Epigrams 5

On the deeds of Liberius in exile. § I. Contemporary writers on the deeds of Liberius in exile are brought forward, whom alone the author proposed to himself as future judges in this celebrated controversy. I had resolved with myself, although an occasion had offered itself, not to enter upon any discourse concerning these matters, because they seemed to lie outside my plan, and lest it be said that a wheel so often turned was being turned again by me with useless labour.

But afterward I changed my plan, because I had seen, first, that the heresy of Liberius was being chanted over again ad nauseam by the Jansenists in years past against the Catholics; then, that there had lately been a writer of history of our party who held it as a thing beyond doubt; and finally, because by reading and reflecting I had observed that this question, owing to the lack of monuments, is treated by men otherwise most learned—while each one serves his preconceived opinion—not so much as to be explained, but rather to be made more tangled and more obscure. I therefore let myself be carried along with those many who have handled this controversy; but, lest I weary my readers too much, I have undertaken to throw light on it from contemporary writers only, whose works survive:

whether, however, this has succeeded according to my wish, let those men judge. To begin with, that Pope Liberius, placed in exile, accepted the Sirmian faith, no one will doubt who reads his letter to the Orientals: for I am not the man who would dare, against the resistance of so many ages, to demand it false and reject it utterly among the fabrications of the Arians. But whether Liberius in that passage expresses a will put forth merely in words, or rather one already confirmed by some subscription of his own; and likewise what that Sirmian faith is of which he speaks, I shall say afterward. For now let it suffice to have briefly noted that the Sirmian faith is threefold, as threefold is the formula or exposition which was hammered out and promulgated in that city;

the first, namely, when Photinus was condemned by the Orientals and driven from the Sirmian episcopate and from the city itself; the second, which was drawn up by Ursacius, Valens, and Germinius at a later time, and was called also—though undeservedly—the blasphemy of Hosius and of Potamius; the third, finally, which was dictated by Marcus of Arethusa on the 21st of July in the consulship of Hypatius and Eusebius, that is, in the year 359, and which for that very reason—namely on account of the day and the consuls appended—is received with laughter by Athanasius in his book On the Synods.

When therefore we inquire which of those three expositions of the faith he accepted, and to which of them the pontiff Liberius afterward subscribed, if we consult the Fathers of this age who treat of this matter—Athanasius, Hilary, Jerome—since these clearly designate none of those formulas, they leave us uncertain. For Athanasius, in his History of the Arians addressed to the Monks, or the Letter to the Solitaries, writes thus: Moreover Liberius, having been made an exile, was at last after two years broken; and, terrified by threats of death, he subscribed. Then, to clear him, he straightway adds these words:

But by that very fact there is proved both the violence of those men and the hatred of Liberius for that heresy, and his vote in favour of Athanasius, so long, that is, as he was permitted to act freely and by his own judgment: for the things that are extorted by the force of torments are the decisions not of those who do not shrink back, but of those who are being harassed. Jerome touched on the deed in two places, namely in the Chronicle and in the book On Ecclesiastical Writers; and first he says this: When Liberius had been thrust into exile for the faith, all the Roman clergy swore that they would receive no other;

but when Felix had been substituted into the priesthood by the Arians, very many broke their oath, and after a year were cast out together with Felix, because Liberius, overcome by the tedium of exile and subscribing to the heretical depravity, entered Rome as though a victor. In the latter place: He asserts that Fortunatianus of Aquileia is held detestable, because he was the first to solicit Liberius, bishop of the city of Rome, as he was going into exile for the faith, and broke him, and compelled him to the subscription of heresy. Hilary too records the lapse of Liberius twice: first against Constantius, where he says this: You then turned your war as far as Rome, you snatched the bishop from there; and—O wretched you!

who I know not whether you sent into banishment with greater impiety than you recalled him. Then afterward in the Fragments, in the passage where he calls this Roman pontiff—who wrote that he had accepted the Sirmian faith—an apostate, and consigns him to anathema, I do not now bring forward the words, which are to be recited by me below in a more fitting place. If, therefore, Liberius is said to have subscribed to heresy, he can seem to have subscribed only to the second Sirmian formula; for the former, which had been promulgated in the council convened against Photinus, seemed to Hilary himself catholic and holy in his book On the Synods: and this is the one reason on account of which—to pass over the heterodox—some of our own people have gone over into this opinion.

§ II.—Hilary's testimonies are examined at length, to establish the Sirmian faith accepted by Liberius. That no synod of the Arians could have been held in the city of Sirmium in the year 349, contrary to what some suppose. For the rest, that the Sirmian faith which Liberius accepted is none other than that which had been promulgated by the council against Photinus, Hilary himself manifestly proves—Hilary, whom for that reason I marvel has hitherto been read with too little attention. He treats at greater length of this Sirmian council of the Arians, and of the twofold cause for convening it which the Orientals had set before themselves:

the first, namely, that on that occasion, given the matter of Photinus, they might overturn the decrees of the catholic Synod of Sardica, which had pronounced Marcellus—the teacher of Photinus—and Athanasius innocent; the second, and graver, that under the pretext of the Photinian heresy they might promulgate a new exposition of the faith, by which through secret mines they might destroy the Nicene dogma. He then recites that exposition, and calls it fraudulent, heretical, and pregnant with inner poison under flattering words, and so contrived that by one and the same context it would cast out Photinus, arraign Athanasius as guilty, and overthrow the Nicene faith. He compares it also with the Nicene faith, that by this very thing he may demonstrate the falsity of the other, and says this:

For that which was ordained at Nicaea is full and perfect, and—with all the approaches observed by which heretics are wont to creep in—is bound together by the inviolable solidity of the eternal unity between the Father and the Son; but this one flatters by its simplicity, first asserting that we so believe—which God forbid of anyone: yet the faith of the Westerns, established by the Gospel teachings, confesses the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father, the Father unbegotten, the Son eternal by the substance of eternity—that is, just as the Father is always, so also the Son is always in the Father, and was born of God, and is always in him from whom he is:

but this PERFIDY—not faith—saying God from God, and commending the firstborn, and instituting the name of the Trinity, conceals its venom under the modesty of a religious moderation. After this he comes to Athanasius, and praises him as the author and most vigorous defender of that same Nicene faith, and on that account proves him harassed by the Arians with false accusations, but absolved by the Synod of Sardica, producing the letters of that same synod and several letters written by Liberius before his exile.

But he grieves that this man at last made void, while placed in exile, all those things which before his exile he had either done or promised; and to prove this, he recites that letter to the Orientals, and another written by him to Ursacius and Valens. The words, therefore, of his letter to the Orientals, and the words of Hilary appended to it, are now to be recited by me, which settle the matter. Liberius says, then: that you may know that I speak with true faith—the Lord, and my brother in common Demophilus, who deigned of his benevolence to expound your faith, the catholic faith, which was discussed, expounded, and accepted at Sirmium by very many of our brethren and fellow-bishops. To this Hilary at once notes thus: This is the Arian perfidy.

The Sirmian faith, therefore, which Liberius had accepted, Hilary, as you see, calls a perfidy; but what perfidy is here to Hilary is the one Sirmian faith against Photinus, as we have seen; for this he execrates, this he compares with the Nicene, this very one he reproaches to Liberius; this therefore Liberius had accepted, with Hilary as witness. To this, then, he gave no heed at all who first brought Hilary's fragments into the light, the most learned man Nicolaus Faber, and any others there are who think that by those words of Hilary the second Sirmian formula is expressed: but could he have designated here that one, of which neither when he wrote these things, nor in the whole work of the fragments, did he ever seem either to treat or even to think?

But neither do they, as it seems to me, take the best way of extricating that pontiff from heresy, who hold those interjected annotations of Hilary as adventitious, spurious, and inserted by another hand; since, when those annotations lead us as though by the hand to the Sirmian faith which this pontiff had accepted, they would rather seem to make the case against him. But why the same Hilary here calls the Sirmian faith against Photinus—which in his book On the Synods he judged catholic—an Arian perfidy, I shall say elsewhere; for now I proceed to confirm this matter by other arguments. § III.—Likewise Hilary's testimonies are extended, to establish the faith accepted by Liberius.

From the same letter, therefore, we understand that that faith was, moreover, discussed and expounded by very many brethren and fellow-bishops. This very thing Hilary confirms, enumerating two-and-twenty bishops present at the drawing up of it. But the PERFIDY described at Sirmium, which Liberius calls catholic as expounded to him by Demophilus, these are they who composed it: Narcissus, Theodorus, Basilius, Eudoxius, Demophilus, Cecropius, Silvanus, Ursacius, Valens, Evagrius, Hyrenius, Exuperantius, Terentianus, Bassus, Gaudentius, Macedonius, Marcus, Aetius, Julius, Severinus, Simplicius, and Junior—all heretics. The manuscript

codices recorded by Baronius indicate that others too were present; but the second Sirmian formula, it is established, was composed by three bishops only—namely Ursacius, Valens, and Germinius; and if it please to add Potamius and Hosius, by five at most. Hilary assuredly everywhere expresses those only, and never more; this very thing he indicates besides by that same formula in these words: When some dispute was thought to exist concerning the faith, all things were diligently treated and discussed at Sirmium, in the presence of our most holy brethren and fellow-bishops Valens, Ursacius, and Germinius. This one, therefore, Hilary neither expresses in that passage, nor could he have execrated it as accepted by Liberius, but the other one.

Then, if you observe rightly, Hilary says that neither Hosius, nor Potamius, nor Germinius was present at the drawing up of the faith which Liberius had accepted. But why would he have passed them over in silence, if in that passage he were attacking the second Sirmian formula, which elsewhere he says was composed by them? It must therefore be that he then designated another, namely the Sirmian faith issued against Photinus, at which none of these was present: whereas at the drawing up of the perfidy of that Sirmian faith which Liberius had accepted, the same Hilary asserts that Theodorus, Basilius, and Eudoxius were present; but, if you understand these things of the second Sirmian formula, they are utterly false; since the first had already died, and the other two were far away:

these things stand clearly established from Theodoret, Sozomen, and Epiphanius, whom the reader will himself be able to consult, and besides from Petavius in his dissertations on the Sirmian synod against Photinus. This same thing might perhaps be affirmed of Narcissus and Cecropius: for we read this latter among those whom Georgius of Laodicea, by his letter, was rousing to come maturely to the aid of the faith, perishing by the fraud of Eudoxius and Aetius; the former, however, was leading a tranquil life in his own see, when by the efforts of Basil of Ancyra and by the emperor's command he learned that those heretics had been driven from Antioch.

That faith, finally, which the pontiff had approved and Hilary calls a perfidy, had been composed by the Orientals, who had come to Sirmium under the appearance of casting down Photinus, but in reality that they might again drive Athanasius from his see and overthrow the Nicene faith. But the second Sirmian formula owes its origin to the Westerns alone: hence Eudoxius, as soon as he learned that it had been approved by Hosius, gave thanks to Ursacius and Valens, because by their ministry the Westerns had begun to think rightly. This one, therefore, Hilary neither expresses in those words, nor can he seem to have had in mind.

One thing I see which might perhaps be objected: namely that, besides the one which deposed Photinus and expelled him from his see, there was another Sirmian synod gathered in the year 349, recorded by Petavius and by Constantius—though to Petavius it is of the Western Catholics, while to Constantius and to the recent writer of the History of ecclesiastical authors it is of the Eastern Arians. That this decree concerning the faith, therefore, which Hilary recites expressed in these words, belongs to it: For we profess thus—that there is one unbegotten God the Father, and one only Son of his, God from God, light from light, firstborn of all creation; and adding thirdly the Holy Spirit.

Accordingly [I hold] that the creed which Liberius accepted was drawn up by this synod, and by those bishops whom he names. Indeed, as concerns this Council of Sirmium, Petavius has great adversaries; but whatever may be the case in this dispute—which I do not make my own—what I confidently assert is this: that no council of the Eastern Arians can be seen to have been convened at Sirmium in that year, and before the death of Constans.

But would that emperor, in the city of his own empire and almost before his very eyes, ever have allowed a synod to be convened by which the Nicene faith—of which he had ever been steadfastly tenacious—should be overthrown, and Athanasius, dear to him and rightly taken under his protection, should once more be driven from his see, and that by bishops set under the dominion of Constantius, whose frauds, moreover, and mind alienated from himself he knew? Is this consonant with the polity of those times, whether civil or even ecclesiastical? But indeed those words which Hilary recites you would seek in vain in the Synod of Sirmium, by which Photinus was utterly overthrown and cast down. This, however, I deny:

since, if you attend closely, you will say that Hilary rather copied out the opinions in summary than wished to report the very words, of which nevertheless he retains some part. Furthermore, that there could have been no council of the Eastern Arians at Sirmium, and of that year, Athanasius and Hilary prove most plainly. The former relates, in his History of the Arians addressed to the Monks, of that supreme peace and concord which had received and embraced the whole Church, when he had been restored to his see. But then, as to why that peace was broken, and those most grievous troubles, which thereafter afflicted it, arose again, he brings forward this cause:

When they heard and beheld these things—the successors of the Eusebian opinion and heresy, Leontius, Georgius, Acacius, Theodorus, Narcissus, who in the Synod (of Sardica) had been deposed and stripped of office—they were suffused with great shame. Then, when they saw so great a consensus of minds with Athanasius, and that peace was being fostered, they were anxious with fear and envy, both because so many bishops cherished communion with Athanasius, and because they dreaded lest those whom they themselves had deceived should fall away from them and join themselves to this unanimity and communion, and lest—what seemed about to happen—a triumph should be celebrated everywhere over their notorious heresy.

He writes therefore that they all together approached Constantius, and—as he was hastening against Magnentius—once more inflamed him with wrath against Athanasius, and this was the beginning of all the evils that followed thereafter. But Hilary asserts that, in order to carry into effect the plans they had then been agitating, those men—hot of mind, subtle of wit, stubborn in soldiery—met at Sirmium and sought an occasion of reopening the judgment which had been dissolved by the acquittal of Athanasius, writing that, by a new case against Photinus, the question concerning Athanasius himself—now dead through lapse of time and buried together with the verdict of truth—might be stirred up into public remembrance.

Moreover he says that they then composed that creed, of which I have cited a few words, which he calls heretical, fraudulent, suffused with inner poison beneath flattering words, and finally PERFIDY, so that, when the unwariness of readers and the simplicity of the unlearned had been caught off guard by such soft beginnings, by one and the same assent of an elicited subscription there might be a passage to the censure of Photinus, to the indictment of Athanasius, and to the condemnation of the catholic faith. This, then, was the aim of this Council of Sirmium against Photinus. And this matter was transacted when Athanasius had already been restored to his see, and Constans had been destroyed by the treachery of Magnentius:

If therefore Athanasius could scarcely return to Alexandria at the end of the year 349, as eminent men reckon, and as the illustrious Father Thomas Mamachi, theologian of the Casanata, recently demonstrated most fully in his On the Reckoning of the Athanasian Chronology, Letters 1 and 3; if the emperor Constans perished at the beginning of January, in the consulship of Sergius and Nigrinianus; if by one and the same Council of Sirmium this was effected, that by a single subscription all might proceed to the censure of Photinus, to the indictment of Athanasius (then peaceably governing in his own Church), and to the condemnation of the Nicene faith—then it is necessary that you seek another time and year, one truly suited to those proceedings, than the one which has seemed right to those learned men.

§ IV.—It treats of the heresy of Demophilus, bishop of Beroea in Thrace, and it is proved that he was perpetually a Semi-Arian, and a most bitter adversary of the Arians: was he present at the Council of Ariminum? Lastly Liberius asserts that the Sirmian creed which he had accepted had previously been set forth to him by Demophilus; that this may not seem strange, Hilary explains, who writes that the Westerners, except for the one Nicene creed, by God's great favor were ignorant of all the other written creeds. It must therefore now be inquired whether Demophilus was an Arian or a Semi-Arian, when Liberius was in exile at Beroea, and which heresy he professed both at that time and also thereafter.

We read therefore that he, together with Eudoxius, Martyrius, and Macedonius, brought the Macrostich formula to the Westerners, and went out from the Council of Milan with angry minds together with his associates, because they had refused to condemn the heretical opinion of Arius. But if those who brought that formula sincerely professed it, they could at least seem orthodox in appearance; since they held those who say that the Son is from that which was not, or from another substance, and not from God, or that there was a time or an age when He did not exist, as strangers to the holy and catholic Church.

Philostorgius writes that Eudoxius at least passed over from the opinion of the Arians to those who asserted the homoeousion ('like in substance'), after reading the books of Asterius, and was finally recalled to the Anomoeans. Moreover, they all were present at the Council of Sirmium against Photinus, and they all therefore professed one faith—if they did not assert one thing with their voice while retaining another opinion in their mind. From the time of that same council down to the second Sirmian formula, we know that no other opinion at least was openly introduced among the heretics: that blasphemy came forth, as I think, in the first months of the year 358, through Ursacius, Valens, and Germinius;

but that Demophilus himself ever joined himself to them we nowhere read, whether when it was composed, or when it was afterwards augmented by the number and consent of some other bishops. On account of the troubles that then arose, in the following year the Synod of Ariminum was convened; at this, if we believe Socrates and Sozomen, Demophilus was present with Ursacius, Valens, Germinius, and Caius, and when they proposed in the assembly of the Fathers the third Sirmian formula he both lent them support and on that account was condemned with his associates by anathema.

Socrates and Sozomen drew these things from Athanasius, that great and most holy prelate—whom, however, I fear his memory may have failed in his book On the Synods, as it failed him in his Letter to the Africans, where he reckons Eudoxius too among those who had been present at the Synod of Ariminum and were deposed; for the bishop of Beroea, who was counted among the Easterners, could neither have been present at that council nor moreover have been deposed, since Constantius had haughtily forbidden the Westerners assembled at Ariminum to decree anything at all against the Eastern bishops;

and this is the reason why the surviving acts of that council, and the synodical letters—whose authority is to be held in higher esteem—mention only Ursacius, Valens, Germinius, Caius, and Auxentius as the Arians then present at the synod, and list them among the deposed, but nowhere name Demophilus; for how could they have mentioned one absent and placed far from that place? To these same acts authority accrues from the testimony of Hilary, who in his treatise against Auxentius numbers them all among the heirs of the spirit of Arius, but passes over this man in silence; and him too the presbyters Marcellinus and Faustinus omit, when they enumerate the other Arians who were present at that same Council of Ariminum.

And what, moreover, of the fact that those ten bishops who had been sent as legates to the Emperor when the synod was finished, and afterwards prevaricated at Nicaea in Thrace—when they rescinded the earlier acts of the council and by name restored communion to Ursacius, Valens, Germinius, and Caius—passed over this same Demophilus in deep silence? Had he indeed sinned more gravely, so that he was deemed unworthy of any pardon at all in the eyes of those ignorant bishops? Let it therefore be certain and settled that Demophilus was not present at the Council of Ariminum. Yet one might ask here why there is no mention of him even in the Synod of Seleucia, at which the emperor had ordered all the Easterners to be present. Or did he perhaps prefer to stay away from those troubles?

Or was he rather among those one hundred and five Homoeousians mentioned by Hilary, but shunning quarrels? Either could easily have been the case, since Basil the Great writes that he was so disposed in mind: 'Constantinople has long had Demophilus, and concerning him indeed a certain semblance of right faith and piety is proclaimed by all who come, with the highest consensus; so much so that even the dissenting parties of the city have coalesced into one, and some of the neighboring bishops have embraced union with him.' But why do we use arguments not necessary in a matter that is manifest?

For what the opinion of Demophilus was, we understand from a certain fragment which Philostorgius took from his commentaries, and which Suidas preserved and transmitted to us. He says therefore: 'The Son was begotten by the will of the Father alone, without time and without intermediary, so that He may be the minister and servant of the Father's commands'—namely, in the ministry of the dispensation and of redemption, as he seems to explain by the words that follow:

for if you compare these with the lengthy Antiochene formula, or with the Synod of Sirmium against Photinus, you will see one and the same opinion expressed in both: namely that the Son was begotten by the will of the Father alone, without time, without intermediary, so that He might obey the Father and be His minister, while the Father is Father not by substance only but also by authority—which authority, moreover, Hilary so explained that he detracted nothing from equality, because the subjection of piety is not a diminution of essence, nor did the duty of religion make the nature degenerate.

Hence the same Philostorgius carps at Demophilus himself—as he is wont to do at all who are foreign to his own sect—because he flowed muddily, because he confounded and mixed up all dogmas, and especially the ecclesiastical ones, and finally because, being most gravely hostile to the Eunomians, he afflicted them with the gravest evils. But this testimony, since it is most plain and decisive, no one would justly doubt that Demophilus was perpetually a Semi-Arian, and that moreover he set forth to Liberius in exile that faith which he sincerely professed. § V.—In what year and month may the Sirmian blasphemy seem to have been composed and sent into Gaul? Various opinions on this matter: Hilary is adduced and explained, and by his testimony the controversy is settled.

This too I have set before myself, to investigate more diligently in what year and time this Sirmian blasphemy may seem to have been written, and what afterward was its outcome and fruit; for by these things it will also come about that some light may be added to the history of those times. Most therefore hold that it was thrust into the light in the year 357 by evil arts; but there is hardly anyone who offers any reason for his opinion, except Peter Coustant, who uses the authority of Hilary, who writes thus to the Gallican bishops who had condemned it: 'For you have conquered, Brethren, with immense rejoicing of faith, and the honor of your unharmed conscience held a twofold glory—namely, of the integrity of conscience and of the authority of example.'

'For the imperturbable fame of your faith has, though late, now moved certain of the Eastern bishops to some shame for the heresy they had nourished, and having heard those things which had been most impiously composed at Sirmium, they contradicted the audacity of the irreligious by certain decrees.' The decrees which Hilary mentions are those which the Synod of Ancyra had promulgated. Hence the same Coustant says:

From Hilary's words there must intervene between this synod—the Gallican, namely—and the Ancyran such a lapse of time that the formula of the latter could conveniently be carried into Gaul, then a synod of the Gallican bishops be convened, its decrees be conveyed into Asia to Hilary, and from Hilary to the Easterners, who, stirred by the example of the Gauls, convened the Synod of Ancyra. Yet Coustant is not the only one who confers this glory upon the Gallican bishops, since Tillemont so understands Hilary as to hold that the Eastern bishops convened that Synod of Ancyra after they had learned that the blasphemy had been proscribed in Gaul.

Furthermore, that the Gallican bishops of those times were truly most holy and most learned, and granted by God to guard the faith, no one would deny; I too gladly concede that there were many in this same age—and that there are even now, by the favor of God Most Good and Great—who, as sons and heirs of such great Fathers, have increased their glory; but perhaps the meaning of Hilary in this passage is not what Tillemont and Coustant suppose; for he does not praise the Gallican bishops because, in recalling and condemning this Sirmian formula, they were by their example the instigators to the Easterners—for, as I shall presently say, from Hilary himself it is established that this was false:

but he praises them because, by the fame of their perpetually preserved right faith, they had brought it about that the Easterners were at length ashamed of the heresy they had nourished: which constant fame, as it could easily long before be spread through the East and carried to the bishops of those provinces, so also it ought long before to have moved those very men to shame for the heresy they had nourished—which shame, however, they made public only when, seizing the occasion of the Eudoxian blasphemy, by issuing the Ancyran definitions, they were seen to put from themselves the infamy of the heresy as something alien. Hence it comes about that the reason on account of which Coustant assigned it to the year 357, not yet advanced, may seem not sufficiently solid.

But those who think it was composed in the year 358 rely chiefly on this foundation: that Constantius, who was present at its composition, although he departed from Rome at the end of May in the year 357 in order to hasten into Illyricum, nevertheless seems neither to have left Italy nor to have reached Sirmium before the last days of that year, since we have laws given by him at Milan on the 4th and 6th day of December; but this reasoning too is not free from difficulty. For Ammianus Marcellinus writes that the emperor, having with difficulty left the City, hastened into Illyricum in order to suppress the movements of the Quadi and the Sarmatians:

To Ammianus is added Julian, who says that he sent Chnodomarius, captured in the battle of Argentaria, at once to Constantius, just as he was returning from the Quadi and Sarmatians; then he adds this: 'So it happened that, although I had fought, he had merely made the journey, and although he had spoken peacefully with the dwellers along the Ister, not I but he triumphed.' Now since the battle of Argentaria cannot be removed from the year 357, and in that year Constantius made his journey through Illyricum, nothing prevents him from having been able conveniently to reach Sirmium and to be present at the composition of the formula.

Nor indeed is there need, as some do, to recall the emperor—unwilling and worn out—back from Illyricum to Milan in the month of December, in which we read that laws were given in that city, and then to place him again at Sirmium on the 18th day of the same month, occupied with the publication of other laws. For we easily free him from this difficulty if, with Reinesius, we say that it came about through the unskillfulness of the copyists that 'Medianae,' either written in abbreviation or through the inexperience of the transcribers, was replaced by 'Mediolanum' (Milan). For Mediana was a place, a retreat of the emperors, at the third milestone from Naissus, famous for the division of the empire between Valentinian and Valens.

And this correction will be more easily approved by one who considers with himself that, taking into account the journey and the stages, it could scarcely have happened that the emperor, who was at Milan on the 6th and 7th of December, was occupied on the 18th day of the same month with publishing laws in the city of Sirmium. But if Law 14 on Bishops, which is addressed to Felix the Roman bishop, was given not at Milan but at Mediana, then Liberius at the end of the year 357 had not yet departed from Beroea and let go of his former constancy, since we know that that pontiff, as soon as he seemed to yield, came to the emperor and by him was restored to his see.

Why therefore I should consider truer the opinion of those who think that the Sirmian formula was written in the first or second month of the year 358, the twofold testimony of Hilary brings about—one in his book On the Synods, the other in his work against Constantius. For in the first place, when he was informing the Gallican bishops about the definitions of the Synod of Ancyra, he says this: 'And this indeed, dearest brethren, all the doctrine of faith which was published by a few Easterners according to the standard of the whole Church, emerged in these very nearly same days in which you rejected the heresy thrust upon you; the reason for which had to be set forth, namely that silence concerning the one substance was being decreed.'

By these words, therefore, which are truly decisive, it is plainly evident that at almost one and the same time anathema was pronounced upon it by the Gallican and the Ancyran bishops. But if we know that this was done by the Ancyrans about the feast of Easter, which in that year fell on the twelfth of April, it must be seen to have been done by the Gauls in the same month also; which kind of argument Sirmond uses, so that he rightly judges that the synod by which he thinks the Sirmian blasphemy was condemned by the Gauls was assembled at almost the same time. But how great a span of time could have intervened, in order that this impious formula could be carried from the place where it was written into Gaul? For as soon as it was received and made known, Hilary indicates that it was condemned:

(a) But would the space of a single month have been by no means sufficient, with Ursacius especially and Valens striving to have it transmitted as quickly as possible? Therefore it can scarcely be placed outside the first or second month of that same year. The second testimony of Hilary—these words of his to Constantius supply it: 'For we wander with an uncertain wind of doctrines.... Now indeed, what does the faith of the recent year not contain by way of change? The first, which decrees the homoousion ('of one substance'), is torn to pieces. The next again, which decrees and proclaims the homoeousion ('of like substance'). The third, which by indulgence excuses the term ousia (substance) as simply presumed by the Fathers. The last, which does not excuse but condemns it.'

He was writing while stationed at Constantinople, when the year 359 was now nearly ending, or the next one already beginning. Now nearest to this is the year which had preceded: this, therefore, had given birth to the Sirmian blasphemy and to the Ancyran exposition which is contrary to it; which formulas were then followed not long after by the third Sirmian formula, which excuses the term ousia, and then by that of the Acacians at Seleucia, which was afterward endowed by them with a new appendix at Constantinople, and openly condemns the term ousia. That this monstrosity, then, was sent into Gaul as soon as it came forth into the light, Hilary and Phoebadius do not allow us to doubt. But since Hilary says that it was sent not by a synod—which there had been none—not by bishops, but only from the town of Sirmium,

he indicates not obscurely the way by which it had been sent. Ursacius therefore and Valens, being masters of affairs, employed the service of a Magistrianus (that is, of the public courier), with this intent, that it might be carried most swiftly, and moreover that it might bear before it the name and command of the emperor, so that it might be received the more easily: for Gothofredus observes that the Magistriani were chosen to convey the great mandates of princes, and from Theodoret we gather that it was not unusual for Constantius to use them in disturbing the affairs of the Church. And this is what the same Hilary explains more openly in another place, and in these words:

Formerly in obscurity and in corners the Lord Christ was denied to be the Son of God according to nature, and, destitute of the paternal essence, He was proclaimed to have received, together with the other creatures, His being out of things non-existent. But now, by the PROFESSION OF PUBLIC AUTHORITY, the heresy bursts forth; that which formerly muttered furtively now, no longer in secret, gloried as victor. Then, accusing Ursacius and Valens as the authors, as it were, of this impiety, he says, 'they deceived the ignorant king, so that, occupied with wars, he set forth a creed of perfidy of this kind, and—himself not yet regenerated—set forth a form of believing to the Churches'; for from this you gather that all things were then accomplished under the single name of the emperor.

They had used this same fraud—which turned out badly—in the bandit Synod of Milan, assembled in the year 355. For, not daring out of fear of the people to bring forth their own expiatory offenses, they sent a letter under the emperor's name, filled with every depravity, with this intent, that if the people received it with favorable ears, they might by PUBLIC AUTHORITY obtain their desires; but if it had been received otherwise, all the odium would fall on the king, and even that pardonable, because, being then still a catechumen, he might justly be thought to have been able to be ignorant of the sacrament of faith. And from this passage of Severus you understand also what 'the profession of public authority' means to Hilary.

But there is also another reason why that formula ought to be seen as sent not in the name of a synod or of bishops, but only in the single name of the emperor. For if you except Hosius, the other four whom Hilary asserts to have been its authors were outside the communion of the Church: this at least the Gallic bishops had certainly determined concerning Ursacius and Valens. Wherefore, since by the canons all commerce of letters with orthodox bishops was forbidden them, there was no reason why those Arians should write to them in the customary manner and about matters pertaining to the faith; and this one way remained, which they also used, to see to it that the formula was sent by Constantius and promulgated through the magistrates—which we read was sometimes done by Constantius.

Indeed, when the matter of Athanasius was at issue, he had written to the magistrates and threatened a fine, unless someone had compelled the bishop of his own city to subscribe against him. Since this is so, the opinion of those who call that Sirmian blasphemy 'synodical' and say it was framed in a synod seems to me paradoxical, since moreover neither was the number of bishops necessary for defining so great a matter present, nor were synodical letters in the customary manner either written or sent, nor were those convoked who had the right of attending:

although, if you should wish to call that fortuitous and clandestine meeting of four or five bishops by the name of a synod, and the formula issued by it 'synodical,' I would by no means object—yet in that sense in which the Council of Sardica wrote that the Arians coming to Sardica held synods among themselves in various places, and made pacts with threats, so that they should by no means come to Sardica for the judgment, nor assemble into one with the holy synod—by that word expressing their private and clandestine meetings. But, to return to my purpose: although these things are by no means wholly foreign to it, as soon as this formula was announced and made known to the Gallic bishops, it was openly rejected, openly condemned:

whether by an assembled synod, as Sirmond holds, or by the circulating letters of the bishops, as could also have happened, it matters nothing to inquire. But now see to what the argument comes back: if you assert that it was written in the year 357, if you see it promulgated and supported by the authority of Constantius, why was nothing done by him in the meantime against the resisting bishops? Hilary indeed reproaches Ursacius and Valens because, when it was promulgated, they had driven the contradicting bishops into exile. 'For they have compelled us,' he says, 'to the wish for exile, while they impose the necessity of impiety.' But to those men, prepared for every audacity and cruelty, neither counsel nor spirit was lacking, but time.

For meanwhile the Synod of Ancyra was held at the beginning of the month of April, which had pierced through the Sirmian blasphemy lurking beneath the Eudoxian heresy. The legates who had gone from it to Constantius—Basil of Ancyra, Eleusius and Eustathius—and who had been able conveniently to reach Sirmium at the beginning of May, drove the emperor away from his former opinion. Ursacius himself, Valens, and Germinius were compelled to comply with Constantius, to abjure the Sirmian formula, and to profess the Ancyran exposition, which was then promulgated. Hence all the sinews of their power to do harm were suddenly, and beyond all expectation, cut off. The matter is related by Hilary, Socrates, and Sozomen, who may be consulted.

Do you not see that all is clear and plain, and that what Hilary says—that the Gauls and the Ancyran bishops condemned that impiety at almost one and the same time—is most true? But let us proceed to bring light to the matter at hand. It may therefore be asked whether that formula was sent into the East, just as into Gaul, and promulgated? Some think so; for my part, I would not easily grant that Ursacius, Valens, Germinius, and Potamius, its authors—being Westerners, and lacking the consent of all the other Churches—set forth their own creed to the Easterners, that it might be common to them also, and promulgated it, so that it might be received by all as a certain and established dogma.

This view, moreover, the following considerations confirm, unless I am mistaken. First, that George of Laodicea, in the letter which was read at the Synod of Ancyra, names only Aetius and Eudoxius as the authors of the heresy then arising. Second, that Basil of Ancyra, in the encyclical written from the synod which he himself held, both censures only these men, and also writes that he had learned from reports from the Illyrians that that ruin was creeping and spreading more widely, after the manner of leaven: therefore the Easterns had not seen it, nor had it been customarily made known in those regions. Third, I do not deny that it had become known to Eudoxius, who had recently crept into the see of Antioch:

but I maintain that it was made known to Eudoxius alone, and only through the private letters of Ursacius, Valens, and Germinius, because it was not hidden from them what mind that most wicked man possessed, and that they held a common cause with him: hence he alone gave thanks to Ursacius himself, to Valens, and to Germinius, because through their ministry the Westerns had begun to think rightly; expressing in these words that Hosius had been forced to profess that blasphemy: and those to whom he writes back, as you see, are only three. Fourth, Constantius, the heresy having been disclosed to him through the legates who had come from Ancyra, both condemned the innovators to exile—namely Aetius, Eudoxius, and their associates—and by written letters warned the Antiochenes not to abandon the faith promulgated at the Dedication (Encaenia):

and that they should execrate the Eudoxian heresy as impious, new, and lately emerged from the abyss of error. But would he have been so shameless as to do and write these things, if that formula had previously been approved by himself, if it had been promulgated throughout the East by his order and by encyclical letters of the bishops, so that it might be received? But, you will say, it could have been spread privately and by familiar letters: yet what will you conclude from this? Had Demophilus on that account certainly seen it? Could he, moreover, expound to Liberius a faith which he had received only by rumor and by an uncertain report secretly put forth, and which he did not sufficiently understand?

On the contrary, the Ancyran definitions, by which the Antiochene and Sirmian exposition was expressly confirmed, had at once been promulgated by encyclical letters, as is customary: Constantius, moreover, had then ordered that these alone should prevail. Scarcely, therefore, could Demophilus have expounded to Liberius any faith other than the one that then prevailed. Since these things are so, there is by no means any need for me to linger longer in refuting Du Pin, and the anonymous writer who, in years past, again set Du Pin before us, translated into the French language under the title Treatise on Ecclesiastical and Secular Power.

This writer first confidently places Demophilus among the Anomoeans, then dreams up a double formula signed by Liberius—one, namely, at Beroea, wholly Arian and conformed to the opinion of the Anomoeans, the other at Sirmium, with this very intent and design, that he might clear himself concerning that former one signed at Beroea, and dispel before Basil of Ancyra and the other Semiarians—who had been legates to Constantius while he was staying at Sirmium—the rumor, spread abroad, that he had professed the Son to be unlike the Father.

For what I have hitherto said and argued, and what besides still remains to be said again, clearly demonstrate that Du Pin rashly fabricates as facts things that never were, and confirms them with false testimonies, in order, as is his custom, to throw dust in the reader's eyes. § VI.—The whole sequence of what was done by Liberius is set forth, and his letters to the Easterns and to Ursacius and Valens are explained. The expounded sequence of what was then done is confirmed by the authority of Sozomen, and by the testimony of Acacius and of the other Arians gathered at Constantinople, a testimony not previously noticed.

What I have hitherto said and argued, therefore, both shows what faith was undertaken by Liberius, and also offers the whole sequence of events as now easy to perceive. Basil, then, after the Synod of Ancyra was completed, and perhaps during the days of Easter, set out to the emperor who was staying at Sirmium; and there, as I have said, he could easily arrive at the beginning of May: that he accomplished his affairs with equal speed and success we know from Hilary and Sozomen: for the Sirmian blasphemy was abrogated and the Antiochene faith of the Dedication was again confirmed; Ursacius, moreover, and Valens, authors of that same blasphemy, professing ignorance, revoked what they had done, being compelled to subscribe to the Antiochene and Ancyran ecthesis (statement of faith):

Eudoxius and Aetius, and the other manifest followers of that impiety, were made exiles: the Basilians, finally, as victors, traversed all places to confirm the homoeousian or Ancyran faith, which is the same as the Sirmian. I therefore do not at all doubt that they at once took care to scatter letters in every direction, by which all the bishops throughout the East—and especially those who professed the Sirmian faith—should be informed of this matter; among whom Demophilus must rightly be counted, because he was not far off, and had been present at the drawing up of that same Sirmian faith, and, as we have seen, openly professed it together with the Semiarians.

Now when Basil had related and explained all these things to Liberius in person, he obtained that the latter—broken by exile and desirous of seeing the City again—should write to the Easterns who were in the imperial court and held sway over affairs with the emperor, namely Basil, as Nicephorus explains, and his associates. Nor does it seem to overturn this view of mine that the same pontiff also wrote to Ursacius and Valens, the authors and champions of that Sirmian blasphemy:

for since they had by then revoked that formula, and had been compelled to profess the same faith as Basil and the other Semiarians, there was no evident reason why the same pontiff, who had written to the Easterns, should have shunned communion also with those Westerns—whose favor with Constantius was great, and whose faith was then the same as that of the others. Hence you understand why, in the letters written to the Easterns, Liberius says that he accepts the faith expounded to him by Demophilus, but made no word of this matter in the others drawn up to Ursacius himself, and to Valens and Germinius.

For who would not see from this that, when the same Liberius drew up those letters, the faith of all of them was one, and that consequently both letters were sent after Valens, Ursacius, and Germinius had subscribed to the definitions of the Synod of Ancyra, and there seemed to be no outward discord of opinions between them and the Easterns? Now, however, we must see what Liberius did after he came to Sirmium. Athanasius and Hilary, as I have said, indeed express nothing that makes us know this matter clearly. Socrates touched not at all upon the fall of this pontiff; since Rufinus, whom he generally follows, writes that he had ascertained nothing certain on this subject.

Sozomen alone, therefore, remains, who transmitted to posterity the memory of what was then done, and that so accurately described, that whoever is unwilling to follow his authority in this matter must have utterly cast off all shame. It is therefore worth our while to hear him. 'Not long after, the emperor, having returned from the city of Rome to Sirmium, when the Western bishops had sent a legation to him, summoned Liberius to himself from Beroea: and when the legates of the bishops of the East were present, having convened the priests who were in the court, he began to compel Liberius to profess that the Son is not consubstantial with the Father.'

Now Basil, Eustathius, and Eleusius, who wielded chief authority with him, were pressing and urging the emperor to this. When they had then gathered into one document those things which had been decreed against Paul of Samosata and against Photinus, bishop of Sirmium, and besides the formula of faith issued at the dedication of the Antiochene basilica—as though, under the pretext of the word 'consubstantial,' certain persons were trying to establish their own heresy—they brought it about that Liberius and Athanasius, Alexander, Severianus, and Crescens, bishops of Africa, assented to that formula. Likewise Ursacius and Germinius, bishop of Sirmium, and Valens of Mursa, and as many bishops as were present from the parts of the East, assented.

But they also in turn received from Liberius a confession, in which he declared those who asserted that the Son is not similar to the Father in substance and in all things to be alienated from the Church..... These things having been accomplished through the legates of the Westerns, the emperor granted permission to return to Rome. The bishops who had convened at Sirmium also wrote to Felix, who then presided over the Roman Church, and to the clergy of that same city, that they should receive Liberius, and that both should govern the apostolic see and together exercise the priesthood without any dissension. So says Sozomen: but as for those whom Valesius—whose translation I use—sets forth as legates of the Westerns, I for my part think there were none:

since the Greek word πρεσβεύω expresses both those who are sent as legates, and sometimes those who approach as intercessors on another's behalf: in this sense at least Langus, the translator of Nicephorus, and Fronto Ducaeus understood that word. Therefore I understand to be designated in this passage Fortunatianus of Aquileia, whom Liberius had sent with letters to the emperor, and also Ursacius and Valens themselves, whom he had bound to himself, and the others then placed in the court: for the brief delay did not allow that those whom the same pontiff had wished to be sent from Campania through Vincentius of Capua could then be present.

You see, then, that Liberius was recalled from exile through the agency of Basil, after he had written that he had accepted the Sirmian faith: and then, after he had actually subscribed to that same faith together with some African bishops, he was granted the power of going to Rome and of recovering his see. But since he, on the testimony of Anastasius, entered the City on the third day before the Nones of August, he must have come to Sirmium in the month of June, and, his affairs there being completed as that month was already waning, have set out on the journey to Rome. Everything, indeed, if you take it thus, rightly coheres for itself: for the clandestine formula of Ursacius and Valens, at Basil's insistence, is abrogated, and the Sirmian ecthesis against Photinus is again promulgated while May was not yet far advanced:

Liberius, not far absent, accepts the faith expounded by Demophilus, and announces this to Basil of Ancyra and the other Easterns placed in the court, by those letters which I have recalled. He is therefore called from exile to the emperor, and, having professed in writing the faith which he had said he accepted, returns to his see. For no one could deny that all these things could conveniently have taken place within the space of three months. Moreover, Sozomen is not the only witness of this matter; since they are confirmed by the not obscure testimony of Acacius of Caesarea. He had been—along with the others of the Arian dregs who had resolved that 'substance' (ousia) was to be rejected from the faith—deposed in the Synod of Seleucia by the Semiarians, the champions of 'substance':

but the Acacians, a little later being stronger, in order to repay like with like in the robber council of Constantinople, expelled the leaders of the Semiarians from their sees: and since they wished to seem to have done this justly, when they deal with Basil of Ancyra they set forth these causes, among some others—namely, that he had been the cause of dissension and tumult for the Illyrians, Italians, and Africans, and had been the author of those things which had befallen the Roman Church. Why, then, he is said to have been the cause of dissension and tumult for the Illyrians, Italians, and Africans, I shall by no means inquire, although my mind inclines to believe that these words express that zeal with which he had labored, that in those regions the Ancyran definitions might be received and the Anomoeans condemned.

I ask, therefore, since this pertains to the matter at hand, what those things were which had not long before befallen the Roman Church and which Acacius turned into a charge against this same Basil as the principal author. Most people pass over the matter untouched, as if it were set in obscurity: but Tillemont, from whom nothing of diligence escapes, suspects that in this passage the intrusion of Felix is indicated, and that the blame for that affair is transferred from Acacius to Basil. But how could Acacius reproach Basil for the ordination of Felix, of which he himself—at Milan, together with the other Arians who controlled Constantius—was, if we believe Jerome, the chief author and promoter?

But I, for my part, wonder why no one has touched upon that one true cause which offers itself spontaneously, and openly explained the force of those words: for by them we understand to be expressed, not obscurely, those seditions, and perhaps even the murders, which Socrates and Sozomen, and the supplication of Marcellinus and Faustus, recall as having arisen and been perpetrated at Rome, when Felix—whom Acacius had raised up—was expelled from his see upon the return of Liberius; and that in that passage Basil was charged with the blame for these, inasmuch as he had been the one and principal author of bringing back that pontiff.

But if Liberius was summoned from Beroea through the agency of this same Basil, if he subscribed to the faith proposed by him, if, these things then being completed, he was restored to his see, I think there will henceforth be no one who would raise a dispute against this pontiff concerning the Sirmian blasphemy, unless he first persuades himself that it was championed by Basil, and moreover that Constantius—who presided over the conduct of this affair, who had ordered the Antiochene formula to be retained, who had punished Eudoxius and Aetius, leaders of that same blasphemy throughout the East, who had compelled Valens, Ursacius, and Germinius to abjure it—permitted the Roman pontiff to confirm it at the same time;

I cannot, therefore, sufficiently marvel at the rash judgment of those who, although they are so far removed from the age of the events, could make Liberius—what no ancient writer dared—guilty of having subscribed to the second Sirmian formula. § VII.—The question first proposed by Tillemont is examined: namely, whether Liberius not only kept silent about the homoousion, but even condemned it? The reasons on account of which that most learned writer shows himself doubtful are set forth. Sozomen is brought forward for the truer view and is elucidated: whether it is to be held for certain that the Synod of Antioch, which was held against Paul of Samosata, condemned the homoousion. Hilary and Victorinus, not rightly understood by Tillemont, are adduced and explained.

No one had brought this doubt into the open before Tillemont, who first proposed it when he was treating of the Arians, and, having turned it over on both sides and at last left it unresolved, leaves it to a more learned man—worthy, as he says with his singular modesty, of such a man. Why he doubted thus, these few words of Sozomen, which have already been recited, bring about: 'Constantius, having convened the priests who were in the court, began to compel Liberius to profess that the Son IS NOT consubstantial with the Father.' For he takes them in such a way as to think that Liberius was forced by Constantius not only to abandon the profession of the homoousion, but even openly to condemn it. There was indeed a reason, as he suspects, why the emperor would want this.

For if Basil and the other Semiarians had in the Council of Ancyra pronounced anathema against this word, if they then possessed and controlled the mind of Constantius, it could also easily have happened that, using the favor of the times and the authority of that same emperor, they drew that pontiff into this opinion. Yet there is one thing that keeps Tillemont in doubt about this matter, and it is this: that Basil and the other legates of the Synod of Ancyra had determined that the anathema ought to be kept secret, and had expunged this decree from the definitions promulgated at Sirmium.

Then he brings forward reasons, or conjectures, on account of which he judges that they, seizing the opportunity, withdrew from that resolved plan, and loosed free reins to that anathema; first, because Hilary writes that Ursacius, Valens, and Germinius demanded of the same Basil that the letter on the exposition of the homoousion and the homoeousion be read; which the learned man supposes to be that very one which had been written by the Synod of Ancyra, recited by Epiphanius, and which, asserting the homoeousion, had proscribed the homoousion with an anathema;

secondly, because Victorinus teaches us that letters were written by the Easterns to the Africans, that they—together with all the Easterns and the Africans themselves who had so determined—should cast the homoousion out of the Church, and he laments that in those letters not reasons sought from sacred Scripture, but command and threats, were added; for if all, as we have seen, had subscribed with Liberius to one and the same formula, the judgment concerning all must surely be the same; and if the African bishops and the Easterns are said to have then proscribed the homoousion from the Church, no reason can be brought why Liberius should be exempted from that charge. These, then, are the reasons on account of which that most careful man seemed to leave this matter in uncertainty;

yet, that it may be placed in clear light, I must first inquire what Sozomen meant by the words just recited, and then the force of the adduced conjectures must be weighed. As regards the first point, namely concerning Sozomen's meaning, I do not indeed contend that Constantius and those Semiarian bishops did not urge Liberius not to profess the Son to be consubstantial with the Father (ὁμοούσιον). But the question is what the force of these words is—whether, namely, they imply an open execration of the homoousion, or merely a bare silence about it laid out; and this, when the whole sequence of the deed which Sozomen relates has been rightly weighed, I judge most true and manifest.