The Library

10I read twenty books of Eusebius's Demonstratio Evangelica. (Only ten are extant.)

11I read Eusebius's Praeparatio Ecclesiastica in several books, from which selections are made. This work has perished.

12I read Eusebius's Demonstratio Ecclesiastica in several books. This work has perished.

13I read two books of Eusebius's Refutation and Defence, and a second edition of the same, which differs from the first in some passages while agreeing in others.

14The work of Apollinarius against the Greeks, on religion, and on truth, has been read by me. The author is a man of Hierapolis, having become bishop of Hierapolis in Asia; he flourished under Marcus Antoninus Verus, emperor of the Romans. The man is notable, and employs a notable style. Other memoirs of his, worth mentioning, are said to exist, which we have not yet come upon.

15The minutes of the first council, in three volumes, have been read by me. The book bore the inscription of Gelasius, offered as minutes of proceedings rather than a history. It is a paltry thing, and humble in expression, though it traces what happened at the council in full detail.

16I read the Acts of the third council, the council of Ephesus, made up almost wholly of Saint Cyril's letters to Nestorius, with that impious man's replies to him.

17I read the Acts of the fourth council, the council of Chalcedon, in several books. Fifteen sessions were held, at which Dioscorus and Eutyches were condemned and Nestorius excommunicated; Flavian was declared innocent after his death, together with Eusebius of Dorylaeum, Theodoret, and Ibas. Other matters were also taken up, and the spirit of piety was strengthened.

1The treatise of Theodore the presbyter has been read by me, arguing that the book of Saint Dionysius is genuine. Four objections are taken up in the treatise: first, that if it were genuine, some of the later Fathers would have recalled its sayings and usages — yet none did; second, that Eusebius, son of Pamphilus, in compiling a register of the books composed by our blessed Fathers, made no mention of it; third, how this book expounds in detail traditions that grew up in the Church by degrees and over long time — for great Dionysius, as the Acts make plain, lived alongside the Apostles, while what the book contains is for the most part a record of traditions that grew up in the Church by degrees or at a later date; it would be implausible, so the objection runs, indeed a fabrication, to hold that Dionysius set down what grew up in the Church long after great Dionysius's death. Fourth, how the book recalls the epistle of God-inspired Ignatius — for Dionysius was at his height in Apostolic times, whereas Ignatius completed his contest through martyrdom under Trajan, writing the epistle the book recalls a little before his death. Having promised to resolve these four difficulties, he maintains that, so far as rests with him, the book is the genuine work of great Dionysius.

2I read Hadrian's Introduction to the Scriptures, a useful book for catechumens.

3The History of Nonnosus has been read by me; in it he gives an account of his embassy to the Ethiopians, the Amerites, and the Saracens — the strongest peoples of that time — and also to other eastern nations. Justinian then held the Roman Empire, and Caïsus served as phylarch of the Saracens, a descendant of Arethas. To Caïsus, already phylarch, Nonnosus's grandfather had been sent as ambassador, dispatched by Anastasius, emperor at the time, and had arranged terms of peace. Indeed, Nonnosus's father too — Abrames was his name — went as ambassador to Alamandarus, phylarch of the Saracens, and rescued two Roman generals, Timostratus and John, taken captive under the laws of war; for the emperor Justin he secured the generals' release. Caïsus, however, to whom Nonnosus was dispatched, ruled the two most notable tribes among the Saracens, the Chindeni and the Maadeni. To this Caïsus, Nonnosus's father had also been sent before Nonnosus was chosen for the embassy, dispatched by Justinian, and had concluded treaties of peace — so much so that he took Caïsus's son (Mavias was his name) as hostage and conveyed him to Justinian at Byzantium. After this period Nonnosus undertook his embassy on two errands: to bring Caïsus, if possible, to the emperor, or to reach the king of the Auxumites — Elesbaas then ruled that people — and besides these, to visit the Amerites. Auxumis is a very great city, as it were the metropolis of all Ethiopia, lying to the south and east of the Roman dominion. Nonnosus endured many plots of peoples and many assaults of wild beasts along the road, falling often into many straits and impasses, yet he accomplished what had been resolved and returned home safe.

Caïsus, after Abrames had again served as ambassador to him, presents himself at Byzantium; dividing his own phylarchy between his brothers Ambrus and Izidus, he received from the emperor the governorship of Palestine, with a great multitude of his subjects accompanying him.

What we now call sandals, he says, our forefathers called arbylae, and what we call a phakiolion they called a phasolis.

Most of the Saracens — those at Phoenicon and those beyond Phoenicon and the so-called Taurene mountains — hold a certain place sacred, where, as they hold, a god was set free; and there they gather twice each year. The first of these festivals, as it runs its course, fills a whole month, falling, by his reckoning, about mid-spring, when the sun enters Taurus. The second festival extends over two months; they hold it after the summer solstice. At these festivals, he says, they keep complete peace — not only with one another but with all the native inhabitants; and they say the wild beasts too are at peace with men, and not only that, but with one another. He also reports many other marvels, no different from myths.

He says Adulis stands fifteen days' journey from Auxumis. As they journeyed to Auxumis, Nonnosus and his companions witnessed a remarkable sight near the place called Aue — Aue lies between the city of the Auxumites and that of the Adulites — a herd of elephants, not small but near five thousand. These elephants grazed in a great plain; it fell to the natives to approach them, and that was easy, with nothing to keep them from their pasture. This, then, was the spectacle that met them on the way. One must also speak of the blending of the airs, as it succeeds from Aue to Auxumis. For summer and winter are reversed. When the sun passes through Cancer, Leo, and Virgo, as far as Aue — as with us — summer and drought possess the air, but from Aue to Auxumis and the rest of Ethiopia fierce winter sets in, not through the whole day, but beginning each time at midday, clouding the air and flooding the land with violent rains. At that same season the Nile, full toward Egypt, overflows and irrigates the land. But when the sun passes through Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces, the air is reversed: upon the Adulites as far as Aue it floods the land with rains, while from Aue to Auxume and the rest of Ethiopia the land yields them summer and the season's fruits.

Sailing from Pharsan, Nonnosus put in at the farthest of the islands, where the following befell him — strange even to hear. He met some with human shape and appearance, smallest in stature and black in skin, shaggy with hair over the whole body. With the men came women like them and children still smaller than their own men. All were naked except that the full-grown, men and women alike, covered their nakedness with some small skin. They showed nothing wild or savage; they had human speech, but a dialect utterly unknown to all their neighbours and far more to Nonnosus's party. They lived off sea-oysters and fish cast up by the sea onto the island. They had no boldness, but at the sight of men like us they cowered, as we do before the greater beasts.

4The work of Theodore of Antioch, on behalf of Basil against Eunomius, in twenty-five books, has been read by me. In expression he is not altogether brilliant, but in thought and argument very close-packed, and accredited throughout by the testimonies of Scripture. He conducts the refutation of Eunomius's works almost word for word, and proves at length that Eunomius is utterly unlearned in secular learning, and far more so in our theology. This is the Theodore who became bishop of Mopsuestia, I believe.

5The work of Sophronius likewise, on behalf of Basil against Eunomius, has been read by me. He is clearer than Theodore and much more concise, and does not go through every work of Eunomius; instead he exercises himself on those passages, and overthrows by refutation those which seem to hold his heresy together and to be its chief points. He employs an aphoristic manner, and in general his discourse is detached and disconnected — though not from want of judgment; rather, it is rounded off with logical arguments as well.

6The work of Gregory of Nyssa likewise, on behalf of Basil against Eunomius, has been read by me. In expression — an orator if ever there was one — he is brilliant, preserving ever what gives delight, yet even he does not refute Eunomius's writing point by point in order. Hence he is more concise than Theodore, but fuller than Sophronius; he abounds in reflections and examples. One may say without fear that as far as he outstrips Theodore in beauty, brilliance, and utmost sweetness, so far does Theodore outstrip him in the number of his arguments, straining whatever is fruitful into service of the point at hand.

7Another treatise of the same Gregory of Nyssa, on the same subject, has been read by me, in which, grappling with Eunomius chiefly by logic, he utterly confutes him, rotting away every stronghold of his impiety. The beauty of his discourse, and its well-tempered brilliance, shine out with sweetness in his case too.

8The work of Origen on first principles, in four books, has been read by me. The first book concerns the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; in it he utters grave blasphemies, saying the Son was made by the Father and the Spirit by the Son, and that the Father pervades all beings, the Son only rational beings, and the Spirit only those being saved. He says other most perverse things as well, full of impiety: he drivels about transmigrations of souls, ensouled stars, and other things like these.

His first book, in his own phrase, gives a mythologized account of the Father, of Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, and further of rational natures. His second concerns the world and the creatures in it, and further that the God of the Law and the prophets is one, that the God of the Old and New Testaments is the same, and the incarnation of the Saviour, and that the same Spirit was in Moses, the other prophets, and the holy Apostles; further the soul, the resurrection, punishment, and the promises.

His third concerns free will: how the devil and the opposing powers, according to the Scriptures, campaign against the human race; that the world is created and perishable, having begun in time.

His fourth concerns the end: that the Scriptures are divine. Finally, how one ought to read and understand the Scriptures.

9The fifteen books of Eusebius's Preparation for the Gospel have been read by me, in which he refutes for the most part the vain babbling of the Greeks, showing how they remained at variance with themselves throughout. At the start of the fifteenth book, and at its end, he mentions another treatise, which he entitled Demonstration of the Gospel, a sequel to the Preparation: the one is nearly a refutation of Greek error, the other a confirmation of the Gospel message.