Part 44

A book On Prayer, explaining in the first part the Lord’s Prayer; in the second, several ceremonies often used at prayer. An exhortation to Patience, in which the motives are displayed with great eloquence. An exhortation to Martyrdom, than which nothing can be more pathetic.

He wrote a book On Baptism, proving in the first part, its obligation and necessity; in the second, treating on several points of discipline relating to that sacrament.

As to his other works, in his first book to his Wife, written probably before he was priest (see Ceillier, p. 375, and 391), he exhorts her not to marry again, if she should survive him; and mentions several in the Church living in perpetual continency. In the second, he allows second marriages lawful, but if the woman be determined to engage a second time in the married state, insists that it is unlawful to marry an infidel. He alleges the impossibility of rising to prayer at night, giving suitable alms, visiting the martyrs, &c. with a pagan husband: “Can you conceal yourself from him,” says he, “when you make the sign of the cross upon your bed or your body?--Will he not know what you receive in secret, before you take any food?” that is, the eucharist, (l. 2, c. 5.) He concludes with an amiable description of a Christian holy marriage: “The Church,” saith he, “approves the contract, the oblation ratifies it, the blessing is the seal of it, and the angels carry it to the heavenly Father who confirms it. Two bear together the same yoke, and are but one flesh, and one mind: they pray together, fast together, mutually exhort each other, go together to the church, and to the table of the Lord. They conceal nothing from each other, visit the sick, collect alms without restraint, assist at the offices of the Church without interruption, sing psalms and hymns together, and encourage each other to praise God.”

In his treatise On the Shows, he represents them as occasions of idolatry, impurity, vanity, and other vices, and mentions a woman who, going to the theatre, returned back possessed with a devil: when the exorcist reproached the evil spirit for daring to attack one of the faithful, it boldly answered: “I found her in my own house.” In his book On Idolatry, he determines many cases of conscience, relating to idolatry, as that it is not lawful to make idols, &c., but he says, a Christian servant may attend his master to a temple: any friend may assist at an idolater’s marriage, &c. In two books On the Ornaments or Dress of Women, he zealously recommends modesty in attire, and condemns their use of paint. In that On veiling Virgins, he undertakes to prove that young women ought to cover their faces at church, contrary to the custom of his country, where only married women were veiled. In that On the Testimony of the Soul, he proves that there is only one God from the natural testimony of every one’s soul. In his Scorpiace, written against the poison of the Scorpions, that is, Gnostics, especially a branch of those heretics named Cainites, he proves the necessity of martyrdom, which they denied. In his Exhortation to Chastity, he dissuades a certain widow from a second marriage, which he allows to be lawful, though hardly so; and the harshness of his expressions show that he then leaned toward Montanism.

Tertullian was a priest, and continued in the Church till the middle of his life, that is, to forty or upwards, when he miserably fell. Montanus, an eunuch in Phrygia, set up for a prophet, and was wonderfully agitated by an evil spirit, and pretended to raptures in which he lost his senses, and spoke incoherently, not like St. Quadratus and other true prophets. He was joined by Prisca, or Priscilla, and Maximilla, two women of quality, and rich, but of most debauched lives. These had the like pretended raptures, and many were deceived by them. Montanus, about the year 171, pretended that he had received the Holy Ghost to complete the law of the gospel, and was called by his followers the Paraclete. Affecting a severity of doctrine, to which his manners did not correspond, he condemned second marriages, and flight in persecution, and ordered extraordinary fasts. The Montanists said that, beside the fast of Lent observed by the Catholics, there were other fasts imposed by the Divine Spirit. They kept three Lents in the year, each of two weeks, and upon dry meats, as necessary injunctions of the Spirit by the new revelations made to Montanus, which they preferred to the writings of the apostles; and they said these laws were to be observed for ever. (See Tert. de Jejun. c. 15, also St. Jerom, ep. 54, ad Marcellam, et in Aggæ, c. 1), which is the reason why the Montanists, even in the time of Sozomen, kept their Antepaschal fast confined to two weeks, which the Catholics at that time certainly observed of forty days. For, as bishop Hooper (of Lent, p. 65), remarks, those great fasters would hardly have been left behind, had they not been restrained by the pretended institution of the Spirit, to which they punctually kept; and this circumstance rendered these facts superstitious. Pepuzium, a town in Phrygia, was the metropolis of these heretics, who called it Jerusalem. The bishops of Asia having examined their prophecies and errors, condemned them. It is said, that Montanus and Maximilla going mad, hanged themselves. See Eusebius.

Tertullian’s harsh, severe disposition fell in with this rigidness. His vehement temper was for no medium in any thing; and failing first by pride, he resented some affronts which he imagined he had received from the clergy of Rome, as Saint Jerom testifies; and in this passion deserted the Church, forgetting the maxims by which he had confuted all heresies. Solomon’s fall did not prejudice his former inspired writings. Nor does the misfortune of Tertullian destroy at least the justness of the reasoning in what he had written in defence of the truth, any more than if a man lost his senses, this unlucky accident could annul what he had formerly done for the advancement of learning.

Tertullian is the most ancient of all ecclesiastical writers among the Latins. St. Vincent of Lerins, who is far from shading the blemishes of this great man, says, “He was among the Latins what Origen was among the Greeks--that is, the first man of his age. Every word seems a sentence, and almost every sentence a new victory. Yet with all these advantages, he did not continue in the ancient and universal faith. His error, as the blessed confessor Hilary observes, has taken away that authority from his writings which they would have otherwise deserved.” St. Jerom in his book against Helvidius, when his authority was objected, coolly answered, “That he is not of the Church,” “Ecclesiæ hominem non esse.” Yet he sometimes speaks advantageously of his learning. Lactantius calls his style uncouth, rugged, and dark, but admires his depth of sense; and he who breaks the shell will not repent his pains for the kernel. Balsac ingeniously compares his eloquence to ebony, which is bright and pleasing in its black light. The great master of eloquence, St. Cyprian, found such hidden stores under his dark language, that he is reported never to have passed a day without reading him; and when he called for his book, he used to say, “Give me my master.”

We find this once great man, who expressed in his Apologetic (cap. 39) the most just and fearful apprehension of excommunication, which he there called, The anticipation of the future judgment, afterward proud, arrogant, and at open defiance with the censures of the Church. And this great genius seems even to lose common sense when he writes in favor of his errors and enthusiasm, as when, upon the authority of the dreams of Priscilla and Maximilla, he seriously disputes on the shape and color of a human soul, &c. He lived to a very advanced age, and leaving the Montanists, became the author of a new sect called from him Tertullianists, who had a church at Carthage till St. Austin’s time, when they were all reconciled to the Catholic faith. Tertullian died towards the year 245.

The works which he wrote after his fall are, a book On the Soul, pretending it to have a human figure, &c. Another On the Flesh of Christ, proving that he took upon him human flesh in reality, not in appearance only. One on the Resurrection of the Flesh, proving that great mystery. Five books Against Marcion, who maintained that there were two principles or gods, the one good the other evil; that the latter was worshipped by the Jews, and was author of their law; but that the good god sent Christ to destroy his works. Against this heresiarch, Tertullian proves the unity of God, and the sanctity of the Old Law and Testament. In his book Against Praxeas he proves excellently the Trinity of Persons, and uses the very word Trinity (c. 2), but he impiously condemns Praxeas, because coming from the East to Rome he had informed pope Victor of the errors and hypocrisy of Montanus; on which account he says, he had banished the Paraclete (Montanus) and crucified the Father. “Paracletum fugavit, Patrem crucifixit,” (c. 1.) For Praxeas, puffed up with the title of confessor, broached the heresy of the Patripassians, confounding the three Persons, and pretending that the Father in the Son became man, and was crucified for us. His apology for the Philosophers’ Cloak, which he continued to wear rather than the Toga, for its conveniency, and as an emblem of a severer life, seems only writ to display his wit. His apology to Scapula, proconsul of Africa in 211, is an exhortation to put a stop to the persecution, alleging that “a Christian is no man’s enemy, much less the emperor’s.” In his book On Monogamy he maintains against the Psychici (so he calls the Catholics) that second marriages are unlawful, which was one point of his heresy. One of his arguments is, the duty of a widow always to pray for the soul of her deceased husband. (c. 10.)

He writ his book on Fasts, to defend the extraordinary fasts commanded by the Montanists; but shows that certain obligatory fasts were observed by the Catholics, as that before Easter, since called Lent, in which they fasted every day till vespers or evening-service: that those of Wednesday and Friday till three o’clock, called stations, were devotional. Some added to these Xerophagia or the use only of dried meats, abstaining from all vinous and juicy fruits; and some confined themselves to bread and water. The Montanists kept three Lents a year, and other fasts always till night, and with the Xerophagia.

Tertullian wrote also his book On Chastity, against the Catholics, because they gave absolution to penitents who had been guilty of adultery or fornication. For the Montanists denied that the Church could pardon sins of impurity, murder, or idolatry. In this book he mentions twice, that on the sacred chalices was painted the image of the good shepherd bringing home the lost sheep on his shoulders. Scoffing at a decree made by the bishop of Rome at that time, he writes, “I am informed that they have made a decree, and even a peremptory one; the chief priest, that is, the bishop of bishops, saith; I remit the sins of adultery and fornication to those who have done penance.” (c. 1.) He calls him apostolic bishop, c. 19, and blessed pope, c. 13, ib. His book On the Crown was written in 235, the first year of Maximinus, to defend the action of a Christian soldier who refused to put on his head a garland, like the rest, when he went to receive a donative. Tertullian says these garlands were reputed sacred to some false god or other. He alleges that by tradition alone we practise many things, as the ceremonies used at baptism, yearly oblations (or sacrifices) for the dead, and for the festivals of martyrs, standing at prayer on the Lord’s day, and from Easter to Whitsuntide, and the sign of the cross “which we make,” says he, “upon our foreheads at every action, and in all our motions at coming in or going out of doors, in dressing or bathing ourselves; when we are at table or in bed; when we sit down or light a lamp, or whatever else we do.” (De Corona, c. 3 and 4.) His book On Flight, was written about the same time to pretend to prove against the Catholics that it is a crime to fly in time of persecution.

The most correct edition of Tertullian’s works is that of Rigaltius, even that of Pamelius being ill pointed, and abounding with faults; though Rigaltius’s notes on this and some other fathers want much amendment.

[191] Tert. l. ad Scapul. c. 3.

[192] L. 7, Ep. 8.

[193] Euchar.

[194] Ennod. l. 8, Ep. 24, ad Faust.

[195] Magisteriani were officers under the Magister Officiorum, who held one of the first dignities in the imperial court, and had a superintendency over the Palatines, inferior officers of the court, the schools or academies of the court, and certain governors. See Du Cange, Glossar.

[196] This ceremony was much more ancient. Alcuin and Amalarius ascribe its institution to pope Zosimus; but others make it of older date. At Rome the archdeacon on Holy Saturday blessed wax mingled with oil, particles of which having a figure of a lamb formed upon them were distributed among the people. Hence was derived the custom of Agnus Deis made of wax sometimes mixed with relics of martyrs, which the popes blessed in a solemn manner. See Saint Gregory of Tours, de Vit. Patr. c. 8. The Rom. Order, Alcuin, Sirmond, Not. In Ennod., &c.

[197] That a pretended woman called Joan interrupted the series of the succession between Leo IV. and Bennet III., is a most notorious forgery. Lupus Ferrariensis, ep. 103, to Bennet III. Ado in his Chronicle, Rhegino in his Chronicle, the annals of St. Bertin, Hincmar ep. 26, pope Nicholas I. the successor of Bennet III. ep. 46, even the calumniators of the holy see, Photius l. De Process. Spir. Sti. and Metrophanes of Smyrna, l. de Divinitate Spiritus Sancti, who all lived at that very time, expressly testify, that Bennet III. succeeded immediately Leo IV. Whence Blondel, a violent Calvinist, has by an express dissertation demonstrated the falsity of this fable. Marianus Scotus, at Mentz, wrote two hundred years after, in 1083, a chronicle in which mention is first made of this fiction; from whence it was inserted in the chronicle of Martinus Polonus, a Dominican, in 1277, though it is wanting in the true MS. copy kept in the Vatican library, as Leo Allatius assures us, and in other old MS. copies, as Burnet (Nouvelles de la Rep. des Lettres, Mars, 1687), Casleu (Catal. Bibl. reg. Londin, p. 102), &c., testify. Lambecius, the most learned keeper of the imperial library at Vienna, in his excellent catalogue of that library, vol. ii. p. 860, has demonstrated this of the oldest and best manuscript copies of this chronicle; also of Marianus Scotus. Her name was foisted into Sigebert’s Chronicle, written in 1112; for it is not found in the original MS. copy at Gemblours, authentically published by Miræus. Platina, and the other late copies of Martinus Polonus and Sigebert, borrow it from the first forger in the copy of Marianus Scotus, probably falsified; certainly of no authority and inconsistent; for there it is said that she sat two years five months, and that she had studied at Athens, where no schools remained long before this time.

As to the porphyry stool shown in a repository belonging to the Lateran church, which is said to have been made use of on account of this fable, it is an idle dream. There were two such stools; one is now shown to travellers. It is certainly of old Roman antiquity, finely polished, and might perhaps be used at the baths or at some superstitious ceremonies. The art of cutting or working in porphyry marble was certainly lost long before the ninth age, and not restored before the time of Cosmus the Great of Medicis; this work is still exceeding slow and expensive. On this idle fable see Lambecius, Blondel, Leo Allatius, Nat. Alexander, Boerhave, &c.

[198] The emperor Adrian, nobly born at Italica, near Seville, in Spain, was cousin-german to Trajan; and having been adopted by him, upon his death ascended the imperial throne in 117. He was extremely inquisitive, and fond of whatever was surprising or singular, well skilled in all curious arts, mathematics, judiciary astrology, physic, and music. But this, says Lord Bacon, was an error in his mind, that he desired to comprehend all things, yet neglected the most useful branches of knowledge. He was light and fickle; and so monstrous was his vanity, that he caused all to be slain who pretended in any art or science to rival him; and it was accounted great prudence in a certain person that he would not dispute his best with him, alleging afterward that it was reasonable to yield to him who commanded thirty legions. The beginning of this prince’s reign was bloody; yet he is commended in it for two things: the first is mentioned by Spartian, that when he came to the empire he laid aside all former enmities, and forgot past injuries: insomuch that, being made emperor, he said to one who had been his capital enemy: “Thou hast now escaped.” The other is, that, when a woman cried to him as he was passing by: “Hear me, Cæsar;” and he answered, “I have not leisure.” The woman replied: “Then cease to reign.” “Noli ergo imperare.” Whereupon he stopped and heard her complaint.

[199] St. Paulin. ep. 11. ad Sever.

[200] St. Hieron. ep. 13. ad Paul.

[201] Adrian became more cruel than ever towards the end of his life, and without any just cause put to death several persons of distinction. At last he fell sick of a dropsy at his house at Tibur. Finding that no medicines gave him any relief, he grew most impatient and fretful under his lingering illness, and wished for death, often asking for poison or a sword, which no one would give him, though he offered them money and impunity. His physician slew himself that he might not be compelled to give him poison. A slave named Mastor, a barbarian noted for his strength and boldness, whom the emperor had employed in hunting, was, partly by threats, partly by promises, prevailed upon to undertake it; but instead of complying, was seized with fear, and durst not strike him, and fled. The unhappy tyrant lamented day and night, that death refused to obey and deliver him who had caused the death of so many others. He at length hastened his death by eating and drinking things contrary to his health in his distemper, and expired with these words in his month, “The multitude of physicians hath killed the emperor.” “Turba medicorum Cæsarem perdidit.” (See Dio et Spartian in Adr.) He died in 138, being sixty-two years old, and having reigned twenty-one years.

[202] _A sette Frate_, in the villa of Mafiei, nine miles from Rome. See Aringhi, Roma Subter. l. 3, c. 14.

[203] Ado, Usuard; Mart. Rom. cum notis Baronii et Lubin.

[204] The best editions of St. Philastrius’s book De Hæresibus, are that printed in Hamburg in 1721, by the care of Fabricius, who has illustrated it with notes; and that procured by Cardinal Quirini at Brescia in 1738 together with the works of St. Gaudentius.

[205] St. Aug. Pref. l. de hæres.

[206] Utrecht was an archbishopric in the time of St. Willibrord, but from his death remained a bishopric subject first to Mentz, afterward to Cologne, till, in the reign of Philip II. Paul IV. in 1559, restored the archbishoprics of Utrecht and Cambray, and erected Mechlin a third with the dignity of primate. To Utrecht he subjected the new bishoprics of Haerlem, Middleburg, Deventer, Lewarden, and Groeningen; to Mechlin, those of Antwerp, Ghent, Bruges, Ipres, Bois-le-Duc and Ruremond; to Cambray, those of Arras and Tournay, with two new ones, St. Omer and Namur.

[207] He also gave him Austrasia, great part of which from that age has been called Lorrain, either from this Lothaire or rather his younger son of the same name, whom he left king of that country.