Chapter III: Theological Science and Literature (3)

§ 48.6. =Christian Latin Poetry= reached its highest excellence
in the composition of hymns (§ 59, 4). But also in the more
ambitious forms of epic, didactic, panegyric, and hortatory
poems, it has respectable representatives, especially in Spain
and Gaul, whose excellence of workmanship during such a period
of restlessness and confusion is truly wonderful. To the fourth
century belongs the Spaniard =Juvencus=, about A.D. 330. His
_Hist. evangelica_ in 4 books, is the first Christian epic;
a work of sublime simplicity, free of all bombast or rhetorical
rant, which obtained for him the name of “the Christian Virgil.”
His _Liber in Genesin_ versifies in a similar manner the Mosaic
history of the patriarchs. His countryman =Prudentius=, who died
about A.D. 410, was a poet of the first rank, distinguished for
depth of sensibility, glowing enthusiasm, high lyrical flow,
and singular skill in versification. His _Liber Cathemerinon_
consists of 12 hymns, for the 12 hours of the day, and his
_Liber Peristephanon_, 14 hymns on the same number of saints who
had won the martyr’s crown; his _Apotheosis_ is an Anti-Arian
glorification of Christ; the _Hamartigenia_ treats of the origin
of sin; the _Psychomachia_ describes the conflict of the virtues
and vices of the human soul; and his 2 bks. _Contra Symmachum_
combat the views of Symmachus, referred to in § 42, 4.--In the
fifth century flourished: =Paulinus=, bishop of Nola in Campania,
who died in A.D. 431. He left behind him 30 poems, of which
13 celebrate in noble, enthusiastic language, the life of Felix
of Nola, martyr during the Decian persecution. =Coelius Sedulius=,
an Irishman (?), composed in smooth dignified verse the Life of
Jesus, and the _Mirabilia divina s. Opus paschale_, so called
from 1 Cor. v. 7 in 5 bks.; and a Collatio V. et N.T. in elegiac
verse. The _De libero arbitrio c. ingratos_ of the Gaul =Prosper
Aquitanicus= lashes with poetic fury the thankless despisers of
grace (§ 53, 5).--The most important poet of the sixth century
was =Venantius Fortunatus=, bishop of Poitiers, _Vita Martini_,
hymns, elegies, etc.

§ 48.7. In the =National Syrian= Church, the first place as a
poet belongs to =Ephraem= [Ephraim], the _Propheta Syrorum_. In
poetic endowment, lyrical flow, depth and intensity of feeling,
he leaves all later writers far behind. Next to him stands
=Cyrillonas=, about A.D. 400, a poet whose very name, until quite
recently, was unknown, of whose poems six are extant, two being
metrical homilies. Of =Rabulas of Edessa=, who died in A.D. 435,
the notorious partisan of Cyril of Alexandria (§ 53, 3), and of
=Baläus=, about A.D. 430, we possess only a number of liturgical
odes, which are not altogether destitute of poetic merit.
This cannot, however, be said of the poetic works of =Isaac of
Antioch=, who died about A.D. 460, filled with frigid polemics
against Nestorius and Eutyches, of which their Catholic editor
(Opp. ed. G. Bickell, Giess., 1873 f.) has to confess they are
thoroughly “insipid, flat and wearisome, and move backwards and
forwards in endless tautologies.” Less empty and tiresome are
the poetic effusions of the famous =Jacob of Sarug=, who died
in A.D. 521; biblical stories, metrical homilies, hymns, etc.
Most of the numerous liturgical odes are the compositions of
unknown authors.

§ 48.8. =The Legendary History of Cyprian.=--At the basis of the
poetic rendering of this legend in 3 bks. by the Empress Eudocia,
about A.D. 440, lay three little works in prose, still extant in
the Greek original and in various translations. In early youth
Cyprian, impelled by an insatiable craving after knowledge, power
and enjoyment, seeks to obtain all the wisdom of the Greeks, all
the mysteries of the East, and for this purpose travels through
Greece, Egypt, and Chaldæa. But when he gets all this he is
not satisfied; he makes a compact with the devil, to whom he
unreservedly surrenders himself, who in turn places at his
disposal now a great multitude of demons, and promises to make
him hereafter one of his chief princes. Then comes he to Antioch.
There Aglaidas, an eminent heathen sophist, who in vain abandoned
all to win the love of a maiden named Justina, who had taken
vows of perpetual virginity, calls in his magical arts, in order
thereby to gain the end so ardently desired. Cyprian enters into
the affair all the more eagerly since he himself also meanwhile
has entertained a strong passion for the fair maiden. But the
demons sent by him, at last the devil himself, are forced to flee
from her, through her calling on the name of Jesus and making
the sign of the cross, and are obliged to own their powerlessness
before the Christians’ God. Now Cyprian repents, repudiates his
covenant with the devil, lays before an assembly of Antiochean
Christians a confession inspired by the most profound despairing
sorrow of the innumerable mischiefs wrought by him with the help
of the demons, is comforted by the Christians present by means
of consolatory words of scripture, receives baptism, enters
the ranks of the clergy as reader, passes quickly through the
various clerical offices, and suffers the death of a martyr
as bishop of Antioch, along with Justina, under the Emperor
Claudius II.--Gregory Nazianzen too in a discourse delivered at
Constantinople in A.D. 379, “on the day of the holy martyr and
bishop Cyprian,” treated of the legend, in which without more ado
he identifies the converted Antiochean sorcerer with the famous
Carthaginian bishop of that name, and makes him suffer martyrdom
under Decius (?).--The romance may have borrowed the name of its
hero from an old wizard; but his type of character is certainly
to be looked for in the philosophico-theurgical efforts of
the Syrio-Neoplatonic school of Iamblichus (§ 24, 2), in which
the then expiring heathenism gathered up its last energies
for conflict with victorious Christianity. The conception of
the heroine on the other hand, is with slight modifications
borrowed from the Thecla legend (§ 32, 6). By the _Legenda aurea_
(§ 104, 8), which is just an adaptation of this earlier one,
the legend of Cyprian was carried down even beyond the time of
the Reformation. Calderon’s “Wonder-working Magician” presents
a Spanish-Catholic, as the Faustus legend of the 16th century
presents a German Protestant construction, which latter, however,
in direct opposition to the tendency of the early Christian
legend, allows the magician to drop into hell because his
repentance came too late. The Romish Church, however, still
maintains the historical genuineness of the old legend, and
celebrates both of the supposed saints on one day, 25th September.