THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY OF SOCRATES, SURNAMED SCHOLASTICUS, OR THE ADVOCATE. COMPRISING A HISTORY OF THE CHURCH, IN SEVEN BOOKS, FROM THE ACCESSION OF CONSTANTINE, A. D. 305, TO Translated from the Greek: WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR, AND NOTES SELECTED LONDON: HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN. MDCCCLIII. THE LIFE OF SOCRATES, AND AN ACCOUNT OF HIS WRITINGS. SOCRATES, our historian, was a native of Constantinople; for he himself states that he was born and educated in that city, and that for this reason he has detailed principally events which occurred there. In his youth his philological studies were prosecuted under the direction of the grammarians Helladius and Ammonius, both of whom were idolaters; who, having withdrawn from Alexandria about this time, had taken up their abode at Constantinople. The reasons which induced them to migrate from Alexandria are thus explained by Socrates himself.'-When the Pagan temples had been pulled down, by the zeal and exertion of Theophilus bishop of that city, Helladius and Ammonius (one of whom had been a priest of Jupiter at Alexandria, and the other of Simius) grieved at the contempt which was cast upon their gods, quitted the scene of what they considered sacrilege, and retired to Constantinople. These transactions took place during the consulship of Tamasius and Promotus, according to the "Chronicon" of Marcellinus, which was the eleventh year of the emperor Theodosius. It would therefore appear that Socrates was born about the commencement of his reign, inasmuch as boys were generally placed under the tuition of grammarians at ten years of age: but some date his birth in the year 380. He afterwards studied rhetoric 1 Book v. chap. xvi. under Troïlus, a celebrated teacher of philosophy and eloquence at Constantinople. This however is rather inferred from his frequent and honourable mention of Troilus, than from any direct statement of the fact. He speaks of Side in Pamphylia as the country of Troïlus, and names Eusebius, and the bishops Silvanus and Alabius, as among the number of his distinguished pupils; and finally1 declares that the Prætorian prefect Anthemius, who during the minority of Theodosius guided the administration, was greatly influenced by his counsels: to which he adds this eulogy of him: "Who, in addition to his philosophical attainments, was not inferior to Anthemius in political sagacity." On these grounds therefore it is concluded that Troïlus taught Socrates rhetoric. Our author's first appearance in public life was in the Forum at Constantinople, as a special pleader: it was from this circumstance that the cognomen "Scholasticus was applied to him; which indeed was the general appellation for advocates on their leaving the schools of the rhetoricians to devote themselves to the duties of their profession. When at length he resigned his legal practice, his attention was directed to the compilation of a "History of the Church," in seven books, from the year 309, where Eusebius ends, to the year 445; in which he has displayed singular judgment, and accurate as well as laborious research. He has carefully marked the periods of remarkable events, by giving the Consulates and Olympiads; and has invested his matter with authority, by having drawn his information from the most authentic sources to which he could obtain access, such as public records, pastoral and episcopal letters, acts of synods, and the works of other ecclesiastical writers. In the composition of his "History," he has studiously adopted and maintained simplicity and plainness of style, to the rigorous exclusion of all oratorical ornament, in order that he might Book vii. chap. i. be the more readily understood by all classes of persons, as he himself declares at the commencement of his first and third books. His first two books were originally composed on the entire credit of Rufinus; but having afterwards discovered, from the works of Athanasius, that the principal circumstances of the persecution, which that noble defender of the Divinity of Christ suffered, had been omitted, he subsequently amended them.1 He however confounds Maximian with Maximin, which is surprising, considering that he chiefly lived at Constantinople. He errs also in stating that five bishops were condemned in the council of Nice for refusing to approve the confession of faith there made; for a letter of the council shows that there were but two, viz. Theonas and Secundus. Theognis and Eusebius were indeed exiled by command of the emperor Constantine; but it was at another time, and for a different reason than that assigned by Socrates, as Jerome and Philostorgus testify. His allusion to the council of Sirmium is full of obscurity; and he was evidently under the mistake of supposing that the three confessions there promulgated at three several councils, were set forth on one and the same occasion. Socrates, moreover, in speaking of the council held at Antioch by the Arians in the year 341, seems to attach too much of authority to the usage which early prevailed of inviting the bishop of Rome to all ecclesiastical conventions in the West. As if he believed there was a law which forbad any decision in the Church without that prelate's sanction. But Julius himself, who was neither ignorant of his privileges, nor disposed to relinquish any right which pertained to his see, far from pretending to pre-eminence among his brethren, disclaimed everything beyond the courtesy of being 1 See book ii. chap. i., where he states the grounds of his conduct in this respect. [SOCRATES.] b |