Arnobius

Footnotes

^[4624] This corresponds exactly to the English, “to shoot at the pigeon and hit the crow.”

^[4625] Lit., “with vicarious substitution for.” [A very pertinent question as to the images worshipped in Rome to this day. There is one Madonna of African hue and features. See also Murray’s Handbook, Italy, p. 72.]

^[4626] The ms. reads effi-gitur, corrected as above, effin., in all edd. except Hild., who reads efficitur—“is made,” and Stewechius, effigiatur—“is formed.”

^[4627] Lit., “boy’s age.”

^[4628] Flavus, so invariably associated with blue eyes, that though these are the feature brought into contrast, they are only suggested in this way, and not directly mentioned—a mode of speech very characteristic of Arnobius.

^[4629] i.e., a fact which can be seen to be true by appealing to analogy.

^[4630] So the ms., LB., Hild., and Oehler, reading donastis, the others donatis—“you give.”

^[4631] As the appearance of the moon is the same in some of its phases as in others, it is clear that Arnobius cannot mean that it has thirty distinct forms. We must therefore suppose that he is either speaking very loosely of change upon change day after day, or that he is referring to some of the lunar theories of the ancients, such as that a new moon is created each day, and that its form is thus ever new (Lucr., v. 729–748).

^[4632] Lit., “is changed through a thousand states with daily instability.”

^[4633] Lit., “are.”

^[4634] Lit., “intestine and domestic.”

^[4635] The ms. reads leon-e-s torvissimam faciem, emended, as above, leonis t. f., in LB., Orelli, Hild., and Oehler, and l. torvissima facie—“lions of very stern face,” in the others. Nourry supposes that the reference is to the use of lions, or lion-headed figures, as architectural ornaments on temples (cf. the two lions rampant surmounting the gate of Mycenæ), but partially coincides in the view of Elm., that mixed figures are meant, such as are described by Tertullian and Minucius Felix (ch. 28: “You deify gods made up of a goat and a lion, and with the faces of lions and of dogs”). The epithet frugifer, however, which was applied to the Egyptian Osiris, the Persian Mithras, and Bacchus, who were also represented as lions, makes it probable that the reference is to symbolic statues of the sun.

^[4636] Lit., “such a god to whose form and appearance the likeness of this image has been directed.”

^[4637] Lit., “that.”

^[4638] The ms. and both Roman edd. read unintelligibly sanquineo decotoro, for which s. de colore, as above, has been suggested by Canterus, with the approval of Heraldus.

^[4639] The ms. here inserts puetuitate, for which no satisfactory emendation has been proposed. The early edd. read pituitate, a word for which there is no authority, while LB. gives potus aviditate—“drunk with avidity”—both being equally hopeless.

^[4640] ms. sic, corrected by Gelenius si.

^[4641] So Meursius, ac dicere, for ms. -cidere.

Chapter XI

^[4642] It is worthy of notice that although in this passage, as often elsewhere, Arnobius adheres pretty closely to the argument proposed by Clemens Alexandrinus, he even in such passages sometimes differs from it, and not at random. Thus Clement speaks merely of a “stone,” and Arnobius of an “unshaped stone.” The former expression harmonizes with the words of Maximus Tyrius (Serm., xxxviii. p. 225, Steph.), “The Arabians worship I know not whom, but the image which I saw was a square stone;” while Suidas (Küster’s ed., s.v. θεὺς ῎Αρης) agrees with Arnobius in calling it a “stone, black, square, unfashioned” (ἀτύπωτος). This is the more noteworthy, as at times Arnobius would almost seem to be following Clement blindly. [See Clement, cap. iv. vol. ii. p. 184, this series.]

^[4643] So Arnobius renders Clement’s Cithæronian Hera.

^[4644] So corrected in the notes of Canterus from Clem. for the ms. reading Carios, retained by the first four edd. and Elmenh. In Icaria there was a temple of Diana called Ταυροπόλιον.

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