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# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XIV/Additional Canons 4/Part 17

From Chapter XVII. of the Book St. Basil Wrote to Blessed Amphilochius on the Holy Ghost.
(Found translated in lib. cit., p. 40 et seqq.)
Canon XCII.
He speaks of the written doctrine, and the unwritten tradition of the Apostles, and says, that both have the same efficacy as to religion. The unwritten traditions which he mentions, are the signing those who hope in Christ with the Cross; praying toward the East, to denote, that we are in quest of Eden, that garden in the East from whence our first parents were ejected (as he afterwards explains it), the words of invocation at the consecration of the Bread of Eucharist, and the cup of eulogy; the benediction of the baptismal water, the chrism and of the baptized person; the trine immersion, and the renunciations made at baptism; all which the Fathers concealed from those who were not initiated. He says the dogmata were always kept secret, the Kerugmata published; he adds the tradition of standing at prayer on the first day of the week, and the whole Pentecost (that is, from Easter to Whitsunday), not only to denote our rising with Christ, but as a prefiguration of our expecting an eternal perfect day, for the enjoyment of which we erect ourselves; and lastly, the profession of our faith in Father, Son and Holy Ghost at baptism.
Canon XCIII.
He asserts the Doxology [in these words] “with the Holy Spirit,” to be an unwritten, Apostolic tradition. For this is a dogma full of authority, venerable for its antiquity.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XIV/Additional Canons 4/Part 15

Of the Same to the Chorepiscopi, that No Ordinations Should Be Made Contrary to the Canons.
(Found translated in Vol. VIII. Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, p. 157. Epistle liv.)
Canon XC.
A letter to his Village-bishop: he complains of the want of discipline of the multiplying of the clergy, and that without due examination and enquiry into their morals; that they had dropped the old custom, which was for the priests and deacons to recommend to the Village Bishop, who taking the testimonial, and giving notice of it to the [City] Bishop, did afterwards admit the minister into the sacerdotal list; that the number of the inferior clergy was unreasonably increased, especially in time of war, when men got into orders to avoid the press: he orders a list of the clergy in every village to be sent to him, and who admitted him, if any have been admitted into the inferior orders by priests, that they be looked on as laymen. Let not who will, put his name into the list.  Re-examine those who are there, expel the unworthy, admit none without my consent for the future; if you do he shall be counted a layman.

## Footnotes

* ↑ Johnson by mistake has the singular instead of the plural.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XIV/Additional Canons 4/Part 18

From the Letter of Basil the Great to the Nicopolitans.
There is also in Tilius and Bishop Beveridge here inserted an epistle of St. Basil the Great to the Nicopolitans, comforting them under the loss of their church or oratory, and telling them, that they ought not to be concerned that they worship God in the open air, for that the eleven Apostles worshipped God in an upper room, where they were cooped up, while they that crucified Jesus performed their worship in a most famous Temple.

## Footnotes

* ↑ I.e., at the end, after the Epistle of Gennadius.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XIV/Additional Canons 4/Part 13

Of the Same to Diodorus Bishop of Tarsus, concerning a Man who had taken Two Sisters to Wife.
(Found translated in lib. cit., p. 212 et seqq. Epistle clx.)
Canon LXXXVII.
Contains the preface of his letter to Diodorus Bishop of Tarsus, in which he tells him of a letter shewed him in justification of a man’s marrying two sisters bearing his name; but he hopes it was forged.
Canon LXXXVIII.
Contains the rest of the letter, in which he argues and inveighs against this practice.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XIV/Additional Canons 4/Part 16

Of the Same to His Suffragans that They Should Not Ordain for Money.
(Found translated in lib. cit., pp. 156 and 157. Epistle liii.)
Canon XCI.
One letter to the bishop subject to him, wherein he prohibits to take money for orders, and to bring merchandize into the church, which is entrusted with the Body, and Blood of Christ; they had their pay after the ordination was performed; this he calls an artifice, and declares, that he who is guilty of it shall depart from the altar in his country, and go buy and sell the gift of God where he can.
# Omniana/Volume 1/Meditation and Contemplation

99. Meditation, and Contemplation.
The Jesuit Richeome distinguishes between Meditation and Contemplation in a manner worthy of being quoted in any book which should treat upon English synonimes, the distinction though applied in a religious sense, being general. "Contemplation, he says, is a regard of the eyes of the Soul fastened attentively upon some object, as if after having meditated of the creation, she should set the ​eye of her understanding fast affixed upon the greatness of God, upon the beauty of the Heavens; or having discoursed of the passion of our Saviour, she beholdeth him present, and seeth him crucified, and without any other discourse, persevereth constantly in this spectacle. Then the Soul doth contemplate upon her meditation: so that contemplation is more than meditation, and as it were the end thereof: and it groweth and springeth upon it many times, as the branch doth upon the body of the tree, or the flower upon the branch. For the understanding having attentively and with many reasons to and fro meditated the mystery, and gathered divers lights together, doth frame unto herself a clear knowledge, whereof, without further discourse one way or other, she enjoyeth (as I may say) a vision, which approacheth to the knowledge of Angels. Hereof we learn the difference betwixt these two actions: for meditation is less ​clear, less sweet, and more painful than Contemplation: it is as the reading of a book, which must be done sentence after sentence but Contemplation is like casting the eyes upon a picture discerning all at once. Meditation is like eating: Contemplation is like drinking,.. a work more sweet, cooling, and more delicate,.. less labour and more pleasure than eating is. For he that meditateth taketh an antecedent, doth behold, weigh, and consider it, as it were chewing the meat with some pain; and afterward doth gather conclusions one after another, as it were swallowing down of morsels, and taketh his pleasure by pieces: but he that contemplateth receiveth his object without pain, swiftly and as it were altogether, as if he took a draught of some delicate wine. Such is Meditation, and such is Contemplation.
Pilgrim of Loretto. p. 49.
Philosophical as this is, the consequences which must result from applying ​it to acts of devotion are apparent, and of this no doubt the Jesuit and the other teachers of this doctrine were well aware. Let but an enthusiast be once taught to keep the understanding passive, and the imagination awake, and dreams, apparitions, rapts, ecstasies, with all the other symptoms of hagiomania, will follow in the natural course of the disease.
# Omniana/Volume 1/M. Dupuis

106. M. Dupuis.
Among the extravagancies of faith, which have characterised many infidel writers, who would swallow a whale to avoid believing that a whale swallowed Jonas; a high rank should be given to Dupuis, who at the commencement of the French Revolution, published a work in twelve volumes octavo, in order to prove that Jesus Christ was the Sun, and all Christians, worshippers of Mithra. His arguments, if arguments they can be called, consist chiefly of metaphors quoted from the Fathers. What irresistable conviction would not the following passage from Souths' Sermons (Vol. v. p. 165) have flashed on his fancy, had it occurred in the writings of Origen or Tertullian! and how compleat a confutation of all his grounds does not the passage afford to those humble souls who, ​gifted with common sense alone, can boast of no additional light received through a crack in their upper apartments!
"Christ, the great Sun of Righteousness and Saviour of the World, having by a glorious Rising, after a red and bloody Setting, proclaimed his Deity to men and angels; and by a compleat Triumph over the two grand Enemies of Mankind, Sin and Death, set up the everlasting Gospel in the room of all false Religions, has now changed the Persian Superstition into the Christian Doctrine; and without the least approach to the idolatry of the former, made it henceforward the duty of all nations, Jews and Gentiles, to worship the rising Sun."
This one passage outblazes the whole host of Dupuis' Evidences and Extracts. In the same sermon, the reader will meet with Hume's argument against miracles anticipated, and put in Thomas's mouth.
# Omniana/Volume 1/Mayor. Merino

148. Mayor Merino.
Holinshed will have the word Mayor to be derived from the hebrew mar, dominus. The ancient inhabitants of Franconia, he says, being descended from the old Hebrews, have retained many Hebrew words, either from the beginning, or else borrowed them abroad from other regions which they conquered. So, he continues, the head officers and lieutenants to the Prince in the cities of London and York for an augmentation of ​honours by an ancient custom (through ignorance what the title of mayor doth signify) have an addition, and are intituled by the name of lord mayor, when mayor simply pronounced by itself signifieth no less than lord without any such addition (Vol, 2, p. 298, ed. 1807). This is going a long way for an etymology which is to be found so near home. Even if it had travelled to us from the east it would more likely have come from the arabic mir or emir. Perhaps the old Leonese word merino is a mongrel diminutive of this title, likely enough to have been formed when the two languages were as it were running into each other. Mirquebir, the augmented title, was in use at Ormuz. Merino would be sufficiently explained by supposing it a diminutive grade. The opinion that it is derived from the sheep quasi marino I have elsewhere shown to be unfounded.
Mayor I supposed, as the reader will have perceived, came to us from ​Magister, or from Major through the French. But since this note was writing I have met with the word in the Laws of Hywel Dda, Maer. Wotton renders it Præpositus. Owen in his Dictionary derives it from Ma-er, but of the former of these words, he gives so wide and indefinite an explanation, that any thing may be derived from it. Terms of civil polity in the Welsh, are most likely of Roman origin. But when the word is found with such slight variations, in Hebrew, Arabic, the Keltic, and (as Holinshed implies) the Teutonic dialects also, the Roman word likewise must be supposed to have proceeded from the same primitive language.
# Omniana/Volume 1/Medical Poets

4. Medical Poets.
"Such physicians, says Huarte, as I have marked to be good practitioners, do all piddle somewhat in the art of versifying, and raise not up their contemplation very high, and their verses are not of any rare excellencie." If this observation be true, Dr. Ferriar of Manchester has given proof in his poetry of his talents for physic.
# Omniana/Volume 1/Menageries

41. Menageries.
P. Labat uses the word in his account of Cayenne, and thinks it necessary to explain it. C'est ainsi qu'on appelle les lieux où l'on èleve des bestiaux et des volailles, et où l'on cultive le manioc et les autres grains et fruits qui servent à la nourriture des Habitans et de leurs Esclaves. This, therefore, is probably the origin of the word.
# Omniana/Volume 1/Locke

21. Locke.
Locke's simile of the sheet of white paper is to be found in Hooker, "the soul of man being at first as a book wherein nothing is, and yet all things may be imprinted;" and Hooker, perhaps, remembered Aristotle, who compares it to a tablet without a picture.
# Omniana/Volume 1/Melancholy

34.
According to old physicians, perfect ​melancholy is the complexion of theass. This would have supplied a good allusion in the days of Ben Jonson, when it was the humour of fools to be melancholy. It would be well if our fools could be persuaded into the same humour, but they imitate the magpie instead of the owl. We shall lose our character as a serious nation. In all that sort of conversation which is denominated small talk, and of which, like small beer, most use is made, it may be observed that the listener always laughs. Young ladies would do well to remember, that if laughter displays dimples, it creates dells; and young gentlemen, when they practise at the glass, would also do well to observe how far more becoming a long face is than a broad one. Broad faces are vulgar, and of all things they should avoid vulgarity. Laughter also is a plebeian emotion; nothing beyond a silent and transitory simper should ever be ​indulged in by the refined ranks. Be melancholy, be melancholy, according to your complexion! It was when our statesmen had long faces that the phrase long-headed was introduced as synonimous with wise. If the national physiognomy goes on for another century receding from the oval as it has done for the last, the next new mythology will make the man in the moon our progenitor, and prove the genealogy by the likeness.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XI/John Cassian/Conferences of John Cassian, Part III/Conference XXIII/Chapter 16

Chapter XVI.
What is the body of sin.
This then is that body of death from which we cannot escape, pent in which those who are perfect, who have tasted “how gracious the Lord is,” daily feel with the prophet “how bad for himself and bitter it is for a man to depart from the Lord his God.” This is the body of death which restrains us from the heavenly vision and drags us back to earthly things, which causes men while singing Psalms and kneeling in prayer to have their thoughts filled with human figures, or conversations, or business, or unnecessary actions. This is the body of death, owing to which those, who would emulate the sanctity of angels, and who long to cling continually to God, yet are unable to arrive at the perfection of this good, because the body of death stands in their way, but they do the evil that they would not, i.e., they are dragged down in their minds even to the things which have nothing to do with their advance and perfection in virtue. Finally that the blessed Apostle might clearly denote that he said this of saintly and perfect men, and those like himself, he in a way points with his finger to himself and at once proceeds: “And so I myself,” i.e., I who say this, lay bare the secrets of my own not another’s conscience. This mode of speech at any rate the Apostle is familiarly accustomed to use, whenever he wants to point specially to himself, as here: “I, Paul, myself beseech you by the mildness
and modesty of Christ;” and again: “except that I myself was not burdensome to you;” and once more: “But be it so: I myself did not burden you;” and elsewhere: “I, Paul, myself say unto you: if ye be circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing;” and to the Romans: “For I could wish that I myself were Anathema from Christ for my brethren.” But it cannot unreasonably be taken in this way, that “And so I myself” is expressly said with emphasis, i.e., I whom you know to be an Apostle of Christ, whom you venerate with the utmost respect, whom you believe to be of the highest character and perfect, and one in whom Christ speaks, though with the mind I serve the law of God, yet with the flesh I confess that I serve the law of sin, i.e., by the occupations of my human condition am sometimes dragged down from heavenly to earthly things and the height of my mind is brought down to the level of care for humble matters. And by this law of sin I find that at every moment I am so taken captive that although I persist in my immovable longing around the law of God, yet in no way can I escape the power of this captivity, unless I always fly to the grace of the Saviour.

## Footnotes

* ↑ Ps. xxxiii. (xxxiv.) 9.
* ↑ Jer. ii. 19.
* ↑ 2 Cor. x. 1; xii. 13, 16; Gal. v. 2; Rom. ix. 3.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XI/John Cassian/Conferences of John Cassian, Part III/Conference XXIII/Chapter 2

Chapter II.
How the Apostle completed many good actions.
It remains therefore for us to measure its meaning and drift from the inmost feelings of the speaker, and to discuss what the blessed Apostle called good, and what he pronounced by comparison evil, not by the bare meaning of the words, but with the same insight which he showed, and to investigate his meaning with due regard to the worth and goodness of the speaker. For then we shall be able to understand the words, which were uttered by God’s inspiration, in accordance with his purpose and wish, when we weigh the position and character of those by whom they were spoken, and are ourselves clothed with the same feelings (not in words but by experience), in accordance with the character of which most certainly all the thoughts are conceived and opinions uttered. Wherefore let us carefully consider what was in the main that good which the Apostle could not do when he would. For we know that there are many good things which we cannot deny that the blessed Apostle and all men as good as he either have by nature, or acquire by grace. For chastity is good, continence is praiseworthy, prudence is to be admired, kindness is liberal, sobriety is careful, temperance is modest, pity is kind, justice is holy: all of which we cannot doubt existed fully and in perfection in the Apostle Paul and his companions, so that they taught religion by the lesson of their virtues rather than their words. What if they were always consumed with the constant care of all the churches and watchful anxiety? How great a good is this pity, what perfection it is to burn for them that are offended, to be weak with the weak! If then the Apostle abounded with such good things, we cannot recognize what that good was, in the perfection of which the Apostle was lacking, unless we have advanced to that state of mind in which he was speaking. And so all those virtues which we say that he possessed, though they are like most splendid and precious gems, yet when they are compared with that most beautiful and unique pearl which the merchant in the gospel sought and wanted to acquire by selling all that he possessed, so does their value seem poor and trifling, so that if they are without hesitation got rid of, the possession of one good thing alone will enrich the man who sells countless good things.

## Footnotes

* ↑ Cf. 2 Cor. xi. 29.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XI/John Cassian/Conferences of John Cassian, Part III/Conference XXIII/Chapter 21

Chapter XXI.
That although we acknowledge that we cannot be without sin, yet still we ought not to suspend ourselves from the Lord’s Communion.
Yet we ought not to suspend ourselves from the Lord’s Communion because we confess ourselves sinners, but should more and more eagerly hasten to it for the healing of our soul, and purifying of our spirit, and seek the rather a remedy for our wounds with humility of mind and faith, as considering ourselves unworthy to receive so great grace. Otherwise we cannot worthily receive the Communion even once a year, as some do, who live in monasteries and so regard the dignity and holiness and value of the heavenly sacraments, as to think that none but saints and spotless persons should venture to receive them, and not rather that they would make us saints and pure by taking them. And these thereby fall into greater presumption and arrogance than what they seem to themselves to avoid, because at the time when they do receive them, they consider that they are worthy to receive them. But it is much better to receive them every Sunday for the healing of our infirmities, with that humility of heart, whereby we believe and confess that we can never touch those holy mysteries worthily, than to be puffed up by a foolish persuasion of heart, and believe that at the year’s end we are worthy to receive them. Wherefore that we may be able to grasp this and hold it fruitfully, let us the more earnestly implore the Lord’s mercy to help us to perform this, which is learnt not like other human arts, by some previous verbal explanation, but rather by experience and action leading the way; and which also unless it is often considered and hammered out in the Conferences of spiritual persons, and anxiously sifted by daily experience and trial of it, will either become obsolete through carelessness or perish by idle forgetfulness.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume XI/John Cassian/Conferences of John Cassian, Part III/Conference XXIII/Chapter 18

Chapter XVIII.
That even good and holy men are not without sin.
But that no one however holy is in this life free from trespasses and sin, we are told also by the teaching of the Saviour, who gave His disciples the form of the perfect prayer and among those other sublime and sacred commands, which as they were only given to the saints and perfect cannot apply to the wicked and unbelievers, He bade this to be inserted: “And forgive us our debts as we also forgive our debtors.” If then this is offered as a true prayer and by saints, as we ought without the shadow of a doubt to believe, who can be found so obstinate and impudent, so puffed up with the pride of the devil’s own rage, as to maintain that he is without sin, and not only to think himself greater than apostles, but also to charge the Saviour Himself with ignorance or folly, as if He either did not know that some men could be free from debts, or was idly teaching those whom He knew to stand in no need of the remedy of that prayer? But since all the saints who altogether keep the commands of their King, say every day “Forgive us our debts,” if they speak the truth there is indeed no one free from sin, but if they speak falsely, it is equally true that they are not free from the sin of falsehood. Wherefore also that most wise Ecclesiastes reviewing in his mind all the actions and purposes of men declares without any exception: “that there is not a righteous man upon earth, that doeth good and sinneth not,” i.e., no one ever could or ever will be found on this earth so holy, so diligent, so earnest as to be able continually to cling to that true and unique good, and not day after day to feel that he is drawn aside from it and fails. But still though he maintains that he cannot be free from wrong doing, yet none the less we must not deny that he is righteous.

## Footnotes

* ↑ S. Matt. vi. 12.
* ↑ Eccl. vii. 21.