which you worship, and which shines with the one. And it must be laid down as an underbrilliance of a heavenly body in the eyes of stood thing that I am not to join you in your carnal men and of beasts,-but that of which prayers, or in holding conventicles, or in it is written through the prophet, "The Sun taking the name of Manichæus, unless you of righteousness has arisen upon me;" and give me a clear explanation, without any obof which it is said in the gospel, "That was scurity, of all matters touching the salvation the true Light, which lighteth every man that of the soul. cometh into the world.": Let those rage against you who know not with what sighs CHAP. 4.-PROOFS OF THE CATHOLIC FAITH. and groans the least particle of the knowledge of God is obtained. And, last of all, let those rage against you who have never been led astray in the same way that they see that you are. CHAP. 3. For my part, I,—who, after much and long-continued bewilderment, attained at last to the discovery of the simple truth, which is learned without being recorded in any fanciful legend; who, unhappy that I was, barely succeeded, by God's help, in refuting the vain imaginations of my mind, gathered from theories and errors of various kinds; who so late sought the cure of my mental obscuration, in compliance with the call and the tender persuasion of the all-merciful Physician; who long wept that the immutable and inviolable Existence would vouchsafe to convince me inwardly of Himself, in harmony with the testimony of the sacred books; by whom, in fine, all those fictions which have such a firm hold on you, from your long familiarity with them, were diligently examined, and attentively heard, and too easily believed, and commended at every opportunity to the belief of others, and defended against opponents with determination and boldness,-I can on no account rage against you; for I must bear with you now as formerly I had to bear with myself, and I must be as patient towards you as my associates were with me, when I went madly and blindly astray in your beliefs. 5. For in the Catholic Church, not to speak of the purest wisdom, to the knowledge of which a few spiritual men attain in this life, so as to know it, in the scantiest measure, indeed, because they are but men, still without any uncertainty (since the rest of the multitude derive their entire security not from acuteness of intellect, but from simplicity of faith,)-not to speak of this wisdom, which you do not believe to be in the Catholic Church, there are many other things which most justly keep me in her bosom. The consent of peoples and nations keeps me in the Church; so does her authority, inaugurated by miracles, nourished by hope, enlarged by love, established by age. The succession of priests keeps me, beginning from the very seat of the Apostle Peter, to whom the Lord, after His resurrection, gave it in charge to feed His sheep, down to the present episcopate. And so, lastly, does the name itself of Catholic, which, not without reason, amid so many heresies, the Church has thus retained; so that, though all heretics wish to be called Catholics, yet when a stranger asks where the Catholic Church meets, no heretic will venture to point to his own chapel or house. Such then in number and importance are the precious ties belonging to the Christian name which keep a believer in the Catholic Church, as it is right they should, though from the slowness of our understanding, or the small attainment of our life, the truth may not yet fully disclose itself. But with you, where there is none of these things to attract or keep me, the promise of truth is the only thing that comes into play. Now if the truth is so clearly proved as to leave no possibility of doubt, it must be set before all the things that keep me in the Catholic Church; but if there is only a promise without any fulfillment, no one shall move me from the faith which binds my mind with ties so many and so strong to the Christian religion. 4. On the other hand, all must allow that you owe it to me, in return, to lay aside all arrogance on your part too, that so you may be the more disposed to gentleness, and may not oppose me in a hostile spirit, to your own hurt. Let neither of us assert that he has found truth; let us seek it as if it were unknown to us both. For truth can be sought with zeal and unanimity if by no rash presumption it is believed to have been already found and ascertained. But if I cannot induce you to grant me this, at least allow me CHAP. 5.-AGAINST THE TITLE OF THE EPISTLE to suppose myself a stranger now for the first time hearing you, for the first time examining your doctrines. I think my demand a just OF MANICHÆUS. 6. Let us see then what Manichæus teaches me; and particularly let us examine that treatise which he calls the Fundamental Epistle, in which almost all that you believe is con- longer be able to believe the gospel either, tained. For in that unhappy time when we for it was through the Catholics that I got my read it we were in your opinion enlightened. faith in it; and so, whatever you bring from The epistle begins thus:- Manichæus, an the gospel will no longer have any weight apostle of Jesus Christ, by the providence of with me. Wherefore, if no clear proof of the God the Father. These are wholesome words, apostleship of Manichæus is found in the gosfrom the perennial and living fountain." pel, I will believe the Catholics rather than Now, if you please, patiently give heed to my you. But if you read thence some passage inquiry. I do not believe Manichæus to be an clearly in favor of Manichæus, I will beapostle of Christ. Do not, I beg of you, be en- lieve neither them nor you: not them, for raged and begin to curse. For you know that they lied to me about you; nor you, for you it is my rule to believe none of your statements quote to me that Scripture which I had bewithout consideration. Therefore I ask, who lieved on the authority of those liars. But is this Manichæus? You will reply, An apostle far be it that I should not believe the gospel; of Christ. I do not believe it. Now you are for believing it, I find no way of believing at a loss what to say or do; for you promised you too. For the names of the apostles, to give knowledge of the truth, and here you as there recorded, do not include the name are forcing me to believe what I have no of Manichæus. And who the successor of knowledge of. Perhaps you will read the Christ's betrayer was we read in the Acts gospel to me, and will attempt to find there a of the Apostles; 3 which book I must needs testimony to Manichæus. But should you believe if I believe the gospel, since both writmeet with a person not yet believing the gos-ings alike Catholic authority commends to me. pel, how would you reply to him were he to The same book contains the well-known narsay, I do not believe? For my part, I should rative of the calling and apostleship of Paul.* not believe the gospel except as moved by Read me now, if you can, in the gospel where the authority of the Catholic Church. So Manichæus is called an apostle, or in any when those on whose authority I have con- other book in which I have professed to besented to believe in the gospel tell me not to lieve. Will you read the passage where the believe in Manichæus, how can I but consent? Lord promised the Holy Spirit as a Paraclete, Take your choice. If you say, Believe the to the apostles? Concerning which passage, Catholics: their advice to me is to put no behold how many and how great are the things faith in you; so that, believing them, I am that restrain and deter me from believing in precluded from believing you;-If you say, Manichæus. Do not believe the Catholics: you cannot fairly use the gospel in bringing me to faith in Manichæus; for it was at the command of the Catholics that I believed the gospel;— 7. For I am at a loss to see why this epistle Again, if you say, You were right in believing begins, "Manichæus, an apostle of Jesus the Catholics when they praised the gospel, Christ," and not Paraclete, an apostle of but wrong in believing their vituperation of Jesus Christ. Or if the Paraclete sent by Manichæus: do you think me such a fool as Christ sent Manichæus, why do we read, to believe or not to believe as you like or dis-Manichæus, an apostle of Jesus Christ,' like, without any reason? It is therefore fairer instead of Manichæus, an apostle of the Parand safer by far for me, having in one instance aclete? If you say that it is Christ Himself put faith in the Catholics, not to go over to who is the Holy Spirit, you contradict the you, till, instead of bidding me believe, you very Scripture, where the Lord says, "And make me understand something in the clear- I will send you another Paraclete." Again, est and most open manner. To convince me, if you justify your putting of Christ's name, then, you must put aside the gospel. If you not because it is Christ Himself who is also keep to the gospel, I will keep to those who the Paraclete, but because they are both of commanded me to believe the gospel; and, the same substance, · that is, not because in obedience to them, I will not believe you they are one person, but one existence [non at all. But if haply you should succeed in quia unus est, sed quia unum sunt],-Paul too finding in the gospel an incontrovertible tes- might have used the words, Paul, an apostle timony to the apostleship of Manichæus, you of God the Father; for the Lord said, "I will weaken my regard for the authority of and the Father are one. 996 Paul, nowhere the Catholics who bid me not to believe you; uses these words; nor does any of the aposand the effect of that will be, that I shall no This is one of the earliest distinct assertions of the dependence of the Scriptures for authority on the Church.-A. H. Ñ.] CHAP. 6.-WHY MANICHEUS CALLED HIMSELF AN APOSTLE OF CHRIST. since he exhorts us to believe that the Holy tles write himself an apostle of the Father. Why then this new fashion? Does it not savor of trickery of some kind or other? For if he thought it made no difference, why did he not for the sake of variety in some epistles call himself an apostle of Christ, and in others of the Paraclete? But in every one that I know of, he writes, of Christ; and not once, of the Paraclete. What do we suppose to be the reason of this, but that pride, the mother of all heretics, impelled the man to desire to seem to have been sent by the Paraclete, but to have been taken into so close a relation as to get the name of Paraclete himself? As the man Jesus Christ was not sent by the Son of God, that is, the power and wisdom of God-by which all things were made, but, according to the Catholic faith, was taken into such a relation as to be Himself the Son of God—that is, that in Himself the wisdom of God was displayed in the healing of sin- fesses to be sent by or to be united with the ners, so Manichæus wished it to be thought Paraclete, neither statement can hold good, that he was so taken up by the Holy Spirit, I am on my guard, and refuse to believe whom Christ promised, that we are hence- either in his mission or in his susception. forth to understand that the names Manichæus and Holy Spirit alike signify the apostle of Jesus Christ, that is, one sent by Jesus Christ, who promised to send him. Singular audacity this! and unutterable sacrilege! CHAP. 7.—IN WHAT SENSE THE FOLLOWERS OF MANICHEUS BELIEVE HIM TO BE THE HOLY SPIRIT. CHAP. 8.-THE FESTIVAL OF THE BIRTH-DAY OF MANICHÆUS. 9. In adding the words, "by the providence of God the Father," what else did Manichæus design but that, having got the name of Jesus Christ, whose apostle he calls himself, and of God the Father, by whose providence he says he was sent by the Son, we 8. Besides, you should explain how it is should believe himself, as the Holy Spirit, to that, while the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit be the third person? His words are: “Manare united in equality of nature, as you also ichæus, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the acknowledge, you are not ashamed to speak providence of God the Father." The Holy of Manichæus, a man taken into union with Spirit is not named, though He ought specithe Holy Spirit, as born of ordinary genera-ally to have been named by one who quotes tion; and yet you shrink from believing that to us in favor of his apostleship the promise. the man taken into union with the only-be- of the Paraclete, that he may prevail upon gotten Wisdom of God was born of a Virgin. ignorant people by the authority of the gosIf human flesh, if generation [concubitus viri], pel. In reply to this, you of course say that if the womb of a woman could not contam- in the name of the Apostle Manichæus we inate the Holy Spirit, how could the Virgin's womb contaminate the Wisdom of God? This Manichæus, then, who boasts of a connection with the Holy Spirit, and of being spoken of in the gospel, must produce his claim to either of these two things,-that he was sent by the Spirit, or that he was taken into union with the Spirit. If he was sent. let him call himself the apostle of the Paraclete; if taken into union, let him allow that He whom the only-begotten Son took upon Himself had a human mother, since he admits a human father as well as mother in the case of one taken up by the Holy Spirit. Let him believe that the Word of God was not defiled by the virgin womb of Mary, have the name of the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, because He condescended to come into Manichæus. Why then, I ask again, should you cry out against the doctrine of the Catholic Church, that He in whom divine Wisdom. came was born of a virgin, when you do not scruple to affirm the birth by ordinary generation of him in whom you say the Holy Spirit came? I cannot but suspect that this Manichæus, who uses the name of Christ to gain access to the minds of the ignorant, wished to be worshipped instead of Christ Himself. I will state briefly the reason of this conjecture. At the time when I was a student of your doctrines, to my frequent inquiries why it was that the Paschal feast of the Lord was celebrated generally with no interest, though to be baptized with the Holy Spirit, whom sometimes there were a few languid worship- also ye shall receive after not many days, pers, but no watchings, no prescription of any that is, at Pentecost. When they had come, unusual fast,-in a word, no special cere- they asked him, saying, Lord, wilt Thou at mony,-while great honor is paid to your this tine manifest Thyself? And when will Bema, that is, the day on which Manichæus be the kingdom of Israel? And He said unto was killed, when you have a platform with them, No one can know the time which the fine steps, covered with precious cloth, placed Father hath put in His own power. But ye conspicuously so as to face the votaries,- shall receive the power of the Holy Ghost the reply was, that the day to observe was coming upon you, and ye shall be witnesses the day of the passion of him who really suffer- unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judæa, ed, and that Christ, who was not born, but and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part appeared to human eyes in an unreal sem- of the earth."'i Behold you have here the blance of flesh, only feigned suffering, with- Lord reminding His disciples of the promise out really bearing it. Is it not deplorable, of the Father, which they had heard from that men who wish to be called Christians are His mouth, of the coming of the Holy Spirit. afraid of a virgin's womb as likely to defile Let us now see when He was sent; for shortly the truth, and yet are not afraid of falsehood? after we read as follows: And when the day But to go back to the point, who that pays of Pentecost was fully come, they were all attention can help suspecting that the inten- with one accord in one place. And suddenly tion of Manichæus in denying Christ's being born of a woman, and having a human body, was that His passion, the time of which is now a great festival all over the world, might not be observed by the believers in himself, so as to lessen the devotion of the solemn commemoration which he wished in honor of the day of his own death? For to us it was a great attraction in the feast of the Bema that it was held during Pascha, since we used all the more earnestly to desire that festal day [the Bema], that the other which was formerly most sweet had been withdrawn. there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues, like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. And when the sound was heard, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because every man heard them speak in his own language. And they were all amazed, and marvelled, CHAP. 9.-WHEN THE HOLY SPIRIT WAS SENT. saying one to another, Are not all these which 10. Perhaps you will say to me, When, speak Galilæans? and how heard we every then, did the Paraclete promised by the Lord man in our own tongue, wherein we were come? As regards this, had I nothing else born? Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, to believe on the subject, I should rather look | and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, in Armenia, for the Paraclete as still to come, than allow and in Cappadocia, in Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, that He came in Manichæus. But seeing and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the regions that the advent of the Holy Spirit is narrated of Africa about Cyrene, and strangers of with perfect clearness in the Acts of the Rome, Jews, natives, Cretes, and Arabians, Apostles, where is the necessity of my so they heard them speak in their own tongues gratuitously running the risk of believing the wonderful works of God. And they were heretics? For in the Acts it is written as fol- all amazed, and were in doubt on account of lows: "The former treatise have we made, what had happened, saying, What meaneth O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both this? But others, mocking, said, These men to do and teach, in the day in which He are full of new wine. You see when the chose the apostles by the Holy Spirit, and Holy Spirit came. What more do you wish? commanded them to preach the gospel. By If the Scriptures are credible, should not I bethose to whom He showed Himself alive lieve most readily in these Acts, which have after His passion by many proofs in the daytime, He was seen forty days, teaching concerning the kingdom of God. And how He conversed with them, and commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith He, ye have heard of me. For John indeed baptized with water, but ye shall begin! 2 the strongest testimony in their support, and which have had the advantage of becoming generally known, and of being handed down and of being publicly taught along with the gospel itself, which contains the promise of the Holy Spirit, which also we believe? On I Acts i. 1-8. 2 Acts ii. 1-13. reading, then, these Acts of the Apostles, which stand, as regards authority, on a level with the gospel, I find that not only was the Holy Spirit promised to these true apostles, but that He was also sent so manifestly, that no room was left for errors on this subject. words from the perennial and living fountain; and whoever shall have heard them, and shall have first believed them, and then shall have observed the truths they set forth, shall never suffer death, but shall enjoy eternal life in glory. For he is to be judged truly blessed who has been instructed in this divine knowlCHAP. 10.-THE HOLY SPIRIT TWICE GIVEN. edge, by which he is made free and shall II. For the glorification of our Lord among abide in everlasting life." And this, as you men is His resurrection from the dead and see, is a promise of truth, but not the beHis ascension to heaven. For it is written stowal of it. And you yourselves can easily in the Gospel according to Joan: "The Holy see that any errors whatever might be dressed Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus up in this fashion, so as under cover of a was not yet glorified.' Now if the reason showy exterior to steal in unawares into the minds of the ignorant. Were he to say, why He was not given was that Jesus was not yet glorified, He was given immediately on These are pestiferous words from a poisonous the glorification of Jesus. And since that fountain; and whoever shall have heard them, glorification was twofold, as regards man and and shall have first believed them, and then have observed what they set forth, shall never as regards God, twice also was the Holy be restored to life, but shall suffer a woful Spirit given: once, when, after His resurrection from the dead, He breathed on the face death as a criminal: for assuredly he is to be of His disciples, saying, "Receive ye the pronounced miserable who falls into this inHoly Ghost; fernal error, in which he will sink so as to " and again, ten days after abide in everlasting torments;-were he to say His ascension to heaven. This number ten signifies perfection; for to the number seven, this, he would say the truth; but instead of which embraces all created things, is added gaining any readers for his book, he would the trinity of the Creator.3 On these things all into whose hands the book might come. excite the greatest aversion in the minds of there is much pious and sober discourse But I must keep to Let us then pass on to what follows; nor let among spiritual men. my point; for my business at present is not alike by good and bad, by learned and unus be deceived by words which may be used to teach you, which you might think pre-learned. What, then, comes next? sumptuous, but to take the part of an in66 13. May the peace, quirer, and learn from you, as I tried to do he says, "of the invisible God, and the knowledge of the truth, for nine years without success. Now, therefore, I have a document to believe on the be with the holy and beloved brethren who subject of the Holy Spirit's advent; and if both believe and also yield obedience to the you bid me not to believe this document, as divine precepts." Amen, say we. For the your usual advice is not to believe ignorantly, prayer is a most amiable and commendable without consideration, much less will I believe your documents. Away, then, with all books, and disclose the truth with logical clearness, so as to leave no doubt in my mind; or bring forward books where I shall find not an imperious demand for my belief, but a trustworthy statement of what I may learn, Perhaps you say this epistle is also of this character. Let me, then, no longer stop at the threshold: let us see the contents. 1 John vii. 39. 2 John xx. 22. 3 [This is, of course, fanciful; but is quite in accordance with the exegetical methods of the time. A. H. N.] 4 [The Manichæans assumed the role of rationalists, and scorned the credulity of ordinary believers. Yet they required in their followers an amount of credulity which only persons of a peculiar turn of mind could furnish. The same thing applies to requires infinitely less credulity to believe in historical Christianmodern rationalistic anti-Christian systems. The fact is, that it ity than to disbelieve in it.-A. H. N.] one. Only we must bear in mind that these words might be used by false teachers as well than this, all might safely read and embrace as by good ones. So, if he said nothing more it. Nor should I disapprove of what follows: May also the right hand of light protect you, and deliver you from every hostile assault, and from the snares of the world.” In fact, I have no fault to find with the beginning of this epistle, till we come to the main subject of it. For I wish not to spend time on minor points. Now, then, for this writer's plain statement of what is to be expected from him. CHAP 12.-THE WILD FANCIES OF MANICHÆUS. 14. "Of that matter, |