1 In the case of Savonarola such a want has now been fairly well supplied by Villari and other writers. For a good portrait of Erasmus, see “Erasmus, his Life and Character,” by Robert Blackley Drummond, B.A. 2 vols., 1873.
2 “That godly clerk and great preacher” is the description of him in the English Homilies, Hom. i.
3 “Remains,” vol. iii. Letters to Dr. Woodward and Mrs. Hannah More.
4 Wall, on Infant Baptism, endeavours to prove that she was a Pagan, in order to account for the delay in Chrysostom’s baptism, but his reasons are far from convincing.
22 See references in Bingham, vol. iii. b. xi. Wall, vol. ii.
23 Basil: Exhort. ad Baptismum; Greg. Nazianz. Orat. 40 de Bapt.; Nyssen, de Bapt.; Chrysost. in Acta Apost. vol. ix. hom. i. in fine, and in Illumin. Catechesis, vol. ii. p. 223.
24 Philostorgius, ii. 7; Socrates, i. 23; Theod. i. 21.
26 Athanas. Hist. Arian. 20, 21; Theod. ii. 9, 10.
27 Socr. ii. 26; he had been deposed from the rank of presbyter because he was a eunuch, in accordance with the provision of the Council of Nice, c. i. Labbe, i. p. 28.
73 Tillemont maintains that the Theodore to whom the first letter is addressed must have been a different person from the fellow-student of Chrysostom and eventual Bishop of Mopsuestia, but he stands alone in this opinion, and his reasons for it seem inadequate.—Till. xi. note vi. p. 550.
75 Sulp. Sever. Vit. St. Martin. lib. i. p. 224. The affectation of reluctance to be consecrated became a fashion in the Coptic Church. The patriarch-designate of Alexandria is at this day brought to Cairo, loaded with chains, as if to prevent his escape.—Stanley, Eastern Church, lect. vii. p. 226.
76 C. 5. This word may refer to the bishops or the people. Ambrose calls the people his “parentes,” because they had elected him bishop.—Comment. in Luc. l. viii. c. 17.
83 The words priest and bishop are employed, in the following translations and paraphrases, to correspond with ?e?e?? and ?p?s??p??, which are used in the original without much apparent distinction. Chrysostom is speaking of the priesthood generally, and it is not easy to say which Order he has in his mind at any given moment.
91 Ammian. Marcell. lib. xxvii. c. 3. Socrat. lib. iv. c. 29. See a multitude of evidence carefully collected on this subject in Bingham, vol. i. b. iv. ch. 2.
93 Comp. in Act. Apost. Hom. iii. 5. “Men now aim at a bishopric like any secular office. To win glory and honour among men we peril our salvation.... Consuls and prefects do not enjoy such honour as he who presides over the Church. Go to court, or to the houses of lords and ladies, and whom do you find foremost there? no one is put before the bishop.”
121 The custom of one monk reading the Scriptures aloud during dinner was first adopted, according to Cassian, in the Cappadocian monasteries.—Cass. lib. iv. c. 17; Sozom. iii. 14; Jerome’s translation of the rule.
128 In Matt. Hom. 68, c. 3. When they received the Eucharist, which they did twice a week, on Sundays and Saturdays, they threw off their coats of skin, and loosened their girdles.—Sozom. iii. 14.
129 In Matt. Hom. 68, c. 3; 69, c. 3; in 1 Tim. Hom. 14, c. 4, 5.
145 The word in the decree is “militare,” but this term appears to be applied to civil duties as well as military. Vide Suicer, sub v.st?ate?e??. The Egyptian monks, however, do seem to have been specially forced into the army. De Broglie, v. 303; Gibbon, iv.; Milman, History of Christianity, iii. 47.
166 The bishops of Egypt and the West generally adhered to Paulinus, Sozom. vii. 11, till by the united efforts of Chrysostom and Theophilus the universal acknowledgment of Flavian was obtained in A.D. 398.
179 Euseb. Vita Const. iii. 50. Chrysost. vol. iii. p. 160 and vol. xi. p. 78. Vide also MÜller de Antiq. Antioch., p. 103.
180 This description of Antioch is mainly collected from MÜller’s admirable and exhaustive work on the Antiquities of Antioch, or from the authorities referred to therein.
181 See Socrates vi. 1, and Montfaucon’s preface to “De Sacerdotio.”
185 C. 4. Executed in 371 in the reign of Valentinian, Valens, and Gratian; Ammian. Marcell. xxix. 1, who calls him a Gaul, not, as Chrysostom, a Sicilian.
207 To the establishment of parochial divisions with separate pastors in Alexandria we have the direct testimony of Epiphanius, HÆres. 69; Arian. c. 1. In Rome, however, and Constantinople, though the churches were numerous, the clergy seem to have been more or less connected with the mother Church.—Vide Bingham, chap. viii. 5, book ix.
208e??a??s??? e?te??? ?a? ?pe???????—applied by rather a strong rhetorical licence to a man forty years old.
209?d?p? p??te???. This seems to prove that he had not preached during his diaconate.
234 It is a treatise, because too long for a homily, though mutilated of its proper conclusion. It must belong to the first two years of his priesthood, because it promises a more ample discussion of several points, which promise we find redeemed in the homilies against the Jews, and these homilies, again, can be proved, by internal evidence, to have been delivered not later than A.D. 387. See Montfaucon’s Monitum, vol. i. pp. 811 and 839.
246 See Perowne, vol. i. in loco; Ps. lxxii. 6; and Delitzsch in Isa. lx. 17.
247 Milman’s History of the Jews, vol. ii. book xix.
248 Basnage’s Hist. des Juifs, vi. 41. Newman’s Arians, ch. i. sect. i.
249 V. in fine; robbers may possibly be used in a figurative sense.
250 I. c. 7. They seem early to have claimed medical skill. When Simon Ben Jochai went to Rome as ambassador, in the reign of Antoninus Pius, to obtain the abrogation of persecuting edicts, he won the favour of the Emperor by curing his sick daughter—Milman, ii. 443.
253 i. c. 7. So the idle youth of Rome turned for amusement into the Synagogue. Horace, Sat. ix. 69.
254?p?????s?ete ????????. i. 4. This admonition “Discern one another” was uttered just at the close of the Missa Catechumenorum, when all but the baptized had to depart.
255 Newman’s Arians, ch. i. p. 16. Hefele, pp. 305, 306.
257 According to Theod. iii. 20, the Jews had ceased to offer sacrifices by the reign of Julian, and when he inquired the reason, said, because it was unlawful except on the site of the Temple; and this was one chief reason why Julian commanded the Temple to be restored.
270 Perhaps that convulsive twitching which we call “quick blood.”
271 In Ephes. Hom. xii. c. 3. In Hom. viii. and xii. on 1 Cor. he rebukes the heathenish ceremonies performed at the birth of a child. One was, to give it that name which was attached to the candle that burned longest out of a row of candles.
277 Cod. Theod. xvi. v. 10, lib. 7, 9. Sozomen informs us (vii. 22) that Eugenius, the usurper, after the death of Valentinian II., was persuaded by divinations to take up arms.
286 Probably the prÆtorium built in the reign of Constantine for the Count of the East, who from that time resided in Antioch; vide MÜller, Antiq. Antioch., ii. 16.
287 Liban. Or. 12, p. 395, and 21, p. 527. Theod. vii. 20. Sozom. vii. 23. Zos. iv. 41.
288 Chrys. Hom. de Stat. iii. 1; xxi. 1. Zosimus (iv. 41) sends Libanius also to Constantinople, but this is a palpable error. There is no trace of his having gone, either in his own Orations or in any other historian.
289 Socrat. vi. 5. The most common practice was for the preacher to sit, the people to stand.
300 xx. 9. A passage in another homily on this subject is curious, as proving that just the same jugglers’ feats were performed in Antioch in the fourth century as at the fairs and races of the present day:—“Persons pretended it was next to impossible to conquer an inveterate habit: this was a paltry excuse, perseverance could conquer any difficulty. To unlearn a habit of swearing could not be more impossible than to acquire the art of throwing up swords, and catching them by the handle, or balancing a pole on the forehead with two boys at the top of it, or dancing on a tightrope.”—Hom. in Dom. Serv.
310 xii. 2-4; xiii. 3. Comp. Aristotle’s distinction between natural and conventional law or justice, Eth. v. 7.1: f?s???? and ?????? d??a???. Compare also his description of p??a??es?? as the ???? ????se?? in b. iii., and of f????s?? (nearly = Butler’s “Conscience”) in b. vi.
311 Comp. again what Aristotle says of the necessity of training to improve the natural gifts, b. x. 9, and of the formation of habits by repeated acts. Comp. Chrys. Hom. xiii. 3, with Arist. Eth. ii. 4, 5.
317 Liban. Orat. 20. De Broglie, vi. 150, 151. Chrys. Hom. xvii. 2.
318 xvii. 2. The colonnades, especially of the great street which ran through the city from east to west; the pe??p?t??? or promenades were lined by colonnades with seats.—Vide MÜller, Antiq. Ant. ii. 12.
323 It was the custom to signalise the great festivals by acts of mercy. “The oil of mercy glistens on the Festivals of the Church,” says Ambrose, Serm. 14, on Ps. cxviii. 7. Leo the Great also, Serm. 39, alludes to the custom. But, to prevent any abuse of the practice, it was enacted by Theodosius in A.D. 384-385, that it should apply only to those accused of petty offences: the grosser crimes of robbery, adultery, magic, murder, sacrilege, were to be excepted from claims to this indulgence.
328 Called ????a?? t?? ?p?s???????, this last word being the name of Ascension Day among the Cappadocians, possibly because Christ’s work on earth for man’s redemption was completed by his return into heaven. (Vide Leo Allatius, quoted in Suicer, Thesaur., sub verbo “Episozomene,” and Bingham, Antiq. b. xx. sect. 5.)
332 Hom. de CÆmet. et Cruce, vol. ii. c. i. in Ascens. Christi, vol. ii., and de Sanct. Martyr. vol. ii. p. 705. The Sunday corresponding to the present Trinity Sunday was kept as a kind of All Saints’ Day. See Bingham, b. xx. c. 7, sect. 14.
333 Aug. Hom. xxvi. Gelas. Decret. in Grabe, vol. i. The word “legend” is perhaps derived from these Acts of the Saints, which were to be read—“legenda.”
341 Flavian caused the remains of some much-revered saints who were buried beneath the pavement of the church to be taken up, and placed in another separate grave, because the people were distressed that the reliques of such venerated personages should repose in the same vaults with the remains of less saintly, if not heretical, characters.—Hom. in Ascen.
342 De S. Babyla, c. 12. De Stat. i. 2, and viii. 2. Quod Christus sit Deus, c. 7. De Stat. v. 1.
350 See Dr. Hessey’s Bampton Lectures, “on Sunday.”
351 Whether it was a regular custom for the rustic population to visit Antioch on this day, or whether it was the first great influx for trade and legal business after the recent suspension of all business, does not appear.
356 Ignatius is said to have first introduced antiphonal singing at Antioch, Flavian and Diodorus to have established it there; Socr. v. 8; Theod. ii. 19. Basil refers to it as a common practice, but Ambrose is generally allowed to have introduced it to the Western Church, and on this occasion. Vide Suicer.
368 Socr. v. 26. Sozom. vii. 29. Ambrosii Vita a Paul. scripta, de obit. Theod.
369 Of course I do not forget that the idea and name of Roman Emperor and Roman Empire lived on for centuries more, but the elevation of Charles the Great was a revolt against the old order of things. He can hardly be regarded as a successor of Theodosius so truly as Theodosius was a successor of Augustus.
372 Philostorg. xi. 3. For much assistance in his notices of Rufinus and Eutropius, the writer must pay his acknowledgments to the admirable work by AmÉdÉe Thierry: “Les trois ministres des fils de ThÉodose”—Rufin, Eutrope, Stilicon.
381 Possibly alluded to by Chrysostom in Hom. iv. de Penitentia, c. 2, where he mentions “incursions of enemies” among other recent calamities. These homilies were probably delivered in A.D. 395.
407 The title Patriarch is occasionally used in the following pages, although it does not appear to have been a formally recognised title till fifty years later. Socrates (A.D. 440 about) uses it (vide c. 8), but the first occurrence of it in any public document is in the acts of the Council of Chalcedon, A.D. 451, where it is applied especially to Leo i. of Rome.—Can. 28. LabbÉ, vol. iv.
415 See Hefele, p. 131, and on the date of this synod.
416 Stanley, Eastern Church, lecture v. Socr. i. 11. Sozom. i. 23. The truth of the story has been disputed, but apparently on insufficient grounds. Vide Hefele, p. 436.
432 From this and what follows it would appear that communicants went within the rails to receive, and close to the altar. This was the most primitive custom. Sometimes the recipients stood; vide passages cited in Bingham, b. viii. ch. 6, sec. 7.
436 The use of silk seems from its first introduction into the Empire to have been regarded as the ne plus ultra of luxury. It was condemned by Pliny, vi. 20, xi. 21. Elagabalus was the first man as well as the first Emperor who ventured to wear a material hitherto confined to female dress. See Gibbon, vol. vii. c. 40, and his interesting account of the introduction of silk-worms from China to Constantinople by some Persian monks in the reign of Justinian.
443 Hom. xx. in Act. Apost. p. 162. This set of fifty-five Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles, of which much use is made in this chapter, was delivered in A.D. 400, between Easter and Whitsuntide, in which interval it was customary to read through the Acts in the Lessons for the day: vide Bingham, vol. iv. These homilies are among the least polished of Chrysostom’s productions. Erasmus, who translated them into Latin, was thoroughly disappointed and out of humour with them, and even doubts their authenticity. In a letter to Tonstal, Bp. of Durham, he declares that he could have written better matter himself even when “ebrius ac stertens.” But most persons familiar with Chrysostom’s productions will agree with Montfaucon and Savile that these homilies could have flowed only from that golden vein, though the ore is not so much refined as usual, and that some passages are in his very best style. None of his homilies, except those on the Statues and St. Matthew, contain more curious revelations of the manners and customs of the age.
450 Vol. xii. Hom. vi. adv. Cath. pp. 143 and 491.
451 Vol. xii. Hom. i., “Quod frequenter,” etc. Socrates, vi. 22. If we may estimate the man from the account by Socrates, his admirer, who relates a number of his so-called witticisms, the book is no great loss.
452 Greg. de Vita sua, pp. 585-1097. Orat. xxii., xxvii., xxxii.
454 Socrates, vi. 8. Vide Dean Stanley, Eastern Church, pp. 131, 132, for specimens of these Thalia; e.g. one commences, “Where are those who say that the Three are but one power?”
462 Vol. xii. 471. The titles “mother of churches,” “nurse of monks,” “staff of the poor,” etc., were not bestowed till after his return from his first exile, vol. iii. p. 446. M. Thierry has erroneously introduced them into this earlier stage of his life.
463 Claud. in Eutrop. lib. i. The pathetic appeal is by Claudian put into the mouth of an allegorical impersonation of the city. Claudian was the intimate friend and companion of Stilicho, and may not improbably have assisted at this audience. He is a valuable guide to the history of this period, and especially as an indicator of public opinion on the great events of his day.
464 Gibbon, vol. v. p. 361. Claudian, De Consul. Mall. Theod.
500 The Alexandrian Chronicle is precise in fixing Dec. 23, A.D. 400, as the date of his defeat on the Hellespont, and Jan. 3, A.D. 401, as the day on which his head was brought into Constantinople. This certainly leaves a very insufficient interval for the events recorded in Zosimus.
502 Palladius, author of the Dialogue prefixed to Migne’s edition of Chrysostom’s works. On the debated question whether this Palladius was the same Bishop of Hellenopolis who wrote the Lausiaca, vide Tillemont, xi. “Vie de Pallade.”
503 There was in fact what might be called a floating synod of this kind always in existence in Constantinople; the Patriarch being ex officio President.—Tillemont, xv. 703, 704.
504 We are in the summer of A.D. 400, and the capture and death of GaÏnas occurred in Jan. A.D. 401.
505s?? t?? t???t?ta; sometimes we have ?s??t?ta, “your Holiness.”
507 See, on this whole subject, Bingham, viii. 13. 6; and Robertson, i. pp. 187 and 318, and the authorities there cited.
508 Pallad. Dial. c. 14, 15. Sozomen (viii. 6) says that Chrysostom deposed thirteen bishops of Asia, Lycia, and Phrygia. This is possible, as the synod may have inquired into other simoniacal cases beyond the original six.
511 LabbÉ, ii. p. 947. It must always be borne in mind that Diocese was the name of the largest civil division of the Roman Empire. Each diocese contained several provinces, e.g. Thrace, six; Asia, ten; Pontus, eleven. The whole Empire was divided into thirteen dioceses, and about one hundred and twenty provinces. The Ecclesiastical divisions followed more or less the plan of the civil. An archbishop was bishop of the metropolis of a Province, a Patriarch of one or more Dioceses.
512 Can. xxviii.; and Can. ix. Chalced. in LabbÉ, iv. pp. 769 and 798.
523 Theophilus is said to have fallen down before her and kissed her knees, an obeisance prompted by avaricious hopes on his part, and repelled by genuine humility on hers.
530 Jerome declared that Origen had composed more books than most men would find time to copy.—Epist. xxix.
531 The Paschal Letter was a circular addressed to clergy and monks throughout the diocese soon after the Epiphany; the primary object was to announce the date of the first day of Lent and of Easter Day, whence the name; but other matters were, as in the present instance, frequently introduced. See Tillemont, xi. 462.
535 The contest for precedence was eventually decided in favour of Jerusalem. The see was made a Patriarchate in the reign of Theodosius II., and its jurisdiction fixed to the three Palestines by the Council of Chalcedon, A.D. 451.
543 Pallad. Dial. c. 6. Other causes of the enmity of Theophilus are mentioned by Socrates, vi. 9, and Sozomen, viii. 12, but not incompatible with the account of Palladius.
572 Phot. c. 59. Chrys. Ep. 125 ad Cyr., where he indignantly repels the charge:—“had he done so, might his name be blotted out from the roll of bishops;” but at the same time he deprecates the treatment of such an offence (had it been committed) with extreme severity: for had not our Lord Himself instituted that holy feast, and had not St. Paul baptized without previously fasting? Chrysostom shrinks in horror from the supposition of such a gross violation of ecclesiastical rule as the act in his case would have been, but refuses to place it on the same footing with the commission of a flagrant moral crime, or direct disobedience to any command of Christ. There are, however, some doubts whether this letter is genuine. See infra, p. 317, and note.
575 It contains the celebrated passage: “Herodias again dances and demands the head of John;” which recurs as the exordium of another and spurious homily (vol. viii. p. 485), and also an indignant repudiation of the offence of administering baptism after eating.—vol. iii. 427. Socrates, vi. 16. Sozom. viii. 17, 18.
576 The authenticity of which has been questioned. The style is perhaps not quite worthy of Chrysostom; but in one of his sermons after his return from exile he apparently alludes to some quotations from Job made in this discourse.
577 More strictly speaking, “the Hieron,” “the sacred spot” where the Argonauts were supposed to have offered sacrifice to Zeus on their return from Colchis.
578 Sozom. viii. 18, 19. Socrat. vi. 16, 17. Zosim. v. 23.
580 Socr. vi. 16. Soz. viii. 18. Chrys. Ep. ad Innoc. in Dial. Pall. p. 10.
581 It appears from subsequent events that Theophilus had not yet actually quitted Constantinople, but he and his partisans had retired for the time discomfited from the field of active opposition; and this would justify the language of Chrysostom, who is speaking under excitement.
582 Sermones 1 and 2, post red. ab exsil. vol. iii.
587 The celebrated exordium of a homily supposed to be directed against Eudoxia—“Again Herodias rages, again she demands the head of John”—if actually spoken with reference to John the Baptist, may easily have been represented by the malevolent as aimed at the Empress. But the whole homily has been pronounced spurious by Savile and Montfaucon, and on perusal of it their verdict seems reasonable. The discourse is the production of a thorough misogynist, describing with much coarseness and acrimony the misery and trouble caused by the wickedness of women. Most will agree with Savile, that it is “scarcely worth reading, and quite unworthy emendation.”—Vol. viii. p. 485.
612 One previous letter we possess in Chrys. vol. iii. p. 539, in which he expresses his horror at the late outrages in the Church of St. Sophia, and at the gross violation of justice and law in the recent so-called trial of Chrysostom.
630 Epp. ccxxxiv. ccxxxvi. It is not mentioned in Pliny or Ptolemy, but appears in the Itinerary of Antonine as Cocusus (pp. 10, 13). It stood at the confluence of several roads, but apparently not high-roads, one of which connected Antioch with Asia Minor.
642 There seems no doubt that Maruthas was an able and active missionary bishop. Socrates (vii. 8) tells strange stories of his skill in exposing some tricks of the magi, by which they attempted to prejudice the Persian king Isdigerdes against Christianity.
663 Pallad. Dial. pp. 38, 39, who says that they came out of Syria, Cilicia, and Armenia: but how could this be if it took three months to convey Chrysostom from Cucusus to Comana?
665 This is his day in the Calendar of the Eastern and Western Church.
666 The Roman martyrology states that the remains of the saint were afterwards translated to St. Peter’s, Rome, but the statement is not supported by any trustworthy historical evidence.—Tillemont, xi. 352.
667 I must acknowledge my obligations in the composition of this chapter to the very useful and instructive work of Dr. Th. Foerster, Berlin, entitled “Chrysostomus in seinem VerhÄltniss zur Antiochenischen Schule.”—Gotha, 1869.
668 In Rom. Hom. xiii. 2. 1 Cor. Hom. xiii. 3. In Phil. vii. 5.
673 In Genes. Hom. xx. 3. In 1 Cor. Hom. ii. 2. In Matt. Hom. lix. 1, 2.
674 Comp. Jeremy Taylor, “On Original Sin,” ch. vi.: “A man is not naturally sinful as he is naturally heavy, or upright, naturally apt to weep and laugh; for these he is always and unavoidably.” Comp. also Aristot. Eth. ii. c. 1.
731 De Stat. xi. c. 5. The authenticity of the letter to CÆsarius is so doubtful that I have not ventured to introduce here the celebrated passage which it contains on this subject. It will be found in the Appendix, where the curious history of this letter is related.
739Vide Dr. Pusey, Eiren. i. p. 113: “We could preach whole volumes of the sermons of St. Augustine or St. Chrysostom to our people, to their edification and without offence: were a Roman Catholic preacher to confine himself to their preaching, he would (as it has been said among themselves) be regarded as ‘indevout towards Mary.’”
742 I have not thought it expedient to crowd the margin with references to Chrysostom’s works for every one of the liturgical forms above mentioned. They may nearly all be consulted in Bingham, book xv., who has collected them with great care. The fullest passages occur in vol. ii. p. 345; iii. p. 104; x. pp. 200 and 527; xi. p. 323. The so-called prayer of St. Chrysostom in our Prayer-Book is found in the Liturgies of St. Basil and St. Chrysostom, but cannot certainly be traced to either of those fathers. It was inserted at the end of the Litany in 1544, and of the Daily Service in 1661.
766 Vol. ix. p. 407. Comp. Jerome: “Quotusquisque nunc Aristotelem legit? quanti Platonis vel libros novere, vel nomen? Vix in angulis otiosi eos senes recolunt; rusticanos vero et piscatores nostros totus orbis loquitur, universus mundus sonat.”—In Galat. iii.
