Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/889

 peccant." In the Lord's Prayer he has "quotidianum," not "supersubstantialem." He has the doxology at the end; in this differing from the usage of Latin versions but agreeing with the Apostolic Constitutions (iii. 18), a work he highly valued. In the beatitudes he follows the received text in placing "Blessed are they that mourn" before "Blessed are the meek," contrary to Jerome and the bulk of the Latin versions. Both here, however, and in the case of the doxology, he agrees with the Codex Brixianus. He reads "neque filius" (Matt. xxiv. 36); he distinctly omits Luke xvii. 36 (50, 213).

Besides the Scriptures he uses the Shepherd of Hermas (33, 142), but acknowledges that it was not universally received; the Clementine Recognitions (20, 94; 50, 212; 51, 214), the Apostolic Constitutions or Canons as he calls them (13, 74; 53, 221). The first of these passages does not appear in our present text of the Constitutions; the second is from bk. viii., which Krabbe gives good reason for thinking an Arian addition to the previously known work. In the latter half of the 4th cent. the Arians appear to have made active use of literary forgery. In their interests was made the longer edition of the Ignatian epistles, which Zahn has conjecturally attributed to Acacius of Caesarea. Interpolations of Arian tendency were also made in the Clementine Recognitions. Our writer used Josephus. He had also, besides the Ascension of Isaiah, another O.T. apocryphal book (not the book of Jubilees), from which he learned the names of Cain and Abel's sisters, fuller details about the sacrifice of Isaac, was enabled to clear Judah from the guilt of incest in his union with Tamar, etc. He had further N.T. Apocrypha, which, though not absolutely authoritative, might, in his opinion, be read with pleasure. These related in full detail the story of the Magi, compendiously told by St. Matthew, telling how they had learned to expect the appearance of the star from a book preserved in their nation, called the book of Seth, and had in consequence for generations kept a systematic look-out for this star. Probably the same book told him that Joseph was not present when the angel appeared to Mary, and related how our Lord conferred His own baptism on John the Baptist. Directly or indirectly the writer was much indebted to Origen, and there may be traces of acquaintance with two or three other anti-Nicene fathers. His fanciful interpretations of Scripture, though including some few of what may be called patristical commonplaces, seem to be mostly original. With reference, however, to the question of authorship, it is important to determine whether his coincidences with St. Augustine are purely accidental. He is certainly no follower of Augustine. He has little in common with that father's comments on the same passages of St. Matthew, and differs in various details, e.g. (49, 205) he follows Origen's division of the Commandments, making "Honour thy father and mother" the fifth, and (p. 218) counting it as belonging to the first table; yet he appears to have been acquainted with Augustine's Enarrationes on the Psalms, as he has scarcely a quotation from the Psalms which does not shew some resemblance to Augustine's comment on the same passage; e.g. (4, 43) in Ps. viii. 4, "The heavens, the work of Thy fingers" mean the Holy Scriptures; (5, 37) on Ps. xc. 11, the remark "Portatur non quasi infirmus sed propter honorem potestatis" verbally agrees with Augustine's "Obsequium angelorum non ad infirmitatem domini pertinet sed ad illorum honorificentiam." There is a striking verbal similarity (7, 52) between the comment on "mittentes retia" and Augustine's remarks on that subject in Ps. lxiv. 4. The interpretation that the "mountains" to which Christians are to flee are the Holy Scriptures may have been suggested by Augustine in Ps. lxxv. 2; see also the sermon (46) "de Pastoribus."

Our author lays claim to no great antiquity. He says (52, 218) that the time since our Lord's ascension had been nearly as long as the life of an antediluvian patriarch. Accordingly Mill (Praef. N.T.) fixes his date 961. In favour of the late date there is the use of the medieval word "bladum" for corn, though we do not know the exact date when such words crept into popular language. But a very strong argument for an earlier date is that the author's studies appear all to have lain in Christian literature earlier than the middle of the 5th cent.; and that he appears to know nothing of any of the controversies in the Christian church after that date. Making all allowance for the narrowing influence of a small sect, we find it hard to believe that the type of Arianism which existed at the time specified could have been preserved in such complete purity two or three centuries later. Our author does not appear to have lived in an Arian kingdom outside the limits of the Roman empire. He draws illustrations (30, 130) from the relative powers of the offices praefectus, vicarius, consul; from the fact that a "solidus" which has not the "charagma Caesaris" is to be rejected as bad (38, 160). When he wrote, heathenism was not extinct, as appears from the end of Hom. 13 and from what he says (10, 13) as to the effect on the heathen of the good or bad conversation of Christians. All things considered, we are not disposed to date the work later than the middle of the 5th cent., which would allow it time to grow into such repute in an expurgated form as to pass for Chrysostom's with Nicolas I. If so early a date can be assigned to it, we have at once a claimant for its authorship in the Arian by Maximinus, who held a conference with St. Augustine. The Opus Imperfectum was written by an Arian bishop at a distance from his people, as Maximinus then was. The doctrine of the two writers is identical, and there are points of agreement in what Maximinus says as to the temporal penalties to which the expression of his opinions was liable, and as to the duty, notwithstanding, of confessing the truth before men. Maximinus, while in Africa, could hardly help making some acquaintance with the writings of St. Augustine, and might very conceivably adopt his exegesis of particular passages, though on the whole slightly regarding his authority.

[G.S.]

Publius (3), a solitary, commemorated by Theodoret in his Religiosa Historia, c. v., born at Zeugma, on the Hellespont, of a family of