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# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume V/Apologetic Works/The Great Catechism/Chapter XIII

Chapter XIII.
But, it is said, to be born and to die are conditions peculiar to the fleshly nature. I admit it. But what went before that Birth and what came after that Death escapes the mark of our common humanity. If we look to either term of our human life, we understand both from what we take our beginning, and in what we end. Man commenced his existence in a weakness and in a weakness completes it. But in the instance of the Incarnation neither did the birth begin with a weakness, nor in a weakness did the death terminate; for neither did sensual pleasure go before the birth, nor did corruption follow upon the death. Do you disbelieve this marvel? I quite welcome your incredulity. You thus entirely admit that those marvellous facts are supernatural, in the very way that you think that what is related is above belief. Let this very fact, then, that the proclamation of the mystery did not proceed in terms that are natural, be a proof to you of the manifestation of the Deity. For if what is related of Christ were within the bounds of nature, where were the Godhead? But if the account surpasses nature, then the very facts which you disbelieve are a demonstration that He who was thus proclaimed was God. A man is begotten by the conjunction of two persons, and after death is left in corruption. Had the Gospel comprised no more than this, you certainly would not have deemed him to be God, the testimony to whom was conveyed in terms peculiar only to our nature. But when you are told that He was born, and yet transcended our common humanity both in the manner of His birth, and by His incapacity of a change to corruption, it would be well if, in consequence of this, you would direct your incredulity upon the other point, so as to refuse to suppose Him to be one of those who have manifestly existed as mere men; for it follows of necessity that a person who does not believe that such and such a being is mere man, must be led on to the belief that He is God. Well, he who has recorded that He was born has related also that He was born of a Virgin. If, therefore, on the evidence stated, the fact of His being born is established as a matter of faith, it is altogether incredible, on the same evidence, that He was not born in the manner stated. For the author who mentions His birth adds also, that it was of a Virgin; and in recording His death bears further testimony to His resurrection from the dead. If, therefore, from what you are told, you grant that He both was born and died, on the same grounds you must admit that both His birth and death were independent of the conditions of human weakness,—in fact, were above nature. The conclusion, therefore, is that He Who has thus been shown to have been born under supernatural circumstances was certainly Himself not limited by nature.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume V/Apologetic Works/The Great Catechism/Chapter XIV

Chapter XIV.
“Then why,” it is asked, “did the Deity descend to such humiliation? Our faith is staggered to think that God, that incomprehensible, inconceivable, and ineffable reality, transcending all glory of greatness, wraps Himself up in the base covering of humanity, so that His sublime operations as well are debased by this admixture with the grovelling earth.”
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume V/Apologetic Works/The Great Catechism/Chapter XIX

Chapter XIX.
Nevertheless, since neither those who take the Greek view, nor yet the leaders of Jewish opinions, are willing to make such things the proofs of that Divine manifestation, it may be as well, as regards these demurrers to our statement, to treat more particularly the reason by virtue of which the Divine nature is combined with ours, saving, as it does, humanity by means of itself, and not working out its proposed design by means of a mere command. With what, then, must we begin, so as to conduct our thinking by a logical sequence to the proposed conclusion? What but this, viz. with a succinct detail of the notions that can religiously be entertained of God?

## Footnotes

* ↑ The Greek Fathers and the English divines for the most part confine themselves to showing this moral fitness and consonance with God’s nature in the Incarnation, and do not attempt to prove its absolute necessity. Cf. Athanasius, De Incarn. Verb. c. 6; Hooker, Eccles. Pol. V. li. 3; Butler’s Analogy, pt. ii. c. 5.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume V/Apologetic Works/The Great Catechism/Chapter XVII

Chapter XVII.
But it will be said that the objection which has been brought against us has not yet been solved, and that what unbelievers have urged has been rather strengthened by all we have said. For if, as our argument has shown, there is such power in Him that both the destruction of death and the introduction of life resides in Him, why does He not effect His purpose by the mere exercise of His will, instead of working out our salvation in such a roundabout way, by being born and nurtured as a man, and even, while he was saving man, tasting death; when it was possible for Him to have saved man without subjecting Himself to such conditions? Now to this, with all candid persons, it were sufficient to reply, that the sick do not dictate to their physicians the measures for their recovery, nor cavil with those who do them good as to the method of their healing; why, for instance, the medical man felt the diseased part and devised this or that particular remedy for the removal of the complaint, when they expected another; but the patient looks to the end and aim of the good work, and receives the benefit with gratitude. Seeing, however, as says the Prophet, that God’s abounding goodness keeps its utility concealed, and is not seen in complete clearness in this present life—otherwise, if the eyes could behold all that is hoped for, every objection of unbelievers would be removed,—but, as it is, abides the ages that are coming, when what is at present seen only by the eye of faith must be revealed, it is needful accordingly that, as far as we may, we should by the aid of arguments, the best within our reach, attempt to discover for these difficulties also a solution in harmony with what has gone before.

## Footnotes

* ↑ the Prophet, i.e. David; Ps. xxxi. 19: ὡς πολὺ τὸ πλῆθος τῆς χρηστότητός σου, κ.τ.λ. Hervetus translates Gregory here “divitiæ benignitatis,” as if he had found πλοῦτος in the text, which does not appear. Jerome twice translates the χρηστότης of LXX. by “bonitas”; Aquila and Symmachus have τί πολὺ τὸ ἀγαθόν σου. This is the later sense of χρηστότης, which originally meant “serviceableness” and then “uprightness” (Psalm xiii. 2, 4; xxxvi. 3; cxix. 66), rather than “kindness.”
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume VI/Prolegomena/Introductory

I.—Introductory.
St. Jerome’s importance lies in the facts: (1) That he was the author of the Vulgate Translation of the Bible into Latin, (2) That he bore the chief part in introducing the ascetic life into Western Europe, (3) That his writings more than those of any of the Fathers bring before us the general as well as the ecclesiastical life of his time. It was a time of special interest, the last age of the old Greco-Roman civilization, the beginning of an altered world. It included the reigns of Julian (361–63), Valens (364–78), Valentinian (364–75), Gratian (375–83), Theodosius (379–95) and his sons, the definitive establishment of orthodox Christianity in the Empire, and the sack of Rome by Alaric (410). It was the age of the great Fathers, of Ambrose and Augustine in the West, of Basil, the Gregories, and Chrysostom in the East. With several of these Jerome was brought into personal contact; of Ambrose he often speaks in his writings (Apol. i. 2, iii. 14, in this series Vol. iii., pp. 484 and 526; also this Vol., pp. 74 and 496, Pref. to Origen and S. Luke; and the Pref. to Didymus on the Holy Spirit, quoted in Rufinus’ Apology, ii. 24, 43, Vol. iii. of this series, pp. 470 and 480; also On Illust. Men, c. 124, Vol. iii. 383; see also Index—Ambrose); with Augustin he carried on an important correspondence (see Table of Contents); he studied under Gregory Nazianzen (80, 93; see also Illust. Men, c. 117, Vol. iii. 382) at the time of the Council at Constantinople, 381; he was acquainted with Gregory of Nyssa (Illust. Men, c. 128, Vol. iii. 338); he translated the diatribe of Theophilus of Alexandria against Chrysostom (214, 215). He ranks as one of the four Doctors of the Latin Church, and his influence was the most lasting; for, though he was not a great original thinker like Augustin, nor a champion like Ambrose, nor an organiser and spreader of Christianity like Gregory, his influence outlasted theirs. Their influence in the Middle Ages was confined to a comparatively small circle; but the monastic institutions which he introduced, the value for relics and sacred places which he defended, the deference which he showed for Episcopal authority, especially that of the Roman Pontiff, were the chief features of the Christian system for a thousand years; his Vulgate was the Bible of Western Christendom till the Reformation. To the theologian he is interesting rather for what he records than for any contribution of his own to the science; but to the historian his vivid descriptions of persons and things at an important though melancholy epoch of the world are of inestimable value.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume VI/Prolegomena/Character and Influence of Jerome

VI.—Character and Influence of Jerome.
This Introduction must be concluded with a few words on the character and influence of Jerome, which are taken from the article upon him in the Dictionary of Christian Biography. He was vain and unable to bear rivals, extremely sensitive as to the estimation in which he was held by his contemporaries, and especially by the Bishops; passionate and resentful, but at times becoming suddenly placable; scornful and violent in controversy; kind to the weak and the poor; respectful in his dealings with women; entirely without avarice; extraordinarily diligent in work, and nobly tenacious of the main objects to which he devoted his life. There was, however, something of monkish cowardice in his asceticism, and his influence was not felt by the strong.
His influence grew through his life and increased after his death. If we may use a scriptural phrase which has sometimes been applied to such influence, “He lived and reigned for a thousand years.” His writings contain the whole spirit of the Church of the Middle Ages, its monasticism, its contrast of sacred things with profane, its credulity and superstition, its value for relics, its subjection to hierarchical authority, its dread of heresy, its passion for pilgrimages. To the society which was thus in a great measure formed by him, his Bible was the greatest boon which could have been given. But he founded no school and had no inspiring power; there was no courage or width of view in his spiritual legacy such as could break through the fatal circle of bondage to received authority which was closing round mankind. As Thierry says in the last words of his work on St. Jerome, “There is no continuation of his work; a few more letters of Augustin and Paulinus, and night falls over the West.”
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume VI/Prolegomena/Chronological Tables

Chronological Tables of the Life and Times of St. Jerome A.D. 345–420.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume VI/Second Title Page

THE PRINCIPAL WORKS OF ST. JEROME.
Translated
by
the hon. w. h. fremantle, M.A.,
Canon of Canterbury Cathedral and Fellow and Tutor of Balliol College, Oxford,
with the assistance of
The rev. G. Lewis, M.A.,
Of Balliol College, Oxford, Vicar of Dodderhill near Droitwick,
and
The rev. w. g. martley, M.A.,
Of Balliol College, Oxford.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume VI/The Letters of St. Jerome
## Contents

* Letter 1
* Letter 2
* Letter 3
* Letter 4
* Letter 5
* Letter 6
* Letter 7
* Letter 8
* Letter 9
* Letter 10
* Letter 11
* Letter 12
* Letter 13
* Letter 14
* Letter 15
* Letter 16
* Letter 17
* Letter 18
* Letter 19
* Letter 20
* Letter 21
* Letter 22
* Letter 23
* Letter 24
* Letter 25
* Letter 26
* Letter 27
* Letter 28
* Letter 29
* Letter 30
* Letter 31
* Letter 32
* Letter 33
* Letter 34
* Letter 35
* Letter 36
* Letter 37
* Letter 38
* Letter 39
* Letter 40
* Letter 41
* Letter 42
* Letter 43
* Letter 44
* Letter 45
* Letter 46
* Letter 47
* Letter 48
* Letter 49
* Letter 50
* Letter 51
* Letter 52
* Letter 53
* Letter 54
* Letter 55
* Letter 56
* Letter 57
* Letter 58
* Letter 59
* Letter 60
* Letter 61
* Letter 62
* Letter 63
* Letter 64
* Letter 65
* Letter 66
* Letter 67
* Letter 68
* Letter 69
* Letter 70
* Letter 71
* Letter 72
* Letter 73
* Letter 74
* Letter 75
* Letter 76
* Letter 77
* Letter 78
* Letter 79
* Letter 80
* Letter 81
* Letter 82
* Letter 83
* Letter 84
* Letter 85
* Letter 86
* Letter 87
* Letter 88
* Letter 89
* Letter 90
* Letter 91
* Letter 92
* Letter 93
* Letter 94
* Letter 95
* Letter 96
* Letter 97
* Letter 98
* Letter 99
* Letter 100
* Letter 101
* Letter 102
* Letter 103
* Letter 104
* Letter 105
* Letter 106
* Letter 107
* Letter 108
* Letter 109
* Letter 110
* Letter 111
* Letter 112
* Letter 113
* Letter 114
* Letter 115
* Letter 116
* Letter 117
* Letter 118
* Letter 119
* Letter 120
* Letter 121
* Letter 122
* Letter 123
* Letter 124
* Letter 125
* Letter 126
* Letter 127
* Letter 128
* Letter 129
* Letter 130
* Letter 131
* Letter 132
* Letter 133
* Letter 134
* Letter 135
* Letter 136
* Letter 137
* Letter 138
* Letter 139
* Letter 140
* Letter 141
* Letter 142
* Letter 143
* Letter 144
* Letter 145
* Letter 146
* Letter 147
* Letter 148
* Letter 149
* Letter 150
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume IX/Title Page/De Trinitate or On the Trinity
## Contents

* Introduction
* De Trinitate or On the Trinity
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume IX/Title Page/De Trinitate or On the Trinity/De Trinitate or On the Trinity
## Contents

* Book I
* Book II
* Book III
* Book IV
* Book V
* Book VI
* Book VII
* Book VIII
* Book IX
* Book X
* Book XI
* Book XII
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume VIII/Expositions on the Book of Psalms/Psalm XLIX
## Contents

* Part 1
* Part 2
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume V/Philosophical Works/The Making of Man/On the Making of Man/Chapter 10

IX. That the form of man was framed to serve as an instrument for the use of reason.
1. Now since our Maker has bestowed upon our formation a certain Godlike grace, by implanting in His image the likeness of His own excellences, for this reason He gave, of His bounty, His other good gifts to human nature; but mind and reason we cannot strictly say that He gave, but that He imparted them, adding to the image the proper adornment of His own nature. Now since the mind is a thing intelligible and incorporeal, its grace would have been incommunicable and isolated, if its motion were not manifested by some contrivance. For this cause there was still need of this instrumental organization, that it might, like a plectrum, touch the vocal organs and indicate by the quality of the notes struck, the motion within.
2. And as some skilled musician, who may have been deprived by some affection of his own voice, and yet wish to make his skill known, might make melody with voices of others, and publish his art by the aid of flutes or of the lyre, so also the human mind being a discoverer of all sorts of conceptions, seeing that it is unable, by the mere soul, to reveal to those who hear by bodily senses the motions of its understanding, touches, like some skilful composer, these animated instruments, and makes known its hidden thoughts by means of the sound produced upon them.
3. Now the music of the human instrument is a sort of compound of flute and lyre, sounding together in combination as in a concerted piece of music. For the breath, as it is forced up from the air-receiving vessels through the windpipe, when the speaker’s impulse to utterance attunes the harmony to sound, and as it strikes against the internal protuberances which divide this flute-like passage in a circular arrangement, imitates in a way the sound uttered through a flute, being driven round and round by the membranous projections. But the palate receives the sound from below in its own concavity, and dividing the sound by the two passages that extend to the nostrils, and by the cartilages about the perforated bone, as it were by some scaly protuberance, makes its resonance louder; while the cheek, the tongue, the mechanism of the pharynx by which the chin is relaxed when drawn in, and tightened when extended to a point—all these in many different ways answer to the motion of the plectrum upon the strings, varying very quickly, as occasion requires, the arrangement of the tones; and the opening and closing of the lips has the same effect as players produce when they check the breath of the flute with their fingers according to the measure of the tune.

## Footnotes

* ↑ This and part of the next chapter, according to the division of the Greek, are included in the ninth chapter of the Latin Version.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume V/Philosophical Works/The Making of Man/On the Making of Man/Chapter 12

XI. That the nature of mind is invisible.
1. What then is, in its own nature, this mind that distributes itself into faculties of sensation, and duly receives, by means of each, the knowledge of things? That it is something else besides the senses, I suppose no reasonable man doubts; for if it were identical with sense, it would reduce the proper character of the operations carried on by sense to one, on the ground that it is itself simple, and that in what is simple no diversity is to be found. Now however, as all agree that touch is one thing and smell another, and as the rest of the senses are in like manner so situated with regard to each other as to exclude intercommunion or mixture, we must surely suppose, since the mind is duly present in each case, that it is something else besides the sensitive nature, so that no variation may attach to a thing intelligible.
2. “Who hath known the mind of the Lord?” the apostle asks; and I ask further, who has understood his own mind? Let those tell us who consider the nature of God to be within their comprehension, whether they understand themselves—if they know the nature of their own mind. “It is manifold and much compounded.” How then can that which is intelligible be composite? or what is the mode of mixture of things that differ in kind? Or, “It is simple, and incomposite.” How then is it dispersed into the manifold divisions of the senses? how is there diversity in unity? how is unity maintained in diversity?
3. But I find the solution of these difficulties by recourse to the very utterance of God; for He says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” The image is properly an image so long as it fails in none of those attributes which we perceive in the archetype; but where it falls from its resemblance to the prototype it ceases in that respect to be an image; therefore, since one of the attributes we contemplate in the Divine nature is incomprehensibility of essence, it is clearly necessary that in this point the image should be able to show its imitation of the archetype.
4. For if, while the archetype transcends comprehension, the nature of the image were comprehended, the contrary character of the attributes we behold in them would prove the defect of the image; but since the nature of our mind, which is the likeness of the Creator evades our knowledge, it has an accurate resemblance to the superior nature, figuring by its own unknowableness the incomprehensible Nature.

## Footnotes

* ↑ The Bodleian ms. of the Latin version gives as the title:—“The definition of the human mind.”
* ↑ Rom. xi. 34.
* ↑ Gen. i. 26.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume V/Philosophical Works/The Making of Man/On the Making of Man/Chapter 15

XIV. That the mind is not in a part of the body; wherein also is a distinction of the movements of the body and of the soul.
1. But we have wandered far from our subject, for the purpose of our argument was to show that the mind is not restricted to any part of the body, but is equally in touch with the whole, producing its motion according to the nature of the part which is under its influence. There are cases, however, in which the mind even follows the bodily impulses, and becomes, as it were, their servant; for often the bodily nature takes the lead by introducing either the sense of that which gives pain or the desire for that which gives pleasure, so that it may be said to furnish the first beginnings, by producing in us the desire for food, or, generally, the impulse towards some pleasant thing; while the mind, receiving such an impulse, furnishes the body by its own intelligence with the proper means towards the desired object. Such a condition, indeed, does not occur in all, save in those of a somewhat slavish disposition, who bring the reason into bondage to the impulses of their nature and pay servile homage to the pleasures of sense by allowing them the alliance of their mind; but in the case of more perfect men this does not happen; for the mind takes the lead, and chooses the expedient course by reason and not by passion, while their nature follows in the tracks of its leader.
2. But since our argument discovered in our vital faculty three different varieties—one which receives nourishment without perception, another which at once receives nourishment and is capable of perception, but is without the reasoning activity, and a third rational, perfect, and co-extensive with the whole faculty—so that among these varieties the advantage belongs to the intellectual,—let no one suppose on this account that in the compound nature of man there are three souls welded together, contemplated each in its own limits, so that one should think man’s nature to be a sort of conglomeration of several souls. The true and perfect soul is naturally one, the intellectual and immaterial, which mingles with our material nature by the agency of the senses; but all that is of material nature, being subject to mutation and alteration, will, if it should partake of the animating power, move by way of growth: if, on the contrary, it should fall away from the vital energy, it will reduce its motion to destruction.
3. Thus, neither is there perception without material substance, nor does the act of perception take place without the intellectual faculty.

## Footnotes

* ↑ This is chapter xv. in the Latin version and some Greek mss. The Bodleian ms. of the Latin gives the title:—“That the mind is sometimes in servitude to the body, and of its three differences, vital, spiritual, and rational.”
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume I/Church History of Eusebius/Notes and table/Note 10

On Bk. III. chap. 39, § 16.
For from the first epistle of John and from that of Peter likewise, read from the former epistle of John and from the epistle of Peter likewise. See p. 388.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume I/Church History of Eusebius/Notes and table/Note 11

On Bk. IV. chap. 10.
For the Pious, read Pius.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume I/Church History of Eusebius/Notes and table/Macedonian Months

Table of Macedonian Months
The months of the Macedonian year, as commonly employed in the time of Eusebius, corresponded exactly to the Roman months, but the year began with the first of September. The names of the months were as follows:—
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume I/Church History of Eusebius/Notes and table/Note 1

On Bk. III. chap. 3, § 5 (note 17, continued).
Since this note was in type Dr. Gardiner’s admirable and exhaustive essay on the authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews (in the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. XIV. p. 341 sq.) has come to hand, and I have been much pleased to see that the theory that Barnabas wrote the epistle is accepted and defended with vigor.