Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 6.djvu/29

 FATHERS

FATHERS

with considerable violence and with the clever and hasty argumentation which is natural to him. The placid flow of St. ( -yprian's eloquence (Bishop of Car- thage, 249-58) is a great contrast to that of his " mas- ter . The short treatises and large correspondence of this saint are all concerned with local questions and needs, and he eschews all speculative theology. From this we gain the more light on the state of the Church, on its government, and on a number of interesting ec- clesiastical and social matters. In all the patristic period there is nothing, with the exception of Euse- bius's history, which tells us so much about the early Church as the small volume which contains St. Cypri- an's works. At the end of the century Arnobius, like Cyprian a convert in middle age, and like other Afri- cans, Tertullian, Cyprian, Lactantius, and Augustine, a former rhetorician, composed a dull apology. Lac- tantius carries us into the fourth century. He was an elegant and eloquent writer, but like Arnobius was not a well-instructed Christian.

C. (1) The fourth century is the great age of the Fathers. It was twelve years old when Constantine published his edict of toleration, and a new era for the Christian religion began. It is ushered in by Eusebius of Caesarea, with his great apologetic works 'Praepara- tio Evangelica" and "Demonstratio Evangelica", which show the transcendent merit of Christianity, and his still greater historical works, the "Chronicle" (the Greek original is lost) and the "History", which has gathered up the fragments of the age of persecutions, and has pre- served to us more than half of all we know about the heroic ages of the Faith. In theology Eusebius was a follower of Origen, but he rej ected the eternity of Crea- tion and of the Logos, so that he was able to regard the Arians with considerable cordiality. The original form of the pseudo-Clementine romance, with its long and tiresome dialogues, seems to be a work of the very beginning of the century against the new develop- ments of heathenism, and it was written either on the Phoenician coast or not far inland in the Syrian neigh- bourhood. Replies to the greatest of the pagan at- tacks, that of Porphyry, become more frequent after the pagan revival under Julian (361-3), and they occu- pied the labours of many celebrated writers. St. Cy- ril of Jerusalem has left us a complete series of instruc- tions to catechumens and the baptized, thus supplying us with an exact knowledge of the religious teaching imparted to the people in an important Church of the East in the middle of the fourth century. A Pales- tinian of the second half of the century, St. Epipha- nius, became Bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, and wrote a learned history of all the heresies. He is unfortu- nately inaccurate, and has further made great difficul- ties for us by not naming his authorities. He was a friend of St. Jerome, and an uncompromising oppo- nent of Origenism.

(2) The Alexandrian priest Arius was not a product of the catechetical school of that city, but of the Lucianic school of Antioch. The Alexandrian ten- dency was quite opposite to the Antiochene, and the Alexandrian bishop, Alexander, condemned Arius in letters still extant, in which we gather the tradition of the Alexandrian Church. There is no trace in them of Origenism, the head-quarters of which had long been at Cssarea in Palestine, in the succession Theoctistus, Pamphilus, Eusebius. The tradition of Alexandria was rather that which Dionysius the Great had re- ceived from Pope Dionysius. Three years after the Nicene Council (325), St. Athanasius began his long episcopate of forty-five years. His writmgs are not very voluminous, being either controversial theology or apologetic memoirs of his own troubles, but their theological and historical value is enormous, on ac- count of the leading part taken by this truly great man in the fifty years of fight with Arianism. The head of the catechetical school during this half-century was Didymus the Blind, an Athanasian in his doctrine of

the Son, and rather clearer even than hia patriarch in his doctrine of the Trinity, but in many other points carrying on the Origenistic tnulilion. Here may be also mentioned by the way a rather later writer, Syne- sius of Cyrene, a man of philosophical and literary habits, who showed energy and sincere piety as a bishop, in spite of the ratlier pagan character of his culture. His letters are of great interest.

(3) The second half of the century is illustrated by an illustrious triad in Cappadocia, St. Basil, his friend St. Gregory Nazianzen, and his brother St. Gregory of Nyssa. They were the main workers in the return of the East to orthodoxy. Their doctrine of the Trinity is an advance even upon that of Didymus, and is very near indeed to the Roman doctrine which was later embodied in the Athanasian creed. But it had taken a long while for the East to assimilate the entire mean- ing of the orthodox view. St. Basil showed great patience with those who had advanced less far on the right road than himself, and he even tempered his lan- guage so as to conciliate them. For fame of sanctity scarcely any of the Fathers, save St. Gregory the Wonder-Worker, or St. Augustine, has ever equalled him. He practised extraordinary asceticism, and his family were all saints. He composed a rule for monks which has remained practically the only one in the East. St. Gregory had far less character, but equal abilities and learning, with greater eloquence. The love of Origen which persuaded the friends in their youth to publish a book of extracts from his writings had little influence on their later theology; that of St. Gregory in particular is renowned for its accuracy or even inerrancy. St. Gregory of Nyssa is, on the other hand, full of Origenism. The classical culture and literary form of the Cappadocians, united to sanctity and orthodoxy, makes them a unique group in the his- tory of the Church.

(4) The Antiochene school of the fourth century seemed given over to Arianism, until the time when the great Alexandrians, Athanasius and Didymus, were dying, when it was just reviving not merely into orthodoxy, but into an efflorescence by which the re- cent glory of Alexandria and even of Cappadocia was to be surpassed. Diodorus, a monk at Antioch and then Bishop of Tarsus, was a noble supporter of Nicene doctrine and a great writer, though the larger part of his works has perished. His friend Theodore of Mopsuestia was a learned and judicious commenta- tor in the literal Antiochene style, but unfortunately his opposition to the heresy of ApoUinarius of Laodi- cea carried him into the opposite extreme of Nestori- anism — indeed the pupil Nestorius scarcely went so far as the master Theodore. But then Nestorius re- sisted the judgment of the Church, whereas Theodore died in Catholic communion, and was the friend of saints, including that crowning glory of the Antiochene school, St. John Chrysostom, whose greatest sermons were preached at Antioch, before he became Bishop of Constantinople. Chrysostom is of course the chief of the Greek Fathers, the first of all commentators, and the first of all orators whether in East or West. He was for a time a hermit, and remained ascetic in his life; he was also a fervent social reformer. His grandeur of character makes him worthy of a place be- side St. Basil and St. Athanasius.

As Basil and Gregory were formed to oratory by the Christian Prohsresius, so was Chrysostom by the heathen orator Libanius. In the classical Gregory we may sometimes find the rhetorician; in Chrysos- tom never; his amazing natural talent prevents hia needing the assistance of art, and though training had preceded, it has been lost in the flow of energetic thought and the torrent of words. He is not afraid of repeating himself and of neglecting the rules, for he never wi.shes to be admired, but only to instruct or to persuafle. But even so great a man has his limita- tions. He has no speculative interest in philosophy