History of the Christian Church, Volume II: Ante-Nicene Christianity. A. D. 100-325

and at large, are likewise of a practical nature, and contend, in fanatical rigor, against the restoration

of the lapsed (De Pudicitia), flight in persecutions, second marriage (De Monogamia, and De

Exhortatione Castitatis), display of dress in females (De Cultu Feminarum), and other customs of

the "Psychicals," as he commonly calls the Catholics in distinction from the sectarian Pneumatics.

His plea, also, for excessive fasting (De Jejuniis), and his justification of a Christian soldier, who

was discharged for refusing to crown his head (De Corona Militis), belong here. Tertullian considers

it unbecoming the followers of Christ, who, when on earth, wore a crown of thorns for us, to adorn

their heads with laurel, myrtle, olive, or with flowers or gems. We may imagine what he would

have said to the tiara of the pope in his mediaeval splendor.

Notes.

The chronological order of Tertullian’s work can be approximately determined by the

frequent allusions to the contemporaneous history of the Roman empire, and by their relation to

Montanism. See especially Uhlhorn, Hauck, Bonwetsch, and also Bp. Kaye (in Oehler’s ed. of the

Opera III. 709–718.) We divide the works into three classes, according to their relation to Montanism.

(1) Those books which belong to the author’s catholic period before a.d. 200; viz.:

Apologeticus or Apologeticum (in the autumn of 197, according to Bonwetsch; 198, Ebert; 199,

Hesselberg; 200, Uhlhorn); Ad Martyres (197); Ad Nationes (probably soon after Apol.); De

Testimonio Animae; De Poenitentia; De Oratione; De Baptismo (which according to cap. 15, was

preceded by a Greek work against the validity of Heretical Baptism); Ad Uxorem; De Patientia;

Adv. Judaeos; De Praescriptione Haereticorum; De Spectaculis (and a lost work on the same subject

in the Greek language).

Kaye puts De Spectaculis in the Montanistic period. De Praescriptione is also placed by

some in the Montanistic period before or after Adv. Marcionem. But Bonwetsch (p. 46) puts it

between 199 and 206, probably in 199. Hauck makes it almost simultaneous with De Baptismo.

He also places De Idololatria in this period.

(2) Those which were certainly not composed till after his transition to Montanism, between

a.d. 200 and 220; viz.: Adv. Marcionem (5 books, composed in part at least in the 15th year of the

Emperor Septimius Severus, i.e. a.d. 207 or 208; comp. I. 15); De Anima; De Carne Christi; De

Resurrectione Carnis; Adv. Praxean; Scorpiace (i.e. antidote against the poison of the Gnostic

heresy); De Corona Militis; De Virginibus ve!andis; De Exhortatione Castitatis; De Pallio (208 or

209); De Fuga in persecutione; De Monogamia; De Jejuniis; De Pudicitia; Ad Scapulam (212); De

Ecstasi (lost); De Spe Fidelium (likewise lost).

Kellner (1870) assigns De Pudicitia, De Monogamia, De Jejunio, and Adv. Praxean to the

period between 218 and 222.

(3) Those which probably belong to the Montanistic period; viz.: Adv. Valentinianos; De

cultu Feminarum (2 libri); Adv. Hermogenem.

§ 198.

s

Minucius Felix.

(I.) M. Minucii Felicis Octavius, best ed. by Car. Halm, Vienna 1867 (in vol. II. of the "Corpus

Scriptorum Eccles. Latin."), and Bernh. Dombart, with German translation and critical notes,

2d ed. Erlangen 1881. Halm has compared the only MS. of this book, ormerly in the Vatican

518

Philip Schaff

History of the Christian Church, Volume II: Ante-Nicene

Christianity. A.D. 100-325.

---

library now in Paris, very carefully ("tanta diligentia ut de nullo jam loco dubitari possit quid

in codice uno scriptum inveniatur ").

Ed. princeps by Faustus Sabaeus (Rom. 1543, as the eighth book of Arnobius Adv. Gent); then by

Francis Balduin (Heidelb. 1560, as an independent work). Many edd. since, by Ursinus (1583),

Meursius (1598), Wowerus (1603), Rigaltius (1643), Gronovius (1709, 1743), Davis (1712),

Lindner (1760, 1773), Russwurm (1824), Lübkert (1836), Muralt (1836), Migne (1844, in

"Patrol." III. Col. 193 sqq.), Fr Oehler (1847, in Gersdorf’s "Biblioth. Patr. ecelesiast. selecta,"

vol. XIII). Kayser (1863), Cornelissen (Lugd. Bat. 1882), etc.

English translations by H. A. Holden (Cambridge 1853), and R. E. Wallis in Clark’s "Ante-Nic.

Libr." vol. XIII. p. 451–517.

(II.) Jerome: De Vir. ill. c. 58, and Ep. 48 ad Pammach., and Ep. 70 ad Magn. Lactant.: Inst. Div.

V. 1, 22.

(III.) Monographs, dissertations and prolegomena to the different editions of M. Fel., by van Hoven

(1766, also in Lindner’s ed. II. 1773); Meier (Turin, 1824,) Nic. Le Nourry, and Lumper (in

Migne, "Patr. Lat." III. 194–231; 371–652); Rören (Minuciania,) Bedburg, 1859); Behr (on the

relation of M. F. to Cicero, Gera 1870); Rönsch (in Das N. T Tertull.’s, 1871, P. 25 sqq.); Paul

P. de Felice (Études sur l’Octavius, Blois, 1880); Keim (in his Celsus, 1873, 151–168, and in

Rom. und das Christenthum, 1881, 383 sq., and 468–486); Ad. Ebert (1874, in Gesch. der

christlich-latein. Lit. I. 24–31); G. Loesche (On the relation of M. F. to Athanagoras, in the

"Jahr b. für Prot. Theol." 1882, p. l68–178); RENAN (Marc-Auréle, 1882, p. 389–404); Richard

Kuhn: Der Octavius des Minucius Felix. Eine heidnisch philosophische Auffassung vom

Christenthum. Leipz. 1882 (71 pages). See also the art. of Mangold in Herzog2 X. 12–17

(abridged in Schaff-Herzog); G. Salmon in Smith and Wace III. 920–924.

(IV.) On the relation of Minuc. Fel. to Tertullian: Ad. Ebert: Tertullian’s Verhältniss zu Minucius

Felix, nebst einem Anhang über Commodian’s Carmen apoloqeticum (1868, in the 5th vol. of

the "Abhandlungen der philol. histor. Classe der K. sächs. Ges. der Wissenschaften"); W. Hartel

(in Zeitschrift für d. öester. Gymnas. 1869, p. 348–368, against Ebert); E. Klusmann ("Jenaer

Lit. Zeitg," 1878) Bonwetsch (in Die Schriften Tert., 1878, p. 21;) V. Schultze (in "Jahr b. für

Prot. Theol." 1881, p. 485–506; P. Schwenke (Uber die Zeit des Min. Fel. in "Jahr b. für Prot.

Theol.’ " 1883, p. 263–294).

In close connection with Tertullian, either shortly before, or shortly after him, stands the Latin

Apologist Minucius Felix.

1532

533

Converts are always the most zealous, and often the most effective promoters of the system

or sect which they have deliberately chosen from honest and earnest conviction. The Christian

Apologists of the second century were educated heathen philosophers or rhetoricians before their

conversion, and used their secular learning and culture for the refutation of idolatry and the

vindication of the truths of revelation. In like manner the Apostles were Jews by birth and training,

and made their knowledge of the Old Testament Scriptures subservient to the gospel. The Reformers

of the sixteenth century came out of the bosom of mediaeval Catholicism, and were thus best

1532

Jerome puts him after Tertullian (and Cyprian), Lactantius beforeTertullian.

519

Philip Schaff

History of the Christian Church, Volume II: Ante-Nicene

Christianity. A.D. 100-325.

---