Search a Bible verse · Source library · Sources and text rights

Exposition of the Christian Faith — Historical footnotes

Chapter XVIII.

Complete historical editorial footnotes. These notes retain the original edition’s wording; individual note authors are unspecified.

English translation and editorial credits: Augustus Henry Eugene de Romestin, Eugene de Romestin (assistant), Henry Thomas Forbes Duckworth (assistant).

Read the original source · Text reuse terms

1896 (historical English edition; transcription printing date uncertain) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Fucus, the word used by St. Ambrose, denoted face-paint in general, but it seems to have also had the especial meaning of a red pigment, or rouge for the cheeks. The custom of face-painting was known of old in the East (2 Kings ix. 30; Ezek. xxiii. 40), whence, most probably, it passed into Greece—it was known, in Ionia at least, when the Odyssey was written (say 900 b.c.)—and thence to Rome. See Dict. Antiq. art. “Fucus.”

Editorial footnote · Exposition of the Christian Faith, Chapter XVIII., editorial note cite_note-1 · Original source

Read the surrounding source paragraph

119. So, indeed, following the guidance of the Scriptures, our fathers declared, holding, moreover, that impious doctrines should be included in the record of their decrees, in order that the unbelief of Arius should discover itself, and not, as it were, mask itself with dye or face-paint. For they give a false colour to their thoughts who dare not unfold them openly. After the manner of the censor’s rolls, then, the Arian heresy is not discovered by name, but marked out by the condemnation pronounced, in order that he who is curious and eager to hear it should be preserved from falling by knowing that it is condemned already, before he hears, it set forth to the end that he should believe.

1896 (historical English edition; transcription printing date uncertain) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

An allusion to the practice of the nota censoria. The censors, under the Republic, were vested with the power of appointing properly qualified citizens to vacancies in the Senate, and it was their duty to make up the roll of senators for each lustrum, or period of five years. Exclusion from the Senate was simply effected by omitting a senator’s name from the new list, and senators so “unseated” were called præteriti, since their names had been passed over and not read out with the rest. The decrees of the Fathers of the Church laid down, as it were, the qualification for membership: all who came under the description established by these decrees were regarded as admitted—whilst those who, like the Arians, did not were tacitly excluded. Or we might say that the Anathema, appended to the Nicene symbol, excluded the Arians, not by name, but by description. In either way, the exclusion was tacit, like the censorial, in so far as no names were mentioned. In the case of exclusion from the Senate by the censors, it was understood that the reason for exclusion was grave immorality.

Editorial footnote · Exposition of the Christian Faith, Chapter XVIII., editorial note cite_note-2 · Original source

Read the surrounding source paragraph

119. So, indeed, following the guidance of the Scriptures, our fathers declared, holding, moreover, that impious doctrines should be included in the record of their decrees, in order that the unbelief of Arius should discover itself, and not, as it were, mask itself with dye or face-paint. For they give a false colour to their thoughts who dare not unfold them openly. After the manner of the censor’s rolls, then, the Arian heresy is not discovered by name, but marked out by the condemnation pronounced, in order that he who is curious and eager to hear it should be preserved from falling by knowing that it is condemned already, before he hears, it set forth to the end that he should believe.

1896 (historical English edition; transcription printing date uncertain) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

The Council of Ariminum (Rimini on the Adriatic coast of Italy) was held in 359 a.d., Constantius being Emperor. “The Bishops who attended the Council of Ariminum,” observes Hurter, “to the number of more than 400, informed the Emperor that they had resolved to allow no change in what had been determined upon at Nicæa. This is the ‘first confession.’ That great confession, however, was not maintained for long. Partly overawed by the Emperor, partly deceived by the Arians, the Bishops agreed to strike out the words ‘substance’ and ‘consubstantial.’ After this came the ‘correction,’ which Ambrose calls the ‘second,’ being made either by those Bishops who, recognizing their error, withdrew the decrees of the Council held at Ariminum, or by the Councils that followed—namely, the Councils of Alexandria (presided over by Athanasius), of Paris (362 a.d.), and of Rome (held under Pope Damasus, in a.d. 369).”

Editorial footnote · Exposition of the Christian Faith, Chapter XVIII., editorial note cite_note-6 · Original source

Read the surrounding source paragraph

122. This also was the teaching of the First Confession in the Council of Ariminum, and of the Second Correction, after that Council. Of the Confession, the letter sent to the Emperor Constantine beareth witness, and the Council that followed declares the Correction.