not from the Holy Scriptures, but from the Grecian sophists.^ Besides, he by no means stood alone in the church in this matter, but had his predecessors in the * Comp. also the remarks of B. H. Cowper in the iutroduction to his English translation, Lond. 1866, p. xiii. ^QOt' ' Not Basil the Great (as Socrates supposes), for he was much older, and died in 379 ; but probably (as Montfaucon conjectures) the bishop of Eaphanea in Syria, near Antioch, whose name appears among the bishops of the council of Constanti- nople, in 381. ^ Even the purest moral philosopher of antiquity, Plato, vindicates falsehood, and recommends it to physicians and rulers as a means to a good end, a help to the healing of the sick or to the advantage of the people. Comp. De republ. iii. p. 266, ed. Bipont. : E» yap op^uis iKiyofxiv &pTt, Koi tw uvti i&eoly /xiv axp't'^'^ov ifei^Sov. dj/dpwTTois Se xP''i''''A""'i ^'^ ^v (paptxaKov ilhn, ^r\\ov on rh y^ toiovtov larpo'is Soreoi', iSittiTais 5e oux aiTTfov. AriXov, (<pT). ToTr &pxovcri 6?; ttjj ir6\eus, (tirep ria'if SWois, Trpo(TT}Kfi \pevde(Tdai ^ TroXe/xiuv fj iroAiTuv sVe/ta, eV u(p(\fia rris Tr6\eoci' toIs' Se &\Kuti ■nami' ovx arrriov rod toiovtov. The Jewish philosophizing theologian, Philo, liad a similar view, in his work : Quod Deus sit immutabilis, p. 302. § 51. MORAL CHAKACTEB OF THE CLEEGY IN GENERAL. 255 Alexandriaa fathers,' and his followers in Cassian, Jerome, and other eminent Catholic divines. Jerome made a doubtful distinction between 'yvfivaartKw<; SGrihere and BoyfiarcKm scribere, and, with Origen, explained the severe censure of Paul on Peter in Antioch, for example, as a mere stroke of pastoral policy, or an acconmiodation to the weakness of the Jewish Cliristians at the expense of truth.'* But Augustine's delicate Christian sense of truth revolted at this construction, and replied that such an inter])retation under- mined the whole authority of Holy Scripture ; that an apos- tle could never lie, even for a good object ; that, in extremity, one should rather suppose a false reading, or wrong translation, or suspect his own apprehension ; but that in Antioch Paul spoke the truth and justly censured Peter openly for his incon- sistency, or for a practical (not a theoretical) error, and thus deserves the praise of righteous boldness, as Peter on the other hand, by his meek submission to the censure, merits the praise of holy humility.' Thus in Jerome and Augustine we have the representatives of two opposite ethical views : one, unduly subjective, judging all moral acts merely by their motive and object, and sanction- ing, for example, tyrannicide, or suicide to escape disgrace, or breach of faith with heretics (as the later Jesuitical casuistry does with the utmost profusion of sophistical subtlety) ; the other, objective, proceeding on eternal, immutable principles and the irreconcilable opposition of good and evil, and freely ' Clemens Alex., Strom, vi. p. 802, and Origen, Strom, vi. (in Hieron. Apol. i. adv. Iluf. 0. IS), where