Gregory Thaumaturgus

Footnotes

Introductory Note to Gregory Thaumaturgus.

^[220] The text is, ἢ κακῶν ἂν ἔλεγον, etc. The Greek ἤ and the Latin aut are found sometimes thus with a force bordering on that of alioqui.

^[221] ἀφραίνομεν. The Paris editor would read ἀφραίνω μέν.

Argument XI.—Origen is the First and the Only One that Exhorts Gregory to Add to His Acquirements the Study of Philosophy, and Offers Him in a Certain Manner an Example in Himself. Of Justice, Prudence, Temperance, and Fortitude. The Maxim, Know Thyself.

^[222] ἀλλὰ γὰρ πᾶσι μέχρι ῥημάτων τὸ φιλοσοφεῖν στήσασιν.

^[223] The text is, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπεὶ ἀλήθειαν ἡμῖν, οὐ κομψείαν ἐπηγγείλατο ὁ λόγος ἄνωθεν. The Latin rendering is, sed quia veritatem nobis, non pompam et ornatum promisit oratio in exordio.

^[224] The text is, καίτοι γε εἰπεῖν ἐθέλων εἶναι τε ἀληθές. Bengal takes the τε as pleonastic, or as an error for the article, τ᾽ ἀληθές. The εἶναι in ἐθέλων εἶναι he takes to be the use of the infinitive which occurs in such phrases as τὴν πρώτην εἶναι, initio, ἑκὼν εἶναι, libenter, τὸ δὲ νῦν εἶναι, nunc vero, etc.; and, giving ἐθέλων the sense of μέλλων, makes the whole = And yet I shall speak truth.

^[225] The text is, καὶ ἡμᾶς ἑτέρους. The phrase may be, as it is given above, a delicate expression of difference, or it may perhaps be an elegant redundancy, like the French à nous autres. Others read, καὶ ἡμᾶς καὶ ἑτέρους.

^[226] The reading in the text gives, οὐ λόγων ἐγκρατεῖς καὶ ἐπιστήμονας τῶν περὶ ὁρμῶν, τῶν δὲ ὁρμῶν αὐτῶν· ἐπὶ τὰ ἔργα καὶ λόγους ἄγχων, etc. Others would arrange the whole passage differently, thus: περὶ ὁρμῶν, τῶν δὲ ὁρμῶν αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τὰ ἔργα καὶ τοὺς λόγους ἄγχων. Καὶ, etc. Hence Sirmondus renders it, a motibus ipsis ad opera etiam sermones, reading also ἄγων apparently. Rhodomanus gives, impulsionum ipsarum ad opera et verba ignavi et negligentes, reading evidently ἀργῶν. Bengel solves the difficulty by taking the first clause as equivalent to οὐ λόγων ἐγκρατεῖς καὶ ἐπιοτήμονας…αὐτῶν τῶν ὁρμῶν ἐγκρατεῖς καὶ ἐπιστήμονας. We have adopted this as the most evident sense. Thus ἄγχων is retained unchanged, and is taken as a parallel to the following participle ἐπιφέρων, and as bearing, therefore, a meaning something like that of ἀναγκάζων. See Bengel’s note in Migne.

^[227] θεωρίᾳ.

^[228] διὰ τὴν ἰδιοπραγίαν τῆς ψυχῆς, perhaps just “the private life.”

^[229] ἑαυτοῖς τε καὶ τοῖς προσιοῦσιν.

^[230] The text is, τὸ πρὸς ἑαυτὴν εἶναι. Migne proposes either to read ἑαυτούς, or to supply τὴν ψυχήν.

^[231] ὃ δὴ καὶ δαιμόνων τῷ μαντικωτάτῳ ἀνατίθεται.

^[232] σωφροσύνην, σώαν τινὰ φρόνησιν, an etymological play.

^[233] ἐπιτηδεύσεσιν.

Argument XII.—Gregory Disallows Any Attainment of the Virtues on His Part. Piety is Both the Beginning and the End, and Thus It is the Parent of All the Virtues.

^[234] The text is, οὐδὲ τῷ τυχεῖν. Migne suggests οὐδέ τῷ θέμις τυχεῖν = nor is it legitimate for any one to attain them.

^[235] The text is, ὑπομονῆς ἡμῶν. Vossius and others omit the ἡμῶν. The Stuttgart editor gives this note: “It does not appear that this should be connected by apposition with ἀνδρείας (manliness). But Gregory, after the four virtues which philosophers define as cardinal, adds two which are properly Christian, viz., patience, and that which is the hinge of all—piety.”

^[236] The word is προήγορον. It may be, as the Latin version puts it, familiaris, one in fellowship with God.

^[237] ἐξομοιώθητι προσελθεῖν. Others read ἐξομοιωθέντα προσελθεῖν.

Argument XIII.—The Method Which Origen Used in His Theological and Metaphysical Instructions. He Commends the Study of All Writers, the Atheistic Alone Excepted. The Marvellous Power of Persuasion in Speech. The Facility of the Mind in Giving Its Assent.

^[238] μηδὲν ἐκποιουμένους. Casaubon marks this as a phrase taken from law, and equivalent to, nihil alienum a nobis ducentes.

^[239] The text is, ἧς οἵονται. We render with Bengel. The Latin interpreter makes it = Even those who frequent the temples do not deem it consistent with religion to touch anything at all profane.

Argument XIV.—Whence the Contentions of Philosophers Have Sprung. Against Those Who Catch at Everything that Meets Them, and Give It Credence, and Cling to It. Origen Was in the Habit of Carefully Reading and Explaining the Books of the Heathen to His Disciples.

^[240] [The ultimate subjugation of Latin theology by Aristotelian philosophy, is a deplorable instance of what is here hinted at, and what Hippolytus has worked out. Compare Col. ii. 8.]

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