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Faith safe while in awe, guided by Holy Spirit. 251

that thou didst not know, nor that thou didst not will it. For when thou gavest the bond, thou hadst knowledge of it, and when thou knewest, thou didst assuredly also will it; and thou art guilty as well in deed as in thought; nor canst thou, by the lighter charge, bar the graver one, so as to say that it is altogether rendered false, by thy giving a bond for that which thou dost not actually perform. Yet I have made no denial, because I have sworn no oath.' Nay, but notwithstanding thou hadst done nothing of this kind, yet thou wouldest be said to have sworn, if thou hast consented. Hath not a word understood in writing, and a mute sound in letters, its force? Again, Zacharias when he was punished by the loss of his voice for a season, having conferred with his mind, passeth over his useless tongue, dictateth from his heart to his hands, and pronounceth without a mouth the name of his son. In his pen there speaketh, and in his waxen tablet there is heard, a hand clearer than any sound, a writing more vocal than any mouth. Ask whether he hath spoken, who is found to have uttered words. Let us pray to the Lord that the necessity of such a contract as this may never press upon us: and should it chance to do so, may He give to our brethren the means of doing good to us, or to ourselves boldness to rid ourselves of all such necessity, lest these writings which deny our Religion, standing in the place of our words, be brought forward against us in the day of judgment, sealed with the seals no longer of advocates but of angels.

XXIV. Amidst these rocks and bays, amidst these shoals and straits of idolatry, Faith wafted onwards by the Spirit of God holdeth her course: safe while on her guard, secure while in amazement. But for those who are cast overboard, there is an abyss whence none can swim; for those who strike upon a rock, there is a wreck whence none can escape; for those who are swallowed up there is in idolatry a whirlpool where none can breathe: every wave thereof choketh, every eddy sucketh down to hell. Let no man say, 'Who shall so safely guard himself? we must needs go out 1 Cor. 5, of the world.' As if it were not as good to go out, as to remain an idolater in the world. Nothing can be easier than to guard against idolatry, if the fear of it be our chief

10.

6.

IDOL.

252 Christian law lightened, that it may be obeyed completely.

DE fear; every necessity is of secondary account when comVII.24. pared with so great a peril. For this cause the Holy Spirit, Acts 15, when the Apostles in their days considered of the matter, loosened the bond and yoke which was upon us, that we might have nought to do, save to avoid idolatry. This shall be our law. The lighter its burden, the more perfectly should it be administered; a law proper to Christians, by which we are known and examined by Heathens. This must be propounded to such as are approaching towards the Faith, and inculcated on such as are entering upon the Faith, that they may deliberate while yet approaching, but when in the service may deny themselves. For it mattereth not whether, after the figure of the ark, the raven', and the kite, and the wolf, and the dog, and the serpent shall be in the Church: the idolater is assuredly not contained within the figure of the ark. No animal was made an emblem of That which was not in the ark, may not be in

the idolater.
the Church.

f The "raven" was regarded as the type of those, generally, who fell back to the world; (S. Hil. in Ps. 146. §. 11. 12. S. Aug. c. Faust. xii. 20. S. Ambr. de Myst. c. 3. see Scriptural Views of Holy Baptism, p. 307. 309. ed. 2.) the

'kite' of rapacity; the 'wolf' of cruelty; (feritate lupos, rapacitate milvos vincere, Jer. Ep. 68. ad Castrut. §. 1. quoted by Lac.) the dog' of uncleanness, (2 Pet. 2, 22. Chrys. Orat. 2. in Jud. [iv. §. 6. ed. Ben.] ap. Lac.)

Note F, on c. xviii. p. 246.

Tertullian seems to understand the words of Isaiah 53, 3. literally, as though the absence of every thing highly accounted of among men were part of His humiliation, (c. Marc. iii. 7. and adv. Jud. c. 14. "nec adspectu quidem honestus;" c. Marc. iii. 17. at length; de carne Christi c. 9. very explicitly ;) T. however speaks of lowliness, of absence of any outward dignity or majesty to command respect, of what might readily be despised, not as M. Medina and others (ap. Moreau t. 1. Hæreses Tert. p. 54. Christus indecorus) say, that He was "non speciosus forma, sed fœdus et deformis." Thus in the de c. C. "These, Matt. 13, 54. were the words of persons despising His appearance. So that He had not a body even of human dignity (honestatis) much less of heavenly brightness." It is also true, (as Moreau contends) that T. uses these terms, partly, in reference to His sufferings and indignities at the hands of men; as 1. c. "Were even the prophets silent as to the absence of dignity (ignobili) in His aspect,

Absence of dignity ascribed to our Lord, of earthly beauty only. 253

His very sufferings, His very indignities, speak; the sufferings, of a human flesh, the indignities, of one undignified" (inhonestam), but not exclusively, since he argues that had He had the dignity of a heavenly countenance, they had not dared this; and adv. Jud. he distinguishes the " nec adspectu, &c." from the rest. T., on the other hand, explains Ps. 45, 2. exclusively of "spiritual beauty," adv Marc. iii. 17. The passages of S. Clem. Alex. Pæd. iii. 1. rv öv aïoxev in reference to Is. 53. (coll. Strom. ii. 5.) will from the contrast, have the same meaning, of contrast with, and absence of, human beauty. So again, very plainly, Strom. vi. 17. (p. 293. ed. Sylb.) súrsaùs is opposed to a beautifulness, which would fix the mind on itself; "Not without purpose did the Lord will to employ a lowly form of body, lest any praising the comeliness and admiring the beauty, should be distracted from the things said;" and Strom. iii. 17. p. 202. " He Himself, the Head of the Church, passed the life in the flesh, unattractive and without form (anòès xai äμogpos) teaching us to look up to the invisible (¿udìs) and incorporeal of the Divine Cause." In like way when Celsus had said, that whereas it was "impossible that whoso had something Divine above others, should not differ from others," but that His form "was, as they say, small and durudis and abject" (¿ymns), Origen admits the durudis," but not, as Celsus explains it, abject, nor is it clearly shewn that it was small," (c. Cels. vi. §. 65.) S. Basil, again, (in Ps. 44.) says only negatively that it" does not celebrate beauty of person, for we have seen Him and He hath no beauty, &c." Is. 53. So S. Aug. in Ps. 43. §. 16. "As man He had neither beauty nor comeliness; but He was beautiful in form in That, whereby He is above the sons of men."" Ps. 45. "Therefore manifesting that forma deformis of the flesh," &c. and on Ps. 118. " The Bridegroom Himself, lovely not in outward form but in excellency."

It appears, further, that these writers do not rest on any tradition (for Celsus'," they say," implies, at most, only a current notion in his day,) but on an exposition of a prophecy; and, therefore, their words are not to be taken further than the prophecy bears, if interpreted of the outward form, "absence of outward comeliness."

This same passage of Isaiah is by others interpreted of the " marring of His countenance" through His sufferings; (whence the Jews thought that He was near "fifty years old;") and this is evidently the meaning of Thaddeus in the document from the Syriac, ap. Eus. i. 13. " of the power of His works and the mysteries which He spake in the world—of the lowness and meanness and humiliation of the Man, Who appeared visibly, and how He humbled Himself and died and minished His Divinity." This T. himself joins with the other meaning, and S. Aug. gives it as the meaning, in Ps. 44. §. 3. and in Ps. 127. §. 8. “That Bridegroom than Whom nothing is more beautiful, of Whom Esaias said a little before, 'We saw Him, and He had no beauty nor comeliness.' Is then our Bridegroom unlovely? (foedus)-He seemed unlovely to those who persecuted Him, and unless they had deemed Him unlovely, they had not assaulted, had not scourged, had not crowned with thorns, had not dishonoured Him with spittings; but because He seemed to them unlovely, they did those things unto Him, for they had not

2354 Dignity of our Lord visible to those worthy to behold it.

NOTE the eyes to which Christ would appear lovely-Those eyes are to be ON DE cleansed, that they may be able to see that light;" which gives a sort of comment on T.'s stronger language de carne Christi, 1. c.

IDOL.

explains Is. 53. 2, 3. of His sufferings (in Ps. 44.)

Theodoret

This passage of S. Aug. further shews that these Fathers did not think of what we should mean by "meanness of countenance" and the like, but only a lowliness of the outward form, which (as is the case often now in such degrees of moral dignity as men may reach unto) had nothing attractive except for those who had a certain sympathy with it, and whose eyes were purified to see the hidden Majesty. Thus Origen, who admitted the dvoudis imputed by Celsus, says, (Comm. in Matt. §. 100. t. iii. p. 906. ed. de la Rue al. Tr. 35.) “ A tradition has come down to us of Him, that there were not only two forms in Him, one according to which all saw Him, another, according to which He was transfigured before His disciples in the mount, when His countenance also shone as the sun, but that He appeared to each according as he was worthy. And being the Same, He appeared as though He were not the Same to all;" (which O. likens to the Manna, Wisd. 16, 20. 21.)" And this tradition does not appear to me incredible, whether as relates to the body, on account of Jesus Himself, that He appeared in different ways to men, or on account of the very nature of the Word, which does not appear alike to all." And S. Jerome (in Ps. 44. Ep. 65. ad Princip. §. 8.) having explained Is. 53, 2. of His sufferings, and Ps. 45. of the "beauty of His excellencies in a sacred and Adorable Body," subjoins, " for had He not had in His countenance and eyes a sort of starry lustre, neither had the Apostles instantly followed Him, nor they who had come to seize Him fallen to the ground," and this, (on S. Matt. 9, 9.) he explains not to belong to the human countenance, but the Divinity gleaming through. "Certainly the very brightness and majesty of the hidden Divinity, which shone through in His human countenance, could at first sight draw beholders to Himself. For if the magnet and amber are said to have the power to join to themselves rings and straws, how much more could the Lord of all creatures draw to Himself whom He would!"

OF BAPTISM.

[The De Baptismo seems to have been written before Tertullian's fall; in that he says, c. 15," the very privation of communion testifieth that they [heretics] are aliens," which he would hardly have said, had he himself been out of communion with the Church. Lumper (c. 3. art. 3. §. 4.) infers the same from the Bishops being placed first, whereas according to S. Jerome (Ep. 41. ol. 213. ad Marcell. c. Montan. §. 3.) the Montanists (like a modern sect) had two orders above them; he notices also a different tone in speaking of Bishops, here and in the de Pudicit. c. i.; and that the Acta Theclæ, against which Tertullian speaks, (c. 17.) were probably written by Leucius, whom Pacian says, (Ep. i. ad Sympr. init.) that the Montanists said falsely that they derived their origin" animatos a Leucio mentiuntur."]

I. HAPPY the Sacrament of our water! whereby being cleansed from the sins of our former blindness, we are made free unto eternal life"! A discussion of this matter will not be idle, as instructing both those who are most perfectly informed, and those also, who content with simply believing, without examining the bearings of traditions, carry about with them through ignorance a belief which recommendeth itself, yet untried. And therefore a certain most venomous serpent of the heresy of the Cainites", lately dwelling in these parts, hath carried away very many with her doctrine, beginning with the overthrow of Baptism; plainly according to her nature; for vipers, and asps, and king-serpents,

* See below, c. 2. 3. 5. Clem. Pæd. i. 6. [p. 41. 2 ed. Sylb.] S. Ambr. de El. et jejun. fin. Ep. [63] ad Verc. Eccl. [§. 11.] S. Chrys. ap Aug. c. Jul. i. §. 21. ~ [Pam.] Chrys. in Matt. Hom. 12.

See on this sect de Præscript. c. 33. adv. omn. Hæret. c. 3. They, as well as the Manichæans, (see S. Aug. Conf. iv. §. 8. note, Oxf. Transl.) followed out the tenet of the impurity of matter, so as to reject Baptism with water. S. Jerome alludes to this rejection, (Ep. 69. ad Ocean. init.) using the same metaphors. "The Cainite heresy ariseth against me, and the vi

per who had once perished lifteth up her bruised head and overthroweth the Sacrament of Christ, not in part, as formerly, [i. e. as to the matter,] but wholly;" in that it was denied that all sin was forgiven in it. add S. Cypr. Ep. ad Magn. fin.

The Basilisk, basiliscus, regulus, Bariλiùs, Barihionos, lo, is a specially deadly serpent, and peculiar to Africa, see Bochart. (Hieroz. p. ii. l. 3. c. 9. 10.) who identifies it with the YDY, DY of H. Scr.; add S. Jerome, Ep. 69. ad Ocean. §. 6.

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