the Creed, and because they reflect the ritual usages of the

fourth century.

CYRIL's lectures to the baptised are also extant; they bear the title of the five Mystagogical Lectures.

It is only just to him to remember that at the Council of Constantinople he declared his agreement with the Nicene Creed, and his acceptance of its test word, Homoousion. His works "do not rank at all high . . . and few would care to read them for their own sake; nor has CYRIL any claim to a place among the masters of Christian thought, whose writings form the permanent riches of the church."

The traditions of Christian literature outside the immediate interests of the doctrinal issue were maintained by LUCIUS CAELIUS LACTANTIUS of Firmium (Firmum), 260-340. He was one of the most learned men of his age, a rhetorician not a theologian, the master of an exquisite Latin style, on account of which he was called the Christian Cicero. In his youth he gained fame by a metrical Symposium, composed of a hundred riddles. After his conversion he wrote a "most beautiful" treatise entitled The Wrath of God, to refute the teaching of the Epicureans and the Stoics by showing that anger is as possible to God as pity. His great work The Divine Institutes, 305-310, is at once an Apology, a manual of theology, and an introduction to the Christian religion, intended to complete or to supersede the less elaborate treatises of MINUCIUS FELIX, TERTULLIAN, and CYPRIAN.

This fine work is in two main divisions, of which the first makes an exposure of false religion in the three treatises: False Religion; The Origin of Error; and False Wisdom. The second part of the book contains an exposition of true religion in four treatises: True Wisdom and Religion; Justice; The True Cultus; and The Blessed Life.

All the wisdom of man consists in this alone, the knowledge and worship of God: this is our tenet, this

our opinion. Therefore with all the power of my voice I testify, I proclaim, I declare: Here, here is that which all philosophers have sought throughout their whole life; and yet, they have not been able to investigate, to grasp, and to attain to it, because they either retained a religion which was corrupt, or took it away altogether.

LACTANTIUS also wrote The Workmanship of God, 304, a treatise of the human body which "may challenge comparison with Cicero's De Natura Deorum in point of style, and is far superior to it in depth and originality." He compressed the substance of his Divine Institutes into single book which he called The Epitome, 315. In a historical apology entitled The Manner in which the Persecutors died, 314, he gave examples of the calamities that had befallen the Imperial enemies of the Faith (page 42).

"Among the papyri discovered at Oxyrhynchus during the last few years was found a fragment on which was written part of a Christian hymn, music as well as words, which was judged to date from about the year 300. The following is the translation:

Of the light of the dawn let nought be silent,
Nor let the bright stars be wanting in praise.

Let all the fountains of the rivers lift up their song

To the Father and Son and to the Holy Spirit.

So let all powers on earth cry aloud, cry aloud Amen, Amen.
Might and honour, glory and

Only Giver of all that is good.

praise to God,
Amen, Amen."

Among other names to be recalled from those stormy times is that of NONNUS of Panopolis, a city of the Egyptian Thebaid. In his pre-Christian days he had written a poem entitled the Dionysiaca, describing the birth, conquests and apotheosis of Dionysius. The poem may have been intended as "an allegory of the march of civilization across the ancient world" or merely as a description of "the gradual estab

lishment of the cultivation of the vine and the power of the Wine-God."

His Paraphrase of the Fourth Gospel, faithfully reproduces the whole text, with poetical expansions to vivify the scenes or to interpret the emotions of the actors. The florid style and exuberant fancy of NONNUS made his work influential with later writers even down to the sixteenth century.

The chief of all the Greek Christian poets was SYNESIUS of Cyrene, 373-414, who, although not a great poet, "at-. tempted with success a style of poetry of which hardly any previous examples" exist. He has spiritual fervour and exaltation, his odes are rich in rapture, with the note of ecstasy that belongs to neo-Platonism rather than to Christianity.

SYNESIUS was a genuine bookman:

I have lessened my estates, and many of my slaves have bought their freedom from me, I have no money in women's ornaments or in coin, but I have many more books to leave than I inherited.

The manifold interests of his life are interestingly pictured in the one hundred and fifty-six Letters which remain from his correspondence; but his Christian Hymns are the most important of his works.

For what are strength and beauty,
And what are gold and fame,
And what are kingly honours,
Compared with thoughts of God.
Let others drive the chariot,
Let others bend the bow,
Let others heap up riches,
And hug the joy of gold.
Be mine to lead unnoticed
A life remote from care,
Unknown indeed to others,
But not unknown to God.

CHAPTER XV

THE DISCUSSION OF THE CREED

The definition of the Creed at Nicæa produced a series of 'heresies', each with its own literature. Viewed from the standpoint of the history of doctrine, these heresies were theological discussions that led to definiteness of thought and carefulness of statement. During their lifetime they were symptoms of an unrest that the Nicene settlement had failed to banish; they indicated that the Faith may be a variety in unity, that a catholic creed need not restrain liberty of thought. As a matter of fact "the eighteen or more creeds, which Arianism and semi-Arianism produced between the first and the second Oecumenical Councils (325-381), are leaves without blossoms and branches without fruit." 1

AETIUS, carrying the views of Arius to their logical issue, affirmed that the Son is unlike the Father. His chequered career of adventure brought him at length to the study of philosophy, and with him "the strife between Aristotelianism and Platonism among theologians seems to have begun."

Several of his theological Letters are known. EPIPHANIUS records and refutes forty-seven of the three hundred heretical propositions which AETIUS laid down.

His renowned pupil and secretary EUNOMIUS, 330-393, became the most powerful champion of his doctrines. He defined and arranged the teaching of AETIUS, to which he added the weight of a moral earnestness, a pure life, and a singularly fine character.

As a writer he was more copious than elegant, but his works gained a great reputation among his followers, and 1 Dictionary of Christian Biography, Vol. I.,

p. 156.

in spite of their obscurity of style and weakness of argument were much dreaded by the orthodox party. His Defence, 363, which has been recovered from BASIL'S celebrated and elaborate Refutation of it, is his most famous work; it was intended to refute the Nicene doctrine of the Trinity. He outlined his doctrine in The Exposition of the Faith, 383, which he submitted to Theodosius. BASIL'S attack upon him in the Refutation provoked him to prepare A Defence of my Defence, of the value of which he seems to have been very doubtful. All that remains of this exists in the passages which are quoted by GREGORY of Nyssa, who, according to PHOTIUS, "treated the wretched thing with the contumely it deserved."

The writings of EUNOMIUS are illustrations of the matterof-fact literalism of a purely intellectual theology, which would be called rationalism to-day. As the result of various Imperial edicts most of them have been destroyed. GREGORY of Nyssa preserves the scanty relics in his refutation entitled Against Eunomius, in which he blackens his opponent's character as much as possible.

A somewhat less rationalistic literalism appeared in Two Dialogues, written by MACEDONIUS, one of the leaders of the semi-Arian party.

HILARY of Poitiers, d. 368, championed the orthodox cause against the Arians in Gaul, and against the semi-Arians in Phrygia. His earliest work was an appeal to Constantius, 355, for the protection of the orthodox against Arian persecution. It sounds the note of liberty of conscience.

God has taught men the knowledge of Himself; He has not exacted it. By His wonderful and heavenly operations, He wins authority for His precepts, and rejects a will that only confesses Him perforce. If force of that sort were employed to promote true religion. the teaching of a bishop would go out to meet it and