Annotationes censoriae in quaedam Lactantii errata, ex codice manuscripto Bibliothecae Regiae MDCLXXIII

CENSORIAL ANNOTATIONS

ON CERTAIN ERRORS OF LACTANTIUS,

FROM A MANUSCRIPT CODEX OF THE ROYAL LIBRARY

NUMBER MDCLXXIII, AMONG THE THEOLOGIANS, IN FOLIO.

OF LUCIUS COELIUS LACTANTIUS FIRMIANUS, THE DIVINE INSTITUTES AGAINST THE GENTILES, TO THE EMPEROR CONSTANTINE, BOOK ONE.

OPPOSITE THIS FIRST PAGE THE FOLLOWING IS READ: This volume corrected according to the censure of the Very Reverend Father Jo[hn] Maria Brasichel, master of the Sacred Apostolic Palace, appointed in the year 1607 by the supreme pontiff Paul V, elected general of the Order of Friars Preachers in the year 1608, and raised to the most ample rank of the cardinalitial dignity in the year 1611.

FURTHER, IN THE MARGIN BELOW, THE FOLLOWING IS READ:

On Lactantius Firmianus St Jerome [writes] much in the Catalogue and in letter 83, to Magnus, where he praises him wonderfully for his eloquence. But lest it befall anyone to stumble in reading the works of Lactantius, the reader is to be warned in advance how circumspectly and with what cautious step he must go in turning over the writings of this same author. Of the same man St Damasus, the Roman pontiff, in a letter to St Jerome, which is 124 among Jerome's letters, says this: "I confess to you indeed that the books of Lactantius which you had given me some while ago I do not read willingly, because many of the letters in them run on to thousands of lines in length, and they rarely discuss our doctrine. Hence it comes about that their length breeds weariness in the reader too; and if some are short, they are better suited to schoolmen than to us, discussing metres, and the situation of regions, and philosophers."

Thus St Damasus; but St Jerome too, in letter 13, to Paulinus, says: "Lactantius, like a sort of river of Tullian eloquence, would that he had been able to confirm our [teachings] as easily as he destroyed those of others!" And in book II on the Epistle to the Galatians, chapter IV, he says: "Many through ignorance of the Scriptures (as Firmianus also does in the eighth book of his letters to Demetrianus) assert that the Holy Spirit is often called the Father, often the Son." Again, in the Apology to Pammachius and Oceanus, he says: "Lactantius in his books, and especially in his letters to Demetrianus, altogether denies the substance of the Holy Spirit, and with a Jewish error says that He is referred to the Father or to the Son, and that the sanctification of both Persons is shown under His name. Who can forbid me to read the books of his Institutes, in which he wrote most powerfully against the Gentiles, because the former opinion is to be detested?" Thus far St Jerome.

St Gelasius in the Roman council pronounces thus: "The little works of Lactantius, apocryphal." So indeed the holy Pontiff judged, with grave and mature judgement. For in these works of Lactantius [there are] manifold errors and opinions at variance with the purity of orthodox doctrine. An index of them master Antonius Raudensis appended at the end of the books of Lactantius. But it seemed both to Francesco Filelfo, in book IV of his Letters, and to many learned men, that the censures of Raudensis were in some points excessively harsh,

in others inept, and that he had omitted many other things worthy of correction.

In Book 1, at chapter 7: "But since," etc. Read all these things with caution right to the end of the chapter, for they are strongly at variance with the theologians' manner of speaking: for God is not begotten or procreated by Himself, since nothing is more impossible than that something should beget or produce itself; nor does it seem that the words of Lactantius can be brought to any good sense except negatively: "begotten by Himself", that is, "not begotten by another". Finally, in this matter, how absurd is that [statement]: "it cannot be that what exists did not at some time begin to be." See the Apparatus sacer of Possevino under Gilbert Génebrard.

In Book 2, at chapter 14: "In a hundred and twenty years." From this opinion of Lactantius, which was also that of Josephus, there dissent St Jerome in the Hebrew Traditions on Genesis 6, St Chrysostom in Homily 20 on Genesis, and almost all the rest. See Sixtus (of Siena), book 5 of the Bibliotheca, annotation 75, and the more recent interpreters on Genesis 6.

In the same Book 2, chapter 15: "When therefore the number of men," etc. This chapter is to be read circumspectly, for Lactantius involves several errors in it. The first is that God from the beginning gave the devil power over the earth. The second, that the angels were not sent to the guardianship of men until after the human race had begun to increase. The third, that God commanded the good angels not to be stained by contagion with the earth, lest they lose the dignity of their heavenly substance. The fourth, that the devil gradually enticed the good angels to vices and defiled them by intercourse with women. The fifth, that this was the sin for which the angels fell from heaven. The sixth, that from that intercourse of the angels with women was born a third kind of beings, who were neither heavenly angels, nor men, nor demons of the underworld, but a certain offspring of earthly demons, who are tempters and deceivers of men, and authors of the magic arts and of human calamities and evils. All these doctrines are absurd, erroneous, and entirely foreign to the sound teaching of the theologians. Consult Sixtus (of Siena), book 5 of the Bibliotheca, annotation 77, and other interpreters on chapter 6 of Genesis.

In Book 3, chapter 24: "What of those who [think that there are men] opposite," etc. That Lactantius, with other ancient authors, does away with the Antipodes is refuted by the plain evidence of the New World, and also by the authority of distinguished writers from antiquity, as Fr Thomas Malvenda demonstrates at length in book 3 of On Antichrist, chapter 14. What he argues against the revolving roundness of the heaven, although some philosophers and Fathers are also found to have taught the same, is nevertheless plainly refuted both by the testimonies of authors and by the clear demonstrations of philosophy and astronomy. See what is noted in the same place (of Thomas Malvenda).

In the same Book 3, chapter 25: "Now [there remain] a few things for us concerning philosophy," etc. Read this chapter with caution; for if Lactantius censures all the philosophy of the ancient Gentiles, he does not act advisedly enough, since that philosophy contained many things both true and right, which were of use and benefit to human life. But if he condemns philosophy universally, he is in no way to be tolerated, and he is at odds with the common mind of the Fathers and of the Church. See Alfonso de Castro, book 13 Against Heresies, under the word "Knowledge".

In Book 6, chapter 2: "They sacrifice, therefore, rich and fat [victims]," etc. Accept with judgement what Lactantius argues in this chapter about not lighting candles and tapers in temples; for just as he rightly inveighs against the pagan and superstitious rite of the heathen, so he seems rather improvidently to have given some of the Innovators a handle for carping at the pious and religious custom of lighting tapers and lamps in churches at the altars, at the relics of the martyrs, etc., a holy usage which the impious Vigilantius also mocked. See Bellarmine, book On the Relics of the Saints, chapters 3 and 4; and Baronius, volume 1 of the Annals, in the year of the Lord 58.

In the same Book 6, chapter 20: For when God forbids killing, etc. Read these ten or eleven lines with caution, for in them Lactantius teaches two things wholly at odds with the right reasoning of theology. First, that it is not lawful to kill a man by judicial sentence and by the public authority, nor to accuse anyone of a capital crime, which is a manifest error. See St Thomas, 2-2, question 64, articles 2 and 3, and his interpreters; and Bellarmine, Book 3 On the Laity, chapters 12 and 13. Second, that it is not lawful for Christians to serve as soldiers, which was the heresy of the Manichaeans and, in our own age, of Erasmus and the other Innovators. See St Thomas, 2-2, question 40, article 1, and his interpreters; Sixtus, Book 6 of the Bibliotheca, annotation 156; Bellarmine, Book 3 On the Laity, chapter 64.

In the same Book 6, chapter 25: Now concerning the sacrifice itself, etc. In this chapter Lactantius argues none too judiciously about the external worship of God, about temples and their adornment, about votive gifts, and about sacrifice; for he seems to disapprove of all external worship of God. Indeed, the chief sacrifice of the Church, that of the Eucharist, is itself also in great part external, and is immolated by an external rite. Moreover, although the internal worship of the mind and spirit is the principal one, and the one that God requires more of each of us (for that external worship without the internal does not bring salvation to a Christian), yet the external worship of God is of itself pious, holy, good and pleasing to God; and the external adornments of churches, which consist partly in buildings, partly in golden vessels, silken vestments, etc., by their very kind contribute to the pious and holy worship of God; and to hold the contrary is the heresy of the Petrobrusians and the Wycliffites, and of the Innovators of our time. See Bellarmine, Book 3 On the Worship of the Saints, chapter 6; and (Baronius) volume 1 of the Annals, under the year 57.

As regards Lactantius's meaning in this chapter, however, Thomasius rightly brings him back to a sound sense in the Notes which he has attached here at the end of the chapter, although Lactantius does not speak circumspectly enough.

Book 7, chapter 14: Let the philosophers therefore know, etc. Not only Lactantius here but many other Fathers too have confined the whole duration of the world within a span of six thousand years; how their singular opinions on this matter are to be taken is shown at length by Father Thomas Malvenda, Dominican theologian, Book 1 On Antichrist, chapters 28, 29, 30. See Sixtus, Book 5 of the Bibliotheca, annotation 190.

In the same Book 7, chapter 27: A great prophet will be sent by God, etc. Lactantius, not rightly grasping the prophecy of Apocalypse 11, here attributes to one prophet only what is foretold there of two prophets, Enoch and Elijah, who are to come in the time of Antichrist. See the book On Antichrist of Father Thomas Malvenda, Dominican theologian, Book 9, chapter 16, towards the end.

In the same Book 7, chapter 19: When therefore the world has been oppressed, etc. Lactantius, not sufficiently versed in the sacred Scriptures, as St Jerome says, and not looking deeply into the words of Apocalypse 16, puts forward in this chapter certain things about Antichrist that are not sufficiently consistent: these are carefully examined in Book 10 On Antichrist of Thomas Malvenda, chapters 11 and 13.

In the same Book 7, chapter 21: With everlasting fire, whose nature, etc. Although it is neither erroneous nor rash to assert that the fire of hell is of a different nature from this elemental fire of ours, provided that it is acknowledged to be a true and bodily fire, yet the better and more probable opinion of the theologians is that it is of the same nature and species as ours, though distinguished by certain qualities. See Domingo Báñez, Part 1, Question, article 2, doubt 2, conclusion 2.

In the same chapter 21: But when He has judged the just too, etc. This error of Lactantius concerning the purging of the bodies of the just by fire after the universal judgement has been rejected by the schools of the theologians. See Sixtus, Book 5 of the Bibliotheca, annotations 170, 171.

In the same chapter 21: Yet let no one think, etc. It is a manifest heresy, condemned by the Church, to assert that the souls of the just, released from the body and needing no purgation, are not at once admitted to God's clear

vision, or essential beatitude. Lactantius too seems to have been of this error; for his words scarcely admit a sound understanding. See Sixtus in book 6 of the Bibliotheca, annotation 345; Bellarmine, book 1 On the Beatitude of the Saints, chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 6; Coccius, volume 1 of the Thesaurus Catholicus, book 5, article 2.

In the same, book 7, chapter 22: "This reasoning deceived them," etc. Here add the scholion placed below at chapter 21.

In the same book 7, chapter 24: "Now I shall append the remaining things," etc. What Lactantius disputes at length in these three last chapters of this book, namely 24, 25, 26, on the first resurrection of men, on the golden reign of Christ of a thousand years on earth after the first resurrection; on the binding of the devil for

a thousand years, and his loosing, and the battle of Gog and Magog, drawn from wrongly understood prophecies of Apocalypse 20, are almost all of them wholly foreign to the sense of sacred Scripture and to the teaching of the Church and of the holy Fathers, and plainly erroneous, as Father Thomas Malvenda, a Dominican theologian, has shown at length in book 10 of his On Antichrist, from chapter 3 to chapter 11.

In the same book 7, chapter 25: I have already shown above, etc. See the note above on chapter 24. But what Lactantius adds here, that from his own time to the end of the world only two hundred years remained, is convicted of error both by experience itself and by manifest reason. See the book On Antichrist of Father Thomas Malvenda, Dominican theologian, book 2, chapter 30.