastical faith, to which those same men should have to subscribe if they wished to be joined to the Church, to a certain friend of his, a priest, a most eloquent man: who according to custom used to manage this business for him. It seemed necessary to the Dictator to say in that very statement, concerning the Incarnation of the Lord, the Lordly Man. The Apollinarists were offended at this expression: they began to find fault with the novelty of the expression. He who had dictated it began to be present to himself, and from the true authority of the writings of Catholic men to confute those who attacked it. It happened that one [*] of those very men who alleged the novelty of the expression showed that in a little book of Athanasius the bishop the expression about which the question was held was written. As though now persuaded, he to whom it had been proved asked that the codex be given him, that he might satisfy others also who were ignorant and gainsaying. Having received the codex, he devised an unheard-of kind of adulteration. The very place in which that expression was written he erased: and he wrote again that very expression which he had erased. The codex, being returned, was received without suspicion. Again a question is raised about the same expression. For proof the codex is brought forward: the expression about which the question was is found set in the codex over an erasure. Credit is denied to the man who brought forward such a codex, because that erasure seemed an indication of corruption and falsity. But since, to say the same things again, these things were done to one living by one living, he straightway did everything so that the fraud of the crime committed might be laid bare, and that the stain of what had been committed might not cling to the innocent Man, who had done no such thing; but might redound upon the author of the deed and to his fuller infamy.

[232] St. Jerome openly professes in book 2 against Rufinus num. 20 in that council. that these things were said of him by Rufinus, nor does he deny the truth of the fact, even though he disapproves that Rufinus alleged such things to prove that the books of Origen had been corrupted by heretics. For neither could the corruption of Origen's Works rightly be gathered from that fact; and the fact itself, since it had for many years remained unknown to the public, could seem fictitious to most when after eighteen years it was publicly written by Rufinus. Hence St. Jerome calls them open absurdities, as contributing nothing to Rufinus' purpose, and indeed calls it a little fable, because such it could seem; and when he had declared that he was being attacked under the name of a certain friend of Damasus, Bishop of the City of Rome, … to whom he handed over the ecclesiastical letters to be dictated, and had briefly touched upon the fact, he addresses Rufinus thus: I ask you, dearest friend, that in ecclesiastical treatises, where the truth of doctrines is in question, and where the authority of our elders is demanded concerning the salvation of our souls, you dismiss ravings of this kind, and do not hold the tales of luncheons and dinners for a proof of truth. For it can happen that, even if you heard the truth from me, another who is ignorant of this matter may say that it was made up by you, and, like a mime of Philistion or a trick of Lentulus and Marullus, elegantly invented in polished speech. So Jerome. And those words, Even if you heard the truth from me, sufficiently suggest that the fact was true, and was related by Jerome himself to Rufinus while they were friends; but that it is called a little fable because it really has the appearance of a little fable, and after eighteen years, being related to those who were ignorant of it, could seem a little fable. For the rest

I observe that that manner of speaking, by which Christ was called the Lordly Man, was indeed in use among various writers, but displeased others. See St. Augustine, book 1 of the Retractations, chapter 19.

[233] The saint, whose fame was great at Rome, being asked by Damasus, Among the works which St. Hieronymus wrote at Rome, he reckons first those which were written to Damasus. Now Damasus set the highest value upon Jerome's learning and genius, and on that account the saint's fame at Rome grew bright in a wonderful manner. Jerome himself declares this in Epistle 45 (elsewhere 99) to Asella, in these words: Before I knew the household of the holy Paula, the enthusiasm of the whole city was in concert about me. In the judgment of almost all I was adjudged worthy of the supreme priesthood. Damasus, of blessed memory, spoke my words. I was called holy, I was called humble and eloquent. Thus he spoke of the earlier time, at the moment when he was departing from Rome, the enthusiasm of most of the Romans having by then changed. Among the works, however, written at Rome to Damasus, he places first in the Catalogue the treatise On Hosanna. Damasus asked for this little work by a letter which stands as the 19th among the Hieronymian letters. Since it is very short, I subjoin it entire: When I was reading the commentaries in the Greek and Latin tongue upon the interpretation of the Gospels, written by our own men, that is, by orthodox men, both long ago and lately, upon that which is read, Hosanna to the Son of David, they put forward views not only diverse but even contrary to one another. It falls to your charity, with that burning vigour of intellect of yours, to cut away opinions and put down ambiguities, and to write with a living sense what the phrase means among the Hebrews, so that for this, as for many things, our cares may render thanks to you in Christ Jesus. Thus Damasus, in the year 383 or the following.

[234] he writes on Hosanna, Jerome, for his part, begins his dissertation, which stands as the 20th among the Epistles (elsewhere 145), thus: Many have invented diverse things concerning this word, etc. And having refuted the exposition of St. Hilary and of others, he adds: It remains, therefore, that leaving aside the rivulets of opinions we run back to the fountain itself, whence it was taken by the Evangelists. Presently he proceeds to inquire into the Hebrew passage of the Old Testament from which the Evangelists had drawn it, and weaves a learned disputation. The whole he concludes with this epilogue: These things meanwhile, according to the mediocrity of my understanding, I have dictated briefly and concisely. But let your Beatitude know that in disputations of this kind no weariness ought to creep in upon the reader: for we too could easily have feigned something which would resolve the question out of a single word, as we have shown the rest to have done; but it is more becoming to labour a little while for the truth, and to lend an ear to a foreign tongue, than to report a fabricated opinion about a language not our own. Would that this counsel of St. Jerome had always pleased all writers, or at least those who profess criticism in writing! Jerome mentions that exposition of his when writing on Matthew, at chapter 21, verse 9, in these words: Further, as to what follows, Hosanna to the Son of David, what it signifies I remember to have stated many years ago in a short Epistle to Damasus, then bishop of the city of Rome, and I shall now touch upon it briefly.

[235] likewise on the parable of the prodigal son After this little work Jerome subjoins another in the catalogue of his own writings, expressed in this manner: And on the thrifty and the prodigal sons. This exposition too Damasus requested, in words inserted in Jerome's Epistle 21 (elsewhere 146) to Damasus. Who is that Father in the Gospel (Luke 15) who divides his substance between two sons? who are the two sons? which the elder, which the younger? How does the younger squander the substance he received with harlots; and, when famine came, is set over the swine by the prince of the region, eats husks, returns to his Father, receives the ring and the robe, and has the fatted calf slain for him? Who is the elder brother, and how, coming from the field, does he begrudge the reception of his brother? And the rest, which is more fully set out in the Gospel. These things Damasus asked, adding what follows: I know that many in this reading have said diverse things, and have reckoned the elder brother the Jew, and the younger the Gentile people. But I ask, how can it be fitted to the Jewish people: "Behold, so many years have I served thee, and I never transgressed thy commandment; and thou never gavest me a kid, that I might feast with my friends"? And he replies: "Son, thou art ever with me, and all that is mine is thine". But if we should wish the parable to be about a just man and a sinner, it cannot suit a just man that he should be saddened at the salvation of another, and most of all of a brother.

These things concerning Damasus's inquiry are from Jerome's letters; and he, weighing the questions wisely propounded, begins his answer, or his Epistle, thus: Your Beatitude's question was a disputation. And so to have asked was, in the asking, to have given a road to the things asked. For to him who asks wisely, wisdom shall be reckoned.

[236] Then indeed he elucidates and resolves the questions propounded, and the whole parable together with other kindred matters, at length and learnedly, and on his elder brother. as may be seen in the praised Epistle 21. At the end he adds something of an unnecessary apology for his style, closing the Epistle thus: I do not doubt that the speech of our littleness seems to you unpolished: but I have often pleaded that a discourse cannot be polished save that which one's own hand has filed. Therefore pardon my aching eyes, that is, pardon one who dictates, especially since in ecclesiastical matters it is not words that are sought but sense, that is, life is to be sustained by loaves, not by husks.

These two little works to Damasus I believe to have been composed rather in the year 383 than in 384, at the end of which, as I shall prove, Damasus died. For since I judge that Jerome was not idle after the business of the Roman council was dispatched, I think it more probable that the earlier little works to Damasus were composed in the year 383, although I do not deny that they could also have been composed in 384. Of the later work Jerome makes mention in book 2 against Jovinian, writing thus: Upon which parable (of the thrifty and the prodigal son) I once dedicated a little book to Bishop Damasus, while he was still alive.

[237] In the catalogue of his own writings, from whose order I judge that one must never depart without evident reason, Damasus reads Jerome's preceding writings, St. Jerome, after the works just recounted, subjoins: On three questions of the Old Law. This little work, which stands as the 36th among the Epistles (formerly 125), Jerome likewise composed at the request of Damasus, made through the Epistle numbered 35 among the Hieronymian letters (elsewhere 124). The Pontiff addresses Jerome thus: I have resolved to rouse you, sleeping and for a long time now reading rather than writing, by little questions sent to you; not that you ought not also to read—for by this, as by daily food, speech is nourished and grows fat—but because this is the fruit of reading, that you should write. And so, since yesterday, when the registrar was sent back to me, you said that you had no letters left, except those which you had once dictated in the desert, and which I read and copied out with all avidity; and since you further promised that in the stolen hours of the night you could, if I wished, dictate some; I gladly accept from one who offers what I had meant to ask for, even had you refused. Nor indeed do I think that there will be any converse of our disputation more worthy than if we discourse together about the Scriptures; that is, that I ask and you answer… Gird yourself, therefore, and expound to me the matters subjoined, preserving on both sides a [\] measure, so that neither may the propositions want a solution, nor the Epistle brevity. For I confess to you that the books of Lactantius which you gave me long since I read without pleasure, because very many of his Epistles are stretched out to the space of a thousand lines, and they rarely dispute about our doctrine.*

[238] and by questions stirs the saint to write other things: The alleged words of Damasus prove, first, how highly that holy and learned Pontiff valued Jerome's writings, and with how great avidity he read them all, even those long since inscribed to others. They intimate, secondly, that the little work of Jerome which Damasus requests was written a notable time after the earlier ones, and thus was in all likelihood composed in the year 384. From Jerome's answer it is further clear that at that time Jerome was intent upon acquiring and transcribing Hebrew books, and that he had thought of translating into the Latin tongue the book of Didymus on the Holy Spirit. Now from this design of Jerome's, who did not translate the said book of Didymus before the death of Damasus, Vallarsius in the preface to the Veronese edition probably infers that these things were written on both sides not long before the death or the last illness of Damasus. This is indeed probable, for the reason given, yet by no means certain; because perhaps Damasus preferred that St. Jerome should first undertake other matters, to be recounted below.

[239] and this perhaps before he wrote at Rome to others. But since Vallarsius, with us and with most moderns, fixes the death of Damasus in the year 384, in the month of December, he believed that before this Epistle of Damasus and the lucubration of Jerome which followed it, many other things had been written by the saint to Marcella, to Paula, to Eustochium, against Helvidius: all of which are placed later by Jerome himself in the catalogue. I do not deny that the learned editor's conjecture appears probable, yet I do not hold it certain, for the reason already given. Wherefore I judge that the order of Jerome himself must be followed, and that his familiarity with those noble Roman women was begun after the little works to Damasus were written, or at any rate not long before, so that the writings addressed to them are more probably later. The very Epistle of Damasus adduced favours the Hieronymian order: for Marcella, Paula, Eustochium, Blæsilla, and other pious virgins, after the saint had begun to serve their piety, kept Jerome more occupied than that Damasus could have called him sleeping and for a long time now reading rather than writing.

[240] He answers the questions of Damasus, and transcribes Hebrew books, Damasus, further, when he had set out those things, propounds five exceedingly difficult questions from Genesis, which may be read in the said Epistle. Jerome, however, begins his answer, that is, Epistle 36, in this manner: After I received the Epistle of your Sanctity, I at once called a notary and commanded him to take it down. When he was made ready for the task, I was picturing to myself in thought beforehand what I was about to bring forth with my voice. Meanwhile I was already moving my tongue and he his joint; when suddenly a Hebrew came in, bringing not a few volumes which he had received from the synagogue as though to read. And straightway, "You have," he said, "what you had asked for": and he so hurriedly startled me, doubtful and not knowing what to do, that, leaving all else aside, I flew off to writing: which indeed I am doing up to the present moment. But since yesterday, a deacon having been sent to me, you said that you were awaiting—as you think, an Epistle; as I judge, a Commentary—desiring a brief answer to matters which severally require the prolixity of great volumes, ταῦτά σοι ἐσχεδίασα, two little questions only being passed over: not that I could not have answered something to these also, but because they have been published in the Latin tongue by most eloquent men, namely our own Tertullian and Novatian; and if we should wish to bring forward anything new, the disputation must be a wider one. Certainly I await your pleasure: whether you wish the opinions to be set out for you with epistolary brevity, or books to be made on each severally. These things are against the brevity which he desired

by Damasus.

[241] Now the questions passed over were, the one concerning clean and unclean animals, and he thinks of translating the book of Didymus: the other concerning circumcision: saying that Origen too had written on these, he adds: So that, if I myself could find nothing, I might at least borrow from his fountains. And he at once intimates that he is meditating other things, continuing thus: And, to speak more truly, I have in hand the book of Didymus on the Holy Spirit, which, when translated, I desire to dedicate to you, lest you should think that I do nothing but sleep, you who reckon reading without a pen to be slumber. Then, the three questions having been discussed: Having therefore set forth the problems which you had subjoined to your Epistle, I have appended what seemed good to me, asking pardon alike for haste and for delay; for haste, because I wished to dictate in one short night's work a task of many days; for slowness, because, detained by another work, I did not write back at once to your questions.

Of this little work St. Jerome makes mention in the book of Hebrew Questions on Genesis, at chapter 4, verse 15, in this manner: Upon which little chapter there exists our Epistle to Bishop Damasus. Now the first question was upon these words: Everyone who kills Cain shall pay sevenfold vengeance. And treating of the second question, resolved at chapter 15, verse 16, concerning the fourth generation, in which the return of his posterity to the promised land was promised to Abraham, he says: Upon which little chapter we have published a small volume.

[242] After the work just praised, St. Jerome places in the catalogue two Homilies on the Song of Songs. he translates two homilies of Origen. Of these homilies of Origen, which he turned into Latin, Jerome himself makes mention in Epistle 84 (elsewhere 65), writing thus: They object against me, why I once praised Origen. Unless I am mistaken, there are two places in which I praised him: the little preface to Damasus on the Homilies of the Song of Songs, etc. Among the works of Jerome in the Veronese edition those homilies stand in volume 3 from page 499, where the saint begins his preface to Damasus thus: Origen, though in his other books he has surpassed all men, in the Song [\] of Songs surpassed himself. Then he explains how many volumes he wrote upon the Song, and says that he passes them over, because to translate them all is a matter of immense leisure, labour and expense: but these two treatises, he says to Damasus, which he composed in the manner of everyday speech for little ones still at the breast, I have interpreted faithfully rather than ornately, offering you a taste of his meanings, not a meal, that you may perceive how highly those things are to be esteemed which are great, when things which are small can so please.* These praises of Origen furnished matter of accusation to Jerome's enemies; but we shall repel all accusations of that kind together. For the rest, it appears that Jerome meanwhile deferred the more prolix book of Didymus, in order first to translate the shorter homilies of Origen.

\ one ought to read uni*, I think

\ elsewhere utrumque*

\ elsewhere Cantica*

§ XIV. At the wish of Damasus he corrects the Latin text of the Gospels from the Greek, and the whole New Testament, and from the Old the Psalter.

At the command of St. Damasus, the Latin text The matters concerning the correction of the text of the sacred Scriptures which must now be set forth were begun at Rome, at the command of Damasus; but in the catalogue of Jerome's writings not all the things touched upon there are enumerated by him, nor placed in their own order. This only does Jerome say in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 135: I restored the New Testament to the Greek original; and he adds, I translated the Old according to the Hebrew (tongue). But since in that catalogue of his writings he reckons up only books written or translated into another language, he seems to speak of the New Testament corrected only on occasion of the Old translated, and at that time in which he was composing the translation of the Old from the Hebrew. Hence he reckons only the correction of the New Testament, even though he had also corrected many parts of the Old from the Greek text of the Seventy interpreters. Now these corrections were begun by the saint at Rome, at the command of Pope Damasus, as is evident from the Preface which he prefixed to the Gospels. For in it he thus begins, addressing Damasus: You compel me to make a new work out of an old, so that, after the copies of the Scriptures have been scattered over the whole world, I should sit as a kind of arbiter: and, since they vary among themselves, should decide which are those that agree with the Greek verity. He says the Greek verity, because all the Gospels, with the single exception of Matthew's, which at least was first translated into Greek, and all the remaining books besides, had been written out in Greek by their own authors.

[244] of the New Testament he corrects from the Greek: Jerome did not shrink from that useful labour, yet he foresaw how much ill-will that emendation could create for him, continuing thus: A pious labour, but a perilous presumption, that he who is to be judged by all should judge concerning the rest; to change the tongue of an old man, and to drag back a world already growing grey to the beginnings of childhood. For what learned man, or unlearned either, when he has taken up the volume into his hands and has seen that what he reads differs from the flavour which he once imbibed, does not at once break out into a cry, calling me a forger, calling me a sacrilegious man, for daring to add, change, or correct anything in the old books? Against which ill-will a twofold cause consoles me: that you, who are the supreme Priest, bid it be done; and that what varies is not true, as is proved even by the testimony of slanderers. For if faith is to be placed in the Latin copies, let them answer, in which. For there are almost as many copies as there are manuscripts. But if the truth is to be sought from the greater number, why, returning to the Greek original, do we not correct those things which were badly published by faulty translators, or more perversely amended by unskilled presumers, or either added or changed by drowsy copyists? Nor indeed do I dispute concerning the Old Testament, which, turned into the Greek tongue by seventy elders, has come down to us at the third remove… I speak now of the New Testament; which, that it is Greek, is not doubtful, excepting the apostle Matthew, who first published the Gospel of Christ in Judæa in Hebrew letters. This surely, since in our tongue it is discordant and leads along the diverse paths of rivulets, must be sought from a single fountain.

[245] Then, what Jerome accomplished in the four Gospels he teaches, a little after, in these words: in what manner he performed this in the Gospels. Therefore this present little Preface promises only the four Gospels, whose order is this—Matthew, Mark, Luke, John—corrected by a collation of Greek manuscripts, but ancient ones. And that they might not differ much from the custom of the Latin reading, we have so tempered our pen that, only those things being corrected which seemed to change the sense, we have suffered the rest to remain as they were. The canons also, which Eusebius, bishop of Cæsarea, following Ammonius of Alexandria, arranged in ten numbers, we have set down as they are had in the Greek. And if any of the curious should wish to know which things in the Gospels are the same, which near akin, and which peculiar, let him learn it by their distinction. For a great error has grown up in our manuscripts, while, where one Evangelist has said more on the same matter, they have added it in another because they thought there was less there. Or while one has expressed the same sense in another way, he who had first read one of the four has judged that the rest also must be emended after its example. Whence it has come about that with us all things are mixed, and in Mark there are found many things of Luke and of Matthew; again in Matthew many of John and of Mark, and in the others the things proper to the rest. When therefore you have read the canons which are subjoined, the error of confusion being removed, you will both know the things common to all, and restore to each his own. These things suffice, that the studious reader may understand how great and how necessary emendations St. Jerome applied to the Latin manuscripts of the Gospels in his day. The canons themselves, which he received from the Greeks, he will also be able to see more fully explained and set out in the Veronese edition.

[246] This correction of the Gospels was certainly made while Damasus was alive. He did not complete the whole before the death of Damasus: Whether the saint completed the correction of the whole New Testament before the death of Damasus is not equally certain: for we find no dedication of the other books. For this cause I rather conjecture that Damasus began to labour under his last illness while Jerome was occupied in correcting the other books of the New Testament. Certainly the earlier words of the Preface cited intimate that the correction of the whole New Testament was sought by Damasus. Generally, too, the saint asserts: I restored the New Testament to the Greek original. He repeated the same in Epistle 71 (elsewhere 28) to Lucinius, where he writes thus: I do not doubt that you also have the edition of the Seventy interpreters; and many years ago I handed it over to students most diligently emended. The New Testament I restored to the Greek authority. For as the trustworthiness of the old books is to be examined from the Hebrew volumes, so that of the new requires the standard of the Greek tongue. Here again he speaks clearly of the whole New Testament. But what he says of the interpretation of the Seventy regards the Old Testament, and will be proved below.

[247] The labour bestowed by Jerome upon the correction of the Gospels pleased St. Augustine, [and perhaps Augustine did not at once see the whole of it, though it pleased him:] and in the Epistle which stands as the 104th among the Hieronymian letters (elsewhere 88), to Jerome, he writes the following concerning that emendation: Accordingly we render no small thanks to God for your work, by which you have translated the Gospel from the Greek: because in almost every place there is no stumbling-block, when we have compared the Greek Scripture. Whence, if anyone contentiously favours the old falsity, upon the manuscripts being produced and collated, he is either most easily taught or refuted. And if a very few things rightly give pause, who is so hard as not readily to pardon a labour so useful, to which no return of praise suffices? Yet from these words of St. Augustine a twofold doubt can arise: the first, why he speaks of the Gospel alone; the second, why he says you have translated, not you have corrected. To the first I answer that Augustine speaks of the Gospel either because he was as yet ignorant of the emendation of the other books, or because far more things had needed emendation in the Gospels than in the other books of the New Testament: for by the imprudent counsel of certain men many things had been added to the several Gospels out of the others, as Jerome testifies above at number 145. To the second I say that it is called a translation because that emendation was so notable that the Gospels thus emended could be said to have been translated from the Greek tongue. For he translated from the Greek all those things which had not been well expressed in Latin.

[248] yet Jerome corrected the whole, Jerome, in Epistle 112 (elsewhere 89), answering Augustine and looking back to the words alleged, speaks thus: And if, as you say, you accept me in the emendation of the New Testament, and set forth the cause why you accept me—namely, because very many who have knowledge of the Greek tongue can judge of my work, etc. Here he substitutes the New Testament for the Gospel, and emendation for translation, although Augustine had spoken otherwise. And so he either intimates how Augustine ought to have spoken, or teaches him that the remaining books also were corrected by himself, if perhaps he did not know it. Certainly St. Jerome, after the Gospel, corrected the remaining books of the New Testament also, and that very thing at Rome, immediately after

the Gospels were finished, I in no way doubt that he began. But in all likelihood, as I have already said, Damasus fell gravely ill, or even died, before the work was completed. And when he was dead, envious detractors rose up gravely against the holy man, and little by little dared to carp at all his words and deeds.

[249] and, though his rivals clamoured against him, This is clear from Epistle 27 (elsewhere 102) to Marcella, given at Rome, which the saint begins thus: After my former Epistle … it was suddenly reported to me that certain little men were studiously disparaging me, because against the authority of the ancients and the opinion of the whole world I had attempted to emend some things in the Gospels. Although I could by my own right despise them (for the lyre sings in vain to an ass), yet, lest they should accuse us of pride, as they are wont to do, let them have this answer: That I was not of so dull a heart, nor of so gross a rusticity (which they alone hold for holiness, asserting themselves disciples of fishermen, as though they were holy for this reason, if they knew nothing) as to have thought that anything in the Lord's words was to be corrected, or was not divinely inspired: but that I wished to recall the faultiness of the Latin manuscripts, which is proved from the diversity of all the books, to the Greek original, from which even they do not deny that they were translated. And if the wave of the purest fountain displeases them, let them drink muddy rivulets, etc.

[250] in all likelihood he finished it at Rome: After other matters to be brought forward presently, he returns to that flock of unskilled men whom he calls two-footed asses, and at the same time shows that the Epistles of St. Paul also were corrected by him, while he adduces three passages from them, as they had formerly been read and as he had corrected them: Let them read, he says: "Rejoicing in hope, serving the time". Let us read: "Rejoicing in hope, serving the Lord". Let them think that an accusation against a presbyter is by all means to be received. Let us read: "Against a presbyter receive not an accusation, save under two or three witnesses: but them that sin rebuke before all." Let this please them: "A human saying and worthy of all acceptance". Let us err with the Greeks, that is, with the Apostle, who spoke in Greek: "A faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance". These passages show that immediately after the Gospels some Epistles of St. Paul also were cleansed, so that it becomes likely that the emendation of the whole New Testament was carried through at Rome; yet dedicated to no one (the Gospels excepted), because in the meantime Damasus had died or was near to death. It is not, however, altogether certain that the whole was carried through at Rome.

[251] Nay rather, from various passages of St. Jerome a suspicion can arise where he also corrected the Psalter, that in the same Roman sojourn the Latin text of the Old Testament also was corrected from the Greek of the Seventy interpreters. For by the words given at number 246 he testifies that many years ago he handed over to students the interpretation of the Seventy most diligently emended. Similarly, in book 2 against Rufinus, number 24, he speaks thus of the emended Latin text of the Seventy interpreters: Have I spoken anything against the Seventy interpreters, whom many years ago, most diligently emended, I gave to the students of my own tongue? Nevertheless those things could have been done afterwards. But of the Psalter he speaks more clearly, when in book 2 against Rufinus, number 30, he puts forth these words: The Psalter also, which certainly most correctly emended according to the Seventy interpreters Rome long since received by our labour, etc. That this was corrected by him at Rome he declares again in the clearest words in the Preface to the Psalter according to the Seventy, which he also corrected a second time afterwards, and then furnished with that Preface. For thus he speaks there: The Psalter, while placed at Rome, I had long since emended, and according to the Seventy interpreters, though cursorily, I had corrected it in great part, etc. And so concerning the Psalter there is no doubt.

[252] But it appears to me far more probable and as it were certain but not the whole Old Testament. that the labour of emending or translating the whole version of the Seventy interpreters was undertaken by the saint later, in Palestine. For, as we shall see in its own place, St. Jerome translated the pure edition of the Seventy interpreters, which was preserved in the Hexapla of Origen at Cæsarea in Palestine; not the common one, which was interpolated. But while he was staying at Rome he had not yet been in Palestine, nor had he seen Origen's Hexapla at Cæsarea, so that it is by no means probable that the version from them and the emendation was put together at Rome. The one thing, therefore, which the saint appears to have accomplished at Rome for the correction of the Old Testament is some sort of emendation of the Psalter, which he corrected at Rome the first time, but not so accurately, as he himself intimates in the words already given: The Psalter, while placed at Rome, I had long since emended, and according to the Seventy interpreters, though cursorily, I had corrected it in great part. The second correction or translation of the Psalter from the Hexapla, together with all the rest, will be set forth hereafter.

§ XV. The book against Helvidius: the Epistle on the Guarding of Virginity to Eustochium: on occasion of this many were offended. Two other Epistles of the year 384.

The saint writes against Helvidius, As the first little work after those already reckoned to Damasus, St. Jerome places in the Catalogue the book Against Helvidius, on the perpetual virginity of Mary. Of that work the holy Doctor makes mention in very many other places. In the Epistle to Eustochium on Virginity, which follows in the Catalogue, he refers Eustochium to it at number 22 in these words: How many vexations marriage has, and by how many anxieties it is bound, I think has been briefly set out in that book which we published against Helvidius on the perpetual virginity of blessed Mary. That this book was written at Rome he declares upon the Epistle to the Galatians, chapter 1, verse 19, in these words: I remember that, while I was at Rome, at the urging of the brethren I published a book on the perpetual virginity of holy Mary. Of it he makes mention again upon Matthew, chapter 12, verse 19. In the Prologue of the Dialogue against the Pelagians he brings forward another reason for writing, writing thus: But against those who say that I write this work inflamed with the torches of envy, I shall briefly answer that I have never spared heretics, and have laboured with all zeal that the enemies of the Church should become my enemies also. Helvidius wrote against the perpetual virginity of holy Mary. Was I led by envy to answer him, whom I have never seen at all in the flesh? In the very book against Helvidius, number 16, he says: I myself, who write against you, though I dwell in the same city with you, do not know whether you are, as they say, white or black. Helvidius, therefore, was also at Rome, but unknown to Jerome.

[254] while Damasus was still alive, In Epistle 48 (elsewhere 50) to Pammachius, number 17, he speaks thus of this book and of the Epistle to Eustochium which followed a little after: While Damasus of holy memory was still alive, we wrote the book against Helvidius on the perpetual virginity of blessed Mary, in which it was necessary for us, in order to proclaim the blessedness of virginity, to say many things about the vexations of marriage. Did that excellent man, learned in the Scriptures, a virgin, and a doctor of the Virgin Church, reprehend anything in that discourse? In the book to Eustochium also we said far harder things about marriage, and no one was wounded in this matter. For a lover of chastity caught up the proclamation of purity with an attentive ear. From these things we have it that while Damasus was alive the book against Helvidius was written, and that it was read by Damasus. Which is doubtful concerning the Epistle to Eustochium, as I shall set forth below. But since Damasus died in the month of December of the year 384, the book against Helvidius will have been written in that same year 384, after the little works to Damasus mentioned, as the order of his writings drawn up by Jerome himself has it. Of that book too Jerome makes mention upon Ezekiel, book 13, at chapter 44, in these words: Upon which little question I know that at Rome, in my youth, I wrote a book of no great size against Helvidius, a heretic of that time. Let it be permitted briefly to observe that the book is said to have been written in youth, because even then he was growing up in the study of the Scriptures, and afterwards went to new masters. Yet he was more than fifty years old, and two years later, when he went to Didymus, his head was already sprinkled with grey hairs, and it befitted rather a master than a disciple, as he himself observes in Epistle 84 (elsewhere 65).

[255] on the perpetual virginity The perverse doctrines of Helvidius, which the unlearned man strove to inculcate, were two: the first, that the most blessed Mother of God, after the birth of Christ, bore other sons by Joseph, who were called the Brethren of the Lord; the second, that virginity is not superior to wedlock. I do not inquire whether all the things are true which Gennadius asserted of Helvidius in the Catalogue, chapter 32. This is abundantly established, that he was a man excelling neither in eloquence nor in learning, and utterly obscure. St. Jerome begins his little work in this manner: Lately, being asked by the brethren to answer the little book of a certain Helvidius, I put off doing it: not because it was difficult to convince a rustic man, scarcely imbued even with his first letters, upon the assertion of the truth; but lest by answering he should become worthy to be vanquished. To this was added that the man, turbulent, and alone in the whole world both layman and priest to himself (who, as that other says [\], reckons loquacity to be eloquence, and judges railing at all men to be a mark of a good conscience), having received matter for disputing, should begin to blaspheme more amply, and as from a lofty place to deliver sentence upon the whole world: and should mangle me with abuse, because he could not with truth. But since all these so just causes of my silence have ceased for a juster end, on account of the scandal of the brethren, who were moved at his madness, now the axe of the Gospel must be laid to the roots of the unfruitful tree, and it must be delivered to the flames together with the barrenness of its leaves, that he may learn at last to keep silence who has never learned to speak.*

[256] After the invocation of the most holy Trinity, he speaks thus of the method of the most blessed Virgin Mother. by which he was about to write: We do not desire the field of rhetorical eloquence, we do not seek out the snares of the dialecticians nor the thorn-thickets of Aristotle. The very words of the Scriptures must be set down: let him be refuted by the very testimonies which he has used against us, that he may understand that he was able indeed to read what is written, but was not able to recognize the things which are strengthened by piety. And when he had eloquently overthrown the arguments of Helvidius and confirmed the Catholic opinion, at the end he addresses him with this closing of his discourse: We have played the rhetorician, and after the manner of declaimers have sported a little. You, Helvidius, have compelled us, you who, now that the Gospel shines forth, will have virgins and married women to be of the same glory. And because I judge that you, overcome by the truth, will turn to detraction of my life and to railing (for little women too are wont to do this, who in corners wish ill to the masters who have conquered them), I say this by way of anticipation, that your revilings will be a glory to me, since with the same mouth with which you disparaged Mary you mangle me, and the Servant of the Lord experiences a currish eloquence equally with his Mother. For the rest, at number 16 he compares Helvidius with that obscure good-for-nothing who burned the temple of Diana, so that, since he could not by right deeds, he might at least acquire a name for himself by a crime; and therefore it is no wonder that he treated with repeated contempt a man who from vanity had fallen into impious doctrines, in order to strike into him a wholesome shame, if it could be done.

[257] After the said book St. Jerome places the Epistle To Eustochium on the keeping of Virginity. He writes rules of life for St. Eustochium the virgin, In the words given at number 254 the saint calls it a book. And in truth that little work, although it is everywhere reckoned among the Epistles, and among them is the twenty-second, is of such bulk that it can deservedly be called a book, and surpasses several other books of Jerome in length. Of St. Eustochium I treated on the 28th of September, and there I recounted in compendium the excellent rules of life which St. Jerome gave in this little book to her, who in girlhood had professed virginity. Yet that most noble Virgin, who had Jerome as the master of her manners until death, will have to be commemorated more often in the course of this work, as also her mother St. Paula, that most holy widow, who, once she had come to know Jerome at Rome, never afterwards would depart from him. Her Life too has been given by us on the 26th of January, where the signal virtues of that most noble widow may be seen more fully. Here I shall only inquire in what way the familiarity of St. Jerome with St. Paula and her daughters, and with St. Marcella, likewise a most illustrious widow, of whom we treated on the 31st of January, appears to have arisen. The first appears to have been Marcella, who, from love of the sacred Scriptures, endeavoured to insinuate herself into the familiarity of St. Jerome: and since she was a friend of St. Paula, and as it were her mistress in the piety which she had professed first, it seems that through Marcella arose that intercourse which grew up so greatly between Paula and Jerome. The foundation of this conjecture I shall briefly set before the eyes of my readers.

[258] to whose mother St. Paula he seems to have become known through St. Marcella: St. Jerome, in Epistle 127 (elsewhere 16) to the virgin Principia, composed the Epitaph, or compendium of the life, of St. Marcella. In it he observes that Marcella was the first of noble women who wished to imitate the institute of the monks at Rome. Then at number 5 he says: Her friendship the venerable Paula enjoyed: in her chamber was nurtured Eustochium, the ornament of virginity, so that it is easy to estimate what the mistress was, where the disciples were such. These things show that Paula and Eustochium were as it were disciples of Marcella. But by what industry Jerome was drawn on by Marcella he teaches at number 7 in these words: In fine, when ecclesiastical necessity had drawn me also to Rome with the holy pontiffs Paulinus and Epiphanius, … and I was modestly avoiding the eyes of noble women, she so acted, according to the Apostle, in season and out of season, that she overcame my bashfulness by her industry. And because I was then reckoned to be of some name in the study of the Scriptures, she never met me but that she asked something about the Scriptures; nor so as to acquiesce at once, but to raise questions on the contrary side; not that she might contend, but that by asking she might learn the solutions of those objections which she understood could be made. When he says that the bashfulness by which he avoided the eyes of noble women was overcome by Marcella, he abundantly intimates that she was the first with whom he began to treat of the understanding of the sacred Scriptures. From these things, therefore, flows of itself the conjecture already given, that by Marcella's doing Paula and Eustochium were made disciples of St. Jerome. Yet the saint could also have become known to Paula through Paulinus and Epiphanius.

[259] [That Epistle was given in the year 384, Damasus in all likelihood being still alive,] Now of the many Epistles which Jerome wrote at Rome to those holy women, the first reckoned is the lengthy Epistle to Eustochium of which we are treating. And we suspect that it was written at the request of Paula, and in all likelihood of Marcella too, and at the desire of Eustochium herself. Whether it was written while Pope Damasus was alive is somewhat ambiguous from the words recited at number 254. For Damasus is clearly said to have read the book against Helvidius; but of the Epistle to Eustochium this is not expressly affirmed. Yet since in the Epistle itself, at number 22, mention is made of Pope Damasus, and there is not added of holy memory or any other indication of his death, it seems more probable that the Epistle was written while Damasus lived. Wherefore I judge that it was drawn up in the year 384 as it drew to a close. From the Epistle itself, at number 15, we also have it that Blæsilla, Eustochium's eldest sister, had been bereaved of her husband before Jerome wrote this. Indeed Tillemont, in Note 29, judges that Blæsilla had already by then been converted to that pious and austere life which she began nearly four months before her death. But to me the plain contrary appears. I subjoin the words themselves: And indeed you have learned by a domestic example the vexations of marriage and the uncertainties of wedlock, when your sister Blæsilla, greater in age but less in purpose, was widowed in the seventh month after receiving a husband. O unhappy human condition, and ignorant of the future! She lost both the crown of virginity and the pleasure of marriage. And although widowhood holds the second degree of chastity, yet what crosses do you think she endures at every moment, beholding daily in her sister what she herself has lost, and, since she has with greater difficulty to go without a pleasure she has tasted, having a lesser reward of continence. Yet let her too be secure, let her be rejoicing. The hundredfold (of virgins) and the sixtyfold (of widows) fruits are from one seed of chastity. All these things indicate an honourable widow, such as Blæsilla was for some time after her husband's death; not that most fervent woman, dead to the world, such as Jerome testifies Blæsilla to have been in the last three or four months, in Epistle 39 (elsewhere 25) to Paula. Wherefore there is nothing in the Epistle to Eustochium which proves that it was written after the year 384.

[260] Now in that Epistle St. Jerome not only gave excellent instructions to Eustochium, He offended not a few Romans, because vices but also gravely censured the vices of many; both that the holy virgin might beware of them, and that she might know the dangers arising from others, and in all likelihood also that he might instruct many at once. These things the saint accomplished with his accustomed liberty and eloquence, yet with this caution, that he inveighed only against vices common to many, and did not attack persons by name. For this cause none could be angry, save one who confessed himself guilty. Nevertheless the mouths of many were opened against St. Jerome on occasion of that Epistle, and he himself sufficiently indicates this in Epistle 52 (elsewhere 8) to Nepotian, written ten years later, which likewise contains rules of life for clerics and monks. For he concludes it with this epilogue: You have compelled me, dearest Nepotian, now that my little book on Virginity, which I had written at Rome for the holy Eustochium, has been stoned, after ten years to open my lips again at Bethlehem, and to expose myself to be pierced through by the tongues of all. For either nothing ought to have been written, lest we should undergo the judgment of men—which you have forbidden me to do; or, if we write, we must know that the darts of all slanderers are to be hurled against us.

[261] But what in that Epistle most offended Roman eyes the saint intimates in Epistle 27 (elsewhere 102) to Marcella, in these words: For one thing that I wretchedly said—that virgins ought to be more often with women than with men—I offended the eyes of the whole City, I am marked by the fingers of all. "They that hate me without cause are multiplied above the hairs of my head, and I am become to them a byword". And do you think that I shall say anything hereafter? Rufinus, who wrote against Jerome with a mind so angry that he often seems in his wrath not to have weighed what he was charging, accuses him of far more in book 2 of the Invectives, number 4. He wrote, he says, while placed at Rome, a certain little book on the preserving of Virginity: which little book all the pagans and enemies of God, apostates and persecutors, and whosoever hate the Christian name, were copying out for themselves in rivalry, for this reason, that in it he defamed with most foul reproaches every order of Christians, every rank, every profession, and the whole Church alike: and those crimes which the gentiles were thought falsely to charge against us, he asserted to be true, nay, that far worse things were done by our own people than they charged. But if perhaps any gentiles copied out that little work of St. Jerome, they could do so on account of its eloquence. Certainly from that Epistle they could not learn the hidden crimes of Christians punishable by law, but only the vices conspicuous to all, which they could not themselves have been ignorant of, provided they were willing curiously to inquire into the morals of every order.

[262] That vices of this kind in a few were disapproved by the holier sort, and were not common to all, and, accusing Jerome on that account, is refuted. the gentiles understood from Jerome's little work; and thence they ought to have conceived a greater rather than a lesser esteem for the holiness of the morals of the Catholic Church. What Rufinus brought forward to prove that ridiculous accusation is worthier of laughter than of serious refutation. No one ought to have taken ill the little work of the holy Doctor, who generally admonished men not to sin. The saint could deservedly say with the Apostle, Galatians 4, verse 16: Am I then become your enemy, because I tell you the truth? Jerome himself knew that truth is hateful to sinners, and that many are always found who blush to hear what they did not blush to do. Hence in Epistle 40 (elsewhere 100) to Marcella he speaks thus: The physicians whom men call surgeons are thought cruel, and they are wretched. Is it not a wretchedness not to grieve at others' wounds, and to cut dead flesh with unpitying steel? not to shudder, in curing, at what he himself who suffers shudders at, and to be thought an enemy? So nature has it, that truth is bitter and vices are reckoned pleasant. These things, I say, Jerome knew. But he chose rather to profit men than to please them. Nor would he ever have profited the Church much, had he been of those of whom God says in Isaiah 56, verse 10: His watchmen are all blind, they are all ignorant: dumb dogs not able to bark.

[263] Two other Epistles given in the year 384. Epistle 23 (elsewhere 24) and the following, 24 (elsewhere 15), are placed first of all among those written to Marcella in the Veronese edition. The former treats of the departure of the widow Lea, who died on that same day, and who, signal in the holiness of her manners, had presided over a monastery of virgins. Jerome was expounding Psalm 72 to Marcella and others who were present, when the death of St. Lea, of whom we treated on the 22nd of March, was announced, as he declares in these words: When at about the third hour of this present day we had begun to read the seventy-second Psalm … suddenly it was announced to us that the most holy Lea had gone out of the body. On this occasion, therefore, the saint wrote this Epistle, which contains a brief elogium of St. Lea, given by us on the 22nd of March. Two days after was given the following Epistle on the Praises of Asella, as is clear from its beginning. Let no one reprehend us, he says, because in our Epistles we either praise or censure some: since both in reproving the bad there is a correction of the rest, and in proclaiming the best the zeal of the good for virtue is stirred up. The day before yesterday we had said something of Lea of blessed memory; and straightway it stung my mind, and it came into my thought that we ought not to keep silence about a virgin, we who have spoken of the second order of chastity. Therefore the life of our Asella must be briefly set forth, etc. Of St. Asella

we must treat on the 6th of December, where the elogium written of her while she was alive will be given along with other matters. Meanwhile I observe that these Epistles were written about the time at which Prætextatus died, a gentile man, consul designate for the year 385. For in the former mention is made of Prætextatus as very lately dead. But that the death of Prætextatus must be fixed toward the end of the year 384 I shall prove in §18. Wherefore both these Epistles were given toward the end of the year 384, and therefore I have reckoned them here after the other writings of the same year. It may indeed be that certain others to Marcella preceded them: but this at least is uncertain, and perhaps all of those which I shall presently reckon belong to the year 385, or at any rate to the closing of the year 384. But it does not please me to linger over things so uncertain, especially since it matters little whether they were written in one year or the other. Wherefore I shall proceed with that doubt to the rest, when I shall first have set forth what St. Jerome accomplished by living voice for the benefit of several matrons and virgins.

\* Tertullian

§ XVI. The saint expounds the sacred Letters to Marcella, Paula, and others, partly by word and partly by writing: the Epistles given to them are reckoned up.

The holy widows and virgins are reckoned up, That the sacred Letters were frequently expounded by St. Jerome by living voice to the holy widows Marcella and Paula is intimated in several places by the Epistles given to them for the same end. That the same office was performed by St. Jerome for Blæsilla, then a widow, the Preface of the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes teaches, in which the saint writes as follows to Paula, Blæsilla's mother, and to her sister Eustochium: I remember that about five years before this, when I was still at Rome and was reading Ecclesiastes with the holy Blæsilla, in order to provoke her to a contempt of this world and that she might reckon as nothing all that she saw in the world, I was asked by her to discuss the obscure passages after the manner of a little Commentary, so that without me she might be able to understand what she read. By this means he led Blæsilla from the vanities of the world to a most pious life: but because of her death, which followed, the Commentary was deferred. Among these disciples of the saint was Eustochium also, as is clear from Epistle 30 (elsewhere 155) to Paula, where he says: Salute Blæsilla and Eustochium, our young recruits. Salute Feliciana, truly happy in the virginity of flesh and spirit. Salute the remaining choir of chastity, and your domestic church. Of these generally saluted some too were beyond doubt Jerome's disciples in the sacred Letters.

[265] For in Epistle 45 (elsewhere 99) to the virgin Asella he has it thus: to whom Jerome at Rome the sacred Letters Often a throng of virgins surrounded me. To several I frequently discoursed, as I could, upon the divine books. Reading had made assiduity, assiduity familiarity, familiarity confidence. Of these was Asella herself, a most holy virgin. Marcellina too and Felicitas, whom he salutes in that Epistle, appear to have been of their number. The former was in all likelihood St. Marcellina the virgin, sister of St. Ambrose, who then dwelt at Rome. Of her we treated on the 17th of July. The other is otherwise unknown to me. In the same Epistle again, and in others, he salutes the matron Albina, mother of St. Marcella. In the words given above he salutes Feliciana the virgin also. There were certainly several other virgins and widows besides, whom St. Jerome instructed at Rome. But whether St. Lea the widow, whom he praised after her death with an elogium, and Principia the virgin, who after Jerome's departure began to dwell with St. Marcella, are to be numbered among them, I would not venture certainly to declare. For St. Lea, as he says in the elogium, the secrets of a single chamber walled in, so that perhaps she never went out of the monastery over which she presided. And Principia was then of a very tender age, since, when Rome was taken by the Goths in the year 410, that is, twenty-six years later, St. Marcella feared for her chastity, as is gathered from her Epitaph written to Principia. Nevertheless it is credible that Principia, together with Marcella, was from time to time present at St. Jerome's expositions, as the tender Eustochium was present with St. Paula; and that St. Lea at least did not lack his writings.

[266] Now these readings of the sacred Scripture seem to have been so appointed that several came together at once, whether this took place in the house of St. Paula or in that of St. Marcella, or now in the one, expounded. That the saint dwelt in a part of St. Marcella's palace now in the other. For it can scarcely be doubted that those assemblies were held at Paula's or Marcella's house, and that one or the other was always present, if perhaps neither went to the other's palace for that cause. Tillemont, article 23, suspects that Jerome had his lodging in the palace of St. Marcella, because in the praised Epitaph of Marcella, number 8, he writes the following to Principia: We heard that in our place you at once attached yourself to her company, and never withdrew from her even a nail's breadth, as the saying is. This suspicion is favoured by the fact that he held Albina, Marcella's mother, for his own mother, and Marcella herself for his sister. For in Epistle 45 to Asella he bids them be saluted in these words: Salute my mother Albina and my sister Marcella. And in Epistle 32: I desire that Albina our common mother may fare well, … and I beseech that she be saluted through you. These things suggest the suspicion, but do not make the matter certain, since letters were sent to and fro. But since the palaces of the noble Romans were most spacious, Jerome could have had in Marcella's most spacious house some dwelling remote from the rest, in which he both studied, took food, and rested, and in which he received letters from Marcella by a go-between, and gave his own to her.

[267] or in St. Paula's, is less probable: A like conjecture can be made concerning St. Jerome's lodging in the palace of St. Paula, where certainly St. Epiphanius had his lodging: and that conjecture will gain strength from the calumny which was spread by the malevolent against Jerome and St. Paula, as we shall see afterwards. Nevertheless I think it more probable that St. Jerome lived in some house separate from the palace of either; both because nowhere does he clearly declare that he lodged in the palace of either, and because he appears to have had some poor lodging. For in Epistle 42 (elsewhere 149) to Marcella he excuses the brevity of the Epistle on this ground: Since, he says, we cannot deny our presence to friends and to those who have come together to our little lodging. Again in Epistle 32 (elsewhere 74) to Marcella, when, being detained by another work, he had not been able to write much, he says that he is sending two other Epistles, Lest, he says, our Currentius should perhaps have run in vain. Now these words hint at a greater distance from Marcella than that of parts of the same palace.

[268] certainly he dealt modestly with women. But whatever be the case concerning the saint's lodging, this is most certain, that St. Jerome's intercourse with those holy matrons was most cautious. Of St. Marcella he says in her Epitaph at number 3: She saw no cleric or monk (as the necessity of a great household sometimes required) without witnesses. Of Paula he says in Epistle 45 to Asella: Whom I never saw eating. In the same place at number 2, being assailed by calumny, he speaks thus in general of his intercourse with the virgins to whom he expounded the sacred Letters: Let them say what they ever thought of me otherwise than became a Christian. Have I taken anyone's money? have I not spurned gifts whether small or great? has anyone's coin chinked in my hand? has my speech been crooked, my eye wanton?… Have I ever entered the house of any too wanton woman? Have silken garments, glittering gems, a painted face, or the ambition of gold ever carried me away? Thus the saint concerning his modesty and honour in intercourse with women.

[269] How much St. Marcella advanced in the Scriptures, But how much St. Marcella profited in that short time is gathered from her Epitaph, number 7, where the saint proclaims her in these words: What I found in her of virtues, what of genius, what of holiness, what of purity, I fear to say, lest I should exceed the measure of belief and strike a greater grief into you, remembering how great a good you have lost. This only will I say, that whatever in us was gathered by long study and, by long meditation, turned as it were into nature, this she tasted, this she learned, and possessed; so that after our departure, if any contention arose about some testimony of the Scriptures, recourse was had to her as judge. And because she was exceedingly prudent, and knew that which the philosophers call τὸ πρέπον, that is, that what you do should be becoming; she so answered questions as to say that even her own opinions were not her own, but either mine or someone else's, so that in the very thing which she was teaching she confessed herself a disciple. For she knew that it was said by the Apostle: "But I suffer not a woman to teach": lest she should seem to do injury to the male sex, and sometimes to priests, who were inquiring about obscure and ambiguous matters. Thus Jerome, from whose Epistles to Marcella it is sufficiently gathered that she wished to be instructed privately concerning the most difficult questions, whose exposition was chiefly to be sought from a knowledge of the Hebrew tongue. And hence we gather that the rest Marcella learned while Jerome was discoursing to several at once.

[270] The Epistles written to Marcella at Rome in that time the saint reckons thus in his catalogue: He writes several Epistles To Marcella, one book of Epistles. They are sixteen in number, whose order cannot be given from this general reckoning. Two given toward the end of the year 384 I have already reckoned. Of the others some belong perhaps to the same year, and perhaps were even written before those. But this cannot be said or proved with certainty. And so of the rest I shall first reckon those which pertain to the exposition of the Scriptures, where it is not clear that others were interposed. Of these the first that occurs is the one which in the Veronese edition is Epistle 25 (elsewhere 136), whose occasion the saint sets forth thus: Reading the ninetieth Psalm, at that place where it is written, He that dwelleth in the aid of the Most High shall abide in the protection of the God of heaven, I had said that among the Hebrews SADDAI is put for God of heaven: … and that it is one of the ten names by which God is called among the Hebrews. You at once most studiously demanded that I should set out for you all the names with their interpretation. I will do what you have asked. Then follows a brief exposition of the ten names of God.

[271] The following Epistle, 26 (elsewhere 137), explains certain Hebrew names for explaining passages of sacred Scripture, left untranslated in the Greek and Latin Scriptures. He begins the Epistle thus: Lately, when we were together, you asked—not by letter, as you had been accustomed before, but yourself in person—what those words, which we do not have expressed from the Hebrew into Latin, sound like among their own people: and why they are set down without interpretation, such as that Alleluia, Amen, Maran atha, ephod. Jerome answers all of them, except for the exposition of the word Ephod; and he adds: I could wish to write to you something also about the Diapsalma, which among the Hebrews is written SELA; and about the Ephod, and about that,

which stands in the title of a certain Psalm, AIELETH, and the rest of that kind, etc. From these things it is gathered that the two Epistles presently to be mentioned are later than this one. They were preceded by Epistle 27 (elsewhere 102), already twice praised, by which he answers freely, though briefly, his detractors, who reprehended the correction of the Gospels and the Epistle to Eustochium. For it begins in this manner: After my former Epistle, in which I had touched briefly upon a few Hebrew words, it was suddenly reported to me that certain little men were studiously disparaging me, etc. I gave the words with the answer at number 249.

[272] answering his detractors from time to time in them. But from what the saint subjoins to Marcella, it seems that she, of her most gentle disposition, desired that Jerome should answer his most iniquitous calumniators meekly. For he has it thus: I know that when you read these things you will wrinkle your brow, and will again fear that my freedom is a seed-plot of quarrels; and will wish, if it could be done, to press my mouth shut with your finger, that I may not dare to say the things which others do not blush to do. Yet I doubt whether Marcella herself seriously disapproved Jerome's freedom in writing. Perhaps she carried to Jerome the complaints of others, and the saint answered rather these than Marcella's own judgment about that freedom of Jerome's. Perhaps to nearly the same time belongs the like Epistle to Marcella, 40 (elsewhere 100), already praised at number 262, in which he answers Onasus of Segesta, a man unknown, unless perhaps under a fictitious name he designates his detractors generally. Now since this Epistle pertains not at all to Marcella, a most gentle woman, and refutes solely suspicious men, who suspected that everything which Jerome inserted in his writings against vices was said against themselves, it becomes likely that Marcella did not take it ill that the saint, in the Epistles directed to her, defended himself against his detractors.

[273] Others on questions But at whatever time that was written, Epistle 28 (elsewhere 138), on the Diapsalma, was given some time after 26 and 27. The saint begins it thus: What you have received must be repaid with interest, and the postponement of the principal breeds usury. You had demanded our opinion on the Diapsalma: we pleaded the brevity of a letter, and wove the excuse that a matter for a book could not be explained in a letter. But what does it profit with my ἐργοδιώκτης (that is, exactor of work)? A greater eagerness is stirred in you by silence. And so, that I may not draw you out longer, take a few things for many. After his exposition he subjoins: These things we have tasted from the inmost fountain of the Hebrews, not following the rivulets of opinions, nor terrified by the variety of the errors with which the whole world is filled; but desiring both to know and to teach the things that are true. Then he renders Origen's exposition into Latin, and closes the Epistle with these words: Thus far Origen, whose unskilfulness at least in this disputation we have preferred to follow rather than to have the foolish knowledge of those who know nothing.

[274] of sacred Scripture Not long after, Marcella wrung from him Epistle 29 (elsewhere 130), upon a question formerly propounded, at least in part, namely concerning the Ephod and the Theraphim. Jerome felt the difficulty of questions of this kind, and presently declares it: The office of a letter, he says, is to write something about a domestic matter, or about daily intercourse, and in a manner to make the absent present to one another, while they announce to each other what they either wish or have done: although sometimes such a banquet of converse is seasoned also with the salt of doctrine. But you, while you are wholly occupied in treatises, write me nothing except what may torture me and compel me to read the Scriptures. In fine, yesterday, having propounded a most famous question, you demanded that I should write back at once what I thought. As though indeed I held the chair of the Pharisees, so that, as often as there is a quarrel about Hebrew words, I should be required as arbiter and referee of the suit… But because the carrier and go-between of our discourse hastens to return, I say a great matter more swiftly than speech: although for one disputing of the holy Scriptures words are not so necessary as sense. Then he so answers the questions that he makes mention of that Epistle in the 64th, on the Priestly Vesture, to Fabiola.

[275] After a learned exposition, which does not lack solid eloquence, to the same woman at the end he adds the following: How I could wish now to expound to you the whole priestly habit, and through the several kinds of vestments to show the divine mysteries. But since in this very matter we have exceeded the brevity of a letter, and Josephus and Philo, most learned men of the Jews, and many of our own, have pursued this most fully—by whose voice, as they say, you will hear me: as to what else you may wish, question me in person, being present yourself, so that, if perhaps we do not know something, it may die without witness, without judge, in a faithful ear. If our common mother is well, I rejoice, and I pray the Lord that she may be well. We, as you know, detained by the reading of the Hebrews, have contracted rust in the Latin tongue; so much so that even when we speak a certain grating sound not Latin breaks in. Wherefore pardon my dryness: "Though I be rude in speech," says the Apostle, "yet not in knowledge". To him neither was lacking, and one he humbly disclaimed. To us both are lacking, because we have lost what as boys we had that could win applause; nor have we attained the knowledge we wished for, according to the fable of Æsop's dog, losing even lesser things while we pursue great ones. Thus humbly does Jerome both deny himself a perfect knowledge of the Scriptures, and affirm that his eloquence suffered much detriment from the almost continual reading of the Hebrew tongue, to which was added the omission of the reading of the poets and orators for nearly a whole decade. In truth the knowledge of the Scriptures grew in Jerome, which in the following years he endeavoured with great zeal to perfect. Nevertheless even at that time it seems to have been so great that he yielded to none then living, although Jerome's humility, who knew what he lacked, could believe the contrary. His eloquence too, manly and full of sap, even if it had lost perhaps something of its little flowers, seems certainly to have yielded to none of the Latins.

[276] There remains, of the Epistles to Marcella on obscure passages of sacred Scripture, Epistle 34 (elsewhere 141), by which several passages of Psalm 126 are expounded, Epistles. and above all what the bread of sorrow is, and what the children of them that have been shaken out. But by no indication is it clear whether this is earlier or later than those just reckoned. Further, when he was compelled there to refute an ill-founded opinion of St. Hilary, he does it most modestly, with an elogium of that saint, attributing the occasion of the error to the presbyter Heliodorus, whose help he had used for the Greek tongue, and to ignorance of the Hebrew tongue. So great a man, he says, and the most eloquent of his times, I do not dare to reprehend: who both by the merit of his confession, and by the industry of his life, and by the brilliance of his eloquence, is proclaimed wherever the Roman name is. He closes the Epistle with these words: While the swift hand of the notary was setting these things down at my dictation in stolen hours, as they say, for a little night's work, and I was thinking to say more, already nearly the fourth hour of the night had passed: and suddenly, roused by certain pangs of an aching stomach, I broke out into prayer, that at least in the remaining space of the hours, with sleep stealing on, my infirmity might be baffled. Tillemont doubts, article 30, whether that Epistle was written at Rome, or afterwards in Palestine. But I cannot doubt that it was written at Rome, since it is broken off because of the pain of his stomach. For the saint could have continued it on the morrow, if he was in Palestine. But at Rome Marcella was awaiting an answer the same day.

[277] At Rome too, beyond doubt, was written Epistle 37 (elsewhere 133) to Marcella. Marcella had inquired about the word Tharsis, Another on the Commentaries of Rheticius, which is taken in various ways in the sacred Letters. She had also asked of Jerome the Commentaries of Rheticius, bishop of Autun, on the Song of Songs. Perhaps on that occasion Jerome had told Marcella of the error of Rheticius about the word Tharsis, from which she took occasion to demand the exposition. Whatever be the cause, in the Epistle he discourses only briefly on the word Tharsis, and disputes much more at length in disapproval of the Commentaries of Rheticius. Innumerable, he says, are the things which in his Commentaries seemed to me sordid. His diction is indeed well composed, and flows in a Gallic buskin: but what is that to an interpreter, whose profession it is, not that he himself should appear eloquent, but that he should make him who is to read understand in the same way in which he himself who wrote understood. And after other things to the same effect: In vain, then, do you demand of me the Commentaries of that man, since in them far more things displease me than please. And if you should object, why I gave them to others, you shall hear that not all ought to feed on the same foods. Jesus in the desert feeds more people with barley loaves, fewer with wheaten. He adds much more, by which he proves that those Commentaries are useless to those who seek the understanding of the Scriptures, such as Marcella was. In all likelihood the saint, who had lately read the Commentaries of Rheticius, had communicated them to some before he had read them thoroughly, and wished by this Epistle to forearm them, lest they should trust them too much.

[278] another on the Montanists, another on the Novatians. Again at Rome was given Epistle 41 (elsewhere 54), on the perverse doctrines of the followers of Montanus. Marcella had been tempted by a certain follower of Montanus, and therefore had inquired of Jerome. He, for his part, explains their ravings: for to have set forth their perfidy is to have overcome it, he says. At Rome likewise was given Epistle 42 (elsewhere 149) against the Novatian heretics, on the sin against the Holy Spirit; concerning which Marcella had asked, as it has at the beginning. At the end he excuses his brevity in this manner: It ought indeed to have been discussed more at length; but since we cannot deny our presence to friends and to those who have come together to our little lodging, and since not to answer you at once seemed altogether the mark of an arrogant man, we have comprehended a broad disputation in a short discourse, so that we have dictated not so much a letter as a little Commentary. These two Epistles have nothing from which it can be gathered whether they were written before those reckoned above on questions of sacred Scripture, or afterwards.

[279] To the same woman he writes on the illness and conversion of Blæsilla, Of the other five given to Marcella at Rome, which I have not yet reckoned, I judge the first to be Epistle 38 (elsewhere 23), which treats of the illness of Blæsilla and of her conversion to a better life. This I judge to have been written about March or April of the year 385, that is, about three months before the death of Blæsilla, which I shall fix about July of the same year, that is, not long before Jerome departed in the month of August into Palestine. This Epistle again teaches that Jerome wrote apologies to Marcella, not for her, who knew everything well enough, but for others, who took most ill Jerome's doings, and most of all the conversion of Blæsilla to a better life. That great ill-will was stirred up against Jerome from that conversion on the part of Blæsilla's kinsfolk he himself intimates in Epistle 39, on the Death of Blæsilla, to Paula, where at number 6 he says: And for me—Blæsilla being of course dead—she obtains pardon of my sins; because I admonished, because I exhorted, because I took upon myself the ill-will of her kinsfolk, that she might be saved.

[280] whose purpose of a better life But her conversion he narrates in the said Epistle to Marcella, and weaves a free apology on her behalf. Our Blæsilla, he says, we have seen

burning continuously with the heat of fevers for nearly thirty days, that she might know that the delights of the body must be cast off, since a little while hence it must be furrowed by worms. To her too came the Lord Jesus, and touched her hand, and behold, rising she ministers to him. She savoured somewhat of negligence, and, bound with the swathings of riches, she lay in the sepulchre of the world. But Jesus groaned, and, troubled in spirit, cried out, saying: Blæsilla, come forth. And she, being called, arose, and behold, she feasts with the Lord… Her body lay almost lifeless, and death drawing near shook her panting limbs. Where then were the helps of her kinsfolk? where the words emptier than any smoke? She owes you nothing, O ungrateful kindred, she who has died to the world and lives again to Christ. Let him who is a Christian rejoice: he who is angry shows that he is not a Christian.

[281] Presently he goes on, with a wonderful but just freedom, to defend against the iniquitous lovers of the world the purpose of Blæsilla, he defends most freely. that is, the cause of God; and he laughs at the over-affected adornment of women, comparing Blæsilla's preceding worldly life with that pious and modest way of living which she had chosen. Nor does he hesitate to compare with Antichrist those who disapprove such an institute of life. For he is an adversary of Christ, he says, and an antichrist, to whom the precepts of Christ are displeasing. But what the worldly men were calumniating he intimates at the end in these words: We, because we do not use a silken garment, are judged monks: because we are not drunken, and do not loosen our mouths with guffaws, we are called continent and gloomy. If a tunic is not white, at once comes that cry from the crossroads: He is an impostor and a Greek. Let them cavil with wittier sayings if they will, and lead about men stuffed with a fat paunch; our Blæsilla will laugh; nor will she disdain to hear the revilings of croaking frogs, since her Lord was called Beelzebub. Thus far Jerome, against whom perhaps the sudden change of Blæsilla to piety exasperated more of the powerful than did the Epistle to Eustochium. But that unjust indignation, contrary to the Gospel, rose to its height when, about three months later, Blæsilla died; and Paula wished to sail into Palestine. Some have fixed this Epistle in the year 384, because they believed that Blæsilla died earlier than, as I shall prove below, she died.

[282] Several of the Epistles reckoned above were perhaps written after the one mentioned, on the sickness and conversion of Blæsilla. He writes to St. Paula on the Hebrew Alphabet, That, however, is uncertain. But I do not doubt that three are later, given at nearly the same time about the end of June, namely 30 (elsewhere 155) to Paula on the Hebrew Alphabet; 31 (elsewhere 19) to Eustochium on Little Gifts; and 32 (elsewhere 74) to Marcella. The first, to Paula, he begins thus: The day before yesterday, when I was trying to explain to you the hundred and eighteenth Psalm, etc., … you most studiously inquired what those Hebrew letters mean which seemed to be inserted in the Psalm we were reading. I answered that it was composed according to the order of the letters… Again and again you demanded that I should set forth for you the interpretations of the several letters. I told you, I confess: but because, on account of the barbarousness of the tongue, everything we said slips from the memory, you desire that a little commentary be made, so that, if perhaps you should stumble in anything, reading may console your forgetfulness. From these things it is understood on what occasion that epistolary exposition of the Hebrew Alphabet was given; and how studiously Paula endeavoured to understand the sacred Letters.

[283] But Jerome gives not only a learned exposition, mingling pious admonitions, but one sprinkled also with moral doctrine, by which he might lift up the mind of Paula, torn away a few years before from the vanities of the world, the more toward heavenly things. After such an exposition he adds the following: I ask you, what is more sacred than this mystery? what more delightful than this pleasure? What foods, what honeys, are sweeter than to know the prudence of God, and to enter into his hidden things, and to look upon the mind of the Creator, and to learn that the words of the Lord your God, which are derided by the wise of this world, are full of spiritual wisdom? Let the rest have their riches to themselves, if they will; let them drink from jewelled cups, let them glitter in silk, let them be delighted with the applause of the people, and let them be unable to exhaust their riches through their various pleasures. Let our riches be to meditate in the Law of the Lord day and night, to knock at the door that is not open, to receive the loaves of the Trinity, and, with the Lord going before, to tread down the waves of the world. That Jerome feared lest Blæsilla or Eustochium should fall back from their purpose, nay, and perhaps Paula herself, who was a widow still in the flower of her age, being about thirty-eight years old, is sufficiently intimated by what follows.

[284] and indicating his solicitude for her household. Salute, he says, Blæsilla and Eustochium, our young recruits. Salute Feliciana, truly happy in the virginity of flesh and spirit. Salute the remaining choir of chastity, and your domestic church, for which I fear all things, even those which are safe, lest, while the Father of the household sleeps, the enemy should oversow tares: although they may even dare to say: "I am a strong city, a city which is not assaulted." No one is secure while a hostile army besieges. No one, as blessed Cyprian says, is safe enough who is near to peril. If our φιλοπονοτάτη Marcella should wish to have a copy of this Epistle, give it her. And remember me, beseeching that our Lord Jesus Christ may swiftly crush Satan under our feet. The example of Eustochium, from whom her modest garment was violently torn off at the bidding of her uncle, and a secular habit put upon her, as was said in St. Eustochium on the 28th of September, sufficiently shows that Jerome did not fear without cause, on account of the attempts of the kinsfolk, who were both most powerful and joined by affinity with many powerful men. And that this Epistle was written after the conversion of Blæsilla is clear from this, that the saint calls her a young recruit. That it was written about the end of June will be gathered from the following one, with which it seems to have been communicated to St. Marcella.

[285] He writes to St. Eustochium on Little Gifts, This is the 31st (elsewhere 19), on Little Gifts, to Eustochium, and it was written on the feast of St. Peter, that is, the 29th of June, as is clear from these words of Jerome: It is a festal day, and the birthday of blessed Peter. Eustochium had sent, in all likelihood at the wish of her mother Paula, certain little gifts of modest value, with a letter to St. Jerome. He, however, takes from each of them occasion to instruct and admonish the pious girl, as was said in St. Eustochium on the 28th of September, numbers 26 and 27. And the saint says to Eustochium that he gives those admonitions from the Scriptures, that you may even now remember your former little book, he says. He speaks of the Epistle on the Keeping of Virginity, which we believe to have been written in the year 384 as it was running to its close, and while Damasus was alive. That opinion of mine is somewhat confirmed by the words given: for the memory of that little book could not have slipped from Eustochium, unless it had preceded by many months the Epistle on Little Gifts, given about the middle of the year 385. Tillemont, article 107, tears that Epistle on Little Gifts more than twenty years away from its true date, and believes it to have been written after the death of St. Paula in some uncertain year. His reason is that he will have it that Eustochium disposed of nothing while her mother Paula was alive, and therefore could not send gifts to Jerome. That reason is inept: for even if she neither wished nor was able to send gifts against her mother's will, she certainly could with her consent or at her bidding.

[286] The Epistle itself cries out against Tillemont's opinion, and indeed at Rome. as I have already said in St. Eustochium. One argument, by which it is made certain that it was written at Rome, I have reserved for this place. Jerome, enumerating the gifts received, has it thus at number 3: We have received also a basket crammed with cherries, such, and blushing with so virginal a modesty, that I might now think them brought by Lucullus. For this kind of fruit, when Pontus and Armenia had been subdued, he first brought from Cerasus to Rome. Whence the tree also took its name from its native country. If Lucullus first brought cherries to Rome, in what other place but Rome could he think them then brought by Lucullus? At Rome, therefore, Jerome wrote that Epistle, and on the chief festival of St. Peter the apostle, which is celebrated on the 29th of June: for then cherries are ripe there.

[287] Epistle 32 (elsewhere 74) to Marcella seems to have been written a day or two after the preceding. He writes to Marcella, while he was occupied This is an excuse for the Epistle he had not written, which Marcella desired. But since that excuse teaches with how useful a work Jerome was occupied, I subjoin the whole: That I should write so small a letter, he says, there was a twofold cause: both that the courier was hastening, and that I, detained by another work, was unwilling to occupy myself with this as with a παρέργον. You ask what that thing is, so great, so necessary, by which the duty of epistolary converse has been shut out. For some time now I have been comparing the edition of Aquila with the volumes of the Hebrews, lest perchance the Synagogue should have changed anything out of hatred for Christ: and, to confess to a friendly mind, I find many things which pertain to the strengthening of our faith. Now, having accurately gone through the Prophets, Solomon, the Psalter, and the books of Kings, I am holding to Exodus, … about to pass over to Leviticus. You see, therefore, that no duty is to be preferred to this work. Nevertheless, lest our Currentius should perhaps have run in vain, I have annexed to this little discourse two Epistles which I had sent to your sister Paula and her pledge Eustochium, that, while you read them, and find in them something alike of doctrine and of charm, you may think that what was written to them was written to you also. I desire that Albina our common mother may be well: I speak of the body, not being ignorant that she is well in spirit: and I beseech that she may be saluted through you, and cherished with a twofold duty of affection, because in one and the same person a Christian is loved and a mother at once.

[288] From this Epistle, which teaches that certainly a great part of Aquila's version, in comparing Aquila's version with the Hebrew text and in all likelihood the whole, was collated with the Hebrew text at Rome by Jerome, it becomes likely that even then the saint had thought of a new version of the Old Testament from the Hebrew. For thus he was always advancing to further things. He was transcribing the volumes of the Hebrews when Damasus asked for the exposition which he gave in Epistle 36, mentioned at number 240. After transcribing the Hebrew books he proceeded little by little to the collation with Aquila, and had already carried it far forward. And in order to finish the sooner, he gave no answer to Marcella's question; yet he sent to her two Epistles already written to others, lest she should bear the refusal too hardly. That these are the two just praised cannot indeed be proved by a certain argument; yet it is most likely, both because there are no others extant upon which the suspicion falls, and because these are lively and learned, as Jerome intimates, and because both these two and the third to Marcella seem to belong to the later times in which the saint was at Rome.

[289] Another to Marcella, Two other Epistles the Veronese editor added to those written at Rome, which others believed to have been written later. To me too those seem to be numbered among the Roman ones which are there 43 and 44, elsewhere 18 and 20: but I do not believe that Epistle 33 was written at Rome, of which only a Fragment is had from Rufinus. Very short is the 44th, entitled On Gifts, and this

I suspect was written not long after the one just mentioned to Eustochium, since it is of the same genius. Perhaps Marcella, having received no answer to the question she had propounded, and having seen the Epistle to Eustochium, sent certain little gifts, so that in this way she might get a letter. However that may be, Jerome begins the Epistle thus: That we may console the absence of bodies by the converse of the spirit, each one does what he is able. You send gifts: we send back Epistles of thanks. I do not see why the Veronese editor in the Annotations will have it that this Epistle was written in another's name, and perhaps in that of Paula and Eustochium. For the gifts indeed seem to have been sent by Paula and Eustochium too, as the title has it; yet Jerome speaks in his own name, although there is something of obscurity in the Epistle.

[290] another to the same on the discomforts of the City Epistle 43 is in all likelihood the last which Jerome gave to Marcella at Rome, when he had determined to depart. In this Epistle he seems to exhort Marcella to the solitary life, yet he nowhere admonishes her to leave Rome herself. Wherefore he perhaps rather renders a reason why he himself wished to return to the solitary life and to leave Rome, as the Veronese editor also believes in his chronological table of the Epistles. But whether he was endeavouring to lead Marcella to the solitary life, or to approve his own resolve to others, he reckons up the discomforts of the City and the occasions of sinning thus: I pass over the luncheons, by which the mind is loaded and weighed down. I am ashamed to speak of the frequency of paying respects, by which either we ourselves go daily to others, or await the rest who come to us. Then we fall to words, discourse is worn threadbare, the absent are torn to pieces, the lives of others are described, and, biting one another, we are consumed one of another. Such food occupies us and dismisses us. And when our friends have withdrawn, we reckon up our accounts. Now anger puts upon us the person of a lion: now superfluous care thinks beforehand of things that will last for very many years… Garments are sought out not for use only but for delight. Wherever there is a gain, the foot is swifter, the speech quick, the ear more attentive. He reckons up many more things of that kind, from which even the pious in the throng of cities are rarely safe.

[291] and the good of the solitary life. Then he continues thus: Wherefore, since we have already passed many spaces of life in tossing about, and our ship has now been shaken by the whirlwind of storms, now pierced by the dashing of rocks, let us, as soon as we may, enter as it were a haven, the retreat of the countryside. There common bread, and a herb watered by our own hands, and milk, the delicacies of the country, will furnish foods indeed cheap, but innocent. Living thus, sleep will not call us away from prayer, nor satiety from reading. If it be summer, the shade of a tree will furnish a retreat. If autumn, the very temperateness of the air and the leaves strewn beneath will show a place of rest. In spring the field is painted with flowers, and among the plaintive birds the psalms will be sung more sweetly. If there be cold and wintry snows, I shall not buy firewood, and shall keep vigil, or sleep, the warmer. Certainly, so far as I know, I shall be cold more cheaply. Let Rome have her tumults to herself, let the arena rage, let the circus run mad, let the theatres riot, and—since something must be said of our own people—let the senate of matrons be visited daily. For us it is good to cleave to the Lord, and to put our hope in the Lord God; so that, when the kingdoms of heaven have exchanged that poverty, we may break forth into the cry: "For what have I in heaven, and besides thee what have I desired upon earth?" Namely, that when we find so great things in heaven, we may grieve to have sought small and perishing things on earth. Perhaps this Epistle is later than the one to Paula presently to be mentioned, and was written a few days before Jerome's departure. Dolci, in the Life, chapter 14, judges that St. Jerome, after the Synod of the year 382 was concluded, dwelt in a suburban ascetery. But that conjecture lacks foundation, and is repugnant to very many things which the saint both did and wrote at Rome.

§ XVII. The hatreds of many against St. Jerome increase: Blæsilla being dead, he writes concerning her decease to Paula, who grieved too much: the saint, assailed by black calumnies, resolves to depart, and at his departure writes to Asella.

The ill-will against the saint, and its causes. As long as St. Jerome remained at Rome after the death of St. Damasus the Pope, the hatreds of many Romans against him seem always to have grown, until at last they assailed the saint with atrocious calumnies. The Epistle given to Eustochium had offended many, and in all likelihood the purpose of that most constant virgin, her modest habit and austere life, in which she was confirmed by Jerome, exasperated her powerful kinsmen more. There was added the like life of St. Paula, and at length of Blæsilla, whom her kinsfolk vainly endeavoured to draw into a second marriage. Now she above all had been drawn by Jerome to that pious, modest, and austere way of living, as we have already seen. Again, the untimely death of Blæsilla, scarcely twenty years old, increased the ill-will, and the excessive grief of her mother Paula over her furnished matter to the detractors, as though she had preferred to have grandchildren by Blæsilla married again, rather than to see her abstaining from a second marriage. At last the fury of the Romans was brought to its height when it became known that Paula was about to depart from the City and to sail to the Holy Land. For when this purpose was known, both Jerome and Paula were presently assailed by a most atrocious calumny, of which we shall treat below.

[293] The death of Blæsilla seems to be fixed about the month of July of the year 385, Blæsilla being dead, St. Paula grieving too much that is, a short time before the departure of Jerome, as I shall prove below. Of that decease Jerome wrote Epistle 39 (elsewhere 25) to Paula her mother, who was passing all bounds in grief, whom he consoles with an eloquent discourse, and toward the end sharply reprehends for a mourning more bitter than is right. How great was the licence of slanderers on that occasion Jerome declares at number 5 in this manner: I cannot speak without a groan what I am about to say. When they were carrying you back lifeless from the midst of the funeral procession, the people murmured this among themselves: Is not this what we often said? She grieves for a daughter killed by fastings, because she did not have grandchildren even from a second marriage of hers. How long shall this detestable race of monks not be driven from the City? not be overwhelmed with stones? not be cast headlong into the waves? They have seduced a pitiable matron, who, how far [\] she was unwilling to be a nun, is proved from this, that no woman of the gentiles ever so wept for her own sons.* None was attacked by these gibes more than Jerome, who in that very Epistle confesses that Blæsilla was converted to better things by his admonitions. So little did he care for the insane voices of a most fickle multitude, nay, and for the ill-will of Blæsilla's powerful kinsmen. For he knew that it belonged to a Christian man to please God rather than men.

[294] in an Epistle the saint consoles and reprehends her. Yet he sharply rebuked the weakness of Paula, although he otherwise venerated her as a saint, because by an excessive mourning she could not please God, and was an offence to men. And when at number 4 he addresses her as a nun, he sufficiently intimates that even then she had the purpose of leaving Rome and setting out for a solitary place. And thus far I have spoken, he says, as though I were addressing one Christian woman out of the crowd. But now, since I know that you have renounced the whole world, and, the delights of the age being cast away and trodden under foot, give yourself daily to prayer, to fastings, to reading; since after the example of Abraham you desire to go out of your land and from your kindred, so that, leaving both the Chaldees and Mesopotamia, you may enter the land of promise; since you have either lavished all your little substance upon the poor, or, dead to the world before your death, have given it to your children—I wonder that you do those things which, if the rest of women did them, they would seem worthy of reprehension. These words not only intimate the purpose of leaving Rome, but also a near departure, since to this end Paula had already distributed her goods among the poor and among her children. But since the Epistle was written a little after the death of Blæsilla, as Jerome declares in Epistle 77 (elsewhere 30) to Oceanus in these words: It is many years since, upon the falling asleep of Blæsilla, I consoled the venerable woman Paula while the wound was still fresh: it is necessary for us to say that Blæsilla died about the month of July: for in the month of August Jerome departed, and Paula followed him not long after.

[295] Blæsilla had asked various things of Jerome, That Epistle Jerome reckons in the Catalogue of his own writings in these words: A consolatory letter to Paula on the death of her daughter. And it is reckoned in the last place among the things written at Rome, and it is beyond doubt the last little work which the saint wrote at Rome, apart from the Epistle to Asella, not mentioned in the Catalogue, and perhaps one or another of those mentioned to Marcella. I pass over the elogia of Blæsilla, which may be seen in the Epistle itself. This I observe, that Blæsilla had asked Jerome to make Latin out of the Greek the twenty-five tomes of Origen on Matthew, and five others on Luke, and thirty-two on John, as Jerome himself testifies in the Preface to the Homilies on Luke rendered into Latin, saying that this was beyond his strength, his leisure, and his labour. What besides Blæsilla had asked of Jerome—she whom he had torn away from the vanities of the world by the exposition of Ecclesiastes—the saint sets forth in the Preface of the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes, where he says: I remember that about five years before this, when I was still at Rome and was reading Ecclesiastes with the holy Blæsilla, … I was asked by her to discuss the obscure passages after the manner of a little Commentary, so that without me she might be able to understand what she read. And so, since on the very eve of our work she was snatched away by a sudden death, and we did not deserve, O Paula and Eustochium, to have such a partner of our life, and, stricken then by so great a wound, I fell silent, etc. The words alleged indicate that a little before the death of Blæsilla the saint had wished to expound Ecclesiastes for her, as he afterwards did for Paula and Eustochium. From the words And we did not deserve … to have such a partner of our life, it is also gathered that Blæsilla would have set out with her mother Paula and her sister Eustochium into Palestine, had she continued to live.

[296] Tillemont, in his St. Jerome, article 37, judges that Blæsilla died at about the same time whose death must be fixed about July of the year 385. at which Prætextatus the gentile died, prætorian prefect and consul designate, whose death he rightly fixes toward the end of the year 384. His sole reason is drawn from Epistle 39, of which we are treating: for in it, at number 2, Jerome brings in God speaking to Paula, who grieved too much, in this manner: Blush; you are surpassed by comparison with a heathen woman. The devil's handmaid is better than mine. She feigns that her unbelieving husband has been translated to heaven; you either do not believe, or do not wish, that your daughter (Blæsilla) dwells with me. That heathen woman was Paulina, the widow of Prætextatus, a great priestess of Ceres, as Vallarsius observes on Epistle 23, in which that lie of the impious woman about Prætextatus is more clearly exploded. From the passage alleged, therefore, it is clear that Prætextatus had died before Blæsilla. But those words cannot prove that Blæsilla lived so short a time after Prætextatus that she must be said to have died toward the end of the year 384 or the beginning of the following one. For Paulina had not retracted her lie after six or seven months,

and it was recent enough, and well enough known at Rome, to be exploded again by Jerome. Far older was the example of Melania, which in the same Epistle, at number 4, he proposes to Paula as though it were recent. That reason, therefore, has no force against our chronological arrangement. For neither is it likely that Paula remained long at Rome after she had divided her goods among the poor and her children in order to depart; so that the death of Blæsilla must be fixed about July of the year 385, as I said above.

[297] At length the fury of certain men broke out against St. Jerome, An atrocious calumny forged against the saint, as soon as St. Paula's coming departure became known. A worthless man was suborned, and in all likelihood a slave, to charge Jerome with some fabricated crime, nay, with unchastity, as is intimated clearly enough, and to spare not even Paula. Those who hated the saint readily believed the fictitious crime, and those certainly who were the authors of the calumny left nothing undone by which it might find credit with very many. But the calumniator, when he was forced by torments to speak the truth, confessed Jerome's innocence. This palinode of the calumniator, whom we believe to have been a slave, because he was examined by torments, sufficed to clear Jerome in a court of law. But the licence of calumniating was too great for the mouths of many to be closed by that confession, since Jerome's enemies strove to the contrary, among whom beyond doubt many were powerful, and not a few perhaps gentiles. For I should believe the architects of that calumny to have been seculars and nobles rather than ecclesiastics or monks. There were indeed not lacking ecclesiastics or monks of a freer life who were opposed to Jerome and carped at both his writings and his deeds. But it is one thing to disapprove or carp at someone's sayings or doings, and another to fabricate atrocious calumnies. The first was done not only by seculars but also by unskilled ecclesiastics: the second may have been done by the wickedness of a few, but it seems to have found credit with many out of hatred of the saint.

[298] From the praised Epistle to Asella are had the things which have been briefly said. of which he complains in the Epistle to St. Asella, That lady may have been of profit to St. Jerome on this occasion, whether by her testimony or in some other way; and he begins thus: If I should think that thanks could be rendered by me to you, I should not be wise. God is able to restore to your holy soul, in respect of my person, what it deserves. For I, unworthy, could never either estimate or wish that you should bestow upon me so great an affection in Christ. And although some think me wicked and overwhelmed with all crimes—and for my sins even these things are small—yet you do well, in that out of your own mind you think even the bad to be good. For it is perilous to judge of another's servant, and pardon is not easy for having spoken evil of the upright. That day will come, that day will come, on which you too will grieve with me that not a few are burning. I am the shameful one, I the turncoat: I the liar, deceiving by the art of Satan. For which is the safer, to have either believed or feigned these things of the innocent, or to have been unwilling to believe them even of the guilty? Certain men kissed my hands, and with a viper's mouth disparaged me: they grieved with their lips, they rejoiced in their heart. The Lord saw and mocked them, and reserved me, his wretched servant, together with them for the judgment to come. Another calumniated my gait and my laughter: that one disparaged my countenance: this one suspected something other than simplicity.

[299] refuting the calumny, Then he proceeds to his defence in this manner: Certainly I lived with them almost three years. Often a throng of virgins surrounded me… Let them say what they ever thought of me otherwise than became a Christian. Have I taken anyone's money? have I not spurned gifts whether small or great? has anyone's coin chinked in my hand? has my speech been crooked, my eye wanton? Nothing else is objected against me but my sex, and this is never objected save when Paula sets out for Jerusalem. We have hence the time of the forging of the calumny: when it had become known that Paula would set out for Palestine. There follows the calumny censured: Be it so; they believed a liar: why do they not believe him when he denies? The man himself is the same who he was: he confesses me innocent, who lately declared me guilty. And certainly torments express the truth more than laughter does: except that a thing is the more readily believed which is either gladly heard when it is feigned, or, when it is not feigned, is pushed into being feigned. Before I knew the household of the holy Paula, the enthusiasm of the whole City was in concert about me. In the judgment of almost all I was adjudged worthy of the supreme priesthood. Damasus, of blessed memory, spoke my words. I was called holy, I was called humble and eloquent. Have I ever entered the house of any too wanton woman? Have silken garments, glittering gems, a painted face, or the ambition of gold ever carried me away? Thus far the saint refuted in general the suspicions of unchastity objected against him, without indicating the person with whom he was accused, save most obscurely, by indicating that the calumny arose from the published purpose of Paula to set out for Jerusalem.

[300] which involved St. Paula also, But what follows most clearly indicates that St. Paula was accused along with him. And the words are to be read as questions, as Martianay published them; and they are to be expounded not of honourable intercourse, as Tillemont wrongly understood in article 25, but of impure love, which he refutes from the manners of St. Paula. Was there no other of the matrons at Rome who could tame my mind (that is, draw it to lust) save one mourning and fasting, squalid with filth, almost blinded with weeping; whom the sun often caught still beseeching the mercy of the Lord through continual nights: whose song was the Psalms, whose speech the Gospel, whose delight continence, whose life a fast? Could no other delight me but she whom I never saw eating? But after I began to venerate, to reverence, to look up to her for her merit of chastity, all virtues at once forsook me. These last things he utters ironically, and presently, going on in his refutation, he declares that a calumny of this kind had also been spread about Melania, likewise a most noble woman, who long before had set out for Egypt and Palestine—not because Jerome had then been accused, but because the case of Melania (who is also sometimes called Melanius) and of Paula was alike. This alone seems to be the meaning of that passage, which has tormented learned men, and it is no great mystery.

[301] Let us hear Jerome, who thus continues: O envy, first the gnawer of thyself! and intimating what grieved O craft of Satan, always persecuting holy things! No other women furnished a tale to the city of Rome but Paula and Melanius, who, despising their fortunes and forsaking their pledges, lifted up the cross of the Lord as a kind of banner of piety. If they sought the baths, if they chose unguents, if they had their riches and widowhood as material for luxury and licence, they would be called ladies and holy. Now in sackcloth and ashes they wish to seem beautiful, and to go down into the hell of fire with fastings and squalor. Forsooth it is not permitted them, with the people applauding, to perish with the crowds. The irony is plain. The saint goes on: If the gentiles carped at this life, if the Jews did, they would have the consolation of not pleasing those to whom Christ is displeasing. But now, O shame! Christian men, neglecting the care of their own houses and heedless of the beam in their own eye, look for a mote in another's eye. They tear at a holy purpose, and reckon it a remedy for their own punishment if no one be holy, if all be disparaged, if there be a crowd of the perishing, a multitude of sinners. After these things he compares the manner of life of Paula and of Melania (though she was living in Palestine) with the life of worldly men, who were stirring up such great tumults.

[302] You, he says to the worldly man, are pleased to bathe daily (namely in the bath); another reckons these cleanlinesses calumniators: to be filth. You belch up the heath-cock, and glory in the sturgeon you have eaten. I fill my belly with beans. You are delighted by herds of men guffawing: I by Paula and Melanius lamenting. You desire what is another's: they despise what is their own. You are delighted by wines smeared with honey: they drink cold water, which is sweeter. You reckon that you lose whatever you have not in the present, have not eaten, have not devoured: they desire things to come, and believe that what is written is true. Granted that it is ineptly and emptily that the resurrection of bodies has persuaded them—what is that to you? To us, on the contrary, your life is displeasing. Be fat, and much good may it do you: leanness and pallor delight me. You reckon such as these wretched: we reckon you more wretched still. Like is returned for like, and each of us seems to the other to be mad. These things, which intimate the manners not only of Paula and Melania but of Jerome himself, the saint wrote not without grief, yet with a mind by no means cast down, as is clear from the words that follow: These things, my lady Asella, I have written hurriedly, weeping and grieving, as I was already going on board ship; and I give thanks to my God that I am worthy to be hated by the world.

[303] But pray that from Babylon I may return to Jerusalem, the saint's signal fortitude and modesty that Nebuchadnezzar may not rule over me, but Jesus the son of Josedec: let Ezra come, whose name is interpreted helper, and lead me back into my own country. Foolish was I, who wished to sing the song of the Lord in a strange land, and, having deserted Mount Sinai, was demanding the help of Egypt. I did not remember the Gospel, that he who goes out from Jerusalem straightway falls among robbers, is stripped, wounded, slain. But although the priest and the levite despise him, that Samaritan is merciful, to whom, when it was said, "Thou art a Samaritan and hast a devil", denying the devil, did not deny that he was a Samaritan; for him whom we call the keeper, the Hebrews call Samarite. Certain men chatter that I am a sorcerer: as a servant I acknowledge the title of faith. The Jews too call my Lord a magician: an Apostle was called a seducer. Let no temptation lay hold on me but such as is human. How small a part of straits have I endured, I who serve as a soldier of the cross? They have imputed to me the infamy of a false crime: but I know that through good report and ill report one comes to the kingdoms of heaven. Salute Paula and Eustochium, mine in Christ whether the world will or no. Salute my mother Albina and my sister Marcella, Marcellina also and the holy Felicitas, and say to them: We shall stand together before the tribunal of Christ; there it will appear with what mind each has lived. Remember me, thou pattern of modesty and ornament of virginity; and by thy prayers calm the waves of the sea.

[304] in those most grievous calumnies. I have wished to give this whole Epistle, because it declares with what an infamous calumny the saint was assailed: and at the same time makes manifest the admirable fortitude, constancy, humility, and patience of the man. For if calumny troubleth a wise man, and shall destroy the strength of his heart, Ecclesiastes 7, verse 8, we cannot but admire the wonderful wisdom and fortitude of Jerome, who in an Epistle not very long, and hastily drawn up, humbly and bravely refuted the calumny, and stripped it of all verisimilitude by solid arguments; yet used such great modesty that he wounds no one by a bitterer word, nor utters anything unworthy of a Christian man. In the Preface to the book of Didymus on the Holy Spirit rendered into Latin he speaks thus of his Roman sojourn: When I was dwelling in Babylon, and was a settler of the purple-clad harlot, and lived by the law of the Quirites, I wished to chatter something about the Holy Spirit, and to dedicate the little work I had begun to the Pontiff of that City. And behold, that pot which in Jeremiah is seen after the rod from the face of the North began to burn, and the

senate of the Pharisees cried out, and not one scribe or moulder of opinion, but the whole faction of unskilfulness conspired against me, as though a battle of doctrines had been declared against them. Straightway I, as by right of return, went back to Jerusalem, and after the hut of Romulus and the Lupercalia of the games, I beheld the lodging of Mary and the cave of the Saviour, … reckoning that place far more august which brought forth the Saviour of the world than that which brought forth the murderer of his brother (Remus)—that is, Romulus.

[305] They do not seem to have been clerics, This passage Baronius attempts to expound at the year 385, number 8, and conjectures that by the senate of the Pharisees the Roman clergy is designated, and that it is accused of ignorance and called a faction of unskilfulness. That most eminent writer does not judge that the Roman clerics were universally so unlearned, and rightly; but he judges that something must be pardoned to Jerome, who was indignant for just causes. But I by no means see that Jerome needs any excuse, unless he unjustly carped at some. Nor do I see on what foundation Jerome should have designated by the senate of the Pharisees and the faction of unskilfulness the Roman clergy rather than any proud men whatsoever, greedy of glory, hunting after a reputation for learning, and unskilled censors of others. Baronius judges that the clerics were angry with Jerome on account of the Epistle to Eustochium, and recites these words of Jerome from Epistle 130 (elsewhere 8) to Demetrias: About thirty years ago I published a book on the Keeping of Virginity, in which it was necessary for me to go against vices, and, for the instruction of the virgin whom I was admonishing, to lay open the snares of the devil. That discourse offended very many, since each one, understanding what was said of himself, did not gladly hear me as an admonisher, but turned away from me as an accuser of his own work. Nevertheless what did it profit to have armed an army of gainsayers, and to have shown the wound of conscience by the pain? The book remains, the men have passed away. These words indeed prove that many were offended by that book, as I have already related; but they by no means prove that they were clerics: nor have I been able to find any argument by which I can prove that the clerics had the chief part in persecuting Jerome.

[306] Certainly Jerome, in Epistle 54 (elsewhere 10), when he was about to instruct Furia, but worldly nobles a most noble and youthful widow, and to dissuade her from a second marriage, intimates that he fears another kind of men, writing thus: Knowing and seeing, I put my hand into the flame: brows will be drawn up, the arm will be stretched out, and angry Chremes will rage with swollen mouth. The nobles will rise up against my Epistle; the patrician throng will thunder, crying out that I am a magician, that I am a seducer, and that I must be deported to the ends of the earth. Let them add, if they will, "Samaritan", that I may recognize the title of my Lord. By Chremes he in all likelihood designates the father of Furia, then still living. The nobles and the patrician throng certainly do not signify clerics. Wherefore, since the saint says that at that time he feared most of all the kinsmen of Furia and other nobles and patricians, it becomes most likely that it was chiefly their censure and wrath which raged against the saint on account of Eustochium, Blæsilla and Paula being instructed, of whom Furia was a kinswoman; and that it was they who armed the army of gainsayers against Jerome. I would not indeed say that no clerics opposed Jerome to please the nobles, or that none was offended by the Epistle to Eustochium; for there, as Baronius observes, he admonished that luxurious, dainty and frivolous clerics were to be avoided, whose familiarity was perilous: I will not deny that these could have been offended by that admonition, and I readily believe that some really were offended. But the offence of a few clerics could not stir up so great a persecution as Jerome suffered, and it is altogether gratuitously that Baronius says that the Roman clerics are called by Jerome the senate of the Pharisees, or that the whole clergy is charged with unskilfulness.

[307] So improbable indeed does that persuasion of Baronius seem to me but the powerful and the kinsmen of St. Paula, that I cannot find whence that most learned writer could have fallen into it, unless perhaps by a slip of memory he believed that by Pharisees none can be understood but priests and clerics. But neither were the Pharisees among the Jews priests alone, although among these there were some Pharisees: and Jerome seems to call none Pharisees but those who imitated the vices of the Pharisees, of whatever order they might be. In this sense Jerome, writing on Matthew, when he expounds those words of Christ about the scribes and Pharisees, chapter 23, verse 5, All their works they do to be seen of men, says: Whoever, therefore, does anything whatsoever in such a way as to be seen of men, is a Scribe and a Pharisee. This is Jerome's mind; he calls those Pharisees who, full of arrogance and pride, set themselves against those who chose a modest, humble, pious life, more conformable to the doctrine of Christ, just as the Pharisees drew the people away from Christ in every way they could. And that these were powerful, noble and rich men is clear from all St. Jerome's Epistles in which he answers their revilings. These he refutes in the Epistle to Asella by the words given at number 301. These he sharply confutes in Epistle 38, on the sickness of Blæsilla, where of Blæsilla restored to health he does not hesitate to say: She owes you nothing, O ungrateful kindred, she who has died to the world and lives again to Christ. Let him who is a Christian rejoice: he who is angry shows that he is not a Christian.

[308] who were persecuting Jerome. Presently he weaves an apology against these men, continuing thus: A widow, who is loosed from the marriage bond, has need of nothing but to persevere. But does a darker garment scandalize someone? Let John scandalize him, than whom among those born of women there was none greater: who, called an angel, baptized the Lord himself: who, clothed with a covering of camel's hair, was girded with a leathern belt. Do cheaper foods displease? Nothing is cheaper than locusts. Let those women rather scandalize Christian eyes who paint their faces and eyes with rouge and certain dyes: whose plastered faces, deformed with excessive whiteness, counterfeit idols: from whom, if by chance a drop of tears breaks out unawares, it runs down in a furrow: whom not even the number of their years can teach that they are old women: who build up their heads with others' hair, and polish a bygone youth upon their aged wrinkles; who, in fine, trembling before a flock of grandchildren, deck themselves out as little girls. I omit the rest: for these things sufficiently hint at what condition of men and women he was refuting. To please these too, while Blæsilla was being buried, as Epistle 39 has it, the people—not the clergy—murmured among themselves: How long shall this detestable race of monks not be driven from the City, not be overwhelmed with stones, not be cast headlong into the waves? Whose ill-will he took upon himself in Blæsilla's cause, Jerome himself declares in the same Epistle in these words: And for me (Blæsilla) obtains pardon of my sins; because I admonished, because I exhorted, because I took upon myself the ill-will of her kinsfolk, that she might be saved. Wherefore that most grievous persecution which Jerome suffered at Rome is not to be attributed to the Roman clergy, nor consequently did Jerome accuse the clergy of unskilfulness; but chiefly to the kinsmen of St. Paula, and to other men and women of the same order who were their friends. And these, by reason of their power, drew many to their side, and among them in all likelihood some less religious clerics, and by name those whom the Epistle to Eustochium had offended.

[309] Pope Siricius does not seem to have been opposed to Jerome. Another conjecture of Baronius is that Siricius, the successor of Damasus, did not use the service of St. Jerome in writing his Epistles, nor cherished the saint with so great a friendship as Damasus had shown him. Both seem true: for neither have we any indications of a singular friendship which existed between Siricius and Jerome. But I judge that this happened by no fault of Siricius, nor from a mind hostile to Jerome; but rather by Jerome's own will. Nay, I strongly suspect that the care of writing ecclesiastical Epistles lay upon Jerome only for a short time; namely because he himself did not desire cares of that kind, but preferred to be occupied solely with the study of the sacred Scriptures. I judge, therefore, that Damasus consented to Jerome's desire, and instead of the business of the Church committed to him the correction of the New Testament, and propounded to him various questions from the sacred Letters. Damasus's Epistle 35 among the Hieronymian letters alone—in which he says that he wishes to rouse Jerome, for a long time reading rather than writing, with little questions—and Jerome's answer to it, sufficiently intimate that at that time Jerome was no longer Damasus's secretary for letters, but rather rendered him service for the understanding of the sacred Scriptures.

[310] For the rest, St. Gregory the Great, in book IX, Epistle 12 of the latest edition, to John bishop of Syracuse, says: For that ALLELUIA should be said here (namely outside the Paschal season, as we now speak) is handed down as having been drawn from the church of Jerusalem out of the tradition of blessed Jerome. Some things less certain about his doings at Rome. Damasus could have instituted this at Jerome's suasion. Certainly the Alleluia was most pleasing to Jerome: for he frequently makes mention in his Epistles of that Hebrew praise of the Lord. But whether the custom was transferred to the Roman church from the church of Jerusalem, or from that of Antioch or Constantinople, at Jerome's instance, or perhaps from all of these, I do not inquire. Something might also be observed here about a disputation of St. Jerome which he held at Rome with some learned man, as he himself relates in Epistle 69 (elsewhere 83) to Oceanus. But I should prefer to set forth that whole disputation at the time at which the said Epistle was given, so that we may pass on to investigating the year in which the saint departed from Rome. Nor shall I examine further certain Epistles to Damasus, which have long since been numbered among the spurious by the learned editors of St. Jerome's Works: nor shall I inquire whether a few verses are really Jerome's which Baronius exhibited under his name in his Annals at the year 384, since I have not found that the saint was ever occupied in composing verses.

\ elsewhere quia*

§ XVIII. Jerome's departure into Palestine must be fixed in the year 385.

Although some things suggest the suspicion, Concerning the year in which St. Jerome departed into Palestine I long hung in doubt between 384 and 385, because I found some sayings of St. Jerome which seemed to favour the former more than the latter: while the arguments of the chronologers, who everywhere fix Jerome's departure in the year 385, had already been in some measure resolved by our Papebroch, even though he too consented to the more common opinion about the death of St. Damasus. What pressed me most of all was a passage of St. Jerome in the Epitaph of St. Paula, where he says of St. Paula: She lived in her holy purpose five years at Rome, twenty years at Bethlehem. For since, as Jerome himself testifies in the same place, she died on the 26th of January in the year 404, and departed into Palestine after Jerome in the month of August or September, from either month of the year 385 up to the 26th of January of the year 404 there are found only eighteen years and four or five months, even if the whole journey, which certainly took some months, be included in the sojourn at Bethlehem. I readily believed indeed that the journey into Palestine was reckoned within those twenty years; but I could scarcely judge that eighteen years and perhaps five months were called twenty years by Jerome, especially since he was writing an Epitaph, and was exactly designating St. Paula's whole age by years, months and days.

[312] These reasons suggested to me a strong suspicion in favour of the year 384, that Jerome departed from Rome in the year 384, and Pagi, at the year

404, number 34, made himself forgetful of his own position: for from them he inferred that St. Paula lived at Bethlehem from the year 384: which is altogether repugnant to his own opinion about the death of Damasus. For it is certain from Jerome himself that St. Damasus was dead before either he or St. Paula departed from Rome, since in Epistle 45 to Asella, which he wrote as he was departing, he says: Damasus, of blessed memory, spoke my words. In the same Epistle again he openly intimates that the persecutions which he suffered at Rome began after the death of Damasus, so that it must necessarily be said that Jerome remained at Rome for some months at least after the death of Damasus. And so, since Damasus died on the 10th or 11th of December, and Jerome departed in the month of August, Jerome's departure cannot be tied to the year 384, unless the death of Damasus be fixed in the year 383. This Baronius, Tillemont, and several others saw, who fix the death of Damasus in the year 384, and the departure of Jerome and Paula into Palestine in the year 385. Their arguments tend to prove that St. Damasus did not die before December of the year 384: from which it follows that Jerome did not depart before August of the following year. But again some things can be brought forward which hint that Damasus died in the year 383, and above all the passage of Jerome alleged above, whose difficulty Baronius, Pagi and Tillemont dissembled rather than weighed: and on whose account our Papebroch believed the epoch of Damasus's death less certain, although he assents to the more common opinion, and records that he died in the year 384.

[313] yet from the death of Prætextatus, mentioned by Jerome himself, Wherefore by long study I inquired whether the arguments which seem contrary to the words of St. Jerome understood in their proper sense could be dissolved by a sufficiently probable answer; but inquiring thus I found another argument, by which I laid aside all doubt about the year in which the saint departed into Palestine. Above we saw that Jerome made mention of the death of Prætextatus, consul designate, in Epistle 23 to Marcella, on the Departure of Lea, and again in Epistle 39, on the Death of Blæsilla. But the death of Prætextatus, who in the year 384 was prætorian prefect, can by no means be fixed before August, or even about the beginning or middle of August of that same year 384; but must necessarily be fixed toward the end of the year. For since he died as consul designate, before he could enter upon the consulship on the Kalends of January, and since consuls at that time were designated as the year drew to its close, as Tillemont proves by several examples in volume 5 of the Emperors, Note 20 on Theodosius I, it must be said that Prætextatus died toward the end of the year 384, as the said Tillemont also observes. Besides, Godefroy in the Chronology of the Theodosian code, page CXII, cites a Law given at Aquileia in the year 384 on the 5th of the Ides of September … to Prætextatus prætorian prefect. Prætextatus, therefore, was alive at the beginning of September, and in all likelihood was not yet designated consul.

[314] it is certainly established that he did not depart before the year 385. Now this argument binds the more certainly, because the Epistle in which the first mention is made of the death of Prætextatus seems to have been written many months before Jerome's departure. Jerome therefore did not depart in the year 384, in which Prætextatus was living after August; but in the month of August of the year 385, about eight or nine months after his death. Nor can it prudently be said that Prætextatus is not named by Jerome in either Epistle, and that for that cause the man of whom the saint speaks is perhaps another. For the orator Symmachus, who was then prefect of the City, in book 10, Epistles 23, 24 and 25, announces the death of Prætextatus to the emperors, and not only intimates that he had been designated consul, but also writes such things about the disturbance and mourning of the City at the death of Prætextatus as Jerome writes about the consul designate. Wherefore neither Baronius, nor Tillemont, nor Vallarsius doubts that Jerome speaks of Prætextatus: nor can it deservedly be doubted, since both the time and all the rest agree, and Prætextatus was consul designate.

[315] Another argument, the chief of those which have been brought forward to fix the death of St. Damasus toward the end of the year 384, and consequently St. Jerome's journey in the year 385, The same is rightly inferred from the Epistle of Siricius to Himerius, is drawn from the Epistle of St. Siricius the Pope to Himerius of Tarragona, related in Baronius at the year 385, number 6, and printed in Labbe, volume 2 of the Councils, column 1017, and in Coustant's Epistles of the Roman Pontiffs, column 624, and in others. For the Epistle is marked as given on the third of the Ides of February, in the consulship of Arcadius and Bauto; that is, on the 11th of February of the year 385. And the opening of the Epistle clearly intimates that it was given about the beginning of the Pontificate of Siricius, who succeeded Damasus. For Siricius begins thus: The report of your fraternity, directed to our predecessor Damasus of holy memory, found me already established in his See, because the Lord so ordained. And when we read it with some care in an assembly of the brethren, we found as many things worthy of reprehension and correction as we could have wished to find worthy of praise. And because it was necessary for us to succeed to the labours and cares of him to whose honour we have succeeded by the grace of God, having first given, as was fitting, an indication of my advancement, we do not refuse a fitting answer to your consultation on the several points, according as the Lord has deigned to inspire us, etc. All these things intimate that Siricius wrote this at the beginning of his Pontificate, and not long after the death of Damasus, since Himerius believed him to be alive when he was writing his own Epistle. For whether Himerius wrote while Damasus was alive, or when he was already dead but in ignorance of his death, his letter reached Rome when Siricius had been elected, and Siricius intimates that he answered not long after. And so everything agrees rightly with the 10th or 11th of December, on which Damasus died, and with the year 384. But it is enough for us to have shown that Damasus died at least after August of the year 384, and consequently that Jerome did not depart before August of the year 385.

[316] Our Papebroch, in the Propylæum of May, page 58, acknowledges the force of this argument, whose consular note, because it was formerly read faultily, was suspect: provided the consular note be genuine. But since this was at first published faultily in this manner: In the consulship of Arcadius and Bauto, most illustrious men, he holds this note suspect for a twofold cause. First, he says, because the other epistles of this Pontiff, dug out from elsewhere, lack a consul: nor in the genuine preceding epistles of other Pontiffs, nor in those which other bishops gave to the Roman Pontiffs, nay, even to this Siricius, is a date of day or consulship hitherto noted, so that it seems altogether that this usage had not yet obtained in the signing of letters. Secondly, the title common to both consuls (namely most illustrious men) is deservedly suspect. For no one in that age would have written so, but rightly: "Arcadius Augustus and Bauto, most illustrious man, consuls." Thus Papebroch concerning the date of the Epistle, which he otherwise confesses to be weighty and sound, and suspect to no one of any plagiarism, so that all his suspicion falls upon the subscription alone, as though that had been afterwards added, not upon the epistle itself, as some have wrongly said.

[317] But Coustant, in the Epistles of the Pontiffs, column 638, in the annotations on the Epistle of Siricius, observes the following: since the same is rightly read in the more ancient manuscripts, "Most illustrious men" is absent from the more ancient manuscripts. Nor did Dionysius Exiguus read those two words, as his genuine copy preserved in the royal library assures us. Afterwards, in the collection sent by Hadrian to Charlemagne, "V.V. C.C." was rashly added before "coss.", and thence it was transferred into others also. But of all the kinds of collections there is none which does not exhibit that consular note. Wherefore to Tillemont the conjecture of Papebroch deservedly seemed slight and unsound, who, moved by this note, suspects that the rest of the Epistle is not sufficiently pure and sincere. Thus he brings forward excellent things by which Papebroch's reasons can be satisfied; but he says falsely that the rest of the epistle seemed to Papebroch not sufficiently pure and sincere, since Papebroch plainly says the contrary here, and impugns the epoch alone. He ought therefore only to have inferred that from the documents produced Papebroch's conjecture becomes improbable. For since that consular note is found in absolutely all the collections, and in the more ancient manuscripts, as also in Dionysius Exiguus, lacks the fault afterwards added, it becomes improbable that it was afterwards added; and thus Papebroch's conjecture falls, who judged according to the documents published in his own time.

[318] and in Dionysius Exiguus, that suspicion ceases: The said Coustant further uses this answer to Papebroch's argument: Nor ought the learned man to have been more moved by this, that it was hitherto unusual for the predecessors of Siricius to sign their letters with a consular note; especially since it is established that this usage was afterwards familiar to Innocent and to his other successors. But Papebroch could indeed be moved by the reason stated, both because among the epistles of Siricius he found only two marked with a consular note, and both of them liable to difficulties, but none of Anastasius, who stands midway between Siricius and Innocent; and because he saw a false note of consuls added to one of the Epistles of Damasus. Yet if he had known that that consular note is read rightly joined to the Epistle in Dionysius Exiguus, whose authority in these matters ought to be great, he would beyond doubt have laid aside his suspicion.

[319] and Siricius seems to have been the first to add consular notes to Epistles. To confirm this the example of Innocent and his successors avails. For, after I had diligently considered the Epistles of the supreme Pontiffs of the fourth and fifth centuries, I am led into this opinion, that I believe the usage of signing letters with the note of the day and of the consuls was begun by the Pontiffs as the fourth century drew to its close. Siricius seems to have been the first to do it, but not constantly. Of his successor Anastasius only one Epistle is extant, without any note of time, from which no certain judgment can be formed about his custom. Then, of Innocent's letters more have the note of the day and of the consuls than have Siricius's; yet the greater part of them still lack it. Afterwards the Epistles of Zosimus, who followed Innocent, are almost all signed with a consular note, though some with the month and day only. Nearly the same custom obtains in the Epistles of the Pontiffs next following, namely Boniface, Celestine, Sixtus III, Leo the Great, and others. And so what Siricius is found to have done in a few, Innocent in more, the Pontiffs who followed in the fifth century did in most of their letters. But since Dionysius Exiguus gave the said Epistle of Siricius with the consular note, as did all the other collectors of Pontifical Epistles, as Coustant testifies, there remains no doubt that the epoch of that Epistle is legitimate, and that the argument drawn from it for the death of St. Damasus, and for referring Jerome's departure to the year 385, is valid.

[320] Another argument of Baronius. Baronius also drew an argument from

an Epistle of Symmachus, then prefect of the City, in which he makes mention of Damasus as alive: and Tillemont made much of this. I set it forth in compendium. Symmachus, in book 10, Epistle 34, when he had been accused of persecution against the Christians, clears himself, and calls Pope Damasus a witness of his innocence. But, they say, Symmachus was prefect of the City in the year 384. In that year, therefore, Damasus was alive. The consequence would be most certain, if Symmachus had not obtained the prefecture before the year 384. But from Epistle 31 of the same book it can easily be proved that he was prefect from the summer of the year 383. And so he could have been accused before December of that same year, and defended himself by the said letter, so that from the argument thus propounded nothing certain is had about the time of Damasus's death. Yet since in the same Epistle mention is made of Prætextatus, prætorian prefect, and Prætextatus perhaps did not hold that prefecture in the year 383, but certainly held it in the year 384, it becomes most likely that the Epistle of Symmachus was written in the year 384, and consequently that St. Damasus lived in that year, which from the former argument becomes certain. But if Damasus lived in the year 384, Jerome departed only in the following one, as has been proved by certain arguments.

[321] Wherefore the passage of St. Jerome which has the chief difficulty, on account of the twenty years attributed to St. Paula's sojourn in Palestine, A passage of St. Jerome seemingly contrary is expounded, must necessarily be explained in that improper manner which writers sometimes use, and which St. Jerome in all likelihood used, in order to employ a round number and to extend St. Paula's sojourn in Palestine as far as he could. Namely, he reckoned part of the year 385, in which Jerome and Paula departed into Palestine, for a year, and after 18 full years the beginning of the year 404, in which Paula died, for another year; and by that manner of reckoning he found twenty years. By the same manner of speaking Christ the Lord is said to have been three days in the sepulchre, even though he did not remain there for a great part of the first and third day.

[322] The Chronicles of Marcellinus and of Prosper might also be objected: and answer is made to the Chronicle. for Marcellinus fixes the death of Damasus in the year 382; while Prosper writes these things at the year 385: At this time Jerome the presbyter, now famous throughout the whole world, dwells at Bethlehem, serving the universal Church with excellent genius and study. These things at least, as regards his dwelling there, would be said more rightly of the following year; for about the beginning of the year 386 Jerome arrived in Palestine. Prosper therefore seems to refer Jerome's journey to the year 384, just as he also seems to fix the election of Pope Siricius at the beginning of that same year 384. But the authority of these chronologers must yield to more certain arguments; and against both may be set Idatius, who in his Chronicle defers the Pontificate of Siricius to the 8th year of Theodosius, 386 of the Christian era, so that he believed Damasus did not die before 385, and thus errs in the contrary direction. These things, therefore, prove only that collectors of Chronicles easily go astray by a year or two, and that for that cause their authority is not to be adhered to when more certain monuments are had from elsewhere.

§ XIX. The saint's journey into Palestine and his companions: the holy places of Palestine and Egypt surveyed: Didymus consulted about the sacred Scriptures.

The saint with his companions goes aboard ship in the month of August, Since it has been abundantly proved that St. Jerome departed from Rome into Palestine in the year 385, we proceed to the journey itself and to his companions on the journey. Jerome wrote the Epistle to Asella recited in §17 when he was about to go on board ship. Concerning the departure itself he records these things in book 3 against Rufinus, number 22: Do you wish to know the order of my setting out from the City? I will narrate it briefly. In the month of August, while the Etesian winds were blowing, with the holy presbyter Vincentius (of Constantinople, already mentioned before) and my young brother (Paulinian, who had joined himself to Jerome at Rome) and other monks who now dwell at Jerusalem, I went untroubled on board ship at the Roman Port (a town afterwards destroyed), a very great throng of holy men accompanying me—namely as far as the Port and to the ship. Yet matrons or virgins do not seem to have accompanied him, since he salutes the dearest of them all in the Epistle to Asella, and by name Paula and Eustochium, who were to follow shortly.

[324] and sails to Cyprus, thence to Antioch, and comes to Jerusalem: Of the voyage he subjoins: I came to Rhegium (a city in the farthest corner of Italy, on the Sicilian strait, to which Scylla also lies adjacent); I stood a little while on the Scyllæan shore, where I learned the old fables, and the headlong course of wily Ulysses, and the songs of the Sirens, and the insatiable whirlpool of Charybdis. And when the inhabitants of that place were telling me many things, and giving me counsel to sail not to the columns of Proteus but to the port of Jonas—for the former is the course of men fleeing and troubled, the latter of a man untroubled—I chose rather to go by Malea and the Cyclades to Cyprus. Where, being received by the venerable bishop Epiphanius, in whose testimony you glory (this ironically of Rufinus), I came to Antioch, where I enjoyed the communion of the pontiff and confessor Paulinus, and, escorted by him in mid-winter and in the severest cold, I entered Jerusalem.

[325] by which same journey St. Paula also followed. I saw many wonders, and what report had earlier brought to me I verified by the judgment of my eyes. These last words intimate that Jerome had never before been at Jerusalem. By almost the same course St. Paula arrived in Palestine a little after, who likewise saw St. Epiphanius in Cyprus and Paulinus at Antioch. The saint does not indeed say that he was in Cyprus or at Antioch with Paula at the same time. Yet this is likely, especially as regards Antioch, since Paula too, as Jerome testifies in the Epitaph, or Epistle 108, departed from Antioch in mid-winter. Wherefore Tillemont suspects, article 42, that Jerome and Paula departed together from Antioch into Palestine: which to me also becomes likely.

[326] He visits the holy places, But if they made this journey together, they will also have gone together to all the holy places of Palestine which St. Paula visited, as Jerome sets forth at length in Epistle 108. Baronius does not judge that St. Jerome was on the journey with St. Paula and the others which she made to all the holy places of Palestine and Egypt. His sole reason is that Jerome does not clearly declare it. But since St. Jerome undertook the same journeys, and that for the understanding of the sacred Scriptures, and in at least one place intimates that he was present with Paula as she visited the holy places, I can scarcely doubt that St. Jerome, accompanied by several learned men who might expound the several places, or at any rate the traditions current about the holy places, made those journeys together with St. Paula and the virgins who accompanied her. For the saint describes Paula's journeys with such accuracy that from his manner of narrating he seems to have been present at each.

[327] that he may better understand the sacred Scriptures, With what intention he surveyed Palestine he sets forth in the Preface to the book of Paralipomenon corrected according to the Seventy interpreters, beginning thus: As those understand the histories of the Greeks better who have seen Athens, and the third book of Virgil (that is, the wanderings of Æneas) those who have sailed from the Troad through Leucate and the Acroceraunian heights to Sicily, and thence to the mouths of the Tiber; so he will look upon holy Scripture more clearly who has contemplated Judæa with his eyes, and has come to know the memorials of the ancient cities, and the names of places, whether the same or changed. Whence it was our care, along with the most learned of the Hebrews, to undertake this labour, that we might go about the province of which all the churches of Christ resound. For I confess, my dearest Domnio and Rogatianus, that I have never in the divine volumes trusted to my own strength, nor had my own opinion for a master, but have been wont to ask even about those things which I thought I knew—how much more about those on which I was in doubt? In the Preface to the Commentaries on Nahum he says that the village of Elcesi, in which the prophet Nahum was born, was shown him by his guide.

[328] Wherefore by the words given above, I saw many wonders, etc., together with St. Paula, I judge that nothing else is intimated than what is related in St. Paula's journey through Palestine. For at number 10, when he relates that St. Paula entered Bethlehem and the cave of the Saviour before she had fixed her dwelling there, he says: She swore, in my hearing. By these words, therefore, he clearly declares that he was with Paula at that time, so that there is no reason to think that the rest of the Palestinian journey was made by her without her master Jerome. Besides, the saint in the Preface of book 1 on Hosea indicates that he was at Alexandria in the year 386 at St. Paula's request. But no reason occurs why St. Paula should have asked Jerome to set out for Alexandria, unless because she, setting out thither herself, desired the saint as a companion of the journey. St. Jerome's words I shall give at number 337. It seems therefore not to be doubted that in the year 386 he first, in the winter season, visited with St. Paula the chief places of Palestine, and then in the spring season set out for Egypt: for we shall see that Paula returned from Egypt in the summer season. For this cause Jerome, in book 3 against Rufinus, after the words given about the journey into Palestine and the wonders seen there, subjoins the following about the journey into Egypt and the return to Bethlehem: Thence I hastened to Egypt, I surveyed the monasteries of Nitria (as did St. Paula also), and among the choirs of the saints I perceived that asps (the Origenists) lay hid. Straightway with quickened step I returned to my own Bethlehem, where I adored the manger and the swaddling-clothes of the Saviour—just as St. Paula also did, fixing her perpetual dwelling at Bethlehem.

[329] Wherefore both the time at which each undertook those journeys, who had Jerome for her master. and all the circumstances, intimate that Paula surveyed everything with Jerome, as with the master whom she had chosen for herself for the understanding of the sacred Scriptures. But that Jerome does not clearly declare this, although the thing was otherwise most honourable, since several companions of their own sex were present with each, I suspect happened on account of the calumnies spread by the malevolent at Rome, for whose sake in all likelihood they did not depart from Rome at the same time. And so, since no doubt remains with me that the journeys of Paula, related by Jerome, are Jerome's own also, and that the places mentioned in the Scriptures were surveyed by him no less studiously than by her, I shall recite those journeys in compendium, cutting away for brevity's sake many things which are inserted to commend the piety of St. Paula. These may be seen on the 26th of January in St. Paula. And from what is to be given the prudent reader will gather how much St. Jerome laboured to acquire a perfect understanding of the sacred Letters.

[330] I omit, he says, the journey through Cœle-Syria and Phœnicia (by which they set out from Antioch into Palestine); I shall commemorate only those places The places are set forth which are contained in the sacred volumes. Leaving behind Berytus, a Roman colony, and the ancient city of Sidon, on the shore of Sarepta she entered the little tower of Elijah, in which, having adored the Lord and Saviour, she came through the sands of Tyre, on which Paul planted his knees, to Acco, which is now called Ptolemais: and through the plains of Megiddo,

privy to the slaying of Josiah, she entered the land of the Philistines: she marvelled at the ruins of Dor, once a most powerful city; and, by a change of fortune, at Strato's Tower, named Cæsarea by Herod king of Judæa in honour of Cæsar Augustus, in which she saw the house of Cornelius, now the church of Christ, and the little dwellings of Philip, and the chambers of the four virgin prophetesses. Then Antipatris, a half-ruined little town, which Herod had called by his father's name, and Lydda, turned into Diospolis, famous for the resurrection of Dorcas and the healing of Æneas. Jerome seems to join these things together, although Æneas alone was healed at Lydda, while Dorcas was raised up at Joppa, presently to be mentioned, because St. Peter was at Lydda when he was asked to raise up Dorcas.

[331] the places Not far from it (Paula saw, with Jerome) Arimathea, the village of Joseph who buried the Lord, and Nob, once a city of priests, now the tomb of the slain: Joppa also, the port of the fleeing Jonas; … and, retracing her journey, Nicopolis, which was formerly called Emmaus, near which the Lord, being known in the breaking of bread, dedicated the house of Cleophas as a church. And setting out thence, she went up to Bethhoron the lower and the upper, cities founded by Solomon but afterwards destroyed by various tempests of war, looking on the right hand at Aialon and Gibeon, where Jesus the son of Nun, fighting against five kings, commanded the sun and the moon; and condemned the Gibeonites, for their tricks and the snares by which they obtained a covenant, to be drawers of water and hewers of wood. In Gibeah, a city (another) ruined to the ground, she stopped a little while, remembering its sin, and the concubine cut into pieces, and the three hundred men of the tribe of Benjamin reserved for the sake of Paul the apostle… She entered Jerusalem, the city of three names, Jebus, Salem, Jerusalem, which was afterwards raised up by Ælius Hadrian into Ælia out of the ruins and ashes of the city… And, prostrate before the cross, she adored as though she beheld the Lord hanging there. Entering the sepulchre of the resurrection, she kissed the stone which the angel had removed from the door of the monument: and the very place of the body, in which the Lord had lain, as one thirsting for the waters she had longed for, she licked with faithful mouth… Going out thence, she went up to Sion… This city David once stormed and rebuilt… There was shown her the column, supporting the porch of the church, stained with the blood of the Lord, to which he is said to have been bound and scourged. There was pointed out the place where the Holy Spirit came down upon the souls of a hundred and twenty believers, that the prophecy of Joel might be fulfilled.

[332] the holy places, Then she went on to Bethlehem, and on the right-hand side of the road she stood at the sepulchre of Rachel, in which she … brought forth Benjamin. And thence, entering Bethlehem and going into the cave of the Saviour, after she had seen the sacred lodging of the Virgin, and the stable in which the ox knew his owner and the ass the manger of his Lord, … she swore in my hearing that she saw with the eyes of faith the Infant wrapped in swaddling-clothes, the Lord wailing in the manger, the magi adoring, the star shining above, the Virgin Mother, the diligent foster-father, the shepherds coming by night, … the little ones slain, Herod raging, Joseph and Mary fleeing into Egypt… Not far from thence she went down to the tower of Ader, that is, of the Flock; beside which Jacob fed his flocks, and the shepherds keeping watch by night deserved to hear: Glory to God in the highest, etc. With no other intention did St. Paula then come to Bethlehem with St. Jerome than to survey the holy places, as is sufficiently gathered from what follows. Yet she wished afterwards to fix her habitation there, but first to complete her pilgrimage, as follows.

[333] And at once with quickened step she began to go along the old road which St. Paula which leads to Gaza, that is, to the power or to the riches of God, and to turn over silently with herself how the Ethiopian eunuch, prefiguring the peoples of the gentiles, changed his skin, and, while he reads over the old Instrument, found the fountain of the Gospel. And thence she crosses to the right. From Bethsur she came to Escol, which is rendered "cluster". Whence, in testimony of a most fertile land, … the spies carried a cluster of wonderful size. And after no long space she entered the cells of Sarah, seeing the cradle of Isaac and the traces of Abraham's oak, under which he saw the day of Christ and was glad. And rising up thence she ascended Hebron, that is Cariath-arbe, that is, the town of four men… On the next day, the sun being now risen, she stood on the brow of Caphar Barucha, that is, of the Villa of Blessing, to which place Abraham accompanied the Lord: whence, looking down upon the broad wilderness and the land once of Sodom and Gomorrha, of Adama and Seboim, she contemplated the vineyards of balsam at Engaddi; and Segor, "a heifer of three years old", which was formerly called Bala, and was turned into Zoara, that is, "the Little One", in the Syriac tongue. She remembered the cave of Lot, and, turning to tears, admonished her virgin companions that wine must be shunned, whose work the Moabites and Ammonites are…

[334] Afterwards, having entered the sepulchre of Lazarus, she saw the lodging of Mary and Martha, with Jerome and Bethphage, the village of the priestly jawbones, and the place in which the wanton colt of the gentiles received the bridle of God, and, spread with the garments of the Apostles, offered his soft back for sitting. And by a straight road she went down to Jericho, thinking again of that wounded man of the Gospel, … and of the place Adomim, which is interpreted "of bloods", because much blood was shed there by the frequent raids of robbers: and of the sycamore tree of Zacchæus; and beside the way the places of the blind men… Entering Jericho, she saw the city which Hiel founded in Abiram his firstborn, and whose gates he set up in Segub the youngest of his sons. She looked upon the camp of Galgala, and the Heap of foreskins, and the mystery of the second circumcision; and the twelve stones which, brought thither from the bed of the Jordan, had made firm the foundations of the twelve Apostles; and the fountain, once most bitter and barren, of the Law, which the true Elisha seasoned with his wisdom and turned into sweetness and abundance. Scarcely had the night passed when in the fiercest heat she came to the Jordan; she stood on the bank of the river, and, the sun being risen, she remembered the Sun of justice, how in the midst of the river's bed the priests set dry footsteps, and how, at the command of Elijah and Elisha, the waters standing on either side, the wave furnished a road: and how the Lord cleansed by his own baptism the waters polluted by the flood and stained by the slaying of the whole human race.

[335] It would be long, if I should wish to speak of the valley of Achor, … in Palestine she surveyed. in which theft and avarice were condemned; and of Bethel, the house of God, in which Jacob, naked and poor, slept upon the naked ground, and … saw the ladder reaching up to heaven. The sepulchres too, on Mount Ephraim, of Jesus the son of Nun, and of Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest, she venerated from over against them… Why should I tell of Shiloh, in which the ruined altar is shown even today, and where the tribe of Benjamin anticipated the rape of the Sabines by Romulus? She passed through Shechem, … which is now called Neapolis, and entered the church built on the side of Mount Gerizim beside the well of Jacob: sitting upon which the Lord, thirsting and hungering, was satisfied by the faith of the Samaritan woman… And turning aside thence she saw the sepulchres of the twelve patriarchs: and Sebaste, that is, Samaria, which in honour of Augustus was named by Herod in the Greek tongue Augusta. There are buried the prophets Elisha and Abdias, and … John the Baptist. Where she trembled, dismayed by many marvels… She went up the mountain on foot, in whose two caves, in the time of persecution and famine, the prophet Abdias fed a hundred prophets with bread and water. Thence with a quick journey she ran through Nazareth, the nurse of the Lord; Cana and Capharnaum, familiar with his signs; the lake of Tiberias, sanctified by the Lord's sailing upon it; and the wilderness in which many thousands of people were fed with a few loaves… She climbed Mount Tabor, on which the Lord was transfigured. She looked far off at the mountains Hermon and Hermoniim, and the widest plains of Galilee, in which Sisara and all his army were laid low, Barak conquering; the torrent Cison, which divided the middle of the plain; and the town beside Naim, in which the widow's son was raised up, was pointed out…

[336] Jerome, having set out into Egypt with Paula, I will pass over to Egypt; and at Sochoth, and by the fountain of Samson, which he brought forth from the grinding tooth of the jawbone, I will pause a little; and I will bathe my parched lips, that, refreshed, I may see Morasthim, once the sepulchre of the prophet Micah, now a church. And I will leave on one side the Horites and the Gittites, Maresa, Idumæa, and Lachish: and through the softest sands, which withdraw themselves from the footsteps of those who pass, I will come to Sior, the river of Egypt, … and will pass through the five cities of Egypt which speak the tongue of Canaan, and the land of Goshen, and the plains of Tanis, in which God did wonders: and the city No, which was afterwards turned into Alexandria; and the Lord's town of Nitria, in which with the purest nitre of virtues the filth of very many is washed away daily. Presently he adds with how great piety she visited the monks, and at last returned, coming by sea from Pelusium to Majoma, and going back to Bethlehem, there to remain for ever. That Jerome was the companion of this whole journey, and that he received the information about the places from the learned men who guided them, but that he set forth the histories and mysteries of sacred Scripture to St. Paula more fully, I am altogether persuaded. But about what was done at Alexandria something more must be said.

[337] He consults Didymus about doubtful points of sacred Scripture, That he came to Alexandria at St. Paula's request, Jerome declares in the preface of the Commentaries on Hosea, writing thus to Pammachius, Paula's son-in-law: Whence about twenty-two years ago, when at the request of the holy and venerable woman, your mother-in-law, nay rather your mother, Paula, … who always burned with love of monasteries and of the Scriptures, I was at Alexandria, I saw Didymus, and often heard him, a man the most learned of his time, and I asked him that he would complete what Origen had not done, and would write Commentaries on Hosea; and he dictated three books at my request, and five others on Zachariah. From these words we have, first, that that journey was made in the year 386; for it cannot be fixed earlier from what has been related above, nor yet later, since twenty-two years, even incomplete, cannot otherwise be found before the Commentaries on Hosea, written about the end of the year 406. From the same passage I cannot doubt that St. Jerome set out into Egypt together with St. Paula, since at her request he undertook that journey in the same year in which she did. Of Didymus consulted at Alexandria he speaks thus in the Preface of the Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians: In fine, lately for this cause above all (of consulting learned men) I went to Alexandria, that I might see Didymus, and might inquire of him about all the things in the Scriptures which I held doubtful. It is likely that St. Paula was present at these consultations of Jerome with Didymus also.

[338] But on account of these, even though they were continued but a short time, and for this cause reckoned him among his masters, the most humble Jerome reckons Didymus among his masters. For in Epistle 50 (elsewhere 51) to Domnio he has it thus: I had Gregory Nazianzen and Didymus as my catechists in the holy Scriptures. St. Jerome was a master rather than a disciple, both in years and in sacred knowledge, when he propounded his doubts to Didymus,

as is clear from Epistle 84 (elsewhere 65) to Pammachius and Oceanus, in which he writes the following about these matters: My head was already sprinkled with grey hairs, and it befitted a master rather than a disciple. Yet I went on to Alexandria, I heard Didymus. In many things I give him thanks: what I did not know, I learned: what I knew, I did not lose by his teaching. Thus the saint speaks, because Didymus was indeed a most skilled interpreter of sacred Scripture, yet a follower of Origen in many things. He hints, therefore, that Didymus profited him for the understanding of the difficulties of sacred Scripture, and did not harm him as regards the integrity of Catholic doctrines. Rufinus, who objected against St. Jerome many things that were harmless or even praiseworthy, turned it into a crime that he had written a courteous Epistle to Didymus, which has perished, as Jerome says in the said Epistle 84, writing thus: And a certain man dares to produce my letters to Didymus, as to a master. A great crime in a disciple, if I have called a learned and aged man my master. And yet I should like to inspect the Epistle itself, which has been kept so long for a calumny. It contains nothing but honour and greeting. These things are inept and frivolous.

[339] The same Rufinus carps at Jerome in book 2 of the Invectives, even though he stayed with him but a short time. as if he gloried too much in Didymus as his master. Moreover this man, he says, who in his whole life did not stay a full thirty days at Alexandria, where Didymus was, through almost all his little books boasts far and wide that he is the disciple of Didymus the Seer, and that he had Didymus as his καθηγητής, that is, preceptor, in the holy Scriptures. And all that boasting was purchased in a single month. We readily believe that Jerome did not stay more than a month at Alexandria, since he both visited the monasteries of Egypt and returned in the same summer into Palestine, as we shall see. But a most learned man, who had begun the study of the sacred Scriptures easily twenty years before, and had for several years been in it the master of others, even learned men, could propound more to Didymus in a single month than a common disciple would learn in a long time, nay, perhaps more than Rufinus himself had learned. Without warrant, therefore, does he carp at Jerome for the brevity of the time, who is rather to be praised because with a grateful mind he indicated his masters, although Didymus is really Jerome's master in no other sense than that he consulted him about some more obscure passages of Scripture—in which way St. Augustine too often desired to confer his doubts with Jerome, had occasion been given; and perhaps in that conference Didymus learned no fewer things than Jerome did. But Jerome's modesty is to be praised, in that he attributed the honour of mastership to the elder man.

[340] With St. Paula he visits the monasteries of Nitria, From Alexandria St. Jerome went on further into Nitria together with Paula, as seems to me sufficiently certain. Of himself he says: Thence I hastened to Egypt, I surveyed the monasteries of Nitria, and among the choirs of the saints I perceived that asps lay hid. So too he brings Paula after Alexandria to the Lord's town, Nitria, by the words given at number 336 from the Epitaph, where St. Jerome adds: Which (town) when she had seen, the holy and venerable bishop Isidore the confessor meeting her, and innumerable throngs of monks, of whom many the priestly and levitical degree exalted, she rejoiced indeed at the glory of the Lord, but confessed herself unworthy of so great an honour. Why then [\] should I tell of the Macarii, the Arsenii, the Serapions, and the remaining names of the columns of Christ? Whose cell did she not enter? At whose feet did she not fall? Through each of the saints she believed that she saw Christ, and rejoiced that whatever she had bestowed on them she had bestowed upon the Lord. Thus briefly does Jerome speak of the chief monks whom he saw with St. Paula. Who these seem to be has been said in the Annotations to the Life of St. Paula. Certainly Isidore the bishop and confessor is not St. Isidore of Pelusium, as the Veronese editor noted by a slip of memory, since he was never a bishop and was a young man in the year 386. That St. Arsenius is not designated either, but that we must read Arsisius* or in some other way, since St. Arsenius came to the desert long after the year 386, the Veronese editor admits.

[341] and at length returns with her to Bethlehem. Paula, moreover, somehow desired to pass her life in the midst of the monks, for which cause she would beyond doubt have built a monastery of women, but Jerome in all likelihood dissuaded her from it, who continues thus: A wondrous ardour, and a fortitude scarcely credible in a woman. Forgetful of her sex and of bodily frailty, she desired to dwell with her maidens among so many thousands of monks. And perhaps, all men receiving her, she would have obtained it, had not a greater longing for the holy places drawn her back. And because of the fiercest heats, coming by sea from Pelusium (a coastal city of Egypt) to Majoma (the port of the city of Gaza in Palestine), she returned with such swiftness that you would have thought her a bird. And not long after, being about to remain for ever in holy Bethlehem, she remained for three years in a narrow little lodging, etc. What Jerome subjoins in book 3 against Rufinus, after finding asps among the saints, about his own return, agrees rightly with Paula's journey. Straightway, he says, with quickened step I returned to my own Bethlehem, where I adored the manger and the swaddling-clothes of the Saviour. The saint adds: I saw also the most famous lake (the Asphaltite, I think), nor did I give myself over to idle leisure, but learned many things which I did not know before. But this perhaps he says of another and lesser journey, which he could have made afterwards without St. Paula. For the rest, on occasion of Jerome's words, that he found asps, that is, Origenists, among the monks, we observe that even then he shrank from the errors of Origen, even though he dealt with Didymus about the exposition of the Scriptures. But more will be said of these things in another place, against the objections of Rufinus.

\ elsewhere ego*

§ XX. The saint's life at Bethlehem and his first occupations: his Hebrew master Baranina, and Rufinus's ridiculous accusations on his account.

At first he dwells at Bethlehem in a narrow lodging, Of Bethlehem, where Jerome's piety chose his habitation on account of the birthplace of Christ the Lord, and of the neighbouring sepulchre of the Lord at Jerusalem, the studious reader will find many things in Epistle 46 (elsewhere 17), which was given in the name of Paula and Eustochium either in that same year 386 or not long after, to St. Marcella, and was in all likelihood composed by Jerome himself. No other Epistle of Jerome is found for the first years of his dwelling at Bethlehem, so that the saint seems then to have occupied himself solely with those studies which conduce to the understanding of sacred Scripture, and to have wished to lead a life so solitary that he abstained even from frequent commerce of letters. But since he says that St. Paula remained for three years in a narrow little lodging, Jerome himself beyond doubt was content with a narrower one, who had fewer companions with him than St. Paula had virgins. But in the year 388 or 389, as I observed on the 28th of September in St. Eustochium, Paula with her company, and in all likelihood Jerome too with his companions, began to inhabit monasteries built at Paula's expense. For of these Jerome subjoins in Paula's Epitaph, number 14: Until she should build cells and monasteries, and found lodgings for divers pilgrims beside the road, on which Mary and Joseph had found no lodging.

[343] That one of these was a monastery of men, which (Paula) had handed over to men to govern, Jerome declares in the same place at number 19. afterwards in a monastery, over which he always presided, The saint himself presided over it until his death, and helped Paula, who was set over the women, and afterwards Eustochium, with his counsels and instructions. That the monastery was not beside the public road Jerome intimates in the book on Hebrew Places, on Genesis, at Bethlehem, where he says that near Bethlehem was the tomb of king Archelaus in that place which is the beginning of the path that turns aside from the public road to our cells, as he says. The author of the first Life, who could have known St. Jerome's monastery, even though he frequently errs in other things, has it thus about its founding: Many religious men, to whom the fame of his life was known, at once flowed together to him, and good disciples observed their good Teacher still under a little hut: and not long afterwards, because of the multitude of disciples and the throng of those arriving, he built himself a cell, a small little place of habitation, at the Bethlehem gate which looks to the West and is seen by those going out to the North—namely with the wealth of St. Paula, who supported Jerome and his monks. Afterwards, however, Jerome, having sold his paternal goods through his brother, laboured at founding a hospice, as will be said in its own place.

[344] With what intention Jerome had chosen a solitary habitation at Bethlehem, leading a solitary life, Jerome declares in various places. In the book against John of Jerusalem, near the end, he says of himself and of Vincentius the presbyter: For it was on this account that both I forsook Antioch and he Constantinople, most renowned cities, not that we might praise you preaching among the peoples; but that in the fields and in solitude, bewailing the sins of our youth, we might bend the mercy of Christ toward us. In Epistle 117 (elsewhere 47) to a Mother and Daughter, when he was invited to correct them by a letter, he answered the one who urged him: As though indeed I held an episcopal chair, and were not shut in my cell and far removed from the crowds, either bewailing past vices or striving to avoid present ones. What he presently adds also intimates that the saint was then less ready to send letters into remote provinces. But it is also unfitting, he says, to lie hid in body and to wander with the tongue through the whole world. More from that Epistle I shall give in its own place. How highly he valued solitude he intimates in Epistle 125 (elsewhere 101) to Rusticus in these words: Let others see what they think: for each is led by his own judgment. To me a town is a prison, and solitude a paradise. Of his cell he makes mention in other places also.

[345] and content with cheap food and clothing. Moreover, that Jerome was content with cheap food in his solitude he himself intimates in several places. In Epistle 79 (elsewhere 9) to Salvina he declares that he writes in praise of Nebridius, her deceased husband, provoked by no benefit, and intimates his own frugality in these words: Far from Christians be such a suspicion. "Having food and raiment, with these we are content". Where there is a cheap little herb, and common bread, and moderate food and drink, there riches are superfluous, there is no flattery, which above all looks to profit. Again in Epistle 130 (elsewhere 8) to Demetrias he shows by a like reason that he is a stranger to flattery, writing thus: Besides, a monastery cell, cheap food, and a despised garment, and an age now near to death, and the provision for a short time, are free from all infamy of adulation. But these things necessary for modest food and clothing, as I have already said, St. Paula procured for Jerome, as also for the whole monastery, as the saint hints in the Epitaph of St. Paula, number 30, where he asserts that no money was left by the dying Paula to Eustochium, but a great debt: and, what is harder than this, an immense multitude of brethren and sisters, whom it is hard to support and impious to cast off. Palladius too, in the Lausiac History, chapter 80, says

that Paula had the care of Jerome. But that Jerome himself lacked money, and did not desire it, as neither a bishopric, we understand from many other places, and by name from his words in book 1 against Rufinus, near the end, where he speaks thus: For neither do we canvass for the priesthood, who lie hid in our cells, nor, condemning humility, do we hasten to purchase a bishopric with gold… Money we neither have nor wish to have. Having food and raiment, with these we are content.

[346] He goes on learning the Hebrew tongue. Among Jerome's first occupations at Bethlehem was the study of the Hebrew tongue, which he had begun to learn in the desert of Chalcis. He wished, namely, to acquire a more perfect knowledge of that tongue, and to that end hired for himself a Jewish master, who came secretly and taught the saint. Of these things he speaks thus in Epistle 84 (elsewhere 65): Men thought that I had made an end of learning. I came again (from Egypt) to Jerusalem and Bethlehem. With what labour, at what price, did I have Baraninas as my nocturnal preceptor! For he feared the Jews, and showed me another Nicodemus! Of that Hebrew preceptor the saint makes mention thus on Isaiah, chapter 22, verses 15, 16 and following: But the Hebrew who instructed us in the reading of the Old Instrument, etc. In other places too he makes mention of the same man, omitting his name. But in the said Epistle Jerome presently declares how much he otherwise shrank from the Jews on account of their perfidy, writing these words: If it is expedient to hate men and to detest any nation, I turn away from the circumcised with a wondrous hatred. For to this day they persecute our Lord Jesus Christ in the synagogues of Satan. Let someone object to me, why did I have a Jew as my preceptor? Thus speaks the saint, judging that what he had done with the best intention was to be disapproved by no one. And indeed I do not see that this plan of Jerome's can be disapproved by any man of sound mind, since he was of such learning that no peril threatened him from that master.

[347] Nevertheless Rufinus objected this against Jerome as a grave crime in book 2 of the Invectives, number 12, under the Jewish master Baraninas. Rufinus, where among other things he says: For, when Christ and Barabbas were set forth together, I, like an unskilled man, chose Christ. You, as I see, cry out with those who say, "Not this man, but Barabbas." And presently: But that Barabbas of yours from the synagogue, chosen instead of Christ, taught you to hope for the resurrection of the flesh not in power but in frailty; to become a friend of the letter that kills and an enemy of the spirit that gives life: and certain other more secret things, which, if the matter shall demand, will afterwards be brought forth in due time. Presently Barabbas the master is repeated again. There will not, I think, be so shameless an adversary of Jerome, and so obstinate a defender of Rufinus's ineptitudes, as to find in these things more of sound sense than of calumny. Certainly Tillemont, who in many places so extols the modesty and moderation of Rufinus, as though he had never read, or at least never seriously weighed, his bloody writings against Jerome, confesses in article 44 that those jests of Rufinus are not only cruel but equally frigid and insipid. Yet even so he wished in part to protect Rufinus or to carp at Jerome, since he intimates that the Jew's name was Barabban or Barabbas, which Jerome denies in the answer presently to be given. But not even Rufinus says that the proper name of that Jew was Barabbas, although for some similarity he uses the name of Barabbas, that he may set a Jewish preceptor against a Christian one; while Jerome openly denies that he was called Barabbas. And so we must either charge Jerome with a lie, who knew the name of his own master, or condemn the criticism of Tillemont, who tacitly charges Jerome with a lie, so as not even here to desert Rufinus.

[348] I should like just now to ask the defenders of Rufinus whether they know calumniating bitterly on that occasion, what those more secret things are which Jerome had learned from the Jew, as Rufinus asserts; and whether they think that Rufinus—who accuses Jerome's praiseworthy deeds so atrociously, who wove a disputation no less prolix than inept to show the saint a perjurer on the strength of a dream, who published many other things about Jerome, so that he seems to have brought out everything he knew, and likewise to have asserted many things which he did not know—covered those more secret things meanwhile with silence, and did not, after the manner of calumniators, invent the more secret things? He objects in the same place that the saint was introduced to Logic by the εἰσαγωγή of Porphyry. A grave crime, if as a youth he used the logical work of a gentile that he might learn the art of reasoning! Nevertheless Rufinus again infers from it the following: For Porphyry taught you to speak ill of Christians, to cut to pieces virgins, continent persons, deacons, presbyters, and to defame in published little books absolutely every degree and order of Christians. These things are false. But if they were true, it would be ineptly and falsely said that Jerome learned them from the Dialectical work which he used at Rome under a master. I have wished to bring these things forward, that the studious reader may be able to form a judgment about the moderation which some ridiculously attribute to Rufinus. For these things and others no less grave and inept Rufinus brought forward against St. Jerome, because Jerome had declared himself generally against the Origenists.

[349] he is refuted with a jest by Jerome. Let not the prudent reader wonder, therefore, that St. Jerome repels so insipid an adversary with laughter and a free jest: and let him rather acknowledge with St. Augustine the signal moderation of the saint, who in book 1 against Rufinus answers thus: I hear besides that you carp philosophically at certain things in my Epistle, and that a man of wrinkled brow and knitted eyebrow sports upon me with Plautine salt, because I said that Barabbas the Jew was my preceptor. Nor is it any wonder if for BARANINAS, where there is some similarity of words, you have written Barabbas, since you have so great a licence of changing names that out of Eusebius you have made Pamphilus, and out of a heretic a martyr. The man must be guarded against, and by me above all avoided, lest suddenly, while I am unaware, you name me Sardanapalus instead of Jerome. Hear then, thou pillar of wisdom and rule of Catonian severity. I did not call him my master; but I wished to prove my own zeal for the holy Scriptures, that I might show that I had read Origen in the same way as I had heard him (Baraninas). For neither ought I to learn Hebrew letters from you. Presently he brings forward more to prove his plan by reason and by the examples of others. But as to what he says, that Rufinus substituted St. Pamphilus for Eusebius, Jerome had already proved it before. For he shows that nothing written by Pamphilus was ever published, and therefore that the Apology which Rufinus published for Origen under the name of St. Pamphilus must be reckoned Eusebius of Cæsarea's, not St. Pamphilus's. The prudent reader will see that in the words alleged Rufinus is laughed at by Jerome because he affected the highest gravity of manners, and yet meanwhile, though wounded by no word, so bitterly accused deeds that were innocent. Hence he calls him ironically the pillar of wisdom and rule of Catonian severity. I can scarcely persuade myself that those severe censors who accuse Jerome of excessive bitterness would not, if they were accused in the same way in which Rufinus accused Jerome, be far more bitter.

[350] The Apology which Jerome denied to be the martyr Pamphilus's, But it must be briefly observed here that a suit is brought against Jerome by the defenders of Rufinus, because he denied that the Apology translated by Rufinus was St. Pamphilus's, and proved rather that it was Eusebius's. To pass over others, Tillemont, in volume 5, Note 2 on St. Pamphilus, contends that it is not proved by St. Jerome that that Apology is not St. Pamphilus's. Wherefore I bring forward, for brevity's sake, only one argument of Jerome's. In book 1 against Rufinus, number 9, he recites from the Life of Pamphilus written by Eusebius a passage in which Pamphilus's love for the learned and his zeal for collecting books are praised. Then these words are added: And he himself indeed wrote nothing at all of his own work, except letters which he perhaps sent to his friends: so far had he cast himself down in humility. These words seem to leave no doubt. For if he wrote an Apology for Origen, he wrote something of his own work. But to have written something of one's own work, and to have written nothing at all of one's own work, so directly contradict one another that even a novice in dialectic understands that they can never be true together. Yet Tillemont sets against this the words of Eusebius from the History, book 6, chapter 33, where he has it thus: But whatever it is necessary to learn about him can be sought from the Apologetic which was composed by us and by the most holy martyr of our time, Pamphilus, in his defence: which indeed, on account of certain malevolent accusers, we worked out jointly by common zeal and effort. Thus Eusebius, who gladly attributes to himself the holy martyr as a partner in composing that work; and he could truly do so, provided that Pamphilus—who, as the same Eusebius testifies in the passage cited by Jerome, read most studiously the treatises of the ancient writers—supplied to Eusebius various documents to be inserted in the Apology, and still more if he helped him with zeal and counsel, even though he himself wrote nothing.

[351] That this is the genuine exposition of Eusebius's words will be admitted by anyone, I think, must be attributed altogether to Eusebius as its author, who prefers to seek the truth rather than by useless contention to make Eusebius contradict himself. Pamphilus wrote nothing but familiar Epistles; he did not, therefore, write the Apology for Origen. Yet he helped Eusebius, the writer of the Apology, namely by searching in the ancient writers, by showing the passages he had found, by supplying other documents, and perhaps also by suggesting some arguments. Eusebius himself, when he names himself first, abundantly intimates that he was the writer of the Apology, and that Pamphilus was his helper in that work. And this is made plainly certain from the passage alleged by Jerome, in which Pamphilus is said to have written nothing of his own work. And the exception added, of the letters which Pamphilus sent to his friends, also confirms that nothing else was written by him. Socrates, who in book 3, chapter 7, attributes the Apology to Pamphilus and Eusebius together, and Photius, who at pages 297 and 298 likewise calls both of them authors of the Apology, are to be expounded in the same sense. But if they should wish to make Pamphilus a writer also, they are by no means to be heard, since Eusebius most certainly knew in what manner the Apology was composed, and denies that Pamphilus was its writer, while confessing him his helper. Thus by no means are some later writers cited by Tillemont to be heard, who attributed the Apology to Pamphilus, since they were in all likelihood led into error by Jerome, who in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 75, ascribes to Pamphilus an Apology distinct from the Eusebian one. But Jerome acknowledged and retracted the error in books 1 and 3 against Rufinus.

[352] Now indeed everyone will easily perceive that he is neither the author of a work nor called so although Pamphilus helped with it. who supplied the documents, or sought out the material, or even helped the writer with counsel; but he who out of the documents sought out composes the work. For the latter inserts into the work not only his own style but also his own doctrine, whereas the other offers only what belongs to others, or, if he adds anything of his own, submits it to the writer's judgment. Tillemont himself saw that the helpers of writers are not the authors of works; but he wished to attribute a little more to St. Pamphilus, and therefore to subtleties

as it were dialectical, but contrary to sound dialectic, he has recourse. He says, first, to those words of Eusebius, He wrote nothing at all of his own work, that the work was common to Eusebius and Pamphilus, and that therefore nothing is said to have been written by him of his own work. A wretched cavil indeed, which it was not necessary to adopt from an English writer. For Eusebius had said of Pamphilus, He prepared many manuscripts, namely by copying out many with his own hand, as Jerome has it in On Illustrious Men, chapter 75. Therefore Eusebius says he wrote nothing at all of his own work, because he had copied out many works of others. If he had written or dictated the Apology by a common labour with Eusebius in such a way that they were equally authors, so that neither had done anything without the other, Eusebius would have done Pamphilus an injury by saying that he wrote nothing of his own work, since the work would have been the property of both. For a thing is called one's own not only of one man but also of several, if they possess it by common right. Tillemont's second answer is equally wretched, that that Apology, as it was translated by Rufinus, could be reckoned among letters, since it contains almost nothing but the words of Origen and the Epistle to the Confessors. I care to say nothing here, except that Tillemont is everywhere a most wretched antagonist of St. Jerome.

§ XXI. The sacred Scripture read through with SS. Paula and Eustochium and expounded to them: the Commentaries on four Epistles of St. Paul and on Ecclesiastes.

He expounds the Scripture by word of mouth to SS. Paula and Eustochium, We have seen that St. Jerome went through the Hebrew Scripture with Baraninas the Jew. Whether SS. Paula and Eustochium, who learned the Hebrew tongue, were present at these conferences, I nowhere find. But Jerome certainly had other conferences with those holy women, of which he relates the following in the Epitaph of St. Paula, number 26: In fine (St. Paula) compelled me to read through the Old and New Instrument with her daughter, myself discoursing. And this, refusing out of bashfulness, I nevertheless performed on account of her assiduity and frequent demands, so as to teach what I had learned—not from myself, that is, from presumption, the worst of preceptors, but from illustrious men of the Church. If anywhere I hesitated and frankly confessed that I did not know, she would by no means [\] let me rest; but by continual questioning compelled me to indicate which out of many and various opinions seemed to me the more probable. This exposition of sacred Scripture will have been begun after his habitation was fixed at Bethlehem in the year 386 or 387, or at any rate it was begun before the Commentaries written there. For on chapter 2, verses 9 and 10, of the Epistle to Titus he speaks thus of the exposition of Leviticus: Of which I remember to have expounded to you lately in Leviticus. Which beyond doubt he says of expositions given by word of mouth. In all likelihood the saint expounded to them by Epistles also many difficulties of sacred Scripture, as at Rome he had expounded them to Damasus and Marcella, since in reckoning up his own writings in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 135, he says: But of the Epistles to Paula and Eustochium, because they are written daily, the number is uncertain.* But these Epistles have perished.

[354] and at their request he writes upon the Epistle to Philemon; The said holy women drove Jerome, reluctant as he was, by their prayers, to write Commentaries on some Epistles of St. Paul. These the saint reckons first, after the Roman writings, in the catalogue of his works just mentioned, in these words: Three books of Commentaries on Paul's Epistle to the Galatians. Likewise three books on the Epistle to the Ephesians. One book on the Epistle to Titus. One book on the Epistle to Philemon. He adds: Commentaries on Ecclesiastes. All these Commentaries he dedicated to SS. Paula and Eustochium, and consequently wrote them all, as it seems, yet not exactly in the order in which they are here enumerated. He began with the smallest Epistle of St. Paul, that to Philemon, which he proves in the Preface to be both Paul's and canonical. And at the beginning of the Commentary he writes thus: In a preposterous and perverse order it has pleased you that I should dictate upon the Epistles of Paul. For when you frequently asked, O Paula and Eustochium, that I should do it, and I strenuously refused to do it, you compelled me at least to discuss the small one, which seemed to you the last both in the number of its lines and in sense and order. Thus that most humble man, who did not yet trust himself, although he was conspicuous for manifold learning, and had for many years turned over the sacred Scriptures with continual study.

[355] The Epistle to Philemon expounded, the saint straightway undertook to expound the Epistle to the Galatians in three books. then for the sake of St. Marcella also, For he begins the Preface of the first book thus: It is very few days since, having interpreted Paul's Epistle to Philemon, I had passed over to the Galatians, passing over many that lay between. And behold, suddenly letters were brought me from the City, announcing that both the venerable old woman Albina (mother of St. Marcella) had been restored to the presence of the Lord, and that St. Marcella, deprived of her mother's companionship, now demands the more your consolation, O Paula and Eustochium. And because this meanwhile cannot be, on account of the great spaces of sea and land between, I should wish at least to heal the wound suddenly inflicted with the medicine of the Scriptures. I know indeed her ardour, I know her faith, what a flame she always has in her breast, that she surpasses her sex, forgets the human, and, at the beating of the timbrel of the divine volumes, crosses the Red Sea of this world. Certainly when I was at Rome she never saw me in such haste but that she asked something about the Scriptures. Nor indeed, after the Pythagorean manner, did she think whatever I answered was right: nor did a prejudged authority prevail with her without reason; but she examined all things, and weighed everything with a sagacious mind, so that I felt I had not so much a disciple as a judge. And so, since I reckon that it will both be most pleasing to her who is absent, and useful to you who are present, I set about a work untried before me by writers of our tongue, and taken in hand even by the Greeks themselves by scarcely a few, as the dignity of the matter required.

[356] Then he enumerates the writers who had expounded the Epistles of St. Paul, he explains the Epistle to the Galatians, and, disapproving Marius Victorinus and preferring Origen to the rest, continues thus: Not that I am ignorant that Caius Marius Victorinus, who taught rhetoric at Rome when I was a boy, published Commentaries on the Apostle; but because, occupied with the learning of secular letters, he was wholly ignorant of the holy Scriptures; and no one, however eloquent, can dispute well about what he does not know. What then, am I foolish or rash, in promising what he could not do? By no means. Nay rather in this, as it seems to me, I am the more cautious and the more timid, in that, feeling the weakness of my own powers, I have followed the Commentaries of Origen. He subjoins also the writings of Origen on the Epistle, and enumerates other Greek writers on the Epistles of St. Paul; but none among them was properly Catholic, so that Origen was certainly the chief before Jerome, and Chrysostom followed afterwards. Then he subjoins these things: And so, to confess it simply, I have read all these, and heaping up very many things in my mind, having called a notary, I dictated either my own things or others', retaining meanwhile the memory neither of order nor sometimes of words nor of meanings. It is now only for the Lord's mercy that things well said by others should not perish through our unskilfulness, and that what pleases among their own should not fail to please among strangers. Thus far Jerome concerning the writers whom he could consult. And of these none was of great name except Origen, unless one should wish to add Didymus and Apollinaris, who did not lack acuteness; so that it is no wonder that at that time, when approved interpreters were few, Origen was held in admiration by Jerome for the understanding of the Scriptures, although he did not approve his perverse doctrines.

[357] At the beginning of book 2 the saint intimates his own diligence, by which in the interpretation of the Scriptures he consulted the passages of the Old Testament alleged in the New, consulting the texts alleged from the Old Testament, writing thus: I have this custom, that, as often as anything is taken by the Apostles from the Old Instrument, I run back to the original books, and diligently examine how they are written in their own places. His modesty, which shines out excellently in the words alleged above, he makes manifest again at chapter 4, verses 22 and 23, in these words: Let these things meanwhile be said, so far as the mediocrity of our genius allows. But if anyone can find something greater, how Ismael, who was born of the bondwoman, is not the son of promise, but Isaac, who was born of the free woman, he rather is to be heard. He was unwilling, therefore, to prescribe a law to others, that they should not dare to expound otherwise. This modesty also seems to have brought it about that he from time to time alleged the opinions of Origen or of others, which, even if he did not approve them, he does not laboriously refute, as though he had been hindered by a modest shame from openly fighting against one whom he knew to be most learned. But of these things more hereafter.

[358] but neglecting ornament of speech, Besides, when St. Jerome seriously set his mind to composing Commentaries upon the sacred Scripture, he prudently cast away ornament of speech and the pomp of eloquence—not that he uses an inelegant style, but because he preferred by clear and simple diction to resolve the obscure difficulties of the sacred Letters, rather than by the little flowers of rhetoric to make his exposition less lucid. That he had long abstained from the reading of the gentile writers, among whom eloquence is to be sought, he also declares in the Preface of book 2 in these words: And, to confess it simply, it is now many years since we ceased to read these things. But more fully does that most modest man declare his mind in the Preface of book 3, beginning thus: This third volume on the Galatians, O Paula and Eustochium, we hammer out, not unaware of our weakness, and feeling that the rivulet of our slender genius scarcely murmurs with a little sound. For now in the churches too these things (he means ornaments of words) are sought; and, the simplicity and purity of Apostolic words being laid aside, men assemble as to an Athenæum and lecture-halls, that the applause of the bystanders may be stirred up, that discourse, painted with the falsehood of the rhetorical art, may come forth into public like some little harlot, not so much to instruct the peoples as to seek the people's favour, and, after the manner of a psaltery and a sweetly singing flute, may soothe the senses of the hearers … But what shall I do? Shall I be silent? But it is written: "Thou shalt not appear empty in the sight of thy Lord"… Shall I speak? But the harsh sound of the Hebrew reading has soiled all elegance of speech and all the charm of Latin eloquence.

[359] as an interpreter of sacred Scripture must do For you yourselves know that it is more than fifteen years since Tully ever came into my hands, or Maro, or any author whatever of the gentile letters: and if perchance anything from them creeps in while we speak, we remember it as an ancient dream through a mist. But what I have gained from the unwearied study of that tongue I leave to the judgment of others. I know what I have lost in my own. To this is added that, on account of the infirmity of my eyes and of my whole poor body, I do not write with my own hand, nor can I make up by labour and diligence for the slowness of my speech… But, having called a notary, I either dictate at once whatever comes into my mouth; or, if I wish to think a little,

being about to bring forth something better, then he silently reproves me, contracts his hand, wrinkles his brow, and by the whole gesture of his body protests that he is present in vain … To what purpose these things? Namely, that both to you and to the rest who may perchance wish to read there may be an answer: that I am not writing a panegyric or a controversy, but a Commentary; that is, that I have this purpose, not that my own words should be praised, but that what has been well said by another should be understood as it was said. It is my office to discuss obscure things, to touch briefly upon the manifest, to linger over the doubtful. Whence by most men the work of Commentaries is called an Explanation. If anyone seeks eloquence, or is delighted with declamations, he has in either tongue Demosthenes and Tully, Polemon and Quintilian. The Church of Christ was gathered not from the academy and the lyceum, but from the lowly common folk.

[360] Then he proves this from the Apostle, and adds that the Apostles used simple words for the instruction of the people, he teaches. An accusation brought against the saint is refuted. and that even so the books of the Apostles are read more than those of the philosophers, and infers the following: And so their simple words must be laid open in simple speech: their words, I say, not their sense. But if, by your prayers, I could [\] have in expounding their Epistles that spirit which they had in dictating them, then you would see [\] that there was in these as great a majesty and breadth of true wisdom as there was arrogance and vanity in the literary men of the world. Briefly I confess to you the secret of my mind. He who is to understand the Apostle through me, I do not wish that he should understand my writings with difficulty, and, in order to know the Interpreter, should seek another interpreter. All these things I have thought should be recited, both that anyone may understand the saint's mind about the style suited to the exposition of sacred Scripture, and because Tillemont, in article 1, reckons among St. Jerome's faults that he seemed to have too high an opinion of his own eloquence and to boast of it too much. For the words alleged by no means intimate this, but plainly the contrary: for what cause did he weave as it were an apology for the simplicity of his style, if he was over-confident of his eloquence? Jerome was in truth adorned with signal eloquence, and proved it by many writings, in which the ornament and gravity of his discourse conduced to the end he had set before himself. But it is one thing to be eloquent, another to boast of eloquence or to flatter oneself too much about it. The first I find in all Jerome's writings: the second I can make manifest by no indication, nor has Jerome's censurer alleged any passage from which he tried to prove his accusation.

[361] The three books on the Epistle to the Galatians having been composed, Explaining the Epistle to the Ephesians, the saint passed to another, and expounded the Epistle to the Ephesians likewise in three books. In the Preface of the first book he himself indicates this in this manner: And because already, at your prayers, a few days ago we set forth what seemed good to us on the Galatians, now we must pass to the Ephesians, the middle Epistle of Paul, as in order, so also in meanings. That even then there were rivals who disparaged St. Jerome's studies is gathered from the same Preface. For, having commended the study of sacred Scripture, he answers them modestly, not boasting of his style but rather excusing himself. I subjoin the whole beginning: If there is anything, Paula and Eustochium, which holds a wise man in this life, and persuades him to remain of an even mind amid the pressures and whirlwinds of the world, I reckon it to be first of all the meditation and knowledge of the Scriptures. For since in this above all we differ from the other living creatures, that we are a rational animal and can speak; and since all reason and speech is contained in the divine books, through which we both learn God and are not ignorant why we were created: I marvel that there have been some who, giving themselves to sloth and sleep, are unwilling to learn what is excellent; or who think that the rest, who have this zeal, are to be reprehended. To whom, although I could answer more severely, and briefly dismiss them either offended or appeased—that it is far better to read the Scriptures than to gape after increasing and heaping up wealth—I shall say this, which I would maintain even before the most unjust judge, that my leisure pleases me, and that solitude seems to me more delightful than all the crowd: and that, as I do not reprehend, do not condemn what they do, so they ought to grant me my own ineptitudes.

[362] he endures rivals, whom he confutes, I am little eloquent—what is that to you? Read a more eloquent man. Do I not worthily translate Greek into Latin? Either read the Greeks, if you have knowledge of that tongue; or, if you are only a Latin, do not judge a free gift, and, as the common proverb has it, look a gift horse in the teeth. Do I drag you to court with joined hand, because you do not write our things? [\] Everyone more unskilled than I will read me: your sayings perhaps, if you write them, Tully will admire. Did Tertullian deter the blessed martyr Cyprian from writing, or Cyprian Lactantius, or Lactantius Hilary? I say nothing of the other small fry who chatter at me in their books. Unless there are small things too, great ones cannot stand out. The first is not so called unless a second and a third follow. We do not climb to the heights unless we step through the depths. Wherefore I beseech both you who are present, and the holy Marcella, the unique pattern of widowhood, not lightly to hand over my little works to slanderers and the envious; and not to give what is holy to dogs, nor to cast pearls before swine. Who, since they cannot imitate what is good, do the only thing they can—they envy; and they think themselves learned and erudite in this, if they disparage others. To whom, I beseech you, answer that they should themselves set pen to paper, that they should join three words together, as the saying is; that they should sweat a little, and make trial of themselves, that from their own labour they may learn to pardon those who labour. For you yourselves know that you compelled me to this work of Explanations unwilling and drawing back.* These things abundantly teach that detractors were not lacking to Jerome as soon as he wrote upon sacred Scripture.

[363] and writing for Paula, Eustochium and Marcella, It is further clear from what has been alleged that those Commentaries on the Epistles of St. Paul were written also for the sake of St. Marcella, who continued to dwell at Rome and to write from time to time to Jerome, as again is clear from the Preface of the second book, which I subjoin entire: At your prayers, O Paula and Eustochium, we set about the second book on the Ephesians, being about to send new little gifts to Rome also: not that the senate of the learned should deign to read these things and to enrol them in the libraries of the ancients; but because the holy Marcella demands by letter that this very thing be done. As often as I remember her studies, her genius, her labour, so often do I condemn myself for sloth, who, placed in the solitude of the monastery and looking upon that manger in which the shepherds in their haste adored the wailing Little One, cannot do what a noble woman, amid a noisy household and the management of a house, accomplishes in her spare hours. Wherefore I pray both her and you, and any who shall perchance read, all in common, to know that I do not bring forth a discourse long pondered and polished, but that for revealing the mysteries of the Scriptures I use words almost from the crossroads, and sometimes in single days reach the number of a thousand lines, so that the Explanation of the Apostle, once begun, may be completed by the prayers of Paul himself, whose Epistles we are attempting to expound.

[364] The third book he directs by yet another Preface to SS. Paula and Eustochium, and likewise makes mention of St. Marcella, he intermingles excellent and so commends the knowledge of the Scriptures that he far prefers a just man imbued with that knowledge to a just man who is simple and unlearned; yet he prudently adds that unlearned justice is to be preferred to any learning whatsoever destitute of the ornament of virtues. But if anyone, he says, instructed only in the meditation of the Law, neglects his own life, … he is like sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal, and salt that has lost its savour, to be trodden under foot in the dunghill. But if the choice of each be given (setting aside him who has both wisdom and justice), I should rather have just rusticity than learned wickedness, etc. He gives other excellent instructions on morals also in the same book. I bring forward one passage for an example, where he wisely expounds the words of the Apostle, chapter 5, verse 20, Giving thanks always for all things, which he observes must be so understood of prosperity and adversity that not only for those things which we think good, but also for those which press us hard and come against our will, the glad mind should break forth into the praise of God, as Job did, whose words he brings forward.

[365] And this doctrine he straightway illustrates in this manner: instructions of piety toward God. This giving of thanks is observed among prudent men both generally and specially: generally, that we give thanks to God because the sun rises for us, the day runs its course, the night is changed into rest, the darkness is tempered by the splendour of the moon, and by the rising and setting of the stars the seasons change and return: because the rains serve us, the earth brings forth, the elements wait upon us, because so great varieties of animals have been given either for carrying, or for working, or for food, or for covering, or for example, or for wonder: and at the last, because we were born, because we subsist, because in the world, as in the house of some most powerful head of a household, we exercise the management, and understand that all that is in the world was created for our sake. But specially, when we give thanks for the benefits of God which come to us. But this both the gentile does and the Jew, both the publican and the heathen. It is the proper virtue of Christians to render thanks to the Creator even in those things which are thought adverse. If a house has fallen down, if a most beloved wife and children have been cut off by captivity or poison or shipwreck, if we have lost our riches by proscription, if innumerable diseases and the weakness of gout, always to be looked for by wretched men, have broken our health. Those who seem to themselves holier are wont to render thanks to God because they have been freed from perils or from miseries. But according to the Apostle this is the greatest virtue, that in the very perils and miseries thanks be rendered to God, and that we should always say: Blessed be God; I know that I bear less than I deserve: these things are small compared to my sins: nothing is rendered to me that is worthy of them. This is the mind of a Christian; this man, taking up his cross, follows the Saviour, whom neither bereavement nor losses weaken. Thus far the saint.

[366] There followed the Exposition of the Epistle to Titus, directed in its Preface to Paula and Eustochium. He explains the Epistle to Titus. He does not indeed make mention in the Preface of the preceding ones; but at chapter 1, verses 10 and 11, he speaks thus: And we, a few months ago, dictated three volumes in explanation of the Epistle to the Galatians. But since from what has been said above it is established that the exposition of the Epistle to the Ephesians followed immediately upon the explanation of that to the Galatians, a few months designate the time in which he expounded the Epistle to the Ephesians and carried that to Titus thus far. It is therefore not to be doubted that this book of Commentaries on Titus straightway

followed after the rest on the three other Epistles of St. Paul. Further, from the words alleged we can conjecture that several months were spent in explaining those four Epistles of St. Paul. The saint would indeed have finished sooner, if he had dictated daily; but it is likely that he was occupied on far more days in seeking out and preparing the matter to be dictated than in dictating. For at chapter 5, verse 14, on the Ephesians, he intimates with how great diligence he sought out the words there praised by the Apostle, Rise, thou that sleepest, etc., writing thus: I certainly, according to my poor little means, diligently winnowing all the editions of the ancient Scriptures, and the very volumes of the Hebrews, have never found this written. A like diligence in seeking out the passages alleged by the Apostle in the Old Testament the saint declares in the words given at number 357. I would not, therefore, have the prudent reader think that those Commentaries are a hasty work, or one too much hurried. For although the saint says above, at number 359: I either dictate at once whatever comes into my mouth, etc.; and again at number 363, that he sometimes reaches in single days the number of a thousand lines; he asserts these things only of the swiftness of dictating matter already conceived by diligent study, the care of polishing the discourse being neglected. Jerome therefore does not deny that he diligently investigated the true sense of St. Paul's Epistles, and all those aids by which he might explain it to others; but only says that he did not seek ornament of speech, or that he did not interpose delays in dictating for the sake of a more polished style.

[367] He wrote those Commentaries in the year 389, The year in which the saint composed the Commentaries on those four Epistles of Paul is somewhat made known from the words alleged at number 359: For you yourselves know that it is more than fifteen years since Tully ever came into my hands, or Maro, or any author whatever of the gentile letters. For in §6 I proved that the dream, on account of which the saint abstained from the reading of the profane writers, happened in the year 374 at the time of the Lenten fast. If now we add more than fifteen years, he will have written upon the Epistle to the Galatians, where he says this, in the year 389, and in all likelihood in the same year upon all four in the order designated above. I find nothing repugnant to this chronological arrangement. For the greater part of the year 386 was spent in the journeys through Palestine and Egypt. Then Jerome read the Old Testament in Hebrew with Baraninas, and the Old and New with SS. Paula and Eustochium, so that he could easily have occupied himself with these studies in the years 387 and 388, with the added care of the monasteries, which at that time were being built at St. Paula's expense, but with Jerome helping her by counsel and by the care of ordering everything. That these Commentaries cannot be fixed later is clear from the following ones on Ecclesiastes, which must necessarily be fixed either in the close of that same year 389 or at the beginning of the year 390. Tillemont, article 48, and Vallarsius in the Preface to volume 7 of St. Jerome's Works, fix those Commentaries in the year 387; but without arguments that avail to persuade of it.

[368] and in the same year, or at the beginning of the next, those on Ecclesiastes. After the four Epistles of St. Paul were expounded there seems to have followed at once the Exposition of Ecclesiastes, to which the saint thus prefaces: I remember that about five years before this, when I was still at Rome and was reading Ecclesiastes with the holy Blæsilla, in order to provoke her to a contempt of this world and that she might reckon as nothing all that she saw in the world, I was asked by her to discuss the obscure passages after the manner of a little commentary, so that without me she might be able to understand what she read. And so, since on the very eve of our work she was snatched away by a sudden death, and we did not deserve, O Paula and Eustochium, to have such a partner of our life, and, stricken then by so great a wound, I fell silent: now, placed at Bethlehem, a more august city forsooth, I render both to her memory and to you what I owe; admonishing this briefly, that I have followed the authority of no one; but, translating from the Hebrew, I have rather adapted myself to the custom of the Seventy interpreters, in those places at least which did not differ much from the Hebrew. Sometimes I have remembered Aquila also, and Symmachus, and Theodotion, that I might neither deter the reader's zeal by too great novelty, nor again, against my own conscience, forsaking the fountain of truth, follow the rivulets of opinions. Thus far Jerome, from whose words that Commentary is more probably to be fixed in the year 389. For, as I proved in §17, Blæsilla died in the year 385, a short time before Jerome's departure into Palestine, that is, about the month of July. But if to these we add four years and some months, so that it may be about five years, we come as far as the year 390. But Blæsilla asked for that explanation some time at least before her death, namely after her conversion to a pious and modest life, which she survived by three or nearly four months. The Commentary on Ecclesiastes seems, therefore, to have been written before the end of the year 389, especially since St. Jerome by about five years perhaps understands only four years and a few months. It will therefore have been written in the later months of the year 389, or perhaps in the earlier ones of 390. But this is less probable, because the saint is wont to say more rather than less about time.

[369] Certainly Tillemont and Vallarsius made too much haste, as is proved. who fixed it in the year 388. The first is somewhat contrary to his own chronology: for in article 37 he fixes the death of Blæsilla toward the end of the year 384 or the beginning of 385, so that about five years would lead at least to 389. Vallarsius, in the Preface to volume 3, says that Ecclesiastes was expounded to Blæsilla in the year 383, when Blæsilla had not yet perfectly bidden farewell to the world. But that opinion is by no means likely or probable. For the words of Jerome alleged altogether intimate that the exposition of Ecclesiastes was asked by Blæsilla a short time before her death, since Jerome alleges that as the sole cause of that work's interruption. Besides, unless she had been converted before, a woman given over to the world, such as Blæsilla was, would not have heard Jerome explaining the Scriptures in private meetings, nor would she have asked for his Commentaries. But what the saint says, In order to provoke her to a contempt of this world, etc., does not intimate that Blæsilla was even then too much addicted to worldly things, or not yet converted to a more perfect worship of God; but only that Jerome laboured to water and nourish the seeds of piety which she had already conceived, and to incite her to a still more perfect contempt of the world by reading through Ecclesiastes with her, whose doctrine is most opportune to that end. Vallarsius himself saw, in the Preface of volume 1, where he gives the chronology of the Epistles, at Epistle 38, that the last time of his sojourn at Rome is designated by Jerome in the words alleged above, in which he says that Ecclesiastes was expounded to Blæsilla while he was still at Rome. He adds in the same place: Moreover it has been ascertained from elsewhere that toward the end of the year 389 or the beginning of the next—which will be established in its place by certain arguments—Jerome published these Commentaries on Ecclesiastes. There was no cause why he should abandon this chronology. For about five years, which must be begun from the year 385, leads to the end of the year 389 or further; and the more than fifteen years during which he had abstained from profane writers, when he was expounding the Epistle to the Galatians, begun from the Lent of the year 374, lead to about the Easter of the year 389 or a little further. And so, since the saint gave some months at least—perhaps four or six or even eight—to the Epistles of Paul, and only then went on to Ecclesiastes, perhaps he did not finish it until the last months of the year 389 or the beginning of the next.

[370] Some observations on the aforesaid Commentaries. A few things must now be observed concerning these Commentaries. What he says of the Commentary on Ecclesiastes—Translating from the Hebrew, I have rather adapted myself to the custom of the Seventy interpreters, in those places at least which did not differ much from the Hebrew—is not to be so understood as though Jerome had then published the Latin interpretation from the Hebrew which we now have in the Vulgate Scripture. For he published that interpretation of Ecclesiastes later, to be mentioned in its own place. He gave indeed the text from the Hebrew where the interpretation of the Seventy did not please him; but where theirs was not much different from the Hebrew fountain he preferred to retain their interpretation, because it was in use in the Church. Afterwards, however, he gave the pure Hebrew text. Besides, to several of the Commentaries just mentioned Jerome afterwards referred the prudent reader, that from them he might understand what he himself had long since thought about the doctrine of Origen. For in Epistle 84 (elsewhere 65) to Pammachius and Oceanus he speaks thus: But if they wish to know my judgment upon Origen, let them read the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes: let them unroll the three volumes on the Epistle to the Ephesians, and they will understand that I have always gone against his doctrines. For what folly is it so to praise anyone's learning that you follow his blasphemy too? Again, in the book against John of Jerusalem, number 17, he points to the same Commentaries as against the perverse doctrine of Origen, in these words: Nearly ten years ago, in the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes and in the Explanation of the Epistle to the Ephesians, I think the mind of my soul was made plain to the prudent. That these words aptly agree with our chronology I shall show in the chronology of that book, about which writers greatly disagree.

[371] The other Epistles of St. Paul Cassiodorus, in the Institution of Divine Letters, chapter 8, reckons St. Jerome's Commentaries on the Epistles of St. Paul in these words: On which (the Epistle to the Galatians) the holy Jerome too extended an Exposition in three books. The same father Jerome in three books diligently opened up the Epistle to the Ephesians. On Titus also he comprehended an Exposition in one volume. On Philemon likewise he laid it open in one book. Thus far Cassiodorus brought forward certainties. Then he adds the following: But the remaining letters of holy Paul, that is, the two to the Corinthians, the two to the Thessalonians, the one to the Colossians, the two to Timothy, the holy Jerome is said to have explained. From Cassiodorus perhaps the author of the first Life judged that most of Paul's Epistles were expounded by the saint. But what was said in Cassiodorus's time about these Epistles being expounded by Jerome seems false. Certainly St. Jerome, in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 135, reckons up his own writings down to the year 392, and among them only four Epistles of St. Paul expounded. And we have no indication from which we can conjecture that others were afterwards explained by the saint. It is likely, therefore, that an exposition of St. Paul's Epistles which was someone else's was attributed to St. Jerome.

[372] St. Jerome did not expound. The said Cassiodorus had there premised: But I have found a third manuscript of the Epistles of St. Paul, which by some is said to contain the very brief annotations of blessed Jerome, which likewise, by Christ's bounty, I have left to you. These Annotations will perhaps be the Commentaries formerly published under St. Jerome's name with the Epistle to Heliodorus prefixed. They may be seen in Martianay among the spurious works, volume 5, column 925 and following. Yet I would not say with certainty that these were the ones intimated by Cassiodorus: for to some they will seem too prolix for Cassiodorus to have called them very brief annotations. They are, however, brief if they be compared with Jerome's Commentaries, and are almost only annotations. However that

may be, these are reckoned rather Pelagius's, or some Pelagian writer's, than St. Jerome's: nor do I judge that he wrote upon more than four Epistles of St. Paul. Of Ecclesiastes explained by Jerome, Cassiodorus writes thus in chapter 5: But the second book of Solomon, which is called Ecclesiastes, was powerfully expounded by blessed Jerome: which in the Latin tongue he names the Preacher, because he speaks to the people, and his discourse is directed not specially to one but generally to all.

\ elsewhere volebat*

\ elsewhere possem*

\ elsewhere videretis*

\ read legas*

§ XXII. The books written on the Hebrew Questions on Genesis, on the Hebrew Places, on the Hebrew Names.

The saint writes the Hebrew Questions, After the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes, in which the saint had begun to express Hebrew things in the Latin tongue, he reckons in the catalogue of his writings other little works for which the Hebrew tongue had been of use, thus: One book of Hebrew Questions on Genesis. One book on Places. One book of Hebrew Names. These three little works, which must be fixed about the year 390, he seems to have composed at the same time, since in each he from time to time alleges the other two. I shall follow St. Jerome's order, even though the last of the three is believed to have been published first. Perhaps he reckoned the book of Hebrew Questions first because it was a new work, whereas the others were for the most part translated from the Greek. Perhaps too that book was finished before the others, and only published later, because Jerome was meditating others as well, as we shall presently see. Jerome was suffering the disparagements of the envious while he wrote them. For in the Preface he answers them: and where he had observed that the same had happened to Terence, Virgil, and Cicero, he continues thus: It is no wonder, then, if against me, a little manikin, unclean swine grunt, and trample pearls with their feet, when against most learned men, and such as ought to have overcome envy by their glory, spite has blazed out. But this befell them deservedly, whose eloquence thundered in the theatres, the senate-house, the assembly, before the rostra. For fortitude in the open always has rivals, and lightnings strike the highest mountains. But me, removed far from cities, forum, lawsuits, crowds, even so, as Quintilian says, envy has found out in my hiding-place. Wherefore I beseech the reader (if indeed anyone, seized with love, shall read these things too) that in the books of Hebrew Questions, which I have appointed myself to write upon all holy Scripture, he should not seek eloquence, not the charm of orators, but should rather himself answer my enemies on my behalf, that pardon must be granted to a new work.

[374] For as we, humble and poor, neither have riches meaning to publish them on the whole Scripture, nor deign to accept them when offered; so let them too know that they cannot have the knowledge of the Scriptures, that is, the riches of Christ, together with the riches of the world. It will be our study, then, either to refute the errors of those who suspect various things about the Hebrew books; or to restore to their own authority those things which seem to teem in the Latin and Greek manuscripts: to explain also by the reasoning of the native tongue the etymologies of things, of names and of regions, which do not sound in our own speech. And that the emendation may be more easily recognized, we shall first set forth the testimonies themselves as they are among us, and from a collation of what follows we shall indicate what in them is either less or more or otherwise. Nor indeed, as the envious bark, do we charge errors upon the Seventy interpreters: nor do we reckon our labour their reprehension, etc. From what has been alleged the reader will perceive that Jerome wished to compose this work, which is exceedingly studious, upon the whole holy Scripture: yet we have only one book, upon Genesis, and that alone is mentioned by the saint himself in the book On Illustrious Men. Besides, when long afterwards he wrote on Isaiah, in book 15, at chapter 54, he praises that book in these words: Of which it has been spoken more fully in the book of Hebrew Questions which we wrote on Genesis. And so there is no doubt with me that Jerome completed only that single book of Hebrew Questions: for he both reckoned that one alone in the year 392 among his writings, and praised that one alone as an old man, nowhere another.

[375] [but interrupting them for the sake of other works, and afterwards leaving them off,] It is certain, however, that he meditated more, and for that cause praised that work, while he had not yet changed his purpose, as though there were several books. For in the book on Hebrew Places, column 207, at the word Elmoni, he says: Because of these I have disputed more fully in the books of Hebrew Questions. In the Preface of the book of Hebrew Names he speaks thus: For I now have in hand the books of Hebrew Questions, a new work, and one unheard of hitherto by Greeks as well as Latins. The saint certainly wished then to write several books. But he interrupted that work in order to translate into the Latin tongue some Homilies of Origen on Luke, at the request of Paula and Eustochium. For in the Prologue to those Homilies he addresses them thus: I have laid aside for a little the books of Hebrew Questions, that at your pleasure, in spare hours, I might dictate these things, such as they are—not mine, but another's. And from this interruption, which perhaps occurred after the book on Genesis was finished, there in all likelihood followed the omission of continuing the work, because at that time many were demanding various Works of St. Jerome, and above all, so far as I conjecture, that he should translate the sacred Scripture from Hebrew into the Latin tongue. For by that Work of Hebrew Questions he was as it were preluding to a complete translation. That work was useful: but a complete translation was far more useful still.

[376] He wrote only the book on Genesis. Cassiodorus, on the Institution, chapter 1, has it thus of that work: The holy Jerome too in one volume resolved the Hebrew questions propounded on the book of Genesis, which run through the divine Scriptures of both Testaments with equal brightness, like a line drawn by a single pen. These are necessarily read through by Catholics, since, so great questions being resolved, the text is left most plain and is published in clear light. By these words Cassiodorus does not intimate that the work was continued over the whole Scripture, as Tillemont wrongly judged in Note 32; but asserts that the questions arising from Genesis were resolved by the help of the whole sacred Scripture. For by in one volume, and by the words on the book of Genesis … the questions propounded, he clearly declares that he speaks solely of the book of Questions on Genesis.

[377] Of St. Jerome's other two little works Cassiodorus goes on there to speak, but less accurately: The Explanations also, The book on Hebrew Places, he says, of the Hebrew names and places, which are set, for a great part of the understanding, in the authority of the old books, he made clear for us in one volume by his own translation into Latin. Of the New Testament also he made another book, in which that most diligent Doctor unravelled the questions pertaining to the same Law. He seems there to confuse two little works, the one on Places, the other on Names, and to substitute for the second book the augmentation of the book on Names from the New Testament, as will become plain from the description of each work. That which by a short title is called On Places is inscribed by a longer one: On the situation and names of Hebrew Places. This work Eusebius composed in Greek; Jerome made it Latin and in many places enlarged and corrected it, as he himself advises in the Preface. But the augmentation from the New Testament does not belong to this book, in which those Places are not expounded which are mentioned only in the New Testament, but to the other one, on Names.

[378] From St. Jerome's Preface, which I subjoin, the studious reader will understand everything. written by Eusebius, he translated and enlarged. Eusebius, he says, who received his surname from blessed Pamphilus the martyr, after the ten books of Ecclesiastical History; after the Canons of Times [\], which we have published in the Latin tongue; after the names of the divers nations, in which he set forth how they were formerly called among the Hebrews and how they are called now; after the Chorography [\] of the land of Judæa, and the distinct lots of the tribes, and a picture of Jerusalem itself and of the temple in it with a very brief exposition; laboured at last in this little work, that he might gather for us from the holy Scripture the names of almost all the cities, mountains, rivers, villages, and divers places, which either remain the same, or were afterwards changed, or in some part corrupted. Whence we too, following the study of that admirable man, have translated them according to the order of the letters, as they are set down in the Greek; leaving out those things which do not seem worthy of memory, and changing very many. For once for all I said in my preface to the book of Times that I am either a translator or the founder of a new work; especially since a certain man, scarcely imbued with his first letters, has dared to turn this very book into the Latin tongue in a manner not Latin: whose unskilfulness the prudent reader will at once discover by comparison with what we have translated. For as I do not claim lofty things for myself, so I believe that I can rise above what clings to the ground. Thus far Jerome, whose additions and corrections the studious reader will be able to find by comparison with the Greek text in the Veronese edition, volume 3.

[379] St. Jerome's third little work of that time is called The book on Hebrew Names, out of Philo the Book of Hebrew Names, or On Hebrew Names. It is a Latin interpretation of Hebrew names, whether they be proper names of men or of places, setting forth their etymologies in alphabetical order. The reasons of his design the saint explains in the Preface, where at the same time he declares how highly he valued both this and the two other books mentioned above. Philo, he says, the most eloquent man of the Jews, is proved by Origen's testimony also to have published a book of Hebrew names, and to have joined their etymologies alongside according to the order of the letters. And since this is commonly had among the Greeks and has filled the libraries of the world, it was our study to turn it into the Latin tongue. But I found the copies so discordant among themselves, and the order so confused, that I judged it better to be silent than to write something worthy of reprehension. And so, at the exhortation of the brethren Lupulianus [\] and Valerianus, who think that I have made some progress in the knowledge of the Hebrew tongue, and moved by the very usefulness of the thing, I ran through the several volumes of the Scriptures in order; and, restoring an old building with new care, I think I have done what should be sought after by the Greeks also. Besides, I give this warning in the Preface, that, if anything here has been passed over, the reader should know that it is reserved for another Work. For I now have in hand the books of Hebrew Questions, a new work, and one unheard of hitherto by Greeks as well as Latins.*

[380] and out of others he put together with great study. Not that I insolently extol my own study, but that, conscious of my sweat, I may provoke the ignorant to read them. If anyone, therefore, shall wish to have both those and the present volume, and the book of Places also, which I am about to publish, he will set small store by the belching and nausea of the Jews. And lest perhaps, the building being completed, the finishing hand should as it were be lacking, I have interpreted the words and names of the New Testament, wishing in part to imitate Origen, whom, after the Apostles, of the churches

the master, no one but an unskilled man will deny. For among the other excellent monuments of his genius he laboured in this also, that what Philo as a Jew had omitted, he as a Christian should fill up. Thus far Jerome, who admired Origen's manifold labours, useful for the understanding of sacred Scripture, and the acuteness of his supreme genius. For no one, down to the time in which the saint wrote these things, had published many volumes upon sacred Scripture; since Augustine, Chrysostom, and Jerome himself, who expounded the sacred Scripture more copiously than the rest, had not yet at that time brought forth much, while all the older writers published fewer works. Besides, Jerome at that time seems not to have known Origen's chief errors well enough, since long afterwards he had not yet read his worst work of all, on First Principles. And so that exaggerated praise of Origen proceeded partly from ignorance of his manifold errors, of which nevertheless he was not ignorant of them all, and partly from admiration of his genius and the multitude of his writings; just as he praises Eusebius, whom he knew to be an Arian. But more of these things will come to be discussed hereafter.

[381] Other little works of the kind formerly falsely attributed to the saint. But it must here be briefly observed that other little works were formerly attributed to St. Jerome, which have some similarity to the aforesaid ones. In the Veronese edition, volume 3, from column 755, are published the Hebrew Questions on the three books of Kings and two of Paralipomenon, which were formerly ascribed to St. Jerome. But it is clear, both from what has been said and from the style and other things, that these are not St. Jerome's. And Martianay, praised there at column 753 in the Preface, proved from Rabanus Maurus that the books are those of a certain Hebrew who flourished not long before Rabanus. In the same place, from column 721, is published the book On Places from the Acts, namely of the Apostles, formerly likewise ascribed to St. Jerome. But in the prefatory Admonition there it is sufficiently proved that that book must not be reckoned St. Jerome's, nor was it written before the seventh century. Of these, therefore, I shall say no more, even though more arguments could be added.

\ Chronicon*

\ elsewhere Topographiam*

\ elsewhere Lupuli*

§ XXIII. Didymus's book on the Holy Spirit rendered into Latin, and 39 Homilies of Origen on Luke. Rufinus's objections about these refuted.

Didymus's book on the Holy Spirit, as he had begun at Rome, After the little works of Hebrew Questions, Places, and Names, St. Jerome continues thus in the oft-mentioned catalogue of his works: One book on the Holy Spirit of Didymus, which I translated into Latin. Thirty-nine Homilies on Luke. These are Origen's, and were given by Jerome to the Latin tongue. But since it was on account of the Homilies that he interrupted the books of Hebrew Questions, and yet he reckons Didymus's book first, it is ambiguous which work's translation came first. But I shall follow Jerome's order: for it is not improbable that the translation of the book on the Holy Spirit was likewise dictated by Jerome when he was occupied with the dry works of Hebrew Names or Places, for which far more things had to be sought out than written or dictated, so that the notaries whom he maintained might meanwhile have something to copy out. He had already thought at Rome of translating Didymus's book and dedicating it to St. Damasus, as he says in Epistle 36 (elsewhere 125) to Damasus in these words: And, to speak more truly, I have in hand the book of Didymus on the Holy Spirit, which, when translated, I desire to dedicate to you. The same he intimates again in the Preface to the translated book, which he thus begins: When I was dwelling in Babylon, and was a settler of the purple-clad harlot, and lived by the law of the Quirites, I wished to chatter something about the Holy Spirit, and to dedicate the little work I had begun to the Pontiff of that City. These words intimate that the little work was begun at Rome; but it was laid aside on account of the persecutions that arose there, on whose account, as he adds, he departed into Palestine.

[383] Then he continues thus: And so, my brother Paulinian, he renders from Greek into Latin: since the aforesaid Pontiff Damasus, who had first urged me to this work, now sleeps in Christ, being now helped by your prayers as well as those of the handmaids of Christ venerable to me, Paula and Eustochium, I murmur here in Judæa, provoked by you, the song which I could not sing in a strange land, reckoning that place far more august which brought forth the Saviour of the world than that which brought forth the murderer of his brother. And, that I may confess the author in the title, I have preferred to be the translator of another's work rather than, as some do, an ugly little crow, to adorn myself with others' colours. I read lately the little books of a certain man on the Holy Spirit; and, according to the Comic poet's saying, out of good Greek I saw Latin that was not good. Nothing there dialectical, nothing manly and terse, which might draw the reader into assent even against his will: but the whole flabby, soft, glossy and pretty, and painted with choice perfumes [\] from this side and that. But my Didymus, having the eye of the spouse from the Song of Songs, and those lights which Jesus bade be lifted up to the whitening harvests, looks far higher, and has restored to us the ancient usage, that a seer should be called a prophet. Certainly whoever reads him will recognize the thefts of the Latins; and will despise the rivulets when he has begun to drink from the fountains. He is unskilled in speech, not in knowledge, expressing an apostolic man by his very speech, as much by the light of his meanings as by the simplicity of his words. All these things I have wished to bring forward, because from them too Rufinus had matter to object against the holy Doctor, as we shall see below. Of Didymus Jerome treats in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 109, where he enumerates several of Didymus's writings, and among them, one book on the Holy Spirit, which I, he says, turned into Latin.* The Greek text has perished, but Jerome's translation is extant in the Veronese edition, volume 2.

[384] likewise 39 Homilies of Origen on Luke, The Prologue to the said Homilies of Origen, which the Veronese edition exhibits in volume 7, I shall likewise give, both because it lay open to calumny and because it pertains almost wholly to Jerome's doings. A few days ago, he says, you said that you had read the Commentaries of certain men on Matthew and on Luke, of which the one was dull both in meanings and in words; the other played with words and slumbered in its opinions. Wherefore you asked that, such trifles being despised, I should at least translate the thirty-nine Homilies of our Adamantius on Luke, as they are had in the Greek; a troublesome thing, and like a torment, to write, as Tully says, for another's stomach and not one's own. Which nevertheless I shall now do for this reason, that you do not demand loftier things. For that which the holy Blæsilla once at Rome had demanded—that I should hand over to our tongue his twenty-five tomes on Matthew, and five others on Luke, and thirty-two on John—is beyond my strength, my leisure, and my labour. For you perceive how much your authority and will avail with me. I have laid aside for a little the books of Hebrew Questions, that at your pleasure, in spare hours, I might dictate these things, such as they are—not mine, but another's; especially since I hear on the left a croaking raven of ill omen, and one who in a wondrous manner laughs at the colours of all the birds, when he himself is wholly dark.

[385] which he confesses not to be free from faults. I confess, therefore, before he objects it, that in these Treatises Origen plays as a boy with knucklebones: other things are his manly works, and others the serious works of his old age. Which, if it shall please, if I shall be able, if the Lord shall grant me leave to turn them into the Latin tongue, and if I shall first have completed the work I laid aside, then you will be able to see—nay, through you the Roman tongue will learn—how much good it both formerly did not know and has now begun to know. Besides, the Commentaries of the most eloquent man Hilary, and of the blessed martyr Victorinus, which they published on Matthew in diverse speech but by one grace of the Spirit, I have arranged to send to you in a few days; that you may not be ignorant how great was once the zeal of our own men also for the holy Scriptures. Thus far Jerome, who abundantly declares that he does not set great store by those Homilies of Origen, when he says that he translates them at the pleasure of Paula and Eustochium, and that, such as they are, they are not his own but another's. That they are not free from errors either he openly declares, when he confesses that in them Origen plays as a boy with knucklebones. But there are other things which Rufinus twists invidiously out of both Prefaces against Jerome, and these come to be examined in this place. I shall not, however, examine here what Rufinus discussed concerning the praise of Origen and of Didymus, but only those things which he contends were said against St. Ambrose and against the City.

[386] That St. Ambrose was censured in both Prefaces, Rufinus Rufinus, in book 2 of the Invectives, number 21, contends that all that Jerome says about the little books on the Holy Spirit was aimed at St. Ambrose's books on the Holy Spirit, and that by the words an ugly little crow St. Ambrose is designated. What is said in the other Preface about the Commentaries of a certain man on Luke he likewise refers to St. Ambrose's Exposition of Luke, and ridiculously calumniates that he is called by Jerome a croaking raven of ill omen, writing thus at number 24: You have heard how he whom he had before called a raven and wholly dark, he now again calls a little crow, painting himself with others' feathers or colours; and how shamefully he tears him, and says that a man has nothing manly in him who was chosen by God for the glory of the churches of Christ, etc. How inept these calumnies are, at least in part, I shall presently show. But first let us hear by what arguments he strives to persuade his readers of them, at number 22. But if he should wish to deny this, he says, which all men know, that he said it of holy Ambrose, he will first be convicted from this, that among the Latins only his, and no other's, Commentary on Luke is current. Then he knows that I have his letter, in which, excusing this very thing as regards others, he turns the suspicion upon him. But, because that letter contains also certain more secret matters, which meanwhile I am unwilling to publish before the time, we will prove it further from other things like these. Then, to prove it, he brings forward the words given from the Preface to Didymus's book.

[387] Those assertions of Rufinus, although partly quite incredible and others contend, and partly plainly uncertain, have nevertheless found in our own age their patrons, and not unlearned ones. The Benedictines, who saw to the reprinting of St. Ambrose's Works at Paris in the years 1686 and 1690, in volume 1, in the Admonition to the Exposition of St. Luke, leave it as it were undecided whether St. Jerome spoke of St. Ambrose's Exposition of Luke. Again, in volume 2, in the Admonition to the books on the Holy Spirit, they do not altogether declare that St. Ambrose's books on the Holy Spirit were censured by Jerome; but they so defend them against the Hieronymian censure as though it were certain that they were designated by Jerome, and they adduce some arguments to prove Rufinus's charge. But Tillemont, in volume 10, Note XI on St. Ambrose, does not hesitate to declare it as certain that the books which Jerome censures were St. Ambrose's on the Holy Spirit, and again

in Note 35 he says that the same Exposition of St. Luke was censured, and heaps up many things by which he tries to prove that Jerome did not judge rightly of St. Ambrose's Works. I pass over others who are wont to follow Tillemont as their leader by whatever path he goes. And so, since the honour of Ambrose and of Jerome is at stake, it pleases me to examine more attentively the foundations of that opinion. For there are not lacking others who are of the contrary opinion: and Rufinus's assertions, where he writes against Jerome, seem to deserve little credit.

[388] The Veronese editors set themselves against Rufinus, to pass over others, others resisting, and in their Annotations both on Jerome's Preface to the book on the Holy Spirit and on the passage of Rufinus alleged, they observe that it does not seem to be Ambrose who is carped at with his name suppressed, since Jerome commends Ambrose in many places. But on Jerome's Preface to the Homilies on Luke they declare their mind thus: Rufinus calumniates that St. Ambrose is here marked by Jerome under the name of a raven; first from this, that among the Latins only his and no other's Commentary on Luke was current. Then, that he had in his own keeping a letter of Jerome himself, in which, excusing this very thing as regards others, he turned the suspicion upon him (Ambrose). But let no one believe Rufinus, even on oath, that the holy Father could have thought that of Ambrose, whom he constantly esteemed most highly, and not rarely praised in his books as occasion arose. Thus those learned men, who could have had a most thorough view of Rufinus's readiness in calumniating, since they not only published everything written by Jerome and Rufinus in those controversies, but also illustrated it with various Annotations.

[389] to whom Rufinus's licence in calumniating was better known. To me indeed, after I have several times attentively turned over the writings on both sides, it seems like a miracle that a prudent man can believe Rufinus against Jerome, if his sayings cannot be proved from elsewhere; since he frequently asserts what is openly false, or at any rate shamelessly infers what is utterly false from what is true. Such are his making Jerome a perjurer out of a dream, and afterwards defending that calumny too; his calumniating that Barabbas was chosen by him instead of Christ, because he had a Jew as master of the Hebrew tongue; and when in book 2, number 12, from the fact that the saint in his youth used Porphyry's Isagoge to learn logic, he infers this: For Porphyry taught you to speak ill of Christians, to cut to pieces virgins, continent persons, deacons, presbyters, and to defame in published little books absolutely every degree and order of Christians. Who does not see that these things are neither true, nor rightly inferred from the use of a book composed for learning logic, and that it is not for young men to choose the books by which they are taught some art, but for their masters, who instruct many at once? And so these things are the work of a man who does not know how to keep measure. Of an equally insane brain are the things which at number 27 he pursues thus about himself and St. Jerome: There exist no writings of mine in which any error of mine needs correcting. Yours exist in plenty, which, as I see, must now all be condemned according to your own opinion. And lower down: But you do well if you do penance for all things, not only those which you have spoken but those which you will speak. For it is certain that all you have written is to be repented of. I pass over very many other things of that kind, in which the modesty of Rufinus, so greatly praised by Tillemont in article 1, appears no more than a fair colour in an Ethiopian; nor any more prudence or sound judgment than in a man carried away by wrath, who licentiously pours out against his adversary everything that comes into his mouth, whether true or false.

[390] Certainly St. Jerome names no one, Let us now examine how prettily Rufinus's assertions, of which we are here treating, hang together. The saint says: I have preferred to be the translator of another's work rather than (as some do), an ugly little crow, to adorn myself with others' colours. These words, in my judgment at least, designate no one, nor does Jerome disapprove those who draw some arguments from more ancient writers, or adopt their opinions, and express everything in their own style; but generally those who take most things from some more ancient writer, and, suppressing his name, put everything forward as their own. That he was unwilling to do this, Jerome says, and accuses no one by name, but only adds, as some do. It is certain that plagiarists have never been lacking, and that their practice is generally disapproved. But if anyone should wish to contend with Rufinus that St. Ambrose is carped at as a plagiarist, he will first have to prove that Ambrose was such. But the Benedictine editors, in the Admonition to Ambrose's books on the Holy Spirit, acknowledge indeed that some things seem to have been transferred by Ambrose from Didymus's book into the books on the Holy Spirit. But they observe that Ambrose drew from many, and more from Basil than from Didymus, and did not do it in such a way that he ought to be called a plagiarist. And so Jerome does not seem to have been thinking of Ambrose when he said: Certainly whoever reads him will recognize the thefts of the Latins; but of others, who had plundered Didymus's work more.

[391] and says things which do not agree with St. Ambrose's books From the last words it is gathered that several Latins wrote about the Holy Spirit after Didymus, and this seems beyond doubt, since the Macedonian heresy against the Holy Spirit was then new, and had infected many churches, so that bishops and other teachers beyond doubt set themselves against the newly arisen heresy. Wherefore these words of Jerome: I read lately the little books of a certain man on the Holy Spirit; and … out of good Greek I saw Latin that was not good. Nothing there dialectical, nothing manly, etc.; but the whole flabby, soft, glossy, etc.—in all likelihood attack the Work of some unlearned writer who had scraped together many things from the Greeks, and above all from Didymus, and had set forth his arguments in a style somewhat polished, but flabby and by no means cogent. Certainly St. Jerome could not speak thus of St. Ambrose's books. For whoever knows dialectic, as Jerome knew it excellently, will clearly perceive that St. Ambrose in the books on the Holy Spirit reasons more dialectically than in most of his other works; and on the contrary uses a style less ornate and more simple than in many others. This simplicity of style St. Augustine observed in book 4 of the Christian Doctrine, chapter 21, whose words the Benedictines allege faultily in their Admonition: The holy Ambrose, he says, although he is treating a great matter concerning the Holy Spirit, in order to show him equal to the Father and the Son, nevertheless uses a subdued kind of speech; since the matter undertaken requires not ornaments of words, nor the emotion of feeling to bend men's minds, but proofs of things.

[392] If anyone should now wish to compare Ambrose's books on Virginity, on the Holy Spirit. he will find them composed in a more ornate and less dialectical speech. Yet Jerome in Epistle 22, number 22, assigns them to St. Eustochium to be read, speaking thus of them and of Ambrose: In which he has poured himself out in such eloquence that he has sought out, expressed and set in order whatever pertains to the praises of virgins. And so, if Jerome could speak thus of books in which a far greater elegance of diction shines out, and far less care for dialectical reasoning, it seems to me utterly incredible that the books on the Holy Spirit were censured by Jerome as destitute of dialectical vigour and stuffed solely with the little flowers of words. Wherefore I do not hesitate to affirm that Rufinus used his accustomed rashness when he wished to drag the alleged words of Jerome to St. Ambrose; and that those who believed Rufinus have not sufficiently weighed how rash he was in asserting things in his books against Jerome, and how incredible it is that the saint could assert of books that are full of dialectical reasonings that there is in them nothing dialectical, nothing manly; and of a simple style, that the whole is pretty. For it was not the natural elegance of diction, which he himself uses, but the affected ornament of speech, which the said books lack, that he disapproved in so grave a matter, so that he must necessarily have had others in view, whom antiquity did not value enough for them to have come down to us.

[393] No more do I think that Ambrose's Commentaries on Luke are designated, That St. Ambrose's Commentaries on Luke were censured by Jerome, when Jerome said the following: You said that you had read the Commentaries of certain men on Matthew and on Luke, of which the one was dull both in meanings and in words; the other played with words and slumbered in its opinions. If we follow the most obvious understanding of this passage, both had written on Matthew and on Luke. But St. Ambrose did not write on Matthew, so that in this sense he cannot be one of the two. But let us for the moment gratuitously believe that the Commentaries of the one were on Matthew alone, and of the other on Luke alone, and that in that way Ambrose could be designated. Even so there will be no reason why that Commentary on Luke cannot be by an unknown man, just as the writer is unknown whose Commentary on Matthew is mentioned. Each will have been an unskilled writer, the one destitute also of all eloquence, the other eloquent enough indeed, but not having attained to the understanding of sacred Scripture. And so the works of both Commentaries are called trifles; and in place of those Commentaries on Matthew Jerome promised the better ones of Hilary and Victorinus; in place of the others on Luke he was translating Origen's Homilies on Luke, and those not sufficiently approved by himself, in which he confesses that Origen plays as a boy with knucklebones. He feared too the ill-will, in all likelihood, of him who had written on Luke, and declares that fear in these words: Especially since I hear on the left a croaking raven of ill omen, and one who in a wondrous manner laughs at the colours of all the birds, when he himself is wholly dark. Therefore, before that man can object that the said Homilies of Origen are not very accurate, Jerome confesses it of his own accord.

[394] is not probable, both because he had in all likelihood not yet seen them, All these things Rufinus transfers to St. Ambrose, whom the wrathful man calumniates as both named a raven and wholly dark. Jerome feared, therefore—if we believe one who asserts incredible things—that he would suffer Ambrose's ill-will if he translated Origen's Homilies, and Ambrose laughed at the colours of all the birds, that is, despised all writers. Rightly do the Veronese editors say to this: Let no one believe Rufinus, even on oath, that the holy Father could have thought that of Ambrose. I for my part should rather believe that St. Ambrose's Exposition had not been seen by Jerome while he was translating Origen's Homilies. Perhaps too it was not yet wholly finished, which may be examined in its own place in St. Ambrose. It was at least among St. Ambrose's later Works, nor could it have been completed for many years. No one, therefore, ought to wonder if Jerome had not yet seen it, who was both at a very great distance of lands, and had no intercourse, so far as we know, with the Milanese or with St. Ambrose, so that perhaps he did not see that Work before Ambrose's death. Certainly he by no means despised St. Ambrose's Exposition or Commentaries on Luke. For in Epistle 121 (elsewhere 151) to Algasia, who had propounded various questions from the New Testament, at question 6 he refers her to it,

to Ambrose's Commentaries on Luke, in these words: What Ambrose, bishop of Milan, thought about this passage, you will be able to read in his Commentaries.

[395] and because he often mentioned Ambrose with praise, Besides, St. Jerome esteemed St. Ambrose most highly, and always spoke honourably of him and of his writings. In Epistle 15 (elsewhere 57) to Damasus he says ironically: Let Ursinus be joined with your Beatitude, let Auxentius be associated with Ambrose. Thus by way of honour he sets Damasus against Ursinus, and Ambrose, as the chief defender of the faith, against the Arian Auxentius. How highly he praised Ambrose's books on Virgins we have already seen at number 392. In Epistle 48 (elsewhere 50) to Pammachius, number 14, he praises St. Ambrose's book on Widows, recites many things from it with praise, and again at number 17 defends himself by his authority. I should like to recite some words which he subjoins after a long passage of Ambrose at number 15: From all which it is clear that I have said nothing new about virgins and married women; but have followed in all things the opinion of my elders, namely both of this man (Ambrose) and of the rest who have disputed about ecclesiastical doctrines: whose negligence I long rather to emulate than the obscure diligence of others. These words intimate how highly he valued the writings of Ambrose, whose words alone he had recited. Again in Epistle 84 (elsewhere 65) he mentions three holy writers whom he valued highly, as we shall see, thus: Nor are we more eloquent than Hilary, nor more faithful than Victorinus, who translated his (Origen's) treatises, not as translators, but as authors of a work of their own. Lately the holy Ambrose so compiled his Hexaëmeron as to follow rather the opinions of Hippolytus and of Basil.

[396] In Epistle 112 (elsewhere 89) to Augustine, number 20, and esteemed him most highly. having reckoned up the Greek interpreters of the Psalms, he subjoins this about the Latins: But among the Latins, Hilary of Poitiers and Eusebius of Vercelli, bishops, translated Origen and Eusebius, of whom the former our own Ambrose has followed in certain things. Let your prudence answer me, why you, after so many and such interpreters, have thought differently in your Explanation of the Psalms. I observe a few things here. If Jerome esteemed any other of the Latins highly, he certainly esteemed St. Hilary most highly, as he frequently declared in his writings. Yet here, by saying our own Ambrose, he sufficiently hints that the writings of Ambrose pleased both himself and Augustine even more than those of Hilary. He also clearly declares that Ambrose took fewer things from the Greeks in his Exposition of the Psalms than Hilary did. Thirdly, by calling them such and so great interpreters he abundantly makes manifest that Rufinus's assertions are utterly improbable, namely that Jerome had spoken with the greatest contempt of Ambrose's books. Again, in book 1 against Rufinus, number 2, he reckons Ambrose with Hilary and Victorinus among the columns of the Church, observing that those three saints transferred many things from Origen into their own works, yet that he alone was blamed by Rufinus on that score. Of all these, he says, he is silent, and, passing over as it were the columns of the Church, he hunts me alone, a flea and a man of no account, through the corners. To all these praises of Ambrose and of his writings is added that he never in any place refuted him, so far at least as I have been able to find. Who then would believe Rufinus, even on oath, that he spoke thus of two works of Ambrose, as Rufinus has feigned; especially since those works are not such as Jerome despised, but are to be numbered among Ambrose's chief works?

[397] Tillemont, however, in Note XI on St. Ambrose, asserts without any doubt Tillemont, adducing Rufinus's that Jerome spoke of St. Ambrose, and adduces reasons for his opinion. The first is this: He (Rufinus) never proves that these things must be understood of St. Ambrose. And so he assumes it as certain that the thing is well ascertained. But that is no reason at all, since Rufinus's habit of rashly twisting anything whatever against St. Jerome is too well known for mere rashness in asserting to be taken for an argument. This boldness of Rufinus in calumniating, which is manifest, Jerome himself notes in book 3, number 1, in these words: I too could heap up falsehoods against you, and say that I had either heard or seen things which no one knew, so that among the ignorant impudence might be taken for truth, and fury for constancy. But far be it from me to be your imitator, and to do myself what I reprehend in you. Besides, even if Rufinus's rashness in asserting were not so great, he could have judged that the arguments which he had brought forward to show that Jerome had spoken ill of the Commentaries on Luke sufficed to make anyone believe that the books of the same Ambrose on the Holy Spirit were marked by Jerome with the censor's rod. For there is no fit reason by which, the first being admitted, one would deny the other. Wherefore let us hear whether Rufinus or his defenders have brought forward fit arguments about the Commentary on Luke. arguments, which fight against each other,

[398] The first two arguments Rufinus brings forward in these words: But if he should wish to deny this, which all men know, that he said it of St. Ambrose, he will first be convicted from this, that among the Latins only his, and no other's, Commentary on Luke is current. These two arguments—all men know, and then, among the Latins only his (Ambrose's) and no other's Commentary on Luke is current—would seem of some weight, if Rufinus were less bold in asserting, and did not himself at once destroy both arguments while thinking to bring forward a third. For he continues thus: Then he knows that I have his letter, in which, excusing this very thing as regards others, he turns the suspicion upon him (Ambrose). These three arguments of Rufinus Tillemont reckons in Note 35 on Ambrose, and others produced the same before him and after. Let us examine them severally, then. All men know, he says. How did all men know that St. Ambrose's Work was censured by Jerome, if the suspicion fell upon others, and Jerome excused them in his letter? Again, how was Ambrose's the only Commentary on Luke extant, if there had been a suspicion that Jerome spoke of others? And so from Rufinus's own words it is gathered that it was not established whose Commentary Jerome was speaking of, and that other Latin Commentaries on Luke were not lacking, about which he could have declared his mind: for the suspicion could not fall upon others unless others had written on Luke. Let us even believe that Rufinus's assertion is true, Only his Commentary on Luke is current. This will profit Rufinus nothing, if it be rightly understood. For those words signify that Ambrose's Commentary alone was everywhere read by all: but they by no means indicate that others were not composed. Of those others, therefore, whose composition Rufinus himself hints at, Jerome may deservedly have disapproved one, and it perished along with many others, because it was not approved.

[399] is refuted. The letter of Jerome which Rufinus alleges proves nothing. For let us believe Rufinus, that in that letter Jerome declared that he had not spoken of one or another upon whom the suspicion fell; there were not lacking others of moderate learning who could have put together Commentaries on Luke and sent their attempt to St. Paula; just as several no doubt wrote at that time about the Holy Spirit against the Macedonians. Perhaps in Jerome's own monastery there were not lacking men who by attempting to expound Luke made trial of their own genius. But whether that man was one of St. Jerome's monks, or an Italian, or a Gaul or a Spaniard, or from Illyricum or Africa, no one ought to wonder that a Commentary was written by a man not sufficiently learned, which neither Paula nor Eustochium nor Jerome himself approved, and which for that cause was not read by many and was quickly suppressed. The same is the case with the little books on the Holy Spirit which Jerome read and disapproved. But the books and Commentaries of St. Ambrose bearing the same names are not worthy of his censure, as the adversaries themselves acknowledge; so that it is utterly improbable that the books of a holy Doctor whom he esteemed most highly were censured by Jerome with so grave a censure.

[400] Another argument of Tillemont is examined, Tillemont adds to Rufinus's arguments, already refuted, the elogium which Jerome gave in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 124, writing thus of St. Ambrose: Ambrose, bishop of Milan, writes to this present day; concerning whom, because he still survives, I shall withhold my judgment, lest on either side either adulation or truthfulness be reprehended in me. Tillemont, with some others, wonders at this elogium, that the saint withholds his judgment; as though it were a sign of a mind averse from Ambrose, or at least that he esteemed his writings less. But of many others likewise he passed no judgment, by name of Gregory of Nyssa and Amphilochius, who were living. He mentions certain writings of St. Athanasius, long since dead, but likewise brings forward no judgment upon them. He brings forward scarcely anything, too, in praise of the writings of St. Hilary, which he certainly esteemed highly. Thus he frequently commemorates the most illustrious Fathers with almost no praise of their writings, perhaps because their name had become sufficiently famous, as we suspect also from these words of the Prologue: Certainly since they have become famous by their own writings, they will not greatly sigh over the loss our silence causes. This indeed he says of those who were altogether passed over. But the case is the same with those who had attained a great name. Wherefore St. Jerome did not much care in that book to bring forward his own judgment about the several writers whom he reckons up, but very briefly brings forward about some only a little word of praise, and lightly censures a few; as will be most clearly evident to those who read the book through. We may also observe that those who became known by fewer writings are frequently praised more by Jerome than the more celebrated, who were sufficiently known to all; namely that the gentile despisers of Christian learning might learn how great and what manner of men founded, built up and adorned the Church, and might cease to charge our faith with mere rustic simplicity.

[401] This reason did not compel him to celebrate St. Ambrose, whose name was most famous, and a reason is given why in the book On Illustrious Men with fuller elogia. Yet another consideration perhaps restrained Jerome from bringing forward his judgment about his writings, namely that he had read few of them. He had indeed read his books on Virgins and on Widows while he was at Rome, and had there commended them with honourable elogia. But most of St. Ambrose's works were composed after Jerome departed from Rome in the year 385; others a few years before that departure, so that perhaps Jerome had never seen them at Rome. But I strongly suspect that no little works of St. Ambrose reached Jerome in Palestine before the book On Illustrious Men was written. For that in the earlier years in which he lived at Bethlehem Jerome had very little intercourse with the Westerners is clear from his Epistles, among which none is found given from Palestine before the year 392, except the single one to Marcella, which was written in the name of Paula and Eustochium. And so it is most likely that only a few of St. Ambrose's earlier Works had been read by Jerome while he was writing that book; just as in chapter

129 he confesses that of the writings of St. John Chrysostom, which even then were many, as he rightly says, only the little work On the Priesthood had been read by him. For if of Chrysostom's very many Works, and those for a great part composed for expounding the sacred Scripture—such as he sought above the rest—Jerome had seen only one, even though they were composed at Antioch, who can deservedly contend that the Works of Ambrose, as soon as they were composed, straightway flew over from Milan into Palestine?

[402] Certainly the knowledge of St. Augustine's earlier little works did not fly to Jerome with such speed, Jerome passed no judgment. who from the year 386 published several, and in almost every year sent others into the light. Yet not even the name of Augustine is found in the book On Illustrious Men, so that it must be said that nothing about his writings had become known to Jerome down to that time. The saint, not doubting that he was ignorant of some, renders a reason in the Preface in these words: But if any of those who write to this day have been passed over by me in this volume, they will have to impute it to themselves rather than to me. For, since they conceal their writings, I could not know of what I have not read, and what is perhaps known to others may have been unknown to me in this corner of the earth. And so, since St. Jerome had neither read nor seen most of St. Ambrose's Works, as is plainly beyond doubt, and yet could not from elsewhere be ignorant that Ambrose's eloquence was great and his fame most celebrated, he was unwilling to bring forward his judgment, lest he should deservedly be marked for adulation if he celebrated with a magnificent elogium writings he had never seen; or should seem to have despised so great a man if he candidly declared that he had seen nothing of his writings but a few. For not all would have considered how difficult it was for Jerome at Bethlehem to obtain the lengthy Works of St. Ambrose, which would first have had to be copied out at great expense, and then carried into Palestine. So much money Jerome himself did not have, and he was seeking old writings rather than recent ones. And Paula had spent the wealth which she had reserved for herself for pious uses partly on her journeys, partly was piously spending it on founding monasteries and maintaining in them monks and nuns, partly also on the poor and other pious uses; so that they do not even believe what is likely who judge that the Works of St. Ambrose reached Jerome so quickly.

[403] It is proved that St. Ambrose's Commentaries on Luke From this observation, moreover, it is not only gathered that Jerome could not in the year 392 pass a judgment without adulation on most of St. Ambrose's Works; but it becomes as it were beyond doubt that St. Ambrose's Commentaries on Luke had not been seen by Jerome when he translated Origen's Homilies. For those Commentaries were in all likelihood not finished before the year 389, as can be proved from what the Benedictines in their Preface, and Tillemont in his St. Ambrose, article 49 and Note 34, have collected about them, even though these say they were written in the year 386. Both observe that the Homilies were spoken to the people, and afterwards divided into ten books. Secondly, that those Homilies were delivered to the people at the time of the persecution of the Arian empress Justina, who greatly harassed St. Ambrose in the years 385 and 386; but in the course of the year 387 she fled from Milan, and died in the year 388. Thirdly, that part of the Homilies was spoken after peace was restored to the church of Milan. All these things, proved by them, will be able to be further confirmed in St. Ambrose. It is not now necessary that we inquire whether Ambrose began to deliver the Homilies on Luke in 386 or in 385. But from a few things I shall show that much time was spent on those Homilies.

[404] were finished He was delivering the contents near the end of book 4, number 76, before Easter. For he says that through the Epiphany season he had cast his nets to catch men and bring them to the Church, and that even then he had caught nothing: No one has yet given in his name. That these things were spoken not long after the feast of the Epiphany, or in Lent, they rightly observe, since the saint desired that they should give in their names, in order to receive baptism at Easter. The Homilies of four books, therefore, he had delivered about February. On the 7th of December, on which he was ordained bishop, he delivered the Homily contained in book 8: for there at number 7 he speaks thus: Beautifully is the beginning of the Law read to me today, when it is the birthday of my priesthood. And so in about ten months he delivered only the Homilies of four books, unless to these months a whole year must also be added. Of the persecution he makes mention in book 7, number 49 and following, which was grievous in the year 386, and began to abate when the bodies of SS. Gervasius and Protasius were found in the month of June. Yet he could also have spoken afterwards of that persecution as he there spoke, as long as Justina survived, or at any rate as long as she remained with her son Valentinian at Milan; so that Ambrose could have written and spoken those things no less in the year 387 than in 386. Nor yet was it unfitting to bring forward similar things about it afterwards, even though it were languishing, since the heretics survived.

[405] Lastly, in book 9, number 32, he speaks so magnificently of the peace of the Church and of Italy that they were not that he seems to designate the time in which the emperor Theodosius, having conquered the tyrant Maximus, procured full peace for Italy, especially since Justina died about the same time, and Valentinian the younger had been converted to piety. Behold the acceptable time, he says, in which the year is not stiff with the wintry frosts of a darkening perfidy, nor does the shapeless crust of blasphemy grow together in high clouds while the ice endures; but, freed from the storms of sacrilege, the earth is now bringing forth new fruits. Truly she brings forth: for the storm of all dissensions has boiled away, all the ardours of secular desire, and all the heats by which the people of Italy were once seethed through the fires of Jewish and lately of Arian savagery, are now tempered by a serene breath. The tempest is stilled, concord sails, faith breathes: the sailors in rivalry seek again the harbours of faith which they had left, and press sweet kisses upon their native shores, rejoicing that they have been freed from perils and absolved from errors. These things, I say, agree excellently with the year 388, in which both Maximus was slain, and Justina died, and peace was given to the Church and to Italy.

[406] But neither in 386 nor in 387 could Ambrose so speak of peace, before the year 389 or 390, since Justina always continued to favour the Arians, and therefore it could always be feared that the languishing persecution might resume its strength. Now Justina remained with her son Valentinian at Milan until September of the year 387. But then, when the tyrant Maximus burst into Italy, they fled to the Eastern empire. Wherefore at least down to September of the year 387 Ambrose would not have said that all danger to the Church from the Arians had ceased. For Theodosius himself wrote to Valentinian, who fled to him, that he had been compelled to flee because he had made war on piety, as Theodoret testifies in book 5, chapter 15, who adds in the same place that he was converted to piety, that is, to the Catholic faith, by Theodosius himself. St. Ambrose testifies the same in Epistle 53 to Theodosius, whose instruction, he says, so converted him that he now loved the man whom before he persecuted; and now regarded as a parent him whom before he repelled as an adversary. And so Valentinian, until his flight from Italy, was a persecutor of Ambrose at Justina's instigation, and was brought back to better counsels by Theodosius only about the end of the year 387, or in the year 388; so that before this year Ambrose could not have spoken so magnificently about the peace of the Church. Besides, the tyranny of Maximus, who had seized Valentinian's empire and was preparing war against Theodosius, would not have allowed Ambrose, who detested it, to say such glad things. Wherefore by no means can Ambrose be reckoned to have written the aforesaid things about peace before Maximus was conquered; so that he seems only to have delivered or written them in the month of October in the year 388, when Theodosius, having won his victory, had come to Milan, or a little later.

[407] There remained to St. Ambrose a tenth book, which he could have finished in the year 389. [and therefore that they were not seen by Jerome when he is said to have censured them.] After the Sermons on the whole Gospel spoken to the people, the Commentaries, distinguished into ten books, had to be put together; so that we may deservedly doubt whether these saw the light before the year 390. For Ambrose's perpetual business left him not much time for study, and since the Commentaries on Luke did not require haste, he seems to have interposed certain other little works among them, and certainly several Epistles. And so it does not even seem probable that Ambrose's Commentaries on Luke were seen by Jerome while he, about the year 390, was translating Origen's Homilies. For the rest, in what year they were begun I by no means determine here. It is enough for me that they do not appear to have been finished before the year 389 or 390, as I have proved.

[408] Other objections To the objection just refuted Tillemont adds another, namely that on various occasions the opinions of Ambrose are disapproved by Jerome. To prove this he brings forward two passages where he believes that Jerome thought otherwise than Ambrose. The objection is plainly inept, since in the passages designated Ambrose is not named, so that perhaps Jerome did not even know what Ambrose thought about them. Others add an objection omitted by Tillemont, namely that St. Jerome in the books against Rufinus never denied that he had spoken contemptuously of St. Ambrose's books; nay, they seem to make much of this objection, as though it were a tacit confession. But they have not considered, I think, that Jerome answered many other things not at all, because he had not seen Rufinus's books, when he first answered in general some of the graver objections which he had learned from friends, Rufinus's books not yet having been received.

[409] are refuted. Then in his second answer, that is, book 3 against Rufinus, he answered only the letter afterwards sent by Rufinus, and omitted any further answer to Rufinus's books, which he had by then received. For this cause St. Jerome answered nothing to many other things, and did not even laboriously refute Rufinus's chief objection about Origen's errors, which Rufinus contended were inserted in Jerome's books, alleging many passages at length; but was content with a general and brief answer. And so that argument drawn from Jerome's silence has absolutely no force, as Tillemont seems to have perceived. For, since it was unwillingly and with reluctance that he answered a second time, as he testifies in book 3, number 9, he was unwilling at least to extend his answer to everything, as he declares at number 43; and for that cause he passed over very many things, to which he thought of answering in another work, if peace, or at any rate silence on both sides, did not follow.

\ perhaps coloribus*

§ XXIV. Rufinus's objection, drawn from Jerome's sayings about the City, is refuted: and it is shown how magnificently Jerome thought of the faith of the Roman Church and the authority of the supreme Pontiff.

[The saint grieved that the relics of idolatry were not yet destroyed in the City,] Rufinus, in book 2, number 22, also tries to show from Jerome's words in the Preface to Didymus's book how he says of the city of Rome, by God's favour the head of Christians, things which

were said then, when gentile peoples and persecuting princes dwelt in it. The words which displeased Rufinus are these: When I was dwelling in Babylon, and was a settler of the purple-clad harlot. But these are drawn rather from Scripture than taken from the gentiles. The following, however, are the gentiles': And after the hut of Romulus, and the Lupercalia of the games. And the place which brought forth the murderer of his brother (Remus)—that is, Romulus. A great crime indeed, if Jerome hinted that there survived at Rome certain relics of heathenism, which not long after the emperor Theodosius for the most part took away, as Tillemont relates in volume 4 of the Emperors, in Theodosius, article 48! The saint grieved that under Christian emperors idolatry could not yet be abolished at Rome, and that a good large number of gentile senators and other nobles and plebeians survived.

[411] Of the desolation of the temples, which the piety of Theodosius brought in, and at the same time rejoiced at the progress of the faith, as Prudentius fully pursues in book 1 against Symmachus, Jerome afterwards speaks with joy in book 2 against Jovinian, at the end, thus addressing Rome: But I will speak to you, who have blotted out with the confession of Christ the blasphemy written on your forehead, mighty City, City mistress of the world, City praised by the Apostle's voice… The Capitol is squalid, the temples of Jove and its ceremonies have fallen, etc. In Epistle 107 (elsewhere 7) he again exults thus over the progress of religion: The gilded Capitol is squalid: all the temples of Rome are covered with soot and spiders' webs: the City is moved from its foundations, and the people, flooding past the half-ruined shrines, run to the tombs of the martyrs. He knew, therefore, how to grieve over the relics of gentile superstition, and no less to rejoice at its ruin and at the progress of the Christian religion. This he had already celebrated in Epistle 46 (elsewhere 17) in these words: There is indeed there (at Rome) a holy Church, there are the trophies of Apostles and martyrs, there is the true confession of Christ, there is the faith preached by the Apostle, and, heathenism being trodden down, the Christian name daily raising itself on high.

[412] But how great an esteem he had for that faith, which he frequently says was praised by an Apostolic mouth, thinking excellently of the religion of the Romans. he clearly declares in the Preface of book 2 on the Epistle to the Galatians, in these words: Do you wish to know, O Paula and Eustochium, how the Apostle marked each province by its own characteristics? To this day either the same traces of virtues or of errors remain. The faith of the Roman people is praised. Where else is there such zeal and such a concourse to the churches and to the sepulchres of the martyrs? where does the Amen resound like heavenly thunder, and the empty temples of idols are shaken? Not that the Romans have any other faith than that which all the churches of Christ have; but that in them there is greater devotion and simplicity in believing. Then he also sets forth what displeased the Apostle in the Romans, studying neither to flatter them nor to accuse them without cause. There are never lacking in great cities things that can be disapproved; just as those cities everywhere have some things praiseworthy. But Jerome was of such freedom in writing that he is not wont to dissemble vices when occasion is given of speaking of them; just as neither does he keep silence about virtues. That Rufinus carps at this I do not wonder, since he accuses many praiseworthy things too in Jerome without any reason. I wonder more that Rufinus's trifles could have pleased some modern writers, on whose account I refute them more fully than they would otherwise seem to need refuting. Of the piety of the Romans he speaks also in Epistle 66 (elsewhere 26), and again in Epistle 127 (elsewhere 16), number 8, and in many other places.

[413] But if we should wish to investigate what Jerome thought of the Roman Church, the authority of the Roman Church, what of the necessity of communicating with it, what of the authority of the Roman Pontiff and his immunity from error in defining articles of faith, we shall satisfy the followers of Rufinus more fully than they perhaps desire. Already in §10 I recited many things which he wrote to Damasus in praise of the Roman Church. I repeat very few. I have judged that the chair of Peter and the faith praised by an Apostolic mouth must be consulted. Presently: Among you alone is the inheritance of the Fathers preserved uncorrupted. Again: You are the light of the world, you the salt of the earth, you the golden and silver vessels. Again: I, following no one first but Christ, am joined in communion with your Beatitude, that is, with the Chair of Peter. Upon that Rock I know the Church was built. Whoever eats the lamb outside this house is profane. If anyone shall not have been in the ark of Noah, he shall perish when the flood reigns: and below: Whoever gathers not with thee, scatters; that is, he who is not Christ's is Antichrist's. The words alleged declare, first, that the Roman Pontiff is the successor of St. Peter. Secondly, that he was stained by no error of heresy the uncorrupted inheritance of the Fathers intimates, especially since he says among you alone is it preserved. Thirdly, Jerome openly and repeatedly makes manifest the necessity of communicating with the Roman Church, and leaves no hope of salvation to all those who withdraw from its communion.

[414] the necessity of communicating with it, The necessity of communicating and believing with the Roman Church Jerome makes manifest in other places too. Of St. Athanasius and his successor Peter of Alexandria he says in Epistle 127 (elsewhere 16), number 5: They had fled to Rome as to the safest haven of their communion. In book 1 against Rufinus, number 4, he writes thus: What does he call his faith? that in which the Roman Church is strong? or that which is contained in the volumes of Origen? If he shall answer, the Roman: then we are Catholics, etc. Besides, what he intimates about the uncorrupted faith of the Roman Church by the uncorrupted inheritance of the Fathers he hints at in other words too in Epistle 48 (elsewhere 50) to Pammachius, number 17, speaking of St. Damasus the Pope, who had reprehended nothing in Jerome's Epistle to Eustochium: Did that excellent man, he says, learned in the Scriptures, a virgin, and a doctor of the Virgin Church, reprehend anything in that discourse? I should like whoever thinks the words alleged must be expounded otherwise to tell me why Jerome calls the Roman Church a Virgin, unless because he believed that it was never stained by any error of its head. Hence Jerome freely answers Theophilus of Alexandria in Epistle 63 (elsewhere 68): But yet know that we hold nothing more ancient than to keep the rights of Christ, and not to remove the landmarks of the Fathers, and always to remember the Roman faith, praised by an Apostolic mouth, of which the Alexandrian church glories that it is a partaker.

[415] and of following its faith, These things show how highly Jerome valued the faith of the Roman Pontiff, from which he never wished to withdraw; of which he was so confident that in Epistle 15 to Damasus he wrote: Decree, I beseech you, if it please you, and I shall not fear to say three hypostases—even though he declares that manner of speaking most suspect to himself. For he believed himself safe by the authority of the Roman Pontiff, as he again testifies in the same place in these words: Wherefore I adjure your Beatitude by the crucified Salvation of the world, by the consubstantial Trinity, that by your letters authority be given me either to keep silence about hypostases or to speak of them. Whence could so great a confidence arise in Jerome, unless because he believed that the Roman Pontiffs, resting upon the promise and help of Christ the Lord, not only had never fallen into error, but never would fall? In this sense, in book 2 against Rufinus, whom he charges with defending Origen's writings, he speaks thus: Yet know that the Roman faith, praised by an Apostolic voice, does not receive tricks of this kind: even if an angel should announce otherwise than what was once preached, it, fortified by the authority of Paul, cannot be changed. Thus he celebrates the holiness and the truth of faith as proper to the Roman Church in Epistle 46 (elsewhere 17) to Marcella, in that very place in which he strives to persuade her that Rome, on account of its power, ambition and greatness, is less suited to the profession of the monastic life, and speaks thus: There is indeed there a holy Church, there are the trophies of Apostles and martyrs, there is the true confession of Christ, there is the faith preached by the Apostle, etc.

[416] Lastly, he seems to adorn the Roman Church with such magnificent elogia, and that the teaching of the Roman Pontiffs and so to extol the Roman faith, for no other reason than that he believed that to St. Peter and his successors that privilege was given by Christ, that they should never fall into error while teaching the Church committed to them. Certainly either I am greatly mistaken, or St. Jerome taught in express words, and always professed, that opinion which almost the whole Catholic Church, the Gallican excepted, still follows. For this cause he so commends in various places the Roman Church for the purity of its faith, its truth, and its constancy never to be changed. For this cause he writes so confidently to Damasus that he will embrace whatever he should command about saying one hypostasis or three. For Jerome himself in the Dialogue against the Pelagians, book 3, number 17, says: Otherwise it is most foolish for me to depend upon another's judgment concerning my own faith. By what reasoning, then, would he have wished to depend upon Damasus's judgment, unless he believed him, by reason of the Apostolic Chair, immune from error in teaching?

[417] Further, Jerome most clearly indicates his mind on Matthew, at chapter 17, verses 22 and 23, is immune from error, Jerome plainly teaches. where he asks how St. Peter, after the magnificent promises of Christ: Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, etc., afterwards heard the Lord say to him: Get thee behind me, Satan, thou art a scandal to me. Then he answers: But if he who asks this should consider that that promise to Peter, and the beatitude, and the power, and the building of the Church upon him, were promised in the future, not given in the present, he will understand. "I will build," he says, "my Church upon thee, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." And: "I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven." All in the future; which if he had given him at once, the error of a perverse opinion would never have found place in him. Jerome wished, therefore, that Peter, after he had been appointed head of the Church, was no longer liable to error in teaching. For this cause, then, he calls the Chair of Peter, that is, the Roman Church, a Virgin too, and says that its faith cannot be changed, and lays it down that it must be so followed by all that he says that he will perish who shall be unwilling to do it: If anyone shall not have been in the ark of Noah, he shall perish when the flood reigns. These things will suffice for anyone to perceive how excellently St. Jerome thought of the authority of the Roman Pontiffs and of the Roman Church.

§ XXV. Seven Treatises and other writings on the Psalms: the Life of Malchus, likewise of St. Hilarion.

Seven Treatises on the Psalms, which have perished, After Origen's Homilies on Luke translated, Jerome continues thus about his own writings: Seven treatises on the Psalms from the tenth to the sixteenth. Of these seven Treatises, in which he expounded seven Psalms, the saint makes mention in no other place of his Works, and the Treatises themselves have either perished or lie hidden hitherto. Hence the learned doubt whether those Treatises are St. Jerome's or Origen's, seven of whose Treatises he could have made Latin. Vallarsius

in the General Preface to the Works of St. Jerome, prefixed to volume 1, at numbers 21 and 22, discusses both sides and leaves the question undecided. Yet he seems to incline to this side, that he rather believes those seven Treatises to have been composed by Jerome than merely translated from the Greek; as to me too it is more likely. But since for neither opinion are there arguments in any way certain, I should prefer to refer curious readers to the indicated passage of Vallarsius than to dispute at greater length about an uncertain matter, especially since that little work of Jerome's—whether as author or as translator—has perished.

[419] The Breviary on the Psalms is not Jerome's: yet he wrote on Psalm 93, The said Vallarsius observes, however, that some things from those Treatises of Jerome are perhaps mingled with the Breviary on the Psalms, which was formerly ascribed to St. Jerome in various manuscripts, but is now by the most certain arguments denied to him by the learned. That Breviary the reader will find in Vallarsius, volume 7, after the genuine Works of Jerome, and there he will at the same time find it clearly proved that it is not St. Jerome's Work, so that I have no necessity of discussing that matter again. The said Vallarsius further observes in the Preface, number 23, that St. Jerome wrote other things on the Psalms too. For by the testimony of St. Augustine it is established that Psalm 93 was expounded by Jerome. For in Epistle 148 (elsewhere 111) to Fortunatianus, which he called a Commonitory, at number 13 he says that he will bring forward one passage of St. Jerome against the Anthropomorphites, and presently at number 14 continues thus: When therefore that man, most learned in the Scriptures, was expounding the Psalm where it is said: "Understand, ye senseless among the people, and, ye fools, be wise at length. He that planted the ear, shall he not hear?" etc. (which are read in Psalm 92), among other things he says: "This passage makes especially against those who are Anthropomorphites, who say that God has members such as we too have," etc. These words of Augustine certainly prove that Psalm 93 was expounded by Jerome. Yet no one ought to infer from the words of Jerome alleged by Augustine, which are read at Psalm 93 in the Breviary just mentioned, that that Breviary is really Jerome's, or at least that it was attributed to Jerome by Augustine. For Vallarsius clearly proves that many Hieronymian things are indeed found in the said Breviary; but that it is the work of a much more recent author, who patched together that Breviary out of the writings of Jerome and other Fathers on the Psalms.

[420] likewise on the second, Finally Vallarsius at number 24 proves that Jerome composed certain other little Commentaries on the Psalms as well. And this we understand from the words of the holy Doctor in book 1 against Rufinus, number 19, where he has it thus: He is said also to carp at this, that, interpreting the second Psalm, for what we read in the Latin, "Lay hold of discipline", and what is written in the Hebrew volume, NESCU BAR, I said in my little Commentaries, "Adore the son". And again, turning the whole Psalter into the Roman tongue, as though forgetful of my old exposition, I put: "Adore purely": which surely is plainly contrary to all his own positions. Then he sets forth by what reasoning the Hebrew words can be expounded in the said ways, on account of their ambiguity. And for his defence he subjoins: What then have I sinned, if I have rendered an ambiguous word by a different interpretation; and if I, who in little Commentaries, where there is liberty of discussion, had said "Adore the son", in the body of the text itself, lest I should seem a violent translator and give place to Jewish calumny, said "Adore purely" or "choicely", which Aquila also and Symmachus translated? What harm, then, does it do to the faith of the Church, if the reader is taught in how many ways a single little verse is explained among the Hebrews? Thus Jerome in his own defence.

[241] But here we observe from the words alleged that the saint wrote little Commentaries on at least some of the Psalms, and some others he wrote before the year 392; and by name on the second, in which are the words expounded in different ways. Again, from the words given it is gathered that they had already been composed before the saint made the Psalter Latin from the Hebrew. Hence we can in some measure obtain a knowledge of the time in which he composed those brief Commentaries. For he translated the Psalter before writing, in the year 392, the book On Illustrious Men, in which, at chapter 134, he has it thus concerning Sophronius: He also translated into Greek in elegant speech my little works On Virginity, to Eustochium, and the Life of the monk Hilarion: the Psalter too, and the Prophets, which we turned from Hebrew into Latin. From these things, therefore, it is established that those Commentaries were written before the year 392. Yet the saint does not mention them among his writings in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 135, either because the Work was even then unfinished, or because he hoped some day to write upon the Psalms more at length and more accurately.

[422] Certainly Jerome once thought of explaining the Psalms accurately, and he thought of writing more fully on the Psalms. if leisure and life should be given him, since on Isaiah, chapter 63, verse 3, he writes this: In a good sense are the eighth and eighty-third Psalms inscribed "For the winepresses": of which, in their own places, if life be my companion, the Lord granting, it shall be spoken. Thus Jerome about the year 410, who afterwards expounded Ezekiel, and died while expounding Jeremiah, so that it is not likely that a complete Work on the Psalms was ever composed by him. But as regards the little Commentaries of which we are treating, they were in all likelihood written for the sake of SS. Paula and Eustochium, to whom he dedicated his first labours in Palestine. Perhaps too it was only an epistolary exposition, and perished with the very many Epistles given to those holy women at Bethlehem, of which Jerome speaks thus: But of the Epistles to Paula and Eustochium, because they are written daily, the number is uncertain. Thus far about the writings on the Psalms which have perished. Of their emendation and translation we shall treat in their own places.

[423] After the Treatises on the Psalms St. Jerome reckons two Lives among his writings, in these words: He writes the Life of the monk Malchus, The Life of Malchus, the captive monk, and of blessed Hilarion. If these Lives are mentioned by the saint in the order of the time in which they were composed, they belong to the year 390 or 391. It can, however, be doubted whether perhaps they were not composed much earlier, that is, before the saint's other Works at Bethlehem, since in the Life of Malchus he says, I who have long kept silence, as though he had written that little work first in Palestine after a fairly long silence, which he observed after he departed from Rome. Yet I should prefer to follow St. Jerome's order, who had perhaps kept silence for some months, and had laboured usefully either in correcting the sacred Scripture or in preparing himself for the version from the Hebrew, before he wrote the Life of Malchus. And that Jerome's order must altogether be followed is gathered from this, that Evagrius of Antioch at number 2 is called Papa, since he was made bishop only in the year 388. Jerome further intimates that he is thinking of writing an ecclesiastical History, which nevertheless he never did, in all likelihood because he always had one thing after another to do. The deeds of Malchus, as he sets forth at number 2, he had learned when he was living in solitude in Syria, where Malchus also dwelt as an old man, who himself narrated everything to Jerome, as is said at the end.

[424] thinking of composing an ecclesiastical History, I subjoin the whole Preface: Those who are about to fight a naval battle, he says, first, in harbour and on a calm sea, turn their rudders, pull their oars, prepare their grappling-irons and hooks, and accustom the soldiers stationed along the decks to stand firm with poised step and slipping foothold, so that what they have learned in a mock fight they may not fear in a real contest. So I too, who have long kept silence (for he has made me silent to whom my speech is a torment), desire first to be exercised in a small work, and as it were to wipe off a certain rust of the tongue, that I may be able to come to a broader history. For I have resolved to write (if only the Lord grant me life, and if my detractors shall at least cease to persecute me who am fleeing and shut away) from the coming of the Saviour down to our own age, that is, from the Apostles down to the dregs of our time, how and by whom the Church of Christ was born and grew up, increased by persecutions and was crowned with martyrdoms; and how, after it came to Christian princes, it became greater indeed in power and riches, but less in virtues. This Work was worthy of Jerome, but the love of the sacred Scriptures turned his cares aside to their interpretation.

[425] and the Life of St. Hilarion. After the Life of Malchus there followed the much longer Life of St. Hilarion, which by the year 392 had already been rendered into Greek by Sophronius, as is clear from the words given at number 421. The deeds of St. Hilarion Jerome could learn both from St. Epiphanius, who had known him, and from many others then still living. From his Preface I transfer a part hither: Being about to write the Life of blessed Hilarion, I invoke the Holy Spirit who dwelt in him, that he who bestowed those virtues on him may grant me speech to narrate them, so that deeds may be matched by words. And below: For although the holy Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, who lived much with Hilarion, wrote his praise in a short Epistle, which is commonly read: yet it is one thing to praise the dead with commonplaces, another to narrate the dead man's own virtues. Whence we too, undertaking the work begun by him rather in his favour than to his injury, despise the voices of slanderers: who, formerly disparaging my Paul (the first hermit), will now perhaps disparage Hilarion also; calumniating the one for his solitude, objecting to the other his throngs; so that he who always lay hidden should be held never to have existed, and he who was seen by many should be reckoned of little worth. This their forefathers the Pharisees did of old, to whom neither John's desert and fasting, nor the crowds, the food and drink of the Lord and Saviour, were pleasing.

§ XXVI. The correction of the Old Testament according to the Seventy, or its translation into Latin from the text of the Seventy which was in the Hexapla of Origen.

The New Testament having been corrected at Rome, Since St. Jerome, after the Works just related, mentions his labours spent upon the emendation of the sacred Scriptures, I think we must discuss them in this place, although all those things which he touches upon most briefly were not accomplished even within twenty years. The New Testament, he says, I restored to the Greek original: the Old I translated according to the Hebrew. Of the correction of the New Testament, which he began at Damasus's command and more probably completed wholly at Rome, I have discussed sufficiently in §14, where I also proved that the Psalter was corrected by the saint the first time at Rome. But the translation from the Hebrew was only in part finished when Jerome wrote these things, if indeed he wrote them thus in the year 392. For Vallarsius observes that in the Veronese manuscript the words the Old I translated according to the Hebrew are not read. But whether Jerome spoke thus because he had translated a part and was meditating the translation of the remaining books, or whether these words were afterwards added, it is most certainly established

that some books were translated from the Hebrew before the year 392 and some after. But before he undertook this labour he laboured much in cleansing the edition of the Seventy interpreters, and not only corrected it but also made the whole of it Latin out of the Greek. Of these things, therefore, we must treat first.

[427] St. Jerome in Epistle 71 (elsewhere 28) to Lucinius, number 5, says: He corrected the whole Old Testament in Palestine, I do not doubt that you too have the edition of the Seventy interpreters, and many years ago I handed it over to students most diligently emended. And in book 2 against Rufinus, to show that he is no adversary of the edition of the Seventy interpreters, he writes thus at number 24: Have I spoken anything against the Seventy interpreters, whom many years ago, most diligently emended, I gave to the students of my own tongue? Jerome does not here declare what copies he used in the emendation; nor does he clearly set forth whether he only removed the faults of the old Latin edition, or whether he substituted a new translation from the Greek text. Yet he somewhat intimates the latter in these words: I gave to the students of my own tongue.

[428] But he asserts it in Epistle 106 to Sunnia and Fretela, or rather turned it from Greek into Latin according to the Hexapla. in which at number 2 he sets forth what the difference was between the vulgate edition of the Seventy interpreters, which was less correct, and the other preserved in Origen's Hexapla, which he calls pure and says was rendered into Latin by himself. In which I briefly give this warning, he says, that you may know that there is one edition which Origen and Eusebius of Cæsarea, and all the Greek commentators, call κοινή, that is, the common and the Vulgate, … and another of the Seventy interpreters, which is found in the Ἑξαπλοῖς manuscripts, and has been faithfully turned by us into the Latin tongue, and is chanted at Jerusalem and in the churches of the East. And below: But this κοινή, that is, the common edition, is the same as the Seventy. But this is the difference between the two, that the κοινή is the old edition corrupted according to places and times and the will of the copyists. But that which is had in the Ἑξαπλοῖς, and which we have translated, is that very translation of the Seventy interpreters which is preserved in the books of the learned uncorrupted and unstained. Thus far Jerome. From these things it is clear that the whole translation of the Seventy was given by Jerome to the Latin tongue, as it was had in the Hexapla of Origen.

[429] That the saint might be able to render the Greek edition of the Seventy according to the Hexapla into Latin, But he had first procured the whole Hexapla for himself, it was necessary that he should first procure for himself the Greek text of the Hexapla, which was preserved in the library of Cæsarea in Palestine. Wherefore he not only had that Greek text copied out for himself in the first years in which he dwelt at Bethlehem, but the whole Hexapla as well, that is, the Old Testament written out in six different ways. That Jerome had all these, together with three other Greek translations, that is, the fifth, sixth, and seventh, which were also in the Hexapla but did not comprise the whole Old Testament, there is no doubt. And that he had them before he wrote the Commentaries on the Epistle to Titus about the year 389 he hints in these at chapter 3, verse 9, where at the same time he sets forth what the Hexapla of Origen contained. He says there first what the difference is between Hebrew and Greek letters, which do not altogether correspond to the Hebrew, just as the Latin cannot exactly correspond: and he observes that the Hebrews were wont to laugh when their words are expressed in Greek or Latin with a different sound.

[430] and had himself collated them with the authentic copies. Then he continues thus: Whence it was our care to emend from the authentic copies themselves all the books of the Old Law which that learned man Adamantius (Origen) had arranged in the Hexapla, transcribed from the library of Cæsarea. In which both the Hebrew words themselves are written in their proper characters, and are expressed in Greek letters in a neighbouring column. Aquila too and Symmachus, the Seventy also and Theodotion, keep their own order. These make the Hexapla, that is, the Scripture expressed in six ways, namely twice in Hebrew—first in Hebrew letters, again in Greek. Then come the four Greek translations. Yet there were in the same collection three other translations, as he subjoins: But some books, and especially those which among the Hebrews are composed in verse, have three other editions added: which they call the Fifth, the Sixth, and the Seventh translation, having obtained authority without the names of their translators. These that immortal genius bestowed upon us by his labour, so that we need not greatly dread the haughtiness of the Jews, who rejoice with loosened lips and twisted tongue and hissing spittle and scraped throat. All these things Jerome not only had, but also corrected according to the authentic copy of the library of Cæsarea, perhaps in the year 386 or 387, certainly before he wrote these things. That he had all those, and by name the three last translations, Jerome also testifies in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 54, on Origen.

[431] He translated the text of the Seventy But in what manner he made the Greek translation of the Seventy interpreters Latin, and that augmented from the Hebrew text, indicating by various signs what had been added by the Seventy to the Hebrew text and what omitted from it, he declares in some of the Prefaces to his translation. The Preface to the Psalter, in volume 10 of the Veronese edition, column 105, has it thus: The Psalter, while placed at Rome, I had long since emended, and according to the Seventy Interpreters, though cursorily, I had corrected it in great part. And because you see it again depraved by the fault of copyists, and the old error prevailing more than the new emendation, you compel me, as it were in a new field, to work the ground already broken, and with slanting furrows to root out the thorns springing up again; saying that it is just that what often sprouts ill should be the oftener cut down.

[432] augmented from the Hebrew through Theodotion's version; Whence with my accustomed preface I admonish both you, for whom perchance this labour sweats, and those who shall wish to have copies of this kind, that what I have diligently emended be transcribed with care and diligence. Let each one mark for himself either the lying line or the radiating signs, that is, either the obeli or the asterisks, and wherever he shall see a preceding little stroke (that is, an obelus), let him know that from it up to the two points which we have set down there is more in the Seventy translators. But where he shall perceive the likeness of a star, let him know that it was added from the Hebrew volumes, likewise up to the two points, according to the edition of Theodotion only, who in the simplicity of his speech does not disagree with the Seventy interpreters. Knowing, therefore, that I have done this for you and for every studious man, I do not doubt that there will be many who, either from envy or from haughtiness, will prefer to seem to despise excellent things rather than to learn, and to drink from a turbid rivulet rather than from the purest fountain.

[433] In the Preface to the three books of Solomon, volume 10, column 435, he more clearly intimates and by adding obeli and asterisks he indicated that he not only corrected the Latin edition, but did so by giving a new translation, and that likewise augmented according to the Hebrew text. By the same signs too he there distinguished what was omitted and what added. I subjoin the Preface itself: The three books of Solomon, that is, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, I have restored to the old authority of the Seventy interpreters, either designating whatever is superfluous by lines prefixed (elsewhere obeli), or inserting, with stars marked before them, the things which were lacking; that you may more fully know, O Paula and Eustochium, what is lacking in our books and what is redundant.

[434] Moreover, blotting out and abolishing those things also which unskilled translators had badly turned into our tongue from the Greek speech, what had been omitted or added by the Seventy. I have corrected them with the most scrupulous truthfulness. And where, by a preposterous and perverse order of sentences, the light had been snatched away, restoring them to their own places I have made intelligible what lay hid. Further, in that book which by most is entitled the Wisdom of Solomon, and in Ecclesiasticus, which no one is ignorant is the work of Jesus the son of Sirach, I have restrained my pen, desiring to emend for you only the canonical Scriptures, and to commend my study to what is certain rather than to what is doubtful. From the last words it is clear that St. Jerome corrected only those books of sacred Scripture which even then by the consent of all were canonical, not those which were afterwards admitted by the Church into the canon, and even then were held by many as canonical. For the rest, Vallarsius in his Annotations suspects that that Preface suffered some corruption from the copyists, because the style seems less elegant.

[435] Not all the Prefaces survive which he prefixed to the books of the Old Testament corrected or translated from the Greek, On account of these corrections he is assailed by detractors, so that it is no wonder that many Prefaces to the corrected books of the New Testament have also perished. Besides those given, however, there also survives the Preface to Job corrected, or translated from the Greek, from which we understand that the saint, on account of a most useful labour, lay open to the bites of the envious. It stands thus in volume 10, column 47: If I were weaving a basket of rushes, or plaiting palm leaves, so that in the sweat of my face I might eat bread and handle the work of the belly with an anxious mind, no one would bite at me, no one would reprehend me. But now, because according to the Saviour's saying I wish to work for the food that perishes not, and to clear the ancient way of the divine volumes of thorns and thickets, the tooth is fixed in me: I, the corrector of faults, am called a forger, and am said not to remove errors but to sow them. For so great is the habit of antiquity that even acknowledged faults please most men, since they prefer to have manuscripts fine rather than emended.

[436] Wherefore, O Paula and Eustochium, unique pattern of nobility and humility, yet he goes on, and the book of Job instead of the fan, the baskets and little hampers, the little gift of monks, receive these spiritual and abiding gifts: and rejoice that blessed Job, who among the Latins still lay on the dunghill and teemed with the worms of errors, is now whole and unstained. For as by his trial and victory all things were doubly restored to him, so I in our tongue (I speak boldly) have made him have what he had lost. Therefore both you and every reader I admonish with my accustomed preface, and, always annexing the same at the beginnings of the books, I ask that, wherever you shall see the preceding little strokes [\], you should know that what is subjoined is not had in the Hebrew volumes: further, where the image of a star shall shine, that these things have been added from the Hebrew in our speech. Moreover, those things which we seemed to have and which were so corrupted that they took away the sense from readers, at your prayers I have corrected with great labour, reckoning that something more useful would come to the churches of Christ from my leisure than from the business of others.* Thus far Jerome there.

[437] to emend. This labour of Jerome's especially But how great the faults of the book of Job were he intimates again in the Preface to his own translation from the Hebrew, volume 9, column [ ], saying this about the book of Job: From which, if you take away the things that were added under asterisks, the greatest part of the volume will be cut off: and this at least among the Greeks. But among the Latins, before that translation which we lately published under asterisks and obeli, nearly seven hundred or eight hundred lines are lacking, so that it is curtailed

and mangled and gnawed, and the book publicly displays its foulness to readers. This correction or translation of Job by Jerome St. Augustine had, and wonderfully approved, before he had seen all the books of the Old Testament. For in the Epistle which is the 104th among the Hieronymian letters, Augustine dissuades Jerome from a version from the Hebrew, and urges rather a translation from the Greek of the Seventy interpreters, writing this at number 4: I for my part should prefer that you translate for us the Greek canonical Scriptures, which are put forth under the authority of the Seventy interpreters. And at number 6: And by this you will profit us most, if you restore to Latin truthfulness that Greek Scripture which the Seventy produced: which in different manuscripts is so various that it can scarcely be borne; and so suspect, lest something else be found in the Greek, that men hesitate to bring forward or prove anything from it. By then Jerome had beyond doubt finished all those translations, when Augustine wrote this about the year 404; so that it must be said that most of them were even then unknown to Augustine.

[438] St. Augustine approved. What was added from the Hebrew was Theodotion's. Yet he had seen the translation of Job from the Greek, since at number 3 he writes the following: But in this Epistle I add this, which we have since learned, that Job was translated by you from the Hebrew, whereas we already had a certain translation of yours of the same Prophet turned into Latin from the Greek tongue: where, however, you marked with asterisks what is in the Hebrew and is lacking in the Greek; and with obelisks what is found in the Greek and is not in the Hebrew: with such wonderful diligence that in certain places we see single stars at single words, signifying that those words are in the Hebrew but are not in the Greek. Thus St. Augustine. But now it must be observed that all those things which were added from the Hebrew to the edition of the Seventy interpreters under asterisks were not first added from the Hebrew by Jerome, nor inserted by him into the said edition, but were taken by Origen from the translation of Theodotion, as St. Jerome declares in Epistle 112 (elsewhere 89), by which he answers that Epistle of Augustine's, at number 19 in these words: But where there are asterisks, that is, little stars shining before, it was added by Origen from the edition of Theodotion. Jerome, therefore, did not first add these, but made Latin, along with the rest, what had been added by Origen. And that they were taken from Theodotion's edition he also advises in the Preface to the Psalter, in the words given at number 432. Jerome, however, did not translate the Greek words of Theodotion, but we expressed the same things from the Hebrew itself, he says in Epistle 112 to Augustine.

[439] But now, even though the prefaces to all the books of the Old Testament made Latin from the Greek by Jerome are not extant, The edition of the Seventy was different in different regions. it is nevertheless established from the words recited at number 427 and following that all which were in the Jews' canon were thus emended by him, or translated from the Hexapla. The saint testifies this again in the Preface to the version of Paralipomenon from the Hebrew, volume 9, column [ ], in these words: For the rest, I remember that I once gave to our people the edition of the Seventy translators, emended from the Greek. I pass over other places where the saint intimates the same. But I observe that he somewhat doubted whether even thus the translation of the Seventy interpreters was extant pure. For he begins the said Preface thus: If the Edition of the Seventy interpreters remained pure and as it was turned by them into Greek, you would be urging me superfluously, my Chromatius, holiest and most learned of bishops, to translate the Hebrew volumes into the Latin tongue. For what had once taken possession of men's ears, and had strengthened the faith of the nascent Church, it was just should be approved even by our silence. But now, since according to the variety of regions different copies are current, and that genuine and ancient translation has been corrupted and violated, you think it a matter for our judgment either to determine out of several which is true, or to hammer out a new Work upon an old one, and, as the saying is, to pierce the eyes of the crows while the Jews mock. Alexandria and Egypt in their Seventy praise Hesychius as their author. From Constantinople to Antioch the copies of Lucian [\] the martyr are approved. The provinces midway between these read the Palestinian [\] manuscripts, which, elaborated by Origen, Eusebius and Pamphilus published: and the whole world fights against itself with this threefold variety.

[440] From these things it is clear that Origen's edition, which Jerome had adopted, Augustine studiously asks for Jerome's translation. could be called pure only in so far as it had not been vitiated by copyists: but that it was not equally certain whether Origen everywhere exhibited the text of the Seventy interpreters more correctly than the first authors of the other editions did. And of Origen's edition, which he had made Latin, he continues thus: And certainly Origen not only composed copies of four editions, writing the several words over against one another, so that one that disagrees is at once convicted, the rest agreeing among themselves; but, what is of greater boldness, he mixed into the edition of the Seventy the edition of Theodotion, designating with asterisks what had before been lacking, and with little strokes what seemed added superfluously. Thus the saint concerning the translation of the Seventy interpreters, which in exactly the same manner in which Origen had made the Greek he had exhibited in Latin, in order to prove that a translation from the Hebrew would be useful, and to be preferred even to this edition. Yet St. Augustine studiously asked for Jerome's edition of the Seventy as soon as he knew that it had been completed by Jerome. For in the Epistle which is the 116th among the Hieronymian letters (elsewhere 97), at number 34, he writes thus to Jerome: Then send us, I beseech you, your translation of the Seventy, which I did not know you had published. And at number 35: But I desire your translation of the Seventy for this reason, that we may as far as possible be free from the great unskilfulness of the Latin translators, such as they are, who have dared this. He adds another reason, to be reported below, where the translation from the Hebrew will be treated.

\ elsewhere he calls them obeli*

\ elsewhere Juliani*

\ elsewhere Palæstino*

§ XXVII. The translation of the Old Testament from the Hebrew, at first disapproved by some.

About 390 the saint began to translate the Old Testament from the Hebrew, After St. Jerome had brought to an end the Latin edition of the Seventy interpreters, of which we have treated, he set about a Work of greater difficulty and of the greatest usefulness, namely the translation of the Old Testament from the Hebrew text itself. That he might set about this, he had first procured all the aids, namely a knowledge of the Hebrew tongue through Hebrew masters, the editions of all the preceding interpreters preserved in Origen's Hexapla, and a great understanding of sacred Scripture through long study and through a diligent survey of the places of Palestine. That laborious work he began about the year 390: for he had already translated a notable part when in the year 392 he wrote the book On Illustrious Men, where at chapter 134 he says of Sophronius, he translated into Greek in elegant speech (certain little works), the Psalter too, and the Prophets, which we turned from Hebrew into Latin. Nevertheless the saint did not finish the whole translation before the year 404, in which St. Paula died, as we shall see below. St. Jerome spent so many years upon the translation of the Old Testament because he interposed many other writings which were more urgent and could be finished sooner. Wherefore, if I were to reckon everything in order of time, very many other things would have to be interposed among these. But it will be pleasanter for the reader, I think, if I set forth everything pertaining to this translation consecutively; and I shall do this the more willingly because the years in which the several books were translated cannot be exactly designated, nor is even the order altogether certain.

[442] beginning with the four books of Kings, The saint seems to have made his beginning from the four books of Kings, as they are commonly called. But the two former are named among the Hebrews Samuel, the two latter Malachim, that is, of Kings. The Prologue prefixed to these books, which is everywhere called the Helmeted Prologue, and in which the canonical books of the Jews are enumerated, persuades us that Jerome began from them. There is added that they are reckoned by the Hebrews among the Prophets: for the Prophets, at least for a great part, he had translated in the year 392, as the words just given prove. But this last reason does not press much, since Jerome says that the books of Joshua and of Judges and of Ruth also are reckoned among the Prophets, and yet he translated them last. But the Prologue itself rather shows that the translation was begun from the books of Kings: for he makes mention of no preceding one, nor says that he had been torn by the envious on account of those translations, but feared lest this should happen. And to forestall what might be objected, he speaks thus in the prologue, volume 9, column 459: I beseech you, reader, do not reckon my labour a reprehension of the ancients. Into the tabernacle of God each one offers what he can: some gold and silver and precious stones: others offer fine linen and purple and scarlet and hyacinth. It will go well with us if we offer skins and goats' hair. And yet the Apostle judges our more contemptible parts the more necessary. Whence all that beauty of the tabernacle, and the distinction, in its several kinds, of the present and future Church, is covered with skins and hair-cloth, and the cheaper things keep off the burning of the sun and the injury of the rains. By these things the saint modestly intimates the usefulness of his Work, even though he compares it with the cheaper offerings.

[443] Then he continues thus: Read then first my Samuel and Malachim (that is, testifying that he had endeavoured to translate everything faithfully: the four books of Kings); mine, I say, mine. For whatever by frequent translating and more anxious emending we have both learned and hold, is ours. And when you have understood what you did not know before, either reckon me a translator, if you are grateful; or a παραφραστής, if you are ungrateful. Although I am in no way conscious of having changed anything of the Hebrew verity. Certainly if you are unbelieving, read the Greek and Latin manuscripts, and compare them with these little works, and wherever you see them differing among themselves, ask any of the Hebrews to which you ought rather to give credence: and if he confirms ours, I suppose you will not reckon him a guesser, so as in the same place to have divined in the same way as I. But you also, handmaids of Christ, I ask—you who anoint the head of the reclining Lord with the most precious ointment of faith, who by no means seek the Saviour in the sepulchre, for whom Christ has now ascended to the Father—that against the barking dogs which rage against me with rabid mouth and go about the city, and think themselves learned in this, if they disparage others, you should set the shields of your prayers. These last words are beyond doubt directed to SS. Paula and Eustochium, who pressed Jerome most of all for these translations, as is read in several Prefaces.

[444] After the books of Kings Jerome in all likelihood went on to translate the Prophets, passing on to Isaiah and the rest of the Prophets, all of whom he inscribed to SS. Paula and Eustochium with different Prefaces. In the Preface to Isaiah, column 685, having complained of his detractors, but briefly, he continues thus: And nevertheless I ask this of fastidious readers, that, as the Greeks after the Seventy translators read Aquila and Symmachus and Theodotion, either for the sake of their own learning, or that they may better understand the Seventy by comparison with them,

so these too may deign to have at least one translator after the earlier ones. Let them read first, and afterwards despise, lest they seem to condemn what they do not know, not from judgment but from the presumption of hatred. And below: Whom (Christ) the more you love, O Paula and Eustochium, the more ask of him that for the present detraction, by which my rivals ceaselessly tear me, he himself may restore to me a reward in the future: who knows that I have sweated in the learning of a foreign tongue for this, that the Jews might not longer insult his churches concerning the falsity of the Scriptures.

[445] In the Preface to Jeremiah, besides what he observes about the Prophet and his Prophecy, all of which, as also the Psalter, he had translated by the year 392; as he does in other Prefaces too, he declares what he has done that is singular, and what he expects, in these words: Besides, we have corrected to its pristine fidelity the order of the visions, which among the Greeks and Latins is altogether confused. But the book of Baruch, his notary, which among the Hebrews is neither read nor had, we have passed over: awaiting for all these things the curses of our rivals, to whom it is necessary for me to answer in each of my little works. And this I suffer because you compel me. For the rest, to cut the evil short, it would have been more right to set a limit to their fury by my silence, than daily by writing something new to provoke the madness of the envious. When he says, You compel me, he in all likelihood addresses Paula and Eustochium, to whom he says the same in other places also. In the Preface to Ezekiel, column 903, he observes that the edition of the Seventy does not differ much from the Hebrew text. In the Preface to the twelve Minor Prophets he again addresses Paula and Eustochium, and advises that among the Hebrews it is a single book. And that all these Prophets were translated before the year 392 I can scarcely doubt: or at any rate he finished them in the course of the year 392. The same is certain of the Psalter.

[446] unless perhaps Daniel must be excepted: which does not seem so. But it does not seem equally certain whether he translated the prophecy of Daniel so soon, both because in the Preface, column [ ], he observes that Daniel was not reckoned by the Hebrews among the prophets, but among those who wrote the Hagiographa, and because he suffered great difficulty in the translation of Daniel. Yet since Jerome himself numbered Daniel among the Prophets, and inscribed his translation to Paula and Eustochium, he perhaps translated him next after the rest of the Prophets. And in the Preface he observes that Daniel had not before been read in the Church from the translation of the Seventy, but from that of Theodotion. Of the diversity, such as it is, of the language of Daniel and of certain others he speaks thus: It must be known that Daniel especially and Ezra were written in Hebrew letters indeed, but in the Chaldean tongue, and one περικοπή of Jeremiah; that Job too has very much in common with the Arabic tongue. And on this occasion he confesses that in his youth he was nearly torn away from the study of the Hebrew tongue by the difficulty of understanding Daniel, and adds: And, to confess the truth, to this present day I can read and understand the Chaldean tongue better than I can pronounce it. He concludes the lengthy Preface with these words: Wherefore I beseech you, O Paula and Eustochium, pour out prayers for me to the Lord, that, as long as I am in this poor body, I may write something pleasing to you, useful to the Church, worthy of posterity. For by the judgments of those now living I am not much moved, who on either side slip away either through love or through hatred.

[447] One of the reasons for this translation was, The Psalter Jerome translated at the prayers of Sophronius, who rendered the translation into Greek. On what occasion Sophronius asked for it he sets forth in the Preface, volume 9, column [ ], among other things pertaining to our purpose, in this manner: Since therefore, lately disputing with a Hebrew, you brought forward certain testimonies from the Psalms concerning the Lord and Saviour, and he, wishing to mock you, asserted at almost every word that it was not so had in the Hebrew as you objected from the Seventy interpreters, you most studiously demanded that after Aquila and Symmachus and Theodotion I should translate a new edition into the Latin tongue. For you said that you were more disturbed by the variety of translators; and that, from the love by which you are carried away, you were content either with my translation or with my judgment. Whence, urged on by you, to whom I owe both what I can and what I cannot, I have again given myself over to the barkings of my detractors, and have preferred that you should seek in friendship my strength rather than my will. Certainly I shall say confidently, and will cite many witnesses of this work, that I have at least knowingly changed nothing of the Hebrew verity. If, therefore, anywhere my edition shall differ from the old ones, ask any of the Hebrews, and you will clearly perceive that I am torn in vain by my rivals, who, most perverse men, prefer to seem to despise excellent things rather than to learn. For since they always seek out new pleasures, why in the study of the Scriptures alone are they content with the old savour?

[448] that an answer might be given to the Jews, who appealed to the Hebrew text. Nor do I say this that I may bite at my predecessors, or think that anything is to be taken from those whose translation, most diligently emended, I once gave to the men of my own tongue: but because it is one thing to read the Psalms in the churches of those who believe in Christ, another to answer the Jews who calumniate the several words. And if you shall translate this little work of mine into Greek (as you promise) ἀντιφιλονεικῶν τοῖς κατασύρουσιν (that is, contending on the opposite side with the disparagers), and shall wish to make the most learned men witnesses of my unskilfulness, I shall say to you that saying of Horace: "Carry not wood into the forest". Except that I shall have this comfort, if in a common labour I understand that both praise and blame are common to me with you. Thus far Jerome, who frequently repeats that reason for giving a new translation from the Hebrew in other places too, and adds several others. For the rest, after the Prophets and Psalms were translated, the saint perhaps did not at once go on to the other books of the Old Testament, since he both began in the year 392 to expound the Minor Prophets with Commentaries, and wrote not a few other things at that time.

[449] The translation of the book of Job seems to be among the first after the year 392. Certainly in the Preface, volume 9, column [ ], he speaks of his translation from the Greek To the book of Job, translated with great labour, as lately published, whereas in some Prefaces he says it was published long since. And at the beginning he refutes those who said that this new interpretation was hammered out in reprehension of the Seventy interpreters. But how great the difficulty of the translation was he sets forth in these words: I remember that for the understanding of this volume I hired at no small price a certain preceptor from Lydda, who was reckoned to hold the first place among the Hebrews. Whether I profited anything by his teaching I do not know. This one thing I know, that I could not translate anything but what I had first understood. And a little before: But this translation follows none of the ancient interpreters: but from the Hebrew and Arabic tongue itself, and sometimes the Syriac, it will echo now the words, now the sense, now both together. For even among the Hebrews the whole book is said to be oblique and slippery, and what the Greek Rhetoricians call ἐσχηματισμένος: and while it says one thing it does another, so that, as if you should wish to hold an eel or a little lamprey with tight hands, the harder you press it the sooner it slips away.

[450] he studiously confutes his detractors: Toward the end he thus confutes his detractors: Let my dogs therefore hear that I have laboured in this volume, not that I might reprehend the ancient translation, but that those things which in it are either obscure, or omitted, or at any rate depraved by the fault of the copyists, might become more manifest by our translation… And if among the Greeks, after the edition of the Seventy, the Gospel of Christ already shining forth, the Jew Aquila, and Symmachus and Theodotion, judaizing heretics, have been received—who concealed many mysteries of the Saviour by a crafty interpretation, and yet are had in the ἑξαπλοῖς in the churches and are explained by ecclesiastical men—how much more ought I, a Christian, born of Christian parents, and bearing the standard of the cross on my forehead, whose zeal it has been to recover what was omitted, to correct what was depraved, and to open the mysteries of the Church in pure and faithful speech, not to be rejected either by fastidious or by malignant readers? Let those who will have the old books, whether written on purple parchments in gold and silver, or in uncial letters, as they commonly say—burdens rather than manuscripts: provided they permit me and mine to have our poor little sheets; and manuscripts not so beautiful as emended. Each edition, both the Seventy according to the Greeks and mine according to the Hebrews, has been translated into Latin by my labour. Let each one choose what he will; and let him approve me as studious rather than malevolent.

[451] In Epistle 49 (elsewhere 52) to Pammachius, given in the year 294, The translation of Job must be fixed in the year 393 or 394: he writes thus about his translations at number 4: If you shall read the sixteen books of the Prophets, which I turned into Latin from the Hebrew tongue, and if I find that you are delighted with this work, you will provoke us not to keep the rest also shut up in the book-case. I lately translated Job into our tongue, a copy of which you will be able to borrow from the holy Marcella your cousin. Read the same in Greek and in Latin, and compare the old edition with our Translation; and you will clearly perceive how great a distance there is between truth and falsehood. From these things it is abundantly gathered that Daniel too was translated with the rest of the Prophets; but the book of Job after the Prophets, in the year 393 or 394. Jerome does not there make mention of the books of Kings and of the Psalter; but that these were translated among the first books is certain from elsewhere.

[452] of the books of Esdras in the year 394, There followed perhaps the Translation of the two books of Esdras, which after the manner of the Hebrews he joined into one book. That his Roman friends Domnio and Rogatianus had long asked for. Jerome begins the Preface, column 1521, thus: Whether it is more difficult to do what you ask, or to refuse, I have not yet determined. For neither is it my judgment to refuse you when you command anything: and the greatness of the burden imposed so weighs upon my neck that I must fall beneath the load before I can lift it. There are added to this the zeal of the envious, who think that everything we write must be reprehended, and sometimes, with their own conscience fighting against them, publicly tear what they read in secret, so much so that I am compelled to cry out and say: "Lord, deliver my soul from wicked lips and from a deceitful tongue". It is the third year that you are always writing and writing again that I should translate the book of Ezra for you from the Hebrew. From the last words I conjecture that this book was not translated by Jerome before the year 394, since in all likelihood they did not ask for it until, in the year 391 or 392, they had seen the first Translations at Rome. Then, on account of the envious, he writes this: And so I ask you, my dearest Domnio and Rogatianus, that, content with private reading, you do not bring the book out into public, nor thrust food upon the fastidious, and that you avoid the haughtiness of those who know only how to judge of others, and to do nothing themselves. But if there are any of the brethren to whom our works are not displeasing, give them a copy, etc. He adds not a few things for his own defence, but these I pass over, because like things will return below.

[453] at a time when the saint was much torn by his rivals: At the end he makes mention of one adversary

or of two, and intimates that on his account he will not keep silence, in these words: And so, although the viper hiss, and "victorious Sinon boast of his burnings", my eloquence, with Christ's help, will never be silent: even if my tongue be cut out, it will stammer. Let those read who will: those who will not, let them throw it aside. Let them winnow the accents, let them calumniate the letters: I shall be more provoked to study by your charity than deterred by their detraction and hatred. Who was designated by the word viper, and who Sinon is, and whether the same man is designated by both words, cannot be said with certainty. It is equally uncertain to me whether that one or twofold adversary lived at Rome, or in Palestine or elsewhere. For here lived Rufinus, who at that time stirred up John, bishop of Jerusalem, against Jerome; while at Rome lived others, not so well known, who at the same time calumniated the saint's books against Jovinian. Vigilantius too began about that time to disparage Jerome. This is certain, that by viper a slanderous man is intimated, by Sinon a crafty one and ready to injure. But since the saint everywhere used words of that kind in order to spare the names of his adversaries, it would not be fair to investigate by slight conjectures men whom he wished to be known only to his own friends.

[454] The translation of the books of Paralipomenon seems to be fixed in the year 396, since in the Preface, column [ ], the saint says: the books of Paralipomenon translated in the year 396, I lately wrote a book on the Best Kind of Translating. For we shall see that that book must be fixed about the end of the year 395 or the beginning of 396. And the translation of the books of Paralipomenon was inscribed to St. Chromatius of Aquileia, who urged Jerome to translate the Hebrew volumes into the Latin tongue. This bishop, then, signal in learning and holiness, was one of those who approved St. Jerome's design and exhorted him to go on; although many, and among them St. Augustine, were of the contrary opinion. On their account he again produces a new argument for his Translation in this Preface. For, when he had proved the necessity of a new translation from the variety of the editions of the Seventy, which was one in Egypt, another at Constantinople and Antioch, another in Palestine (I gave the words at number 439), and where he had reckoned up the Greek Translations composed after the Seventy, he goes on to show the defect of the edition of the Seventy, since in it were not found all the things which were alleged by Christ the Lord and by the Apostles from the Old Testament.

[455] And thus he reasons: If, then, it was permitted to others not to hold to what they had once undertaken, and after the seventy cells—which are commonly bruited abroad without an author—they opened the several cells; and if that is read in the churches which the Seventy did not know, why should my Latins not receive me, who, the old edition being unviolated, have so composed a new one that I prove my labour to the Hebrews and, what is greater than these, to the Apostles as my authorities? I lately wrote a book on the Best Kind of Translating, showing that those sayings from the Gospel, "Out of Egypt have I called my son"; and "Because he shall be called a Nazarene"; and "They shall look upon him whom they pierced"; and that saying of the Apostle, "What eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things that God hath prepared for them that love him"; and the rest like these, are found in the books of the Hebrews. Certainly the Apostles and Evangelists knew the Seventy interpreters: and whence had they to say these things which are not had in the Seventy? Christ our Lord, the founder of both Testaments, in the Gospel according to John says: "He that believeth in me, as the Scripture saith, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water". Surely that is written which the Saviour testifies is written. Where is it written? The Seventy have it not: the Church knows not the apocrypha. We must return, therefore, to the Hebrews, whence both the Lord speaks and the Disciples take their examples.

[456] These things I say with the peace of the ancients, and I answer only my detractors, the saint proves, answering his detractors. who gnaw me with a dog's tooth, disparaging me in public, reading me in corners; the same men both accusers and defenders, since in others they approve what in me they condemn, as though virtue and vice lay not in things but changed with their author. Thus the saint in his own defence, who in the praised Epistle on the Best Kind of Translating also shows where the several texts produced above are found in the Hebrew, as he also does in the Preface to the Pentateuch. Now that all the Translations hitherto mentioned were finished before Epistle 71 to Lucinius is gathered from that very letter, since the saint there writes this at number 5: The canon of the Hebrew verity, except the Octateuch, which I now have in hand, I have given to your servants and notaries to be copied. Vallarsius observes indeed that elsewhere Heptateuch is read, and elsewhere Pentateuch. But I do not doubt that Octateuch must be read: for we shall easily designate eight books finished later. For the rest, the Epistle to Lucinius was written in the year 398, as I shall show in its own place.

[457] The three books of Solomon, after a long illness In the same year 398 the Translation of the three books of Solomon seems altogether to be fixed, namely of the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs. The reasons are drawn from the Preface by which he directed them to the holy bishops Chromatius of Aquileia and Heliodorus of Altinum, his old friends. The saint begins it thus in volume 9, column [ ]: Let an Epistle join those whom the priesthood joins: nay, let not paper divide those whom the love of Christ binds together. The Commentaries on Hosea, Amos, Zachariah, Malachi, which you ask for, I would have written, if my health had allowed. You send the solace of expenses, you support our notaries and copyists, that our genius may sweat for you above all. And behold, at my side a frequent throng demanding different things, as though it were fair either that I should labour for others while you hunger, or that I should be indebted to anyone but you in the reckoning of giving or receiving. And so, broken by a long sickness, lest I should be wholly silent this year and be mute among you, I have consecrated to your name the work of three days, namely the translation of three volumes of Solomon: MASTOTH, which the Hebrews call Parables, and the vulgate edition Proverbs; COELETH, which in Greek we can call Ecclesiastes, in Latin the Preacher; SIR ASSIRIM, which in our tongue is rendered the Song of Songs.

[458] translated in the Lent of the year 398. The long sickness by which Jerome was broken does not occur in Palestine before the year 398. But in that year he was sick for three months, and in Lent began somewhat to convalesce, as we shall see in §36, when we shall treat of the Commentaries on Matthew and of the Epistle to Lucinius, in which that illness is commemorated. And so that illness altogether persuades us that that Translation was accomplished in the year 398 in Lent, especially since it was finished before the Epistle to Lucinius, as is clear from the words given at number 456. Another reason too persuades us that the Translation of these books was not made sooner, or at any rate not before 396, in which the saint dedicated the Commentaries on Jonah to St. Chromatius. For since Chromatius here is said to have asked for Hosea, Amos, etc., he would rather have explained one of these than Jonah, if that request had been made before the year 396. For the rest, for the sake of the gainsayers the saint adds the following at the end of the Preface: If indeed the edition of the Seventy interpreters pleases anyone more, he has it emended by us long since. For we do not so hammer out new things as to destroy the old. And yet, when he has read most diligently, let him know that our version is better understood, which has not soured by being poured into a third vessel, but, straight from the press and entrusted to a most clean jar, has kept its own savour. This very thing St. Augustine afterwards acknowledged, as we shall see hereafter.

[459] Then Genesis was translated, and the remaining There followed the translation of the Pentateuch, which Jerome had in hand when he wrote to Lucinius. But some years seem to have passed before it was finished. Yet it was not so much the bulk of the Work itself, great though it be and demanding much time, that drew out these translations to so long a delay, as the multitude of other writings which occupied Jerome in the later years of the fourth and the earlier years of the fifth century, so that in all likelihood the translation of the Pentateuch was frequently interrupted. The translation of the Pentateuch was asked for by Desiderius, St. Jerome's friend, whom I suspect to be that Desiderius to whom Epistle 47 is extant, written in an uncertain year after 392, as Vallarsius also judges. For that Desiderius greatly desired the Works of St. Jerome, so that it is very likely that the translation of the Pentateuch was asked by him when he had learned that it was not yet translated. The saint begins the Preface, volume 9, column 1, thus: I have received the desired Epistles of my Desiderius, who by a certain presage of things to come obtained a name along with Daniel, beseeching that I should hand over to the ears of our people the Pentateuch translated from the Hebrew tongue into the Latin. Then he adds some things about his detractors, who said that the new translation was made in reprehension of the Seventy interpreters. But this Jerome constantly denies, and defends his design by various arguments.

[460] I pass over these, because like things have already been given, and subjoin the end of the Preface: books of the Pentateuch finished not long before 404. Now I pray you, dearest Desiderius, that, since you have made me undertake so great a work, and to take my beginning from Genesis, you help me with your prayers, that I may be able to translate the books into the Latin tongue in the same Spirit in which they were written. From these words it becomes probable that the book of Genesis was translated before the rest, and sent with the said Preface to Desiderius toward the end of the fourth century. The same becomes sufficiently certain from elsewhere. For in book 2 against Rufinus, number 25, he recites a great part of this Preface, as the Prologue of Genesis, not of the Pentateuch. Nay, the whole Pentateuch was not yet finished at that time, so that it seems clear that only the book of Genesis was first sent to Desiderius, and that the remaining four books of the Pentateuch were sent without another Preface, either together or singly. But from the Preface to Joshua it is clear that the Pentateuch was not finished so long before the year 404 that he would have finished the remaining four books before the 26th of January of that year. For St. Paula was dead when Jerome was writing the Preface to Joshua: and he begins it thus: At length, the Pentateuch of Moses being finished, etc.: by which words he intimates that it had not long been finished.

[461] There remained for Jerome to translate, of the books which the canon of the Hebrews comprised, In the year 404 were translated the books Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and perhaps Esther. Of all these he treats in the Preface prefixed to the book of Joshua, column 355, and intimates at column 357 that he translated them about the time of St. Paula's death, and at the prayers of St. Eustochium, writing thus: But after the falling asleep of the holy Paula, whose life is a pattern of virtue, and after these books, which I could not refuse to Eustochium, the virgin of Christ, we have determined, while this spirit rules these limbs, to apply ourselves to the explanation of the Prophets, and by a kind of right of return to take up again the work long since laid aside; especially since the admirable and holy man Pammachius demands this very thing by letter, and since we, hastening to our fatherland, ought to pass by with deaf ear the deadly songs of the sirens. Thus St. Jerome proposed in the year 404. But since he resumed the exposition of the Prophets only at

the end of the year 406, he in all likelihood yielded to the prayers of other friends, so as first to translate also Tobias and Judith; as we shall see that he did.

[462] He begins the Preface to Joshua and the rest thus: At length, the Pentateuch of Moses being finished, of Joshua, of Judges and of Ruth. as though freed from a great debt, we set our hand to Jesus the son of Nave, whom the Hebrews call Josue ben nun, that is, Joshua the son of Nun; and to the book of Judges, which they call SOPHTIM, to Ruth also and Esther, which they utter by the same names. And we admonish the reader that a diligent copyist should preserve the forest of Hebrew names, and the distinctions divided by clauses, lest both our labour and his own study should perish. And, first of all, let him know—what I have often testified—that I do not hammer out new things in reprehension of the old, as my friends charge; but that I offer, so far as in me lies, to the men of my own tongue (those at least whom our works delight) that, in place of the ἑξαπλοῖς of the Greeks, which need both the greatest expense and labour, they may have our edition. And if anywhere in reading the ancient volumes they have been in doubt, by comparing these with them they may find what they seek; especially since among the Latins there are as many copies as manuscripts, and each one has, at his own pleasure, either added or taken away what seemed good to him, and certainly what is discordant cannot be true: wherefore let the scorpion cease to rise up against us with arched wound, and let it stop carping at a holy work with venomed tongue, either receiving it, if it pleases; or despising it, if it displeases. Thus the saint, whom, the further he advanced in the Translation, the braver we may find in refuting his adversaries.

[463] The translation of the book of Esther, dedicated to Paula and Eustochium, But now, since Jerome here names Esther too among the books translated after the death of St. Paula, while there is extant a Preface to the book of Esther by which it is dedicated to SS. Paula and Eustochium, the learned doubt whether the book of Esther was translated before the death of St. Paula, or afterwards with Joshua and the rest. But that we may set forth our opinion more clearly, it is necessary to transfer hither the whole Preface to Esther, which otherwise too pertains to the deeds of St. Jerome. The book of Esther, says the saint in volume 9, column 1565, is agreed to have been vitiated by various translations, which I, lifting out of the archives of the Hebrews, have translated more closely, word for word. Which book the Vulgate edition drags out with ragged folds of words here and there, adding what could be said and heard on the spur of the moment, as it is customary in the exercises of the schools, a theme being taken, to think out what words he could have used who suffered the injury, or he who did it. But you, O Paula and Eustochium, since you have been eager to enter the libraries of the Hebrews, and have approved the contests of translators, holding the Hebrew book of Esther, look upon our Translation word by word, that you may be able to recognize that I have neither augmented anything by addition, but with faithful testimony have simply handed over the Hebrew history to the Latin tongue, as it is had in the Hebrew. Nor do we court the praises of men, nor do we dread their reproaches. For, caring to please God, we do not fear the threats of men; because God scatters the bones of those who desire to please men, and, according to the Apostle, they who are such cannot be servants of Christ.

[464] seems to have been made before the death of St. Paula This Preface, most worthy of Jerome, altogether persuades me that the book of Esther was translated before the death of St. Paula. For all the things which have been thought out by various men, to avoid confessing that that book was dedicated to St. Paula and Eustochium together, are most clearly refuted by the very words of the dedication. For it is not the names alone that designate Paula the widow and Eustochium the virgin, but above all the knowledge of the Hebrew tongue, in which we know SS. Paula and Eustochium were excellently imbued. But that Domnio and Rogatianus, whom some have wished to substitute, were so skilled in the Hebrew tongue is not even likely. Still more ineptly did someone wish to substitute for St. Paula her granddaughter Paula, who at that time was an infant. And so it must rather be considered whether the words of St. Jerome which in the Preface to the book of Joshua seem contrary cannot be so understood that the book of Esther was translated between the Pentateuch and the death of St. Paula in the year 403 or at the beginning of 404. Certainly Jerome does not say that the Pentateuch was finished after the death of St. Paula. Tillemont indeed in Note 36 infers this from Jerome's words as certain, and others assert the same. But I do not find by what laws of dialectic it can be inferred. Where Jerome speaks of the Pentateuch being finished, he does not treat of Paula's death, but of his own progress to the remaining books of the Hebrew canon, Joshua, Judges, Ruth and Esther. Rightly shall we infer from this that these four were not begun before the Pentateuch was finished.

[465] But where he speaks of the death of St. Paula toward the end, he joins her death with his own labour in translating these last books, at the close of the year 403 or the beginning of 404, so that in all likelihood he had already finished part of them. For thus he speaks: But after the falling asleep of the holy Paula … and after these books, … we have determined … to apply ourselves to the explanation of the Prophets, etc. That joining of her death and of the last books intimates that Jerome was occupied with these when St. Paula died. For the Preface was written after the books were finished. Wherefore the book of Esther could already have been translated before the death of St. Paula, as its Preface teaches that it was. The saint, therefore, when he had diligently considered the books still to be translated by him, will have translated the book of Esther first of them, as needing a new translation more, because in it the Translation of the Seventy interpreters was very far from the Hebrew text. And so I altogether judge that the Pentateuch was finished in the year 403, and that Jerome then went on to consider the four remaining books and to prepare them for Translation, but completed first the Translation of Esther before the death of St. Paula, and that of the rest after her death in the year 404.

[466] The studious reader will find nothing in the whole Preface to Joshua repugnant to this order, and afterwards the books of Joshua, of Judges and of Ruth. provided he will rightly weigh each point. For Jerome, who had dedicated the book of Esther with a separate Preface to Paula and Eustochium, in the Preface to Joshua addresses any reader whatever, and briefly instructs him about the four books translated after the Pentateuch; but he does not say in what order he translated these severally. But from elsewhere we know that the Translation of Esther was finished first. And so it is by no means necessary that we should say that in one or the other passage of Jerome there is an error, as Tillemont will have it in Note 36; but it must plainly be said that he and others wrongly concluded from Jerome's words that the Pentateuch was finished after the death of St. Paula, and that from this arose the whole difficulty which has wondrously vexed the learned. For the rest, we now have the Octateuch which remained to be translated when in the year 398 Jerome was writing to Lucinius, namely the five books of Moses, the sixth Joshua, the seventh Judges with Ruth—for among the Hebrews it is one book, as Jerome testifies in the Helmeted Prologue—and the eighth Esther.

[467] Although Jerome had determined to translate from the Hebrew only the books of the Hebrew canon, The books of Tobias translated by the same man he nevertheless yielded to the demands of the bishops Chromatius and Heliodorus, that he should make Tobias Latin from the Chaldean, as the Preface to Chromatius and Heliodorus prefixed to Tobias teaches, in volume 10, column 1, which I subjoin: I do not cease to marvel at the insistence of your exaction. For you demand that I should draw a book written in the Chaldean tongue into a Latin style—the book, that is, of Tobias, which the Hebrews, cutting it off from the catalogue of the divine Scriptures, have consigned to those which they call apocrypha. I have satisfied your desire, yet not by my own zeal. For the studies of the Hebrews charge us, and impute it to us, that we translate these things for Latin ears against their canon. But judging it better to displease the judgment of the Pharisees and to serve the commands of bishops, I persisted as I could. And because the tongue of the Chaldeans is near to the Hebrew speech, finding a fluent speaker most skilled in both tongues, I seized upon the labour of a single day: and whatever he expressed to me in Hebrew words, this I, calling a notary, set forth in Latin speech. I shall repay the reward of this work by your prayers, when I shall have learned that it is pleasing to you that I have fulfilled what you deigned to command.

[468] and of Judith, at an uncertain time. There followed the Translation of the book of Judith, in all likelihood asked for by the same bishops. To it the saint thus prefaces: Among the Hebrews the book of Judith is read among the apocrypha: whose authority for strengthening those things which come into contention is judged less fit. Yet, written in the Chaldean tongue, it is reckoned among the histories. But because the Nicene synod is read to have reckoned this book in the number of the holy Scriptures, I have yielded to your demand, nay, to your exaction; and, setting aside the occupations by which I was greatly straitened, I have given it one little night's work, translating sense from sense rather than word from word. I have cut away the most faulty variety of many manuscripts: only those things which I could find with the sense entire in the Chaldean words I have expressed in Latin, etc. Thus Jerome, who sufficiently intimates that the authority of the Nicene council sufficed him to reckon the book of Judith among the sacred Scriptures, as now he would likewise not doubt about the remaining books admitted as canonical in the council of Trent. Yet the other books which were outside the canon of the Hebrews, namely Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, the books of Maccabees, and Baruch, he is nowhere read to have rendered into Latin from the Hebrew or Greek. For the rest, the time at which the books of Tobias and Judith were translated is not established.

§ XXVIII. Examination of what Rufinus objected against St. Jerome's Translation: St. Augustine at first dissuaded the Translation; afterwards approved it and used it.

Among those who accused the Translation from the Hebrew, Rufinus From St. Jerome's frequent complaints we have already understood that his design of translating the Old Testament from Hebrew into the Latin tongue was disapproved by many. Yet it is likely that most dared to carp at that most useful labour only in words, not in writing, and disparaged it rather secretly among their own friends than publicly. But Rufinus, when he had determined to disapprove everything in Jerome, and to accuse his good deeds no less than his bad—if indeed he found any bad to accuse—declared public war on the saint's labours, and with every effort strove to paint the new Translations in black colours. He preluded to this accusation in book 2 of the Invectives, number 12, where he calumniates that Barabbas was chosen instead of Christ by Jerome, because he had had Baraninas as master of the Hebrew tongue, and adds: But that Barabbas of yours from the synagogue, chosen instead of Christ, taught you to hope for the resurrection of the flesh not in power but in frailty; to become a friend of the letter that kills and an enemy of the spirit that gives life. Thus Rufinus preluded no less ineptly than he afterwards accused. To recite all his words would be too prolix. But I shall give his arguments one by one, and from time to time his words too. Tillemont, who recites most of Rufinus's accusations and adopts not a few, was unwilling in article 56 to institute this examination, or

to set Rufinus here against Jerome. The reason which he brings forward, if it is true, ought to have restrained him also from twisting many other things out of Rufinus against Jerome, and from setting down accusations alone without due examination.

[470] First Rufinus objects, in book 2, number 31, that the books of the divine Scriptures, accuses it: his first argument which the Apostles handed over to the churches of Christ as the fullest instrument of faith, were changed by Jerome by a new … translation borrowed from the Jews. To confirm the argument he says at number 32 that it must not be doubted that St. Peter the apostle himself also handed over to the Church the instruments of the books. But that whole ratiocination of Rufinus's plainly proves nothing against St. Jerome's Translation. For certainly neither St. Peter nor the other Apostles had given the Church Latin manuscripts, such as then existed: nor Greek manuscripts discordant among themselves. And so, if the Apostles wholly approved the interpretation of the Seventy, which they certainly sometimes used, as St. Augustine also said afterwards in Epistle 116 among the Hieronymian letters, number 35, they certainly did not approve the changes afterwards introduced by the negligence of copyists or the boldness of certain men. Besides, the Apostles certainly did not disapprove the Hebrew Scripture: why then was it not permitted to Jerome accurately to make Latin that Scripture which the Apostles and Christ the Lord himself used, as he shows in various places? Why was it not permitted to point out and open up the fountain from which the Interpretation of the Seventy had flowed, so that whatever turbid change had crept into the various editions of the Seventy might be the more easily detected by comparison with the Hebrew text?

[471] If Jerome, at Damasus's urging, laudably corrected the New Testament from the Greek text, it is sifted and refuted: in which almost the whole of it was written, with no less usefulness could the Greek as well as the Latin edition of the Seventy be corrected from the Hebrew text and reduced to one form. St. Jerome's Translation would therefore have been most useful, even if it had been adopted by the Church for no other use than to cut away the errors which had crept into at least some editions of the Seventy interpreters, and to remove the variety of different manuscripts. And perhaps it was chiefly to this end that Jerome undertook those arduous labours, since he begins the Preface to the books of Paralipomenon thus: If the Edition of the Seventy interpreters remained pure and as it was turned by them into Greek, you would be urging me superfluously, my Chromatius, … to translate the Hebrew volumes into the Latin tongue. And so worthy of Rufinus, unworthy of a prudent man, are the words by which at number 31 he thus insults the saint: Say, how will this offence be amended—nay, this outrage, how will it be expiated?

[472] He objects, secondly, that none of the saints, not Peter, likewise his second, his third, not Paul, not any other, dared to give a translation from the Hebrew. But this presses not at all: for the Apostles were occupied with other things: and the other saints either did other things, or did not so perceive the usefulness of a new translation, or did not dare to undertake so great a labour. Certainly what Rufinus attempts to turn into a fault in Jerome I, with the Church, reckon his greatest praise, namely that he was the first who dared to undertake so great labours, and could bring them to an end amid countless calumnies. He objects, thirdly, in the words already given, and frequently repeats in others exceedingly invidious, that Jerome borrowed his translation from the Jews, and made the Translation with Barabbas inspiring him. But these are trifles and empty declamations: for it is one thing to learn the Hebrew tongue with a Jew for master, another to translate the sacred Scripture according to the mind of the Jews. The first Jerome did laudably, not the second, since he composed his Translation in order to shut the mouths of the Jews; and set forth many things foretold of Christ more clearly than the Seventy had translated them.

[473] and his fourth most invidiously, He objects, fourthly, the insult offered to the Seventy interpreters, and extends that objection with most odious assertions. Nay, he most petulantly insults Jerome, as one convicted of a grave crime which could by no means be cleared away. But that artful calumny of Rufinus is sufficiently refuted by the judgment of the whole Church, which now for eleven centuries has judged that the greatest service was rendered to it by Jerome in that Translation. But that the studious reader may understand from this accusation how much Rufinus's honesty wavers in accusing Jerome, it is necessary to observe that the saint in most of his Prefaces, and in the first of them all, to his Translations diligently warned the studious reader not to believe that his labour in translating was a reprehension of the ancients, that is, of the Seventy interpreters: and likewise warned frequently that he was not hammering out new things that the old might be destroyed. Yet Rufinus everywhere attacks Jerome as though he had wished to change the edition of the Seventy and to substitute his own for it, so that with some show of likelihood he might cry out that the law of the Christians had been emended or changed, and object the scandal of the gentiles too. But this also, he says at number 34, how is it to be taken? How much do you reckon has been added to the unbelief of the gentiles by this deed? For what is done among us is not hidden from them. Knowing therefore that our Law has now been emended or changed, do they not say among themselves: These men err, nor is there anything of truth among them? Behold, they themselves, when they please, correct and emend their laws. But it is certain that error went before, where emendation has followed; nor can that seem divine which is changed by man.

[474] and twisted by Rufinus in bad faith. Rufinus could have reasoned thus when St. Jerome corrected the Latin New Testament from the Greek: yet he would have reasoned ill, because to emend the various copies of the Law, into which errors have crept through the carelessness or boldness of copyists, is not to emend or change the Law, but to see to it that it be not vitiated and changed by errors. Again, he could have used the same ratiocination, if it were legitimate, when Jerome gave an emended edition of the Seventy interpreters by translating it into the Latin tongue according to Origen's Hexapla. But when he reasoned thus against the Translation from the Hebrew, he added bad faith to a most inept ratiocination. For it is false that even the least thing was then changed, corrected, or abolished by Jerome in the Translation of the Seventy. Jerome frequently testifies that he adds his own Translation to the Old, does not substitute it for that one, nor wishes the Old to be abolished. So often had Jerome indicated his intention that it could not be unknown to Rufinus, who diligently searched through his writings. In bad faith, therefore, he accused Jerome, as though by his Translation he had wished to abolish the old and Vulgate one: and that bad faith of Rufinus shows itself abundantly in almost all his accusations. I pass over what Rufinus objects about the History of Susanna and the Hymn of the three children being erased, as he speaks at number 32. For Jerome everywhere translated only those things which he found in the Hebrew; but he erased nothing from the edition of the Seventy. Besides, to all the things which he had heard objected by Rufinus he abundantly answered in book 2 against Rufinus, from number 24 to the end of the book; yet he refutes nothing more anxiously than the calumny about the Seventy being reprehended, on whose account he recites a great part of his Prefaces.

[475] Yet the malice of the calumniators against the saint went even further. For in his name they composed an Epistle, An Epistle was forged in St. Jerome's name, in which Jerome himself was feigned to condemn his own Translation and to do penance for it. The whole matter Jerome himself narrates in book 2 against Rufinus, number 24, writing thus: Brother Eusebius writes that among the African bishops, who had come to court on ecclesiastical business, he found an Epistle written as it were in my name, in which I did penance, and testified that I had been led on by the Hebrews in my youth to turn the Hebrew volumes into Latin, in which there is no truth. Hearing which I was astounded. And because in the mouth of two or three every word stands, and a single witness was not believed even in Cato's case, the writings of many Brethren from the City taught me the same thing, inquiring whether it were so, and tearfully declaring by whom that Epistle had been spread abroad among the common people. What would he not dare who has dared to do this? It is well that malice has not as much strength as it has endeavour. Innocence would have perished, if power were always joined to wickedness, and if calumny prevailed in all that it desires. My style, such as it is, and the form of my speech, that most eloquent man could not reproduce: but amid his very tricks and the person of another, in which he had fraudulently clothed himself, he showed who he was.

[476] Therefore he who had feigned an Epistle of penance under my name, as though he had repented of the Translation, because I had badly translated the Hebrew volumes, is said to object that I interpreted the holy Scriptures to the condemnation of the Seventy, so that, whether the things I translated are false or true, I remain in the charge: since either I confess that I erred in the new Work, or the recent edition is a condemnation of the Old. I wonder how in the same Epistle he did not say that I was a murderer and an adulterer and a sacrilegious man and a parricide, and whatever of baseness the silent thought of the mind can revolve within itself. I owe him thanks, that, when there is so great a forest of crimes, he objected to me one crime of error or of falsehood. Have I spoken anything against the Seventy interpreters, whom many years ago, most diligently emended, I gave to the students of my own tongue, whom I daily expound in the assembly of the Brethren, whose Psalms I chant in continual meditation? Was I so foolish that, as an old man, I should wish to forget what I learned in boyhood? All my treatises are woven with their testimonies. The Commentaries on the Twelve Prophets expound both my own and the Seventy's Edition. O labours of men, always uncertain! O studies of mortals, sometimes having contrary ends! Whence I thought I was deserving well of my Latins, and stirring up the minds of our people to learn—since even the Greeks do not disdain a version from the Latin after so many translators—thence I am called into blame, and am thrusting food upon a nauseated stomach.

[477] And what is safe in a man, if innocence is criminal? of which crime Rufinus was suspected. While the master of the household slept, an enemy oversowed tares. "The boar out of the wood has laid waste the vineyard, and the singular wild beast has devoured it." I keep silence, and letters not mine speak against me. I know not the crime, and I confess the crime in all the world. Woe is me, my mother, why hast thou borne me, a man that is judged and discerned by all the earth? Thus far Jerome, who then subjoins many things from his own Prefaces, and refutes the frivolous objections about Daniel, about Susanna, about the hymn of the three children, at number 33. But now, concerning the Epistle foisted upon Jerome, I observe that Rufinus was suspected of that forgery, so far as the words of Jerome given intimate. Yet the saint did not name Rufinus, in all likelihood because he did not have, nor could have, certain testimonies about a thing which had been done secretly. Rufinus too denied the deed, but did not persuade Jerome that he had had no part in it, as we understand from what he discusses in book 3 against Rufinus, number 25, thus: Whither will unbridled boldness not once burst out?

He has objected to himself another's crime, that we may seem to have invented it. What was said without a name he reports as said against himself, and, clearing away sins that are not his, he is secure only about his own innocence. For he swears that he did not write the Epistle to the Africans under my name, in which I confess that, led on by the Jews, I translated lies: and he sends books containing all the same things which he swears he did not know (namely the same arguments against Jerome's Translation). And I wonder how his prudence agreed with another's wickedness, so that what another man lied about in Africa, this man should harmoniously say to be true, and that some unskilled person could imitate the elegance of his style. This similarity of style and of arguments certainly furnished no slight argument against Rufinus; and it can scarcely be doubted that the Epistle was at least forged by Rufinus's partisans, if perhaps Rufinus himself did not do it.

[478] St. Augustine by various reasons dissuades Jerome St. Augustine, to whom also at first the Translation of the Hebrew Scripture was not pleasing, indicated to St. Jerome far more modestly the inconveniences which he suspected could arise from it. In the first Epistle, the 56th among the Hieronymian letters, at number 2, he exhorts Jerome to translate the Greek interpreters of sacred Scripture, and especially Origen, into Latin; but dissuades the translation from the Hebrew in these words: But as for turning the holy canonical Letters into the Latin tongue, I should not wish you to labour, except in that manner in which you translated Job (namely from the Greek with additions from the Hebrew), so that, signs being applied, it may appear what difference there is between this translation of yours and that of the Seventy, whose authority is of the greatest weight. But I cannot sufficiently wonder if anything is still found in the Hebrew Letters and copies which escaped so many translators most skilled in that tongue. For I pass over the Seventy, about whose concord—whether of counsel or of a greater spirit than if there had been one man—I do not dare to pass a certain judgment either way; except that I judge that a pre-eminent authority in this office must without controversy be attributed to them. Those move me more who, translating later, and holding, as they say, with their teeth to the way and rules of Hebrew words and expressions, not only did not agree among themselves, but also left many things which remained to be dug out and brought forth so long afterwards. For if they are obscure, it is believed that you too could be deceived in them: but if they are manifest, it is not believed that those men could be deceived in them. Of this matter, then, I should beseech that of your charity you would set forth the causes and make me certain. This Epistle, since it wandered through Italy, could increase the number of those who disapproved Jerome's design. But this happened by no fault of St. Augustine, as we shall see afterwards.

[479] from the Translation from the Hebrew, Before Jerome had answered these things, St. Augustine again propounded other arguments to dissuade him, in Epistle 104 among the Hieronymian letters, where first at number 3 he asks for what cause he had not indicated in the Hebrew Translation, by obeli and asterisks, in what things it differed from the Seventy. Then at number 4 he has it thus: I for my part should prefer that you translate for us the Greek canonical Scriptures, which are put forth under the authority of the Seventy interpreters. For it will be very hard, if your Interpretation shall begin to be read more frequently in many churches, that the Latin churches should be discordant from the Greek churches, especially because a gainsayer is easily convicted when the Greek book is produced, that is, a book in a most well-known tongue. But whoever shall be disturbed by anything unusual in what has been translated from the Hebrew, and shall bring a charge of falsehood, either scarcely or never will recourse be had to the Hebrew testimonies, by which what is objected may be defended. And if recourse be had, who will bear that so many Latin and Greek authorities be condemned? To this is added that the Hebrews, when consulted, can answer something else, so that you alone may seem necessary, who can convict even them: but yet before what judge? It would be a wonder if you could find one. This inconvenience he confirms by an example, which he sets forth in these words:

[480] For a certain brother of ours, a bishop, when he had appointed your Interpretation to be read in the church over which he presides, intimating the inconveniences which from its public stirred up something in the prophet Jonah put far otherwise by you than had grown old in the senses and memory of all, and had been chanted through the successions of so many ages. So great a tumult arose among the people, especially with the Greeks arguing and inflaming the calumny of falsehood, that the bishop was compelled … to demand the testimony of the Jews. But whether from unskilfulness or from malice they answered that this was in the Hebrew manuscripts which both Greeks and Latins had. What more? The man was compelled to correct it as though it were an error, wishing, after great peril, not to be left without a congregation. Whence it also seems to us that you too could sometimes be deceived in some things. And see what this is in those letters which cannot be emended by comparison with the testimonies of the languages in common use.

[481] But since in the Preface to Job, which Augustine had seen, reading in the Church could arise. Jerome had observed that very many things in that book had been passed over by the Seventy, Augustine in the said Epistle at number 6 again asks the cause of so great a difference, writing thus: But what seems to you to be the reason why in many things the authority of the Hebrew manuscripts is one thing, and that of the Greek, which is called the Seventy, another, I should wish that you would deign to disclose. For that version has no small weight which thus deserved to be published abroad [\], and that the Apostles used it, not only the thing itself indicates, but I remember that you too have attested it.* Thus far St. Augustine, whose arguments set forth rather the inconveniences which could arise from public use in the churches, and from the substitution of a new Translation for the Old Seventy, than from that at which alone Jerome seems to have aimed by his labour, namely that by his Translation he might help the studious to understand sacred Scripture.

[482] St. Jerome at length answered everything in Epistle 112, But afterwards, Jerome's answer being received, but for brevity's sake I pass over the answer, which may be read there. This only I observe, that Jerome's design was approved by Augustine, since in the Epistle which is the 116th among the Hieronymian letters, at number 34, he wrote back thus: Concerning your translation you have now persuaded me with what usefulness you wished to translate the Scriptures from the Hebrew; namely, that you might bring into the open those things which were passed over or corrupted by the Jews. But deign, I ask, to intimate by what Jews—whether by those very men who translated before the coming of the Lord; and, if so, by which of them, or by which one: or by those later ones, who can for this reason be thought either to have taken away some things from the Greek manuscripts, or to have corrupted things in them, lest they should be convicted by those testimonies concerning the Christian faith? But why those earlier ones should have wished to do this I do not find. Then he asks for St. Jerome's translation of the Seventy interpreters, and besides the usefulness of the Work he writes this for a second reason: And that those who think that I envy your useful labours may at length some time, if it can be, understand that I am unwilling that your Interpretation from the Hebrew be read in the churches for this reason, lest, bringing forward as it were something new against the authority of the Seventy, we should disturb with great scandal the peoples of Christ, whose ears and hearts have been accustomed to hear that Interpretation which was approved even by the Apostles. He adds his own opinion about the gourd in Jonah 4, as the Seventy have it, for which St. Jerome put ivy. That change had created the tumult of the people related at number 480.

[483] [and perhaps the usefulness of the Translation being perceived from elsewhere also,] I do not find that Jerome answered these things further, nor any of Augustine's later questions. Neither did he send his Translation of the Seventy interpreters: but at the end of Epistle 134 (elsewhere 94) he writes thus: We suffer in this province a great scarcity of notaries of the Latin tongue; and therefore we cannot obey your commands, especially in the edition of the Seventy, which is distinguished by asterisks and spits. For we have lost very much of our former labour by the fraud of a certain man. Yet he wrote most affectionately to Augustine, but was on his guard against all disputation with him, and prudently indeed, as I shall set forth in its own place. And he could the more keep silence to those last questions of St. Augustine's, in proportion as he had set forth everything in his various Prefaces. For he had both proved that some testimonies about Christ had been omitted by the Seventy, and that the Jews or the judaizers were not to be trusted—such as were all the translators who had written after Christ. He had already answered too that objection that the Apostles had sometimes taken testimonies from the Seventy; and by name in book 2 against Rufinus, number 34, where, having said that Christ and the Apostles took various things from the Hebrew, he adds: Nor do we say this that we may censure the Seventy interpreters, but that the authority of the Apostles and of Christ is greater; and that wherever the Seventy do not disagree with the Hebrew, there the Apostles took their examples from their Interpretation; but where they differ, they set down in Greek what they had learned among the Hebrews. As therefore I show that many things set down in the New Testament from the old books are not had in the Seventy, and teach that these are written in the Hebrew: so let my accuser show that something is written in the New Testament from the Seventy interpreters which is not had in the Hebrew, and the contention is at an end. Thus Jerome, who had examined the copies and had worn out his life upon them.

[484] he greatly praised those labours of St. Jerome, But these things were less known to St. Augustine, who little by little began to approve Jerome's labours more, when he had better understood the usefulness of the Work. Certainly Augustine, near the end of the Epistle which is the 132nd among the Hieronymian letters, says: For unhappy is he who does not both worthily honour the so great and so holy labours of your studies, and give thanks for them to the Lord our God, by whose gift you are such as you are. And presently: By whose teaching, in the name and with the help of the Lord, ecclesiastical letters in the Latin tongue have been so helped as they never could have been before. St. Augustine, therefore, acknowledged the usefulness of St. Jerome's studies in correcting and translating the sacred Scriptures. For on account of Jerome's other writings alone he would in all likelihood not have preferred him to SS. Cyprian, Hilary, Ambrose, and generally to all the Latins, especially since many of them were not yet composed, and several St. Augustine had not yet seen when he wrote this. But having considered the correction of both Testaments, and above all the translation of the Old with the assignment of the places in which Christ the Lord and the Apostles had used the Old Testament from the Hebrew alone, St. Augustine could prefer Jerome's labours not only to the writings of all the Latins, but even to those of the Greek Fathers. These, however, Augustine does not name, because he had not so thorough a view of their Works as of the Latins'.

[485] Further, that SS. Jerome and Augustine at length had the same judgment about the right use of the Translation from the Hebrew, and agreeing with the saint about the use of that Translation, I should like briefly to show, as Martianay proved in the Prolegomena to St. Jerome's divine

Library. I have already advised that it was not Jerome's design that anyone should use that Translation in chanting the Psalms, or for public reading in the Church, but for investigating the sense of sacred Scripture. In the words given at number 476 he says of the Seventy: Whom I daily expound in the assembly of the Brethren, whose Psalms I chant in continual meditation. In Epistle 106 (elsewhere 98) to Sunnia and Fretela, number 46, Jerome declares his mind thus: From which it is plain that we must chant as we have translated (namely from the Greek of the Seventy), and yet must know what the Hebrew verity has. For this which the Seventy translated must, on account of its antiquity, be chanted in the churches: and that other must be known by the learned for the knowledge of the Scriptures. Jerome, therefore, did not wish that the churches should at once cast away the Translation of the Seventy interpreters, and read the new one publicly to the people, which was apt to disturb the people, as St. Augustine well observed. But Jerome wished to profit the learned, that in the interpretation of the Scriptures they might be able to observe what the Hebrew text had, and from it confound the Jews and unravel many difficulties. In this way Augustine himself at last used St. Jerome's Translation, and grieved that he had not done it sooner.

[486] For in the Questions on the Old Testament, volume 3, St. Augustine indeed uses the Seventy interpreters, he employed the same in various little works, but he also employs the Hebrew verity, that is, Jerome's Translation. Indeed, at once in the second Question on Genesis he says: In the Hebrew it is found otherwise. Passing over others, I add one example. In question 152 on Genesis the Hebrew manuscripts are mentioned, and a little after it is said: But neither by any Hebrew verity is that question resolved. And presently: With whom Jacob is asserted to have entered Egypt, even according to the Hebrew verity. In the later years of his life St. Augustine composed the Mirror, collected from sacred Scripture, which in the Benedictine edition is had in volume 3 from column 681. And the editor observes in the prefatory Admonition that St. Augustine there used a version not from the Greek of the LXX, which he was wont to follow, but from the Hebrew, because he had at last found this to be plainer than that in many places. Book 4 on Christian Doctrine Augustine wrote about the same time, and there in chapter 7, number 15, being about to adduce a passage from the prophet Amos, he speaks thus: But not according to the Seventy interpreters (who, themselves also translating by the divine Spirit, seem for this reason to have said some things otherwise, that the reader's attention might be the more admonished to search out the spiritual sense: whence some of their renderings are also more obscure, because more figurative), but as they have been translated from the Hebrew into Latin speech by the presbyter Jerome, skilled in both tongues. St. Augustine therefore began to use Jerome's Translation toward the end of St. Jerome's life, and used it very much in the Questions on the Old Testament, written in the year 419; and at last in the final years of his life he even preferred that Translation.

[487] and grieved that he had not used it sooner, Certainly in Epistle 261 (elsewhere 140) to Audax, number 5, he not obscurely intimates that he would have done better had he used the Hieronymian Translation in expounding the Psalms, writing thus: I do not have the Psalter translated by the holy Jerome from the Hebrew. But we have not translated, but have emended some faults of the Latin manuscripts from the Greek copies. Whence perhaps we have made something more convenient than it was (in the Latin manuscripts alone), yet not such as it ought to have been (namely by comparing the Translation from the Hebrew). For even now, if things which perhaps then escaped us disturb readers, we emend them by comparing manuscripts. Thus what is perfect we too seek with you. Augustine in his old age saw, therefore, what Jerome had long before seen: how much perfection an accurate interpretation of the Hebrew text brings to sacred Scripture. But it is by no means to be wondered at that St. Augustine did not see everything at once, who perhaps had not yet given as many months to the study of sacred Scripture as Jerome had years, and had read almost only Latin books, whereas the other had searched through the Latin copies, and the various Greek, and the Hebrew themselves, with the most diligent study.

[488] when he knew the sacred Letters better. But it is greatly to be praised that St. Augustine, when by long study he had attained a great understanding of sacred Scripture, did not hesitate to praise St. Jerome's labours and to profit by them. More about these things may be seen in Martianay's Prolegomena, where it is also set forth at about what time the Hieronymian Translation, which besides Augustine others too used while Jerome was alive, began to be adopted by the whole Latin Church. It will be enough for me to have observed that Jerome was of the greatest spirit, who not only dared to undertake so great a labour, but amid countless disparagements brought it to an end with wonderful constancy. For the rest, lest I be drawn too far from the saint himself, I refer the reader to Martianay.

\* that is, to be widely celebrated

§ XXIX. The Commentaries written on Nahum, Micah, Zephaniah, Haggai and Habakkuk; the Epistle to St. Paula, the book On Illustrious Men.

Five of the Minor Prophets explained, Having finished what I thought must be discussed about the Translation of the Old Testament, I return to the saint's writings which were finished before the book On Illustrious Men, drawn up in the year 392, in which, at chapter 135, he enumerates most of them thus: I have written besides two books of Explanations on Micah: on Zephaniah one book: on Nahum one book: on Habakkuk two books: on Haggai one book: and many other things on the prophetic work, which I now have in hand and which are not yet completed. There is added in the printed editions: Two books against Jovinian, and to Pammachius an Apologetic and an Epitaph. But Vallarsius observes that these last are not found in the manuscripts, and seem to have been added from elsewhere, because they were composed after the book On Illustrious Men. But the Exposition of the five Prophets from among the Minor, who are named above, was in all likelihood composed in that very year 392, after the saint had translated from the Hebrew the books of Kings, all the Prophets, and the Psalter, and before the book On Illustrious Men, since by this book first, and then by others, the Explanation of the Prophets once begun was interrupted. There is added the Preface to Jonah, which Jerome begins thus: About three years have flowed by since I interpreted five Prophets, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai: and, detained by another work, I could not fulfil what I had begun. For I wrote the book On Illustrious Men, and two volumes Against Jovinian, an Apologetic also, and on the Best Kind of Translating, to Pammachius: and to Nepotian, or about Nepotian, two books, and other things which it would be long to enumerate. Thus the saint at the beginning of the year 396, so that three years cannot certainly lead us back further into the preceding years than to the year 392, even if some months be added.

[490] For whose sake, and in what order he expounded the five Prophets praised, first Nahum, he declares in the Preface of book 3 on Amos, where he thus begins: In a preposterous and confused order we have both begun the Work of the Twelve Prophets, and, with Christ's help, shall complete it. For not from the first to the last according to the order in which they are read, but as we could and as we were asked, have we discussed them. Nahum, Micah, Zephaniah and Haggai I first προσεφώνησα to the φιλοπονωτάταις Paula and her daughter Eustochium: secondly I assigned two books on Habakkuk to Chromatius, bishop of Aquileia. The reader sees that those five Prophets are not reckoned in the same order: but in the last place the order in which they were expounded seems to be intimated, since Habakkuk is put last, just as he was the last of these to be explained. In the Preface to Nahum he teaches that the prophecy was woven against the Assyrians, and adds: Of the consummation of the world, therefore, according to ἀναγωγή, O Paula and Eustochium, the prophecy is woven for the consolation of the saints, that whatever they see in the world they may despise as passing and perishable, and may prepare themselves for the day of judgment, when the Lord will be the avenger against the true Assyrians. And he expounded both the text from the Hebrew and that translated from the Greek of the Seventy, and did this constantly in all the prophets, although he weaves the historical sense rather from his own Translation, and instruction for the ordering of morals both from his own and from the Seventy. In this book I do not find him complaining of detractors.

[491] But in all likelihood, when the Explanation of Nahum appeared, second Micah, when the saint was assailed by the darts it stirred up the zeal of his rivals. For on Micah, who follows, chapter 1, verse 1, he writes thus: Do you, O Paula and Eustochium, pour out prayers to the Lord and Saviour, that envy may not harm me, but that my mind, being free, may think only of what it strives to explain, and may not feel the buffets of revilings, which the Lord in his passion despised. But what they objected he declares more fully in the Preface of the second book, which he begins thus: We are always answering the envious, because envy does not cease: and the openings of our books confute the curses of our rivals, who commonly boast that I write certain ineptitudes of a barren and meagre style, and that, since I know not how to speak, I cannot keep silence. And so I beseech you, O Paula and Eustochium, that you close your ears to barkings of this kind, and, helping my infancy of speech, as they call it, with your prayers, obtain for me, according to the Apostle, the opening of my mouth, so that to me speaking of the Scriptures may be applied: "The Lord shall give the word to them that preach with great power".

[492] But I warn the fat bulls which have surrounded me of his rivals; to be quiet and to cease reviling, lest they make their own evil deeds known, if they go on to injure. For as to what they say, that I plunder the volumes of Origen, and that it is unseemly for the writings of the ancients to be defiled: what they reckon a vehement reproach, that same I count the greatest praise, since I wish to imitate him whom I do not doubt to be pleasing to all prudent men and to you. For if it is a crime to translate the good sayings of the Greeks, let Ennius be accused, and Maro, Plautus, Cæcilius and Terence, Tully too and the other eloquent men, who translated not only verses but many chapters and very long books and whole plays. Nay, let our own Hilary be guilty of theft, because on the Psalms he turned nearly forty thousand lines of the aforesaid Origen according to the sense. Whose negligence, all of them, I long rather to emulate than the obscure diligence of these men. This whole answer the saint sketched out of Terence, contrary to his custom, in order to show by this very thing, so far as I conjecture, how much gibes of that kind are to be despised. What Rufinus wished to infer from that answer we shall see afterwards.

[493] whom he refutes in his Prologues: third Zephaniah, In the Preface to Zephaniah he again refutes another objection, beginning thus: Before I approach Zephaniah, … it seems that answer must be made to those who think me ridiculous because, passing over men, I write above all to you, O Paula and Eustochium. Who, if they knew that Huldah prophesied while the men were silent; and that Deborah, both judge and prophetess, overcame the enemies of Israel while Barak feared; and that Judith and Esther, in a type of the Church, both slew their adversaries and delivered Israel, which was about to perish,

from danger, they would never crook their hand behind my back into the stork's beak. It is a way of mocking. He adds other illustrious women, even gentile ones. At the end he somewhat intimates that he began to write to women because they desired the exposition of the Scriptures more than men did. For he has it thus: For me it may suffice, since another work presses upon me, to have said at the end of the Prologue that the Lord rising again appeared first to women, and that they were the Apostles of the Apostles, that men might blush not to seek him whom the weaker sex had already found. By these things he sufficiently intimates that hitherto he had not written much to men, because these had not urged him to write as Paula and Eustochium had. He could have added that he was supported chiefly by Paula's wealth, so that he could both collect many books and obtain everything opportune and necessary for writing, and that therefore it was most just that he should labour chiefly for the sake of those to whom he owed so much, and who were most studious of the sacred Scriptures. That Prologue seems to have stirred up men to ask: for about that time very many began to ask for his writings.

[494] fourth Haggai, To Paula also and Eustochium he wrote the Commentaries on Haggai, at the end of which he briefly touches another objection of some adversary, at which the studious reader will deservedly wonder, in these words: I beseech you, reader, to pardon one who dictates in swift speech, and not to require the charm of eloquence, which I lost long ago by the study of the Hebrew tongue; although Alecto asserts that I was always an infant and dumb. To whom I shall say: The Lord will give the word to him who evangelizes with great power. Vallarsius observes that it is read otherwise in the Queen's manuscript, namely: Although from my mother's milk I judge that I was always an infant and dumb. But the words seem rightly given, and hint that a woman adversary is designated, since Alecto is one of the three Furies, and that she perpetually disparaged Jerome as though destitute of all eloquence. We wonder indeed that rivalry could do so much as to object even a defect of eloquence to a most eloquent man: but this objection makes us not wonder that Jerome not rarely apologizes for his style—he who knew excellently the art of speaking ornately, but believed that this ought not to be the chief care of an interpreter of sacred Scripture. He excused his style, therefore, because it was carped at by some, though undeservedly, since he knew that he could write more ornately if he had wished to polish his style and to proceed more slowly. But he did not think that this was expedient in Commentaries on sacred Scripture, nor did he seek in them the praise of eloquence, but the profit of his readers, as he very often declares.

[495] Then Jerome passed on to the prophecy of Habakkuk, and lastly Habakkuk. which, expounded in two books, he dedicated to St. Chromatius, bishop of Aquileia. Him he names in both Prefaces, and in the first he says: On Nahum, by your prayers, a book is already published: on Zachariah and Malachi, if life be my companion, we shall discourse. But only because the discourse had been about those three; so that no one ought to infer that Micah, Zephaniah and Haggai were not explained before Habakkuk. The Prologue of the second book has it thus: We write, my Chromatius, venerable father, a second book on Habakkuk, dedicating a special little work to his Canticle, and setting about with all our strength an epic discourse, and one composed in the manner of the Psalter, that is, of the lyric. Let the viper therefore hiss, and let Sardanapalus insult, fouler in his vices than in his name; let us pursue the road we have begun, etc. Again in chapter 3 he makes mention either of his own enemies or of the Church's, or perhaps of both, writing thus: I too will say something like this: Divide, O Lord, to the astonishment of all, Ahab and Jezebel. I am not indeed Elijah: but yet that Ahab and Jezebel slew Naboth, and took his vineyard, and made it a garden for their luxury. Let some servant of thine, an Abdias, be found, who may feed thy poor man and beggar; let the blood of the harlot be given to the dogs: let impious and greedy Ahab be slain by the Lord's javelin. I strongly suspect that by Sardanapalus and Ahab, if it be the same man, Jovinian is intimated, whose heresy had begun to infect the Church, and that by Jezebel either the heresy itself, or a woman who was Jovinian's helper, is designated.

[496] In the same year 392 St. Jerome wrote the book so very frequently praised, On Illustrious Men, The book On Illustrious Men written, or On Ecclesiastical Writers. He indicates the year in chapter 135 in these words: Up to the present year, that is, the fourteenth of the prince Theodosius (or 392 of our era), I have written these things. In the Preface to Dexter, prætorian prefect, he sets forth both the year and the reasons for writing, beginning thus: You urge me, Dexter, that, following Tranquillus, I should arrange the ecclesiastical writers in order, and that what he did in enumerating the illustrious men of gentile letters I should do among our own; that is, that from the Passion of Christ to the fourteenth year of the emperor Theodosius I should briefly set forth to you all who have handed down anything to memory concerning the holy Scriptures. And having enumerated the gentiles who had reckoned up their own authors, he sets forth the difficulty of the Work thus: But my condition and theirs is not alike. For they, unrolling old Histories and Annals, could, as from an immense meadow, weave no small garland for their little work. What am I to do, who, following no forerunner, have myself for my master—the worst of masters, as they say? Although Eusebius, the son of Pamphilus, in the ten books of ecclesiastical History has been of the greatest help to us: and the volumes of each of those about whom we are to write often attest the ages of their own authors.

[497] And so I pray the Lord Jesus Christ that what your Cicero, who stood in the citadel of Roman eloquence, did not disdain to do in the Brutus, to refute the boasting of the gentiles: weaving a catalogue of the orators of the Latin tongue, that I, at your exhortation, may worthily fulfil in enumerating the writers of his Church. But if any of those who write to this day have been passed over by me in this volume, they will have to impute it to themselves rather than to me. For, since they conceal their writings, I could not know of what I have not read, and what is perhaps known to others may have been unknown to me in this corner of the earth. Certainly since they have become famous by their own writings, they will not greatly sigh over the loss our silence causes. Let Celsus, then, and Porphyry and Julian learn, those rabid dogs against Christ; let their followers learn, who think that the Church had no philosophers and eloquent men, no teachers, how great and what manner of men founded, built up and adorned it; and let them cease to charge our faith with mere rustic simplicity, and rather acknowledge their own unskilfulness. This reason—that the boasting of the Gentiles might be beaten back—seems also to have moved Jerome to insert now and then in his writings the sayings of the Gentile poets, orators and philosophers. That some ancient writers were omitted in that book, of whom some were afterwards mentioned in Gennadius's Catalogue, and others there too passed over, anyone will easily see who shall wish to compare Jerome's book with the said Catalogue and with the more recent Libraries of Writers. The editors of St. Jerome's Works have observed besides that this book of the saint's has manifestly been interpolated in various manuscripts, and that some things were from time to time afterwards inserted, as is apt to happen in such a Work, considering the boldness of certain copyists of the middle ages.

[498] what he said there about St. Pamphilus's Apology for Origen he retracted. Jerome in chapter 75 reckons St. Pamphilus the martyr among the ecclesiastical Writers, and attributes to him the Apologetic for Origen, which he believed was written by him before Eusebius of Cæsarea wrote. But in book 2 against Rufinus, number 24, he says that he first saw that book, which was current under the name of Pamphilus, written in a manuscript of Rufinus; and because, he says, it was no care of mine what was said for a heretic, I always held it as though the Work of Pamphilus and of Eusebius were different… Whence also nearly ten years ago, when my friend Dexter, who administered the prætorian prefecture, had asked me to weave for him an index of the authors of our religion, I put among the other commentators this book too as published by Pamphilus, thinking it to be such as it had been published abroad by you and your disciples. Thus Jerome sets forth how he was deceived, and proves against Rufinus that the Apology is Eusebius's, not Pamphilus's. What the modern defenders of Rufinus objected to Jerome has already been refuted on another occasion in §20.

[499] St. Augustine could have wished that the errors of the heretics were indicated, St. Augustine received St. Jerome's book not long before he wrote to Jerome the Epistle which is the 67th among the Hieronymian letters, which was given in the year 397, but without a title: and he had heard from a certain monk that it was called an Epitaph, and asked of Jerome whether this were true, since the name seemed unfitting. Of the book itself he says at number 2: Yet we sufficiently approve that same book as usefully composed by you. Yet St. Augustine desired something in the said book, which would in truth have been most useful had Jerome been willing to accomplish it; but it was of immense labour. In the book too, he says at number 9, in which you have commemorated all the ecclesiastical writers whom you could remember, and their writings, it would be done more conveniently, as I judge, if, having named those whom you know to be heresiarchs (since you were unwilling to pass over even them), you should subjoin also in what points they were to be avoided: although you have passed over some too, and I should desire to know with what design this was done. Jerome answered these things long afterwards in Epistle 112 (elsewhere 89), number 3, that the book must by no means be called an Epitaph, and that the title could have been understood from the Work itself, and concludes: This book, then, must be called either "On Illustrious Men" or, properly, "On Ecclesiastical Writers": although by most unskilled correctors it is said to be inscribed ON AUTHORS.

[500] But why he passed over some heresiarchs, and did not set forth the heresies of others, which Jerome seems to have omitted for brevity's sake. as St. Augustine had asked, St. Jerome did not there say, just as he kept silence about several other things; either because the Epistle would have become very prolix without such omissions, or because he was unwilling to render an account of everything to St. Augustine, whom he did not yet know well. Perhaps the sole reason was that he was unwilling to delay the interpretation of sacred Scripture and the Translation from the Hebrew by too laborious a Work, such as this would have been if he had wished to indicate the errors of all the heresiarchs. Of his own Work he makes mention most modestly in Epistle 47 (elsewhere 154) to Desiderius, at number 3, in these words: I wrote a book On Illustrious Men, from the Apostles to our own age, imitating Tranquillus and the Greek Apollonius: and after the catalogue of very many I placed myself too at the end of the volume, as one untimely born and the least of all Christians; where it was necessary for me briefly to note down what I had written up to the fourteenth year of the prince Theodosius.

[501] That book of St. Jerome's is extant also in Greek, published first by Erasmus A Greek Translation of this book as translated by Sophronius, by whom we know some of Jerome's little works were rendered into Greek, and reprinted in the Veronese edition. But from Vallarsius's prefatory Monition it is clear that the judgments of the learned about that Greek Translation are very various, because it does not seem to be of so great antiquity. I do not care to examine

the various opinions, since that matter pertains less to St. Jerome. It will, however, be useful briefly to prove that that Work which is extant in Greek is not Sophronius's, who flourished in St. Jerome's time, nor deserves much authority, as Vallarsius too judges. Tillemont indeed in article 58 says that there are no reasons for doubting that it is Sophronius's: but Vallarsius alleges such reasons that for a prudent man no doubt of the forgery remains. For, having rejected the opinion of those who would have the Translation forged by Erasmus or another of the same time, and of others who claimed it for Sophronius, Jerome's friend, Among opinions so far apart, he says, the middle one, which the more prudent men, Bosius, Huet, and others approve, is by far the more likely.

[502] Then he brings forward arguments which prove that it is not Sophronius's. that it is not Sophronius's, who lived with Jerome, And this is persuaded first by the style itself, which has not without reason seemed to savour of a later Greek. This argument presses the more because Jerome in chapter 134 asserts that some of his little works were translated by Sophronius in elegant speech. For by what reason shall we find elegance of Greek speech in the Translation of which we are treating, when the Greek phrasing everywhere clings servilely word for word to the Latin diction, and for the most part lacks the articles and those particles which among the ancient Greeks are very frequent for elegance's sake? Secondly, The errors too and false readings, which, though not innumerable, as Vossius exaggerates, are nevertheless of such a kind as to persuade us that the translation was prepared from a more recent Latin copy, says Vallarsius—these persuade us that it is not Sophronius's translation. For he could have had an accurate Latin copy. By what reason, then, shall we believe those things to be Sophronius's which agree with corrupt copies?

[503] is made manifest by certain arguments. There are added the texts of the ancient Greeks which Jerome inserted in Latin from the Greek into his book, and which Sophronius could easily find and copy out in Greek. St. Jerome quotes in several places the words of Hegesippus, the words of Papias, the words of St. Ignatius, the words of St. Irenæus, the words of Alexander of Jerusalem, the words of Apollonius, the words of Serapion, the words of Polycrates of Ephesus, the words of Alexander bishop of Cappadocia, the words of Dionysius of Alexandria, and lastly the words of Eusebius of Cæsarea, in whose History the translator could have found the Greek words themselves. Yet in place of Jerome's Latin words the translator reckoned in Greek of his own, and that much different from the Greek which Jerome had made Latin, as may be seen in the Veronese edition. But that Sophronius, Jerome's friend, was so negligent as to prefer to bring in Greek writers speaking in words not their own rather than to copy out their lengthy texts from Eusebius's History, is utterly incredible; and thus it becomes equally incredible that the Translation which we have is his.

[504] Vallarsius's third argument is drawn from the interpolation of the Hieronymian Work. For to the Greek Translation the translator added ten elogia, namely of seven of those Apostles who wrote nothing, and three of St. Paul's Disciples, of whom likewise no writings are extant. And these were added not at the end of the Work, but after the first and fourth chapters, in which places they would have had to be put in order of time had they been Jerome's, so that the interpolation is most manifest. And so that these are not Sophronius's, who flourished with Jerome, becomes clear and manifest, especially since those elogia are of small learning, and are taken almost wholly from the Pseudo-Dorotheus. In the Veronese edition they are given as an Appendix after St. Jerome's book; and there is subjoined there a second Appendix on the twelve Doctors: which more insipid little work was afterwards composed by some Anonymous writer, and formerly published wrongly under St. Jerome's name.

§ XXX. The two books against Jovinian the heresiarch.

The errors of Jovinian the heresiarch Since St. Jerome's first writings after the book On Illustrious Men are the books against Jovinian the heresiarch, to be fixed in the year 393, although they were perhaps begun at the close of 392, some things must be said about that heresy and about the time in which it seems to have arisen. St. Augustine, On Heresies, chapter 82, describes the heresy of Jovinian and his followers thus: This heresy arose from a certain monk Jovinian in our own age, when we were still young men. He said that all sins, like the Stoic philosophers, were equal: and that a man could not sin after receiving the laver of regeneration: and that fastings, or abstinence from certain foods, profited nothing. He destroyed the virginity of Mary, saying that she was corrupted in bearing. He also equated the virginity of nuns, and the continence of the male sex in saints who choose the celibate life, with the merits of chaste and faithful marriages; so that certain consecrated virgins of already advanced age in the city of Rome, where he taught these things, are said, on hearing him, to have married. He himself indeed neither had nor wished to have a wife: which he argued profited not on account of any greater merit with God, to be of advantage in the kingdom of eternal life, but on account of a present necessity, that is, lest a man should suffer the vexations of wedlock.

[506] Yet that heresy was quickly suppressed and extinguished, that St. Augustine reckoned rightly, nor could it reach so far as to deceive any priests. Thus St. Augustine, who some think added two errors to the remaining errors of Jovinian, namely that about the equality of sins and that about the corrupted virginity of the most blessed Virgin Mary; because St. Jerome did not refute these. But that suspicion is utterly improbable, and the reason exceedingly weak. For neither did Jerome pass over those errors altogether without refutation, as we shall see. But if he had passed them over, we should believe that at the time in which he wrote they had not yet been detected, but became known afterwards. But certainly the second, about the Virgin's integrity being lost in childbirth, was already before Jerome's books observed and refuted by St. Ambrose in Epistle 42 to Pope Siricius, number 4, where he has it thus: But out of the way of perversity they are betrayed into saying: "A Virgin conceived, but it was not a Virgin who gave birth". The other, about the equality not only of sins but also of merits, St. Jerome refutes at length, who in book 1, number 3, briefly sets forth the heresies of Jovinian in these words: He (Jovinian) says that virgins, widows and married women, who have once been washed in Christ, if they do not differ in their other works, are of the same merit. He strives to prove that those who have been born again in baptism with full faith cannot be overthrown by the devil. He propounds thirdly that between abstinence from foods and the receiving of them with thanksgiving there is no difference. Fourthly, and lastly, that there is one reward in the kingdom of heaven for all who have kept their baptism.

[507] There indeed Jerome seems to omit that error, is proved. that sins are equal, mentioned by Augustine; just as Augustine omits the error here asserted about the equal merit of all good men. But in book 2, number 18, Jerome more fully sets forth Jovinian's fourth proposition, by which he made both the just equal in reward, and likewise sinners in punishments. Both errors he begins to refute at number 21 in this manner: And at the same time I wonder how that slippery serpent, our Proteus, changes himself into the monstrous shapes of various forms. For he who in coupling and gorging is an Epicurean, suddenly in the repayment of merits becomes a Stoic… If it is not permitted to swerve a little from the virtues, and all sins are equal, and he is guilty of the same crime who in hunger has snatched a loaf and he who has killed a man, you too are held guilty of the greatest crimes. By several arguments indeed St. Jerome shows that the merits of the just are greater in some than in others, and the glory of some more excellent than the reward of others; yet he returns from time to time to sins, and clearly proves their unequal gravity and unequal punishment. There are light sins, there are grave ones, he says at number 30. It is one thing to owe ten thousand talents, another a farthing. And for an idle word indeed, and for adultery, we shall be held guilty: but it is not the same to blush and to be tortured; to redden and to be racked for a long time, etc. He adds much more.

[508] Some years before St. Jerome wrote these books the heresy of Jovinian was born, but at first it crept only in secret. St. Augustine says that it arose while he was a young man. Now Augustine was born in the year 354, so that that vague assertion somewhat intimates that between the years 380 and 390 the perverse doctrines of Jovinian began to be spread at Rome. The evil was detected When Jovinian's heresy had been reported to Pope Siricius, it was by him at Rome when Jovinian and his followers dared to spread certain writings, which were carried to St. Siricius the Roman Pontiff. Among those who brought Jovinian's writings to Siricius and saw to it that he was condemned was St. Pammachius, to whom St. Jerome in Epistle 48 (elsewhere 50), number 2, writes thus: Therefore, by your doing after the Lord's, he (Jovinian) was condemned, because he dared to compare marriage with perpetual chastity. There were, however, other noble Romans too who acted with Pammachius against Jovinian, as is clear from the Epistle of Pope Siricius to the church of Milan, in which at number 5 Jovinian and his followers are said to have been brought to Siricius's notice by faithful Christians, men of the best family, illustrious in religion. Among these in all likelihood was Domnio, to whom St. Jerome afterwards wrote also about Jovinian.

[509] and by St. Ambrose and others at Milan it was condemned. The doctrine of those heretics having been examined, the condemnation presently followed, of which St. Siricius at number 6 has it thus: Know, therefore, that the sentence of us all, both presbyters and deacons and of the whole clergy too, was one: that Jovinian, Auxentius, Genialis, Germinator, Felix, Prontinus, Martialis, Januarius and Ingeniosus, who have been found to be the kindlers of a new heresy and blasphemy, should by the divine sentence and by our judgment remain condemned for ever outside the Church. When St. Ambrose had received this Epistle of St. Siricius, he gathered a council of some bishops, and with them likewise condemned Jovinian and the partners of his impiety, and indicated this to Siricius by Epistle 42 (before which, in the latest edition, the said Epistle of Siricius is prefixed), written in the name of all the bishops. The same nine are named in it; but there for Prontinus is read Plotinus; for Martialis, Martianus. This twofold condemnation had already been carried out before St. Jerome wrote. Baronius refers both to the year 390, but without certain proof. Yet Baronius cannot be far from the truth. He also recites a law of the emperor Honorius by which Jovinian and his accomplices were afterwards banished into exile; and he observes that it is referred to the year 412. But in all likelihood the chronological notes are corrupt, since Jovinian did not live so long. Yet from that law we have it that Jovinian, even after his condemnation, did not cease to hold assemblies outside Rome.

[510] But Jerome, having received the heresiarch's writings, This boldness of the heresiarch seems to have induced those Romans who had seen to his condemnation to send his writings to St. Jerome to be refuted. These certainly the saint received for this end in the year 392 or 393, since he begins the first book thus: A very few days

have passed since the holy brethren from the city of Rome sent me the little Commentaries of a certain Jovinian, asking that I should answer their ineptitudes, and should crush the Epicurus of the Christians with evangelical and Apostolic vigour. Which, when I had read them and did not understand them at all, I began to unroll more frequently, and to sift not only the words and sentences but almost the single syllables, wishing first to know what he said; and so either to approve or to refute what he had said. But so great is the barbarism of his writings, and his most filthy speech is so confused with so great faults, that I could understand neither what he says, nor by what arguments he wishes to prove what he says. For the whole of it swells, the whole of it lies flat: it raises itself at each point, and, like a crippled snake, breaks in the very effort. He is not content to speak in our way, that is, in the human way; he attempts something loftier. He adds more, in which he laughs at the wondrous obscurity of his speech, adding also some sayings of the poets. And he confirms his own sayings by adducing Jovinian's words. Then he reduces his errors to four propositions, given at number 505. The first proposition, by which virgins, widows and married women were laid down to be of the same merit, he refutes at length throughout the whole first book.

[511] At the beginning of the second book he propounds the second error, by which Jovinian would have it that those who had received the grace of baptism could no longer be tempted or overcome by the devil. On account of this proposition, which Jerome refutes sufficiently indeed, though less at length, Jovinian was one of the forerunners of the Pelagians. To Jovinian's third proposition, by which the merit of fasting and of abstinence from flesh and other foods is attacked, he passes at number 5: and that proposition, which flatters the senses, he refutes with manifold learning and much more at length. At number 18 he first sets forth the heresiarch's fourth proposition, by which both the wicked were said to be equal, and likewise the just, and presently again confutes it at length. Lastly at number 35 he weaves an epilogue, and briefly reckons what was disputed in both books, in these words: We have spoken of married women, widows, virgins. We have preferred virginity to widowhood, widowhood to matrimony. The περικοπή of the Apostle disputing on questions of this kind has been expounded: answer has been made to the several objections. Secular literature too has been brought into the midst—what women were virgins, what had but one husband; and on the contrary what vexations the conjugal bond sometimes has.

[512] We have passed to the second division, in which he denies he refuted. that those who have obtained baptism with full faith can afterwards sin. And we have taught that, God excepted, every creature is subject to fault, not because all have sinned, but because they can sin, and the ruin of the like is the fear of those who stand. Thirdly we came to fastings: and because the adversary's proposition was twofold, appealing either to the philosophers [\] or to the examples of the divine Scriptures, we too have answered both. The fourth, that is, the last division had distributed the sheep and the goats, the right hand and the left, the just and sinners, into two ranks, wishing to show that there is no difference between one just man and another, one sinner and another. And, to prove this, he had heaped up countless examples from the Scriptures, as though agreeing with his own opinion. To which question we have answered both by arguments and by examples of the Scriptures, and have crushed the old opinion of Zeno as much by common sense as by divine reading.* Thus Jerome of what he had proved. But among these things he does not reckon the virginity of Mary the Mother of the Lord, although he had discussed some things about it in book 1, numbers 31 and 32, but rather to prefer virginity to widowhood than to defend that tradition of the Church against Jovinian. And so the error of Jovinian about the virginity of the Mother of God being corrupted in childbirth—which he perhaps asserted only out of Helvidius—either Jerome did not find in his writings, or he believed that his own book, in which he had formerly defended the virginity of the most blessed Mary against Helvidius, sufficed.

[513] That the morals of Jovinian were most base Jerome declares in various places, Jovinian was base in his morals. not only calling him at the beginning the Epicurus of the Christians, but also at number 40 a slave of vices and of luxury, and a dog returned to his vomit, because he had been a monk and professed himself a monk, and yet meanwhile in food and clothing followed not poverty but every kind of delicacy. And yet, he says, let this handsome monk, fat, sleek, whitened, and always walking about like a bridegroom, either take a wife, that he may prove virginity equal to marriage: or, if he shall not take one, he acts in vain against us in words, since in deed he is with us. What sort of disciples were with Jovinian he sets forth in book 2, number 36, writing this: Now it remains that we address our Epicurus, rutting in his little gardens among young lads and little women. Those favour you who are fat, sleek, whitened. Add, if you will, according to the Socratic mockery, all the swine and dogs; and, because you love flesh, the vultures too, the eagles [\], the hawks and the owls, etc. And that they were not few he subjoins; but adds this reason: That many acquiesce in your opinion is a sign of pleasure: for they do not so much approve you speaking as favour your vices.* He also shows at number 37 how greatly Jovinian's most wicked doctrines drew men addicted to the flesh, and at last at number 38 exhorts the Romans to beware of pleasure and luxury.

[514] These books were frequently praised afterwards by the saint, Of that excellent Work against Jovinian the saint afterwards makes mention on various occasions in his writings, and from time to time refers his readers to what was there disputed. In Epistle 154 (elsewhere 10) to Furia, a most noble and young widow, whom he dissuades from a second marriage, he speaks thus of it at number 18: I know that about two years ago I published books against Jovinian, in which I crushed by the authority of the Scriptures the questions that come from the other side, where the Apostle concedes second marriages. And it is not necessary to write the same things afresh, since you can borrow thence what has been written. In Epistle 59 (elsewhere 148) to Marcella, number 2, he has it thus: The second question was that in which you say that you have read in passing in my little works that the lambs which stand on the right and the goats which stand on the left are Christians and gentiles. I do not remember ever to have said this, and, if I had said it, I should not be obstinate in error. But so far as occurs to me as I dictate on the sudden, I know that in the second volume against Jovinian I disputed upon this little chapter; and not only upon this, but also upon that which falls under the same question, where the bad fishes shall be separated from the good fishes. What therefore was fully said there seems now to be omitted. In Epistle 123 (elsewhere 11) to the widow Ageruchia, number 8, he says that he omits many examples of widows who refused second marriages, which, he says, you can take for your edification from the first volume against Jovinian. Again in Epistle 58 (elsewhere 13) to St. Paulinus, number 6, he says: You have the books against Jovinian, which discuss more fully the contempt of the belly and the gullet. These things make manifest that St. Jerome so answered the heretics that by the same work he formed the morals of Catholics.

[515] but written in the year 393, In the Preface of the Dialogue against the Pelagians he speaks thus of that Work: Jovinian, whose heresy is now revived, disturbed the Roman faith in my absence, so tongueless and of so putrid a speech that he was worthier of pity than of ill-will. To him too I answered, as I could. From the words in my absence it is gathered that Jovinian's heresy arose after Jerome had departed from Rome in the year 385, and therefore between 385 and 390. But that these books must be fixed in the year 393 I have already advised, although they were perhaps begun at the close of the year 392. For they followed after the book On Illustrious Men: for this is praised in book 1 against Jovinian, number 26; and in the Preface to Jonah the saint indicates the order in which these books were written, in these words: For I wrote the book On Illustrious Men, and two volumes Against Jovinian, an Apologetic also, etc. And so that they are reckoned in the book On Illustrious Men, chapter 135, will have happened either because they were begun immediately after it, or rather they will have been added by someone afterwards. For there are subjoined in the same place the Apologetic and the Epitaph to Pammachius, which were certainly added afterwards; since Jerome himself in the year 392 did not know that he would write them.

[516] The books against Jovinian seem greatly to have pleased St. Augustine, they greatly pleased St. Augustine. who in the Epistle which is the 132nd among the Hieronymian letters makes mention of them at number 4, writing thus to Jerome: But this about the equality of sins the Stoics alone have dared to argue against all the sense of the human race: which vanity of theirs you have most lucidly convicted from the holy Scriptures in that Jovinian, who in this opinion was a Stoic, but in hunting after and defending pleasures an Epicurean. In which most delightful and most excellent disputation of yours it appeared plainly enough that it did not please our authors—or rather that Truth itself, which spoke through them—that all sins are equal. St. Augustine praises the same Work of Jerome's also in book 3 On the Merits and Remission of Sins, chapter 7, alleging a lengthy text in which St. Jerome asserts original sin. Of Jovinian he speaks thus: A few years ago there arose at Rome a certain Jovinian, who is said to have persuaded consecrated virgins, even those already advanced in age, to marry, etc. His writings indeed—for he dared to write too—when the brethren had sent them to Jerome to be refuted, etc. He observes that original sin was not denied by Jovinian, but was asserted by Jerome as a thing admitted by all. Nay, Pelagius wrongly alleged those books, as is clear from Augustine, in the book On Nature and Grace against Pelagius, chapter 65, where he expounds the words of Jerome objected: and Jerome is there called the venerable presbyter.

\ elsewhere philosophorum*

\ elsewhere aquilas*

§ XXXI. The books against Jovinian ill received at Rome: the saint writes an Apology for them and two Epistles.

Calumnies spread against the saint's books, Although I have no reason to doubt that envy and slander alone, without any fault of St. Jerome's, brought it about that some at Rome ill received his books against Jovinian, and stirred up at least a brief storm against St. Jerome, as though in them he had not spoken rightly about marriage, yet I see that some of the moderns here too put forward as it were just causes for which that tumult arose against Jerome, which had for its authors either hidden Jovinianists or rivals lacking sufficient learning. Tillemont in article 59 so sets forth the occasions of that scandal that it sometimes becomes doubtful whether he wishes to excuse St. Jerome or to accuse him of imprudence in speaking. The opinion of Baronius, expressed in these words, pleases me more: Certainly the earlier writings seemed to need no Apologetic; since the saint had at once declared in book 1, number 3, that marriage is good, as we shall see.

[518] But I cannot assent to that most learned man when at number 58 he too greatly increases the number of those offended, even though Siricius does not seem to have been offended, and among

them places the Roman Pontiff St. Siricius himself, and that from a passage of St. Jerome about Pammachius ill understood, since the words signify quite the contrary. But, says Baronius, he found as adversary of the Commentaries written by him not that one monk, to be despised rather than refuted, but very many, and those pious men and assertors of the Catholic faith, somewhat offended because it seemed to them that by that same St. Jerome matrimony had been made light of and despised; and these same men were stirred up against Pammachius, whom all knew to have always been the keenest defender of the same Jerome: nay, that the very Pontiff of the Roman Church was moved for the same cause, Jerome himself writes thus to Pammachius: "I hear that the zeal of the whole City is stirred up about you: I hear that the will of the Pontiff and of the people agree with one mind. It is less to hold the priesthood than to deserve it." But these words by no means signify that the people and the Pontiff were opposed to Pammachius, as Baronius will have it: but rather declare that Pammachius was so far in the love and esteem of all that they believed him worthy of the priesthood. And so there is no reason why we should say that Siricius was offended by those books of St. Jerome, or any men by name distinguished for probity and learning.

[519] They had caused anxiety to Pammachius and Domnio. Nevertheless the tumults stirred up against the saint's books by men bold rather than learned caused anxiety even to pious men, who admonished St. Jerome by letter. Of these, if perhaps there were others too, Pammachius and Domnio certainly became known, both illustrious in piety, both venerated among the Saints, both afterwards joined to St. Jerome by a special friendship. Pammachius had been Jerome's fellow-student, but there had been no commerce of letters between them up to that time. With Domnio Jerome already had some commerce: for in Epistle 49 (elsewhere 52), written at the same time as the Apology, he says that he had sent certain things to the holy father Domnio. But so far as I can gather from the saint's answer to each, Domnio admonished him, and at the same time indicated who and what manner of man he was who was shamelessly traducing the said books. Besides, he collected some texts which seemed to some to present difficulty, and sent them to Jerome. Jerome himself indicates this in Epistle 50 (elsewhere 51), by which he answered Domnio, at number 3 in these words: He (the monk, the calumniator of those books) should at least have imitated your modesty, who, having excerpted from the volume those passages which seemed to cause scandal to some, arranged them in order, asking that I should either emend or expound them.

[520] Of these Domnio admonishes the saint about the levity of the calumniator, The whole Epistle intimates that Domnio wrote much about the levity of that monk, who was traducing Jerome's books, not in writings, but in words before an unskilled multitude. For he begins thus: Your letter sounds alike of love and of complaint: of your love, by which, diligently admonishing, you dread for us even what is safe; of the complaint of those who do not love, and who, seeking occasion in sins, chatter against their brother and lay a scandal against their mother's son. For you write that they—nay, some fellow I know not, from the crossroads, from the street-corners, from the squares, a monk who haunts the market-place, a newsmonger, a wrangler, cunning only at disparaging, who through the beam of his own eye strives to pluck out the mote of another's—harangue against me; and gnaw, tear and rend with a dog's tooth the books which I wrote against Jovinian. That this dialectician of your City, and pillar of the Plautine family, has read neither Aristotle's κατηγορίαι, nor the περὶ ἑρμηνείας, nor the ἀναλυτικά, nor even Cicero's τόποι, but among the circles of the unskilled and the συμπόσια of little women weaves ἀσυλλόγιστοι syllogisms, and dissolves our sophisms, as he thinks, by clever argumentation. All these things Jerome says about that inept wrangler, as though copied out for him by Domnio.

[521] Then the saint discusses much about the manners of that monk, whom on his suggestion the saint describes, whom he depicts as conversing too freely with women, and from time to time reprehends the man's boldness ironically, and from time to time seriously too, so that it is not to be doubted that he learned the manners of that most frivolous man from Domnio's letter. He also suggests the suspicion that he was a secret follower of Jovinian, although he had publicly disputed against him: and that suspicion is not improbable from the man's manners, and above all from his attack on Jerome's books. But what that monk ought to have done he sets forth at number 3 in this manner: Surely if he thought that I erred (for in many things we all offend, and if any man offend not in word, he is a perfect man) he ought either to have argued or to have inquired by letter: which that learned and noble man Pammachius did, to whom I ἀπελογισάμην as I could, and in a longer Epistle set forth in what sense I said each thing. And at number 4: Let him spare himself, let him spare me, let him spare the Christian name. Let him know that he is a monk not by talking and running about, but by keeping silence and sitting still. These things the saint says beyond doubt that St. Domnio might have wherewith to restrain the vain fellow.

[522] With the same intention, I think, he provokes the man to write at number 5, and provokes him to write. writing thus: It is no great thing, my Domnio, to chatter through the corners and the physicians' shops, and to pass sentence upon the world: This man spoke well, that one ill: this one knows the Scriptures, that one raves: this one is talkative, that one utterly speechless. By whose judgment has he deserved to judge of all men? To bawl everywhere in the crossroads against anyone whatever, and to heap up curses, not charges, belongs to buffoons and to men always ready for quarrels. Let him move his hand, let him set pen to paper, let him bestir himself, and show in writing whatever he can. Let him give us occasion to answer his eloquence. I can bite back if I will: I can, when wounded, fix my tooth. We too have learned our letters; we too have often withdrawn our hand from the rod. Of us too it can be said: He has hay on his horn, flee far off. But we prefer to be disciples of him who says: "I gave my back to the scourges, and turned not away my face from the confusion of spitting: Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again"; and after the buffets, the cross, the scourges, the blasphemies, at the last prayed for those who crucified him, saying: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do". And I too forgive my brother's error: I understand that he has been deceived by the devil's art. And at the end: Further, if he is unwilling to write, and thinks the matter must be handled only with curses, let him hear, though so many lands, waves and peoples lie between, at least the echo of my cry. I do not condemn marriages, I do not condemn wedlock. And, that he may hold my opinion the more surely, I wish all those who perhaps, because of nightly fears, cannot sleep alone, to take wives. Thus the saint to Domnio.

[523] But what Pammachius did is clear partly from the words given above—that he inquired by letter; Pammachius, who then for the first time wrote to Jerome, and partly from Epistle 49 (elsewhere 52), which was given to him together with the longer Apology: for there it is also said that he withdrew the copies. Jerome would not have wished this, I think, if he had been consulted first: yet he was unwilling to disapprove the deed, because Pammachius had done it with the best will, who seems to have held some sayings of Jerome's suspect. Jerome begins the Epistle thus: It is sometimes a mark of Christian modesty to be silent even with friends, and to console one's humility rather by silence than, by taking up old friendships again, to incur the charge of ambition. As long as you kept silence, I kept silence; nor did I ever wish to expostulate on this matter, lest I should seem not to be seeking a friend but courting a more powerful man. But now, provoked by the kindness of your letter, I shall try always to take the first part, and not so much to write back as to write; that I may be known both to have kept silence hitherto out of modesty, and to have begun to speak with still greater modesty. At the beginning of the Apology he gives almost the same reason for his preceding silence, in these words: That I have not written to you until now, the cause was your silence. For I feared lest, if I wrote to one who was silent, you should think me troublesome rather than dutiful.

[524] having withdrawn the copies, admonished the saint in friendly fashion: But let us return to the said letter, in which he continues thus: As to my little works against Jovinian, I know very well that you acted both prudently and lovingly in withdrawing the copies. But that diligence profited nothing, since several coming from the City read over to me the very things which they said they had taken down at Rome. In this province too the books had already been published abroad, and, as you yourself have read, "A word once sent forth knows not how to return". I am not of so great felicity as most commentators of this time, that I can emend my trifles when I will. As soon as I have written anything, either my lovers or my enemies, with different zeal but with equal eagerness, scatter my works among the common people: and they are excessive either in praise or in blame, following not the merit of the style but their own stomach. And so, what alone I could do, I have προσεφώνησα to you an ἀπολογητικόν of the Work itself; which when you have read, you will yourself satisfy the rest on our behalf. Or, if you too shall wrinkle your nose, you will be compelled to expound otherwise that περικοπή of the Apostle in which he disputes about virginity and marriage. Nor do I say this to provoke you to write, whose zeal in the sacred Letters I prefer to my own; but that you may compel others, who tear us, to do this. They know letters, they seem to themselves smatterers: they can not reprehend me but teach me. If they shall write anything, my interpretation will be the more neglected by comparison with their Work. Read, I beg you, and diligently consider the Apostle's words: and then you will see that, to avoid calumny, I was far more indulgent to husbands than he wished. He adds some writers who had expounded the Apostle's passage.

[525] but he sends him an Apology, In the Apology itself (which among the Epistles is the 48th, elsewhere 50), after the beginning given above, he sets forth in what way he wishes Pammachius to use it, continuing thus: But now, provoked by your most sweet letter, and by a letter of such a kind as to provoke me to the philosophy of our own teaching, I receive with open hands, as they say, my former fellow-student and comrade and friend, and prepare him as the defender of my little works: yet only if I first have you as an appeased judge; nay, if I shall have instructed my own advocate upon all the points on which I am accused. For this both your Tully, and before him Antonius in a brief and single volume, wrote: that the first cause of victory is to learn diligently the case for which you are to speak. Then he explains the state of the question, and at the same time intimates what had been reprehended in his books, in these words: Certain men reprehend me because in the books which I wrote against Jovinian I was excessive either in the praise of virgins or in the censure of married women [\]: and they say that it is in a manner a condemnation of matrimony to proclaim chastity so highly that no comparison seems left between a wife and a virgin. If I remember the problem rightly, this is the contention between Jovinian and us, that he equates marriage with virginity, while we subject it: he says that there is either little or no*

difference, while we say there is much. This was in truth the state of the question; nor was it difficult for Jerome to prove his Catholic opinion against Jovinian, whose error had already been condemned. But the calumniators had said that not only had virginity been preferred to marriage by Jerome, but that marriage had also been condemned. Therefore the saint presently proceeds to refute that calumny.

[526] And he does this by producing the very words of his Work, in which he proves that he did not condemn marriage. discussing thus: Did I not, I ask, say this at once at the very beginning of my Work? "For we do not, following the doctrine of Marcion and of Manichæus, disparage marriage. Nor, deceived by the error of Tatian, the chief of the Encratites, do we think all coupling foul: he who condemns and rejects not only marriages but also the foods which God created for our use. We know that in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and earthenware; and that upon the foundation of Christ, which Paul the architect laid, some build gold, silver, precious stones; others on the contrary hay, wood, stubble. We are not ignorant that marriage is honourable and the bed undefiled. We read God's first sentence: 'Increase and multiply, and fill the earth'. But we so receive marriage as to prefer the virginity which is born of marriage. Will silver not be silver, if gold is more precious than silver?" etc. These things and others that follow, equally clear, the saint brings forward from his Work, so that I can scarcely conceive with what boldness of calumny it was said that marriage was condemned by him. That second or third marriages were not condemned by him either he proves at number 5 by bringing forward these words from his Work: I do not condemn men twice married, nay, nor thrice married, and, if it can be said, eight times married. Then, when he had at length proved that marriage was by no means condemned by him, he goes on to explain some things which had furnished occasion to the calumniators.

[527] Now a few things remain to be examined about the time in which both the books against Jovinian and the Apology seem to have been written. After the books against Jovinian written in the year 393, Since St. Jerome in the year 392 wrote on five of the minor Prophets, and afterwards composed the book On Illustrious Men—for which Work very many things had to be sought out, read and examined, so that it could not be finished in a short time—he will have finished this book in the year 392 as it ran to its close. Besides, St. Jerome places about three years between the Explanation of the five Prophets and that of the prophet Jonah. But it will be shown in its own place by certain arguments that the Commentaries on Jonah were not published before the year 396. Wherefore, even if by about three years we understand three years and some months, as is altogether necessary, and add even six or seven months to the three years, even so we must look back to about the end of the year 392, in which the book On Illustrious Men will have been published. Wherefore the publication of the books against Jovinian must necessarily be fixed in the year 393, since the Work is of great bulk and of greater labour, being full of sacred and profane learning. Besides, the errors of the new heresiarch had first to be laboriously investigated out of his own obscure writings, before the saint could leap forward to refute them. Wherefore those books will not have reached Rome before the year 393 was well advanced, so far as I can conjecture.

[528] But when the said books had been carried to Rome, again a notable time was needed before they should come into the hands of many, and before the censures and calumnies of the envious or of Jovinian's friends should bring it about the Apology seems to be fixed in the year 394 or 395, that they caused anxiety even to pious and learned men. And so I do not judge that the letters of Pammachius and Domnio were sent to St. Jerome before the year 394 and the passing of winter. For when Pammachius's Epistle came to Jerome, several coming from the City had already announced the same things to him, as Epistle 49 testifies, so that Pammachius will have written at a time fit for travelling, and Jerome in all likelihood did not receive his letter before the summer of the year 394. And so I judge the Apology must be fixed in the year 394, unless perhaps more time intervened on account of the very long journeys, and it must be moved down to the year 395. This epoch certainly does not seem to me improbable, because I find nothing by which it is established that the Apology was only one year later than the books written against Jovinian.

[529] since it seems to have been written after the death of Pammachius's wife; But from elsewhere Jerome in Epistle 49, which was sent together with the Apology, somewhat intimates that Pammachius's wife was already dead by then, when he says: I hear that the zeal of the whole City is stirred up about you. I hear that the will of the Pontiff and of the people agree with one mind. It is less to hold the priesthood than to deserve it. These words signify that Pammachius was judged worthy of the priesthood or of the episcopate, as much by the people as by the Roman Pontiff. But no one would have thought of this unless his wife Paulina had been dead, so far as appears. Now that the death of Paulina did not become known to St. Jerome before the year 395 we shall gather from Epistle 66, by which the saint consoled Pammachius on Paulina's death two years afterwards, in the year 397, as will be proved in its own place. And so it seems to me at least uncertain whether St. Jerome wrote his Apology in the year 394 or in 395.

[530] and it could have been written in the year 395. But what the saint wrote in those three years and some months, between the minor Prophets expounded in the year 392 and Jonah explained at the beginning of the year 396, he enumerates thus in the Preface to Jonah: About three years have flowed by since I interpreted five Prophets: … and, detained by another Work, I could not fulfil what I had begun. For I wrote the Book On Illustrious Men (finished at the close of the year 392) and two volumes against Jovinian (in the year 393); an Apologetic also (in the year 394 or 395) and on the Best Kind of Translating, to Pammachius: and to Nepotian (on the Life of clerics and monks) or about Nepotian (an Epitaph) two books, and other things which it would be long to enumerate. These other things, besides the translations from the Hebrew, are the Epistles to be enumerated below, and other lesser little works. But there is nothing among these which compels us to fix the Apology before the year 395. For the things which were certainly written after the Apology could have been composed in a few months.

[531] By it all the murmuring ceased. But whether the Apology was drawn up in the year 394 or in the following one, it was well received at Rome, and there stilled all the murmuring. Jerome himself testifies this in the Preface to the Commentaries on the prophet Jeremiah, where he answers Pelagius, who was again carping at the books against Jovinian: Let him read the Apology of that same Work, which many years ago Rome received with joy against his master: and then he will perceive that he blasphemes with the voices of others, and is so unskilled that he does not even have curses of his own; but uses against us the rage of enemies long since buried. Rufinus himself, who is wont to carp at everything of Jerome's, even the good, no less unskilfully than unmercifully, did not dare to set anything against the Apology; but in book 2, number 38, and again at number 44, complains that Pammachius did not proceed in the same way with himself, by withdrawing from publication the copies of the writings by which the Romans were offended. But he brings in Jerome speaking thus of his own Apology: I wrote out the Apologetic afresh, and what was understood otherwise I recalled, as far as I could, to a more correct understanding.

[532] Yet Rufinus—as he is not wont to speak without exaggeration of those things which had been reprehended in St. Jerome—seems also to have exaggerated the offence that arose at Rome from the books against Jovinian, Rufinus's sayings about those books when he says, in the name of Jerome addressing Pammachius, of those books: Since some understood them otherwise than I remembered having dictated them, … and almost all were offended, among whom you yourself too were thought to be. Certainly I shall not believe that almost all were offended, or that Pammachius was truly offended, since he on occasion of those books renewed his old friendship with Jerome, and since by a single Apology, in which nothing is retracted but everything is defended and more strongly asserted, all offence was taken away. Nor do these things agree with what the same Rufinus had said before at number 7, carping at the Epistle to Domnio. For he there writes thus: When a certain man had reprehended his little books which he wrote against Jovinian, to the aged Domnio of blessed memory, who had indicated this very thing to him, he, writing back, excuses himself and says: That it could by no means have come about that he erred, a man who had the knowledge of all things. Here he brings forward one accuser, just as there seems to have been only one who openly accused the books and perhaps drew some to his side, and caused anxiety and fear to several.

[533] But Rufinus does something else by the words alleged, and the biting accuser wishes to accuse Jerome of arrogance. are examined But he ought not to have taken up open falsehoods to that end. For Jerome neither attributes to himself in that Epistle the knowledge of all things, nor says that it could by no means have come about that he erred, as the calumniator asserts with stinging pen. Nay, he intimates the plain opposite at number 3 in these words: Surely if he thought that I erred (for in many things we all offend, and if any man offend not in word, he is a perfect man) he ought either to have argued or to have inquired by letter. Jerome knew, therefore, that he was a man and liable to error. But what he says in that Epistle about his own studies and masters tends only to this, that he may suffuse with a wholesome blush an unlearned man whom he sharply reprehends, partly with ironical words, partly with wholesome admonitions, and may teach him not to speak of things not sufficiently known to him.

[534] That Epistle is sharp, I confess, and might seem too bitter, and are refuted. if a just reason for so writing had been lacking. But I cannot doubt that St. Jerome judged that the petulant monk must be so handled, either because he believed him stirred up by vainglory to get a name for himself, or because he held him suspect as a secret follower of Jovinian. But whether he was driven by love of the heresy or of vainglory, his disparagements could not but be harmful to the Romans, and were destitute of a fit foundation: and for that cause at least he believed the man must be quickly restrained; and perhaps he accomplished this more by that sharp Epistle than by the longer and more moderate Apology, by which he instructed the Romans. For the rest, it is not established who that young monk was whom Jerome refutes. But certainly it was not Rufinus, who did not then dwell at Rome but in Palestine, nor was he young, but of a fairly advanced age. But Jerome calls him a young man and a monk, whom I do not find by any sufficiently certain indication.

\ elsewhere nuptiarum*

§ XXXII. Other little works written about the same time, and various Epistles.

Annotations on the twelve Prophets and the books of Kings: Among the little works which were written not long after the book On Illustrious Men, the Annotations, which have perished, must be mentioned in the first place. Of them the saint makes mention thus in Epistle 49 to Pammachius, number 4: I had sent some τῶν ὑπομνημάτων (that is, of the Annotations) on the twelve Prophets

to the holy father Domnio, and Samuel too and Malachim, that is, the four books of Kings. Which if you shall wish to read, you will approve how great is the difficulty of understanding the divine Scripture, and especially the Prophets: and that by the fault of translators the things which among their own people flow with the purest course of speech teem with faults among us. From these things it becomes certain that those Annotations on the minor Prophets and on the books of Kings were written before the Apology, which was sent with that Epistle. Perhaps they even preceded it by some years. For it is likely that those Annotations were composed by the saint when he was translating the sacred Scripture from Hebrew into the Latin tongue, or even before the Translation, and so they will have been composed about the year 391. Annotations of that kind could certainly make the Translation more expeditious and safer. The saint could also send Annotations before lengthy Commentaries.

[536] St. Epiphanius's Epistle translated In the year 394 must be fixed the Epistle of St. Epiphanius to John, bishop of Jerusalem, which St. Jerome made Latin out of the Greek. It is now the 51st among the Hieronymian letters (elsewhere 60), and in it St. Epiphanius discusses many things against the errors of Origen, of which St. Epiphanius held suspect John of Jerusalem, Rufinus, and Palladius the Galatian. For whose sake he translated St. Epiphanius's Epistle St. Jerome declares in Epistle 57 (elsewhere 101), which is an apology for the translation, at number 2 in these words: About two years ago the aforesaid father Epiphanius had sent a letter to bishop John, arguing with him about certain doctrines, and afterwards gently calling him to repentance. Copies of these were eagerly snatched up in Palestine, either for the merit of the author or for the elegance of the writing.

[537] for the sake of Eusebius of Cremona. There was in our monastery a man not undistinguished among his own people, Eusebius of Cremona, who, when this Epistle was flying about on the lips of many, and both learned and unlearned were admiring it for its doctrine and purity of speech, began to ask me earnestly to turn it into Latin for him, and, for ease of understanding, to explain it more openly: for he was wholly ignorant of Greek speech. I did what he wished, and, calling a notary, dictated it hurriedly and swiftly, briefly noting in the margin of the page what sense the several chapters contained within. For he had strongly demanded that I should do it for himself alone. And I asked of him in return that he should keep the copy at home, and not readily publish it abroad. The matter passed thus for a year and six months, until by a new piece of trickery the aforesaid translation migrated from his desk to Jerusalem. Thus far Jerome about his own Translation. But in what manner it was published, accused and defended, we shall now say, even though other Epistles of the saint were written before the Apology for this one.

[538] After the words given, Jerome thus continues: For a certain pseudo-monk, either having received money, as is plainly given to understand, Since this version was accused, or from gratuitous malice, as the corrupter strives in vain to persuade, having plundered his papers and his stores, became a Judas, a betrayer: and gave my adversaries occasion for barking against me, so that they harangue among the unskilled that I am a forger, that I have not expressed word for word, that for HONOURABLE I said DEAREST; and that by a malignant interpretation—which is a shame to say—I was unwilling to translate αἰδεσιμώτατον πάππαν. These and such-like trifles are my crimes. Jerome was accused by John of Jerusalem himself, at the instigation of Rufinus and Melania, who dwelt at Jerusalem. This about John is intimated in various places, about Rufinus and Melania at number 12, where Jerome, after he had shown what ineptitudes they were objecting, subjoins these words: This is not the fault of him under whose person another plays out the tragedy; but of Rufinus and Melanius, his masters (perhaps in the Latin tongue), who taught him at great cost to know nothing. John, I think, did not know the Latin tongue, or at any rate did not know it well enough to judge of the fidelity of the Translation. But Rufinus and Melania knew it, and saw that Latin words did not correspond to the several Greek words, because Jerome had not expressed word for word; and since there was a grave dissension between John and St. Epiphanius, of which we shall treat hereafter, and Jerome adhered to Epiphanius while Rufinus adhered to John, they dared to traduce the translation as unfaithful.

[539] For this cause, therefore, St. Jerome wrote the lengthy Epistle to Pammachius on the Best Kind of Translating, he writes an Epistle to Pammachius, which elsewhere he calls a book, and which in the words given at number 530 he reckons among the things written before the Commentary on Jonah. There Jerome shows at length that a translation expressed word for word is not always to be preferred, nay, that it often becomes ridiculous, since every tongue has its own properties which another tongue cannot fitly express by corresponding words. And from this observation, since he had everywhere preserved the sense of the Greek Epistle, he proves the ignorance of his adversaries. Praising Pammachius's learning at the beginning of the Epistle, Whence I too, he says, reckon myself happy in this business at least, that I am to answer an unskilled tongue before learned ears, which objects to me either ignorance or falsehood, if I either could not or would not truly translate another's writings: of which the one is an error, the other a crime. And lest perhaps my accuser, by that facility with which he says everything, and by that impunity by which he thinks all things lawful for himself, should accuse me too before you (Romans), as he charged father Epiphanius, I have sent this Epistle, which may teach you, and through you others who deign to love us, the order of the affair.

[540] How great was the licence of his accusers he declares again at the end, or the book on the Best Kind of Translating, just as through the whole course of the Epistle he clearly proves that what was objected were mere ineptitudes. But since he there discusses many things too which intimate that a Translation of sacred Scripture from the Hebrew is useful and opportune, the saint seems to have done this studiously, because the same detractors were carping at that too, so that from this Epistle he might afterwards take arguments for its defence; as he does in the Preface to the books of Paralipomenon, praising the book on the Best Kind of Translating, and again in the Preface to Genesis, even though he keeps silence about the book. The same little book, as he there calls it, he praises on Matthew chapter 26, verse 32, and on the third chapter of Malachi, in order to prove that the Apostles did not always take the testimonies of sacred Scripture from the Translation of the Seventy interpreters. And so the saint composed the said Epistle in order to defend his own Translations, although he took the occasion from the calumnies which were being spread against the Translation of St. Epiphanius's Epistle. But how great the disparagements were he declares at the end in these words: I have exceeded the measure of a letter, but I have not exceeded the measure of my grief. For I, who am called a forger and am torn to pieces among the shuttles and looms of little women, am content to deny the charge, not to return it. Whence I leave everything to your judgment, that you may read the Epistle itself, both Greek and Latin: and you will at once understand the dirges and shameful complaints of my accusers. Further, it is enough for me to have instructed my dearest friend, and, hiding in my cell, only to await the day of judgment. And I could wish, if it can be done, and if my adversaries will allow, to write for you Commentaries on the Scriptures rather than Philippics of Demosthenes and of Tully.

[541] about whose date there is dispute, As regards the time in which that excellent Epistle was written, there is a notable disagreement among the learned about the year. The difficulty is caused by the saint's own words, in which at number 5 he speaks of the translated Chronicle of Eusebius, and fixes that translation about twenty years before. For since the Chronicle does not seem to have been begun before the year 379, as was said at number 216, twenty years would lead us down to the year 399. Vallarsius, in the Preface to St. Jerome's Works, where he gives the chronology of the Epistles, at Epistle 57 strives to remove the difficulty, having first related the various opinions, in this manner: For Tillemont and Martianay refer it to the year 396, and our fellow-countryman Cardinal Noris judges it written two years later. But as regards Noris, I believe that this led him into error, that, deceived by a false reading, he read "twenty years ago Eusebius's Chronicle was turned into Latin by Jerome", when FIFTEEN must altogether be read there for TWENTY, or XV for XX in Roman numerals, which are easily confused and deceive in writing. For that Jerome undertook that Work when he was at Constantinople in the year 380 (or 379) is established by so many and so certain testimonies that no one has ever called it into doubt. The said editor in his Annotations on the passage alleged observes again that fifteen must be read for twenty; yet he adduces no manuscript by whose authority that conjecture may be supported. Nevertheless that would be the readiest way to remove the difficulty, since I have no doubt that the Epistle of which we are treating was written in the year 395 or 396.

[542] on account of the difficulty arising from the time of writing the Chronicle: Vallarsius is nevertheless mistaken when he believes that the opinion that the Chronicle was written about the year 380 is denied by no one. For Pagi, at the year 395, number 19, fixes it seven whole years earlier, writing thus: But that (Chronicle) Jerome turned into the Latin tongue in the year 373. He takes his argument from the Epistle which we are examining, and from the passage about about twenty years; because he believed the Epistle to have been written about the year 392. But neither was this Epistle written in the year 392, nor did Jerome turn the Chronicle in the year 373, since in the year 373 he set out for Syria, and in the following year 374 he was sick. Yet Pagi's reason is not improbable for the version of the Chronicle having been begun in the Desert about the year 376. Certainly about twenty years send us back to that time. And from elsewhere I do not see why he could not have begun that Work in the desert. For there he wrote the Life of St. Paul the first hermit, as was said at number 137. And in the Epistle to Paul of Concordia, to whom he sent the said Life, he says: If this little gift shall please, we have other things also laid up, which with very many Eastern wares shall sail to you, if the Holy Spirit shall breathe upon them. By Eastern wares he designates, I think, Greek writings to be rendered into Latin; nor do I see why he could not have been thinking of Eusebius's Chronicle, and have begun its translation. For everything we brought forward in §12 about the Chronicle being written at Constantinople proves only that it was there finished and published. If this conjecture, which I leave to the judgment of the learned rather than assert, is true, the about twenty years will present no difficulty, whether the Epistle to Pammachius was written in the year 395, as Vallarsius will have it, or in the year 396, as others judge.

[543] But that it was written in one or other of these years seems to me certain. Yet that Epistle must be fixed about the beginning of the year 396. For that Epistle was certainly written before the Commentaries on Jonah, drawn up in the year 396, as I shall prove. Again, it was written when about two years had flowed by after the writing of St. Epiphanius's Epistle, which we shall see must be fixed about the middle of the year 394, when we shall treat of the dissension which

arose between John of Jerusalem and St. Epiphanius and extended itself to St. Jerome. This about two years, therefore, leads rather to the earlier months of the year 396 than to the middle of the year 395, in which Vallarsius fixes the Epistle, especially since he himself agrees that St. Epiphanius's Epistle was given in the year 394. What he says, that by about two years a year and six months is understood, is refuted by St. Jerome's own Epistle. For at number 2 he says that the Epistle was made Latin by him, not at once when it was written, but when it was flying about on the lips of many; and that his translation lay hid for a year and six months. Again, the Latin translation, when brought out into public, was first accused and traduced by Jerome's rivals before he wrote the Epistle to Pammachius, so that by about two years certainly more must be understood than a year and six months, and we plainly arrive at about the beginning of the year 396. The argument which Vallarsius takes from the little word dudum (long since), in order to fix the Epistle about the middle of the year 395, seems to me altogether useless. For he will never prove that dudum is used by Jerome of so short a time that it is almost the same as lately, and cannot be extended even to a year. In the words of Jerome given by me at number 251 the word dudum is twice extended to many years.

[544] Among the little works which preceded the Commentaries on Jonah He writes to Nepotian, is also reckoned, in Jerome's words recited at number 530, Epistle 52 (elsewhere 2) to Nepotian, which is entitled On the Life of clerics and monks, and is called a book, as it may deservedly be called on account of its length and the excellent instructions which it contains. In that place St. Jerome indeed put this Epistle after the Epistle to Pammachius and the Apology for the books against Jovinian; but he seems to have done this only in order to join it with the Epitaph of the same Nepotian, as the words themselves intimate: And to Nepotian, or about Nepotian, two books. The first was written to him while he lived, the second two years later about him when dead. And so that order does not hinder us from holding for certain that the Epistle to Nepotian was written earlier, and perhaps even before the Apology for the books against Jovinian, and must altogether be fixed in the year 394. For this epoch the Epistle itself indicates at number 17, where Jerome writes thus: You have compelled me, dearest Nepotian, now that my little book on virginity, which I had written at Rome for the holy Eustochium, has been stoned, after ten years to open my lips again at Bethlehem, and to expose myself to be pierced through by the tongues of all. The Epistle or little book on Virginity to Eustochium was certainly written in the year 384, as was proved at number 259. And so this Epistle to Nepotian must be fixed in the year 394, as being ten years later.

[545] who demanded rules of life, But when he says that the mouths of all would be opened again, he feared this for the reason that, being about to give rules of life to clerics and monks, he could not but speak of the vices which by the sloth of the negligent are wont to creep into either institute. Wherefore he there continues thus: But indeed nothing ought to have been written, lest we should undergo the judgment of men, which you forbade me to do; or, if we write, we must know that the darts of all slanderers are to be hurled against us. Whom I beseech to be quiet and to cease reviling: for we have written not as to adversaries but as to friends: nor have we inveighed against those who sin, but have warned them not to sin. And not against them only, but against ourselves also we have been severe judges: and, wishing to take the mote out of another's eye, we first cast out our own beam. I have wounded no one, no one's name has been marked even by description. My discourse has struck at no one in particular. It is a general disputation about vices. He who shall wish to be angry with me will first confess of himself that he is such a man. With these words Jerome closed the Epistle, most full of excellent precepts and elegantly composed. That it had long been asked for he declares at the very beginning, thus commencing: You ask of me, dearest Nepotian, by letters from over the sea, and ask frequently, that I should set out for you in a short volume rules of life, and by what reason he who, having forsaken the warfare of the world, has begun to be either a monk or a cleric, may keep the straight path of Christ, and not be carried off into the divers by-ways of the vices. This St. Jerome teaches throughout the whole little work.

[546] who, on receiving them, valued them most highly. How studiously he asked for those instructions Jerome testifies again in the Epitaph of Nepotian, number XI, adding also, to his praise, how highly he valued them when received. I transfer the passage hither. How often did he beseech me by letters from over the sea to write something to him? how often did he set before me the nocturnal messenger of the Gospel and the widow who importuned the hard judge? And when I refused by silence rather than by letters, and by the shame of one keeping silence suffused with shame the one who asked, he set his uncle (Heliodorus the bishop) against me as an intercessor, who might both ask more freely for another and more easily obtain it for the reverence of his priesthood. I did, therefore, what he wished, and in a short little book consecrated our friendship to eternal memory. On receiving which he boasted that he had surpassed the wealth of Crœsus and the riches of Darius. He held it with his eyes, with his hands, in his bosom, at his lips. And when he often unrolled it on his bed, the sweet page often fell upon the breast of the sleeper. But if any of the pilgrims or of his friends came, he rejoiced at our testimony about himself. And whatever was lacking in the little work he made up for by a measured distinction and by variety of delivery, so that in his reciting it he himself seemed daily either to please or to displease. These things he turns to the praise of Nepotian, of whose Epitaph, from which these things are taken, we must now speak, even though certain other writings preceded it.

[547] The Epitaph of Nepotian must be fixed Vallarsius rightly fixes the Epitaph of Nepotian, that is, Epistle 60 (elsewhere 3) to Heliodorus, in the year 396, and at the beginning of the year. The chief reason is that it precedes the Commentaries on Jonah, in whose Preface it is mentioned; for these Commentaries must necessarily be fixed in the earlier months of the year 396. This is the reason, I say, why the Epitaph cannot be placed later. But why it could not have been written earlier, the reason is drawn from the Epistle itself at number 16, where he has it thus: I will come to private dignities, and I will not speak of those who go beyond two years. And, to pass over the rest, it is enough for us to write the different ends of three men lately of consular rank. Abundantius lives in exile at Pityus, in need. The head of Rufinus was carried on a pike to Constantinople, and his right hand, cut off, begged alms from door to door to the disgrace of his insatiable avarice. Timasius, suddenly cast down from the highest step of dignity, thinks that he has escaped because he lives inglorious at Assa. Of the three here mentioned Rufinus was slain in the year 395, on the 27th of November, according to Tillemont, who proves the day in volume 5 of the Emperors, Note 4 on Arcadius, from Socrates. Pagi agrees, at the same year. And so Jerome in all likelihood did not learn of Rufinus's death in Palestine before the beginning of the year 396.

[558] Besides, the said writers again rightly observe from the ancients at the beginning of the year 396: that Rufinus was slain because he had called barbarians into the empire, namely the Goths into Greece and the Huns into the East, and that this was done in the same year 395. Jerome speaks at number 16 of the Greek cities which the barbarians had occupied: and a little after he has it thus of the Huns: The East seemed free from these evils, and was dismayed only by rumours. Behold, last year, sent against us from the farthest rocks of Caucasus, wolves not now of Arabia but of the North ran through so many provinces in a short time. It is certain that the Huns are here treated of, whom Rufinus had called into Asia and the East in the year 395, as Tillemont relates in his Arcadius, article 4, and confirms in Note 3. And so, since St. Jerome says last year, this passage leaves no doubt that he wrote in the year 396.

[549] Tillemont, who wrongly fixes Jerome's Epistle in the year 397, The arguments of Tillemont, who charges Jerome with negligence, found nothing here to answer, except that solemn thing which he has frequently repeated, that St. Jerome is not accurate in that matter. But, to answer once for all to an accusation so often repeated, by which St. Jerome is charged with negligence in chronology, I do not hesitate to say that Tillemont's dialectic is frequently not accurate, that the sayings of Jerome and of others are frequently not rightly expounded by him, and that thence his own chronology of Jerome's deeds is frequently faulty. Wherefore Jerome is not accurate in chronology only in Tillemont's imagination, because the latter has frequently not found Jerome's true assertions to agree with his own faulty chronology. I have examined many assertions of Jerome's about chronology: but hitherto I have found none which seems false. But if that accusation of Jerome is everywhere unjust, how much more ineptly is he said not to be accurate in a fact to which he was near both in place and in time?

[550] But Tillemont's arguments, by which he strives to defer the Epistle to the year 397, are reported are the following. The first is taken from those words of the Epistle: It is twenty years and more that between Constantinople and the Julian Alps Roman blood is daily shed. And he will have it that the beginning of the Gothic war is designated, which he says broke out in the year 377. The observation is empty. For from Tillemont himself, in volume 5 of the Emperors, it is clear in various places that both the Goths and several others of the barbarians whom Jerome there reckons began much earlier to make inroads into that part of the Roman empire. Secondly, he argues from the words given at number 547 about the fall of the three men of consular rank, and explains those words of Jerome, and I will not speak of those who go beyond two years, in such a way as to make them intimate that more than a year had passed since their fall. But to say two years it was enough that the fall of one of them exceeded a year. And so from those words it is gathered that Abundantius, who is not without reason named first of the three, was banished at about the beginning of the year 395.

[551] and refuted. The poet Claudian likewise intimates that Abundantius fell before Rufinus. For in book 1 against Eutropius, who had been promoted by the favour of Abundantius in the court of the emperor Theodosius, and by whom Abundantius too was first banished, he sings thus:

Of no man before him did Eutropius seize the plundered wealth, nor did he strike down any first with exile, and this alone he did in due form, to condemn his own author.

If we join these things to Jerome's words, who mentions the exile of Abundantius before the death of Rufinus, we shall readily believe that Abundantius was banished about the beginning of the year 395, especially since the ancients do not speak openly of the time of his exile. Thirdly, Tillemont says that Jerome intimates that there was no war in the East while he was writing. But he rather intimates the contrary at number 16, as may be seen there. Wherefore nothing hinders us from fixing the Epitaph of Nepotian in one of the earlier months of the year 396; and that chronology seems certain, both because Jerome says that last year the Huns came into the East, and because the Commentaries on Jonah, which followed, cannot be deferred longer.

[552] Nepotian's love for Jerome For the rest, from the Epitaph of Nepotian, which is most eloquent, I bring forward no more than a few things which testify to the love of the presbyter Nepotian for St. Jerome, clearly declared in his very death. Who would believe, he says at number 13 of the dying Nepotian, that at such a time he remembered our intimacy, and that, while his soul was struggling, he knew the sweetness of our studies? Taking his uncle's (Heliodorus's) hand, "This tunic," he said, "which I used in the ministry of Christ, send to him who is most dear to me, in age a father, in colleagueship a brother (Jerome); and whatever affection is owed by you to your nephew, transfer it to him whom you loved equally with me." And with such words he failed, touching his uncle's hand in remembrance of me. Of that Epitaph the saint makes mention thus in Epistle 77 (elsewhere 30): The circle of the fourth summer is rolling round since, writing to bishop Heliodorus the Epitaph of Nepotian, I spent in that grief whatever strength I could have.

§ XXXIII. Other Epistles to be fixed between 393 and 396: the friendship between Jerome and Augustine begun.

An Epistle given after the year 393 For the remaining Epistles of St. Jerome which seem to have been written from the year 393 on, I shall follow generally the order arranged in the Veronese edition, although it is not certain that they were all written in that order. The first of them is placed Epistle 47 (elsewhere 154) to Desiderius. Tillemont in Note 40 fixes this Epistle in the year 393, because it was certainly written after the book On Illustrious Men, and he believes it written not long after, because St. Jerome referred Desiderius to that book that he might learn which of Jerome's writings he did not yet have. Vallarsius preferred to say about 393, and indeed more rightly. For everything that is read in that Epistle Jerome could have written even some years later, nor does he say that he had lately written On Illustrious Men, as he could have written in the year 393. But since he sends Desiderius to Marcella or Domnio for his writings, he could have learned from them Jerome's later writings, if he did not know them. And so the reason alleged for the year 393 does not press, and I rather believe that the Epistle was written some years later, so that I do not even hold for certain that it was given before the year 396.

[554] Desiderius was a pious and eloquent man, who had asked by letter for the Works of St. Jerome, to Desiderius, and had praised the saint. To his praises the humble man answers modestly in this manner: Having read the discourse of your condescension, which your benevolence bestowed on me when I did not expect it, I rejoiced indeed at the testimony of an honourable and eloquent man: but, returning to myself, I grieved enough that I, unworthy of such praises and heraldry, am rather weighed down than raised up by them. For you know that our teaching holds the banner of humility, and that walking through the lowest we climb to the highest. How small, then, or how great am I, that I should deserve the testimony of a learned voice, that the palm of eloquence should be handed me by one who by writing most eloquently has deterred me from writing? Nevertheless I must dare, that charity, which seeks not the things that are its own but its neighbour's, may render the offices of greeting, since it cannot fill the place of a teacher. Then he invites him with his sister Serenilla into Palestine, in the name of St. Paula too, writing thus after the praises of both: And so what the venerable Paula besought me to do, I do of my own accord: and I exhort and pray you by the love of the Lord that you grant us the sight of you, and by the occasion of the holy places enrich us with so great a gift. Certainly, if our company should displease you, to have adored where the feet of the Lord stood is a part of faith; and, as it were, to have seen the fresh traces of his nativity and of the cross and passion.

[555] Of the writings asked for he answers thus: dwelling at Rome. Of my little works—because very many have flown out of their little nest and have been published abroad by the rash honour of an edition—I have sent nothing, lest perchance I should send the same things which you have. But if you should care to borrow copies, you will be able to receive them either from the holy Marcella, who dwells on the Aventine, or from the Lot of our time, Domnio, a most holy man. But I, awaiting your presence, will either give you everything when you are here; or, if any difficulties shall hinder this, will gladly send whatever you shall bid. Thus the saint. Whether Desiderius really set out for Palestine is not established. The learned also doubt whether this Desiderius is the same as Desiderius the Aquitanian presbyter, who with Riparius afterwards informed Jerome about the errors of Vigilantius. To state my opinion briefly, I say that I scarcely doubt that he is a different man. For since he is sent to Marcella and Domnio, it cannot be doubted that he was living at Rome. That he afterwards set out thence for Gaul, and presided over some parish near the borders of Spain, as the other Desiderius did, becomes by no reasoning probable to me. What Vallarsius says in his Annotations, that he seems to be a stranger at Rome, because Marcella's house is pointed out to him as on the Aventine, I shall not at once admit. For even if he were a Roman, he could easily in so great a City be ignorant where Marcella, a widow dead to the world, dwelt. And at any rate Jerome does not indicate where St. Domnio dwelt. And so I should rather believe that this is that Desiderius who asked and obtained from Jerome the Translation of Genesis, as I have already intimated at number 459.

[556] The time of the writing of Epistle 54 (elsewhere 10) to Furia, on the Keeping of Widowhood, is more nearly known. For near the end the saint has it thus: I know that about two years ago I published books against Jovinian. The Epistle to Furia more probably to be fixed in the year 395, But these books, as has been proved, were published in the year 393. Wherefore about two years leads us to the beginning or about the middle of the year 395. Tillemont fixes the Epistle in the year 394, because he had fixed the books against Jovinian in 392. But Vallarsius fixes it at the end of the year 394, because he believes it is not a full two years. To me it rather seems that it must be fixed in the year 395, so that Furia's husband, who was dead, may be found. For neither do we know for certain whether the books against Jovinian were published before the summer of the year 393. Now it is established from Epistle 123 (elsewhere 11) that Furia's husband was the son of Probus the consul, since there at the end she is called the daughter-in-law of Probus, formerly consul. And that Probus the consul had three sons, and that they were all ordinary consuls, Jerome declares in Epistle 130 (elsewhere 8) to Demetrias, number 7, where he says of Proba, the widow of Probus: Whom the ordinary consulships of her three children, Probinus, Olybrius and Probus, did not weary. It seems, therefore, that it must be said that one of these three was Furia's husband, and that the same was consul before his death.

[557] who seems to have been the widow of the consul Probinus: Tillemont in Note 41 seeks for Furia's husband and does not find him, because he could not fit any of the three to his own chronology. This is certain, that Olybrius lived long afterwards, and therefore was not Furia's husband. His brother Probus was not consul before the year 406, so that neither can he be Furia's husband. There remains, therefore, only Probinus, who in the year 395 held the ordinary consulship with his brother Olybrius. But we do not know how long they held the consulship. Further, I have been able to find nothing to hinder the said Probinus from being believed to be Furia's husband, since I have found no certain mention of him among the historians after the year 395. For he who came forth as consul on the Kalends of January could have died in the same or the next month, whether in his consulship or after laying it down. Probinus was a young man when consul, as is clear from Claudian, who composed a poem on that consulship, addressing the consuls thus:

You have begun where the end was; your beginnings few old men have deserved: and you hold the goal before the youthful bloom shadows your sweet cheeks, and your age clothes your face with laughing down.

Furia's husband will likewise have been a young man, since Jerome addresses her as a young girl. Wherefore I judge that Furia was the wife of Probinus; and that he died in one of the earlier months of the year 395: and that then Furia wrote at once to Jerome, that he might give her rules of life; and that Jerome answered in the summer of the year 395 by the letter whose date we are seeking. Tillemont objects his own chronology, according to which Furia's husband was dead from the year 394. But I answer that the Epistle to Furia can be referred to the year 395 as well as to the year 394, even without the observation about Probinus: but since this is added, the chronology must be accommodated to the facts; and the facts, otherwise sufficiently probable, must not be denied on the strength of an arbitrary chronology: which that writer does too frequently.

[558] and had asked rules of life from the saint. Furia moreover herself asked instruction from Jerome, as is clear from the beginning of the Epistle, which runs thus: You beseech by letters and suppliantly entreat that I should write to you—nay, write back—how you ought to live, and preserve the crown of widowhood with the name of your chastity unhurt. Then he praises her purpose of keeping her widowhood, and confirms it by the domestic examples of Furia. Yet he does not dissemble at number 2 that he must fear the anger of Furia's kinsmen, because he was following with praises the laudable purpose of a most noble and youthful widow, but he fortifies himself and her with reasons. Knowing and seeing, he says, I put my hand into the flame: brows will be drawn up, the arm will be stretched out:

And angry Chremes will rage with swollen mouth.

The nobles will rise up against my Epistle; the patrician throng will thunder, crying out that I am a magician, that I am a seducer, and that I must be deported to the ends of the earth. Let them add, if they will, "Samaritan" too, that I may recognize the title of my Lord. And presently: Let that envy depart which slanderers always fix with their tooth in the Christian name, so that, while men fear reproaches, they are not provoked to virtues. Apart from letters, we know nothing of one another: and the cause is one of piety alone, where there is no knowledge of the flesh. Presently he begins to give rules of life suited to a young widow, and concludes them all at the end with these words: Think daily that you are to die, and you will never think of a second marriage.

[559] The first Epistle of St. Jerome to St. Paulinus Vallarsius fixes in the year 394; The first Epistle to St. Paulinus, whom to the study of the Scriptures, Tillemont, in his St. Jerome, article 72, refers it to the year 395, although in his St. Paulinus, article 21, he seems to mention the same in the year 394. Since the matter must be deduced from the deeds of St. Paulinus, I abstain from further inquiry. St. Paulinus, when he had been converted to a pious life, sent both little gifts and a letter to St. Jerome, to which Jerome answers by Epistle 53 (elsewhere 103). This he begins thus: Brother Ambrose, bringing me your little gifts, has delivered also a most sweet letter, which from the beginning of our friendship displayed the trust of a faith already proved and of an old friendship. For that intimacy is true, and joined by the glue of Christ, which is brought about not by usefulness of household goods, not by the mere presence of bodies, not by crafty and fawning adulation; but by the fear of God and the study of the divine Scriptures. Then the saint discusses very many things learnedly, that Paulinus, lately

converted, may be led on to the study of the sacred Scriptures, and modestly offers himself as master, if he should wish to come to Bethlehem. I beg you, dearest brother, he says at number 9, to live among these things (the studies of the Scriptures), to meditate on these, to know nothing else, to seek nothing else; does it not seem to you already a dwelling of the heavenly kingdom here on earth? I would not have you offended in the holy Scriptures by the simplicity and as it were the meanness of the words, which were so uttered either by the fault of the translators or of set purpose, that they might the more easily instruct a rustic congregation: and that in one and the same sentence the learned should hear one thing and the unlearned another. I am not so petulant and dull as to promise that I know these things, and to gather on earth the fruits of those whose roots are fixed in heaven: but I confess that I wish it; I set myself before one who sits idle; refusing to be a master, I promise to be a companion. To him that asks it is given, to him that knocks it is opened, he that seeks finds. Let us learn on earth those things whose knowledge may abide with us in heaven. I shall receive you with open hands, and—that I may blurt out something inept and in the swollen manner of Hermagoras—whatever you shall seek, I shall try to know along with you.

[560] You have here a brother most loving toward you, Eusebius, who has doubled for me the pleasure of your letter, and exhorts him to leave all things. relating the honourableness of your manners, your contempt of the world, your faithfulness in friendship, your love of Christ. For your prudence and the charm of your eloquence the Epistle itself displayed even without him. Then he admonishes him to send the world its notice of dismissal outright, continuing thus: Hasten, I beg you, and rather cut than untie the rope of the little ship that clings in the shallows. No one who is about to renounce the world can sell well the things he has despised in order to sell them. Whatever of your own you have taken for expenses, count as gain… Let us so live as having nothing and possessing all things. Food and clothing are the riches of Christians. If you have your property in your power, sell it: if you have not, throw it away. To him who takes away your tunic your cloak also must be left. Forsooth, unless you, always putting it off and dragging on day after day, shall cautiously and step by step have sold your little possessions, Christ has not the wherewithal to feed his poor! He has given all to God who has offered himself. The Apostles left only their boat and their nets. The widow put two mites into the treasury, and is preferred to the riches of Crœsus. He easily despises all things who always thinks that he is to die. Thus far St. Jerome, whose words sufficiently indicate that this Epistle was written before St. Paulinus had renounced his riches, so that in all likelihood it must be fixed earlier than the year 394. To this year perhaps the second Epistle of St. Jerome to Paulinus will come nearer, which Vallarsius fixes about 395, Tillemont at the close of the year 396.

[561] The second to the same to be fixed at the end of the year 394, For Vallarsius's opinion seems to me sufficiently certain, nor can I doubt that that Epistle, which is the 58th (elsewhere 13), was written by Jerome at the close of the year 394 or at the beginning of 395. The chief reason is drawn from the panegyric Oration on the emperor Theodosius, which Paulinus had sent to Jerome. This Jerome greatly praises in the Epistle at number 8. Your book, he says, which you sent, prudently and ornately composed on behalf of the prince Theodosius, I have gladly read. And below: Happy Theodosius, who is defended by such an orator of Christ. For these things are uttered of Theodosius as alive, since also at number 1 the mouth of Paulinus is praised by which the most religious prince is defended. And so Theodosius the emperor was alive, or at any rate Jerome was still ignorant of his death, when he was writing the Epistle. But Theodosius died in the year 395, on the 17th day of the month of January, so that Jerome certainly did not write after February, in which the death of Theodosius could not be unknown in Palestine. But from elsewhere we have it that the victory of Theodosius over the tyrant Eugenius, of which Paulinus also makes mention in his Oration, as is gathered from Gennadius chapter 48, was gained on the 6th day of September of the year 394. And so Paulinus could not send his Oration to Jerome before about the end of September or the beginning of October: and thus it will not have reached Palestine before November of the year 394, or later. From these things, therefore, we have it that the Epistle seems to have been written between November of the year 394 and February of the year 395.

[562] when Vigilantius was at Bethlehem: But since Paulinus's Epistle was carried by the presbyter Vigilantius, it must also be inquired whether he seems to have been in Palestine at the end of the year 394. St. Jerome in the book against Vigilantius, number 12, testifies that there was a sudden earthquake in Palestine in the middle of the night when Vigilantius was there. But Marcellinus in his Chronicle at the year 394 has it that several regions of Europe were shaken by earthquakes in that year from the month of September into November. Wherefore it is most likely that that earthquake, in which Vigilantius behaved with little decorum, happened in the month of November of the year 394. But Vigilantius did not remain long in Palestine, as Jerome writes to Paulinus at number XI in these words: With what eagerness I received the holy presbyter Vigilantius, it is better that you should learn from his own words than from my letter. Why he set out from us so quickly and left us I cannot say, lest I should seem to wound someone. Yet I detained him a little, as one passing by and hastening, and gave him a taste of our friendship, that through him you might learn what you miss in us. And so in all likelihood Vigilantius departed from Jerome with the letter to Paulinus before the end of the year 394. Tillemont in Note 50 judges that Vigilantius was in Palestine in the year 396, because in the year 395 he carried Paulinus's Epistle 5 (elsewhere 1) to Severus. But he could have carried that after he had returned from Palestine. And what Tillemont believes, that Vigilantius was not then a presbyter, because he is called by Paulinus only our Vigilantius, is altogether empty: for the better known Vigilantius was to Severus, the more easily could Paulinus omit the title of presbyter, as he frequently omits the titles of others. For the rest, what passed between Jerome and Vigilantius at that time will be said afterwards, when we treat of Vigilantius.

[563] Now from Jerome's Epistle, in which he gives excellent instructions to Paulinus, but in this, having refuted his own praises, to Paulinus I should like to transfer some things hither. First, to the praises with which St. Paulinus had adorned him the saint answers most humbly, thus beginning: A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth the things that are good, and the tree is known by its fruits. You measure us by your own virtues, and, being great, you extol the small: and you take the last place at the banquet, that you may be advanced by the judgment of the master of the household. For what is there in us, or how little, that we should deserve the heralding of a learned voice, that by that mouth by which the most religious prince is defended we, humble and small, should be praised? Do not, then, dearest brother, estimate us by the number of our years, nor reckon grey hairs wisdom, but wisdom grey hairs, etc.

[564] When he had refuted the praise which Paulinus had attributed to him from his old age, he urges that he should not dwell in a city, if he wishes to be a monk, he likewise confutes the praise drawn from his dwelling in the holy places, concluding thus at number 4: Why, you will say, this, repeated with so long a preface? Namely, that you may not think that anything is lacking to your faith because you have not seen Jerusalem: nor reckon us better because we enjoy the dwelling of this place: but that, whether here or elsewhere, you have an equal reward for your works with our Lord. Indeed, to confess simply the movements of my mind, considering both your purpose and the ardour with which you have renounced the world, I judge that there are differences of places, if, leaving cities and the throngs of cities, you dwell in a little field, and seek Christ in solitude, and pray alone on the mountain with Jesus, and enjoy only the neighbourhood of the holy places; that is, that you should both lack the city and not lose the purpose of a monk. By these and many other things he dissuades Paulinus, if he wishes to lead a monastic life, from wishing to dwell in any city, and by name at Jerusalem, on account of the excessive throng of people; but he expressly advises that a city must be dwelt in if he wishes to exercise the office of a presbyter, or to undertake a bishopric.

[565] Wherefore Jerome does not dissuade Paulinus from dwelling in the places of Palestine, and again to the study of the Scriptures but in the most populous city of Jerusalem. Nay, he secretly invites Paulinus to himself again, as he had invited him in the first Epistle. For, having praised his Oration on Theodosius, he subjoins this at number 8: Oh, if it were permitted me to lead such a genius, not through the Aonian mountains and the peaks of Helicon, as the poets sing, but through Sion and Itabyrium and lofty Sinai! If it should fall to me to teach what I have learned, and as it were by hand to deliver the mysteries of the Prophets, something would be born to us which learned Greece did not have. And, having set forth the difficulty of rightly understanding the Scriptures, he again subjoins: If you had this foundation—nay, if the finishing hand as it were were laid upon your work—we should have nothing more beautiful, nothing more learned, nothing sweeter, nothing more Latin than your volumes. Presently, having enumerated the chief Latin writers who had gone before, in order to stir up Paulinus the more vehemently to the study of the Scriptures, he intimates that all can be surpassed by him if he gives himself wholly to searching the Scriptures; and addressing Paulinus most affectionately, and calling him fellow-initiate, comrade, friend, … before he was known, he asks him not to suspect flattery, and addresses him in these words: You have a great genius and an infinite furniture of speech: and you speak both easily and purely, and that very ease and purity is mingled with prudence. For when the head is sound, all the senses are vigorous.

[566] he exhorts him, as he had done in the first Epistle. If to this prudence and eloquence there should be added either the study or the understanding of the Scriptures, I should soon see you holding the citadel of our men; and, going up with Joab to the roof of Sion, singing on the housetops what you had learned in the chambers. Gird yourself, I beg you, gird yourself. Life has given nothing to mortals without great labour. Let the Church have you as its noble, as the senate had you before. Prepare for yourself riches which you may daily pay out… I am content that nothing in you should be middling: I desire all to be of the highest, all perfect. Thus far St. Jerome. And from the words brought forward it is abundantly clear that Jerome desired no less in this Epistle than in the preceding one to have Paulinus as his companion. Wherefore Baronius at the year 394, number 105, wrongly believed that the preceding one was written to another Paulinus, as though Jerome in the one had dissuaded the journey to Jerusalem and in the other had urged it. Otherwise did Cassiodorus judge of the first to Paulinus, who praises it in the book of Institutions, chapter 6, and again at chapter 21 has it thus about the same: He addressed a marvellous Epistle of his to Paulinus, from a senator made a presbyter, teaching how he should read through the divine Scriptures with due caution, where he briefly and wonderfully indicated the force of each book of the Old and New Testament. Which if I had found earlier, yielding to his eloquence I should perhaps have been content to say nothing on that head. For the rest, the commerce with St. Paulinus will recur, who seems exactly to have followed St. Jerome's counsels in choosing such a life as, if he wished to be a monk,

Jerome urged. He did not come into Palestine, because Jerome had proved that it was not necessary: and afterwards he was promoted to a bishopric, from which the holy Doctor did not dissuade him, at least openly.

[567] He writes to Amandus, in all likelihood of Bordeaux, About the same time at which St. Jerome wrote to St. Paulinus, Epistle 55 (elsewhere 147) to the presbyter Amandus seems to have been given. For besides other reasons Vallarsius's observation in his Annotations pleases me. This is, he says, that Amandus, presbyter of Bordeaux and afterwards bishop, to whom St. Paulinus gave several Epistles. Of that holy Amandus, bishop of Bordeaux, we have treated on the 18th of June, where it is laid down that he was promoted to the bishopric after the year 400. For since St. Amandus was a friend of St. Paulinus, it is likely that by his example he had recourse to St. Jerome by letter. Another reason by which the Epistle seems to be fixed after the year 392 and before 398 is this. It is not mentioned in the book On Illustrious Men, published about the end of the year 392: and again in the Epistle no mention is made of the Commentaries on Matthew, written in the year 398. But since Amandus had propounded the first question from Matthew, the saint would have pointed him, after his custom, to the Commentaries on Matthew, if they had already been written. Another reason which Tillemont gives in article 77, that the saint seems in this Epistle not to withdraw sufficiently from the errors of Origen, I by no means approve, but shall show in its own place that St. Jerome's words can be excellently expounded. So much for the time, which cannot be more exactly designated: now a few things about the Epistle.

[568] Amandus had propounded from the sacred Letters three difficult questions, on various questions; the first from the Gospel of Matthew, the second and third from the first Epistle to the Corinthians. To each the saint answers, as may be seen there. To Amandus's Epistle had been attached a little paper in which it was asked whether a woman who has left an adulterous and sodomite husband, and taken another by force, can communicate with the Church without penance, while he whom she first left is still alive. Jerome answers that the woman must do penance, and that the second husband must be left. Cutting away, therefore, all pleadings, he says, the Apostle most openly defined that while her husband lives a woman is an adulteress if she marries another. Yet he adds much to show that that by force must not be understood strictly, intimating that he is unwilling to condemn a woman who without free choice has suffered violence. Tillemont in article 77 suspects that that woman was Fabiola, of whom more will be said in its own place. But Fabiola indeed took a second husband, having left the first; but she did not take him by force, as is clear enough from her Epitaph, that is, St. Jerome's Epistle 77, and will be explained hereafter. Besides, Fabiola was at Rome, but that woman in all likelihood was in Gaul: Fabiola did public penance before the time at which the Epistle to Amandus seems to have been written, so that that suspicion becomes improbable on every side.

[569] Epistle 59 (elsewhere 148) to Marcella Vallarsius refers to the year 395 or 396. on others to Marcella: through Alypius he begins to know St. Augustine. It was certainly written after the books against Jovinian, the second of which is praised in it at number 2. Wherefore it was at least not written much earlier. That it was not written much later either is gathered from the silence about the Commentaries on Matthew, which he could have pointed to for two of the questions. The reason for writing was five questions propounded by Marcella, to which the saint answers, thus beginning: You provoke us with great questions, and, while you question, you teach a mind torpid with idleness. The rest may be seen in the Epistle itself, from which I recited some things in §30, number 514. But now, since no more Epistles occur that were given before the year 396, I briefly observe that the friendship between SS. Jerome and Augustine was begun from the year 393 or 394, and that St. Alypius, who a little after was made bishop of Tagaste, came in one or other of those years into Palestine to Jerome, who had before begun to become known to Augustine through his writings, and thus became better known to him. But Augustine in all likelihood first became known to Jerome through Alypius. These things are gathered from Augustine's first Epistle to Jerome, which is fixed as given in the year 394; but it was not carried to Jerome until years afterwards. Jerome then wrote to Augustine, but this first Epistle to him has perished. But of the beginning and progress of the letters between Jerome and Augustine I shall treat accurately in §50.

§ XXXIV. The Commentaries on Jonah and Obadiah written in the year 396: in the year 397 the little work on the 10 Visions of Isaiah composed: an Epistle written to Castrutius, another to Vitalis.

In the year 396 he writes on Jonah, I proceed to the saint's Commentaries on the prophet Jonah, already several times mentioned, which must altogether be fixed in the earlier part of the year 396. For he begins the Preface thus: About three years have flowed by since I interpreted five Prophets. But, as was proved at number 489, he interpreted five Prophets in the year 392 before the book On Illustrious Men. And so three years leads to the year 395, but the added word about intimates that some months can be added to the three years, so that we come to the year 396, if that seems necessary from elsewhere. And we are altogether compelled to do this, because among the Works composed meanwhile Jerome at once reckons the epitaph of Nepotian. For that this Epitaph was not written before the year 396 began has been proved by altogether certain arguments at number 547 and following. Wherefore the Commentaries on Jonah must altogether be fixed in the year 396, into which three years with some months after the explanation of the five Prophets can run. Tillemont in Note 56 judges that we must not read three years but four years, so that the Commentary on Jonah and the Epitaph of Nepotian may be deferred to the year 397. But in no manuscript is four years read, and there is no other necessity for four years than that arising from Tillemont's chronology. He believed that the Epitaph of Nepotian could by no means be fixed before the year 397, but gave arguments already refuted at number 550. But if he had attended a little more to Jerome's words about the time of the irruption of the Huns, uttered in the said Epitaph at number 16, Behold, last year, etc., he would have seen that the Epitaph was certainly written in the year 396. For since he acknowledges that the Huns burst into the East in the year 395, he ought not to have doubted about the Epitaph's being written in the year 396.

[571] Commentaries dedicated to St. Chromatius, Further, that Jonah was explained before Obadiah, of whom we shall presently treat, is gathered from the said Preface, in which the saint then writes this: Therefore after so long a time, as by a kind of right of return, taking my beginning of interpreting from Jonah, etc. He dedicated this Commentary to St. Chromatius, whom he addresses in these words: Chromatius, venerable father: but not to St. Pammachius, since of the books written before to him he does not say to you, but to Pammachius. And so a difficulty is caused by the words in the Preface of book 3 on Amos, where Jerome teaches in what order he explained the minor Prophets, and to whom he dedicated the several Explanations. Now he writes to Pammachius, and the words bearing on this point run thus: Thirdly, after a long silence, I expounded Obadiah and Jonah at your command. About Obadiah there is no doubt, since it was dedicated to Pammachius. About Jonah he seems to say the same here; yet it can be so understood that he expounded Jonah no less than Obadiah at Pammachius's prayers, yet dedicated the one to Chromatius and the other to Pammachius. Of the Commentary on Jonah Jerome makes mention on Matthew chapter 12, verse 40, in these words: Upon this passage we have disputed more fully in the Commentaries on the Prophet Jonah: to that place, therefore, we refer the reader's diligence. The same Commentary he praises in Epistle 112 to Augustine.

[572] Augustine himself frequently praises the Commentary on Jonah, greatly praised by St. Augustine: and by name in book 1 against Julian, chapter 7, number 34, where with a signal elogium of St. Jerome he speaks thus: Nor should you think that the holy Jerome is to be despised because he was a presbyter: who, learned in the Greek and Latin, and moreover in the Hebrew tongue, passing over from the Western to the Eastern Church, lived in the holy places and in the sacred Letters to a decrepit age; and read all, or almost all, who before him had written anything about ecclesiastical doctrine in either part of the world: and held and brought forth no other opinion on this matter. Who, when he was expounding the prophet Jonah, said most openly that even little ones were held liable to the sin of the offending Adam. Again in book 3 On the Merits and Remission of Sins, chapter 6, he praises the said Commentary in favour of original sin thus: This, however, I know, that the holy Jerome too, who even today is engaged in ecclesiastical letters with the fame and labour of so excellent a doctrine, in resolving certain questions in his books employs this also as a most certain proof without any dispute. For in what he wrote on the prophet Jonah, etc. And presently: If we could easily question this most learned Man, how many commentators on the divine Scriptures in both tongues, and writers of Christian disputations, would he commemorate? etc.

[573] The Commentary on Obadiah, which Jerome as a young man had attempted to expound, likewise on Obadiah, nearly thirty years was published at about the same time, as is clear from the words recited at number 571. In the Preface the saint says much about his youthful attempt, which with wonderful humility he partly disapproves and partly excuses; but these things have already been recited in §9, where from number 160 I investigated the place and time in which the saint poured out that first attempt, and proved that it must be fixed in the desert of Chalcis about the year 375, not in the year 366, to which some looked, because they believed it to have been composed thirty years before the second, which we fix in the year 396. Tillemont in article 82, on account of those thirty years which they believe interposed between the two Commentaries, says that the second must perhaps be deferred to the year 403. Jerome's words, by which they were led into that opinion, I transfer hither: And then, he says, we gave what we had: and now, if at least we have made some progress, we render to the Lord what is his own. For by his grace I am what I am. Nor do I deny that through these thirty years I have sweated in his work and labour. These thirty years they believe must be numbered from the time in which as a young man he had written on Obadiah. But I judge that Jerome looks back to that time in which he had begun the study of the sacred Letters. For thus it can be excellently understood, since during that whole time he had sweated in the work and labour of the Lord, and during that whole time had made progress, even before he attempted to expound Obadiah.

[574] But since he says that Obadiah was expounded by him when both he and Heliodorus were striving to dwell together in the solitude of Syrian Chalcis, after the study of sacred Scripture was begun. Jerome's words must altogether be expounded of the beginning of his sacred study. For I proved at numbers 161 and 162

that by those words the year 375 is designated, from which by no reasoning can thirty years be found down to the composition of the Commentary on Obadiah. But by the exposition given above all the difficulty ceases: for about the year 366 he set his mind to the study of sacred Scripture, even though he did not altogether lay aside the reading of the profane writers before the year 374. Further, he concludes the Commentary on Obadiah thus: These things, in two little night's works, following the authority of the ancients and above all the Hebrew Exposition, I have dictated in hurried speech, and I have opened my mouth; but I know not whether Christ has filled it. Whence the wise reader ought rather to seek the consistency of the meanings than the charm of the speech. For we do not dictate with that smoothness and composition of words with which we write. It is one thing, my Pammachius, often to turn the pen and to write what is worthy of memory; another, when the notaries' fingers are ready, to dictate out of shame at keeping silence whatever comes into one's mouth. In this Prophet I both sported as a young lad and presumed as an old man. Whoever shall say truer and better things, go over to his opinion. But, lest anyone should understand these things wrongly, it must briefly be observed that the Commentary was indeed dictated in two little night's works, and that this is intimated lest the eloquent Pammachius should be offended if he finds anything of roughness in the style: but that it must not be inferred from this that the matter to be dictated was prepared by Jerome with the same speed. Of Obadiah formerly expounded the saint makes mention on Ezekiel, book 8, at chapter 25, verses 12 and 13.

[375] The saint expounds the ten Visions of Isaiah, To about the same time, or one year later, Vallarsius refers the historical Interpretation of the ten Visions of Isaiah, which was afterwards inserted into the Commentaries on Isaiah, and there constitutes the whole fifth book. Of the time I shall treat below. The cause of writing was Amabilis the bishop, otherwise almost unknown. Jerome himself declares this in the Preface to book 5 on Isaiah, where he addresses St. Eustochium thus: It is many years since, being asked by the man of holy memory, bishop Amabilis, to write upon the ten visions of Isaiah, I, on account of the straitness of that time, touched briefly in a short discourse upon what seemed to me in each, expounding only the history, which was what he asked. Then he there adds the Preface joined to the little work, addressed to Amabilis, from which I transfer a part hither: Hitherto, father Amabilis—pillar of charity and of the name, and to me the most loving of all whom the earth has borne—you demanded by letter that I should discuss for you in a historical exposition the ten visions which in Isaiah are most obscure: and that, leaving aside the Commentaries of our own men, who, following various opinions, have composed many volumes, I should lay open the Hebrew verity: and you very often admonished me, drawing back as I was and deferring to another time a most troublesome kind of explanation. But this year you sent our son Heraclius the deacon, who might summon me to law with joined hand, and exact the promise from moment to moment. Heraclius, therefore, being present, obtained what Amabilis had not yet been able to obtain by repeated letters.

[576] at the request of bishop Amabilis, and in the year 397: But now from Heraclius the deacon it is gathered that Amabilis was a bishop in Pannonia or Dalmatia. For Heraclius the deacon carried to Jerome the letters of Castrutius the Pannonian, to be mentioned below. Of the time of that little work we have only from the words alleged that it was written many years before the Commentaries on Isaiah, to be fixed about the year 408, and some years at least after the Translation of the Prophets from the Hebrew, finished in the year 391 or 392, since this must have become known to Amabilis before he asked for that little work; and he asked long before he obtained it. Further, the time of the writing of that little work is more nearly known from the saint's Epistle 71 (elsewhere 28) to Lucinius, in which at number 7 he writes: I have … sent … also the manuscript, that is, the ten exceedingly obscure Visions of Isaiah, which I lately discussed in a historical explanation. For this Epistle to Lucinius the saint wrote in the year 398, as I shall prove by a certain argument at that Epistle. He makes mention also of that little work of his in Epistle 72 to the presbyter Vitalis, number 4, where he says: According to the Prophecy of Isaiah, which I lately interpreted among the ten Visions. But these words do not help for chronology. But since the Epistle to Lucinius was written in the Lent of the year 398, there is scarcely a doubt that the Visions of Isaiah, which he said were lately expounded, belong to the year 397, as Vallarsius has it. Tillemont in article 63 refers the said little work of Jerome's, with the Epistle to Lucinius, to the year 394, but without a fit reason, as will be proved at the Epistle. For the rest, in the Preface to the historical explanation of the Visions he intimates to Amabilis that a mystical interpretation must be added; but he did not add it until he expounded the whole of Isaiah.

[577] But when the saint gave the said little work to Heraclius the deacon to be carried to Amabilis, he writes to Castrutius the blind Pannonian, he committed to him also Epistle 68 (elsewhere 33) to Castrutius, dwelling in Pannonia. Castrutius was blind, and even so had wished to set out to Jerome, and had come with that intention as far as Cissa, doubtless then situated on the Adriatic sea, even though that city is now not well enough known. All these things are dug out of the said Epistle, which the saint thus begins: My holy son Heraclius the deacon has related to me that out of desire for us you had come as far as Cissa; and that you, a Pannonian man, that is, an earthly animal, did not fear the swells of the Adriatic sea and to undergo the perils of the Ægean and Ionian. And had not the pious affection of the brethren held you back, you would have fulfilled your will in deed. I have thanks, therefore, and set it down as received. For in friends it is not the deed that is sought but the will. Because the one is often furnished by friends, the other love alone bestows. And at the same time I beseech you not to reckon that the weakness of body which you bear has befallen you from sin. This opinion he refutes, and gives excellent admonitions that he should bear his blindness patiently. At the end he adds: We, although you have not come this year, nevertheless do not despair of your coming. And if the holy deacon (Heraclius), the bearer of this letter, shall again be caught in your embraces, and, with him accompanying you, you shall come hither, I shall gladly accept that the delay of the payment is doubled by the greatness of the interest.

[578] From these last words Vallarsius and Tillemont suspect and to the presbyter Vitalis, that Heraclius the deacon returned to St. Jerome in the following year, and then brought the letter of the presbyter Vitalis, to which the saint answered by Epistle 72 (elsewhere 132) to the presbyter Vitalis, and they therefore fix this a year later. The matter seems to me doubtful; nor do I see why Jerome could not have written to Vitalis in the same year. Certainly those words, According to the Prophecy of Isaiah, which I lately interpreted among the ten visions, do not compel us to look to the following year. For the prophecy of which Jerome there speaks was the second Vision among the ten, so that the word lately agrees excellently with the time in which he was writing the Epistle, if he wrote it immediately after the Visions were expounded, and sent it together with them into Pannonia or Dalmatia. But whatever be the case about the year of the Epistle's writing, the reason for writing was the difficult questions propounded by the presbyter Vitalis, namely: why Solomon and Ahaz are said to have begotten sons at eleven years of age; as the chronologers believed had to be inferred from the subtraction of the years of which Scripture treats in various places. But in his second answer Jerome shows that the Scripture can be expounded in such a way that they were of greater age when they began to beget, namely if each began to reign with his father before his father's death.

[579] [from whom he had received little gifts, and to whom he had sent his own in return.] Besides, Vitalis and Amabilis had sent little gifts to Jerome, and letters, of which the saint thus begins: Zeno the shipmaster, by whom you say that the letters of your sanctity were sent to me, delivered only one short epistle of the blessed father Amabilis, containing the accustomed little gifts. And I wonder enough what was the cause that, whereas he proved faithful in delivering both your blessings and his, he is found negligent in delivering the letter. For I do not think that you, a disciple of truth, are mistaken, unless perhaps for a Greek the Latin discourse went astray among his papers. And so I write back to the second epistle, which my holy son Heraclius the deacon delivered to me. Then at the end: The little gifts sent by you I have gladly received, and I earnestly pray that in the love with which you have begun to seek us you may persevere to the end. For it is not to have begun, but to have persevered, that is virtue. Receive ours in return, sent by Desiderius. The editor observes in the margin about Desiderius, Suppose the Aquitanian presbyter. But I have not yet found that Desiderius the Aquitanian was ever in Palestine. And since Desiderius is the name of many, it does not seem a matter for divination who he was. Whoever received the little gifts to carry, they seem to have been sent before this Epistle, which more probably Heraclius the deacon carried in the year 397.

§ XXXV. To Fabiola, whom he had before seen in Palestine, he writes on the Priestly Vesture; to Principia on Psalm 44; to Pammachius on the death of Paulina.

Fabiola, given over to piety, comes to Bethlehem, St. Jerome seems to have sent not a few Epistles to Rome in that same year 397, and those lengthy and learned. Of these I reckon first Epistle 64 (elsewhere 128) to Fabiola on the Priestly Vesture. Fabiola was a most noble matron, as is clear from her Epitaph, that is, from Jerome's Epistle 77 (elsewhere 30) to Oceanus; but she had been allotted a husband depraved by many vices, and, having left him, had married a second. This deed Jerome does not excuse but condemns; although he brings forward some things to excuse her somewhat on the ground of ignorance. But Fabiola herself, after the death of her second husband, condemned that marriage, and by public penance, as Jerome fully narrates, washed away her sin. But afterwards she gave herself wholly to works of piety and mercy. Whence suddenly and contrary to the expectation of all she sailed to Jerusalem, says the saint in the said Epistle at number 7, where, being received by a concourse of many, she made use of our lodging (that is, St. Paula's monastery). Remembering which companionship, I seem to myself still to see her whom I saw. Good Jesus, with what fervour, with what zeal she was intent upon the divine volumes, and, as though desiring to satisfy a certain hunger, she ran through the Prophets, the Gospels and the Psalms, both propounding questions and storing up their solutions in the little chest of her breast! Nor indeed was she satisfied by her desire of hearing: but adding knowledge she added sorrow: and, as though pouring oil on the flame, she took fuel for a greater ardour.

[581] One day, when we were holding the Numbers of Moses in our hands, consulting Jerome about the sacred Letters, and she was modestly asking me what so great a heap of names meant; why the several tribes were joined in one place and another; how Balaam the soothsayer so prophesied the future mysteries of Christ that scarcely any of the Prophets prophesied so openly of him; I answered as I could, and seemed to satisfy her question. Turning over the book, therefore, she came to that place where the catalogue is described of all the halting-places through which, going out from Egypt,

the people came as far as the streams of the Jordan. And when she sought the causes and reasons of each, in some I hesitated, in others I ran with unstumbling foot, in most I simply confessed my ignorance. But then she began to press the more; and, as though it were not lawful for me not to know what I do not know, to expostulate, and to call herself unworthy of such great mysteries. What more? My shame at refusing wrung from me a promise of a work of my own of such a disputation: which, deferred until the present time, as I now understand, by the Lord's will, shall be rendered to her memory, so that, clothed with the priestly garments of the former volume addressed to her, she may rejoice that through the wilderness of this world she has at length come to the land of promise. These things abundantly intimate that Fabiola, as long as she dwelt at Bethlehem, was instructed in the sacred Letters by Jerome; and that even then the Epistle on the Halting-places, of which we shall treat hereafter, had been promised her, but that the other, on the Priestly Vesture, was sent first.

[582] Presently Jerome intimates that Fabiola did not dwell long at Bethlehem, and the Huns bursting into Syria, Jerome too being ready for flight, but that for fear of the Huns, who burst into Syria in the year 395, she returned to Rome. But, he says, let us pursue what we began. While we were seeking a dwelling worthy of so great a woman, since she so desired solitude that she was unwilling to lack the lodging of Mary (that is, Bethlehem), behold, suddenly, as messengers ran to and fro, the whole East trembled, etc. The cause of so great a fear was the irruption of the Huns, of whose advance, swiftness and cruelty he discusses much. But since the Huns could not have reached Syria except when the year 395 was well advanced, being men whom the traitor Rufinus summoned in that same year from regions far distant, it becomes likely that Fabiola came into Palestine in that same year 395, and it is certain enough that she departed thence in the year 395. Jerome too and St. Paula were preparing for flight, and in all likelihood had betaken themselves to some maritime city. For of these things he speaks thus: Then we too were compelled to make ready ships, to be on the shore, to guard against the coming of the enemy, and, while the winds raged, to fear the barbarians more than shipwreck, providing not so much for our own safety as for the chastity of the virgins. Yet Jerome and Paula with their companies did not depart, because the Huns did not penetrate into Palestine, and they vehemently loved their habitation at Bethlehem; but Fabiola did not await the last extremity.

[583] Let us hear Jerome, who has it thus: Us there held in the East our now fixed abodes, she departs, and addresses the saint by letter: and our inveterate longing for the holy places. She, who was wholly among her baggage and a stranger in every city, returned to her fatherland, that she might live poor there where she had been rich; dwelling in another's house, who before had had many guests… We grieve only for this, that we have lost the most precious jewel of the holy places. Rome has received back what she had lost, etc. That return of Fabiola's must be fixed in the year 395, as I have already advised; but in all likelihood she departed toward the end of the year, so that perhaps she did not come to Rome before the following year. But afterwards she sent a letter to Jerome, in which she asked that he would expound to her the priestly vestments. For in the Epistle of which we are treating the saint at number 8 has it thus: You have compelled me by your letter, Fabiola, to write to you about the priesthood of Aaron and about the vestments. I have offered more, in that I have built up a little preface about the foods and firstfruits of the priests, and about the observance of the pontiff. Having gone out from Sodom and hastening to the mountains, you are unwilling to dwell in the little city of Segor. Passing beyond the proselytes, you go past the Israelites, leaving behind the Levitical degree, and, flying over the priests on swift wing, you come to the pontiff. But while you diligently inquire about his vestments and the Rational of the breast, our company has displeased you. And you indeed enjoy the leisure you desired, and near Babylon perhaps sigh for the fields of Bethlehem. We at Ephrata, peace being at length restored, hear the Infant wailing in the manger, and desire that his complaints and little cries may reach your ears. By these last words he modestly invites Fabiola to return.

[584] but Jerome sends her the Epistle on the priestly vesture. What Jerome says about peace being restored can be understood in a twofold way, namely of the withdrawal of the Huns from the East, who departed in the year 396 or 397; or also of the peace composed between Jerome and John of Jerusalem; for there was a dissension between these when Fabiola was in Palestine. If Jerome meant to intimate both peaces, which is less probable, the Epistle was written later; if only the first, it could have been given at the close of the year 396 or in the year 397, which appears more probable. Whatever be the case about the year, the saint concludes the lengthy Epistle, full of learning, with these words: These things in one little night's work, when the rope was already being loosed from the shore and the sailors were shouting more frequently, I have dictated in hurried speech—what I could hold in memory, and what I had heaped up by long reading in the rational of my breast; well understanding that I am flowing on by the impulse of speaking rather than by a writer's judgment, and, after the manner of a torrent, bringing forth a turbid discourse. There is current in the index of Septimius Tertullian a book on the Vestments of Aaron, which meanwhile to this day I have not found. If it shall have been found by you, because of the greatness of the City, I beg you not to compare my drop with his river. For I am to be estimated not by the genius of great men, but by my own strength. Thus humbly the saint. But what he says about one little night's work must again be understood only of the style. He dictated swiftly, but after he had prepared himself by long reading to dictate learned things. So far was he from despising this Epistle long afterwards that he both called it a book and refers his readers to it, writing on Ezekiel, book 13, at chapter 44, verses 17 and 18, where he has it thus: Of the priestly vestments it has been written more fully in Exodus: and we long ago published a book, to whose interpretation the diligent reader must be sent. Of Fabiola's Epitaph and other matters we shall treat in their own place.

[585] To Principia the virgin he explains Psalm 44, Epistle 65 (elsewhere 140) to the virgin Principia Vallarsius refers with very probable reason to the year 397, although Tillemont in article 85 looked to the beginning of the following year. It contains an Explanation of Psalm 44, whose beginning is: My heart hath uttered a good word. Principia the virgin dwelt at Rome with St. Marcella, whom Jerome esteemed most highly, so that her virtues seem to have become known to Jerome through Marcella, and she herself took confidence to ask for the saint's writings. And she asked for an interpretation of the Psalm just mentioned, and of the whole Song of Songs. The first she received meanwhile; the second Jerome promised, concluding the lengthy Epistle thus: When you too, O daughter Principia, mingled in the choir of the Saints, shall be led among the virgins to the King, and out of the ivory houses shall delight the Bridegroom in your honour, then remember me too, who gave you, by the Lord's revealing, the understanding of this Psalm, and say: I will be mindful of thy name; that you, who have understood a part of the song, may also, if life be your companion, understand the whole Song of Songs.

[586] The interpretation of the Song of Songs here promised St. Jerome commemorates in the Preface to Matthew, and promises her an Explanation of the Song of Songs. which he expounded about the Easter of the year 398, writing thus to Eusebius of Cremona, who was setting out for the West: I beseech that … you also give copies, when you come to Rome, to the virgin of Christ Principia, who asked me to write upon the Song of Songs; from which work, being shut out by a long sickness, I have deferred the hope to the future; binding you by this law, that if you withhold from her what was written to you, she too may afterwards shut up in her little cupboard what shall be written to her. From these things it becomes certain that Epistle 65 to Principia was written at least before the year 398, since in it Jerome makes no mention of his illness, and that illness began about the beginning of the year 398, as I shall prove in its own place. But since the first postponement of the Song does not seem to have arisen from his illness, but that Jerome might meanwhile finish other things, it is not equally clear in what part of the year 397 the Epistle was dictated. The saint begins the Epistle with a defence of himself for writing sometimes to women. I know, Principia, daughter in Christ, he says, that I am reprehended by very many because I sometimes write to women, and prefer the frailer sex to men, and therefore I ought first to answer my detractors, and so to come to the little disputation which you asked for. On this occasion he collects many excellent women from the sacred Letters, and of those living at Rome briefly praises SS. Marcella and Asella.

[587] To the same year 397 Vallarsius rightly refers Epistle 66 (elsewhere 26) to Pammachius on the Death of his wife Paulina, He writes to Pammachius on the death of Paulina but to the later part of that year. Tillemont in article 95 and Note 60 fixes it in the year 399, or at the close of the year 398, and that only because St. Jerome is not so accurate in chronology that he must everywhere be strictly followed, he says. But he who six hundred times wrongly accuses Jerome of negligence in chronology, as Vallarsius has already observed, himself frequently departs from correct chronology. But the reason for fixing this Epistle at the close of the year 397 is had from Epistle 77, that is, from the Epitaph of Fabiola, where the saint at the beginning reckons up the Epistles written up to that time in praise of the dead, thus beginning: It is many years since, upon the falling asleep of Blæsilla, I consoled the venerable woman Paula while the wound was still fresh. The circle of the fourth summer is rolling round since, writing to bishop Heliodorus the Epitaph of Nepotian, I spent in that grief whatever strength I could have. About two years ago I gave my Pammachius a short Epistle upon the sudden sickness of Paulina, blushing to say more to a most eloquent man, and to thrust his own upon him, lest I should seem not so much to console a friend as by foolish boasting to teach one who was perfect. From these words the date of this very Epistle must first be fixed. This I do briefly thus. The Epitaph of Nepotian has been fixed by certain arguments at the beginning of the year 396, or at any rate before the summer of that year. From that time, therefore, the circle of the fourth summer was rolling round in the year 399: for the first summer was that of the year 396. The Epitaph of Fabiola, therefore, was written in the summer of the year 399.

[588] at the close of the year 397, when Paulinian But the Epistle to Pammachius on the Death of Paulina preceded it by about two years, so that from this passage alone it seems to be fixed at the end of the summer or in the autumn of the year 397, and cannot conveniently be deferred to the beginning of the year 398, much less to the Easter of that year. Besides, since from the beginning of the year 398 Jerome laboured under a long illness, and in the Epistle made no mention of his illness, from this indication too it is gathered that the Epistle was given at the close of the year 397, that is, before the illness. Yet there is something at the end of the Epistle which at first glance

made me doubtful, and which can be objected. The words I shall give more fully below. We were compelled, says the saint, to send our brother Paulinian to our fatherland, that he might sell the half-ruined little farms, etc. Now in book 3 against Rufinus, number 24, Jerome seems to say that Paulinian, together with Eusebius of Cremona, set out for Italy one year after Rufinus had set out thither. But since Rufinus does not seem to have undertaken that journey except about the spring of the year 397, consequently the journey of Paulinian as well as of Eusebius seems to have to be deferred to the Easter of the year 398. Jerome's words, by which he answered Rufinus complaining that he had sent rivals after him into the West, are these: Vincentius, Paulinian, Eusebius, Rufinus, presbyters: of whom Vincentius came to Rome long before you: Paulinian and Eusebius set out a year after your voyage: Rufinus was sent two years after in the case of Claudius. These words, I say, can persuade the less attentive that Paulinian set out together with Eusebius in the year 398.

[589] he sent his brother to his fatherland. But it must be considered, first, that in the Epistle to Pammachius Jerome speaks of Paulinian's journey alone, not of Eusebius, whom he would have named along with him if he had undertaken that journey with him: secondly, that Paulinian was sent to his fatherland, that is, into Pannonia; but that Eusebius sailed straight to Rome, as is established from the Preface to Matthew. Wherefore it is certain that those two neither set out together nor undertook the same journey. And so when Jerome says Paulinian and Eusebius a year after, an almost full year must be understood of Eusebius; but of Paulinian, who departed from Palestine before the end of the year 397, either an incomplete year—say seven or eight months after Rufinus's journey—can be understood, or even a full year, if Jerome looked to the time at which, his business in Pannonia being finished, Paulinian set out for Italy. In this sense, in which he answered Rufinus's complaint excellently, Jerome in all likelihood used the words. Rufinus said: You sent accusers to Rome after me. The saint answers that this is false, and alleges these reasons. Vincentius set out before: Paulinian and Eusebius—the one from Pannonia, the other from Palestine—a year after; Rufinus, another than the man of Aquileia, two years after. Thus Jerome could speak fittingly, because Rufinus did not complain of Paulinian's journey into Pannonia, but only of Jerome's friends who had come to Rome. These things suffice to answer the difficulty, even if we should wish to hold it certain that Rufinus did not set out for Rome before the year 397.

[590] In this Epistle he celebrates Paulina in few words, The cause of writing that Epistle was the death of Paulina, wife of St. Pammachius, whom he consoles upon it, but two years later, since at the beginning he says that he had importunately kept silence for two years. Jerome had kept silence, I think, because no one had at first asked for an Epitaph of Paulina, and his friendship with Pammachius had not yet struck deep roots, having been born from a recent commerce of letters when Paulina died. But afterwards, as the friendship between Jerome and Pammachius grew year by year, he wished so to praise Paulina his deceased wife, the daughter of St. Paula and the sister of St. Eustochium, that he brings forward far more in praise of SS. Paula and Eustochium, and above all of St. Pammachius, who had embraced a monastic and most pious life. But he not only praises Pammachius, but also exhorts him by many arguments to more perfect things, and suggests to him excellent instructions for living.

[591] After many things which I pass over, at number 13 he stirs up that most noble and most wealthy man by the example of Paula and Eustochium to humble ministries, but by many arguments exhorts Pammachius to piety. writing this: That you, of patrician family, have begun to be a monk first among the first, let it be to you an occasion not of swelling but of humility, since you know that the Son of God was made the son of man. However much you cast yourself down, you will not be humbler than Christ. Suppose you walk with bare feet, be clothed in a dark tunic, make yourself equal to the poor, deign to enter the cells of the needy, be the eye of the blind, the hand of the feeble, the foot of the lame; suppose you yourself carry water, cut wood, build the fire: where are the chains? where the buffets? where the spittings? where the scourges? where the gibbet? where death? And when you have done all that I have said, you are surpassed by your Eustochium and Paula, if not in deed, at least in sex. Then he relates their humble ministries. The words were given on the 28th of September in St. Eustochium, number 36. These things show with how great freedom the saint seized any occasion whatever of exhorting to more perfect things.

[592] For the rest, in the same Epistle he declares for what cause he had sent his brother Paulinian to their fatherland, From the sale of his paternal goods the saint writing thus: We in this province, having built a monastery (at St. Paula's expense) and a guest-house beside it (with her money, so far as I judge), lest perchance Joseph too, coming now with Mary to Bethlehem, should find no lodging, are overwhelmed by such great throngs of monks flowing together from the whole world, that we can neither forsake the work begun nor bear it beyond our strength. Whence, because that word of the Gospel has almost befallen us, that we did not first reckon up the expenses of the tower to come, we were compelled to send our brother Paulinian to our fatherland, that he might sell the half-ruined little farms which escaped the hands of the barbarians, and the property of our common parents, lest, forsaking the ministry of the Saints once begun, we should furnish laughter to slanderers and rivals. That these buildings were erected by St. Paula in the first three years in which she dwelt with St. Jerome at Bethlehem has already been said in §20. But it is likely that, as the number of monks and nuns gradually increased, the monasteries first built had to be enlarged with new buildings: and it is certain that the wealth of St. Paula, although she had been most rich—because she had renounced the greatest part of it at Rome—did not suffice for the expenses which she was making, both for the monasteries, and in relieving the want of the poor, and in other pious works.

[593] For in the Epitaph of Paula Jerome testifies at number 30 strives to relieve the want of his monasteries. that not a single coin was left to her daughter (Eustochium), but … a great debt: and … an immense multitude of Brethren (monks) and Sisters (nuns), whom it is hard to support and impious to cast off. On account of this want St. Jerome in the year 397 sent Paulinian to their fatherland, that from the sale of his parents' possessions he might gather what money he could, and relieve St. Paula with it. He does not seem to have had any care before—so long, that is, as he dwelt in Palestine—to gain anything from his paternal goods. The care of maintaining the monasteries St. Paula had undertaken. When her wealth failed, since St. Jerome's nearest kinsmen were in all likelihood dead, the saint wished by the sale of his paternal goods to succour her as far as he could. Tillemont is mistaken, who in article 52 attributes to Jerome the building of another monastery and hospital: for I find no indication of that opinion. When he says we, he means Paula, and joins himself, because he had always directed her by his counsel.

§ XXXVI. In the year 398, after a long illness, the saint writes to Lucinius, then on the Gospel of Matthew, and several Epistles to various persons.

The saint, to Lucinius, who had sent notaries and The saint's first Work in the year 398, in which he was long sick, seems to have been the translation of the three books of Solomon, of which I treated at numbers 457 and 458. There followed the Epistle to Lucinius, then the brief Commentaries on the Gospel of St. Matthew, which St. Eusebius of Cremona demanded when about to depart for Rome. Of the illness I shall speak more conveniently after the little works in which mention is made of it. The reason for writing to Lucinius the Spaniard was that Lucinius himself had written first to Jerome, and, having sent six notaries to copy them out, had studiously asked for all the saint's Works. Jerome relates this in Epistle 75 (elsewhere 29) to Theodora, Lucinius's widow, written after his death, at number 4, writing this in his praise: With what desire did he demand our little works, and, six notaries being sent (because in this province there is a scarcity of writers of the Latin tongue), cause to be copied out for himself whatever we have dictated from our youth to the present time! He adds modestly: He honoured not us, who are the little and least of all Christians, but Christ, who is honoured in his servants.

[595] asked for all his Works, even his translations, But from the Epistle 71 (elsewhere 28) to Lucinius of which we are treating we understand that Lucinius asked also for all the little works which Jerome had translated from another tongue into Latin, and, deceived by a false rumour, believed that some things had been translated by the saint which he had never translated. For this cause Jerome at number 5 reckons in general the Works translated by him, writing this: Further, that the books of Josephus, and the volumes of the holy Papias and Polycarp, have been translated by me, a false rumour has carried to you, because it is beyond my leisure and my strength to express such great matters in another tongue with the same charm. Of Origen and Didymus we have translated a few things, wishing in part to show our own people what the Greek learning held. The canon of the Hebrew verity, except the Octateuch, which I now have in hand, I have given to your servants and notaries to be copied, etc. He adds concerning the emended Seventy interpreters and the New Testament words already recited above in their own places.

[596] he kindly grants them, and for the little gifts Of his own little works copied out by Lucinius's notaries the saint premises this: My little works, which you say you desire not by their own merit but from your goodness, I gave to your men to copy, and I have seen them copied in paper manuscripts: and I frequently admonished them to collate more diligently and to emend. For I could not read over so many volumes because of the throngs of those coming and going and of pilgrims, and, as they themselves who were present have proved, being held by a long indisposition, I scarcely began to breathe in the days of Lent, in which they themselves were setting out. Whence, if you shall find errors of the pen, or if some things are less well copied, so as to hinder the sense of the reader, you ought not to impute it to me, but to your own men, and to the unskilfulness of the notaries and the carelessness of the copyists, who write not what they find but what they understand; and while they strive to emend others' errors, display their own.

[597] Lucinius had also sent some little gifts to Jerome, he sends little gifts, to whom the saint likewise sends others, writing thus of these at number 7: Two little cloaks and a shaggy garment from your stores I have received, either for my own use or to be given to the Saints. I have sent to you and to your sister (that is, Theodora his wife, whom he had begun to hold as a sister, the use of marriage being laid aside) the ensigns of poverty and the tokens of daily penance, four little hair-shirts, suited to your purpose and your uses: and a manuscript, that is, the ten exceedingly obscure Visions of Isaiah, which I lately discussed in a historical explanation, so that as often as you shall see my little works, so often, remembering your sweetest Friend, you may make ready the voyage which you had put off for a little. It can be asked here why the saint reckons one little work among his gifts and not likewise all the others. There is no other reason, I think, than that he had had it copied out by his own copyists, whereas all the others had been copied out by Lucinius's notaries.

[598] From the words alleged it is further clear that

Lucinius wished to set out to Jerome, and invites him to himself: and this is also known from the said Epistle to Theodora, where he says of Lucinius when dead: Whom I believed would come hither in a short time. Hence, after the words alleged above, he most affectionately subjoins: And because a man's way is not in himself, and the steps of a man are directed by the Lord, if perchance (which God forbid) there shall be some hindrance, I beg that those whom charity joins may not be separated by the length of lands: and that we may feel our Lucinius, though absent, always present by the interchange of letters. From the beginning too, and throughout the whole Epistle, he displays much love toward Lucinius, and after his manner mingles excellent admonitions, and ardently exhorts him constantly to persevere in what he has well begun.

[599] Of the time in which this Epistle was written I have no doubt. The Epistle given in Lent of the year 398: Everything so intimates that it was written in the year 398 in Lent. For from the Preface to Matthew it is established that Jerome was sick from the beginning of the year 398, and somewhat recovered in Lent, as is said above: I scarcely began to breathe in the days of Lent, in which they themselves were setting out. And so, since no illness of the saint is known by which he laboured in the preceding years, we must necessarily look to the Lent of the year 398. There is added that he says the Translation from the Hebrew was finished except for the Octateuch, that is, the first seven books of sacred Scripture and Esther. But the books of Paralipomenon were certainly not translated before the year 396 or 397, as was proved at number 454. Tillemont in article 63 wishes without any reason to refer the Epistle to Lucinius to the year 394. Without any reason, I say: for he brings forward nothing else than that he does not speak ill of Origen and Didymus, when he says Of Origen and Didymus we have translated a few things, etc.; and he believes that after the controversies about Origen's errors had arisen Jerome would not have spoken thus of Origen and Didymus. But that observation is plainly of no account: for what he there says of Origen and Didymus he would not have feared to say likewise ten or twenty years afterwards.

[600] Besides, what he has in the Preface to the ten Visions of Isaiah, whose Explanation he sends to Lucinius, sufficiently proves that Jerome was not much addicted to Origen which was denied without any reason. when he wrote those things. For thus he speaks: What then shall I do? Shall I undertake a work in which most learned men have sweated? I mean Origen and Eusebius the son of Pamphilus, of whom the one wanders in the free spaces of allegory, and, having interpreted the names of individuals, makes his own genius the mysteries of the Church; the other, promising in his title a historical exposition, sometimes forgets his purpose and goes over to the tenets of Origen. In this passage he both calls Origen and Eusebius, a most notorious Arian, most learned; and at the same time carps at both, but chiefly at Origen. The Epistle to Tranquillinus, to be mentioned below, clearly shows that Jerome never condemned everything in Origen, and this I shall prove further there. The same will be clear from the words presently to be recited, which were written in that very year 398. But whether St. Jerome was ever so addicted to Origen as to approve some of his errors we shall investigate in §41.

[601] In the same year he writes Let us meanwhile pass to the Commentaries on Matthew, dictated in the same year about Easter, at the request of Eusebius of Cremona, who was about to sail to Italy. In the Preface, having premised many things about the four Gospels, the saint addresses Eusebius thus: And I wonder enough, dearest Eusebius, why, being about to sail suddenly to Rome, you wished this to be given you by me as a kind of travelling-provision, that, briefly expounding Matthew, I should be terse in words and ample in meanings. If you had remembered my answer, you would never ask in a few days for the work of years. For first it is difficult to read all who have written on the Gospels. Then it is far more difficult, with judgment applied, to excerpt what is best. I confess that many years ago I read on Matthew twenty-five Volumes of Origen, and as many Homilies of his, and his commatic kind of interpretation: and the Commentaries of Theophilus, bishop of the city of Antioch: of Hippolytus the martyr too, and Theodore of Heraclea, and Apollinaris of Laodicea, and Didymus of Alexandria: and of the Latins, the little works of Hilary, Victorinus, Fortunatianus: from whom, even if I plucked but a little, something worthy of memory would be written. Origen, whom in the year 398 he could no longer name without reprehension, if we believe Tillemont refuted above, he names first among the interpreters of Matthew.

[602] Commentaries on Matthew, quickly dictated: Let us go on meanwhile with Jerome. But you, he says, in two weeks, with Easter now at hand and the winds blowing, compel me to dictate; so that when the notaries should take it down, when the sheets should be written, when they should be emended, in what space they should be set out in fair copy (here is added in two manuscripts, you do not consider at all, as the phrasing seems to require) —especially since you know that I have so languished for three months that I scarcely now begin to walk; nor can I make up for the greatness of the labour by the shortness of the time. Therefore, leaving aside the authority of the ancients, whom I have not had the opportunity either to read or to follow, I have briefly set out the historical interpretation, which you chiefly demanded: and from time to time I have mingled flowers of the spiritual understanding, reserving the perfect work for the future. But if my life shall be longer, or if you on your return shall fulfil your promises, then I shall strive to fulfil what remains: nay, the foundations being laid and the walls in part built, I shall set upon it a most beautiful roof, that you may know what difference there is between the sudden boldness of dictating and the lucubrated diligence of writing. Certainly you know—and I should blush to call you a witness of my falsehood—that I have dictated the present little work with such swiftness that you would think that I was rather reading another's work than composing my own. Nor think this said from arrogance and trust in my genius, but because I desire to show you how much you avail with me, who have preferred to risk myself among the learned rather than to refuse anything to your diligent asking. Whence I beseech that, if the speech is rougher, and the discourse does not run with its accustomed flow, you should attribute this to haste, not to unskilfulness. Thus far Jerome, who in all likelihood never composed another interpretation of Matthew, although he proposed to do it, because he was afterwards always most busy both in writing other things and above all in interpreting the Prophets.

[603] But what he says about the swiftness of dictating this Commentary he had then been sick for three months from the beginning of the year; regards not only the act of dictating itself, which the saint everywhere carried forward swiftly, but also the preparation of the matter dictated. But it must be considered that Jerome had been occupied for more than thirty years with the study of the Scriptures before he dictated upon Matthew, and therefore that the literal sense, which almost alone he explains, was most thoroughly known to the saint. He points in this Commentary to various little works written before, as has been said in their own places. When at the end of his life he wrote on Jeremiah, he makes mention in the Preface to Eusebius of the Commentaries on Matthew thus: That you may join an Evangelical man to Matthew the evangelist, whom many years ago, at your exhortation, I expounded in terse meanings. In Epistle 73 (elsewhere 126) to Evangelus he makes mention thus at the end of Matthew explained after his illness: I, after a long sickness, could scarcely be free of fever in the days of Lent, and, while I was preparing myself for another Work, I spent the few days that remained upon the exposition of Matthew, and with such eagerness took up again my interrupted studies, that what profited the exercise of my tongue harmed the health of my body. By these things what has been said about the saint's illness, which ceased in Lent, is further confirmed. But since it lasted three months, the illness began about the beginning of the year 398. The other work for which the saint was preparing himself before the Explanation of Matthew was the Translation of the Pentateuch from the Hebrew: for in the Epistle to Lucinius he says of the Octateuch, which remained to be translated: which I now have in hand. This seems certain enough.

[604] But another doubt arises here, namely whether the saint relapsed into illness, but his year-long infirmity belongs to another time. and then laboured under the year-long infirmity of which mention is made in Epistle 74 (elsewhere 131) to the presbyter Rufinus, distinct from the others. That infirmity was continued beyond a year: for the Epistle was dictated in bed, and after twelve months in which he had been worn out by continual languor, before he had recovered. Vallarsius in his Chronology, at Epistle 74, judges that that illness was continued from the month of December of the year 397 to November of the year 398, and discusses much to persuade us of this. But I cannot acquiesce in his opinion, both because the words given above, what … harmed the health of my body, do not intimate so great a detriment of health as an illness of eight or nine months would have been, which with the preceding one would have made a year-long illness; and because we have other writings of St. Jerome to be fixed in that very time in which he would have been labouring under that long sickness; and because we shall find another time in which the saint seems to have been sick so long and to have written nothing. To Vallarsius's arguments I shall then answer more conveniently. And so I go on to reckon the Epistles which I judge to belong to the year 398.

[605] Among these the first seems to be Epistle 73 to Evangelus, already praised. For the words given above, He writes to Evangelus about Melchisedech, I, after a long sickness, could scarcely be free of fever in the days of Lent, etc., altogether intimate that the Epistle was written in the same year, and indeed not very long after the Commentaries on Matthew. The reason for writing was this. Evangelus had sent to Jerome the little work of an Anonymous writer, who strove to prove that Melchisedech, mentioned in Genesis 14 and in other places, was the Holy Spirit; and had ardently asked that the saint would declare his own opinion about Melchisedech. I confess, says the saint, that I wished to dissemble my opinion… But when I read the Epistle again, and found on the last page that I was adjured with wondrous entreaties not to spurn my petitioner, I turned over the books of the ancients, to see what each said, and to answer you as it were from the counsel of many. Then he brings forward the various opinions, and the error of Origen and Didymus, by which Melchisedech was said to be an angel; and after a learned disputation in which he proves that he was certainly a man, he concludes thus against the Anonymous writer: You have what I have heard, what I have read about Melchisedech. It was mine to cite witnesses: let it be yours to judge of the credit of the witnesses. But if you shall reject them all, you will certainly not receive that spiritual interpreter of yours, who, unskilled in speech and in knowledge, with such haughtiness and authority pronounced Melchisedech to be the Holy Spirit, that he has proved most true that which is sung among the Greeks: "Ignorance breeds confidence, learning fear".

[606] to Magnus the orator, about writers Another question was propounded to Jerome by Magnus, a Roman orator, but at the instigation of Rufinus, as Jerome at least judged. Jerome answered by Epistle 70 (elsewhere 84), and mentions the question propounded at number 2, writing this: But as to what you ask at the end of your Epistle—why in our little works we sometimes set down examples from secular letters, and defile the whiteness of the Church with the filth of the heathen—have a brief answer. You would never ask this, unless Tully wholly possessed you; if you read the holy Scriptures, if, leaving Volcatius aside, you unrolled their interpreters. By this brief answer the saint intimates

that the question seems to have been propounded by Magnus in order to provoke Jerome to praises of profane eloquence. Then he defends the sober use of secular letters both by the authority of the sacred Letters and by the example of the ancient Fathers and of Hebrew writers too. And when he had reckoned up several, he says at number 3: Read them, and you will find us most unskilled in comparison with them, and that after so long a leisure (from the reading of profane authors) we scarcely remember, as it were through a dream, what we learned as boys.

[607] to be cited sometimes. Toward the end he adds this: Although I rather think—what comes into my mind as I dictate—that you are not ignorant of what has always been practised by learned men: but that the question is propounded to me through you by another, who perhaps, on account of his love for the Histories of Sallust, is Calpurnius surnamed Lanarius. Whom I beg you to persuade not to be a toothless man envying the teeth of those who eat, and not to be a mole despising the eyes of the she-goats. By Calpurnius Jerome designates a perfidious man who used a crafty question to do harm. But since afterwards Rufinus in book 2 of the Invectives had objected to Jerome that he used the words of Horace, Virgil, Cicero and other Gentiles, and had exaggerated this in most bitter words as a great crime, Jerome received those blunt thunderbolts of Rufinus with laughter rather than seriously, answering thus in book 1 against Rufinus, number 30: Doubtless this is that Sallustian Calpurnius who had raised for us through Magnus the orator no great question, which we satisfied in a brief little book (that is, in this very Epistle of which we are treating). From this passage it is gathered that the Epistle to Magnus was given in the year 398. For, as will be said afterwards, Rufinus came to Rome in the year 397, and departed thence in the year 398. But Jerome could not have suspected that this was suggested to Magnus by Rufinus after Rufinus had departed from Rome, as Vallarsius also observed.

[608] Again in the same year 398 I judge Epistle 62 (elsewhere 76) to Tranquillinus to have been written, Asked by Tranquillinus, he sets forth who had propounded another question to Jerome, namely about Origen, concerning whose doctrine a controversy had been stirred at Rome. Vallarsius preferred to fix this in the year 396 or 397. But the question propounded itself persuades me that it was not written before 398: for in this year there began to be published at Rome Origen's Work on First Principles, rendered into Latin by Rufinus. And by the publication of this Work the Origenian heresy began to be spread at Rome: and many at once set themselves against it. And so with the year 398 everything agrees that is read in the said Epistle, and it should rather be deferred to the following year than fixed before 398. Now the first words of the Epistle only indicate the friendship of Jerome and Tranquillinus. But at number 2 the question is intimated, and its occasion, in these words: That you say that many have been deceived by the error of Origen, and that my holy son Oceanus is fighting against their madness, I both grieve and rejoice; since either the simple have been tripped up, or by a learned man help is brought to those who err.

[609] And because you ask the opinion of my Littleness—whether, according to brother Faustinus, he is utterly to be rejected, or, according to certain men, to be read in part; in what way the Works of Origen must be read, I for my part think that Origen, on account of his learning, must sometimes be so read as Tertullian, Novatus, Arnobius, Apollinaris, and several ecclesiastical writers Greek as well as Latin, so that we may choose their good things and shun the contrary, according to the Apostle who says: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good". But for the rest, those who are led either into too great love of him or into hatred by the perversity of their own stomach seem to me to lie under that prophetic curse: "Woe to them that call good evil and evil good; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter". For neither on account of his learning are his perverse doctrines to be received, nor on account of the perversity of his doctrines are the useful Commentaries on the holy Scriptures which he published utterly to be rejected. But if his lovers and his detractors shall draw the rope of contention between them, so that they seek nothing middling, nor keep measure, but either approve or disapprove the whole, I shall the more gladly choose pious rusticity than learned blasphemy. These things Jerome wrote with great judgment in the year 398, or perhaps in the following year, in which he wrote like things to St. Paulinus too, as we shall see.

[610] Cassiodorus in the book of Institutions, chapter 1, praises St. Jerome's Epistle Cassiodorus follows Jerome. and follows his opinion, writing thus: But in what way he (Origen) ought to be read, St. Jerome has probably indicated in the Epistle which he wrote to Tranquillus, so as neither to keep the studious from the necessary reading of him, nor again to cast the incautious headlong into ruin. Whom indeed men have not without reason said must be handled after the manner of dill; which, while it seasons the dishes of the sacred Letters, is itself nevertheless, when boiled and drained of juice, thrown away. Of whom it has been said in conclusion: Where he is good, no one is better; where he is bad, no one is worse. And therefore he must be read cautiously and wisely, so that we may take from him the most healthful juices, without at the same time swallowing the poisons of his perfidy, contrary to our life. These things Cassiodorus goes on to explain at greater length, accurately following St. Jerome's opinion, which even in this age will not displease the learned. Other Epistles, referred by Vallarsius to the year 398, I have either already mentioned or shall mention in their own places.

§ XXXVII. Examination of the discord which was between John of Jerusalem and St. Jerome, who favoured St. Epiphanius against John.

A grave discord arisen in Palestine, The order of time has brought us to the point where we must set forth the long controversy which arose between St. Epiphanius and John, bishop of Jerusalem, and which reached St. Jerome, because he supported St. Epiphanius against John of Jerusalem. For the book against John of Jerusalem, which was written by Jerome toward the end of that contention, must more probably be fixed at the close of the year 398, and certainly cannot probably be fixed after the year 399, nor before 398, as I shall prove below. On account of this dissension there are also extant two Epistles of St. Jerome to Theophilus of Alexandria, which I have not yet mentioned, because they must be commemorated in this place. That the whole matter may be more clearly examined, some things must first be observed. St. Jerome had come into Palestine about the beginning of the year 386, and, after his pilgrimage to the holy places and into Egypt, had in the summer of that same year fixed his seat with St. Paula at Bethlehem, which town belonged to the diocese of Jerusalem. About the same time John obtained the bishopric of Jerusalem, and administered it for many years after the controversies of which we are treating. He is said in his youth, before his bishopric, not to have shrunk from the Arians and Macedonians, which I do not examine, as being by no means necessary to our purpose. The same man afterwards, as we shall see, was suspected of too great love, or at any rate indulgence, toward the heresiarch Pelagius, so that it is the less to be wondered at that in the time between he was believed addicted to the errors of Origen.

[612] because St. Epiphanius held John of Jerusalem St. Epiphanius was bishop of Constantia in Cyprus, of great age, venerable for the holiness of his manners and for great learning. He had been born in Palestine, and there had led the monastic life in the diocese of Eleutheropolis, which was adjacent to that of Jerusalem, and on that occasion he sometimes came to his own monastery, and could know what was done in the neighbouring diocese of Jerusalem. That most learned old man also knew the perverse errors of Origen, and, burning with zeal for the faith, grieved that many did not sufficiently beware of them. Of those errors he by name held suspect John of Jerusalem, and Rufinus of Aquileia, who was then a presbyter and dwelt at Jerusalem with the elder Melania, who was suspected of the same errors.

[613] suspect of Origen's heresy, This suspicion of his St. Epiphanius candidly declared in the Epistle to John, which among the Hieronymian letters is the 51st (elsewhere 60), at number 6, in these words: But may God free you, brother, and the holy people of Christ which is entrusted to you, and all the brethren who are with you, and above all Rufinus the presbyter, from the heresy of Origen and from the other heresies and their ruin. In the same Epistle St. Epiphanius discusses many things against the errors of Origen. St. Epiphanius's suspicion does not seem to have been ill founded, especially as regards Rufinus: and the very holiness and learning of the man make it impossible for us prudently to believe that such things were rashly uttered by him in an Epistle which at once became public, as is established from Jerome's Epistle on the Best Kind of Translating, by which he defends his own Latin version. Yet it can be doubted whether John did not seem less estranged from some of Origen's errors rather out of ignorance than because he had determined obstinately to adhere to them against the Church's condemnation.

[614] Meanwhile, before St. Epiphanius wrote the said Epistle in the year 394, but John accused St. Epiphanius, John was complaining of St. Epiphanius, because he had ordained Paulinian, St. Jerome's brother, a presbyter: for the Epistle was written either to defend or to excuse that ordination. The deed St. Epiphanius himself narrates in the said Epistle, at number 1, in this manner: In the monastery of the Brethren and of pilgrim Brethren (that is, St. Jerome's at Bethlehem) who owed nothing to your province; and who, on account of our littleness and the letters which we frequently directed to them, had begun to have a disagreement with your communion also—lest they should seem by a certain hardness, and by our own conviction of the ancient faith, to be separated from the church, we ordained a deacon; and after he had ministered, a presbyter again: upon which you ought to have congratulated us, understanding that we were compelled to do this out of the fear of God; especially since there is no difference in the priesthood of God, and where the usefulness of the Church is provided for. For, if the several bishops of the churches have churches under them to which they seem to give their care, and no one stretches beyond his own measure, yet the charity of Christ is set before all, in which there is no dissimulation: nor is it to be considered what was done, but at what time, and in what manner, and among whom, and why it was done.

[615] For when I had seen that a multitude of holy Brethren was dwelling in the monastery, because he had ordained Paulinian presbyter: and that the holy presbyters Jerome and Vincentius, out of modesty and humility, were unwilling to perform the Sacrifices due to their name, and to labour in this part of the ministry, which is the chief salvation of Christians; and that you could not find and lay hold on a servant of God who often fled from you, because he was unwilling to undertake the heavy burden of the priesthood; nor could any other of the bishops easily find him. (Whence I marvelled enough how by God's dispensation he came to us with the deacons of the monastery and the other Brethren, to satisfy me, because I had I know not what sadness against them.) When, therefore, an assembly was being held in the church of the village which is beside our monastery, we ordered him, who was unaware and had absolutely no suspicion, to be laid hold of by many deacons, and his mouth to be held, lest perchance, desiring to be freed, he should adjure us by the name of Christ. And first we ordained him deacon, setting before him the fear of God and compelling him to minister: for he strove hard against it, crying out that he was unworthy, and protesting that the burden was too heavy for his strength.

Scarcely, then, did we compel him, and were able to persuade him by the testimonies of the Scriptures and by setting before him the commandments of God. And when he had ministered in the holy Sacrifices, again with immense difficulty, his mouth being held, we ordained him presbyter: and with the same words with which we had persuaded him before, we urged him to sit in the order of presbyters.

[616] After these things we wrote to the holy presbyters of the monastery and to the other Brethren, and rebuked them, which ordination Epiphanius defends, because they had not written about him, since a year before I had heard many of them complaining that they had no one to perform for them the Sacraments of the Lord, and all asked for him by their own testimony, and testified to the great benefit to the monastery in common: why then, when the opportunity was found, they had not written to us, nor asked anything about his ordination. These things were done as I have said, in the charity of Christ, which I believed you had toward our littleness: although I ordained him in a monastery, and not in a parish subject to you. Thus far St. Epiphanius, partly defending his deed by right, because the monastery for which Paulinian had been ordained was not subject to the bishop, being one of pilgrims; and the place where the ordination was made certainly was not in his diocese. Yet he defends himself more by the laws of charity and equity, on whose account he had believed that the deed would not be taken ill by John. And in truth St. Epiphanius afterwards intimates at greater length that that ordination was a pretext, but that the true cause of John's indignation was that Epiphanius had reproved him as a defender of Origen. But these things may be seen on the 12th of May in St. Epiphanius, §3. From the words alleged I further observe that Paulinian's ordination was made without Jerome's knowledge, although Jerome afterwards defended St. Epiphanius.

[617] and Jerome made his Epistle Latin; The Epistle of St. Epiphanius just praised must altogether be fixed in the year 394, as I have already said. For it was written about two years before Jerome's Epistle on the Best Kind of Translating, which cannot have been written later than the close of the year 395 or the beginning of 396, as was proved by other arguments at number 543. Jerome translated it, but that Latin Version lay hid for a year and six months with Eusebius of Cremona, until, says the saint in the said Epistle at number 2, by a new piece of trickery the aforesaid Interpretation migrated from his desk to Jerusalem. For a certain pseudo-monk, either having received money, as is plainly given to understand, or from gratuitous malice, as the corrupter strives in vain to persuade, having plundered his papers and his stores, became a Judas, a betrayer; and gave our adversaries occasion for barking against us. This publication was made in the year 395, since Jerome at the end of that year or the beginning of the next answered the calumnies spread on that occasion. And Rufinus, who was wholly with John of Jerusalem, St. Jerome accuses in book 3 against Rufinus, number 3, of having induced that monk to steal the Epistle, writing thus: This is the Epistle which you brought out of brother Eusebius's chamber with gold coins, that you might calumniate the translator and hold me guilty of a most manifest crime, because for HONOURABLE I had translated DEAREST. And so already in the year 395 John's indignation against Jerome had begun, and Rufinus adhered to John against him, at least by secret suggestions.

[618] who from the year 395 was involved in the controversy. From elsewhere too we have it that from the year 395 St. Jerome with his monastery was involved in the discord which had begun between St. Epiphanius and John. For in the Epitaph of Fabiola, who was in Palestine in the year 395 and departed thence before the end of the year, the holy Doctor has it thus at number 8: There was at that time a certain dissension among us, and domestic wars surpassed the battle of the barbarians (the Huns). St. Jerome's adversaries made an attempt upon Fabiola and Oceanus her companion, as he himself intimates in book 3 against Rufinus, number 4, speaking in the same place of St. Epiphanius's Epistle stolen after it had been made Latin, and writing this: Who stole from the chamber of brother Eusebius at Bethlehem the Epistle that praised you? By whose craft, and by whose servants, was the manuscript found in the lodging of the holy Fabiola and of Oceanus, a Christian and prudent man, which they had never seen? That manuscript had in all likelihood been placed there to draw Oceanus and Fabiola to the defence of Origen, or to stir them up against Jerome and St. Epiphanius. But the attempt was vain, whatever the intention of those who had thrust in the manuscript.

[619] They could effect more with Vigilantius, a turbulent and rash man, The same man had been accused in Palestine of Origen's heresy who came into Palestine in the year 394 with St. Paulinus's letter to Jerome, as was said at numbers 561 and 562. For that unskilled man dared, who perhaps had heard nothing before about Origen's errors, to accuse Jerome as addicted to them. But he had first been at Jerusalem with Rufinus, by whom he could have been instructed, as Jerome intimates in book 3 against Rufinus, number 19, writing thus: I answered you in Vigilantius. For he accused the same things which you afterwards both praise as a friend and accuse as an enemy. I know by whom his rage against me was stirred up, I know your mines. The simplicity which all proclaim I am not ignorant of. Through his folly your malice raged against me: and if I repelled it by my Epistle, lest you alone should seem to have the staff of letters, you ought not to feign a foulness of words which you have nowhere at all read; but to understand and confess that through his madness your calumnies were answered. These last things Jerome says because Rufinus accused Epistle 61 (elsewhere 75) to Vigilantius, whom, after his departure from Palestine and his relapse into calumnies, the saint had sharply refuted in it. That Epistle was written in the year 395 or later, that is, at least a year after Vigilantius's departure, namely after Jerome had learned that he was being defamed by him in the West as stained with Origen's errors. First I shall relate from it what was done at Bethlehem, then the rest that bears on our purpose.

[620] Jerome saw that Vigilantius was a man disorderly in his manners. by Vigilantius when he was present there, Yet, because he had been sent by St. Paulinus, he received him kindly, and did not even complain of him in his Epistle to Paulinus, save obscurely in these words: Why he set out from us so quickly and left us I cannot say, lest I should seem to wound someone. In the Epistle to Vigilantius, number 3, he has it thus: You tear me: you call the holy brother Oceanus into the charge of heresy. The judgment of the presbyters Vincentius and Paulinian and of brother Eusebius displeases you. You alone are a Cato, the most eloquent of the Roman race, who wish credit to be given to your own testimony and prudence. These things were done partly at Bethlehem, partly afterwards; but on departing he had asked pardon, and therefore the saint subjoins: Remember, I beg you, that day when, as I was preaching about the resurrection and the truth of the body, you leapt up at my side, and clapped your hand, and stamped your foot, and cried out that I was orthodox. For this cause perhaps—unless the crafty man wished to dissemble his own thoughts—he begged pardon of St. Jerome, as is read at the end of the Epistle. But whether he returned to Rufinus before his journey, or only dissembled at his departure, again in the West he calumniated Jerome as a heretic.

[621] For after the words just given Jerome thus continues: and defamed by him in the West; After you began to sail, and the rottenness of the bilge-water reached the inmost part of your brain, then you remembered that we were heretics. Of these things Jerome makes mention even long afterwards, when Vigilantius had fallen into other errors, in Epistle 109 (elsewhere 53) to Riparius, number 2, thus: I, I myself once saw this monster, and wished to bind the madman with the testimonies of the Scriptures as with the bonds of Hippocrates: but he went off, he escaped, he got away, he broke out: and between the waves of the Adriatic and the Alps of king Cottius he shouted in declaiming against us. And so Jerome again cleared himself to Vigilantius, thus beginning the Epistle: It would indeed have been just not to satisfy you at all by a letter, since you did not believe your own ears: for neither will you be able to acquiesce in a written sheet, who gave no credit to the living voice. But because Christ gave us in himself the pattern of perfect humility, giving a kiss to his betrayer and receiving the repentance of the thief upon the gibbet, I signify to you absent the same things which I said to you when present: that I have so read, or read, Origen as I read Apollinaris or the other commentators, some of whose books the Church does not receive. Not that I say that all things contained in their volumes are to be condemned: but that I confess some things are to be reprehended… Whence I wonder enough that you wished to object to me the doctrines of Origen, whose error in very many things you are to this day wholly ignorant of. He adds not a few things about Origen's errors, and excuses by the example of others that he rendered some of his writings into Latin. But these things will be disputed more fully afterwards.

[622] whom he therefore admonished by a sharp Epistle. Then he seriously admonishes the vain man not to ruin himself by his boasting—with a stinging pen indeed, but one which could profit Vigilantius, if he had any shame, or at least restrain others, that they should not mix themselves in disputations which they do not understand. It is no small thing, he says, to know what you do not know: it belongs to a prudent man to know his own measure, and not, stirred up by the zeal of the devil, to make the whole world a witness of his unskilfulness. Doubtless you both desire to boast and brag in your own country that I could not answer your eloquence, and that I dreaded the acuteness of a Chrysippus in you. I am held by Christian modesty, and I am unwilling to unlock the hiding-places of my cell with a biting discourse. Otherwise I should bring forth πᾶσαν τὴν ἀριστείαν σου καὶ τροπαιοφορίαν. But these things I leave to others either to speak of or to laugh at. I, as a Christian speaking with a Christian, beseech you, brother, not to wish to be wiser than you are; nor to bring forth with your pen either your innocence or your simplicity, or at any rate those things which I keep silent about and which, though you do not understand them, the rest do understand, and so to furnish all men with a laugh at your ineptitudes. From your early years you learned something else: you are accustomed to other disciplines. It is not for the same man both to test gold coins and the Scriptures; both to taste wines and to understand the Prophets or Apostles. Thus far he taught an unlearned and vain man by a wholesome admonition; at the end he more sharply reprehends Vigilantius's impious interpretation of Daniel, and subjoins this: My own injury I bore patiently: impiety against God I could not bear. Whence I have seemed to write at the end of my letter more bitingly than I had promised. Although, after your former penance, in which you begged pardon of me, it is most stupid to have offended again, so as to have matter for penance. May Christ grant you to hear and be silent; to understand, and so to speak. Of Vigilantius more will be discussed afterwards.

[623] A decree of exile against Jerome obtained by John, We have already seen that from the year 395 Jerome was involved in the controversy which had begun between St. Epiphanius and John of Jerusalem, and that in the same year his Latin version of St. Epiphanius's Epistle was secretly carried off. And so in the same year I judge that the rescript of exile against St. Jerome, which nevertheless took no effect, was obtained by John. Jerome himself favours this opinion when in the book against John, number 42, he speaks thus of John: Who stirred up that most powerful beast, hanging over the necks of the whole world, especially against our necks? For from these words we have it that on John's part a secular prince was stirred up against Jerome and his monks—whom many probably believe to have been Rufinus, administrator of the Eastern empire under Arcadius—that he might drive Jerome and his companions into exile. That a decree of exile was obtained by John, but took no effect, Jerome declares more clearly in Epistle 82 to Theophilus, number 10. Lately, he says, he demanded and obtained exile for us: and would that he had been able to accomplish it, so that, as to him the will is imputed for the deed, so we too might have the crown of exile not only in will but in effect. By shedding blood, and by suffering rather than doing insults, the Church of Christ was founded… A monk—alas the grief!—both threatens monks with exile and obtains it; and this a monk who boasts that he holds an apostolic chair.

[624] These things the saint says in disapproval of John's deed. But that neither he nor his monks were much terrified by these things [which took no effect, in all likelihood through the death of the prefect Rufinus.] he subjoins, continuing thus: This nation does not know how to yield to terror, and puts its necks rather than its hands beneath the impending sword. For which of the monks, an exile from his country, is not an exile from the world? What need is there of public authority, and of the expenses of a rescript, and of runnings to and fro over the whole world? Let him but touch us with his little finger, and we shall go forth of our own accord. The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof. Christ is not shut up and held by a place. If it was really Rufinus by whom the rescript was obtained, as is most likely—because he is said to have hung over the necks of the whole world, that is, to have aimed at empire, which was believed of Rufinus—the rescript will have been given in the year 395 as it drew to its close, and will have taken no effect because Rufinus was slain before its execution: and this happened on the 27th of November in the year 395, so that the decree of exile could have been given in that same month. From the same Epistle, number 7, it is clear that Jerome was accused by John or his followers of having turned certain writings of Origen into Latin: to which accusation he briefly answers, observing that this was done in order that, since they did not dare openly to defend Origen, they might at least shield him by the like error of many.

[625] Besides, either in the same year or perhaps in the following, John wrote to the Western bishops, John writes to various persons against the ordination of Paulinian, accusing the ordination of Paulinian, and consequently all who defended it. He objected two things against the ordination, namely the youth of Paulinian, and the place of his own diocese, in which he said that he had been made a presbyter. About the age there was no great difficulty, since either he was thirty years old when he was ordained, as Jerome's passage can be expounded; or so near to the age of thirty that he had reached it when this Epistle of Jerome's was written. Nor did the place where he was ordained cause any difficulty, since it was not in the diocese of Jerusalem but of Eleutheropolis. But the place for which St. Epiphanius had in good faith ordained him caused difficulty, since Bethlehem was under the bishop of Jerusalem. For this cause it appears that Paulinian, when he had learned of John's indignation, abstained from administering the Sacraments in the monastery until peace should be made. Certainly Jerome at number 8 writes this: He says that my brother is the cause of the discord—a man who rests (that is, does not administer the Sacraments to the monks, as I judge) in the cell of the monastery, and interprets clerical office not as an honour but as a burden. And, having until the present day beguiled us with a feigned show of peace, he has stirred up the ears of the Western priests, saying that he, a young lad and almost a boy, was made a presbyter in his own parish of Bethlehem. To these things Jerome answers that he was not ordained in the diocese of Jerusalem, and more about his age, as may be seen there.

[626] who abstains from administering the Sacraments in the monastery. But that Paulinian abstained from administering the Sacraments at Bethlehem—which alone could seem contrary to John's right—is further clear from the book against John, in which at number 41 the saint addresses John thus: But if your talk is about Paulinian, you see that he is subject to his own bishop (St. Epiphanius), that he dwells in Cyprus, and comes from time to time to visit us, not as yours but as another's, namely his by whom he was ordained. But if he should wish to be here too, and in our exile to live quietly in solitude, what does he owe you but the honour which we owe to all bishops? Suppose him ordained by you: you will hear the same from him which the bishop Paulinus of holy memory heard from me, a wretched man: Did I ask you to ordain me? If you so bestow the priesthood as not to take the monk from us, you must look to your own judgment. But if under the name of presbyter you take from me that for which I forsook the world, I have what I always had: you have suffered no loss in the ordination. From these things, I say, it is clear that Paulinian dwelt at first in the monastery as a monk—perhaps as long as there was hope of peace being quickly made—and then began to live in Cyprus. By this caution every pretext of complaining was taken from John, who could easily have permitted Paulinian to perform the priestly office in St. Jerome's monastery, if he loved peace.

[627] John at last forbids the monks entrance to the church. But John's indignation at last broke out so far that he forbade the entrance of the church to all who should call Paulinian a presbyter. The fact is established from the book against John, number 42, where Jerome addresses John thus: Is it not you who rend the Church, who command your clerics that, if anyone shall call Paulinian, consecrated by bishop Epiphanius, a presbyter, he be forbidden to enter the church? From which time to the present day we look only upon the cave of the Lord, and, while heretics go in, we, placed afar off, sigh. Is it we who rend the Church, or he who denies a dwelling to the living and a sepulchre to the dead?… Who has suffered the bones of the Saints and their harmless ashes to be beaten by the rains until now? With these blandishments the good shepherd invites us to peace. Yet I do not judge that these things were done before the year 397 or 398, because Jerome does not complain of them in the Epistle to Theophilus, given at the close of the year 396, as I shall prove at number 640. Besides, Rufinus in the year 397 departed from Jerusalem to Rome, peace having been made with Jerome in the church of the Resurrection, so that at that time entrance to the church does not yet seem to have been forbidden to Jerome. For we shall prove that concord with John was restored later. Thus far we have seen what John contrived against St. Jerome; let us now examine what the saint did on his part.

[628] St. Epiphanius, when John, being admonished, would not answer about his faith, Already before the ordination of Paulinian St. Epiphanius held John suspect as addicted to the errors of Origen, and from time to time admonished him, yet did not withdraw from his communion. In these things Jerome had no part. There followed the ordination of Paulinian, on whose occasion John stirred up many tumults, and was unwilling that he should administer the Sacraments in the monastery of Bethlehem. Again St. Jerome kept silence, and Paulinian either abstained altogether from administering in the monastery, or, if perhaps he had at first begun in good faith—which I nowhere find—at least ceased when he understood the bishop's prohibition. St. Epiphanius, having heard John's complaints and threats about Paulinian's ordination, defended it by Epistle 51 to John, and in it charged both John and Rufinus as favourers of Origen's errors; and that this was the only cause why John took that ordination so ill he declares at number 3 in these words: For I see that all your indignation has been stirred up for this cause, that I said to you: "You ought not to praise the father of Arius, and the root and parent of the other heresies". Again Jerome did nothing in these matters, except that he rendered the Epistle into Latin for the sake of Eusebius of Cremona, adding also the condition that he should keep it secret.

[629] St. Epiphanius's Epistle in no way moved John to answer about his faith, admonishes the monks not rashly to communicate with him: or to remove the suspicion of heresy by a just defence. Wherefore St. Epiphanius, when John was unwilling to clear himself of the suspicion of heresy, admonished the monks not rashly to communicate with him, as the said Jerome asserts at number 40 in these words: But after, being addressed by the blessed father Epiphanius both in speech and in letters, he scorned to answer; writings came from the same Epiphanius to all the monks, that without satisfaction as to his faith no one should rashly communicate with him. On account of these letters, therefore, the monks somewhat withdrew from John's communion, because they knew that by such tergiversation he was becoming suspect.

[630] Nevertheless Jerome never so broke communion on his own part with John and so they somewhat abstain from his communion, as men withdraw from the communion of heretics, so as to shun also those who communicated with him; nor did he ever call John a heretic. Both we have from Epistle 82 to Theophilus, in which he answered a letter of John's written to the same Theophilus of Alexandria. For at number 4 he has it thus: He writes in that letter of his (John) that he has never been wounded by me, nor called a heretic. This Jerome acknowledges, answering thus: In what way, then, does he himself wound me, bandying me about as sick with a most evil disease and as a rebel against the Church? After a little, concerning the controversy begun between Epiphanius and John he says: I was neither present nor did I hear. I am one of the people—nay, not even one, because, while many cried out, I kept silence. Again, when he had observed that John does not answer openly about his faith, he adds: I meanwhile am silent: now I shall feign that my prudence is either unskilfulness or fear. What will he do to me accusing, who, as he himself testifies, disparages me when I praise? Then at number XI he has it thus about communion: Besides, as to what he writes, that we communicate with him through you and through the Roman Church, from whose communion we seem separated: it is not necessary to go so far: here too in Palestine we are joined with him in the same way. And lest this [\] should be too far off, in the village of Bethlehem we are associated in communion with his presbyters, so far as in us lies.* These things are also clearly confirmed in the book against John, number 42, where he observes that the Church is not rent by him, since the whole household of Bethlehem communicated there in the church, and presented there those to be baptized; but that it is rent by John, who forbade those to be baptized to be received, and prohibited others from entering the church.

[631] Let us ask, then, in what sense that must be understood

which Jerome says until he should answer about his faith, in the book against John, number 43: That we did not communicate with you is a matter of faith: answer (about your faith, that is), and it will be a matter of ordination. By these words Jerome confesses that he and his did not communicate with John, and alleges as the first cause faith, as the second the ordination of Paulinian. He alleges faith as a cause, not because he called John a heretic, but because John, accused of heresy by St. Epiphanius in public letters and in private conversation, had never been willing to give a candid confession of his faith, and to indicate in clear words that he was free from Origen's errors. Hence at number 42 he says to John: Who rends the Church? We, whose whole household of Bethlehem communicates in the church; or you, who either believe rightly and proudly keep silence about your faith, or believe ill and truly rend the Church? And so Jerome did not abstain from John's communion not knowing whether he was culpable, as Tillemont says, but knowing very well that by that silence he was becoming suspect and culpable, because he was unwilling to remove the suspicion by a clear answer, when he was reproved by a man venerable for learning, holiness and miracles, whose authority throughout all Palestine was of the greatest weight. The other cause was the ordination of Paulinian, because on its occasion John demanded from the monastery a greater subjection than Jerome believed was owed him.

[632] communicating meanwhile with the metropolitan of Cæsarea, Meanwhile Jerome communicated with the bishop of Cæsarea, who was metropolitan of Palestine and therefore of Jerusalem too. This Jerome indicates at number 37, saying that the controversy ought not to have been referred to Theophilus of Alexandria, to whom John had had recourse; but to the metropolitan of Cæsarea in Palestine or of Antioch for the whole East, and writing this to our purpose: Either, then, you ought to have referred it to the bishop of Cæsarea, with whom you knew that we communicated, your own communion being spurned. And so the bishop of Cæsarea seems either to have ordained presbyters for St. Jerome's monastery, or to have sent thither one or two of those ordained before, who might administer the Sacraments to the monks. The number of presbyters in the monastery certainly grew in the time of the dissension. For when Jerome at number 42 had said that by himself and his men forty persons to be baptized had been offered to John's presbyters, he subjoins: And certainly there were five presbyters in the monastery who by their own right could baptize: but they were unwilling to do anything against your stomach, lest this too should give you occasion for keeping silence about your faith. On this I observe that Jerome and Vincentius alone are named as presbyters when Paulinian was ordained, so that he is gathered to have been the third, from St. Epiphanius's words given at number 615. Secondly, those forty, who are said to have been of different age and sex, belonged to the monastery on no other title than that they had been imbued there with the articles of faith; and this seems to have been the reason why the presbyters did not baptize them in the monastery. Yet the saint says that they could have done it by their own right—perhaps because of the monastery's exemption—but were unwilling to do it, lest they should offend John.

\ perhaps quoque*

§ XXXVIII. In what ways concord between John and Jerome was several times attempted, and at what time it seems to have been made: the saint's friendship with Theophilus begun.

To reconcile peace between John and Jerome From St. Jerome's book against John it is gathered that that discord was continued for three years or longer, since at the beginning he says that he speaks after three years. But he does not begin this three years from the beginning of the discord, but from John's Apology, as I shall prove below. Yet concord was attempted in various ways; but I cannot find whether from the year 395, in which John declared himself against Jerome, there was already serious negotiation about making peace. I rather believe that the first attempt belongs to the year 396, since the peace was treated of about Easter. Of that attempt St. Jerome in the book against John, number 39, has it thus: When through that most eloquent and most Christian man count Archelaus, who was the mediator of peace, a place of covenant was appointed, was it not first of all demanded that faith should lay the foundations of the concord to come? You promised that you would come. The day of Easter was at hand: a frequent throng of monks had gathered: you were awaited in the place: you knew not what to do. Suddenly you sent word that I know not what woman was sick: that you could not come on that day. The saint observes here that John ought not, because of the illness of one little woman, to have abstained from a treaty of concord. Then he subjoins: We were unwilling to give occasion: for we saw the trick: we overcame by patience the injury of your delay. Archelaus writes back: he advises us to stay a second and a third day, if you should wish to come. But he, being busy—for the little woman did not cease to vomit—until he had escaped the nausea, utterly forgot us. Therefore by the tergiversation of John, whom Rufinus was instigating, that attempt came to nothing.

[634] That count Archelaus, who strove to reconcile peace between John and Jerome, count Archelaus labours, but in vain. is in all likelihood the same as the Archelaus who in the year 397 was prefect of Egypt, as Tillemont observes in volume 5 of the Emperors, Note 14 on Arcadius. Hence it also becomes likely that Archelaus laboured at reconciling that peace by the command of the emperor or of his ministers, after the decree of exile had been rescinded which John had obtained against Jerome in the year 395, and which took no effect, as we saw at number 624. But whether Archelaus did it by the emperor's command or by his own design, John does not seem to have wished for peace yet, but rather to accuse Jerome, as the saint complains in Epistle 82 to Theophilus, number 8, saying: And, having until the present day beguiled us with a feigned show of peace, he has stirred up the ears of the Western priests, etc. In the same Epistle, at number 2, he declares repeatedly to Theophilus, who was exhorting him to peace, that he vehemently desires peace, but that John is not disposed to it, freely writing this: For it is no great thing to hold forth peace in word and to destroy it in deed: to strive after one thing and to show another: to sound concord in words and in fact to exact servitude. We too desire peace; and not only desire it but ask for it: but the peace of Christ, true peace, peace without enmities, peace in which war is not wrapped up, peace which does not subject adversaries but joins friends. Why do we call domination peace, and not render to each thing its own name? Where there is hatred, let it be called enmity; where charity, there alone let it be called peace. These things abundantly declare that certain things were demanded by John which the monks did not judge should be granted him.

[635] [The matter having been referred to Theophilus of Alexandria, the presbyter Isidore,] To this end John referred the controversy to Theophilus of Alexandria, who up to that time had not set himself against the followers of Origen, and was opposed to St. Epiphanius, so that John and Rufinus could readily hope that he would likewise be opposed to Jerome; as at first he does seem in some measure to have been opposed to him. But Jerome's prudence at length brought it about that he reached fair conditions of peace, and made Theophilus his own and St. Epiphanius's friend, but a most keen persecutor of the Origenian heresy. In what way Theophilus first strove to bring back concord is not altogether known. But it is established that he sent into Palestine the presbyter Isidore, whom at that time he esteemed highly, although he afterwards grievously persecuted him. Now that Isidore vehemently favoured John, and St. Jerome complains much of his prejudice, because it had been detected through his preceding letter, which had been written to Rufinus, as Jerome clearly says in book 3 against Rufinus, number 16; but by an error it had been addressed to the presbyter Vincentius, St. Jerome's companion, to whom it was also delivered three months before Isidore's embassy.

[636] who greatly favoured John, is sent by him into Palestine, Of these things at number 37 Jerome addresses John thus: This Isidore, he says, who is lifted to heaven by your praises, is defamed at Alexandria for the very thing for which you are at Jerusalem (namely the Origenian heresy): whence he seems to have come not as an envoy but as an ally. Besides, a letter written by his hand, which three months before the embassy had been directed to us, carrying his error, was delivered to the presbyter Vincentius: which is kept by him to this day, in which he exhorts the leader of his army (Rufinus) to stand with firm step upon the rock of faith, and not to be frightened by our dirges. He promises, before there was any suspicion of an embassy, that he will come to Jerusalem, and that at his coming the wedges of the adversaries will at once be trampled down. Then from the letter itself he brings forward the following words: As smoke is dissolved in the air, and wax melts at the neighbourhood of fire; so shall they be scattered who, always resisting the faith of the Church, now through simple men attempt to disturb that same faith. Such a letter of Isidore's having been seen by Jerome, no one ought to wonder that he complains much of his favour toward John, both in this place and a little before, where he says to John: You preferred to trouble ears already preoccupied (those of Theophilus and Isidore) than to render to your own metropolitan the honour due to him.

[637] and strives in vain to compose peace; Afterwards Isidore came, but by no means reconciled peace. And he came two months after Archelaus's fruitless attempt, as will be said below, that is, about June of the year 396, or in that very month of June. Three times he approached the litigants, gathered together, I think, at the same time, as is hinted at number 39, where Jerome, complaining of him, speaks thus: This man, who is said to have approached us three times, … who spoke to us the mandate of bishop Theophilus, was unwilling to deliver the letters sent to us by him. And when we said, If you are an envoy, deliver the letters of your embassy: if you have no letters, how will you prove yourself an envoy? he answered that he had indeed letters for us; but that he had been adjured by the bishop of Jerusalem not to deliver them to us. Of the withholding of those letters the saint writes thus in book 3 against Rufinus: You are not ignorant that his (Theophilus's) letters were always given to me, even at that time in which you forbade them to be delivered to me. He attributes to Rufinus here what before he attributed to John, because John did everything at Rufinus's instigation, and both alike suggested the plan to Isidore. Of this matter the saint speaks again in Epistle 82, given afterwards to Theophilus, writing this at number 9: In fine, how peaceful and pertaining to concord were the letters you sent us by the presbyter Isidore, we prove from this, that those who falsely boast of peace were unwilling to deliver them. This too, therefore, was a just cause of complaint.

[638] But now that Isidore could accomplish nothing, because the monks were unwilling to restore the broken communion because John would not give satisfaction about his faith. unless John should give satisfaction about his faith, the saint relates thus in the book against John, number 39: Two months, then, after (Archelaus) Isidore, long awaited, came at last, who heard not, as you feign (he speaks to John), testimony in your favour, but the cause of the satisfaction demanded (by the monks). For when he objected to us: Why did you communicate with him, if he was a heretic? he heard

from all: We communicated, suspecting nothing of heresy. But after, being addressed by the blessed father Epiphanius both in speech and in letters, he scorned to answer, writings came from the same Epiphanius to all the monks, that without satisfaction as to his faith no one should rashly communicate with him. The letters are at hand, nor can there be any doubt on this matter. These are the things which the throng of Brethren answered: not, as you argue, that you are not a heretic because you were never at some time called one. From this constancy of the monks John and Isidore, and beyond doubt Rufinus too, perceived that an Apology was necessary by which he might wipe away the suspicion of heresy, deeply impressed on the minds of many. Yet he was unwilling to clear himself before St. Epiphanius, or before Jerome and the other monks: but preferred to write an Apology to Theophilus, in which he should rather accuse his adversaries than defend himself.

[639] And so before Isidore's departure he wrote the Apology, John writes an Apology to Theophilus: in his presence and with his help, as St. Jerome asserts in the book against John, number 38, in these words: This very Apology, of which we now speak, was dictated in the presence and with the great collaboration of Isidore, so that the same man was both its dictator and the bearer of the letter. This Apology at number 4 he calls an Epistle, which John wrote to bishop Theophilus. For John hoped that Theophilus would be favourable to him, and was not unaware that he must be instigated, both by Isidore and by Rufinus. Certainly Jerome in book 3, number 18, addresses Rufinus thus about Theophilus, who had by then greatly changed: And daily, by couriers sent (to Theophilus), you were boasting that his enemy (perhaps St. Epiphanius) was our friend and most familiar: and you were lying about those things which you now shamelessly write, that you might stir up his hatred against us, and that grief at an injury might become an oppression of the faith. But that prudent man, of Apostolic wisdom, proved by time and by facts both our mind toward him and your plots against us. In truth Theophilus, who at first showed himself favourable to John, afterwards began to esteem Jerome and Epiphanius highly. And Jerome intimates in the book against John, number 5, that the state of the controversy was not thoroughly understood by Theophilus, and that it came about thence that he approved the Epistle or Apology of John, since John had chosen only some of the articles of faith objected against him, to which he could easily answer.

[640] he communicates it to Jerome, with a letter added And so Theophilus, having received that Epistle of John's, by which he both believed John Catholic and perceived that the monks were accused of schism and of violating the canons, so took up John's cause that he preferred to bring back his adversaries to peace by sweetness and gentleness, rather than to exasperate them more by too great austerity of words. He wrote in that same year 396, as is most likely—that is, not long after receiving John's Epistle—to Jerome and the other monks, that he might stir them up to subject themselves to John, and communicated to them John's Epistle itself, as is clear from St. Jerome's answer, who briefly refutes it. This is the often-praised Epistle 82 (elsewhere 62), by which Jerome answers Theophilus. But since the saint beyond doubt answered Theophilus at once, just as Theophilus had written not long after Isidore's return and the receipt of John's Apology, the order of events altogether hints that Epistle 82 must be fixed as the year 396 drew to its close. For Archelaus about Easter, which in the year 396 fell on the 13th of April, had attempted to bring back concord: two months after, that is, in the month of June, Isidore had come. He remained some time in Palestine, so that certainly on his return he did not come to Alexandria before July, or rather August. Then, all things being understood and John's Epistle examined, Theophilus will have written his own, so that on account of the great distance of lands by which Bethlehem is separated from Alexandria Jerome could not have answered save in one of the later months of the year 396. Vallarsius defers that Epistle to the year 399, for no other reason than that he believes it written at nearly the same time as the book against John; but we shall see that at least two years must be interposed between them.

[641] sweet and inciting to peace: But what Theophilus's Epistle was like is gathered from St. Jerome's answer, who thus begins: Your Epistle, showing you to be a possessor of the Lord's inheritance—who, going to the Father, said to the Apostles, "My peace I give to you, my peace I leave to you"—has testified that you are a partaker also of that felicity in which the peacemakers are called Blessed. You caress as a father, you instruct as a master, you teach as a pontiff. You have come to us not in the austerity of the rod, but in the spirit of kindness and gentleness and meekness, so that in your very first words you should echo the humility of Christ, who saved the race of mortals not by lightning and thundering, but by wailing in the manger and by keeping silence upon the cross… Whence, touching upon many things from the sacred volumes in praise of peace, and flying like the bees through the various fields of the Scriptures, whatever was sweet and apt for concord you have reaped with skilful eloquence. Running, therefore, we were incited to peace: the sails spread for sailing were filled by the frequent breeze of your exhortation, so that not with drawing back and fastidious, but with eager and full throats we drank the sweet streams of peace. That Theophilus's Epistle was gentle he again intimates at number 9 in these words: Why do they seek peace afar off, and wish it to be imposed on us by others? Let them be peacemakers, and peace will at once follow. Why do they abuse the name of your sanctity against us for terror, when your Epistle sounds peace and gentleness, while their words threaten hardness? Likewise in several places he repeats that he wishes for peace, and above all toward the end of the Epistle, which he thus concludes: May Christ, God almighty, grant to your prayers that we may be joined together in peace, not by a feigned name but by true and faithful love; lest, biting one another, we be consumed one of another.

[642] Nevertheless Jerome explains why he judges But Jerome answers Theophilus, briefly refuting John's Apology that peace is not sincerely sought by his adversaries, and briefly intimates much more to an understanding reader than he declares in clear words. For first he hints that they cannot be secure about John's charity, since he seemed to seek only the subjection of the monks. Secondly, that they are not secure about John's faith either, since he answered ambiguously, he declares in these words: But a pure faith and an open confession does not seek tricks and quibbles of words. What is simply believed must be simply confessed. I could indeed freely cry out, and say even amid Babylonian swords and fires: Why is something else answered than what is asked? Why is the confession not simple and open? He fears everything, tempers everything, leaves everything ambiguous, and walks as it were upon ears of corn. But intimating these things only briefly, he goes on to answer some things which John had objected about certain men ordained in the monastery, about some little works of Origen translated by Jerome, and by name about the ordination of Paulinian at number 8, where he subjoins: But if he cannot have peace with my brother (Paulinian) except as with a subject, and one repudiating the bishop of his ordination (St. Epiphanius), he shows that he does not so much desire peace as, under the occasion of peace, vengeance: and that he is not otherwise content with the leisure of quiet and peace, unless he has entire what he threatens. He adds also complaints about John, and by name that he had obtained the rescript for the exile of the monks, as was said at number 623.

[643] Among the complaints is also this, that he served the will of others—namely of Rufinus and his friends, as he clearly declares in the words given at number 538—against Jerome and his monks. and saying that he desires peace. Yet even so he protests that he desires peace, writing thus: Wherefore, what I said at the beginning of the Epistle I even now repeat: that we wish for the peace of Christ, and desire concord: and that we ask you to admonish him not to extort peace but to will it. Let him be content with the grief of our past insults. Let him at least blot out old wounds with new charity. Let him be such as he was before, when he loved us of his own judgment. Let not words flow to him from another's stomach. Let him do what he wishes, and not what he is compelled to wish. Either let him, as a pontiff, command all alike: or, as an imitator of the Apostle, let him serve the salvation of all equally. If he shall show himself such, we of our own accord offer our hands, we stretch out our arms; let him have us as friends and kinsmen: and let him feel that in Christ we are subject to him as to all the Saints… For we too left our own countries for this, that we might live quietly without any quarrels in the fields and in solitude; that we might venerate the pontiffs of Christ (who nevertheless preach the right faith) not with the fear due to masters, but with the honour due to fathers; that we might defer to bishops as bishops, and not be compelled under another's name to serve others whom we do not wish to serve. We are not of so puffed-up a heart as to be ignorant of what is owed to the priests of Christ… But let them be content with their own honour: let them know that they are fathers, not masters, especially among those who, spurning the ambitions of the world, prefer nothing to quiet and leisure. All these things, as also the whole Epistle, clearly intimate that Jerome so wished for peace that it should not stand in the way of the liberty of his pilgrim monks, and that John should openly condemn the errors of Origen. What Theophilus did on receiving this Epistle I do not find. But I suspect that he went no further; and that concord did not follow until two or three years afterwards.

[644] But peace was not yet composed at that time, nor in the year 397. Tillemont in article 81 judges that Theophilus came into Palestine to restore peace between Jerome with his companions and John. But Epistle 63, to be recited below, from which someone wished to gather this, by no means signifies that Theophilus came into Palestine, but that for some time Theophilus sent no letters to Jerome. For the sequence of the discourse requires that, where some have read in which you remained with us, we should read with the Veronese edition in which you kept silence with us. This Tillemont himself saw and observed, so that I wonder that a fact is related by him which was asserted solely from an utterly incongruous and false reading. Yet he judges that peace was made in the year 397, because in that year Rufinus, before he departed for Rome, restored his friendship with Jerome. But this is true of Rufinus, and thence I too had a suspicion that peace was made at the same time with John of Jerusalem. But the arguments which offer themselves on the contrary side are so weighty that I altogether judge that Rufinus returned to peace with Jerome at least in appearance, because he was departing to the West, where Jerome had powerful friends whom he did not wish to have as enemies: but that the dissension between John and Jerome remained undecided. For Rufinus departed in the year 397: but the book against John, according to all the chronological notes which it contains, cannot have been written before the year 398 was running to its close. Besides, in the book against John he nowhere wounds Rufinus by a single word. But in the Epistle on the Best Kind of Translating

he names Rufinus as the instigator of John. Hence I gather that that book was composed after he had returned into favour with Rufinus: for otherwise there was frequent occasion for naming him, as is clear from what has been said above about Rufinus.

§ XXXIX. The time of the writing of the book against John of Jerusalem: the controversy with John composed.

Jerome writes against John, at the exhortation of Pammachius, Now, since there is great disagreement among the learned about the time of the writing of the book against John, we must discuss it at greater length. First, at the beginning of this book, written to Pammachius, the saint alleges his reasons for writing thus: You know, Pammachius, you know that I come down to this Work not out of enmity, not out of desire of glory, but provoked by your letters out of ardour of faith; and that I wish, if it could be, that all should be of the same mind, and that I cannot be reprehended for impatience and rashness, if I speak after three years. In fine, unless you said that the minds of many were disturbed by the Apology about which I have now determined to write, and that opinion wavers on both sides, I had resolved to remain in the silence I had begun. From these words we have it that Jerome did not write until John's Apology, composed about the middle of the year 396, had been read at Rome and had there disturbed the minds of many, and that this very thing had at last become known to St. Jerome through Pammachius's letter. But it does not seem to have been sent to Rome before the year 397, since it was written to Theophilus, that he, having read it, might impose peace, or rather subjection, on the monks; and for that cause it seems to have been sent to Rome only after Theophilus's attempt had come to nothing. Certainly at number 5 it is read: But you say, The bishop of Alexandria approved my Epistle. This, then, was known at Rome. And so I can scarcely conceive by what reasoning some fix the book against John at nearly the same time as Jerome's Epistle to Theophilus mentioned before. For John's Apology could reach Alexandria, whither Isidore carried it, much sooner than the West or Rome; and Theophilus alone had been chosen by John as it were the judge of the controversy, so that it does not become likely that the Apology was sent into the West save after Theophilus's attempt had failed.

[646] Wherefore those words, if I speak after three years, three years after his Apology was written, seem altogether to be referred to the time in which John's Apology was written, as the natural understanding of the passage requires. Jerome had not kept silence for three years about his controversy with John; but he had kept silence as regards his Apology, which he undertakes to refute after three years. Already about the beginning of the year 396 he had defended the Translation of St. Epiphanius's Epistle against the disparagements of John and Rufinus. Of the controversy he had beyond doubt spoken with Archelaus and Isidore, who had striven to reconcile concord, and by name he wrote much about it to Theophilus in the often-praised Epistle 82. But in this Epistle he was unwilling studiously to prove that the declaration of faith which John had inserted in his Apology was not sufficiently open nor sufficient to wipe away the suspicion of the Origenian heresy, of which he had been accused by St. Epiphanius. He does indeed hint something there about the ambiguous exposition of faith in the words recited at number 642: but he declares nothing clearly; he undertakes to prove nothing; and he subjoins: I meanwhile am silent: now I shall feign that my prudence is either unskilfulness or fear. And so he undertook to refute John's Apology after three years, because he understood that many were disturbed by it. But since St. Jerome generally so numbers years that the last is not complete, we shall more probably understand three years not complete, that is, two years and some months. And so, since the Apology was composed about the middle of the year 396, this book written against it cannot more probably be fixed than at the close of the year 398 or the beginning of the following one.

[647] The other chronological notes which that Work contains agree accurately with the date already given. that is, at the close of the year 398 or the beginning of 399. At number 17 the saint speaks thus: It is not the time to write against the doctrine of the Gentiles and in part of the Platonists. Nearly ten years ago, in the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes and in the Explanation of the Epistle to the Ephesians, I think the mind of my soul was made plain to the prudent. That the saint wrote on the Epistle to the Ephesians in the year 389, and on Ecclesiastes at the close of that same year, or perhaps at the beginning of the following one, I proved at numbers 367 and 368. And so it was nearly ten years after the exposition of the Epistle to the Ephesians, that is, the tenth year begun, at the close of the year 398. But since Ecclesiastes was explained some months later, it is not equally certain that the decade already begun as regards those Commentaries had run out when he was writing against John of Jerusalem; yet this very thing is more probable. But whether these Commentaries too preceded by ten years, or only the Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians, since he says nearly ten years ago and speaks of both little works together, the saint's words are accurate and plainly conformable to the chronology given.

[648] Vallarsius argues from the same passage, and says that the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes were composed about the year 390, as is proved by other chronological notes and thence refers the book against John to the year 399 or 400. But the said editor elsewhere, with Tillemont, fixes those Commentaries in the year 388, as I observed at number 369. I could have wished that he had everywhere kept the same chronology. Those Commentaries were written about five years after they had been promised to Blæsilla in the year 385, and long before the middle of the year; so that that about five years would rightly hold even if they were written about the middle of the year 389: but it neither agrees with the year 388, to which Tillemont ties them, nor does it more probably carry us as far as the year 390; since St. Jerome's manner of speaking is to increase rather than to diminish an interval of time.

[649] of the same Epistle, There remains a third note sending us back to the same time. To John, who wished the monks to be subject to him, Jerome answers thus at number 41: If you speak of me and of the presbyter Vincentius, you have slept long enough, who, now awakened after thirteen years, say these things. For it was for this that both I forsook Antioch and he Constantinople, most renowned cities, not that we might praise you preaching among the peoples; but that in the fields and in solitude, bewailing the sins of our youth, we might bend the mercy of Christ toward us. Tillemont in Note 42 confesses that the thirteen years here asserted cannot more rightly be begun than from the year 386, in which St. Jerome came with Vincentius into Palestine, and in which John obtained the bishopric of Jerusalem. Every other understanding of that passage is so improbable that I can scarcely conceive how learned men could look elsewhere. For John could not lay claim to the subjection of Jerome and Vincentius before they were in Palestine; but only from the time in which they fixed their habitation there.

[650] it is clearly proved, Vallarsius saw this too, but brought Jerome into Palestine later than he ought, here again forgetful of himself, unless we prefer to believe that his assistants had one chronology and Vallarsius himself another, and that thence it came about that not everything agrees together. But what he says here, that those thirteen years must be begun from the completed year 386, is improbable. For about the beginning of the year 386 Jerome came into Palestine, and after a long pilgrimage to the holy places, and a journey made into Egypt, fixed his dwelling at Bethlehem in the summer of the year 386. Wherefore the thirteen years must be begun from about the middle of the year 386, and these lead excellently to the end of the year 398 or the beginning of the following one, so that the last year remains incomplete, as Jerome generally numbers his years. The said Tillemont asserts with us that the said thirteen years lead to the year 399, or at least to 398. But that this last is to be preferred I shall now prove.

[651] and is confirmed from elsewhere too. Jerome at number 42 says that forty persons to be baptized were offered to John's presbyters, and designates the time thus: A few months ago, about the days of Pentecost, when, the sun being darkened, the whole world dreaded the Judge as now about to come. In the year 398 Pentecost fell in the month of June. And so if by a few months we understand four, five, or six months, we are led to October, November or December. That so many months must be understood as to lead to the following year is less likely. Besides, that the controversy of Jerome and John was ended before the summer of the year 399 is gathered from Epistle 77, that is, from the Epitaph of Fabiola, which I shall prove at number 820 was written in that very summer. For in it at number 8 it is said: There was at that time (at the close of the year 395) a certain dissension among us, etc. By the word was he altogether hints that it had ended before he wrote that. Thirdly, it is certain that John's Apology was written before Rufinus departed for the West, and was written about two months after Easter, so that it cannot be fixed later than about June of the year 396. More than three years, therefore, would Jerome have kept silence after it, if he had written against John at the close of the year 399 or in the year 400.

[652] Further from the truth have those strayed who fixed the book against John in the year 392 or 393, That book was not written in the year 392 or 393, because they believed that by the words just alleged, the sun being darkened, etc., an eclipse of the sun is indicated, and they find such an eclipse in those years. But it is clear enough from what has been related that that controversy began later, and that the book was written much later. And by those words the sun being darkened I do not judge that an eclipse is signified. For since the darkening of the sun by an eclipse, that is, by the interposition of the moon, is ordinary and is foreknown by astronomers, it would not have induced so much fear that the whole world dreaded the Judge as now about to come. It will have been, then, an extraordinary darkening of the sun which struck in so great a dread: and thus those words do not bear on the matter.

[653] Tillemont in Notes 42 and 52 fixes the book against John in the year 396 as it ran to its close, nor at the close of the year 396, because he believed that concord was established before Rufinus departed for Rome in the year 397. But his whole chronology is distorted and contrary to all the chronological notes adduced above. Against the said date are the nearly ten years which had run out after the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes, and, as he himself confesses, the thirteen years in which Jerome had dwelt in Palestine. He objects that solemn saying of his, that Jerome is not accurate in reckoning years. But I am rather compelled to believe that Tillemont's dialectic is not accurate, than that Jerome wrote thirteen for eleven and said ten for eight. There is added the three years in which he kept silence as regards John's Apology, begun about June of the year 396 and ended at the close of the year 398. Those three years he refers to the beginning of the controversy, which he begins in the year 394. But neither does Jerome seem in the year 394 to have been mixed up in the controversy which then was between Epiphanius and John, nor does he say that he had always kept silence about it, but that he had kept silence as regards the Apology which he was then setting about to examine. Wherefore Tillemont has only one argument for his opinion,

namely that he believed John and Rufinus were reconciled with Jerome at the same time. This he believed so certain that I do not find that he anywhere tried to prove it. I have already at number 644 alleged reasons for the contrary: and these are confirmed by the date of the writing of the book against John.

[654] But what he brings forward in Note 52 proves nothing for either side. for which there is no notable reason. Jerome says that St. Epiphanius was bidden by John through the archdeacon to keep silence. Then he subjoins at number 14: He thereafter through the whole three years swallows his own injuries, and, despising a private quarrel, demands only the correction of the faith. It is not established at what time that was done, and therefore it cannot help toward accurately putting together a chronology. But certainly it was not done at the beginning of the controversy, as Tillemont seems to infer. For Epiphanius long laboured to tear John away from the errors to which he believed him to adhere. But after that deed he seems to have broken communion with John, and afterwards to have kept silence. Certainly a little after Jerome says that it was known to him and his what Epiphanius thought about John's discourse: To whom, he says, he came, disturbed by your words and half dead, saying that he had rashly communicated. And being asked by the whole monastery to return to you from Bethlehem, unable to bear the prayers of so many, he so returned in the evening that at midnight he fled away. These things sufficiently indicate that St. Epiphanius broke communion at that time, after he had been able neither by letters nor by conversations to move John to declare his opinion against the errors of Origen. Then too he will have written to the monks not rashly to communicate with John, from whose communion they had not before withdrawn. The time is not otherwise known. But since the saint says above, thereafter through the whole three years, by which he in all likelihood intimates a complete three years, we conjecture that these things happened at the close of the year 395, and this agrees with the words related at number 618, by which the dissension is said to have been in full force when Fabiola was departing from Palestine at the close of the year 395.

[655] In that book the saint refuted John's Apology, It remains that we say a few things about the book itself, since very much has already been recited from it. Jerome was writing this book at the exhortation of Pammachius, who in all likelihood had by then learned that the Apology for Origen had been translated by Rufinus, and perhaps also Origen's books on First Principles, and therefore could the more exhort Jerome to write against the favourers of Origen. And in that book he undertook to refute John's Apology, by which he had striven to persuade men that he was a Catholic, and that his faith had been made suspect by Epiphanius, Jerome and the other monks for no other cause than that he had disapproved the ordination of Paulinian made by Epiphanius. John had inserted in his writing many complaints about the monks, attacking these more than St. Epiphanius, whom Jerome and the other monks followed as their leader. St. Jerome answers everything; but chiefly he endeavours to prove that John did not give in his Apology a clear confession of faith, nor answer all the heads of heresy objected to him by St. Epiphanius, nowhere accusing John of heresy, yet condemning his tergiversation, in that, though asked in Palestine, he had never been willing to answer St. Epiphanius, but had had recourse to Theophilus of Alexandria, and to him, insufficiently instructed about the state of the controversy, had answered one thing for another. Rufinus, whom St. Epiphanius had accused by name, Jerome does not name in the whole book, yet once designates him by the leader of the army, to whom Isidore in the year 396 wrote the letter which by an error was carried to the presbyter Vincentius. For that that leader was Rufinus, Jerome afterwards indicated in book 3 against Rufinus, number 6. But no one could know this from the book against John except those who had seen the Epistle; so that Jerome seems then wholly to have spared Rufinus on account of his friendship restored with him.

[656] and shows that his confession of faith was ambiguous: Jerome indeed frequently stings John for his tergiversation, and everywhere so sifts his ambiguous sayings as to show that the same things could be said by a man infected with Origen's errors. Yet how diligently he guards against seeming to judge of what is within, I shall briefly show. From the beginning he declares that it is perilous to judge of another's mind, and to investigate and set forth the reason of each of his sayings and words. Presently at number 2: Certainly if there is no suspicion of heresy (as I desire and believe), why does he not speak my meaning in my words? What he calls simplicity I interpret as malice. He wishes to persuade me that he believes purely: let him then speak purely too. He brings forward many like things by way of objection; but nowhere does he call him a heretic, nowhere does he charge his words with heresy. But he only sets forth in what sense they could be said by Origenists. And that this alone is treated of in that book he declares again at number 22, hinting at the same time that he will one day write against Origen, in these words: It is not the time to write against the doctrines of Origen: we shall dedicate that to another Work, if Christ shall give us life. Now it is asked whether he who is accused has answered the questions, and whether his answer is simple and open. A Work against Origen, such as he thought of writing one day, he seems never to have written. Yet he declared himself strongly against Origen and the Origenists in Epistle 84, and not rarely disputed against them in his Commentaries on the Prophets, and in other writings too.

[657] For the rest, some judge that the book is not finished; it seems altogether complete. and Tillemont suspects that it was not finished because peace was composed by Theophilus's agency before the book was completed. Vallarsius thinks it not improbable that its last part, and that a very small one, has perished. But I by no means see that the book is either unfinished or mutilated. For he examines John's answers about faith down to article 37 in the Veronese edition; and there he intimates that he is passing on to his objections against the monks, which he only briefly refutes, and at the end touches briefly upon many things. What is lacking I do not find. The ending can somehow seem abrupt: but I find the same in several other little works of Jerome, so that from this I cannot certainly conclude that the book is either unfinished or mutilated. Vallarsius finally judges that this book was not seen by Rufinus when he wrote against St. Jerome. This I shall readily believe, since it reached Rome after Rufinus had departed thence, who does not attack that book, even though he touches on some things contained in it too: but he could have known these from elsewhere. Yet the chief reason why it escaped Rufinus will perhaps be that at first it was communicated only to Jerome's friends.

[658] But as regards the end of the controversy, it is not sufficiently clear The concord between John and Jerome, by whose intervention concord was at last established. Most judge that this was done by Theophilus's agency, but without any certain argument. That conjecture may indeed be true. Yet perhaps John himself set his mind to making peace; either because he understood how great was the offence of the Romans on account of Origen's books on First Principles, which Rufinus made Latin at Rome in the year 398; or because he perceived that his faith was becoming suspect to many, and that the suspicion had not been removed by his former Apology to Theophilus; or because he had better learned Origen's errors during the dissension; or from some other cause unknown to us. Rufinus himself, when he saw that he had incurred the offence of the Romans, could have persuaded John to renew his friendship with St. Jerome: for he said that it was by Jerome's example that he translated Origen's writings. Whatever the cause may have been, about the year 399 all dissension ceased, and John restored his friendship not only to Jerome and the monks, but also gave satisfaction to St. Epiphanius, since no discord remained between them. If Theophilus reconciled the concord, it will in all likelihood have been established when he himself began sharply to persecute the Origenists, that is, about the year 400. For Jerome's Epistle 63 (elsewhere 68) to Theophilus does not seem to have been given long before that persecution of the Origenists, and not yet was all dissension between Jerome and John removed when it was given; or at any rate Theophilus, when he wrote to Jerome, did not know that concord had been made, since he admonished him about keeping the canons.

[659] What Theophilus's Epistle was like is in some measure gathered from Jerome's, about the establishing of which about 399 he wrote again which I subjoin entire: Your beatitude remembers that at that time in which you kept silence [\] with us, my speech never ceased from its duties: nor did I consider what you were then doing by way of management, but what it befitted me to do. And now, having received the letters of your condescension, I see that I have gathered some fruit of the Evangelical reading. For if the frequent petition of a woman bent the sentence of a hard judge, how much more are a father's bowels softened by assiduous entreaty?* This modest complaint about Theophilus's silence intimates that he, after one Epistle (or perhaps several) to Jerome, in which he had striven to stir the saint to concord with John, did not for a long time answer Jerome's letters, while Jerome nevertheless sent from time to time dutiful Epistles, which have perished: but that at length Theophilus, perhaps in the year 399, wrote again to Jerome a Letter, to which he answers, and that about establishing concord with John: for I do not see why he should otherwise have admonished him about the canons. And so this Epistle, from Theophilus's long silence, must be fixed a notable time after the 82nd to Theophilus, given at the close of the year 396, and can easily belong to the year 399.

[660] Theophilus, as is known from Jerome's answer, Jerome in it thus continues: That you admonish us about the ecclesiastical canons, we give thanks. "For whom the Lord loves he chastens, and scourges every son whom he receives". But yet know that we hold nothing more ancient than to keep the rights of Christ, and not to remove the landmarks of the fathers, and always to remember the Roman faith, praised by an Apostolic mouth, of which the Alexandrian church glories that it is a partaker. From these words, and more from what follows, I suspect that Theophilus in his letter had declared his own opinion about the Origenists, but had added that he patiently hoped for their correction. For the saint continues thus: That you bear much patience toward the nefarious heresy, and think that those brooding upon the vitals of the Church can be corrected by your gentleness, displeases many holy men: lest, while you wait for the penitence of a few, you should nourish the boldness of the lost, and the faction should become stronger. Farewell in Christ. Jerome would not have written this, unless Theophilus in his Epistle had opened his mind. And of that Epistle of Theophilus, which has perished, Jerome seems to speak in Epistle 86 (elsewhere 70) to Theophilus, who was then acting openly against the Origenists, which he thus begins: Lately I received the writings of your beatitude, amending your old silence and provoking me to my accustomed duty.

[661] when not long after Jerome wrote again, Whence, although through the holy brethren Priscus and Eubulus your discourse to us has ceased, yet, because we have seen them, stirred by zeal for the faith, hastily traverse the regions of Palestine and pursue the scattered serpents even to their lurking-places, we write briefly that the whole world exults and glories in your victories: and that the standard of the cross has been raised at Alexandria, and trophies against heresy

shining, so that the rejoicing throng of the peoples may look on. Well done for your virtue, well done for your zeal for the faith. You have shown that your silence until now was management, not consent. For I speak freely to your reverence. We grieved that you were too patient, and, not knowing the helm of the master, we were eager for the destruction of the lost. But, as I see, you lifted your hand long and suspended the blow, that you might strike the harder. To Theophilus's writings, amending his old silence, he answered by the Epistle given above, in which he speaks modestly of that silence, and complains of Theophilus's patience toward the nefarious heresy. This complaint he here excuses and amends. And so, since he says that he had lately received those writings of Theophilus, it becomes clear that that Epistle 63, by which he answered them, was not given many months before this one, in which he mentions again their receipt. Both can belong to the same year: yet I should prefer to conjecture that the former is of the year 399, the latter of the following one.

[662] But the concord between Jerome and John was complete when Jerome wrote the latter, had been reconciled, and was then complete: since he subjoins the following words: Concerning the receiving of a certain man you ought not to be aggrieved against the pontiff of this city (Jerusalem—that is, John), because you enjoined nothing in your letters: and it was rash to pass sentence about what he did not know. Yet I judge that he neither dares nor wishes to wound you in anything. By these words he excuses John to Theophilus: nor is he afterwards read to have complained of him in a single word. Besides, it is established that Theophilus in the year 400 wrote a Synodical letter to the bishops of Palestine against the Origenists, and among them to John, and that he with the rest wrote back. Both Epistles are had among the Hieronymian ones in the Veronese edition, where the first is the 92nd, the other the 93rd: and both are believed to have been translated by Jerome into the Latin tongue. Other indications of a complete reconciliation are that Jerome in the books against Rufinus does not intimate even the least complaint about John, although he is from time to time compelled to name him; and that John was present at St. Paula's death in the year 404, as Jerome testifies in her Epitaph, number 28. Nay, that Jerome presided over the parish at Bethlehem Posthumianus seems to say, who at the beginning of the fifth century was there with Jerome, in Sulpicius Severus, book 1 of the Dialogues, chapter 8, in these words: The church of that place the presbyter Jerome rules: for the parish belongs to the bishop who holds Jerusalem. Tillemont so expounded the passage as not to distinguish the church from the parish. I rather judge that by church the monastery is understood, as that word is elsewhere not rarely taken; and that Posthumianus means that the monastery is ruled by Jerome, and the parish by a presbyter of the bishop of Jerusalem; as Jerome clearly declares was certainly the case before, in the book against John, number 42.

[663] From what has been said it is abundantly clear that friendship was restored between Jerome and John about the year 399. the thing accomplished about the year 399. But I prefer to be ignorant by whose agency that thing was accomplished, rather than to attribute that praise, by uncertain conjectures, either to Theophilus or to anyone else. Tillemont in article 81 observes that by Palladius in the Lausiac History, chapter 118, that glory is attributed to Rufinus and Melania: but what Palladius says is obscure, calling it the schism of Paulinus. But that we must read of Paulinian, as Tillemont will have it, I shall not readily believe, so that the matter does not concern us at all. For the rest, I should like briefly to observe that from the dissension with John arose Jerome's friendship with Theophilus, with whom before he seems to have had no commerce; and that Theophilus was chiefly urged by Jerome to root out the errors of Origen. That endeavour of Theophilus's was certainly praiseworthy: for what certain moderns, and by name Tillemont in many places, have contended, that there were no followers of Origen's errors, appears to me so absurd that it does not deserve refutation. It would, however, be another question whether John of Jerusalem ever followed the errors of Origen, or at any rate adhered to them so obstinately as to contract grave guilt. Neither did Jerome say; nor shall I say, nor can I. What Jerome afterwards did on Theophilus's behalf I shall examine in the course of this work.

[664] But here I shall briefly inquire who that man was, concerning whose reception the saint excuses John to Theophilus. Paul, deprived of his priesthood, he then received into hospitality I can scarcely doubt that it is Paul, who was for some time in St. Jerome's monastery, because he had been condemned by Theophilus and cast out of his see, we know not for what cause. On that account Rufinus charged St. Jerome in a letter never published, which the saint refutes in the third book against Rufinus. Of these things at number 17 he says, addressing Rufinus: Further, as to your asking when I began to follow the opinion of father Theophilus and to be joined to him in communion of faith, you answer yourself: "Then, I believe, when you were defending with the greatest effort and with all zeal Paul, whom he had condemned, when you were urging him to recover by an imperial rescript the priesthood which he had lost by episcopal judgment". To this objection of Rufinus Jerome first complains that he insults the wretched Paul, who was at least a presbyter, and more probably a bishop, as the word priesthood intimates. That Paul was not one of the followers of Origen's errors Jerome declares in these words: Either I am mistaken, or that is true which very many bandy about, that in him you persecute the enemies of the Origenists, and under the occasion of one man (Paul) rage against both (namely Paul and Theophilus). Presently he also hints that the justice of the sentence passed against Paul was not established for him, writing this: Nor do I say this as judging of the sentences of bishops, or as desiring their decrees to be rescinded: but that each one should do at his own peril what seems good to him, and should himself know how his own judgment is to be judged.

[665] Jerome, and defends the deed against Rufinus. In our monastery hospitality is our care, and we receive all who come to us with a glad countenance of kindness. For we fear lest Mary with Joseph should find no place in the inn, lest Jesus, shut out, should say to us: "I was a stranger, and you took me not in". Heretics alone we do not receive, whom you alone receive. For our purpose is to wash the feet of those who come, not to sift their merits. Remember, brother, his confession, and the breast which the scourges cut. Remember the prison, the darkness, the exile, the mines, and you will not be indignant that a passing traveller was received into hospitality. Do we seem to you rebels for this, that we hold out a cup of cold water in the name of Christ to the thirsty? Do you wish to know why we ought to love him the more and you to hate him the more? The faction of the heretics, lately put to flight from Egypt and Alexandria, betook itself to Jerusalem, and wished to be joined to him, so that, since their grief was one, their accusation (against Theophilus) might become one. These he repelled, spurned, cast off, saying that he was no enemy of the faith, nor did he undertake war against the Church: that what he had earlier attempted was of grief, not of perfidy: nor had he assailed another's innocence, but had wished to prove his own. Do you think an imperial rescript impious after the sentence of priests? Of what sort it is, let him know who obtained it. Thus far about Paul, in all likelihood a bishop, who under the Arians or under Julian could have suffered for the faith all those things which Jerome reckons. His reception did not break Jerome's friendship with Theophilus, since that was continued down to the year 405, when it seems to have been broken on account of the persecution of St. John Chrysostom. Yet that very reception and this answer show that Jerome was not so tenacious of Theophilus's friendship as to be willing for his sake to abstain from good works.

\ elsewhere, faultily, maneas*

§ XL. Rufinus departs with Melania to Rome, and translates the Apology for Origen and his books on First Principles.

Rufinus, whose friend Jerome was in his youth, At about the same time at which the dissension between Jerome and John of Jerusalem was composed, a graver war broke out against Jerome from Rufinus, who before had instigated bishop John against the saint; but in the year 397, when he wished to depart from Palestine to Rome, had restored concord with Jerome either seriously or at least in appearance. If we should wish diligently to investigate the causes of that most grave dissension, we shall easily find that there was no fault in Jerome, but that by Rufinus's crafty artifice a necessity was imposed upon the saint of doing those things by which the other blazed into such great enmities and poured out so many calumnies against the saint, that among the prudent he detracted more from his own reputation than he was able to harm St. Jerome. That the whole matter may shine out more clearly, it must be taken up further back. We saw in §6 that between Jerome and Rufinus, while both were young men, there was a friendship, and that they dwelt together for some time at Aquileia. Then in §7 I produced Jerome's most friendly letters, in which he declares to Rufinus, then living in Egypt, how much he desires to see him in Syria: both in these and in other letters to Florentius he celebrates the praises of Rufinus with a loving and liberal pen.

[667] That Rufinus answered so great a love as those Epistles declare I have never been able to find, he does not seem to have answered his friendship in kind: so that a not ill-founded suspicion arises that Rufinus was not even in his youth sincerely attached to Jerome. No more do I find that there was afterwards, from the year 375 to 386, any commerce of letters between Jerome and Rufinus. Nevertheless Jerome by no means forgot his Rufinus when he wrote the Chronicle about 381, where he makes honourable mention of him. To Rufinus, living with Melania at Jerusalem, Jerome came again beyond doubt in the year 386, when he saw Jerusalem and afterwards fixed his dwelling at Bethlehem. Tillemont in article 44 wondrously proclaims the friendship which he judges existed at that time between Jerome and Rufinus: but he alleges no fit reasons by which we can believe that the friendship was sincere, on Rufinus's part at least. For it is abundantly clear that Rufinus was among those who carped at Jerome's labours, and by name at the translation of the Old Testament from the Hebrew, and did other things already related, which suggest a plotter rather than a friend.

[668] Tillemont indeed brings forward a passage from an Epistle of St. Augustine, nor does their friendship seem afterwards the 110th among the Hieronymian letters (elsewhere 93), in which the friendship which had flourished between Jerome and Rufinus is indeed much celebrated. But it can be doubted whether St. Augustine in Africa understood what had been done between Jerome and Rufinus in Palestine. Certainly Augustine does not seem to have had a clear view of Rufinus's secret machinations against Jerome; but to have read the letters which Jerome as a young man had written to Rufinus and about Rufinus to Florentius, and other things in which their friendship was narrated. But that St. Augustine said as much about their friendship as he could conceive in his mind from the foregoing, I do not at all wonder, since he greatly grieved at the discord that had arisen, and endeavoured by his letters to urge Jerome to repair the peace. For about Rufinus's sincerity Augustine in Africa could not and ought not to judge, especially since he perhaps knew nothing of his machinations.

[669] to have been of the highest, or at least it cannot be proved To prove the friendship of Jerome and Rufinus

in Palestine, Tillemont brings forward what Rufinus in book 2, number 8, ineptly discusses in order to convict Jerome of perjury. Let us hear the acuteness of the wrathful man. Otherwise, he says, if he should deny it (that he is a perjurer), I can have as witnesses very many of the brethren, who, staying in my cells on the Mount of Olives, copied out for him very many Dialogues of Cicero, whose quires, while they were writing, I too frequently held in my hands and read over: and I learned that much larger payments were given them by him than are usual for other writings. To me too once, when he had come from Bethlehem to Jerusalem and had brought with him a manuscript in which there was one Dialogue of Cicero and that same one in the Greek of Plato—that he gave me that very manuscript, and that it was with me for some time, he can in no way deny. But why do I dwell so long on a matter clearer than the light? when to all these things which we have said above there is added also this, where every pretext fails, that, placed in the monastery at Bethlehem, not long ago he performed the office of a grammarian, and expounded his own Maro, and the comic and lyric poets, and the historians, to little boys delivered to him to learn the fear of God—forsooth that he might become a teacher of the gentile authors, whom, if he had but read them, he had sworn that he would deny Christ—in a dream, that is.

[670] from the words of Rufinus, who will have it that boys by Jerome I have adduced all the words of the inept declaimer, because they in some measure bear on St. Jerome's doings, if they are true. That this is true I readily believe, that boys were instructed in St. Jerome's monastery, and that the Dialogues of Cicero were copied out for their use by Rufinus's monks. Nor do I see why Jerome could not carry with him a Dialogue of Cicero, and the same in the Greek of Plato—whether to be copied, or when it had been copied by the monks—and hand it to Rufinus. But I do not see that a singular friendship can be inferred from these things. Certainly the much larger payments which poor Jerome paid for the copying do not intimate a great friendship. That he came once to Rufinus and handed him a Dialogue to be copied or already copied does not hint at much familiarity. Rufinus would certainly have found other things against Jerome, if he had been joined with him in intimate closeness, since it is clear that he attempted to suck poison out of any flowers of virtue whatsoever, and did not fear to betray secrets.

[671] were taught Grammar. But as regards the office of grammarian which Rufinus will have it that Jerome performed, it is not even probable that the saint daily, or at set times, undertook those duties of teaching boys, since he had other things to do, and complains that he did not have sufficient leisure for meditating the Scriptures. Would that, he says in book 1 against Rufinus, number 31, the celebrity of the place and the concourse of holy men from the whole world allowed me to read the divine Scriptures. I have no space for meditating on outside matters. Yet perhaps Rufinus did not invent the whole; but after his manner exaggerated the thing beyond the truth. The saint could, in order to encourage the boys and their masters, have from time to time explained something himself from the poets and other profane writers, and have prescribed for them better books to be read. He acknowledges in Epistle 21 to Damasus that in boys it is a matter of necessity to read the poets. But it is by no means a matter of necessity to read everything, even what is foul, in the poets. That this should not happen that most wise Master could take care.

[672] The friendship between Rufinus and Jerome, if on Rufinus's part it was sincere, A dissension arose between Rufinus, too much addicted to Origen, and Jerome, suffered much detriment because Rufinus showed himself too much addicted to Origen. Hence St. Epiphanius in his Epistle, number 6, says to John of Jerusalem: But may God free you, brother, and the holy people of Christ which is entrusted to you, and all the brethren who are with you, and above all Rufinus the presbyter, from the heresy of Origen. Rufinus had not yet translated any writings of Origen into the Latin tongue when by those words that most learned examiner of heresies, Epiphanius, declared his mind about him. Jerome, on the contrary, had made many of Origen's works Latin; and yet Epiphanius never held Jerome suspect of Origen's heresy, but was joined with him in great friendship. Those who were thus accused by Epiphanius wished to turn the accusation against St. Jerome, the Translation of Origen's writings furnishing the occasion. They therefore urged on Vigilantius, an unskilled and bold man, to reprove Jerome of the Origenian heresy to his face in Palestine, and afterwards to repeat his calumnies in Gaul. Again, in his Apology John of Jerusalem, whom Rufinus helped with counsel, accused Jerome of having turned Origen's Works into Latin, as is clear from Jerome's answer in Epistle 82 to Theophilus. And so already in Egypt and Italy and in all the provinces to which John's Apology came, and by name in Gaul through Vigilantius, St. Jerome was being traduced as an Origenist.

[673] Meanwhile Rufinus, after he had played his part through Vigilantius and John, but peace was composed before Rufinus's departure from Palestine. and had seen to it that Jerome was accused throughout almost the whole Roman world about the translated Works of Origen, thought of departing to Rome, and wished first to reconcile Jerome to himself. Peace certainly was restored, and that with difficulty, if we believe Rufinus, who in book 2 against Jerome, number 37, says that that peace was scarcely repaired with the utmost sweat. St. Jerome agrees in book 3 against Rufinus, number 33, answering Rufinus, who contended that the concord was broken by him. I come, he says, to the gravest charge, in which you accuse me of unfaithfulness after friendships were reconciled. I confess that among all the curses which you either object or threaten, nothing is so to be repelled by me as fraud, guile, unfaithfulness. For to sin belongs to man, to lay snares to the devil. Was it then for this that in the Anastasis (that is, in the church of the Resurrection at Jerusalem), the Lamb having been offered, we joined right hands, that etc. The peace made in the church, the Lamb having been offered—that is, the most holy Sacrifice of the Mass having been offered—manifestly intimates that that concord was concluded at a time in which it was lawful for Jerome to enter the churches of the diocese of Jerusalem. And so either peace was made at the same time as with John of Jerusalem, or it was made before that time in which he forbade entrance to the church to all who should call Paulinian a presbyter. The second must altogether be said: for Rufinus departed long before peace was made with John. Again at number 24 Rufinus complains thus: You gave us peace as we were setting out, and from behind hurled javelins armed with poisons. But the saint answers: We gave peace, we did not receive heresy. We joined right hands: we accompanied you as you went away, that you might be Catholics, not that we might be heretics. Rufinus, who with the elder Melania

[674] About the year in which Rufinus set out from Palestine to Rome the learned do not agree, some determining the year 396, others, and those the more numerous, referring his journey to the year 397, and some improbably looking to 398. This last opinion I have called improbable, because St. Siricius the Pope died in the year 398, on the 26th day of November. For thus Rufinus would have been at Rome only a few months while Siricius was alive. But from the deeds to be related it is established that he stayed there a long time, yet departed before the death of Siricius. It remains, therefore, only to inquire whether he departed from Palestine and came to Rome in the year 396 or 397. Another doubt is whether the elder Melania set out with Rufinus at the same time, and before, into Egypt and Palestine, and returned with him into Italy. Tillemont in various places declares as certain that Melania set out for Egypt before Rufinus, and returned to Italy after Rufinus. But he attempts to arrange the chronology of the elder Melania in volume 10, Note 2 on the elder Melania, where in my judgment at least he embraces an opinion altogether improbable, and such as is repugnant to absolutely all the ancients whom he praises. Even so, however, that opinion of Tillemont's has had learned followers. But I candidly declare that I have no doubt that Melania and Rufinus sailed together into Egypt, and thence came into Palestine, and together in the year 396 or 397 returned into Italy.

[675] was in Egypt in the year 374, Tillemont confesses that by St. Jerome in the Chronicle Melania's journey into Palestine is fixed in the year 374. But against this date he discusses at length from Palladius's Lausiac History, which we shall examine much more briefly. Meanwhile, that Rufinus too came into Egypt at the same time is clear from Jerome's Epistle 3, which he wrote to him from Antioch, as was said at number 123. For he wrote the Epistle in mid-summer, and wrote it when he had certainly learned of Rufinus's arrival, so that Rufinus will have sailed from Italy at the close of the year 373 or in the earlier months of the year 374, and have come with Melania into Egypt. In Epistle 4, written at the same time, Jerome believed that Rufinus had come with the holy Melania from Egypt to Jerusalem. This was not yet true. But how could Jerome believe that they would come together, unless he had known that they had departed together? St. Paulinus agrees, in Epistle 29 of the latest edition (elsewhere 10) to Severus, where at number 6 he says of Melania returned from the East: We received the holy woman herself (Melania) returning from Jerusalem after five lustres. Five lustres indicate nearly twenty-five years. But it is not necessary that the fifth lustre be complete, so that Paulinus could speak thus of twenty-three or twenty-four years, as the ancients everywhere speak of years, even though the last is only begun. And so I do not doubt that Melania departed with Rufinus at the close of the year 373, and returned with him in the year 397, in which we shall fix Rufinus's return. For in Epistle 28 (elsewhere 9) too St. Paulinus calls Rufinus the presbyter the spiritual companion on the way of the holy Melania. For the rest, these two Epistles, on account of Tillemont's blunders, which the editor followed, have been torn away from their just date.

[676] had departed thither from Rome with her in the year 373, But that Melania departed with Rufinus rather at the close of the year 373 than in the year 374 I gather from Jerome's Epistle 39 (elsewhere 25) to Paula, in which at number 4 he praises Melania's constancy at the death of her husband and two sons, and then subjoins: Nay, with what mind she despised them she proved afterwards in her only son, to whom, having yielded all the possessions she had, she sailed to Jerusalem when winter was already coming on. If she sailed when winter was already coming on, it is necessary that she sailed at the close of the year 373. For in the middle of the summer of the year 374 Jerome, sick at Antioch, had learned for certain that Rufinus had come into Egypt, and believed that he would by then be with Melania in Palestine. Even before that he had heard rumours of Rufinus's arrival in Egypt. What Tillemont set against these things from Palladius is nothing, provided we take away the idea he himself added. Palladius, praising in general the hospitality of Melania, says: For thirty-seven

years, receiving guests, she furnished them at her own expense with the things they needed, etc. Whether Tillemont dreamed sleeping or waking that the thirty-seven years in which Melania exercised hospitality must be understood of her sojourn in Egypt and Palestine, I shall not declare; but I have no hesitation in saying that it is a mere dream; since Melania after her husband's death could exercise hospitality at Rome no less than in Egypt and Palestine.

[677] But what Palladius says before of Melania and Rufinus together: and, many years having been passed in Palestine, returned with her. And for twenty-seven years they received those who came to Jerusalem for the sake of a vow—cannot help Tillemont. For this writer fixes Rufinus's journey into Egypt in the year 374, and makes Rufinus dwell six years in Egypt, and at last brings him out of Palestine in the year 397. From the year 374 to 397 we have twenty-three years; how then did Rufinus exercise hospitality at Jerusalem for twenty-seven years, especially if he remained six years in Egypt? These things I observe for the sake of those who with Tillemont follow Palladius, a by no means accurate writer, against Jerome and Paulinus, who are far more exact. But Tillemont from his dream about the thirty-seven years passed by Melania in Egypt and Palestine deduces many other things after his manner: namely that she departed from Rome about 366, remained ten years in Egypt, came into Palestine in the year 376, returned to Italy in the year 402, to Rome in 403. He adds many things about Melania's kinsfolk, which do not seem more certain; but these I do not examine. I shall say candidly, however, that almost everything which Tillemont discusses in his six annotations on the elder Melania, being deduced from a faulty chronology, seems faulty. If he had at least accurately followed the less accurate guide whom he chose, he would have seen that the same twenty-seven years are attributed to Melania and to Rufinus in Palestine; and consequently that their departure must be fixed at the same time, even from Palladius. But, leaving these things, let us inquire into the time at which Rufinus returned with Melania.

[678] I have already advised that Rufinus departed at the close of the year 373, Rufinus came to Rome before the year 398, as is clear after Jerome had in the same year departed by another road into Syria. Five lustres, therefore, can lead to the year 398. But before the death of Pope Siricius, who died in the year 398 on the 26th of November, Rufinus was at Rome longer than that his arrival could be fixed in the same year. This is proved still more certainly from Rufinus's words in the Preface to book 3 of Origen's On First Principles, where he says that in the days of Lent the first two books on First Principles were translated by him. For the bulk of that work compels us to say that he had been at Rome already before Lent; and since he had translated other things before, as we shall see, that he came thither from the year 397 at least. Again in the same Preface he continues thus: But since in those days you too, religious brother Macarius, both remained [\] near at hand and were more at leisure, I too worked the more. But these two latter ones (the third and fourth) we unfolded more slowly, since you come to us more rarely as an exactor from the farthest and uttermost part of the City.* From these words we can conjecture that two or three months were spent on these later books. But since they were begun about Easter, which in the year 398 was celebrated in the month of April, we believe they were finished about June or July, that is, four or five months before the death of Pope Siricius. But even if they had been finished only in the month of September, Rufinus could have left Rome before Siricius's death: for Rome was already in a tumult against him on account of the earlier books when he wrote the Preface to these last ones, as he there confesses. And so there is no doubt that the Version of the books on First Principles must be fixed in the year 398, and that in the same year Rufinus left Rome.

[679] from the Works written there, which he must have begun from the year 397; Now before the version of the books on First Principles Rufinus worked out at Rome other little works for Origen, and those of such bulk that he must have begun those Works at least in the year 397, if perhaps he did not finish them before the year 398, as becomes likely enough. The first was the Greek Apology for Origen, which he attributed to St. Pamphilus and made Latin, as it is published in Martianay, volume 5, from column 219, where Rufinus thus prefaces it to Macarius, who had asked for that Work: Moved by love of knowing the truth, O man of desires, Macarius, you enjoin on me a thing which may confer on you the grace of the truth known: yet for me I do not doubt that it will procure the greatest offence of those who think themselves wounded by anyone who has not thought something ill of Origen. After the translated Apology Rufinus set about weaving by his own labour another Apology for Origen, published in the same place from column 249, in which he confesses that certain things are found in Origen's writings contrary to the rest, and such as the rule of truth does not admit: which we too, he says, neither receive nor approve. But he contends that all these were stuffed into Origen's Works by heretics. Of both Apologies Rufinus makes mention in the Preface of the first book on First Principles.

[680] and from the same it is also gathered that he did not come Since from Rufinus's Works it is clear that he was at Rome from the year 397, from the same it must equally be proved that he did not come to Rome before the said year. Rufinus in book 1 of the Invectives, number 9, so narrates the occasion of translating Origen's Apology and afterwards the other little works, that he at the same time intimates that the first was begun not long after his own arrival. A man, he says, famous for faith, learning, nobility, and life, Macarius, when he had in hand little works against fate or astrology, and was composing them with useful and most necessary sweat, but in some points, because the matter was most difficult, was hesitating to discuss the dispensations of divine providence, said that in his sleep something of this kind was shown him by the Lord: that a certain ship was shown him coming from afar over the sea; which, when it had entered harbour, would loose the knots of his hesitation. And rising, when he was thinking anxiously about the vision, he said that we came upon him at that very time. To whom at once he indicated both his little works and his ambiguity and his vision. Further, he asks what Origen, whom he had heard to be most famous among the Greeks, thought about such matters, and begs that his opinions on each point be briefly set forth to him. I at first said that the thing was difficult to do: yet I said that the holy martyr Pamphilus had in some measure composed something of such a Work in his Apologetic. At once he demands that this be turned into Latin for him. I said that I had had no practice in a work of this kind, and that by an almost thirty years' neglect I had grown torpid as regards the Latin tongue. Yet he persisted, entreating that in whatever speech only the knowledge of what he desired be shown him.

[681] to Rome before the year 397; And when I had done this in such speech as I could, he was kindled with a greater desire to know more fully those very things from which the few passages I had translated seemed to have been taken. He began to press me more vehemently as I excused myself, and to adjure me under the fear of God not to deny him such helps as could assist him toward a good work. And when he insisted vehemently, and I perceived that his desire was according to God, I at length acquiesced, and translated. This whole account of Rufinus's about the cause of his translating—whether it be true and simply related, or was sought out to avert or mitigate the ill-will of the translation—abundantly intimates that Rufinus did not stay long at Rome before he began to translate the Apology. And so, since that work is not of such bulk that it could not be finished in a few months, even though in all likelihood Rufinus proceeded slowly at first, there is no probable reason for saying that he came to Rome before the year 397. That date is confirmed from the journey of Eusebius of Cremona, who departed about the Easter of the year 398 to Rome a year after Rufinus's voyage, as Jerome testifies in book 3 against Rufinus, number 24: likewise from the journey of another Rufinus, who sailed two years after. For of this Rufinus's journey Jerome writes to Rufinus of Aquileia himself in Epistle 81 (elsewhere 66), when the saint already knew everything which Rufinus had translated at Rome, so that we cannot fix that Epistle before the year 399. And so everything hangs together prettily, if Rufinus's journey be fixed in the year 397, Eusebius's in the following year about Easter, and at last that of the other Rufinus in the year 399.

[682] The one reason of those who would have it that Rufinus came to Rome from the year 396 nor is there any reason for the year 396. is both false and would prove nothing even if it were true. For they believed that the Epistle just praised, in which the departure of the other Rufinus is asserted, was written while the first Rufinus was still at Rome, and thence infer that Rufinus stayed two years at Rome, namely from the year 396 to 398. But in that very Epistle Jerome intimates that Rufinus's departure was established for him. My brother Paulinian, he says, has not yet returned from our fatherland, and I think that you saw him at Aquileia with the holy father Chromatius. Jerome knew, therefore, that Rufinus had set out from Rome to Aquileia: for otherwise he could not have seen Paulinian there. The very beginning of the Epistle, from which they gathered the contrary, also sufficiently hints at this, since it runs thus: That you stayed long at Rome, common report has indicated. Nor do I doubt that you, whom your mother's mourning forbade to go, were recalled to your fatherland by longing for your spiritual parents, lest you should grieve more in their presence for what, being absent, you could scarcely bear. These things, I say, indicate that Rufinus, after he had stayed long at Rome, departed thence to Aquileia, where his spiritual parents were. He will have been at Rome, then, perhaps for a year, or for a year and some months. Yet if Jerome, which he does not say, clearly declared that Rufinus stayed two years at Rome, it would not be necessary to understand a complete two years, but one begun would be found from May or June of the year 397 to October or November of the following year.

\ elsewhere monebas*

§ XLI. The offence which arose at Rome against Rufinus: Jerome, admonished by friends about the praises of Rufinus, by which he was becoming suspect, admonishes Rufinus in friendly fashion, and in other letters declares his mind against the errors of Origen.

Rufinus foresaw that tumults would arise from his version, When Rufinus undertook to translate Origen's Apology, he was not ignorant that many would be offended by that translation, since he declares it in the Preface itself. Still more did he know it when he set about the books on First Principles. For in the first Preface to these he speaks thus: But I have given this warning in the Preface lest perhaps the calumniators should think that they have again found matter for accusation. But let perverse and contentious men see to what they do. We meanwhile have undertaken so great a labour … not that we may shut the mouth of the calumnious (which cannot be done,

though perhaps God will do even this), but that we may furnish material to those who wish to advance in the knowledge of things. In the Preface to books 3 and 4 he alleges experience as witness, writing thus: But if you remember what I advised in the earlier little Preface, that some would be indignant if they heard us not speaking ill of Origen in some measure, you have, I think, straightway proved that this followed. But if in that Work those demons who stir up the tongues of men to speak ill were so inflamed—in a work in which he had not yet fully laid bare their secrets—what do you think will happen in this, in which he will reveal all their blind and hidden ways, by which they creep into human hearts and deceive weak and frail souls? You will at once see everything thrown into confusion, seditions stirred up, cries spread through the whole City, and him called to condemnation who by the light of the evangelical lamp has attempted to put to flight the darkness of diabolical ignorance. But let him make little of these things who desires, with the rule of the Catholic faith kept safe, to be exercised in divine learning. These things prove both that Rufinus foresaw, and that in the event he experienced, how great tumults that translation stirred up at Rome.

[684] but in it he corrected the errors against the Holy Trinity, not the rest. Then he advises that he had passed over or corrected those things which seemed contrary to his other opinions and to our faith—namely, as is gathered from the first Preface, what had been said not rightly about the Trinity, or favouring the Arians. But then he goes on thus: But as regards rational creatures (that is, men and angels), if he has seemed to say anything new, because the sum of faith does not lie in this, for the sake of knowledge and of exercise—since perhaps we must necessarily answer certain heresies in such an order—I have passed nothing over either in these little books or in the earlier ones, except that if perhaps he wished to repeat in these later books things said in the earlier ones, and for brevity's sake I thought it convenient to cut some of them out. Yet if anyone shall read these things with the zeal of profiting and not of disparaging, he will do more rightly if he wishes them to be expounded to him by more skilled men. These things altogether intimate that those errors which Rufinus left in his Translation—namely about souls, angels, and various matters pertaining to men and to good and bad angels—were left by him because, as he would have it, the sum of faith does not lie in this. And so he seems to have held the errors of Origen which had not been condemned in other heretics not for errors, but for new opinions, and those sometimes necessary against certain heresies.

[685] Among the first who set themselves against the impiety at Rome St. Marcella, seeing that Origen's errors pleased many, was St. Marcella, whom on that account Jerome celebrates with deserved praises in her Epitaph, that is, in Epistle 127 (elsewhere 16) to Principia, where at number 9 he has it thus: A heretical tempest arisen in these provinces (Palestine and Egypt) threw everything into confusion: and was stirred to such madness that it spared neither itself nor any of the good. And, as though it were too little to have set everything here in motion, it brought a ship full of blasphemies into the Roman harbour. (He alludes to Macarius's dream related at number 680.) And at once the dish found its cover, and muddy feet mingled the purest fountain of the Roman faith with filth… Then came the infamous interpretation of the books περὶ ἀρχῶν: then the disciple ὄλβιος (Macarius), truly worthy of his name, if he had not fallen upon such a master: then came the loose gainsaying of our own men, and the school of the Pharisees was thrown into confusion. Then the holy Marcella, who had long restrained herself lest she should seem to do anything out of rivalry, after she perceived that the faith praised by an Apostolic mouth was being violated in very many, so that he was drawing even priests and some of the monks, and above all men of the world, into agreement with him, and was mocking the simplicity of the Bishop, who judged the rest by his own disposition—publicly resisted, preferring to please God rather than men… The heretics, seeing that from a small spark the greatest fires were being kindled, and that the flame long since laid beneath had now reached the roof, and that what had deceived many could not be hidden, ask and obtain ecclesiastical letters, that they might seem to have departed in communion with the Church. Not much time intervenes; there succeeds to the pontificate that distinguished man Anastasius, etc.

[686] But in what way St. Marcella publicly resisted the followers of Origen he presently declares in these words: sets herself against them, and by her doing Rufinus's Translation is condemned. This was the beginning of the heretics' condemnation: that she brought forward witnesses who had first been instructed by them and afterwards had been seized by the heretical error [\]: that she showed the multitude of the deceived: that she thrust forward the impious volumes περὶ ἀρχῶν, which were shown as emended by the hand of the scorpion [\]: that the heretics, summoned by frequent letters to defend themselves, did not dare to come, and so great was the force of conscience that they preferred to be condemned in absence rather than to be convicted when present. By these few words Jerome intimates that Rufinus's interpretation was condemned by Pope Anastasius, St. Marcella above all others acting against it, who for this cause is called Jezebel by that most modest man Rufinus. From what has gone before it is likewise clear that Rufinus departed from Rome before the death of Pope Siricius, and had received ecclesiastical letters from him, in which he afterwards gloried, as though he could not be condemned by Anastasius, because he had not been condemned by Siricius before the hearing of the cause. But that condemnation of Rufinus's Translation did not follow at once, but only in the year 400 or 401.

[687] Since he had foreseen that no slight tempest could arise against the Translation of the books περὶ ἀρχῶν, that is, On First Principles, Since Rufinus so used the authority of Jerome, who praised Origen, he wished to use the authority of Jerome to commend Origen, and wrote this in the Preface: I know that very many of the brethren, provoked by the desire of the knowledge of the Scriptures, have demanded of several men skilled also in Greek letters that they should make Origen a Roman, and bestow him upon Latin ears. Among whom our brother and colleague too, at the entreaty of Bishop Damasus, when he had translated two Homilies on the Song of Songs into Latin from the Greek, so ornately and magnificently prefaced that Work as to stir up in anyone the desire of reading Origen and of seeking him out most eagerly, saying that to his soul belongs that which is said, "the King has brought me into his chamber": asserting that, though in his other books he surpasses all men, in the Song of Songs he surpassed even himself. Indeed he promises in that very Preface that he will bestow both those books on the Song of Songs and very many others of Origen upon Roman ears. But he, as I see, pleasing himself in his own style, follows a matter of greater glory, that he may be the father of the word rather than its translator. We therefore follow a matter begun and approved by him, but cannot adorn the sayings of so great a man with equal powers of eloquence. Whence I fear that it may happen through my fault that that man, whom he approves as the second Doctor of the Church after the Apostles by the merit of his knowledge and wisdom, should seem far inferior through the poverty of our speech.

[688] and his example, so that he could seem an Origenist, Then he says that he yields to Macarius's desire on this condition, that he follow the rule of his predecessors, and especially of that Man of whom, he says, we made mention above: who, when he had translated into Latin more than seventy little books of Origen, which he called Homiletic, and also several of the Tomes written on the Apostle—in which, though several stumbling-blocks are found in the Greek, so filed and purged everything in translating that the Latin reader finds nothing in them which differs from our faith. How apt all these things were to render Jerome suspect of the Origenian heresy anyone will easily perceive, if only he considers that he had long since been accused by Vigilantius in Palestine, and afterwards in Gaul, as addicted to Origen's errors. Likewise John of Jerusalem in his Apology had objected to Jerome the translation of Origen's writings, and that Apology had been sent in all directions, so that Jerome would by now have been called an Origenist, unless he openly and bravely declared his mind before the world.

[689] and the saint had been admonished of this by friends, His Roman friends Pammachius and Oceanus saw this, and therefore by the Epistle which is the 83rd among the Hieronymian letters (elsewhere 64) admonished the saint about the translated Work, and at the same time about the Preface, of which they have it thus: Indeed subtly in the Preface of his Work he expressed a mention of your Sanctity with the name suppressed, that he himself had completed a Work promised by you, obliquely conveying that you too think in the same way. Purge, then, the suspicions of men, and convict the accuser, lest, if you dissemble, you should seem to consent. They sent with their Epistle Rufinus's Translation of the books on First Principles, and intimated that they suspected that, to excuse Origen, many things had been withdrawn from his books which could have shown his open impiety: and for that cause they asked that he should make another Translation, and turn the said book on First Principles as it was published by the author himself.

[690] in a private Epistle to Rufinus The saint obeyed his friends, who admonished him rightly, yet in such a way that he attempted to preserve his friendship with Rufinus, so far as the necessity of answering and of proving his own faith allowed. He translated Origen's books περὶ ἀρχῶν, and wrote to Pammachius and Oceanus Epistle 84 (elsewhere 65), in which he declares his own faith and speaks strongly against the Origenists in general, but nowhere names Rufinus. Besides, since he had also received a letter from Rufinus, he answered it at the same time, treating Rufinus in friendly fashion, but complaining of his Preface. This is the already praised Epistle 81 (elsewhere 66), in which he has it thus: That you complain that everyone serves his own stomach and does not acquiesce in our judgment—the Lord is witness of our conscience that after our friendship was reconciled no rancour has intervened by which we should wound anyone: nay rather we have provided with all caution that not even chance should be turned into malevolence. Rufinus had in all likelihood complained of Jerome's friends, whom he had found opposed to him at Rome.

[691] Jerome then continues thus: But what can we do, he complains in friendly fashion of that fraud: if each one thinks that he does justly what he does, and seems to himself to bite back rather than to bite? True friendship ought not to dissemble what it feels. The little Preface to the books περὶ ἀρχῶν has been sent to me, which from the style I understood to be yours: in which obliquely—nay, openly—I am attacked. With what mind it was written, you must see; in what sense it is understood, is plain even to fools. I too, who have very often declaimed figured controversies, could repeat something of the old artifice, and praise you after your own manner. But far be it from me to imitate what I reprehend in you. Nay rather I have so tempered my judgment that I might both escape the charge objected, and, as far as in me lies, not wound a friend, though wounded myself. But I beseech you that, if hereafter you shall wish to follow someone, you should be content with your own judgment alone. For either the things we seek are good or bad. If good, they do not need another's help:

if bad, a multitude of sinners does not furnish a patronage for error. These things I have wished rather to expostulate with you as a friend than, being provoked, to rage publicly, that you may perceive that I cultivate purely a friendship reconciled, and do not, according to the Plautine saying, hold a stone in one hand and offer bread with the other.

[692] This Epistle was written either together with the longer 84th, That Epistle was written in the year 399, as also the 84th, in which the saint defends himself, or a little after, as is clear from these words: I have so tempered my judgment—namely in Epistle 84—that I might both escape the charge objected, etc. But both were written after the books περὶ ἀρχῶν had been translated, of which, when rendered into Latin, mention is made in the 84th toward the end. Both must be fixed in the year 399, both because Jerome could not have received Rufinus's Translation save at the close of the year 398 or the beginning of the following one, and the version of Origen's books needed a notable time; and because the other Rufinus, who departed two years after the man of Aquileia, that is, in the year 399, is said to have been sent by Jerome, so that in all likelihood he carried both Epistles and the books rendered into Latin to Rome. The said date seems to me quite certain; nor do I understand why Vallarsius separated those Epistles, nor can I approve his rejecting the 84th into the year 400. For what he says in it at number 3 about Epistle 18 on the Seraphim—The book is in men's hands, published twenty years ago—does not press much. For since the saint uses a round number, it is not necessary to take the twenty years so strictly. And so, since the said little work seems to have been written in the year 380 or 381, as was said at number 223, Jerome could in the year 399 attribute twenty years to it. Thus in book 3 on Isaiah he attributes about thirty years to the same little work, even though he certainly wrote the book on Isaiah before the year 410.

[693] These things about the time being briefly said, I subjoin the remaining part of the Epistle to Rufinus, by which he strove to preserve Rufinus's friendship, that the fair reader may see how much the saint strove to preserve peace with him: My brother Paulinian, he says, has not yet returned from our fatherland; and I think that you saw him at Aquileia with the holy father Chromatius. The holy presbyter Rufinus too we sent for a certain cause through Rome to Milan, and asked him to see you with our mind and respect: and we have signified the same to our other friends, lest, biting one another, you be consumed [\] one of another. It is now for your moderation and that of your friends to give no occasion to the impatient, lest you find that not all are like me, who can be delighted by figured praises.* This Epistle, which could somewhat have restrained or mitigated Rufinus's fury, was not delivered to him by Jerome's friends, and for that cause he afterwards said that it was forged.

[694] but it was not then handed to Rufinus. For in book 3 against Rufinus, number 38, he addresses Rufinus thus about it: You think too that I have invented a new falsehood, in composing under my own name an Epistle to you, as though written long ago, that I might seem good and modest—an Epistle which you never received at all. This matter can very easily be proved. Many at Rome have had copies of it these three years or so, who were unwilling to send it to you, knowing what you were bandying about concerning my name, and what things unworthy of the Christian profession and nefarious you were inventing. I wrote, not knowing, as to a friend. They did not deliver it to one whom they knew to be an enemy, sparing both my error and your conscience. And so that Epistle was indeed sent by Jerome, and proves his moderation, but could have no effect, because it was not given to Rufinus.

[695] But in another Epistle Jerome discusses in general But the other, given to Pammachius and Oceanus, in which the saint attacks the Origenists in general, but chiefly refutes the suspicion of Origenism which he saw sprinkled upon himself by Rufinus's praises, drove Rufinus into fury. Jerome thus begins it: The papers which you sent (namely Rufinus's Preface) have affected me with an honourable insult, so proclaiming my genius as to take away the truth of my faith. And because good men at Alexandria and at Rome and in almost the whole world are wont to bandy about the same things concerning my name, and love me so much that without me they cannot be heretics, I shall omit persons and answer only to things and to charges. For it profits not the cause to revile the revilers in return, and to bite adversaries with the like, when it is commanded us not to render evil for evil; but to overcome evil with good, to be sated with reproaches, and to offer the other cheek to him that strikes. Then he discusses at length, to prove that Origen's errors were never approved by him, that he had praised the man's genius and great labours, not his perverse doctrines, which he reckons up. Rufinus's assertions about the corruption of Origen's Works, and about St. Pamphilus's Apology, he so refutes as indeed not to name Rufinus, yet openly to attack his Preface, and to disapprove the version of the books on First Principles as a pernicious Work.

[696] against the Origenists, in order to clear himself. The necessity of writing thus he intimates repeatedly in the course of the work, and above all toward the end in these words: These things, most loving brethren, I have dictated to your Epistle in swift speech, overcoming my purpose, so as to write against him whose genius I had before praised, preferring to be endangered in reputation rather than in faith. This have my friends procured for me, that, if I keep silence, I be judged guilty; if I answer, an enemy. Both conditions are hard: but of two I shall choose what is the lighter: a quarrel can be made up again, blasphemy does not deserve pardon. If Rufinus had rightly considered these things, and had at the same time observed that Jerome's discourse is always directed against many, and that he was not attacked alone even under a suppressed name, he would certainly have blazed out less against the saint, upon whom he himself by his crafty praises had imposed the necessity of defending himself. This necessity Rufinus himself could have perceived, since he was by no means ignorant of what Vigilantius had bruited about Jerome in Palestine and in the West, what John of Jerusalem had written about him in his Apology, and what many in various parts of the world thought. Posthumianus in Severus, Dialogue 1, chapter 7, is a most clear witness of that opinion of many, when he narrates the tumults stirred up on account of the Origenists, and speaks thus of Jerome: This greatly moved me, that Jerome, a man most Catholic and most skilled in the sacred Law, was thought at first to have followed Origen, whom now the same man above all men condemned, and all his writings. And so both the necessity of defending himself and the Catholic faith excused Jerome; and that Epistle itself is sharp only against the Origenists, but moderate toward Rufinus.

[697] The other thing which offended Rufinus was the repeated version of the books περὶ ἀρχῶν, At the same time he translates the books on First Principles, as he indicates of which the said Jerome at the end has it thus: But what labour I have endured in translating the books περὶ ἀρχῶν I leave to your judgment: since to change anything belongs not to one who translates but to one who overturns; and to express the same word for word belongs by no means to one who wishes to preserve the charm of eloquence. In Epistle 85 (elsewhere 153) to St. Paulinus, which was sent into the West at the same time, he sets forth more fully the necessity of that version, on whose account he deferred the Commentaries on Daniel, writing this: To the first (question propounded by Paulinus) Origen answers most strongly in the books περὶ ἀρχῶν, which I lately translated at the bidding of our Pammachius: detained by which Work, I could not fulfil what I had promised you, and have again put off our Daniel. And indeed, though it was the will of Pammachius, a man most loving toward me and excellent, yet of one man only, I should have deferred it to another time, had not almost the whole brotherhood from the City demanded the same, asserting that many were in peril and were acquiescing in perverse doctrines. Whence I was compelled by necessity to translate books in which there is more evil than good: and to keep this measure, that I should neither add anything nor take away, and should preserve the Greek fidelity with Latin integrity. Copies of which you will be able to borrow from the aforesaid brother; although the Greek suffices you, and you ought not to seek the turbid rivulets of our poor little genius, you who drink from the fountains themselves.

[698] Besides, because I speak to a learned man, instructed as much in the divine Scriptures as in the letters of the world, to St. Paulinus, explaining his mind about Origen's writings, I wish your condescension to be admonished of this, that you should not think that I, after the manner of a rustic buffoon, reprobate everything which Origen wrote—which his ἀκαιροσπουδασταί (that is, his untimely partisans) charge against me; and, as though they were accusing the philosopher Dionysius, that I have suddenly changed my opinion—but only that I repudiate his perverse doctrines. For I know that they lie under an equal curse who call good things evil and those who judge evil things good; who make bitter sweet and sweet bitter. Or what is such obstinacy, so to praise anyone's teaching as to follow his blasphemy? From these words those must be corrected who, as Posthumianus just praised testifies, asserted that Jerome had before followed Origen and afterwards condemned all his writings. Both were bandied about by the lovers of Origen: both even now some moderns have bandied about, or at any rate have spoken of Jerome's change as though he had suddenly slipped from excessive love into extreme hatred. But Jerome never condemned everything of Origen's, as is clear from the words alleged. That Origen's errors never pleased Jerome either I trust I shall abundantly prove against Rufinus and his modern favourers.

[699] and answering the questions propounded by him. For the rest, in the Epistle to Paulinus the saint answers two questions propounded from sacred Scripture, or rather for the first refers him to Origen, for the second to Tertullian, to whom he adds a few things. To Paulinus's complaints about the brevity of his letters, having praised his eloquence, he replies thus: That you complain that I send small and unpolished little letters, comes not from carelessness but from fear of you, lest, speaking to you more wordily, I should send more that must be reprehended. And, to confess simply to your holy mind, in the single season for sailing to the West so many letters are demanded of me at once that, if I should wish to write back everything to each, I could not keep up. Of a little gift received he has it thus at the end: A cap small in texture but most ample in charity, for warming an old man's head, I have gladly received, rejoicing both in the gift and in the giver of the gift. From this digression we shall return to Rufinus.

\ read corrected*

\* of Rufinus

\ elsewhere consumamur*

§ XLII. Rufinus writes two books of Invectives against Jerome: his objections about Origenism are examined.

Rufinus, having received Jerome's Epistle 84, two books Rufinus was not at Rome when Pammachius there received Jerome's celebrated Epistle with the new version of the books on First Principles. Yet he quickly obtained that Epistle through Apronianus, whom I do not doubt to be the same as the Apronianus whose conversion Palladius attributes to Melania, although Tillemont wished to bring in another Apronianus, because he had made Melania dwell even then in Palestine, and therefore believed that that Apronianus was converted later. But we know nothing of another Apronianus, whom Tillemont produced solely from a faulty chronology. In what way he received that Epistle

Rufinus, he clearly shows by the two books of Invectives against Jerome which he set against a single Epistle; and he intimates the same at once in book 1 of the Invectives, beginning thus: I have read through your writings, Apronianus my dearest son, which, sent from the East by a good Friend and brother (namely Jerome) to that most noble man Pammachius, you have transmitted to me: and I remembered the Prophetic saying which says: "The sons of men, their teeth are weapons and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword". But he wished wrongly to fit this to St. Jerome, since he censured Origen's errors and the Origenists in general, lest he should seem a partner of them, and touched Rufinus in no other way than by refuting what he had brought forward in Origen's favour. After the words adduced Rufinus piously consoles himself by the example of Christ the Lord: but that piety does not agree with the rest of the Work. For, if he had wished to imitate Christ's example, or even Jerome's own, he would have contained himself within the limits of a just defence, and would not have broken out into accusing Jerome, save so far as the necessity or usefulness of defence required.

[701] of Invectives against him, He attacks first what Jerome said: I shall omit persons and answer only to things and to charges. For he contends that persons were not omitted, since, he says, throughout the whole text of his invective he ceaselessly accuses and tears the translator of the books. So great is this exaggeration that it falls little short of an open lie. So far did Jerome guard against even tacitly designating persons that scarcely anyone would have understood that Rufinus was being refuted, had not the version of the books περὶ ἀρχῶν been disapproved; and he discussed everything against the Origenists so generally that no one ought to have taken it ill, unless he first confessed that he was of their flock. Again, he says that Jerome did not answer to charges, whereas no one had objected a charge. Hence at number 2 he says: For not for curses, but for blessings and praises, he has repaid revilings and curses. But those praises, by which Jerome was becoming suspect of heresy, were as good as curses, since by them the curses of Vigilantius and others, who bandied about that Jerome was an Origenist, were strengthened. Jerome refuted not only those praises but at the same time the calumnies of others: yet he set himself against no one by name, but against the heresy and generally against the favourers of the heresy. And indeed Rufinus did not even attempt to prove that his praises were not accusations of Jerome. Nay rather he clearly confirmed that very thing by the whole of that disputation in which, partly from the praises given to Origen and partly from his writings, he wished to make him an Origenist. Wherefore no one who has rightly considered the matter will be able to say that Jerome's Epistle was too vehement, or that from it ought to have been born that most grave discord which Rufinus began on its occasion.

[702] after some complaints, contending to make him an Origenist, But here, after the Preface, he sets forth his own faith and defends the version of the books περὶ ἀρχῶν. Then at number 16 he contends that his version had been adulterated by those who, he says, were sent from the East to lay snares for me. Most grievously at number 17 he complains of St. Eusebius of Cremona, who, he says, was sent from the monastery to Rome as a man most skilled in calumniating; and presently of St. Marcella, whom he both names Jezebel and most keenly censures. Their deeds he attributes to Jerome's instigation, and makes him the head of the whole accusation. But he attacks the saint more openly at number 19, where he begins a lengthy disputation to teach that Origen's errors were openly inserted in the saint's Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians. This question, therefore, I undertake to examine here. But that the reader may perceive how improbable the accusation is, I shall first observe a few things. When Jerome had been accused of Origen's heresy by Vigilantius, in Epistle 61 to him, after other things by which he clears himself, he writes this at number 2: Read the books on the Ephesians, read my other little works, and above all the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes: and you will clearly perceive that from my youth I have never, deterred by anyone's authority, acquiesced in heretical perversity. Again in the book against John of Jerusalem, number 17, he says of a certain error of Origen: It is not the time to write against a doctrine of the gentiles and in part Platonic. Nearly ten years ago, in the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes and in the Explanation of the Epistle to the Ephesians, I think the mind of my soul was made plain to the prudent.

[703] Thirdly, in that very Epistle 84, by which he strongly declared himself against Origen, chiefly from his Commentaries on the Ephesians. he speaks thus at number 2: They object against me, why I once praised Origen. And after some things by which he excuses himself, he subjoins this: I praised the interpreter, not the doctrinaire; the genius, not the faith; the philosopher, not the apostle. But if they wish to know my judgment upon Origen: let them read the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes: let them unroll the three volumes on the Epistle to the Ephesians, and they will understand that I have always gone against his doctrines. For what folly is it so to praise his learning that you follow his blasphemy too? Now let it be permitted to reason thus. Jerome knew Origen's perverse doctrines: he knew what he had written in the Commentaries on the Ephesians: to these Commentaries he thrice sends his readers, that they may perceive that he was always opposed to Origen's perverse doctrines. By what reasoning, then, shall we believe that perverse doctrines were there adopted by Jerome, which he himself judges were there refuted, or at least rejected, by him? This surely is neither likely nor credible, unless it can be manifestly proved by the words themselves. But neither did Rufinus, with all his quibbles—which are sophisms, not reasonings of sound dialectic—ever prove it, even though he everywhere insults Jerome boldly and no less childishly.

[704] He objects first the praises given by Jerome to Origen, Let us hear the preliminary skirmish, in which he strives to infer from the praises given to Origen that his errors were adopted. And this, he says, is the gravity of so great a Master, that him whom you praise in some things you condemn in others; and him whom in your Prefaces you called the second master of the churches after the Apostles, you now call a heretic? What heretic could ever be called a master of the churches? These things he amplifies with tedious discourse and many circumlocutions; but the whole little disputation tends to prove that Origen, having been praised before, ought not afterwards to have been reprehended or charged with errors by Jerome. But that this is utterly false is manifest to anyone. For even if Jerome had first praised the same things in Origen and afterwards, his error being known, had disapproved them, he would be praiseworthy for having rightly changed his opinion. But he praised some things—namely his learning, his knowledge of the idioms of sacred Scripture, the acuteness of his interpretation, his manifold labours, and the multitude of the books he wrote; and reprehended others—namely the novelty and perversity of his doctrines and his manifold errors. And so on this side too that whole cavil of Rufinus's falls, as lacking sound dialectic no less than elegance of speech. This one thing can be said, that Jerome was excessive in praising Origen; but that excessive praise is again to be excused, because at that time he did not have Origen's manifold errors thoroughly known. Hence in book 2 against Rufinus, number 9, he addresses him thus: Pardon me that, in my youthful age, before I knew his heresy more fully, I praised Origen's learning and zeal for the Scriptures: and I shall give you pardon that with a hoary head you have written an Apology for his books.

[705] in which he confesses he was excessive, while he did not fully know his errors, Nor ought it to seem incredible to anyone that Origen's errors were not very quickly fully known even to the most learned Jerome. For, as he himself testifies in Epistle 84, number 8, He spoke a thousand Treatises and more in the church: he published besides innumerable Commentaries, which he himself calls τόμοι. So many writings of Origen Jerome could not read in a short time, especially since he was everywhere most busy either in reading or interpreting the Scriptures, both Greek and Hebrew, or in writing and reading other things; nay, he seems not even to have had most of Origen's writings before he was at Alexandria in the year 386, since at number 3 he says of Origen's Works received there: And the papers of Alexandria emptied our purse. And so before the year 386 he seems to have read only a few of Origen's writings, and those less faulty, and by name several of his Homilies, of which he had rendered some into Latin at Constantinople and some at Rome. Besides, the disputations about Origen's errors had not yet arisen when the saint adorned him with his chief praises, so that in all likelihood he understood nothing about his errors save from his Works themselves. For these causes, then—namely because he did not know that Origen's Works were defiled by so many errors, and because he admired in Origen his eloquence, learning, and immense labours of study—he was more lavish in the man's praises than he ought to have been, if he had had thoroughly known all that he learned afterwards. For in the Preface to the Homilies on the Song he says: Origen, though in his other books he has surpassed all men, in the Song of Songs surpassed himself. And below: So that from this it seems to me to have been fulfilled which is said: "The King has brought me into his chamber".

[706] In the Preface to the Homilies on Jeremiah and Ezekiel he called Origen the saint confesses, although he did not praise or defend his errors. a man who, according to the opinion of Didymus the Seer, is the second master of the churches after the Apostle (elsewhere, the Apostles); but certainly at that time, when dwelling at Constantinople he wrote this, he had not read many of Origen's Works. He had seen more when, about the year 390, in the Preface to the book on Hebrew Names, he said of Origen: Whom, after the Apostles, the master of the churches, no one but an unskilled man will deny. These things, even though they can be excused and referred to the multitude of Origen's useful writings—especially since he nowhere praised the doctrines peculiar to Origen, or denied that he was liable to errors—yet Jerome, as I judge, would have wished unsaid or unwritten. And for this cause the saint could take it the more ill that Rufinus had abused them to commend Origen's Works. But he had not only abused them before; here too he exaggerates Jerome's assertions on both sides beyond the truth. For it is false, first, what he says, that in almost all his books he carries his praises up to heaven. It is false, secondly, that he made him equal to the Apostles. It is false, thirdly, that he called him an Apostle. It is false, fourthly, that from these same sayings he called him first an Apostle and afterwards a heretic. These are Rufinus's exaggerations, or rather fictions and open lies, and above all the last. Who would not marvel at the man's impudence, lying so openly without any proof or show of truth, as to assert that from the same sayings Origen was called both an Apostle and a heretic? That what goes before is also false the reader will perceive in Rufinus himself, book 2, where from number 13 he has heaped up Jerome's sayings in praise of Origen, but has given nothing of great weight beyond what was recited above.

[707] Then at number 21 Rufinus proceeds to other sayings of Jerome. Where Jerome as it were confesses Origenism, I shall recite the saint's own words from Epistle 84, which he attacks. Jerome at number 3 speaks thus: If you believe me, I have never been an Origenist: if you do not believe me, I have now ceased to be one.

But if even so you are not brought to belief, you compel me to write in my own defence against your darling [\]; so that, if you do not believe me denying, you may at least believe me accusing. Again at number 6: But suppose that I erred in my youth, and, trained in the studies of the philosophers, that is, of the gentiles, at the beginning of my faith was ignorant of Christian doctrines; and thought to find in the Apostles what I had read in Pythagoras and Plato and Empedocles. Why do you follow the error of a Little One in Christ and a suckling? Why do you learn impiety from one who did not yet know piety? The second plank after shipwreck is simply to confess one's fault. You have imitated me erring; imitate me corrected also. We erred as young men, let us be amended as old men. Let us join our groans, let us couple our tears, let us weep and turn to the Lord who made us: let us not await the devil's repentance. That presumption is vain and drags into the depth of hell: here life is either sought or lost.*

[708] If I never followed Origen, you seek in vain to defame me: he uses an oratorical concession. if I was his disciple, imitate me repentant. You believed me confessing: believe me denying too. Thus Jerome, using an oratorical concession, which Tillemont in article 65 abused. Much more did Rufinus abuse it in book 1, number 21, where he brings in Jerome as confessing heresy and ill repenting. But it is too gross a calumny to come up for serious refutation.

[709] Rufinus's first objection from the Commentaries on the Ephesians Rufinus proceeds at number 22 to Jerome's Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians and on Ecclesiastes, in order to convict the saint of Origen's opinions. But Jerome had not pointed to these—all his other little works being condemned and renounced, as Rufinus insultingly lies—but because in his other Works, namely those written before, little or nothing is found about Origen's errors. For this cause neither ought Tillemont in article 48 to have wondered that the Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians were pointed to by Jerome. For with what judgment would he have pointed to books in which the matters which came into controversy are not treated? But let us briefly examine Rufinus's objections. The first is taken from Jerome's words on chapter 5, verse 29, to the Ephesians. The words themselves, since they are short, I bring hither. Let us then cherish, both husbands their wives and our souls their bodies, that both wives may be brought into husbands, and bodies be brought back into souls: and that there be no diversity of sexes at all: but as among the angels there is no man and woman; so let us too, who are to be like the angels, begin even now to be what is promised us in heavenly things.

[710] is refuted: From these words Rufinus infers that Jerome says that wives are turned into husbands, and bodies are brought back into souls, which were the errors of the Origenists, who did not admit in the resurrection a diversity of sexes or the truth of the flesh. But I say briefly: Rufinus was stupid if he believed that Jerome meant this; of the worst faith if he feigned that he believed it. For it is most manifest that Jerome speaks of the present life, since he says, let us begin even now to be, etc. He exhorts, therefore, that souls should cherish their bodies, and husbands their wives, for the divine service, and that so the body as well as the soul, the wife as well as the husband, may serve God. In the same sense the Apostle says of the baptized, Galatians 3, verse 28: There is neither Jew nor Greek: there is neither bond nor free: there is neither male nor female: not taking away the diversity of conditions or of sexes, but teaching that by faith and baptism they have been made Christians equally. More at length did Jerome himself answer the insipid objection in book 1, number 28.

[711] Rufinus's second objection, in which he uses either too gross a logic Then Rufinus goes on to Jerome's twofold explanation of chapter 1, verse 4, and after his manner wraps everything in sophisms. The first exposition, which is Jerome's own, has nothing that approaches Origen's errors. The second, which is Origen's, contains a manifest error, that souls existed before bodies and were cast down into bodies for their sins; and another too, that God chooses each one from the merit of the elect. But this exposition Jerome indeed recites; yet he also disapproves and refutes it, so that again this passage could not have been objected by an intelligent man without bad faith. Let us hear in what manner the saint propounds that explanation. But another, he says, who attempts to show that God is just, because he chooses each one not from the prejudgment of his own knowledge, but from the merit of the elect (thus running before the Pelagians), says, etc. From these words, in which Jerome modestly laughs at that attempt, Rufinus snatches an argument worthy of his own dialectic, inferring thus: Whence he manifestly shows that by that former exposition the justice of God is not shown—which is surely impious—but by this one, whom he calls "another", whose assertion, doubtless wishing to demonstrate it to all as undoubted and Catholic, he gave such a testimony, that by this assertion of his he attempts to show that God is just. From this reasoning, which is unworthy of a dialectician of three months' standing, he presently insults Jerome as over a prostrate enemy, attributing the whole heretical exposition to him. I should be ashamed to examine ineptitudes of this kind, did I not see that several moderns, and by name Tillemont in articles 46, 48, and in other places, doubt whether Rufinus's arguments can be sufficiently answered.

[712] Let us see, then, in what manner Jerome rejects both heresies contained in that exposition, or the worst faith: namely about souls pre-existing, and about election on account of merits. I select only a few of Jerome's words, which suffice for our purpose. For Paul did not say: "He chose us before the foundation of the world, WHEN we were holy and unspotted"; but "He chose us, THAT we should be holy and unspotted": that is, that we who were not holy and unspotted before should be so. Which can also be said of sinners converted to better things. And so he most clearly rejects the heresy of election to grace on account of preceding merits. Presently he clearly rejects the other error in these words: Which, indeed, so understood, makes also against him who says that before the world was made souls were chosen on account of their holiness and their freedom from all fault of sins. For, as we have already said before, Paul and those like him are not chosen because they were holy and unspotted: but they are chosen and predestined that in the consequent life they may by works and virtues become holy and unspotted. These things the saint says to refute the exposition which Rufinus with the worst faith bandies about as adopted by him. The same objection Jerome again refuted more fully at number 22.

[713] With the same faith he attributes to Jerome, at verses 5 and 6, the objection of Origen, a third equally inept or of bad faith. again arguing for the existence of souls before the world. The words are these: And so in this passage those seize an occasion who think that before the foundation of the world souls, with the angels and the other names of the virtues, dwelt in the heavenly Jerusalem, etc. The very words show that another's opinion, and one by no means approved by himself, is recited by Jerome, who indicates this again a little after, when, about to produce other words of Paul which they drag to the same heresy, he speaks thus: And that which certain men think they know, and do not know, written to the Romans, … they refer to the same sense. That do not know clearly shows that that error is disapproved by Jerome. Rufinus here, more candid than usual, says: Nor do I deny that you seem to say it of another. Yet presently he returns to his own disposition, and will have it that that is Jerome's opinion, because he did not refute it. But the objection is continued in the following verses, and is altogether refuted by Jerome. The objection, afterwards adopted by the Pelagians, is propounded at verse 6 thus: What praise, he says, of the glory of God's grace is it to grant favour to some in Christ, to prepare others for eternal punishments, … unless causes went before which prove the justice of God? To this he presently begins to answer in this manner: Every grace, therefore, which we obtain is completed to the glory and praise of him who justified us in the Beloved, that is, in our Lord and Saviour, etc. And he subjoins much on the following verses conducing to the resolution of the objection. The objection too, so far as from these words the pre-existence of souls was inferred, had been sufficiently resolved at verse 4.

[714] Presently at number 28 Rufinus goes on to what Jerome discussed at verse 12, Another passage of Jerome's, craftily wrapping up many things, which he could the more easily do because St. Jerome refers his readers to another place. But even here the truth will unfold itself, and will cast down the imaginary triumphs of a man perpetually applauding himself. The saint writes upon those words of the Apostle, That we may be unto the praise of his glory, who before hoped in Christ, and discusses thus: If he had only said, We hoped in Christ, and had not premised before we hoped, which in Greek is προηλπικότες, the sense would be plainer, that those who hoped in Christ were called and predestined by lot… But now the addition of the preposition draws us to that understanding of which we disputed above, expounding what is written: "Who hath blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ, as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted before him": namely that, as he has already blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places and chose us before the foundation of the world, so also we are now said to have hoped before in Christ from that time in which we were chosen and predestined and blessed in heavenly places. So Jerome there.

[715] most excellently Catholic, But he refers to what he had written at verses 4 and 5, and above all to these words: But that he testified that we were chosen, that we should be holy and unspotted before him, that is, before God, before the fabric of the world, pertains to the foreknowledge of God, to whom all future things are already done, and before they are made all are known. As Paul himself too is predestined in his mother's womb, and Jeremiah in the womb is sanctified, chosen, strengthened, and, in a type of Christ, is sent as a prophet to the nations. Jerome will have it, therefore, that we hoped before the world already in God's foreknowledge, just as in that same foreknowledge of God we received the blessing before we existed. The passage can perhaps be expounded otherwise, so that we hoped before is the same as we hoped before other men. But certainly Jerome's exposition has nothing in common with the errors of Origen.

[716] by twisted sophisms But Rufinus invents that an exposition of Origen is pointed to by Jerome, which after the words given he subjoins, and then, as we saw at number 712, refutes. That this is a mere fiction the thing itself indicates, since the saint had rejected and refuted that exposition. The same is made manifest by those words, as he has already blessed us with every blessing

etc.: for of the blessing of God not a word is read in Origen's whole exposition; but about it many things are read in Jerome's own explanation. Yet with such great confidence does our new dialectician rise up, as though he held Jerome bound fast on every side by the following words. Let us hear some of the words of the man insulting Jerome, that the studious reader may understand how great is that modesty of Rufinus so greatly celebrated by Tillemont. By what way is escape made hence, Master? whither is the breaking out? whither again the getting away? Wherever you turn, you will stick fast. I do not say that no approach for withdrawing yourself is given, but that not even the chance of breathing a little is allowed. Is this what the Aristotelian Commentaries of your Alexander have done for you? is this Porphyry's εἰσαγωγή? is it thus that the discipline of so many and so great philosophers, of Greek and Latin and moreover of Jewish learning, has cultivated you, that you should come into straits so inextricable, and be so wretchedly hemmed in, that not even at the Alps could you be defended? I pass over much more, and things more bitter against the saint. I only wished to give a specimen of the man's stupid boasting, who, if he had known dialectic even moderately, could not but have perceived that Jerome was no more bound fast by his sophisms than a little bird is caught in a garden walled about on every side.

[717] The saint, after the exposition given at number 714, subjoins another, he attacks thus beginning: But another, not maintaining this doctrine, that we existed and hoped in Christ before we dwelt in this body, will transfer the understanding thither [\], so as to say, etc. By these words Rufinus believes Jerome caught, striving to bind him with a dilemma of this sense. When Jerome says another, he either designates another man or himself. I answer for Jerome that by that word another man is designated. But this being granted, he strives to infer that that other is reproved by Jerome, who, not maintaining this doctrine, that we existed and hoped in Christ before, sought another exposition; and consequently that the doctrine which that other does not maintain is Jerome's. This whole ratiocination of Rufinus's, wrapped up in many words, is nothing but a wretched sophism. For in all likelihood Jerome uttered those words, that we existed and hoped in Christ before*, according to the exposition premised, that we existed in God's foreknowledge, etc.; and thus they are in the highest degree Catholic.

[718] But if anyone should wish those words to have been uttered by Jerome in the Origenian sense of souls pre-existing, Rufinus, not even so will it help Rufinus. For the Origenian doctrine will not on that account become Jerome's doctrine, even if he does not admit the exposition of the passage which that other man produced to refute that doctrine. And so (unless Jerome uttered those words in the Catholic sense just given) he only intimates that the second exposition, which he does not adopt but recites, was produced by someone to refute Origen. So in the words recited at number 711 he says that Origen's exposition, which he confutes, was given to show the justice of God. From this likewise Rufinus dreamed that it was adopted by Jerome, as though he could not acknowledge that God is just unless he admitted all the errors ill devised to prove God's justice.

[719] Further, Rufinus, when he had insulted Jerome with wordy prolixity, and various errors to him as though he had referred to Origen's exposition, at last at number 32 attacks the second, whose beginning I gave, and not only strives to attribute it to Jerome, but also seeks in it other errors which it by no means contains. That exposition holds that all are to be subjected to Christ at the time of judgment; that those are called hoping before who were subjected before; hoping, those who then of necessity become believers; and it is added, but not unto the praise of his glory. At the end it is said: Provided that both he who hopes and he who hopes before should know that according to the diversity of hope they will receive diverse rewards. From these words Rufinus calumniates that rewards are promised by Jerome to all, even to the devil and his angels, though inferior ones, and, he says, him of whom you charge another with an opinion, not an assertion, of some eventual pardon of punishments, you bring into the kingdoms of Christ to the second rewards. This gross calumny shows that Rufinus dared everything against Jerome without even a likely reason. For neither is the exposition Jerome's, nor are rewards taken only in a good sense, but also for punishments, which sense they there have as regards the reprobate.

[720] Rufinus himself saw the weakness of his arguments, although by boasting of words he strives to persuade the reader of the contrary. by his reasonings For at number 29, being about again to prove that the opinion which by his sophisms at number 26 he had so certainly attributed to him—so that he said: For no escape has now remained to you any longer—was Jerome's own; being about, I say, to prove this by another sophism, he speaks thus: Now, therefore, I give thanks to God that he has relieved me of the weight of a most grave suspicion. For perhaps I seemed to some to be acting too contentiously or calumniously about that "other", since according to a rhetorical figure I maintained that this man whom he calls "another" was himself. But he could by no means have feared this, if no escape had remained to Jerome, if he held him bound fast on every side by just ratiocination, as he boasts. But neither does Rufinus so trust this very sophism, for whose discovery he gives thanks to God, that he was unwilling to lead Jerome out of the cave at number 31, until, he says, he falls into that from which, even if we all try and desire it, he cannot come out. If we believe Rufinus, he was unwilling to cut the throat of one shut up in a cave. But that fictitious kindness of Rufinus's is no less cruel than his reasonings are faulty: for he does not lead him out of the cave of the first error save in order, without any proof, to attribute to him another exposition, and out of it to invent a new error, and at last at number 33 to conclude, by sheer licence of calumniating, that both were asserted by Jerome.

[721] strives in vain Yet presently at number 34 the inept sophist subjoins this: But since I do not doubt that this novelty of the matter scarcely deserves belief—that anyone should be believed to condemn what he builds up—I know what you desire: that, if we can, we should produce such arguments from the same books, and so evident that absolutely no place of doubting about them should remain to anyone, that is, where not even that "Another" of his is named; and so I shall do. These words sufficiently intimate that the weakness of his preceding sophisms was not unknown to Rufinus, who promises more certain arguments: and yet he could not adduce what he promised. For he adduces indeed a passage in which the word Another does not indicate that another's opinion is being reported; but the same thing is intimated in other words. The words of Jerome which he alleges are had at chapter 2, verse 7, to the Ephesians. Of that passage Jerome himself in book 1 against Rufinus, number 24, declares his mind thus: We set down a threefold exposition. In the first, what seemed good to us: in the second, what Origen would object: in the third, what Apollinaris simply explained. For his own exposition, which after his custom is the first, he designates another by no indication. For Origen's objection, which contains a perverse doctrine, he indicates another by these words: But he who is a diligent reader at once inquires and says: What then, etc.

[722] to attribute; And so Jerome altogether intimated that he was reciting another's opinion, even though he did not do it by the word Another; and Rufinus's cavil falls. But that by the words diligent reader he there indicated Origen, the saint partly excuses and partly defends in book 1 against Rufinus, number 24, writing thus: Behold, you will say, under the person of a diligent reader you have set forth the opinions of Origen. I confess my error: I ought not to have said "diligent" but "blasphemous": and if I had done so, and had known by some prophecy that you would follow after dirges of this sort, I should have avoided even the words of calumny. A great crime, if I called Origen a diligent reader—whose seventy books I translated, whom I extolled to heaven with praises, on whose account I was compelled two years ago to answer in a short little book your heraldings against me. That Origen was called by me the master of the churches you object among your praises: and do you think that I ought to be afraid if you as an enemy accuse me of having called him a diligent reader? We are wont to call the most sparing traders, and thrifty servants, and troublesome tutors, and the most cunning thieves, "diligent". And in the Gospel the steward of iniquity is said to have done certain things prudently, etc. Thus the saint about the words. For that the passage objected is not his is certain and beyond doubt.

[723] Rufinus goes on at number 35 to another passage of Jerome's, from which he wishes to infer that he posits ascents and descents in the other life too, Another passage of Jerome's, as though he acknowledged merits and demerits in heaven after this life. Of the passage, which is had at chapter 1, verse 21, Jerome speaks thus in book 1 against Rufinus, number 23: The second passage which our brother showed me to have been reprehended by him I shall set down briefly, because it is very frivolous and displays its own calumny openly. Yet Jerome's words, which Rufinus seized on, can be expounded in a twofold sense. Rufinus after his manner chose the worse. When the saint had asserted that there are different grades of angels, namely principalities, powers, virtues, dominations, he teaches that these diversities will exist afterwards too, in these words: Which distributions of offices will exist not only at present but also in the age to come, so that through the several advances and honours, and ascents too and descents, one either grows or diminishes, and comes to be under one power, virtue, principality and domination after another. Thus Rufinus objected the passage, as though angels and men, according to Jerome, went on in the blessed life to grow or diminish in merits. But the saint so answers the objection that those increases have indeed their effect in the blessed life, but were acquired on the way, that is, while angels and men were in the state of meriting and sinning.

[724] But if he thinks that I follow Origen for this reason, attacked by Rufinus, is expounded. because I set down in my exposition advances and honours, ascents and descents, increases and diminutions, let him know that there is much difference between saying that of angels and seraphim and cherubim demons and men are made—which Origen affirms—and saying that the angels themselves have obtained among themselves different kinds of offices, which is not repugnant to the Church. As also among men the order of dignities is different according to the variety of labour, since bishop and presbyter and every ecclesiastical grade has its own order; and yet all are men: so among the angels too the merits are different, and yet all persist in angelic dignity: nor are men made out of angels, nor again are men reshaped into angels. The arguments by which the saint proves his statements in the Commentary itself also conspire with this exposition, since from them nothing can be inferred except that in heaven too there are different grades of angels and different ministries, some higher than others. Hence Vallarsius in his Annotations observes against Huet that Jerome does not say that the blessed angels even now by doing well ascend to higher things, or by doing ill roll down to lower.

[725] Presently too the said Rufinus attacks the words which

are read at verses 22 and 23, Another passage, on those words of the Apostle, And him he gave to be head over all the Church. They are as follows: Not only of men, but also of angels and of all the virtues and rational creatures, the Church can be understood. Jerome has those words, but what evil is in them neither does Rufinus declare nor do I find, since they were said of the Church triumphant. Rufinus could more rightly have objected Jerome's words which are read a little before, on those words, And he hath put all things under his feet. The question arising thence he propounds thus: But why all things—that is, angels, thrones, dominations, powers, and the other virtues, which were never contrary to God—are subjected to his (Christ's) feet, seems obscure. Then he subjoins: It can therefore be answered that no one is without sin, and that the stars themselves are not clean before God, and that every creature dreads the coming of its Creator. Whence the cross of the Saviour is said to have purged not only the things that were on earth, but also those that were in the heavens. This answer involves a difficulty, especially since the word purged is referred to that, the stars themselves are not clean before God, so that one might think that sins are attributed to the angels too, which were remitted by the merits of Christ. But it cannot be said that the good angels ever sinned; and that the bad were redeemed by Christ is plainly Origenian and heretical. Theologians attempt to explain Jerome's words in a sound sense: nor do I disapprove their attempt or reckon it useless. Yet I shall say briefly what seems to me more probable.

[726] whose understanding is doubtful, I judge that Jerome speaks according to Origen's mind, not from his own opinion, although he intimates less clearly than he is elsewhere wont that he is reciting another's opinion. For first he gives a threefold exposition: and where he does this, the first is his own, and the second generally Origen's, the third Apollinaris's. The question which arises from the words he hath put all things under had already been resolved by Jerome, namely that some are subjected by will, others by necessity, and that thus Christ is the head of all, that is, of the whole Church, which is his body. This he sets forth in these words: For as a head has very many members subject to it, of which some are faulty and weak; so our Lord Jesus Christ too, since he is the head of the Church, has as members all those who are gathered in the Church, both saints, that is, and sinners; but the saints subject to him by will, the sinners by necessity. And so it comes about that even his enemies are subjected under his feet. This exposition, which directly fights against Origen, could easily be extended to the Church triumphant and to the angels, who are subject to their head Christ by will no less than the blessed among men. And so, when he adds, Wherefore in this, that he says ALL THINGS, he seems to raise a question, he passes to an exposition which must be referred, at least in part, to Origen, so far at least as I judge. For this cause in the answer recited at number 725 he says, It can therefore be answered: and presently, is said to have purged—in that manner of speaking, namely, which he is wont to use when he reports the views of others.

[727] is elucidated, That opinion is confirmed by what follows, since he presently subjoins a third exposition of the word all things, beginning with the word Another. For from the threefold explanation of that same word all things it is gathered that the first was Jerome's opinion, the second Origen's, the third Apollinaris's, as I have already intimated. Besides, Jerome acknowledged indeed that the cross of Christ profited the angels too, but he did not dare elsewhere to say that it profited them for purging, or that the holy angels were ever stained by any sin. For on chapter 4, verse 10, he writes this: For neither can we know how the blood of Christ profited both the angels and those (the Saints) who were in hell, and yet we cannot but know that it did profit them. How it profited the Saints he had already partly said at verse 9, where he says that Christ descended into hell that as Victor he might lead away with him to the heavens the souls of the Saints which were held shut up there. And by what reason it partly profited the angels he sets forth at chapter 3, verse 10, in these words: The cross of Christ therefore profited not only us but also the angels and all the virtues in heaven, and opened the mystery which before they did not know. More may be seen in the same place, which the theologians of today too will readily admit. And so Jerome admits indeed that the cross of Christ profited the angels too; but he did not judge that it profited sinning angels unto redemption, although he seems obscurely to intimate that opinion of the Origenists.

[728] The same he intimates at chapter 2, verse 15, in these words: And so it comes about (he says—namely Origen) Other objections of Rufinus that the cross of the Lord profited not only earth but heaven too: not only men but angels also: and that every creature was purged by the blood of its Lord. But that this whole passage was reported according to Origen's mind I shall observe at number 729. Again at number 36 Rufinus imputes to Jerome what belongs to others. For at chapter 1, verse 17, on those words in the knowledge of him, the saint reports certain Origenian matters in the person of others, speaking thus: But as to what he says, In the knowledge of him, … certain men so understand it … and presently, they suspect, … and repeating other things like these. The words themselves so manifestly indicate that another's views are being reported that the mere reading of the passage suffices. But what Rufinus says—that they are Jerome's, because no refutation is subjoined—is frivolous. For merely to have reported certain things is enough to have refuted them, especially if they had already been refuted before, as the existence of souls before bodies, which is there treated of, had been refuted before.

[729] Rufinus heaps up trifles at number 37, when other objections are recited from those words of Jerome, that the stars themselves are not clean before God—by which he expresses Job chapter 15, verse 15, And the heavens are not clean in his sight—he contends to infer that the stars are called by him rational and capable of sin. Secondly, when he carps at the Catholic exposition of these words, We were by nature children of wrath. Thirdly, when at number 18 he triflingly attributes to St. Jerome that he says the soul was made first and then the body. Jerome's passage at chapter 2, verse 10, may be consulted: for there is not even the shadow of that calumny there. Fourthly, he proceeds again to another's exposition, and, attributing it to Jerome, will have it that one nature of souls and of angels was laid down by him. Jerome's passage is had at chapter 2, verse 15, Who made both one, which Jerome rightly expounds of the Jews and the gentiles. But then he reports another exposition, thus beginning: But he who reads that saying of the Apostle. That he is reciting another's opinion he indicates, because he always speaks in the third person to the end. In vain, then, does Rufinus declaim against Jerome on account of that exposition, as though it were Jerome's very own opinion, since it is wholly another's and is only reported by him. No more is it true that one nature of souls and of angels is asserted in it.

[730] Another error he contends at number 40 to attribute to Jerome, and are refuted. by which souls are said to be cast into bodies, as into chains, on account of preceding sins. Hence he heaps up several passages in which Jerome seems to say that the soul is bound by the body. To this objection Jerome himself answered in book 1 against Rufinus, number 25, having first related the passage which is objected, and adding thus: And in this too I set down a threefold exposition, as above: in the first, what seemed good to me; in the second (this is objected) what Origen asserted; in the third, what Apollinaris, going against his doctrines, thought. Read the Greek Commentaries, and unless you find it so, I shall confess the crime. What is my sin in that passage? That, doubtless, for which I answered above—why I did not name those by whom the things were said. It was superfluous to set down at each testimony of the Apostle the names of those whose little works I had signified in the Preface that I would translate. Presently he defends the very manner of speaking by which the soul is said to be bound by the body, in these words: And yet that the soul is said to be bound by the body, until it return to Christ, and in the glory of the resurrection exchange its corruptible and mortal body for incorruption and immortality, is not of an absurd understanding. Whence the Apostle too says, "Unhappy man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" etc. This manner of speaking surely no one will disapprove, unless it be said in that sense in which the Origenians would have the soul to have existed before the body. But that perverse doctrine Jerome always rejected.

[731] Rufinus's last objection, There remains Rufinus's last objection, by which he contends to attribute to Jerome the error about the resurrection of all to the blessed life. He alleges two texts to that end, the first of which is had at chapter 4, verses 3 and 4, where Jerome, after his own exposition of the passage—which has no difficulty—subjoins another's with this transition: Or at any rate this is indicated more subtly, etc. The other and lengthy text is read at chapter 4, verse 16, and Jerome confesses in book 1 against Rufinus, number 26, that this is Rufinus's chief objection. The fifth passage, he says, is the strongest, in which, expounding that testimony of the Apostle: "From whom the whole body, compacted and joined together by every joint of supply, according to the operation in the measure of every member, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in charity": we compressed into a brief discourse Origen's most ample exposition, which turns the same meanings over in different words, taking away nothing of his examples and assertions. But this way of proceeding causes a difficulty, because the saint does not indicate at the beginning that he is giving another's views. Yet he intimates it in the course of the passage, inserting these words into the exposition: yet so that, not according to the other heresy, all are placed in one age, etc.

[732] refuted by Jerome himself, For, having noted these words, he says: I show (namely by the words alleged) both that the things of which I dispute are heretical, and that they differ from the other heresy. What, then, are the two heresies? One, which says that all rational creatures are reshaped into angels. The other, which asserts that in the restitution of the world each thing will be what it was created: for example, that because demons come from angels, demons again become angels: and that the souls of men are reshaped as they were created, not into angels, but into that for which they were created by God, so that both the just and sinners become equal. In fine, that you may know that I was not explaining my own opinion, but comparing the heresies with one another, both of which I had read in the Greek, I completed my disputation with this ending: "Therefore, as we said above, these things are more obscure among us, because they are said μεταφορικῶς in the Greek," etc. Against this declaration of Jerome's, which otherwise we can hold for certain—because he certainly did not doubt that the punishments of the reprobate are eternal—that scruple can nevertheless arise, that the saint thus gave no exposition of his own at verse 16: for the contrary

he everywhere does, so as to give his own first and then to subjoin one or two of others. But to this objection, which I have myself framed, I answer that Jerome at the preceding verses had declared what the body of Christ is—which otherwise would have had to be explained here—and how it grows and advances in Christ its head.

[733] whose explanation is confirmed, At verse 12 he says: Because, since the Church is the body of the Lord, and the Church is built of living stones, those whom we mentioned above as set in the Church have this as their work, that according to the dispensation and the offices entrusted to them they should build up the Church of Christ, that is, his body. Of the increase and advance of this body, at verse 13 and the following—Until we all meet into the unity of faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the age of the fulness of Christ, etc.—the saint discusses plainly such things as at the same time elucidate verse 16, to which at last he subjoins Origen's explanation. Wherefore he did not omit his own Catholic exposition, but joined it to the preceding verses, just as he commemorated at verse 16 the whole exposition of Origen, which likewise pertains to the preceding verses. Jerome's whole exposition regards the Church, and has nothing in common with the perverse Origenian doctrine about reprobate men and angels being restored entire at the end of the world. This heresy St. Jerome not only rejects in many other places, but in those very Commentaries which Rufinus so traduced he most clearly asserts the eternity of punishments.

[734] For he strongly rejects another error of the Origenists at chapter 5, verse 6, on those words of the Apostle, especially from the contrary Catholic opinion, Let no man deceive you with vain words, etc., and at the same time asserts eternal punishments, writing this: The words which deceive and trip men up are empty and void… Since therefore there are very many who say that there will be no punishments for sins, and that no torments will be applied from without; but that sin itself and the conscience of the fault is the punishment, since the worm does not die in the heart, and the fire is kindled in the mind after the likeness of a fever, which does not torture the sick man from without, but, seizing the bodies themselves, punishes what it possesses without the application of torments from outside. These persuasions, therefore, and fraudulent snares he called vain and empty words, which seem to have a certain flower of speech and to flatter sinners: but, while they give them confidence, they rather bear them to eternal punishments.

[735] The same man a little before, at verse 5, reckons certain grave sins, asserted in the same Commentaries. by which whoever is held guilty cannot have an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God; and presently others lighter, which we everywhere call venial, and of one of these he says: It does not destroy, nor exclude for ever from the kingdom. These things abundantly show that Jerome did not doubt that the punishments of evil men and angels are everlasting. I pass over more which could be brought forward to the same end from the same Commentaries; nor do I hesitate confidently to assert that none of Rufinus's objections is legitimate, that is, that from none of them is it rightly inferred that any of Origen's errors pleased Jerome, since all those passages which he brought forward as involving error were only reported by the saint, but by no means approved. And the few sayings of Jerome's own which he recited contain no error, but were twisted by him into a perverse sense.

[736] Yet the studious reader may ask for what cause Jerome so often recited in those Commentaries the tenets of Origen which he disapproved, A reason is given why he so often recited Origen's errors, and everywhere without laborious refutation. To the first he himself answers in book 1 against Rufinus, number 16, writing thus: For I followed Origen and Didymus and Apollinaris in the Commentaries on the Ephesians (who certainly have doctrines contrary to one another) in such a way as not to lose the truth of my faith. What work do Commentaries have? They set forth the sayings of another; what is written obscurely they make plain in clear speech; they unroll the opinions of many, and say: This passage some so set forth, others so interpret: those strive to strengthen their own sense and understanding by these testimonies and by this reasoning, so that the prudent reader, when he has read the different explanations and has learned the things of many that are to be approved or disapproved, may judge which is truer, and, like a good money-changer, may reject the coin of counterfeit money. Another reason he gives at number 22 in these words: I set down everything, … so that his disciples should have nothing new to thrust upon the ears of the Latins. For we more easily despise what is known than what is sudden. These things seem to suffice to excuse Jerome as regards the errors of Origen which he mentioned. Yet a scruple remains, why he did not refute and name them more, as he afterwards did in the Explanations of the Prophets, in which he did not spare Origen.

[737] and did not refute them more laboriously, He renders the reason, writing long afterwards on Jeremiah, at chapter 22, verse 24 and following, where he has it thus: I am wont in Commentaries and Explanations, whose custom it is to set down the different opinions of interpreters, to mingle in speech of this kind: "Some say this: Others judge that: Several think thus". Which both that wretched Grunnius (Rufinus) and, after many years, the disciples of Jovinian and of him have calumniated and do calumniate—that I set down my own opinions under the names of others: which I do out of benevolence, lest I should seem to tear anyone by name, etc. Another reason why he did not sharply harass Origen's errors he gives in Epistle 84, number 7, in these words: For I have not been wont to insult the errors of those whose genius I admire. A third he mentions in the same place a little before thus: Physicians too say that great diseases are not to be cured but left to nature, lest the remedy should exasperate the sickness. These reasons press the more on account of a fourth, which is expressed there at number 8 thus: Others have erred in the faith, both Greeks and Latins, whose names it is not necessary to produce, lest we should seem to be defending him not by his own merit but by the error of others. For if there were almost none, or few, of the older writers who had not fallen into some errors afterwards reprobated by the Church, what need was there for Jerome to harass more sharply the errors of him above all, who had also written many good and useful things?

[738] in those Commentaries St. Jerome, And so Jerome seems to have hoped that Origen's errors would be more easily forsaken if he so expounded the passages of sacred Scripture from which they had been drawn that the exposition should contain nothing but the sound doctrine of the Church; and then added what others had wished to infer from the same passages of foreign doctrine, especially if he added from time to time some refutation, or at least tacitly intimated that such doctrine displeased him. And this he did everywhere. For when for the first time, at chapter 1, verse 4, he mentioned the perverse doctrine about souls existing before the foundation of the world, and the other joined to it about their election on account of merits, he at once refuted both, and did it at that time, he says in book 1 against Rufinus, number 22, in which the name of Origen flourished in the world—that is, when there was no disputing about his errors. That both the said errors displeased him he shows again at verse 5. Then at verse 12 he refers to the earlier exposition set against the same error.

[739] nevertheless prefixing the Catholic explanation. To say all in a word: so far as by reading and re-reading those Commentaries I have been able to gather, he everywhere prefixes the Catholic exposition before he recites Origen's fictions. Nevertheless I would not deny that those Commentaries must be read cautiously, since in them more than in any others he reported Origen's fictions, and the saint did not always refute them; nay, sometimes he shows by scarcely any indication that he shrinks from them. Yet if anyone shall studiously observe that Jerome gives his own exposition upon all St. Paul's words, either repugnant to Origen's errors or at least having nothing in common with them, he will sufficiently perceive that those errors were by no means approved by the saint, and that what he says in Epistle 84 is true: I have never been an Origenist.

\* Origen

\ elsewhere, in Rufinus, transfert*

§ XLIII. Certain observations of Tillemont about Jerome's imaginary Origenism are examined, and certain other objections of the moderns.

Although Jerome asserts that he was never an Origenist, Tillemont did not repeat Rufinus's objections, but preferred to augment them with others sought from elsewhere, and frequently without fit proof asserts that St. Jerome does not seem to have been free from some of the errors attributed to Origen. This criticism appears to me the more strange, the more often he intimates in very many places that all those, or at least most of those, who at that time were suspected of Origen's errors were by no means defenders of the errors imputed to them. Of Jerome he observes in article 91, on those words of his, I have never been an Origenist, and other like sayings, that many observations can be made—as though he wished modestly to intimate that this seemed to him false. But I prefer to believe Jerome rather than to adopt Tillemont's unfair suspicions. Jerome in book 1 against Rufinus, number 31, again speaks thus: Is it because we are not Origenists, and do not know that we sinned in heaven, that we are charged as sinners on earth? And presently: As long as I did not refuse your praise, you followed me as a master: you called me brother and colleague, and confessed me Catholic in all things. After I did not acknowledge your praises, and judged myself unworthy of the heralding of so great a man, you at once turn your pen, and blame everything you praised before, bringing forth from the same mouth both sweet and bitter. These things, which are most true, sufficiently prove that Rufinus leapt out of wrath to accuse Jerome of Origenism. I can therefore scarcely conceive by what criticism some prefer to believe the wrathful Rufinus rather than Jerome candidly denying, since he says again in book 2, number 17: I am not what you charge: if you are what you are accused of, you must see to it yourself.

[741] But let us examine Tillemont's arguments, or rather sayings. with frivolous objections One objection, by which from an oratorical concession he brings in Jerome as it were confessing, I have already refuted at number 708. He undertakes to examine St. Jerome's thoughts about Origen in article 46, and there relates many things said by us, and adds some things bearing on our purpose. Speaking of the saint's Commentaries on sacred Scripture, he says: It must be confessed that many (errors of Origen) were inserted in the earlier ones. He adds the reasons which St. Jerome gave for reporting those errors in his Commentaries, and he would not have disapproved them if Origen had everywhere been named and the errors refuted. But he asserts that some were also reported by Jerome in his own name. To this last I have answered sufficiently, namely that Jerome everywhere gave his own exposition, and therefore that the studious reader can perceive what is Jerome's and what another's. Wherefore if Tillemont did not perceive this, it will have happened because he did not search through those Commentaries diligently enough. Certainly Jerome's words, which he points to on Jeremiah chapter 22, do not have what he asserts from them. Jerome says of Rufinus and others:

They slander me as putting forward my own opinions under other men's names. Who could extract from these words that they were reported by Jerome under his own name? For plainly the contrary is said. As for the many errors which Jerome is supposed to have inserted into his earlier Commentaries, that is true of the Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians in the manner just stated; in the Commentary on Ecclesiastes he recalled Origen's errors more rarely, in the others most rarely of all, and everywhere under another's name, and with his own exposition set first.

[742] in vain the contrary He observes besides, in art. 48, that it seems astonishing that Jerome should have appealed to his Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians, so that anyone might see that he himself had been opposed to Origen. For, he says, he does not allege so much as a single passage of that book where he condemns any one of the errors that belonged to the Origenist teaching, except that, when speaking of some opinion, he says that another opinion is a heresy, and so forth. And yet Jerome, in bk. 1 against Rufinus, no. 15, addresses his adversary in these words, with which he might also address Tillemont: Although inconstancy does not deserve credit, and professed enmities carry the suspicion of falsehood, nevertheless I will boldly join step with him, wishing to know what heretical thing I have written, so that with him I may do penance, and swear that I was ignorant of Origen's evils and have only now first learned his impieties from Pope Theophilus; or else I shall show that I indeed thought rightly, but that he, after his manner, does not understand. For it cannot be that in the same books on the Ephesians, which, as I hear, he impugns, I have spoken both well and ill, and that from the same fountain sweet and bitter have flowed, so that I, who throughout the whole Work condemned those who believe souls to have been fashioned out of angels, should suddenly, forgetful of myself, defend what I had previously condemned. Then in no. 22 he cites the very words by which he refuted the said error in the first place. And throughout the whole book he refuted Origen's errors, by leading back to the Catholic sense the sacred texts from which those errors had been deduced.

[743] to insinuate Tillemont next passes on to the Commentaries on Ecclesiastes, and observes that at chap. 4 — namely at those words, And I praised the dead, etc. — the pre-existence of souls is rejected, which is done in these words: But he says this, not because he who is not yet born exists before he is born, and is happier because he is not yet weighed down by a body; but because it is better not to be at all, and not to have any perception of substance, than to be or to live unhappily: just as the Lord also speaks concerning Judas, etc. Nevertheless, Tillemont adds, he presently reports also the opinion of others who expressly asserted that error, without any refutation. But an error expressly rejected in so many words, and refuted by a contrary exposition of the passage, Jerome did not judge to need further refutation; and from this very fact Jerome's censor might have learned that those opinions were not the Saint's own which he thus reports, even if he does not reject them with a weighty censure or an elaborate refutation. Tillemont adds that at chap. 7, namely at those words, And the day of death above the day of birth, the said error of Origen is again reported without refutation. But Jerome had already there declared his mind by a twofold Catholic exposition. Even the third exposition itself, although it seems to be given according to Origen's mind, could be expounded in a Catholic sense, if it were necessary.

[744] Tillemont relies upon, He objects likewise to Jerome's words at chap. 1, and at those words: The perverse cannot be adorned (in the Vulgate, The perverse are corrected with difficulty), where, after a twofold exposition, the Saint subjoins these words as a third: Otherwise: When all have been restored to their integrity through penance, the devil alone will remain in his own error, etc. If the passage is so understood that all are said to be about to be restored in the end through penance, then that error is reported by Jerome after his usual manner. But if he only meant that penance is set before all in this life, and that by it all can be restored to their integrity, the devil excepted, who cannot repent, then the passage has nothing of the Origenist error, and the very exception of the devil makes it likely that this is what he meant. Certainly that error concerning a penance to be performed after death is refuted by Jerome at chap. 9 and ℣ 5 in the Vulgate, where he says that the passage is to be expounded thus: That while men live they can become just, but that after death no occasion of a good work is given. For a living sinner can be better than a dead just man, if he is willing to pass over to his virtues… Why? Because the living, through fear of death, can perform good works: but the dead have no power to add anything to what they once carried away with them from life, … nor can they now do anything justly, nor sin; nor add virtues, nor vices. To this exposition, which leaves no doubt about the mind of St. Jerome, he again subjoins the contrary Origenist one, which Tillemont might also have noted.

[745] He preferred to object other words of Jerome, which have nothing of the Origenist error, of which another objection also is made, but would contain another error if they were rightly objected. At chap. XI and these words, And if the tree fall toward the South, etc., he says that Jerome declares that each man will remain in the state in which death overtakes him. The objection suggests that temporal punishments after this life — that is, what we call purgatorial fire — are there denied. Jerome's words do indeed have that sense, but they by no means exclude the temporal punishments of the just, which Jerome most clearly acknowledges in other places. Wherever, he says, you have prepared a place for yourself and a future seat, whether toward the South or toward the North, there, when you have died, you will remain. And after various expositions he again has these words: The tree, therefore, which has fallen in this life, and has been cut down by the condition of mortality, either sinned before, while it stood, and is afterwards placed in the region of the North (that is, of the damned); or, if it has borne fruits worthy of the South, it will lie in the southern quarter. And there is no tree that is not either toward the North or toward the South. By these words the Saint excludes several Origenist errors, by which merits and sins are attributed even to the life to come, or the restoration of all sinners is asserted, or the eternity of punishments is denied. Jerome therefore asserts, with Ecclesiastes, that a man either dies in the grace of God, and will thus enjoy eternal rewards, or dies in deadly sins, and is thus to be punished with eternal torments. But neither of them denies that the just who die not wholly purged are to be purged by temporal punishments: yet these too fall toward the South, and will remain perpetually in that state, that is, in the grace of God.

[746] It is worth transferring hither a passage which others impugn, and others make charges of quite the opposite kind against him, so that a fair reader may see how ready many men have been to drag St. Hieronymus's words into a perverse sense, and to fasten upon him errors from which he shrank. In the Dialogue against the Pelagians, written long afterwards, no. 28, Jerome speaks thus: But if Origen says that all rational creatures are not to be destroyed, and attributes penance to the devil, what is that to us, who say that both the devil and his satellites, and all the impious and transgressors, perish everlastingly, and that Christians, if they have been overtaken in sin, are to be saved after punishments. Nothing could be said more suited to Catholic doctrine, if the passage be rightly understood. The Saint says that the devil perishes eternally, and his satellites, and all the impious (that is, unbelievers, whether they were gentiles, or heretics, or in any way estranged from the Catholic faith) and transgressors (that is, grave sinners) who have died in their sins without the remedy of penance. Then he says that those Christians are to be saved after punishments (namely those of purgatory) who have been overtaken in sin, that is, who either committed only light sins, or indeed fell into some grave sin, but, not clinging to it, endeavoured to correct themselves by penance.

[747] but the solution of both The very manner of speaking suggests the exposition given: for transgressors, or grave sinners, are set over against those who have been overtaken in sin. And in these words Jerome imitates the manner of speaking which the Apostle used in Gal. 6 ℣ 1: Brethren, even if a man be overtaken in any fault, you who are spiritual instruct such a one in the spirit of meekness. On this passage Jerome asks why the Apostle wishes these to be corrected gently, and others severely, and answers thus: But there it is said to those who, after sin, not perceiving their own error, were unwilling to be subject to their elders and to be corrected by penance. But where the sinner, understanding his wound, hands himself over to the physician to be healed, there the rod is not necessary, but the spirit of meekness. And he says this of those who have been overtaken in some sin, as he premises. And before he says: And beautifully does he (the Apostle) call a man overtaken in a fault one who is liable to die, showing from the very name the frailty of his condition. And so Jerome seems to have used those words deliberately, so as to suggest that it is Christians fallen through frailty, and these corrected by penance, whom he says are to be saved after punishments, whether endured in this life or in purgatory.

[748] is furnished out of Jerome, Both kinds of punishment, namely eternal ones for deadly sins and temporal ones for lighter, Jerome asserted plainly in the often-praised Commentary on the Ephesians, at chap. 5 ℣ 5, where he reckons up three mortal sins, fornication, uncleanness, and covetousness; and he who has been liable to these, he says, cannot have an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Then he enumerates three lighter ones, which we call venial — filthiness, foolish talking, and jesting — and observes that those liable to these are not perpetually excluded from the kingdom of God. And when he had discoursed at length about these, he concludes thus: And as foolish talking and jesting do, so also does this filthiness: it does not destroy, nor exclude for ever from the kingdom. In Epistle 119 (elsewhere 152) to Minervius and Alexander he likewise writes as follows: They are not to perish by everlasting death, because they are not held in a mortal crime, but in a light and small sin. And so he acknowledged both temporal punishments after this life for lighter sins, and eternal ones for graver.

In vain do his adversaries have recourse to other passages of Jerome: in vain do they invent, and that quite improbably, that the Saint afterwards changed his opinion concerning the eternal torments of grave sins, even of Catholics. For he found the eternity of torments asserted in so many places of the sacred Writings, and himself asserted it in so many places, that he must equally have forgotten both the sacred Scriptures and his own writings, if he had afterwards denied a doctrine so well established, and had gone over to ravings so often refuted.

[749] and against other objections They do indeed object the last words of the Commentary on Isaiah, which seem to have been faultily printed, and even so cannot confirm the adversaries' improbable censure. The passage is printed thus: And just as we believe in eternal torments for the devil and for all deniers and impious men, who said in their heart: there is no God — so for sinners and impious men who are nevertheless Christians, whose works are to be proved and purged in the fire, we judge that the sentence is a moderate one and mingled with clemency

of the Judge. Vallarsi observes that in a most ancient Ambrosian manuscript it is read thus: so of sinners, even Christians, whose etc. In whatever way the passage be read, no one will conclude from it by a legitimate inference that Jerome denies that the torments of Christians who have died in mortal sins will be eternal. For the sentence of the Judge can be moderate and mingled with clemency, even though the punishment be prolonged to eternity, the infinite gravity of the offence being considered; inasmuch as a lighter punishment is inflicted than the gravity of the sins would seem to deserve in the eyes of a hard and unmerciful judge. And so either he does not there deny that the torments will be eternal, or, if the passage be read as it stands in the Ambrosian manuscript, he is speaking of sinners who have done penance, and perhaps at the same time of others: and of all of them he says that the sentence of the Judge will be moderate, but he does not deny the eternal punishment of those who have died in mortal sins. For he says these things in answering the objections of those who would have the torments come to an end at some time. For since in the passages of sacred Scripture which he recites as alleged in favour of that error mention is made of the mercy of God, he does not deny God's mercy and clemency, but the illegitimate inference.

[750] But that the diligent reader may see still better how foolish is the reasoning of those who, by several passages of the Saint from the moderate sentence of the Judge mingled with clemency — such as we do not deny to be passed even upon the demons themselves — have attributed to Jerome the error that the torments of wicked Christians will one day come to an end, I observe that the Saint writes upon these words of Isaiah: Their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched; and that by these words the eternity of torments is clearly asserted. To confirm that doctrine he recites the most plain words of Christ the Judge in Matth. 25: Go into the eternal fire, which was prepared for the devil and his angels, where at ℣ 46 there follows: And these shall go into eternal punishment, but the just into eternal life. And on this passage in his Commentaries on Matthew Jerome had long before noted the following: Prudent reader, mark that both the punishments are eternal, and that perpetual life has thenceforth no fear of falling. That Jerome had not forgotten this doctrine while he was writing upon Isaiah is abundantly clear, not only because he says that the passage is expounded by most in such a way that they do not deny the eternal torments of transgressors and of those who deny the Lord, and because in proof of this he alleges the aforementioned passage of Matthew; but most of all because he himself asserts eternal torments in express words, writing thus: And before the eyes of all the Saints the torments of those will be displayed who, instead of gold and silver and precious stone, have built upon the foundation of the Lord hay, wood, and stubble, the fuel of everlasting fire. That those who build upon the foundation of the Lord are Christians, no prudent man will deny. And with no more justice can it be denied that those are consigned to eternal torments who have built … the fuel of everlasting fire.

[751] The following words also illustrate that truth. For he adds: it is confirmed. Further, those who would have the torments end at some time, and who hold that, though after long ages, the tortures nevertheless have a term, etc. For if the patrons of the contrary opinion held that the torments come to an end at some time, most men, whom Jerome himself follows, taught that they never come to an end. If these things are not yet enough for St. Jerome's censors, let them hear the same man speaking at chap. 65 of Isaiah, ℣ 20, concerning the time of judgment: At that time, therefore, he says, when there shall be one age for all, both the Saint and the sinner shall be made perfect by a like resurrection, nor shall they differ from one another in time; but the one shall be drawn to rewards, the other to torments; and in this the sinner shall be accursed, that with an incorrupt body he shall suffer eternal punishments. I add no more. For if these things have not sufficed for contentious men, who frame for themselves rules of reasoning foreign to all sound dialectic, in order to overthrow what is certain and beyond doubt by means of obscure passages, such men deserve rather to be despised than to be refuted further.

§ XLIV. An account is given of what was decreed at Rome against Rufinus: other objections and calumnies of Rufinus against Jerome are examined and refuted.

Since he had been accused by St. Jerome's friends. Thus far I have examined the objections by which Rufinus wished to render Jerome suspect of Origen's errors, and some others touching almost the same articles of faith, added by certain recent writers. But Rufinus attempted to defame not only Jerome's doctrine, but his life as well; and he poured out many complaints, by which he strove to transfer to Jerome the blame for the whole contention that had arisen between them, and to make him out guilty of violated friendship. Many objections concerning the Saint's deeds I have already discussed in various places; the rest I shall examine here, when I shall have refuted Rufinus's complaints. We have already seen, in §40, that Rufinus was accused at Rome on account of the translated books of Origen On First Principles, and that St. Marcella acted against him before St. Anastasius the Pope: that Pammachius too and Oceanus stood with Marcella against the same man. To these, who were most closely bound to Jerome, there were joined several men from Jerome's own monastery who had set out for the West, of whom the chief were Vincentius the priest, who had left the East before Rufinus, and Eusebius of Cremona, who came to Rome one year after Rufinus and was among his chief accusers. On this occasion, then, Rufinus wished to attribute the whole blame to Jerome, because those by whom he had been accused were Jerome's friends and disciples. Whether those accusers contracted any blame, and whether it was rightly imputed to St. Jerome, we shall see below. Let us first say what followed from the accusation.

[753] and it had been condemned by Pope Anastasius That Rufinus's Version of Origen's books On First Principles was condemned by Pope Anastasius is clear from the Epistle of Anastasius to John of Jerusalem, which is found in the Verona edition, vol. 2, from col. 577: for that Translation is there censured at great length. That Rufinus himself was condemned also, and deprived of communion, some assert and others deny. Anastasius certainly disapproved his deed greatly, and speaks of it in the said Epistle thus: Ruffinus, concerning whom you have deigned to consult me, has the divine Majesty as the arbiter of his own conscience, before whom let him see for himself, with the whole duty of devotion, in what manner he ought to approve himself. Then he discourses at greater length against the Version, as plainly harmful, and adds: Moved by this, you will be able to verify from what follows what kind of Epistle our littleness has transmitted, drawn up with more diligent care, to our brother and fellow-bishop Venerius (of Milan). Whence, therefore, let that man who made the translation have it with himself, and keep this conscience to himself: I labour under no superfluous dread, nor am I troubled with empty fear. He says this, in all likelihood, because John, Rufinus's friend, had excused him by the testimony of a good conscience. And at the end: And so, dearest brother, setting aside all suspicion (concerning Rufinus's accusers), weigh Ruffinus by your own mind, if he translated Origen's sayings into Latin and approved them; nor is he unlike a guilty man who lends his assent to another's faults. Yet this I wish you to hold, that he is so held to be estranged from our parts, that we do not even desire to know what he is doing, or where he is. Finally, let him see for himself where he can be absolved.

[754] The last word suggests the condemnation, indeed even the excommunication, of Rufinus. Rufinus's version of the books On First Principles, Yet Vallarsi, with Coustant, opposes this opinion; but in their statements I find no certain reasons. For that he was absolved from the suspicions cast upon him, as they interpret it, does not seem to me a sufficiently probable interpretation. Yet I would not assert for certain that Rufinus was excommunicated by Anastasius, since this is clearly asserted neither here nor elsewhere, much less that he was treated as a heretic. But his deed is certainly condemned, and the translated Work: Anastasius also suggests that the translation of so pernicious a Work was not free from sin, so that perhaps he speaks of the absolution of sins when he says, Let him see for himself where he can be absolved. Whatever he may there have meant to say, he indicates that he had written about the matter to Venerius of Milan, and at the same time he informs us that the reading of Origen had been prohibited even by a law of the emperor, writing thus: This also, which I rejoice to have happened, I could not keep silent, that rescripts have issued from our most blessed princes, by which everyone who serves God is called back from the reading of Origen, and he is condemned by the sentence of the princes whom that profane reading has shown to be guilty. The mentioned Epistle of Anastasius to Venerius is not extant; but there is extant another, written on the same matter to Simplicianus, the predecessor of Venerius. Now Simplicianus died about the middle of August in the year 400, so that I do not doubt that Anastasius wrote another Epistle on the same subject to Venerius.

[755] In the said letter to Simplicianus Anastasius signifies and some errors of Origen contained in them, that certain heads of Origen's doctrine had been brought to him, and that he had condemned them; he mentions too that Theophilus of Alexandria had written concerning the danger of Origen's doctrine. I transfer a part of it hither. With like spirit, he says, the holy and honourable man Theophilus, our brother and fellow-bishop, does not cease to keep watch over the interests of salvation, lest the people of God through the various churches, by reading Origen, fall into great blasphemies. Approached by the said letters, I approach your holiness. He presently says that he has condemned Origen's doctrine, and repeats it lower down in these words: Holding therefore this precept, we have declared that whatever there is contrary to our faith, once written by Origen, is alien from us and punished. These things we have written to your holiness by Eusebius the priest (of Cremona), who, bearing the warmth of faith and having love toward the Lord, laid before us certain chapters of blasphemy, which we not only shuddered at and passed judgment upon, but also — if there be any other things set forth by Origen — know that they too have been condemned by us together with their author. Thus far Anastasius.

[756] The learned editor did indeed doubt whether the said Epistle could have been sent to Simplicianus, Anastasius, to whom Theophilus of Alexandria had previously written, whom he thinks to have died after the middle of the year 400, because he finds no Epistle of Theophilus of Alexandria addressed to Anastasius before that time. For the synodical letter of Theophilus, as Vallarsi proves in his Annotations to the Epistle of Anastasius, seems to have been issued about September of the year 400; whereas St. Simplicianus, of whom we have treated among ourselves at the XVI of August, died about the middle of that month in the same year, so that Anastasius could in no way have written to Simplicianus about Theophilus's synodical letter. But he himself laid the doubt aside, and judged that Anastasius was speaking of some other letter of Theophilus, and that opinion seems to me certain. For Anastasius is speaking of an Epistle of Theophilus which was written not long after Jerome's Epistle to Pammachius and Oceanus, as is gathered from Jerome's Epistle 88 (elsewhere 71) to Theophilus. For the Saint, praising Theophilus's zeal against the Origenists, addresses him thus: The voice of your beatitude has thundered through the whole world, and, while all the churches of Christ rejoice, the devil's poisons have fallen silent. No longer at all does the ancient serpent hiss; but, twisted and disembowelled, lurking in the darkness of caverns, he cannot endure the bright sun. For my part, on this matter, and before you wrote, I had sent Epistles to the West, disclosing to men of my own tongue the tricks on the heretics' side. It was brought about by the dispensation of God

I think, that at the same time you too should write to Pope Anastasius, and, without knowing it, strengthen our opinion.

[757] he writes about the whole matter to Simplicianus of Milan, Jerome's Epistle was issued in the year 399, as was proved in no. 692: and so, if Theophilus wrote at the same time — that is, not long after — instructing Anastasius about the danger threatening from the Origenists, his Epistle will have been issued in the same year 399, or at any rate in one of the earlier months of the year 400, so that either at the close of the year 399 or in the year 400 Anastasius could easily have written to Simplicianus about the cause of the Origenists. But in this Epistle Rufinus is not named; nor is any mention made of the translation of the books On First Principles. Nevertheless, since the Pontiff says that chapters of blasphemy were laid before him by Eusebius, and since these had been drawn from the books On First Principles translated by Rufinus, both Rufinus himself and his Version are struck at, though the name is suppressed. It is likely too that the condemned chapters of blasphemy were sent along with the said letter to Simplicianus.

[758] and he summons Rufinus to Rome. Besides, it is established that Rufinus was called to Rome to defend himself. For Jerome speaks of Rufinus and his associates in the Epitaph of St. Marcella, that is, in Epistle 127, no. 10, writing thus: While the heretics, summoned by frequent letters to defend themselves, did not dare to come: and so great was the force of conscience, that they preferred to be condemned in their absence rather than to be convicted in their presence. These things are also confirmed by Rufinus's own Apology and by other writings of Jerome. But it is obscure whether Rufinus was summoned before the said letter of Anastasius to Simplicianus, or afterwards. Perhaps he was summoned both before the condemnation of the chapters, and again afterwards, to render an account of his faith and to state the reasons for having translated a pernicious Work.

[759] But he, by an Apology in which he arrogantly Rufinus preferred to write an Apology to Anastasius rather than to come to Rome and render in person an account of his faith and of his version. The Apology, printed in the Verona edition, vol. 2, col. 573, he begins in this manner: I hear that certain persons, when they were stirring up controversies before your Beatitude either about the faith or about I know not what other questions, made mention also of my name. And your Sanctity indeed, being trained as it were from the very cradle by the rules of ecclesiastical tradition, lent no ear to the slanderers concerning one who was absent and well known to you both in faith and in the love of God. Yet, since the report of the attack upon my reputation has reached me, I have thought it fair — since I myself have been restored to my parents after nearly thirty years, and it were hard enough and inhuman if I should so quickly abandon those whom I have revisited so late, and at the same time because the labour of so long a journey has made me too frail for repeating such labours — that I should satisfy your Beatitude by a letter of mine: not that I might wipe away the stain of suspicion from your holy mind, which, like a kind of sanctuary of God, admits nothing unjust; but that I might offer you, against rivals who perhaps bark at me, a sort of staff of my own confession, by which they might be driven off.

[760] That preface is plainly arrogant, and the whole Apology matches it, accuses his adversaries of envy, since he attributes the whole commotion raised against him to the envy of his adversaries, and says that his Translation is blamed out of spite alone. He concludes the whole with these words: But they shall render an account on the day of judgment who beget stumbling-blocks and dissensions and scandals for the brethren out of envy alone and spite. That Apology Jerome refuted in bk. 2 against Rufinus, as will be said. Meanwhile it is established that the judgment of Pope Anastasius concerning Rufinus's innocence was not what he here seems to promise himself in the preface of the Apology. Anastasius did not believe that Rufinus and his Version were accused out of envy alone. For in the Epistle to Simplicianus he attributes to Eusebius, the chief accuser, warmth of faith and love toward the Lord — not envy, not spite, not the other sins with which Rufinus tried to defame St. Eusebius of Cremona.

[761] Concerning SS. Marcella and Pammachius, who were among the first to attack Rufinus, he laboured in vain to satisfy Anastasius. he judged without doubt still better: for John of Jerusalem, who pressed suspicions of this sort concerning Rufinus's adversaries, he rejected in these words: But as to your being troubled by the common complaint concerning Ruffinus, so as to pursue certain persons with vague suspicions — I shall restrain this opinion of yours by an example from the divine reading, as it is written: “Man is not as God: for God sees in the heart, man sees in the face.” Wherefore it is certain that Rufinus did not satisfy Anastasius. And he wrote another Epistle against him to Venerius of Milan, the successor of Simplicianus; and he sent it to John, Rufinus's patron, together with the Epistle just praised. This Epistle to Venerius he issued in all likelihood after reading Rufinus's Apology, and in it he seems to have spared Rufinus less. Jerome speaks of it in bk. 3 against Rufinus, no. 20 and following, refuting Rufinus, who called it a forgery. For the rest, whatever the condemnation of Rufinus may have been, I pass on to examine the things he vomited forth against St. Jerome.

[762] The first accusation, concerning which some things have already been said in nos. 701 and 702, Rufinus complained without cause of Jerome's Epistle 84, is against Jerome's Epistle 84, by which Rufinus would have it that he was attacked. But I have already observed that Jerome could not but clear himself by some public declaration against the Origenists, unless he wished to be suspected of Origenism, and that he did this in such a way that nowhere did he either name Rufinus or attack him personally. Jerome repeats this frequently. I adduce only one passage. Where in bk. 1 against Rufinus he had proved that he had in truth been accused by Rufinus's figurative praises, in no. 3 he addresses Pammachius and Marcella thus: I have your letters, in which you write that I have been accused, and you urge me to answer the man who charges me, lest, if I keep silent, I should seem to acknowledge the charge. To these I replied, I confess, and although injured, I so kept the laws of friendship that I defended myself without accusing my accuser: and what one friend at Rome (Rufinus) had objected, I said was being bandied about by many enemies throughout the whole world, so that I might seem to be answering not a man, but charges. Jerome could truly speak thus in general terms, because he was not only believed to favour Origen, but this was also bandied about in various parts of the world on account of the praises given to Origen and certain of his little works translated.

[763] as if he had been attacked by name, Against this Tillemont objects, in art. 91, that Jerome would more easily have brought it about that no one should perceive that Rufinus had been attacked, if he had not so clearly indicated his preface to the books On First Principles, and had not spoken of the Apology of St. Pamphilus. But I cannot find Rufinus's preface clearly indicated in Jerome's Epistle. Pamphilus's Apology for Origen was not vaunted by Rufinus alone, but without doubt the Origenists everywhere appealed to it. Wherefore, since Jerome says nothing about its being rendered into Latin, he did not, even by what he argued against that Apology, attack Rufinus by name. To state my mind in few words, he could not have spared Rufinus more, unless he had wished to spare the Origenists too, and to leave his own defence ineffectual. And so it is false, what he subjoins, that Rufinus was directly attacked by Jerome: yet it is true that some assertions of Rufinus in favour of Origen were refuted by Jerome. That Rufinus was called a heretic in that Epistle, as Tillemont wishes to persuade us, is again false, because Jerome only says: And they love me so much that without me they cannot be heretics: and not only does he omit the name, but he refers those words to no particular deed; and he is speaking of things which good men were bandying about in almost the whole world.

[764] [since that Epistle was written for just reasons and generally against the Origenists.] Rufinus could indeed himself perceive that some of his assertions were being refuted and some of his deeds disapproved in Jerome's Epistle, because he knew what he had written and done; but he ought not on that account to have believed that everything said generally against heretics was uttered about himself. Rightly, then, does Jerome mock the man's anger in bk. 1, no. XI, with these words: That whole Epistle, in which I give satisfaction on my own behalf, is directed against heretics and against my accusers. What is it to you, who say that you are both orthodox and my praiser, if I am rather sharp against heretics and bring their tricks into the open? Rejoice at my invective, lest, if you grieve at it, you should seem to be a heretic. When one writes against vices without naming names, he who grows angry is his own accuser. It would have been the part of a prudent man, even if he was pained, to dissemble his consciousness, and to dispel the cloud of his heart by the serenity of his brow. Jerome has similar things in other places, and rightly against Rufinus, whom Tillemont vainly tries to help with useless observations. For even if Jerome had refuted Rufinus far more openly, and had not been brought into so great a necessity of defending himself, he would rightly have composed his writings against Rufinus, as one who was bringing danger upon the Catholic faith by his version of the books On First Principles.

[765] The deeds of Jerome's friends Rufinus wrongly attributed to the Saint himself Rufinus's second accusation is that Vincentius, Eusebius, and other priests were sent by Jerome to the West to accuse Rufinus himself; and he aggravates this accusation in bk. 1, no. 17, by contending that his own writings had been corrupted by St. Eusebius of Cremona and by St. Marcella, and thus accused. This accusation Rufinus afterwards repeated, and he wished further to infer that the laws of friendship had been violated by Jerome. The Saint answered only in the third book, from which I shall briefly transfer a few things hither. Concerning the priests who set out for the West he answers, in no. 24, that all of them went thither a notable time before or after Rufinus, and all of them either on family business or for the peril of another man's life. He adds the reason why they could not have been sent to accuse Rufinus, namely that Jerome could not foresee what Rufinus would do at Rome. Hence he says: A new kind of calumny: we sent accusers before you committed the things to be accused. It was not, I say, it was not of our counsel, but of God's providence, that men sent for another purpose should fight against a nascent heresy. Other reasons for refuting that suspicion of Rufinus he alleges in no. 33.

[766] Again in no. 34 he refutes Rufinus, who kept giving out that his papers had been taken from him by theft and treachery by Jerome's disciples, and he also invented falsehoods about them. or even bought at a great price. Of Rufinus's papers being falsified through Eusebius of Cremona he treats in no. 5, and refutes that charge of his at length. Since Rufinus's levity in calumniating ought to be perfectly evident to anyone, I here set down only a few words of Jerome: See, he says, whether this be not rather the truth, that copies were given by those few friends of yours, both by Eusebius and by the rest, which so agree and accord among themselves that not even by a point does one differ from another. Of the accusation of Rufinus through Eusebius, thus

does he declare his opinion: Both before I wrote, and now I protest the same, God hearing me, that I did not approve his accusation, nor that of any Christian against a Christian… But because each man lives by his own temper, and a friend is not straightway master of another's will; just as I blame even a true accusation, so I do not admit the falsification of papers in a holy man. That Jerome did not violate the laws of friendship is clear enough from what has been said before: yet he himself adds many things, from which I bring forward one, at no. 24: We gave him peace, he says of Rufinus, we did not take up his heresy. We joined right hands, we escorted them as they departed, that you might be Catholics, not that we might be heretics. Even these words alone suffice to excuse Jerome: for human friendship ought not to hinder a man from defending the faith.

[767] Rufinus, when in the remainder of the first book he had attacked Jerome's doctrine, Other charges began in the second to attack his character. Jerome had written in Epistle 84, no. 3: But that they (the Origenists) league themselves together by orgies of perjury and lying, the sixth book of the Stromata … most plainly teaches. The very words of Origen, who teaches from Plato that the prudent must sometimes use a lie, he afterwards recited in bk. 1 against Rufinus, no. 18. But the earlier words, in uttering which Jerome had no thought of Rufinus, that man took so ill that in an elaborate disputation he strove to convict Jerome of perjury. But that ridiculous theology of Rufinus, by which he sought to accuse the Saint on the strength of a dream, and, applying a logic utterly unheard of, to condemn him for perjury, I have already refuted in §6. Many things too he babbles out on that occasion in no. 4 against the Saint's excellent Epistle to Eustochium on preserving virginity; but these I have sufficiently refuted at no. 261 and following, and the Epistle itself sufficiently defends itself. What again on that occasion he asserts in no. 7, that the Greek tongue was unknown to Jerome in his youth, I refuted at no. 85. In no. 10 Rufinus adds a new accusation, but a plainly ridiculous one, which I have not yet examined. St. Jerome had said in Epistle 22 to the virgin Eustochium, addressing in no. 20 her mother St. Paula: He has conferred a great benefit upon you: you have begun to be the mother-in-law of God. This saying, if we are to believe Rufinus, is worse than the errors of Origen — of which he names two chief ones — and surpasses all heathenism, nay all impiety… And what so impious or profane, he says, could have been said even by any of the gentile poets? By reason of this saying, since Jerome has not Paul but Porphyry for his introducer, as Rufinus will have it, he has fallen into that abyss of blasphemy. All this Rufinus handles so seriously, so hotly, so at length, as if he were speaking the truth. But the diligent reader will know the lion by his claw.

[768] of Rufinus against Jerome, Passing in no. 12 to Jerome's teachers, he carps at the Saint for reckoning Didymus among his masters, on which I have already answered at nos. 338 and 339. He rises up more sharply because Jerome used Baraninas the Jew as his teacher for the Hebrew tongue, and learned logic from the Work of the gentile Porphyry. But these follies of Rufinus I chastised at nos. 347 and 348. Then he adduces many texts of Jerome in which he praised Origen, and in no. 19 contends that it was as lawful for him as for Jerome to praise Origen. This objection alone Rufinus ought to have used, omitting all the things I have thus far reviewed out of the second book. Yet even here there is a great difference in the various circumstances. Jerome praised Origen, partly in Epistles and other Works by recounting his immense labours for the Church, partly in Prefaces to his less faulty little works by commending the man's genius and learning. But Rufinus extolled Origen with praises borrowed from Jerome in the most faulty of all his Works, which contains a compendium of his errors. Secondly, Jerome praised Origen at a time when he did not yet sufficiently understand his errors, when there were no contentions about them, or at any rate scarcely any. But Rufinus extolled Origen when he could not be ignorant of his manifold errors, which he was rendering into Latin; after he had been present for several years and had heard of the contentions that arose on their account between St. Epiphanius and John of Jerusalem; after he had long since been warned by St. Epiphanius to beware of them. Thirdly, Jerome never so praised Origen as to assert that he was free from errors. But Rufinus contended that the errors which occurred in Origen had been inserted by heretics.

[769] of which one, drawn from a fragment of an Epistle, Further, among the eulogies given to Origen by Jerome, Rufinus in no. 19 recites a fragment of a letter which Jerome had once written to St. Paula, and in which he had woven a catalogue of his Works. That fragment has indeed something discordant in it, if it is faithfully reported — not for convicting Jerome of Origen's errors, but for attributing to him imprudence in writing. But I shall readily believe that the things which are read in that fragment were dictated by Jerome: yet I shall not equally admit that the worse things read there were not taken from elsewhere. We could, I think, speak more certainly if we still had the six books of the Apology for Origen which Eusebius of Caesarea composed, with the help of Pamphilus. For I have scarcely any doubt that Jerome drew from them whatever he wrote in that Epistle in favour of Origen. For Eusebius, in bk. 6 of the History, chap. 33, refers his readers to that Apology, so that whatever it is necessary to know about him (Origen) they may find collected there. There, then, Jerome will have found the catalogue of Origen's writings which he composed for St. Paula: there he will have found what he subjoins in this manner: For this labour what price did he receive? He is condemned by Bishop Demetrius (of Alexandria), the priests of Palestine and Arabia and Phoenicia and Achaia excepted: the city of Rome consents to his condemnation: she herself convenes the senate against him, not on account of novelty of doctrines, not on account of heresy, as the rabid dogs now pretend against him; but because they could not endure the glory of his eloquence and his knowledge, and because, when he spoke, all were thought dumb.

[770] It is most likely that these are the very words of Eusebius, which, together with the catalogue of writings, Jerome transferred from the Apology. some difficulty is raised, For this was Eusebius's opinion also in bk. 6 of the History, chap. 8, where he attributes to Demetrius's envy the persecution which he stirred up against Origen, so that it does not even seem doubtful that Jerome spoke according to Eusebius's mind. But since Rufinus cut up Jerome's Epistle, which is not extant entire, into various parts, we cannot show with equal certainty that Jerome recited all the alleged words out of Eusebius, although, as I have said, this is most likely. The very conclusion of the Epistle, which is Jerome's own, suggests our conjecture. For it runs thus: Why I have written these things, and dictated them by the little flame of a poor lamp in swift but not cautious speech, you can understand, if you think of the Epicuruses and Aristippuses. That phrase not cautious … speech suggests that not everything is Jerome's own. For he would not have wished imprudently to dictate his own views, but he could believe that a little more was allowed him in reporting the views of others, especially if he himself gave warning that they were uttered in unguarded speech. On account of the Epicuruses and Aristippuses — that is, men more devoted to the belly and the palate than to labours — he was narrating out of Eusebius the vast labours of Origen: the attached observation, although imprudently written, he was unwilling to omit, but he charged it with imprudence. This is my conjecture concerning them.

[771] If, however, anyone should wish to contend that Jerome spoke out of his own opinion, since we do not know whether the Saint spoke out of his own opinion, not even so will he prove that novelty of doctrines and errors were denied to Origen by Jerome. For this alone is said, that the reasons for condemning Origen were not drawn from novelty of doctrines or from errors, but from elsewhere, and that they took their origin from the envy which Demetrius had conceived against Origen. Eusebius, in bk. 6 chap. 8, relates the astonishing resolve of the young Origen, by which he made himself a eunuch, having ill understood Christ's words in the Gospel. Then he adds that this deed of Origen's afterwards became known to Demetrius, but that at first he decided nothing against Origen on that account. But not long after, he says, when he saw him increasing day by day in prosperous successes, and already celebrated as great and illustrious in the talk of all, suffering something human, he began — by letters written to all the bishops everywhere in the world — to tear that deed of Origen's to pieces as most absurd. For the most approved and most distinguished prelates in Palestine, namely those of Caesarea and of Jerusalem, having judged Origen worthy of the prerogative and the summit of the highest honour, had laid hands on him and ordained him a priest. At that time, then, when Origen flourished with vast glory, and had obtained among all mortals everywhere the greatest name for virtue and wisdom, Demetrius, since he had nothing else to lay against him, most gravely charged him with that deed which he had once committed as a young man, and tried to involve in his accusations even those who had raised him to the honour of the priesthood. Thus did Origen's patrons speak concerning his condemnation by Demetrius — patrons whom Jerome followed, if perchance he did not give Eusebius's very words. Some say that a graver lapse of Origen's in the persecution was the cause of his condemnation, others that it was heresy. Of Demetrius of Alexandria we shall have to treat on the IX of October, where the true reason can be examined.

[772] Meanwhile I observe that it is not denied by the words alleged above who at least did not deny the novelty of Origen's teaching or his errors, that Origen was addicted to new doctrines, but it is only said that this was not, in that judgment, the cause — at any rate the chief cause — of his condemnation. Demetrius died in the year 231, when Origen had begun to write many things, so that he could well have seen that danger threatened the Catholic faith from his genius, and been roused by this danger to procure his condemnation. I observe further that what Rufinus reproaches Jerome with, out of the passage alleged, is false; his words are these: This man, whom you deny to have been justly condemned by Demetrius in a cause of faith, and this man, whom you deny to have been accused for novelty of doctrines — will you call him execrable for novelty of doctrines? The accuser's own statements fight with one another: for if he denied that he was accused for novelty of doctrines, on what ground could he deny that he was justly condemned in a cause of faith? Certainly if he had not been accused of novelty of doctrines, as Jerome's words have it, neither had he been condemned in a cause of faith; and thus the justice of the condemnation could not be denied. Nay, the justice of the condemnation is not denied at all by Jerome's words; it is only suggested that Origen might have been treated more mercifully on account of his merits, and that according to Eusebius's mind. But many things can be done justly and lawfully in judgments, which can also be mercifully and laudably omitted. Wherefore everything falls to the ground that Rufinus declaims invidiously against Jerome out of that passage.

[773] they are reported and refuted. He begins another charge at no. 21, that he wrote contemptuously of St. Ambrose, whose fame was great, he having lately died. But this fiction, adopted by certain recent writers, I have examined at length and rejected in §23, as also in §24 the other

objection, that he had written ill of the Roman Church. He adds in no. 25 that St. Jerome erased from the Chronicle what he had there written in praise of Melania the elder, when he saw that his own acts displeased a woman of stricter discipline. It would be no crime if the Saint had erased from his writings the praises of Melania once she had begun to favour the Origenists against the Catholics. But Rufinus's suspicion was empty, so far as I judge; for the passage which he says was erased is still read concerning Melania in St. Jerome's Chronicle. I pass over many of Rufinus's arguments, because in them it is not the deeds of St. Jerome that are in question, but only matters disputed between the two men. Among these, however, one occurs at no. 29 which I have already examined at no. 350, namely concerning the Apology translated and published by Rufinus under the name of Pamphilus the martyr. Then at no. 31 Rufinus passes on to attacking the Translation of the Old Testament from the Hebrew; but this accusation too, launched in the bitterest words, I have abundantly repelled in §28. Wherefore, since nothing further remains to be examined concerning Jerome's deeds, I here set an end to this disquisition.

§ XLV. The time is assigned at which Rufinus wrote against Jerome, and at which the Saint answered him in two books: and the character of Jerome's answer.

Rufinus began to write his books against Jerome That in the very year 399, in which St. Jerome issued Epistle 84 to Pammachius and Oceanus, as was said at no. 692, Rufinus began to write his Invectives against Jerome, I do not doubt at all. For from the beginning of Rufinus's books it is wholly clear that Jerome's Epistle, when it had been carried to Rome, was sent by Apronianus to Rufinus, who was living at Aquileia or in his neighbouring native place; and that he delayed not long, but leapt swiftly to answer. There is a further reason from bk. 3 of Jerome against Rufinus, where he says in no. 10: For are your books, which you have polished for three years, any more eloquent? Jerome reckons that three-year period down to the time at which Rufinus himself sent his books to Jerome: for so long could he go on polishing them. And he sent them in the year 402, and in all likelihood in the spring, since in the same year Jerome answered the Epistle sent with the books, as we shall see. Jerome believed, therefore, that Rufinus had begun those books before the end of the year 399, so that a three-year period, just begun, may be found between the commencement of the writing and the sending. Rufinus must have spent much time on those books, since he read through many of Jerome's writings to that end, from which he gathered his sophisms, and since the books themselves are written with as much care and diligence in calumny as I remember to have detected in no others. Nevertheless it is likely that they were finished by the year 400, and communicated by Rufinus to his friends in the state they then were; but afterwards somewhat polished and enlarged. A notable addition is found at the end of book 2 from no. 45.

[775] Rufinus did not publish the said books as soon as they were written; from the year 399, and gave them, when written, to his friends; but he gave them to his friends and disciples to read, and hence it came about that St. Jerome had a less than perfect knowledge of them when he wrote his first Apology. That they had been written against him he had understood from the letters of many, as he attests at the beginning of bk. 1 against Rufinus. But that they had not been published he presently complains in these words: Books are written against me, they are pressed upon all to hear; and yet they are not published, so that they may both strike the hearts of the simple and take from me the opportunity of answering for myself. A new kind of malice: to accuse what you fear to bring forth; to write what you hide. If what he writes is true, why did he fear the public? if false, why did he write? Then, when he had said much about the necessity by which he had repelled Rufinus's praises, lest he should seem an Origenist, he shows by his very words that he had no accurate knowledge of those books, writing thus at no. 3: Now too, because I refused a praiser, and, turning my pen, showed that I am not what my friend proclaimed, he is said to be raging, and to have woven three books against me with Attic charm, accusing the very things he had praised before.

[776] From these words some have believed that Rufinus's books against Jerome were three. but he did not publish them openly. They were two, not three, But they did not consider that the Saint was not well informed about those books when he wrote that, and that he therefore speaks doubtfully, he is said … three books, etc. Certainly Gennadius, in the Catalogue, chap. 17, says that Rufinus answered Jerome in two volumes; and the very conclusion of the second book, before which he draws into a compendium everything said against Jerome in both books, clearly demonstrates that Rufinus's books were only two, and that an end was there set to the Work. It does not seem necessary to me, therefore, to prove this at greater length. If anyone nevertheless desires more arguments, he may consult Vallarsi, who had been led into error by Jerome's words; and for that reason, in the Preface to vol. 2, proved at some pains that Rufinus's books were only two. Yet after Jerome's first answer Rufinus wrote back to him a most bitter Epistle, which could have made a third book, had it seen the light. But it was given only to Jerome, and never seems to have been published, even if perhaps it was shown by Rufinus to certain friends. Again at no. 4 Jerome says of Rufinus's books: But against those books which chatter in corners and bite me with a furtive accusation, I shall try to answer when they have been published, and have come forth from darkness into the light, and have been able to reach us either by the zeal of the brethren or by the rashness of rivals. For those books are not greatly to be feared which their own author fears to bring forth, and has decreed shall be read only by his confederates. The Saint has more on these matters in other places.

[777] and Jerome had not seen them when he answered what he had heard. And so Jerome had indeed heard much about the books written by Rufinus when he himself wrote two books against Rufinus, but he had not seen the books themselves, and for that reason he could not answer point by point, nor in the order in which Rufinus had attacked him. Yet to those charges which he had learned Rufinus had brought against him, partly through his brother Paulinianus, returned from the West, partly through the letters of friends, he wished to answer at once. Paulinianus had investigated before all else the objections Rufinus had made out of the Commentaries on the Ephesians, as Jerome attests at no. 21, writing thus: But since my brother Paulinianus has related that certain things in the Commentaries on the Ephesians were censured by him, and has committed a few of them to memory, and has pointed out to me the very passages, I ought not to slip away: and I ask the reader that, if I am a little longer in setting forth and washing away the charges, he will pardon it to necessity. For I do not accuse another, but strive to defend myself and to refute the calumny of heresy laid against me. The refutation is long enough, but exceedingly modest. He only explains the passages objected, and not even all of them; nowhere does he answer Rufinus's sophisms and his manifold invectives. From this manner of answering, then, it is confirmed that Rufinus's books had not been seen by Jerome while he was answering, as he again says at no. 15 in these words: What precisely he accuses in my books, I do not know. For the report of his charges came to me, not the writings: and it is foolish, according to the Apostle, to beat the air with one's fists. Nevertheless I shall answer at hazard, until I come to certainties.

[778] In his answer Jerome Throughout the whole first book Jerome defends his own cause, not touching Rufinus except lightly now and then, to defend himself the better. This will be plain to the diligent reader if we give a very brief summary. The Saint was accused of having injured Rufinus by Epistle 84, in which he attacked the Origenists in general, and by his own Translation of the books On First Principles. He proves that both were necessary: his declaration against the Origenists, because by Rufinus's feigned praises he was becoming suspect of Origenism; and a faithful Translation of the books On First Principles, because by Rufinus's Translation a danger was being created for the faith of the Romans. In this defence he charges Rufinus with inconstancy, who in his eulogy had called Jerome a Catholic, and afterwards an Origenist; and thence he concludes: Either my praiser believes rightly, and by his own confession takes me as his associate; or he believes ill, and shows that I was praised before for this reason, that he thought me a sharer in his error. The reason for his Translation he gives at length at no. 6. I recite only a few words: My Work had a twofold usefulness, in that both a heretical author is exposed and an untruthful translator is convicted. Further, in this defence of his Jerome also shows, at no. 8 and following, that the Apology which Rufinus had translated and published under his name for Origen's defence was not Pamphilus's. And from this demonstration he takes for himself an argument of this sort: And do we wonder if you would have me, a poor little man of small worth, a praiser of Origen, when you have fastened a calumny upon a martyr?

[779] defends himself almost exclusively. So at no. XI he uses the example of St. Methodius the martyr, to whom, on account of the praises formerly given to Origen, Eusebius of Caesarea had objected: How has Methodius dared now to write against Origen? And he observes that Rufinus does the same about him, using these words: Let it suffice now to have touched upon this, that an Arian man lays against a most illustrious and most eloquent martyr the very thing which you, in my case, both praise when you are a friend and accuse when you are offended. By this example he defends the praises formerly given to Origen, and adds likewise that he had in various places praised Eusebius, an Arian man, and had rendered some of his little works into Latin, in order to prove that neither from any sort of praise of heretics, nor from the translation of anyone's little works, does a man otherwise Catholic fall under suspicion of heresy. Presently, at no. 13, he defends himself for having used Baraninas the Jew to learn the Hebrew tongue, and proceeds further to his Commentaries on the Ephesians, reciting meanwhile at no. 18 the passage of Origen where he taught that lying is lawful for the prudent.

[780] The defence of his Commentaries being finished, he proceeds to washing away Rufinus's other accusations. For what reason, under feigned names, It is worth reciting Jerome's own words concerning the first accusation, which has pleased many recent writers also: Of which the first is, he says, that I am a foul-mouthed man, a detractor of all, and that I always fix my teeth in my predecessors. Let him produce one man whose name I have censured in my little works, or whom, after his own art, I have grazed with a figurative praise. But if I speak against the envious, and if the point of my pen wounds a Luscius Lavinius or an Asinius Pollio of the family of the Cornelii; if I remove from myself a man of a play-actor's spiteful mind, and direct all my darts at a single stock, why does he distribute his wounds among many, why does he show by his impatience at being answered that it is he who is aimed at? This answer of Jerome's entirely confirms that he used feigned names in order, by a hidden admonition, to make detractors and the envious mindful of their duty, and to teach them wittily, from the qualities of the persons whose names he used, what fault or sin they were committing.

[781] I know indeed that to some, such passages of Jerome under feigned names seem sharp and

bitter stings. he grazed his adversaries. But to me it seems rather to be attributed to Jerome's moderation that he chose to use that manner of correcting rivals and detractors. For they are deceived who think that the same persons were always designated by Jerome under feigned names of this kind, and that it was everywhere known whom he was attacking. For from the comparison of different passages it can be abundantly proved that the same person cannot always have been designated by the same feigned name, and that it is sometimes vain to ask who was meant. Wherefore I am altogether persuaded that Jerome used names of this sort for no other end than that the reproof might be more hidden, and that it might become known to none but those alone to whom the sins of the persons reproved were known. Thus it is only known to the learned that Rufinus is now and then designated under a feigned name, because from Rufinus's deeds it is gathered why Jerome grazed him now under the name of Scorpion, now of Grunnius, now under other names. But those too will be deceived who suppose that Rufinus is always meant, if only they find a name under which they know he was once insinuated.

[782] Next Jerome wittily washes away the charge of perjury, most bitterly objected against him, In what manner the Saint restrained himself. casting back no charge against Rufinus in the whole book, but only defending himself. Yet at no. 31 he declares in weighty words by what bridle he restrained himself, lest he should strike back more heavily against a most bitter accuser, writing thus: This one thing I announce, and, repeating it, I shall warn again and again. You provoke a horned beast: and if I did not heed that word of the Apostle, “The evil-speakers shall not possess the kingdom of God;” and, “Biting one another, you are consumed by one another;” you would already feel now that out of a little and treacherous concord a great discord has arisen in the world. What does it profit you to heap up curses against us before those who know us and those who do not alike? Is it because we are not Origenists, and, not knowing that we sinned in heaven, are convicted of being sinners on earth? And have we returned to concord for this, that I should not be permitted to speak against heretics, lest, if I describe them, you should think yourself aimed at? etc. For the rest, at the end he adds something about the objection which had been raised by Chrysogonus, Rufinus's friend, and which will be examined later. Let us pass on, then, to the second book.

[783] In the second book the Saint refutes Rufinus's Apology, In this book the Saint examines Rufinus's Apology to Pope Anastasius, in which he had both tried to prove his own faith and to defend the Translation of the books On First Principles; and this last he had done in such a way as to carp at Jerome, though suppressing his name. And so Jerome begins his book thus: Thus far, concerning my crimes — nay rather, on behalf of my crimes, which a treacherous praiser once heaped upon me, and which his disciples more steadily allege — I have answered with moderated grief, not as I ought, but as I could. For my purpose is not so much to accuse others as to defend myself. I shall come to his Apology, in which he strives to satisfy holy Anastasius, Bishop of the city of Rome, and in his own defence again builds up a calumny against me, and loves me so much that, snatched away by the whirlwind and plunged into the depths, he lays hold above all of my foot, that with me he may either be freed or perish. He presently runs through Rufinus's whole Apology, weighs it carefully, and refutes very many things, reciting also most of his words. He censures Rufinus's confession of faith chiefly on this head, that he had reviewed three opinions about the origin of souls, and among them Origen's heretical one, and had left them all doubtful, without even rejecting the heretical one. He also heaps up much from Rufinus's prefaces to refute these words of his: I am neither Origen's defender nor his champion.

[784] in this part too defending himself and his friends. If anyone reads that whole disputation of Jerome's, he will readily think that he played the part of an accuser rather than of a defender. But if he weighs further the reason for writing, he will fully understand that such an accusation, whatever it was, was necessary for the defence of Jerome and his friends, and most of all for guarding the integrity of the Catholic faith against the cunning of the Origenists. For since Jerome and his friends had censured the Translation of the books On First Principles out of zeal for the faith, it was necessary to defend that judgment of theirs and to repel frivolous excuses, lest they should seem to have been moved rather by a lust for calumny than by zeal for defending the faith. No more was it fitting to leave ambiguous confessions of faith unexamined, lest Catholics should be seduced by them. And so St. Jerome, in this part of the book too, even though he seems to be accusing Rufinus, is rather defending himself and his friends and the Catholic faith. Besides, he far more openly protects himself, when he shows how great a difference there is between the books of Origen which he himself made Latin, and the most faulty books On First Principles which Rufinus translated. Then in the remaining part of the book Jerome defends at length his own Translation of the Old Testament from the Hebrew, which Rufinus attacked. But of these things I have already treated abundantly in §28.

[785] The earlier books Jerome published in the year 401, It remains that we briefly inquire into the time at which the Saint brought forth those two books which he dedicated to Pammachius and Marcella. The time is gathered, after a fashion, from bk. 1, no. 24, where he says that his Epistle 84 was written two years before. For since this was written in the year 399, as was said at no. 692, that two-year interval sends us back to the year 401. The same year is likewise suggested in bk. 2, no. 24, where he says that nearly ten years before he had written the book On Illustrious Men, which he composed toward the end of the year 392. For by that manner of speaking he seems to mean nine years not quite complete. Vallarsi, however, assigns these two books of Jerome to the year 402, because he believed that Jerome's Epistle 84, by which Rufinus was so exasperated, belongs to the year 400, and for that reason extends nearly ten years to ten years nearly complete; which ill agrees with Jerome's ordinary manner of speaking, who is wont so to express a number of years that the last is incomplete.

[786] Besides, Vallarsi is compelled in his chronology to assign Jerome's third book against Rufinus to the same year 402, and the third he composed in the year 402. to which he has attached the two earlier ones. But it is far more probable that the third belongs to the following year: for before it was written, the earlier ones had reached Rome from Palestine, and thence Aquileia and Rufinus, and Rufinus's answer had again reached Jerome in Palestine. If we only consider that in Jerome's time everything had to be carried, not by appointed couriers, but by travellers who were going from one province to another, or were sometimes sent for that purpose, we shall hardly believe that all this was accomplished in one year. Jerome himself seems to make the third at least a whole year later than the earlier ones. For between his Epistle 84 and the earlier books against Rufinus he sets a space of two years; but Rufinus's books, which he had received before the third, he says in bk. 3, no. 10, were polished for three years. Wherefore, even if we should wish to believe that the two-year period was more nearly complete than the said three-year one, it will still be necessary to interpose about a year between the two earlier books and the third against Rufinus; for the latter began to write at least some months after Jerome's Epistle 84, by which he was stirred to write. And so I judge that these things happened in this order. In the year 399 Jerome wrote his Epistle 84 against the Origenists, declaring that he was not of their flock. Toward the end of the same year, or in the year 400, Rufinus composed two books against Jerome. And Jerome in the year 401 replied to the two with the two earlier books. On receiving these, Rufinus, either in the same year 401 or in the following, wrote a sharp and threatening Epistle to Jerome, which is lost, if it ever saw the public light. To this Epistle Jerome answered in the third book in the year 402, as we shall presently narrate.

§ XLVI. Rufinus writes a threatening Epistle to Jerome along with his books: and Jerome answers the Epistle by his third book.

Rufinus writes a sharp Epistle, What Rufinus's Epistle was like — written, as I have already noted, in the latter part of the year 401, or more probably in the spring of the year 402, but now lost — is gathered after a fashion from Jerome's answer, that is, from bk. 3 against Rufinus. It was full of abuse and threats against Jerome, whom at the end he even threatened with death, namely by an accusation to be contrived in the courts. It also contained some things by which Rufinus tried to defend his own cause. Rufinus had said that it was dictated in a very short time; but this Jerome refutes at no. 10 in such words that he yet declines to contend that Rufinus was occupied a long time. He only denies that Rufinus's Epistle was written in two days, which indeed is not probable, if Rufinus said it in the same sense in which Jerome refuted it, namely that within two days he had read Jerome's books and dictated his own Epistle.

[788] after receiving the books, sent by Jerome himself: And from that passage it is gathered that Jerome's books were carried to Rufinus from the East by a merchant, so that it becomes likely that they were sent to Rufinus by Jerome himself. And who will believe you, a most truthful man, says the Saint, that a trader in Eastern wares, who had both to sell what he had carried from here and to buy there what he might convey back hither, was only two days at Aquileia, so that you were compelled to dictate an Epistle against us hastily and off-hand? That they were sent to Rufinus by Jerome I also gather from bk. 1, no. 12, where, concerning the Epistle written to Rufinus in the year 399, which his Roman friends had not sent to him, he speaks thus to Rufinus: A copy of which I have appended to this volume, that you may know how great a grief I tempered with how great a moderation of friendship. And so I do not doubt that they were sent to Rufinus by Jerome; but Jerome had also sent his Apology to others staying at Rome: and it is likely that it reached Rome much sooner than Aquileia, so that perhaps Rufinus himself already had a copy through his Roman friends when he received the one sent by Jerome.

[789] to that Epistle Jerome, Certainly Rufinus knew that Jerome's Apology had been published. For he complained of it, and said that he had sent his own writings only to those who had been offended by Jerome's Epistle 84, adding at no. 3 this reason, that Christians must speak, not for display, but for edification. Both these things Jerome refutes in these words: And whence, I ask you, did the report of your books reach me? Who spread them at Rome, who in Italy, who through the islands of Dalmatia? If they lay hidden in your own desks and those of your friends, how did my crimes reach me? And do you dare to say that you speak, not for display but for edification, like a Christian, you who invent, an old man about an old man, such things as a murderer would not say of a robber, nor a harlot of a whore, nor a buffoon of a mime? You who are in labour with mountains of crimes against me, and who so long beforehand sharpen the swords you would plunge into my throat?… This is that holy modesty of yours, this the Christian edification; so modest are you, so decent, that men coming in droves from the West have told me your curses, so much by heart

and so consistently, that I was compelled to answer, not your writings, which I had not yet read, but the reports of writings, and to catch upon the shield of truth the darts flying through the whole world.

[790] lest he should be said to keep silence out of fear, Jerome also gravely remonstrates that Rufinus had threatened him with death, and says that for this reason he is answering again, lest he should seem to have kept silence out of fear, writing thus at no. 2: I call Jesus to witness the conscience of me who will judge both this letter and your epistle, that at the admonition of the holy pope Chromatius I wished to keep silent, and to make an end of quarrels, and to overcome evil with good. But because you threaten destruction unless I hold my peace, I am compelled to answer, lest by silence I should seem to acknowledge the charge, and you should interpret my mildness as a sign of a bad conscience. Yet he resolved steadfastly to abstain from bringing charges. Take this gain meanwhile, he says at no. 1, that one who was once your friend, and is now accused, does not wish to lay base things to your charge. And I say this, not because I dread the swords of your accusation, but because I would rather be accused than accuse, and suffer injury than do it. He is speaking of baseness of morals and of hidden crimes, which he does not wish to allege. He did not, however, refrain from alleging his patronage of heresy, because that was the very matter in controversy. So too he not seldom mocks Rufinus's childishness in writing and reasoning: for this Rufinus himself, by writing, made manifest to all who know the art of writing correctly and reasoning rightly. Now and then he touches on other matters little honourable to Rufinus, but well known, and he sharply grazes his astonishing lust for calumny. But the necessity of defending himself altogether required that liberty.

[791] But how much against his own desire he was engaged in such a contest he again declares at no. 9 in these words: I call the Mediator Jesus to witness, as though compelled, he answered, that I come down to these words unwillingly and reluctantly, and that, if you had not provoked me, I should always have kept silence. In short, cease to accuse, and I shall cease to defend. For what edification is it to the hearers that two old men should fight each other on account of heretics; especially when both wish to be seen as Catholics? Let us leave off the patronage of heretics, and there will be no contention between us. With the same fervour with which we once praised Origen, let us now condemn him who is condemned in all the world. Let us join right hands, let us link our hearts, and follow with brisk step the two προπαιοφόρους of East and West (he means Theophilus and Anastasius). We erred as young men, let us be amended as old. If you are a brother, rejoice that I am corrected. If I am a friend, I ought to congratulate you on your conversion. As long as there is a quarrel between us, we shall seem to be holding the right faith by necessity, not by will. Our mutual enmities take from us the testimony of true repentance. If we believe one thing, if we both will and refuse the same things (from which even Catiline testifies that firm friendships are born), if we hate heretics alike, and equally condemn our old error, why do we strive against one another, when we attack the same things and defend the same things? Forgive me that in my youth I praised Origen's learning and his study of the Scriptures, before I knew his heresy more fully: and I shall pardon you for having written an Apology for his books with a hoary head. These things sufficiently show that Jerome was not gladly engaged in that contention, but was compelled by the necessity of answering.

[792] Another reason too impelled Jerome to answer, and desiring peace with Rufinus, namely that he was unwilling to be forbidden to write freely against the Origenists. Hence he says to Rufinus at no. 37: You are too suspicious and querulous, who refer what is said against heretics to your own dishonour. But if I cannot be your friend otherwise than by being the friend of heretics also, I shall bear your enmities more lightly than their friendship. Again at no. 43: Do you wish me, then, to be silent? Do not accuse. Lay down your sword, and I shall throw away my shield. In one thing I shall not be able to agree with you: that I should spare heretics, that I should not prove myself a Catholic. If that is the cause of discord, I can die; I cannot be silent. Finally he concludes the book with these words: At the end of your Epistle you write in your own hand: I hope you love peace. To which I answer briefly. If you desire peace, lay down your arms. I can acquiesce in one who speaks kindly; I do not fear one who threatens. Let there be one faith between us, and peace will follow at once.

[793] Out of love of peace, so far as appears, Jerome did not answer further the earlier books of Rufinus which he had then received, although he was thinking of refuting them. For at no. 3 he speaks thus: And I shall follow the traces of your proposition (in your last Epistle), reserving the rest for those most learned books of yours, he did not answer his earlier books further. which I refuted before I had read them. The Saint was therefore meditating a fuller refutation than the one he had published in two books, before he had seen the books he was refuting. But the intercession of St. Chromatius, and perhaps of others, brought it about that after this book he abstained from refuting Rufinus further. And from this observation it is clear that from Jerome's silence concerning certain objections made by Rufinus in the earlier books no fit argument is to be had for confirming them, as some have believed. This argument, I say, is invalid: Jerome did not answer Rufinus's objection: therefore he acknowledged that what Rufinus objected was true — as some argue concerning the things that Rufinus would have it the Saint said too bitterly against St. Ambrose. There is not a single small page in Rufinus's two books upon which the Saint could not have expatiated at length, if he had been willing to use as much care in refuting as Rufinus used in accusing. But Jerome's moderation preferred to set an end to hateful disputations rather than to discuss all Rufinus's objections.

[794] The objections of Rufinus in that book Further, it will be enough to touch very briefly on the remaining sayings of Rufinus which the Saint refuted. He had repeated, when he sent his books to Jerome, that his own papers of the books On First Principles had been falsified by Jerome's friends. But the Saint examines this objection from no. 4 and refutes it excellently. At no. 6 he charges Jerome with boastfulness; at no. 7 Rufinus complains that he was not admonished alone, but that Jerome wrote Epistle 84 to others as well; at no. 12 he brought forward some things to vindicate the Apology published under the name of St. Pamphilus. To all these Jerome answers abundantly. Rufinus tries at no. 13 to excuse the translation of the books On First Principles by Jerome's example, and specifically because he had taken some things away and added others. But Jerome answers that this alone is not objected to him, but rather that he had strengthened a heretical translation by the testimony of his own preface. There follow other sayings of Rufinus about the resurrection of the flesh, about Theophilus of Alexandria, about Paul who was taken in by Jerome, of whom I treated at no. 664, and about Vigilantius, with answers subjoined to each. Rufinus had also reasoned against the Epistle of Pope Anastasius, and had set against it the testimony of Siricius. His sayings Jerome examines at nos. 20 and 21, and there brings forward these words, useful for the chronology: You produce an Epistle of Siricius, now sleeping in the Lord, and despise the sayings of the living Anastasius. These words show that the Epistle was issued before the death of Anastasius had become known in Palestine.

[795] the Saint refutes, Since Rufinus had by way of passing allusion insinuated much against Jerome's character, and had specifically cast suspicion on his doings at Rome and on the journey undertaken thence into Palestine, the Saint briefly recounts the whole journey at no. 22, and challenges Rufinus to speak in these words: But what was judged concerning me at Rome, and what was afterwards written, I do not wish you to keep silent, especially since you have the testimony of the writings, and since I am to be convicted, not by your words, which you can feign and boast with unpunished falsehood, but by ecclesiastical documents. See how much I fear you. If you produce even a small paper against me from the Bishop of Rome or of another church, I shall confess as my crimes all the things written against you. Could I not also examine your own departure?… But far be it from me to do what I blame in you, and to patch together in an ecclesiastical disputation the ravings of old wives' quarrels. Then the diligent reader will find at no. 23 how unworthily Rufinus spoke of St. Epiphanius in his letters; then at no. 24 Rufinus's complaints about Jerome's friends, and presently several other things, and specifically at no. 27 in what manner Rufinus tried to extricate himself for having first praised in Jerome the things he afterwards blamed, and at no. 28 for not having rejected Origen's heretical opinion on the existence of souls before bodies. And on this article he holds Rufinus fast, showing at length that ignorance was not to be feigned there: and when Rufinus had charged the Saint with smokescreens, Jerome replies thus concerning that ignorance: These are the smokescreens, these the mists, with which you try to take away the light from men's eyes.

[796] There follow several objections of Rufinus already sufficiently refuted, and now and then he binds him more sharply, namely concerning the perjury, the violated friendship, the falsified papers, the books On First Principles translated after Rufinus. Presently at no. 38 Rufinus charged Jerome with a lie, as if he had afterwards fabricated Epistle 81, of which I treated at no. 690. The Saint answers: Many at Rome have had copies of it (the Epistle) for about three years past, who were unwilling to send it to you, knowing what you were bandying about concerning my name, and what things unworthy of the Christian profession and abominable you were inventing. I wrote in ignorance, as to a friend. They did not deliver it to one whom they knew to be an enemy, etc. Another dispute again is handled at no. 39. Rufinus had said that he had taken from other books of Origen the things he had corrected in the books On First Principles. But when Jerome had noticed that this was false, he had asked from which Works of Origen he had taken them. And Rufinus, since he could not answer aptly, wished to turn the argument back, and demanded the books of Pythagoras, because the Saint had said, What I had read in Pythagoras and Plato and Empedocles. But Jerome rightly answers that he had spoken, not of books, but of the doctrine of Pythagoras written down by others. On this occasion he chastises Rufinus's insolence more sharply than usual with these words: Out of so vast a forest of books you cannot produce one shrub or twig. These are the true smokescreens, these the clouds which, while you charge them upon me, you know to have been extinguished and scattered in yourself by me; nor do you bow your broken neck, but with greater impudence than ignorance you say that I deny what is ready to hand, so that, having promised mountains of gold, you do not bring forth even a leather coin out of your treasuries. I acknowledge that your hatreds against me are just, and that you rave against us with a true madness: for unless I boldly demanded what does not exist, you would seem to have what you do not have. Thus everywhere does Jerome sharply bind Rufinus, where the cause of Origen is at issue.

[797] In the same place and elsewhere he now and then repeats the six thousand books of Origen, both on account of his patronage of Origen against St. Epiphanius, because Rufinus with his usual modesty had said of St. Epiphanius: This is that doting old man, this is the Anthropomorphite, this is he who, in your presence, chanted six thousand books of Origen, who thinks that preaching against Origen has been enjoined upon him in the tongues of all nations, who for that reason

forbids him to be read, lest others should learn his thefts. Similar calumnies of Rufinus concerning St. Epiphanius Jerome refutes in bk. 2, no. 22, where he also answers thus concerning the books: But as for the six thousand books which you pretend were read by him, who will believe either that you speak the truth, or that he could have lied?.. What he (Origen) did not write, how could the other (Epiphanius) read? Count the lists of his books, which are contained in the third volume of Eusebius, in which he wrote the Life of Pamphilus, and you will find — I do not say six thousand — but not even a third part. We have an Epistle of the aforesaid pontiff, in which, while you were still in the East, he answers this calumny of yours, and refutes a most manifest lie with the free brow of truth. I have adduced these things lest anyone be led into error by Jerome's words, especially since several recent writers, and with them Tillemont, vol. 3, in Origen, art. 27, contend that it is not incredible that six thousand books were written by Origen, and would have it that this is not sufficiently refuted from the lists compiled by Eusebius. But if we consider that a reader would not find even a third part — that is, not even two thousand of Origen's books — in the lists which Eusebius most diligently compiled in Palestine, where Origen had written most of them, and where St. Pamphilus had tried to collect all his writings, we cannot but wonder at that ridiculous criticism which, concerning the number of Origen's writings, preferred to believe a lying rumour rather than most diligent collectors who reviewed everything, since these were so near both in place and in time that many things could not escape their diligence.

[798] and also on account of his impudent threats. I return to Jerome's answer, who at no. 41 addresses Rufinus thus: I shall come to your epilogues, that is, to your curses, in which you exhort me to repentance: and, unless I am converted — that is, unless I keep silence while you accuse — you threaten me with destruction: and you declare that this scandal will redound upon my own head, since it was I who provoked you, a most gentle man of Mosaic meekness, by my answer to the madness of writing. For you boast that you know crimes which I confessed to you alone as my dearest friend, and that you will bring them into the open; and that I am to be painted in my own colours; and that I ought to remember how I lay at your feet, that you might not cut off my head with the sword of your mouth. And after many things, in which you exult like a madman, you call yourself back and say that you desire peace — but only with the proviso that I shall thenceforth be silent, that is, that I shall not write against heretics, nor dare to answer your accusation. If I do this, I shall be a brother and a colleague, and a most eloquent man and a friend and a comrade, and, what is greater than all this, you will judge Catholic everything I have translated out of Origen. But if I mutter and stir myself, straightway I shall be impure and a heretic, and unworthy of your friendship. These are my commendations; thus do you exhort me to peace, and you do not grant that even a groan and tears may be free to my grief. I too could paint you in your own colours, and rage against a raging man; and say whatever I either know or do not know: and with the same licence, nay with the same fury and madness, heap up things either false or true, so that I should be ashamed to speak and you to hear: and lay to your charge things which would condemn either the accuser or the accused, so that by hardness of brow I might gain the reader's belief, and be judged to be writing truly what I wrote impudently. But far be it from Christian morals that, while men seek the blood of others, they should offer their own, and be murderers in will without a sword. This befits your goodness and your meekness and simplicity, who out of the one dunghill of your breast bring forth both the scent of roses and the stench of corpses; and, against the prophet's saying, call that bitter which you had praised as sweet. He adds more against the threats of death, aimed at him through the courts; and he shows the baseness of those threats.

[799] When St. Jerome had sent his answer Jerome writes thus in Epistle 102 (elsewhere 91) to St. Augustine: Calpurnius, surnamed Lanarius, with his usual rashness sent me his curses, which I have learned reached Africa too by his own zeal. To these I have answered briefly and in part, and have sent you copies of his little book, intending, when it shall be opportune, to send a fuller Work at the first occasion: in which I have taken care not to injure any man's Christian reputation, but only to refute the lie and folly of a raving and unskilled man. That Rufinus is here designated under the name of Calpurnius, and his books under the name of curses, can admit of no doubt. And Jerome is speaking of the earlier books, since of these alone could he have understood that they had reached Africa. But it may be doubted whether Jerome sent to Augustine his own earlier books, or the later one, or all together. Tillemont, art. 104, thinks that the second answer, that is, the third book alone, was sent by Jerome; and that the earlier ones are called the fuller Work which he would afterwards send. That the third book was then sent I scarcely doubt, since it comes under the name of a little book, whereas the earlier answer comprised two books. But I do not think that the earlier books are called the fuller Work; rather that Jerome was even then thinking of publishing a fuller Work against Rufinus, in which he might more accurately refute his books, which he had not previously seen. Certainly in that third book he refuted only Rufinus's last Epistle, and he says at no. 3 that he will reserve the rest for those most learned books (of Rufinus), so as to meditate an accurate refutation of them, as I have already shown at no. 793. But that more accurate refutation of Rufinus was left undone out of love of peace.

[800] What St. Augustine thought of Jerome's answer when he received it, to St. Augustine, he indeed grieved much over so great a discord, and of his controversy with Rufinus, is gathered from his Epistle, numbered among the Hieronymian ones 110 (elsewhere 93), to Jerome. For in it at no. 6 he thus answers Jerome's words: I do not know what slanderous writings against your name have reached Africa. We have, however, received what you deigned to send, answering those curses. On reading it, I confess, I grieved much that so great an evil of discord had arisen between persons so dear and intimate, bound together by a tie of friendship most widely known to almost all the churches. And indeed how greatly you restrain yourself, and how you hold in the stings of your indignation, so as not to return curse for curse, is sufficiently apparent in your letter. Yet when I had read that very letter, I wasted away with grief and stiffened with fear, wondering what those things he wrote against you would do about me, if they should happen to come into my hands? Woe to the world because of scandals. Behold it comes to pass, behold it is utterly fulfilled, what Truth says: Because iniquity has abounded, the charity of many shall grow cold. For what faithful breasts are now safely poured out into one another? into whose bosom shall affection securely cast itself entire? what friend, in short, is not to be feared as a future enemy, if between Jerome and Ruffinus that could arise which we now lament? He adds very much more, in which he deplores the inconstancy of human friendship.

[801] Moreover at no. 8 he declares his desire to learn of their mutual concord, and he earnestly wished for peace; yet to Jerome and with a feeling of grief writes thus: Alas for me, who cannot find you both together somewhere: perhaps, moved as I am, grieving as I am, fearing as I am, I would fall at your feet, I would weep as much as I could, I would entreat as much as I love; now each of you for his own sake, now both of you for each other's sake, and for others, and especially for the weak, for whom Christ died, etc. Augustine subjoins more to declare his fear. And then, after various arguments, he clearly intimates at no. 10 that he finds no excess in Jerome's answer, writing thus: Wherefore, what prudent man does not see how tolerably you too bear the now incredible enmities of one once your dearest and most intimate friend, your conscience consoling you; and how, whether it be what he boasts, or what is perhaps believed by certain persons, you reckon it among the weapons on the left hand, with which no less than with those on the right the fight against the devil is waged. Nevertheless I should have preferred to have him somehow gentler, rather than you thus better armed. It is a great and sad wonder, that from such friendships men should have come to these enmities. It will be a joyful thing, and a much greater one, that from such enmities they should have returned to their former concord. If anyone weighs these things attentively, he will perceive that Jerome is praised by St. Augustine as moderate in checking the stings of his indignation and in abstaining from curses; as patient in bearing enmities; as a prudent imitator of the Apostle, who in 2 Cor. 6 ℣ 7 fought, and wished others to fight, by the arms of justice on the right hand and on the left, by glory and dishonour, by evil report and good report — namely because, assailed by so many calumnies, he neither deserted the cause of the faith, that is of God, against the Origenists, nor defended his own cause with womanish fury by curses.

[802] he attributed no blame at all, but a great one to Rufinus. And so Augustine's sharper words about the broken friendship, about charity growing cold, about scandals, are turned against Rufinus. To Rufinus Augustine first attributes the curses, and then the incredible enmities, nay also this great and sad wonder, … that from such friendships men should have come to these enmities. Wherefore I do not see on what ground Tillemont, art. 130, presents Augustine as though indifferent, as if he had found no more fault in Rufinus than in Jerome. For to practise incredible enmities against someone is not free from blame; to bear another's incredible enmities patiently is matter of great praise. In the same Epistle, therefore, he ascribes blame to Rufinus and praise to Jerome. Yet since Augustine at no. 8 had addressed both in the same words, and had gravely set forth the danger of that discord, Jerome wrote thus in Epistle 115 (elsewhere 96) to Augustine: But if a friend, who first attacked me with a sword, has been repelled with a pen, let it belong to your humanity and justice to blame the accuser, not the one who answers. Augustine replied in Epistle 116 (elsewhere 97): For in that (Epistle) I deplored that so great a discord had arisen between you, at whose so great friendship, spread abroad by report in every direction, fraternal charity was rejoicing. And this I did, not by blaming your Brotherliness in anything — since I have not dared to say that I knew of any fault of yours in the matter — but by grieving over human misery, whose continuance in retaining friendships by mutual charity, however great such charity may be, is uncertain.

[803] Pope Gelasius, with his council, praises Jerome's zeal Gennadius, in the book On Illustrious Men, chap. 17, stands entirely on Rufinus's side. For at the end of the eulogy which he wove, a magnificent one, for Rufinus, he has this: But he also answered the Detractor of his little works in two volumes, showing and proving that he had exercised his talent with regard to God and for the usefulness of the Church, with the Lord's help; but that the other, spurred on by the goad of rivalry, had turned his pen to abuse. But Gennadius can have no great authority in these matters, seeing that he disparages many other Fathers of the Church, and namely St. Augustine, and

exalts their adversaries with undeserved praises. More rightly did the Fathers of the Roman council, with St. Gelasius the Pope, judge concerning the disputations between Jerome and Rufinus, whose words concerning Rufinus and his writings, in Labbe, vol. 4 of the Councils, column [ ], are these: Likewise Rufinus, a religious man, published very many books of ecclesiastical Work, and also interpreted some Scriptures. But since the blessed Jerome censured him in certain matters concerning the freedom of the will, we hold those things which we know the aforesaid blessed Jerome to hold: and not only concerning Rufinus, but also concerning all whom the oft-mentioned Man reproved out of zeal for God and religious regard for the faith. There is added concerning Origen: Likewise some little works of Origen, which the most blessed man Jerome does not repudiate, we receive as fit to be read. But all the rest we say are to be rejected along with their author. These things abundantly show how great was the authority of St. Jerome with St. Gelasius and the Fathers of that council.

[804] It is further clear that it was their judgment that Jerome was moved by zeal for God and religious regard for the faith in refuting Rufinus, who seems to have taken Epistle 84 so ill, to set himself against Rufinus, just as he always set himself against heretics and their supporters. And he did this with such moderation that at first he was willing to spare Rufinus, and attacked the Origenists in general in Epistle 84. If Rufinus's moderation had been the same, and he had abhorred the Origenists as much as Jerome did, he could have approved everything said by him against the Origenists, and either have disregarded Jerome's whole Epistle, or have cleared his version of the books On First Principles as made with no evil intent, at a friend's entreaty, not to defend Origen's errors, but only that Macarius, who was about to write against fate, might draw arguments from them. He could have said such things, I say, if he had hated Origen's errors, and had translated that author's worst books with the intention that the good in them should be selected and the bad left. That very thing too, that he had abused Jerome's authority to commend Origen, he could have excused, and referred to Origen's learning alone and not to his doctrines, if he had commended Origen with a simple mind and had abhorred his depraved doctrines. But Rufinus himself in his books shows far more openly that he was less estranged from some of Origen's errors than Jerome ever said of him. For through at least half of the first book he so compares Jerome's words with several of Origen's errors that nowhere does he say that those errors are to be condemned, or that the opinions are heretical; but everywhere he only infers that Jerome taught the very things he condemned in Origen.

[805] But it was not by silence alone that Rufinus made himself suspect of too great a love for Origen; because he would not have some of Origen's errors condemned, he also clearly declares that certain of his opinions do not seem to be condemnable, but that judgment concerning them should be left to God. Where at no. 23 he had by a ridiculous sophism fastened upon Jerome an error concerning the removal of the difference of sexes in the resurrection, and had disapproved his demanding of others an opinion about the difference of sexes, he immediately subjoins: How much more rightly you would act if in such matters you imitated us whom you blame, and left these things to be known by God alone, as the truth of them stands. He does the same concerning another error of Origen's, about the pre-existence of souls before bodies, in the very Apology to St. Anastasius. For having reviewed three opinions, he adds: But I, having read each of these, say with God as my witness that up to the present I hold nothing certain and defined on this question, but leave it to God to know what is the truth, and to whom He himself may deign to reveal it. From these words it is indeed not proved that those errors of Origen were adopted by Rufinus as his own opinion; but only that they were not condemned by him.

[806] For this reason I said that he was less estranged from some of Origen's errors, which indeed he does not openly that is, that they were not disapproved by him. This again is clear from his words in bk. 2, no. 9, where he calumniously asserts that two errors of Origen, namely concerning the pre-existence of souls and the complete restoration of all the damned, are shared by Jerome with Origen; and declares that he finds not much that is perverse in them, in these words: How truly you have said these things, God will see: yet they seem to me to contain not much impiety against God, nor anything of heathenism, especially if you say them with this mind, namely as desiring by any reasoning to defend God's justice. Do not, then, trouble yourself enough over these things, nor subject yourself needlessly either to penance or to condemnation. Who does not see that two manifest heresies are held by these words to be opinions neither evil nor condemnable?

[807] adopt as his own, Besides, in bk. 1, no. 43, he says to Jerome: That Origen of yours, whose disciple you do not deny yourself to be, and whose betrayer you confess yourself, etc.; namely because Jerome in his Epistle had set forth various errors of Origen. This had driven Rufinus into a fury, since he wished those errors of Origen to be held as opinions by no means condemned; and he clearly intimated this in the Preface to book 3 On First Principles, where he says that in those books he had not omitted or changed anything if he (Origen) seemed to have said anything new concerning rational creatures, because, he says, the sum of the faith does not lie in this, and because he believed that perhaps we must of necessity answer certain heresies in such a fashion (that is, according to those opinions). And so, while he tried to make Jerome an Origenist, he did not wish to prove him a heretic, but rather to prove Origen a Catholic; and as a defender of Origen's errors he so acts in the books against Jerome as neither to adopt those errors for his own, nor to condemn them or openly abandon them. This opinion of his he again declares in the conclusion of the second book, but at the same time asserts that he will follow the judgment of the Catholic Church if the said opinions be condemned.

[808] yet he contends that they had not But as for the rest, he says, which have been said concerning the natures of creatures (in the books On First Principles), that they in no way pertain to faith in the Godhead we have already said above. But if he (Jerome) now calls into calumny things which formerly gave no offence, I do not forbid him, if it please him, to revoke that sentence of mine by which he might have been absolved, and to bring forward his own, by which he ought to be bound. My opinion concerning him, then, is not to be thought blameworthy, but his own, who blames in others what he approves in himself. But this is a new kind of trial, where I myself defend my accuser: and where he thinks me at last overcome only if he proves himself guilty. Nevertheless, let us suppose that a synod of bishops follows your opinions, and orders that all books which contain such things must, as they say, be condemned along with their authors. Those books will be condemned first among the Greeks: and what is condemned among the Greeks is without doubt condemned among the Latins.

[809] been condemned. Let one come to your books: they will be found to contain the same things; according to your own judgment it must needs be that they be condemned together with their author. And just as it profited Origen nothing that he was praised by you, so neither will it profit you that you were excused by me. For I must needs follow the judgment of the Catholic Church, whether it be given against Origen's books or against yours. These last words declare Rufinus's religious will to follow the judgment of the Catholic Church. But no less manifestly do they intimate the opinion in which he then still was concerning Origen's errors, which he was unwilling to have called errors, but uncertain opinions which formerly gave no offence, as he had persuaded himself. For while he attributes those opinions to Jerome's books, and says that he can be absolved by his own sentence, he most openly asserts that he was the patron of those errors, and Jerome at the same time their adversary.

[810] From what has been said, therefore, no doubt remains to me that Rufinus was a patron of Origen's errors The circumstances of the controversy being considered, when he wrote against Jerome and tried to stain him with six hundred calumnies. This St. Epiphanius had long since perceived and asserted in a public Epistle, and St. Jerome could by no means be ignorant of it. Yet so great was his moderation that in the books in which he refutes Rufinus he nowhere treats him as a heretic or an Origenist. He does indeed now and then declare that Rufinus is suspected of heresy by others, and that favour is shown by him to heresy; in various places he intimates it, and proves that his confession of faith is not free from all suspicion of fraud; but he never openly attributes heresy to him. Equal is Jerome's moderation in refuting the charges falsely laid against him. For he casts back upon him no unknown crimes, nor does he in turn accuse his accuser's morals. Yet I shall not deny that some sharpness is now and then sprinkled upon Jerome's style against Rufinus; but it is of such a kind that, considering the necessity of refuting a supporter of the Origenists and at the same time a most bitter accuser and calumniator, it seems to have arisen rather out of zeal for God and religious regard for the faith, as Pope Gelasius observed, than out of any defect of modesty or gentleness.

[811] St. Jerome everywhere laughs at Rufinus, and with frequent irony repels the blind blows he deals; the moderation of Jerome in refuting Rufinus is apparent. sometimes he blames his style and his plainly insipid dialectic, at other times more seriously his most frivolous lust for calumniating and inventing anything whatever. His crafty arts too he briefly grazes in several places, and he gravely reproves the threats of death he had aimed at him. The latter served for the defence of Jerome himself, whom Rufinus had attacked first with crafty praises, then with open calumnies, and at last with a most grave threat: the former could strike a salutary shame into his adversary. And so Jerome defends himself against Rufinus much in the way that a most valiant and at the same time most gentle fighter would defend himself, if he dexterously turned aside the blows of a gladiator rushing upon him, and compelled the man to withdraw with nothing but jests, or a light graze of the skin. But let these things suffice concerning the contentions between Rufinus and Jerome. If anything further shall seem to need examination concerning Rufinus, it will be done briefly at the year 410, in which he died.

§ XLVII. Jerome writes to Oceanus on the Twice-Married: to Theodora the widow, to Abigaus the priest, to Oceanus on the death of Fabiola, to Fabiola on the Stations, and to Salvina the widow.

The Saint writes to Oceanus on the Twice-Married, Since the controversy between Jerome and Rufinus was drawn out over several years, and since I was unwilling to interrupt it by other writings of St. Jerome, I now go back to the year 399, in order to review the Epistles written by the Saint in that year and the following ones. Epistle 69 (elsewhere 83) to Oceanus, however, must be placed first; it is of uncertain year, but was certainly written before the year 401, in which the Saint mentions it at the end of the second book against Rufinus, and after the year 395, in which Oceanus returned from Palestine to Rome with Fabiola, as was said at no. 583. Oceanus had asked whether a man should be accounted twice-married, and excluded from the episcopal dignity, if he had taken a wife before baptism and, she being dead, another after baptism, as had been done by

Carterius, a Spanish bishop, about whom the controversy had arisen. On the same question Jerome had once disputed at Rome with a most eloquent man, against whom he had maintained that such a one is not to be held twice-married, because in baptism a man becomes new. He recounts his own disputation in the Epistle itself, in which he again defends and inculcates the same opinion at length. He brings forward arguments for his opinion that are indeed plausible, and he had asserted the same in his commentary on the Epistle to Titus at chap. 1 ℣ 6, so that there is no doubt that he asserted that opinion stoutly and held it for many years. Yet the contrary opinion, which Ambrose, Augustine, Innocent and Leo, the supreme Pontiffs, and others held, prevailed in the Church, as Vallarsi observes on the said Epistle.

[813] and defends an opinion which was not indeed rejected by Pope Siricius, Tillemont in art. 96 tries in these matters to set St. Jerome at odds with St. Siricius the Pope, writing thus in French: And although Pope Siricius had declared the contrary in a famous Epistle, while St. Jerome was still at Rome, he nevertheless defended his own opinion with all his might, and rejects the other as wholly false and improbable, nay even attributes heresy to it. It is by no means obscure at what these words aim, by which the author strives to set St. Jerome against a decree of Pope Siricius, in order to teach his followers that decrees of this sort of the Roman Pontiffs need not necessarily be obeyed. But let it be permitted, in defence of St. Jerome, to declare candidly that in the words alleged two things are asserted so openly false that I cannot find how they could have been put forward in good faith by a learned man. It is false, first, that Pope Siricius is ever read to have decided that question which had been proposed to Jerome; and it was added in the worst faith that he did so while St. Jerome was still at Rome. Meanwhile the less expert reader is prettily played with, since no place where this is found is assigned in the margin. Meanwhile there can be no doubt that the Epistle of Siricius to Himerius of Tarragona is meant: for this alone among the Epistles was issued in the year 385, before Jerome had left Rome; and in it Siricius does indeed forbid the twice-married to be ordained priests. Let the diligent reader now turn over the whole Epistle of Siricius. He will find in it, at chap. 8, a strong prohibition that anyone twice-wed or twice-married be promoted to the priesthood; but that controversy which Jerome treated — whether he who, after a wife taken and dead before baptism, has taken another when baptized, is to be held twice-married — is not touched upon by so much as a single word. Wherefore it is false that this was decided by Siricius while Jerome was at Rome, or even afterwards.

[814] [but by the First Council of Valence as regards practice, and afterwards rejected by Innocent I;] It is equally false that Jerome brands with heresy the opinion he was attacking. He does indeed mention at the beginning a heresy which he calls Cainite, and adds: For it says that there are certain sins which Christ cannot cleanse with his blood, etc. But those who maintained the opinion contrary to Jerome by no means said this: nor was he yet treating of the controversy when he merely made mention of that heresy, in order thereafter to be able to borrow arguments from it. Jerome asserts his opinion stoutly indeed and eloquently with various arguments. But it is again plainly false that heresy is fastened by him on the contrary opinion. This indeed I acknowledge, that the further application of St. Jerome's opinion was long before rejected by the First Council of Valence, can. I, in which it is forbidden that a cleric be ordained from among the twice-wed. And there is added: Nor is it to be asked whether they stained themselves by this necessity of unhappy lot when already initiated in the divine sacraments, or when gentiles. But it was also added that no trouble should be brought upon those previously so ordained, in these words: It was also resolved that concerning the status of those who were ordained before, nothing be reopened, etc.: and so far that canon favoured Jerome. But his opinion St. Innocent the Pope afterwards wholly rejected in the Epistle to Rufus and the other Macedonian bishops, which may be seen in Labbe, vol. 2 of the Councils, col. 1272, and in other collectors.

[815] But earlier still St. Ambrose attacked Jerome's opinion, [and a little before by St. Ambrose, against whom Jerome was unwilling to set himself.] or at any rate asserted the contrary in bk. 1 On Duties, chap. 50, and in the Epistle numbered 63 in the most recent edition, to the church of Vercelli when bereft of its bishop. On this account too a certain Chrysogonus, a friend and follower of Rufinus, dared to carp at Jerome. This Jerome himself relates in bk. 1 against Rufinus, no. 32, writing as follows: I hear besides that it is objected against me by Chrysogonus, his follower, why I said that in baptism all sins are remitted, and that, when the twice-wed man is dead, a new man rises again in Christ: and that there are in the Church some priests of this sort. To whom I shall answer in a brief discourse. They have the little book which they call into accusation. Let him answer it: let him overthrow it by his own disputation, and confute writings with writings… Let him hear us proclaiming again that the old Adam wholly dies in the laver, and that the new man is raised with Christ in baptism; that the earthly man perishes, and the supercelestial man is born. We say these things, not because we ourselves, Christ being favourable, are held by this question: but because, being asked by the brethren what seemed good to us, we answered, prejudging no one, but letting each follow what he will, and not overthrowing another's decree by our own opinion. Whose decree it is of which the Saint speaks cannot be said for certain. But it seems likely to me that St. Ambrose's Epistle 63 to the people of Vercelli is meant, because it was written not long before St. Jerome's Epistle. For the rest, Baronius at the year 405, no. 60, acknowledges that our holy Doctor's Epistle is fortified with almost irrefragable reasons, and praises his modesty in that he wishes no one to agree with it against his will. It could seem highly probable, as long as the contrary practice had not been prescribed by Pope Innocent.

[816] About the year 399 must be set Epistle 75 (elsewhere 29) to Theodora, He writes to Theodora the widow, the widow of that Lucinius the Spaniard to whom the Saint wrote in Lent of the year 398, as was said at no. 599. Jerome hoped that Lucinius would shortly come into Palestine, as he had intimated by letter. For this reason he begins the Epistle with these words: Stunned by the mournful news of the falling asleep of Lucinius, holy and venerable to me, I have scarcely been able to dictate a short Epistle: not that I grieve for his lot, whom I know to have passed over to better things, … but because I am tormented with longing, in that I did not deserve to see the face of that man whom I believed would come hither in a short time. The Saint presently goes on to console Theodora, and gives many praises to Lucinius, and declares his own love for the departed at no. 5 in these words: And so, dearest daughter, take this Epistle as the epitaph of my love for him: and whatever you know me able to do in spiritual work, boldly command it, so that the ages to come may know that he who says in Isaiah: “He has set me as a chosen arrow, in his quiver he has hidden me,” has with his point wounded two men separated from one another by so great spaces of sea and land, so that, though they do not know each other in the flesh, they are joined by the love of the spirit.

[817] to Abigaus the Spaniard, At the same time in all likelihood, or at any rate not long after, was issued Epistle 76 (elsewhere 32) to Abigaus, likewise a Spaniard, who in the title of the Epistle is called a priest. From the Epistle itself it is not clear whether he really was a priest; yet this becomes likely from the manner in which he commends to him the lately mentioned Theodora, as one to be instructed by his admonitions, writing thus: My holy daughter Theodora, sister of Lucinius of blessed memory, commended by herself, I commend by my word, that she may not grow weary on the journey begun, that she may come to the holy land with much labour through the desert; that she may not think it perfect virtue to have gone out of Egypt, but to come through innumerable snares to Mount Nebo and to the river Jordan; that she may receive the second circumcision at Gilgal, that Jericho may fall for her, overthrown by the blasts of the priestly trumpets, etc. Without doubt the Saint wrote these things to a man learned in the sacred Writings, who knew in what manner the struggles and journeyings of the Israelites teach us by what labours vices must be cut away and virtues acquired, and how we must break through by the narrow way to the heavenly fatherland. Abigaus was blind, and Jerome, consoling him, admonishes him not to grieve that he has not what little ants and flies and serpents have, that is, the eyes of the flesh; but rather to rejoice that he has been endowed with that eye of which it is said in the Song of Songs: “You have wounded me, my sister, my spouse, with one of your eyes.”

[818] humbly excusing his past silence: And since Abigaus had hinted that he had received no answer to his letter, the most kindly Jerome carefully takes precautions lest he should believe that this had happened out of pride or contempt, beginning thus humbly about himself: Although I am conscious to myself of many sins, and daily say in prayer on bended knees: “Remember not the sins of my youth and my ignorances”: yet, knowing that it was said by the Apostle: “Lest, puffed up with pride, he fall into the judgment of the devil”: and that it is written in another place: “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble,” I have from boyhood tried to avoid nothing so much as a swelling mind and an upright neck, provoking God's hatred against itself. For I know that my master and Lord and God said in the humility of the flesh: “Learn of me, for I am meek and humble of heart,” etc. More may be seen in the Epistle, which is no less pious than learned. This Epistle, with the preceding one, I assign to about the year 399 with Vallarsi, because both were written not long after the death of Lucinius, who was alive in the year 398. Tillemont treats of both in art. 64; but, because he had fixed the Epistle to Lucinius too early, he has likewise torn these from their proper time.

[819] to Oceanus the Epitaph of Fabiola, Epistle 77 (elsewhere 30) to Oceanus on the death of Fabiola, which Tillemont placed too late, seems certainly to be fixed in the summer of the year 399, as Vallarsi rightly proved. And since the chronology of several preceding ones depends on this Epistle, its date must be solidly proved. Jerome begins in this manner: It is several years since I consoled the venerable woman Paula, her wound still fresh, over the falling asleep of Blesilla. The circuit of the fourth summer is rolling by since, writing to Bishop Heliodorus the Epitaph of Nepotian, I spent in that grief whatever strength I could have. About two years before this I gave my friend Pammachius a short Epistle on the sudden pilgrimage of Paulina, blushing to say more to a most eloquent man, etc. The Saint enumerates all the more famous Epistles which up to that time he had written in praise of the dead, or to console those most nearly related to them over their death. Whether he omitted the lately mentioned Epistle to Theodora because it is shorter, I do not determine: certainly for that reason he will have omitted the very short Epistle 23 on the Departure of Lea, written at Rome in the year 384. But the said

Epistle to Theodora is not so very short, and perhaps it was written after this one. This, however, seems more certain of Epistle 79 to Salvina, which is both lengthy and of the same kind, so that it seems certainly to have been written after the present one, since it is not mentioned, as Tillemont acknowledged and observed in Note 67.

[820] From the words just alleged, the only ones that can be of use it must be fixed in the year 399, are those said of the Epitaph of Nepotian, The circuit of the fourth summer is rolling by since, etc. For the date of that Epitaph seems so certain that it cannot by any means be torn away from the earlier part of the year 396. For in it certain events are recorded which carry us down to the beginning of the year 396, as was shown at no. 547 and following. From the passage about the Huns alone, Behold, in the past year, etc., it becomes certain that it was written in the year 396. But from that passage it is not proved that it was written before the summer. Yet this is proved from the date of the Commentaries on Jonah, which were written in the earlier part of the year 396, as was proved at no. 570; for since the Epitaph of Nepotian preceded them, it cannot be fixed except about the winter or spring of the year 396. And so in that same year the first summer was rolling by since the Epitaph was written, and the fourth in the year 399, when he penned to Oceanus the Epistle on the death of Fabiola, that is, the Epitaph of Fabiola. Fabiola had been with Jerome in Palestine in the year 395, and there, hearing him expound the Scriptures by living voice, had asked for an exposition of all the Stations of the Israelites who set out from Egypt into the promised land. The Saint promised that he would write a little work on the Stations. But when the Huns burst into the East, Fabiola departed for Rome in that same year, Jerome himself with his household also preparing for flight.

[821] By this terror, therefore, the first delay was cast upon the little work. to Fabiola, already dead, on the Stations. And Fabiola, having returned to Rome, asked by letter for an explanation of the priestly vestments, which Jerome wrote for her in the year, as we believe, 397. This was the second delay to the aforesaid little work on the Stations. After this we find nothing further of Fabiola, who died in the year 398 or at the beginning of 399, when Jerome had not yet written the little work on the Stations. Nevertheless, the promises given to her while she lived he wished to discharge to her even when dead, and he rendered to her memory what he had put off writing while she lived, as has already been related in Jerome's own words at §35, no. 581, where more about Fabiola may be seen. Wherefore Epistle 78 (elsewhere 127), or the exegetical book to Fabiola on the XLII Stations of the Israelites in the desert, was written in the year 399, and sent together with her Epitaph to Oceanus, as is certainly more probable. He does indeed say in the Epitaph, at no. 7, concerning that little work: Which, deferred until the present time, as I now understand, by the Lord's will, shall be rendered to her memory; as if he were only promising that he would write it. Yet if we consider that a fairly lengthy little work was composed without any other Preface, we shall easily gather that the Epitaph, in which the occasion of writing it is set forth, was added to it in place of a Preface, and that therefore both little works appear to have been published together.

[822] Epistle 79 (elsewhere 9) to Salvina, the most noble widow of Nebridius, To Salvina, daughter of Gildo, is fixed by Vallarsi about the year 400. Tillemont in Note 67 would prefer to assign it to the year 401, because he acknowledges that it seems later than the lately mentioned Epitaph of Fabiola, which he believed must be fixed in the year 401, or at any rate not before 400. This latter chronology has been refuted, and cannot help toward fixing Epistle 79 after the close of the year 399. But the Epistle itself supplies no mark of the year in which it was written. The knowledge of the persons treated of, however, rather persuades us that the Epistle was written in the earlier years of the fifth century than before the end of the preceding one. Salvina was the daughter of Gildo, a Moorish prince who governed Africa for several years for the Romans. Her father Gildo at length rebelled against the Roman empire, and was conquered and slain by his own hand, which Tillemont, in vol. 5 of the Emperors, fixes in the year 398. Meanwhile Salvina his daughter had been bound in marriage to Nebridius, who at no. 5 is called by Jerome the messmate and fellow-pupil of the Augusti, namely because he was born of the empress's sister and brought up in the court of Theodosius with Arcadius and Honorius. Afterwards too, by the care of that same Theodosius, he was joined in matrimony with Salvina, Gildo's daughter, that by this bond he might make Gildo more faithful. Of these things Jerome speaks thus at no. 2: Another perhaps may praise Nebridius because, born of the sister of an Augusta and nursed in his aunt's bosom, he was so dear to the most invincible prince (Theodosius) that he sought out for him a most noble wife, and by this hostage, as it were, rendered faithful to himself an Africa divided by civil wars.

[823] and widow of Nebridius, From what has been alleged we gather that the marriage of Nebridius and Salvina was decreed while Theodosius was still alive, who died at the beginning of the year 395. But since he is called the fellow-pupil of the Augusti, he does not seem to have been much older than Arcadius, whom the said Tillemont, in Arcadius, art. 1, holds to have been born about the year 377. Wherefore the age of Nebridius does not allow us to fix his marriage with Salvina many years before the death of Theodosius; and from other considerations it is likely that the marriage was not contracted until after the tyrant Eugenius was conquered in the year 394, since by that victory Theodosius first joined to his own empire, along with the rest of the West, Africa, which had been under the emperors of the West. If the matter stands thus, as is most likely, both from the age of Nebridius and from the beginning of Theodosius's ruling in the West in his own name, Salvina will have come to Constantinople in all likelihood in the year 395, after the death of Theodosius, or toward the end of the preceding year. For since Theodosius conquered Eugenius in the year 394, in the month of September, the marriage contract could not be entered into so quickly with Gildo, who was in Africa and had joined neither of the warring parties, that Salvina should have reached Constantinople before the last months of that year. Hence it becomes much more likely that she was sent thither in the year 395, so that she came after the death of Theodosius. This conjecture is favoured by Jerome's very manner of speaking, since he says that Nebridius was so dear to Theodosius that he sought out for him a most noble wife; he does not say gave, because in all likelihood Theodosius died before her arrival. In the year 396 a certain Nebridius was proconsul of Asia, which dignity Salvina's husband may have received after the marriage contracted in the year 395.

[824] living at Constantinople, And since Nebridius left Salvina a son and a daughter, of whom Jerome speaks at no. 6 in such a way that they seem then to have been several years old, they were joined in matrimony at least for some years; nor did Jerome write to Salvina immediately after the death of Nebridius, so that everything suggests that the Epistle was written after the year 400 rather than before. But it seems certainly to have been written before the year 404, in which St. John Chrysostom was driven out of Constantinople, since it touches nothing of the troubles of that time. Salvina, who by Palladius in the Dialogue on the Life of Chrysostom, p. 90, is called Silvina, was among the pious women to whom Chrysostom bade farewell. Palladius speaks of her there thus: And having entered the baptistery, he (Chrysostom) calls Olympias, who did not depart from the church, and with her Pentadia and Procla the deaconesses, and Silvina the wife of the blessed Nebridius, who adorned her widowhood with honour and modesty. Besides, when Jerome was writing, Salvina's mother and aunt were with her, as he indicates at no. 9 in these words: Certainly, since your holy mother is with you, and your aunt, a perpetual virgin, clings to your side, you ought not dangerously to seek the company of strangers, being safe in the society of your own. I have pursued these matters rather at length, that it may be known what sort of woman Salvina or Silvina was, rather than to make certain the year of an Epistle written about the beginning of the fifth century.

[825] Let us now see for what reason he undertook to write precepts of widowhood to a person so illustrious, he writes precepts of living for widows. whom he confesses to have been otherwise not at all known to him, and in what manner he accomplished it. He takes precaution at the outset lest anyone should think that he wishes to insinuate himself into the royal court, and on the occasion of a discourse to seek the friendship of the powerful. Then he says: Why, then, do we write to one whom we do not know? There are three reasons. The first, because by the duty of the priesthood we love all Christians in the place of children, and their advancement is our glory. The second, because the father of the deceased was bound to me by the closest intimacy. The last, and the stronger, because I could deny nothing to my son Avitus when he asked, who, overcoming me by frequent letters as the widow overcame the hard judge, and setting before me the examples of the many to whom I had written before on the same matter, so overwhelmed with shame one who would refuse, that I considered rather what he desired than what it befitted me to do. Then he celebrates the dead Nebridius with deserved praises, gives Salvina excellent precepts of living, and diligently admonishes her to abstain from a second marriage. That the most noble widow diligently obeyed the holy Doctor's precepts becomes most likely from the words of Palladius given at no. 824. This Epistle, with others, as a little book containing precepts of living, Jerome afterwards mentioned in Epistle 123 to the widow Ageruchia, and there says of Salvina: Of whom … the one is the daughter of Gildo, who held Africa.

§ XLVIII. Several Epistles of Theophilus and Epiphanius to Jerome, rendered by him into Latin; and Jerome's Epistles to Theophilus concerning the Origenists: likewise the synodical and Paschal Epistles of Theophilus translated, but none against Chrysostom.

Theophilus, planning to cut out the errors of Origen, I observed at no. 663 that the friendship between Jerome and Theophilus, prelate of the church of Alexandria, seems to have arisen on the occasion of Jerome's dissension with John of Jerusalem, and that Theophilus was stirred up by Jerome to cut out the errors of Origen. The words of Jerome complaining of Theophilus's excessive leniency toward the Origenists I gave at no. 660, and afterwards those praising Theophilus for the struggles undertaken against Origen's followers. And so, after Theophilus had determined zealously to cut out those errors, he resolved to use Jerome's help also, and desired him as the translator of his own writings, so that the Latin Church might better understand what was being done in Egypt and written there in Greek. The first Epistle of Theophilus on these matters to Jerome is numbered 78 among the Hieronymian ones (elsewhere 69), whose superscription is this: To his most beloved and most loving brother Jerome the priest, Theophilus the bishop. The Epistle itself runs: The holy bishop Agatho with the most beloved deacon Athanasius has been sent on an ecclesiastical cause: which, when you have learned it, I doubt not that you will approve our zeal and glory in the Church's victory. For certain wicked and frenzied men, desiring to sow and establish the heresy of Origen in the monasteries of Nitria, have been cut down by the prophetic sickle. Because we remembered the Apostle's admonition: Rebuke them sharply.

[827] and incites Jerome against them: and he, praising his endeavour, Do you therefore hasten also, as one who shall receive a part of this reward, to amend by fitting words of the Scriptures all those who have been deceived. We desire, if it may be

done, both to guard in our days the Catholic faith and the rules of the Church among the peoples subject to us, and to lull to sleep all new doctrines. That Agatho and Athanasius, who carried this Epistle to Jerome on their way, were sent to Rome by Theophilus becomes highly likely from Jerome's answer; indeed this would seem altogether certain, if it were established that Jerome's answer was deferred until he had learned the outcome of the embassy, as it is probable that he did. Certainly Jerome, who not long before had congratulated Theophilus on his deeds against the Origenists, wrote back to Theophilus Epistle 88 (elsewhere 71), which he thus begins: A twofold favour has your beatitude's letter conferred on me; both that it had as its bearers the holy and venerable Agatho the bishop and Athanasius the deacon, and that it displayed a zeal of faith against a most wicked heresy. The voice of your beatitude has thundered through the whole world, and, while all the churches of Christ rejoice, the devil's poisons have fallen silent… For my part, on this matter and before you wrote, I had sent letters to the West, disclosing to men of my own tongue the tricks on the heretics' side (namely by Epistle 84). It was brought about, I think, by the dispensation of God, that at the same time you too should write to Pope Anastasius, and, without knowing it, strengthen our opinion. Since I do not doubt that Jerome is speaking of his Epistle 84 (for in this he most of all disclosed the tricks of the Origenists), and since it was written in the year 399, I have already said at no. 757 that the Epistle of Theophilus to Anastasius, of which Jerome here speaks, must be fixed in the latter part of the year 399 or the earlier part of 400. That Epistle was, I think, carried by Agatho and Athanasius to Pope Anastasius, who by that Epistle was the more stirred up to root out Origen's errors.

[282] he promises his help. After the words given, Jerome goes on thus: But now, admonished by you, we shall apply our zeal the more, that both here and far away we may recall the simple from error. And let us not fear to incur the hatred of certain men: for we ought not to please men, but God: although the heresy is defended by them more ardently than it is attacked by us. And at the same time I beseech you, if you have any synodical letters, to send them to me, so that, strengthened by the authority of so great a pontiff, I may more freely and confidently open my mouth for Christ. Vincentius the priest came from the City two days before I issued this Epistle, and humbly salutes you, and in frequent talk celebrates the fact that Rome and almost all Italy has been set free, after Christ, by your Epistles. Strive on, then, most loving and most blessed pope, and on every occasion write to the Western bishops, that they may not cease to cut down the evil shoots with the sharp sickle, as you yourself signify. This Epistle of Jerome is rightly fixed by Vallarsi in the year 400.

[829] In the same year Vallarsi places another Epistle of Theophilus to Jerome, But when, stirred up also by other letters of Theophilus, which among the Hieronymian ones is 89 (elsewhere 72); but this was certainly written after the former, and may also suit the following year. Of the one year or the other I determine nothing: but I subjoin the whole Epistle: I have learned that your sanctity too knows Theodore the monk, and I have approved his zeal; because when he set out from us to sail to Rome, he was unwilling to proceed before he had embraced and visited you and the holy brethren who are with you in the monastery, as his own bowels. When you have received him, rejoice for the tranquillity of the Church. For he has seen all the monasteries of Nitria, and can report the continence and meekness of the monks; how, Origen's followers being extinguished and put to flight, peace has been restored to the Church, and the Lord's discipline is preserved. And would that among you too those might lay aside their hypocrisy who are said secretly to undermine the truth: concerning whom the brethren in those regions, thinking ill of them, have provoked me to write this.

[830] Wherefore beware, and flee men of this sort, he wished to write against the Origenists, he had to answer Rufinus: according to what is written: “If any man brings not the ecclesiastical faith to you, say not to him so much as Hail”. Although it is superfluous for me to write these things to you, who are able to recall the erring from error: yet it does no harm that even prudent and learned men should be admonished out of solicitude for the faith. All the brethren who are with you I wish to be greeted in my name. Theophilus could have written this also in the year 401. But in whatever year Theophilus wrote this Epistle, rendered into Latin by Jerome, in this as in the former one he not obscurely invites Jerome to write against the Origenists. The Saint really wished to do this, but was delayed by Rufinus's books, as he declares at the end of bk. 2 against Rufinus in these words: I have exceeded the measure of a letter, and I who had already set my pen against a wicked heresy have been compelled to answer on my own behalf.

[831] Other Epistles too Jerome made Latin out of Greek in the years 400 and 401. yet several Epistles of Theophilus and of others on these matters Of these the Saint has this in bk. 3 against Rufinus, no. 16: Two Epistles of his (Theophilus), the synodical and the Paschal, against Origen and his disciples, and others against Apollinarius and the same Origen, I have translated in the course of about these two years, and given to men of our tongue to be read for the edification of the Church. The synodical one belongs to the year 400, and therefore Jerome, writing in the year 402, reckons a two-year period begun from its translation. It was first published by Vallarsi, and is placed among the Hieronymian ones as Epistle 92. There is subjoined there another synodical letter, in which there answer the preceding one To the Lord and most honourable bishop Theophilus, Eulogius, John, and the other bishops who were found at Jerusalem on the holy day of the Dedication, as the superscription has it. Of these Epistles, since St. Jerome was only the translator, even of the second, as Vallarsi certainly judges, I add nothing more, except that the depraved doctrines of Origen are condemned in both, but that in the former many deeds done by Theophilus are also recounted. Similarly translated by Jerome seems to be Epistle 90 (elsewhere 67), which is from Theophilus to Epiphanius concerning the condemnation of the monks and the flight of certain of them who betook themselves to Constantinople, and with which he sent to St. Epiphanius the aforesaid synodical letter.

[832] he translated into the Latin tongue. There follows Epistle 91 (elsewhere 73) of Epiphanius to Jerome, to whom he sends Theophilus's synodical letter. From this, likewise translated by Jerome, I bring hither the beginning: The general Epistle, he says, which was written to all Catholics, pertains to you in particular, who, having a zeal of faith against all heresies, are particularly opposed to the disciples of Origen and Apollinarius. Then he praises Theophilus's zeal, and subjoins: And lest I should seem to repeat the same things again, and to weave a longer Epistle, I have sent to you his very writings, that you may be able to know what he has written to us, and what a great good the Lord has granted to my last years, that what I always cried out should be approved by the testimony of so great a pontiff. And now I think that you too have published some Work, and that, in accordance with my earlier Epistle (hitherto unknown), in which I had exhorted you on this matter, you have polished a book for men of your own tongue to read. For I hear that the shipwrecks of certain men have reached the West as well, who, not content with their own perdition, wish to have more men partakers of their death: (he seems to mean Rufinus and his associates) as though a multitude of sinners lessened the crime, and as though the flame of gehenna did not grow greater with the multitude of logs. The holy brethren who are with you, serving the Lord in the monastery, we greet most warmly both with you and through you. Thus Epiphanius in the same year. Of the same year too is Epistle 94 in Vallarsi, elsewhere unpublished, in which Dionysius, bishop of Lydda or Diospolis, congratulates Theophilus on his victory over the Origenists, and exhorts him to go on cutting out the harmful errors. And of this too Vallarsi rightly judges Jerome to have been the translator.

[833] [among these is the Paschal letter of the year 401, and the second of the year 402,] The first Paschal Epistle of Theophilus, which Jerome likewise rendered into Latin, belongs to the year 401, in which Theophilus published it in Greek in order to announce the Easter of that year, which fell on the XIX of the month Pharmuthi, that is, on the XIV of April. From the appointed day of Easter, which is indicated toward the end of the Epistle, it is manifestly gathered that the first of Theophilus's Paschal Epistles is that which formerly was printed in the second place, and which Vallarsi has rightly restored to the first, placing it among the Hieronymian ones as 96. At the beginning Theophilus discourses somewhat against Apollinarius, and presently at great length against Origen, as may be seen in the Epistle itself. The other Paschal letter of Theophilus, likewise translated by Jerome, is Epistle 98, in which much is argued against Apollinarius, and more against Origen. The day of Easter, which is designated toward the end as the eleventh of the month Pharmuti *, that is, the sixth of April, again proves for certain that it belongs to the year 402. This Jerome sent to Rome in the early spring of that same year, both in Greek and in Latin, to Pammachius and Marcella, with his own Epistle 97 (elsewhere 78) added to them, which he thus begins: Again I enrich you with Eastern wares, and in the early spring send Alexandrian riches to Rome. In the Epistle he praises the zeal and eloquence, and at no. 2 inveighs against the monks who had betaken themselves to Constantinople, as Theophilus also does in the Paschal letter at no. 22.

[834] which he sends to Pammachius and Marcella with his own Epistle, Then at no. 3 he addresses Pammachius and Marcella thus: Receive, you lights of the Christian senate, the Epistle both in Greek and in Latin this year also, lest again the heretics should falsely claim that many things have been added or changed: in which I confess I have laboured to preserve the elegance of the words with an equal grace of translation, and, running within the appointed lines and nowhere going beyond in any place, not to lose the streams of his eloquence, and to render the same matters in the same style. Whether I have achieved this or not, I leave to your judgment. He presently explains the four parts of the Epistle, and adds: Pray the Lord, therefore, that what pleases in Greek may not displease in Latin, and that what the whole East admires and proclaims Rome may receive with a glad bosom: and that the Chair of Peter the apostle may confirm by its own preaching the preaching of the chair of Mark the evangelist. Although it has been spread abroad in common talk that the blessed Pope Anastasius too, with the same fervour, because he is of the same spirit, has pursued the heretics lurking in their dens, and that his letters teach that what was condemned in the East has been condemned in the West. To whom we wish many years, that the reviving seed-plots of heresy, long since dried up by his zeal, may die. Anastasius died at about that same time, namely on the XXVII of April in the year 402, but this had not yet become known to Jerome when a little later he wrote book 3 against Rufinus.

[835] Of Theophilus's first letter he makes mention in this one too, in these words: in which he reproves the monks who had fled to Constantinople. If anything here is said too little against Origen, it is contained in the Epistle of last year, and this one, which we have just translated, aiming at brevity, ought not to say more. And he designates the second by the words given at no. 831 from bk. 3 against Rufinus: And others against Apollinarius and the same Origen. But from Palladius in the Dialogue

on the Life of St. John Chrysostom, p. 61, we learn that the monks who had fled to Constantinople said that they were ready to anathematize every false doctrine, and there accused Theophilus of tyranny and other things. Hence we understand at what Jerome's words aim, when he writes this against them: And although their writings are held fast, they deny with their voice what they confess in letters. What need is there to beset the Propontis, to change places, to range over different regions, and to tear in pieces with rabid mouth a most illustrious pontiff of Christ and his disciples? If you speak the truth, exchange your old ardour of error for the ardour of faith. Why do you stitch together rags of curses from here and there, and carp at the life of those whose faith you are unable to withstand? Are you therefore not heretics, if certain men, on your assertion, shall have believed us sinners; and will you not have a mouth stinking with impiety, if you can point to a scar on our ear? What does it profit your faithlessness, or what good is the Ethiopian's skin and the leopard's spots, if a blemish should appear on our body? Behold, pope Theophilus with entire freedom proves Origen to be a heretic; nor do they defend his sayings, but pretend that they were altered by heretics, and say that the books of many men have been likewise corrupted, so as to defend him, not by his own faith, but by the errors of others, etc. These last words strike Rufinus too, and the preceding ones touch him as well, in that instead of defending himself he was calumniating.

[836] Theophilus without doubt wrote a Paschal Epistle again in the year 403. [The third Paschal letter is of the year 404, which the Saint translated more slowly:] But this is either lost or still lies hidden, so that we do not know whether Jerome made this one Latin too. But there is extant a third Paschal Epistle of Theophilus, and it belongs to the year 404, since Easter is there indicated on the twenty-second day of the month Pharmuti, that is, on the XVII day of April, on which it was to be celebrated in the year 404. Theophilus sent that Epistle to Jerome to be translated into the Latin tongue. But the Saint could not satisfy his desire as soon as possible, as he shows in Epistle 99 (elsewhere 31) to Theophilus, beginning thus: From the time when I received your beatitude's letter, with the Paschal book attached, down to the present day I have been so harried both by the sorrow of mourning and by anxiety, and by different rumours from every side concerning the state of the Church, that I have scarcely been able to turn your volume into the Latin tongue. For you know well, according to the old saying, that eloquence is not a sad thing — especially if to sickness of mind there be added sickness of body. And this very Epistle, burning with fever, and now lying five days in bed, I have dictated with excessive haste, briefly indicating to your beatitude that I have undergone great labour in its translation, in order to render all the sentences with equal grace, and that Latin speech might in some measure answer to Greek eloquence. Among other causes of his slowness he alleges the death of St. Paula, who died in the year 404 on the XXVI day of January, in these words: Whence, I beseech you, pardon my slowness also: for I am so worn out by the falling asleep of the holy and venerable Paula, that apart from the translation of this book I have written up to now no other divine Work.

[837] in this Theophilus cut the throat of Origen alone, without injury to the living, But there are also other things in the said Epistle that call for observation. In the year 403 Theophilus, taking occasion from the monks who had fled to Constantinople, with the other bishops attached to him had condemned St. John Chrysostom in the council of the Oak near Chalcedon, as has been set forth by us at the XIV of September in St. John Chrysostom, §58 and following. Chrysostom had also been banished into exile, but was recalled the next day, and so his cause remained undecided until, after Easter of the year 404, he was again expelled and driven into exile. Yet at these last proceedings against Chrysostom Theophilus was not present, although he assisted Chrysostom's adversaries with his counsel. In the Paschal Epistle, therefore, which he was writing at the beginning of the year, an occasion seemed to offer itself of declaiming against Chrysostom. But Theophilus restrained himself, and did indeed argue some things against Origen, but without injury to any person. Praising this, Jerome says: It is an excellent book, both among philosophers and in pleading the cause it has undertaken without odium to persons. But what he says before that: And, dealing generally, while you instruct all, you cut the throat of one, is most clearly said of Origen, by refuting whose errors Theophilus was instructing all; so that Tillemont, in vol. XI, in Theophilus, art. 19, has vainly sought Chrysostom in those words, whose enemy he makes Jerome against his will.

[838] but he did not ask for books of Theophilus written against Chrysostom; At the end of his Epistle to Theophilus the Saint says: The books which you announced that you had written some time ago, send to us either to be read or to be translated. Of which books Jerome here speaks is quite unknown. The said Tillemont, in Theophilus, art. 20, would have it that Theophilus's book against Chrysostom is meant, of which Facundus of Hermiane, in bk. 6, p. 258, says such horrible things that one is ashamed to transfer them hither. For the same writer says at p. 160 that that Book, too horrible not only for its insults but also for its often repeated recapitulation of curses, was translated by Jerome the priest. That opinion, as wholly improbable, I have already refuted in vol. IV of September at the XIV day, in St. John Chrysostom, §86. Wherefore I refer prudent readers thither, that they may perceive that the assertions of Facundus ought not to have been so easily admitted by men who otherwise profess a severe criticism. For my part I certainly do not see on what ground, or with what indulgence, Tillemont could adopt without any examination a thing in the highest degree improbable, asserted by Facundus a hundred and fifty years afterwards. The age of Facundus cannot have so great authority; and other errors of the same kind, which a schismatic writer inserted into his Work, certainly do not supply the defect of his age. By what merit of its own, then, did it obtain with Tillemont undoubted credit, in a matter utterly incredible from all the circumstances and from the silence of all ancient writers? But the reasons why that fictitious book is to be attributed neither to Theophilus as author nor to Jerome as translator the reader will find set out in the place alleged.

[839] Yet I add a few things here, drawn from Jerome's character. but rather he indicates great anxiety over the troubled state of the Church, In the said Epistle to Theophilus he praises Theophilus's zeal against the Origenists by not a word, but only says, while you instruct all, you cut the throat of one, and presently praises him for pleading the cause he has undertaken without odium to persons. But in all the preceding Epistles to Theophilus he extols his fervour against the Origenists with wonderful praises, and sharpens it with new goads besides; nay, even in the writings against Rufinus and others published before Chrysostom's condemnation, whenever mention is made of Theophilus's deeds against the Origenists, he always celebrates him as a defender of the Catholic faith. But in this Epistle, which was written after Chrysostom's first condemnation, yet before the judgment of the supreme Pontiff Innocent was known, he indicates much anxiety in these words already alleged: From the time when I received your beatitude's letter, with the Paschal book attached (that is, from the month of January or February) down to the present day, I have been so harried both by the sorrow of mourning and by anxiety, and by different rumours from every side concerning the state of the Church, that I have scarcely been able to turn your volume into the Latin tongue. Who does not see that Jerome was troubled by the proceedings against Chrysostom, and hesitated in doubt about the justice of the condemnation, because some stood for Chrysostom and others against him with Theophilus?

[840] If he thought ill of Chrysostom, as they will have it, why does he not praise Theophilus? by which he seems to disapprove Theophilus's proceedings against Chrysostom. why does he not exhort him to go on? why does he not add goads to one who wavers? Thus, he says, I have been harried by different rumours from every side concerning the state of the Church. Who was troubling the Church, if not Theophilus with his party by persecuting Chrysostom? Whom do the words alleged modestly strike, if not Theophilus, who was conscious to himself of the persecution stirred up against Chrysostom? For he signifies that he approves neither the zeal nor the intention of Theophilus, nor by even the slightest word does he either disapprove Chrysostom, or commend or excuse Theophilus's proceedings against him. Certainly if a man declares his grief about disturbances to the author of them, and by no word either excuses or praises him, he not obscurely carps at him. But the author of the Church's troubled state was Theophilus, in turning his arms against Chrysostom. Not obscurely, therefore, does he intimate by the words alleged that his proceedings against Chrysostom in no way meet his approval. So in bk. 3 against Rufinus, no. 17, treating of Paul the priest, likewise deposed by Theophilus, he manifestly intimates that he is by no means satisfied of the justice of the sentence passed against Paul. If you delight in the judgments of pope Theophilus, he says to Rufinus, and think it wrong that the decrees of pontiffs should be torn up, what do you say of the others whom he himself condemned?… Nor do I say this as though I judged concerning the judgments of bishops, or desired their decrees to be rescinded; but because let each man do at his own peril what seems good to him, and let him himself know how his own judgment is to be judged.

[841] Besides, Jerome's character was utterly foreign to an accusation such as was brought against Chrysostom at Theophilus's instance. Not even the deed of Eusebius of Cremona, whom otherwise he greatly esteemed as a holy man, would he defend against Rufinus's complaints, answering him thus in bk. 3, no. 5: Which from Jerome's character becomes most likely, Both before I wrote, and now I protest the same, God hearing me, that I did not approve his accusation, nor that of any Christian against a Christian. And presently: Just as I blame even a true accusation, so I do not admit the falsification of papers in a holy man. If Jerome was of this disposition in the year 402, when he wrote these things, on what ground could he in the years 403 and 404 approve a most grave accusation of a most holy man and most learned prelate, whom not even the bitterest calumniators dared to render suspect of Origen's heresy, whose sanctity, learning, and eloquence could not be unknown to Jerome, since he was famous throughout the whole East, and is abundantly known from his own writings, of which in all likelihood Jerome had read not a few? I look in all Jerome's writings for even a single word from which it might appear, or even in any way be gathered, that Jerome thought ill of Chrysostom, and I find none. Again I look for even the least indication from which it might be known that Theophilus's proceedings against Chrysostom were approved by Jerome. But I labour in vain: for no indication of this sort is found either in Jerome's Works, or in any contemporary or nearly contemporary writer — nay, in none at all before Facundus of Hermiane.

[842] and from his perpetual silence thereafter with Theophilus and about Theophilus. If anyone now desires at least some signs suggesting that Theophilus's proceedings against Chrysostom greatly displeased Jerome, I shall easily find several. The first is had from the words alleged, and from that whole Epistle to Theophilus. The second is that after the year 405 no correspondence is found between Jerome and Theophilus,

even though Theophilus ruled the church of Alexandria for seven years afterwards, and Jerome lived much longer, so that it becomes most likely that Jerome wished to have no further business with Theophilus after he had, on account of Chrysostom's cause, been deprived of communion with the Roman Pontiff. The third is that in the Works of St. Jerome written after the year 405 there is a deep silence about Theophilus, even in those places where he was recounting the proceedings against the Origenists. In Epistle 127 to Principia he celebrates the deeds of St. Marcella and of St. Anastasius the Pope against the Origenists; but not a word about Theophilus. Again in Epistle 130 to Demetrias, no. 16, he narrates St. Anastasius's deeds against the Origenists; but he says nothing of Theophilus, even though the passage would seem entirely to require it, since he there says: This wicked doctrine was once current in Egypt and in the parts of the East, etc. I find no other reason why Jerome should afterwards have kept silence about Theophilus so constantly, than that he held his proceedings against Chrysostom in abhorrence.

[843] A fragment of an Epistle of Theophilus excusing himself is uncertain. If the fragment of an Epistle of Theophilus is genuine which Vallarsi published among Jerome's Epistles in the place of 113, as the beginning of an Epistle of Theophilus to Jerome, I should scarcely doubt that Theophilus wished to excuse himself to Jerome, as the very words indicate: To few, he says, at the outset, is the judgment of truth pleasing. But since the Lord says through the Prophet: “And my judgment goes forth as light,” those who are surrounded by the horror of darkness, and do not perceive the nature of things with a clear mind, shall be covered with eternal shame, and learn from the very outcome that their endeavours have been in vain. Whence we too always desired that John, who lately ruled the church of Constantinople, should please God; and we were by no means willing to believe the causes of his ruin, into which he was being carried improvidently, etc. Concerning these things I have already argued, in the place alleged in St. John Chrysostom, against Martianay, that they cannot be held for the words of St. Jerome, but must be held for the words of Theophilus — if, that is, that fragment of an Epistle, which was found in a single codex and annexed to a certain Epistle of St. Jerome to Theophilus, was not afterwards fabricated. Of the genuineness of that fragment, which Valois, Tillemont and Vallarsi attribute to Theophilus, I pass no certain judgment, since the superscription which was prefixed to it is certainly corrupt and plainly ridiculous, so that this alone could raise a suspicion of the whole fragment's being supposititious, which some impostor may have stitched onto a Hieronymian Epistle.

[844] But Epistle 114, which follows in the Verona edition, But Jerome's Epistle 114 seems to be of the year 405, seems, both from its style and from its contents, to be Jerome's. Vallarsi with Tillemont refers it to the year 405, because the Saint recounts the hindrances to translating Theophilus's book thus: That I have been rather slow to send back to your beatitude your book translated into the Latin tongue, many hindrances in the meantime have caused: the sudden irruption of the Isaurians, the devastation of Phoenicia and Galilee, the terror of Palestine and especially of Jerusalem, and the building, not of books at all, but of walls. Besides this, the harshness of the winter, an intolerable famine, especially for us, upon whom the care of many brethren has been laid. Amid these difficulties the translation grew by hours snatched and, so to speak, stolen through the night, and was already held in loose sheets. When, during the days of holy Lent, I needed only the collation of what had been fairly written out, I was seized by a most grievous illness, and, entering the threshold of death, was preserved by the Lord's mercy and by your prayers, perhaps for this, that I might fulfil your command, and might translate with the same grace with which it was written by you that most eloquent volume which you have woven out of the flowers of the Scriptures — although weakness of body and sorrow of mind have blunted the edge of my wit as well, and have retarded, as by certain barriers, words that were gliding in a downward course. The irruption of the Isaurians into Phoenicia and Galilee, and the harshness of the winter, fit the year 405, so that with the said writers I judge that this Epistle belongs to the year 405.

[845] Concerning the book with which it was sent, opinions have differed. and there was sent with it to Theophilus the Paschal book rendered into Latin, Tillemont believes that it was the Paschal book of the year 405, as the very subject-matter seems to suggest, about which Jerome adds: We have admired in your Work the usefulness of all the churches, that those who do not know may learn, instructed by the testimonies of the Scriptures, with what veneration they ought to receive the Holy Things and to serve the ministry of Christ's altar: and that the sacred chalices and the holy veils, and the other things which pertain to the worship of the Lord's Passion, do not lack holiness as though they were empty and devoid of sense; but that from their association with the Body and Blood of the Lord they are to be venerated with the same majesty as His Body and Blood. Vallarsi too confesses that by these words a plainly different book seems to be meant than the one which Facundus asserted was written by Theophilus against Chrysostom and translated by Jerome. Nevertheless he adds that he is not moved by that reason: For neither, he says, did Jerome translate the Paschal letter of that year, nor did any of the ancients assert it. But that reason is not pressing, since the ancients could easily have been silent about the translation of a Paschal book, as they were silent about the version of others.

[846] Nor are the reasons better which he adds to prove and that a modest one, that the book against Chrysostom is meant, and that a slanderous one. For if Vallarsi had weighed better how slight the authority of Facundus ought to be in assertions of this kind, he would not have believed him even on oath that a most impious and most foolish writing, from which he alleged several curses, was Theophilus's as author and Jerome's as translator. But that the book which Jerome translated in the year 405 was free from curses, I am wholly persuaded by Jerome's words, who adopts it as his own, continuing thus in the said Epistle: Receive, then, your book — nay, mine; and, to speak more truly, ours: and when you have favoured me, you will be your own supporter. For it was for you that my talent sweated, and I wished to compensate for Greek fluency by the poverty of the Latin tongue. Nor indeed, as eloquent translators do, have I rendered word for word; nor have I counted out the money which you had given me in parts, but have weighed it as a whole, so that nothing is lacking of the sense, though something be lacking of the words.

[847] but not the book against Chrysostom. And your Epistle I have therefore turned into Latin and prefixed to this volume, so that all who read may know that it was not by rashness and boasting, but by your beatitude's commands, that I took upon me a burden beyond my strength. Whether I have achieved it, I leave to your judgment. Certainly, if you blame my weakness, you will grant pardon to my good will. Thus far Jerome, whose whole Epistle suggests a modest book; and that it was, as usual, a Paschal one is also hinted at by the time, since the translation is said to have been so finished during the days of holy Lent that it was held in loose sheets. Theophilus had not yet in the year 405 been deprived of communion with the Apostolic See, but was afterwards excluded from it on account of the persecution of Chrysostom; and at the same time from all correspondence with St. Jerome, in whose Works I find no mention of Theophilus afterwards. I have not wished to examine Vallarsi's reasons at greater length, since the diligent reader may consult the Acts of Chrysostom assigned above.

* before Pharmuthi.

§ XLIX. The Saint writes to Sunnia and Fretela on questions of sacred Scripture, to Laeta on the education of her daughter, to Eustochium the Epitaph of St. Paula: he translates the writings of St. Pachomius and of others.

The Epistle to Sunnia and Fretela, Among St. Jerome's outstanding Epistles is deservedly numbered Epistle 106 (elsewhere 98) to Sunnia or Sunia and Fretela or Fretella, as the names of these men are variously spelled. They are not otherwise known, even though John George Stredowski, who in our century composed a sacred History of Moravia, attributes them to Moravia and makes them bishops. That they were not bishops when St. Jerome wrote to them the superscription of the Epistle itself sufficiently declares, since it runs thus: To his most beloved brethren Sunnia and Fretela, and the rest who serve the Lord with you, Jerome. That they were also far distant, in Germany, and of a race not long converted, the beginning of the Epistle declares. Truly in you, says the Saint, the apostolic and prophetic word has been fulfilled: “Their sound went out into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world”. Who would believe this, that the barbarous tongue of the Getae should seek the Hebrew truth; and that, while the Greeks slumber, nay rather wrangle, Germany itself should search out the utterances of the Holy Spirit? That they were likewise of a fierce and warlike race is gathered from the words that presently follow: Hands long calloused with holding the sword-hilt, and fingers fitter for handling arrows, grow soft for the pen and the reed, and warlike breasts are turned to Christian meekness.

[849] Vallarsi thinks they were Huns, and that St. Jerome speaks of them in Epistle 107 to Laeta, no. 2, who are believed to have been Huns or Goths, where he says: The Huns learn the Psalter, the frosts of Scythia glow with the warmth of faith. Questions had been proposed by them from almost the whole Psalter, so that this conjecture acquires much probability from the subject-matter of the Epistle. Hence he further infers that this was written before the following one to Laeta. Nor do I see that their being in Germany is contrary to the said conjecture. For about the end of the fourth century, that is, about the time this Epistle was written, the Huns seem already to have had several settlements in the eastern part of Germania Magna beyond the Danube. Yet doubt can arise, because he also says: The barbarous tongue of the Getae seeks the Hebrew truth. For concerning the Getae he adds in the Epistle to Laeta: The ruddy and fair-haired army of the Getae carries about the tents of the churches; and perhaps for that reason they fight against us on equal terms, because they trust in an equal religion. Thus the Saint of the Goths, whom the ancients commonly call Getae. Sunnia and Fretela, then, were either of the Huns or of the Getae, that is, the Goths; nor is it necessary for our purpose to investigate their nation more diligently.

[850] They had observed that there was much diversity between the Greek and the Latin text of the Psalter; and they had proposed many questions from the Psalter. and, having noted the differences of the passages, they asked in what manner each was expressed in Hebrew. Hence at no. 2 the Saint says to them: You ask of me a thing of great labour and of greater ill will, in which not the writer's talent but his learning is put to the test; so that, while I myself desire to judge of others, I offer myself to be judged by all: and that in the work of the Psalter, according to the arrangement of your paper, wherever there is a dispute between Latins and Greeks, I should signify what agrees better with the Hebrew. Then, either about the same matter, or about the difference that existed between the Vulgate edition of the Seventy translators and the other preserved in Origen's Hexapla, which he had rendered into Latin, he says: On which matter my holy son Avitus also had often inquired. And since the occasion of our brother Firmus the priest presented itself, who delivered your letter to me, writing to two I answer to both in common, and free myself from the great usury of friendship, which the more we pay the more we owe. And so, for the benefit of many, Jerome wrote this learned and most lengthy Epistle on very many questions.

[851] Vallarsi believed that he had found arguments

firm enough It can be fixed with certainty neither in the year 403, by which to refer this Epistle to the year 403. But they do not seem to me so solid. If those words from the Epistle to Laeta, The Huns learn the Psalter, designate Sunnia and Fretela, as he thought, this Epistle will have to be fixed about the year 400 rather than 403. For the following Epistle to Laeta certainly must not be fixed after the year 401, as we shall presently see. The second argument, which is drawn from the silence about this Epistle in the Apologies against Rufinus, seems to me useless. This, says Vallarsi, is first of all admitted, as was also rightly noted by Martianay, that Jerome would never have passed over this most brilliant Epistle in silence, if he had composed it by that time when he was writing the Apology for himself against Rufinus. For since the priest of Aquileia made it his chief calumnious charge that the translation of the Old Testament undertaken by Jerome was in disparagement of the Seventy translators, it can scarcely be believed that Jerome, in order to blunt his adversary's calumny, would have wished to beg examples from here and there, and to suppress in silence this one Epistle, in which throughout the Seventy translators are well spoken of, and from which he could have adduced the most brilliant testimony of all in his own favour. So reasons Vallarsi.

[852] nor in the year 405, since it lacks any certain mark of time. But Jerome did not need that Epistle for his defence. To blunt Rufinus's calumny he recited the very Prefaces which he had prefixed to the books translated from the Hebrew, and begged no examples from his other Works. Wherefore I do not see why he should have wished to defend himself from that Epistle rather than from his other Works; nay, I cannot even find that Jerome could have drawn suitable arguments for himself out of that Epistle. And so this whole argument, which Vallarsi borrowed from Martianay, proves nothing at all: nor is Martianay's opinion helped by it, who suspects that the Epistle was written about the year 405, nor Vallarsi's judgment, who places it about 403. And the latter, since he believes it was written before the Epistle to Laeta, would, I think, have refrained from it, if he had had a more certain view of the date of the Epistle to Laeta. For if that lengthy one to Sunnia and Fretela preceded, it must be fixed about the year 399 or 400. But if Firmus the priest, who is mentioned in this Epistle, is the same as Firmus, likewise a priest, whom in the year 415, as we shall see in its place, Jerome sent into the West, that Epistle may have been written much later. So true is it, what most have believed, that it lacks any certain mark of time.

[853] He writes to Laeta But Epistle 107 (elsewhere 7) to Laeta can be brought back to a definite interval of time, as Tillemont already saw in art. 97, though not to a year. In it the Saint mentions several things about the progress of the Catholic faith and the ruin of idolatry. Of the latter he says at no. 2: Marnas of Gaza mourns shut up, and continually dreads the overthrow of his temple. And so the Epistle was written at the time when the temple of Marnas had already been closed by an edict of the emperor Arcadius, but not yet overthrown. Now it was closed in the year 398, and utterly overthrown in the year 401. Wherefore the said Epistle of Jerome was certainly written between the years 398 and 401. Of the temple of the idol Marnas at Gaza, first closed and then overthrown, there is an accurate treatment among us in the Life of St. Porphyry bishop of Gaza, at the XXVI of February. What can further be adduced from the same Epistle does not indicate the time more nearly. Those words: The ruddy and fair-haired army of the Getae carries about the tents of the churches, and perhaps for that reason they fight against us on equal terms, because they trust in an equal religion. These words, I say, were not uttered on account of the battle which took place at Pollentia in the year 403 between the Romans and the Goths, as Vallarsi will have it, since the Epistle was certainly written before that year; but about the war between the Goths and the Romans in general, which lasted long, and in which the Goths not seldom conquered the Romans, and not seldom likewise were conquered. I would not therefore guess of what battle he is speaking.

[854] about the education of her little daughter, promised to God. Laeta, a most noble woman, had as her father Albinus, not only a gentile but even a pontiff, who was still alive; but her mother was a Christian, as she herself was, and her husband was Toxotius, the son of St. Paula, by whom she had borne a single daughter Paula. Now St. Marcella, and Laeta herself as well, had asked that Jerome should write instructions for rightly bringing up the little Paula. This is indicated at no. 3 in these words: For my purpose was, invited by the prayers of the holy Marcella and by your own, to direct my discourse to the mother, that is, to you, and to teach how you ought to educate our Paula, who was consecrated to Christ before she was born; whom you vowed before you conceived her in the womb. The whole Epistle, therefore, teaches excellently in what manner she ought, by herself and by others, to educate, guard, govern and instruct a girl destined for Christ. And at the end he exhorts her to send her to her grandmother Paula and her aunt Eustochium, to be trained among the virgins in the monastery; and he offers himself as a helper in her excellent education in these words: I myself, if you send Paula, pledge myself as both her teacher and her foster-father. I shall carry her on my shoulders, I shall as an old man form her stammering words, far more glorious than the world's philosopher *, who taught not a king of the Macedonians, destined to perish by Babylonian poison, but shall train a handmaid and bride of Christ, to be offered to the kingdoms of heaven. Paula was sent to Bethlehem, but after the death of her grandmother St. Paula, of whom we shall now treat.

[855] After St. Paula had lived most holily under the discipline of St. Jerome, Of St. Paula, who died in the year 404, partly at Rome, partly at Bethlehem, for about twenty years, she passed to a better life full of the merits of good works in the year 404, on the XXVI day of January, on which her Acts were given in our Work. Her death struck St. Jerome hard, and, as he declares in several places, hindered his studies for a time. Of her he speaks thus in Epistle 99 to Theophilus, excusing the slowness of his translation of his Paschal Epistle: Whence, I beseech you, pardon my slowness also: for I am so worn out by the falling asleep of the holy and venerable Paula, that apart from the translation of this book I have written up to now no other divine work. For we have suddenly lost, as you yourself know, a solace which (as the Lord is the witness of our conscience) we reckon not for our own needs but for the refreshment of the Saints, whom she carefully served. I shall give like passages on another occasion below.

[856] Nevertheless he dictated the lengthy Epitaph of St. Paula to Eustochium her daughter not long after her death. he writes an Epitaph to Eustochium. It is Epistle 108 (elsewhere 27), and, I think, the longest of all the Epistles, so that it may be called a Life of St. Paula, and among us has been published as a Life. Jerome himself calls it a volume, who at no. 32 addresses Eustochium about that labour thus: This book I have dictated for you in the course of two short vigils, with the same grief which you endure. For as often as I wished to set my pen and pen the promised Work, so often did my fingers stiffen, my hand fall, my sense grow faint. Whence the uncultivated style bears witness to the writer's desire, without any elegance or charm of words. Then he thus commends himself to the departed: Farewell, O Paula, and help by your prayers the last old age of one who reveres you. Your faith and your works join you to Christ. Being present, you will the more easily obtain what you ask. I have raised a monument more lasting than bronze, which no age can destroy. I have carved an inscription on your tomb, which I have appended to this volume, so that, wherever our discourse may come, the reader may know that you have been praised, and that you are buried in Bethlehem. The verses which were carved on the tomb may be seen there with the rest.

[857] In the same year 404 St. Jerome translated the Paschal Epistle of Theophilus, The Rule of St. Pachomius and other as has already been said. Then, after a long silence, he translated from the Greek the Rule of St. Pachomius, that St. Eustochium might use it, who after her mother's death had taken up the government of her monastery. Various little works were translated by him after the Rule, which yet are likewise directed to the instruction of monks. Then follow several Epistles of the same Pachomius, and one also of St. Theodore his disciple. These were published in the Verona edition, vol. 2, where at col. 53 St. Jerome begins his preface to his Translation in this manner: Although a sword, however sharp and polished, if it lies long hidden in the scabbard, grows foul with rust and loses the splendour of its former beauty: whence I too, grieving over the falling asleep of the holy and venerable Paula — not that I would act against the Apostle's precept, but because I sighed for the refreshments of many that were cut off by her death — received books directed to me by the man of God Silvanus, which he had received sent from Alexandria, so as also to enjoin that they be translated. For he said that in the monasteries of the Thebaid and in the monastery of Metanoea — which was changed from Canopus into Repentance by a happy conversion of its name — there dwelt very many Latins, who did not know the Egyptian and Greek tongues in which the precepts of Pachomius and Theodore and Orsiesius were written. And these were the first who laid the foundations of monasteries throughout the Thebaid and Egypt, according to the command of God, and of the angel who came, sent to them for this very institution.

[858] instructions of his he translated from the Greek tongue into Latin, And so, because I had long been silent and had swallowed my grief in silence, but Leontius the priest, sent to me for this very cause, and the other brethren with him, were pressing me, I called a notary and dictated in our tongue the writings as they had been translated from the Egyptian into the Greek language, so that I might both obey such great men who commanded — not to say asked — and, with a good omen, as they say, break my long silence, restoring myself to my old studies, and refreshing the soul of a holy woman who always burned with love for monasteries, and meditated here on earth on what she was to see in heaven. The venerable virgin too, her daughter Eustochium, might have something to give her sisters to do, and our brethren might follow the examples of the Egyptians, that is, of the Tabennesian monks: who have in each monastery fathers, and stewards, and weekly officers, and ministers, and superiors of the individual houses, so that in one house forty brethren, more or less, dwell, who obey the superior. Then he goes on to set forth more about the institute and manner of life of those monks.

[859] and several Epistles, even symbolic ones, But concerning several Epistles written symbolically he adds this at the end: The Thebans say that to Pachomius and Cornelius and Syrus — who is said to be living to this day beyond a hundred and ten years — an angel gave the knowledge of a mystical tongue, so that they might write to one another and speak by a special Alphabet, wrapping up hidden meanings in certain signs and symbols: which Epistles we have translated into our language just as they are read among the Egyptians and Greeks, setting down the same characters as we found them, and where the Egyptians

have imitated the simplicity of speech, there lies the fidelity of the translation, lest a rhetorical style should change men who are apostolic and wholly of spiritual grace. But the other things contained in their treatises I have been unwilling to taste beforehand, so that they may be learned in their own authors, and that those who delight in the pursuits of a holy way of life may drink from the fountains rather than from the rivulets. From the Saint's long silence after the death of St. Paula, Vallarsi rightly gathers that those little works were translated by Jerome toward the end of the year 404 or the beginning of 405. And that Jerome undertook the labour of this translation not only for the benefit of the Latin monks who were living in Egypt, but also that St. Eustochium might select precepts from them for her own nuns, and that Jerome's own monks might at least in part observe those precepts, I have already said at the XXVIII of September in St. Eustochium, §4.

* Aristotle.

§ L. The friendship of SS. Jerome and Augustine, which had been brought into danger by a controversy with an unhappy accident added, was preserved and increased by the moderation of both.

When St. Augustine had received knowledge of St. Jerome, We have come to those times in which the controversy between SS. Jerome and Augustine concerning Peter's being reproved by Paul was most vigorous — begun by St. Augustine in such a way that through an unexpected accident their friendship, which had not very long been begun, was brought into the greatest danger of enmity. Wherefore I shall diligently examine the beginning and end of that controversy, and shall first briefly observe what Augustine was, and what Jerome, when that controversy arose. The Epistle of St. Augustine from which Jerome's offence took its origin is fixed in the year 394, when Augustine was a priest and reckoned about forty years of age, and seven or eight years from his conversion and his receiving baptism. St. Augustine had already written various little works; but they are neither numbered among his chief Works, nor had they been seen by Jerome. In the year 394, therefore, Jerome seems to have known nothing of Augustine's learning and holiness, except what he had learned from Alypius when present in the year 393 or 394. And in the following years Jerome could not conceive a much greater estimate of Augustine's learning, both because he had seen few or almost none of his little works, and because he had been challenged by several Epistles which do not exhibit the whole Augustine to us even now.

[861] On the contrary Jerome, as he was more than twenty years older than Augustine, being still a priest, he first writes to him courteously, so had spent nearly thirty years in sacred studies, and had written many little works on sacred Scripture, more for the forming of morals, and against heretics; and he had drawn the highest knowledge of the Scriptures, just as from his youth he had attained the greatest skill in profane letters and a knowledge of various tongues, so that there is no doubt that at that time Jerome was greater than Augustine not only in age but also in learning and fame. Now Augustine became known to Jerome through Alypius, who was in Palestine in the year 393 or at the beginning of the following year; and Jerome to Augustine partly through his writings, partly through the said Alypius. When he had returned to Africa, Augustine in the year 394 wrote the first Epistle to Jerome, numbered among the Hieronymian ones 56 (elsewhere 86), which he thus begins: Never has anyone become so easily known to another as to me the quiet gladness of your studies in the Lord, and your truly liberal exercise. Although, therefore, I greatly desire to know you altogether, yet there is one small thing of you that I lack, namely the bodily presence: and even this, after the most blessed brother Alypius, now a bishop, but then already worthy of the episcopate, had seen you and was seen by me on his return, I cannot deny was in great part impressed upon me by his account. And before his return, when he was seeing you there, I too was seeing you, but with his eyes…

[862] asking him to translate Greek writers, Since, therefore, you love me, first by the communion of the spirit in which we are knit into one, and then already from his mouth, I by no means impudently, as a stranger might, commend to your brotherliness our brother Profuturus, who, we hope, will truly profit our endeavours, and then by your assistance — unless perhaps he is such a man that I myself may be more commended to you through him than he through me. Presently at no. 2 he has this: We ask, then, and with us the whole zealous society of the African churches asks, that you may not think it burdensome to spend care and labour on translating the books of those who have handled our Scriptures in Greek in the best way. For you can bring it about that we too may have such men, and one above all, whose name you sound more gladly in your writings. He is speaking without doubt of Origen. But at that time Jerome had begun to know Origen's errors better; and for that reason the Saint was unwilling to do this, being occupied with more useful matters besides. Yet that request could not offend the holy Man.

[863] but disapproving the translation of the Scripture from the Hebrew, But what follows in Augustine's Epistle was fitted to sting Jerome's mind. For first at no. 2 Augustine argues some things to dissuade Jerome from the translation of sacred Scripture out of the Hebrew, and among other reasons brings forward this: For if they are obscure, it is believed that you too could be deceived in them; but if they are plain, it is not believed that they (the earlier translators) could be deceived in them. It cannot be doubted that Augustine wished with the best intention to dissuade Jerome from that labour. But Jerome, who well perceived the immense usefulness of his work, understood at the first glance that Augustine's reasons to the contrary were weak; and therefore he could rightly think that Augustine was not of such an age or learning that his counsel should be followed against his own knowledge. And since many others also opposed that same Translation, he saw that the petty reasonings of his rivals prevailed more with Augustine than his own long-meditated plans, springing from a long study of the sacred Scriptures. And so such counsel, given at the beginning of a friendship, when neither man thoroughly knew the other, was fitted to raise unfavourable suspicions in Jerome.

[864] and attacking his opinion about Peter's being reproved. But a most learned man must have been stung far more by what Augustine argued in the same Epistle, at nos. 3 and 4, against Jerome's assertions in the Commentaries on the Epistle to the Galatians concerning St. Peter's being reproved. The passage of Paul, Gal. 2 ℣ XI, But when Cephas had come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was blameworthy (the Greek: reproved), Jerome so expounded as to believe that Paul's reproof was feigned rather than real, as others too have explained the passage, and namely Chrysostom. St. Augustine vehemently opposed the said exposition in the book On Lying, from which the passage was cited by us at the XXVIII of August in St. Augustine, no. 284, where Jerome's words which displeased Augustine were likewise given. Augustine contended that from the opinion of Jerome and others it follows that St. Paul lied. Hence in the said Epistle to Jerome he speaks thus: That the patronage of lying should have been undertaken there either by you, such a man as you are, or by anyone else, if another wrote those things, I confess I grieve not a little, until those things which move me be refuted (if perhaps they can be refuted). For it seems to me most ruinous to believe that there is any lie in the holy books, etc. He amplifies this at length, as if he had really believed that Jerome was a patron of lying, and admitted a lie even in the sacred Writings. At the end he signifies that he is sending some of his own writings to Jerome, whom he courteously asks to be willing to act as their critic. For it was St. Augustine's intention that they should sincerely indicate to one another what seemed to need correcting in the other's writings; and therefore he himself had begun to do this in Jerome's writings.

[865] That Epistle of St. Augustine was not carried to St. Jerome Since that Epistle had not been sent, Augustine writes another, until several years later. Meanwhile St. Augustine on another occasion greeted St. Jerome; and he wrote a short Epistle to Augustine, which has perished. On receiving this, Augustine, now a bishop, in the year 397 sent to Jerome a lengthy Epistle, numbered among the Hieronymian ones 67 (elsewhere 87), of which this is the beginning: I am grateful that in return for a subscribed greeting you have sent me a full Epistle, but a much shorter one than I should wish to receive from you, such a Man, from whom, however much of your time it may occupy, no discourse is too long… Wherefore enter, I pray, upon this literary conversation with us, lest bodily absence should have much power to separate us; although we are joined in the Lord by unity of spirit, even if we rest from the pen and keep silence. And the books indeed which you have wrought out of the Lord's granary present you to us almost entire. For if we do not know you for the reason that we have not seen the face of your body, then in this way you do not know yourself either: for you too do not see it. But if you are known to yourself for no other reason than that you know your own mind, we too know it not a little in your writings, in which we bless the Lord that He has given you such as you are to yourself and to us and to all the brethren who read your works. By these words and others in the same Epistle Augustine plainly shows how highly he esteemed Jerome. What he there asked concerning the book On Illustrious Men, and what he desired in it, has already been said in its place.

[866] But since Augustine knew that his former Epistle had not reached Jerome, and in it he exhorts Jerome to a palinode: in this one he again argues at length against his opinion about Peter's being only feignedly reproved. In the midst of the disputation, at no. 3, he inserts this in commendation of Jerome: But I would by no means arrogate to myself to try to enrich with my pennies your talent, golden by the divine gift: there is no one more fit than you to amend that Work. Here he tacitly, but openly at no. 7, invites him to a palinode, writing thus: Wherefore seize, I beseech you, a noble and truly Christian severity joined with charity, to correct and amend that Work, and, as they say, sing your παλινωδίαν. For incomparably more beautiful is the truth of the Christians than the Helen of the Greeks. For our martyrs have fought more bravely for her against this Sodom than those heroes for that woman against Troy. Nor do I say this in order that you may recover the eyes of your heart, which God forbid that you have lost, but that you may turn to those eyes which, though you have them sound and watchful, you have by some dissimulation turned away, so as not to attend to the evils that follow, if it be once believed that a writer of the divine books could honourably and piously lie in some part of his Work. This passage above all stung Jerome, who was very far indeed from that impious opinion by which a lie is attributed to the divine books, or even from defending a lie. And he believed that he was being compared with Stesichorus, who according to the fables lost his sight because he had written against Helen, and, having sung a palinode, recovered it.

[867] St. Augustine there subjoins concerning his earlier Epistle: this Epistle was carried, not to Jerome, but to others: I had already at one time written you an Epistle from here, which was not delivered, because the man to whom I had given it to deliver did not proceed. From which this was suggested to me while I was dictating the present one — something I ought not to omit in this one either — that, if your opinion is different, and that opinion is the better, you would gladly pardon my fear. For if you think otherwise, and think the truth (since, unless it be true, it cannot be better), then, not to say without any fault, at least without great fault, my error favours the truth — if truth can rightly in any man favour a lie. Thus far Augustine. Jerome received the Epistle, not through the man to whom it had been given to carry to the Saint, but several years later, when it had been seen and read by many, through Sisinnius the deacon.

[868] meanwhile, ignorant of it, Jerome writes in friendly fashion to Augustine. Meanwhile about the year 397 he seems to have sent to Augustine Epistle 103 (elsewhere 98), which is very short and friendly. It begins thus: Last year I sent a letter to your worthiness through our brother Asterius the subdeacon, rendering the prompt duty of a greeting: which I suppose was delivered to you. Now too, through my holy brother Praesidius the deacon, I beseech you first to remember me: then to hold the bearer of the letter commended to you, etc. From the Asterius here mentioned, who carried another Epistle of Jerome in the year 402, Vallarsi thinks that this Epistle belongs to the year 403. But I rather believe with Tillemont, Note 72, that Jerome is not speaking in this of the Epistle of the year 402, but rather of that which I said above had perished, since he seems to have known nothing of the Epistle of Augustine in which he was attacked. However that may be, Jerome was afflicted when he wrote this very short letter, since he has this: We, established in a monastery, are shaken by various waves on every side, and endure the troubles of pilgrimage. These things fit the years 397 and 398, in which John of Jerusalem brought various troubles upon St. Jerome's monastery.

[869] But when after several years Augustine asked for an answer, In the year 402, before he had received any answer to his objection, Augustine wrote to Jerome Epistle 101 (elsewhere 90), of which this is the beginning: I have heard that my letter has come into your hands, but that I have not yet deserved a reply I would by no means impute to your love. Without doubt there has been some hindrance. Whence I acknowledge that the Lord is rather to be entreated by me, that He may give to your will the means of sending what you have written back, for He has already given the means of writing back, since, whenever you shall wish, you will very easily be able. Then he denies that a book was written by him against Jerome, as he had heard was reported to him, and sent to Rome. Know that this is false, he says: I call our God to witness that I have not done this; but if perhaps some things are found in some of my writings in which I shall be found to have thought otherwise than you, I think you ought to recognize — or, if it cannot be recognized, to believe — that it was not said against you, but that what seemed good to me was written by me. I would say this, indeed, in such a way that I am not only most ready, if anything in my writings has moved you, to receive in a brotherly spirit what you think to the contrary, rejoicing either in my own correction or in your very goodwill; but that I even ask and demand this of you. This was entirely Augustine's intention; but the difficulties of that plan Jerome experienced at once, nor could he ever be induced to do it.

[870] To this Epistle Jerome answered at once; but with the same freedom in disapproving certain of St. Augustine's stings which Augustine had first used in attacking his opinion [and since Jerome had received the Epistle, not from him, but a copy of it from elsewhere,] and in demanding a palinode. It is Epistle 102 (elsewhere 91), by which Jerome wished to deter Augustine from the licence of criticizing, and invited him to a mutual love, running toward him of its own accord. At the very moment of the departure of our holy son Asterius the subdeacon, my intimate friend, your beatitude's letter reached me, in which you satisfy me that you did not send a book to Rome against my littleness. Neither had I heard that this was done, but copies of a certain Epistle, as though written to me, reached us through our brother Sisinnius the deacon: in which you exhort me to sing a παλινωδίαν upon a certain chapter of the Apostle, and to imitate Stesichorus, wavering between the vituperation and the praises of Helen, so that he who by disparaging her had lost his eyes should by praising her recover them. I frankly confess to your worthiness that, although the style and your ἐπιχειρήματα seemed to me your own, yet I thought that copies of a letter ought not rashly to be trusted, lest perhaps, if I answered, you should be injured and justly remonstrate that I ought first to have proved the discourse to be yours, and so to write back. There was added to the delay the long illness of the holy and venerable Paula. For while for a long time we sat by her sickbed, we almost forgot your Epistle, or his who had written under your name, remembering that little verse: “Music in mourning is an untimely tale”. And so, if the Epistle is yours, write openly, or send truer copies, so that without any rancour of stomach we may engage in a disputation of the Scriptures, and either amend our own error, or show that another has reproved us in vain.

[871] But far be it from me to dare to touch anything in the books of your beatitude. he asks whether that Epistle is his, freely reproving some things. For it is enough for me to prove my own, and not to carp at others'. For the rest, your prudence knows very well that everyone abounds in his own sense, and that it is a boyish boastfulness — what young men used once to do — to seek fame for one's own name by accusing illustrious men. Nor am I so foolish as to think myself injured by the difference of your explanations: because neither are you injured, if we hold contrary views. But that is the true reproof between friends, if, not seeing our own wallet, we consider, as Persius says, the pack of others. It remains that you should love one who loves you, and that, a young man, you should not challenge an old one in the field of the Scriptures. We have had our own times, and have run as much as we could. Now, while you are running and traversing long stretches, rest is owed to us: and at the same time (let me say it with respect to your honour, and by your leave), lest you should seem to be the only one who has put something to me out of the poets, remember Dares and Entellus, and the common proverb, that a weary ox plants his foot the more firmly. These things we have dictated in sadness: would that we might deserve your embraces, and might, by mutual conference, either teach something or learn. After some things about Rufinus's books, already given, he concludes the Epistle thus: Remember me, holy and venerable pope. See how much I love you, in that even when provoked I have been unwilling to answer; nor do I believe that to be yours which I might perhaps reprove in another. Our common brother (Paulinianus, whom Augustine had also greeted) humbly greets you. The whole Epistle tends to this, that he may not be compelled to come down into a contest with Augustine.

[872] If St. Augustine had known sooner how much Jerome shrank from that contest, Augustine again asking for an answer, Jerome he would perhaps have pressed less to extort an answer. But before receiving this letter he again asked for an answer by another letter, but that has perished. Meanwhile Jerome learned better in what places Augustine's Epistle had been seen, to which an answer was being asked. Since, then, he took it ill that an Epistle of this sort had been so widely published, and had come to him only by a chance accident, and since everything seemed to suggest that he was being challenged by Augustine to a contest from which he shrank, he remonstrated more gravely, yet without breach of friendship, by Epistle 105 (elsewhere 92), which he used as a last engine, lest he should be compelled to write against Augustine. I subjoin nearly the whole: You send me frequent Epistles, and often urge me to answer a certain Epistle of yours, copies of which, as I have written before, reached me through brother Sisinnius the deacon without your signature: and which you signify that you sent first through brother Profuturus, and secondly through some other man; and that meanwhile Profuturus was called back from his journey and made a bishop, and was taken off by a swift death; and that the other, whose name you keep back, feared the perils of the sea and changed his plan of sailing. Augustine had spoken of two Epistles, of which the first had indeed been entrusted to Profuturus, but was returned to Augustine: the second was entrusted to Paul, and reached Italy, and, being first read in many places, was at last carried by Sisinnius to Jerome.

[873] [in friendly but free terms he remonstrates about the Epistle scattered through Italy,] Of this he subjoins: Since these things are so, I cannot sufficiently wonder how this same Epistle is said to be held by very many both at Rome and in Italy, and has reached me alone not at all, to whom alone it was sent; especially since the same brother Sisinnius has said that he found it, among your other treatises, not in Africa, not with you, but on an island of the Adriatic, about five years ago (that is, in the year 398 or 399). These things could indeed give room for suspicions, nor do we even now know by whose misfortune or treachery this happened. We know, however, that St. Augustine was without blame; but this very thing Jerome could not know for certain, who could not yet have a clear view of the holy Prelate's singular sincerity. Wherefore so singular a happening would certainly have broken the friendship of a man less moderate and steadfast than Jerome was, who subjoins: From friendship every suspicion must be removed, and one must speak with a friend as with a second self. Some of my intimates and vessels of Christ, of whom there is a very great number at Jerusalem and in the holy places, were suggesting that this was done by you not with a simple mind, but in search of praise and of gossip and of a little popular glory, so that you might grow at our expense; so that many might know that you challenge and I fear, that you write as a learned man and I keep silence as an unskilled one, and that at last someone had been found who would impose silence and measure upon my garrulity. But I, to confess frankly to your worthiness, was at first unwilling to answer for this reason, that I clearly did not believe the Epistle to be yours, nor (as is the vulgar proverb about certain things) a sword smeared with honey. Then I was taking care not to seem to answer impudently a bishop of my own communion, and to reprove some things in the Epistle of one who reproved me, especially since I judged certain things in it heretical. Lastly, lest you should justly remonstrate — namely, if it had not been Augustine's Epistle, as he adds.

[874] and deters Augustine from contention, He goes on at once to deter Augustine from the dispute which he was fleeing: Therefore, as I have already written before, either send that same Epistle signed with your own hand, or cease to provoke an Old man hiding in his cell. But if you wish either to exercise or to display your learning, seek out young men, eloquent and noble, of whom there are said to be very many at Rome, who can and dare to engage with you, and to draw the yoke with a bishop in the disputation of the holy Scriptures. I, once a soldier, now a veteran,

ought to praise your victories and those of others, not myself again to fight with an exhausted body; lest, if you frequently drive me to write back, I should recall that piece of history, that Q. Maximus broke by his patience a Hannibal exulting with youthful spirits.

Time bears away all things, the mind as well: often as a boy I remember that I used to lay long suns to rest with singing. Now so many songs are forgotten by me: my very voice now flees from Moeris.

And, to speak rather from the holy Scriptures, that Barzillai the Gileadite, making over to his young son the benefits and all the delights of king David, showed that old age ought neither to seek these things nor to accept them when offered. All these are the words of one declining a contest, and deterring Augustine from pressing on.

[875] Then he goes on to the Epistle from which the report had arisen at Rome about a book written against Jerome. candidly disapproving his stings, But as to your swearing that you have neither written a book against me nor sent to Rome one that you did not write; but that, if perhaps some things are found in your letters which differ from my view, I have not been injured by you, but that you have written what seemed right to you: I beg you to hear me patiently. You did not write a book: and how, then, have the writings in which you reprove me been brought to me by others? Why does Italy have what you did not write? On what ground do you demand that I write back to things which you deny you wrote? I am not so dull that, if you hold different views, I should think myself injured by you. But if you reprove my words face to face, and demand an account of my writings, and compel me to amend what I have written, and challenge me to a παλινωδίαν, and restore my eyes to me — in this friendship is injured, in this the laws of intimacy are violated. Let us not seem to contend childishly, and to give our supporters or detractors matter for contention in turn. I write this because I desire to love you purely and in a Christian way, and to retain nothing in my mind that is at variance with my lips. For it is not fitting that I, who from youth up to this age have been sweating with labour in a little monastery with holy brethren, should dare to write anything against a bishop of my own communion — and that bishop whom I began to love before I knew him, who first challenged me to friendship, whom I rejoiced to see rising after me in the learning of the divine Scriptures. Therefore either deny the book to be yours, if perhaps it is not yours, and cease to demand a reply to what you did not write: or, if it is yours, confess it frankly; so that, if I write anything in my own defence, the blame may lie with you who provoked, not with me who was compelled to answer. These things tend to the same end as the preceding, namely that Augustine should cease to demand an answer to his objections.

[876] But since, from Augustine's first attack, he could rightly fear that contentions would arise and declining a contest with him, and the examination of his writings, if he should wish to disapprove anything in Augustine's writings — especially since even then he could less well know Augustine's exceptional humility and charity, and perhaps feared that he would find another Rufinus — he answers thus to the criticism offered of these: You add besides that you are ready, if anything in your writings moves me and I wish to correct it, to take it in a brotherly spirit, and not only that you will rejoice in my goodwill toward you, but you entreat me to do this very thing. Again I say what I think: you provoke an old man, you goad one who is silent; you seem to be parading your learning. But it is not fitting to my age to be thought ill-disposed toward one to whom I rather owe favour. And if in the Gospels and the Prophets perverse men find something to strive to reprove, do you wonder if in your books, and especially in the exposition of the Scriptures, which are exceedingly obscure, certain things should seem to depart from the straight line? And I say this, not because I already judge that certain things in your Works are to be reproved: for I have never given attention to reading them, nor is there a supply of copies of them among us, except the books of your Soliloquies and certain Commentaries on the Psalms, which, if I wished to examine them, I would show to differ — I do not say from me, who am nothing, but from the interpretations of the ancient Greeks. Farewell, my dearest friend, in age my son, in dignity my father, and observe this at my request, that whatever you write to me you should cause to reach me first. Thus Jerome, striving in every way to draw Augustine off from demanding an answer: for to this alone are directed whatever things may seem sharper in this Epistle.

[877] lest he should be compelled to contend with a Catholic bishop. Very different in this matter were the views of Augustine and of Jerome. Augustine would have liked to correct Jerome freely, and with the same freedom to be corrected by him. But Jerome knew that from such freedom many contentions everywhere arise, and occasions of scandal are begotten, and that time which can be spent on more useful things is thus spent at least less usefully, and sometimes perniciously. And so I do not hesitate to subscribe to St. Jerome's view, who for six or seven years struggled not to be compelled to undertake a serious contest, or to defend himself against the attacking Augustine — first by simple silence, then by setting forth the disadvantages of that disputation, and at last partly by friendly admonitions, partly by candid reproofs, deterring him, yet in such a way that even in the very stings of his words he displays a fatherly benevolence toward a younger man and a great respect for a learned bishop. Augustine himself, I think, would not have pressed Jerome to answer, if the matter had been still untouched, after he had received this and the earlier Epistle of Jerome. Certainly he was somewhat struck by those letters, especially the latter, as I shall say below: and he saw, in Epistle 110 among the Hieronymian ones, at no. 9, that it is more expedient to consult charity than knowledge at the peril of charity.

[878] But when Augustine, not yet having seen Jerome's letter, both sent his own But before Jerome's letter was delivered, St. Augustine had already issued Epistle 104 (elsewhere 88), in which he again pressed Jerome to answer, and at the same time sent his three preceding Epistles, that he might the more surely obtain an answer. From the beginning of the Epistle it is clear how greatly he desired that answer. From the time when I began to write to you, he says, and to desire your writings, no better occasion has ever presented itself to me than that my Epistle should be brought to you by a servant of God and a most faithful minister, most dear to me, such as our son Cyprian the deacon is. Through him I certainly so hope for a letter from you, that in this kind of thing I could not hope for anything more certain. For our said son will lack neither zeal in asking for a reply, nor grace in earning it, nor diligence in guarding it, nor alacrity in carrying it, nor fidelity in delivering it. Only, if in any way I deserve it, may the Lord help, and be present to your heart and to my desire, that no greater will may hinder your brotherly will. Since, therefore, I have already sent two Epistles, but have received none of yours afterwards, I have wished to send those same ones again, believing that they did not arrive. And even if they did arrive, and perhaps rather it is yours that could not at all reach me, send again those same writings which you have already sent, if by chance they have been kept. If not, dictate again what I may read, provided that you do not think it burdensome to answer these, which I have now long been awaiting. He adds that he is also sending the first letter which he had written as a priest to attack Jerome's opinion about Peter's being reproved.

[879] And so Cyprian carried four Epistles of Augustine at once to Jerome, and the preceding ones, and again asked for an answer, by which he was utterly compelled to answer the objections. The first of these Jerome had never seen, because it had indeed been written, as was said at no. 861, but not sent. The second he had had for several years, but had been unwilling to believe for certain that it was Augustine's, because it was not signed by him, having been carried into Italy, and of which he had only a copy. These two sharply attacked Jerome's opinion. The third was written only to obtain an answer, and to this he had answered, as also to another which has perished, by the two Epistles just cited. The fourth again demanded an answer, and besides argued against the Translation of sacred Scripture from the Hebrew, as the first also did. But of these things we have treated in their place. This one thing I observe, that that most useful labour then displeased Augustine, but afterwards pleased him wonderfully.

[880] About the year 405 those letters reached Jerome, Jerome at last, by a long Epistle and not long afterwards he answered. Jerome's Epistle 112 (elsewhere 89), by which he answered three Epistles of St. Augustine, was certainly composed after the middle of the year 404: for among the writers whom he alleges for his own opinion he praises at no. 6 Chrysostom, carried off into exile about the middle of the year 404, thus: What shall I say of John, who lately in the pontifical rank ruled the church of Constantinople, and wrote a very extensive book precisely on this chapter, in which he followed the opinion of Origen and of the ancients. Jerome could speak of him thus after the middle of the year 404, and in the year 405, or even later. But there is no reason for fixing the Epistle after the one year or the other. Let us now see how Jerome bore himself in the disputation against Augustine, which he had been unable to avoid either by dissembling and keeping silent for several years about the Epistle scattered against him through Italy, or by declining the contest openly enough in two Epistles, or by any of the reasons he had brought forward in those Epistles; because St. Augustine had gone on always pressing him to answer, and had sent his Epistles a second time before he had received Jerome's letter declining the contest.

[881] Perhaps Augustine did not know that his Epistle had not been carried to Jerome, answered thus the three Epistles by which he was attacked, but published in Italy. But certainly Jerome did not know whether that happening, unusual in his own case, had occurred without Augustine's fault. Wherefore it would not be to be wondered at if Jerome had answered more sharply, having advanced unwillingly to the fight, and been dragged as it were by the twisted neck into the arena. He begins his Epistle thus: I have received at once three Epistles — or rather short books — from your worthiness through Cyprian the deacon, containing various, as you call them, questions; as I think, reproofs of my little works. If I should wish to answer these, the bulk of a book would be needed. Yet I shall try, so far as I can, not to go beyond the measure of a rather long Epistle, and not to delay a brother who is in haste: who, three days before he was to set out, demanded letters from me, so that I was compelled to blurt out these things, such as they are, almost with my armour on; and to answer in hurried speech, etc. He mentions only three Epistles, because he had had one of the four before, and had answered it.

[882] so as to be careful of their friendship. And presently at no. 2 he says, Our armour is Christ, and the teaching of the apostle Paul. Then, turning to Augustine, how well he thinks of him

he declares in these words: I do not doubt that you too pray for this very thing, that while we contend between ourselves the truth may prevail. For you do not seek your own glory, but Christ's. And when you have conquered, I too shall conquer, if I understand my error: and, on the contrary, when I conquer, you prevail, because children do not lay up treasure for their parents, but parents for their children. And in the book of Paralipomenon we read that the children of Israel went forth to fight with a peaceful mind, even amid the swords and the sheddings of blood and the corpses of the slain thinking not of their own victory, but of peace's. Let us answer, then, to all points, and, if Christ commands, resolve the manifold questions in a brief discourse. I pass over the courtesies of greeting, with which you soothe my head: I say nothing of the flatteries with which you strive to console your reproof of me. I shall come to the matters themselves. After these words, which are indeed most kindly and most pious, he answers what Augustine had asked concerning the book On Illustrious Men.

[883] modestly to refute his objections, Then at no. 4 he proceeds to the controversy about Peter's being reproved, and, reporting Augustine's words in summary, he indicates in this manner what chiefly displeased him in them: And you assert … that I ought not to teach a lie, but that all things which are written sound just as they were written. Then he goes on to defend his own opinion, first by the authority of the ancients, then by theological reasons, and most modestly at no. XI washes away the objection about the patronage of lying in these words: I, or rather others before me, set forth the reason which they had supposed — not defending an obliging lie, as you write, but showing an honourable dispensation, etc. Then he goes on in turn to attack some assertions of St. Augustine, of which he says: If this is true, we slip into the heresy of Cerinthus and Ebion, etc.; but he strives to draw that consequence out of Augustine's assertions only by a lengthy disputation. But he subjoins at no. 18: I beg you, therefore, and again and again beseech you, to pardon my little disputation: and to impute to yourself that I have gone beyond my measure, since you compelled me to write back, and took away my eyes along with Stesichorus. And do not think me a master of lying, who follow Christ saying: “I am the way, the truth and the life”. Nor can it be that I, a worshipper of truth, should bow my neck to a lie.

[884] and then to deter him from a like fight. And do not stir up against me the little crowd of the unskilled, who venerate you as a bishop, and look up to you with the honour of the priesthood when you declaim in church: but who think little of me, a man of the last age and almost decrepit, pursuing the retreats of monastery and countryside. And seek out for yourself those whom you may teach or reprove. For to us, divided from you by such spaces of sea and land, the sound of your voice scarcely reaches. And if perhaps you write letters, Italy and Rome will receive them before they are brought to me, to whom they are to be sent. After this, at no. 19, Jerome answers what Augustine had argued against his plan of Translating the Hebrew Old Testament, and closes the whole Epistle with these words: I ask at the end of the Epistle that you do not compel an Old man at rest, and long a veteran, to serve as a soldier, and again to risk his life. Do you, who are young and set on the pontifical height, teach the peoples, and enrich the Roman roofs with the new fruits of Africa. It is enough for me to whisper in the corner of a monastery with a poor hearer and reader. Thus Jerome answered Augustine's objections once and most modestly — certainly considering the circumstances of things and persons — nor could he thereafter be induced by any engines either to a further answer or to examining the questions proposed by Augustine.

[885] Meanwhile St. Augustine, having received Jerome's Epistle 102, Augustine strives to appease Jerome by another Epistle: in which he had noticed something of offence, and from which he had learned that his attacking Epistle had reached Jerome from elsewhere, took much pains to appease him by Epistle 110 among the Hieronymian ones, formerly 93, which seems to have been composed at about the same time at which Jerome's last one was issued. That Epistle indeed greatly commends the charity and humility of St. Augustine, in whose Life more has been said about it. I only observe here in a few words that Augustine offers and subjects himself to Jerome's correction, nay demands it in many words. He also confesses that the letter which Jerome disapproved was his, and adds: Why, then, do I strive against the river's current, and not rather ask pardon? I beseech you, therefore, by the meekness of Christ, that, if I have injured you, you would forgive me, and not render evil for evil by injuring me in return. But you will injure me if you keep silent to me about my error, which you may perhaps find in my writings or sayings. Thus throughout the whole Epistle Augustine goes on desiring mutual criticism. But Jerome feared the disadvantages of such liberty, and would never afterwards take it up. St. Augustine seems to have sent the said Epistle to Praesidius, so that it might be seen by him and thus be sent to Jerome. This is gathered from Augustine's Epistle to Praesidius, numbered among the Hieronymian ones III (elsewhere 95), unless perhaps the longer one, of which presently, was sent to Praesidius.

[886] But St. Augustine needed neither the help of Praesidius to have Jerome as his friend, but he writes most affectionately to Augustine, unwilling to dispute. nor would he have obtained by the patronage of six hundred friends, I think, that he should have him as the critic of his writings; which he long desired in vain. Jerome's sincere goodwill is abundantly attested by Epistle 115 (elsewhere 96), which seems to have been issued not long after the aforesaid one of Augustine, perhaps in the year 405, and of which I subjoin the chief part: When I anxiously inquired of our holy brother Firmus what you were doing, I heard with joy that you were safe. Again, when I was not, I will not say hoping for, but demanding a letter from you, he said that he had set out from Africa without your knowing it. And so I render you by him the courtesies of greeting, one who embraces you with a singular love; and at the same time I beseech you to pardon my modesty, in that for a long time I could not refuse you when you commanded me to write back. Nor did I answer you, but cause answered cause. And if it is a fault to have answered, I beg that you would patiently hear that it is a much greater one to have provoked. But away with complaints of this sort: let there be between us a pure brotherliness: and thenceforth let us send each other writings, not of questions, but of charity. After many greetings he adds at the end: In the field of the Scriptures, if you please, let us play without pain to one another.

[886] This letter of Jerome's Augustine had already received Augustine, by a lengthy Epistle, to Jerome when he wrote a very long Epistle, numbered among the Hieronymian ones 116 (elsewhere 97), answering the last three of Jerome. It will be enough for me to observe a few things about this lengthy Epistle, because it belongs rather to St. Augustine than to St. Jerome, who never answered it. First he says that Jerome's last Epistle had been carried to him, and that from it, being of a more cheerful sort, he hoped that the pardon which he had asked had been granted him by Jerome. Secondly he insists that Jerome should be willing to deal with him seriously concerning the Scriptures with such freedom that each might freely reprove in the other what displeased him. But this very thing Jerome above all refused, on account of the disadvantages apt to arise from it. Thirdly, at no. 4, he again begins to dispute at length against Jerome's opinion about Peter's being reproved, and to answer his apologetic Epistle, now and then mixing in some things from the first of Jerome's three Epistles; and also defending the freedom of reproving friends' errors. Fourthly, from no. 32 he excuses the mishap of the Epistle carried, not to Jerome, but into Italy, against his will, and removes all blame for that happening from himself, adding these words: But in what way it happened is both long to relate and, unless I am mistaken, superfluous; since it is enough, if I am at all believed in this, that it was not done with the mind supposed: and that it was in no way of my will, or arrangement, or consent, or even thought, that it should be done.

[887] partly tries to satisfy him, partly attacks his opinion, Fifthly, at no. 33 he somewhat softens the harder things said against Jerome, and excuses them in this manner: I did not think that against you was that which I knew I had done in the sincerity of friendship, whether to admonish, or that you might be corrected, or I by you. But, your intimates excepted, I beseech you yourself, by the grace by which we have been redeemed, not to think that whatever good things of yours, granted you by the Lord's goodness, I have set down in my letters, I set down with treacherous flattery. But if I have sinned against you in anything, forgive me. Nor should you draw what I mentioned about the deed of some poet or other — more ineptly perhaps than learnedly — further than I said; since I immediately subjoined that I had not said this in order that you might recover the eyes of your heart, which God forbid that you ever lost, but that you might attend to those eyes which you have sound and watchful. Only for the sake, therefore, of the παλινωδίαν to be imitated, not for the sake of Stesichorus's blindness, which I neither attributed to your heart nor feared for it, did I think that matter should be touched on. And again and again I ask that you would confidently correct me, where you shall have seen that I need it. For although, according to the titles of honour which the Church's usage has now established, the episcopate is greater than the presbyterate, yet in many things Augustine is less than Jerome — although correction is not to be shunned or disdained even from any inferior. Thus throughout the whole Epistle Augustine defends the freedom of correcting friends; nor does he anywhere intimate that his censure of Jerome's opinion displeases him, but rather tries with all his might to defend and confirm it.

[888] always desiring a mutual criticism of their writings: Sixthly he says that he is now persuaded of the usefulness of translating the Scriptures from the Hebrew, and discusses other things about Jerome's Translations, already mentioned before. And he concludes the whole Epistle in this manner: I think I have answered your three Epistles enough — nay, perhaps more than enough — of which I received two through Cyprian, one through Firmus. Write back what shall seem good for the instruction of us or of others. And I shall take more diligent care, so far as the Lord helps me, that the letters which I write to you may reach you before they reach anyone by whom they may be more widely scattered. For I confess that I too do not wish that to be done to me with regard to your letters to me, which you most justly complain was done with mine to you. Yet let there please us mutually not only the charity, but also the freedom of friendship: and do not keep silent with me, nor I with you, about what in our writings moves us in turn — with that mind, namely, which in the eyes of God is not displeasing in brotherly love. But if you think this cannot be done between us without a ruinous offence to that very love, let it not be done. For that charity which I would wish to have with you is certainly greater; but this lesser one is better than none. These words, like the whole Epistle, abundantly explain St. Augustine's mind. He wished that each should freely reprove the other's Works, if either should find in them anything worthy of reproof, just as he had begun by sharply grazing St. Jerome's opinion.

[889] But St. Jerome agreed with St. Augustine's view only so far but Jerome did not approve it, as to believe and to wish that he should be free, in doubtful matters, to depart from the opinions of others, even of Catholics, and in due time and place confidently to build up his own; but he did not think it belonged to friends to undertake singular contests of this kind, since, on account of the diversity of opinions, friendship in such fights is with difficulty preserved unharmed. For when one perceives that the other does not acquiesce in his reasons, he readily thinks that the other is more tenacious of his own opinion than is right. Besides, the spectators of such contests are not all adorned with the same charity and moderation as Augustine and Jerome were. And so, when they go over to one side or the other, they not seldom tear the opposite side with curses and calumnies; while others will not hesitate to condemn both combatants, as having entered the arena out of envy or hatred. Lastly, when the matter concerns obscure and doubtful things, about which controversies among the learned generally arise, much more time is consumed in such disputations than usefulness is drawn from them. These disadvantages, roughly, Jerome objected to St. Augustine in various Epistles; but Augustine with wonderful charity set his own reasons against them in this Epistle, exhibiting indeed a most beautiful idea of perfect charity, but one which Jerome judged less suited to human weakness.

[890] Wherefore Jerome seems to have answered St. Augustine nothing further, who answered nothing further, although at least at that time he did not depart from his own opinion. He preferred, I think, by keeping silence to obtain that Augustine should proceed no further, rather than to press further with reasons against a friend. Perhaps too the illness with which he began to be afflicted in the year 405, as we shall see, and which compelled the Saint to lie abed for a very long time, was a hindrance to his sending friendly Epistles to Augustine. Whatever the cause was, for not a few years no Epistle of Jerome to Augustine is found, nor of Augustine to Jerome. Nevertheless Jerome was still of the same opinion when, some years later, he was writing on Isaiah. For toward the end of bk. 14 he clearly, in brief words, attacks the opinion of those who say that the dispensatory contention between Peter and Paul was truly a quarrel and a struggle. Augustine afterwards believed that Jerome had departed from his own opinion, and indicated this in Epistle 180 (elsewhere 260) to Oceanus, citing in his own favour the Dialogue against the Pelagians written by Jerome. I doubt, however, whether this can be made certain.

[891] Augustine does not adduce Jerome's words; but without doubt he had in view those in the praised Dialogue, bk. 1, no. 22: nor yet does he seem to have changed his opinion. God certainly wills that bishops or priests be such as the Vessel of election teaches. As to the first thing he said, irreproachable — there is either no such man, or a rare one. For who is there who has not, as it were on a beautiful body, either a mole or a wart? For if the Apostle himself says of Peter that he did not walk with a straight foot in the truth of the Gospel, and was so far blameworthy that Barnabas too was led into the same dissimulation; who will be indignant that that is denied to him which the chief of the Apostles did not have? From these words, I say, St. Augustine believed that Jerome had changed his opinion. But Jerome long before their disputations said something similar in the commentary on the Epistle to Philemon at ℣ 8 and 9. For he says of St. Paul: Who had once rebuked Peter for not walking with a straight foot in the truth of the Gospel. At that time certainly he had not changed his opinion, since a little later he wrote on the Epistle to the Galatians, so that from the former passage I cannot infer that Jerome's opinion was changed: for he never denied that Peter was blameworthy, as is added in the former passage, since this is said by St. Paul. Wherefore I do not see that it is rightly deduced from the words alleged that St. Jerome changed his earlier opinion. Nay, the whole dispute has remained undecided down to our own times, and most interpreters follow neither Augustine nor Jerome closely. But enough of these things.

§ LI. The Epistle to a Mother and Daughter, another to Julian: the Saint's long illness, during which the Epistle to Rufinus was issued, to be fixed in the year 406.

The Epistle to a Mother and Daughter, of uncertain year, I have reviewed St. Jerome's Epistles down to the year 404 or 405, excepting, however, two which were issued about that time taken broadly, but cannot be tied to a certain year. The first of these is Epistle 117 (elsewhere 47) to a Mother and Daughter, dwelling in Gaul in the same city, but in different houses. St. Jerome was unwilling, in order to spare their honour so far as he could, to make those persons more nearly known to the readers of the Epistle; nay, he wished the Epistle itself to be kept secret. Yet it afterwards became known, perhaps because it could profit many, having been composed for the correction of the two. Hence, because it was commonly unknown in Gaul to whom the Saint had written, some said that the persons were fictitious, as Jerome declares in his book against Vigilantius, no. 3, writing thus: But now it is time that, setting down his own words, we should strive to answer them one by one. For it may be that a malignant interpreter will again say that the subject was invented by me, for me to answer with a rhetorical declamation; like that one which I wrote to Gaul concerning a mother and daughter who were at variance with one another. The Saint wrote this in the year 406, as it was drawing to a close; and thence Vallarsi gathers that the Epistle was issued not long before, namely in the year 404 or 405. But this conjecture is very uncertain: for the Epistle could have been kept secret for several years by those for whose benefit it had been written, and then published so as to profit all. Wherefore it seems that we must only say that it was not written after the year 404 or 405, but perhaps some years earlier, after St. Jerome's fame had shone out in Gaul, and he himself had composed many books, and certainly while he was living at Bethlehem.

[893] at the request of their son and brother, The occasion of writing and the subject of the whole Epistle the Saint sets forth in the Preface, which I subjoin: A certain brother from Gaul told me that he had a virgin sister and a widowed mother, who were dwelling in the same city in separate cells; and that, either because of the loneliness of their lodging, or to guard their small means, they had taken to themselves certain clerics as protectors, so as to be joined to strangers with greater dishonour than they had been separated from each other. And when I groaned, and signified far more by my silence than by speech: I beg you, he said, to rebuke them by your letter, and to recall them to concord, so that the mother may acknowledge her daughter, and the daughter her mother. To whom I said: A fine province you lay on me, that I, a stranger, should reconcile those whom a son and brother could not. As if indeed I held an episcopal chair, and were not shut up in a cell and far removed from the crowds, either bewailing past vices or striving to avoid present ones. But it is also unfitting to lie hidden in body, and to wander with one's tongue over the whole world. And he said: You are too fearful. Where is that old steadfastness, in which, rubbing down the world with much salt, you reported something Lucilian? This is what puts me to flight, I say, and does not let me part my lips. For after, by reproving crimes, I was myself made a criminal, and, according to the proverb worn thin in the common speech: While all wrangle and deny, I believe I have neither ears nor touch: the very walls have resounded with curses against me; and they sang about me who were drinking wine (he seems to speak of the calumnies scattered at Rome in the year 385) — compelled by the evil, I have learned to be silent, judging it better to set a guard on my mouth and a fortified door on my lips, than to incline my heart to words of malice, and, while I carp at vices, to run into the vice of detraction.

[894] When I had said this, he said: It is not detraction to reconcile them and to remove scandals, to speak the truth: nor does a private rebuke make a general doctrine, since there is either a rare man, or none, who falls under the guilt of this fault. I beg you, then, not to let me, wearied by so long a journey, have come in vain: for the Lord knows that, after seeing the holy Places, this above all was my reason, that with your letter I might heal my sister and my mother. And I said: Now at once I shall do what you wish: for Epistles are sent overseas, and a discourse dictated for a particular case can rarely find those whom it may bite. But I beseech you to keep this discourse secret. And when you have carried it as your provision for the journey, if it be heard, let us rejoice together; but if it be despised, as I rather think it will be, I shall have lost my words, and you the length of your journey. Having thus prefaced, Jerome presently directs his discourse briefly to the mother and daughter together, then addresses the daughter alone — who, twenty-five years of age, as is said at no. 10, was living with a young cleric, a lector, separated from her mother and brother — in a lengthy discourse, in order to induce her to live with her mother or with her brother and to separate herself from that cleric, setting forth the perils and scandals of that cohabitation: lastly he deals more briefly with the mother alone, that she should not show herself hard to forgive her daughter, and should live with her and with her son.

[895] What sort of Epistle it is he sets forth at the end in these words: These things I have dictated in swift speech in the course of a short vigil, dictated hastily by the Saint. wishing to satisfy the desire of him who asked, and exercising myself as though upon a scholastic theme. For on that same day at dawn he who was to set out was knocking at the door. And at the same time I wished to show my detractors that I too can say whatever comes into my mouth. Whence I have touched but lightly on the Scriptures; nor have I woven my discourse, as I have been wont to do in other books, with their flowers. It is an extempore dictation, and poured forth with such facility by the light of a little lamp, that my tongue outran the hands of the notaries; and the volubility of my speech overwhelmed their signs and their stealings of words. This I have said for the reason that he who does not pardon my talent may pardon at least my time. Let this suffice concerning that Epistle, which I should not dare to refer with certainty to the fifth century, since it could have been written thus some years before the end of the fourth.

[896] He consoles Julian, who in a short time suffered many losses, Epistle 118 (elsewhere 34) to Julian is also of uncertain year, although it is referred by Vallarsi to the year 406. Julian was a noble and wealthy man, known to Jerome for a long time, and he seems to have lived in Dalmatia, since he is said at no. 5 to support many monks through the islands of Dalmatia. He had suffered many adversities in a short time, which Jerome enumerates thus at no. 2: I hear that in a short time you have buried two little maiden daughters (the one six, the other eight years old, who died within twenty days, as is said at no. 6) in almost joined funerals, and that your most chaste and most faithful wife Faustina — nay rather your sister in the warmth of faith, in whom alone you were finding rest after the loss of your children — has been taken from you by a sudden falling asleep: …

there have followed losses of your household estate, the devastation of the whole province by a barbarian enemy, and, amid the general depopulation, the private ruin of your possessions, the herds of cattle and flocks driven off, your servants bound and slain; and, in the case of your only daughter, whom so frequent bereavements had made dearer to you, a most noble son-in-law chosen, from whom — to pass over everything else — you have received more grief than joy. On account of all these things Jerome consoles Julian: but he so consoles him that in far more words he exhorts him to contempt of the world and to embracing the monastic life. He praises Julian's liberality toward the poor and toward monks, but stirs him to greater things, because, he says at no. 6, I would not have you be a monk among worldlings and a worldling among monks: and I shall demand the whole of you, whose mind I hear is devoted to the divine worship.

[897] and exhorts him to the monastic life Among other reasons by which he strives to induce Julian to the monastic life, he sets before him at no. 5 the example of SS. Pammachius and Paulinus, who had also, like him, been bound in marriage, and were adorned with riches and nobility. Nor is there any reason, he says, for you to plead nobility and the weight of riches. Look at the holy man Pammachius, and at Paulinus the priest of most fervent faith, who offered not only their riches, but themselves, to the Lord: who, against the devil's shuffling, consecrated to the Lord by no means skin for skin, but their flesh and bones and souls: who can lead you on to greater things both by example and by speech, that is, both by deed and by tongue. You are noble, and so are they, but more noble in Christ: rich and honoured; and so are they — nay, out of rich and honoured men, poor and inglorious; and therefore richer and more renowned, because poor and unhonoured for Christ. From these words it is clear that the Epistle was written after it had become known to St. Jerome that the monastic life had been chosen by Pammachius and Paulinus. It is certain, therefore, that it was not written before the year 398, since Epistle 66, in which Jerome consoles Pammachius on the death of his wife, and likewise exhorts him to embrace the monastic life, was issued toward the end of the year 397, as was proved at no. 587 and following. Therefore Pammachius's monastic life did not become known to Jerome before the year 398, and consequently the Epistle was not issued before that year, but in all likelihood some years later, after Pammachius had become famous for his piety and monastic life. St. Paulinus, who is called a priest, is believed by most to have been raised to the episcopate in the year 409. Wherefore the Epistle must be fixed in some uncertain year between 398 and 409. For that Vallarsi, on account of the devastation of the province, believes it was issued in the year 406, seems to me altogether uncertain, since the Goths very often devastated the provinces neighbouring Italy in those times, and not only the Goths, but other barbarians too.

[898] On what occasion, and with what speed, St. Jerome dictated this Epistle, The Epistle dictated most swiftly. he explains at the beginning, thus opening: My son, your brother, Ausonius, at the very moment of his departure, when he had granted me his presence late and taken it away quickly, and in a point of time had said both hail and farewell, thought he would return empty unless he carried to you something of my trifles in hurried speech. The warrant having already been issued, the public horse was being saddled, and the belt girt the noble youth clad in a scarlet tunic: and yet he, with a notary set beside me, kept forcing me to speak such things as a swift hand might swiftly follow when swiftly uttered, and such that the signs for the words might outrun the tongue's speed. And so, not by the diligence of a writer but by the rashness of a dictator, I break my long silence toward you, offering you the bare will to do my duty. It is an extempore Epistle, without order of thoughts, without allurement or arrangement of words, so that in it you may find all the friend and nothing of the orator. At the end he again has this: Forgetful of my purpose and of the brevity of a letter, I desired to say more: for to the dignity of the subject, and to the merit of your person, all that is said is too little; and lo, our Ausonius has begun to demand the sheets, to press the notaries, and, by the neighing of his waiting horse, hastily to convict my poor wit of slowness. Remember us, then, and take care to fare well in Christ, etc. From these words we may gather that Jerome perhaps spent not a whole hour on this lengthy epistle. Yet it is elegant and learned; nor does it lack the eloquence of an orator any more than the freedom of a friend urging a friend to the best things.

[899] In the year 404 as it was running to its close, or at the beginning of the following one, was issued Epistle 109 (elsewhere 53) to Riparius the priest, The Epistle to Riparius against Vigilantius. in which Jerome made a prelude to the book written against Vigilantius. For this book, as I shall show in its place, was certainly written toward the end of the year 406; and in it, at no. 10, he mentions the Epistle thus: Of vigils and all-night watches to be frequently kept in the basilicas of the martyrs I answered briefly in another Epistle, which I had written about two years ago to the holy priest Riparius. If by about two years he means a year and six, seven or eight months, as is likely enough, the Epistle to Riparius was issued in the year 405 about the beginning of spring; but if a complete or nearly complete two years, it will have been written toward the end of the year 404. More about that Epistle I shall give in §52, where I shall treat of the book against Vigilantius, which with others the Saint dictated after a grave and long illness.

[900] During the time of this illness, so far as I could gather from the comparison of St. Jerome's deeds and writings, The Epistle to Rufinus, who is to be distinguished from others of the same name, the Saint dictated in his bed Epistle 74 (elsewhere 131) to Rufinus the priest, who must be entirely distinguished from Rufinus of Aquileia, and also from that other whom we saw set out from Palestine into Italy in the year 399. That Rufinus was a new friend of St. Jerome when the Saint wrote to him, since as a reason for dictating even in bed he alleges that he was unwilling to refuse anything to one who commanded him at the beginning of a friendship. But neither was Rufinus of Aquileia a new friend; nor that other Rufinus, whom Jerome sent from Syria into Italy long before this Epistle was written according to our chronology. The chronology of others, who fixed the Epistle in the year 398, could be no more helpful for believing that it was written to Rufinus the Syrian: for at that time that Rufinus seems to have been with Jerome. Perhaps he was a Roman priest to whom Jerome writes: for Vallarsi attests that in several manuscripts the title of the Epistle is this: To Rufinus the Roman priest on the judgment of Solomon, and that in some there is added, on the cutting of the little child. Rufinus had, namely, proposed to Jerome an explanation of the most famous judgment of Solomon on the quarrel of the two harlots.

[901] written about the judgment of Solomon. But whether that Rufinus was a Roman priest or one of another city, he challenged Jerome to friendship by his letter; and wrote of the love toward him of a certain Eusebius, a priest, who in all likelihood is the one of Cremona. From these matters Jerome modestly begins his Epistle in this manner: Report often lies much in either direction, and with false rumour spreads abroad both evil about the good and good about the evil. Whence I too rejoice indeed at your sanctity's testimony concerning me, and at the love of the holy priest Eusebius: nor do I doubt that you proclaim me publicly, but I greatly dread the silent judgment of your prudence. And so I beseech you rather to remember me, and to make me worthy of your praise. That you were the first to challenge me to this duty, and that the second part in writing back has been given me, comes not from carelessness toward friends, but from ignorance: for if I had known, I should have anticipated your discourse. Then he answers at some length the question proposed about the judgment of Solomon. The answer pleased Cassiodorus, since in his book On Institution, chap. 2, he praises it in these words: On which passage the holy Jerome too discoursed with a most delightful exposition, as is his wont.

[902] when the Saint was lying ill for a year: In the last part Jerome speaks of his illness, writing thus: If anywhere we have stumbled, and what we have written should seem frivolous to a wise reader, let him lay the blame on him who caused it. For we dictated even these things lying in bed, and worn out by a long sickness, scarcely able to dictate to a notary things to be written swiftly — not to fill out the subject, but that we might not seem to refuse you, who at the beginning of a friendship commanded something. Pray for us that the Lord may grant us health, so that after the twelve months in which I have been worn out with continual weakness I may be able to write something worthy of your desire: and pardon me if my discourse, gushing out, does not flow in its accustomed course. For we do not dictate with the same charm with which we write: because in the one we often turn the pen, meaning to write again things worthy to be read; in the other we roll out in swift speech whatever comes into the mouth. I have gladly seen Caninius, who will be able to tell you how grievous and dangerous a wound of my right hand I have endured down to the present day, on which I dictated these things. That Caninius had in all likelihood brought Rufinus's letter, and was to carry back this one. And that this Rufinus is other than the one of Aquileia and the Syrian is suggested not only by all that we have recited about a recent friendship, but also by Caninius the bearer of the letters, and by the time at which the Epistle was written, which I shall now investigate.

[903] this illness is referred by one writer to the year 398, It was certainly written at the time of the illness which had afflicted the Saint twelve months, so that we must look for a year in which he wrote nothing, or little. No such year is found from the year 386, in which Jerome began to live in Palestine, down to the year 397 nearly ended; since in all the intervening years the Saint wrote much, and in the later ones also translated much from the Hebrew Old Testament into the Latin tongue. The first mention of a somewhat lengthy illness is found in the year 398, and Vallarsi believed that this lasted a year or twelve months, thinking that it began in the month of December of the year 397, and continued at first for three months; then in the spring left off for some time, during which the Saint wrote on Matthew and the Epistles to Lucinius and to Evangelus; and at last that the illness returned, and continued to the November of the year 398, so that the twelfth month was begun when he was writing to Rufinus. This opinion of his Vallarsi inculcates at length in the Chronology of the Epistles, at this Epistle 74, in the Preface of the first volume: nor would I deny that it seems probable, since the illness could have grown worse again after the Commentaries on Matthew were dictated, and so have been drawn out to twelve months, especially since in the Epistle to Evangelus he says that the eagerness with which he had resumed his studies in dictating on Matthew had harmed his bodily health.

[904] Nevertheless I think it much more probable that that illness of the Saint belongs to the years 405 and 406: but it is more probable that the illness arose in the year 405, for I find very few writings of Jerome in the year 405, and none at all in the first and greater part of the year 406, so that it would be very easy to place twelve months at that time,

utterly devoid of any writing of the Saint — nay, more could even be found, if it were established that the sickness continued for a notable time after the Epistle to Rufinus was written. For all the Works of St. Jerome which can be referred to the year 405 are the Translation of the Rule and of other writings of St. Pachomius; the Translation of some books of sacred Scripture, which at the time of St. Paula's death was not yet finished, as was said at no. 461 and following; the Epistle to Riparius, and perhaps the twin Epistle to Augustine. Theophilus's Paschal book too Jerome may have translated in the year 405, and sent it with his own Epistle: and if this was done by him, as was set forth at no. 844 and following, in the same year, during the days of holy Lent, he fell into a most grievous weakness, from which, however, he somehow soon recovered. If we but consider that most of the writings enumerated, and namely the Translations, seem either to have been begun or even finished from the year 404, and that nothing of them all can be fixed with any certainty, or with great probability, after the middle of the year 405, we shall find Jerome entirely idle from the middle of the year 405 until nearly the autumn of the year 406, when he began again to write much, as we shall presently see.

[905] Wherefore I am wholly persuaded that that long illness and that the Saint recovered from it in the year 406. by which the Saint was afflicted for twelve months, or perhaps even longer, began in the year 405, and ended in the following year 406 about the autumn, or not long before. In the Preface to the book of Joshua translated from the Hebrew the Saint attests that after the falling asleep of the holy Paula, who died in the month of January of the year 404, and the books still to be translated from the Hebrew, which he could translate in a few months, he wished to apply himself to the explanation of the Prophets, Pammachius also asking this by letter. Yet he deferred this work until the autumn of the year 406, even though in all the intervening time he composed no Work that required great effort or long labour. Of so great a delay, therefore, I find no other cause than that the Saint, otherwise always most laborious, was compelled by that long illness to rest. We do not find the Saint so idle in the year 398, in which he not only published the Commentaries on Matthew and several lengthy Epistles, but also in all likelihood the lengthy book against John of Jerusalem. In the same year too he could translate Genesis and certain other books of the Pentateuch from the Hebrew. Besides, in no writing composed about the end of the year 398 or in the following year does he mention his illness; whereas toward the end of the year 406 he mentioned the illness from which he had recently recovered, as we shall presently see at no. 909, so that this reason too, which Vallarsi wished to use, does not favour him but contradicts him. I proceed to the year 406.

§ LII. Zechariah, Malachi, Hosea, Joel and Amos expounded; the Epistle to Minervius and Alexander.

The material being nearly ready for dictating on five Prophets, Now in the last part of the autumn of the year 406 there came to St. Jerome Sisinnius the monk, sent by St. Exuperius bishop of Toulouse to carry generous relief for the want of the monks of Palestine and Egypt, as was set forth at the XXVIII of September in St. Exuperius, no. 26 and following. He brought not only the letter of St. Exuperius, but also those of certain others, namely of Minervius and Alexander the monks, proposing many questions, and of Riparius and Desiderius the priests, who were sending the writings of Vigilantius, that the Saint might refute them. Jerome, his long illness having ceased, had resumed his studies before Sisinnius's arrival by the explanation of the Minor Prophets, of whom five remained to be expounded, namely Zechariah, Malachi, Hosea, Joel and Amos, whom I have listed in the order in which they were explained; yet none of these Commentaries had been brought to its conclusion, but a great part of the material to be dictated seems to have been ready, so that perhaps at the beginning of autumn, or even a little before autumn, the Saint had resumed his studies. What I have asserted about Sisinnius's arrival and the material being in some sort ready is gathered from the Preface on Zechariah, which the Saint thus begins: Now in the last part of the autumn our brother, your son Sisinnius the monk, delivered to me a letter of your worthiness; on reading which I rejoiced that you are safe and mindful of me, etc. Thus he addresses Exuperius, whose praises he also celebrates.

[907] he dictates three books on Zechariah, And lower down: And since I desired to offer you some little gift of my poor talent, and since the Explanation of the Twelve prophets which I had begun was coming to its conclusion, I was unwilling to abandon the work I had undertaken, but what I was going to dictate even without you I consecrated above all to your name. And I rejoice that the most obscure book of the prophet Zechariah, and the longest among the Twelve, must be discussed at a time when, because of the haste of him who is to return, the exposition suffers no delay; but, willy-nilly, I am compelled, at least in hours snatched and stolen through the night, to dictate what I may send you. That the exposition, as he says, was coming to its conclusion — seeing that four books were still to be explained after this one — must, it seems, be understood altogether of the material prepared for dictating, not of Commentaries dictated. For that not even those on Zechariah had been dictated before Sisinnius's arrival is plainly clear from the Prefaces to the three books of which it consists; for in all of them mention is made of the speed of dictation on account of Sisinnius's haste, or, as the second Preface has it, while brother Sisinnius hastens to go to Egypt. And the third he begins thus: Brother Sisinnius urges me to send things unpolished and unfinished, so that I have not, I do not say the opportunity of amending, but not even of re-reading them. He is in haste for his own work: we do less in ours, while learning is turned to no purpose; and whatever we have conceived in thought, we are not allowed to adorn with well-arranged speech. He says more to excuse his style. He adds in the first Preface, to our purpose: But if there are any to whom I earlier promised an exposition both of these and of other volumes, let them pardon my incredible love for you, and let them think that whatever I have written to you was written to them.

[908] From Zechariah Jerome went on at once to Malachi for the sake of Minervius and Alexander, one on Malachi, who had proposed other questions. It is a single book, in whose Preface he discusses various matters relating to the Prophet, and addresses them concerning his purpose thus: These things, my Minervius and Alexander, who agree not so much in blood as in religion, I have said briefly in the proem, that I might not abandon the work on the Prophets which I had undertaken, and might sweat for you with an extraordinary labour. Let this suffice concerning the exposition of Malachi. But since he wrote both a lengthy Epistle to Minervius and Alexander and the book against Vigilantius, which were to be carried into Gaul by the same Sisinnius, it may be doubted whether he first dispatched these, or whether he went on to explain the remaining three Prophets, whose Commentaries he dedicated to St. Pammachius.

[909] If we consider the Preface of the third book on Amos, and going on to the earlier ones, which is last of all, we shall judge that the five Prophets were explained in an unbroken course of study. For, having first related the exposition of the seven others, which long preceded, he adds the following about those five: In the present year, which has given its name to the annals of the sixth consulship of Arcadius Augustus and of Anicius Probus (that is, in the year 406), I have expounded Zechariah for Exuperius the bishop of the church of Toulouse, and the prophet Malachi for Minervius and Alexander, monks of the same city. And at once running back to the beginning of the volume (of the Twelve Prophets), I could not refuse you (Pammachius) Hosea and Joel and Amos. And after a most grievous sickness of body, I have shown my rashness by the speed of my dictation, so that what others dare not write though they often turn the pen, I have committed to that chance which always attends those who dictate, and which makes a trial, at the risk of boldness, of one's talent and learning: since, as I have often attested, I am unable to bear the labour of writing with my own hand, and in the explanation of the holy Scriptures it is not well-arranged words adorned with oratorical flowers that are sought, but the learning and simplicity of truth. These last words show that the excuse concerns only the style, not the material, which had earlier been maturely weighed. And from the words adduced it is clear that in the same year 406, in which in the last part of the autumn he dictated on Zechariah and Malachi, he also dictated on Hosea, Joel and Amos; and indeed consecutively, if those words, And at once running back to the beginning of the volume, etc., are to be taken strictly.

[910] And so I shall go on to treat first of the exposition of the Prophets, three books on Hosea, even though it may have been that, while he was busy with these, Sisinnius pressed too hard for his departure, and that therefore he interposed some days to dispatch the remaining things which Sisinnius was to carry into Gaul. On Hosea he wrote three books, to which he prefixed Prefaces to Pammachius. In the first he discusses at length the obscurity of that prophet, and reckons about twenty-two years from the time when he had been in Egypt and had seen at Alexandria Didymus, whom he calls the most learned man of his time. These words show that Rufinus's calumnies did not bring it about with Jerome that he no longer dared to praise the learning of those whose faith he did not approve in everything. For Didymus was among the chief followers of Origen. But as regards the twenty-two years: since he had been in Egypt in the year 386, the twenty-first year was still running when he wrote this about the end of the year 406; but by the word about he suggests that the time was not so exactly counted. After enumerating there the older writers who had written on Hosea, he subjoins this about the manner in which he followed them: I say this that you may know what forerunners I have had in the field of this Prophet: whom, however — let me confess it to your prudence simply, and not proudly, as one of my friends (in all likelihood Rufinus) is always hissing — I have not followed in all things, so as to be rather the judge of their work than its translator, and to say what seemed good to me in each point, and what I have received from the teachers of the Hebrews, scarcely one or two of them.

[911] despising the gibes of his rivals, In the Preface to the second book he again discusses at length the detractors of whom he was never free. I transfer a few out of many here: He who sails often sometimes suffers a storm: he who frequently takes the road either endures the assault of robbers, or at least fears it; in art both glory and detraction arise with favourable and adverse winds, while either friends praise beyond desert, or enemies disparage beyond justice: and rarely will you find one who in either direction is led, not by favour or hatred, but by the equity of the matter. And this I see happening to me as I sweat in the explanation of the Scriptures. For some despise them as trifling, and whatever we say they look down upon with wrinkled nose: others, out of hatred of our name, consider not the matters but the persons: and approve the silence of others more than our zeal. There are those who assert that we act boldly, because we have seized upon a work which none of the Latins before us has dared to attempt. Certain men think themselves eloquent and learned in this, if to another's work

they detract, and judge, not what they themselves can do, but what we cannot. Then he exhorts Pammachius to despise their gibes; and says that he rejoices indeed in his defence, but would rather be in such a position that no one should profit him by praising, no one harm him by blaming. Then he adds the reasons: For while we live, and are contained in a fragile vessel, the zeal of friends seems to profit and the reproaches of rivals to harm: but after earth has returned to its own earth, and pale death has taken away both us who write and those who judge of us; and another generation has come, and, the first leaves falling, a green wood has grown up — then talents alone are judged, without the dignity of names: nor does he who is about to read consider whose it is, but what sort of thing it is that he is about to read, whether the author be a bishop or a layman, etc. In the third Preface he pursues at greater length the zeal and love of Pammachius.

[912] one on Joel, From Hosea he presently passed to Joel, expounded in a single book. Both in the Preface and at the beginning of the Commentary he mentions Hosea as previously explained. At chap. 1 ℣ 4 he also speaks of Amos as to be expounded. In the Preface he speaks briefly of a rival, in all likelihood Rufinus, and of the favour of Pammachius, to whom he subjoins: And what we promised to the holy and venerable Paula your kinswoman, receive as a dutiful heir; and whatever, either in talent or in learning, we can do less than your expectation, sustain with a friend's favour: and do not consider our strength, but our will. Joel being expounded, he presently proceeded likewise to Amos, whose Prophecy alone of the Twelve Minor ones remained to be explained.

[913] and three on Amos. He dictated three books on Amos, inscribed to the same Pammachius. At chap. 1 ℣ 1 he says that the Explanation both of this prophet and of Hosea and Zechariah had been promised both to other holy men and namely to Paula, of holy and venerable memory. In the Preface of the second book he enumerates the advantages of old age: and since he seems to be speaking chiefly of his own, I bring some of it hither: Old age, he says, brings with it many things both good and bad: good, because it frees us from most shameless mistresses, the pleasures; sets a measure to gluttony, breaks the onset of lust, increases wisdom, gives riper counsels… But the things thought to be the evils of old age are these: frequent infirmities, a most troublesome rheum, … dim eyes, food turning sour, a hand sometimes trembling, teeth bare of gums and falling out amid the meals. Besides this, it is often tortured by gripings and stabs of the stomach, and by the pains of gout in foot and hand, so that it cannot even hold a pen or a reed, cannot walk on its own feet, and seems to be maimed in a great part of life, and dead beforehand in many limbs. Since these things are so, in a comparison of evils I shall bear sicknesses more tolerably, provided that I am free from that one and most grievous mistress, lust, etc. According to our chronology he was nearly seventy-six years old when Jerome wrote this. In the Preface he shows the order in which he expounded all the minor Prophets: but we have given all that in its own places.

[914] Of their exposition the Saint afterwards makes mention in various places All the Minor Prophets expounded before the four Major. in such a way that, if it were uncertain, it could be proved even from these that the Twelve Minor were expounded before all the Major. For in the Preface on Daniel, whom he explained first of the Major, he says that he will not expound everything at length, as, he says, we did in the Twelve prophets. He begins his preface on Isaiah thus: The twenty books of Explanations on the Twelve prophets having been completed scarcely in a long time, and the Commentaries on Daniel, you compel me, Eustochium, virgin of Christ, to pass to Isaiah. What he says about a long time is most true: for he began these Commentaries in the year 392 and completed them about the end of the year 406, because he twice at least interrupted their continuation for some years on account of other labours. In the Preface of book XI on Isaiah he says: In the Explanation of the Twelve Prophets I have seemed to some longer than I ought. In the Prologue on Jeremiah, who was expounded last, he again makes mention of that same Work of his. For the rest, I briefly observe that from the Saint's words on Amos chap. 5 ℣ 19 certain men have wished to infer that he wrote a Commentary on Job, but that they were deceived by the perverse reading of one word, discimus, for which they read diximus. Of whose nature, he says (that of the Leviathan or the serpent) and manifold terror we learn more fully in that very volume (Job). From the words in that very volume — which Jerome certainly did not write — it is abundantly clear that we must not read diximus. That Jerome did not write Commentaries on Job Vallarsi proves more fully in vol. 3, col. 825.

[915] While the Saint was dictating these things, he was at the same time considering a most difficult question proposed to him by Minervius and Alexander, Writing to Minervius and Alexander, on account of excessive haste and others by others, all of which Sisinnius the monk had brought, who came suddenly to Jerome to have an answer to each, because he wished to depart for Egypt sooner than he had before promised. Wherefore he perhaps interrupted the Commentaries on the Prophets for some days, in order to hasten an answer to the questions proposed, and with others to dictate Epistle 119 (elsewhere 152) to Minervius and Alexander, in which there is a lengthy discussion of a difficult passage of the Apostle, 1 Cor. 15 ℣ 51, on those words variously read: We shall indeed all rise again, elsewhere we shall all sleep, etc. I subjoin the beginning of the Epistle to our purpose: At the very moment of the departure of our holy brother Sisinnius, who had brought me your writings, I am compelled to dictate these things, such as they are; nor can I conceal it from your prudence: (but I beseech you not to refer this saying to boasting, but rather to full intimacy, since I speak to you as to myself). He has brought me many questions of holy brothers and sisters from your province, to which I thought I should answer within the most ample space of time, up to the day of Epiphany. And when in stolen little vigils of the night I was dictating answers to most of them, and, the others finished, was reserving myself for yours as for the most difficult, he suddenly came upon me, asserting that he would set out at once. From the words adduced we gather that several Epistles of Jerome, which he had dictated to the questions proposed, have perished: for this one alone of those then dictated has reached us.

[916] [on the passages of the Apostle to be explained he only collects the opinions of others,] But what follows shows that Jerome, by reason of his excessive haste, on the question just mentioned, and on another likewise from the Apostle's words about the resurrection, 1 Thess. 4 ℣ 14 and following, only collected the opinions of others, and did not set forth his own. For he goes on in this manner: And when I asked him to put off his journey, he began to plead to me the famine of Libya, the needs of the monasteries of Egypt, the waters of the Nile not full, the hunger of many, so that it would have been almost an offence against the Lord to wish to detain him longer. And so the woof and the warp, the threads and the webs which I had prepared for your tunic, I have sent you unwrought, so that whatever is lacking to me may be woven by your eloquence. As a reason for acting thus he alleges their prudence and learning, and explains the metaphors he has used in these words: And so I too, constrained by time, have set forth for you the opinions of each of those who have left little Commentaries on sacred Scripture, and have translated most things word for word (from the Greek), both to free myself from the question and that the authority of the old expositors may be sent you, so that in reading and approving each you may acquiesce, not in my will, but in your own judgment.

[917] and gives a reason for what he did, But since all those whose words he had alleged had not thought rightly in all points concerning the faith, toward the end of the lengthy Epistle he alleges reasons why he consults writers of this kind, proceeding to them thus at no. XI: These things I have dictated in swift speech, setting forth to your prudence what learned men thought about each passage, and by what arguments they wished to prove their opinions. For the authority of my littleness, who am nothing and lie open only to the bites of the envious, is not so great as that of those who have gone before us in the Lord. Nor, as with the disciples of Pythagoras, is a teacher's opinion to be weighed as prejudged, but the reason of the doctrine. But if anyone of the contrary faction mutters, why I read the explanations of those in whose doctrines I do not acquiesce, let him know that I gladly hear that word of the Apostle: “Prove all things, hold fast that which is good”… For if I wish to know dialectic, or the doctrines of the philosophers, and — to return to our own things — the knowledge of the Scriptures, I ought by no means to question the simple men of the Church, whose grace is of another kind, … but those who have learned the art from the artificer, and meditate on the Law of the Lord day and night. That these are rather to be consulted for the interpretation of the Scriptures, even if they do not think rightly about everything, than simple Catholics, he goes on presently to prove at length, tacitly refuting Rufinus and his followers, who disapproved this in Jerome, or wrongly explained it.

[918] refuting Rufinus and his associates. I do not think, however, that Jerome wished that even simple and unlearned men, for whom such reading would be dangerous, should search out the interpretation of the sacred Scriptures in heretical writers; but only those who had both outstanding learning and the necessity of explaining them to others. Against Rufinus's adherents likewise he says: I profess both in my youth and in my last age that both Origen and Eusebius of Caesarea were most learned men, but that they erred in the truth of doctrines. And again this: Why do my friends tear me, and why do fat sows grunt against one who is silent? Whose whole study — nay, the haughtiness of whose knowledge — is to carp at the works of others, and so to defend the faithlessness of the ancients that they lose their own faith. My purpose is to read the ancients, to test each thing, to keep what is good, and not to depart from the faith of the Catholic Church. At the end he suggests that he has not answered all the questions proposed, adding this: Wishing to answer other little questions, and to dictate either my own views or others', I was suddenly admonished by brother Sisinnius to write letters both to you and to the other holy brethren who deign to love us. I shall therefore check my pace, and, if life be my companion, shall reserve myself for a future work, so that I may both obey you by instalments, and my broken and aged little body may be able to bear a moderate burden.

§ LIII. The Epistle to Riparius, and the book written against Vigilantius the heresiarch.

Vigilantius, partly refuted in the Epistle to Riparius, At the same time St. Jerome swiftly dictated the book against Vigilantius the heresiarch, against whom nearly two years earlier he had issued the Epistle to Riparius the priest, as I said briefly at no. 899. We have already seen at no. 619 and following that Vigilantius had been in Palestine with St. Jerome, whom he dared to calumniate as a follower of Origen's errors; and that, having asked pardon at his departure, he afterwards relapsed into the same calumnies in the West, and for that reason was rebuked by the Saint in a sharp Epistle indeed, by which the disease of a most empty-headed man might have been healed, if he had laboured under a less obstinate malady. But the man, unlearned,

and furnished with almost nothing but audacity, took it upon himself to leap forward to writing, and poured out many errors with an unskilled pen. Of these Riparius the priest wrote to Jerome, but did not then send him the books of Vigilantius: yet he understood that the cult of the relics of the holy martyrs was disapproved by Vigilantius, and the solemn vigils of Christians at the tombs of the martyrs. For this reason Jerome defended those two heads in the Epistle to Riparius, adding at the end: I had wished to dictate more, if the brevity of a letter did not lay upon me the modesty of silence; and if you had been willing to send us the ditties of his books, so that we might know what we ought to write against. But as it is, we have beaten the air, and have disclosed, not so much his faithlessness, which is plain to all, as our own faith. For the rest, if you wish us to write a longer book against him, send his dirges and follies, that he may hear John the Baptist preaching: “Already the axe is laid to the root of the trees,” etc.

[920] Riparius, together with Desiderius the priest, did what Jerome had asked. having received his books, the Saint refutes him more fully in a short book, For in the book against Vigilantius, no. 3, he speaks thus: The authors of this little dictation of mine are the holy priests Riparius and Desiderius, who write that their parishes are stained by his neighbourhood, and have sent through brother Sisinnius the books which, snoring in his drunkenness, he vomited forth. And they assert that some have been found who, favouring their own vices, acquiesce in his blasphemies. He is indeed unskilled both in words and in knowledge, and of unpolished speech; he cannot defend even true things: but on account of men of the world, and of little women laden with sins, always learning and never coming to the knowledge of the truth, I shall answer his dirges in one short vigil, lest I should seem to have spurned the letters of holy men who have entreated me to do this. That this little Work was swiftly dictated he declares at the end in these words: These things, as I have said, at the request of the holy priests, I have dictated in the vigil of a single night, brother Sisinnius being in great haste, and hurrying to go to Egypt for the refreshment of the Saints: besides, the very subject had open blasphemy in it, which demanded rather the indignation of the writer than a multitude of testimonies.

[921] the impiety of an unlearned man With how great indignation Jerome received the errors of Vigilantius, that is, his open blasphemy, as he calls it, he declares in many places. He begins the Epistle to Riparius thus: Having first received your letter, not to answer is a mark of pride, to answer of rashness. For you ask about those matters which it is sacrilege both to utter and to hear. You say that Vigilantius, who is called by this name κατ᾽ ἀντίφρασιν (for he would more rightly be called Dormitantius), is again opening his stinking mouth and putting forth a most foul stench against the relics of the holy martyrs, and calling us, who receive them, ash-mongers and idolaters, for venerating the bones of dead men. O unhappy man, to be bewailed with every fountain of tears! who, saying these things, does not understand that he is a Samaritan and a Jew, who hold the bodies of the dead for unclean, etc. He then calls him both a mad brain and a useless vessel, and, after refuting the heresy, says: O tongue to be cut out by the physicians — nay, mad head to be cured, so that he who does not know how to speak may some time learn to keep silent. After other things given before, he gives the reason for his indignation at no. 3, writing thus: Perhaps you may reprove me in a silent thought, why I inveigh against an absent man. I shall confess my grief to you. I cannot patiently hear so great a sacrilege. For I have read of the spear of Phinehas, the austerity of Elijah, the zeal of Simon the Canaanite, the severity of Peter slaying Ananias and Sapphira, and the constancy of Paul, who condemned to eternal blindness Elymas the magician, who resisted the ways of the Lord. Piety for God's sake is not cruelty. He adds a passage from Deuteronomy chap. 13, where those are commanded to be slain who would lead men into idolatry.

[922] and his foolish rashness Then, having more fully understood the heresiarch's errors, he began the book thus: Many monsters have been begotten in the world. Centaurs and sirens, screech-owls and pelicans we read of in Isaiah. Job describes leviathan and behemoth in mystic language. Cerberus and the Stymphalian birds, the Erymanthian boar and the Nemean lion, the chimaera and the many-headed hydra the fables of the poets relate. Virgil describes Cacus. Spain has brought forth the three-formed Geryon. Gaul alone has had no monsters, but has always abounded in brave and most eloquent men. Suddenly there has arisen Vigilantius, or more truly Dormitantius, who with an unclean spirit fights against the spirit of Christ, and denies that the tombs of the martyrs are to be venerated: who says that vigils are to be condemned; that Alleluia is never to be sung except at Easter; that continence is a heresy, and chastity a seed-bed of lust. And as Euphorbus is said to have been born again in Pythagoras, so in this man the depraved mind of Jovinian has risen again: so that both in him and in this man we are compelled to answer the snares of the devil… That other, condemned by the authority of the Roman Church, amid pheasants and pork not so much gave up his spirit as belched it out. This innkeeper of Calagurris, and — by contrariety, from the name of his little village — a dumb Quintilian, mixes water with wine; and out of his old trade tries to join the poisons of his own faithlessness to the Catholic faith; to attack virginity, to hate chastity, to cry out against the fasts of the Saints at the banquets of worldlings; while he plays the philosopher among the goblets and, licking his lips at the cakes, is soothed by the melody of Psalms; so that only amid the feasts does he deign to hear the songs of David and Idithun and Asaph and the sons of Korah. These things I have poured out with the mind rather of one grieving than of one laughing, since I cannot restrain myself, and cannot pass by with a deaf ear an injury to the Apostles and martyrs.

[923] I wished to adduce these things so that anyone may perceive what the new doctrines of Vigilantius seemed to the most learned Jerome — doctrines which some in the middle ages adopted, and which in later centuries men revived who were fonder of their own convenience than of the precepts and traditions of the Church. If in the fifth century the inventions of Vigilantius appeared to the most learned Jerome so absurd and improbable and contrary to the doctrine of the whole Church that he believed he must be compared with the foulest monsters, with centaurs, with sirens, with Cerberus, with the chimaera, with the many-headed hydra, and with the other prodigies mentioned, because he had poured out such foul and harmful things — then a prudent man will easily be able to understand that they ought to seem neither better nor truer nor more tolerable in our own time. For things which thirteen or fourteen centuries ago were so discordant and destitute of every appearance of truth, so crazed and opposed to the sacred Scriptures, that Jerome not only sets down their author as the first monster of Gaul, but at no. 4 also names him a man of unsettled head and one to be bound with the bonds of Hippocrates, and adorns him with other titles of that sort, and at no. 7 pronounces that he sleeps while waking and writes while asleep — those dreams of Vigilantius, I say, which in the fifth century seemed so chimerical, in what manner at length can they seem true or tolerable in our time to a prudent man and a lover of truth? For a false doctrine, contrary to sacred Scripture, cannot in the course of time become true.

[924] Nor can it prudently be said that Jerome erred, both because for nearly forty years, when he wrote this, he had been most diligently engaged in the study of the sacred Scriptures and of ecclesiastical doctrine; in daring to attack the doctrine of the Church. and most of all because to the truth asserted by Jerome none of the holy Fathers or of the ecclesiastical writers ever set himself in opposition. For from the silence of all these it becomes plain that the doctrine asserted by Jerome against the perverse doctrines of Vigilantius was common to the whole Church; and this could further be easily confirmed from the holy Fathers, if our plan and this place required it. But now I briefly observe that Jerome's style is vehemently accused by Lutheran and Calvinist writers, and namely by Jean Le Clerc, whom Joseph Swinger of the Society of Jesus, doctor of sacred theology, refuted at length in the Apology for St. Jerome, printed in the year 1752. I do not care to treat the matter here at such length, lest this Commentary be too far extended. Yet let me be allowed to say a few things for Jerome against the admirers of Vigilantius, so that these men may return to saner counsels, and may not rave against a physician who of necessity cuts away putrid limbs.

[925] First, then, I say that St. Jerome's little Work was read by the ancients, and doubtless by some who had known Vigilantius, and yet that it was reproved by none as too bitter. Secondly, Gennadius, who certainly did not favour Jerome overmuch, but was rather in some sort opposed to him, gives in the Catalogue, chap. 35, an account of Vigilantius, and says that he was led astray by human praise, and presumed beyond his strength, being indeed polished in tongue but not practised in the sense of the Scriptures. He attributes to him depraved writings on Daniel, and, he says, he uttered other frivolous things, which are necessarily placed in the catalogue of heretics. To him the blessed Jerome the priest also replied. If now we should wish to ask the Apostle in what manner we ought to refute men who, catching at popular favour, presume beyond their strength to teach others, and with a new and openly heretical doctrine lead the simple astray, he will certainly answer what he wrote about the Cretans to Titus, chap. 1 ℣ 13: Rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith. And so Jerome obeyed the Apostle's command: for I do not see that there were lesser reasons for sharply rebuking Vigilantius, whose doctrine, as flattering the senses, was fitted to lead many astray and to tear them from the sound doctrine of the Church.

[926] is not to be disapproved, but rather praised. So Paul himself in Acts 13 ℣ 10 sharply rebuked Elymas the magician, and punished him with blindness, because he set himself against the progress of the faith; so Christ the Lord himself often sharply grazed the Pharisees. I pass over other examples, of which very many could be adduced. For if we praise Judges who punish thieves and robbers even with death, because they are harmful to the human race, on what ground shall we condemn teachers when they chastise with grave words heresiarchs, far more pernicious than thieves, so as to compel them by a salutary shame to desist from what they have wickedly begun, or at least to bring it about that their pernicious doctrines make no progress? Thirdly, the outcome itself taught that Jerome rightly used so great a sharpness at the beginning of that nascent heresy, lest the sweet poison should be drunk by many: for thus that monster was smothered in its cradle. And so the followers of Vigilantius ought not to accuse Jerome's sharpness any more than we accuse physicians who against certain diseases apply sharp and bitter remedies, so that the evil may be more surely healed. From that sharpness they may rather learn that Vigilantius laboured under a grave evil, that the wounds which he was contriving to inflict on the Church were dangerous; that the controversies he was stirring up were not doubtful, but open heresies; and that therefore he was not to be taught by a modest and subtle disputation, but to be repelled by a sharp rebuke. This last reason Jerome himself gives toward the end in these words: And the very subject had open blasphemy in it, which demanded rather the indignation of the writer than a multitude of testimonies. This no one in Jerome's most learned age is read to have denied.

[927] The chief errors of Vigilantius, Wherefore let us briefly review the chief heads of the errors of Vigilantius refuted by Jerome. The first error of Vigilantius, by Jerome

refuted, denies that the relics of the Saints are to be venerated. This heresy the Saint refutes at no. 5, and another presently at nos. 6 and 7, that the Saints can neither hear us nor pray for us: then at no. 9 he defends the custom of certain persons of lighting candles above the tombs of the martyrs; and, returning to the cult of the martyrs and of relics, to which the other things already mentioned also pertain, he observes at no. 9 that Eunomius the heresiarch, one of the chief followers of Arius, had taught that heresy earlier. You laugh, he says, at the relics of the martyrs, and with Eunomius, the author of this heresy, you build up a calumny against the churches of Christ: nor are you frightened by such company into not speaking against us the same things which he speaks against the Church. By a kindred error Vigilantius attacked the vigils and night-watches in the basilicas of the martyrs, which Jerome defends at no. 10. Then at no. 11 the signs and miracles which are done in the basilicas of the martyrs: and he not only grazes Vigilantius sharply, but at no. 12 also relates a most disgraceful deed of his, and on that occasion declares his own religious fear at no. 13 in these words: I confess my own fear, lest perhaps it come of superstition. When I have been angry, and have thought some evil thing in my mind, and a nightly phantasm has deluded me, I do not dare to enter the basilicas of the martyrs: so wholly do I tremble both in body and in mind.

[928] Lastly he very briefly touches upon several other inventions of Vigilantius, which St. Jerome refuted: namely that he argued against fasts and virginity, against the custom of sending alms to Jerusalem, and against the monastic life and the renunciation of all possessions. The two latter heads the Saint defends at some length at no. 14 and following. The rest he in all likelihood only touched upon, because he had discussed them at sufficient length against Jovinian, and in other places too. He concludes the little Work with these words: But if Dormitantius shall again keep vigil to curse me, and with the same blasphemous mouth with which he tears the Apostles and martyrs shall think that I too must be disparaged, I shall keep vigil against him, not with a brief little watch, but for a whole night; and against his associates — nay, his disciples or masters, who, unless they see the swollen wombs of women, think their husbands unworthy of the ministry of Christ.

[929] Of Vigilantius and his disciples Jerome speaks on Isaiah chap. 65 ℣ 4 and 5, he afterwards mentions him again. where he teaches that a man is held for unclean by the Jews if he is not led by an error like their own, and adds: Just as the Samaritans and Jews do to us, and all heretics, such as lately sprang up in Gaul under a crack-brained master, who, shunning the basilicas of the martyrs, flee us, who there celebrate prayers according to custom, as though we were unclean. But this is done not so much by them as by the demons dwelling in them, who cannot bear the strength and the scourges of the holy ashes. For the rest, the Calvinists, who have adopted all the dreams of Vigilantius refuted by Jerome far more accurately than they have the doctrine of Christ or of the Apostles, will have something to ponder, if they are willing to investigate why Jerome refuted Vigilantius much more sharply, and treated him more contemptuously, than any other heretics; and why in that most learned age none of Jerome's rivals, who were very many, undertook to defend Vigilantius. I proceed to other matters.

§ LIV. The Commentary on the prophet Daniel: the Epistle to Hedibia, another to Algasia, another to Rusticus, another to Avitus.

The Saint expounds the Prophet Daniel, After the twelve minor Prophets had been explained, whom we saw finished about the end of the year 406, Jerome passed to Daniel, who was the first of the Major expounded by him. He passed, I say, to Daniel either immediately after finishing the Minor, or after the book against Vigilantius and several Epistles, which were not works of very long labour, so that I can scarcely doubt that the Commentary on Daniel was written in the year 407, since it was certainly composed before the Commentaries on Isaiah and after those just mentioned on the Twelve Prophets. The Saint dedicated them to Pammachius and Marcella, as is clear from these words of the Preface: And so I beseech you, Pammachius φιλομαθέστατε, and Marcella, the unique example of Roman sanctity, joined in faith and in blood, to assist my endeavours with your prayers. But he resolved to proceed more briefly in this Commentary than he had done before in others. But now it is time, he says, that we should weave together the words of the Prophet himself — not, according to our custom, setting forth everything and discussing everything, as we read in the Twelve Prophets; but briefly and at intervals explaining only those things which are obscure, lest the bulk of innumerable books should breed disgust in the reader. There was added, in all likelihood, this reason too, that many things in Daniel are historical and clear enough.

[931] excusing himself for reading profane historians to this end. From this Preface too it is clear that the Saint did not easily depart from his resolve not to read profane writers, since he uses the excuse of necessity. But for understanding the last parts of Daniel, he says, the manifold history of the Greeks is necessary, namely of Sutorius Callinicus, Diodorus, Hieronymus, Polybius, Posidonius, Claudius, Theon, and Andronicus surnamed Alipius, whom Porphyry too (who had written against Daniel) says that he followed: of Josephus also, and of those whom Josephus sets down, and especially of our own Livy, and Pompeius Trogus, and Justin, who relate the whole history of the last vision, and describe the wars of Syria and Egypt after Alexander down to Caesar Augustus — that is, of Seleucus and Antiochus, and of the Ptolemies. And if at any time we are compelled to recall secular letters, and to say some things from them which we once left aside, it is not of our will, but, so to speak, of a most grievous necessity, that we may prove that the things foretold by the holy Prophets many ages before are contained in the writings both of the Greeks and of the Latins, and of other nations. These words at the same time show that Jerome's preparation for rightly expounding Daniel was no small one. In this same Preface Jerome again defends his Translation from the Hebrew, because the churches read Daniel from the Translation of Theodotion, not from the Seventy. And from that passage Montfaucon made a difficulty for himself, because he did not rightly understand Jerome's words; but Vallarsi expounded the passage well in his Annotations.

[932] Because of this Commentary the Saint was accused, That a dangerous suit was brought against him on account of this Commentary Jerome declares in two Prefaces on Isaiah. In the Preface of book 10 he brings forward only this about it: I hear besides that a scorpion, a dumb and venomous creature, is muttering I know not what about the answer once made in my little Commentary on the prophet Daniel, nay is trying to strike, though it is to die in its own pus. Whose dirges and mournful ditties have not yet been disclosed to me, and therefore my answer is deferred. What that was he in all likelihood indicates in the Preface of book XI, where he writes this: But if in the exposition of the statue and of its feet, and of the difference of its toes, I interpreted the iron and the clay of the Roman empire, which Scripture portends as at first strong and afterwards feeble, let them not impute it to me, but to the prophet. For princes are not to be flattered in such a way that the truth of the holy Scriptures should be neglected, nor is a general disputation an injury to one person. And when this was being guarded against by the kindly zeal of my friends, it was suddenly taken away by God's judgment, so that both my friends' zeal for me and my rivals' snares were made manifest. From what has been said it is clear what the passage was which so greatly offended one person, others without doubt instigating him. He had said on Daniel chap. 2 ℣ 42, concerning the weakness of the Roman empire, Which at this time is most manifestly proved, … when both in civil wars and against various nations we need the help of other barbarian peoples. These things were indeed most true; but truth begot hatred.

[933] We cannot say for certain who was so greatly offended by that true observation of Jerome's. in all likelihood because Stilicho thought himself grazed: Yet Tillemont's conjecture seems to me most likely, who at art. 120 suspects that it was Stilicho, of whom he says, Nor is a general disputation an injury to one person. Certainly all the circumstances favour this conjecture. For Stilicho, who was a barbarian by nation, had the greatest power in the Roman empire, and used various barbarian commanders both in the civil wars against the tyrants and against the emperor Arcadius himself, and against other nations. And so, even if Jerome had perhaps thought of Stilicho no more than of others, flatterers and enemies of Jerome could have persuaded him that the words alleged were uttered against him. Certainly some one man suspected that he was aimed at, and he seems to have been carried off by a sudden death, as is gathered from those words, it was suddenly taken away by God's judgment — namely the supposed injury to one person. This agrees entirely with Stilicho, who in the year 408, on the XXIII day of August, was slain by order of the emperor Honorius. The time of his death agrees excellently with the conjecture: for the Commentary on Daniel could have been carried into the West either before the end of the year 407, in which it was dictated, or at any rate in the year 408 a notable time before Stilicho's death. And his death must have become known to Jerome when he was writing on Isaiah, on whose exposition he spent nearly the years 408 and 409, as we shall see. Wherefore Tillemont's conjecture about Stilicho is, as I have said, most likely.

[934] In the same Preface Jerome relates that other things too in that Commentary displeased his detractors. some things in it likewise displeased his rivals, It is difficult, nay impossible, he says, to please all; nor is there so great a diversity of faces as of opinions. In the explanation of the Twelve Prophets I seemed to some longer than I ought: and for this reason in the little Commentaries on Daniel I aimed at brevity, except in the last and the last but one vision, in which, because of the greatness of the obscurity, it was necessary for me to extend my discourse, and especially in the exposition of the seven and the sixty-two and the one week: in discussing which I briefly summarized what Africanus the chronographer, what Origen and Eusebius of Caesarea, and Clement too, a priest of the church of Alexandria, and Apollinaris of Laodicea, and Hippolytus, and the Hebrews, and Tertullian thought, leaving it to the reader's judgment which of the many he should choose. And so what I did out of modesty in judging, and in honour of those who were to read, may perhaps not please certain persons who desire to know, not the opinions of the ancients, but my own view. To whom the answer is easy: that I was unwilling so to accept one as to seem to condemn the others. And certainly, if men so great and so learned displease fastidious readers, what would they have done about me, who for the slenderness of my poor talent lie open to the bites of the envious? So Jerome.

[935] His summary about the weeks pleased the Author of the Work on the Promises, published with the Works of St. Prosper: for he says that the calculations were made with great labour and talent. but it pleased Augustine and others. Jerome's modesty likewise did not displease St. Augustine, who, being asked about similar matters by Hesychius bishop of Salona, in Epistle 197 (elsewhere 78), sending him Jerome's very expositions, wrote this: But concerning the prophetic sayings or predictions, about which you wished me to write something, it seemed better to me that the expositions of the holy Jerome, a most learned man, of those same

words (lest perhaps you should not have them), excerpted from his little Works, should be sent to your beatitude. But if you already had them, and they did not satisfy your inquiry, I ask that you would not think it burdensome to write back to me what you think of them. To this Hesychius answered that the reader's judgment is held in suspense by the variety of the exposition. For, he says, if that most learned Man, our fellow-priest, says that it is dangerous to judge concerning the opinions of the teachers of the churches, and to prefer one to another, how much more is a reader unable to do what the Master hesitated to do? This indeed is true: but for a prudent reader it will be enough if he understands that the passage can be variously expounded. The said Commentary of Jerome St. Augustine again praises, and refers his readers to it in these words: Let them read the book of Jerome the priest on Daniel, composed with sufficient diligence and learning. We see here that it is called a book, so that in all likelihood Augustine did not have that Work divided into several books, just as it still exists without division. And so it is at least doubtful whether in Cassiodorus, book of Institutions, chap. 3, Daniel is rightly read as having been explained by Jerome in three books.

[936] To Hedibia and Algasia at the same time, At about the same time at which Jerome expounded Daniel, he answered many questions of sacred Scripture, brought by a certain Apodemius from the parts of Gaul near the Ocean, and proposed by the pious women Hedibia and Algasia. The Epistle to the former is 120 (elsewhere 150), to the latter 121 (elsewhere 151). That they were written at the same time is gathered from Apodemius, who in both is said to have brought the questions. Whatever, therefore, is read in either for determining the time holds good for both. And in the second, answering question 10, he says at col. 876: Of which we have discoursed more fully in the Prophet Amos. And so, since Amos was expounded about the end of the year 406, these Epistles cannot be fixed before the year 407. For this reason Tillemont in Note 73, and Vallarsi in his Chronology, fix them in the year 407, and, adding another reason not equally certain, at the beginning of the year 407. That other reason, which I believe by no means certain for fixing the Epistles about the beginning of the year, is drawn from the irruption of the Vandals and other barbarian nations into Gaul, about which Jerome is silent in those Epistles, although he says much of it in Epistles issued after the year 407, as we shall see. Tillemont in vol. 5 of the Emperors, Note 22 on Honorius, observes that the entry of the Vandals is fixed in the Chronicle of St. Prosper on the last day of the year 406, and tries further to prove that it must be fixed about the beginning of the year 407. Yet he confesses that by Orosius, who was then living, it is fixed only two years before the capture of Rome, and by Tiro Prosper after the death of Arcadius, who died in the year 408.

[937] more probably in the year 407, the Saint writes, I shall not examine the said chronology too curiously. Let us believe that it is most accurate, and that the Vandals crossed the Rhine on the last day of the year 406. At least from Tiro Prosper it is sufficiently gathered that their advances were not so rapid in the first months of the year 407 that they could bring much terror to the provinces of Gaul most remote from the Rhine, about the Ocean, before the summer of that same year, and perhaps even before the year 408. Apodemius, therefore, could at the beginning of the summer of the year 407 sail from Bordeaux, or from some other port of those parts on the Ocean, into Palestine, without yet having heard much about the barbarians' advance in the parts of Gaul near the Rhine. Jerome in all likelihood had heard nothing more about them from elsewhere when Apodemius landed in Palestine. Wherefore in midsummer, nay in the whole year 407, Jerome could easily be silent about that irruption of the barbarians into Gaul, because he did not know that it would be so destructive to all Gaul. From that silence, therefore, it seems to me rather more probable that the Epistles were written in the year 407: for it would be more astonishing if Jerome had said nothing in the year 408 about the irruption of the Vandals into Gaul, when writing to Gauls. Yet since we do not know how great the advances of the Vandals were in the year 407, it does not become altogether certain to me that the Epistles were issued before the year 408. Apodemius perhaps arrived at that very time when Jerome was explaining Daniel, and the said Epistles may have been dictated while the Commentary on Daniel was not yet finished.

[938] The former one, to Hedibia, the Saint thus begins: Unknown to me in face, answering many questions of sacred Scripture to Hedibia, you are most well known to me by the ardour of your faith: and from the farthest borders of Gaul you challenge one hiding in the countryside of Bethlehem to answer about little questions of the holy Scriptures, sending a little memorandum by a man of God, my son Apodemius; as though indeed you did not have in your own province eloquent men perfected in the law of God — unless perhaps you demand a test of us rather than our learning, and wish to know what we too think about those things which you have heard from others. Your forebears Patera and Delphidius — of whom the one, before I was born, taught rhetoric at Rome; the other, when I was already a young man, illumined all the Gauls with his talent in prose and verse — now sleeping and silent, justly reprove me for daring to mutter anything to the stock of their family; although, while granting them greatness of eloquence and learning in secular letters, I shall with good reason withdraw from them the knowledge of God's law, which no one can receive unless it be given him by the Father of lights… Whence I freely profess (nor do I fear that this be called proud) that I write to you, not in the learned words of human wisdom, which God will destroy, but in words of faith, comparing spiritual things with spiritual… Pray, therefore, that a true Elisha may quicken the barren and dead waters in me… And do not be delighted by the glitter of secular eloquence, which Jesus saw falling like lightning from heaven, etc.

[939] Then he begins to answer twelve questions, and how a widow without children ought to live. all of which were proposed from the Gospels and the Epistles of St. Paul, excepting however the first, which is framed in these words: How a man may be perfect, and how a widow ought to live to God who has been left without children. Hedibia, therefore, was a widow without children; nor had she few sons, as seemed to be said in the answer to the first question in the earlier edition, which was faulty, and was corrected by Martianay and Vallarsi. And so you too, since you have not a few children, make yourself very many friends of the mammon of iniquity. Jerome urges her to make very many poor people her friends by her wealth, in place of the children whom she did not have, and of whom she could have had only a few. After precepts of living given at no great length, he assigns her two Epistles on the same subject, which she could further consult, thus concluding his first answer: But how a widow ought to live the Apostle comprised in a brief discourse, saying: “The widow who lives in pleasures is dead while living”; and we in the two little books which we wrote to Furia and to Salvina think it has been more fully said. Then he answers the other eleven questions accurately and at length.

[940] To Algasia likewise he explains scriptural difficulties. With the same care, and even more at length, he answered the eleven questions of Algasia, likewise chosen from the Gospels and Paul's Epistles, so that these two Epistles, whether we look to the matter or to the bulk, may be reckoned among the books published on sacred Scripture. The beginning of the second is this: My son Apodemius, who, coming to us by a long voyage, has set his seal on the interpretation of his own name, and from the shore of the Ocean and the farthest borders of the Gauls, passing Rome by, sought Bethlehem, that he might find in it the heavenly bread, … brought me on a small sheet the greatest questions, which he said were given by you and were to be delivered to me. On reading them I understood that the zeal of the queen of Sheba was fulfilled in you, who came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon. Not indeed that I am Solomon, who is preferred in wisdom to all men both before him and after him; but you are to be called the queen of Sheba, in whose mortal body sin does not reign, and who, wholly turned to the Lord, shall hear from Him: “Return, return, O Shunamite.” For Sheba in our tongue means conversion. And at the same time I noticed that your little questions, proposed only from the Gospel and from the Apostle, indicate that you either do not read the old Scripture enough, or do not understand it enough: which is wrapped in such obscurities and in types of things to come that it all needs interpretation…

[941] and for like matters assigns her Alethius the priest. Besides, I have wondered much why, having left the purest spring so near, you have sought the streams of our rivulet from so far off, and, passing over the waters of Siloe, which go with silence, have desired the waters of Sihor, which are defiled with the turbid vices of this world. You have there the holy man Alethius the priest, who with living voice, as they say, and with prudent and eloquent speech can resolve what you ask — unless perhaps you desire foreign wares, and, by variety of taste, our garlic seasonings too delight you. To some sweet things are pleasing, some are delighted by the somewhat bitter: the stomachs of these are renewed by sour things, of those sustained by salt… And so cure our bitterness with his nectar-like honey, etc. It is not indeed established for certain who this Alethius the priest was, so greatly praised by Jerome. Yet Tillemont's conjecture is most likely, who at art. 119 thinks that he is the same as the Alethius to whom St. Paulinus's Epistle 33 is extant, and who was afterwards made bishop of Cahors, much praised in another Epistle of St. Paulinus, a fragment of which Gregory of Tours gave in bk. 2, chap. 13. I shall not observe more on the said Epistles. In neither is anything read about the irruption of the barbarians into Gaul. But from that it is not proved that they were written at the beginning of the year 407: for Jerome could be silent about it even about the end of that same year, because the barbarians were still far distant from the provinces situated about the Ocean, in which Hedibia and Algasia lived, as I have already said; or also because it was not necessary in questions of sacred Scripture to mention it.

[942] More probably at the same time he writes to Rusticus. Perhaps the Saint wrote a third at the same time, namely Epistle 122 (elsewhere 46) to Rusticus, in which he mentions the barbarians who had entered Gaul in such a way that he does not seem yet to know all the evils brought by them upon the Gauls. Tillemont at art. 121 refers it to the year 408, which is also noted in the margin in Vallarsi; but he in the chronology of the Epistles preferred to assign the year 407. It could have been written toward the end of the year 407, or in the following year. But it seems to me more probable that it was written at the same time as the two preceding, from which Tillemont and Vallarsi separated it only because it mentions the barbarians in Gaul. For the beginning plainly suggests that Jerome wrote to Rusticus at the same time at which he wrote to Hedibia, since he was induced to write by her entreaties. That I, unknown, he says, dare to write to one unknown, the holy handmaid of Christ Hedibia, and my daughter, your wife Artemia — nay, your sister

by your wife and fellow-servant, has been brought about by her entreaty. She, by no means content with her own salvation, sought yours both before in your native land, and now seeks it in the holy places. I can scarcely doubt that Hedibia, in the same letter in which she demanded an answer to her questions, at the same time asked Jerome to write to Rusticus about doing penance. And Artemia, Rusticus's wife, may have sailed with Apodemius to the East: for she had reached Palestine when Jerome was writing this. Hedibia could indeed have written twice to Jerome, and sent a second letter to him with Artemia, if she departed for Palestine after Apodemius. But there is nothing that compels us to say this.

[943] The whole Epistle of Jerome exhorts Rusticus to penance. whom he exhorts to penance, because he had broken the pledge The reason is set forth at no. 4 in this manner: Your former wife, now your sister and fellow-servant, has told me that, according to the Apostle's precept, by consent you abstained from the work of marriage, in order to be free for prayer: and that your footsteps again wavered, as though set on the open sea — nay (to speak plainly) slipped. But that she heard from the Lord with Moses: “But do thou stand here with me”: and said of the Lord: “He set my feet upon a rock”. That your house, which had not solid foundations of faith, afterwards fell in the devil's whirlwind: but that hers stands firm in the Lord, and does not deny you its shelter, so that you, to whom she was formerly joined in body, may now be joined in spirit… And that when the fury of the barbarians and the threat of captivity were separating you, you promised under the attestation of an oath that either at once or afterwards you would follow her as she went to the holy places, and would save your soul, which you had seemed to have lost by negligence. Render, therefore, what you promised in God's presence. The life of mortals is uncertain: lest you be snatched away before you fulfil your promise, imitate her whom you ought to have taught…

[944] But if the remnants of your household estate hold you, so that you may see both the deaths of friends and of fellow-citizens, and the ruins of cities and villas, given to his wife concerning continence. at least amid the evils of captivity, and the fierce faces of the enemy, and the countless shipwrecks of your province, hold fast the plank of penance: and remember your fellow-servant, who daily sighs for your salvation and does not despair of it. You wander in your fatherland — nay, not your fatherland, since you have lost your fatherland: she for you, in the venerable places of the Resurrection and of the Cross, and of the cradle of the Lord Saviour, in which as a little child He wailed, remembers your name, and draws you to herself by prayers, so that, if not by your own merit, at least by her faith you may be saved, etc. From what has been given it is clear that the province from which Rusticus came had already suffered much, and that this had become known to Jerome before he wrote this. But from that we cannot certainly infer that it was written after the two mentioned, in which those things are not read, especially since we do not know from which province of the Gauls Rusticus was: for the provinces near the Rhine suffered much from the year 407, but not so those near the Ocean and Spain.

[945] He sends the Translation of the books On First Principles to Avitus, Epistle 124 (elsewhere 59) can be fixed about the year 408, as Tillemont does at art. 121. Vallarsi in his Chronology believes it must be referred to the year 409 or 410. The beginning of the Epistle will serve both for fixing the date and for the matter itself. About ten years ago, he says, the holy man Pammachius sent me a certain man's sheets, containing the volumes of Origen περὶ ἀρχῶν translated — nay rather corrupted — asking this urgently, that a Latin translation should preserve the Greek truth… I did as he wished, and sent him the books, which, when he had read them, he shuddered at, and shut up in his desk, lest, if brought out among the public, they should wound the minds of many. Being asked by a certain brother, who had a zeal of God but not according to knowledge, to give them to him to read, as though he would return them at once, he could not suspect fraud because of the shortness of the time. He who had received them to read employed notaries, copied out the whole Work, and returned the codex much sooner than he had promised. And with the same rashness, and (to put it more lightly) ineptitude, what he had ill filched he entrusted still worse to others. And since large books, disputing on mystical matters, can with difficulty preserve the abbreviations of shorthand, especially those dictated stealthily and swiftly, everything in them is so confused that in most places they lack both order and sense. Wherefore you ask, dearest Avitus, that I should send you the very copy which, translated by me long ago and given to no one else, was perversely published by the aforesaid brother. Receive, then, what you asked, but in such a way that you know there are very many things in them to be detested by you, etc.

[946] carefully teaching with what errors they are defiled. On this let us now observe a few things. The books περὶ ἀρχῶν, or On First Principles, Rufinus translated in the year 398, and it does not seem to be doubted that Pammachius sent them to Jerome in that same year. And so about ten years leads us to the year 408, if they were nearly full, or if at least nine and a half be taken, since they were not finished by Rufinus until about the middle of the year 398. If, however, Jerome meant only a little beyond nine years, this Epistle will have been written toward the end of the year 407: certainly it is not to be fixed in the year 409 or 410. The Epistle is lengthy, in which Jerome sets forth the errors of Origen's books On First Principles, which he was sending at request, in all likelihood not intending to send them unless they had already been in Avitus's hands, but plainly full of faults. For at least he was unwilling to send them except with an antidote attached, concluding the Epistle with these words: Whoever, therefore, shall wish to read these books, and to proceed to the land of promise with shod feet, lest anywhere he be bitten by serpents and struck by the arched wound of the scorpion, let him first read this book, and, before he enters the way, let him know what things he must beware of. The said Tillemont thinks that this Avitus, to whom Jerome's Epistle was sent, was a Spaniard, and one of the two who are mentioned in Orosius's Consultation to Augustine concerning the error of the Priscillianists and Origenists, which may be seen in vol. 5 of St. Augustine's Works, col. 607 and following. If the matter is so, St. Jerome feared not without cause: for that Avitus is said to have so opposed himself to the Priscillianists that he fell into some errors of the Origenists.

§ LV. The Commentaries on Isaiah: the Epistle to Ageruchia.

The Saint begins to expound the Prophecy of Isaiah, The order of times has brought us to the most lengthy of all St. Jerome's Works, and one composed with great diligence — to the Commentaries, I mean, on the prophet Isaiah, which he distinguished into eighteen books. Tillemont at art. 120 thinks that this Commentary was begun by Jerome in the year 408 or 409. Vallarsi in the Preface of vol. 4, which presents this Work, departs from that opinion, and will have it that the Commentary was not begun before the year 410. But this chronology seems to me utterly improbable, because Jerome would thus have been almost idle in the years 408 and 409, in which he wrote very few Epistles; while a very great Work, with which he suggests in various places that he was occupied for a very long time, he would have finished within less than a year: for that the Work was finished long before the end of the year 410 is most certain, and Vallarsi himself will not deny it; nay, that it was finished before the year 410 I shall prove below. The argument on account of which he differed from Tillemont is drawn from Jerome's words on chap. 6, where the Saint writes this: Of this vision about thirty years ago, when I was at Constantinople and was being trained in the studies of the holy Scriptures with that most eloquent man Gregory Nazianzen, then bishop of that city, I know that I dictated a short and hasty Treatise:… To that little book, therefore, I refer the reader, and I beg that he be content with the brief exposition of this present time.

[948] The said little Work Vallarsi fixes in the middle of the year 381, not in the year 410, because Nazianzen held the bishopric of Constantinople for only a few months about the middle of the year 381. From this time he reckons twenty-nine years, so that about thirty may truly be said; and so fixes the beginning of the Work in the year 410. But all this can be so deceptive that I should not presume to fix the beginning of the Work with certainty even after the year 407. For first, that Treatise on the Seraphim, written at Constantinople, is not of so certain a date that it must necessarily be fixed about the middle of the year 381, but it could also have been dictated in the year 380, nay even from the year 379, as I observed at no. 223. Certainly during all that time Jerome seems to have been at Constantinople, and Nazianzen was administering the bishopric of that city, even though he ruled it as his own only for the last few months. Secondly, that about thirty can be wonderfully deceptive; for since it is a round and large number, I should not dare to say for certain whether two or three years are not lacking to complete thirty. Thirdly, Jerome did not utter the words alleged at the beginning of his Work, but when he had already explained five chapters and dictated two books. And so, since Jerome spent much more time in preparing himself for his greater Works than in dictating them, in all likelihood he had had Isaiah in hand for many months, and perhaps a whole year, before he came in dictating to that place; and so again the passage is deceptive for seeking the beginning of the Work.

[949] Wherefore I have no doubt that Tillemont's chronology is nearer the truth: but in the year 408, or toward the end of 407: and I should prefer to fix the beginning in the year 408 rather than 409; nay, I should not dare to say that the Commentary was begun after the end of the year 407, since we do not know whether the Saint spent that whole year on Daniel and some Epistles. For, Daniel being finished, he proceeded to Isaiah, as the first Preface to St. Eustochium has it, which he thus begins: The twenty books of Explanations on the Twelve Prophets having been completed scarcely in a long time (about the end of the year 406), and the Commentaries on Daniel (in all likelihood in the year 407), you compel me, Eustochium, virgin of Christ, to pass to Isaiah: and to render to you what I promised to your holy mother Paula while she lived. Which indeed I remember I promised also to that most learned man, your brother, Pammachius: and since you are his equal in affection, you surpass him by being present. And so both to you and to him through you I render what I owe. Presently, Eustochium's entreaties being obtained, he pronounces thus about the manner of expounding: And let no one think that I desire to comprise the argument of that volume in a brief discourse, since the present Scripture contains all the mysteries of the Lord. He brings forward more in commendation of the Prophecy of Isaiah, which may be read there, as also the rest. In the Preface of book 2 he again demands Eustochium's prayers, as he does in the third and is wont to do in most of the others.

[950] the fifth book is a little Work composed by me. In book 3 and at chap. 7 ℣ 21 and following the Saint speaks of the Roman empire laid waste by the barbarians, writing this: But now a great part of the Roman world is like what Judaea once was: which we do not think happened without the wrath of God, who by no means

avenges the contempt of Himself by Assyrians and Chaldeans, but by savage nations, once unknown to us, whose faces and speech are terrible, and who, wearing womanish and gashed faces, pierce through the fleeing backs of men, and of well-bearded ones. For "of the Roman world" there had earlier been printed "of the Roman city". But that fault has been corrected, and the very comparison with Judaea shows that it is not the City that is in question, but the Roman empire, which since the preceding century the Goths and other barbarians were laying waste in various parts. When Jerome had come to the fifth book and chapter 13, he introduced some change on account of the little Work on the Ten visions of Isaiah, written earlier and dedicated to bishop Amabilis, as was said at no. 575. For he gave that whole little Work as the fifth book: and since in that little Work he had given only a historical explanation, he subjoined two books, the sixth and the seventh, in which he gave the moral and allegorical explanation of those XI chapters which had first been expounded historically — an explanation otherwise usually joined at once to the historical. That he would do this he says in the fifth Preface; that he is doing it, in the sixth and seventh; and that he has done it, in the eighth, of which this is the beginning: The sixth and seventh books above contain the allegory of the fifth volume, which I once dictated with a historical explanation. The present Work, that is, the eighth book, returns to the exposition begun, so as to discuss equally both the history and the tropology according to both editions (the Seventy and the Translation from the Hebrew).

[951] In that Work, having proceeded more slowly, In the Preface of the ninth book he indicates that he is proceeding less quickly in these Commentaries, thus beginning: Occupied with various troubles, we dictate the explanations on the prophet Isaiah at intervals. Whence, the eighth volume being completed, we now after some space of time pass to the ninth, not without the bite and detraction of the envious, who, not knowing what they hear or what they say, dare to judge of what they do not know, and despise before they test; and reckon themselves learned and eloquent if they detract from all writers. Despising their spite and garrulous muttering, let us ask God's help, and say with the Psalmist's imprecation: “Scatter the nations that will wars,” etc. Jerome had by then in all likelihood heard something of the calumny forged against him because of what he said in the Commentaries on Daniel. But he knew rather more when he was writing the Preface of book 10, as was said of that calumny at no. 932; nor yet did he then know the whole, and therefore he had deferred his answer. Meanwhile he went on, in order to obey Eustochium and Pammachius, … who, he says, with insatiable zeal compels me by letters, when Isaiah is finished, to pass on to Ezekiel, while I, worn out by the weakness of age and of body, and by the lack of notaries who might help me with their services, still stick in the same mire, and scarcely believe that in this volume I shall finish half of Isaiah. These words again suggest that Jerome proceeded rather slowly on Isaiah. For, from the time when he had begun that Commentary, Pammachius at Rome guessed that it would be nearly finished, when he was only halfway: for otherwise he would not have pressed him to go on to Ezekiel.

[952] Nevertheless I judge that the first ten books were finished by Jerome before the end of the year 408, about October of the year 408 he seems to have written book XI: because in the Preface of book XI the Saint suggests that the death of Stilicho had become known to him, which he was still ignorant of when he was writing the Preface of book 10. Certainly it is most likely, as I proved at no. 933, that Stilicho's death is there indicated in obscure words to those who understand, since the injury to one person, which his rivals calumniously said was inflicted by Jerome, but his friends denied, was suddenly taken away by God's judgment — that is, I think, by the slaying of Stilicho; whether he contended that the injury was inflicted by Jerome's words on himself, or on the emperor. And if, as I have said is most likely, the Saint is really speaking of Stilicho's death, he will have written this about October of the year 408, since he was slain on the XXIII day of August. This mark agrees excellently with the time at which I believe this Commentary was begun. For if, Daniel being finished, he began this at once in the latter part of the year 407 or the earlier part of the following 408, he could, proceeding more slowly than usual and interposing several Epistles related in §54, spend either a whole year, or eight or ten months, on the first eleven books.

[953] The remaining part of the same Work also proceeded more slowly, while dictating book 13, both on account of old age and the other disadvantages already mentioned, and on account of the great care with which he explained Isaiah, and lastly on account of a grave illness to be mentioned below. Meanwhile in the progress of the Work he did not lack rivals, as he briefly suggests in the Preface of book 12, declaring that he is content with the zeal of his friends in these words: For me the testimony of a few suffices, and I am content with the praise of friends, who in demanding my little Works are carried away by love of us and by zeal for the Scriptures. He was seized by a grave illness while dictating book 13. Which, from the order given, must have happened in the winter season about the beginning of the year 409. In the very sickness he dictated a short Preface, prefixed to the book which was afterwards finished. I subjoin the whole: Many mishaps beset those who sail. If a rather violent wind blows, the storm is a terror. If a gentler breeze ruffles the surface of the outstretched element, they greatly dread the ambushes of pirates. And so it comes about that souls entrusted to a fragile plank either fear danger or endure it: of which each is heavier than the other — either to fear death perpetually, or to endure what you have feared.

[954] I see this happening to me as I sail on the sea of Isaiah: he was seized by a grave illness, for while the sails are spread in an unimpeded course, and the keel glides on, furrowing the plains of the deep with the sailors' hands secure; a sudden whirlwind of sickness rising up, with such masses of waves and with the resounding crash of billows dashed together, has terrified the fearful hearts of my friends, so that they were compelled to say: “Master, save us, we perish”. Wherefore, Eustochium, unique example of nobility and virginity in the whole world, let not the pupil of your eye be silent; and cry in your heart: “Abba, Father”. And say with the Psalmist: “Arise, why sleepest thou, O Lord?” — that, by your prayer and Christ's mercy, I may finish the Work enjoined upon me on Isaiah. For already the thirteenth book of Explanations is being hammered out, which has not yet come to its end. And meanwhile, until the merciful and compassionate Lord, patient and of many mercies, restores my former health, I have dictated this little Preface in hurried speech, so that what is held in the loose sheets may be copied out; and full correction be reserved to the reader's judgment. Thus the Saint in his illness about correction; but in all likelihood he himself afterwards applied it: for the illness was not long; yet even so a notable delay was cast upon the Work by his weakness. Baronius at the year 409, no. 14, believed that the siege of the City was in question, because for whirlwind of sickness (languoris turbo) he read whirlwind of din (clangoris turbo); but what follows also renders this opinion improbable.

[955] but then suddenly healed. Of his illnesses and his healing Jerome thus begins in the Preface of book 14, which I also transfer hither entire: The Lord, who looks upon the earth and makes it tremble, who touches the mountains and they shall smoke, who says in the canticle of Deuteronomy: “I will kill and I will make alive; I will strike and I will heal” — by frequent illnesses has made my earth also tremble, to which it was said: “Earth thou art, and into earth thou shalt go”. And He frequently admonishes one forgetful of the human condition, so that I may know myself to be a man and an old one and on the very point of dying. Of whom it is written: “Why does earth and ashes glory?” Whence He who had struck me with a sudden weakness healed me with incredible swiftness; so as to frighten rather than afflict, and to amend rather than to scourge. And so, knowing whose is all that I live, and that perhaps my falling asleep is deferred for this, that I may complete the Work begun on the Prophets, I give myself wholly to this study, and, set as it were on a watchtower, I contemplate not without groaning and grief the whirlwinds and shipwrecks of this world, thinking by no means of things present, but of things to come; and dreading, not the fame and gossip of men, but the judgment of God. And do you, Eustochium, virgin of Christ, who helped me when sick with your prayers, invoke the grace of Christ for me now that I am healed, that with the same spirit with which the Prophets sang of things to come I may be able to enter into their cloud and darkness, and to know the word of God, which is heard by no means with the ears of the flesh, but of the heart; and to say with the Prophet: “The Lord gives me the tongue of instruction, that I may know when it behoves me to speak”. Which testimony is the beginning of the fourteenth book on Isaiah, which I now desire to discuss. I have adduced all this that the reader may perceive Jerome's religious sentiments. Very many things could be recited to this end from the books themselves, but this Commentary would grow too large.

[956] To whom this Work was promised and dedicated. And so, for brevity's sake, I shall select very few things from the remaining Prefaces. In the Preface of book 16 he much praises the learning of St. Eustochium, because she had proposed a difficult objection from the Scriptures against Jerome's own assertions; to which the Saint there answers. I have set forth the objection more fully at the XXVIII of September in St. Eustochium, no. 62. In the Preface of book 18, the last, he again declares at the outset to whom he dedicated this lengthy Work, thus beginning: The eighteenth book on Isaiah, nay the last, is dedicated, O daughter Eustochium, to your name and to that of your holy mother Paula, so that those whom I looked up to with equal honour I may now recall with equal commemoration; especially since she too, while she lived, together with you repeatedly asked for this Work, and that most learned man your brother Pammachius both then and afterwards did not cease to compel me with frequent letters: and since for me the same religious regard belongs to friends present and absent, and to men and women sleeping in Christ — that is, a charity of souls, not of bodies.

[957] After much disputing, especially against the Millenarians, whom he frequently refutes in the later books, and why it is so lengthy. he thus defends the length of his whole Work: But if the length of the Explanations on the Prophets displeases anyone, let him freely hear that I have said far less than the obscurity of the matter demands; and that anyone can make short little Commentaries for himself out of our breadth, which yet will not suffice for full understanding. For it is not a simple history and an order of deeds that is narrated by the Prophets; but everything is full of riddles; and one thing sounds in the words, another is held in the meanings; so that things which you had reckoned plain, and to run on with untroubled reading, are again wrapped in the obscurities of what follows. But it is time that I set an end to the prophetic volume, in whose exposition, if I have been longer than usual, allowance must be made for the last parts, which I was unwilling to divide, lest the number of books should be increased. Thus far Jerome about that Commentary, which is not only lengthy, but also full of manifold learning, so that it is not to be wondered at if he spent nearly two years on it, namely 408 and 409. But let us now in a few words inquire into the time at which it seems to have been finished.

[958] This time is designated with some confusion

by Jerome in the Preface to Ezekiel, About the time of the capture of Rome, and of the death which he begins in this manner: The eighteen volumes of Explanations on Isaiah being finished, I desired to pass to Ezekiel, which I have often promised to you and to your mother Paula of holy memory, O Eustochium virgin of Christ, and to set, as they say, the final hand to the Prophetic Work: and behold, suddenly the death of Pammachius and Marcella, the siege of the city of Rome, and the falling asleep of many brothers and sisters were announced to me. And I was so stunned and dumbfounded that day and night I thought of nothing but the salvation of all, and reckoned myself a captive in the captivity of the Saints, nor could I open my mouth until I should learn something more certain; while I hung anxious between hope and despair, and tormented myself with the evils of others. But after the most illustrious light of all lands was extinguished — nay, the head of the Roman empire was lopped off, etc. He adds that even then the Explanation of Ezekiel was deferred.

[959] But on the words alleged it is necessary to observe several things. of Pammachius and Marcella, the Work was finished, First, they cannot be so expounded that everything should be believed to be related in its own order: for St. Marcella, whose death seems to be placed before the siege of the City, was still alive when Rome was captured, as Jerome clearly attests in her Epitaph, that is, in Epistle 127 (elsewhere 16) to Principia, relating at no. 13 how much she suffered at that time, and fixing her death some days after the capture of the City. It must be said, therefore, that Jerome reviewed without order of time all the sad events on account of which he had long deferred the Explanation of Ezekiel, and joined Marcella's death with that of Pammachius, as those of his chief friends, whose decease he most of all mourned, even if Pammachius perhaps died a notable time before Marcella. St. Pammachius has been treated by us at the XXX of August, and his death fixed, with hesitation, in the year 409 or 410. Secondly, on the year of the capture of Rome the learned do not agree; for Baronius, Tillemont and many others set down the year 410, and defend it with many reasons. But Pagi, whom others both preceded and followed, tries by many arguments to prove that Rome was captured in the year 409, and on the XXIV day of August. This opinion of Pagi, which Muratori too followed in the Annals of Italy at the year 409, seems to me far more probable than the opposite one.

[960] [and since the City was more probably captured in the year 409, on the XXIV of August,] Thirdly, there was a threefold siege of Rome by Alaric: the first toward the end of the year 408, as the learned now generally agree, chiefly for this reason, that after the siege was raised the emperor Honorius took up at Ravenna the insignia of his eighth consulship at the beginning of the year 409. Of this siege, which was bought off from Alaric with much Roman gold, let us hear Jerome speaking in Epistle 123 (elsewhere XI) to Ageruchia, no. 17: Who will believe this? what Histories will comprise it in worthy language, that Rome fights in her own bosom, not for glory but for safety — nay, does not even fight, but ransoms her life with gold and all her furniture? Which happened not by the fault of the princes, who are most religious, but by the crime of a half-barbarian traitor (Stilicho), who armed our enemies against us with our own wealth. Thus Jerome in the year 409, in all likelihood in the summer, before he knew of the second siege. The second siege of Rome followed after some months, because Honorius, residing at Ravenna, was unwilling to consent to the compacts between the Romans and Alaric. And by this siege Alaric compelled the Romans to accept as emperor Attalus, whom Honorius had made prefect of the City. At last there followed the third siege and the storming of the City, after Alaric had again cast Attalus down from the empire; and this is fixed by Pagi, Muratori and others, as I have said, on the XXIV of August in the year 409. And if we follow this opinion, Jerome certainly finished his Commentary on Isaiah in the year 409, whether in the words alleged above he is speaking of the first siege, or of the second, or of the third, by which the City was stormed.

[961] the Commentary seems to have been finished about autumn. Fourthly I observe that not all the things related above, which the Saint says were announced to him when he was thinking of passing to Ezekiel, must necessarily be placed after Isaiah was finished: for he was already thinking earlier, when this was finished, of passing to Ezekiel. Certainly he clearly enough suggests Pammachius's death in book 17, on chap. 60 ℣ 6 and 7, in these words: In short, your mother Paula of holy memory, and your brother Pammachius, passed through the eye of a needle — that is, by the strait and narrow way that leads to life — to the kingdoms of heaven, leaving behind, with their baggage, the broad way that leads to hell. Among the dead too he reckons Pammachius no less than Paula in the Preface of book 18, saying that he has the same regard for men and women sleeping in Christ as for the living, since he had named those two alone along with Eustochium. I suspect, therefore, that Pammachius died at the beginning or about the middle of the year 409. Hence I further infer that it is not necessary to say that Jerome's Commentary was finished when he heard of the first siege of Rome. From all this, finally, I conclude that this lengthy Work of Jerome seems to have been finished in the year 409, and certainly some time before he heard of the storming of the City. And if we consider that ten or eleven books, that is, more than half, seem to have been finished about October or November of the year 408, as was said at no. 952, we shall rightly conjecture that the whole Work was finished about the autumn of the year 409.

[962] Epistle 123 (elsewhere XI) to Ageruchia, who was also called Geruntia In the same year the Saint writes to Ageruchia, and designated by other similar names, was issued in that same year 409, more probably before the Explanation of Isaiah was finished. For the first siege of Rome, which happened about the end of the year 408, is clearly mentioned in it in the words given at no. 960; but not the second and third and the storming, which could have become known to Jerome before the end of the year 409. There is mentioned in it the disaster of almost all the Gauls, which began in the year 407 and was brought to its height in the two following years. But Jerome did not yet know of the barbarians' entry into Spain when he was writing. Yet according to Tillemont, vol. 5 of the Emperors, in Honorius art. 39, the Alans, Vandals and Suevi penetrated into Spain in the month of September or October of the year 409, so that for this reason too the Epistle cannot be fixed after the year 409. The disaster of the Gauls and the fear of Spain the Saint expresses at no. 16 in these words: Mainz, once a noble city, has been captured and overthrown, and many thousands of men slaughtered in the church. The Vangiones have been destroyed by a long siege. The most powerful city of the Remi, the Ambiani, the Atrebates, the Morini at the world's end, Tournai, the Nemetae, Strasbourg, have been carried over into Germany. Aquitaine, the Nine Peoples, the Lugdunensian and Narbonensian provinces — all have been laid waste, except a few cities: and these too the sword ravages without, and famine within. I cannot make mention of Toulouse without tears, which, that it has not fallen thus far, the merits of the holy bishop Exuperius have brought about. The Spains themselves, at the very point of perishing, tremble daily, etc.

[963] Jerome does not indicate at whose request he writes to Ageruchia, to whom he dissuades a second marriage, and gives precepts of living. whether he had received a letter from her, or was induced to write by another's letter. No more does he openly declare in what province Ageruchia lived. Nevertheless I judge that she lived in Gaul, and in some city not yet stormed; both because he says so much of the disasters of the Gauls, in order to dissuade her from a second marriage, and most of all because at no. 18 he says: Or in what delights do you abound, who have lost the revenues of your possessions, who see your besieged little household wasting away with sickness and hunger? For those words entirely suggest that she lived in one of the cities of Gaul not yet taken, of which he says above: Which too the sword ravages without, and famine within. For the rest, the whole Epistle, which is lengthy, is directed to dissuading Ageruchia, a young widow, from a second marriage, and to giving some precepts of living. Yet for these he assigns her several earlier little Works, concluding the Epistle thus: Read, as to how you must live in preserving your widowhood, the book to Eustochium on preserving Virginity, and the others to Furia and Salvina… This little book on Monogamy shall possess its title under your name.

§ LVI. The Commentary on Ezekiel begun, and broken off after three books on account of an incursion of the Arabs: several Epistles are reviewed.

[Isaiah being finished, the Saint, hindered by excessive grief over the disaster of the City] From the year 408, in which he was expounding Isaiah, Jerome was meditating, after that Work was finished, to pass at once to Ezekiel, as St. Pammachius asked in the words given at no. 951. But when he had nearly finished Isaiah, and then had brought it entirely to its conclusion, he became slower to go on, having heard of the death of Pammachius, the siege of the City of Rome, and the great calamities of the Western empire, as he again shows in the words cited at no. 958. Having at last learned of the storming and devastation of the City by Alaric — to be fixed in the year 409, as I judge with Pagi, and in the month of August — and at the same time of the death of St. Marcella, who survived the capture of the City by a few days, he laid aside all his studies, and for a long time abstained utterly from dictating. And so at least for the remaining part of the year 409, toward the end of which he must have learned of that disaster, and for a great part of the year 410 too, as we may in all likelihood conjecture, he abstained from dictating on Ezekiel, even though perhaps he began little by little to prepare himself. Of these things the Saint speaks thus in Epistle 126, which we shall fix below in the year 411: I long ago wished to take up the volume of Ezekiel, and to render to my zealous readers the promise so often made: but at the very outset of dictating my mind was so confounded by the devastation of the Western provinces, and especially of the City of Rome, that, according to the common proverb, I did not know even my own name, and I long kept silence, knowing that it was a time for tears.

[965] and of the Western provinces, does not at once go on to Ezekiel, Some understand those words, at the very outset of dictating, in such a way as to think that Jerome had begun to dictate when he heard those things. But I should prefer to believe that he only wished to begin, as he clearly declares in the Preface to Ezekiel in the words, I desired to pass — namely to Ezekiel — and then I was so stunned and dumbfounded, that … nor could I open my mouth until I should learn something more certain. And when he had learned this, he went on keeping silence the more, as he presently adds: But after the most illustrious light of all lands was extinguished — nay, the head of the Roman empire lopped off, and, to speak more truly, the whole world perished in one City — “I was dumb and was humbled, and kept silence from good things, and my sorrow was renewed: my heart grew hot within me, and in my meditation a fire was kindled”: nor did I think that saying was to be neglected: “Music in mourning is an untimely tale”. These words, as well as the earlier ones, suggest no small cessation between Isaiah and Ezekiel, which at last to explain

he began, in all likelihood in the year 410 as it ran on, and already well advanced.

[966] yet he begins before the end of the year 410, He reviews the reasons for beginning in this manner: But because you (Eustochium) demand this unceasingly, and because a scar is little by little forming over a great wound; and the scorpion is pressed down under the soil of Trinacria between Enceladus and Porphyrion, and the many-headed hydra has at length ceased to hiss against us: and a time has been given in which we ought not to answer the snares of heretics, but to apply ourselves to the exposition of the Scriptures — I shall take up the prophet Ezekiel, whose difficulty the tradition of the Hebrews proves… Which Work, if by the Lord's mercy I shall have brought it to its conclusion, I shall pass to Jeremiah, etc. It is necessary to join several observations to the words alleged. First, the great wound over which Jerome says a scar is little by little forming is without doubt the storming of Rome. But why he says that a scar is forming over this wound I should not at all understand, unless he had heard of the death of Alaric, who after the capture of Rome led his host toward Sicily, and, having vainly attempted to enter it, suddenly died in its neighbourhood some months after Rome was stormed. These things, therefore, seem to have been written many months after the disaster of Rome became known.

[967] Secondly it must be asked who that scorpion is who is said to be buried between Enceladus and Porphyrion in Trinacria, that is, Sicily. having learned of the death of Rufinus, whom he paints in black colours. Baronius believed that Rufinus was so designated, at the year 410, no. 60. This opinion of Baronius Tillemont, Vallarsi and others have embraced with the greatest consent. Of Rufinus likewise these words are explained: And the many-headed hydra has at length ceased to hiss against us. Of the same man, now dead, and of his disciples, of whom Pelagius was one, he speaks in the Preface of book 6, writing this: I thought that, the serpent being pierced through the middle, the young shoots of the hydra would not come to life again, and that, according to the fables of the poets, Scylla being dead, the Scyllaean dogs would by no means rage against me, who do not cease to bark: and that, the heretics being struck by God's hand, lest even God's elect should be tempted, if it were possible, the heresy itself does not die, but hereditary whelps of their hatreds are left behind against us, who, feigning what is ours, do not forsake the poisons of their ancient mother and of wily Ulysses: and only smear their lips round with honey; and, according to the words of the Scriptures, they have softened their words above oil: yet they themselves are darts, and fiery darts, which must be both repelled and extinguished with the shield of faith. That by these words the Pelagian heretics are meant, both Baronius and others judge, and the very time favours this opinion. Baronius consequently supposes that Rufinus is set down by Jerome as a forerunner of the Pelagians, and that he is that Rufinus who is said to have been the first at Rome to deny original sin: which, however, Tillemont at art. 95 does not think, wishing to prove that that is another Rufinus.

[968] Of a certain Rufinus Marius Mercator, in Garnier, p. 30, has this: It is asked whether Rufinus, who is said to have denied Original sin, This foolish question, and one no less hostile to right faith, was first brought to Rome under Anastasius of holy memory, supreme Pontiff of the Roman Church, by a certain Rufinus, a Syrian by nation; and, crafty as he was, fortifying himself against the odium of it and not daring to bring it forward himself, he deceived Pelagius, a Briton by race, then a monk, and thoroughly imbued and instructed him in the aforesaid impious vanity. Thus Mercator of Rufinus, who is said to have first denied Original sin at Rome. But as the first author of that heresy he sets earlier Theodore of Mopsuestia, a bishop in Cilicia. Of the same Rufinus Caelestius speaks in St. Augustine, bk. On Original Sin, no. 2, when he was being questioned in the council, answering thus: The holy priest Rufinus at Rome, who stayed with the holy Pammachius. I heard him saying that there is no transmission of sin. Then, being questioned again, he answered: I have heard several others say so too. But he did not name them. That this was that very Rufinus, Jerome's adversary, Noris strives at length to prove in the Pelagian History, bk. 1, chap. 2. But, as I have already said, Tillemont's opinion is contrary, and Garnier contends by several arguments that that Rufinus, Pelagius's master, is to be distinguished from the one of Aquileia.

[969] is Rufinus the disciple of Jerome. I confess that the controversy is ambiguous, because Mercator says some things about Rufinus which do not fit the one of Aquileia. But I by no means see why Mercator could not err in slight circumstances, who perhaps never saw Rufinus, and seems to have been a young man at the time when the things he reports were done in secret. He called Rufinus a Syrian by nation, though he was an Italian. He could believe him a Syrian from his long dwelling there, and because he had learned the error in Syria. He says that error was brought forward at Rome by Rufinus under Pope Anastasius. Again it is a very slight error, if Rufinus persuaded Pelagius of that error when, under Anastasius's predecessor Siricius, he was translating Origen's books On First Principles, some months before the Pontificate of Anastasius. Thirdly there is objected the phrase, who stayed with the holy Pammachius: for they do not believe that there was room for Rufinus of Aquileia with Pammachius, Jerome's friend. But it must be considered that Rufinus left Palestine as Jerome's friend and came to Rome, so that I do not see why he could not for some time have been a guest with Pammachius. All the other things which are objected are so slight that for brevity's sake I think they should be omitted.

[970] who in the year 399 was sent by him to Milan; I except, however, the little book of faith which Sirmond published and Garnier reprinted at p. 286, since this is certainly by a man who denies Original sin; but it will be vainly attributed to some Rufinus the Syrian who was Pelagius's master. For, if we believe Mercator, Rufinus the master of Pelagius, whoever he was, was unwilling to bring forward himself the opinion, or heresy, which denies Original sin. On what ground, then, shall a little book in which it is denied be attributed to him? Wherefore against all these things far outweighs the silence of all the ancients concerning any other Rufinus besides the one of Aquileia who was a friend and teacher of the Pelagians: for that Rufinus, St. Jerome's disciple, who set out for the West in the year 399, seems to me improbably brought forward, both because it is not known that he ever wrote anything, and because he does not seem to have been a Syrian by nation, but a Latin. For Rufinus was sent by Jerome to Milan in the cause of Claudius, or, as Jerome says in bk. 3 against Rufinus, no. 24, for the peril of another man's life. But the Saint does not seem likely to have sent to Milan for such a cause a Syrian, certainly ignorant of the Latin tongue.

[971] or rather Rufinus, Jerome's adversary. But that Rufinus of Aquileia was at least in other respects a forerunner of the Pelagians Jerome himself suggests in many places. And this seems to have been the reason why the Saint spoke of him more harshly after his death than while he lived. In Epistle 125 (elsewhere 4) to Rusticus, no. 18, he warns him to beware of detraction, and reproves this vice of Rufinus thus: Grunnius used to advance to speaking with a tortoise's pace, and at certain intervals plucked out scarcely a few words, so that you would have thought him to be sobbing rather than speaking. And yet, when the table was set and he had laid out a heap of books, with raised eyebrow and wrinkled nostrils and furrowed brow, he snapped with two little fingers, provoking his disciples by this signal to listen. Then he would pour out sheer trifles and declaim against individuals: you would say he was Longinus the critic, and a censor of Roman eloquence marking down whom he pleased, and excluding him from the senate of the learned. This man, being well provided with money, pleased the more at luncheons. Nor is it any wonder, if one who was accustomed to bait many hooks would go forth into public with a wedge of chattering men clamouring around him — a Nero within, a Cato without, wholly ambiguous, so that you would say that out of contrary and diverse natures one monster and a new beast had been compacted, according to that line of the poet:

A lion in front, a dragon behind, in the middle the chimaera herself.

Here nothing indeed is said about depraved doctrines, yet he paints Rufinus in black colours on account of his evil-speaking, which no one will prove more surely than Rufinus himself proved it in his books against Jerome. As a forerunner of the Pelagians too he reckons Rufinus with others in Epistle 133 to Ctesiphon, and afterwards in several other places, chiefly however on account of the books rendered by him into Latin which favoured the Pelagians. But let it suffice to have suggested these things briefly.

[972] Let us return to Ezekiel expounded. The first two books he seems to have dictated without hindrances cast upon him from elsewhere, He finishes three books on Ezekiel: then, on account of a sudden or at any rate without any that are mentioned, unless the hindrances which he mentions in the Preface of book 3 had already begun before the second was finished. Thus he there philosophizes: Nothing is long which has an end, and the whole past series of times is of no profit, unless perchance it has prepared for itself a provision of good works, which always look to things to come, nay to things eternal, and are confined by no bounds. It is a true saying: All things that rise, set, and, having grown, grow old. And elsewhere: For there is nothing made by work and hand which age does not finish and consume. Who would have believed that Rome, built up by the victories of the whole world, should fall; that she herself should become both mother and tomb to her own peoples; that all the shores of the East, of Egypt, of Africa should be filled with the number of the menservants and maidservants of the once mistress City; that holy Bethlehem should daily receive as beggars those once noble of both sexes, and abounding in all riches? To whom, since we cannot bring aid, we grieve with them, and join tears to tears; and, taken up with the burden of holy work, since we cannot bear to see them flocking in without groaning, we have laid aside the Explanations on Ezekiel and almost all study, and desire to turn the words of the Scriptures into works, and not to say holy things, but to do them. Whence, admonished again by you, O Eustochium virgin of Christ, we resume the interrupted labour, and, having begun the third volume, desire to satisfy your longing, etc. The three books being finished, in all likelihood in one of the earlier months of the year 411, he was compelled to break off the Work and to flee on account of a sudden irruption of barbarians.

[973] I conjecture that in this interval several Epistles were dictated by the Saint. irruption of the Arabs, compelled to flee, Of one it is certainly established, namely of Epistle 126 (elsewhere 82) to Marcellinus and Anapsychia, which for this reason I mention first. But in this year, he says at no. 2, when I had expounded three books (on Ezekiel, of which he is treating), a sudden onset of the barbarians — of whom your Virgil says, “and the far-ranging Barcaei”; and holy Scripture of Ishmael: He shall dwell over against the face of all his brethren — so overran the frontier of Egypt, of Palestine, of Phoenicia, of Syria, dragging everything along with it like a torrent, that we could scarcely, by the mercy of Christ, escape their hands. But if, according to the famous orator, the laws are silent amid arms, how much more the studies of the Scriptures, which need both a multitude of books and silence, and the diligence of copyists, and, what is peculiarly their own, the diligence and leisure of those who dictate.

[974] And so I have sent two books to my holy daughter Fabiola, he sends two of them to the younger Fabiola: copies of which, if you wish, you may borrow from her. For by reason of the shortness of the time I could not have others transcribed: and when you have read them,

and have seen the porches, it will be easy to guess what the house itself will be. From these words what I have said about the Work being interrupted after three books is abundantly confirmed. And the barbarians whom the Saint was compelled to flee — withdrawing in all likelihood with his household to some fortified town — were the wandering Arabs, or Saracens, whose incursions were frequent rather than long-lasting. And Fabiola, to whom Jerome sent two books, was perhaps the daughter of the Fabiola whose epitaph the Saint wrote, as was said at no. 819: for Oceanus too, who took some care of the elder Fabiola, is mentioned in this Epistle, and much praised, so that he is said to have been able to answer Marcellinus in Jerome's stead on all questions of the Scriptures.

[975] he writes to Marcellinus, and refers him to St. Augustine, But who Marcellinus himself was, to whom this Epistle was written, must be briefly indicated. For of St. Marcellinus the tribune and notary we have already treated in our Work at the VI of April, and there shown that he is the very man to whom this Epistle of Jerome was sent. He presided in the year 411 over the famous conference of the Catholics with the Donatists, held on the Kalends of June of the year 411 at Carthage, so that in all likelihood the Epistle was written in the earlier part of the year, since it has nothing about that conference. Jerome had already written other Epistles to Marcellinus, which have perished. For he thus begins: At last I have received from Africa a letter of your united affection: and I do not repent of the impudence with which, while you were silent, I frequently pressed my Epistles upon you, so as to deserve a reply, and to learn that you are safe, not from others announcing it, but above all from your own words. Now Marcellinus had asked about the origin of the soul, a question much agitated at that time on account of the various errors of heretics about it, and because the opinion of Catholics was not yet fixed, or at any rate not yet received by all. The Saint refers him to his own little Works against Rufinus, and further to St. Augustine, whose friend Marcellinus was, in these words: Certainly you have there the holy and learned man Augustine the bishop, who with living voice, as they say, will be able to teach you, and to explain his own opinion — nay, through himself, ours.

[976] to whom he had already proposed the same question. But Marcellinus had already proposed the same question to St. Augustine, and had found him hesitating, which Jerome did not know. Hence Augustine, in the Epistle numbered 131 among the Hieronymian ones, written afterwards to Jerome, suggests at no. 8 that he had learned his opinion from the Epistle to Marcellinus, and adds: In which Epistle you deigned also to make mention of me most kindly, that he had me here in Africa, who could more easily explain that opinion to him. But if I had been able, he would not have inquired this of you, placed so far away — if indeed he wrote to you about it from Africa. For when he wrote I do not know. I only know that he well knew my hesitation about this: whence, without consulting me, he chose to do it. Although, even if he had consulted me, I should rather have urged him and given thanks that you could confer upon us all something — had you not preferred to write back briefly rather than to answer. I believe, lest you should labour superfluously where I was, whom you thought to know very well what he had asked… You have sent me disciples, that I may teach what I have not yet learned myself. Teach me, then, what I am to teach. For many demand of me that I should teach, and I confess to them that I am ignorant of this, as of many other things. Again Augustine in his Epistle 190 (elsewhere 157) to Optatus, no. 20, relates the same things more briefly, saying that Marcellinus wrote about the soul far across the sea to that most learned Man, and that he himself seized the occasion thence of consulting Jerome by an Epistle to be reported in its place, from which I have cited the above. He praises that same Epistle of Jerome in other places too. He could certainly have perceived from it Jerome's sincere goodwill toward him.

[977] Perhaps in the same year, and at that time when the Saint had somewhat interrupted his studies on Ezekiel, He writes to Rusticus the monk, Epistle 125 (elsewhere 4) to Rusticus the monk was written. It certainly seems to be fixed about the year 411, because from the words about Rufinus cited at no. 971 it is gathered that Rufinus's death was already known to Jerome when he was writing this. And Rufinus is believed to have died some time after the capture of Rome (in the year 409), so that his death cannot have become known to Jerome before the year 410, in which this too could have been written. But what is said a little before the end: For the rest, according to the miseries of this time, and with swords raging everywhere, he is rich enough who does not lack bread: he is exceedingly powerful who is not compelled to serve. The holy Exuperius, bishop of Toulouse, an imitator of the widow of Zarephath, hungering, feeds others, … and has paid out all his substance to the bowels of Christ. These words, I say, and many others which I gave in St. Exuperius at the XXVIII of September, also suggest that the Epistle was written after the disaster of the Gauls at the barbarians' hands, and in all likelihood when they had already advanced into Spain, leaving the Gauls. For the deeds of St. Exuperius seem to have become known only then, since Toulouse had before been encircled by the barbarians. And so, since the barbarians toward the end of the year 409 advanced from the Gauls into Spain, which Jerome certainly did not learn before the year 410, everything suggests that the Epistle is to be fixed about the year 411, but in an uncertain year.

[978] The Epistle is excellent and lengthy, and was written to instruct a young monk, learned for his age, to whom he offers excellent admonitions: who had a religious widowed mother still living. St. Jerome uses in it the freedom customary with him, by which he grazes vices in general, so as to teach Rusticus to beware of them and to avoid the dangers of falling. The Saint does not indicate whether Rusticus himself had demanded those instructions, or his mother, or someone else on his behalf. But he begins in this manner: Nothing is happier than a Christian, to whom the kingdom of heaven is promised: nothing more laborious than he who is daily in peril of his life: nothing braver than he who conquers the devil: nothing weaker than he who is overcome by the flesh, etc. Nothing further do I adduce from the Epistle, which has already been praised several times. Of Rusticus I briefly note that he is believed by many to be the same as St. Rusticus bishop of Narbonne, who is venerated on the XXVI of October, where this can be more fully examined by us. That he was a Gaul is manifest from the whole Epistle. But I do not investigate more here.

[979] To the year 411 belongs also Epistle 127 (elsewhere 16) to Principia the virgin, likewise to Principia the Epitaph of St. Marcella, that is, the Epitaph of St. Marcella the widow. She died some days after the capture of Rome, as is said toward the end. But Jerome about the beginning confesses that he had passed over two years, perhaps not full, in silence. For this reason, according to our chronology of Rome captured in the year 409, it must necessarily be fixed in the year 411; by others in the year 412, because they believe Rome was taken in the year 410. From this lengthy Epistle, which has been reprinted among us at the XXXI of January, as narrating the virtues and deeds of St. Marcella, I have cited some things in their places. Wherefore I here transfer only the beginning: Often and much you demand, Principia virgin of Christ, that I should recall in writing the memory of the holy woman Marcella, and should describe the good which we long enjoyed, so that it may be known and imitated by the rest also. And I grieve enough that you urge one running of his own accord, and think that I need entreaties, who would not yield even to you in love of her, and who receive far more benefit than I bestow by the recollection of such great virtues. For that I have hitherto kept silence and passed two years over in silence, was not from dissimulation, as you ill suppose, but from an incredible sadness, which so oppressed my mind that I judged it better to be silent for the present than to say nothing worthy of her praises.

[980] and to Gaudentius on the education of Pacatula. To about the same time is to be referred Epistle 128 (elsewhere 12) to Gaudentius on the education of the infant Pacatula. It was certainly written some time after Rome was laid waste, while the grief of that wound still lasted, as is sufficiently gathered from those words in which at no. 4 Jerome thus indicates his feelings: Alas the wickedness! the world is falling, and yet our sins do not fall. The famous City, and the head of the Roman empire, has been swallowed up by one conflagration. There is no region which does not have Roman exiles. Churches once holy have fallen into ashes and embers, and yet we are eager for greed. We live as though we were to die the next day, and we build as though we were always to live in this world. With gold the walls, with gold the ceilings, with gold the capitals of the columns gleam; and naked and hungry before our doors Christ dies in the person of the poor man. And lower down: In these times our Pacatula was born. Yet from these words the Epistle cannot be fixed with certainty in the year 413, in which Vallarsi places it; since those calamities began before the capture of Rome, so that we do not know in what year Pacatula was born, or the Epistle afterwards written for her education. Jerome concludes it in this manner: That I should dictate this in hurried speech, and after the slaughter of friends and perpetual mourning should, an Old man, write for an infant after a long restoration, your charity, brother Gaudentius, has impelled me: and I have preferred to give a little rather than nothing at all to one who asks, because in the one case there is a will oppressed by grief, in the other a slighting of friendship.

§ LVII. The continuation of the Commentary on Ezekiel, and, after the Epistles interposed, which are reviewed, its end.

The Saint continues Ezekiel, but slowly, on account of the multitude In the same year 411, in which Jerome broke off his studies on Ezekiel, he in all likelihood resumed them with the fourth book, but advancing slowly on account of intervening hindrances, about which some things have already been said and more will presently be said. In the Preface of book 5 he sufficiently declares that there were notable intervals of time in which the books followed one another, when he thus begins: Lest the number of the books be confused, and the order of volumes divided from one another by long spaces of time be spoiled, I have prefixed little Prefaces to each book, so that from the front of the title the reader may at once know which book he is to read, and what prophecy we are to explain. By the calumnies of heretics — without doubt the Pelagians — Jerome was again assailed when he was dictating book 6, in the year 412, as is gathered from the order. Most of the words of the Preface I gave at no. 967. But after those he subjoins: These things I have said, daughter Eustochium, that you may help by your prayers one labouring at the prophetic Work and resisting heretics. By what hindrances his Work was delayed he explained in the Preface of book 7, which he thus begins: Long ago as boys we read: Nothing is so easy that it does not become difficult if you do it unwillingly. I confess that I promised the Explanations on Ezekiel long before, and cannot fulfil the promise because of the press of those coming hither from all the world; since there is no hour, no moment, in which we are not meeting crowds of the brethren, and exchanging the solitude of a monastery for a throng of guests — so far that either we must shut our door, or must abandon the studies of the Scriptures, by which the doors are to be opened.

[982] And so in hours snatched, nay stolen, of the nights

of needy pilgrims who were flocking to Bethlehem, which, as winter drew near, began to be longer, we try to dictate these things, such as they are, by a little lamp, and to digest by meditation the weariness of a troubled mind. From the approach of winter we gather that these things were dictated about October of the year 412. The Saint goes on: Nor do we boast, as some perhaps suspect, of our reception of the brethren; but we simply confess the causes of our delays; especially since the flight of the Westerners, and the crowding of the holy places by those in need, in their nakedness and wounds, shows forth the fury of the barbarians. Which we cannot see without tears and groaning — that that former power and that ignorance of riches has come to such want that it lacks roof and food and clothing. And yet the hard and cruel minds of certain men are not softened at all; while they shake out their poor rags and little bundles, seeking gold in captivity. There is added to this difficulty of dictating, that, my eyes being dim with old age and suffering something of blessed Isaac's affliction, I am by no means able to read over the volumes of the Hebrews by nightly lamplight, which even by the brightness of sun and day are darkened to me by the smallness of the letters. And the Commentaries of the Greeks too I know only by the voice of the brethren: and no one doubts that food chewed by another's teeth breeds nausea in those who eat. The Saint was then over eighty years old, so that it is not to be wondered at that the eyes of one who read perpetually failed little by little.

[983] Of the miseries of his time, and of the greed and the mercilessness toward the poor of certain men, he likewise complains in the Preface of book 8, and on their account he reproves the greed of certain men. from which I transfer a part hither: What profit our dictation on the Prophets may bring to others is a matter for God's judgment and for the conscience of those who (declamations and applause and arrangement of words being set aside) desire to know what their discourse either narrates of the past, or convicts in the present, or foretells as to come. To us meanwhile it profits: for while we do this and think of nothing else, we take up the Explanations after the manner of a theft, and compensate the miseries of the days by the study of the nights; the mind is fed, and forgets the calamities of a world which, set now at its uttermost end, groans and travails, until he who holds be taken out of the way, and the once iron feet of the statue be crushed by the fragility of their clay toes. The world falls, and the upright neck is not bent. Riches perish, and greed by no means ceases. They hasten to gather what will again be seized by others. Tears have dried up, all piety is taken away. Many there are who ask: few who give. Nor do we blush, professing poverty in a cheap little cloak, to brood over the wealth of Croesus, etc… These things, Eustochium virgin of Christ, let the mouth have spoken out of the abundance of the heart; and we have spoken a little more freely than befits our humility. That book he in all likelihood dictated in the year 413, as is gathered from the next.

[984] For in bk. 9, on chap. 28 ℣ 10, he mentions the tyranny of Heraclian, He was dictating book 9 toward the end of the year 413: writing thus: For provinces have been handed over to them to govern, as though to judges, by the emperor. And they, forgetting that their honour depends on another's bidding — such as Heraclian lately was in Africa — have raised themselves up with a tyrannical mind against their king and lord. Now Heraclian's tyranny occurred in the year 413, and was ended by his death about the August of that same year, as Tillemont relates in vol. 5 of the Emperors, art. 50. Wherefore Jerome did not write that book except as the year 413 was drawing to its close; so that certainly in this year he had not yet finished that Work, and perhaps not even in the following one. Meanwhile the Pelagians were growing strong, who hated Jerome after Rufinus's example, and calumniated his Translation from the Hebrew. This he suggests in bk. 10, on chap. 32 ℣ 17 and following, writing thus: I am not unaware that so great a discrepancy between the two editions (the Translation from the Hebrew and the Seventy) will be wearisome to a fastidious reader. But what am I to do with my calumniators, who, if I withdraw anything from the translation of the Seventy interpreters, cry out that I am sacrilegious and without fear of the Lord — especially when those who are at variance in the truth of the faith and follow the errors of the Manichaeans stir up the minds of the unskilled in this, if they can show anything changed from the old custom, preferring to err gladly rather than to learn anything true from a rival. The same men he again refutes on chap. 33 ℣ 23 and following, where he calls them the heirs of the Grunnian faction.

[985] [he thinks modestly of his own exposition, and on account of the excessive difficulty] The Preface of book XI, which I judge was dictated in the year 414, the Saint thus begins: The eleventh book of Explanations on Ezekiel will contain in its last part the prophecy against Gog and Magog, and will come down to the beginning of the city set on the mountain and of the temple situated in it. Which if, with the Lord's help and with Him expounding His own mysteries, I shall be able to bring to its end, I shall have long and much to doubt whether I ought to set my hands to the spiritual temple, or openly to confess my ignorance, etc. At the end he suggests that he does not approve St. Ambrose's opinion about Gog, writing thus modestly: On a most difficult Prophecy I briefly note this, that a man of our age, by no means undistinguished, writing to the emperor, said of this nation: This Gog is the Goth; and on what ground all the things written of it can be fitted to him, it is not for me, but for those who think so, to discuss. That opinion had been asserted by Ambrose in bk. 2 On the Faith to Gratian, chap. 16. With like modesty, when he had expounded that part of the Prophecy, that is chapter 38, he adds this at the end: But if anyone reproves our views, let him either bring forward better ones for us to follow; or, if he is unwilling to say anything, let him leave perfect knowledge to God: provided he know that by no means our strength, but our intention, is to be judged.

[986] of explaining Ezekiel's temple he interrupts the Work for a notable time, At the end of that book the Saint has this: Thus far we have spoken on the prophet Ezekiel, God, as we desire and believe, helping and opening our mouth; not destroying the opinion of others, if any have written or shall hereafter write, but asserting our own, such as they are. But in the building of the temple, and the order of the priests, and the division of the holy land, and the river going forth from the temple, and the trees always green on either bank and bearing fruit each month, and the rest which are contained down to the end of the prophetic volume, we openly confess our lack of skill, judging it better meanwhile to say nothing than to say little. And so at chapter 40 the Saint again interrupted his Work, in order by long study to consider the last nine chapters, and at last to expound that most difficult part of the Prophet. For how long the Saint abstained from dictating he nowhere clearly declares, but that the time was a notable one he abundantly hints in the Preface of book 12, which he thus begins: My trepidation in the explanation of Ezekiel's temple — nay, my perseverance in silence — your prayers, daughter Eustochium, and the Lord's promises have overcome, who says: “Ask, and you shall receive: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you”. And the excuse which we used, in saying at the end of the former volume, It is better to say nothing than to say little — you have turned to the contrary, so that you think it matters rather to say little than nothing…

[987] I shall obey your will, therefore, and, the Holy Spirit blowing, yet at Eustochium's urging he resumes the exposition, shall spread my sails… And to the fastidious reader — nay, to the hostile mind that will read our work — I declare this with all freedom in the explanation of the temple: that, if he desires the truth, let him seek it from others. But we simply confess and dictate the things which in a most difficult Work we can conjecture, meaning to give thanks to the Lord if He shall have opened to us the doors of knowledge, not in all things, which is impossible, but in most. That modest trepidation the Saint goes on from time to time to suggest down to the end of his Work. On chap. 40 ℣ 5 and following he speaks thus: It must be simply confessed, then, that I wish to discuss the temple of blessed Ezekiel, of which all the ages have been silent, not out of rashness, but in faith and fear of God desire to set forth to my readers the conjecture of my mind; so that, if I offer in the tabernacle of God goats' skins and hair, by which the thorns and stings of sins may be warded off, and rains and storms kept away; another, who is rich, may according to the quality of his merits offer iron, or bronze, or silver and gold and most precious stones, and may not despise our gifts because they are smaller, but may rejoice in his own wealth. For unless there be lowest things, there cannot be highest: and that greater things may be praised, they grow by comparison with the lesser.

[988] Again on ℣ 35 and following he adds at the end: Pardon, and he finishes it in the year 414 or at the beginning of the following one. reader, the difficulty of the passages; or, if you can find anything better, teach me: we gladly learn what we do not know. I pass over many similar sayings of that most modest Man, and briefly note only that in the last Preface of book 14 nearly the same things recur, and that there is there added about the Work to come: Which (book) if I shall bring to its end, and if the Lord shall grant me a space of this life, I shall pass to Jeremiah, who alone of the Prophets remains to us: whose exposition will be indeed of my labour and of your prayers, but properly of Christ's mercy. In what year St. Jerome finished this lengthy and most difficult Work I cannot say for certain. Yet I do not doubt that he composed the later books chiefly in the year 414, since the year 413 was already advanced when he was dictating book 9, as was said at no. 984; but I do not know whether in the year 414 he could bring his Work to its end; nay, considering the difficulty of the later books, I rather conjecture that the Work was finished in the year 415, more probably, however, at the beginning of the year, since before the middle of that same year he both began to explain Jeremiah and to attack the Pelagians, as we shall see.

[989] But before he had finished the Work he dictated the very lengthy Epistle 130 (elsewhere 8) to Demetrias on preserving Virginity, Before finishing Ezekiel, in the year 414 he writes as he himself declares in this one at no. 2 in these words: How great is the merit — nay, the miracle — of our virgin in my eyes may be estimated from this, that, occupied in the explanation of Ezekiel's temple, which is the most difficult work in all the holy Scriptures, and in that part of the shrine in which the Holy of Holies and the altar of incense are described, I preferred to use this byway for a little while, so as to pass from altar to altar, and to consecrate to eternal chastity a living victim, pleasing to God and without any stain. Of the Holy of Holies and the altar of incense St. Jerome discoursed toward the end of book 12, so that in all likelihood the Epistle was written before book 13. And it is fixed in the year 414, a date which seems to me certain. Two books on Ezekiel then remained for Jerome to dictate.

[990] to Demetrias, a most noble virgin, Demetrias was a most noble virgin of the illustrious family of the Anicii, daughter of Olybrius the consul, now dead, and of Juliana, then still living, granddaughter of Proba, who had had three sons consuls, and likewise survived. They, when there was captured by Alaric

Rome, had fled into Africa, and there Demetrias had been destined for marriage, when suddenly, casting away her costly attire, clad in a cheap tunic and covered with a cheaper mantle, as Jerome relates at no. 5, she offers herself to her grandmother Proba and her mother Juliana, to whom she thus declared her purpose, and found them not only astonished but even immediately consenting. That noble purpose of Demetrias is attributed to the exhortations of SS. Augustine and Alypius, and is fixed in the year 413, as was said at the XXVIII of August in St. Augustine, who rejoiced wonderfully at her conversion, as was set forth there in §45. Yet St. Jerome above all was asked to write precepts of living to Demetrias, perhaps at Augustine's own suggestion.

[991] at the request of Proba her grandmother and Juliana her mother, Certainly in the very opening of the Epistle he declares that he writes this Epistle at the entreaties of Proba and Juliana, since he thus begins: Among all the subjects which from my youth to this age I have written either with my own hand or with that of notaries, nothing is more difficult than the present work. For being about to write to Demetrias, a virgin of Christ, who both in nobility and in riches is first in the Roman world, if I say everything suited to her virtues, I shall be thought to flatter: if I withhold certain things, lest they seem incredible, my modesty will do damage to her praises. What, then, shall I do? What I cannot fulfil, I do not dare to refuse: so great is the authority of her grandmother and her mother, women of distinction, in commanding, their confidence in asking, their perseverance in extorting. For they do not demand of me anything new and extraordinary, whose talent has often been worn down on subjects of this kind.

[992] and among precepts of living he admonishes her to beware of heretics, Presently, when he had added a few things, he briefly praises that most noble family, then at greater length the purpose of Demetrias, and the immense joy born of it not only in Africa but at Rome too and in Italy; and at last at no. 7 he begins to prescribe excellent precepts of living to Demetrias, and does this at length with that freedom which he always used in such matters. The rest can be read there. One thing, because it bears on the present time, I transfer hither. I almost passed over, he says at no. 16, what is the chief matter. While you were a little girl, and while Anastasius, bishop of holy and blessed memory, was ruling the Roman Church, a savage storm of heretics from the parts of the East tried to pollute and shake the simplicity of the faith, which was praised by the Apostle's voice. But that man of a most rich poverty and of Apostolic solicitude at once struck the harmful head, and checked the hissing mouths of the hydra. And because I fear — nay, have learned by report — that in certain persons the poisonous seed-plots still live and sprout, I think you must be forewarned of this with a pious affection of charity: that you hold the faith of the holy Innocent, who is the successor and son both of the Apostolic chair and of the aforesaid man; and that you do not receive a strange doctrine, however prudent and shrewd you may seem to yourself. For men of this sort are wont to mutter in corners, and, as it were, to seek God's justice. Then he sets forth some of the Origenists' quibbles, and subjoins: This impious and wicked doctrine was once current in Egypt and in the parts of the East, and now lurks secretly, as in vipers' dens, among very many, and pollutes the purity of those parts, and creeps like an hereditary disease in a few, that it may reach very many.

[993] On the words alleged I observe that Jerome does not exhort Demetrias and that she should follow the faith of the Roman Pontiff. to hold the faith of St. Augustine, by whose admonitions chiefly she had been converted, but that of St. Innocent the Roman Pontiff, as occupying the Chair of St. Peter; not that he did not greatly esteem St. Augustine, but that he judged that the Roman Church must in this respect be preferred to the most learned and holiest bishops, as is clear enough from what was said in §24. Secondly, that they are the cavils of the Origenists about the pre-existence of souls, from which he warns Demetrias to beware, not those of the Pelagians. Hence it becomes likely that the errors of the Pelagians were not yet perfectly known at that time to St. Jerome, since in all likelihood he would have wished to warn her to beware of them. The Epistle written long ago to St. Eustochium he commends to Demetrias in these words: About thirty years ago I published a book on preserving Virginity, in which it was necessary for me to go against vices, and, for the instruction of the virgin whom I was admonishing, to disclose the devil's snares. That discourse offended very many, since each, understanding of himself what was said, did not gladly hear me as an admonisher, but turned away from me as an accuser of his own conduct. Yet what did it profit to have armed an army of protesters, and to have shown the wound by the pain of conscience? The book remains, the men have passed away. I have written also to very many virgins and widows σπουδασμάτια *, and whatever could be said has been culled in those little Works, so that either the same things would be repeated by us superfluously, or things now omitted would do great harm. This the Saint said without doubt so that Demetrias might procure for herself those little Works, and add them to this Epistle.

[994] To the same year 414 is referred Epistle 129 to Dardanus, To Dardanus, asking about the land promised to the Hebrews, and it was certainly not written earlier; yet it could also have been written at the beginning of the year 415, after Ezekiel was finished, or even when Jeremiah was already begun. Jerome mentions it in bk. 1 on Jeremiah, on chap. 3 ℣ 18, in these few words: I lately published a small little book on the Land of promise. That lately can be referred to the earlier part of that same year 415, in which Jerome was writing this, and still more probably to the preceding year 414. But that it was not written earlier the words already given somewhat suggest, and Vallarsi confirms it from the double prefecture which Dardanus had held, in the years, as he notes, 409 and 413. Now Dardanus had asked for an exposition of the land which had been promised to the Israelites who set out from Egypt, as Jerome suggests at the beginning, thus opening: You ask, Dardanus, most noble of Christians and most Christian of nobles, what is the land of promise which the Jews, returning from Egypt, possessed. To this question Jerome so answered that he did not give a geographical description of the land promised to the Hebrews, but rather proves what is to be understood allegorically and anagogically by the land of promise. [he gives a mystical exposition concerning the Church, yet does not deny the historical one.]

[995] Yet he takes care lest anyone believe that the historical understanding is denied by him, admonishing thus at no. 6: Nor do I say this in disparagement of the land of Judaea, as the heretical sycophant falsely says, or in order to take away the truth of the history, which is the foundation of spiritual understanding, but that I may shake down the haughtiness of the Jews, who prefer the narrowness of the synagogue to the breadth of the Church. Then he shows the calling of the gentiles foretold in the sacred Writings: and subjoins: Whence it is clearly demonstrated that all the things of that people went before in shadow and type and image, but were written for us, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. He closes the Epistle with these words: This, most eloquent man, now more honoured in Christ, the honour of a double prefecture being past, I have dictated for you in a hurried and brief vigil, lest I should seem to keep silence altogether. For at the same time — nay, on the same day — both your letter was delivered to me and mine was demanded, so that I must either be silent or answer in unpolished speech: of which the one belongs to modesty, the other to charity.

* elsewhere σπουδάσματα

§ LVIII. The Commentary on Jeremiah begun: the Epistle to Ctesiphon written against the Pelagians: the continuation of the Commentary: the Dialogue against the Pelagians: the end of the unfinished Commentary.

Jerome begins to explain Jeremiah, In the first part of the year 415, and perhaps at the very beginning of the year, St. Jerome began to write on Jeremiah, as is clearly gathered from what was said about Ezekiel, which could scarcely have been finished before the end of the year 414, and from what is to be said about the Epistle to Ctesiphon, written after the first book on Jeremiah, and yet before the middle of that same year. Of his purpose Jerome speaks thus in the Preface to St. Eusebius of Cremona, to whom this Commentary is dedicated: After the Explanations of the Twelve Prophets, of Isaiah, of Daniel (who preceded Isaiah), and of Ezekiel, we at last set our hand to Jeremiah, dedicating his little Commentaries to you, brother Eusebius, so that you may join the Evangelical man to Matthew the Evangelist (dedicated to the same man), whom very many years ago, at your exhortation, I discussed with condensed meanings. And since the volume is very long, and in most places a plain history is woven, I admonish your prudence not to seek in this a broad explanation… Presently he says that he will omit Baruch, because it was not in the Hebrew, and will restore the order of Jeremiah, confused by the error of copyists, and will supply much … from the Hebrew sources. But hindered by other occupations, and forestalled by illness and death, he could not accomplish everything, or bring this Commentary to its conclusion.

[997] defending his books against the attack of Pelagius, Presently he goes on to refute Pelagius, who after Rufinus's example had attacked the Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians. As lately, he says, an unlearned calumniator has burst forth, who thinks my Commentaries on Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians are to be reproved. Pelagius repeated Rufinus's calumnies, as is clear from these words: Which his master Grunnius, not seeing, once strove to carp at. The same Pelagius attacked the Saint's books against Jovinian, repeating the gibes of a monk not yet known, as is clear from these words: To pass over the volumes against Jovinian, in which he grieves that virginity was preferred to marriage, and marriage to a second marriage, and a second marriage to polygamy. Nor does that most stupid fellow, weighed down with the porridges of the Scots, remember that we said in that very Work: “I do not condemn the twice-married, nay nor even the thrice-married,” etc. Both from other things and from the porridges of the Scots it is gathered that all this is argued against Pelagius. And that Pelagius was not only Rufinus's disciple but also that monk's who first attacked the books against Jovinian is gathered from what follows: Let him read the Apology for that Work (against Jovinian), which very many years ago Rome received with joy against his master: and then he will notice that he blasphemes with others' words; and is so unskilled that he does not have even curses of his own, but uses against us the madness of enemies, even of those long since buried. Through the course of that book the Saint at various turns refutes several heads of the Pelagian heresy.

[998] But he attacked the Pelagians at greater length in Epistle 133 to Ctesiphon, against whose heresy he afterwards writes which he mentions as written in the Preface of book 2, writing thus: The second book on Jeremiah, brother Eusebius, we dictate in swift speech, turning our ears away for a little, that we may not hear the judgment of blood and bewail the souls of the slain, who by the opinion of their own virtues daily fall into pride, and think themselves like God, so as to attribute to all men that equality which the impious heresy of the Arians denies in the Son, and set their mouth in heaven, and leave nothing further to the future beatitude of the Saints. To whose fury we have answered as we could; and, if the Lord grants life, we shall answer more fully. That this is said of the first little Work against the Pelagians is gathered from the Preface of book

4, in which he mentions the second Work against the same men, that is, the Dialogue, which he here promises in his last words, as he also promised in the Epistle to Ctesiphon. Orosius, in the Apology which certain men have tried in vain to render suspect as supposititious, asserts that he spoke thus of that little Work of St. Jerome in the synod of Jerusalem: This the blessed Jerome too, whose eloquence the whole West awaits as dew upon the fleece (for many heretics with their doctrines have already been struck down by his attack), condemned both in his Epistle which he lately published to Ctesiphon; and likewise in the book which he is now writing he refutes it by an altercation set out in the manner of a dialogue.

[999] The synod of Jerusalem, in which Orosius said this, the Epistle to Ctesiphon, to be fixed in the first part of the year 415. was held in the year 415 toward the end of July, as the chronologists agree, and prove from that same Apology. Now that lately can extend only to a few months, and by no means to the preceding year, since between the Dialogue which Jerome was then writing and the Epistle to Ctesiphon, which he had lately written, the Saint seems to have composed nothing except two books on Jeremiah, namely the second and third. For in the Preface of the fourth he mentions the Dialogue as written, as we shall see. Wherefore the Epistle to Ctesiphon was written between the beginning and the middle of the year 415, in all likelihood in the spring. Pagi in his Critique at the year 411, no. XI, rightly indeed refutes those who believed that Epistle was written from the year 411 or 412; but he too goes astray, in fixing it toward the end of the year 413 or the beginning of 414. The whole series of St. Jerome's deeds clearly suggests that St. Jerome's struggles against the errors of the Pelagians began in the year 415 with the said Epistle; although he began much earlier to refute their calumnies against himself, as we have said in their places.

[1000] Let me now transfer some things hither from the said Epistle. At the beginning he shows that in this Epistle he is answering a question proposed by Ctesiphon, thus opening: Not boldly, as you falsely suppose, but lovingly and zealously have you sent me a new question out of an old one, In this Epistle he reviews the forerunners of Pelagius, and namely which before your letter had deceived very many in the East, so that through a feigned humility they learned pride, and said with the devil: “I will ascend into heaven,” etc. Presently he shows whence the Pelagians had drawn the perverse doctrine by which they contended that a man, if he will, can be free from all disturbance and all sin — namely from the Stoic philosophers; and at once he begins to refute the doctrine itself. He goes on at no. 3 to review others who had taught similar things, and reckons among them Manichaeus and Priscillian, most foul heresiarchs. Then he sharply grazes Evagrius of Pontus and Melania, as addicted to that same doctrine, and Rufinus, who had made Evagrius's books Latin.

[1001] he sharply grazes Rufinus, Presently he charges Rufinus still more gravely in these words: But that rashness of his — nay, that madness — who could set forth in worthy language: that he entitled the book of Xystus the Pythagorean, a man without Christ and a heathen, with the name changed, as that of Sixtus the martyr and Bishop of the Roman Church: in which, according to the doctrine of the Pythagoreans, who make man equal to God and say that he is of His substance, many things are said about perfection, so that those who do not know the philosopher's volume may drink under the name of a martyr from the golden cup of Babylon … Whence you too usurp very many testimonies against the Church. This error of Rufinus St. Jerome attacked in several places. How harmful it was for a time is clear from the words of St. Augustine in bk. 2 of the Retractations, chap. 42, where he treats of his book On Nature and Grace, and adds: In which I so defended certain words which Pelagius set down as those of Xystus the Roman Bishop and martyr, as though they really were of that same Xystus: for so I had thought. But afterwards I read (in all likelihood in this Epistle of St. Jerome) that they are of Sextus the philosopher, not of Xystus the Christian. Further, Jerome numbers among Pelagius's forerunners Origen too, and Jovinian in one error. Then he proceeds to a fuller refutation of the said doctrine.

[1002] and he challenges Pelagius, though suppressing his name. At the end, at nos. XI and 12, he subjoins this: No one's name is touched by name in this little Work. We have spoken against the master of a perverse doctrine. And if he grows angry and writes back, he will be betrayed like a mouse by his own droppings, and will receive fuller wounds in a real contest. It is many years since, from my youth to this age, I have written various little Works, and I have always made it my study to say to my hearers what I had learned publicly in the Church; and not to follow the arguments of philosophers, but to acquiesce in the simplicity of the Apostles… Since these things are so, I challenge my adversaries to examine afresh all my past papers, and, if they find any fault in my poor talent, to bring it into the open. For either they will be good, and I shall gainsay their calumny; or they will be blameworthy, and I shall confess my error, preferring to amend rather than to persevere in the depravity of an opinion. And do you too, excellent doctor, either defend what you have said, and support the sharp points of your opinions with a following discourse, lest, when it pleases you, you deny what you have said; or, if you have certainly erred, as a man, confess it freely, and restore concord among those who are at variance with one another. Let it come into your mind that the Saviour's tunic was not torn even by soldiers. You see the quarrels of brethren among themselves, and you laugh and rejoice that some are called by your name and some by Christ's. He adds other things to move the man, and likewise at the end exhorts Christians not to take up the heresy, promising again a fuller Work.

[1003] Yet he waited for some time, in all likelihood to see He continues the Work on Jeremiah, complaining of the Pelagians, what effect this lengthy and careful Epistle would have in Palestine, where Pelagius was, and had John bishop of Jerusalem devoted to him. Meanwhile he returned to the Explanation of the Prophet Jeremiah, and about the middle of the year 415 dictated the second and third books. In the Preface of the latter he complains at length of the calumnies of the Pelagians, because they did not allow him quietly to apply himself to explaining the sacred Writings. Omitting the earlier parts for brevity's sake, I transfer hither what seems to me to need setting forth about John of Jerusalem and Pelagius: But he does this day and night, both openly and by ambush, mixing false things with true — nay, smearing all his lies round with treacherous honey, so that he who hears the sweetness of the words may not dread the poisons of the breast. He promises peace in order to wage heavier wars: he laughs in order to bite: he offers his hand in order to slay unawares the guileless Abner. This surely is what the Apostle too was saying: “For we are not ignorant of his devices”. Here he is silent, elsewhere he brings charges: he sends papyrus Epistles into the whole world, formerly gold-bearing, now abusive, and thinks our patience, which comes of Christ's humility, a sign of a bad conscience. All this seems to be said of John of Jerusalem, who was both devoted to Pelagius and again opposed to Jerome, and alone so powerful that he could accomplish all this. That John was devoted to Pelagius he himself plainly showed in the same year in the synod of Jerusalem: and since to that synod, where he alone was bishop with his priests, he did not summon St. Jerome, by this very fact he showed himself opposed to him. Yet the same will be more apparent from what is to be related under the following year.

[1004] The following words of Jerome likewise designate John keeping silence at Jerusalem, and, the third book being finished, he writes the Dialogue against Pelagius. and Pelagius speaking there. And he himself, being dumb, he says, barks through Albinus his dog, a great and corpulent one, and one who can strike more with his heels than with his teeth. For he has his descent of the Scottish race from the neighbourhood of the Britons: who, according to the fables of the poets, must be struck like Cerberus with a spiritual club, that he may fall silent in eternal silence along with his master Pluto. But this elsewhere — namely in the very Work which I judge was written after the third book on Jeremiah, in the month of July and the following months of the year 415. For in the Preface of book 4 he says that he was long silent, but was at last compelled to answer by the frequent demand of the brethren… Nor yet, he says, have I gone so far as to set down the names of the authors, preferring that they should be corrected rather than defamed. He kept silence about the names of the authors both in the Epistle to Ctesiphon and in the Dialogue. But the Epistle he did not write at the frequent demand of the brethren — or at any rate he nowhere says so — but in answer to the questions of Ctesiphon alone. That he wrote the Dialogue thus, on the contrary, he attests at its very beginning. My Epistle to Ctesiphon being already written, he says, in which I answered his questions, there was a frequent demand of the brethren why I should any longer put off the promised Work, in which I promised that I would answer all the little questions of those who preach ἀπαθειαν. These things compared together leave no doubt. It is equally certain from the words of Orosius given at no. 998 that the Saint was occupied with this Work when the assembly of Jerusalem was being held toward the end of July.

[1005] After the words given, and many other things about the forerunners of the Pelagians, and about the method by which he is to write this second Work against the Pelagians, he subjoins the following: In the Preface he shows what method he is to use, and refutes And although in the earlier Epistle which I wrote to Ctesiphon I touched on a few things against their errors, by reason of the shortness of the time, this book which we are now striving to hammer out will keep the custom of the Socratics, so as to set forth (by a dialogue) what can be said on either side, and that the truth may become more evident when each has set down what he thinks. Then at no. 2 he thus refutes his detractors: But against those who say that I write this Work inflamed with the torches of envy I shall answer briefly, that I have never spared heretics, and have striven with all zeal that the enemies of the Church should become my enemies too. Helvidius wrote against the perpetual virginity of holy Mary: was I led by envy to answer him, whom I never saw at all in the flesh? Jovinian, whose heresy is now being revived, troubled the Roman faith in my absence — a man so tongue-tied and of so rank a style that he was rather worthy of pity than of envy. Him too I answered as I could. Rufinus brought the blasphemies of Origen and the books περὶ ἀρχῶν, so far as in him lay, not upon one city but upon the world, so that he published even Eusebius's first book of the defence of Origen under the name of Pamphilus the martyr: and, as though that man had said too little, vomited out a new volume in his place. Do we envy him because we answered, and were there such rivers of eloquence in him as to deter me from the pursuit of writing and dictating?

[1006] the calumny by which he was said to be driven to write by envy, Palladius, of slavish wickedness, tried to restore the same heresy, and to build up a new calumny against me about the Hebrew Translation. Do we envy his talent and nobility too? Now also the mystery of iniquity is at work, and each man chatters what he thinks. I am the only one who is stung by the glory of all; and so wretched that to these

also I bear envy, who do not deserve envy. Whence, that I might prove to all that I hate not men but errors, and do not seek the infamy of any, but rather grieve for the lot of those who are supplanted by knowledge falsely so called, I have set down the names of Atticus and Critobulus, through whom I might bring out what both our side and that of our adversaries thinks. Nay rather, all of us who follow the Catholic faith desire and wish the heresy to be condemned and the men to be amended: or at any rate, if they should choose to remain in error, that the fault should not be ours who have written, but theirs who have preferred a lie to the truth. On the words alleged I observe that there are reviewed in this place the chief heretics or supporters of heretics against whom the Saint wrote, excepting however the Luciferian schismatics and Vigilantius the heresiarch: secondly, that it is not sufficiently known who this Palladius mentioned here is, nor is there extant any little Work of Jerome which seems to have been written against any Palladius. But certainly he does not seem to be Palladius bishop of Helenopolis, of whom Jerome would not have spoken with such contempt, as I have already observed at the XIV of September in St. John Chrysostom, §1; and there at no. 19 I reviewed other men named Palladius, one of whom seems to be grazed here.

[1007] In that Work he refers to St. Augustine's Work for the baptism of infants. The said Work of Jerome is modestly written, and is lengthy and divided into three books. At the end of book 3 he enumerates several little Works of St. Augustine published against the Pelagians, and makes honourable mention of him in these words: The holy man and eloquent bishop Augustine wrote some time ago to Marcellinus … two books on Infants to be baptized, against your heresy, etc… He is said also to be hammering out others specially against your name, which have not yet come into our hands. Whence I judge that I must forbear this labour, lest that saying of Horace be applied to me: “Do not carry wood into the forest”. For either we should say the same things superfluously; or, if we should wish to say new things, the better ones have been taken up by a most illustrious talent.

[1008] Further, the calumny of the Pelagians, who gave out that Jerome wrote against Pelagius out of envy, That Work was not written by Jerome out of envy alone, was known also to St. Augustine, who in bk. 2 against Julian, chap. 10, where he had praised several Fathers along with Jerome against the Pelagians, adds this: Of whom … you will perhaps try to withdraw Jerome the priest, … because in the East he defended the Catholic faith against Pelagius with a pious intent… But of that holy priest, who according to the grace given him so laboured in the Church that he greatly aided Catholic learning in the Latin tongue by many and necessary writings, Pelagius is not wont to boast, except that he envied him as a rival. But I would not have it seem to you that for this reason he should be withdrawn from the number of these judges. For I have not set down the opinion which he held and defended against your error at the time of the enmities; but that which, free from all partisan zeal, he set down in his writings before your damnable doctrines sprouted forth. Thus Augustine — not because he believed the calumny about envy to be true, but in order to stop Julian's mouth.

[1009] Jerome's Dialogue Julian the Pelagian calumniated long afterwards also before Augustine, in the Unfinished Work against Julian, bk. 4, chap. 88, the Pelagians gave out, but other things too in the same Work as if Jerome there relied on the testimony of a fifth Gospel (that of the Nazarenes) to show that Christ had not only natural but also voluntary sin, on account of which He knew Himself to be cleansed by John's baptism. Jerome's words, from which Julian seized an occasion of calumny, are found in bk. 3, chap. 1, no. 2, as has already been observed by the editors. But St. Jerome cited that Gospel as he presently cites St. Ignatius, not to attribute the authority of a Gospel to it, but only for its antiquity, and to indicate what all ecclesiastical men thought. Besides, the blasphemy about Christ's sin cannot be proved from the words alleged of the apocryphal Gospel. But Julian had not set down the words themselves; and therefore Augustine begins his answer thus: If you had set down Jerome's words, perhaps I should show how they must be taken without the blasphemy which you try to bring in upon him. Another passage of Jerome too, without in the least indicating it, Julian calumniated in the same place, and again in chap. 121, as if he had attributed to Christ the disgrace of falsehood. Augustine again answered in chap. 121 that Jerome's very words were not given him. But Vallarsi probably assigns the words in bk. 2, no. 17, and explains them.

[1010] Again, in the place alleged, Julian says to Augustine: Of which Work (the Dialogue) you boast in that Epistle they carped at: but it greatly pleased Augustine and others. which you sent to Alexandria, so as to say that Pelagius, overwhelmed by him with masses of Scriptures, cannot vindicate free choice (expounded in the Pelagian sense). But that Work was met by a Catholic man who had been assailed. Although the Epistle of Augustine here praised has perished, we at least know that that Work of Jerome greatly pleased St. Augustine. He praises the same Work in his Epistle 180 (elsewhere 260), in words alleged on another occasion. Augustine also desired that he should defend the said little Works of his against Annianus: why he did not do so will be set forth in the course of the narrative. For the rest, that the two little Works of Jerome against the Pelagians were held in great esteem among the ancients is sufficiently gathered from the Chronicle of Idatius. For at the XXI year of Honorius he has this: Jerome, mentioned above, outstanding in all things, most skilled also in the elements of the Hebrews, continually engaged — as it is written — in the law of the Lord by day and night meditation, has left countless studies of his own work. At the last he crushed the sect of the Pelagians, with its author, with the adamantine hammer of truth. Against these and against other heretics there are extant his most approved monuments.

[1011] He writes book 4 on Jeremiah, challenging the Pelagians The Dialogue against the Pelagians being finished, the Saint returned to expounding Jeremiah, in all likelihood about the autumn of the year 415. In the Preface of book 4 to Eusebius he has this: Occupied by the great crowds of those flocking hither from all the world, and by the cares of the holy brethren and of the monastery, I was dictating the Commentaries on Jeremiah at intervals, so that what was lacking to leisure might be supplied by industry: when suddenly the heresy of Pythagoras and Zeno, of ἀπαθείας and ἀναμαρτησίας — that is, of impassibility and sinlessness — which was once cut down in Origen, and long since in his disciples Grunnius and Evagrius of Pontus and Jovinian, began to come to life again, and to hiss not only in the parts of the West but also of the East, and in certain islands, especially in Sicily and Rhodes, to stain very many, and to grow day by day, while they teach in secret and deny in public. To answer it, after long keeping silence and swallowing my grief in silence, I have been compelled by the frequent demand of the brethren: nor yet have I gone so far as to set down the names of the authors, preferring that they should be corrected rather than defamed. For I am the enemy, not of men, but of error. And they, in order to inflict upon me a sort of retaliation and to fix their own teeth in their pain, patching together the old calumnies of their masters, have been shown to be so tongue-tied and wretched that they could not even curse in their own words…

[1012] to an open confession, and thinking of writing a third Work against them, With whom let me speak in brief. Either what you teach is good, or it is bad. If good, defend it freely: if bad, why do you secretly cut wretched men's throats with error, and, to deceive the simple, boast of an exposition of the right faith? Which, if it is true, why is it hidden; if false, why is it written?… And when we have said something in general against vices and heretics, they complain that they are aimed at, and by an indignation long dissembled proclaim the evil of their conscience. But if we must take care not to seem to injure an old friendship, if we cut down a most haughty heresy with the spiritual sword, then we shall have to endure the crosses of a betrayed faith… Nay rather, let them hear that word of the Apostle: “We must obey God rather than men”. And again: “If I pleased men, I should not be Christ's servant”: But these things, unless they keep silence, we shall pursue more fully in a Work of their own. By these last words he threatens a third Work, unless they keep silence; and one, indeed, in which he would set down the names of the authors. For two little Works, as I have proved, he had already written.

[1013] notwithstanding his old friendship with John, as it seems, of Jerusalem. But what he says, lest we seem to injure an old friendship, does not seem to be understood of any other than John of Jerusalem, with whom St. Jerome had lived on friendly terms for many years after he first came into Palestine, and, after a discord of some years, had restored the friendship with him about the year 399. For it seems by no means to be said of Pelagius himself, both because there never seems to have been any friendship between Jerome and Pelagius, and because he by no means spares Pelagius in the Preface of the third book; nay, nor in several others, designating him clearly enough, even though he suppresses the name.

[1014] In the Preface of book 5 Jerome declares the fury of the Pelagians against him, He writes the fifth and sixth books, which not long afterwards broke out, as we shall see, by means of the very history which he was about to expound, writing thus: The fifth book of the Commentaries on Jeremiah, brother Eusebius, will have its beginning from two baskets: of which the one will show the sweetness of right faith, the other the bitterness of the heretics' faithlessness. Although Hananiah son of Azur resists Jeremiah, and Shemaiah the Nehelamite desires the Prophet to be sent into prison, and Zephaniah the priest conspires in the words of the false prophets: yet the truth can be shut up and bound, but cannot be conquered: which is both content with the fewness of its own and is not terrified by the multitude of its enemies. After book 5 Jerome seems presently to have proceeded to the sixth also: but in its Preface he does not touch the Pelagians, but refutes them briefly here and there through the course of the book, as he did through the whole Commentary on Jeremiah, which he left unfinished, having expounded only thirty-two chapters in six books, and having omitted the last twenty and the Lamentations.

[1015] Cassiodorus indeed, in the book On Institution, chap. 3, says: nor does he seem to have dictated more thereafter. Whom (Jeremiah) the holy Jerome too is shown to have commented on in twenty books: of which we have been able to find only six; but the rest, with the Lord's help, we are still seeking. But it is likely that Cassiodorus was deceived by a false report. For since the Saint explained much more than half in six books, we shall not easily believe that another fourteen books were written by him on the smaller part; especially since neither Cassiodorus saw them, nor has anyone else, so far as I know, mentioned them. A probable reason why Jerome seems thereafter to have ceased from interpreting, even though he survived some years, we shall find below. Of the three books on the Lamentations of Jeremiah, which were once published under St. Jerome's name, I shall say nothing, except that they were rightly long ago denied to the Saint.

§ LIX. The Saint, consulted by Augustine through Orosius and by two books, answers him: the Saint's monasteries overthrown by the fury of the Pelagians.

St. Augustine sends Orosius to Jerome to be instructed, When Orosius, a Spanish priest, had come into Africa to St. Augustine, to be instructed by him

for refuting the heresies flourishing in Spain, St. Augustine, when he had taught him for some time, in the year 415 sent Orosius on further to St. Jerome, so that he might learn the rest from him, and that he himself might on this occasion consult Jerome about some doubts of his own. And that the consultation might be rendered more useful, St. Augustine wrote two lengthy Epistles, or books, as he himself called them: the one on the Origin of the human soul, the other on a certain passage of James the apostle, published among the Hieronymian Epistles as Epistles 131 and 132. How highly he esteemed Jerome and his learning Augustine declares plainly in them, especially in the former, whose beginning I subjoin: I have asked and do ask our God, who has called us into His kingdom and glory, that what I write to you, holy brother Jerome, consulting you about the things I do not know, He may will to be fruitful for us. For although you are much greater than I in years, yet I myself, now an old man too, consult you. But no age can seem to me too late for learning what needs to be learned; because, even if it more befits old men to teach than to learn, yet it befits them more to learn than to be ignorant of what they teach. For my part I bear nothing more grievously, amid all the straits which I suffer in most difficult questions, than the absence of your charity at so great a distance, so that I can scarcely send my letters or receive yours, at intervals not of days, not of months, but of some years: whereas, if it could be done, I should wish to have you present daily, with whom I might speak of whatever I wished. Nor yet on that account ought I not to do what I could, though I could not do all that I wished.

[1017] and writes to him two books of consultation, Behold, there has come to me a religious young man, a brother in Catholic peace, in age a son, in office our fellow-priest, Orosius, alert in talent, ready in speech, burning with zeal, desiring to be a useful vessel in the Lord's house, for refuting the false and pernicious doctrines which have slaughtered the souls of the Spaniards much more unhappily than the barbarian sword their bodies. For from there he hastened to us from the shore of the Ocean, roused by the report that he could hear from me whatever he wished about the things he wished to know. Nor did he gain no fruit from his coming: first, that he should not trust report too much about me; then I taught the man what I could; and what I could not, I advised him whence he might learn it; and I urged him to go to you. And when in this matter he received my counsel or command gladly and obediently, I asked him that, coming from you, he should return to his own country by way of us. Holding him to this promise, I believed that an occasion had been granted me by the Lord, by which I might write to you about the things I desire to know through you. For I was looking for someone whom I might send to you, and no one readily occurred to me who was fit both in fidelity of action, and in alacrity of obedience, and in practice of travelling. When, therefore, I found this young man by experience to be the very one whom I was asking of the Lord, I could not hesitate. Orosius in all likelihood departed from Hippo for Palestine in the early spring of the year 415: certainly he was in Palestine some time before the assembly at Jerusalem held toward the end of July, since he was present there, and alleged St. Jerome's Epistle to Ctesiphon, which without doubt he received in Bethlehem from Jerome himself: for he also knew that he was then occupied with the Dialogue.

[1018] namely on the soul of man, But what Augustine desired to be expounded by Jerome he then states summarily thus: Receive, then, what I ask for myself, and do not think it burdensome to open and discuss. The question of the soul has troubled many, among whom I confess that I too am one. For what I hold most firmly about the soul I shall not keep silent. Then I shall subjoin what I would still have explained to me. Then he sets forth at length what seems to him certain about the soul, and what doubtful, adding not a few reasons and arguments on both sides about the doubtful points. The same question he sets forth at the beginning of the second Epistle in these words: What I wrote to you, brother Jerome, honoured by me in Christ, inquiring about the human soul — whether, if new individual souls are made to this day for individuals as they are born, where they contract the bond of sin which we do not doubt must be loosed by the Sacrament of Christ's grace even in newly born infants — since it ran on into no small volume, I was unwilling to burden with any other question. His chief doubt about the soul Augustine declared in the words alleged.

[1019] Then he proceeds to the second, subjoining this: and on a passage of James; asking for the solution of both doubts. But what presses more sharply is much less to be neglected. Therefore I ask and beseech you by God to expound to me what I think will profit many: or, if you already have it expounded either by yourself or by some other, to send us how that is to be taken which is written in the Epistle of the apostle James: “For whoever shall have kept the whole Law, but offends in one point, has become guilty of all”. Which matter is such and so great that I much repent of not having written to you about it long ago. Augustine then discusses many things about the passage alleged, many about the virtues, many about the vices, and that most humble man concludes the Epistle in this manner: I have said many things by which I should perhaps bring weariness upon you, who yet do not expect to learn these things which you approve, since you have been accustomed to teach them. But if there is anything in them, so far as concerns the matter itself (for with what eloquence they are set out I do not much care) — if, then, there is anything in them which offends your learning, I ask that you would admonish me by writing back, and would not think it burdensome to correct me. For he is unhappy who does not both worthily honour the great and holy labours of your studies, and give thanks for them to the Lord our God, by whose gift you are such as you are. Whence, since I ought more gladly to learn from anyone what I uselessly do not know, than more readily to teach anyone what I do know, how much more justly do I demand this debt of charity from you, by whose teaching, in the name and with the help of the Lord, ecclesiastical letters have been so much aided in the Latin tongue as they never could be before? He ends by repeating his entreaties that he would expound the saying of James alleged.

[1020] St. Jerome received Orosius excellently, after his custom, and without doubt profited him much by his learning, Jerome writes back by Orosius, whom he received excellently, although we have nothing particular written about it. He returned to Africa in the year 416, at which year Marcellinus wrote this of him in the Chronicle: The same Orosius, sent by Augustine the bishop to Jerome the priest to learn the nature of the soul, on his return was the first to bring to the West the relics of blessed Stephen, then lately found. In all likelihood he returned at the beginning of spring, and he certainly returned before, in the same year, St. Jerome suffered from the Pelagians what we shall see. Orosius carried to Augustine Jerome's Epistle 134 (elsewhere 94), as Augustine himself attested in the Epistle to Optatus, numbered among the Hieronymian ones of the Verona edition as 144, where a part of it is cited. The said Epistle of Jerome I transfer hither in parts: An honourable man, my brother, the son of your worthiness, Orosius the priest, I received both for his own merit and at your command. But there fell out a most difficult time, when it was better for me to be silent than to speak; so that our studies ceased, and, according to Appius, a canine eloquence was practised. By canine eloquence the Saint indicates the licence of calumny and abuse which the Pelagians used. With this they were indeed already persecuting Jerome when Orosius arrived, yet not so that his studies ceased. I should therefore prefer to believe that Jerome is speaking of the last period in which Orosius stayed in Palestine, when the Pelagians' fury against Jerome seems to have grown still greater.

[1021] most affectionately; but for good reasons omits an answer to the questions, He goes on thus: And so to your two little books, which you have dedicated to my name, most learned and shining with every splendour of eloquence, I have not been able to reply at this time. Not that I think there is anything to be reproved in them; but because, according to the Apostle: “Let every man abound in his own sense: one indeed thus, another thus”. Certainly whatever could be said, and drawn with a lofty talent from the fountains of the holy Scriptures, has been set down and discussed by you. But I beg your reverence to bear with me a little while I praise your talent. For we discuss among ourselves for the sake of learning. But rivals, and especially heretics, if they see differing opinions between us, will calumniously say that they proceed from rancour of mind. But it is my resolve to love you, to look up to you, to honour, to admire you, and to defend your sayings as my own. Certainly in the Dialogue which I lately published I made mention of your beatitude as was fitting (the words given at no. 1007), and let us rather take pains that a most pernicious heresy be removed from the churches: which always feigns repentance, so as to have the opportunity of teaching in the churches, lest, if it betrayed itself in open light, being cast out it should die. These things were written after the synod of Diospolis, in which, the Pelagian heresy being condemned, Pelagius himself was absolved; whence those words, always feigns repentance. I return to the Epistle.

[1022] and greets Augustine in the name of Eustochium and the younger Paula. Your holy and venerable daughters Eustochium and Paula walk worthily both of their family and of your exhortation, and specially greet your beatitude: also all the brotherhood which with us strives to serve the Lord Saviour. The holy priest Firmus we sent last year on their business (that of Eustochium and Paula) to Ravenna, and thence to Africa and Sicily; and we think he is now staying in the parts of Africa. I pray you to greet in my service the holy men who cling to your side. I have also directed a letter of mine to the holy priest Firmus, which, if it comes to you, do not think it burdensome to forward to him. May Christ the Lord keep you safe and mindful of me, lord truly holy and most blessed pope. Paula, here mentioned for the first time in the Works of St. Jerome as living at Bethlehem, was without doubt the granddaughter of St. Paula, that is, the daughter of Toxotius, Eustochium's brother, and of Laeta, to whom Jerome wrote an Epistle about her education, as was said at no. 853. She could then scarcely be twenty years old. And Firmus had been sent, so far as appears from the words, to collect the revenues arising from the estates of Eustochium and Paula, by which chiefly the monasteries at Bethlehem were supported, and the poor in all likelihood fed. Jerome added at the end, or after the Epistle was written: We suffer in this province a great scarcity of notaries of the Latin tongue, and therefore we cannot obey your commands, especially in the edition of the Seventy, which is distinguished with asterisks and obeli. For most of our earlier labour we lost by a certain man's fraud. That Translation of the Seventy Augustine had asked for many years before, and had perhaps repeated the request in another Epistle.

[1023] [When the Pelagians had afflicted St. Jerome's monasteries with slaughter and fire] In that same year 416, at the beginning of which the Epistle already given seems to have been written, St. Jerome suffered a most grievous harassment through the hatred of the Pelagians, together with both monasteries of which he had the care. The execrable deed is narrated by St. Augustine in the book On the Deeds of Pelagius, which he composed in the year 417, and in which he set forth the doings of Pelagius in Palestine and the councils held there against him. And having set forth the proceedings in the synod of Diospolis, he subjoins this at the end of the book: But as for those things which after this judgment are said to have been perpetrated there with incredible audacity by I know not what band of desperate men, who are reported to support Pelagius most perversely — that men and women servants of God, belonging to the care of the holy priest Jerome, were afflicted with a most wicked slaughter, that a deacon was killed, that the buildings of the monasteries were burned, that scarcely a rather well-fortified tower protected him himself, by God's mercy, from this onset and incursion of the impious — of these things I see that we should rather keep silence, and wait to see what our brother bishops there judge should be done about such great evils, which who would believe that they can dissemble? For impious doctrines of men of this kind must be refuted by any Catholics whatever, even by those who are far from those lands, lest wherever they can do harm, they should reach so far: but impious deeds, whose restraint belongs to episcopal discipline, must be punished above all where they are committed, by those present or stationed nearby, with pastoral diligence and pious severity.

[1024] We, therefore, placed so far off, ought to wish that such an end be given there to these matters Jerome modestly, with his household, refers the matter to Pope Innocent, that it be not necessary to judge of it further anywhere; but what it rather befits us to proclaim, that the minds of all who have been gravely wounded by the report of those crimes flying everywhere may be healed by the ensuing mercy of God. What St. Augustine wished ought to have been done by John of Jerusalem: but he is said to have been too devoted to Pelagius to believe at once that those wicked men must be severely restrained. For this reason, and most of all because they feared even worse things, both St. Jerome and Eustochium and Paula took care that their complaints should be carried to Innocent, the supreme Pontiff, but with such modesty that they accused no one by name. And they seem to have set forth the matter to Aurelius bishop of Carthage, and to have sent him the letter written to Innocent. Certainly Innocent sent the letter which he wrote back to St. Jerome to Aurelius, and added to him also a brief Epistle, numbered among the Hieronymian ones as 135, which I subjoin: To his most beloved brother Aurelius, Innocent. Our fellow-priest Jerome has rightly trusted your most pious affection in the matter of reaching us. We suffer with a member of our flock, and what we judged should be done, or were able to do, we have swiftly executed. Let your Brotherliness, dearest brother, hasten to deliver the letter to the said man with all speed.

[1025] Epistle 136 is from Innocent to Jerome, but somewhat obscure through several faults who consoles Jerome by letter, which have been introduced into it by the fault of copyists. First he says some things by which he seems to hint that the proceedings in Palestine against the Pelagians had not been rightly conducted. Secondly he briefly consoles Jerome, and bids him be well mindful of what he had preached about those who suffer injury or peril for the truth. Then he subjoins the following, which are less corrupt: And so, roused by so great a scene of evils, we hastened to take up the authority of the Apostolic See to repress all wickedness: but we read of no one against whom we should rise up, either called by name or charged by any statement of a crime. What we can do, then, we do: we grieve with you. But if you shall lodge an open and manifest accusation against any men, I shall either appoint competent judges, or, if anything more urgent and anxious can be done by us, I shall not delay, most beloved son. Nevertheless I have written to my brother bishop John, that he act more circumspectly, lest anything further of such a kind be done in the church entrusted to him — a thing which to have foreseen and driven off, that it might not happen or might not happen again, would afterwards be to himself also most troublesome. From these words we gather that no one was named by Jerome as the author of the crime, and the same is made more manifest from Epistle 137, which is from Innocent to John. But of this modesty of Jerome and Eustochium, as also of what Eustochium and Paula suffered in particular, I have treated sufficiently at the XXVIII of September in St. Eustochium, no. 68 and following. And so I say only in general that both monasteries were plundered and burned, and that in both murders were committed, as is made manifest from Innocent's letter to John and from the words of Augustine given above.

[1026] and rebukes John of Jerusalem, Not obscurely does Innocent reprove John's excessive indulgence toward Pelagius, and his negligence in the said outrage, hinting also that the chief author of the crime committed is not unknown. Which (outrage), though it be not ambiguous by whom it was committed, yet your Brotherliness ought to have kept watch and provided more anxiously for his flock, that nothing of this kind should arise, etc. Again: Does that piety of your priesthood not stir at all at so great a power of the devil admitted against you and against your own? Against you, I say; for it utterly condemns the gravity of a priest that so great a wickedness should have been accomplished in the Church. Where were your provisions? where, at any rate, if the misfortunes had happened, were your helps or consolations, since they say that they still fear more than they complain of having suffered? I should judge more deeply, if they had spoken with me at all more openly about this matter. See, brother, the snares of the ancient enemy, and be vigilant with the spirit of a good ruler, so that these things, which have been brought to us by report rather than by a manifest accusation, may be either corrected or beaten back: lest ecclesiastical law compel him who has not defended them to answer the cases of those who have been laid low. This Epistle of Innocent, which cannot have been written except toward the end of the year 416 or at the beginning of the following one, perhaps did not find John alive: for about that same time John died, and in the year 417 had as his successor Praylius, who likewise at first was devoted to Pelagius.

[1027] as favouring Pelagius, who died a little after: But whether John also favoured the Pelagian heresy I do not here inquire. But that he was too devoted to Pelagius himself we have not from Jerome alone, who always suppressed his name in these matters in silence, but most clearly from St. Augustine, who in Epistle 179 (elsewhere 252) to John himself, issued in the year 416, says among other things: But to Pelagius our brother, your son, whom I hear that you greatly love, I suggest that you show this love, that men who have known him and heard him carefully may not think that your sanctity is deceived by him. Again at no. 5: If you love Pelagius, let him also love you — nay, rather himself — and let him not deceive you. And it is established that Praylius too, John's successor, wrote to the supreme Pontiff on Pelagius's behalf. But in all likelihood this was done before Innocent's letter was carried into Palestine.

[1028] Pelagius afterwards driven out of Palestine. But that Pelagius was afterwards condemned in a council of the Easterns and driven out of Palestine, Jerome indicates not only enigmatically, but Marius Mercator also in clear words in the Commonitory, chap. 3: for where he had said that the bishops of Palestine were at first deluded by Pelagius, he immediately subjoins: But afterwards, being plainly detected, with his accusers pressing on, he was both exposed by a later synod, over which Theodotus of holy memory, bishop of Antioch, presided, and was driven away from the holy and venerable places of Jerusalem. Which the writings sent by that same holy Theodotus to the most reverend bishop of the city of Rome, and by Praylius of holy memory, bishop of Jerusalem, attest; copies of which we have in our hands as evidence. These things happened in the year 417 or 418: for the time is not expressed.

§ LX. Jerome, when he had withdrawn to another place, writes to Riparius, and, having returned, to Apronius: the Epistle to Cyprian: one or two to Augustine: three others of uncertain date.

Jerome writes to Riparius about Pelagius's expulsion, That Jerome, when his monasteries had been overthrown by the crime of the Pelagians, withdrew from Bethlehem with all his household to another place, Epistle 138 (elsewhere 55) to Riparius shows. And since this was written after Pelagius's expulsion, it seems to be fixed about 418, although it may perhaps have been written before the end of the year 417. Riparius, to whom this was written, is in all likelihood the same as Riparius the priest to whom the Saint wrote about Vigilantius, as was said at no. 899. I transfer the Epistle hither: That you are fighting the wars of Christ against the enemies of the Catholic faith I have learned both from your letter and from the report of many; and that the winds are contrary, and that those who ought to be the defenders of the age are supporters of ruin, to their mutual ruin. Whether Riparius was even then fighting against the Vigilantians, or rather against the Pelagians, is not clear. But the words suggest that the secular powers were opposed to his efforts. Then the Saint subjoins about the affairs of Palestine: Yet know that in this province, by no human aid but properly by the sentence of Christ, Catiline (Pelagius, the leader of the conspiracy) has been driven not only from the city (Jerusalem) but also from the borders of Palestine: and that we grieve greatly that with Lentulus many associates of the conspiracy have remained, who are staying at Joppa. Who that Lentulus is, is not clear. He was certainly one of the chief Pelagians; but he cannot be John of Jerusalem, who was dead, nor Praylius, who expelled Pelagius.

[1030] Presently he writes thus about the monastery he had left: But it seemed better to us to change our place [after he himself with his household had departed from the devastated monasteries:] rather than the truth of the faith; and to lose the pleasantness of buildings and dwelling rather than to be stained by communion with those to whom for the present we must either give way, or at any rate fight daily, not with the tongue but with swords. But how much we have suffered, and how the lofty hand of Christ has raged for us against the enemy, I think you have learned from the widespread report of all. Again it is obscure in what way God raged against the enemy, unless the death of John of Jerusalem is hinted at. But it is clear that Jerome was unwilling to communicate with Pelagius, and that for this reason, when he had been absolved by the deceived judges in the synod of Diospolis, the Pelagians raged so greatly against Jerome and his monks and nuns. No less clearly does he declare that he with his household withdrew from the monasteries, lest they should have to fight daily; and hence it becomes likely that he withdrew from the whole diocese of Jerusalem: and he does not seem to have returned yet when he was writing this Epistle, in which he presently exhorts Riparius to the contest, and mentions Alentius the deacon, who had been in Palestine, and in all likelihood was to carry this letter to Riparius.

[1031] Epistle 139 (elsewhere 56) to Apronius was in all likelihood written in the year 418, after St. Jerome had resumed with his household his former dwelling in the monasteries: for that Jerome and Eustochium afterwards died in them is certainly established. Apronius, then to Apronius, when he had returned to the monastery: to whom it was written, is not otherwise known to us; but he is praised as burning with zeal for the faith. It is obscure

what the beginning of the Epistle means, since Apronius is said to have attempted something in vain for the faith; of which the Saint subjoins: This is my joy, when I hear that my sons fight for Christ: and may He in whom we believe Himself confirm this zeal in us, that we may willingly shed our blood for His faith. Then he grieves that a noble house which had fostered heretics has been overthrown. And he goes on in this manner: But you will do best if, all things being laid aside, you seek the East and especially the holy places: for here everything is quiet. And although they have not lost the poisons of their breast, yet they do not dare to open the mouth of impiety, but are like deaf asps, and stopping their ears… But our own house, as regards carnal wealth, being utterly overthrown by the persecutions of the heretics, is, by Christ's favour, full of spiritual riches. For it is better to eat bread than to lose the faith. Since everything was quiet in Palestine, I cannot doubt that Jerome was again dwelling in his monastery, as those words also hint: Our house … utterly overthrown, etc.

[1032] [The plundering of the monastery is perhaps the cause of the unfinished Commentary on Jeremiah.] I add here another observation, namely that St. Jerome's library was in all likelihood scattered by the plundering and burning of the monastery, so that this seems to be the cause why he did not bring the Commentary on Jeremiah to its end. For the six books on Jeremiah which we have he had in all likelihood finished before that disaster: but he lived some years afterwards, so that he seems to have been able to finish the Commentary, if he had had at hand all the books necessary for finishing it. For want of these, then, I suspect the Commentary was not finished. If, however, all the books were perhaps preserved, the necessity of migrating elsewhere and extreme poverty may have brought it about that he dismissed the notaries, whom he could not support; and so for want of notaries he could not go on. Certainly, being afterwards asked by Augustine to answer Annianus the Pelagian, he answered that he would do it, but adds: If … we shall have a supply of notaries. Wherefore I judge that both for want of notaries, and in all likelihood of books too, the Saint could not go on. For he wrote no Work of great bulk after that time.

[1033] The Epistle to Cyprian on Psalm 89, while the Pelagian heresy For this reason too I doubt whether Epistle 140 (elsewhere 139) to Cyprian the priest is rightly fixed by Vallarsi about the year 418. For this is lengthy and careful; but the few others which the Saint wrote after the overthrow of the monastery are merely familiar and very short. There is added another reason, namely that no mention is made in it of the evils which the Saint had suffered. This, however, is certain, that it was written while the Pelagian heresy flourished, since the Saint refutes the Pelagians in several places. It contains an Explanation of Psalm 89, which Cyprian, being present in Palestine, had requested, as is said at the beginning. And this presence of Cyprian makes the time of the Epistle's writing more ambiguous, both because we do not know in what year he was with St. Jerome, and because it somewhat weakens the reasons already given for fixing the Epistle earlier, since Cyprian could have procured notaries, and to him the Saint perhaps did not wish to speak of the evils which he well knew.

[1034] flourished, but it was issued in an uncertain year. Whatever be the case about the year, that little Work is the work of Jerome as an old man, and belongs to the times of the Pelagians. I transfer hither only the beginning: Formerly, he says, Cyprian, most zealous of priests, … I knew you only by letters, … But now, since a knowledge of the outward man too has been made between us, and, after the greeting and the sweet embraces by which friendship is knit together, you at once ask of me — so that you may prove true what you had heard — that I should expound to you the most difficult Psalm, which among Greeks and Latins is entitled the eighty-ninth, not in a composed discourse of words and with popular applause, which is wont to deceive and caress the ears of the unskilled, but in a simple discourse and with the truth of ecclesiastical speech, etc.

[1035] There remain (besides some of uncertain date) three Epistles of Jerome to St. Augustine to be mentioned, He congratulates Augustine on the victory over the Pelagians, or perhaps only two, if the first two make but one, since the second was only added after the signature, as the latest editors probably judge. They are Epistles 141 and 142, written about the year 418, or at any rate after the condemnation of the Pelagians by the supreme Pontiff. And since Pelagius and Caelestius were condemned first by Pope Innocent, then also by Zosimus, the African bishops greatly pressing, among whom Augustine was foremost in learning, to this holy Doctor he chiefly attributes the victory won over the Pelagians, writing to him thus in congratulation: At every time indeed I have venerated your beatitude with the honour that is fitting, and have loved the Lord Saviour dwelling in you: but now, if it can be, we add something to the heap, and fill it up completely, so that we do not suffer even one hour to pass without mention of your name — you who against contrary winds have stood firm by the ardour of faith. You have preferred, so far as in you lay, to be freed alone out of Sodom, rather than to remain with those who perish. Your prudence knows what I mean. Well done for your virtue: you are celebrated throughout the world. Catholics venerate and look up to you as the founder anew of the ancient faith: and — which is the sign of greater glory — all heretics detest you: and they persecute me with equal hatred, so that those whom they cannot kill with swords they may kill with their wish. May the mercy of Christ the Lord keep you safe and mindful of me, venerable and most blessed lord pope.

[1036] If the following Epistle 142 was really a part of the preceding one, and he suggests to him their obstinacy. both will have been issued after Pelagius was condemned and driven out in the East, as was said at no. 1028. He writes as follows: Many halt on both feet, and are not bowed even with broken necks, keeping the affection of their former error, though they have not the same freedom of preaching it. The holy brethren who are with our littleness humbly greet you. I pray your crown to greet in my name your brothers, my lord Alypius and my lord Evodius. Jerusalem, captured, is held by Nebuchadnezzar, and will not hear the counsels of Jeremiah: nay rather she longs for Egypt, that she may die in Tahpanhes, and perish there in everlasting servitude. These last words are enigmatic, but could easily be understood by Augustine, who knew the persons. The earlier words designate the Pelagians, of whom he wrote similar things to Apronius, given at no. 1031. But whether Jerusalem signifies many clerics and laymen whom in that city Pelagius, indicated by the word Nebuchadnezzar, had perverted, or some particular person, I do not determine. Certainly John of Jerusalem is not meant, who died before Pelagius's expulsion; nor does Praylius his successor seem to be hinted at, since he is believed to have expelled Pelagius: unless perhaps he did this only because he did not dare to oppose the other bishops. Jeremiah rightly admonished: but this too can be expounded of various persons.

[1037] The Saint at an uncertain date writes to Exuperantius, Before I proceed to St. Jerome's last Epistle and his blessed death, I should like here to treat of three Epistles which Vallarsi placed last of all in the Verona edition, because they entirely lack any certain marks of time. The first of these is Epistle 145 (elsewhere 35) to Exuperantius, who followed a military life, but, being outstanding in piety, under the cloak and military dress performed the works of the prophets, and overcame the outward man, who promised otherwise, by the inward man, who is formed to the image of the Creator. Exuperantius had a brother Quintilian, through whom Jerome had received knowledge of him. And he exhorts Exuperantius to leave everything and come with his holy brother Quintilian to Bethlehem, to serve God perfectly. Vallarsi in his Annotations thinks that the Exuperantius is meant of whom Palladius writes in the Lausiac History, chap. 80, under the name of Oxyperentius. Palladius there praises a certain solitary Posidonius, to whom he also attributes the miracle of casting out a demon.

[1038] who is improbably believed to be Palladius's Oxyperentius, And he brings him in prophesying about Jerome, writing thus: I know this prophecy also of this holy man (Posidonius). For a certain Jerome, a priest, was living in those places, who was adorned with great excellence in the Roman tongue and with a distinguished talent: but so great was his envy that the excellence of his learning was overwhelmed by it. When, therefore, holy Posidonius had spent many days with him, he says in my ear: The noble Paula, who takes care of him, will die first, being freed from his envy. But, as I think, on account of this Man no holy man will dwell in these places, but his envy will spread even to his own brother. And so it happened. For he drove hence the blessed Oxyperentius the Italian, and another Peter, an Egyptian, and Simeon, admirable men, whom I have noted. This whole account of Palladius seems to have more of calumny than of solid foundation. For Posidonius, whom he celebrates, is otherwise unknown to me. And the sayings of Posidonius, which he sells as prophetic, seem to be held for such neither from his manner of speaking, since he added, as I think, nor from the outcome. Of Jerome's envy against his own brother Paulinianus nothing has ever come to light anywhere. And the departure of three monks from the monastery, even if it be believed most certain, by no means proves that a holy man could not live with Jerome.

[1039] who wrongly calumniates Jerome, as is proved. The plain contrary is said by Postumianus in Severus's Dialogue, chap. 9. For Postumianus, who was six months with Jerome, does indeed say: Whose continual fight against the wicked and perpetual struggle has stirred up the hatreds of the abandoned. Heretics hate him, because he does not cease to attack them: clerics hate him, because he assails their life and their crimes. But he presently adds: But plainly all good men admire and love him… And had it not been fixed in my mind, and promised with God as witness, to go to the desert I had resolved on, I would not have wished to depart from so great a Man for even a small point of time. These words directly conflict with Palladius's improbable assertions. For the rest, I do not judge that Exuperantius — who perhaps did not at all embrace the monastic life — should be confounded with Oxyperentius, since the difference of the name is notable, and no reason is brought forward for confounding them.

[1040] Epistle 146 (elsewhere 85) to Evangelus likewise lacks any mark of time. I treated at no. 605 of Epistle 73 to Evangelus the priest, issued in the year 398. The Epistle to Evangelus on the dignity of priests above deacons: This may be the same Evangelus, even though the title of priest is omitted in the heading. For, as Vallarsi attests, in two Verona manuscripts the Epistle is inscribed: To Evangelus the priest, on the order of the priesthood. Annianus too, the Pelagian, to be mentioned in §61, dedicated to Evangelus certain Homilies of Chrysostom rendered into Latin. But whoever that Evangelus was, the Epistle was written against those who equalled or preferred deacons to priests. For this reason Jerome, in order to cast down the pride of the deacons, exalts the dignity of priests, and shows that priests are almost equal to bishops; and at the end he assigns the difference of the three grades by this comparison: And that we may know that the Apostolic traditions were taken from the Old Testament,

what Aaron and his sons and the Levites were in the temple, this let bishops and priests and deacons claim for themselves in the Church; namely the bishop is compared with Aaron the high priest, the priest with the priest, the deacon with the levite.

[1041] This passage alone suffices to refute those in this Epistle the Saint does not make priests equal to bishops, who would have it that priests and bishops were equal in Jerome's view. For between Aaron the high priest and his sons the priests there was a great difference, even from their first institution by God. This difference, then, St. Jerome sets between bishop and priest, and that from the first institution. For he suggests that the diversity of priesthood in the Church has its origin and form from the Old Testament. Wherefore, just as we know that Aaron by the first institution was greater in dignity than his sons the priests, so also he makes bishops — of whom he says in the same Epistle, They are all successors of the Apostles — greater than priests by the very origin of the institution. But where both in this Epistle and in other places he says that priests and bishops are the same, he teaches that they were not distinguished by name, but that the name of priests was given to bishops also, and that likewise priests were indicated by the name of bishops. He teaches besides that most of the offices of bishops were common to priests; yet not all. And on this ground he proves that priests, at whose prayers the Body and Blood of Christ is consecrated, are not much inferior in dignity to bishops. But he does not arrogate to them a perfect equality, as these words again prove: For what does a bishop do, except ordination, which a priest does not do?

[1042] It pleases me, for the benefit of the prudent reader, to collect briefly out of this short Epistle, as some contend, but clearly attributes eminence to bishops. which the Calvinists have objected as favouring their error about the equality of priests with bishops, all those indications by which Jerome suggests the true opinion about the pre-eminence of bishops over priests. But first I observe that Jerome is disputing about the eminence of priests over deacons, and to that end exalted the dignity of priests as much as he could. First, where he seems most of all to prove that the dignity of bishops and of priests was once the same, and where he really proves that the name was the same for both, he mixes in these words: And lest anyone contentiously contend that there were several bishops in one church, etc. If Jerome thought — as his words indicate that he did think — that in one church there were not several bishops in the time of the Apostles, of which he is there treating, he believed therefore that not all priests were bishops; since it is certain that in several churches there were several priests. Secondly he observes that at Alexandria, from Mark the evangelist, who lived in the Apostles' time and was himself an Apostle, at least a secondary one, always one of the priests was chosen and placed in a higher grade, whom they called bishop. He acknowledges, therefore, that in the Apostles' time the grade of bishop was higher than that of priests. Thirdly, by the words given above he attributes ordinations to the bishop alone, not to priests. Fourthly, he says that all bishops are successors of the Apostles, but not so priests. Fifthly, to prove that priests are greater than deacons, he says: He who is promoted, is promoted from the lesser to the greater. But bishops are no less ordained from priests than priests from deacons. Sixthly and lastly, he compares bishops with Aaron and priests with his sons the priests, as has already been said. These things seem to me enough for St. Jerome's mind to be established from this Epistle. His other Works I shall not touch, lest in a matter examined by many I become longer than is right.

[1043] The Epistle to Sabinianus the deacon, Epistle 147 (elsewhere 48) to Sabinianus, a fallen deacon, is equally of uncertain date, as Tillemont confesses in Note 77, even though he referred it to about the year 409 or 410, because at no. XI Sabinianus is said to have sinned with the wife of a barbarian husband, and presently there is added about his flight: You enter Rome in hiding, you lurk among the Samnite robbers, and at the first news of the husband, that a new Hannibal had come down for you from the Alps, you trust yourself to a ship, though it was unsafe. You come somehow into Syria, thence you say you wish to cross over to Jerusalem, and you promise to serve God. Who would not receive one who promised himself a monk, especially being ignorant of your tragedies and reading your bishop's letters of commendation to the other priests? But you, unhappy man, were transfiguring yourself into an angel of light, and, a minister of Satan, were feigning to be a minister of justice. Under the clothing of sheep you lay hidden, a wolf, and after the adultery of a man you desired to be an adulterer of Christ. All this I have set down in order briefly to explain what Sabinianus's life was, and how he deceived St. Jerome. Meanwhile Tillemont says that Alaric king of the Goths crossed the Alps in the year 408, so that the Epistle could have been written in the year 409 or 410, if that new Hannibal is Alaric himself, or one of the barbarian commanders serving with Alaric. But since many barbarian commanders served under the Romans too, he confesses that the matter is uncertain.

[1044] whom, on account of his crimes briefly set forth, But whatever be the case about the time, Sabinianus was a deacon ordained by a certain holy bishop, but Jerome nowhere names him. That he was ordained in Italy the words already given suggest, and still more those at no. 10: All Italy knew you. All groaned that you stood before the altar of Christ. For he is said at no. 4 to have committed many acts of debauchery and adultery; but he was at last compelled to flee on account of a lust indulged with the wife of a barbarian commander, who is said at no. XI to have been arrested; and so he came into Syria and to St. Jerome's monastery, still having his bishop's letters of commendation. And since he was unknown, and said that he wished to profess the monastic life, he was received by Jerome, and as a deacon also read the Gospel in the church. Bloodless, he says at no. 6, withered, pale, so as to be free of all suspicion, you used to read the Gospel of Christ as a deacon. We thought your pallor to be that of fasting, and we wondered at your bloodless face, contrary to your habit and custom, as though worn out with vigils. But the hypocrite was keeping vigil in order to seduce a virgin of St. Paula's monastery, with whom he used to speak at night through a window, and to drive her to flee with him. He already had her consenting when the crime became known to St. Jerome, as he says at no. 6 in these words: Already the ladders by which you would let down the wretched girl were being prepared; already the route was arranged, the ships decided on, the day appointed, the flight worked out in your mind; and behold that angel, the doorkeeper of Mary's chamber, the guardian of the Lord's cradle, the bearer of the infant Christ, before whom you were doing such things, himself betrayed you. Presently he says that her letters, by which he had induced her to the crime, are at his hand, but that he cannot bring them forward — namely because the crime was to be punished with death.

[1045] And so, when, being caught, he begged pardon, I forgave him, I confess, the Saint exhorts to penance. says the Saint at no. 8; for what else can I do to you, being a Christian? I exhorted you to do penance, and to roll yourself in sackcloth and ashes, to seek solitude, to live in a monastery, to implore God's mercy with continual tears. But you, the pillar of good hope, inflamed by the goads of the viper, have become to me a crooked bow, and hurl the arrows of insults against me. I have become your enemy by speaking the truth. I shall not grieve at your curses… This I lament, that you do not lament yourself. He adds much about the soft and lustful life which he was leading. Then he exhorts him to penance thus: Turn, wretched man, to the Lord, that the Lord may turn to you. Do penance, that He too may repent of all the evils which He has spoken of doing to you. Why, neglecting your own wound, do you strive to defame others? Why do you tear with your bite, like a madman, one who counsels you well and diligently? Suppose I be a wretch, as you commonly give out: at least do penance with me: a criminal, as you feign: imitate the tears of the criminal. Many other things, by which with fervent charity he exhorts Sabinianus to penance, may be seen there. But whether the Epistle had any effect is unknown.

§ LXI. The last Epistle to SS. Augustine and Alypius: the blessed death of St. Jerome more probably occurred in the year 419.

Augustine, still awaiting Jerome's answer to his questions, I proceed to the last of St. Jerome's Epistles that are extant, which shows that he did not lack the best will to fight against heretics down to his last breath, but that opportunity at last failed him, and the strength of a decrepit Old man gave out. A few things, however, must be observed before we treat of that Epistle. St. Augustine had sent in the year 415 a twofold question to St. Jerome, namely about the soul and about the saying of James the apostle, as was said at no. 1016. St. Jerome had indeed written back, and had given fit reasons for not answering those questions; nor yet had he clearly declared that he would never answer. And so St. Augustine went on awaiting, or doubtfully hoping for, an answer, as is clear both from others of his Epistles and most of all from the Epistle to Optatus, which was written about the end of St. Jerome's life, and is numbered 144 among his Epistles. Augustine writes to Optatus that he has not yet received an answer from Jerome to his consultation, and says: Behold, nearly five years have rolled by since the time when the book of consultation was sent — and yet he did not judge that the answer must be despaired of. He also cites the Epistle written back by Jerome, and at no. 3 calls him a most beloved Friend, to be honoured for his immense merits; and forbids his own book of consultation to be published, so long as Jerome's answer could be hoped for.

[1047] he writes to him with Alypius. The Saint writes back to them most affectionately Meanwhile Augustine and Alypius together wrote to Jerome, and asked him whether he had yet answered the little Work of Annianus, who had attacked his little Works against the Pelagians. To this Epistle of theirs Jerome answered by Epistle 143, which I bring hither entire in parts: The holy priest Innocentius, who is the bearer of this discourse, last year, as though he were by no means to return to Africa, did not take my writings to your worthiness. Yet we give thanks to God that it so happened that you should overcome our silence by your Epistles. For every occasion is most welcome to me by which I write to your reverence, calling God to witness that, if it could be, taking the wings of a dove I should be wrapped in your embraces; always indeed for the merit of your virtues, but now most of all because, with you as fellow-workers and authors, the Caelestian heresy has been cut down, which so infected the hearts of many that, although they feel themselves overcome and condemned, yet they do not lay aside the poisons of their minds; and, what alone they can do, they hate us, through whom they think they have lost the freedom of teaching their heresy.

[1048] about the death of Eustochium, and about the book of Annianus the Pelagian: But as to your asking whether I have written back against the books of Annianus, the pseudo-deacon of Celeda, who is most abundantly fed in order to supply frivolous words for another's blasphemy — know that I received those very books, sent in loose sheets by our holy brother Eusebius the priest, not long ago: and since then, either through the onset of illnesses,

or through the falling asleep of your holy and venerable daughter Eustochium, I have so grieved that I thought them almost to be despised. For he sticks in the same mire, and, apart from tinkling and borrowed words, says nothing else. Yet we have done much, in that, while he tries to answer my Epistle (to Ctesiphon), he betrays himself more openly, and lays his blasphemies open to all. For whatever he denies having said in that wretched synod of Diospolis, he confesses in this Work. Nor is it a great matter to answer most foolish dirges. But if the Lord grants life, and we shall have a supply of notaries, we shall answer in a few short vigils, not to convict a heresy that is dead, but to refute its unskilfulness and blasphemy by our discourse. And your sanctity would do this better, lest we be compelled to praise our own writings against a heretic. From the death of St. Eustochium, in whose name Jerome greeted Augustine in other later letters, it becomes clear that this is the last one to Augustine. But the Work of Annianus, of which he here treats, St. Jerome never refuted, having died either in the same year in which this letter was issued, or in the following one. Of that Work I shall treat below, as also of its author.

[1049] The Epistle written from Bethlehem, Meanwhile I cite the rest of the Epistle. Our common holy children, Albina, Pinianus and Melania, greet you warmly. This letter I have given to the holy priest Innocentius to carry from holy Bethlehem. Your granddaughter Paula (a granddaughter, namely, by reason of her youth, as Eustochium was a daughter) piteously entreats that you be mindful of her, and greets you warmly. May the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ keep you safe and mindful of me, lords truly holy and, in the affection of all, venerable fathers. From these words it is clear, first, that St. Jerome had returned to Bethlehem to his monastery, which had been destroyed by the Pelagians. Albina, Pinianus and Melania the younger — who was the daughter of Albina, wife of Pinianus, and granddaughter of Melania the elder — are said to have lived in Africa for seven years after they left Rome; and thence to have sailed to Egypt and further into Palestine. And from this passage we gather that those persons, no less outstanding in piety than in nobility, even though they had once been most closely joined with the elder Melania, who favoured Rufinus and the Origenists against St. Jerome, had contracted a friendship with Jerome, as they had long since contracted one with Augustine. In what year they came into Palestine can be more accurately examined at the XXXI of December, on which St. Melania the younger is venerated. This, however, I observe here, that Albina, Pinianus and Melania dealt with Pelagius that he should condemn in writing whatever was said against him; and that they wrote this to St. Augustine, in all likelihood in the year 418. But since Pelagius had answered fraudulently after his manner, St. Augustine, informed of these matters by letter, about the middle of the year 418 wrote to Albina, Pinianus and Melania the books On the Grace of Christ and On Original Sin, in which he uncovers the frauds of Pelagius and Caelestius.

[1050] Let us now examine the date of this last Epistle. in the year 419, in the month of August or September. Innocentius the priest, who was to carry it, had also been in Palestine in the preceding year. Now Innocentius the priest was sent in the year 419 to Alexandria, to ask from St. Cyril, who then ruled the church of Alexandria, for the authentic canons of the council of Nicaea, and returned in the same year to the African council before the VI Kalends of December: for then those same canons were sent to Rome. From this journey of Innocentius the priest into Egypt most gather that the said Epistle of St. Jerome was issued in that same year 419. To this chronology it is no objection that Innocentius had been in Palestine in the preceding year too; that certainly cannot help toward fixing the Epistle in the year 420. For in the year 419 Innocentius could not omit Jerome's Epistle on the ground that, as he believed, he was not to return to Africa, as he is said to have done in the year before this one was issued: for he had been sent by the African bishops to carry the Nicene canons into Africa. This alone we may wonder at, on what ground he came into Palestine in the year 419, when he had been sent to Alexandria on business of great moment, and Bethlehem is separated from Alexandria by a notable distance. But he will have done this by reason of the friendship of Augustine, Alypius, and perhaps of other African bishops too, with Jerome. They will have asked him, during the time in which the canons were being sought at Alexandria and translated into Latin, to carry a letter to Jerome and to receive an answer from him, or at any rate to cross over into Palestine before or after. And since Innocentius seems to have departed from Africa for Alexandria about the end of the month of May, and to have returned in the month of November, it is likely that Jerome's letter was written in the month of August or September. Certainly it is not likely that it was issued after September.

[1051] Now as regards the books of Annianus, the pseudo-deacon of Celeda, A conjecture about the Work of Annianus here mentioned. St. Jerome certainly never refuted them, who wrote nothing that is extant after this Epistle. And since Jerome suggested that he desired St. Augustine to refute those books, it would indeed be astonishing if that holy doctor, who in refuting Pelagius and his disciples had the chief part, had left untouched books which he knew and wished refuted. Wherefore, since Pelagius wrote his books On Free Will in the year, as it seems, 417 — that is, at such a time that Augustine in the year 419 could ask Jerome whether he had answered them — the suspicion of certain men appears probable enough, that these are the very books about which St. Augustine inquired. Certainly they were extant when in the year 419 Augustine was writing to Jerome and Jerome answering him: nor are any others known with which the words of St. Augustine or of Jerome can agree. And what St. Jerome says of Pelagius, Whatever he denies having said in that wretched synod of Diospolis, he confesses in this Work, seems entirely to confirm the conjecture given. For those words seem to make Pelagius the author of the Work, or at any rate the chief one. For this reason some think that Pelagius supplied the thoughts, but that Annianus expressed Pelagius's arguments in his own style, and that for this reason Jerome says of Annianus, Who is most abundantly fed in order to supply frivolous words for another's blasphemy. If this opinion is true, as seems to me most likely, St. Augustine abundantly refuted those Pelagian books in the book On the Grace of Christ. But I do not examine more of these matters, since they belong less to St. Jerome, to whose death I am gradually proceeding.

[1052] The Saint, when he had laboured under the great weakness of old age, St. Jerome was not far from the ninetieth year of his age when he seems thereafter to have published no Work. If we believe the author of the first Life, the Old man fell into the greatest weakness. Finally, he says, he was wearied with such lassitude that, even lying on his bed, he was raised up by a rope hung from a beam and grasped with upturned hands, so that he might perform, as he could, the office of the monastery — very many days passing in squalor of body and thinness of voice. The expression is defective or faulty; but the reader will understand what the author meant. But the weakness mentioned by him does not seem to have been so great that Jerome could have dictated nothing further in it; but rather to have been an effect of decrepit old age.

[1053] in the Lives he is said to have died in the year 419; At the end of that same Life this is read about the Saint's death: Now the blessed Jerome fell asleep in the XII year of the reign of Theodosius the Younger. And presently about the day: He fell asleep in the Lord on the day before the Kalends of October. His age is expressed thus: He completed the whole time of his life in LXXXVIII years and six months. All this may be true; but it is not equally certain. On the day of death here asserted all agree, but not so on the year assigned to his death: for the twelfth of Theodosius the Younger coincides with the year 419 of the Christian era. In the other Life, which Martianay gave in vol. 5 as the second, the following is read: And so the blessed Jerome, after he had raised by the exuberant abundance of his writings an impregnable tower for the Church of Christ against the darts of heretics, in the ninetieth year of his age, and the twelfth of Theodosius's reign, departed to the Lord in a good old age, namely on the last day of September, and at the last hour of that day, as the sun was setting. This last is said after the manner of the Italians, among whom the last or twenty-fourth hour of the day is when the sun sets. To the XII year of Theodosius St. Jerome's death is likewise attributed in the third Life in Martianay, col. 516, but there he is said to have died in the ninety-eighth year of his age, which is certainly false.

[1054] but most, with St. Prosper, fix his death in the year 420; But among more recent chronographers the authority of St. Prosper has generally prevailed, who in the Chronicle, at the consulship of Theodosius for the IX time and Constantius for the III, that is, at the year 420, has this: Jerome the priest dies in the XCI year of his age, on the day before the Kalends of October. This date of St. Jerome's death Baronius, Pagi, Tillemont and other recent writers have handed down as undoubted with the greatest consent, so that I should not wish to call the common opinion into doubt, were it not fixed and certain with us to follow ancient monuments rather than the authority of recent writers. With this intention, then, let me examine the authorities and reasons which can be alleged for the one year or the other. Of the year of St. Jerome's death I find nothing in the Chronicles of Idatius and of Marcellinus, so that the authority of Prosper alone fights for that opinion against the consent of the Lives.

[1055] But I do not see that that authority must be held irrefragable, which is not made certain by the authority of St. Prosper alone. both because St. Prosper certainly contradicts himself, as he is printed: for he says he was born in the year 331, and died in the year 420; and yet meanwhile attributes to him ninety-one years, although within the years asserted a full ninety do not run. Besides, Prosper fixes in the same year the beginning of the reign of Constantius, whom Honorius adopted as his colleague. Baronius followed Prosper. But Pagi, Tillemont and very many others fix the beginning of Constantius's reign in the year 421. Yet St. Prosper could far more easily go astray in the year of St. Jerome's death, from which he was distant by a very great interval of place, than in the year in which Constantius was made emperor in the West. Wherefore the authority of St. Prosper does not seem to suffice to make certain the year of St. Jerome's death, any more than to tie his birth to a certain year, and to establish many other things in which the chronographers depart from him. That the Lives cited for the year 419 are likewise of no great authority I readily acknowledge. Yet there may be a suspicion that the date of his death, of which even the hour is designated, flowed from his Epitaph. For this reason I shall examine to which year the Saint's death seems rather to be assigned by the likelihood of reasons.

[1056] The order of St. Jerome's deeds seems rather to favour the year 419 But from Jerome's deeds and the writings of St. Augustine than the following 420. For his last Epistle to St. Augustine was issued in that month of the year 419, so that the Saint in that same year,

on the XXX day of September, could have exchanged mortal life for immortal. And so, if he survived to that day of the year 420, for more than a whole year he left no writing, not even a small Epistle, which has come down to our times. This would indeed be most astonishing, especially since St. Eustochium, whom he esteemed no less than her mother St. Paula, died in the year 419, so that Jerome does not seem likely to have omitted her Epitaph, if he had survived her death by a whole year and some months. There is added St. Augustine's silence toward St. Jerome in all that time — and not only toward Jerome, whom he esteemed most highly, but even about Jerome as living. But of greater weight seems what St. Augustine wrote of St. Jerome as dead in bk. 1 against Julian, chap. 7, in this manner: Nor should you think that holy Jerome is to be despised because he was a priest, who … lived in the holy places and in sacred Letters to a decrepit age, etc. I gave all the words at no. 572.

[1057] St. Augustine seems to have written this toward the end of the year 420 or the beginning of 421, it seems more probable that Jerome died in the year 419: as is gathered from bk. 2 of the Retractations, chaps. 61 and 62. For the four books to Boniface against the two Epistles of the Pelagians, which Augustine mentions in chap. 61, are commonly fixed as written in the year 420. Then in chap. 62 he mentions the books against Julian thus: Meanwhile the four books of Julian the Pelagian, which I mentioned above (chap. 53), came also into our hands… I wrote, therefore, six books against those four, etc. These words plainly indicate that the six books against Julian were begun immediately after the said four to Boniface were finished. And these four, since they are not very long, Augustine in all likelihood finished before the end of the year 420. And so it seems more probable that the six books against Julian were begun in that same year 420 as it drew to its close. Tillemont and the Benedictine editor do not believe that they were begun before the year 421, but they allege no reason, except that they say Jerome died on the XXX day of September in the year 420. But this is the very thing I am here inquiring into, so that no argument can be drawn from it. But whether Augustine wrote what has been alleged about Jerome toward the end of the year 420 or at the beginning of the following one, since he does not suggest that his death had been recently learned, it will always be more probable from these words that Jerome died in the year 419 than in the following 420.

[1058] for the Epistle of Augustine in which the last mention is made of him as living I see, however, that against the year 419 there can be objected the Epistle of Augustine already cited, numbered among the Hieronymian ones 144, to Optatus, especially if it is rightly fixed in the year 420: for in it St. Augustine speaks of Jerome as living. But even if I believed it certain that it must be fixed at the beginning of the year CDXX, as Vallarsi thinks, I should nevertheless judge that Jerome's death could have been unknown to St. Augustine for four or five months, or even longer, considering the immense distance of the places and the inconvenience of approaching winter. For letters did not then pass to and fro after the modern manner; nor did anyone at once desire to undertake so great a journey, nor would he immediately have found a ship ready for beginning a very long voyage as winter drew near. Wherefore it would not be astonishing if St. Augustine had been ignorant of St. Jerome's death until the spring or summer of the following year, especially since a messenger — if we should be willing to believe that any was sent at once about it into the West — ought rather to have been sent into Italy than into Africa. I wished to observe these things so that the prudent reader may perceive both that the said Epistle to Optatus does not stand in the way of the likelihood of our opinion, even if it be believed to have been written at the beginning of the year 420; and that St. Jerome's death would more probably have been unknown to Augustine when toward the end of the year 420 or the beginning of 421 he was writing the first book against Julian, if he had lived until the XXX of September in the year 420. I would not indeed deny that the news of it could have been carried before the end of the year in which the Saint died to Hippo Regius, where Augustine was living, by a prosperous voyage; but we must consider, not what could have happened, but what commonly happens in like circumstances.

[1059] seems to have been written in the year 419, Now as regards the said Epistle of Augustine, I should rather believe that it was written in the year 419 than at the beginning of the following one. The words from which the chronology is fixed are these: Behold, nearly five years have rolled by since I sent into the East a book — not of my presumption — and I have not yet deserved a reply by which this question (about the soul) might be unravelled for me, in which you desire me to give you a fixed opinion. Augustine is speaking of the book sent to St. Jerome by Orosius, as was said at no. 1016. And since Orosius departed in the year 415 at the beginning of spring, already in the summer of the year 419, and still more in the autumn, five incomplete years had rolled by. And that five incomplete years are reckoned is gathered from the added word nearly. Wherefore I judge that that Epistle was written about autumn, or at any rate before the end of the year 419; nay, even before Augustine had received Jerome's last Epistle. For he was even then awaiting Jerome's answer to the question about the soul, and believed that Jerome was occupied with writings against the Pelagians, as these words of his indicate: For I know rather that he is occupied with other matters which must by no means be deferred, and are to be valued more highly. Augustine would not have written this after receiving Jerome's last Epistle, in which he preferred to leave to Augustine the care of refuting Annianus the Pelagian in these words: And your sanctity would do this better, lest we be compelled to praise our own writings against a heretic. For, having received such an answer, he could at least have doubted whether he was occupied with other things.

[1060] From what has been said it is gathered that that Epistle to Optatus was issued in the year 419. nor do we afterwards find any indication of Jerome as living. There is extant another Epistle of Augustine to the same Optatus, 190 (elsewhere 157), which was issued in the year 418, and treats likewise of the question about the soul at Optatus's inquiry. In it, at no. 20, he already tells Optatus that he had proposed that question to St. Jerome, and that he is awaiting his answer before deciding the question. For this reason Optatus wrote again in the year 419, because he believed that Jerome's answer would now have been delivered: for he asked that it be sent to him along with the rest, as Augustine attests. Of that consultation of Jerome by two books Augustine wrote to Evodius in that very year 415, in Epistle 169 (elsewhere 102), toward the end. Of the same consultation he makes mention after Jerome's death in bk. 2 of the Retractations, chap. 45, and says that he was unwilling to publish those two books as long as (St. Jerome) was in the body, … lest perhaps he should some time answer, and they should rather be published with his answer itself; but that he published both after Jerome's death. And so the publication of the books was in all likelihood made in the year 420, after Jerome's death became known — which I judge is more probably to be tied to the year 419, both because of the mention of him as dead made repeatedly by Augustine in the books against Julian, and most of all because after September of the year 419 we have no writing of Jerome, not even the smallest Epistle, and no indication at all of his being alive.

§ LXII. The Saint's burial at Bethlehem, where the tomb is held in honour even after the body was translated; as also certain other places on account of the Saint's memory.

The Saint buried at Bethlehem, Of the year in which St. Jerome died Marcellinus said nothing in his Chronicle, but he did not keep silence about the place of his death and burial, writing of him thus at the year 392: Down to this XIV year of the reign of Theodosius the blessed Jerome, beginning from Peter the apostle after the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ, and ending with himself, described the ecclesiastical volumes of CXXXV illustrious men, living near the town of Bethlehem, where he both founded a monastery for himself, and, being learned also in Hebrew letters, wrote many other ecclesiastical works, and made the end of his life at a very great age, and was buried there — to Catholics indeed an impregnable tower of the Church, but to all heretics an untiring enemy, fighting both by the purpose of his own life and by the assertions of the books published by him. Here he is clearly said both to have died and to have been buried at Bethlehem. The first Life agrees, since it has these words, perhaps taken from some epitaph: Kindly Bethlehem holds him, to be offered up to the Lord when He comes again. The other Life in Martianay, col. 24, having related St. Jerome's death, subjoins the following: But the holy and venerable women, namely Paula and Eustochium, despisers of the world by his example and admonition, and bearers of the cross of Christ, had departed before his death, the Bridegroom calling them. Further, the blessed Jerome, while he still lived, had made himself a tomb by cutting the rock at the entrance of the cave of the Lord's manger, not far from the tomb of the aforesaid holy women: where, the perversity of the world being overcome, he was buried on the day before the Kalends of October. With these statements about the Saint's burial at Bethlehem all more recent writers everywhere agree, nor is there any doubt about it.

[1062] where his body was in the XIII century. Of the Saint's tomb at Bethlehem very many afterwards made mention. From some of them it seems to be proved that the Saint's body remained there down to the XIII century. Certainly James of Vitry, bishop of Acre and afterwards Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, in bk. 3 of the Eastern History, published in Martène and Durand, vol. 3 of the Anecdota, col. 278, asserts that the body was at Bethlehem in his time, in these words: Bethlehem, in which the heavenly Bread was born, in which, a star leading them, the magi offered gifts to Christ, where the Latin translator Jerome rests. Thus he in the XIII century; and in the same century Burchard in the Description of the Holy Land spoke thus of Bethlehem: I saw there also the cell of St. Jerome, his bed and his tomb, and the cloister of the monks. He does not indeed here say whether the body was even then at Bethlehem; but at least he does not assert that it had been translated thence, or that the tomb was empty. So James of Voragine, who after the middle of that same century wrote the Lives of the Saints, asserts in his Life of St. Jerome at the XXX of September that he was buried at Bethlehem, but mentions no translation. Nay, Marino Sanudo too, who wrote in the XIV century, says in bk. 3, chap. XI: Not far from the manger Jerome was buried: saying nothing of a translation. And lower down: And in a certain crypt is shown the cell in which the blessed Jerome afflicted himself with penance, and laboured very much in the translation and exposition of sacred Scripture: his little bed too is shown, and the workrooms of the cloister over which he presided. He says nothing of a translation. Yet that the body was translated we shall see in its place.

[1063] The tomb remained in veneration even after the translation of the body, Of St. Jerome's tomb, what it was like

in later centuries, mention has been made by us at the XXVII of January in St. Paula, at the V of March in St. Eusebius of Cremona, and at the XXVIII of September in St. Eustochium the virgin. For it always remained in veneration, even after the translation of the body. John Cotovicus, a native of Utrecht and a knight of Jerusalem, in his Jerusalem Itinerary, which was printed at Antwerp in the year 1619, describes in chap. 8 the sacred places seen at Bethlehem, and there at p. 235 speaks thus of St. Jerome's tomb: Hence (from the cave of the Innocents) one passes to the left through a long and narrow cave adorned with a marble altar, where they say the body of the blessed Eusebius, Jerome's disciple, is buried: to which, toward the West, is joined another cave of square form, adorned with two altars: that which meets those entering on the left is said to be the monument of the blessed Paula, widow and mother, and of Eustochium, her daughter and a virgin: that which is seen opposite is said once to have contained the bones of the divine Jerome: which, in the opinion of many, having been carried to Rome, as also those of Eusebius, an empty monument has remained here. Then he relates some things about SS. Paula and Eustochium, and presently passes to another memorial of St. Jerome.

[1064] From the monument of Paula and of Jerome, he says, one goes to another retreat of that same Jerome, or study, as they will have it, in which they say he spent the summer seasons in his studies, as also his study, and translated the Bible from the Hebrew into the Latin tongue. It consists of arched work, and, adorned with a marble altar, is both loftier and brighter than all the other underground places: for on the side which looks toward the North it has a little window by which light is poured in, whereas the rest are wholly without any light. On the western side of that same chapel is a stone stair, by which one formerly ascended to the shrine above; but, the door having afterwards been blocked up by the Minorites, it has for some years begun to be of no use. While one goes to this * and stands there on the step, the Minorites sing together the hymn: This confessor of the Lord, consecrated, etc.: then they recite the Antiphon: O best Doctor, light of the holy Church, blessed Jerome, lover of the divine law, pray for us to the Son of God. Vers. Pray for us, blessed Jerome. Resp. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ. Presently the Guardian adds this prayer: Almighty everlasting God, who by the teaching and merits of blessed Jerome hast in manifold ways enlightened thy Church, grant us, we beseech thee, that we who pay his commemoration with devout mind may by his merits and prayers be able happily to come to eternal joys. Through Christ our Lord, etc.

[1065] Of the same place Quaresmius treats in the Elucidation of the Holy Land, bk. 6, chap. 17, elsewhere called an oratory, and calls it the Oratory of St. Jerome, and sets it as the tenth place of the second pilgrimage. And since he adds some things to what has been given, I transfer his words hither: From the chapel of the holy Innocents the procession turns to the left side, and enters a cavernous place: and, having left first on the right the mausoleum of St. Eusebius abbot of Cremona, and afterwards on the left two others, the one of St. Jerome and the other of St. Paula and Eustochium her daughter, … it turns again to the right, and enters a chapel like a chamber: on whose eastern side an altar is erected, and it is called the Oratory of St. Jerome, the outstanding doctor of the Church, and is beneath his school, … and his memory is honoured here. The reason of the name is that, as the common tradition hands down, and as Friar Bonifacius left in writing in bk. 2 On the Perpetual Cult of the Holy Land, St. Jerome in the summer seasons devoted himself there to his studies, etc. If this is the true reason of the name, it is more rightly called a Study, as Cotovicus has it. But if it was called an Oratory because of the altar erected there, of the school which is above this place I shall presently treat with Quaresmius. Meanwhile I observe that those stairs of which Cotovicus speaks gave an ascent to the school; but that the door was in all likelihood blocked up after the school was turned to a profane use, as we shall see.

[1066] Then to the tomb, which he says is honoured in the eleventh place of the second pilgrimage, which is not far from the tomb raised from the ground. Quaresmius proceeds thus in chap. 18: Withdrawing from the oratory of St. Jerome, we return to his venerable sacred tomb. This tomb is raised from the ground in the form of an altar, covered with a marble slab (like it are two others, of which presently), and is on the western side. In it the venerable body was honourably buried, as ancient tradition teaches, when first the holy Doctor at Bethlehem, at the Lord's manger, flew away to eternal glory, leaving the prison-house of the body. Afterwards it was translated to Rome into the basilica of St. Mary at the Manger. Then he treats of the tombs of SS. Paula and Eustochium and of St. Eusebius of Cremona, and about all of them subjoins in chap. 20: Over this tomb, and over the others of the saints Jerome, Paula and Eustochium, Mass is celebrated, and the Office is solemnly chanted at them on the solemn days of these Saints, the Brethren flocking also from Jerusalem for the festivals. These things at the same time indicate the cult of the Saint in those places; and others have similar things who committed their pilgrimages through the Holy Land to writing. It is added also in the Life of St. Eusebius of Cremona, vol. 1 of March, p. 384, that before each tomb a glass lamp burns.

[1067] The Saint's school, turned by the Turks to a profane use: Of St. Jerome's school, which is above his oratory just mentioned, Quaresmius treats in bk. 6, chap. 1, in the first place of the second pilgrimage. The school of St. Jerome, he says, is a certain place spacious in length and breadth. Its length is forty-two paces, its breadth sixteen. It is skilfully wrought, the structure built of hewn and squared stones: and its vault is supported by marble columns. And this place is called the place of St. Jerome's studies; because this holy Doctor, who spent the greater part of his life holily and laudably at Bethlehem, either had his library in it, or received in it those who came to visit him and for the sake of learning; or else it served both purposes. So the common tradition of these parts has it. This place indeed belongs by right to the Franciscan friars; but it has been turned by the Turks and Moors into a stable for beasts. For when these pass this way and turn aside to the Friars, they put their beasts in it. Nevertheless the faithful visit it too, on account of the holy Doctor's memory. Presently in chap. 2 he treats of the monastery of the Franciscans, and says that it is believed by some to have been once the guest-house for pilgrims which St. Jerome founded there, as has been said before; by others one of the monasteries built there by St. Paula, and more probably that for men, in which St. Jerome lived with other monks. For, he says, to this day there is shown on its northern side a large place in the open air, where there was a large refectory for the religious: and, as formerly, so now too it is called the Refectory of St. Jerome.

[1068] but the other places, the tomb excepted, perhaps somewhat changed. Sanudo in bk. 3, chap. 6, asserts that the monastery of Bethlehem was destroyed by the Saracens in the year 1263, in the month of April. But it is not very likely that St. Jerome's monastery, just as he himself had inhabited it, stood unchanged down to those times. Hence the diligent reader will easily see that most of the places just related, which are held in veneration by the faithful on account of the memory of St. Jerome, have in all likelihood been not a little changed in the course of time, and that it is not altogether certain that all were in exactly the same place and of the same extent in which they are now shown — the tomb, however, excepted, which we judge was never changed, save that through the piety of the faithful more ornaments have been added. For the rest, from so many places venerable on account of the memory of Jerome who once dwelt in them, we plainly perceive how great is the piety of the faithful toward the holy Doctor; nor would it suffer much harm even if either his Study, or the school, or the dining-hall had been in somewhat different places: for it is at least established that the Saint lived long in those places and ended his life there.

* perhaps hanc

§ LXIII. Eulogies given to St. Jerome by illustrious men: some observations on errors inserted by certain writers.

The Saint celebrated with several eulogies by St. Augustine, Among the illustrious men who celebrated St. Jerome with praises, St. Augustine must be numbered in the first place, than whom no one praised him more frequently or more sincerely. But, just as I shall not repeat the praises given by very many to Jerome while he lived and already related before, so neither shall I repeat the words of Augustine cited in the course of this Commentary, which may be seen in their places. Hence only a few things from St. Augustine remain to be mentioned. St. Augustine, in Epistle 148 (elsewhere III) to Fortunatianus, citing some words of St. Jerome, then living, about the vision of God, calls him at no. 7 a most learned Man, as frequently elsewhere; then at no. 8 a Man of God, and at no. 14 a Man most learned in the Scriptures. So in Epistle 198 (elsewhere 79) to Hesychius he again calls him, while living, a holy Man, and presently a most learned Man. I pass over many similar passages. More distinguished and more lengthy eulogies see at no. 572, at no. 1007, and in several other places.

[1070] Bishop Idatius in his Chronicle says repeatedly by Idatius, St. Prosper, St. Cassian, that St. Jerome was seen by him as a boy. And in his Preface he is called by him: a perfect recorder in all the monuments of deeds and sayings, Jerome the priest. Then at the XII year of Arcadius and Honorius, where he had praised the chief bishops of the East, he adds of St. Jerome: Jerome, endowed with the priesthood, dwelling in the neighbourhood of Bethlehem of Judah, is held outstanding in all things. More words of the same Idatius about Jerome I gave at no. 1010. No less distinguished is the eulogy which was given from Marcellinus's Chronicle at no. 1061. St. Prosper in the Poem on the Ungrateful, from verse 55, thus celebrates St. Jerome for his writings against the Pelagians:

Then too the guest of Bethlehem *, of illustrious name, graced alike with Hebrew and with Greek and Latin speech, a pattern of morals and the world's teacher, Jerome, with books of high excellence cut the enemy asunder, and made known with what a whirlwind the risen darkness sought to obscure the true light.

St. John Cassian in bk. 7 On the Incarnation praises St. Jerome against Nestorius, and on that occasion the Saint is adorned by him with these titles: Jerome, the master of Catholics, whose writings shine red like divine lamps through the whole world. And a little after: Jerome, a man of the greatest knowledge, and likewise of most approved and pure doctrine. In the Preface to the book On the Institutes of Monasteries, SS. Basil and Jerome together are praised by the same Cassian as men both noble in life and illustrious in speech and knowledge.

[1071] Cassiodorus in his Chronicle, at the consulship of Arcadius and Bauto, by Cassiodorus, that is at the year 385, says:

Jerome the priest, settled at Bethlehem, is held marvellous by the whole world. The same writer, in the book On the Institution of Divine Letters, chap. 21, thus celebrates Jerome: The blessed Jerome too, an outstanding master of the Latin tongue, who bestowed so much on us in the translation of divine Scripture that we scarcely need to go to the Hebrew fountain, since he is known to have satisfied us with the great abundance of his eloquence, produced very many books and copious letters. Blessed are they to whom, by the Lord's gift, he deigned to write. Plain, learned, sweet, with a ready abundance of words, he turns his talent in whatever direction. Now he sweetly coaxes the humble, now he breaks the necks of the proud, now he repays his detractors in kind with a necessary sharpness, now he proclaims virginity, now defends chaste marriages, now praises together the glorious struggles of the virtues, now accuses the lapses of depravity in clerics and monks. Yet, wherever place offered, he mingled examples of the Gentiles with a most delightful variety; unfolding everything, adorning everything, and always advancing eloquent and even through the various kinds of disputation. For although he draws out some books with great copiousness, yet, by reason of the sweetness of his sayings, his ending is always welcome. Whom I do not think to have dwelt at Bethlehem to no purpose, but that in that land of miracles his eloquence too, after the manner of the sun, might shine upon us from the East. Many other things have been adduced from Cassiodorus in the course of this work, and others will still be adduced where we treat of the Saint's lost or supposititious writings.

[1072] in the Catalogue of Gennadius, In the Catalogue of Writers, or of Illustrious men, of Gennadius, as it is printed in Martianay, vol. 5 of St. Jerome's Works, chap. 1, col. 25, this eulogy is found: Our Jerome, most excellently learned at Rome in Greek and Latin letters, was also ordained priest there. Further, he came as a young man to the town of Bethlehem; where, a prudent animal, he offered himself to remain at the Lord's manger. Among the other little works of his labours, down to the XIV year of the reign of Theodosius, beginning from blessed Peter and ending with himself, he wrote On Illustrious Men. Besides, by countless books published as constructions of the Apostles and Prophets, he completed an immovable Catholic tower of the Church against the darts of the faithless. He was so learned also in Hebrew and Chaldee letters that he translated all the books of the Old Testament into Latin, namely from the codices of the Hebrews. The prophet Daniel too, who spoke in the Chaldee style, and the just Job in Arabic — both these authors he turned into the Roman tongue with a perfect translation. The Gospel of Matthew likewise he made Roman out of the Hebrew. For, preaching and guarding virginity of mind and body and repentance for offences, alone of all the Romans he commented upon all the XVI books of the prophets. Moreover in all the prologues of his books he shows himself to Catholic readers so brilliant an interpreter, and in the immense volumes of his Epistles so sinewy, that he seems neither ever to have spared the faithless nor to have yielded to the envious. Nearly ninety years old, as they report, he afterwards rested in the Lord. Whom the town of Stridon bore, famous Rome taught, kindly Bethlehem holds: the heavenly hall received his spirit. He flourished chiefly under the prince Theodosius and his sons Arcadius and Honorius.

[1073] which eulogy, of an uncertain author, must be corrected in certain points: On this eulogy, which is not accurate, some things must necessarily be noted. I have already proved at no. 19 that it does not seem to be attributable to Gennadius, in most of whose manuscript Catalogues it is not read. Yet since it was printed from a codex to which Martianay attributes more than a thousand years, it is certainly ancient, and is therefore here reprinted, even though it is of an uncertain and unknown author. Yet several errors in it must be corrected. The author of the eulogy is mistaken first, when he says that Jerome was ordained priest at Rome: for that he was ordained at Antioch by Paulinus I showed at nos. 194 and 195. He is mistaken again when he asserts that Jerome came to Bethlehem as a young man: for according to our chronology he numbered nearly fifty-five years when he fixed his settled dwelling at Bethlehem. As to what is touched on about virginity, St. Jerome did indeed greatly praise and proclaim it, but he by no means asserted that he had preserved it wholly unharmed in himself; and he rather confessed the contrary, as was said at no. 79.

[1074] also by Facundus, St. Ennodius, St. Gelasius the Pope, Facundus of Hermiane, in the Work on the Three Chapters, bk. 4, chap. 2, speaks thus of St. Jerome: Our Jerome too, a very learned man, who was besides of such wide reading that he read all, or almost all, the expositors of the divine Scriptures whether in Greek or in Latin speech, etc. Baronius, in his Annotations on the Martyrology, brings forward from St. Ennodius's Epistle to Faustus these words: Our Jerome, if he did not call Gregory his teacher, would be reckoned better than he; but good things must be applied by name to him from whom they seem to have taken their origin. But Jerome did not have St. Gregory Nazianzen for his master for so long a time that he could not afterwards turn out greater and more learned than he. St. Gelasius the Pope, with a council of seventy bishops, in vol. 4 of Labbe's Councils, col. [ ], not only reckons the little Works of blessed Jerome the priest among the chief writings of the Fathers, but also declares how highly he esteems his authority, when lower down he thus determines concerning Rufinus: Likewise Rufinus, a religious man, published very many books of ecclesiastical work, and also interpreted some Scriptures. But since the blessed Jerome censured him in certain matters concerning the freedom of the will, we hold those things which we know the aforesaid blessed Jerome to hold; and not only concerning Rufinus, but also concerning all whom the oft-mentioned Man reproved out of zeal for God and religious regard for the faith. So a little before there are received with all honour the Lives of all the hermits, which, however, the most blessed man Jerome wrote. And lower down: Likewise some little works of Origen, which the most blessed man Jerome does not repudiate, we receive as fit to be read. But all the rest we say are to be rejected along with their author. The Pontiff admits of the Works of Rufinus and Origen those which are admitted, or not repudiated or reproved, in the Writings of St. Jerome.

[1075] by Mansuetus of Milan, Claudianus Mamertus, Servatus Lupus, St. Isidore, In the Epistle of Mansuetus archbishop of Milan and of the council of that city to the emperor Constantine Pogonatus, which is inserted in the Acts of the VI general council in Labbe, vol. 6, there are praised at col. 602 the chief Fathers, namely St. Leo the Pope, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Basil, St. Cyril of Alexandria, St. Athanasius, St. John Chrysostom, St. Hilary, St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, and at last in most magnificent words, before all the rest, the most learned Jerome the priest, conspicuous with every mark of leadership. Likewise St. Jerome is called by Claudianus Mamertus in bk. 2 On the State of the Soul, chap. 9, the Chief of expositors. So in Servatus Lupus, in the book On Three Questions, p. 267, Jerome is the second light of expositors — the second, namely, because of St. Augustine set before him there. In the same little Work, p. 222: Jerome, outstanding in divine and secular learning. Again at p. 273, Augustine and Jerome are called two most illustrious lights of the doctors. The same two also, in the same place, p. 6, in Einhard's Epistle to Lupus, are set down as the most illustrious expositors of the sacred divine Letters. St. Isidore in bk. 6 of the Etymologies, chap. 4, commends the translation of sacred Scripture from the Hebrew in these words: Jerome the priest too, skilled in three tongues, turned those same Scriptures from Hebrew into Latin speech, and eloquently poured them over. Whose translation is deservedly preferred to the rest. For it is both more tenacious of the words, and clearer in the perspicuity of the sense, and, as being Christian, truer in its interpretation.

[1076] by St. Aldhelm, St. Aldhelm the bishop sang the praises of St. Jerome in rude verse indeed, yet generously, thus beginning about him in vol. 13 of the Lyons Library of the Fathers, p. 14:

Behold, I shall unfold the heralding of a splendid Priest, while the thought of the Saint knocks at the inmost chambers of my heart; whose fame grows through the four-square world and whose wisdom shines to the farthest bounds; who was a translator, and a virgin guardian of modesty, turning Hebrew oracles into Roman words. For he laid open the abyss of the rough and ancient Law, his page unlocking seventy-two books, which now the letter writes down on consecrated sheets. Besides, he drew forth treatises rightly to be marvelled at, and by sure commentaries on the Prophets he unwove hidden sayings, unfolding the mysteries of things. He stands renowned as a Master through the ages for his pages, which now are duly copied through the four-square world. And though an illustrious crowd of readers is throughout the earth, the same man, sprung from Eusebius his father, brought forth an enumeration of the published volumes of the ancient Fathers; from the time when the Saviour took the cradle of our flesh upon the earth, cleansing the crimes of the age, when He climbed the gibbet of the cross with His consecrated body, and, having endured wounds, had purged with red blood the human race polluted by the fraud of the evil one — who ever strives with such zeal, or so skilfully, to search out the utterances of the twin Laws, as that same Teacher had meditated on the sacred books, night and day, as the Psalmist sings? A rival *, therefore, defiled with the plague of spite, had torn that same Seer with horrid gapings of the jaws; thus is glory plucked at by the black throats of envy, and the praise of kindly men mauled by the fraud of the wicked: for dogs often press upon a boar with their barkings, hemming him in on all sides with a thick encircling ring. But he scatters the hostile mastiffs with his tusk, and, having gained his wish, reigned on high with a bound.

[1077] in one point too to be corrected, The said Aldhelm then returns to the praises of Jerome on the occasion of the virgins whom the Saint instructed. For, treating at p. 17 of St. Eustochium, he sings again thus:

When the holy Interpreter had written many little works, who set in order the utterances of the rough and ancient Law, turning Hebrew oracles into the tongues of Romulus' sons, and Argive speech as well into Italian words — that same Translator, rich in shadowy books, translated into Latium, unfolding foreign volumes, and at the same time brought forth into the light the Pelasgian treasures of books which the page had veiled in shade, loosing the locks with Ausonian words for keys. Besides, a volume adorned with polished speech that same teacher wrote to a handmaid of Christ, in which are painted the heraldings of a chaste life, with what garlands shining integrity is adorned, keeping the limbs untouched and free from wanton stain.

He adds at last that the Master — namely Jerome — was asked by the mother of Demetrias to write for Demetrias rules of living. For the rest, on those verses I observe that St. Jerome is wrongly praised in them as a virgin. But most rightly is his translation of sacred Scripture from the Hebrew praised: and truly, I think, is it said that from the time of Christ the Lord's birth and passion there has been no one who spent so much zeal and labour in searching the sacred Scriptures thoroughly, and in rightly understanding and expounding them. By the rival who out of envy attacked St. Jerome, Rufinus is in all likelihood designated, who was certainly the chief one, although others too were not lacking.

[1078] Since I have given verses, I add other shorter ones, which were published among the poems of Alcuin, by Blessed Alcuin, Jonas of Orléans, Pope Nicholas I, etc. where the seventy-second, on SS. Gregory and Jerome, runs thus:

Gregory the prelate, and the kindly doctor Jerome: the one was a father of the Church, the other a master.

And presently in Poem CXIII it is said:

Jerome, the marvellous doctor of the whole world.

Jonas of Orléans, in the Work on the cult of images, bk. 3, about to adduce his authority, says: Jerome

the interpreter of the sacred Law, and (so to speak) the library of mother Church. I pass over very many others who briefly praised Jerome, but on account of the similarity of the saying I transfer hither the words of Pope Nicholas I in his Epistle to king Lothair, where St. Jerome is called a cultivator of the heavenly library. Singular is the saying about SS. Jerome and Augustine which the Monk of St. Gall reports in the Historians of France in Bouquet, vol. 5, p. 110. For, as the said Monk attests, when the emperor Charlemagne said: O that I had twelve clerics so learned and so perfectly instructed in all wisdom as Jerome and Augustine were! Alcuin, being present, replied: The Creator of heaven and earth did not have many like them, and you wish to have twelve? I pass over all the rest of the middle ages, except the martyrologists, whose words will be cited below. I pass over also the far more numerous most learned men of later centuries, because the judgment of more recent writers on the writings and virtues of St. Jerome is everywhere known.

* i.e. Bethlehem

* Æmulus

§ LXIV. The natal day of St. Jerome announced in all sacred Calendars everywhere at the XXX of September: several observations on the Saint's age, much increased by certain writers; the translation of the body at the IX of May. The Saint likewise mentioned by the Greeks and the Muscovites.

The memory of the Saint celebrated in the most ancient Martyrologies, In the most ancient Martyrologies, which we call Hieronymian, because St. Jerome either is the author of that Martyrology, or rather was long thought to be its author (about which more will be said in its place), the memory of the holy Doctor is celebrated at the XXX of September. In Florentini, in the text which he gave from his own codices, it is read thus: In the territory of Jerusalem, the deposition of St. Jerome the priest. In the most ancient Epternach codex, which he cites in his Annotations: At the town of Bethlehem, of Jerome the priest. In the same place, in the Corbie codex: In the city of Bethlehem, the deposition of St. Jerome the priest. Of the same St. Jerome the priest an ancient Calendar makes mention, which was published after the Martyrology. There are added the Hieronymian Martyrologies which were published by us in vol. VII of June, and those published by d'Achery in the Spicilegium, and the ancient ones which Martène gave in vol. 3 of the Anecdota and vol. 6 of the Amplissima Collectio. In all of these, I say, which are entire, the memory of St. Jerome is honoured at the XXX of September. As regards the place, there is the same variety which may be observed from the words already given. For in some he is mentioned at Bethlehem, in others at Jerusalem or in the territory of Jerusalem, or even at Jerusalem, which is not right. Bethlehem in St. Jerome's time was in the diocese of Jerusalem, and for this reason he who had died at Bethlehem may have been announced as in the territory of Jerusalem; or to the town of Bethlehem, where in most he is rightly placed, it may have been added that it belongs to the territory of Jerusalem. Certainly in the Murbach codex in Martène it is read thus: In the territory of Jerusalem, in leem (read, in Bethlehem), of Jerome the priest. And out of in the territory of Jerusalem it may have come about that others for brevity's sake wrote at Jerusalem, as is read in the Gellone codex and in the first one in Martène. Let this suffice concerning the Hieronymian martyrologies. Particular eulogies I shall give below.

[1080] likewise in Bede, Rabanus, Wandelbert, Bede in his Martyrology, as it is printed before vol. 2 of March, has this: In Bethlehem of Judah, the deposition of St. Jerome the priest, who died in his ninety-first year. In three codices, after the word priest, this is interposed: Who conferred much on the holy Church by his labour: for to him the world was crucified, and he to the world. Which Papebroch believed was added by Florus. In the metrical Martyrology which d'Achery published in vol. 10 of the Spicilegium, Bede sings thus at the same day:

And on the day before (the Kalends of October) the good interpreter Jerome shines.

Rabanus, elsewhere accustomed to follow Bede, did not follow him here as to Jerome's age, and wove an eulogy of this sort: In Bethlehem of Judah, the deposition of Jerome the priest, whose life and teaching is laudably known everywhere in the churches of Christ; how he translated the divine books from the Hebrew tongue into Latin, and expounded the Prophetic books in the allegorical sense. And when he had completed the days of eighty-eight years, leaving the present life, he departed to eternal rest. Wandelbert celebrated Jerome in verses of this sort:

An approved interpreter of the Law, both old and new, an instructor in doctrine, a condemner of wicked heresy, Jerome, on the day before, closes exulting September.

To these, on account of the magnificence of the eulogy, I add the words of an ancient Martyrology which Martène found marked with Bede's name, and gave in vol. 6 of the Amplissima Collection, where at the XXX of September this is read: The natal day of St. Jerome the priest, than whom after the Apostles there was no other more excellent.

[1081] in the small Roman, in Ado, and others, The old or small Roman Martyrology, which Rosweyde published, mentions Jerome most briefly in these words: At Bethlehem, of Jerome the priest. But Ado wove a lengthy eulogy, in which he asserts many things about St. Jerome's deeds and many about his writings. But not everything is related in the right order, nor is everything accurate. The order can be restored from our Commentary; and what Ado says, he is afterwards ordained a priest of the Roman Church, has been refuted at no. 197 and following. He concludes the eulogy with these words: At last, after a perfect manner of life pleasing to God, in the ninety-eighth year of his age he rested in peace at the town of Bethlehem on the day before the Kalends of October, in the twelfth year of the emperor Honorius. He composed his books over fifty-six years. What is asserted about his age, and about the years which he spent in writing books, is read also in the Auxerre Martyrology in Martène. The same age Usuard attributes to St. Jerome, announcing him briefly thus: On the same day at Bethlehem of Judah, the deposition of blessed Jerome the priest, who died in the ninety-eighth year of his age and the sixth month. But this age is too great, since the Saint seems to have died either in the eighty-ninth or the ninetieth year of his age. So too he did not spend fifty-six years in writing books, although this too is read in the first Life; but far fewer. That Ado says he died in the XII year of Honorius, which coincides with the year 406, is clearly faulty, and he meant, I think, to say with the first Life, in the twelfth year of Theodosius the Younger, which is the year 419. The said errors about the age and the year of St. Jerome's death are found also in the Martyrology of Notker, who abridged much from Ado.

[1082] In two supplements to Usuard's Martyrology in our Sollier the Saint is said to have died in the ninety-ninth year of his age, with some singular eulogies at the 30th of September, and likewise in two, in the year of the Christian era CDXXIII. Both seem to have been adopted from Giovanni d'Andrea, who in part 2 of the Life of St. Jerome, fol. 23 and 24, inquires at length into the year of St. Jerome's death, and by his argument arrives at saying at fol. 25: From these things thus gathered I conclude (though as it were trembling), because of the contradictions of the Chronicles which I have seen, that Jerome died in the year of the Lord four hundred and twenty-two or twenty-three, in the ninety-ninth year of his age. This I only indicate that the reader may see whence those errors flowed: for the year of his death has been discussed in §61. What is read as singular in the eulogy of the Brussels codex I transfer hither: Of whom (Jerome) a certain man in a vision of the night heard one, as it were reading in a book, these verses:

Admiring Greece rejoices in no nursling more, if she shall count her forefathers back from the first origin: more than what is praised is that which is praised in him.

In another of several codices there is reported the deposition of holy Jerome the priest, a most holy man and most learned in sacred Scripture. He, having attained the studies of all letters, and having become an imitator of the most approved monks as well, etc. I pass over the rest.

[1083] Baronius in the Roman Martyrology so praised St. Jerome [as also in the present-day Roman one. In this also, at the IX of May, the translation of the body,] as at the same time to mention the translation of the body. I subjoin the words: In Bethlehem of Judah, the deposition of St. Jerome the priest and doctor of the Church, who, having attained the studies of all letters and having become an imitator of approved monks, pierced many monsters of heresies with the sword of his doctrine: at last, when he had lived to a decrepit age, he rested in peace, and was buried at the Lord's manger: whose body, afterwards carried to Rome, is preserved with worthy honour in the basilica of St. Mary Major. The same writer again writes this about the translation of the body at the IX of May: At Rome likewise the translation of holy Jerome the priest and doctor of the Church from Bethlehem of Judah to the basilica of St. Mary at the manger. Baronius in his Annotations cites Peter de Natalibus in the Catalogue of the Saints, which he wrote about the year 1370. It is read announced more briefly in the Usuardine codex of Utrecht in Sollier, in these words: Likewise the translation of the glorious Jerome, outstanding doctor. That codex belonged to the Clerics of St. Jerome at Utrecht, so that it is not to be wondered at if they perhaps among the first inscribed the translation of their Patron in the sacred Calendars. But Sollier in his Preface, p. LIX, observes of that codex: Nowhere do certain indications of its age occur. Nor would I determine from the script whether it was written in the XIV century or at the beginning of the following one, so that perhaps that codex is later than Peter de Natalibus. The same translation is briefly mentioned from the register of the Charterhouse of Utrecht, whose age is equally uncertain.

[1084] as also announced by other more recent writers. The author of the manuscript Florarium of the Saints, who finished his work in the year 1486, has this at the IX of May: The translation of blessed Jerome, priest and outstanding doctor. In the said Sollier the Lübeck-Cologne edition, both of the year 1490, mentions the translation thus: At Bethlehem of Judah, the translation of blessed Jerome, priest and doctor of the Church, to the city of Rome. Almost the same words Greven has. Maurolico in his Martyrology announced the translation at the IX of May in these words: Likewise (the translation, as he said before) of St. Jerome from Bethlehem to Rome, into the church of St. Mary Major. Galesini on the same day: At Rome besides, the translation of holy Jerome, priest and doctor: which was made thither from the town of Bethlehem to the basilica of St. Mary Major. There are added other more recent martyrologists, whose catalogue it is not necessary to weave. This I observe to our purpose, that by the martyrologists cited the time at which the translation was made is not indicated, and that none of those alleged is certainly older than the XIV century. Thus far of the Latin Calendars.

[1085] The memory of the Saint at the 15th of June among the Greeks and Muscovites. There remain some things to be said about the memory of St. Jerome among the Greeks and the Muscovites. Our Henschen in the Prætermissi at the XV of June observed to our purpose the following: “St. Jerome resting in peace is recorded in the manuscript Menaea of Dijon, and in the added verses he is called Jerome the great, to whom after death a great crown is due, so that he seems to mean holy Jerome the doctor of the Church, who should be referred to the XXX of September: and this is more clearly recognized from the Muscovite Synaxary, where he is said to have been born in the Dalmatian city of Stridon.” Thus far Henschen. And the Muscovite Synaxary which he cites,

is that very one which elsewhere among us is called the Slavo-Russian, and which the most illustrious lord John Gabriel, baron of Sparwenfeld, rendered word for word into Latin out of the Slavonic tongue, and collated with many codices. In it, after the words alleged, only this is added about the Saint's age: He lived in the year CCCLXXXVIII. There is added another shorter Synaxary of the Russians, which, rendered into Latin, Fr. George David, of the Society of Jesus, then a missionary at Moscow, sent hither in the year 1688: for in it at the same day is read: Of the venerable Jerome. From these it is clear that the memory of St. Jerome was not altogether neglected and passed over by the Greeks, as a certain recent writer believed.

§ LXV. The Saint's body translated from Palestine to Rome, and deposited in the basilica of St. Mary Major.

The body of St. Jerome translated to Rome, We have already seen St. Jerome's translation asserted in various Calendars, but the time of the translation passed over. The first of the writers whose Works we have in print will be, I think, Giovanni d'Andrea, who asserted that translation. For in part 2 of the Life of St. Jerome, or, as he calls it, of his Hieronymianus, fol. 35, he asserts the translation to the basilica of St. Mary Major, but presently slips into fictitious miracles which were supposed to have been done in Palestine, and which are asserted in the supposititious Epistles of which I have treated. But afterwards he goes on to narrate the Roman translation, citing a Roman Legend, and writing thus: But continuing, in a certain Legend from Rome I found that, a great course of time having passed after the death of the glorious Jerome, Jerusalem was destroyed and occupied by barbarians. And when it had been bereft of the relics of almost all the Saints, the body of blessed Jerome alone being left in those parts, that same glorious Doctor appeared to a monk living there, bidding that his body be carried to Rome and laid in the church of the Mother of God at the Lord's manger. And he, admonished by a threefold vision, arose and took up the sacred relics of blessed Jerome: and came to Rome with two companions: and in the aforesaid basilica, in a humble place, as he himself had bidden, before the Lord's manger, with the canons of that basilica assisting, devoutly laid them. And thus the holy Man, triumphing in heaven, willed to honour that basilica which, warring on earth, he had most devoutly praised with great encomiums. Thus Giovanni d'Andrea about the Roman translation; but he presently returns to the fictitious Epistles, to report fabulous miracles.

[1087] The most illustrious and most reverend lord Pietro Filippo Strozzi, and that translation briefly narrated by Giovanni d'Andrea, canon of the basilica of St. Mary Major, most kindly communicated to us at Rome in the year 1753 a manuscript Dissertation on the body of St. Jerome, which he composed on account of a silver casket found in the said basilica with sacred relics, which he judges to be those of St. Jerome, and tries to prove that they should be held for such. A like Dissertation was put together by the most learned lord Giuseppe Bianchini, a priest of the Roman Oratory, who with the most illustrious Strozzi was present at the said finding of the relics, and intends to prove the same thing with him: and with like kindness he gave us a Summary of his Dissertation. And since these learned men not only discuss the relics of St. Jerome, once hidden and afterwards found, as they certainly try to prove, but also strive to assert the Roman translation itself and to investigate its time, I shall often have to cite them. Bianchini in his Summary attests that three manuscript accounts are had at Rome, and one of them in the Vallicellan codex A. 13, which he says was transcribed word for word from Giovanni d'Andrea. But if no more is read in the codex than in Giovanni d'Andrea's Hieronymianus, I shall more readily believe that Giovanni d'Andrea's account was afterwards transcribed into the codex: for the account conforms to Giovanni d'Andrea's style, and does not seem to be such an account as was composed by the first writer, but as it was abridged by Giovanni d'Andrea from the first composition. And that accounts of this kind about the Saints were not seldom excerpted from larger Works and transferred into manuscript codices I have frequently found: for instance, among the copies sent hither for the Lives of the Saints we have sometimes found some fragment about a Saint from St. Gregory of Tours, sometimes a lengthy eulogy from Ado, sometimes an account from Vincent of Beauvais, sometimes from others. So then the abridged account of Giovanni d'Andrea could have been transferred into the Vallicellan codex, as also the miracles done at Troia, to be given below from Giovanni d'Andrea.

[1088] more at length by Peter de Natalibus: Peter de Natalibus in bk. 4, chap. 145, sets down a twofold translation of St. Jerome, but the first is drawn from the supposititious letters, and is plainly none at all. The second (nay rather the first) translation is, he says, that which is found in the Roman Chronicles, by which his body was translated from Bethlehem to Rome and laid up in the church of St. Mary Major. For after many courses of years from the death of the glorious Jerome, Jerusalem being destroyed and occupied by the Saracens, when it had been bereft of the relics of almost all the Saints, the body of blessed Jerome alone being left in those parts, that Doctor himself appeared to a monk living there, bidding him carry his body to Rome and entomb it in the church of the Mother of God beside the Lord's manger. And when he dreaded to do this, he is admonished a second time by the holy Doctor: and, refusing to fulfil the commands, is a third time more harshly rebuked for his negligence. Then he secretly took away the relics of St. Jerome, and with two faithful companions, all succeeding prosperously, came to Rome. Whom the Saint again admonished near the City by a vision, that, only the canons of the church being called together, he should lay up the body by night as it were clandestinely, lest from the crowds coming up it should suffer some diminution in the relics. And so, as the Saint had commanded, he fulfilled the orders; he announced beforehand to the canons of that church alone, and, they being present, in a humble place, namely in the ground, before the Lord's manger, he devoutly laid the body by night: where by certain persons angelic voices were heard singing together; and an immense light, like the noonday ray of the sun, shone forth there, and a wondrous fragrance of odour sprinkled every one. And this festival is celebrated on the day on which the body of the kindly Doctor was there deposited, namely the VII Ides of May. Thus the said de Natalibus, who abridged the first Acts less than Giovanni d'Andrea did.

[1089] both of whom, as it seems, drew their matter from a History written at Rome, Paolo de Angelis, in his work on the Basilica of St. Mary Major, bk. 6, chap. 4, published the Translation of St. Jerome to the said basilica, as it is read, he says, in a most ancient manuscript book of the archive of St. Mary Major, and in another book of the archive of St. Peter at the Vatican. A copy of the same we have from a Lectionary of the Medici Library at Florence, which I have collated with the printed edition, from which it not seldom differs in the minutiae of some words, but as to the matter itself plainly agrees. That this is the first History of the translation I am wholly persuaded, because the author does not cite older writings, but asserts that he will write as he had received it by truthful assertion from holy and honourable bishops and from the older priests (in the manuscript, Fathers) and clerics fearing the Lord. If an older History of the translation had existed at Rome, the author would without doubt have cited it, as Giovanni d'Andrea cited one, which I judge to be this very one. For everything which Giovanni d'Andrea related is read in this History: but the rest he omitted. Receive, then, diligent reader, from the edition of Paolo de Angelis the whole account, written in all likelihood in good faith, yet not with the greatest discrimination. That each point may be more easily weighed, I subjoin it in parts.

[1090] How the body of blessed Jerome, the outstanding doctor, which is here reprinted entire. was carried to Rome, and most devoutly placed in the basilica of the blessed Virgin Mary before the manger. This is to be taken as the title, and is omitted in our manuscript. Among the laudable prerogatives which the divine mercy abundantly conferred upon the reverend and kindly City, it exultingly granted her the bodies of the chief Apostles, namely Peter and Paul, Philip and James, Bartholomew and Matthias, and also of precious martyrs, confessors, virgins, for her most sure protection and for the possessing of perpetual glory: by whose most powerful suffrages she may shine magnified in time, and may resplend perennially glorious with eternal gladness in the heavens. Among whom blessed Jerome, the outstanding doctor, deserved to obtain a magnificent place in the aforesaid City at the basilica of the ever Virgin Mary which is called at the manger, so that he might more fittingly rest in her royal house, whom in life he strove more excellently and faithfully to commend with magnificent and most devout praises. How, then, the body of that same wonderful Doctor was carried from Bethlehem, where it had been buried, to the aforesaid hall of the glorious Virgin, to Rome , as we have received by truthful assertion from holy and honourable bishops and from the older priests and clerics fearing God, we set forth in a brief discourse, with love, to our readers, for the praise of that same most blessed Jerome. This I have judged should be given from the printed and the manuscript text collated together, choosing from each what seems more correct, and noting the variant words in the margin where the faults are not clear enough. In the printed text, besides, for these words for the praise of that same most blessed Jerome, there is read, for the praise of that same most blessed Lady, which is referred to the Virgin. Let us subjoin the rest likewise.

[1091] Therefore after that holy city Jerusalem, on account of the sins of mortals, remained bereft of the most holy — nay, of all — relics, the body of the venerable Doctor alone remained at that time more secretly and without fitting honour in Holy Mary of Bethlehem. Wishing therefore that his most holy body be carried back to the magnificent City, where he had formerly been a Cardinal and whence he had withdrawn, and be venerably placed in the aforesaid house of the Mother of the Most High , he appeared to a certain most holy monk dwelling in the parts beyond the sea, to whom with a calm and sweet utterance he said: Brother, to be loved and to be placed with me in heavenly glory, know that I have obtained from the Lord, with the help of the Queen of heaven, that you should by your labours and expense take my body out of the tomb, and carry it to Rome as quickly and devoutly as may be, and take care to place it in a humble tomb before the door of that most blessed crypt which is called the manger of the Lord , so that my body may cling in that holy basilica to the most sweet Queen, whom while living I loved from my infancy, sought in my youth, and in old age preached with all my strength, insufficient though I was, and praised with pious and holy testimonies of the Scriptures even to my end. And when that holy man had heard such things from holy Jerome in a threefold vision of visitation, he arose in haste, and went to the place, and cautiously, two companions accompanying him, took up the most blessed body, a wondrous fragrance of odour abounding there, and secretly returned to his own place: and, lest a scandal should grow up in those parts, he kept the secret until he should come more devoutly to the City, as the Saint had demanded. I briefly note here that in the printed text there is some variation in the wording where it is asserted

that the body of St. Jerome alone survived at Bethlehem, but that the same thing is plainly asserted.

[1092] [to Rome, and lays it up with his companions and the canons in the basilica of St. Mary Major:] And since the aforesaid monk, most faithful to Christ, had understood from holy Jerome that in such services he should avoid popular attention, lest in the court it should suffer any diminution of its relics, coming to the oft-mentioned basilica with those two companions secretly by night, only the canons of that hall assisting and rendering, as much with heart as with mind, most devout praises with lowered voice to God and the blessed Virgin, he buried it between the columns of the basilica and the door of the manger with full watchfulness of mind. And in that office of burial the said canons, with the monk and his two companions, perceived an unspeakable sweetness of odour, and their blessed eyes beheld an immense brightness, such as they had never seen in the basilica . For there was present at the burial of her most learned Praiser and most devout Jerome one brighter than the moon and more splendid than the sun, sweeter than all perfumes, hedged about with roses and with the precious mystical lilies of the valleys — the most splendid Virgin Mary, who, most sweet Lady, showed all that has been related, in honour of her most faithful servant and for his possessing the ineffable everlasting glory which he had deserved; she herself bearing sweet testimony of herself through Solomon: They that make me known shall possess eternal life. With these words, which are properly said of eternal Wisdom, the account ends in our copy.

[1093] The conclusion of the account. But in the said de Angelis the following is added: Rejoice therefore, blessed Doctor; rejoice and exult, Friend of Jesus Christ, founded in true charity, that that most sweet Queen of heaven and earth, whom while living in the world you made known with immense praises and precious preachings, has wonderfully honoured you at your coming, has evenly magnified you before our heavenly Judge, has crowned you perennially in the heavenly palace with angels and archangels, and at last has honourably prepared for you a fitting place in this her royal and beautiful hall. We also accordingly beg you, venerable and most blessed Priest of Christ — we, the praisers, though unworthy yet assiduous and most devout, of so great and glorious a Virgin and of your sanctity — that, even as we magnify your most holy body with assiduous praises on earth, so you may by your most holy and assiduous prayers effectually commend us sinners to our Saviour in heaven: by His granting, who is over all things God, good unto ages of ages. Amen. Thus far the Translation written by an Anonymous author, which Giovanni d'Andrea abridged, as the diligent reader will easily see if he carefully compares his brief summary with this account. Peter de Natalibus wished to follow the same, but after his manner, that is, by changing some things rather freely.

[1094] That Translation is confirmed by the testimonies of Roman Pontiffs, But now it may be asked concerning that history of the Translation whether from it the translation seems sufficiently certain, and at what time it was accomplished. I answer that the translation itself seems certain enough, but that the several circumstances of the translation do not seem equally certain. For that translation of the sacred body can be confirmed by very many testimonies, some of which the said de Angelis adduced. He cites first a bull of Pope Pius II, issued at Rome at St. Mary Major, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation MCDLVIII, on the twelfth Kalends of February, in the first year, he says, of our Pontificate. And from the first year of the pontificate of Pius II it is clear that the bull was issued in the year 1459, as we now begin the year from the Kalends of January, but that the year 1458 is expressed, because that year ran until the XXV day of March. In the Bull the Pontiff grants indulgences on the IX day of May, on the feast of the translation of St. Jerome, and speaks thus of his body: Desiring greatly that the altar of the divine Jerome, chief doctor of the universal Church, where his most glorious body rests in the basilica of blessed Mary Major of the city of Rome, built by the divine miracle of the summer snow, should be frequented with fitting honours, etc. He subjoins other Letters of the same Pontiff, issued in the year 1464, on the Kalends of June, by which the said festival of the translation is transferred to another day, in these words: Moved also by this occasion, we have by Apostolic authority decreed that the solemnity of the translation of the most blessed Jerome, priest and chief doctor, which was formerly kept on the seventh Ides of May, is to be kept and celebrated on the vigil of the Lord's Ascension, on which a greater throng of peoples is known to flock from the places bordering the City to the shrines of the Saints: and that the altar of that same glorious Doctor set up in the basilica of blessed Mary Major of the city of Rome — at which, as at the hour of his sacred falling asleep, he rests in the same flesh in which he flourished — may on that day be more fruitfully and devoutly honoured, transferring to that same vigil the plenary remission formerly granted by us, etc.

[1095] There are added in the same place Letters of Sixtus IV, in which mention is made of the foregoing, of many martyrologists, and of writers and the indulgences are confirmed. In them likewise the altar of St. Jerome is mentioned, and it is added: At which his sacred body is known undoubtedly to be laid up. To these are added there the Roman Martyrology and Breviary, and there must further be added the Martyrologies mentioned above from no. 1083, and the cited Peter de Natalibus and the older Giovanni d'Andrea. Peter Calo, of the Order of Preachers, who is praised by Peter de Natalibus in his Prologue as the latest of all writers about the Saints, says at the end of the Miracles of St. Jerome, of which we have a copy: The body of St. Jerome was carried to Rome, … but I have not found by whom, or when. Thus he at the beginning of the XIV century, in all likelihood before Giovanni d'Andrea, and perhaps even before the history of the translation was written. Baronius at the XXIII of July, in his Annotations on the Martyrology, produces the inscription of the basilica of holy Mary Major, set in mosaic work in the apse, and framed in these words: In this sacred basilica are laid up the bodies of the holy Matthias the apostle, Jerome the doctor, and Romula and Redempta the virgins. Strozzi in the said manuscript Dissertation, §14, thinks that that list of indulgences and relics, part of which we have just given, was composed in mosaic work not long after the death of Pope Nicholas IV, who died in the year 1292 and was buried in the basilica of St. Mary Major. This I can neither confirm nor weaken, since I have not examined the work itself.

[1096] But certainly Francesco Pipino too, also cited by Strozzi, of the XIV century. of the Order of Preachers, whose Chronicle Muratori published in vol. 9 of the Writers of Italy, chap. 23, treating of Nicholas IV, entirely suggests that the body of St. Jerome rested in the basilica of St. Mary Major before that Pontiff's death, since he writes this: The same Nicholas dies at Rome, and was buried in the church of St. Mary Major beside the tomb of blessed Jerome. Pipino flourished at the beginning of the XIV century, and in the year 1320 set out for Palestine, and carried his Chronicle down at least to the year 1314, that is, to the death of Pope Clement V. The said Strozzi adds Lope de Olmedo, the founder of the Hieronymite Order in Italy, who wrote a Life of St. Jerome in the XV century, under the pontificate of Martin V. Since that is not at hand for us, I transfer hither the words copied out by Strozzi, omitting however for brevity's sake the earlier ones, in which are enumerated the bodies of certain chief Saints which are preserved at Rome. Among whom, says the author, blessed Jerome, the outstanding doctor, deserved to obtain a magnificent place in the aforesaid City at the basilica of the ever Virgin Mary which is called at the Manger, so that he might more fittingly rest in her royal house, whom in life he strove more excellently and faithfully to commend with magnificent and most devout praises. I pass over more recent writers of the Life of St. Jerome, and many others who agree about his translation to the basilica of St. Mary Major. For the testimonies alleged entirely suffice, especially since I have not found any writer who asserted that after the XIII century the Saint's body remained at Bethlehem, or was translated to another place. Yet other testimonies of the translation will be cited below.

[1097] But the History of the Translation itself seems less accurate. But as regards the several assertions of the writer about the manner in which the body was translated and deposited in the basilica of the most blessed Virgin, I shall gladly confess that they do not all seem equally certain. Indeed the writer professes that he will narrate the matter as he had received it from bishops and from older priests; but he names none of them, nor does he affirm that any of them was present at the event, which ought not to have been kept silent if he had learned the matter from eyewitnesses. By that manner of speaking, then, he somewhat suggests that he wrote a notable time after the translation, and makes it likely that none survived of the canons and others who had been present at the translation. Since, therefore, the author seems to have written perhaps forty or fifty years after the event, and cites no older writings, many of his statements will be able to seem less certain. Such is, first, what he says, that the body was translated to Rome from its first tomb, that is, from Bethlehem. For perhaps long before this the Saint's body had been carried from Bethlehem to another city of the Holy Land which was subject to Christians, and thence afterwards translated to Rome. Such, secondly, is what is added, that the body was taken away by a monk admonished by a revelation. Certainly I do not see how a monk could have carried it off secretly from Bethlehem, while the Saracens held sway there. Such, thirdly, seems to me what is asserted about all the relics having been previously carried away from the city of Jerusalem, and about the body of St. Jerome alone being left at Bethlehem. Such are almost all the remaining circumstances, since the author by his vague account entirely hints that he was not accurately informed about the persons who took part in the translation, or about the manner and time in which it was accomplished.

* perhaps possidenda

* elsewhere in

* elsewhere Romæ

* in the Ms., patribus

* printed text: sanctissimis cunctis

* These words are not in the Ms.

* printed text: quanto

* elsewhere appellatur

* elsewhere trina

* elsewhere devotus

* elsewhere devotus

* elsewhere a

* elsewhere in eadem basilica

* elsewhere oculis

§ LXVI. The time is inquired into at which the Saint's body was carried to Rome.

[The body of St. Jerome was certainly not translated to Rome before the XIII century:] Bianchini, cited above, in the manuscript Dissertation on the body of St. Jerome, whose Summary he communicated to us, investigates at length and carefully the time at which the body was translated to Rome. And he proves excellently that that sacred body was not removed from Palestine nor translated to Rome before the XIII century, and further intends to prove that it was not translated except after the year 1283. The first point seems altogether certain. For James of Vitry, cited at no. 1062, who was both bishop of Acre and Apostolic legate in the Holy Land in the XIII century, affirms in express words that St. Jerome rested at Bethlehem in his time. To this testimony, which is beyond all exception, there is added the silence of all writers,

who either flourished before the XIII century, or wrote in that very century, at least down to the year 1283 or nearly the end of the century, since none of them mentioned a translation of St. Jerome into Europe, even though they made mention of him or of his tomb. Hence the opinions of those fall of themselves who, from ill-founded conjectures, made the translation many centuries older, and namely the opinion of the most illustrious Francesco Bianchini, who in his Annotations on Anastasius the Librarian, vol. 3, from p. 110, discoursed at length in order to prove that the body of St. Jerome, together with the Lord's manger, was carried from Palestine to Rome in the VII century.

[1099] For to prove so ancient a translation the words of Adamnan which he produces cannot help. nor is what someone judged about an older translation probable. St. Adamnan wrote toward the end of the VII century or the beginning of the following one a little Work on the Holy Land, as Arculf the bishop, who had visited the holy places, explained each thing to Adamnan after he had been carried thence to England. These words of Adamnan, then, the said Francesco Bianchini produces: Concerning the tomb of holy Jerome too, when we inquired with like solicitude, Arculf says thus: The tomb of holy Jerome, about which you inquire, I saw; which is found in another church, built outside that same little city (Bethlehem) in the valley, which, situated on the southern side, borders on the ridge of the aforesaid little hill of Bethlehem. And that tomb of Jerome, composed with similar workmanship to David's monument, has no ornament. Having cited these words, Bianchini strives to infer from the lack of ornament that St. Jerome's tomb was empty. But that reason has no force: for the tomb could lack ornament on account of the Saracens ruling in Palestine, and perhaps also it had lacked all ornament up to that time, and went on lacking it until the entry of the Latins into the Holy Land. For the Latins do not seem to have remained long in the monastery of Bethlehem after St. Jerome's death, and the Greeks, who almost neglected St. Jerome's cult, do not seem to have been solicitous about adorning his tomb. But at least Arculf or Adamnan did not say that the Saint's tomb was empty, or that the body had been translated to Rome, just as no one else is read to have asserted it before the decline of the XIII century.

[1100] Giuseppe Bianchini, who carefully refutes the said opinion of his most illustrious uncle, There is likewise no testimony by which, before the decline of the XIII century, draws another argument from the Work of John the deacon on the Lateran Church, which Mabillon published in vol. 2 of the Museum Italicum. And it was written about the year 1260 to Alexander IV, not to Alexander III, as is read in the index of contents in the volume, perhaps through the typesetter's error. Hence he reasons thus. John the deacon in chap. 15, p. 573, reviews the relics of St. Mary Major. But he makes no mention of the body of St. Jerome. Therefore in the year 1260 it was not in the basilica of St. Mary Major or translated to Rome. It could indeed be answered that not all the bodies of Saints which were then preserved in the basilica of St. Mary Major are enumerated there by John the deacon, as is gathered from the catalogues of relics of this church. Nevertheless the argument will not lack its probability, since he at least reviews the chief relics, and speaks of the body of St. Matthias, and omits the body of no Saint so famous as St. Jerome is. He adds greater force to that same argument from another quarter, from the silence of James of Voragine about the translation. Certainly the said author speaks of St. Jerome's burial at Bethlehem, but is silent about a translation; nor does he seem likely to have passed this over, if he had understood that it had been accomplished. But James of Voragine, who died archbishop of Genoa in the year 1298, is rather to be reckoned to have written the Lives of the Saints some years after 1260 than before, and perhaps about 1280 or 1290 he was more occupied with them than about 1260: for of the time at which he composed his books we know nothing, except that some were written before his episcopate, begun in the year 1292, and others during his episcopate.

[1101] it can be proved to have been translated. Nor yet from that silence Bianchini adds Burchard, who in the year 1283 was in the Holy Land. His words from Canisius's edition I have already given at no. 1062: but from them nothing can be proved either for a translation before that time or for the body remaining there then; since he only says briefly that he saw the cell, the bed and the tomb of St. Jerome, and hints no more that the body was in the tomb than that it was in the cell or the bed. Nay, I should rather believe that in the year 1283 it was no longer at Bethlehem, but was either already at Rome, or in one of those cities which even then remained to the Christians in Palestine. I shall gladly confess, indeed, that no certain testimony is found of the Saint's body being translated from Bethlehem before that time. But from other considerations it does not appear likely that it was left so long at Bethlehem, where the Saracens ruled, who could do it injury, especially since various occasions were not lacking for snatching it from their power. That the diligent reader may perceive these occasions, I shall begin from the year 1220, about which time Vitry attested that the Saint's body was at Bethlehem. In the year 1221 a truce of eight years was made between John of Jerusalem and Meledin king of the Saracens, who together with Egypt possessed part of the kingdom of Jerusalem and Jerusalem itself. During the time of that truce the Saracens would not have grudgingly permitted the body of St. Jerome to be translated into the dominion of the Christians.

[1102] does it seem certain that the translation was not made Again in the year 1229 the emperor Frederick II made with the same Meledin a truce of ten years, rightly indeed disapproved by the Christians, yet such that he received Jerusalem and Bethlehem, and on that occasion the Christians had full liberty of translating the sacred body of St. Jerome to a safer place before war with the Saracens should be renewed. So favourable was that occasion for translating all relics from unfortified places, that I can scarcely think that the body of St. Jerome remained at Bethlehem until the truce was ended, especially since ecclesiastics, who disapproved Frederick's doings in Palestine, must have feared that Bethlehem and Jerusalem would again fall into the hands of the Saracens, as in fact happened. And indeed, just as we have no testimony of the body being then removed from Bethlehem, so we can prove by no argument that it remained there until the year 1240, so that it becomes to me highly likely that it was in those times secretly removed from Bethlehem by ecclesiastics. Yet other occasions too were not afterwards lacking of drawing the sacred body of Jerome out of the hands of the Saracens, if it had not yet been done, since there were other truces afterwards, which I pass over for brevity's sake. St. Louis king of France also stayed in Palestine from the year 1250 to 1254, and would easily have found a way of receiving the body of St. Jerome, if it had been at that time at Bethlehem. Lastly, in the year 1263, as Sanudo attests in bk. 3, part 12, chap. 6, the monastery of Bethlehem was destroyed by the Saracens, so that at least not long after the destruction of the monastery the relics do not seem to have been left there, if indeed the body of St. Jerome had remained there down to that time — which I shall not believe without a witness.

[1103] The time at which it was translated to Rome can be broadly assigned between the middle and the end of the XIII century. before the year 1283: nor is it made certain that it was not made after 1286. Bianchini in his manuscript Summary strives to fix the translation in the year 1284 or 1285. But I do not find reasons strong enough for determining the time so closely. He reasons thus. Burchard, whose words I gave at no. 1062, was in the Holy Land in the year 1283, and makes no mention of a translation. It was therefore made after that year. But by the same right another will say: Burchard makes no mention of the body being preserved there. Therefore it did not remain at Bethlehem. That the body was translated not after the year 1286 Bianchini wishes to infer from the fact that William Durandus in the Rationale of the Divine Offices, bk. 7, chap. 1, numbers the feast of St. Jerome among the semi-double feasts, as if it had then been recently instituted. But in all likelihood the festival of St. Jerome had been celebrated with that rite no less long than those of SS. Ambrose, Augustine and Gregory, with whom it is there placed, as also with some Apostles and Evangelists; nor was that festival instituted on account of the translation of the body. Nevertheless I entirely judge that before the year 1290 the body of St. Jerome was in the church of St. Mary Major, and that on account of other arguments adduced by the said Bianchini.

[1104] Paolo de Angelis, in his work on the Basilica of St. Mary Major, bk. 6, chap. 1, affirms [Yet the Saint's body seems to have been in the basilica of St. Mary Major before 1290:] that a bull was issued by Nicholas IV in the year 1290, on the 1st day of March, and that by it various indulgences are granted to those visiting the basilica of St. Mary Major on the days there enumerated. And from that bull it is probably gathered that St. Jerome's relics were already there: for his festival is honoured with particular indulgences, which is not done for the festival of any other confessor. Nicholas, namely, grants two years and as many quarantines to those visiting the church from the first day of Lent, which is called St. Martin's, until the feast of the Purification: and from Septuagesima Sunday until the feast of Pentecost on each day, and on each of the festivals of the holy Apostles, of Michael the archangel, of Lawrence and of Jerome. Here the same indulgences are given on the festivals of St. Jerome and of the Apostles, and no other confessor or doctor is there honoured with particular indulgences. And that this was done on account of the body deposited there is gathered from the indulgences for the feast of St. Matthias which follow there. For on the festival of St. Matthias, whose body was preserved in that basilica, four years and as many quarantines are granted, as on the Nativity of the Lord and on the other chief festivals. And so, just as Matthias alone of the Apostles has four years, doubtless on account of his body, so Jerome alone of the doctors and confessors has, along with the Apostles, two years — certainly on account of the presence of his body. Hence, then, we shall rightly infer that before the year 1290 the Saint's body was at Rome, especially since we find it there again by other arguments in the year 1292 and in the year 1295 and thereafter: but thus we do not yet know at what time it was carried thither. What is read in the said de Angelis in the same place about indulgences from Panvinio proves the same, if it is equally accurate.

[1105] The words of Pipino given at no. 1096, in which Nicholas IV is said in the year 1292 to have been buried beside the tomb of blessed Jerome, again prove that the body of St. Jerome was there at least before the year 1292. [and the translation was certainly made in the XIII century between 1220 and 1290,] But at the same time they seem to suggest that the translation

was made earlier than Bianchini thinks. For since Pipino lived at that time, he seems likely to have suggested something about a recent translation, if the translation had preceded the death of Nicholas IV by only seven or eight years. Bianchini adds the mosaic work, whose words about the body of St. Jerome were cited at no. 1095, which he asserts was put together in the year 1295 by order of Cardinal Giacomo Colonna. More will be cited, and some documents not much later, when we treat of the place in which the body was deposited. Meanwhile from what has been adduced thus far I gather that the body was carried to Rome in the XIII century, at least after the year 1220 and before 1290. For this is entirely proved from Vitry, compared with the monuments written in the year 1290 and a little later. Secondly, from the silence of those whom we have said wrote about 1260, it becomes at least more probable that the translation to the basilica of St. Mary Major happened after the year 1260. And this I call more probable, not certain: because the translation is asserted to have been made secretly, and therefore could have remained hidden for some years, and so have escaped those writers from whose silence that reason is drawn.

[1106] more probably too between 1260 and 1280. Peter Calo, whose death Échard in the Library of the Preachers, vol. 1, p. 511, fixes about the year 1310 or a little later, so that in all likelihood he began to write his vast volumes on the Lives of the Saints already before 1300, knew indeed that the body of St. Jerome had been carried to Rome, but did not know by whom or when this was done. I find no other cause why he could be ignorant of the author and time of the translation, than that it was accomplished secretly and perhaps concealed for not a few years. For the translation could be concealed for various reasons, and, when these ceased after some years, the possession of the body in the church of St. Mary Major could thus be made public in such a way that neither the author nor the time of the translation became known; and I judge that this in fact happened. Wherefore we shall now vainly investigate more closely the time of the translation, or indeed its chief author. No one either stated the time more closely or indicated the author while the event was recent. The Anonymous author said this as regards the time: After … Jerusalem … remained bereft of the most holy — nay, of all — relics: and when the body of St. Jerome alone was left at Bethlehem. Nor do Giovanni d'Andrea and Peter de Natalibus designate the time more closely, except that they say Jerusalem had been occupied by barbarians. None adds that the body remained there until the complete loss of the Holy Land, which certainly cannot be fixed before the year 1291; and indeed I have already proved that the body was translated before that year. And so the time of that translation cannot be narrowed to a few years, and it seems we must only say that it certainly happened between 1220 and 1290, and more probably too between 1260 and 1280.

§ LXVII. The Saint's body deposited near the little shrine of the Manger; an altar afterwards built there, under which it was placed, where it remained until the pontificate of Sixtus V, when it is said to have been secretly removed and hidden.

The Saint's body placed before the little shrine of the Lord's Manger, Of the place in the basilica of St. Mary Major in which the sacred body of St. Jerome was deposited the Anonymous writer of the translation, who without doubt knew the place very well, speaks thus: Between the columns of the basilica and the door of the manger … he buried it. Giovanni d'Andrea, who after the year 1336 gave a summary from that account of the Translation, cited at no. 1086, has this about the place: In the aforesaid basilica, in a humble place … before the Lord's Manger … he devoutly laid it. What is said about a humble place is also taken from the Anonymous author, by whom St. Jerome is said to have given these orders about his burial to the monk in the vision: Before the door of that most blessed crypt which is called the Manger of the Lord, take care to place it in a humble tomb. Peter de Natalibus, who also wrote in the XIV century, before the altar to St. Jerome was erected there, sets forth his mind about that place thus: In a humble place, namely in the ground, before the Lord's manger, he devoutly laid the body by night. All these come to the same thing, and at the same time suggest that the Saint's body was deposited without display in the ground near the little shrine of the Manger, which in the old Liberian basilica was much smaller than the magnificent chapel of the Manger now is, built by Sixtus V, in which the altar of St. Jerome is enclosed. But if the Saint's body was placed before the very door of the little shrine of the Manger, it did not lie exactly in the same place where the altar was built, which is on the left to those entering the chapel of the Manger, and at the side of the chapel near the corner: in about which place it is also marked in the plan of the Old basilica in Paolo de Angelis.

[1108] Strozzi and Bianchini attest that in the chapel of the manger there was another monument, where it remained at least until the year 1398, namely a mosaic work which was above the tomb of Cardinal Gonsalvo, who died in the year 1299. By that mosaic work, says Strozzi, the Cardinal is represented kneeling at the feet of the most blessed Virgin, who is seated and holding her Son in her arm. At her sides stand St. Matthias the apostle and St. Jerome, who each hold an inscription in their hands; St. Matthias this one: The former altar holds me; but St. Jerome the following: I lie at the cave of the Manger. Each observes that the place in which the little shrine of the Manger was, was low, and therefore they think it is called a cave. Whether the author of the inscription spoke thus for that reason, or by allusion to the stable or cave in which the Lord was born, I shall not inquire. It will be enough for me to observe that by that inscription it is again confirmed that the body of St. Jerome was deposited near the little shrine of the manger. That monument was afterwards translated to another chapel of the church. Strozzi and Bianchini again cite the testament of Stephen de Guascis, canon of St. Mary Major, made in the year 1398, and from it Strozzi cites these words: Whereas lord Stephen, with greater and singular devotion, the venerable body of the outstanding doctor blessed Jerome, which rests in a chapel of the aforesaid church of St. Mary Major under an iron grate before the manger of the Lord, etc. From these words we gather that the Saint's body remained in the same position until the year 1398, that is, for a whole century and more.

[1109] an inscription which is said to have been above the tomb. The said Strozzi and Bianchini think that above that tomb of St. Jerome in the basilica of St. Mary Major there were set as an epitaph the little verses which Giovanni d'Andrea cites at fol. 53, prefacing these words: And on the tomb of Jerome, of which above, these verses are found carved:

Here lies the leader of the doctors and the flower of priests, holy Jerome; but his place is all too low. Here do thou, discreet Catholic, or witty one, say Hail as you come, and beware of walking above.

I have given the verses badly turned, as they are printed: Strozzi cited them just now somewhat differently, namely from a manuscript codex: the second line in him is read thus:

Holy Jerome, whose place is all too low.

Perhaps it was written:

Holy Jerome, whose place is very small.

Or else the little verse will not scan. But in the XIII and XIV centuries men were less scrupulous in the measurement of syllables, especially in inscriptions of this kind. If such little verses were really carved above the tomb, they will have been removed when the body was translated beneath the altar.

[1110] About the beginning of the XV century an altar built for the Saint, For the said canon de Guascis took care that an altar should be erected to St. Jerome, and the body deposited under it, about the beginning of the XV century. The construction of the altar was in all likelihood begun after the testament was drawn up. Paolo de Angelis, in bk. 5, chap. 2, says of it: Stephen son of Paul Octavian de Vaschis built and endowed a chapel dedicated to holy Jerome. Then this in another type: Stephen son of Paul Octavian de Vaschis founded and endowed a chapel in the church of holy Mary Major of the City, under the invocation of holy Jerome, about the year 1400, of the value of a hundred and twenty scudi for endowment. Further, that the Saint's body was deposited under it not long after is gathered from the codicils which the said canon added to his testament, as Strozzi and Bianchini attest. For in one of them, of the year 1409, he speaks in a different manner of the position of St. Jerome's body, and from it Strozzi cites these words of his: Let him (the chaplain) be held to all the burdens or obligations, as is more fully contained in the said testament, and as appear written and specified in it, except indeed that he be not bound or held save to celebrating only three Masses in perpetuity in each week in the said chapel of St. Jerome above the body of the said outstanding Doctor. If the Masses were to be celebrated above the body, then already in the year 1409 the body was beneath the altar on which those Masses were to be celebrated. Of the year itself, however, in which that translation was made, there is no record in the archive of St. Mary Major, as Strozzi confesses. Yet, lest this seem astonishing to anyone, he observes that other records too have perished, and those even of greater moment than this.

[1111] and the body deposited under it, Yet lest anyone, on account of the lack of that record, should wish to doubt the fact, he produces certain other documents in confirmation. First he alleges the words of Nicola Signorili, who composed a Description of Rome and dedicated it to Pope Martin V. And he, when treating of the relics, as Strozzi attests, and Bianchini too, has this: Likewise in another altar, situated near the manger, rests the body of blessed Jerome the doctor. Thus he, from a Vatican manuscript. They add the words of the Venetian Cardinal Pietro Morosini, who likewise lived under Martin V and died in the year 1428. He had bequeathed a sum of money that the body of St. Jerome, which was under an altar, should be raised and placed more honourably. But since the sum bequeathed did not suffice to carry out everything, the canons of St. Mary Major set forth the matter to the supreme Pontiff, and obtained from him that they might use that money in another way. Strozzi from the archive of St. Mary Major cites part of the instrument in which Antonio Casini, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, sets forth the reasons proposed to Martin V for obtaining the change of the legacy.

[1112] From it I bring hither some things to our purpose: which remained under that altar We make known … that some time ago lord Peter of blessed memory, Cardinal deacon of the Holy Roman Church of the title of St. Mary in Domnica, in his testament and otherwise gave and bequeathed … to the aforesaid church, for raising on high the body of blessed Jerome the priest and confessor, most excellent doctor of God's holy Church, lying in that same church before the chapel of the glorious Virgin Mary called at the Manger, under a certain altar erected under the name of that same holy Jerome, a hundred florins, and that in a silver casket or otherwise honourably

it should be raised above the said altar, and there be more honourably venerated: and that the said hundred florins so bequeathed, nor many more, could suffice for the erection of the aforesaid, and that the casket itself in its re-covering and otherwise needed many repairs amounting to nearly the said sum, etc. These words indeed leave no doubt that the body was in the XV century beneath the altar which is dedicated to the Saint. But I much doubt whether the holy Doctor's body did not remain in the place in which it was from the first placed near the Manger. For perhaps the altar was built above that tomb, and this indeed seems to me more probable; and thus it will not be astonishing that no instrument of a translation to the altar is found, since there was no need to translate it at all. Nor does it stand against this conjecture of mine that it is said by various writers to have been placed before the Lord's Manger: for that is not to be taken more strictly than these words just given are to be taken: Before the chapel of the glorious Virgin Mary. For the very altar of St. Jerome was before the old chapel of the manger, but not directly opposite its door, and the same was in all likelihood true of the tomb.

[1113] I pass over the documents which Bianchini heaped up about St. Jerome's body being deposited there down to the pontificate of Sixtus V. One will suffice for me, until the pontificate of Sixtus V. which Strozzi too alleges. Before his pontificate, when he was called Felice Peretti, Cardinal of Montalto, he wished to build a magnificent chapel for St. Jerome in the basilica of St. Mary Major, that the Saint's body might be transported to it. Hence the Canons of St. Mary Major granted to Cardinal Peretti two chapels of the basilica, namely one of SS. Philip and James, the other of St. Barbara, for building, and for transporting thither the body of the divine Jerome, and for making and constructing a chapel there. These are the words of the instrument given for that end by the Canons in the year 1581, on the XIII day of February, says Strozzi. This was afterwards confirmed by another on the XX day of February of the same year, says Bianchini, citing from it some words about the faculty given to the Cardinal. But Cardinal Peretti could not finish everything before he was promoted to the supreme pontificate. And afterwards, when the chapel was finished, the altar of St. Jerome was destroyed, but his body was not at all found. Whence this came about must now be inquired with Strozzi and Bianchini.

§ LXVIII. The Saint's body is said to have been secretly removed and hidden, lest it should be translated elsewhere by Sixtus V: and afterwards often sought in vain.

The Canons are said to have hidden the body, lest it be translated elsewhere. Mabillon in the Italian Journey, p. 65, on the occasion of the chapel of the Manger built by Sixtus V in its present form, writes the following: About this chapel we have received this from a man worthy of credit. When Sixtus before his pontificate had wished to undertake it, the Canons resisted, lest, that is, he should fail in the middle of the undertaking through straitness of means: Felix (for that was the Cardinal's name) took the matter indignantly; but asked the grand duke of Tuscany to stand surety for him to the Canons: that condition being obtained, Felix set his hand to the work, which he completed as Pontiff: then there came back into Sixtus's mind what had happened to Felix, and he began to consider in what way he might despoil the Canons of the body of holy Jerome, which is preserved in that chapel: therefore he restored from the foundations, under the holy Doctor's patronage, the church on the bank of the Tiber which had been Sixtus's Cardinalitial title, in order to translate the sacred relics into it: but the Canons, scenting the trick, hid them in a secret place, and thus guile was outwitted by guile. Thus Mabillon, as he heard it at Rome. But it may be doubted whether he who so narrated the matter did not mix some false things with the true, since he was narrating an event nearly a whole century past. In another account presently to be given, which comes from a witness privy to the whole matter, nothing is read about Sixtus's indignation against the Canons, nothing about the cause of the indignation here asserted. And so I do not interpose my judgment on these points.

[1115] An account written on this matter by Giovanni Battista Confalonieri, Another account, written in the year 1636 by Giovanni Battista Confalonieri, Strozzi cites from a manuscript codex in his Dissertation, §36. It is written in Italian, but in Latin these words are subjoined: These things for the perpetual memory of the matter. Praise be to God, to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and to St. Jerome. This narrative is taken from the manuscript Miscellany codex of Giovanni Battista Confalonieri, a Roman, keeper of the archive of the castle of St. Angelo, p. 246. The codex is preserved there with the most illustrious lord Giusto Fontanini, honorary chamberlain of our most holy Lord, to whom it was given as a gift by Cardinal Nunzio of illustrious memory. Thus much at the end about the codex. At the beginning too certain Latin words are prefixed in this manner: At Rome, the translation of St. Jerome, priest and doctor of the Church, from Bethlehem of Judah to the basilica of holy Mary at the Manger. From the Roman Martyrology, at the seventh Ides of May, that is, the IX of May. Then follows the Italian account, which I faithfully turn into Latin and subjoin.

[1116] who attests that the body of St. Jerome was not found, On the occasion of this feast, which is celebrated in the said basilica, and which in the current year MDCXXXVI fell on the Friday after the Octave of the Ascension, we went to that same basilica — the most illustrious lord Ugo Ubaldini, Canon of St. Peter's, who was the brother of the Cardinal of the same surname, who died on the XXII day of April of the year MDCXXXV; and together with that Canon there were with us in agreement lord Flaminio Cerasola, a nobleman of Bergamo, and I, Giovanni Battista Confalonieri, a Roman, all three priests. And when we had satisfied our devotion, we grieved that the place had never been found in which the body of the said Saint was, after his altar was removed, which stood at the side of the nave behind the ciborium in which the sacred relics are preserved; and which is now opposite, at the columns of the chapel of Sixtus V which is called the chapel of the Manger. After that chapel of Sixtus V had been built, this Pontiff ordered the said altar of St. Jerome to be removed, because it hindered the view of the said chapel. And when the Saint's body was sought there, that it might be translated to some fitting place, it was never found, even though they dug to a depth of about twenty palms, and perhaps further, through the whole circuit.

[1117] I, Giovanni Battista Confalonieri, well remember when his altar was pulled down by order of Sixtus V: that that digging was seen by me several times with great grief, such as was the feeling of the whole City of Rome and of all pious men. That the body was under the altar everyone held for most certain: and even now it is plain that many bishops and prelates who caused themselves to be buried near the said altar were placed with a tombstone, with their heads toward the door of the said nave which looks toward the pyramid, and their feet toward that same altar. Besides, on the rear side there was as it were a small confessio (that is, a crypt), where a lamp burned perpetually, and there were there small candles which likewise were lighted at certain railings with iron rings, if I remember rightly. While we were thus discoursing, and I was bringing out such particular circumstances of the matter, the above-mentioned lord Flaminio Cerasola could not contain himself from relating to lord Canon Ubaldini and to me this very thing, which he had learned from his uncle, likewise of the Cerasola family, who was a Canon of that same church of holy Mary Major: his memorial is found above the column of the holy-water basin near the chapel of Paul V.

[1118] His nephew by his brother affirmed that that nobleman had been on most familiar terms with Sixtus V [and says that he had learned from Flaminio Cerasola that the body had been secretly removed;] while he was a Cardinal, and had lived in his vineyard or garden which is situated at the foot of the hill of the said basilica, and that there was so great an intimacy between them that he says he gave him his own bed and his own mattresses when he went to the conclave in which he was elected Pope. But when he did not continue that friendship in his pontificate, and did not show Canon Cerasola so much affection of a grateful mind as he had hoped; and when the latter perceived that that Pontiff, as soon as he had obtained the Apostolic See, had immediately ordered the restoration of the church of St. Jerome at Ripetta, which had been his title when he was a Cardinal, and which was built in his first year in the form in which it is seen today — the good Canon Cerasola feared that that Pontiff might perhaps be thinking of taking away the body of St. Jerome from the said basilica and translating it to the new church at Ripetta. For this reason the Canon resolved, either alone or accompanied, on a certain night most secretly to take up the body from beneath his altar and privately to carry it to the floor of the choir, namely between the columns of porphyry marble of the high altar and the monument of Nicholas IV built by Sixtus V — namely under the porphyry stone which, if it be carefully examined, is seen to have been removed and broken on one side, which was then badly refitted: for two or three fragments of porphyry marble or of other stone are seen not rightly fitted into their place. And so it is believed that it may be in some casket.

[1119] and he adds probability to that hiding. To this account there was written in the margin in our copy the following: Lord Flaminio asked us to say nothing to others: for if the said holy body were found, the basilica of holy Mary Major would suffer loss. I judge that this should be inserted in this place, unless in the codex too it is read only in the margin. And Confalonieri goes on thus: To the probability that it may be under the said round slab, I added that perhaps the reason occurred to the said Canon of placing the body under the said slab of porphyry, that the Saint might be the more honoured, because he was being laid between the high altar, under which is placed the body of St. Matthias the apostle, and that monument which we see today of Nicholas IV, where at that time the most holy Sacrament was kept in the corner where the lamp burned, where there was a transverse iron bar on which candles were lighted out of devotion, where there was a little window in the wall in which stood the pyx of the most holy Sacrament: and on festival days two very large veils interwoven with gold were placed there, in the manner in which tapestries were then found. In the same way the most holy Sacrament was kept in the basilica of St. John Lateran down to the times of Gregory XIII, in the corner of a very large column of the tribune toward the door, above which the organ is set. Thus far the Italian account of Confalonieri, after which follow the Latin words given before: These things for the perpetual memory of the matter, etc. This account was cited in the year 1659 under Confalonieri's name, and gave occasion for seeking the body, as will be said below.

[1120] That fact, by the testimony of such persons Strozzi, however, having given the account, inquires at length what is to be judged of it, as he also premises much for commending the authority of those from whom it came. First he praises Giovanni Battista Confalonieri as a witness beyond all exception, and adduces about him the words of Severano, who was contemporary with Confalonieri, and to

whose writings he refers in the Sacred Monuments of the Seven Churches of Rome, p. 45, where he praises him not only as a theologian and Apostolic archivist, but also as a person of great piety and learning. Of his fidelity in writing, therefore, there can be no doubt. Of Flaminio Cerasola, who narrated the fact, he cites these words of Giano Nicio Eritreo in the Pinacotheca: If you ask Flaminio Cerasola's native place, you will find it Bergamo; if his family, noble, for he was a patrician of that city; if his literary studies, civil law and the knowledge of sacred doctrines; if his character, most excellent; if his talent, not dull and slow, but austere. These things suffice, so that Flaminio too ought not to be suspected of falsehood. He set up an epitaph to his uncle Ludovico, who is said to be the author of the deed, which Strozzi transcribed thus: To Ludovico Cerasola of Bergamo, Canon of this basilica and most deserving of it, a man of outstanding probity and dexterity, Flaminio Cerasola, Apostolic protonotary and canon of the church of Bergamo, set this up to his dearest uncle. He lived 63 years, 5 months. He died on the day before the Ides of December, in the year of the Lord 1591.

[1121] it is asserted, so that it does not seem to be doubted. Him indeed Eritreo does not praise so highly, saying that he was rather ready of tongue and prone to disparage others. Nevertheless he says nothing of him from which we might guess that he was a lover of fables. And indeed we cannot easily see on what ground he would have wished to relate to his brother's son a fabulous deed, and one dangerous to himself, so that the latter should keep it under almost perpetual silence. Wherefore it does not seem to be doubted that the body of St. Jerome was really removed secretly from the place where it rested under the altar. For if we consider the very many testimonies, partly given before, partly passed over for brevity's sake, and the common opinion of all, by which it was believed to rest under the altar, we shall not be able with reason to doubt that it was there at some time. Again, if we weigh how great diligence was used by order of Sixtus V in digging and searching, we shall understand still more certainly that the body was not there at that time. Wherefore it remains that we believe it was secretly removed, either in the time of Sixtus V or before. But that it was removed before, no one ever thought or said: and the author of that deed Ludovico Cerasola himself declared himself to be, as his brother's son attested, a priest of advanced age adorned with upright morals, and, from his account, Giovanni Battista Confalonieri, likewise a priest of advanced age, and a pious and learned theologian. The testimony of both was given in the year 1636 about a fact which had happened under Sixtus V, that is, nearly fifty years before, or about 1586. That matter, at least on the side of the persons, does not seem liable to a suspicion of falsehood; especially since it thus becomes known why Sixtus V could not find the body in the place in which everyone believed it rested.

[1122] Yet Strozzi produces reasons which can be objected against the fact itself, An answer is given to some difficulties, which is truly more to be wondered at than imitated. These reasons would press hard if Cerasola had been accused of that deed by another and had himself denied it. But the first, which would be the chief one, becomes less effective if he himself related it to his nephew. For the first difficulty is, says Strozzi, on what ground a prudent man, such as Canon Cerasola was, should on his own judgment have undertaken a deed which must involve the whole chapter with Sixtus V. But we shall no less hardly see how a prudent man could say that he had undertaken such a deed if he did not do it, and never retract that fiction of his. How great that Canon's prudence was is not clear to me. If what Giano Nicio Eritreo asserted about him is true, he was ready of tongue, etc., so that he does not seem to have lacked passions. Men who are such are easily carried away by some apparent advantage, or by desire or fear, to undertaking something which they would not do if with a calm mind they weighed all the disadvantages and evils which are to be feared from such a deed. But a man even moderately prudent will never pretend that he has done things from which he must fear grave evils for himself if they become known; or if he ever proceeded to such madness before some one man, he will quickly undeceive him of the error, since he can hope for no advantage from the fiction, but must fear much evil. To the difficulty objected Strozzi answers that perhaps the removal of the body was entrusted to Cerasola by a chapter decree: for although in the account no mention is made of such a decree, yet it is not denied that the matter was carried out by Cerasola with the counsel of the chapter. He adds that other things were decreed at that time by the chapter against the express will of Sixtus V, and that therefore this decree of the chapter, against which there was no express prohibition, would be less astonishing. So he at greater length.

[1123] The second difficulty is, says Strozzi, how it is credible which can be objected against a deed so astonishing, that from the mere restoration of the church of St. Jerome at Ripetta the chapter should have conceived so great a fear of losing the body as to leap to such a decree. He answers that perhaps the fear was not groundless, since Sixtus V had prepared under the table of the high altar of the church at Ripetta a marble casket in which to enclose the body of St. Jerome, as the tradition of that church had it, he says. In confirmation of that tradition he adds that Giuseppe Bianchini learned it from the chief cleric of that same church. The fear itself he confirms with these words: And in fact the said casket was found empty, and devoid of all other relics. This he proves from an instrument drawn up in the year 1749, on the V day of February, on the occasion of the demolition of the altar. And if the casket always remained empty down to the year 1749, Strozzi rightly suspects that this happened because after the death of Sixtus V that fear continued, and because Sixtus's nephews or other Cardinals promoted by him hoped that the body of St. Jerome would at some time be found and translated into that casket. Certainly Flaminio Cerasola, when in the year 1636 he was narrating the concealment of the body, even then feared that the basilica of St. Mary Major would lose it if it were found.

[1124] can be objected, The third difficulty is, he says, that Canon Cerasola alone could not have taken up and hidden the body in the manner in which it is said to have been done. But neither is he said in the account to have been alone, nor is it credible. He is said to have resolved either alone or accompanied to hide the body. I judge that the question here is of the plan of carrying out the thing, and that whether he conceived it alone or with others Flaminio seems not to have known. But for the execution of the thing he certainly was not alone, but employed either other canons as well, or at least fit workmen. Strozzi conjectures that the sacristan of the church was present, without whom he could not enter by night. He conjectures besides that Carlo Pini, the mason of that same church, was present, because on the XXIX day of January the Canons gave his daughter a dowry of fifty scudi out of regard for piety. These things are likely for the reasons which Strozzi adds, yet uncertain. But it cannot with reason be doubted that Cerasola, when undertaking the raising and concealment of the body, had with him fit workmen and enough to finish the work quickly: for such men are easily obtained for a price.

[1125] although they are very slight. The fourth difficulty is, says Strozzi, that no instrument of that concealment was drawn up by the Canons; but the answer is easy, whether the concealment was made by the common counsel of the Canons, or by Cerasola alone, or by a few conspiring with him. For by the Acts of the concealment, once they had become known, the secret would have been betrayed, the authors would have become known, and the body itself could not with difficulty have been found. And so either the authors handed down nothing in writing about that concealment, or, if they briefly noted something, they hid that writing no less than the body itself, so that it may lie hidden even at this time. Strozzi attests that in the archive of St. Mary Major no decree of the chapter is found which was made in the time of Sixtus V, and he judges that that lack arises from the fact that the Canons were unwilling that their decrees should become known to the Pontiff, and that they feared lest they should be found in the archive by a rigorous inquisition, so that they either did not commit them to writing then or hid them. From what has been said it is clear that no reason occurs why we should not be able to believe that the body of St. Jerome in the time of Sixtus V was really removed from its place and hidden, as is narrated in the writing of Giovanni Battista Confalonieri: but from that writing it is not established whether the thing was done by the common counsel of the Canons of that church, or of a few, or even of Cerasola alone.

[1126] That removal of the body is to be fixed about the year 1586 or 1587: Further, the time at which the body was secretly removed and hidden Strozzi proves thus. Sixtus V finished the Sistine chapel before the end of the third year of his pontificate, and, the chapel being finished, he ordered the altar of St. Jerome to be destroyed and the body to be sought. And so that concealment was made before the XXIII of April in the year 1588, in which the third year of Sixtus V was completed; and perhaps the body had been removed a year or two before: which deed must be fixed about the year 1586 or 1587. Great was the grief of the Romans when the body was sought in vain beneath the place of the removed altar and never found, as Confalonieri suggests in the words cited at no. 1117. Whether the body of St. Jerome was also sought in other parts of the basilica of St. Mary Major under Sixtus V I do not find. But Strozzi sufficiently suggests that some of the Romans went so far, out of grief that the body was not found in its place, as to say that the body had never been in the basilica of St. Mary Major. But, as he rightly observes, this happened because they had not examined the documents by which the Saint's body is asserted to belong to the said church. Bianchini also asserts that the Office of the translation was discontinued in the church of St. Mary Major until the year 1627, in which he says it was resumed by a solemn decree. He thinks this was done by the Canons in order to persuade Sixtus V and his nephews that the body was no longer there; but that conjecture is uncertain: for such a reason for omitting the Office they certainly would not have made public. Meanwhile the said Bianchini says that he has read the chapter Acts of St. Mary Major from the time of Sixtus V, and that in them the Canons never called into doubt the presence of the body of St. Jerome.

[1127] When Confalonieri's account about the hidden body had become known, the body afterwards sought several times in vain. in the year 1659 some Canons of St. Mary Major, namely Ascanio Rivaldi, Girolamo Muti, and Domenico Salvetti, Pope Alexander VII giving his consent, began at night-time to seek the sacred body of St. Jerome in the place where, according to Confalonieri's account, they suspected it lay. They had digging done round about, and diligently noted everything found in the course of the digging, as is related in the Acts then drawn up, which Strozzi cites in his Appendix; but after six hours of continued labour they gave up hope of finding the body there, and so ceased. An account of this

search was obtained, not from the archive of St. Mary Major, but from the Chigi library, in all likelihood because it had been given to the Pontiff, who was of the house of Chigi. Hence Strozzi believes it came about that the Canons in the time of Clement XI were unaware of that search, and again sought the sacred body in the same place, but with equally fruitless labour. For Giusto Fontanini, most well known by his writings, had received Confalonieri's Account about the hidden body, and both he and others were unaware that the body had been sought under Alexander VII in that very place where they sought it again. Lastly Strozzi subjoins that the body of St. Jerome was at other times sought through almost the whole basilica of St. Mary Major, and certainly in all those places in which any hope of finding it could shine out, but always in vain. Hence he infers that no hope remains of finding the sacred body of St. Jerome in the basilica of St. Mary Major, unless the relics, of whose finding we shall now treat, are that very body.

§ LXIX. Whether the relics found under the high altar of St. Mary Major seem to be those very ones which were translated to that basilica as the body of St. Jerome.

When in the year 1747 the high altar of St. Mary Major had been pulled down, In the year 1747, on the XIV day of November, in the confessio or underground crypt of the high altar of the basilica of St. Mary Major there was found a silver casket full of sacred relics, but without any name or inscription from which it might be established whose Saint's relics they are. But Strozzi, already frequently cited, who found them with the companions to be mentioned below, judges that these very ones are the body of St. Jerome, or those parts of the body which were translated to the basilica of St. Mary Major. To prove this he composed a Dissertation, which we have at hand and cite. The occasion of the finding was that Benedict XIV of glorious memory wished to restore the chief altar of the basilica of St. Mary Major, and to that end the old altar had been pulled down. On this occasion, I say, the most illustrious lords Pietro Filippo Strozzi and Antonio Sartoni, Canons and chief Sacristans of St. Mary Major, with several companions joined to them, and with the necessary workmen employed, diligently investigated what relics were laid up in the demolished altar or in its confessio. What relics were found under the second table of the altar Strozzi sets forth diligently: but those do not concern us. But what he found in the confessio I shall transfer hither from his Italian account in a Latin summary.

[1129] on the 14th of November a silver casket was found in the confessio, On the XIV day of November, he says — namely of the year 1747 — in the evening we entered the confessio, whose pavement consisted of a single porphyry stone. That porphyry pavement was to be removed, and when it had been removed with the rest, after other things less pertinent here they found a silver casket, and presently suspected that relics were kept in it. After a brief prayer, says Strozzi, I put on the sacred stole, the most illustrious lord Antonio Sartoni being present with various ecclesiastical ministers of the basilica, with the craftsmen of the fabric, and with a notary called to draw up the acts. I took that casket with all reverence, and carried it onto a small table set not far from there. It was made with ancient and rude workmanship, of oval form, seven inches long, four inches wide, three and a half inches high. Above the lid there was as it were a seal of wax, which was crumbled in the hand of the bystanders, so that no image could be recognized in it. Within it was seen full of fragments of bones, which, as I handled them, seemed to me like a cooked and soft mass: so damp were they.

[1130] full of relics, which were twice examined. Both in that first examination, which was made at night by torchlight, and in the second, which followed on the XXV day of November of the year MDCCXLIX and was made in broad daylight, we emptied the said fragments into a silver vessel: and they were examined minutely, and it was investigated whether among them there was not some small plate with the Saint's name. With like diligence the little chest was inspected within and without, that we might search whether it had any indication. That diligence of ours was for the rest fruitless: “and this alone was observed (these are the words of the instrument made on the aforesaid XXV day of November) — how small and badly fitted the fastening of the lid was: whence it was thought that this little chest had perhaps at other times been enclosed in a larger casket, in which the Saint's own name may readily have been. Then with like diligence the said fragments of bones were considered, and among these there were recognized bones of various members of the human body, and several teeth of an adult person were very clearly distinguished, and various fragments of a skull.” Thus from the instrument of the examination of the year 1749, which he cites entire in his Appendix. He adds that some presently thought that these were the relics of St. Matthias the apostle: but that he refuted that opinion from the fragments of the skull that were found, which cannot be reconciled with the head of the holy Apostle, which, he says, we have quite entire, and almost wholly covered with its own skin. And so the bones, without further conjecture about the Saint whose they were, were restored to their casket, and carried into a cupboard of the Canons' sacristy, and there meanwhile carefully preserved by means of two keys.

[1131] Having made this account, to which Strozzi prefixed not a few other observations, Some observations on those relics, he begins to reason, and rightly infers the following: first, that those bones are at least those of an adult Saint; secondly, of an adult Saint from among the most illustrious of those whose bodies are held in the basilica of St. Mary Major, both because they were found in a place more conspicuous than the rest, namely in the confessio, and because they are in a silver casket — an honour which, as he affirms, was never given to any other Saint in the basilica of St. Mary Major; thirdly, that the bones found can, by the usual manner of speaking, be called a body, since they are bones of various members of the human body. The said casket seems small indeed for a human body: but it was so full, as Strozzi attests, that he could with difficulty put all the bones back into it; nor does he contend that all the bones of a body, or even most of them, are contained in that casket, but that according to the customary way of speaking of relics it is rightly called a body. This part will suffer no difficulty, provided it can be made certain that those bones are St. Jerome's, whose bones are held divided in many places. Fourthly he observes that the said relics were found under porphyry marble, just as Canon Cerasola is said to have hidden the relics of St. Jerome under a porphyry stone. This is as it were a prelude of one hastening to his arguments.

[1132] Then from the manner in which the body had been deposited there from which it is suggested that they are St. Jerome's. he strives to infer that it was placed in that spot rather by a furtive concealment than by an honourable translation. For first, there is no record of a body having been translated thither. But, he says, it does not become likely that the body of any illustrious Saint was translated by the elder Canons with so great negligence. Great carelessness indeed it is that the Saint's name was not added, that they placed the casket in a badly built spot which they did not even sweep clean beforehand, as he gathers from coins and other small things found there. All this, I say, would seem to be blameworthy for slovenly negligence, if the body had been carried to that place with a solemn translation. But Strozzi conjectures that they are rather indications of a furtive translation or concealment. The name could be omitted lest it be recognized and carried off, if at any time it were found. The place is badly fitted because the work had to be done at night and in haste. The coins were not found for lack of abundant light, as one of his friends conjectures in Strozzi, who argues from them a furtive and nocturnal translation.

[1133] Presently Strozzi passes in Art. 5 to another argument, and strives to prove that those bones found cannot be believed to belong to any of the other Saints Another argument for claiming those relics for St. Jerome whose bodies are said to be held in the basilica of St. Mary Major. To this end he enumerates from a manuscript Catalogue of the relics of that church the bodies of Saints which are said to be preserved in it, beginning from the high altar, under which the said relics were found. And in the Catalogue there are said to rest under the high altar the bodies of St. Matthias the apostle, of St. Epaphras the disciple of St. Paul, and of the holy virgins Romula and Redempta. I shall not inquire how certain that tradition is, that the bodies of those four Saints rest under the said altar, since that is not necessary to our purpose. I shall only cite Strozzi's argument, who contends that those bodies of Saints which were deposited in the confessio or under the altar by Paschal I were never removed from their place: but that the casket which he himself found in the confessio in the year 1747 was placed there about the year 1600. The reasons by which he believes the bodies which Paschal I placed under the altar were never removed from their place he expresses in these words: No one could take them thence, because that altar had never been searched through, as I have said. And so the same Saints rest perpetually there, as the said Catalogue will have it, and as our tradition holds: and consequently the anonymous body cannot be attributed to any of those Saints.

[1134] which nevertheless is not free The other point — namely that that silver casket was placed there about the year 1600 — he intends to prove by this argument. When the casket was found, the masons, moved by various local observations, judged that that niche built of rough wall, in which the casket had been placed, was built at the same time as the front of the confessio, which Cardinal Pinelli restored in the year 1600. Thus the most illustrious man reasons, in order to investigate the truth, not to drag his readers even against their will to his own opinion, if they should judge some opposite one more probable, or everything too uncertain. Wherefore it will be useful to note some things on that argument, lest the learned believe that it is adopted by me as certain, or the less critical think that by that argument it is made certain that the relics found are not those of any of the Saints who rested in the confessio or in the crypt of the high altar. And so, solely for the reader's instruction, I ask first how certain that judgment of the masons ought to seem, who believed that the niche was built at the same time as the front of the confessio. They do not seem to have been able to judge that from the workmanship of the niche itself, of whose rudeness Strozzi complains. Wherefore they may perhaps have gone astray by a notable period of time. Secondly, if the relics were placed there in the year 1600, they certainly were not placed there by Canon Cerasola, but in all likelihood by Cardinal Pinelli.

[1135] from various difficulties, Thirdly, if Cardinal Pinelli deposited the silver casket there in the year 1600, he must have found those relics somewhere. Besides, either he knew whose relics they were, or he was entirely ignorant of it. If he knew that the relics were St. Jerome's, it was the part of a prudent man

and a pious one to communicate that knowledge to those who could continue it and transmit it to others, until that hidden treasure might at some time safely come out into the open. If he did not know whose the relics were, he would not have hidden them, nor at night have had a rough niche made for them; but would rather have had the relics examined, and, with a public translation and with a record of the deed added, have had them carried to a well-prepared and adorned place. Wherefore I should rather judge that that casket was there before Cardinal Pinelli in the year 1587 was made archpriest of the basilica of St. Mary Major; or, if it contains the relics of St. Jerome, that it was deposited there about that very time at which Pinelli was made archpriest. The whole thing could have been done in the year 1587 before the XV day of October, on which Pinelli received the dignity of the archpriesthood: for if Cerasola really hid the relics of St. Jerome, the thing must have happened about that time. But it does not become probable to me that Cardinal Pinelli, who was promoted by Sixtus V, was privy to that deed, which must have greatly displeased Sixtus V.

[1136] Besides, another conjecture may offer itself about the relics found without a name. and against which other conjectures can be set. It is established that Rome was captured both before and after the times of Paschal, and namely in the year 1527, and long and miserably plundered by the insolence of soldiery. It is established that in that plundering of the City many relics were stripped of their ornaments and contemptuously cast aside by heretics; and that many likewise were carried off by Catholics. Who will now say that the confessio or crypt of the altar of St. Mary Major was free from that plundering? What hindrance, then, was there that the bodies of the Saints which had been deposited under the altar could not then have been carried off, or stripped of their ornaments and so left — nay, even poured out of their caskets and mingled together? Sacrilegious and horrible are the things we say. But that like things were done we do not at all doubt. If anyone, then, should conjecture that the anonymous relics which Strozzi found in the silver casket were found there after the plundering, and collected into one casket, because it was not known to which of the Saints preserved there those relics belonged — in what way could it be proved that that conjecture lacks its probability? Yet I should not wish to force that conjecture on anyone as probable enough: for it is not clear to me how much harm the fury of the heretics or the greed of the Catholic soldiers wrought in the basilica of St. Mary Major, and namely in that part of it. This one thing I say, that it does not seem to me proved by certain arguments that those relics cannot be among those which for many centuries rested under the said altar.

[1137] More certainly does Strozzi show that the relics so often mentioned are not any of the other bodies attributed to the basilica. The second part of the same argument is certain; In the Catalogue there are reviewed the bodies of SS. Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrice, martyrs, which, he says, rest together in a leaden chest, on whose lid the names are marked in an ancient script. To the same church there are attributed in the Catalogue two bodies of the Holy Innocents. These, says Strozzi, rest in a marble chest under the table of the altar of St. Lucy. The body of St. Pius V is asserted to belong to the same basilica in the Catalogue. But that, he says, is held in a casket known to all, which can be seen each year on the festival. There remains the body of St. Innocentius the martyr, brought to the basilica after the Catalogue was written. But that rests and can be seen under the altar of St. Catherine. Thus all the bodies attributed to the basilica of St. Mary Major have been reviewed, except the body of St. Jerome, which Strozzi contends, by that enumeration of the others, was found by him. But, as we have already seen, that proof somewhat fails as regards the bodies which are said once to have been deposited under the high altar, that is, in the very place where the relics were found.

[1138] Yet from whatever deficiency of one argument I should not wish to conclude and the difficulties of the first part are somehow answered. that the relics found are not St. Jerome's, if by other arguments that can be made certain or at least probable. Nor shall I even say that by that argument nothing of probability is added toward claiming the relics found for St. Jerome. For although it is not made quite certain that the relics found belong to none of the Saints whom Paschal I is said to have deposited under the altar, at least it is more probable that those bodies were never removed from the place in which they had been deposited by Paschal: for no record is found of their ever having been raised, examined or translated after Paschal's time, so that their raising or translation, even from place to neighbouring place or into another casket, cannot probably be asserted. And again it is not probable that the bodies or relics which Paschal deposited under the altar were placed in that position in which the anonymous ones were found, or in a silver casket so small as the one which was found. For since the masons judged that the niche in which the casket had been placed was built about 1600, it is not probable that they went so far astray as to refer to the year 1600 a work built in the IX century, in which Paschal flourished. And so it is not probable that the relics were placed in that position by Paschal; or in a silver casket so small, and without any record attached, as the thing itself declares. But as regards the plundering of the City which took place in the year 1527, we have no document by which to prove that the Confessio of St. Mary Major suffered anything in it. And if it had suffered anything — which I do not further inquire — and if the relics of the Saints had been scattered there, and afterwards gathered into that silver casket, a record of that deed ought, it seems, to have been added to the said relics. Wherefore neither does that suspicion, which was proposed for the sake of elucidation at no. 1136, seem probable enough.

§ LXX. It is highly likely and probable that the relics found without a name are St. Jerome's.

By various reasons, From what has been given thus far we can infer, first, that the anonymous relics are certainly not those of any of the other Saints who rest in the basilica of St. Mary Major, excepting those four whom Pope Paschal is said to have placed under the high altar. Secondly, we shall legitimately infer, without any examination of that opinion by which the bodies of SS. Matthias, Epaphras, Romula and Redempta are believed to have been deposited under the altar by Paschal, that it is not probable that the anonymous relics are any of the said bodies. For, whether those bodies were at some time in the basilica of St. Mary Major, or whether that basilica never had other relics of SS. Matthias and Epaphras than those which the Catalogue assigns, separated from the bodies, to the ciborium of relics, at least there is no record of their bodies being found, or raised, or translated to another place. Wherefore it is not probable that any of the said four bodies was placed in that position in the XVI or XVII century. And yet from the masons' judgment it becomes as it were certain that the Anonymous relics were placed there in one or the other of those centuries; since they judged the niche to have been made about the year 1600, nor is it likely that they went astray by a whole century. It remains now to be examined whether the body of St. Jerome, which is the only one remaining of those attributed to the basilica of St. Mary Major, could have been translated to that place, and whether it is probable that it was translated thither.

[1140] which are set forth, Of the body of St. Jerome we have it that it was not found by Sixtus V in the place where it had rested, that is, under its own altar. We have from Confalonieri's account that it was secretly carried to another place in that same basilica and hidden. These pieces of information alone prove that it could have been placed in the spot where the anonymous relics were found. Let us now see whether it can also be made likely that it was really carried thither. Strozzi in his Dissertation, art. 3, relates that not only was the body of St. Jerome twice sought in the place where, according to Confalonieri's account, it was believed to have been deposited by Cerasola, but that it was sought through almost the whole basilica in his own time, when Benedict XIV magnificently restored the basilica of St. Mary Major. On this occasion, he says, the whole structure of the basilica which exists from the time of Sixtus V was searched through, excepting only the interior structures of two chapels, namely the Cesi and the Sforza, which had been built a few years before the said pontificate. But from other considerations it is not credible that the body was hidden in these; especially since they then had a new pavement, in which the trick would have been too visible. He affirms that the whole structure was searched palm by palm, because, he says, all the altars of the basilica older than Sixtus V were changed. He adds that everything was likewise visited round about the walls and elsewhere, and finally that the whole floor was deeply disembowelled. From this diligent searching of almost the whole basilica he concludes that no hope remains of finding the body of St. Jerome in the basilica of St. Mary Major, if it has not been found.

[1141] From these things we may reason thus. It is established that the body of St. Jerome was in the basilica of St. Mary Major: it becomes highly probable, nor has anyone ever said that it was carried thence, nor is it probable; since both Confalonieri's account of the concealment contradicts such a suspicion, and since hitherto no one has claimed the possession of the body of St. Jerome for another place. And so, since in the said church a body was found which cannot probably be believed to be that of any other of the Saints resting in the basilica; and since in no other place of the basilica does the body of St. Jerome seem able to lie hidden — by a twofold reason we are compelled to judge that the relics found are St. Jerome's: first, because they cannot probably be attributed to another; secondly, because it is not likely that the body of St. Jerome is anywhere in the whole basilica, unless it be this very one. If anyone should deny the first reason, he will have to confess that there were in that basilica relics so notable that they could be called a body, and these enclosed in a silver casket, of which no mention is made either in the Catalogue or in any document: which is utterly improbable, especially since they had not lain for many centuries in the position in which they were found, but were so placed in the XVI or XVII century. And if anyone should wish to contend that the body of St. Jerome may even now lie hidden in some place of the basilica, at least he will never point out that place, and so will not say probable things: and at least he will never show by a fit reason whose the relics found are, and for what cause they were placed in the confessio without a name and without any record of translation or deposition. But that mystery we grasp without difficulty, if the relics are St. Jerome's.

[1142] But, someone will say, according to Confalonieri's account the body of St. Jerome was not placed by Cerasola in the confessio; that the relics found in what manner, then, did it reach the confessio and get found there?

This is indeed the chief reason that can be objected, but it is not insuperable. Confalonieri really wrote that the body was hidden between the porphyry columns and the monument of Nicholas IV, not in the confessio, and that Flaminio Cerasola so narrated it: yet he added that it was deposited under porphyry marble. Various things can probably be answered to this objection, nothing certainly. First, Flaminio Cerasola, who was a young man when he learned from his uncle the fact which he narrated nearly fifty years later, could have erred about the place where the body was hidden, because his uncle had indicated the place to him less distinctly. If perhaps his uncle only said that the body was hidden under a porphyry stone — because he was unwilling to entrust the whole secret to a young man — the latter could have added a fallacious conjecture, and explained the matter to himself of another porphyry stone, and after fifty years have narrated it to others.

[1143] are St. Jerome's, Secondly, if the body was at first hidden altogether in the place designated, as Confalonieri wrote, nothing stands in the way of its being able afterwards to be removed thence and carried to the confessio. Paolo de Angelis in bk. 5, chap. 9, writes briefly of these matters thus: The Confessio too, existing under the high altar, Cardinal Pinelli restored within our memory, adorning it excellently, while he was preparing a tomb for himself there. Hence Strozzi and Bianchini think that the secret of the hidden body was communicated to Cardinal Pinelli after the death of Sixtus V, and that he was the author of the body's being secretly translated to the confessio. That conjecture does not lack its likelihood. For although Cardinal Pinelli in all likelihood would have been unwilling, while Sixtus V was alive, to whom he owed his dignity, to consent to a concealment of the body which was bound greatly to displease Sixtus, it need not seem equally improbable that he afterwards saw to it that the same body should be placed in a more honourable place and preserved for the basilica of which he was archpriest. Perhaps too he learned the secret from one or more of the canons on this condition, that it should not be free to him to reveal that mystery, and so he could do nothing more useful for the Saint's glory than to see that it was placed in an honourable spot.

[1144] and certainly cannot so probably be attributed to any other Saint. This conjecture, then, may appear more likely than the rest, especially if Cardinal Pinelli built in the confessio the porphyry pavement under which the relics were found. But if the pavement of the confessio was already porphyry before — about which I find nothing certain — the relics could have been secretly carried off from their earlier place by one of the Canons who were privy to the secret, and carried to the confessio, lest they should be discovered by Pinelli in the course of digging; nay, perhaps this was done by Canon Cerasola himself for reasons unknown to us, either before or after the death of Sixtus V, whom he survived more than a year. But, in whatever way those relics reached the confessio, they cannot be attributed with equal probability to any Saint as to St. Jerome. For we know that his relics were hidden: and from the concealment is understood the cause why the name was not added, and why a record of the translation was not appended as usual. For those who, by a plan more to be wondered at than praised, hid the relics of St. Jerome lest the basilica of St. Mary Major should be deprived of them, wished not only to make their finding difficult, as we may conjecture, but at the same time took pains that, if at any time they should be found by a diligent search, they could not be recognized. Conjectures of this sort offer themselves freely about the body of St. Jerome because of the concealment: but not about any other relics, since there was no fear of losing other relics. Wherefore, if any others whatever had been found, even though they lacked both a name and every record, at least a record of the finding and of the deposition would have been added at the deposition.

[1145] Much probability is added to that opinion by To the likely conjectures which we have reviewed Strozzi and Bianchini have added a tradition, confirmed by sworn testimonies, about the manner in which the body of St. Jerome rested in the basilica of St. Mary Major. And that tradition agrees so well with the anonymous relics found that they think all doubt is removed by it. The testimony, as it was given by thirteen persons and written in Italian, Strozzi cites in his Appendix; whence, rendered into Latin, I transfer it hither: We the undersigned give full and undoubted assurance, our oath being also interposed, that very many times we have heard persons, both attached to the most holy basilica of holy Mary Major and strangers to it, who said: “That the body of holy Jerome, doctor of the Church, was buried in the aforesaid most holy basilica in a silver casket”. All this we witnesses affirm, because we have often heard it said, as above. In witness of these things we have made the present writing, signed by our hand, in the matter of our knowledge. This XIX day of November MDCCXLVII.

[1146] I, Alessandro Pratesi, priest, and Toledan beneficiary of the said basilica, a tradition confirmed by the oath of witnesses, affirm as above.

I, Andrea Fidanza, beneficed cleric and sacristan of the said basilica, affirm as above.

Alessandro Rossi, cleric of the said basilica, affirm as above.

Francesco Antonio Giovenali, priest, affirm as above with my own hand.

I, Gaetano Longhi, affirm as above.

I, Antonio Barbarossa, priest, beneficed cleric, and second sacristan of the said basilica, confirm what is above, with my own hand.

I, Giacchino Ferrarese, chaplain and confessor, attest as below.

I, Antonio Faccini, priest, attest as below.

I, Orazio Berdini, affirm as above.

I, Bernardino Amici, affirm as above.

I, Ausonio Olivieri, confirm as above.

I, Filippo Onofrii, confirm what is above, because I have frequently heard it, especially several times from D. Tommaso Bianchini, formerly beneficiary and sacristan of the said basilica, who died in the year MDCCXLIII, at the age of sixty-three years.

[1147] Francesco Berdini, priest, chaplain of the aforesaid most holy basilica, that the body of St. Jerome rested attest what is expressed below, and further, that I heard this from the lord of good memory D. Domenico Corsi, beneficiary of the said basilica, who died at the age of ninety-one years in the year MDCCXXX, as also from the lord of good memory D. Tommaso Bianchini, likewise beneficiary and sacristan of the said basilica, who died in the year MDCCXLIII at the age of sixty-three years; and namely that I learned from the priests expressed above that the said silver casket containing the body of St. Jerome must be placed under a certain porphyry stone; and besides that I know that at various times searches were made for the said body under porphyry stones of this kind: and because all this is true, I have expressed it in more words. Thus far the testimony of thirteen honest men.

[1148] Now as regards that tradition in a silver casket, as the relics were found, which said that the body of St. Jerome lay under a porphyry stone, and which was confirmed by only three of those thirteen witnesses, it could easily have arisen from Confalonieri's account, and therefore would add little or nothing of weight to the arguments already given, if there were not the other tradition about the body enclosed in a silver casket. But this adds much strength to the remaining arguments for attributing to St. Jerome the relics enclosed in a silver casket. For whether we believe this tradition to be older than the concealment of the body or more recent, we shall hardly understand how it could have arisen from anything but the very truth of the matter. For no one in the last century could divine that in our times a silver casket would be found with relics which men would wish to be attributed to St. Jerome, so as for this cause to invent that Jerome's body was contained in a silver casket. Wherefore that tradition seems to have arisen either because before the concealment it was known that the Saint's body was preserved in a silver casket, which could then easily be known; or because those who saw the casket after the concealment of the body (as Canon Cerasola saw it with several others, and those who afterwards placed the casket in the confessio, unless perhaps it was placed there by Cerasola himself) indicated to certain others that it was of silver. That information could be secretly indicated to a few, so that, if the knowledge of the place in which the body was placed should at some time perish through the death of those who knew it, at least in that way the knowledge of the body might in some fashion be reached. Wherefore that tradition about the silver casket entirely suggests that the relics found are St. Jerome's, and from it the other one, by which the body was said to be under a porphyry stone, receives strength.

[1149] especially since other relics in that church lack silver caskets. Strozzi, setting forth this argument, observes in §72 that none of the bodies of Saints which rest in the basilica of St. Mary Major ever rested in a silver casket, except the body of St. Jerome. And so there is so much the less appearance that the tradition about the body of St. Jerome resting in a silver casket was invented. For no one would have gratuitously invented what could be proved by no example, what was contrary to the custom of that church, what by no probable conjecture could be thought true. Further, Strozzi confesses that some things were objected to him against that tradition, namely that it does not seem immemorial, nor is it anywhere found in writing. But at least it is confirmed by the oath of honest men, and by that oath it is established that it flourished long before the finding of the casket, about which, as preserved in the church of St. Mary Major, no one was thinking, no one knew anything, except from that tradition. At least the tradition said that a silver casket with the relics of St. Jerome had been placed under a porphyry stone, just as it was found. We cannot say that a bold fabulist divined this in inventing it, unless we ourselves wish to divine and to invent.

[1150] The opinion about the relics of St. Jerome being found is not opposed by The said Strozzi in §65 affirms that the fewness of the bones, which fall far short of the completeness of a human body, stands in the way with many, so that they do not dare to attribute those relics to St. Jerome, but that he is of the wholly opposite opinion — and, in my judgment, most rightly. To this purpose he skilfully observes that the body of St. Jerome remained in the Holy Land during all that time in which very many princes flocked to it from almost the whole of Europe, and with them bishops, abbots, and other ecclesiastics of the first rank, so that it is by no means to be doubted that very many desired, and many obtained, relics of the holy Doctor, whose name was everywhere most famous. And so, even if we should wish gratuitously to suppose that the body of St. Jerome remained undivided down to the year 1099, in which Jerusalem was captured by the Christians and Godfrey of Bouillon made its king, we shall not be able with reason to doubt that from that time the Saint's relics began to be shared with many, and that several bones were carried into Europe in the course of the hundred and fifty years during which, at the least, they thereafter remained in the Holy Land, and that some were given also to other Eastern churches.

[1151] Strozzi indeed cites in his Appendix a donation of relics which had earlier been received from Godfrey of Bouillon, and reviews not a few preserved in other places. the fewness of the bones found, but it rather favours it. To these I shall add several others,

attributed to St. Jerome in various provinces. So great will this enumeration be, which will be given in §72, that it must be said that the greater part of St. Jerome's body has been divided among various churches, cities and provinces. Therefore the fact that the anonymous relics can constitute only the smaller part of a body favours that very opinion of Strozzi, who believes that the relics found are that part of St. Jerome's body which remained together and retained the name of the body; as has happened with many other Saints.

§ LXXI. An answer is given to the objection from the relics at Nepi: the relics, which in all likelihood are St. Jerome's, deposited under the table of the high altar.

Against the said opinion it is objected that the Saint's head The most illustrious Strozzi relates in §67 that he, together with his most illustrious colleague D. Antonio Sartoni, was admitted on the XV day of November in the year 1747 to the supreme Pontiff Benedict XIV, to give him an account of the relics found, and that among other things he suggested to the Pontiff from that time his own opinion, that he believed them to be St. Jerome's, and added some reasons. But the most holy Lord, he says, with his supreme prudence, suspending any judgment, objected by way of discussion that the cathedral church of Nepi claims for itself the head of the holy Doctor: and gave him a manuscript account of it, sent to him not long before by the most illustrious lord Viviani, bishop of the said city. This was perhaps the chief reason why Benedict XIV, Pontiff of glorious memory, having read Bianchini's Dissertation, did not believe it sufficiently proved that those relics were St. Jerome's. He was certainly of that opinion in the year 1753, as we heard from his own mouth, when he treated of the matter with us in general terms, but did not produce particular reasons. Whether the said Pontiff likewise read and weighed Strozzi's Dissertation, communicated to us about that time, we did not learn. But he certainly never declared that the relics found were to be held for the body of St. Jerome.

[1153] Now as regards the Nepi reports, is preserved in the city of Nepi. the most illustrious Strozzi renders them suspect on many grounds, and to me too they do not seem to cohere well, or at least by no means to stand in the way of our believing the relics found to be St. Jerome's. In Strozzi they are in Italian, and I render them wholly into Latin thus: From an ancient tradition it is held that after the plundering of Rome, made in the year MDXXVII by Charles of Bourbon, commander of the army of Charles V, when, by reason of the death of that commander, the aforesaid army was scattered and the soldiers were returning with their spoils, Arminio, Antonio and Pancrazio Greca, full brothers of Nepi, joined together and posted themselves at the bridge of Passarella in this territory (of Nepi), through which the Roman road then passed, to lie in wait for the soldiers: and that they succeeded in despoiling many and depriving them of the booty which they were carrying with them: and that among the other things which they found was the sacred head of St. Jerome; and that this was afterwards given by the aforesaid Greca brothers to the cathedral church, and an instrument of donation was drawn up in the commune. This tradition is even now confirmed by the descendants of the said family, that they heard it from their forebears; and among them by D. Giuseppe Vallerani, who is descended from a woman of the said family, surnamed Greca. So much from tradition.

[1154] But the tradition of the people of Nepi wavers. But in that tradition there are not a few errors, which, however, have little bearing on the matter, and are therefore only briefly to be mentioned. Rome was not plundered by Charles of Bourbon himself, since he was killed in the assault on it; nor was the army scattered by reason of his death, since it remained long in the City; nor does it seem to have been scattered at all, although greatly reduced by pestilence, when at last it left the City. Yet what is asserted could have happened, that the said brothers, after the army had passed through the territory of Nepi, intercepted some of the stragglers and wanderers, stripped them of their spoils, and snatched from them the head of some Saint. But, if for the moment we should wish to believe this true and certain, whence did the people of Nepi know that that head was St. Jerome's? If there were fit indications or testimonies, why were they not noted, or why are they not now produced? If the donation made to the cathedral church was strengthened by a public instrument, why is not the instrument itself produced, and recourse had to tradition alone? And what sort of tradition is that? For it there are cited no cathedral Canons, no elder ecclesiastics; but a single noble family, which relates the glorious exploits of its ancestors, and can produce nothing but a report learned from its forebears. How weak these things are for producing belief, anyone even moderately versed in criticism will easily see.

[1155] and most of all, if it is to be understood of an entire head: If now we look to the City, it will become still more incredible that that head is St. Jerome's, especially if it is entire, as Strozzi seems to think. For there are no documents from which it is established that the head of St. Jerome was preserved separately from the body either in the basilica of St. Mary Major or in any other of the City. Of the body many writers of the XIV and XV centuries made mention, and among them several Roman Pontiffs; about a head separately placed there is everywhere a deep silence. Besides, in the review of the relics which are preserved in the various provinces of the world we shall find many parts of the head, and some so notable that they cannot stand together with an entire head preserved elsewhere. But that the head which the people of Nepi honour as the head of St. Jerome is entire I do not find in their own account. They do indeed call it a head, but from that it is not gathered that it is an entire head, or even a whole skull. For we shall see that the few relics of the head which are held at Cluny are there called the Head of St. Jerome the Cardinal: and such a manner of speaking is so usual that from it nothing can be gathered for the completeness of the body or member which is named. Wherefore from the account of the bishop of Nepi, which Strozzi cites, I cannot gather that an entire head is held there: and if it is not entire, it cannot stand in the way of the Anonymous relics being judged to be St. Jerome's.

[1156] for they have probable grounds from elsewhere What follows in confirmation in the Nepi reports avails for probably attributing to the said church some relics of St. Jerome, but not for an entire head or the greater part of a head, nor for strengthening the tradition just examined. For the people of Nepi produce a letter written by order of Gregory XIII to Alessio Stradella, bishop of Nepi, to ask from the church of Nepi relics of St. Jerome for the consecration of the Gregorian chapel. The letter is written in Italian by the Pontifical sacristan, and was issued on the XXVIII of April in the year 1580. I shall cite it wholly rendered into Latin. After the ordinary superscriptions without and within, the letter runs thus: Our most holy Lord desires that the consecration of the altar of his Gregorian chapel be made with relics of the four Doctors who are represented in it in mosaic work. And since one of them is St. Jerome, whose relics (as was believed) have not been found at all in the basilica of St. Mary Major outside the place in which that holy body rests, the lord prefect of the pontifical chamber, by order of the Most Holy Lord, has bidden me write to your most reverend lordship, that you would send me from those particular relics which you have in your church of Nepi so great a part as you know to be sufficient and suitable for the above-mentioned use: and the sooner this is done, the better. I shall offer it in the name of your most reverend lordship, whom I beg to write me her commands, and to whom I wish all prosperity. Rome, the XXVIII day of April MDLXXX. The servant of your most reverend lordship. Brother Augustine, sacristan of our Lord.

[1157] After this Letter the reports add that consequently, on the 1st day of May of the same year, by the most illustrious bishop, the chapter being present, there was opened in the cathedral church a silver head in which those sacred relics are enclosed. for claiming some relics of St. Jerome for themselves. And from which, they say, there was extracted a particle of the chin-bone on the right side at the end. He adds that this particle was fortified with due testimonies, so that it might be sent to Rome to the most reverend sacristan of the Pontiff, and that all the Acts of these proceedings were written by Enea Sansoni, notary of Nepi, and that they are still preserved, together with the letter cited, in the archive of Nepi. Thus far the said reports. And by these it seems to me abundantly proved that some relics of St. Jerome are preserved in the church of Nepi. For Gregory XIII would not have asked for them unless he had believed them confirmed by lawful testimonies and true. But from them I cannot perceive that an entire head is held there. For by the letter something is asked from those particular relics, without mention of an entire head, which in all likelihood would not have been designated by such words. Again, in the extraction nothing is said about an entire head, but those sacred relics are said to be enclosed in a silver head, which could truly be said even if only a tenth or twentieth part of a head had been in the silver head. The extraction itself is so related that no mention is made of a division, and the particles seem rather to have lain joined together than to have been connected by the completeness of a head. Wherefore I shall hardly be able to believe that an entire head is at Nepi, unless a lawful inspection be made of the relics which are contained in the silver head, and unless after the inspection the completeness of the head be established by due testimonies.

[1158] But in whatever way at last we consider those relics, The relics of Nepi cannot stand in the way of the Roman ones being Jerome's. I do not see why they can or ought greatly to hinder us from judging that the relics found in the silver casket are more probably St. Jerome's. For the more the relics of Nepi approach the completeness of a head, the less probable will it become that they are St. Jerome's; and so they will rather have to be held for the head of another Saint than the Roman relics, for whose attribution to Jerome the weightiest reasons fight. But if at Nepi there are only some parts of a head, even if it were established most certainly that they are those of St. Jerome the doctor of the Church, they will not be able to stand in the way, even in the least, of the genuineness of the Roman relics, among which only three or four parts of a skull, and those small, are said to have been found. Other objections against the said relics I do not find which I judge worth relating; nor do we know of any church which has wished to claim for itself, against the basilica of St. Mary Major, the possession of the body of St. Jerome. Nevertheless I believe it is not for us to determine anything certain about the said relics, since Benedict XIV, under whose pontificate they were found, did not declare them to be Jerome's. I have only briefly alleged the reasons which the most illustrious Strozzi set out more fully for claiming them for St. Jerome. To his outstanding learning I would have the diligent reader ascribe whatever arguments I have produced for claiming those relics for St. Jerome. Almost nothing in them is mine except the order, which for brevity's sake I have here and there changed, and the choice of reasons, which I selected out of many and set forth in my own words.

[1159] Those relics again examined in the year 1749, Now I shall briefly add from the same Dissertation whither the said relics were translated. In the year 1749, on the XXV day of November, they were again examined, and a parchment slip added, as is had from the instrument then written by Bernardino Monti the notary, in which the words inscribed on the slip are expressed thus: These sacred relics were examined on the XXV day of November MDCCXLIX by the most illustrious and most reverend lord Giampe, bishop of Philippopolis, and the most illustrious and most reverend lords Pietro Filippo Strozzi, Antonio Sartoni, and Francesco Ascevolini, canons of the most holy basilica of holy Mary Major, as from the instrument of this kind in the Acts of Monti the notary, etc. All subscribed in this manner:

Bernardino Monti, notary, in witness.

I, Giovanni Battista Giampe, bishop of Philippopolis, examined them.

I, Pietro Filippo Strozzi, examined them.

I, Antonio Sartoni, examined them.

I, Francesco Ascevolini, examined them.

This examination made, the most illustrious Canons likewise examined the other relics previously found in the demolished altar and its confessio, without, however, opening the casket in which were the bodies of SS. Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrice, martyrs, as is more fully related in the same instrument. But we are now treating neither of these martyrs nor of the other relics.

[1160] and deposited under the table of the high altar, recently restored, The examination of everything being finished, the sacred relics were carried to the new altar, magnificently built by Benedict XIV, on the shoulders of the three said Canons, to whom was added as a fourth the already frequently cited Bianchini, priest of the Roman Oratory, whom they wished to be present also at the examination of the relics. And the most illustrious bishop in pontifical vestments followed the procession, said the prayers, and performed the ceremonies usual in such cases. Of the place where the silver casket was deposited Strozzi speaks thus briefly in §80: On the XXV day of November in the year MDCCXLIX the said silver casket, containing an anonymous body — which is the same as if it were said, the body of the holy Doctor — was translated under the table of the new high altar, built at great expense, into a most elegant porphyry urn in which up to now the founder of our basilica rested together with his consort. He adds that the bodies of the holy martyrs Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrice were laid in the same urn — namely, as is read in the Acts, their leaden casket was placed in the middle of the urn, and above the leaden casket the silver one with the anonymous relics; and another with the rest. Lastly, all being deposited there, the stonecutters, prepared for that end, fitted the altar table itself into its place before the Canons, and with it closed the porphyry urn.

[1161] In the following year 1750 Benedict XIV consecrated that new altar on the very festival of St. Jerome, which in the following year Benedict XIV consecrated on the feast of St. Jerome. and in the short diploma by which on that occasion he granted indulgences to the people on the day of the consecration and on its anniversary, he mentions the relics deposited in that altar. Part of the diploma, as Strozzi cited it in his Appendix, I transfer hither: On the XXX day of September, the feast of St. Jerome, confessor and doctor of the Church, in the jubilee year MDCCL, I, Benedict XIV, Bishop of the Catholic Church, in this Liberian basilica — which, dedicated by Sixtus III and disfigured by the injury of time, I have brought back to a more august form with a new portico and façade, a pavement inlaid with mosaic, with paintings and choice marbles and reliefs overlaid with gold — the Papal altar, erected and consecrated by St. Paschal, and successively consecrated likewise by Clement III with a new stone laid upon it, having been wholly demolished and more magnificently erected, with the porphyry urn set in it, in which are laid the bodies of the holy martyrs Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrice, together with a silver casket with the bones of a single human body, but without a name, just as it had been found there — I consecrated with solemn rite in honour of the blessed Virgin Mary, a homily having first been delivered before Cardinals, bishops, the clergy of the basilica, and a great multitude of the people, and I enclosed in it relics of the holy Stephen the protomartyr and Lawrence the martyr, etc. He adds the indulgences which he granted for that day, and for the anniversary day of the consecration. This one thing I observe on the diploma alleged, that Benedict was indeed unwilling to declare the anonymous relics to be St. Jerome's, yet chose for the consecration of the altar the festival of that holy Doctor, and thus in some way suggested his own surmise about those relics.

§ LXXII. Relics of the Saint in several cities of Italy, Gaul, Germany, Belgium, and other provinces.

Rome has other relics of St. Jerome too, Since we have now long disputed about the relics which more probably are St. Jerome's, but which can constitute only the smaller part of a body, it is worth while at this point to investigate the other particles too: and in this search I shall again have as a helper the most illustrious Strozzi, who assigns us not a few. I shall begin from the City in which we are engaged. Piazza in the Vatican Ephemerides at the XXX of September assigns to the altar of the most blessed Virgin in the Vatican basilica a part of the chin of St. Jerome, which he asserts was placed there by Gregory XIII. Of that particle of the chin sent to Gregory by the bishop of Nepi we treated at no. 1157. The same Piazza in the Ephemerides of the City at the XXX of September adds several particles. I render the Italian words into Latin: His relics are, he says, in the church of St. Cecilia, a part of that Saint's shin-bone; in the church of St. Mark, part of his girdle. In the church dedicated to Jesus his arm is exposed. He also attributes some relics to the magnificent altar of St. Jerome in the Vatican basilica. Again, to the basilica of St. Mary Major, together with the catalogue of relics of that church, he ascribes a chasuble, stole, and maniple with which St. Jerome used to celebrate in the chapel of the holy manger at Bethlehem. So to the church of St. Anastasia he attributes a chalice which St. Jerome is said to have used. At the same day in the Menology he also ascribes some relics of St. Jerome to the church of St. Sabina. Very many churches in which the Saint's festival is celebrated with indulgences and with singular solemnity the diligent reader will find in the same place.

[1163] at Florence very notable ones, We pass over to Florence with Strozzi, who most diligently searched out the relics of St. Jerome preserved in his own native place. Cosinas Minorbetti, archdeacon of Florence and bishop of Cortona, in the last century wrote in Italian an Account of the relics of the metropolitan church of Florence, which little Work was printed at Bologna in the year 1685 by the care of Francesco Cionacci, who added very many observations as well. And about the relics of St. Jerome this is read in Italian at p. 30, which I render into Latin: In the largest silver casket of relics there are the jaw and an entire arm of St. Jerome. Strozzi attests in §66 that these relics were shown to him at Florence not long before he wrote his Dissertation. He says that the casket is indeed very large, and consisting of so great a weight of silver that his strength was not sufficient to lift it from the altar on which it had been set, so as to examine it conveniently. It was made in the year 1487 by the pious munificence of Jacopo Mantinelli, Canon of Florence, as is known from the words carved on the casket. The first inscription is this: The arm and jaw of the lord Jerome, priest. Lower down follows this: Jacopo Mantinelli, canon of Florence, received these golden bones in this silver, 1487. Strozzi adds: In the upper part of the casket is the arm, or the arm-bone entire: in the lower part is seen the chin quite entire, joined with its jaws likewise entire, in one of which are the two last teeth.

[1164] obtained from Frederick of Clermont, Strozzi also sets forth, from an instrument preserved at Florence, in what manner the church of Florence received those relics. These relics of the holy Doctor, he says, together with many others, were given to the said metropolitan church by lord Frederick of Clermont, abbot of Berretum (perhaps of Berceto near Parma), of the Order of St. Benedict, who in the year MCDXXXIX was at Florence at the ecumenical council, and was moved to give them by a divine inspiration, as is had from the instrument, and by the distinguished fame of the church of Florence. He adds that the donation was made with solemn stipulation in the lodging of Eugenius IV, and that the Pontiff consented to it, after the genuineness of the relics had been proved, he says, by authentic documents, which he attests are still preserved at Florence and were seen by him. Nay, in his Appendix he cites from them a letter of three Cardinals who in the year 1220 gave those relics to Frederick of Clermont, one of the forebears of the said abbot. That letter, or notary's instrument, as it will perhaps more rightly be called, is also found in Ughelli, vol. 1 of Italia Sacra, among the bishops of Tusculum, col. 232 of the Venetian edition. Ughelli subjoins another Letter, issued in the year 1412, from which it is understood that very many relics which are enumerated in the earlier document remained until that time in the noble family of Clermont, and that in that year they were given to Frederick of Clermont, with the consent of Pope Gregory XII, so that the lord Frederick himself may be able to retain, hand over, place and assign them as he wishes and where he wishes, by leave of the aforesaid most holy lord Pope. And in that Letter he is called Frederick of Clermont, … abbot of the monastery of St. Anne of Josaphat, of the diocese of Thessalonica, of the Order of St. Benedict. Ughelli mentions another letter also for the corroboration of the said relics, issued in the year 1417 at the council of Constance.

[1165] Nevertheless from the earlier instrument of the year 1220 there arises a difficulty on account of the corruption of the names. and formerly given by a king of Jerusalem, For in it these are the words: Which (relics) we received from the magnificent prince and lord of good memory, D. Goofredo Baldduy, king of Ihrlm, as appears by the great and authentic privileges of the said lord king, which you too have seen and read with your own eyes. Strozzi says that he cited this instrument because not a few faults have crept into Ughelli's edition. It may first be asked who that king of Jerusalem is by whom the relics are said to have been given. Strozzi explains it of Godfrey of Bouillon, but at the same time exhibits the variety of reading. For instead of Baldduy Minorbetti reads Balduino, Ughelli Balandinii, and Strozzi himself Baladini. All these differ much from Bullonius or Bouillon, or even from all the ways in which I have found Godfrey's surname written in those times: nor have I found that Godfrey himself ever added the surname of Bouillon to his name, and he would have done so still less after he had sold the duchy of Bouillon. Besides, these words also have a difficulty: which we received from king Godfrey. For Godfrey of Bouillon had been dead a hundred and twenty years when the Cardinals so spoke. Yet this difficulty is easily removed if we say with Minorbetti and Strozzi that the said relics had been given to the Roman Church, or to the churches of those Cardinals.

[1166] But as regards the text, it is certainly corrupt; whose name is somehow corrupted. and therefore it is ambiguous how it was written in the letters from Jerusalem, and whether Godfrey, the first Latin king of Jerusalem, or his brother Baldwin, or another of the kings — of whom there were five Baldwins — was the donor of those relics. The Cardinals, who knew that king Godfrey was called by various men Bullonius on account of the duchy of Bouillon, perhaps suggested that name to the notary,

and he, through his lack of skill (as not seldom happens with notaries), dislocated the name; or those did so who afterwards transcribed the instrument. But if Baldwin I gave those relics, it will have been written of Godfrey's brother (or successor) Baldwin, or something similar. But it does not matter whether Godfrey or Baldwin first sent those relics to the Romans, since by later testimonies their genuineness seems sufficiently confirmed by those who had seen the earlier ones. For the rest, for other relics too preserved at Florence Strozzi cites Zamboni's Sacred Diary, which is not at hand for me, and in which he says that some of them are attributed to the churches of St. George, of St. Mary Novella, and of the Congregation of St. Nicholas.

[1167] Masini in his Bologna Surveyed at the XXX of September attributes some relics of St. Jerome to three churches of that city, Some in various cities of Italy. namely to the church of St. Barbatianus of the hermits of St. Jerome, of St. Stephen, and of St. John in Monte. Carisius in the Sacred Diary of the church of Milan at the XXX of September assigns relics of the Saint to two churches dedicated to his name. The first is in the city toward the Vercelline gate, and was in his time that of the Jesuate monks: and these being afterwards extinguished, it now belongs to the Society of Jesus. Paolo Morigi in the Milanese Sanctuary treats of the relics of that church of St. Jerome in chap. 4, p. 120, and attributes to it half a leg and a finger of St. Jerome. The other is of the Hieronymite monks near Milan outside the Ticinese gate at Castellazzo: and to this Carisius ascribes a thumb of St. Jerome. Morigi agrees at p. 213 about the Saint's thumb preserved there, yet subjoining: From which (thumb) Pope Gregory XIV Sfondrati of happy memory took away something from the nail, when he was bishop of Cremona. I return to Strozzi: At Bergamo, he says, the shin-bone of the holy Doctor is venerated, which was translated thither from the kingdom of Cyprus. This sacred pledge is called by some writer, by synecdoche, the Body of St. Jerome. In the church of the Society of Jesus at Tivoli a notable fragment of a bone of that same Saint is honoured, which it received from the cathedral church of that city. Among the relics of the metropolitan church of Cosenza, which are reviewed in Ughelli, vol. 9 of Italia Sacra, col. 252, there is numbered a shin-bone of blessed Jerome.

[1168] There are none at Orléans, From Italy I pass to neighbouring Gaul, which also venerates some relics of St. Jerome. But first I do not well grasp what François Le Maire means by what he writes in the History of Orléans, chap. 40, p. 201, about a reliquary of St. Jerome. He there enumerates many reliquaries which were formerly carried about at Orléans in procession, and among them a reliquary of St. Jerome, which he says was carried by two men. And from this someone may easily suspect that a part of St. Jerome's body, or notable relics of him, were formerly at Orléans or in the diocese of that city. Nevertheless the said Le Maire says nothing about relics among the people of Orléans. Charles de Saussay in the Annals of the church of Orléans reviews the Bodies of Saints formerly preserved in the church of Orléans and in various places of the diocese: but he is silent about St. Jerome. Wherefore I do not judge that the body or notable relics of St. Jerome the doctor were at Orléans. Whether perhaps the body or other relics of St. Jerome bishop of Nevers were carried in the procession at Orléans can be examined at the V of October, on which he is venerated.

[1169] but at Cluny there are notable ones, Of the relics of the holy Doctor honoured in Gaul André du Saussay in the Gallican Martyrology at this day has this: At Cluny, the veneration of the most sacred head of holy Jerome, greatest doctor of the Church. Some of whose precious remains are also held in the highest veneration at Toulouse, both in the college of Foix, which acknowledges the most blessed Confessor as its patron, and in the priory of St. Louis, of the Order of St. Benedict. Of the head of St. Jerome seen at Cluny with other relics our Papebroch makes mention in his Itinerary, that is, in the Return from Rome to Belgium, p. 237. Strozzi in the year 1751 had careful investigation made of how great those Cluny relics are, and in his Appendix cites the letter received on the matter with a twofold instrument. The first is an Inventory of the relics of Cluny, which was written in the year of the Lord one thousand three hundred and four; and in it, with other relics, there is numbered The head of holy Jerome in an ivory vessel. That sacred pledge was therefore there from the year 1304; but in the letter it is said that it is not established at what time or in what manner it reached Cluny. Those relics could have been carried from Palestine in the XII or XIII century into Gaul and to Cluny; but this we cannot know for certain. They have this inscription: The head of holy Jerome the Cardinal. The title of Cardinal, which in the middle ages was given to St. Jerome, sufficiently shows that the relics were believed to be those of St. Jerome the doctor of the Church, so that there seems no need to have recourse to St. Jerome of Nevers mentioned above, to whom no one ever gave that title.

[1170] The other instrument sent to Strozzi is a testimony of the physician and surgeon of the abbey of Cluny, who examined those sacred bones of the head in the year 1751, parts of a skull, on the XI day of December. They attest that under the too generic title of a head there are only three bones of the skull, namely the crown or coronal bone, as the anatomists call it, meaning the bone of the forehead, and the two parietal bones, joined by their natural sutures. I turn their very words from the French into Latin: This alleged head, they say, mentioned under the too extended title of the head of St. Jerome, presented to us only three bones of the skull, the coronal and the two parietals, united and connected by their natural sutures, the coronal and the sagittal. The first of these bones is wholly entire. The right parietal in its posterior part, where it is connected with the occipital, has been cut off with an axe. By the violence of this operation the left parietal has been slightly broken in the same part in which the right was cut off. The anterior angle of that same parietal (the right) is torn in its lower part, but the same is seen entire in the left parietal. For the rest, these three bones are absolutely sound and infected with no decay. They add that this freedom of the bones from decay is worthy of the greater consideration because many sacred bones have not resisted decay. From what has been said we gather that nearly half the skull is held among the monks of Cluny, namely the whole bone of the forehead, one whole lateral bone of the skull, and the other somewhat mutilated; but that the occiput is not there, nor the temples, nor the remaining parts which make up a complete skull.

[1171] Further, from the cutting related of one part of the skull the monks of Cluny conjecture other particles in Gaul. that the relics preserved at Toulouse were perhaps shared with that city by their own forebears. But this may be so, yet it is uncertain, since the people of Toulouse could easily have received theirs too from the Holy Land. At Paris relics of St. Jerome are exposed in the church of the Religious of the Order of the Most Holy Trinity, which they affirm to be one of the Saint's thumbs, says Baillet in St. Jerome. Among us in vol. III of February, in the Acts of St. Angilbert, abbot of Centula, p. 102 and following, there is a full account of the relics preserved in the abbey of Centula and collected by St. Angilbert, and among the Confessors whose relics were held there St. Jerome is numbered. Wherefore in the abbey of Centula relics of the Saint seem to have been before the translation of the body into the West: nor is this to be wondered at, since Charlemagne with St. Angilbert laboured to collect many relics, and since in the same place, at no. 12, St. Angilbert asserts that from Constantinople or Jerusalem, through envoys sent thither by Charlemagne, some also were obtained and carried to his monastery. Let this suffice concerning those preserved in Gaul.

[1172] Our Belgium too has notable parts of the relics of St. Jerome, Some notable particles in Belgium, which in all likelihood came thither from Palestine through those returning from the expeditions of the crusaders. I shall enumerate only those which Raissius reviewed in various places in the Belgian Hierogazophylacium. To the people of Mechlin he attributes at p. 367 an arm of St. Jerome, most excellent doctor of the Church: to those of Tournai in the cathedral church of St. Mary at p. 314, two bones, a great and a small, of holy Jerome, outstanding doctor of the Church: to those of Douai in the abbey of Beaupré, of the Cistercian Order, at p. 95, Also a great bone of St. Jerome, priest and doctor of the Church. In the treasury of relics which the veiled noble virgins of the Order of St. Benedict at Bourbourg possess (in the farthest part of Flanders to the west is the town commonly called Borborg) he numbers at p. 128, Of the relics of St. Jerome, great doctor of the Church; and of his tomb. To the treasury of the Charterhouse of Rutilia he reckons at p. 472 a great bone of St. Jerome, most excellent doctor of the Church. A particle of St. Jerome he ascribes at p. 470 to the abbey of the Holy Sepulchre at Cambrai, of the Order of St. Benedict; and at p. 463 to the collegiate church of St. Saviour at Bruges, something of holy Jerome, from a letter of the bishop of Bruges. There will perhaps be more in other churches of Belgium, since Raissius did not review the sacred deposits of all; but that is not our purpose either.

[1173] others in Germany, Not a few relics of St. Jerome are held in veneration in various churches of Germany. Pešina in the Phosphorus of Prague at the XXX of September gives the following among the Prague relics concerning St. Jerome: Of St. Jerome, doctor of the Church, a finger and a part of his garment; by whom they were brought is not established. Likewise another notable fragment. Several Gelenius attributes to Cologne in his Work, but most of them less notable. To the church of St. Pantaleon, an abbey of the Benedictine Order, he attributes at p. 372 something of the backbone of St. Jerome; and to the Charterhouse of Cologne at p. 456, something of a rib of St. Jerome the priest. And in general he reviews some relics of St. Jerome at p. 264 in the Collegiate church of St. Gereon, where at p. 266 he adds something of the tomb of blessed Jerome; at p. 276 in the Collegiate church of St. Severinus; at p. 289 in the Collegiate church of St. Cunibert; at p. 292 in the Collegiate church of St. Andrew; at p. 310 in the Collegiate church of the Blessed Virgin Mary ad Gradus; and at p. 586 in the monastery of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Bethlehem, of the virgins of the third Rule of St. Francis. Bucelinus in the Benedictine Sacrarium, which he gave after his Menology, at the XXX of September premises some things about St. Jerome, and subjoins about his relics among the Benedictines: There are preserved in various monasteries several parts, especially at Mount St. George (a monastery of Tyrol) and at Andechs (in Bavaria). He adds that the head is preserved at Cluny and a great bone at Beaupré, as has already been said. In Brower and Masen in the Annals of Trier at the year 855, no. 114, there is cited a letter of the emperor Lothair about relics given to the monastery of Prüm, of the Order of St. Benedict in the diocese of Trier, among which the emperor reckons a foot of St. Jerome the priest. So much for Germany.

[1174] The head of St. Jerome which is held in Spain, In Spain too relics of St. Jerome are held, but whether of the present Doctor is not equally certain.

But perhaps the Italians will not admit that the sacred head is held there, and that entire. I shall nevertheless cite what I have in writing before me about that head. For our Pinius, when he was in Spain, in the year 1722, in the month of February, copied out from the manuscript Lipsanology of the royal monastery of St. Lawrence of the Escorial the things relating to those relics, which with many others were received at Cologne in the year 1593 and transported into Spain. In it at fol. 83 there is read in Spanish what I render into Latin: The entire head of the blessed Jerome D. (doctor, they mean, I think), covered with shaggy silk of a golden colour, and adorned with other ornaments, which I pass over. There is also a label written in golden letters on parchment. Pinius also copied out the entire testimony by which the Prioress and nuns of the monastery of blessed Mary Magdalene, commonly called of the White Ladies, of the Order of St. Augustine, attest that by unanimous consent and deliberate will they gave as a gift to the reverend father in Christ, Fr. Baltasar Delgado, commissary of Philip II, most invincible and most powerful Catholic king of the Spains and the Indies etc. (with the previous indult, however, of the ordinary bishop of the place), two named sacred heads, namely of St. Jerome and of St. Margaret the duchess; likewise eleven heads from the company of St. Ursula, whose names are unknown.

[1175] They presently indicate from whom they had formerly received those relics, was received at Cologne with such a testimony, namely from Henry Molenach, archbishop of Cologne, who, as they relate before from their own records, had introduced those nuns into that monastery. Henry De Molenark he is called by Denis de Sainte-Marthe in vol. 3 of Gallia Christiana, col. 690, and his archiepiscopate is there extended from the year 1225 to 1237, so that the nuns must have received those relics within the years just mentioned, in which the body of St. Jerome the doctor was more probably in Palestine. I return to the testimony: Which heads we received from the aforesaid bishop among other relics; and the first two on the high altar, the rest in certain places of our church (from which the said reverend father himself extracted them), we have hitherto preserved and venerated with pious religion. The first reason for the donation is said to be the piety of him who had asked. The second is set forth thus: Having no small regard also for these commotions of our fatherland, on account of which this most precious treasure of the church must be feared for from men of ruined piety (namely the disciples of Luther and Calvin), and since in very many places of our fatherland we have seen (alas the grief!) those most excellent riches plundered and basely cast aside with a certain wicked fury and with sacrilegious hands by ill-disposed and more than diabolical men. We trust, therefore, that these sacred heads will in this way be not only safer from the hands and insolence of wicked men, and in some fashion even vindicated; but also that they will bring no small increase of piety to the pious fervour of his reverend paternity and to very many other pious minds.

[1176] There are read as subscribed, of the nuns who are also named at the beginning, so that it is not clear whether it is of the present Doctor, Maria Van Haizfelt, Prioress, and five others. Then William Comans of Horst, canon of the collegiate church of St. Gereon of Cologne. Fr. William Tielanus, Dominican of Cologne. Georg Braun, dean of the church of Blessed Mary ad Gradus of Cologne, Apostolic commissary. By the mandate of the most reverend bishop of Cyrene, for greater assurance, Fr. William Budding, secretary. By the mandate of the most reverend lord Braun, Apostolic commissary, Roland Weierstras, public notary. The testimony was given in the said monastery in the year of the Lord MDXCIII, the V of September. And so about these relics transported into Spain there is no doubt. But it is not equally certain that that head is St. Jerome's, the doctor of the Church. For in the Testimony of the nuns who possessed that sacred head, it is called only of St. Jerome, without the title of priest or doctor of the Church, or other additions from which it might be gathered that the great Jerome is meant. This reason presses the more because the nuns wished to distinguish St. Margaret from others by the title of duchess, and added nothing to indicate St. Jerome by his titles, whose distinction was most easy. Meanwhile I see that a certain Jerome is numbered in Crombach among the martyrs, companions of St. Ursula. Whether perhaps his head was translated into Spain can be examined at the XXI of October.

[1177] For the rest, the said father Baltasar Delgado on the following VI day of September received also other relics at Cologne from an abbey of nuns of the diocese of Cologne, [which is equally doubtful about the other relics received in the territory of Cologne.] which was situated between Cologne and Düren, and was commonly called Koninxdorff; but the nuns had fled to the city for fear of the heretics. A village of that name is still found on the maps in the territory of Cologne near the borders of the territory of Jülich, but with no indication of an abbey, so that I suspect it was either destroyed or transferred elsewhere. In the year 1583, in which the relics were given, Anna de Berg, surnamed Trips, was abbess, and Margaret of Hoechstede prioress. And among the relics given, which were carried into Spain, there is numbered a bone of St. Jerome, but distinguished by no title, although all the other Saints whose relics were then given are very distinctly distinguished from their namesakes by their titles. In the very full index of the relics which were carried to Lisbon, as it was given among us in vol. 2 of January, p. 612, relics of St. Jerome are also found.

[1178] Other relics of the Saint in other places. Bedeković in the Life of St. Jerome, chap. 27, writes thus: There is also held a particle of relics of that same holy Doctor, approved by authentic Roman documents, in our Stridon, the native place of that same holy Man, in a church dedicated to him, and entrusted with perpetual stability to the care of the Fathers of the Order of St. Paul (the first Hermit) by the emperor Leopold I of pious memory: which, however, is only of bone. He calls the particle of bone because he asks whether the body remained incorrupt. But that question is by no means necessary. And about the place, what we said in §3 may be consulted. Lastly our Bolland left us a slip about the relics of St. Jerome written in his own hand, which I shall cite, even though I cannot confirm that assertion from elsewhere: In the island of Samos, he says, the tongue of St. Jerome is still seen incorrupt. D. Emmanuel Pimentel, count of Feria, attests that he saw it there, and that the marquis of Santarem took pains that it might be given to him. Let this suffice for a fair reader concerning the Saint's relics.

§ LXXIII. The cult of St. Jerome: his festivals and Offices.

The Saint's festival attested at least from the X century, That the name of St. Jerome is celebrated in all the Latin Calendars was said in §64, where I also cited the words of most of the ancient martyrologists. From them it is clear that the Saint's festival was kept from ancient times in some churches at least. In the first codices of the Sacramentaries, as they are printed, the festival of St. Jerome at the XXX of September is not yet found. Yet Hugh Ménard in his Annotations to the book of Sacramentaries of St. Gregory, p. 181, writes thus of the second Kalends of October, which in his edition is empty, after the feast of St. Michael: Further, in the printed copies and in the codex of Ratoldus there follows: II Kal. Oct., the Natal day of St. Jerome; but the prayers are different, which in the codex of Ratoldus are of this sort. “May the glorious intervention of thy holy Jerome, we beseech thee, O Lord, commend us”. Over the offerings: “Receive, O Lord, favourably our prayer,” etc. Preface: “And to entreat thy mercy, that the repeated solemnity of blessed Jerome the priest may continually bestow on our minds the sweetness of spiritual gladness,” etc. Where these words, Repeated solemnity, suggest that formerly there was in the Church a twofold solemnity of St. Jerome; although in this codex of Ratoldus there is only one. For the completion: “We have received, O Lord, the votive gifts of blessed Jerome,” etc.

[1180] and formerly his name in the canon of the Mass in some places. The words alleged entirely prove that the festival of St. Jerome in the Roman Church is very ancient, and was wont to be celebrated at least from the X century, in which the codex of Ratoldus was written. But from the words repeated solemnity I should not dare to infer that there was a twofold festival of St. Jerome each year, since they can be understood of the annual repetition. In the canon of the Mass, as it was published by Ménard at p. 2, after the Apostles and martyrs there are reviewed also some confessors, and among them St. Jerome in this manner: Communicating and venerating the memory in the first place of the glorious ever Virgin Mary, etc., of Hilary, Martin, Augustine, Gregory, Jerome, Benedict, and of all the Saints, etc. In his Annotations at p. 15 he cites the confessors added in the codex of Reims, and to those reviewed there is added Remigius. But in the codex of Ratoldus neither Augustine nor Jerome is found, and in the present-day Roman canon no confessor at all.

[1181] William Durandus in the Rationale of the divine offices, bk. 7, chap. 1, treats of the festivals and their diversity. [The Saint, like most of the Apostles, was formerly honoured with a semi-double Office,] And when he had enumerated the double feasts, greater and lesser, he comes to the semi-doubles, which he begins to review thus: And these are the semi-double feasts of the Saints: of Andrew, Nicholas, Lucy, Thomas the apostle, the Innocents, … Gregory, Augustine, Jerome, Ambrose, Philip and James, etc. I pass over the rest for brevity's sake, and only note that in the same rank were then all the Apostles, except Peter, Paul and John, so that the solemnity of St. Jerome and of theirs was celebrated with the same rite. But we do not know from what time this was begun. Afterwards Boniface VIII raised the Feasts of the Apostles, Evangelists and four Doctors of the Church to the double rite by a bull which for the greater part is inserted in the Sixth of the Decretals, bk. 3, tit. 22, chap. 1. And of the doctors he speaks thus: The outstanding doctors of that same Church too — the blessed Gregory, who, renowned for merits, bore the care of the Apostolic See, Augustine and Ambrose, venerable prelates, and Jerome, endowed with the title of the priesthood, outstanding confessors — God appoints to be extolled with the highest voices, to be sounded forth with special praises, and to be venerated with special honours. For the most lucid and salutary teachings of these doctors have illuminated the aforesaid Church, adorned it with virtues, and formed it in morals. Moreover, through them, as through shining and burning lamps set upon a candlestick in the house of the Lord (the darkness of errors being put to flight), the body of the whole Church shines like the morning star. Their fruitful eloquence too, by the inflowing grace of the heavenly watering, unlocks the riddles of the Scriptures, loosens knots, makes clear what is obscure, and explains what is doubtful. By their profound and beautiful discourses too the ample fabric of that Church glows as with sparkling gems, and, raised higher by a singular elegance of words, more gloriously flashes…

[1182] We, therefore, led by pious counsels and stirred by worthy zeal, and afterwards, with those same and other doctors, with the double rite. carefully intending to imitate several of our predecessors the Roman Pontiffs (who, following a feeling of special devotion, ordained that the feasts of certain Saints be celebrated under a double Office), we will, decree and command, with the counsel and assent of our brethren, that the chief festivals of those same Apostles, Evangelists, and Confessors (the doctors aforesaid) be celebrated each year under a double Office throughout all the churches of the world

solemnly, in all times to come for ever. The whole bull may be seen in Odorico Rinaldi at the year 1295, no. 55, where it is read as issued at Anagni on the XII Kalends of October, in the 1st year of Boniface's pontificate, that is, in the year 1295 of the Christian era. The feasts of the four Doctors have remained hitherto under the same rite, but the feasts of the Apostles and Evangelists have been raised to a higher rite. In the greater Litanies St. Jerome is likewise invoked with the other three doctors. I do not care to mention the various Offices which were composed in honour of the Saint, and namely I pass over one which I have in manuscript, put together in a quite different kind of verse; but I do not know whether it was ever brought into use.

[1183] The Lessons of the present-day Office, with some disturbance of order, The Office which the Roman Church now uses comprises the Saint's chief deeds, but with the order somewhat disturbed. In the prayer it rightly calls St. Jerome the greatest doctor in expounding the sacred Scriptures. The fourth Lesson runs thus: Jerome, son of Eusebius, born at Stridon in Dalmatia under the emperor Constantius, was baptized at Rome as a young man, and instructed in the liberal disciplines by Donatus and other most learned men. Then out of zeal for learning he travelled through Gaul; where he cultivated some pious men learned in the divine Writings, and copied out many sacred books with his own hand. Presently betaking himself to Greece, furnished with philosophy and eloquence, he flourished exceedingly in the company of theologians: but above all he studied under Gregory Nazianzen at Constantinople; and he professes that with him as teacher he learned the sacred Writings. Then for religion's sake he visited the cradle of Christ the Lord, and traversed the whole of Palestine: which pilgrimage, with the most learned of the Hebrews employed, he attests profited him much toward the understanding of sacred Scripture. Some things are here said which happened later: nor was he furnished with philosophy and eloquence in Greece, as the words alleged can be understood, but at Rome. And he heard Nazianzen later, namely after his solitary life in Syria, and much later still traversed Palestine, namely after he had lived some years at Rome under Pope Damasus.

[1184] setting forth the Saint's deeds. The fifth Lesson goes on thus: Then he withdrew into the vast solitude of Syria: where he spent four years in the reading of the divine books and in the contemplation of heavenly beatitude, tormenting himself with constant abstinence, with a force of tears, and with affliction of the body. Being made a priest by Paulinus bishop of Antioch, and having set out for Rome with Paulinus and Epiphanius to Pope Damasus about the controversies of certain bishops, he was his helper in writing his ecclesiastical letters. But since he was held by a longing for his former solitude, returning into Palestine (or rather setting out thither for the first time), at Bethlehem, at the manger of Christ the Lord, in the monastery which had been built by Paula the Roman lady, he established a kind of heavenly plan of life: and although he was assailed in various ways by illnesses and pains, yet he overcame the discomforts of the body by pious labours and by continual reading and writing. The sixth Lesson: As though to an oracle, questions of divine Scripture to be explained were referred to him from all parts of the world. Pope Damasus consulted him (while he was at Rome), and holy Augustine consulted him often, about the most difficult passages of Scripture, on account of his singular learning and his understanding not only of the Latin and Greek tongue, but of the Hebrew and Chaldee also: and because, by the testimony of that same Augustine, he had read almost all writers. He harried heretics with most vehement writings: he always undertook the patronage of the pious and of Catholics. He translated the Old Testament from the Hebrew: the New, by command of Damasus, he restored to the Greek text; and in great part also explained. Besides, he rendered into Latin many writings of learned men: and he himself illuminated Christian teaching with other monuments of his own genius. And coming to extreme old age, illustrious in holiness and learning, under the emperor Honorius he departed to heaven. Whose body, buried at Bethlehem, was afterwards translated to Rome into the basilica of holy Mary at the Manger.

[1185] Other lessons about St. Jerome were in use in the XV century, The lesson formerly in use, as I gather from the Roman Breviary which was printed at Venice in the year 1479. Others again were in use in the year 1518, but almost only abridged from the earlier ones. In them six lessons are recited from the Life of St. Jerome, whose words are frequently alleged. In the Breviary which Cardinal Francisco Quiñones composed anew under Paul III, although the Office is double, only one lesson about the Saint's deeds is found, but that a longer one and arranged in excellent order. I am glad to communicate the whole of it to the learned reader: Jerome, born under the emperor Constantine, in the year CCCXXXI from the redemption of the world, in the town of Stridon (which is on the border of Pannonia and Dalmatia), of Christian parents, was sent while still a boy to Rome to be instructed in the liberal studies. Where, having Donatus as his teacher in grammar and (as some will have it) Victorinus in rhetoric, he learned Greek and Latin letters most happily. And when he had advanced in age, he took up the Aristotelian, Platonic, Stoic, and all the rest of philosophy. Then for the sake of learning he traversed Gaul. Whence he returned to Rome, and thence set out for Syria. And this too having been in great part traversed out of zeal for learning, he withdrew into the vast desert which separates the Syrians from the Hagarenes. All this seems certain, except a very few points. For it is uncertain whether he returned from Gaul to Rome, which nevertheless may be true. But certainly he departed for Syria, not from Rome, but from Aquileia. Let us return to the Saint's desert.

[1186] Where for four years, removed from the throng of men, which everywhere proceeds in the right order, having intercourse with God alone and with his books, he washed away the lapses of his youth with a shower of tears; and wiped off, by the harshness of his labours, the stains contracted through the thoughtlessness of that age. In short, by fasting and vigils and incredible austerity restraining the rebellious flesh and the wantonness of his age that kept springing up again, he taught his body to serve the spirit. Yet in that solitude he was sometimes visited by friends, and he himself visited the neighbouring monks. The difficulty of the Hebrew tongue he mastered with untiring labour: of which he attained not only the understanding but also its peculiar sound and native harshness: employing for that purpose the most learned of the Hebrews, whom he hired at a vast fee, emptying his purse that he might enrich his breast with learning. Nor content with this, he attacked the Chaldee tongue likewise, which, however, he pursued thus far only so that he could understand it more truly than sound it. Gregory Nazianzen he himself calls his teacher, and attests that with him as expositor he learned the sacred Writings. But where he heard the man, or for how long, is not sufficiently established. When, therefore, he was now held famous for vast learning and holiness, being called back to Rome he was made a priest. Here there is a little disturbance. For he was not made a priest at Rome, but at Antioch, after his dwelling in the desert. And from Antioch he set out for Constantinople, and there heard Nazianzen for two years or nearly three. Then he set out for Rome.

[1187] Where, when by the example of his most approved life he was chastising men's morals, and above all was steadfastly reproving the crimes of the clergy, not bearing their envy, he set out from the City again and returned to Syria: yet in a few points it must be corrected. and at Bethlehem, beside the manger which had received the infant Christ, he chose a seat for his coming old age. Where with pious and learned men, in the monastery which the holy matron Paula had founded, he led a most holy life for many years. He wrote very many books. He translated the Old Testament from the Hebrew, the New from the Greek into the Latin tongue. He besides gave Latin dress to many Works of the Greeks. At last, the course of his life being most holily finished, renowned for many miracles, in that same town of Bethlehem he departed to the Lord on the day before the Kalends of October, in the year of Christ's birth CCCCXXII, and the ninety-first of his own age. This marked year of his death was perhaps taken from Giovanni d'Andrea: but Baronius, and others generally following him, substituted the year 420. I rather believe that the Saint died in the year 419. These lessons are found in the Breviaries of the years 1536, 1542 and 1557, which we have in print, and doubtless in the other editions, down to the Breviary reformed by St. Pius V according to the decree of the council of Trent. In this the lessons are nearly the same as in the present-day one.

[1188] The feast of the translation, formerly celebrated on the IX of May, Although the translation of St. Jerome is announced in the Roman Martyrology at the IX of May, the festival of this translation does not seem ever to have been celebrated by the whole Church. But it was certainly kept on that very day formerly in the basilica of holy Mary Major, and is there now celebrated on the Vigil of the Lord's Ascension. For in the proper Offices of the basilica of St. Mary Major, printed in the year 1636, among the feasts of May this is read: On the Vigil of the Ascension. The Translation of holy Jerome, priest, confessor, and doctor of the Church, double (his body rests in this basilica). All as on the day in the Roman Breviary. It is certain, however, that the Translation was formerly kept on the IX day of May, on which Pope Pius II also granted indulgences to those approaching the altar of St. Jerome in the basilica of St. Mary Major, by a bull printed in Paolo de Angelis.

[1189] is now kept on the vigil of the Lord's Ascension. The same Pius, by another bull printed in the same place, bk. 6, chap. 4, transferred the festival to the day even now in use, thus beginning: Pius, bishop, servant of the servants of God, for the perpetual memory of the matter. The holy Roman Church has instituted that many celebrations of the Saints be kept outside their natal days, so that it might honour their memory either at a more opportune time or with a fuller veneration. Moved also by this occasion, we have by Apostolic authority decreed that the solemnity of the translation of the most blessed Jerome, priest and chief doctor, which was formerly kept on the seventh Ides of May, is to be kept and celebrated on the Vigil of the Lord's Ascension, on which a greater throng of people is known to flock from the places bordering the City to the shrines of the Saints. He adds the indulgences to be gained there on that day. Given at Rome at St. Peter's in the year of the Lord's Incarnation MCDLXIV, on the Kalends of June, in the sixth year of our pontificate. Let this suffice concerning the festivals and Offices: for it is not necessary to review the churches in which, either on account of relics or of patronage, the Saint's festival is kept with some singular solemnity.

§ LXXIV. Several churches dedicated to the Saint in Italy in the XIV century: miracles wrought at Troia in Apulia.

An ancient church of the Saint in the diocese of Trieste, Giovanni d'Andrea published his Hieronymianus in the later years of his life, that is, between 1342 and 1348, in which he died: for of Sperantius bishop of Cervia, whose death is fixed by Ughelli in the year 1342, he makes mention as of one deceased in words to be given below, and in many other places he suggests that he did not write as a young man, nor at the beginning of the XIV century. And the said Giovanni d'Andrea was carried by a wonderful feeling of piety toward St. Jerome, and strove by his own example to instil it into others. Hence at the very beginning of his Work he complains that Italy had been remiss in the Saint's cult, and says that for more than five lustra he had inquired after churches dedicated to St. Jerome, and had found no others in Italy but one at Troia in Apulia and two in Tuscany. Yet in the same place he mentions another church too, which he says was built in the Saint's native land

as he thinks. Of this he speaks thus at fol. 20: And on account of the beginning of the Legend I premise that the place where Jerome's parents were buried is today called Soregna (elsewhere Sdringa) in the diocese of Triestrina (that is, of Trieste), and there is there a church of blessed Jerome, though a very poor one: and it is said that it was formerly called Strido. This is more commonly said of Trieste, which, because it was thrice destroyed and wiped out, was called Triestrum, the name of Stridon being changed. But these things about Trieste being formerly called Stridon are frivolous. Yet even so they show that the tradition about Sdringa having formerly been Stridon, as they will have it, was not received by all in the XIV century. What I argued about the Saint's native place in §3 may be seen. I have transferred the words hither only to show that there was an ancient church of St. Jerome there.

[1191] Of the church which in the XIV century was dedicated to St. Jerome at Troia in Apulia [another at Troia in Apulia, built on account of a repeated revelation of the Saint] Giovanni d'Andrea treats at greater length at fol. 17 and 18. Now, in declaring, he says, what I said above about Troia, it must be known that in modern times in Apulia, in the province of Capitanata , near the archbishopric of Siponto, in the city which is called Troia (whose bishop is exempt, and is said by Apostolic privilege to wear the pallium), there were certain most devout hermits, among whom one was called brother Bellatus : (nor shall I pass over that my own maternal great-grandfather was of the same name.) That brother Bellotus * (so the name is printed here) was a man of great penance, filled with purity of mind and good simplicity: who related that Jerome had appeared to him in sleep, asserting that in a certain and expressly designated place of that city he wished a church to be built under his name, which should be served in the divine praises by brethren of the Order of Preachers: and in like manner he appeared to several other men of God, and namely to master Nicholas Bardanus of Troia, still living, who at my request deposed this. These two, being astonished, did not reveal it, since the place designated seemed unfit, because the city's filth was thrown out in it. After a time Jerome appeared again, rebuking them for their silence during so long a time.

[1192] For which cause he gathered very many devout servants of God into one place, and honoured with miracles. relating to them what I have said. And they by a deliberate and inspired counsel resolved to dig that place for the sake of founding it. And when the aforesaid men had begun to dig, they found foundations for the church to be built, previously constructed of great stones. But whether they belonged to some most ancient building, or were miraculously and newly formed by divine power, was unknown. Certain brethren of the aforesaid Order being therefore called, they began to build upon those foundations. And divine providence, which glories in its Saints, provided this occurrence * for the fuller progress of the building. A certain prelate, travelling in a carriage for his own convenience or by reason of bodily suffering, with a great retinue of horsemen, when he was at the place of the building, asked for what reason that church was being made: and having heard the answer, moved to laughter, said that the brethren, having found a new Saint, were doing it for gain. This the most glorious Jerome, most famous among the ancients, took ill: which appeared by the outcome. For suddenly the oxen broke into flight and toward a nearby ravine, which is a very great precipice. And he, considering this and repenting of his word, vowed to offer to that building the carriage with the oxen and all that it carried, if blessed Jerome would deliver him from the aforesaid peril: which he did. For after the vow the oxen at once halted (that is, stood still): and on this account travellers and the people of the land were more encouraged to contribute to the building, so that to the glory of that Doctor in the year of the Lord MCCCXV his building was completed.

[1193] And these things are confirmed by fit testimonies: Where modern miracles of the Doctor shine forth, which I received from * Troia together with the foregoing narrative under the public testimony of the ecclesiastical and secular judge of that place, with the subscription of thirty-seven lettered witnesses: among whom were the dean, the cantor, and eight canons of the cathedral church: likewise two priests, judges and notaries to the number of ten, and other upright men notably worthy of credit. With so many witnesses Giovanni d'Andrea confirms the miracles which he then narrates in part 2. And the account just given we have also from a manuscript codex of the Milanese library of St. Ambrose, as also the Miracles presently to be given, some things, however, being omitted, the testimonies here alleged suppressed, and the author's name unmentioned. That simple compiler of the codex, who transferred from Giovanni d'Andrea's Work into his codex as much as he pleased, would by that negligence of his have brought it about that miracles which acquire authority from a contemporary writer and from the testimonies alleged would have been held by many for fables. These d'Andrea cites at fol. 46, beginning thus: Modern miracles must be written of, which flashed forth at Troia after the beginning of the construction of the church, of which mention was made above before the end of the first part, and beyond what is described there. I shall set down first the eight of which I am more certain.

[1194] A lame man healed, A certain John Penatus, an inhabitant of Troia, had withered legs, so that he could not walk; but went about on a crutch or a tub or little stools *, drawing his hands along the ground after the manner of such men. Coming with devotion and with hope of healing to the place where the church of blessed Jerome was being built, he was most perfectly delivered, so that afterwards, as long as he lived, he walked most steadily.

[1195] an innocent man delivered from death, Secondly, master James Scutellarius, of commendable life, going from Troia, where he lived, to the land of Acqua Putida *, fell in with certain wicked men, robbers of the highways and murderers, travelling with them without knowing that they were such. The governor of the province, pursuing those wicked men, seized them and master James along with them: and put them all to torture. Which master James, being unable to endure, confessed that he had been their companion in many crimes previously confessed by them. On account of which the governor condemned them to the gallows: and while they were being led to the place of execution, according to the custom of the country with their hands bound behind them and ropes hung about their necks, and while that same master James was continually and suppliantly invoking blessed Jerome in aid of his innocence, blessed Jerome appeared visibly to the governor, who was in his chamber, commanding that he should free master James, whom he had condemned though innocent. The governor, terrified, at once ordered him to be brought back before him: and when he had returned, asked him whether he was invoking the aid of any Saint. And when he had answered concerning blessed Jerome, the governor ordered him to be released without delay. And he, having taken neither food nor drink, went with the noose about his neck and with his hands bound to the church, to render thanks to blessed Jerome for so great a benefit; and that noose hangs at his image painted in that same church. And the aforesaid master James is still living. That governor too, to ask pardon and out of devotion for the miracle, visited the church, and offered a money-subsidy for its building.

[1196] Thirdly master Barbatus of St. George, an inhabitant of Troia, a dead man called back to life, while he was living in the land of Santa Maria, formerly called Lucera, died, or at least seemed dead in the opinion of all who saw him. On account of which the clergy of the city, to carry the corpse for burial, went to his house at the hour of Vespers. But because the hour seemed late and unsuitable, they returned without the corpse, the burial being put off to another day. And when the husband's wife, bewailing his death, was suppliantly and with a loud voice praying blessed Jerome to restore her husband to his children, at once the dead man cast forth spittle from his mouth, and, opening his eyes, was healed. On account of which he moved to live at Troia, and living there is still alive.

[1197] Fourthly, Nicholas John Marscalci *, who through an illness had lost his sight and had long been blind, nor was he hoped to see thereafter, when he had vowed himself to blessed Jerome, his sight was suddenly restored to him.

[1198] Fifthly, Maria of the land of Casalnuovo, who had a twisted hand from birth, a hand useless, which she could not use to help herself, humbly vowing herself to blessed Jerome, was at once delivered, working freely with that hand as with the other.

[1199] Sixthly, a certain young man of the land of Pulcarini * had twisted feet from his birth, and a lame man healed. with which he could walk badly. He, coming most devoutly with his parents to the church of blessed Jerome, and vowing himself to that same church, was at once delivered, and, walking perfectly with his feet made straight, humbly adored the aforesaid image of blessed Jerome.

[1200] Seventhly, when John, an infant, went with his sister, who was older than he, to a kiln where lime was being burned, A boy fallen into a kiln and was looking within while the fire was strong, he fell into it upon the fire. But his sister invoking blessed Jerome for her brother's safety, the boy was drawn out unharmed.

[1201] Eighthly, a certain Preaching friar, dwelling in the aforesaid church, and a man fallen from a height are preserved unharmed. when he had climbed the church with other workmen to cover the roof, six canne in height, fell headlong by accident to the ground: and when in falling he had invoked blessed Jerome, he escaped unharmed. Thus far of the miracles which he said were proved by ecclesiastical and secular judgment in the words given at no. 1193, as he here again hints, going on thus: The above I received under that solemn testimony which I set forth above at the end of the first part; in which it was contained that many other miracles had been done there, which could not easily be described in a single instrument . Of these will in all likelihood be those which he immediately subjoins, prefacing this about the manner in which he received the later ones: But I received from a religious bishop, not however of Troia but of the neighbouring parts, and from brethren worthy of credit who were conventuals of that place at Troia, many miracles, of which I shall describe some, continuing the numbering begun.

[1202] Likewise three cripples healed, Ninthly, I shall join together three cripples healed by his power. The first is Peter Gisualdo, who at the urging of a certain pilgrim woman vowed in the evening that he would have twenty Masses said in honour of blessed Jerome in his church, if by his power he were healed before the next day. And being cured before daybreak, on that same day he took a sickle and reaped barley with the others (which was then being harvested): and at length fulfilled his vow. Likewise a certain poor man of Ariano *, having a crippled daughter, made a vow for her to blessed Jerome, and at once she was healed. Another, long crippled, being at once healed after his vow, on the feast of blessed Jerome offered before his image the staff by which he had somehow supported himself, and fulfilled his vow.

[1203] a captive freed from prison, Tenthly, when the army of the lord king Robert (was besieging) the city of Trapa (in the manuscript Trapeni, that is, Drepanum, a city of Sicily well enough known, on the sea, which city Robert king of Naples vainly attempted to take in the year 1314, as Muratori has it in the Annals of Italy) and against it

had made no progress in fighting, when the army moved off, some young men remained, fighting with crossbows against the men of the city. And the citizens, coming out of the city, seized many of them: among whom there was captured a certain Gualterucius of Manfredonia, and he was put in prison with iron fetters. And he devoutly with tears made a vow to blessed Jerome, that, if he would free him, he would for eight days have Mass celebrated in his church by a priest to be brought at his own expense. And falling asleep, and in the morning finding himself outside the walls of the city, giving thanks to blessed Jerome, he fulfilled his vow.

[1204] another from the depth of a river, Eleventh, Samnus (in the manuscript Sabinus) of Salpi, crossing a river, was enveloped by the waters and plunged into the deep. And when he had made a vow to blessed Jerome with his heart, since he could not with his mouth, at once the waters lifted him up.

[1205] a blind, a deaf and a dumb man healed: Twelfth, I shall join three together, namely a blind, a deaf, and a dumb man, about whom miracles shone forth. Dominic of Salpi, an inhabitant of Casale San Clerico, through a grave illness and the failure of the physician wholly lost his sight. And at the urging of a certain lady he made a vow for his own healing to blessed Jerome in the evening, and in the morning was fully healed, and fulfilled his vow. Likewise a certain lady of Petra had two sons; of whom one was dumb and the other deaf. And when she had made a vow to blessed Jerome with much devotion, the first received the benefit of speech, the second of hearing.

[1206] a dead girl raised. Thirteenth, a certain woman, Marriana *, bore a dead daughter: and a vow being made by the father to blessed Jerome with much devotion and abundance of tears, the girl came to life again.

[1207] a possessed woman delivered, Fourteenth, a certain girl of Castelluccio * was possessed by a demon, and being brought by her parents and friends to the church of blessed Jerome on a Sunday, while the brethren were singing Matins, the demon went out of her through the girl's mouth with cries and howlings, hairs being cast forth through the girl's mouth upon the altar. And the girl, being healed, stayed eight days at Troia, visiting the church morning and evening and hearing the Office there.

[1208] Fifteenth, he links together birds and four-footed beasts. a falcon found, a horse healed, a boy unharmed in danger. For a certain nobleman had lost a falcon; and when, though diligently sought, he could not find it, he made a vow to blessed Jerome for recovering it: after which, when he had entered the gate of the city of Troia, the falcon came to his hands. Another, a French knight, a member of the household of the lord prince of Taranto , had a most beautiful horse of great value, whom pains so sharply assailed that he lay motionless. The knight, despairing of that horse's life, vowed that, if it were healed, he would offer one florin to the building of the church of holy Jerome. And it rose up sound without delay, and the knight fulfilled his vow. Likewise Peter, brother of lord Matthew of Salerno , being at a good inn *, handed the horse which he was breaking in to a boy, the son of his nurse, to hold for a little. But the horse took fright at the movement of a hen, and by an unheard-of mischance a noose was made out of the horse's bridle-chain, in which the boy was caught, and he was dragged by the horse more than a mile. But Peter, fearing the boy's death, made a vow to blessed Jerome for his safety: and at once the horse stood fixed on its forefeet until it was caught. And then the boy appeared unharmed, and was presented by him in the church of blessed Jerome.

[1209] Here Giovanni d'Andrea sets an end to the second part of his Work, and to the miracles of St. Jerome, These miracles first written down by Giovanni d'Andrea. written, as it seems, most faithfully, and by way of conclusion adds the following little verses:

These wonders of holy Jerome, not yet made known to the Latins, his own John, son of Andrew, has written down.

From these verses it is clear that the first writer of this account is Giovanni d'Andrea: and that those things which are found expressed in the same words in manuscript codices are fragments of that Work — such as those which we have from the already mentioned codex of the Ambrosian library, from which we also have what I shall presently give about another church from Giovanni d'Andrea. That copy was of use only for restoring here and there some words, and especially proper names, where they were faultily printed. To this end I have besides used a manuscript codex of the XIV century which we have in our library. And so, partly from this manuscript of Giovanni d'Andrea's Work, partly from the fragments of the Ambrosian codex, come the variant readings given above or still to be given.

[1210] The said Giovanni d'Andrea in part 1, after he had treated of the church of Troia, Another ancient church of the Saint; goes on thus at fol. 18: Of the two churches most lately known to me, putting first what is shorter and lacks a miracle, I have learned that in the diocese of Arezzo and the district of Castel Anghiari, and the plebate of Blessed Mary of Micciano, there is a certain rural church of his name: whose patrons are said to be the counts of Monte Dagli *. This church seems to have been already old then, so that without doubt it was founded before the body of St. Jerome was translated from Palestine into Italy. Yet the other will be much older, if Jacobilli in the Saints of Umbria, vol. 1, p. 502, did not stray too far from the true age of St. Bevignate, a monk of Perugia, whom he judged to have flourished about the end of the V century and the beginning of the sixth. This our Henschen adopted at the XIV of May, where he treated of St. Bevignate solely from Jacobilli and Ferrari, because he had no other documents.

[1211] Meanwhile let us hear Giovanni d'Andrea: Of the second, in which there is a miracle, he says, it must be known that the solemn information which I had from Perugia about the church of blessed Jerome another which is believed to have been found by a revelation, which is within the precinct of the monastery of holy Bennegnas (now Bevignate), collected from various writings and sayings of religious and secular prelates, has this: that the aforesaid holy Bennegnas, while he lived, related that holy Jerome had appeared to him and had charged him to dig in a certain named field, which was all under cultivation; since beneath it there was a church dedicated to his name; and that he should uncover that church: which that Saint and tiller of the field at first did not weigh. Jerome appeared a second time about the same thing and rebuked him: and he then asked a certain knight, the lord of that field (who was called lord Consolus ), that he would give him leave to dig, relating the aforesaid visions. And the knight laughed at him. But when he pressed importunately, he granted that he should wait for the harvest of the grain, with which that field was then full, and afterwards dig. That Saint himself, since he had resolved wholly to obey the vision, began to doubt where * he ought to begin. Blessed Jerome appeared a third time, saying that he should dig where he found grain ripe for reaping. And going thither in the morning on the XIV of May (although it was not the time of harvest), he found grain full, dry and ripe for reaping in a certain small portion of the field: and there, the reaping being first done, he began to dig, and found a church entirely underground with a small bell: which he wholly uncovered.

[1212] and it is almost underground. Which is now said to appear to a small height above the ground: for the stone vault * which then existed, and which had partly fallen through age, being destroyed, the walls were raised, and above them the church was covered with a wooden structure and tiles. And one goes down into it by six stone steps. And I have it that that church is kept rather neglectedly, not without blame to those whose business it is to set it in order. Nor is Mass celebrated in it, except on the feast of blessed Jerome, which is on the last day of September: on which day it is celebrated there solemnly enough, and kept festival with a great concourse of the citizens. Thus far the author, whose account here is not as certain as the earlier one about the church of Troia. For the former was received from eyewitnesses and ear-witnesses: but the latter seems to have arisen from popular traditions, since it is said to be collected from various writings and sayings of prelates. For very few things are related about St. Bevignate, and those very things can by no means seem certain to a learned and critical reader. Jacobilli, who fixed the death of St. Bevignate about the year 500, did not touch by so much as a word on the finding of that church of St. Jerome, nor reckon it among the deeds of St. Bevignate. And so I fully believe that some church of St. Jerome existed in the territory of Perugia in the XIV century; but all that Giovanni d'Andrea related about the finding of that church I hold for uncertain. What he related besides about the miracles of St. Jerome from supposititious writings, which were circulated under the names of SS. Cyril, Augustine and Eusebius of Cremona, I did not think should even be touched upon.

[1213] The cult promoted by Giovanni d'Andrea, But the outstanding piety of a man most learned in law and an excellent devotee of St. Jerome deserves that we should transfer hither what he relates that he did in the Saint's honour. He complains at fol. 15 that no church was formerly dedicated to St. Jerome at Bologna, where he taught, just as elsewhere he not seldom grieves that the piety of the Italians toward Jerome was not so great as he himself desired. I began, therefore, he says at fol. 16, to venerate the glorious Doctor by keeping his vigil and celebrating his feast in various ways: by imploring his aid in my acts, my undertakings, my counsels, my judgments and my writings. I caused his name to be given to certain boys at their catechism, and to be taken by monks at their entrance… In the public part of my own house I had his history fully painted. In the cathedral church of Bologna I endowed a chapel and a priestly benefice to his name and honour: and beyond Bologna, beside the public and frequented road by which one goes to Florence, together with my daughter-in-law *, now deceased, I founded a beautiful parish church with its buildings and endowment. A monastery of the Carthusian Order, very lately begun near Bologna within a mile toward the West, at the expense of others and my own, and also a parish church within the same distance toward the North, I obtained to be entitled to his name.

[1214] In various churches I procured that altars be erected to his honour, and churches built. assigning to each of the aforesaid churches a special Office of that Doctor, elegantly composed and set to music at my request. Eager to obtain what follows, I visited various provinces overseas by letters and messengers: I laboured to have something of his relics: which I think I have attained. Beyond these things I have conceived something notable, which I have resolved now not to bury in silence, but to cover over. I write this that I may attract those who read to like things: for which, however, what has been said before and what is to be written below would suffice. Then he excuses himself for relating his own doings: and goes on thus: And to those who imitate them I wish beatitude: which, all evils being set aside, is the heaped-up * combination of goods; which, that they may easily attain it, may God grant them to do what they would have wished to have done, and to omit what they would have wished to have omitted, at the time of death. And this I hope has been attained by the lord of honoured memory

father Superantius of Cingoli, doctor of decrees and bishop of Cervia, who, deigning to imitate me his teacher, in the aforesaid place of his origin (namely Cingoli) founded and endowed from his patrimony a beautiful church to the honour of that Doctor. This foundation was made in the year 1336, as the inscription in Ughelli has it, vol. 2, among the bishops of Cervia. He adds: And the other prelates will act justly if they do not suffer their dioceses to lack churches of blessed Jerome. Thus the pious writer. Very many churches of St. Jerome were indeed built afterwards throughout Europe: but these I pass over.

* Ms. Campaniæ

* in the Ms. Bellotus and Bellocus

* elsewhere Bellocus

* in the Ms. congregaverunt

* elsewhere prædicti

* in our Ms. hunc locum casu

* Ms. de

* Ms. Scabellis

* Ms. Putridæ

* Ms. Marschalk

* Ms. Pultamna or Pultanina

* Ms. supradicta

* Ms. recipi

* Ms. de Dirianno

* Ms. in Arriano

* Ms. Cascilucio

* Ms. Tartenta

* Ms. de Samelo

* i.e. hospitio

* Ms. Bogli

* Ms. mandasse

* Ms. quæ verba

* Ms. Consolatus

* Ms. Conatus

* elsewhere quomodo

* Ms. valva

* Ms. uxore

* Ms. Carthusiensis

* Ms. cumulata

§ LXXV. On the pictures representing St. Jerome: and on that occasion some little fables are reported and refuted.

[The Saint, by the care of Giovanni d'Andrea, painted with a Cardinal's hat and a lion,] Giovanni d'Andrea, among the things which he says he did for the honour of St. Jerome, reviews not only the prayers which he composed about him, the hymns and poems which he had composed by others as well — and not without added fables, and in the style of the XIV century — but also painted pictures, of which he speaks thus: I dictated the form in which he is now painted sitting in a chair, with the hat (that is, the cap) which Cardinals now use laid aside, and with a tame lion; thus multiplying pictures of him in various places. These words suggest that Giovanni d'Andrea was the author of the addition to pictures of St. Jerome of the Cardinal's hat and the tame lion. For that writer really thought that St. Jerome had been a Cardinal of the Roman Church, and he indicates this in part 2, fol. 20, in these words: And when he was thirty-eight years old, he was ordained Cardinal priest by Pope Liberius to the title of holy Anastasia, as one Legend contains. He suggested the same in other places, and had it inserted into hymns and poems. That error grew little by little through the writers of the Life whom I reviewed in §2. In the first Life St. Jerome is only called a priest of the Roman Church, but it is not added by whom he was ordained. He strayed less, in making him a Roman priest instead of an Antiochene one, and at least added no more.

[1216] after the opinion about his Cardinalitial dignity The second Life contains a graver error about these matters. For at the beginning it suggests that he was ordained priest while as a young man he was pursuing his studies at Rome. Who, when he was passing midway between boyhood and youth, touched by a heavenly impulse, having left all his kinsfolk and his father's estate, in order that he might be able to be a perfect imitator of the Gospel, boarding a ship, with a favourable breeze blowing, by the dispensation of divine mercy came to the City of Rome, to the thresholds of the exalted Apostles Peter and Paul. In which, namely, being carefully and excellently instructed in Greek and Latin letters, and receiving the garment of Christ, he was also ordained Cardinal priest there. The author plainly errs when he says that Jerome left his father's goods at that time: for he was being sent to Rome for literary studies, and in them he was supported by his father's goods, as also afterwards on his travels. He errs again, if he means that he was ordained priest in that first stay at Rome, as the words suggest: for he was ordained much later. Nay, he says lower down that he was ordained at Rome by Damasus in such a way as again to suggest that this was done in the first Roman stay. And so he errs thirdly, in keeping St. Jerome at Rome down to the pontificate of Damasus, and so confounding the Saint's two stays in the City. Certainly the second added to the first biographer in saying that St. Jerome was ordained by Damasus.

[1217] had gradually grown strong through the biographers: The third increased the errors already mentioned, and not only makes the Saint a Cardinal priest in the first Roman stay, ordained however by Liberius; but presently brings him in, with St. Paula, contending excellently against the Arians and against Liberius himself, whom by a new error he makes an Arian. Who by the fitting ecclesiastical grades, he says, ascended to the dignity of the Cardinalate. For, being thirty-nine years old, he was ordained by Liberius, Prelate of the Apostolic See, priest of the Roman Church of the title of holy Anastasia. But neither did Liberius live down to the XXXIX year of St. Jerome's age, nor did Jerome remain at Rome to that age. Meanwhile this writer added to the earlier ones that he was a priest of the title of St. Anastasia. But presently he joins still grosser errors, going on thus: But when that same Apostolic man (Liberius), after nearly four years, turned apostate and had consented to the Arian doctrine, and many were hiding themselves for fear of the persecution which was stirred up by Constantius, this man, according to the prophetic word, set himself as a wall for the house of Israel, that he might stand in battle in the day of the Lord… Nay, according to the wisdom given him, sending forth the arrows of his eloquence, he scattered them, and, multiplying the lightnings of the divine sayings, he confounded them. Magnificent words indeed, but most base errors.

[1218] but that opinion is entangled in gross errors. For he presently joins still more clearly the emperor Constantius and Pope Liberius as persecutors of Catholics, and to Jerome fighting against the Arians he joins St. Paula. But neither was Liberius ever an Arian, nor did he ever persecute Catholics. And Constantius died in the year 361, while Jerome was being imbued with the liberal disciplines, and had not yet touched the study of the sacred Writings; how, then, was he writing under Constantius against the Arians? Paula, being born in the year 347, was a girl of ten or twelve years when Constantius was persecuting the Catholics; in what way, then, did she at that time begin to bestow help upon him and to supply him from her own means, as that writer asserts? From these things the diligent reader will understand with how great errors the things asserted in the Lives about St. Jerome's Cardinalitial dignity are entangled, and from the Lives they have passed to others. For all the Lives make him a Cardinal before he led the solitary life in Syria. But it is established that he was made a priest at Antioch, after he had returned thither from the solitude. And if he had at all been enrolled among the Roman priests, that would have been done at the time when, after his solitary life, he was living at Rome under Damasus, to whom he was most dear. But that this opinion is not probable I have shown abundantly in § XI.

[1219] And that Giovanni d'Andrea had St. Jerome painted with a tame lion By a like error it was believed was likewise done out of an error which he held for true history. The first Life has nothing about this. But the author of the second Life in Martianay, vol. 5, from p. 513, wove a long account, which is certainly false about St. Jerome. For on a certain day toward evening, he says, when blessed Jerome had sat down with the brethren, as is the custom of monks, to hear the sacred reading, … suddenly a huge lion, limping on three feet and holding up the fourth, entered the cloisters of the monastery. And at the sight of him the terrified brethren, some of them, turned to flight… But holy Jerome, undaunted, went to meet the lion's coming as though to an arriving guest. And when they had come near one another, … it offered the sole of the foot which it had injured. Then, calling the brethren, he ordered them diligently to wash the injured foot, inquiring why the lion went thus limping. And when this had been done and they had carefully looked, they found the sole of the lion's foot wounded by thorns. Care therefore being diligently applied to it, along with food, it recovered at once from the stroke of the injury.

[1220] Having then laid aside all the fury of beastly wildness, that a tame lion served St. Jerome, it began to dwell among them, going to and fro, like a domestic and quiet animal. Then Jerome asks the brethren what work they should commit to the lion. And when they advised that they should commit the ass to him to guard, so it was done; for, the care of the ass being enjoined upon the lion, the lion protected it. But once, while the lion slept, merchants who were making for Egypt, … seeing the ass grazing, since they saw no guardian present, … seized it and led it away with them. The lion then seeks the ass, but when all hope of finding the ass had been taken away, coming to the door of the monastery he stood still: for, conscious of his fault, he did not dare to enter, as he had been wont to do before with the little ass. And blessed Jerome with the brethren, seeing him lingering without the ass at the doors of the cell, and because he had returned at an unusual hour, thought that, driven by the urging of hunger, he had killed his animal: and, unwilling to give him his accustomed ration, they said: Go, and chew what is left of the little ass, which has remained to you, and fill your gullet. Yet, no evidence of the ass being killed being found in the place to which the lion was wont to lead the aforesaid animal, … returning they took care to announce this to blessed Jerome. On hearing which, he said to the brethren: I beseech you, brethren, although you suffer the loss of the ass, yet do not exasperate this lion nor cast him out: but, governing him as before and offering him food, feed him: and, cutting wood in the grove, bind it moderately together, so that he may be able to draw it and bring it to us here in the ass's stead. And so it was done.

[1221] and he is clothed in several little fables, The lion therefore, condemned to carry the ass's burdens, is said often to have sought the ass. And when the merchants who had led the ass away were returning from Egypt with camels, that ass going before, and had drawn near the lion; he, recognizing the ass, roaring fiercely, rushed upon them with a great din, yet hurting none of them. And they, at once leaving everything, … turned to flight. And as they fled, the lion, roaring terribly, struck the ground strongly with his tail, and forced the terrified camels, loaded as they were, to go before him to the cell. The brethren, then, seeing an unusual thing — that the ass went before, the laden camels in the middle, and the lion came following behind them — presently going out quietly, took care to announce it to blessed Jerome. On hearing which, going out, he ordered the doors of the monastery to be opened kindly, and commanded the deepest silence, saying: Take the loads off our guests, that is, off the camels and the ass, relieve them, wash their feet, offer them food, waiting to see what the Lord wished to show His servants in this deed. All being done, … the lion began, as before, to go rejoicing hither and thither through the cloisters of the monastery, casting himself down at the feet of each of the brethren… Seeing which, the brethren, doing penance because they had laid upon him the charge of cruelty, said: Behold our shepherd, whom a little before we were cruelly condemning as a devourer, etc. But now enough of fables: the camels, the merchants being kindly received,

and admonished to steal no more, St. Jerome is said to have restored. This whole little fable, dressed up as it is with ridiculous details, has a place also in the third Life of St. Jerome, but is there related a little more briefly and less awkwardly. The whole of it too Giovanni d'Andrea adopted from the second Life, relating it at fol. 22.

[1222] [and was adopted by many: but something of this kind happened to St. Gerasimus, not to Jerome.] And that great doctor of the laws made so much of that insipid little fable that he wished it to have a place in the few verses by which he had the history of St. Jerome painted in his house. He cites those twelve verses at fol. 54, in which two about the Lion run thus:

Then the lion grows tame: he obeys the kindly commands: he carried wood; he laments the stolen (ass) and gladly brings it back.

Again in the hymn which follows there, that lion is thus mentioned:

He who carried wood, and tamed the lion, the law-giving Abbot.

Wherefore no other reason is to be sought why Giovanni d'Andrea had St. Jerome painted with a tame lion, than that he held the little fable for true history. And for other reasons that painting could afterwards be continued, after it became known that what prevailed in the middle ages about St. Jerome's lion is false. Yet we judge that something similar happened, not to St. Jerome — of whom neither in his own writings nor in contemporary or nearly contemporary writers is such a prodigy read — but to St. Gerasimus the abbot, who half a century after St. Jerome flourished in Palestine in the solitary life, and of whom we have treated at the V of March. The event is there narrated from the Spiritual Meadow, whose author says that he learned it from the elders of St. Gerasimus's monastery. That is indeed marvellous, even as it is there related: yet everything is asserted in a more probable manner than by the author of the Life of St. Jerome, who is believed to have been led into error by a certain similarity of name, and to have transferred to St. Jerome what had happened to St. Gerasimus. From whatever quarter he was drawn into error, he certainly erred, and transferred to St. Jerome a deed attributed to St. Gerasimus, with improbable exaggeration.

[1223] In the Life of Blessed Colomba of Rieti, written by Sebastian of Perugia, The Saint appeared with a lion to Blessed Colomba, and why. of the Order of Preachers, the Blessed one's confessor, and given at the XX of May, at no. XI there is narrated a wonderful apparition offered to the Virgin. For with Christ the Lord there are said to have appeared to the Virgin SS. Peter and Paul and St. Dominic, and also St. Jerome with a lion… And the lion which had been with St. Jerome remained with her all that night, and a fragrance of wonderful odour was in that room for a long time. The apparition is said to have been made to her while waking and praying; nay, it is read that the Blessed one vowed virginity in it, and had on that account to endure vast struggles. Hence our Papebroch in his Annotations observes about the lion that by some writers St. Leo is understood, but by himself that animal which is always wont to be painted with St. Jerome, and that it was therefore left, when the vision ceased, with Blessed Colomba for the rest of the night, as a guardian of the vow she had made, and a pledge of the fortitude to be divinely given her for the defence of her purpose against the temptations that would soon rise up. He adds that for this reason the assertion about the lion of holy Jerome, which arose from error, is not confirmed. Again, at the XXV of May in Maria Maddalena de' Pazzi, p. 247, no. 8, he discusses that lion, and brings forward another reason why St. Jerome could appear with a lion, although the lion was received from St. Gerasimus on account of some affinity of name. For so far, he says, has that vulgar error prevailed that the Saint is now wont to be painted in no other way, and he must needs adapt himself to it, if he wishes to be recognized, without any other mark of himself, from his dress and companion. More in the same place. But now with Baronius and others we say that a lion is painted with St. Jerome because, like a lion, he roars against heretics in his writings.

[1224] Another most rank little fable, which I was unwilling to touch on in its place, Another little fable related, was born in the middle ages and gradually took strength. About it I find nothing either in the first Life or in the second. The author of the third Life hints at something, and others afterwards completed it. Of St. Jerome living in the City and suffering a grave calumny I treated abundantly in §17. But the said biographer adorns it thus: Finally those men (the envious) placed near his bed a woman's garment, which he might put on when rising for Matins. Giovanni d'Andrea at fol. 21 completed the fable from others. But while he (the Saint) was reproving the wantonness of certain clerics and monks, they, being exceedingly indignant, prepared snares for him, and by means of a woman's garment (as John Bereth and Vincent say) he was basely mocked by them. For when Jerome rose for Matins after his custom, he found a woman's garment which his rivals had placed beside his bed, and, believing it to be his own, put it on, and so went forth into the church. There is no need of great criticism for anyone to see that a badly patched fable is being told.

[1225] St. Jerome never hinted at any such trick, and refuted. the most bitter Rufinus never reproached him with so great a negligence of the Saint, no ancient writer ever mentioned a deed so unusual and incredible. That St. Jerome at Rome was wont to go forth daily to some church to recite the prayers of Matins is not likely, nor can it be gathered from any indication of his deeds: for we do not know that he was enrolled there in any congregation or particular church in which he would have done this. Besides, he was neither blind, so as not to be able to see the garment he was putting on; nor out of his mind, so as to be unable, even in the dark, to distinguish between a woman's garment and his own. But let this suffice about an insipid little fable, which stands as far from the appearance of truth as from truth itself.

[1226] Nor does the multitude of more recent writers Yet I would not have the diligent reader wonder that I have disputed at some length about the little fables just mentioned, which seem unworthy of so serious a refutation. For Bedeković, already frequently cited, just as he undertook to defend the Epistles feigned under the names of SS. Cyril, Augustine and Eusebius of Cremona, as I noted at no. 26, so also he wished not only to insert the said little fables into his Work, but even to defend them as true events. That man, pious and not unlearned, but less furnished with historical criticism, reprinted much that had been argued at length for St. Jerome's cardinalitial dignity in part 2, chaps. X and XI of his Work, and at last at the end the whole Treatise of Ciaconius; yet leaving the reader liberty to judge of the whole matter. But in part 2, chap. 14, with all due peace and reverential esteem for Baronius and others, he believed that the lion must be attributed to St. Jerome, supported, he says, by several writers cited.

[1227] suffice for vindicating the lion for St. Jerome, And those several writers are cited by him earlier in this manner: As James of Voragine writes in the Legend of the Saints, and Fr. Henricus Engelgrave in his sermon for the feast of St. Martin, out of Fulgosus: to whom is added Bonifacio Bagatta in the Wonders of the Christian World, vol. 1, bk. 7, chap. 1, no. 11, citing as a witness Marko Marulić, bk. 4, chap. 5. But writers of this kind, of whom the first is of the XIII century, can make a number, not an authority. I could easily adduce far more, and I have already adduced some older than these, from whom that fable was adopted by later writers, and inserted even into some Breviaries. Hence what Bedeković cites thus from a Breviary of his Order formerly in use likewise has no force:

The lion serves with the little ass, given as a companion to the beast: and going with it he watches over it with vigilant guard. Losing it, he takes up its duty, offering his back to the burden, etc.

From the second Life of St. Jerome it flowed down to others, as fables are wont, once they have arisen, to be adopted by many.

[1228] nor the examples of other Saints to whom Further, in favour of St. Jerome's lion the said writer argues thus: For if it happened to one, why could it not happen to another Saint? Since we read that most different Saints, dwelling in the most different regions, were honoured by the Most High with equal graces and also wrought equal miracles; and that Surius, in his Life of him, writes that this very thing which happened to St. Jerome concerning the lion happened to blessed Sabas the abbot. Thus he. It is true that nearly the same favours were conferred by God on different Saints, and that the very lions in question showed themselves mild and obedient to several Saints. What is specifically objected about holy Sabas the abbot is to me certain and undoubted — not because it is found in Surius, but because it is read in the Life of St. Sabas, written most faithfully by Cyril of Scythopolis and published in Cotelier, which at no. 49 runs thus: To this holy old man, coming from Ruba to Calamon of the Jordan, there came a lion of enormous size, limping, which by approaching showed him its foot, and by a nod urged him to cure it. And our father Sabas, understanding the beast's pain, sat down, took hold of its foot, and drew out the embedded splinter. Then the lion, freed from pain, rose and went away: and from that time through the days of Lent it followed the old man, rendering him kindly service. The holy old man had then a certain Syrian disciple, Phlaim by name, who lower down at Ruba had an ass for service: and when he sent him for some answer or business, he committed to the lion the guardianship of the ass. And so the lion in the morning would take the ass's halter in its mouth and go off, and pasture it all day, and in the evening water it, and so return with it. But when some days had passed, while the lion was fulfilling this service, … Phlais … fell into fornication; and on that same day the lion crushed the ass and made it its food. That fallen disciple was led to penance by St. Sabas, but the lion in all likelihood went away.

[1229] The same Cyril in the Life of St. Cyriacus, given at the preceding day, lions rendered service mentions a tame lion which he himself saw. He was going with abbot John to St. Cyriacus, whom that lion served. When, then, we were drawing near the place, he says at no. 15, there met us a very great and most terrible lion. But abbot John said to me, who was troubled: Do not fear. And when the lion saw us going to the old man, it gave way. Then Cyriacus said to Cyril: Do not be afraid, son: for that lion always stays here with me, guarding my scanty vegetables from the wild goats. And lower down of the same: And as we were eating, the lion came and stood before us: and the old man, rising, held out to it a piece of bread, and sent it away to guard the vegetables. And the old man assured me, says Cyril, that it guarded not only the vegetables, but also kept off robbers and barbarians from there. And presently of their departure: And so, having departed, we saw the lion sitting in the way, and eating

a wild goat: and it, seeing that we halted and did not dare to go forward, left the beast and withdrew until we had passed by there.

[1230] The same Cyril again, in the Life of St. John the Silentiary, mentions a lion or for defence, God really granted, given to the Saint for defence against the Saracens. The Life is given at the XIII of May, and at no. 13 it has that St. John was unwilling to withdraw from his laura on account of the Saracens, and presently subjoins: But God, who always takes care of His servants, commanded His angels indeed (as the Scripture says) to preserve His Saint: but wishing to make him secure, as one who had been a little frightened, He sent a perceptible guardian, a very great and most terrible lion, which by day and by night guarded him from the snares of the savage barbarians. And on the first night indeed, when he saw the lion sleeping near him, he was somewhat afraid, as he himself told me: but when he saw that it followed him day and night and was not torn away from him, and drove off the barbarians, he sent forth songs in which to give thanks to God, who does not leave the rod of sinners upon the lot of the just.

[1231] The diligent reader will see how generously I deal with Bedeković: bring about, for the one lion which he objected out of Surius, I have produced three in that same Palestine where St. Jerome lived, and have cited for them a witness beyond all exception, who himself saw one of them; received the second from one who had seen it; and learned the tameness of the third through fit witnesses. To these we could join several other lions which either did not harm men, God so disposing, or even profited them; if there remained even the least doubt whether God could — I will not say could, but even willed — to bestow such benefits on several Saints. Why, then, do we deny St. Jerome his lion? I shall say it in a few words for the sake of those who have less grasp of historical criticism, and by the good leave of those who do not need this discussion.

[1232] so that it may be probable that a lion served St. Jerome. We deny Jerome's lion because it lacks fit witnesses: for men who lived several centuries after Jerome are not fit witnesses for so great a matter, especially if without selection and judgment they threw onto paper whatever they found anywhere. We deny Jerome's lion because Jerome's deeds have been transmitted to posterity by so many writings of the Saint himself and of others who were contemporary or nearly so, that a prodigy so unusual could not have been suppressed by the silence of several centuries, if it had really happened. Lastly we wholly repudiate St. Jerome's lion, because that lion is feigned in a wholly improbable manner: for Jerome lived at Bethlehem, where he governed two monasteries, one of men, the other of women. Wherefore that lion, which is feigned to have stayed with Jerome for many years and to have wandered freely outside, would frequently have brought great terrors both to those living in each monastery, and to the inhabitants and pilgrims staying at Bethlehem, and would have stirred up not a few complaints against the Saint. Hence those who even moderately understand how many fables were born and propagated in the middle ages see without any difficulty that that lion of Jerome's must undoubtedly be numbered among them. Let this suffice at the same time for the woman's garment, with which Bedeković in chap. 12 again brings St. Jerome into church — to be stripped off for ever along with it.

§ LXXVI. Whether St. Jerome seems to be the author of the Martyrology which is everywhere cited under his name?

Some attribute the Martyrology to Jerome as translator, others as collector. Among St. Jerome's doubtful writings the first place readily belongs to the most ancient Martyrology which is commonly wont to be cited under his name, even though, as our Bolland observed in the general Preface of the Work itself, §4, it cannot be proved by certain arguments that it was composed by St. Jerome. So much has already been written by learned men on this question, and disputed on both sides without any decision of the ambiguous question, that I shall not presume to hope that the doubt about that Martyrology is to be removed by me. Wherefore I shall only briefly examine the chief arguments which have been brought forward, or can be brought forward, for attributing some Martyrology to St. Jerome, either as translator or as collector. For some have maintained that Eusebius is the collector of the Martyrology and Jerome the translator; others have preferred to call Jerome himself the author of the ancient Martyrology. The chief champion among recent writers of attributing the Martyrology to Jerome is Florentini, who published that very one which he believes to be Jerome's at the press of Lucca in the year 1668, and illustrated it copiously.

[1234] He is its author, if the Epistles prefixed to it are genuine: And Florentini draws his first argument from the twofold Epistle prefixed to the Martyrology. If these Epistles are not supposititious, it becomes certain that the collector of the Martyrology is St. Jerome. For the first has this title: Here begins the Epistle of the bishops Chromatius and Heliodorus to Jerome the priest. And Chromatius and Heliodorus, whom we have often mentioned before as friends of Jerome, ask that, searching out from the archives of holy Eusebius, priest of Caesarea and of Palestine, the feasts of the martyrs, you may send them to us, they say, so that this duty may through your holy industry be better and more perfectly rendered to the Lord's martyrs. They ask, therefore, that he compose a Martyrology from Eusebius's collection. The title of the other Epistle is this in Florentini: The reply of Jerome the priest. He relates first what Eusebius accomplished, with Constantine's help, then what he himself did: For this reason we have written down the feasts of each month (as is added in Baronius) and of each day, as you deign to bid, etc. I pass over the rest: for these suffice for us to have the author of the Martyrology, if the Epistles are genuine.

[1235] But Baronius in the Preface to the Roman Martyrology, but the Epistles are certainly supposititious: where in chap. 5 he gave the Epistles, attacks them powerfully with many arguments, and holds them for supposititious. Florentini indeed tried to answer in his Annotations on the Epistles, from p. 17, the historical arguments of Baronius, but as regards the style of the Epistle attributed to Jerome he confesses that he is overcome, and does not dare to attribute it to Jerome. Nevertheless he by no means confesses that the things asserted in the said Epistles are false. He prefers to believe that what is read in the Epistles is true, and that they were composed by some pious man, … whether he, he says, reported the things contained in them from ancient tradition, or from some older book. But if the Epistles are not, the one of Chromatius and Heliodorus, the other of Jerome — as is certain and undoubted after Baronius to all the learned in whom I have found any mention of those Epistles — how shall we have from those Epistles an argument for adjudging the Martyrology to St. Jerome? For neither in Jerome's own Works, nor in any writings of his contemporaries, is a single word found from which it might become likely or probable that any Martyrology was composed by St. Jerome.

[1236] The first who is called in as an ally for claiming the Martyrology for St. Jerome the words of Cassiodorus do not help is Cassiodorus, who in the book On Institution, chap. 32, has these words: And therefore, mindful of future beatitude, read constantly the Lives of the fathers, the confessions of the faithful, the passions of the martyrs (which among other things you will without doubt find in the Epistle of holy Jerome addressed to Chromatius and Heliodorus), who flourished throughout the whole world, so that holy imitation, calling you on, may bring you to the heavenly kingdoms. The said Bolland adduced these words, but was unwilling to gather anything certain from them. For he doubted whether those fictitious Epistles already existed then, as may rightly be doubted. He confesses that already in Cassiodorus's time counterfeit wares of that sort were found. But, he says, how could a most learned man fail to recognize a style most remote from Jerome's elegance? Then Bolland suggests another conjecture about Cassiodorus's words, going on thus: Or was there then in men's hands a genuine epistle of Jerome, which afterwards perished; and was another afterwards fabricated by someone unskilfully and fraudulently? Walafrid seems to have recognized the genuine one (namely the one that is extant). No one will persuade me of it. So he rightly doubts whether Cassiodorus spoke of the supposititious Epistle of St. Jerome, or of some other which has perished.

[1237] To me it seems further doubtful whether Cassiodorus's words, for claiming the Martyrology for St. Jerome. Who flourished throughout the whole world, are to be referred to some single Epistle of St. Jerome, and not rather to all those things — the Lives of the fathers, the confessions of the faithful, the passions of the martyrs, … who throughout the whole, etc. And if the words be understood in this sense, Cassiodorus will not have spoken of some Epistle of Jerome comprising all the Saints, that is, of some Martyrology or short list of Saints; but of an Epistle which contained the excellent deeds of one or more Saints: such as is the Epistle to Heliodorus, in which St. Jerome penned the epitaph of Nepotian the priest. Of that Epistle, which besides the virtues of Nepotian contains other incitements to virtue, I should fully believe Cassiodorus to be speaking, if it were read as inscribed to Chromatius and Heliodorus together. For Cassiodorus commends to his own to read the Acts of the Saints to this end, that holy imitation, he says, calling you on, may bring you to the heavenly kingdoms. But the almost bare names of Saints and places which are read in that ancient Martyrology seem less fit for that end, so that I can scarcely think that Cassiodorus spoke of it. Wherefore it will not be necessary to say that the supposititious Epistles already existed in Cassiodorus's time, or another of Jerome's from which they were at length fabricated.

[1238] St. Gregory indeed mentions that Martyrology, The words of St. Gregory the Great in the Epistle to St. Eulogius of Alexandria (bk. 8, Epist. 29), which are then adduced, avail much indeed for proving the antiquity of the Hieronymian Martyrology; but they cannot help toward finding Jerome as its author. St. Eulogius was asking that there be sent him the deeds of all the martyrs, which were collected by Eusebius of Caesarea in the times of Constantine of pious memory. St. Gregory answers that what was collected by Eusebius is unknown to him. But then he subjoins: But we have the names of almost all the martyrs collected in one codex, with their passions distinguished by each single day, and on each day we perform the solemnities of Masses in their veneration. Yet in that volume it is not indicated who suffered and how, but only the name, place and day of the passion is set down. Whence it comes about that many from different lands and provinces are known, as I said before, on each single day to have been crowned with martyrdom. But we believe that you most blessed men have these things. So plainly does all this agree with the Hieronymian Martyrology that the learned now plainly agree that St. Gregory spoke of it. But he indicates by no word that the author of that Martyrology is St. Jerome or Eusebius.

[1239] but he did not see the Epistles afterwards prefixed to it, Valois in his Annotations on Eusebius, p. 316, here gratuitously fastens an error on St. Gregory. For since, he says, Eusebius of Caesarea was believed to be the author of that Martyrology, and Jerome only its translator, as Bede too writes in the Retractations on the Acts of the Apostles, therefore Gregory the Great this Martyrology, of which

he speaks, thought to exist in Greek in the keeping of Eulogius of Alexandria. I pass over what he says about the daily Masses celebrated in honour of the martyrs: in which he alludes without doubt to that Epistle of Jerome prefixed to the Martyrology. I said that an error is gratuitously fastened on St. Gregory. For since the question was of the Works of Eusebius, and he answered that they were not preserved in the Roman archive; and since he then speaks of the Martyrology as of another Work, on what ground is he to be thought to have believed that the collector of that Martyrology was Eusebius? Assuredly he ought not to have used other words than he used, in order to persuade Eulogius that that Work is not Eusebius's, but another's. The whole Epistle cries out that the author of that Martyrology did not seem to Gregory to be Eusebius. For concerning the deeds of the martyrs collected by Eusebius he answers: But whether these have been collected or not, I did not know before your beatitude's letter. On what ground, then, does Valois pretend that the supposititious Epistle was prefixed to the Martyrology in Gregory's time, and was believed by him to be Jerome's? For this Epistle speaks of that collection of Eusebius in such a way that Gregory could not have been ignorant that the Acts of the martyrs had been collected by Eusebius, if he had read the Epistle and held it for genuine.

[1240] Besides, since Eulogius was asking for what had been collected by Eusebius, nor did he believe the author to be Eusebius or Jerome. if Gregory had believed that the Martyrology too had been collected by Eusebius, he would at least have written it; but he says that it is neither Eusebius's nor Jerome's: and, distinguishing the Martyrology from the things collected by Eusebius which had been asked for, he subjoins this: But the things which you wished to be sent, we have indeed sought and not found; but, still not finding them, we seek; and, if they can be found, we shall send them. From what has been alleged it seems to be gathered that those supposititious Epistles had not yet been prefixed to the Martyrology in Gregory's time, that is, toward the end of the VI century, when the Epistle was written. For since the use of the Martyrology was daily, St. Gregory would without doubt have read those Epistles, and most of all when he was seeking what Eulogius had asked for, if they had been set before the Martyrology. Secondly, both from this reason and from Gregory's silence about St. Jerome, it becomes most likely that that opinion about Jerome as the author of the Martyrology arose after St. Gregory's times: for St. Gregory in all likelihood would not have kept silent about the author of the Martyrology, if he had believed him to be the most famous Jerome. Thirdly, from those words of Gregory, but we believe that you most blessed men have these things, it is excellently gathered that the Martyrology was not new in Gregory's time, but ancient and in use in many places: for otherwise Gregory would not have believed that it was not lacking at Alexandria.

[1241] Further, not long after St. Gregory's times, that is, in the VII century, That opinion seems to have arisen in the VII century, and was suspect to Bede: at whose beginning he died, there seems to have arisen the opinion about a Martyrology composed by Eusebius or Jerome, perhaps because someone then prefixed to it in some codices the supposititious Epistles. Certainly at the beginning of the VIII century, when the venerable Bede flourished, that opinion was already current. Yet Bede held it suspect, as is gathered from his words. This Bolland skilfully observed, who cites these words of Bede from the Retractation on the Acts of the Apostles, chap. 1: With whom agrees also the book of the Martyrology, which is entitled with the name and preface of blessed Jerome: although that same Jerome is related to have been not the author of that book but its translator, and Eusebius to have been its author. To these Bolland rightly subjoins: Yet Bede does not assert either that Eusebius was the author, or that Jerome was the translator, but that it is entitled with Jerome's name and preface, and that Eusebius is related to have been the author. Then he observes that by the same Bede in bk. 2 on Mark, chap. 26, there is cited a Martyrology marked with the names of Eusebius and Jerome. St. Bede would not have spoken thus if he had believed the Epistle, which he calls a preface, to be Jerome's. And so from Bede's words we gather that the supposititious Epistle was prefixed to the Martyrology in his time, and that Jerome's name was so given to the Martyrology that others nevertheless preferred to make Eusebius its author and Jerome its translator; but that all this was suspect to Bede.

[1242] Walafrid Strabo, who flourished in the IX century, held the Epistle marked with Jerome's name for genuine, but others in the IX century said that Jerome was the author of the Martyrology. and unhesitatingly ascribed the Martyrology to him. For thus Florentini cites Walafrid's words: Jerome, following Eusebius of Caesarea, wrote a Martyrology through the circuit of the year, being asked to compose that Work by bishop Chromatius and Heliodorus on this occasion, that the religious emperor Theodosius in a council of bishops praised Gregory bishop of Cordova, because, saying Masses every day, he commemorated very many names of those martyrs whose birthdays they were. These things are most clearly taken from the supposititious Epistles prefixed to the Martyrology, which Bede held suspect and which Walafrid admitted as genuine. And, the genuineness of both Epistles being admitted, he could not but make Jerome the author of the Martyrology. Usuard was of the same opinion as Walafrid about a Martyrology composed by St. Jerome, since in his Prologue he speaks thus to king Charles: Besides, I was stirred to this (to writing a Martyrology) by the pious though concise writings of the venerable priests, namely Jerome and Bede, of whom the former, aiming at brevity, and the latter, leaving very many days untouched, are found to have passed over many things necessary to this work. By these words Usuard certainly suggests that some Martyrology was written by St. Jerome, and that it comprised all the days of the year, but was too brief, namely because various struggles of the martyrs were omitted — such as that entirely is which we call the Hieronymian. Rabanus too, in the book On Computation which Baluze published in vol. 1 of the Miscellanies, p. 60, cites the Martyrology as St. Jerome's.

[1243] But that opinion, having in all likelihood arisen from conjectures, Thus that opinion, which more probably was born in the VII century, and perhaps out of conjectures which someone wished to confirm by the fictitious Epistles added to the Martyrology — a design certainly by no means to be praised — that opinion, I say, which could gradually grow strong in the VIII century, was wholly received in the IX. I said that that opinion was more probably born in the VII century, because St. Gregory seems to have known nothing of it. Yet I would not depart a finger's breadth here from Bolland, nor wholly cast aside Cassiodorus's words, but rather with Bolland (adding, however, the conjecture given above about the varying understanding of Cassiodorus's words) I shall say: If that Epistle which Cassiodorus cites was truly Jerome's (and if it is to be understood as it has hitherto been understood), it must be confessed that some little list, or Calendar, was put together by him, the names perhaps being copied of those whose Acts existed in Eusebius's collection, with others added. But if it was already supposititious before (which is hard to believe on account of St. Gregory), yet that opinion became inveterate, that some Martyrology was composed by him. Thus Bolland, everywhere suggesting that Jerome does not seem to be the author of the Martyrology; yet that it is not ill called Hieronymian, since it is known by that name, and since that name arose from an inveterate opinion. St. Jerome too could have collected many names of Saints, and noted their days and the places of their struggle, not only from what had been collected by Eusebius, but most of all at Rome, when he was there in Damasus's time; and so in some fashion have contributed to the composition of the Martyrology.

[1244] seems less probable, All things at last considered, I am plainly persuaded that that ancient Martyrology was indeed composed about St. Jerome's times, that is, in the IV or V century; yet that it was not put together by St. Jerome's work in the form in which it was from the beginning published and brought into use for the feasts of the Saints. The first reason is that that opinion seems to have been born solely from the supposititious Epistles, and that nothing is found in St. Jerome's writings by which it could be confirmed. Certainly he must have collected the Martyrology either before the year 392, in which in the book On Illustrious Men he enumerated his writings up to that time, or after that year. If it had been composed before, he would have numbered the Martyrology among his other little works: and if anyone should prefer to believe it put together afterwards, the other Works of St. Jerome will stand in the way, with which the several years are so full that no reasonable ground can be found for so much time as would have been necessary for composing so laborious a Work. The second reason is that the style of the Martyrology itself by no means agrees with Jerome: nor does that defect of style seem to have arisen from the faults of copyists alone: for those parts too which we cannot call corrupt do not agree with Jerome's elegance.

[1245] But that it was not composed after the fifth century the learned everywhere admit, although it seems to have been composed about Jerome's age, or not long after. because it does not comprise the African martyrs who in the V century suffered in great numbers under Genseric and other Arian kings of the Vandals. There are indeed read in the present-day copies several Saints who died after the V century; but that these were added afterwards is the common opinion of all. Wherefore neither about the antiquity nor about the authority of that Martyrology can there rightly be any doubt, since it was in use in the Roman Church in the time of St. Gregory the Pope. We doubt only about the author, who does not seem to be Jerome, still less Eusebius. Nor is it likely that Eusebius wrote the deeds of as many martyrs as the names of martyrs which were entered in the said Martyrology; so that I cannot believe that the Martyrology was put together chiefly from Eusebius's writings. It becomes more likely to me, considering the multitude of the martyrs, that the archives of those cities in which the martyrs suffered were consulted, and that from them were collected the names of the martyrs and of the places in which each suffered. These catalogues, at the bidding of a pious emperor, could be faithfully composed by notaries or ecclesiastics for all the days of the year, and then sent to some prudent man who would join them all into one body, and add what was to be added from elsewhere. This some prudent and careful ecclesiastic could do at Rome or elsewhere.

§ LXXVII. Other writings, partly doubtful, partly falsely attributed to St. Jerome.

The Saint does not seem to have written the little Work on Heresies: St. Augustine toward the end of the book on Heresies to Quodvultdeus writes this: I have heard that holy Jerome wrote about Heresies, but that little work of his we could neither find in our library, nor do we know whence it can be obtained. But if you should know, get to it, and perhaps you will have something better than this of ours: although I do not think that even he, most learned Man though he was, could track down all heresies. These words raise a suspicion about a little Work on Heresies written by St. Jerome. Yet such a suspicion will have little probability, since from St. Jerome's Works nothing becomes known by which that conjecture could be confirmed. Besides, the Benedictine editor in his Annotations observes the following: In this place most manuscripts insert these words (namely before Augustine's words, But if you should know). Let us hear the words of the interpolator: A most trustworthy man, a diligent knower of his books, being asked about this, said that whoever spread this report did not know what he was saying. For on Heresies, he says, holy Jerome

composed. He spoke the truth, I think: but it would have been enough had that observation been left in the margin. The esteemed editor then adds: There exists a list of heresies under Jerome's name, published by Claude Ménard after Augustine's Opus imperfectum, but in the judgment of the learned it is denied to him. Trithemius too, in his catalogue of the writings of Jerome, lists one book on the eighty-four heresies. But that author mixes much that is spurious into Jerome's writings. Let this suffice concerning them.

[1247] besides the Commentaries on Matthew, others are attributed to him Cassiodorus, who in his book on the Institutions recorded most of the works of St. Jerome, also touched upon some not yet known, and perhaps never written by Jerome. For in chapter 7 he has this: The seventh codex of divine Scripture, therefore, which is the first of the New Testament, … shines with the heavenly light of the four Evangelists. Discussing the particulars of them all, holy Jerome treated them with diligent care: which were comprised in one volume, lest the reader's attention be delayed by divided codices. Blessed Jerome expounded Matthew again in twice two books. Concerning the Commentary on Matthew, divided into four books, there is no doubt, and I treated of it at number 602. But that he expounded the four Gospels I can prove neither from the writings of St. Jerome nor from any contemporary writers. Trithemius, however, in his book on ecclesiastical writers, numbers among the works of the Saint not only those four books on the Gospel of Matthew, but also one book on the Gospel of Mark, one book on the Gospel of Luke, one book on the Gospel of John. And four books on the four Gospels anagogically. Of this anagogical exposition Cassiodorus is perhaps not speaking; yet he seems to indicate Commentaries written separately on the individual Gospels, especially since in the Preface to the Psalter, chapter 1, he praises St. Jerome's Commentary on Mark in these words: Whence also holy Jerome, expounding the Evangelist Mark at the place where he says of John: "He saw the heavens opened and the Spirit descending like a dove, and remaining upon him," treated it with such evident reasoning that no one may presume to go against his opinion.

[1248] there were, according to Cassiodorus, Commentaries on the four Gospels, These words altogether suggest that Cassiodorus possessed a Commentary on Mark whose author he believed to be St. Jerome. But it is not necessary for us to say that Cassiodorus believed Jerome wrote twice on Mark. For in the words alleged above he said that all four Gospels were expounded by Jerome, that is, that Commentaries were written on each one, from which he alleged the Commentary on Mark. From his words, however, several doubts arise. The first is whether St. Jerome really wrote on Mark, on Luke, on John, and twice on Matthew, as Cassiodorus supposed. Against believing this with certainty stands St. Jerome's unbroken silence about those writings, and the fact that hitherto no Commentaries on the four Gospels (apart from the very well-known ones on Matthew) have been found that can prudently be ascribed to St. Jerome. There are indeed printed in Martianay, volume 5 from column 847, Commentaries on the four Gospels written consecutively under this title: Here begins the Exposition of the four Gospels, published from a short proverb, by Jerome the priest. But that these are falsely ascribed to St. Jerome the editor himself noted, and anyone will easily see it who knows St. Jerome's style even moderately. There follow in the same place, at column 887, other Commentaries on Mark, likewise published under the name of St. Jerome, but which the editor again observes are not Jerome's, and other learned men rightly confirm it, since they do not agree with the Hieronymian style, whether we consider the Preface or the Commentaries themselves. Again in the same place, at column 923, there follows a Preface … on the Gospel according to Luke; but this too the editor indicates to be falsely ascribed to St. Jerome, and rightly so on account of a style by no means agreeing with Jerome.

[1249] Therefore, since St. Jerome nowhere mentioned those Commentaries, but these are not yet known, and that opinion is less probable. nor have they been found down to the present, it becomes doubtful whether the authority of Cassiodorus alone is to be reckoned of such weight that we ought to believe they were composed by Jerome. As regards Trithemius, I shall readily believe that those short Commentaries on the four Gospels, which Martianay published, are called by him four books written on the four Gospels anagogically. For they are both four books, and the exposition is almost wholly mystical or anagogical. So likewise Trithemius probably attributed to St. Jerome the Commentary on Mark published by Martianay, and that on Luke, of which in the same place only the Preface is given. But there is a second doubt, whether Cassiodorus also was deceived by fictitious titles, and believed to be St. Jerome's Commentaries that are not Jerome's. This at least did not happen in the case of the short Commentaries on the four Gospels: for the things he brings forward from the Commentary on Mark are not found there. It is not equally certain concerning the Commentary on Mark: for in the one given in Martianay there are at least explained the words of Mark which Cassiodorus above, at number 1247, says were expounded by Jerome. Wherefore perhaps Cassiodorus believed that Commentary, which does not appear to be Jerome's, to be a Commentary of Jerome, and so with the others on Matthew, on Luke and on John. There remains therefore the doubt whether St. Jerome wrote other Commentaries on the four Gospels than those we have on Matthew, and that will always remain doubtful and less probable, unless someone finds Commentaries on the Gospels agreeing with St. Jerome's style and genius.

[1250] Just as Cassiodorus perhaps attributed to St. Jerome Commentaries on the Gospels belonging to others, He does not appear to have expounded all the Epistles of Paul or the Apocalypse. although he had seen them; so it becomes still more likely that the same man erred in those he had not seen. For besides the four Epistles of St. Paul which we have seen expounded by Jerome, he believed many others to have been explained by him, and even that brief Annotations were written by Jerome on the Epistles of St. Paul. But concerning these one may see what was said at numbers 371 and 372. The said Cassiodorus in chapter 9 believed the Apocalypse also to have been expounded by Jerome, writing thus: But the Apocalypse, which leads the minds of diligent readers to heavenly contemplation, and makes them perceive with the mind that the angels are blessed by seeing, is made conspicuous by the exposition of holy Jerome. There is added the author of the first Life, who mentions the Revelation of John among the books expounded by Jerome. But I can scarcely believe that the Apocalypse was expounded by Jerome with a Commentary of that sort. Certainly it would not have been written before the year 392, that is, before the book on illustrious men, in which Jerome does not list it, since he would not have passed over a Commentary which must have been lengthy, had it been composed. Nor does it seem likely to me that the Apocalypse was expounded by Jerome after the year 392, both because he never mentioned that exposition, and because we find his times so divided and full with other writings and occupations that it cannot be understood at what time he could have written so laborious a Commentary, and finally because it is nowhere to be found. Therefore it is to be feared that Cassiodorus, or the author of the first Life, took the work of some other man for a work of St. Jerome: for probably the one took it from the other.

[1251] Spurious little works. A lost Epistle of the Saint. Some little works on the Old Testament, which were once falsely attributed to St. Jerome, I indicated at number 381, and another on the Acts of the Apostles. To these may be added certain other little works, printed in Martianay, volume 5, such as the Commentaries on Proverbs, on Job, and on the Lamentations of Jeremiah, about which it is not necessary to say more. Moreover Cassiodorus reports three questions of the Old Testament expounded by Jerome in a certain Epistle, writing thus: For blessed Jerome too, writing to Abundantius, expounded three other most obscure questions. The first of these is why David, who was coming of his own accord with Achish king of the Philistines to attack Saul, killed the man who afterwards announced the death of that same Saul. The second is why David when dying commanded his son Solomon to kill Joab, the commander of his army. The third question is about Shimei, who inflicted intolerable outrages of curses upon David as he fled, even casting stones. This Epistle to Abundantius, called in another edition "to Antius," has remained unknown down to now, nor is it anywhere mentioned by Jerome himself. It is likely, however, that it was composed by Jerome, to whom questions of that kind were frequently sent. For neither have we any Epistle of another man on those questions, by which Cassiodorus could have been deceived. Trithemius, who recorded many of the little works falsely ascribed to Jerome, said nothing of that Epistle, so that it is probable it was lost some centuries ago.

[1252] Many spurious little works Indeed Trithemius attributes to Jerome more little works on sacred Scripture than Cassiodorus does. For on the Questions of Kings he puts in his catalogue three books; on the questions of Chronicles two books: on the Canticle of Delbora (read Deborah) one book. On the Proverbs of Solomon, five books: on the Song of Songs, three books. Then on the Epistle of Paul to the Romans five books: on the two Epistles to the Corinthians, two books … on the Epistle to the Philippians, one book: on the Epistle to the Colossians, one book: on the Epistle (perhaps he meant to say both) to the Thessalonians, four books: on the two to Timothy, three books: … on the Epistle to the Hebrews, one book: on the Acts of the Apostles, one book: on the Apocalypse, seven books: on the Canonical Epistles, seven books. Let it be said briefly that all these appear to be falsely ascribed to St. Jerome. Most have been published among the spurious pieces. As for those which Trithemius lists as written on the Epistles of St. Paul and the Canonical Epistles, as also on the Acts of the Apostles and the Apocalypse, he does not seem to have seen them himself, since he does not list their opening words, as he commonly does.

[1253] on sacred Scripture, Trithemius adds: On certain Psalms, six books; which likewise I nowhere find among the Hieronymian writings: nor from the deeds of St. Jerome does it seem likely that he wrote six books on the Psalms. The opening, which Trithemius gives, Omne Psalterium fagaci, is found in the Explanation on Psalm XLI in Martianay, volume 5, column 188. Moreover, from the deeds of St. Jerome, Martianay rightly denied to St. Jerome another work on all the Psalms, which he published in the Appendix of the second volume from column 121, especially since he has also proved by several other arguments that that work, which is called the Breviary of St. Jerome on the Psalter, does not appear to be the holy Doctor's. Hence Martianay added in the same place a few other writings on the Psalms, and denied them to Jerome. To sacred Scripture also belongs one book which Trithemius wrongly ascribed to Jerome, reporting the title thus: On the ten temptations in the desert. It is a short little work and the first in the Appendix of the second volume in Martianay, who discusses its true author.

[1254] Besides the things just mentioned on sacred Scripture, Trithemius adds not a few other spurious pieces to the genuine ones of St. Jerome

he mixes into his writings, several others also by Trithemius and a great part of them has been published in Martianay, volume 5. I shall indicate most of them: but here and there the titles seem slightly altered. Trithemius begins his list thus: On the faith, to Damasus, 1 book. This was published as the Explanation of the faith to Damasus, column 122. Trithemius continues: On the faith of the Council of Nicæa, 1 book. There follows in the same place, at column 124, so far as it appears, under this title: Explanation of the faith to Cyril. Certainly the matter agrees, and the opening. Again Trithemius: On the essence of the Trinity, 1 book. It precedes in the same place at column 117. After many little works of Jerome there follows in Trithemius a spurious one, On true Circumcision, 1 book, published in Martianay at column 150. After a few items Trithemius puts On Anne and Joachim, one book, which in Martianay at column 445 is reckoned among those falsely ascribed to Jerome, under the title On the Nativity of holy Mary, as is clear from its opening. Again after other items there follows in Trithemius: On the Chains of blessed Peter, 1 book. It is found in volume 5, column 201, under this title: To Eustochium, on the Chains of blessed Peter. Then, On the principal writers, 1 book, published in Martianay at column 417 as the Catalogue of ecclesiastical writers, to Desiderius. And soon after: On the perfect Man, 1 book, published in Martianay at column 52 under this title: To a sick friend, on the perfect Man, where the editor adds: It is by St. Maximus. Then in Trithemius: On Obedience and the oath, 1 book. It is an Epistle, like most of the preceding, given in Martianay at column 71 under this title: He instructs a friend in the knowledge of the divine law.

[1255] Trithemius continues: On the Three virtues, 1 book, wrongly ascribed to St. Jerome printed under the same title at column 78. Then: On honouring parents, 1 book, which is printed at column 97. Soon after: On the same matter (the life of clerics), to Oceanus, 1 book. This too is falsely ascribed to Jerome, and is printed at column 412. There follows: To Rusticus, on the Life of a bishop, 1 book, published in Martianay at column 99 under this title: On the seven Orders of the Church. Soon after: Rule for nuns, to Eustochium, 1 book; in Martianay this Rule with its proem is given at column 421. Then, after the genuine work of Jerome on Virginity to Eustochium, there follows again a spurious one: Likewise on Virginity, 1 book, given at column 108. After some writings of Jerome there follows again one belonging to another: On the Paschal Candle, 1 book, to which he gives this opening: Jerome to his brother Præsidius. But this is the superscription of an Epistle. Wherefore I do not doubt that it is the Epistle published at column 146 under this title: To Præsidius, on the Paschal Candle, although it has a different opening. Soon after: Consolation of a sick friend, 1 book, in Martianay at column 43. Then: To the fallen Susanna, 1 book, in Martianay at column 176, where the title is the same, but several words precede the opening assigned by Trithemius. Then, On the two sons, 1 book, in Martianay at column 214. Next there follow two titles in Trithemius, namely On the Eighty-four heresies, already mentioned, and Against heretics, 1 book: of which I find nothing published in Martianay.

[1256] Then, after some genuine little works of St. Jerome, there follows On the Assumption of holy Mary, 1 book. and some doubtful ones: It is a lengthy Sermon published by Martianay at column 82 under this title: To Paula and Eustochium, a sermon on the Assumption of the blessed Virgin Mary. This Sermon Martianay denies to St. Jerome with a more extended argument than he commonly employs. Then there follows: On the Testament of Gerontius, 1 book. It is an Epistle, published at column 33 under this title: To the daughters of Geruntius, on despising an inheritance. After genuine little works of the Saint there follows in Trithemius: Life of the holy Fathers, 1 book: of which I find nothing in Martianay. But the author of the first Life says: He wove into history, with most truthful eloquence, most of the Lives of the distinguished hermit fathers. It is an exaggeration, since Jerome wrote only a few, mentioned in their places: but perhaps others were falsely attributed to him. After other items there follow again doubtful titles, namely: On the faith and conduct of Christians: On the Hebrew Alphabet, about which Jerome writes to Paula, but Trithemius quotes a different opening, so that the matter becomes doubtful. Finally, after many works on sacred Scripture have been enumerated, part of which I have pointed out are not Jerome's, Trithemius adds at the end: Several Sermons, 1 book. But we have no Sermons delivered by Jerome before a congregation. Yet Martianay gave in volume 5 several Sermons falsely ascribed to St. Jerome, as also several other little works, which I shall not list, since to each is appended its own judgment.

[1257] [versions from the Greek increased by the same man. Guigo, Prior of the Charterhouse,] Concerning the things which St. Jerome rendered into Latin from the Greek, the said Trithemius speaks thus: He also made many volumes of the Greeks Latin: namely of Origen (not all, but some, reported in their places), of Josephus the Jew (this was falsely asserted, but it was never done), of Eusebius of Cæsarea (the Chronicle and certain other things), of Didymus of Alexandria (a few), of Victorinus the martyr and of others. Jerome, I think, gave no entire writing of Victorinus the martyr to the Latin tongue, but from time to time inserted his Greek words in Latin into his own little works. Now, lest anyone wonder that so many works belonging to others were reckoned by Trithemius among the writings of St. Jerome, he ought to consider that Trithemius wrote before Erasmus had begun to separate the genuine works of St. Jerome from the false. Nevertheless already in the twelfth century Guigo, fifth prior of the Greater Charterhouse, a learned man and a friend of St. Bernard, had perceived that some spurious Epistles were mingled with those of St. Jerome, and began to separate them out. There exists his Epistle on that subject to the brethren of Durbon, published by Mabillon in volume 1 of the Analecta from page 331, which I here transcribe in full.

[1258] gathering the Epistles of St. Jerome, judged that some To his most beloved friends and brethren in Christ, Lazarus, Prior of Durbon, and the rest serving God in the same hermitage, Guigo, called Prior of the Charterhouse, eternal salvation from the Lord. Among the other works of Catholic men, which they laboured to produce for the instruction of the faithful, which our littleness too has striven to gather or to correct, we have also reduced into one great volume the Epistles of blessed Jerome, as many as we could, sought out from every quarter and, by the faculty granted by God, purged of falsehoods. But we have cut away from them certain ones which, either from the writings of other doctors, or from the difference of style and sentiments, we found unworthy of the title of so great a Man. Among these is that one whose title is To Demetrias, having this opening: "If, relying on the highest genius and equal learning": (it is found in Martianay, volume 5, column 12; another of Jerome to Demetrias exists, mentioned in its place.) For blessed Augustine, in his work against Pelagius On the Grace of Christ and on Original Sin, says that this is by Pelagius himself, inserting certain fragments of it into his treatise and refuting them. To this are added also these: To Titatius (in Martianay, where it is published at column 405, "to Tyrasius") on the death of a daughter, whose opening is this: "I have received the writings of your charity." A consolatory letter to Oceanus, having this opening: "The reproaches of divers persons, manifold tribulations" (published in the same place, column 408). To a widow, which begins thus: "Great confidence in writing to our humility." (in the same place, column 37.)

[1259] To a Virgin, or to the daughter of Mauricius (for it is found entitled in two ways), taking this beginning: as certainly spurious, "How great a beatitude in the heavens." Likewise On the fall of a virgin, or On penance, to Susanna: for both titles are found in different manuscripts. This is entitled with such various authors that it should be adorned with the name of none of them; its opening in certain books is this: "I think it a light crime." In others this: "What are you doing, my soul? why do you seethe with thoughts?" This has already been assigned, as also the following: To Desiderius, on the XII readers, composed by I know not whom in mockery of the learned. To Celantia, beginning thus: "It is a celebrated saying of the Old Scripture." This indeed is written in a nobler style: but not even so is it worthy of blessed Jerome. Concerning this Epistle to Celantia it may be doubted whether perhaps it is not Jerome's own. Martianay published it in volume 4, column 810, under this title: To the matron Celantia, on the manner of living piously. And he adds this judgment, though bringing forward no reason: It is an Epistle of Paulinus, bishop of Nola, not of Jerome. Tillemont, on Jerome, article 144, judges that the Epistle is worthy of St. Jerome, yet is neither his nor St. Paulinus's; and as his reason he brings forward the gravity of a style always even and serious. The learned Veronese editors, in their Annotations on the Epistle, collated in volume 1, declare more confidently that it is neither Jerome's nor Paulinus's, on account of the even gravity of the style, and prefer to suspect that it is a lucubration of Sulpicius Severus. To me too the style does not seem Hieronymian.

[1260] The last is the disputation On the Origin of the soul (published in Martianay, volume 5, column 384), as though between the blessed Jerome and Augustine: ought to be separated out. where, although many things are set down from their writings, it is nevertheless false: both because the aforesaid doctors never spoke with one another face to face; and because that same question could not down to the present be clearly settled either by them or by the other followers of the Catholic faith. The opening of this Disputation is found to be this: "Since among you the heavenly eloquence of a most pure fount." But lest the Epistles of the aforesaid Doctor should seem to the unskilled to be diminished in number without reasonable cause, place these letters of our littleness at the beginning. Farewell. Pray for us. Thus far Guigo, from whose critical judgment it becomes plain that already for many centuries learned men had perceived the necessity of separating the genuine works of St. Jerome from the spurious. There remain some other things to be said about the writings attributed to St. Jerome. In the first Life, towards the end, it is said: He published also a singular and thundering book of the jurisconsult. We do not know whether by these words some genuine work of Jerome is indicated, or some spurious one attributed to him. A little before, the same Life seems to attribute to St. Jerome some work against Celsus, Porphyry and Julian the emperor. But that work is the Catalogue of ecclesiastical writers, which that author had set forth before, and which he here repeats in other words, as if it were another work.

[1261] The Preface to the book which is called Comes is not Jerome's, In Martène, volume 1 of the Amplissima Collectio, in the Epistle of Berno, abbot of Reichenau, to Aribo, archbishop of Mainz, at column 384, there is cited a Lectionary of St. Jerome, which book he called Comes. In d'Achery, volume 13 of the Spicilegium, page 253, there is given a preface to the said book under this title: In the name of the holy and undivided Trinity, here begins the Epistle of St. Jerome, sent to Constantius. Preface of the following book, which is called Comes. The said d'Achery, in his Preface to the reader, number IV, concerning that preface

speaks thus: To be noted among these is the Preface of St. Jerome to the book which is called Comes, which is prefixed to none of the editions I have seen. But that this book is a genuine offspring of Jerome is maintained by Pamelius in the Prolegomena to volume 2 of the Liturgicon, and most recently by Cardinal John Bona of most happy memory, in his excellent work on liturgical matters, book 2, chapter 6, before the middle. I do not here repeat what most learned men have written on this subject. But whether Jerome is the author of that preface which I have published, I leave to the reader to judge. But I, after others, shall not hesitate to declare that that preface has nothing of the Hieronymian style, and cannot prudently be attributed to St. Jerome.

[1262] nor is the Comes itself, even though by some in the Middle Ages As regards the Lectionary itself, called Comes, and published without that preface by Pamelius in volume 2 of the Missal of the Holy Latin Fathers, page 1, the learned of today do not think that this work either is St. Jerome's, and not without just cause. For, first, neither in the writings of St. Jerome, from which we learn nearly all his deeds, nor in any contemporary writers, nor even in any others who are some centuries later, do we find suitable testimony by which we might attribute that work to St. Jerome. The said Cardinal Bona, book 2, chapter 6, enumerates several writers who attribute the Comes to St. Jerome, writing thus: All the ancient writers on sacred Rites cite this book under the name of Lectionary, some without the author's name, others with the name of St. Jerome expressed and the title Comes. So the Micrologus, chapter 25: "The book also of the Comes or Lectionary, which St. Jerome put together." And Berno of Reichenau, chapter 1: We believe blessed Jerome to be the arranger of the Lectionary, as his own Prologue, placed at the head of that same Comes, testifies … Hugh of St. Victor likewise, book 2 On the Offices of the Church, chapter 11: Jerome the priest collected the Lectionary as the Church has it today: but Pope Damasus appointed that it be read as is now the custom. We have here three writers who openly make St. Jerome the author of the Comes. But all of them flourished many centuries after Jerome. Berno, who is older than the others, flourished in the twelfth century, and openly declares that he was led into that opinion from the Preface which we have said was falsely ascribed to St. Jerome. How little, then, can we attribute to his authority?

[1263] attributed to Jerome, to be adjudged to the Saint. In Florentinius, who will presently be cited more fully, page 16, there is added to these authors Honorius (of Autun) in the Gemma animæ, book 1, chapter 88. But he likewise is younger than Berno. Pamelius adds Radulphus of Tongres and John Beleth, to whom I can join John Andreæ as well; but all these are younger than the foregoing. Pamelius further suggests that that Lectionary book is cited by Alcuin and Amalarius, but without the name, so that these, at least older than the rest, ought rather to hinder than to help in claiming it for St. Jerome. Moreover, the said writers, who wish to claim that Comes for Jerome, conjecture that it was composed by the Saint at the order of Damasus. But that conjecture becomes improbable both from the Preface and from the work itself: from the preface, because it is not addressed to Damasus, but to a certain Constantius unknown to us. More certainly is that conjecture refuted from the work itself: for the Old Testament is there read according to St. Jerome's version from the Hebrew. But that version was begun by Jerome some years after the death of Damasus. In what way, then, could the Saint have arranged all the lessons thus at the bidding of Damasus? This argument alone suffices utterly to refute that opinion, destitute as it is of the authority of the ancients. Wherefore I refrain from the others that are at hand.

[1264] Florentinius, in the Preliminary Admonitions to the Martyrology, page 16, also writes some things about the book Several Epistles prefixed to the Works are likewise spurious. called Comes, which he saw in the library of the canons of Lucca with a prologue prefixed that bears the name of St. Jerome. Then he adds, page 17: Thus I saw in the same library of the canons of Lucca a Pontifical History, written eight hundred years ago and afterwards enlarged by the labours of Anastasius the Librarian, bearing at its front the Epistles of blessed Jerome to Pope Damasus, and of Damasus to Jerome, in which blessed Jerome himself is not obscurely made out to be the author of that work which is entitled Episcopale; as though Jerome had either composed or remade all the ecclesiastical collections under Damasus. So to the most ancient Catalogue of the Pontiffs, which our Henschen published before volume 2 of April, he found prefixed Epistles written under the names of Jerome and Damasus, which are certainly not theirs and bear open marks of forgery, as learned men have long since observed. So Henschen quoted in the same place, page IV, two others, falsely put under the name of the same Saints, and equally spurious. The former Martianay also reprinted in volume 5, column 5, in which, however, the author of that Catalogue of Pontiffs is not said to be St. Jerome, as in the Epistles seen by Florentinius, but the Catalogue is said to have been sent to Jerome by Damasus. From what has been said it is clear that some Letters were forged so that the ancient Martyrology might be attributed to St. Jerome; others, that he might be believed the author of the ancient book of the Lectionary or Comes; others again, that he might be thought to have put together the Catalogue of the Pontiffs, and others, that he might be thought to have received it from Damasus.

[1265] Yet another work is ascribed to St. Jerome in Martène, volume 1 of the Thesaurus Anecdotorum, column [ ], in the Epistle of Gerard of Auvergne, Certain other things falsely attributed to St. Jerome where these things are found: For it is read in the Conferences of the holy Fathers, which Jerome translated, that John the Evangelist, the disciple of Christ, used to handle a partridge with his hands when wearied by divine studies. The deed of St. John, which Cassian reports as told by the people, I do not here examine. I only observe that the Conferences of Cassian were written in Latin, and that indeed after the death of St. Jerome: and even so Jerome is said to have translated them. So in d'Achery, volume 10 of the Spicilegium, page 130, there is published an ancient Calendar, to which this title is prefixed: Here begins the order of the solar year with the letters set over it by St. Jerome, for ascertaining the day of the week and investigating the age of the moon on each several day through nineteen years. So Florentinius in his Preliminary Admonitions, page 16, testifies that in the Lucca manuscript which is called Comes, characters of the ancient ecclesiastical chant are to be seen, marked with certain very minute points. But we have nothing in the deeds of St. Jerome from which we might believe either that the notes of ecclesiastical chant were composed by him, or that the Dominical letters, as they are called, and the golden number were prefixed by him to a Calendar.

[1266] by various writers. Agobard of Lyons, in his book against Felix of Urgel, chapter 29, brings forward a lengthy passage from a work which he attributes to St. Jerome in these words: And so blessed Jerome says, in his short and most elegant treatise on the likeness of sinful flesh, against the Manichæans. I do not think that the treatise cited is Jerome's, since it appears nowhere among the works of Jerome, and the very words alleged by Agobard do not seem worthy of Jerome or consonant with his style. So Agobard in chapter 20 attributes to St. Jerome not a few words from the spurious work On the perfect Man, as Baluze himself observed in his Annotations. So in Martène, volume 5 of the Anecdota, column [ ], Peter Abelard alleged another spurious piece, On the Three virtues, as a work of St. Jerome; and John Andreæ alleged very many of those mentioned above. Finally Sigebert in his Chronicle at the year 382 suggests that a new Psalter was composed by Jerome, and adds: This Psalter Pope Damasus, at Jerome's request, appointed to be sung in the Gallican churches, and on this account it is called Gallican. St. Jerome did indeed twice correct the Psalter, first at Rome, then at Bethlehem. But the second correction was made after the death of Damasus. Wherefore Damasus could not have prescribed for the Gallican churches the second correction, which Sigebert calls the new Psalter. Of both corrections of the Psalter, and of his version of it from the Hebrew, we have treated in their places. From the Psalter some have said that the canonical Office also was composed by Jerome: but let this suffice concerning the spurious pieces: for the other spurious writings, which have been published as such in Martianay, I do not think should be further enumerated. The Veronese editors added Epistle 149, On the Solemnities of Easter.

§ LXXVIII. The error of many is refuted, by which St. Jerome is asserted to have translated sacred Scripture into the Dalmatian or Slavonic tongue.

The Saint is wrongly asserted to have turned sacred Scripture I wished to pass on at once from here to other matters, when even against my will I am detained and compelled to pass to a disputation like the preceding ones. This we do not think necessary for the learned of the first rank, but we write for others also, and an error that arose centuries ago, and has been defended in our times too, ought at least to be repelled, if perhaps it cannot be utterly rooted out. John Dubravius, bishop of Olomouc, in his Bohemian History, book 1, page 4, after saying some things about the Slavonic people or the Slavs, adds: From this nation the divine Jerome was descended, and for his countrymen he translated the Old and New Testament into the vernacular speech, while Gratian and Theodosius administered the empire; and the Illyrians use that translation to this very day, both in divine hymns and in the Sacrifices, so that I wonder there are men who report that the Slavs invaded and occupied Illyria only under the emperor Maurice. Thus Dubravius, before historical and chronological study had been brought to its present perfection, which I have thought should be noted in his excuse. For otherwise it is a gross error that he makes Jerome a Slav by race, since the Slavs fixed their seats in Dalmatia long afterwards. Some similar things had already been asserted before by Philip of Bergamo in his Chronicle at the year 429, where he mixes these things with others about St. Jerome: He therefore, being of unimpaired faith and most pure life, as soon as he had passed the years of youth, first devised and composed for the Dalmatians, a nation neighbouring on his own, certain letters different from the Latin and Greek. These were afterwards called Slavonic, because he gave them to certain Slavs, peoples of Germany. And he not only composed those letters, but also translated the Office which we use from the Greek into that same idiom, and he conferred [*] of it. And this too Pope Eugenius the fourth confirmed to them in most recent times.

[1268] Bedekovich, already cited on various occasions, has undertaken in our times to defend those assertions of men into the Slavonic tongue and to have invented the Slavonic letters: who had less clearly understood the deeds of St. Jerome, or at any rate had been less able to compare them with the historical and chronological notices of the time in which St. Jerome flourished; and he adds to the preceding Orbini in the History of the Kingdom of the Slavs, page 73: Antonius Uramecz in the Postil of the Saints, Sermon on St. Jerome, and four others. But all these are more recent, so that they make up a number and nothing besides, unless suitable reasons be brought forward. Most too are cited only for the invention of the Slavonic letters, not for the translation of sacred Scripture into the Slavonic idiom, which

perhaps Dubravius alone asserted, making Jerome himself sprung from the Slavs. Bedekovich then admits that the contrary opinion about the Slavonic letters is asserted by the priest of Dioclea and by Marko Marulić, whose little works John Lucius published in his Kingdom of Dalmatia and Croatia, and finally by Lucius himself in the Annotations with which he illustrated their little works. The priest of Dioclea, in Lucius, page 288, relates plainly of Constantine the philosopher all those things which Dubravius and Bergomas alike improbably attribute to St. Jerome. For after reporting the conversion of many nations through Constantine, whom for that reason Pope Stephen wished to see, he begins to narrate deeds which some, by a monstrous anachronism, have transferred to St. Jerome.

[1269] And so Constantine, he says, a most holy man, ordained priests, for the invention of the letters was made by St. Cyril, and composing a script in the Slavonic tongue, he changed (that is, translated) the Gospel of Christ and the Psalter, and all the divine books of the Old and New Testament, from the Greek script into the Slavonic: and ordering the Mass after the manner of the Greeks, he confirmed them in the faith of Christ, etc. The same things about the Old and New Testament translated by Constantine, whom he calls Constantius, Marulić reports in Lucius, page 305, and Lucius agrees with both in his Annotations. Lucius, however, erred, and brought forward writers who agree excellently well with one another as though they disagreed, because he did not attend to Constantine's double name: for Constantine, having changed his name towards the end of his life, was also called Cyril, and so was called by some Constantine the philosopher, by others, especially after his death, St. Cyril, and by this latter name he is now known. The Acts of St. Cyril and of St. Methodius his brother have been given by us at the IX of March, where, concerning the change of name, these things are read in the first Life, number 10: But when the Philosopher (so he was commonly called on account of his outstanding learning), who was also Constantine, had perceived that the day of his passing was at hand, by the concession of the supreme Pontiff he imposed on himself the name Cyril, saying that this had been revealed to him, etc. The other Life, number 1, agrees about the name changed before his death with the leave of the supreme Pontiff, and the matter is further proved in the preliminary Commentary, number 28. Lucius could have learned that change of name also from his own priest of Dioclea, who at page 289 has this about it: Then the man of God Constantine, on whom the name Cyril was afterwards imposed by Pope Stephen, etc. But Lucius, carried away by I know not what prejudice, says in his Annotations on those words: Here the Diocleate seems to be blind, etc. But he himself rather refused to understand: for by that observation, which is certain, everything is reconciled.

[1270] as also the translation of Scripture into the Slavonic tongue. What more concerns our purpose, the invention of the Slavonic letters and the translation of sacred Scripture are in the same place attributed to Constantine or Cyril, so that I might refer the reader thither and refrain from this disputation, especially since it is certain that the Slavs were not in Dalmatia or Illyricum while St. Jerome was living, but fixed their seats there some centuries later, and that the Slavonic tongue was not then in use there. Let us nevertheless hear Bedekovich, because we are debtors to all. To Lucius, he says, as being a most learned man and a most careful investigator of Illyrian or Slavonic affairs, I would willingly subscribe, so far as concerns the version of sacred Scripture, did not the authority of so many most weighty men cited above persuade me to think the contrary. Hence I adhere to the opinion of Dubravius and the others, relying very much on the authority of Sixtus of Siena, who in the Bibliotheca sancta, book 4, page 453 (in our copy 243), expressly declares that St. Jerome altogether translated sacred Scripture into his own idiom, in these words: Jerome also translated, as he himself testifies in the Epistle to Sophronius, the whole body of all divine Scripture into the Dalmatian tongue, for the benefit of the peoples of his own nation: who down to this day use the reading of this translation with the highest veneration. Sixtus of Siena really does have the words alleged, and at this I greatly wonder, since the hallucination is clear and manifest.

[1271] They were deceived by Jerome's words who from error believed The Epistle to Sophronius, which Sixtus of Siena alleges, is the Preface to the Psalter rendered into Latin from the Hebrew, where in the Veronese edition, volume XI, column [ ], these things are read: Nor do I say this in order to bite my predecessors, nor do I think anything should be taken from those whose translation, most diligently corrected, I once gave to the men of my own tongue, etc. That phrase, to the men of my own tongue, deceived the Sienese and Bedekovich. For the latter, after bringing forward other letters of Jerome also, about which presently, argues thus: By the phrase "I gave to the men of my own tongue" it appears that St. Jerome delivered sacred Scripture to his own Slavo-Dalmatian or Dalmato-Slavonic nation in the Dalmatian or Slavonic idiom. But many errors are heaped up here. For, first, St. Jerome understands by his own tongue the Latin tongue, which was in use in the Roman empire, or at any rate in many provinces of the Roman empire which had long been under the Romans, and where Greek did not prevail. Thus at that time the Latin tongue prevailed in Italy, Gaul, Spain, Africa, Dalmatia and the neighbouring provinces, as can easily be proved from books written in the Latin tongue, and from peoples instructed in Latin in the sermon. There survived indeed some traces of the ancient tongue in several provinces, as Augustine testifies in one place about the Punic tongue in Africa: yet the Latin tongue so far prevailed among men born in honourable station that St. Jerome could safely call it his own tongue. And that he really called Latin his own tongue or that of his own people can be shown by many examples, and I shall presently adduce some. But how St. Jerome corrected the Latin text of the Old Testament, supplemented it, or even translated it, and in what manner he did so, I have set forth in §26. He speaks of that correction and translation, not of the whole body of Scripture, although he really corrected the whole. For he is answering those who said that he thought ill of the Seventy translators.

[1272] But let us satisfy the excellent Bedekovich, and show by several examples that his tongue was Slavonic, whereas it was Latin. that Jerome designates Latins by the men of his own tongue. Besides the words of the Sienese he objects these words from the Apology against Rufinus: Shall it not be permitted me, after the edition of the Seventy, which most diligently corrected I gave to the men of my own tongue, to translate also, for the confounding of the Jews, those very copies (the Hebrew) which they themselves confess to be most true? These very words show that the matter concerns a translation into the Latin tongue. For Rufinus accused Jerome of having translated Scripture from the Hebrew tongue into Latin, and wished to make out that he had done this in contempt of the Seventy translators. But he answers that he had first given the interpretation of the Seventy corrected in Latin, and afterwards, for the confounding of the Jews, had made the Hebrew Scripture Latin. These things are from the third book against Rufinus. In the second book he treats of the same matter, and speaks thus: Have I spoken anything against the Seventy translators, whom very many years ago, most diligently corrected, I gave to the students of my own tongue, whom daily I expound in the assembly of the brethren, etc. Then he explains whom he calls students of his own tongue, adding after a few words: Whence I thought I was deserving well of my Latins, … thence I am called into blame. In place of six hundred examples by which I could show that Jerome understands Latin by his own tongue, I add one. In the Preface to the three books of Solomon he sets down the Hebrew name of the Song of Songs, Sir assirim, and adds, which in our tongue is translated Song of Songs. It is just as probable that St. Jerome translated sacred Scripture into the Slavonic tongue as it is probable that the words Canticum Canticorum are Slavonic. Let the learned pardon me if I have said more of these matters than an opinion so improbable and resting on no foundation seemed to deserve.

* "to them," I suppose

§ LXXIX. A chronological arrangement of all the deeds and writings of St. Jerome, set out most briefly from the matters discussed.

Birth, Roman studies, travels: That the studious reader may be able to behold at one glance the order of all the deeds and writings of St. Jerome, I shall briefly review from the matters discussed at length the chief deeds and all the writings.

In the year 331 St. Jerome was born, or at any rate about that year.

About the middle of the fourth century he devoted himself for a long time at Rome to the more polite studies, and there went on to learn the Latin and Greek tongues, and rhetoric and philosophy with the other arts, at least until the year 363, having also collected a library there.

After his Roman studies, at the end of the year 363 or later, Jerome set out for Gaul, and in it copied with his own hand several little works of St. Hilary, and stayed a notable time. Perhaps he also set out then for Athens, and into other regions, in order to see and learn much.

About the year 370 the Saint began at Aquileia a quasi-monastic life, and there lived with Rufinus. At Aquileia he writes his first little work, that is, the Epistle On the Woman struck seven times.

[1274] dwelling at Aquileia, journey into Syria: In the year 373 he departs from Aquileia on account of a sudden persecution with his companion Innocentius and Evagrius, a priest of Antioch, and sailing first into Thrace, then by a land journey through Bithynia, Galatia, Cappadocia and Cilicia, where he saw the monastery of St. Theodosius the abbot, he came into Syria, wishing to set out for Jerusalem, but at Antioch he begins to suffer from a long illness, and there dies Innocentius the Saint's companion, and afterwards Hylas, the servant of Melania, in the same or the following year.

[1275] stay at Antioch, whence he goes off into the wilderness: In the year 374, while Jerome continued to be sick at Antioch, his friend Heliodorus, with whom he was thinking of leading a life in the desert, having set out for Jerusalem by another road, came thence to Antioch to Jerome. But he, having changed his purpose of the solitary life, departs again into the West. In the same year at Antioch, not in the desert, he had that famous dream in which he is beaten before the tribunal of the judge, and is so deterred from the reading of the pagan poets and other profane writers that he afterwards abstained from reading them. Again in the same year the Saint writes Epistle 2 to Theodosius the abbot and the monks of Cilicia, declaring his desire of embracing the monastic life: then Epistle 4 to Florentius, who was living at Jerusalem, and along with it the third to Rufinus, whom he had heard had come into Egypt, with great charity. These three were written at Antioch, where he then heard Apollinaris teaching, not yet recognized as a heresiarch. More probably in the same year, about autumn, he began to inhabit the desert of Chalcis in Syria.

[1276] the solitary life in the desert of Syria: In the year 375, dwelling in solitude, he wrote several Epistles, namely the second to Florentius, which is the fifth, asking for some books and declaring his purpose of not going out of the desert; and the sixth to Julian the deacon, the seventh to Chromatius, Jovinus and Eusebius, clerics of Aquileia, in both of which he commends the care of his sister. More probably in the same year, certainly in the desert, he wrote the Life of St. Paul, the first hermit; as also Epistle 10 to Paulus of Concordia; the eighth to Nicæas, subdeacon of Aquileia, the ninth to Chrysogonus, a monk in the same place, and the fourteenth

to Heliodorus, whom at length and eloquently he exhorts to the monastic life. Three other Epistles, which could also have been written earlier at Aquileia, were perhaps written in the same year in the desert, namely the eleventh to the Virgins of Æmona, the twelfth to Antony the monk, and the thirteenth to his aunt Castorina, whom the Saint strives to recall to concord. From the year 374 until the beginning of 379, that is, more probably for over four years, the Saint dwelt in the desert, torturing himself with the harshest penance, afflicted too with many temptations, and from time to time refreshed with heavenly consolations. There he begins with great labour to learn the Hebrew tongue under a master converted from the Jews, and probably copied out the Hebrew Gospel of Matthew which the Nazarenes used. In the desert he probably wrote his first Commentary on Obadiah, which has perished. There he wrote to Damasus Epistle 15, consulting him with which of the three who called themselves bishops of Antioch he ought to communicate, and whether he should say one or three hypostases; and then the sixteenth, again asking about communion: likewise the seventeenth to Marcus the priest, complaining of the vexation he was suffering from the monks because he did not say three hypostases. These Epistles appear to have been written towards the end of the Saint's stay in the desert, especially the two latter.

[1277] More probably in the year 379, in winter or spring, he stays again at Antioch, then at Constantinople: the Saint leaves the desert and comes to Antioch, where he is ordained priest by Paulinus. More probably at Antioch in the year 379 he writes the Dialogue against the Luciferians. In the same year as it drew to its close, or in the following year, Jerome sets out for Constantinople.

In the years 380 and 381 Jerome hears St. Gregory Nazianzen teaching at Constantinople. There he translates the Greek Chronicle of Eusebius, perhaps already begun in the desert, and fills it out with certain additions, and continues it. There again he makes Latin from the Greek fourteen Homilies of Origen on Jeremiah, and as many of the same on Ezekiel: he then labours under a grievous pain of the eyes. At Constantinople he also dictated the treatise on the Seraphim and the coal, which was published as Epistle 18 to Pope Damasus, although it is neither an Epistle nor written to Damasus, but seems only to have been communicated to him afterwards. In the year 381 or 382 Jerome departs from Constantinople.

[1278] In the year 382, as it drew to its close, the Saint came to Rome together with St. Epiphanius of Salamis and Paulinus of Antioch, dwelling, deeds and writings and there, in the council assembled at Rome, gave his services to St. Damasus in writing the ecclesiastical letters.

In the year 383 or the following, the Saint at Rome wrote to Damasus the dissertation or Epistle 20 on the meaning of the word Hosanna, likewise Epistle 21 on the two Sons, that is, an exposition of the parable of the prodigal Son.

More probably in the year 384 he answers by Epistle 36 several questions from the Scriptures proposed by Damasus, copying out at that time some things from the Hebrew Bibles: likewise he translates two Homilies of Origen on the Canticles into the Latin tongue for Damasus. By order of the same Pontiff, he corrects the Latin text of the New Testament from the Greek, as also that of the Psalter from the text of the Seventy translators.

In the year 384 he writes the book against Helvidius on the perpetual virginity of the Blessed Mary; likewise the lengthy Epistle 22 to Eustochium on the keeping of Virginity, containing excellent precepts of right living. At that time he began to imbue with the understanding of sacred Scripture St. Marcella, St. Paula and her daughters Eustochium and Blæsilla, and other noble women. Towards the end of the year 384 he writes Epistle 23 on the death of Lea, and the twenty-fourth on the praises of Asella, both to St. Marcella.

[1279] In the year 384 or 385 the Saint writes several Epistles to St. Marcella, Roman: namely the twenty-fifth on the ten Names of God; the twenty-sixth on certain Hebrew names; the twenty-seventh, in which he defends his correction of the New Testament; the twenty-eighth, on the Diapsalm; the twenty-ninth, on the Ephod and Teraphim; the thirty-fourth on several passages of Psalm CXXVI. All these expositions of difficult passages of sacred Scripture were drawn up for Marcella. To the same he addressed at Rome the thirty-seventh, on the Commentaries of Rheticius on the Song of Songs, which he disapproves; the fortieth, on Onasus, whom he refutes and derides as a detractor; the forty-first, in which he explains and refutes the depraved dogmas of Montanus; the forty-second, on the sin against the Holy Spirit, against the Novatian heretics.

In the year 385 he writes to the same the thirty-eighth, on the sickness of Blæsilla, whose conversion from a worldly life to a pious and modest one he defends with wonderful freedom; likewise the thirtieth to Paula on the Hebrew Alphabet of Psalm CXVIII, which is expounded: the thirty-first to Eustochium on the little Gifts received from her; the thirty-second to Marcella, to whom he sends the two just mentioned. At that time St. Jerome was comparing the Hebrew text of the Old Testament with the edition of Aquila, already then thinking of translating Scripture from the Hebrew tongue into Latin. More probably he also wrote at Rome the forty-fourth, on the Gifts sent by Marcella, and the forty-third to the same Marcella, in which he commends the solitary life and prefers it to the life of the city; whether because he had already resolved to depart from Rome, and knew that St. Paula would follow, or because he was trying to lead Marcella herself to the same purpose. This seems the last of those which he wrote at Rome to Marcella, and was perhaps written after the one to Paula about to be mentioned. The hatred of the powerful Romans against St. Jerome, begun by the Saint's Epistle to Eustochium, having gained freedom to speak ill of him through the death of St. Damasus, and increased by the conversion and subsequent sickness of Blæsilla, rose about July of the year 385 to its height through the death of Blæsilla and St. Paula's purpose of leaving Rome, so that an atrocious calumny was spread about SS. Jerome and Paula. But since St. Paula grieved excessively at the untimely death of her daughter, St. Jerome consoled her by Epistle 39 to Paula on the death of her daughter Blæsilla in such a way as gravely to rebuke her excessive mourning and eloquently to proclaim the virtues of Blæsilla. In the month of August, when he was about to board ship to depart, he writes Epistle 45 to St. Asella, in which he reports and refutes the calumnies invented about himself and St. Paula.

[1280] the journeys preceding his dwelling at Bethlehem: In the year 385, in the month of August, he boarded ship with his brother Paulinian, Vincentius the priest, and others not named, St. Paula following not long after with her daughter St. Eustochium and with several others. The Saint, carried to Cyprus, is received by St. Epiphanius; then, brought to Antioch, by bishop Paulinus. Thence, probably with St. Paula, who came to Antioch by the same road, he came by a land journey into Palestine.

At the beginning of the year 386 St. Jerome with St. Paula, accompanied by learned men, visited the sacred places of Palestine. In the same year he set out with holy Paula into Egypt, and visited the monasteries of Nitria, where he found some Origenists among the monks. At that time he saw Didymus at Alexandria and consulted him about passages of sacred Scripture doubtful to him, staying there, however, but a short time. In the summer of the same year he returns with St. Paula into Palestine, and fixes his dwelling at Bethlehem, living in a narrow little lodging.

[1281] dwelling at Bethlehem: his earlier writings there, Perhaps at the end of the same year, or in the following year, he writes to St. Marcella in the name of Paula and Eustochium Epistle 46 on the Holy Places.

At Bethlehem, about the year 387, he hires a Jewish master named Baraninas, and by his help strives to acquire a perfect understanding of the Hebrew tongue, and with him goes through the Hebrew Scripture. About the same time he reads through the whole Scripture with SS. Paula and Eustochium, which he explains to them.

In the year 389 the Saint publishes Commentaries on the Epistles of St. Paul to Philemon, to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to Titus: likewise, either before the end of that year or at the beginning of the next, on Ecclesiastes.

More probably in the year 390 the Saint composes the book of Hebrew Questions on Genesis: likewise he translates into the Latin tongue the book of Eusebius on Hebrew Places, and corrects and enlarges it: likewise from Philo and Origen he puts together the book on Hebrew Names, which he also enlarges with an interpretation of the names of the New Testament. About the same time Jerome makes Latin the book of Didymus on the Holy Spirit, which he had begun at Rome; as also thirty-nine Homilies of Origen on Luke. About that time the Saint composed seven treatises on Psalms from the tenth to the sixteenth, unless they were only translated from the Greek.

In the year 390 or 391 he writes the Life of St. Malchus the monk, thinking also of writing an ecclesiastical history, which he did not do; and then the Life of St. Hilarion. About the same time he makes Latin from the Greek all the books of the Old Testament which were in the canon of the Jews, according to the edition of the Seventy Translators, yet in such a way that, according to the Hexapla of Origen, which he had earlier procured for himself, he adds to the text of the Seventy those things which were in the Hebrew text, as Theodotion had translated them, prefixing asterisks or little stars to distinguish them; and likewise prefixing obeli before those things which were found only in the Seventy.

[1282] In the year 390 or 391, after the correction or translation of the Old Testament from the Greek already mentioned, the interpretation of Scripture from the Hebrew begun, the Saint began a work of great labour and equal usefulness, namely the translation of the Old Testament from the Hebrew source: with which work he was occupied for easily twenty-five years, in such a way that he interposed many other things, as I have referred each, so far as could be done, to its own time. He made his beginning from the four books of Kings, then translated all the Prophets, more probably not even Daniel excepted, although about the time of this translation we are not equally certain: the Psalter too was translated before the year 392. And so chiefly in the year 391 he translated the books of Kings, the Prophets and the Psalter; yet in such a way that he perhaps began before the end of the year 390 and translated the last of them at the beginning of the year 392. About the same time, certainly before 395, he composed Annotations on the minor Prophets, which have perished.

In the year 392 the Saint publishes Commentaries on several of the minor prophets, namely on Nahum, on Micah, on Saphonias, on Haggai, and on Habakkuk: he writes the book on illustrious Men.

In the year 393 the Saint publishes two books against Jovinian the heresiarch.

In the year 393 or 394 he renders the book of Job into Latin from the Oriental idiom.

[1283] In the year 394 the Saint writes to Nepotian Epistle 52, and thus continued at intervals, so that in the meanwhile on the Life of clerics and monks, containing excellent precepts of living. In the same year he renders into Latin the Greek Epistle of St. Epiphanius to John of Jerusalem: by which translation he offends Rufinus, John of Jerusalem, and others. About the same time, or perhaps a little later, he writes Epistle 47 to Desiderius. But more probably in that same year 394 he makes Latin from the Hebrew the books of Esdras. After St. Jerome had written to St. Paulinus Epistle 53 on the Study of the Scriptures, whose date we do not determine;

Vigilantius, sent by Paulinus, was in Palestine with St. Jerome towards the end of the year 394, and to him on his return he gave a second Epistle to Paulinus, the fifty-eighth. About the same year, or a little later, the Saint answers by Epistle 55 three questions proposed by Amandus, a priest of Bordeaux: likewise by Epistle 59 five questions which St. Marcella had sent. When St. Augustine had begun to know of Jerome, and it had become known to him that Jerome had set out for Palestine through Alypius, he writes to him Epistle 56 among the Hieronymian letters, in which he attacks his opinion about St. Peter. But that letter, carried by chance not to Jerome but to others, gave occasion for offence.

[1284] he did and wrote many other things In the year 394 or 395, after Jerome had understood from the letters of Pammachius and Domnio that his books against Jovinian were being assailed by the calumnies and revilings of adversaries, he composes the Apologetic book (otherwise Epistle 48), which he sends to Pammachius, adding to the same Epistle 49: about the same matters he writes Epistle 50 to Domnio. By these the disturbances raised against the aforesaid books were removed. In the year 395 Fabiola learns the sacred Letters in Palestine, with Jerome expounding: but on account of the Huns bursting in she departs at the end of the year, as Jerome was thinking of fleeing.

In the year 395 the Saint wrote to Furia, the widow, as it seems, of the consul Probinus, Epistle 54 on keeping Widowhood. From this year the Saint begins to suffer much from John of Jerusalem.

Towards the end of the year 395 or the beginning of the next, Jerome composes the book on the best manner of translating, that is, Epistle 57 to Pammachius. At about the same time, when the Saint was being defamed by Vigilantius, who had returned to the West, he writes to him Epistle 61, in which he sharply refutes his calumnies.

In the year 396 the Saint composes the Epitaph of Nepotian, that is, Epistle 60 to Heliodorus: likewise Commentaries on Jonah and on Obadiah. He translates the books of Chronicles from the Hebrew into the Latin tongue. But since there was a quarrel between John of Jerusalem and Jerome, and John had written about it to Theophilus of Alexandria, towards the end of the year 396 Jerome writes to Theophilus about that same quarrel Epistle 82.

[1285] the Saint, In the year 397 Jerome, for the sake of bishop Amabilis, expounds in a Commentary ten visions of Isaiah, afterwards inserted into the complete Commentaries on Isaiah. At the same time he writes to Castrucius the blind Pannonian. More probably in the same year he answers by Epistle 72 questions proposed from Scripture about Solomon and Ahaz: he writes to Fabiola a book, that is, Epistle 64, on the priestly Vestment: and Epistle 65 to the virgin Principia, in which he explains Psalm XLIV. Towards the end of the same year he consoles Pammachius on the death of his wife Paulina by Epistle 66; and sends his brother Paulinian into their homeland to sell the hereditary goods of their parents, so that he might as far as he could relieve the want of the monasteries and support St. Paula. At that time the discord between John of Jerusalem and St. Jerome and his monasteries was raging, so that in this year or the next even entrance to the church was forbidden by John to Jerome and his monks. Rufinus, however, when in the same year he departed to the West, had seemed to enter into peace, whether truly or feignedly, with St. Jerome. In this year or the next the Saint wrote Epistle 103 to St. Augustine.

[1286] he also laboured under a long illness, In the year 398 Jerome laboured under a long illness, namely from almost the beginning of the year until Lent, not an annual infirmity. After recovering his health in Lent, the Saint in Lent translates from the Hebrew into the Latin tongue the three books of Solomon, namely Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and the Song of Songs; preparing himself to translate the Pentateuch also. Then in Lent he writes to Lucinius the Spaniard Epistle 71, and sends him back some things in return for the little gifts received. For Lucinius had ordered all the little works of Jerome to be copied out by six notaries sent into Palestine. Before Easter he dictates the Commentaries on Matthew for the sake of Eusebius of Cremona, who after Easter set out for Italy. In the same year he wrote to Evangelus Epistle 73 on Melchizedek: likewise the seventieth to Magnus the orator, in which he defends the sober use of profane writings. In the same year or the next he addressed to Tranquillinus Epistle 62, answering prudently the question proposed by him about the manner in which the writings of Origen are to be read. Towards the end of the same year or the beginning of the next, Jerome composed the book against John of Jerusalem, in which he sets forth the controversy long agitated with him, and refutes his Apology. In the same year 398 or the next he began the translation of the Pentateuch from the Hebrew, and perhaps finished Genesis. But the translation of the whole Pentateuch was frequently interrupted by other things, and was not finished long before the year 404. Meanwhile Rome had been disturbed because Rufinus had translated Origen's books On Principles into the Latin tongue. This translation, made in the year 398, stirred up the Roman friends of St. Jerome, because Rufinus in his Preface had alleged St. Jerome as greatly favouring Origen.

[1287] In the year 399, when the Saint had been warned by his Roman friends, Pammachius and Oceanus, and had a sharp quarrel with John of Jerusalem, at last settled, of the praises craftily given him by Rufinus as a praiser of the Works of Origen, and of Origen's books On Principles unfaithfully translated by him, and had been asked by the same to translate the books On Principles faithfully and to declare his own opinion against Origen openly, he translates the books On Principles, writes to Pammachius and Oceanus Epistle 84, in which he repels the figured praises of Rufinus, as given to a friend of Origen, and proves that he praised Origen in such a way that he never approved his depraved dogmas; and at the same time sends to them the books On Principles, which he had faithfully rendered into Latin. At the same time the Saint wrote to Rufinus Epistle 81, in which he modestly complains of his deed: but it was not delivered to Rufinus by the Roman friends. In the same year he writes to St. Paulinus Epistle 85, in which he also declares his own mind about Origen. Jerome composed several Epistles or little works in the year 399; namely the Epitaph of Fabiola, that is, Epistle 77 on the death of Fabiola, to Oceanus; and the exegetical book to Fabiola on the XLII Stations of the Israelites in the desert, which work he had promised her while living, and composed in memory of her when dead, and sent to Oceanus. To the same Oceanus, in an uncertain year, but after 395 and before 401, the Saint wrote Epistle 69, answering the question proposed by him whether a man is to be held twice-married with a view to the priesthood, if he has married one wife before baptism and another after baptism. In the year 399, or not long after, the Saint likewise wrote to Theodora, the widow of Lucinius the Spaniard, Epistle 75; and to Abigaus, also a Spaniard, Epistle 76: likewise Epistle 63 to Theophilus of Alexandria, when the controversy of Jerome with John of Jerusalem was not entirely settled. That discord, however, was wholly removed in the same year.

[1288] After peace with John was established, Jerome, towards the end of the year 399 or in the following year, he was also assailed by the grave enmities of Rufinus, writes to Theophilus Epistle 86, in which he extols his zeal against the Origenists. From that time much friendship passed between Jerome and Theophilus, and St. Epiphanius was the friend of both: but Rufinus, having seen Jerome's Epistle against the Origenists, broke out into open enmity, and began to write his Invectives against Jerome, and from the year 400 secretly communicated them to his friends, yet did not publish them so soon. About this time, certainly between the years 398 and 401, the Saint writes Epistle 107 to Læta on the education of her daughter. Perhaps about the same time was written Epistle 106 to Sunnia and Fretela: but it lacks any certain note of time.

In the year 400 Jerome writes to Theophilus Epistle 88, answering a letter received from him, which he is believed also to have made Latin. In the same year he translated the Synodal Epistle of Theophilus to the bishops of Palestine and Cyprus about the Origenists; and the Epistle of the synod of Jerusalem to Theophilus, likewise that of Dionysius, bishop of Lydda, to the same: likewise the Epistle of Theophilus to St. Epiphanius; as also another of St. Epiphanius to Jerome himself, all among the Hieronymian letters in the Veronese edition from 90 to 94, all written in the cause of the Origenists, because Jerome joined with Theophilus and Epiphanius in abolishing that heresy. There is added Epistle 89 of Theophilus to Jerome, but this was perhaps written in the following year. About the same time, certainly before the year 404, St. Jerome wrote Epistle 79 to Salvina, a most noble widow, on the death of her husband Nebridius, in which he suggests to her excellent lessons of right living.

[1289] and refuted his calumnies: In the year 401 the Saint makes Latin from the Greek the Paschal Epistle of Theophilus, in which he discourses at length against the Origenists. In the same year, when he had understood from many that he was being sharply attacked by the writings of Rufinus, and had learned much of his arguments from friends, although he had not yet been able to obtain his books, he refutes Rufinus in two books, that is, partly answers his arguments and partly refutes his Apology to Pope Anastasius.

In the year 402 Jerome translates the second Paschal Epistle of Theophilus, and sends it to Rome to SS. Pammachius and Marcella, to whom on that occasion he writes Epistle 97. In the same year he writes the third book against Rufinus, answering his Epistle which was never published. In the same year, having received a letter of Augustine, he writes to him Epistle 102, asking whether the Epistle he had received was his, and greatly declining to descend into a contest with Augustine.

[1290] the translation from the Hebrew at length finished. About the year 403 Jerome finished the translation of the Pentateuch from the Hebrew, begun some years before and frequently interrupted by other things.

In the year 403 the Saint, having again received a letter of Augustine, writes to him Epistle 105, in which he complains of St. Augustine's Epistle circulated through Italy, and tries at length to deter him from pressing for an answer to it. Towards the end of this year or the beginning of the next, Jerome translates the book of Esther from the Hebrew.

In the year 404 St. Paula died. Her lengthy Epitaph, that is, Epistle 108 to Eustochium, St. Jerome composes. He translates the Paschal Epistle of Theophilus composed for the year 404, and writes to Theophilus Epistle 99, in which he excuses the slowness of his translation and asserts that he had been sick for some days. In the same year the Saint makes Latin from the Hebrew the books of Joshua, Judges and Ruth. Jerome likewise translated from the Chaldee the books of Tobit and Judith, but at an uncertain time.

[1291] The dissension with Augustine ended: his annual illness; Towards the end of the year 404 or the beginning of 405, Jerome translated from the Greek tongue into Latin the Rule of St. Pachomius, and other ascetical documents and letters of the same and of others of the Tabennesiote Order. Towards the end of the year 404 or in the year 405, St. Jerome writes to St. Augustine Epistle 112, in which he answers several of his Epistles and defends his own opinion about Peter having been rebuked: likewise the Epistle

109 to Riparius.

In the year 405, as it seems, St. Jerome writes to Augustine Epistle 115, excusing his defence in a friendly way.

Not after the year 405, but perhaps many years earlier, the Saint dictated Epistle 117 to a Mother and daughter living in Gaul. Between the years 398 and 409 he addressed Epistle 118 to Julian, whom he consoles and exhorts to the monastic life.

From the year 405, either at its middle or when it had advanced towards Autumn, until about the Autumn of the year 406, St. Jerome seems to have been sick and to have written almost nothing.

[1292] In the year 406, still lying ill of his disease, Jerome seems to have dictated Epistle 74 to Rufinus the priest, many things written at once and the interpretation resumed a different man from the Rufinuses mentioned before, on the Quarrel of the two harlots and the judgment of Solomon. Healed of his disease, about the end of summer or the beginning of autumn, he began to prepare material for explaining the Prophets not yet expounded. But towards the end of autumn there arrived the monk Sisinnius, sent into Palestine by St. Exuperius of Toulouse to bring aid for their want, and bringing letters of others too to Jerome. After his arrival the Saint dictated Commentaries on Zechariah, on Malachi, on Hosea, on Joel and on Amos: likewise he wrote the very lengthy Epistle 119 to Minervius and Alexander on the passage of the Apostle: We shall indeed all sleep, etc.; and finally the book against the errors of Vigilantius, written in a sharp style, to restrain the senseless impiety of an unskilled man.

In the year 407 he writes Commentaries on the prophet Daniel. More probably in the same year he composes Epistle 120 to Hedibia, in which he answers at length twelve questions sent by her from Gaul: likewise Epistle 121 to Algasia, who had proposed eleven other questions at the same time. Either at the same time or in the year 408 he dictated Epistle 122 to Rusticus, whom he exhorts to penance.

In the year 407 as it drew to its close, or in the year 408, Jerome sends to Avitus the books of Origen On Principles, as he had made them Latin, accurately copied out, because Avitus had them in a faulty state, whom by Epistle 124 he anxiously warns to beware of the poison lurking in them.

[1293] Towards the end of the year 407 or the beginning of 408, Jerome began his greatest work on Isaiah, of the Prophets, on which he spent the last years of his life in which he advances less quickly, and about the beginning of the year 409 is also delayed by illness. These lengthy Commentaries on Isaiah, on which the Saint perhaps spent almost two years, seem to have been finished about the autumn of the year 409.

In the year 409, more probably before the Commentaries on Isaiah were finished, Jerome wrote Epistle 123 on Monogamy to the widow Ageruchia, to whom he both dissuades a second marriage and gives excellent lessons of right living. Hearing about the end of the same year of the storming of the City of Rome by the Goths and of the death of many friends, he puts off for a while to another time his plan of explaining Ezekiel.

In the year 410 Jerome begins to expound Ezekiel, but after finishing two books he interrupts the work for some time on account of the multitude of Romans who came needy from the City into Palestine. Those two books he sent to Fabiola.

[1294] In the year 411, having finished the third book on Ezekiel, the Saint is compelled to flee to a fortified city on account of the Arabs suddenly bursting into Palestine. At that time he wrote Epistle 126 to Marcellinus and Anapsychia on the Origin of the soul, thus he spent them, yet so that he also interposed referring them for further exposition to St. Augustine. Perhaps at the same time, certainly about 411, the Saint writes Epistle 125 to Rusticus the monk, setting forth excellent precepts of living. In the year 411 Jerome composes the Epitaph of St. Marcella, that is, Epistle 127 to Principia. About the same year too he addressed Epistle 128 to Gaudentius on the education of the little child Pacatula. Probably in the same year 411 he resumed the interrupted Explanation of Ezekiel, proceeding slowly, however, on account of the impediments that met him and his failing eyes, so that he was engaged on that explanation for the three following years as well, interrupting it again for a notable time at chapter 40 on account of the extreme difficulty of expounding Ezekiel's temple.

In the year 414, the Explanation of Ezekiel not yet being finished, the Saint wrote Epistle 130 to the most noble virgin Demetrias, to whom he delivered excellent admonitions of living, as Juliana, the mother of Demetrias, and Proba her grandmother had asked him.

Towards the end of the year 414 or the beginning of 415, Jerome finished his lengthy Commentaries on Ezekiel.

In the year 414 or 415 he wrote to Dardanus Epistle 129 on the Land of Promise.

[1295] he interposed not a few things. At the beginning, or at any rate before the middle, of the year 415, Jerome began to write Commentaries on Jeremiah, defending himself from the outset against Pelagius, who was repeating the old calumnies of Jerome's enemies. Before the middle of the same year he composes Epistle 133 to Ctesiphon, in which he began to refute the Pelagian dogmas, and showed that the work of Sixtus the Pythagorean philosopher had been foisted upon men by Rufinus as a work of St. Sixtus the Pope. After this Epistle he returned to the Commentaries on Jeremiah. But having finished the third book, he began to compose the Dialogue, divided into three books, in which he more fully refutes Pelagius. In the same year he resumes the Commentaries on Jeremiah. Again in the same year 415, Orosius, a Spanish priest, who had come to Augustine to be instructed, and had been sent by him to Jerome to be further taught, came into Palestine to the Saint; and brought him two books of Augustine, in which Jerome was consulted about the Origin of the soul and about a certain sentence of the apostle James.

[1296] The Saint suffers grave things from the Pelagians, In the year 416, when Orosius was returning into Africa, St. Jerome writes to Augustine Epistle 134, in which he answers Augustine most amicably, yet declines to declare his judgment about the books or Epistles sent by him. In the same year the fury of the Pelagians raged with slaughter and fire against the monasteries of SS. Jerome and Eustochium, so that Jerome himself scarcely escaped. Hence St. Jerome, fearing still graver things, informs St. Innocent the Pope of the whole matter, and with his own people withdraws meanwhile from the burnt monasteries to a place unknown to us. This burning of the monasteries seems to have been the cause on account of which, six books on Jeremiah having been finished before, the Saint could not afterwards go on and complete the Commentaries on Jeremiah, whether because his library had been burnt, or because extreme poverty did not allow him to maintain notaries.

In the year 417 or 418, Jerome not yet having returned to his monastery, writes Epistle 138 to Riparius.

Probably in the year 418, when Jerome with his own people had returned to the monasteries in Bethlehem, he wrote Epistle 139 to Apronius. The Saint likewise wrote to Cyprian the priest Epistle 140, but in a more uncertain year, yet in the time of the Pelagians, so that this lengthy Epistle, in which the eighty-ninth Psalm is expounded, may at least be fixed between the years 415 and 419.

About the year 418 Jerome wrote to St. Augustine Epistles 141 and 142, perhaps given at the same time, and in the one most amicably congratulated him on the victory won over the Pelagians, in the other hinted at their obstinacy.

[1297] In the year 419, about the month of August, Jerome addressed Epistle 143 to SS. Alypius and Augustine, and decrepit, he dies at Bethlehem. and this seems the last of all that have come to our knowledge. More probably in the same year 419, on the XXX day of September, the Saint ended his life by a blessed death.

Besides the writings just now bound to their several times, three Epistles are added at the end in Vallarsi. Of these the first is Epistle 145 to Exuperantius, whom the Saint exhorts to leave the secular warfare and embrace the monastic life. It seems to have been written at Bethlehem, because he wishes that God may make Exuperantius, free and with his holy brother Quintilian, sail quickly to us, he says (that is, I think, to Bethlehem). The second is Epistle 146 to Evangelus, in which the error of those is refuted who made the deacon equal to the priest. The third is Epistle 147 to the fallen Sabinianus. This was certainly written at Bethlehem, when the monasteries of St. Jerome there had, for some time at least, been rightly established.

§ LXXX. Those things are examined which have been objected against the Saint's morals or writings by certain moderns, and have not yet been discussed.

Some things wrongly asserted about St. Jerome: Since we have reviewed in a brief compendium the deeds and writings of St. Jerome, it is agreeable also briefly to review those things which I find objected against the Saint by various men, or wrongly asserted about him, that is, if they have not already been reported and examined in their places. So many things have been objected against St. Jerome by various moderns, either rashly or at any rate without suitable reason, that it would not have been expedient to examine each in its own order, lest the true deeds should be frequently interrupted, but it was more convenient to put off many things to this place. David Czvittinger, in his Specimen of literary Hungary, page 168, wove together a lengthy elogium of St. Jerome: but that writer is heterodox, and in his own name rashly reproves that greatest of Men, and alleges not a few censures of others, nor is he free from some errors already refuted. For he both makes him a Slav by nation, and attributes to Jerome the version of sacred Scripture into the Slavonic tongue; which assertions are not only improbable, but altogether ridiculous. Among Jerome's masters he wrongly numbers Victorinus the Rhetorician and Paulinus of Antioch: of this latter, however, Jerome was a friend, and was ordained priest by him, but he never numbered Paulinus among his masters, as neither Victorinus. These things Czvittinger took over from Cave, the preceding from others.

[1299] Cave's too is the censure which he repeats, conceived in these words: heterodox men, who put forward Jerome as too vehement, For the rest — be it said with the leave of that most holy man — he was of a too fervid and ungoverned temper, who indulged his feelings too much: once provoked, he treated his adversaries most harshly, and scarcely, or hardly even scarcely, restrained himself from an invective and satirical vein of writing. Witnesses clear enough for us are the enmities which he had with Rufinus, once his intimate, with John of Jerusalem, Jovinian, Vigilantius, and others. Against these, seizing on any slight occasion and laying aside almost all gravity, he pours out whole wagon-loads of abuse; taking no account of person, dignity or learning. This accusation is repeated at page 174 from Scaliger in these words: He was too vehement, especially against Jovinian and Vigilantius, though undeservedly, as Erasmus himself acknowledges. The accuser appeals to Erasmus, and Cave likewise alleged Erasmus for other things and made much of his judgment. And so let us hear Erasmus in the Life, as it is in manuscript among us. There, at folio 166, he observes that certain men, judging (St. Jerome) by their own manners, dream that he was a sour and uncivil man; whereas there was never anything more kindly or more urbane than he.

[1300] have Erasmus against them, who all the things pertaining to Jerome Again at folio 179 Erasmus speaks thus: Besides this there are those whom the bitterness of his speech somewhat offends, because in his writings he sometimes seems to grow hot more sharply than befits Christian gentleness, and plainly to recall something of the old comedy, seizing on many men with his teeth. In

this opinion was Augustine once, and in our memory, if it please the powers above, Francesco Filelfo, a man indeed learned, but sometimes more than enough φιλαυτὸς. But these men seem to me to weigh too little the circumstances of the business, his country, his temper, his confidence in himself, the wickedness of his rivals, a kind of insult to be borne by no one: and lastly not even that saying of Terence: "If you were here, you would think otherwise." No men [*] bear an insult to themselves with less self-command than those who are most slow to feel another's. He inveighed sharply against Rufinus, but Rufinus had deserved sharper. The one stoutly repels the charge of heresy; the other threatens the executioner and assails his reputation with invented crimes. And no one rages more grievously than he to whom it was not permitted to be gentle. But if anyone should look more attentively and more closely into those books in which he inveighs against his adversaries with sails and horses (as they say) and lets out all sail to freedom, he will find wonderful traces of a most kindly and most gentle nature. He often plays, and deals in festive rather than in venomous wit. He conceded some things to his age and to the feelings of his friends; and he repels the charge from himself in such a way that, if it could be done, he would wish to spare his enemy. Many things he suppresses knowingly and deliberately, preferring to yield to Christian modesty rather than to a provoked spirit; as in the Epistle against John of Jerusalem — how much he grants to his own sense of shame, how much to the title of bishop, how he restrains himself! And if anything more odious occurs, he often suppresses the name, sometimes makes use of fictitious words, as in the argument about reconciling a mother and daughter, against the unchaste deacon, against the fallen Susanna. But this last Epistle is no longer reckoned Jerome's.

[1301] weighed more maturely, likewise St. Augustine and all the ancients. Erasmus continues: Nay, he even vents his spleen against Rufinus and his associates under the feigned names of Grunnius, Luscius Lanuvinus, Calpurnius Lanarius, Scorpio, the Alpine Dog, and others of that kind. Thus far Erasmus, who certainly had read the works of Jerome more, and by reading them could have conceived a juster estimate of Jerome's character, than the censors mentioned above, to the weighing of whose words I now come closer. Cave rashly asserts that Jerome was of an ungoverned temper, and with the same rashness adds that he indulged his feelings too much. If the accusation were true, he would not rightly call Jerome most holy: for to indulge one's feelings too much does not belong to Saints. But no one will ever prove the truth of that censure. On the contrary it can easily be proved that Jerome never proceeded from an ungoverned temper to the refuting of adversaries, and was never more sharp or bitter in refuting them than either necessity or just reason required. Which of the ancients ever, besides the enemies of Jerome and those whose vices he reproved, called him too bitter or of an ungoverned temper? This assuredly St. Augustine did not say, as Erasmus seems wrongly to suppose. For he praised Jerome's moderation, in that he held back the stings of his indignation, so as not to return cursing for cursing, and in that he bore tolerably the incredible enmities of Rufinus, as was said more fully at number 800 and following. Pope Gelasius with the Roman council praised Jerome in the very point that is objected, and suggests that he was moved by zeal for God and by religious regard for the faith, not by an ungoverned temper or by disordered feelings. The words of Prosper, who calls Jerome a Model of manners, Cave himself quotes. But a man of ungoverned temper, indulging his feelings too much, cannot be a model of manners. Nor yet was Prosper ignorant that heretics had been sharply refuted by Jerome: for he indicates this very thing in these words, He cut the enemy asunder. I pass over the many ancients who with unanimous consent proclaimed Jerome's praise.

[1302] Let us now consider how excellently Jerome knew how to conquer his spirit, The mildness, patience and charity of Jerome proved by his deeds, to restrain his anger, and to endure the annoyances and injuries inflicted on him with patient silence. In his youth he suffered a persecution, on account of which he fled from Aquileia and set out for Syria. Yet he never indicated who was the author of that persecution. In the desert of Syria he was much harassed by the monks, and for that cause was compelled to leave the solitude: yet he never named the author. At Rome he was accused and assailed with such calumnies that he departed. He always spared the names of his persecutors. At Bethlehem he saw the monasteries of which he had the care laid waste with slaughter and flame; he never declared the names of the authors of the crime. These things assuredly are not those of an ungoverned temper, nor of one indulging his feelings too much: but of a brave and patient man, who knew how to bridle the motions of anger, and preferred to suffer injuries rather than to inflict them.

[1303] If we now weigh Jerome's controversy with St. Augustine, and particularly by his manner of dealing with St. Augustine. we shall see clearly how openly false are those words of Cave: Once provoked, he treated his adversaries most harshly. For he saw his opinion disapproved in grave words by Augustine, when he had well known neither the learning nor the sanctity of the man who provoked him, as was set forth in §50: he understood that the Epistle in which he was attacked had come into the hands of many before he himself had seen it; yet even so he wished to be silent, and could not be impelled except by several letters of Augustine to answer, lest he should write against a Catholic bishop. He answered at last under compulsion, not harshly but in friendly fashion, and even so excused his answer in a following Epistle, and ever afterwards loved and praised Augustine. Tillemont, who surely ought to be suspected by no one of excessive favour towards St. Jerome, acknowledges in his manner of dealing with St. Augustine a consummate virtue, namely perfect mildness, patience, charity, virtues plainly opposed to those vices of which Cave falsely accuses Jerome.

[1304] If now we wish to weigh more accurately Jerome's dealings with Rufinus and John of Jerusalem, He gave Rufinus a just cause of complaining about us, we shall find in these very dealings a wonderful mildness of Jerome, as Erasmus rightly observed. Jerome loved Rufinus, and first complained of him in Epistle 57 to Pammachius, because he was instigating John of Jerusalem. Nevertheless this first discord was settled before Rufinus departed to the West in the year 347. How sincerely Jerome wished to cultivate the renewed friendship is gathered from his book against John of Jerusalem, in which he never names Rufinus, although he could have said much about him. Then Rufinus, by translating Origen's books On Principles, and by praising Jerome in the Preface, and by rehearsing the praises which he had once given to Origen, laid upon Jerome an absolute necessity of declaring his own opinion about the errors of Origen. For unless he had declared himself opposed to the errors of Origen, he would have been reckoned an Origenist, especially since he had long since been traduced as an Origenist by Vigilantius. And so by his silence he would, on account of the notable fame of learning in which he flourished, have lent authority to errors that ought to be condemned. Compelled therefore by this necessity, he laid open and condemned the errors of Origen by Epistle 84, and explained the praises once given to Origen, and proved himself a Catholic. And he did this with such moderation that he did not even name Rufinus. Had Rufinus been of the same moderation, had he been equally willing to desert the cause of Origen and to condemn his errors, he could have joined himself with Jerome, and modestly excused his version of the books On Principles.

[1305] and spared both him and John much. But Rufinus was less anxious to defend himself than to accuse Jerome, against whom he at once wrote two books of Invectives, so as to make him an Origenist even against his will, and liable to many charges. Jerome could not but defend himself, assailed by so many calumnies. But in what manner did he do it? With the greatest moderation, if the matter be attentively considered. He often plays, and deals in festive rather than in venomous wit, says Erasmus rightly, and this has already been sufficiently proved above. He wished to sprinkle the man with a wholesome shame, and so to draw him away from the licence of calumny, and still more from the defence of Origen. Had he obtained this last, he would soon have returned to concord. As regards John of Jerusalem, there was again the utmost necessity for Jerome to answer his Apology, after he had been silent for three years, as was proved at number 645. And he did this in such a way that he granted much to his own sense of shame, much to the title of bishop, and knowingly and deliberately omitted many things in order to spare John, as Erasmus rightly notes. He had many weapons against John, had he been willing to use them all; still more against Rufinus: but he used almost only those which he judged fit for defending himself or for amending his adversaries, preferring to spare his enemies where it could be done, rather than without the necessity of his own defence to strike or wound them grievously.

[1306] With just reason the Saint refuted Jovinian and Vigilantius more sharply, There remain Jovinian and Vigilantius, whom I shall not deny were more harshly handled. Indeed I do not even wonder that Jerome does not please Lutheran and Calvinist writers in his books against Jovinian and Vigilantius. I wonder more that the doctrine of Jovinian and Vigilantius, which Jerome refuted with a sharp pen, could ever have been adopted by men who try to claim for themselves the knowledge of sacred Scripture, who profess, in words at least, to hold the authority of the holy Fathers in esteem. But, to return to my purpose, let us briefly examine why the most gentle Jerome refuted Jovinian so bitingly, as the Epicurus of the Christians, and Vigilantius as the first monster of Gaul. Of Vigilantius I have already declared this at number 925; of Jovinian the reason is almost the same, and all the things that were said in the same place to defend Jerome's vehemence against Vigilantius hold equally for Jovinian, although he refuted the latter less bitterly than Vigilantius. If perhaps the things said there do not suffice anyone to justify Jerome's sharpness against those two heresiarchs, rash and unskilled men, let him add this of the most wise Solomon, Proverbs 26 ℣ 5: Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he seem wise to himself. This assuredly was not said in vain, so that it could never have place. Jerome therefore obeyed Solomon's admonition, and at once stifled the monsters at their birth, all antiquity approving his deed.

[1307] Cave adds another objection, continuing thus: And what wonder? nor does he exercise a harsh censure upon St. Paul, he says, since he is wont to exercise upon St. Paul the apostle himself a censure too harsh and plainly insolent. How often does he anxiously weigh him by the critical rules of the grammarians, objecting solecisms and faulty diction, and that he uses a trivial speech! Ridiculous is the objection, whose solution lies in those very words of which Cave subjoins the beginning. I shall transfer the whole passage hither from the Commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians, book 2, on chapter 3 ℣ 1. We, he says, as often as we have noted solecisms or anything of the kind, do not strike at the Apostle, as the malevolent charge, but are rather the Apostle's defenders, because a Hebrew of the Hebrews, without the polish of rhetorical speech and composition of words and beauty of eloquence, could never have led over the whole world to the faith of Christ, had he not preached him, not in the wisdom of the word, but in the power of God. For he himself also says to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 2 ℣ 1:) And I, when I had come to you, brethren, came not in loftiness of speech [] or of wisdom, announcing to you the testimony of God. And again (℣ 4 and 5:) "And my speech [] and my preaching

was not in the persuasive words of wisdom [*], but in the showing of the spirit and of power, that your faith may not be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God." He therefore, who makes solecisms in his words, who cannot render a hyperbaton and complete a sentence, boldly claims wisdom for himself, etc. Thus he gives the reason for the observation which he had set down before in these words: But I think that in this place the diction is also faulty. And soon after: But if anyone can teach, even according to the connection of the speech and the eloquence, that the Apostle was perfect and did not fall into the faults of the grammatical art, he rather is to be listened to. Thus Jerome, even though he knew that the true glory of the Apostles was not to be sought from knowledge of the grammatical or rhetorical art.

[1308] Wherefore he rightly calls malevolent those who carped at observations of this kind about the laws of grammar, as Cave ridiculously calumniates. which the necessity of explaining the words brought with it, as being less honourable to the Apostle. All the Fathers everywhere acknowledge that the Apostles were not lettered, and Chrysostom in particular frequently calls them unlearned and illiterate. In Homily 3 on the first Epistle to the Corinthians he discourses at length on that matter, and laughs at those who wish the Apostles to have excelled in human wisdom, alleging those words of Paul, 1 Cor. I ℣ 17: Not in the wisdom of the word, lest the cross of Christ be made void: and then adding: For this was the reason why the Apostles were not wise men or philosophers, not from any weakness in the gifts of grace, but that the preaching might not be injured. And lower down: But do you show me whether Peter and Paul were learned; but you will not be able: for they were unlearned and illiterate … But I have said these things, he says, because I once heard a certain Christian disputing ridiculously against a Greek. For both in the disputation were confuting and ruining their own case. For what the Christian ought to have said, that the Greek said: and what it was fitting for the Greek to say, this the Christian urged. For when the question was about Paul and Plato, that Greek tried to show that Paul was unlearned and rude. But the Christian out of simplicity strove to prove that Paul was more learned and more eloquent than Plato. I pass over much for brevity's sake: for from these things the studious reader will easily perceive that Cave has ridiculously joined himself to Jerome's malevolent censors, while he carps at the Saint because he did not always find the grammatical laws observed in the words of the Apostle, and candidly declares this from the necessity of interpretation. For such an accusation is a eulogy, as Chrysostom witnesses, who declares and proves it in many words.

[1309] [The Saint is not rightly accused on account of what he said about second marriages,] Cave repeats another calumny too, worn threadbare by Jerome himself, when he says that, while he extols virginity with altogether immoderate praises, he seems to think less honourably and modestly about marriage. Certainly, he says, he makes the twice-married only better than harlots, compares them with the unclean animals of Noah's ark and with serpents, and does not blush to compare a woman who repeats a second marriage to a dog returning to its vomit and to a washed sow returning to its wallowing-place. It is an old calumny, as I have already said, for which Cave assigns the books against Jovinian and the Epistle to Gerontia, or to Ageruchia, which is the 123rd. As regards the books against Jovinian, Jerome himself abundantly justified himself in the Apology written for them, by which the mouths of the calumniators were then stopped. But the said Epistle to Ageruchia was never drawn into calumny by the ancients, and also defends itself. He dissuades Ageruchia from a second marriage, and teaches that both men and women who are content with a first marriage are preferred to the twice-married: because after a first marriage men may be chosen for the priesthood, and women enrolled among the widows. Nevertheless he observes that second marriages also are conceded by the Apostle, nay even advised to the incontinent, but for this reason: For it is better to marry than to burn. These and other words of the Apostle Jerome expounds, when he says: On account therefore of those women who have committed fornication to the injury of their husband Christ, … the Apostle wishes a second marriage, preferring a second marriage to fornication. And lower down he again indicates why the Apostle wishes young women to marry: Because it is far more tolerable to be twice-married than to be a harlot, and to have a second husband than several adulterers. What evil lurks in these comparisons I truly do not perceive. For at number 9 he declares his mind thus: What then? Do we condemn second marriages? By no means: but we praise the first. Do we cast the twice-married out of the Church? Far from it. But we summon the once-married to continence. In the ark of Noah there were not only clean but also unclean animals. It had men, it had serpents too. Thus Jerome speaks in order to show that in the Church, of which the ark of Noah bore the type, there are men of diverse merits; and that the twice-married are not outside the Church, even though they are set after virgins and widows. Hence in book 2 against Jovinian, number 22, he says: Why in the type of the Church, in the ark of Noah, are there diverse animals, and, according to the quality of their merits, diverse dwellings? But this is not to compare the twice-married with unclean animals and serpents.

[1310] since these are easily understood in their context. What is said last about the comparison of the twice-married with the dog returned to its vomit, and with the washed sow to the wallowing-place, I could scarcely find. I think, however, that the words of Jerome in Epistle 54 to Furia, number 4, are meant, where these things are read: What straits marriage has, you have learned in marriage itself: and as though with the flesh of quails you have been filled to nausea: your throat has felt the bitterest bile. You have vomited up the souring and sickly food: you have relieved your burning stomach. Why do you wish to take in again what was harmful to you? "The dog returning to its vomit, and the washed sow to its wallowing in the mire." Brute animals too and roving birds do not fall into the same snares and nets. These words touch second marriages no more than first. Furia herself had written to Jerome and had declared her purpose of preserving widowhood, as is clear from the beginning of the Epistle: at the same time she had declared how harmful it had been to her to have married, as is understood from the words alleged. And so he exhorts her not to return to what she had found full of straits and bitterness and harmful to herself. To this belongs the comparison of the dog returning to its vomit and of the sow to the wallowing-place, as also of the animals and birds which take care not to fall a second time into the same nets. Wherefore those comparisons do not strike all the twice-married, but only those who have found by experience that they are returning to manifest dangers of sinning if they repeat marriage. If anyone desires more, he will be able to read Jerome's Apology for his books against Jovinian, of which Erasmus says: Would that those men diligently read this Epistle who malignantly pluck a few little words out of other men's books to calumniate them, not at all weighing by whom, to whom, and on what occasion they are said; what precedes, what follows. Merely quibbling like women over two words, they think themselves clever. These words fit Cave excellently.

[1311] Czvittinger heaped up from various sources more objections against St. Jerome, Other objections of no weight. but some have been weighed and refuted in their places; others are of such a kind that they need no examination, and are sufficiently refuted by the almost common consent of all. Such are the things heaped up in the same place about his lesser learning, his lesser skill in the Hebrew tongue, his lesser theological knowledge, his less correct interpretation of the prophets, and others like them. It will be enough to oppose to them all, since they have already been refuted by others, the words of Erasmus, also reported in the same place from Epistle 15 of book 9: The ecclesiastical world has Jerome as the one man equally accomplished in both kinds of learning, the sacred and, as they call it, the gentile. I add a few words of the same from Jerome's Life itself: Who ever, he says, so drew the sacred Letters from the very founts? who drank them in more deeply? who learned them with like care? who had them so ready at hand and in readiness (as they say)? who quoted them either more thickly or more aptly? who expounded them more learnedly? who treated them more holily or more happily? who unrolled those most learned interpreters more diligently? who refuted the dogmas of heretics more effectively? Who had the philosophy of Christ more inwardly known? Who expressed it more vividly either in letters or in life? Thus Erasmus, and much more besides about Jerome's learning. I shall not touch upon Jean Le Clerc, who fought for Vigilantius against Jerome; but Le Clerc was refuted in a sufficiently lengthy Apology by Joseph Swinger, a theologian of our Society praised before. Daillé too objected some things from Jerome's books; but those especially have been refuted before, and Noël Alexandre answered them all. Wherefore we shall pass on to other matters.

[1312] Pagi in his Critica, at the year 229, number 7, Another objection, as though the Saint had carped too unfairly at Origen, after observing what Origen had inserted from Theodotion into his edition of the LXX Translators with asterisks, adds: For which cause Jerome, in the Epistle to Augustine and in the Preface to the books of Chronicles, says that the books of the LXX Translators were corrupted by Origen. In which Jerome certainly seems more unfair towards Origen: who so bitterly reproves what Origen had done with a good and pious purpose. But in these matters we miss Pagi's diligence, who copied out the words of Henri de Valois in his Annotations on Eusebius, page 314, without any examination, although the accusation is false, as he could have seen had he taken care to consult Jerome himself. For Jerome in Epistle 112 to Augustine does not reprove Origen's deed, but argues, as they say, ad hominem. First he says without any reproof: But where there are asterisks, … it has been added by Origen from the edition of Theodotion. Then he begins to answer the things which Augustine had objected against St. Jerome's version from the Hebrew, and in particular the argument from the authority of the Seventy translators, which Augustine pressed much in Epistle 104. Hence Jerome speaks thus: And I wonder how you read the books of the Seventy Translators, not pure, as they were published by them, but corrected, or corrupted, by Origen through obeli and asterisks; and do not follow the little translation of a Christian man, especially since the things that have been added he translated from the edition of a Jew and a blasphemer after the passion of Christ. Do you wish to be a true lover of the Seventy Translators? Do not read the things that stand under asterisks; nay, scrape them out of the volumes, to prove yourself a supporter of the ancients. But if you do this, you will be compelled to condemn all the libraries of the churches. For scarcely one book or another will be found which does not have these things. Jerome reasons in this manner. If the Seventy Translators alone are to be admitted, why do you not read their edition pure, but enlarged from Theodotion, and therefore, in your own opinion, corrupted? But if you do not spurn the interpretation of a Jew, why do you judge mine to be despised? That this is Jerome's true meaning is shown by the ironical concession that follows, by which he advises him to delete all Theodotion's additions and so condemn all the libraries. This, in my judgment at least, is not to carp at Origen, but to refute Augustine.

[1313] is refuted. Similarly in the Preface to the books of Chronicles he does not intend to accuse or carp at Origen, but to defend his own translation from the Hebrew by the examples of Origen and others. To this end he observes first that that genuine and ancient translation (of the Seventy) has been corrupted. But he by no means says that it was corrupted by Origen. And he proves it corrupted because some copies were read at Alexandria, others at Antioch and Constantinople, others in Palestine. Jerome indeed believed that purer copies were to be had in Origen's Hexapla, who had corrected them, and therefore from time to time calls them corrected, uncorrupted and unstained. Yet on account of the disagreement of other manuscripts it could be doubted whether Origen's correction had everywhere been accurate. These things therefore he observes only in order to demonstrate the usefulness of the new version from the Hebrew. Then he takes another argument for himself from the deeds of Origen, who published four interpretations in the Hexapla: nor did he do only this: but, what is of greater boldness, he says, in the edition of the Seventy he mingled Theodotion's edition, marking with asterisks the things which had been lacking before, and with little rods those which seemed to have been added superfluously. Jerome could not disapprove Origen's deed, since he had given a quite similar edition in Latin: yet he says it was of greater boldness, because by that deed he as it were determined what was missing in the translation of the Seventy and what seemed redundant. Then he argues thus for himself: If therefore it was permitted to others (namely to Hesychius, to Lucian, and above all to Origen) not to hold to what they had once undertaken; and after the Seventy cells, which are commonly bandied about without any authority, they opened separate cells (each giving his own edition), and this is read in the churches (from Theodotion) which the Seventy did not know; why should my Latins not receive me, who, leaving the old edition inviolate, have so composed a new one that I may prove my labour on the authority of the Hebrews and, what is greater, of the Apostles? All these things tend to defend Jerome, not to accuse Origen, as Valois and Pagi falsely assert.

* No men

Vulg. not in loftiness of speech*

ib. my speech*

ib. not in the persuasive words of human wisdom*, etc.

§ LXXXI. The things objected against St. Jerome in the History of Samuel Basnage are refuted.

The objections Samuel Basnage, in his Political-Ecclesiastical Annals, volume 3, clearly shows that he grieved much that the dreams of Jovinian and Vigilantius had been refuted by Jerome. Hence he everywhere snatches up all the things that have been objected against Jerome by other moderns. Hence he fights against St. Jerome not only for Vigilantius and Calvin, but he also refused to leave Jovinian wholly undefended, because he too played the forerunner to Luther and Calvin in some things. Nay, he even pronounces that Jerome wrote worse things against Jovinian than Jovinian himself had written. Basnage, however, seems to proceed modestly, and everywhere prefaces that he makes these observations with Jerome's leave. With Jerome's leave, he says at the year 383, we think that he inveighed too harshly against Jovinian, whom he calls an Epicurus, since it is well ascertained that that Epicurean abstained from marriage, as Augustine, nay Jerome himself, pointed out. But by what dialectic would Basnage have proved that he was not an Epicurus because he abstained from marriage? But in order to prove that Jerome spoke ill of marriage, he first brings forward from book 1 against Jovinian, chapter 4, or number 7, these words: What sort of good is that which forbids prayer, which does not permit the Body of Christ to be received (perhaps "to receive")? So long as I fulfil the office of a husband, I do not fulfil that of a continent man. Jerome is there speaking of the conjugal act, which he does not deny to be good, since he alleges the words of the Apostle bidding the debt to be rendered; but, as he suggests before, that good is not such as is not overshadowed by the preference of another. That assertion may perhaps displease the followers of Jovinian, but it will not displease the Apostle.

[1314] Next he objects a passage also from the Epistle to Ageruchia already cited, of Samuel Basnage where Jerome relates that a woman who had had twenty-two husbands was buried by the last, who likewise had had twenty wives; and he adds: What shall we say to such a woman? Surely that which the Lord said to the Samaritan woman: You have had twenty-two husbands, and he by whom you are now buried is not your own. He objects both passages again at the year 420, and there from the former reasons thus against Jerome: It follows that Abraham, Isaiah and Zechariah were without continence. A wretched sophism! If I shall have said that, so long as St. Paul was sleeping, he was not fulfilling the office of an Apostle, I shall not have denied that St. Paul was an Apostle even while sleeping. So Jerome did not deny that many husbands are continent, but that the office of a continent man is not fulfilled by them so long as they perform the conjugal work, even though they are and remain continent, provided they fulfil the conjugal Office with good intention and with the fear of God. From the following words of Jerome, Basnage infers thus: From which it is understood that a marriage of this kind was to Jerome pure and simple harlotry. Again an inept inference, which fastens upon Jerome an altogether ridiculous opinion: for he was not so stupid as to have believed that more than twenty husbands were lawfully joined to a woman and then at last to have excepted the twenty-second. Why then does Jerome say, He is not your own? He could have said this in a variety of senses, but in what sense he said it he explains in book 1 against Jovinian, number 14, in these words: For where there is a number of husbands, there the husband, who properly is one, has ceased to be.

[1315] for Jovinian. Basnage objects in the same place a third passage of Jerome from book 1 against Jovinian, number 7, where the Saint expounds those words of the Apostle, 1 Cor. 7 ℣ 2: But on account of fornication let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband. He has it thus: He did not say, on account of fornication let every man take a wife, otherwise by this excuse he would have loosed the reins to lust, so that as often as a wife dies, so often another must be taken, lest we commit fornication. Basnage does not think this endurable, although it is the genuine exposition of the Apostle's words, who in that place treats of those joined in marriage, and therefore those words, Let every man have his own wife, cannot mean, Let every man take a wife. Just as little can he command by those words that no one should lead a celibate life: for so he would contradict Christ the Lord, who advises virginity; and he himself a little after says to the unmarried and to widows that it is good for them if they so remain. What then in the alleged words of Jerome displeased Basnage? This, namely: Otherwise by this excuse he would have loosed the reins to lust. For he objects those words of the Apostle, 1 Timothy 5 ℣ 14: I will therefore that the younger (that is, widows) marry, and says: The Apostle therefore would have loosed the reins to lust. But it is one thing entirely to advise marriage to all, another to permit it to some particular persons, and that from fear of fornication, as Jerome frequently explains. This is not to loose the reins to lust, since a good thing is permitted, and one that can be done well, and since it is either permitted or even advised from fear of a greater danger. But to exhort all to marriage would be to loose the reins of lust to many, since not all go to marriage as the angel Raphael taught the younger Tobias to approach his bride, Tobit 6 ℣ 22, namely with the fear of the Lord, and led by love of children rather than by lust; but some undertake marriage in such a way as to shut out God from themselves and from their mind, and give themselves over to their lust like the horse and mule, which have no understanding; as is also read in the same place.

[1316] for Rufinus, Basnage in the same place also objects some things, as though Jerome had not admitted the eternal punishments of the sins of Christians; but we have examined and refuted those objections in §43. He also discourses much for Origen against Jerome in various places, and wishes to make him an Origenist even against his will: but these matters have been fully discussed, so that Basnage's observations are already abundantly refuted, as are also his assertions for Rufinus against Jerome, like those of Tillemont. One thing perhaps may be added here about Rufinus: for at the year 411, number 7, Basnage gravely complains that Jerome attacked him even when dead, writing thus: Jerome, with an ungoverned mind, inveighs shamelessly enough against the ashes of a man once both his friend and a priest, whom he designates not by his own name but by the appellation of a scorpion. These revilings of Jerome indeed we cannot praise, etc. The words of Jerome which he objects I gave at number 966, and I added other assertions of Jerome about the dead Rufinus at numbers 967 and 971. But the reason on account of which Jerome proceeded thus I said seemed to be that Rufinus was the forerunner of the Pelagians, whose heresy was gradually gaining increase. But the most modest Basnage, who strove with all his might to excuse Rufinus, and even so could not clear the man, does not scruple to accuse St. Jerome in six hundred ways, as shameless, as illiberal, as inconstant, as ungoverned in mind, and in other ways which I pass over, since all have been refuted before.

[1317] Let it be permitted only to declare in a few words that the words of Postumianus are still true, and for Vigilantius who had been six months with Jerome, in Sulpicius Severus, Dialogue 1: The heretics hate him, because he does not cease to assail them: the clerics hate him (that is, the irreligious ones), because he attacks their life and crimes. But plainly all good men admire and love him: for those who judge him to be a heretic are mad. Jerome goes on to assail Vigilantius and Calvin in his writings: hence those tears, hence hatreds more than Vatinian, hence other accusations, some frivolous, some altogether false, all refuted before, except a few pertaining to Vigilantius. First he carps at Jerome because, like an inconstant man, he changed the love with which he received Vigilantius, as he likewise objected concerning Origen and Rufinus. A wonderful doctrine of morals indeed it will be which Basnage insinuates by those accusations, if we must always pursue with the same affection those whom, not yet well known to us, we once praised or loved, whether we find them good and worthy of praise, or wicked and rather to be corrected by reproof. St. Jerome was not of this mind. For he praised Origen on account of his notable learning and his vast labours of study, which he had earlier perceived more clearly than his manifold errors, which he afterwards so reproved that even at that time he praised and proclaimed many things in Origen. He loved and praised Rufinus for a long time, namely as long as the latter did not leap forth into enmity in his eagerness to excuse and defend some errors of Origen. But when he had found that he had become a patron of Origen's errors and a detractor of his own reputation, he repelled his accuser, and strove, partly by friendly admonition, partly by rebuke, to tear him away from the patronage of Origen.

[1318] But as regards Vigilantius, he had perceived the man's by no means lovable character more quickly. against Jerome He had been sent with letters to Jerome by St. Paulinus of Nola. Jerome, however, as was fitting, received St. Paulinus's messenger, and a priest at that, kindly and lovingly. Yet in that short time in which Vigilantius remained in Palestine, Jerome saw the man's rashness, but strove to bring him back to a sound mind, and restrained him at least for a time, as was said at number 619. This is that love

of Jerome towards Vigilantius, praiseworthy indeed; of the change of which Basnage complains. But he complains in vain: for, as Jerome truly loved the rash man, whom he had been able by the weight of reasons to restrain for a short time only, he was trying, by striking shame into him through a sharp Epistle, to draw him back to better counsels. But when he had become a heresiarch, he ought to spare him less, as being a champion of the Catholic faith. Let us now hear what Basnage carps at in that book as unworthy of Jerome. If the Lamb is everywhere, then they too who are with the Lamb must be believed to be everywhere. Of these words he exclaims: Are these things worthy of the great Jerome? He does not, however, dare to declare what evil those words contain: for in truth they have nothing absurd. He is refuting the error of Vigilantius, who shut up the Apostles and Martyrs in a place, and he sets these words before: Will you lay down laws for God? Will you cast chains upon the Apostles, that they should be held in custody until the day of judgment, and not be with their Lord? Of whom it is written: "They follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes." Then follow the words objected, which signify that Christ and the Saints are present in every place, when they will, but not that they are extended to every place after the manner of God, as Daillé would have it. Jerome denies that the Saints are held in one place, as what follows also clearly shows. If this pleased neither Vigilantius nor Calvin, yet it pleased the whole Church in Jerome's time.

[1319] are set forth, About the candles lit in honour of the martyrs — are these things worthy of Jerome? adds Basnage, quoting these words of his: That was done for idols, and therefore is to be detested: this is done for the martyrs, and therefore is to be accepted. Then he argues thus: By which conclusion it follows that divine honours are bestowed upon the martyrs: for such were those with which idols were honoured by candles lit in the daytime. Where, I ask, did Basnage learn a dialectic of this kind? Jerome denies the very thing which he infers. He admits that candles are lit in the same manner, but denies that they are lit with the same intention, that is, lit as to gods. For they are lit in honour of the Servants of God, and that honour is referred to God himself: which Jerome proves at length to be done piously and rightly. Thirdly Basnage objects these words of Jerome: But we do not light candles in broad daylight, as you vainly calumniate: and he adds, as though about to convict Jerome of a lie, Since it was more certain than certainty that candles were lit before the tombs of the martyrs, which Jerome, forgetful of himself, confesses to be done by women. But if we attend to the words of Vigilantius which Jerome is refuting, we shall easily see to what his words are to be referred. The heresiarch had said: We see a rite almost of the gentiles introduced into the churches under the pretext of religion, masses of candles lit while the sun is still shining … Men of this kind show great honour to the most blessed martyrs, whom they think must be illuminated by the cheapest little tapers, etc. It is in this sense that Jerome denies that candles are lit by the ministers of the Church, that is, lit in order that the Saints may be illuminated, as Baronius observed at the year 58, number 73. For that lights are lit in broad daylight even by the ministers of the Church he testifies lower down, writing thus: For even apart from the relics of the martyrs, throughout all the churches of the East, when the Gospel is to be read, lights are lit, though the sun be already ruddy; not indeed to drive away darkness, but to show a sign of gladness; and he shows that this is wisely done. And so he denies that masses of candles are lit over the tombs of the martyrs to illuminate the martyrs.

[1320] are examined Then he defends the deed itself: But if some, he says, through the inexperience and simplicity of secular men, or at any rate of religious women, of whom we can truly say: "I bear them witness, they have the zeal of God, but not according to knowledge," do this for the honour of the martyrs, what do you lose thereby? The Apostles too once found fault, because the ointment was wasted; but they were rebuked by the voice of the Lord. For neither did Christ need ointment, nor the martyrs the light of candles: and yet that woman did this in honour of Christ, and the devotion of her mind is accepted. And whoever light candles shall have their reward according to their faith, the Apostle saying: "Let each abound in his own sense." Do you call men of this kind idolaters? I do not deny that all of us who believe in Christ have come out of the error of idolatry. For we are not born, but reborn, Christians. And because we once worshipped idols, ought we now not to worship God, lest we should seem to venerate him with an honour like that of idols? That was done for idols, and therefore is to be detested: this is done for the martyrs, and therefore is to be accepted. He adds more to prove that lights are rightly lit even by day.

[1321] But the whole disputation tends to show that that pious Work should not appear to be abolished, and are refuted. since it can be done piously and wisely by all, even if some innocent error should creep in upon the excessive simplicity of certain persons; just as a little after, at number 10, he defends the nocturnal vigils in the shrines of the martyrs, even though he does not deny that abuses sometimes creep in, because the fault of a few does not prejudice religion, since they could err even without vigils, whether in their own houses or in others'. Basnage, attending to what Jerome said about the simplicity of women, discourses thus for Vigilantius: What sin did Vigilantius commit, if he wished that womanish folly, which Jerome does not deny, to be cast out of religion, which ought always to be most chaste and most wise? I answer that Vigilantius sinned in this, that an unskilled man dared to attack the praiseworthy piety of many, and to compare it with idolatry. He imitated the deed of Judas in John 12, who carped at Mary the sister of Lazarus and drew others of the Apostles to his side, because she had poured precious ointment on the feet of Jesus. But Jesus himself defended and praised Mary's pious work, Matthew 26: Why are you troublesome to this woman? For she has wrought a good work upon me. So Jerome defended the pious liberality of secular men and of women, and restrained Vigilantius, who rashly spoke against it. For if some do not rightly perform good works through ignorance, they are to be instructed, not the good works themselves abolished. Finally it vexes Basnage that Jerome frequently charges Vigilantius with blasphemy. Let those who wonder at this with Basnage try diligently to investigate why the most learned Jerome, most gentle towards good men, objects blasphemy, madness and folly to no one more frequently than to Vigilantius, and by God's grace they will easily find the reasons. I go on to other matters.

§ LXXXII. On the religious Orders instituted under the patronage and name of St. Jerome: the Saint in an apparition instructs St. Frances of Rome.

[The Saint was a monk or an ascetic: but we have nothing ascertained about his Rule.] There is no doubt that St. Jerome professed the monastic, or at any rate the ascetic, life, if anyone prefers to use that name; and that until his blessed death he lived in a monastery with the monks whom he governed. Nevertheless he does not appear to have prescribed for himself or for his own any fixed laws of living, that is, any Rule to be perpetually observed. In the year 404 he rendered the Rule of St. Pachomius into Latin, and other ascetical documents of the same, as was said at number 857: and it is altogether likely that he did this not only for the Egyptian monks, but for his own too, that they might draw from it lessons and precepts of living. But I do not think that that Rule was prescribed as a fixed law for the monks of St. Jerome. Just as little can I find out whether the monks and nuns who under the discipline of St. Jerome served God at Bethlehem ever bound themselves to God and to their superiors by a vow of perpetual poverty, chastity and obedience. And so I shall say no more of these matters. Equally obscure is it how long Latin successors remained in the monastery of St. Jerome. The only thing we find about them is the tomb of St. Eusebius of Cremona, whom from his tomb we know to have died there, and consequently we may suspect that he lived in the monastery after Jerome and presided over it. The same suspicion may be had about Paulinian, Jerome's brother. Certainly both seem to have survived Jerome, since the Saint nowhere mentions their death. So in the monastery of the women, after St. Eustochium, there survived the younger Paula, that is, the niece of St. Paula. But we are entirely ignorant how long those three lived after Jerome, nay even whether Paulinian and Paula remained at Bethlehem until their death, and finally whether the Latins went on dwelling for a long time in the monasteries of Bethlehem. Moreover we do not know that there were any other monasteries under the discipline of St. Jerome than those of Bethlehem, one of men, the other of women; nor do we think this likely or probable from the deeds of St. Jerome.

[1323] [The things written about the spread of the Order of St. Jerome are altogether new,] Nevertheless John Peter de Crescentiis, in an Italian work entitled Præsidium Romanum, writes things plainly marvellous about the Order of St. Jerome and its spread. For, even while St. Jerome was living, he finds Hieronymite monks almost everywhere in the world, namely at Rome, and not only at Bethlehem, where they really were, but in other parts too of Palestine and Syria, in the famous island of Lérins, and in several other places. If anyone should wish to consult even the index alone of the work, he will see that Hieronymite monks are assigned in it at Constantinople, in Greece, in Africa, in Gaul, in Britain, England, Scotland, Ireland, and finally throughout the whole world. I thought I had made some progress in the knowledge of the deeds of St. Jerome, both by diligent reading of his works and by the investigation of the Lives which have appeared down to the fourteenth century, and of many more recent ones too. Nevertheless all those assertions appear to me so new and so unheard-of that I seem to have been transported to a foreign land, of which I have perceived nothing either by sight or by hearing.

[1324] about the rule written by him, Crescentius also assigns a Rule of St. Jerome, as though written to St. Eustochium for nuns. But this has been published in Martianay, volume 5 of the works of St. Jerome, among the spurious pieces, from column 421, where the said editor declares his judgment about it in these words: What need is there to use arguments in this matter, that this Rule is not Jerome's, since the whole character of a most insipid style shows it so openly that it can be perceived even by the most unlearned? I myself cannot sufficiently wonder at the man's remarkable impudence. With what authority does he speak? You would think him some Apostle. And this impostor, more fortunate than Paul himself, while established in the body enjoyed a divine vision, having passed, I suppose, whole months among the Seraphim. Then "restored to be seen by the body," though he had said before "to be seen in the body," he came back to us foreknowing the future. For portents of this kind this spurious Jerome writes of himself: who, if he could have changed his prodigious stammering and his most inept loquacity, was plainly Jerome. As it is, the projecting ears betray the ass; and the whole style cries aloud that he was unworthy to hold the place of a servant in the divine Jerome's kitchen. But hear now, reader, the fine preface, which does not express Jerome as an old man, as it tries to do, but some drunkard, at once with wine

and with age doting. If to anyone this censure seems too vehement and sharp, I shall not deny that the same could have been said more mildly. But Martianay believed that no quarter should be given to men who with the worst design presume to foist wares of this kind upon the holy Fathers.

[1325] In vain does Crescentius allege several modern writers or at any rate by his descendants, these things were asserted. who cited that Rule under the name of St. Jerome: for their authority cannot bring it about that a work which is proved by manifest reasons to be spurious should henceforth be attributed to St. Jerome by learned critics. Nor indeed does Crescentius contend pugnaciously for attributing the Rule with certainty to St. Jerome: for after he had answered some arguments, he admits that there are others too by which the Rule seems to be denied to St. Jerome. This is manifest, that Jerome is said to have been a hundred years old when he wrote it. For he is feigned to write this himself by a manifest falsehood, since he never reached that age. Crescentius, however, maintains that it must be held very ancient. But it will not easily, I think, be proved to be older than the fourteenth or fifteenth century. Certainly John Andreæ, who wrote in the fourteenth century, appears to have been wholly ignorant of it. For if he had known it, he would not have rejected it, seeing that he rejected none of the spurious pieces, and would without doubt have seized on the fact that Jerome is there called a hundred years old, to assert his age.

[1326] But for what cause did Crescentius spread the Hieronymite monks so widely through the whole world? Five Orders of Hieronymites, namely the Jesuates, Why did he try to attribute to them a Rule either written by Jerome or at any rate most ancient? Namely in order to persuade men by these reasons that Hieronymite monks had remained in the Church in a continuous succession, and that their successors are those Hieronymites who still flourish in Spain and Italy. He does not, however, contend this for all: for five different Orders, of which two were extinguished in the preceding century, have had St. Jerome as patron. All took their origin in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, so far as can be gathered from certain documents. The first in time of institution was the Order of the Jesuates of St. Jerome, whose founder is Bl. John Colombini. But these did not have the surname of St. Jerome from the beginning of their institution, but received it afterwards by decree of Alexander VI, namely because they chose the said Saint as their patron by unanimous consent, as is read among us in Bl. John Colombini, volume VII of July, page 345; and there it is added: But in the year MDCLXVIII Clement IX, Roman Pontiff, by his constitution suppressed and abolished them for just causes. The rest pertaining to the said Order may be seen in the same place: but they never contended that they derived their origin from the successors of St. Jerome.

[1327] The second Order, called of St. Jerome from the beginning, had as founder Charles Granelli, the Fiesole congregation of Hieronymites, whom many have called Blessed, as I noted in the Prætermissi at the VII of September. Polydore Vergil, On the Invention of things, book 7, chapter 3, writes thus about that Order: There are also the Hieronymite Eremites, whom we mentioned in the last chapter (but there he mentions rather the Spanish ones), of whose Order a certain Charles, surnamed Granelli, a Florentine, is said to have been the author, who of his own accord put on the eremitical dress and chose a seat for himself in the mountains of Fiesole. Others relate that it was not Charles but a certain Redo, count of Montegranelli, who first instituted those hermits under the rite of St. Augustine at Fiesole, with the approval of Gregory XII. Nay, there are those who invent that this family was first instituted by Jerome in the desert, and was increased by Eusebius of Cremona and by several other men of outstanding sanctity who had lived with him, and that so it came about that afterwards several, emulating by the example of a better life one institution which had arisen, as happens, from modest beginnings, restored it more than once, and that in this way from one order some followed the Benedictines, some the Augustinians, while others remained in their own institute. Thus he, about the end of the fifteenth century, looking at the Hieronymites generally, I suppose, so that that opinion of certain men had already arisen, that certain Hieronymites of today have their origin from St. Jerome. This opinion, however, gave birth to a controversy which has again been agitated in our times, as I learn from the Historical Monuments of the Order of St. Jerome, of the Congregation of Bl. Peter of Pisa, volume 1 of whose second edition was published in the year 1758 by John Baptist Sajanello, lecturer and emeritus provincial of that Order. Nevertheless those who at this time strive to claim for themselves the aforesaid antiquity and origin from St. Jerome are not of the Fiesole congregation, but of the Hieronymite Order which flourishes much in Spain, and from which, through Lope de Olmedo, yet another was born in Italy.

[1328] both instituted in the fourteenth century, and afterwards extinguished: Since I do not wish to examine the said controversy laboriously, but prefer to imitate Joseph of Sigüenza, the historian of the said Order in Spain, who refrained from claiming so great an antiquity for his Order, but placed its beginning in the fourteenth century and under Gregory XI, I shall almost only quote what the said Sajanello relates about each of the Orders of St. Jerome. Hence also I shall not inquire in what year Charles Granelli, by his withdrawal to the desert, laid as it were the first foundations of that Order. This was certainly done in the fourteenth century, and perhaps at almost the same time at which in Spain a beginning was given by the eremitical life to the Order that was to be born. And so Sajanello speaks of the confirmation by the supreme Pontiff Innocent VII at page 35, when he writes this: Bl. Charles, count of Montegranelli, with several companions (disciples of Bl. Thomasuccio, as some hold), gave origin to the Fiesole Congregation about the year MCDV. They were Hieronymites in name from their very beginning, as appears from the Bull of Gregory XII in the Roman Bullarium at the year MCDXV. But afterwards they professed the Rule of St. Augustine by the indult of Eugenius IV in the year MCDXLI, as in the same Bullarium. But they wore a habit of grey colour, that is, of the third Order of St. Francis. Some, however, changing it to tawny or lion-colour, in order to make themselves like the other Hieronymites, made a schism. Wherefore it was necessary for Paul II, by a Bull given in the year MCDLXV, on the twelfth of the Kalends of July, to separate them from one another, and to assign separate monasteries at Padua and Vicenza to those wearing the habit of the third Order, yet in such a way that all should be subject to the same rector general, and be called of St. Jerome. For these things he cites his own Bullarium and Wadding, and modestly adds his doubt in these words: But whether they were Hieronymites in origin, who shall determine? Yet to me the origin seems sufficiently assigned through Charles Granelli the founder. For the rest, that Order was extinguished together with the Jesuates of St. Jerome, and by the same Bull of Clement IX.

[1329] The Hieronymite Eremites in Spain, Polydore Vergil, book 7, chapter 3, speaks thus about St. Jerome after other things: Lastly he built himself a place near Bethlehem, where he spent the rest of his life in the Apostolic manner. Hence it came about that very many Hieronymites afterwards arose as imitators of his institute, and a certain new family arose, which from the name of Jerome, whom they somehow make the author of their institute, although it is far different from that in which he lived, are called Hieronymites: who are clothed in the native colour, and with a cloak over the tunic, gathered in folds and slit in the upper part from top to bottom, gird the tunic with a leathern belt, and protect their feet with wooden sandals. Sajanello quotes these words at page XIII, and in his Annotations explains the native colour as tawny, and for that cause finds something wanting in the words. But the native colour seems to me the native colour of the wool itself, unchanged by any dye. Vergil says these things about the Hieronymites such as they are in Spain, and who first of all obtained the name of Hieronymites, namely from Pope Gregory XI, who gave them the Rule of St. Augustine, and at the same time granted that they might be called brothers or hermits of St. Jerome. This Order still flourishes and is very well known in Spain and Portugal under the name of the Eremites of St. Jerome, and these Hieronymites above all are said to trace their origin back to St. Jerome, although the Order's historiographer Joseph de Sigüenza does not do so.

[1330] From these, through Lope de Olmedo or Olmeto, whom Vergil calls Lupus of Seville from his homeland, The Monks of St. Jerome in Italy, there arose in the fifteenth century another Order of Hieronymites, which flourishes only in Italy, although it was begun in Spain, and is called the Order of the monks of St. Jerome. The occasion of erecting this new Order was that Lope, who was general superior of the Eremites of St. Jerome, wished something to be changed in his Order, and most of the Eremites were unwilling to consent to that change. Hence, with the approval of Martin V, he carried those changes into execution for those who were willing to consent or to be aggregated to the new Order from elsewhere, and was separated from the Order of Eremites. The said Vergil, in chapter 2, on account of the title of monks, I suppose, joins them as it were to the Benedictines, saying that the Eremites of the divine Jerome were at last enrolled by Martin the fifth into the family of the divine Benedict. Which Order, he says, having already fallen away from the rule of the fathers, Lupus of Seville, the superior of that family, restored with new institutions, of whose beginning an account will be given in the following chapter. Those words have already been given at number 1329. Further, Lope de Olmedo first retained for some time the Rule of St. Augustine, then composed a new one from the writings of St. Jerome, and obtained its approbation from Martin V. This Rule has been published in Martianay, volume 5, from page 343, and there is prefixed to it the approbation of Pope Martin, given at the prayers of Lupus de Oliveto, as the name is read there.

[1331] In that approbation this reason is given for putting together a Rule from various Epistles and treatises and substituting it for the Rule of St. Augustine: they are different from the Eremites of Spain, For lately, says the Pontiff, it having been set forth to us on the part of our beloved son Lupus de Oliveto, general superior of the Order of the monks hermits of St. Jerome, that formerly he himself and several other professors of that same Order of St. Jerome, then living under the Rule of St. Augustine, kindled with the zeal of devotion, for the fruit of a better life desired to live more strictly and more perfectly than that Rule dictated, and in the true monastic state which St. Jerome himself is said to have professed with his monks and brethren and observed in common; and, as he bore the name of the same Saint, so desired to imitate his life, rule and works. There follows the approbation of the said Rule, and an absolution from the observance of the Rule of St. Augustine. And so this Rule was brought into use, and observed at least until the death of the venerable Lope, who died at Rome in the year 1433 in the monastery of St. Alexius, where, as Hippolyte Helyot testifies in his History of the Orders, volume 3, page 454, this epitaph of his is read: Here lies the Reverend Father in Christ Brother Lope de Olmedo, a Spaniard by nation, the reviver and reformer, and first general superior, of the Order of the monks of St. Jerome, and Prior of this monastery, who died on the XIII day of April,

in the year MCDXXXIII, in the third year of the pontificate of our lord Pope Eugenius IV. If we believe Helyot, the Hieronymite monks after the death of Lope resumed the Rule of St. Augustine.

[1332] and instituted a new Order. Sigüenza, in his History of the Hieronymite Order, book 3, chapter 5, denies that the Order was reformed by Lope, and not without reason, as it seems to me: for he neither restored a fallen discipline nor brought back into use statutes of the Rule that had been abrogated; but introduced a discipline more austere than had been in use from the beginning in the Order of the Eremites of Spain, and then a new Rule as well, so that he must rather be said to have instituted a new Order than to have reformed one instituted before. For the rest, the monasteries which Lope had founded in Spain for his new Order were afterwards aggregated to the Hieronymite Eremites who are in Spain and Portugal. From what has been said it is clear that the words of Polydore Vergil, given at number 1330, must be corrected, in which he asserts that the Order of the Hieronymites had by then fallen away from the rule of the fathers and was restored by Lope. Which of them, finally, come nearer to the manner of life of St. Jerome and of his monks at Bethlehem, the Spanish Hieronymites or the Italian, I leave to others to inquire.

[1333] The Order of St. Jerome of Bl. Peter of Pisa, The said Vergil in chapter 4 mentions yet another Order of St. Jerome, writing thus: There arose in the land of Italy at the same time at Urbino (or at Montebello near Urbino) — it is a most ancient and very famous City of Umbria — a new congregation of Eremites, differing almost not at all in dress (at that time, that is) from the family of the divine Jerome, of which we made mention above. For from their scapular dress there hangs only a slender strip thrown back over the shoulders: but their footwear, as use bears, is common, and the rest as with the other Hieronymites. A certain Peter, an Etruscan and born at Pisa (namely Bl. Peter Gambacorta), was the author of this new institute, who, aided by the wealth of the citizens, built there a monastery over against our own house, which today is held the chief of all the others, as well for the number of its Eremites and the holiness of their life as for the devotion of the people towards them; which houses are said to be twenty in number in Italy alone, since the institute, being recent, has not yet spread to any other part of the world. Thus Polydore Vergil, who is by no means lavish in praises of Religious families, yet did not pass over wholly unpraised at least that one which, being of Urbino, he had known more closely. That Hieronymite Order afterwards grew, and began to extend itself into neighbouring Germany and other nearby regions, as may be seen in the Historical monuments already cited, of which so far we have only the first volume. Of the same Order we have treated among us in Bl. Peter Gambacorta the founder, volume III of June from page 531, where by its ancient name it is called the Order of the poor Eremites of St. Jerome, but now the Order of St. Jerome, or the Congregation of Bl. Peter of Pisa from its founder.

[1334] Further, when I perceive that so many Eremitical and monastic Orders in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries took the name and patronage of St. Jerome, I strongly suspect that through the Life of St. Jerome which John Andreæ wrote in the fourteenth century to which another congregation, perhaps Hieronymite, was joined. devotion towards the holy Doctor took great increase. For he reproaches his Italians with growing lukewarm in devotion towards St. Jerome, declares that he found only very few churches of the Saint after long inquiry, and nowhere mentions by a single word any Order of St. Jerome; as neither does any other Life written before the fourteenth century. What then was lacking, he says at folio 16, to this most glorious Confessor, that could bring in devotion, or make (read increase?) it when brought in? Let our Italian elders answer. And because they cannot, let them with bowed head confess their negligence. Nor let them allege ignorance of him with whose sayings their ears were daily filled. But although on that account I am disturbed against those same Italians, the great-great-grandfathers of our great-great-grandfathers (perhaps forefathers) and their descendants, in whose keeping he, bestowing so much, ought not to have lacked glory; nor ought their tongue to have clung so long to the palate; yet this consolation is mixed in, that divine providence reserved for me among us the beginning of this veneration, drawing me to the zeal of devotion by the little cord of reason. So he, drawing men to venerate St. Jerome not only by words but still more by examples. And in truth after that Life was written, in the same fourteenth century, not only were several churches in Italy dedicated to St. Jerome, but the Religious Orders already mentioned began to be marked with his patronage and name. Sajanello adds at page 35 to those reported another Order, as Hieronymite from the beginning, namely the Congregation of Laurence of Spain begun at Venice, and afterwards inserted into the Congregation of Bl. Peter of Pisa. But about this I shall say nothing further, because I do not know whether it was Hieronymite from the beginning, and it is now joined to the Hieronymite Order before mentioned.

[1335] Further, the said Sajanello at page 32 asks why Bl. Peter of Pisa imposed the name of St. Jerome on his Order, Why this congregation has the name of St. Jerome, and candidly brings forward those reasons which in my judgment all the Hieronymites can bring forward, and, laying aside all contention, will laudably bring forward: To the twelve companions, he says, whom Bl. Peter joined to himself, he proposed for imitation the life of St. Jerome, towards whom he had an incredible affection and devotion. Few indeed are these words of the author of the Compendium, but they furnish copious matter for discussion. I shall try, however, to study brevity, lest I be wearisome to readers. I have heard more than once secular men and women ask our brethren whence the title of the Order of St. Jerome came to us and to our Congregation. What have you, many said, to do with St. Jerome? He lived as a monk at Bethlehem fourteen centuries ago: you eremites in Italy do not yet count the fifth century from your origin. It would have been easy to answer that many others formerly existed in Italy, such as those of Laurence of Spain, of Beltramo of Ferrara, or of Peter Malherba (these two I did not wish to mention, because they are joined to the Hieronymite Order of Bl. Peter of Pisa, and so are now certainly Hieronymite, even if they had not been such before), of the Jesuates and of the Fiesolans; and that other Congregations still flourish, such as that of Bl. Lope de Olmedo, and our own of Pisa, all under the title of St. Jerome, while yet none of these goes back before the fourteenth century. But this was to tie the knot, not to loose it.

[1336] More pleasing was the answer of those who said that our Congregation was called of the Order of St. Jerome … various reasons both on account of the blessed founder's incredible devotion towards this Saint (as Francisco Suárez also thinks about the other Hieronymites, On the Virtue of Religion, volume 4, book 2, chapter 5), and from the fact that Bl. Peter the founder proposed this most holy Doctor, the master and cultivator of the eremitical life, for imitation to himself and to his own, and chose him as patron. Wherefore our brethren were not only everywhere called eremites of the Order of St. Jerome in public instruments in the fifteenth century, but the Apostolic See too used this title once in the same century, and from Clement the seventh down to the present has used it continually. So indeed, prudently as well as truly. For in order that any society, or monastery, or house of ascetics be called of the Order of St. Augustine or of St. Benedict, it is not necessary that those eremites or monks or nuns should show that they derive from that founder by a continuous and never interrupted succession: but it is enough that that society or monastery, whether from the beginning or afterwards, should choose for itself the Rule, so as to become of that Order. And this was frequent before the thirteenth century. John Peter Crescentius in the Præsidium Romanum, book 1, Narration 8, brings forward one example from Walafrid Strabo, a writer of the ninth century, who in the Acts of St. Gall, the disciple of St. Columbanus, relates that St. Othmar added to the eremitical life of St. Gall the rites and Rule of St. Benedict. Therefore St. Columbanus and his disciple Gall did not have the Rule of St. Benedict: but by his successor St. Othmar the monks of St. Gall were made of the Order of St. Benedict, because they received his Rule, although they did not have their origin from St. Benedict. On these things I briefly observe that that example is not effective for the Hieronymites: for many monks indeed who were of the Order of St. Columbanus or of other founders were made Benedictines, because they received the Rule of St. Benedict. But none received the Rule of St. Jerome, since this Saint wrote no Rule: for that which the venerable Lope de Olmedo gathered from his writings is not to be held a Rule of St. Jerome.

[1337] are alleged. Wherefore better are the things which Sajanello adds, continuing thus: I indeed, having diligently examined many writers who have treated of the origin and propagation of the Order of St. Jerome, having also turned over the papers of our archives, and finally having weighed the words of the author of the Compendium, gather this, that Bl. Peter and his companions and their successors were and are of the Order of St. Jerome in name, in habit, in devotion and in imitation: yet I do not dare to say that they were such in origin, since neither the Hieronymite Order of Spain nor the other Congregations of Italy can easily prove an origin from St. Jerome by continuous succession. Thus truly and candidly the said writer. Then, having reported the controversy about the origin of the other Hieronymites, at page 36 he proves by very many instruments that his Order was called Hieronymite at least from the year 1437, and again declares at page 37 that Bl. Peter the founder was a Hieronymite by devotion and imitation, and that the first oratories of that Order were dedicated to St. Jerome. And in order to confirm that his Order was Hieronymite only by the name and patronage of St. Jerome, that is, by the endeavour to imitate his virtues, he cites other writers too, and quotes many words of Thomas Francis Rotarius. Would that all writers used the same candour. Not so many useless controversies would arise.

[1338] Nevertheless Sajanello concedes to others a little more than I could wish. For at page 32 he rightly says that St. Jerome lived at Bethlehem with monks, but not so well adds: The monks who lived under St. Jerome do not appear to have had any special Rule, For whom he appointed either the Rule of St. Antony or of Basil, or one of his own. And so, if St. Jerome adopted the Rule of St. Antony, why should his monks not rather be called of the Order of St. Antony than of St. Jerome? The same holds of the Rule of St. Basil, if that had been observed in the monastery of St. Jerome. If Jerome had given them a Rule of his own, it would without doubt have been carefully preserved, or at any rate some mention would be made of it somewhere in the Saint's copious writings. If I believed that any fixed Rule, to be observed perpetually by all, had been proposed to the monks of St. Jerome, I would think this rather of the Rule of St. Pachomius than of any other, since Jerome at least made that one Latin. But Jerome seems to have undertaken that translation rather that pious

superiors might choose certain lessons from it and propose them to their subjects, than that he might bind his own to the observance of the whole Rule of Pachomius. If, however, anyone should wish to contend that that Rule was strictly prescribed to the monks of St. Jerome, he will be aggregating that monastery to the Order of St. Pachomius. So far as I have been able to gather from the reading of the works and deeds of St. Jerome, I conjecture that sacred Scripture served as the rule of living for the monks of St. Jerome, together with the commands of the superiors, who directed them according to their own prudence, yet in such a way that they had a domestic order, that is, fixed hours for praying and for performing other things. Hence St. Jerome is commonly not reckoned among those who wrote a monastic Rule or instituted a Religious Order.

[1339] Secondly, he seems to grant too much when he asserts that the monastic Order of Jerome was propagated by his disciples through Greece, nor does their institute appear to have been propagated elsewhere: Italy and all Europe, nay even Africa. I find nowhere any indications of this propagation, nor even the slightest traces. Either that propagation of the Order would have taken place while Jerome was living, and so mention would have been made somewhere in the Epistles or other writings of the Saint of monasteries subject to him; or it would have taken place after Jerome's death, and that propagation of Hieronymite monks would be known from writers of the fifth or sixth century. But of that propagation not a word is found either in the writings of Jerome or in any writers down to the fourteenth century. We have illustrated so many holy monks in our Work: yet not one older than the fourteenth century whom we can call a Hieronymite, except those who lived with the Saint at Bethlehem.

Thirdly, Sajanello, generous towards others, adds: In Hungary and throughout Illyricum the Hieronymites were still flourishing in the fourteenth century, in the time of Bl. Peter the founder, calling the divine Jerome the author of their religion, as John Dubravius testifies in his Bohemian History, book 22, where he asserts that the emperor Charles IV brought this institute to Prague.

[1340] I consulted Dubravius, because, if he had this, we should have yet other Hieronymites, certainly it was not flourishing in Illyricum in the fourteenth century, about whom I find nothing elsewhere. But he does not seem to me to be speaking of Hieronymite monks, but of Slavs, who said to Charles IV that they had been converted to the Christian faith by St. Jerome. Dubravius in book 22, page 210, treats of New Prague, built by Charles IV (it is a part of present-day Prague, which is divided into the Old, the New, and the Little Town), and of the inhabitants brought into it, and has this: He likewise chose separately as fellow-dwellers those who called themselves Slavs, naming the divine Jerome the author of their religion, whom for this reason Charles particularly venerated, because he was born in Illyria, whence the Bohemians draw their origin. To these words the Basel editor put in the margin Hieronymites, as if the matter concerned monks, and so gave others occasion for error. But the author asserts that the Slavic people, which inhabits Bohemia along with other peoples and uses its own Slavonic speech, which most Germans do not understand, received in New Prague streets separate from the others to dwell in. At this time too the people of Prague who are Slavs by origin go on using their own idiom, and most do not understand the German tongue, just as most Germans dwelling there do not know the Slavonic. Those people believed, by an error easily to be pardoned in a nation, but already refuted in §78, that St. Jerome, because he was born in Illyricum, a great part of which the Slavs afterwards occupied, was a Slav by origin, and that their forefathers had been converted to the faith by his work. Hence they called him the author of their religion, that is, of the Christian faith. This is the whole of those words, from which Hieronymite monks are asserted for Hungary and all Illyricum in the fourteenth century — and no great mystery.

[1341] nor at Rome in the time of St. Pammachius, nor at Altinum, In vain is St. Pammachius alleged as a propagator of the Hieronymite Order in the City, because he built there the church of SS. John and Paul on the Cœlian Hill. Of that church, built by the senator Byzantius and by Pammachius his son, and frequently restored by several, Martinelli treats in Roma sacra, page 128, but says nothing of monks formerly dwelling in that church. Only in the fifteenth century was that church given to monks, as he adds, writing thus: At last, when the temple was neglected and through inattention almost unknown, Cardinal Latino Orsini (promoted by Nicholas V) made it famous and rendered it celebrated, and chose as its inhabitants most modest men, endowed with Christian simplicity and holiness, whom they call Jesuates, under whose care it still stands, as a title of a Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church. The most recent writer of Ancient and Modern Rome, volume 1, page 437, writes more about that church, and attributes its construction to Pammachius alone. That it was granted to the Jesuates by Nicholas V he agrees, and teaches to whom it was given after the extinction of the Jesuates. But no one says anything about monks placed there by Pammachius. Sajanello adds: In the Venetian lagoons, Altinum, a most ancient city (overthrown by the Huns), and other neighbouring places had Hieronymites, before the illustrious order of St. Benedict took its origin, instituted and propagated by the bishop of Altinum St. Heliodorus, a disciple of Jerome.

[1342] nor is it proved that they were in Spain or Italy. Next he conjectures that the Hieronymite Order was carried into Spain by Orosius, or from Italy by St. Paulinus. But all those things are said from conjectures, and those poorly founded. Meanwhile, for brevity's sake, let us suppose that all is true, and that Pammachius built a monastery at Rome, that another was erected at Altinum by Heliodorus, that Orosius did the same in Spain, and St. Paulinus at Nola in Campania. Let us feign, I say, that things are true which cannot be proved: will it then at once have to be said that all those monks of Italy and Spain were Hieronymites? That certainly does not seem so to me. For Jerome neither gave them a Rule of living, nor directed them as their superior, nor founded their monasteries. Whence then will they be Hieronymites? Nay rather, just as we rightly call Hieronymites those whom Jerome gathered and directed at Bethlehem, so to the several monasteries which neither received laws of living from elsewhere nor were subject to others, we shall more rightly leave the names either of their founders or of the places in which they were; unless the Congregations themselves, as Sajanello testifies of his own Congregation, have sought and obtained for themselves the name of some Saint under whose patronage they desire to live. But let us stop here, and leave the Hieronymite Religious free to judge of their origin and antiquity as, all things weighed, they shall have judged it should be judged. I do not undertake to examine thoroughly that new, or rather old, controversy.

[1343] Only for the sake of the most illustrious Sajanello, who still awaits from a work yet to be published Not propagated by Jerome, but from another cause what was the origin, spread and extinction of the Hieronymite Institute in Illyricum, let us quote a few things from a very recent writer who wrote about St. Jerome in Illyricum, and inquired carefully about the Hieronymite Order, and discussed it through the whole of chapter 30. He cites many writers, and mentions Hieronymite Religious in Italy and Spain: but he finds none more ancient in Hungary or Illyricum. He raises the doubt whether the Hieronymite Order was founded by Jerome himself, and for its resolution cites Thomas Francis Rotarius, in Italian Rovero, Moral Theology, chapter 4, On the Religious Orders in particular and their origin, number 22, discoursing thus: About the year MCCCLXX there began in Spain the monastic Order of the Eremites of St. Jerome. Some think that it took this name from the divine Jerome because the Order founded by the divine Jerome near Bethlehem, which lasted for some time after his death, being at length extinguished, was recalled to life by pious men in the monastery of St. Bartholomew of Lupiana. But although it is established that the divine Jerome built a monastery, it is not established that he was the founder of a particular Religious body, to which he handed down a proper habit and rules and form of living; whence the divine Jerome is not commonly placed among the founders of Religious bodies.

[1344] Others have said that the divine Jerome appeared to the first eremites of this Order in a monastic habit, the Hieronymites seem to have their name. in likeness of which they took the habit they wear: for this reason they were called Hieronymites. But, as Suárez notes, an apparition of this kind is not sufficiently proved from history worthy of credit. Rather, therefore, because the first monks of this Order chose him as patron, taking care with much affection and zeal to imitate his examples and follow his doctrine, they were called Hieronymites from the Leader, Patron and Doctor they had chosen for themselves. These things the Illyrian writer brought forward about the Hieronymites of Spain and Italy, keeping deep silence about Hieronymites who might have survived in Hungary and all Illyricum from the age of Jerome down to the fourteenth century. He adds other writers who deny to St. Jerome the institution of any particular Order, and he himself at last agrees with them. But I have already said more than was necessary for the studious reader to be able to understand my opinion about these matters. Nor is it agreeable to examine or refute the lengthy volumes in which some have tried to trace back their origin to St. Jerome.

[1345] Just as little shall I examine whether it was on account of an apparition An apparition of St. Jerome, that St. Jerome was chosen patron of several Religious Orders. But at the end of the Commentary I shall briefly add an apparition of the Saint mentioned in the Life of St. Frances of Rome, which was given at the IX of March and written by the Saint's Confessor. The thirtieth vision of St. Frances there runs thus: On another occasion, when this handmaid of God had received the most holy Sacrament of the Body of Christ in the oft-mentioned chapel, and was in an ecstasy, motionless, a certain most bright and divine light led her happy spirit into another more splendid light, in which there appeared to her the glorious doctor Jerome, saying to her: O noble soul, come up higher to enjoy your Creator, who has given me leave to show him to you. Then that devout soul saw a lofty throne, on which was seated the Word made man. She, by reason of the exceeding brightness of the throne and of him who sat upon it, could see nothing else but a certain human form. But she was placed by the aforesaid Doctor in a spot remote from the places in which the glorious spirits were seated, as a certain stranger and poor pilgrim, who for the space of an hour remaining in so great joy [*], the Lord willing to give her leave (that is, to dismiss her) caused it to be said to her by the aforesaid Doctor: O soul, who have been accustomed to make such a journey, and always wish to use your own will, you are always ready and firm to stand in such a vision; you have taken it into your practice to gaze upon that mirror and delight which is in the contemplation of the highest Majesty: you believe that you see exceedingly, and you see nothing: so great is the abyss in the contemplation of the most High Almighty. We, who always stand before him, cannot see the whole: what ought you to do,

you who are still in the very harbour? Most beautiful is the parted colour, white and red. See to it that you have a pure heart and innocent hands, and burning charity continually in your mind; and if you have these things together in your mind, you can ascend. Since you have been made glad by such a vision, receive comfort and go down below.

[1346] in which he instructed But being brought back from the motionless ecstasy to the mobile ecstasy, she spoke, disputing with the aforesaid Doctor, defending her own rights and alleging causes why she ought not to withdraw, her spiritual father and the aforesaid Rita hearing her. But St. Jerome, rebuking her, said to her: O soul, are you not ashamed of so great presumption, nor do you lose your boldness to stand here above: you do not know where you are: so great is this abyss. Strengthen yourself in the love of God, and withdraw hence with him. O soul, you do not understand, but have become rude. You believe and persuade yourself that you are truly obedient. In these matters it is shown whether you are consenting to him, when it is said to you by us that you ought to withdraw. For if it so pleases us, you ought to obey. For what is the true denial of oneself, but the renouncing of the things that please? Why do you not remove from yourself the things that please you? You are unwilling to let go your joy, which makes you spirited: you would wish to stand always absorbed in your own will.

[1347] St. Frances of Rome. But then the soul is well tried, and its good will is then better expressed, when it is thus cast out from the jubilation of its mind, and it never has a perfect good, nor becomes quiet, until it is cast away from its glad peace. Then it is well proved and seen that such a soul undergoes examination, when it is found content in "yes" and "no." If you persuade yourself that you are truly obedient, in this you will well know it, if in such matters you are well content and patient. There follow several more things to this purpose, which may be seen in the same place. At the end it is added: After that devout soul was removed from the divine vision, it remained in the vision of that most glorious Doctor. St. Jerome recurs several times in the Visions of St. Frances. He is also read to have appeared to others, and in particular to St. Francis Xavier when sick: but let us at last set an end to this lengthy Commentary, and leave those and other visions of that kind to be read in their places.

* while she was