A View of Antiquity Presented, Part 8
Lactantius.
§ 1. LVcius Caelius was his name,Scultet. in Medull. cent. 4. cap. 10. unto which his eloquence gained him the addition of Lactantius, from his milky and smooth kind of speaking: as his Country that of Firmianus, being an Italian by Birth,Ad an. 302. § 61. in apparat. Magnin. in Geograph. in Ital. num. 15. (not an African, as Baronius and Posseviue imagine, because he was the Scholar of Arnobius that was so) of the Province called Picenum of old, but afterward by the Lombards, Marchia Anconitana, from the chief Town therein,Heylin. Geograph. Ancona: as also Marchia Firmiana, from the strong Town Firmium, heretofore the Head City of the Piceni, which Country is a part of the Land of the Church under the Government of the Popes of Rome. Some do contend that he was of the German Race;Winpeling. in Epitom. rer. German. cap. 10. and that at this day there is a Family not obscure among the Germans, which, bearing the name of the Firmiani, do boast themselves to be the posterity of Lactantius: but the general consent of Authors shews this to be but a vain conceit.
He was at first the Scholar of Arnobius, Hieronym. in catalog.Professour of Rhetorick at Sicca in Africa; as also some time at Rome, where Lactantius heard him, and profited much in the study of eloquence; who also instructed him in the Christian Religion, which it seems, he had embraced before he came into Bythinia; whither, under Di…olesian the Emperor, he was called, unto the City of Nicomedia, wherein for some while he professed the Art of Rhetorick, whereof he had been a learner before. But being a Latine in a Greek City,Hieronym, in catalog. his auditory grew thin, so that he was destitute of hearers: hereupon laying aside the work of teaching he betook him unto his pen and fell to writing; being provoked unto, and put upon it by a couple of impure and foul-mouthed Philosophers,Lib. Institut. 5. c. 4. who either of them had belched out their books, against both the Religion and name of Christians.
He was at length in France made Tutor unto Crispus, Hieronym. in catalog. Trithem. de script.the son of Constantine the great (and his great friend) who committed him for his breeding unto the c…re of Lactantius; an evident argument both of his fame and faithfulness.
§ 2. He was a man of great Learning,Osiand. epito. cent. … script. eccles. de temp. c. 9. … eruditione clarus; abundanter …, inqui… Trithemius: a very grave Author, saith Hospinian; one notably skilled … the Art of Rhetorick, and in all Philosophy; having diligently perused the writings of all sorts of Humane Authors,Cent. 4. c. 10. as his books do sufficiently testifie in which he omitted almost …one of any science, or Profession, whose testimony he made not use of: and so excelled in …loquence of speech,Scultet. in medull. that therein he was judged to be superior even unto his Master Arnolius, who yet was of chief note among Orators. He is for this cause often stiled Orat… disertissimus, Chron. Ber…om.the most eloquent and elegant Lactantius, who among the Latines especially added Ornament unto Christian Doctrine; the very top, and most eminent of the Latine Rhetoricians: & in Divinis Scripturis nobiliter institutus.Trithem, de script.
His great abilities he notably improved for the publick good;Possevin. in apparat. for though he were somewhat defective in the inward knowledg of Divine Mysteries, and far inferiour unto many others for his skill in delivering and confirming the Doctrine of Christianity; yet was he a stout Champion for the truth and gave good testimony of his zeal thereunto in opposing with all his might the adversaries thereof; for which work he was excellently furnished, having such a dexterity herein, that he easily refuted and overcame them. Vtinam, Ep. ad Paulinum. 13.inquit Hieronymus, tam nostra confirmare potuisset, quàm facilè aliena destruxit. For observing the Christian Religion to be destitute of those that should eloquently defend it, the opposers of it being such, I, saith he, undertook this task; being grieved with the sacrilegious writings which they published;Instit. l. c. 4 and stirred up hereunto with their proud impiety, and conscience of the truth it self: that so with all the strength of my wit, I might reprove the accusers of righteousness: not that I might write against them, who might have been confounded in few words; but that I might at once, by one assault, put to flight all those, who every where do, or have undertaken the same work. A most laudable enterprise, wherein as he manifested no small love unto the truth in attempting it, so did he manage it with no less dexterity; for which he hath been deservedly famous in the Church of Christ unto this day: His challenge that he makes of all the Heathen is remarkable.Instit. l. 5. cap. 20. Si qua, inquit, … fiducia est vel in philosophiâ, vel in eloquentiâ, arment se, ac refellant haec nostra; si possunt, congrediantur comminus, & singul… quae que ; discutiant. Decet cos suscipere defen…onem Deorum suorum, ne si nostra invaluerint, ut quotidie invalescunt, cum delubris …, ac ludibriis deserantur.—Procedant in medium Pontifices, seu minores, seu maximi flemines, augures, item reges, sacrificuli, qui que ; sunt sacerdotes & antistites religionum. Convocent nos ad concionem, cohortentur nos ad suscipiendos cultus Deorum, persuadeant multos esse, quorum numine ac providentiâ regantur …nia, ostendant origines, & initia sacrorum, ac deorum, quomodo sint mortalibus tradita, qui sons, quae ratio sit, explicent, proferant, quae …rces in cultu, quae poena in contempta maneat, quare ab hominibus se coli velint, quid illis, si beati sunt, humana pietas conferat. Quae …mnia, non asseveratione propriâ, (nec enim …let quicquam mortalis hominis authoritas) sed divinis aliquibus testimoniis confirment, ficuti nos facimus.—Doccant isti hoc modo, si qua illis fiducia veritatis est, loquantur, audeant, inquam, disputare nobiscum aliquid ejusmodi, jam profecto ab aniculis, quas… con…emnunt, & à pueris nostratibus error illorum ac sultitia irridebitur, &c.
§ 3. Of the books that he wrote, many have been devoured by time, which hath left scarce any thing of them remaining besides the names, of which I find mentioned,
1. His Symposium or banquet, which he wrote in Africa, Hieronym. in catalog. Cent. 4. c. 10. de script. Eccles.while he was but a youth in the Schools; or (say the Centurists) unto the youths of Africa: and (as Trithemius hath it) in Hexameter verse.
2. foreign, or his journey from Africa unto Nicomedia, Hieronym. in Catalog.in Hexameter verse: (this shews him to have been also an excellent Poet) of which I conceive Damasus is to be understood,Ep. 124. inter Hierony. Epist. (if not rather of his Epistles or of both) who gives us an account of the number and nature of them; thus: I confess unto you that those books of Lactantius which you sent me of late, I therefore willingly do not read, because in them many Epistles are extended unto the space of a thousand verses or lines,See Riccard. Vincent. in notis in Cantacuzen. in Cantic. and they do rarely dispute of our Doctrine: whence it comes to pass, both that their length begets a loathing in the Reader, and, if any be short, they are more fit for the Schools then for us, disputing of verse or meeter, of the Situation of Regions or Countries, and Philosophers.
3. His book, which he Entituled Grammaticus.
4. Ad Asclepiadem, lib. 2. apud Trithemium, l. 1.Hieronym. in Catalog.
5. Of Persecution.
6. Four books of Epistles unto Probus.
7. Two books of Epistles unto Severus.
8. Two books of Epistles unto Demetrian his Auditor or Scholar.
All these Ierom reckons up in his Catalogue.In Ep. ad Gal. c. 4. He also make mentions of the eighth book of his Epistles unto Demetrian: so that it seems he wrote so many unto him: Unless we may suppose, that all his Epistles were gathered into one volume, which make up the number of eight books; whereof the two last (and so one of them, the eight) were unto Demetrian.
9. His book of Paradise, in Hexameter verse;Trith. de Script. All these are lost and perished, none of them being now to be found.
Those that at this day are extant under his name, are these that follow, viz.
1. Seven books of Institutions, In institut. libris contra gentes scrip. fortissimè. Hierony. Ep. Par…m. 65. Cent. 4. cap. 10. Instit. lib. 1. cap. 1. Ad an. 302. § 60.against the Gentiles, which with an high and Heroick Spirit he wrote under Constantine the Great; for so he himself speaks; Hoc opus, inquit, nunc nominis tui auspicio inchoabimus Constantine Imperator maxime. Baronius calls them luculentissimos libros.
That which occasioned the writing of them was the cunning and calumniating books, especially of two great enemies of Christianity: the one whereof, professing himself a man of chief note among the Philosophers, wrote three books against the Christian Name and Religion; whom Baronius supposeth to be Porphyrius, an Apostate, who at this time excelled among the Platonicks, and set forth bitter Commentaries against the Christians; (which then no other Philosopher did.) And therefore by Cyril not unjustly stiled, the father of Calumnies.
The other, (being of the number of the judges, and one that was the principal Author of the persecution then raised against the Christians, in the City of Nicomedia and whole province of Bithynia) wrote two books not against the Christians, lest he should seem enviously to inveigh against them; but unto the Christians, that he might be thought gently and with humanity to advise them: which books he intituled, foreign: Baronius thinks his name to be Hierocles, a crafty fellow, concealing the wolf under the sheeps skin, that by his fallacious title he might ensnare the Reader. To confute these, and to render the truth oppressed with reproaches, more illustrious and shining with her own beauty, Lactantius undertook this Noble task of Writing his seven most excellent books of Institutions. Thus Baronius. in annal. ad an. 302. § 43. ad 61. Of which in general Lactantius himself thus speaks. Quanquam, inquit, Tertullianus candem causam plenè peroraverit, in co libro, cui Apologetico nomen est, tamen quoniam aliud est accusantibus respondere, quod in defensione aut negatione solâ positum est; aliud instituere, quod nos facimus, in quo necesse est totius doctrine substantiam contineri; non defugi hunc laborem, ut implerem materiam, quam Cyprian…s non executus est in eâ oratione, quâ Demetrianum, sicut ipse ait, oblatrantem at que ; obstrepentem veritati redarguere conatur. Loctant. Institut. Lib. 5. cap. 4.
The several books are Entituled by these several Names:
1. Of False Religion;Scultet. … Medull. Lactantii institutionum libri apud catholicos & optimos quos que ; viros, praesertim sex priores, optimè audierunt semper. Bulling. de orig. error. wherein he shews the Religion of the gods to be false: After the proem, asserting providence, and that there is but one God, which he proves by the testimonies and Authorities of the Prophets, Poets, Philosophers, Sibyls, and of Apollo: also (refuting the Gentile gods and their Religion in the general, and of the Romans in particular) he proveth that they were born at a certain time, lived most wickedly, and at length did undergo the Law of all Mortals. Of this, and his book de opificio dei, Chytraeus thus speaks; Prima pars operis, inquit, quae Ethnicas idolomanias & Philosophicas de deo & summo bono opiniones taxat, De rat. stud. Theolog.& liber de opifieio Dei in structurâ corporis & animo humano, eruditus & lectu utilissimus est.
2. Of the Original of error, and that the Religion of the Gods is vain which he evinceth by divers arguments, shewing that the causes of all errors in this kind are these two. First, The defection of Cham and the posterity of pious Noah, from God. Secondly, The cunning and craft of the Devil. Thirdly, Of false Wisdom; wherein he demonstrate; the vanity of Philosophy and Philosophers, instancing in the Epicures, Stoicks, Pythagoreans and the rest, shewing how false their chief tenets and opinions be, and lastly that Philosophy is not true wisdom.
4. Of true Wisdom; which comprehends the Doctrine of Christ, his Person, Name, Nativity, two Natures, Miracles and Passion; and afterward he declares the causes of Heresies to be Avarice, Pride, Ignorance of the Scripture, and admiration of false Prophets.
5. Of Justice: that 'tis not to be found among the Gentiles; and that they are deceived, who think Christians to be fools; and that their sin is great and inexcusable; who persecute the Church pretending it to be for their good, viz. That they may bring them unto a right mind.
6. Of true Worship: which consists in this, that the mind of the worshipper be presented blameless unto God, discoursing at large of vertue and vice, as the ways leading unto heaven and hell; and con…luding, that the best Sacrifices which we can offer unto God are these two, integrity of mind, and the praise of his name.
7. Of the Divine Reward,Lib. 7. c. 6. and the last Judgment, the sum whereof he himself thus sets down; the world, saith he, was made, that we might be born; we are born that we may acknowledg God the Creator of the world, and our selves; we acknowledg him, that we may worship him; we worship him, that we may obtain immortality, as the reward of our labors; we receive the reward of immortality, that we may for ever serve, and be an eternal Kingdom unto the most High God our Father.
2. Of the Anger of God; some Philosophers denying it, he proves by nine several arguments that God is angry, and answers the objections to the contrary.In Catalog. & in comm. in Ep. ad Ephes. c. 4. He wrote this book unto Donatus, and it is highly commended by Ierom, who calls it a most fair or elegant book, which he wrote in a learned and and eloquent stile.
3. Of the Workmanship of God;Scultet. in Medull. unto Demetrian his Auditor: a learned piece and most profitable to be read. It was written by him to this end, that by the wonderful structure of man, he might prove the Providence of God: He therefore takes a view of, and looks into the several members of the body, and in them shews how great the power of Divine Providence is: withal removing the cavils of the Epicures against it: And toward the end, discourseth of the Soul for the same purpose.
4. An Epitome of his Institutions, which wants the beginning;In Ep. ante edit. Vene…. Lact. opera. and is clearly, saith Baptista Ignatius, but a fragment: being a repetition of the chief heads of doctrine contained in that larger work. All these, saith Bellarmine, are without controversie the works of Lactantius.
There are besides these; certain Poems that appear, and have been published unto the world under his name; concerning which it is very questionable whether they be his or no: seeing, that neither Ierom nor Trithemius take any notice of them, nor did Thomasius is he tells us, find them in any Ancient▪ Copies.In Schol. in Lactant. The Titles of them are these following.
1. Of the Phoenix: they are not, saith Thomasius, In Schol. in Biblioth. patr. tom. 9.the verses of Lactantius, but written by some most elegant Poet, who yet, I believe, saith he, was not a Christian: for he calls his Phoenix the Priest of the Sun, and speaks of Phoebus, as if he were in very deed a god.
2. Of the day of the Resurrection of the Lord; which for elegancy, is no way comparable unto the former;Ibid. whence it evidently appears that they are not of the same Author and Authority. Thomasius saith, that he found them in the Vaticane Library among the works of the Christian Poet Venantius Fortunatus Bishop of Poictiers. And whereas in the Ordinary Editions the Poem begins with this Distich, Salve festa dies.—
By the Authority of the Vaticane copy, he placeth it twenty Distichs off, immediately before that. Mobilitas anni.—
Which from his copy he amends thus, Nobilitas anni.—and in the Pentameter, for Stridula cuncta, he puts Stridula puncta. And out of the same copy, he adds unto the Poem, ten verses more then are usually found, both because they very well agree with it, and also because in the end of the Poem be these Numeral Letters, CX. to make up which, those ten were to be added; yea, I find an hundred and twelve verses of this Poem, in the Parisian Edition of the Poems of Venantius.Biblio. Patr.
3. Of the Passion of the Lord; of which Poem Thomasius tells us he could no where find any footsteps at all:Ibid. and therefore unlikely to have Lactantius for the Author. Yea the Author both of this and the former is very doubtful, saith Bellarmine, because some do deny them to be his;De script. Eccles. though hereof we have no certain Argument. His verses of Christs Passion, saith Mr. Perkins, are counterfeit, for they contradict all his true writings in these words, Flecte genu lignum que crucis venerabile adora.
Perkins problem. For (saith Illiricus, in Catalog. test. veritat. lib. 4.) He vehemently inveigheth against Images.
4. As for the Arguments upon the several Fables of Ovids Metamorphosis, Possevin. in appar. Chro. Bergomens.and the Annotations upon Statius his Thebais, by Gesner and Glareanus attributed unto Lactantius, (which they account most worthy to be read) the diversity of the Stile speaks them not to be his:Ibid. they rather belong, saith Po… sevine, unto Luctatius Placidus a Grammarian. The Commentaries upon Thebais, De Poet. hist.saith Gregorius Gyraldus, are not of Lactantius; for in them many things almost word for word are taken out of Servius the Grammarian, who lived more then an age after Firmianus: they are the work of one Placidus Lactantius, or (as some Learned men call him) Placidus Lutatius: thus he.
§4. His stile is so accurate and polite, that he excelled all those of his time,In Chron. ad an. 322. (vit omnium, inquit Eusebius, suo tempore eloquentissimus) and hath justly merited the name of the Christian Cicero; Alsted. encyclop. hist. Trithem. descript.coming nearest of any unto that Prince of Orators, in whom chiefly, the Latine Tongue was fully ripe and grown unto the highest pitch of all perfection. Ierom therefore stiles him a certain River as it were of Tullian, Ascham. Schoolmr. l. … In Ep. ad Paulin. 13. Ep. ad Magnum. 84. In elect. in l. 2. Arnob. in praefat.eloquence: and he that shall Read his works, saith he, will find in them an Epitome of Cicero's Dialogues. And as he followed his Master Arnobius, so did he, saith Goddeschalcus Stewchius, almost overtake him: for however Arnobius might go before him in the strength of his arguments, and weight of things; yet doth Lactantius so recompence that in elegancy of speech, and gravity of sentences, that it is a hard matter to know which to prefer before other: the clearness and neatness of his Language was wonderful;Ant. Sab…lli. Ennead. Lud. Vives. de trad. disciplin. l. 3. Ante Nazianz. opera. de poet. hist. being the most eloquent of all the Christians; his sound is plainly Ciceronian; to whom Erasmus ascribes, faelicem facilitatem: fuit eloquentiae Ciceronianae, inquit Gyraldus, inter Christianos praecipuus aemulator.
§5. There are to be found in his writings many grave sentences and excellent passages, that may be of great use unto the Reader; though in the Doctrine of Christianity he come short of many others; his principal scope being the discovery and confutation of heathenish idolatry and superstition; which he happily performed. Non multum potest juvare lectorem, In orat. de lect. patr. ante loc. …6.inquit Chemnitius, tautùm enim fer… contra Paganismum disputat. Amongst divers things in him not unworthy of serious observation, take these that follow.
1. Speaking unto those, who, having been accustomed unto polite Orations or Poems,Instit. l. 6. cap. 21. pleasing and delightful to the ear, do therefore despise, as sordid, the plain and common language of the Scripture: saith he, Cannot God the former of the heart, speech and tongue, speak eloquently? Yea, but in his most wise providence he would have those things to want varnish, which are Divine: that all might understand the things which he spake unto all.
2. Again, to the same purpose; the Sacred Scriptures,Instit. l. 3. c. 1 saith he, deliver things briefly and nakedly, neither indeed was it meet to be otherwise, as if when God would speak to men, he should assert his words with arguments, as if he were not to be believed; but, as it became him, he spake as God himself, as the great judge of all things; for whom, 'tis not to argue, but to pronounce what is true.
3. Of the mighty force and efficacy of the Scriptures and Christian Religion, beyond all the Rules of Moral Philosophy, to expel vice and plant in men all kind of vertue, he thus speaks.Instit. lib. 3. cap. 2…. Da mihi virum, qui sit iracundus:— Give me, saith he, a man that is wrathful, foulmouthed, unruly, with a few words of Gods book I will make him as gentle as a Lamb; Give me one that is close fisted, covetous, greedy of money; I will send him back unto thee liberal, bountifully distributing his money with his own hands. Give me one that is fearful of torment and death; He shall soon despise crosses, and fires, and Phalaris his Bull. Give me a le…her, an adulterer, a haunter of brothel-houses; you shall see him sober, continent. Give me one that is cruelly disposed and blood-thirsty; that fury of his shall be changed into true clemency. Give me one who is unjust, unwise, a sinner, he quickly shall be just, wise, upright. So great is the power of Divine Wisdom, that being infused into the brest of a man, doth at one assault expel folly, the mother of vices.—Hath any one of the Philosophers either performed these things, or can he, if he will? Who when they have worn out all their time in the study of Philosophy, can make neither any other, nor themselves better, if nature a little withstand. Therefore their wisdom when it hath done its utmost,Non excindit vitia sed …bscondit. doth not abolish, but hide vices. Whereas a… few precepts of God do change the whole man, and, the old being put off, do make him new, that you cannot know him to be the same.
4. Of the Church: thus. The Church, saith he▪ Instit. 4. c. 13is the true Temple of God, which consisteth not in walls, but in the hearts and faith of men, who believe on him, and are called faithful or believers.
5. Again, That only is the Catholick Church, which retains the true Worship of God.Inst. l. 4. c. 30 … This is the fountain of verity, this is houshold of faith, this is the temple of God, into which who so shall not enter, or from which, who so shall depart, he is an alien from the hope of eternal life and salvation.— And because every company of Hereticks, do think that they chiefly are Christians, and theirs to be the Catholick Church; we are to know, that that is the true; wherein is Religion, Confession and Repentance, which wholsomly cures the sins and wounds unto which the frailty of the flesh is subject.
6. Of Repentance thus; He that repents of his deed,Inst. l. 6. c. 24 understands his former error: wherefore, the Greeks do better and more significantly call it foreign, then we Latines can call it Resipiscentiam. For he repents, and, as it were, recovers his mind from madness, who grieveth for his error, and corrects himself for his folly, and confirms his mind to live more uprightly, being most wary of this, that he be not again drawn into the same snares.
7. Again, The conscience of sin and fear of punishment,Inst. l. 5. c. 13 makes a man the more Religious: and always faith is by much more firm, which repentance resettles or puts again in its place.
8. He sets down the sum of the Law, referring it unto two heads, after this manner. The first head or chief point of the Law is to know God and to obey and worship him alone: Or, the first duty or point of righteousness is to be in conjunction or communion with God: the second with man: the former is called Religion: the other is named, mercy or humanity.—Wherefore the principal bond of men among themselves, is humanity, the which, whosoever shall break asunder, is to be accounted a wretch and a parricide. For if we all have our Original from one man, whom God formed, surely, we are of kin and of the same blood;Consangu. Act. 17. 26. and therefore is it the greatest crime to hate a man, even an enemy: for which cause God hath commanded that we should never bear enmity toward any, but always take it away, to wit, that we should pacifie those who are enemies unto us,Gen. 13. 8. by admonishing them of the alliance that is between us.
9. God, saith he, is not to be worshipped with offerings and much blood;Inst. l. 6. c. 25 but with a pure mind and honest purpose. Temples are not to be builded unto him with stones heaped together on high; but to be hallowed by every one in his own brest. If any one think that garments and gems and other things which are had in esteem, are dear to God, he plainly knows not what God is; who thinks that he takes pleasure in those things, which, if even a man contemn, he shall be justly praised. What therefore is pure, what worthy of God? but that which he himself in his Divine Law requireth. Two things there are which ought to be offered; a gift and a sacrifice: the gift is integrity of mind; the sacrifice, praise and thanksgiving.
10. There is no man so rude and of such barbarous manners,Inst. l. 1. c. 2. but, when he lifts up his eyes unto heaven, albeit he know not by the providence of what God this universe, which he beholds, is governed, yet doth he understand that there is one, by the very vastness, motion, order, constancy, utility, beauty and temperament of thing: and that it cannot be, but that that which consisteth in such an admirable manner, is guided by some greater Counsel.
§6. These and many other the like useful passages are to be found in his writings: though yet for the chief points of Religion he handles them but very slenderly, and not so plainly as he should: for there is not a clear sentence concerning faith, the benefits of the Son of God, or of any other necessary part of the Doctrine of Christianity to be met with in Lactantius throughout:Cent. 4. c. 10 he being for the most part imployed in refuting the false opinions of the Gentiles; which is the ground of that speech of Chemnitius, In Orat. de lect. patr. Scultet. in Medull.that Lactantius cannot much advantage his Reader. Many points of Religion he but toucheth only, and the most he understood not: so likewise speaks Chytraeus of him;De stud. Theolog. Doctrinam Evangelii propriam, de beneficiis Christi, & de fide parùm intellexit. Whence it comes to pass that his errors were neither few nor small; speaking of the weightiest doctrines very unfitly and improperly; though perhaps in some of them (as Osiander charitably conceives) he thought better,Epitom. hist. Eccles. cent. 4. l. 1. c. 31. and was more sound in his judgment.
His Errors were such as these.
1. Concerning God,Inst. l. 1. c. 7. his expression is very unmeet and dangerous, viz. That God made himself, Yet may his meaning be that God had his being of himself; for so: lib. 2. 9. 'tis God alone who is not made;—he is of himself, as we said: lib. 1. and therefore is such as he would himself to be, viz. impassible, immutable, uncorrupt, blessed, eternal.
2. He so speaks of Christ,Cent. 4. c. 10. say the Centuturists, that a man may well say, he never rightly understood either the person or Office of the Son of Son of God. As where he saith;
That God did produce a Spirit like himself,Inst. l. 2. c. 9. who should be endued with the vertues of God his Father. Also, The Commands of his Father he faithfully observed:Ibid. l. 4. 14. for he taught, that God is one, and that he alone ought to be worshipped; neither did he ever say that himself was God; for he should not have been faithful, if, being sent to take away the gods, and to assert one, should have brought in another beside (that) one. These and such like words he hath, that do not a little smell of Arianism. Indeed, he in this particular doth not express himself so warily as he ought; which hath occasioned such suspicions of him; but yet however, that in his judgment he neither denied nor doubted of the Deity or Eternity of Christ, seems clear from divers other places, where in so many words he acknowledgeth both; as, where he calls him the word of God; &, (inquit) meritò sermo & verbum dei dicitur, Inst. l. 4. c. 8.qui procedentem de ore suo vocalem Spiritum, quem non utero sed mente conceperat, inexcogitabili quadam majestatis suae virtute, ad effigiem, quae proprio sensu, ac sapientiâ vigeat, comprehendit, & alios item Spiritus in angelos …guraverit. Also,Ibid. if any wonder that God should be generated of God, prolatione vocis … Spiritus; when once he shall know the sacred voices of the Prophet, he will certainly cease to wonder. Again, he saith, that the Jews condemned their God.Lib. 4. c. 18. Lastly, Sicut …ater, Lib. 2. c. 9.inquit, sine exemplo genuit Authorem suum; sic ineffabiliter Pater genuisse credendus est Coaeternum. De matre natus est, qui ante jam fuit; de Patre, qui aliquando non fuit. Hoc fides credat, intelligentia non requirat, ne …ut non inventum putet incredibile, aut reper…um non credat singulare. If therefore in some places he seem to deliver that which savors too much of Arius, or speak not so clearly of Christ as he should;In Scholiis. in l. 4. c. 16. &c. 22. in Bibli. Patr. Thomasius, that diligent peruser of him, who compared divers Copies together, is of the mind, that there his books are by some Arian corrupted; giving sundry instances herein.
3. He unadvisedly saith, that Christ after his resurrection went into Galilee, Inst. l. 4. c. 20because he would not shew himself unto the Jews, lest he should bring them unto repentance, and save those wicked men.
4. He is silent concerning the Priestly Office of Christ,Cent. 4. c. 10. Scult. c. 12. Chytr. de stud. Theol. mentioning no other ends of his Incarnation or coming, and passion, but only to reveal and make known unto men the Mysteries of Religion, and to give them an example of vertue.
5. He knew nothing at all of the Holy Ghost;Cent. ibid. and makes little or no mention of him in his books now extant. Or,Ep. 65. Pam. if he knew any thing, Ierom acquaints us what his apprehensions of him were; In his books, saith he, and especially in his Epistles unto Demetrian, he denies the substance of the holy Ghost, saying, according to the error of the Jews, that he is referred either unto the Father, or the Son; and that the sanctification of either person, is demonstrated under his name. So that, what Ierom spake of Origen, may not unfitly be applied unto him also,Ibid. viz. that his opinion of the Son was bad, but concerning the holy Ghost was worse.
6. He conceited, that the Angels were given unto men to be their guardians,Inst. l. 2. c. 15 lest they should be destroyed by the Devil, unto whom at first the power of the earth was given. And that those guardian Angel, being allured to accompany with women were for this their sin cast down from heaven; and so of the Angels of God, became the Ministers of the Devil.
7. Also,Inst. l. 7. c. 5. That God created an infinite number of souls, which he afterward put into frail and weak bodies that being in the midst between good and evil, and vertue being propounded unto man consisting of both natures, he might not with ease and delicacy obtain immortality, but with great difficulty and labor get the reward of eternal life.
8. He speaks nothing of the righteousness of faith;Inst. l. 7. c. 27 but that salvation is merited by good works;Lib. de opisi. dei. c. 20. and that if a man serve not the earth, which he ought to tread underfoot, he shall merit everlasting life.De stud. Theolog. Cum lib. 5. & 6. (inquit Chytraeus) orationem de justitiâ Christiana ex professo instituerit, tamen de philosophies tantum sen legis justitia disputat & justitiae …dei, quae Evangelii propriâ est, nullam ferè mentionem facit.
9. Of Prayer, saith he, As often as a man asks, he is to believe that he is tempted of God,Institut. lib. 6. c. 13. whether he be worthy to be heard: Of pardon of sin thus, that God vouchsafes it unto them that sin ignorantly, but not unto them that sin of knowledge and wittingly. Also that a man may be without sin, which yet he contradicts within a few lines after.
10. He hath many superstitious things concerning the virtue of the sign of the Cross, viz. That it is terrible unto the Devils, qui adjurati per Christum, de corporibus quae obsederint,Institut. lib. 4. c. 27. fugiunt. Nam sicut Christus ipse Daemonas verbo fugabas, ita nunc sectatores ejus eosdem, spiritus inquinatos de hominibus et nomine Magistri sui et signo passionis excludunt. Cujus rei non difficilis est probatio, nam …um diis s…is immolant, si assistat aliquis signatam fronte gereus, sacra nullo modo litant, nec responsa potest consultus reddere vates.
11. He thinks it unlawful for a righteous man to go to war,Institut. lib. 6. c. 20. or to accuse any one of a capital crime, because Murther is forbidden.
12. He denyed that there were any Antipodes,Institut. lib. 3. c. 24. and that with much earnestness and confidence, bestowing a whole Chapter upon the maintainance of so evident a mistake, in shewing the Original, and (as he conceived) the absurdity of the Antipodian opinion, and confuting it: wondring at the folly of those that held it. What shall we think, saith he, of them who give out that there are Antipodes walking opposite unto us? Do they speak any thing to the purpose? or are there any so stupid as to believe, that there are men whose feet are higher than their heads, or that those things there do hang which with us do lye on the ground? That the Plants and Trees spring downward, that the snow and rain and hail fall upward upon the earth? And need any man marvel that hanging Gardens are accounted in the number of the seven wonders of the world, since the Philosophers have made both Fields and Seas, Cities and Mountains all hanging?—What to say of these I know not, who having once erred do constantly persist in their folly, and with vain defend vain things, only sometimes I think that they play the Philosophers in jest, or wittingly and knowingly undertake to defend falshood, to exercise, as it were, and shew their wit in things that are evil. Strange ignorance that accounts so palpable a truth so gross an error, yet herein was Lactantius outgone by Zachary Bishop of Rome, Hakewel. Apolog. lib. 3. cap. 8. § 1.(oh the infallibility of that Chair!) who condemned one Vigilius Bishop of Saltzburg as an heretick, only for holding that there were Antipodes.
13. That the Souls of all men are detained in one common prison,Institut. lib. 7. c. 21. until the coming of the great Judge.
14. He hath fond conceits of the coming of a great Prophet immediately before the end of the world,Institut. lib. 7. c. 17. who shall convert men unto God, and work strange miracles; unto whom he applies those passages concerning the two witnesses, me…tioned in Revel. cap. 11.
15. He is a millenary, asserteth two resurrections,Institut. lib. 7. cap. 14. and largely discourseth of the reign of the Saints upon earth after the first, for the space of a thousand years, and what should fall out during that time. After this (saith he) shall be the last judgment, in which not all shall be judged, (the wicked being condemned already) but only those who know God, at what time their good works shall be weighed with their bad, and if the good do over ballance the bad they shall go into life, if otherwise they shall be condemned. A gross error and cross to plain Scriptures.
16. He thus speaks of the last judgment,Institut lib. 7. c. 21. when (saith he) the Lord shall judge the righteous, he shall prove or try them by fire, (he seems to allude unto, 1 Cor. 3. 13.) Then they whose sins shall prevail either in weight or number shall be burnt, but those whom righteousness and maturity of virtue shall have fully concocted, shall not feel that fire: For they have somewhat that repels the force of the flame, &c.
These and other the like unsound passages are scattered up and down in the Writings of Lactantius, who is therefore to be read with much caution, (apud Lactantium inquit Hyperius,De rat. stud. Theolog. lib. 4. invenies plura quae sapientem lectorem desiderant.) He made too much of Philosophy, (as did also other of the Ancients) chiefly that of Plato, Thomas. in Schol. in lib. 7. cap. 15. institut.and too closely followed Origen, which was the cause why in so many things, he swerved and wandred from the truth, and was so great a stranger unto it: Retinuit tamen hactenus (inquit Bullingerus) suam gloriam in Ecclesiâ Christi.de Orig. error. c. 29.
§ 7. As concerning his death, I find no mention at all in History, where, or after what manner he ended his life. That he lived unto a great Age, may be gathered from what Ierom writes of him,In catalog. that in his extreme old Age, he was in France, Schoolmaster unto Crispus the Son of Constantine the Great, where therefore it is most likely he might end his days: But withal he was reduced to such poverty and want, (which is somewhat strange being a man of such worth and so greatly favoured by that good Emperour) that for the most part he lacked even necessaries for his subsistence.Euseb. chron. ad an. … 12.