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ST. CLEMENS.

fellow-labourer' with St. whose names were writHe was born at Rome, besides others, the Pon

IT makes not a little for the honour of this venerable apostolical man, (for of him all antiquity understands it,) that he was Paul, and one of those ten in the book of life.' upon Mount Cœlius, as, tifical, under the name of Damasus, informs us. His father's name was Faustinus, but who he was, and what his profession and course of life, is not recorded. Indeed, in the book of the Recognitions and the τα κλημέντια (mentioned by the ancients and lately published) we have more particular accounts concerning him: books which however falsely attributed to St. Clemens, and liable in some cases to just exception, yet being of great antiquity in the church, written not long after the apostolic age, (as we shall show hereafter,) we shall thence derive some few notices to our purpose, though we cannot absolutely engage for the certainty of them. There we find St. Clemens brought in, giving this account of himself.

1 Vit. Clement. Concil. tom. i. col. 74.

2. He was descended of a noble race, sprung from the family of the Cæsars,' his father Faustinianius, or Faustus, being near akin to the emperor, (I suppose Tiberius,) and educated together with him, and by his procurement matched with Mattidia, a woman of prime family in Rome. He was the youngest of three sons, his two elder brothers being Faustinus and Faustus, who after changed their names for Nicetas and Aquila. His mother, a woman it seems of exquisite beauty, was by her husband's own brother strongly solicited to unchaste embraces. To avoid whose troublesome importunities, and yet loath to reveal it to her husband, lest it should break out to the disturbance and dishonour of their family, she found out this expedient: she pretended to her husband that she was warned in a dream, together with her two eldest sons to depart for some time from Rome. He accordingly sent them to reside at Athens, for the greater conveniency of their education. But hearing nothing of them, though he sent messengers on purpose every year, he resolved at last to go himself in pursuit of them; which he did, leaving his youngest son, then twelve years of age, at home, under the care of tutors and guardians. St. Clemens grew up in all manly studies, and virtuous actions, till falling under some great dissatisfactions of mind concerning the immortality of the soul, and the state of the other life, he applied himself to search more narrowly into the nature and the truth of things. After having baffled all

2

Recogn. lib. vii. n. 8, p. 476; Clem. Homil. 12, n. 8, p. 678; Epitom. n. 76, p. 781, edit. Paris.

2 Recogn. lib. i. n. 1, p. 392; Cl. Hom. i. p. 546; Epist. p. 749.

his own notions, he betook himself to the schools of the philosophers, where he met with nothing but fierce contentions, endless disputes, sophistical and uncertain arts of reasoning; thence he resolved to consult the Egyptian hierophantæ, and to see if he could meet with any who by arts of magic was able to fetch back one of those who were departed to the invisible world, the very sight of whom might satisfy his curious inquiries about this matter. While he was under this suspense, he heard of the Son of God's appearing in the world, and the excellent doctrine he had published in Judæa, wherein he was further instructed by the ministry of St. Barnabas, who came to Rome. Him he followed first to Alexandria, and thence, after a little time, to Judæa. Arriving at Cæsarea he met St. Peter, by whom he was instructed and baptized, whose companion and disciple he continued for a great part of his life.

3. This is the sum of what I thought good to borrow from those ancient writings. As for his relations, what various misadventures his father and mother, and his two brothers severally met with, by what strange accidents they all afterwards met together, were converted and baptized into the Christian faith, I omit, partly as less proper to my purpose, partly because it looks more like a dramatic scene of fancy, than a true and real history. As to that part of the account of his being related to the imperial family, though it be more than once and again confidently asserted by Nicephorus,' (who transcribes a good part of the story,) and by

H. Ec. lib. ii. c. 35, p. 191; lib. iii. c. 2, et 18, p. 247.

note and learning is, that it was written before the destruction of Jerusalem, while the temple and the Levitical ministration were yet standing. Which they collect, I suppose, from a passage where he speaks of them in the present tense.' But whoever impartially considers the place, will find no necessary foundation for such an inference, and that St. Clemens's design was only to illustrate his argument, and to show the reasonableness of observing those particular stations and ministries which God has appointed us, by alluding to the ordinances of the Mosaic institution. To me it seems most probable to have been written a little after the persecution under Domitian, and probably not long before Clemens's exile. For excusing the no sooner answering the letters of the church of Corinth, he tells them it was διὰ γενο μένας ἡμῖν συμφορας και περιπτώσεις, by reason of those calamities and sad accidents that had happened to them. Now plain it is, that no persecution had been raised against the Christians, especially at Rome, from the time of Nero till Domitian. As for Mr. Young's conjecture from this place, that it was written in the time of his banishment; he forgot to consider that the epistle was written not in Clemens's own name, but in the person of the church of Rome. A circumstance that renders the place incapable of being particularly applied to him.

2

6. By a firm patience and prudent care he weathered out the stormy and troublesome times of Domitian, and the short but peaceable reign of Nerva. When, alas! the clouds returned after rain,' and began to thicken into a blacker storm in

2

the time of Trajan, an excellent prince indeed, of so sweet and plausible a disposition, of so mild and inoffensive a conversation, that it was ever after a part of their solemn acclamation at the choice of a new elected emperor, MELIOR TRAJANO,' "better than Trajan." But withal he was zealous for his religion, and upon that account a severe enemy to Christians. Among several laws enacted in the beginning of his reign, he published one (if Baronius, which I much question, conjecture the time aright; for Pliny's epistle,3 upon which he seems to ground it, was probably written at least nine or ten years after,) whereby he forbad the Heteriæ, the societies or colleges erected up and down the Roman empire, whereat men were wont to meet, and liberally feast, under a pretence of more convenient dispatch of business, and the maintenance of mutual love and friendship; which yet the Roman state beheld with a jealous eye, as fit nurseries for treason and sedition. Under the notion of these unlawful combinations, the Christian assemblies were looked upon by their enemies; for finding them confederated under one common president, and constantly meeting at their solemn lovefeasts, and especially being of a way of worship different from the religion of the empire, they thought they might securely proceed against them as illegal societies, and contemners of the imperial constitution; wherein St. Clemens, as head of the society at Rome, was sure to bear the deepest share. And indeed it was no more than what himself had long expected, as appears from his letter

1 Eutrop. H. Rom. lib. viii. non longe ab initio.

2 Ad. Ann. 100, n. 8. tom. ii.

3 Epistl. 97, lib. x.

VOL. II.

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