Second Dissertation

Clement says elsewhere that an Argive by the name of Argo constructed the statue of Juno of Tiryns. Perhaps no more has been committed to writing about this sculptor than about the previous one, unless he is the same one whom Pliny calls an Argive and a disciple of Polycletus. As for this Polycletus, whom Clement invokes elsewhere, Pliny mentions him frequently; anyone can easily consult him.

We read that it was rightly observed by Clement that the works of the sculptor Lysippus were esteemed to be of no less value than those of the painter Apelles. It is for this reason that Alexander the Great, as Pliny, Cicero, and others relate, wished to be painted by no one other than Apelles and to be sculpted by no one other than Lysippus. Hence that verse of Horace:

*He forbade by edict that anyone but Apelles* *Should paint him, or any other than Lysippus* *Should mold in bronze the face of the brave Alexander.*

Moreover, although the works of Lysippus were of such high value, one may easily gather from the things that Pliny narrates that his facility in crafting them was no less than his art and industry. For Lysippus, he says, is said to have made 1500 works, all of such art that each of them could have granted him renown. Finally, many others praised by our Clement are to be found. But we have discussed those above and in the preceding book.

SECOND DISSERTATION ON THE BOOKS OF THE STROMATA. CHAPTER FIRST ANALYSIS OF THESE BOOKS.

ARTICLE I. Analysis of the first book.

Although the beginning of this work—or rather the preface to it—long ago perished entirely through the injury of time, we easily understand from those things which survive that in the prologue of this work, which is so greatly missed, the work itself was undoubtedly directed by its most learned author to a certain friend of his, so that it might always be at hand for him either to peruse or to share with others. Before Clement addresses his subject matter, he makes it perfectly clear that for an upright man, or a Christian preaching the truth, the ability to write useful books cannot be denied, a right that was once granted to Theopompus and Timaeus, who peddled curses and fables, to Epicurus, the author and leader of impiety, and to Hipponax and Archilochus, who recounted base things. Furthermore, since books and writings are the children of our soul, and catechists are truly the spiritual fathers of those whom they instruct; and since even philosophy itself gladly shares itself with others; no man could justly say that it is forbidden to leave behind for posterity certain commentaries for the good of others.

Nor does Clement wish it to be objected against him that there is not a knowledge for all, and that Christ frequently spoke in parables so that the hearers would not understand. For among men there are by far more who can perceive the doctrine delivered to them. Christ, however, did speak in parables in reality, but to refute the coming ignorance of men. And this is confirmed by that same parable of the Lord Christ, by which he teaches that those who have been imbued with the divine word ought, like the Apostle, not only to share it with others but also to put it to use. If any, however, have not received doctrine of this kind, the blame for this is to be attributed to them alone; for whether it is delivered in writing or by voice, Clement clearly demonstrates that it is angelic and that its effects are marvelous.

But he diligently warns us that we ought to distribute it, just like the Eucharist, not rashly and indiscriminately to all, but only to those who have shown themselves worthy to receive or to communicate it. Therefore, he clearly reveals what the status of the one communicating and of the one receiving ought to be, and what conditions are required in both: namely, that in the one teaching and writing, there is no hope or desire for reward, base profit, or vain glory, but a mind always alien to corruption, filth, and adulation, intent only on procuring the salvation of one’s neighbor gratis; and in the auditor and reader, no vice of an overly curious mind, no hypocrisy, but always a perfect conscience. But if the harvest of these be more abundant—that is, the number greater—then those who write or teach ought also to pray to God himself that the company of their companions might be great and increase. And they themselves, just like good farmers who have scattered good grain in the minds of others, if they have fed some who were recalled from error with spiritual food, that is, with the true doctrine, then they will truly be ministers of God and will receive from Him a worthy reward for their labors.

But because that spiritual food can be increased in a twofold way—namely, by knowledge and by Greek philosophy, which, like nuts, contains one thing that is good and edible, and another that is useless and to be rejected—he teaches that it is not to be distributed to those whose mind is still preoccupied with human doctrine and not yet empty of the various captious arguments of subtle disputes; but to others who have the faith, which is followed by persuasion.

Furthermore, he demonstrates that a great distinction exists between a public speaker and a writer. For the former sees before him who and what kind of auditor he has, and knows exactly what he ought to expect from him; but the latter sees nothing in an absent reader, but only hopes that he might one day become a partaker of divine grace. But if this reader’s mind has been dulled and blinded by the false prejudices of corrupt doctrine, Clement proves that he must be sent to the light of the true divine Scripture by the authority of the sacred writers and even of Plato.

^A

The old law was preparing for the worship of the true God and for true piety, in order that it might lead to the acceptance of the faith of Christ, and indeed, it can still prove not a little useful to Christians even now for defending the dogmas of their own faith by demonstrations.

Then, however, Clement, having refuted the arguments brought forward against these things, warns a man not to delay and remain in this pagan philosophy; and by the various examples of the ancient patriarchs, Abraham, Jacob, and Judah, he makes it plain there that this philosophy is a handmaid to true wisdom, just as other disciplines are to philosophy. From which he concludes that this same philosophy renders men fit through study, labor, and exercise to reach the truth itself, which is Christ—some more easily, some with greater difficulty. He does not deny, however, that some can attain the Christian truth without letters and that pagan philosophy; but he contends that those things are useful for attaining it—whereby the fallacies of the sophists are clearly dissipated—more easily and more promptly. But certainly, he does indeed confirm the utility of this philosophy by the testimony of Anaxarchus and Hesiod; but he proves that it will profit only those who have received the rain and cultivation like good soil.

Furthermore, he declares that by the name of philosophy he does not mean the Platonic, or Aristotelian, or any other particular sect; but whatsoever things have been rightly, piously, and justly taught in all the sects of the philosophers. Indeed, he flatly and insistently denies that any fruit can be reaped from these by any man after death, unless he first professes the Christian faith in this life. Nor does he allow any excuse for ignorance ^B of this faith to be accepted by any infidel before the birth of Christ. For, besides the fact that it could have been known from the sacred Scriptures long since translated into the Greek language, many other paths also led men to it.

Just as Clement orders the sophistic art of litigating and deceiving, which is entirely occupied with the allurements of words, to be kept far and deeply removed from Christian borders, so he wants everyone, even if it does not please the many, to study the truth. This he demonstrates beautifully by the authority of the Apostles as well as by the testimony of pagan philosophers and poets. For which reason he proves that Christians, even the less learned, who both clearly repudiate those fallacious arts of the Greek sophists and do not care to please the many, are not inferior to any learned heathens whatsoever.

Immediately, he meets the objection of those—using various examples of the farmer, the physician, the athlete, and the pilot—who, having completely rejected philosophy and other liberal disciplines, required only faith from a Christian man. In confirmation of his own opinion, he openly shows that the power of God is not well perceived except by philosophizing; and that the liberal disciplines are not a little useful, so that true things may be distinguished from false, and so that the difficult meanings of the sacred Scripture may be rightly understood. And indeed, Christ is asserted to have utterly overturned the threefold temptation of the devil, taken from the testimonies of sacred Scripture, by other words of the same Scripture. There our author castigates the temerity of those who dared to falsely assert that the devil is the inventor of philosophy and dialectic.

Therefore, he thinks that those who urged that the prophets and apostles, although not in the least skilled in these disciplines, nonetheless understood all the meanings of sacred Scripture perfectly well, are not to be heeded. For he replies that this clearly singular intelligence and knowledge had been divinely handed down and infused into them. Wherefore, others not gifted with the divine spirit, to the divine writings ^C

they are in need of the proper interpretation, yet they require the aid of human attainments and disciplines. For although the precepts established in the divine writings are such that faith alone is necessary to believe them, yet for them to be rightly understood, for one to be able to respond to questions concerning them, and finally for them to be fulfilled, there is need of both dialectics and human art. To these points he demonstrates that in a Christian man, knowledge, diction, and eloquence, which are to be acquired through human disciplines, are required no less than good acts and the works of the virtues. Reverting then ^A to the sophistic art, he again proves through both reason and the authority of Sacred Scripture that it ought to be cast out completely from the Christian commonwealth.

After this, he teaches that the style of Christian speech and writing, to which he himself intended to adhere in these commentaries, should be plain and simple—yet clear and perspicuous—and so alienated from all vain and superfluous ornamentation that it might be more able to benefit others than to delight them. And to establish that point more clearly, he brings forward authorities not only from Plato and Sacred Scripture, but even institutes a comparison of speech with clothing, food, and also with the Muses and Sirens. Moreover, just as the discourse is simple, so the mind of the orator ought to be entirely removed from the pursuit of human glory, so that a single auditor might suffice for him.

He wisely admonishes us, however, that the contentions of words and profane novelties are to be avoided and that one should never glory in them. Nor does he explain any less clearly what that philosophy and human tradition is, from whose fraudulent seduction we must always beware. He declares, therefore, that it is first of all that of the Epicureans, which takes away God’s providence and ascribes pleasure to the rank of the gods; then the dogmas of the Stoics, who babbled that God is a body and that He pervades every most vile matter; and finally the melodious trifles of human traditions or youthful questions, or the inept witticisms of words, by which no one will ever attain to truth and virtue, which can be acquired only by sagacity and much labor.

It is therefore clear and plain to all that ^B Clemens makes that philosophy true and in accordance with divine traditions which constantly asserts the providence of God, extending itself to all things and to each individual. For if that is taken away, the entire economy of the Lord’s Incarnation is taken away. Wherefore he contends that Diogenes, Thales, Hippasus, and other philosophers who worship the elements of the world must be completely driven away as impious homunculi given over to pleasure; and he adds that they are infants and small children unless they become men through their profession of the Christian religion and know how to discern the true from the false. For opinion is not truth itself, in which charity, which edifies, resides.

Since, however, wisdom, handed down to us by the Son of God in mystery, must be hidden, Clemens ingenuously confesses that this was an impediment to him in writing these books, and that he still fears that he might expose it to unworthy men with too much boldness. Yet because Christ commanded the arcane traditions of true knowledge to be explained—not indeed to all, but to those to whom it is fitting—for this reason Clemens signifies that in these his commentaries he will write about things that contain the truth scattered here and there, so that it may remain hidden from the unworthy. ^C But this truth, however much it may be one, has, he says, various and manifold particles dispersed among the various sects of philosophers, all of which can be collected and referred to one place by a Christian man without any danger.

For indeed those individual parts of truth, as he observes at this clearly singular intelligence and knowledge, have been dispersed among the philosophers, plucked from the divine Word Itself. That this may be more clearly manifest, he undertakes to prove that our sacred writers are more recent than any others at all whom one might choose; and that these latter, if they handed down any true things, had borrowed them from the former. Wherefore he first observes that among all Greek writers, Orpheus, Linus, and the poets are considered the most ancient, whom the seven sages of Greece indeed followed; concerning the last of whom he briefly notes how diverse the opinions were. Furthermore, with their various sayings and proverbs brought into the medium, he proves their method of philosophizing to have been clearly Hebraic and enigmatic.

To these, however, succeeded the philosophers, of whom there was initially a triple sect: the Italic, whose parent, Pythagoras, first wished to be called a philosopher; the Ionian, which drew its origin from Thales; and the Eleatic, from Xenophanes. There, moreover, ^D Clemens observes both the homeland of Pythagoras and that of Thales to have been discussed in the past, and that the former alone seems to have met with the Egyptian prophets, and to have had no teacher of his own, just as Pherecydes had none. He then narrates in succession what, from that triple sect, flowed the succession—namely, the Cynic, Academic, Peripatetic, and Stoic schools—and who were the authors of them, and who are recorded as their successors.

But in order to show that the philosophy of the Hebrews preceded all these by a long interval of time and ages, he inquires not at all negligently into the time when the princes and leaders of ethnic philosophers—such as Xenophanes, Thales, Pythagoras, Polycrates, and Solon—lived. Thence he demonstrates at length that they and others—namely Pythagoras, Antisthenes, Orpheus, Homer, Thales, Plato, Democritus—either rose from the barbarians, Babylonians, and Egyptians, or, having been educated by them, drew many of their dogmas from there. Nay, he writes that it has been handed down to memory by some that Pythagoras was a pupil of Nazaratus the Assyrian, or of Ezekiel, or of the Gauls and Brahmins; and that Aristotle was a pupil of a certain Jew. [index: entries preserved]

^A and shows how the invention of other arts, disciplines, laws, and legislation was attributed to these same barbarians. He aptly observes, however, that they are more recent than Moses.

Yet others rose up with great spirit and cried out: "If the matter stands so, philosophy was stolen by theft. Therefore," they said, "it can be neither good nor useful, seeing that it was delivered to us by thieves, not by God." To these Clement replies that, even if God did not prevent this theft, He nonetheless converted it into a good and utility for men. Nor does he allow them to urge further that God Himself, who does not prevent evil, is in truth its author. For by various examples he clearly proves that the cause of evil may be attributed not to Him who, while acting freely, does not prevent it, but rather to him who commits it. And truly the devil, and as Hermas wrote in the *Shepherd*, (the) false prophets, however much they were thieves and liars, nonetheless, by false sayings and lies, sometimes mingled in true things, and even things not useless to others, even against their own will. Finally, such is the providence of the good God that He Himself uses evils for good.

Therefore, among the Greek philosophers, who stole many dogmas from the Hebrew prophets and afterwards either changed, interpolated, or adulterated them, there remains even now some trace of divine wisdom and truth. But the true prophets cannot be called thieves; rather, only those gentile philosophers who, blinded by arrogance and pride, did not recognize the true God and His Son. That this is to be blamed on nothing else but their own defect, Clement beautifully shows. For since God has called all to the faith and knowledge of Christ and exhorts them again and again to profess it, they could certainly have chosen and embraced it and been regenerated by the sacred waters of baptism.

^B And indeed, our Clement proves again that certain true dogmas are found in the books of the pagans, and he convinces us of this most plainly by the authors of theirs cited by the Apostle. Yet he warns us seriously that not all philosophy is to be admitted indiscriminately, but only that which, as Plato aptly observes, argues correctly for the good of man, inciting and exercising the soul toward spiritual things. Wherefore, whether this be said to have attained the truth by chance, or by art and industry, or by any other way whatever, that is to be ascribed to divine providence and economy. Nor is there, of course, any reason for anyone to object that nothing was handed down by the philosophers except through an apparent semblance of truth. For as long as we live in this life, we see God, as the Apostle says, through a mirror, but we shall see Him face to face only after death. Finally, Clement there not unaptly observes that the erring philosophers are rightly compared by the same Apostle to our own heretics, who, having abandoned God and having been abandoned by Him, feed on winds and, entangled in various errors, seek for water without water in the sacrament of the Eucharist and baptism.

^D Furthermore, although in Greek philosophy some things occur that are in entire accord with the truth, it does not follow from this that it alone suffices. For since there are often many causes for one and the same effect, philosophy itself can be called only an auxiliary and imperfect cause to be compared by men to the truth, which is sometimes found without it through faith and the Son of God alone. For it was not a cause of righteousness in any other way than as a beginning and an inception. Furthermore, if any should object that the doctrine of Christ is most perfect and needs no help or aid, they will receive an immediate response from Clement that it is not indeed made more perfect by Greek philosophy; but on the contrary, the doctrine of faith provides for valid cavillations to be fortified and defended just as bread provides what is necessary for living; while philosophical truth, not unlike sweetmeats and side dishes, precedes it and soothes the soul with its sweetness.

Clement promises that he will demonstrate that they stole their dogmas from the Hebrews, after he has shown from the age of Moses that the philosophy of those same Hebrews is older than any other. Therefore, he first observes that this antiquity of Moses was accurately disputed by Tatian and Cassian. But in order to make it clearer for his own office, he proves that this same Moses is older than the pagan writers by other authors who, the more hostile and inimical they were to the Hebrew race, the less could faith be denied to them. From them, therefore, he makes it plain how many generations are numbered from Inachus, the first king of the Argives, and from the first beginning of the Assyrian kingdom down to the destruction of Troy, and what has been handed down by writers and even women concerning the first kings of other nations, the gods of the pagans, and men famous among them during those times. He concludes, therefore, that Moses, as one who was a contemporary of Inachus, who was the most ancient of all, was superior in age to all other writers.

Moreover, upon the occasion of speaking of that first leader and legislator of the Hebrew people, he subjects to the eyes of all a brief chronology of his successors, both of the judges and of the kings of that same nation, and he assigns the age of the prophets who flourished during those times. There, he observes that Ilium was razed and destroyed during the reign of Solomon, and he brings forward various opinions and views of more ancient writers concerning the age of Homer. Finally, he shows that Christ the Lord was made man after the LXXII weeks were predicted by Daniel. Then, furthermore, after he observes that the Babylonian captivity lasted from the eleventh year of Joachim, king of Judah, to the second year of Darius, king of the Persians, Assyrians, and Egyptians, he then immediately exhibits for us a chronological series of the kings of the Persians and Macedonians. From these, he concludes that Haggai and Zechariah, the last of the Jewish prophets, who were prophesying in the XLVIII Olympiad, existed before Pythagoras, who was in the LXII Olympiad, and Thales, the most ancient of the Greek sages, who flourished around the L Olympiad, had their times. These philosophers and sages, therefore, as Clement concludes, are far more recent not only than Moses, but even than Solomon, who governed the Jews in the times of Menelaus—that is, the Trojan times—and whose letters to Vaphres, king of Egypt, and to the king of the Tyrians in Phoenicia, and the responses of these to him, Alexander Polyhistor recorded. Around the same L Olympiad also lived Onomacritus the Athenian, whose poems, indeed, or those of certain others, are believed to be those which are ascribed to Orpheus and Musaeus. Amphion, however, lived two generations before the Trojan times, and long after him flourished Demodocus and Phemius.

Afterwards, Clement proposes those things which occur in the memory concerning the times of other poets as well as of the fatidical seers. But he asserts that all these are called thieves by Scripture, and that others, incited either by the observation of natural things or by demons, and disturbed by water, smoke, or a certain quality of the air, predicted the future. Among the Hebrews, however, there were true prophets divinely inspired by the Spirit; and first indeed before the law, Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; then indeed, after the law was given, Moses and others, who are called by our author by their names one by one; and also the women Sarah, Rebecca, Mary, Deborah, and Huldah. Finally, John the Ba-

Baptist, and his father Zacharias, and Anna and Simeon, announced the future in a similar way.

Then, indeed, our Clement gathers the sum of Greek chronology ^A from the birth of Moses to the death of the emperor Commodus. Then he immediately exhibits another [chronology] to us, which extended from Adam to the same emperor according to the calculations and opinion of the barbarians. There he discusses the diverse dialects and languages of the nations and peoples, and represents for us, not without diligence, a double method for calculating the years of each one of the Roman emperors. He also discusses 68 the census, or description made after the day of Christ's birth, the year and day of the same Christ's baptism, preaching, and death, and the abomination of desolation predicted by Daniel; and finally, he presents in summary the chronology published by Flavius Josephus from the birth of Moses to his own times, in such a way that he continuously joins to it another [chronology] different from it. Furthermore, he demonstrates that the Hebrew Scriptures of the Old Testament, during the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, were rendered into the Greek tongue by seventy-two elders—not without the divine inspiration of the Holy Spirit—and were restored by Ezra after the Babylonian captivity, where they had been lost; and finally, that many things were borrowed from them by Plato as well as by Pythagoras 69.

Hence he shows ^B 70 who Moses was, what were the beginnings of his life and education, by what names he was called, in what disciplines he was imbued, which ones he taught to others, what is said of him by the mystics or among the secret traditions of the Jews, concerning a certain Egyptian man put to death by him 71, and concerning his wondrous conversation with the king after he had been led out of prison; and what, finally, the poet Ezekiel sang concerning his upbringing. Then, having pursued the history of this same Moses, he narrates 72 how, and by what right, having despoiled the inhabitants of Egypt, he—that statesman, prophet, philosopher, legislator, and most highly instructed in every art and science of reigning and of fighting against enemies, which Clement describes graphically—led the Hebrews thence ^C 73. Why, he even says that the Greeks received and learned these arts and sciences from him! For not only did Miltiades imitate him in the battle at Marathon, but Thrasybulus also, leading his army by the light of a fire by night 74. There, furthermore, our author adds some things not unworthy of knowing concerning the pillar going before the Hebrews, and concerning other pillars of the pagans 75.

To these things, indeed, he makes manifest to us in the same place that Plato was aided by this same Moses in the establishing of laws, who by his law led men not only to God and Christ the Lord, but was himself also a wise man, whom philosophers proclaim as king, legislator, emperor, just, holy, and a friend of God. Since, however, he had previously been a shepherd of sheep, thence Clement teaches that a legislator ought to be like a shepherd, who always takes care of the flock, seeks the lost sheep, and leads all to eternal happiness 76. And he says that the only-begotten Son of God is such a one.

Wherefore he reprimands the incredulous obstinacy of the Greeks, who, refusing to believe that the law was given divinely by Moses, boasted that Minos received laws from Jove, Lycurgus from the Delphic Apollo, and Zaleucus from Minerva 77. And lest anyone claim that this law of Moses is neither good nor honest because it decrees punishments for the wicked, Clement immediately meets this objection, and teaches that it is therefore no more to be blamed than a physician who, lest healthy limbs be corrupted, orders putrefied parts to be burned, cut, and amputated. Which he confirms from the fact that just as a father [corrects] his son, so God instructs and punishes us. Finally, for the wicked ^D who are punished, others are deterred from vice. Therefore, since the law is good and beneficial, it is permitted to every one through it to become a servant of God, a faithful attendant, a son, and by perfect charity to be referred into the chosen adoption of sons. But Clement prudently observes that it is good only for those who behave themselves according to it, and use it well 79.

Moreover, he teaches that the Mosaic philosophy is quadripartite, of which the first part treats of historical matters; the second, the established laws of morals; the third, sacrifices; the fourth, finally, theology, which is said by Plato to be of the "great mysteries," but by Aristotle is called "metaphysics." But dialectic is to be acquired by a good and moderate man only by such a law, so that he may be able, to the best of his ability, to both say and do those things which are pleasing to God. For the function and office of that [theology], which transcends the most excellent nature of all, is to lead us as if by the hand—not, however, without the divine grace of the Savior—to true wisdom, that is, to lead us to the true knowledge of man and God 80. But since the will of the law is understood in a triple sense—either as a sign revealing, or as a precept confirming for right instruction, or as prophecy predicting—it can be understood by men, but not by children. Yet the Greeks, as Plato says, are always children, that is, addicted to hearing childish fables; and therefore they do not perceive the most ancient truth which is among the barbarians. Therefore for their sake, as Hermas speaks divinely, they who are double-minded, and always arguing, are in need of heavenly visions and illuminations. Finally, Clement shows that the natural law and the Mosaic law are one and the same, and that by the name of law God himself is also signified. And indeed the word *theos*, he says, is said *para tēn thesin*, because, namely, God establishes, orders, and administers. But he himself is called by Peter law and reason. And there Clement puts an end to the first book of the Stromata.

ARTICLE II. Analysis of the second book.

Clement briefly explains from the very beginning of this book 81 what he is about to treat next. For he says that it must be demonstrated by him that Greek men not only imitated those things from our sacred scriptures which are held to be beyond faith and worthy of admiration, but had also plundered and stolen their main dogmas concerning faith, wisdom, *gnosis* and science, hope and charity, repentance and continence, and the fear of God; and that all things whatsoever which the commentary of the place in which he will be engaged demands, must be elucidated by him. He adds, moreover, that he will discuss first of all the occult, symbolic, and enigmatic style of speaking of the barbarian or Hebrew philosophy; which, indeed, because other ancient philosophers followed it, is therefore most useful and extremely necessary to know. After these things, however, he declares that he will so respond to the objections and insults of the Greeks, by which they used to harass us, that by putting forward a few testimonies of Sacred Scripture, the Jews might be able to be converted from them to Christ out of those things which they believe. Furthermore, he says that he will refute the new doctrines of the Greeks with such mildness and gentleness of perfect charity that they might perceive, not without some blushing, how vain are those disciplines from our philosophy for the sake of which they had undertaken such long journeys, and how foolishly they gloried concerning their own dogmas, which they had stolen from our authors. Finally, he promises that he will show throughout how useless are those disciplines which they foolishly and insipidly sold—astrology, mathematics, magic incantations, and the rest of the encyclopedia. These things, furthermore, are of such weight and moment.

^A With a style thus plain, and lacking those flowers of eloquence and enticements which he candidly professes he has never studied or sought to treat—for he clearly and openly proves, through a triple comparison and the testimony of Hermes and Solomon, that those who cling to the adornment of words necessarily escape the things themselves—Clement enters into his argument. He asserts that there are, from among the many paths of wisdom, two: namely, faith, by which we do not resist Divine Providence, and the fear of God, by which we are taught to shun sin. And while we learn the former from the barbarian philosophy we follow, Clement shows it to be true and perfect. For once it has been exercised by right instruction, it lifts us from the cognition of corporeal things to the knowledge of God Himself. Yet, because there is an infinite distance between the unbegotten God and the begotten human, God Himself approaches man, yet in such a way that He cannot be known by him as He is. Wherefore, truth, still lurking in the recesses of Holy Scripture, is not yet fully manifest to us. Deservedly, then, are they to be praised who bestow their labor on finding it. But the secret mysteries of our religion, which no one can ever grasp without faith, are certainly not to be disclosed to any unbeliever.

Proceeding thence to the discourse on faith which he has begun, he quotes certain definitions of it from the Apostle and also from others. Faith, he says, which is the principle of action and the foundation of prudent choice, becomes knowledge through meditation and gathers the most certain proofs concerning God, the author of those same Scriptures, from the Holy Scriptures themselves. But against the Basilidians, who prattled that faith was planted in us by nature and according to the natural dispositions of each, and against the Valentinians, who boasted that faith belonged to the simple—that is, the orthodox—and not to their own perfect followers, Clement proves with various arguments that it is so situated in our own free choice as to remain, nonetheless, a gift of God. Thence he explains how, through it, we are led from those things which cannot be demonstrated to that which is altogether simple and entirely void of all matter—that is, to the knowledge of the Divine nature. And there he incidentally castigates the incredulous or pagan philosophers who falsely imagined that nothing at all existed except that which is composed of matter. Furthermore, Clement teaches that whatever is spiritual is grasped by faith and intelligence alone. Therefore, he concludes—even by the testimony of Aristotle—that faith, which conjecture vainly attempts to imitate, is superior to knowledge and is its judge. Thereafter he clearly sets forth what the opinion of Epicurus and Heraclitus was concerning faith, and that a man endowed with it, since he is a participant in the truth, is rightly called by Plato, and even by Speusippus and the Stoics, blessed, kingly, and a living law.

^B Furthermore, our author proceeds to say that he who fulfills the law is himself, like the scytale of the Lacedaemonians of old, inscribed upon a lofty beam, an exemplar of divine virtue; and he, as one who is alone wise, possesses all things. All these things those Greek men derived from Moses, who did not speak with God as Minos did with Jove, but as a friend with a friend. For this man was indeed wise, a king and a legislator; but more excellent than he was our Savior, who, being more beautiful and richer than all, was himself announced as king by the children and the Jews, was foretold by the prophets, and is the sole high priest, the greatest king, and legislator, whose father is God alone. That Plato subscribed to these dogmas, Clement further proves by his very words, in which he constantly asserts that the wise man alone is rich, free, beautiful, and a king.

Returning thence to his interrupted discourse on faith, Clement proves by the testimony of the same Plato that faith is entirely necessary in war as in peace, and indeed in all things. And this, which is the greatest of virtues, is called wisdom by Solomon and the knowledge of first causes by Xenocrates. Although that knowledge which is held by faith is not a demonstration properly so-called, nonetheless, assent must be rendered to it no less. For if the Pythagoreans contend that one must believe their master when he speaks, is it not just that we should have faith in the Savior God—which arises only from hearing—and not demand proofs of his words from Him? And indeed, when we hear the preaching Apostles, then faith lifts us up to the Word of God and the Son, though we do not yet understand that this Word is a demonstration. Lest anyone, by denying that faith is within his power, bring forth an excuse for his ignorance, Clement makes it plain that all are called by God and can therefore attain faith. Those, therefore, who believe in the God who calls and obey Him, are led to the repentance of their sins, which is itself the office of faith.

^C Our Clement also makes it plain that hope—which is the expectation of acquiring the good—consists in this same faith. But because this expectation must be faithful, he discourses more clearly on what the faithful and infidelity are, what faith is, which clearly differs from opinion, and what expectation and trust are. From these things he later concludes that we have our trust in God alone: "Whom we know will not transgress those things which were beautifully promised to us, and therefore were created and kindly given to us by Him." What benevolence is, he explains in the same place, and teaches that if it was "reckoned to the believing Abraham as righteousness," it must be believed by us who are Israelites and the seed of Abraham. For the Old and New Testament were delivered by one and the same God through His Son. Wherefore the righteousness of God, as the Apostle says, revealed from faith to faith, has flowed from prophecy and is perfected in the Gospel.

Faith, then, says Clement, is not a human thing, but something divine, which is neither torn away by mundane friendship nor dissolved by present fear. For such is the connection of charity with faith, that the latter makes men faithful, while the former is its basis and foundation. He demonstrates that this is brought about in these steps. First, he says, faith appears as the inclination toward salvation. Then fear, hope, and repentance, progressing with temperance and tolerance, lead us to charity and the knowledge, γνῶσιν. He confirms these things by the authority of Barnabas, and learnedly proves, and concludes from thence, that faith is the basis of truth.

^D Thereafter, he argues against those who rejected fear and altogether spurned the law. He who rejects the law clearly despises God, its author, and being without fear, is impious and unjust, and utterly abhors the truth itself. But fear, they said, is a turning away from reason and a perturbation of the soul. But Clement proves from this that such a definition of fear is false: because fear, by striking the one who transgresses the commandment, is consonant with reason. But if they insist that this fear is called "caution," εὐλάβεια, by the philosophers, he replies through Critolaus that that caution is good. What, moreover, of the fact that, by the testimony of Solomon, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom? If, therefore, the law brings fear, the knowledge of it is also the beginning of wisdom, and therefore they who refuse the law are altogether insipient and impious.

With these things thus established and asserted, Clement teaches that all vices are to be feared, because they are justly and deservedly prohibited by the law. Wherefore he rebukes the heretics who, from these words of the Apostle: "Through the law comes the knowledge of sin," inferred that the law was evil. For there the Apostle...

^A intends nothing else, except that through the law the knowledge of sin might be made manifest to us. From this true and genuine sense of the apostolic words, and from the by no means uncertain authority of Ezekiel and Barnabas, he concludes that the law is good, inasmuch as it instructs us, chastises us, and through fear directs and leads us to Christ. Then, truly, he exposes and explodes the various and absurd ravings of the wandering sects of Basilides and Valentinus with, for the most part, four arguments. He also refutes the Marcionites, who, having rejected even the fear of God, had dreamt that the law was neither good nor evil, but merely just. For he proves that fear, just as the law, is truly good, and shows that by the fear of God we are led not only to hope, but also to the love of God Himself, and indeed of our neighbor. Furthermore, Clement touches briefly there on hospitality and humanity, the companions and attendants of that love, and adds that the Jews, being destitute of faith and love, and therefore rejected by God, gave place to the calling of the gentiles. We are reminded, however, by the testimony of Hermas, that not all Jews and gentiles are rejected, but only those who do not repent of their sins. Finally, our author concludes from the things said that faith, piety, and love are mutually connected.

The true philosopher, therefore, he continues, and the lover of truth, becomes a friend of God through love, and attains perfect knowledge. By the threefold authority of Plato, Matthias, and the Gospel according to the Hebrews, he teaches that the beginning of this same knowledge is wonder. But in order that one might become a perfect "gnostic," he says that three things are required: contemplation, the execution of precepts, and the constitution of good men; so that if one of these is missing, knowledge will limp. In fact, he shows clearly from Holy Scripture what those divine precepts are that must be fulfilled by all, and in which the progress and life of both Hebrews and Christians are grounded.

Since the same Scripture also admonishes us to follow God, and to strive, as much as possible, to attain the knowledge of Him; hence Clement teaches that there is a double knowledge and science, just as there is a double faith. And the former science, like faith, is human, weak and feeble, and always wavering and unstable; but the other science, and the faith flowing from it, takes its origin from the sacred writings; and it is most certain and immutable, and is never separated from just action. Clement compares this, moreover, to the "gomer," which was the tenth measure of the three, and from this concludes that the gnostic consists of faith. For in faith, just as Abraham and Moses once stood before the Lord, so he stands and is never changed. On the contrary, other philosophers, who are unwilling to hear divine precepts, occupied with perishable and mortal things, are always fluctuating and carried here and there. Wherefore, because the Apostle vehemently exhorts Timothy to avoid the profane novelties of those men, the heretics for that reason alone rejected the same Epistles of the Apostle. The true gnostic, therefore, is he who has known the Lord, and through Him his Father. With faith, therefore, let us believe in the things past, and with hope let us expect the things to come; to the gnostic, who knows God, love persuades all things. The beginning of this is fear, which through growth becomes faith, and at length becomes love.

Clement further distinguishes a twofold sin: one, indeed, is voluntary, which is deservedly condemned; the other, however, is involuntary, which in turn is of two kinds. One is committed through ignorance, the other, however, by necessity. Regarding the former, he notes six species, and adds that, just as in the Mosaic law certain involuntary sins were punished, so in the Christian law they are punished who, by some perturbation of mind, have made our sacred mysteries known to the pagans. By the example of Lot’s wife, he then makes it clear that voluntary sin is deservedly punished, and he defines clearly what that is. Nor does he show less clearly how sin and misfortune, crime and injustice, differ from one another ^B. But further, because it lies within our power both to obey the commands and to be brought to discipline, thus he concludes that they truly sin who voluntarily surrender themselves to the perturbations of the soul, to anger, and to desire. ^C

Having brought forward the definition of the aforementioned sins, he explains their various differences more fully from the writers of the sacred Old and New Testaments, and from the Epistle of Barnabas. To these things, moreover, he convinces us with many reasons drawn from Scripture that we do not fall into sins by necessity, but that it is open and free to us to sin or not to sin. Having seized the occasion there, he proves that these adages of the ancients: "Follow God; Mercy is better than punishment; Give a pledge, and harm is at hand; Know thyself, and attend to thyself," were culled from the sacred Scriptures. After he had concluded from this that sins are purged by alms and faith, and that they are avoided by the fear of God, he immediately rebukes those who prattled that joy and sadness, and other perturbations of the soul, were really attributed to God in the Scriptures. He admonishes, however, that mercy belongs properly to God, and not to man, whose only highest perfection is to become His adopted son through the knowledge of true doctrine. But that this may be more easily perceived, he continually defines what science and ignorance are, and what experience, intelligence, cognition, and truth are added to science itself. Since, indeed, rational faculties are ministers of the will, from this he infers that in the gnostic, the will, judgment, and practice are exactly the same, not otherwise than words, dogmas, life, and morals, obeying the “institute.”

Having descended from here to moral virtues, he affirms without hesitation that they are plainly taught by the Mosaic law, from which the Greeks drew the principles of all moral science. And he proves that this is so regarding piety, as well as prudence and justice, and incidentally shows in the same place that that Pythagorean adage was culled from our same sacred writers: "Do not step over the scales." But because it would be too long to dispute individually about all these virtues celebrated in divine Scripture, ^D therefore, having put their definition before the eyes of all, the author manifestly demonstrates that they are so mutually connected and joined that one can neither be had without another, nor can one be treated without all the others also. Yet he touches on some specifically, and in the first place he teaches temperance, which, while not befitting God, is plainly necessary for us, so that, being content with few things, we may be allowed to approach the divine nature. In the same Scripture, it is also commanded and commended to have fortitude, by which, unbroken or effeminated by no desires, we do not

^A only endure any labors and pains with a great and manly spirit, but also, if it be necessary, undergo martyrdom with the shedding of our blood. And indeed, that is signified by the human law by which he who has not yet taken the virgin betrothed to him is forbidden from military service 20. Our Clement confirms this by the example of the Midianites, from which, and also by the authority of Barnabas, he infers that piety and religion are the beginning of wisdom, and that the fear of God is a good thing.

Next, he discourses on liberality and beneficence, and shows that this is commanded by various laws of Moses and by the words of the sacred Proverbs, and concludes from this that the law is good 21. But since beneficence or liberality pertains to love or charity, he makes it clear to us how this virtue is established in other laws of Moses 22. From these he finally proves that the old law is full of humanity and kindness, and that we are led by it, as by a pedagogue, to Christ, who commended these virtues with no less study and care. ^B

Then, immediately from these and other precepts of the same old law which he brings forward, he proves that his decree regarding gentleness toward living creatures was taken by Pythagoras. Therefore, says Clement 23, the Greeks, who most cruelly exposed their newborn children, wrongly attacked the law of Moses regarding this gentleness. Their true inhumanity is condemned not only by the Mosaic law, but even by Roman law, which forbids a pregnant woman, even if condemned to death, from being executed before she has given birth. Clement proceeds, and citing the law of Moses regarding not cooking a lamb in the milk of its mother, he strikes those who, in order to eat more delicately, as if the meat were tempered with milk, kicked the bellies of certain animals before birth 24. To these he adds other precepts of the same Moses regarding gentleness, and finally, having placed before our eyes the command given with great care for the tending of newly planted trees, he explains by what method those who have given their name to the Christian religion are to be imbued with the dogmas of our faith, so that they may be able to attain the highest perfection of the Gnostic 25. ^C But he clearly describes who the perfect Gnostic is, and says that others, in order to become good and virtuous, must be taught by him. But he immediately warns him seriously to avoid and decline pride with care, since, like other sins, it requires repentance.

Immediately, he briefly reveals how one ought to act and what its usefulness is. But since the fruit of this is that the penitent chooses God and is in turn chosen by Him, Clement says that man’s nobility is situated in this: that he chooses all things most beautiful and honest 26. This, indeed, he illustrates with the examples of Adam, Noah, Abraham, and Isaac. Furthermore, he excuses the polygamy of Abraham in that same place and says that there was only one heir of his, whom his brother, older by birth, served for that reason; because for an evil man, the greatest good is not to be under his own control. Then afterwards, he shows by the testimony of sacred Scripture that all things belong to the wise man, and that he is not only a king; but, as Plato is witness, he is also blessed, namely in that greatest similarity to God that can be attained, which Philo records is obtained by the perfect observation of His commandments 27. Wherefore, the Stoics established that the end of man is to live in accordance with nature, yet so that by the name of nature they understood God. Furthermore, since there are three kinds of friendship, as Clement confirms from Hippodamus, he gathers from this that this same image of God exists in the heart of a man who does good not only to friend and enemy, but who is also brave and constantly endures adversity. But the Gnostic, living familiarly with God and crucified to the world, that fortitude and tolerance ^D just as Ananias, Daniel, Lot, Abraham, and Jonas will possess 28.

The divine law, therefore, instructs men in every virtue, but primarily in continence, where it forbids 29 the flesh of fat animals, and especially of swine, and certain fish which entice to pleasure. For pleasure, that fuel of desire, which makes men soft and effeminate, as the writers quoted by our author themselves testify, must be rooted out. Indeed for that reason the soul ought to be separated from all disturbances, and to crucify them, and, as Christ says, to lose itself and meditate on death 30. But to do this task, it is necessary that each one put on the armor of God, as the Apostle speaks, against the snares of the devil, and use indifferent things well; for Clement not unskillfully demonstrates that all disturbances of the soul and temptations of the demon arise from these and from pleasure 31. Furthermore, he refutes the heretical opinion of Basilides regarding those disturbances of the soul, along with that of two other arch-heretics, Isidore and Valentinus, although they fall into other errors, with the authority of Christ the Lord and Barnabas 32.

Under these matters, he declares that he had encountered a certain follower of the Gnostic heresy, who said he was addicted to pleasure because it is not for man, unless he has experienced it, to overcome it 33. But he asserts that this man, no differently than Aristippus, is completely deceived. He also asserts that those are such who, abusing the false interpretation of the words of certain ones of Nicolas, an apostolic man, wallowed in the mire of unrestrained and obscene pleasure, like goats and Sardanapalus. But because no other use of pleasure appears to be, except that it is a certain vicarious accession to things necessary for life and as it were a condiment, therefore Clement concludes against Epicurus that base and unbridled pleasures, as the poet Diogenes witnesses, are to be condemned; and that fear, as the law commands, and caution are necessary to be overcome as our chief enemy 34. And Clement strives to illustrate this with testimonies from various pagan writers, and primarily poets, and teaches that nothing is more lovable than the honesty and gravity of the law, and its daughter, caution and religion. For that divine law commands nothing too harsh and severe, just as it commands nothing too soft and lax.

Lest anyone should plead that he is too weak to fulfill the law, Clement brings forward the examples of the ancients, who, though they were of the same nature as we are, offered and dedicated themselves entirely to God 35. What of the fact that Zeno preferred the Indian tortured by fire to the rest? Finally, the martyrs, daily subjected to the most exquisite tortures, led the fear of the law to Christ. And these, truly superior to pleasure and greater than the Gnostics in the world, living not anymore by the flesh but by the spirit, are rightly called gods. From these, therefore, our Clement infers that pleasure, and all other things which excite to lust, must be fled by a true and Christian philosopher; and that temperance must be followed, by which the sweet yoke of Christ and the complete health of soul and body is made, and by which we arrive at the final end, namely, eternal beatitude 36.

But with that opportunity given, Clement expounds at length in what the ancient philosophers thought that final end and the supreme good were situated. Therefore, from that source, Epicurus and the Cyrenaics, Dinomachus and Caliphon, Hieronymus, Diodorus, the Aristotelians, Zeno the Stoic, Cleanthes, Antipater, Archidemus, Panaetius, Posidonius, some of the more recent Stoics, Aristo, Herillus, Ly-

^Acus, Leucimus, Critolaus, Anaxagoras, Heraclitus, Democritus, Abderites, Hecataeus, Apollodorus, Nausiphanes, Diotimus, Antisthenes, Annicerii, Metrodorus, Plato, Speusippus, Xenocrates and Polemo. He sets forth each of their opinions, but dwells longer in explaining the sentiment of Plato. These having been explained at last, he makes it clear what the end of a Christian is, which is not to be minimized.

Since, however, the pleasure about which he has argued, and desire, seem to fall into matrimony, our author first defines what marriage is. Then he investigates whether, and what sort of wife is to be taken by a man, and what the opinions of the philosophers were concerning marriage—of Plato, Democritus, the Stoics, and the Peripatetics, who served pleasure no less than Pythagoras did. After these things, he brings forward many points of reasoning, by which those who approve of matrimony demonstrated its necessity and utility. He also puts forward laws enacted for the unmarried, and shows what sort of marriage ought to be—how holy, honest, and alien from all baseness. Finally, he diligently notes that Holy Scripture, which gave advice about taking a wife, but not a commandment, altogether and deeply forbids that she should ever be cast away once taken. And there, Clement, on account of the excessive multitude and length of the chapters, completes this book.

ARTICLE III.

Analysis of the third book.

Clement pursues his argument about nuptials in the third book against the heretics. He relates that marriage is approved by the Valentinians, but only by an impious opinion. But he refutes the absurd errors concerning these same nuptials and marriage of the followers of Basilides and his son Isidore by a correct definition of continence. Then he explains what the orthodox feel concerning first and second marriages; and he profligates and utterly overthrows the wicked opinions of Carpocrates and Epiphanes his son concerning the community of wives, and the promiscuous intercourse of the followers of this heresy in their execrable synaxes. There, however, he clearly shows that they are not only condemned by the authority of the old law—which they prattled was contrary to God, who in reality had founded it just as He did the new—but that they also abuse the testimony of Plato. Moreover, he asserts that all those heretics, like the magicians, were entangled in errors plainly similar, indeed even greater, and were noted and defeated by the epistle of Jude.

He then proceeds to the Marcionites, who, falsely imagining that matter and the creature were evil, unworthily rejected nuptials. This heresy having been destroyed there, he promises that elsewhere he will uproot their false principle regarding the evil nature of created things and their vain opinion concerning metempsychosis. Then indeed he names by their own names those ethnic writers ^D who assailed generation with curses: namely, Heraclitus, Empedocles, the Sibyl, the Poet—that is, Homer, Theognis, Euripides, Solon in Herodotus, and again Homer, Orpheus, Philolaus, Pindar, Plato—whom, however, he denies to have given Marcion an occasion for saying that matter is evil. Furthermore, Clement warns us that a contradiction occurs in these sentiments of ethnic men, concerning which he promises that he will argue elsewhere.

He proceeds and narrates what the tragedy sang concerning the miserable condition of man. But, he says, for that reason some thought that the Pythagoreans abstained from venereal matters; but that they did not observe this from their opinion, unless after children had been begotten by their wives. For which reason they were prohibited the use of beans for that purpose only, because, by the testimony of Theophrastus, women became sterile from them. But because the aforementioned Marcionites, not for the sake of continence but out of hatred of the Creator, refused the use of creatures, and perversely interpreted certain words of Christ to defend this error of theirs, hence Clement reveals what the true sense of those same words is.

Then, having made mention of Carpocrates again, he relates certain things passed over by himself regarding Nicolaus, by which he both frees him from the suspicion of the inflicted crime and shows that the heretics, of the same name as himself, had abused his authority and words, which Matthias was said to have spoken similarly. Immediately, however, he attacks them most fiercely, who shamelessly preached that promiscuous and mystical communion of lust. But of these, especially one, who cited some passage of Scripture preposterously to entice a certain virgin to that base stupration, after he has severely and deservedly castigated him, he uproots this nefarious error by the authority of the Apostle. To which he adds the words of another man of the same sect and heresy, and confesses that perhaps someone might have approached the opinion of his followers, if they had spoken only of a spiritual communion, just as the Valentinians spoke.

But because they, like the followers of Prodictus, who assumed the false name of Gnostics, said with plainly incredible audacity that all things, even those most obscene, were permitted them, he refutes these most invincibly by various arguments drawn from right reason, holy Scripture, and human law. He similarly convicts other heretics dwelling in the same error, and first indeed those who dreamed that the lower parts of man were made by a power other than the divine; secondly, the Antitactae, who prattled that evil originated not from God indeed, but from some creature of His, which for that reason we must always resist and oppose. Against these, however, our author disputes more lengthily, and defeats their errors by many and very valid points of reasonings, and plainly dissolves their objections, taken from the corruption of the sacred text.

Finally, lest he be too long by pursuing individual heresies, he reduces them all to two principal 114 heads. For they either teach

ἀδιαφόρως ζῆν

Then he combats against the second type of heretics, who, under a false pretext of continence, are haters and impugners of both God and nuptials and the procreation of children, by the authority of John, and solves their objections, taken first indeed and openly from certain words of Christ to Salome, as they supposed; secondly and more obscurely, from the law concerning marriages passed in the Old Testament and, as they said, abrogated in the New; thirdly, from the fact that they prattled that every union of man and woman was impure and wicked.

^A And fourthly, because in the resurrection there will be no more marriage, but [they will be] as the spirit, as is gathered not obscurely from the Apostle.

Then he passes on to other heretics who, boasting that they imitated the celibacy of Christ, did not fear to call the devil the author of marriages. He beats down the pride of those who boasted that they understood the Gospel better than others, because Christ, the Son of God, even though He had no need of a helper or children in this world, nevertheless had the Church as His bride and approved of marriage. For this reason Clement discourses there on the sense in which it was said by the same Christ the Lord that some are eunuchs who have made themselves such for the sake of the kingdom of God, and by the example of many athletes—especially Astylus and Criso, as well as the citharoedist Amoebeus and Aristoteles Cyrenaeus—he shows that temperance is good, unless it is kept for the sake of charity toward God Himself. Indeed, what of the fact that he clearly proves that the heretics who disapprove of the use of marriage and food are expressly noted and condemned by the Apostle, by Elias, by Samuel, by the words of Christ, and indeed by the example of Peter and Philip, who begat children from their wives, and finally by the writings of Paul? ^B Furthermore, he solves the objection of Carpocrates from these words cited above: "Give to everyone who asks of you," demonstrating that this is to be understood concerning the alms given to the poor, and that treasures are not to be gathered in vain.

Moreover, he teaches that Christian continence, which no one can attain without the grace of God, is more excellent through philosophy. For it commands that the desire for any illicit things be taken away and removed entirely, and that we be content only with those things that are necessary. And indeed, angels, overcome by desires, were cast down hither from heaven. But he adds that the Valentinians openly taught that Christ used food in such a way that He did not excrete it. Therefore, just as the orthodox practiced continence for the sake of honesty and the love of God, so the heretics professed it in hatred of the Creator. But these are surely ignorant and impious for this very reason, just as are very many nations. He says that such are the Brahmans, who always abstain from living things, wine, and all food—sometimes for three days—and who count life as nothing, just as death, which regeneration follows, and who venerate Hercules and Pan. Among the Indians, moreover, the *gymnosophists* spend the whole course of their lives naked, foretell the future, and worship a certain pyramid. Finally, the gymnosophists, just as the *semnoi*, never ^C “use” women who remain in virginity, and predict future events by the observation of things celestial.

But because those who dreamed that all things were indifferent and that therefore there were no illicit things or sins were twisting some places of Scripture, and especially these words of the Apostle to the Romans: "Sin shall not have dominion over you," etc., into their own wicked senses, Clement briefly shows what the true meaning and sense of them and of the Apostle is. ^D Returning from there to those who pretended a false continence out of hatred for the Creator, he openly makes it known to all that these words of Christ in the Gospel according to the Hebrews to Salome: "I have come to undo the works of the woman," are wrongly objected; since they signify nothing else than that the works of desire—avarice, contention, insane love of woman, and other sins of this kind—are to be undone by Christ.

The same heretics nevertheless urged that Christ said to the same Salome: "Men will die as long as women bear children." But Clement replies that this is to be understood concerning the death of the soul, namely sin. And indeed, the woman was the cause of life just as she was the cause of death. Furthermore, this life is not ^A of the flesh, but of the spirit, as is gathered from the Apostle.

Nor did they urge with less force against the intent of Christ similar words of His: "I have done well, who have not borne." For the words which immediately follow: "Eat of every herb," etc., openly signify that it is in our power either to lead a celibate life or to be joined in marriage; which indeed, just as the legitimate procreation of children, is good and lawful. For the Creator of the world, as the heretics falsely opined, was not an elect man and the Savior the son of another God; but a man and woman joined in legitimate wedlock, and the child conceived from them, are those two or three in whose midst God is said by Matthew to be. To these, moreover, Clement attaches other orthodox explanations of the same words of Matthew.

Then, however, he disproves and destroys the errors of these heretics by the very words and testimonies of Scripture. But he sets forth to the Catholics what the legitimate and lawful use of marriage is; and he wishes them to be warned there by these words of Moses: "Depart from the midst of them," etc., implying not the separation of a wife from a man, according to the false interpretation of the heretics, but the separation of the Jews themselves from the Gentiles, and the future separation of Christians from the heretics. Then he again proves by the authority of Paul that marriages, especially first ones, are legitimate; and by his testimony, as well as that of Peter, that not only are the desires and defilements of the flesh to be condemned, but that our life is to be instituted not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit.

He observes, moreover, in passing, that the same God of the Old and New Testament is preached by the Apostle, and that his words are perversely usurped by the heretics against the Creator. Furthermore, Clement continues, the same Apostle asserts the bond of marriage to be so strict that he does not want spouses to be separated from each other unless for a time, and by mutual consent in order to devote themselves to prayer. He decrees, therefore, that both marriage and celibacy are good, and he wishes that all should persevere in the state in which they were called.

By this authority of Paul, our author ^B confutes those who, like Tatian, ascribed marriage and the generation of children to the devil. He explodes the foolish quibbles of the same Tatian, and shows that legitimate marriage, and the children conceived from it, are approved by God, who, by abrogating the law of the Old Testament which permitted polygamy and prescribed the washing of spouses rising from the marriage bed, introduced monogamy in the time of the New Testament; in such a way, however, that he permitted second marriages because of the intemperance of man, as the Apostle says, and the need to manage a household. Therefore, in both Testaments, whose author—whatever Tatian might prattle—is asserted to be one and the same God, marriage was always as holy and approved as the Mosaic law itself was holy and approved by God. To this truth, indeed, the Apostle, who had foretold of the impious haters of marriage that were to come, most openly bears witness. From which Clement gathers that neither marriage, nor the use of flesh or wine, is prohibited; provided, however, that they both be used with thanksgiving, and that the laws of temperance and continence as established in all the epistles of the Apostle be applied.

The heretics urged that marriage is reprobated in the Gospel, in which it is not only read that treasures are not to be stored up on earth, where all things will be consumed; but it is furthermore written: "The children of this age neither marry nor are given in marriage." But Clement responds that the former testimony looks to the offering of aid to those in need, and the latter to the future resurrection.

Nor was an argument of greater moment drawn by the heretics from the fact that the Apostle [called] a celibate man

^A one who cares for the things of the Lord. For married people also can be solicitous about divine things and can please God. But there Clemens observes how severely the same Apostle rebukes those who are prone to second marriages.

Finally, the remaining objections of these same heretics were derived from the fact that the Jews are called by Christ the Lord a wicked and adulterous generation, and [from the fact] that he who had taken a wife refused to come to the divine supper. Our author easily dissolves both points. For Christ rebukes the Jews so harshly in these words because they, following the tradition of the elders and the commandments of men, were adulterating the divine law, [which is] the guide to virginity. Furthermore, Christ rebukes those invited to the wedding, in name and by parable, who on account of pleasures refused to obey the commandments of God, which married people can satisfy without difficulty. Finally, what the Psalmist sang: *I have grown old among all my enemies* ^B; Clemens says this is not to be referred to procreation, as the heretics falsely thought, but to sin, for instance fornication, and by no means to legitimate marriage.

Since, however, Cassianus, the leader of the Docetic heretics, held the same error as Tatianus regarding the evil of human generation, and [since] the foundations of this impious opinion were largely the same, Clemens asserts that these have already been thoroughly overturned by him. Wherefore he moves on to demolish, in a similar fashion, other equally flimsy pillars of the same Cassianus. For what is more futile for establishing that false opinion of his than these words of Christ, which he used to boast: *When you have trampled upon the garment of shame, and when the two have become one, the male with the female?* Indeed, Clemens immediately responds that these do not occur in our four Gospels, but in that which was inscribed according to the Egyptians; and that by the word "male" is designated anger, and by "female," desire.

Moreover, regarding what Cassianus added—that the soul is divine from the beginning, [and] comes here effeminated for generation and destruction—Clemens demonstrates ^C that this is overly Platonic and plainly erroneous. For he briefly explains what was, in fact, the first thing, for the sake of blotting out which Christ became man—namely, the sin of Adam—and what "the old man" signifies in Paul, and why he finally says that our dwelling is in the heavens. Finally, he promises that elsewhere he will set forth, against this same false interpretation of Cassianus, what is the true meaning of the tunics of skins of Adam and Eve. In the meantime, he clarifies the true and genuine sense, against the heretical quibbles, of all these [texts]: that Paul orders a wife to be taken on account of fornication, that Christ denies that one who does not hate wife and children can be his disciple, that Isaiah reports that it was said by the Lord to the eunuchs, [and] that Jeremiah and Ezra pray poorly for the day of their birth.

Clemens proceeds to dissolve other arguments of Cassianus, wrongly deduced by him from the words of Job: *No one is clean from filth, not even if his life be but one day long*; and of the Psalmist: *In sins I was conceived, and in iniquities my mother conceived me*; and finally from Malachi: *May I see the firstborn instead of impiety, the fruit of my womb for the sins of my soul.* For Clemens himself teaches that all these things do absolutely nothing for heretical impiety, and [that] Catholics possess [the correct] explanations. To these, indeed, he adds [the teaching of] the Apostle writing: *He who contends, abstains from all things*, [saying] that by these words he did not mean one must abstain from all things, but that one must live temperately in all things.

Furthermore, Clemens proves that generation is not evil from the fact that Christ was born of a virgin. Therefore, in vain did they infer that man was fashioned by generation like a beast of burden; [in vain did they infer] that the Docetæ [taught] that a phantastic body was received from the same Christ, and Marcion and Valentinus [held] that an animal body [was so received]. In vain also did they chatter that Adam, had it not been for the devil's persuasion, would never have cohabited with his wife, and that in youthful ardor he had anticipated the times of intercourse with her. ^D Indeed, these badly fabricated and wrongly thought-up figments of erring men did not prevent generation from being good, through which not only do all worldly things consist, but Christ himself also assumed a human, yet not [a] beautiful, body.

Clemens therefore considers that those are no longer to be heard who object that this intercourse is called in Sacred Scripture "knowledge," that is, the transgression of the commandment, and is therefore a sin. For this word also signifies the knowledge of the truth, and it does not mean that the laws of marriage are to be infringed. Moreover, even if the Apostle said that flesh, the enemy of the soul, cannot possess the kingdom of God, it is nevertheless certain that the infirmities of our flesh have been healed by Christ, and [that] man for that reason, if however he has not sinned, can attain the kingdom of God.

From which, Clemens concludes that all those heretics wander a whole heaven away from the rule of Catholic truth, as much those who, under the pretext of false continence, condemned marriage and creatures, as the others who, wallowing in every kind of most unbridled lust and pleasure, tried to persuade others that it was permitted for all [to do the same]. Wherefore, that we might flee them and never associate with them, not only the Prophet commands, but also the Apostle, who proscribes fornication, but by no means 116 marriage. Wherefore, in turn, Clemens rebukes others who, approving of the old law as if it were the same [as] marriage rejected in the new, wrongly repudiate [it]. Finally, in concluding this book, he diligently warns us that the name of "Gnostics" is being used by these heretics quite undeservedly.

ARTICLE IV.

Analysis of the fourth book.

Clemens declares that he must now dispute about martyrdom and about the perfect man. In this treatise, however, he says that he will speak about those things which the order and connection of his argument and discourse will require. Therefore, he makes his reader aware that, after having taught that the slave and the free, the man as well as the woman, must philosophize, he will then dispute about faith, about inquiry, about the symbolic manner of speaking, and about those things which pertain to morals; then, indeed, about the utility of the barbarian philosophy gleaned by the Greeks, about the exposition of Sacred Scripture against the Greeks and the Jews, and about those things which in the previous books, so that they might not be too long, were passed over; afterward, indeed, about physical principles according to the opinions of the Greeks and the barbarians, and about the chief dogmas of the philosophers, about Scripture, by which it is demonstrated against the heresies that there is but one omnipotent God, with the highest authority, and finally about Gnostic contemplation. In order that these things may indeed be explained more clearly, Clemens says that he must begin from small things, and from those things which were written about the creation of the world, and that from there he will guide the minds of the readers gradually to more sublime things; so that after he has imposed an end to those things which pertain to morals, he may lead them to the contemplation of the Divinity itself.

Moreover, he announces that all these matters are to be treated by him not separately and with an accurate method, but mixed together and confusedly, often passing from one to another, on account of the unskilled and poorly disposed readers. For which very cause [he says he has composed] these commentaries, which [are] like a field full of all [kinds of] herbs and...

^A of what it is to lose or to find one’s soul.

Furthermore, Clement continues, the Stoics say that the soul is changed into wisdom; but Plato [says] that its conversion comes from a nocturnal day, or from light that is dark to the perfect light and knowledge of God. Finally, other philosophers grant that a man may so lead his soul away from the body that there remains no further hope of action. But the Christian martyr, being sought for torture on account of his confession of Christ, never hesitates to cease from every evil act, and to prefer the love of God to the threats of men. Then indeed he fulfills that Dominical precept: “Go, sell all that you have” (τὰ ὑπάρχοντα). And this Clement indeed has briefly expounded, and shows that it cannot be observed without charity.

He, therefore, who approaches the life-giving Word neither for fear of punishment nor for the sake of some promise of a gift, they stand at the right of the sanctuary; but those who are led by the hope of gifts are hirelings, and stand at the left; and these indeed [relate] to the image, but those truly to the likeness of Christ. Furthermore, both are designated by the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, and are said to serve either the Lord or mammon. But the second, indeed, being called to the supper do not come, and they are called foxes, just as the first are called birds. ^B Yet the anxieties of poverty, if it be not borne with an equal mind, are numberless, just as those of riches, glory, and marriage, as the parable of the fourfold seed denotes. Therefore, all things that happen are to be so used that, believing with the whole heart and tranquil in the whole mind, we may be exercised through the gnosis life unto the habit of eternal life. And this, indeed, that he may persuade all, our Clement discourses briefly on what are the treasures on earth, as Christ teaches, which are not to be gathered, and what is the treasure in heaven that does not fail. Wherefore, those who desire to be poor on account of righteousness, they have at least heard what the same Christ the Lord pronounced against the excessive anxiety and avarice of riches, and what He said of Zacchaeus, or, as some supposed, Matthias, the prince of publicans, and what of the widow casting two mites into the treasury.

Furthermore, Clement signifies openly that he has written these things for the explanation of the first evangelical beatitude. Then he comes to the second, and teaches who are those “meek,” whom Christ asserts are blessed and shall possess the earth. There, moreover, he reveals the various differences of merit and of heavenly mansions for the diverse merits of men. But the third beatitude, Clement continues, is of “those who mourn,” namely, those who are sincerely led by repentance for an evil life led, which he expounds. The fourth, “the merciful,” that is, those who, as much as in them lies, offer help to others, he declares blessed. The fifth, “the pure in heart,” who, having rejected the desires and thoughts of the world, come to the knowledge and contemplation of God. ^C The sixth, “the peacemakers,” who have so tamed desire, anger, and other affections of the soul that they always lead a pious and holy life.

Finally, in the last beatitude of those who “suffer persecution for righteousness’ sake,” Clement lingers longer in explaining, and proves that they are those who sustain the tortures inflicted on account of their Christian profession with constant patience and great alacrity of spirit. Every temptation, he says, is an occasion for martyrdom, and he who does not obey the commands of God, this man by denying God denies himself, and is an infidel and a hypocrite. But he who loves God loves himself, and he who dies for Christ the Savior dies for his own salvation and is called a brother. Furthermore, whoever ex- ^D

-^Aists is a martyr and witness of God himself, in whom he believes. Clement therefore rises up against those who condemned martyrdom, and says that they are ignorant of the fact that it is the beginning of true life, and that honors after death are decreed for those who live piously, just as punishments are decreed for the impious. And this is proven by him not only from our own sacred authors, but also from pagans, namely the Pythagorean Theano and Plato. Hence, after he has chastised Telephus, who had said there was only one way to the underworld, he makes it clear to all through Aristophanes, Epicharmus, and Matthew and Paul, how unhappy, miserable, and brief the life of unbelieving men is. Truly, he rightly admonishes us from this, along with Marcion, that no creature is evil, but that those who have laid down their life through martyrdom are truly blessed and happy.

Therefore, those are not to be heard who think it impossible for weak flesh to resist powers and the spirits of domination. For by the help and aid of God this is easy for everyone, provided they have trust in Him. What indeed of the fact that our author confirms that this very thing can be done without such difficulty by the testimony of pagan poets and others, and even by the very example of the Indian philosophers? But since, as the poet Heraclitus testifies, it is the nature of slaves to fear death, ^B Clement teaches from the Apostle that a Christian should neither have a spirit of slavery leading to fear any longer, nor serve sin; but that he has been endowed with the spirit of virtue, love, and sobriety, by which, patiently bearing even the hardest things, he will be blessed, just as Plato writes of the just man.

A Gnostic, therefore, even if he is afflicted by insults, the stripping of his goods, exile, and death, will nevertheless never be torn away from liberty and from the highest charity toward God, which is the third degree of that perfection. Furthermore, Clement briefly rebukes the stubbornness of the Gentiles, who had dreamed that all things happen by fatal necessity. Soon after, he says, to those who strive for perfection is proposed ἡ γνῶσις ἡ λογική, rational knowledge, the foundation of which is the holy Trinity, faith, hope, and the greater of both, charity. Whoever is endowed with this may indeed do all things, but because of the weak conscience of others he abstains from some; he does all things for the glory of God, he fights with spiritual weapons against any height whatsoever that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and he fears no affliction, no danger, and no misfortune. Nor should this be a surprise to anyone at all. For very many pagan men, namely Æsop, the Macedonians, the Lacedaemonians, Zeno the Eleatic, Theodotus the Pythagorean, Paulus a friend of Lacydes, Posthumus the Roman, Anaxarchus, and the envoy sent to Zamolxis, have most steadfastly endured the most bitter torments.

Furthermore, the Church is full of Christian philosophers, both men and women, who spend their whole life in the meditation of death that arouses them toward Christ. And this philosophy can be acquired by all of either sex, whether barbarians or Greeks. For temperance and all other virtues ought to be common to women no less than to men, according to the difference of sex, however; and they must fight against vices and the allurements of the flesh just as much as they. Therefore, while fortification and the virtue of a great soul are indeed desired in women, it is not the kind celebrated in the Amazon, the Sauromatian, the Sacian, or the Iberian. Therefore, all and everyone, as they strive for happiness, must philosophize in a Christian manner. Euripides, therefore, and even Homer at times, sing rashly about women, sometimes well, sometimes badly. But Clement elucidates the mutual duties of these and of men, of parents and children, of servants and masters, and finally of each toward one another, over all of whom ^C may the charity and peace of Christ reign in the hearts of all. And there he incidentally refutes Marcion's error regarding the Creator.

From these things, therefore, he says, it is clearly understood what the unity of faith and Christian perfection is. For this reason, any Christian, whether man or woman, even if the loss of all goods and faculties and extreme punishments are imminent, will never be deterred from religion, piety, and the true worship of God, and will persevere in them unto death all the more steadfastly, the more others have tried to keep him from them. For he will never aim at anything else than that which can rightly and honestly be done, whatever may seem otherwise to others. This indeed Clement confirms by the authority of Epicurus, who taught that one must philosophize from all things and at all times.

Then he immediately shows us the words of Christ the Lord concerning martyrdom and the public confession of our faith, which he demonstrates are partly explained well and partly badly by Heracleon, and he concludes at last that martyrdom appeared to him as a purging of sins with glory. For this very reason the apostles, imitating Christ, who drank the cup of death for the sake of the unfaithful, suffered for the churches they had founded. But the Gnostics, insisting on their footsteps, lead a life so holy and so alien to sin that if any occasion offers itself to suffer for the Church, then for the love of God they undergo torments and death.

Therefore, when Christ says that those who have persecuted us are to be fled, by these words he does not signify that persecution and suffering death for His sake is any evil; but that we must beware not to offer ourselves rashly and inconsiderately to certain death, and thereby provide tyrants the occasion for sinning and killing us unjustly. And to establish this more effectively, he uses the authority of Christ, by which He commands that one's cloak should be given to one who takes away one's tunic.

But, they used to ask, why were Christians tortured and killed, if God was caring for them? Clement answers that we by no means think God willed that Christians should fall into these misfortunes; but that He had predicted to them their future racks and torments, through which they would arrive at the eternal inheritance which He was promising them. What indeed of the fact that even pagans themselves were sometimes afflicted with punishments? What then did the pagans say? For they were evildoers. Very well, continues Clement. If, therefore, Christians paid the penalty to unjust judges because of justice, what does that prove against the providence of the most just God? Was it not right for tyrants to examine the cause of the Christians, and not to deliver the most iniquitous judgment against them solely for the profession of the Christian religion?

Why then, the pagans insisted, was no help brought to the Christians at that time? Because, says Clement, having suffered no injury, they therefore owed thanks to the tyrants, because they gave them the occasion to migrate more quickly to God and to eternal life. And in truth, he asserts in an invincible manner, by the examples of Anytus and Melitus and the authority of Scripture, that they were injured by no torments, even the most exquisite.

Then he discusses in greater detail and uproots the false and heretical opinion of Basilides concerning martyrdom. He warns, however, that he will discuss it again elsewhere. Nor does he strike with a lighter blow the error of Valentinus, who despised martyrdom because his followers, immortal from the beginning, were an elect race; but he babbled that the Catholics, as well as the Phrygians themselves—about whom Clement promises he will speak in the treatise on prophecy—were animal, and from that he wrongly concluded that his disciples had come so that they might destroy the death that proceeded from the Creator, of whom more must be said elsewhere.

^A norum lavabat pedes hospitum, and Sarah, the wife of Abraham, prepared ash-cakes for the angels, and royal maidens among the Hebrews shepherded sheep, just as Homer sang that Nausicaa had gone to the washing-places?

The perfect Christian, therefore, as Clement infers from what has already been said, must strive for divine friendship by carrying out the commandments of God through charity. He must also love his enemy, insofar as he is a human being and a work of God, but by no means his sins, which can be called neither a substance nor a work of God. Moreover, he must not covet the things of others, not, certainly, because they are evil, nor because they are not from God, but because earthly goods should be used rightly. He must, furthermore, bless those by whom he is badly affected, and towards his adversary—not, indeed, as some opined, his own body, but rather the wicked men with whom he is bound to associate—he must be benevolent. Finally, nothing that might happen must separate him from the charity of God.

"You have," our author continues, "a summary of the gnostic martyr," that is, one gifted with knowledge. There is, furthermore, he says, a twofold knowledge: one common to all, by which the true God is recognized; the other for the few, who think it permissible to eat food offered to a false deity, from which the apostles by a broad law decreed that we must abstain. Although, however, it might sometimes be licit, we ought to abstain from these things for the sake of the infirm conscience of others.

The Apostle teaches, moreover, that the common doctrine of faith is the fragrance of knowledge, which escapes those who read the Old Testament and have not yet turned to the Lord. From this, however, Clement distinguishes the perfection of the "gnostic" and the martyr, and explains in what it consists, by the authority of John and Paul, especially in his Epistle to the Hebrews, and also from the book of Wisdom, where martyrdom is described, as has been said, as a glorious purification. Our author demonstrates at length that a certain form of this same "gnostic" is also beautifully displayed in Clement’s Epistle to the Corinthians, which he calls apostolic; and he confirms again by the testimony of Paul those things which were written by him in this epistle concerning perfect charity.

When he was committing these things to writing, there came to his mind a certain "gnostic" whose false opinion it was that he who had looked upon a woman to lust after her had not sinned, unless he had finally gratified that desire by an action, whether in dreaming or in waking. However, to refute this error, he first proposes the judgment of Bocchoris concerning the youth who had seemed to himself to have fulfilled his lust with a harlot in his sleep. Next, he makes plain which aspect of a woman is evil and which is good; and he observes that appetite is so distinguished from desire, that the latter is attributed to pleasure and intemperance, while the former comes from the movement of reason and is established in those things which are according to nature. Finally, those who are free from every vice and agitation of soul, and who are adorned with knowledge and good works, these he calls blessed and says they are transmitted to God.

Both man and woman can be participants of this perfection. Which, indeed, is most clearly proven by our author with various examples: Moses, who preferred to die with his people rather than be safe and unharmed alone; Judith, who for the sake of her fatherland despised the danger to her life that was imminent; Esther, Susanna, and the sister of Moses; as well as the pagan women Lysidice, Philotera, Leæna the Athenian, Telesilla the poetess, the daughters of Danaus, Atalanta, Anticlea, Alcestis, Macaria, the Hyacinthides, Theano the Pythagorean, Themisto, Myia the daughter of Theano, Arignote, the daughters of Diodorus, who were called Menexeno, Argia, Theognis, Artemisia, and Pantaclea. Then, indeed, Hipparchia the Cynic, Arete the Cyrenaic, Lasthenia the Arcadian, Axiothea, and finally Aspasia, many of whom were philosophers. Clement attests that he leaves aside many others: the poetesses Corinna, Telesilla, Myia, and Sappho; the painters Irene and Anaxandra. But what of the fact that the daughter of Cleobulus washed ^B the feet of her father’s guests, and the daughter of a king among the Hebrews served the sheep, just as Homer sang that Nausicaa went to the wash-basins?

Then Clement explains how a woman who cannot be prevented by a man from applying herself to virtue, or her maidservant, ought to conduct herself towards him and obey him. From Euripides, moreover, he reveals what is to be done by a woman who loves her husband with honor. Then he describes and shows how a marriage can be holy and happy, and in what way a woman, if she cannot persuade her husband to live piously and religiously, ought to conduct herself. Finally, he summarizes and elucidates the laws and precepts laid down by the Apostle for married people.

Since, therefore, the goal and purpose of man and woman is one, he reveals from the Epistles of Peter and Paul who is the truly perfect human being. But because there are various degrees of perfection, Clement candidly confesses that it is completely unknown to him whether anyone, besides Christ the Lord, has ever reached the highest peak of perfection. Nevertheless, he affirms without doubt that the perfection of the old law is compared to the profession of the Christian religion. A Christian is indeed perfect if, using that law as a step towards perfection and perceiving it as is fitting with his mind, he orders his life rightly. He will arrive at the summit of perfection if, through supreme charity towards God, he willingly meets death for the confession of Christ’s name with blood poured out.

As for what are the preludes and preliminary exercises of that perfect or "gnostic" life, and how, while we live in this life, we must strive to meet in the perfect man and in the fullness of Christ, our author demonstrates clearly by the authority of Paul. But from the same apostle he wisely notes that there are various kinds of perfection, and one belongs to the prophet, another to the righteous man, another to the martyr, another to the teacher; but that the apostles were most perfect in all things. Yet he maintains that everyone, however, is warned by Paul—who is later than the other apostles—that the writings depend on the Old Testament, and that this cannot be perceived and understood by Hebrew men—unless they believe in Christ.

The first work of the knowing and discerning "gnostic," moreover, and the base and foundation of his other actions, is to abstain from evils; then, to do nothing good either for fear, or for the hope of a promised honor or reward; but to seek the knowledge of God for its own sake. For "the essence of the one who knows," says Clement, "is to contemplate God perpetually and without any intermission." Wherefore, if someone should, by a hypothesis (which, however, cannot happen), propose eternal salvation separated from the knowledge of God to a "gnostic," he would choose the knowledge of God without the slightest hesitation. Therefore, the perfect man will pass his life doing nothing for his own advantage, or for glory and fame, or for a reward to be received from men or from God, but only for that which is beautiful and honorable, being always just and beneficial towards the just and the unjust. He who thus lives, however, according to the opinion of Clement, is no longer merely "continent," but has arrived at the state of *apatheia*, or impassibility, so that he puts on the divine image. For his soul, as far as is possible, is assimilated to God, if it always intends to those things which are the same, and is not converted to corporeal things, by which his affection is varied. ^C

Wherefore, whether waking or sleeping, his same soul is moved in no way by visions and dreams, and, being completely empty of every agitation, it remains ever pure and immaculate. For which reason night is called *euphrone*, and it is especially at night that...

mysteries, since the soul is then completely abstracted from the senses and turned back into itself, is more of a participant in prudence. Concerning death, the same must be said as of sleep. For death, according to Heraclitus, signifies more of an absence of the soul, while sleep signifies less. Wherefore the Apostle allegorically called the Son of God day and light, and called the commandments the armor of light. By a similar metaphor, men were formerly commanded to approach sacrifices and prayers splendid and clean, and it was a custom for the Jews to wash often in bed. But perfect cleanliness is not of the body, but of the mind, namely of deeds, thoughts, and words; so that there may be a freedom from sin even in sleep. A sufficient purification and repentance for a sin committed is that whereby we turn the mind entirely away from past transgressions and from those things which delight the senses. This is confirmed by the very etymology of *episteme* and *pistis*, which derive from station and rest. Yet indeed, it so establishes the human mind that, every fear of punishments or of wicked men being put aside, it remains always just. For this reason, Clement entirely proscribes the error of Epicurus, who thought that a wise man could do injury to others, provided he knew that it would remain ^B deeply hidden. Furthermore, Clement himself contends that one who abstains from injustice through the hope of a reward, just as through fear, is not good of his own accord.

The hope of good or evil things after death, he says, was recognized by pagan philosophers, not only by the followers of Pythagoras, but also by Heraclitus and Plato. These, however, as the Apostle testifies, do not confound. But he who performs his calling simply and sincerely is drawn by the love of God, not for fear, nor for gain or pleasure, to worship and venerate Him piously. Wherefore, even if he has received from God the power to do forbidden things with impunity, he, as one who knows that the honorable is to be loved for its own sake, will never induce his mind to do anything contrary to reason. And indeed, he is completely persuaded that created things, just as legitimate marriage and the procreation of children, whatever the heretics may prattle to the contrary, are indeed good, but that it is more excellent to become *apathes*, subject to no disturbances, and *enaretos*, endowed with virtue, through assimilation to God. ^C Next, Clement makes manifest what is signified by this law, "You shall not covet," and what is the prayer of the Gnostic to God, by which he desires both to be freed from cupidity and to be joined to God himself, and, in a few words, to be content, even though all created things are good.

Then the author, again leaning on the authority of the Apostle, asserts that created things are indeed good, even if some are truly better than others. But he adds that those things which are necessary for us are easily prepared by the kindness of God. From Democritus, therefore, whose reasoning he had already given, he observes a very beautifully stated dictum: that nature and instruction are very similar. But of both, God is the author in the first and second creation. Furthermore, since those things which belong to the mind ought to be chosen by us, Clement concludes that all things which seem honorable appear most pleasant, and that these provide that tranquility of mind by which man, as the Psalmist and Empedocles testify, believes in God. But a twofold man must be distinguished: the first is naturally perfect from God by the idea of an innate spirit, which, as Adam was created, is common to all, to be sure; the other, however, is the individual man, who receives his own character from the form of those things which he has chosen. ^D Yet he, by his nature, is clearly subject to the various disturbances and motions of the soul which cannot fall into God, and can be said to be manifold.

But, furthermore, because it is placed in the free power of every man to believe or not to believe in God, and to observe or transgress His commandments, he is therefore worthy of either praise or blame for deeds rightly or wrongly done; and for sins—all of which, however much Basilides may have dreamed otherwise, are certainly washed away by baptism—he is deservedly afflicted with punishments. But for a threefold reason, just as in a twofold way, sins committed after baptism are punished; whereas those perpetrated before it are said to be purged. But he who is not at all defiled by sin contemplates the immortal nature of God; he is blessed, and, as Plato says, will be a God among men; or with Christ an angel, and alone prudent, he always considers the will of God in tireless contemplation.

Nor is there anything, truly, that one might object, that we cannot arrive at the knowledge of God, who cannot be demonstrated. For through His Son, and the infinite perfections of the same Son, we can know Him, believe in Him, and thus be joined to Him. But if we doubt concerning Him, or do not believe in Him, we are separated from Him, nor are we Levites, or strangers, who do not enter into the holy things of the Lord. For those who have believed and led a pure life are true priests of God and Levites, to whom it is forbidden to touch the dead; or if they have touched them, they are ordered to be purified on the seventh day, and on the eighth to offer a sin-offering. By which law is signified to the Gnostic that a message is to be sent to sins and worldly things, and that he must persevere even unto death in that perfect holiness and justice of body and soul—which is the same as peace and tranquility—which was received in baptism.

In confirmation of this assertion, Clement brings forward these words of Job: "Naked I came out of my mother's womb," etc., and the etymology of the names Rebecca and Melchizedek, and the testimony of Basilides himself. Finally, after he has warned us that our mysteries are to be hidden from the pagans—who also hid their own from others—he himself passes on to moral precepts. Thus he teaches that our Savior, who initiates us into the mysteries, is our only instructor, just as God, lacking a beginning, is the beginning of all things. He argues against the heretics, therefore, who disparaged the body, because not only is its constitution and composition right, but it also receives the soul, most precious to God, and truly capable of the virtues by which it is occupied with God. Wherefore, if Isaiah calls the flesh grass and the flower of grass, by those words he reproves those who walk in sins according to the flesh, as the Apostle says. Yet he confesses that the soul is the better part of man, to which, therefore, good actions are ascribed. But because that soul, which Basilides falsely asserted was always pure by its own nature, is a pilgrim in the body, therefore the wise man, the Gnostic, chastises it severely so that it may not be corrupted by excessive indulgence; and staying in the world as a guest in an inn, which he is soon to leave, never turned backward, and impatient of a longer delay, and groaning with the Apostle, he always aspires to the heavenly mansion and happiness. Concerning this happiness, Clement incidentally observes what Epicharmus and Pindarus sang; and he refutes those who foolishly contended that souls had fallen from heaven to earth so that they might be punished there.

Then he makes it clear

that the Gnostic,

^A is earth and ash; that the former is heard by God, but the latter is not, but rather, whatever the heretics may think to the contrary, is deservedly punished. There, indeed, he reports Pythagoras' saying concerning prayer, but promises to discourse of it further below. Meanwhile, he urges that our works should cry out and shine, and adds that the Gnostic ought, as far as possible, to imitate God. Finally, he says that it seems to him that the elect are called by the poets "Deiform," that is, gods, equal and similar to God, and in counsel peers to Jove; but he asks of Christ that he be taken up into the holy Jerusalem. For this, indeed, can be called the only city, of which the Hyperborean and Arimaspian cities, and the Elysian fields, are images among the poets, just as we know also Plato's republic to be set in heaven as an exemplar.

ARTICLE V. Analysis of the fifth book.

With these ^B things about the Gnostic thus prefaced, Clement hastens to other matters. Yet, returning briefly to faith, he plainly refutes those who distinguished it from knowledge in such a way that the latter would concern the Holy Spirit and the former, the Son of God. For neither can our faith in the Son exist without knowledge, nor conversely can knowledge of Him exist without faith, just as the Father cannot be without the Son. We are truly faithful in this, that we are believers in what is believed and known by few. Furthermore, faith is perceived only by the ears of the soul, which, when we believe what is spoken, is common and imperfect, and becomes perfect through the observance of the precepts.

Then Clement explodes the errors of Basilides, Valentinus, and Marcion concerning faith, and teaches that the foolish questions of these heretics are to be avoided. But that question is best which so agrees with faith that upon it ^C a magnificent knowledge of truth is built. Now faith is strengthened and established when every doubt is removed. But furthermore, some things can be called into doubt and question, while others cannot. For some things, such as the providence of God, are so clear and manifest to all that they stand in no need of proof. From these, however, Clement concludes that God must be believed even without proofs, but that infidel and contentious men attain to neither Him nor His divine Word by their intellect. Also, while one is bound to the body, He cannot be seen by anyone, and can be evidently perceived only in the other life. Wherefore the Savior was sent into this world, that He might teach docile and peaceable men the mystery of great providence and the way of truth. Rightly, therefore, did Numa Pompilius first of all set up a temple of faith and peace; but the faith ^D of Abraham was reckoned unto him for righteousness. What then, of the fact that the Agrigentine poet celebrates faith with praises? But the Apostle exhorts that our faith should not be in human wisdom, but in the power of God, by which alone and without demonstration we can obtain eternal salvation. That this future salvation of the pious—and of the impious through fire, or, as the Stoics say, *ekpyrosis*, [i.e.,] conflagration, and even the cleansing of the earth by fire and water—was learned by the pagans from our sacred Scriptures, he demonstrates. Nay, even the apostate angels, captivated by the love of women, announced both all those things and whatever else they themselves knew.

Furthermore, our faith ought to be neither solitary nor idle, but there is need of inquiry besides, as Clement demonstrates from the Gospel of Luke and the ethnic poets Sophocles, Menander, and Timon. But he aptly warns us that inquiry should not be undertaken to generate contentions, nor should faith be given blindly to all. For God communicates Himself only to those who have heard Him with purity, simplicity, and charity.

And since he has thus discoursed on faith, Clement says the time has now come to discourse on hope and charity. But, he says, so that the speech may not be too long, let it suffice to have noted from Plato that a certain hope of a future immortal life is given to us; and that there is a twofold love and charity, of which one is earthly, by which the body is generated, and the other is celestial, by which the soul and virtue are generated; and this is wont to be called illumination and regeneration by Christian philosophers. To which Clement subjoins those things which Empedocles sang more clearly, but Parmenides more obscurely, concerning charity. But he adds that by him who hopes, no less than by him who believes, are those things seen which are perceived by the intellect and are future. And concluding from thence, that that which is beautiful, honorable, and true, and therefore the divine Word, which is the very idea of truth, or, as Plato says, the divine idea, is perceived by the mind and intellect alone.

There is need, therefore, of labor, diligence, prayers, and—after the remission of sins—of constancy and perseverance in the whole course of one's life to seek and find charity. This we read to be asserted and confirmed by the testimony of Plato and the parable of the ten virgins proposed in the Gospel. And this is the reason why very few from the common crowd are said to philosophize rightly by sacred and profane writers. For these, indeed, not at all content with our saving faith alone, demand proofs as a pledge of truth. But altogether wrongly, since, by the admission of the ethnic writers themselves, sacred mysteries are not to be made manifest to the impious and the unclean, but only to those who are pure and expiated. To prove this, he uses not only the testimonies of those same ethnic writers, but even the very method of the Egyptians for transmitting literature, and their diverse signs, enigmas, and symbols, and the oracles and apophthegms of the wise. For what of the fact that the poets, imbued with theology from our prophets, followed this symbolic manner of speaking, which is commended by the Psalmist and the Apostle? What more? Clement makes it manifest that Pythagoras also borrowed his symbolic sayings and adages—which he here recounts one by one—from our sacred authors, from whom even Plato and others drew many dogmas, though not entirely whole. Finally, he notes that Anacharsis, the king of the Scythians, used the same symbolic manner of speech in his letter to the Byzantine people, and Euphorion in his poems. And there Clement explains and reveals in a few words why the Egyptians placed sphinxes before their temples.

Then he undertakes to demonstrate that the authors of our divine Scripture also very often used the same manner of speaking. But because it would be too long to pursue all and every one of its examples, he selects a few from them. He begins, therefore, to explain those things which were in the Jerusalem temple, and reveals what was signified by the seven enclosures, the priestly vestments, what the covering and the veil variegated with hyacinth, purple, scarlet, and fine linen; what the censer, and the middle place, into which it was lawful for the high priest alone to enter; what the screen expanded before the five pillars, and the veil of the inner sanctuary to the holy of holies, and the four pillars, and the tetragrammaton name imposed upon those who could enter the sanctuary; what the golden lampstand, and the table of the bread of presence; what the ark and the images of the cherubim; what, finally, the long tunic and the other priestly vestments of the Hebrew high priest, and the manner of putting them on and taking them off.

There, moreover, he observes that the Hebrew high priests, from the tribe...

sanctified [and] most noble, to have been an image for God’s elect, just as those who were assumed into the kingdom and prophethood were anointed. For this reason, the Egyptians entrusted their mysteries and the knowledge of divine things not to everyone, but only to those who were either future kings or the most approved among the priests. ^A Indeed, Clement briefly clarifies what the riddles and symbols of these same Egyptians signified: namely, the ship, the crocodile, the boy, the old man, the hawk, the fish, and eyes and even ears consecrated to the gods, a lion, an ox, a horse, a sphinx, a man, and likewise four animals, namely two dogs, an ibis, and a hawk.

Others also, our author continues, dedicated to philosophy, used similar symbols. For Idanthuras, King of the Scythians, threatening war, sent a mouse, a frog, a bird, an arrow, and a plow in place of a letter. Anacharsis also symbolically signified pleasure, and even more so the need to restrain the tongue. Among the Greeks, Androcydes invented the Ephesian letters, and thus found symbolic ones. But Dionysius the grammarian writes that the symbol is of two kinds: one by words, such as the Delphic precepts; another by the things themselves, such as a wheel and a branch, which signify something mystically. That symbolic interpretation, therefore, is most useful for right theology and piety, for the sharpness of the mind, the brevity of practice, and for demonstrating wisdom.

Moreover, the very teaching of children, still based in the elements—namely *bedy*, *zaps*, *chthon*, and *plektron* of the four elements, as Clement proves—comprehends such an interpretation. After he has reported and explained other words of the second and third childish instruction, he immediately proves that Epigenes interprets many modes of Orphic speech as symbolic. He adds that others similar to these were used not only by the Pythagoreans, but appear also among philosophers and poets, everywhere and almost in countless numbers. To these points, their entire books and other lucubrations, such as those of Heraclitus, Euphorion, Callimachus, and Lycophron, indicate the hidden intention of the writer. ^B

Clement further shows from the epistle of Barnabas that precept by which Moses prohibited eating the pig, the eagle, the hawk, and the raven, and [he shows] that these words of his in the book of Exodus: "He cast the horse and his rider into the sea," have their own mystical significance and explanation. In a similar way, also, according to our same Clement, those things which are read in the book of Genesis about the patriarch Joseph—being stripped of his tunic, cast into a pit, and afterward sold—can be explained. Furthermore, John the Baptist, even if he spoke more openly than other prophets, yet said enigmatically that he was not worthy to loose the latchet of Christ’s shoe. Nor does our author show that the testaments of the Romans were entirely free from this mode of writing. But life, he says, will fail me if I wish to bring forward all the examples of symbolic locution, which are infinite. For this reason, although these are longer, he professes nevertheless to have brought them forward for the sake of memory and brevity.

Therefore, he refutes the pagans who contended that one must speak to Christians not symbolically and enigmatically but clearly and lucidly, and he does so especially because they themselves most severely ordered their own mysteries to be entirely hidden from others. Hipparchus, indeed, a Pythagorean, was expelled from his school for having committed the decrees of his master to writing openly, and a column was placed for him as for a dead man. Nor among the followers of Pythagoras or Plato alone, but among the Epicureans also, the Stoics, and the Peripatetics, were there certain arcana which they did not permit to all. ^C

For the same reason, surely, some philosophers, like Plato, concealed their dogmas, obscurely wrapped in certain fables. The disciples of Pythagoras were also of two kinds: some as listeners, others as mathematicians, to whom alone the way to his genuine philosophy was open. The Peripatetics also distinguished a dual kind of discourse, one being "opinion-based," the other "demonstrative," so that they nearly separated opinion and fame from true glory and truth. And Parmenides indeed terms this a dual way of doctrine. Finally, the Ionic Muses said that the common crowd of men follow the poets and use the laws, but the best [men] pursue immortal glory. Wherefore Paul, and afterward Barnabas, taught that doctrine is twofold: one for those starting out, the other for those perfected, which was a mystery hidden from others. There, however, Clement cleverly and incidentally notices that there were already, from the time of the Apostle, unwritten traditions. He continues, and shows by other words of Holy Scripture that the same hidden and mystical kind of speaking—the opposite, indeed, of what is feigned about Jove—conduces to the perfection of good men.

Moreover, as is clear from Plato and the Apostle, this was necessary because God, surpassing all human cognition, can be expressed by no words. Hence Plato, before one is asked about God, orders a great sacrifice to be made, which is certainly nothing other than the secession and amputation of the body’s vices and its affections. Hence Socrates calls philosophy—insofar as it calls us away from the senses—a meditation on death. Hence, finally, the five-year silence established by Pythagoras. And our author observes that these things were received by these philosophers from Moses.

Most, therefore, and indeed with good reason, are they chastised who did not fear to opine the same things about God as about themselves. For those things which occur in Scripture concerning God’s eyes, hands, feet, and other members and affections are to be explained allegorically, as Clement proves elsewhere that he himself would do. It is of the greatest utility, toward healing the errors of those people, to discover [the truth] through wisdom indeed, but with the aid and ministry of others. But whoever those men are who are adorned with wisdom, knowledge, and perfection, Clement explains beautifully from Isocrates; and thence he concludes that the *gnostikon bion*, or "gnostic life," is extolled by the Greeks with divine praises, even if they have not known it as it truly is. But since it is evident to us that the *gnosis* is rational food, he gathers from that that they are truly blessed who hunger and thirst after justice, because they will be satisfied by that eternal food.

Clement then reveals how Euripides agreed in a wonderful way with these things that he had argued concerning the perfect and the imperfect. And so that this might shine forth more and more, he makes it clear that there were various degrees by which the pagans became participants in their mysteries. In the first place, among them, had their place expiations and lustrations, just as the laver does among the barbarians, or Christians; then the small mysteries, which were both the foundation of the doctrine and a preparation for other things. After these, in the sacred mysteries, there was nothing more to learn, but rather to apprehend and contemplate the things themselves. So also the Christian soul, proceeding through expiation and confession to its first intelligence, and then having passed beyond corporeal things, arrives, in whatever manner, at the knowledge and contemplation of the immense and omnipotent God; yet so that he does not know what He Himself is, but what He is not, and thinks nothing corporeal about Him. For God, indeed, can neither be expressed in words, nor, truly, can He be known except by Himself helping through the Son. ^D Furthermore, that triple degree to divine contemplation is allegorically signified by those three days, which

Abraham went forth to sacrifice his son Isaac. Yet in this life God is seen only through a mirror and in a riddle, but in the other He will be seen face to face. For this reason, Moses willed that only one temple of God be built, and that no image be placed therein; and the Word forbade sacrifices [to be made], in order to signify that only one world—contrary to the opinion of Basilides—was founded by God, who is one, and who does not fall under sight, nor is circumscribed by any place. To this sentiment of Moses, Clement continues, not only Paul subscribed, but also Euripides and Plato, who asserted that God is difficult to discover and to know, and cannot be explained in any words. And that, indeed, he had drawn from the same Moses, just as Orpheus had. Then, truly, Clement proves that this knowledge of God is impassable and must be hidden, not only from the Apostle himself, where he touches upon some things concerning the third heaven to which he was caught up; but also from the Epistle to the Corinthians, and from the prophet’s ashes-covered breads, and also from other words of the Apostle and of the Gospel, and even from the parable of the leaven hidden in three measures of meal, and finally from profane writers like Solon and Empedocles. Our author confirms this with three still further arguments of reason. He does not deny, however, that many names of God are circulated, but he contends that by all of them nothing other than His omnipotence is signified. And certainly, how could He be called by a proper name by man, who cannot have perfect knowledge of Him? ^B

It remains, therefore, that, on the testimony of Plato himself, we know God, whom Paul pronounces to be unknown, with the help of the grace of His Word. Wherefore we must entirely believe Him who speaks about God and His Father, both through the prophets and through Himself. Moreover, those who firmly believe in Him, not only attain faith, which is the worker of good things and the foundation of just action, but they also obtain confidence. Nor, furthermore, do those things which some seem to think Aristotle argued against at all stand in the way of this. It is necessary, therefore, that they, and any pagan philosophers whatever who have learned the truth, be saved through Christ. From the ethnic writers themselves, Clement shows that all were imbued with some knowledge of the one omnipotent God, which was afterwards most clearly revealed. For the rest, he promises to explain elsewhere how the Holy Spirit is infused into the believing Christian man, and what that Holy Spirit is.

Thence, indeed, he passes on to disclose the thefts of the Greeks from our holy Scriptures. First, therefore, as he narrates, the Stoics received from these same Scriptures, but not well understood, the idea that God, just like the soul, is body and spirit, and that He pervades all things. Pythagoras, Aristotle, and Plato borrowed from the same sources their ideas on matter; Epicurus, [their ideas] on the fortuitous event of all things; Aristotle, [the idea] that Divine providence acts no further beyond the limits of the moon; while other philosophers and poets borrowed dogmas concerning the punishments to be endured by fire after death, and consequently concerning the immortality of the soul, and concerning angels as guardians and protectors of men. Again, other decrees of the philosophers ^C were plucked from the same holy books, namely: that the world was created; that the devil is the maleficent prince of demons; that there are two worlds, one intelligible and archetypal, the other which falls under the senses, made to the image and likeness of the former; that the earthly body is a dwelling-place, and the soul is inspired from heaven, and that man was made to the image of God. But since Moses said there is another image of God in man who is adorned and endowed with virtues, the Stoics thence gathered that the end for man is to live according to nature; Plato and Zeno [held it] to be assimilation [to God]; and again, Plato [taught] that friendship and likeness exist only among the good, and at length that this end of the best life is computed by the intelligent man, when he is assimilated to Him whom he understands. ^D

What, then, of the fact that from the writings of Moses they learned that only that which is honorable is good, and that virtue suffices for happiness? There, moreover, Clement observes that many books were written by Aristobulus, where he demonstrates that the Peripatetic philosophy was culled from the writings of Moses and the prophets. He then proceeds, and says that from them also was plucked what Plato handed down concerning the triple genus of men, whence some surmise that the triple form of the commonwealth of the Jews, Greeks, and Christians was described; a point which even here the prince of all philosophers easily teaches—that all in the state are brothers, and that swearing an oath is forbidden; [a point] which he himself, and Pythagoras and Socrates, determined not only that the world was founded by God and is conserved by Him, but which those same men, along with Homer, Callimachus, and Hesiod, asserted concerning the earthly body; what the Stoics define as fire being nature; what Homer sang concerning the separation of water and earth; what is read to have been handed down by the poets Epicharmus, the lyric vates, and Aratus concerning the omnipotence of God, and also by Homer concerning the creation of the world, and by others concerning Jove himself.

Furthermore, Plato seems, I know not how, to have acknowledged in his writings the Father, and the Son, and the most holy Trinity from our Scriptures. He even predicted from thence the future resurrection of the dead, or the ascent and descent of the soul through the twelve signs. Empedocles, however, Heraclitus, and the Stoics record that the created world is to be consumed by fire and is administered by divine providence. What of the fact that the same Plato calls the day of this life night, and sleep and death the descent of the soul into the body, and mentions the Lord's Day as one of rest and eternal happiness—he not only plucked these from the Old Testament, but also divined some things afterward established in the New? Moreover, not only the Hebrews knew the seventh day to be holy, but also the Greeks Hesiod, Homer, Callimachus, and Solon. From holy Scripture Plato still further derived that the just man in this life is to be tormented by punishments and afflictions; Antisthenes likewise [derived that] God is like to no one; Xenophon and the Sibyl [derived that] He is to be seen by no man, and Xenophanes [that] He is one and incorporeal. To this it is added that Bacchylides, Cleanthes, and Amphion handed down to posterity [ideas] concerning the divine nature and against idolatry, Sophocles concerning the incontinence of Jove, and Heraclitus concerning the ignorance of men.

What more? From the same divine books Melanippides learned that the Father, namely God, is the miracle of mortals and the ruler of souls living forever; Plato [learned that] He is unbegotten, unique, and always the same; Hesiod [that He is] the lord of all; Sophocles [that He is] the creator of all; the author of the tragedies [that He is] to be looked upon only in heaven; Euripides [that He is] immense, born from Himself, and the fashioning mind; Euphorion [that He is] Jove, through all and above all; Plato and Heraclitus [that He is] the only wise one, and that He alone is to be obeyed; and at length Timaeus and the Sibyl [that] there is one unbegotten principle of all. Then, truly, Homer, Orpheus, and Xenocrates seem to have indicated the Father and the Son. For this reason, Homer and Epicurus deny that God can be grasped, or that He is composed of human limbs. But concerning the divine Word, Epicharmus speaks openly. From the holy prophets Menander received that God [accepts] neither sacrifices nor victims, but pure [intentions] from sins.

^A […conciencia]; that He is present to all and sees all things. From the same sources, Diphilus sang of the future universal judgment, and of the punishments of the impious thereafter; but the tragedian Sophocles and Orpheus sang that all things are to be consumed by fire, and restored after these events; Empedocles, of the future eternal blessedness of the just; Orpheus, that no one escapes the justice of God, nor is hidden from Him; that He falls under no one’s sight, is known only by the Chaldeans, whose seat is heaven, and the earth is the footstool of His feet, who alone is omnipotent, immortal, immense, ruling and governing all things by His authority. Moreover, because he called God “mother-father,” some have from this imagined a wife for God. Phocylides further, from our sacred authors, collected that angels are good and evil; Philemon, that the worship of idols is to be proscribed; Sophocles, that all things come to pass by the will of Jupiter alone, inasmuch as he is the beginning and the end of all; Orpheus, that there is one God, by whom all things are moved. Pindar, truly, when seized by sacred frenzy, calls God “the All”—a term he culled from Isaiah, just as Hesiod [taught] that it is difficult and arduous for man to scrutinize His supreme counsels. From Moses, another poet—not without merit—took the [notion of] the woman about to bring forth in labor and pain. ^B Finally, from these same streams flowed the fact that Homer calls God just, Menander calls Him good, and Aeschylus calls Him the Most High. Apollo, moreover, bears witness to the glory of God from his own oracle on Minerva. Finally, Thearides and Orpheus taught that there is one principle, and Diphilus defines the sole Father of all as being perpetually honored.

From the arguments thus discussed, Clement concludes that excellent minds are deservedly accustomed to [seek] discipline from Plato. For he wishes man to be converted from the night of the day to the light, and gradually arrive at the contemplation of Him who truly is, in which true philosophy is posited. Although God the Father and Artificer of the universe is known by all creatures according to each one’s mode and strength, yet not all know either what that which is, is, nor the manner in which the Lord is Father and Creator, nor the other dispensation of truth, unless they have first been taught by Him. On this account, those who have believed in Him [recognize] the Father and the Son; but the Greeks themselves, not believing, recognize only the Creator. Moreover, that they do not believe, this must be attributed to those themselves who possess freedom, not to God, who is not the cause of evil. Miserable, therefore, and unhappy is he who does not believe the truth. But he who approaches the true discipline, to him, as Parmenides and Metrodorus say, it must be granted to occupy himself in the contemplation of God and divine things. But we must always ascend to Him, until we arrive at the heavenly happiness which Pythagoras called “heavenly,” and Jeremiah called the “chosen inheritance.” ^C

…‹religion of the gnostic man›; yet in such a way that his primary scope is to inscribe all these things without risk upon charters, which are to be handed down in writing for the sake of memory. In the three books of the *Paedagogus*, he declares that he has previously explained that discipline of life which must be begun from Christian childhood, or catechesis, and which is increased by faith, and prepares and disposes the soul for gnostic science. Therefore, when the Greeks have learned from these things which will be discussed, how impiously they harass and persecute the true worshiper, then he himself will lift and dissipate their doubts concerning the advent of Christ.

What manner of writing, he says, was in the previous books, such will be the mode of writing in the composing of these later ones; in which all things will be disseminated here and there, mixed and confused, without art or order—in whatever way they may have offered themselves to the mind. And this variety of arguments will excite both himself and others who are fit for knowledge, to laboriously inquire into the things which are useful to them. For knowledge can hardly be acquired without labor.

But [knowledge] is twofold. The former is held by the ministry of the senses, and is common both to beasts and to men—but which, says Clement, I would never call knowledge. The latter is the mere operation of the rational soul, by which we perceive something intellectually.

Before Clement sets out to treat his argument, he says those things must be completed which he had discussed at the end of the fifth book, concerning the symbolic mode of speaking used both by the Greeks and by the Hebrews. But having deferred this for another time, he already undertakes to prove that the Greeks, as has been demonstrated, stolen most things from our [Scriptures], and are themselves guilty of having committed thefts against one another. Therefore, he first puts forth that which was admitted among them: that the philosophers of various sects derived their primary dogmas and decrees from Socrates. Next, he reveals the thefts and robberies of the most celebrated authors among the Greeks from other Greeks—Homer from Orpheus and Musaeus; Archilochus, Cratinus, Euripides from Homer; Euripides from Aeschylus, Theognis, Epicharmus; Sophocles from Euripides; Theognis, Thucydides, Philistus from Solon; Critias from Euripides; Pherecydes from Homer, and Euripides from the same Homer. Afterwards, he compares the ‹stolen› parts of those who flourished at the same time or contended with one another: Sophocles with Euripides, Eumolus with Solon, Euripides with Homer, Theognis with Panyasis, Hesiod with Euripides, and the same Euripides with Homer, Callias with Menander, Antimachus with Augias, Hesiod with Simonides, Epicharmus with Diphilus and Plato, Euripides with Diphilus and Theodectes, Bacchylides with Moschion, Theognis with Aristophanes, and finally Anacreon with Euripides. And lest his discourse be drawn out too long, Clement cites Hippias as his witness, who argued abundantly concerning the thefts of the Greeks.

Thus far Clement says he has demonstrated enough and more than enough why the Greeks are called thieves by the Lord, and that he does not wish to gather more materials for an argument that would be infinite. Nevertheless, he has something left that must be touched upon, where ^D the opinions of the same Greeks concerning first principles are to be brought forward. Finally, he adds that from what has already been said, it is gathered both how their books are to be read, and how much the eternal beneficence and justice of God were clear and manifest to all.

ARTICLE VI. Analysis of the Sixth Book

The argument of this and the following book Clement first proposes and declares: that after he has described the moral discipline and the ‹gnostic› way of life and its institution, he will then demonstrate that the [gnostic] is not only not impious, but truly pious...

But in order to lay bare similar thefts and equal compilations of philosophers and historians, he again compares Alcmaeon with Sophocles and Xenophon, Euripides with Archelaus, Orpheus with Heraclitus, Athamas with Empedocles, Plato with Menander, Euripides with Hyperides, Isocrates with Andocides, Theognis with Hyperides and Euripides, Stasinus with Xenophon, Sophocles with Herodotus, Theopompus with Sophocles, Antiphanes with Plato, Thucydides with Demosthenes, Cratinus with Andocides, Lysias and Aeschines. What more? He contends that Demosthenes [is compared] with Philinus, Isocrates with Lysias, Homer with Theopompus, Chilon with Epicharmus, Hippocrates with Eu-

Euripides, Homer with Archinus and Demosthenes, Herodotus with Aristophanes and Parmenides, Plato with Philemon, Demosthenes with Phanocles, Plato with the Historian, Empedocles with Euripides, Plato with Euripides, and Euripides with Epicurus, and Aristophanes with the same Epicurus. And ^A Clemens concludes that these indeed suffice to demonstrate the plain theft of [their] opinions.

Now, therefore, he shows that it was not only the entirety of others' books that had been stolen by them, but also their own proper and chief dogmas, and impudently ascribed to themselves under a false name. For Eugamon falsely claimed for himself the book of Musaeus on the Thesprotians, Pisander of Camirus the *Heraclea*, and Panyasis the *Capture of Oechalia* composed by Cleophilus. Homer, in truth, stole much from Orpheus, Hesiod from Musaeus, and Aristophanes from Cratinus, in the same number of words. Moreover, the thefts of the comic poet Plato and Aristophanes in *Daedalus* are mutual and reciprocal. Philemon attributed to himself the *Cocalus* published by Aristophanes, with only a few things changed. In truth, the poems of Hesiod were translated into prose by the historians Eumelus and Acusilaus. From Melesagoras, Gorgias, Eudemus, Bion, Amphilochus, Aristocles, Leandrius, Anaximenes, Hellanicus, Hecataeus, Androtion, and Philochorus gathered much.

Thence Clemens, having omitted Heraclitus who culled many things from Orpheus, says that Plato received from Pythagoras, and both of them from the Egyptians, that the soul is immortal; but that the Stoics and Aristotle drank from Plato, and Epicurus from Democritus for his many and chief dogmas. Finally, if anyone should wish to pursue the rest, as he says, which the Greeks pilfered either from their own or from our writers, life would fail him.

But they were not only thieves and plagiarists, ^B but they also imitated those things which were miraculously brought about among us by divine power by men conspicuous for holiness, and sold them prodigiously as if they were Greek fables. But if these things, Clemens urges, were believed to be true, why do the miracles of Moses and other prophets appear incredible to them? For they narrate the sterility of the earth removed by the prayers of Aeacus, which Holy Scripture testifies was obtained by the prayers of Samuel. The Greeks have handed down in memory that winds lacking [in force] were recalled by the sacrifice of Aristaeus, or that, when the sacrifice itself was performed, they blew in favor of the Greeks, or were restrained by Empedocles, and that health was miraculously restored to certain infirm persons. But Holy Scripture testifies more than once that the same things were done by our people, and that all things are done by God. Again, the Greeks said that hail and storms were excited by the anger of demons and evil angels, or calmed by the sacrifices of magi, or that plague and war were delayed after ten years; and they thought that the angels, by whose help they supposed these things were done, were the holy souls of dead men.

But having put off the discourse on these things to another time, ^C Clemens further rebukes the Greeks, because, after Damasus had predicted rain from conjectures about the stars, many had faith, yet they do not wish to believe those things which have been handed down by our sacred writers, namely, that God appeared to Moses on Mount Sinai, where a fire was burning without consuming anything, and where trumpets were sounding, though no one was blowing them. For that is established not only by the testimony of Aristobulus, but can be confirmed by other examples which are narrated by these same Greeks. For a certain cavern in the island of Britain is said to exist where the sound of cymbals playing in harmony is heard. In the woods also, the leaves, sometimes moved by a sudden and dense gust, render a sound very like the singing of birds. In three mountains of Persia a triple sound is emitted, and in the first, to be sure, [it is like] the confused shouting of men as if in battle; in the second, a more vehement and ^D distinct sound; in the third, the voices of men, just as if they had conquered, singing a paean. But on Mount Sinai, voices, thunders, and all other things were produced by almighty God so that the minds of the infidels might be led to the true faith.

Then again Clemens proves that the Greeks took the most beautiful documents, which they wrongly arrogate to themselves, from our people and from the Egyptians, and their dogma, especially concerning the migration of the soul into bodies. Thereafter he unfolds the truer mysteries of Egyptian philosophy and religion, [their] rites, and their various degrees, and presents the inquiries proposed by Alexander to the ten Indian gymnosophists, and [how they were] immediately and very briefly solved and unraveled by them. Finally, he concludes that it has been demonstrated by him more than enough that the Greeks were thieves and compilers of every kind of writer, and utter plagiarists.

After this, from the *Preaching of Peter*, he himself makes it clear that the pagans' knowledge of God is far more imperfect than that of the Christians, and that true worship is not offered to Him by those same pagans as it is by the Christians. For pagans worship wood, as Peter says in the same place, stones, gold, silver, birds, beasts, and serpents, and they sacrifice to dead men. The Jews, indeed, although they know the true God, yet do not know that they are worshipping angels, archangels, and the moon. But Christians in a new and spiritual way worship God through Christ, the author of both the Old and New Testaments, who gathers both them and the Greeks and the Jews into one and the same people through faith; and, as Paul bears witness, He sent prophets to all of them, who would preach Christ. Wherefore Peter, in the same *Preaching*, and Isaiah before him, exhort the Israelites and Greeks to do penance for their sins and to receive the faith of Christ. For this very reason Clemens, with various arguments and with the testimonies of Hermas and Holy Scripture, strives to prove that the Gospel was preached by Christ the Lord, and after Him by the apostles, in the underworld to those infidels who had lived piously and holily before the coming of Christ, even if not altogether perfectly, so that, having received the faith and having done penance for their sins, they might attain eternal happiness for that reason.

After this, Clemens returns to the philosophers, and demonstrates that they, even with the heretics Valentinus and Isidore, the son of Basilides, admitting it, purloined many things from our authors. Nay more, what Pherecydes said allegorically in theology, this same Isidore testifies was taken from the prophecy of Cham. But Clemens teaches in the same place that the foundation of true philosophy is not, as he had said above, the institution of life handed down by the heretics; but that firm and always stable wisdom, or the knowledge of divine things, which, since it is derived from the Word, so embraces the present, the past, and the future that it can never fail. Wherefore it is partly eternal and perfect, but partly imperfect and temporal. Philosophy is held by the supreme desire for this wisdom, the goal of which is that the soul may always think good and true things, and speak rightly of the same.

Christians, therefore, love this wisdom, which is the knowledge of the Son of God. Among the pagans, however, the philosophers who dispute about virtue certainly cannot be argued against when their decrees altogether correspond to the right way of living. But, having culled these decrees from our teachers, they wrongly adorn them with the adulterous flowers of Greek eloquence, and, misrepresenting some and depraving others by their own false conjectures and *philautia* (self-love), they have fallen into various errors. Hence it happens that they accept generalities instead of particulars, and the creature instead of the Creator.

^A And yet they never found the true master and teacher. For Cleanthes chose Zeno for his master, Theophrastus chose Aristotle, Metrodorus chose Epicurus, and Plato chose Socrates. But if you ascend step by step and inquire solicitously who were the masters of Pythagoras, Pherecydes, Thales, and the other earliest wise men, they will answer that these were Egyptians, Indians, Babylonians, or Magi. If you insist and ask again 126 who those ones also had as preceptors, you must certainly return to the first man. But whose master was he? If you ask further, it certainly could not have been man, nor even the angels, inasmuch as they are devoid of members and of every bodily organ. But grant that they might be called the first man’s masters: it still remains to be inquired who was their master. And He surely can be no other than the Son of God and the Wisdom, through whom all things were made. Every sound and correct doctrine, therefore, must be attributed to that one Master and Teacher. ^B Therefore, if any adulterate his doctrine with human traditions, he is certainly not their master. But if any have believed in his coming and in his sacred writings, then all of them, just as the philosophers who were not brought to the knowledge of true philosophy and the true Law by the Lord's doctrine, are rendered pure and holy in body and soul by his divine utterances, as if by silver refined and purified.

"Double, however," says Clement, "is the purgation." The former is abstinence from evils, common to the Jew, the believer, and the Greek, which some vainly imagine to be the highest perfection. The latter, however, is that by which the gnostic increases in justice and beneficence, until he becomes perfect and persists in the likeness of God through an unchangeable habit of doing good. From these things, furthermore, which our author discourses upon there concerning wisdom, he concludes that there is a double contemplation: one, that of the philosophers, by which they indeed strive for divine wisdom, but do not attain it unless as it is declared by the voice or writings of the prophets. ^C The other, however, he says is that of the Christians, which is handed down to them even without writing by the apostles, and is to be exercised always in an eternal habit, subject to no change. Wherefore, as the Apostle says, it is never permitted for a Christian to return to the philosophy of the pagans.

No one, however, should object that this is squarely and utterly proscribed by the same Apostle. For by various testimonies of holy Scripture, and by the authority of Barnabas itself [it should be read Clement of Rome], our Clement proves that all knowledge and understanding have been communicated to individual men, though in diverse and various ways, more or less. To this is added that philosophy is useful to the wise man because, by its aid, provided he himself be faithful and humble, he dilutes and overturns the various sophisms of others. Then Clement answers others still, who proclaimed that philosophy originated from the devil or was sown with tares and errors. For it is agreed that false doctrines, such as those of Epicurus concerning pleasure, arose in Greek philosophy, and heresies in Christian doctrine, alongside the good wheat of truth; but that does not prevent Greek philosophy from having in some way laid the foundations of our true and perfect philosophy regarding particulars. Moreover, it is concerned with spiritual things, which, beyond a doubt, no one knew before Christ revealed them. ^D Now, however, we dare to assert that those things are known to the "gnostics," such as the apostles were.

Then, indeed, Clement explains what that knowledge is, and how far it extends, by which a man arrives at that degree of perfection that no more affections befall him, except those which are necessary for the preserving and refreshing of the body. But he contends that Christ the Lord Himself was entirely devoid of them; and he clearly and briefly discourses upon what kind of desires those were, and still are, in the souls of the apostles after Christ’s resurrection, or even now occur in the perfect "gnostic." There, furthermore, Clement graphically describes in what that highest perfection or state of perfection consists, by which one, unmoved and unagitated by pleasures, or desires, or perturbations of the soul, but always clinging to spiritual and divine things, is so intimately conjoined to and assimilated to God, as far as it is permitted to human nature, that always intent upon good works, and never unprepared for them, he always desires and craves his own salvation and that of others. Although, therefore, he is moved by no pleasures, neither by day nor by night, and being accustomed to temperance, moderation, and honesty, he is content with only those things altogether necessary for sustaining life; yet these virtues are secondary to him, while the primary and chief thing of all is knowledge. Wherefore, he does not diligently attend to other disciplines, by which we are exercised for knowledge, and he picks from each—for instance, music, arithmetic, geometry, dialectic—that which leads to the truth.

Therefore, the same author of ours rebukes those who feared Greek philosophy, just as children fear masks. For if their faith is shaken by some probable argument, they must necessarily confess that they will not attain the truth, which can in no way ever be conquered. Against these, however, dialectic is a fortification of a kind, never to be stormed by any sophistical quibbles. Wherefore, the "gnostic" uses the disciplines as handmaidens, so that he may separate truth from falsehood and never fall into errors. And what wonder, when the distinction of names and things in the holy Scriptures infuses the soul with great light! One must, however, avoid the many and useless abuses of these disciplines, and not use them badly, as the heretics do, but always well, though subordinately. Clement indeed teaches that Abraham used astronomy and arithmetic in the same way, and there he discourses at length on numbers, and especially on the three hundred and eighteen. Moreover, he shows the use of geometry in the construction of the tabernacle and the ark of the covenant, as well as music in the Davidic Psalms, and tells many things about the various kinds of music and harmony; and he clearly expounds how, and for what uses, Christians ought to apply it, no differently than astronomy. Therefore, as Clement concludes from what has been said, the disciplines offer aid to philosophy, and philosophy in turn aids the treatment of truth. Which utility of theirs, after he has proven it by reason, and especially by the fact that there is a need for great exercise and experience for pursuing knowledge, then he confirms and asserts it again by the authority of holy Scripture.

After this, he passes on to the solving of the objection of those who argued that for a Christian man the knowledge and science of the stars' motions, and also of geometry, dialectic, and the other disciplines, are utterly useless, and that in the end all Greek philosophy is an invention of human wit, which is not instructed by the truth. Therefore, so that Clement may dilute these arguments of his adversaries, he first shows that they are plainly deceived in the greatest matters; as they do not know that the "gnostic," gifted with free will, can render human doctrine entirely holy, even though it be received from men. Moreover, it is absurd to say that philosophy is worse than the art of the carpenter and of building ships. And in confirmation of his assertion, he brings forward the mystical explanation of the five barley loaves and two fishes, with which Christ had fed five thousand men.

Clement proceeds, and teaches that the four cardinal virtues, as they are called, which the Greeks refer to as having been received from the Hebrews, are not acquired without labor. For man is created apt for acquiring virtue, or for progressing in it; and for this reason, he has need of discipline and exercise. But since knowledge excels all disciplines, it is for that very reason most difficult to acquire, nor is that difficulty overcome without much labor. ^A Furthermore, the *gnostic*, a just and holy man who strives for the highest perfection, has not only pure deeds and thoughts, but also pure words. He knows perfectly well what sin is, and what ought not to be done. Wherefore, if he should sin, it is not to be attributed to the fault of a demon, but to him who, by his own malice and choice, becomes wicked and a *daemonic* man. And we call those things good which are virtues and honest actions, of which some are to be chosen for the sake of something else, such as faith; others, however, for their own sake, such as knowledge, which is therefore the most perfect good. The utility and office of this is so to cut away desires in the *gnostic*, both in possession and in use, that, content with only necessary things, he may always live piously; that he may never prefer children, parents, or wife to divine charity; and after children are born, his wife should be to him as a sister, as she will be in reality after the resurrection. For souls have no sex, and the woman, like Sarah—whom Abraham properly called sister—becomes "manly." ^B Just as God grants the prayers of those who are indeed repentant of their sins, yet have not yet believed everything firmly (*στερεῶς*), so to those who live without sin and *gnostically*, God grants, even before they ask, all things which they think to ask for. Moreover, even if the *gnostic*, joined to God by charity, should pray in his thought at all times, he nonetheless asks of Him four things: namely, the remission of sins; then, not to sin anymore; thirdly, to have the power to do good; and finally, with a pure heart, to contemplate God face to face. Wherefore his justice is also fourfold. He, furthermore, like Abraham and Moses, is both faithful and just, and through the most perfect institution of his life, becomes, as far as human nature allows, like God the Savior, and in his *ἀπαθεία* (impassibility) equal to the angels, and by the constant observation of divine commandments is inscribed into the number of the apostles. What more? He is, not indeed by the imposition of hands, but in spirit, a presbyter of the Church and a deacon of the divine will, and he shall sit to judge the people on twenty-four thrones. The *gnostic*, moreover, will be chosen both from the Greeks and from the Jews; but the degrees and orders of such chosen and perfect men in heavenly glory will be various, just as they are for the sacred ministers of the Church. But indeed, in order for one to attain this heavenly glory, or eternal happiness, not faith alone, but good works also are required. It is therefore necessary that the faithful man both lay aside his vices, and cleanse the sins committed after baptism by the most grievous punishments and sufferings of sincere repentance, and by their perpetual sorrow become worthy to be numbered among those for whom eternal glory awaits on account of their justice.

Clement makes it clear that not only the faithful man who acts wickedly, but also the Gentile who has no faith, is most justly condemned by God. For he, besides the fact that he could have both recognized God and believed in Him, sins in this: that there is no good *telos* (end) to his action. But he who is well-conscious of himself is holy toward God, just toward men; he always keeps his soul intent upon good thoughts, words, and deeds, and judges nothing to be an evil except sin and ignorance. Therefore, the *gnostic* who perseveres constantly in love will obtain an eternal dwelling in future beatitude according to his merits. For those mansions are various; but theirs is the greatest, who, like the Lord, arrive at the perfect man. In whom, however, this likeness and image of God in the *gnostic* man consists, Clement skillfully clears up against the false opinion of certain persons. But this divine likeness, as he teaches, the *gnostic* expresses first by acting, and then by teaching. Nevertheless, he hides our sacred dogmas from the unworthy, and unfolds and explains them when, how, and before whom it is proper. ^C Now, the doctrine and philosophy of the same *gnostic* is perfect, just as that of the Greeks is imperfect; but if this latter, like a wild olive, is grafted onto the former as if onto a good olive tree, it will certainly bear most numerous fruits. And certainly, the grafting of Christian doctrine is distinguished, just as that of trees, in a fourfold manner. The first takes place in the Gentiles, the second in the philosophers and Jews, the third in the heretics, and the fourth and most useful is that of the *gnostic* doctrine, which is able to perceive the things themselves. From these, however, corroborated by the authority of the Apostles and Solomon, Clement concludes that knowledge is to be sought until it is found. Its discovery is the perception of the doctrine delivered to us by our Savior, whom the sacred oracles of the prophets prove to be the Son of God, as do the testimonies concerning the assumption of His human flesh, and after His ascension into heaven, His precepts and miracles. For then it is certain that we have found the truth through this perception of the doctrine of Christ, inasmuch as it is the very virtue of faith itself, announced by the Son of God Himself, which most invincibly overturns and overcomes all things contrary to it. Therefore, just as he is an impious man, and one to be convinced by punishments rather than by words, who denies the providence of God; so we, taught not by sophists but by God, learn how we may arrive at the knowledge of Him and at eternal salvation, by honoring Him and insisting upon good actions. ^D Yet Greek philosophy is not therefore to be entirely rejected. For in at least some of its teachings—namely, about divine providence, about the future punishments of the impious, and the reward of the good—it teaches the truth itself, which nevertheless it has not attained in other matters, for example, regarding the Son of God. Wherefore, the heretics are liars among us; since, even if they have not erred in the less important dogmas of our religion—about which, on account of the infirm minds of some, one might, after the manner of Paul, make some concession—they nevertheless destroy its principal decrees and foundations from the root. For they interpret SACRED SCRIPTURES not for the dignity of the Lord, but against the pious tradition of the apostles and the ecclesiastical rule. Moreover, that their true sense may be understood, it is necessary to search them with great diligence and arduous labor. For their mode of speaking is clearly parabolic. But what a parabola is, Clement accurately defines, and he maintains that the passage which we have written concerning the incarnation and economy of Christ is being referred to it by some in a preposterous and altogether absurd manner.

Clement, however, makes it manifest by this way of speaking, which he has demonstrated to be most ancient, that the prophets used it—they who, when they had foretold the future coming of Christ, were tortured with various torments, as was Christ Himself, and were even put to death. And these things are confirmed by him from the *Preaching of Peter*. He adds that the Hebrew language, which is far older than Greek, has a peculiar dialect and various tropes of its own, by which the truth, to be opened only to the initiated, is enveloped. Then he again shows that the sense of Scripture is twofold: the first indeed, the literal, or according to the letter, is clear and perspicuous to all if it is taken by a plain reading; the other is the allegorical, which he demonstrates to be difficult of discovery, both by the testimony of Hermes and Isaiah, and by that which Joshua and Caleb *when he was being assumed*—a twofold

^A allegory is set forth for us. First, he considers it superfluous to speak of the decimal number of these commandments as sacred. Next, he explains in order what the tablets of the Decalogue, inscribed by the finger of God, signify allegorically; what the finger of God is; what its writing is; why there are only two tablets; what the ark containing them signifies; and why the same tablets were renewed and inscribed twice. There he discusses at length the twofold spirit of man, and the twofold nature of his soul, created not by tradition like the body, but existing in its desires and in the divine image. Approaching then to explain the individual precepts, he discourses separately on the first, second, and third. But in the exposition of this third one, in which the observance of the seventh day and the Sabbath is commanded, he digresses from his subject and institutes a long discussion concerning the number seven, and the six and eight conjoined to it. ^B Furthermore, he inserts certain things concerning the rest and action of God, and teaches whether the world was created by Him in time, or at once, and in the same moment and day, and what that day is to be called. Returning thence to the other commandments of the Decalogue, he interprets them in a clearly similar manner, though the ninth is omitted.

How idolatry and the worship of false deities are forbidden by most of these precepts, Clement makes manifest. Later, he teaches that Greek philosophers do not worship the God they name as God, because they know Him only in part. And it is from this imperfect knowledge that they did not hesitate to attribute human affections to Him. Nor is it a wonder, indeed, since they live their lives in such a way that they seek only what is probable, not what is true. But Christians, having received a spark of truth, spare no labor, study, care, or diligence, so that, having set aside false opinions, they may recognize it clearly, and become good, pious, and honest men, and as far as possible, like to God Himself.

Moreover, as Clement proceeds, there are two species and ideas of truth, namely, things and names. But Greek philosophers cling to words, whereas Christians cling to things. He proves that we must stop with this by a twofold example: one, that of Christ the Lord, who was of humble bodily form; and another, that of crows, which imitate human voices. But the one who has received faith, it is proper for him to become a partaker of knowledge, and if upon this foundation he has placed gold, silver, and precious stones, he turns into a regal and "gnostic" man. ^C

Yet it is not absurd to say that Greek philosophy, which, like hair and clothing, is of some use, was given by God. For it leads a man to Christian perfection, provided he is not ashamed to be taught by barbarian philosophy. For whoever has investigated perfect philosophy curiously and without arrogance, but with a sincere love of truth, and has given himself over to the custom of the Christians, he is certainly led first to the faith, and then to greater progress, and finally strives for salvation. Then, furthermore, he is adorned with true prudence, whose definition and various names are explained by our author. ^D Wherefore, he again chastises and refutes those who wrongly contended that philosophy did not originate from God, but from the devil. From this, however, he concludes that the Law was given to the Jews, but philosophy to the Greeks, until Christ should come into this world having been made man. Yet he reminds us that he means by philosophy every truth, which we attain by the help and ministry of philosophy itself.

Therefore, that truth flowed from God, just as all other things which are good in the arts. Immediately, however, after Clement has made clear to everyone that the manner of teaching and informing both the "gnostic" and the [other] men of God is threefold, he then declares that the "gnostic" always occupies himself in those things which are preeminent, in such a way that, if he has leisure, he may touch upon Greek philosophy for the sake of relaxing his mind. Nevertheless, he asserts without doubt that those who chase after empty and superfluous things in it, and whose time is spent in contentious sophistries, are chasing shadows. Although it is good to know all things, yet he whose soul cannot be imbued with all disciplines ought to choose the better and more excellent ones. But the knowledge of the "gnostic" is always firm and constant, and by it he detects at least that which is false. Wherefore, from this and from what was said above, Clement infers that one must philosophize.

And while these things are so, the Greeks ought to learn from the Law and the prophets that there is one omnipotent God, that there can be no image of Him, nor are idols images of the body, much less of the soul, of those whom the pagans worship and revere. Having left and repudiated these things, man becomes just by abstaining from evils and loving his neighbors. But with the increase of justice, the "gnostic" is recognized, who, when he has arrived at the summit of faith—which the Apostle said holds the "principality"—will attain eternal happiness.

After this, to refute the error of another of the Greeks, who boasted that they had comprehended the truth, Clement openly shows that human reason is too weak to be able to attain it without the help and aid of God Himself. For from Him all the fountains of wisdom and truth have flowed to us first through the Law and the prophets, then through the forerunner of Christ, and finally through His apostles and preachers. On the other hand, it was not just any teachers who pleased the philosophers, but only some—namely, Socrates to Plato, Plato to Xenocrates, and Aristotle to Theophrastus and Zeno to Cleanthes. But what of the fact that philosophy flourished only in Greece? Our doctrine, however, is disseminated not only in Judea, but throughout the whole world among all nations and peoples. To this, indeed, that Greek philosophy, as often as it was prohibited by the magistrates, so often immediately perished: but ours, the more harshly and cruelly it was forbidden and vexed by princes and kings and all their satellites, the more it always flourished. Finally, he proves that the claim of the Greeks is just as false—that their poets, however light-minded, were inspired by the divine spirit—as it is certain that our holy prophets are the instruments of the divine voice. And there Clement finally puts an end to this book, and says that he has depicted, as on a tablet, what the "gnostic" ways are and the pious institution of his life, and that after he begins to treat of the origin of the world, he then promises that he will demonstrate what that same "gnostic" is in the contemplation of things natural.

ARTICLE VII.

From the very beginning of this book, Clement undertakes to demonstrate to the Greeks that the "gnostic," or the truly Christian man, is pious and religious, and therefore is clearly unjustly vexed and agitated by them on that account. And first he declares that he will prove this by evident moments of reason, but not by divine ones, which he will use later when the Greeks have believed; lest, while describing Christianity, he should interrupt the thread of his discourse with things which were not yet sufficiently open to the Greeks. He warns, how-

- ^Aever, that although he may not bring forward the very words of holy Scripture, he follows its teachings. Proceeding then to his argument, he distinguishes between a twofold worship: the first concerns men, the second concerns God. But he shows most plainly that the “Gnostic” is truly pious and religious in both, just as are the angels. The Gnostic, therefore—that is, the true Christian—is undeservedly branded as an atheist and an impious man among the pagans, since he is convinced that God is omnipotent and has learned the divine mysteries from His only-begotten Son, and neither refers wood, or spirit, or man to the number of the gods, nor ever does anything unjustly. Therefore, says Clement, that man is the most excellent thing on earth, endowed with the highest piety toward God, and an angel on earth; but it is established that the Word and Son of God is by far the most excellent and perfect of all, who assumed human flesh, who imbues the Gnostic with mysteries, who suckles the faithful with good hope, who chastises the hard of heart, who was announced by the prophets as Lord and Savior, and who, compelling no one, persuades all to choose and fulfill what is good, who instructed the Greeks in philosophy by means of the works of angels, who cares for all, and bestows His benefits upon Greeks, barbarians, and the predestined, according to their ^B capacity for virtue. He further called everyone equally, but conferred exceptional honors upon those who believed. He is the minister of the Father’s will, who, although he could never be prevented by anyone from doing anything, himself also trained man in the habit of impassibility, ἀπαθείας. What more? He is the Savior of those who believe and the Lord of those who do not believe; hence he hates no man, but looks upon all, leaves no one behind, is the cause of all good things, the first author of motions, and the power. He is the same one who, although he could be comprehended by no one, put on human flesh, by which he showed that each one can obey divine commands. He governs all things, and places individuals in their own order, so that the inferiors look to their superiors and those set over them until they arrive at the supreme pontiff. But those who, out of infirmity, have fallen into an evil habit, being agitated by the perturbations of the soul, fall to the ground. The soul of the just man, however, always becomes better through the spontaneous observation of the laws, and through various advancements in piety and justice comes to the habit of ἀπαθείας, until it attains an eternal inheritance.

Therefore God, calling everyone to the contemplation of Himself, gave precepts to those who were before the law, and philosophy to the Greeks, through which all could arrive at faith, so that no one can be excused for the privation of it, for ignorance of the good God, for lack of progress in virtue according to his strength, or for failure to perform penance for sins. The Gnostic, however, surpassing others in divine contemplation, will be gifted with insatiable and eternal happiness. Clement clearly reveals by what ^C grades of virtues and good works he can both reach and lead others to the perfect assimilation to God, as far as is possible. Moreover, he teaches that these virtues are gentleness and humanity, ἡμερότητα καὶ φιλανθρωπίαν, a heart alien to pride and arrogance, and the highest and perfect worship of God, which he affirms to be a sacrifice and holocaust acceptable and pleasing to God. For this reason, the Gospel and the Apostle commanded that the old man, with his desires and perturbations of soul, be put to death, and the new man be raised up, just as the law commanded the sinner to be removed from the midst. For this same reason, we offer no gift or sacrifice to God, who is in need of nothing, as pagans and Jews do, unless we offer ourselves. Those who do not understand these things deny either that there is a God, or that He observes all things, or finally they do not ^D recognize the true God. And from all these our author concludes that the Gnostic is truly pious and religious; for he is altogether solicitous for his own salvation and that of his neighbors, persuaded that the weakness of matter or some fatal necessity is not the cause of evils; and having become an imitator of God, he multiplies benefits upon all as far as he is able in his manliness. If, indeed, he holds a magistracy, he visits the good with honor, as Moses did, and the wicked with punishments. Furthermore, in his soul, God the Father and the Word are seated by the accurate observation of divine laws, and the contemplation, impressed upon him by the same Word of God, transformed into His likeness as far as is lawful for man, becomes the third divine image.

Then, therefore, by a firm and stable comprehension of divine science, the Gnostic rules himself and his own, and approaches the truth. But Clement explains in detail how he conducts himself in both divine and human matters by this divine science, and how he applies himself to the four cardinal virtues, as they are called. To these he subjoins that he is a servant of God who of his own accord subjects himself to the divine precepts; but he who is pure of heart, no longer for the sake of the precepts but for the sake of the knowledge itself, γνῶσιν, this one is the friend of God. For virtue is acquired by no one except through a true victory over all perturbations of the soul. But he who, in that struggle, conducts himself like a brave athlete and serves the omnipotent God, the arbiter of the games, is crowned by Him with the immortal laurel. 130 Furthermore, it is situated in the power of anyone, if he wishes, to achieve this. But he who has observed the commands of God will become faithful. And he who ultimately renders thanks to Him as much as he can for the benefit received is certainly already a friend of God. But Clement warns there that the chief action of thanksgiving is to do those things that are best. Since, therefore, God holds the actions of the just man to be grateful and acceptable, these men, without a doubt, who aggress against those who believe in the same God, affect Him with contumely and disgrace. And indeed, although the divine Word, spread everywhere like the sun, observes all things, the Greeks nevertheless fashion gods in the form and manner of human beings. But the Gnostic, being entirely alien to their errors, worships and honors the true God. Although Clement signifies that he has sufficiently disputed about the false religion of the Greeks in the *Protrepticus*, nevertheless, so that he may make it still clearer how great their impiety is, he chooses a few things from many, by which it may be demonstrated more and more that the gods are fashioned as similar to men, and even worse than they. For those Greeks, Clement continues, shamelessly chatter that the gods were harmed by men, and that Diana was enraged against the Aetolians because of Oeneus, and Minerva against Diana herself because she had given birth in the temple. Nor is their superstition the least, whereby they imagined that future events were announced to them by things that happen naturally—for example, if a mouse gnawed through an altar or a lecythus, if a sow devoured her piglets, if a pestle entangled a serpent, and finally, if anyone sneezed. Nor are others less superstitious, who pray for sobriety and health but bring diseases upon themselves on feast days by drunkenness; others, with similar superstition, feared suspended inscriptions, yellow wool, pieces of salt, torches, and squills, by which they were purified in lustration, and were terrified by various incantations of sorcerers. But the true expiation of the soul is if it be entirely purged of sins and of impious and false dogmas, such as that one: that God is included in temples and images. For the holy and true temple of God is the Church, or the congregation of the faithful, and primarily the Gnostic, in whose soul, both purged and adorned with blessed works, the divine effigy and image is found. Indeed, whatever is to be believed is already tan¬

^A in honor of the likeness, consecrated to God. Next, Clement explodes another superstition of the pagans, who, imagining that the gods desire sacrifice like food, used to sacrifice those parts of the slaughtered animals which were shameful, and which the pagans themselves did not eat. For God has no need of food or of anything at all. Wherefore He is duly worshipped by Christians as much with prayers as with a pure affection of the heart, in which is truly the best and most holy sacrifice. And in very truth, since the pagans have recorded that Pythagoras approached the altar undefiled by any slaughter or death, surely they ought to have had faith in us, who say that the holy soul of a just man is the altar, and that pious prayer is the incense.

But if anyone should object that sacrifices were made in the Old Law, Clement replies that they were not made for the reason that the Jews might eat the flesh of slaughtered animals, but because those things allegorically signified our religion. He adds, however, that abstinence from flesh is good, provided it is not done on account of Pythagorean metempsychosis. Then he brings forward the reasons ^B for which the Jews did not eat swine's flesh nor sacrifice a goat, and why certain Gnostics abstained from meat and wine; and finally, why the Egyptian priests, abstaining from meat and fish, would use only the lightest of little birds for food. Finally, from all these things, our Clement concludes that not splendid and extravagant sacrifices are to be offered to God, but pious ones, which are acceptable to Him: namely, prayers and supplications proceeding from the voices of all nations and sexes gathered into the unity of the faith, with a pure mind, a right institution of life, and with holy works.

For we are commanded to honor and worship our Savior and His Father through Him, not on select days, but through our whole life and in all ways. The Gnostic, however, ^C honors Him not in any definite place and temple, or on appointed feast days, but in every place and at every time of his life, whether he is alone or in company with others; and in deeds, words, and affections he always becomes better. But he is joined more closely to God than others, having become more intimate with Him, and bearing gravity, cheerfulness, and kindness in everything; he becomes a truly royal and holy priest of God. What wonder? For he admits absolutely nothing of seductive pleasure, not even in his dreams; but he refers the honorable use of all things to God, and offers to Him the first fruits of them, and always gives Him thanks for them. Moreover, he never comes to banquets unless for the sake of friendship and harmony. For he is persuaded that God hears and knows all things, and that He searches out even the very thoughts of minds, the vows, and the innermost and secret recesses of the heart. Conversely, however, he who degrades God to humble forms and indecent desires, his religion is vain and impious, and his prayers and supplications are utterly null and ^D void.

Clement therefore teaches what sort of prayer is right and good, what ought to be asked of God, and how the Gnostic, not like others at fixed hours—the third, the sixth, and the ninth—but throughout the whole curriculum of his life, should pray to God and commune with Him. Incidentally and briefly, however, lest he stray too far from his purpose, he rebukes the followers of Prodicus, who, having been taught by the Cyrenaics, had dreamt that one should not use prayer. By a threefold argument, therefore, he makes clear that the Gnostic, of whom he had begun to speak, and any man who is truly pious, obtains from God everything whatsoever he requests of Him; or rather, that God does not await his voice, but hears the pious thoughts of his mind. It is allowed, therefore, adds Clement, to pour forth prayers to God without a voice, provided that the mind is turned toward Him. Hence, indeed, because the rising sun is an image of Christ, among Christians the custom prevailed that they turned to the East to pray to God. Pagan temples, conversely, faced the West, that they might be taught to turn themselves toward the East, or the faith of Christ.

And because the prayer of a wicked man, who does not seek true goods, is most pernicious to himself and to others, therefore the Gnostic, content with present things and desiring nothing earthly, asks for the stability of those things which he possesses, for aptitude for future things, and for the eternity of those things which he is about to receive. But the most perfect of the Gnostics asks of God an increase of contemplation, and such perseverance in it that he may never fall away from virtue. And when he himself, by long and constant exercise which proceeds from knowledge, has acquired virtue, then it becomes a natural habit in him. And from this Clement concludes that he alone is pious and religious.

Nor does he stop his progress there, but having pursued his argument, he shows that the Gnostic rejoices in goods not only present, but also in those promised and in the life to come, and that greater help is brought to him from God than to others. And he, like other pious men, if helped by the aid of God he has applied himself to good actions, will receive the crown from Him like a virtuous athlete. But what that Gnostic ought to do, and what his whole life is like, what his readings and prayers are, how far he is a stranger to falsehood and swearing, how he ought to relieve others with his resources, to imbue others with true doctrine, or to accommodate himself to the infirmity of others, our author clearly reveals. And so, since the piety and religion of the true and sincere Christian and Gnostic is such, from this he infers that he is not only not impious, but that he alone worships and venerates God with pious, holy, chaste, and true religion and true worship.

Then, subsequently, in order that Clement might establish and confirm these things even more firmly, he proceeds thus: "Knowledge (γνῶσις)," he says, "is the perfection of man as man, which, agreeing with himself and with the divine Word in mode, and in life, and also in speech, is completed by the science of divine things. But of this—which differs from wisdom acquired by doctrine—as faith is the foundation, so Christ is the foundation and the edifice of both. To faith, therefore, is granted knowledge, to knowledge charity, and to charity the everlasting inheritance. Knowledge, moreover, is swift for the purgation of sins, apt for receiving a change for the better, and by the mystical progressions of a certain proper light, it transmits a man pure in heart to the unchangeable good, that is, to contemplate God face to face in all eternity."

The first salutary change, therefore, is from ethnic religion to faith, the second from faith to knowledge; and this ends in charity, and leads man, always changed for the better, to eternal happiness, as is indeed confirmed by Clement with certain testimonies of Scripture. He confesses, however, that some things done by non-Gnostics (πρὸς τῶν μὴ γνωστικῶν) are done rightly, but, since they are devoid of charity, they act without reason, and therefore their action is evil, for which even the cause is not good, nor can the end be good without charity.

Moreover, how holy the works of the Gnostics are, Clement clearly proves by a brief description of his whole life, and of the various degrees and progressions of it up to the supreme apex of perfection. He adds, however, that this mode of living is instituted by him not only according to the example of the patriarchs and prophets, but also of the angels, and of the Lord Himself. Therefore, all hard things and any chastisements whatever brought by tyrants, no less than all pleasant things—like the joy of Peter’s wife being led to execution

as well as the receipt of apostolic teaching, he utterly disdains and despises.

^A The soul of the Gnostic, adorned with these virtues, becomes a certain earthly image of God and a temple of the Holy Spirit. Truly, one who can be conquered by no pleasure, and who is master over all desires, rises boldly against every danger, every fear, poverty, disease, ignominy, and death itself. For he holds the most firm conviction that the only evil is that which arises from ignorance, and, armed with the Lord’s weapons, he fights bravely. This fortitude of the Gnostic does not arise from blind or reckless impulse, as it does in children and beasts, nor from base and fleeting reward, as in prestidigitators, but is always generated from right reason. Wherefore, martyrs never rush headlong to death, but, when God calls, and out of the sole and highest love for Him, they most constantly meet it. As for Christians who are imperfect, and children in the faith, when they suffer something for God led by other reasons, even if some crown remains for them, charity is always to be chosen and sought for its own sake, and not for the sake of another.

Courage in the Gnostic, therefore, has this effect: that he is always void of fear; justice, that he always speaks the truth; temperance, that, not melting away in any human desire or passion, he is always consistent and master of himself. The source of all these things is the most holy and most excellent—the sovereign—charity of all knowledge, by which the “Gnostic” becomes a man truly perfect, a friend of God, adopted as His son, and shall see Him face to face forever.

Indeed, he not only does not despise his neighbor, but he relieves the afflicted with consolations and exhortations; to the poor, even though he might hate the man himself, he gives what he needs, kindly and liberally according to his merit. For he has no enemy but the one who, on account of his own vices and sins, is enemy to God. Moreover, if some who are still imperfect restrain themselves because of promises or the fear of God, he, on account of charity and that he might please God alone, endures and sustains all things. If he obtains any praise from it, he directs it to the use and utility of others. By another way, too, he is said to be self-controlled, when he not only suppresses the perturbations of the soul, which are undoubtedly evil, but even good things—such as good movements of the soul—he controls and restrains for the sake of a certain greater perfection, and possesses the stable and firm magnitude of knowledge, from which he brings forth those actions that are done out of virtue. “He who not only rules the passions, but has also become master of the good, and has securely attained the grandeurs of knowledge. From which he bears fruits of activity according to virtue.” Therefore, he eats, drinks, and takes a wife only out of necessity, as right reason has dictated. Truly, in the administration of the house and the procreation of children, never torn away from the love of God, he rises above every temptation which is wont to arise from children, wife, servants, and from goods and riches. But to the celibate and the virgin, who has no care of a house, it happens very frequently that he is not tempted, and thus he is inferior to the other in some things, and superior in others.

For the sake of receiving knowledge, the soul must first be variously exercised. For that *gnosis*, or cognition, is a certain rational death of the soul, by which, separated from movements and perturbations, it lives freely and is pleasing and acceptable to God alone. Then, he is so far from taking any pleasure from food, drink, and Venus; he even holds speech that might bring some delight to be suspect. For no one will ever be able to serve God and pleasure. But he who strives to become like the Lord, he with great force exerts himself to be free from desire. But he who has desired and then controlled himself is like a widow, who by temperance ^B becomes a virgin again. But he who has not wished to excise the perturbation of the soul, he kills himself.

The Gnostic, therefore, is saved through the knowledge which is the soul’s food and through the things he has known: and, imitating the evangelical virgins, he thus asks for what is promised to him by God, in such a way that he is prepared for the things he seeks, not so much to obtain them as that they are to be obtained. His whole life, provided it is not stained by sin, is prayer and conversation with God; and whatever he wills—yet he desires nothing useless—he immediately obtains. But if anyone should object that certain sinners sometimes obtain what they ask, Clement answers that this happens rarely, and because God foresees that they will distribute something of it to others. But to those who are worthy, even when they do not ask, what is truly good is granted. He proceeds, therefore, on the royal road, who is made just by no necessity, neither by hope nor by fear, but by a free disposition of mind.

The Gnostic, however, like a divine husbandman, cuts away desires, and, planting and watering, reaps a twofold fruit. He, in truth, is vexed by no one unless God permits it for the utility of others. Furthermore, having borne the evils inflicted by others with a strong and manly spirit, he confirms the others in the faith, just as the apostles did, and asks that if any hate him, they may be led to repentance. Thus, after he has exercised himself for a long time, he is never dissolved by pleasure, nor broken by any worldly promise, and he never falls into sin; but, still placed in the flesh, he overcomes every desire, and he grieves that he is still constituted in the necessities of this life, and he uses this same temporal life as if it were alien to him. He knows, moreover, the enigmas of the fasts of the fourth and sixth day, when he fasts and abstains from avarice and lust—the fountains of all vices—and from every evil action and thought. And through this observance of divine precepts, he celebrates the Lord’s day and the day of the Lord’s resurrection.

What then? If at any time, by seeing something he does not wish, he feels himself affected by pleasure, then he immediately chastises the faculty of sight itself, and desires to see and hear only what pertains to himself, and believes that he sees God in the beauty of the object set before his body. If, needing to take food of necessity, he consumes a little time, he thinks he is being torn away from his work. Wherefore, in his dreams he sees nothing that does not befit one who has been chosen. Moreover, this man in this life is entirely a guest and a pilgrim; he despises those things which others admire, and lives in the city as if in a wilderness. In one word, throughout his whole life he fulfills the apostolic absence.

What more? When he does the best things, he wishes to be hidden from men and to persuade himself and the Lord that he lives by His precepts. Wherefore he always despises himself and never his neighbor, and for that reason he consoles the afflicted, makes the needy a partaker of his own goods, if he has any; nay, even out of his own penury he increases his beneficence. Furthermore, adorned with pure and sincere faith, he praises the Gospel through works and contemplation, and, by rightly performing the things that God has taught, he receives praise from Him. Not at all weaned by his own hope, he despises all worldly things, and has pity on those who, after death, are afflicted with punishments but confess God. His own conscience, however, is always right, and, being always prepared for death, he lives in this world as a pilgrim, and eats, drinks, and takes a wife according to the dictate of right reason, and in his dreams he always does and thinks holy things: and thus ^C *katharos eis euchēn*, always pure for prayer, he prays and petitions with the angels.

Then again, Clement teaches what his operation is, his justice and prayer, what he asks of God, and how he anticipates Christ who is calling. He also makes clear how he [honors] his father and mother,

and hates his own soul, and is plainly inseparable from God's commandments and hope throughout all his life, always giving thanks to God, enduring all things, as Job did, most patiently, being superior to good and evil things, carefully accommodating himself to others, and forgiving the sins they commit against him, that he might be worthy to receive protection from Him through obedience. Our author continues 21 and shows what that "gnostic" is, who demands of God rather than asks, who begs from Him on behalf of those appearing as brothers, how he is an instrument of divine goodness and a small temple of God Himself; and, having left all earthly things behind, he tends toward God and transcends heavenly things. Thus, says Clement 22, the perfect "gnostic" lives, mixing hope with faith for the expectation of future things, and always follows the divine commandments with deeds that follow after knowledge. Being disturbed by no circumstance, and never preferring what is pleasant and useful to the divine counsel, he becomes acceptable to God and praiseworthy to the world. Finally, in the good use of worldly things, he gives thanks to God and admires the Creator, because his end, which occurs through gnostic operation carried out fittingly according to the commandments, ends in contemplation, and therefore after death he is transferred to a holy reward. Clement moreover declares that these things were said by him in very brief terms, as in a seed, for the Greeks concerning the "gnostic," and he reveals in a few words what difference exists between him and the believer 23.

Yet he professes that many more things occur to him from the sacred Scriptures concerning the gnostic, which, for the sake of brevity, he has left for others to explain. Nevertheless, he brings forth one passage from the sixth chapter of the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, and by a clear and perspicuous interpretation and paraphrase of it, he describes the sum of the gnostic's perfection, as he himself speaks, but elegantly and clearly. ^B After this, he turns his pen against the Greek philosophers and the Jews, who, on account of the great dissension of the heresies, denied that the name of faith and the Christian religion should be embraced 24. But he proves this opinion to be false, because even among them there are many sects and heresies; yet they did not think that for this reason they should renounce their dogmas. Then Clement replies that these heresies were predicted by Christ, and that reproach follows after things that are good; and that covenants and agreements are not broken by an upright man just because they are broken by some other wicked men. Furthermore, even if there are various sects of physicians, this does not prevent them from being admitted by the sick, nor their healing and driving away their diseases 25. But to these things, heresies have arisen from an excessive love of self or vain glory, so that true piety and true worship of God might be examined more diligently. To this is added that no one thinks one should abstain from ripe fruit because another that is pernicious is similar to it. Nor for that reason does one not commit himself to the royal road, because others lead to a precipice. Finally, the farmer does not for that reason leave off cultivating his gardens, because weeds grow together with the vegetables.

Then indeed Clement openly demonstrates how the Christian truth is separated from all the errors of heretics, who deceive either themselves or others. This, he says, is drawn from sacred Scripture and the ancient Church, and is proved by such certain demonstrations that it is never permitted for anyone to depart from it. The sacred Scripture, our author says, is like the Mother of God; it brings forth truth, and ever remains a virgin itself. Wherefore heretics reject it, or twist it into perverse meanings, and therefore have fallen into various errors. But if, having put aside error, someone permits himself to be led to the truth, he is in a way made a god from a man 26. For the first principle of our doctrine is God Himself, who through the prophets, evangelists, and apostles ^C brings us to the knowledge of the truth. From their divine writings, therefore, the most certain proofs are extracted 28, and by them believers become perfect gnostics.

Then our author relates how and how perversely heretics abuse these same sacred Scriptures, and being puffed up by the opinion of empty wisdom, and perpetually but wrongly litigating, they move every stone so that they might not be dislodged from their seat. Then indeed he explains how difficult it is to heal their errors and how they can finally be led back to the way of truth. But just as the nations are in ignorance, and the true disciples of the Church are in knowledge, so they dwell in opinion 29. Therefore, since the same heretics can have no demonstration, they mock, despise, and condemn one another. Wherefore these men seek after contention, pagan men seek after pleasure, believers seek after joy, and gnostics seek after gladness 30. But because teachers, as Clement proves by induction, make disciples like unto themselves, from this he concludes that he who has followed the Scriptures handed down by the Lord, and obeys Him, is made God in the flesh after the likeness of the teacher. And truly he shows that there are two principles of sin, namely ignorance and imbecility. But the remedy of the former is knowledge and the evident demonstration drawn from the sacred Scriptures; that of the latter, however, is the exercise led by faith and fear. Both, however, grow into the perfect love of the gnostic. But it can happen that heretics, understanding these things, may be converted to God 31. But if they persevere, obstinate in their errors, they will be affected by even more severe punishments by Him than the Catholic sinners.

Our author signifies that these things discussed so far by him are meant so that no one might fall into heresy; or, if someone has fallen into it, and can still be healed, he might be led to the truth. But of those there are many who, greedy for new things, followers of pleasure, and incited by false glory, corrupt and adulterate the sacred Scriptures. Such were Marcion, Prodicus, and others like them, with whom it would have gone well if they could have known those things which had been previously handed down 32. Therefore, only the gnostic is nourished in the Scriptures themselves, who follows the tradition of the Lord in words and deeds, and finds the demonstrations he seeks in the same Scriptures.

But if anyone should object regarding knowledge (γνῶσις), as Scripture says it "puffs up" (φυσιοῦν), Clement replies that by this word it is signified to feel 33 magnificently and truly. And he demonstrates that this is established in other places of Scripture. Since, therefore, the knowledge of sacred Scripture is magnificent and true, certainly no one for any reason ought to break or corrupt it, nor, by serving cupidity and vain glory, steal the ecclesiastical rule. Wherefore, neither the heretics conscious of this crime, nor others deceived by them, will enter into the kingdom of heaven. For they do not have the true key of the Lord's tradition, but a certain false one, by which, having cut out the door of the Church and broken open its side, they pass over the barriers of truth.

Hence Clement proves that all those heretics were much more recent than the true Church, which ought to be and can only be one, both Catholic and universal. The principle of its eminence and construction, surpassing all other things, is founded and constituted by its unity 34. But heresies have taken their name from their authors, places, nation, dogmas, or perverse deeds. Finally, our author teaches the faithful, Jews, and heretics to be signified by the Mosaic law concerning clean and unclean animals; and after he has briefly discussed the manner in which these books were written and their title, he places a crown upon this book, while still promising another 35.

CHAPTER II.

ARTICLE I.

It is absolutely certain and agreed upon by all that Clement of Alexandria is the true author and begetter of these seven books of the *Stromata*. For besides the fact that these books are most steadfastly ascribed to this same Clement by the most ancient and recent writers—Eusebius, Jerome, Epiphanius, Cyril of Alexandria, Photius, and very many others—some of these, and especially Eusebius and Epiphanius, have frequently transcribed in the same words various fragments from these same books, which can even still be found within them. Indeed, did not Clement himself openly declare and testify that he was the author of these books, when he praised his own *Admonition to the Greeks* and the books of the *Pedagogue* written by him?

From this same testimony of our Clement, we furthermore gather that he did not set his hand to this work until after he had published his commentaries on both the *Admonition* and the *Pedagogue*. We are entirely persuaded that these *Stromata* followed those books after no great interval of time—a conclusion derived from the mutual connection between them, which, as it seems to us, constitutes a not altogether weak argument. But if you ask at what time in reality the *Stromata* books were brought to light, you will be able to learn this from Eusebius. For he speaks thus regarding them: "Hence, furthermore, Clement, in the first book of the *Stromata*, describing the succession of times, limits his chronological calculation by the death of the Emperor Commodus. From which it appears that these volumes were elaborated by him during the reign of Severus Augustus, whose times we are now setting forth." And indeed, we read even now in the first book of the *Stromata* that the chronology of the Roman emperors, edited by our author, concludes with the death of Commodus. Now, Commodus was slain at the end of the year of Christ 192, and Pertinax, who was placed in his stead, is said to have reigned only three months. Severus succeeded him; and Eusebius asserts, not undeservedly, that Clement applied himself to the writing of these *Stromata* books while Severus was reigning. And indeed, he himself elsewhere numbers our same Clement among those writers—as we have said—who, before the time of the Supreme Pontiff Victor, strenuously defended the divinity of Christ the Lord against the heretics. But Victor, having been inaugurated into the supreme pontificate in the same year, 192, in which ^B Commodus was killed, is said to have laid it down together with his life in the year 201. However, Eusebius cannot be understood to refer to any other books than the *Protrepticus*, or the *Pedagogue*, or the *Stromata*, whether these are considered singly or all together. Finally, it is certain that the first book of the *Stromata* was composed by our Clement after the death of the Emperor Commodus.

But as for others, which were written with such and such varied erudition, he had need, certainly, of leisure and time to complete them. For in them, certain spurious works of writers are distinguished from the true ones, and the testimonies of authors of every kind—and indeed the poems of poets—are described in the very words of the authors. But who could easily persuade himself that Clement held all these in his memory, and, without having consulted the works of the authors, transcribed them so faithfully on the spur of the moment?

What then, when Clement himself, while completing these books, professes that he is not yet advanced in age, but that he is not of such a tenacious memory that he could render the passages of so many writers in their own words at will? Hear, I beseech you, his words: "To me, he says, memorials are being stored up against old age, a remedy against oblivion." And again afterwards: "But I know well that many things have slipped away due to the length of time, as things that have escaped without being written down. Whence, alleviating the weakness of my memory, and providing for myself a monument of memory that is beneficial and constant in fixed chapters, I have necessarily used this description. There are therefore some things which we have not even recalled; for there was in those blessed men a certain great power. There are also things which were not noted down, which, having remained for a time, have now escaped; some, however, which were being extinguished, as things that were languishing in the very act of thinking." However, if you should judge that this should be attributed to Clement’s extreme and singular modesty, in that he was diffident about the powers of his own genius and, much more, about the infirmity of his own old age, we will not gainsay it.

Moreover, because Severus is recorded as being neither hostile to the Christians at the beginning of his reign nor as having openly persecuted them, it seems that Clement was able, during those times of ecclesiastical peace, to put the final hand to this work, which is indeed almost immense. For then, indeed, he could have with him the books of which he had need, and he could have accessed them, without difficulty, for the things which his memory did not suggest to him. Furthermore, he testifies that he had gathered into these commentaries many things which he had heard from his most learned preceptors—men of great erudition—and he is therefore to be believed to have needed, without doubt, fewer books, and ones not at all difficult to find. Finally, he signifies not obscurely that these same preceptors of his were still among the living, and that his hard work would be pleasing to them: "Rightly, however, I know, he was saying, that they will exult—I do not say that they are delighted by this exposition, but by that sole observation which is in the annotation." It is therefore very likely that these *Stromata* were edited and made a matter of public knowledge by Clement around the year 194. And certainly Eusebius, in his *Chronicle* at the fifth year of the reign of Severus, that is, the year of Christ 198, has this: "Clement wrote many and varied things." By this mode of speaking, no one will, with right and merit, deny that these *Stromata* books—which were his principal work—are especially designated, and that, according to Eusebius' usual custom, they are noted as having been written, not in that year in fact, but around that time.

At some might perhaps be troubled as to why they do not so easily assent to this opinion, by the fact that a long discussion regarding martyrs is instituted in these books. For therein, while Clement proves so exhaustively that Christians are undeservedly vexed by pagans, tortured, and afflicted with the cruellest punishments, does he not thereby imply that he wrote these *Stromata* of his when the Emperor Severus was raging more cruelly against the Christians, and was attacking them more bitterly? For what else, they will say, do these words of our Clement indicate than this Severan cruelty and savagery? "But for us, the fountains of martyrs are overflowing daily, whom we see with our eyes, who are burned, tortured, and beheaded." This argument certainly does not seem to be of small moment. It can, however, be answered that the chief aim of Clement, in discussing martyrdom in this way, is to refute the error of certain heretics who ^A totally proscribed and spurned martyrdom. Wherefore he extols it with the greatest praises, and demonstrates that the highest pinnacle of Christian perfection is placed therein. Moreover, that many departed from this life by martyrdom daily, he does not seem to say for the reason that the Severan persecution was then raging more savagely, but because even in those times of ecclesiastical peace, very many were obtaining the palm of martyrdom.

Yet if anyone, persuaded by this reasoning, should contend that the books of the *Stromata* were published towards the end of the reign of Severus, his opinion may remain with him, as far as we are concerned. But let him, I pray, remember that they are so connected with the *Exhortation to the Greeks* and the three books of the *Tutor*, as we have said, that no long passage of time elapsed between all these labored works of our author.

ARTICLE II. By what reasons impelled Clement wrote these books, what is their subject matter, and in what singular manner and method they were composed.

Although Clement had promised in the previous books that he would publish these commentaries of the *Stromata*, yet, once those earlier books were completed, he confesses that he still remained doubtful and uncertain as to whether he should keep his word. For he hesitated as to whether it was lawful for him to divulge the sacred mysteries of our religion in these books of the *Stromata* to pagans, which ought to have been hidden from those unworthy men, lest they should mock them in their customary manner. Wherefore: "These things," he says, "were an impediment to my writing, and I still fear, as the saying is, to cast pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turning, rend us." Yet since Christ had said in the scriptures that the truth ought to be preached openly and plainly, even if not to all everywhere, at least to those to whom it behooves, Clement declares that he was moved to write these books. Furthermore, he judged it altogether absurd for a Christian man, while announcing the truth, to be denied any freedom to publish useful works that would be profitable to very many, when it had been granted with impunity to pagan men, who write fables, blasphemies, and impious and obscene things.

Another reason also impelled him to complete these commentaries; namely, that they might undoubtedly be a stimulus and incentive to virtue for him, and that if the dogmas of the true and pious doctrine handed down in them should ever escape his memory or that of others, they could be easily recalled by reading these same books. But the chief reason, and that which is gathered from the whole work, for his publishing these [books] was that he might disclose the true and sincere doctrine of the Christian faith ^B against the errors of the pagans, especially of the philosophers, and of the heretics, and whatever in them ought to be rejected or accepted by a Christian man.

To these things, indeed, after he had utterly overturned the impious superstitions of the heathens in his *Exhortation to the Greeks*, and after he had imbued with its first precepts those who had recently given their name to the Christian religion in the three books of the *Tutor*, he thought it necessary to make manifest to them in what the perfection of the same Christian religion consists, and towards which they must always strive. In demonstrating these things, Clement puts his whole effort, and to prove them, he uses the firmaments of reasons sought, as far as he can, from the authority and testimony of Holy Scripture, and of writers both Christian and profane, which are the more valid. And this is indeed the aim of his in all these books of the *Stromata*, and the matter and argument of the same books, as is clear from the analysis of them presented by us.

But lest, in divulging our mysteries more clearly to profane men, he should imprudently strike against the reef he wished to avoid, he fashioned this work with a singular art and method: "For our commentaries," he says, as we have often said, "are varied and, as the very name indicates, woven together, containing things that pass from one to another, and by the series and context of the words signifying one thing, while indicating another... for the scripture will find one who is about to understand it." Again, elsewhere, he explains in what manner and by what method he wrote these books: "And in a meadow, indeed, where flowers bloom in varied ways, and in a garden where there is a planting of trees, those of one kind are not separated by each species from those which are of another kind, even though some may have written out collections of various things plucked for the learned, and meadows, and Helicons, and honeycombs, and tapestries: but they are those which, as the occasion offered itself, came to my mind, and are neither purged by order nor by diction, but are dispersed by design, and like a field, the description of the *Stromata* is varied: *the delineation of the Stromata*." And indeed, in these books, Clement so mixes the explanation of our sacred doctrine and of our holy mysteries with the explanation of philosophic, and even of poetic and other dogmas, he so interrupts his discourses again and again, he so not infrequently diverges on purpose from his subject, he so at times passes from one argument to another, and afterwards reverts to the former; that in publishing them, there is nothing at all to be feared from a profane and ethnic man, however morose and hostile to the Christians he might be. Wherefore, a little after the beginning of this work, he speaks of it in this manner: "But there are also some things which the scripture has tacitly signified to me: and in some it will insist, while it will only state others; but it will endeavor both to speak while concealing, and to open while occulting, and to show while remaining silent." What else, I pray, do these words sound than that he, insisting longer on certain things, will explain them more fully; but some things he will state plainly and simply; yet in such a way that by stating them he conceals them from the pagan man, and by concealing them, he makes the same things manifest to Christians and to them alone?

What, indeed, is the fact that he declares openly in the same book, that not only the more difficult mysteries of our religion, but even the very seeds of faith itself, are enfolded and implicated with the true dogmas of the philosophers in such a way that they lie open only to Christians, and are recognized by them alone? "The *Stromata* will reveal the truth mingled with the dogmas of philosophy; or rather, covered and hidden, just as the edible part [is covered] by the husk."

For, I believe, it is fitting that the seeds of truth be guarded only by those who are tillers of the faith. The *Stromata*, therefore, will contain truth admixed with the decrees of philosophy, or rather covered and hidden, just as that which is edible in a nut is covered by its shell. For it is proper, I think, that the seeds of faith be reserved for the tillers of the faith. And, to pass over other things, he says again toward the end of the seventh book that he has completed this work, with dogmas scattered here and there, so that the holy traditions might not easily be discovered by just anyone who is not initiated into the mysteries. He clarifies this indeed more fully in the same place, and pursues it at greater length with these words: "The books of the *Stromata* are certainly not like those cultivated gardens in which trees and plants are arranged in a certain order for the delight of the eyes; but rather like some dense and shady mountain, in which are planted together cypresses and planes, laurels and ivy, apple trees and olives, and figs; so that through deliberate intent, the plants of fertile and non-fertile trees are mingled together, because the Scripture wishes for that which is beautiful and mature to lie hidden from those who might snatch and carry it off... Therefore, the books of the *Stromata* [οἱ Στρωματεῖς] do not pay attention to order or diction."

But how successfully this method of writing turned out for him, you may gather from the fact that Origen, as Jerome attests, later imitated it: "Origen," he says, "imitating him, wrote ten *Stromateus*, comparing the opinions of Christians and philosophers among themselves, and confirming all our religious dogmas from Plato, Aristotle, Numenius, and Cornutus." ^A

ARTICLE III. Of the true title of this work, of its integrity, and of its division into books and chapters, of its style, elegance, utility, and various erudition.

Photius asserts that he found the inscription of it: "I found, however," he says, "in a certain ancient manuscript [ἐν τινι παλαιῷ βιβλίῳ], this work inscribed not only as *Stromateus* [Στρωματεῖς], but in its entirety according to this model: *Titi Flavii Clementis, presbyteri Alexandrini, gnosticarum secundum veram philosophiam commentationum Stromatum primus, secundus, tertius, etc., liber*." That this therefore is the true and sincere inscription of this work, assigned to it by its own author, we believe can scarcely be called into doubt by anyone with any right and merit. And indeed he himself exhibits the same title of his books to us in some places with these words: "This is now the sixth and together the seventh book of the *Stromateus* [τοῦ ... στρωματέως], [the work of] gnostic commentaries according to true philosophy." ^B

From this so singular method of writing, as has been said, and from the variety of arguments, brought together without any order but mixed and confused, it can be concluded not entirely without reason that these books were inscribed by our Clement as *Stromateus* [Στρωματεῖς], as is clear from his words cited above. If anyone, however, desires witnesses to this inscription other than Clement himself, let him certainly hear Eusebius, who clearly explains this title, and the argument of the entire work, and even the type of writing: "Moreover, in the *Stromata* [τοῖς Στρωματέων] he not only strews many flowers from the sacred scriptures, but also reminds [us] from the books of the Gentiles, if anything perchance has been well stated by them; explaining the various opinions of the Greeks and of the barbarians, which are read among many of them; also refuting the false dogmas of the heresiarchs. To these he enumerates multiple histories, providing for us a very rich store of promiscuous erudition. He intermixes with all these also the opinions of the philosophers. Therefore, the title *Stromateus* [Στρωματέων] is very fitting for his books." Hence, even a little earlier, he pronounces with no doubt concerning the inscription of these books: "There exist eight books of his *Stromateus* [Στρωματέων], which he himself inscribed: *Titi Flavii Clementis de vera philosophia commentariorum, qui ad scientiam pertinent, stromateis* [στρωματεῖς]." Eusebius therefore did not doubt that this was the true and genuine title of this Clementine work. Nor indeed without reason. For Photius ^C in a certain ancient codex found this clearly similar and...

From Clement, therefore, if at other times these books are called simply *ton stromateon* [τῶν Στρωματέων], or even more simply by him, and by Cyril of Alexandria, and other Greek writers, *stromateis* [στρωματεῖς], or *stromateus* [στρωματεύς], or by other Latin authors "Books of Stromata," who would doubt that this was done for the sake of brevity? Furthermore, it also seems certain that the plural noun *hoi stromateis* [οἱ Στρωματεῖς] is derived from the singular *stromateus* [στρωματεύς] according to the sense and mind of our Clement. For he uses this singular noun no less frequently than the plural at the end of the first, second, third, and fourth books. What, then, of the fact that he uses both words indiscriminately and with the same meaning? For at the end of the seventh book, it will be clear and manifest to anyone reading that the same terms, *hoi stromateis* [οἱ Στρωματεῖς] and *ton hebdomon stromatea* [τὸν ἕβδομον στρωματέα], denote exactly the same thing.

But if you should ask what these names signify, we shall answer you according to our custom candidly and ingenuously that we completely dissent from the opinion of some who think that by this the maker of *stromata* and tapestries is signified. For nothing, we think, appears more contrary to Clement's mind. For why, pray, did he himself compose his books as a meadow, and a dense and shady grove, as has been said, unless it be because they were like *stromata* and tapestries, in which the true doctrines of our faith, like flowers in a meadow and trees in a grove, are seen to be gathered confusedly and mixed together, without any order?

If, however, anyone wishes to know what is precisely understood by these names by Clement, let him approach Pollux, and from him he will learn that among those things which were formerly used at banquets, there were placed *hypagonia*, *stromata*, *peristromata*, *hypostromata*, *cubitalia*, *strata*, *peristromata*, and *substrata*. But elsewhere, ^D where he explains by what name the vessels for storing clothes, chests, or wardrobes are called, he there relates that what the ancients called *stratilia* (vestments), these were called by the more recent ones *stromateis* [στρωματεῖς], in which those *strata* (coverings) were deposited: "What the ancients called *himatia stromatodesma* (garments for coverings), these the more recent ones called *stromateis* [στρωματεῖς], in which, as the name indicates, the *stromata* (coverings) were put away." He indicates that [it held] other vestments as well. "What the ancients called *stratilia* (garments), the more recent ones called *culcitras* (mattresses/cushions), and in which, as the name indicates, those *strata* (coverings) were deposited; certain however that also other garments [were]." Again, however, where he discourses further about the vessels of the clothes themselves, he has these things: "And *stromateis* also. Apollodorus the Geloan in *Pseudaianti* says: 'A sword, a *stromateus* of a spear'; and Apollodorus of Carystus in *Anteuergetonti*: 'They were loosening the *stromateis*'." And [so on] for *stragula*. Apollodorus...

of Carystus, moreover, in *Beneficium Rependente*: "They were unfastening the *stragula*." Lastly, he himself observes that the word *stromata* is found in Antiphanes and Sophocles denoting beds.

From these things, therefore, it is clear that the words *stromata* or *stromateis* were very often used for a chest or vessel, or, if you will, for a bag in which variously woven garments were stored, and sometimes for those garments themselves or for carpets of varied and diverse color. Yet if you argue that the name *stromateis* was used by Clement only in the former sense, you would not easily persuade us to your opinion. I would wish you to notice, however, that there is no need to dispute about the meaning of a word used by any author where that author indicates not obscurely what he understood by that word. Since, therefore, Clement compares his books to a meadow and a dense grove, sown with various flowers and trees mixed together without any order, it is not very difficult to understand what he meant for the title *Stromateis* inscribed upon them.

Regarding that Greek word, moreover—which some in Latin have called a work variously woven, others *Miscellanea*, and finally many, retaining the Greek name, have called *Stromata*—you may see Casaubon in his *Animadversions upon Athenaeus*. Many writers, furthermore, before our Clement, testified that they had placed the name *stromateis* as a title for their works, as Gellius makes known. Eusebius, indeed, brought us a testimony taken from the *Stromateis* of Plutarch. Therefore, Clement inscribed this title on his books all the more willingly, as he knew it to be more customary among the pagans and more suitable and convenient for his own purpose.

Perhaps a more certain opinion could be reached concerning the sincere title of this work if it were whole and perfect. But for a long time now it has been truncated at the beginning, lacking its own inscription and start; nor has any manuscript codex thus far been able to repair and restore it. For from this beginning, if it still existed, we would certainly have known both what the title of these books had been and to whom Clement had dedicated them. But one should grieve less for this loss, insofar as from elsewhere, as we have seen, we can more easily detect that very few things were either deleted or torn away from the beginning of the first book. From those things indeed which remain, we gather clearly that nothing there is wanting except perhaps one or two phrases.

Much more serious, therefore, are the losses and detriments of those things which our author had promised that he would write at the end of the seventh book. For there he promises that he would complete another book on those things which he still had to say: "And so, after this seventh book of the *Stromateis*, let us take up another beginning for those things which follow next." Whether, however, it was permitted for Clement due to leisure, and even due to the dire persecution of tyrants then raging against the Christians, to stand by his promises, is not so certain.

We know, indeed, that another book is added in the 137 editions to the seventh book of the *Stromateis*. But this, as we shall demonstrate in its place, is admitted by everyone who is sane to be entirely spurious and adulterine. It is the opinion of some, however, that an eighth book was edited by Clement to fulfill his promise, which they judge to be inscribed with another title: *Who is the Rich Man Being Saved*. Whether this opinion is true, we shall examine below in a more suitable place.

There is, furthermore, no room for doubt that this whole work was divided by the author himself into various books. For besides the fact that the first book is read as cited in the fifth, it is also clear and evident from the end of each book, so that whoever might try to prove ^A that it was attempted, one might seem to have wished to bring light to the midday and most clear sun.

For this reason, regarding the division of this work into seven books, it is worth observing only that it was done by Clement for no other artifice than due to the excessive length, as he himself testifies, of the more prolix discourse and arguments. For at the end of the third book he imposes an end in these words: "The discussion undertaken by us has led us further than is fitting, and has made the discourse more prolix. Whence let the third book of the *Stromateis* also, concerning those things which are of the monuments of philosophy, have this end." But before that, regarding the end of the second book: "Let the second discourse," he says, "which is called *stromateus*, be terminated here also due to the prolixity of the chapters: *dia to mekos te kai plethos kephalaion*."

Yet let no one, I ask, conclude from this that these books were distributed by him into various chapters. For it is agreed, as much from the manuscript codices themselves as from the sole or even lightest reading of the work, that there is no distinction of chapters in it at all. Wherefore this name of *kephalaia* signifies nothing other than the arguments treated there by Clement without any distribution of the discourse into diverse parts.

If anyone, however, were to divide them into diverse chapters, or sections and articles, in a new edition of these commentaries, he would without doubt be bestowing a very useful service upon all readers. We are not indeed ignorant that, due to the arguments themselves—which, as we said, are inserted promiscuously and confusedly, and very often interrupted and intersected—this is most difficult to do. But since these difficulties can be vanquished by the labor of a skillful and ingenious man, from this it certainly seems all the more necessary, the more difficult it is.

These, moreover, if a division of this work into chapters is ever to be made, will clearly lessen and relieve the inconvenience and great weariness for all in reading it, due to the great confusion of arguments as well as the ^B obscurity of style. For there is no one who, while perusing them, even if we were entirely silent, does not immediately sense how dark and thorny is Clement’s manner of writing in this whole work. Yet we do not think that those obscurities and winding ways of an unpolished and inelegant discourse are to be ascribed to the negligence or carelessness of our author. For he declares that he employed—nay, that he openly affected—these, just as he did the confusion of the things themselves, on purpose; so that the sacred mysteries of our religion, which he wished to hide from the pagans, might not be more evidently open to all through a clearer manner of speech. Afterwards, indeed, regarding why he despised the adornment of elegant speech, he offers this reason at the end of the whole work: "Therefore the books of the *Stromateis* heed neither order nor diction, *out' oun tes taxeos, oute tes phraseos stochazontai hoi Stromateis*; since even the Greeks purposely wish the adornment of diction to be absent, and secretly, not as nature commands, insert dogmas; doing this so that those who read their writings might be laborious and keen in finding [them]."

On account of these causes, not once does Clement profess that he has fled from eloquence and the adornment of speech in this work; which, nevertheless, we have observed—with Photius as an excellent judge—was employed by him not without study and art in the earlier books.

Although, however, these books are composed and adorned with no flowers of eloquence, nay, even if the variety of arguments, as has been said, arranged with no order, and their confusion, very often bring the greatest difficulties and most burdensome weariness to those reading them; nevertheless, all those things in no way ever hindered them from having been most profitable to Christians. For how much in value, and how useful by all...

kinds of doctrine and erudition—which is why the whole work is to be wondered at—those books are, there is a most abundant witness to us in Eusebius, who asserts that in his own time they were so widely circulated and common that they were in everyone’s hands. ^A Wherefore, when he produces a fragment of them, he deliberately omits many testimonies of ancient authors cited by Clement: “Of which,” as he says, “it would be altogether superfluous to append the words, since anyone may have copies of the writings of Clement himself.”

But what are we to say of the fact that Clement himself compares these books to a field fertile with all manner of herbs, and asserts that if they are read attentively and accurately, one may reap from them an abundant harvest of fruit—and not without pleasure? This, indeed, is clearly confirmed by his own comparison of these same books to a dense and shady grove. For from this dense and rough woodland, as he says: “When the husbandman has taken the roots and transplanted them elsewhere, he will produce a beautiful garden and a pleasant grove.”

And indeed, how much fruit and profit all Christians can derive from these books is clearly shown by the primary and chief arguments which are handled against the errors of the pagans and heretics, and for the defense of our religion, as well as those concerning the greatest perfection of the Christian life. For from these it is liquidly understood what the true doctrine of Christ was, which Clement himself had received from the immediate successors of the apostles, and which scarcely anyone in these first centuries of the Church has transmitted to us in writing more clearly than he.

Finally, to pass over other things, the same utility of this work is proven by its sum and omnigenous doctrine and erudition, in which the whole work everywhere flows and abounds in a marvelous manner. This shines forth on almost every single page, as may be clearly demonstrated even from the analysis of it which we have presented.

Wherefore both ancient and more recent writers praise these Stromata with the highest accolades, and on account of this excellent and chief work of Clement the surname *Stromateus* was, as Theodoret, Cassiodorus, and others have testified to us, imposed upon him.

ARTICLE IV. Concerning the manuscripts of this work, and concerning certain corrupt places in it.

^C It will truly seem strange to many, and not without reason, that the Greek manuscripts of these books—the number of which ought always to have increased because of their great utility and erudition—have perished through the negligence of men, so that out of the numberless copies which were in everyone’s hands in the time of Eusebius, as has been said, scarcely one or another can be found. But such is the lot and fortune of human affairs, that those things which are better and of greater value do not persist for a longer period of time, but often for a shorter one, than others.

In his own edition of these works of Clement, Hervetus confesses that he had the use of only one incorrect manuscript. We, however, have spent almost all our effort in searching for manuscripts with greater diligence elsewhere, in whatever way we could, whether through our own efforts or those of our friends. For we found only one Greek exemplar in the Claromontanus library of the RR. PP. of the Society of Jesus in this royal city. But that one, furnished to us through the immense kindness of Hardouin, who is known to all learned men, was transcribed by a recent hand on paper, and at the beginning it is abbreviated just as it is in the printed editions. Furthermore, many errors and slips of the scribes occur in it, which, without the help of other codices, can scarcely be ^D corrected by anyone.

Yet, as we will explain later when we reveal the barriers of difficulty that exist in correcting them, none of these should be considered unpleasant or perhaps useless to the reader. The first place, therefore, that offers itself to us is expressed in these words: ‘Ἐπειδὴ μὴ μόνη ἡ παράδοσις καὶ πάνδημος τῷ γε αἰσθομένῳ τῆς μεγαλειότητος τοῦ λόγου· ἐπικρυπτέον οὖν τὴν ἐν μυστηρίῳ λαλουμένην σοφίαν, ἣν ἐδίδαξεν ὁ Υἱὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ.’ “But since not only the tradition is public to him who has perceived the magnificence of the Word, but there is also a wisdom that is to be hidden, which is spoken in a mystery, which the Son of God taught.” Hervetus thinks that something is missing from this Greek text, and that after the word “magnificence” there should be added: “but also the mystical.” And in truth, this phrase does seem disjointed and mutilated. Nevertheless, we read nothing else in our manuscript codex than what we read in the edition. But even if something was omitted there through the carelessness of the scribes, we should be little concerned about their negligence. For since no change to the text has been made, the mind of our author is easily clear to everyone, and his meaning here does not appear entirely obscure: there is a twofold wisdom or tradition of Christian truth—the one public to him who has perceived the magnificence of the word, that is, of the divine; the other, however, which the Son of God taught, is given in mystery and is to be entirely hidden from all, never to be divulged to any, except to him alone who has had not only the tongue, like Isaiah, but also the arts, pure and chaste from every stain of vice.

Nor has the emendation of these verses of Euripides, cited by our Clement, seemed easy to Hervetus: Οὐ δεῖται γὰρ ὁ Θεός, εἴπερ ἔστ' ὀρθῶς Θεός, . . . . . . ἀοιδῶν οἶδε δύστηνοι λόγοι. For in his observations on this place of Clement, he says that he senses a certain hiatus after the first verse: but what is missing there, he says he cannot divine. Yet from the tragedy of Euripides which is inscribed *Hercules Furens*, he could easily have known that, if he had wished to consult it according to his duty. For those two verses, with the adverb *ou* removed from the beginning of the first, and the word *oudenos* added at the beginning of the second, are held in their entirety thus: Δεῖται γάρ . . . Οὐδενός· ἀοιδῶν . . . The Latin interpretation of which is: For God, if he indeed is rightly God, needs Of nothing. These are the wretched tales of poets.

Theodore Canter, however, wished in vain to apply a healing hand to certain other verses of Pindar transcribed by our Clement: *Ev andron*, etc. For he had not sufficiently noted that these are recorded by Eusebius not only in the same way as in our edition of the Clementine works; but that they are transcribed in the same Eusebius in the form of meter, which has not been done in the edition of Clement, as follows: Ἐν ἀνδρῶν, ἐν θεῶν γένος, Ἐκ μιᾶς δὲ ματρὸς πνέομεν ἄμφω. Of men and gods, one race there is, From one mother we both draw our breath.

^A Nor can these things of Clement be omitted by us without observation; not as they are wrongly held in the editions, citing Euphorion and Aeschylus, but merely the words of Aeschylus: *ο τε Εὐφορίων, ὅ τε Αἰσχύλος*, which are better exhibited in Eusebius thus: *ὅ τε Εὐφορίωνος Αἰσχύλος*. For he, according to Suidas, was the son of Euphorion. And in the second verse of the same Aeschylus, which Clement describes there, the same Eusebius renders *χωρεῖ*. Furthermore, by the standard of meter, other verses of Pindar are restored by the same Eusebius thus: *Τί Θεός; Ὅτι τὸ πᾶν.* And again: *Θεὸς ὁ πάντα τεύχων βροτοῖς.* What is God? The All. And again: God begetting all things for mortals. Hervetus, however, through the carelessness of I know not whom, did not have this second poem rendered into Latin. Yet you will see both ^B presented in the fragments of the same Pindar, if you have the leisure to read them.

But in Eusebius, no less than in our Clement, these things are corrupted which follow after a page or two: *οἱ δὲ τοῦ χρυσοῦ γένους κρίνειν ἀκριβέστατα, καὶ πάντα*. In the text of Eusebius, after the last word *πάντα*, we read *εἰς*, by which a greater wound is inflicted on this passage. Some think *εἰσὶν ἱκανοί* should be read instead of *εἰς*, but they offer no reason for such a correction. But that light may be brought to this corrupt and dark passage, it must be observed that many passages of Plato are cited there by our Clement in almost the same words, just as if it were one and the same passage. For the first passage of Plato is in his seventh book of the *Republic*, where he writes that it is the task of those who establish the city to force the "best natures of men" to apply their minds to the discipline which we said above is the greatest, etc., *τὰς βελτίστας φύσεις*, etc.

The second passage of the same philosopher occurs ^C after two whole pages, where he discusses those who must be compelled to guard the city, and says: "This, as it seems, will not be the turning of a potsherd, but the turning of the soul from a kind of nocturnal day to the true [day], to that which truly is, i.e., to the firm and genuine recognition of truth; which we say is true philosophy; *τοῦτο δ’, ὡς ἔοικεν, οὐκ ὀστράκου*, etc." From both of those passages of Plato, which our Clement, as if they were one and the same, transcribed in the same words—with only one or two exceptions, as is wont to happen—he continuously concludes that he [Plato] thought that those who are participants in true philosophy are of the golden race, just as the same Plato had said in the third book of the *Republic* in these words: *Ἐστε μὲν γὰρ δὴ πάντες οἱ ἐν τῇ πόλει ἀδελφοί· ἀλλ᾽ ὁ Θεὸς πλάττων, ὅσοι μὲν ὑμῶν ἱκανοὶ ἄρχειν, χρυσὸν ἐν τῇ γενέσει συνέμιξεν αὐτοῖς.* "You are all, indeed, who live in the city, brothers; but God, when he fashioned you, mixed gold in the generation of those among you who are fit to rule." But Clement took nothing thence except four words: *ἐστὲ μὲν δὴ πάντες ἀδελφοί* (saying). To these he immediately added those things which are argued to be corrupted. But if you weigh them attentively, you will easily understand that in them there is a repetition or rather a proof of the former, and therefore they ought truly to be of Plato, and perhaps excerpted from another of his books, but so deformed and defiled by scribes that they could hardly be restored to their original and true form by anyone, unless his other ^D complete and sound codices of Clement were found.

Nevertheless, these corruptions of the text do not at all prevent us from perceiving that this is the meaning of Clement: that Plato wrote that all who are partakers of true philosophy are truly brothers and of the golden race. And that those who are of the golden race are able to judge most accurately about all things.

Nor, indeed, is it easy to correct the verses of Epicharmus cited by Clement: *ὦ θύγατερ αἱ αἴ*, etc. Yet someone in his scholia to this passage believed that he could amend them with his own conjectures: but we fear that the genuine verses of Epicharmus as rendered by him may not satisfy many. However, since Clement said that the same thing was signified by these verses of Epicharmus as by the poems of Euripides subjoined there by him, one should grieve the less over their depravity, the more clearly their meaning is exhibited there by Euripides.

Afterwards Clement reports from Herodotus that the Pythia answered someone asking: *Τό τε πειρῆναι τοῦ Θεοῦ, καὶ τὸ ποιῆσαι, ἴσον γενέσθαι*, "To try God and to do are one and the same." But in the published editions of Herodotus this is the response of the Pythia, yet not in these same words: *τὸ πειρῆναι τοῦ Θεοῦ, καὶ τὸ ποιῆσαι, ἴσον δύναται*, "To try God (or to will that God do something) is the same as to do." And this reading is demanded by Herodotus, and indeed, if this passage be accurately weighed, by the intent of Clement himself. For similar, and almost the same things, he contends are those words of Aristophanes here: *δύναται γὰρ ἴσον τῷ ὁρᾶν τὸ νοεῖν*; and likewise the words of Parmenides: *Τὸ γὰρ αὐτὸ νοεῖν ἐστίν τε καὶ εἶναι.*

Moreover, the prefects of the latest edition of Clement's works incorrectly corrected Hervetus's Latin version of Aristophanes' words. For Hervetus had rendered them excellently in Latin: "It is worth as much to think it in the mind, as to do it." In that same last edition, the testimony and verse of Parmenides, which are nevertheless exhibited therein in Greek, were without doubt through the negligence of the printers not rendered in Latin. This verse signifies in Latin: "It is the same to think in the mind and to be."

Therefore, from that testimony of Aristophanes and Parmenides cited by Clement, it is gathered not obscurely that in the text of the same Clement one should rather read *τὸ πειρῆναι*, as in Herodotus, than *τό τε πειρῆναι*, as in the edition of Clement's works.

But that the auditor, preoccupied by the false errors of the heathens, should haul the truth from the pure fountains of Sacred Scripture, Clement uses the authority of Plato, who orders farmers not to irrigate, nor to take water from others, unless they have first dug for themselves down to the earth which is called virginal—*ἄχρι τῆς*, says Clement, *παρθενίου καλουμένης*. And Hervetus observes that in Plato it is held *μέχρι κεραμίδος γῆς*, "down to the earth which is called potter's clay (creta)." Wherefore in this passage of Clement he suspects some error of the scribes, and confesses that he himself found nothing at all concerning "virginal earth" elsewhere.

It is indeed true that in Plato it is not read *μέχρι κεραμίτιδος*, or according to other codices *κεραμίου γῆς*, "down to the clay," as his interpreter rendered it, or "potter's earth." We also know that Plutarch has related the same words of Plato thus: *ἄχρι τῆς κεραμίτιδος καλουμένης γῆς*. Whence it can be gathered that the passage of Plato is perhaps not entirely sound. It seems certain, however, that he wrote *κερα...*

κεραμίτιδος* rather than *παρθενίου*, both because both words signify the same thing—since clay is earth that no one has ever used—and because that word better suited his purpose regarding sacred Scripture, which he (as will be said below) compares elsewhere with the Virgin Mother of God. Furthermore, these words *παρθενίου γῆς*, which Hervet says he has nowhere read, are noted in the scholia on our Clement’s works as being repeated in Nicander’s *Alexipharmaca*. Let us add in passing, if you like, that the virgin earth is accepted by Tertullian in another sense as earth neither watered by rains nor made fertile by showers, from which Adam and Christ were fashioned: "Assuredly," he says, "that virgin earth, not yet watered by rains nor made fertile by showers, from which man was first fashioned, from which now also Christ has been born of a virgin according to the flesh." ^B

When Clement explains the arguments of his *Stromata* shortly thereafter, he proposes one of them thus: *Καὶ τούτοις ἀντερεῖ πάνθ’ ὅσα προοικονομηθῆναι καθήκει τῆς κατὰ τὴν ἐποπτικὴν θεωρίαν γνώσεως*. Which in the latest edition has been rendered into Latin as follows: "And he will speak against those things which it behooves to have been dispensed before the prophetic contemplation." And thus indeed Hervet declares openly that he had once made the Latin from Clement’s Greek. But upon weighing the matter more maturely, he says that for *προφητικήν* one should read *ἐποπτικήν*, which is "inspecting" or "speculative" contemplation. For he intends that Clement is here alluding to the mysteries of the Greeks, by which, when it was permitted to behold them, those people were called *ἐπόπται*, as we shall say below. Those, however, who were in charge of the later edition of these *Stromata*, having rejected that correction of Hervet, which perhaps did not seem entirely consistent with the author’s meaning to them, decided that the Greek word *προφητικήν* and the Latin *propheticam* were to be retained. And in truth, the same word is found in our Greek manuscript codex. Nothing, therefore, in the Greek text should be changed unless the greater authority of another manuscript intervenes. But if you ask what the word *ἐποπτική* signifies there, we shall answer you that *ἐπόπτης*, according to Julius Pollux, signifies not only the same as "spectator" but sometimes also "one who looks upon." ^C Wherefore his translator rendered the word *ἐπόπτης* as *inspectores* ("inspectors") in Latin. And yet, if the word *ἐποπτική* can be accepted in that sense, this passage of Clement must be translated into the Latin language thus: "And (our discourse) will indicate whatever it is fit to dispense before the knowledge of the *inspecting* or *inspectress* contemplation." For it is certain that the word *ἀντερεῖ* sometimes signifies "I announce," "I declare," and "I indicate." Furthermore, that the word *ἐποπτική* is used there by Clement in that meaning, and in the very sense we have mentioned, is gathered not obscurely from the things which he immediately subjoins, and from the arguments themselves which he handles in the entire work. If, however, anyone has attained another, truer interpretation of these words, and another sincere meaning of them, if he wishes to suggest it to us, we shall surely render him the greatest and most deserved thanks. ^D

In the fourth year, since there is also a need of time for him who is firmly instructed through catechesis, the quaternion of virtues is consecrated to God, with the third already alone being joined with the fourth hypostasis of the Lord; but a sacrifice of praise is above holocausts. *Τῷ δὲ τετάρτῳ ἔτει, ἐπεὶ καὶ χρόνου χρεία τῷ κατηχουμένῳ βεβαίως, ἡ τετράς τῶν ἀρετῶν καθιερούται τῷ θεῷ, τῆς τρίτης ἤδη μόνης συναπτούσης ἐπὶ τὴν τοῦ Κυρίου τετάρτην ὑπόστασιν. Θυσία δὲ αἰνέσεως ὑπὲρ ὁλοκαυτώματα*. Therefore, Hervet confesses that he does not understand these things. He conjectures, however, that it is to be understood from this—so he speaks—that it is that perfect faith which embraces three hypostases, or persons, of which the third, namely the hypostasis of the Son, is alone joined with the fourth hypostasis of the Lord, namely with the human nature. This, to be sure, since it was separated from the Son’s person before the flesh was assumed by Him, seems in some way able to be called a fourth hypostasis, although in reality, in Christ, invested with human flesh, there is but one divine person. Wherefore he wishes us to be seriously warned about this matter, lest we inadvertently fall into the error of Nestorius.

But so far is the darkness of this passage from being cleared away by this obscure explanation, that a far greater one is rather cast upon it. For who would easily persuade himself that Clement spoke there of a triple person of God, and of a fourth hypostasis—improperly so called—of the humanity of Christ? How did he slip into that discourse about divine persons, concerning which he says or insinuates absolutely nothing, neither before nor after? By what reason, finally, will Hervet prove that Clement understood by the word *ὑπόστασις* a person, or, as they say, personality? It certainly escapes no one among the ancient writers who have written before and after the age of Clement that that name is most often used to signify nature, or the same thing as *οὐσία*. Nay, if we are to believe Jerome: "The whole school of secular literature knows nothing else by *hypostasis* than *ousia*." ^A To us, therefore, it will be more easily proven that Clement is not speaking of divine persons, but of the quaternion of virtues, which they commonly call cardinal. For the word *ὑπόστασις* there seems to signify nothing else than that which stands and subsists, or the firm and always immobile state of consistency of some thing. Wherefore we think this is the true meaning of Clement: the quaternion of virtues is consecrated to God, the third alone, namely justice, joining man to the fourth *ὑπόστασις* of the Lord, that is, to the firm state of the Lord, no longer subject to change. For that learned man maintains that by this quaternion of virtues the Christian man is, so far as it is possible, assimilated to God, and, with the perturbations of the mind quieted, attains, arrives at, and adheres to the permanent state of God, which is subject to no change, as much as it is permitted. That this is Clement's mind is clearly demonstrated by what he had said about those four virtues, and added in the same place concerning the "gnostic," or perfect Christian: "For this is the gnostic," he says, "according to the image and likeness of God, who imitates God as far as is possible for him, omitting nothing of those things which make for that likeness which can be attained—containing, sustaining, living justly, ruling over the perturbations of the mind, imparting the things he has, doing good by word and work according to his strength." Furthermore, as for the subsequent words: "A sacrifice of praise is above holocausts," how they cohere with the preceding, even if we confess it is most difficult to state, yet this meaning can be assigned to them: that to him who has attained this quaternion of virtues, a sacrifice, far more excellent than holocausts, is offered by him to God Himself. If anyone nonetheless shows that the mind of our author was otherwise, we shall yield our hands to him, and we shall willingly suffer ourselves to be overcome by him. ^B

Hervet further notes that very dense darkness is cast upon Clement's text elsewhere, and that something is depraved or gaping and mutilated there through the carelessness of scribes, where, through the benevolence of the Mosaic law, it is demonstrated by that argument—because it commands that recently planted trees be nourished and fostered for three years, and in the fourth year consecrated to God—Clement subjoined these things: ^C Furthermore, it certainly ought to seem strange to no one that four

^A cardinal virtues are called by Clement a quaternion of virtues; since the three theological virtues—faith, hope, and charity—are called by him the "holy trinity." You will find other places still more corrupted, and because of the depravation of the Greek text, most obscure and shrouded in darkness more than Cimmerian; but a more opportune occasion for discussing them will be given later.

141 ARTICLE V.

*On the Latin interpretation of these and other books of Clement, on the commentaries of Hervet, and on the various notes and observations of others upon them, and the diverse editions of these and other works of Clement.*

The Latin interpretation of these Stromata, as of the other books of our Clement, was prepared and made public by Gentian Hervet, an Aurelian and canon of the Church of Reims. But it has seemed to those who have undertaken the labor of reprinting and publishing these works of our author, not only obscure and unpolished, but in many places not very faithful, and not without reason. For no one will compare it with the Greek text, however cursorily, without immediately noticing that the sense and mind of Clement are often not expressed by his interpreter, and that no less, and indeed sometimes even greater, fog and obscurity are poured into his interpretation than are found in the text of the author himself. Whether this should be ascribed to other studies which occupied Hervet, or to the extremely difficult language of Clement himself, let others judge. But as to this first Latin interpreter of Clement’s works, if one cannot fully apply that saying of Terence: *He made bad Latin out of good Greek*—we can certainly say of him: *He made difficult and obscure Latin out of difficult and obscure Greek.* Nevertheless, we do not wish to detract any of the due honor from the learned man for his various labors expended for the good of the republic of letters.

^B Some have later attempted to correct this interpretation of Hervet. But they not only left the main errors and mistakes, and almost all of them, completely intact, but their own corrections are sometimes even worse and more inferior than the very errors they wished to correct. We have many examples of this incorrect interpretation at hand, which frequently come to the attention of readers, but we do not think that all these should now be examined one by one. For another, more apt and convenient place for discussing them will be ours. Furthermore, it is so certain and clear that even the emenders of the Hervetian version have freely and openly confessed that time did not permit them to correct all the errors and slips of both Hervet himself and the printers, who were hastening with too much speed.

^D A very useful and clearly necessary service to the republic of letters will surely be rendered by that person who brings forth a new Latin version of these Stromata and other of our Clement’s works and commentaries, by which his Greek text may be rendered clearly and accurately. It does not escape us, and it has already been observed by us, that this is most difficult, and that there is scarcely any work of a Greek writer in existence in which greater difficulties occur everywhere in rendering it into Latin. But because they can finally be overcome by the strenuous labor of some learned man, he ought to be all the more motivated to complete this interpretation, the more useful and necessary it seems for the public good, both on account of the author’s antiquity and erudition, and especially on account of the defense our Clement undertook against pagans and heretics concerning our sacred dogmas.

^A To accomplish this more easily, perhaps the diverse readings which we have collected from the Clermont codex may contribute something. Nor will the various and long fragments of these works of Clement, which were described by Epiphanius and especially by Eusebius in his books *On Evangelical Preparation*, be of a mediocre assistance. For from them the text of our Clement can be corrected in many places.

Furthermore, Hervet published very long commentaries on all these works of our author, from which, even if some things could be taken and chosen for the illustration of a new edition, they should nevertheless be rejected from it entirely. For they are not only too prolix and mangle the text of Clement in a completely preposterous way, but they also bring greater and more frequent obscurity to this same text, which they should have clarified, illustrated, and rendered clearer. Furthermore, it is not shown in them how the author's speech and discourse hold together and are connected. Yet this, without doubt, ought to have been the primary scope, duty, and office of a commentator in the explanation of these books, on account of the variety of subjects mixed together. ^B It is added that in these long commentaries Hervet sticks everywhere to things obvious and easy to anyone, and dissimulates and silently passes over almost everything that is difficult. The same Hervet also ingenuously confesses that he was ignorant of many things—which is, indeed, the excellent and commendable modesty of a learned man—and that he never read them elsewhere. Yet, it will be demonstrated by us, God willing, that not a few of these were not so difficult to find, just as was done in the previous dissertation. Finally, it has been observed by many already that the same Hervet was mistaken in many places, and that the mind and sense of our Clement was often not rendered and expressed by him, neither in these commentaries nor in his own Latin version.

For that very reason, those in charge of later editions of the Clementine works, having omitted these commentaries of Hervet entirely, have subjoined new and various notes and observations of many learned men at the bottom. There is a threefold class of them: the first of which was compiled and composed by Frederick Sylburgius from various animadversions of Arcerius, Canterus, Commelinus, Remus, Victorius, Xylander, and others. But in these, the text of Clement is corrected not from manuscript codices, but from those cited by Eusebius, as we have said, and from certain fragments described by him, and thus from the conjectures of those same writers, which are almost always doubtful and uncertain. Indeed, places of Sacred Scripture and other writers cited by Clement are indicated in those same scholia; but most things less obvious and more difficult are left out completely.

^D The second class includes the emendations of Daniel Heinsius; in these, that learned man attempted to heal certain corrupted places of Clement with his own conjectures, and to explain other obscure ones. The things he attempts to clarify are certainly not many, nor do they have explanations more difficult than many others. Wherefore, in the third class of annotations, other emendations are presented, gathered from the various readings, commentaries, and adversarial notes of learned men. But their authors aim chiefly at indicating some places of Sacred Scripture, or restoring corrupted ones, and confirming the testimonies of certain ancients cited by Clement with the authority of others. Sometimes they also attempt to heal a corrupted text of Clement, occasionally to bring light to the obscure, and to set forth something more clearly concerning some heretics attacked by Clement himself. But it is certainly to be lamented that many more things, which are more difficult to explain than all the rest, are missing in them.

In these, therefore, all [the] scholia and annotations being for the most part omitted, and those [matters] being very many, and most difficult, and worthy of knowledge, and especially concerning the chief dogmas of the Christian religion taught in this whole work, since nothing clearly occurs in them, we deemed it worthwhile with our own strength to illustrate these books of the *Stromata* as accurately as possible with new observations and notes, by how much more, as we have said, the authority of our most ancient and most learned Clement ought to be of moment among all. Before [that], however, something must be said by us concerning the Greek and Latin editions of these same *Stromata*, and other of his works.

At Florence, however, from one Greek manuscript of them found in the Medicean Library, they were first edited in Greek type only by Pietro Vettori in the year 1550. In the following year, these same works were rendered into Latin by Gentiano Herveto, and published from the same press in Latin alone, without any commentary. In the year 1560, the same were published again in Latin only, with the additions of the same Hervet from older ^A commentaries, printed at Basel by Froben.

After these, by the efforts of Friedrich Sylburg, they were issued to the public with Greek character only, but with various readings and emendations of the Clementine text added. Thereafter, those published in Greek and Latin types were made public law at Leiden in the year 1616 from the collation of Daniel Heinsius, who added brief emendations to various readings and corrections collected by Sylburg. Then, these editions were divulged at various times and in various cities, but were published primarily at Paris in the years 1619 and 1641, and later elsewhere. Finally, in the Library of the Preacher Fathers, the three books of the *Paedagogus* were published in Greek and Latin, and in our Lyons Library, all the works of our Clement of Alexandria, concerning which we are discoursing, were published in Latin only, and completely without any observations and commentaries.

CAPTER III.

New annotations on the seven books of the *Stromata* of Clement of Alexandria, and first concerning those things which pertain to Holy Scripture.

ARTICLE I.

Clement teaches and affirms no less clearly and assertively in these *Stromata*, as in his other commentaries, that the sacred books, both of the Old and New Testament, were written by their authors being inspired by the divine Spirit. For in the seventh book he teaches that he who follows God is led by Him κατὰ τὰς θεοπνεύστους Γραφάς, that is, "according to the divinely inspired Scriptures," as the Latin interpreter says. And this indeed our author had learned from the Apostle, who wrote to Timothy: Πᾶσα Γραφὴ θεόπνευστος. "All Scripture is divinely inspired." But to Clement it was so persuaded, that he pronounces firmly that God, speaking in the prophets, in the evangelical writers, and in the apostles, is the first and indemonstrable, ἀναπόδεικτον, principle of our doctrine, and that this voice of the Lord is more worthy of faith than any demonstration, or rather that it alone is the demonstration: Ἔχομεν γὰρ τὴν ἀρχὴν τῆς διδασκαλίας τὸν Κύριον, διά τε τῶν προφητῶν, διά τε τοῦ Εὐαγγελίου, καὶ διὰ τῶν μακαρίων ἀποστόλων πολυτρόπως καὶ πολυμερῶς ἐξ ἀρχῆς εἰς τέλος ἡγούμενον τῆς γνώσεως. "For we have the Lord as the beginning of doctrine, who through the prophets, and through the Gospel, and through the blessed apostles, in many ways and in many manners, from the beginning to the end, leads to the knowledge." Whence also a little later he has these things: Οὐ τὴν ἐξ ἀνθρώπων ἀναμένομεν μαρτυρίαν, ἀλλὰ τῇ τοῦ Κυρίου φωνῇ πιστούμεθα τὸ ζητούμενον ἢ πασῶν ἀποδείξεων έχεγγυωτέρα, μᾶλλον δὲ ἡ μόνη ἀπόδειξις οὖσα τυγχάνει καθ᾿ ἣν ἐπιστήμην οἱ μὲν ἀπογευσάμενοι μόνον τῶν Γραφών, πιστοί. "We do not wait for the testimony which is given by men, but we prove what is sought by the voice of the Lord; which is ^B more worthy of faith than any demonstration, or rather which is the only demonstration; by which knowledge, those who have only tasted the Scriptures are faithful." Wherefore he eloquently calls the sacred prophets the instruments of the divine voice, but that they were made the organs of the divine voice, *ὄργανα θείας γενομένους φωνῆς*, no one will deny. Nor should you say that he speaks only of the sacred seers, whom it is certain foretold future things by divine inspiration. For Clement himself calls all the books of holy Scripture by the name of prophecy not once, and where he quotes certain words from the book of *Proverbs*, he calls the prophet the author of it without doubt: Εἴρηκεν ὁ προφήτης, "The prophet said." The reason why it is so called by him, if you ask, Clement himself suggests to you, where he cites the words of that sacred author, as if uttered by the divine Word, in this manner: ὁ Λόγος φησί, "The Word says." For which reason indeed he calls all our Scriptures generally Dominical; and compares them, inasmuch as they bring forth truth in intact and unspotted virginity, to the Mother of God the Virgin: Such, he says, are the Dominical Scriptures to us, αἱ Κυριακαὶ Γραφαί, "bringing forth truth, and remaining virgins with the concealment of mysteries." But there is no need at all to dwell longer on proving those things which are obvious to everyone everywhere in the work and clearer than the noonday sun.

But on the other hand, someone might ask, does not Clement confess that many things occur in the very writings of the prophets, which, the Holy Spirit not inspiring, proceeded from them alone? Are not his words on this matter clear and perspicuous: "For those who are called prophets do not only say that they hear some things from God, but they themselves also are shown to announce by *anthupophora* (counter-argument) those things which are commonly bruited by the people, bringing forward certain questions which are made by men, from which is also the proposed saying"? Did the prophet need any divine inspiration to announce those things which were commonly bruited by the people? But, whoever objects this, he ought to remember that Clement asserted in most clear words that the prophets were ^D the organs of the divine voice, as we have said. By which mode of speaking

^A it is evident how integrally and altogether incorruptly Clement, and other Fathers of the Church, judged that the text of Scripture was to be preserved. For they willed that nothing whatsoever should be changed—not only in its words, but not even in its accents and punctuations, nor in its true and genuine meaning.

Furthermore, that period of time must be studiously observed, during which the writers of the New Testament are said by our Clement to have ceased writing under the inspiration of the divine Spirit. For from Him, this space of time is thus circumscribed: "The doctrine of the Lord which was at His advent, began from Augustus, and is completed in the middle of the time of Tiberius; while the doctrine of His apostles, until the ministry of Paul, is completed in the time of Nero." What then, you will ask, does not the same Clement ascribe the Apocalypse to John by name, and is he not read to have cited its words as from some book of the New Testament? And yet, a long time after the death of Nero, and, as Irenæus writes: "This revelation was seen at the end of the reign of Domitian." But you should notice, if you please, that Clement is there disputing against the heretics of his own time, whose errors he demonstrates to be later than the books written by divine inspiration. But because many, as Eusebius testifies, denied that John's Apocalypse was to be numbered among the other books and writings of the New Testament, for that reason Clement, in order to take away from the heretics every occasion for litigation, thought that not it, but only those books and writings whose authority was certain and even accepted by those same heretics, were to be cited.

Since, therefore, Holy Scripture is of divine authority, Clement chastises those heretics who dared to corrupt and adulterate it. And in what manner they attempted to weaken its sacred text, he himself discourses thus: « Οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ κατὰ τὴν ἀνάγνωσιν, φωνῆς τόνῳ διαστρέφοντες τὰς Γραφὰς πρὸς τὰς ἰδίας ἡδονάς, καί τίνων προσωδιῶν καὶ στιγμῶν μεταθέσει, τὰ παραγγελθέντα σωφρόνως τε καὶ συμφερόντως βιαζόμενοι πρὸς εὐπαθείας τὰς ἑαυτῶν. » "These are they who, in reading, pervert the Scriptures by the tone of their voice to their own pleasures, and by the transposition of some accents and points, force what has been commanded soberly and profitably toward their own gratifications." You see clearly how the heretics perverted the sacred text of Scripture solely by the transposition of accents and points, or by perverse punctuation, or even by reading it with a tone of voice either higher or lower.

Clement relates elsewhere that Scripture was adulterated by them in other ways also: "First," he says, "they do not use them all; then, they do not use the perfect [ones], nor as the body and contexture of prophecy dictates. But choosing those things which are spoken ambiguously, they trade them for their own opinions, plucking a few words here and there, and not considering what is signified by them, but using the naked expression itself. For in almost all the places they adduce, you will see them regarding the names alone, as if they change what is signified, and they do not know how they are spoken, nor do they use the allegations they bring forward in the way their nature demands." The heretics, therefore, distorted the Scriptures by completely rejecting certain entire books of it, or at least some part of them, where they saw their own errors being fundamentally overthrown. Then, indeed, clinging only to the names, by their perverse and clearly preposterous interpretation, they twisted them into depraved and heretical meanings. Finally, Clement asserts that they so abuse the divine word with lies, fictions, and depraved arts, that they appeared by right to deserve not to be admitted to the Scriptures at all.

We observe these things ^B by design, so that it may be manifest how Clement our author established this certain and settled rule for finding that true meaning of Scripture and its genuine sense: "Truth is not found in the translation of meanings—for thus they would overturn all true doctrine—but in that one should consider what perfectly becomes and befits the Lord and omnipotent God, and in that, one should confirm each of these things which are demonstrated through the Scriptures, again from the same similar Scriptures." Moreover, these excellent norms for investigating the true sense of Scripture, established by our Clement, are confirmed in a wonderful way in the third book of Augustine's *De doctrina Christiana*, and are explained more fully. If, therefore, you wish to approach him and other interpreters of Scripture who discourse most abundantly on this subject, you will not spend your labor altogether in vain.

Our author shows that there is a double sense of Scripture, the literal and the allegorical, and that this is understood by few. Indeed, he proves this with the authority of Hermas and Isaiah, and then by a brief explanation of the individual commandments of the Decalogue. What wonder, then, if our Clement, not otherwise than many other most ancient and learned Fathers of the Church, should have applied himself with greater study to the allegorical sense of Scripture than to its literal exposition? For he declares himself to be fully persuaded that the letter of Scripture is clear to all, and that it admits of an allegorical sense, which is itself by far more difficult, and that names and expressions are rightly compared by some with the body, and those things which are signified by the same names, with the spirit.

If you inquire why Scripture has such difficult explanations, Clement will immediately answer you that its oration is enveloped in many shadows of obscurity, and therefore its sense can be perceived neither by many, nor without study and labor. Yet, if you further wish to know why the oration of Scripture, which ought to have been most manifest to all, as it seems, is involved in such great obscurity, you will receive this response from the same Clement: "Because," he says, "truth is not for4 all, he conceals the truth in many ways, and for those alone who have been initiated into knowledge, those who seek the truth for the sake of charity, he causes the light to arise."

Another reason for this obscurity can also be brought forward from our Clement himself. For since he asserts the style of Holy Scripture to be plainly enigmatic and parabolic, the principal cause of its obscurity must without a doubt be attributed to this kind of writing. And indeed, after he made this manifest by the testimony of both the Psalmist and the Apostle, he added a little later: "It would be long to pursue all the prophetic and legal [parts], by bringing forward those things which were spoken through enigmas; for almost universal divine Scripture brings forth its oracles in this way." Which, indeed, lest some rather morose person should complain that it was rashly said by him, he confirms with a mystical ^D exposition of those things which were in the temple of Jerusalem, and of the priestly vestments, and also of Joseph’s many-colored mantle.

Nor, furthermore, does Clement show that the writers of the New Testament only, but also those of the Old, used the same plainly parabolic style of writing. For he himself proves that, while Christ was alive, and after He was dead, John the Baptist and His disciples spoke thus:

^A Christ’s own intimates, he says, who preached the Word, used parables after He Himself had departed from this life. What, however, a parable, an enigma, a trope, and other figures of diction in the Scriptures are, he himself explains subsequently. Regarding these, moreover, consult the author of the commentaries on chapter 1 of Proverbs in Jerome, likewise Cassiodorus’s book *On Schemes and Tropes*, page 620, and also Augustine, who says the knowledge of tropes is useful for understanding the Scriptures.

Before we conclude this discourse concerning the books of sacred Scripture in general, it must be noted that it is most difficult to explain what Clement means when he wrote that the four pillars of the Jerusalem temple are ἁγίας μήνυμα τετράδος διαθηκῶν παλαιῶν, "the sign of the holy quaternion of the Old Testaments." For Hervetus openly confesses that he does not understand what these mean. But if we may be permitted to indulge in conjectures, we shall say that it does not seem altogether alien to the truth that Clement was referring there to a certain division of the books of the Old Testament, by which some distributed them into four parts, namely, into legal, historical, parenetic, and prophetic, or distributed them in some other way. Concerning this and other partitions of those sacred volumes, many have handed down a great deal in writing, whom anyone can easily consult. If, however, anyone wishes to suggest another, truer explanation of Clement’s words, he will find us by no means reluctant to be brought over to his opinion.

ARTICLE II.

That we may come to certain books of sacred Scripture in particular, Clement first of all most explicitly ascribes the book of Genesis to Moses, its true author. For he cites a certain testimony taken from it in these words: “The most wise Moses used repetition beautifully, signifying the incorruption of body and soul, describing it in Rebecca in this way: ‘But the virgin was beautiful, a man had not known her.’” Elsewhere he says: “Moses appears to call the Lord a covenant: ‘Behold I,’ he says, ‘my covenant with you.’”

^B He also produced elsewhere a testimony transcribed under the name of this same Moses from the book of Deuteronomy, as follows: “Whence it was said to them by Moses: ‘I will provoke you to jealousy,’” etc. What of the fact that, still under the same name of Moses, other passages are praised by him after Barnabas, not only from Deuteronomy, but also from Exodus? But what need is there to run through the individual books of Moses, when Clement explicitly asserts there that he is the author of the entire Pentateuch, where he hands down that the moral laws which are read therein were written by Moses himself? “It is clear,” he says, “that all the other virtues, which are written among Moses, αἱ παρὰ τῷ Μωσεί ἀναγεγραμμέναι, offered to the Greeks the principle of the entire moral place.” For where, I ask you, would these laws of Moses be written, if not in the Pentateuch? But, as we think, no sincere person...

^C Let us add, however, if you wish, that the foolish stubbornness of those insular men is refuted even more expressly by these words of Clement: “For the Mosaic philosophy is divided into four parts: both into the historical part, and that which is properly called legal, which indeed were proper to the treatment of morals; the third, however, is that which pertains to sacrifices, which indeed is of the contemplation of nature; and finally the fourth kind, the theological, which is the higher contemplation.” But in what books will you find these, unless in those which have been inscribed under the name of Moses up to this time? What, finally, of the fact that Clement asserts and demonstrates that pagan philosophers drew their own, as we shall see below, truer dogmas from these same books of Moses? But since it would appear superfluous to confirm with many arguments that which is clearer than light itself, we must now examine what he has said regarding Moses himself that is singular and worthy of observation.

Concerning his age, which is older than all the philosophers of Greece, our Clement argues at length, and by various chronologies of various authors, which are to be accurately represented by us below, he proves that this same Moses is far more ancient than both the gods of the pagans and all their wise men and philosophers, poets and writers. But concerning this opinion of the ancients, enough, we think, has been discussed in our dissertations on the works of Justin Martyr and Tatian.

After this, Clement narrates many things concerning the origin, life, and history of Moses, which we believe no one will find useless to compare with the three books of Philo on the life of this same Moses, and the second book of Josephus’s *Jewish Antiquities*. Nor will it be ^D superfluous for you, if you wish, to compare the verses cited by Clement from the poet Ezekiel concerning the education of Moses with those which Eusebius transcribed more fully and not without various readings from this same poet of the Jews.

But that which Clement wrote in this manner regarding the name of this great legislator of the Israelites seems truly worthy of our observation: “The queen gives the boy the name, Moyses, an apt etymology, for the reason that she had lifted him out of the water. For the Egyptians call water *moy*, in which he, who was about to die, had been exposed. For they call him Moyses who, having emerged from the water, has breathed. It is clear, therefore, that previously, when the boy was circumcised, his parents imposed some name. He was also called Joachim. He had also a third name in heaven, after he was assumed, as the mystics say, namely Melchi.” 145 That which Clement relates concerning the etymology and imposition of the name Moyses is, beyond doubt, culled [alt-version omitted] from Philo. For these are his words: Τὸ γὰρ ὕδωρ μῶς ὀνομάζουσιν Αἰγύπτιοι (For the Egyptians call water *mōs*). Which indeed are read thus in Clement: Τὸ γὰρ ὕδωρ μοῦ ὀνομάζουσιν Αἰγύπτιοι (For the Egyptians call water *mou*). Where you see that there are as many words in each, except that for *mōs*, Clement—or rather the scribes of his works—wrote *mou*. Whether, however, that is to be attributed to their carelessness, you will not unjustly doubt. For in the published...

^A manuscript of Claramontanus we read *mou* written throughout.

But regarding this etymology of the Mosaic name, Josephus, who furthermore brings forward this reason for why he gained the name from the river into which Moses was cast: Τὸ γὰρ ὕδωρ μῶ Αἰγύπτιοι καλοῦσιν, ὔσης δὲ τοὺς ἐξ ὕδατος σωθέντας; "For the Egyptians call water *mo*, and those saved from the water *yses*." But Vossius mocks this etymology, and proves that the name of Moses was derived from the verb *masha*, that is, *to draw out*, *to lead out*, from these words of Exodus: "And he called his name Moses, saying: Because I took him from the water." And indeed not a few have supported this opinion of Vossius. Yet there are not a few who think that, in order to signify that he was drawn from the waters, a certain Egyptian name was first imposed upon Moses by the daughter of Pharaoh; and that afterwards he was called Moses by the Hebrews in their own language. Nor is that opinion bereft of its probability. But because that first Egyptian name is unknown to us, some judge that nothing certain can be defined about it by anyone. Furthermore, let it suffice for us that we have pointed out Philo, whose earlier authority Clement followed.

There is truly no less difficulty ^B regarding the other two names of Moses, one of which Clement asserts was given to him in circumcision as Joachim, and the other in heaven as Melchi. For Hervet confesses that he has read nothing of either elsewhere. Nevertheless, Cedrenus makes mention of the name Melchi somewhere. But he testifies that this name for Moses was not given in heaven, as Clement says, but by his father: "They say that Moses, when he was brought into the light, was named Melchi by his father, which word signifies king." Syncellus similarly: "Having finished the age of infancy, he calls the ripening child Moses, for he says, because they snatched him from the waters; although earlier he had received the name Melchias from his parents." Thus he was distinguished by a double name, and the recommendation of the things performed by him became the title of the double appellation. For Melchias is explained as king, and Moses in the sacred Egyptian language is explained as having been snatched from the waters.

In this, however, he is argued of error by others, because he believed the name of Moses to be derived from the Egyptian, and not the Hebrew language. ^C Moreover, both Cedrenus and Syncellus differ from our Clement in that they testify the name of Moses to be only double, while he testifies it to be triple.

The author of the *Questions on the Hebrew Books of Kings and Chronicles*, which were wrongly carried under the name of Jerome, also hands down many other names of Moses. Gualmynus and various authors cited by the most learned Huet narrate that Moses was called by many other names, and ones far different from those we have mentioned. But who will doubt that these have arisen solely from the brains of the Jews and their secret and fictitious traditions? Wherefore, regarding the name of Joachim and Melchi, Clement declares nothing from himself, but deliberately added, *ὡς φασὶν οἱ μύσται*, "as the mystagogues say." By the name of mystagogues he elsewhere signifies them to be those who undoubtedly knew the causes of the mysteries and sacrifices, encompassed in the secret traditions among the Jews.

Without doubt, from these same less than pure fonts Clement had drawn what is not more consonant with the truth, which he himself writes ^D in the place cited earlier: "They say the mystagogues," that he (Moses) slew the Egyptian by word alone, just as certainly Peter is later said in the Acts to have done to those who had usurped for themselves the price of the field and had lied. But in the book of Exodus we read: "And when he had looked about this way and that way, and saw no one present, he hid the Egyptian in the sand." For what else do these words sound, if not that this Egyptian was killed secretly and with no one looking on, not by the word of Moses, but by his hand?

But if anyone should ask of us who those mystagogues are from whom Clement received this, we will respond that Rabbi Solomon indeed handed down to memory that the Egyptian was killed by Moses by pronouncing the tetragrammaton name of God. But it will be persuaded to us with no difficulty that this was taken by Clement not from him, but rather from Artapanus, to be praised by us shortly, or from the very false traditions of the Jews themselves.

Why then, you will ask, does Clement bring these fictions of the mystagogues, which he knew were clearly absurd and thoroughly alien from the truth, into the medium so seriously? The answer to this question is easy and ready. For in these books of the *Stromata* he, just as against the pagans, argues again and again against the Jews, for the defense of the Christian faith undertaken by himself, to be confirmed from their false and absurd opinions.

Lest therefore you marvel at that which is no less singular, which our author himself later subjoined regarding the same Moses from Artapanus, a historian of the Jewish race: "Artapanus certainly in his work on the Jews reports that Moses was enclosed in custody by Nechephres, king of the Egyptians, because he asked that the people be liberated from Egypt, and that by night, with the prison opened, by the will of God he had gone forth; when he had come to the palace, he had stood by the sleeping king and had awakened him; and he, struck with amazement because of what had happened, had ordered Moses to tell the name of him who had sent him, and that he indeed, when he had inclined to his ear, had spoken; but the king, when he had heard, had fallen mute; when, however, Moses had held him, he had come to life again." We read a long fragment of this Artapanus described by Eusebius, where that act of Moses, or rather fable, and many other things no less repugnant to the sacred text are narrated. There, however, the king of Egypt is not Nechephres, but with the prior syllables transposed, Chenephres, just as in the *Alexandrine Chronicle*, and the writer is called not Artapanus, but Artabanus.

But it is far more consonant with that sacred text what Clement narrates about the same Moses: "This Moses was a theologian and prophet, and as some, an interpreter of the sacred laws, *ὡς δέ τινες, νομοθετῶν ἑρμηνεύς ἦν*." For Philo, not at all ignorant of this sacred history, begins the life of Moses with words clearly similar to these: *Μωσῆς ὁ καὶ μέν τινας νομοθέτου τῶν Ἰουδαίων, κατὰ δέ τινας ἑρμηνέως νόμων ἱερῶν τὸν βίον*, etc., "Moses, the life of the legislator of the Jews, as some think; as others, the life of the interpreter of sacred laws," etc.

146 But what Clement subjoins: "Born in the seventh generation," is explained more clearly by Josephus in these words: "He was," he says, "the seventh from Abraham; for he himself was the son of Amram, as was his father Kohath, and this man truly [was the son of] Levi, and Levi [the son of] Jacob, who was begotten from Isaac: and this man was the son of Abraham."

But from both, yet especially from Philo, Clement undoubtedly gleaned what he predicts of the varied and manifold knowledge of the same Moses. But he certainly [proclaims] him not only skilled in the making of laws.

but also says that he himself became a living law, and brought forward a good method for the administration of the commonwealth. ^A Moreover, another witness to this knowledge of Moses, cited by our Clement, just as by Eusebius, is Eupolemus.

Since Moses, therefore, was endowed with such wisdom, knowledge, equity, and justice, our author skillfully argues against certain morose accusers who condemned the Israelites for avarice on the grounds that, when departing from Egypt, they had plundered the goods of the Egyptians by the command of the same Moses. He frees them from the charge of any avarice or even theft for a twofold reason. And first, indeed, because this plundering of goods was no less just than is war; since the Egyptians, on account of a famine, had reduced the Israelites, whom they had befriended, to slavery against law and justice. Second, because they recovered the wages due for their services, of which they had been unjustly deprived for so long, by this plundering. Wherefore Epiphanius says: "Since for so many years, he says, the Israelites had given their services to the Egyptians without any wages, was it not most equitable in the judgment of both God and men that their wages should finally be paid to them at least in the end? Wherefore God is not unjust, who sent his own people forth from there with spoils," etc. ^B However, to certain more recent writers and theologians, both of these reasons do not seem sufficient, unless a third is added, which Augustine proposes in this manner: "God commanded this, who knew what every man deserved to suffer; nor did the Israelites commit theft, but provided a service to God who commanded it." But it could perhaps be said that this reason is not excluded by Clement nor by others, [a reason] which can easily be gathered by anyone from the sacred text of Scripture. Regarding this question, moreover, besides the interpreters of Scripture itself, you may see the scholastic theologians in *lib.* Sentent., dist. 37, §3, and in S. Thom., 2-2, qu. 66, art. 5, ad 1.

Furthermore, Clement proves and demonstrates by various arguments against the heretics, those haters of the Mosaic Law, that it is not harsh and cruel, as they babbled, but full of humanity, gentleness, and kindness. ^C But one of these, to pass over the others, is this argument of Clement, that that law gave an exemption from military service to a man who had betrothed a wife: "The benevolent law commands that these be exempted from the campaign; indeed, in a general-like manner." Thus the benevolent law orders [them] to be exempt from military service, and indeed in an imperial manner, that is, according to the true and most prudent laws of a commander, of whom, as we have seen, he said Moses was most experienced. There, moreover, he aims at nothing other than Deut. xx, 7, and xxiv, 5, which, to note this in passing, ought to have been indicated in the editions of Clement. Finally, it cannot be omitted by us in what sense he wrote that the law of Moses was fulfilled by Christ: "The Lord did not come to dissolve the law," he says, "but to fulfill it; but to fulfill it, not as if something were lacking, but because the prophecies of the law were perfect in his advent. For the right institution of life was preached through the Word even to those who lived justly before the law during the time before the law." ^D To this opinion of our Clement, the ancient Fathers of the Church, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Hilary, and others, subscribed with great consensus and number. Others, however, departed into other opinions, and [into] other [interpretations] of the words of Christ, who, to fulfill the law...

[1078] Moses, furthermore, was not only most instructed in the science of commanding an army, but the fact that he was also skilled in leading [the host], which Clement writes, can escape no one unless they are a complete stranger and foreigner to sacred history. Yet, that it might not seem incredible to any pagan man that an army of Israelites, led by him at night through desert and inaccessible places, was preceded by a pillar of fire, Clement confirms this with a double example. The first is that of Miltiades, the Athenian commander, who, having led his army through difficult places in the dead of night, attacked the Persians and defeated and destroyed them in the battle of Marathon. This history, moreover, has been committed to memory by Herodotus, Plutarch, and others.

The second example is that of Thrasybulus, who, at night, through untrodden places, with a pillar of fire, as Clement himself says, shining before them, led the exiles back to their fatherland. That extraordinary deed of Thrasybulus is mentioned not only by Trogus Pompeius, praised by Hervetus, but even by Valerius Maximus, Plutarch, and others; but neither any of them, nor Xenophon, who narrated that [event] far more elaborately than the rest, make any mention of a pillar of fire. But the most learned bishop of Avranches mentions it in his *Alnetan Questions*, though with no author cited. Finally, to these, if it pleases, let us add that which Pausanias testifies was done in eternal memory of this deed: "Thrasybulus indeed, the son of Lycus, and that whole band of Athenian exiles, because they had recovered their fatherland [after] moving from Thebes and expelling the thirty tyrants, placed in the temple of Hercules, as a work of Alcamenes, Minerva and Hercules himself, in the form of a colossus, from Pentelic marble."

By various examples, Clement shows elsewhere that what is read in the Scriptures is worthy of faith for any man, [for example] that God showed himself to be seen by the same Moses on Mount Sinai, at the time when fire was burning, consuming nothing of the things that were growing on the mountain, and the sound of trumpets was heard, which was inspired without any instruments. Concerning the circumference of that mountain, Aristobulus, cited by Clement, clearly asserted it was not less than five days' journey. Josephus, however, only said that "it is the highest of all [mountains] in its region, and on account of [its] excessive height and rocky precipices, it fatigues not only the ascents of men, but the very sights."

In this mountain, therefore, the sound of trumpets miraculously stirred by the omnipotence of God, Clement says, are the less incredible in that others, which could seem no less extraordinary, are reported to have been produced in a natural way in the cavern of Britain and in the mountains of Persia. But Pliny reports others not clearly dissimilar to these unusual sounds, where he writes this about Mount Atlas: "That it shines at night with frequent fires, is filled with the lasciviousness of Aegipans and satyrs, and resounds with the playing of pipes, of the flute, and the sound of drums and cymbals." Solinus reports the same thing, whom consult if you have leisure, just as also Kircher on others, and even on these sounds, which Clement professes to have described from the writers of Britain and Persia. Finally, Clement recounts from a certain history concerning the death of Moses that he was *analambanomenos*, as Philo also speaks, that is, when he was passing from this life into another, and was being assumed by the Lord, then by Joshua and...

^A Caleb, but in a different way; that there were two visions; and one indeed was with the angels, but the other above the mountains, which was worthy for him, to whom in the valleys just things might be performed 7. What that history is, from where Clement might have drawn it, is truly most difficult to say. For concerning this double vision of Joshua and Caleb, nothing at all occurs either in Deuteronomy, nor in the Epistle of Jude 8, nor even in the writings of Philo 9 and Josephus 10, where discourse is instituted concerning the death and burial of Moses himself. Moreover, Philo writes in the same place that Moses died and was buried while no one was watching.

Wherefore what is reported in the Epistle of Jude concerning the dispute over the burial of Moses, between Michael and the devil, Origen judged to have been derived from a little book concerning the Ascension of Moses 11. From this same little book, therefore, some think this vision of Joshua and Caleb was taken. But to others it seems more probable that Jude excerpted these things from some tradition of the elders that was by no means written, or from some other apocryphal writing, which nevertheless deserved human trust. Clement, therefore, since he signifies openly enough that he had plucked these things from some apocryphal writing; whether one of those which are cited really was it, or another similar to them, we shall hear more willingly from others.

ARTICLE III.

Concerning the books of Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Wisdom, and Ecclesiasticus.

Now we must pass to the other books of the Old Testament, and first of all it is helpful to observe that the book of Job is cited by Clement, just as if he himself had not doubted that it was composed by the inspiration of the divine Spirit, no less than the other books of Sacred Scripture. For in this manner he cites the words of Job, both from the same book and from the epistle of Clement of Rome 12: "There is no one clean from filth, says Job, not even if his life should be but one day 13." Which things, even if you do not find them in the Vulgate version of the Bible, you will nevertheless find them rendered by the Septuagint and by our Clement in exactly the same words, if you except a few variant readings. Elsewhere he has brought forward still other words of Job: "But Job the just; I, he says, came out naked from my mother's womb, and naked I shall return there 14." And again a little later: "Justly therefore Job, who arrived at knowledge: Now, he says, I know that you can do all things, and there is nothing which you cannot do. For who shall announce to me the things which I knew not, the great and admirable things which I did not know 15?" Nor is there any reason why anyone should argue that these words are indeed attributed to Job by Clement, but not in such a way that he asserted that he, or the author of this book, spoke or wrote them inspired by the divine Spirit: for not only did our Clement cite this same book, as we have said, just like the others, and with other books of the Old Testament, as if of one and the same weight and authority, but also somewhere he praises it by the name of Scripture alone, undoubtedly holy and divine, just as the others that are not in the least doubtful: "The Scripture indeed says, ^B *phēsi g' oun hē Graphē*; The abyss says to destruction: We have not seen his appearance, but we have heard his voice. 16" The abyss says to destruction: We have not seen its appearance, but we have heard its voice 16. These are indeed the very words of the book of Job, which the Septuagint interpreted in this way: *Hē apōleia, kai ho thanatos eipon*. In the Vulgate, however, in Latin they are read thus: "Perdition and death said: We have heard its fame with our ears 17." Therefore, no one can doubt that Clement believed the book of Job ought to be ascribed to the canon of the sacred books.

But he mentions everywhere that the Psalms were written and sung by David. For truly, in the name of David himself, the first is praised by this same Clement of ours thus 18: "But also David... Blessed is the man, who has not walked in the counsel of the ungodly... nor stood in the way of sinners 19." And also the ninth psalm 20: "David also says: But the nations are stuck fast in the destruction which they made. The foot of them is caught in this snare which they hid 21," etc. And elsewhere 22: "But now also David sings openly, bearing witness to the truth: Let sinners be turned into hell 23," etc. Psalm fourteen 24: "Who are such, as the blessed David says, *kata ton Dauid*, will rest on your holy mountain 25." And psalm fifteen 26: "Again David openly, or rather the Lord in the person of the Saint... My heart has rejoiced, and my tongue has exulted 27." Also the seventeenth psalm 28: "But now David says: Dark water in the clouds of the air 29," etc. But what of the fact that Clement relates and approves the words of another Clement, namely the Roman 30, in which he ascribes to the same David the fiftieth, sixtieth, eightieth, and other psalms 31? What more? From the same David our author produces the one-hundred-second psalm 32: "This by David, he says, was said by way of confession: I ate ashes like bread 33." To this is added that in other books 34, besides the psalms V, XLIV, XLVIII, CXXV, CXVII, he adjudges this one, CXVII, in this way 35: "The psalmist David says: In what shall a young man direct his way 36?" as also the one-hundred-eleventh 37: "But David cried out: The just man shall not be moved forever 38." Finally, so that our speech may not be too long, adding only this, that the author of psalm CXVII, in the same way 39, is David to be designated by this same Clement of ours elsewhere thus 40: "David writes: Teach me goodness, and discipline, and knowledge, because I have believed in your commandments 41." But in another book 42: "He said (David): I was conceived in sins, and in iniquities my mother conceived me 43."

But because there are varied opinions of both ancient and recent writers concerning the author of the Psalms, it will by no means be foreign to our purpose to explain them briefly, so that we may make it plain and evident to all, as far as it can be done, to which one our Clement adhered. The first opinion, therefore, concerning their parent was formerly that of the impious Paul of Samosata, and of certain Anabaptists of our own age far worse than him, who have reached such a pitch of rashness that they do not blush to proclaim openly that all the psalms were written after the birth of Christ. But this insolence of impious men, bold for every crime, is easily repelled by the authority of the Old as well as the New Testament. For, to pass over other things, the seventeenth psalm is described entire in the second book of Kings, chapter XXII, and the psalms CIV and CVI are ascribed to David by name in the first book of Paralipomenon, chapter XVI. And Christ himself was wont to quote the one hundredth and ninth psalm, and Peter the tenth 44.

But it is truly shameful to refute so insane and manifest an error at any greater length or to pursue it further.

There is, therefore, another opinion, diametrically opposed to this and championed by a great number of authors of all ages, which contends that all psalms without exception should be attributed to David himself. But this is rejected by others, partly because many psalms bear on their front a name other than that of David, and partly, above all, because it is held as certain that some were written after David’s time, through the periods of the Babylonian captivity and even after the restoration of liberty to the Jews. Wherefore Jerome writes to Cyprian: "Let us know that those who believe all the psalms should be attributed to David, and not to those whose names are written upon them, are in error. But if any lack an inscription, he says that these are to be assigned to those whose names are contained in the preceding psalms." And in this way Jerome declares in the same place that Moses is the author of eleven such psalms. Nor did he state this only once, but also in another letter to Sophronius: "We testify," he says, "that all the psalms belong to the authors who are set down in their titles, namely David, Asaph, and Idithun, the sons of Core, Eman the Ezrahite, Moses, and Solomon, and the rest whom Ezra gathered into one volume." ^B This, then, is the third opinion concerning the authors of the Psalms, held not only by Jerome but also by Hilary and others, who wish them to have been written by those in whose names they are inscribed.

But because a double title for them occurs, one in the Hebrew text and another in the Greek, it follows that some depart into a fourth opinion, asserting that not the erroneous Greek inscriptions, but only the sincere ones of the Hebrew text should perhaps not be trusted in every case. For although the name of Moses is read as prefixed to psalm LXXXIX in them, yet because mention is made of Samuel therein, certain writers—not of the lowest rank—depart from the opinion of Jerome and others, who suppose this psalm to have been edited by Moses, the leader and lawgiver of the Israelites. The supporters of this fourth opinion think that David is truly the author of the psalms that bear his name, and of certain ones inscribed with no name—for instance, those which, as we have said, are adjudicated to him in the books of Paralipomenon and the Acts of the Apostles. But as for those before which the name of Asaph is prefixed, they believe that most, though not all, of them proceeded from that same Asaph. For they opine that it is manifest that some of these are later than him and relate to the Babylonian captivity. Finally, we read the names of the sons of Core and Idithun, and others, effectively prefixed to certain psalms; yet not because they were written by them, but because they were sung by them. They are convinced, therefore, that hardly any other authors of the psalms besides David and Asaph can be assigned. Yet they have never doubted that all the psalms whatsoever, no matter by whom they were composed, were composed under the inspiration of the Divine Spirit; nor can this be rightfully called into doubt by any truly Christian man. ^C

In this great variety of opinions, if you ask to which our Clement has accessed, we shall answer that he seems to us to be inclined rather toward the second [opinion]. ^D For Clement does not just once adjudicate the book of Proverbs to Solomon. From the very beginning of his Stromata he praises his words as follows: "Solomon says, therefore: 'My son, [if] thou hast received the word of my commandment, thou shalt hide it with thee,'" etc. And later: "And 'drink water from thy vessels,' Solomon admonishes." And again in the same book: "Now wisdom, Solomon says, 'gird about' [with a wall]," etc. Furthermore: "Rightly, therefore, Solomon: 'He who sows,' he says, 'works righteousness,'" etc. In the same way, in the second book and elsewhere, he constantly attributes this book to Solomon. For there he says that an ancient proverb is taken from the voice of Solomon, who says: "My son, if thou hast become surety for thy friend, thou shalt hand over thy hand to an enemy," etc. And so that we may pass over the other things which are not to be gathered for an entirely clear matter, go if you wish to the fourth book of the Stromata, and there you will find the same book cited still under Solomon’s name. Meanwhile, listen to what Eusebius has said about him: "Not only he (Hegesippus), but also Irenaeus and all the ancients are accustomed to call the Proverbs of Solomon 'Wisdom, containing the precepts of all the virtues.'"

From these things, and others which have been observed by us in these and other books of our Clement, it is clearly evident to all that, even if at the end of the book of Proverbs some things are attributed to authors other than Solomon, our Clement was nevertheless entirely convinced that the author of all of them and of the later proverbs, which others are reported to have collected from the sayings of Solomon, was to be called none other than the same Solomon. Nor, indeed, was the mind of those whom we cited a little earlier—namely, Hegesippus and Irenaeus—any different; nor that of Melito and Origen, who in their indices of the books of the Old Testament adjudicate the Proverbs generally to Solomon.

As for the Book of Wisdom, although it has sometimes been simply called "divine Wisdom" or "Wisdom" by Clement, he praises it in some places under the name of Solomon: "Now indeed, Solomon, calling the Gnostic [the] wise man, says these things: 'They shall see the death of the wise [man], and shall not understand what of him,'" etc. And not much later: "For behold Solomon: 'For there shall be given,' he says, 'the grace of faith, and a lot in the temple of the Lord [shall be] more pleasing.'" And again, certain things being interpolated: "Discourses on cognition, he says, Solomon says these things: 'Clear is [Wisdom] and unfading, and is easily perceived,'" etc.

Yield, someone will say. Is Clement not therefore noted by Eusebius because he brings forward in these books of the Stromata "testimonies of the Scriptures which are repudiated by some, namely from the Wisdom of Solomon," ἀπὸ τῶν ἀντιλεγομένων Γραφῶν, that is, [repudiated] by those who rejected it outside the sacred canon of Divine Scripture? But when Eusebius says that it was rejected by some, he undoubtedly signifies that it was received by many. And in very truth, Clement had many predecessors and left after himself patrons and defenders of this opinion. Moreover, some of them, in order to prove this, bring forward into the middle these things which Barnabas refers to in his epistle: "Let us lie in wait for the just one, because [he is] useless," etc. But, to tell the truth, these words are not from the Wisdom...

^A of this book, as they think, but are taken from the prophecy of Isaiah.

It seems more certain, therefore, that the words of this book are cited in the first epistle of Clement of Rome: "Who will say to him: What have you done, or who will resist the power of his strength?" In the book of Wisdom we read: "For who shall say: What have you done? or who shall stand against your judgment?" Which the Vulgate has rendered thus: "For who will say to you: What have you done, or who will stand against your judgment?"

But he does not name the author of the sacred books there, as neither does he for the others which he is read to have cited most frequently. Yet indeed that same passage of Wisdom, and others, are brought forward by Cyprian, who, just like our Clement, calls this book the Wisdom of Solomon. However, we have judged it fitting to omit naming the other Fathers of the Church and the rest of the writers who have subsequently either supported or opposed this opinion, since this has been done by few, and not for a long time now. Let it suffice, therefore, to have pointed out what Augustine has handed down concerning this book: "But two others, of which one is called Wisdom, the other Ecclesiasticus, custom has obtained that they are called Solomon’s, because of a certain similarity of style; however, the more learned do not doubt that they are not his." ^B

But how then, you will ask, does Clement attribute this book to both Jesus and Solomon, which, as Augustine says: "That a certain Jesus, who is surnamed Sirach, wrote it, is agreed upon among those who have read the same book in its entirety." But observe, I pray, that the same Augustine has written elsewhere that, even though the more learned men affirm that this book is not Solomon's, it was nonetheless received by the Church, especially the Western [Church], from antiquity, and because of the similarity of style, it had obtained the custom then of being called Solomon's. Wherefore some think it was fashioned by Jesus, the son of Sirach, from the sentiments of Solomon and others, and even his own. From which opinion our Clement does not seem to have departed far, and for that reason he can easily be reconciled with himself. But let each one retain his own opinion in this matter, as far as we are concerned.

Moreover, by the same persons by whom the superior book of Wisdom is placed in the number and canon of the sacred books, by those same persons this one also is placed, as we saw a little earlier; and it is cited by Cyprian more frequently by the name of Solomon alone. Since, therefore, it was received by the Church, especially the Western, into its authority, it is certainly no wonder if Eusebius pronounces of it, just as of the superior book, that Clement in his books of the *Stromata* has brought forward testimonies of the Scriptures which are repudiated by some; namely, from the Wisdom of Solomon, and from that which is called Wisdom of Jesus, son of Sirach. But because it has been ejected from there by some others, ^C indeed, these two books were inscribed into the canon of Holy Scripture in the Council of Hippo in the year 393, canon 38, and in the Carthaginian [Council] under Pope Siricius, in the year 397, canon 47, and under Gelasius I in the year 494, and finally in the Council of Trent. You may see the same Augustine's book II, *De doctr. Christ.*, chapter 8, *Speculum*, page 733, and book II, *Retractat.*, chapter 4. See also, if you wish, our Coutant's notes and observations to the *Prologus in lib. Psalm.* of Hilary, page 3.

Furthermore, how frequently our author has lauded that book of Ecclesiasticus has already been observed by us above, and it will be shown again below. For this reason we shall note only this one thing, namely, that this same book is called by him by the simple name of Wisdom, just as the book of Proverbs is, since he speaks of ethnic poets thus: "They have heard, as I think, that beautiful Wisdom which says to us: 'Observe the occasion in the midst of the unwise; but always be conversant in the midst of those who think.' And again: 'The wise will hide wisdom.'" For the first passage occurs plainly in the book of Ecclesiasticus, the second however in the book of Proverbs, so that it makes one wonder at Hervet, who, when he had sought them in vain, suspected that they were taken from the sacred book of Wisdom.

It will appear worthy of greater wonder to some, and perhaps not undeservedly, that a twofold author of this same Ecclesiasticus is designated by our Clement himself. For in one place he calls this book the Wisdom of Jesus, or, as he himself speaks: "As the Wisdom of Jesus says." And again in the same book: "Hear from the Wisdom of Jesus." But in another place he vindicates the same book for Solomon. For by him Heraclitus is sometimes brought forward: "Helped indeed by Solomon, who says: 'If you have loved to hear, you shall receive; and if you have inclined your ear, you shall be wise.'" Which are the identical words of Ecclesiasticus VI. ^D

ARTICLE IV. On the books of the prophets, of the Maccabees and of the fourth [book] of Esdras, and on their authors.

That the books of the four "great" prophets, as they say, are cited throughout this work of the *Stromata* under the name of those to whom they are ascribed, no Catholic man will wonder. For there can be no controversy or dispute about them among the orthodox and fair judges of matters. Therefore, it will be noted by us only in passing that this statement is incorrectly attributed by our Clement under the name of Isaiah: "I, who harden the thunders," etc. Nor by a better right is it attributed by Eusebius, who transcribed this passage of Clement, to Hosea, as it is ascribed elsewhere by our Clement. For these are the very words of the prophet Amos.

But in another book, where our author himself uses a testimony of the same Amos, he signifies that his prophecy is not only truly inscribed with his name, but also composed by him under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit: "The Holy Spirit," he says, "spoke through Amos: 'They who drink wine strained, and sit,' he says, 'on an ivory bed.'" Finally, it will be said below that [Amos] is cited by this same author of yours in the sixth book of the *Stromata* under the name of Scripture alone.

In just the same way he produces Jonah and Malachi as witnesses: "Jonah himself secretly signifies," he says, "the same, when he says: 'And he who was governing the glory came to him and said: Why do you sleep? Arise... .' Malachi, however, the prophet, openly shows God saying: 'I will not accept a sacrifice from your hands,'" etc. But previously: "Di-

"Who irritated God with your words, and you say: In what have we irritated him?" etc. Similarly, Clement defends the prophecy of Micah, disseminated under his name, where he writes: "These are they, of whom the prophet Micah says: Hear, O peoples, the word of the Lord, you who dwell together with sorrows." Although indeed those very words do not occur in that book of Micah, they seem nevertheless to be excerpted from its first chapter. Suppose, however, that they are not to be found, and that Clement’s memory lapsed there; it is no less certainly gathered from that fact that he believed Micah to have been the true author of this prophecy.

And indeed, elsewhere he translates his very words, but under the name of one of the twelve prophets: "He shall bring me," he says, "testimony, one of the twelve prophets, who said: 'I shall see the firstfruits for the impiety of the fruit of the belly, for the sins of my soul.'" Which indeed is beyond all doubt to have been taken from his chapter vi, 7.

But from this passage of Clement we discover most manifestly that he acknowledged as true and genuine the same number of the twelve books of the prophets of the Old Testament as we read placed in the sacred canon. Furthermore, in his chronologies, as will be said below, he lists them one by one, and calls the last of them Haggai, and Zechariah, and the Angel, who was from the twelve. Again, however, afterwards: "Haggai," he says, "Zechariah, ^B and the one among the twelve, the Angel," and he who was from the twelve, the Angel. By which name, indeed, it can be tested that Malachi is designated by the words of the fourth book of Esdras: "Malachi, who is also called the Angel of the Lord." For Jerome teaches that the Hebrew name of Malachi was rendered by the interpreters of the sacred Scripture in Greek as "his angel." Moreover, if it pleases, let us add the book and prophecy to which the name of Zechariah was attached; this is attributed by our Clement somewhere to this very man in this way: "Certainly Zechariah threatens: He shall rebuke you who chose Jerusalem. Behold, is this not like a brand snatched from the fire?"

Now, what the books of the Maccabees contain, Clement openly reveals; but because which of them was the author was not easy to say, he seems to have deliberately omitted it there, where he says: "He mentions Aristobulus who composed an epitome of the deeds of the Maccabees." Concerning this commentary, however, and the book of Esther, what, you will ask, does our author mean, since elsewhere he has handed this down in writing? "In this captivity (Babylonian) was Esther and Mordecai, whose book is had, just as also of the Maccabees: Esther and Mordecai, of whom a book is carried, as also that of the Maccabees." Because of this, you will ask, did Clement perhaps think that there is only one book of the Maccabees, just as of Esther? Could he have spoken so coldly about these books, had he believed them to have been written by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit?

But we can answer you that our author there used the word *biblion*, which can signify a volume and booklets consisting of many books. Moreover, if he did not judge that these books should be placed in the number of the canonical, he had many supporters of his opinion in the first centuries of the Church. For Melito, in his epistle to Onesimus, subjoined ^C an accurate index of the sacred books, in which he entirely omitted these books. But more openly, with a similar index exhibited, he added: "Extra the count of these are the books of the Maccabees, which are inscribed Sarbet and Sarbaneal." Eusebius also, in the *Chronicon*: "The history of the Maccabees," he says, "calculates the reign of the Greeks from this point." Truly these books are not received among the divine Scriptures. The Council of Laodicea also and Athanasius in their indices of the books of the sacred Old Testament omitted these books as well. By the same Athanasius, you will see them enumerated among other books of the Old Testament which are challenged.

But the Council of Hippo in the year 393, and the Council of Carthage in the year 397, placed the books of Esther and the Maccabees into the number of the canonical. Whence Augustine says: "The books of the Maccabees, which not the Jews, but the Church holds as canonical, because of the vehement and wonderful passions of certain ones." In another book, however, he simply ascribes them to the sacred canon, just as the others, as being received by all. Wherefore, although Hilary, Ambrose, and other Church Fathers and councils following them may have wished the same books to be held as canonical for most grave and weighty reasons, nevertheless it should seem strange to no one if our Clement, having followed the custom of his own time, did not place them in the sacred canon.

^D At some, without doubt, with justice and not entirely without reason, will wonder that the fourth book of Esdras is praised by him as a work of divine authority and written by a prophet, in these words: "For why was not my mother's womb a sepulcher, that I might not see the affliction of Jacob and the labor of the people of Israel, as Esdras the prophet says?" For that testimony, transcribed from chapter v, 35 of the book of IV Esdras, is held in the Vulgate thus: "And I said: Why, O Lord, to what end was I born? Or why did not the womb of my mother become a sepulcher for me, so that I might not see the labor of Jacob and the weariness of the people of Israel?" What then, will someone argue, was this book, although it may have been cited as an epistle in Barnabas, as was said elsewhere, never having been admitted into any canon of sacred Scripture, rejected by all? But we have endeavored to satisfy this not minimal question of difficulty with our manful strength, where we disputed about it in our admonition to Ambrose's book *On the Good of Death*. To him, therefore, if you have leisure, you can go, and you will find this passage of Clement cited by us there.

ARTICLE V.

Concerning the Greek interpretation of the books of the sacred Old Testament, Clement thus opens his mind. First, he teaches that not only the Law, but also the prophetic Scriptures, that is, not only the books of Moses, but all the canonical books of this sacred Scripture, were converted from the Hebrew tongue into the Greek language. Second, this Greek interpretation was adorned, he says, in the time, he says, of Ptolemy, son of Lagus, or, as some say, in the time of him who was surnamed Philadelphus, when Demetrius Phalereus had contributed the greatest diligence to that matter, and had vehemently procured that they be translated. For that Philadelphus, continues Clement, wished his library, by far the most opulent of all others, to be adorned by these sacred books, rendered into Greek. Third, however, how this Greek [version of the] divine Law . . .

^A had been completed, he explains in the same place. The Seventy-two Elders, he says, men who were most learned and highly skilled in Greek, were sent by the Jews, who had been brought under the Macedonian dominion, to Philadelphus. And when they had come to him, and each of them had individually translated from their own proper prophecy, they all conspired together [producing] translations that were consistent in both meaning and phrasing. For it was the will of God, which had deliberately prepared this for the ears of the Greeks. But this could not have happened in this way unless the Seventy Elders had rendered all those books of sacred Scripture into Greek in diverse and separate places. These locations, divided from one another, do not appear to be other than those cells which Justin Martyr, as we have seen elsewhere, mentioned. Fourth, finally, Clement declares that this version was completed by these same elders not without the inspiration of the divine will: "Nor indeed," he continues, "was it alien to the inspiration of God, who had given the prophecy, that He should also make the translation, as it were, a Greek prophecy."

Whether Clement himself believed this opinion to be true, and actually subscribed to it, can be brought into controversy not without reason. For he seems to determine nothing clearly certain about it, but rather to report the opinions of others. And indeed, whether this version was published during the reign of Ptolemy Lagi or Philadelphus, the fact that there is no slight disagreement among writers bears witness. He does not declare clearly enough to which opinion he himself leans.

Although Clement narrated these things historically, that does not prevent him from signaling—not so obscurely—that he held the conviction that the translation of the Old Testament had truly proceeded from the Seventy-two Elders. And certainly, since he has cited the testimonies of Scripture in his books from no other source than that [version], and has almost always reported them in the very same words, is this not a proof for us, not obscure and not uncertain, that this version was highly approved and accepted by him, however much some may have disputed its age?

Who those [elders] were, he seems to have passed over in silence, though not imprudently. Wherefore, in order to satisfy someone desiring to know something about them, we shall briefly say that Irenaeus, whose words are exhibited in Greek by Eusebius, believed that this translation was preserved by the Seventy Elders, as we have noted elsewhere ^B, under the reign of Ptolemy, son of Lagus. But few, such as Anatolius and Theodoretus, have followed his opinion. We have noted in another place that far more others have brought the judgment of the Aristean view.

Furthermore, concerning another Greek translation of the Old Testament older than this one of which we are speaking, Clement introduces Aristobulus speaking thus: "Aristobulus writes in his first book to Philometor in these words: 'Plato also followed our laws and showed clearly enough that he was very studious of those things that are said in them. For before Demetrian, and before Alexander and the Persians obtained power, [our laws] had been translated, and those things which had been done by our Hebrews in the exodus from Egypt, and whatever events and deeds were notable to them, and had appeared, and the taking of the region by force, and the description of all the laws that were published; so that it is clear that the aforementioned philosopher took many things from them.'"

Whether Clement went along with this opinion is something you may rightly doubt. For Eusebius not only reported these words of our Clement, but he also transcribed the whole fragment of Aristobulus much more fully than Clement did. Therefore, the judgment regarding Clement must be the same as regarding Eusebius, whom no one could rightly or justly say had conceded to the opinion of our Clement and Aristobulus simply because he brought forward the testimony of both for the things he had undertaken to prove. For if that were true, good God, how many varied and mutually conflicting opinions would Eusebius have to be said to have held, he who compiled his books with the testimonies and fragments of countless authors, both Christian and Jewish and pagan! Moreover, Clement used the words and authority of Aristobulus—a Hebrew, according to the witness of Eusebius, and a learned writer and follower of the Peripatetic philosophy—for the reason that he might more effectively prove that Plato and other most ancient philosophers had ^C drawn more truthful dogmas from the books of Moses and the prophets, even before the Seventy-two Elders had translated them into the Greek language. But if anyone contends more stubbornly, and demonstrates to us with valid weight of arguments that he accepted that older translation of the Old Testament, we shall say to him that our same Clement, as we have seen elsewhere, had both patrons and adversaries of this opinion.

CAPUT IV. On the writings of the New Testament.

ARTICLE I. On the four sacred Gospels, and on the Gospel according to the Hebrews and according to the Egyptians.

To proceed now to the books and writings of the New Testament, our Clement believed that the four Gospels, vulgate and accepted by all, were to be numbered among the books termed canonical and of divine authority. Regarding what he handed down in his commentaries of the Hypotyposes concerning them, ^D Eusebius narrates it thus: "In these books, Clement reports a certain tradition concerning the order of the Gospels, which he had received from the older presbyters, in this manner. He said that those which contain the genealogy of the Lord were written first. The Gospel of Mark, however, was written on an occasion of this kind: when Peter had publicly preached the word of God in the city of Rome, many who were present urged Mark, seeing as he had long followed Peter and remembered his words, to write down those things which had been preached by the apostle. Mark, therefore, composed the Gospel and imparted it to those who had requested it from him. When Peter discovered this, he neither entirely forbade the thing to be done, nor urged that it happen. But John, the last of all, when he saw that in the other Gospels those matters which pertain to the body of Christ were thus...

^A inspirited by the divine Spirit, he wrote down the spiritual Gospel at the request of his friends. Indeed, Clement, in mentioning that description where the series of the Lord’s descent is contained, undoubtedly understands the Gospel of Matthew and Luke.

Moreover, the fact that Eusebius added that Clement had handed down in these books that the Gospel was written by Mark, neither with Peter urging nor forbidding it, seems indeed to conflict with the things which Eusebius himself handed down in writing from the same Clement and Papias: "When Peter had learned through the revelation of the Holy Spirit, being delighted by the ardent zeal of the men, he is said to have approved that book by his own authority, so that it might thereafter be read in the Church." This is related by Clement in the sixth book of his *Hypotyposes*, to which testimony Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, also accedes. How, then, can Peter be said by Clement to have approved this Gospel by his own authority, when in the same book it is alleged to have been neither forbidden nor approved by him? Valesius responds that this signifies in these words that, since Peter neither forbade nor praised it, he approved it by a silent consensus. ^B But weigh, I pray you, whether it does not seem more probable to you that Mark, before he applied his hand to this work, was neither incited by Peter to perform it, nor deterred by him from writing it. But, when it was finished, once Peter had learned how much it could profit the Christians, it was then approved and confirmed by him. But perhaps a more certain opinion could be formed on this matter if Clement’s books of *Hypotyposes* were extant.

Furthermore, he says, the Hebrew original itself is held to this day in the library at Caesarea, which the martyr Pamphilus compiled most zealously. I also had the opportunity of transcribing this volume from the Nazarenes who use it in the city of Beroea in Syria. Elsewhere, however, he speaks in a similar manner: "In the Gospel according to the Hebrews, which is written in the Chaldean and Syrian language but in Hebrew letters, which the Nazarenes use to this day according to the Apostles, or as many think, according to Matthew, which is also held in the library at Caesarea." The Nazarenes therefore used that Gospel, of which—to pass over other things—the same Jerome says again: "In the Gospel which the Nazarenes and Ebionites use, which we recently translated into Greek (elsewhere he adds 'and Latin') from the Hebrew, and which is called by many the authentic Gospel of Matthew." This Gospel, therefore, had been written in Hebrew, and Jerome translated it into Greek and Latin from the copy which was preserved in the library at Caesarea.

Epiphanius also gives testimony that it was among the Nazarenes, and indeed a most perfect one: "There is truly among them," he says, "the Gospel according to Matthew written in Hebrew, and indeed a most absolute [πληρέστατον] one. For they preserve this most certainly down to the present day, just as it was written at the beginning in Hebrew letters. But I do not know if they have cut away those genealogies which were carried from Abraham down to Christ." But what really of the fact that the Ebionites, as he testifies, used that alone, just as the Cerinthians did? For we read these things written by him concerning them: "They admit the Gospel according to Matthew, which alone they use after the manner of the Cerinthians or Merinthians, and they call it the Gospel according to the Hebrews." He adds, however, later: "Although they do not have even that intact, but adulterated and mutilated, and they call that same thing Hebrew." ^C With all of the (Christ's) genealogy cut away, just as... "Which indeed, as we have said, whether they had been cut out also from the very copy of the Nazarenes, he confesses he does not know." Therefore, it is a lapse of memory or an error of the scribes or copyists, as we have noted elsewhere, that Theodoret wrote that the Gospel *according to Peter* was in use among the Nazarenes.

Furthermore, that only four Gospels, and no more, were admitted by him is clearly proven from the fact that he refutes heretics who were abusing the words of other Gospels; because these things which they were objecting against the doctrine of the catholic faith were not found in those four. For he replies thus to their objections: "In the four Gospels handed down to us, they are not found."

Although our author, Origen, believed that only four Gospels—concerning which we have touched upon some things elsewhere—were written by divinely inspired writers, he nevertheless praises certain others which are considered entirely uncertain and apocryphal. For from the very Gospel according to the Hebrews, *τῷ κατὰ Ἑβραίους Εὐαγγελίῳ*, he brings forth this testimony: "In what way it is also written in the Gospel according to the Hebrews: 'He who has wondered shall reign, and he who has reigned shall rest'." No one, however, ought to be affected with great astonishment by this. For Eusebius testifies that Papias and Hegesippus also used that same Gospel. For regarding the former, he writes these things: "He explains another history about a woman who was accused before the Lord of many sins. Which, indeed, is written in the Gospel according to the Hebrews." Regarding the latter, however: "He brings forth into the medium some things from the Gospel of the Hebrews and the Syriac and from the Hebrew language." ^D We have also as a witness Jerome by Ignatius, the bishop and martyr of the Church of Antioch, that this Gospel was sometimes, as we have said elsewhere, and by Origen, frequently praised: "Which Origen," he says, "uses frequently." Finally, Eusebius concerning the Ebionites: "They embraced," he says, "only the Gospel that is according to the Hebrews, and held the rest in low esteem."

If you ask which that Gospel was, hear what the same Jerome consigned to writing about it, where he disputes concerning the Gospel of Matthew: [58 ...]. But from both, the testimony of Jerome and of Epiphanius, some think it can be gathered that that which these most learned Fathers of the Church dispute about was the genuine copy of the Gospel according to Matthew. To these things, however, some of them think it to be true what Epiphanius handed down to memory, that it was an intact and most perfect copy of this Gospel, preserved by the Nazarenes and Ebionites. But that which he says, that the Ebionites and Cerinthians removed the genealogy of Christ from it, seems less likely to them. For the Cerinthians and others preserved it thus in their own codex, so that from it they would say Christ was born of the seed of Mary and Joseph. But others, wishing to consult for the honor of Epiphanius by at least some reason, do not deny that this was a copy of the Gospel according to Matthew; yet they willingly confess that it was not altogether pure and intact, but, as Epiphanius himself narrates, that it was corrupted and mutilated.

But many others assert that this Gospel of either the Nazarenes or the Ebionites differed entirely from the genuine copy of Matthew, moved by these reasons. Many things, they say, [that] the most ancient of the Church...

^A fathers have tasted, [which] you would seek in the Gospel of Matthew in vain. Then, furthermore, in the Gospel according to the Hebrews, the testimonies of the Old Testament were transcribed from the Hebrew text, whereas in Matthew they were taken from the Greek interpretation of the Seventy Elders. Moreover, Eusebius and Jerome not only distinguish each Gospel from the other, but the same Eusebius declares that the latter was relegated by some to the class of spurious works: "But also into the same order," he says, "some have already referred the Gospel according to the Hebrews, in which those Hebrews who have embraced the faith in Christ especially delight." Therefore, Origen pronounces thus concerning it: "It is written in a certain Gospel, which is called according to the Hebrews, if it pleases anyone to receive it, not for the sake of authority, but for the manifestation of the proposed question." Finally, we heard Jerome above saying that this Gospel is called by some "according to the apostles." And yet it is the same one which ^B Ambrose and Jerome himself called the "Gospel of the Twelve." Both, however, and all others, affirm without hesitation that this Gospel is illegitimate and spurious.

From these things, however, which we have said, it is easily gathered what was the mind and opinion of our Clement concerning this Gospel. For he signifies not obscurely that only the four commonly accepted Gospels are to be admitted, as is evident from what has been said. Any other books, therefore, he held by no means for true, genuine, and of divine authority, but rejected and repudiated them as false and apocryphal.

To this is added the fact that those words which he quoted from the Gospel according to the Hebrews, since they occur in neither Matthew’s nor the three other evangelists’ books, it is thence clearly concluded from the principles he established above that he believed that same Gospel to be of authority and importance far inferior to, and not the same as, the other four Gospels.

By what reason, then, you will ask, does he employ its words? By the same, we reply, as that by which he brought forward the testimony from the apocryphal Traditions of Matthias there, namely, not for the sake of authority, as Origen says, "but for the manifestation of the proposed question."

Furthermore, in confirmation of this reply, those things may be put forward which Clement himself committed to writing concerning the Gospel according to the Egyptians. For he refutes the error of the Cassianists, who abused the words of this Gospel for the patronage of their heresy, as follows: "Therefore," says Cassian, "when Salome asked when the things upon which she was inquiring would be known, the Lord said: When you have trampled upon the garment of shame, and when the two have become one, and the male with the female, neither male nor female." "For the first part," he says, "we do not have in the four Gospels handed down to us: *'Ev τοῖς παραδεδομένοις ἡμῖν τέτταρσιν Εὐαγγελίοις οὐκ ἔχομεν τὸ ῥητὸν,* but in that which is according to the Egyptians."

By this argument it is most manifest that he admits only the four Gospels which the Church receives; and therefore that [work] which was called "according to the Egyptians" was proscribed as spurious and apocryphal for the reason that what Cassian objected from it was not found in those four Gospels.

Yet before this, he disputes somewhat differently against the followers of the same heretic, though omitting their name: "Those," he says, "who resist the creature of God by that specious continence, also speak those things which were said to Salome, of which we made mention earlier." These, however, are contained, as I suppose, in the Gospel according to the Egyptians. For they say the Savior himself said: "I came to destroy the works of the female." In the place, however, to which ^D Clement sends us, he had indeed said that those same words were objected to by the heretics, but he kept silent entirely about where they were taken from, just as also did Theodotus in his epitome. Furthermore, our author dilutes this objection of theirs, not by rejecting the authority of the cited Gospel, but by the succeeding words of it, which he thought sufficient for himself.

Beyond that, one does not dare to define with certainty from which Gospel those later words were excerpted, and he excludes it entirely from the canon of the writers of the New Testament. But the former testimony, transcribed from this very Gospel, occurs also cited in the second epistle which bears the name of Clement of Rome; but since the rest of what was written in that same epistle has perished, no one can state with certainty what that Clement of Rome, or the author of this epistle, thought concerning this Gospel.

By Origen, however, it is most openly repudiated. Concerning it, he writes these words: "The Church has four Gospels, the heresies many, of which one is written 'according to the Egyptians'." Neither less clearly does Jerome: "From diverse authors," he says, "were the beginnings of diverse heresies published, as is that 'According to the Egyptians,' and Thomas, and Matthias, and Bartholomew," etc. But Epiphanius not only rejects this Gospel into the class of apocrypha, but also records as follows that its title, "according to the Egyptians," was prefixed by some: "But this whole error and its foundation they drew from certain apocrypha, especially from the Gospel of the Egyptians; for they gave it this name, *ὄνομα ἐπέθεντο τοῦτο*, in which are most things of this kind, which are proposed as mysteries, secretly and hiddenly under the person of the Savior, as if he were declaring to the disciples that he is the same [being as] the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." But whoever those might have been who thus inscribed this Gospel, although Epiphanius is silent, it is certain nonetheless that they are more ancient than Origen and our Clement, who mention this title.

But whoever on earth they may be, it is certainly constant that that Gospel was repudiated not only by the cited Origen and Jerome, but also by all orthodox men, who, besides the four Gospels received by all Churches, judged that no other was to be admitted, but that all others were to be numbered among the apocrypha.

From these, therefore, or other similar pseudo-Gospels, Clement quoted some things still, as that Mary the mother of God had been inspected by a midwife, of which we shall discourse below.

ARTICLE II.

Concerning the title and author of the Book of the Acts of the Apostles, of the Epistles of Paul, and especially of that which he wrote to the Hebrews.

Clement approves the inscription of the book of the Acts of the Apostles, where he uses its testimony thus: "Paul mentions in the Acts of the Apostles: *ἐν ταῖς Πράξεσι τῶν ἀποστόλων*." Elsewhere, however, he calls it simply "Acts": *καὶ ὁ Λουκᾶς Ἐν ταῖς Πράξεσι*. "And Luke in the Acts." The author of it, moreover, he declares most openly to be Luke: "Luke also...">

he says, "in his Hypotyposes," as is confirmed by those things cited among Eusebius 69. We frequently find all the Epistles of the Apostle Paul, whether expressed in his own name or in the name of the Apostle by antonomasia alone, praised by him. Sometimes, indeed, he records long fragments of them and expounds them clearly, or demonstrates and defends their true sense against the frivolous arguments of heretics. It was therefore a matter of firm conviction for our Clement that Paul was their true author.

Above all others, he uses the authority of that same Epistle of Paul which he wrote to the Hebrews, and most constantly adjudicates it to him. Indeed, when he brings forth the definition of faith from it thus: "The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen 71," he immediately adds: "As is the opinion of the divine Apostle, *κατὰ τὸν θεῖον Ἀπόστολον*." A while later, he draws many more things from the same Epistle for the commendation of the faith, and afterward, to signify that he had transcribed them from Paul, he adds simply: "The Apostle says, *φησὶν ὁ Ἀπόστολος*," etc. ^A In exactly the same way, he cites it elsewhere; but in his chief discussion concerning "the Gnostic," he transcribes various long fragments from chapters x, xi, and xii of that same Epistle, having cited the name of the Apostle. But it would be a completely useless task to pursue these matters at greater length, as they are clearer than light.

But, you ask, since that is true and manifest, why did Eusebius not fear to write that this Epistle, which he confesses to be so constantly attributed to Paul by Clement, is one of those scriptures "which are rejected by some 75"? Eusebius himself offers the reason in those same words: "It must be known, however, that the Epistle to the Hebrews has been rejected by some, who say that it is not held by the Roman Church as a certain and genuine Epistle of Paul 76." Later, he teaches that it is not numbered by Gaius among the other Epistles of the Apostle, and adds: "Indeed, this Epistle is even now not believed by some Romans to be the Apostle's 77." Jerome also records the same thing regarding Gaius. But where he discourses on Paul: "The Epistle," he says, "which is carried to the Hebrews, is not believed to be his on account of the distance in style and diction; but is ascribed either to Barnabas, according to Tertullian, or to Luke the Evangelist, according to some, or to Clement, later bishop of the Roman Church, whom they say arranged and adorned the sentiments of Paul with his own style; or certainly [it is believed anonymous] because Paul was writing to the Hebrews, and on account of the envy felt toward him among them, he cut off the title of his name at the beginning of his salutation 78."

Verum Eusebius, from whom almost all those things have undoubtedly been culled by Jerome, bears witness that this Epistle to the Hebrews is cited quite often in that which Clement wrote to the Corinthians in the name of the Roman Church, and therefore not undeservedly seems to be reckoned among the other writings of the Apostle: "When he inserts," he says, "many sentiments from the Epistle to the Hebrews, and sometimes uses their words, it is enough to indicate that that work is by no means recent. Wherefore, with the rest of the Apostle's writings, it also seems not without cause to have been reckoned. For since Paul had written to the Hebrews in his native tongue, some report that Luke the Evangelist, others [that] this Clement of whom he speaks, translated it. Which indeed seems more true, especially since both Clement's [epistle] and that Epistle to the Hebrews possess the same style 79." From which words you may easily understand that it was debated by these writers regarding the translator of this Epistle rather than its author. Which, if it be so, then justly it can be concluded from this that this Epistle could have originally been ascribed by the Roman Church—in whose name Clement, the disciple of the apostles, wrote—to Paul. ^B Nor does the mind and opinion of Origen seem to be otherwise. For he pronounces thus upon this Epistle among Eusebius: "The sentiments themselves, indeed, are the Apostle's, but the diction and the composition of the words are of another, who wished to record the sayings of the Apostle, and, as it were, to digest into commentaries those things which he had heard from his master. Therefore, if any church holds this Epistle as Pauline, let it be praised on that account. For the ancients did not hand it down as Paul's without reason. But who truly wrote it, I believe is known to God alone. But the writers whose monuments have reached even unto us, partly ascribe it to Clement, Bishop of the city of Rome, and partly to Luke, who gave the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles to writing 80."

Furthermore, that our Clement held the same opinion regarding the author of this Epistle as being Paul, and regarding Luke as his interpreter, can be proven not absurdly from his lost *Hypotyposes*, in which, as Eusebius says: "He affirms that the Epistle to the Hebrews is indeed Paul's, but that it was written first in the Hebrew tongue, as it was to the Hebrews; and that Luke, however, carefully translated it into the Greek tongue and published it for Greeks; wherefore the same color of diction is found in that Epistle as in the Acts of the Apostles. But he observes that this subscription, 'Paul the Apostle,' was correctly and orderly omitted. For since he was writing to Hebrews, who had long before conceived a sinister opinion of him, and held him suspect, he used prudent counsel and did not wish to alienate them right from the beginning by the appended subscription of his name 81." Moreover, we have restored all these testimonies of our Clement, as well as those of Origen, Eusebius, and Jerome, in their entirety, because through them the arguments of a few even among the more recent scholars—who used to judge this Epistle apart from Paul either because it lacked a Pauline superscription, or because it was not written in the same style as his other Epistles, or because it had been ascribed to others—are easily diluted. ^C

It is established, therefore, that Paul is the true and original author of this Epistle, whatever both ancient and more recent heretics, who were suppressed by his authority, may have blathered. And this opinion is strengthened and asserted by the great consensus of the Churches, councils, and writers.

And do not say, I pray, that this is called into doubt by Augustine, since he writes somewhere concerning this same Epistle: "Very many say it is the Apostle Paul's, but some deny it 82." Nor yet press that it is cited by him elsewhere as if doubtful and uncertain in the words: "In the Epistle which is inscribed to the Hebrews 83." For that most learned man speaks historically in the former place, in the latter, however, those who were placed in charge of the new edition of Augustine's works observed that in manuscripts of good quality the word *scribitur* («is written») is exhibited instead of *inscribitur* («is inscribed»). But in whatever way you think that should be read, you cannot thence justly conclude that Augustine hesitated, uncertain about the parentage of this Epistle, which he placed in the number of Paul's Epistles, no differently than others as certainly having proceeded from him 84.

ARTICLE III.

Apostles are twice [quoted] in the Stromata, just as we observed in the books of the Paedagogus, in that we read them cited by Clement with the explicit name of those by whom they were written. For the first, inscribed with the name of Peter, he cited in these words: "The admirable Peter says: 'Beloved, I beseech you, as strangers', etc." Elsewhere, however: "And Peter," he says, "says similar things in the Epistle." And so even in other places. ^B In like manner he also praises the first Epistle of John, and testifies that it was given by him: "John appears in the greater epistle... If anyone sees his brother sinning," etc. Afterward, however: "And if we shall have said," says John in the Epistle, "that we have fellowship with him," etc. And still further below, in the very same way, he brought forth other testimonies of his. But I ask that you notice that when Clement calls it the "greater Epistle of John," he signified by this way of speaking that others also had been composed by the same Apostle John. Moreover, that both that Epistle of Peter and that of John are to be accepted as among the sacred books of the New Testament, and that they had been received by the common consent of all, Eusebius most explicitly asserts. ^C No less openly did Clement testify that the Epistle marked with the name of Jude was written—or, as he himself speaks, "prophetically" (προφητικῶς) — by that inspiration of the divine Spirit. "Concerning these and similar heresies," he says, "I think that Jude spoke prophetically in the Epistle: 'Likewise these also, dreaming'," etc. We know indeed that Eusebius wrote that this Epistle was cited by Clement in both these [works] and in the books of the Hypotyposes, and [that it was] rejected by some. But concerning its authority, enough has already been disputed by us, as we believe, in the previous dissertation. Finally, our author, transcribing words of the Apocalypse, attributes it to John by name: "As John says in the Apocalypse." Someone might, indeed, rightly argue: but who [is] that John, whether [he is] the apostle and evangelist, ^D or [if] another bearing the same name [is meant], is not indicated by Clement. However, since he has not called the author of the first Epistle, written by John the evangelist, by any other name, that he is speaking of one and the same John is indeed very likely. Furthermore, concerning this argument and this question, we have disputed elsewhere more than once.

Therefore, we shall add nothing more to these things, except that all the things which Clement committed to memory concerning the sacred writings of the New Testament are confirmed in a way that is clearly marvelous by Origen, as we read in Eusebius. This, however, was unknown to Hervetus, who indeed confesses in good faith that he does not know what that Preaching of Peter is. Nor had he read, or did he remember any longer that he had read, these things which were written by Jerome concerning it: "But his books, [that is, of Peter], from which... the third [is] of the Preaching... are reckoned among the apocryphal scriptures." Now Eusebius had preceded Jerome, whose words, likewise not noticed by Hervetus, are these: "It is evident that the books of the Preaching and revelation of this same Peter have never been held as catholic writings, since neither anyone of the ancients, nor any of the more recent writers of the Church, has used testimony taken from those books." That Eusebius says there that the book of the Preaching of Peter was never held as catholic is proven from the testimony of Origen just cited, and especially [that] of Jerome. But when he added there that no one had used that book, then he had undoubtedly suffered a lapse of memory. For it is certain from his own commentaries of the Evangelical Preparation, where—as we have said—he described many things from these books of the Stromata, and from his Ecclesiastical History which is cited, that these books of our Clement had been perused by him, in which, as we have observed, a testimony taken from the Preaching of Peter is brought forward not once.

156 Furthermore, Clement transferred certain things into these books of the Stromata from a certain commentary which he himself calls the Traditions of Matthias. "From Matthias," he says, "in [the] Traditions: Admire the things that are present." Again, however: "They say in the Traditions that the apostle Matthias said, among other things: 'If the neighbor of an elect [person] should have sinned, the elect [person] has sinned. For if he had comported himself as the Word commands, his neighbor would have so revered his life that he would not have sinned.'" Finally, when he refutes and attacks the Carpocratians, he produces Matthias as a witness thus: "They say that Matthias also taught thus: 'To fight indeed with the flesh, and to use it, bestowing nothing on it for the sake of pleasure, but to increase the soul through faith and knowledge.'" The same is reported from our Clement by Eusebius. But neither declares to us where, or in what book, he taught these things. However, it seems by no means unlikely that these things were culled from the Traditions of Matthias cited by our Clement.

But if you ask Baronius what these Traditions are, you will hear from him that this book, which heretics used, has been lost, and consequently that it was not the genuine progeny of Matthias. But if Clement speaks of it where he writes concerning the old heretics Valentinus, Marcion, and Basilides, [saying] that "they boast that they are bringing forward the opinion of Matthias," there can be no doubt that he considered that book pseudepigraphical and apocryphal. For it is added by him continually: "For there was one doctrine of all the apostles, just as [there was] also tradition; [but] the opinion falsely and fictitiously sold by the heretics as [the] opinion of Matthias differed completely." Be that as it may, no one will be judged [to have denied] that those Traditions were long ago proscribed by all with great consensus as spurious and false.

Nor, moreover, should it be a wonder to you that apocryphal writings of this kind are praised by Clement, seeing that he observes that a verse of the ethnic poet Epimenides is cited by Paul himself in his Epistle to Titus.

^A And in the first to the Corinthians [he cites] an iambic of another pagan poet, whose name he keeps silent: "Paul also makes mention of Epimenides in the Epistle to Titus, saying thus: One of themselves, a prophet of their own, said: Cretans are always liars..." discoursing to the Corinthians concerning the resurrection of the dead, he used a tragic iambic: "What does it profit me, if the dead do not rise? ... Evil communications corrupt good manners."

Who this latter poet is, and the things that are here cited by our Clement from both of those ethnic writers, Jerome explains clearly and explicitly 13: "Paul," he says, "the apostle, has abused the verse of the poet Epimenides, writing to Titus: Κρῆτες ἀεὶ ψεῦσται, κακὰ θηρία, γαστέρες ἀργαί, that is: 'Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, slow bellies.' A hemistich of which heroic verse Callimachus afterwards used. Nor is it a wonder if among the Latins the translation, expressed word for word, does not keep the meter, since in the same language even Homer’s verses barely hold together in prose." In another epistle likewise he places a senarius of Menander: Φθείρουσιν ἤθη χρηστὰ ὁμιλίαι κακαί, that is: "Evil communications corrupt good manners."

To these things, indeed, after Clement had set down the words reported in the Acts of the Apostles of Paul preaching at Athens on the Areopagus about the God unknown to them, the last of which are these 15: "As some of your own poets have said: For we are also his offspring," from all of these he draws this conclusion: "From which it is clear that, even while using poetic examples from the Phenomena of Aratus, he approves what was rightly said among the Greeks, and by 'the unknown God' he signified by circumlocution the Creator God." This complete hemistich of Aratus, just as several other poems, our Clement later exhibited from his Phenomena, and Eusebius did so from him and also from Aristobulus 16. Wherefore, in Jerome, these things are read 17: "In the Acts of the Apostles, when he was preaching to the people and disputing on the Areopagus, which is the court of the Athenians, he said among other things: 'As also some of your poets have said: For we are also his offspring.' Which hemistich is read in the Phenomena of Aratus, whom Cicero translated into the Latin tongue, and Germanicus Caesar, and lately Avienus, and many whom it would be overly long to enumerate... The inscription of the altar, however, was not as Paul asserted: 'To the Unknown God'; but thus: 'To the gods of Asia, and Europe, and Africa, to gods unknown and foreign.' But since Paul did not need many gods, but only the one unknown God, he used a singular word, that he might teach that He was their own God, whom the Athenians had prefixed in the altar title, and whom they, knowing rightly, ought to have worshipped, yet whom they worshipped while ignorant, and could not be ignorant of. Paul, however, did this rarely, and as the exigency of the place rather than ostentation demanded." Moreover, we have transcribed the whole of this passage here in its entirety, because both our Clement and very many others contend that the altar of the Athenians was inscribed with no other words than these: "To the Unknown God." But this discrepancy between these writers and that author of the commentaries on the Epistle to Titus ought to seem the less wonderful to you, the more that some are in doubt whether these commentaries on the Epistle to Titus truly proceeded from Jerome. He who desires to know more about this hemistich of Aratus and that inscription on the altar should approach the interpreters of the Acts of the Apostles.

^B

ARTICLE IV. How the testimonies of the Holy Scripture are cited in these books of the Stromata, and concerning certain things which have not been discovered hitherto.

The testimonies of Holy Scripture are cited and represented by our Clement in these Stromata in exactly the same way as in the previous books. For he joins together many things separated from one another, and sometimes plucked from various books or their diverse chapters, just as if he had taken them from one and the same place. Often, however, he transcribes them silently without the name of the author. In the common editions of these Stromata, moreover, many things are indicated badly, and far more occur in the margin without anyone noting whence they were excerpted. Finally, some things which Clement reported either from memory or from a codex different from ours could not yet be found. Which things indeed we have thought ought to be subjected to the eyes of all here, so that those things which have been found by us may be made open to others; and those which we could not find might at some time be demonstrated to us by some man studious of the divine word.

First, therefore, Hervetus says that he could not find these words praised by our Clement in neither the Septuagint nor in our Vulgate interpretation of the Holy Books 18: "Διότι ἠλέησέ με ὁ Θεός, ἐστί μοι πάντα — Because God has had mercy on me, all things are mine 19." But the editors of the later editions of these Clementine Stromata have annotated in their margin "Gen. xxv," but quite erroneously. For these very words of Jacob are to his brother Esau in Gen. xxxiii, 11, unless, in that appearing in the Septuagint, for διότι we read ὅτι, and the copulative particle καὶ is placed before it 20. But these things which are cited shortly afterwards: "You are a king from God among us 21," are written in Genesis xxiii, 6.

This passage of Exodus, however: "Καὶ σὺ λάλησον πᾶσι τοῖς σοφοῖς τῇ διανοίᾳ, οὓς ἐνέπλησα πνεῦμα αἰσθήσεως — And you speak to all the wise in thought, whom I have filled with the spirit of understanding 22," Hervetus warns us that he has not found in any manuscripts of Holy Scripture, whether Latin or Greek or others. Nevertheless, these are held in the very same words in the Septuagint, Exodus xxviii, 3, except that for πνεῦμα αἰσθήσεως, we read among them πνεύματος σοφίας καὶ αἰσθήσεως 23.

^C It has also been noted by no one where those other words are which Clement attributes to Wisdom 24: "Σοφία λέγει· Ὁ δὲ ἐμοῦ ἀκούων, κατασκευάσει ἐπ' ἐλπίδι πεποιθώς — Wisdom says: 'But he who hears me shall dwell in hope, trusting.'" But certainly he accepted those from nowhere else than Proverbs i, 33, where they are represented in this manner: "Ὁ δὲ ἐμοῦ ἀκούων κατασκευάσει ἐπ' ἐλπίδι." In our Vulgate, however: "But he who hears me shall rest without fear 25." Whence you may gather that there were certain variant readings there, and that "πepoitώς" (trusting) was added in Clement’s codex.

Not long after this, however, Clement reported this saying of Solomon 26: "Ὁ σπείρων δικαιοσύνην, ἐργάζεται πίστιν — He who sows righteousness, works faith." But in the Septuagint version it is read thus: "...Λήψεται μισθὸν πιστόν — He shall receive faithful reward 27." Which indeed we note for this reason, because Hervetus observes that it cannot easily be perceived how these things cohere with the former ones. But from the said words of the Septuagint it seems that this is the sense of our author: that the Greeks, who have philosophized rightly, saw God per-lucent through a veil, and received the reward of their labor in investigating the truth, truly, that is, faith.

There is as yet in the edition of the works of the Clementines

^A designated, where the locus of Proverbs may be found, cited by our author as follows: "The tree of life," says the prophet, "is in good desire." There seems to be no other reason for this omission than that it was not looked for in the Greek Septuagint translation of the Elders, chap. xi, 12. For there the same words are presented, with only the preposition *en* omitted.

Clement, omitting the name of the author, heaps together several passages of Scripture, which Hervetus, after searching for in vain, promises great thanks to those who might point them out. The first of these loci is: "As gold and silver are tested in a furnace, so the Lord chooses the hearts of men." But this is read in Proverbs xvii, 3, as follows: "As silver and gold are tested in a furnace, so are chosen hearts with the Lord." But in the Latin Vulgate version: "As silver and gold are tested by fire in a furnace, so the Lord tests hearts." See this locus, if you wish, in the notes of Nobilius.

The second locus is conceived in these words: "The merciful man is long-suffering." You will find all those things ^B, except for the first two words *ho men*, in the same manner in Proverbs xix, 11, in the Greek version of the Elders.

The words of the third locus are: "In every one who is solicitous there is wisdom." And these, without doubt, are plucked from the same book of Proverbs, chap. xiv, 23, according to the Septuagint: "In every solicitous person there is abundance." But the Latin version rendered these thus: "In every work there will be abundance." Where you see that there have been various readings of this locus even now, and that Clement read in his codex *sophia* instead of *perisson*.

Thence continuously, in the fourth place, Clement reports these things: "For solicitousness falls upon an intelligent man." You will find this in the very same words in the Septuagint, Prov. xvii, 12. But in the Vulgate version you would look for this in vain.

Furthermore, Hervetus openly makes it clear to his mind that it did not occur to him whence Clement transcribed these words of Scripture: "The simple will be more cunning [when] understanding, but the wise will receive knowledge." But some in their own commentaries on this passage of Clement suspect to no avail that he had aimed at that ^C passage in Proverbs, chap. i, 4 and 5: "That cunning may be given to the simple... the wise man hearing will be wiser." For Clement thought of nothing of the sort then, but took these from Proverbs, chap. xxi, 11, where we read this: "The simple becomes more cunning; but the wise man understanding will receive knowledge." Truly, he adapted these things to his own senses.

Also, no one has pointed out to us where these things occur: "The abundance of the knowledge of wisdom will make him who is near it alive." But regarding word for word, they are represented in Ecclesiastes chap. vii, 1, in the Septuagint, and in our Vulgate they were made Latin from the Greek thus: "But this has more of erudition and wisdom, that they grant life to their possessor."

Besides, Hervetus says that he has nowhere found these other words of Solomon: "Therefore it is rightly said among the Solomonians: Wisdom is in the mouth of the faithful." But some suspect that this was taken from the book of Ecclesiasticus, chap. xxxiv, 8: "And wisdom is in the mouth of a faithful man."

Alia duo ^D Sapientiæ nomine testimonia, a nullo nobis designata, hunc Clemens adhuc refert in modum: "They heard that beautiful one, which speaks to us of wisdom: 'In the midst of the senseless keep the time; but in the midst of those who are thinking, be thou always present'; and again: 'The wise will hide perception.' " Hervetus, however, says that it has not occurred to him at all where these things are said in the Wisdom of Solomon. But he could have found the first in the very same words in the book of Ecclesiasticus, chap. xxvii, 12, according to the Greek Septuagint translation. The second, however, in Proverbs, chap. x, 14, in the same manner as it is read in Clement's text. The Latin Vulgate, however, says: "The wise, he says, hide wisdom."

Where, however, Clement rails against certain heretics who, with the enticing flattery of words, like dogs fawning with their tails, were caressing others and were trying to entice them blandly into their own errors and vices: he says, they were called *plektai tais ourais*, according to the prophet, "strikers with their tails," according to the prophet. But who that prophet might be, or where he said this, both Hervetus confesses himself to be ignorant, and all the rest of the editors of the Clementine works passed over in the deepest silence. Nor, indeed, can we deny that this is most difficult to say. Yet, it will not be unpleasing to us if it be granted that Clement only alludes to Isaiah ix, 15: "And the prophet who teaches lawlessness, this is the tail," which the Latin Vulgate rendered thus: "And the prophet who teaches lying, he is the tail."

What, then, of the fact that no one noted, and Hervetus searched for in vain, the testimony of Isaiah cited by Clement: "But the pious, says Isaiah, consulted what is wisdom." Truly, it is a wonder. For that is presented in the Septuagint in the same words of Isaiah.

^A Moreover, that the whole world of wealth is faithful, but the unfaithful person is not even worth an obol. Wherefore the same Hervetus thinks these were drawn from the Hexapla of Origen. But by what argument, I pray you, will he prove that these codices came into the hands of Clement? Indeed, it is more likely that Clement read these very same words in his own copies of Ecclesiasticus, which we have observed to have been not a little different from ours.

Three places cited by Clement again remain, which have not been found by us. The first: "Qui est sollicitus, vitam quæret." The second: "Qui Deum quærit, inveniet cognitionem cum justitia." The third: "Qui eum recte quærunt, pacem invenerunt." Let us add a fourth, brought forward by the same Clement elsewhere as follows: "Quicunque autem superbia aliquid agere aggressus fuerit, Deum, inquit, irritat."

You will perhaps doubt whether Clement intended to aim at certain words of Scripture, or simply to transcribe them, where he himself said: "Luceant opera tua. Et ecce homo et opera ejus ante faciem ejus. Ecce enim Deus et opera ejus." ^B Clement says these are the words of the prophet Sophonias: "And the spirit took me, and lifted me up into the fifth heaven, and I was contemplating the angels, who were called Lords, and their diadem was placed upon them in the Holy Spirit, and the seat of each of them was seven times greater than the light of the rising sun, inhabiting the temples of salvation, and praising the ineffable and most high God." Nevertheless, certain authors of the Clementine scholia observe that these are not found at all in the prophecy of Sophonias, and therefore were taken by our Clement from certain secret lucubrations.

Some, however, think that a certain passage of Esdras, which is not found in its published books, is exhibited by our Clement in these words: "In Esdra scriptum est: Et sic fuit Christus rex, dux Judæorum, cum impleta essent septem hebdomades in Jerusalem, et in sexaginta duabus hebdomadibus quievit universa Judæa, et fuit absque bellis, et Dominus noster Christus sanctus sanctorum cum venisset, et visionem implesset et prophetam, in carne unctus est Patris sui spiritu." ^C But we have already warned that spurious books of Esdras, differing entirely from ours, are cited by our Clement. What wonder, then, if he brought forward into public view some things from them which are no longer held in our copies? Truly, Clement does not seem to signify anything else in that place than that it is written in Esdras that the temple was built in seven weeks. Moreover, the rest which follows, if you ponder it attentively, you will concede to be the words of Clement, not of Esdras.

Furthermore, it is easy for us to point out these things, which the Carpocratians brought forward in defense of their nefarious error, the words of Scripture: "A te petenti des," and how Clement ^D answers that this is utterly overturned by another authority of the same sacred text: "Subjungit," he says, "Et eum qui velit mutuo accipere, ne averseris." For each of those places is read word for word in Matthew, except that for "da" here "dido" is held. In the Latin Vulgate, however, it is rendered in these words: "Qui petit a te, da ei; et volenti mutuari a te, ne averseris." Wherefore Tertullian says: "Omni, inquit, petenti te, dato, suum habet titulum, proinde ad eleemosynam pertinentem." Finally, those same words are cited by Barnabas in this way: "Omni petenti te, tribue." But these nevertheless seem to have been taken from Luke’s Gospel.

Where, moreover, in the sacred books could those things be written, which Clement still cites: "Vidisti enim, inquit, fratrem tuum, vidisti Deum tuum," you would not easily say. But what if it is said that he looked only to those words of Matthew: "Domine, quando te vidimus esurientem? Amen dico vobis, quandiu fecistis uni ex his fratribus meis minimis, mihi fecistis." For it is added by Clement immediately: "Servatorem puto Deum nunc nobis dictum esse." Moreover, Clement testifies that he borrowed these things from a certain Gospel: "Non enim invidens, inquit, præcepit Dominus: Mysterium mihi, et filiis domus meæ." But of those who published scholia on the books of Clement, one thinks that those words, in whatever Gospel they are finally found, were culled from the prophecy of Isaiah xxiv. Although they do not occur at all in the ancient Septuagint editions, they were nevertheless added in the annotations of the recent Roman edition, and cited by Augustine in Psalm vii, and by certain other Church Fathers. But Jerome has testified that he found them added in the interpretation of Theodotion. Which things, indeed, we read were observed in the notes of Nobilius.

But this observation does not altogether remove the difficulty. For although those words were of Isaiah, it remains to be inquired nevertheless why our Clement asserted so confidently that they were taken by him from a certain Gospel, rather than from the book of Isaiah. But furthermore, I would wish you to notice that Clement said simply, "in a certain Gospel." By which manner of speaking, he quite openly signifies that these were written by him from memory. Moreover, no small amount of strength is added to our conjecture from the fact that he did not render these same words in the same way in different places. For from that it can easily be understood that he cited those by the name of Gospel which in reality were Isaiah’s. Yet what prevents one from believing that he read them at some time in some copy of the apocryphal Gospels, which, as we have seen, he praised more than once?

What more? No one has yet told us whether Clement culled these words from the writings of the New or Old Testament: "Pete, et faciam, animo cogita, et dabo." Nor will that indeed be perfectly clear to anyone. For we know that Elias, while he was being snatched into heaven, said to Eliseus: "Pete quid, faciam tibi." But these things contribute nothing to our matter. And so it seems more likely to us that this testimony was transcribed by Clement from some apocryphal Gospel in a similar way.

Elsewhere Clement relates ^A that the Apostle Paul, in the Acts of the Apostles, made mention of the philosophy of the Epicureans and even the Stoics. But in what place of this book that occurs, no one has noted. To us, however, there seems to be hardly any room for doubt but that it is noted there in Acts Chapter xvii, 18, where these philosophers are explicitly named. Of this very place, there exists in the new edition of Augustine a one hundred and fiftieth sermon against the Epicureans and Stoics.

Concerning the silent naming of the author and the writing, Clement related these things, indicated by no one: "For he himself said: I will not forsake thee, neither will I leave thee, as one for whom I have judged thee worthy because of a true and genuine election." But this passage occurs in the Epistle to the Hebrews in the very same words, even if it is found primarily, though not in the exact same manner, in the book of Joshua.

Furthermore, before we put an end to these matters, two things still remain to be observed. And first, indeed, where Clement attacks the followers of Marcion: "What if," he says, "they usurp the voice of the Lord, who says to Philip: Let the dead bury their dead, but do thou follow me." In the Gospel of Matthew indeed, these words are to be read, although transposed, and they are represented otherwise in Luke. Yet every evangelist omitted the name of him to whom these things were said. Whence, therefore, did Clement or the followers of Marcion receive the idea that this man was called Philip? Could it be from that which we have seen cited more often by our same Clement, according to the Gospel of the Egyptians, or rather according to the Hebrews? But since neither exists, no one should dare to assert anything certain in this regard.

Secondly, it must be noted that Clement elsewhere testifies that the chief of the publicans, who said to the Lord: "Behold, the half of my goods I give, ^B and the alms" (or as we read in Luke, "to the poor"), was called by some Zacchaeus and by others Matthias. The author of the *Recognitions*, which are circulated under the name of Clement, teaches that this Matthias was the same as Barnabas. "Barnabas," he says, "who was substituted in the place of Judas as an apostle." But what faith is to be placed in this writer, we have sufficiently shown elsewhere.

CAPUT V. Concerning the works of the apostolic men, and other most ancient writers, concerning divine unwritten traditions, and concerning the marks and characteristics of the true Church.

ARTICLE I. Concerning the epistle of Barnabas, the books of Hermas, the epistle of Clement of Rome, concerning certain ancient interpreters of Holy Scripture, and concerning the writings of Tatian and Cassian.

Besides the sacred scriptures of the Old and New Testament, composed by authors inspired by the Holy Spirit, our Clement makes use of the epistles and books of others, who hold the first place after them and were their disciples, for the defense of the Christian religion, and by their authority defends and maintains the dogmas entrusted to us by Christ. For that very reason, he not only cites them as most abundant witnesses of divine truth, but also describes long fragments from their various writings, by which he attacks and utterly overturns the false opinions and inventions of erring men.

That we may make a beginning with the epistle of Barnabas, Clement has certainly extracted many things from it, which have been represented by us elsewhere. Moreover, in the first book of this our *Apparatus*, we have tried to prove, ^C not in vain, if our mind does not deceive us, that Barnabas, whom our same author more than once calls an apostle and apostolic, and one of the seventy and a hearer of Paul, is the true author of this epistle.

Nor are the fragments from the book of Hermas, which is called *The Shepherd*, which Clement has transferred into his books, any fewer. We have exhibited intact elsewhere those things which Clement himself gleaned from it. Furthermore, concerning the former place of that book, cited by our same author, Hervetus observes two things: first, that this book is counted among the apocryphal; second, that the things which Clement described from it are not found in the one which was recently published in the library. But what library this is, we cannot divine. For that book is published not only in various *Bibliothecae Patrum* but also in editions of the *Orthodoxographia*, where the words cited by our Clement occur. Whether that book should be called apocryphal, or the true and genuine offspring of Hermas, we think it has been demonstrated by us in its proper place.

Our author also drew much from the true and genuine epistle of a man of the same name, Clement of Rome, and reported it in just as many words. But now, concerning it, we have touched upon something above ^D which should have been unknown neither to Hervetus, the writer of such prolix commentaries on the works of our Clement, nor to others. But perhaps the occasion will someday offer itself to us to dispute more fully touching that same epistle. In the meantime, however, it pleases us to note that the first place of it is thus exhibited by our Clement: Now Clement in the epistle to the Corinthians, he says, explaining the difference of those who are approved in the Church: "Let some one be faithful, let him be powerful in explaining knowledge, let him be wise in the discretion of words, let him be wondrous in works." But again he repeats these things in another book, and adds: "Let him be chaste and clean." For he ought to be the more humble, the greater he seems to be, says Clement in the epistle to the Corinthians. And Hervetus indeed concedes that these things are clear and explicit, but he professes that he does not know how they cohere with the preceding, and especially with the following: "And others indeed snatch from the fire, but have mercy on those who are discerned." Yet he certainly did not know that these latter words are not those of Clement of Rome. Plain and open, however, is the coherence of these words with others, nor is their sense obscure. For there our Clement discourses of the wise man, who he says must be such as to snatch some from the fire of fallacies and arguments proposed by others, and to have mercy on those who are discerned from false prophets. Then, in truth, our author [speaks of] this epistle...

of Clement, which he calls apostolic, and he praises it in this manner ^A: "Clement also, an apostle, who in the Epistle to the Corinthians also, himself too to us, describing the form and exemplar of the Gnostic, says: Who among you is versed in every virtue," etc. Finally, so that we may state this once and for all, he transcribed fragments of this epistle, which, because they are somewhat lengthy, it suffices to have pointed out. Observe, moreover, in passing, that these things which are cited by Clement are sometimes intersected, and some things which are his own are inserted into them, and sometimes [they] are interposed in the middle. But who would not marvel at Hervetus, who, in the passage of our Clement which we cited later, seriously admonishes his readers that, while mention of this epistle is made in book III of the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius, nothing of it remains any longer than what our Clement has left to us here? For how could those things have been undiscovered by Hervetus which Irenæus, as we have observed, and Origen, Photius, and others have handed down in their writings?

Although it is sufficiently clear from what has been said that this epistle is assertively ascribed by our author to Clement of Rome, it is nevertheless read somewhere as being cited by him under the name of the Romans alone ^B: "Furthermore," he says, "it is written in the epistle of the Romans to the Corinthians: The infinite ocean, and the worlds that are after it." But Irenæus and Eusebius, who more than once assert that this epistle was written by Clement in the name of the Roman Church, provide us with the reason why he cited it in that way.

Therefore, Clement has lapsed in his memory, unless it be an error of the scribes, where he attributes certain words of the same epistle to Barnabas in this way: "Exposing the saying of a prophet, Barnabas introduces: Since there are many doors opened, that which is justice, it is in Christ, into which all who have entered are blessed." For these words, which he himself had elsewhere ^C reported without stating the author's name, though not without some variation in reading, are represented in the epistle of Clement of Rome, § 48, with the word *v* added before *δικαιοσύνης*, in the very same words.

Moreover, the explanations of certain interpreters of the holy Scriptures regarding the first words of the first psalm are praised by our Clement in this way: "I heard a man learned in these matters saying that the counsel of the ungodly signifies the nations; but the way of sinners signifies Jewish opinion, and the chair of pestilence, [signifies] the accepting of heresies." Another, however, said that the first beatitude was more properly placed in those who have not followed wicked opinions, which have departed from God. But the second [beatitude] concerns those who remain on the broad way, or those who have been nourished in the Law, or even those who were not led to repentance from the Gentiles. And the chair of pestilence and the theaters and the tribunals, where they follow more wicked and destructive powers, and the fellowship of their works. No one, surely, will deny that it is most difficult to define who those learned interpreters of the holy Scriptures are. Yet, in so obscure a matter, if it be permitted to us to make a conjecture from the word *ἀκήκοα* ("I heard"), we suspect that it can be concluded, not at all absurdly, that Clement designated his own teachers, and primarily Pantaenus, whom he had heard, as was said above, in the Alexandrian school, explaining the holy Scripture. We will not deny, however, that others, such as Alexander of Jerusalem, could have been designated by him.

Clement proves that Moses, of all writers the most ancient, had been read by the ethnic philosophers ^D in the speech of Tatian the philosopher to the Greeks, in which he testifies that he had argued *ἀκριβῶς* ("accurately") concerning them. But concerning this speech, and the argument treated therein regarding the age of Moses, there was discussion elsewhere by us, and again, concerning that and his chronology, just as that of Cassianus, which was praised by the same Clement of ours, it will be argued below.

Clement further cites the *Exegeticon* of this same Cassianus, which Hervetus openly signifies he does not know if it still exists. How then could it have happened that he either did not read [the things] which he wrote while discussing our Clement, or that they escaped his memory, since Jerome wrote thus: "He also mentions in his Stromata the volume of Tatian... and a certain *chronographia* of Cassianus, which little work I could not find"? For if that was not the same [work] as the *Exegeticon*, it will nevertheless appear to no one, doubtlessly, that it perished together with it. Whether this Cassianus is the same as the prominent defender of the heresy of the Docetae, there will be a more opportune place later for examining.

161 ARTICLE II.

It will not be entirely irrelevant to append to this discourse on Christian authors those things which our Clement committed to memory concerning the Sibyls and their oracles concerning Christ and the Christian religion, as they think. In the first book of the *Stromata*, he narrates these things concerning the Sibyl: "Heraclitus says that the Sibyl appeared not in a human manner, but rather divinely." Therefore, they say that in Delphi, in the sanctuary, a stone is shown, upon which the first Sibyl is said to have sat, who had come from Helicon, educated by the Muses, since she was the daughter of Lamia the Sidonian. Serapion, however, says in his verses that the Sibyl did not cease from the art of divination even when dead, and that that which receded from her into the air after [her] death is what divines through lots and auguries; but that from that part which was changed into the earth with her body, an herb arose, as is consistent, and that whatever beasts had eaten it, when they were in that place, he writes, signified to men complete knowledge of the future through their entrails. And he judges that her soul is that face which appears in the moon.

Whatever Clement mentions there concerning the Sibyl, he proposes these things not from his own opinion, but from the opinion of Heraclitus and the poet Serapion and other pagans. But we judge that there is no one at all of such unsound mind who would say that these things were brought forward by our Clement as certain and in no way doubtful. For he was not so little imbued with the doctrine of the Christian religion that he is said to have believed that the Sibyl did not cease from the art of divination after death, and that one part of her flew away into the air, and another remained in the earth, from which an herb, suitable for the use of divinations, arose, and finally that her soul is the face which appears in the moon. It must therefore be held as certain and established that these things are adduced by our Clement against the pagans for this reason: in order that he might overturn their false opinions by the very exposition of those things which they held out as true and certain, and that he might assail them with an argument "to the man," as they say, and utterly destroy them.

Concerning this Sibyl, moreover—her name, her parents, her verses, and the stone from which she is reported to have poured forth her oracles—Pausanias narrates many things, which, indeed, because they are rather long, are easily found by anyone in his book.

Furthermore, out of the things which Pausanias left there for posterity, no small light can be brought to bear here, not only on this passage of our Clement, but also on another, where he discusses the Sibyls again in this manner: “The Sibyl,” he says, “is said to be older than Orpheus. Concerning her name and the answers brought forth by her, many things are said, and since she was Phrygian, she is called Diana, and when she had come to Delphi with her, she sang: ^A O Delphi, you who are servants of Phoebus who strikes from afar, I come to you, about to set forth the mind of powerful Jove, raging much against my kinsman Phoebus.”

There is also another, who is called Herophile the Erythræan. Heraclides Ponticus mentions these in his book *On Oracles*. I omit the Egyptian and the Italian, who lived at Rome—Carmentalis—whose son was Evander, who founded the temple of Pan at Rome, which is called the Lupercal.

Furthermore, he lists their individual names shortly after: “The crowd of Sibyls,” he says, “is Samian, Colophonian, Cuman, Erythræan, Pythian, Taraxandrian, Macetian, Thessalian, Thesprotian.”

Many have recorded many things about them in writing, as we have said elsewhere. Therefore, to the things handed down by us, we shall now add only those which Lactantius thus related from Varro: that there were ten Sibyls in number, and he enumerated them all under the authors who wrote about each individual one. First was the Persian, whom Nicanor mentioned, who wrote the deeds of Alexander the Macedonian. Second, the Libyan, whom Euripides mentions in the prologue of his *Lamia*. Third, the Delphic, of whom Chrysippus speaks in the book he composed on divination. Fourth, the Cuman in Italy, whom Nævius names in the books of the *Punic War*, and Piso in the *Annals*. Fifth, the Erythræan, whom Apollodorus the Erythræan affirms was his own fellow citizen. Sixth, the Samian, about whom Eratosthenes wrote that he had found it written in the ancient annals of the Samians. Seventh, the Cuman, by the name of Amalthea, who by others is called Demophile or Herophile. Eighth, the Hellespontine, born in the Trojan territory, in the village of Marpessus, around the town of Gergithium, whom Heraclides Ponticus writes lived in the times of Solon and Cyrus. Ninth, the Phrygian, who prophesied at Ancyra. Tenth, the Tiburtine, by the name of Albunea, who is worshiped at Tibur as a goddess. . . whose sacred rites the senate transferred to the Capitol. From this place of Lactantius you will indubitably find the same described by Isidore ^B. Although both might report the names of the Sibyls differently than Clement, you may perhaps easily induce your mind to believe they speak of the same ones, if you remember with what different names the sibyls, as has been noted by us elsewhere, have been called by various writers.

Moreover, Clement displays certain oracles of the sibyl not only in these, but also in earlier books, but he remained silent as to which of these sibyls they belonged. Indeed, in one place he calls her “the prophetess of the Hebrews” (παρὰ τῆς προφήτιδος τῶν Ἑβραίων), or as they think, “the prophetic one” (ποιητικήν). ^C But truly, he produced nothing about the sibyl more worthy of consideration—and perhaps admiration—than when he testifies that the Apostle Paul was sent to the Gentiles to examine the books of the same sibyl, just as those of Hydaspes, saying thus: “The Apostle Paul says: ‘Take also the Greek books, and recognize the sibyl, how she signifies one God, and those things which are to come; and take Hydaspes, and read, and you will find the Son of God written much more clearly and openly, and how many kings shall draw up a battle line against Christ, who have Him in hatred, and those who bear His name, and His faithful, and His endurance and advent.’”

The whole difficulty of this thorny passage is placed in this: that Clement brings forward certain words, by which Paul exhorted the Gentiles to read the books of both the sibyl and Hydaspes. For nowhere among the nations did that exhortation of Paul ever exist.

To solve the knot of the difficulty, Cotelerius contends that these words: “The Apostle Paul, saying,” ought not to be referred to the following: “Take also the Greek books,” etc., but to the preceding: “God gave them their own prophets in their own tongue,” as the *Preaching of Peter* and the Apostle Paul will declare. Thus, he suspects these words, “Take the Greek books,” etc., are Clement’s, not Paul’s. But that conjecture and explanation of Cotelerius is not at all approved of by more skilled men; since it completely fights against the entire series and context of Clement’s oration. And indeed, why did Clement add the word “saying” (λέγων) before “Paul,” unless to indicate that the subsequent words were his? But come now, I ask, on what reasoning does Cotelerius say that these things, which are attached by us immediately after the quoted words of Clement: “Then with one word he questions you: The whole world, and what is in the world, whose are they, if not God’s?” are to be referred to Peter rather than to Paul, who was praised in the last place? He has certainly brought forward no cause, nor could he have brought forward any. For since Clement continuously added: Therefore Peter says that the Lord said, etc., it is inferred not obscurely that the prior words were ascribed by him not to this Peter, but to the Apostle Paul.

Therefore, it seems more probable to others that a pseudepigraphical and apocryphal book of Paul had been cited by Clement; or rather, some public sermon, where it was reported that he had said these things about the sibyls, which had reached the times of Clement not by writing, but by word of mouth and, as they say, from hand to hand. ^D For there can be no doubt to anyone that there were certain apocryphal writings which were circulated under the false name of Paul. For that is truly such a work as that which Gelasius the supreme pontiff calls the *Revelation of Paul*. But whether this or some other pseudepigraphical writing of the Apostle is designated by Clement, no one will easily divine.

Nor, furthermore, did he cite only false and supposed writings of the New, but also of the Old Testament. For he made mention of the *Prophecy of Cham*, from which Pherecydes had transferred many things into his *Theology*. But we have already touched upon that somewhat elsewhere.

ARTICLE III.

Clement teaches that there are traditions of a double kind, some indeed human, and having risen from men, which the Apostle proscribes with these words: “See that there be no one who seduces you through philosophy and vain deceit according to the tradition of men (κατὰ τὴν παράδοσιν τῶν ἀνθρώπων), according to the elements of the world, and not according to Christ.”

^A Regarding this, Clement 18 explains how the Apostle speaks of the tradition of men: he calls human tradition "canorous vanities, which revolve in speech." Therefore, he also writes: "Avoid the younger, for such contentions are childish." In the Greek text of Clement we read: τὴν λογικὴν τερθρίαν λέγει. The word τερθρία or τερθρεία, according to Suidas, means the same as λεπτολογία—that is, a dispute about matters of the smallest moment. This explanation does not seem alien to the sense of Clement, for, clarifying his mind more clearly, he signifies—not obscurely—that this *terthrian* is the same as the childish, or novel, contentions of men concerning trifling matters of words. He asserts that these are by all means to be avoided and repudiated by Christian men.

Furthermore, he states that other traditions have flowed down to men from the apostles and Christ the Lord, which they subsequently received in their own order from their predecessors, not in writing, but by word of mouth. Indeed, Clement preaches his masters 20: "They," he says, "who kept the true tradition of the blessed doctrine, directly from the holy apostles Peter, James, John, and Paul, so that the son should receive it from the father... these, God willing, have come down to us also, as seeds deposited from our ancestors and the apostles." Therefore, from his preceptors, who were disciples of the apostles, Clement, just like other Christians of his age, received the blessed tradition of the evangelical doctrine, not only in writing, but also by word of mouth, just as a son does from his father.

Why, then, the apostles handed down certain things to their disciples, and these in turn to others, not by writing but by word, he explained shortly after 21: "For He did not reveal to the many those things which were not for the many, but to the few to whom He knew they were fitting, who could both receive them and be informed by them. For secret things, like God, are believed by word, not by writing." Τὰ δὲ ἀπόρρητα, καθάπερ ὁ Θεὸς, λόγῳ πιστεύεται, οὐ γράμματι.

But elsewhere in another book 22, where he proves by the words of the Apostle writing to the Colossians that knowledge is not for all, he immediately adds: "For there were already things which were handed down to the Hebrews, ἀγράφως, without writings." From the Apostle's time, therefore, there were certain tenets of our religion which were handed down to the Hebrews and others professing the Christian faith not by writing, but by living voice.

Furthermore, Clement refutes the heretics, who did not interpret Holy Scripture according to the dignity of the Lord and the pious tradition of the apostles, with this argument 23: Παρακαταθήκη γὰρ ἀποδιδομένη Θεῷ, ἡ κατὰ τὴν τοῦ Κυρίου διδασκαλίαν, διὰ τῶν ἀποστόλων αὐτοῦ τῆς θεοσεβοῦς παραδόσεως σύνολός τε καὶ συνάσκησις. "For the deposit, which is rendered to God, is, consistent with the Lord's teaching, the understanding and exercise of the pious tradition through His apostles." But what was that pious tradition of the apostles regarding the true sense of Scripture, if not its true exposition, which they were accustomed to teach their disciples either in private conversations or in public sermons?

Nor only in these books of the Stromata does he commend and defend those divine traditions, but, as Eusebius testifies 24, in the book he composed concerning the Passover, he affirms that he was compelled by his close associates to commit to writing for posterity the traditions that he had received from the older presbyters. And those older presbyters, as Eusebius observes in the same place, were disciples of the apostles, who had received these traditions from the same apostles, just as they had received them from Christ. Finally, from the same Eusebius, we note earlier that Clement testifies in another book, just as Origen does, that he learned from the older presbyters in what order the Gospels were written, and besides the four received in all the Churches, none other is to be admitted.

No one, unless blinded by an insane error, has ever denied that the greatest reverence and highest honor are due to such traditions as these, which have flowed from the apostles and even from Christ the Lord.

^B 163 ARTICULUS IV. On the notes and characteristics of the true Church, which guards the sacred deposit of divine tradition.

The sacred deposit of that Christian doctrine, transmitted to us both through the Scriptures and through tradition, is placed by the Catholic Church, intact and inviolate, beyond all controversy. But what that true Church is, and how, and by what marks and characters it can be separated and distinguished from any other false and schismatic one, our Clement clearly explains 26: "I call the Church, not a place, but a congregation of the elect." Of this, which is truly the temple of God, he assigns three principal notes by which it is most manifestly discerned from all other congregations. First, it is the most ancient of all, and older than all heresies. Second 27, since God Himself is one, it is one—namely, in the unity of faith and doctrine handed down in the Holy Scriptures, which no heresies have ever been able to rend or destroy. Third, it is καθολική, "catholic," or universal, which is not disseminated in only certain parts of the earth, as individual heresies are, but throughout the whole world, and embraces men who are just according to the purpose of God. Therefore, that alone is the true Church, which Clement subsequently describes in this manner 28: "And so we say that, in substance, and in thought, and in principle, and in excellence, the ancient and catholic Church alone is, in the unity of one faith which is from the proper covenants, or rather from the covenant, which is one in different times, in which by the will of God through one Lord He gathers those who are already ordained, whom God predestined, having known that they would be just before the foundation of the world." ^C Then he immediately praises its excellence and primacy because of this unity: "But," he says, "the eminence of the Church, like the principle of construction, is from unity, surpassing all other things, and having nothing similar or equal to it." That these are the certain and by no means doubtful notes of the true Church, and its own genuine characters, by which it is distinguished from others, our Clement proves the more effectively insofar as he shows more clearly in the same place that all these things do not fit any sect of heretics at all. And truly, with how valid arguments he convinces that all heresies and heretics are more recent than the true Church itself, will be demonstrated by us below.

Therefore, let us add only this one thing here, which he himself handed down 29, that we learn demonstratively through the Scriptures themselves how heresies have lapsed, and on the contrary, how in the truth alone and in the ancient Church there is the most perfect knowledge: Δι' αὐτῶν τῶν Γραφῶν ἐκμανθάνειν ἀποδεικτικῶς, ὅπως μὲν ἀπεσφάλησαν αἱ αἱρέσεις, ὅπως δὲ καὶ ἐν μόνῃ τῇ ἀληθείᾳ, καὶ τῇ ἀρχαίᾳ Ἐκκλησίᾳ ἥ τε ἀκριβεστάτη γνῶσις. You see, therefore, how Clement repeats and inculcates that the primary note of the true Church is its antiquity over all other sects. But I would have you also diligently observe how clearly he asserts that it is demonstrated certainly and evidently from the Holy Scriptures which are the errors of heretics, and that the most perfect knowledge is found in the truth alone and in the ancient Church. ^D

1111 IN CLEMENTEM ALEX. D. LE NOURRY DISSERTATIO II. 1112

CHAPTER VI. On God, and Christ the Lord, and the perpetual virginity of his most holy mother. ARTICLE ONE. On the etymology of the name Theos, and on the significance of the article 'ho' prefixed to it, on other names of God, His nature, and attributes, and on predestination.

From those sacred and incorrupt sources of Divine Scripture and tradition, Clement drew the sincere and orthodox dogmas of our religion, which are found throughout those books of the *Stromata* delivered and explained by him. But before we come, as is our custom, to the examination of these individual points, we must briefly set forth what he has handed down concerning the etymology of the name ^A *Theos* (God): *Theos*, he says, *is so called from "thesis" (placing/position) and "taxis" (order/arrangement), which is administration.* But concerning the various etymologies of this name, consult, if you please, Vossius’ *Etymologicon*.

Let one also consult the book of Dionysius *On the Divine Names*, the book of Drusius *On the Tetragrammaton*, the *Lexicon* of Johannes Buxtorf, and also the theologians in Part II of St. Thomas, quæst. 13; Estius and others on Book I of the *Sentences*, dist. 48 and 22; and the comment of Kirker and our own Martianay, *On the Ten Names of God*, tom. II, new edition of the works of Jerome.

And without a doubt, that which Clement wished us to observe is not unworthy of attention: ^B as often as the article *ho* is prefixed to the name *Theos* in Scripture, it signifies God Almighty. For when he impugns the error of heretics who condemn human generation, using these words from Genesis: *Adam knew his wife... For God has raised up for me another seed instead of Abel*; he adjoins there: *For he did not say "God" absolutely, but by the prefixing of the article, namely saying "ho Theos", he signified Him who is Almighty.* From this rule, laid down by Clement, it is entirely proved that he was convinced that the Son of God is called God Almighty in the Holy Scriptures as often as, with the article *ho* prefixed, he is termed *Theos*. But because we shall speak later concerning the divinity of Christ, it suffices to have noted this in passing.

Furthermore, Clement demonstrates not only by the testimony of Plato, but also by a threefold reason, that neither by this name nor by any other, nor by any words, can the infinite and spiritual nature of the Supreme Being, as they call it, be properly expressed. ^C Wherefore, he says, if at any time we name Him, not calling Him properly either the One, or the Good, or Mind, or that which itself is (*auto to on*), or Father, or God, or Creator, or Lord, we do not say this as if pronouncing His name, but we use beautiful names because of His power, so that the mind may not wander, but may find support in these. For not one of these things signifies God, but all of them together indicate the power of the Almighty. He teaches, however, that the chief and mystical name of God was *Jehovah*, consisting, just like *Theos*, of four letters: *Moreover,* he says, *that mystical name, the tetragrammaton, which was imposed only upon those who were able to enter the adytum; it is called Jehovah, which is expounded as "He who is" and "He who is to be." Moreover, among the Greeks, the name Theos contains a quaternion of letters.* Regarding the explanation of the name Jehovah which Clement writes in the same place, it seems to have been taken from Isaiah and the book of the Apocalypse. But whoever wishes to know more about this and other names of God, let him go to Jerome, who testifies that there were ten names of God among the Hebrews.

^D Since, therefore, men can devise no proper name for God, it is truly no wonder if Clement proves that He is difficult to know and explain, using the words of Plato: *To find the Father and Maker of the universe is difficult, and to speak of Him to all, after one has found Him, is impossible; for it can by no means be explained in words.* The same things have also been described by Theodoret. But in Plato’s *Timaeus*, from which without a doubt both Clement and Theodoret extracted these things, they are presented a little differently, as they are also in Cyril of Alexandria.

But although Clement has said that the edge of the human intellect is too dull to know God perfectly, unless it is aided by the help and assistance of God Himself; he nonetheless teaches that no man, if he be of sound mind, has been entirely bereft of the knowledge of the one and almighty God. Nay, he shows that it was not completely obscurely signified by Xenocrates and Democritus that there is a certain knowledge of God even in living things lacking reason. If, therefore, any man has been ignorant of God, he declares without hesitation that this is to be imputed to him as a fault, and that he cannot be excused from blame. And indeed, just as Christ in the New Testament called all in such a way that none can offer the pretext of ignorance; so at that time the Law and the prophets were indeed given to the barbarians, but philosophy to the Greeks, by whose ministry they could recognize God the Creator.

Furthermore, Clement proves that this knowledge of God in the Greek philosophers was very imperfect. And first of all, because they, as Empedocles cited by him said, knew little of the whole; and from the great fire of Holy Scripture they elicited only a certain spark of the knowledge of God. Secondly, because at their time Christ, not yet made man, had not disclosed to men the highest perfections of God, as far as it could be done.

Moreover, since the nature of God is infinitely perfect, and above all the grasp and intelligence of the human mind, hence, says Clement, *it comes about that man cannot know what God is, but what He is not.* He knows, therefore, that He is of spiritual substance; *since "figure and motion, or condition, or seat, or place, or right hand, or left hand" are not even to be thought of concerning the Father of all.* For He Himself is the first cause, above place, and time, and name, and intelligence. Wherefore Moses signified that He does not fall under visual aspect and cannot be circumscribed. Therefore, Clement justly and deservedly concludes against the Stoics: *God is not endowed with a human form so that He might hear, nor does He have need of senses, as pleased the Stoics.* If, therefore, any members, if any anger, or threats are attributed to Him in the Scriptures, Clement asserts that these are to be explained allegorically. No wonder, therefore, if no...

perturbations of the soul ^A are thought to exist in Him, nor the same restraint as in humans, but rather that mercy, properly understood, and wisdom belong to Him alone.

Moreover, the nature of the supreme God, as Clement says, is not only incorporeal; but He is also “without beginning” (ἄναρχος), complete, and in every respect an absolute first principle of the universe, the efficient principle; and insofar as He is essence (οὐσία), He is the principle of the efficient cause; but insofar as He is the Good, He is the moral principle; and again, insofar as He is Mind, He is the principle of the reasoning and judging faculty. For, as our same author speaks elsewhere, “God, who is always what He is, has not received this, which is to be Lord and a good principle, from another.” Hence he frequently shows, against the errors of the pagans and heretics, that God is one and the creator of all: that He is present everywhere, but not enclosed in certain and definite places; that He knows and hears all things, and not only the voice, but even the thought. ^B

And our Clement demonstrates His omnipotence, and His care and providence for all things, not only with invincible arguments, but asserts that it was known also to the pagans, who were learned in the custom of the Hebrews. For what of the fact that, if this providence of God be taken away, the economy of the Savior seems (as he says) to be a fable? “The economy concerning the Savior appears a fable.”

Furthermore, the beneficence of God is eternal, just as His justice is; for He will never cease to do good. Nor does Clement allow it to be objected against him that God, having created the world, rested from all work, as it is written: “For being good, if ever He should cease from doing good, He would cease to be God: which it is not even lawful to speak.” For since He is good, if He ever ceased to do good, He would cease to be God; which it is impious to say. ^C

Clement further teaches that there is only one catholic Church, which gathers through one Lord those who are already ordained, whom God predestinated, having known before the foundation of the world that they would be righteous. “Gathering through one Lord those already set in order, whom God marked out as going to be righteous, having known it before the foundation of the world.” Our Clement will appear to some to assert openly there that the divine predestination of blessed men—which theologians define as the preparation of grace in the present and of glory in the future—happens from merits foreseen by God. But since he most manifestly establishes and defends the necessity of divine grace for doing good works, as we shall see below; what prevents it from being said that he is speaking of that predestination by which God gratuitously predestines men to the eternal happiness of heavenly glory, not from their merits, but by the aid of His own divine grace? But perhaps he would stray closer to the truth who thinks that Clement speaks indeed of the predestination of those whom God knew would be righteous, but has remained entirely silent regarding that predestination which is based on the foresight of their merits, whether before or after. Which of these may be the truer explanation of the Clementine sense, we leave to the judgment of those who are addicted to no party, and who sacrifice to truth alone. ^D

ARTICLE II. On the supreme divinity of Christ.

We have seen the supreme divinity of Christ the Lord and Son of God most evidently asserted by our Clement in his previous books. Now, however, we must consider how that divinity is defended by him in these Stromata commentaries with no less clarity and evidence. Therefore, Clement first reproves the Greek philosophers who think that the Son of God speaks through a man, and that God has a son, and that he has suffered; whereby it happens that the anticipation of their own opinion persuades them not to believe. What, I ask you, seemed “fabulous” to those Greek philosophers? Did they not think it false and incredible that an adopted Son of God, and a mere man, should be speaking through a man? Did they not think it “fabulous” that God should have an “adopted” son, who truly suffered and died? By no means. Therefore, it seemed entirely absurd and fictitious to them that which Clement and other Christians preached: that there is a Son of God, who is of the same nature exactly as He is, and is one and the same as that God, afterwards made man, eventually suffered, and ended his life by the punishment of the cross. What wonder, then, if our Clement should say that He is the true Son of God, who “surpasses all human nature” (ὑπερβάλλει πᾶσαν ἀνθρωπίνην φύσιν)... “For the true light was... who alone is God the Father.” And not much later: “When, however,” he says, “it is said: ‘God is faithful,’ it signifies to whom it is proper to believe in the one proclaiming; but by these [words] His Word is declared, and He was the faithful God,” (ἀποφαίνεται δὲ ὁ Λόγος αὐτοῦ· καὶ αὐτὸς ἂν εἴη πιστὸς Θεός). There, certainly, our author openly declares the supreme divinity of Christ. For it was observed by us above that he himself taught that as often as the article is placed before the name “God” (Θεός), so often is the true and Supreme God signified.

For the same reason, surely, when he had brought forward Plato saying that the gods are to be believed, he himself contends with a much better right that faith is to be had in the true prophets of God, and especially in Christ, since He is, he says, “the true Son of God” (Υἱὸν ὄντα γνήσιον). For no creature and no man at all can be called the true Son of God, “the genuine Son” (γνήσιος Υἱός); but only He who is one with God the Father, and of the same substance and nature.

Furthermore, he says that the will of this true Son of God, Christ the Lord, is omnipotent, by which, looking into the hearts of men, He knows and beholds their more hidden thoughts: “The Lord,” he says, “draws near to the just, and nothing of our thoughts, and the discussions we carry on in our mind, is hidden from Him. I speak of the Lord Jesus, who beholds our hearts with His omnipotent will.” Hear, I beseech you, his Greek words: “I speak of the Lord Jesus; who by His omnipotent will is the overseer of our heart.” But who, I ask, searches our hearts by His own omnipotent will, if not the only true God?

But come, let us see how he again asserts and vindicates that same omnipotence of His will and power, and His supreme divinity: “For the Word of the Father of all things is not this [Word] which is uttered, but the most manifest wisdom and goodness of God, and also a power altogether almighty, and in reality divine, and not incomprehensible even to those who do not confess it, an almighty will.” For the Word of the Father of all things is not this, which is proferred, but the most manifest wisdom and goodness of God; and again, an omnipotent power, and truly divine, which is not of such a kind that it cannot be comprehended by the intelligence even by those who do not confess it, a will which contains all things by its omnipotence. Could the supreme divinity of the Word, and His divine nature and substance, ever be explained more clearly? For it is said that the “Logos is not [prophorikos],” (the Word of the Father is not, indeed, external, uttered, and transient, like the word of man: and therefore it is [endiathetos], internal, and, as theologians say, internal and immanent). Then it is said to be sa...

^A expressed in clear words, when Clement calls him the Son, a principle lacking time and beginning, and the first-fruits of those things which exist: *The Son is a timeless and beginningless principle, and the first-fruits of existing things.* A Son lacking time and beginning, and the first-fruits of those things which exist.

Wherefore, he says elsewhere that he is infinite, and that a circle is composed from his perfections, in which there is no end, nor beginning, nor any distance, nor dimension. *The Son,* says Clement, *is wisdom, and knowledge, and truth, and whatever things have any kinship with these. Moreover, he is demonstration and explanation.* Furthermore, all the potent spirits, the powers of the Spirit, when they have become one thing together, contribute to the same end, namely, to the Son. ^B But he is infinite in the concept of each of his powers. Although the Son does not become truly one, as one, nor many, as parts, but as all things are one, from whence also all things come. For he is the same circle of all powers, which are revolved into one and united. And therefore the Word is called alpha and omega, whose end becomes a beginning, and in turn ends in that which is the beginning from above, nowhere accepting distance and dimension. You surely understand how clearly Clement there defines the Son of God as being like an infinite circle, lacking beginning and end, and who is therefore of the same eternity and nature with the Father? For he proclaims him to be infinite in himself, and in each one of his perfections, in such a way that no time can ever be assigned in which he did not exist. But what Clement says, *Although the Son does not become truly one, as one, nor many, as parts, but as all things are one, from whence also all things come;* ^C even if it is not entirely clear and manifest; nevertheless, with these words he seems to signify that all the infinite perfections of the Son, even speaking strictly, are a certain unitary thing by concept; and that these are not divided from themselves, as parts of some created composite, but in reality, and in themselves, they are one, from whence all things are. However much these things may seem obscure and difficult to some, it is certainly sufficient for us that Clement there most clearly defines the Son of God as being infinite by his own perfections, lacking head and end, and that all things are from him. For what more effectively and evidently could be desired for the assertion of his infinite nature, existing before all things—that is, before and above all creatures—and consequently his highest and supreme divinity?

But the most learned man Petavius ^D rises up against us, and objects that our author has there said in the most express words that the Son, but by no means the Father, can be demonstrated. Therefore, says Petavius, Clement thought the Son was inferior to his Father. But if this argumentation of Petavius is correct, indeed Clement must be said to have absurdly contradicted himself in that very place where we have seen him so clearly assert the infinite perfections of the Son and his eternal nature, the same as that of the Father. Far be it, however, that this most insipid mark of contradiction should be branded upon our most learned author. And certainly Petavius elicits a false conclusion from a true antecedent. For what prevents the Son of God, who alone—not indeed the Father—became man, from also alone—but not the Father—falling under human demonstration? What indeed, if Clement has only said there with the evangelists that the Father is not demonstrated by himself, but through the Son? Does he therefore imply that the Son, whom he there proclaims eternal, immense, and infinite, is inferior to the Father?

^A Certainly, if one considers these things attentively, we believe that no one would say such a thing.

Come then, let us also show further how he, in the same book, no less clearly establishes and distinctly confirms this same divinity of Christ. For indeed, concerning His nature, he writes in this manner: “This is the greatest excellence, which disposes all things according to the will of the Father, and governs the universe most excellently, working all things with tireless and inexhaustible power, because it acts, looking upon secret and hidden notions. For the Son of God never departs from His watchtower; as He who is not divided, is not cut, does not pass from place to place; but is always everywhere, and is contained nowhere, all mind, all paternal light, all eye, who sees all things, hears all things, knows all things, and searches the powers by His power. To Him is subject the entire host of angels and gods, the paternal Word, I say, who took on the holy dispensation, for the sake of Him who subjected them.” These words of Clement, truly, regarding the supreme divinity of Christ and the Word, are so clear and lucid that he who would dare to mutter even the slightest thing against them seems to be seeking a knot in a bulrush and darkness in the noon-day sun, which shines more brightly still.

^B Petavius, therefore, admits that Clement speaks honorably there of the Son of God. And rightly, indeed. For who has ever spoken more honorably of Him after the Arian times? But, says the same Petavius, these things savor of the character of Platonic and Arian dogma, which Clement premised: “But the most perfect, and most holy, and most principal, and that which most commands, and is most kingly, and by far the most beneficent nature is that of the Son, the nature of the Son, which is closest to the only omnipotent, closest to the only Almighty.” But that weapon of Petavius, as well as that of others, is indeed leaden, and his argumentation vain and futile. For truly, Clement asserts that the nature of the Son is not only close, but entirely the same as that of the Father. And indeed, does he not say the nature of the Son is the same as the Father’s, He who is called by him “not divided, not cut, not passing from place to place, being everywhere at all times, and nowhere contained”? Who, I ask, is everywhere and immense? Who is contained by no place, unless it be He who clearly possesses the same nature with God the Father? Who is “all mind,” all light paternal, “all eye,” who sees all things, hears all things, and knows all things; except He who is entirely of the same intelligence and nature with the Father? Who, finally, governs and orders all things? Who works all things with tireless and inexhaustible power, unless it be He to whom there is the same power and nature, through and through, as to the eternal Father? Clement, therefore, says the nature of the Son is close and nearest—that is, most conjoined—precisely because it is one and the same. And indeed the word “closely” (*prosexestatē*), which Clement uses, signifies nothing other than “most conjoined and adhering.” By this word, indeed, he signifies that the Son, since He received His origin and His divine nature from His Father, is therefore close to Him, or, as the ancient Fathers speak, subordinate, yet so that He is of one and the same nature with Him, and is one and the same, as has been proven more clearly than the noon-day sun by the many testimonies of our same author, since He is God together with Him.

Admittedly, why, I ask, could the nature of the Son of God not have been called by our Clement, before the times of the Nicene synod, “closest to the only omnipotent” in a Catholic sense; since afterwards by the most victorious defender of that same synod, Basil, the same Son of God is called without hesitation “second after the Father in order,” because He is from Him, ^C and in dignity, “the Father is the origin and cause of His being,” for the Father is the origin and cause for Him. What, indeed, of the fact that he—just like other Fathers after the Nicene synod—writes without doubt that the Father is said to be greater than the Son, because He is His “cause and principle”? Was the Son therefore any less, in a Catholic sense, called by Clement “closest to the omnipotent” than by others “second from the Father,” and “less than the Father,” or in whatever sense the Father is greater?

Therefore, Petavius ought no longer to object to us what Clement added a little later: “Nor would the Lord of all things ever be hindered by another, and especially serving the will of the good and almighty God and Father.” Nor would He ever be hindered by another, He who is the Lord of all, and who serves the will of the most good and almighty Father. For from those things which Clement argues there, it is easily understood that by that word “serving,” he meant nothing else but that the will of the Father is most perfectly fulfilled by the Son. For there he teaches most openly that the Son cannot be hindered by anyone from procuring the salvation of men; since He is the Lord of all. Which he repeats once and again in this very place. Furthermore, Clement there added: “Ignorance does not touch God, who before the constitution of the world was the Father’s counselor; for this was the wisdom with which God the Almighty was delighted. For the Son is the power of God, being before all things that were begotten, the most principal Word of the Father and His wisdom.” He calls the Son of God, in just the same way as the Father, not only God, but also His counselor, power, Word, and wisdom, who was one God with Him before the constitution of the world, that is, before all time and from eternity.

^D Wherefore, wherever He is named by Clement as “first-created wisdom,” beware lest you believe Him to be called a creature. For all who have touched even with their fingertips the documents and writings of the ancient Fathers of the Church know that the word “to create” is used by them indiscriminately for “to create” and “to beget.” To this is added that Clement himself says elsewhere: “Solomon, before heaven, and earth, and all things that are, says that wisdom was begotten by the Almighty,” although in the sacred text it is read “created.” Clement therefore judged the signification of both words to be the same.

Let no one, therefore, oppose to us against such a clear and open sentiment of our Clement concerning the true divinity of the Son his books of *Hypotyposes*, in which, by the testimony of Photius and even, if you wish, of Rufinus, he also numbers the Son among created things. For there is no one who does not know that these books were foully corrupted by some impious heretic and most impudent scoundrel, and filled with nefarious errors, which Clement in his genuine works utterly refuted. For Photius himself added there: “He talks nonsense about six hundred other blasphemies of this kind, whether he himself or someone else, having assumed his person; clearly as if having filled those eight books themselves with these portents of blasphemies, by discussing the same things again and again, and sporadically, and confusedly, as if struck by stupor, by producing Scriptures.” No faith, therefore, is to be placed in these most corrupt books, which, on the contrary, certainly cannot be denied, nor in all those things which we have collected from the true works of the same Clement concerning the asserted divinity of Christ, nor even in that writer who, according to Eusebius, undoubtedly reported our Clement among those who…

wrote in defense of this orthodox dogma before the supreme pontificate of Pope Victor. I understand, he says, Justin, Miltiades, Tatian, and Clement, and very many others, in whose books the divinity of Christ is sustained.

One thing, therefore, remains for us to observe: that it seemed to Clement that the orthodox doctrine concerning the most holy Trinity is declared so certainly and clearly in the sacred Scriptures that he did not judge it to have been altogether unknown to the pagan authors, who drew many things from them. For indeed concerning Plato he writes thus: ^A “When he calls God the cause of all things, yet concerning the second and third things, I do not understand it otherwise than that the holy Trinity is signified: οὐκ ἄλλως ἔγωγε ἐξακούω, ἢ τὴν ἁγίαν Τριάδα μνημονεύεσθαι.” Also, after the Council of Nicaea, Cyril of Alexandria, from the same passage and another which Clement here cited after Justin Martyr, similarly proves that the mystery of the most holy Trinity was not entirely unknown to this coryphaeus of philosophers: “Although, he says, he names the second and third God, not rightly; but as I think, he contradicts his own opinions. For after he said they were one, he divides them again into three, and individually into each, except that he says the Father must be named the God of the Creator.” Therefore Cyril, not otherwise than our Clement, was fully persuaded that Plato had made mention of the most holy Trinity, although more obscurely and not altogether correctly, yet in reality. But it is concluded from that with no uncertainty that the opinion of Clement and Cyril concerning the most holy Trinity was absolutely the same. ^B By the very same testimony of Plato, which can be read even more fully in Eusebius and in the works of Plato, each one having used it, argues from it in a similar way. Finally, if you wish, let us add that it is observed by Clement again that a similar, that is to say an obscure, discourse of the Father and the Son is made by the poets Orpheus, Homer, and the dramatic philosopher Euripides. But this reproach of obscurity, what else, I ask you, does it demonstrate, unless that the doctrine of Clement and the Nicene Fathers concerning the mystery of the Trinity was altogether sound and the same? How constantly, moreover, he persevered in defending this chief dogma of the Christian religion is so clearly and invincibly proven by all the things brought forward by us from these books of the *Stromata* and his other books, that he who would dare to deny it or call it into doubt would seem to wish to steal the light from the midday sun.

ARTICLE III

After these things have been thus argued and established by us against the old and new errors of the Arians and Socinians, a booklet fell into our hands, furtive indeed, of I know not what Socinian man, in which he asserts, with truly intolerable audacity, that the second person of the most holy Trinity was made by the Fathers of the second century of the Church from Plato's λόγῳ. But who could bear the most filthy mouth and the clearly incredible impudence of that writer, who, while he cannot deny that the supreme divinity of Christ is openly and clearly preached and defended by our Clement, foolishly and insipidly babbles that he is one of the first Fathers of the Church who introduced this new dogma into the more sacred inner sanctuaries of the Christian Church from the school of Plato? For that most audacious man feigns that in the first century after the birth of Christ, all Christians, who had utterly rejected the message of gentile philosophy, denied the divinity of Christ; ^C but in the beginning of the second century, Justin Martyr, and afterwards our Clement, having been imbued by the doctrine of Plato, accommodated it to Christian documents, and from the Word of God, the Logos, Wisdom, and other things which Plato said were attributed to God, constituted persons distinct from God the Father, but of the same nature. But who would not be astonished that such a stupendous and hitherto unheard-of paradox had entered into the mind of any man, and that it was so insolently brought to light and taught by him? For we let pass the fact that this fabrication is rejected and impugned even by the men of the same sect of which this new writer is a supporter, who have tried to drag Justin Martyr and our Clement to their sides against the divinity of Christ. For indeed, we do not think that we must fight against this most insipid monster of an opinion, which must needs collapse by itself, owing to the customary contradiction of erring men. We prove its falsity most evidently from those things by which it has been abundantly demonstrated in this and our other previous dissertations that the most learned Fathers of the Church, in the first and second century of the same Church, and our own Clement himself, acknowledged and constantly defended the supreme divinity of Christ.

Furthermore, it is clearly a ridiculous dream of a waking man that this teaching concerning the same divinity of Christ had been introduced into the Christian Church by Justin Martyr, or anyone else, along with the Platonic philosophy. Which, indeed, that it may be plain and manifest to all, must first be diligently observed: that gentile philosophy, as even that Socinian writer admits and we shall show below, was kept far outside the borders of the nascent and adolescent Church. Afterwards, however, Clement and other most erudite men proved by various arguments that what was true in it and other philosophers' tenets, and what gentile philosophers had drawn from the Hebrews, was to be admitted by Christians. But then they, as will also be said below and must to be diligently noted, found many and very bitter adversaries, who, while they stubbornly denied that, not without a long lapse of time, something from the pagan philosophy was accepted by our people. From these things thus observed, it is clearly collected that it is absolutely false that in the age of Clement, and much less in that of Justin Martyr, when the heat of this controversy was greater, a new dogma concerning the divinity of Christ could have been transmitted from Plato's Academy into the Church of the Christians. For indeed, against anyone who would have dared to attempt that, all Christians, and especially those hostile to gentile philosophy, would have instantly flown, nor would they have allowed him to go unpunished for utterly overturning the chief foundation of our faith. With what face, therefore, did our Clement in all his writings, but especially in these books of the *Stromata*—where he proves to such a degree that the true doctrines of ethnic philosophy are to be received by Christians—assert and defend the divinity of Christ everywhere, as we have seen? Why, not deprecating the snares and malevolence of his adversaries, does he not attempt to ward them off, nay, does he not even think about them? Why does he propose and defend this dogma as openly and confidently as others, which no one has ever opposed? Is this not for us a most manifest indication that this was always the common opinion and sentiment of all Christians?

What, indeed, of the fact that he makes it no less plain to Plato, as one instructed in the knowledge of the Hebrews, that the mystery of the most holy Trinity was not well understood, and that in explaining it he did not depart far from the truth? What, also, of the fact that the same Clement does not [present] from these things, which he (the prince of philosophers) had easily said concerning the Logos of God, the Word, and Wisdom, but...

as we have said, he has brought forward testimony for the divine Trinity?

But come now, by what reason, I ask, are Clement and other writers of that same age said to have made persons who are distinct from the Father but of the same nature, from only two attributes of God, and not at all from others? Certainly, no reason can ever be brought forward for this, neither by this Socinian writer nor by any other. But it is shameful and wearisome to dwell any longer on the refutation of a most absurd opinion, born from the rotten brain of a heretical man.

ARTICLE IV. On the predictions and oracles concerning Christ who is to come into the world, and especially on the seventy weeks of Daniel.

Why the Son of God, true and eternal God, wished to put on human flesh at a certain appointed time and to become man, Clement, contrary to Cassianus, offers this reason: that he might destroy and abolish our sin and that of the first parent of men, admitted through disobedience and a perverse will. Moreover, that that coming of Christ to men, or, as theologians say, his incarnation, had been predicted from the very beginning of the world by various divine oracles of the prophets, our author has declared clearly as follows: "Of the Lord who was to come to men," he says, "who was to teach us, there were innumerable signifyings, announcers, preparers, and precursors from on high, from the foundation of the world, presignifying through works and in words, preaching that he would come, and how, and when, and what the future signs would be. Certainly, the Law and the prophecy premeditate from afar. Then the precursor (namely John the Baptist) shows the present one, after the teachers preaching signify the power of the coming." But what these predictions were, and how they attained their effect, it is not at all necessary for us to demonstrate. For this topic has been treated most profusely and learnedly not only by almost all scholastic theologians, but also by other most learned writers, both modern and ancient, and especially by Eusebius and Huet, ^A in entire and very large volumes published on it, which there is certainly no one who does not know, or who cannot easily have access to their books.

Nevertheless, we consider it a sin to pass over in silence what our author has written down to explain the most celebrated oracle of Daniel regarding the things to be until Christ made man. Therefore, three things which particularly pertain to our purpose must be accurately examined: first, what the true opinion of our Clement is concerning this prophecy, and the interpretation of it, about which some contend among themselves; second, what is argued concerning it with justice or injustice; and third, finally, what the opinions of others are concerning the same prediction.

But before all else, since our Clement has described the entire text of Daniel, it must be accurately placed before the eyes of everyone by us, [to show] in what way and how differently from others he exhibits it: "Seventy weeks," he says, "are abbreviated upon the people, and upon the holy city, that sin may be consumed, and may seal sins, and may blot out iniquities (Euseb. * anomias), and that it may make atonement (Euseb. and Polygl. add adikes, iniquities, or injustices), and that it may cause everlasting righteousness, and may seal the vision and the prophet (Euseb. propheteian, prophecy), and that it may anoint the Holy of Holies: and you shall know and understand from the issuing of the word, that you may answer (Euseb. and Polygl. apokrithenai, it may be answered), and Jerusalem may be built. Until Christ the leader are seven and sixty-two weeks, and it shall be turned, and the street and wall shall be built (various readings and Polygl. add ^B periods, and after sixty-two weeks the anointing shall be exterminated, and there shall be no judgment (Polygl. and Euseb. ouk estin, there is not) in it, and he shall destroy the city and the sanctuary with the coming leader; and they shall be cut off by a flood, and until the end of the war, abbreviated (for συντετμημένου) by slaughters, and he shall confirm a covenant with many (Euseb. and Polygl. pollois, for many) for one week, and in the middle (before lo add 'of the') of the week my sacrifice shall be taken away (Euseb. lacks 'my') and the libation, and in the temple the abomination of desolations (Euseb. and Polygl. add 'shall be'), and until the consummation of time, a consummation shall be given into desolation."

Thus far the sacred text of the editors of the Bibles, and nothing more is contained in it or in Eusebius. Clement, however, goes on and immediately connects these words of the sacred text: "And in the middle of the week he shall cause the incense of sacrifice to cease, and [the] expansion of destruction, until the consummation, and the order of the libation of destruction." But in the Anglican Polyglots, among the variant readings, it is noted before these words, "a covenant with many for one week;" or as Nobilius notes, after these two words, "my sacrifice," these things, which are represented a little differently in the Aldine edition and in the margin of the Vatican, were once written: "And half of the week he shall cause the altar and sacrifices to cease, and [the] expansion of destruction, ^C and until the consummation, and of the order of haste upon the destruction." But Nobilius observes that for "and of the wing" it is held otherwise "until the wing." "And half of the week he shall cause the altar and sacrifices and the wings (al. until the wing) to cease from destruction, until the consummation, and [he] shall place into desolation in haste." Finally, Tertullian, when he described the text of Daniel, omitted those later words and has these different from ours: "Until Christ the leader seven and a half weeks, and sixty-two and a half weeks, and he shall turn," etc.

These things being observed, it must now be examined how Clement interprets that oracle of Daniel: "That therefore in seven weeks," he says, "the temple was built, this is clear. For it is written in Ezra: And thus there was Christ the king, the leader of the Jews, when seven weeks had been fulfilled in Jerusalem, and in sixty-two weeks all Judea was quiet, and was without wars, and our Lord Christ, the Holy of Holies, when he had come, and had fulfilled the vision, and the prophet, in the flesh was anointed by the Spirit of his Father. In these sixty-two weeks, as the prophet said, and in one week the Lord: half of the week Nero held [power] reigning, and in the holy city Jerusalem he set up the abomination, and in the middle of the week, he himself was also taken away, and Otho, and Galba, and Vitellius. But Vespasian both obtained the empire, and destroyed Jerusalem, and rendered the sanctuary desolate."

Afterward, however, with several pages interposed: "Furthermore," he says, "those things also are to be referred to the chronology, the days, I say, which Daniel signifies from the desolation of Jerusalem, the years of Vespasian, seven months seven. Two years also are added to Otho, and Galba, and Vitellius, with seventeen months, eight days, and so three years are made, six months, which is the half of a week, just as the prophet Daniel said. For he said there were two thousand three hundred days from the time the abomination stood by Nero ^D in the holy city until its overthrow."

^A Since he shows the statement which follows: *How long shall the vision be, the sacrifice taken away, [the] sin of desolation, which is given; and the power and the sanctuary shall be trodden under foot? And he said to him: Until evening, two thousand three hundred days, and the sanctuary shall be taken away* (Dan. viii, 13, 14). These two thousand three hundred days, therefore, make six years and four months, half of which Nero held while obtaining the empire, and this was half a week; but Vespasian, with Otho, Galba, and Vitellius, held the other half. And therefore Daniel says: *Blessed is he who shall have arrived at the one thousand three hundred and thirty-five days* (Dan. xii, 12). For up to those days was the war; after these, however, it ceased. This number is also shown from the subject chapter, which reads thus: *And from the time of the change of the perpetuity, and when the abomination of desolation shall have been given, one thousand two hundred and ninety days. Blessed is he who shall have waited and arrived at the one thousand three hundred and thirty-five days* (ibid. 10, 12). This is the opinion of our Clement concerning the oracle of Daniel and the weeks assigned by him. Which, indeed, that it may be more easily understood, it must be noted first that these weeks of Daniel, according to the mind of Clement, are neither of days, nor of decades, nor of jubilees, or fifty years, nor of centuries, or years of one hundred, as it has perversely seemed to some; but as he ^B himself clearly declares, [they are] of years, so that each week consists of seven years. Indeed, he, as we have seen, stated in express words that three years and six months are half a week. Furthermore, that he speaks of solar years is easily inferred from the fact that he accommodates them to the years of the Roman emperors, which were undoubtedly solar. Therefore, from his opinion and the more certain opinion of others, seventy weeks make four hundred and ninety years. With which, indeed, since he thinks two other half-weeks were added by Daniel, just as Tertullian also thought, but somewhat otherwise, as has been said, it is clearly evident that he was persuaded that the sum of four hundred and ninety-seven years was constituted by these Danielic weeks. Thus far, however, the opinion and explanation of Clement concerning these weeks seems true to more learned men, and to be preferred to the opinion of others, who assign to the time from the *abomination of desolation* foretold by Daniel, and the birth of Christ, a period of time either shorter or longer than is fitting.

Secondly, therefore, it must be noted that the chief and almost entire difficulty in explaining the weeks of Daniel is shifted to establishing their beginning and end. Whether, however, these are correctly circumscribed by our Clement, or what might be said to have been mistaken and to have strayed from the truth in circumscribing them, must now be investigated.

First, therefore, let Jerome come forward, and let us attend to what he argues as false in that opinion of Clement: "Clement," he says, "a most learned man, a presbyter of the Church of Alexandria, making little of the count of years, says that seventy weeks of years, that is four hundred and ninety years, are completed from Cyrus, king of the Persians, down to Vespasian and Titus, emperors of the Romans, with two thousand three hundred days added to that same number, of which we spoke above: and he attempts to enumerate the times of the Persians and Macedonians and Caesars within these weeks; whereas, according to the most diligent computation, from the first year of Cyrus, king of the Persians and Medes, in which Darius also reigned, down to Vespasian and the overthrow of the temple, six hundred and thirty years are computed." ^C Jerome therefore accuses Clement of a great error, namely an anachronism of two hundred and forty years, and brings him to task. Others also argue against Clement for almost the same aberration, led by the argument that from the first year of Cyrus, which is the first of the fiftieth Olympiad, which happened in the two hundred and twelfth Olympiad, one hundred and fifty-eight Olympiads, and thus six hundred and twenty-eight years, are counted.

But Petavius thinks that the true mind and opinion of Clement was not sufficiently perceived, nor even by Jerome himself, who did not notice that the seventieth week is isolated and is being separated by Clement from the others. Indeed, he admits that Clement speaks very obscurely; however, he judges this to be his genuine and true sense. The beginning of the weeks, says Petavius, he took from the first year of the Persian empire, but the second of Cyrus, and completes the first seven weeks in the second year of Darius. Furthermore, he did not think that the seventy weeks were joined and continuous for him, but he separated their three parts from each other by intervals of time. For he carries the first interval of forty-nine years from the beginnings of Cyrus down to the second of Darius. Then, however, he added sixty-two weeks, that is four hundred and thirty-four years. He opined, however, that they end at some Christ, and both that part of the weeks and this interval of time; so that in the first interval, or after seven weeks had elapsed, a Christ, a leader (*hγούμενος*), had existed at Jerusalem. By which name, indeed, Petavius thinks the prince and leader of the Jewish people is to be understood, after their liberty was restored to them. Then, however, another interval of sixty-two weeks is closed by Clement either with the birth of Christ or his baptism; for he did not indicate either quite clearly. Finally, he assigns the half-part of the last, or seventieth week, separated from the others, to the reign of Nero, during whose reign the *abomination of desolation* was placed in the temple. But Otho, Galba, Vitellius, and the beginnings of Vespasian occupied the other half-part, up to the final devastation of the city and temple of Jerusalem. ^D Petavius further adds that the seventy years of Jeremiah are, according to the mind and opinion of our Clement, begun from the first year of the forty-eighth Olympiad, which is the eleventh of Jehoiakim and the seventh of Nebuchadnezzar, and are carried down to the second of Darius. And this, the most learned Petavius judges to be the true opinion of Clement. For otherwise, he says, Clement would contradict himself too openly, as one who is persuaded that, under the Persian rule, two hundred and thirty-five years flowed, and from there to the death of Cleopatra three hundred and four years, and thus from Cyrus to the Actian victory five hundred and thirty-nine years. Nevertheless, Petavius does not doubt that there are many false and absurd things in Clement's opinion.

But whether he has explored the mind of our author better than others can be called into doubt not without reason. For, in the first place, no trace of any interval of time interjected by Clement within the seventy weeks appears in this book. But, says Petavius, unless that is interposed, Clement is to be condemned for an immense anachronism. But it is not lawful to attribute to him those things about which he has no word, and does not even seem to have thought, in order to free the writer from error. Furthermore, another way of excusing him and perceiving his mind can perhaps be entered into. For it is not so clear and manifest, whatever Petavius may say, whence Clement took the beginning of the seventy weeks. And certainly, although he exhibits the chronology of the kings of the Persians, and starts it from Cyrus, and says that Zerubbabel was sent in the second year of Darius Hystaspes to restore the Jerusalem temple; it does not follow from that, however, that Clement asserted that the seventy weeks took their beginning from the first year of Cyrus.

^A Indeed, Petavius says that Clement calculates forty-nine years from this year of Cyrus to Darius. Therefore, in the number seven, as he says, the weeks calculated from Ezra are comprised. But this conclusion is that of Petavius, not of Clement, who nowhere said that these weeks were contained within these years of Cyrus and his successor Cambyses. But what of the fact that Clement did not report that chronology of the Persian kings to reconcile the first 171 weeks of Daniel with it, but to demonstrate that the Hebrews and sacred writers were more ancient than the rest? We certainly admit that the end of these weeks, when compared not without care from him with the years of the Roman emperors, is extended to the times of Vespasian and the destruction of both the city and the temple of Jerusalem. But the more diligently he instituted this comparison, the more clearly it is evident that it did not enter his mind to maintain that their beginning coincided with the beginnings of the Persian kingdom. To these things, indeed, Clement made no mention whatever of the law given by Cyrus for restoring the Jerusalem temple, which is the sole foundation of their opinion for those who think that Daniel’s weeks begin therefrom. But on the contrary, he relates clearly how Zerubbabel was sent in the second year of Darius for the sake of restoring the Jerusalem temple. It is therefore uncertain whether he thought that Daniel’s weeks took their beginning from this point of time only. However, whatever may be said about this opinion of Clement, which is as obscure as Petavius says, it certainly cannot be denied that it is entangled in the greater difficulties the longer he is argued, not without reason, to have protracted the time of these weeks, as we have said. Wherefore, if anyone is found in his opinion, which some have nevertheless defended later, he is certainly to be directed back to the testimony brought by him from a certain apocryphal book of Ezra.

^B Moreover, this lapse will be more easily pardoned in our Clement, because there are many opinions, both of the ancients and of the moderns, regarding these seventy weeks of Daniel, and especially regarding their beginning and end. For they have lapsed into such varied and different sentiments that there seem to be as many interpretations as there are men. Furthermore, to recount these individually is as much alien to our undertaking as it has been a laborious task for Petavius, Baillius, and others, but chiefly for the author of the *Synopsis Criticorum*. ^C If you wish to know which of those opinions, which lead the beginning of these weeks from the end of the Babylonian captivity, were more famous, we will represent to you three or four of the chief ones. Thus, the first, about which we have discussed thus far, and which is attributed to our Clement not in one and the same sense, is that of those who judge that the weeks of Daniel had their beginning in the first or second year of Cyrus and were terminated by the ruin of the city and temple of Jerusalem. The second sets the beginning of the weeks in the seventh year of Artaxerxes Longimanus and their end in the death of Christ. The third asserts that they began in the second year of Darius, either Hystaspes or Nothus, and ended in the twelfth year of Nero, in which the war was waged between the Romans and the Jews in such a way that three years and six months later Jerusalem was destroyed and razed to the ground. The fourth assigns their beginning to the twentieth year of Artaxerxes Longimanus and their end to the fortieth year after the death of Christ, or, as others prefer, within the space of the last week, during which Christ finished his life by the punishment of the cross. But what may be the grounds for these and other opinions, and what is valid or weak in them, you will learn from Jerome, who has reported the sentiments of Africanus, Eusebius, Hippolytus, Apollinaris, our Clement, and Tertullian, and also from the moderns, Scaliger, Petavius, Huet, Baillius, and others, both theologians and interpreters of Holy Scripture, and also historians and chronologists.

ARTICLE V. Of the year and day of the birth and baptism of Christ the Lord.

Of the year and day on which Christ, according to that prediction of Daniel and the oracles of other prophets, was born and died, the things which our Clement determined must be examined all the more accurately because, misunderstood by Hervetus, they may perhaps appear more difficult to others. But concerning the year of Christ’s birth, he writes this: The Lord was born in the twenty-eighth year, when they first ordered a census or enrollment to be made in the time of Augustus. That this is true is written thus in the Gospel according to Luke: In the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar, the word of the Lord came unto John the son of Zacharias. And again in the same: Jesus was coming to baptism, being about thirty years of age. Therefore, our Clement clearly declares that Christ the Lord was born in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Augustus Caesar. Wherefore he himself says a little later: "Which they call," he says, "the twenty-eighth year of Augustus."

But the most famous and most ancient writers affirm with great assurance that Christ was born in either the forty-first or the forty-second year of the same emperor. For Irenaeus handed down these things about it in these very words: Our Lord was born about the forty-first year of the reign of Augustus. Tertullian, however, asserts more expressly and clearly that he was born in the forty-first year of Augustus: For we see, he says, that in the forty-first year of the empire of Augustus, in which he reigned after the death of Cleopatra, Christ is born. And the same Augustus survived for fifteen years from the time Christ was born. Eusebius, however, rejects the same day of the birth of Christ to the following year: The year, he says, was already the forty-second of Augustus' reign. But after Egypt was subdued, and after the death of Antony and Cleopatra, in which the dominion of the Ptolemies in Egypt ceased, it was the twenty-eighth; when our Savior Jesus Christ, at that first census which was made while Quirinius was governor of Syria, was born in Bethlehem of Judea according to the prophecies of him. Wherefore, in his *Chronicle*, this year of Christ’s birth is registered in the forty-second year of the reigning Augustus. Epiphanius and others have subscribed to Eusebius more than once.

Wherefore Hervetus, relying on the authority of Eusebius, as it seemed to him, and thinking the Greek text of Clement was corrupt, believed that "forty-first year of Augustus" should be read instead of "twenty-eighth year of Augustus," and he was so persuaded of this that he dared to change the text of Clement itself in his Latin translation. But wrongly. For he knew not, or certainly had not attended to the mind of, what is nevertheless common and trite among chronologists, that there are two primary beginnings of the Octavian empire: one indeed in the very year or the following year in which Julius Caesar was killed; the other, however, from the Actian victory, or after the death of Antony and Cleopatra, when Augustus became master of things. But only from this second point of time were Clement and his fellow Egyptians, who then, as Eusebius testifies, had been brought under the power of Augustus after the dominion of the Ptolemies was abandoned, accustomed to compute the beginnings of his 172 reign. And this

if any need were, is most invincibly proven by the authority and history of Eusebius which we have already cited, where, according to that later opinion of the Egyptians, and consequently that of our Clement, he signifies with no less clarity than our Clement does that Christ was born in the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Augustus. Hervetus, therefore, will certainly appear to many to have read his Chronicle—not this passage of Eusebius, though it is sufficiently obvious to all, but only the one which he quoted. Thus, one can easily discern not only from this but from many other places what great diligence he employed in writing his commentaries on these books of the Stromata. But this by the way.

Our author further describes not only the year of Christ's birth, but also his delivery, and the month and day of his baptism, though according to the opinions of others rather than his own view: «There are some who concern themselves more curiously with the Lord's birth, adding not only the year but also the day, which they say is the twenty-eighth of August, into the twenty-fifth of Pachon. But the followers of Basilides celebrate also the day of his baptism, ^B spending the whole preceding night in readings. They say that this was the fifteenth year of Tiberius, the fifteenth of the month of Tubi; though others say it was the eleventh of the same month. Moreover, some of them say that he was born on the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth of Pharmuthi.» Now, Hervetus observed in this place that the days and months of the Egyptians, which Clement notes there so accurately, were neither known to him, nor did he understand what is meant by the twenty-eighth of August into the twenty-fifth of Pachon. He confesses, indeed, that the names of these months are enumerated by Epiphanius, but that the Egyptians' method of computing them is different from ours, since, as Cel. testifies (lib. xv, cap. 19), they begin the year from Cancer. Therefore, he leaves these things to be examined by those to whom they are more clearly understood. But as for those Egyptian months, not only does Bede dispute them (lib. *De temp. rat.*, cap. 9), and Noviomagus in this book, but also more recent chronographers: Calvisius (*Isagog. chronol.*, cap. 9); Scaliger (*De emendat. temp.*, p. 188); Petavius (*Rationar. tempor.*, part 1, cap. 12, and lib. VII *De doctr. temp.*, cap. 13, p. 650); and Kirker (tom. II *OEdip. Egypt.*, part 1, cap. 1 et seq., and especially p. 275 et seq.).

From these writers, all will easily learn what Hervetus did not know: that the Egyptian month Pachon begins on the twenty-sixth of the Roman April; Tubi on the twenty-seventh of December; and Pharmuthi on the twenty-seventh of March. Clement therefore relates that in his time there was a threefold opinion—doubtless among the Egyptians—concerning the day of Christ's birth: some held the view that he was brought into the world on the twenty-fifth of Pachon, that is, the ninth of May; others, on the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth of Pharmuthi, that is, the nineteenth or twentieth of April; and finally, others on the fifteenth or eleventh of Tubi, that is, the twelfth or eighth of our beginning January.

From this last opinion, some think that Epiphanius does not depart far, he who describes the birthday of Christ most accurately in this way: «For when he was born in the month of January on the eighth of the Kalends of January, which is with the Romans the sixth day of January, but with the Egyptians the sixth of Tubi, with the Syrians or Greeks the sixth of Audynaeus; with the Cypriots or those of Salamis the fifth day of the fifth month; with the Paphians the fourteenth of July; with the Arabs, however, the twenty-first of Aleom; with the Cappadocians the thirteenth of Atarta; with the Hebrews the thirteenth of Tebeth; with the Athenians the sixth of Maemacterion.» And these indeed are the words of Epiphanius, by which he seems rather to signify by what name the month of January was called among those nations, ^D calling it that, or whether they celebrated the birthday of Christ on the same day of the month of January as the Romans.

But that the same Epiphanius added that Christ was born on the eighth of the Kalends, or the sixth day of January, for this he is certainly rebuked by Jerome: «Among the oriental peoples,» the words of Jerome are, «after the gathering of fruits and the wine-presses, when the tithes were brought into the temple, October was the first month and January the fourth.» He adds the fifth day of the month, that he might signify the baptism, in which the heavens were opened to Christ, and the day of the Epiphany is venerable to this day; not, as some think, the birthday in the flesh; for then he was hidden, and did not appear.

However, our Clement brought forward not his own, but the opinions of others concerning the day of Christ's nativity. But some think these were heretics. But because Clement names no one there, indeed rather because he names the Basilidians there, having omitted others, this does not seem at all certain or indubitable. Since Clement himself has openly said that this was not the opinion of all, but only of some, we can hence infer with some certainty that many others departed from it. On which day the Egyptians believed this day of Christ's birth to have occurred, and celebrated its solemnity, Cassianus relates thus: «This custom is observed in the region of Egypt according to an ancient institution, that after the completion of the day of the Epiphany, which the priests of that province say is the day of the baptism of Christ, or of his nativity according to the flesh. Whence also concerning both they make only one solemnity, not two, as is done in the parts of the West.»

Various, therefore, as is clear from what has been said, have been and even now are the opinions concerning that very day in one and the same region, or in the same provinces and kingdoms. For of the moderns, four opinions can be counted for the most part, the first of which is of certain people who deny that this day can be assigned and defined. The second is of Calvisius and Scaliger, who contend that it occurred toward the end of September. The third is of Nisbet, who affirms that Christ was born at the beginning of April, on the very day and hour of his death. The fourth, finally, is of Baronius, Petavius, and very many others, who think that this day, according to the ancient tradition of the Church, fell on the twenty-fifth of December. But if you wish to know with what foundations of reasoning the upholders of these opinions rely, see Baronius in his *Notes on the Martyrology* for 25 December, and in his *Apparatus* to the *Annals*, § 120 et seqq.; Calvisius, cap. 46 and 47, *Isagog. chronol.*; Scaliger, lib. vi *De emendat. temp.*, p. 506 et seqq., and lib. I *Can. isagog.*, p. 305 et seq.; Petavius in the cited passage of Epiphanius, and lib. II *De doctr. temp.*, cap. 1 et seq., and cap. 7; Baillie, lib. *Operis hist.*, quaest. 1, 2, and 3; Pagi in his *Apparatus chron.*, § 138 et seq., and others.

ARTICLE VI.

We have both heard Clement our author relating the various opinions on the day of the birth of Christ the Lord, and we have honestly and ingenuously placed before the eyes of all what more learned men have said against them, in our customary manner. But what he himself wrote concerning the single year of Christ's preachings after his baptism, and consequently the last year of his life, let us now set forth with the same candor of spirit. It indeed seems certain that which we have read written by him somewhere: «In the thirtieth year, indeed, the Lord preached.» But elsewhere, after these

words, he produced the words of Luke: «And Jesus was coming to the baptism of about thirty years of age.» He immediately subjoins: «And that he ought to have preached for only one year, ^A *καὶ ὅτι ἐνιαυτὸν μόνον ἔδει αὐτὸν κηρύξαι*, this also is written thus: He sent me to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.» This both the prophet said and the Gospel. Therefore, in the fifteenth year of Tiberius and the fifteenth of Augustus, thirty years are thus completed up to the time when he suffered. Nothing certainly is clearer or more expressive than these words. But as they are clear and evident, they ought certainly to fill everyone with greater admiration. For who would not wonder how any Christian man, imbued even with the lightest reading of the Gospels, and consequently our Clement, much more so, cultivated with such illustrious erudition and doctrine, could have been able to depart into an opinion so contrary and repugnant to the same Gospels?

Nevertheless, Origen seems to side with our author, whose words are these: «The sign, however, of the grace poured out upon his lips is this, that in a short time having passed—for he taught for a year and a few months—nevertheless the entire world was filled with his doctrine and the faith of piety.» We know indeed that in another book published among his works, three years and a half are assigned to the preachings of Christ in this manner. These people, who argue that the passion of Job lasted for three years and a half, ought to have said three months and a half, so that they might at least not have resisted to some extent the truth, and might have simulated that Lordly example. For the Lord preached for three years and a half from his baptism until his passion. Thus, even the history itself signifies not three years, but a brief time of months. But since the author of this commentary is someone entirely different from Origen, it will seem strange to no one if he departs from his false opinion, or corrects and amends it.

Tertullian, however, like Origen, seems to provide patronage to the opinion of our Clement with these words: «After Augustus, who survived after the birth of Christ, fifteen years are completed: to whom Tiberius Caesar succeeded, and he had the empire for twenty-two years, seven months, nine days. In the fifteenth year of his empire Christ suffered, having about thirty years when he was suffering.» Some say that Africanus and Lactantius also agreed with Tertullian, because both assert that Christ was put to death by the Jews in the fifteenth year of Tiberius. But besides the fact that in the Greek text of Africanus one reads *ἑξκαιδέκατον*, the sixteenth, which falls in the second year of the 201st Olympiad mentioned by him, neither of them certainly defines in the same place in what year Christ died.

^B Yet let it be that all of them, and even Gaudentius, subscribed to the opinion of our Clement; nevertheless, it will ^C never be proven thereby that it is true. For it is clearly evident from the holy Gospels that at least three Passovers, and thus at least three years, were completed by Christ the Lord after his baptism, through which he labored in public addresses and preachings.

But perhaps someone will ask why Clement or certain other learned men so imprudently fell into this error, so contrary to the holy history of the evangelists. The answer is easy and obvious. For it is evident that from those things which he cited—the words of Isaiah reported by Luke: «He sent me to preach the acceptable year of the Lord»—he had induced in his mind that Christ had held public addresses among the Jews for only one year after his baptism and before his death.

^D Therefore, the hallucination of our Clement, although it cannot be excused at all, can nevertheless be diminished by a kind reader, because after he had said that Christ had been affixed to the cross in the fifteenth year of Tiberius, he reviews the opinions of others, who had thought that his death should be rejected to the following year. But it is better to produce the very words of Clement, in which not only the year but also the day of the same death of Christ assigned by them is remembered: «And concerning his passion,» he says, «discussing more subtly, some indeed say the Lord suffered in the sixteenth year of Tiberius Caesar, on the twenty-fifth of Phanemoth, others indeed on the twenty-fifth of Pharmuthi, and others yet on the twenty-ninth of Pharmuthi.» But these months, as we have already observed, are Egyptian, of which the first, Phanemoth, began on the twenty-fifth of February, but the second, Pharmuthi, began on the twenty-seventh of March. Wherefore, from these, some were thinking that Christ died on the twenty-first day of March, but others on the twentieth, or the twenty-fourth of April. Moreover, Clement himself is entirely silent in that same place as to which opinion he leans toward. Furthermore, in designating the day on which Christ died, the most learned writers of our age and of the age before us differ not a little among themselves. Some indeed, from a constant tradition, as they say, for the first three centuries of the Church, assert that he was put to death by the Jews on the twenty-fifth day of March, others on the twenty-third day of the same month, others on the third of April, or even on another day. But concerning this question, besides authors cited by us in the previous article, read the dissertation of Gerard Voss, *De annis quibus natus, baptizatus et mortuus est Christus*, and the observations of Henschenius and Papebrochius on March 25th.

Finally, one thing remains for us to note, which Clement touched upon somewhere, but as if through a lattice, concerning the hour of Christ’s death: *Τοιοῦτόν τι καὶ ἡ ἕκτη ὥρα τῆς σωτηρίου οἰκονομίας ἐμφαίνει, καθ᾽ ἣν ἐτελειώθη ὁ ἄνθρωπος.* «The sixth hour of the saving economy, in which man was perfected, also shows something of such a kind.» But what other thing does Clement intend for himself with these words, except that Christ gave up his soul at the sixth hour, and emitted the final breath of his mortal life?

We indeed are not unaware of how many difficulties occur in reconciling the various and, as it seems, mutually opposed opinions and narratives of the evangelists concerning this supreme hour of Christ. But Clement not obscurely hints that Christ was affixed to the cross before the sixth hour, and departed from this life at the sixth hour itself. Whether this opinion of his is true, and whether therefrom some method is provided for reconciling the evangelists with themselves, we willingly leave to be determined by the judgment and discretion of others. Whoever should wish to know more about this question, let him read the various interpreters of the Gospel, and Augustine, book III of *De consen. evang.*, chap. 13, the author of the *Commentaries on the Psalms* in Jerome, on Psalm 77; Sixtus of Siena, book VI of the *Bibliotheca*, annot. 131; Baronius on the year of Christ 34, § 162 and following; Petau, book XI of *De doctr. tempor.*, chap. 19; Bailli, book II of *Operis histor. et chron.*, quæst. 14.

Let us add here in passing that Clement, where he discusses briefly the 318 household servants of Abraham with whom he liberated his captive brother Lot, observed that the cross of the Lord is signified by the first letter T of that number in Greek, and the sacred name of Jesus by the other two, eta and iota. But that seems to have been taken by him from the most ancient epistle of Barnabas, which he often cites. Ambrose also not once, and Paschasius the deacon of the Roman Church, or rather Faustus of Riez...

and other Fathers have said. You may, if you please, read more on this matter noted by Cotelier in his notes on the epistle of Barnabas, p. 18 et seqq.; Moyne, *Var. sacr.*, p. 780 et seq., and what we have noted down on the books of Ambrose.

ARTICLE VII.

Although Clement, as was said before, taught that the body of Christ was by no means beautiful, yet he affirms most assertively that the same Christ the Lord was most beautiful in the excellent and most perfect endowments of His soul and His virtues: “For if anyone,” he says, “should assert that the just, even if they are deformed in body, are beautiful insofar as their ways are most just, hardly anyone saying so could be thought to speak wrongly. And His appearance was deficient beyond all the sons of men, says the prophecy.” ^B Wherefore he teaches and proclaims most openly elsewhere that Christ alone was endowed with all virtues simultaneously and was perfect: “Someone is perfected,” he says, “and is brought to completion, both as pious and religious, and as tolerant, and as continent, and as a worker, and as a martyr, and as a Gnostic. But in all things at once to be perfect, I know not if there be any, save only Him who for our sake put on the nature of a man.”

Furthermore, he considered the same Christ to be so adorned with the greatest perfection of every kind of virtue that He alone was always free and immune not only from all perturbations of the soul, but even from bodily necessities. “Such,” our author himself says, “is the Gnostic; for in him alone fall those affections which arise so that the body might remain, namely hunger, thirst, and the like. But in the Savior, indeed, for the body, as a body, to require necessary ministries in order to remain would have been ridiculous. ^C For He ate not on account of the body, which was held together by holy virtue; but so that it might not enter the minds of those who were with Him to think otherwise of Him, as indeed some afterward believed, that He appeared only in vision and phantom. He Himself, however, to speak once, was free from passion, as one upon whom no movement might steal, neither pleasure, nor pain.”

But many think that our Clement, just as in diminishing the beauty of the body of Christ, so in augmenting the endowments of that same body, went too far and beyond the bounds of truth. For there he seems clearly to teach that Christ ate only for this reason, that the body assumed by Him might not be thought only appearing and shadowed, and not true. Wherefore he seems to admit absolutely no hunger, thirst, pain, sadness, or other non-vicious affections in Christ. And yet that He truly hungered, thirsted, and suffered, and was affected by other movements of soul and body, is so certain by the testimony of Matthew ^D and other evangelists that it can never be denied by anyone without error.

But if the mind and opinion of our Clement, and what he wrote elsewhere about Christ, are examined attentively and diligently, anyone will easily perceive that it is far from the case that he wished to remove entirely from Christ the Lord all senses of pain or sadness, and other affections of human nature—or, if you will, infirmities—but rather that he openly pronounces that the flesh of Christ was truly passible, inasmuch as it truly died, and so before death, truly suffered pains and torments. But it is better to hear him speaking himself: “Now indeed also the entire economy, which was foretold by the prophets concerning the Lord, seems truly to be a parable to those who do not know the truth, when they hear that the Son of God, who made all things, took on flesh, and was conceived in the womb of the Virgin, insofar as his sensible little flesh was born (καθ’ ὃ γεγένηται τὸ αἰσθητὸν αὐτοῦ σαρκίον). And consequently, insofar as it was born, that it suffered (τοῦτο πεπονθότα), and rose again, one indeed speaks, and others hear; to the Jews indeed a scandal, but to the Greeks foolishness, as the Apostle says. But the Scriptures openly, and to those who have ears, manifesting the truth, proclaim that same thing which the flesh He assumed suffered (ὃ πεπονθυῖα σὰρξ, ἣν ἀνείληφεν ὁ Κύριος), as the power and wisdom of God.”

But, you will say, does Clement not bring forward that sole reason why Christ ate, lest the flesh assumed by Him be believed to be feigned and shadowed? Truly, those who object these things to us have not sufficiently adverted that this reason is brought forward by Clement there because he is briefly, and after his usual manner, refuting and debunking the heretics of his time who denied the true flesh of Christ. Although, therefore, he brought forward that sole reason there, because he thought it alone sufficient to refute them; from this, however, no one can justly and deservedly infer that other reasons were excluded by him. And indeed he himself suggests another in the same place. For he says, “Christ's body, which was held together by holy virtue, as a body, not to require necessary ministries in order to remain.” What, I ask, does he mean by these words other than that Christ was subject by no necessity to hunger and thirst and other such movements? Since His body was held together by holy virtue (δυνάμει συνεχόμενον ἁγίᾳ), that is to say, by divinity, which could sustain that body of His without drink and food, which other men need, and provide it with growth. Therefore, Clement approaches the true, sound, and orthodox opinion of those who judge that Christ used these things in such a way that He nevertheless did not need them, and that He could have sustained His own body without the help of them, and that all hunger, thirst, pain, and other affections did not fall upon Him by necessity, but were always placed under the free choice of His will. And this was indeed the opinion of Basil the Great, to be silent about others, which he expresses in these words: “Christ eats and drinks, not needing them, but showing to you the norm and manner of those things which fit the body and are necessary for human life. So therefore He wept, by modestly seeking and lamenting, and by correcting entirely excessive pain and vehement affliction... For just as the food which He Himself tasted is not for pleasure, but rather an occasion of abstinence, and an example of frugality, that we might be content with little; so also His tears are not a law for us to weep, but a certain rule of weeping honestly, according to which it is fitting to endure those things that are sad honestly and with decorum, the laws of nature being kept.” Compare, I beseech you, the words and sayings of this Basil the Great and of our Clement. The former says that Christ indeed ate and drank, but not needing them; the latter strictly that the body of Christ did not demand those necessary things in order to remain. Basil teaches that Christ ate and drank so that we might have in Him an example of frugality; Clement, however, so that it might not be said that Christ assumed a simulated body. What, therefore, in these words of Clement is more worthy of reprehension than in those of Basil? Whoever wishes to know more about these things, let him go to the scholastic theologians, in III Sent., distinc. 15, and to St. Thomas, III part, quaest. 15, art. 5 et seqq.; Thomassin, lib. IV *Theolog. dogmat.*, cap. 11, 12, 13; and our own Coutant, in the preface to the Works of Hilary, § 131 et seq.

ARTICLE VIII. OF THE BOOKS OF THE STROMATA. Why Christ led a celibate life? That He is arguably an inexplicable sacrifice and the door of eternal life, and the only teacher of all men; and what Clement thought concerning His preaching in the underworld.

^A From the first passage of Isaiah, who predicted that in the guise of an ox and a bear, the Jews and the Gentiles would both come to be, and that God would be blessed by the beasts of the field. Finally, he adds the witness of the Psalmist, who seems to him to have indicated no less obscurely the future salvation of the Gentiles in two psalms.

Why Christ led a celibate life in this world, Clement provides three reasons, which are clearly worthy of observation: "In the first place, thus he speaks, He had the Church as His own bride; then, indeed, He was not a mere man, such that He should require any helper according to the flesh; nor was it necessary for Him to beget children, He who remains forever and was born the only Son of God." By these words, indeed, not only is the supreme divinity of Christ, concerning which there was prior discussion, most clearly asserted; but our author also proffers three arguments, not of slight weight, by which he beautifully shows why Christ Himself chose to remain celibate through the whole time of His mortal life.

Clement teaches furthermore that He is not only an inexplicable—as he himself puts it—sacrifice, which is sanctified for us, and the door through which alone all men, even philosophers, if they wish to be saved, can enter into the heavenly fatherland; but that He is also the only teacher and instructor of all men: "He alone," he says, "is the teacher, who is the only one of the most high and pure Father, who instructs man." Nay, he added elsewhere: "He is the teacher of all things that have come to be, the counselor of God, who foreknew all things. He, moreover, from on high, from the first constitution of the world, in many ways and by many methods has taught and perfected."

But herein Clement is condemned for error, because he maintained that Christ, our divine instructor, announced the Gospel to those who were detained in the underworld, whether Jews or Gentiles, in such a way that those who had lived remarkably well above others, and were led by repentance to the knowledge of their own individual sins... were saved. He said moreover, whether to Hebrews or Gentiles; for he remained hesitant as to whether the Gospel was announced by Christ only to the Hebrews. Wherefore, since he thought that pagan men, who had lived piously, were made partakers of the same grace and mercy, he added this for that reason: "But if He announced the Gospel only to the Jews, who lacked that knowledge and faith which is through Christ, it is clear at any rate that since there is no respect of persons with God, the apostles also, just as here, so also there announced the Gospel to those who were of the Gentiles, fit for conversion."

Nor does he propose and touch upon this opinion casually and briefly, as he does more often elsewhere; but he strains every nerve of his mind to prove it, and to persuade everyone of it, if possible. For he gathers various arguments drawn both from the authority of the Holy Scripture and the Shepherd of Hermas, and from reason itself, by which he attempts to demonstrate it, as far as in him lies. But the first testimony of Scripture, taken from the book of Job, a little differently than from the Septuagint translation, is adduced, by which the underworld—that is, as Clement thinks, not the place, but those who were in the underworld—are held to have heard the voice and power of Christ. Other testimonies he draws especially from the Gospel, where, after the death of Christ, we read that many bodies of dead men rose again, so that, he says, they might be transferred to a "better place."

Then, furthermore, he strives to establish and corroborate this opinion of his with another double testimony; and ^B the foundation of these arguments, which he draws from reason itself, is primarily this: Since he is speaking of pagans who lived piously and justly, even if not perfectly, he deems it neither fair nor credible that they should be visited with the same punishment as the impious and the unjust. "For who," he says, "of sound mind would have supposed that the souls of the just and of sinners are held under one condemnation, branding the stain of injustice upon Providence?" Therefore, he continues, it was fitting for God, who is no respecter of persons, in His counsel, providence, goodness, and omnipotence, that the Gentiles—just as we have said—who were righteous, no less than the Jews, wherever they might finally be in place, having been instructed by Christ or the apostles and informed by true knowledge, after they had performed repentance for the sins they had committed, should be gifted with eternal salvation.

This was indeed Clement’s opinion, gathered primarily from the *Shepherd* of Hermas, whose very words he transcribed not only in this place, but in another book as well. Whether he has attained its meaning and sense, however, there is surely no small reason for doubt. For we have shown elsewhere that what Hermas wrote concerning that preaching of the apostles in the underworld can be understood in an allegorical sense. Conversely, Clement not only accepted those things in a literal sense, but also spares no effort or labor, and with every kind of argument strives to prove that pagans, no less than Jews, who had lived piously in this life, even if not perfectly, were led to ^C repentance, by which they afterwards attained eternal salvation.

Jobius subscribed to the same opinion, whose words apud Photius are these: "If the prince of the apostles, coming to the spirits who were in prison, preached... to those who were Hebrews or Gentiles; for he remained doubtful whether the Gospel was announced by Christ only to the Hebrews... this is the infidels, who on account of their infidelity remained sinners, are condemned, as if they had become mere flesh and were severed from the spirit; how many, however, even in the underworld, believed in Christ, who was justice itself, they enjoy spiritual joy."

Others have gone even further, such as the authors of the little book or sermon *De Paschate*, and the commentaries on the Pauline Epistles in Ambrose, and also in Pope Gregory, Georgius the presbyter, and Theodorus the deacon of the Church of Constantinople, against whom he argues thus: "But lest I dwell upon your charity in my dispute, let it be known what Philaster said in the book which he wrote *On Heresies* concerning this heresy, whose words are these: 'There are heretics who say that the Lord descended into the underworld, and preached to all even after death, so that those who confessed might be saved.'"

Among the heresies, Augustine also reckons the same opinion: "Another," he says, "thinks that when Christ descended into the underworld, the unbelievers believed and were all thereafter liberated." Therefore, after he had egregiously refuted this, as well as the previous opinion of Clement and others, in his letter to Evodius, and convinced them to be erroneous, he explains what the catholic faith has prescribed in these words: "Wherefore let us hold most firmly what faith has established with most solid authority... In which there is also this: that (Christ) was in the underworld and in the loosening of their sorrows, by which it was im- ^D

to be held; and from whom it is also rightly understood that He loosened and set free those whom He willed, and received back the body which He had left upon the cross, having placed it in the sepulchre. Gregory, moreover, whom we have already praised, says: "Hold nothing, except what the true faith teaches through the Catholic Church, because the Lord, descending into hell, snatched from the cloisters of hell only those among them who, living in the flesh, had been saved by His grace in faith and good works." Nor, in truth, was the mind of D. Thomas and other theologians, and especially of Estius, in the *Magister Sententiarum*, any different. From these you may gather what is to be decided regarding a certain more recent theologian, who, after Ecumenius, teaches that Christ is said by Peter to have descended into hell after death, and to have imparted notice and salvation to some, namely to those who had rightly composed their own lives, and had been so disposed that, if Christ had then arrived, they would have been prepared in mind to receive His faith.

ARTICLE IX. Concerning the perpetual virginity of Mary, the Mother of Christ, and the fabricated story of her inspection by a midwife.

As we make our progress from Christ the Lord to His most holy Mother, it must be considered by us what Clement determined regarding her immaculate virginity. For he not only calls her a virgin in one place, having given birth, but he also writes these things about her elsewhere: "But, as it seems, to many even to this day Mary appears to be a woman in childbed because of the birth of the Son, although she is not a woman in childbed. For some say that she, after she had brought forth, was inspected by a midwife and found to be a virgin." Such, however, are the Lord's Scriptures to us. "She brought forth, and did not bring forth," says the Scripture, as one who conceived from herself and not from the union. Clement, without doubt, marks and rebukes certain heretics, of whom we have spoken elsewhere, who wrongly affirmed that the virgin Mother of Christ both conceived and brought forth just like other women. Therefore, Clement teaches on the contrary that she conceived without the congress of a man, and brought forth with her virginity intact, and ^B finally, after the birth, was still found to be a virgin. We read that the most learned African [Tertullian], using the same weapons and for the same reason against these same heretics—whom he calls Academics not without some mockery—fought thus for the virginity of Mary: "We acknowledge the conception and the birth of the virgin Mary, of which these Academics say: 'She brought forth, and did not bring forth, she is a virgin, and not a virgin'; as if, even if it were to be said thus, it would not be more fittingly said by us. For she brought forth, who brought forth from her own flesh, and she did not bring forth, who did not bring forth from a man's seed. And she is a virgin, as far as a man is concerned; she is not a virgin, as far as the birth is concerned." Thus that most learned African constantly maintains and defends the most perfect virginity of the Mother of God, Mary, before the birth. But if any stiff-necked person should contend that it is asserted by him that the same Mother of God was not a virgin in the act of giving birth, as some opine, let him know that he departs just as far from the orthodox truth as he does from the mind and opinion of our Clement. But if you ask who those were who, as our author says, handed down that the most holy Mother of Christ was inspected by a midwife to see if she were a virgin after the birth, we will answer that they were without doubt the writers of apocryphal books. For this is found described neither in the books of Holy Scripture nor in the approved works of the Fathers, but [is contained] in the proto-Gospel of James, and not without a miracle that is little to be believed. But the matter is recounted far differently by Suidas from hidden and secret writings and Jewish traditions, but none that are worthy of any faith at all. Clement is, without doubt, to be understood regarding these or similar apocryphal lucubrations. But however much these things may be apocryphal, and if you will, false, fictitious, and fabricated, yet from the cited passage we have fully established that the entire and immaculate virginity of Mary before the birth, in the birth, and after the birth is approved and asserted by our same Clement. Finally, let us add to these what had almost escaped us, that Christ is called in another work by Clement the *fruit of a virgin*: ὁ Χριστὸς, τῆς Παρθένου καρπὸς, ^C that is, the fruit of the virgin. But we have touched upon some things elsewhere regarding that perpetual virginity of Mary.

CHAPTER VII. Concerning the necessity of grace, concerning the free will of man, concerning his sins, and concerning original sin.

ARTICLE I. Concerning the necessity of divine grace for fulfilling every good work, and for persevering in them even unto death.

The result of the death brought upon Christ the Lord by the Jews with so many tortures and torments was that He not only most cumulatively satisfied for the sins of all men for the justice of God, but also that grace and help and assistance were abundantly imparted to them, by which every man, and without which no one can ever do anything good that leads to eternal salvation, [is able to act]. Now, the necessity of that divine grace for rightly performing any good and salutary works, which no one has ever denied without committing the error of sin, our Clement everywhere acknowledges and preaches. Therefore, it is to be scrutinized by us with all the more diligence, by how much more clearly and constantly he himself asserts that orthodox document of the Christian faith, as some of the Fathers of the Greek Church seem to some to have defended this more coldly. Moreover, that this subject may be treated with that ingenuousness and sincerity which is customary, we shall first observe in what manner he taught that the thoughts of pious men and those endowed with virtue are instilled into their souls. ^D These are his Greek words: "But even the thoughts of virtuous men come about according to a divine thought, the soul being in some way disposed, and the divine will being distributed into human souls, while the partial divine ministers assist in such services." Furthermore, their thoughts, who are endowed with virtue, occur through divine inspiration, when the soul is in some way affected, and the divine will is transmitted into human souls, while they who are the peculiar ministers of God lend their aid to such ministries. When the thoughts of pious men [are directed] both by "divine inspiration," and by the administration of God—

^A if our author so openly professes that our salvation is had and received by the help and ministry of both the external and the internal grace of God, has he not spoken clearly enough there? And do not those [words] also aim still more plainly at this very internal grace and the saving help of Christ, whereby he expressly signifies that we, unless there be dispelled from us—by the saving help of the Mediator—the darkness of ignorance, which has been infused by evil conversation (that is, by our sins), can neither know ourselves, nor the Son of God, nor His Father, rightly and as we ought? For he writes 77 that we are led by the hand of dialectic to true wisdom, which indeed is a divine power, which knows those things that are as they are, having that which is perfect, free from all perturbation, not without the Savior, οὐκ ἄνευ τοῦ Σωτῆρος, who removed from the sight of our soul the darkness of ignorance infused by evil conversation, by means of the divine Word, and restored to it that which is best and most excellent, so that we may rightly know man and God. He is the one who truly shows how it behooves us to know ourselves, who reveals the Father of the universe to whom he wills, and causes [one] to understand, as far as it is possible, as human nature can comprehend. "For no one knows the Son, except the Father; nor the Father, except the Son, and he to whom the Son may have revealed [Him]." Since, therefore, without the Savior—that is, without the divine grace of our Savior—if Clement thought it impossible for us to have the darkness of ignorance, which is infused by sin, removed, or to know ourselves, or God the Father, or the Son, as it ought to be known, who does not see that by these words of his, the necessity of divine grace for removing ignorance, and for our knowing ourselves and God rightly and as we ought, is fully and deeply established and confirmed? ^B

But not only there, but in another place also, Clement himself demonstrates by reason the same necessity of grace for rightly knowing God, and adds 78: "Whether, therefore, the Father Himself draws to Himself anyone who has lived purely and progressed to the notion of the blessed nature, into which death cannot fall; or whether our free will, coming to the knowledge of the good, passes the barriers, as they say in the gymnasia; yet not without excelling grace, πλὴν οὐ χάριτος ἄνευ τῆς ἐξαιρέτου, does the soul arise, and leap up, and is lifted above those things which are preeminent, laying aside whatever is heavy, and rendering to Him what is related." What then of the fact that he said elsewhere that we have need of the assisting grace of God to compare even the least knowledge of God? "Those," he says 79, "who ascribe to themselves the teacher, hardly arrive at the knowledge of God, [even when] grace brings them help to any knowledge whatsoever: τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῖς συλλαμβανούσης εἰς πόσην ἐπίγνωσιν, inasmuch as they accustom the will to contemplate the will, and the holy spirit to contemplate the Holy Spirit; since the Spirit of God searches the deep things; but the natural man does not receive those things which are of the Spirit." ^C From the infirmity of human nature, therefore, he gathers that the grace of God is necessary for rightly knowing God in any way whatsoever.

Nor does our Clement assert most explicitly that only this true knowledge, but also continence—that is, that one should contain oneself in desiring—cannot be had without the grace of God. "What then," he says 80, "is [it], in our opinion, not to desire? It is not that one who is desiring should bear himself bravely, but that he should even contain himself from desiring. But that continence cannot be understood otherwise than by the grace of God. Ἀλλ' ὅπως καὶ τοῦ ἐπιθυμεῖν ἐγκρατεύηται. Λαβεῖν δὲ ἄλλως οὐκ ἔστι τὴν ἐγκράτειαν ταύτην ἢ χάριτι τοῦ Θεοῦ. And therefore he said: 'Ask, and it shall be given [you].'" ^D You hear, therefore, that we can never attain to that continence—or abstinence from desiring—without the grace of God, as Clement most explicitly speaks.

Come now, and hear how the same author of ours discourses on how, by His help and aid, we overcome even the graver temptations: "If anyone," he says 81, "should disputatiously say: 'And how is it possible that the weak flesh should resist the powers and spirits of the dominions?' let him know this, that it is [by] relying on the omnipotent [God] and Lord, and having confidence in Him, that we oppose the powers of darkness and death." To him who objects, therefore, [asking] how weak flesh can conquer temptations, resist the devil, and constantly endure torments for the confession of Christ, he does not answer that this is placed in the power of our free will, or that this does not surpass the strength of the human mind and nature: but ὅτι τῷ Παντοκράτορι καὶ τῷ Κυρίῳ θαῤῥοῦντες, having certain confidence in the Omnipotent and the Lord, who will bring help to the infirmity of our flesh by His grace, and will aid us with His omnipotent help.

And indeed, how would he have said that temptations could be conquered without the grace of God, when he himself, against the Basilidians, shows that faith, which is the foundation of all good actions, is by no means, as they prated, natural, or instilled in us by nature, but is the true grace of God and a gift freely granted to us by Him? For after he has utterly overturned that error of the heretics by various arguments, he then concludes 83: "That which is science, is a demonstrative habit; but faith is grace, ἡ πίστις δὲ χάρις." But previously, in the same manner, he had said: "For the teaching of piety is a gift, but faith is grace: Δωρεὰ γὰρ ἡ διδασκαλία τῆς θεοσεβείας, χάρις δὲ ἡ πίστις."

The false opinion of the Greeks—that is, the pagans—not at all unlike this, he later strikes down and destroys with these words 85: "It is not, therefore, he says, faith to be reprehended rashly, as [if it were] easy and common, and [something] that belongs to anyone. For if it were a human pursuit, as the Greeks think, it would have been extinguished long ago. But if it increases, it is not [a thing] where it is not. I say, therefore, that faith, whether it is founded by charity, or even by fear, as the accusers say—is something divine, so that it is neither pulled away by other mundane friendship, nor dissolved by present fear." Faith, therefore, which Clement says 86 "is the principle of action and the foundation of a good election," if it be a gift and grace of God, who would dare to deny that he was wholly persuaded that it is not acquired by our works, merits, or strength alone, but is infused and inspired in us by God, that is, by His divine gift?

Furthermore, our Clement defines the grace of God as being, besides, most evidently necessary for any good actions whatsoever, yet in such a way that he urges the free will of our mind to act along with it for the performing of a good work, and to confer its own labor with it. Hear, I entreat you, his words and turn your attention to them: "Neither," he says 87, "is it possible that we can attain anything without the free will and institution of our mind, nor is the whole [consequence] placed in our will, as to what is about to happen; for we are saved by grace, χάριτι γὰρ σωζόμεθα, but not without good works; but it is necessary indeed, since we are naturally apt for the good, to apply some zeal to it. It is necessary, [however], that the mind also be sound, and that repentance not be delayed from the hunting of the good, for which indeed we have most need of divine grace, πρὸς ὅπερ μάλιστα τῆς θείας χρήζομεν χάριτος, and [we need] right doctrine, a chaste and pure affection of the mind, and the attraction of the Father toward Himself, καὶ τῆς τοῦ Πατρὸς πρὸς αὐτὸν ἀλκῆς."

ἀλκῆς.

^A ...are manifest, so that even those who are not at all favorably disposed toward our Clement are forced to admit that he truly acknowledged the necessity of divine grace for doing good. And indeed, surely there is no one so dull and sluggish who does not see how clearly and perspicuously the necessity of divine grace and the corresponding operation of man acting with it are explained by our Clement in that place.

Furthermore, regarding his statement that "all utility related to life" — that is, any human action which is useful for winning eternal life — is accomplished in the supreme sense by God Almighty, the Father who presides over all, through the Son, who is therefore "the Savior of all, but especially of the faithful," as the Apostle says: how could all that utility, or good action, be accomplished by God the Father through the Son, except by His interior and divine grace, without which man can never do anything good or conducive to eternal salvation?

If you desire more, I pray you to attend diligently to those things which were handed down by him elsewhere in his writings: "It is clear," he said, "that honoring their good nature and holy institution, He inspires strength for the rest of salvation in those who have determined to live well, exhorting some, while bringing help to others who have proven themselves worthy of their own accord... Just as a physician provides health to those who bring him help toward health, so also does God provide eternal salvation to those who bring Him help, and cooperate with Him toward knowledge and good actions." But I would have you observe these words of Clement: "Those who have proven themselves worthy of their own accord," he is not saying that aid is brought by God to those who, of their own accord, or by the powers of their own nature alone, have proven themselves worthy; but rather to those who, acting as has been said with divine grace and effecting good works, have proven themselves worthy. For in that place Clement speaks of the "Gnostic," or perfect Christian, who is not only just with habitual justice, as they say, but who has also made the greatest progress in Christian virtue. ^B Therefore he added in that same place: "God honors this man also, assisting him with more immediate care." Clement therefore openly teaches that men are assisted to act well by God not only through exhortations or some external means, but also through interior grace, by bringing help to them, yet in such a way that they, like patients with a physician, cooperate toward knowledge and good actions.

Finally, a little before he had said of the same "Gnostic," that even if he should have ascended to the highest peak of knowledge, he nonetheless petitions God that his contemplation may be increased, and that he may always remain in virtue and justice: "He who has now reached the highest degree of knowledge prays that his contemplation may be increased and continue; just as one who is an ordinary man prays to be perpetually healthy. Furthermore, he will also pray that he may never fall from virtue, mostly assisting and giving effort so that he may perpetually remain of such a kind that he cannot fall." Now, whoever says that the increases of contemplation and final perseverance in goodness and virtue are to be sought and implored from God, surely considers this not to be situated in one's own power, but to be a pure gift and grace of God.

^C

ARTICLE II. Of the free will of man, and whether Clement attributed more to it than is right.

We have seen thus far how fully and constantly Clement taught the necessity of the grace of Christ, even to the admission of those who are least favorable to him, and how he openly professed it. But those same people, being poor judges of the orthodox doctrine of ancient writers and the Fathers, boldly accuse the same Clement of having attributed to the free will of man more than was right, and so having at times diminished the necessity of divine grace, and not having removed it entirely from the midst. But whether this accusation is just or unjust, must now be investigated.

Wherein, therefore, the free will of man, or human liberty, is situated, Clement defines thus: "It is in our power, being equal masters of the things opposed to it, such as to philosophize or not; and to believe, and not to believe. Therefore, by this, that we are equally participants in both of those things which are opposed to each other, it is found that that which is in our power can come to be. Moreover, actions of such a kind can be done by us, and not done, ^D regarding which it is consistent that praise and blame should follow; and those who are punished for the sins which have been committed by them, are punished for those things alone." In that place, he certainly says that the liberty of man is posited in this, that he can do something or not do it, and as Clement himself speaks, "believe or not believe," and "philosophize or not philosophize." Which indeed is that very thing which our Schoolmen call the "liberty of contradiction."

What "voluntary" is, he also explains as follows: "The voluntary is either that which is from desire, or that which is from plan and election, or that which is from thought: *To de hekousion e to kat' orexin estin, e to kata proairesin, e to kata dianoian*." But by these words, Clement rather explains whence and why something is voluntary, than exhibits an accurate definition of the voluntary.

However, in this explanation of human freedom, or free will and the voluntary, there is nothing clearly that is not sound or orthodox. In what, therefore, did Clement sin in explaining these things? Certainly in nothing. Wherefore I would have you spend diligence, to see where those morose men claim he has exceeded the limits of the true doctrine. They object to us that in three places something is conceded and attributed by him to the powers of the human free will more than is right. The first is taken from his *Exhortation to the Greeks*, where after these words of Christ: "Yours is the kingdom of heaven," Clement immediately subjoins: "Yours it is, if you will, by freely directing the will of the soul toward God; yours, I say, if you only will to believe, and to follow the compendium of the preaching." The second is read in the second book of the *Stromata* thus: "We, however, have received from the Scriptures that the power to choose and avoid was given to men by the Lord with a free and absolute power." The third, finally, was plucked by them from these words of the same book: "Defection, and withdrawal, and disobedience are in our power, just as obedience is also in our power. Wherefore those things which are voluntary are also judged."

But what, I pray, occurs in these three places which is not entirely consistent with the true and catholic doctrine on the free will of man and the decrees and sanctions established about it? Did our Clement state or assert there in any way whatsoever that we, without the divine grace of the Savior, can believe even the least thing rightly and in a Christian manner, or will or act piously and holily? Not at all. And it is so far from the case that he said or even thought this, that he rather openly declares, as we have seen, that the Christian faith is the gift of God. What, moreover, is the fact that he, as has also been observed by us, in the most articulate words asserts that the free will, which is in us, does not come to the knowledge of good, and is not raised to those things which are preeminent, without the exceptional grace of God? What, finally, is the fact that he teaches no less perspicuously, as we have noted, that the whole is not in our power, since we are saved by the grace of God? Many indeed others in the other *Stromata* of Clement...

occur in his writings where he speaks and disputes in the exact same manner concerning human liberty. However, since his doctrine is entirely the same everywhere, we have judged that time should not be wasted in describing them. Therefore, we shall present only this pronouncement of his, which is not altogether unworthy of notice: "To the wicked (that is to man) good is the greatest thing, which is not in his power." But how rightly Clement said that disobedience and any other sin is placed in our power, and how orthodox his sentiment concerning sins is, must now be carefully examined by us.

ARTICLE III.

Clement explains what sin is in these words, plainly and clearly: "Sin is certainly placed among actions, not among substances: for to sin lies in activity, not in essence. Therefore, it is not the work of God. Sinners, however, are called enemies of God, those who are enemies of the commandments, to which they do not obey, just as friends are those who do obey; the latter indeed by reason of conjunction, but the former by reason of alienation, they are called such from free choice of the mind. For there are no enmities, nor is there sin, without an enemy and a sinner."

In these words, Clement presents to us a notion of sin that is not altogether imperfect. In the first place, he declares that sin "is placed among actions," by which name he signifies that he is speaking of an actual sin, as they call it.

Afterward, however, by this very word "action," he understands not only that which is outwardly performed in deed and word, but also the very evil thoughts and depraved desires. For, to pass over more, by which he asserts that one sins in coveting, we shall merely put forward that which was pronounced by him: "The Lord searches the hearts and kidneys, and he is judged who has looked upon concupiscence." Wherefore he also says: "Do not covet." But in addition to these, Clement himself shows that this three-fold genus of sin—namely, by word, by act, and by thought—is clearly declared by Moses.

Thirdly, he openly teaches that sin is not a substance, that is, the very malice, or, to speak in the manner of the schoolmen, that which constitutes sin formally, is nothing at all of a physical nature. And indeed malice, or formal sin, as he himself implies, is a defect and a certain alienation from the law and commandments of God. For which cause, assuredly, sinners are there called by him enemies of the commandments of God.

Finally, he makes it plain that sin arises from free choice of the mind or the free election of man. Wherefore, in another book, we read these things written by him: "Immediately he who is bad by nature, having become base because of vice, has been established as evil, having what he chose voluntarily. But being prone to sin, he also sins in accordance with actions." Which indeed Hervetus rendered into Latin thus: "Now he who is bad by nature, since he has become a sinner on account of vice, is rendered wicked, having what he chose. But besides the fact that he did not render this whole passage into Latin, he certainly seems to have interpreted the Greek phrase *kakos physei* not clearly and distinctly enough by the Latin words *natura malus* (naturally bad). But since the word *physis* in Latin signifies not only nature, but also character and natural propensity, therefore this whole passage of Clement can be translated thus: "Now, however, he who is bad only by character and natural propensity, has become a sinner on account of vice, and is rendered wicked, having what he chose. But since the same doctrine is everywhere entirely his, we have not judged that time ought to be wasted in describing them. Nevertheless, does one wish something shorter and more expressive to be brought forward? It is at hand: "Sin," he says, "is voluntary injustice. Injustice, however, is a voluntary vice."

180 Beware, however, lest you believe that no sin at all is recognized by Clement except the voluntary one. For indeed he himself confesses that there are many involuntary ones, which, even if not all, deserve to be called sins worthy of punishment nonetheless. For he warns us that murder and the effusion of seed are punished by the Mosaic law. But he adds that there is yet a certain involuntary sin, which was punished by a penalty similar to the voluntary one. But which is that, learn from him himself: "Although he also will be punished, as if on account of a voluntary act, if anyone should have transferred the passion to the truth. For in truth he is to be punished who is incontinent of the generative word, which itself also is an affection of the mind alien to reason, which approaches near to futile loquacity. The faithful chooses to conceal things in spirit." Hervetus confesses that he does not understand how it can be said that a man must be subjected to punishments "as if on account of a voluntary act," who "should have transferred a perturbation of the mind to the truth." He suspects, however, that Clement is speaking there of that man who, seized by some perturbation of the mind, rashly divulges our sacred mysteries, namely the Eucharist, which ought to be hidden entirely from pagans. But we fear that this conjecture of the learned man will not be approved by many. Which, that it may be more easily perceived, the Greek words of our Clement must be described: "Although even he will be punished as if for a voluntary act, if anyone were to transfer the passion to the truth. For indeed the incontinent of the generative word is to be punished; which also itself is a passion of the soul, irrational, near to empty talk. But the faithful has chosen in breath to conceal things." However, the whole difficulty of this place revolves in these words: *epi ten aletheian tou gonimou logou*. But Hervetus seems to have rendered the former ones badly, *traduxerit ad veritatem* (shall have transferred to the truth), from which hardly any sense can be elicited. Wherefore they can perhaps be better rendered, "shall have transferred against the truth." But what Clement means in other words by *gonimon logon* (generative word) is certainly more difficult to say. For although they read properly and word-for-word the same in Greek as they do in Latin, "generative word," yet what these signify is not more ready and easy to explain. Furthermore, for the sake of its explanation, observe, I ask, the word *gonimos* used by Clement previously, where he says: "Therefore the generative (or rather, the earth, as has been noted by others) is fruitful towards the casting of seeds." Which thus the Latin interpreter translated: "Therefore the fertile earth aids for the casting of seeds." And not badly, indeed. For the word *gonimos* sounds in Latin not only as "generative," but also "fertile." From which the sense of these words of Clement can be gathered here: He also "shall be punished as if for a voluntary act, who shall have transferred a perturbation of the mind against the truth. For indeed he is to be punished who is incontinent of the generative, or fertile, word, that is, he who does not contain the fertile word within the limits of truth. Which itself also is an affection of the mind, which approaches near to futile loquacity. The faithful, however, chooses to conceal things in spirit," namely, lest by excessive loquacity he should cross the boundaries of truth. If anyone, however, with Hervetus because of these latter…

^A remarks, persists in contending that Clement speaks of our sacred mysteries so as not to reveal them to a pagan, we shall certainly not resist his opinion, provided that he concedes that Clement is to be understood as speaking no more of the Eucharist than of any other mystery of our religion. For from either explanation, that which is relevant to our matter is equally concluded: that by Clement some sin is acknowledged which, even though it be involuntary, is nonetheless judged by a just punishment. For that thing, even though, when it is committed, it is involuntary on account of a perturbation of the soul, because this perturbation of the soul was nevertheless voluntary, therefore that sin was in its origin and in its cause actually voluntary.

Furthermore, into the substantiation of these points, that which Clement said in the same place can not absurdly be brought: "Proximity exists between—and they are distinguished—sin, misfortune, and crime, or an unjustly done act, ἀδίκημα." For he explains thus what each one of these is: "Sin is, for example, to live luxuriantly and intemperately. Misfortune, however, is to kill an enemy unknowingly. Crime is the rifling of tombs or sacrilege."

Besides this, Clement teaches elsewhere that there are two principles of sins: ignorance and infirmity. By the former it comes to pass that one does not judge well concerning those things which ought to be done; by the latter, however, that those things about which one judges correctly are not performed. "There are," he says, "two principles of any sin: ignorance and weakness. Both are in our power, since we neither wish to learn nor to restrain desire. But of these, one is that through which they do not judge correctly; the other, however, is that through which they are not able to execute those things which have been correctly judged."

^B There, however, I would have you note how Clement says that both sin—of ignorance and of infirmity—is in our power, and is truly voluntary, and thus is deservedly and justly punished. He assigns the remedy for both in the same place: for ignorance, knowledge and evident demonstration from the Scriptures; for infirmity, however, exercise according to reason, which is instituted and taught, guided by faith and fear. But in another book he added further remedies to these two: "By alms," he says, "and faith sins are cleansed; but by the fear of the Lord everyone turns away from evil." But we shall dispute later concerning faith and fear and other remedies for sins.

It is helpful in the meantime with our same Clement to note that sin, even though it flows from vice, κακία, is nevertheless distinguished from it as from an effect. "Vice indeed," so he speaks, "is on account of ignorance, yet it is not ignorance; nor are passions, nor are sins, vices, even though they proceed from vice." Finally, vice is said by our Clement to be generated almost by habit and custom, and "the Gnostic, or perfect Christian, knows well that only vice is an enemy, and brings destruction to those who advance toward knowledge."

ARTICLE IV. Concerning original sin, where incidentally concerning the sin of Adam.

181 How correctly Clement feels and disputes concerning the individual sins of men, so poorly is he accused of having felt inaccurately concerning original sin, which is common to all men. Moreover, there are still some writers of this age who accuse him of having not at all understood the nature of that same original sin. Whether, however, with justice or injustice this stain of error is branded upon him, it is now for us to explore ^C according to the duty that is incumbent upon us. They say, therefore, that he either speaks not sufficiently aptly and conveniently concerning original sin, or that he wrote without being entirely persuaded of it: "Let them say to us, therefore, where has an infant born sinned? Or how did he, who has done nothing, fall under the curse of Adam? It remains for them, therefore, as it seems, ὡς ἔοικεν, consequently to say that generation is evil, not only that which is of the body, but also that which is of the soul, on account of which the body also exists." And when David said: "In sins was I conceived and in iniquities did my mother conceive me," he speaks prophetically indeed of Eve as mother, but Eve was the mother of all the living; and although he was conceived in sins, yet he was not himself in sin, nor was he himself a sin. "If, however, anyone also turns from sin to the faith, he is turned from the custom of sin as from a mother to life; let one of the twelve prophets bear witness for me, who said: 'I shall look upon the first fruits for impiety, the fruit of my womb for the sins of my soul.'" He does not accuse him who said: "Increase and multiply," but he calls the first impulses and movements that come from generation, through which we do not know God, impieties. If anyone, however, says that generation is evil on that account, let him also say that it is good, insofar as we recognize the truth in it.

From this passage of Clement, which, that we might not appear to have concealed anything, we have represented in its entirety, some argue that that most learned man either completely denied the fault of original sin, or at least that he had not at all noticed it where it was most necessary, and made no mention of it. For do they not say, they argue, that he completely exempts the newborn child from it when he says: "Let them say, therefore, to us, where has an infant born sinned? Or how did he, who has done nothing, fall under the curse of Adam?" Clement thought, therefore, that no one had fallen under the curse of Adam unless after he had done something, namely, evil. What, indeed, of the fact that he appears to interpret the words of Jeremiah: "Cursed be the day in which I was born," and of David: "In sins I was conceived," in a clearly wonderful sense, so that to be conceived in sins is not to be conceived in the sin of the parents, which is transferred to the children, but in the very deeds and acts of the people who are sinning itself? And not only the heterodox, but also some Catholic men contend that this is indeed the true, but less orthodox, opinion of our Clement concerning the fault of original sin. However, their reasons and arguments have been proposed by us so sincerely and candidly that something has been added to their strengths rather than anything at all subtracted.

But before we demonstrate what is true or false in these things, and so that the mind and sense of our author might be more easily understood, it must be assiduously noted that he is disputing there against certain heretics, and ^D especially Cassian, who impiously proclaimed that both marriage—an invention of the devil—and generation, or any intercourse of a man with a woman, was an evil, nefarious, and wicked thing. These, however, in defense of their most perverse error, abusing those three testimonies of Jeremiah, Job, and David, added a fourth, taken from the words of the fourth book of Esdras: "Why was not the womb of my mother my tomb, that I might not see the affliction of Jacob and the labor of the race of Israel?" Wherefore Clement, so that he might blunt the weapon twisted by them from the same Scriptures, argues thus against them: "Let them say to us, where has an infant born sinned? Or how did he, who has done nothing, fall under the curse of Adam? It remains for them, therefore, as it seems, a consequence to say that generation is evil, not only that which is of the body, but also that which is of the soul." By which argument indeed he makes it manifest with these reasons and Scriptural testimonies, by which the heretics pro-

wished to claim that the generation of the body is evil, they were ^A also refuted and convicted of the same thing; for the same people rightly and constantly denied that the generation of the soul was evil and vicious.

But so far is it from the truth that Cassianus and his followers, against whom Clement disputes, believed in a depraved generation of the soul, that on the contrary, they themselves—as we have shown elsewhere—contended that the substance of souls is the nature of God. Yet what man of sound mind would wish to deny that this single argument, as they call it, could have sufficed for our Clement to utterly overthrow the absurd opinion of those heretics regarding the evil generation of the body?

Although, therefore, he may have said nothing at all there about original sin, yet from his silence it cannot be concluded that the stain of that original sin was either minimized or denied by him. For what, pray, if that most learned man was convinced that he had no need to resort to an exposition of original sin in order to refute these heretics? Or what indeed, if by questioning the heretics, he wished to force them, even against their will, to a public confession of original sin?

Nevertheless, you will urge that the words of Jeremiah be explained by him not as concerning original sin, but as concerning the sins and disobedience of the people. For indeed, says our author, Jeremiah brought them forth: "Not saying that generation is to be absolutely execrated, but taking ill the sins and disobedience of the people." But did Clement say that this was the only interpretation of these words—ones objected to him by the heretics—and that no other equally true one could be brought forward by anyone? Therefore, he brought this one forward, without excluding any other, because it alone was clearly sufficient to destroy the error of the heretics.

Moreover, to these words of David objected by the heretics: "In sins was I conceived," when he responds: "And if he was conceived in sins, yet he himself was not in sin, nor indeed was he himself sin," can he rightfully and deservedly be argued to have made any mention at all of original sin? For there he pronounced one thing for his own opinion, or rather that of the Catholic Church; and another against the impious invention of Cassianus and other heretics. And for his own orthodox opinion he said: ^C *Καὶ ἐν ἁμαρτίαις συνελήφθη*, "and if he was conceived in sins." But against the heretics: *Ἀλλ’ οὐκ αὐτὸς ἐν ἁμαρτίᾳ, οὐδὲ μὲν ἁμαρτία αὐτός*, "but he himself was not in sin, nor indeed was he himself sin." By which words our Clement surely declares—not obscurely—that even if David, as the Catholic Church teaches, was conceived in sins, that is, in original sin; yet it cannot thence be inferred by the heretics that he was in sin, or rather, was sin itself, in that sense, namely, in which they were foolishly prattling that the generation of David and of other men was vicious and corrupt, and that its author was not God, but the devil.

Finally, the response of Clement to the words of Micah seems worthy of no less attentive consideration. For the heretics were crying out that he had written in the book of his prophecy: "I shall see the firstfruits for impiety, the fruit of my womb for the sins of my soul." But to these, just as to the previous words of David, Clement returns two points. First, indeed, Micah—as Clement himself speaks—"Does not accuse him who said: 'Increase and multiply,'" that is, that divine prophet does not accuse God who, when he had said: "Increase and multiply," clearly signified that generation is not evil, as Cassianus and his supporters suggest, but good. Secondly, concerning Micah, and thus our author proceeds: "He calls those first impulses and motions from generation, through which we do not know God, impieties: *Τὰς πρώτας ἐκ γενέσεως ὁρμὰς, καθ’ ἃς Θεὸν οὐ γινώσκομεν, ἀσεβείας λέγει*." How, however, could Clement conclude from the words of Micah that he had said the first [movements] from it [generation] are evil, unless he had been fully convinced that man is born stained with original sin, from which, as from a fountain and first origin, those evil motions and perverse impulses arise, through which we do not know God?

Lest, however, the heretics should still persist, and in vain think that they could thence conclude that the generation of man is entirely evil and from the devil, Clement added that it is good insofar as through it we know God. For if we had not been born, we could surely never have known God. You see, therefore, how Clement, by destroying the heretics' perverse error concerning the evil generation of man, and by diluting their various reasons taken from sacred Scripture, has not remained entirely silent about the stain of original sin and its perverse effects, and much less has he denied it. Finally, even if he had completely omitted it in silence, because he could very easily solve and overturn all the heretics' cavils even without its mention, it could never be concluded from his silence, however profound it might be, that original sin was denied by him, or that its stain and blot was not recognized.

Yet, perhaps someone will rise up against us, and object that our Clement thought that the children of holy men, at least, were born entirely immune from original sin: "For those," he says, "who are sanctified, their seed also, I think, is holy." But in order for the true meaning of these words to be grasped, the whole passage must be set forth: "Those who say that coition—which they themselves also received from coition in order to exist—is wicked, how could they not be wicked themselves? But of those who are sanctified, their seed also, I think, is holy. And to us, not only the spirit must be sanctified, but also our morals, and our life, and our body. For by what reason does the Apostle Paul say that the woman is sanctified by the husband, or the husband by the woman?" There Clement attacks the same heretics as above, who used to dream that *συνουσίαν*, coition, or any intercourse of a man with a woman, was a sin and a disgrace. But Clement now refutes that ridiculous invention of an opinion, because the supporters of it themselves confessed that they were wicked. Furthermore, "of the sanctified," continues Clement, "their seed is holy, not indeed by that holiness by which anyone can either obtain eternal happiness without baptism, or receive remission of sins: but by such holiness as the Apostle writes of—the unbelieving husband or wife being sanctified by the believer." Wherefore Tertullian, concerning the mind of our Clement, said aptly enough: "The Apostle says that those born from a sanctified spouse are holy, as much from the prerogative of the seed as from the discipline of the institution. Otherwise, he says, they would be born unclean, wishing their children to be understood as being marked out for holiness, and through this also for salvation; so that by the pledge of this hope, he might support marriages which he had decreed should be retained. Otherwise, he remembered the Lord's definition: Unless one is born of water and the spirit, he will not go into the kingdom of God, that is, he will not be holy." But concerning these things, see more in Augustine, *De peccat. mer. et remiss.*, book 1, ch. 26; book 3, ch. 12, and elsewhere; as also in his letter 153 to Paulinus, where he seems to have praised this passage of Tertullian, although by some error or lapse of memory, the book *De monogamia* is cited in his text.

But come, let us now see how our Clement in other books acknowledges original sin itself in reality. Of those same heretics, therefore, whom we noted above, those who condemn nuptials to the hatred of the Creator, where he dilutes their objections, he demonstrates that it [the fall] is the death of the soul. But where, do you think, does he argue…

ment utilizes? With these very words of the Apostle: "And therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and through sin death spread to all men, ἐφ' ᾧ πάντες ἥμαρτον, in whom all have sinned."

But as to the manner in which all have sinned in Adam, he himself appears to explain it afterwards not obscurely, where he renders the reason for why the Son of God was made man: "It is certain," he says, "that the Lord also came to those who had wandered in their senses or thoughts; to us, I say, the Savior came; of which things, indeed, what was corrupted by our disobedience to the commandments, while we too greedily pursued pleasure, when perhaps our first-formed had anticipated the time, and had desired and failed of the grace of marriage not at the time." εἰς τοὺς πεπλανημένους τὰ νοήματα, εἰς ἡμᾶς, ὁ Σωτὴρ ἀφίκετο· ἃ δὴ ἐκ τῆς κατὰ τὰς ἐντολὰς παρακοῆς ἐφθάρη, φιληδονούντων ἡμῶν, τάχα που προλαβόντος ἡμῶν τὸν καιρὸν τοῦ πρωτοπλάστου, καὶ πρὸ ὥρας τῆς τοῦ γάμου χάριτος ὀρεχθέντος καὶ διαμαρτόντος. Clement therefore says that we wandered and sinned by disobedience, in our too greedy pursuit of pleasure, when our first-formed had desired the grace of marriage before the appointed time and hour, and for that reason had wandered.

It should be noted, moreover, that Clement there has added ^B *τάχα που*, that is, "perhaps," by which word he confesses that he is not entirely certain whether this is truly the sin of Adam, by which he anticipated the appointed time of intercourse with Eve his wife. And he certainly attributes this opinion only to some, and those, as it seems, heretics. And while this is neither rejected nor admitted, it makes it manifest that it cannot be concluded from it by these same heretics that generation is evil: "And if," he says, "when the serpent had taken the rationale of a cunning design from brute animals and had persuaded, say that Adam assented to the union with Eve, namely because the first-formed would not otherwise have used this nature, as some think; again creation is reproached with curses, ^C as something that made humans weaker by the nature of animals lacking reason, instances of whom are those who were first formed by God. But if nature had indeed led them, like brutes, to the procreation of children; but they were moved more quickly than they should have been, led by fraud, when they were still young, the judgment of God is indeed just against those who did not wait for the will; but the generation is holy, through which the world consists, etc." Whatever, furthermore, may be said to have been Clement's position on this opinion, it is certainly not obscure that he confesses that we sinned in Adam, and therefore are defiled by original sin.

Indeed, this can be established from what follows, nor entirely without merit, which we read written elsewhere by him: "Just as God is father of all by creation... so He wishes us, once converted, to be made as children, recognizing Him who is truly Father: so that we may be regenerated through the water, namely of baptism." But how can that regeneration of all by the water of baptism come about, unless from the death which was brought about by original sin? ^D But some one may say, Clement seems to deny original sin when he thus argues: "Job the just says, 'Naked I came out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither'; not naked of possessions—for this is both small and common—but as a just man he departs naked from vice and sin, and from the unformed image which follows those who have lived unjustly." For this was what was meant: "Unless you are converted and become as little children, pure indeed in flesh, but holy in soul, through abstinence from evil works, showing that He wishes us to be such as He also generated from the womb of water." But what, I ask, is there against the sincere doctrine concerning original sin? For Clement, after having discoursed on the perfect purgation of sins in the gnostic, teaches from the cited testimony of Job that he ought to depart from this world void and clean of vice and sin, especially of idolatry, in order to enter into the rest and eternal happiness designated by the seventh and eighth number.

Rightly indeed, you will say. But Clement says that a man departs from his mother's womb just as he ought to depart from this world void and immune of vice and sin. Therefore he acknowledged no stain of original sin. But I ask you to notice that Clement there gathers from the words of Christ that He wishes us, departing from this world, to be in reality such as He also generated from the womb of water, οἵους καὶ γεγέννηκεν ἐκ μήτρας ὕδατος, of the sacred water, that is, of baptism, by which all the filth of any sins whatsoever are washed away. What then does our author hint by these words, other than that we come forth pure and empty of sin from the waves of holy baptism alone, and not from the womb of our mother and genitrix?

It does not escape us that Nicetas the Metropolitan of Heraclea in his catena of Greek Fathers on this book of Job has reported the words of our Clement in this manner: "Naked of vice and sin, as if I were formed from the womb of my mother from the earth in the beginning, naked I shall return into it; not however of possessions, for this would be small and common, but of vice and sin, and from the dark idol which receives those who have lived unjustly." But it is not entirely certain whether Nicetas extracted these from the books of the *Stromata*. For he continues by adding many things from the same Clement of ours, which, just as it is clearly uncertain from where they were drawn, so also it can be not undeservedly gathered that these too were not taken from these books. Because, however, some of the things we have quoted occur word for word in the book cited by us above, though with some things interspersed and truncated, let us grant that all the other things written there were also in it. But what of it, I pray you, against original sin? Nothing at all. For the earth, indeed, from which we were formed, is that very one from which Adam was made by God. But who would doubt that Adam was produced from it naked and empty of all vice and sin? Moreover, in these things which we have transcribed from the *Stromata* themselves, Clement makes no mention whatever of the earth, and speaks only of the sacred womb of the water of baptism, by which man is generated freed and loosed from all vice and sin.

CHAPTER VIII.

On the creation and excellence of the world and all things.

ARTICULUS I.

De homine peccatore hactenus. De totius autem mundi ac præsertim primi hominis creatione, illiusque cum corporis tum animæ dotibus, quid Clemens noster animadversione dignius tradiderit, nunc expendamus. Primum igitur ille non solum aperte docet mundum et omnia, quæ ab initio totus ipse mundus complectebatur, simul nulloque

^A interval of time, to have been founded and created by God: but he also explains clearly why they are said to be created in the intervening times, as follows: The creations which were on different days, he says, were accepted in the greatest sequence; inasmuch as all things which were made, which were created at the same time with thought, would have honor from that which is older, nor would there be an equal estimation of them. Nor would the birth of each one have been declared by voice, if the creation were said to have made all things in a heap and at once. For it was necessary to have named something first as well. Therefore, the first things were spoken prophetically, from which the second things [arose], although all things were made at once by power from one essence. For there is one, as I think, will of God in one identity. But how was the creation made in time, if time itself was made together with those things which are? You see how he not only asserts, but also proves why all things were created at once, although in the sacred books of Scripture we read that they were founded not at once, but at a different time, and on various days.

^B Nor was Clement content to have said this once; he repeats the same thing a little later: Therefore, that we may learn that the world was begotten, but that we should not think that God creates in time, the prophecy added: This is the book of the generation, and of those things which are in them, when God made heaven and earth. For that "when they were made" signifies an indefinite utterance and one devoid of time. But this: "on which day God made," that is, in which, and through whom He made all things, and without whom nothing was made, signifies that operation which is done through the Son, whom David calls: This is the day which the Lord has made, let us exult and rejoice in it, that is, through the knowledge which has been handed down through Him, let us enjoy divine feasts. For the Word is called the Day, which illuminates hidden things, and through which every creature came into light and to generation. Clement brings forward another reason there why God created the world not in time, but all at once. But this reason ^C is confirmed by some testimony of divine Scripture, which in its sacred text is perhaps held not in the same words as in the context of our Clement, due to the carelessness of scribes. But consult the notes of Nobilius on these, if you wish.

Furthermore, as regards his opinion concerning the world and all things which were in it, that they were created by God not in time, but at the same instant and at once, he seems to follow Philo, whose words are these: Then, therefore, all things were founded at once. In which universal workmanship, it was necessary for order to be preserved, because of the future generation of other things from others. And again elsewhere: It is of rustic simplicity, he says, to think that the world was founded in six days, or at any rate in a certain time; because the whole world is a vicissitude of days and nights, which the motion of the sun, traveling above the earth and under it, necessarily produces. But the sun is considered a part of the heaven; so that it must be confessed that time is later than the world, since ^D it is an effect of the world. For the motion of the heaven indicated the nature of time. Origen also subscribed to Philo, and even Athanasius, and certain other Fathers of the Church. But above all, Augustine should be consulted in his book *On Genesis to the Letter*.

On the contrary, however, far more think that the world was made on distinct days, just as it is narrated in the book of Genesis. On which opinion, now approved by the common consent of almost everyone, the scholastic theologians are to be approached in book II of the *Sentences*, dist. 12, and in St. Thomas, Part I, quest. 74, art. 2; Petavius, book I *On the Workmanship of the World*, chap. 5, and the interpreters of sacred Scripture on Genesis.

ARTICLE II

Finally, Clement thinks that this word of Genesis, "day," by which God is remembered to have made heaven and earth, should be understood of His Son. But most of the Fathers interpreted not that, but the first words of Genesis, "in the beginning," of the same Son of God. See Origen, homily 1 on Genesis; Eusebius, book V *Preparation for the Gospel*, chap. 12; Ambrose, book I on the *Hexaemeron*, chap. 4, § 15; Augustine, sermon 1, on the Scriptures and elsewhere; Cassian, conference VII, chap. 7; Methodius, book *On Creation* in Combefis; Eucherius, *Questions on Genesis*; Gregory of Tours, book I *History*, chap. 1; Zacharias the Christian, book II *Consultations*, chap. 3, vol. Spicil. Dacher.; Aponius, book VI on the *Canticle*; Alcuin, interrogation 26 on Genesis and book II *On the Faith of the Holy Trinity*, chap. 14; Rupert, book VII *On the Divine Offices*, chap. 5, and book I, chap. 15; Peter of Blois, book *Against the Perfidy of the Jews*, chap. 5; Bruno of Segni, in book V of the *Sentences* chap., and others cited by Petavius, book I *On the Workmanship of the World*, chap. 1, p. 229, vol. III *Dogmatic Theology*.

If Clement believed that the world and all things which are in it were created at once and at the same moment, why then, you will ask, does he assert that man is inferior to the angels in time and clothing? Does he not indicate by these words that the angels were created before man, and therefore the world was not created at once, but by different intervals of time by God? But hear, I pray, how our Clement speaks of these things, and perhaps with no great labor you will understand that he did not contradict himself in the least. For these are his words: «And what is it, in which man differs from the beasts, and again the angels of God are wiser than he? And you have diminished him, he says, a little less than the angels. For they do not take the Scripture concerning the Lord, although He also bore flesh, but concerning him who is perfect and gnostic, who is diminished from the angels both in time and in clothing.» Therefore, Clement refers there to the opinion of certain people, who interpreted the cited words of the Psalmist not of Christ the Lord, although they could be understood of Him, but of the gnostic and perfect Christian, τοῦ τελείου, καὶ γνωστικοῦ, τῷ χρόνῳ καὶ ἐνδύματι ἐλαττουμένου παρὰ τοὺς ἀγγέλους, who is diminished from the angels in time and clothing. But although Clement had subscribed to this opinion, what of it, I ask you, against his opinion that the whole world was founded at once? For he is not arguing there about any man, nor about Adam, but about the perfect and gnostic Christian. But he says that this one is ἐλαττούμενον, lesser, and inferior to the angels in ἐνδύματι, "clothing," that is, the body, καὶ χρόνῳ, "and in time," undoubtedly because man, in order to ascend to the highest peak of perfection, needs a longer time than an angel. Which indeed will be clearer from what is to be said soon. Meanwhile, we will observe in passing that the common opinion of theologians, who think the world was created on different days, is now with St. Thomas that the angels were created at the same time as the corporeal creature, although many of the most ancient Fathers of the Church, not of the most intimate name, thought they were created before the corporeal world. If you wish to know their names, you can read them in Estius.

Moreover, the angels are not only superior to the "gnostic" and perfect Christian, but just as the "gnostic" is on earth, so they are in heaven, a most excellent thing-

præstantissimam esse palam Clemens pronuntiat: «In terra, ^A ait, res est præstantissima homo, ὁ θεοσεβέστατος, qui est maxima in Deum pietate. In cœlo autem res est præstantissima angelus, qui loco propius et jam purius est æternæ et beatæ vitæ particeps.»

Tametsi porro auctor noster angelos adeo excellentis et præstantis naturæ fuisse persuasum omnino habuerit, dicit tamen eos aliquando divino quodam eguisse dono, cujus adipiscendi gratia Deum rogare debuerunt: «Cum sit, inquit, unus bonus Deus, ab ipso ex bonis alia quidem dari, alia vero permanere precamur nos et angeli, sed non similiter.» Ait itaque Clemens nos, quemadmodum 185 angelos, aliquid a Deo postulare: «ἀλλ' οὐχ ὁμοίως, sed non similiter.» Quodnam autem sit illud inter nostram angelicamque precationem discrimen, sic ille edisserit: «Οὐ γάρ ἐστι ταὐτὸν αἰτεῖσθαι παραμεῖναι τὴν δόσιν, ἢ τὴν ἀρχὴν σπουδάζειν λαβεῖν· Non est enim idem petere, ut donum permaneat, aut ab initio, ut id accipiamus, contendere.» Quibus utique verbis ille satis perspicue declarat nos ab initio divinæ gratiæ donum a Deo petere, ut boni aliquid, quo cœleste præmium mereamur, agamus.

Verum ipsemet Clemens non minus clare tradit angelos, quos a creationis suæ initio gratia et virtute præditos fuisse pro certo ponere videtur, perseverantiæ donum, quo scilicet in ea qua conditi erant justitia perseverarent, tantummodo postulasse. Et vero cum ex eis aliquos, uti jam dictum est, et ex infra dicendis adhuc patebit, in peccatum incidisse fateatur, hinc quoque et alios ne similiter prolaberentur, et in bono ac virtute permanerent, divina gratia opus habuisse collegit, et professus est. De gnostico etenim sermonem ubi facit, hæc de angelis adhuc habet: «Novit aliquos quoque ex angelis propter socordiam humi esse lapsos, quod nondum perfecte ex illa in utramque partem proclivitate in simplicem illum atque unicum expediissent se habitum.»

Scimus quidem quibusdam visum fuisse eosdem angelos etiam postea quam in bono confirmati fuerint, aliquid obsequiis, quæ hominibus exhibuerant, meruisse. Sed huic Magistri sententiarum opinioni, jam dudum proscriptæ, nota erroris inusta est. Videsis theologos scholasticos in hunc Magistri locum, et in D. Thom. 1 part., quæst. 62, art. 2, ac Petavium tom. III Dogm. theolog., lib. 1, De angel. cap. 16, pag. 96 et seq.

Quanquam autem angeli, teste Clemente nostro, ejusdem omnes sint naturæ, ex illis tamen alios aliis superiores, majorisque ordinis et potestatis esse hunc ille in modum nobis exposuit: «Septem, inquit, sunt, quorum maxima est potentia, ^B primogeniti angelorum principes,» Ἑπτὰ μέν εἰσιν οἱ τὴν μεγίστην δύναμιν ἔχοντες πρωτόγονοι ἀγγέλων ἄρχοντες. Ibi certe Clemens ad illum alludere videtur vel Tobiæ locum; «Ego sum Raphael angelus, unus ex septem, qui adsumus ante Dominum;» vel etiam Apocalypseos: «Et a septem spiritibus, qui in conspectu throni ejus sunt.» Hos itaque, qui «ante Dominum» et in conspectu «throni ejus assistunt,» ait Clemens esse primogenitos angelorum principes. Quod quidem rursum hoc ipsiusmet Danielis testimonio confirmari potest: «Michael unus ex principibus primis,» Μιχαὴλ εἷς τῶν ἀρχόντων.

Quosdam vero his esse inferiores, et quæ sint eorum officia et munia, sic auctor noster alio in libro edisserit: «Hic est qui dat Græcis sapientiam per inferiores angelos,» διὰ τῶν ὑποδεεστέρων ἀγγέλων. Sunt enim jussu divino et antiquo per gentes distributi angeli, εἰσὶ γὰρ συνδιανεμημένοι προστάξει θείᾳ καὶ ἀρχαίᾳ ἄγγελοι κατὰ ἔθνη. Docet igitur Clemens et primo quidem angelos esse per gentes distributos, qui scilicet eis præficiuntur, et regnorum sunt tutores ac defensores. Ex illis autem unus procul dubio erat, de quo apud Danielem scriptum legitur: «Princeps autem regni Persarum restitit mihi viginti et uno diebus.»

Secundo Clemens testatum facit angelos esse distributos jussu divino et antiquo; quibus verbis innuere videtur illos non solum in veteri, sed in novo etiam testamento hæc obiisse munia. Denique addidit Dominum Græcis dedisse sapientiam per inferiores angelos. At eo sapientiæ nomine non aliud, uti infra dicetur, quam nonnulla gentilis philosophiæ certa ac veritati plane consentanea documenta et placita intelligit. Data porro opera ille per inferiores angelos, ea cum Græcis communicata esse declarat; ut nobis haud dubie tacitus insinuet alia, quæ majoris momenti erant, hominibus superiorum angelorum ministerio palefieri.

Illi porro nobis divinam voluntatem annuntiant non solum signo quodam corporeo, aut aspectabili figura, sed eam quoque in intimos humani animi sensus transmittunt: «Divina, inquit, voluntas in humanas animas transmittitur, dum qui sunt singulares divini administri ad talia opem ferunt ministeria.» Porro autem his ministeriis angeli sic homines servant, aut eis serviunt, ut eos semper reddant meliores.

Ea vero præter generalia angelorum erga homines ministeria et officia, non obscure Clemens noster tradidit ex iis aliquos «singulis» hominibus ad eorum procul dubio custodiam deputatos. «Per gentes, ait, et civitates sunt distributæ angelorum præfecturæ; τάχα δὲ καὶ τῶν ἐπὶ μέρους, ὧν ἐνίας ἀποτετάχαταί τινες Fortasse autem etiam ex iis sunt deputati singulis.» Vel magis ad verbum, «fortasse autem ex eis nonnulli quibusdam singulatim deputati sunt.»

^C At quamvis Clemens noster ibi dubius et hæsitans de angelis custodibus loqui videatur, de iis tamen alibi ipse ulla sine dubitatione suam tunc fert sententiam, ubi superius paganos scriptores ex sacris nostris auctoribus plura furatos esse ut ostendat, hæc de Platone habet: «Parvorum autem convenienter Scripturæ et minimorum angelos, Deum videntes, quinetiam nostri curationem et visitationem, quæ ad nos venit per angelos, qui nobis præsunt, indicans, non veretur scribere: Postquam omnes animæ vitam elegissent, ita ut sortitæ erant, ordine accedere ad Lachesim; illam autem eum, quem unusquisque elegit dæmonem, cum eo mittere vitæ custodem, et ut adimpleat ea quæ elegerit.» Vides itaque hæc non quidem de Lachesi, nec de animarum ante sui corporis exsistentiam electione, quod fabulosum utique et a paganis fictum esse putabat, sed de angelis hominum custodibus a Clemente nostro non dubitanter amplius, sed asseveranter et certo pronuntiari. Atqui si persuasum ille habuit isthæc de iisdem angelis a Platone «κατὰ τὴν γραφήν, secundum Scripturam,» et ei convenienter fuisse litteris consignata, nullus ipse profecto ^D dubitavit unicuique homini ab ipso vitæ suæ exordio angelum quempiam, qui eum custodiat et tueatur, a Deo fuisse addictum ac præpositum. Illum porro Clementis locum, ab Eusebio descriptum et citata ab eodem Clemente Platonis verba in ejusdem philosophorum coryphæi invenies operibus tom. II, libro x De republ., pag. 617.

^A And from there he himself concludes that the knowledge of providence and sublime truths flowed forth to men. But to whom will these things be credible? For how could depraved angels have been able to lie with women, unless they themselves are said to have been of a corporeal nature? Furthermore, how is it maintained by Clement that they instructed women with true teachings, since other writers consider it far more probable that those same wicked angels enticed and led them into error, and especially into the sins of idolatry and lust? But we have already sufficiently argued about these matters elsewhere, as has been noted.

Finally, where Clement mentions that many things outside the common and natural order of events were performed by these same wicked angels, or through their operations, he set down these words in the same place: ^B "They suppose, however, it makes no difference whether we call these souls, τὰς ψυχάς, gods or angels. Indeed, those skilled in their doctrines have placed almost all the tombs of the dead in many temples, as if they were statues of gods, calling their souls demons, and teaching that they are worshiped by men, because they received power from divine providence on account of the purity of their lives to discharge the ministry to men in the place which is around the earth. For they knew that some souls are held by a corporeal nature. But when we discuss angels, we shall speak of this in its own time." Clement notes that this was the opinion of the pagans, that demons are the souls of dead men, but the souls of the pious, which to be of aid and assistance to other men, haunted the place which is around the earth. But Tatian, as we have said elsewhere, reports and refutes this error.

Our author, however, as to what he feels about this opinion, since it did not contribute to his own subject, was content to send us to another of his own writings, passing it over in silence. For he puts it thus: "But concerning these things, we shall discourse in the treatise *On Angels* as the Scripture proceeds in due time." Whether he ever fulfilled his promise, or whether he was not permitted by leisure to keep his word and bring that treatise to light, no one, we suppose, could easily say. But if that writing of our author *On Angels* were still extant, we would have much more certainty regarding what he thought about them and their nature, gifts, and offices. ^C The opinions of the pagans concerning angels were briefly touched upon by Joan. Anton. Venerius in his book *On Oracles and Divinations of the Ancients*, chapters 3 and 4.

But it is more singular that Clement adds incidentally concerning these same angels: "Those angels," he says, "who had obtained the heavenly lot, having fallen into pleasures, announced secrets to women, and whatever had come to their knowledge, while other angels concealed it, or rather reserved it for the coming of the Lord, from whence flowed the doctrine of providence and the revelation of sublime things." In a few words there, Clement divulged many things about the wicked and apostate angels, which many will not unjustly think cannot escape the mark of falsehood and error. For he says ^D that before prophecy was handed down to the Greeks—that is, before the Greeks had received anything from our sacred writings—angels, having undoubtedly fallen into corporeal pleasures, revealed to the women with whom they had had relations secrets and all those things which had come to their knowledge, and which the good angels had concealed from them, or rather had believed should be reserved for the coming of the Lord.

187 ARTICLE III.

To descend from angels to men, it is pleasing to listen to our author as he explains how perfect in body and soul Adam was created by God. "Adam," he says, "we call perfect as regards his formation; for nothing was lacking to him of that which gives to man the character of form and species. But while he was being formed, he received perfection, and was justified through obedience. This was what was growing into a man, namely that which lay in his own power, that is, free will. But that he chose, and consequently that he chose what was forbidden, is not a fault to be attributed to God." Against this opinion of Clement, however true and certain, certain heretics objected

attempting to carp at it so cleverly and correctly, that he now answers them even further: "Hear from us that he was not made perfect in his constitution, but apt for the reception of virtue; for it makes a great difference to have been made apt for acquiring it." Clement therefore judges that Adam was formed by God perfect in that sense, not indeed such that He had adorned him with such a heap of virtues that he could progress no further; but that he was created in such a perfection of justice and virtue, that he was always apt for acquiring and receiving greater. And indeed, who is ignorant that Adam, after he was created by God, just as he did in truth sin, was also able to merit something by good actions, and for that reason receive an increase of grace and virtue? Nay, God even forbade Adam the use of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, as not a few of the Church Fathers testify, in order to provide him with matter for merit and virtue, and especially for obedience. Consult the theologians on St. Thomas, 1st part, q. 95, art. 4; Petau, Vol. II, *Theolog. dogm.*, lib. 1, *De opif.*, chap. 9, p. 340.

^B Furthermore, from these words of our Clement you will learn of what parts God created man: "He is composed," he says, "of a part that is participant in reason, and one that is void of reason; of soul and body, ἐκ λογικοῦ καὶ ἀλόγου συγκείμενος, ψυχῆς καὶ σώματος. But the body indeed works with the earth, and tends toward the earth; but the soul is exalted to God." He teaches, moreover, that this is far more subtle than the body, and perfectly simple and incorporeal, and therefore could not be submerged and extinguished by the waters of the flood: "The soul, which is a thing far more subtle, λεπτοτέραν, than the body," so he speaks, "could in no way be affected by water, which is coarser, διὰ λεπτότητα, καὶ ἀπλότητα μὴ κρατουμένης, ἢ καὶ ἀσώματος προσαγορεύεται, which because of its subtlety and simplicity cannot be overcome, and which is also called incorporeal." There is certainly no man who does not perceive how clearly Clement asserts that the human soul is of a nature not only spiritual and incorporeal, but also immortal. Wherefore, he no less clearly teaches elsewhere that it is the principal part of man, which is not at all generated by parents as the body is, but, created by God Himself, enters into it. "Επεισκρίνεται δὲ ἡ ψυχὴ καὶ προεισκρίνεται τὸ ἡγεμονικόν, ᾧ διαλογιζόμεθα, οὐ κατὰ τὴν τοῦ σπέρματος καταβολὴν γεννώμενον, "The soul enters, and the principal faculty also enters before it, by which we reason, which is not generated through the emission of seed." He adds that it is the principle of all our actions, by which every action of man is perfected. ^C And he shows this in this way. When man is first born, he receives the beginning of life from things subject to perturbations. Then the carnal and corporeal spirit, which is most prone to movement, obtains the faculty of nourishing, growing, and moving. And in this is situated the part of man, void of reason indeed, but animated, ἐψυχῶσθαι, and by the body it first suffers, καὶ πρωτοπαθοῦν διὰ σώματος, and through this body man feels, desires, rejoices, is angered, is nourished, is increased. Furthermore, through it he undertakes actions suited to him, which the mind has thought of and conceived, τὰ κατ᾽ ἔννοιάν τε καὶ διάνοιαν. But the faculty of reasoning and the principal part, τὸ λογιστικὸν καὶ ἡγεμονικόν, is called the cause of the human constitution, and it has the free faculty of choosing, in which is inquiry, discipline, and knowledge. "To that, however, all things are referred, and on account of it, καὶ δι' ἐκεῖνο, man lives, and in a certain way lives." Finally, with desires conquered, the principal part of the soul reigns, whence reason proceeds, βασιλεύει τὸ ἡγεμονικόν.

What wonder, then, if Clement affirmed that the soul after the resurrection is of no sex? "They themselves," he says, "by themselves are equal as souls; souls are neutral, neither masculine nor feminine; since they neither marry, nor are given in marriage." Ambrose, however, speaking about the soul itself, in whatever state it may be, writes in general: "The soul has no sex; but perhaps it received a feminine name for this reason, because a more violent heat of the body moves it; but it mitigates the impetus of the flesh by a certain soft and gentle reasoning of its own." Finally, to pass over many others, Gregory of Nazianzus in his oration on his sister Gorgonia writes these things: "And you have made that conspicuous distinction of male and female to be of the body, and not also of the soul." ^D Yet I would have you note that Clement recognizes in man a certain corporeal spirit, σωματικὸν πνεῦμα, through which he senses, is nourished, and grows. Moreover, elsewhere he says that in the "gnostic" the soul is corporeal, σωματικὴν ψυχήν, to which it "puts a bridle upon the spirit and the one experienced in reason that struggles against it." Nay, he himself says that the sacrifices of the Mosaic law signified the purification of the part of the soul which lacks reason, τὴν ἀποκάθαρσιν τοῦ ἀλόγου μέρους τῆς ψυχῆς, and that this was acceptable to God.

But we have noted elsewhere that certain ancient writers, from these words of the Apostle to the Thessalonians: "That your whole spirit, and soul, and body be preserved in the coming of our Lord," distinguished a triple substance in man, as Jerome says: spirit, by which we sense; soul, by which we live; body, by which we walk. Whether Clement subscribed to this opinion, and of what nature he believed this soul to be, so that you may understand, hear, I pray, what he handed down in writing regarding souls when he disputes against statues and images: "Souls," he says, "do not fall under sight, not only those which are possessed of reason, but also the souls of other living beings. But their bodies never become parts of the souls themselves, but instruments, as vehicles for some, for others indeed possessions, and for others they are in another way." You have understood without doubt how most apertly Clement defines any soul, even those of animals lacking reason, as not falling under sight, ψυχαὶ ἀόρατοι. Then their bodies do not become parts of the souls, τὰ δὲ σώματα αὐτῶν μέρη μὲν αὐτῶν οὐδέποτε γίνεται τῶν ψυχῶν, but are their ὄργανα, organs and instruments, yet in a diverse and disparate way. For of some they are vehicles, sedes, of others indeed ὀχήματα, carriages, and of others finally κτήματα, possessions, goods, and faculties. From which he concludes that the image of no soul at all can be made or formed. But of course it is not permitted to anyone from that to infer that Clement thought the souls of all living beings are not at all corporeal, but of a spiritual nature and substance.

What then, you will say, is the thought of him thus disputing, and what is his opinion and sentiment? It seems certainly to be no other than that the soul of any living being...

is not a part of that body; but is so included in it that it can neither be seen nor depicted by anyone. And truly, Clement is there discoursing concerning the rational faculty of animals, rather than the souls of men. But if you contend that Clement has there said that there is in men a certain soul, which is intermediate between his body and his spirit, or spiritual substance, and you establish this by strong arguments, then without doubt you will conclude that he has given his own support to the opinion of the ancients of whom it has been spoken.

However, I would have you take care most diligently ^A lest you accuse him of a ridiculous error, by which certain wicked men have in vain imagined that there is nothing in man besides a corporeal and mortal substance. For not only in these books, but in others, as we have already proven, our Clement himself teaches most evidently that the soul of man, or the spirit of man, is incorporeal, simple, and spiritual. And in confirmation of this assertion, that indeed could be brought forward which is said by him 78.79: "The soul, ceasing from the senses at night, is turned back upon itself, and is more a participant in wisdom." Our Clement had without doubt drawn this doctrine from the ancient philosophers. For by Tully, after the more ancient princes of the philosophers, it is thus proven 80: "When the mind is released by sleep from the society and thought of the body, then it remembers the past, discerns the present, and foresees the future. For the body of the sleeper lies as if dead; but the mind is vigorous and lives. This it will do much more after death, when it has entirely departed from the body. Therefore, as death approaches, it is much more divine." ^B But let it be said that Clement drew this from anywhere else, it is certain and most evidently appears from his statements that he was fully and deeply persuaded that the human soul is not of a corporeal, but of a spiritual, and therefore immortal, substance and nature.

In what part of the body, however, this soul is, and what its seat may be, Clement discourses as follows 81: "Rightly Moses says that the body is formed from the earth, which Plato calls the earthly tabernacle; but the soul, endowed with reason, is breathed into the face from above. For here they say the principal faculty of the soul is situated, *tò ἡγεμονικόν* (the leading part), interpreting the entrance of the soul into the protoplast through the accession of the senses, and that therefore man was made in the image and likeness. For the image of God is the divine and royal reason, the impassible man; but the image of the image is the human mind, *εἰκὼν δὲ εἰκόνος ἀνθρώπινος νοῦς*." The human mind, he says, *ἀνθρώπινος νοῦς*, or *τὸ ἡγεμονικόν*, the principal faculty of reasoning, has its seat in the face of man. ^C But if you should inquire more curiously whether Clement thought it to be fixed in the whole or only in some part of the face, *προσώπου*, we will answer that, just as we have said above, in another book he explicitly taught that its seat is in the brain. Let us add, if you like, that he perhaps received this opinion from Plato. For he pronounced most explicitly concerning the soul: "We say that this has its seat in the highest citadel of the body." But concerning this argument, and concerning the movements and modes of thinking of this same soul, we have disputed in the preceding dissertation, cap. 6, art. 2.

It therefore seems more difficult to Hervetus that Clement there proves man to have been made in the image and likeness of God, *εἰκόνα καὶ ὁμοίωσιν*, by this reasoning: *εἰκὼν μὲν γὰρ Θεοῦ λόγος θεῖος καὶ βασιλικός, ἄνθρωπος ἀπαθής*. ^D "For the image of God is the divine and royal reason, the impassible man." But truly, when this Hervetus did not sufficiently understand these words, he suspected that those two words *ἄνθρωπος ἀπαθής*, unless something is missing from the Greek text, had been improperly inserted into it, and for that reason should be entirely deleted. But that learned man had not sufficiently observed that these things are represented in the exact same way in Eusebius, who described this place of our author. Furthermore, that those are his genuine words, and not intruded into the text of Clement by anyone, cannot be at all obscure to anyone who considers it a little more diligently. For by these words *ἄνθρωπος ἀπαθής*, what other than Christ the Lord is designated, whom Clement says is the divine and royal *λόγος*, the discourse, or if you will, the reason of God? The sense of it therefore is this: Christ, the impassible man, and the divine and royal reason, is the first image of God; but the human mind is the image of this image. And that this is the true mind of our Clement can be proven from elsewhere not at all ineptly, because he himself wrote these things in another book in these words: "The image of God is his Word, *Λόγος*... but the image of the Word is man. The true mind is that which is in man, who for this reason is said to have been made to the likeness of God, assimilated to the divine reason by the prudence which is in the heart, and by that reason is a participant in the Word and reason." Elsewhere in the former place Clement added that it can be gathered from Moses that there is another assimilation and likeness of God in man, when, to be sure, he becomes endowed with virtue through the true worship of God and the diligent and perfect observance of his precepts.

This indeed Clement himself explains elsewhere more fully and clearly: "Perfect," he says, "is the inheritance of those who grow into the perfect man after the image of the Lord. But likeness, *ὁμοίωσις*, is not, as some imagine, in the human figure, *τὸ σχῆμα τὸ ἀνθρώπειον*, for this consideration is impious; but neither is the assimilation that which is handed down in the virtue of the primary cause; for this also is an impious tradition of those who expected the virtue of man and of God Almighty to be the same... To the likeness of God, therefore, he comes who is adopted into a son, and co-opted into the number of friends, from the fact that he is a co-heir of masters and gods if, just as the Lord himself taught, he has been perfected through the Gospel." It is certainly plain and manifest that Clement is there dealing not with that most important likeness and image of God to which man was made at his creation, but with that which can be attained in this life by the "Gnostic" man, or the man grown and perfected in Christian virtues. Nevertheless, he also mixed in something concerning the former image, which is naturally inherent in all men.

For he rejects and repudiates false opinions concerning this likeness of God, and rightly and deservedly proscribes that one first, which proclaimed that this likeness was constituted in the figure of the human body. For God would have to be called corporeal, composed after the likeness of the human figure. Which indeed Clement rightly contends is an impious statement. Wherefore, in another book, where he proves man becomes similar to God and his image by doing good to others, he has these things there: "For that which is to the image, *εἰκόνα*, and likeness, *καθ' ὁμοίωσιν*, is not signified from the body (for it is a sin for the mortal to be assimilated to the immortal), but by mind and reason, *κατὰ νοῦν καὶ λογισμόν*, by which the Lord seals both that likeness which is in doing good, and that which is in commanding." Again, elsewhere: "Is it not therefore, for that reason, rightly said that man was made to the image of God, not as far as it concerns the figure of the construction, *οὐ κατὰ τῆς κατασκευῆς τὸ σχῆμα*, but because God indeed creates all things by reason; but the Gnostic man, having been made, performs good and honest actions by his faculty of reasoning." But concerning these things, [we will say more] further on, when the complete perfection of the "Gnostic" man is treated.

At certain, Clement, just as he asserts in the *Exhortation to the Greeks* that the image of God is in the human mind, so also in these books of the *Stromata* he rightly denies that it is imprinted on the human body. That this was stated by Clement regarding that image which man received at his creation is clearly gathered from the things which have been discussed. Now, Augustine and Theodoret ^A ascribed to the number of heretics those who used to say that the image of God was in the human body. You may see, if you like, Epiphanius, who reviews and discusses almost all opinions regarding this question. Finally, Petavius discusses more on this, concerning which we have touched upon certain things elsewhere.

CHAPTER IX. De novae legis sacramentis.

Article I. On holy baptism, by which baptized Christians called one another by the name of brothers, and on its figures and images among pagans and Jews, and on the baptism of heretics.

Although Adam was created by God endowed with such great and excellent gifts of a sound and whole nature, we have nevertheless taught above that he, and we in him, sinned by transgressing the divine command of that same Creator of ours, and were cast down from that happy state. From this source and origin of all our ancestors, not only did a perverse and unbridled desire sprout forth, and a depraved inclination toward every sin, but from it also wounds were inflicted upon men, by which we are born wounded and even dead in sin, and afterwards we fall into various crimes. For the healing and washing away of those wounds, our Savior Christ the Lord instituted and administered many remedies, and especially the sacraments of His new law. But since our Clement has inserted into these books of the *Stromata* some things worthy of note, these certainly must not be passed over by us without some commentary.

Therefore, regarding baptism, which is the first of all the sacraments, as no one ^B fails to recognize, he asserts that we are regenerated as dead in sin: "As he says, we are regenerated through water," that is, of baptism. Wherefore he calls this same water of the divine bath the mother and womb of water, *μήτραν ὑδάτων*, out of which we are born pure and holy.

How, moreover, any sins of a past life are washed away and removed more easily and liberally by the sacred waters of this bath than those committed afterwards are washed away and removed with more difficulty, he explains with these words: "It is necessary to know, however, that those who fall into sins after the bath, these are they who are disciplined; for what was done before was forgiven, but what is born afterwards is cleansed away." It must be known, therefore, that those who fall into sins after the bath are they who are chastised. For what was done previously has been forgiven; but what is done afterwards is expiated. But what else does our author suggest by this way of speaking, except that the sins which were admitted before baptism are easily cleansed by the water of the spiritual bath alone; but those which are perpetrated afterwards are to be forgiven and expiated with much greater difficulty and not without chastisement? You may see, if you have the inclination regarding this matter, Morinus, book III, *De pœnitent.*, chapters 4, 5, and following.

After the reception of the sacrament of baptism, Christians used to call one another by the name of brothers. "Them," says Clement, "we call brothers, who have been regenerated by the same Word": *ἀδελφοὺς τοὺς τῷ αὐτῷ λόγῳ ἀναγεννηθέντας, προσαγορεύομεν*. The custom of which appellation, having arisen from the very cradles of the Church, grew and matured with her. Regarding this, Tertullian says: "But as to our being spoken of by the name of brothers, you do not, I suppose, defame us other than because among them every name of blood comes to be considered a sham from their affection. But we are also your brothers by the right of a single mother, nature, even if you are little men, because you are bad brothers. But how much more worthily are they called and held to be brothers who have acknowledged one God as Father, who have drunk one spirit of holiness, who from the same womb of ignorance have started forth into the one light of truth." Nor will you see things unlike this in Minucius Felix in the *Octavius*, Arnobius, and others. Yet Clement also teaches that all men are brothers under another title, namely that of the consensus of faith and works; and he confirms this by the testimony of Plato himself. Which, indeed, it should suffice to have noted in passing.

Furthermore, our Clement shows that an image of sacred baptism existed not only among the Jews but also among the Gentiles. And among the Gentiles, indeed, in that which Homer sang concerning Penelope and Telemachus in the *Odyssey*, books A' and Δ'. Among the Jews, however, because it was their custom that they were often washed in bed. But Clement aptly warns that these were clearly imperfect baptisms, since we ought to be clean and pure not in the bath, but in the mind. You might read, if you have the leisure and inclination, the book of the most illustrious bishop of Avranches, *Alnetan. quæst.*, chapter 20, page 268 and following.

But as pertains to the baptism of heretics, our same Clement concludes from the cited words of Proverbs that its water is to be regarded by its own author as neither fitting nor genuine. So also Clement speaks: "Then he calls out: Thus will it cross over strange water: the heretical baptism, not calculating it as proper and genuine water." ^C Then he acclaims: "For thus you will cross over strange water; regarding heretical baptism as not fitting and genuine water." The Greek word *οἰκεῖος* signifies the same as domestic and familiar, to which *ἀλλότριος*, alien, is opposed by Clement. Wherefore he seems to teach nothing else there than that the baptism of heretics is not of the true family and house of Christians, but of an alien one, and therefore neither genuine nor true. But what, I ask you, do these things sound like, other than that it is always evil and illicit, although it is not always invalid, as the scholastic theologians speak? But concerning this question, elsewhere. Meanwhile, you may see what we have noted regarding it in Ambrose’s book *De mysteriis*.

Article II. On the sacrament of the Eucharist and penance, and whether the latter can be repeated.

Although Clement has sprinkled a few things in these books of the *Stromata* concerning the sacrament of the Eucharist, which was especially to be hidden from pagans, he nevertheless openly ^D

^A teaches in the bread and wine offered by Melchizedek that there was a type and figure of it: "Melchizedek," he says, "king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who gave wine and bread as a sanctified nourishment in type of the Eucharist." Meλxiseδέx βασιλεὺς Σαλήμ, ὁ ἱερεὺς τοῦ Θεοῦ ὑψίστου, ὁ τὸν οἶνον καὶ τὸν ἄρτον τὴν ἡγιασμένην διδοὺς τροφήν, εἰς τύπον εὐχαριστίας. Weigh these words of Clement with us for a moment, I pray. He said that the wine and bread offered by Melchizedek were a figure of the Eucharist; yet he himself calls that same wine and bread, τροφὴν ἡγιασμένην, without hesitation, sanctified nourishment. But if it was a simple and naked figure of the Eucharist, Clemens being witness, as a sanctified nourishment, it must surely have been persuaded to him that this sacrament of the Eucharist is far more outstanding and excellent than the type by which it was figured. In what, I ask, would this excellence consist, unless in the fact that the sacrament of the Eucharist is no longer a mere figure, but truly embraces a far more sacred food, namely the body and blood of Christ? And that this is indeed the mind of our Clement, even if explained a little obscurely, can be gathered not at all unjustly from those things which we have disputed above. Did not Ambrose also argue in this same way? "You have known things more outstanding; for light is better than shadow; truth than figure; the body of the Author than manna from heaven," which manna indeed was a type and figure of the Eucharist. Finally, Clement names the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, both here and in the passage soon to be cited, by the sole and simple name of εὐχαριστία (Eucharist). But it had been so named previously by Ignatius, bishop of Antioch.

Furthermore, regarding the institution of the Eucharist, Clement proves that the commands of the Lord must be known before they are observed, in this way, which is worthy of note: "Therefore the Savior, when He had taken bread, spoke first, and gave thanks: ἄρτον λαβών, πρῶτον ἐλάλησεν, καὶ εὐχαρίστησεν. Then when He had broken the bread, He set it forth, that we might eat rationally, ἵνα δὴ φάγωμεν λογικῶς, that is, by correctly discerning and turning the mind to that which we eat."

Moreover, our author testifies that in his own time the custom had gained ground that ^B after certain ones had divided the Eucharist, they would permit each one of the people to take their part: Τὴν εὐχαριστίαν τινὲς διανείμαντες, ὡς ἔθος, αὐτὸν δὴ ἕκαστον τοῦ λαοῦ λαβεῖν τὴν μοίραν ἐπιτρέπουσιν. "When some, as is the custom, have divided the Eucharist, they permit each one of the people to take their part." Dionysius of Alexandria also writes to Pope Xystus regarding this same custom: "He who has stood at the holy table and has reached out his hands to receive the holy food, and has received it, and become a partaker of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ." It is not necessary to collect here more on this subject, which could be confirmed by the countless testimonies of the Fathers, both Greek and Latin. If, however, anyone wishes to read their testimonies more curiously, let him approach Cardinal Bona's second book, *Rerum Liturgicarum*, chapter eighteen, § 3 and 4.

Furthermore, Clement ^C counts among the herd of heretics those who use only water in the Eucharist. Concerning these we have disputed in Book II of the *Apparatus*, dissertation 1, chapter 6, art. 1.

Furthermore, since such is the frailty of human nature that it falls into sin again and again, Clement teaches that of all those sins also which have been committed after baptism, penance is to be performed; indeed, not only, as he says, to generate pardon, but it is the will of God that he who obeys the commandments should be preserved, and be led to penance for his sins. He adds in that same place: "But forgiveness does not consist in remission, but in healing," συγγνώμη δὲ οὐ κατ᾽ ἄφεσιν, ἀλλὰ κατ᾽ ἴασιν συνίσταται. Forgiveness does not consist in remission, but in healing. What does Clement mean by these words, but that the forgiveness of sin is given by God, not only so that it may be remitted and medicine applied to it, but also so that it may be committed no further?

What other utility and fruit of penance there might be, he shows us thus from Scripture: "Rightly was that saying uttered concerning the penitent: 'You have chosen God today, that He might be your God, and the Lord has chosen you today, that you might be His people.'" He discusses many other things concerning penance and its necessity and utility, which, since they are everywhere obvious and easy for everyone, let us hasten to examine those things which seem obscure and difficult to many, and not altogether immune from error. Relying, therefore, on the testimony of Hermas, he says that penance, which he called in the book of the *Pastor* "great understanding," is first among those who, having been dipped in holy baptism, repent of idolatry and other sins of their past life. "But if they fall again thereafter after baptism, God, having had mercy on them, has given them one more penance that does not repent." However, there have not been wanting those who, in these words, imprudently cause something of the poison of the Novatian heresy to be imputed to our Clement.

But they unjustly, indeed, inflict this mark of more severe censure on our most learned author. For there he, following the aforementioned Hermas, speaks of public penance, which in the first centuries of the Church—as no one who is not entirely ignorant of ecclesiastical history is unaware, and which we demonstrated in our observations on the same books of Hermas and Ambrose—was performed only once. ^D Yet Hervetus urges that the error lies in this, that Hermas, whom Clement follows, asserts without hesitation that for men who have fallen into sin after the holy washing of baptism, only one penance is granted once, but that another is of no avail to them. Truly, Hermas considers that it does not avail and is useless in this sense; because at that time no one was admitted by the Church to a second public penance. Furthermore, we showed that the error of the Novatians consists precisely in this, that they denied that the power of absolving those who were penitent for their crimes was given to the ministers of the Church. But no one will ever prove that this was written or handed down anywhere by Hermas or by our Clement. Finally, Clement described those things which are objected from Hermas only in this place, and nowhere else. From all of which it is clearly concluded that he asserted nothing else than what was asserted by Hermas and other Church Fathers, namely that there is only one public penance after baptism.

Perhaps someone will insist: Does this not smell entirely of the Novatian heresy, which Clement added in the same place: "But this man also, who sinned afterwards, is then led to penance; even if he obtains pardon, he ought to blush; as one who is not to be washed again for the remission of sins." But our author is speaking there not of a second, but of the first public penance after the salutary washing. The meaning of his words, therefore, is that a Gentile man, or anyone else guilty of any sin, is washed and cleansed in the remission of sins by the holy water of baptism without any other pains of public penance. Wherefore he himself added in the same place: "Therefore, having been incited from the Gentiles and from that former life to faith, the remission of sins..."

namely by the sacrament of baptism; for this can never be repeated. Finally, when speaking of this man who performs that penance, he says: ἐὰν συγγνώμης τυγχάνῃ, "even if he obtains and secures forgiveness," in these very words he clearly defends and maintains the Catholic dogma; and thus he utterly overturns the heretical opinion of the Novatians.

Nor is it written less in a Catholic sense by him: "It appears, therefore, that it is not penance to ask for forgiveness often for those things for which we often sin," that is, the penance of such a man is held to be neither true nor sincere, who falls into the same sins for which he has often asked forgiveness. And yet, there is nothing in this famous maxim more trite or common in the writings of the ancient Fathers of the Church.

ARTICLE III. On the sacred orders of bishop, presbyter, and deacon, and how correctly they are distinguished by Clement.

That there are three sacred orders in the Church, of bishops, presbyters, and deacons, not only distinct from one another, but also from the rest of the flock of Christians, Clement declares so openly that the Centuriators, although it is known they were of a mind more hostile than well-disposed towards him, are forced to acknowledge it openly and voluntarily. And in truth, by the comparison of those same orders, he proves that there are various ranks among the blessed who enjoy eternal felicity: "For here also in the Church the progressions of bishops, presbyters, and deacons are, as I think, imitations of angelic glory and of that economy and dispensation which the Scriptures say those await, who, insisting on the footsteps of the apostles, have lived in the perfection of righteousness, according to the Gospel. These, raised in the clouds, the Apostle writes will first be deacons, then are to be co-opted into the presbyterate, a perfection of glory; for glory differs from glory, until they have grown into a perfect man." Thus he distinguishes those three ranks of the ecclesiastical hierarchy from one another, and teaches that some are superior to others.

Moreover, he distinguishes deacons and presbyters no less clearly from other faithful Christians. For a little earlier he writes that the "gnostic" is indeed a presbyter and a deacon, but only improperly and metaphorically, namely in piety, and in the integrity and holiness of his life, but not by ordination, as he who is not ordained by men. But it is better to hear Clement speaking in his own words: "This," he says, "is truly a presbyter of the Church, and a true deacon, that is, a minister of the will of God, καὶ διάκονος ἀληθὴς τοῦ Θεοῦ βουλήσεως, if he does and teaches the things of the Lord, not as one who is ordained by men, nor because he is considered righteous is he a presbyter, but because he is righteous he is enrolled in the presbyterate. And although he may not have been honored with the first seat here on earth, he shall sit on the four and twenty thrones judging the people, as John says in the Apocalypse." Certainly, the sacred order of presbyter and deacon cannot be more clearly and lucidly separated from the plebeian and remaining state of Christians. For however much, according to Clement, a layman and secular person might be perfect, as he says, a "gnostic," he is nevertheless distinguished from a presbyter and deacon, and is not honored with a first seat; for he "is not ordained by men," οὐχ ὑπ' ἀνθρώπων χειροτονούμενος, that is, he has not received from men the imposition of hands by which a presbyter or deacon would be inaugurated. From which it may further be gathered that Clement meant that Christians are initiated into the sacred order of deacon and presbyter by the laying on of hands.

Furthermore, he distinguishes the diaconate from the presbyterate, just as he discerns both so clearly from the episcopate, that the sect of the presbyterians, when they could not deny this, had their coryphaeus Blondel conceive a wondrous escape to diminish the authority of our most erudite writer. For he admits that this distinction of three orders was born from the usage of the Churches, which, however, he himself, in full voice, denied was instituted by God through the apostles, as Clement himself maintained. But where, I ask you, exists any word of Clement denying that this distribution was instituted by the apostles, or even doubting it? Where is any voice, or rather, where is any trace of such an expression or statement? Certainly, Blondel has produced none, nor will he ever be able to produce one. And there, you will rightly and deservedly miss the judgment of this same Blondel, a man among his own most acute. For what reasons, do you think, does he bring forward to prove his opinion? Certainly those which are of no strength at all, or by which he does not so much prove that the distinction of those three orders is denied by Clement, as that it is not admitted by him. For first he objects to us that Clement recognized only two 192 ecclesiastical orders, and no more sacred functions. Therefore, if that is the case, we say, surely Blondel himself falsely said that a distribution of a triple sacred order was admitted by our Clement.

He insists, however, and brings forward other words of Clement, in which he disputes thus about presbyters and deacons: "Similarly, however, in the Church, the presbyters preserve the image of the one that makes men better; the deacons, however, that which serves. In both these ministries, angels serve God in the dispensation of earthly things, and the gnostic himself." From this, Blondel thinks he can conclude that Clement recognized no more than two functions of sacred orders, the βελτιωτικήν (the corrective) of presbyters, and the ὑπηρετικήν (the ministerial) of deacons. But by this argumentation of his, it is concluded, against him again, that the distribution of the triple order, born from the usage of the Church, as the same Blondel admits, was not actually known to our Clement himself. Did Clement, then, contradict himself as absurdly as Blondel? Far from it. And certainly, if he mentions there only two functions of a double order, there was likely no other cause than that he had undertaken to prove that there was only a twofold service which is concerned with human affairs.

But come, let us press harder against Blondel, if you like. In the same place, Clement compares those double functions of presbyter and deacon with medicine and philosophy. Shall Blondel, then, or any other man of sound mind, be able to infer from this that neither other disciplines nor any other knowledge besides those are recognized by our Clement? Who does not see that nothing at all is more futile and weak than this argumentation of Blondel? Therefore, Clement was silent about the episcopal order in this place because it had nothing to do with his subject. But where he thought it necessary to make mention of it, then certainly, as has been said, he clearly distinguished that same order from the presbyterate and diaconate, as Blondel himself confesses.

But, says Blondel, he is ascribed by Clement to the "apostolic" grade as worthy of the "presbytery." Very well. For there Clement is speaking of Matthias, who showed himself worthy by the integrity and innocence of his life and morals to become an apostle. But what follows from this against the distinction of bishop and presbyter made by the same Clement? Yet, Blondel still screams against the presbyter...

^A of the first see, the *protokathedria*, and even the episcopal see and order, being attributed to him by our Clement in that same place. But that is entirely foreign to Clement’s intent. For nothing else is handed down there by him, except that the "gnostic" and righteous man is metaphorically referred to the presbyterate and diaconate. Though he may not have been honored with the first see in this life, he will nonetheless sit as judge and arbiter of peoples in the next. But there, Clement no longer compares the "gnostic" with a true presbyter. Suppose, however, that he had compared them: what would you elicit from that, unless it were that Clement ascribed to the presbyter some right of the first see—that of a deacon, of course, whom he mentions in the same place, and who is undoubtedly superior? And surely, since a little later he declares the bishop to be superior to the presbyter and the deacon, it must be admitted that another, no doubt higher, right of the first chair is assigned by him to the bishop as well.

Finally, Blondel objects that the youth to whom the apostle John had recommended a young man is called bishop and presbyter by Clement without any discrimination. So be it; if Clement used both names indiscriminately at some time, Blondel will certainly gain nothing from that, unless he demonstrates that the duties and functions of a bishop were ascribed by Clement to a presbyter somewhere. Yet Blondel has neither proved this, nor do we believe he will ever prove it. Add also that Clement could have called this bishop *presbyter*, or "elder," on account of his advanced age, as Pearson observes. Lastly, we have shown here and elsewhere that in our Clement, the episcopate is not only most evidently distinguished from the presbyterate, but the former is also placed by him before the latter, as being of a higher established order and dignity.

Furthermore, before we put an end to this discussion concerning the sacred ministers of the Church, it is worth noting in what honor they are to be held, since he wrote these things concerning the "gnostic," whom Clement calls a presbyter improperly and metaphorically, as has been said, and concerning the pagan priests: "This (gnostic) man is truly royal, this is the holy priest of God; which is indeed preserved even now among those who are most learned among the barbarians, who promote the priestly race to the kingdom." Regarding this custom of the pagans, see Strabo, book I of his *Geography*, p. 23, and book XIV, p. 633; Cicero, book I, *De Divinatione*, p. 270; Dionysius of Halicarnassus, beginning of book V, *Antiquitates Romanae*; and Casaubon on Suetonius, p. 101.

ARTICLE IV. On the celibacy of those who were initiated into these sacred orders.

Whether Clement believed that those inaugurated into those sacred orders, as we have seen, ought to be celibate, someone perhaps will ask of us, and not without good reason. For when that most learned man refutes the heretics who are haters and enemies of marriage, he fights against them with the authority of the Apostle: "He even admits the man of one wife, whether he is a presbyter, or a deacon, or a layman: κἂν πρεσβύτερος ᾖ, κἂν διάκονος, κἂν λαϊκός, using marriage without reproach, ἀνεπιλήπτως γάμῳ χρώμενος. But he will be saved through the generation of children: σωθήσεται δὲ διὰ τῆς τεκνογονίας." Will you not say that by these words Clement clearly signifies that presbyters and deacons, no less than laymen, were admitted by Clement, just as by the Apostle, as those who used marriage without reproach and labored in the begetting of children? Indeed, he says they are to be saved by the generation of children.

^B But why, I beseech you, have they hidden the subsequent words of Clement with a fallacious and fraudulent silence? For Clement continues: "Which he did not carry about, because there was no need for great service for him. 193 He says, therefore, in a certain epistle: Do we not have the power to lead about a sister as a wife, as also the rest of the apostles? But these, οὗτοι μέν, as was fitting, attending to the ministry which could not be set aside—namely, preaching—led about women, not as wives, but as sisters, who would minister together among women who kept the houses, through whom the doctrine of the Lord could also enter into the gynaeceum without any reproach or evil suspicion." Attend, I pray, and weigh with us the single words of our Clement. There he uproots from the foundation the error of the heretics who condemn marriage by the example and testimony of the apostles, for this reason, namely, that some of them, having been joined in marriage, had led about wives. But under what conditions, I ask you, did they lead them about, according to our Clement? He himself provides two, and most worthy of note. The first is that through them the evangelical doctrine of Christ might be disseminated more safely and securely among women living in private homes, to whom men could not enter without some reproach or evil suspicion. The second, however, which makes most for our argument, was that those whom the apostles led about with them, they held as sisters, without any use or commerce of marriage, even though that were otherwise lawful. Clement therefore thought that certain apostles, namely Peter and Philip, and also, if you wish, Paul—about whom, however, we shall soon dispute—had indeed married wives formerly, but with whom, after they were endowed with apostolic dignity, they lived a celibate life.

^C To this is added what our author later handed down in writing concerning Paul: "But if anyone wishes to be equipped and unencumbered, not wishing to beget children because of the trouble and occupation involved in rearing children, let him remain, says the Apostle, ἄγαμος, ὡς κἀγώ, celibate as I am." What could be clearer or more explicit than these words of Clement for asserting and proclaiming Paul's celibate way of life in the apostolate? What, indeed, of the fact that Eusebius, whom they quite rightly deem to have subscribed to the opinion by describing Clement’s words in his own, wrote these things in the same plain sense, not only about Paul but about all those consecrated to divine ministry: "The divine word, he says, dictates that a bishop should be the husband of one wife. Nevertheless, it behooves those who are consecrated, and occupied in the ministry of God, to refrain thereafter from the commerce of a wife."

^D Yet someone will press Clement, relying on the authority of Paul, in the passage cited earlier, as speaking of the marriage of a presbyter and deacon just as of a layman, and as having said that they are all saved through the generation of children. But when the celibacy of the apostles, and above all of Paul, is declared by him so clearly and assertively

^A, perhaps one might conclude not inappropriately that these latter words of his are to be referred not to the priest and deacon, but to the layman. For his meaning here seems to be this: Paul admits the man of one wife, whether he be priest, or deacon, or even a layman: "but he shall be saved," that is, the layman, "through the generation of children." This, indeed, was fully sufficient to uproot the opinion of the heretics who condemn marriage. Moreover, he declares that the man of one wife is admitted by Paul to the holy orders of the Church, that is, he who, having been bound to only one marriage, has never been a bigamist. Wherefore, contending against the error of those same heretics, he says: "When he appoints a bishop, he establishes a leader who rightly presides over the house of the Church. But he establishes the marriage of one wife as the house of the Lord."

Perhaps it may not be absurd to bring forward as a foundation for this explanation the fact that Epiphanius has testified that the ecclesiastical and apostolic canons were established concerning the celibacy of those who were initiated into holy orders. For it will be credible to no one that these were violated by our Clement, mocked, and held for nothing. Concerning them, indeed, Epiphanius ^B writes thus: "Moreover, he does not admit to the order of deacon, priest, bishop, or subdeacon him who still lives in marriage and is active in having children, even though he be a man of one wife; but only him who has refrained from the practice of having one wife, or has been deprived of her. This occurs chiefly in those places where ecclesiastical canons are strictly observed." But are there not still, in some places, priests, deacons, and subdeacons who beget children? I answer that this does not happen by the authority of the canon, but because of the sloth of men, who at certain times are accustomed to act and live negligently, on account of the excessive multitude of people, when, clearly, those who might apply themselves to these functions are not easily found. Who would dare to derogate from the faith of Epiphanius, who states these things so assertively? For he could not have cited such broad laws of continence and celibacy with such confidence unless he had read them with his own eyes, or had known them to be confirmed by witnesses greater than any exception ^C.

Truly, someone will argue that this is entirely weak and fragile. For if any laws were given concerning this matter, they could not have been sanctioned long before the times of Epiphanius. For no less, indeed, does he assert that subdeacons, just as others inaugurated into a higher order, are held by these laws. Wherefore, when he testifies that they are chosen from virgins, or from monks, or at least from those who abstain from their wives, he must undoubtedly be considered to be discussing the customs of his own time rather than those of previous centuries.

But this is incorrectly objected. For Epiphanius himself constantly affirms that this law was established by the apostles themselves: "He commends," he says, "singular marriages, as he has shown as if in a certain model that priestly duties and ornaments are to be communicated to those who have maintained continence after one marriage or have persisted in virginity; this the apostles then honestly and religiously decreed as an ecclesiastical rule of the priesthood." Furthermore, Jerome ^D not obscurely intimated that this continence of the holy ministers of the Church flowed not only from the apostles, but also from Christ the Lord: "Christ," he says, "was a virgin, the Virgin Mary dedicated the virginity of both sexes. The apostles are either virgins, or continent after marriage; bishops, priests, deacons are chosen either as virgins, or as widowers, or certainly as chaste after their priesthood." But if you contend that Jerome was then carried away by the heat of the dispute against heretics, and that even by Epiphanius a false and apocryphal law is cited, your opinion, if you have proven it correctly, may remain yours. Furthermore, I have touched upon something regarding that celibacy of the holy ministers of the Church in our Ambrosian observations. But this argument is treated copiously by many, by holy Fathers like Jerome, especially in his *Contra Jovinianum* book I, page 27, etc., by the scholastic theologians in *IV Sentent.*, distinct. 37, and 194 D. Thom. 2-2, quæst. 88, art. 11; by controversialists like Bellarmine *lib. I De cleric.*, cap. 18 and following; by historians, such as Baronius to the year of Christ 58, num. 12 and following; by interpreters of holy Scripture in *II ad Timoth.* cap. II, and other critical authors; Thomassin vol. I *Discipl. eccles.*, part 1, lib. II, c. 23; Godefroy in *leg. 44, tit. De episc.*, etc., vol. VI, page 86 and following, and others.

ARTICLE V. Of the wife and daughter of Peter.

What we have seen ordered in writing above by Clement concerning three apostles, Peter, Philip, and Paul, these things must now be examined individually. Therefore, concerning Peter and Philip he has this: Πέτρος μὲν καὶ Φίλιππος ἐπαιδοποιήσαντο — "Peter and Philip procreated children." But Peter, with Epiphanius as witness, had taken a wife from the town of Capharnaum: "He, born of Bethsaida, from the town of Capharnaum, had taken a wife, which two towns are not far separated from each other." Elsewhere, however, he writes that she was taken by Peter before he was called to the apostolate by Christ the Lord: "Having already taken a wife," he says, "when he also had children and a mother-in-law, he attached himself to Christ from the ceremonies of the Jews." Wherefore Jerome fights thus against Jovinian: "Peter and other apostles, to grant him this much for the time being, indeed had wives, but such as they had taken at a time when they did not know the Gospel. Those who were later assumed into the apostolate, leave the marital office. For when Peter says to the Lord in the person of the apostles: 'Behold, we have left all, and have followed thee,' the Lord answered him: 'Amen I say to you, there is no man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the kingdom of God's sake, who shall not receive much more in this present time, and in the world to come life everlasting.'" And in epistle 34 to Julian: "And Peter had a wife, and yet he left her with the net and the boat." To be numbered among these is the author of *Quaestiones Veteris et Novi Testamenti*, who recorded these things concerning the same Peter: "And that something may be said in this place concerning the apostles, which pertains to the strength of the cause, surely saint John was a guardian of chastity; but his fellow-disciple, that is, saint Peter, is known to have had a wife, and this did not hinder the procreation of children for him to receive the primacy among the apostles."

That the name of Peter's daughter was Petronilla is held by various Acts of the martyrs, just as the Martyrologies pertain. But what faith is to be had in them, you will learn from Baronius to the year of Christ 69, num. 32 and 33, and from Bolland for May 12 in the *Acta SS. Nerei et Achillei*, c. 14, page 10 and 14, to May 31, page 420. In the same Acts of SS. Nereus and Achilleus we read that the same Petronilla, suffering from palsy, was healed by her very father Peter. Truly, Augustine declares that this was drawn from the apocryphal books and proven by the Manichaeans who deny other things about Peter: "Which, although," he says, "they blame with great blindness, when they read it as great in the apocrypha and..."

attributed by Tertullian and others to it." But Rufinus argues that the Greek author did not represent the text in his Latin version. Nor has Valesius warned us that in any Greek codex of the Eusebian history it is found otherwise than as transcribed by him. Indeed, he desires there the good faith of Christophorson, who substituted one of the seven deacons for one of the twelve apostles.

The same story is told by Nicephorus, but after Eusebius, who, when he had judged it worthy of mention, is judged by Baronius to contain nothing inconsistent with the truth.

ARTICLE VI.

As far as concerns the apostle Philip, that he begat daughters and subsequently gave them in marriage, Clement affirms without hesitation. But both points create no small difficulty for learned men. It is indeed certain, and established by the book of the Acts of the Apostles, that Philip had four daughters, of whom we read there: "Entering the house of Philip the evangelist, who was one of the seven, we stayed with him. And this man had four virgin daughters who were prophetesses." But this Philip is there called "evangelist" and "one of the seven," undoubtedly among the first deacons of the Church, and therefore entirely different from the apostle Philip.

Wherefore ^A some accuse our Clement of a lapse of memory in this matter, because he confused this Philip the deacon with the apostle. And for the confirmation of their opinion, they bring forward the testimony of Jerome, who does not think it can be proven that any of the apostles, except Peter, were virgins. But others easily answer them that Jerome’s meaning is manifest to everyone from his own previous words. For he says: "Now our whole struggle is concerning the canon (of sacred Scripture, that is)." Therefore, from Scripture alone, says the holy doctor, no one will be able to prove that any of the apostles, except Peter, were not virgins.

Conversely, some think that the text of Eusebius was corrupted in that place, because the narrative of Caius concerning Philip, which is added in that place, can only be understood of the deacon. But to this, indeed, Eusebius signifies that it is fully consistent with the words cited above from the book of the Acts of the Apostles. Yet in that sacred book, Philip is declared to be an evangelist. ^B The knot of this not minor difficulty some attempt to cut rather than untie, when they respond that the apostle Philip was truly different from the deacon Philip, and that therefore the daughters of both are to be distinguished; so that the four daughters of the deacon Philip rested in Caesarea in Palestine; but of the other three, who were the daughters of the apostle Philip, two are buried in Hierapolis in Phrygia, and the third in Ephesus in Asia. But if this response and opinion of theirs is true, they surely free our Clement, whether they wish it or not, from the inflicted error of transposition. For they will no longer be able to say that the daughters of the apostle Philip are confused with the daughters of the deacon of the same name.

But certainly many accuse the same author of ours of being guilty of a more serious error, because he asserts that the daughters of the apostle Philip, whom Polycrates testifies remained virgins, were given in marriage by their father. Yet this is not fully and entirely elicited from the words of Polycrates. For indeed concerning the third daughter of Philip, he speaks thus: "She led a certain spiritual life." But these words do not signify that she was always a virgin. ^C Indeed, because Eusebius there expressly said that her two sisters "grew old in virginity," it is not ineptly gathered that Eusebius was persuaded that she had embraced a different way of life and had been at some time joined in marriage.

However, we voluntarily leave it to others, who may judge it more true and equitable, to decide upon this truly obscure question. Let it suffice for us to have noted that the opinion of our Clement is so strengthened and established by the authority of Polycrates that many writers, both Greek and Latin, being thoroughly convinced by it, have believed that these were the daughters begotten by the apostle Philip. But if anyone shall show by stronger arguments that they all persevered in the state of virginity, we do not in the least forbid others from giving their assent to him.

Not a little difficulty also resides in that which Clement said in the last place concerning the apostle Paul: "He does not fear in a certain epistle to call his consort." For although it has been proven by us above that Paul passed a celibate life during the times of his apostleship, it still remains to be inquired whether he had in fact taken a wife at some time before. But if we have faith in Origen, there were two opinions of the most ancient authors on this matter: "Paul therefore," he says, "as some hand down, was called with a wife, concerning whom he speaks, writing to the Philippians: 'I ask also of you, true yokefellow, assist those who are with her.' Therefore, having become free by mutual consent, he calls himself a servant of Christ. But if, as it seems to others, he was without a wife, nevertheless whoever is free..."

^A from this, he is a servant of Christ. And so, if Origen gathered Clement into the number of the defenders of the former opinion, we may not unjustly infer from his own words that these are the words of Paul, by which Clement thought his own wife was being addressed. But these are taken from his Epistle to the Philippians, where in place of the word *germana* (sister), *germane* (sincerely) is now read. However, because Clement designates no epistle of Paul by name, who can definitely determine whether these are cited from him? But what of the fact that Theodoret severely censures those who think that Paul in the cited passage made mention of his wife? However that may be, Eusebius was certainly persuaded that Clement, in the words we have cited, “enumerated the apostles,” namely Paul, just as Peter and Philip, “who had wives.”

But surely, on the contrary, does not Clement deny that Paul was ever joined in marriage, where, after he had discoursed about spouses and those joined in matrimony, he immediately subjoined: "But if anyone wishes to be unencumbered, not choosing procreation because of the occupation in procreation, let him remain, says the Apostle, unmarried, as I am." But if anyone nevertheless contends and demonstrates with certain arguments that Clement was there speaking only of the celibate life of Paul, exercising the office of the apostolate, he may remain in his own opinion. Let him know, however, that very few have supported him. For most writers, and primarily Tertullian, Jerome, Epiphanius, Augustine, and other interpreters of the Pauline epistles—Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, and very many others, both ancient and recent—think that the same apostle was *agamos* (unmarried) in such a way that he never entered into any marriage.

ARTICLE VII.

On the supreme perfection of the apostles after the resurrection of Christ.

^C Whether the apostles, while they lived in this mortal life, reached the highest peak of Christian perfection—that Clement makes this plain, he first observes that perfection is accepted in many ways, just as he is perfect who behaves himself in any one virtue; so that someone in some singular virtue, such as piety, continence, religion, or tolerance, may be perfect and accomplished. Then Clement confesses that he does not know if anyone besides Christ the Lord was ever perfect and fully adorned with all virtues at the same time. Third, he teaches that there is another class of perfect men, namely those with gifts of the Holy Spirit, of whom the Apostle writes to the Corinthians: "To one is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith in the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings in the same Spirit, to another the working of powers, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another kinds of languages, to another the interpretation of languages." From which Clement concludes that some were perfect in prophecy, the just in justice, martyrs by confession, and others in other gifts: but the Apostles, he says, were full in all, ^D that is to say, in the aforementioned gifts of the Holy Spirit. Wherefore he immediately subjoins: "You will find, therefore, if you wish, from their deeds and writings the knowledge, life, and preaching, justice, chastity, prophecy." That this was his mind is clear from the fact that earlier, as we have seen, he said that only Christ was perfect in all virtues at the same time. Indeed, the doctrine of Augustine was the same, who, against the Pelagians, demonstrates that except for Christ the Lord, no one has ever been a man, not even Paul himself, in this mortal life, free from all sin whatsoever. Which, when he had proven abundantly in book II *On the Merits and Remission of Sins*, he thus concludes: "It can therefore happen, as I have said, that there is now some perfect hearer of wisdom whose perfect teacher is not yet [granted]; he can be a perfect knower of justice, not yet a perfect performer. When, therefore, the perfection of anyone is read in the Scriptures, one should not look carelessly at what point it is said; for one is not therefore understood to be entirely without sin because he is said to be perfect in some thing." Again, however, in another book it is read: "A man is indeed read to be 'without crime,' he is read to be 'without reproach'; but he is not read to be 'without sin,' except the Son of Man, one and the same only-begotten Son of God, etc." Wherefore he elsewhere refutes and attacks the error of the Pelagians thus: "The Pelagians, new heretics, seem to themselves to be religious lovers and praisers of the saints, if they do not dare to say that they were of imperfect virtue; since the vessel of election himself confesses this, who, considering where he still was, and that the body which is corrupted weighs down the soul—'Not that I have already attained,' he says, 'or am already perfect, brothers, I do not consider myself to have comprehended.' And yet a little later, he who had denied himself to be perfect: 'As many as are perfect, therefore, let us be of this mind,' he says; to show that according to the manner of this life there is a kind of perfection, and to that perfection this is also ascribed, that everyone should know he is not yet perfect, etc." These things he pursues more fully later. To that book, therefore, if you wish for more, we send you, and to the theologians in *Sententiae*, distinction 41, and St. Thomas 2-2, question 184, art. 2, and 1-2, question 109, art. 8.

But we seem to hear some, not only muttering secretly, but even openly objecting that Clement clearly and plainly taught that the apostles after the Lord’s resurrection were henceforth subject to no disturbances of mind, and consequently to no sin. For who, they will insist, can be any other sense of these words of Clement? "But the apostles, when they had overcome anger, and fear, and desire through the Lord's teaching by a certain richer knowledge, did not even receive those things which seem good from those movements that inflict passion, such as confidence, emulation, joy, [and] desire; as those who, because of a certain firm and stable state of mind, were changed in nothing at all; but always remaining in a habit of exercise, alien to alteration, after the resurrection of the Lord indeed." What then? Do they think that Clement believed the apostles reached the summit of such perfection after Christ's resurrection; so that they fell into no plane or minimum, and, as they say, venial sin thereafter? If this was Clement's opinion, it is accused of falsehood and error by Augustine, who, against the Pelagians, demonstrates that for the same apostles, just as for other perfect Christians, it happened, due to the infirmity of this life, that they slipped into these lighter sins: "What is holier in the new people," he says, "than the apostles? And yet the Lord commanded them to say in prayer: 'Forgive us our debts.' Therefore, the hope of all the pious, groaning under this burden of corruptible flesh and in the infirmity of this life..."

^A remains in the martyrdom of those, and of them we bear testimony.

Why then, you will ask, did Polycrates keep silent about this, when hardly a more opportune occasion could have been given him for proclaiming the martyrdom of Philip? For in his letter to the supreme pontiff Victor, he commends many martyrs of the churches of Asia by name, and concerning Philip, the first of them, he writes only these words: "In Asia great lights have been extinguished... Philip, truly one of the twelve apostles, who died at Hierapolis." We cannot deny that Polycrates used the word *kekoimētai* there, which signifies a tranquil and peaceful death rather than one brought about by tortures. Wherefore, what ought to be concluded in this matter, let us hear more gladly from others.

We are indeed not unaware that in a certain edition of the Eusebian Chronicle cited by Baronius, the martyrdom of Philip is mentioned; but many have already noted that this does not appear in other editions of his, nor in various manuscript codices.

Nicephorus relates that Matthew exhaled his spirit peacefully in fires into which he had been thrown on account of his confession of Christ. But he did not convince everyone of this. In some Greek Menologies, however, Matthew is said to have been consumed by fire, and in Latin Martyrologies he is described more simply as crowned by martyrdom. You may see the observations of Baronius in his *Martyrologium*.

However, the martyrdom of Thomas is proven by many more writers. For Theodoret numbers him among the most celebrated martyrs: "For the Pandian, Dasian, and Dionysian festivals, and your other feasts, the solemnities of Peter and Paul, and Thomas and Sergius, and Marcellus, and Leontius and Pantaleemon, and Antoninus, and Maurice, and other martyrs are performed." Gaudentius, too, Bishop of Brixia, says: ^B "Of these four, we have the blessed relics in the present, who, preaching the kingdom of God and righteousness, were killed by the unfaithful and the wicked, and are shown to live forever with God by the virtues of their deeds; John is reported to have been consummated in the city of Sebaste in the province of Palestine, Thomas among the Indians, Andrew and Luke at Patrae, the city of Achaia." And in no other way, purely similarly, Nilus says in Photius: "Paul was plucked like a vintage, and Thomas appeared as another cluster maturing for martyrdom." But when he is joined with Paul, who would not easily convince himself that he is the very same Thomas the Apostle of whom we are speaking? What, indeed, of the fact that Gregory of Tours in his history of his martyrdom, which he had without a doubt read, left this writing for us: "Thomas the Apostle is declared to have suffered in India, according to the history of his passion"? As to which passage, you may see the observations of our own Ruinart. ^C

Finally, Levis is mentioned last by Clement. But who that might have been, Hervetus confesses he has not discovered, unless perhaps he is the Lebes ascribed to the catalog of the bishops of Jerusalem. And indeed, where Eusebius compiled this catalog, he says: "Levis was the twelfth in order." But since the discourse of our author is concerning the apostles, and this Levis is far removed from their time, it is far more likely that he speaks of someone else rather than him. Who then, you will ask, should be reckoned among the apostles or apostolic men? We confess that this person cannot be easily identified by anyone. For we read of two men adorned with that name in the Gospel. The first is Levis, whom Mark ^D and...

are alleged to have been a publican. But if he were the same as Matthew, as many suppose, he should not be understood as the one whom Clement clearly distinguishes from Matthew. Furthermore, we know that there are not wanting critics who imagine that this same Levi the publican was someone other than the apostle Matthew, and they endeavor to prove this by these words of Origen: "Let there be also Levi the publican, who followed Jesus. He was not, however, of the number of the apostles, except according to certain copies according to the Gospel of Mark." To these others respond that this was not stated by Origen seriously, but only as a concession to Celsus. But this response seems entirely weak, and not consistent with the text of Origen.

Wherefore, if there were any arguments sufficient to confirm the opinion of Origen, it must be explained from Clement, or rather from Heracleon, ^A that Levi was a publican. But since we have stumbled upon a mention of Matthew, I would like to direct your attention to what Clement relates concerning his abstinence. "Matthew," he says, "the apostle used seeds, berries, and vegetables, without meat." For you would scarcely find anyone who has committed this to writing besides Clement, with us not at all disagreeing but proving it.

There was, however, another besides him, to whom the surname ^A *Lebbaeus*, or *Leaeus*, or, as some say, *Leses*, is said to have been given. He is Judas, and by another name Thaddaeus, whom some wish to be understood as our author. But since all these things rely on mere conjectures, and not on certain and evident proofs, we have preferred to hear from others what ought to be decided concerning this question rather than to pronounce anything.

Chapter X. On marriage.

Article I. How marriage is defined by Clement, how good it is, and how spouses ought to use it.

In these books of the *Stromata*, Clement argues about marriage the more fully and accurately because the heretics of his time attacked it the more fiercely, and, with incredible rashness and impudence, proscribed and condemned it as wicked and nefarious. But from this most grave conflict, as if from the striking and rubbing of stones, a greater fire of sound and true doctrine will be elicited by us.

^B ...that woman was given as a helper." But on these matters, we have spoken elsewhere, and will speak further below.

First, therefore, marriage is thus defined by Clement: *Γάμος μὲν ἐστι σύνοδος ἀνδρὸς καὶ γυναικὸς ἡ πρώτη κατὰ νόμον, ἐπὶ γνησίων τέκνων σπορᾷ* — "Marriage is the first and lawful conjunction of man and woman for the procreation of legitimate children." From this definition of marriage, it is clear according to Clement's mind that it is not just any conjunction of man and woman, but *κατὰ νόμον*, "according to the law." But since he said "the law" indefinitely, he perhaps used that word intentionally, so as to signify not only the divine law, which had been ordained in the Sacred Scriptures and by the apostles, but also the human law, that is, of secular princes, according to which marriage, as a legitimate and solemn civil contract, ought to be entered into by all. Wherefore in another book ^C he said nothing more about it: "Each of us has, if he wishes, the power of taking a wife legitimately, *κατὰ τὸν νόμον γαμεῖν*, in the first, I say, nuptials, *τὸν πρῶτον λέγω γάμον*."

Although Clement said "first conjunction" in both places, no one should infer from that that second nuptials are disapproved of by him. For we shall show below that he judged more equitably concerning them. These words, therefore, he added to the definition of marriage because second nuptials were granted by apostolic indulgence to those who could not contain themselves.

Finally, Clement teaches that the end of marriage is the legitimate procreation of children. Yet that is not, by his own admission, the only end of marriage. For he declares that its function and ministry are one thing, and its end is another, to wit, the care to be taken of those very children, as well as of the wife, and even of the house, to which, ^D ...that woman was given as a helper." But on these matters, we have spoken elsewhere, and will speak further below.

Which notion of marriage, just as it is open and clear, so also, as it is true and proper, it demonstrates that this is a good, just, and entirely equitable thing, so much so that it is a wonder that, apart from certain pagans, and those most voluptuous, who denied it, there were found men [who would argue against it]. However, Clement recounts the nefarious, impious, and almost stupendous errors of very many, such as the Basilidians, Isidore, Carpocrates, Epiphanes, Marcionites, and others, concerning that same marriage, and he overthrows and eradicates them.

Furthermore, he reduces all those false opinions of the heretics, or rather the monsters and prodigies of opinions, to only two headings: "For they teach," he says, "either to live indifferently—that is, that there is nothing good or evil in this world, no vice, no virtue, but that all things are indifferent; or they profess continence out of hatred, that is, clearly, out of hatred of the Creator, whom they have opined to be evil, and they impiously prattled that nuptials also are evil and that the devil is their author." He dissolves and destroys the futile reasons and various cavils of all these with such perspicuity, and demonstrates with such solidity and most invincible moments of reasoning that marriage is good.

But although Clement has most invincibly proven that it is good, he nevertheless says: "Neither is a wife to be taken by anyone, nor always, but there is also a time in which it is fitting, and a person to whom it is fitting, and an age up to a certain limit. Therefore, a wife is not to be taken by just anyone, nor always: but neither altogether and impudently and rashly, but by one who is in a certain state, and such as he is, and when it is fitting, and for the sake of children, and for one who is in all things similar, and who does not love the man by force or necessity." And so, as Clement rightly teaches, it is not for everyone, nor at every age, nor at any time that it is lawful to enter into marriage; but for the person to whom it is fitting, whose age is mature for marriage and apt for children, as he had said in another work, and finally, the time of marriage is to be chosen. Furthermore, a wife ought to be for him, to whom she is about to be wed, altogether *κατὰ πάντα*, "in all things" similar, that is, in customs,

^A and profession, so that she may return the love of her husband of her own accord.

Moreover, having celebrated the marriage, the marriage must be maintained, as Clement’s words are, "as a sacred statue, pure from those things which defile; seeing that we indeed arise from sleep with the Lord, but go to rest with thanksgiving, and we pray: When sleep indulges, and the light has shone serene; testifying to the Lord in our whole life, possessing piety and religion in the soul, but leading temperance even unto the body."

Then in the same place he shows how modestly and piously a wife ought to bear herself, alien to suspicion and crime, and also to all vain and superfluous adornment, devoting herself to constant prayers; and as a faithful guardian of her house, she should, as far as possible, exclude from her sight those who do not belong to it.

He also makes it clear elsewhere ^B how a marriage can be holy and happy; what the wife ought to do if she cannot persuade her husband to live piously; and he brings before the eyes of all the precepts given by the Apostle to those who are married.

To these things, however, he says: "He who has taken a wife for the procreation of children ought to exercise continence; so as not even to covet his own wife, whom he ought to love, applying himself to the children with honest and moderate pleasure." For which reason he proves that the divine law has ordained that "men should use their wives moderately, and for the sake of the procreation of children alone." But we have already heard him discussing these things in the same way, and even more fully.

ARTICLE II.

Concerning second marriages, whether Clement judged rightly regarding them, and concerning the polygamy of the patriarchs of the Old Testament.

Among the Centuriators, our Clement is ill-regarded, because he taught that second marriages are of a certain imperfection, and not without sin. Let us see, therefore, whether he is rightly or wrongly censured and beaten by them and others on this account. First, indeed, Clement, concerning first and second marriages, in the book cited by the Centuriators, thus determines: "We admire monogamy, and the dignity concerning one marriage, *μονογαμίαν καὶ τὴν περὶ τὸν ἕνα γάμον σεμνότητα*; saying, however, that one ought to have mercy on others, and that one should bear the burdens of another; lest he who seems to stand upright, should himself also fall." But concerning second marriages: "If you are burnt," says the Apostle, "join yourself in marriage." But what is there in that ^C which is not altogether convenient and consonant with the divine doctrine of the Apostle? Nothing, certainly. And indeed Clement himself afterward still shows that this was handed down by the same Apostle: "He introduces monogamy," says he, "on account of the procreation of children and the care of the house, to which the woman was given as a helper; and if the Apostle grants a second marriage by way of indulgence to anyone on account of intemperance and burning, he does not sin here according to the testament, for it is not prohibited by the law; but he does not fulfill that highest perfection which is sought after by the Gospel."

What, I beseech you, could be desired more effectively and expressively in these words to utterly clear away the false stain of a double error, rashly cast upon our Clement by the Centuriators? For, firstly, in what clearer way could our author signify to us that second marriages are "without sin," than when he writes most eloquently that they are granted by the Apostle by way of indulgence: so that he who is bound to a second marriage, *δευτέρου γάμου*, "he does not sin," *οὗτος οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει*; since it is interdicted by no law.

^D Nor does Clement say there that there is in reality imperfection or sin in a second marriage; but that he who is joined in a second marriage does not reach that supreme perfection of Christian life commended in the Gospel. Wherefore, where marriage is defined by him, as we have seen: "The first conjunction of man and woman according to the law;" or where it is also handed down in writing by him: "Each one of us has the power of taking a wife, according to the law, in the first, I say, marriages;" or where finally he is said to establish monogamy by the words of the Apostle, by which he gives the woman, after her husband has died, the power of marrying again in the Lord, but calls the one who remains a widow blessed; by all these modes of speaking, the same author of ours intended nothing else for himself, except that second marriages, on account of a man’s incontinence, were permitted by apostolic indulgence and favor, and that they, even if they are not a sin—which indeed could not be permitted by the Apostle—are nevertheless not of such great perfection as is the state of widowhood, virginity, and holy continence.

But yet someone will rise up against this, and not without some agitation of an elated mind will object to us the very words of Clement himself, by which he most eloquently asserts that he thinks as a Catholic, who says that the falling from one to several marriages is fornication, just as he is a heretic who would dare to call the first marriage fornication. But fornication is without doubt a sin. Therefore, second, and by stronger reason, other subsequent marriages are also actually called a sin by him.

But that it may be known whether this is the true mind and sentiment of Clement, all his words must be written down here: "To those, however," he says, "who are inclined toward second marriages, the Apostle speaks suitably in a certain high tone, for the purpose of shaming and restraining them. For he says: 'Behold, every sin is outside the body; but he who commits fornication sins against his own body.' Now if anyone dares to call marriage fornication, he again attacks the law and the Lord, and assails them with curses. For just as avarice, and the greed of having more, is called fornication, as it is opposed to sufficiency; and as idolatry is the attribution of God from one to many; so fornication is the falling from one marriage to many. But how, as we have said, could second marriages be granted and permitted by the Apostle, and subsequently by our Clement, by way of indulgence, if they truly are fornication, and if that fornication is a sin?"

One must therefore carefully weigh what Clement understood by the name of fornication. For in three ways, as he himself says, fornication—nay, even adultery, *ἥ τε πορνεία, ἥ τε μοιχεία*—is taken by the Apostle. For avarice is called fornication by him, inasmuch as it is opposed to *αὐταρκεία* [self-sufficiency], which is a habit; so he speaks to those for whom it is fitting to be content, and who by themselves acquire those things which confer a blessed life. Secondly, he says that idolatry is called fornication by the same Apostle, because it is the attribution of God from one to many; or because it turns us away from the one and true God, and turns us toward many, and consequently false, gods. Therefore, by the same reasoning, second and other marriages are said by him to be a third and similar kind of fornication; since they lead and remove a man from that perfection which is in the first marriage, on account of his own incontinence.

Furthermore, although Clement openly argued that second and, by stronger reason, other subsequent marriages were of a certain imperfection, he would not, however, depart from the opinion of many of the most ancient Fathers of the Church,

^A of which you will find further citations, beyond those many lauded by us there, in others by Cotelier in his observations on the book of the Shepherd, page 64.

We have thus far heard Clement discoursing on second marriages after the death of a spouse. But it is useful to touch briefly upon what he taught concerning the polygamy of the patriarchs of the Old Testament, who had several wives at once. He admits that this, even though it was entirely forbidden to Christians, was nevertheless granted to those patriarchs by God Himself for a just cause. For at that time, he says, God required this, when it was necessary for the human race to be increased and multiplied. Concerning Abraham, he pronounces in the same manner by name: "He had taken children from three wives, not that he might enjoy pleasure, but because he hoped, as I think, to multiply the race in the beginning." Ambrose, ^B indeed, offers this very same reasoning—which he considers by no means doubtful, but entirely certain—and explains it more fully. You may see, if you please and if you have the leisure, what we have noted in the books of this same Ambrose, and what the scholastic theologians have disputed concerning the polygamy of Abraham and other patriarchs in 4 Sentent., distinct. 33, and in D. Thom. supplem. quæst. 65, art. 2.

ARTICLE III. On the marriage bond never being dissolved.

How tight and indissoluble the bond of marriage is, our Clement explains in these words: "But that the Scripture has counseled taking a wife, and never permits one to depart from marriage, it clearly establishes the law: 'You shall not put away your wife, except for the cause of fornication.' He considers it adultery to be joined in marriage while the other of the separated parties is living. Consequently, he teaches that no one is bound by any law of Scripture to enter into marriage; but once it has been entered into, then the spouse is bound by divine law never to put away the spouse."

It is true indeed, some say, that the most tight bond of marriage is highly commended there by Clement. But because he added there *πλὴν εἰ μὴ ἐπὶ λόγῳ πορνείας* (unless for the cause of fornication), from that they think they can infer that Clement was persuaded that this very bond of marriage is truly dissolved by adultery, and that it was allowed for the innocent spouse, when he wished, to enter into another marriage. Wherefore, regarding what Clement subjoins—that it is adultery to be joined in marriage while the spouse is living—they say that "except for the cause of fornication" is to be understood there; for they thought that only for that cause is a second marriage, while the spouse is living, reckoned as lawful; which cause being removed, it would be adultery in fact.

But we fear that these men have not grasped the mind of Clement. For listen, I pray, to what he subjoined thereafter: "But he who takes a wife who has been put away," he says, "commits adultery; for if one puts away a wife, he makes her commit adultery, that is, he compels her to commit adultery. And not only does he who put her away cause this, but also he who takes her, offering the woman opportunity for sin; for if he does not take her, she will return to her husband." What, I ask, do these things mean? Does not Clement most clearly signify there that the bond of marriage 200 is not so dissolved even for the cause of fornication that it is lawful for the woman dismissed to marry another man, or to be accepted as a wife by another? Does he not expressly declare that it shall be that she, if she has married no one, should return to her husband? Hence, by this divorce, Clement seems to have understood nothing other than the mere separation of the wife from the husband, or, as the theologians speak, the separation of the spouses according to bed, not according to the bond.

And indeed, the things that subsequently follow demonstrate that this is the meaning of our Clement not at all obscurely. For he continues: "But what does the law (unless it be of Moses) command regarding her who has committed adultery and been convicted of adultery, but that she be delivered to the fire, if she should be the wife of a priest? ^C But the adulterer also is buried under stones, though not in the same place, so that even death is not common to them. Nor does the law fight against the Gospel, but consents to it; for why not, since the Lord is the provider of both? For she who has fornicated lives indeed in sin, but is dead to the commandments; but she who has been led to repentance, as one who has been regenerated through the conversion of life, has the regeneration of life, dead indeed to the old fornicator, but having entered again into life, she who is born through repentance." Here Clement makes it plain that the old law agrees with the evangelical in this, that the wife convicted of adultery should be removed from the midst. The old law indeed commands her to be covered with stones, or if she be the wife of a priest, to be consumed by fire. But the evangelical law declares her dead to the commandments and to spiritual life. But this new law, which far excels the old in gentleness, does not command the adulteress to be put to death, so that there may be given to her a place for repentance, and that through sincere and true repentance she may be recalled, as it were, to spiritual life. Furthermore, after her repentance for her crime has been accomplished, she can return to her husband and be accepted by him. Clement therefore did not think that marriage is so dissolved by adultery that it would be lawful for the innocent spouse to be joined in a second marriage afterward. For if a man had taken another wife, he could not by any means have received back his former adulterous wife; whom, however, after she had performed penance, Clement testifies is to be received by him.

Nor is there any reason, indeed, why anyone should object to us that the distinction of marriage regarding the bed and regarding the bond was completely unknown to Clement and the most ancient Fathers of the Church, having been thought up by scholastic theologians. For even from the Apostle himself, Clement proved it thus: "That marriage which, by consent, for a time is free for prayer, is a doctrine of continence. He added that, indeed, 'by consent,' so that no one should dissolve the marriage. But [he added] 'for a time,' so that he who has taken a wife should not, by exercising continence out of necessity, ^D sometimes fall into sin, as one who, in falling into it, might indeed spare his own marriage, but covet another's." Truly, no one can doubt that Clement is speaking there of spouses separating from each other only regarding the bed and for some space of time, so that they might more easily attend to prayer. But when he adds "by consent," namely mutual, so that no one should dissolve the marriage, he shows that there is a divorce by which the marriage bond is completely dissolved and annulled. Furthermore, Clement has openly denied that that [bond], while the spouse is living, can ever at all be dissolved and annulled. The opinion of Tertullian is the same, who writes to his wife: "How many are there who immediately after the laver seal their flesh? How many likewise who, by mutual consent, remove the marriage debt between them? By voluntary eunuchs, for the sake of heavenly desire, abstinence is tolerated, with the marriage kept safe." Other Fathers, whose names we have deemed superfluous to mention in a matter so certain, concur with this same opinion with indeed the greatest consensus.

Furthermore, when Clement has taught from the Apostle that spouses can indeed be separated from each other for a time, but only by mutual "consent," notice, I pray, whether from that it can justly and deservedly be gathered that the cause of fornication alone is mentioned in the Gospel for putting away a wife in any manner; because for that cause alone a husband could put away his wife, guilty of adultery, even protesting, unwilling, and resisting. But we have discussed this question elsewhere.

1181 DE LIBRIS STROMATUM. ARTICULUS IV.

De perpetuo virginitatis et continentiae statu et voto.

Perpetual continence and the state of chastity and celibacy are approved and commended by Clement no less than marriage. For we have already heard from him that marriage is consulted by the authority of the Sacred Scripture. But if it is only consulted by it, and not commanded, it is lawful and pious for anyone to embrace the profession of virginity and celibacy no less than that of marriage. But we have little need of arguments, since, where Clement has most clearly pronounced that everyone must persevere in that state which he has chosen, whether of marriage or of celibacy ^A: "The purpose," he says, "of each one, both of him who has castrated himself and of him who has again joined himself in marriage for the procreation of children, must persist, not yielding or acquiescing to that which is less and inferior." And not content with having said this once, he repeats the same a little later not less clearly ^B: "All the Apostles," he says, "admit both, the one who gives thanks to God and uses marriage moderately, and the one who, as the Lord wills, lives in chastity, choosing without offense and perfectly, as each one has been called."

Do you wish for something more express? Listen, I pray, to him still disputing from the authority of the same Scripture. "Again the Lord says: 'He who has taken a wife, let him not cast her out; and he who has not taken one, let him not take one.' [Greek: Ὁ κατὰ πρόθεσιν εὐνουχίας ὁμολογήσας μὴ γῆμαι, ἄγαμος διαμενέτω.] He who out of a purpose of chastity has professed not to take a wife, let him remain celibate." Let the haters of the vows of chastity and continence, pronounced by monks and religious men, see what they can grumble or bark against this clear and manifest definition of our Clement. For what difference is there between one who makes a vow of chastity and one who ^C is described as [Greek: κατὰ πρόθεσιν εὐνουχίας ὁμολογήσας]? Will they accuse Clement of some error? But there he fights against heretics by the common and accepted custom and usage of the Church. But this matter of the vow of continence and virgins has already been treated by us in our admonition to the books of Ambrose *De virginibus*.

Yet perhaps someone will object that a vow, as theologians say, cannot be made by anyone except for the sake of a better and more perfect good. But Clement decrees that marriage is more excellent and superior to celibacy and virginity. For "whoever is perfect," so he speaks, "has the Apostles as examples, and he is truly proven a man, not in that ^D he has chosen the monastic life; but he surpasses those men who, in marriage and the procreation of children and the care and providence of a house, exercise themselves without pleasure and pain, and while he is engaged in the care of a family, he is nevertheless undivided from the love of God, and rises against every temptation that is brought about by children, wife, servants, and possessions." He therefore who is joined in wedlock, and has overcome the temptations rising on every side from children, wife, servants, and possessions, without being in the least torn away and distracted from the love of God, is preferred by our Clement to the other who professes virginity and celibacy.

But he who will argue in this way, let him direct his mind to those things which Clement subjoined continually: "But to him who has no house, it happens for the most part that he is not tempted. He, therefore, who cares only for himself is conquered by him who, although he is indeed inferior in those things which pertain to his own salvation [Greek: κατὰ τὴν ἑαυτοῦ σωτηρίαν], is yet superior in those things which look to the dispensation of life, and in truth preserves a small image of the providence of truth." He affirms, therefore, that the celibate is inferior to the married only in those things which look to the dispensation of life, that is, of the house and family. But he contends that this same man, because he is less subject to temptations, and thus in those things which pertain to salvation, is superior to the married. And no man of sound mind will ever rightly deny that vows can be made regarding those dangers which remove temptation and those things which are more conducive to salvation.

You will nevertheless urge Clement in another book, where he compares a virgin with a widow, to have said: "Greek: Ἤδη τινὲς καὶ τῆς παρθένου τὴν χήραν εἰς ἐγκράτειαν προτείνουσι, καταμεγαλοφρονήσασαν ἧς πεπείραται ἡδονῆς." Which the Latin interpreter rendered thus: "Now some also prefer a widow to a virgin, as far as continence is concerned, as one who has despised with a great and lofty soul the pleasure she has experienced." Therefore, you will say, Clement preferred the widow, who has experienced a husband, to the virgin. Nor will you patiently bear to be told that in subsequent editions of Clement's works, for these words "virgin," as far as continence is concerned, there had been substituted "incontinent virgin." Indeed, nothing could be produced more contrary to the Greek text of Clement.

Wherefore, we cannot deny either the ignorance or the fraud of those men who so perversely adulterate the text of their author, and their wickedness can be excused by no one. But these men, nor the first Latin interpreter either, grasped the sense of Clement. For it seems to us that it should be here: "Now indeed some extend the widow to the virgin's continence, as one who utterly despises the pleasure which she has experienced." Nor that this was his mind, we can surely prove from what is read written by him elsewhere: "Greek: ὃ γὰρ ἐπιθυμήσας, καὶ κατασχὼν ἑαυτοῦ, καθάπερ ἡ χήρα, διὰ σωφροσύνης αὖθις παρθένος." "For he who has desired and has restrained himself is, like the widow, again a virgin through temperance." Yet certainly no one of sound mind will ever conclude from this that the state of virginity was relegated by our author behind marriage or widowhood.

Chapter XI. On Christian virtues and certain Christian morals.

Article I. On the so-called cardinal virtues, and primarily on maintaining continence, opposing pleasure, and the meditation on death.

To come now to the virtues common to all Christians, it must first be noted that a virtue is defined by Clement somewhere: "Greek: Ἡ ἀρετὴ αὐτὴ διάθεσίς ἐστι ψυχῆς σύμφωνος ὑπὸ τοῦ λόγου περὶ ὅλον τὸν βίον." "Virtue itself is an affection of the soul under the command of reason through the whole life, consonant and responding."

More, however, he treats individually about the virtues, which, indeed, as they are easy, there is no need for us to delay long in explaining them. For he excellently and accurately defines and explains what piety is.

^A And he says that endurance, the sublimitity of the mind, [Greek: μετριοφροσύνην], greatness of soul, [Greek: μεγαλοψυχίαν], liberality, and magnificence are species of this fortitude. But he discourses as clearly upon liberality and magnificence, humanity and kindness, as he does upon the other virtues. Beyond these, he himself teaches that man becomes similar to God through beneficence and fortitude. ^B Finally, he declares all those virtues to be so interconnected and conjoined with one another that one can neither be possessed without the other, nor can any one of them be discussed without the others. Since, however, virtue itself is not innate in us, but we are born capable of acquiring it, and such aptitude is not virtue, but a movement toward virtue; for this reason it must be acquired by labor, discipline, and exercise. And from this it happens that some arrive at a lesser, others at a greater and perfect virtue.

Furthermore, some point ought not to be passed over without notice, which Clement, concerning chastity—and consequently concerning other virtues which were common to pagan and Christian men—does not hesitate to affirm: that it is not good unless we apply ourselves to it for the sake of the love of God: [Greek: Οὐδὲ εὐνουχία ἐνάρετον, εἰ μὴ δι' ἀγάπην γίνοιτο τὴν πρὸς Θεόν.] Castration is not endowed with virtue unless it is done for the sake of love toward God.

^C Since, however, we have happened upon the mention of chastity, it is pleasing to explain a little more fully what our author has argued at various points against the heretics concerning continence. He presents to us this definition of continence, [Greek: ἐγκράτεια]: [Greek: Continentia est corporis despicientia convenienter pactis cum Deo initis.] Continence is an act of contempt for the body according to the covenant made with God. The reason for which definition he himself renders thus: Greek: Non solum enim in rebus venereis, sed etiam in aliis, quæ anima perperam concupiscit, non contenta necessariis, versatur continentia. For continence is occupied not only in sexual matters, but also in other things which the soul perversely desires, not being content with what is necessary. We know, indeed, that continence is defined slightly differently by Saint Thomas and other scholastic theologians. But that virtue is certainly circumscribed by them with a much stricter meaning than by our Clement. ^D For this reason, in another book, he himself said: Greek: Continentia est affectio, quæ non transilierit ea, quæ visa fuerint ex recta ratione. Continens autem est is, qui continet eas appetitiones, quæ sunt præter rectam rationem; vel qui se ipsum continet, ne appetitione efferatur præter rectam rationem. Continence is an affection which does not go beyond those things which have been judged according to right reason. And the continent man is he who contains those appetites which are contrary to right reason; or he who contains himself, lest he be carried away by appetite contrary to right reason.

202. In what way, however, the continence of pagan philosophers and that of Christians differs, Clement thus explains: Greek: Humana continentia, quæ est ex sententia philosophorum Græcorum, profitetur pugnare cum cupiditate et in factis ei non inservire. Quæ est autem ex nostra sententia non concupiscere, non ut quis concupiscens se fortiter gerat, sed ut etiam a concupiscendo se abstineat. Human continence, which is according to the opinion of the Greek philosophers, professes to fight against desire and not to serve it in deeds. But that which is according to our opinion is not to desire, not so that someone, while desiring, may act bravely, but so that he may even abstain from desiring. Whence he wisely concluded that Christian continence is more excellent than the philosophical.

Furthermore, he declares the cause and incentive for observing this, to be held by Christians, in these words: Greek: Nos propter dilectionem in Dominum, et propter ipsum honestum amplectimur continentiam, templum Spiritus sanctificantes. Honestum est enim propter regnum cœlorum se ipsum castrare ab omni cupiditate, et emundare conscientiam a mortuis operibus ad serviendum Deo viventi. Quocirca hæreticos, qui in carnis odium, et paganos, qui vanis and human-only reasons embraced continence, he shows to be ignorant and clearly lacking insight.

He affirms, therefore, that the excellence of Christian continence is such that, although it does not fall into God, who lacks nothing and is subject to no perturbation, nevertheless, by the observation of it, we approach the divine nature.

But to attain that continence, he says, desire must be pruned. In order that this may be cut back, pleasure, its fuel, must be uprooted and taken away entirely. Moreover, they say the definition of pleasure is a "soft and soothing motion with some sensation." But as he says pleasure is the fuel of desire, so he also teaches that desire is the principle of pleasure: [Greek: πάσης ἡδονῆς ἐπιθυμία κατάρχει.] The principle of all pleasure is desire. But desire, as he continues, is a distress and anxiety, which, on account of need, desires something. Yet elsewhere pleasure, as it is called by him, generates the first desire; [Greek: πρώτην ἐπιθυμίαν γεννᾷ.] Which, as he proceeds, is a longing and appetite, [Greek: ὄρεξις], alien to the reason of him who has complied with it. By these later words, does he not signify quite openly that desire and pleasure generate one another?

But again he warns us that [Greek: ἐπιθυμίαν], desire, and [Greek: ὄρεξιν], appetite, are distinguished by the more learned in such a way that they attribute the former to pleasure and intemperance; but they contend that the latter, which is a movement of reason, is among those things which are according to reason.

Furthermore, although pleasure is to be shunned by the Christian man, and its affection is not at all necessary, nevertheless, Clement says, it is an appendix and consequence, [Greek: ἐπακολόθημα], of certain natural necessities: hunger, cold, marriage. And so, if it were taken when food was being consumed, or children were being begotten, it could not be that one could drink or take nourishment without it, nor could another use for it be shown. For it is not an operation, nor an affection, nor is pleasure any part of us. But what of the fact that he himself confesses that the same pleasure bites us and lies in wait for us, not only by day but even at night in dreams themselves, enticing us with snares? Wherefore we must fight against it as against an enemy, with divine (as the Apostle says) armor, and with fear, and with the caution that is the daughter of the law, and we must separate our soul from perturbations, and we must also kill it, and be occupied with the meditation of death. He further reminds us that, when he was writing these things, the entire Church was full of both men and women who, through the whole time of their life, meditated on death, which arouses one to Christ. But there will be a place to discuss these things later.

ARTICLE II. Of Faith.

From the theological virtues, the first is beyond doubt faith, which Clement describes from the Apostle in this manner: Greek: Πίστις πρόληψις ἑκούσιός ἐστι, θεοσεβείας συγκατάθεσις, ἐλπιζομένων ὑπόστασις, πραγμάτων ἔλεγχος οὐ βλεπομένων, κατὰ τὸν θεῖον Απόστολον. Faith is a voluntary anticipation, an assent of piety, a substance of things hoped for, an argument of things not seen, according to the divine Apostle. He adds, however, that it is defined by others: "An assenting union to a thing not apparent." But from his own opinion, or at least with no author cited, he puts forth this definition of faith: [Greek: Ἡ μὲν πίστις]

an ^A assumption that is voluntary, and a pre-judgment of a prudent apprehension. Thus, from this definition, he makes it plain in the same place how it differs from opinion and other habits of the mind.

Furthermore, Clement shows that faith, like knowledge, is twofold. One is human, which is derived from rhetorical and dialectical arguments, and can only be called opinion. The other is divine, by which we truly obey God commanding us and believe Him speaking in Holy Scripture. And this indeed is the most certain knowledge, not only never liable to any error, but by which even the infirm are healed and the dead are recalled to life.

Now the question is held only concerning this faith. But Clement teaches that it lives together with hope, and that we can through it, without demonstrations and not by the wisdom of men, but by the power of God, attain eternal salvation. For which reason it is still said by him: "Faith is a short, so to speak, knowledge of those things more necessary (namely, for salvation)." Therefore, Clement severely castigates some who distinguished it from knowledge in such a way that they chattered that the latter pertained to the Holy Spirit, and faith to the Son. For we ought to know and believe the Son just as the Father.

But since he had asserted that faith is voluntary, he proves this elsewhere by the fact that by faith itself we believe God speaking through the Scriptures with a completely free assent. And thence he utterly overthrows the error of certain heretics, who falsely proclaimed that faith is innate in us.

Although he affirms so assertively that faith is voluntary, he nevertheless pronounces just as clearly, as we saw a little earlier, that it is a gift of God, and is infused into us divinely.

Furthermore, Clement frequently hands down, repeats, and inculcates how much necessity this very faith has for everyone to attain eternal salvation. For he teaches that other sciences are like food and dainties, without which life can indeed be sustained; but faith is necessary to us, just as bread is for living: "And what is," he says, "the truth from faith, is as necessary for living as bread. But the discipline which precedes it is like food and dainties."

^A it is evident that they have been preoccupied and prevented by the faith of God. Wherefore he pronounces most openly both to the Gentiles and to the Jews: "To those certainly who were just from the law, faith was lacking; and therefore when the Lord was healing them, he said: 'Thy faith hath made thee whole.'" But for those who were just from philosophy, there was need not only of faith in the Lord, but also that they should depart from the worship of idols. Therefore, Clement was most persuaded that faith in the Lord was plainly and thoroughly necessary for every pagan man, however pious and just. For which reason he asserts confidently that not only do good works profit no one after death unless he has had faith; but that anyone, whether faithful or Gentile, is most justly condemned without faith. Whence faith is rightly and deservedly called by him: "A power unto salvation, and a strength unto life eternal," through which, as the Pastor or Hermas cited by him wrote, "the elect of God are saved." Finally, by faith alone, he himself adds, they think they attain the principle of the universe, namely God.

Does anyone desire anything more explicit? ^B Attention, I beg you, consider what that same Clement, relying on the authority of Barnabas, has left written for us concerning faith and other virtues: "Since the said virtues are elements of knowledge, it happens that faith is more elementary, which to the Gnostic is as equally necessary as respiration is to one living in the world for living. But as we cannot live without elements, so neither can we attain knowledge without faith. This, therefore, is the basis of truth." Thus it was the opinion not only of our Clement, but also of Barnabas, that faith is altogether necessary for all men to produce spiritual life and knowledge, no less than respiration is for producing natural life.

No wonder, therefore, if in another place he concludes that no man at all can live without faith—that is, spiritual life—saying: "None, he says, of any race at all, neither of farmers, nor of shepherds, nor of those who dwell in cities, can live, unless of that which is more excellent and better—"

^D Our author further teaches that faith "is the principle of action and the foundation of prudent choice;" nay rather, and of knowledge: "For not to doubt about God, but to believe, is the foundation of knowledge." He continually adds furthermore: "But both is Christ; the foundation, I say, and the building, through whom is the beginning and the end. And the extremes indeed are not taught, namely the beginning and the end, faith, I say, and charity. Faith therefore is the principle, and charity the end. But both so emanate and flow from Christ, that they are not taught." Wherefore, a little later, he concludes that faith is a brief and compendious knowledge of those things which are necessary, and that this is built upon faith through the doctrine of the Lord. Finally, he asserts that faith is the seat or base, ἕδρασμα, of charity, and that through the very necessity which intercedes between both, the faithful are made by charity: "Charity," he says, "that which intercedes with faith, friendship (φιλία), makes the faithful. But faith is the basis and stabilization of charity."

By the comparison of being grafted from the oleaster into the good olive tree, instituted by the Apostle, Clement then makes it manifest that the unfaithful is transferred into Christ by faith, and he adds: "But it is better ^C that the faith of each one be grafted into the soul itself." Of which he immediately returns this reason: "For the Holy Spirit is in a way distributed and transplanted through it, according to the circumscription of each, uncircumscribedly," (κατὰ τὴν ἑκάστου περιγραφὴν ἀπεριγράφως), "that is, through faith the Holy Spirit is grafted and transplanted uncircumscribedly into each one who believes, according to his disposition and merit." Wherefore he himself writes elsewhere: "We indeed say that the Holy Spirit is breathed into him who has believed... but not as a piece of God in each one of us."

Although he admits that, with all doubt or cause for questioning removed, faith is confirmed and stabilized, he nevertheless warns us seriously that it should not be that alone, but that there is need of inquiry besides. For faith, as he himself attests, is the way to attain the truth, and it lifts us to the word of the Lord and to the Son; "We do not yet understand the word of the Lord to be a demonstration." And truly, as

he says, faith is a meditation that becomes knowledge, resting upon a stable and firm foundation. Nor, however, does it permit the inference that anything in the faith is doubtful or uncertain. For, "he who has trusted the divine Scriptures," he says, "having a steadfast judgment, which cannot be gainsaid, receives the voice of the demonstration of Him who gave the Scriptures." Therefore he asserts without hesitation that faith is more excellent than knowledge, and is its ^A criterion. And this, indeed, Theodoret has reported from Aristotle.

How great the force and power of faith are, Clement clearly shows in these words: "Discipline, therefore, is to obey the commandments, which is to believe in God; and faith is the power of God, which is the force of truth." Immediately afterwards he says: "If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall move mountains." And again: "According to your faith be it done unto you." And one is indeed healed, having received healing through faith; but the dead man rises again through the power of Him who had believed that he would rise again.

Finally, since Clement, as we have said, taught that faith is the basis of truth, he makes plain from this by what steps we ascend from it to charity and to [Gk] γνῶσις. "First toward salvation," his words are, "inclination, then faith, appears; after which fear, and hope, and repentance, together with continence and endurance, leading us onward, bring us to charity and knowledge."

Furthermore, concerning what has been discussed thus far from Clement about faith, do not be reluctant to compare it with those things that Theodoret committed to writing, and if you wish, with what theologians have discussed more copiously in their commentaries on faith, and in lib. Sentent., distinct. 25, and in St. Thomas, 2-2, questions 1 and 2.

ARTICLE III. On infidelity, and whether all the actions of unbelievers are sins.

The virtue opposite to faith is infidelity, which is called by Clement ^B by opposition to faith, [Gk] ἡ δὲ ἀπιστία ὑπόληψις τοῦ ἀντικειμένου ἀσθενὴς ἀποφαντική. Which words, taken literally, mean nothing other than: "infidelity is an infirm, negative opinion of the contrary." But Hervetus, perhaps having read in the Greek text [Gk] ἀποφαντική instead of [Gk] ἀποφατική, rendered these words into Latin thus: "Infidelity is an infirm, enunciative opinion or judgment of that which is the opposite." But it is not any more evident from this what the meaning of these words of Clement is. To us, however, reading the same thing in the Claromontanus manuscript codex, and in the Greek edition, this appears to be the mind and meaning of our author: infidelity is a weak and infirm opinion, which denies that the contrary—that is, that which has been handed down by God in the Sacred Scriptures, and which, because of its infirmity, it cannot perceive—is true. But if you think one should read [Gk] ἀποφαντική, the meaning of Clement will still be the same: "Infidelity is an infirm opinion, which enunciates, and because of its infirmity asserts, that which is contrary to the Sacred Scriptures and to the truth." And this explanation can be confirmed without absurdity from those things which are immediately appended: [Gk] Καθάπερ ἡ δυσπιστία ἕξις δυσπαράδεκτος πίστεως. "Just as difficulty in believing is a habit that admits faith with difficulty."

Clement says that infidelity or incredulity is twofold: one being good, the other indeed evil. And of both he says: "Much incredulity has produced good things, faith evil... Now not to believe in truth indeed brings death, just as believing brings life. Contrariwise, however, to believe in a lie, and not to believe in truth, leads to perdition." ^C But since we are disputing about that infidelity which, because it does not believe in the primary truth, or God, speaking in the Sacred Scriptures, is for that reason rightly and deservedly affirmed by Clement to bring death and to lead to perdition; for this very reason he says again later on: "Concerning the unbelievers," [Gk] περὶ ἀπίστων, "it has been said that they are reckoned like the dust which the wind blows from the face of the earth, and as a drop that falls from the vessel." The reason for this he himself intimates and suggests: "To believe in Him (the divine Word, that is) and through Him, [Gk] μοναδικόν ἐστι γενέσθαι, is to become one; that is, to be bound in Him indivisibly; but not to believe is to doubt, and to be separated and divided by a space and an interval."

Since, indeed, Clement, as has been said, consistently asserted that faith is the foundation of good action and prudent choice, without which no one can live a spiritual life, and on the contrary that by infidelity anyone is dragged into perdition and death is brought to him; from this he sagely concludes that the action of any pagan, since his end is not good, is truly sin, and is evil. But it is better to listen to him speaking most clearly about this matter: "How, while to be saved absolutely is from those things which are the means, yet to be perfect, as is fitting, is a duty," [Gk] κατόρθωμα, "that is," as Cicero interprets, "a right or rightly performed act: so also is every action of the Gnostic a right and perfect duty," [Gk] καὶ πᾶσα πρᾶξις γνωστικοῦ κατόρθωμα. "But for him who is only a believer, the action can be called moderate, as it is not yet performed [Gk] κατὰ λόγον, according to reason, nor is it rightly steered by knowledge. On the contrary, however, the action of any pagan is sinful, [Gk] παντὸς δὲ ἔμπαλιν τοῦ ἐθνικοῦ ἁμαρτητική. For the Scriptures show that one ought not merely to do good absolutely, but to produce actions by looking to a certain goal, and to work from reason." Certainly, I do not know whether anything clearer or more precise could be brought forward to explain this question. For Clement does not only assert most distinctly that every action of an unbelieving man is sin and evil; he also renders a certain and clear reason for it; because, forsooth, that action of the unbelieving man is not referred to a good end.

Observe in passing these Greek words, [Gk] οὐδὲ μὴν τοῖς ἀπείροις τοῦ αὐλεῖν, αὐλῶν, which were omitted entirely in the Latin interpretation; perhaps because they seemed superfluous. Thus, however, they sound in Latin: "And to play the flute for the unskilled, is not a playing."

But having touched upon these things, does not Clement argue in the same way, as we have seen, regarding the actions of unbelievers, where he has these words: "Whatever action, therefore, is done by one who knows, is a right action. But whatever is done by one who does not know, is evil; even if he persists greatly, and remains in this purpose; because it is not made strong from consideration, nor does it direct actions to something useful from those things which lead to virtue, and which proceed from virtue. And the same ratio applies to other virtues. Every reasoning, therefore, which is done by one who does not know," [Gk] διὰ τοῦ ἀνεπιστήμονος, "even if it proceeds from fortitude, or any other virtue, is therefore evil, because it does not proceed from [Gk] λογισμῷ, from consideration, or rather from reason; nor is it referred to anything useful from those things which lead to virtue, and which proceed from virtue." And that the actions of unbelievers are such, no one at all doubts. Thus, Clement judged them to be evil, both from the cause—namely, ignorance—and from the end, because they are not referred to true virtue. ^D That this is, furthermore, the very sentiment of Augustine, which he defended against the Pelagians, and primarily against

^A those enemies of the grace of God, he declared in most express terms: "However much the works of unbelievers may be praised, we know the true and invincible judgment of the Apostle: 'Whatever is not of faith is sin'." And after he has dealt at length with this argument against Julian, he elicits this conclusion from the things he had discussed: "From which it is inferred that even the very works which unbelievers do are not their own, but belong to Him who makes good use of evil things. But the sins are their own, by which they do even good things; because they do them not with a faithful, but with an unfaithful—that is, a foolish and harmful—will: and such a will, as no one doubting Christ would deny, is an evil tree, which cannot produce anything but evil fruit, that is, only sins. For everything, whether one wishes it or not, which is not of faith, is sin. And for this reason, He cannot love these trees, and if they remain as such, He disposes to cut them down; because without faith it is impossible to please God. But I am lingering here, as if you yourself had not already pronounced these trees to be barren. How, therefore, do you not either joke in these disputations, or rave, when you praise the fruit of barren trees? Which indeed are either nothing, or if they are evil, they are not to be praised: or if the fruits are good, surely they are not barren trees; rather, they are also good, whose fruits are good, and they must please God, whom good trees cannot fail to please, and it will be false what is written: 'Without faith it is impossible to please God'."

We know indeed that very many theologians after Saint Thomas think that unbelievers cannot perform good works which are from grace—namely, meritorious works; yet [they hold] that they can equally perform good works to which the goodness of nature suffices. For this reason, they say, they do not sin in every action of theirs, but only in those which they perform out of unbelief.

Whether or not this was also the opinion of our Clement, one might perhaps think it possible to discern from those things in which he distinguishes two categories of men, of whom some are ignorant, while others are knowing and expert in doing something well ^B and living rightly. Yet he denies that this, however they may have acted, will profit them after death, unless they have had faith: "Now let us also consider this," he says, "whether when those who do not know how to act well live rightly—for it happens that some act well—others are led through intelligence to the word of truth, as if to a mark. But Abraham was not justified by works, but by faith. Nothing, therefore, will profit them after the end of life, even if they now act rightly, unless they have faith."

Then indeed, after he has warned us elsewhere not only with both Testaments—the Old as well as the New—but also with the laws established among the Greeks and philosophers, that "the nature of an action is most manifest," he immediately added: "And to say it once, all utility which pertains to life is indeed accomplished by the supreme reason from God Almighty, who presides over all, [the Father] through the Son, who is also on this account the Savior of all, as the Apostle says, but especially of those who believe." Whether or not it can be concluded from these [words] that Clement thought certain works of unbelievers were indeed good, but neither useful nor pertinent for obtaining eternal life, let it be the judgment of others. But if they declare that the matter is so, let them explain to us how our most learned author was consistent with himself, who most openly professes that he does not at all doubt that the action of any Gentile is a sin.

ARTICLE IV. That besides faith, good works are necessary for obtaining salvation.

Although Clement, as we have seen, did not believe that ^C they were necessary for men to obtain eternal life, yet he also established and proclaimed that good works are necessary, and are required by God’s command. Let us therefore select a few [passages] from these: "We ought," he says, "to have works that call out, as if we were walking in the day. For let works shine; and: 'Behold the man and his works before his face.' For behold God, and His works. The Gnostic ought to imitate God, as far as it is possible for him to be." Do you hear by what testimonies of Holy Scripture he proves that good works are required as entirely necessary, not only for Christians who are less perfect, but even for the Gnostic—that is, the most perfect Christian? But I ask you to listen for a moment to him again as he explains his mind in another book: "We ought, therefore, to offer to God sacrifices not sumptuous and splendid, but such as are pious and acceptable to Him, and that incense composed in the Law, which consists of many tongues and voices in prayer, or rather which is constructed out of various nations and sexes through the gift of the testaments into the truth of faith, and is gathered in praises, with a mind indeed pure, but with a just and right institution of life from holy works, and just prayer: ἐξ ὁσίων ἔργων, ἀρχῆς τε δικαίας." Therefore, Clement believed that everyone was bound and obligated to perform good works besides faith. What, indeed, of the fact that he himself declares faith—that which is in question—to be the producer of good works in these words: "Now indeed faith, even if it is a voluntary assent of the soul, is nevertheless a producer of good works, and the foundation of just action"?

Nor is there anything that any heterodox person could respond [to say] that nothing occurs more frequently in the writings of our Clement than that good works are not only counseled, but even commanded in the Holy Scriptures; but that he nowhere said that any man ever merited either the remission of sins, or divine adoption, or eternal life and salvation by these works of his. For our Clement utterly overturns this error. For he not only clearly teaches that we are raised to eternal happiness by the performance of good works, ἀγαθοεργίᾳ, and by divine assimilation, θείας ὁμοιόσεως; but he also adds in the same place: "There are other sheep," says the Lord, "which are not of this fold, which have been deemed worthy of another fold and mansion in proportion to their faith. But my sheep hear my voice, understanding the commandments from my knowledge." This, however, [is] to be accepted magnificently, and according to dignity and merits, along with the reward of works and mutual consequence. Wherefore when we have heard: "Your faith has saved you," we do not understand him to say absolutely that they will be saved who have believed in any manner whatsoever, unless works have also followed. What could be clearer and more luminous than these words of our Clement for condemning the error of the heretics? For there he most disertisely pronounces that a man is made whole by faith, and also by good works, which will be rewarded simultaneously in the other life. On account of which he shows elsewhere from the words of the Gospel itself that there are many mansions with the Lord, and distinguished rewards for each according to their merits and the proportion of their life.

To these, moreover, we have heard Clement plainly and clearly asserting that good works after the end of this life profit no one, unless he has had faith. Is it not, therefore, correctly inferred from that, that good works will profit those men after the end of this life who will be adorned and endowed with true faith along with the good works? To these, add besides, if you wish, what is read as written by him: "We have been born so that we might choose to obey [His] commandments, to this end, that we might wish to be saved... It is therefore the duty of man to obey God, who has announced various precepts through salvation...

^A and has adopted it, and kept it, he is faithful. But he who renders thanks for the benefit received, to the best of his ability, through charity, he is a friend. Clement was therefore persuaded that good works are useful for acquiring eternal salvation, and that man, aided by the grace of God, as has been abundantly proven from this, merits the rewards of eternal happiness. Finally, from the words of Christ Himself and the parable of the laborers proposed by Him, he makes it manifest that by the constancy of a right life, that is, by good works, we violently seize the kingdom of Christ: "They," he says, "who take the kingdom by force, are the violent," not with contentious prayers, but with the constancy of a right life; and they are said to offer violence by prayers which are made without ceasing, so that those who have removed the stains contracted from former sins might be cleansed.

Before we conclude this treatise on faith, it will perhaps not be useless to set forth in a few words what Clement records as having been handed down about it by the Greek philosophers. He begins from Aristotle in this way: Aristotle, he says, calls faith that which follows knowledge, a judgment by which we judge this or that to be true. Whence he concludes that this is more excellent than knowledge. But these things are to be found more clearly transcribed by Theodoret. Next, Clement narrates that Epicurus thought faith to be προλήψεως διανοίας, that is, as Hervetus rendered it, an anticipation of thought. But for this definition of faith, one must again read Theodoret, who illustrates it with various examples. Finally, Clement, and Theodoret again, show us what Heraclitus, Plato, and Epicharmus taught about it.

206 ARTICLE V. Concerning hope and fear.

The second theological virtue is hope, which is defined by Clement thus: Ἐλπὶς προσδοκία κτήσεως ἀγαθοῦ. "Hope is the expectation of acquiring a good." Again, a little later: Ἐλπὶς προσδοκία ἀγαθῶν, ἢ ἀπόντος ἀγαθοῦ εὔελπις. "Hope is the expectation of goods, or the good-hoping of an absent good." Indeed, this definition is suitable for every hope, whether human or divine, or, as they say, natural and supernatural. But that concerning which we are arguing is that ^B "through which," as our Clement speaks, "we desire those things which are best," οἳ δι' ἣν ἐφιέμεθα τῶν βελτι- όνων, namely God Himself, or the eternal happiness by which we may enjoy God eternally.

Wherefore he openly teaches that future things are to be expected by us, just as by faith we believe things that are future and even those that are past. Whence he had explained a little earlier how great the connection is between both that virtue and charity: "Since faith, like time, is twofold, we shall find two virtues which dwell together. For to time, which is past, belongs memory; but to that which is future, hope. For we believe that things past have existed, and that those which are future will be. And again, we love, being persuaded by faith that the past things are so, and expecting the future with hope." For this reason, without doubt, hope is said by him to consist of faith; because, indeed, the eternal beatitude which we believe to be future, we expect and hope for with most firm hope. Nay, even he who hopes, as Clement himself speaks, "just as also he who believes, sees with his mind those things which are foreseen by the intelligence, and those things which are future."

Moreover, this hope is of such constancy and firmness, ^C as is charity, and the powers of both are such that they can never be overcome by any circumstances, nor even by the most cruel punishments: "Neither therefore," says Clement, "does the hope of happiness, nor charity toward God, bear ill what befalls; but it remains free, even if it fall among the most savage beasts, and into the most consuming fire: and even if it be exhausted by tyrannical torments, hanging on divine friendship, it is not in any way reduced to servitude, but traverses superior regions, its body being delivered to those who can hold only that."

How rightly, then, the Apostle wrote to the Romans that this hope does not confound, he proves thus: "For because of future hope there is patience. And hope is also, equivocally, the yielding and restitution of hope, which does not confound, as it is no longer affected by reproaches and insults." Furthermore, that this same hope was not unknown to the pagan philosophers and poets, our Clement shows clearly not only in the same place, but also in the following book.

Moreover, just as that which is set before hope is God the merciful Himself, who bestows eternal reward and beatitude upon pious men; so also to fear is set before it the same God, who visits the impious and the wicked with everlasting punishments and torments. But from that fear, as our Clement explains, we fear not so much God Himself as the being separated from God: "For he fears," says Clement, "not God, but [to be] separated from God." That this fear is a good thing he proves in the same place ^D not only by the authority of Holy Scripture, but also a little earlier from that famous saying of Solomon: "The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord." For there he beautifully observes that wisdom is called the accomplishment, which is the fear of the Lord, leading to wisdom. But then he refutes egregiously the followers of Basilides and Valentinus, who were abusing this oracle of Proverbs in an entirely preposterous and perverse way to establish the most absurd inventions of their errors. He reveals the utility of fear there to be: "that those whom reason does not conquer, fear may soften." Nor does he stifle with a lighter blow the stubbornness of the heretics, who had insipidly dreamed that fear is an alienation, either from reason or from the mind, and that it is therefore an evil, and consequently the old law was to be rejected. Wherefore, before the eyes of all, Clement in the same place adds what this same law truly and deservedly announces is to be feared, and how Barnabas exhorts us to meditate on the fear of God.

Furthermore, the fear of God, as he teaches, is the turning away from evil, and it aids faith, and after faith it is the first of those virtues which lead us to charity, or, as he says elsewhere, to repentance and hope. What more? Somewhere he asserts that the fear of the Lord is discipline and knowledge, and that by this same fear sins are avoided by everyone; but elsewhere he says that doctrine joined to it is the first step toward Christian perfection. Finally, he repeats not only the utility of fear, but also a certain necessity of it, from the fact that the law seems to have willed divinely that fear should necessarily impend; whereby with greater caution and attention a philosopher might be far from a fall and sin.

Moreover, he distinguishes not obscurely a twofold, or rather a threefold fear. For after he had said that the beginning of love is fear, which is made through the increase of faith, and then [comes] love; so he continues: "But I do not fear and hate as a wild beast, but I also revere the father, whom I fear and love."

^A The first fear, then, according to the mind of Clement, is that by which one fears something as a wild beast, to be sure on account of the punishment to be inflicted. But this fear is entirely servile, and Clement declares that it is mixed with hatred. The second fear is that by which one dreads offending one’s father. This fear, however, is merely filial, which, as Clement says, is joined to love. Finally, concerning the third fear, which is intermediate between the two, or rather the secondary effect of the former fear, Clement says: "Where again, fearing that I might be chastised, I love myself, choosing fear." Therefore, one who is affected by that fear so dreads chastisement that he truly loves himself more than the one by whom, undoubtedly on account of guilt and offense, he fears to be chastised. Regarding this double or triple kind of fear, you may read what Saint Thomas has handed down; for indeed, no small light can be brought to this opinion of our Clement from that source.

Whether Clement thought that any such kind of fear was good, if you inquire, weigh, I pray, what he gathers a little later from the *Shepherd* of Hermas: "It must be feared that the Lord [is to be feared] for edification, but not the devil for destruction." On the other hand, the works of the Lord, that is to say the commandments, are to be loved and done; but the works of the devil are to be feared and not done. "The fear of the Lord instructs, and chastises, and restores to love: but the fear of the works of the devil also holds hatred as a fellow-dweller." From these words and the previous words of our author, you easily understand, as we believe, that he was persuaded that the fear of the devil or of wild beasts—that is, ^B of punishment and torture—if it persists only in that, is not good, since it does not have love, but rather hatred attached to it. On the contrary, however, the fear of God, by which we fear to offend Him as a father, is truly good; inasmuch as it is the beginning of love and leads us to it.

Nevertheless, I pray, do not induce your mind to believe that all servile fear is utterly proscribed and repudiated as entirely evil. For besides the fact that he demonstrates—as we have said—against the heretics that the old law and the fear struck by it are not at all evil, when from this fear we ascend to filial fear, love, and charity; he demonstrates this much more clearly when he explains by what steps this happens: "It is permitted not to be a son of unbelief, but to pass from darkness to life, and, having accommodated the ear to wisdom, to be a legitimate [son] of God: to be a servant, indeed, at first, then to become a faithful slave, and then to become a devoted attendant, fearing the Lord God." And if one ascends further, he is listed in the number of sons. "But after charity has covered a multitude of sins, by the perfection of blessed hope, it is permitted to him then, increased in charity, to be received and listed in the chosen adoption of sons, which is called the friend of God." Clement therefore thought that the fear of servants and slaves is good when by that fear we are led little by little to the love of God and the most perfect charity.

Who, therefore, does not see that this doctrine of Clement concerning the fear of God is entirely consistent with the opinion of the Tridentine Fathers, and is clearly the same as this definition of theirs, by which the heretics of our age are struck with this anathema? "If anyone shall say that the fear of hell, by which we flee to the mercy of God by grieving over sins, or abstain from sin, is sin, or makes sinners worse, let him be anathema." Wherefore elsewhere this same synod of the Fathers says: ^C "...that imperfect contrition, which is called attrition, because it is commonly conceived either from the consideration of the baseness of sin, or from the fear of hell and punishments, if it excludes the will to sin, with the hope of pardon, declares not only that it does not make a man a hypocrite and a greater sinner, but that it is also a gift of God and an impulse of the Holy Spirit, not yet indwelling, but only moving, by which the penitent, being helped, prepares for himself a way to righteousness." For is this not the very teaching of our Clement, who, as we have seen, often repeats and proves that fear is the beginning of wisdom, of discipline, and of divine love, and that it opens for us the way to penitence, faith, hope, and the most perfect charity?

But someone will perhaps object that Clement most eloquently pronounces that one who abstains from injustice ^D out of fear of punishment, or of imminent danger, or of hatred, or even for the sake of the hope of a reward to be obtained from God, is not good of his own accord, and seems rather to be just than actually being so. Therefore, Clement thought that the fear of punishment and the hope of reward make a man, as heretics say, a hypocrite and a greater sinner. Yet could that most learned man have finally fallen into the error that he had so often proscribed, as we have seen? Doubtless, no man of sound mind would easily admit this into his mind. Nor, indeed, was this ever his purpose and meaning. For we read what was written by him: "But we wish to know him who is always and in all things just, who remains just, neither fearing the punishments which are decreed by law, nor avoiding the hatred of the wicked who persecute sins, nor dreading the danger which hangs over him from the crimes and wickedness themselves. For he who abstains from doing anything of those things which are unjust on account of these [fears], is not good of his own accord, but [is good] through fear... But if he has abstained from doing injustice on account of the hope of remuneration to be obtained from God, because of those things which he has done justly, not even in this way is he good of his own accord. For as fear, so also does the reward make him just, or rather, causes him to appear just." Certainly, it can be doubtful or obscure to no one that Clement is there speaking of the just and perfect man, whom he calls "gnostic," and who has attained perfect charity; or, to use the very words of our Clement, "who is always and in all things just." And this man, as he continues, remains just without any fear of punishment or danger. And rightly so. For in his first Epistle, John wrote: "Fear is not in charity; but perfect charity casts out fear; because fear has punishment: but he who fears is not perfect in charity." Therefore, Clement has brought forward this reason why that just man has cast out fear. He who abstains from unjust works because of fear or the hope of reward is not just of his own accord: but that double affection causes him to appear just. For he has not yet arrived at that perfect charity, by which,

The just man

What then, another will argue, does Clement decree that all hope, even of the "reward to be obtained from God" as he himself says, just as fear, is to be utterly repelled by the "gnostic" or perfect Christian? Does Clement then, he will urge, teach not obscurely that hope, which is the second theological virtue, is only for imperfect Christians, and by no means for the perfect? But this does not seem to be the meaning of Clement, who is so far from establishing that hope is to be cast aside by the perfect Christian, that on the contrary he [always]...

declares it must be preserved. For these are the Greek words of his passage: «If, however, anyone should abstain from injustice because of the hope of a reward to be rendered by God to the just for their works, he is not good of his own accord. For as fear makes that man just, so does a reward make this one just, or rather, it makes him appear to be just.» In Latin: «But if one should abstain from doing injustice on account of the hope of a reward to be rendered by God for just works, he is not ^A good of his own accord. For as fear makes the former man just, so does a reward make this one just, or rather, it shows him to be a person who appears just.» By these very words he openly signifies that he who is just due to the divine reward to be rendered by God for just works—even if not of his own accord, that is, if he does not abstain from injustice out of a pure and sole love for God or, as they say, out of the sole motive of charity—nonetheless is just, or rather shows himself to us to be just. Therefore, he does not decree that the hope of reward is to be rejected by the perfect Christian, about whom, as is evident from what has been said and what he subjoins, Clement is arguing, since he affirms that the man is truly becoming just or, rather, appears just to us; since we rightly judge him to be truly just who acts well and justly for the sake of the hope of a reward. And that this indeed is his intention is easily understood from the following [pages], in which he shows that not only by pagan philosophers, but even by the Apostle, this hope—which is good for the good after death, but to the contrary for the wicked—is by no means to be renounced. But these things will shine forth more clearly from those points which Clement has handed down regarding charity and the "gnostic," or perfect Christian, which are presently to be explained by us.

ARTICLE VI.

On charity towards God and neighbor.

The third of the theological virtues is charity, and from it, along with faith and hope, Clement teaches that a trinity is composed; yet in such a way that charity is greater and more excellent than the other two: «For those,» he says, «who tend toward perfection, the proposal is rational knowledge—yvwors ὴ λογική—the foundation of which is the holy trinity—ή ἁγία τριάς—faith, hope, charity; but the greater of these is charity.» Moreover, he says that those three virtues are the foundation of rational knowledge—yvwσews τῆς λογικῆς—that is, of Christian perfection, which by him is called γνῶσις, just as the perfect Christian is wont to be called γωστικός. Furthermore, Clement says that these same three virtues follow one another in such a way that faith hopes for the sake of repentance, piety [hopes] for the sake of faith, and the perseverance that is in them, and the exercise together with discipline, ends in charity, and this is perfected by knowledge.

That charity is greater than faith and hope, he asserts not only after the Apostle, but proves it even from the fact that to him who is informed by charity, all things are indeed permitted; but out of consideration for others, he abstains from them; he refers all things to the glory of God, and fights with spiritual weapons against whoever exalts himself against the knowledge of God; finally, he fears no event, no affliction, no danger, and lastly, no kind of death or punishment, however cruel.

As to the progress by which that charity is reached, he teaches thus: «The observation of ignorance is the first discipline for him who walks κατὰ τὸν λόγον. When someone had been ignorant, he sought; and when he had sought, he found a teacher; and when he had found, he believed; and when he had believed, he hoped; and when from this he had loved, he is made like the beloved, studying to be that which he formerly loved.» By these steps, therefore, we ascend to charity, by which a man is made like unto God.

^B Another effect of this same charity is that the neighbor is loved for the sake of God. This charity, or love of neighbor, Clement describes thus: «Charity—ἀγάπη—is the concord of those things which are according to the Word—κατὰ τὸν λόγον—and according to [the] life—κατὰ τὸν βίον—and [the] manner—κατὰ τὸν τρόπον—that is, according to reason and life and morals; or, to speak in few words, it is a society of life—κοινωνία βίου—or the extension of friendship and benevolence with right reason, concerning the use of companions; but a companion—ὁ ἑταῖρος—is 'another self'—ἕτερος ἐγώ; whence also we address as brothers those who have been regenerated by the same Word—ad sodalium consuetudinem (a companion, namely, or 'another self') by which we call them brothers who have been regenerated by the same Word.» In a few words, Clement exhibits to us there a rule and norm by which true and right love toward the neighbor should be directed. For first, he teaches that it ought to be according to the Word—κατὰ τὸν λόγον—that is, that it should never exceed the circumscription of right reason. Then, indeed, Clement desires that the same love be according to [the] life and [the] manner—κατὰ τὸν βίον καὶ τὸν τρόπον—that is, according to the statutes set by God for the pious and holy forming of life and morals. For that charity, as he himself explains a little later, ought not to be feigned, but true, so that, hating evil, we may adhere to what is good and to fraternity. Wherefore, Clement adds a third point: that we love with that love those who have been regenerated by the same Word, namely, by the sacrament of baptism, and by the profession of the Christian religion, and whom we therefore call brothers.

I would have you note that it is not therefore prescribed by Clement that they alone be loved, but that they be loved more than others on account of the holiness of life and pious fraternity. For he himself makes it plain elsewhere that Christ commanded us in the Gospel not only to love our enemies, but also to bless those who treat us with insults and punishments, and to pray for them. From which certainly, and from those things which Clement mentions regarding the companions of this charity, it can hardly be obscurely gathered that a certain order is intended by him in this charity, regarding which theologians [write] after St. Thomas, 2-2, q. 26, and Estius in the third book of the Sentences, distinct. 29.

Furthermore, regarding this utterance of Clement, "another self," Erasmus, Cent. 1, adag. 2, p. 12, expresses it a little differently, namely in this manner, φίλος ἕτερος αὐτός. For Cicero previously [wrote]: «For that man is indeed a friend who is as it were another self.» But consult Erasmus, if you please.

Finally, Clement enumerates three virtues especially as companions of charity toward the neighbor, namely hospitality, humanity, and affection—dilectionem—which indeed are found to be quite clearly explained by him. And he discusses no less clearly in the same place what feeling and consensus of minds might be.

But it ought not to be omitted by us what he committed to writing regarding friendship. For he says that its kind is threefold; and the first indeed, and the best and most excellent, proceeds from virtue. For firm is the love from the Word—στερρὰ ἡ ἐκ λόγου ἀγάπη—and the love from reason is stable.

The second kind of friendship, and the intermediate one, is that which is by retribution—κατὰ ἀμοιβήν—or remuneration. But that kind of friendship, by the judgment of our Clement, is grasped for society and willingly sharing communication, and is conducive to life; it is common—κοινή—and is the love from grace—ἡ ἐκ χάριτος φιλία; for friendship is common from grace.

Thirdly, finally, «which indeed,» he says, «we Christians call that which is from habit—τὸ ἐκ συνηθείας φαμέν—that is, that it flows from custom or familiarity; but it is...

that which can be changed or altered into pleasure. What, however, should be thought concerning this triple friendship? He concludes thus: There is, therefore, one friendship of the philosopher, another of the man, and a third of the animal. For man is in reality the image of God in doing good, in which matter he himself is also affected by the benefit, just as a pilot both saves and is saved at the same time. By these words he certainly signifies that the third kind of friendship is merely animal, and therefore not altogether worthy of a man who is possessed of reason; that the second is good; but that the first is best. For in the second kind of friendship man is indeed a benefactor to others, but only κατὰ ἀμοιβήν, by way of remuneration, in that each expects the return of a benefit conferred upon him. But the first kind of friendship arises from virtue and reason, and through it man does good to any other ^B men whatsoever without any hope of vicissitude, and benefits them. 209 Now Clement says that this is the image of God, who, by the very fact that he adorns others with benefits, is himself adorned by these same benefits of his. Furthermore, why does he teach elsewhere that those who, as far as they are able, have mercy on others and bring them aid are just as merciful as those who, although they may not have the power, yet desire it as much as lies within them, and are prepared with a sincere mind to do it? He promises with certainty that both will receive honor and reward according to the measure of their will.

ARTICLE VII.

Concerning certain customs and institutions of the Christians.

To this discussion concerning Christian virtues let us append those things which Clement has inserted time and again in his books of the ^C Stromata concerning their customs. When he discourses there concerning the "Gnostic," he writes that the fourth and sixth days—the days of Mercury and Venus—are understood as enigmas by him; without doubt because all Christians were fasting on these days. And indeed Epiphanius repeated that fasting on both days from apostolic sanction, or at least tradition, in these terms: «Who is there anywhere on earth who does not concur in the fact that the fourth and sixth days are consecrated to fasting in the Church? But if we seek authority from the constitution of the apostles, why is the fast of the fourth and sixth days sanctioned for them by a perpetual law, except for Pentecost? ...But if the apostles had made no mention of the fourth or sixth day in their constitution, one could nevertheless have used other arguments. Although the matter has been written about most accurately by them, and this very thing, having been accepted by the Church, was confirmed by common consent long before any Aerius existed with the Aerians.»

Therefore, Epiphanius claims that this fast was decreed by a certain law ^D of the apostles, perhaps in their Constitutions. But since the authority of these apostolic Constitutions was not entirely certain, so that the Aerians might not mutter anything against it, Epiphanius certainly did not judge that it should be urged more than was proper. For this reason, he refutes the error of the Aerians concerning fasts with an invincible argument, taken from such a constant tradition of those same apostles, that no man, not even a heretic, could ever justly reject it.

Tertullian, however, similarly bears witness that this same fast flowed from the apostles; but he indicates not obscurely that the Catholic men thought they were held by no law of commandment to observe it: «The apostles,» he says, «also observed it, imposing no other yoke of fixed fasts to be observed by all in common, but let them run passively, nor under any law of precept, nor beyond the final hour of the day, when prayer also generally concludes at the ninth hour, according to the example of Peter which is related in the Acts.» Thus he introduces the orthodox speaking after his own defection to the Montanists. But Augustine can certainly be cited as a most rich witness that they were poorly and wrongly refuted by this man, who was already too stubbornly addicted to the parties of the heretics, when he wrote these words to Casulanus: «But if, since I think I have sufficiently answered him as far as I could, you ask my opinion on this matter, I, revolving this in my mind in the evangelical and apostolic writings, and in the whole instrument which is called the New Testament, see that fasting is commanded. But on which days one ought not to fast, and on which one ought to fast by the commandment of the Lord or the apostles, I do not find defined.» But perhaps it might be answered that Augustine there made mention only of some decree prescribed in the sacred Scriptures of the New Testament, but by no means of any other established thereafter by the apostles after Christ’s ascension into heaven. But it can also be pressed that if Augustine had known of any given by them by word and speech, it ought to have been brought forward by him as the matter demanded.

However you may say the matter stood, there is clearly no room for doubting that the aforementioned days of fasting were observed most religiously by all Christians, if you except certain heretics. For besides the authors praised by us, we read that this was certainly handed down most clearly by Origen: «We have,» he said, «the days of Lent consecrated to fasting. We have the fourth and sixth days of the week, on which we fast solemnly.»

Why, however, Christians fasted on those two days, Epiphanius brings forward this reason: «The fast on the fourth or sixth day is declared until the ninth hour, because the Lord was apprehended on the fourth day, and lifted up on the cross on the sixth. Therefore the apostles decreed that one must fast on those days, so that what is written might be fulfilled: *When the bridegroom shall be taken from them, then shall they fast*.» He returns to the same point, which Augustine relates a little differently: «The reason why the Church fasts especially on the fourth and sixth days seems to be that, having considered the Gospel, it is found that the Jews made their plan to kill the Lord on the fourth day of the week, which they commonly call the *feria quarta*. But after a day had passed... He was handed over that night, which already belonged to the sixth day of the week, which day is clearly that of His passion... On this day, therefore, the Lord suffered, which no one doubts is the sixth day of the week: wherefore the sixth day itself is also rightly assigned to fasting.»

Augustine further adds that the Roman Church and certain churches of the West observed the same fast on the Sabbath, but by no means the East. But the supreme pontiff Innocent I, no less than Isidore of Seville, having made mention of observing the fast on the sixth day and the Sabbath, do not make the slightest word of mention of the fourth day. Finally, Nicholas I answers to the *Consultations of the Bulgarians* that one must fast on every sixth day of the year, expecting only certain feasts; but he allows the fourth day to each person’s discretion. From which it can perhaps be gathered not absurdly that no written law concerning these fasts was made by the apostles, as we were saying a little before. Furthermore, concerning these same days of fasting, if you have the time and the desire, you may consult Petavius on the last place of Epiphanius cited by us, and also Cotelerius in the *Constitutions*.

num apostolicarum librum quintum, capite quinto, ^A ronymi epist. 7 ad Lætam, et 8 ad Demetriad.; Cassiani lib. De cœnobit. instit., cap. 4, et aliorum qui de his canonicis, ut vocant, Deum precandi horis aliquid litteris mandarunt. Nam id a viris eruditis anticipatum est, Cotelerio in lib. iii Constit. apostol., cap. 4, et uberius ab eminentissimo cardinale Bona De divina psalmod., capite 1, § 4 et seq., Thomassino lib. 1 Discipl. ecclesiast., cap. 36 et 37, et aliis.

Clemens further testifies that Christians were accustomed to beseech and pray to God at certain fixed hours. For where he discourses on the "gnostic," he speaks of them thus: "But if some," he says, "establish fixed and definite hours for prayer, such as the third, the sixth, and the ninth: yet the gnostic prays throughout his whole life... For those who understand the blessed trinity of holy mansions know also the threefold division of hours, which are honored by as many prayers." ^A 210 Clemens indeed notes fixed hours of prayer for Christians. But when he says that they are established by some, by this mode of speaking he certainly designates Christians who are less perfect, who, not inflamed by greater zeal, or occupied with various worldly affairs, consecrated at least these hours—the third, the sixth, and the ninth—with prayer. For perfect Christians, or gnostics, poured forth their prayers and vows to God not only during these hours, but, as Clement says there, throughout their whole life.

Cyprian also testified that the same hours had been observed of old, that is, by the men of the ancient covenant, and he gives the reason there why they are said to be consecrated in honor of the Trinity, as Clement also says; for, he says, "In celebrating prayers, we find that the three youths, strong in faith and victorious in captivity, observed the third, sixth, and ninth hour, clearly for the mystery of the Trinity, which was to be manifested in the last times. For even the first hour coming into the third shows the perfected number of the Trinity. And likewise the fourth proceeding to the sixth declares another trinity. And when the ninth is completed from the seventh, the Trinity is counted perfectly by the three-hour periods; which intervals of time, those who worship God, determining them spiritually long ago, observed at established and lawful times for prayer; and the matter was revealed afterwards, that they had been sacraments, since the just had prayed thus before." There is no need to gather here the testimonies of ancient writers, such as Tertullian in his book *De jejunio*, ch. 10; Basil, *Regulae fusius disputatae*, lib. XVIII, p. 470 et seq.; Hieronymus, epist. 7 to Laeta and 8 to Demetrias; Cassian, lib. *De cœnobit. instit.*, ch. 4, and others who have committed to writing something concerning these "canonical" hours, as they are called, for praying to God. For this has been anticipated by learned men: Cotelier in his book on the *Apostolic Constitutions*, ch. 4, and more fully by the most eminent Cardinal Bona in *De divina psalmodia*, ch. 1, § 4 et seq., Thomassin in lib. 1 *Discipl. ecclesiast.*, ch. 36 and 37, and others.

Furthermore, that Christians were accustomed to devote themselves to prayers while turned toward the east, not only is Clement a witness, but he explains to us the reason for this custom thus: "Since the east is an image of the day of birth, and from there as well the light increases, which first shone out of darkness, and for those who are wallowing in ignorance, the day of the knowledge of truth has risen, just as the sun rises; therefore prayers are held at the sunrise of the morning. Whence also the most ancient of temples looked toward the west, so that those who stand with their faces turned toward the idols might be taught to turn toward the east." In Origen the reason brought forth from Clement regarding that ritual and custom of the Christians had undoubtedly not arrived. For he thinks it comes from ecclesiastical observations, the reason for which is not easily discovered by anyone: "The reason," he says, "why we bow our knees when praying, and why from all regions of the heavens we turn to the eastern part alone to pour forth our prayer, is not easily grasped by anyone." Nevertheless, Cardinal Bona, besides the argument of our Clement regarding this rite, has reported four others taken from the writings of the ancient Fathers of the Church. Moreover, in the time of Tertullian this custom was so public and common that pagans believed the sun was adored by Christians as their God: "Because it became known," he said, "that we pray toward the east." Concerning this custom, the author of the *Apostolic Constitutions*, Basil, and almost infinite other writers speak. Regarding many other rituals or customs of Christians mentioned by our Clement, we have already discoursed above. Something concerning certain others, however, we shall briefly touch upon below, when the opportunity to speak of them presents itself to us.

Chapter XII. On the Gnostic or perfect Christian, and the martyrs.

ARTICULUS I. Quid apud Clementem γνωστικός et γνῶσις nomina significent.

That the perfect Christian is called *gnostikos* by Clement, we have already noted. But sometimes the philosopher is also called by that name by him. But what he desired this Greek name *gnostikos* to signify, he himself explains clearly in many places. In the first book of the *Stromata*, the *gnostic* is described by him thus: 'Ο δὲ τῆς παντοδαπῆς σοφίας ἔμπειρος, οὗτος κυρίως ἂν εἴη γνωστικός. "He who is experienced in the manifold excellence of wisdom, this man would be properly a gnostic." Indeed, he affirms that the martyrs themselves, who were killed by various torments for the confession of Christ, are those who "are superior to pleasure, who conquer the perturbations of the soul, who know each of the things which they do; who are gnostics, τοὺς γνωστικούς, who are greater than the world, τοὺς τοῦ κόσμου μείζονας." Moreover, in his book, he has declared not obscurely that *gnostikon* means entirely the same as *perfectum* (perfect). Therefore, at the beginning of the seventh book, he answers that it will be that in it he will openly demonstrate that only the *gnostikos* is a pious and religious man. Which, indeed, after he argued and proved it with various arguments, he elicits this conclusion: Μόνος ἂν εἴη τῷ ὄντι εὐσεβής τε, καὶ δίκαιος, καὶ θεοσεβὴς ὁ γνωστικός. "Only the gnostic would be in reality pious, just, and religious, and a true worshiper of God." Finally, that we may pass over many other good things, our author writes in the same book that those who believe in the divine Scriptures, being more certain than any other demonstration, are truly the faithful; but then he continuously subjoins these things: Οἱ δὲ καὶ προχωρήσαντες, ἀκριβεῖς γνώμονες τῆς ἀληθείας ὑπάρχουσιν οἱ γνωστικοί. "But those who have progressed further are perfect knowers of the truth, the gnostics." But regarding how much the faithful and the gnostic differ from one another, he had explained with these words: "It must be known that if a man has acted rightly in one or another aspect of the *pistos*, or faithful, he will not, however, conduct himself with that same highest summit of knowledge; just as the *gnostikos*, as the gnostic, and indeed regarding that which, according to the gnostic, we might call, so to speak, apathy, nor does he..."

^A satisfy himself with mere human definition, but rather, through divine science, he is brought to completion, according to both his manner and his life, and the word is harmonious and consistent with itself and with the divine Word. To state it once, it is a certain cognition of man, as the perfection of man, which is completed through the science of divine things, and in manner (or rather, in morals), and in life, and in discourse, it is congruent and consistent with itself and with the divine Word. He renders the reason for this there, because faith is perfected through it, insofar as through it the faithful man becomes perfect.

Furthermore, he distinguishes a twofold ^B cognition in Christians, of which one is common to all—by which, for instance, God is known. The other, however, is communicated to a few, which, by the authority of the Apostle, he shows to be the perfection of faith, more excellent than mere catechesis, and holding the primacy; and he maintains that man ought to be exercised in it toward the habit of eternal contemplation, into which no alteration falls 89. Those, therefore, who tend toward perfection, our author says, are offered rational cognition, whose three theological virtues—faith, hope, and charity—are the foundation 90. But those informed by perfect cognition among the Gnostics, such as the apostles were, know all things that are to others doubtful and incomprehensible, and grasp them with a firm comprehension. What more? These Gnostics most certainly perceive and understand not only the first cause of all things, but also all those things which concerning good and evil, and any other matters whatsoever, have been handed down by the Lord. They possess secondary virtues as well; for the chief thing for him (the gnostic) is cognition: *For cognition is primary for him*. Therefore, of other sciences and disciplines he takes to himself only those which from each discipline can contribute to the truth.

It is therefore no wonder if Clement elicits this conclusion concerning this cognition: *The most perfect good, therefore, is cognition—which is desirable in itself; but, consequently, those goods also which we attain through it*. ^C This cognition is, without doubt, for this reason also called by him a rational, or spiritual, death, which separates the soul from movements and perturbations, and leads it to beneficence and good works, so that it may live the life that God wills. *For now*, he says 91, *as death is the separation of the soul from the body, so cognition is, as it were, a rational death, leading and separating the soul from the passions, and leading it to the life of beneficence and good operations, to the life of well-doing, so that then it may say to God: I live as you will.*

Observe, I pray you, how far Clement departs here from the opinion of certain moderns, who wish to be called "mystics," by which they exclude the exercise of virtues from the state of, as they say, "transformed souls." For what, I ask you, can be the more perfect state of those souls, than that certain spiritual death by which they are removed from ^D perturbations, or, as the scholastics like to speak, from the passions? And yet Clement clearly affirms that souls are brought by this very state *to the life of well-doing*. What, however, does the word *eupoia* signify there, if not beneficence, or good actions, and good works, by which the soul, dead to perturbations, lives a spiritual life as God wills—that is to say, as was commanded by God Himself, it expends its effort always in good actions? So far is our Clement from wishing the soul, placed in that state, to be despoiled of every act of virtue, that he rather believes it is led by that very fact to the proper performance of all the duties and offices of the virtues. For this reason, truly,

he asserts that this *gnosis* excels all disciplines, yet is most difficult to acquire, and cannot be obtained without much labor. But these things must be discussed by us more fully and clearly, after we have fleetingly noted that the word *gnosis* is sometimes used by Clement also for the intuitive vision of God, as they say, and for eternal happiness.

ARTICLE II.

What may be the progress of the Gnostic to the highest pinnacle of virtue.

Although, as we have seen, Clement has often taught that by the name of *gnostic* and *gnosis*, the perfect Christian and the perfection of the Christian life is signified, he nonetheless shows that there are various advancements of the gnostic in virtue and various kinds of perfection. But because, as he himself puts it, for us indeed, as far as possible, the soul must first be exercised in various ways, so that it may be ready and apt to receive knowledge; for this reason, he warns that there are certain "preliminary exercises" of gnostic training, such as those which, as the Apostle testifies, create and effect in man repentance for sins, zeal, defense, indignation, fear, desire, emulation, and vengeance.

However, how varied the advancements of the gnostic are, Clement himself explains to us. Their basis, as he says, is abstinence from evils. Next, the gnostic does nothing good, neither out of fear, nor for the sake of the hope of honor; but only that bounty which is done for the sake of charity is to be sought by him for the sake of the honorable itself.

But beware lest you think these words of Clement, "for the hope of promised honor," should be understood as the hope of eternal honor, or eternal happiness. For in the same place he added that the gnostic, after he has arrived at the charity by which he is held by the desire for the good for its own sake, asks for an eternal inheritance: "But now, in the person of God," Clement’s words are, "it is said by the Lord: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance." A most royal petition, which teaches man to pray for salvation without reward, so that we may be heirs and possess the Lord.

A little later he recounts again these same advancements of the gnostic or perfect Christian. For first, he wants kindness to be put forward, but not on account of any use of those things which pertain to oneself. Then, indeed, the gnostic, Clement says, judges what is beautiful and honorable, and does it always, not "for the sake of glory," or, as the philosophers say, for the celebration of fame or reputation, nor for the sake of a reward, to be received either from men or from God, whether from men or from God, for example, in this world; since, as we have said, he always asks for the eternal from God. Finally, if he should be wronged, he does not return like for like, but without any record of the received injury, he is always just and good toward the just and the unjust.

Furthermore, in another book our author recounts in detail how the gnostic advances step by step and gradually, and ascends to the highest pinnacle of perfection. From the knowledge of created things, says Clement, that gnostic begins. But when he has begun to hear something about God and His providence, then he believes those things to be true which he previously admired. Hence he strives with all his powers that he may be able to perceive the knowledge of those things for which he burns with desire, and thus he becomes worthy of contemplation. Then, having known the will of God, he exerts all the nerves of his mind so that he may understand those things which are signified by the words of Sacred Scripture. And immediately he trains himself by scientific knowledge, by which he can have them seen and explored more universally and magnificently by the Lord, whom he knows to have donned flesh, were spoken.

Then, indeed, when he has attained these things, he never prefers the pleasant to the useful: but if sickness, or accident, or even death itself threatens, he remains unaffected and unmoved. Furthermore, using created things as right reason dictates, he gives thanks to the Creator for them, and is clearly the master of using them. Even if harmed by someone, however undeservedly, he is yet never mindful of the injury inflicted, he worships the Creator, loves his neighbor, and prays to God for him. In afflictions, however, and other adverse events, and in the disturbances of the mind, whether voluntary or involuntary and necessary, he always behaves in such a way that he preserves his soul completely unharmed. In these things, therefore, remaining firm and stable, he not only praises good and honorable things, but he himself, from a servant, becomes dear to God through the charity of the good and honorable. Thus he is lifted up to the highest pinnacle of perfection, and with the examples of the patriarchs, prophets, angels, and the Lord Himself placed before his eyes, he does not love all the goods of the world, even though they may be at hand, but hopes for those things which he has known to be destined to be eternal. Finally, he constantly sustains labors, miseries, and punishments for the sake of this hope, and these, however heavy and burdensome they may be, just like other things which are pleasant and delightful, he entirely contemns and spurns.

However, even though Clement may have said that the gnostic ascends to that summit of highest perfection, he nonetheless expressly declares that his soul, throughout the entire course of this mortal life, always makes certain advancements and is augmented by virtues, until it attains eternal happiness in the other life: "The soul," he says, "which continually becomes better, for acquiring virtue and preparing and augmenting justice, will receive a better place in the universe: as that which is extended through every advancement to a habit of impassibility, until it has progressed to the perfect man, namely to the excellence of knowledge and inheritance simultaneously. These saving conversions are divided, according to the order of change, by times, and places, and honors, and knowledges, and inheritances, and ministries, up to the transcendent and continuous contemplation of the Lord in eternity." Nor was it enough for him to have said this once, but afterwards he writes to the same effect: "Knowledge, *gnosis*, is therefore swift toward purification, *katharsis*, and apt for easy change toward the better. Whence also it easily transfers one to that which is akin to the soul, and divine, and holy, and through the mystical perfection of a certain proper light transmits the man, until it has restored him to the highest place of rest, who is pure in heart, teaching him to contemplate God knowingly and by comprehension face to face." Let fair judges of affairs judge how much this sound and orthodox doctrine of Clement differs from the opinion and error of those who falsely gabble and preach that the supreme perfection of the Christian man is constituted in a certain fictitious and clearly idle rest, and in the cessation of all good actions and virtues. But let us proceed to many other things which our author has handed down in his writings concerning the gnostic, and by which this false opinion is fundamentally overturned.

ARTICLE III.

What good works Clement desires in the Gnostic.

What good works Clement desires in the gnostic, and what virtues he desires in him, so that it may be made plain, it is not necessary for us to recount, since he himself has handed down that the gnostic not only abstains from every greater sin whatever, whether of speech and thought, or of feeling and deed; but also to be known by that very "sin" 1205 [beginning here next page]

^A shadow. "For works follow knowledge no otherwise than the shadow follows the body." Hence also elsewhere: "If in truth," he says, "we consider things, knowledge is the primary purification of the soul's part, and a good operation."

We would certainly not reach the end of what is to be said, if we were to describe everything that Clement committed to writing in various places—and especially in this, and in the sixth and seventh books—concerning the good actions of the gnostic and the divine precepts to be fulfilled and observed by him not only by day, but also by night. We wish, however, that you be reminded yet again by the author himself, that from the same Clement of ours, out of the Epistle of Clement of Rome to the Corinthians, and the first Epistle of Paul to the same, the example and specimen of the gnostic are, in a wonderful manner, established, confirmed, and corroborated with respect to all the things that have been said thus far.

ARTICLE IV.

With no less zeal does Clement wish for assiduous labor to be given by the gnostic to all the cardinal, as they are called, as well as theological virtues, just as he does to good actions. And to begin from the first, he teaches that the gnostic is, as far as possible, an imitator of God ^B, "omitting none of those things which contribute to that likeness which can be attained, [being] continent, enduring, living justly, ruling over the perturbations of the soul, and distributing what he has, [he] does good by word and deed according to his powers."

Concerning each of those four virtues, to say something in particular, Clement makes it clear that the same gnostic preserves prudence and, just as with justice, uses it to prepare wisdom. He says, furthermore, that his justice—the first duty of which he asserts to be embracing his neighbors with love—is fourfold, and that it consists in words and deeds, in self-abstinence from all evils, in beneficence, and finally in the perfection of knowledge. What, then, of the fact that he subsequently handed down in his writings that one justice is for the sake of charity, and another for the sake of fear? Finally, he maintains that the sanctity ^C and wisdom of the gnostic are his companions and associates, and there he clearly defines those three virtues. It is pleasing, however, to hear him speaking: "Moreover," he says, "a mutual consequence of the three virtues is found in the gnostic, who, morally, physically, and logically (or rather rationally), is occupied about God. For wisdom is the knowledge of divine and human things. But justice is the harmony of the parts of the soul. And sanctity is the worship of God."

By fortitude, indeed, the gnostic attains this, that neither by accusation, nor by evil report, nor by glory or flattery is he conquered; but he bears labors, misfortunes, and all things contrary to him with an equal mind. He resists with all his might pleasure, covetousness, pain, anger, and all things which entice him to evil either by force or by fraud: he does not anticipate the occasion ^D of martyrdom, but undertakes it with a willing and constant mind when he is called by God. Furthermore, he rises up against the bodily soul, and puts a bridle on the spirit which refuses to obey; and through the exercise of life, which is always ready to overcome the movements of the soul with knowledge, the perfection of fortitude is increased in him. Nor is this wonderful, truly. For he despises with a great mind all the things that are in the world, as a pilgrim and a stranger therein, and is always prepared for death. He is also a fortifier and teacher of others in the faith. Wherefore our Clement constantly

^A asserts that the gnostic is, indeed, metaphorical regarding that which is life’s righteousness. A wife, however, is a sister to him after the reception of children, to be judged as though she were born of the same father, remembering the man only when he looks upon his children.

Cibi, Clement says, drink and anointing have no use for the gnostic unless it be honorable, which he refers to God; he offers the first-fruits of those things which he uses, and gives thanks for them. Then, our author proceeds: “Coming rarely to convivial feasts, unless some banquet which professes friendship, concord, and agreement persuades him to come.” But it is so far from the case that the gnostic receives any delight from food, drink, and Venus, that he even holds in suspicion the conversation itself, which brings some pleasure.

Nor furthermore does Clement prescribe to the gnostic only a clearly moderate use of food and drink and other necessary things; but he also testifies that some have abstained from meats altogether ^B: “Perhaps some one of the gnostics, for the sake of exercise, has abstained from meats; and so that the flesh may not luxuriate too much and be carried with too great force into the matter of Venus.” Clement says “perhaps” on purpose; because many, on account of infirmities of health and a languid stomach, could not abstain from meats entirely.

Regarding any gnostic whatsoever, he pronounces thus: “He knows himself the enigmas of the fast of these days, I mean the fourth and the sixth.” And what else does Clement mean by these words than that the gnostic has not only passed these days of each week in fasting, as other Christians have, but that he knows also that it is signified to him by these fasts that he must fast from avarice, lust, and any evil actions and thoughts whatsoever?

What, moreover? “Now indeed,” as he speaks elsewhere, “the soul of the wise and gnostic man, as one who is a pilgrim and a stranger in the body, uses it severely and honestly, ^C showing toward it no excessive affection or indulgence, Gk text: οὐ προσπαθῶς (that is, without affection), as one destined to leave the tabernacle immediately if the time of departing calls it.”

Wherefore he said in yet another book, if he sees that he is looking at things he does not wish to, he chastises the faculty of sight, when he feels that he is being afflicted by pleasure from the application of sight Gk text: κολάζων τὸ ὁρατικὸν, ὅτ' ἐν ἡδομένου ἑαυτοῦ κατὰ τὴν προβολὴν τῆς ὄψεως συναίσθηται. But these things, concerning the same gnostic who rises against the fleshly soul and restrains it and its desires and represses the allurements of pleasure, are, having been explained by us ^D a little further above, clearer to everyone than that we should again expend effort in proving them at greater length.

Nevertheless, we cannot pass over in silence what Clement records concerning the Apostle, a gnostic surely most perfect: “Paul also, ‘I chastise my body,’ he says, ‘and bring it into subjection.’ Since, he who strives abstains in all things, that is, contains all things, not abstaining from all things, but using none of those things which he has judged must be used: they, indeed, to receive a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible, living in the struggle, but not receiving the crown without dust.” Clement therefore thought that Paul had chastised his body with abstinence and continence, and, like an athlete, had won in the struggle, but not without dust, that is, not without bodily castigations, or, as they say, mortifications, had received the crown. Furthermore, concerning the word of Paul, *ὑπωπιάζω*, in the Clementine scholia you will find many things not unworthy of note.

But how pleasures, whether by day or whether

^A in dreams, occur, and how the Gnostic restrains them and is not swayed by them, Clement thus explains: "For he is content with a meager diet, which makes him satisfied with few things; being habituated to this, he is temperate and moderate, with gravity and honesty, needing few things for the necessities of life, seeking nothing superfluous: and he does not even admit these as primary, but as necessary from the custom of life and the pilgrimage of the flesh. But he devotes himself entirely to knowledge, which, as Clement speaks, τῆς ψυχῆς τροφὴ ἡ γνῶσις, is the soul's nourishment."

But furthermore, the Gnostic strives with great force that by exercise itself he may become void of desire: "Whoever, he says, studies to be assimilated to the character which was given by the Lord, ἀνεπιθύμητοι ἐξ ἀσκήσεως γενέσθαι βιάζονται, they strive with great force that by exercise they may become void of desire."

But further, from these things which we have said, who can fail to see clearly how persuaded Clement was that the mortifications of the body are altogether necessary for every Christian, even the most perfect? Who, moreover, from this would not most easily understand that if anyone were to say that these things should be driven away and excluded from the state of men who are, as they say, mystics, such a person would plainly and thoroughly refragate the doctrine of our Clement and the documents of the true Catholic Church?

ARTICLE V. Concerning the chaste and holy dreams of the Gnostic.

The Gnostic, by always afflicting his body, as has been said by us, and by nourishing his soul with knowledge, which is a food purely spiritual, effects that no pleasure—which lies in wait and bites us by luring us with illusions not only by day (these are the words of Clement), but even at night in dreams themselves—should trap us in those same dreams, "nor should he see a dream which does not befit the elect." And Paul afterward: "Moreover, looking upon dreams, he does and thinks holy things, by that reason always being clean for prayer." But he had said previously in another book: "The principal part of the soul, remaining unalterable, does not assume any diversity of visions, which are caused by daily motions, dreaming images." ^B Moreover, surely the Lord commands to watch, so that the soul may never be moved by perturbations of the mind even in dreams, but commands it to keep its nocturnal life also pure and immaculate, just as it operates by day.

Nor, furthermore, does this seem to be the singular document of our author. For among Cassian, the abbot Chaeremon, or rather Cassian himself under the name of this abbot, when he recounts the various degrees of chastity, the sixth and last is thus remembered by him: "The sixth degree of chastity is that one be not deluded by the seductive phantasms of women even while sleeping." But Cassian himself elsewhere subscribed to this opinion in his own words, not those of others: "Of which purity this will be an evident sign and full proof, if either no deceiving image occurs to us while resting and relaxed in sleep, or at least if it does occur, it has no power to excite any motions of concupiscence. For although such a commotion is by no means reckoned as the full harm of sin, yet it is not yet an indication of a perfect mind, nor a manifestation of vice refined to purity, when an illusion of this kind operates through lustful images." Again, truly afterward: "And so this is the end of integrity and the perfect proof, if no titillation of pleasure has crept in while we are resting, and, for the necessity of nature, to us ^C in unconscious states, obscene concretions are discharged."

Has not, indeed, John Climacus also added his own vote to the same opinion, who discusses chastity and purity thus: "Chastity is familiarity with an incorporeal nature... Purity is the general surname of all virtues. He is chaste who feels neither motion nor any change of his state even in dreams. He is chaste who has possessed perfect insensibility toward the appearance and variety of bodies always, even in dreams. This rule is the end of such perfect and consummated chastity, that we may look upon animate things just as we do upon inanimate, and be affected by rational bodies just as by brute ones." And a little later: "If that, he says, is a sure argument of true chastity, that one remains immovable in those phantasms which we see through the sleep, then it will surely be the end of wantonness, if anyone while waking suffers a flux from unclean thoughts."

What then, someone might ask, does this opinion not altogether oppose and fight against apostolic doctrine? For who was more perfect than the apostle Paul? Yet that divine man confesses that a thorn of the flesh was given to him, that it might buffet him. He lamentably bewails and deplores elsewhere that he sees another law in his members, resisting the law of his mind, "and capturing him in the law of sin." But what, indeed, of what Augustine wrote against the errors of Julian and Pelagius: "But who doubts that concupiscence can be diminished in this life, but cannot be consumed?" Which he himself repeats elsewhere, and asserts and defends by the authority of other Fathers of the Church.

Is this, then, not the error of the Pelagians, someone will urge, and a little branch of the doctrine of Origen, which Jerome also, like Augustine, cut down while attacking the errors of the Pelagians with these words: "Your doctrine is a little branch of Origen." For in that psalm, where it is written, to say nothing of the others: "Moreover, even until night my reins have instructed me," he asserts that the holy man, of whose number you are, when he has come to the summit of virtues, does not even at night suffer those things which are of men, nor be titillated by any thought of vices. "Nor should you blush at the company of such, refuting the names of those to whose blasphemies you are joined." But Erasmus in his scholia to this epistle notes that this opinion is not quite deservedly marked by Jerome as an error. For besides the fact that Pliny believed it possible through a certain herb that one might not experience obscene dreams, he argues that Jerome himself was not sufficiently consistent. For, indeed, poured out in praises of virginity, the same Jerome plainly praises those who, living in the flesh but not according to the flesh, imitate the angelic life. And indeed to Eustochium concerning the custody of virginity he wrote this: "As soon as the Son of God entered upon the earth, he instituted a new family for himself; so that he who was adored by angels in heaven, might have angels also on earth."

Then, indeed, for the confirmation of those things which Erasmus reports from Pliny, it can be brought forward what Cicero recorded in letters concerning Plato: "Plato commands that one should proceed to sleep with the body so affected that there be nothing that brings error and perturbation to the soul." From which it is also thought that the Pythagoreans were forbidden to eat beans; because that food has great inflammation, contrary to the tranquility of the mind, which is seeking things that are true. But afterward, indeed: "So therefore he who delivers himself to rest with a mind thus prepared, both by good thoughts and by things accommodated to tranquility, discerns certain and true things in dreams."

^A But we have no doubt at all that the defenders of Jerome can most easily clear away the stain of error or contradiction inflicted upon him. For although that most learned writer may have said that men imitate the life of angels, he did not consider them, even like the angels, to be any longer subject to the infirmities of human flesh, nor to have reached such a pinnacle of virtue as to never again, in the night, experience those things which are human. Nor did Pliny write that there is any herb by which a man could attain that greatest purity of the flesh of which they speak. And indeed, even if he had asserted it under oath, who would wish to put faith in him?

As regards Cassian, even if in the cited passages he had stumbled upon the rock of Pelagian error, this should stir up admiration in no one. For everyone knows he was not entirely pure of this stain, nor clearly beyond it. Yet there are those who think that he, in the very passages that are cited, did not recede from the sound and orthodox doctrine of the Catholic faith. They say, indeed, that the repugnance of flesh and spirit in all men was recognized and asserted by him, just as it was by the Apostle. To Cassian, therefore, they maintain, there was no other mind or intent than that there are certain most perfect men—such as Abbot Serenus, described by him—in whom, by the benefit of divine grace, in a manner entirely singular and most rare, the fatal fire of perverse desire seemed to be refrigerated, lulled, and even extinguished. Finally, in that same conference of his which is praised, he does not reluctantly concede that perfect men, sleeping, are moved and agitated by the motions of the flesh, but he denies that anything is diminished or taken away from the perfection of chastity in that regard. For he concludes his discussion on chastity thus: "This is the consummation of chastity, that no pleasure of lust may constrain the vigilant monk, that the illusion of dreams may not deceive the one resting: but when, due to the carelessness of a mind lulled to sleep, the motion of the flesh happens to the sleeper, just as it was excited without any titillation of pleasure, so it may rest without any itching of the body."

In the same sense, Climacus, after those things which we have related, immediately added his own words: "No one of those who exercise themselves in the study of chastity should think that he has acquired this by his own labors or his own industry. For it is not possible that anyone should overcome his own nature; and where finally nature has been overcome, there he who is above nature is known to have arrived." There, certainly, he declares most openly how great the fragility of our nature is; but he silently passes over whether it is often or rarely that one is found whom, in sleep, no foul image or motion of the flesh any longer moves or titillates. But there will be another place to say more about both those authors.

^C Therefore, we do not think that those who would have wished to provoke us to the pagan philosophers, those hunters of vain glory, should be listened to any further. For we know that Epicurus sold himself on the idea that he would be like himself in his dreams. We are not unaware, either, that Plato taught: "When someone delivers himself to sleep with a healthy and well-tempered habit of body, and that part of the soul in which reason dominates is aroused by itself, and having recalled into itself, as if to a banquet of good thoughts, its own keenness of contemplation and intellect, has set before itself [the objects of its thought]; and that part of the soul, meanwhile, in which desires reside—neither pressured by lack nor satiated by abundance—rests most of all and does not disturb that best part either with joy or with grief, but allows it to consider by itself alone and purely, and to desire and to perceive whatever it knew of things past, present, or future: in the same way also when that part of the soul in which anger has its seat is so pacified and extinguished that it rests, hostile to no one; and consequently with two parts of the soul settled in this manner, and the third, in which the power of reasoning resides, more freely aroused, then one gives oneself to rest; and finally, when one is thus moderately composed in mind, one most of all embraces the truth, and no nefarious visions of dreams are presented to one’s mind." It is not unknown to us, either, what Aristotle handed down: "Those who are instructed in virtues see better dreams, because they also notice better things while awake." For these and other sayings of other philosophers, if any are brought forward, prove nothing else than that he who approaches sleep with a mind rightly composed and best instructed in virtues, possesses far purer and holier thoughts in that same sleep. But that he should thereafter always think holy and chaste thoughts, neither this philosopher nor any other has asserted; nor, if it were proven that any philosopher ever affirmed this, is it in any way to be believed. For it is certain from the common experience of even the holiest of men that no one, except by the singular benefit of divine and almighty grace—which, as we have seen, was not granted to Paul—has been entirely free and immune from every motion and titillation of the flesh, whether awake or sleeping, through the long time of his life.

To our Clement, therefore, since the question now concerns him alone, let us come: that he said God commanded all Christians to be vigilant so that the soul should not be moved by any perturbations, even in dreams, is to be explained with a benevolent interpretation, as far as can be, and as is given to the fragility of human nature. With equal benevolence is that to be accepted which is taught by him, that the Gnostic, worn out by abstinence and fasting, in dreams—indeed, not always, and through the rest of his life, but often and very often—and for the most part, both acts and thinks holy things. For Clement, being most conscious of our infirmity, does not seem to assert that Christians have actually attained this perfection, but rather that he excites and exhorts them to strive toward it. And that, in truth, can be proven to them by the things he says about the head of Christ the Lord, of the apostles...

ARTICLE VI.

On the theological virtues of the Gnostic, faith, hope, and charity.

As regards the theological virtues, Clement maintains that the Gnostic consists in faith: "the Gnostic is in faith." From those things which we have debated above regarding this virtue, it can be obscure to no one that Clement deemed it to be entirely necessary not only for the Gnostics, as it is for other Christians, but that it ought to be more perfect in them. Concerning this increase and excellence of faith in the Gnostic and in Christians who are more perfect, we read these things dictated by him: "But that which is superadded in an excellent way is perfected by the faithful, and is in turn perfected through that which arrives from doctrine and the reason for performing commandments, such as the apostles were, of whom it was said that faith moves mountains and transplants trees. Whence, when they had sensed the magnitude of the power, they prayed that faith might be added to them, which, like a grain of mustard seed, might profitably bite the soul, and grow in it so much that, in it, reasons regarding sublime matters might find their rest."

But the Gnostic joins and mixes this faith with hope for the expectation of the future: "With the serpent," says Clement, "joined with the dove, together perfectly..."

^A living, and with a good conscience committing his hope to the expectation of the future." It is certain, moreover, and is evident from those things which precede and follow, that the discourse there is concerning the perfect Gnostic. It was, therefore, believed by him [Clement] that this Gnostic must be equipped not only with faith, but also, in hope, with the expectation of the future. Wherefore, writing again elsewhere regarding the martyr—that is, the most perfect Gnostic, as he deems him 69: "Is, therefore, the hope of faith after death not manifest to them?"—who even in the very time of torments give thanks to God. "They possessed firm and constant faith, which the faithful also followed by deeds." But what is the meaning of the fact that the perfect Gnostic is said by the same Clement 70 to be "inseparable from hope," just as he is from the "commandment," giving thanks to God always, "as the animals which glorify Him," which are spoken of allegorically through Isaiah? Nor, indeed, does the Gnostic only hope, but he also desires his own and others' eternal beatitude: "And therefore (the words are the author's own) he will not, indeed, desire (or pray) to obtain those things which are here, to whom it is persuaded that he will obtain those things which are good; but he will always desire to hold fast to the right and to his own faith; and furthermore, that as many as possible may become like him for the glory of God, which is completed through knowledge, ᾗ κατ᾽ ἐπίγνωσιν τελειοῦται." Regarding the Gnostic's charity, there is no need for us to draw out a long and elaborate thread of discourse. For all who have even lightly leafed through these books of the *Stromata* know that nothing is more studiously commended by Clement in them, and almost nothing occurs more frequently in them, than his multiple and various exhortations and incitements, by which he excites, sharpens, and impels all Christians, even the most holy, to achieve the perfection of that charity. Yet, as we select a few from the very many scattered throughout, that first pronouncement of Clement occurs 71: "By all means charity has persuaded the Gnostic who knows the one God. To the Gnostic who knows God, love has persuaded all things."

Where, however, the same author of ours undertakes to prove that only the Gnostic truly worships God, there he defines this worship thus 73: "The worship of God for the Gnostic is a continuous care of the soul, and its perpetual occupation in God through charity, which is never interrupted, κατὰ τὴν ἀδιάλειπτον ἀγάπην." Such, therefore, is the Gnostic's worship toward God, as is his charity. Because, therefore, his charity is never interrupted by any vice or graver sin, for that reason he always worships God, and his occupation in God is perpetual. With this charity he suffers all things, endures all things; and, affected by ignominy, publication of goods, exile, and death itself, he is never separated from that charity by any ^B iniquitous liberty of the soul. He suffers all things with a strong and constant mind, not to please man, but to please God: "Although," says Clement 75, "praise also follows him by consequence, not for his own utility, but for the imitation and use of those who praise. From human praises, moreover, he is of such an averse mind that he desires nothing further besides God, whom he has resting within himself." Wherefore Clement declares that this charity is to be sought for its own sake, and not for the sake of anything else 76.

Very many other things regarding the Gnostic's perfect charity toward God Clement gathers everywhere. But since these are obvious and easy for everyone, or if they have any difficulty, are elucidated by us in the preceding and following articles, ^C we must now accurately weigh the argument of his [Clement’s] regarding the pure, as they say, love of God.

ARTICLE VII. On the pure Gnostic's love and charity toward God.

We know it has seemed to some that this was the opinion of our Clement: that a perfect Christian, or Gnostic, at some point arrives at a state of most perfect charity—not only an act, but what they call a habitual state—by which he loves God most constantly, having no regard for any other good, nay, not even for his own eternal beatitude. And they are accustomed to call this habit and state of pure love so, because God Himself alone, and His supreme and infinite perfections, are, as they speak, the motive, or cause, reason, and argument of this love. For although they profess that God by His nature is our very beatitude, or, as they say, the object of our beatitude, they nevertheless contend that the same God is so often loved by the Gnostic for His own sake alone, or by the motive of His perfections alone, that they wish his own eternal happiness to be, as it were, actually sacrificed by him at times for this act or habit of pure love. A truly harsh sacrifice, but one by which they think nothing at all is offered to God except what concerns our affairs. Furthermore, they think that the whole structure of the mystical and spiritual life, as they call it, or as Clement likes to speak, the "Gnostic" life, is founded and built upon this sentiment of pure, as we may still speak with them, love, and that distinction between the object of it and the motive.

But they bring forth many testimonies of our Clement in defense of this opinion of theirs, which indeed, lest we seem to dissimulate anything, are to be transcribed by us in their entirety and accurately examined. Therefore, the first, taken from the fourth book of the *Stromata*, is framed in these words 77: "I think, however, that one ought to approach the saving Word ^D neither for fear of punishment, nor for the sake of any promise of a gift, but for the sake of the good itself. Those who are such stand at the right side of the sanctuary. But those who, for the donation of those things into which corruption and decay fall, think in turn that they will receive incorruption, are called mercenaries in the parable of the two brothers." But they who object these things to us have not sufficiently and diligently noticed that our Clement is arguing there about the martyr, who can be compelled by no threats or torments to abjure the faith of Christ. But that martyr, as Clement says, "is persuaded [...] to approach the saving Word, not for the promise of a good—namely, earthly and temporal—but for the sake of the good itself," to whom eternal beatitude is promised for those who suffer persecution for the sake of justice. Wherefore he opposes this martyr to him who thinks that he will receive incorruption for the donation of some falling and fleeting good. So far, therefore, is that love, which they call pure, from being established by these words of our Clement, that it actually appears to be fundamentally overturned. Nor do those things which are cited by the patrons of the mystical life from the same author of ours contribute more to its stabilization; we read them thus 78: "For it is the work of the Gnostic, not abstinence from evils—for that is the basis of the greatest progress—but not even to do any good for fear; for it is written: 'Whither shall I flee and where shall I hide from thy face?' ... Nor indeed for the hope of promised honor; for it is said: 'Behold the Lord, and his reward.' But only that benevolence which is done for the sake of charity is to be sought by the Gnostic for the sake of the honorable itself." But the same Clement plainly...

indicates that this implies no exclusion of the hope of eternal bliss, but only of the promise of some earthly honor. And this is demonstrated most evidently from the things which Clement has continuously subjoined, and which have been omitted by the mystics: "But truly," he says, speaking in the person of God, "it was said by the Lord: 'Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance.'" ^A A most royal petition, which teaches that the salvation of men is to be sought without a reward, not doubtfully earthly and human. Indeed, in the same place he added: "That we may be heirs, and may possess the Lord." I truly do not know whether anything more valid or effective could be brought forward to destroy the opinion of the mystics concerning pure love.

Yet they press on, and they contend that this 'pure' love of God is evidently proven by these words of the same Clement ^B: "If, therefore, every conjunction, *oikειώσις* (familiarity), which is entered into with those things which are good and honorable, *tà καλὰ*, is made with appetition, how can he who seeks those things which are honorable be without passions?" But these men, as it seems, do not know the divinity of charity. For the charity of him who loves is not an appetition, but is a benevolent and firm conjunction, a *sterētikē oikeiōsis* (or familiarity endowed with the power of loving), restoring the Gnostic—who is in no way indigent of place or time—into the unity of faith. But whoever has already been brought through charity into those things in which he is to be, as one who has perceived hope through knowledge, seeks nothing, as one who, as far as it can be done, has that which is to be sought. He rightly remains, therefore, in one immutable habit, loving from knowledge. Nor, therefore, will he burn with vehement desire to be assimilated to the good things, since he has through charity that which is good and honorable. But what need has he further of confidence and desire, who has received familiarity with God, who is subject to no passions, through charity, and through it has enrolled himself in the number of his friends? But what, I ask you, can be gathered from thence for the asserting of pure love of God? For there Clement speaks of the Gnostic who, still constituted in this life, possesses God according to the perfection of charity as far as it can be done. Yet the same Clement declares that nothing is sought by him, surely transient and earthly, which might avert or separate him from God, to whom he is joined by charity. Wherefore he himself said: ^C *"Oudè ζηλώσει ἐξομοιωθῆναι τοῖς καλοῖς,* 'he will not burn with vehement zeal to be assimilated to other goods from God.'" But does this prevent him from hoping, desiring, and expecting eternal happiness? By no means. And indeed this will appear most evidently not only from what is to be said below, but our author himself in this very place asserts that the Gnostic, equipped with perfect charity, therefore seeks nothing; because *tēn elpida proeilēphōs dia tēs gnōseōs*, "he has without doubt anticipated the hope of future life through knowledge," surely because he tastes of the delights of the hoped-for eternal happiness in the possession by which he enjoys God.

Perhaps with better right the more recent mystics bring other things into the middle for the patronage of their opinion on pure love, by which it is most explicitly established by Clement that if the *gnōsis* of God could ever be separated from eternal salvation, then the Gnostic would not hesitate at all to choose it: "If anyone, by hypothesis," the words of Clement are ^D, "should propose to the Gnostic whether he prefers the knowledge of God or eternal salvation; but let them be separated, although they are altogether the same; he would choose the knowledge of God, doubting nothing at all, judging that it is to be sought for its own sake, which has transcended faith through charity to knowledge, a property (or a little more clearly, because he judges it to be a property to be sought for its own sake, which exceeds faith through charity to knowledge). But it must be diligently observed what Clement said: "The knowledge of God, *tēn gnōsin tou Theou*, and eternal salvation, *tēn sōtērian tēn aiōnion*, are altogether the same, *pantōs en tautotēti onta*." But if these be entirely the same, they can certainly never be separated from each other. God cannot, therefore, be known and loved without the eternal salvation itself being immediately known and loved at the same time.

But, you will say, if by hypothesis they could be separated, then the Gnostic would truly love God, as Clement says, for his own sake alone. But this hypothesis, just as Clement also confesses, is a thing clearly impossible, and which can in no way ever be made more possible, than that God himself should not be God. Tell me, therefore, I beg, do you think that Clement has established a certain rule of loving God purely from fictional and chimerical hypotheses of this kind? Do you think it came into his mind that, so that a Gnostic might love God with pure love, the hypothesis of a thing altogether impossible must be feigned? Did that most learned man not know how, as nothing but an absurdity can follow from an absurdity, so nothing but an impossibility can follow from an impossible thing? Clement’s mind and meaning, therefore, is that the knowledge and love of God and eternal salvation are so much the same that one cannot be loved without the other. The Gnostic, therefore, loves eternal salvation by that very fact that he pursues God with the most chaste love, not for the sake of glory, fame, and the reward of this life and time, but for his own sake alone.

Why therefore, you say, does Clement propose this hypothesis of a thing clearly impossible? For he is not to be said to have proposed it rashly and inconsiderately. We respond that the reason for this hypothesis proposed by him was that he might show more clearly and effectively how pure, chaste, and alien from all desire the love of the perfect Gnostic for God, and his charity, ought to be. But he warned that this hypothesis was impossible deliberately and on purpose, so that he might reveal with no less evidence that the Gnostic, by loving God so chastely and purely, also by a necessary consequence, or, as the scholastics say, secondarily, always wants and loves salvation. Of the same sort entirely is another hypothesis, again set forth by our Clement in these words: "If he abstained from doing injury on account of the hope of the remuneration to be obtained from God for those things which he will have done justly, not even so is he of his own accord good. For as fear, so does the reward make this one also just... But he who obeys the naked calling, insofar as he is called, he does not tend toward knowledge on account of fear, nor on account of pleasures. For he does not consider whether any useful gain, et

^A externally follows, but being drawn by the love of Him who is truly lovable, and being urged toward that which ought to be done, he is a pure worshiper of God. Thus, even if he were to receive by hypothesis from God the power to do those things which are prohibited without any punishment, and even if he were told that he would receive the blessings of the saints on that account; and even if he were persuaded that it would come to pass that he could hide from God the things he does (which indeed cannot happen), he would never be induced in his mind to do anything against right reason, once he has chosen that which is truly honorable, and to be chosen for its own sake, and to be sought and loved on that account. There our Clement proposes a double hypothesis, neither of which can ever come to pass; and by setting forth the second, he most prudently warns us that it is impossible. The reason for these and the former is the same. By these, therefore, ^B Clement shows what the Gnostic should be in the disposition of his mind and heart, rather than what must really be done by him in daily practice and the accustomed exercise of piety and most perfect virtue.

Come now, and consider attentively what our author has undertaken to prove by these hypotheses. Do you not see that nothing else is concluded therefrom, except that the perfect Christian never chooses anything against reason, neither on account of reward, nor for gain or utility, nor on account of any external and adventitious pleasure; but, being attracted by an interior pleasure, he always chooses that which is honorable? Clement therefore openly professes that any Gnostic whatsoever is always drawn and enticed by some interior pleasure in every action of most perfect virtue and charity. To these things, moreover, Clement writes a little later: "So, therefore, the honorable things seem to be truly the most pleasant, and of themselves provide that fruit which they desire, namely, the tranquility of the soul." But if honorable things are the most pleasant, and the Gnostic never does anything without interior pleasure, surely he will never be able to love God without interior pleasure of this kind.

Are not these same things ^C the opinion not only of the ancient Fathers of the Church, but even of the most learned among the pagan philosophers? For Cicero, where he makes it plain according to their opinion that honor alone is to be sought for its own sake, and that utility, if it be compared with it, ought to be relegated to a lower place, nevertheless observes there with Panaetius that nothing is useful which is not also honorable. Ambrose, however, as we have noted in its proper place, subscribes to and supports the opinion of Cicero.

Nor must it be said any longer that that pleasure or utility is not a motive why honor should be sought, or why God should be loved with a pure love and for Himself alone. For although those most learned writers affirm most professedly that honor is loved for its own sake alone, they nevertheless admit that by the very fact that it is loved in this way, it has pleasure and utility as necessary and inseparable companions. Wherefore, even if the pleasure and utility of love and charity, and even of the honor to be sought, might sometimes appear not to be the primary motive, as they say, it must nevertheless be, by all means, perfectly ^D a secondary motive, or, if you desire, an effect never disjoined from it.

Finally, since the hypotheses proposed by Clement, as we have said, are conceded to never be able to happen in reality, certainly no one, unless he be a man of unsound mind, ought ever to feign them for purely loving God. Let these hypotheses, therefore, lie, which are never in use, nor ever ought to be; or if they can have any value, they ought to be useful for making manifest as clearly as possible the disposition of a man who is diligent in loving God, but not for truly loving God.

220 ARTICLE VIII.

Concerning the vocal prayer of the Gnostics.

Clement defines prayer, or, if you prefer, orison, thus: "Prayer is conversation with God." Yet he warns us in the same place that this prayer can be offered by us without words, and without moving our lips, while we cry out to God within. Indeed, he asserts that this interior prayer is always answered by God. For by the alacrity of the spirit, achieving [* νοητὴν οὐσίαν *], an intelligible essence, and [* λόγῳ *], by reason, trying to lead the body away from the earth, and despising the bond of the flesh, we force the soul, lifted up [* τῷ πόθῳ κρειττόνων *], by desire for better things, to progress toward holy things. For the Gnostic, that he may show himself to be as near as possible to God, willingly transcends the whole world. Wherefore, both through the hours of prayer appointed for all Christians, the third, the sixth, and the ninth, and through his whole life, he studies to dwell with God in his prayers.

Furthermore, Clement himself, as we have seen, expressly asserts that the same Gnostic prays not only with the upright, and with those who have more recently believed, as is fitting; but he also, when taking food, offers prayers, praises, and readings of the holy Scriptures, and while food is being taken, sings psalms and hymns; and finally, before he goes to rest, and even at night, he pours out prayers, by which, placed in the contemplation of eternal memory, he joins himself to the divine choir.

To this is added what Clement appended concerning the vocal prayers of the Gnostic: "But he does not use that which is made by the mouth, the verbose, [* πολυλόγον *], prayer; as one who has learned what it is fitting to ask of the Lord. In every place, therefore, he will pray, but not so that he may appear openly to the people. Nay, indeed, he prays in every way while walking, and in conversation, and in quiet, and in reading, and in the things that are done according to reason. But if he has thought only in the penetralia of his own soul, and has invoked the Father with ineffable groanings, He is near, even while he is still speaking." You see clearly that it is so far from the case that Clement has excluded prayers poured forth by the mouth from the continuous contemplation of the Gnostic, that he openly professes that these are most frequently done by the Gnostic, provided they are not too verbose, just as he professes for that former one.

We surely know that Clement said that the Gnostic's prayer is anticipated by God, inasmuch as He hears him before he asks: "I will say," He says, "still speaking, and I will do; think in your mind, and I will give." But in prayer, the Lord does not wait, "Ask," for in the very fact that He said God anticipates his voice and prayers, He makes it plain indeed that the same Gnostic asks and demands something from God by voice and prayers. In the same sense, it had been written earlier that the Gnostic prays also by thought, [* καὶ κατὰ τὴν ἔννοιαν *]. But what, I ask, do these words of his mean, if not that the Gnostic prays to God not only with mind and thought, but often also with voice and words? [* alt-version omitted *]

^A our author, joined to God at every hour through charity, and having become intimate. And first, he seeks the remission of sins, then not to sin any more; then to be able to do good, and to understand all the creation and dispensation that has been made through the Lord; so that, having become pure in heart through the knowledge which is through the Son of God, he may be initiated face to face into the mystery of the blessed spectacle. ›

Do you wish to hear our Clement speaking in express words about both kinds of prayer? It will be easy for us to satisfy you. For concerning him who is truly a Gnostic according to the ecclesiastical rule, ^B he pronounces these things: ‹ To him alone is granted that which he asks according to the will of God, [Gk: καὶ αἰτήσαντι, καὶ ἐννοηθέντι], both to him who asks and to him who thinks. For just as God can do whatever He wills, so the Gnostic receives whatever he asks... and thanksgiving, and the petition for those things which pertain to the conversion of neighbors, is the work of the Gnostic. › In which manner the Lord also prayed, indeed giving thanks for the ministry, but asking that as many as possible might be in the knowledge, so that in those who are being saved, God may be glorified through the salvation that comes from knowledge, and that He who is alone good, and who is alone Savior, may be known through the Son from age to age. ›

Let those who wish to claim Clement as a patron of a completely vain opinion, by which they wish prayers poured forth by the mouth, and movements, as they say, discursive and reflective, to be excluded from the perfect state of contemplation, be gone; and let them obstinately contend that pure love of God is the only meritorious motive for all actions, and constitutes the whole interior life. For our author not only affirms most constantly that the Gnostic asks many things from God for himself as well as for the salvation of his neighbors by words and mouth, just as he does by thought and meditation; but he also proves this most invincibly by the example of Christ the Lord, whom he shows to have poured forth prayers to His Father by giving thanks to God and by praying for the salvation of men. ^C

But let us proceed, and let us follow our author as he discourses no less clearly on this same prayer of the Gnostic. For shortly after the words of his which we have cited, he asserts that wicked men pray that they might possess the good things which they do not have: ‹ But the Gnostic, he says, will ask for the stability of those things which he possesses; for the aptitude for those things which are about to happen; and for the eternity of those things which he is about to receive. And he prays that those things which are truly good, which dwell in the mind, may both exist for him and remain, nor does he desire anything of those things which are absent, being content with the present. ›

Without doubt, Clement is discoursing there about the Gnostic, who is united to the Spirit through infinite charity. Yet the same Clement most clearly teaches that the eternity of those things which he is about to receive is asked for by him; and that he may remain and persevere in the good. Who, therefore, would dare to whisper to us or openly object that Clement ever taught, not only to any Christian man, but even to the most perfect Gnostic, that God is to be loved so purely that at least sometimes, and in extremities, as they say, under trials or vexations, he should be so little solicitous about his eternal beatitude that he would willingly acquiesce in his own loss and his own just condemnation, which he falsely imagines has been decreed for him by God? Nothing, certainly, can be imagined more contrary to his mind.

But if anyone should persist in contending that Clement is not speaking there of the most perfect Gnostic—which, however, is manifestly false—let him hear what the same Clement subjoined a little later about him specifically: ‹ But he who, he says, has already arrived at the highest degree of knowledge, [Gk: κορυφαῖος δὲ ἤδη ὁ γνωστικός], prays that his contemplation ^D may increase and never cease, especially helping and giving effort to remain such forever; just as he who is a common man, if he asks for the remission of his sins, asks that he may not sin any more; then that he may be able to be a benefactor, and understand all creation and the dispensation that was made through the Lord; so that, having become pure in heart through the acknowledgment which is through the Son of God, he may be initiated face to face into the mystery of the blessed spectacle. ›

Truly, it is evident, as you see, and no further room for doubting is left, that Clement is speaking there most evidently of the [Gk: κορυφαῖος γνωστικός]. And yet, in the most express words, he says there of the coryphaeus of the Gnostics, or the prince and head, that it is requested by him not only that contemplation might increase and remain, but also that it might never fall away from virtue. Nor, moreover, is it enough for him just to ask this; for with the example of the angels who fell into sin placed before him, fearing a similar fall and lapse, he gives effort and strives with all his strength to persevere in good and grace.

With what spirit, and what the Gnostic asks of God, Clement discourses a little later. For in truth he says that such a one is more prepared for not obtaining those things which he asks, rather than for obtaining those things which he does not ask: ‹ The whole life (of him, forsooth), says Clement, is indeed prayer and conversation with God, but on account of his singular holiness he is more prepared not to obtain if he asks, than to obtain if he does not ask. ›

Our author proceeds, and adds that he, since he never asks for useless things, always obtains from God that which he wills. But if he be clean from sins, he will obtain entirely what he wills. For God says to the just: ‹ Ask, and I will give to you; think, and I will do. › If therefore they are useful, he will receive them immediately: he will never ask for useless things, and therefore he will receive. Thus, what he wills will come to pass. ›

Furthermore, that Gnostic 'asks' that he may live in the flesh, that he may be endowed with the power of knowing, to use the words of Clement again, ‹ so that, living as one who is free from the flesh, he may obtain those things which are best, but flee those things which are worse. ›

Finally, to pass over the rest: ‹ The whole, says he, of prayer is thanksgiving for things past, present, and future, as things that are already present through faith. › But to these, he hastens to give thanks to God, so that he rather anticipates God as He calls, if it is permissible to speak thus, than follows Him. Nor, moreover, does he pray to God only for himself, but also for others, that their sins may be forgiven, and that they may arrive at the knowledge of God as soon as possible: ‹ He asks also for the relief, (Clement's own words are) of those things in which we have sinned, and conversion to acknowledgment. ›

Furthermore, by imitating God Himself, and by obeying Him when He commands, he asks for the remission of sin even for those who have sinned against him: ‹ For, says Clement, the Lord plainly commanded to pray for enemies. › Wherefore he not only forgets the injury received, and most willingly forgives him by whom he was harmed: but also, by reciting the prayer instituted by Christ, he prays to God for him: ‹ He never remembers them, (these are still the very words of our Clement) who have sinned against him, but forgives them. Wherefore he also justly prays, saying: Forgive us; for we also forgive. ›

Who, therefore, upon hearing these things which we have brought forward, would not either lament or detest the miserable blindness and the inflexible stubbornness of those who dare to deny that Clement ever desired prayers poured forth to God by mouth and thought from any most perfect Gnostic?

ARTICLE IX. On the divine contemplation and meditation of the Gnostic, or mental prayer, as they say.

From vocal, as they say, prayer and supplication to mental, or divine, Gnostic contemplation or meditation, as we transition, Clement shows by the example of Abraham that man is raised to it, first by the sight of beautiful things, then by the desire for the best things, and finally, after his eyes have been opened by the Teacher, to perceive spiritual things. By these steps, therefore, the soul, rising above corporeal things, is led somehow to the understanding of the Almighty. Wherefore Clement says: "If, having removed ^A all things that are present, bodies and those things called incorporeal, we have cast ourselves toward the greatness of Christ; and then, in the vastness and immensity of Him, have proceeded with holiness, we will reach the understanding of the Almighty somehow, knowing Him not as He is, but as He is not. For figure, and motion, or status, or seat, or place, or right hand, or left hand, are not even to be thought of regarding the Father of all."

From these words of our Clement, certain more recent authors think that two things can be gathered: first, that at the time of such contemplation, the soul of the man contemplating, established as much in the burgeoning fervor of contemplation as in extreme vexations and temptations, is deprived of a distinct, reflex, and sense-perceived intuition of Christ the Lord. Second, that in that pure and direct contemplation, the soul is not occupied by any singular and finite idea of divinity, but transcends everything corporeal and finite, so that it consists in a purely intellectual idea and species of the divine nature, abstracted from any body.

But that these things are entirely alien to the mind of our Clement, there can be no doubt. For, to speak candidly, it is not at all clear to us whether Clement is there disputing about a certain state of Christian speculation and meditation, or rather about a certain cognition and knowledge of the Christian philosopher, by which he is raised gradually from corporeal and created things toward the knowledge of God; yet in such a way that he might know Him somehow, not as He is, but as He is not—or, as the scholastics say, through His negative attributes—by thinking of nothing corporeal regarding Him any further.

Suppose, however, that Clement is speaking of that very Gnostic meditation, the most perfect one if you wish; you will not advance even a hair’s breadth by it. For he makes mention of that contemplation by which we know or contemplate God not as He is, but through His negative attributes, as we have said. ^B Concerning the mental position, which Hervetus did not understand, we can again not unjustly gather that our author instituted his discussion there regarding philosophical cognition of God, as we have said, rather than regarding mental Christian prayer and meditation, as they say.

But he discusses the meditation of the Christian contemplator himself without doubt, where he teaches that the Gnostic of a great and lofty soul, who possesses as knowledge that which is best, is easily moved and applied to contemplation; or as he himself speaks: "Of those things which fall into contemplation, *ton theorēton*, to have the power permanent in the soul, that is, the sharp-sighted keenness of knowledge, *toutestin tēn diōratikēn tēs epistēmēs drimūtēta*." To which he immediately adds: "To possess this power, he contends with the greatest force, and keeps in his own power those things that fight with the mind; and, residing perpetually in contemplation and exercising himself in it, he abstains from those things which are pleasant, and rightly performs those things which are to be done, using moreover great experience, as much in doctrine as in things which pertain to life."

But from these words of Clement, will you not say, does it not become plain to all that Clement was persuaded that there is a certain habitual state of contemplation, so to speak, so sublime and perfect, by which the Gnostic utterly rejects all acts which they call discursive, and his soul is vacant of all work whatsoever?

But whoever argues thus does not pay enough attention to the Greek text of our author. It is held as follows: *Ταύτην δὲ, ὡς ἔνι μάλιστα, βιάζεται κτήσασθαι τὴν δύναμιν, ἐγκρατὴς γενόμενος τῶν ἀντιστρατευομένων τῷ νῷ· καὶ τῇ μὲν θεωρίᾳ ἀδιαλείπτως προσεδρεύων, τῇ ἐφεκτικῇ δὲ τῶν ἰδεῶν, καὶ τῇ κατορθωτικῇ τῶν πρακτέων ἐγγυμνασάμενος ἀσκήσει, πρὸς τούτοις ἐμπειρίᾳ πολλῇ χρησάμενος, τῇ κατὰ τὴν μάθησίν τε καὶ τὸν βίον.* Which indeed ought to be rendered word for word thus: "This (namely the sharp-sighted keenness of knowledge, as we have said), as much as it is possible, he strives with the greatest strength to possess; remaining abstinent from (or becoming master of) those things that oppose the mind, and assiduously sitting by constant contemplation, and exercising himself in that practice which restrains the delectable ^C and rightly performs those things which are to be done: moreover, truly using much experience, both in doctrine and in life."

You understand indeed that Clement speaks there of a constant and perpetual Gnostic contemplation, *theōria*, but only in as much as it is possible, *hōs eni malista*, that is, in as much as is conceded to human frailty and infirmity. Which, truly, is the most prudent exception he has used almost everywhere. Furthermore, how much labor human weakness can give to that constant contemplation, he wisely omitted. And truly, if such a provident and necessary caution had always been employed by those who have spent so much labor in prescribing laws for mental prayer or contemplation, they would never have struck upon so many rocks of errors.

Furthermore, Clement covers with no less silence what the acts of that perpetual meditation might be, whether direct or reflex; nor can anything be elicited about these acts from the whole context of his discourse. Finally, he declares clearly that this Gnostic, by exercising himself in that perpetual meditation, not only abstains from delectable things, but always rightly performs all those things which, as much by the doctrine by which he ought to imbue others as by his own manner of life by which he may be able to devote effort to all virtues, are to be done by him. Wherefore Clement there touches upon all the virtues, upon which that Gnostic contemplator, through the whole span of his life, ought to confer all care and diligence. And indeed he had made it plain above that there are two forms of per

perfection, that is, this abstinence from evils, which some deem to be perfection and consummation, and that is, to state it once, the common perfection of the faithful Jew and the Greek. But the Gnostic, after that perfection which is decreed by the law of others, proceeds to the operation of beneficence in justice: and to whom the increase of justice has grown into beneficence, ^A to him the perfection remains in an immutable habit of beneficence according to the likeness of God. Certainly, there can be no greater perfection for the Gnostic than that which is described there by our Clement. And yet that perfection or purification does not consist in this, that the Gnostic should do nothing, or that he should perform a good deed only once or occasionally, but that he should always do good, and remain and persevere in the likeness of God in an incommutably beneficence habit. Furthermore, he asserts clearly, as we have seen above, that God cannot ever cease from doing good without at once ceasing to be God. He did not, therefore, think that the Gnostic, because he contemplates God perpetually, ceases from good works to be performed toward God, himself, and his neighbor; ^B nay, rather, that from this perpetual contemplation of God, the good actions of the Gnostic must always flow and proceed, it is manifest that he held this for certain and established.

We have not indeed failed to note that the opinion of the philosophers, who thought it lawful for the soul to depart for a just cause, "if anyone," he says, "should be so removed from acting that no hope of action is left for him any longer," is not condemned by this same Clement of ours. But there Clement is not speaking of a certain idle and fictitious rest, but of the intermission of evil actions: so that whoever turns to God with a sincere mind abstains henceforth from every evil work. For concerning the martyr who intrepidly confesses Christ before a tyrant, ^C Clement added this immediately: "And abstinence from evil works is found to be a certain diminution and extinction of evils, while their operation is taken away by the cessation from acting." He shows there that poverty and other Christian virtues are placed in him for that reason, because the soul, neither clinging to earthly things nor led by the desire for them, but torn away from them, may freely strive toward God. But by this "Dominic exercise," Clement says that the soul is willingly led away from the body, and by transferring itself, is torn away, so that, as Christ says, it may be found having been lost.

For the same reason, he declares afterwards that the sacrifice acceptable to God, and the true worship of Him, is that by which the soul of man is separated from his body and its affections and vices, ^D and even from the senses. Furthermore, he proves that the philosophers received from the doctrine of Moses that man should avert himself from corporeal senses and contemplate God with a pure and solitary mind. Finally, Clement himself admonishes us elsewhere that when Christ commanded us to watch, it was as if He had said: "Meditate how to live, and attempt to separate the soul from the body." Observe, moreover, that he deliberately used the word "attempt," that is, try, endeavor, strive; because for man constituted in this life, this is most difficult and granted to very few.

Hence, from what has been said, it should be certain and explored by all that our Clement, from the state of contemplation itself, however perfect, has excluded nothing at all except evil actions and affections, and never the good ones commanded by God. For he teaches, repeats, and inculcates everywhere, as we have noted above, that he produces these from this very meditation, and that in them the most perfect contemplator and Gnostic is always exercised, and that they must always follow him, as the shadow follows the body. Finally, to add this as well, however much

^A he may have wished that there be a perpetual and continuous divine contemplation for the Gnostic, he nonetheless teaches that the same Gnostic exercises himself in human disciplines, music, geometry, and dialectic: "Taking," he says, "our author, from each individual discipline that which contributes to the truth." Nor does it at all hinder this doctrine that we read in these books of the Stromata what is handed down by him concerning the habit of the same Gnostic, which they call *apatheia* [the absence of passions], as is now to be laid open by us.

ARTICLE X. Concerning the Gnostic's *apatheia*, or emptiness of passions.

"Apatheia," says Augustine, "if it could be said in Latin, would be called impassibility." Which, as Jerome writes to Ctesiphon, "we can call impassibility or imperturbability, when the soul is never moved by any vice of perturbation: and, to speak more simply, it is either a rock or God." Therefore the Greek word *apatheia* sounds the same in Latin as the emptiness of affections and perturbations.

But there are many things which must be weighed by us not negligently, which Clement discusses in various places concerning it. First, it is helpful to note that he himself has handed down that the soul of the just man becomes always better by the spontaneous observance of laws; seeing that ^B it is "stretching forth according to each progress into a habit of *apatheia*, until it reaches the perfect man, the excellence of knowledge at once and of the inheritance." "Let it be extended through each single progress to the habit of impassibility, until he has arrived at the perfect man, to the excellence of cognition and at the same time of inheritance." But, I ask you, what does Clement mean by these words, if not that there is no habit of *apatheia* that is entirely perfect in the just man still living in this life, but that he arrives at it only then, when he has obtained eternal beatitude?

But then a little later he added: "The activity of the perfected Gnostic is to converse with God through the high priest, being assimilated to the Lord in power through all the service to God; which extends to the salvation of men according to the stewardship of the kindness towards us, according to the same liturgy, according to the teaching, according to the beneficence of works. Yea, he creates and forms himself; but also, he adorns those who hear him, the Gnostic being assimilated to God, to Him who by nature possesses what is passionless, by assimilation ^C as much as possible to the one who from discipline has been established in *apatheia*, and these things—conversing and being with the Lord without distraction." Which indeed in Latin word-for-word sounds thus: The action of the perfect Gnostic itself is to converse with God through the high priest, after he has been assimilated to the Lord in power, through all the worship he exhibits to God. Which worship indeed extends itself to the salvation of men according to the care of His beneficence towards us, according to the ministry and doctrine itself, and through works of beneficence. Now indeed he creates and builds up himself. To these things indeed the Gnostic adorns those who hear him, being assimilated to God, who by His nature possesses an emptiness of perturbations; assimilating himself to that *apatheia*, as far as it is possible to become so, which was established by exercise, especially while always conversing with God and existing with God. ^D That Clement explains here the *apatheia* of the most perfect Gnostic, the emptiness of perturbations and affections, is beyond doubt. And yet, just as he teaches it to be naturally inherent in God, so he confesses that it is indeed acquired by the Gnostic through exercise, divine worship, and perpetual conversation with God, but only as much as is possible—that is, as much as human frailty is able to attain it. With this exception, which he applies almost everywhere, and which must never be omitted, he indicates that no person in this mortal life reaches that summit of supreme perfection, where he is thereafter entirely free from all perturbations and commotions of the soul whatsoever.

And truly, from those things which have been discussed by the same Clement concerning the works, virtues, and prayer of the same Gnostic, we show that any Gnostic must, throughout the whole time of his life, occupy himself in good actions, and ought to pray to God both for others, and for himself, and most especially for the increase of contemplation and perfection, and for his own perseverance in the good—nay truly, he is also concerned for the salvation of others.

Wherefore, regarding this same Gnostic, who is pure from bodily desires and cleansed by holy thoughts, and whose principal faculty of the soul has nothing adulterated, he writes thus: "When, therefore, the Gnostic has passed his time in contemplation, communing purely with the Divine, participating in the holy quality, he becomes more closely in the habit of passionless identity, so that he no longer possesses science and knowledge, but is [himself] science and knowledge." When, therefore, he has been conversant and has remained in contemplation, having a pure communion with God, he who is a participant of the holy quality from his cognition approaches more closely to the habit of impassible identity; so that he no longer has knowledge [as something acquired] and possesses cognition, but is [himself] science and knowledge. That the discourse there by our Clement is instituted concerning the most perfect Gnostic, no one will flatly deny. But there Clement himself declares that he does not indeed arrive at the habit of that impassible identity, but approaches it more closely. And rightly so. For he knew that this exceeds the powers of human imbecility, and that no man, while he lives a mortal life, can attain *apatheia*, or a perfect emptiness of all perturbations.

Nevertheless, someone will object to us that it is asserted by the same Clement in most express words that the Gnostic, who is perfect in beneficence, good works, and every kind of virtue and oblivion of injuries, and who is dead to the flesh but lives by the spirit, has truly touched the habit of impassibility. For after he has discoursed about his good actions and the holiness of his life, he then immediately subjoined these words: "For him the flesh is dead, but he himself lives alone, having consecrated the tomb as a holy temple to the Lord, having turned the old sinful soul toward God. This one is no longer continent, but has become in the habit of *apatheia*, awaiting to be clothed with the divine form." "To him the flesh is dead, but he himself lives; as one who has consecrated the sepulcher as a holy temple to the Lord, converting his old soul, which was obnoxious to sins, to God. He is no longer continent, but has arrived at the habit of impassibility, as he awaits to don the divine figure."

What, then, of the fact that he later added that this Gnostic "has a virtue in no way base and to be rejected," in Greek it is held «οὐχ ἕξει τὴν ἀρετὴν ἀπόβλητον οὗτος οὐδαμῶς», or in dreams, or in any vision, or phantasy; "since he never departs from the habit, falling away from that which is to be a habit." But what can ever be called or imagined as a greater habit of *apatheia* than this?

We indeed easily concede to the one objecting these things that this is the most perfect habit of *apatheia*, to which indeed the Gnostic endowed with all virtues arrives, as Clement indeed signifies, but with the exception mentioned above always posited, as far as it is possible, *ὡς ἔνι μάλιστα*, or *κατὰ δύναμιν*, as much as it is possible, and as it is established in his power. And truly Clement concludes his speech in this way: "For this is the assimilation to God according to ability, to keep the mind in the

same relation; for this is the relation of the mind, as mind, and the varied disposition becomes so with respect to the impulse towards material things." For this is what happens, as far as it is possible, assimilation to God, to preserve the mind in that habit and relation which is in those things which are the same; this then is the habit of the mind as mind. ^A A various affection truly happens through it, which is the affection toward material things. Therefore he says that the gnostic's *apatheia* and assimilation to God is that by which he always contemplates things eternal and divine, as far as it is possible, and does not subsequently return and reflect toward earthly and bodily things, which, as we have said, the necessity of his infirm body does not require.

Perhaps another might press that the principal part of that gnostic’s soul is said by Clement ^A in the same place to remain "unchangeable and invariable," ^B since it admits no variety of visions from daily motions, not even dreaming, nor do diverse notions ever enter into him. But there, an exception must still be supplied—as far as is possible—just as from those things which we have said from the same Clement concerning sleep, and which are still shortly to be said by us, it is plain and manifest.

In the same sense, therefore, our Clement later, against certain heretics whose name he spared, beautifully demonstrates that those things which were created for our use are in reality good, but that one good is better than another: "Through that," he says, "which is assimilation to God, to become impassible and endowed with virtue." And again, a little later: "In sum," he says, "impassibility is in every kind of desire. But the man who has been led to impassibility, [becoming a divinized man], becomes purely unique, becomes God without any defilement, he becomes one."

But there Clement still vindicates that *apatheia* which a man, for his part—that is, in his infirm part—can attain. For he had said above that man by his nature is subject to the perturbations of the soul, and only by virtue becomes exempt from them. Turn your mind, I ask, to his words: "The courage of man, [being impassioned], they say, according to essence, makes the one who participates in it fearless and invincible, and anger is the bodyguard of the mind in patience, and endurance, and such like. And on desire is ranked also temperance, and saving prudence." The virtue of a man of great and strong soul, although he is, by his essence, they say, subject to the perturbations of the soul, renders the one who is a participant of it fearless and insuperable; and ^C anger is the servant of the mind in patience and tolerance, and things that are similar. But under desire is placed temperance, and saving prudence. Therefore, he who by nature, and if you will, by his essence, is subject to the perturbations and motions of the soul, cannot be altogether exempt and immune from them. But much less will it be able to come to pass that man in this life can ever attain to the habit of *apatheia*—impassibility, to speak so with Augustine and Jerome—or that constant and permanent state which God possesses by His own nature. Therefore, the mind and opinion of our Clement was nothing else but that man, of that *apatheia* and assimilation to God, as far as it is possible and as is granted by the powers of fragile human nature, may become a possessor at some time, but never for the whole remaining time of his life thereafter.

Furthermore, when Clement in the same place asserts that temperance itself and saving prudence are placed under desire—that is to say, good [desire]—hence it is certainly clear that he excludes from the gnostic, even the perfect one, only bad desire, by which, namely, he might fall into grave sin. Which, without doubt, for the reason...

^D But let some, remitting nothing from this, insist that Clement denied that any desires at all are to be admitted in the perfect gnostic, not with confidence, because he is not occupied in heavy and troublesome things, and nothing can tear him away from the love of God, nor anger, since he so loves God that he has no hatred for any creature; nor emulation, since nothing is missing for his assimilation in which he might be good and honest. Finally, that we may not be too long by recounting all the things which he lists one by one, let it suffice here to report what he concludes in one word: "Therefore we must exclude the gnostic whom we call perfect from every psychic passion; for knowledge produces exercise, and exercise produces a habit or disposition."

But let those who will object these things to us carefully observe that Clement is there disputing about perfect gnostics, such as the apostles were after the resurrection of the Lord Christ, who, having conquered their desires, remained alienated from every vicissitude and change in a stable and constant habit of virtue. Yet we have shown above that this *apatheia* of the apostles did not prevent them from falling into certain venial sins; but it did effect that they would never fall away from the perfect love of God and grace, as they say, the sanctifying and habitual, nor be torn from it. And in a similar sense, in that same place which is objected, Clement says concerning other perfect gnostics that they are not severed and separated from the love of God by any perturbation or motion of the soul. Therefore, he concludes from the things he had said: "Deservedly, therefore, he remains in one unchangeable habit, loving from knowledge." From this, however, he thinks it comes about that he, as has been said, burns neither with vehement study nor with desire, since he is joined to God through love. Which, indeed, is proved by our same Clement in the same place by this reasoning: "For it cannot be that he who is now once perfected through love, and receives the insatiable delight of contemplation eternally and insatiably, and enjoys it, should be delighted by certain small and humble and abject things. For what just cause remains for him to return to worldly goods, which he has accepted as light, to which no access lies open?" In this, therefore, Clement judged the *apatheia* of the gnostic to be placed, that, joined to God by supreme love, he does not return to the abject and falling goods of this world, nor is he delighted by them.

But if anyone still insists and urges that Clement there constantly affirms that there is no longer need of fortitude or temperance for the perfect gnostic: "since he has afflicted his desires with death, and no longer uses his body," we shall send him to the subsequent words concerning the same gnostic: "He will always desire what is right, and hold to faith acting rightly, and besides, that very many should become like him to the glory of God, which is perfected through knowledge. For he is a Savior who is assimilated to the Savior, insofar as it is lawful for human nature, to arrive at His image, correctly acting in the performing of precepts, in nowise transgressing them. This, however, is to worship God through that which truly is justice of deeds and of knowledge." However much, therefore, according to the opinion of our Clement, the gnostic may be called *apathes*, exempt and empty of affection, perturbation, and desire, he nevertheless always [preserves] both a perfect faith for himself, and salvation for others.

He will always desire, he will always obey the commandments of God, and will worship God not only by knowledge but also in deeds, and will serve him. Then, indeed, Clement speaks of that assimilation to the Savior and that impatibility ^A of which human nature is capable, *ἀνθρωπίνη φύσει θέμις*, as far as human nature allows. But who does not know how great human frailty is?

Furthermore, where Clement wrote that the Gnostic no longer uses the body, he added immediately: "But he only permits himself to use what is necessary, so as not to provide himself a cause for dissolution." But does not this use of things only as they are necessary bring with it and require temperance and continence? Clement asserts this same thing a little later, as has already been observed by us where we discussed the virtues of the Gnostic. Nay, in the same place he clearly affirms that the same Gnostic exercises himself in human disciplines for the sake of knowing the truth.

Do you wish for these things to be proven to you by other testimonies of our author? We need not look far. For in the same book we subsequently read these things written by him: ^B "That assimilation which happens to our Savior arises for the Gnostic, who indeed has become perfect, *εἰς ὅσον ἀνθρωπίνῃ θεμιτὸν φύσει*, as far as is permitted to human nature, just as the Father, he says, who is in heaven." He also said that he is perfected in knowledge, *ἐξομοιούμενον εἰς δύναμιν τῷ Κυρίῳ*, assimilated to the Lord according to his powers, in piety, doctrine, and the execution of good works. He adds, however, that he possesses *ἀπάθειαν* (apathy/impassibility), but *ὡς ἔνι μάλιστα*, as far as it can possibly be.

Where, indeed, he proposes and exhibits the example of the perfect Gnostic from the Apostle’s Epistle to the Corinthians, he there teaches that it is possible for him to attain sanctity, yet so that he falls into no perturbation, and is in the flesh, just as if he were devoid of flesh: but afterwards he adds: *Καὶ τῷ ἁγίῳ Πνεύματι, ὡς ἔνι μάλιστα, κατὰ δύναμιν, ἀνεκράθητε*, and with the Holy Spirit, as far as possible, according to your power, you are mingled. Not only here, as you see, did he apply the exception, *ὡς ἔνι μάλιστα*, but he added moreover, ^C *κατὰ δύναμιν*, according to human strength and virtue.

Finally, to omit many other things, he openly declares somewhere that the Gnostic, as we have already said, extends through every progress *εἰς ἕξιν ἀπαθείας*, into a habit of being void of perturbation, or impatibility, until he arrives at the perfect man and the eternal inheritance. By which words he clearly signifies that the Gnostic only becomes possessed of perfect *ἀπάθεια* when, after the course of this life, he enjoys eternal blessedness. And these things, indeed, are established and confirmed in a plain and most invincible manner from all those matters which have been discussed so far concerning the various progresses of the Gnostic, his good works, virtues, prayers, and contemplation.

The mind and opinion of our Clement concerning the impatibility (*ἀπάθεια*) of the Gnostic was therefore no different from that of the other Fathers of the Church, and especially of Augustine. But in order that this may be made clearer and more manifest to all, the passage of the same Augustine should be written in full, although it is somewhat long, ^D where he discusses that word *ἀπάθεια* at some length: "That which in Greek is called *ἀπάθεια*, which if it could be called 'impassibility' in Latin, is thus to be understood (it is accepted, indeed, in the mind, not in the body), that one lives without those affections which occur against reason and disturb the mind; it is indeed something good and most desirable, but it is not of this life. For it is not the voice of just any men, but of the most pious, and of many just and holy men: 'If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and truth is not in us.' Then, therefore, this *ἀπάθεια* will be, when there will be no sin in man. But now, it is lived well enough if it is without crime; but he who thinks he lives without sin, does not act so that he may not have sin. Moreover, if this *ἀπάθεια* is to be spoken of, where no affection can touch the mind at all, who would not judge this stupor to be worse than all vices? It may not be absurdly said, therefore, that perfect blessedness will be without the sting of fear, and without any sadness; but who would say that love and joy will not be there, unless he is entirely cut off from the truth? If, however, that *ἀπάθεια* is that in which no fear terrifies and no pain torments, it is to be shunned in this life, if we wish to live correctly, that is, according to God; but in that blessed life, which is promised as eternal, it is clearly to be hoped for."

That the mind of our Clement is the same is evident from the fact that, after showing the example of the perfect Gnostic from the Apostle, he immediately added: "Understand how it was said by the Lord: 'Be, as your Father, perfect,' perfectly forgiving sins, and forgetting injuries received, and living in a habit of impatibility. For just as we call someone a perfect physician and a perfect philosopher; so, I think, *καὶ τέλειον γνωστικόν*, also a perfect Gnostic. But nothing from these, even if it be the greatest, is assumed to equality with the similitude of God. For we do not say, as the Stoics most impiously do, that the virtue of man and God is the same. Shall we not, therefore, be perfect, as the Father wishes? For it cannot be that someone is perfect as God is: but the Father wishes us, living in this way so that we obey the Gospel, to become perfect beyond reproach."

Clement therefore does not desire from a man living this life some divine or Stoic *ἀπάθεια*, or, as Augustine says, "a stupor worse than all vices," but solely that voidness of perturbations and perfection which a man can obtain, for his own part, from his frailty. Which is indeed asserted invincibly, because Clement has constantly asserted that no one in this life is perfect in every virtue, as we have observed, except Christ the Lord.

Wherefore he proclaims most clearly elsewhere: "There is therefore one Lord alone who is alien from all desire from the beginning, benign and clement, who for our sake also became man. Whoever, however, studiously strive to be assimilated to the character which was given by him, so that they may become devoid of desire, contend with great force from exercise."

But I do not know someone whom we seem to hear still murmuring, and objecting against us something that is not altogether far from the truth, who might say that Clement, who everywhere preaches that Christian perfection far excels the ethnic [pagan], thought that a Christian man arrives at that *ἀπάθεια* which even the pagans themselves are said to have ascribed to their Stoics. For Tully indeed set forth the opinion of Pyrrho with these words: "His (namely, Aristo's) supreme good is to be moved in neither direction in matters; of which he says there is *ἀδιαφορία* (indifference). But Pyrrho *does not even feel* these things: which are named *ἀπαθῆ* or *ἀπάθεια*." But he who objects such things ought to remember, first, that this opinion of the Stoics, by the testimony of Jerome, is erroneous and entirely opposed to sacred Scripture. For against Ctesiphon he writes these words: "For what greater rashness can there be than to lay claim to, I will not say the likeness, but the equality of God; and in a brief sentence to embrace the poisons of all heretics, which [they drew] from the philosophers, and especially from Pythagoras and Zeno, the prince of the Stoics..."

1231 IN CLEMENTEM ALEX. D. LE NOURRY DISSERTATIO II. 1232

from the fountain. For those things which the Greeks call *pathe*, we can call perturbations, namely, sickness and joy, hope and fear, of which two are present and two are future. They assert that these can be extirpated from the minds, and that no fiber or root of vices resides in man at all through meditation and the assiduous practice of the virtues.” In his second book against the Pelagians: “There are four,” he says, “perturbations by which the human race is vexed... which, according to the Stoics—namely, Zeno and Chrysippus—it is possible to be without in reaching perfection; but according to the Peripatetics, it is both difficult and impossible, to which opinion the authority of all Holy Scripture consents.” By strong and most firm arguments of reason, as we think, and by the words of our Clement cited a little earlier, we have demonstrated that he, being most tenacious of the doctrine handed down in Holy Scripture, had in no way stumbled upon this shoal of error, so contrary to him, nor had he admitted that stupor which, as we said from Augustine, everyone judges to be worse than all vices.

Then, too, the same Augustine attempts to prove by the authority of Tully and Aulus Gellius that the Stoics had not departed from the sentiment of other philosophers regarding affections of the mind, and that between them and the Platonists and Peripatetics there was a contention of words rather than of things. When he had proven this by the testimony of Cicero, he concludes thus: “It seems to me, therefore, in this matter, where it is asked whether the passions of the mind happen to the wise man or if he is entirely alien to them, that they make a controversy of words rather than of things. For I believe that they themselves feel nothing else than what the Platonists and Peripatetics feel, as far as the force of the things pertains, not to the sound of the terms.” Which being firmly established by the reasonings of Gellius, he elicits this conclusion again: “If these things are so, there is nothing, or almost nothing, that differs between the opinion of the Stoics and the other philosophers concerning the passions and perturbations of minds: for both defend the mind and reason of the wise man from their domination. And perhaps the Stoics say that they do not befall the wise man, because they do not in any way obscure or distort his wisdom, by which he is indeed wise. However, they do befall the soul of the wise man, while the serenity of wisdom is saved, on account of those things which they call favorable or unfavorable, although they do not wish to call them goods or evils.” It seems wonderful, therefore, to some that this perfection of *apatheia* of all kinds is attributed to the Stoics by Jerome, which Augustine tried with such zeal to deny to them. But whatever you say of it, on which Lipsius argues at length, it is enough for us that Clement has vindicated them from the error, if they have fallen into any. ^B

ARTICLE XI.

There will perhaps be some one who, against this true and genuine *apatheia* asserted by our Clement, might object to us that, in the most eloquent words of the latter, the gnostic is declared to become entirely like God by the voidance of affections. For he himself gives testimony to us that, by pursuing those things which are honorable and most pleasant, he attains that tranquility of mind by which he truly becomes God: “In this way,” he says, “it is possible to become one who has already escaped to being a gnostic God: ‘I have said: Ye are gods and sons of the Most High’.” Which he confirms not only by the authority of the Psalmist, but also of Plato: “He who contemplates Him into whom the gaze does not fall, said: God living among men.”

We admit indeed that this was said and asserted by our Clement not once, but very often; but what he understood by this divine likeness and assimilation, he himself explains so clearly that it needs no interpreter at all. For where he speaks of it, he almost always adds that the gnostic is assimilated to God, not indeed entirely, but as far as it is possible, as much as is allowed to man, and according to his strength and infirmity. So many examples of this exception offer themselves to those reading these books of the *Stromata* that scarcely any other thing seems to occur more frequently repeated in them. ^B More were exhibited in the earlier article; but that we may now choose a few from others, this first is to be noted, which is held after the words objected to us in the same book: “He who consists in knowledge, *en gnōsei*, assimilated to God as much as he is able, *eis hoson dynatai*, is now spiritual, and therefore elect.” In the seventh book, however: “Washed, he says, you are, not absolutely, as the rest; but when through knowledge you have cast off the affections of the soul; *kath’ hoson dynamis*, that according to your strength you might be assimilated to the goodness of God’s providence and through tolerance, and through the forgetting of injury received.” But previously in the second book: “This is, he says, the gnostic according to the image and likeness, who imitates God, as far as it is possible for him to be.”

In precisely the same manner he speaks concerning the likeness of the gnostic with the divine Word, and even with the human flesh put on by Him. For in the same second book he still writes thus concerning it: “But rightly is the assimilation to the Word, as far as it is possible, the end, and the restoration into perfect adoption through the Son.” Elsewhere, however: “He is saving, who is assimilated to the Savior, as far as it is permitted to human nature, to reach His image, in executing the precepts by not transgressing them in the least, conducting himself rightly.” ^C In that way, therefore, just as Clement signifies elsewhere, he wishes the perfect gnostic to be the Savior just as the heavenly Father, that is, himself—not indeed with the most heaped-up perfection, which he witnessed as belonging to Him alone, as we have seen; but which man can attain in this mortal life. But what of the fact that, although he declares him to be like the angels, he elsewhere affirms him to be inferior?

Moreover, those things which were handed down to memory by the same Clement of ours concerning the norm and rule of this divine assimilation, and the modes of comparing it, can bring no small light to this doctrine. For truly we read these very words of his regarding them: “Meekness, as I at least opine, and kindness, and the magnificent and majesty-filled worship of God, are the rules of gnostic assimilation, *gnōstikēs exomoiōseōs kanones*.” He adds, however, to these virtues, and to the perfect observation of divine laws, that the gnostic is raised to the supreme degree of contemplation, ^D and that the image of Himself is imprinted on him by the Son of God, so that he is now, he says, “a third divine image, which, as far as it is possible, *hina ēi*, is assimilated to the second cause, and to the one who is truly life, through which we live the true life.” Furthermore, he makes it manifest that this divine effigy is inscribed in the soul of the gnostic by good works: “the divine effigy, as Clement says, we shall find, and the holy image in the soul of the just, when it has been blessed; as it is purgated, but the blessing makes the works.” Finally, just as disciples become similar to their masters, so he who obeys the Lord (as Clement speaks) and follows the prophecy given through Him,

^A is made to the image of the Master, who lives in the flesh, “according to the image of the teacher in the flesh.” By these means, therefore, Clement clearly declares that the Gnostic becomes similar to Christ, the Son of God, and to His Father Himself, and indeed that he is made God.

Moreover, from the rules established by Clement for attaining divine assimilation, and from all that has been observed by him concerning this likeness of the Gnostic to God and his ultimate perfection and ^B *apatheia* (impassibility), it is most evidently gathered that he was thoroughly persuaded that the same Gnostic does not ascend to those heights in this life, except so far as it is possible for him, and as much as is permitted and granted to human frailty, as we have said. Nor should it be less evidently certain to all that certain recent writers wander entirely from the path, attempting wrongly to claim our Clement as the patron and defender of their own fictitious opinions concerning his spiritual and contemplative life.

But they perhaps, clinging more obstinately to their errors, will urge that Clement said more than once that the Gnostic remains in an immutable habit of beneficence in the likeness of God, and that virtue itself cannot be lost by him. What then? Has Clement, that keenest champion and defender of orthodox doctrine, as we have seen, struck the reef of such an error, and, as they love to say, made shipwreck in the harbor? Have we not heard from him himself that it is most constantly affirmed that the Gnostic prays to God for the increase of contemplation and virtue, and for ^C perseverance in virtue until the end, to speak in the scholastic manner?

But they will say, "There is no need for conjectures in a matter most evident." For Clement himself has said in these very words: “To whom the increase of justice has grown into beneficence, to him perfection remains in an immutable habit according to the likeness of God,” *ἐν ἀμεταβόλῳ ἕξει εὐποιίας καθ᾽ ὁμοίωσιν τοῦ Θεοῦ διαμένει*. But these men have certainly not grasped the mind of our Clement. For there he teaches that there is a double purification of the soul: one by abstaining from evils, the other by doing good after the likeness of God. In this immutable habit of beneficence, he says he perseveres as long as he obeys the mandates of God and is not torn away from divine charity.

Nor should you oppose to these other words of Clement: “But if he has learned to love God, he will not have virtue so that it can be lost.” For we have previously admonished that the Greek words of Clement there are *ἀρετὴν ἀπόβλητον*, and that they sound the same as “vile and rejected virtue.” The meaning of Clement, therefore, is that that Gnostic is not adorned with such virtue as might waver and fluctuate, unsteady and vacillating, but with such as is constant, firm, and stable, by which it is indeed brought about that his soul is not moved or overcome, in a mortal way (as they say), by any perturbations into sinning against God and His divine law.

Yet you will contend more vehemently against this, that Clement established in most express words that, just as weight is natural to a stone, so for the Gnostic the habit of virtue becomes natural; so that from it he can no longer fall. For these are the very words of the same Clement: “Therefore, for him who by exercise proceeding from knowledge has prepared virtue, which cannot be lost, it becomes a natural habit. And just as weight to a stone, so his knowledge turns out to be such that it cannot be lost, nor is it departed from against his will, but voluntarily, by the power of reason and knowledge, and providence, so that it is not lost.” But he who argues in this way has either concealed or ^D not sufficiently noticed the things that precede and follow, and many other things which, in this edition of the Stromata he has used, have been omitted. For he had previously written in his works: “But indeed he will also ask that he may never fall from virtue, most especially helping and giving effort so that he may perpetually remain of such a kind that he cannot fall.” But if that Gnostic could no longer lose virtue, he would bestow his effort in vain and ask in vain; that it might be granted to him not to fall from it, and to remain in it perpetually and always persevere.

Furthermore, in the second edition of Clement’s Works, where the passage objected to us occurs, which is at the beginning, when [the editor] wished to correct Hervet’s interpretation, he did not himself render the complete Greek text of the author into Latin. For it is read thus even in Greek editions: *Τῷ ἄρα ἀναπόβλητον τὴν ἀρετὴν ἀσκήσει γνωστικῇ πεποιημένῳ φυσιοῦται ἡ ἕξις· καὶ καθάπερ τῷ λίθῳ τὸ βάρος, οὕτως τοῦδε ἡ ἐπιστήμη ἀναπόβλητος, οὐκ ἀκουσίως, ἀλλ᾽ ἑκουσίως, δυνάμει λογικῇ, καὶ γνωστικῇ, καὶ προνοητικῇ καθίσταται· ἐπὶ δὲ τὸ μὴ ἀποβληθῆναι δι᾽ εὐλαβείας ἀναπόβλητον γίνεται· τῆς μὲν εὐλαβείας πρὸς τὸ μὴ ἁμαρτάνειν, τῆς δὲ εὐλογιστίας πρὸς τὸ ἀναπόβλητον τῆς ἀρετῆς ἀνθέξεται.* Which later words in the same edition are rendered thus in Latin: “For by caution it is brought about that it cannot be lost.” But, as you see, by this interpretation the Greek text is truncated, not rendered. But Hervet had interpreted it thus: “But because it is by caution that it is brought about that it is not lost: he will retain caution indeed so that he may not sin; but good caution so that virtue may not be lost.” But to us, here, the sense of the words of our Greek author seems to be that virtue cannot be lost by the Christian Gnostic, not indeed involuntarily, *οὐκ ἀκουσίως*, so that he would preserve it absolutely and necessarily; but voluntarily, *ἀλλ᾽ ἑκουσίως*, by reason, to be sure, and providence, by taking care not to fall into sin. The reason for which Clement brings forward is because *εὐλάβεια*, reverence and piety, and *εὐλογιστία*, well-composed reason or providence, so guards against and declines sin that his virtue cannot be lost.

Finally, even if that Greek text and its Latin interpretation did not clearly demonstrate this genuine and true sense of Clement’s words, from those things which follow, as from those previously exhibited by us a little before, it is not obscurely gathered that his mind and opinion was none other than what we have said. Which indeed can be beautifully confirmed from those things which he added there. For these are his very words: “So therefore the Gnostic has all goods in his power, but not yet in magnitude; for otherwise he could not be moved, as pertains to the divine, which are owed as progresses and administrations.” But by these words, Clement openly professes that the Gnostic in this life can be moved from good and virtue, and that it is not unless after death, when he will enjoy eternal happiness, that it cannot be lost by him.

Nothing, therefore, can be found in this opinion and doctrine of Clement that is not entirely correct and plainly orthodox. And indeed he said nothing there at all that has not later been said by Ambrose in these words, which yet no one would dare to accuse of error: “So great,” says that excellent doctor, “is the power of consummated amendment, that he returns to a certain age of spiritual childhood, which knows no ways of error; [he] cannot admit crime, even if [he] wishes, because [he] has become unused to knowing the habit of sinning.” In the same sense, certainly, our Clement asserted that a solid and immutable possession of good is established in the Gnostic through his knowledge. For he teaches there that he rises and fights against every temptation, and finally elsewhere...

it, as we have more than once said, requires perseverance in goodness, virtue, and contemplation. But these doctrines of our Clement concerning the Gnostic, which indeed even now ^A will reveal and illuminate, he himself commended to posterity in these books of the *Stromata*, as we shall soon see, touching upon martyred men—whom he consistently asserts to be the most perfect of the Gnostics.

ARTICLE XII. Of martyrdom and the martyrs, how great a multitude of them there was in the time of Clement, of the martyrs of the Old Testament, and of those who have departed from this life by a non-bloody martyrdom.

Clement instituted a discussion in the fourth book of the *Stromata* against certain heretics regarding martyrdom, or the true confession of Christ and His religion before tyrants, and under any tortures whatsoever, even to the last gasp and the shedding of all one's blood; a discussion interrupted, as often happens, by various ^B documents. He notes, however, that there was a twofold type of heretics who had equally wandered from the truth in an error that was diametrically opposed. For some, although they believed that the confession of the true God was a good thing, even as knowledge was, still contended that those who allowed themselves to be lured by tortures and death for this confession were bringing death upon themselves. Others, indeed, out of hatred for the Creator, rushed into death of their own accord, without being driven. Clement uproots the ruinous foundations of these men and shows, by the authority of the Apostle, that *the testimonies are examples of a glorious sanctified conversion* (τὰ μαρτύρια ἐπιστροφῆς εἶναι παραδείγματα, εὐδόξως ἡγιασμένα), not indeed when anyone rashly throws himself headlong into it, but when he obeys God who calls him with a ready and eager mind. ^C He most invincibly refutes the frivolous cavils of others, and demonstrates that the death which a Christian is compelled to undergo—not by rashly and voluntarily casting himself into certain death, but by the will and aid of God—through torments and martyrdom, is the principle of true life and eternal reward. And he truly declares that not only are sins blotted out by martyrdom, but that it is also seen to be a purging of sins with glory. Which truth he supports and confirms by the authority of the Book of Wisdom.

Moreover, whoever for the sake of the confession of Christ seizes the occasion of death, which he does not offer to himself or procure, but accepts when offered, he is, according to Clement, truly a philosopher, a Gnostic, sincere toward God, a genuine believer, and a beloved brother of Christ, greater than the world and pleasure. He therefore, in the presence of pain, seeks and chooses that pleasure which is gained through hope. To these things, moreover, he who is truly strong and a friend of God certainly behaves in the manner of Christ, who says ^D: “Go, sell all that you have, and give to the poor, and come, follow me.”

For that very reason: “Now,” says Clement, “we call martyrdom a consummation, not because the man has reached the end of life, as others have, but because he has shown the perfect work of charity.” Indeed, he asserts and demonstrates that perfect charity and the sum of all virtue are placed in this. But Clement represents to us what kind of man that Christian ought to be, so that he may be able to attain this perfection, of which both women and men are capable.

But how true and sound this doctrine of Clement concerning martyrdom is, there is surely no one who does not see it, or to whom it is not entirely easy and expedient to learn it from other Church Fathers and from scholastic theologians after the divine Thomas.

But there are, moreover, three things to be observed by us from this same Clement regarding martyrdom itself. For he is a most ample witness to us that in his time there was a maximum frequency and multitude of martyrs: “To us,” he says, “there are daily overflowing fountains of martyrs, who are seen by our eyes, who are scorched, tortured, and beheaded.” The fear of the law, which led them as a pedagogue to Christ, exercised them all, so that they might show piety through blood.

But surely by that single testimony of our Clement, the vain opinion of those is utterly overturned who, having published dissertations on the paucity of martyrs, have dared to affirm that their number was far smaller than is commonly thought. For martyrs are said there by Clement to be not few, but “overflowing fountains of martyrs” (ἄφθονοι μαρτύρων πηγαί), which he himself saw not rarely, but “daily” (ἑκάστης ἡμέρας), not with alien eyes, but with his own (ἐν ὀφθαλμοῖς ἡμῶν θεωρούμεναι).

Secondly, when Clement from the Epistle of Paul to the Hebrews commemorates very many martyrs of the Old Testament, he himself there notes that the Apostle has openly said that “their salvation in Christ was one with ours.”

Lastly, thirdly, Clement teaches that those also are martyrs who, even if they have not ended their life by the sword of tyrants or other tortures, have nevertheless persevered unto death in true worship of God, piety, holiness, and the observation of the divine precepts: “Whatever soul,” he says, “has behaved purely and sincerely with the knowledge of God, and has obeyed the precepts, and is in life and speech a martyr, however it may be freed from the body, pours out faith like blood through its whole life, and even at the exit.” But again later: “Whoever follow the commandments of the Savior, in every action are martyrs, doing indeed what He wills, but following the Dominant Lord, and in reality testifying to whom they believe, to whom they have crucified their flesh with its concupiscences and passions.”

CHAPTER XIII. Of heresies and heretics.

What has been handed down by Clement concerning them in general.

Clement signifies that he wrote many things in these books of the *Stromata*, both about heretics and against heretics, as well in general as in particular, so that no one might fall into heresy, or if he has fallen, that he might be led back to the truth, provided he is curable. He declares, however, that he can be healed who has not, for the sake of leisure, sloth, vain glory, or pleasure, rejected the truth by corrupting the sacred Scriptures with the simulation of fallacious wisdom, and with human doctrines and traditions, and by pursuing novelties. Clement reveals in these words all the fountains whence heresies arise and gush forth.

^A He considers, however, that they may be referred to two heads: "For they either teach," he says, "that one should live indifferently, *ἀδιαφόρως*, that is, that all things are indifferent, and that there is no vice and no virtue. Or, exceeding all bounds, they profess continence through impiety and hatred," that is, under the pretext of continence, they have dreamt that the Creator and the creature, as well as marriage and the procreation of children, are evil, and they abhorred them. And these, he says, are the ones on account of whom the pagans were accustomed to vex the Christian name with reproaches and curses.

He testifies also that there were heretics of another twofold kind, some of whom, called *δοξόσοφοι*, that is, wise in their own opinion, thought they had found the truth, and were deceiving only themselves. Others, indeed, even though they knew that they knew nothing, yet being desirous to preside over their own sect rather than the Church, by vain sophistries and by an impious depravation or repudiation of the sacred Scripture, they attempted to induce whomsoever they could into their own errors. Moreover, those men, although often refuted by the orthodox, nevertheless arguing with incredible stubbornness, and with a stupendous ambition and pride that is altogether intolerable, and being also ensnared by lust, wished to abandon nothing of their errors and heresy. On which account we are commanded to flee from these and to be entirely separated from them.

Furthermore, by various arguments Clement makes it manifest that a great multitude of heretics and their dissension is undeservedly brought against us by the Jews as well as by the pagans, so that they might not give their name to the Christian religion and embrace it. For among all these, just as among physicians, there were also various sects and heresies, by which, however, they were not prohibited from their own profession of religion and medicine. Then, God had predicted the future heresies of the Christians. Finally, Clement assembles many comparisons, by which he clearly and plainly shows that evils are mingled with goods, nor is a just man ever moved or driven from virtue and truth by them. From which he concludes that the pretext of those same Jews and pagans is empty, because it would be allowed for them, if they were willing, to find the truth.

But lest anyone be deceived in inquiring into this very thing, Clement assigns certain rules by which the true documents of the Christian religion can be distinguished and discerned from errors and heresies. For he asserts, first, that they are detected from the sacred Scriptures; but secondly, that in the truth alone and in the ancient Church, *καὶ τῇ ἀρχαίᾳ Ἐκκλησίᾳ*, is the most perfect knowledge of them. For, as he himself proves, it is clear that all heresies and heretics are more recent than the most ancient, most truthful, and catholic Church.

Finally, we learn from our Clement whence and how heresies obtained their names. For some were named after their authors, as the Valentinians, Marcionites, and Basilidians; although these boasted that they followed the opinion of Matthias, ^D who was without doubt more ancient than Basilides. But other heretics were surnamed either from the places whence they had derived their origin, as the Peratici; or from a nation, as the Phrygians; or from their works, like the Encratites; or from their dogmas, as the Docetae and Haematitae; or from things which they honored, such as the Caianists and Ophiani; or finally from their wicked actions, as the Simonians and Eutychites.

ARTICLE II.

From those things which Clement relates individually regarding the heretics and their errors, many have been narrated by us in the preceding books. Wherefore we shall now unfold only those things whose explanation, whether because they are in obscure words or certainly in a singular manner of speaking, we deemed should be deferred to this place.

Concerning the Simonians, therefore, he records these things: "The followers of Simon," he says, "wish to be assimilated in their manners to the *Standing One* *τῷ ἑστῶτι*, whom they worship." However, there can be no doubt that by the word "Standing One" is meant Simon Magus, the author of this heresy. But why Clement said he was "standing," Hervet admits he never read, but only that there were statues of Simon and Helena placed by his followers. But here it seems to us that the meaning of our Clement is to mock these heretics. He had said that the Gnostic consists in faith, just as Abraham and Moses are said to have "stood" before God on account of their piety and holiness in the text of the Sacred Scripture. But against this he writes that the Simonians, leading an impiously evil life and one corrupted by the most profligate morals, as we have observed, and adoring the image of the standing Simon and Helena, the latter in the figure of Minerva, the former in that of Jupiter, wished by their impiety to be entirely assimilated to that same Simon. Therefore, Clement seems to allude, at once subtly and pungently, to both, both to the most corrupt manners of the Simonians and to their impious cult, in which they even then were standing and persisting, by his first words.

Indeed, it is no less difficult to explain what he himself records regarding the age of that same Simon. For where he refutes the heretics who falsely boasted that they had already arisen from the apostolic age, and demonstrates that they, and specifically Basilides, Valentinus, and Marcion, are later than the sacred writers, he handed down in the same place: "Similarly, the Valentinians also say that they heard Theodates. He was a companion of Paul. For Marcion, having been born in the same age as them, was living as an old man with younger men, after whom Simon heard Peter preaching for a little while, *μεθ’ ὃν Σίμων ἐπ’ ὀλίγον κηρύσσοντος τοῦ Πέτρου ὑπήκουσεν*." But how, I ask, could Simon have heard Peter after Marcion, whom we have shown to have disseminated his heresy a long time after the times of Peter? But what of the fact that Clement himself in the same place attests that Marcion was a contemporary of Basilides and Valentinus, who were without doubt more recent than Peter? But certainly, however advanced in age he was when he lived with them, if he was "born in the same age" as them, as he says, he could not have reached the time of Peter, and thus not even the time of Simon. Must we therefore think that Clement has most absurdly contradicted himself in such few words? This will certainly not be easily proven to anyone. What then? Is his Greek text corrupted or mutilated? But we have found nothing adulterated or truncated in the manuscript codex or elsewhere. Or did Clement report these things from the false opinion of the heretics themselves, who did not once contradict themselves? But by this explanation the force of his words seems to be altogether destroyed. To us, therefore, it will be 231 easier to convince that here, as often happens with Clement, there is a hyperbaton, or the words quoted by us, "For Marcion ... with younger men," should be enclosed in a parenthesis, so that they might be read thus: Theodates was a companion of Paul; after whom (namely, Paul) Simon heard Peter preaching for a little while. Which things, if they are so, this will be the meaning of our Clement, that Simon heard Peter preaching for a short time, after which

he had placed his hand upon his final divine writings and scriptures. Regarding Simon Magus and his errors, we have disputed in Book I of the Apparatus, dissertation 1, chapter 3.

Furthermore, Clement refutes certain people 10 who, wishing to arrogate to themselves as the author of their heresy Nicolas, who was without doubt one of the seven first deacons of the Church, strove to twist his own words into a depraved and heretical meaning. But Clement’s words, by which he freed Nicolas not only from error but also from the crime wickedly branded upon him by wicked men, because they have been described and examined by us elsewhere 11, will not be repeated here. Moreover, both concerning this argument and concerning the Nicolaitans, or those who, as Clement says, claimed to profess the heresy of this Nicolas, we have dealt with in Book 1 of the Apparatus, dissertation 1, chapter 8.

Regarding the errors of the Basilidians, however, Clement mentions many things already noted by us, which there is no need to set forth again. Yet we think it will not be troublesome to anyone if we attempt to explain here, a little more fully, certain knotty and thorny points. Hervetus, however, confesses that he does not sufficiently understand what Clement means by these words: "Further, the Basilidians say that faith and election are proper in each interval, *kath' hekaston diastēma*; yet again from the consequence of the supramundane election, the mundane faith of the whole nature follows, and that the gift of faith is also convenient according to the mode of each one’s hope." But for Clement’s sense to be perceived, it must be noted that the Greek word *diastēma* signifies space, interval, and distance. Furthermore, the Basilidians, as Clement records in the same place, insipidly taught that faith is innate and natural to man. But this false principle having been posited, they, as it seems to us that Clement said, concluded that faith, since it is natural, is in each person either greater or lesser according to the difference and proportion of his nature itself; so that he would have the greater faith whose nature was more excellent. Wherefore, if the excellence of any one’s nature were so great that his election and faith were supramundane, he would follow the mundane faith of the whole nature and for the mode of his hope would be a convenient gift of faith. Which, indeed, that this is Clement’s sense can be gathered, not absurdly, from the fact that for the overturning of this error he demonstrates that faith is an office of voluntary and free election.

Moreover, Clement later makes it attested 14 that faith is defined by these heretics as the soul’s assent to something of those things which do not move the sense, because they are not present. He further seems to hint that they supposed this same faith to be founded by fear. But he immediately added that it, whether it be founded by fear or by charity, is something clearly divine 15.

Another error of Basilides, mentioned by us elsewhere, was this: that martyrs were afflicted with punishments and death on account of those sins which they had committed before they were born. But when Clement attacks and destroys this false opinion with various arguments, there he slays Basilides with his own sword 16: "If, however, as Basilides himself says, we assume one part from what is called the will of God, that all things are loved, because they preserve reason and proportion toward the universe, and another that they desire nothing, and a third that they hate nothing, then punishments will also be by the will of God; which indeed it is impious to think." ^B The Greek of Clement is as follows: *Ei de, hōs autos phēsin ho Basileidēs, hen meros ek tou legomenou thelēmatos tou Theou hupeilēphamen, to ēgapēmenai hapanta, hoti logon aposōzousi pros to pan hapanta; heteron de, to mēdenos epithumein; kai triton, misein mēde hen, thelēmati tou Theou kai kolaseis esontai.* But this passage seems to Hervetus to be wrapped in such obscurity that he judged it to have been corrupted or mutilated by the negligence of the library copyists.

But there Clement argues against the Basilidians, as they say, *ad hominem* 17. For among their false opinions one was this, as we read a little earlier observed by Clement himself, that motions and perturbations of the soul are in man, and, as he presently subjoins, that fear and labor are necessary in a martyr, and that a man is always necessarily impelled to action. Wherefore he said 18: "Labor and fear, therefore, do not happen to things, as they themselves say, as rust to iron, but it comes to the soul from its own will." Ex from this absurd opinion of Basilides, by which he proclaimed that man desires nothing and hates nothing, but that everything happens to him necessarily by the will of God, our Clement concludes against the same heretic that martyrdom, punishments, and death must be referred to the will of God. Which indeed is certainly altogether impious to say.

Hervetus accuses the previous words of Clement of clear, or even greater, corruption 19: "Providence, even if it begins to be moved from a principal, *hōs phanai*, so to speak, is nevertheless mixed into and innate to the substances, with the generation of the substances from the God of all." But by these words Clement shows that it cannot be answered by the Basilidians that the reward or expiation of martyrs arises from divine providence, even if they were to say that their punishments also proceed from the same. For divine providence, even if it begins to be moved from a principal, *hōs phanai*, so to speak, is nevertheless itself mixed into all substances, even with their generation, by God himself, or rather it extends itself to all substances whatsoever, and consequently to the expiations, punishments, and deaths of martyrs. Therefore God will be the cause of both, and consequently the punishments of the martyrs will be just, and were justly and deservedly inflicted by tyrants. Which is absurd to say. Whether Clement, by these words *hōs phanai*, signified that he was arguing from the opinion of the heretics themselves, we shall gladly hear from others. For it satisfies us to have demonstrated that this is Clement’s argument, by which he destroys the heretics’ false opinion.

Basilides’ son was Isidore, about whom we have also discoursed in his proper place 20. But it ought also to be noted by us that a fragment from the same Isidore’s book *On Morals* is transcribed by Clement 21, which is also exhibited by Epiphanius 22. But the things which Clement had just said were culled from the followers of Basilides, these Epiphanius attributes in the same place to Epiphanes, the son of Carpocrates. Whether, however, he could have been called not only the follower of his father Carpocrates, but also of Basilides, 232 if you ask, we will answer that it might perhaps seem not far from the truth to those who know that these heretics were generally entangled in the same errors, and especially against the laws of continence and marriage. And if this be so, we certainly learn from Epiphanius that those are the words of Epiphanes which Clement reported under the name of the Basilidians. Further, if Hervetus had read this passage of Epiphanius, he could have smoothed out from it what seemed to him more obscure in Clement’s text. Finally, from the first of the same

^A Isidorus’ book, which bore the title *Expositions of the Prophet Barcoph*, Clement shows that the pagan philosophers had borrowed many things from our sacred writers.

Furthermore, the errors, or rather the monstrosities of error, of Carpocrates and his son Epiphanes, which were mentioned by our same Clement, were also indicated by us in the previous book. And from this it can not absurdly be inferred that they are the disciples of Carpocrates whom Clement attacks while omitting their names, for the reason that they ridiculously preached that all things are indifferent, that is, that there is nothing good or evil.

Major obscurity ^B will be seen in this, that our same author, when he impugns the execrable synaxes of the Carpocratians and the nefarious opinion about the community of wives, adds there concerning Carpocrates himself: «It seems to me that he badly understood Plato, who says in the *Republic* that the wives of all ought to be communal; for he was saying that those who had not yet married were common to those who were going to seek them, just as a theater is also common to spectators: but that each one of them belonged to the one who had occupied her first, and that she who had married was no longer common.» For it is established by the law enacted by Plato in his books of the *Republic* that it was settled that wives and even, if possible, children should be common to all. But where Plato prohibited anyone from that community of wives after marriage, or where at least he signified that his stated law pertains only to the unmarried, you would not easily say. For in the place cited by us, and also in the *Timaeus*, he discusses more on marriages and the community of wives; but there is no word there about that exception after marriage. Thus Clement perhaps thought that those things which we read there written by Plato about wives should be explained from other things which were discussed by him in the sixth book of the *Laws* on marriages and weddings.

Finally, Epiphanius ascribes this interpretation of Plato, whether true or false, not to Carpocrates ^C but to his son Epiphanes. But what prevents it from having proceeded from both the impious father and son? Furthermore, Clement describes who that Epiphanes was, as we noted elsewhere, and he exhibits a long fragment from his book *On Justice*.

But from the school of this Carpocrates, as I have said, came forth Prodicus, who is noted by our Clement as the founder of a new heresy, and he is reported to have possessed the secret books of Zoroaster. But the followers of Prodicus falsely called themselves Gnostics, whose errors, just as the crimes mentioned by us elsewhere, our author recounts and refutes. Indeed, he testifies that they drew that absurd opinion from the Cyrenaic philosophers, by which impious men taught «that one ought not to pray.» With these, moreover, as with the Marcionites and other heretics of the same sort, «It would have been well acted,» says Clement, «if they could have known those things which were handed down earlier.» Furthermore, he cites there a fragment from the book of a certain heretic, whose name is omitted. But that it could be from Prodicus himself, or from one of his followers, it may be not unjustly considered. ^D Concerning these, this also written by our Clement occurs to us somewhere: «If these also, just as the Valentinians, had posited spiritual unions, perhaps, ἴσως, someone might have accepted their opinion.»

Not from this, however, let anyone infer that the errors of the Valentinians were approved by Clement, or at least not entirely disapproved by him. For when the followers of Prodicus had arrived at such a degree of impudence that they did not blush to call public lust and meretricious conjunction a mystical and sacred communion; hence Clement, in order to beat back their impudence more effectively, said not affirmatively, but doubtingly, that perhaps someone would eventually go over to their opinion if they had admitted only spiritual communions, as the Valentinians did.

Valentinus, however, is beaten by our Clement for this reason, because he dared to assert falsely and impiously that his followers were immortal from the beginning, children of eternal life, and he said that the elect race and the orthodox were animal. For this reason, indeed: «The Valentinians,» says our author, «while they have attributed faith to us simple ones, they wish to have knowledge themselves, who are saved by nature, from the abundance of an excellent seed, saying that it is more separated from faith than the spiritual is from the animal.» But this impiety of theirs, which Theodoret also mentions, is exploded elsewhere by Clement. Concerning these, moreover, and other errors of Valentinus and his disciples, we have discussed at length elsewhere; and from that it is gathered that Achamoth, or Enthymesis, is what Clement reports as being called mother by them. Furthermore, he cites a letter of the same Valentinus to refute the errors of the Basilidians. Which thing indeed Hervetus, who expostulates about its obscurity, does not seem to have sufficiently noticed. He also cites other letters of the same Valentinus, one of which had been given to Agathopous, where he taught that the continence of Christ was so great that he did not excrete food. Into that error, however, as we have said, he had fallen, because he imagined the body of Christ was composed with such incredible art that it could neither be seen, nor touched, nor suffer anything ever. From this letter of Valentinus, however, and from his error, however absurd, our author destroys and overthrows the false snares of other heretics.

There was, moreover, among the disciples of Valentinus, one of note, Heracleon, whose false opinion concerning martyrdom Clement refutes. But about him, and the one who is cited in the same place by our same Clement, we have made comment elsewhere.

ARTICLE III

The errors of Marcion, whom Clement calls the Pontic, he impugned more frequently and sharply than almost all others. Of which there seems no more plausible reason than because the false and absurd documents of this heresiarch, pushed by him or by others, were spreading more into the Church. But for this reason Clement castigates him, because he falsely boasted that he had drawn his perverse opinions from Plato. «But,» says Clement, «I think that the occasions of external and alien dogmas having been quite clearly shown, Marcion has received them from Plato ungratefully and ignorantly.» Nor does he assert this only generally about his nefarious documents, but specifically about matter, which he had dreamed to be evil: «And to speak in few words,» he says, «he did not give Marcion the opportunity to think matter was evil.» What

truly remains a perverse dogma regarding the soul, ^A *Macro-*, that is, too Platonically—or rather, by corrupting Plato’s doctrine, has been asserted by him himself—is something Clement observes in the same place. See therefore whether he or some Basilidian was the one whom our author himself, while omitting the name, chastises for the reason that he said the human soul is sent down from the heavens to things that are inferior. Finally, if you have the mind, you may see concerning Cassian what we have noted in the previous book.

Regarding the painted and fallacious body of Christ and the false pretense of continence against legitimate marriage, Tatian, a disciple of Valentinus, uttered the same things that Cassian did, whom the same Clement also refutes with the same arguments. Tatian further maintained that the Old Law was established by one God, and the New Law by another. In his own book, *On Perfection according to the Savior*, he had disseminated errors regarding others and especially regarding false continence and against marriage. But regarding him and his errors and sect, we have dealt elsewhere.

Clement further hunts down certain heretics whom he calls, as he says ^B, *Antitactas*, or adversaries and opponents. Those heretics taught that God, the Father of all, is indeed our God by His own nature, and that all things which He made are good; but that from among those things which were created by Him, someone had sown tares, generating the nature of evils. For this reason, in retaliation against the Father, they even opposed Him. «Since therefore,» the words are Clement’s, «He said: *You shall not commit adultery*, we, they say, commit adultery; that we may dissolve His commands.» Theodoret handed down to memory the same things about them, but neither Clement nor Theodoret revealed to us where or when those heretics had arisen. It is moreover worth noting what Clement records of them again: «They are those who, in reading, per ^C vert the Scriptures by the tone of voice to suit their own pleasures, and by the transposition of certain accents and punctuation marks, they drag what were moderately and usefully commanded toward their own indulgences.» Finally, he still rebukes them because they interpreted what had been spoken allegorically by the holy prophets according to the letter and without figure.

By our Clement, some «puny and worthless» heretics are also refuted, who in their wakefulness had dreamed that man was formed by diverse powers; and that those parts which are indeed up to the navel are of a more divine art, but those which are below, of a lesser one. Who those persons were, no one knows from the commentaries of our Clement, just as he did not set forth many other things. But Saint Augustine ascribed a similar error to the Paterniani or Venustiani ^D thus: The Paterniani think that the lower parts of the human body were not made by God, but by the devil, and by granting license for debaucheries from all those parts, they live most impudently. They also call them the Venustiani. But since they attributed these lower parts of the human body to the devil, while others, whom Clement mentions, only said they were of a lesser than divine art, if you contend they were diverse, your own opinion may remain with you. But since these are called by Clement *pusilli et nullius pretii*, puny and worthless men, who they were is of little, or rather no, interest to know. Clement, as we have seen, furthermore makes it clear that most heretics altogether wrongly called themselves Gnostics.

ascribed to him a name; but elsewhere he declares that he had encountered a certain prefect of the heresies, who, wishing to be called a Gnostic, impudently affirmed that he fought against pleasure by the use of pleasure; and that the only great man was he who, having experienced pleasure, was not overcome by it. Him, however, as one who utterly abused the name and authority of Nicolaus, Clement refutes and convicts with various proofs of reasoning.

He mentions still another who sought the name of Gnostic, who denied that any man sinned at any time, by whom a woman was looked upon for the purpose of lust, unless he had actually fulfilled by some act that which he lusted after. But this ridiculous interpretation of the Gospel words is deservedly rejected by Clement.

Finally, our same Clement briefly touches upon other heretics, namely the Encratites, of whom we have treated in Book II of our Apparatus, dissertation 1, chapter 6, article 1; and the Hydroparastae, who used only water in the sacrament of the Eucharist, of whom we also spoke in the cited place, as well as of the Phrygians, mentioned by Clement in Book VII, page 765. In the same place he made mention ^A of the Docetae, the Ophites, and the Cainites, of whom we have treated in the second book of our Apparatus, chapter four, article four, sections one and three, and in chapter nine, article three.

Concerning the Peratici, Clement says these things, and no more: "Others are called from their place, as the Peratici." They think, however, that these are the same as those whom Epiphanius (Heresy 53, p. 461 and seq.) says are named from the region which is called Peraea, and by another name are called Sampsaei and Elcesaei, and whom he testifies have joined themselves to the Osseni. Concerning whom he says: "Who, since they are neither Christians nor pagans, are of a certain middle kind, or rather are nothing at all." Moreover, something has already been observed by us concerning the Osseni. Theodoretus, however, writes that there were certain heretics by the name of Peratae, concerning whom he says thus: "They are called Ademes," ^B and the Peratic Euphrates, from whom the Peratae were named. These, however, contended that the world was divided into three parts, and named three gods, three words, three minds, three men, and that Christ, of triple nature, body and power, passed through the unbegotten world and that which is generated of itself, and finally descended into this one of ours. Whether these were the same as the aforementioned Peratici, or whether they were, as some opine, the same as the Nazarenes, of whom we speak in Book I of our Apparatus, dissertation 1, chapter 7, we prefer to await the opinion of others than to offer our own.

As to the Haematites, called by that name in the same place by Clement, Hervetus declares openly that he has nowhere read of them. But Clement observes that they obtained this name from their own peculiar doctrines. Yet the Haematites, according to Pliny, Book III of his Natural History, chapters 16 and 20, are a blood-colored magnet, which also gives forth blood if rubbed, but also saffron. From this observation, perhaps, a place is given for surmising, not without cause, that these are the people whom Clement relates as having rushed headlong into hatred of the Creator unto certain death and destruction, for which they were held to be martyrs.

Lastly, Clement reports that the Eutychitae took their origin from the Simonians. But Hervetus seems to have read "Euchitae" instead of "Eutychitae," and through this error wrongly suspected them to be those who are so called by Theodoretus. For the same Theodoretus, no less than our Clement, relates that there were other Eutychitae truly originating from Simon: "From this," he says, "bitter root sprang the Cleobiani... Eutychetae, Cainites." He mentions them elsewhere, as does Pamphilus in his Apology of Origen. We, however, have noted something about them in another place.

CAPUT XIV. Of Gentile Theology.

ARTICULUS I. What kind of gods the pagans fashioned; of Jove, whom Prometheus deceived; of the etymology of Apollo, of Pan and Hercules, what the contests of the latter signify, why he is said to have undertaken the columns of the world from Atlas, and to have served Admetus with Apollo; of Apis and Serapis; of Butas and the cruel embassy to Zalmoxis, and of the anger of Diana and Minerva.

Indeed, many things which pertain to the theology of the pagans, either observed or exploded by our Clement, ^C we have attempted, as far as our strength allowed, to unravel and explain in the previous dissertation. But other things still remain for us, dispersed in these books of the Stromata, which in our manner ought to be either confirmed or illustrated. Concerning the gods of the Egyptians, you will find them described in his narration. But concerning the gods of the Greeks, the matter is clearer and better known from the writings of the poets and many others, and especially from Tullius in book I, *De Natura Deorum*, Plutarch, and others, than to require any proof. And certainly, we have already said enough about them elsewhere.

Therefore, Clement attacks both the Greeks and the barbarians, because they fashioned gods not only altogether similar to themselves in form and character, but also subject to the same perturbations of mind. For as Xenophanes testifies, the Ethiopians thought their gods were black and snub-nosed, the Thracians ^D fair and blue-eyed; the barbarians, moreover, imagined savage gods of wild character; the Greeks, finally, thought them more refined. Xenophanes' verses, in which he sang of these things, are used not only by our Clement but also by Eusebius and Theodoretus, who plainly held the same as he did concerning the Ethiopians and Thracians, and not only the Persians, Medes, and Egyptians. Moreover, Clement derived from Hesiod that Jove was deceived by Prometheus, when the bones were placed at the feast, covered with fat. But concerning this fable, one must read Lucianus and Natalis Comes, who reported verses to this effect from Hesiod's *Theogonia* other than our author did. Apollo, however, as Clement rightly says, who is understood mystically from the privation of many, is one God. For there is no one who does not know that the name Ἀπόλλων is derived from 'a' privative and 'πολλοί' (many), just as if, all multitude being rejected, the Only One is spoken of. Concerning this etymology of his name, read Macrobius, Book I, *Saturnalia*, cap. 17. Furthermore, concerning the age of the same Apollo and others mentioned by Clement, it will be discussed below, where we treat of chronology.

Some Brahmins, as Clement mentions, worshipped Hercules and Pan: but Pan was so long unknown to the Athenians that they did not learn from Philippides who he was, for as long as he was known as something else. Which indeed Pausanias has explained more clearly. Furthermore, Clement [ascribes] to the twelve labors of Hercules...

^A some, however, think these things are entirely false and fictitious. Regarding this, one should consult Vossius, *De origine et progressu idololatriae*, lib. I, cap. 13, page 213; Scaliger in his *Animadversiones* on the *Chronicon* of Eusebius, page 131; and Huetius, *Demonstratio evangelica*, cap. 13.

Clement has declared in these words 15 that Butta is honored by some peoples of India as a god: "There are also some among the Indians who obey the precepts of Butta, whom, on account of his extraordinary virtue, they have honored as a god." But Hervetus declares that he has never encountered anything concerning this Butta. But is this not the one of whom Pausanias says: "At the very entrance, he says, there are altars: one to Neptune, to whom they also offer divine divine honors by oracle to Erechtheus; another to the hero Butta, a third to Vulcan. On the walls are painted things pertaining to the race of the Butadae." Regarding him, you may consult, if you wish, the authors cited by Vossius himself, Apollodorus and Tzetzes, who testify that the same Butta or Butes is the son of Erechtheus.

Regarding the hero Zalmoxis, Clement has recorded these things 18: "It is said that a barbarian race, not averse to the taste of philosophy, chooses every year an envoy to the hero Zalmoxis; now Zalmoxis was one of those familiar with Pythagoras. Therefore, he who ^B is judged the most approved is sacrificed by those who have indeed philosophized but have not been chosen, mourning as though they had been repulsed from a blessed ministry." But Hervetus admits that many have indeed mentioned Zalmoxis, but that another writer who remembers an embassy of this kind to him is not easily found. Nevertheless, Herodotus was not very difficult of access. The history of this embassy by him, although not in the same manner as by Clement, is read thus consigned to letters: "To this one (Zalmoxis) they constantly send with a ship some messenger chosen by lot from among themselves, instructing him in those things of which they are always in need, and thus they send him. To some of them, the assignment is given to hold three javelins; to others, having grabbed the hands and feet of him who is sent to Zalmoxis, they toss the man aloft toward the javelins. If he is extinguished for the time being, they consider the god propitious to them; if not, they accuse the messenger himself, asserting that he is an evil man. This one having been accused, they send another, giving him mandates while he is still living." Regarding this Zalmoxis, you may read Diodorus Siculus, ^C lib. II *Bibliotheca*, page 59; Strabo, lib. VII *Geographica*, page 297; Porphyry 236 in Cyril of Alexandria, book VI *Contra Julianum*, page 208; Suidas, and others.

Furthermore, as a specimen of the angry gods, Clement relates that "Diana was angry with the Aetolians on account of Oeneus." But this is described more fully by Homer, lib. IX *Iliad*, page 166; Ovid, lib. VIII *Metamorphoses*, fab. 7; Cyril of Alexandria, lib. V *Contra Julianum*, page 175 20.

What the same Diana responded to Minerva, because she had given birth in her temple, and who was angry with her, Clement has revealed in the verses of a certain poet whom he does not name 21. However, in the scholia on Clement, who that poet might have been has been indicated by no one. But there will be another place for us to speak of that matter.

Finally, he says himself 22 that we have received our mind and that we know what ought to be done; and for this reason, *τὴν Ἀδράστειαν καθ᾿ ἣν οὐκ ἔστι διαδράναι τὸν Θεόν*, this is Nemesis, through whom it is not permitted to escape God. The witness, moreover, is Theodoret 23, who says that *Ἀδράστεια* is so called because nothing escapes her, "Adrastia, because nothing escapes her."

ARTICLE II.

the inscription of the temple constructed in Epidaurus, concerning the altar in Delos consecrated to Apollo, concerning the savor and libations of sacrifices, concerning the columns of Bacchus, Apollo, Acicarus, and others which the pagans worshiped, or upon which they had inscribed their own decrees.

25 Perhaps it will not easily be proven to many, ^A what Clement has handed down, that the most ancient temples of the pagans faced west; so that they, being in the posture of looking at the statues, might be taught to turn toward the east. For in the scholia of our Clement, one certain person from Caelius Rhodiginus and Gyraldus, just as Cardinal Bona from various other writers, proves that the Gentiles prayed to God and sacrificed to Him turned toward the east. Furthermore, the same most eminent Cardinal, in science and piety, shows again from Vitruvius, Apuleius, Dionysius Thrax, and Hyginus the grammarian that the temples of the pagans were so founded as to look toward the east. Wherefore the scholiast of Clement suspects that he is to be understood as speaking of that cell which Vitruvius testifies in that place ^B to have been positioned toward the west. But it must be noted that Clement is speaking of the most ancient and Egyptian temples of the gods. And yet Psammitichus, as we learn from Diodorus Siculus, having obtained the whole kingdom, τῷ μὲν ἐν Μέμφει θεῷ τὸ πρὸς ἕω προπύλαιον κατεσκεύασε, καὶ τῷ ναῷ τὸ περιβόλον, "for the god who is in Memphis, he constructed the propylon facing the east, and for the temple, a sacred enclosure." Thus, if the vestibule of the temple was constructed facing the east, did not the temple itself face toward the western region?

Moreover, Clement adds that those temples were so built that the pagans, being turned toward the east, that is, toward Christ—this is to say, with a messenger sent to the ethnic religion—might be taught to embrace the Christian profession.

Clement narrates elsewhere that a temple of Pan was constructed at Rome by Evander, which was called the Lupercal. Regarding the Lupercal, one should read Plutarch in the *Life of Romulus*, p. 51, and in the *Life of Caesar*, p. 736; Polydorus Vergilius, book II, *De inventione rerum*, chap. 14, where he also discourses at greater length on the Lupercalia, as does Plutarch again in volume II of his *Roman Questions*, p. 286; likewise Livy, book I; Valerius Maximus, book II, chap. 2, etc. But most of these writers maintain that the Lupercal is a place or a cave where Remus and Romulus were reared by the she-wolf. But if you ask whether the temple of Pan, called the Lupercal, was constructed by Evander in this or another location in the City, Servius will reply where ^C under the Palatine hill this place was truly consecrated to Pan by Evander and called the Lupercal, where every year in the month of February certain sacred rites were performed, by which the presiding priests were called Luperci. You may see other interpreters of the poet regarding the cited passage.

Before the temple of Epidaurus, and, as Clement says, at the entrance to it, this epigraph was written: "It behooves him who enters the thresholds of the holy temple to be chaste..." Which, indeed, is set forth more fully in the scholia; but it should have been noted that for the word ἔμφαιναι, as it is in our Clement, ἐμφανὲς is represented in Porphyry. Of whose temple that inscription was, neither Clement nor anyone else in the annotations has indicated. But there were three, as Scaliger and others noted, at Epidaurus. Regarding the third, however, and the temple of Aesculapius, by which that city was especially celebrated, it seems that Clement should perhaps not undeservedly be understood.

^D Clement still clearly shows that Moses permitted only one temple to be built to God, but that no statues were to be placed in it, by which he might signify that God is one, just as the world is one, and that He cannot be circumscribed by any place. This he proves by certain arguments, and first by the verses of Euripides, which are in that play of his which he entitled *Hercules Furens*, lines 1345 et seqq., which the old Hercules could find and from them correct the text of Clement. Then by the testimony of Zeno, which Theodoret reported thus: "Zeno of Citium, in his book *On the Republic*, forbids both the building of temples and the making of statues, because no work of that kind is to be deemed worthy of God." Finally, Clement shows this by the authority of Plato, then in book XII of the *Laws*, p. 950, which you will see asserted by Theodoret in the cited place; then also by the seventh epistle of the same Plato, which was given to the relatives and friends of Dion, vol. II, p. 341, and made public. Concerning temples, however, we have debated in book I of the *Apparatus*, dissert. 7, chap. 8, § 1, and in the dissertation on chap. 8, art. 4.

Regarding altars and sacrifices, our Clement says the matter was widespread and common, that the most ancient altar was in Delos, namely that of Apollo, on which nothing blood-stained was ever slaughtered, and to which only Pythagoras approached. Concerning it, besides Laertius, Macrobius handed down this for memory: "It is established, as Cloatius Verus teaches in the second book of his *Ordinator*, that there is an altar at Delos, at which no victim is slaughtered, but they worship God only with solemn prayer." The words of Cloatius are these: "The altar at Delos is of Apollo Genitor, on which no animal is sacrificed, which they say Pythagoras worshiped as inviolable." For that reason, as Cyril of Alexandria notes, it was called the altar of the pious. You may read the observations of Casaubon and Ménage on the passage of Diogenes Laertius cited by us.

A little earlier, where Clement proves that the true altar of God is the congregation of faithful Christians, and that their prayers are the best and most holy sacrifice, he there urges the pagans thus: "What, then, do they say about God—does He breathe, like the race of demons?" For it was a ridiculous opinion of the pagans that demons delight in the savor and libations, as Porphyry explains in Theodoret in these words: "They delight in the savor and libations, by which their corporeal and spiritual power is refreshed and fattened." Where Theodoret himself says: "Whence it is evidenced that evil demons are those whom the poet (Homer) calls gods, according to Porphyry. For he affirms here, and that one affirms there, that they delight in the savor and libations." But concerning these things in the previous dissertation.

237 In that same dissertation we have also shown how true that is which Clement in the *Stromata* has still consigned to memory, that the pagans worshiped columns before statues and images. Regarding the column of Bacchus, however, which Clement mentions in the same place, you may see Natalis Comes in *Mythology*, book five, chapter 13, and the authors cited by him.

Clement also makes it evident that the image of the Delphic Apollo was a column, in certain poems inscribed with the name *Europias*, in the verses. Now it has seemed to some that by both that column of Apollo and that of Bacchus something else is signified, which once went before the Israelites in the desert. But that does not seem consonant with the mind of our Clement.

Concerning another column, Clement wrote these things: "Democritus has composed the Babylonian ethical logoi; for it is said that the stele of Acicarus, having been interpreted..."

was appended to his writings." But he denies that he ever read anything about this column elsewhere. Harduin, however, ^A has no doubt that this was the column of the Babylonian writer whose name was Acicarus, which Democritus, having interpreted it, wrought into his own works. But he has given us no voucher for himself or his opinion. Others, however, think that such column of Acicarus was like the columns of Mercury, upon which, before the invention of the use of papyrus, they used to engrave philosophical doctrines in hieroglyphic letters. And indeed, besides the writers cited by Huet, the most learned bishop of Avranches, Iamblichus speaks of these: "But if you propose any philosophical doubt, we shall also determine it for you according to the ancient columns of Mercury, which Plato and Pythagoras, even before him, reading, constituted their philosophy." Concerning this passage, you should see the annotations of Thomas Gale. Finally, from Laertius, Pliny, and Eusebius, those things which the same Clement added concerning the books and travels of Democritus can be illustrated and confirmed. Wherefore, there is no need to pursue these things at greater length. We shall observe, however, concerning the columns, that it was reported by the same Pliny in writing: "There are many islands without names; but famous are Isura, Rhinnea, and the next one, in which are written stone stelae in unknown letters." And still further down: "In another (island) are stone stelae in unknown letters." For to no one can it be a doubt that what Clement calls in Greek a stele ^B is called in Latin a *stela* by Pliny. Concerning them also are Ammianus Marcellinus, Syncellus, and others.

But having been given the occasion of the Egyptian columns, it may be permitted to add to these what Josephus commended to memory concerning the grandsons of Seth, who had devised the science of the stars and celestial things: "Lest," he says, "their inventions should slip from the knowledge of men and perish before they were fully known, knowing that Adam had predicted a universal destruction of things, one by fire, another by flood, having erected two columns, they inscribed their inventions on each; so that if the brick one happened to be destroyed by the flood, the stone one surviving might provide men with the abundance of learning and exhibit what it contained inscripted." For he says that that stone one, dedicated by them, still exists in our own times in the land of Syria. Furthermore, Ammianus Marcellinus reports that *syringes* or columns of this kind were buried in the ground for fear of flood and oblivion. You should see the observations of Valesius on this passage.

ARTICLE III.

Different were the mysteries among the pagans, some of the beginners, others indeed of the perfect, which are thus explained by our Clement: "In the mysteries which are among the Greeks, the first place is held by expiations, ^C *katharsia*, just as among the barbarians, the washing, *loutron*. After these, however, are the small mysteries, *ta mikra mysteria*, which have some foundation of doctrine and preparation for future things." In the greater ones, however, concerning the universe, it remains no longer to learn, but to contemplate, *epopteuein*, and to comprehend with the mind both nature and the things themselves. But Casaubon thinks that the expiation or lustration was not distinct from the small mysteries. Nevertheless, in another book, Clement has also written: "That before the tradition of the mysteries, too, certain expiations, *katharsia*, must be exhibited to those who are to be initiated into the mysteries; for it is right that, having put aside an impious opinion, they be converted to the true tradition." But in these places our author seems not so much to have distinguished the lustrations from the minor mysteries as to declare them to be the beginning of them, or rather, a prelude, if you will. And indeed, perhaps in this sense he had said somewhere: "For there is also the proagon, and the mysteries prior to the mysteries." For the contest, and the prelude to the contest, and the mysteries are those which precede the mysteries. If, however, anyone proves that by these words only lesser and greater mysteries are indicated, we shall certainly not contend much with him on that matter. For from that it is also clearly gathered that the lustrations could also be called the preludes of the lesser mysteries. But what kind of lustrations ^D these were and how they ought to be done, Meursius explains at length. Now, those who were initiated into the small mysteries were called *mystae*. To the greater ones, however, those admitted were called *epoptae*, to whom it was permitted to behold that which was most sacred in the mysteries.

That pagans might be initiated into all these mysteries, not a small interval of time had to be interposed. For Plutarch is a witness that Demetrius sinned against their established and solemn laws in the same time, *mysteria a parvis*, the words of Plutarch himself are, "to perceive all things up to the last and hidden sacred rites, which they call *epoptika*." But as he continues: "It was a sin, nor had it ever been seen before; but the small ones were performed in the month of Anthesterion, the great ones in Boedromion, the hidden ones they looked upon having interposed at least a year from the great ones." Tertullian, however, signifies that the space of time between these mysteries was much longer by these words: "For even those Eleusinian, the heresy itself of Attic superstition, which they keep silent, is a shame. Therefore they torment those arriving, initiate them for a long time, seal the tongue, when they instruct them in the *epoptas* five years beforehand, so that they might build up an opinion by the suspension of knowledge." From which testimony of both Plutarch and Tertullian, some infer that between the minor and major mysteries a space of at least one year, but at most seven years, must have elapsed. Some, however, exist who think five years were always interposed. For the great mysteries were wont to be celebrated only every five years, as they say, and only in the fifth year were they made *epoptae*. Wherefore these words of Plutarch: "They were *epoptae* at least a year having intervened from the great ones," they judge to be corrupted and thus to be corrected: "They were *epoptae* in the great ones, at least a year intervening." But let it suffice to have noted these things. For concerning those mysteries, one may read Casaubon in book VI of Athenaeus, ch. 5, and Meursius in his book *De Cerere Eleusina*, ch. 8; Fasoldus *De festis Graecor.*, decade 2, and Castellanus concerning the same festivals. But this very Meursius does not seem to have sufficiently noticed that they were truly corrupted in the ancient editions.

^A The Tertullian words cited, which are reported by him as follows: "They initiate longer than they consign." For in the later editions they have been correctly amended thus: "They initiate longer, they consign the tongue." By these words Tertullian signifies that the tongue of those initiated into the rites of Ceres was consigned, lest those mysteries should ever be revealed to anyone not yet initiated. Now, Clement not only mentions this silence frequently, but ^B he also observes that it was enjoined by Plato somewhere, where he presents his words, omitting, however, the name of the *Theaetetus* from which they are taken: "But consider, looking around, lest anyone hear who has not been initiated into the mysteries." And how severely those guilty of this silence were treated, we can learn from the very example that our Clement records: Aeschylus, having uttered mysteries on the stage, was acquitted after the case was heard in the Areopagus, when he showed that he was not initiated into the mysteries. But if you were to ask what punishment he would have suffered, Aelian will answer—who tells the story somewhat differently—that the Athenians were already prepared to stone him.

Furthermore, that such silence was not always observed with such caution and severity, we may perhaps not unreasonably infer from Clement himself. For when he had said: "Nor are the mysteries shown to those who approach rashly and impudently, but with certain purifications and predictions or rather precepts," he added immediately: "For the Muse at that time was not greedy, nor a mercenary; nor were the sweet-voiced, soft-speaking songs of Terpsichore sold for silver." Yet, even though Hervetus confesses that he does not understand how these things cohere with what precedes, nor whence they are taken, the sense of Clement seems to be this, which is relevant to our subject: that the ancients carefully concealed their mysteries when they were not yet being divulged for the sake of gain or any reward. Meursius gathers more concerning this silence; Plutarch, however, says that Terpsichore was one of the Muses mentioned by Clement, who used to delight others with dances and choral songs, just as Melpomene did.

If necessity compelled them to say anything about the mysteries, they involved and veiled it in enigmas, signs, symbols, allegories, tropes, and metaphors, as Clement testifies. ^C Both Greeks and barbarians did this. On this account, the Egyptians placed sphinxes before their temples. Concerning which custom one should see Plutarch and Kircher.

Moreover, by the authority of the grammarian Dionysius Thrax, our author proves ^D that this symbolic mode of speaking and discoursing was formerly situated not only in words, but in the things themselves. And first, indeed, symbols in speech were the Delphic precepts and other sayings and apophthegms of the wise, such as: "Follow God," concerning which Cicero, Ambrose, and Erasmus [dispute], and that: "Forgiveness is better than punishment," which Laertius and Stobaeus attribute to Pittacus. Furthermore, both that adage, as well as these other two: "Know thyself," and: "Spare time," about which the writers to be cited presently dispute, and many other things of this kind, Clement asserts and demonstrates to have been drawn from our sacred Scriptures. But he brings before the eyes of all, in particular, those things which were pronounced by Pythagoras. Concerning those, such as that one: "Do not harbor a swallow in your house," one should read Laertius, book VIII in the *Life of Pythagoras* § 17, and the observations of various people on these books, Plutarch in *De liberis educand.*, tom. II, p. 12, in *Sympos.*, lib. VI, quaest. 7 and 8, and *De Iside et Osiride*, p. 354; Cyril of Alexandria, lib. IX *Contra Julian.*, p. 300; Suidas on the word Pythagoras, Lilius Giraldus in his book *De interpret. philos. Pythagor. symbol.*; Erasmus, *Adag.*, chiliad. 1, centur. 1, adag. 15 and seqq.; Marcil. Ficinus at the end of tom. I; Kircher, *Oedipi Aegypt.* tom. II, class. 3, cap. 5, p. 157 and seqq.

Hervetus, however, warns us that he does not know if this symbolic Pythagorean adage: "One must not navigate on land," is read anywhere other than in our Clement. And Junius indeed confessed openly that it had been omitted by all until now. For this, if you like, consult the book after Erasmus's *Adagia*, centur. 4, adag. 47, p. 1086.

Clement confirms the sixth Pythagorean proverb: "The balance is not to be stepped over," with certain verses which are cited by him solely for the sake of poetic elegance. But Hervetus confesses to us that he finds it unknown what Clement intends by these words, unless perhaps Sappho was indicated. But he surely guessed poorly. For the verses are from Euripides in the *Phoenissae*, lines 540 and following, tom. II of the *Poetae Graecorum*.

Regarding the final symbolic saying, Clement observes that it is prohibited by Pythagoras "to walk on royal or rather public roads." Concerning this adage, you may read Menagius in the passage of Laertius cited above, or, if you desire, our observations on the epistle of Ambrose to Irenaeus.

Among the number of those same symbolic sentences of Pythagoras, that one must undoubtedly be placed, which our Clement writes elsewhere, he had said: "The Muses are more pleasant than the Sirens." For we read that this statement was committed to memory by Theodoret: "They say that that Pythagoras, whose fame is celebrated among you, said—those who wrote his life—that the Muses ought to be preferred to the Sirens. But I, if it had been his custom to use clear language, as it was for certain other philosophers, would affirm that he preferred that voice of the Muses as being sweeter."

After the mentioned Pythagorean sayings, Clement relates that Aristocritus makes mention of a certain letter in which Anteas, King of the Scythians, being about to wage war against the Byzantines, wrote: "Do not bring harm to my taxes, lest my horses drink your water." Vossius, however, enumerates this Aristocritus among those writers whose age is uncertain, but of whom Pliny makes mention. Anteas, indeed, or as Clement speaks, 'Azolas, seems to be the one who is called Anteias by Plutarch, and concerning whom he records these things: "The Scythian king Anteas, having obtained the captive flute-player Ismenia, ordered her to play during the drinking bouts. And while the rest pursued her singing with applause and admiration, he swore that he heard the neighing of his horse more sweetly: so far had he dragged his ears away from the Muses, worthy of hearing not horses, but asses."

In the same symbolic mode of speaking, Clement asserts that sages and poets also used to the same degree, Orpheus, Linus, Musaeus, and others. But concerning the sentences and utterances of Orpheus, one should read Kircher, tom. II *OEdip. Egypt.*, class. 3, c. 4, p. 150, etc., and also in *Obelisc. Pamph.*, lib. II, c. 3, p. 104 et seq., where the pronouncements of Linus are also represented by him. Furthermore, two other examples which our Clement...

^A has brought forward, we cannot omit. The first of these is recounted by him in these words: "They say indeed that Idanthura, king of the Scythians, as Pherecydes the Syrian relates, sent to Darius, who was threatening war and had crossed the Ister, a symbol instead of a letter—a mouse, a frog, a bird, a dart, and a plow." These were interpreted by Orontopagas and Xiphodres. But the same story is described thus by Herodotus 95: "At last Darius was struggling for lack of supplies. The kings of the Scythians, understanding this, sent a herald to him with gifts: a bird, a mouse, a frog, and five arrows." And he added immediately in the same place ^B that these symbols were explained by Darius himself and Gobryas in the same way as Clement said they were by Orontopagas and Xiphodre, but that the king of the Persians was called not Idanthura, but Idathyrsus. However, Clement cites the author Pherecydes the Syrian, who is older than Herodotus and therefore beyond doubt no less worthy of belief. Of him, moreover—concerning whom we have spoken more fully elsewhere—our Clement makes mention more than once.

Another symbolic example from Anacharsis the Scythian is also taken from our same Clement. But it is by no means necessary for us to pursue this at greater length, since you will find it confirmed by Laertius 97 and Plutarch 98. As for other symbolic and enigmatic proverbs and sayings of the seven sages of Greece, some will be touched upon by us below.

^C Furthermore, above all others, the Egyptians used to exert greater study and quite singular effort in concealing their mysteries. Wherefore they "did not," says Clement 99, "entrust their mysteries to just anyone, nor did they hand down the knowledge of divine things to the profane, but only to those who were to come into the kingdom, and from among the priests to those who had been judged most approved in both education, doctrine, and lineage." With these, the things which Plutarch wrote down concerning the same people in this manner agree well 1: "Kings were chosen either from the priests or from those of the warrior class; for the former were held in honor and authority because of their virtue, the latter because of their wisdom. But whoever was created king from the warrior class would immediately give himself over to the priests and become a participant in philosophy, which conceals most of its indications and proofs of subtle truth in fables and stories; which they themselves plainly declare by usually placing sphinxes before their temples." Regarding this matter, see further, if you please, Kircher, *Obel. Pamph.*, lib. II, cap. 1 and 2.

How the Egyptians concealed their mysteries, Clement explains thus: "But now," he says 2, "those who are taught by the Egyptians are first taught the method of the Egyptian letters, which is called epistolographic, that is, for writing letters; secondly, the sacerdotal, which those called hierogrammateis use, that is, those who write about sacred matters; and lastly, the hieroglyphic, that is, the sacred writing which is inscribed; of which one kind is ^D through the first elements, that is, speaking literally; the other is symbolic, that is, signifying through signs." Thus Clement teaches that there was a triple system and form of characters among the Egyptians: epistolary or common, sacerdotal, and hieroglyphic; and that of the latter there were two species, specifically the first, proper or through elements, and the other, describing through signs. Herodotus, however, testifies that it also was twofold: "They use," he says 3, "two types of letters, of which they call some sacred, others popular." Kircher, however, thinks there was a quadruple type of these same Egyptian letters. See, if you please, his *Obelisc. Pamph.*, lib. 11, cap. 5, pag. 124, and lib. IV, pag. 372; but as to when the hieroglyphic letters were first written on columns or steles, referred to above, or rather inscribed, Syncellus thus narrates 4: "From steles placed τῇ Συριακῇ γῇ, and inscribed in the sacred dialect and in hierographic letters by Thoth, who is Mercury the first; the second Mercury, the son of Agathodaemon and father of Tat, handed down books which he deposited in the inner sanctuaries of the temples." They report that the latter did these things after the time of the flood, and the former before. You may read Eusebius, lib. 1 *De præparatione evang.*, cap. 9.

What those hieroglyphic letters inscribed on these steles were like, you will learn from Ammianus Marcellinus. "For," he says 5, "having carved the walls, they sculpted many kinds of birds and wild beasts, and innumerable species of animals, which they called hierographic letters." For this very reason, Cyril of Alexandria calls the symbolic figures by the simple name of letters 6: "These men, carving letters into temples and obelisks, did not use ours, but by other figures representing the natures of things, they brought a certain hidden knowledge to the more wise." Lucanus also sang of these in his poems 7: Not yet had Memphis learned to bind the river-reeds, And only on stones did they preserve the birds and wild beasts, And sculpted animals, the magic tongues. See the observations of Valesius on the words of Ammianus cited just before.

And this very thing is the second symbolic type, which Clement, as has been said, records as being established in things, and he proposes more examples of it to us. Indeed, "from the Egyptians," he says 8, "some represent the sun in a boat, and others in a crocodile." Not much otherwise, Eusebius—whose books had without doubt not been read by Hervetus, as he himself quite plainly declares—is recorded as having handed down these things to memory: "The Egyptians sometimes represent the sun by the symbol of a certain man’s boat placed upon a crocodile." Where what the boat and the crocodile signify, he discourses in no way different from our Clement. But concerning these, see Kircher, tom. II *OEdip. Ægypt.*, syntagm. 1, cap. 5, pag. 159.

Then, however, Clement added 10: "In Diospolis also, which is a city of Egypt, in a sacred temple called Pylon, a boy is expressed as a sign of generation, an old man of death, and again the hawk as a symbol of God, as the fish is a symbol of hatred, and with another significance again the crocodile is a sign of impudence." Plutarch, however, states 11: "At Sais, in the vestibule of the temple of Minerva, there was sculpted an infant, an old man, then a hawk, afterwards a fish; in the last place, a river horse. These symbols denoted: the infant and old man, birth and death; the hawk, God; the fish, hatred, as we said, on account of the sea; the river horse, impudence." Read also what he said a little higher up 12, as well as Pierius, *Hierogl.*, pag. 218, and Kircher, *OEdip. Ægypt.*, syntag. 12, cap. 2, pag. 581. Concerning these, moreover, and the rest of the Egyptian symbols mentioned in the same place by our Clement—ears, eyes, ox, horse, sphinx, man, and wings—which were unknown to Hervetus, see the books of the authors praised just now, where they have attempted to elucidate and interpret these. But above all, one should read Vossius, lib. v *De physiol. Christ.*, and *Strom.* lib. v, p. 567.

^A Furthermore, Clement relates: "Now truly, in those things also that are called by them *theological xwpacial*, they carry around golden images, two dogs, one hawk, and one ibis, and they call the four images four letters." The elder, however, confesses that he has never encountered anything at all that he has read anywhere regarding these *xwpacial*. Yet it occurred to him that these might be certain feastings. To others, however, it seems more probable that they were, as our Clement openly signifies, a solemn procession—to speak in our manner—in which those golden images were carried publicly, either in memory of the journey undertaken by Osiris, or perhaps of Isis seeking Osiris, who had been lost and scattered by Typhon. See Kircher, lib. II, cap. 5, *Obelis. Pamphil.*, pag. 121.

The ibis, moreover, just like the hawk, was a bird, and Strabo says it is most tame and very similar in size and shape to a stork. But Herodotus relates that there were ibises of two kinds, and he graphically describes the shape of both. By Cicero, however, they are depicted as if they were of only one kind. Both, moreover, claim they are honored by the Egyptians because they used to kill and consume certain winged serpents that were brought in from the vastness of Libya by the African wind. Wherefore Pliny says: "The Egyptians also," he says, "invoke their ibises against the coming of serpents." Finally, many others have mentioned the ibis: Diodorus, lib. I *Histor.*, p. 55; Pausanias, lib. II, p. 253; Plutarch, lib. *De Isid. et Osir.*, p. 381; Eusebius, lib. II *Præpar. evang.*, cap. 1, p. 49; Aelian, Aldrovandus, and others.

^B Furthermore, Iamblichus made mention of Androcydes, who is cited by Clement. But it is not so certain whether he is the one whom Pliny testifies to have written to Alexander the Great. But concerning him, more below. From the same storehouse of magic art, Kircher not unjustly deems that other letters—or names—were taken, concerning which our Clement discourses a little later: "Now, indeed, the instruction of boys, which is occupied with the elements, comprises the interpretation of the four elements." These, however, were the names: *bedi*, by which, according to Orpheus and Dione the Thyte, water was signified, or, according to the comic poet Philydeus and Neanthes of Cyzicus, air; *zaps*, by which some, albeit ignorantly, thought fire was designated, or others, like Euphorion, Dionysius the iambic poet, Cratinus the younger, and Simmias of Rhodes, thought the sea was meant; *bchthon*, by which earth; *plectrum*, by which some wished air to be named, but the philosopher Cleanthes, the sun. Moreover, Laertius teaches that the earth was called *xθονίην* by Pherecydes of Syros: on which passage you should read the observations of Casaubon and Menage. Clement also relates other names of this kind—*sphinx*, *enachzbi*, *chthyptes*, *plegmos*, and *drops*—of which he exhibits various meanings according to the opinion of different authors. Finally, he adds later: "A third childish description is also reported in this manner: *marptes*, *sphinx*, *clops*, *sauchtedon*"; and to these he added the names *cercisis*, *pampulochrosis*, *stemosis*, *miton*, *moira*, *leucostolos*, *antheos*, *argis*, and *gorgonios*. But these names, the Kircher we cite considers to be magic, born in darkness, and brought forth by dark spirits. 241 Regarding the word *moira*, Vossius collects many things which are easy to read in his work.

Finally, Clement adds that the images of the ibis, the hawk, and two dogs are called four letters by the Egyptians, ^C undoubtedly hieroglyphic, or hierographic, concerning which we have disputed thus far. Truly, Plutarch speaks thus concerning the ibis: "The Egyptians make the ibis the sign of the first letter, not correctly in my judgment, assigning the first place in letters to a mute animal that lacks a voice." However, it is not denied that the ibis, as our Clement asserts, is a hieroglyphic letter among the Egyptians, but he plainly denies that the first place ought to be given to it. These matters are explained more fully by Pierius, lib. xv and lib. XLVII, p. 351, and Kircher, lib. *Obel. Pamph.*, cap. 6, p. 126 and following, and especially tom. III *OEdip. Ægypt.*, diatr. 2, p. 42 and following.

ARTICLE IV.

By the authority of Androcydes the Pythagorean, Clement shows that the Ephesian letters—*askion*, *kataskion*, *lix*, *tetras*, *damnameneus*, and *aisia*—were a certain hitherto symbolic kind of writing, and he interprets them accordingly there. Hesychius, however, explains these same letters and their meaning a little differently than he does. But Suidas and many others think they are certain obscure incantations. Wherefore Plutarch says: "The Magi bid those possessed by evil spirits to read and recite the *Ephesia grammata* with them." Truly, in Athenæus, the poet Anaxilas sings: And besides these, carrying in sewn leathers the beautiful Ephesian letters.

^D From which it is gathered that Clement, by these words *paídon didaskalia*, means nothing other than the doctrine of those who were impiously professing the magic art among the Egyptians. It should be noted also by us that Clement calls this childish description of these names the third, even if he seems to have designated only two. But it is not a mean indication to us that, among these magic names, the first place is assigned by him to the Ephesian letters. Truly, all these things, had they not been commemorated by our author, ought to have been omitted by us and buried in perpetual darkness, and condemned to everlasting oblivion and utterly overwhelmed.

However, before we impose an end to this discourse on the Egyptian and other magic letters and names, it must be further noted that Clement wished to have it testified in another book concerning the superstitious abstinence of the priests among the Egyptians: "The Egyptians," he says himself, "in the purifications that are performed by their rite, do not permit the priests to eat flesh, and they use the lightest of birds; and they do not touch fish, both because of certain other fables, and especially because such food makes the flesh humid." One should read Herodotus on this matter, lib. II, § 36 and following, and Diodorus Siculus, lib. I, p. 57.

Finally, Clement, a little higher up, thus excoriates and inveighs against the plainly absurd superstitions of other pagans: "Deservedly do the superstitious, because they are so prone to fear anger, think that all things that happen are signs and causes of evils; if a mouse should gnaw an altar, which was constructed of mud..."

it, and since he had nothing, he gnawed the oil-flask..... What is surprising, says Bion, if a mouse gnawed a basket, when it could find nothing else to eat? For it would have been surprising if, as Arcesilaus joked, the basket had eaten the mouse. ^A That superstition about the mouse, and the witticism of Bion and Arcesilaus on the matter, as mentioned there by Clement, along with not only Menander's verses about the torn shoelace of the right foot, but also Antipho's witty remarks concerning the vain presage about piglets devoured by a sow, and Diogenes' derision of a pestle found by someone and circled by a serpent, and finally other verses of Philemon facetiously mocking these things, have been recorded by Theodoret. Added to this is what we read in Cicero: “We are so light-minded and inconsiderate that if mice nibble anything that is needed, we consider this a single portent.”

But perhaps you will ask us who this person is, whom our Clement and Theodoret call simply Bion, and whose witticism Clement has recorded here, and another elsewhere in these words: “It seems to me that Bion wittily said: How could men ask Jove for beautiful offspring, which he could not provide for himself?” ^B Therefore, we shall answer that, although many persons, no fewer than eleven, have borne the name of Bion, according to Laertius, this can nevertheless be attributed to none more aptly and plausibly than to Bion of Borysthenes, whom the same Laertius testifies to have mocked and despised the gods and all sacred things.

Furthermore, regarding the aforementioned ridiculous superstitious auguries and predictions, see Tiraquelli’s *Animadversions* on Alex. ab Alexan., Book V, *Genial. dier.*, chap. 13.

Again, the verses of Diogenes the Cynic cited by Clement were also described by Theodoret in poetic form, in which he neatly attacks this inscription, written by some wicked man on a certain house: “Famous victor Hercules lives here; let nothing evil enter.” And how, he asks, will the master of the house enter? But you will find enough in the scholia of this place regarding what Clement adds concerning the wood and painted stone which the pagans worshiped.

Therefore, that which Clement wrote in the same place is far more difficult: “For it may be seen that the ears ^C from those that are purified, if they are warmed, become alive. But this would not happen if they partook of the evils of the one being purified.” One can certainly see eggs from those who are being purified, if they are warmed, becoming alive. Yet this would by no means happen if they partook of the evils of that which is being purified. Hervet indeed declares that he does not perceive the sense of these words, and leaves it for those more sagacious to investigate. However, since in the Greek text it reads ὦτα, “ears,” but in the Latin interpretation it is rendered “eggs” (ova), because they undoubtedly thought that τὰ ᾠά should be read. And this emendation indeed seems correct. But if you ask what sense can be derived from it, we will first answer you that it seems to us that Clement had regard for what Lucian calls “an egg from a purification.” For the pagans used eggs, and also sulphur, torches, and other things mentioned by Clement in the same place in their purifications. Regarding eggs, Juvenal sang thus: “...unless she purifies herself with a hundred eggs.” Regarding sulphur, the same poet: “...they would desire to be purified, if sulphur with torches were provided.” ^D Again, Ovid on both the egg and sulphur: “And let the old woman come who will purify, and the bed and the place, And let her bring forth sulphur and the eggs with a trembling hand.”

Apuleius, moreover, wrote not only about the egg and sulphur, but also mentioned torches or flares, where he discusses a ship being purified: “With the images,” he says, “duly arranged, the high priest, having spoken most solemn prayers from a pure mouth, purified the ship—most expertly made and adorned with wonderful Egyptian paintings—with a shining torch, an egg, and sulphur, and dedicated it to the goddess.” From these things thus observed, one can elicit that sense of Clement’s words. He rightly and deservedly mocks and explodes the vain fear of the Gentiles, who used sulphur, torches, and other things which sorcerers used in unclean purifications; because the eggs also used in those purifications, if they are warmed, become animated, and chicks are hatched from them. This certainly would not happen if the evils which were perpetrated in those nefarious purifications and lustrations passed to the eggs themselves, and they were truly polluted and contaminated by them.

CAPUT XV. De philosophia (On Philosophy).

Whether Christians ought to study philosophy, and whether Clement was the first to assert it.

Clement demonstrates most evidently by various arguments that attention must be paid to philosophy, and that every Christian man should diligently strive to acquire it perfectly. But because some at that time thought otherwise, he answers their objections and invalidates and refutes the arguments contrary to his opinion. However, the state of this question, which in the time of our Clement ought to have been all the greater in proportion to the degree that the most celebrated defenders and doctors of the Christian faith were disputing about it, must be accurately observed, so that what our author understands by the name of philosophy may be correctly perceived by all. But since that cannot be explained more clearly than in his own words, hear, I pray, how he reveals his mind on the matter: “By philosophy,” he says, “I do not mean Stoic, nor Platonic, or Epicurean, or Aristotelian, but whatsoever has been correctly said by these sects, which teach justice with pious knowledge; this whole selection I call philosophy; but whatever has been adulterated separately by human thoughts, I would never call divine.” Afterward, however, he admonishes us in most eloquent words to admit the philosophy of any ethnic men, but only of those “who, as Socrates said in Plato, have philosophized correctly.” Again, however, elsewhere: “We do not call that philosophy a beginning,” as we once noted, “which is accepted in each heresy, the institution of life, that which is truly philosophy, truly artistic wisdom, which provides experience of those things which are in life. But wisdom is a solid knowledge of divine and human things, firm and stable, and which cannot fall away...”

^A from the sense of the intellect, makes manifest to anyone that the Hebrews were more advanced in age than the pagan philosophers. For he does not build and confirm this solely by the most certain testimony of the pagans themselves, whose number was almost infinite, but also by the chronology assigned by those very authors themselves—whether philosophers, or wise men, or others—as well as by the age of the gods, and the various chronologies of those same men, and even those of the Hebrews and Christians, as will be more fully and clearly explained by us below.

^B Finally, he proves with no less evidence that the Greek philosophers were thieves and plagiarists in that they stole all their true decrees and teachings from the sacred books of the Hebrews. This he proves from the fact that their leaders and standard-bearers had gathered all these tenets from the Hebrews and the Egyptians, among whom they had long remained, either by word of mouth or from their writings, which were translated into their own language at that time. Then, indeed, by various and manifold induction, he lists one by one which dogmas the ethnic philosophers drew from those divine sources ^C and convicts them most manifestly of theft and plagiarism, demonstrating that they were thieves. Furthermore, our author observes that, even before the Greek translation of Scripture, women themselves had received certain teachings from angels concerning divine providence and heavenly matters. Finally, he adds that the philosophers had excerpted various dogmas from the holy prophets, which they sometimes understood well and more often poorly.

This is the true and genuine mind and opinion of our author concerning the study that Christian men should apply to pagan philosophy. To prove this, three things had to be demonstrated by him: First, that in that pagan philosophy and its various sects, certain true tenets and teachings are to be found. Second, that the doctrine of the Hebrews and the books of Moses are more ancient than all others, ^D both Greek philosophers and other writers. Third, that those dogmas consonant with truth and equity, which the Greek philosophers taught in their schools and writings, were taken from those same Hebrews and Moses. And these three things he demonstrates most invincibly in his *Stromata* books.

For first, he plainly shows that in every sect of philosophers, certain decrees are truly found that are consonant with the truth, whether more or fewer. And although those things lie scattered and disconnected in their books and writings, far from one another, whoever gathers them together and composes them for himself will contemplate the truth without danger.

Second, by various and valid lines of reasoning, Clement gathers that certain true teachings were asserted and handed down by pagan philosophers, and that this part of ethnic philosophy is to be applied to by all Christians not without diligence. Moreover, just as it is certain that many were subsequently brought over to his opinion, so it seems to us that he was neither the first author and asserter of this opinion, nor was he the one who, before all others, joined the study of philosophy with the sacred writings of the Christians. For Eusebius testifies to us that Origen, in order to purge himself before some who criticized his study of pagan philosophy too much, wrote these things in a certain letter: "When I had dedicated my whole self to the word of God, and the report of our erudition was already spreading more widely, with heretics now flowing to me, and now students of Greek disciplines, and especially philosophers, I decided to examine the dogmas of the heretics and to scrutinize whatever is boasted of by philosophers concerning the truth. And this we did, following the example of that Pantaenus, who benefited many before us, who indeed was not moderately instructed in such knowledge; then also Heraclas, who now sits among the presbyters of the Alexandrian Church, whom I found at the teacher of philosophy, having spent five years with him before I began to listen to doctrine of this kind." Then Eusebius immediately adds: "And therefore, although he had previously worn common clothing, having laid that aside, he put on the philosophic habit, which he retains even now, and does not cease to study the books of the Greeks diligently."

Now the words of Origen openly indicate that Pantaenus had applied himself to philosophy. But our Clement, as we noted above, admits that the same Pantaenus was his teacher. There seems, therefore, to be no place for doubting but that Pantaenus, rather than our Clement, first joined the study of sacred Scripture and true philosophy. Whether this was done by anyone else before Pantaenus, since it is passed over in silence by Origen—even though it would have contributed much to his cause—we for our part do not dare to define with certainty.

ARTICLE II. Opposing arguments to this opinion are solved and refuted.

Although the opinion of Clement, sincerely set forth by us and circumscribed by the boundaries and limits which we have noted, contains nothing that is not most true and easily provable to all, it nevertheless had, in his time, many opponents not of low standing among the Christian name ^A. Wherefore Clement proposes their various arguments all the more integrally and candidly, and strives to answer and satisfy them as much more accurately as their authority in the Church appeared more grave and illustrious.

If the devil or false prophets have stolen something from the Hebrews, it is certainly established that they left us some true records, which can be received by Christians not without profit. Some, moreover, objected from this that philosophy, unto the ruin and destruction of men, originated not from God, but from an evil author and the devil himself. But in what manner, responds Clement, can the devil be said to be the inventor of philosophy and dialectic, he whom Christ, when He was tempted by him, wisely eluded? ^B What then, of the fact that the devil is sometimes transformed into an angel of light, who announces certain things that are true and useful to men? But he deceives men only when, through the truths he speaks, he leads them into error and falsehood. We have said, however, that the question concerns only that philosophy which, sincere and certain, uncorrupted by any soot of error and false opinion, has handed down to us records of eternal truth.

To these points, however, even if some things are said by someone ineptly, they ought not for that reason to be condemned, but must be attentively examined as to whether they are consonant with the truth. Finally, since the Greek philosophers, as we have seen, drew the things they taught truly from the Hebrews, if they themselves despise or reject them either of their own accord or through some fear, they are certainly no less useful and even necessary to us, having been divinely transmitted. And this, as we have already said, is that Greek philosophy which is to be embraced by Christians, and is the foundation of our own religion ^C.

Again, therefore, Clement thereafter shows that philosophy did not originate from the devil, but in truth from God Himself, inasmuch as it renders men endowed with virtue, the use of which was granted to the best and most outstanding of all the Greeks. Furthermore, having made a gradation, he demonstrates that the almighty God, and His divine Word, is the primary teacher and preceptor of truth and of true doctrine.

On the other hand, some argued that Greek philosophy attains to the truth by chance, in some way and meagerly; or if it teaches any truths, these have been stolen by theft. But since every theft is evil, it is certainly to be ascribed not to God or His prophets, but to the devil or inferior powers. But of course, both points are easily solved by our Clement. To the first, indeed, he responds: "If Greek philosophy does not comprehend the magnitude of the truth, and is still weak for the carrying out of the Lord's mandates, it nevertheless prepares the way for the most royal doctrine, in some manner correcting and previously forming the character, and confirming him who opines (or judges) that there is providence to the receiving of the truth." To the second, indeed: "The theft had some utility," he says, "which returned to men—not that he who stole proposed to himself what was useful, but that Providence directed the outcome of the bold enterprise toward what is useful." For whomever you say have stolen the dogmas of the true philosophy, certainly from their theft—which was admitted not indeed with God as author, but by His not prohibiting it—men can take some utility. ^D And truly, whether the devil, or false prophets, have stolen something from the Hebrews, it is certainly established that they indeed left us some true records, which can be received by Christians not without profit.

Yet they still persisted in pressing the point that, even if God had been the sower and planter of some philosophy, the impious farmer, the devil, nonetheless scattered and disseminated the pestiferous tare and darnel of error and impiety over that crop, by which it was destroyed. But, says Clement, the same tare of error and impiety has been scattered by heretics over the most true decrees of the Christian religion. Must therefore the same Christian religion be proscribed for that reason? What man, unless of diseased mind, ever dreamed that? Wherefore, just as the false and absurd teachings of the philosophers, such as those of the Epicureans regarding pleasure, and other records against right reason, which are called by the Apostle "of the wisdom of this world," must be proscribed and repudiated by all; so one must also insist upon that unique philosophy which hands down the true elements of perfect science and is always occupied with those things which are spiritual and eternal.

Clement does not, therefore, allow it to be objected any further to him that philosophy was invented by the pagan philosophers themselves. For however much we may have received it from men, we are nonetheless imbued by it with the doctrine of the Lord, and we are taught what must be done by us. Moreover, Clement proves by various testimonies of sacred writers that the origin of all human wisdom and intelligence is to be referred back to God Himself.

What then, others insisted, was philosophy not totally and entirely forbidden and prohibited to all Christians by the Apostle in his Epistles? Not at all, responds Clement. Paul indeed rejects and repudiates only the false, erroneous, and impious dogmas of philosophy. Furthermore, the same Apostle, as Clement mentions elsewhere, does not appear to censure philosophy; but he does not want him who is a participant of the height of knowledge to recur any longer to Greek philosophy, calling it allegorically "the elements of the world," as it teaches elements in a certain way, and is as it were a discipline preceding the truth. Clement therefore forbids that the Gnostics and perfect Christians should return to the elements of Greek philosophy, which only those who, not yet having known the truth, strive to arrive at the climax of Christian perfection, ought to study. Nevertheless, Clement permits the Gnostic, in some place, that he might, if leisure and time allow, for the sake of relaxing the mind, taste and touch Greek philosophy as a sweetmeat after dinner. But he proclaims openly to all that they pursue the shadows of reasons who, studying philosophy, occupy themselves with superfluous things and deceitful sophisms.

Nor, however, were these who, "fearing Greek philosophy no otherwise than children fear ghosts," being already clearly defeated by these arguments, finally silenced; they still objected to our Clement the examples of the prophets and apostles, who had neither learned nor known the arts of philosophy. But that very light weapon is easily blunted by him. For they did not need these arts and studies, because they were imbued by the divine Holy Spirit with knowledge and doctrine that was purely heavenly. Therefore, that those who have not been gifted with that same divine gift have need of labor and industry to understand and attain the true records of philosophy, no one will justly deny.

^A As the law would lead the Jews to the Christian faith? "Perhaps," he says, "it was primarily given to the Greeks then also, before the Lord had called the Greeks as well. For it led the Greeks too, in the manner of a schoolmaster, just as the law led the Hebrews to Christ." And Clemens was so convinced of this that he declares, neither once nor doubtfully, that if they did not believe in Christ after He became man, they could provide no excuse for this sin. "For this reason," he would say, "the Lord gave the precepts, both prior and posterior, drawing from one source, neither counting as nothing those who were before the law, without the law, nor permitting those who did not heed the barbarian philosophy to be carried off unrestrained. For having provided commandments to those, and philosophy to these, He concludes unbelief at the coming, at which time he who has not believed is inexcusable. For from another source, both Greek and barbarian, He leads toward that perfection which is through faith."

ARTICLE IV.

Truly, someone might ask, even if our Clement has said that philosophy was given to the Greeks so that after the birth of Christ they might be brought to His faith, he none the less affirms clearly and assertively elsewhere that the same philosophy was communicated to them beforehand, just as the law was to the Jews; by which they were to become a special people of God, and even righteous. For after it was openly declared by him that philosophy was transmitted to the Greeks by the benefit of divine providence, he immediately concludes: "Rightly, therefore, was the law given to the Jews, and philosophy to the Greeks, until the coming: from this point, however, is the universal and general calling to the special people of righteousness, through that doctrine which is of faith, gathering through one Lord, who is the one only God of both, of Greeks, that is, and of barbarians, or rather, of the whole human race."

But by these words Clement does not mean that the Greeks were made righteous by philosophy, but that philosophy was given to them, just as the law was to the Jews, and that from thence Greeks and barbarians, and all other men whatsoever, were called to profess the doctrine of the faith, that is, the Christian religion. But of what philosophy, pray, has Clement spoken there? Surely of that which, as we have seen, handed down true dogmas drawn from the sacred fountains of the Hebrews. Wherefore we read that this was continuously added by our author: "But we have often said that philosophy is that which pursues truth through philosophy, even if it be singular. Now, however, those things also which are good in the arts, as in the arts, have their beginning from God."

Let it be, another will urge, that this is the meaning of those words of Clement. Does he not, moreover, in the first book of the *Stromata* constantly assert that before Christ assumed the form of man, the Greeks were truly made participants of righteousness, and thus of divine grace, by their philosophy? For these are his very words: "To those who were justified by philosophy (τοῖς ὑπὸ φιλοσοφίας δεδικαιωμένοις), help is stored up as a treasure: that agreement also which leads to the worship of God and piety toward God. And philosophy was indeed necessary to the Greeks for righteousness (εἰς δικαιοσύνην Ἕλλησιν ἀναγκαία φιλοσοφία) before the coming of the Lord. Now, however, it is useful for the worship of God and piety for those who gather faith through demonstration. For your foot, he says, will not stumble if you refer whatever is good to the providence of God, whether they be Greek or our own." But you must remember that Clement [speaks] of that tan-

and, as we have seen, speak of philosophy, which teaches justice along with true knowledge, and has gathered its true doctrines from the divine Hebrew writings or traditions, and which therefore must be referred to God himself, the author of all wisdom and of all good things, as he repeats in this very place.

Furthermore, this very philosophy did not make a man just, and, as the scholastics say, adorned with justifying grace, unless he had as his companion some faith in the Christ who was to come, to whom, as has been said, it was leading him. For regarding the philosophers and those who live righteously, the following was later decreed by Clement: "It will profit them nothing after the end of their life, even if they act rightly now, if they do not have faith: οὐδὲν ὄφελος αὐτοῖς μετὰ τὴν τελευτὴν τοῦ βίου, κἂν ἐνεργῶς ὦσι νῦν, εἰ μὴ πίστιν ἔχοιεν." Wherefore he immediately adds that the sacred Scriptures had been translated into the Greek language, so that every excuse of ignorance might be taken away. ^B

What then, seeing that in the same book, where Clement warns us again that philosophy cannot by itself, if it be alone, attain to the truth, but is only a concomitant and auxiliary cause for finding it, he immediately added? "Although it also sometimes justified the Greeks on its own, ἐδικαίου, philosophy, yet not to universal and general justice, οὐκ εἰς τὴν καθόλου δὲ δικαιοσύνην, to which it is found to be a helper and assistant, as the first and second step is to one who ascends into an upper room, or grammar is to one who is about to study philosophy." You see beyond doubt in what sense Clement said that the Greeks were made just through philosophy—not, of course, by perfect and, as he himself says, general justice, but only so that it is like a first and second step to a certain upper room, and like grammar for one desiring to profess philosophy. Thus, that former was only a first and very remote disposition, or a first and also a second ^A step, by which those Greeks might ascend to perfect justice, after, indeed, they had embraced the faith of Christ, to which, as has been often observed, this same philosophy was leading them.

And indeed, he himself in another book in which he makes it plain to all that the true philosophy of the pagans, or true, as has often been said, the decrees of gentile philosophy, emanated from God, and that therefore there was among the Gentiles a certain obscure knowledge of God, later declares there that there are different ways by which the Greeks are not indeed made possessors of true justice, but are led toward justice: "Not only," he says, "are the testaments different, but there are also different ways of doctrine which lead those who are among the Greeks to justice, εἰς δικαιοσύνην ἀγόντων, and those who are among the barbarians." But if those ways of doctrine only lead the Greeks toward justice, they do not render them participants in perfect justice, or, to speak with the scholastics, in justifying grace. For which reason he himself a little above asserts in the most explicit words that faith was absolutely necessary for the philosophers in order for them to become just: "To those who were just from philosophy," these are his very words, "there was need not only of faith in the Lord, but also that they should depart from the worship of idols."

Nor is there anything for one to object that he is arguing about the pagans who existed after the human birth of Christ. For he adds continuously: "But now that the truth has been revealed to them, they too have been led by repentance, because of those things which they had done. Wherefore the Lord preached to those who were in the underworld." For although 246 this opinion of Clement concerning Christ's preaching to those in the underworld is false, as we have demonstrated above; from it, nevertheless, it is most clearly inferred that he is speaking about the philosophers and pagans, for whom, even before the coming of Christ, he determines that faith was utterly necessary in order for them to become just. But that is still invincibly established, asserted, and confirmed from those things which have been argued by us above concerning this necessity of faith.

CHAPTER XVI.

On the various thefts and perverse imitations of our sacred Scripture by Gentile philosophers and writers.

ARTICLE 1.

On the various thefts and plagiarisms of our sacred Scripture by Gentile philosophers and writers.

We have seen how often Clement says and repeats that gentile philosophers stole many dogmas from the writings and traditions of the Hebrews, whether knowingly and prudently, or even unknowingly and imprudently, and that they weakened and corrupted not a few of them. Whence he says: "Philosophy, when it has received from divine Scripture a certain spark of fire, catches a glimpse with its vision in a few things." But what were those thefts and robberies of the philosophers, noted one by one by him, must now be weighed by us.

Moreover, besides the Delphic precepts cited by us and the proverbs popularized by the Greek sages, which he maintains were plucked from our sacred writers, he thinks this statement also: "That it belongs to the wise man to have all things," is taken from the words of the patriarch Jacob transcribed by Moses: "And because God has had mercy on me, I have all things." He also thinks that another pronouncement: "That the wise man is the friend of God," was accepted from there, where God is read to be the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and God is said to speak to Moses himself face to face, just as a man is wont to speak to his friend. And from this also, Clement signifies, arose the reason why they represented Minos as having spent nine years with Jupiter. But of this fable of Minos elsewhere.

From the same sacred origin, he teaches, flowed that apophthegm of the Stoics and of Plato concerning the wise man, that he alone is free, rich, fair, a king, and blessed. But read concerning this opinion, if it pleases you and you have leisure, the book of Philo: *That every good man is free*; the paradoxes 5 and 6 of Cicero; the book of Ambrose, *On Jacob and the Happy Life*, and letter 37 to Simplicianus, and what we have annotated on these writings of Ambrose.

From Moses and from other sacred writers, our author asserts that those things were in addition gathered which the same philosophers have frequently preached concerning the moral virtues: temperance, prudence, justice, fortitude, tolerance, honesty, continence, and religion.

He also says that it seems to him that Pythagoras received from the law of Moses his gentleness toward animals devoid of reason. Not, however, from that Py-

Pythagoras ^A are the opinions of all the ancients the same. You may see Laertius in his *Life*, lib. VIII, § 28; Suidas under the word Pythagoras; Athenaeus, and Lyco praised by him, lib. *Deipnosoph.*, p. 418; Plutarch, vol. II, lib. *Non posse suaviter*, etc., p. 1094.

What also was defined by these same philosophers regarding the ultimate end of man, flows from the same divine fountains, says Clement. But those matters will be discussed more opportunely below. Nowhere, however, does he unfold and lay bare these thefts of the philosophers more clearly and in more detail than in the fifth book. And this appeared of such moment to Eusebius—a man of great learning—that he deemed it worth the labor to transcribe in their entirety, and in the very same words, all those things which our Clement pursues through thirteen pages. Moreover, both began their account from this point: “What follows next is to be imparted, and the theft of the Greeks, from a barbarian philosophy, must now be shown more clearly.” And we have quoted these words of theirs for this reason, that everyone may understand that therein, by the name of “barbarian philosophy,” which has been perversely explained by some, nothing else is signified than our sacred Scriptures.

Truly, those thefts of the Greeks, which Clement in the same place has recounted in his usual manner, confusedly and mixed together, and not always with the books and places of the authors praised by him noted, are to be brought into some order, and the places of the authors not cited by him are to be pointed out by us, as far as it can be done. Let us therefore begin from those things that concern God; our author thinks that some have gathered from the words of Isaiah that God is one and incorporeal, and of no form or figure, and like to no one. ^B By the same Clement of ours, Antisthenes the Socratic is noted there, of whom Laertius and we elsewhere have said more, and whose words, like those of Xenophon, who is praised second, occur in Theodoret.

The third, Xenophon, is again cited by Clement elsewhere regarding this same matter, and his poems, with the exception of the first two, the same Theodoret has recorded.

The fourth, Bacchylides, whose verses are presented in metrical form by Eusebius and Henry Stephens in the fragments of the same Bacchylides.

The fifth, Cleanthes the Stoic, of whom Clement speaks previously in this same book and in his *Exhortation to the Greeks*.

The sixth, Amphion—not that most ancient son of Jupiter and Antiope, but a certain younger poet, who by Clement is called by these words: “Amphion says to Antiope.”

The seventh, Melanippides, whose verses are represented in metrical form by Eusebius and in *Poet. Græc.*, vol. II, p. 133. But because two were named by this name, it seems the younger is praised by Clement. Concerning both, see Suidas and Vossius, *De poetis Græcis*, chapters 4 and 5, at Olympiads LXV and LXXX, pp. 23 and 29.

The eighth, praised by Clement elsewhere more than once, is cited here in this manner: “The great Parmenides, as Plato says in the *Sophist*.” And in truth, in this book of Plato, there are many things about him, but of the verses cited by our author, nothing clearly is found. His second verse, however, is referred to by Theodoret.

The ninth, the poems of Hesiod mentioned in this place, are to be found in the *Exhortation to the Greeks*, just as other verses of Solon’s, which are still found by us in the book *On the Monarchy of God* and in Cyril of Alexandria’s book *Contra Julianum*, p. 32, and in Theodoret’s sermon 7, *De sacrificiis*, p. 590.

247. The tenth, Euripides, whose first two verses are exhibited in the *Exhortation to the Greeks*, and with them the third in book 11 of Cicero’s *De natura deorum*, in which you may see the observations of Lescalopier. In Eusebius, however, they are all described metrically.

^C His words are in *Admonition to the Greeks*, as are also other verses of Solon, which we have found preserved in the book *On the Monarchy of God*, and in the book of Cyril of Alexandria, *Against Julian*, p. 32, and in the seventh sermon of Theodoret, *On Sacrifices*, p. 590.

247. The tenth, Euripides, of whom the first two verses are displayed in the *Exhortation to the Greeks*, and with them the third in book 11 of Cicero's *De natura deorum*, in which you may see the observations of Lescalopier. In Eusebius, however, they are all described metrically. ^D His words are found in Theodoret, and that proverb which is missing from the present texts, you will find explained by Erasmus.

Our author adds in the same place that which Timaeus Locrus taught concerning the one and unbegotten principle of all things. But we shall speak of that elsewhere.

Finally, regarding this same matter, there is praised by Clement... pidas, Thearides, or, as it is written in our Greek manuscript, ...carpidas, and by Hervetus, Theatrides; but by no one is it indicated who he might be. See, however, whether he can be said to be the one who by Tatian, and after him by Eusebius, is called Theagenes, or by Athenaeus, Theodoridas.

Adhering to the same origin of holy Scripture, Clement still wishes those things to be referred to which the most learned of the Greeks either committed to letters or which the poets sang concerning the supreme power of God, and by name Epicharmus, or the lyric poet, or Pindar. And those poems which our author transcribed from both, you will find in Theodoret. A third is joined to these by Clement, Aratus, whose certain verses from those cited here he had already reported above, both in the first book of these *Stromata* and in the *Exhortation to the Greeks*; and all are exhibited in the published *Phaenomena* of Aratus. The tragic poet Aeschylus, celebrating the same power of God and calling Him the Most High, seems, says Clement, to expound that paraphrastically: “The earth trembles before the face of the Lord,” which is from Psalm cxiv, 7, according to the interpretation of the Seventy, but not without one variant reading. For in place of “trembles” (*tremit*), there is read in them “was shaken” (*sadeubê*). But the poems of Aeschylus occur in Justin. Our author also says that that statement of Isaiah, or as Eusebius says, of Hosea, was expressed by Orpheus: “Solidifying the thunder,” etc. But it is neither’s; it is the oracle of the prophet Amos iv, 13. To this point our author also refers the words of Archilochus of Paros, reduced by Eusebius to the meter of the poems. But in Theodoret, this Archilochus, of whom we shall speak below, is called a most obscene poet: but he is cited more than once by our Clement. He judges that other verses of Pindar and Orpheus point to other words of Isaiah, one of which, which is missing in the published books of these *Stromata*, is restored by Eusebius. See also the poems of Pindar in his fragments. Clement teaches concerning the divine presence of God everywhere.

^A His observations regarding the words of Isaiah and Jeremiah, which he asserts were taken from our divine scriptures, are expressed in the verses of Orpheus, which can be found in Justin Martyr and Cyril of Alexandria. Since the same scripture adds that Orpheus sang that heaven is the seat of God and the earth is his footstool. Moreover, his poems—those most recently cited by Justin and Cyril—have been transcribed by Theodoret. By the same Justin and Cyril, other poems of the same Orpheus are presented, in which he declares that there is nothing above God, and that nothing escapes Him.

Furthermore, Clement observes that God is called "Mother-Father" by the same Orpheus. By this mode of speech, he indicated the origin of things from nothing, and gave occasion to those who introduce those seeds of things to attribute a spouse to God. Hervet conjectures that the Valentinians are noted here; and why not other heretics, and even pagans, who basely invented the fictitious marriages of the gods?

What of the fact that Clement ^B teaches that God the Father and the Son are signified not only by Plato, as we saw above, but also by Homer, Orpheus, and Xenocrates? The two former verses of Homer are in *Odyssey* IV, page 125, while the third is found in the same place on page 122. You see here that three verses of one and the same poet are cited by Clement as if they were contiguous, when in fact they are separated by no small interval. But he not infrequently uses this singular method of citing the testimonies of writers.

He also clearly shows that the Stoics, having twisted certain passages of Holy Scripture into a foreign and overly literal sense, introduced the idea that God in his own nature is body, soul, and spirit, and that he pervades the entire substance. Regarding this last opinion, we have spoken above, and Plutarch and others have spoken of both. Yet Clement argues that they, no less than Pythagoras and Aristotle, took what they taught about matter from Genesis; and that Epicurus took the teaching that all things happen by chance from the Book of Ecclesiasticus; and that Aristotle concluded from the Psalms ^C that God's providence is circumscribed by the bounds of the moon. To these, he refers the verses of Philemon described by Theodoret, by which idolatry is excised, as well as the multitude of victims which he (in other poems that the author of the book *On the Monarchy of God*, as we said elsewhere, attributes to Philemon) attributes to Menander.

By what reason, do you think, did the Pythagoreans call the heaven *antichthona*, that is, the earth opposite to our feet? Surely so that, after Jeremiah, they might signify the elect earth and the inheritance of God, whose heirs, whoever they may be, shall be kings of the earth.

How many things Plato drew from our sacred fountains, someone might perhaps think he can gather from the fact that Clement—and after him, Eusebius—refers to the testimony of the Pythagorean Numenius regarding him, in this manner: "The Pythagorean philosopher Numenius writes openly: For what is Plato, if not Moses speaking in Attic Greek?" But regarding this citation of Numenius, and also regarding the reading by Plato of the books of Moses and the other prophets of the Old Testament, we have discoursed elsewhere. Therefore, to proceed to those things which Clement teaches were taken by Plato from these same books, there first come to our attention those details which this most learned of philosophers—and Orpheus, and not least Menander—handed down concerning the souls of children and the angels who are the guardians of men. For our Clement ^D asserts that these were taken from our divine scriptures: but regarding these, see above, chapter 8, article 2.

Clement adds: "Perhaps the *daemon* of Socrates also signified something of this kind." But he had already made mention of this *daemon* in Book I, pp. 11 and 34, where he also cited the book of Plato inscribed *Theages*, and what is related about that *daemon* does indeed occur there. Regarding this *daemon* of Socrates, various writers, both profane and sacred, have spoken; Laertius, Book II, *On the Lives and Dogmas of Philosophers*, § 32; Cicero, Book I, *On Divination*, page 275; Tertullian, the book *On the Soul*, chapters 1 and 40; Cyprian, *On the Vanity of Idols*, page 13, Oxford edition, and others.

Clement reveals many other thefts of the Greeks, which are clearly similar to these, from our sacred commentaries, regarding the archetypal and intelligible world, the creation of the corporeal world and of man, and certain other documents, which are either easy, or explained in scholia, or explained by us in other places. Wherefore, leaving these aside, we shall observe the passage of Plato on the creation of the world as presented by Theodoret. Clement also thinks that it was accepted by that same Plato from the Scriptures that true friendship and likeness is established and prevails among the good alone among men. But for *Lysia*, as it is held in the text of Clement, one must read *Lyside*, just as in Plato himself, Vol. II, page 214. See also, if you wish, his *Timaeus* at the end, and Cicero's book *On Friendship*. To these, our author again proves that it is derived from the same streams, that which Plato further taught, that all in the same state are brothers, Vol. II, *On the Republic*, before the end, page 415, and also that an oath is prohibited. In our author's edition, we are sent to the tenth book of Plato's *On Laws*. But Hervet complained that he had sought that in this book in vain. To us, however, it will not be hard to prove that Clement alluded to these words of the following book: "Nor let him who sells praise his wares, nor affirm with an oath that they cost him so much."

Clement thinks that the resurrection of the dead is perhaps signified by the very famous fable of Her, or Er the Armenian, whom Plato writes came back to life on the twelfth day after his death. The words of Clement are: "He (Plato) himself, in the tenth *Republic*, makes mention of Her the son of Armenius, of the race of Pamphilus." Which indeed Hervet rendered into Latin thus, but is argued to have rendered it poorly: "The same man (Plato), in the tenth *On the Republic*, makes mention of Her the Armenian, of the race of Pamphilus." For the interpreters of Eusebius translated it better: "Of Er the son of Armenius, of the race of Pamphilus." And in very truth, the same Hervet interpreted the following words of Clement thus: "Zoroaster wrote, the son of Er the Armenian, who was a Pamphilian." From whence, that the former interpretation ought to be corrected, how Hervet did not see it, we certainly do not see. Then, in his commentary on this passage, he observes that no mention of Zoroaster is made by Plato at all. What is surprising, since it is not said even by our Clement, but that this Her or Er of Armenius is Zoroaster himself. Nor did he say this for nothing, but it is he himself who records the words of Zoroaster, by which he had handed down this history, or if you prefer, fable, to posterity. And perhaps Plato borrowed this very thing from him. But who this Zoroaster was, is not easily said. For Hervet confesses there were two, and Cotelerius confesses there were more. As for the rest, that fable of Her or Er is not only from Pla-

-^Ato, and recounted from him by Eusebius, but also by Plutarch in his 9th book of *Symposiac Questions*, q. 5, p. 740; by Macrobius in *De somnio Scipionis* lib. 1, cap. 1; by Valerius Maximus in his book *On Miracles*, cap. 8, § 12, and others. Whether Arnobius aimed at it, we shall examine in its proper place.

Regarding the supreme judgment of God, Clement brings forward more from the poems of Diphilus, which you will find in Theodoret, and under the name of Philemon in Justin. See book 11 of this Apparatus, dissert. 2, cap. 5, § 3.

As for the testimony of Plato which he brings forward concerning punishments to be suffered after death, it is also exhibited by Justin Martyr. Two verses regarding the future beatitude of man after this life are cited by him from the philosophical poetry of Empedocles; for he, as we note elsewhere, had written down philosophical matters in strict meter. Clement therefore testifies that this sentiment was derived from the same sacred origin, just as the other one, by which the same Empedocles taught that the world would be consumed by fire and renewed. But if we are to trust Laertius, he asserted that this order of things was eternal. But the same Empedocles, concerning whom we have said something elsewhere, had perhaps ^B relaxed his view on this opinion. Nevertheless, as Clement continues, Heraclitus supported him, who taught that one world is eternal, while another is subject to destruction; yet so that after it has been consumed by fire, it returns to its pristine state. Earlier, however, Clement had said, which he repeats even here, that this philosopher moved his feet into the opinion of the Stoics concerning the *ekpyrosis*, or the conflagration of the world. It is certainly established, and it is evident by the authority and testimony of Plutarch, Eusebius, and others, that Heraclitus taught that all things are born from fire and resolved into it. But Laertius openly refutes this opinion regarding the distinction of a twofold world, which our author assigns to him, for he writes in express terms that he believed that "this universe was finite, and there was one world," and that it was born from fire, and again, through certain cycles at various times, this whole age is set on fire. Yet if you ask why Heraclitus fell into these contrary and conflicting opinions, or why various sentiments were ascribed to him by others because he spoke quite obscurely, we will candidly answer that the latter seems to us more probable than the former. If you ask for the reason, we will bring forward the authority of Cicero, and these words of his: "Not everyone interprets Heraclitus the same way; because he did not want it to be understood what he was saying, let us omit him." Furthermore, concerning the aforementioned opinion of the Stoics regarding the conflagration of the world, one must read Numenius in Eusebius, as well as Laertius, and others. Our author observes that Plato also reached their opinion, and the place of Plato cited by him is indicated in his scholia.

Moreover, Clement proves that the seventh day was sacred not only to the Hebrews but also to the Greeks, ^C by citing the poems of Hesiod, Homer, and Callimachus: which Eusebius indeed reported from our Clement, and earlier from Aristobulus; but the verses that he ascribes to Callimachus, this one ascribes to Linus, and not without the greatest discrepancy of readings in the first verse. For the rest, concerning the sacred seventh day, see the observations of Casaubon in Suetonius, book 2, p. 327. Finally, regarding the various thefts and plagiarisms of the Greeks from Holy Scripture, one must read Daniel Classen’s *Theologia gentilis*, *Thesaurus Graecarum antiquitatum*, vol. VII.

ARTICLE II.

On the depraved imitation of certain miracles.

Clement again rebukes and refutes the Greeks—already clearly convicted of the theft and plagiarism of which we have spoken—because, out of depraved emulation and fictitious fables, they wished to imitate certain miracles performed among us, for the sake of our own learning, by most holy men. "This," says Clement, "they attempted to express with, however, a preposterous emulation, yet they also professed that those things were true." For men are not accustomed to imitate things they know to be false, but to deny, despise, and ridicule them.

Let us see, however, what examples of this perverse emulation Clement brings forward. The first is Aeacus, who, like Samuel, by his prayers repelled the barrenness of the earth and obtained a great abundance of grain and fruits. Nevertheless, Hervet candidly confesses that he has never read this anywhere, and nothing has been observed about this matter in the other annotations of our Clement. But besides the fact that Eusebius represented that whole fragment of our Clement, Pausanias certainly mentions this story more than once. For at the end of his1 first book, it is read to have been recounted thus: "On the mountain ridge is a shrine called that of Zeus Aphesius. It is said to have been so called because when Aeacus was performing a divine rite to Zeus Panellenius in Aegina, in order to deprecate a squalid drought of the land, because of a certain oracle, once the sacrifice was duly performed, God removed the calamity." More extensively in another book: "When Greece was laboring under a long drought, and not less the rest of Greece outside the isthmus than the whole Peloponnese was affected by the dearth of heavenly waters, messengers were sent to Delphi to learn from the oracle the cause and remedy of the calamity. The Pythia replied there that Zeus was to be placated: but in such a way, if he would obey, as to use Aeacus as the intercessor. Therefore, from that response, messengers from individual cities were sent to Aeacus to beg him to undertake the deprecation. He, after sacred rites were duly performed to Zeus Panellenius and vows were made, made Greece partaker of rain. In memory of the event, the Aeginetans placed those statues." It is truly a wonder how these things, and what Diodorus Siculus, albeit a little differently, recorded to memory regarding the same story, escaped the diligence of Hervet and others.

Next, Clement writes that popular fame once spread that winds were either recalled and summoned, or stilled and prohibited, by Aristaeus and Empedocles of Agrigentum. But one must read Diodorus and Herodotus regarding the first; and regarding the second, Laertius, among whom you will find the poems of the same Empedocles cited by our Clement.

Thirdly, it was a vain and futile opinion of some that pestilence, as our author says, hail, storms, and other things of this kind are effected and created not only from the disturbance of matter and air, but by a demon and wicked angels. But if you wish, consult Vossius about these things.

Clement continues: "But now they say the magi, who are of Cleon, observing the heights of the clouds, which were to be about to eject hail, ward off the wrath with chants and sacrifices. But if by chance they lack an animal at any time, they sacrifice with their own bloodied finger." Pausanias, however: "I myself, indeed, have seen men who ward off hail with sacrifices and incantations." But you will perhaps not regret comparing this entire place of Pausanias with the words of our Clement.

^A Laertius says that Democritus was fed by Damastus—read *Damasus*—his brother, due to extreme scarcity. Then he immediately adds: "But when he had predicted certain future events, and the subsequent outcome of the events had produced belief, he was already judged by most to be worthy of divine honors." Should these things not have sufficed for Hervetus to confirm Clement's narration? But if anyone should desire more, let him read these words of Pliny: "They report that the same Democritus, while his brother Damasus was harvesting, prayed amidst the most intense heat that the remaining crop be spared, and that what had been reaped be carried under shelter; and having been approved by a severe downpour a few hours later, his prophecy was confirmed."

CHAPTER XVII.

On the various sects of the philosophers. On the Ionian sect and Thales its founder, and on his successors; on other sects arising from there, on the Cynic sect and its parent Antisthenes, on the Stoic sect and its founder Zeno.

Concerning the various schools of the philosophers, our Clement has recorded many things in writing, but, according to his custom, without regard for time or order of narrative. Therefore, we have considered it worthwhile to explain those things written by him as best we can, in order to reduce them into their proper chronological order, as far as it may be possible for us. Clement ^B begins his discussion of them thus: "There were three successions of philosophy, which took their names from the places in which they were occupied. The Italic, which originated from Pythagoras; the Ionic, from Thales; and the Eleatic, from Xenophanes." Eusebius has reported the very same thing in almost the same way: "From Pythagoras," he says, "the race of philosophy was first propagated, which they called Italic, from Italy, where it had flourished the most. Then that second one followed, which Thales, one of the seven sages, instituted, and which they called Ionic. To this succeeded the Eleatic, which lays claim to Xenophanes of Colophon as its parent." It is, however, certain that the chronological order is entirely confounded by both Clement and Eusebius. For it is agreed among all—and it must be beyond controversy, since the age of Thales is assigned by both of them and by all others—that Thales was not only more ancient than the others, but was actually the first to have treated philosophical arguments concerning the nature of things. But perhaps they called Pythagoras the first because he, as is known to all, was the first to take the name of philosopher, and also, as Cicero says, he amplified the understanding: "Nor was Pythagoras," the words are of him, "the inventor of the name alone, but the amplifier of the things themselves."

Be that as it may, the age in which Thales lived is then shown by our Clement thus: "Eudemus, in his *Astrological Histories*, said that Thales predicted the eclipse of the sun which happened at the time when the Medes and Lydians joined battle, with Cyaxares, of the family of Astyages, reigning in Media, and Alyattes, of the Croesus family, in Lydia." Herodotus also agrees with him in ^C this. But these times are around the fiftieth Olympiad. And indeed, the cited passage of Herodotus occurs in his first book. But Eusebius records the eclipse of the sun mentioned by Clement in the second year of the forty-eighth Olympiad. For this reason, Clement himself later declares still quite clearly that Thales flourished around the fiftieth Olympiad. Tatian, however, supports him fully. But since he, like our Clement, said "approximately and about," Eusebius does not seem to differ much from them, as he states, according to the common opinion of writers, that Thales lived from the thirty-fifth to the fifty-sixth Olympiad. To these ^D things, moreover, Augustine says: "In the reign of Romulus, Thales of Miletus is reported to have lived; he was one of the seven sages, who, after the theological poets, among whom is Orpheus, were most of all ennobled, and were called *sophoi*, which in Latin is *sapientes* [wise men]." See Laertius and the notes of Scaliger on the cited *Chronicon* of Eusebius; also Cyril of Alexandria, *Against Julian*, book 1, page 12; Petavius, *De doctrina temporum*, book 10, chap. 1, page 154, and in his *Chronologia*; Meursius, *De archontibus Atheniensibus*, book 1, chap. 11, and others.

Laertius testifies that the Ionic sect of Thales was so called because he was a native of Miletus, a city which, as Mela says, is the principal city of all Ionia, and, as the geographers have noted, is situated on the borders of Ionia and Caria. Yet not all have given their suffrage to Laertius. For as our Clement writes, Thales, as Leander and Herodotus report, was a Phoenician, but as some have judged, a Milesian. Theodoret has exactly the same, and calls upon the same witnesses. Eusebius, however, without naming anyone, says: "Thales was either a Phoenician, as some write, or, as others say, a Milesian." But why, one might argue, did both Clement and Theodoret cite as a witness Herodotus, by whom that same Thales is called simply a Milesian (*ho Milesios*)? Was someone else cited by Clement who was distinguished by the same name of Herodotus? Laertius solves the knot of this difficulty, who records these things concerning Thales from the beginning of his *Life* as described by him: "Thales, as Herodotus, Duris, and Democritus say, was born of the father Examyes and the mother Cleobulina, from the Thelidae family, who trace their origin from the most noble of the Phoenicians, Cadmus and Agenor..."

^A Archelaus, whom Socrates heard. Things plainly similar to this, and Laertius does not use more words, but Eusebius narrates them more fully; and we have discussed this sect and its followers elsewhere. Moreover, he was recorded as a citizen of Miletus, having departed from his ancestral soil of Phoenicia with Neleus; or, as it seemed to the majority, he was a native Milesian and born of a noble family. Thales therefore, if one is to believe Laertius, was by origin and country a Phoenician, but was gifted with the citizenship of Miletus, and from there, or from a long residence in that same city, he received the surname of Milesian.

^B Wherefore Clement not unworthily calls him a Phoenician shortly after by race and origin: «Thales, being by race a Phoenician.» And he adds immediately, «it is also said that he had meetings with the prophets of the Egyptians.» But earlier: «Only [μόνος], he says, he seems to have had meetings with the prophets of the Egyptians.» Plutarch has famously confirmed this opinion of our Clement concerning the meeting of Thales with the Egyptians, and what was handed down by him concerning the country and sect of this same Thales: «He seems, he says, to have been the prince of philosophy, and the Ionian sect derived its name from him... Having devoted himself to philosophy in Egypt, he returned to Miletus, now at a more advanced age.» But again in another book: «They think Homer, just as Thales, was instructed by the Egyptians.» Josephus, however, asserts without doubt that this was approved by the common consensus of all: «But also those who among the Greeks first philosophized about celestial and divine things (that is how he speaks), namely, Pherecydes the Syrian, Pythagoras, and Thales, are all unanimously admitted to have been disciples of the Egyptians and Chaldeans, and to have briefly written down what are judged by the Greeks to be the most ancient of all things, so much so that they are scarcely believed to have been written by them.» And that we may pass over other witnesses in a matter so manifest, Thales himself, in his letter to Pherecydes which Laertius presents, is said to have written these things: «We are not so mad and foolish, I and Solon the Athenian, that when we sailed to Crete for the sake of visiting, and had likewise penetrated into Egypt so that we might meet with the priests and astronomers there, we would not have traveled to you with equal zeal.» But if this letter should seem to you, as to some others, to be falsely attributed to Thales, surely you will not deny faith to Laertius, who writes these things about Thales again: «He used no teacher, except that he went to the Egyptian priests and attached himself familiarly to them.»

But, someone will ask, why is that Thales alone [μόνος] said by Clement to have had meetings with the Egyptian prophets; since he himself, and others, as we have seen, have most consistently handed down in great number and by consensus that many others came into Egypt, and there associated with the Egyptians and were imbued with philosophical sciences and doctrines. But let whoever objects to this, I beg, consider that it does not seem at all probable that Clement, so learned and perspicacious a man, would have contradicted the opinion of so many and such great men and himself so absurdly. We shall therefore easily be persuaded that this word «only» was added to his text by some sleepy scribe, or that he is not speaking his own opinion, but that of others, even if they are entirely straying from the truth, as often happens in common usage.

The Ionian sect of philosophers, furthermore, founded by Thales as we have said, and who they were and who succeeded Thales, Clement explains thus: Anaximander, the son of Praxiades, a Milesian, succeeds Thales. To him succeeds Anaximenes, the son of Euristratus, a Milesian. After whom [comes] Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, the son of Hegesibulus. He transferred the school from Ionia to Athens. ^C And to him succeeds Archelaus. Whatever is to be said regarding the Ionian muses, «The Ionian muses» (Ἰάδες μοῦσαι), being praised by Clement? But what these were, Hervetus confesses was not explored by him. Some indeed think that the philosophers of the Ionian sect are signified by that name. Nor is their conjecture perhaps entirely vain. For although by this very name poetry and music might seem to be designated, it is agreed nonetheless that that term was sometimes used for signifying the liberal arts and philosophy as well.

251 Whatever be the case, Clement reports that the Cynic, Academic, Peripatetic, and Stoic schools flowed from the Ionian sect. So also does Laertius, whom, as well as the observations of various others upon his writings, and also Vossius, you should not be loath to approach.

But there are some things beyond these, and perhaps not entirely uselessly, to be noted by us. For Clement makes it attested that Anaxagoras transferred the school from Ionia to Athens. And indeed, Laertius in his Life has committed these things to writing: «He began to philosophize at Athens under Callias in the twentieth year of his age, as Demetrias Phalereus reports in his description of the rulers, where they also report that he stayed for thirty years.» But the same man says in the subsequent Life of Archelaus: «He was the first, he says, from Ionia to introduce natural philosophy into Athens, and was called a natural philosopher, because natural philosophy ceased in him, with Socrates introducing ethics.» Therefore, some who think these words of Laertius are entirely opposed and contrary to themselves, suspect that either some addition, or an error of the scribes, has crept into this second place in Laertius. But what prevents Laertius from having truly spoken there only about natural philosophy? Could it not have been introduced into Athens by Archelaus after the Ionian school was transplanted there by Anaxagoras? But this conjecture we gladly leave to learned and fair judges.

Clement then narrates that Antisthenes, who is called by Theodoret «a companion of Socrates and teacher of Diogenes,» was the author and parent of the Cynic sect. Which indeed has been handed down not once by Laertius and even by Suidas and others, and which Ausonius sang in a certain epigram:

Inventor of the Cynics first was I: what logic this? Alcides is said to be much earlier. I was once second to Alcides my teacher: Now I am first of the Cynics, and he is a god.

Whence perhaps our Clement in his Exhortation to the Greeks is read to have cited Antisthenes, as we noted in the previous dissertation: «Antisthenes did not intend this as a Cynic, etc.» There have not been lacking those, however, for whom it came into doubt whether he was truly the prince and author of this sect. Concerning which matter, read the annotations of Menagius in Laertius, Book VI, *On the Lives and Doctrines of Philosophers*, § 13.

^D Furthermore, Clement notes that he was a Phrygian by country, but that this was not entirely certain and explored. For indeed these are the words of Laertius concerning him: «Antisthenes was the son of Antisthenes, an Athenian. Moreover, it was said that he was not a native. Which, when it was cast at him as a reproach, he is said to have replied: 'And the mother of the gods is Phrygian.' For his mother seemed to be from Thrace.» Which is also asserted somewhere by Plutarch...

that his house flowed down to that which they called the temple of Ceres.

Furthermore, we learn from the same Laertius not only that Pythagoras taught philosophy for a long time at Metapontum, but he also cites as witnesses Dicaearchus and Heraclides, who testified that he ended his life in the same city. For this reason, Cicero wrote: "Do you know that at some time I came with you to Metapontum, and did not turn aside to a host before I had seen the very place where Pythagoras had passed his life and had his seat?" Valerius Maximus also, supporting the same opinion, wrote these things concerning the same Pythagoras: "He also proceeded to the part of Italy which was then called Greater Greece; in which, having brought forth the fruits of his studies in very many and most wealthy cities; ^A Metapontus beheld his burning pyre with full reverence; a city more noble and illustrious as a monument to Pythagoras than to his own ashes." From these things, therefore, as we believe, it is easily understood why his sect was called "Italic."

Concerning the fatherland of the same Pythagoras, how varied and discordant the opinions have been, Clement recounts in these words: "Pythagoras, son of Mnesarchus, was a Samian indeed, as Hippobotus says; but as Aristoxenus says in his *Life of Pythagoras*, and Aristarchus, and Theopompus, he was a Tuscan, Tyrrhenian; but as Neanthes says, a Syrian, or Tyrian; so that by the opinion of many, Pythagoras was by race a barbarian." We find the same thing reported in different words by Eusebius. Yet Clement seems to have inclined more toward the opinion that Pythagoras was a Tuscan. For when, a little later, he takes upon himself to prove that very many of the ancient wise men and philosophers were barbarians by race and educated by barbarians, he has these things to say about Pythagoras, and nothing more: "Since, indeed, it has been shown that Pythagoras was a Tuscan." But ^B in Laertius, Aristoxenus calls him a Tyrrhenian, and others a Samian; according to Plutarch, an Etruscan; according to Cyril, Alexander Polyhistor calls him an Assyrian; according to Theodoret, Aristoxenus, Aristarchus, and Theopompus, who are cited by Clement, have handed down that he was a Tyrrhenian; Neanthes that he was a Tyrian. Finally, to pass over others, Pythagoras is called simply a Samian by some, as by Epiphanius. But we have already noted something on this matter elsewhere.

At what time that philosopher flourished, Clement defines thus: "Pythagoras is found at the time of Polycrates the tyrant, about the sixty-second Olympiad." And Tatian subscribed to this opinion. Therefore, Vossius, Harduin, and others rightly and deservedly take issue with Pliny—or his copyists—by whom Pythagoras is said ^C to have flourished about the forty-second Olympiad and in the 142nd year after the founding of the City. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, however, writes that he lived after the fiftieth Olympiad, while Laertius writes the sixtieth. Moreover, Eusebius testifies that he flourished in the sixty-fifth and departed from this life in the seventieth. You should see Petavius’s *Chronologia*, Part 1, and Book III of *Ration. temp.*, chapter 5, and other chronographers, as well as the observations of Menagius in Laertius, book VIII, § 45.

ARTICLE II.

Now, indeed, that we may come to the Italic sect, founded by Pythagoras, you will easily gather from these words of our Clement why it was so called: "The philosophy of Pythagoras, which was called 'Italic,' grew old in Metapontum, a town of Italy." And in very truth, even if Laertius asserts that Pythagoras sought out Croton, which was a town of that part of Italy which was then called Greater Greece—no less than Metapontum or Metapontium—and there gave laws to the Italians and precepts to his disciples; he himself, nevertheless, relates that six hundred, or no fewer, of his disciples [would come] to Metapontum by night to hear him ^D

^A

What Clement finally adds: *at the time of Polycrates*, this is confirmed by the testimony of Laertius; for he who writes that this same Pythagoras, when he was traveling to Egypt, wrote [letters] to Amasis on the recommendation of Polycrates.

Although Clement, as well as Laertius, Eusebius, and very many others, have testified in several places that the Syrian Pherecydes was Pythagoras’ teacher, it does not seem entirely uncertain that he had other masters besides him. For, as our own Clement himself said a little later: "It is narrated that Pythagoras was a disciple of Sonches the Egyptian archprophet, certainly after he had arrived in Egypt," as everyone easily concedes. But something will be said about Sonches below in chapter 20, art. 2.

From Laertius, moreover, we learn that Pythagoras not only heard this man and the Syrian Pherecydes, but also Hermodamas. "He, as we have said before (the words are Laertius’), at first heard the Syrian Pherecydes. But after his death, having set out for Samos, he gave himself into the discipline of the now-aged Hermodamas, the grandson of Creophilus. Finally, he sought Egypt."

But what of the fact that Plutarch designates still another teacher for Pythagoras, namely Oenuphis the Heliopolitan, about whom something will yet be noted by us shortly?

Furthermore, Clement, supported by the authority of the ancients, brings forward other teachers of Pythagoras: Alexander in the book *On the Pythagorean Symbols* relates that Pythagoras was a disciple of Nazaratus the Assyrian; some think him to be Ezekiel, but it is not so, as will be shown later; and he further wishes that Pythagoras heard the Gauls and the Brachmans. But the most learned Huet, formerly the Bishop of Avranches, thinks that the text of our Clement is corrupted there, and that for *Nazarat* one should read *Zarata*, whom he assumes to be the one referred to by Porphyry as Zabratus and by Plutarch as Zaratas, but who is in reality Zoroaster. ^C In this, however, he opines that Clement himself hallucinates in that he denies this man to be Ezekiel. For the same Huet tries to persuade some with conjectures that Zoroaster is an invented character, a personage feigned by the ancients, who with some traits represented Ezekiel, but in countenance and entire body represented Moses. But although in describing proper names of men, slips of the scribes occur not infrequently in manuscripts, yet no trace of a corrupted Greek text appears in our manuscript codex. Whether, however, the reasons of the most learned Huet are sufficiently firm and valid for proving this corruption of the text and for pointing out the features of Ezekiel in Zoroaster, others perhaps may be able to judge more clearly and thoroughly than we can.

What our Clement further added, that Pythagoras was a hearer of the Gauls and the Brachmans, Laertius expresses without doubt and with even more details in fewer words: "When he was a youth," he says, "most eager for learning, leaving his homeland, he was initiated into almost all the mysteries of the Barbarians and the Greeks." But a little earlier, Clement had written that Pythagoras is said to have consorted with the prophets of the Egyptians, on account of whom he was also circumcised, so that entering the inner shrines of the Egyptians, he might learn their mystical philosophy; and he associated with the most eminent of the Chaldeans and the Magi, and signifies that which is now called the Church, ^A which in his own text is *omakroeon*. From Laertius himself, whom we have already cited more than once, we have learned that Pythagoras penetrated into Egypt, and entered the inner shrines of the Egyptians, and consorted with the Magi and the Chaldeans. Of his circumcision, however, we have the witness Theodoret: "For it is said," he says, "that Pythagoras also underwent circumcision, having received it from the Egyptians, who had accepted this law from the Hebrews."

For the rest, concerning the various journeys undertaken by Pythagoras for the sake of education and doctrine, as has been said from our Clement so far, Eusebius has recorded these things in one and the same place: "Indeed, they report that even the Syrian Pherecydes himself, to whom they say Pythagoras gave his attention, was a teacher. Although they do not state that Pythagoras used him as his only teacher, but that he had intercourse with the Magi among the Persians and with the prophets among the Egyptians, at which time it is clear that the Hebrews had migrated partly into Egypt and partly into Babylon. Thus our philosopher, diligently exploring whatever was eminent and learned among any people, traveled through Babylon, Egypt, and Persia, imbued with the disciplines of the Magi and priests. He is also said to have heard the Brachmans (these are the philosophers of the Indians). He, therefore, having learned astrology from some, geometry from others, and arithmetic and music from others, and other things from others, could derive nothing from the Greeks alone; they were then laboring under such a scarcity of wisdom and ignorance of all things. On the contrary, he himself, heaped with foreign arts and doctrines, opened the fountain of all erudition in Greece." You may see the same Eusebius in the same place lib. X, cap. 12; Cicero, lib. *De finib.*, page 113; Valerius Maximus, lib. VIII, cap. 7, 8; Iamblichus, and others who handed down the life of Pythagoras to posterity, as well as the observations of various men on the passages of Laertius cited by us.

Moreover, what Clement calls Pythagoras’ *omakroëon*, Hervetus rendered in Latin as *auditorium* [auditorium], and Menagius cleverly observes that the same was used by some with the same significance. By that name, the house is no doubt signified into which, by the testimony of Laertius, his disciples, as we have said, even flocked by night to hear him.

From these same disciples of Pythagoras, some were called *akousmatikoi*, that is, as Hervetus says, "listeners," others *mathematici*, who sincerely and genuinely grasped philosophy. But Aulus Gellius discusses both in lib. I, cap. 9, *Noct. Attic.* The former sort were those who observed the state of five years’ silence, and [that which was] heralded by so many writers, about whom Laertius and others write of the Pythagorean life.

Although, however, you may find few things among our Clement about individual disciples of the same Pythagoras, he himself mentions Numa, the king of the Romans, as the most famous of all the others, who, as Clement himself says, was a Pythagorean and, assisted by Moses, indeed forbade that any image of God be made similar to any man or animal; but who nonetheless was the first of all men to place a temple to Faith and Peace. Eusebius described the former passage of Clement in the same number of words, except for two typographical errors in Clement, and the fact that for *allos* we read *glōttē* in Eusebius.

But there, Clement is condemned by Hervetus and certain others for a certain monstrous anachronism. For by the authority of Eusebius and Livy, they prove Pythagoras to be far more recent than King Numa.

^A Furthermore, Dionysius of Halicarnassus⁹ refutes the opinion of our Clement with various and not entirely feeble arguments, in this manner: "Many write that Numa was a disciple of Pythagoras, and that at the time he was created king by the Romans, he had his residence in Croton while studying philosophy. However, the chronology of Pythagoras is repugnant to this account. For Pythagoras was not a few years, but four whole generations, posterior to Numa, as we have learned from public histories. For the latter assumed the Roman empire in the sixteenth Olympiad, whereas Pythagoras established his residence in Italy after the fiftieth Olympiad. Moreover, Myscelus built Croton only in the third year of the seventeenth Olympiad, that is, four years after the beginning of Numa's reign. Therefore, the same Dionysius of Halicarnassus believes that those later writers so conjoined the sojourn of Pythagoras in Italy and the wisdom of Numa Pompilius—even though they are separated by a long interval of time—that they convinced themselves therefrom that Numa was a disciple of Pythagoras." ^B Cicero agrees beautifully with Dionysius of Halicarnassus, who, when he had said somewhere¹⁰: "Some relate that our king was a Pythagorean, he who lived many years before Pythagoras himself;" in another book he brought this forth in writing¹¹: "I believe that because of the admiration for the Pythagoreans, Numa the king was also considered a Pythagorean by later generations. For when they learned of the discipline and institutions of Pythagoras, and had received from their ancestors the equity and wisdom of this king, yet because of his antiquity were ignorant of the ages and times, they believed that he who excelled in wisdom had been a hearer of Pythagoras." Furthermore, Pliny¹² and Livy¹³ relate that in the chest in which Numa Pompilius was buried, books were found in which the decrees of Pythagoras were written: "To the vulgar opinion," says Livy, "by which it is believed that Numa was a hearer of Pythagoras, [one] accommodates credibility with a plausible lie."

What wonder, then, if Clement, having followed many other prior authors, has called Numa a Pythagorean? For, to pass over the others quoted not indiligently by Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Cicero, he certainly has as a voucher for his opinion, one by no means to be despised, Plutarch, ^C whose words are these very ones¹⁴: "Whence it became widespread that Numa had drawn this wisdom and erudition primarily from Pythagoras... He forbade the Romans to attribute to God the form of a human or beast: neither was there any image, painted or fashioned, of God among them before, but for the first hundred and sixty years they built temples and cells for the gods, but had no image at that time, deeming it impious to represent higher things by lower, nor could any approach to God be made otherwise than by the mind." It is easily understood from these words of Plutarch that our Clement took his account, not only because they are plainly similar, but also because some things are entirely the same. If, therefore, there is any error in these matters, it must be refunded entirely to Plutarch, not to Clement. Nothing else can be held against Clement, except that he did not cite his witness, Plutarch. For from the whole context of his speech, a cautious reader will easily perceive that he argues there from the things which had been handed down by the pagans themselves. And indeed, Clement added nothing of his own there, except that Numa, aided by Moses, had established these laws against the images of God. Concerning images and temples, I have dis- ^D cussed this in my dissertation on the same, cap. 7, art. 1 and following.

Our Clement15 puts before us yet another, an "Hippodamus the Pythagorean," Ἱππόδαμος ὁ Πυθαγόρειος, that is, without doubt a disciple of Pythagoras, whose opinion concerning the three kinds of friendship he explains. But is this not the same man whose opinion on the best form of administering a republic is agitated and exploded by Aristotle¹⁶? Again, Clement makes mention of "Eurysus the Pythagorean," Εὐρύσου τοῦ Πυθαγορείου, or a disciple of Pythagoras, and relates how he said that man was created by the highest artificer of all things, who used himself as a pattern. What more? Numenius is called "Numenius the Pythagorean philosopher," Πυθαγόρειος φιλόσοφος, by this same Clement of ours¹⁷, just as he is by Eusebius¹⁸ and Theodoretus¹⁹. Our Clement has left us some words of his, while Eusebius²⁰ and to a lesser extent Theodoretus²¹ have left us various and long fragments of his books.

Our author also proposes the opinion of "Athamas the Pythagorean," Πυθαγορείου, concerning the first principles of things²², and openly indicates from whom it was taken. But his memory, no less than his books, hardly anyone except Clement has rescued from oblivion. He likewise exhibits certain words of "Philolaus the Pythagorean," and we will mention this below in cap. 19, art. 1²³. From the history of this man's life published by Laertius²⁴, you will easily persuade yourself that he was truly a disciple of Pythagoras. Concerning other disciples of his mentioned by our Clement, we will observe what is noteworthy, according to our custom, below as more convenient occasion offers.

ARTICLE III.

Concerning the Eleatic sect, its parent Xenophanes, and his various successors.

The third sect of philosophers, which Clement acknowledges as "Eleatic"²⁵, took its origin indeed from Xenophanes, but received its name from his own disciples, the Eleatics Parmenides and Zeno. ^D Concerning this age of Xenophanes, he gathers this from ancient writers: "The prince of the Eleatic discipline was Xenophanes of Colophon, whom Timaeus says lived at the time of Hiero, who held dominion in Sicily, and of the poet Epicharmus; but Apollodorus says that he, having been born in the fortieth Olympiad, lived until the times of Darius and Cyrus." But Laertius testifies that he flourished circa the sixtieth Olympiad. Petavius²⁶ subscribed to Laertius, although Eusebius²⁷ noted that he flourished in the fifty-sixth Olympiad, during the reign of Cyrus. Either opinion could easily be reconciled by the fact that Xenophanes, as Laertius testifies, lived to a very great age. However, if you believe Casaubon²⁸, you will relegate the age of Xenophanes to later times.

What the succession of the philosophers of the Eleatic sect was, our Clement relates there in few words²⁹: "The auditor of Xenophanes was Parmenides, his Zeno, then Leucippus, then Democritus; and the auditors of Democritus were Protagoras of Abdera, Metrodorus of Chios, whose [disciple] was Diogenes of Smyrna, whose [disciple] was Anaxarchus, and his was Pyrrhon, whose [disciple] was Nausiphanes; some say that Epicurus was a disciple of his." But Laertius³⁰, having passed over the Eleatic school, refers it to the Italic one thus: "Furthermore, the Italic series was this: Pythagoras to Pherecydes, Pythagoras succeeded Telauges the son, and to him Xenophanes, to whom Par-

- ^A menides, to him Zeno the Eleatic, Leucippus to Zeno, Democritus to Leucippus, and to Democritus many others, but among the rest Nausiphanes and Naucides are celebrated." To them, however, Epicurus succeeded in his own order. Wherefore he had said a little earlier that the Italic sect had ended in Epicurus. Nor does Eusebius seem to dissent from this, who nevertheless narrates these things a little differently. But Cicero distinguishes the Eleatic or Eretriac family from this Italic sect as follows: "The Megarians, whose discipline was noble, of which, as I see it written, the prince was Xenophanes, whom I just named; then Parmenides and Zeno followed him. Thus, from these the Eretriac (or Eleatic) philosophers were named; afterwards Euclid, a disciple of Socrates, the Megarian, from whom the same were called Megarians." But Plato, cited by Theodoret: "Among us the Eleatics, 'Eλɛατixòv ἔθνος, are named from Xenophanes, and they draw their beginning from higher up." Wherefore Theodoret himself said: "Xenophanes, son of Orthomenes, the Colophonian, who was the prince of the Eleatic sect."

But the successor of Xenophanes, Parmenides, is decorated by Clement, after the same Plato himself, with the name of "the Great," and his three poems about hope are cited by the same Clement. Moreover, Theodoret transcribed the first of them, who calls Parmenides the Eleatic not a student of Xenophanes, as others do, but an ἑταῖρον, a companion and associate.

Parmenides was succeeded by Zeno, namely the Eleatic, distinct from Zeno the Cittiean, prince of the Stoics. Whence Epiphanius says: "Zeno the Eleatic, the Eristic or contentious man, held the same opinion as the other Zeno." Furthermore, Laertius wrote the lives of him and his successors, namely Leucippus, Democritus, and Protagoras, no less than those of Xenophanes and Parmenides, on whom various people have observed many things.

These, moreover, as our author Clement is the source, were followed by Metrodorus of Chios and Diogenes of Smyrna. But both, and even Zeno, as we learn from Theodoret, contended with ^C mutual disagreements, making themselves princes of new and clashing dogmas. Epiphanius, however, reports that Metrodorus of Chios willed that absolutely nothing be known by anyone, and that Diogenes of Smyrna, or as others will have it, of Cyrene, departed into the opinion of Protagoras. That Diogenes is called by Laertius, and by others the student of Metrodorus, and by Anaxarchus, whom Clement said was substituted for him in the same place: "Anaxarchus the Abderite," says Laertius, "was a student of Diomenes of Smyrna. Others hand down that he was a student of Metrodorus of Chios. He used to say that he did not even know this, that he knew nothing." Furthermore, others hand down that Metrodorus was an auditor of Nesus of Chios, and others of Democritus. But since that Anaxarchus sat in the Eleatic school as an auditor, he was able to hear both Metrodorus and especially Diogenes or Diomenes. Be that as it may, the history of the life of Pyrrho, who, by the testimony of our Clement, was himself substituted in the same school, is described by the same Laertius. But there it is clearly confirmed that which Clement finally added: that Nausiphanes was a student of Pyrrho, and that Epicurus himself had him as an auditor in this very school; just as he still does in the Life of Epicurus, as also Cicero, lib. 1 De natur. deor., page 205 et seq.; Sextus Empiricus, lib. 1 Adv. mathemat., and Gassendus, book 5 De Vita Epicuri, cap. 4.

255 ARTICLE IV. Of the Academic sect, where about Plato its author and about his Hebrew and Egyptian masters, where also about Thoyth; about Sechnuphides, and about the prayer of Lachesis, of which Plato makes mention, and about certain other places of the same Plato, cited by Clement.

Clement further makes mention of the old and middle Academy, the words about the older of which we read thus: "Plato withdrew into the Academy... To Plato succeeds Speusippus, to him Xenocrates, to whom Polemon; and the auditors of Polemon were Crates and Crantor, in whom the old Academy ended." But when and how that Academy was instituted by Plato, and why it was called by that name, Laertius narrates at length, and counts its successors in this old Academy just as many as Clement does. Read about them, if you wish, Menagius's observations on the former place of Laertius cited by us.

But Plato, whom all concede to have been not only the prince of this sect but easily of all philosophers, is called by our Clement, ὁ ἐξ Ἑβραίων φιλόσοφος, "the philosopher from the Hebrews." And there was without a doubt no other cause for this appellation, unless because Clement had it most firmly persuaded that Plato had borrowed all his true teachings, and whatever in his excellent doctrine is consonant with truth, from the Hebrews. But of these things we have already said enough elsewhere, and even in the previous chapter, art. 2.

Clement further thinks, and attempts to prove from the words of Plato himself, that he came into Egypt, where from its inhabitants, just as from other barbarians, he had gathered very many and most excellent dogmas. Which certainly, even if he had passed over in silence, is asserted so openly by Laertius, book 1, in his Life, § 7; by Tully near the end of book 5 De finib., page 113; by Cyril of Alexandria, books 1 and 2 Contra Julianum, pages 15 and 47; by Augustine, book 8 De civit., cap. 4; by Lactantius, book 4 De vera sapient., cap. 2; by Valerius Maximus, book 8, cap. 7, § 9, and by many others, that there remains not the least place for doubting this arrival of Plato in Egypt.

Clement continues indeed his discourse about Plato: "Neither is he unaware that in the Phaedrus he shows us the Egyptian king and Thoyth as wiser, whom indeed he knows to be Mercury." But that prince of philosophers remembers this Thoyth or Theuth not only in the Phaedrus, but also in the Philebus, where he calls him both a divine man and testifies that he lived in Egypt and taught many things there. Moreover, that this Mercury had a name, and who Mercury was, is to be learned from these words of Tully: "Quintus Mercury, whom the Pheneatae worship, who is said to have killed Argus, and for that reason to have ruled Egypt, and to have handed down to the Egyptians laws and letters. Him the Egyptians call Thoyth, and by the same name the first month of the year is called among them," that is, the month of September, as Lactantius sagely observes, whom consult regarding the same Thoyth, or Thouth, and Thoth, as Suidas says, as well as Eusebius and Huet, formerly the prelate of the Avranches Church, and others.

Furthermore, Plato was reported, as Clement proceeds, to have been a disciple of Sechnuphides the Heliopolitan; just as Pythagoras of Sonches the Egyptian archprophet, and Eudoxius of Cnidus of Conuphis, likewise an Egyptian. Laertius commemorates many masters of both Plato and Eudoxius, but he suppresses in the deepest silence those whom they heard in Egypt. Nor indeed did Clement dare to affirm this, but only that it had been spread by common fame. But from Plutarch we learn

^A that Eudoxus was a hearer of Conuphis; but elsewhere in the same place Sonchites, [Greek: Σογχῖτος], is called the master of Solon by him. "A testimony," he says, "is also borne by the wisest of the Greeks, Solon, Thales, Plato, Eudoxus, Pythagoras, and in the opinion of some, even Lycurgus; who came into Egypt and conversed with the priests; and they say that Eudoxus was taught by Conuphis the Memphite, Solon by Sonchites the Saite, and Pythagoras by Oenuphis the Heliopolitan." In this, therefore, Clement disagrees with Plutarch, because he makes Sonchites the teacher of Pythagoras and Sechnuphis of Plato; whereas Plutarch declares Sonchites to have been the teacher of Solon and Oenuphis of Pythagoras. But those who know how frequent are the slips of copyists or the lapses of memory of the authors themselves in describing proper names will not find it difficult to admit that Oenuphis is the very same person who in Clement's text is called Sechnuphis. And indeed, both are handed down as being Heliopolitan by birth.

Our author still proceeds ^B: "In the dialogue on the soul (which is, namely, inscribed *Phaedo*), Plato again seems to acknowledge prophecy, introducing a prophet who declares the speech of Lachesis and predicts to the souls as they cast lots; and in the *Timaeus* he introduces the wisest Solon learning from a barbarian." And the wording is thus: "O Solon, Solon, you Greeks are always children," etc. Regarding Lachesis, we read these things in the tenth book of the same Plato's *Republic*, page 617: "Therefore he said that the souls, when they had first arrived there, must immediately approach Lachesis, then a certain prophet would arrange these souls each in its order; afterwards, when it had received lots and patterns of lives from the knees of Lachesis, and had ascended a certain high tribunal, he says thus: 'Maiden Lachesis, daughter of Necessity,' she says this: 'Daily souls, there is at hand the beginning of another cycle, destined for the mortal and truly death-bearing race of men; not a demon will receive you, ^C but you will elect a demon, whichever one has drawn the lot first,' etc." Barbarians, however, or, as Clement later wrote, the Egyptian priest's taunt to Solon that the Greeks are always children, has been recorded from the same *Timaeus* of Plato by Eusebius, book X, *Praepar. evang.*, chapter 4, page 471; Cyril of Alexandria, tom. VI, book I *Contra Julianum*, page 15; and Theodoret, *On the Cure of Greek Affections*, discourse one, on faith, page 473.

Finally, Clement cites more passages of Plato, not yet indicated by anyone, which we have thought it not entirely useless or superfluous to disclose to those reading his books, so that they may know where to find them. The first is on avoiding excessive curiosity about words, which is found in the same Plato's *Statesman*, vol. II, page 261, in the very same words. But what Clement says ^D, without citing any author, that a philosopher meditates on death throughout the whole time of his life, this has been culled from Plato's *Phaedo*, as Theodoret reports in *On the Cure of Greek Affections*, discourse 8, page 601. And again, on the following page he shows us that same thing which our Clement commemorates from Plato's book II of the *Republic*, page 361, vol. II, regarding the constancy and fortitude of a just man even in the greatest torments. But afterwards he writes, according to Plato's opinion, that truth is either learned from God or from those who derived their origin from the gods. This indeed seems taken from the same Plato's *Phaedrus*, vol. III, page 262. Finally, Clement praises the book to which the name *Demodocus* was prefixed, and which was ascribed to Plato, as doubtful; but by Laertius it is counted, not without certainty, among the spurious works of Plato.

ARTICLE V.

Socrates is rightly called the master of our Clement's Plato. Indeed, this is expressly asserted by Laertius, Suidas, and very many others. To this is added that Laertius, Pausanias, and even Apuleius narrate the dream of Socrates, in which he seemed to himself by night to see a cygnet flying into his bosom, the day before Plato was committed to him for discipline by his father.

But Socrates heard Archelaus, as Clement testifies, concerning whom Laertius says in the *Life* of the same Socrates: "Since, therefore, he had been a hearer of Anaxagoras according to some, and of Damon, as Alexander says in his *Successions*, after his condemnation he betook himself to Archelaus the physicist, to whom Aristoxenus writes that he was a favorite." Then Laertius presents to us the poem of Timon cited by Clement, and two others still omitted by this same author of ours. Whence that is confirmed which is gathered from these poems by Clement, that ethics, instead of physics, was introduced by this same Socrates. Which indeed Laertius himself had handed down from the beginning of his work in these most express words: "Physics flourished alone up to Archelaus; but ethics took its beginning from Socrates." But Cicero explains this a little more fully and clearly: "From ancient philosophy up to Socrates, who had heard Archelaus, a disciple of Anaxagoras, numbers and motions were treated, and whence all things originated or whither they retreated; the magnitudes, intervals, and courses of the stars, and all celestial things were zealously inquired into by them. But Socrates was the first who called philosophy down from heaven and placed it in cities and even introduced it into homes, and compelled it to inquire about life and morals and things good and evil."

But by the words and authority of Plato, Clement makes it manifest that Socrates had a daemon from his early youth, by whose voice he was restrained from doing those things which he was about to do. And in truth, the words of Plato occur in that book which Clement cites, which is inscribed *Theages*. But many have committed to writing more about this daemon of Socrates. For Laertius, in his *Life*, says: "He asserted, he says, that a daemon predicted the future to him." But Cicero says: "That is what we have received concerning Socrates, and which is often said by himself in the Socratic books, that there is a certain divine something, which he calls a daemon, to which he always obeyed, never impelling, often recalling." And from this it is proved by him that, when things had gone badly in the fighting near Delium, Socrates, at the warning of God, consulted for his safety by flight. There still exists today the entire book of Plutarch and Apuleius, *On the God of Socrates*, of which mention has been made furthermore by Xenophon in the *Apology of Socrates*, Tertullian in the book *On the Soul*, ch. 1 and 40, Cyprian *On the Vanity of Idols*, page 13, and several others, from whom some think that this daemon of Socrates was nothing other than a sagacious and extraordinary power of intellect, by which he easily foresaw that all things would turn out.

Furthermore, our Clement reports certain things said against pleasure by the same Socrates, which you will find in Xenophon, just as others also, which he brought forward a little earlier from Xenophon himself.

[1289] These words of Socrates himself, Clement quoted, concealing his name: “For me,” he says, “Anytus, indeed, and Melitus will kill, but no one will harm me in any way.” These are taken from Plato, in the *Apology of Socrates*, vol. I, p. 30, and transcribed by Theodoret in *Graecarum affectionum curatio*, sermon 8, p. 603, vol. IV.

Finally, Clement observes incidentally somewhere [*84*] that philosophers who later embraced various sects willingly confess that they derived their principal dogmas from Socrates. And not undeservedly, indeed. For no one is ignorant not only of how great an authority he held among all philosophers, but also how many and how great his hearers and disciples were. From these, however, as Vossius correctly notes [*85*], the most famous families and sects of philosophers were founded and established. But what of the fact that Cicero, beyond many things he has gathered of a magnificent nature concerning him, states most clearly that moral philosophy originated with him? Moreover, “Socrates,” he says [*86*], “seems to me, a fact which is agreed upon by all, to have been the first to call philosophy away from occult matters and things wrapped in nature itself—in which all philosophers before him were occupied—and to have brought it to common life,” etc.

But to pass from him and other masters of Plato to his disciples and successors, Speusippus is mentioned by Clement as having been the first substituted in his place [*87*]. Elsewhere, however, he is still said to be the son of Plato’s sister, and testimony is cited from his own first book *To Ctesiphon*. Furthermore, Laertius made public the lives and history of the others who were substituted in his place in their own order, namely, Xenocrates the Chalcedonian, as says Cicero [*88*], Polemon, Crates, and Crantor, in whom Clement testifies the old Academy ceased [*89*]. After these, however, from Arcesilaus, a student of Crantor, as far as Hegesilaus, as Clement says [*90*], the middle Academy flourished; then Carneades succeeded Hegesilaus, and those who follow thereafter. But concerning this Academy, he writes thus in the prologue of his work: “Arcesilaus introduced the middle Academy, to whom [succeeded] Lacydes, who discovered the new Academy, to Lacydes [succeeded] Carneades, and to him Clitomachus, and in this Clitomachus it ended.” Concerning these and other successors of Plato, one should read Eusebius [*91*], and what Numenius argues concerning the same philosophers in his work.

[1290] Furthermore, that Aristotle held the chief place among the disciples of Plato, and that the sect of the Peripatetics was founded by him, as our Clement says [92], there is no one who does not know. But that which is less common and vulgar is the report that our author narrates from Clearchus, and Eusebius after him, that the same Aristotle had associated with a certain Jew, whom Clearchus himself knew. Clement added that Theophrastus succeeded this same Aristotle, Straton to Theophrastus, Lycon to Straton, Critolaus to Lycon, and finally Diodorus to Critolaus. Indeed, the life of Theophrastus, Straton, and Lycon was published by Laertius [93]. Cicero [94], however, mentions not only them but also Critolaus and Diodorus, and explains briefly who they were and what kind of men they were.

But elsewhere our author simply calls Critolaus a Peripatetic [95]. Whether this is also the one who is called by him above [96] Phaselites (Φασηλίτης), you will perhaps ask? For Hervetus confesses that he doesn't know who this is. But others perhaps do not unjustly think that this man is none other than a disciple of Aristotle. For Cicero calls him, like Diodorus, a Peripatetic [97], and he testifies, as Macrobius [98] and Aulus Gellius do, that an embassy was sent by the Athenians to the Roman Senate to this same Critolaus the Peripatetic, Carneades the Academic, and Diogenes the Stoic—most famous and noble philosophers, as the same Cicero speaks. Furthermore, concerning Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and their disciples, see Joachim Stephanus Pomeranius, *De jurisdictione veterum Graecorum*, ch. 13.

CHAPTER XVIII. On the various opinions of philosophers.

ARTICULUS I. On the name of philosophy, and the opinions of the Epicureans concerning God, of the Pythagoreans and Plato concerning the human soul cast into a body, and on metempsychosis; of Plato and others on the procreation of man; of Pythagoras on sexual intercourse and beans, and of others on the prohibition of flesh, and especially pork, on certain animals that use no food, on the varying movement of created things, on the fourfold grafting of trees, and the comparison of that with Christian doctrine, on the soul of plants, and on crows imitating the human voice.

Clement often reports the various opinions of philosophers in his *Stromata*, either to show that Christian doctrines are consistent with the truth and to confirm them, or to refute and explode the erroneous dogmas of ethnic writers. But to commence our discourse from Pythagoras, our author declares that he gave himself the name of philosopher in order to signify that God, as was later said by the Apostle, is alone wise. In support, however, of this assertion, that testimony of Laertius can not absurdly be brought forward [99]: “Pythagoras first called [it] philosophy, and himself a philosopher, when he was having a conversation at Sicyon with Leon, the tyrant of the Sicyonians—or Phliasians, as Heraclides Ponticus says in the book which he entitled *On the seven-day-dead woman*: for no man, but only God, is wise. For earlier, that which is now called philosophy was called wisdom, and he who professed this was called a wise man, whoever had reached the highest acuity of mind.” Read, if you wish, Menagius’ observations on this passage.

But by the authority of the Apostle and by various and strong reasons, Clement explodes all that philosophy which regarded the elements with the greatest honor; the Stoics, who dreamed that God is corporeal and pervades any most vile matter, and that the soul is in no way whatsoever affected by the body, and that all things are indifferent; the Epicureans, who utterly removed the providence of God, and referred pleasure to the number of the gods, and thought that atoms were the principles of things; and Epicurus himself,

who taught that a wise man, if he can remain hidden from all, is able to do injury to others. This final error, in truth, is utterly overturned by Plato ^A and Cicero, and likewise by Ambrose. Regarding the former and other opinions of philosophers of this kind, we have already discoursed above, or it will be dealt with subsequently.

Moreover, Clement makes it clear that this same Plato received from Pythagoras, and he from the Egyptians, the notion that the souls of men are immortal: "Plato," he says, "drew from Pythagoras that the soul is immortal, and he [drew it] from the Egyptians." Yet that this was truly the opinion of Plato, no one who has lightly touched upon his writings can certainly deny. But Clement also conveyed that it was asserted by the Pythagoreans and by that same Plato that the souls of men existed before their bodies, and that they are thrust into them as into a prison in order to pay the penalties for sins previously committed. Theodoret speaks in the same way: "Pythagoras," he says, "and Plato introduce a certain population of souls lacking bodies, and say that after they have fallen into some sin, they are destined for bodies for the sake of punishment." Thus, Plato in the *Cratylus* called the body a sepulcher, as if the soul were buried in the body. And Philolaus the Pythagorean was in agreement with them, saying in these words: "Ancient theologians and seers testify that the soul has been yoked to the body for the sake of certain punishments, and is buried in it as if in a tomb." Clement had previously exhibited these same words of Philolaus to us, and therefore it is very likely that Theodoret drew them either from him, or that both drew them from the same source.

Furthermore, Clement ^B clearly shows that from this opinion of Pythagoras and Plato concerning the transmigration of souls, or *metempsychosis*, which was first derived from the Egyptians, the Marcionites wrongly inferred that they considered human procreation to be evil by its own nature. For he proves from this that it is concluded from the mind of Plato by these heretics, because he decreed that wives ought to be common, as has been said elsewhere.

Yet our Clement, who rebukes these heretics for the reason that they wrongly attempted to draw Plato to their side, is himself accused by certain writers of our age, and not of the lowest rank, of having favored the erroneous and false opinion of this same Plato, and even of Origen, concerning the pre-existence of the human soul—or rather, the soul of man, which they feigned to have existed before its body. But by what right or reason they could have written this about him, we confess is entirely unknown to us. We are not, however, unaware that they cite books I and III of the *Stromata*. But since they neither indicated any passage of these books, nor any words of Clement, we are certainly the less able to divine them in that it is more certain and established to us that nothing occurs in these, or in the other genuine and non-interpolated books of our author, which could ever have given the slightest occasion for this accusation. If, moreover, anything about this ^C opinion was truly said by him somewhere, there he certainly does not relate his own sentiment, but rather that of others, whom he does not support, in his customary manner. Finally, we saw above that this very error was refuted and utterly overturned by him.

Moreover, he brings forth more from Plato’s *Phaedo* as though he had the book in his hands, and describes words by which that greatest philosopher could appear to have signified that human procreation is the cause of the greatest evils. Indeed, he displays the statement cited by him against Venus-pleasure: "I pray you, good words: I, for my part, fled hence as if from a mad and savage master." But Clement denies that the Marcionites had the right or authority to conclude from this that Plato believed with them that human procreation was base, or that it had emanated, as they gossiped, from evil matter and from a God who was not indeed good, but only just. For he shows against the errors of Marcion that Plato taught that the world was founded by a good God, and that whatever it possesses, it received as good from Him; but if there are any evils in it and in man, these arise from bodily temperament, or from that ^D perturbation by which, before man came into the world, he was affected and stained by sin.

Clement further admits that the miserable condition of man, born for labor, is lamented by that same Plato, Empedocles, and others. Regarding this Empedocles, for whom the poems are represented by Henri Estienne—just as are those of another poet, namely Homer, brought forward by the same Clement, and cited no differently than in Theophilus of Antioch, book II *Ad Autolycum*—and about those of Theognis, in Stobaeus, *Sermon* 110, p. 602, and Theodoret, *De Græcar. affect. curat.*, *sermon* 5, p. 544; of Euripides, by the same Stobaeus and Theodoret, loc. citat.; of Cicero, book I *Tusculan.*, p. 134; of Laertius, book IX in the life of Pyrrho, § 73; and of Plato in the *Gorgias*, vol. II, p. 492; and also the words of Solon, in Herodotus book I, § 32, p. 13, and in Theodoret, loc. cit., p. 544; finally, the story of Cleobis and Biton is narrated by the same author whom Clement cites, Herodotus, loc. cit., § 31, p. 12. Tullius, moreover, describes this story briefly in this way from the same Herodotus and others: "They are accustomed to bring forward in the schools the judgments of the immortal gods concerning death, and they do not indeed invent them themselves, but [cite] Herodotus as authority and many others. First, the sons of the Argive priestess, Cleobis and Biton, are proclaimed: it is a known story. For when it was commanded that she be carried by chariot to a solemn and established sacrifice, quite far from the town to the temple, and the beasts were delaying, then those youths, whom I just named, having put aside their garments, anointed their bodies with oil and approached the yoke. Thus, the priestess being conveyed, as the chariot had been led by her sons, she is said to have prayed to the goddess to give them a reward for their piety, the greatest that could be given by a god: and after the adolescents had feasted with their mother, they gave themselves to sleep and were found dead in the morning." These words of Cicero we have repeated for the reason that nothing else is brought forward by our Clement about this story except that generation is blamed and death is praised by it.

Clement furthermore adds that procreation was also disapproved of by Heraclitus. But he promises to demonstrate in his treatise on principles that all these testimonies of ethnic authors are perversely usurped by the Marcionites for the defense of their errors. Meanwhile, he confirms this by other, undoubtedly Euripidean, verses, which he cited by the name of the tragedy alone. For we read that the later ones were praised from this same Euripides' *Antiope* by Stobaeus, *serm.* 96, p. 531.

Finally, Clement subjoins that the Pythagoreans are still wrongly cited by the heretics, who ordered their followers to abstain from Venus-pleasure. He contends, indeed, that only after children had been conceived was this forbidden to them, just like the use of beans, not for the causes brought forward by certain writers, but because they made women sterile. Which, i—

^Adem as he confirms by the testimony of Theophrastus: Theophrastus in his book *On Natural Causes* reports that the pods of beans, if placed at the roots of trees that have recently been planted, cause the plants to wither. Various writers have indeed given different reasons for that prohibition against beans, and preeminently Laertius in book VIII, in his *Life of Pythagoras*, § 19, 24, and 34, and Menagius, and other interpreters of Laertius, on these passages; likewise Cicero, book I *On Divination*, page 266, and book II, page 297; Pliny, book XVIII of his *Natural History*, chapter 12; Plutarch, in his book *On the Education of Children*, page 12; Lilius Gyraldus, *On the Symbols of Pythagoras*, page 475 et seqq.; Erasmus, *Adagia*, chil. 1, centur. 1, page 15.

Furthermore, observe in passing that the fifth book of Theophrastus cited by Clement, *Tōn physikōn aitiōn* (*On Natural Causes*), is the very same work cited by Laertius under the title *Peri physikōn aitiōn* or *Peri physikōn historiōn* (*On Natural Causes* or *On Natural Histories*). ^B However, it is noted in his scholia that for *physikōn* one should read *phytikōn*, that is, "On the causes or histories of plants." And indeed that emendation is not bad. For this is the inscription and title of that book in Athenaeus: *En Aitiois phytikois ei Peri phyton* (*On the Causes of Plants* and *On Plants*). You may look at the annotations of Menagius on the cited passage of Laertius. There exist even today, edited in Greek and Latin, two commentaries of Theophrastus, of which the former is inscribed *On the History of Plants*, and the latter *On the Causes of Plants*.

Moreover, even though so many eminent writers consistently assert that the use of beans was forbidden by Pythagoras, Aulus Gellius nevertheless unhesitatingly affirms that this ancient and common opinion regarding this Pythagorean interdict is entirely false. And indeed Aristoxenus the musician (the words are those of Gellius), a man of most diligent learning and a pupil of the philosopher Aristotle, in the book he left concerning Pythagoras, says that Pythagoras used beans more often than any other food; because this food would gently loosen and smooth the belly. Gellius considers, however, that Aristoxenus learned this from Xenophilus the Pythagorean and intimate friend of his, and from certain others who did not live far from the time of Pythagoras. The occasion for the error, moreover, is thought to have been the word *kyamon* (bean), which Empedocles, a follower of Pythagoras, used, and by which he wished to deter men not from the eating of beans, but from the waste of the reproductive act. Whether that testimony of Aristoxenus should outweigh the authority of so many other writers, let those who are fair and true judges of matters decide.

In a not dissimilar way, although Clement stated that Pythagoras and his followers, led by a false opinion concerning transmigration, abstained from eating the flesh of animals, Laertius nevertheless also cites the same Aristoxenus, who asserted that all living creatures, with the exception of the plow-ox and the ram, were permitted by Pythagoras himself to all men. Athenaeus, however, states: "Aristoxenus reports that Pythagoras did not abstain from animal foods." Suidas related the same thing as Laertius, but without citing any author. Yet he had written earlier that Pythagoras was the first author to teach men to abstain from beans and from eating the flesh of animals. Nay, Plutarch, concerning this Pythagorean abstinence, brought forward reasons as if it were certain and in no way doubtful. But this variety of opinions doubtlessly arose from nowhere else than from various and perhaps false rumors, or from the different biographers of this philosopher, who, being imbued with false opinions, as is the custom, ^A consigned to writing things both about him and contrary to him. Naso, who introduces Pythagoras speaking in a brief oration, makes him say:

Spare, mortals, to defile your bodies with forbidden meals: There are grains, there are fruits that weigh down the branches with their weight, And swollen grapes upon the vines. A generous earth provides riches and mild sustenance, And offers meals without slaughter and blood.

Furthermore, since we have fallen upon the mention of abstinence, it may be remarked that it is not only approved by our Clement if someone abstains entirely from food made from animal flesh; but more than that: "It seems," he says, "that Xenocrates, treating separately of nutrition from animals, and Polemon in his work *On Life According to Nature*, clearly teach that the nourishment derived from flesh is useless." How true that is, you will learn from Galen's book *On the Faculties of Foodstuffs*, and on "good juices" (*euchymia*) and "bad juices" (*cacochymia*), and other medical works, as well as Macrobius, book VII of the *Saturnalia*, chapters 4, 5, and 8. To corroborate the opinion of Xenocrates and Polemon, those verses of Naso concerning the golden age may not be inaptly brought forward: That old age, which we have named the golden, Was fortunate in the fruits of trees and the herbs which the earth brings forth, Nor did it defile mouths with blood; Then also birds moved their wings safely through the air, And the hare wandered fearless in the middle of the fields, Nor had its own credulity hung the fish upon the hook.

Next, Clement descends specifically to swine-flesh, and suggests reasons here and elsewhere why Moses once prohibited the Jews from eating it. And he supports and corroborates this with the testimonies of certain pagan writers. And first, indeed, the etymology of the Greek word *hys* brought forward by someone: it is said to be as it were *thyein* (to sacrifice), because that animal is suited solely for slaughtering and sacrificing. But Varro says it a little differently: "The pig," he says, "is called *hys* in Greek, once called *thysus*, from that verb which they call *thyein*, which is to immolate. For it seems that the first beginning of immolating was taken from the swine species of livestock."

Yet Clement, for the confirmation of his opinion, uses not only the testimony of Aesop, which is also reported by Aelian, but he connects these things there besides: "Wherefore Cleanthes used to say that the pig has a soul instead of salt, so that the flesh might not rot." Pliny also reported the same thing in these words: "This is a most brute animal, and it is not inaptly thought that a soul was given to it in place of salt." But Cicero is still closer to the point of Clement: "What," he says, "does the pig have except meat? For which, indeed, lest it should rot, Chrysippus says that a soul itself was given instead of salt." There, for Cleanthes, who is cited by Clement, he names Chrysippus, as we have already noted. Moreover, Clement provides other reasons why men should abstain from pork, namely that it is useless. This, indeed, Lactantius explains a little more fully: "It always serves the belly and fodder, nor can it provide any other use while it lives, like other animals, which either provide a vehicle for sitting, or help in the cultivation of fields, or pull carts with their necks, or carry burdens upon their backs, or provide clothing from their hides, or watch over houses." Concerning these and other things supplied by Clement regarding this abstinence...

from rationales, read, if you have the time and the desire, Plutarch in his *Symposiaca*, Quest. 5, p. 667 et seq., and the observations of Henri Estienne at p. 685; Athenaeus, *Deipnosophists* bk. 1, p. 96; Aristotle, *History of Animals* bk. 5, ch. 20, and bk. 8, ch. 21 and 28; Pliny, *Natural History* bk. 8, ch. 51; Bochart, *Hierozoicon* (On the Animals of Sacred Scripture), bk. 2, ch. 57, p. 695 et seq.; Gesner, Aldrovandus, and others who have published books and treatises on animals, by whom those things are also mentioned which Clement has recorded for history regarding these same swine and even goat meats 47.

Furthermore, he relates that there are certain beasts lurking in caverns which were said to be nourished either by the thickness of the air or by the exhalation of their own bodies, and to grow without any harm. Regarding these, Aldrovandus should be read where he disputes about monsters. Yet these things are undoubtedly no less fabulous and fictitious than those which Pliny and Solinus handed down in their writings regarding the race of the Astomi living without any food or drink, but solely by the scent of roots and flowers. Indeed, Strabo rejects these stories and consigns them to the realm of fables 48, ^B 49.

But as to the discrimination between beasts and other creatures, whether animate or inanimate, our Clement, following the ancient philosophers and Philo, has taught in these words: "Of those things which move, some are moved by appetite and sight, like animals: others, however, are moved by translation, as are inanimate things; but among inanimate things, they say that plants also are moved by passing over into growth, if one grants that plants are inanimate. And indeed stones participate in habit, plants in nature, and brute animals also share in appetite, sight, and the things mentioned before; but the power of reasoning is proper to the human soul." Clement touches briefly there upon the general constitution of all things, or their specific differences, as the scholastics say. For some are participants in ^C a corporeal affection, stable and difficult to move, by which they are held together by a most firm bond, just as stones. Others, like plants, are said *κινεῖσθαι μεταβατικῶς εἰς αὔξησιν*, "to be moved by passing over into growth." Brute animals, however, are endowed with *ὁρμῆς καὶ φαντασίας*, "appetite and sight." But Philo had previously explained these things somewhat more clearly 51: "God made habit, *δεσμὸν κραταιότατον ἕξιν εἰργάσατο*, a most powerful bond, for stones and woods—which are inanimate—that is a spirit reflecting back into itself. For, beginning from the middle, it tends toward the extremes; and when it has reached the highest surface, it reflects back again, until it has arrived at the same place from which it first set out. And this is the circular movement of habit, *ἕξις*. God attributed nature, *φύσιν*, to those things which cling to roots; and he attributed it as tempered with many faculties, and as a nourishing and generative power. The Creator also fashioned the soul with three things, different from nature, *φύσεως*: sense, *αἴσθησις*, sight, *φαντασίᾳ*, [and] impulse, *ὁρμῇ*." Having explained these three things, he added immediately: "Animals surpass those things that cling to roots by all these things... Man surpasses the rest of the living creatures by an excellent gift, which we call mind." A little above, he had written: "In this way that most fertile stock, founded with its own roots, has been strengthened by the roots themselves; but truly, some individual stocks are moved by transit, while others are established without transition: *τῶν ἐν μέρει, καὶ βραχυτέρων φυτῶν, τὰ μὲν μεταβατικῶς κινητά, τὰ δὲ ἄνευ μεταβάσεως*, as remaining in the same place; and those which use transitive motion, ^D *τὰ μὲν οὖν μεταβατικῇ κινήσει χρώμενα*, which we call 260 living things, have yielded in place of accession to the more ample parts of the universe." Consider, I pray, whether our Clement has conformed to these words of Philo. For you see the same descriptors, *ἕξις*, *φύσις*, *ὁρμή*, *φαντασία*, *μεταβατικῶς*, and others being used by him with the same significance. But if Clement did look toward him, then surely by those words, "if one grants that plants are inanimate," he seems to make it manifest to all that he held—contrary to the opinion of some others—that only nature, *φύσιν*, [exists in plants] and that there is no soul in plants. But what the ancient philosophers 53 thought about that matter, Plutarch relates, whom you may consult if you wish.

Furthermore, regarding the grafting of trees, which Clement compares with the reception of Christian doctrine 54, he demonstrates that it is fourfold according to the ancients of natural science. The first, he says, is the grafting of a tree between the wood and the bark; and in this manner, the pagan novice is imbued with sacred doctrine in the catechism. The second is that by which, just as another plant is inserted into the split wood of a tree, so for the philosophers, after their dogmas have been dissected, the knowledge of truth is inserted, and for the Jews, with the true sense of the Old Testament opened, the new doctrine of Christ is inserted. The third grafting of a tree is when both scions are shaven right to the pith: thus even heretics are drawn toward the truth by force. The fourth is called inoculation, *ἐνοφθαλμισμός*, which Pliny also—no differently than our Clement—explains thus 55: "Inoculation is a technique similar to a cobbler's awl for opening an eye in the tree, with the bark cut, and inserting a seed/bud taken by that same awl from another." And this was the ancient inoculation for figs and apples. Virgilian [technique] seeks a hollow, in the knot of a bud, of the expelled bark, and closes a bud from another tree inside. And the verses of Virgil designated by Pliny are these 56:

*Nec modus inserere, atque oculos imponere simplex:* *Nam qua se medio trudunt de cortice gemmæ,* *Et tenues rumpunt tunicas, angustus in ipso* *Fit nodo sinus: huc aliena ex arbore germen* *Includunt, udoque docent inolescere libro.* *Aut rursus enodes trunci resecantur, et alte* *Finditur in solidum cuneis via, deinde feraces* *Plantæ immittuntur, nec longum tempus, et ingens* *Exiit ad cælum ramis felicibus arbos,* *Miraturque novas frondes, et non sua poma.*

One should read the observations of the learned on these verses of Virgil and on the cited passage of Pliny, who note that this fourth type of grafting has long been antiquated. But Hervet warns that for him it is not sufficiently certain to what this is compared by Clement. Yet regarding it, Clement himself said openly: "This is the type of *γνωστικῆς διδασκαλίας*, of Gnostic doctrine, which can perceive the things themselves." By which words he indeed contends that the fourth mode of grafting, or inoculation, is the perfect doctrine of the Christian Gnostics, by which they are clearly able to perceive and observe divine things themselves. But if he did not say more about it there, there is certainly no other reason than that he had sufficiently explained it elsewhere, as we have seen. For the rest, concerning this and other modes of grafting, you should read Theophrastus, bk. 1 *On the Causes of Plants*, ch. 6 and 7; Columella, bk. 5 *De re rustica*, ch. 11, and *On Trees* ch. 26; Varro, bk. 1 *De re rustica*, ch. 40, etc.

Finally, observe with us, if you please, our Clement 57, how he proves that one must adhere to things, and by no means to names and words, by bringing us the example of crows, which imitate human voices.

^A And again, regarding these same people and Epicurus, the same orator discourses elsewhere.

Dinomachus and Callipho did not differ much from these, who, as the author mentioned writes, said that the end is whatever is in itself to be done for the sake of obtaining and enjoying pleasure. But then, a little later, concerning Callipho alone: "According to the opinion of Callipho," he says, "virtue was added indeed for the sake of pleasure, but in the course of time, when it had seen its own beauty, it brought it about that, from the beginning, that is to say, it was in honor equal to pleasure." But concerning both, Cicero writes these things: "Either pleasure can be joined to honesty, as it pleased Callipho and Dinomachus." But concerning Callipho alone, he left this written in one place: "Callipho judged pleasure and honesty to be the ends." Which he also repeats in other words elsewhere. But in another book he justly and deservedly chastises both Callipho and Dinomachus thus: "I judge that Callipho and Dinomachus are to be reproached, who thought that they would settle the controversy if they had yoked pleasure with honesty, just as one might yoke a beast to a man."

It will perhaps seem wonderful to some that Hieronymus and Diodorus are called Peripatetics not only by our Clement, but even by Cicero, when he signifies by these words that both of them do not deviate far from the opinion of the Epicureans ^B. And Hieronymus the Peripatetic [held] that the end was to live without molestations and disturbance, but that the extreme good, looking toward the end, was happiness. And Diodorus, who similarly was of the same heresy, declares the end to be to live without any molestation and honestly. And in no dissimilar way, Tullius: "To be free from all molestation, Hieronymus, and the same with honesty, Diodorus, both Peripatetics, judged to be the end." Which indeed he repeats not once, but in this and in another book. But for this very reason he doubts whether each can be called a Peripatetic. He himself must truly be heard as to how he explains this in his own words: "I pass over many," he used to say, "among whom is the learned man and pleasant Hieronymus, whom I now do not know why I should call a Peripatetic; for he set forth the supreme good as the vacuity of pain. But he who dissents regarding the supreme good, dissents regarding the whole system of philosophy... Diodorus, a student of Critolaus, joins to honesty the vacuity of pain. This also is his own, and dissenting regarding the supreme good, he cannot truly be called a Peripatetic." Therefore, Cicero did not believe that either could truly be called Peripatetic, even if they had subscribed to most all of the opinions of Aristotle and other Peripatetics, because of that very fact, that they dissented from them regarding the supreme good.

But into the flock of the Epicureans are without doubt to be numbered the Annicerians, concerning whom our Clement has handed down these things ^C: "But those who are called Annicerians, from the Cyrenaic succession, did not establish any finished end of the whole life; but [they said that] there is a proper end of every single action, namely that pleasure which is effected from the action." These Cyrenaics weaken and abrogate the term of Epicurean pleasure, that is, the removal of pain, calling that constitution 'dead'; for not only are we affected by joy because of pleasures, but also because of customs and honors. But Epicurus thinks that all joy is primarily affected from the flesh. That the Annicerians took their origin from the Cyrenaics Clement affirms not undeservedly. For the Cyrenaics were divided, in fact, into a sect, the Hegesiac, the Theodorean, and the An-

Annicerian. The parent of this was Anniceris the Cyrenaic, by whom Plato was redeemed for twenty or thirty minae, as Laertius writes, or for eight sesterces, as Lactantius says. See Menagius’s observations on the second book of Laertius, § 86. Furthermore, Cicero speaks thus concerning the opinion of the Annicerians: “From Aristippus,” he says, “the Cyrenaic and Annicerian philosophers are named, who placed every good in pleasure, and judged that virtue was to be praised on that account, because it was efficient of pleasure.” These having become obsolete, Epicurus flourishes, being almost the supporter and author of the same opinion. In that passage, indeed, Cicero purposely added that Epicurus was a champion and patron of almost the same opinion. But our Clement declares more clearly in what the opinion of both Epicurus and the Annicerians differs. Consult Laertius, lib. II, § 96, in the Life of Aristippus.

The same author of ours continues ^A, and he reveals what Metrodorus, whom he calls an Epicurean by name, believed concerning the highest good, in these words of his: “What else,” he says, “is the good of the soul, other than a firm, stable, and good constitution of the flesh, and the hope worthy of trust that it will be so in the future?” Cicero speaks in the same manner: “Metrodorus himself,” he says, “a near alternate Epicurus, describes the blessed life in these almost identical words: ‘When the body is well constituted, and it is explored that it will be so in the future.’” Which, indeed, he himself stated again in his own words in lib. I Tuscul., p. 138, lib. II De officiis, p. 404, and lib. I De natur. deor., p. 211, where he has this concerning that same Metrodorus: “Metrodorus accuses his brother Timocrates because he doubts that all things which pertain to the blessed life are measured by the belly; and he says this not once, but often.” You should read Plutarch, lib. *Non posse suaviter viv.*, p. 1091, where he speaks concerning Metrodorus and Epicurus, as well as Laertius and Gassendi regarding the life of Epicurus.

Furthermore, our Clement elsewhere ^B has brought forward the words of this same Epicurean Metrodorus, by which he admonishes Menestratus, that although he himself is mortal; yet his soul ascends until it perceives the age and infinity of things, where according to the opinion of Plato, man, no longer bound to the body, will contemplate God in pure light. He asserts that these things were said by him divinely.

Clement comes also to the Stoics, and says ^C: “Zeno the Stoic thinks that the end is to live according to virtue. Cleanthes, however, [says to live] in accordance with nature, and in reasoning well; which he established as being situated in those things that are to be chosen according to nature. And Antipater, his familiar, thinks it is situated in those things which are to be chosen continuously and without any lapse according to nature, and in those which are beyond nature being rejected. And again Archedemus explained the end thus: in those things which are according to nature, the greatest and chief ones, being unable to overstep when choosing. Besides these, however, Panaetius [says] to live in accordance with the appetites which are given to us by nature. Finally, however, Posidonius, to live by contemplating the truth and order of the universe, and to organize oneself, as far as it can be done, so that one is not led in anything by the part of the soul which lacks reason.” Regarding all these, he himself said previously, and also elsewhere, more simply: “The Stoics established that the end is to live consequentially to nature, *τὸ ἀκολούθως τῇ φύσει ζῆν*. Which Theodoretus recounts in the same words. But Cicero [explains] more clearly: ‘There are,’ he says, ‘ends of goods… for the Stoics to agree with nature, which they wish to be from virtue, that is, to live honestly: which they interpret thus, to live with the intelligence of those things which happen according to nature, choosing those which are according to nature and rejecting the contraries.’ See also his lib. IV De finib., p. 91.

Regarding these individually, just as Clement [does], Laertius discourses in these words: “First, Zeno in the book *On the nature of man* says the end is to live ^D agreeably according to nature, and that is to live according to virtue; for nature leads us to it. Similarly also Cleanthes in the book *On pleasure*, and Posidonius, and Hecato in the book *On ends*... Archedemus, however, [says] to live without omitting any duties... Cleanthes, however, accepts only the common nature, which it behooves one to follow, but not the particular; and that virtue is commonly understood as an affection, and that it itself is to be sought for its own sake, not for some fear or hope, or any of those things which are external, but that the blessed life is constituted in it itself; as it is ingrained in the soul for the agreement of the whole life... But that virtue is teachable, Chrysippus also said in the first [book] *On the end*, and Cleanthes, and Posidonius in *Exhortations*, and Hecato. That it is teachable is evident from the fact that goods are made from evils. Panaetius indeed posited two virtues, the contemplative and the active; others three, the rational, the natural, and the moral; Posidonius four, many Cleanthes, Chrysippus, and Antipater.”

Cicero, however, elucidates the opinion of Zeno more fully and clearly: “Zeno was by no means the one who, like Theophrastus, would cut the sinews of virtue; but on the contrary, one who placed everything which pertained to the blessed life in one virtue, and numbered nothing else among goods, and called that honest, which was something simple, and alone, and one good. Furthermore, even if other things were neither good nor bad, nevertheless he said that some were in accordance with nature, and others were contrary to nature; and he numbered among these very ones others that were intermediate and average. And he said that those things which were in accordance with nature were to be taken and deemed worthy of a certain estimation: and the contraries to the contrary; but he left neither [in the category of] intermediates,” etc. See that same Cicero regarding that same Zeno and others of his adherents and successors ibid., p. 36, and lib. IV *De finibus*, p. 86 et seqq.; lib. III *De offic.*, p. 389, and lib. IV *Academic. quaest.*, p. 51, where Panaetius is called a princeps of the Stoics, and p. 34, Cleanthes as a Stoic of the older generation.

For this reason, perhaps, Clement continues: “But some from the more recent Stoics have handed down that the end is *τὸ ζῆν ἀκολούθως τῇ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου κατασκευῇ*, ‘to live consequentially to the constitution of man.’ But we previously saw this opinion being ascribed by him and by Theodoretus to all the Stoics generally, that the end is *τὸ ἀκολούθως φύσει ζῆν*. But what difference exists between this and the prior opinion, weigh, I ask, and pronounce.”

Meanwhile, however, let us follow our author. Thus he continues: “What shall I recount Ariston to you? He said the end was *ἀδιαφορίαν*, that is, indifference; but he plainly leaves the indifferent indifferent. Or shall I bring into the middle those things which are said by Herillus? Herillus posits to live from knowledge as the end.” Laertius speaks more explicitly about both of them: “Ariston of Chios, surnamed the Siren, said that the end was to live indifferently to anything between virtue and vice, leaving no variation however slight, but keeping oneself equally in all things.” But later Herillus of Carthage said that the end was knowledge, which is to live always, referring all things to living with knowledge, so that ignorance...

is ^A a thing indifferent. Further, Cicero says in another book: “And just as Aristo’s opinion was rejected, which asserted that there was no difference between one thing and another, and that there were no things other than virtues and vices, between which there is any difference at all.” Finally, in the following book: “Aristo held only this; he denied that there was anything other than vices and virtues that should be avoided or sought.”

When he had said a little before that the knowledge of things in itself was marvelously praised by Aristotle and Theophrastus, he records these things concerning Herillus: “Caught by this one thing, Herillus argued that knowledge was the highest good, and that no other thing was to be sought for its own sake.” Therefore, elsewhere he reminds us that he in this matter openly and thoroughly opposes his teacher Zeno: “I omit Herillus, who places the highest good in cognition and knowledge; since he was a hearer of Zeno, you see how much he disagreed with him.” The opinion of both is furthermore refuted by the same Cicero in other books. If you wish for more, consult Lipsius, who enumerates and clarifies the various opinions of the Stoics concerning the ultimate end of goods. See also Laertius, book VII, regarding the life of Zeno towards the end, discussing Aristo and others called by the same name, and the following chapter regarding Herillus.

^B After these things, however, Clement says: “We should also adduce, he says, those things which are decided by the physicists regarding the proposed subject.” If you ask what he means by the name of physicists, we will respond to you that they are those who, as has been observed above from Laertius and Cicero, philosophized about natural and physical things up to Socrates, by whom ethics was introduced. But Clement himself and Eusebius indicate elsewhere that they originated from Thales. Therefore, Clement relates the opinion of many of them, and first of all that of Anaxagoras and Heraclitus in these words: “They say that Anaxagoras of Clazomenae said that contemplation is the end of life, and the freedom ^C which proceeds from it. But Heraclitus of Ephesus said a ‘well-pleasing’ life.”

The opinion of both is more clearly explained by Theodoret thus: “Heraclitus of Ephesus changed the name of pleasure, but preserved the meaning. For instead of pleasure, he said ‘well-pleasing.’ Yet this definition also has another force. For he posited ‘well-pleasing’ indefinitely, but did not express its quality... Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, in the contemplation of life and the freedom of soul that proceeds from it, constitutes a definition fitting for a philosopher.”

Then Clement says: “Heraclides Ponticus reports that Pythagoras taught that the knowledge of the perfection of the virtues of the soul is happiness, in Greek: τὴν ἐπιστήμην τῆς τελειότητος τῶν ἀρετῶν τῆς ψυχῆς εὐδαιμονίαν εἶναι. But we shall not altogether unwillingly lend our suffrage to those who have ^D proven this place of Clement to be corrupt, and to be amended from these words of Theodoret: Ὁ δὲ πολυθρύλλητος Πυθαγόρας, τὴν τῶν ἀριθμῶν ἐπιστήμην, ἔσχατον ὑπελάμβανεν ἀγαθόν, ‘But the widely-celebrated Pythagoras supposed that the final good was in the most exact science of numbers.’” It appears that one should read, as in Theodoret, ἀριθμῶν, of numbers. In confirmation of this emendation, that testimony of Cicero concerning the Pythagoreans can be brought forward: “The Pythagoreans wish all things to proceed from numbers and the principles of mathematicians.” And certainly it has been amply proven by us elsewhere that the first principle of things was constituted by Pythagoras himself in unity and numbers. For that very reason, he, as Laertius testifies, opined that virtue was harmony, or the number of sounds and music, and besides that, health, and every good, and God; and therefore that all things consist through harmony.

After these things, however, Clement says: “Furthermore, the Abderitans teach that there is an end; Democritus indeed, in the book *On the End*, [teaches it is] tranquility of soul, τὴν εὐθυμίαν, which he also called εστώ, and often exclaims: ‘Pleasure and the lack of it are the term for those who have reached the highest vigor.’ Hecataeus, however, [calls it] αὐτάρκειαν, self-sufficiency.” But these are called Abderitans by Clement, Ἀβδηρῖται, because almost all declare both Democritus and Hecataeus—as will become clear from things to be said presently—to be sprung from Abdera, a maritime city of Thrace, which was later called Clazomenae, although some have called Hecataeus a Milesian. For which reason Theodoret handed down these things concerning Democritus, sufficiently congruent and agreeable to the words of our Clement: “Epicurus opined that the supreme good was pleasure alone. Δημόκριτος ὁ Ἀβδηρίτης, Democritus the Abderite, the father of his dogmas, instead of pleasure put tranquility of soul, τὴν εὐθυμίαν, with a change not of opinion, but of names only.” But Tullius: “Democritus’s [end], he says, is security, which is tranquility of soul, which they call εὐθυμίαν.” But afterwards: “If he also placed the blessed life in the cognition of things, yet from that investigation of nature he wished it to follow that one should be of good spirit; for that is what he calls the highest good εὐθυμίαν, and often ἀθαμβίαν, that is, a soul free from terror.” But Laertius explains the opinion of this Democritus more towards the mind of our Clement with these words: “That the end is a quiet and untroubled state of soul, εὐθυμίαν, which, as some interpret it indirectly, is not the same as pleasure, but that state according to which the soul is blessed with great tranquility and constancy, while it is agitated by no fear, no superstition, or any other disturbance. He also calls it εστώ, from the goodness of constancy, and by many other names.” Furthermore, that Democritus is held among Cicero as a “man great among the first,” and “from whose fountains Epicurus irrigated his little gardens.” But Laertius, praised very recently by us, who committed his life to letters, observes that he is called by some an Abderite, by others a Milesian.

Hecataeus also, by the authority and witness of Suidas, is called an Abderite philosopher and a critic and grammarian. But some think this to be the one whose first book concerning the philosophy of the Egyptians is cited by Laertius. There are not wanting, however, those who think he is other than the Abderite, and that he was a Milesian, the son of Hegesander, and a historian. And indeed, our own Clement elsewhere praises Hecataeus as one who composed histories. Finally, Pausanias and others have often made mention of Hecataeus of Milesia. But concerning him you may see Vossius, book I, *De historicis Graecis*, chap.

^A 40. Although there were two writers, it is certain, however, that Theodoret remembers Hecataeus the philosopher, who, as our Clement writes, considered the supreme good to be *autarkeia*, or "sufficiency."

To the same family and class of philosophers are ascribed by our author: Apollodotus the Cyzenaean, [who advocated] *psychagogia* (the attraction of the soul), just as Nausiphanes advocated *kataplexis* (the striking of the soul); for he said that this was called *athambia* by Democritus. The Latin interpreter rendered it thus: "Apollodotus the Cyzenaean, the delectation of the soul, just as Nausiphanes, admiration or stupefaction." For he says this is called *athambia* by Democritus. I would have you observe in passing how some Greek words of Clement are rendered into Latin in an ambiguous way, others not at all, and are left thus by that Latin interpreter here and also elsewhere more than once. But if the word *athambia*, as Suidas observes and as could easily be proven from other writers, is the same as *aphobos* (fearless), [denoting one who is] undaunted and devoid of stupor and amazement, then the meaning of our Clement can be elicited from this: Nausiphanes taught that the supreme good is admiration, but one that is devoid of and empty of stupor and amazement.

Furthermore, we will by no means argue against those who have proven that this is that Apollodotus whom Laertius calls Apollodorus and nicknames *Hortityrannus* ("Tyran-gardener"), and who is said to be a disciple of Epicurus. See the same Laertius, book X, in the *Life of Epicurus*, § 25; Gassendi, book II, *De vita et moribus Epicuri*, chap. 6, p. 187; Vossius, book IV, *De hist. Graec.*, chap. 20, p. 466; and Jonsius, book II, *De script. hist. philosoph.*, etc. Moreover, we have shown above that Nausiphanes was a teacher of Epicurus, whom, however, Cicero testifies to have been harassed by him with every insult.

^B Next to him, according to our Clement, comes Diotimus, who established that the ultimate end is absolute—as Clement himself speaks—"the perfection of goods, which he says is called *eusebeia* (godliness)," in the same way, as we have seen, that Democritus said. But Laertius relates that Diotimus was a Stoic and hostile toward Epicurus, whom he attacked most severely. But he himself was later accused of atheism and paid the death penalty, if credit is to be given to Demetrius, whom Athenaeus cites here in these words: "Diotimus (read Diotimus), who wrote several books against Epicurus, accused by Epicurus's Zeno (of atheism), paid the death penalty," as Demetrius Magnesius says in his *Homonyms*.

Furthermore, Antisthenes is referred to the same number of philosophers by Clement, who taught that the ultimate end was *tuphian* (vanity), a word which Theodoret also used. But the interpreter of the former rendered it in Latin as "the emptiness of pride," while the latter rendered it as "modesty of soul." Laertius, however, reports that it was pronounced by him that "the absence of glory is a good, and similar to labor." But more has already been observed by us concerning this same Antisthenes.

What the more recent Academics decided on this same subject, Clement taught in these words: "Some of the more recent Academics wish to put forward as the end a firm and stable abstinence from impressions." In a plainly similar way, we read what was consigned to writing by Cicero: "Some Academics are said to have established that the end of goods and the supreme duty of the wise man is to resist impressions and to firmly hold back his assent." You may infer that these *ek tes Akademias neoterous*, the more recent Academics, as Clement says, from the fact that in another book Cicero himself wrote: ^D "To live honestly enjoying those things which nature first conciliates to man, as the old Academy held, as indicated by the writings of Polemon—whom Antiochus approves of most—and Aristotle; and his friends now seem to approach this most closely."

Nevertheless, Clement makes it attested that a twofold end of man is assigned by Plato, the prince of the Academies. One, indeed (these are the words of our Clement), is that which is participate-able, and the first in forms themselves, which he calls the good. The other, however, is that which is a participant of it, and which, proceeding from it, receives likeness; this is indeed in men, who claim virtue and true philosophy for themselves. And these things have been handed down by Plato in vol. II, book IV, *De legibus*, p. 716. Moreover, he has similar things in the *Theaetetus* of his, cited later by Clement, vol. II, p. 176. Hence, truly and deservedly does Theodoret say: "Plato," he says, "son of Aristo... established the end of goods to be to become like God as much as we are able." Eusebius affirms that the end of man was placed by Plato in virtue itself. But Clement also seems to have held this for certain. And indeed, who, if not endowed with virtue, could ever receive the likeness of God?

Nor does Clement obscurely signify in the same place that Plato drew these things from his teacher Socrates, who, as Cleanthes is our authority, taught "that he is the same man, just and blessed; and that he curses the one who first divided the just from the useful; as one who has done an impious thing." Which is certainly asserted clearly by the testimony of Cicero and Theodoret: "For Socrates," says Tullius, "was accustomed to curse him who first separated utility from its nature (that is, honor); for he sought that to be the head of all evils." But Theodoret says: "Plato's teacher too, Socrates, son of Sophroniscus, was accustomed to call not the man who abounded in riches or enjoyed a favorable breeze, but the man adorned with justice, blessed; and he called those who separated utility from justice impious. For he judged only that which is just to be useful."

Moreover, that excellent teaching of Plato, and other precepts of the same philosopher, to have been approved and defended by the Stoics, Clement shows thus: "Antipater the Stoic, in the three books he wrote, proves that according to Plato's opinion only the honest is good, and he also proves that according to his opinion virtue is sufficient for blessedness; and he adduces many other dogmata which agree with the Stoics." But concerning these, one must read Cicero's *Paradoxa*, p. 431 et seq., book *De officiis*, p. 389, etc., and Lipsius' *Manuductio ad Stoicam philosophiam*, dissert. 20, vol. IV, p. 481.

From Plato, Clement comes to the first of his disciples, Speusippus—who, as Cicero also relates, was Plato's son by his sister, and was left as his heir—and also Xenocrates and Polemon, who were also auditors of Plato, as the same Cicero witnesses, about whom we have discoursed above. Moreover, the same Cicero reports their opinions on the supreme good in book V, *De finibus*, p. 86, and again Xenocrates' opinion in book V, *Tusculan.*, p. 145, and in book II, *De legib.*, p. 330.

The followers of the Peripatetic school, of which, as we have already observed, Aristotle was the author, defined this ultimate end, as our Clement testifies, to be *to zen kat' areten*, "the living according to virtue completing blessedness with a triple kind of good."

Nor therefore is he who is poor, nor the inglorious, nor the sickly, nor even one who might be a slave, blessed according to their opinion. ^A Regarding Aristotle, however, the parent of these men, his opinion concerning the ultimate good and happiness is thus briefly explained by Tully: "He joined the use of virtue with the prosperity of life." But by Theodoret: "Aristotle affirmed that full happiness consists of a triple kind of good, that is, of the good of the soul, of the body, and of external goods." This indeed was explained more fully by Laertius in book v of his *Life*, § 30, and by Aristotle himself, a witness in this matter more certain and richer than all others, in book II of his *Ethics*, ch. 9 and following. Moreover, the Peripatetics eagerly embraced the opinion of their master. For they taught that the good was not only honorable, but also pleasant and useful; yet in such a way that one was greater than the other, namely, that the honorable was more excellent than the pleasant, and the useful more than the pleasant; yet he who lacked one of these was not entirely blessed. See Cicero, book II *De finibus*, p. 78, book I *De natura deorum*, p. 198, and book II *De officiis*, p. 389.

Although our Clement, Cicero, and others have generally defended that opinion for all the Peripatetics, our Clement nevertheless mentions three of them by name, of whom only the last gave his full approval to him. These are the very words of our aforementioned author concerning them: "Furthermore, Lycus the Peripatetic said that the true joy of the soul was the end, just as Leucimus said it was that which proceeds from honorable things. Critolaus, however, who was also a Peripatetic, said that it was the perfection of life flowing correctly according to nature, which is completed from three kinds, signifying the perfection handed down by the ancients from hand to hand." He who is called Lycus by Clement in that passage, but elsewhere Lycon, had his life described by Laertius, and mention was made of him by Athenaeus. Cicero briefly touched upon his opinion, and also that of Critolaus. But Epiphanius wrote even more briefly about him: "Critolaus the Phaselite followed Aristotle." Finally, as nothing occurs to others nor to us, even after the most accurate searching, regarding Leucimus, see whether in writing this name there was not some slip of the scribes. ^B Do not be surprised, moreover, as Ambrose says, that such multiple, complicated, and confused questions of the philosophers are put forward on this subject. For they went off into so many different and mutually discordant opinions that Augustine collected that they could be reduced from Varro to two hundred and eighty-eight. On these, however, read the same Augustine in the cited book XIX *De civitate*, ch. 1, 2, and 3; Epiphanius in his *Exposition of the Catholic Faith*, and what we have noted in the cited passage of Ambrose.

265 ARTICLE III. Opinions of the Philosophers concerning faith, hope, and charity; concerning marriage and the laws regarding the unmarried.

Clement relates many things that Aristotle, Epicurus, Heraclitus, and Plato handed down in their writings concerning faith. But we have already shown these above in ch. II, art. 2, where we also showed that the same things which Clement narrates were described by Theodoret. Moreover, Clement still exhibits other things, which Plato and Parmenides are said to have handed down to posterity concerning hope, and the same Plato and Empedocles concerning charity. The poem of Parmenides is cited by Clement, and was also brought forward by Theodoret.

What however the philosophers determined concerning marriage, so that Clement might make it clear, he begins thus from Plato: "Plato places marriage among external goods, asserting the immortality and a certain perpetuity of our race, by which posterity, as if in turn, hands the torch to posterity." These things were indeed taken from his book v *De legibus*, vol. II, p. 776. Wherefore Theodoret says: "We admit Plato, who places marriage among goods, and calls it the invention of securing immortality, and the stability of the race."

Clement wisely rebukes Carpocrates and his son Epiphanes, who abused the authority of Plato to patronize their own absurd error regarding common and promiscuous wives. For he shows clearly that both heretics distorted into wicked meanings all those things which, as we have already seen, this prince of all philosophers easily pronounced in his commentaries *On the Republic*, for example book v, vol. II, p. 457, and, if you wish, in the *Timaeus*, vol. III, p. 18, concerning this subject. Therefore, when Clement writes elsewhere that Euripides drew the same dogma from this same Plato, there he undoubtedly left it to be understood by the reader that this poet, no better than those heresiarchs, had grasped the mind of Plato. Moreover, out of this perverse interpretation of this philosopher, our author does not absurdly conclude that his own very false opinion concerning evil generation was wrongly attributed by the Marcionites to this same Plato.

Clement then makes it attested that marriage and the procreation of children are repudiated by Democritus and Epicurus, and others who placed the highest good in pleasure and in the absence of trouble and pain, because of the burdens they bring. Theodoret agrees with our Clement, and has handed down these things in writings entirely apposite to his mind: "We vehemently condemn Democritus and Epicurus, who order that marriage and the procreation of children be avoided. For those who measured the happiness of men by pleasure, repudiated altogether whatever could bring any care or disgust." Jerome, however, takes away something from this opinion which is attributed to Epicurus, and thinks that he did not forbid all marriage to the true wise man, but ordered that this true wise man should rarely take a wife: "Epicurus," these are the very words of Jerome (although Metrodorus his disciple had Leontium as a wife), "rarely says that marriages are to be entered into by the wise man; because many inconveniences are mixed in with marriages." You may see Laertius, book x in the *Life of Epicurus*, § 119, and the observations of Casaubon, Gassendi, and Menage on this passage, Arrian, book I, ch. 23, and book III, ch. 7.

Furthermore, Clement continues, according to the opinion of the Stoics, marriage is indifferent, and the taking of children; but according to the Peripatetics, it is a good. Nor did Theodoret explain the same opinion of the Stoics to us otherwise. Hear his words, I pray: "The Stoics proceeded by a certain middle way. For they counted marriage and the taking of children among indifferent things." But will you not say, Zeno says in Laertius that a wise man "will take a wife for the sake of procreating children?" And does not Chrysippus in Cicero still ^C denote the same, cited by Clement...?

^A expressed it more explicitly: "Seeing that man was born to protect and preserve human beings, it is consistent with this nature that a wise man should be willing to hold and manage a public office, and, living according to nature, should take a wife and be willing to procreate children from her." Therefore, it was a conviction among them that marriage is not an indifferent thing, but a good. However, I would like you to notice that it was determined by those same Stoics, on the testimony of Laertius himself, that "whatever we can use well and badly is not a good," and is therefore indifferent. And this is even more clearly evident from the things that were established by them regarding the various types of indifferent things, as noted by the same Laertius in the cited passage, by Tullius in books 3 and 4 of *De Finibus*, and more expansively by Justus Lipsius in book 2 of his *Manuductio to Stoic Philosophy*, tom. IV, dissertations 23 and 24.

Furthermore, it will seem strange to no one that marriage is approved by the Peripatetics, if one knows that their leader, Aristotle, as Aristippus has left to memory ^B, loved the concubine of Hermias, whom, having obtained her for himself, he took as a wife, and being transported with joy, he sacrificed to the woman, just as the Athenians sacrifice to Ceres at Eleusis, and composed a Paean to Hermias, which was written "inwardly," that is, inside. You may see what was recorded regarding this matter by Lycon the Peripatetic in Eusebius.

Some light, therefore, may be brought to these matters from what Clement concludes from the words mentioned: "But, to speak briefly, those who have turned their dogmas to the tongue alone have served pleasures: some with concubines, others with harlots, but most by using young boys. And that 'wise quaternion,' ^C *e keine tetraktys*, in the garden with a harlot was cultivating pleasure." For there have not been wanting those who, beyond the things said about the concubine of Hermias, have accused the same Aristotle of incontinence and intemperance, even though Aristocles attempts to vindicate him from this vice. That Pythagoras is designated by the name of the "quaternion" not without irony by our author, one may judge not altogether unworthily from the things which we formerly observed concerning the same quaternion in Ambrose. You will be able to consult that, if you have the disposition, just as you will observe in Stobaeus, sermons 65 and 66, "On the praise and blame of nuptials," where the verses of Menander, mentioned a little later by Clement, and many things handed down by various writers concerning weddings and the various opinions of philosophers regarding those same weddings and matrimony are explained. Nor should it be wearisome for you to consult Jerome at the end of book II of *Against Jovinian*, who also discusses many things regarding these.

Yet one must not omit Homer, who is afterwards praised by Clement in these words: "Homer establishes the greatest vow for a man and his family, but not absolutely; rather, with good harmony and concord." Where Homer sang these things, Hervetus confesses is not clear to him. Some, however, in their annotations on this passage of our author, merely warn us that the same 266 things are celebrated by Euripides in his *Medea*. But will the conjecture of one who thinks that Clement alluded to these verses of Homer be altogether false? ^D

"May the gods give you as much as you desire in your heart, A husband and a home, and provide harmony Good; for there is nothing better and stronger than that."

You see, indeed, that the principal words appear there which Clement used, and therefore it cannot be said rashly that he did not focus on these very words of the same Homer.

Moreover, although philosophers are divided into such varied and contrary parties regarding marriage, this nonetheless did not prevent it from being entirely approved by those who held magistracies or the care of the republic. For Clement testifies that penalties were established by them against the unmarried, because they deprived the cities of the greatest good: "Legislators do not permit," our author says, "that those who have not taken a wife should hold the highest magistracies." Indeed, the Laconian legislator not only imposed a penalty on him who had not taken a wife, but also on him who had taken only one, and on him who had taken one too late, and on him who lived alone. And the illustrious Plato orders that the sustenance of a wife should also be paid from the public treasury by him who had not taken a wife, as well as the expenses that ought to be given to magistrates. "For if, once they have taken wives, they do not produce children, which is within their power, they will cause a scarcity of men, and will dissolve the cities, and the adornment which consists of them."

Truly, it ought to be beyond all controversy that penalties were dictated against the unmarried by the law of the emperors, namely the Julian and Papian laws. Regarding which law Tacitus says: "It was reported," he says, "then concerning the moderating of the Papia-Poppæa law, which Augustus in his elder years, after the Julian proposals, had sanctioned for the inciting of penalties against the unmarried and for increasing the public treasury." But that that law, of which Suetonius also made mention, was abrogated by Constantine the Great, the author of his life narrates in these words: "The old laws punished the childless by the deprivation of their fathers' inheritance. And this was truly most atrocious; for it visited a penalty upon men devoid of children, as if they were guilty of some crime. But the emperor, this right having been abrogated, brought in a holy and religious law." Sozomen, however, explains this law more clearly: "There was an old law among the Romans which forbade the unmarried, *tous agamous*, at the age of 25, to be on equal footing with married men, both in many other things and in that they could inherit nothing by testament unless they were the closest by kin. But those who were childless, *apaidas*, were fined half of the goods which had been left to them... When, therefore, the emperor had taken note... he gave a law to the people, so that the unmarried and childless, *agamoi kai apaides*, might enjoy equal rights as all the rest." That law of Constantine the Great still survives in the Theodosian code, upon which, as well as (as should be read) the Papian and Julian laws, are the annotations of the learned Godefroy, and the comments of Lipsius on the cited passage of Tacitus, pages 62 and 64.

By the name of the Laconian legislator, Clement undoubtedly calls Lycurgus, in whose *Life* Plutarch writes these things: "Yet he also added a certain ignominy to the unmarried:" "He indeed branded with a mark of ignominy and infamy those who had not taken wives; for they were excluded from the spectacle of the naked competing, and in the winter time were forced by the edict of the magistrates to walk around the forum stripped of their garments. And they walked about singing a song composed against themselves, that they were justly punished because they did not obey the laws." But these things of Ariston in Stobaeus regarding all.

^A Alia erant quæ nominabat ἐξωτερικά, alia quæ appellabat ἀκροατικά. *Exoterica* were called those which were conducive to rhetorical meditations, the faculty of sophistry, and a knowledge of civil affairs. *Acroatica*, however, were called those in which a more remote and subtle philosophy was agitated, and which pertained to the contemplation of nature or dialectical discussions. For this discipline, which he called *acroatic*, he allotted time for exercise in the Lyceum in the morning; nor did he rashly admit anyone to it, unless he had first tested their genius, the elements of their education, and their zeal and industry in learning. But the *exoteric* hearings and exercises in speaking he conducted in the same place in the evening, and offered these to the youth in general without selection. See the observations of Menagius on this place in various authors, and in Laertius, book V, § 197 et seq.

Many things were hidden by the Pythagorean philosophers, Plato, and Epicurus, regarding the punishment taken from Hipparchus; the forbidden reading of certain books of Zeno; the various kinds of Aristotelian writings; the fables by which philosophers veiled their teachings, and about the philosopher-women Theano, Themisto, and the five daughters of Diodorus; about Hipparchia, Arete, Lasthenia, Axiothea, and Aspasia.

Although the schools of the philosophers were public, yet, says Clement ^B, not only did the Pythagoreans and Plato hide many things, but even the Epicureans say that there are certain arcana among them, and they do not permit everyone to read these writings. Concerning the Pythagoreans, we have already noted certain things. But how severely the transgressors of this Pythagorean law regarding the concealment of their dogmas were punished is evident from the example of Hipparchus, which is set forth by Clement in these words: "They say that Hipparchus the Pythagorean was accused because he had written openly the decrees of Pythagoras, that he was expelled from the school, and that for that very reason a monument was erected as if he were dead." Nor is this to be wondered at. For, as Origen says, "The venerable school of the Pythagoreans indeed used to place cenotaphs for the deserters of their discipline, precisely because they held them as dead." But see the observations of Menagius on Laertius regarding the Life of Pythagoras, § 358.

The second after the Pythagoreans named by Clement is Plato, whom he shows, not only here but also a little before, to have hidden certain things enigmatically and parabolically, and therefore in the darkness of obscurity. Which indeed will be made still more manifest from what is to be said shortly. As regards Epicurus, however, Laertius in his Life relates that he himself said: "That he would have a school, not indeed so as to gather a huge crowd, and to recite in a multitude, but not willingly." But whether Clement aligns with this, weigh, I pray, and pronounce, after you have read the notes and animadversions of Gassendi on this place in Laertius, vol. V, page 118.

Let us follow our author: "Furthermore, the Stoics," he says, "say that certain things were written by Zeno at first, which they do not easily permit students to read, for whom a test had not first been made by them as to whether they philosophize genuinely and sincerely." ^C Laertius represents a double catalog of Zeno's writings; but he tacitly omitted those whose reading the Stoics did not easily permit to his students, unless they were first approved. And it will not be difficult for us to be persuaded that these were the ones he lists in the latter place, namely the books on nuptials and on love, or the *Republic* books, which Laertius says he wrote at the tail of the dog, and which Tullius says he wrote with less modesty.

The Aristotelians also, continues Clement, say that of their own writings some are indeed *esoterica*, internal, but others are common and external. But these things are explained by Aulus Gellius a little differently and more fully as follows: "The philosopher Aristotle, teacher of King Alexander, is said to have had two kinds of his commentaries and arts, which he taught to his disciples."

What of the fact, however, that philosophers veiled and covered their doctrines by expounding fables—though not all of them—in an allegorical sense? Of these, Clement lists certain ones which are read in Plato: of Er the Armenian, which he mentions in vol. II, book X *of the Republic*, page 214; of Aeacus and Rhadamanthus in vol. II in the *Gorgias*, page 523 and 524; ^D of Tartarus in the *Phaedo* vol. I, page 112 and 113; of Prometheus and Epimetheus in the *Protagoras* vol. II page 320 et seq.; finally, of the war waged between the Atlantines and Athenians in the *Atlanticus*, vol. III, page 112 et seq.

Before we put an end to this discourse on Greek philosophers, it must be noted with our Clement that not only men, but also women, contributed their labor to philosophical disciplines. For Didymus, as the same Clement says, in the book *On Pythagorean Philosophy* reports that Theano the Crotoniate was the first of the women to have philosophized and to have written poems. Which Hervetus denies occurs elsewhere; indeed, Menagius boldly affirms that both are false. But how can that be said with such confidence to be untrue, which is asserted by Suidas so clearly in these words: "Theano the Cressa, or Cretan, a philosopher, daughter of Pythonax, but wife of the elder Pythagoras, from whom she conceived Telanges, and Mnesarchus, and Myia, and Arignote. Some, however, say she was the wife of Cratinus. They write, however, that she was a Crotoniate. She wrote philosophical commentaries, and apophthegms, and a certain poem in verses. Not only philosophical books and a poem did she write, but it is also said by Theodoret that, Pythagoras being dead, she took over the ruling of the school with the sons Telanges and Mnesarchus." But we easily concede, some will say, that Theano taught philosophy by writings and voice, and even in public schools: but we clearly deny with Menagius that she was the first of all women to have philosophized. We also concede if you will designate for us another who philosophized before Theano. In the same way it must be argued concerning the poems. Moreover, Clement does not indeed affirm this assertorily, but cites as a witness Didymus, whose trustworthiness and authority have been elevated by no one up to now. Clement also refers to certain words from these, without doubt, Theano's commentaries, just as if he had them at hand, concerning the immortality of the soul: "She writes, *γράφει*, Theano the Pythagorean: 'It would be a feast in truth for the wicked, who after committing all crimes, then die. And if the soul were not immortal, death would be a gain.'" Furthermore, how chaste a life she led, with philosophy as her guide, Clement makes plain, as from two

in the previous dissertation we showed that the first response of this female philosopher appeared to us to be gleaned from Plutarch. Laertius, however, describes the second somewhat differently in Book VII of the *Life of Pythagoras*, § 43. Finally, both opinions were transcribed again by Theodoret in *Curat. Graec. affect.*, sermon 12, page 675, and by Stobaeus, sermon 72, page 442. What wonder is it, then, if Jerome encourages and exhorts married women to imitate Theano? See Menagius in his appendix to Laertius in the *History of Women Philosophers*, page 500 et seq.

Clement did not, however, suppose that Theano alone applied herself to philosophy. For he testifies that others also spent a great deal of labor upon it, among whose number he places Myia and Arignote, daughters of Pythagoras and the same Theano. Regarding those whom Suidas mentions, one must consult, among others, Menagius, *loc. cit.*, page 501 et seq.

Furthermore, Themisto (these are our Clement's words), a Lampsacenian, daughter of Zoïlus, wife of Leonteus of Lampsacus, applied herself to Epicurean philosophy. And rightly so; for Laertius, Cicero, and Gassendus plainly assert and confirm this fact. As for what Lactantius writes: "No one ever taught that women practiced philosophy, except for one in all of memory, Themisto," this cannot be entirely true, as anyone can easily understand from what has already been said and what is about to be said. Read Menagius, *loc. cit.*, page 498.

Clement also proves, on the not-at-all uncertain authority of the dialectician Philo, that five daughters of Diodorus, surnamed Cronus—Menexene, Argia, Theognis, Artemisias, and Pantaclea—were trained in dialectic. For we read that this was likewise committed to writing by Jerome: "Diodorus the Socratic is said to have had five dialectical daughters of remarkable modesty, of whom Philo, the disciple of Carneades, writes a most complete history." Hence, we learn that the Philo cited by Clement was the master of Carneades. Furthermore, Laertius briefly described the life of Diodorus, who is mentioned in Strabo, as he did that of Hipparchia, of whom Clement speaks later. You may see the observations of various scholars on these passages of Laertius, as well as Suidas, Vossius, and Menagius in *Hist. mulier. philosoph.*, page 497, and others.

Following Hipparchia in our author is Arete of Cyrene, by whose works Aristippus the Mother-taught was educated. And not without reason. For Laertius, in his *Life of Aristippus*, stated this in almost the same words, which is also confirmed by the testimony of Aelian.

Then Clement says: "Among the Platonists, Lasthenia of Arcadia and Axiothea of Phlius ^B philosophize." When Laertius speaks of the disciples of Plato, he gathered both into their number in this way: "With them, two women, Lasthenia of Mantinea and Axiothea of Phlius, who, as Dicaearchus is the author, used to wear men’s clothing." See Themistius, *or.* 4 and 11. Athenaeus, however, in Book VII of the *Deipnosophists*, page 279, and in Book XII, page 546, makes mention of Lasthenia; but in the former passage some not unfairly think that *Arkadis* should be written instead of *Sardis*.

The last to be mentioned by Clement, and inferior to none in the celebrity and dignity of her name, is "Aspasia of Miletus, of whom," as he speaks, "the comic poets write much, and whom Socrates used for philosophy, and Pericles for rhetoric." And that could easily be proven, if need be, by many witnesses, all of them beyond all exception: Plato, Plutarch, Athenaeus, Suidas, and others. Furthermore, regarding these and other female philosophers, you should consult Menagius in his appendix to Laertius.

CAPUT XIX. On the barbarians who philosophized before the Greeks, and on the Seven Sages of Greece.

ARTICULUS I. Of the ancient philosophers among the barbarians, and specifically of the Egyptians, Thebans, Chaldeans, the Druids of the Gauls, the Bactrians, and Zoroaster; of the Magi of the Persians, and those who venerated Christ in the cradle; of the women prophesying among the Germans; of the Gymnosophists of the Indians, the Brahmins, the Allobii, and the Semni; of Butta and Anacharsis; of the Hyperboreans and the Idaean Dactyli, the inventors of iron, copper, Ephesian letters, and musical numbers, their number and name; of Chiron the centaur, and Hyppa or Hippo his daughter.

Before the Greeks, barbarians and men of other nations, even if they did not usurp that name of "philosophers," were nevertheless philosophizing in very truth. For it is affirmed by our Clement regarding them without doubt in these words: "Philosophy, therefore, a thing indeed most useful, long ago flourished among the barbarians, shining through the nations; but afterwards it came even to the Greeks. For its leaders were the prophets of the Egyptians, the Chaldeans of the Assyrians, ^C the Druids of the Gauls, the Samanaei of the Bactrians, the Celts who philosophized, and the Magi of the Persians, who indeed signaled the birth of our Savior, coming into Judea preceded by a star, and the Gymnosophists of the Indians, and other barbarian philosophers." But many of these are mentioned by Laertius as follows: "Most assume that philosophy had its beginning among the barbarians. For he says that Aristocles in his *Magic*, and Sotion in the thirteenth book of his *Succession*, claim that the Magi among the Persians, the Chaldeans among the Babylonians and Assyrians, the Gymnosophists among the Indians, the Druids (Menag.) among the Celtae or Gauls, and those who are called Semnothei, were the authors of this thing; moreover, Ochus the Phoenician, Zamolxis the Thracian, and Atlas the Libyan; and in addition to these, Vulcan, the son of the Nile of Egypt, who revealed the principles of philosophy; and that the ministers of the thing itself were wont to be called priests and prophets." However, he himself contends in the same place and strives to prove that this opinion is false, and that philosophy, which in name utterly abhors barbaric appellation, took its beginning from the Greeks. But regarding the name of philosophy, which first from ^D

Pythagoras has been applied, our Clement and all others concede of their own accord; and no one will quarrel with Laertius. For Clement proves and demonstrates, by no weak kind of argument, that the application to the sciences and disciplines, designated by this name, was given by the barbarians before the Greeks, and most especially from the journeys of Greek philosophers undertaken to Egypt and other nations for the sake of erudition and doctrine, and their long sojourn among them. ^A And these things are demonstrated still more fully by Eusebius, to whom, just as to our Clement, others have assented in a truly great number and consensus, and especially Cyril of Alexandria, who subscribed to the opinion of both in these words: "Those who were called prophets among the Egyptians practiced philosophy. Furthermore, there are the Chaldeans of the Assyrians, the Druids of the Gauls, the Samanaei of the Bactrians and Persians, not a few of the Celts, and among the Persians the Magi, and among the Indians the Gymnosophists." Thus he argues against Julian, and for the confirmation of his assertion, he brings forth for us this testimony of Aristobulus, a much longer fragment of which Eusebius transcribed for the same reason ^B Aristobulus the Peripatetic says somewhere thus: "Whatever was said among the ancients about nature, περὶ φύσεως, the same is also said among those who practice philosophy outside of Greece, partly indeed among the Indians by the Brahmins, and partly in Syria by those who are called Jews." Nor is Augustine ^C less clear: "Of other nations also," he says, "wise men or philosophers have been considered the Atlantici, Libyci, Egyptians, Indians, Persians, Chaldeans, Scythians, Gauls, Spaniards, and others." On which passage you may see the notes of Coquaeus, and the observations of Tiraquellus in *Alexand. ab Alexandro*, book four, *Genial. dier.*, chapter 13, page 581. But if we go through them one by one, certainly Laertius has disclosed certain philosophical documents of the Egyptians, and where Diodorus Siculus discusses the same, he committed these things to memory: ^C "The Thebans proclaim themselves to be the most ancient of all mortals, among whom philosophy was first of all, and a more exact astrology, aided by the very position of the land, for the more illustrious knowing of the rising and setting of the stars." You may see to the same effect what Eusebius related in book X of his *Praepar. evang.*, chapter 8, and from Josephus regarding the same Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Phoenicians in chapter 7. Approach still further, if you wish, Plutarch in the book *De Iside et Osiride*, page 354, and Cicero in the first book *De divinatione*, p. 270. From sacred, or rather from profane rites and ceremonies of the Egyptians, Clement still makes it manifest that they themselves practiced a certain peculiar philosophy. But these Egyptian rites have already been discussed by us.

The philosophy of the Chaldeans, however, is beautifully described by Diodorus Siculus: "Among the Chaldeans," he says, "philosophy comes by tradition of the lineage, and the son receives it from the father, being meanwhile entirely free from other public duties. And because they use their parents as teachers, it comes about that they learn everything abundantly and without envy, and attend to the precepts with surer faith. And while they are nurtured in the disciplines immediately from childhood, they acquire for themselves an excellent habit in philosophy, both because that age is docile, and because they sweat over their studies for a long time." But among the Greeks ^D the greater part approach this philosophy late, etc. But he pursues these things at length, whom you may consult, just as you may easily notice that those philosophers were more ancient than the Greeks from Strabo in book XVI of his *Geograph.*, page 739, and from both, and from Cicero in book I and II *De divinat.*, and from Vossius *De philosoph. sect.*, chapter 1. Wherefore we read this most explicitly handed down by Josephus: "Before the arrival of Abraham to them, the Egyptians were ignorant of disciplines of this kind, which, having set out from the Chaldeans to the Egyptians, finally reached the Greeks."

Concerning the Druids of the Gauls, Diodorus, already praised by us, writes: "There are philosophers among them and theologians (whom they call Druids), whom they deem worthy of exceptional honor." But Strabo, where he treats of the Gauls, writes more amply concerning them: "Among all," he says, "there are three kinds of men who are held in singular honor. Bards sing hymns of these, and are poets. Vates sacrifice, and contemplate the nature of things. Druids, besides this philosophy, also dispute about morals, etc." But there are very many and almost infinite testimonies concerning them in Caesar’s book VI *De bello Gallico*, in Ammianus book XV, page 97 et seq., and of others. Laertius furthermore testifies that the manner of philosophizing and the philosophical doctrine of them and of the Gymnosophists was the same. But Lescalopierius has discussed them more copiously than all others in *De theologia veteri Gallor.*, chapter 15 et seq.

The Bactrians were without doubt taught philosophy by Zoroaster, who, as Eusebius writes, reigned over them in the times of Ninus. For he is considered not only the inventor of magic, but also a most skilled astrologer, and is said to have written many books. You will find a brief fragment of his sacred commentary on Persian rites among the same Eusebius. Furthermore, even if Zoroaster is called a Persian by Clement elsewhere, and a Mede elsewhere; nevertheless, many opine that he was a Bactrian. There is frequent mention of him among various writers; and we have noted something about him elsewhere. You may see, after Bochart’s *Phaleg* book IV, chapter 1, the observations of Huet in *Demonstrat. evangel.*, proposition 4, chapter five, and of Menage on the proem of Laertius, § 8.

That the Magi of the Persians likewise studied philosophy is indicated by no light evidence, namely that the star, which signified the human birth-days of Christ the Lord, led them to Judea. Laertius discusses more about them and their philosophical dogmas from various authors and, by the authority of Aristocles, shows that they themselves are more ancient than the Egyptians. Although, however, not a few, such as Strabo, Hesychius, Suidas, and others have spoken of them, we nevertheless cannot pass over what Philo has fittingly produced in these words regarding our subject: "In the barbarian soil a more frequent number of them is celebrated, to whom noble words and deeds have brought notable glory, such as the Magi among the Persians, searchers of nature, who through leisure contemplate divine virtues more clearly for the sake of knowing the truth, and initiate others into the same mysteries."

But it is a more common opinion of the ancients that the Magi came from Persia to Judea to adore Christ. Justin Martyr, however, pronounces most certainly that they were Arabians, and that they arrived in Bethlehem from Arabia and Assyria. And still more expressely Easterners.

^A Megasthenes, on the other hand, is cited by many others as a rich and excellent witness in Athenaeus, book four of the *Deipnosophistae*, page 153, and book eleven, page 494; by Aelian in book eight *De animalibus*, chapter 7, and book seven, chapter 41; by Pliny in book six of the *Naturalis Historia*, chapter 7, book seven, chapter 2, and book eight, chapter 14; by Josephus, and others. You may consult Vossius, book one *De Historicis Graecis*, chapter 21, page 69, and book one *De origine et progressu idololatriae*, chapter 25, page 95.

What, however, is one to think, one might ask, of Cyril of Alexandria, by whom this very thing, which we have seen Clement cite from Megasthenes, is ascribed to the Peripatetic Aristobulus? Which of those two is to be judged as having said what is true or false? But who would dare to pronounce anything with certainty on this matter? Yet if there has been a lapse of memory in either one of them, without doubt it seems that this should be attributed less to Clement, who indicated the place of his source, than to Cyril, who indicated none at all. Furthermore, the very words of Clement themselves have been recorded by Eusebius in book nine of the *Praeparatio evangelica*, chapter 2, page 410.

Clement narrates further how Alexander, during the conduct of his war, captured ten Gymnosophists, proposed to them ten questions one by one, and how each of them, having solved the question proposed to him on the spot, satisfied the conquering king most fully. Indeed, Hervet seriously warns us that these things are found with hardly any others besides our Clement. Yet, as was noted in his schools, we have easily found them in others, such as in Plutarch in his *Life of Alexander*.

What more? The same author of ours says: «Those of the Indians who are called *Semnoi* live their entire lives in nudity, they practice truth, they predict the future, and they worship a certain pyramid, under which they believe the bones of some god ^B are laid to rest. Neither the Gymnosophists nor the *Semnoi* have intercourse with women; for they judge this to be contrary to nature and wicked; for which reason they keep themselves chaste. There are also women who are called *Semnai*. They seem to observe the heavenly bodies, and through their significance, to predict certain future things.» But when the race of Brachmans or Brachmanae is found to be varied, or at least double, as we have seen from our Clement, and the Greek name *semnos* sounds the same in Latin as august, grave, holy, and reverend, that seems perhaps to be an epithet of certain Brachmans, who led a harder and holier life, rather than a proper name. Weigh, however, whether those whom Strabo called *Gymnetae* might not really be those meant. For he says that among the Brachmans, some were mountain-dwellers, others *Gymnetae*; and others were "civil" or "docetic": but that the *Gymnetae* live naked, as their very name signifies, and for the most part endure the heat of the sun, following the endurance we have mentioned, until their thirty-seventh year; and that women live with them, yet they do not have intercourse, and these are held in the highest admiration. ^C

Furthermore, regarding Butta, whose precepts Clement maintains many Indians followed, we have already said something. Wherefore, let us hear what he wrote regarding Anacharsis: «Anacharsis was also a Scythian, who is written to have excelled many of the Greek philosophers.» And indeed Strabo handed down these things about him to posterity: «But the Scythians who were before us, and especially those who lived not so long after the times of Homer, were such as they were also judged to be by the Greeks, as Homer called them... And for this reason Anacharsis, Abaris, and some others ^D of them...

^A were in great estimation among the Greeks, because they bore upon themselves a certain hereditary mark of ease, perfection, and justice. And again, a little after 69: "Ephorus, furthermore, writes that Anacharsis, to whom he attributes the name of wise, was of that race, and because of his perfection, temperance, and wisdom, he was considered one of the seven sages; and that his inventions were the bellows, the two-fluked anchor, and the potter’s wheel." But that these things are not all true is proven by that geographer, on the grounds that the wheel was known to Homer before Anacharsis. For which reason Laertius 70 reminds us that it is asserted by some, though not by all, that the anchor and the potter’s wheel were invented by him. You may see the observations of Menagius and others on this passage. Concerning the same Anacharsis, we shall speak again a little below, when we deliberate on the seven sages of Greece.

Meanwhile, let us follow our Clement, who, on the authority of Hellanicus, shows 71 that the Hyperboreans lived beyond the Ripaen mountains; and that they are taught justice, not feeding on flesh, but on the fruits of trees. They take those who are sixty years old outside the gates and remove them from the midst. Herodotus 72 is corrected by Strabo 73, who thought that there were no Hyperboreans. And not without reason, as is evident from the witnesses cited by Pausanias 74. Wherefore Pliny, after Pomponius Mela 75, has handed down without hesitation: "Nor does one like to doubt about that race, since so many authors report that they are accustomed to send the first fruits of their crops to Delos, to Apollo, whom they especially worship." Solinus, in his usual manner, subscribed to Pliny, and added besides to our Clement’s proposal 76: "The trees provide their food for the day." No less clearly did Cyril of Alexandria write 77: "Some even of the Hyperborean nations, who dwell beyond the Ripaen mountains, practice justice, shun gluttony and voracity, and do not endure Sybaritic luxury, content only with the use of fruits."

Furthermore, Hervetus doubts whether Clement, when he said of them that *they remove those of sixty years*, by this Greek verb signifies that the sixty-year-olds are killed by the Hyperboreans, or only taken from the midst and removed, so that they no longer appear. For the word can be taken in either sense. But surely Hervetus would not have fallen into that doubt and hesitation if he had read these words of Pliny 78: "Death [comes] only to those who have feasted to satiety of life and are anointed with luxury, by leaping into the sea from a certain cliff. This is the most blessed kind of death." Pliny’s interpreter and follower, Solinus, states the same in other words: "They summon death, and by a voluntary end they chastise the slowness of departing; those whom a satiety of life holds, having feasted and being anointed, destine themselves to a headlong fall into the seas from a known cliff. They judge this kind of burial to be the best." Before both of them, Pomponius Mela 79 had committed this to memory. Consult him, if you wish, and by this example and many others learn how deservedly and rightly, as we have already noted, the care and diligence of Hervetus in writing such long and prolix commentaries on the works of Clement is often to be desired.

Nevertheless, so as not to defraud him of due honor, we will of our own accord admit that it is observed much more accurately by him 80 in Caesar’s *Commentaries*, and in the *Life* of the same Caesar edited by Plutarch 81, that the very same things are narrated as those which our Clement added in the place cited above concerning the prophecies of women among the Germans 82. But we may be permitted to add to his observations that a Druid woman in Gaul, as Vopiscus testifies 83, predicted to Diocletian the empire of the Roman race and of the whole world. Whence it is clear that, long after Caesar’s times, among the Gauls—who perhaps at that time were not yet distinct from the Germans—there still existed women predicting the future.

^B After these things, however, Clement says: "But some, he says, more fabulously (*mythikōteron*), say that of those who are called the Idaean Dactyli, certain sages were the first to arise, to whom the invention of the letters which are called Ephesian, and of those who are in music, the numbers, is referred. For which reason they, who are among the musicians, are called *Dactyli*. The Phrygians, moreover, are barbarians, the Idaean Dactyli." Hervetus directs us to Strabo 84, Caelius Rhodiginus 85, and Polydore Vergil 86, of whom the first thinks the Idaean Dactyli are called Curetes and Corybantes. Others, however, attribute the invention of iron to these same Dactyli. But that they, as Clement says, invented the Ephesian letters, the musical numbers, and the feet in music [called] *dactyls*, he denies having ever read anywhere. Finally, he sends us to Erasmus 87, that we may learn from him what the Ephesian letters were.

Those things, however, which escaped the diligence of Hervetus can be proven and confirmed by this excerpt of Diodorus Siculus 88 from the Cretan historians concerning the Idaean Dactyli: "The first, the memory of whom has certainly been propagated to us, were the inhabitants of Crete at Mount Ida, the Idaean Dactyli. Whom some count as a hundred, others only five, called so, clearly, by the number of the fingers. Some, among whom is Ephorus, relate that the Idaean Dactyli lived around Mount Ida of Phrygia, and that they crossed into Europe with Minos. And since they were conjurers, they busied themselves with incantations, sacred rites, and mysteries, and, staying in Samothrace, struck no small amazement into the islanders. At which time Orpheus, whom nature had instructed with excellent talent for poetry and melody, is said to have been their disciple, and the first to have brought the ceremonies of initiations and mysteries into Greece. ^C Furthermore, the Idaean Dactyli in Crete, as they relate, discovered the use of fire, and explored the nature of copper and iron on Mount Berecynthus in the region of the Antisapterae, and taught the method of smelting it."

For which very reason, as he says, divine honors were paid to them. He adds indeed that the Olympic games were instituted by one of them, who, although he was a different person from the son of Alcmene, was nevertheless nicknamed Hercules. Furthermore, he says that the proofs of this matter still exist, because women even now borrow incantations from this god and tie on certain amulets, as one who was a magician and treated sacred ceremonies. Finally, he distinguishes the Idaean Dactyli from the Curetes, whom others considered earth-born, and others, as Strabo also testifies 89, thought to be sprung from the Idaean Dactyli. We have reported these things, although somewhat prolix, because whatever Clement wrote about the Idaean Dactyli is almost all illustrated in a wonderful way by that narrative of Diodorus 90.

^D For it is clear from that, as the same Diodorus and our Clement repeat elsewhere, that they were not only Phrygians and therefore barbarians; but that the invention of fire and iron, and, as Plutarch teaches, of copper, was also by them; although he himself wrote in another book that the invention of all things that receive the operation of fire is attributed by some to Vulcan.

Furthermore, since the Idaean Dactyli busied themselves with tricks and incantations, as Plutarch says, does it not seem very probable that they also used letters, which Clement and others call Ephesian, and

which, as we read in the book of Genesis, was 'a hammerer and worker in every work of bronze and iron.' And indeed, in confirmation of this opinion, it may be adduced that it is attested that the art of working bronze and refining iron was first devised by the Noropes, as will be said below. ^A Moreover, everyone knows the fable of the centaur Chiron, who, as Clement later mentions, is called "wise" by Hermippus, and by the author of the *Titanomachia* is said to have led men to justice, "having pointed out the formulas of oaths, the rites of the gods, and the images of the gods." For regarding this fable, consult, if you wish and have leisure, Natalis Comes, *Mythology* book V, ch. 12; Suidas, Hyginus, and others.

Lastly, if one of them was Orpheus, what wonder is it if musical modes are said to have been devised by them? But to prove this, there is no need of conjecture: it is asserted in very express words by Solinus: "The musical art began thence, when the Idaean Dactyli had transferred to metrical order the melodies discovered by the clatter and ringing of bronze, the use of which, as we have seen from Diodorus, they are said to have discovered." Moreover, one should read the *Exercitations* of Salmasius on this passage of Solinus, where he described these words of the grammarian Diomedes concerning the dactylic foot: ^B "From the Idaean Dactyli, whom poets call Curetes or Corybantes. For they, while guarding Jove on the island of Crete, lest the little child should betray himself by crying, devised a kind of game, clashing bronze shields among themselves, and by the ringing of the struck bronze, and even by the rhythmic composition of the dactylic foot, they hid the infant's voice." Diodorus, however, testifies that armed dances were invented by the Curetes, whom, as we have said, he distinguishes from the Idaean Dactyli: "Swords, moreover, and helmets, and armed dances are their invention. By the frequent clanging of these they deceived Saturn." Finally, this passage of Solinus was transcribed by Polydore Vergil, concerning which, how Hervetus (by whom, as has been said, he is commended) failed to remark it, let others discourse for us.

We must further note that the discovery of iron is attributed by Clement, ^C just a little later, not to all the Idaean Dactyli, but to two of them, Celmis and Dammaneus: *Celmis and Dammaneus, the Idaean Dactyli, were the first to discover iron in Cyprus. But another who discovered the tempering of bronze, as Hesiod says, was a Scythian.* Eusebius, however, exhibits this passage of Clement, and writes there: *Celmis and Dammaneus.* But if one is to trust the author of the poem *Phoronis*, the second name is better represented in Eusebius, but the first is represented most correctly in Clement.

Moreover, the name of a third Idaean Dactyl, omitted in Clement's edition, is read thus in the Eusebian: *Delas, another.* But there it is written altogether corruptly as *Ioudaion* and *Ioudaios* for *Idaion* and *Idaios*. But as far as Delas is concerned, Pliny asserted that the discovery of smelting and tempering bronze was made by Delas the Phrygian, Aristotle by Lydus the Scythian, and finally Herodotus by Glaucias of Chios. ^D Lastly, it must be noted that Strabo, who — no less than the aforementioned Diodorus Siculus — maintains that iron was discovered by the Idaean Dactyli, has reported various opinions about them, as regarding their number, so also regarding their names. He says: "Sophocles thinks there were five first males... and that the Dactyli received their name from the number. Others invent other things, connecting uncertain things with uncertain, and setting forth different ones in number and name, listing Salaminus, Dammaneus, Hercules, and Acmon among them. Some make them indigenous to Ida, others guests. In this they agree, that iron was first fashioned by them under Ida," etc. And indeed, the already cited author of the *Phoronis* produced other names of theirs. See Natalis Comes, *Mythology* book IX, ch. 7; and Vossius, *De origine et progressu idololatriae*, book I, ch. 55.

Furthermore, there is no need for the reader to be warned by us that Clement spoke about the discovery of iron according to the opinion of pagan men. For Josephus, with good right and without doubt, attributes the discovery of metal-working far more properly to Thobel, or "Tubal-cain," who, as we read in the book of Genesis,

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Moreover, everyone knows the fable of the centaur Chiron, who, as Clement later mentions, is called "wise" by Hermippus, and is said by the author of the *Titanomachia* to have led men to justice, "having pointed out the formulas of oaths, the rites of the gods, and the images of the gods." For regarding this fable, consult, if you wish and have leisure, Natalis Comes, *Mythology* book V, ch. 12; Suidas, Hyginus, and others.

Hyppo, however, or Hippe, the daughter of the centaur, "living with Aeolus," continues Clement, "taught him the contemplation of nature, and native science"; and also, as Euripides bears witness, she was the first to predict from the rising of the stars and from oracles. Nowhere, however, does Hervetus say he read that Hippe lived with Aeolus. Therefore he had not read the books of Cyril of Alexandria against Julian, in the fourth of which both that and all the other things which Clement relates are illustrated and confirmed: "Moreover," he says, "it is narrated that Hippe, the daughter of the centaur Chiron, being married to Aeolus, taught him natural philosophy, which she had received from her father as a kind of hereditary knowledge." And there Cyril appends the same verses of Euripides cited by our Clement. Clement, moreover, uses the word *synoikesasa*, by which not only cohabitation and living together is meant, but also marriage. But concerning Hippe and her father Chiron, something must still be said hereafter.

But it has been demonstrated by us thus far by what arguments our Clement made clear that this knowledge, which is called philosophy, flourished first among the barbarians before it was among the Greek philosophers, and in reality was in use. Therefore, let us now examine what he has handed down regarding the seven wise men of Greece and their method of philosophizing.

ARTICLE II.

Concerning the seven wise men of Greece, and how various their opinions have been regarding them and their number, and especially regarding the seventh, and concerning some of the opinions of Pherecydes, and his theology.

Nothing is more common and widespread than that there were, as they say, seven wise men of Greece. But there is, Laertius says, great disagreement about them and even about their number. And the dispute about the seventh is carried on with greater heat of contention. Clement, however, pronounces about them thus: "The Greeks say that the first seven were held in admiration because of their wisdom, who have been termed the wise men: four of whom were from Asia, Thales the Milesian, Bias the Prienean, Pittacus the Mitylenean, and Cleobulus the Lindian; two, however, were from Europe, Solon the Athenian, and Chilo the Lacedaemonian; but of the seventh, some indeed say it is Periander of Corinth, others Anacharsis the Scythian, and others Epimenides the Cretan, whom Paul knew as a Greek prophet... Others, however, have included Acusilaus the Argive in the number of the seven wise men; others Pherecydes the Syrian; but Plato, instead of Periander, as unworthy of wisdom because he was a tyrant, places Myson the Chenean." But Laertius has handed down not only that there were various opinions about that seventh one, but also that there were more of them; nay, that even seventeen, or rather sixteen, are reckoned by some. Here, moreover, are his words, even if a little... [1321]

longer, which must therefore be transcribed, because they can bring some light to our Clement. In his proem, therefore, after he had said: “Thales, Solon, Periander, Cleobulus, Chilon, Bias, and Pittacus were considered wise,” he added: “To these they add Anacharsis the Scythian, Myson the Chenean, Pherecydes the Syrian, and Epimenides the Cretan. Some add Pisistratus the tyrant.” That same issue he pursues more fully in his first book in this manner: “There is great disagreement about their number; for Leandrius, instead of Cleobulus and Myson, inserts Leophantus of Gorsia, Lebedius or Ephesian, and Epimenides the Cretan. Plato, however, in the Protagoras, puts Myson in place of Periander; Ephorus puts Anacharsis in place of Myson; others add Pythagoras. Furthermore, Dicaearchus gives us four wise men by the consensus of all: Thales, Bias, Pittacus, and Solon; then he names six others, from the number of whom he might have chosen three, namely Aristodemus, Pamphilus, Chilon the Lacedaemonian, ^B Cleobulus, Anacharsis, and Periander. Some add Acusilaus, Caba, or Scabras the Argive. Hermippus, however, in his book On the Wise Men, reports that there were seventeen, from which number others choose those seven differently. He puts in the first place Solon, then Thales, Pittacus, Bias, Chilon, Cleobulus, Periander, Anacharsis, Acusilaus, Epimenides, Leophantus, Pherecydes, Aristodemus, Pythagoras, Lasus the son of Charmantides—or, as Aristoxenus reports, the son of Chabrinus—Hermioneus, and Anaxagoras. Indeed, Hypobotus in his Description of Philosophers sets forth this series of them: first Orpheus, then Linus, then Solon, Periander, Anacharsis, Cleobulus, Myson, Thales, Bias, Pittacus, Epicharmus, and in the last place Pythagoras.” You see, indeed, that regarding these wise men of Greece and their number, there were once almost as many opinions as there were heads. ^C But we could gather many other ancient testimonies about them here: but let it suffice to have added one, taken from Pausanias: “Before the doors of the Delphic temple,” he says, “are read documents useful for the lives of men, written by those men whom the Greeks called wise. These were, from the Ionian nation, Thales of Miletus, and Bias of Priene; from the Aeolian nation, from the island of Lesbos, Pittacus of Mitylene; from those who are in Asia, the Dorian Cleobulus of Lindus, furthermore the Athenian Solon, and Chilon the Spartan; Plato the son of Aristo enumerates Myson the Chenean as the seventh in place of Periander the son of Cypselus.” But the passage of Plato cited by Pausanias and by our Clement in his Protagoras, as Laertius rightly notes, reads in these words: “Of the race of those men was Thales of Miletus, and Pittacus of Mitylene, and Bias of Priene, and our Solon, and Cleobulus of Lindus, and Myson the Chenean; but among them Chilon the Lacedaemonian is reckoned as the seventh.” In his own letter to Dionysius, however, he wrote that Periander was accustomed ^D to be ascribed to this number of wise men; but without a doubt, as Clement says, he later expunged and deleted his name from this catalogue of illustrious men because of his tyranny.

Anacharsis, moreover, is read to have been placed in their number by Nicolaus, whose words in Stobaeus are as follows: “Of the number of these (among the Scythians), the Galactophagi, was also Anacharsis, thought to be one of the seven wise men, who set out for Greece to explore the laws of other nations.” Plainly consistent with these, according to Cyril of Alexandria, are these words: “Anacharsis himself was also of the Scythian race. But so great was his admiration for wisdom among the Greeks that some considered him to be ascribed to the number of the seven wise men.”

Furthermore, this sentiment of Anacharsis is recorded by Clement: “All the Greeks are Scythians to me.” But he was the one who was held in admiration among the Greeks, who said: “My clothing is a *chlaina* (cloak), my supper is milk and cheese.” Laertius has collected more of Anacharsis’s sayings, though not all, in his Life of him; since he not only omitted this one, but also that one, in which he replied to a certain man calling him a Scythian as an insult: “By race, not by character and morals.” Others have reported it differently and in this manner: “To an Attic who was heaping reproach upon him because he was a Scythian, ‘But to me,’ he said, ‘my fatherland is no disgrace, but yours is to you.’” Nor should it be a wonder to anyone that he said milk and cheese, as we have heard from our Clement, were his supper; since it has already been observed from Nicolaus that he was from the race of the Scythians who were called Galactophagi, and who, as he says, have only mare’s milk as their food, which they both drink and eat as cheese made from it. Moreover, the *chlaina* was a garment or a shaggy cloak, about which consult Pollux.

Clement further testifies that the theology of Pherecydes the Syrian was similar to the book of Heraclitus the *skoteinos*, or the obscure and dark one, and that whatever was said allegorically by him was taken from the prophecy of Cham. For Pherecydes himself declares the obscurity of his own theology to Thales in the letter which is carried under his name to him, the Greek words of which Casaubon thought should be rendered into Latin thus: “Whatever thou readest pertaining to the gods, it must be understood allegorically; for all things have been written enigmatically.” Others, however, had turned it into Latin thus: “Perchance I have reserved some things regarding theology, the rest it behooves one to understand; for I indicate all things rather than reveal them.” It does not escape us that this letter appears to many to be spurious and adulterated. But from it, nevertheless, is proven the obscure style of speech of Pherecydes, about which Salmasius has said more in his exercises on Solinus, pages 842 and 843, and it has been touched upon by us somewhat elsewhere.

Furthermore, regarding those wise men of Greece, you should see Laertius, who wrote their lives; Porphyry, cited by Cyril of Alexandria, book I, *Contra Julianum*, page 28; Valerius Maximus, book IV, chapter 1, § antepenultimate; Augustine, book XVIII, *De civitate Dei*, chapter 35, and the various observations of learned men on Laertius and Augustine. Read, besides, Plutarch’s book *The Banquet of the Seven Wise Men*, volume II, page 146 and following, and volume I in *The Life of Solon*, page 84; Ausonius’s *Ludus Septem Sapientum*; Tatian's *Oratio ad Graecos*; Theophilus, book III; Joach. Stephanus, book *De Jurisdictione veterum Graecorum*, chapter 1 and following; and Meursius, book *De vita, legibus, etc., Solonis*, chapter 5.

ARTICLE III. How the seven wise men of Greece can be said to be more recent than Moses and more ancient than the first three sects of Greek philosophers.

Clement affirms that those seven wise men of Greece were indeed subsequent to the age of Moses, but notes they were older than those three most famous and most ancient sects and successions of philosophers of which we have spoken above.

^A But then he exhibits for us the letter of Darius to Heraclitus, and in return the letter of Heraclitus to Darius. That this is in agreement with the words of our Clement, there is no one who does not see. Whence Suidas says regarding this same Heraclitus: “He lived in the sixty-ninth Olympiad, under Darius the son of Hystaspes, namely thirty-six years after Pythagoras, who had begun to flourish in the sixtieth Olympiad.” Eusebius, however, pushed the time of Heraclitus to the beginning of the seventieth Olympiad. And then, four years later: “Pythagoras the philosopher dies.” But we have spoken above concerning this age of Pythagoras.

Gervet declares that he encountered absolutely nothing regarding Mnesiphilus and Melancomas, mentioned by Clement. What then? Is it possible that he had not read these words of Plutarch in the *Life of Themistocles* regarding the former: “One must believe those rather who write that Themistocles was a follower of Mnesiphilus the Phrearrhian. This man was neither an orator nor of the school of philosophers whom they call Physicists; but he embraced that which they called wisdom, which was a knowledge of how to conduct political affairs and a practical prudence, and he held it as a sect from the succession of Solon; those who followed them confused it with forensic arts, and turned the meditation from the action of affairs to words, whence they are called sophists.” You will doubtlessly marvel that this escaped Hervet, and that nothing is noted about them in the scholia on our Clement. Concerning the tyrant Melancomas, however, nothing has occurred to us as yet, just as for others.

Furthermore, someone will ask us why Clement gave the first place among the sages to Thales—a true philosopher and, as we have said, the parent of the Ionian sect—yet affirmed that the seven sages of Greece were older than the three aforementioned sects of philosophers. It seems he wishes to suggest the reason to us himself, where, after having finished his discourse on those sages, he immediately added: “But finally Pythagoras, a companion of Pherecydes, was the first to call himself a philosopher.” Since, therefore, before Pythagoras, whom it is established was more recent than the Greek sages, no one assumed the name of philosopher, Clement affirms not at all undeservedly that these same sages of Greece flourished before the philosophers. However, if you refuse to trust us, and wish a witness not entirely uncertain to be brought forward for you, here is Eusebius at hand, by whom both this, and those things which our Clement argues concerning the same sages, are confirmed in a manner truly wonderful. Hear, I beg, his words: “And indeed the Greeks themselves confess that after Orpheus, Linus, and Musaeus... those seven men were famous in Greece for the praise of philosophy, whom they themselves also named sages. And yet, while Cyrus reigned over the Persians, they all flourished, at which time the newest of all the prophets among the Hebrews existed, more than six hundred years indeed after the Trojan times, but no fewer than one thousand and five hundred after Moses, as will easily be clear to you a little later from the calculation and sequence of times. But at about that age, when those seven more recent sages had emerged, they are reported to have been teachers of a more humane and chastened discipline; but yet, beyond certain famous and learned sentences, they left behind absolutely nothing. But much later the name of philosophers began to flourish and be proclaimed in Greece. The first of these was that Pythagoras, earlier a disciple of Pherecydes, by whom the invention of philosophy was made.”

ARTICLE IV.

What was the manner of philosophizing of the sages of Greece, and regarding some of their sayings and judgments.

What sort of philosophy these sages of Greece practiced...

and their manner of speaking, we have heard from Eusebius. But Clement explains more openly that which he shows to have been derived from the Hebrews and barbarians, and teaches that it was itself Hebraic and enigmatic: they embraced "brevity," as he puts it, which is both admonitory and most useful. This he proves by the testimony of Plato, whose book and words, although he did not cite them, must be transcribed here: "All of these"—namely, the sages of Greece—"were," says Plato, "emulous, studious admirers, as it were, of the Lacedaemonian erudition, and they delivered themselves into its discipline; and that a manner of this sort existed is clear to anyone from those short sayings, worthy of illustrious memory, which are circulated under their names. When they had gathered together, by common consent they consecrated the first-fruits of that wisdom to the Delphic Apollo, which, inscribed in the Delphic temple, are celebrated by the voices of all: *Know thyself,* and *Nothing in excess.* I say this, of course, for this reason, because that manner of philosophizing was ancient, such that they used great brevity of speech."

Clement further provides us with most of these brief and learned sayings of the sages ^A, and begins with that very famous one, *Know thyself*, which some have attributed to Chilon, but others to Thales, and Aristotle to the Pythia. Laertius ascribes it indeed to Thales; but "Antisthenes," he says, "in his *Successions* says that it belonged to Phemonoe, and that Chilon usurped it for himself." Regarding that utterance, Menagius observes more in this place of Laertius, and we ourselves previously noted something in our annotations on Ambrose. Read also Stobaeus, sermon 22, pages 176, 177, and 184.

But Pausanias, concerning that and the second apophthegm which Clement then mentions, *Nothing in excess*, has these things to say: "They indeed (the Greek sages), having set out to Delphi, dedicated those sayings, celebrated in the speech of men, to Apollo: *Know thyself* and *Nothing in excess*." Similarly also Plato, who mentions the former more than once, in the book inscribed *Charmides*, concerning the second and also the third, which was later cited by Clement, handed these things down in writing: "Subject to a diversity of interpretations are also other eulogies, inscribed later by others: *Nothing in excess*; *Give a pledge and ruin is near*"; and there he disputes regarding the adages transcribed from Clement, just as also in the *Philebus* and *Menexenus* again regarding the second: *Nothing in excess*. What then, of the fact that Pliny assigns those three utterances to Chilon in this way? "Mortals gave to Chilon the Lacedaemonian the fellowship of the oracles by consecrating his three precepts at Delphi in golden letters, which are these: *Know thyself*, and *Desire nothing in excess*; and *The companion of debt is misery*." For this last is the same as *Give a pledge, and ruin is near*, which Laertius records as having been spoken by Chilon in this way: *To not fail in a pledge is to avoid ruin*; where you may read the observations of Menagius. By Plutarch also these three utterances are shown in this way together: "There is an admiration even of the ancients for being brief-spoken, and for the fact that the Amphictyons did not inscribe the *Iliad* or the *Odyssey* or the *Paeans* of Pindar in the temple of the Pythian Apollo; but *Know thyself, Nothing in excess, Give a pledge and ruin is near*, admiring the gravity of the concise speech in such brevity, encompassing the meaning as if struck by a hammer." And indeed Laertius, where he notices that these and similar sentences were adjudged to others, warns us also that the second and third were adjudged to Chilon. There, furthermore, you will be able to consult the many things that Menagius brings forward in his own manner. You will find the Homeric poem cited by our Clement in the same place, *Odys* VIII, page 106. Its Latin version was undoubtedly omitted from the last editions of these *Stromata* by an error of the printers. But concerning those three sentences, consult, if you wish, Stobaeus, sermon 3, page 45; Sidonius Apollinaris, poem 15; Ausonius, *The Seven Sages*, Erasmus, *Adages*, chiliad 1, century 6, proverb 93, 96, and 97, etc.

^B Then Clement maintains that Didymus considers this to be Solon's, just as it is Cleobulus's: *The best is the mean.* But Laertius and Stobaeus vindicate this utterance for Cleobulus alone, just as Sidonius Apollinaris does in poem 15, verse 45: "You, Cleobulus of Lindos, command: That the best is the mean." Ausonius also, in *The Seven Sages*: "*Aristón metron* did the Lindian Cleobulus say," which is: *The best mode in all things.*

After this, our author observes this sentence: *All men are evil, or the majority of men are evil*, to have been attributed by Sotades the Byzantine to Bias. Nor perhaps entirely without merit. For Laertius, in the life of the same Bias, writes that he answered someone that "one must love as if we are about to hate; for the evil are the most numerous." Although the first part of this sentence—regarding love and hate—is attributed to the same Bias by Aristotle, Cicero nevertheless contends that it is not so much of this wise man: "But of some impure and ambitious person, or one who recalls all things to his own power." But the second part, Stobaeus, Ausonius, and Sidonius Apollinaris in the cited places, adjudge to Bias himself.

But to Periander was ascribed, as Clement added, this utterance: *Melétē pánta kathairei*, which Hervetus interprets: *Diligent meditation conquers all.* But Laertius reports this a little differently: "It is his also, this, *Melétē tò pán*," and it is described in the same words by Ausonius; but by Stobaeus, *Melétē tò pán*. Furthermore, the interpreter of Laertius preferred to render the Greek word *Melétē*, which others and even Sidonius Apollinaris preferred to translate as "meditation," as "exercise." And indeed this Greek word signifies both. Wherefore, if you prefer the latter interpretation to the former, you will not easily concede that Maro did not depart far from it when he sang: "Persistent labor conquers all." ^C Furthermore, you will doubtless wonder at Hervetus, who declares openly that he read these two later sentences nowhere other than in our Clement.

Besides this, Clement teaches that Pittacus is said to be the author, by common report, of this proverb: *Know the time.* In exactly the same way, Laertius adjudged that to the same Pittacus, no differently than the poets praised by us, Ausonius and Sidonius Apollinaris. Erasmus, whom anyone will be able to consult easily, brings together many things regarding this matter. ^D Finally, Meursius represents the most excellent sayings and utterances of Solon, collected from various authors.

Chapter 20. On pagan legislators and prophets.

ARTICULUS I. De ethnicis legislatoribus Solone, Pittaco, Praxiphane, Minoe, Zaleuco, ac quomodo hi tres legislatores primi dici potuerint. De Cerere, Lycurgo, Dracone, Pythagora et Epicuro. ^A

Of the seven sages of Greece, Clement mentions two, Solon and Pittacus; one of whom gave laws to the Athenians, the other to the Mytileneans. Regarding Solon, the matter is known to all, and is evident from Laertius, Plutarch, and Meursius, who have published the history of his life. Nor is it less certain regarding Pittacus, of whom Laertius writes in his Life: "He composed up to six hundred elegiac verses, and also spoke in prose to the citizens concerning laws." On this passage, consult the observations of Menagius.

Clement narrates elsewhere: "That the famous Pittacus, king of the Mytileneans, used to grind corn, employing it as an effective exercise." As Hervetus often moved us to great wonder by his ignorance of many things which Clement wrote, so here he leads us into the greatest wonder when he openly declares that he has read nowhere of Pittacus grinding corn. For these things are obvious to everyone, and offer themselves spontaneously—if I may say so—even to the slower reader, in the life of this same Pittacus, which he ought to have read before all others, in the words of Laertius: "To this, the exercise was the grinding of wheat, as the philosopher Clearchus testifies." Nor was this discourse of Plutarch on the same Pittacus much harder for Hervetus to find: "Thales, in jest, rightly said it was Epimenides who wished not to cause trouble for himself by grinding and cooking food, which was the case for Pittacus; for when he had come to Lesbos, he heard a serving-maid singing thus at the mill: 'Grind, mill, grind; for Pittacus also grinds, being king of great Mytilene.'" ^B

But who this Praxiphanes may be is much harder to say. For Clement is silent as to the nations for which he established laws, being content only to indicate his fatherland and father. But weigh with me, I beg, whether one might not identify him as the person who is attributed by Strabo to political and learned men in this way: "Rhodes produced memorable men... both civil and those versed in letters and philosophy, such as Panaetius himself, and Stratocles, Andronicus the Peripatetic, Leonidas the Stoic, and before these, Praxiphanes, Eudemus, and Hieronymus."

Regarding Zaleucus, whom Clement also asserts in the same place to have been the first to write laws, he later handed down this: "Plato, Ephorus, Chamaeleo, Heraclides in his work *On Drunkenness*, and Aristotle in *On the Republic of the Locrians*, have handed down to the monuments of literature that Zaleucus the Locrian received his laws from Minerva." He was, furthermore, a disciple of Pythagoras, and is called a legislator by Laertius and Suidas. Consult Iamblichus in his *Life of Pythagoras*. Moreover, Diodorus Siculus exhibits many laws passed by Zaleucus. Athenaeus, however, by whom the book of Aristotle cited by Clement is praised elsewhere, writes that those were condemned to death by Zaleucus who drank wine without a doctor's order, or for a cause other than the recovery of health. Aelian mentions this law along with others. Finally, the same Aelian and Valerius Maximus have handed down to memory that when his son was convicted of adultery, Zaleucus, in order to satisfy the law he himself had instituted—that adulterers be punished by the loss of both eyes—was moved by the prayers of the people seeking pardon, and gouged out one of his own eyes and one of his son's.

But, you will say, I grant that these things are true, certain, and clear. But you will urge, how could Zaleucus be called the first legislator by Clement, who, as Ephorus attests in Strabo, composed his laws from the laws of the Cretans, Laconians, and Areopagites, and only set forth the method and definition of the penalties to be imposed? The knot of this difficulty will surely be solved with ease if you note that Zaleucus, Minos, and others, if you like, are called "first" legislators by Clement in that sense alone: not that they were the first of all humans to enact laws, but because Zaleucus was the first of all who imposed them upon the Locrians, and others upon some other specific cities, provinces, or nations. ^C And indeed, Diodorus Siculus testifies elsewhere that the Egyptians claimed the best sanctions of laws were invented among them; elsewhere, however, he writes that it has been handed down by some that the first laws were promulgated by Ceres, and for that reason the name *Thesmophoros* was imposed upon her: "Some," he says, "assert that laws were promulgated by Ceres, by which men were brought to give to everyone his own, and from this promulgation she is called *Thesmophoros*." Pliny, however, asserts a little more firmly: "The same Ceres gave the first laws; as others thought, Rhadamanthus from Jove his father, ^D to his colloquy with whom in a cave..." But in the end, Ovid sang definitively:

^A *First Ceres moved the clods with a curved plow,* *First gave fruits and mild nourishment to the lands,* *First gave laws; all things are the gift of Ceres.*

But these things are no less false, and feigned by the pagans, than the claim that Zaleucus received his laws from Minerva. For Plutarch, regarding the familiar conversation of him and other lawgivers with God, discoursed in these words: "But if we grant credibility to these men, what then? Shall we deny that Zaleucus, Minos, Zoroaster, Numa, and Lycurgus, who governed kingdoms and established republics, had familiar dealings with God? Or, rather, shall we say that the gods seriously held counsel with them to suggest and advise what is right, but enjoyed the poets and the makers of lyric vibrations only by way of amusement?... Nor does the other report, which is related concerning Lycurgus and like-minded men, contain anything absurd, that they invented such things when managing a fierce and difficult-to-handle multitude, and introducing many novelties into their states, so as to attribute a divine authority to the very things they were proposing for the sake of the general welfare." You see, therefore, what credibility should be placed in those things which Clement reported as having been handed down by the pagans concerning Lycurgus: "They write that Lycurgus, constantly going to Delphi, received his laws from Apollo." Plutarch himself pursues this point more extensively. Wherefore, regarding both of them—namely, Minos and Lycurgus—Strabo wrote ^B quite openly and candidly: "Minos, as Plato says, descended into the cave of Jupiter for nine years and received from him the precepts which he was to bring to men. Lycurgus acted as his imitator in the same way. For, often traveling, he understood from the Pythia what things had to be commanded to the Lacedaemonians. How true these things were, I do not dispute." But he had said before: "Lycurgus betook himself to establishing laws, repairing to the god who is at Delphi, and bringing back mandates from thence, just as Minos pretended to bring back [precepts] from the cave of Jupiter," etc. ^C

Why then, you will ask, does Clement not fear to repeat these and similar fables seriously to us? Clearly, that he might pierce, conquer, and storm the pagans with their own weapons and arms. For from these things, which almost all of them believed to be true, he makes it plain that they themselves cannot derogate from the faith of those things which, as touching Moses and Christ the Lord, were most truly taught by the Jews and then by the Christians, and of their divine institutions.

After these things, however, Clement proceeds thus: "Lycurgus, many years after the capture of Troy, which was one hundred and fifty years before the Olympiads, brought laws to the Lacedaemonians. But Draco, who himself was a lawgiver, is found to have been at about the thirty-ninth Olympiad." Plutarch thought that there was nothing certain about the age of Lycurgus, and reports various opinions of ancient writers concerning it. Nevertheless, Tatian and later Suidas assign the age of Lycurgus, just as that of Draco, in this way: "Lycurgus was born many years after the capture of Ilium, [and] one hundred years before the Olympiads; but Draco is born about the thirty-ninth Olympiad." Therefore, he reckoned the elder Lycurgus as fifty years older than our Clement does. Eusebius, however, in his Chronicle at the year 1134: "Lycurgus is held to be eminent"; at the year 1196: "Lycurgus composed laws for the Lacedaemonians"; and at the year 1128: "The laws of Lycurgus were accepted by Lacedaemon according to the opinion of Apollodorus at this age"; finally at the year 1240: "Here the first Olympiad is established." From which it is evident that from the age of Lycurgus until the first Olympiad not more than one hundred and six years passed, as Eusebius opines, and far fewer from the time at which he is said to have founded the laws for the Lacedaemonians. But more recent chronographers [concerning the opinion of Tatian] ^D approach closer to Clement. Truly, if there be no error in the text of Clement, let no one be moved by this diversity of opinions; since, as Plutarch witnesses, there was the greatest disagreement among the ancients concerning the age of Lycurgus. Moreover, Petaviussubscribed to the assigned time of Draco for both Clement and Tatian; consult him and other chronographers, if you have leisure.

To this discourse on legislators, Clement continuously added: "But Antilochus, who wrote about all learned men, *ho tous historias pragmateusamenos*, completes three hundred and twelve years from the age of Pythagoras down to the death of Epicurus, which was the tenth of October." This last word, *annos* (years), was omitted in the Greco-Latin edition of Clement's works by a typographical error.

For what purpose, then, you will ask, is that mention of Pythagoras and Epicurus there? Is it because Pythagoras himself, as Laertius says, gave laws to the Italians, and was held in high regard with his disciples, who for the most part administered the republic, so prudently that it was called almost an *aristokratia*, that is, a republic of the best? Rightly, indeed, if you could prove that Epicurus also gave laws, either to his own country or to certain peoples. But if this cannot be proven, the sense of Clement seems to be this: Antilochus, who wrote about all learned men, covered a span of only three hundred and twelve years from the age of Pythagoras until the death of Epicurus. Which, indeed, is gathered from the assigned age of each not to be entirely foreign to the truth. However, he inserted that there according to his custom of writing *Stromata*, that is, disjointed things and often not cohering with one another, because he had previously made mention of the age of certain persons.

ARTICLE II. On the heathen seers, Sonchetes, Bacis, both Boeotian and Arcadian, on Amphiletus, Cometes, Cynirus, Admetus, Aristo, Amphiaraus, Epigenes, Dionysius, Nicias, Calchas, Mopsus, and on Batto, who is said to have composed the divination of Mopsus.

Besides the philosophers and wise men, there were many prophets, soothsayers, fatidici, and interpreters of oracles among the Greeks, and, to use the words of our Clement, *chresmologoi sychnoi*, "who predicted many things to many people." But Sonchetes, who is said by Clement to be an Egyptian arch-prophet and the teacher of Pythagoras, did not hold the lowest place among them. But because we have already discoursed upon him above in chapter 17, articles 2 and 4, we must now treat of others, whom Clement names one by one in the same place. But the first who offers himself to us is: Bacis, one a Boeotian, the other an Arcadian, *Bakides, ho men Boiotios, ho de Arkas*. Now, three Bacides are distinguished by Aelian: the first a Greek, the second an Athenian, the third an Arcadian. And Philetas, according to Suidas, tells [a story] more to the mind of our Clement: "That one was from Eleon of Boeotia, but another an Athenian, and a third an Arcadian, from the city of Caphia, who was also called Cydas and Aletes." Theopompus, indeed, in the ninth [book] of his *Philippica*, when he relates many other wonderful things about this Bacis, [states] also that one which lately cleansed the wives of the Lacedaemonians who were seized by madness, by an oracle of Apollo, who had given this cleanser to them. But Pausanias [says] of the first one: "Bacis, he says, is from Boeotia, whom they believe to have prophesied by the instinct of the nymphs." But later: "You may find this invasion of the barbarians into Greece predicted in the oracles of Bacis." Finally, he had said before: "Of this Bacis, whom they report to have prophesied by the love of the nymphs, also the oracles published to other peoples of Greece are celebrated." There also, and in another book, his prophetic poetry...

^A is reported by Diodorus Siculus to have been recorded in the writings of the Argives against Thebes, concerning the expedition and the war. From this, he concludes that Amphiaraus was one generation later than the destruction of Ilium.

As for the other seers mentioned by Clement, Hervetus either passes over them in silence or declares them to be entirely unknown to himself. Epigenes, however, is considered—as Pliny notes—a grave author in the first rank, and one of stellar science, just as Dionysius is an expert in medicine. Yet perhaps the skill of prophesying will not be as easily granted to him as it is to the others.

20. The life of Nicias, however, was published to the light by Plutarch; at the end of it, he testifies that this very Nicias had predicted many things to the Athenians. But if anyone objects that this Nicias was not the Carystian, let him point out to us another who was truly a Carystian and a seer, and we shall yield at once. Furthermore, many, as we have said, have preferred the name of Ariston, concerning whom Menagius has more to say. But who, other than our Clement, would call Ariston the Thessalian a soothsayer? He is cited by no one at all.

28. To this choir of seers, Clement has inserted Calchas and Mopsus, who were, he says, in the times of the Trojans; but Mopsus is more ancient, as one who sailed with the Argonauts. Strabo, however, observes from Jerome that there were three men called by the name of Mopsus, of whom the first was the son—as it is read in the Latin version—of Tiresias and a seer, whereas in the Greek it is had: "from Mopsus, the seer [son] of Tiresias." The second Mopsus was a Lapith, a companion of the Argonauts. Finally, the third Mopsus is he from whom the Attic region assumed the appellation of Mopsopia. But let us see from the same Strabo of whom our Clement speaks. In another book, therefore, these things were recorded by him: «It is handed down by memory that Calchas, along with Amphilochus, the son of Amphiaraus, came there from Troy on foot; and when he had encountered at Claros a better seer, Mopsus, the son of Manto, who was the daughter of Tiresias, he died of grief.» He sets forth the story from Hesiod, Pherecydes, and others. But later, he says, Mallus was founded by Amphilochus and Mopsus, the son of Apollo and Manto, of whom many stories are told, and mention of them has been made by us when we were discoursing about Calchas and the dispute concerning divination between Mopsus and Calchas. Since, therefore, Strabo, just like our Clement, joins Calchas to Mopsus, it is certainly gathered from there that the discourse was instituted by both about the same men, and consequently about Mopsus, [the son] of Apollo and Manto. From which you may observe in passing, I ask, the former passage of Strabo seems corrupted and to be corrected from the latter: "from Mopsus, the son of Manto [and] Tiresias." But this is for another time.

To our point, Cicero rightly writes ^D of Calchas, that he was an augur—the Orator speaks thus—by far the best, and that he was the leader of the fleet; but I believe he was an expert in auspices, not in lands. Amphilochus and Mopsus were kings of the Argives, but they were also augurs, and they founded Greek cities on the maritime coast of Cilicia. The passage of Homer, cited by him, occurs shortly after the beginning of the Iliad, book 1, page 6: Calchas, son of Thestor, by far the best of augurs, Who knew those things that are, and those that will be, and those that had been, And led the ships of the Achaeans into Ilium.

From the same Cicero, the passage of Tertullian must be corrected, where Mopsus the seer is read in Sicily instead of Cilicia. There exists even now in the *Anthology*, or the florilegium of miscellaneous epigrams, one epigram on the prophetic Calchas. ^A Nor was Ptolemy less accurate in book III, chapter 16, and Strabo in book VII, page 340, where they made it manifest to all where that town is situated, and Pausanias in book IV, page 144, why it is so called.

ARTICLE III.

Clement continues his discourse regarding seers thus: "Pythagoras, too, the great, ὁ μέγας, always applied his mind to foreknowledge." By Hervetus, this is proven by the name Pythagoras alone, which is said to have been imposed upon him for the reason that he predicted the truth no less than the Pythian himself. I confess, indeed, that Laertius in his *Life* of him asserted this on the testimony of Aristippus; but the study of foreknowledge and divination could be proven far more validly by the authority of that same Laertius than by the etymology of the name, and by these words of his: "He used only that divination which is brought about by oracles and auguries, but he sought the least from that which is performed by fire, with the exception of frankincense only." If anyone desires further witnesses, see Plutarch in his fifth book *On the Opinions of the Philosophers*, chapter 2, page 904, Porphyry in Eusebius, *Preparation for the Gospel*, book X, chapter 3, page 464, and Suidas at the word *Pythagora ta symbola*, etc.

The second seer is Abaris the Hyperborean, by origin a Scythian, as Suidas notes, son of Seuthes, who wrote the Scythian oracles and, as it pleases some, was a disciple of Pythagoras. Mention of him is made by Herodotus in book IV, § 36, and Diodorus Siculus in book II of his *Bibliotheca*, page 92, Vossius in *De poetis Graecis*, pages 15 and 16, and others.

The third is Aristaeas of Proconnesus, who, to use the words of Strabo, was the author of the poems that are called the *Arimaspea*, second to none in prestidigitation, and whom some thought to have been the teacher of Homer. Discourse about him is not infrequent among various writers: Herodotus, book IV, § 3; Pausanias, book I, page 22, and book V, page 154; Tatian, *Oration to the Greeks*, page 173; Origen, book III *Against Celsus*, page 449; Aulus Gellius, book IX of the *Attic Nights*, chapter 4. See the observations of Oiselius upon him, and Vossius ^B in *De historicis Graecis*, book I, chapter 6, and book IV, page 433.

Nor should Pliny be omitted, who relates not only about this Aristaeas, but also about Epimenides, whom Clement mentions later, certain fictitious things which you will find in his life composed by Laertius, and in Pausanias, Plutarch, and others.

But that our Clement added regarding the same Epimenides that he came to Sparta, Hervetus honestly confessed that this had not been read by him. But it ought to have been read by him in the published *Life of Epimenides* by Laertius, as we have said, where it is written that his body is kept by the Lacedaemonians.

Pausanias, however, in his second book, or in the *Corinthiaca*, writes indeed: "Before the temple of Minerva you may see a tomb, which they say is of Epimenides; for the Lacedaemonians, while they were warring with the Gnossians, captured Epimenides alive; and afterwards, when they had killed him because he predicted nothing pleasant, they buried his uplifted corpse in that place." But in the third

^A book of the Laconians he affirms these things more positively: "Among these is the monument of Epimenides the Cretan, son of Aphareus and Perieres." But I consider those things which are commemorated by the Lacedaemonians about Epimenides to be truer than those commemorated by the Argives.

Zoroaster the Mede and Empedocles of Agrigentum follow him. But of both of these we have spoken elsewhere. The life of the latter was published by Laertius. Regarding those following—Phormio, Polyaratus, and Empedotimus—Hervetus says that nothing occurred to him that he could speak of. But there are many Phormios: one was a Peripatetic, who was said to have discoursed at length before Sennibal, and not without his annoyance, on the duty of a commander and on all military matters. Another was Phormio, son of Asopichus, whom the Athenians, having paid off all the debt he owed, appointed as commander of their fleet, as Pausanias says, and whose victories Diodorus Siculus celebrates. A third is mentioned by the same Pausanias, the blind Phormio, who foresaw in a dream that if the Erythraean men had woven a rope from the hair of women, they would easily sail the ship wherever they wished. And indeed, they relate that not only did this happen, but that he also received the faculty of sight. He was therefore that seer, but an Erythraean; Clement, however, speaks of Phormio the Laconian. Finally, the same Pausanias says there was another Phormio, a true Spartan, who inhabited the house of the sons of Tyndareus; but whether he also was a seer is not easy to say. See, therefore, whether Clement ought to be understood as referring to this one, or that one, or certainly to some other.

Furthermore, Suidas mentions a certain Empedotimus, who had written on physics; but who would dare to affirm with certainty that he was a seer? Yet the memory of Polyaratus is rarer and far more obscure. Therefore, that which Clement has added regarding the daemon of Socrates, and which we have discussed above, is by far more thoroughly explored. But regarding the ring of Execestus, the tyrant of the Phocians, by which he knew the time for carrying out affairs, Clement cites as a witness Aristotle in the book *On the Republic of the Phocians*. But we have lost this book a long time ago. ^B

Clement then passes on to other seers, who were men in reality, but considered gods in opinion, in Egypt. At the head of the rest is Hermes the Theban, whom Hervetus considers to be Trismegistus. Nor, indeed, shall we deny that both the name and the homeland assigned by Clement fit him. But both, no less, also harmonize beautifully with the last two of the five Mercuries, who are said not only to have had the same name and the same homeland, but also, as Cicero testifies, have been inscribed into the number of the gods. Moreover, some think the last to be Trismegistus himself, and we judge that they will easily go over to the opinion of Hervetus. But more regarding the various Mercuries can be found in Pausanias throughout his work, and regarding the Egyptian, in Diodorus Siculus, book two, page ten, and regarding him and others, in Lilio Giraldi, *Historia deorum syntagma 9*.

There he also distinguishes three Aesculapiuses, though without mentioning their homeland. However, Hervetus suspected that the one whom Clement calls "Memphitan" in the cited passage was none other than he who, in Cicero, is said to have invented the *specillum*—or rather, the *specium*—which is the surgical instrument by which the depth of a wound is wont to be explored, and who was the first to have bandaged a wound. Rightly, indeed, if that could be proven by any reasoning or authority from the same Hervetus. Regarding the Mercuries, I have already discussed something above (cap. 1, art. 3). But regarding Memphis, you will be able to read more in Strabo, *Geography*, book 17, page 803 and following; Herodotus, book 2, §§ 99 and 163; and Pliny, at times elsewhere but especially in book five, chapter nine, page 554. ^C

After Tiresias and Manto, of whom we spoke a little before, there follows in our Clement [the mention] of Helenus, regarding whom Tullius says: "What," he says, "did Priam, king of Asia, not have his son Helenus and his daughter Cassandra as seers, the one through auguries, the other through divine agitation of mind?" For which reason Homer sang many things about him, and also Virgil, whom you will be able to hear singing many things about him in his *Aeneid*, book two, verse 40 and following, and again at verse 201 and following.

Furthermore, Hervetus, who notes his loves and prophecy—though without citing any author—immediately added information regarding Brenus, Crenus, Iachus, Polyidus, and many others, whom Clement subsequently recounts, [content] which can scarcely be found anywhere else. And thus our Clement proceeds: *Oenone and Brenus in Ilio* (Oenone and Brenus in Troy). But some suspect that there is a certain error of the copyist there, and that it should rather be read *Oenone Cebreni* (Oenone, daughter of Cebren). This is she, the daughter of the river Cebren, about whom Apollodorus [writes] in book 2. But because we have already shown that there was a certain seeress Oenone at the time of Paris or the Trojan war, who would not see it as more probable that Clement is not speaking of that one, but of this one, who existed in those times along with Brenus, Laocoon, and Helenus?

Afterward, Clement introduces Crenus among the Heraclidae, about whom read Herodotus, book 1, § 7; Diodorus Siculus, *Bibliotheca*, book 4, pages 181 and 182; and Eusebius, *Praeparatio evangelica*, book 5, chapter 20, pages 210 and 211. Consider briefly whether that one whom he calls Carnus, *Karnos*, might be said to be the same one whom our Clement surnames *Krenos*. ^D

Truly, it will seem strange to no one that Hervetus wasted his oil and labor in searching for Iachus and the Iacidae. For both that name is corrupted in his codex, and in Latin and Greek editions it is better rendered as *Jamus* and *Iamidae*. In Pausanias, however, the following is found about them: "You may see a monument which was erected to the seers who came from Elis, and are called the Iamidae." And again in another book: "The seers who are named Iamidae are descended from Iamus, whom Pindar recorded in song to have sprung from the seed of Apollo and to have received from his father the skill of divination." To these things, moreover, Cicero [says]: "Elis in the Peloponnese has two certain families, one of the Iamidae, the other of the Clytidiae, outstanding in the nobility of augury."

Regarding the subjoined seer, of whom our Clement later says: "Polyidus of Argos and Megara, whom the tragedy mentions," the same Pausanias made mention without doubt in these words: "At the first approach to the temple of Liber Pater is the tomb of Astycrates and Manto, the daughters of Polyidus... Polyidus himself is said to have come to Megara to purify Alcathous of the slaughter of his son Callipolidis, and to have built the temple of Liber with a statue, which is entirely hidden in our time except for the face." In the *Anthologia*, or *Florilegium* of various epigrams, one is read where the poet sings about the seer Polyidus thus:

Near him Another seer was, by the laurel of Phoebus Adorned, Polyidus. But from his lips to shake He wished, the prophetic song; but his art In a voiceless bond restrained him.

Truly, Hervetus rightly notes, as recounted by Ovid, ^A what our Clement then narrates concerning Telemus. But he could have first cited Homer in book IX of the *Odyssey*, page 128. He has also rightly and deservedly taken Herodotus' testimony concerning Onomacritus. However, it is cited erroneously in the printed editions of Herodotus as book VI, § 5, instead of book VII, Polymnia § 6. But there will be another place to speak of Onomacritus.

Then indeed Clement ^B reports that Amphiaraus—of whom Diodorus Siculus and we ourselves have spoken elsewhere—was a seer, as were Theoclymenus in Cephalenia, Telmessus in Caria, and Galeus in Sicily. Now, is not the first of these three Theoclymenus, who, having been called a seer not once by Homer, is said to have foretold the arrival of Ulysses? Regarding him, however, Hervetus says he found nothing, just as he did not with the second, namely the seer Telmessus: but only about the town of Telmessus in Lycia, or Caria, celebrated for the discipline of augury. Yet, in his commentaries on the same *Protrepticus* of our Clement, he says it seems likely to him that this town drew its name from the seer Telmessus. But I have noted some things concerning this passage, from which it is clearly evident how little success Hervetus had in his search, looking for many things that were not deeply hidden nor at all difficult to find.

For he even willingly confesses that as to the third seer, Galeus, he had found absolutely nothing elsewhere. But what prevented him from at least finding what the ancients had left written about the Galei or Galeotae? For in Athenaeus one encounters this poem of Archippus regarding the Galei, the wisest of all seers: *Galei, surely the wisest of all seers.*

^B 281 Furthermore, besides Aelian and Hesychius, Cicero testifies that the Galeotae were not only seers, but, as Clement said regarding Galeus, they were soothsayers in Sicily. Concerning Dionysius, the orator handed down this memory: "To him, the interpreters of portents, who were then called Galeotae in Sicily, gave answer." Bochart, however, observes that some think their name was derived from the industry of the lizard (*stellio*); yet he thinks they derived it from the Hebrew word *Gala*, which signifies "to reveal." Finally, the mythologists fabricate that they derived their origin from Galeotes, the son of Apollo and Themisto, and brother of Telmessus. If anyone henceforth should prove that this Galeotes in reality is he whom Clement calls *Galeus*, he will easily lead us to his opinion.

Hervetus was somewhat more fortunate when he accepted from Volaterranus that Idmon, who is later introduced by Clement as prophesying among the Argonauts, was the son of Apollo and Asteria. But he ought to have noticed that this man too is said to be the son of Abas, not only by Herodotus and Apollonius, but also by Orpheus, or rather, by the author of the poems ascribed to him.

*For then there came the bastard son of Abas, the mighty Idmon,* *Whom the daughter of Pheres, Antianeira, having bathed in the river,* *Bore to lord Apollo, by the divine stream.* *To him Phoebus gave prophecy and the prophetic voice,* *That he might speak to men that which was ordained.* *Martius Idmon is numbered as the bastard son of Abas,* *Whom at one time he begot from his union with Apollo* ^A *above the divine waves of the Pheretian one.* *To him Phoebus gave the ability to know and to utter future things with his voice,* *That he might speak things worth remembering to the people.*

But afterwards, in the same Clement of ours, Amphilochus, the son of Amphiaraus, is called a seer in Cilicia. But what do you think Hervetus observed about this seer in his commentaries? Truly amazing. For he informs us that it is written in Pausanias, in the *Corinthiaca*, Book II—add page 61 and 62—that this Amphilochus was the son of Amphiaraus. Correctly, indeed. What else? That he was a seer in Cilicia, he says, I have not read. Why, therefore, most learned sir, did you not read the first book of the same Pausanias? You would certainly have read there these very words of his: "Amphilochus has his own altar in the city itself among the Athenians, and in the Cilician city of Mallus there is his oracle, which is the least fallacious of all that exist in my time." But what of the fact that our Clement himself in another book ^B unequivocally numbers Amphilochus among many who were said to have given oracles? But he surely appears to be no other than this one: "a seer in Cilicia." Finally, we have already heard Cicero speaking of him, whom he joins with Mopsus.

Hervetus observed almost the same things about Alcmaeon, who is asserted by Clement to have prophesied among the Acarnanians, as he did about Amphilochus, namely, that he was also the son of Amphiaraus and Eriphyle, and that he killed his mother: but that he was a seer only insofar as his father Amphiaraus was a seer. But not only Diodorus Siculus, but Pausanias as well, and others, tell and recount more things about this Alcmaeon. Pausanias added that he had sired Acarnan and Amphoterus by his second wife, Callirhoe, and that the Acarnanians, who were previously called Curetes, were named after Acarnan. But Pausanias is completely silent as to how he was a seer there; unless perhaps he leaves room for conjecture from the fact that he handed down that cypresses grew around his tomb in Psophis to such an extent that the mountain was overshadowed by their height ^C. He adds that they are not cut, inasmuch as the natives deem them sacred to Alcmaeon and call them virgins. Whether or not Alcmaeon poured forth oracles there, and is for that reason called a soothsayer by Clement among the Acarnanians, we do not dare to define at all.

Anias also in Delos, Clement continues, was a seer. But Hervetus notices that he is called a king and priest of Apollo by Virgil, but that he had read nowhere that he was a seer. But he certainly should have read the fifth book of Diodorus Siculus, where these things are contained in the very same words: "To Staphylus and Chrysothemis were born three daughters, Molpadia, Rhoeo, and Parthenos. Apollo lay with Rhoeo and made her pregnant. Her father, angered by this, as if she had been corrupted by a man, threw his daughter, enclosed in a chest, into the sea. She, having been cast into Delos, gave birth to a male child, to whom she gave the name Anius. And because he had been saved from danger beyond hope, she placed the infant on the altar of Apollo and prayed to the God that, if he were truly his offspring, he would grant him salvation. And then, they recount that the boy was hidden by Apollo; yet he later bestowed upon him careful education, and instructed in the knowledge of divination, raised him to certain great honors."

Into the number of these same seers, our author again aggregates Aristander the Telmessian, who was with Alexander. It is nothing strange, says Hervetus, since he was from that town in which, as Arrian testifies, the divinations of boys and women were held to be most certain. But what need is there for conjecture, where Plutar-

Plutarch, in the same place, not only ascribes the same Aristander to the seers, but also calls him a seer by name? "Aristander the seer," he says, "when he was inspecting the entrails of the sacrificed animals, asserted more confidently to Corone, that the city would undoubtedly be taken that month... This omen had an outcome corresponding to the prediction of Aristander." He recounted more things similar to these in the same place, pages 684, 693, and 694. You may also consult Aelian in the nineteenth book of his *Various History*, the last section.

In short, three men—but not without the authority of some witness—close this line of pagan seers: for Philochorus, as Clement says, reports that Orpheus was a seer. But that he was a distinguished poet, Hervetus argues, and all agree; yet we learn from Clement and his guide Philochorus that he was a seer. Is that all from these two? What then, did not Pausanias also assert this clearly in these words? "A certain Egyptian thought that Amphion and Orpheus, although he was said to be a Thracian, were Egyptians, and that for this reason it was attributed to the one that he lured wild beasts, and to the other that he moved stones to build walls, because both excelled in the knowledge of the magi." And we read things not far different from these written by Diodorus Siculus. You may see Pliny and Natalis Comes in the seventh book of his *Mythology*, chapter 14.

Then indeed Clement says: "Theopompus, and Ephorus, and Timaeus write that a certain Orthagoras was a seer." Quotations from this Orthagoras' *On Things Indian* are cited by Aelian, book sixteen, *On Animals*, c. 35, and book seventeen, c. 5. Strabo, however, narrates what he consigned to writing concerning the Island of Tyrina. But whether this is the very same man, whom the three authors praised by Clement proclaim to be a seer, some may suspect, but no one will dare to assert with certainty.

Finally, the last place among the seers is given there by Clement to Gaius Julius Nepos, inasmuch as he is named by that title by Pythocles the Samian in the fourth book of the *Italics*. And he cites the third book of the same work in a similar way, "As Pythocles [says] in the third [book] of the *Italics*," as Plutarch—just as Clement himself did elsewhere—cited the third book of his *On Concord*. Since, therefore, it is certain that various books of this writer existed, it should also not be in doubt that in them Gaius Julius Nepos, as Clement testifies, is called a seer.

To all these must be added Branchus, whom our Clement also calls an oracle-giver in another book, where he notes that certain verses of Empedocles were ascribed to him by Apollodorus of Corcyra. But of him, Statius sang this in the second book of the *Thebaid*: "...And to the ancestral honor Branchus..." Again, in the eighth book: "And the unshorn Branchus shall close the sanctuaries, Nor shall the Clarian [Apollo] nor any suppliant consult the doors And the Didymean thresholds, nor the Lycian."

You may see, if you wish, the observations of various men on these verses concerning this seer. Nor, however, should these words of Strabo concerning the same Branchus be passed over: "They say that Branchus was born later from the stock of Machaereus, who presided over the temple at Didyma." And afterwards: "There, fables say that Branchus existed, and the love of Apollo." Laertius, however, asserts that the Branchidae temple was built by Branchus. But consult the observations of Casaubon and Menagius on this place.

Finally, beyond all those things which we have said thus far concerning the pagan seers, you may still read

ARTICLE IV. On pagan women who were prophetic, and the seers Hippo, Boeo, Manto, the Sibyls, Oenone, and Phaemonoe.

Concerning the second seer, who is named by Clement Boeo, or Boeus, Hervetus says it is a wonder there is silence everywhere, and that her name would have perished entirely, had not our author himself taken care to preserve it in his writings. What then? Did not Pausanias, in his tenth book, preserve the name of Boeo in these words? "Boeo, an indigenous woman, reported that at Delphi, with a hymn composed, she dedicated the oracle to Apollo, along with others, [such as] Olen, who was the first to prophesy, and the first to find hexameters." These are the verses which Boeo made: "Here the youths fashioned the sanctuary for thee, Phoebus, Long ago, and Pagasus and divine Agyieus, etc."

The third prophetic woman is Manto, concerning whom Clement again [says]: "Tiresias and Manto, as Euripides says." The history, or fable, of Manto is too well known for it to have escaped Hervetus. But since no witness is cited by him, perhaps it will not be irrelevant to show here three verses of Virgil concerning her: "He also leads the host from his ancestral shores, Ocnus, The son of the prophetic Manto and the Tuscan stream: He who gave [thee] walls, and to thee, Mantua, his mother's name."

Pausanias, however, related these things concerning her, and also concerning Tiresias: "It is handed down in the monuments of the Greeks that when the Argives, having followed the sons of Polynices, had taken Thebes, while they were dragging the seer Tiresias also to the Delphic Apollo along with the remaining booty, he, feeling ill on the way, having drunk water from the spring Tilphussa, breathed his last. His tomb is at the very spring. They say that Manto, the daughter of the seer, was consecrated by the Argives to Apollo: but that she had been sent away by ship, at the command of the God, to Colophon in Ionia, and there married Rhacius the Cretan." The other things which are said concerning Tiresias, namely, concerning the number of years he wrote he had lived, and that he survived as a woman after being a man, and that in the *Odyssey* Homer said he alone was wise among the shades—all have heard these things already.

Indeed, things not entirely dissimilar concerning Tiresias occur in Cicero in this manner: "Amphiaraus and Tiresias [were] not lowly and obscure, nor like those, as it is in Ennius, 'Who for the sake of their own gain stir up fictitious opinions:' but [they were] clear and leading men, who, having been warned by birds and signs, spoke of future things." Of the second of whom even

^A Homer says in the underworld that he alone has wisdom, while the others flit about like shadows. Furthermore, Clement puts forward his own guide, Euripides, by whom Tiresias is in truth introduced in the *Phoenissae*, act 3, as prophesying; the passage of Homer, moreover, is praised by Pausanias and Cicero, and is found in *Odyssey* book x, page 145. Finally, we have already touched upon Tiresias and Manto in the previous article.

After this, Clement ^A enumerates among the prophetic women the band of Sibyls, whom he calls one by one by their own names. But these matters have been discussed by us at length elsewhere, and more than once, in our previous dissertations.

Clement testifies that there was yet another prophetess—though this is in an extraneous place—by the name of Oenone. She was a nymph of Ida who, having been caught by love for Paris, foretold to him that, returned from Greece, he would kindle the conflagration of his fatherland. Ovid published her letter to Paris in verse, and it is found elsewhere still; just as Strabo makes mention of the tomb of both, [that is] of Oenone and of Paris. See Parthenius, *Erotica*, chapter 4. Finally, Clement ^B included in the group of these prophetic women Phoemonoe, whom some believed had been the first to pour forth responses or oracles to Acrisius at Delphi. But more on her shortly, when we must speak of the invention of the hexameter poem.

283 CHAPTER XXI.

On the inventors of the sciences, arts, and other things.

ARTICLE I.

On the inventors of astrology, lamps, the division of the year into twelve months,

the chaste approach to temples and abiding therein, geometry,

and foreseeing the future from the stars and the flight of birds,

likewise of divination by entrails and dreams, and also the trumpet,

the flute, the pipe, and the modes.

Clement shows by a long induction ^B that almost all disciplines and arts, just as philosophy, as shown above, were not invented by the Greeks, but by barbarians. Eusebius fully supports our author, and confirms this opinion not only by various rational proofs, but also by the very certain authority of ancient writers among the pagans. For he inserted into his own writings that lengthy fragment of his on the inventors of things; yet the order of the discourse is more than once changed, with words sometimes transposed, and some things omitted entirely.

How true the opinion of both is, so that it may be plain to all, the things which Clement mentions—except for some, on which we have discoursed above, such as the invention of letters, laws, and iron—must now be run through by us one by one, insisting upon the footsteps of our author. Let us therefore begin our discourse with him from astrology, by which, he says, the Egyptians, as also the Chaldeans, were first initiated, and from them it was later derived to others. And indeed Diodorus Siculus, where he disputes about the Egyptians, says: "The Thebans," he says, "proclaim themselves to be the most ancient of all mortals, among whom was invented philosophy and a more exact astrology, their location in the world aiding them to know more clearly the risings and settings of the stars." ^C And afterwards he says: "The Egyptians affirm that letters and the notation of the stars, as well as geometric speculations and very many arts, and the establishment of the best laws, were invented among them." Furthermore, they assert that the Chaldeans in Babylonia are colonists of the Egyptians, and, having been taught astrology by their priests, arrived at that fame. Finally, in a subsequent book he discusses the astrology of the Chaldeans more copiously.

Nevertheless, in another book he thus narrates that the Egyptians received the same science from Actis, the son of the Sun: "Actis, having traveled into Egypt, founded Heliopolis, and gave it his father’s name. And from this ^B the Egyptians received the knowledge of astrology. Afterward, when the greater part of mankind in Greece had perished, overwhelmed by the flood, and the records of letters had been simultaneously destroyed, the Egyptians, having seized this opportunity, claimed the study of astrology for themselves. And when the Greeks, through the ignorance of letters, could no longer claim the culture for themselves, a rumor prevailed that they [the Egyptians] had been the first of all to discover the knowledge of the stars."

Therefore, it is not at all certain and explored whether the Egyptians invented astrology, or whether they falsely boasted that it was invented by them. Wherefore Laertius says: "They themselves also assert that they were the first to invent geometry, astrology, and arithmetic." Whether they boasted of having invented them truly or falsely, he left [that point] silent, and perhaps not without consideration. For there was a diverse opinion among the ancients on this matter, as Pliny bears witness. For, he says, Atlas, son of Libya, invented astrology; others say the Egyptians; others the Assyrians. But earlier, where he speaks of Babylon: "There endures there," as he himself speaks, "the temple of Jove Belus. This was the inventor of the stellar science." Which indeed was adopted and transcribed by Solinus. But if we believe Servius, Prometheus first taught the Assyrians astrology. Nevertheless, Josephus thinks that the Egyptians learned the knowledge of both numbers and the stars from Abraham. For, he says, "Before the arrival of Abraham, the Egyptians were uninstructed in these kinds of disciplines, which, having proceeded from the Chaldeans to the Egyptians, finally arrived from there to the Greeks." But what of the fact that, in Eusebius, from whom these words of Josephus were transcribed, Polyhistor traces the origin of astrology higher, to Enoch himself, and proves by the testimony of Artabanus that it was subsequently communicated by Abraham to the Egyptians and Phoenicians? But Isidore of Seville reports the opinion of Josephus and adds: "The Greeks, however, say that this art was first devised by Atlas, and for that reason it is said that he supported the heavens." Finally, Theodoretus clarifies the sentiment of others rather than his own in this way: "Some say that the first inventors of geometry, astrology, and astronomy were the Egyptians; but the observation of the days and nativities is said to be the invention of the Chaldeans." ^D

Without doubt, Clement speaks to the same sense, that astrology flowed from the Egyptians and Chaldeans to other men. Then he immediately added: "The Egyptians, for their part, were the first to teach [men] to light lamps and divided the year into twelve months,"

^A a rule was established, that one should not enter the temple while having had relations with women, nor approach the sacred rites unless washed. These are the ones who were first to find time for ceremonies. For most other mortals, except for the Egyptians and the Greeks, have relations in the temples, and arising from Venus, they enter the temple unwashed, thinking that a human is just like other living creatures.

In addition to these, Clement relates that the same Egyptians were also the inventors of geometry. We have already seen this asserted a little earlier, and elsewhere by Diodorus, Laertius, and Theodoret, and even by Tatian. But Laertius, in another book, points out more significantly who the inventor of geometry was, where he writes of Pythagoras: "That he also perfected geometry, although before him Moeris had found its elements, is the claim of Anticlides in the second book *On Alexander*." Yet this Moeris or Myris ruled over Egypt, concerning whom Diodorus Siculus gives more details. By Plato, however, the invention of geometry is ascribed to Theut, a demon of Egypt. Furthermore, on the cited passage of Laertius, various observations are to be read.

But how it is said that geometry was invented by the Egyptians, you will learn first from Herodotus, Book II, § 109; Diodorus Siculus, Book I, p. 73; and Strabo, Book XVII of his *Geography*, p. 757 and 758: "on account, namely, of the measurement of the fields, for which there is need, he says, when the Nile in its flooding confuses the boundaries."

However, Josephus, against the authority and testimony of so many ancient writers, claims that invention of geometry and astronomy for the most ancient Hebrew patriarchs, in such a way that he ^B asserts, without doubt, that on that account God prolonged their lives to far more years than other men, "then also for the sake of virtue, and the utility of the things they devised, [namely] astronomy and geometry." Then, as much on account of the pursuit of virtue as for the utility of the astronomy and geometry they invented, God granted them a more prolonged life, the certainty of which they could not have attained if they had lived less than six hundred years; for from so many years the "great year" consists. But this does nothing against the opinion of our Clement, who proves elsewhere from the sacred sources of the Hebrews that these and all other things, which the Greek philosophers and other professors of various arts and sciences taught as true, were drawn. For he seems here to be attempting to demonstrate nothing other than that those same disciplines and arts were, by their own admission, devised not by the Greeks, but by the barbarians.

Wherefore he proceeds thus ^C: "But there are those who say that the Carians, who gather knowledge from the stars, invented prescience." This indeed we have noted as having been handed down in writings by Tatian elsewhere. But if by that name nothing else is signified than *prognostication*, that is, the consideration specifically of the hours of birth, others assign this to the Chaldeans. For Cicero indeed says: "In Syria, the Chaldeans excelled in the knowledge of the stars and the cleverness of their wits." Whence also Isidore of Seville ^D: "The Chaldeans taught astrology and the observation of births." And truly, for this reason, those addicted to this vain and fallacious science, called by the ancient Fathers of the Church by the name of Chaldeans alone, are often rebuked.

Then next Clement says: "The Phrygians were the first to observe the flight of birds. But the Tuscans, who were neighbors of Italy, perfectly mastered the art of divination by entrails, or inspection of viscera. The Isaurians and Arabians, however, studied omens just as the Telmissians studied divination from dreams." A prediction derived from watching birds is called an *auspice*, just as an *augury* is from the chirping of birds, or

^A from Phrygia, Olympus is claimed to have first introduced into Greece the playing of the lyre, the *kroumata*; then that the Idaean Dactyls and Hyagnis first played the flute; after Marsyas, the son of the latter, then Olympus." Having then interpolated certain things: "This Olympus, he says, they say was one of those who descended from the first Olympus, a disciple of Marsyas, who composed the *nomoi* in honor of the gods. For when he was a favorite of Marsyas, and had learned from him the art of flute-playing, the *aulesis*, he brought into Greece the harmonic *nomoi*, which the Greeks now use in the festivals of the gods." Later, however, he introduces Sotericus in the same book, speaking thus: "The *aulos* (flute/pipe) is not the invention of Marsyas, or Olympus, or Hyagnis, nor is the cithara solely Apollo's; but the same god invented the music of both the cithara and the pipe." Finally, to pass over Hyginus, Tzetzes, and others, we have received this account handed down by Pliny: "They say that the Pisæan Tyrrhenian discovered the bronze trumpet... Midas, in Phrygia, the oblique pipe; ^B Marsyas, in the same nation, the double pipes."

The testimonies of ancient writers which we have brought forward thus far throw some light on those things which are subsequently narrated by our Clement in this way: "They say that a Phrygian Satyr also invented the oblique pipe, the *plagia syrinx*; but the *kroumata*, that is, the modes, [the] Phrygian Olympus." For Clement adduces two there, the second of whom is already acknowledged by Plutarch, whom we have praised. But if you think of looking to the first, the oblique pipe of Pliny, it must be admitted that his opinion regarding it was different from that of our Clement, or rather from those of the authors cited by him.

ARTICLE II

Our Clement continues his discourse on the inventors of things as follows: "But they say that the Egyptian, Apis, a native, *autochthona*, invented medicine before Io came to Egypt; but later, they say that Aesculapius amplified the art." Eusebius, however, exhibits this passage of Clement mutilated, and omits the words: "a native, before Io came to Egypt," undoubtedly because he judged these things far from necessary. Theodoret and Suidas have subscribed to them and to Clement. ^D But Diodorus Siculus says that Apollo brought to light the medical science, which is exercised through the prophetic art, by which the sick once used to obtain health... Born of Apollo and Coronis, Aesculapius, having learned many things in the medical art from his father's discipline, invented surgery and the compounding of medicines. He even investigated the powers of roots, and at length so advanced the art that he is worshiped as its founder and prince. If we believe Pliny, however, there were various opinions of the ancients on this matter, which he sets forth in this way: "The Egyptians claim medicine as discovered among themselves; others through the Arabians, Babylon, and the son of Apollo; herbal and medicinal science [are attributed to] Chiron, son of Saturn, and Philino... Sol, son of Oceanus, to whom Gellius assigns the invention of medicine from honey. They think the same [is] the Arabian, and 'Asklepios, that is Aesculapius, of whom Ter-

Ariston of Ceos says: "Asclepius was the first to explore remedies." We saw above from Cicero 69 that there were several Asclepiuses, of whom he says regarding the third: "The third is [the son] of Arsippus and Arsinoe, who, they say, was the first to discover the purgation of the bowels and the extraction of teeth, whose tomb and grove are shown in Arcadia not far from the river Lusius." Regarding this place, you may see the annotations of Lescalopier. ^A "But Atlas the Libyan (these are the words of our Clement 71) was the first to build a ship, a *naus*, and to sail the sea." Theodoret, however, says: 72 "They affirm that the *scaphe*, a boat, was first put together in Libya." But since the word *scaphe* signifies a ship of any kind, it is gathered from this that he does not depart much from the opinion of our author. But hear Sanchuniathon speaking in Eusebius 73 as follows: "Usous, when a boisterous storm of rain and wind had arisen and a fire had ignited due to the collision of the trees of Tyre, and the forest that was there had caught fire, used a tree whose branches he had previously cut off instead of a ship; he by no means hesitated to commit himself to the sea, even though there was no precedent." Tibullus accords with these words, at least in some part 74: "And that he might watch the vast sea from his towers, Tyre was the first taught to entrust a ship to the winds."

Nevertheless, Strabo writes 75: "A certain Persian, Erythras by name, when a herd of horses, driven by the sting of a lioness, was being chased even to the sea, and he was crossing to a certain island, was the first to cross to that island on a raft he had constructed." But his words are not altogether clear: *schedian pexamenos protos pe-raio-theie pros ten neson*; for by these words it is signified either that Erythras first constructed a ship, or that he was the first of all to be transported to this island by one. If Pliny had this writer in mind, he indicates that he is to be understood in the former sense with these words 76: "Danaus first arrived in Greece from Egypt by ship; before that, they sailed on rafts, which had been invented in the Red Sea between the islands." There, moreover, he would still have stated by whom various types of ships were devised. But the trireme, which 77 Clement a little later attributes to the Sidonians, this same Pliny 78, supported by the authority of Thucydides, 79 maintains was first built by Aminocles the Corinthian. Our Clement, who reports that the quadrireme was first constructed by the Carthaginians, not only assents to him, but furthermore produces Aristotle as a witness and advocate of this opinion. Diodorus Siculus, however, reports that the affairs of the sea and the organization of the fleet, or *stolos*, were attributed to Neptune before anyone else. ^B

To the manufacture of certain weapons our author then passes, and says 80: "The Thracians first discovered that which is called *harpe*; but it is a curved sword; and they were the first to use skins, *peltai*, on horseback." Similarly, the Illyrians also discovered the pelta. But Hervet, who in his corrupt codex had read *tarpe* instead of *harpe*, as it is also held in the Claromontanus, confesses that this word was found by him nowhere. But it was easy for him to correct this error of the scribes from Eusebius, who exhibits the very words of Clement thus 81: "Thrakes protoi ten harpen heuron, esti de machaira kampyle" — "The Thracians were the first to discover the harpe, and it is a curved sword." And in actual fact, *harpe* signifies a sickle, or a falchion, just as *pelta*, in Latin *pelta*, is ^C a very short shield in the manner of the moon, now in the middle.

Moreover, another opinion of certain people is thus reported by Strabo 86: "Others say that the Telchines came first from Crete to Cyprus, then to Rhodes; and that they were the first to forge iron and brass, and that for Saturn [they made] *ten harpen*, the sickle." But he pronounces this clearly feigned and fictitious, as is not obscurely stated, *De harpe*, see Lipsius, Vol. III, lib. II, *Saturnal.*, cap. 9, page 521. Furthermore, Clement 85 adds that Itanon the Samnite first made a shield. Although Eusebius 86 repeats this in the same words as our author, some nevertheless think that for Itanon should be read Tritannus, and that by that name is called that most famous gladiator, whom Pliny 87 and then Solinus 88 narrate was endowed with excellence and truly stupendous strength and power. And in actual fact, Solinus, the epitomizer of Pliny, observes that he is called a Samnite by Varro by nature. But because Pliny calls the Samnites themselves famous for their armor, from this some conclude either that Solinus erred there, as he did elsewhere not once, or that in his text, for *natura*, one should read *ornatura*: which word, as also in Pliny, signifies armor. However, Pliny 89 himself attributes the invention of shields to others, and Apollodorus attributes them to Proetus and Acrisius as they were warring against each other, or to Calchas, the son of Athamas. More, however, which also contribute to our subject, you may read concerning the shield and its origin in Lipsius, Vol. III, lib. III, *De Rom. milit.*, page 70 et seqq.

Another kind of weapon, *imantas*, that is, the long thongs of boxers, or *caestus*, was the invention of Amycus, king of the Bebryces, as Clement later declares 90. And surely Pollux 91 counts the *imantas* among the weapons of boxers. Theocritus 92, and also Apollonius Rhodius, sing of how that same Amycus died while fighting with Pollux with these weapons. Clement, however, declares quite openly that the thongs of boxers and the *caestus* took their origin from there. ^D

Furthermore, Diodorus Siculus wishes all armor to be adjudicated to its author, Mars: "Mars," he says, "was the first to teach [men] to forge all armor, and to instruct soldiers with weapons and darts, and to fight strenuously in organized battles." On the contrary, Artapanus, in Eusebius, relates that the Jews attributed the invention of weapons, and also of ships, and of various machines for lifting stones and for drawing and conducting water, to Moses 96: "They (says Artapanus) attribute the invention of ships, and of the machines by which stones are moved and joined together among themselves, and of Egyptian arms and of instruments necessary for the drawing or conducting of water, and even of philosophy itself, to him." Nor, perhaps, is it entirely absurd if one thinks that in the name of the Jews, the beginning of arms, and if you wish, of military science, should be refunded to Tubalcain, or, as Josephus 97 says, Thobel.

Since, however, brass and iron also pertain to arms, or at least are for the most part their material, we have already seen how Clement, even though he assigned the invention of iron to the Idaean Dactyls, and the tempering of brass to one of them, later added 99: "Furthermore, the Noropes (which is a tribe of Paeonia, but now is called Norica) worked brass, and were the first to purge iron, *kater-gasanto chalkon, kai sideron ekatharan protoi*."

^A for if faith is to be placed in others, some think the Chalybes, others the Cyclopes, demonstrated the smith's craft. Now, "brazen manufacture" in Pliny means nothing other than the art of making vessels and other such things from bronze. But since Clement said above that one of the Dactyls discovered the *chalkou krasin*, the tempering of bronze, if he understands by these words the same art of making bronze vessels, it will be openly inferred from this that, in this long induction of the discovery of things, he has reported not so much his own opinion as that of others. Moreover, various writers with great consensus affirm that the Chalybes were the authors not only of the iron craft, but of the discovery itself. For Dionysius in his *Description of the World*, v. 768 et seqq., sang:

The Chalybes dwell upon the rough and silent land, Knowing the works of exhausting iron. They who stand upon the loud-resounding anvils, Never cease from labor and bitter misery.

After these, the Chalybes also inhabit the hard and savage land, industrious, taught in the craft of iron: Who indeed standing by the heavy-sounding anvils, Never cease from labor and heavy hardship.

Apollonius also, book 2 of the *Argonautica*, v. 374 et seqq., likewise:

.... Among the most miserable of men The Chalybes possess a rugged and unyielding land, Workers. They are concerned with iron works. ... Hence the most laborious of men Possess the rugged Chalybes and the hard land, Workmen who are occupied around iron things.

Nor was the opinion of Ammianus Marcellinus at all different, whose words are these: "The Chalybes, by whom iron was first dug up and tamed." Wherefore Catullus rendered the Greek verses about these same Chalybes into Latin thus:

May the whole race of Chalybes perish: And he who in the beginning began to seek veins under the earth, And to break the hardness of iron.

Toward these things, indeed, we read this poem of Ovid about the Noricians:

Harder even than the iron which the Norician fire forges.

Finally, beyond Virgil, book 1 *Georgics*, v. 57 and 58, and Valerius Flaccus, *Argonautica* iv, see Bochart, *Phaleg*, book 3, chap. 12.

^B Now, however, to take a step toward other things: "Cadmus the Phoenician (the words are those of our author) first discovered the quarry; and in Mount Pangaeum he devised gold mines." Now Pangaeum is a mountain of Thrace on the border of Macedonia. But regarding the quarry discovered by Cadmus, Pliny sponsors our Clement; ^C but regarding the place where he discovered it, the same Pliny testifies that there were two opinions: "He says Cadmus [found] quarries at Thebes; or, as Theophrastus [says], in Phoenicia." But regarding gold mines, he claims that some agreed with Clement, and others dissented from him. For a little above, he added these things: "Cadmus the Phoenician [was] at Mount Pangaeum for gold mines and smelting; as others [say], Thoas and Eaclis in Panchaia, or Sol, son of Oceanus." On the other hand, Cassiodorus says: "Eacus is said to have discovered gold, and Indus, king of Scythia, silver, and to have handed them down to human use with high praise." Furthermore, Clement says in the same place, "They say the Tuscans devised the plastic art." But the second Greek word is not only in the text of our Clement, but also in that of Eusebius, ^D into two: *Tursanoi*, *plattēn*—which latter word, if it be correctly written, as before, means the same as *plastikē*, concerning which we have disputed in the previous book.

Then Clement says: "We have also heard that the Persians were the first to make a chariot, a bed, and a footstool." But Pliny, even if he does not speak explicitly of the chariot, nevertheless seems to aim at it where he writes: "The race of the Phrygians first joined a two-horse chariot, Ericthonius [first joined] a four-horse chariot." But Aelian: "And Ericthonius first joined horses." But that he hinted it was done at Athens is not obscure; this Eusebius asserts without doubt, having happened earlier in Greece and among other nations: "Ericthonius first joined a four-horse chariot in Greece. For truly it was among other nations." Moreover, he noted there that this Ericthonius was contemporary with Moses. But it is certain that before the age of Moses, the Egyptians, as we learn from Sacred Scripture, used chariots. Wherefore the pagans took refuge in fables after their own custom. For, as Cicero says: "They report a fourth Minerva as the inventress of chariots." See Scaliger on the cited words of Eusebius.

Nor should you wonder at our author saying the Persians first made a bed: "For among the ancients (witness Pliny), the *torus* was of straw, just as it is even now in camps. Therefore, afterwards the bed among the Persians, if you trust our Clement, was first established, and began to be in use among them."

But then in the text of Clement, which they think corrupt, we read these things: "Moreover, in the time of Semiramis, king of the Egyptians (*epi te Semirameōs basileōs Aigyptiōn*—for they want it to be read with Eusebius, *epi te Semirameōs basilidos Assyriōn*, Semiramis ruling the Assyrians), they report that byssine garments were discovered." But what of it? If Clement intended to signify there that byssine garments were first manufactured by the Egyptians, cannot the word *Semirameōs* be considered to have been corrupted by the carelessness of some scribe, by which word certainly a certain king of Egypt was designated? For regarding byssine garments, Pollux handed down these things: "Byssus is a certain species of linen among the Indians. Now, however, among the Egyptians, a certain wool is made from a tree, from which a garment is fashioned, which one might say is most similar to linen, except for its density. For a denser fruit grows on the tree, similar to a nut, protected by a triple rind; which being broken, after it has flowered like a nut, this interior part, which refers to wool, is taken out, from which the *subtegmen* is fashioned; but they stretch a linen *stamen* under it." Does he not by these words openly signify that byssine garments were first fashioned and woven by the Egyptians, as Clement reports? See Ferrari, Part I, *De re vestiaria*, book two, chapter 12.

But earlier Clement had said: "Medea, daughter of Aeetes, first conceived in Colchis how to dye hair." But for the confirmation of this opinion, there can perhaps not undeservedly be brought forth these words of Diodorus Siculus concerning Medea herself: "She herself fashions a hollow statue of Diana, in which she hides drugs of various kinds, and by means of ointments makes her hair gray, and her face and whole body beset with wrinkles, so that she truly represented the form of an old woman to those looking at her." But much more is reported about her by poets and mythologists. See Natalis Comes, book vi, *Mythology*, cap. 7. Furthermore, we have disputed on dyeing hair in our above dissertation, cap. 13, art. 1.

ARTICLE III. On the inventors of grammar, the writing of letters, and rhetorical oratory.

If we turn to other arts and disciplines, it must, indeed, be noted by us what our Clement has recorded in these words, which are not sufficiently understood by some, regarding the first grammarian: *Apollodorus of Cymae was the first to introduce the name of "Critic," and was called a Grammarian. Some, however, say it was Eratosthenes of Cyrene, because he published two books, entitled "Grammatical," and was called "the Grammarian" as we call them now; Praxiphanes, son of Dionysiphanes of Mitylene, was the first.* Which the Latin interpreter has rendered thus: *“Apollodorus of Cymae was the first to assume the name of Critic, and was called a Grammarian. Some, however, say Eratosthenes of Cyrene. But because he published two books, which he inscribed "Grammatical," he was named a Grammarian, just as we use the term; the first was Praxiphanes, son of Dionysiphanes of Mitylene.”* The meaning of our author’s words is surely this: Apollodorus of Cymae was the first to assume the name of Critic, and was furthermore called a Grammarian. But some, because Eratosthenes of Cyrene wrote two books *On Grammar*, have called him a Grammarian as well, just as we use the word now. But Praxiphanes was the first to be surnamed a Grammarian. It is, however, difficult to say who this Praxiphanes was. For we learn from Laertius that a discussion by Plato and Isocrates on poets was transmitted in writing by Praxiphanes. He also mentions another Praxiphanes, a student of the Peripatetic Plato and Epicurus. Strabo, moreover, lists a certain Praxiphanes who was involved in civil life and in letters and philosophy. Whether Clement is speaking of one of these, or of someone else, we shall gladly hear from more skilled critics. Pliny, however, has committed to memory that grammar flourished in Apollodorus, on whom, he says, the Amphictyons (that is, the common council of Greece, accustomed to be gathered at Thermopylae) bestowed the honor of Greece. Hervetus, however, thinks this is the one of whom our Clement speaks. But he does not seem to be the one from Cymae, but an Athenian, son of Asclepiades, and a student of the grammarian Aristarchus and the philosopher Panaetius, whose various works are frequently cited by ancient writers. Pliny, moreover, does not report that he was the first grammarian, but only that grammar flourished in him. ^B Yet Virgil wanders much further from the path of truth, who assumes that Laertius received from Hermippus the notion that Epicurus was the first of all to teach grammar, the power of which Plato was the first to perceive. For the words of Laertius are indeed these: *“He says that Hermippus stated he had been a grammar teacher; then, however, having encountered the books of Democritus, he was led to philosophy.”* That he taught grammar first, and then, having read the books of Democritus, gave himself to philosophy, is the assertion of the author Hermippus. These words mean nothing other than that Epicurus taught grammar before he dedicated himself to philosophy. Wherefore Sextus Empiricus narrates that the same Epicurus, having left behind a grammarian who had responded to him that it was not his job, but a philosopher’s, to explain what chaos was, immediately turned to philosophy. Strabo, however, cites and critiques Apollodorus the grammarian in some place, but *who* that man was remains silent. Moreover, he lists various people called by that name, but of the one from Cymae, nothing at all. You may see Jonsius regarding those various Apollodori, book ii, *De histor. philosoph. scriptor.*, cap. 17, and the commentary on those matters by Scipio Tetti, praised by Vossius.

Something, further, we have that is more certain concerning Eratosthenes of Cyrene. For Strabo committed these things to writing about him: *“Callimachus is also a Cyrenaean, and Eratosthenes, both held in honor by the kings of Egypt; the former a poet and at the same time a devotee of grammar, the latter excellent in these, and in philosophy, and in mathematics, as any other.”* Yet Suidas testifies that the latter was a student not only of the Chian philosopher Aristotle, but also of the Cyrenaean grammarian Lysanias. He could not, therefore, deservedly be called the first grammarian. Some, nevertheless, maintain that he was the first of all to claim for himself the surname of philologist on account of his skill in grammar and other sciences. Yet some, as Casaubon testifies, contended that there was no difference between a grammarian, a philologist, and a critic. And in fact, *critics* were formerly called judges and censors of poems and other works, such as, according to Quintilian, Aristarchus and Aristophanes had been. But Clement speaks particularly of him who first assumed the name of Critic. Furthermore, Clement himself openly taught that this was not attributed to Eratosthenes by all, but only by some.

Grammar, since it is the art of speaking and writing well, there can be no doubt that it contributed greatly to written letters. But, Clement says: *“Hellanicus says that Atossa, queen of the Persians, was the first to write letters.”* And this we acknowledge was handed down to memory by Tatian. But Atossa was the daughter of Cyrus and wife of Darius. ^C If you ask who first composed rhetorical oratory, our author responds: *“They say that the orations made in schools, and the properties of rhetoric, were discovered, and that for a fee he was the first to write judicial oratory for another to deliver, by Antiphon the Rhamnusian, as Diodorus says.”* And certainly we read in Plutarch’s book *On the Life of the Ten Orators* that he gave the first place among them to Antiphon in these words: *“Antiphon, son of Sophilus, of the Rhamnusian tribe, was a student of his father... Having obtained the faculty of speaking (some think he achieved it by his own natural talent), he applied his mind to the state... Furthermore, he wrote orations for certain citizens, at their request, by which they might defend their cases in court; and he is said by some to be the first to have attempted this himself. Indeed, of those who came after him, there is no judicial oratory extant, nor even of his contemporaries, Themistocles, Aristides, Pericles... He was of quick wit, and therefore called Nestor.”* Suidas, however, preferred Gorgias to this Antiphon in that very matter, stating about Antiphon: *“No one, he says, is known to have been his teacher; but nevertheless, after Gorgias, he was a prince of forensic diction.”* And about Gorgias, he writes to this effect: *“He transmitted the form of oratory discipline with the force of expression and art, and used tropes, translations, allegories, hypallages, abuses, trajections, conduplications, repetitions, apostrophes, and comparisons. From each individual student he demanded a hundred minae.”* But if you wish to trust Suidas, and desire another more reliable witness, Diodorus Siculus is at hand, whose very own...

words are: “Gorgias the orator, in the faculty of speaking, surpassed everyone of his own age. He was the first to invent various arts of oratory, and he stood out so much above others in the study and profession of wise eloquence that, in lieu of payment, he received a hundred minae from each individual student.” What then? Will you say, is not Diodorus cited by Clement as a witness? But if he is cited here by him, must it not be said that Clement, by a slip of memory, wrote Antiphon instead of Gorgias? But before you pass your judgment on that matter, I pray you, hear Cicero, who discusses this subject concerning famous orators in these words: “Thus Aristotle says that when tyrants were removed in Sicily and private matters were again being handled by the courts after a long interval, the Sicilians Corax and Tisias first (because that people was sharp-witted and naturally contentious) wrote down the art and its precepts. For before this, no one was accustomed to speak by method or art, but rather accurately, and many used to speak from a prepared text, and the discourses of famous things, which are now called commonplaces, had been written and prepared by Protagoras. It is said that Gorgias did the same thing when he had written down praises and censures of individual things: because he judged this to be most proper for an orator, to be able to increase a subject by praising it, and by censuring it, to crush it again. Antiphon the Rhamnusian had written similar things, and Thucydides, a substantial authority, wrote that never had anyone defended a capital case better than he did when he defended himself, in his own hearing.” But if both Gorgias and Antiphon had similar things, it is no wonder if some have attributed to Gorgias that which others have attributed to Antiphon. Therefore, since Clement is explaining not what he himself thought, but what others have held, he has praised his author Diodorus, but perhaps another than the Sicilian. And he could have cited not only him, but Plutarch also, if he had believed it necessary for the confirmation of his opinion. See regarding both Antiphon and Gorgias, Photius, *Bibliotheca*, cod. 259, page 1451 and following.

ARTICLE IV. Concerning the inventors of the art of poetry, and of music, and of the musical modes, of the iambus, dithyramb, hymn, choral dance, erotics, of the various modes of dancing, of the nomoi, the cithara, the nablum, and other musical instruments.

As far as the art of poetry and music is concerned, Clement gathers many things regarding their various parts and their authors, and he discourses on them in his own manner rather confusedly. And first indeed, in an out-of-the-way place, he has this on music: “Zethus and Amphion were the inventors of music around the time of Cadmus.” But it is truly surprising how various and manifold the opinions of the ancients have been concerning the invention of music. For although Valerius Probus speaks in defense of our author, and Eusebius has translated these very words of his into his own books; yet that same Eusebius writes elsewhere that the Greeks attributed the invention of music, or at least of harmony, to Dionysius. But Pliny claims that it was devised by Amphion alone. And Solinus says: “The study of music, he says, began when the Idaean Dactyli translated the measures of rhythms, discovered by the clatter and tinkling of bronze, into a poetic order.” ^A And to Bacchus, and in another place to some parts of his, to Minerva, or else to Apollo, he attributes it. But if we believe Boethius, when Pythagoras had observed in the workshops of smiths that a diverse sound of hammers arose from their varying weight, he discovered therefrom the consonance of music. What more? Chamaeleon Ponticus, in Athenaeus, says that music was discovered and thought out by ancient men from those birds which sing in the solitudes, and that the discipline of music was instituted in imitation of them. Whence Lucretius sang thus concerning the origin of music:

But to imitate the liquid notes of birds with the mouth Was long practiced, long before men could Celebrate smooth songs with singing, and delight the ears, And the whistling of the zephyrs through the reeds first Taught the rustic ones to blow into hollow hemlocks. Then little by little they learned the sweet laments, Which the pipe, struck by the fingers of the singers, pours out, Discovered through lonely groves and woods and forests, Through places of shepherds desert, and holy leisure.

^B But in the opinion of pagan writers, the opinion of Josephus will undoubtedly seem truer to you, who is a witness not entirely uncertain to us that Jubal, the son of Lamech, without doubt first gave his attention to music, and invented the psaltery and the cithara. For in the book of Genesis it is said that he was the “father of those who play the cithara and the organ;” or as in the Greek translation of the Seventy-two Seniors: *oûtos ēn ho katadeixas psaltērion, kai kitharan.*

Regarding the musical modes, however, our author says: “Terpander of Antissa was the first to add modes, *melos*, to poems, and wrote the laws of the Lacedaemonians in numerous verses.” Plutarch explains this a little more fully, and says: “Terpander, the poet of citharoedic nomoi, sang both his own and Homer’s poems in contests with a fixed measure for each, and he was the first to impose names on citharoedic modes.” ^C ... The nomoi of the citharoedic art were instituted by Terpander long before the time of flute-players. He therefore made names for the citharoedic [modes]: Boeotian, Aeolian, Trochaean acute, Cepion, Terpandrian, Tetraedic. Terpander also made citharoedic proems in heroic verses. Moreover, that Terpander imitated the verses of Homer, and the songs of Orpheus, *Orpheōs ta melē*. Wherefore Pliny says: “Terpander composed citharoedic songs.” But in Photius, Proclus in his *Chrestomathia* says: “Nomian Apollo was so called, because when the ancients were constituting choruses and singing *nomoi* to the flute or lyre, Chrysothemis of Crete first used a distinguished stole, and having taken the cithara, imitated Apollo, and sang the *nomon*, which, since it was vehemently approved in that genre, this mode of contest remained. It appears that Terpander was the first to complete the *nomon*, when he employed heroic verse.” But Suidas writes that Terpander is said by some to be of the family of Hesiod or Homer; by others, however, to be from elsewhere, and to have been a lyric poet, who first made the lyre equipped with seven strings, and first wrote lyric modes, although some would like Philamon to have written them. Finally, Athenaeus shows by the authority of Pindar that the barbiton was thought out by him, although he testifies that Neanthes of Cyzicus adjudged its invention to Anacreon. You should see Erasmus, *Adages*, chiliad 1, century 6, adage 41, and Plutarch, already praised by us in the book *On Music*, pages 1140 and 1141.

^D And that we may set aside Berosus, who attributes the origin of music to Bardus, king of the Gauls, and Polybius, and others who seem to attribute it to the ancestors of the Arcadians, Diodorus Siculus assigns this in one place to Mercury, but in another to their schools, or at least to the schools of musical lectures and musical assemblies... But let us return to our Clement: “Now indeed,

^A a certain Archilochus of Paros devised the iamb, but Hipponax of Ephesus the limping iamb.” Some things observed on this passage by the old Hervetus are surely not unworthy of a learned man. But it has undoubtedly escaped him, or rather it was never read by him, which Proclus recorded for memory in Photius: “Of the iambic poets, Archilochus of Paros is easily the prince, and Simonides of Amorgos, or, as some wish, of Samos, and Hipponax of Ephesus, of whom the first flourished in the time of Gyges, the second in that of Ananias of Macedonia, and Hipponax in the times of Darius.” Something will still have to be said later about each of those poets. Wherefore, we shall only note here that the iambics of Archilochus are referred by Plutarch to music thus: “The intention of iambics is toward the paean epibatos, and the heroics are increased into the prosodiac and the cretic; and that some iambics are spoken for striking, while others are sung, that was shown by Archilochus, then used by the tragedians, and they say that Crexus took this and transferred it to the dithyramb.”

Since he mentioned the dithyramb, hear what our Clement is read to have handed down regarding its invention: “But the dithyramb,” he says, “Lassus of Hermione devised.” Suidas and the scholiast of Aristophanes subscribed to his opinion, and his words concerning this same Lassus, or Lasus, are these: “He was the first to write a book on music, to bring the dithyramb into competition, and to introduce contentious opinions.” Yet Herodotus asserts the origin of the dithyramb, at least among the Corinthians, thus: “Arion, first of all men whom we know, both made, and named, and taught the dithyramb at Corinth.” But Proclus, when he explains the etymology of this name, cites as his witness Pindar, who asserted simply that the dithyramb was found at Corinth: “A dithyramb written for Bacchus, from whom it received its name, either because he was brought up in a cave at Nysa in a dithyrambus—that is, with two doors—or because he was found with the sutures of Jove opened, or because he seems to be twice born, once from Semele and again from the thigh. Pindar reports that the dithyramb was found in Corinth. But Aristotle reports that Arion was the first who sang it in this poem, and was the first to lead the cyclic chorus.” Consult Rhodiginus, Book VII of *Antiquarum Lectionum*, cap. 5, p. 228 et seqq., and Vossius, *De poetis Graecis*, p. 23 et seqq.

But to these things, Clement adds: “Stesichorus of Himera sang the hymn, Alcman the Lacedaemonian the choria, Anacreon of Teos the love songs (*ta erotika*), Pindar of Thebes the poem accommodated for dancing (*hyporcheme*), and Timotheus of Miletus the *nomoi* first in chorus and to the cithara.” Concerning the first three, many things occur to us in Athenaeus and Suidas. And, so that we may begin from the latter, these are his words concerning Stesichorus: “He was a lyric poet, and his poems survive in 26 books in the Dorian dialect... He was called Stesichorus because he was the first to establish the *kitharódias choron*, the chorus of cithara-singing. For before he was called Tisias.” Concerning Alcman the Lacedaemonian, the same Suidas says thus: “When he was,” he says, “greatly given to loves, he was the inventor of amatory songs (*erotikon melon*)... He was the first author who allowed hexameters to be sung to the lyre.” Lastly, he says these things about Anacreon of Teos: “He wrote elegies and iambs, everything in the Ionic dialect... He spent his life in the loves of boys and women, and in songs.” He also wrote wine-songs, and iambs, and those things which are called Anacreontics. But at what times they flourished, Suidas also notes there, just as Eusebius and Vossius do, which it may not trouble you to compare together. ^B

Now, the chorus of cithara-singing is said to be singing to the cithara, in such a way that the chorus might dance to the song of the cithara, but the *chorea* is the dancing with the singing. But if these are one and the same, you certainly see that Clement attributed to one what Suidas ascribes to the other. Therefore, a place is not undeservedly given to suspicion, lest something in the text of Clement may be gaping or corrupt. But you must remember that there is not one opinion among all concerning these things, and that our author held one, and later cited the vouchers and witnesses of his own opinion.

But let us now attend to what Athenaeus said concerning these same three men and the things discovered by each of them. Concerning the first, he speaks in these words: “Stesichorus, being not moderately given to love, composed that manner of songs which they once called *paidika* or *paidia* (that is, childish games or childish amusements).” But if these songs, *asmata*, were truly hymns, he certainly agrees with our Clement. A little earlier, he had said of Alcman: “Architas the Harmonic writes, as Chamaeleon says, that Alcman was the prince and leader of all in composing amatory verses, most petulant toward women, and that before all he made that muse public, and issued those songs which used to be sung in the gatherings and conventicles of men.” Finally, he relates in that same place that Critias sang these things about Anacreon:

Τὸν δὲ γυναικείων μελείων πλέξαντα πότ' ὠδάς Ἡδὺν Ἀνακρείοντα Τέως εἰς Ἑλλάδ᾽ ἀνήγεν, Συμποσίων ἐρέθισμα, γυναικῶν ἠπερόπευμα, Αὐλῶν ἀντιπάλον, φιλοβάρβιτον, ἡδύν, ἄλυπον.

Thou who once wove the songs of womanly melodies, Sweet Anacreon, Teos brought thee to Greece, The stimulant of symposia, the beguiling of women, The rival of flutes, the lover of the lyre, sweet, ever ^C pleasant, etc.

Now he is called *melikros poietes* by the same Athenaeus, whom our Clement mentions still in another book, just as Strabo does, who testifies that he lived with Polycrates and filled his songs with the mention of him.

Then Clement says that the *hyporcheme* was devised by Pindar, by which word his Latin interpreter thinks a song accommodated for dancing is signified. But see whether that does not mean the same as *hypochromatikē*, which Athenaeus teaches is the third kind of lyric dance-poetry: “There are,” he says, “three dances in scenic poetry: tragic, comic, satyric; and as many in lyric poetry: Pyrrhiche, gymnopaedia, or *hypochromatikē*.” And a little later he says that it is sung by the dancing chorus, and is common to men and women. For more on this, one should consult Meursius' book *De saltatione veterum*, where he argued many things on this matter. But it seems to have escaped his mind, what our Clement handed down concerning the *hyporcheme*. Proclus, however, in Photius, recorded these things in writing concerning the *hyporchema*: “*Hyporchema*,” he says, “they called a song sung with dancing. For the ancients often used *hypo* for *meta* (‘with’).” They report the inventors of this were indeed the Curetes, others ^D

indeed the son of Achilles, Pyrrhus; whence a certain kind of dancing they call the Pyrrhic. ^A Meursius exhibits the later words of this writer, where he heaps up many things concerning the Pyrrhic dance. But it did not behoove us to allow the Pyrrhic dance to be confused by him with the hyporchema, although Athenaeus seems to have distinguished them quite openly.

Furthermore, Clement added: “Timotheus of Miletus first sang the *nomoi* in chorus and with the cithara.” Truly, Hervetus opines that no one can be found who has said these things. What, therefore, do these words of Plutarch concerning Timotheus mean: “That the *citharoedic nomoi* consisted in ancient times of heroic verses, Timotheus declared, who, first mixing the *nomos* with heroic verse, sang in the dithyrambic style; lest he seem at first glance to violate the old music.” And so that we may leave aside Proclus, who discoursed somewhat obscurely concerning these matters, did not Boethius, to whom Hervetus sends us, declare his mind concerning them clearly enough? “But since,” he says, “Timotheus of Miletus added one string to those which he had previously discovered, and made the music more manifold, they demanded [an account] from Lacedaemon, and a decree was made concerning it.” This decree he indeed represents in Greek, and immediately subjoins these things: “Which decree contains this, namely: On this account the Spartans were angry with Timotheus of Miletus, because by rendering the music manifold, he would harm the minds of the boys whom he had received to be educated, and would hinder them from the modesty of virtue, and because he had overturned the harmony, which he had received as modest, into the chromatic genus, which is softer.” Wherefore Suidas writes to the same effect: “Timotheus, son of Thersander, or of Neomys, or of Philopodes, a lyric poet, who added the tenth and eleventh string to the lyre, and transferred the ancient music to a softer mode. He was, however, in the times of Euripides the tragic poet, during which Philip of Macedon also reigned. He died at the age of 97. He wrote 19 musical *nomoi* in verse, [and] 38 proverbs.” Would not all these things, if Hervetus had read them, or had seriously applied his mind to them, have been sufficient for him to confirm or illustrate the mind of our Clement? Athenaeus, moreover, makes mention of this Timotheus more than once, concerning whom one should read Vossius, lib. *De poet. Graec.*, p. 46. ^B

ARTICLE V. Concerning the inventors of hexametric verse, of tragedy and comedy, and who first published a book.

Now indeed we have already touched upon many things here that pertain to the art of poetics, while discussing music, and elsewhere. But besides this, our Clement proposes various opinions concerning the author of heroic hexameter poems, yet only one: “They say that Phanothea, wife of Icarius, discovered the hexameter, the heroic hexameter: others indeed Themis, one of the Titanides; but Didymus in the book *On Philosophy* reports that Theano of Croton was the first among women to have philosophized and to have written poems.” Hervetus confesses that none of these things had occurred to him. For the hexameter poem alone, so that we may have something certain, he sends us to Polydorus Vergilius, and this Vergilius to Pliny. But Pliny only handed down these things to posterity concerning heroic verse: “We owe heroic verse to the Pythian oracle; undoubtedly because it gave its responses in this kind of poem.” Truly, Pausanias reports the same of Phemonoe, who nevertheless maintains that Olen was before all others in these verses, but claimed he prophesied in only a certain place: “But great was the celebrity of the name of Phemonoe, as she who was the first interpreter of the god, and who first sang oracles in longer senarii, *and first sang the hexameter*; yet she reported that a native woman of Delphi, having composed a hymn, dedicated the oracle to Apollo, [having come] as a stranger from the Hyperboreans, and that various others [did so], then Olen, who was the first to prophesy in that place, and first discovered the longer senarii, *and first sang the hexameter*.” But Proclus, in Photius, concerning the same Phemonoe: “She discovered melody,” he says, “first was Phemonoe, priestess of Apollo, accustomed to render oracles in hexameters.” Finally, it will perhaps seem to some that Eusebius reconciled Pausanias with Pliny in these few words: “Among the Pythians, the prophetess Phemonoe is said to have been the first to sing of future things in hexameter verses.” For both pronounce these things generally about Phemonoe, and without any added exception.

But these writers, one might say, clearly do not say that Phemonoe is the inventress of hexametric verse, but that she gave oracles and prophecies in hexameter verse. Then, indeed, Clement speaks not of Phemonoe, but of Phanothea, wife of Icarius. Both, however, are openly distinguished by him. For below, concerning Phemonoe, these are his own words: “But if anyone should say that Phemonoe was the first to give responses to Acrisius, let him know that Orpheus, and Musaeus, and Linus the preceptor of Hercules, were seven years after Phemonoe.” ^C But those responses were oracles, which the writers, lauded by us, affirm to have been rendered in hexameter verses by Phemonoe, whom Clement had a little below enumerated among the prophets. But if this opinion, to which Clement nevertheless does not dare to lend his own suffrage regarding the prescribed time, be true, Phemonoe must certainly have preceded the first poets Orpheus, Musaeus, and Linus. Because, however, it cannot be invincibly concluded from this that she was the absolute first of all to have composed a hexameter poem: hence it truly arises that others have thought it was to be adjudged to Phanothea, as Clement [indicates], others however to Themis. Concerning Themis, moreover, Diodorus Siculus handed it down to letters: “Themis, princeps, taught the art of prophesying, the rites of the sacred, and the laws serving the worship of the gods; and she taught those things that pertain to good jurisdiction and the studies of peace... Nay, and we say that Apollo himself, when he is about to issue a response, *Themisteuein*, that is, to perform the duty of Themis, because Themis was, of course, the inventress of oracles.” Since, however, the oracles are said to have been poured forth in hexameter verse, as has been said, on this account some have referred the origin of such a poem to her. ^D

Finally, our Clement handed down these things in his writings: “The Cappadocians were the first to discover that which is called the *nablion*, just as the Assyrians also the *dichordon*.” By others, however, namely by the Phoenicians, that it was a discovery is testified by Sopater in Athenaeus: “The *nablan*,” says that Sopater *Parodus* in the poem titled *The Gates*, “writes that it was discovered by the Phoenicians.” You will be able to consult the same Athenaeus in the book lauded by us, and lib. XIV, p. 625 et seqq., as much concerning other musical instruments as concerning their various modes, about which Clement discourses in the same place. Nor should it irk you to approach the *Animadversions* of Casaubon on these books of Athenaeus, and also Plutarch’s book *On Music*, Boethius’s book also *On Music*, ch. 56; Julius Pollux, lib. IV *Onomast.*, ch. 9 and 10; Polydorus Vergilius, lib. I *De inventor. rer.*, ch. 14 and 15.

^A In this manner: Formerly the chorus alone performed tragedy; but afterwards Thespis invented a single actor, so that the chorus might sometimes rest, and later Aeschylus added a second, and Sophocles a third: and in this way tragedy was brought to perfection. However, these things do not prevent our Clement from having found a great many patrons and supporters of his opinion regarding Thespis, although Suidas also testifies that some have dissented from him. You may see the observations and notes of various authors on the cited passage of Laertius.

Yet we seem to hear someone objecting that there is perhaps some error in the text of our Clement, and that instead of Phanothea, Phemonoe should be read. For the name of the latter was not only far more famous and celebrated than that of Phanothea, but she is also said by most writers with unanimous consent to have been the first to give forth the hexameter poem and oracles. To this is added the fact that Porphyry calls her the daughter not of Icarius, but of Delphi. Therefore, we would not think the conjecture of those who object these things to us to be altogether improbable, if the authority of the handwritten codices did not completely resist it. But we have already argued sufficiently and more than enough about these diverse opinions, and especially for the reason that Clement does not indicate to us which way he more strongly inclines.

Finally, regarding Theano, whom Clement, relying on the authority of Didymus, hands down as having written both philosophy and poems, but "first" only among women, we have dealt a little earlier. ^B

Wherefore let us come to tragedy and comedy, concerning which our same author, as usual, establishes these points more based on the opinion of others than on his own: "And tragedy, indeed, was by the Athenian Thespis, but comedy by the Icariean Sisarion. Grammarians report their times." Hervetus indeed admonishes us that Thespis is called the inventor of tragedy by Horace: but he has found nothing of Sisarion the Icariean anywhere. Donatus cites these same lines of Horace, to prove in like manner that the author of tragedy was the same Thespis: "But concerning comedy," he says, "it is doubtful among the Greeks who invented it, but among the Latins it is certain. Livius Andronicus first found comedy and *togata* tragedy." But Evanthius, a contemporary of Donatus: "Although," he says, "to those turning back to ancient matters, Thespis is found to be the first inventor of tragedy; and Eupolis with Cratinus and Aristophanes is said to be the father of old comedy; yet Homer, who is almost the most abundant fountain of all poetry, even provided examples for these poems, and, as if by a certain law of his own works, prescribed them; for he is shown to have made the *Iliad* in the likeness of tragedy, and the *Odyssey* in the likeness of comedy." But Scaliger refutes this opinion concerning the works of Homer, as having been made in the likeness of comedy and tragedy. He also chastises the Sicilians, who, in order to attribute the beginnings of comedy to their own ancestors, boasted that they were colonists of the Megarians and that Epicharmus was their fellow citizen. His own opinion, however, is that comedy, as happens in other things, came from small beginnings, namely from the amusements customarily performed after dinner for the whole night, and was afterwards gradually restricted by certain rules, and perfected by art, and rendered more refined by the genius of Epicharmus. That tragedy indeed is ancient, but comedy no less so. For we read that the tragic poets competed at the tomb of Theseus. Nor do Donatus and Evanthius, already mentioned by us, seem to have departed much from this opinion.

Furthermore, Aristotle writes that for various reasons Homer, Sophocles, Aristophanes, and Epicharmus claimed comedy and tragedy for themselves, and that the Dorians claimed both, but the Peloponnesians tragedy, and the Megarians and Sicilians comedy. Wherefore Solinus, when he speaks of Sicily, says: "Here, first, was comedy invented." And from thence it is clear how obscure their beginnings and origin are, and especially those of comedy, as the same Aristotle testifies. And indeed, although most everyone confesses with our Clement that Thespis was the author of tragedy, Laertius nevertheless attributes to him only one part of it. ^{C D}

Sisarion therefore alone remains, and as is read in our manuscript codex, *Susarion*, whose memory is far more infrequent among writers. But since Clement called him an Icariean, weigh, I pray you, whether his opinion can be confirmed by these words of Athenaeus: "The first origin of both comedy and tragedy was from the carousing and drunkenness in the Attic deme of Icarius, [ ἐν Ικαρίῳ τῆς ᾿Αττικῆς ], at the time of the vintage, whence they called it *trigodia* in the beginning, and *comodia*." But if anyone with Hervetus wishes for the name of Susarion to be brought forth indicated by someone, let him go to Diomedes, and hear him speaking thus: "The first comic poets were Susarion, Nullus (or, as others think it should be written, Mullus), and Magnes." Whoever desires to know more about comedy and tragedy, besides the authors cited by us, let him consult Lilius Gregorius Giraldus, Julius Caesar Scaliger, Joannes Casalius, *De tragedia et comoedia*, and also Polydorus Vergilius, and the books and commentaries and other lucubrations of others concerning each, and concerning the rest, the inventors of things about which we have hitherto discoursed.

Regarding the writing and publication of these very books, Clement narrates this: "And Alcmaeon indeed, the son of Perinthus, of Croton, first wrote a book on nature. But others report that Anaxagoras, the son of Hegesibulus, of Clazomenae, first published a written book." Hervetus, however, notes here that "first" is found nowhere, but "second" is found in Laertius. You will doubtless marvel that Hervetus has not read these words of the same Laertius in the very brief history of Alcmaeon: "He seems to be the first to have written a discourse on nature," [δοκεῖ πρῶτος φυσικὸν λόγον συγγεγραφέ-ναι], "as Favorinus says in his *Omnimoda Historia*." Perhaps it is less to be wondered at if he had said this concerning Theodoret, by whom he is called not *Alcmaeon*, but *Alcman*. For he handed this down in his writings: "Alcman, son of Pirithus, of Croton, who is said to have been the first to write on the nature of things." But that this man is nonetheless the same as he of whom Clement discourses, it is not ambiguous, since the same father of Alcmaeon or Alcman, the same country, and the writing of the book are assigned by both Clement and Theodoret.

However, Themistius, not hesitating, so ascribes and vindicates that for Anaximander, the disciple of Thales: "Emulating the studies and doctrine of that man (Thales), Anaximander, son of Praxiades, did not yet imitate all things; but he immediately changed this, and turned away from the established custom, in that he was the first of the Greeks whom we know who dared to bring forth to the public a book written by himself on nature. For to write books against him was considered ignominious, nor was it received by the ancient Greeks through use and custom. For I omit Anaxagoras of Clazomenae." Regarding this Anaxagoras, Laertius wrote the same things that our Clement did, in such a way that they seem to have been taken from him: "He was the first," he says, "to publish a book written by himself." We indeed do not deny that this was at some time in writing and me-

it has been consigned to memory: that Pisistratus the tyrant is said to have been the first to have set out books of the liberal arts for the Athenians to read; and subsequently the Athenians themselves increased them more zealously and accurately. But since he is dealing with books which were published only in Athens, and not elsewhere, he is certainly in no way at odds with the judgment of our Clement.

ARTICLE VI.

It did not suffice for our Clement to have instituted a long disputation concerning the origin, primordia, and invention of the arts and sciences and other things, unless he also indicated to us those who have produced something concerning the inventors of these things. He named them specifically, so as to make it clear to everyone whom he himself took as vouchers and witnesses of the things he had said concerning the primordia of things. But he says thus: "Scamon indeed the Mitylenean, and Theophrastus the Eressian, and Cydippus the Mantinean, and furthermore Antiphanes, and Aristodemus, and Aristotle; and even Philostephanus, and Strato also the Peripatetic, ^B ἐν τοῖς περὶ Εὑρημάτων ταῦτα ἱστόρησαν, in their books concerning things that were invented, recounted these things." But if you ask whether these things can be proven otherwise, we shall give you an answer: the first is called by Eusebius, who transcribed this passage of our Clement, Scamon, and his book *On Inventions* is cited by Athenaeus thus: "Scamon, as in our Clement, ἐν πρώτῳ περὶ εὑρημάτων, in the first book of Scamon On the Inventors of Things." And a little further down: "Ephorus and Scamon in the books On Inventions." Suidas also mentions him under the word *Scamon*, and Vossius in book III *De histor. Graec.*, p. 411.

The second is Theophrastus the Eressian. For so he is called by Suidas, who suggests more information about him to us. But in Eusebius and Epiphanius it is better read as *Eressios*. For he is so surnamed by Laertius, who left us the history of his life, where among his various works he lists the same books of his as our Clement does, *On Inventions* first and second. Athenaeus also cites many of his books, and in particular the *History of Plants*, about which we spoke above. Eusebius, however, in his *Chronicon* to the year 1696, wrote this about him: "Theophrastus the philosopher is recognized, who, as Cicero says, received his name from the divinity of his speech." ^C Of Cydippus, nothing else is handed down by Vossius in his book *De hist. Graec.*, p. 350, and Gesner in the *Bibliotheca*, except what Clement has supplied to us. It is certain that the name of Antiphanes belonged to many. From Clement himself, our author, he is praised: "Antiphanes the Delian physician." But elsewhere, "Antiphanes the comic poet," whose works you will find nearly infinite in Athenaeus. Beside him, another Antiphanes is named, the Colophonian, in book V of the *Deipnosophists*, p. 304. Yet another is marked with the base stain of falsehood by Strabo in book II of his *Geography*, p. 202. Whether any of these, or anyone else, is being praised by our author, let it be the judgment of others.

Gesner, and especially Vossius, mention still more who were called by the name of Aristodemus: but Vossius confesses it to be completely unknown who the author of the books cited by our Clement was. Aristotle is also gathered into the number of the same writers by our author. But if he was the Stagirite, whom, as Cicero says—excepting Plato—I do not know if I would correctly call the prince of philosophers, surely this book of his perished long ago, nor has it ever been made public among his published works. ^D Concerning Philostephanus, Clement had made mention in another book, and he is said by Athenaeus to be a Cyrenaean by fatherland, and an intimate of Callimachus. You will find not a few things about him in Gesner in the *Bibliotheca*, in Vossius, book I *De hist. Graec.*, chapter 15, p. 93, and in Harduin in the index of authors cited by Pliny.

The last place among these writers is given to Strato the Peripatetic. But because Laertius asserts there were eight of this name, Vossius opines that Clement spoke of the last, because he is called a Peripatetic by both. But Menagius rightly censures him; because he does not seem to have paid enough attention to the fact that the book cited by the name of Strato by Clement is attributed to Strato of Lampsacus in his life published by Laertius. For among the number of his writings are listed, *Εὑρημάτων ἔλεγχοι δύο*, "Two refutations of inventions." But those are without doubt the ones of which Clement made mention. Nor should you say that this Strato was not a Peripatetic. For the same Vossius proves that he was a follower of this family of philosophers for the reason that he studied under Theophrastus. And in actual truth, Cicero more than once testifies that he was a student of Theophrastus, and even that he handed down many new things, and very few concerning morals. Nothing, therefore, prevented him from being correctly called a Peripatetic by our Clement. But what need is there of conjectures, where we read it written by Plutarch no differently than by our same Clement? And indeed, he said, the greatest of the remaining Peripatetics, *Περιπατητικῶν ὁ κορυφαιότατος*, Strato (undoubtedly the Lampsacene), does not agree with Aristotle on many things; and he defends things contrary to Plato concerning motion, mind, and the soul.

Chapter XXII.

ARTICULUS I.

From the first inventors of things, if we pass to those who were masters and teachers of others, and imbued them with certain disciplines; we shall see, proven by no long induction from our Clement, that this was the custom of masters, to make their disciples like themselves: "If anyone," he says, "should give himself to be instructed by Ischomachus, he will make him a farmer, and

if by Lampis a ship-master, and by Charidemus a commander, and by Simon an expert in horsemanship, and by Perdix an innkeeper, and by Crobylus a maker of delicacies, and by Archelaus a dancer, and by Homer a poet, and by Pyrrho a wrangler, and by Demosthenes an orator, and by Chrysippus a dialectician, and by Aristotle a natural philosopher, and by Plato a philosopher." ^A Yet Hervetus declares that almost all these things are unknown to him, and that he does not know whether Ischomachus was skilled in agriculture or left anything written on the subject. Nor, he says, does he know whether Lampis wrote on nautical matters, or Charidemus on military matters, or even Simon on the art of horsemanship. But to him, Crobylus seems to have been a maker of delicacies, but a most wicked man. What more need be said? He confesses that Archelaus, the tetrarch of Judea, was indeed a dancer, but that he finds nothing written that he transmitted to letters regarding the art of dancing. Finally, instead of Ischomachus, he thinks that the most famous poet Hesiod could have been indicated by our Clement with much better right, for it is said that no one among the Greeks recorded anything better on agriculture in public monuments.

Yet one would not unjustly desire greater diligence from Hervetus. For it was not so difficult for him to find more information about these teachers mentioned by Clement. For beginning with Ischomachus, to speak with our Clement, he is not only praised by Columella, but he is also testified to have been cited by Xenophon, whom Cicero rendered into Latin, and he produces his very words; then he adds this: "But these things are indeed ancient, and were of that time when the same Ischomachus denied that anyone did not know how to practice agriculture." Moreover, in another book ^B Cicero, following the authority of Xenophon, in the *Oeconomicus* introduces Ischomachus telling these things to the inquiring Socrates: "When the preparations," etc. Next to him, Clement placed Lampis, who was so skilled in nautical matters that he could instruct others in this art. And why not? Since Plutarch not only calls him a ship-master (*naucleros*), but also committed these things to writing concerning him: "Lampis the ship-master, being asked how he had acquired his wealth, replied: 'The large amount not without difficulty, the small amount with toil, and slowly.'" Demosthenes indeed testifies that there was no ship-owner in all Greece more wealthy than that Lampis. But he brings forth and mentions more about him in his oration against Phormio.

Many things are also available to us concerning Charidemus, by which the opinion of our Clement can be excellently established and fortified. For what is more valid and clear to confirm it than these words of Diodorus Siculus? "Charidemus the Athenian," he says, "who was in great admiration for his virtue and the excellence of his military art—for he had served under Philip—was a leader in the administration of affairs, and an excellent counselor," etc. Arrian and Quintus Curtius also mention him, the latter of whom calls him "skilled in war."

^C No less does Xenophon favor our Clement, from whom the book of Simon on horsemanship is cited in these words: "Simo indeed wrote a book on horsemanship, and he set up a bronze horse at Athens, dedicated in the Eleusinium, and engraved on the base the things he had practiced himself." Indeed, if you wish to believe Pliny: "He was the first who wrote on horsemanship." Hervetus rightly sent us to the *Adagia* of Erasmus, so that we might learn something about Perdix. But he could also have cited that poem of Aristophanes:

"Perdix, indeed, a certain innkeeper, was called ^D The Lame."

Perdix, indeed, was one innkeeper known as the lame one. You may see the Greek scholia published on this passage. Besides Crobylus, the most wretched pimp mentioned by Hervetus, there was another, a comic poet, whose poems, described by Athenaeus, indicate clearly enough that from him, just as our Clement signifies, the recipes for delicacies could be learned. Although Hervetus confesses that Archelaus, the tetrarch of Judea, was a dancer; nevertheless he does not think that he is the one designated by our Clement; inasmuch as he has committed nothing to writing about the art of dancing. As if, indeed, no one could teach the art of dancing unless he had composed some commentary about it. For that reason, therefore, we do not opine that this Archelaus is indicated by our author; but because, since many—whether kings, or philosophers, or even others—have been called by that name, it is very difficult to say of whom our Clement spoke. But what if the copyists erred in describing that name according to their usual custom? Certainly, if for Archelaus one reads Aristonicus there, Hervetus will have a man who, according to Athenaeus, published a book on dancing: "Aristonicus," he says, "of whom is also a treatise *On Dancing*." This indeed can be confirmed by the fact that he had said a little earlier of the same person, as it seems: "Aristonicus of Caristius, the ball-player of Alexander, whom the Athenians granted citizenship for his skill in that art, and moreover a statue." Nor perhaps is it absurd, for the strengthening of this conjecture, to bring forward that which Plutarch handed down about him in these words: "Among others, also the cithara-player Aristonicus, who, having rushed to bring aid in a certain battle, fought strenuously and fell. Alexander ordered a bronze statue to be made for him, and to be placed at the Pythian games, conspicuous with the cithara and spear laid aside, honoring not only the man, but also music, as that which made men brave," etc. Although, furthermore, these things are sufficient to prove that anyone could have been trained as a dancer by him, as our author says; whether he speaks of that man, or rather of some one of those to whom the name Archelaus has been given, we do not dare to determine for certain. Wherefore we will easily yield assent to those who will present us with the Archelaus of whom our author thought mention should be made above all others.

295 ARTICLE II. Of those things which poets stole from other poets, and which certain others also stole from the same poets.

Disciples having become like their masters

no one will truly wonder. But to very many, without doubt, it will seem strange what and how many, indeed, the almost infinite thefts and compilations of every kind which our Clement catalogs 68 and sets forth openly and clearly from the writings, books, and any other commentaries of other pagan and Greek authors. For he, as Eusebius says, compares the passages of Orpheus, Heraclitus, Plato, Pythagoras, Herodotus, Theopompus, Thucydides, Demosthenes, Aeschines, Lysias, Isocrates, and an infinite number of others, whose very words it would be clearly redundant to add, since everyone has copies of Clement's own writings. But although Eusebius may not have chosen to transcribe this passage of Clement in its entirety—because his books were, at that time, in the hands of all, and also because he did not judge this to be altogether necessary for himself—we nevertheless deem it our duty to clarify certain of his more obscure and difficult dicta, and to fortify and support with the authority and testimony of others what was omitted in the Clementine scholia.

But before all else, we put forward Socrates, from whom the philosophers of various sects confessed they had drawn their principal doctrines. We have discussed him above in chap. 17, art. 5. Wherefore, to begin with Homer's thefts, it must be noted that the testimony of his cited by Clement regarding a woman, which is said to have been taken from Orpheus, is found in *Iliad* VI, p. 160, and is represented in the *Anthologia Poetica*, p. 750. Furthermore, you will find in *Iliad* VI, p. 106, other verses of the same poet regarding the life of man, which is like the leaves on trees, taken—as Clement again says 68—from Musaeus.

But at this first step someone might pause and inquire how Clement could say 66 that Homer took these things from Orpheus and Musaeus, and other things still from the *Theogony* of the same Orpheus, which he transferred to the Cyclops in *Iliad* IX, p. 124; seeing that Clement himself elsewhere 67 declares the same Homer to be the most ancient of all poets? Did he not nod and hallucinate there? For among all it is sufficiently agreed that Orpheus and Musaeus, as will be shown later, are prior in time to Homer, as Clement even confesses. Nevertheless, it can be answered that Homer is called the most ancient poet by him because the poems of those who were older than he no longer exist; and that those which were circulated under the names of these—namely, Orpheus and Musaeus—were thought by many to have been composed not by them, but by others more recent than Homer himself, such as Onomacritus. And if this indeed be true, here certainly Homer is the one to be described as having taken these verses from the other, rather than the other from Homer.

Moreover, Clement demonstrates that others compiled much more from the same Homer's poems. For he contends that his verses about not attracting the dead with insults were stolen from Archilochus. And the same verses of both are transcribed by Stobaeus 69.

Next, Clement 69 notes that a certain poem was composed by Euripides from this Homeric one: *Αἰδὼς ἦτ᾽ ἄνδρα μέγα σίνεται ἠδ᾽ ὀνίνησιν.* "And shame, which greatly harms and helps a man." But Stobaeus ascribes that to Hesiod 70. But what is the wonder if Hesiod took this entire poem from Homer, which Euripides, as we gather from our Clement, only imitated with a similar poem?

Furthermore, regarding the shield which Vulcan was said to have fashioned, Clement brought into the middle two of Homer's verses, which he thinks were dictated by Pherecydes the Syrian 71: *Zas fashions a great, beautiful robe, and variously describes upon it earth, and Ogenus, and the houses of Ogenus.* But those two Homeric verses, read far apart in *Iliad* XVIII; and the first, indeed, on p. 341, in the same way as in our Clement: *Εν μὲν γαῖαν ἔτευξ', ἐν δ᾽ οὐρανὸν, ἐν δὲ θάλασσαν.* "In it he fashioned the earth, and in it the heaven, and in it the sea." The second, however, in the same *Iliad*, p. 344, you will find similarly and just as in the published books of our Clement: *Ἐν δὲ ἐτίθει ποταμοῖο μέγα σθένος Ὠκεανοῖο.* "In it he also placed the great strength of the river Oceanus."

You see indeed that Clement, according to his custom, cites two poems as if they were chanted in one and the same place; yet it is certain that they are far removed. But Salmasius 72 remarks more upon the cited passage of Pherecydes, and thinks it was taken from his *Theology*. He observes, moreover, that Ogenus, although to Stephanus he may seem a certain ancient god, is used by our Clement for Oceanus. Finally, he suspects that one should read in his text: *καὶ ἐν αὐτῷ ποικίλλει γῆν, καὶ Ὠγενὸν, καὶ τὰ Ὠγενοῦς δώματα.* But weigh and pronounce whether this correction, which is entirely repugnant to the Greek manuscript codex, should be admitted, and how much force and power there is in its proof.

But what of the fact that Clement still notes that of two Homeric poems brought forward by himself, two others were composed by Euripides? And in truth, the Homeric verses occur in *Odyssey* XVII, p. 250, where for the word *ἀποπλῆσαι*, "to fill," which Clement uses, we read *ἀποκρύψαι*, "to conceal." But at Athenaeus, Diphilus brings forth these verses of Euripides 73: *Νικᾷ δὲ χρεία μ' ἡ ταλαίπωρός τε μοῦ Γαστήρ· ταλαιπωρότερον οὐδέν ἐστι γάρ.* "Egestas me vincit, tum ærumnosus Venter meus, nil enim ventre est miserius."

From these, furthermore, Casaubon 74 undoubtedly attempts to amend the text of our Clement. But consult him, if you wish, and also Erasmus’s *Adagia*, chiliad III, centur. 10, adag. 9, p. 762. From his chiliad IV, centur. 7, adag. 14, p. 891, you will further have clarified that which Clement later 75 brings forward from Callias and Menander regarding the proverb of those who are insane. But that which Clement brings forward from Sophocles: "The gifts of enemies are no gifts," that we find explained at length and confirmed in Erasmus’s *Adagia*, chiliad I, centur. 3, adag. 35, p. 101. Nor in a dissimilar way does he himself, in *chil.* II, centur. 7, adag. 35, p. 727, clarify that which Clement thereafter narrates 76 to have been handed down by Philistus and Thucydides after Solon and Theognis concerning the insolence and ferocity of man on account of secondary and prosperous things.

Then, subsequently, our author describes 77 the dictum of Critias after Euripides regarding children, whom paternal severity renders best. But Casaubon 78 opines that this was taken from his book *On Republics*, which we read cited by Athenaeus and Pollux 79. However, the opinion of some is that this is a different person from Critias, son of Callaeschrus, whose *Elegies* are cited by the same Athenaeus 80.

A poem subsequently brought forward by Clement 81 regarding the allurement of sleep, we read as exactly the same in Stobaeus 82. But in the same place he exhibits another poem from the *Aldines* of Sophocles. And Casaubon 83 opined...

that some ought to have read *Hipponou*; so that the name of this tragedy would have been *Suspicax*. However, he demonstrates, with various not inept lines of reasoning, that the first reading of our Clement is the better and the true one.

But the single poem of Euripides on labor in *Ctimenus*, brought forward by Clement, Stobaeus attributes to Alexides in the *Orchestris*. Others, however, of the same Euripides’ verses, transcribed in our author’s book without the form of meter, are reduced by him to it from Stobaeus thus: Ἀντὶ πυρὸς γὰρ ἄλλο πῦρ μεῖζον ἐκβλαστοῦ- Γυναῖκες, πολὺ δυσμαχώτερον. *Ignis enim loco alium ignem majorem produci- [mus* *Nos mulieres, multo difficiliorem impugnatu.* From which it is to be gathered that there are not only many readings here different from the editions of Clement’s works, but that the same verses were also culled from the *Hippolytus* of Euripides.

Furthermore, Clement notes that Theodectes accepted from Euripides what he sang about variable and wavering fortune. And that indeed is returned to meter by Stobaeus thus: Τὸ μὴ βεβαίους τὰς βροτῶν εἶναι τύχας. *Quod hominum fortuna sit instabilis.*

But he next represents for us the second verse of Euripides a little differently than in our Clement; from which, however, the same number of words, and as exhibited by Euripide at the end of the *Medea* in Greek words, but better in Latin, and in metrical fashion, we read thus: Πολλὰ δ’ ἀέλπτως κραίνουσι θεοί. *Multaque præter spem perficiunt dii.*

ARTICLE III. On the thefts of philosophers, historians, and orators.

From the poets Clement comes to the philosophers, historians, and orators, and detects and demonstrates similar thefts in their writings. For he openly makes it clear, first, that Xenophon and Sophocles accepted from the philosopher Alcmaeon of Croton that an enemy is more easily guarded against than a friend. But as for the opinion of Xenophon which Clement brings forward, you will find it in the fifth book of his *Hellenica*, though not without different readings.

But what Heraclitus and Empedocles handed down concerning the first principles of things, Clement opines that the former drew from Orpheus, and the latter from the Pythagorean Athamas. But we have already discussed these sufficiently above. You should consult Plutarch, *De placitis philosophorum*, book 1, chap. 2, p. 878; Sextus Empiricus, and others.

Clement proceeds, and says that the poem of Menander, in which he sang that those whom the gods love depart this life sooner, was culled from Plato. And indeed Plato’s reference is found in his dialogue inscribed *Axiochus*, vol. III, p. 367. But the verses of Menander are described in the same words by Stobaeus, serm. 119, p. 602.

We also find among Theodoret the things which Clement attaches consecutively from Euripides, Hyperides, Isocrates, and Andocides. ^A And we wish you to be warned, moreover, that it is correctly observed in Clement’s scholia that the verses of Euripides which follow, skimmed from Hyperides, are exhibited by Stobaeus in serm. 2, *De malitia*, namely, p. 30. But there it should have been added that the verses of Theognis also, from which those, as Clement says, were culled, are transcribed in the published sentences of that author.

In the same scholia we are referred, regarding the verse of Stosimus cited later, to the word *Γήτιος* in Suidas. But it should have been added that the same verse is also cited and explained by Erasmus, although the name of the author is left unsaid. Nor should it have been omitted there that what Clement later brought forward from Herodotus had been written in the text of the latter, in his book I, slightly differently than in the former: *Πατρὸς δὲ καὶ μητρὸς οὐκ ἔτι μὲν ζωόντων, ἀδελφεός ἂν ἄλλος οὐδενὶ τρόπῳ γένοιτο* ^B — *Patre et matre jam vita defunctis, alius frater nulla ratione esse potest.* Which reply is said to be that of Intaphernes to Darius.

Plato’s maxim: "An old man, as it seems, has been twice a child," is to be found not only in the book of the same Plato which is praised in the scholia and by Erasmus, but also in the supposed dialogue of his, *Axiochus*, vol. third, p. 367.

However, Casaubon observes that these are the very words of Demosthenes in his oration *De corona*, which our author later said to have been taken from Philinus. See Athenaeus in that place, which is explained by Casaubon.

Concerning Isocrates, and also Lysias, whom our Clement later shows to have been the rival and imitator ^C of the same Isocrates, Cicero has truly handed down many and noble things to memory. But let it suffice to have culled these from the many: "There existed already in those times of old men, whom we mentioned a little before, Isocrates, whose house lay open as a kind of academy for all of Greece, and a workshop of eloquence, a great orator, and a perfect teacher, although he lacked the light of the forum... Then Lysias himself, indeed, was not versed in forensic cases, but was an exceptionally subtle and elegant writer, whom you might now almost dare to call a perfect orator. For you would easily call Demosthenes truly perfect, and one to whom nothing at all is lacking." Many other different things regarding both Lysias and Isocrates have been collected in this book of Cicero, and in the books *De oratore*, etc. ^D But the life of both was published to the common people by Plutarch, vol. II, p. 835 et seqq., and Photius discusses many more things concerning their orations and writings in his *Bibliotheca*, cod. 260 and 262.

But if you desire to find the verses following these of Homer regarding the bravely meeting of death for one’s country in war, go to *Iliad* XII, p. 235. The words of Theopompus, also lauded there by Clement, and many others on the same subject, Victorius will show you.

To these things, indeed, Clement cites the Homeric poem regarding the necessity of death from *Iliad* VI, p. 115, and the words of Demosthenes which Stobaeus testifies he transcribed from his oration *De corona*.

Next, read, if you wish, concerning the cited maxim of Plato and the comic poet Philemon, what Erasmus brought forward for the sake of explanation in the adage: *Ex aspectu nascitur amor*.

Clement maintains that that which the historian recounts—that which is not implanted in any plant by nature, that it should truly grow tame after it has reached a more tender age—was culled again from Plato himself. Whether, however, that word *Historicus* is the author’s own...

name, or whether that of this writer was omitted by the copyist scribes and only his surname remained, we shall gladly hear from others.

Furthermore, do not be surprised, I beg, that Euripides’ *Chrysippus*, which was never published among his works, is cited in that same place by our Clement. For you will find this same work mentioned more than once by Stobaeus. From the same Stobaeus, it is confirmed that what Clement says ^A is asserted by Plato—that "women are held in common"—appears to have been taken from the fifth book of Plato’s *Republic* (Vol. II, p. 257 et seq.). Moreover, Euripides’ *Protesilaus*, where he, according to our Clement, subscribed to this opinion of Plato’s, is cited yet more often by Stobaeus.

Finally, our author ^B adduces things commonly attributed to Epicurus, the first of which is culled from Euripides in these words: *πλουσιώτατον αὐτάρκεια πάντων* (sufficiency is the wealthiest of all things). The latter, however, excerpted from Aristophanes, was this: *δικαιοσύνης καρπὸς μέγιστος ἀταραξία* (the greatest fruit of justice is the absence of perturbation). Now, in the life of this same Epicurus, these are the words of Laertius: *τὴν αὐτάρκειαν δὲ ἀγαθὸν μέγα νομίζομεν* (we consider frugality a great good). And later: *ὁ δὲ δίκαιος ἀταραξώτατος* (the just man is most free from perturbations). These passages in Laertius, Menagius—whom you may consult if you wish—discuss at length according to his custom.

Do not be weary, finally, of perusing the thefts of the Greeks, which Eusebius has left for us in book X of his *Praeparatio evangelica*, chapter 3, written from Porphyry.

ARTICLE IV. On the greater thefts of the Greeks, by which they ascribed to themselves the entire works, books, and other commentaries of others, and on Hippias, who discoursed upon the thefts of the Greeks.

From these so open and frequent thefts of the Greeks, our Clement passes on to others which are still greater and more illustrious, and makes it manifest to all that they have stolen not only the sentiments, sayings, and pronouncements of their own Greek writers, but even whole commentaries and entire books, and have sold and published them as their own. He begins with Eugamon, or Eugrammon, as he is called in Eusebius, who transcribed a few things from this place in our author to prove the plagiarizing of Greek writers. Now, that Eugamon is accused of theft by Clement because he falsely attributed to himself the entire book of Musaeus, *The Thesproti*, and impudently inscribed it with his own name. Concerning him, Eusebius says again in his *Chronicon*, in the 53rd Olympiad, at the year 1451: "Eugamon (as in the text of Clement) the Cyrenaean, who wrote the *Telegonia*, is noted." Some, however, suspect that "Theogonia" should be read there instead of "Telegonia," as it is in the ancient edition of this *Chronicle*.

Another plagiarist brought forward by Clement is Pisander of Camirus, who, as he says, stole Pisino of Lindus's *Heraclea*—that is, the labors of Hercules—and published at least two books of them to the world, inscribed with his own name. From this Pisander, Athenaeus reports the following: "Pisander relates in his second book that the Herculean basin, by which Hercules was carried across the Ocean, was given to Hercules for the sake of the Ocean." Without a doubt, it is from those same books that he committed to memory that which Pisander, as Pausanias relates, handed down concerning the fable of the hydra and the birds that were driven from their place by Hercules by the sound of rattles. You may see Gesner’s *Bibliotheca* and Vossius’s *De poetis Graecis*, p. 15.

Panyasis of Halicarnassus succeeds [Pisino], whom our same author argues to have stolen the *Capture of Oechalia* from Cleophylus, or rather Creophylus. But some other writers have opined that Cleophylus received it from Homer. Suidas speaks of him thus: "Creophylus, son of Astyches, a Chian or Samian, a versifier. Some, however, hand down that he was Homer’s son-in-law, having had his daughter as his wife. Others say he was merely a friend of Homer, and when he had received him into his hospitality, he received from him the poem *The Capture of Oechalia*." But Strabo had already committed to writing concerning him: "Creophylus was also a Samian. They say he once afforded hospitality to Homer and received as a gift from him the inscription of the poem *The Capture of Oechalia*." Callimachus, on the other hand, indicates in a certain epigram that Creophylus was the author, but that it was attributed to Homer on account of his hospitality:

*Me, the Samian, made, who once received Homer* *With hospitality. My fates, Euryte, I lament,* *And beautiful Iole. These are reported to be written* *By Homer; to Creophylus, by Jupiter, is this a light matter?*

Some report that he was Homer’s teacher; others say not him, but Aristeas of Proconnesus. Concerning this, Gesner notes more in his *Bibliotheca*, and Vossius in *De historicis Graecis*, book II, p. 347. But I would have you observe that Callimachus’s opinion can be confirmed not at all absurdly from the very words of our Clement. For if our same Clement had ever sensed even the slightest hint that Creophylus had truly received this poem, *The Capture of Oechalia*, from Homer, he certainly would not have failed to object to the Greeks this double theft of this poem—first that of Creophylus from Homer, and then that of Panyasis from Creophylus. And indeed, he should have kept silent about this the less, the more accurately he commemorates the many compilations of poets from Homer, of which mention was made just above.

"After these things," he says, "Aristophanes, in his first *Thesmophoriazusae* (*ἐν ταῖς πρώταις Θεσμοφοριαζούσαις*), translated verses from Cratinus’s comedy, whose name is *Empipragmeni*, that is, *The Burning Ones*." In exactly the same way, this comedy is cited by Aulus Gellius: "Aristophanes also mentions *The Woman-Haters* (*ἐν ταῖς προτέραις Θεσμοφοριαζούσαις*), in these verses, etc." Thus, the two Aristophanean comedies, in which women celebrating the festival of Ceres are signified, bore the Greek title. But one of these two was published in print more than once with other Aristophanean comedies. Certain poems of the later play, however, are cited by Athenaeus in this manner: "That Demetrius of Troezen inscribes Aristophanes' *Second Thesmophoriazusae* as *Thesmophoriazusae*." Aristophanes’ play, whose title is *Second Cerealia* (or *Celebrating the Festival of Ceres*), Demetrius of Troezen thinks should be inscribed *Second Cerealia*. But by what right Demetrius wished it to be so inscribed is not easily understood. For since our Clement and Aulus Gellius have cited the first Aristophanean comedy marked with the title *Thesmophoriazusae*, they declare not obscurely that another was distinguished by the same title. Furthermore, Athenaeus often cites Aristophanes in the *Thesmophoriazusae*, but without making any distinction between the former and the latter comedy. And truly, not much less frequently is there lauded by him another comedy of the same Aristophanes, to which the name *Daedalus* was prefixed. In it, as our Clement has added, Aristophanes [cites] from the comic Plato...

and in turn had compiled many things from him. Furthermore, the name of the comedy in which Plato is said to have transcribed many things in like manner from Aristophanes seems to be passed over in our Clement’s text. But what that might be, since thirty and no less are cited by Athenaeus, who, I ask, will divine?

Clement follows up with *Cocalus*, which had been aptly fashioned by Aristophanes, [and] the comic poet Philemon, when he had changed it a little, performed it in a comedy which is inscribed *The Supposititious*. Athenaeus once cited that comedy of Aristophanes in this way: "The witty Aristophanes also said in *Cocalus* (ἐν Κωκάλῳ), etc." Gesner observes more things about Philemon, to which can be added those things which are commemorated here by our Clement concerning his comedies.

But what about the fact that we are admonished by our author ^A that Hesiod’s poems were transformed into prose by the historiographers Eumelus and Acusilaus, just as if they contained nothing else but what had proceeded from them, [and] had become public property? If you ask who each of these historiographers was, we will answer you that our Clement, just as has been said by us already above, noted that Acusilaus the Argive is ascribed by some among the famous number of the seven sages of Greece. But whether he is the very one of whom he now makes mention, it can be proven from the fact that Dionysius of Halicarnassus ^B enumerates him among those who composed histories before the Peloponnesian times. Added to this, indeed, is what Josephus also relates of him: "But those who attempted to write histories among them (the Greeks), that is, Cadmus the Milesian, and Acusilaus the Argive, and whoever else are reported to have been after him, preceded by a little time the expedition of the Persians against the Greeks." That this is the very person of whom Clement speaks, someone might not wrongly deem that he can infer from those things which are presently appended by the same Josephus: "But I shall seem to myself to be superfluous to others, if I should wish to explain in how many places Hellanicus disagrees with Acusilaus regarding the genealogies, and in how many Acusilaus corrects Hesiod." For is not that the wily and depraved custom of plagiarists to hide their compilations and thefts; so that they might boast more often that they are correcting the errors of those whose writings they steal, whether they are true errors or falsely attributed ones, and by this fraud and deceit it might appear that they had sipped nothing from them? Concerning this Acusilaus, see Vossius, book I *De histor. Graec.*, ch. 1, p. 5 and 13, where he observes that in Suidas, instead of *Agnaddou*, one should read *Acusilaou*. See also what he further disputes there, book IV, ch. 2, p. 456, concerning his age and style.

The difficulty is therefore greater regarding Eumelus. For Eumelus the Corinthian is celebrated by many. But he was not a historiographer, but a poet. And in the matter itself, our Clement brought forth a poem ^C of Eumelus, which he asserts to have been transcribed by Solon. Wherefore it seems to stick in the throat of Vossius ^D whether he was the same as the historiographer. But the fifth book of Eumelus’s *Histories* is lauded by Laertius in the *Life of Aristotle*. But who, indeed, would not see it to be sufficiently likely that this is the one whom Clement, no differently than Acusilaus, accuses of theft and larceny? But concerning Eumelus the Corinthian and the poet, [we shall speak] elsewhere.

Furthermore, no one is mentioned by our Clement whose writings have been snatched and plundered by more people than Melesagoras. For how many and what kind of thieves those were, you would hardly believe us, unless we represented them to you in the words of the same Clement. But these are the very words of his: "Melesagoras has purloined from Gorgias of Leontini, and Eudemus of Naxos, the historians, and furthermore [from] Bion of Proconnesus, who also transcribed the deeds of the ancient Cadmus, and Amphilochus, and Aristocles, and Leandrius, and Anaximenes, and Hellanicus, and Hecataeus, and Androtion, and Philochorus." You see indeed eleven no less, writers well enumerated by Clement, who not only watered their own little gardens from the fountains of Melesagoras; but also falsely and impudently proclaimed that those things which they accepted from him had flowed forth from themselves as if from their own primary source. Who, therefore, and how great a man, and how illustrious must the monuments of that genius have been, judge from their name, number, and fame, those who, having purloined them, confessed that nothing better could be thought out and written beyond them. But furthermore, if he, as it seems to some, is the same as Amelesagoras of Chalcedon, Dionysius of Halicarnassus testifies that he flourished before the Peloponnesian war. See what Vossius annotated concerning him, book I *De hist. Graec.*, ch. 2, p. 10 and 11.

Now among the compilers of this Melesagoras, our Clement offers first Gorgias of Leontini, whose name [was] most celebrated among the ancient writers. For, not to mention Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Plutarch, Plato, Quintilian, Suidas, and many others, Laertius narrates that he was: "Distinguished in oratory, who also wrote a rhetorical art, who, as Apollodorus hands down in the *Chronicles*, completed one hundred and nine years of life." Cicero indeed: "They were called Sophists," he says, "of whose number the first was Leontinus Gorgias, who dared in the assembly to ask a question, that is, to order to speak on what subject anyone wanted to hear." A bold business, I would say audacious; unless this custom had been transferred later to our own. You will read the same in Cicero, book I and II *De orat.*, book I *De invent.*, in *Brutus*, etc. But we have already discussed him above (ch. 21, art. 3).

Clement gave the second place to Eudemus of Naxos, whom he also calls a historian. But he narrates in the first book of Eudemus [alt-version omitted]: "In his astrological histories (ἐν ταῖς ἀστρολογικαῖς ἱστορίαις) he predicted an eclipse of the sun, which happened at that time when the Medes and Lydians joined battle." But this book of Eudemus is cited a little differently by Laertius: "In his history of things astrological." But this seems to be another [person] than Eudemus of Naxos, whom Vossius opines is the same as Eudemus the Carian. But Dionysius of Halicarnassus, cited by us already, maintains that he lived before the Peloponnesian war, no differently than Amelesagoras.

Clement brings up third Bion of Proconnesus, whom Laertius in the *Life of Bion* called the first out of ten others who were called by the name of Bion, the philosopher of Boristhenes. And perhaps not rashly would someone say that he is the one whom he is read to have praised in the *Aethiopics* simply by the name of Bion.

To those three, a fourth is numbered, Amphilochus, whom Clement signifies as a writer of history, and as being more recent than the ancient Cadmus, whose deeds he wrote. But who or what he was, our own author is silent, nor is it easy to tell. For we have seen him mention the seer Amphilochus more than once. Varro, Pliny, and Columella also make mention of a different Amphilochus: but they openly testify that he wrote concerning agriculture. But if one of these two is the one who is now being discussed, he is certainly designated by our author as the second rather than the first. For they say that he handed down by his writings many things other than those concerning agriculture.

^A

The difficulty regarding Aristocles is no less. For Suidas is a witness that three men were so named. But Vossius more readily accedes to the opinion of Meursius, who thinks it more probable that none of these three, but another, a Rhodian by birth, is cited by our Clement. However, the books of Aristocles on the Republic of the Lacedaemonians, and another on Choruses, both praised by Athenaeus, ought not to have been omitted by him. For it seems no less likely that this is the one whom Clement accuses of theft.

He then proceeds to charge Leandrius with a similar theft, from whom he doubtlessly had already taken the testimony concerning Clearchus’s tomb in another book. For in both places he is called Leandrius by him, although by Eusebius, just as in the first book of our Clement’s Stromata, he is named Leandrus. But they say that this is the very same person whom Laertius called Leandrius the Milesian, and attested to be cited by Callimachus. However, since another Leandrius Nicanor is read commended by Stephanus, it cannot be deemed certain and established whether Clement is to be understood as speaking of only one writer. But we have already touched upon this in the previous dissertation, chap. 14, art. 1.

Besides Anaximenes the philosopher, the pupil of Anaximander, of whom we have spoken elsewhere: "There were," says Laertius, "two other Lampsacenes of that name, one an orator, the other a historian, who, being the orator's grandson, wrote the deeds of Alexander." But because these are the Greek words of Laertius: Ῥήτωρ καὶ ἱστορικός, ὃς ἀδελφῆς υἱὸς ἦν τοῦ ῥήτορος τοῦ τὰς Ἀλεξάνδρου πράξεις γεγραφότος, Menagius, after Vossius, thought they could be better rendered in Latin thus: “An orator and a historian, a nephew by a sister of the orator who wrote the deeds of Alexander.” Therefore, that Anaximenes the orator is said there to have written the Deeds of Alexander. But if the matter stands so, he also seems to be the one of whom Pausanias says: "I found a statue of Anaximenes, who wrote the ancient deeds of the Greeks, and those of Philip and Alexander." And shortly after: "Before Anaximenes, indeed, no one attempted to speak in a sudden improvisation. Furthermore, the verses written concerning Alexander are circulated in his name; in my opinion, they are falsely attributed to Anaximenes." From this, however, it can be concluded with sufficient certainty that the Anaximenes by whom the deeds of Philip, Alexander, and the Greeks were produced in writing is this very person whom Laertius calls an orator and a historian. Diodorus Siculus, however, recorded these things somewhat more obscurely concerning Anaximenes: "Anaximenes the Lampsacene also, who was the first to write a history of Greek affairs, starting from the birth of the gods and the origins of the human race, leads it down to that battle of Mantinea and the death of Epaminondas, covering almost all the deeds of the Greeks and barbarians in twelve volumes." He is commended in the same way by Athenaeus: "Anaximenes the Lampsacene, in the histories which he entitled the First." And again in another book: "Anaximenes, in the book titled Mutations of Kings." Furthermore, Suidas has borrowed what he reported about Anaximenes from the Pausanias we cited. Since, therefore, there were two Anaximenes of Lampsacus, it will certainly be difficult to say which one our Clement is to be understood as meaning. Yet if Pausanias, Diodorus, and Athenaeus ^B truly speak of him, we shall easily concede that our Clement also spoke of him. Moreover, the opinion of Vossius is that the younger Anaximenes is the one actually being discussed by him. See the observations of Menagius on the passage of Laertius cited by us.

After this Anaximenes, Hellanicus and Hecataeus come forward, of whose birthplace, if Clement had at least indicated it, we could have arrived at a knowledge of them more easily. For many writers of history have been called by both names. For by Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Hecataeus the Milesian is reported to have flourished before the Peloponnesian war, and Hellanicus the Lesbian afterwards, yet before Herodotus. And in truth, Hecataeus is cited by Herodotus, and is either called simply Hecataeus by him, or Hecataeus the son of Hegesander, and a *logopoios*, or historian. Pausanias, however, names him either Hecataeus the Milesian, or only Hecataeus. From these, moreover, might one not with some right and not undeservedly suspect that this is the very person of whom our Clement now speaks, and of whom he had said a little earlier: 300 Ἑκαταῖος ὁ τὰς Ἰστορίας συνταξάμενος; “Hecataeus who composed the Histories.” For he seems to be different from that other Hecataeus the Abderite, about whom, as about the Milesian, we have already noted something. But of this Hecataeus we must still dispute further below.

Although Clement here and elsewhere has more than once called Hellanicus simply by his name, two famous historians nevertheless have borne that name, of whom one was a Lesbian, as we have seen from Herodotus, or a Milesian, but the other a Mitylenean. For which reason, more learned critics willingly admit that it is altogether uncertain and ambiguous as to which writer they are meant to be understood by those by whom he is called merely Hellanicus, just as by our Clement. Nevertheless, it is highly likely that he made mention of that Hellanicus of whom he spoke these words with a few other words interposed: "But Dieuchidas the Megarian derived the beginning of his oration from the Deucalionea of Hellanicus." But this commentary, whose first book we find cited by Athenaeus, some have not hesitated to adjudicate to Hellanicus the Lesbian. Vossius disputes more on both Hellanici; consult him if you wish. But we cannot pass over Porphyry, who, in Eusebius, handed down to posterity these things concerning other thefts of Hellanicus, and concerning the almost entire history of Hecataeus transcribed by Herodotus; "What does it avail in this place to say that the work of Hellanicus on the customs of the barbarians was cobbled together from the writings of Herodotus and Damastes? Or that in his second book Herodotus transcribed very many things from the historical narrative of Hecataeus the Milesian word for word, with a few things lightly amended," etc.

Hellanicus is followed by Androtion, who is without doubt the same man whom Pausanias attests wrote commentaries on Attic affairs, or an Attic history. There is also an opinion held by some that he is the one who is ascribed to the list of rustic writers by Varro and Columella at the beginning of their work. And by that name he is cited by Theophrastus in his History of Plants, and Athenaeus is read to have commended his Georgicon, although he said earlier: Androtion or Philippus, or Hegemon in his Georgicon. See Vossius, book III of De histor. Graec., page 322, and Harduin in his index of authors cited by Pliny. ^{C D}

Finally, the last of the writers Melesagoras, a thief and plagiarist noted by Clement, is Philochorus, who is frequently praised by him and also by Athenaeus. See Gesner’s *Bibliotheca*, and what has been noted by us elsewhere concerning him.

Furthermore, just as Clement warns us that Philochorus pilfered many things from Melesagoras, and as was said a little before, that Dieuchidas did the same from him. We observe also the fourth book of his *Megarica*, cited previously by him as "in the fourth of the *Megarica*," and by Laertius as "in the fifth of the *Megarica*," but more simply by Athenaeus as "in the *Megarica*." Consult Vossius, book III of *De historicis Graecis*, page 334, and the notes of various scholars on the passage of Laertius.

Finally, so that this long discourse of our author concerning the mutual thefts of the Greeks, whence it arose, may be brought to an end, he consistently maintains that Plato learned from Pythagoras, and those men from the Egyptians, that the soul is immortal. Indeed, many Platonists, as he himself adds, sold the idea that the Stoics and Aristotle had plucked their principal doctrines and teachings from Plato himself. In short, that Epicurus also had stolen his own from Democritus. But these things can be unknown to no one who has touched, if only with the extreme tips of his fingers, as they say, the books of Laertius and others concerning the lives and dogmas of the philosophers, the commentaries of Plutarch, Theodoret, and others on the sects and opinions of the philosophers, and the lucubrations of Cicero and others on philosophical matters. For besides those things which have been noted by us in this and our other dissertations, Metrodorus clearly affirms in Plutarch regarding Epicurus: "Unless Democritus had preceded him, Epicurus would never have attained to wisdom." Cicero is clearer still: "What is there," he says, "in the physics of Epicurus that is not from Democritus? For even if he changed certain things, such as what I said a little before regarding the inclination of atoms; yet he says most things the same: atoms, the void, images, the infinity ^A of places, and the innumerability of worlds, their birth and their destruction, almost all things of which the theory of nature consists." And again, in another book, he has handed down these things in writing, no less certain and clear: "The things he changes, he corrupts; the things that follow are entirely Democritus': atoms, void, images—which they call idols—by whose incoming we not only see but also think; the infinity itself, which they call *apeirian*, is entirely from him; then the innumerable worlds, which both arise and perish daily." These things, although they are in no way approved by me, yet I would not wish Democritus, praised by others, to be disparaged by him who followed him. But he said it more briefly elsewhere: "Epicurus irrigated his own little gardens from the fountains of Democritus." Wherefore he justly and deservedly mocks him for boasting in his writings that he had no master. But it is not necessary to pursue more extensively these matters which the Orator repeats often, and which no one has ever denied.

Furthermore, Clement professes that there are innumerable other thefts by the Greeks, which indeed, he says, if I wished to bring forward one by one, life would sooner fail me. Therefore, he had sent us first to the sophist Hippias of Elis, who was occupied with this subject. But if you wish to know who he is, hear it from these words of Cicero: "Hippias of Elis, when he had come to Olympia with that great celebration of the games, boasted, while almost all of Greece was listening, that there was nothing in any art of all things that he himself did not know; and not only the arts, by which liberal and noble doctrines are contained—geometry, music, the knowledge of letters and poets, and those things which are spoken about the natures of things, about human morals, and about public affairs—but also that the ring he had, the cloak he was wearing, and the shoes he was dressed in, he had made with his own hand." A book of his is undoubtedly cited by Athenaeus with these words: "Hippias the sophist in the work titled *Collection*." ^B

Chapter XXIII.

ARTICULUS I.

We must now investigate in our own way those things which our Clement deemed should be handed down to us in writing in these books of the *Stromata* of which we are speaking, concerning the various arts, sciences, and disciplines. And so, that we may start from the different dialects of the nations, which pertain to grammar as everyone knows, it must be observed that dialect is defined by him as follows: "Dialect is an expression displaying the peculiar character of a place, or an expression displaying the peculiar or common character of a nation." In another book he asserts that this definition of dialect is approved by all as follows: "They define dialect as an expression finished with a national character." The best proof that this is the definition of dialect is that everyone easily concurs that dialect, strictly speaking, is nothing other than a proper and peculiar mode of speaking, which is distinguished from others by words rather than by syntax or composition. Wherefore, when Aristotle says: "Dialect is the articulation of voice by the tongue," the term "dialect" is taken by him there in a general sense. For, as he himself teaches later, "Voices also differ according to places, and dialects according to places and regions." See Guil. Baillius’s treatise *De dialectis*, and also *Plutarchomer.* note 16, and others.

Regarding the various dialects and languages of the nations, and their origin, as it seems, Clement relates that this was the opinion of Ephorus and others: "Ephorus and others," he says, "many historians, say there are seventy-five nations and languages, when they heard the voice of Moses saying: 'And all the souls of the house of Jacob who came with Jacob ^C into Egypt were seventy-five.'" But if you ask us where that cited passage occurs in our sacred scriptures, which is not noted in the editions of this book of our Clement, we will answer you that it is undoubtedly that which is read thus in the Greek translation of the seventy-two Elders: "All the souls of the house of Jacob who entered with Jacob into Egypt, were seventy-five souls." But although this sentiment is so ^D

^A firmly supported by its foundation, Clement does not hesitate to depart from it. For he adds immediately: "It appears that there are, according to the true account, two and seventy general dialects, as our Scriptures deliver." But it seems that, according to the true reason, the general dialects are seventy-two, as our Scriptures report.

If any one should ask us in what place of the Sacred Scriptures this is found, we shall send him to Augustine, who, after he has disputed in the tenth chapter of Genesis concerning the sons of Noah, indicates that the passage, without doubt cited by Clement, occurs there in these words: "In sum, therefore, all that were born of the three sons of Noah—that is, fifteen from Japheth, thirty-one from Ham, twenty-seven from Shem—make seventy-three. Then follows the Scripture, saying: 'These are the sons of Shem in their tribes, according to their languages, in their regions, and in their nations.' And likewise of all: 'These,' he says, 'are the tribes of the sons of Noah, according to their generations, and according to their nations. From these were the islands of the nations dispersed upon the earth after the flood.' Whence it is gathered that there were then seventy-three, or rather (as will be demonstrated later) seventy-two nations, not men. For previously, when the sons of Japheth were mentioned, this conclusion was drawn: 'From these were the islands of the nations separated in their land, each one according to his language, in their tribes, and in their nations.' From this last passage of Genesis, therefore, Augustine thinks it is indicated that this is the origin of the first diverse languages among men, or, as Clement says, of dialects. Wherefore he later repeats: 'From these three men, the sons of Noah, seventy-three, or rather, as the reason is about to be declared, seventy-two nations, and as many languages, began to exist throughout the lands, which, by growing, filled the islands.'" But who would rightly deny that it is most likely that our Clement referred to that testimony of Scripture which Augustine designates?

Indeed, regarding the primeval dialects and languages of the nations, there were two principal opinions of writers, whose disagreement arose from the various places of Sacred Scripture by which they thought they could be proven. For the first was that of Euphorus and other historians, as our Clement says, who deduced their number from the same number of the sons of Jacob, who the Scripture testifies went down into Egypt. Others, however, just like our Clement and Augustine, desired that the number of these languages be set equal to the number of the grandsons of Noah previously assigned by the same Scripture.

But the supporters and patrons of this latter opinion are still divided into various parties on account of the variant readings of the sacred text. For some, firmly adhering to the Hebrew text, stubbornly contend that there were only seventy sons of Noah, the chiefs of various families, and as many, and no more, primeval languages. Others, however, following the Greek interpretation of the seventy-two Elders, think that two others should be added above this number for those seventy sons of Noah, and consequently, as many languages. To this opinion, moreover, besides Augustine cited by us, and also, as we said, Clement himself, Eusebius also agrees in his *Chronicon*, where, after he has enumerated one by one those who were begotten from the three sons of Noah, he repeats there three times that they were dispersed according to their languages. Epiphanius is clearer: "Therefore," he says, "they build a tower and Babylon. But it displeased the Divine Will concerning the insane structure. Therefore, their languages having been dispersed, He made seventy-two from one, according to the number of men who ^B were found at that time." But again elsewhere: "At which time Babylon in Assyria was built by those same men who also constructed the tower. And there were then... men who were the authors and heads of nearly seventy-two lineages, namely, twenty-one from the offspring of Ham, thirty from the race of Shem, and twenty-five from the lineage of Japheth, when that tower was built with Babylon. From these were all nations and languages dispersed over the whole world. After those seventy-two, who 302 were building the tower, were dispersed here and there by the confusion of languages, for the one which they knew, each received another by the breath of God and by His will. From which, to this day, all the variety of languages has been gathered, the author of each of which it is possible to discover without any trouble. In the Greek text of Epiphanius it is read: 'Of Ham thirty-two, and of Shem fifteen, and of Japheth twenty-five.' But Petavius corrects him thus: 'But of Japheth fifteen, of Shem twenty-five.' Nevertheless, one is missing in these numbers, which ought to have been added. But that error of the scribes stands in no way against the fact that the mind and opinion of Epiphanius is open to all, and is entirely manifest. Finally, besides Jerome and the author of the commentaries edited among the works of the same Jerome, many others in a great number and with consensus have given their suffrage to this opinion.

But although there have been so many and such great defenders of this opinion, yet to others, and especially to more recent ones, it has seemed that nothing was established in Holy Scripture concerning these languages as the very first and as dialects, nor could anything certain be defined about them. For they deny clearly and thoroughly that from the mentioned sons of Noah other peoples or families, and thus languages, could have been constituted. You may see, if you like, Franciscus Junius, Bonfrerius, Cornelius a Lapide, and others on the words of Genesis cited by us, and also Buxtorf, *Dissert. De linguarum confusione*; Walton, *Prolegomen. 1 in Bibl.*, paragraphs 11 and 12, ^C and following.

ARTICLE II

From these things which have been argued, it is easy, we think, to understand why it is said by our Clement that the first and general dialects were barbarian—that is, that they had their origin not from the Greeks, but from the Hebrews: "The first," he says, "and general dialects were indeed barbarian, but names have a nature. For men confess that prayers are more powerful when they are said in a barbarian voice." Which is proved in the same place by him by the authority of Plato, who in the *Cratylus* openly declares the word *pyr* to be barbarian. And indeed this passage of Plato is read in that book, Vol. 1, page 409 et seq.

But it should be noted by us in passing that Clement, speaking of the men of his own age, said as it were through a lattice that they confess those prayers to be more powerful which are offered not in a vulgar and vernacular language, but in a barbarian one. For there is no one who does not know ^D how much heat of contention there has been among Catholics and other writers of this and the previous age concerning this question. But because almost infinite discussions have been published on that matter, it ought to be enough for us to have noted that prayers uttered in a barbarian or foreign language, εὐχὰς βαρβάρῳ φωνῇ λεγομένας, are neither rejected nor disapproved of by our Clement.

He also handed down ^A regarding the Hebrew tongue, which is no less known to anyone. First indeed, he said that the Hebrew dialect, just like all others, has its own proper and peculiar modes of speech, which show its character. Secondly, he said that the same Hebrew language is much older than the Greek. For if, as he says, from Hellen, son of Jove, who was surnamed Deucalion, it came about that languages are called Hellenic—that is, Greek—from the times we mentioned before, it can easily be perceived by how many generations the languages that are among the Greeks are posterior to the Hebrew language. Nevertheless, Conon, cited by Photius, testified to us that very few, in truth, believed Hellen to have been the son of Jove, but that by far the most were thoroughly persuaded that he was begotten by Deucalion. Such, indeed, was the opinion of Diodorus Siculus, and also of Eusebius, whose words in his Chronicle are these: "From Deucalion came Hellen and Pyrrha, these, who previously were called Greeks, were named Hellenes." That this, indeed, was asserted by Apollodorus and others, Scaliger noted in his animadversions on this Chronicle. ^B

Regarding the Greek dialects, Clement established this: "The Greeks say that there are five dialects among them: Attic, Ionic, Doric, Aeolic, and the fifth, common, καὶ πέμπτην τὴν κοινήν." Such was also the opinion of Joannes Grammaticus and others. But the more skilled grammarians, rejecting the last, think there were only four principal Greek dialects, although they admit that many others could be added to them. Strabo, indeed, although he approaches their view, thinks that those four dialects best known to all Greeks can not unjustly be referred to two. For he supposes that the Ionic sprung from the Attic, and that the Doric is the same as the ancient and incorrupt Aeolic. "There are," he says, "many peoples of Greece, and essentially there are as many varieties or dialects of the Greek language. Regarding these, we say that the Ionic is the same as the ancient Attic. For even the ancient Attics bore the name of Ionians, and from thence arose those who led colonies into Asia, the Ionians, and used the language which we now call Ionic. The Doric is also the same as the Aeolic, etc." But about these there is more in the writers of Greek grammar, ^C easily accessible to all, and therefore we have considered it superfluous to pursue it at greater length.

What, then, of the fact that "Plato," says Clement, "also attributes a certain dialect to the gods, especially indeed conjecturing this from dreams and oracles; but otherwise from those possessed by demons, who use neither their own voice nor dialect." But Hervetus warns us that he does not know from which passage of Plato this was taken. But did not Plato himself, citing the testimony of Homer, say in the *Cratylus* that there are certain names which the gods use, and others which men use, to name and designate things? And yet, even if he proved that at greater length in that same place, those things which he presented in the book inscribed *Ion*, about poets and the messengers of oracles and divine prophets, are more relevant to our matter: "Neither is a poet," he says, "able to compose verses before he has been seized by God, and placed outside his own mind, and ^D consequently his mind is no longer within him. For as long as a man is in possession of his own mind, it is in no way possible for him to compose poems and prophesy. Therefore, when God takes their mind away from them, He uses them as ministers, as messengers of oracles and divine prophets; so that we who hear might understand that they themselves are in no way the ones who say things of such great importance; but that it is God who speaks these things, and speaks to us through the ministry of those men." Now, therefore, see, I pray you, and weigh how by right and merit our Clement may be said to have aimed at this place of Plato. Furthermore, regarding the language of the gods, read the observations of Casaubon and Ménage on book 1 of Laertius, *On the Life of Pherecydes*, § 119.

Regarding that same Plato, Clement continuously added these things: "He considers that the languages of animals, which are of the same kind, which they might hear, are also bereft of reason." On which subject, besides others, you will be able to read Aristotle in book 5 *On the History of Animals*, ch. 9; Plutarch, book *On the Cleverness of Animals*, vol. II, p. 967 etc.; Aelian in book 5 *On Animals*, ch. 51; Pliny in book VIII *Natural History*, ch. 2 et seq.; Aldrovandus, etc. ^A

To prove this, Clement proposes to us three examples, no less worthy of admiration than of our own observations. The first is of elephants, who, when one "has fallen into the mud," says our author, "and has cried out, some other one present, having observed this, returns a little later, and leads with him a herd of elephants, and saves him who had fallen." Aelian recounts something similar about elephants, and professes it to be true: "Into a pit," he says, "having fallen, they drag in, with bundles of branches having been thrown in, those who, loaded from old age, rise up, as if by ladders, and are freed. He also narrates that they, with clearly similar cleverness, when they cross deceitful pits, extract from there that one, by others, who had offered himself as a substitute for a bridge to them." Plutarch, however, after Juba, has written these things about them concerning this: "Hunters cover the pits which they make to catch them with light vine-shoots and poured-out, common earth. When, therefore, one of the elephants has fallen into the pit, the others gather material and throw in stones, so that the one who has fallen can easily ^B get out." Many other examples of this sagacity of elephants those two writers, and especially Aelian in book *On Animals*, ch. 15, and Pliny in book VIII *Natural History*, ch. 3 et seq., have exhibited to us. But concerning that which our Clement brought forth, see Aldrovandus in book 1 *On Quadrupeds*, p. 440.

The second is of the Libyan scorpion, which, as Clement says, "if it does not strike a man, then the one going away returns with more; but one, hanging from another like a chain, plots treachery." See, however, whether he might be alluding to that narrative of Aelian concerning those same Libyan scorpions: "A scorpion, he says, if it finds something from which it might suspend itself on a ceiling, it clings there most strongly with its claws, at the same time also letting down its sting. The second, therefore, descending from the ceiling, ^C crawls along the first, and likewise clings with its own claws to the sting of the other, and fixes its own sting aloft. And again from the second, a third is held, from the third a fourth, the fifth similarly keeps the order, and likewise all the rest run down through the first. The last one strikes the sleeping person, and returns through those above, similarly from it the second, then indeed the third from the last, and the rest withdraw themselves, until, as if breaking the chain, all of them have withdrawn among themselves." See Aldrovandus in book *On Insects*, p. 81.

Finally, the third and last example, which is put forward by our Clement, is of fish, of which, as some claim, if one has escaped from a snare, ^D not another of the same kind will be found on that same day. But Plutarch narrates many more things about this cleverness of fish so that they may not be caught, by which that which Clement brought into the middle not altogether assertively, but solely by the testimony of others, can be confirmed in a wonderful way.

ARTICLE III.

^A verba attulit: «In the Phaedrus he says that the soul, when it exists by itself, [αὐτὴν κατ' αὐτὴν γενομένην τὴν ψυχὴν μόνην], can be a participant in true wisdom, and [it] surpasses human powers.» Do you wish for this to be proved to you by other words of the same prince of philosophers? Behold, they are at hand in his Theaetetus, where he expressly asserts: «that the soul partly considers things through itself, and partly through corporeal faculties.» This he proves from the fact that the soul knows the essence and truth of things through itself.

^B I would like you to weigh whether that which our same Clement has handed down—regarding judgment, or the second operation of the mind, as they speak—might favor the followers of the Peripatetic school more: «Assents, [συγκαταθέσεις], are in our power, not only for the Platonists, but even for the Stoics. Therefore, every opinion, [δόξα], and judgment, [κρίσις], and estimation, [ὑπόληψις], and discipline, [μάθησις], by which we live and are always with the human race, is an assent.» And indeed, if judgment is truly an assent and an approval, and this is in our power, does it not correctly follow from this that the judgment by which we deem any proposition true or false is an act of our will rather than of our intellect?

Why then, you will ask, is the same determined by Clement concerning opinion, [δόξα]? For since opinion is neither evident nor certain, how can we give our assent to it? Wherefore Clement had said elsewhere: «For truth is not opinion.» But although an opinion is uncertain and not evident, and is therefore distinguished from science, this does not hinder that men often recognize certain opinions to be false, and others to be true. And certainly, from this knowledge of false or true opinion, it happens that they give their assent to the latter, while they deny the former. Indeed, some, deceived by error, assent even to a false opinion. But if anyone should stubbornly contend that this assent ought to be called error or truth, we shall not violently contradict him. Yet why a false and true opinion cannot be spoken of in some fashion at least, we clearly do not see. But because this often happens to human frailty, that it joins its assent to false things, Clement teaches how a man imbued with a false opinion can be recalled to the truth: «There is a threefold reason for curing an opinion: the knowledge of the cause, and how it can be removed, and [thirdly] the exercise and habituation of the soul, so that it may be able to follow those things that have been rightly judged.»

As, however, false opinion is error, so also conjecture, according to our Clement, is a weak opinion which feigns and imitates faith: «Conjecture imitates faith, being a weak opinion.»

^C But what of the fact that he further admonishes us that from opinion itself, as from science, a demonstration can be made? «Nothing,» he says, «prevents a demonstration, [ἀπόδειξις], from being called twofold: one from science, the other from opinion.» But this latter he calls human, from rhetorical or dialectical arguments, while the former he plainly confirms by manifest testimonies of Sacred Scripture. Wherefore the latter is called by him «the highest and supreme demonstration.» Whence, in another book, he himself wrote this as well: «What is the knowledge of truth among us (that is, Christians)—so that from those things which are already credible, faith may be had in those things which are not yet so—brings it about: which, indeed, is the essence, so to speak, of demonstration.» But there is no one who does not see the accurate and proper [meaning of that] which the scholastics call ^D

^B demonstration's division and definition. For when he discourses on demonstration, his intention and his mind is nothing else than to show that the demonstration taken from our sacred Scriptures is more certain than any other. Wherefore, he had defined it more properly and generally beforehand: ^B Ἀγνοουμένου πράγματος φανερὰν συγκατάθεσιν, «a manifest assent to, or proof of, a thing that is unknown.»

He says that philosophers define science, ἐπιστήμην, as «a habit that cannot be moved by reason, ἕξιν ἀμετάπτωτον ὑπὸ λόγον.» ^B Elsewhere, however, «Science is a habit that makes one stand still.» But here this is more an effect of science than a definition. Yet from this he thinks the etymology of this Greek word is derived: «If science, which is called *episteme*, is to be given an etymology, its explanation must be taken from standing and rest, which is called *stasis*; because it causes our mind to stand firm in matters, which before was borne first one way and then another.» But since he brought forward that same etymology of the word *pistis* there, it is surely clear enough that by these words he indicated only the genus, and not the proper and peculiar difference of science, as the scholastics say. For science ought to be a knowledge of a necessary thing through its proper cause, which is not only certain but, as they say, evident.

^B Furthermore, he contends that science is the same thing as wisdom, which is defined by him as: «A knowledge of divine and human goods.» But he disputes more on that subject, just as on prudence, in these books of the *Stromateis*. He makes clear, however, what the difference is between the two, and how great is the utility of wisdom, the beginning of which is piety. In the former passage, Clement cites the testimony of Callimachus and Bacchylides; but you will find the former [in] the same sense in Cyril of Alexandria, and the latter in Theodoret. Finally, our author shows from Isocrates in the *Panathenaicus* who ought to be called truly wise. This passage of Isocrates, indeed, is read not far from the beginning of that book of his which is lauded by Clement.

305 ARTICLE IV

Now let us attend for a little while to what Clement posits concerning truth. He first says that it consists in four things, namely sense, intellection, science, opinion, and most importantly, mind. Then, «Rightly, he says, is it acclaimed by the Greeks: Truth is the mistress of great virtue:» ἀρχὰ μεγάλας ἀρετᾶς ἄνασσα ἀλήθεια. But where on earth this was ever handed down by the Greeks, either by voice or writing, Hervet admits to be completely unknown to him. However, to learn this, he ought to have consulted the discourses of Stobaeus, and at the beginning of the eleventh to have noticed these words, which are attributed to Olympias, in almost the same phrasing: ἀρχὰ μεγάλας ἀρετᾶς ὤνας (in the margin, ἄνασσα) ἀλήθεια.

^C But the philosophers, who, as our author observes elsewhere, love truth: «The beginning, he says, is to wonder at things, as Plato says in the *Theaetetus*. Matthias, exhorting in the *Traditions*: Wonder at the things present; ^D that it is the first step, establishing [it] as a start for further knowledge. For which reason it is also written in the Gospel according to the Hebrews: ‘He who has wondered will reign, and he who has reigned will rest.’» He proves therefore by a triple authority that wonder is the beginning of truth. But concerning the second and third [authorities], taken from the *Traditions of Matthias* and the *Gospel according to the Hebrews*, we have already disputed above. The third, however, is taken from these words of Plato: Μάλα φιλοσόφου τὸ πάθος τὸ θαυμάζειν· οὐ γὰρ ἄλλη ἀρχὴ τῆς φιλοσοφίας ἢ αὕτη· «This is indeed the passion of a philosopher, to wonder; for there is no other beginning of philosophy than this.»

Moreover, our learned author makes it manifest that truth resides not in cognition only, but also in action; in such a way, however, that the latter flows forth from contemplation. He teaches further that there are two species of truth: ideas, that is to say, names and things; and that the Greeks cling to names, and to the elegance and ornamentation of discourse, but indeed Christians to the things themselves, in which one must be occupied. Nevertheless, he warns us that the distinction and knowledge of names, just as of things, is of no minimal utility for understanding the sacred Scriptures, nor does it bring slight light to their obscure places: «The distinction of names, he says, and of things brings great light to minds even in the Scriptures themselves. For it is necessary to hear both expressions that signify many things, and many [expressions] when they signify one thing; whence it also happens that one answers correctly.»

But although he maintains more than once that truth is most difficult to find, he nevertheless confesses that there are many things that contribute to seeking it, and that it is found with the Son of God helping: «There are, indeed, he says, certain common criteria, such as sense; others, however, of those who have consulted and exercised these[criteria] on things that are true, namely [those] who distinguish what is true and what is false with mind and reason skillfully.» And these people inquire into the truth for as long as it takes until they find it in the sacred Scriptures; and having found it, they rest.

Why, indeed, is it that, just as truth must be sought from the Son of God, and from the divine Scriptures, as we have said, or, as Plato, cited by Clement, says, from God; so also, in order to attain it, not only philosophy, as was said above, helps us, but also other disciplines that are handmaidens of that same philosophy. And indeed, when Clement has proved this by an induction taken from various disciplines, he concludes thus: «The disciplines therefore assist philosophy, and philosophy itself [assists one] in treating of truth.» For they prepare the human mind and dispose it toward attaining truth, which cannot be acquired without much labor and experience, and from there one is led to the knowledge of truth. Wherefore, no one could rightly and deservedly deny that the reading of sacred Scriptures is altogether necessary for attaining truth, in the same way as human disciplines are useful. This indeed Clement confirms with the testimony of Plato, who, even if he denied that encyclical [learning] contributes to the good, nevertheless professes that help is brought by it for exciting and exercising the mind; so that it may be able to attain those things which are perceived by the intellect.

He shows therefore that those are mistaken in the greatest matters who objected against him: «What does it help to know the causes of how the sun is moved, and the rest of the stars; or to have contemplated geometrical theorems, or dialectic, or any one of the other disciplines,» which

^A are taught by human genius, but by no means from the truth? How infirm and of slight moment this objection is, he himself convicts from this 72: because men, endowed with the free choice of liberty, can make human doctrine holy, even if they have received it through men. And this is indeed established and confirmed by him through many testimonies of the divine Scripture itself and the example of Abraham.

Furthermore, he clearly demonstrates 73 that by him who has cultivated the true disciplines and arts of the Greeks or of the pagans, good gold is distinguished and separated from adulterated—that is, the true from the false, sophisticated art from philosophy and from orthodox truth—cautiously and prudently, just as heresies and errors are. Wherefore, it is permitted not only to imperfect Christians, but even to the most perfect—or, as he himself speaks, the Gnostic—through him, to gather from each and every discipline that which contributes to the truth. Moreover, he shows by a brief induction 75 what ought to be culled from each single discipline; yet with this law: that he should not use them as virtues, but only as helpers for attaining the truth. Nevertheless, he commands every Christian not to linger or remain in them, but after he has selected what is good and true in them, to return to true, or Christian, philosophy.

Furthermore, this opinion of our Clement ought to move no one to admiration. For he was persuaded 76 that in all things, not only in disciplines but also in the arts, there is something good which has proceeded from God himself: «Now indeed, those things which are good in the arts, as in the arts, ἐν τέχναις, ὡς ἐν τέχναις, have a divine origin.» ^B Yet he wishes us to be warned, not once nor slothfully, to avoid the much and useless abuse of the disciplines, for all Christians, and primarily for the Gnostic, or the most perfect of those very Christians. But this can be confirmed by the testimony of Plato and Heraclitus himself, which he has elsewhere brought forth 78 in this manner: «'Hεῖ γὰρ, οἶμαι, ὡς ἄρα ἤδη πολυμαθή νόον ἔχει ὁ διδάσκει καθ' Ηράκλειτον· For he knew, as I suppose, that he who is knowledgeable in many things already has understanding, which he teaches, as is the opinion of Heraclitus.» But Menagius judges that this ought to be corrected thus: «'Hεῖ γὰρ, οἶμαι, ὡς ἄρα ἡ πολυμάθεια νόον οὐχὶ διδάσκει καθ' Ἡράκλειτον. And indeed this emendation is proved by the sentence omitted by our author, which is read in Laertius 79 thus: «Πολυμαθίη νόον οὐ διδάσκει: Much learning does not teach the mind.»

Accordingly, Clement opines that these disciplines, which have some utility, are to be used by Christians only as certain preliminary exercises, by which they may be able both to dissolve the captious sophisms of adversaries and to attain the knowledge of truth. Finally, he asserts that they are then not only useless, but pernicious, when they have not been joined with true philosophy: ^C «Arts,» he says, «if they have not been joined with philosophy, will be fatal to anyone.» But all these things become clearer and more open to everyone from those things which we have argued above concerning philosophy.

ARTICLE V.

Concerning grammar, dialectic, arithmetic, and certain numbers, concerning music, geometry, architecture, agriculture, nautical science, and astronomy.

If we follow our Clement as he discourses upon the individual disciplines, we shall hear these things from him 81: «I consider him to be well and usefully educated, who refers everything to the truth; so that, gathering what is useful from geometry and music, and from grammar, and from philosophy itself, he may keep the faith untainted by any snares.» He judges, therefore, that a Christian man, being liberally adorned by each of these disciplines, is able, by their aid and protection, to avoid the snares and deceitful cavillations of heretics and other pagan and erring men, so that he may preserve the doctrine of the Christian religion unblemished and the faith kept from being intercepted by any false arts.

But since grammar is mostly concerned with words and expressions, Clement correctly concludes that it is useful for understanding the sacred Scriptures of both Testaments: «How,» he says 82, «is it not useful to divide words which are ambiguous and which are brought forward in the Testaments equivocally?» And indeed those who have tasted the same sacred books, as they say, with their foremost lips, and especially those who have attempted to interpret, expound, and search out their true meanings, well know the utility, nay, the necessity, of the grammatical art. Yet Clement, as we have said, warns the Christian not to linger in names and words alone, but in the things themselves and the truth which are elicited from them.

Dialectic, moreover, is called by Clement 84 the science of answering and questioning. Nor are those far from this science of whom Laertius wrote 85: «They say that dialectic is the science of correctly discoursing about speech, which consists in interrogation and response. Wherefore they define it thus: the science of the true, the false, and the neither.» And elsewhere he reports that this took its beginning from Zeno the Eleatic.

Concerning its utility, therefore, this our Clement has handed down: «Perspicuity brings help to delivering the truth, and dialectic [brings help] so that we may not be overcome by heresies, which make incursions.» But who will deny that there is no small fruit and profit of dialectic, which brings it about that we are not deceived by heretics, and that we dissolve, confute, and explode their vain subtleties and cavillations?

^D And indeed it is no wonder. For dialectic, as he says 87, according to the opinion of Plato, «is a certain science, a discoverer of those things which are of signification, τῶν ὄντων δηλώσεως εὑρετική τις ἐστὶν ἐπιστήμη.» Furthermore, a twofold dialectic is distinguished by him. The first is busy with sophistical matters, «and says or does some of the things which are said or done by men, and this is to be rejected from afar. The second is to be acquired by the good and moderate man, so that he may be able to choose and say those things which are pleasing to God, and that entirely according to his strength.» Clement teaches, moreover, that this is the prudence which divides those things which are perceived by the intellect, which leads us as if by the hand to true wisdom, which dares to advance even to God himself, and which finally professes a knowledge of divine and celestial things. And it seems he drew all these things from the seventh book of Plato’s *Republic* 89. To these, indeed, dialectic, as he says elsewhere 90, «explains fuse and reasonably, and with choice and assent, those things which have been perceived by the intellect. It confirms those things which have been truly said, and dissolves doubts and sophisms: For dialectic,» as he has furthermore written 91, «is like a certain palisade, lest the truth be trampled by sophists.» And why not indeed? Since «dialecticians,» says Laertius 92, «are called from discoursing, they being clearly those who fight with the acuteness of words and reasons.»

Clement also demonstrates 93 the utility of arithmetic, because the Gnostic, or the most perfect, just as...

it was said, should note the increases and decreases of numbers, and the relations that exist between them, and that very many things fall into the proportion of numbers. Furthermore, to prove that advantage of arithmetic, he not only brings forward the example of Abraham, but also observes certain things about some numbers, namely that the number ten is perfect in every respect, but the number eight is the first cube, equal in every dimension, and, not to mention others, that the number 120 consists of the parity of the number 64 and the imparity of the number 54, whose parts generate squares; nay, rather, that the same number 120 is composed of four ^A figures: one triangle, namely 45, another a square 25, a third a pentagon, and finally a fifth a hexagon. Although our Clement and other Church Fathers, as we have said elsewhere, having been after the Platonists, and especially the Pythagoreans, quite addicted to the science of numbers, were sometimes engaged in elucidating them; yet they judged that greater fruit could be perceived from allegorical and mystical explanation.

In these, indeed, after Philo the Jew, they discovered many allegories and symbols, and also many other figures, which they noted, as in the number three hundred and eighteen, in which our Clement 94 and others, as we have seen, believe the figure of the cross of Christ is designated.

But when our author exhibits the form and image of the Gnostic, or perfect Christian, as expressed by Clement of Rome, he interrupts the words cited by him from the thirty-first Psalm 98 and interjects certain things about the number seven and eight in the middle, thus: «Come, children, hearken unto me, saith the Lord; I will teach you the fear of the Lord. What man is he that desireth life, and loveth to see good days?» 99 Then he subjoins the mystery 307 of the hebdomad and ogdoad, which leads to knowledge: «Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips from speaking guile. Depart from evil, and do good; seek peace, and pursue it.» 100 For by these things he signifies knowledge with abstinence from evils, and with the operation of good things, teaching how to be made perfect both in deed and in word. But the sense of these words of our Clement, which Hervetus confesses he did not sufficiently perceive, is this: Clement of Rome declares by these words of the Psalmist that the hebdomad, or the number seven, signifies abstinence from evils, but ^B the ogdoad, or the number eight, which is more perfect than the former, and contains and comprises the sum of perfection, as we once observed in the exposition of the Gospel of Luke by Ambrose 1—signifies the operation of good things, which is perfected in word and deed. And that this can be confirmed from these and other significations of both those numbers, Clement afterwards revealed 2.

But that custom of expounding numbers mystically was so vulgar and prevalent in his time that if he were to say that the number ten is sacred, it would have seemed to him useless and superfluous. Wherefore, if you wish to learn this—as it is perhaps unfamiliar to you now—you should read Philo’s book *De congressu quaerendae eruditionis gratia*, p. 637 et seqq.; and Origen’s Homily 13 on Leviticus, p. 105, etc.

Hervetus, however, declares that it does not come back to his memory that he ever read anywhere what our Clement previously wrote concerning the number twenty-five: «Now the number 25, which is the fifth from unity, is said to be a symbol of the Levitical tribe.» But this mystical signification seems to rest upon these words of the sacred book of Numbers; «From twenty-five years old and upward they shall go in to perform the service in the tabernacle of the covenant. And when they have completed their fiftieth year they shall cease from serving,» etc.

But what of the fact that Origen brought before us the ^C same interpretation of the number 22 in its symbolic form? «The Levites,» he says, «who serve the Lord, are titled by this admirable and sacred number, the firstborn of the children of Israel.» Furthermore, concerning these and other numbers which our author mentions, and their mystical and allegorical signification, many things occur in the ancient Fathers of the Church, Origen, Ambrose, Augustine, and many others, from whose writings Hieronymus Lauretus collected many things in his appendix to his *Silva Allegoriarum*.

From these things, then, that we have said about arithmetic, anyone will easily concede that music is also useful to a Christian. For no one is ignorant that it is nothing other than arithmetic itself, which, as it is concerned with sonorous numbers, distinguishes in them the causes of harmonic concords and the intervals between sounds, and judges them either by sense or by reason. Although it is therefore called by our same Clement *stochastikê*, or conjectural 8; nevertheless, he approves its utility by the example of David, singing the Psalms with many numbers, thus: «Let David be set forth as an example of music, simultaneously playing and prophesying, praising God harmoniously and with many numbers.» Then he afterwards shows that the Dorian and Phrygian harmony is most becoming and convenient for a Christian, and that from this same harmony of the psalter, which reveals the nobility and gravity of the modes, ^D Terpander—of whom we spoke above—was a great example.

Therefore, through our Clement, it is permitted to a Christian to use this music. But how, and for what reason he ought to use it, from those things which the same Clement had said, he himself thus concludes 10: «Music is therefore to be approached for the adorning and composing of morals. Certainly, even at a banquet, by singing to one another we propose a toast, chanting our own desire, and glorifying God on account of the abundant donation of those things from which men take fruit and advantage, τῇ ἀφθόνῳ τῶν ἀνθρωπείων ἀπολαύσεων δωρεᾷ, and because there have been perpetually supplied nourishments for the growth of body and soul.» Wherefore the Gnostic, or perfect Christian, as Clement says 11: «From music he pursues the proportion which is in those things which are joined and composed.»

Nor does he teach that music is useful to Christians only by singing with the voice: but he also permits the use of certain musical instruments: «And if you know how to sing and play to the lyre and the cithara,» he says 12, «no reproach will fall upon you.»

Not every kind of music, however, does he contend is licit. For just as he asserts that that of which we are speaking is good, useful, and to be admitted, so he judges that the other is superfluous and to be utterly rejected. But which one that is, he explains in these words 13: «But that music is superfluous and to be rejected which breaks down the spirits and variously invites; such as is sometimes mournful, or sometimes shameless and inciting to lust.» This, indeed, he explains more clearly in the second book of the *Paedagogus*, chapter 4, and pursues more fully. Thus, to Clement, only the use of that music is approved 14, and by him it is granted to the Christian, from which they can reap and perceive some good and advantage and spiritual fruit.

Geometry also, agriculture, architecture, and navigation, to a certain Christian utility...

he clearly asserted that it could be of benefit. And although he shows that geometry and architecture are indeed deceptive for them, because by their work they perceive truth, and are brought by discovered proportions to length without breadth, and to surface which lacks depth, and to a point that has no parts, and he leads us from sensible things to those which are perceived by the intellect, that is, to God, who is neither corporeal nor finite.

How this knowledge can contribute to the virtue of a Christian man, Clement teaches beautifully, where he interprets in a mystical and allegorical sense the proportions observed in the construction of the tabernacle, the ark, and the table which were in the Hierosolymitan temple.

Nor indeed does he make it less manifest to all that astronomy is useful to the same Christian, by the example of Abraham, which is hardly uncertain. Furthermore, he explains in this manner how it is usefully employed by the Gnostic himself, or, as we have often said, the most perfect Christian: «Raised from the earth by astronomy, he will be exalted on high in his mind along with the heavens, and will be carried around with the revolution of the stars, always contemplating divine things, and the consensus and harmony which is between them, led by which Abraham ascended to the knowledge of Him who created.»

308 ARTICLE VI.

Not the same, assuredly, but a far different mind and opinion was Clement’s concerning the arts which consist only of words, and especially concerning the sophistic art. But what is this art, which the Greeks, he says, esteemed highly? He explains and defines it thus: «The sophistic art is φανταστικὴ δύναμις, a power of phantasy (or imagination), which engenders in words false opinions as if they were true.» And he immediately provides the reason why he has defined it thus: «For it provides to persuasion, indeed, rhetoric, the art of speaking; but to contention, eristic, the art of disputing.»

This he makes even clearer not only by the authority of Plato, by whom it is called an evil art, and Aristotle, by whom it is called a certain art of deceiving; but also from its principle, office, and end, which our same Clement discourses upon there in these words: «The beginning of the sophistic art is indeed τὸ φαινόμενον, that which appears, or the appearance of things only, and not the things themselves, and the truth. Its office, however, is twofold: one is from rhetoric, which pursues a matter with continuous discourse, a diegetic appearance, or a long pursuit of an apparent thing, but not a true one: the other is from dialectic, the eristic, which is questioning. Its end, however, is ἔκπληξις, stupor and admiration, but not the truth.» Therefore, since the sophistic art is an art of disputing, which is concerned entirely only about those things which appear, and has no other end than to lead men to stupor and admiration, but not to the truth, it receives and claims for itself only that which is worse; and he asserts that these things from rhetoric and dialectic have nothing of good, but are rather of no benefit at all.

From this, therefore, Clement rightly concludes that it, like other superfluous arts which consist only of words and speech, is by right and merit utterly proscribed and condemned by the Apostle. To which he subscribes further a little later, and provides this reason for his subscription and vote there: «The contentious and sophistic art is to be utterly repudiated; since the very dictions of the sophists not only dazzle the eyes of many and seduce them, but sometimes also bringing force to bear, they carry off a Cadmean victory.» This sophistic art, therefore, aims at nothing else than to dazzle the eyes of men, and to deceive and seduce them, and to delude them with a Cadmean victory, that is, an unlucky, unhappy, and to them pernicious and fatal one. Wherefore Christians must be accurately imbued and informed in true philosophy and dialectic, as has been said above from our Clement; lest they be deceived by that fallacious art, and may recognize, repel, and utterly overturn its wily frauds and fallacies and captious sophisms.

Nor does it seem foreign to our purpose to weigh here for a little while what questions Clement judged should or should not be raised by a Christian. He teaches, therefore, that the best question is that which is entirely consistent and agreeable with our faith: but the foolish, useless, and unlearned questions of heretics, and a fortiori of pagans, are, as the Apostle testifies, to be avoided and rejected, and one should not labor over them rashly, according to that verse of Aeschylus: Do not labor rashly on those things which aid nothing. Which verse, we may note in passing, you will find in Theodoret, tom. IV, serm. 4, *De Graec. affect. curat.*, pag. 531.

He says there is a fourfold genus of other useless and to-be-avoided questions. First, those which are entirely clear and manifest to all, for example, whether it is day. Second, those which can never be defined with certainty by anyone, for example, whether the stars are equal in number, or odd. Third, those which can be established and argued on either side for an equal and like reason, just as whether the fetus in the mother's womb is or is not an animal. Lastly, where the argument which is brought forth on either side can never be resolved by anyone. Clement therefore wishes all these questions to be avoided and utterly rejected by all Christians. And would that such prudent, certain, and firm rules for raising and proposing questions were now accurately and diligently observed in the Christian schools by those in charge of them. For then they would not abuse the greatest, and truly hardest, and deeply ungrateful labor of the youth and others, and they would inform them better in knowledge.

Finally, by a similar law of prudence, Clement also commands that the books of the Greeks or pagans should be read by those who know how to beware of the poisons of impiety and error scattered in them, with such caution that, rejecting what is false and harmful, they select only what is true, salutary, and divine.

CHAPTER XXIV.

ARTICLE I.

sisters they would cohabit, and wives were common to them; ^A of the abstinence of athletes, and primarily of Astylus of Croton, of Criso of Himera, and also of the cithara-player Amaebeus, from sexual matters; of the laws passed against adulterers; of another law regarding pregnant women condemned to capital punishment; of Roman wills made by scales and copper, and of the scytalae of the Lacedaemonians.

After those things which our Clement has handed down concerning the arts, disciplines, and sciences of the Greeks and pagans have been examined by us according to our custom, we must now pass on to other matters, which, since he judged them worthy of note regarding their manners and the celebrated crimes of some, and since they cannot be easily understood by all, must still be clarified and explained by us. However, we shall omit those things which we have already attempted to explain, such as what Clement narrates regarding the purple and deceitful garments and ointments proscribed and rejected by the ancient Lacedaemonians, and the fact that newborn infants ^B were exposed by their pagan parents with the most cruel inhumanity. We have in the previous dissertation also noted many things regarding the pagan greed, gluttony, and delicate appetite, to which these things are to be added, mentioned by our Clement in these books of the *Stromata* concerning certain gluttonous men: "Who," he says, "before the birth, in the bellies of some animals, drive their heels, so that they may feed on meat tempered with milk." How true these things are, you will learn from Plutarch, who left this writing for us concerning the corrupted and depraved manners of certain men of his own age: "Others kill pigs with heated spits, so that the blood is extinguished and diffused by the tincture of iron, and softens the meat and renders it delicate. Others jump upon the udders of pregnant sows when the birth is already imminent, and trample them; so that they may devour the blood, and milk, and the matter of the fetus, ^C all at once killed in the mother's throes (O, expiatory Jupiter!) the most inflamed part of the animal."

How alien the Magi were from these manners, you may gather from what Clement has handed down to memory concerning them: "Certainly, it is the concern of those who worship angels and demons to abstain at the same time from wine, living things, and sexual matters." But previously he had said of these same people in his *Exhortation to the Greeks*: "The Magi boast that they already have demons as ministers of their impiety; as those who have inscribed them into the number of their servants, and have made them slaves compelled by necessity through their own incantations; because, of course, through their incantations they compelled them to be present and to serve them." Porphyry narrates more about these impious incantations in Eusebius.

But concerning that superstition of the Chaldeans or Magi, both impious and yet also abstinent, Laertius narrates much, taken from various authors, and first from Sotion, that they practice divination and prediction, asserting that gods appear to them... Their garment is white, their bed the ground, their food herbs, cheese, and common bread. Then, indeed, from Aristotle, Hermippus, Eudoxus, and Theopompus, he notes: ^D "There are two principles according to them, a good demon and a bad one; the one of these is called Zeus and Oromasdes, the other Pluto and Arimanius." You may see the observations of various men on this place of Laertius. Furthermore, Eubulus, as Jerome testifies, who explained the history of Mithras in many volumes, narrates that among the Persians there are three kinds of Magi, of whom the first, who are the most learned and most eloquent, except for flour and herbs, take nothing else in the way of food.

What Jerome discusses more fully in the same place can be brought forward for their confirmation, which our Clement had up to that point only stated generally: "Indeed, even those who worship idols abstain from food and sexual matters." See also Porphyry, book *On Abstinence from Animal Food*, page 599. Although the abstinence of the Magi was so great, and some have asserted that they abstained from sexual matters: "Xanthus, however (these are the words of our Clement himself), in those things which are inscribed *Magical*, says: 'The Magi, however, have intercourse with their mothers, and they say that it is lawful to have intercourse with a sister, and that wives are common, not by force or secretly, but by the consent of both parties, when one wishes to take the wife of another.'" Sotion, already cited more briefly by Laertius, says that the Magi thought it lawful to be joined with mother and daughter. But this is explained more fully in Eusebius by Bardesanes: "Among the Persians (among whom the Magi lived) there was a law, he says, by which it was permitted to join not only daughters or sisters, but also even the mothers themselves in marriage. Nor did the Persians contract those incestuous marriages only in that region, or in that climate alone; but even as many of them as migrated elsewhere from Persis, whom they call Magusaeans, remain bound by the same shameful acts, and they leave the same laws and customs to their descendants as if by hereditary right." Sextus Empiricus, Quintus Curtius, Ovid, and many others have made mention of this most shameful and clearly detestable custom, whose words, to prove more fully that about which no one can doubt, it would be a completely useless waste of time and labor to transcribe in full here. Read, if you wish, the animadversions of Menagius on the place of Laertius cited by us.

But, someone will say, explain to us how Clement stands with himself, who declares that the Magi both abstained from sexual matters and yet were contaminated by the most shameful intercourse with mothers and sisters? Was he speaking of different Magi, separated by the greatest distance in both place and manners? But I ask you to direct your mind to the fact that, besides the fact that it is not alien to the custom of our Clement sometimes to report not what he himself believes, but the various opinions of others on the same matter, it is not affirmed by him there without hesitation that the Magi abstained from sexual matters—which, of course, were prohibited and illicit for them—while they were indeed coupled with mothers and sisters in marriage, but this was permitted by the law passed among them, and therefore they did not believe it was a sin or incest at all. But when, after the faith of Christ was received, they had recognized that this was an evil, then, as Eusebius testifies, they immediately sent word to give it up: "Therefore, neither do the Persians," says Eusebius, "who have once given their name to the discipline of Christ, enter into marriages with mothers any longer... nor are the other kinds of barbarians polluted by the incestuous intercourse of daughters and sisters."

But if we pass from the Magi to the athletes, our Clement has also consigned to letters these things concerning their abstinence: "They say that not a few athletes abstain from sexual matters, on account of the exercise of the body, and are continent, just as Astylus of Croton and Criso of Himera." Which, indeed, are clearly and elegantly confirmed by these words of Plato: "Are we ignorant of those things which are told of the Tarentine Iccus, who, so that he might render himself fit for the Olympic games and others, applied such contention of mind and art, and conformed himself to such temperance, that he never touched either woman or boy, for as long as he was involved in such-like exercises?" The same also concerning Criso, and Astylus, and...

many others, is recorded... ^A regarding the restraint, by which they boasted with the most mindless rashness that they had license to commit every foulest vice, where Clement refutes them with various arguments of reasoning, there he contends against them with this argument: "Moreover, what they do, they do not as kings, but as wretches; for they commit adulteries in secret, fearing lest they be caught, and avoiding being condemned, and fearing lest they be punished." By which words, indeed, he signifies most openly that penalties had been decreed against adulterers by human laws, which these heretics, committing adultery in secret, endeavored to avoid. "Are these things true which the ancients have handed down to memory as having happened to these athletes? What then? That they might surpass others in wrestling, and running, and other bodily faculties of this kind, they voluntarily chose to abstain from that thing which is proclaimed by the common people as blessed." But elsewhere he writes: "Crison of Himera was a runner of flourishing and robust age." Diodorus Siculus, Pausanias, Eusebius, and others have also made mention of him, so obviously to everyone, that it makes Hervet wonder, who openly denied that he remembered reading a single word about him in others, besides our Clement. Concerning Astylus, the same Pausanias records these things: "Astylus the Crotoniate won three consecutive Olympic prizes for the repeated race. And truly, because he had been led by the desire of Hiero, son of Dinomenes, to declare himself a Syracusan, for the latter two victories, for the sake of infamy, the Crotoniates designated ^B his house to the use of a public prison, and tore down the statue dedicated in the temple of Juno at Lacedaemon." Clement continues: "Moreover, Amoebeus the citharoedist was recently wedded, but he abstained from his bride; and Aristoteles the Cyrenaean alone despised his lover Lais. Therefore, when he had sworn to the harlot that he would bring her into his homeland if she had helped him against his adversaries in some struggles, after he had done this, pleasantly fulfilling the oath written by himself, he set up an image of her as similar as possible to the Cyrenaean woman." Aelian tells the same thing about him: "Amoebeus," he says, "the citharoedist, is said to have been endowed with the greatest continence, and though he had a most beautiful wife, he never had intercourse with her." Which, indeed, he thought so singular and worthy of memory that he still considers it should be inserted into his History of Animals. There, however, he added that this Amoebeus, for all the time that he was engaged in contests, abstained from that most beautiful wife of his. Therefore, the difficulty regarding Aristoteles the Cyrenaean is greater. For Hervetus warns us that the same Aelian in his lauded Various History does indeed mention that Aristoteles the Cyrenaean, but that nothing is found in it about the Lais loved by him. But if Hervetus had turned his eyes to those things which were written in it a little earlier, he would certainly have seen there that what Clement attributes to Aristoteles the Cyrenaean, is in nearly the same way ascribed thus to Eubatas the Cyrenaean: "When Lais had seen Eubatas the Cyrenaean, she began to burn with the most ardent love for him, and conveyed to him the suggestion of entering into mutual marriage... A betrothal was made on these conditions, that it should be valid after the games and the contest. When, therefore, he was departing from the contest, so that he might not seem to have failed in his agreement toward the woman, he carried away with him to Cyrene a painted image of Lais," etc. True, it seems to be in no doubt at all that one or the other, or someone from their amanuenses or copyists, erred in copying the name of this lover of Lais. But who in truth erred, you could not easily say. However, since Aelian produces no witness, while Clement produces Ister as the author of his opinion, it can certainly be said not undeservedly that the latter is more likely to have written the truth than the former. But because some list an Aristoteles the Cyrenaic from Laertius, who wrote Poetics, while another man of the same name and the same fatherland is recorded by Stobaeus; whether he was one of these two athletes, or was indeed nicknamed Eubatas, we shall gladly hear from more experienced critics. The clearly intolerable impudence of the followers of Prodicus... ^C Someone will therefore ask what those laws are that were passed against adulterers, and what kind of punishment and penalty were constituted by them, and concerning which law, in the end, our Clement is to be understood. To satisfy these questions, it must be noted that many laws on this subject are mentioned by various writers, namely, the Romilian one by Romulus, as they say, and the Julian one by Caesar Augustus, and others passed by Diocletian, and after the age of our Clement by Constantine and Maximinus. But that our same Clement spoke of the Julian law is inferred not at all ineptly thence, because that law is more illustrious and celebrated than all the rest, and more in use, and was often confirmed by others afterwards, or was more moderately tempered and explained, or was made even more severe by the atrocity of the punishment. ^D But as for the penalty inflicted by them, it is said that adulterers were condemned to death by the Romilian and Julian laws. Later, however, the Emperor Constans, son of Constantine the Great, by a law given to Catullinus in the year 339, imposed a far heavier punishment upon them in these words: "It behooves the judge to sew up those who are sacrilegious regarding nuptials in a sack while still alive, like parricides, or to burn them." But since this very law is more recent than our Clement, he must without doubt be understood as speaking of the Julian law, as we have said, and the punishment sanctioned by it. What then, someone will argue, does not Augustine most explicitly deny that any capital punishment was established against adulterers by the ancient Roman laws, and consequently by the Romilian and Julian, where he wrote in these very words: "The ancient Romans buried the Vestal virgins caught in lewdness alive; but they did not punish adulterous women with death, however much they punished them with some condemnation." But it is truly, altogether likely that he spoke of the Romilian law, whose edict is not absolutely certain, or of certain other laws of the ancients, as he himself says, established before the age of Augustus, and consequently before the Julian law. For we read that statement in writing by Arnobius before the time of that same Augustine: "Men prone to lust, and inclined by the infirmity of nature to the allurements of pleasures; yet they judge adulteries by laws, and visit those with capital punishments whom they have caught having made an assault on the bed of another in violation of the marriage bond." You may see Ulpian, book 11 on the Julian law and book 5 on adulteries; Papian, book 1 on adulteries; Paulus Manutius, book on Roman laws, chapter 19, and Godefridus on the law of Constans cited by us in book IV of the Theodosian Code, page 296. Clement mentions another Roman law elsewhere for the sake of pregnant women in these words: "The Romans, if any pregnant woman has been condemned to death, do not permit her to undergo the punishment until she has given birth." But if we believe Plutarch, this law was first passed by the Egyptians, which some Greeks later received from them: "Do they not," he says, "seem to rightly consider the Egyptian law..."

^A that has also been usurped by them, as he shows by the example of testaments, where asses, or copper and the scales, were merely symbols, figures, and enigmas. If there is any obscurity in the discourse of Clement himself, the whole of it is removed and dispelled by what has been said and by the words of Theophilus.

As to the Greeks, Aelian committed these things to memory: "The judges of the Areopagus, when they had apprehended a woman who was a witch and wished to hand her over to death, did not put her to death before she was delivered of the child. But after she had given birth, they apprehended her, and freeing the innocent infant from condemnation, they alone punished the woman who had deserved the penalty with death." Concerning the Roman law, Quintilian surely spoke when he said: "The law orders the execution of pregnant women to be deferred until the day of birth." Consult, if you wish, the legal experts on the law *De pregnantibus*, in the Digest *De poenis*, etc., Cujacius, Jul. Paul. *Recept. sentent.*, book 1, title 12, *De iudicibus omnium*, § *Praegnantes*.

Lest we stray too far from the Romans, these words of our Clement concerning their testaments must be noted, which Hervetus did not understand at all, nor how they cohered with the preceding ^B or why they were brought forward by him. These are the things that are read here: "And what is done by the Romans in testaments has secured a place, namely those scales and asses for the sake of justice, and the mancipations and the touching of the ears; the former, so that they may be done justly; the latter, for the division of honor; the third, so that he who had fallen in, when a burden was placed upon him, might stand and hear, and hold the place of an intercessor." However, in order that these things, which should not have been so obscure to Hervetus, may be understood by everyone, it must be noted that what Clement recounts about Roman testaments is explained somewhat more clearly and plainly confirmed by Aulus Gellius: "For we have received," he said, "that there were three kinds of testaments: one which was made in the presence of the *comitia calata* in the assembly of the people; another in *procinctu*, when men were called into line to do battle; the third through the emancipation of the family, to which the *as* and scales are applied." And even more clearly, Justinian, book II of the *Institutes*: "The third kind of testament, which used to be made through copper and the scales, that is, which was conducted through emancipation, namely an imaginary sale, in the presence of five witnesses and a scale-bearer, Roman citizens of age, and him who was called the purchaser of the family." There is no room for doubt that our Clement is speaking of this third kind of testament, and by the name *cheirospasmon* has signified in reality the emancipations that intervened in these testaments.

^C Nor is there any need for other proofs for this than the words of Theophilus, in which he discourses on how that kind of testament was accustomed to be made. "It was done," he says, "by emancipation, which was an imaginary sale. For exactly five witnesses were present, and a scale-bearer, Roman citizens, and these of age. And in their presence, he who was to be the successor of the deceased bought the patrimony of the man about to die, saying certain solemn words; and in the name of an imaginary price, he gave a coin to the master of the things, and he who bought it was called the 'purchaser of the family.' Then the dying man arranged what he wished to be done after his death. For he said to the purchaser of the family, or heir: 'To this one I wish the estate to be given, to that one the house, to another a hundred solidi.'"

Furthermore, from these things thus explained, anyone can easily understand why Clement, who is accustomed to mix the profane with the sacred, brought forward this example of a Roman testament, and how these things cohere perfectly with his preceding and subsequent words. For there he is discoursing on the symbolic and enigmatic manner of speaking and philosophizing utilized in our sacred Scriptures. But he shows that this was also usurped by pagans.

^D If we wish to turn for a moment from the Romans to the Lacedaemonians, we shall hear what our Clement has handed down concerning that on which their laws used to be inscribed, which is not entirely easy for everyone: "The Greeks should know that the *scytalae* of the Lacedaemonian ephors were inscribed by law on wood." But to whomsoever these words of our Clement seem obscure, they will be able to find a clear explanation of them in Suidas. For where he discourses on what a *scytale* is, he has these things: "A *scytale* is a Laconian letter; now a *scytale* was a polished and oblong piece of wood. There were two *scytalae* among the Lacedaemonians, and the Lacedaemonian ephors themselves—that is, the chief magistrates, such as the tribunes of the plebs among the Romans—retained one, and the other they handed to the general whom they sent to war. And as often as they wished to command something of him, they brought a white thong, with which they wrapped the *scytale*, and on that space they wrote what they wanted. And unwinding the thong, and removing the *scytale*, they handed it to a courier to be carried away.... It is said, therefore, that the *scytale* is both the letter itself and the wood on which the letter is written." Neither less accurately and elegantly did Aulus Gellius describe the *scytale*, and also Ausonius in these verses:

"Or imitate the Lacedaemonian *scytale*, the strips of Pergamene paper, Wrapped around tapering wood, Inscribing it in a continuous line, which when subsequently loosened, Gave forms not corresponding in separate order, Until it is formed into the circle of similar wood."

If you wish for more, consult Athenaeus, book X of the *Deipnosophistae*, p. 451; Tzetzes, *Var. hist.*, chiliad 9, § 258, p. 409, vol. II of the *Poetae Graeci*, and others.

ARTICLE II.

Our author proposed certain singular deeds of pagan men, whether true or fictitious, but which he judged worthy of mention, briefly at times and obscurely; without doubt because he judged them to be known and common among everyone in his own time. Such surely are those which he brought forward somewhere, examples of involuntary sin: "Or he who did not know himself," he says, "like Cleomenes and Athamas, who were seized by madness; or the act which he commits, like Aeschylus, who when he uttered mysteries on the stage, was acquitted in the Areopagus because he showed that he was not initiated into the mysteries." But we have already discussed this Aeschylus.

Suidas mentions a certain Cleomenes, and relates these things about him: "When he was a leader of the Athenians, besides other evils, he also feigned madness; because he knew that he was hateful to the citizens. On account of which, even carrying a staff, he walked about, with which he warded off those who attacked him." Again, Erasmus discusses the same Cleomenes at the word *Cleomenes*, *Adagia*, chil. III, centur. 5, adag. 61, p. 666. However, some suspect with good reason that in the Greek text of our Clement, for *Cleomenes*...

^A one ought to read Cleomedes. For this suits better than the other what Clement recounts concerning him. For in Pausanias we indeed read: "It is recorded that Cleomedes of Astypalaea killed Iccus the Epidaurian in a boxing match; having been condemned by the aediles for that crime and stripped of the victory, he became mentally deranged with grief; having returned to Astypalaea, when he had entered a school where there were nearly sixty boys, he pulled down the column that supported the roof. Wherefore, the boys having been crushed in the ruin, when the citizens pursued him with stones, he fled into the temple of Minerva, and soon shut himself into a chest which was in the temple. When the Astypalaeans had tried for a long time to lift the lid of this chest, but could not, they broke it open at last; but saw Cleomedes inside neither dead nor alive, and having sent consulters to the oracle concerning the miracle of the thing, this response was returned in verses: 'Last of the heroes, Cleomedes of Astypalaea, / Whom you now deem worthy to be honored among the immortals.' And in the times that followed, the Astypalaeans held Cleomedes in honor as a hero." If these things do not satisfy you, consult Plutarch in *Life of Romulus*, vol. II, p. 35, and the already praised Suidas at the word Κλεομήδης.

Furthermore, the deed of Athamas, or the story, is narrated by the same Pausanias in this manner: "Ino, with Melicertes, her younger son, threw herself headlong into the sea from the rock which they call Moluris, after the father had killed Learchus, the elder son; and some say that Athamas raved thus, driven by fury against his wife and children; but others say he was vehemently inflamed with anger, because he had learned that she had brought the famine upon the Orchomenians by an impious deed, and at the same time he thought Phrixus had been put out of the way by her; and he interpreted all things as having happened not divinely, but by the deceit of a stepmother. They say, therefore, that she then, in flight, cast herself with her son into the sea from the rock Moluris." Ovid follows the story more fully in *Metamorphoses*, book IV, fable 9, who in *Fasti*, book VI, sang these things more concisely in verses 489 and 490: "Driven by these furies, Athamas under a false image, And you, little Learchus, fall by your father's hand."

Our Clement thus recalls the modesty of Polyxena to be sacrificed, which is commended by the poets: "It is written," he says, "by the tragedians that Polyxena, although she was being put to death, yet in dying showed great care that she might fall decently." But Pausanias writes: "That she was sacrificed at the tomb of Achilles, both the poets have sung, and the fables testify." Elsewhere, indeed, he observes this as a monstrous act, as he says, deliberately omitted by Homer. But Ovid, also, or rather concerning this entire story, and what is noted by our Clement, sang it thus: "Even then, there was care to veil parts that should be hidden When she fell, and to preserve the beauty of chaste modesty."

In the same way also Clement briefly touched upon the story of Prodicus, by which virtue and vice were said to have appeared to Hercules in female form. But elsewhere we noted that it is recounted by Justin Martyr, which Xenophon exhibited to us in its entirety from this same book of Prodicus about Hercules. ^B But Clement relates more fully the famous judgment of Bocchoris, king of Egypt—as we learn from Diodorus Siculus and others—concerning a youth who, while asleep, had appeared to himself to have lain with a maiden. He confesses that he would have received [the result] from Plutarch, who testifies that that girl was a weaver and an Egyptian, and surnamed Thonis.

But Clement proposes to us very many examples of heathens, both peoples and individuals, who, having constantly endured various tortures, clearly provided a great and wonderful document of patience to others. "Not only the Aesopians," he says, "and Macedonians, and Laconians, while being tortured, endure bravely," as Eratosthenes states in those things he writes *On Good and Evil*. "But Zenon the Eleatic also, while he was being forced to disclose some secret, resisted the tortures, confessing nothing, and even finally biting off his tongue, he spat it at the tyrant, whom some call Nearchus and others Demylus." Hervetus declares that he does not remember anyone having committed to memory anything concerning this patience of the Aesopians. But in the text of Clement, he had read *Asopii*, whom he thinks, no doubt following Strabo, were inhabitants of Boeotia. But in the published Greek text of Clement, and in the Claromontanus codex, it is written: Αἰσώπιοι, *Aesopii*, of whom the same Strabo says: "As much as one can gather by conjecture," he says, "you may place Mysia in the middle position between Bithynia and the mouths of the Asopus, τοῦ Αἰσώπου, which pertains almost entirely to Olympus." Since, therefore, these were Phrygian peoples and neighbors to Mysia, see whether our Clement spoke concerning them, because they were impunely injured by anyone at all. Whence arose that proverb, "Prey of the Mysians," concerning which you may read Erasmus, *Adagia*, chil. II, centur. 1, adag. 92, p. 315. To them certainly, or even to the Phrygians—concerning whom, as the same Erasmus notes, the proverb was reported, "A Phrygian is mended by stripes"—Clement rather seems to have aimed, than as some scholiast of his suspects, at the imitators of Aesop, who, having been tortured with dire torments, refused to betray the adultery of his master. For there is no room for doubting that Clement is making a discourse not on the patience of a man, but of a certain nation.

Hervetus denies that he has ever read anything concerning the public patience of the Macedonians, but only the example of the noble boy who, while Alexander was sacrificing, patiently suffered his arm to be burned when a coal fell from the censer. But from there, surely, he could have gathered with Valerius Maximus, whom he cites, how great was the patience and fortitude of this people. For Valerius there added: "If Darius had cast his eyes upon this miracle, he would have known that the soldiers of his lineage could not be conquered, for he would have noticed that one of infirm age was endowed with such great strength." ^C Hervetus rightly notes, indeed, that the patience of the Lacedaemonians is celebrated in these verses of Horace: "Nor Lacedaemon so patient has struck me, Nor the plain of rich Larissa, As the house of sounding Albunea."

But why Lacedaemon is called patient by Horace, some provide—not ineptly—the reason, which is narrated in these words of Plutarch: "At Lacedaemon, boys were beaten with lashes for an entire day, often even to death, and they endure it happily and eagerly, and they vie among themselves for victory, which consists in the fact that one may endure the blows longer and more intensely, and [he who does so] obtains the highest glory. That contest is called the scourging, and it is held every year." He repeats the same in *Life of Lycurgus*, p. 51. You may see Lucian, *dialog. De gymnas.*, p. 805; Cicero, *Tusculan Disputations*, II and V, pp. 142 and 189; Tertullian, *lib. Ad martyres*, cap. 4; Stobaeus, Seneca, and many others. But before the words of Plutarch cited by us, he relates many other things by which the Spartans... ^D

^A accustomed boys to bear any hardships patiently.

The crime of Zeno the Eleatic is no less frequently mentioned in the discourse of ancient authors. But first of all, one should read Philo Judaeus, Eusebius, and Diogenes Laertius in his Life, where he observes the tyrant by whom Zeno was tortured: Nearchus, or Diomedon as he is called by others. Valerius Maximus, however, calls him simply Nearchus, just as Plutarch calls him Demyllus. These, indeed, are the names by which this tyrant, as our Clement observes, has been called by others. But one should read the annotations of Menagius on the cited passage of Laertius. Theodoret, however, where he describes the same deed of Zeno from our Clement himself, as it seems, there cites Eratosthenes as a witness, whose testimony Clement does not adduce for his sake, but for the confirmation of those things which he had said about Aesop and others. Wherefore Theodoret either lapsed in his memory, or had read in his own or others' books the text of our Clement differently than it is now held.

But Clement continues: "Similarly, also, does Theodotus the Pythagorean and Paulus, an intimate of Lacydes, do, as Timotheus of Pergamum says in his book *On the Greatness of Soul of Philosophers*, and Achaicus in his *Moralia*." But Hervetus does not know if there is anyone who has ever remembered this Paulus. Yet the commended Theodoret should not have let his memory—or rather his diligence—escape him, for he committed to writing the same things as our Clement, or rather from our Clement, regarding both Theodotus and Paulus. Who, moreover, would not easily let himself be persuaded that this Theodotus is none other than the man whom Valerius Maximus calls Theodorus? For Valerius Maximus narrates in these words that he clearly endured courageously and patiently *fortitude* similar to that of Theodotus, and indeed even the most dire torments from the same: "Against Theodorus also, a most grave man, the tyrant Hieronymus exhausted the hands of his torturers in vain. For he broke the scourges, loosened the straps, unfastened the rack, and extinguished the blades before he could make him indicate his accomplices in the tyrannicide. Furthermore, by staining with a false charge the satellite upon whom the sum of the entire condemnation seemed to hinge as on a certain pivot, he snatched away from his side his faithful guard; and by the benefit of his patience, he not only hid those things which had been secret, but also took vengeance for his own torments." You may see Livy, who has described this whole story at length; and he testifies that Theodorus, having been lacerated by all the intolerable torments of human patience, was called Thraso, and that that satellite whose name Valerius omitted was called by that name.

Then indeed: "Furthermore, Posthumus the Roman, having been captured by the Peucetii, not only did not reveal anything of those things which were secret, but when he had even thrust his hand into the fire as if it were bronze, he stood with a firm and clearly immutable countenance." Hervetus ^D not unjustly suspects that this text of Clement has been corrupted, and should be corrected thus: C. Mucius the Roman by Porsenna, etc. This correction, however, is sufficiently proven by various authors, both Greek and Latin, who very frequently mention that famous act of Mucius, such as Dionysius of Halicarnassus, *lib. v Antiq. Rom.*, pag. 296 et seq., by whom that man is called C. Mucius Codrus; likewise Plutarch, *tom. i In Vita Publicolae*, page 106, and *tom. ii In Parallel*, page 305; Livy, *lib. ii Histor.*; Valerius Maximus, *lib. iii, cap. 3*; and to omit very many others, the poet Martial, who played on that in a triple epigram, *lib. i, epigram 22, lib. viii, epigram 30, and lib. x, epigram 25*.

Nor, furthermore, is the mention of Anaxarchus less frequent among sacred and profane authors, who, when he was being pounded with iron pestles, as our Clement says, exclaimed: "Pound the pouch of Anaxarchus, for you are not pounding Anaxarchus." And if you wish for certain witnesses of this crime to be cited by us, we will immediately produce for you Plutarch, *tom. ii, lib. ix, De virtute morali*, pag. 449; Philo, *lib. Quod omn. prob.*, pag. 881; Valerius Maximus, *l. iii, cap. 3*; and also Cicero, *lib. iii Tuscul.*, pag. 258; Tertullian, *Apologet.*, cap. 50, and also Laertius, *lib. ix* in the *Life* of the same Anaxarchus, § 59, where he, no differently than many others after him, maintains that the Cyprian tyrant by whom Anaxarchus was condemned was surnamed Nicocreon. The text of Origen, therefore, where he is called Aristocreon, must be corrected. See further, if you like, the observations of Menagius on the cited passage of Laertius.

Clement deservedly condemns the Gymnosophists, who rashly threw themselves into the fire, no doubt so that they might be burned alive. Philo Judaeus ought to be a witness above all exception for us [to testify] to this recklessness and audacity, or rather cruelty and inhumanity. For, as he writes, this cruelty was still practiced by them in his own time: "The Gymnosophists of the Indians," he says, " μέχρι τοῦ νῦν, even to this day, at the onset of old age or of some long and incurable disease, before it worsens, they burn themselves in a lit pyre; although they might perhaps be able to resist for a long time. Nay, even their little wives throw themselves with joy onto the pyres of their deceased husbands, and thus are burned alive with the beloved corpses."

From the same Philo we learn whose words these are which Clement attributes thus to the Indian philosophers, or Gymnosophists: "The Indian philosophers say to Alexander: 'You will transfer bodies from place to place; but our souls you will not force to do what we do not wish. Fire is the greatest torment for men; this we despise.' You translate, indeed, bodies from place to place: but you will not force our souls to do what we do not want. Fire is a great torment for men, we despise it." Philo himself has indeed testified to us that these things were taken from the epistle of Calanus, the most patient of the Gymnosophists, to Alexander the Great, but he reported it a little differently and in this manner: "Σώματα γὰρ μετοίσεις ἐκ τόπου εἰς τόπον· ψυχὰς δὲ οὐ δύνασαι ποιεῖν ἃ μὴ βούλονται... πῦρ μεγίστας τοῖς ζῶσι σώμασι πόνους καὶ φθορὰν ἐργάζεται· ταῦτου ὑπεράνω ἡμεῖς γινόμεθα, ζῶντες καιόμεθα. You will transfer bodies from place to place, but you will not offer any force to our souls... Fire excites the greatest pains in living bodies, and not without destruction; yet we despise this while we are burned alive." But concerning these Gymnosophists, whom Laertius says are contemners of death, you may see Strabo, *lib. xv Geogr.*, pag. 717 et seq., and what has been said by us above, chapter 17, article 1.

Furthermore, by this example Clement shows that a Christian, who is tortured and killed for Christ by various and most cruel torments, is blessed ^D and happy. He confirms this with these words of Plato: "Even if the just man is tortured, even if he is gouged in the eyes, he will be happy." And these things were indeed written by him in *lib. ii De republ.*, *tom. ii*, pag. 361, and described by Theodoret, *serm. 8, De Grat. affect. curat.*, *tomo IV*, pag. 602. But he himself in the same place, pag. 600 and 601, exhibits other words of the same Plato and Heraclitus, by which, as our Clement observes, he had said that men who had fallen in war for their country were honored by the gods, and that the latter were of a golden race.

ARTICLE III. On the warlike fortitude of certain women, on the Amazons, Sauromatidae, and Sacides, on the singular childbirth of the Iberian women, on the distinguished deeds of certain women, Lysidice, Philotera, Leaena the Athenian, Telesilla, the daughters of Danaus, together with the one who composed the Danaid, on Atlas, Anticlea, Alcestis, Macaria, the Hyacinthidae, on the poetesses Telesilla, Myia, Corinna, Sappho, Cleobulina, together with the custom of washing the feet of guests, and on the painters Irene and Anaxandra.

Our Clement proves by many and illustrious examples that women have not lacked warlike fortitude just as men have not. And, that we may set aside those mentioned by him—the Amazons, whom no one is ignorant were most well-instructed in such virtue—he committed these things to writing regarding others: "I hear that the Sauromatidae women also engage in war no less than the men, and likewise the Sacides, who shoot from behind and pretend to flee, just as the men." Herodotus, moreover, after he had made a long discourse on the Amazons, passes to the Sauromatidae and writes this about them: "The women of the Sauromatae follow the ancient custom of living. For they go out to the hunt together with the men, and without the men, riding on horses, and they set out for battle, and wear the same garb as the men... No virgin marries until she has killed an enemy; and therefore some grow old and die before they marry, because they cannot satisfy the law." Nor less clearly does Plato testify regarding them: "In our times," he says, "it does not escape me that there are countless thousands of women around the Pontus, whom they call Sauromatidae, for whom there is an equal care and exercise for horses, and indeed for bows and other arms, as there is for men, and this is mandated by public authority and is equally practiced by them." Hippocrates, indeed, asserts that it was necessary for these same women, before they were given in marriage, to have killed not just one enemy, as Herodotus says, but three. "In Europe," he says, "there is a Scythian race which inhabits the Maeotian marsh, and which differs greatly from the rest, called the Sauromatae. Their women ride horses, use bows, and shoot from horseback, and wage war with enemies as long as they remain virgins; and they do not lay aside their virginity before they have killed three enemies; nor do they unite with men before they have performed the rites according to patriotic custom. But if any woman has chosen a husband, she is released from riding, unless the necessity of a common expedition arises."

^C The Sacides, moreover, were from the Sacae, about whom Herodotus, Strabo, and others discourse—women whose warlike virtue is celebrated by Diodorus Siculus in these words: "The kingdom of the Sacae was administered by a woman named Zarina, studious in warlike matters, and by far surpassing all the women of the Sacae in boldness and industry for getting things done. For this race has women who are among the most brave, and who provide aid to the men in the crisis of war." It is not strange, therefore, that Aelian committed to memory what he did about those bellicose women and men: "If anyone wishes to take a girl of the Sacae as a wife, he undertakes a fight with her: and if she is superior, she carries him off as a captive and holds command over him: but if he is inferior, he is ruled by her."

To these women, Clement continuously adds others thus: "I also know that women near Iberia use manly deeds and labors, even if they are pregnant and already about to give birth, nothing of those things which are to be done is remitted, but often in the very contention of labors, the woman who has given birth carries the lifted child home." Varro narrates the same about the Illyrian women: "In Illyricum," he says, "a pregnant woman often, when the time has come, goes off far from her work, and there brings forth a boy and carries him back; one would think she had not given birth, but had found him." If, however, anyone should argue that these women are more remote from the Iberians, we will exhibit others closer to them, namely the Celtiberians; who, as Strabo says, "cultivate the fields, and when they have given birth, they order their husbands to lie down in their place, and they minister to them, and in the midst of working they themselves very often wash and wrap their infants, leaning them against the basin of some river." Moreover, he reports from Posidonius an example of a certain Ligurian woman, who, having been hired with the men for some digging, and having been seized by the pains of childbirth, so that she would not lose her pay, went only a short distance from the place of work, and there brought forth her offspring, and returned immediately to her work. And Diodorus Siculus, with no authority cited, committed that to writing as well. But although he said that it was the custom for the Ligurians to admit their women into the communion of labors; because, however, this act of the woman is as singular and extraordinary as it is presented by him, as it is brought forward by Strabo, you see indeed that our Clement has spoken rather of the former women, or the Illyrians, or the Celtiberians.

Now, indeed, let us come to the distinguished deeds of certain women, whom our author names individually and by their own names: "Dion the philosopher," says Clement, "reports that a certain woman, Lysidice, because of her eminent modesty, washed herself with her tunic." "Philotera, however, when she was about to enter the bath, little by little drew her tunic tight, as much as those parts which were naked were covered by the water; then, again, gradually ascending, she put it on." But since the works of Dion have perished, Hervetus declares that the proof of both deeds rests with our Clement alone. Why not also with Theodoret, who narrates the same things, and who, if he had read his books, ought not to have been omitted by Hervetus?

More famous is the reputation of Leaena the Athenian, who, as Clement writes, "when she was privy to the plots which were being prepared by Harmodius and Aristogiton against Hipparchus, said nothing at all, although she was being cruelly tortured." For besides Athenaeus in book XIII of the *Deipnosophistae*, p. 596, Pausanias in book I, *Attic.*, p. 20 explains this more fully; Plutarch in his book *On Garrulity*, volume II, p. 505; Pliny in book XXXIV of *Natural History*, chapter 8, p. 122, and Meursius in his book *Pisistratus*, chapter 13.

What is also subjoined by our author, that the Argolic women, with the poetess Telesilla as leader, put the Spartans to flight, is discussed more clearly and amply by the authors already cited, Pausanias in book II, p. 63, and Plutarch in his book *On the Virtues of Women*, p. 247, and also by Suidas at the word Telesilla.

But it ought to be much better known to all, what was mentioned next by our Clement: the deed of the daughters of Danaus, which besides almost countless poets and writers, Naso sang of in these two verses:

"And daring to inflict death upon their own cousins, The Belides persistently repeat the waters which they dissipate."

Regarding this fable, see Natalis Comes, book IX, chapter 17.

By Clement, however, is praised the one who made the *Danaid*, *Danaida pepoiekōs*. But I would wish you to weigh whether he is the one whom Strabo cites *en hiketisi, *Danaisin*, in the *Suppliants*, or the *Danaids*, or if he is

Aeschylus, as it is written in the text of Strabo, or rather Euripides, as is noted in his scholia.

Meanwhile, following in the footsteps of our Clement, let us consider what he has said regarding other women. “Other poets,” he says, “sing of the speed of Atalanta in the hunt, the singular friendship of Anticlea, the love of Alcestis for her husband, and the great and lofty spirit of Maceria and the Hyacinthides.” Jerome has briefly summarized the whole story of Atalanta, sung by Ovid, in these words: “The fables relate that Atalanta the Calydonian virgin was always in the hunt, always in the woods, not with a pregnant womb and the disgust of conceptions, but a nimble and chaste lover of virtue.” See Natalis Comes, *Mythology*, book VII, chap. 8.

Anticlea, the mother of Ulysses, expressed her love for him in these verses from Homer concerning her death: ... My longing for you and your counsels, radiant Ulysses, And your gentleness, stole away my honey-sweet spirit.

Alcestis, moreover, that she might snatch her husband Admetus, king of Thessaly, from the death already imminent and at the door, laid down her own life for him. Whence Juvenal sang this of her, and of the aforementioned Belides, or daughters of Danaus: ... They watch the husband undergoing the fates, Alcestis, and if a similar exchange is granted, They wish to save the life of the husband by their own death; The Belides will meet you.

Euripides composed a tragedy on this matter, which he called *Alcestis*.

Macaria, too, whom Clement mentions later, the daughter of Hercules and Deianira, when she had brought death upon herself, as Pausanias attests, is said to have made the Athenians victorious.

Finally, there are various opinions among writers concerning the Hyacinthides. For some say there were four—Antheis, Egleis, Putheis, and Lytaea—who were sacrificed by the Athenians at the tomb of the Cyclops Genestes for the public safety. Others report that they were the daughters of Erechtheus, concerning whom Cicero says: “Death, he says, which even the virgins in Athens—the daughters, I believe, of King Erechtheus—are said to have despised for the sake of their country; am I, a consular man, to fear it, given such deeds?” Wherefore he says elsewhere that there is no one who does not praise them highly. Hyginus, however, contrary to the opinion of others, thinks there were not several, but only one. Read the oration of Demosthenes ^B which is inscribed as a funeral oration, where the Greek orator extols not her alone, but all who have fallen for their country, with the greatest of praises.

Clement also mentions certain poetesses, omitting many others, who won for themselves the highest celebrity of honor and fame by their works. He makes mention, therefore, of Telesilla, of whom we spoke a little earlier; and of Myia, of whom we also spoke when we treated of the philosophers.

He numbers Corinna as the third alongside those two, though she is called Thespian by some, but Corinthian by others; or, as Suidas says, Theban or Tanagraean, a disciple of Myrtis, known as the Lyric Fly. It is said, moreover, that she published epigrams and wrote five books and lyric laws, and that she defeated Pindar five times. Pausanias, though, committed these things to writing about her: “Indeed, the monument of Corinna, who alone among the Tanagraeans sang, is in a famous place of the city; in the gymnasium itself she is painted, wreathed with a fillet: that token of the victory by which she defeated Pindar at Thebes. I believe she won because of her language: for she did not sing in the Doric dialect, as Pindar did, but in that which the Aeolians would easily have understood. But that she was the most beautiful of the women of her time is not difficult to conjecture from her image.” Some think she was very dear to Ovid, because Martial sang: Corinna alone knew her Nason. But others judge that it is falsely thought that Nason’s mistress is marked by this name of Corinna in the poem.

Furthermore, it seems more probable that she, like Sappho, whom Clement also mentions in the same place, is celebrated in these verses of Statius: And Sappho, the bold one, having entered the male hunts, Not fearing the rash Leucadian cliff, And the tangled Sophron, and the subtle arcana of Corinna.

They say, however, that there were two Sapphos, one Mitylenean, and another Lesbian from Eresos, about whom Suidas speaks at the word *Sappho*, and Athenaeus in *Deipnosophistae*, book XIII, p. 596 and following, book XIV, p. 635, and book XV, p. 687, and Casaubon on the former passage of Athenaeus, and Plutarch in the third book of *Symposiacs*, quest. 8, p. 711. Finally, to pass over Eusebius in the *Chronicle* and others, we shall observe that Horace sang of her thus in book I, epistle 19, verse 25: Masculine Sappho tempers the Muse of Archilochus with her meter. And in the second book of *Odes*, ode 13: Sappho complaining to the Aeolian strings Of the maidens of her people.

Nor ought that distich, which is said to be by Plato, to be omitted, which is not at all inelegant concerning her: Some say there are nine Muses, displaying negligence, Behold, Sappho of Lesbos is the tenth.

Cleobulina, the daughter of Cleobulus, also cultivated the poetic art, as our Clement reports, and of the king of the Lindians, whom it did not shame to wash the feet of her father’s guests. For Laertius, in the *Life of Cleobulus*, narrates that he had a daughter named Cleobulina, a writer of hexameter riddles, of whom Cratinus makes mention in a poem of the same name, inscribing it in the plural number. Plutarch adorns her with great praises thus: “Do you not know the wise and famous Eumetis? For so her father calls her, though commonly she is called Cleobulina after the name of her father... you praise her for the skill of her riddles and her wisdom. For indeed, some questions proposed by her traveled to Egypt.... She uses these like dice, as the situation carries, and contends with those who challenge her. But there is also in her a miraculous loftiness of spirit and a civic and human talent, and it is easy for her to rule the citizens more humanely and popularly, as her father does.” Athenaeus cites her book *On Riddles*. Jerome exhorts and encourages wives to imitate her. See Suidas at the word *Cleobulus*, and Menagius in *History of Woman Philosophers*, § 4, appendix; and Laertius, where he discusses the custom of washing the feet of guests.

Furthermore, what Clement added: “As Nausicaa, in Homer, had gone to the washing pools,” is taken from his *Odyssey* VI, p. 79 and following.

...and having allowed this, Aratus, who was a friend of Aratus, wept for the painting... When Aratus had permitted this, Nealces erased Aristratus and substituted a palm tree in his place, daring to add nothing else. What wonder, then, if the daughter of Nealces, who is called a skillful and ingenious painter by Pliny, should also have been a distinguished painter herself? Finally, so that he might not omit female painters entirely, he places before our eyes two, though there are others undoubtedly more illustrious: "Irene, the daughter of Cratinus, and Anaxandra, the daughter of Nealces, as Didymus says in his *Symposiaca*." Pliny says in a similar way: "Irene, the daughter and pupil of Cratinus, painted the girl who is at Eleusis, just as, according to Pausanias, Philen the Elean, who defeated boys in wrestling, was painted by Cratinus the Spartan." Pliny further testifies that Nealces was a skillful and ingenious painter, by whom Venus was painted. But Plutarch says: "He mentions Nealces the painter."

If anyone wishes to know more about the remarkable deeds and fortitude of women, let him go to Plutarch, who composed an entire book on the virtue of these same women, and to Jerome at the end of the first book *Against Jovinian* ^A.

CHAPTER XXV. On various writers cited by Clement in these books of the *Stromata*. ARTICLE I. On historians and others who wrote in prose.

The doctrine and erudition with which we have so far shown our Clement to have filled his books of the *Stromata* are so great, so varied, and so manifold that he could not help but bring in, proffer, and amass the testimonies of innumerable authors and writers of every kind. But because many of these can be unknown to no one who is even moderately literate, and because we have already discoursed sufficiently about many of them—and especially the philosophers—on the occasion given above, we must here institute a discussion only of those who, although less known to the men of our own age, nevertheless seemed of such authority to our Clement that he would either defend his own opinions by them or refute and destroy the errors of others. But so that no confusion may arise in these observations, we shall designate them in an alphabetical order of names, as they say; yet so that we may take our beginning from historians and those who wrote in prose, and then come to the poets.

^A ACHAICUS is cited by Laertius and Theodoret, just as he is by our Clement: "*Achaicus in the Morals*."

ACUSILAUS is not once cited by our author and is called a historiographer. But he is without doubt the one of whom Suidas speaks thus at the word *Acusilaus*: "Acusilaus, son of Cabas, an Argive from the city of Cercas, near Aulis, a most ancient historian." He described genealogies from bronze tablets, which rumor said his father had found while digging in a certain place in his house. But many things have already been said by us about him.

AGIAS and DERCYLUS (^AἍγίας καὶ Δέρκυλος) are called by our Clement; but by Eusebius, who transcribed his words, they are called Ἅγις καὶ Κέρκυλος (Agis and Cercylus); but they are called Agias and Dercylus, Ἀγίας καὶ Δέρκυλος, without a doubt more correctly by Athenaeus.

AESOPUS, says Clement, "used to say that swine cry out most loudly; because, when they are dragged, they realize they are useful for nothing but sacrifice." But Aelian, when he discusses tyrants from the writings of this same Aesopus, tells the matter differently and says: "This saying savors of Phrygia; for in the Phrygian Aesopus it is said: If one were to seize a sow, it would cry out, and not without reason. For since it neither carries wool, nor ^B anything else of that sort, it at once conjectures its death, knowing that it is of use to those who use it."

But neither has indicated to us what that fable of Aesopus was. It is read, indeed, among his published fables, the sixty-eighth, in which a dog is introduced responding to one swearing by Venus: "It signifies that you are vehemently loved by her, who, although you eat her impure flesh, admits you to the shrine in no way." But our Clement, just as Aelian, undoubtedly seems to designate another. Concerning swine's flesh, we have spoken above in chapter 18, article 1.

ALEXANDER, surnamed Polyhistor, in his work *On the Jews*, Clement cited, in which were described the letters of Solomon to Vaphres, king of Egypt, and to the king of Phoenicia, the Tyrians, and also the letters of both of these kings to Solomon. But Eusebius does not exhibit them to us from Alexander Polyhistor, but from Eupolemus. That long fragment, however, which he had previously drawn from the work *On the Jews* of that same Alexander, which he himself cited, he had described in the very same words. There, however, Alexander Polyhistor is adorned with these praises: "A man of the highest talent and much erudition, and also to Greek men, who have tasted the fruit of doctrine not lightly or perfunctorily, far the best known."

Clement further cites other works of his, *On Pythagorean Symbols*, and *On Indian Affairs*. Vossius thinks that the first-mentioned commentary of Alexander is what Laertius calls *Pythagorean Commentaries* in the *Life of Pythagoras*. But he does not seem to have noticed enough that this work is not attributed to Alexander, but rather to Pythagoras himself. For these are the words of Laertius: "Alexander relates in the *Successions of Philosophers*, 'And that he found these things in the Pythagorean commentaries,' and that he found these things in the Pythagorean commentaries." And further on: "These things Alexander reports he found in the Pythagorean commentaries."

Moreover, his mention among various writers is frequent, and therefore it may suffice to have noted these things about him. You may see, if you wish, the observations of Menagius in the book of the same Laertius I, § 116 and lib. VIII, § 36.

ANAXARCHUS's certain words from his book *On Kingship*, this Clement reports in this manner: "Anaxarchus the Eudaemonic writes in his *On Kingship*." But Hervetus thought the word *eudaimonikos* was Anaxarchus's surname, and thus renders it in Latin: "Anaxarchus Eudaemonicus writes," etc.

^A And perhaps not altogether without cause. For Laertius 74 bears witness that, on account of his presence of mind and simple way of life, he was called by others *eudaimonikos*, that is, fortunate or happy. However, this name appears in our manuscript codex, and subsequently in the editions, in the manner in which we have written it, that is, as an adverb. Wherefore, in the most recent editions of these Stromata of Clement, the interpretation of Hervetus having been disregarded and rejected, the Latin was made thus: "Anaxarchus verily and divinely writes," etc. It must be confessed, however, that the conjecture of Hervetus is founded upon the authority not only of Laertius, but also of others cited by Menagius—Sextus Empiricus, Aelian, and Plutarch—and ought, without doubt, to carry more weight than that of one or another scribe who, in copying this name in a hand not strictly ancient, could easily have written *w* for *o* through a carelessness or haste not unusual in these copyists. But if this later reading be the true one, it is gathered from it far more certainly than from the former that this is the Anaxarchus whose *Life* has been published by the same Laertius, and of whom we have discoursed above. Which, indeed, can be confirmed again by the testimony of Clearchus of Soli, who is praised by Athenaeus 75. For by him, Anaxarchus is numbered among the flock of philosophers who were called Eudaemonics, as Laertius also narrates 76.

ANDOCYDES the orator is praised once and again by our Clement, 77 and also by Dionysius of Halicarnassus 78. Plutarch wrote his *Life* (vol. 2, p. 854). Aldus, however, made his Greek orations public, and Gesner notes that his Greek book *On the Mysteries* still exists in Italy. See Photius's *Bibliotheca*, cod. 261, p. 1458.

ANDROCYDES the Pythagorean is brought forward as a witness by Clement, 79 in one place discussing the Ephesians, about whom we have spoken above, and in another 81 teaching that the gorging of wine and meat makes the body indeed robust, but the mind weaker. Pliny, moreover, handed down these things to memory concerning him 82: "Androcydes, famous for his wisdom, wrote to Alexander the Great, restraining his intemperance: 'O King, when you are about to drink wine, remember that you are drinking the blood of the earth; hemlock is the wine of men, hemlock is wine.'" He is still cited by him in book XVII, cap. 24, p. 415. Nor does he seem to be any other than the one whom Theophrastus in book IV of his *History of Plants*, cap. 20, p. 102, and Athenaeus in book VI of the *Deipnosophistae*, p. 258, call a physician. Iamblichus, furthermore, in his *Life of Pythagoras* cites his book *On Pythagorean Symbols*, where those things seem to have been written which our Clement reported from him concerning the Ephesian letters.

ANDRON'S testimony concerning the seven wise men of Greece was produced by Clement 83, just as Laertius did regarding Pherecydes 84. But there, Laertius calls him an Ephesian; whence he is distinguished from others called by the same name. Read, if you wish, the observations of Menagius in book I of Laertius, § 30.

ANTIPATER is called by our same author 85 a Stoic, and a *gnorimos* of Cleanthes, that is, a familiar and associate; or, as pleased Lipsius, a disciple; and that he wrote three books *On Virtue*, where he followed the opinion of Plato regarding the supreme good, and the teachings and dogmas of the Stoics. But many men of this sect have been allotted that name, one of whom, as Cicero says 86, was a Tyrian Stoic, who recently died in Athens, and who, as Plutarch witnesses 87, was the physician and familiar of Cato of Utica. Another was a Tarsian by birth, whom Strabo 88, Plutarch 89, and Athenaeus 90 likewise testify to have been a Stoic. This man, moreover, cites his books *On Superstition* and *On Anger*. Besides this, another Antipater is mentioned, a disciple of Diogenes of Babylon, and others are called by the same name. But whether Clement is to be understood as referring to one of those whom we have named, or to some other, is certainly difficult to say. We, however, willingly assent to those who have proven that he was speaking of the Antipater whom Laertius 91 mentions quite often in his *Life of Zeno*. Furthermore, we examined the opinion of that Antipater regarding the ultimate end, or supreme good, above.

APION the grammarian, an Egyptian by race and hostile to the Hebrews, is cited by our Clement 92, who says that a book was written by him against the Jews. But that matter has been treated by us above in book II, dissertation 5, cap. 2, § 8 and 9.

That the name APOLLODORUS was given to many is as openly plain from our Clement 93 as it is arduous to have explored and ascertained which ones they were. And first, indeed, he is simply praised by him as "Apollodorus the chronographer," [χρονιογράφος], by whom, without doubt, the time of the consecration of Bacchus is there designated, and elsewhere the age of Xenophon and Homer.

There is also an Apollodorus, a Corcyraean by birth, and another from Cumae, who took the name of critic, and was called a grammarian by this same Clement 94. But that this is the one whom he simply calls Apollodorus and the chronographer can be gathered from the fact that he is praised by Laertius with these words 95: "Apollodorus the grammarian in his *Chronicles*," [Απολλόδωρος ὁ γραμματικὸς ἐν τοῖς Χρονικοῖς]. Yet elsewhere he very often addresses him by the name of Apollodorus alone: "Apollodorus in the third book of the *Chronicles*," [Ἀπολλόδωρος ἐν τρίτῃ Χρονικῶν]. Nevertheless, many learned writers maintain that this man was not a Cuman, but an Athenian. And, in fact, Diodorus Siculus has handed down these things written about himself 96: "Following Apollodorus the Athenian from the Trojan War, we establish eighty years to the return of the Heraclidae." But this Apollodorus himself seems without doubt to be the one who is surnamed by Clement as the chronographer. See the annotations of Casaubon in book VI of Athenaeus, cap. 6, and in Aulus Gellius, book XVII, cap. 4. Concerning that Apollodorus we have already spoken somewhat above. Very many other writers, moreover, have been called by the same name, about whom there can be read, in the first place, Scipio Tettius, who [wrote] concerning...

ANTILOCHUS, [Ἀντίλοχος], as we read in our same author, who wrote about all the learned men from the age of Pythagoras up to the death of Epicurus, which was on the tenth of October, includes a total of three hundred and twelve years. Some suspect, and perhaps not altogether without reason, that this passage is corrupt. For, first, there in place of *Antilochus*, and in Dionysius of Halicarnassus 86 in place of *Antilochus* [sic]—whom he numbers among the flock of historians—they think it ought to be read *Antiochus*. And truly, in the earlier editions of the works of Theodoret, when it was once read "Antilochus in the ninth book of his *History*," later authors corrected it and placed "Antiochus." But if this correction be correct, might not someone rashly say that this is he concerning whom we already argued in the previous dissertation, chapter 14, art. 1?

Apollodorus commented on this; and Jonsius, in his book *De scriptoribus historiae philosophicae*; Vossius, in his book III *De historicis Graecis*, p. 327; Gesner, Suidas, etc.

Arcesilaus: Concerning him, as we observed before, Clement brought forward a saying directed at various pagan superstitions. But can he not be deservedly called the one who, as we have also remarked, founded the Middle Academy, and whose life was described by Laertius? Many of his sayings, moreover, were collected by Stobaeus, sermon 41, p. 248, sermon 70, p. 472 et seq., and sermon 93, p. 515.

Archemachus: Our author took the testimony ^A from the third book of his *Euboica*, which you will also find cited by Athenaeus. By Strabo, however, he is called *Archemachus Euboensis*.

Aristarchus: Just as with many others, Clement has revealed to us his opinion concerning the homeland of Pythagoras, and also what he handed down regarding the age of Homer in the *Commentaries on Archilochus*. Some, however, conjecture that this is the one who is said by Suidas to be the son of Aristarchus, a Samothracian by birth, an Alexandrian by adoption, a student of Aristophanes the grammarian, and the son of Ptolemy, tutor to Philometor, who lived during the 156th Olympiad and died in Cyprus after having published over eight hundred books. From this it can be gathered that he was the one who is called by Athenaeus "the grammarian," or "the most learned grammarian," and concerning whom ^B something was observed by us above in book II, dissertation 2, art. 7.

Aristeas: The Argive, as our Clement says, committed something to writing regarding the name and cult of Sarapis, which is described by Eusebius. Athenaeus, however, cites the book of Aristeas *On the Citharoedi*, but he remains entirely silent as to who he was. Whether, therefore, this was the Argive, and the same man praised by our Clement, let the judgment belong to others.

Aristippus: The first book of the *Arcadica* is cited by the same Clement and by Eusebius in the same place. But this writer seems to us certainly to be none other than the one whom Laertius lists among the four Aristippuses, and who is testified to have written a history of Arcadia. You should see the notes and observations in this place of Laertius.

Aristo: According to our Clement, he used to say that pleasure, pain, fear, and desire are a tetrachord, or four strings, which cannot be overcome without great labor and laborious exercise. But of which Aristo this opinion is, since we have said there were many called by that name, if you ask Menagius, he will answer you that this is none of the philosophers mentioned by Laertius, but rather a prophet, whom he considers distinct from them.

Aristocritus: Vossius placed him in the number of those writers whose age is uncertain, and observes that he is mentioned by Pliny, as well as by the scholiast on Apollonius. But our Clement, who cited his first book against Heracleodorus, should not have been passed over by him, nor by others. ^C Aristoteles: Our Clement cites the work of Aristotle *on the Republic of the Phocians* in some places, and also later another, *on the Republic of the Locrians*, which was undoubtedly composed by the same Aristotle. But there is no one who does not know that many have been called by that name. For, besides that most celebrated coryphaeus of the philosophers, the Stagirite, six others are mentioned by Laertius. But since Athenaeus asserts that so many books were written by that founder of the Peripatetic school concerning the republics of various peoples—the Naxians, Aegenetans, Delians, Thessalians, Massalians, Colophonians, and others—is it not likely that he also composed certain commentaries on the republics of the Phocians and the Locrians, which were praised by our Clement? And indeed Athenaeus himself narrates that Aristotle was criticized by some, according to Timaeus, because he erred in explaining the institutions of the Locrians. For this passage, see the observations of Casaubon.

Aristoxenus: Is said by Clement to have written a *Life of Pythagoras* and a book *On Music*. But this is without a doubt the one whose *Commentaries on Pythagoras and His Associates* Laertius cites. By him, and by Gellius, he is also said to have been a musician, and in other places as well. ^D A man most diligent in ancient literature, a student of the philosopher Aristotle, he also published a book on Pythagoras. Suidas reports still more about him: but Athenaeus, and Laertius already mentioned by us, have cited various of his treatises, and Eusebius in his *Chronicle*, Jerome in the preface to his book *On Ecclesiastical Writers*, and many others have made mention of him. There is an error, however, in the age assigned or described for him in Cyril of Alexandria, who elsewhere testifies that the life of Socrates was handed down in the writings of Aristoxenus. Read, if you wish, the annotations of Menagius in book I of Laertius, § 107 and 108.

Artapanus: His work *On the Jews* is cited by our Clement just as it is by Eupolemus in Eusebius, and, as we have said elsewhere, in the Alexandrian *Chronicle*.

Berosus: His *Chaldaean History* is read to have been praised not only by our Clement but also by Tatian, as we observed in book I, above, diss. 5, c. 2, § 8, and also by Josephus in book I *Against Apion*, page 1043 et seq., where he brought forth more to memory concerning him. Athenaeus and others have also made mention of him. Finally, five books of *Antiquities* have been published in print, which all scholars openly profess were falsely inscribed with his name.

Chameleon: He had published a certain book *On the Gods*, as our author says, and another *On Drunkenness*, or intemperance, which is also cited once or twice by Athenaeus. But the same Athenaeus cites many other works of his, and, like our Clement, calls him not only a Heracleote, but also a Pontic. Furthermore, I would like you to note with us that a fragment of Tatian is presented by Eusebius, where, among those who wrote about the age and poetry of Homer, *Megaclides and Chameleon the Peripatetics* are mentioned. For there, some rightly think that the Greek text of Tatian is better represented than in the edition of that oration, where it reads: *Megaclides and the Chamaleons the Peripatetics*. Read the annotations of Menagius in book V of Laertius, § 92, in the *Life of Heraclides*, where testimony is used under the name of Chameleon alone, just as in book III, in the *Life of Plato*, § 46.

^A CLEARCHUS the Peripatetic, as our Clement testifies, said that he had known a certain Jew with whom Aristotle had associated. This can indeed be confirmed by these words of Josephus: "Clearchus, a disciple of Aristotle, and second to none of the Peripatetics, says in the first book *On Sleep* that Aristotle his teacher related such things concerning a certain Jewish man, and he ascribes the same statement to Aristotle himself." ^B In that place, however, he—just as Eusebius in *Praeparatio Evangelica* book IX, chapter 5, page 409—transcribed a long fragment of this writer, culled from the cited book of his. Moreover, he is called a Solensian by Laertius in the preface *On the Lives and Doctrines of Philosophers*, § 9, and by Suidas and Athenaeus, who cited many of his books. Finally, he is lauded by Gellius in *Attic Nights* book V, chapter 11; by Plutarch in *On the Face in the Moon*, volume II, page 920; by Theodoret, volume IV, sermon 5, page 545, and by many others.

CLITARCHUS’ opinion regarding the age of Alexander the Great is reported by our Clement, no doubt taken from the history of that same Alexander written by him, which is read cited more than once by Athenaeus and Quintus Curtius. Diodorus Siculus, moreover, writes that he crossed into Asia with Alexander, and he praises his writings there, just as Strabo does in *Geography* book II, page 491 and 505, and book XV, page 718; Aelian in *On Animals* book XVII, chapters 22, 23, and 24; Pliny in *Natural History* book VI, chapter 18, page 324, book VI, chapter 15, page 668, and elsewhere. And yet, it must not be omitted that Clitarchus is called a celebrated author by him in book X, chapter 49, page 441, even though Quintilian said: "Clitarchus’ talent is approved, his reliability is defamed."

CRATES the grammarian’s view on the age of Homer is also declared by our author. Suetonius, however, testifies that he was a Malleote by birth, and a contemporary of Aristarchus, and that he introduced the study of grammar into the City. Strabo, indeed, says: "Crates the grammarian was a Malleote, whose disciple they say Panaetius was." He recorded, furthermore, that he translated many of Homer’s poems adapted to questions of science, as did Crates the Malleote. Elsewhere, however, he refutes him of error, and embraces the opinion of Aristarchus. We also read in Varro: "Crates the grammarian, who, relying on Chrysippus, a most sharp-witted man, who left six books *On Anomaly* (Περὶ τῆς ἀνωμαλίας), strove in these books against analogy and Aristarchus." Pliny also made mention of him in *Natural History* book IV, chapter 12, page 450, and others did as well. Finally, Laertius published the life of Crates in book four, § 23 and following.

CTESIAS’ history concerning the Assyrian kings was cited by Clement, regarding whom Diodorus Siculus speaks in this manner: "Ctesias of Cnidus, more recent than Herodotus, lived during the expedition of Cyrus against his brother Artaxerxes. For he was captured then, and because of his knowledge of the medical art, he was taken into favor by the king and spent sixteen years with honor beside him. He assiduously investigated here every individual detail from the royal parchments (in which the Persians, by the command of some law, had their ancient affairs recorded in order), and, having reduced them to historical order, translated them for the Greeks." Regarding him, however, these are the words of Strabo: "There was Ctesias of Cnidus, who wrote *Assyriaca* (some improperly call it *Syriaca*) and *Persica*." Photius displayed an analysis of them for us, which he begins with these words: "The *Persica* of Ctesias of Cnidus, distributed into twenty-three books, was read. However, in the first six books, having embraced the affairs of the Assyrians and whatever preceded the Persian empire, he does not proceed to relate Persian affairs until the seventh book onward." That these things are superfluous to pursue at greater length...

^C ...observed that his reputation was not a little diminished by Strabo and Photius; yet it seemed so certain to Diodorus Siculus that he did not hesitate to follow his accounts and insist upon his footsteps. Finally, those matters which our Clement reported from him concerning the Assyrian kingdom are approved and confirmed by Petavius.

^D DEMETRIUS, indeed, is reported by our Clement in the book *Concerning the Kings of Judaea* to have said that the tribe of Judah, and Benjamin and Levi, had not been taken into captivity by Sennacherib, but that they existed from this captivity until the last one, which Nebuchadnezzar made from Jerusalem, for 128 years, 6 months. From the time, however, that the ten tribes were taken captive from Samaria until Ptolemy the fourth, were 573 years, 9 months; from which time also 338 years, 3 months had passed from Jerusalem; but he adds that the opinion of Philo was clearly different. But certainly, because there were many of the name Demetrius, Vossius could not indicate which Demetrius this is, nor did he define anything else about the one who counts the times up to Ptolemy the fourth, except that he cannot be anyone other than Demetrius Phalereus himself, who died under Philadelphus. But he should not have remained silent on what was observed by us in the previous dissertation, that mention was made of him by Jerome, where he says that there were cited by our Clement: "Concerning the Jews, Aristobulus, and a certain Demetrius, and Eupolemus, writers against the gentiles, who, in the manner of Josephus’ *Archaeology*, testify to Moses and the Jewish race." If it is permitted for us to indulge in conjectures, it does not seem entirely improbable to us that this is the one whose two long fragments Eusebius recorded. For after the second, he exhibits another, taken from Eupolemus, who is cited immediately after Demetrius by the same Clement. But who that man is to be called, and whether the same one, as we saw elsewhere, cited by our author, was the writer of the *Argolica*, the matter remains in doubt. Indeed, Laertius records twenty notable Demetrii: but because he was entirely silent about the writings of most of them, certainly no one would dare to affirm whether the one we are treating can be said to be one of them. Weigh, however, whether it does not seem more likely to you that this one is the last of those whom Laertius himself calls: "The Erythraean, a versatile writer, who composed historical and oratorical books." You will read the notes and observations of Menagius on the cited passage of Laertius, where, besides the Demetrii mentioned by the same Laertius, he discourses upon and disputes about many others still.

DIDYMUS is brought forward by our Clement concerning the opinion of certain most ancient philosophers regarding their sayings and adages; he relates what he had handed down in his book *On Pythagorean Philosophy* regarding Theano the Pythagorean, regarding female painters in his *Symposiacs*, and also regarding symbolic speech. ^D In this last place, though, Clement is silent as to where Didymus wrote this, but he calls him a grammarian there. Although this name and surname were given to many, these things nevertheless seem to apply to no one more than to Didymus of Alexandria, whom they nicknamed "Chalcenterus" (that is, endowed with bronze entrails) because of his greatest assiduity, as Suidas says, in writing books. For he had composed more than 3500 books, according to the same Suidas. Athenaeus, indeed, who is read to have cited him frequently, wrote these things about him somewhere: "Didymus the grammarian so-called, *bibliolathas* (that is, forgetful of his own books)..."

^A (being unmindful of his own), by Demetrius of Troezen because of the multitude of books he published; for they are three thousand five hundred, or, as Seneca says, four thousand. Wherefore among very many writers of many things in literature, as Ammianus Marcellinus says, Didymus stood out as a "brazen-guts" of studies, memorable for his writings of manifold knowledge, who in those six books, where he sometimes imperfectly criticizes Tully, imitating the abusive writers of lampoons, is accused by the judgment of learned ears, as if a hoary puppy were barking from afar with rotten voice at a lion roaring in his rage. Finally, to omit more, Laertius testifies that the *Symposiaca* were composed by him. You may see Valesius in Ammianus, and Menagius and Casaubon in the books cited by us on Laertius, and Vossius, book I *De histor. Graec.*, final chapter, and others.

Dieuchidas. Clement proffers his testimony ^A from his fourth book of the *Megarica*, just as Laertius does from the fifth. Simplicius, however, is praised thus by Athenaeus: ^B "Dieuchidas, in the *Megarica*." But as to the fact that he is elsewhere accused by our author of having taken the beginning of his discourse from the *Deucalionia* of Hellanicus, we have treated this above.

Dion the philosopher. What he is said to have related about Lysidica, both by Clement and by Theodoret, we have already noted. I would wish you to examine, however, whether that most famous philosopher, Dion of Alexandria, is the one from whom that proverb flowed, "Not even a whit," concerning which Erasmus, *Adagia*, chil. 1, centur. 8, adag. 39, p. 250. Furthermore, another seems to be distinct from him, whom Clement afterwards called Dion the Thytes, or the Sacrificer.

Dionysius. Clement has brought forth the opinion of Dionysius about the time when Thalus was founded. Although he cited him only by this name, yet it will be easy for us to be persuaded that he is the Argive, concerning whom [we spoke] in the previous dissertation, chap. 14, art. 1.

Dionysius of Halicarnassus. Moreover, Clement cites him ^C in his *Chronicles*. But Vossius, besides the Dionysius of Halicarnassus who was the author of the *Roman Antiquities* and who flourished under the emperor Augustus, thinks there was another, mention of whom Polybius, book XIV, made in these words: "There were born there famous men, Herodotus the writer of history, who was afterwards called the Thurian, because he offered himself as a companion in leading a colony to Thurii; then Heraclitus the poet, a companion of Callimachus, and in our age Dionysius the founder of history." But these are the very words of Strabo in the fourteenth book of his *Geography*, by which all easily concede that he designated Dionysius, the founder of Roman antiquities. Therefore, who would deny that our Clement is also to be understood as referring to him? Let him show us another Dionysius of Halicarnassus, the author of the *Chronicles* cited by Clement.

Finally, Dionysius, clearly distinct from the former, is called by Clement ^D "the Thrax, the grammarian," concerning whom Suidas says: "Dionysius of Alexandria; but the Thrax, from his father Teras, was called Terus, a pupil of Aristarchus, a grammarian. Who taught at Rome in the time of Pompey the Great, and explained various books for the first Tyrannion. He composed many grammatical works and commentaries." But Strabo joins him thus with Apollonius: Dionysius the Thracian, and Apollonius the author of the *Argonautica*, were Alexandrians, but they were called Rhodians. See Vossius in book one of *De historicis Graec.*, chap. 23.

Dorotheus. Clement cites him in the first book of the *Pandects*, which they say are volumes that contained nothing that was not included. But our author in his *Exhortation to the Greeks*, and Eusebius after him, are read to have praised the fourth book of Dorotheus' *Italian Affairs*, just as Plutarch did. But a little later the same Plutarch in exactly the same way employed the testimony of the same Dorotheus with these words only: "Dorotheus writes this in the first book of his *Transformations*." Stobaeus, however, reports certain things taken from the first book of the *Sicilian Affairs* of Dorotheus, undoubtedly the same man. Photius also testified to us that he had perused the Lexicon of Dorotheus, or, as he puts it, "a collection of words used in a strange manner, [arranged] according to the alphabet," which, he says, appears most useful to all students. Furthermore, whether this commentary ought to be called the same as the *Pandects*, it will perhaps not seem altogether improbable to you. For a varying title will not deter you from this opinion; since Athenaeus exhibits another title of this Lexicon to us thus: "Dorotheus of Ascalon, in the one hundred and eighth book of his collection of words." Moreover, from these it is to be learned that this Dorotheus was an Ascalonite by birth, whose other book is cited by the same Athenaeus, book XIV, p. 662. Elsewhere, however, he is called by him only "Dorotheus in the sixth book of the *Histories of Alexander*." Wherefore it cannot be certainly determined whether this man was the Ascalonite, or the Sidonian, who is also lauded by him elsewhere.

[E] Ephorus. Our Clement uses the authority and testimony of Ephorus concerning the seer Orthagoras, concerning the time when Alexander crossed into Asia, and concerning Zeleucus. He was undoubtedly the Cymean whom Diodorus Siculus celebrates with these words: "That Ephorus the Cymean, a pupil of Isocrates, when he undertook a history of things done in various places, omitting earlier events, made the beginning of his writing from the return of the Heraclidae." But afterwards: "Ephorus, describing things done in various places, performs the office of a worthy historian, not only by the eloquence of his words, but also by an accurate observation of order. For he assigns each book to a certain class of events." The opinion of Strabo and Polybius, cited by him, was also the same concerning him, and the same judgment: "For Ephorus," says Strabo, "is better than others, and Polybius himself, praising him, says that Eudoxus wrote well concerning Greek affairs, but Ephorus wrote best concerning the origin of cities, kinships, migrations, leaders, and founders." But although these writers extol Ephorus with such great praises, they still note various lapses and errors of his. And by Seneca and Suidas he is criticized even more severely. Finally, not once did Athenaeus, and even Josephus, Photius, and others, mention him.

Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Clement records that not only was the name of Critic attributed to him by some, as we have seen, but he also reports what he handed down concerning the age of Homer, concerning the time elapsed from the capture of Troy to the death of Alexander, and at what time the same Alexander...

came to Asia, and finally what he wrote in his book *On Good and Evil*, and concerning the constancy of the Æsopians, Macedonians, and Lacedaemonians in torments. Suidas recounts more concerning his age, life, and writings. He is frequently cited by Athenaeus, Plutarch, and Strabo, who, just as they find much to praise in this writer, are also read to have charged him with not a few faults and errors. Finally, besides Stobaeus and others who have mentioned him, one must read on this topic Vossius, bk. II *De histor. Graec.*, ch. 17, p. 108 et seq., and Harduin in the index of authors cited by Pliny.

Clement openly proclaims, and not just once, that Eupolemus is the author of the books *On the Kings of Judea*. Concerning this writer, indeed, is this judgment of Josephus: "Demetrius of Phalerum, and the elder Philon and Eupolemus were not much led away from the truth, *ob πολὺ τῆς ἀληθείας διήμαρτον*. It is worthy that indulgence be given to them; for it was not in them to be able to follow our scriptures with complete scrupulosity." More of his fragments are presented by Eusebius, bk. IX *Praepar. evangel.*, ch. 17, p. 418, ch. 30, p. 447 et seq., and ch. 39, p. 434. Jerome also mentions him in his book *De script. sacr.*, § 48, where he discusses our Clement, as does the Alexandrian chronicle.

Concerning the *Chronicle* of Euthymenes, Vossius and others have produced no witness who has praised it besides our same Clement.

II

HECATAEUS, as Clement still narrates, had composed histories *On Abraham and the Egyptians*. This seems to be the very man about whom Josephus writes in these words: "Hecataeus the Abderite, a philosopher, and at the same time industrious in transactions, being reared with King Alexander, and having remained with Ptolemy Lagi, not incidentally, but wrote an entire book about the Jews themselves, from which I wish to run through certain of those things which were said by him." But after he had related many things from this book of Hecataeus, he added in the same place: "But let the testimonies of Hecataeus now rest. For it is easy for those who wish to read the book itself, and to find these things more openly." In the first book of his *Antiquities*, he is still a witness for us from Hecataeus, being without doubt the same Abderite, that a book *On Abraham* had been published: "Hecataeus indeed," he says, "does not mention Abraham only incidentally, but in this book he has composed and handed down his affairs to posterity." But just as it ought to be justly and deservedly uncertain to no one that this is the same book as that which is cited by Clement, so it can indeed be called into doubt whether this book is the same, or certainly if some part of it was of the aforementioned book, as the same Josephus says, *On the Jews*. For in both places he uses the word, *βιβλίον*. Origen also calls him by the same name: "There exists," he says, "a book of the historian Hecataeus *On the Jews, βιβλίον*, in which he approves of the wisdom of this nation so much, that Herennius Philo, in his commentaries *On the Jews*, first doubts whether this writing is by this historian; then he adds, if indeed it is his, that he seems to have been corrupted by the persuasions of the Jews, and to have approved their tenets." A segment excerpted from this same book *On the History of the Jews* is presented to us by Eusebius, by whom Hecataeus is called the Abderite, a man not only a philosopher, but also most apt for the conduct of affairs. But surely, if it was not different from this history of the Jews, the *On Abraham* book praised by Clement will appear distinct from it, being cited also by the same author, than his *On the Egyptians* history. For does not Diodorus Siculus speak only of it, where he has these words: "Many of the Greeks who went to Thebes in the age of Ptolemy Lagi composed Egyptian histories, among whom is also Hecataeus." He notes and excuses him elsewhere because he turned toward fabulous assertions. Finally, he still reports afterwards what Hecataeus, without doubt already cited by him, had handed down to memory concerning the Hyperboreans. But that this is the man whom we previously mentioned, the Abderite, can be proven by these words of Aelian: "The race of the Hyperboreans, and the honors of Apollo among them, are celebrated not only by poets but also by other writers, and among others Hecataeus, not the Milesian, but the Abderite." But since that philosopher is called such by Josephus and Eusebius, he is also without doubt the one whose testimony Plutarch uses, and whom Laertius aggregates into the number of the disciples of Pyrrho. Although Jonsius suspects this man to have been other than the Abderite historian, he nevertheless maintains elsewhere that many books *On the Philosophy of the Egyptians* were composed by him. Some also opine that he was not the Abderite, but another, whom Dionysius of Halicarnassus calls the Milesian. Regarding both, you might see Suidas on the word *Ἑκαταῖος*, and concerning these we have already touched upon something above in ch. 18, art. 2, and ch. 22, art. 4. Finally, Athenaeus from the second book of Hecataeus's *Description of the Whole World* reports some things which he had said about the Egyptians. But who he is, whether he was the Milesian or the Abderite, he passed over in silence.

That Heracleodorus had been refuted by Aristocritus, our Clement indeed wished us to be informed: but who that Heracleodorus was, and whether he left anything written, he silently passed over. See, therefore, if you can indicate to us anyone who has made mention of him besides our Clement.

Hermippus the Berythian, as we learn from our same author, used to call the centaur Chiron *the wise*, and wrote a certain book *On the Septenary*. But in a few words Suidas has depicted him in his own native colors: "Hermippus the Berythian, from a Mediterranean village, a disciple of Philo of Byblos, by whom he was recommended to Herennius Severus under the emperor Hadrian, although he was born of servile condition, was very eloquent, and wrote many things." Regarding him also we read that Tertullian committed these things to memory: "The rest with its origins, and [the] tales, and relations, with all the subsequent history of dreams, Hermippus the Berythian will exhibit most satiatingly in five volumes."

HIPPOBOTUS, who, our Clement being witness, had said that Pythagoras was a Samian, is frequently cited by Laertius, and especially in the *Life of Thales*, where it is narrated by him what he had handed down in his *Description of Philosophers* concerning the most celebrated wise men of Greece. But in the *Life of Aristippus* he sends us to the same Hippobotus's book *On Sects*. But in the *Life of Pythagoras*, of Empedocles, and of others, he is called by him by his name alone. It will not be difficult to persuade one that in one of these two books of Hippobotus, if indeed there were two, and not one and the same, Pythagoras, as Clement testifies, was said to have been a Samian by birth.

We have seen certain thefts of Hyperides detected by our Clement. But he is without doubt the same one, whose

^A life Plutarch and Photius have described at greater length, and Suidas more briefly. You will find his orations cited frequently by Athenaeus and Stobaeus. Lastly, Tullius, in book II of *De Oratore*, page 118, calls Hyperides and Demosthenes perfect and polished men. See further his book I, page 188, and *Brutus*, pages 216 and 247.

I. ION OF CHIOS, who is cited by Clement in his *Triagmoi*, is a figure whose identity and literary contributions Suidas explains in these words: "Ion of Chios, a tragic and lyric poet and philosopher, son of Orthomenes, surnamed Xuthus. He began to instruct in tragedies in the 72nd Olympiad. Some report that there were 12 of his plays, others 30, others 40. He wrote *On Meteors* and composite orations, whom the comic poet Aristophanes calls 'the Morning Star' in jest." More information about him is found in Athenaeus, chiefly in book II of the *Deipnosophists*, and in Pausanias, book V, page 162, and book VII, page 209. To pass over others like Strabo, book X of his *Geography*, page 645, Laertius has recorded his epigram on Pherecydes, and in his *Life of Pythagoras* he cites him in the *Triagmoi*. ^B There, Menagius observes that in the ancient editions of Laertius it was written incorrectly as *Triaginoi*, and most poorly in our printed copies of Clement as *Trigrammoi*. You may see the observations of this same Menagius and the scholia of another writer on the comedy of Aristophanes entitled *Peace*, page 686.

ISTER, if we believe Clement, published a book *On the Colony of the Egyptians* and *On the Nature of Contests*. The former commentary is found cited by Stephanus at the words *Archas* and *Asia*, and elsewhere. Since many have been known by this name, many believe this to be the one whose various works Athenaeus mentions in the *Deipnosophists*, book VI, page 272; book XI, page 478; book XIII, page 557; and book XIV, page 650; and concerning whom Suidas has passed this to posterity: "Ister, son of Menander Ister, a Cyrenaean or Macedonian, a historian, slave and disciple of Callimachus. Hermippus, however, in the second book *On Slaves Who Were Famous for Learning*, says he was a Paphian. He wrote many things, both in prose and poetry." Read Casaubon in the cited Athenaeus, book VI, cap. 5, and book IX, cap. 9; Vossius, book IV *De Historicis Graecis*, cap. 12; and Menagius’ annotations on book II of Laertius, *Life of Xenophon*, § 59.

J. JOBA, or Juba, whom Clement asserts to have written about the Assyrians, was mentioned by us in the previous book, dissert. 5, cap. 2, § 8. You may see Harduin in his index of the authors cited by Pliny. ^C Why indeed he did not call our Clement by name—just as Tatian, who appears to speak of no other Juba than our author—is not sufficiently certain to us. Yet if anyone correctly shows us that Joabas and Juba were different writers, we shall certainly not gainsay him.

L. LAETUS, whom Clement calls *En tois Phoinikois* (In the Phoenician [Books]), we have already noted in the previous book; and perhaps we do not hold it rash to suspect that this is the very same person who is called Choetus by Tatian.

LEO, as we discover from our Clement, had published a treatise *On the Egyptian Gods*. But concerning what sort of work of Leo, who ^D wrote on Egyptian matters, he should be called, neither Hyginus nor Clement has indicated. Consider, however, whether he is the one whom Arnobius calls Leo, or in another edition, Leontes, and testifies that he committed many things regarding the gods to writing.

M. MEGASTHENES, says Clement, lived under Seleucus Nicator and wrote several books *On Indian Affairs*. And certainly Athenaeus cited him more than once, and Josephus cited his fourth [book] more than once; he furthermore transcribed a portion of the third book. Although Strabo, book II of his *Geography*, page 70, said: "Credit is to be denied primarily to Daimachus and Megasthenes;" yet he uses his testimony more frequently in the same book, page 68 et seq., and book XV, pages 711, 886, 887; and also Pliny, book VI of his *Natural History*, cap. 17, page 682, and book V, pages 11 and 12, book VIII, page 153; Aelian, book VII *On Animals*, cap. 7, book XVI, cap. 41, book XV, cap. 39, and others.

N. NEANTHES, whose opinion concerning the fatherland and the name of Pythagoras Clement sets forth, is held to be a Cyzicenean orator and a disciple of Philiscus the Milesian. Laertius makes it attested that he wrote concerning the Pythagoreans; whence, perhaps, Clement had drawn this, just as Theodoretus had, which he admonishes was handed down by him regarding the fatherland of Pythagoras. Vossius, however, opines that this was taken from his book *On Illustrious Men*, which Stephanus mentions; but he brings forward no proof for his opinion. Moreover, various writings of this Neanthes occur, cited by name by Athenaeus and others. Finally, he is lauded by Laertius, in *Vita Pythagorae*, § 25, by his name alone. But consult Menagius’ observations on the former passage of Laertius cited by us.

P. PHANIAS, whom Clement relates as having written about the time when Alexander came into Asia, is without a doubt the one of whom we read the following in Suidas: "Phanias, or Phaenias, an Eresian, a Peripatetic philosopher, disciple of Aristotle. He lived in the 111th Olympiad, and afterwards under Alexander of Macedon." But by Plutarch he is called a Lesbian, because Eressus was a city of the island of Lesbos. Various of his commentaries are cited by Laertius, book III, in the *Life of Aristippus*, § 65; *Life of Zeno*, § 41; by Athenaeus, book II of the *Deipnosophists*, page 51; book VI, in the *Life of Antisthenes*, § 8; and book VIII, in other places. You may see further, if you have time and inclination, Menagius on Laertius, book V, § 50, and book VII, § 41.

We have already noted the theft of Philinus with our Clement. But since he is said to have compiled something from a certain oration of Demosthenes, it is gathered from this, not entirely without merit, that he was the one who is called the orator Philinus by Athenaeus. You will be able to consult Casaubon on this passage of Athenaeus.

PHILISTUS the Thucydidean, just as he was a compiler and plagiarist of Demosthenes, is accused [of the same]. Therefore, that historian was without a doubt, as Philinus was an orator. For concerning him Plutarch writes in the *Life of Dion*: "Philistus was banished from Sicily, and he fled to certain hosts in Adria, where, as it seems to me"

having plenty of leisure, he composed the greater part of his History." But what sort of history his was, hear from Dionysius the Sicilian: "Among the writers," he says, "Philistus concludes the first part of his Siculan affairs with the capture of Agrigentum in this year, comprising in seven volumes the events of more than eight hundred years. But the second part of his historical work he begins from the end of the former, and carries it through four books." Suidas enumerates many and various works of his, and says that he was a Naucratite, or a Syracusan, the son of Archonides, and a pupil of the elegiac poet Evenus, and that he was the first to compose a history using the art of oratory. Indeed, that Clement said he derived some things from Demosthenes can be not ineptly confirmed by these words of Cicero to his brother Quintus: "That quintessential Sicilian, dense, acute, concise, almost a miniature Thucydides." And still more clearly elsewhere: "The Syracusan," he says, "Philistus, who, being on the most familiar terms with the tyrant Dionysius, spent his leisure in writing history, and, as it seems to me, mainly imitated Thucydides." Furthermore, Pausanias (book I, p. 43 and 29, and book V, p. 171), Dionysius of Halicarnassus in his *Judgement on the Old Writers* (p. 70) and in his *Letter to Pompeius* (p. 16), Eusebius in the *Chronicon* (at the year 805), and many others make mention of him.

PHILO, says Clement, "also wrote of the kings of the Jews, otherwise than Demetrius." And previously: "That philosophy (transmitted in writing by the Jews) had begun before the Greek, the Pythagorean Philo shows in many words. But in his fourth book he adduced his testimony in these words: 'The Pythagorean Philo says, describing the deeds of Moses, or also having been taught by some who were present at that time, with divine utterances, as one who was ever gripped by a thirst for learning.'" But elsewhere, where he borrows the explanation of the names Agar and Sara from his writings, he simply calls him Philo. In the same way also afterward, "as Philo says in the *Life of Moses*." Finally, where he speaks of the daughters of Diodorus: "They were all dialecticians, as says the dialectician Philo in the *Menexenus*." That not one and the same person, but several, are designated by the name of Philo, and are intended by these words of our Clement, certainly no one could rightly and deservedly deny. Therefore, some suspect that the commentary *On the Kings of the Jews* is by the Jew of Byblos, who flourished in the times of Nerva, Trajan, and Hadrian. Others, however, deny it, and contend that it proceeded from another, older author, namely from him whom Josephus—as does our Clement, as we have seen above—joined with Demetrius and Eupolemus.

But this Philo, whom Clement calls a Pythagorean, seems to us to be none other than Philo Judaeus of Alexandria, whose works, published in print, are in everyone’s hands. Which indeed can be proved by a twofold reasoning. For in the first place, Clement records that the deeds of Moses were described by him, by which name who does not see that *The Life of Moses* is designated, which, as Jerome says, was composed by him and comprised in three books, and came out into public view with his other books? Furthermore, this explanation of the name Sara, namely *principatus* (principality), which Clement brought forward from Philo, is not only found in his books but is also peculiar to him, and is rendered better than by others, namely as *domina* (mistress), or *odora* (fragrant), and *domina odoris* (mistress of fragrance). From which it is concluded with no small certainty that by the name of the Pythagorean Philo, this Jewish Philo is truly designated. Why then, you ask, is this Philo called a Pythagorean, since ^A there is borne abroad that famous saying, as we have seen elsewhere: "Either Plato Philonizes, or Philo Platonizes"? But what prevents him from having followed the various dogmas of Pythagoras, and especially those concerning numbers, and having imitated Plato as well? Josephus writes more on this Philo in *Antiquities of the Jews* book XVIII, ch. 10; Eusebius in *Ecclesiastical History*, book II, ch. 5 and 18; Jerome, *On Illustrious Men*, § 21; Photius, *Bibliotheca*, cod. 103 and 104; Suidas, and many others. Lastly, we observe from Jerome (supra, ch. 18, art. 4) that Philo the dialectician was the teacher of Carneades.

POLYBUS, the physician, had made his book *On Eight-Month Infants* available to the public, from which our Clement has cited testimony in one place. He was that illustrious physician, the former pupil and successor of Hippocrates, some of whose Greek pamphlets, published together with the works of his teacher and rendered into Latin by Albanus Torinus, were issued at Basel in the year 1544, by Joannes Oporinus, in Latin characters.

PYTHOCLES of Samos was the author of many books ^B *On Italian Affairs*. For the fourth book is cited by Clement, and the third by Plutarch, and also a third book *On Rustic Affairs*. Finally, you will find a third book of his, *On Concord*, cited by our same Clement.

S. SELEUCUS the mathematician, as has been noted by our Clement, said that the moon changes its figure seven times. But see, I pray, if he be the one of whom these words of Strabo are: "Mathematicians also mention some of them, such as Cidenas, and Naburianus, and Sudinus; and Seleucus the Chaldean from Seleucia, and many other illustrious men." Furthermore, you will learn from Suidas that the same name was given to certain grammarians, and from the notes and observations of various writers on Laertius, book IX, in the *Life of Heraclitus*, § 12. SOTADES, ^C mentioned somewhere by Clement, was surely he who is called an Athenian philosopher by Suidas, and is said to have written a book *On the Mysteries*.

T. THEOPOMPUS and TIMAEUS composed fables and vexed others with slanders, as Clement not undeservedly asserts. For concerning both, Josephus has committed these things to memory: "Certain ones of the Gentiles and of the most glorious cities have attempted to tarnish their nobility and detract from their manners. Theopompus indeed those of the Athenians, while Polycrates those of the Lacedaemonians. But he who wrote the *Tripoliticus* (for Theopompus did not do this, as some think) also bit the city of the Thebans. Timaeus also blasphemed much in his histories concerning the aforementioned and others." But concerning Theopompus, Lucian says: "Otherwise," he says, "you will fall into the same fault as Theopompus, who accuses many too invidiously, and turns that affair into a study and a certain exercise; so that he seems to accuse ^D rather than to record deeds in history." Read Dionysius of Halicarnassus at the beginning of his book *Roman Antiquities*, and his *Letter to Cn. Pompeius* (p. 132); Athenaeus, *Deipnosophists* (passim); Strabo, book VII (p. 317), and elsewhere; Photius, *Bibliotheca*, cod. 176; Suidas, and others. Concerning Timaeus, the opinion of Strabo was the same as that of our Clement, who writes that Timaeus of Tauromenium was "an envious man and a slanderer, and to whom on that account the name Epitimius—that is, the reprehender—was given." But previously Diodorus

Siculus had written similar things in this manner ^A: "Timaeus indeed applied exquisite diligence to the notation of time, and strives assiduously to abound in various knowledge of affairs. But on account of untimely and verbose criticisms, he himself is also deservedly criticized. Wherefore, on account of an excessive freedom in censuring, he was by some named Epitimius, i.e., The Censor." But later ^B: "It pleased me to observe that Timaeus, while he censures with great bitterness the writers who preceded his own time and leaves no room for pardon to historians, is himself caught lying and hallucinating where he professes the most diligent seeking of the truth." Do you wish for yet another witness? Behold, Polybius is at hand, who similarly handed down these things in his writings regarding Timaeus: "We ourselves might also seem to have acted deservedly in the present case, if we have abrogated belief in most of the things said by Timaeus against Demochares: against him, on the other hand, let no one grant pardon or repose any belief, after he has so manifestly, out of his own inborn thirst for slander, exceeded all measure in reviling. Indeed, those slanders which Timaeus heaped upon Agathocles do not please me either; although he was indeed a most wicked man and of all the most impious, etc." You may see his fragments at page 1009 and elsewhere. Athenaeus subscribes to Polybius, who rebukes Timaeus, ^C and indicates how he was called Epitimius: "Timaeus the Tauromenian, forgetting himself—that which Polybius of Megalopolis criticizes in him in Book XIII of his Histories—denies that the Greeks were accustomed to have slaves: in relating that matter, he is indeed Epitimius, 'Eπιτίμαιος; for so Callimachus the Istrian names him in his *Contradictions*." Finally Suidas, who handed down more to memory regarding him, relates that that name was attributed to him by the Athenians, and that he was furthermore nicknamed Graosyllectrian, because, he says, he gathered up anything into his writings. Although both Theopompus and Timaeus, because of their slanders and invectives, were ill-spoken of by many; yet that did not prevent Clement, and very often Athenaeus, and even Laertius and others, from employing their authority and testimony. ^D You should read Photius regarding Theopompus in *Bibliotheca* cod. 176, and regarding Timaeus in cod. 245, and Vossius discoursing on both in Book I *De historicis Graecis*, chapters 7 and 12.

Clement has left us a certain fragment of Thrasyllus' *Chronographia*. It is believed that this is the same man who is called by Tacitus and Suetonius a Chaldean mathematician—or one very skilled in astronomy—and by Plutarch and Stobaeus is said to have written *Aegyptiaca*. The same Plutarch also made mention of him in *De Strimone*, page 1155; Dio, books LV and LVII; Themistius, oration 12; Laertius, book III in *Life of Plato* § 11, 56, and 61; book IX in *Life of Democritus*, § 41. You should read the observations of Menagius, and others.

Thrasymachus, whose oration on behalf of the Larissaeans is cited by Clement, was "a Chalcedonian," says Suidas, "a sophist in Bithynia, who first demonstrated the period and the colon, and instituted the now-customary rhetorical method: a disciple of Plato the philosopher and of Isocrates the rhetor. He wrote hortatory orations, an art of rhetoric, amusements, and rhetorical arguments." Cicero also mentions him not once, indeed in book III *De oratore*, page 200, and *Brutus*, page 206. And in the *Orator*, page 275: "Thrasymachus," he says, "was the leader in discovering numbers in an oration, all of whose writings exist even too numerously." Finally, Athenaeus in *Deipnosophistae*, book X, page 454, reports that this epitaph was inscribed on his monument by Neoptolemus of Paros: "Name theta, rho, alpha, san, upsilon, mu, alpha, chi, omicron, san, Homeland Chalcedon, knowledge his study."

Timaeus of Locri—and thus entirely different from the one we mentioned above—was not undeservedly cited by Clement in his book *On Nature*. For as Suidas relates: "Timaeus of Locri, a Pythagorean philosopher, wrote on mathematics, on nature, and on the life of Pythagoras." Moreover, they say this is the man whom Plato introduces speaking in the dialogue inscribed with his name. You should see Jonsius, *De scriptoribus historiae philosophicae*, and Vossius, book I *De historicis Graecis*, chapter 12, page 81, and book IV, chapter 8, page 458.

The book of Timotheus of Pergamum *On the Fortitude of Philosophers* occurs, cited just as much by Plutarch as by our author.

X.

Of Xanthus the Lydian, cited elsewhere by Clement, we read of *Magica* cited elsewhere. From Dionysius of Halicarnassus, however, he received this eulogy: "Xanthus the Lydian, if anyone, was skilled in antiquities, and was an author of his native history." In another book he again lists him among the writers who flourished before the Peloponnesian War. Moreover, Laertius plucked certain things from his *Chronology*, just as our Clement did. He is cited by Strabo, book XIII *Geographia*, page 572; by Pliny, book XXV *Naturalis historia*, chapter 2, page 376; by Athenaeus, book II *Deipnosophistae*, page 515, where he expresses doubt regarding certain histories ascribed to him. More on him in Suidas at the word Ξάνθος, and others.

ARTICLE II. On the poets cited by Clement.

We must now come to the poets, cited everywhere by our Clement no less than other writers, and we must dispute about them in the same manner and by the same method as with the others.

A.

Clement reports some verses of the Abderitan on more than one occasion, but by name only once. And first, indeed, with these words: "The Abderitan says: "For the tongue of mortals is changeable," etc.

Hervetus thought these verses were those of Democritus of Abdera, but it has been noted in the scholia of the *Clementine* works that they are found in Homer—not indeed the *Iliad*, as is indicated in those works, but *Iliad* XX, page 363, Basle edition 1583—though not without a variant reading. But it may not be without cause that one might call into doubt whether Clement intended to summon Homer under the name of the Abderitan, or some other poet more ancient than him, who had first published the cited verses. For there were not lacking those who accused Homer of having received his *Iliad* from another. Furthermore, these verses are of such a type that they could easily have come into the minds of various poets who were unknown to one another. However, since there is the greatest disagreement among writers as to Homer's homeland, some perhaps believed him to be an Abderitan, and for that reason he was so named by Clement. But this very great obscurity and ignorance regarding the Homeric homeland proves quite openly that Homer could scarcely ever be cited by our Clement solely by the name of the Abderitan. Who, then, that Abderitan might be, we shall gladly hear from others.

Aeschylus is cited not once by our Clement.

^A tur, but much more so by Athenaeus in his *Deipnosophistae* and in other books, and by Stobaeus in his *Anthology*, by Julius Pollux, and by others. Concerning him, Eusebius has handed down these things in his *Chronicle*, at the 71st and 75th Olympiad: Aeschylus is recognized as a writer of tragedies. Regarding these words, one should read the *Animadversiones* of Scaliger, and those of others in Aulus Gellius, *Attic Nights*, book XII, chapter 48, and book XVII, chapter 21, and also Suidas, etc. Furthermore, the tragedies of this poet have been printed 325 times, and his life has sometimes been prefixed to them. Moreover, it is to be observed that among the verses of Aeschylus cited by Clement, in which he sings that glory is the daughter of labor, similar lines are exhibited by the same author in Stobaeus, *Anthology* 29, page 199. Junius, in *Adagia*, century 4, adage 39, will abundantly supply you with more for the explanation of another verse of his concerning the 'yoke of the tongue' that our aforementioned author transcribed.

Regarding AGATHON, Clement has reported two verses, but many more are cited by Stobaeus in *Anthology* 3, 38, 50, 52, and 67. Athenaeus also transcribed some in book X of his *Deipnosophistae*, page 454, and in book XI, page 528. Concerning this poet, you should see Aelian, book XIV, *Varia Historia*, chapter 14; Suidas under the word 'Agathon'; and Vossius, *De poetis Graecis*, pages 39 and 50.

AMPHION and ARION, with whom Clement begins his *Exhortation to the Greeks*, are names unknown to no one. They have been celebrated by so many authors and poets that it seems there is nothing for us to observe further about them. Added to this is the fact that many things about them were already noted in the scholia of this our Clement. Therefore, we shall only remark that Amphion—to whom Zethus is joined—is said by Clement somewhere to be the inventor of music, and to have lived around the age of Cadmus; but elsewhere it is said to have preceded the Trojan affairs by two generations. Eusebius, however, in his *Chronicle*, at the year 632, writes: "Amphion and Zethus reigned after Cadmus was expelled." Then, later, at the year 689: "Amphion reigned in Thebes, who they say moved stones by the song of his lyre." There were, however, some listeners of hard heart and, if I may so speak, of stone. See Scaliger's *Animadversiones* at the earlier place in this *Chronicle*. Petavius, however, assigns the time of the reign of each to the year of the world 2567, which others think happened later. Read, if you wish, the chronographies of various authors. Furthermore, Clement has produced certain verses of Amphion from his *Antiope*. But whether these poems were rightly or wrongly ascribed to that most famous Amphion is something that can not undeservedly be called into doubt. For who does not know that several men were called by this name? And indeed, Athenaeus is read to have cited an epigram of Amphion the Thespian from book II concerning the Muses. The name of Arion and the fable in which he is imagined as having been transported to the shore by a dolphin, enticed by the sweetness of his song, are known to all and do not require our observations.

^B Apollonius; Vossius, book 1 *De historicis Graecis*, chapter 46, and *De poetis Graecis*, page 66; Gesner, and others.

Regarding ARCHILOCHUS, Clement sharply rebukes him because he wrote shamefully, and observes that he is said by Phaenias to be older than Terpander, and to be the inventor of the iambus. However, we have discussed this invention of the iambus above. Therefore, regarding the first point, or the insolence of Archilochus, Valerius Maximus wrote thus: "The Lacedaemonians ordered the books of Archilochus to be cast out of their state because they judged their reading to be insufficiently modest and chaste. For they did not want the minds of their children to be imbued with such things, lest it should do more harm to their morals than good to their intellects. And so, they punished the greatest poet, or at any rate one very close to the greatest, with exile, because he had lacerated a house hateful to him with obscene taunts of his poems." He denotes by these words, 'a house hateful to him,' the home of Lycambes, who, when he had betrothed his daughter Neobule to Archilochus, gave her to another; Archilochus, stirred by anger, so badly insulted Lycambes that, quite unable to bear it, he ended his life with a noose. Therefore Horace sang thus of him in *Epode* 6: "As one rejected by the treacherous father-in-law of Lycambes." Again, elsewhere in his *Ars Poetica*, line 79: "Rage armed Archilochus with its own iambus." See Ovid, Suidas under the word 'Archilochus,' and Erasmus, *Adagia*, chiliad III, century 10, adage 9: "You are exhausting Archilochus."

Regarding his date, there are various opinions. For Herodotus, and later Proclus, apud Photius, claim that he was contemporary with Gyges: but Herodotus leans upon an argument that is entirely weak, as Scaliger thinks. Tatian, however, says: "Archilochus flourished, he says, around the twenty-third Olympiad, in the time of Gyges the Lydian, five hundred years from the Trojan war." Cyril of Alexandria subscribed to this with these words: "They claim Archilochus [was] in the twenty-third Olympiad, under the administration of Manasseh in Judea." Nevertheless, in the *Chronicle* of Eusebius, this is pushed back to the twenty-ninth Olympiad and the year 1355. But Vossius thinks that all these things can be reconciled. You will easily be able to consult him, if you wish.

Clement, our author, transcribed not only in these *Stromata* but also in the books of his *Paedagogus* some poems of the comic poet ANTIPHON. But when he calls him by the name of 'comic poet,' ^D there is no doubt that he should be understood as the one who, according to Suidas, lived in the 91st Olympiad and wrote 365 comedies, or, according to others, 280. Many of these are found cited by Athenaeus in his *Deipnosophistae* books, and some by Pollux in the *Onomasticon*, and by Stobaeus in his *Anthology*. Many others also made mention of him.

APOLLONIUS of Rhodes' *Argonautica*, cited by Clement, was made public by Aldus at Venice in the year 1521, and in volume I of the *Poetarum Graecorum*, and elsewhere.

Regarding ARCTINUS, he was surpassed by Lesches the Lesbian, if you believe the Phaenias cited by our Clement. But who that Arctinus was, and in what time he existed, hear from Suidas: "Arctinus," he says, "son of Teleus, a Milesian poet, disciple of Homer, as Arthemon of Clazomenae mentions in his book *On Homer*. He lived in the ninth Olympiad, four hundred years after the Trojan war." Eusebius, however, in his *Chronicle*, at the 1st Olympiad, year 1249: "Arctinus the Milesian versifier is regarded as famous in almost every meter and work." And two years later: "Arctinus the Milesian versifier is regarded as most flourishing." Finally, at the 3rd Olympiad: "Arctinus, who composed the *Aethiopis* and *Iliupersis*, is recognized." But regarding this last place, see the *Animadversiones* of Scaliger, just as you should see those of Vossius in *De poetis Graecis*, page 10. Nor should Cyril of Alexandria be omitted, whose words concerning the same Arctinus are these: "Arctinus the Milesian is said to have been an epic poet at the first Olympiad."

Our author transcribed two verses of ARISTO concerning pleasure, pain, fear, and desire. Laertius lists many called by that name, of whom the fourth is a tragic poet. Many will perhaps not find it difficult to admit that those verses were sung by him rather than by another.

ARISTOPHANES is often praised by our author |1425| ^A. But because he cannot be unknown to anyone, and his comedies have been printed more than once, we shall only note that certain of his verses, cited by our same Clement from his comedy entitled *The Birds*, are presented without their metrical form, to which they are reduced in the following way from the 1607 Aurelia Allobrogum edition of the same poet's works:

*Αγε δὴ φύσιν ἄνδρες ἀμαυρόβιοι, φύλλων γενεᾷ προσόμοιοι.* *Ολιγοδρανέες, πλάσματα πηλοῦ, σκιοειδέα φύλ’ ἀμενηνὰ,* *Ἀπτῆνες ἐφημέριοι…*

Come now, you men of obscure life, in generation like to the leaves, Weak-powered, creatures of clay, shadowy, powerless tribes, Creatures of a day, devoid of wings...

In Clement's editions, however, it is written *πλάσματα πηλοῦ*, "creatures of clay," instead of *πλάσματα κηροῦ*, "creatures of wax"; but the former reading will without doubt appear better to you.

^B BACCHYLIDES, a writer of poems, is known, as Eusebius says in his *Chronicle*, in the LXXXVII Olympiad, and he had already made mention of him in the LXXVIII and LXXXII Olympiads. But Clement relates that he sang in his *Paeans*: "It is not easy to find the gates of obscure verses." Although Hervetus did not find these elsewhere, they are nonetheless represented by the same number of words in Greek by Theodoret, tom. IV, serm. 2, *De fide*, p. 477. Furthermore, without any regard for meter, Clement transcribed other verses of this same Bacchylides, whom he calls a lyric poet. But you will find them in plain, similar fashion in the fragments of his works, tom. II *Poet. Græc.*, part 1, p. 121. There is no doubt that it was unknown to the editors of these editions that Eusebius, in his *Præparat. evang.*, book XI, cap. 13, p. 679, had restored the genuine form of his poems.

^C The *Iambi*, *Aitia* (Causes), and hymns of CALLIMACHUS are cited by our author more than once. But we have discussed the *Aitia* above. Wherefore we shall only note what is cited by our Clement from his epigrams: *ἕτερος δὲ ἐξ ἑτέρου σοφός*, "one is wise from another." Hervetus did not know that this passage is presented in Cyril of Alexandria, *lib. 1 contra Julian.*, p. 7, as follows: "And at present I consider it true, that which is bandied about by some as a parody: *σοφὸς ἄλλος ἀπ’ ἄλλου*, one is wise from another." Furthermore, certain of Callimachus' poetical works were published by Henri Estienne in the year 1577 and by others, and also in tom. 1 of the *Poet. Græc.*, in both Greek and Latin. We have spoken of him elsewhere.

CALLINUS, says Clement, *is* not much older than Archilochus. "For," he says, "Archilochus remembers the Magnetes who had perished; but this man [Callinus] remembers them as people whose affairs were still prosperous." And this is confirmed in an astonishing way by the words of Strabo: "Callinus indeed remembers the Magnetes as those who still enjoyed prosperous affairs, and were successfully waging war against the Ephesians. Archilochus seems to have already known of their disaster, ordering a quicker lament for the woes of the Magnetes. Hence it may even be gathered that he was posterior to Callinus." However, Athenaeus says to the contrary: "They perished," he says, "having been reduced to slavery by the Ephesians, and the Magnetes, situated by the Maeander, were rotted by excesses beyond measure, as Archilochus and Callinus in their elegies write." For the latter, Callinus, |1426| ^A pointed to a more recent destruction, while he himself, like Strabo, indicated an older one. But since Strabo stands on the side of our Clement, you will perhaps confess that more faith should be placed in these two than in the one, Athenaeus. If, however, anyone proves that Callinus wrote something before, and after the destruction of the Magnetes, it will not trouble us at all.

CLEANTHES the Stoic philosopher's poetry is cited somewhere by our Clement. Elsewhere his poems *On God* are referred to in this manner: "Cleanthes the Stoic in a certain poem *On God*." Laertius, however, described his *Life*, but Menagius, in his observations on it, opines that this last is the work which is reported to be inscribed in the same way by the same Laertius there.

CRATES the Theban's certain poems were brought forward by Clement, which Hervetus judges to be corrupted, and which others in their scholia and annotations on this place of our Clement have tried to correct. But they should also have warned us about those things which Clement subjoined in the same place, which have been transmitted as given by Theodoret in his writings: "Crates the Theban ornamented virtue with many praises; for such is his sentiment:

*Ἡδονῇ ἀνδραποδώδει ἀδούλωτοι, καὶ ἄκαμπτοι,* *Ἀθάνατον βασιλείαν ἐλευθερίαν τ’ ἀγαπῶσιν.* From the servile empire of pleasure liberated, and unbending, The immortal kingdom, and liberty they love."

He used to say: "Hunger is the remedy for the venereal appetite: if not, the noose." We have transcribed these to be compared with the Greek text of our Clement, and so that the errors may be corrected. Laertius rendered these two verses in the *Life of Crates* differently, and testifies that they are attributed to the same Crates only by public rumor:

*Ἔρωτα παύει λιμὸς, εἰ δὲ μὴ χρόνος:* *Ἐὰν δὲ τούτοις μὴ δύνῃ χrῆσθαι, βρόχος.* Hunger calms love, if not, time: But if you are unable to use these, a noose."

Stobaeus, however, who keeps silent about the author of these verses, related the first in the same way as Laertius, and the second in an entirely different manner.

Since our discourse has fallen upon Crates, it is worth noting that the epitaph of Sardanapalus was included by our Clement a little earlier in three verses, and that other similar ones are ascribed to Crates by Laertius in this manner: "There are also these verses of his:

*Ταῦτ’ ἔχω, ὅσσ’ ἔμαθον, καὶ ἐφρόντισα καὶ μετὰ μουσῶν* *Σεμν’ ἐδάην· τὰ δὲ πολλὰ καὶ ὄλβια τύπος ἔμαρψε.* I have such, as much as I have learned, and considered, and with the Muses I have learned [what is] noble; but many things and prosperous things, pride has snatched away."

Regarding the epigram on Sardanapalus, besides the various scholia on our Clement, consult Menagius' annotations on the Laertius cited by us.

^D CRATINUS is not once praised by Clement. And first in his *Archilochi* by him, and more often by Athenaeus in lib. III of the *Deipnosophists*, p. 86 and 92, lib. IX, p. 575 and 410. Secondly, however, in the *Pytine* (The Flagon), and by Athenaeus as *Pytine*, lib. III, p. 94, lib. X, p. 426. Athenaeus cites many other works of his, finally.

Athenians, indeed, were Evetes, and Euxenides, and Mylus, who displayed themselves. ^A Moreover, our author calls him a Pythagorean; which, indeed, is excellently asserted and confirmed by Laertius. But then, by what right Clement elsewhere calls him a comic poet is evident from his various comedies, cited here and there by Athenaeus. Finally, Clement says that this, among others, was his maxim: "Do not believe; these are the nerves of the mind." Is this not the very same that Cicero expresses in these words: "He held to that saying of Epicharmus: 'The nerves and sinews of wisdom are not to believe rashly'?" In one letter to Atticus, he quoted it at somewhat greater length in Greek words in this manner: "We are so entangled in new friendships that the crafty Sicilian, Epicharmus, often whispers to me: *Νῆφε καὶ μέμνησο ἀπιστεῖν· ἄρθρα ταῦτα τῶν φρενῶν.* (Be sober and remember to disbelieve; these are the limbs of the mind). Be sober, and remember not to believe easily: these are the nerves of wisdom." Elsewhere, he calls him a sharp and not unintelligent man, and brings forth another of his maxims: "You seem to me to follow the sentiment of the sharp, not unintelligent Sicilian, Epicharmus: 'I do not want to die; but I think nothing of being dead.'" Besides the Athenaeus cited by us, Pollux in his *Onomasticon* and others have described many things from his comedies. You may see regarding him Vossius in his book *De poetis*, p. 33, and the annotations of various authors on the location in Laertius cited by us.

We learn from Clement that Epigenes wrote a book on the poetry of Orpheus. But the name Epigenes has been given to two men, of whom the one is an astronomer and historian, concerning whom Pliny, *Historia naturalis*, book VII, chap. 1, p. 77, and chap. 15, p. 94, and book X, chap. 3, p. 788, has spoken. The other is a poet, whose various poems are cited by Athenaeus. You should read Suidas at the word *Epigenes*, and Vossius in his third book *De historicis Graecis*, chapter three, p. 363.

Clement has brought forward certain poems of Eubulus; and it is observed in the scholastic commentaries on this *Stromateis* that the later ones were amended by Hervetus after the earlier ones had been corrupted in the printed editions. Clement cites his comedy *Semele*; but this is called *Bacchus* by Athenaeus, who cites many other comedies of the same Eubulus, namely fifty-one, just as Pollux in his *Onomasticon* has cited fewer. But from Suidas you may learn who he was: "Eubulus," he himself says, "a Cettian (Athenian), son of Euphorion, a comic poet, published twenty-four plays." He lived, moreover, in the 101st Olympiad, midway between the Middle and the Old Comedy. Therefore he had not seen all his comedies, when Athenaeus, as we have said, reviews them.

"Eumelus," says Clement, "is said to have reached the time of Archias, who founded Syracuse." Eusebius, however, in his *Chronicle*, in the 10th Olympiad: "Eumelus the poet, who composed the *Bugonia* and the *Europia*, is recognized." Afterwards, in the 14th Olympiad: "Eumelus of Corinth, a versifier, is recognized." ^D From the first passage of Eusebius, someone will perhaps think he can not unreasonably conclude that the same Eumelus is cited here by our author, without the name, in these words: "Moreover, he who composed the *Europia*—*τὴν Εὐρωπίαν ποιήσας*—signifies that the pillar, which is at Delphi, is an image of Apollo by these lines:

*ὄφρα θεῷ δεκάτην ἀκροθινιά τε κρεμάσαι* *σταθμῶν ἐκ ζαθέων καὶ κίονος ὑψηλοῖο.*

'And that we may hang as a tithe for the god the first fruits* *From the most sacred foundations and the high column.'"

' ^A Pausanias, however, gives this poem a slightly different version, in his *Europa*. Scaliger, however, suspects in the former passage of Eusebius that the very same work is designated by both names. Furthermore, the same Pausanias attests that Eumelus was the son of Amphilytus, of the Bacchidæ family, who was reported by some—though not without great reason for doubt—to have written the Corinthian history in verse. But what of the fact that in another book he says: “Eumelus composed a *Canticum* (which they call a prosody) with which they might salute the god”? And these are certainly the only poems that are held for certain to have been composed by Eumelus. From this *Canticum*, there is no doubt that the passages he later produced in Book IV (p. 143) and Book V (p. 167) were drawn. It is uncertain, therefore, whether the poem transcribed by Clement in Book VI, p. 622, is his. On this poet, see more in Vossius, *De poet. Græc.*, pp. 11, 12, 13, and Book IV of *De hist. Græc.*, cap. 1, p. 429 et seq.

Euphorion of Chalcis is praised by our author in *Stromata*, Book V, p. 488, and Book V, pp. 561 and 571. But in these passages, from the works of Euphorion from which he draws what he relates, both he, and Stobæus in *Sermones* 76, p. 453, and 123, p. 616, and Pollux in *Onomasticon*, Book IV, ch. 13, p. 195, are completely silent. In the first book, however, p. 327, he is cited by the same Clement of ours in *On the Aliades*, and in Book V, p. 569, *In the Rebuttals to Theoridas*, and by Stobæus in *Sermo* 57, p. 377, in *Philoctetes*. But we have spoken of him above, in the dissertation, ch. 14, art. 2.

^B The works of Euripides, often praised by our Clement and published in print more than once, are known to all too well for us to draw out a long thread of discourse about them. Therefore, it is only worth noting that he is called by the same author of ours "the scenic philosopher." Origen, too, addresses him by this name: "The scenic philosopher," he says, "formerly a student of the physiologist Anaxagoras." But there, he silently suggests the reason for this appellation. For Laertius and Cicero testify that he was indeed a student of that famous poet Anaxagoras. Wherefore Eusebius wrote of him: “When Euripides had betaken himself to poetry, he was called by some a scenic philosopher.” Certain poems of his are cited by Clement under the name of the tragic poet Euripides from the *Phœnissæ*, which indeed were published in this tragedy, along with others composed by him (Act II, p. 99), and were also transcribed by Theodoret. Then, ^C a little later, our Clement again presents other verses of his using only the name of the tragedy. But the former are attributed by name to Euripides by Stobæus in *Sermo* 40, p. 258. The latter, however, are presented by Theodoret in Vol. IV, *Sermo* 1, p. 478, and are found in *Bacchæ*, Act II, p. 466. Elsewhere, Clement cites *Medea*, as yet keeping silent the name of Euripides. But the verses cited by him in this tragedy (Act V, p. 158) occur not without some different reading. Stobæus, in his *Œdipus*, shows that other verses of Euripides cited by Clement, but without the name of his tragedy being indicated, are found but with different readings. Concerning the other poems of this poet described by our author, we have already spoken often.

II We see certain poems of Heraclitus transcribed by the same author of ours, from which some light can be brought to bear, as Theodoret has likewise reported from him. But because Heraclitus is called simply by both, it may not unjustly be called into doubt ^D whether they were chanted by Heraclitus the Ephesian, whose life Laertius described in Book IX, or by some other from among those whom he testifies were called by the same name in the same place. For although that Heraclitus the Ephesian is said by Suidas to have written in a poetic style, some however opine that these words denote his diction and mode of writing, which are similar to poetry, rather than poems edited by him. To this is added that Laertius asserts there were two others of the same name who were poets, to whom the verses cited by Clement might perhaps be ascribed with better right. If, however, the simple appellation of Heraclitus seems to suit the famous Ephesian philosopher better, let him remain in his opinion, if he can prove it.

Hesiod, just like Homer, says Clement, was later than the times of the Iliad, but older than the seven sages of Greece. Later, however, he causes us to be warned that Euthymenes and Archemachus thought both lived at the same time, about 200 years after the capture of Troy; so that both were later than the prophet Elisha. Cyril of Alexandria, however, says: "In the 165th year after the fall of Troy, they report that Homer and Hesiod lived, while Labotes was reigning over the Lacedæmonians, Lasthenes over the Assyrians, Alba Sylvius over the Latins, and Agelaus over the Corinthians." Suidas, however, observes that it pleased some that Hesiod was older than Homer, while to others he appeared contemporary, and to others still, younger. But Eusebius in his *Chronicon* at the year 996: "Some," he says, "write that Homer and Hesiod lived in these times, in which Solomon was reigning among the Jews." Then indeed at the year 1210: "Hesiod is considered illustrious, as Porphyry wills." Finally, at the year 1255 and the 3rd Olympiad: "Hesiod is considered famous according to some." You see, indeed, how varied the opinions regarding the age of Hesiod have been; regarding the time of Homer, however, more below. In the meantime, you might see what Vossius noted regarding both. But it must be noted by us in addition that two verses of Homer concerning Margites are represented by Clement, regarding which some things have been noted in the scholia. But besides that, do not let it be troublesome to approach Suidas at the entry *Margites*, and Erasmus' *Adages*, Chil. II, Cent. 3, p. 411. Regarding the other poems of both Homer and Hesiod cited by this same author of ours, we have discussed them sufficiently above, where the occasion offered itself.

Hipponax, on account of the lasciviousness and petulance of his poems, is joined by Clement to Archilochus, and he notes elsewhere that just as the iambic was invented by the latter, so too was the "limping" iambic invented by the former. We have spoken of this iambic poem, which is said to have been invented by that Hipponax. But concerning his petulance, and whence it arose, these words of Pliny will make you better informed: "Hipponax," he says, "had a notably ugly face. For this reason, those who made a joke of it set up an image of him in the circles of those who were laughing. Hipponax, indignant at this, sharpened the bitterness of his poems to such a degree that it is believed by some that he drove them to the noose—but that is false." Suidas indeed says: "Hipponax, son of Pytheas the father and Protis the mother, an Ephesian, a writer of iambics; he lived at Clazomenæ, driven out by the tyrants Athenagoras and Comas. For he wrote against Bupalus and the Athenian sculptors, because they had made his images in mockery." Since he had written against Bupalus, as Suidas says, Horace sang in *Epodes* 6: "Or as a bitter foe to Bupalus." Hardouin has brought forward various epigrams regarding this matter in the passage of Pliny cited by us. Many—

^A of his iambic verses are exhibited by Athenaeus in books VII and VIII of the *Deipnosophists*. Mention of him was finally made by Tatian in his *Address to the Greeks*, p. 166; by Eusebius in his *Chronicle* for the year 1329; by Cyril of Alexandria in his first book *Against Julian*, p. 12, and others.

ILJAS PARVA (The Little Iliad). The author is designated by Clement with only these words: *ὁ τὴν μικρὰν Ἰλιάδα πεποιηκώς*, "he who composed the Little Iliad." If you wish to know who he might be, hear, if you please, Eusebius in his *Chronicle* at the year 136, Olympiad 30, speaking of him thus: "Lesches of Lesbos is held to be renowned, who composed the Little Iliad." Regarding the age of Lesches, our author is read to have written the following later: "Phanias, placing Lesches of Lesbos before Terpander, reports that Terpander is more recent than Archilochus, but that Lesches contended with Arctinus and won." But this seems to have been a peculiar opinion of Phanias, to which Eusebius, in what he says about Arctinus—as we have already noted—is so diametrically opposed that he nevertheless agrees with him sufficiently regarding the matters that pertain to the age of Terpander. For at the year 1370, Olympiad 33, he is called famous by him. Furthermore, Scaliger, in his observations on the same *Chronicle* of Eusebius at year 1254, notes that the *Iliou Persis* is attributed to Lesches by Pausanias. Yet at the year 1360, he observes that the Little Iliad is distinguished by Aristotle from the *Iliou Persis*, and therefore no reason occurs to him by which this coryphaeus of the Peripatetics could be reconciled with Eusebius and the Scholiast of the Nemean games. And in very truth, Eusebius adjudges the *Iliou Persis* to Arctinus as its genuine author. ^B Pausanias, however, says: "Lescheos," he says, "revealed in his poems that after Ilium was captured, Aethra escaped and came to the camp of the Greeks." But what of the fact that Athenaeus testifies that the *Iliou Persis* is the work of Agias the Argive? But who is ignorant that the opinions and judgments of various writers have often differed regarding the author of this same work? Therefore, let it suffice for us that Eusebius has supported the judgment of our Clement with his own testimony.

IOPHON, *κωμικὸς*, comic poet, is praised by Clement in the *Audetes* or satyr-plays. But who he is might not be so easy and straightforward for everyone to say. For we read of two men called by this name. One is mentioned by Pausanias in these words: "Iophon of Cnossos, who presented the oracles of the prophets in heroic verse." The other, concerning whom Suidas gave these things to be recorded: "Iophon the Athenian, tragic poet, own son of Sophocles the tragic poet, born of Nicostrata... Iophon taught plays (*δράματα*), of which are the *Achilles*, *Telephus*, *Actaeon*, *Iliou Persis*, *Dexamenus*, *Bacchae*, *Pentheus*, and certain other works of his father Sophocles." But it seems there is an Iophon distinct from both, or as it is written in our manuscript codex, *Ἰωφῶν κωμικός*, unless in this second word, just as in the first, there was a mistake by the copyists, and it should be read as it is in Pausanias, *Κνώσιος*. But who would dare to affirm this?

^C LINUS, just like Orpheus, existed after the seven first wise men of Greece, but both of them, and also Musaeus, existed after Phemonoe, and Clement claims that the same Linus was the tutor of Hercules. Regarding the assigned age of those three most ancient poets, one should read Eusebius, *Praep. evangel.*, book X, ch. 4, p. 469, and more often in his *Chronicle*; Augustine, *De civitate Dei*, book XVIII, ch. 14 and 37, etc.; Theodoret, vol. IV, sermon 2, p. 494, and others. Mention of Linus was made by Pausanias in book I, p. 61; book VIII, p. 251, and book IX, p. 303 and 304; Diogenes Laertius, in the *Proemium*, ^D § 4; Virgil, *Eclogues* 4, line 52; Plutarch, vol. II, book *On Music*, p. 1132; Cyril of Alexandria, in his book *Against Julian*, p. 11; and, to omit very many others, Eusebius in his *Chronicle* for the year 752. Suidas, moreover, no differently than our Clement, asserts that he was the tutor of Hercules. And this is read of as having been sung by Theocritus, *Idyll* 24, verse 103. Concerning which matter we have already touched upon something above in book II, dissert. 5, ch. 3, § 9.

LYCOPHRON’S *Alexandra* is numbered by Clement amongst those writings which had been written quite obscurely. Suidas clearly supports him in this, and says of the same Lycophron: "He also wrote that which is called *Alexandra*, that obscure poem." But that work has already appeared in the last century from the printing press. You will find other works of his enriched by Athenaeus, and poems by Laertius in book II (in the *Life of Menedemus*, § 140), and by Stobaeus, *Sermon* 118, p. 601, and others. Finally, in *Poetarum Graecorum*, vol. II, p. 138, the same *Alexandra* (or *Cassandra*) of Lycophron has been published in Greek and Latin; for it is so entitled there.

MENANDER was the prince of the new comedy, and therefore Clement almost always, when he cites his poems, added the title of "comic poet." "Of him," says Suidas, "there is a widespread report among all, and he wrote 108 comedies." From them, moreover, Athenaeus, Stobaeus, Julius Pollux, and others have culled much; but only a few of their fragments have been edited in print. You may see Eusebius in his *Chronicle* at the years 1696 and 1229, and Scaliger’s annotations on these places, Suidas, Vossius in *De poet. Graec.*, p. 58, and Hardouin in the list of authors cited by Pliny, and others. Concerning him, we have already touched upon some things in the *Apparatus*, book II, dissert. 2, ch. 5, § 3, and in the *Dissertation* on ch. II, art. 4.

MOSCHION: Clement transcribed two lines of Moschion, but Stobaeus has far more in *Sermon* 13, p. 145; *Sermon* 44, p. 307; *Sermon* 93, p. 561; *Sermon* 113, p. 585; *Sermon* 122, p. 615; *Sermon* 124, p. 620.

MUSAUS was joined by Clement to Linus and also to Orpheus, and he relates that he was also a disciple of the latter. Eusebius patrons this in his *Chronicle*, where he recorded these things for the year 747: "Orpheus the Thracian is held to be renowned, whose disciple was Musaeus, son of Eumolpus." Nevertheless, Diodorus Siculus makes a point that he was the son of Orpheus. For he narrates that Hercules, after finishing the tenth labor, betook himself to Athens, so that he might be initiated into the mysteries of the Eleusinian mother, of which mysteries, he says, Musaeus, son of Orpheus, was the ministrant. Suidas, however, produced these things in writing about him: "Musaeus of Eleusis... disciple of Orpheus, or rather more ancient, a writer of heroic verse." But Laertius speaks thus of Musaeus and Linus: "To Musaeus, Athens; to Thebes, Linus are illustrious. It is asserted that one of these, the son of Eumolpus, was the first to write the generation of the gods and the sphere in verse, and that he said all things were made from one, and are resolved into the same. He died at Phalerum, and this epigram was inscribed upon his tomb: '330 The earth of Phalerum hides in this tomb the lifeless Musaeus, dear child of his father.' Furthermore, the father of Musaeus gave the surname Eumolpides to those at Athens." Read the observations of Casaubon and Menagius on this passage. But Meursius thinks that this one, although Laertius joins Linus to him, is someone else, distinct from the Eleusinian. Afterward, Clement warns us of the responses (*χρησμούς*) which, in the name of Musaeus...

^A were circulated, but by others are attributed to Onomacritus. Regarding this issue, and the various persons who went by the name of Musaeus, see more in Meursius, *Lectiones Atticae*, book II, chapter 19, and vol. V of the *Antiquitates Graecae*, page 1823 et seq.

*Onomacritus* was credited by certain people—as Clement relates—not only with the poems of Orpheus (as Suidas also testifies) but also with responses inscribed under the name of Musaeus. But concerning Musaeus, and concerning Orpheus, we have already spoken a little earlier, in book II of this *Apparatus*, dissertation 5, chapter 2, § 9. It has been observed by us, in this same dissertation, chapter 20, art. 3, that Onomacritus is counted among the choir of pagan prophets. In short, Clement assigns the age of this same Onomacritus to around the 50th Olympiad. Some, however, more correctly—as Vossius thinks—refer it to the 60th Olympiad.

*Orpheus* is called a theologian by our Clement, no doubt because, as he had said elsewhere, he expounded theology; and these things are joined to Onomacritus in these words: "Onomacritus is found around the 50th Olympiad, and Orpheus, the disciple of Musaeus, who sailed together with Hercules." However, he had said before: "In the time of Acrisius... and Perseus, and Dionysus (Bacchus), are said to have occurred the deeds of Orpheus and Musaeus." But afterwards: "And if anyone should say that Phemonoe was the first to give responses to Acrisius, let him know that Orpheus, Musaeus, and Linus were twenty-seven years after Phemonoe." But if Orpheus existed in the time of Acrisius, Perseus, and Bacchus, he—and also Musaeus and Linus—certainly lived long before the 50th Olympiad. For Eusebius, in his *Chronicle* at the years 628 and 629, left this writing: "Dionysius, who in Latin is Liber Pater, is born from Semele. Those things which are said concerning Perseus happened at that time." And at the year 672: "Acrisius, the fourteenth king of Argos, in his 31st year." And also at the year 705: "Perseus, after Acrisius was killed not by his own will, migrated from Argos and reigned." Concerning Phemonoe, at the year 650, he records this: "At the Pythian temple, the prophetess Phemonoe is said to have been the first to sing of future things in hexameter verses." Finally, concerning Orpheus at the year 747: "Orpheus the Thracian is held to be famous; his disciple was Musaeus, the son of Eumolpus." But that all these things happened many years before the first Olympiad is most evidently gathered from the same *Chronicle* of Eusebius. And certainly, that same Eusebius is read to have written in another book: "The Greeks desire for Orpheus and Linus after him, then Musaeus, to have flourished around the Trojan times or a little before." But then again, in the *Chronicle* at the year 1240: "From the capture," he says, "of Troy until the first Olympiad are the years of the ages before the Trojan war." What then? Have the copyists or scribes made an error in writing the first place of Clement in Greek, or has the Latin interpreter stumbled in rendering it into Latin? But the Greek text in our manuscript codex is read just as it is in the editions: "Onomacritus... is found around the 50th Olympiad, under the government of the Pisistratids. And Orpheus, who sailed with Hercules, the disciple of Musaeus." But the meaning of these words seems to be this: ^B "Onomacritus... is found in the time of the rule of the Pisistratids, around the 50th Olympiad. But Orpheus, who sailed with Hercules, was—or rather, it must be supplemented, *is found*—the disciple of Musaeus." And if these things are understood in this way, our author will stand beautifully in agreement with himself, and in all those things which he said there will be no discrepancy at all, but a very great agreement. For when Hercules was sailing, then Orpheus is also noted by Eusebius to have flourished. Which indeed can be further confirmed from these words in the preface of the same Eusebius' *Chronicle*: "Moreover, Liber—and the rest, as we shall soon introduce—were after the hundredth year of Cecrops. That is to say, Linus, Zethus, and Amphion, Musaeus, and Orpheus, Minos, Perseus... Hercules, with whom Apollo served Admetus." Nor should you marvel that Orpheus is called the disciple of Musaeus by Clement, just as by Tatian, but on the contrary, his teacher by Eusebius. For we have seen from Suidas that there were different opinions of writers on this matter. There was also an equal disagreement among them concerning the poems of this same Orpheus, which Clement observes are ascribed by others to Onomacritus, and certain other singular things ^C to others. But he offers the testimony of Epigenes, who had said "there is a descent to the underworld and a sacred oration of the Pythagorean Cecrops; and the peplum and physics of Brontinus." Regarding this Cecrops, see Vossius, book IV, *De historicis Graecis*, page 509. Laertius, however, narrates that Brontinus the Crotoniate is said by some to be the father of Theano, but by others to be her husband. And later in the *Life of Alcmaeon*, § 83, he still makes mention of Brontinus. Whether he was one and the same, and truly the one mentioned by Clement, we will gladly hear from others. But we have already spoken often concerning Orpheus in this and the previous book.

*Parmenides*: Clement exhibits7 more [fragments of] his poems, which were also represented by Theodoret, vol. IV, serm. 1, page 476, and serm. 4, page 528. In the former place, however, he is called by him: "Parmenides the Eleatic, who was a companion of Xenophanes the Colophonian"; and he is therefore the one whose *Life* Laertius describes in book IX, *On the Lives and Dogmas of Philosophers*, § 21 et seq., and there he maintains that his philosophy was expressed in verse. We have made mention of this philosopher and poet more than once.

*Pherecrates*: in his *Transfugae* (The Deserters), ^D he is cited once by our author, and by Pollux, book VII, chapter 32, page 361, but much more often by Athenaeus, book II, *Deipnosophistae*, page 90 and 119, book IX, page 385 and 396, and in many other comedies by others. And rightly so, indeed. For according to Suidas: "Pherecrates, an Athenian comic poet, who campaigned with Alexander, published fables," but it would have been better to say "18." For we read that as many were cited by Athenaeus. See Vossius, *De poetis Graecis*, pages 38 and 39.

*Philemon* the comic poet is called upon not once by our author, and by name in the comedy which was inscribed *Hypobolimaeos*. But whether this belonged to the younger or the older comic poet, he is entirely silent. Regarding both, besides Vossius, *De poet. Graec.*, page 58, see Suidas, Athenaeus, Stobaeus, and Pollux, who praised various comedies of Philemon. To all these it may be permitted to add certain verses of his, represented by our Clement concerning the doctrine of Zeno, but cited only under the name of the comic poet. But Laertius exhibits these verses under the name of Philemon the comic poet (but in inverted order, and not without variant readings), and observes that they are attributed by some to Posidippus. Read, if you wish, the observations of Casaubon and Ménage on this place in Laertius. Furthermore, concerning Philemon, in Book I of the *Apparatus*, dissertation 2, chapter 5, § 3, we have annotated something.

*Phocylides*, whose testimony concerning the angels Clement brought forth, is said by Eusebius to have flourished in the 60th Olympiad along with Simonides the lyric poet and Xenophanes the physicist. Nor did Suidas depart far from him, who records these things concerning Phocylides: "Phocylides the Milesian philosopher, a contemporary of Theognis: both, however, were born 647 years after the Trojan war, in the 59th Olympiad. He wrote heroic and elegiac verses, admonitions, or sentences, which they inscribe as chapters; but they are stolen from the Sibylline oracles." But Stobaeus reported more from him. See the animadversions of Scaliger on Eusebius' *Chronicle*, page 95 et seq.

^A Vossius and others recount them. But it is evident from the fact that both connect him with Archilochus that we must understand the one to whom Eusebius gave the first place, regarding Clement. But you will find the poems of Simonides which Clement exhibits in his fragments, vol. III *Poet. Graec.*, page 122 et seq.

PHORONIDIS, the poet, or rather the author, ^A *the poet of the Phoronis*; or, as it is written later, *he who made the Phoronis*, is praised by Clement. Some think the name was given to this poem from Phoroneus, king of the Argives, and they rebuke those who opined that Phoronides was its author. But it does not escape us that Hellanicus in the *Athenian* (is cited) in the second book of the *Phoronis*.

The name of PINDAR and his poems cannot be unknown to anyone. Therefore, concerning those things which have been transcribed by our author, we shall note only this: His first passage, cited in book I of the *Stromateis*, page 294, is read in Theodoret, vol. IV, serm. 2, page 482. The second occurs in the same book, II of the *Stromateis*, page 319, in Athenaeus, book IV of the *Deipnosophistae*, chapter 11, page 912, on which Casaubon’s observations should be read. The third is in book IV, page 544, where he is simply called a lyric poet, again in Theodoret, serm. 8, page 599. The fourth is in book V, page 597, where he is addressed in the same way, in the same Theodoret, serm. 6, page 564, and in Eusebius, book X of the *Praeparatio evangelica*, chapter 13, page 674. There, however, the poems of Pindar described are reduced to metrical form, just as those which our author reported on the following page, where he calls him Pythagorean. ^B In a similar way, the same Eusebius rendered other poems of Pindar, culled by Clement, into metrical form in the same place, page 688. Finally, you will find other verses of the same lyric poet, described by our same author, in his published fragments.

PLATO the comic poet is sometimes simply praised by Clement; but elsewhere he is named in the *Festivals*. However, Laertius in book VIII of the *Deipnosophistae*, page 308, and book IX, page 367, and Stobaeus in lib. VII, chapter 27, page 354, and chapter 23, page 370, and in book X, chapter 7, page 464, and many others elsewhere, have cited this play. Nor is that surprising, for Suidas testifies that twenty-eight were composed by him. Finally, Eusebius in his *Chronicle*, Olympiad LXXX, to the year 1061: "Cratinus, he says, and Plato are held to be famous writers of comedies."

SERAPION, in Greek Σαραπίων, *among the verses*, is cited by Clement. But I would like you to weigh whether he is the Athenian Serapion, poet and physician, a friend of Plutarch, about whom Vossius writes in his book *De poetis Graecis*, page 73.

Our author quotes a poem by SIMMIAS of Rhodes. But see what Suidas has commended to letters under the word Σιμμίας, and Vossius in his book *De poetis Graecis*, pages 59 and 60.

SIMONIDES, says Clement, is reported to have been in the time of Archilochus; but Callinus was not much older. For Archilochus mentions the Magnetes, who had perished. Eusebius in his *Chronicle*, Olympiad XXIX, to the year 1354, conjoined both Simonides and Archilochus with Aristoxenus: ^C «Archilochus, and Simonides, and Aristoxenus, are held to be illustrious.» But regarding Simonides, in Olympiad LV to the year 1458, Simonides is held to be famous. Finally, in Olympiad LXXIII, to the year 1531: «Pindar and Simonides, lyric poets, are held to be illustrious.» Furthermore, from the times so far removed from one another assigned by him, it is easily gathered that he either noted the varied opinions of writers there concerning Simonides, or rather that he made ^D a sermon. And indeed Suidas is called the author of many things; or, as it was written later, *who made the Phoronis*.

The verses of SOLON the Athenian, undoubtedly a most famous legislator, were reported by Clement in book II of the *Stromateis*, page 280; book V, pages 587 and 601; book VI, pages 620, 621, and 685. But besides Laertius and Plutarch, who wrote his *Life*, you may read Meursius in his book *De vita, legibus, etc., Solonis*.

SOPHOCLES is praised again and again by Clement, no less than by Athenaeus, Julius Pollux, and Stobaeus. Indeed, many of his tragedies have appeared in public from the printers' workshops in the past century, and also in vol. II of the *Poetae Graeci*, in the year 1624. It is not surprising, therefore, if this poet is called by Clement in book V, page 606, solely by the name of tragedian.

THEOGNIS of Megara: Clement frequently makes use of his testimony; Stobaeus uses him more frequently, but Athenaeus less so. Eusebius testifies that he flourished in the year 1470, Olympiad LVII, to whose opinion Suidas, who tells more about him, brought his support. You may read the observations of Scaliger on the cited passage of Eusebius. His *Gnomai*, or *Sententiae*, were published in Greek and Latin types more than once, and finally in vol. I of the *Poetae Graeci*, page 604 et seq.

THESPIS is called by Clement and by others the inventor of tragedy, as we have seen. Indeed, he reports some of his words, and Pollux cites his *Pentheus*, and Suidas mentions other comedies.

THRASONIDES the comic poet (these are the words of our Clement) on another scene: "The little maid," he says, "made me her slave." But Laertius makes it testified in book VII in the *Life of Zeno*, § 130: «Thrasonides, even when he had his beloved in his power, abstained from her because she was hateful to him.» Suidas represented these same words under the word "Eros." But although the deed of this man seems entirely contrary to those words of his, that nevertheless does not deep down prevent them from having been able to be those of one and the same Thrasonides. Whether they truly were, we will gladly accept from others.

Clement brought forward the words of the comic poet TIMOCLES, but he was entirely silent as to which of his comedies they are from. From where, therefore, could one divine them? For we learn from Suidas that there were 332 comic poets of this name. But Casaubon, with the passage of Athenaeus restored by him, gathers that one of these two was a comic poet and the other a tragic poet. Yet it is established that only the comic poet is addressed by our author.

Our Clement also brought into the middle many verses of TIMON of Phlius, the last of which are also exhibited by Eusebius, and are said to be taken from his *Silli*. But many things have been observed in the scholia on this passage of Clement concerning this poet. But besides those, he had previously reported the *Silli* of Timon in another book, which indeed, and the things that follow, Laertius presented in book II, § 19, in his *Life of Socrates*. See, if you have leisure and the urge, the animadversions of Menagius and others on this passage of Laertius, and on the *Life* of the same Timon published by him.