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It is a deplorable loss to Catholic reading that ‘The Library of the Fathers', the classic series of translations edited by Pusey, Keble and Newman should have been allowed to remain unfinished and long out of print. Moreover, it is already more than a century since these vernacular versions first appeared, and they have never been surpassed: fine scholarship and loving care alike went to their making, and when we pray for England's return to the Faith, the re-availability in our language of that patristic literature whose istudy birmght the greatest of English converts into the Church should be covered by our intention.
Among the first members of the series, in 1839 to be exact, there appeared the ‘Treatises of Saint Cyprian' the third-century bishop and martyr of Carthage, to be followed in due course by the companion volume of his Epistles.
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- Copyright © 1949 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
References
1 See Newman et Us Peres by Denys Gorce (Editions du Cerf, 1933), a charming contribution to the literature of Newman, written to commemorate the centenary of the Oxford Movement's starting-point, when the first of the ‘Tracts for the Times’ was launched on September 9, 1833
2 In a letter from Newman to Mrs Mozley, dated Jan. 9, 1839, he writes: ‘I think you will be much interested in parts of the forthcoming volume of St Cyprian. ‘The Treatises on Mortality, on Patience, on Envy, to Demelruums and on The Lord's Prayer are especially touching’ (Correspondence, Vol. II, p. 278).
3 ‘Library of the Fathers’ Vol. III, Part I (Parker. Oxford, 1830).
4 The Style and Language of St Cyprian, by E. W. Watson of St John's College, Oxford. (Studio Biblica et Ecclesiastica Vol. IV. Clarendon Press, 1892).
5 Le Latin de Saint Cyprien (Paris, 1902).
6 Newman made himself responsible for the Preface and supposedly for the English version of Pontius: the rest of the translation was the work of the Rev. C. Thornton, of Christ Church, Oxford. To the Epistles Pusey contributed a longer introduction, containing some fine writing, the translation being due to the Rev. H. Carey, of Worcester College.
7 Appended to the Life of St Cyprian by Donald Attwater in Butler's Lives of the Saints (New Edition) is a useful note by Fr Thurston, S.J.: The Letters of St Cyprian, a brief notice in the De Viris Illustribus of St Jerome, the ‘Passion’ of ‘he Saint, and a brief biographical sketch ascribed to his deacon, Pontius, form the main sources of our information. Harnack in Vol. XXXIX of Texte und Vntersuchenegen has devoted a paper to Das Leben Cyprianus von Pontius, and describes Jt as the earliest Christian biography in existence. Reigenstein, on the other hand, in the Heidelberg Siztenberichte, Phil. Hist. Klasse, 1913, takes a less favourable view. For him it is unimportant as a historical source. See upon the whole matter Pere Delehaye: Les Passions de Martyres et lies Genres Itteraires (1921) pp. 82-104. If Delehaye is right we cannot even describe the so-called ‘Proconsular Acts’ of St Cyprian as ‘an unique record of the trials of a martyr in all its authenticity and purity’ (Attwater). Trustworthy as the document may be, it is not an exact copy of the official record.
8 Entitled by Mr Thornton ‘On the Grace of God1. Migne (t IV, col. 206) places Ad Donatum with the Epistles, not with the Treatises.
9 See Library of the Fathers, Vol. Ill, Pt. i, p. 3 and Confessions of St Angustine, especially Bk. VIII, Ch. xi.
10 Hartel's index to the Vienna Corpus edition of St Cyprian's writings contains Upwards of a hundred and thirty references to Baptism.
11 In Tertullien et Saint Cyprien (Textes et Commentaires—Gabalda, 1930), a valuable book of selections and his latest contribution to the literature of St Cyprian, Canon Bayard reproduces the Ad Donatum in toto.
12 pp. 177 ff. Quotations, unless otherwise stated, are from the Library of the Fathers edition. The Latin text used is Hartel, Vienna Corpus edition in 3 vols. I, Treatises, II. Letters, III. Index and spurious works.
13 Migne has a note on this, in the course of which he quotes St Augustine (Ep. ad Vaterianum). Legimns ei.i eliam lihrnm beati.isimi martyris Cypriani de Orat- Dom., et ostendimus quemadmodum docuerit omnia quae ad mores nostros pertinent, quibus recte vivamus, a Patre nostro qui in coelis est exposcenda, tie de libero praesumentes arbitrio a divina gratia decidamus.
14 d'Ales: La Theolngie de Saiyit Cyprien (Paris, 1022) says in effect that obviously Cyprian had Tertullian before him in penning this treatise, but that his (1) insistence on the social character of Christian prayer, (2) on the filial attitude of the child of God, (3) the necessity of Grace for sanctification. (4) the teaching on the twofold purpose of temptation, and finally (5) the insistence on daily Communion, are peculiar to Cyprian.
15 Donald Attwater in the new Alban Butler (Vol. IX, p. 204) quotes St Jerome's well-known anecdote: ‘He particularly delighted in the writings of his countryman Tertullian, scarce passed a day without reading something in them, and when he wanted them used to say: “Reach hither my Master”.'
16 Pontius describes a tumultuous crowd gathered about a large open space and people climbing trees in order to see his execution by beheading.
17 See Mgr. Freppel: Saint Cyprjen IV lecon, p. 81 for a striking passage concerning that mountain which in a sense Cyprian never left. Bossuet was an admirer of the panoramic image and made use of it especially in his sermon ‘Sur la lot de Dieu'.
18 See d'Ales, op. cit., in which it is pointed that among all his prophetic visions (cf. following note) there was one thing of which St Clyprian never dreamt—a Christian Empire. He took the text ‘My kingdom is not of this world’ with entire literalness, his outlook on his own age was frankly pessimistic, his whole purpose ro turn souls towards their eternal destiny.
19 In many passages throughout his writings St Cyprian makes it seem quite natural that he should learn of God in dreams and visions, taking them for granted M himself and others with Scriptural simplicity and referring those who think somnia ridicula et visiones ineptas to the case of Joseph (Ep. 66. p. 207). See also Hartel 520, 6:309, 2:497, 10:498, 9, 15:582:651:734 and Vita 12 and 13.
20 On St Cyprian and the Eucharist read especially Ep. 68, pp. 81 ff. and see d'Ales, op. cit. p. 270: Les, textes eucharistiques de G. abondent en indications concretes riches de sens et de doctrine, and p. 249: une doctrine non pas achevee mais cohirente. On the morrow of his conversion he said to Donatus: Penuria esse nulla jam poterit, cum semel pectus caelestis sagina saturaverit; his allusions supply much valuable evidence to third-century Eucharistic practice, and while employing no technical term, not even the word Eucharist itself, his faith in the. Real Presence is attested by the vivid expressions by which he refers to it: Corpus Dni, Sctum Dni. Corpus, Corpus Xsti, Caro Xsti, Sctum Dni, Cibus Xsti, Cibus caelesti, Panis coelestis, etc.
21 ‘In peace He will give to the conquerors a white crown, according to our works, in persecution a purple crown once and again of our passion’ (p. 249). ‘Let them win a crown either white with good works or purple with suffering. In the heavenly army both peace and war have their garlands wherewith the soldier of Christ may be crowned for victory’ (Ep.p. 23). Migne supplies in a footnote the following from St Jerome: Non solum enim effusio sanguinis in confessions reputatur, sed devotee quoque mentis servitus immaculata quotidianum martyrium est. Illa corona de rosis et violis plectitur, ista de Uliis (Hieron. in Epitaphio Paulae ad Eustochium).
22 See d'Ales, op. cit. pp. 368-369.
23 Cf. Paul Moneeaux: Saint Cyprien (third edition, 1927), especially chapters IV and V.
24 See E. W. Watson: op. cit., in which Cyprian's ‘highly-coloured rhetoric', his invariable use of two words in preference to one, his ‘extraordinary abundance of adjectives', his alliterations, rhymes, rhythmical endings to periods, etc., meet with full if not favourable analysis. Ch. I concludes with the following cogent remark: ‘It is recognised now that the older scholars were wrong in classing together all the Christian authors as writers of ecclesiastical Latin. No such Latin existed till the monasteries were established and the great Fathers had written. And there is no author to whose style the tenn can be less appropriately applied than Cyprian'.
25 The exception proving the rule is his quaint application of Noah's drunkenness to the Eucharist (Ep. p. 183).
26 'L'empreinte mise par Cyprien sur la theologie occidentale, est si profonde qu'un volume ne serait pas trop pour la digager’ (d'Ales, op. cit. p. xii).
27 See Moneeaux, op. cit.
28 See V. L . Kennedy: The Saints of the Canon of the Mass (Home, 1938).
29 Consult Butler's Scti Bcnedicti Monasterium Rcguba (Herder, 2nd ed. 1927).
30 Watson (op. cit.) considers the piling up of synonyms an African trait. (Yet Tertullian is most concise). Sometimes in reading Cyprian one is reminded of later spiritual writers whose redundancy, notably in the case of Barbanson and Fr Baker, is only rendered tolerable by skilful abridgment.
31 St Gregory. Dialogues. Bk. 2, Ch. 38
32 See St Aug. Serm. 312. In Nat. Cypr. M.
33 protestant controversy has made and kept Cyprian's relations with the Holy See and his position on the Baptism of Heretics the most prominent subjects remembered about him. Their total omission from this short sketch may perhaps be oxcused by the following quotation from the treatise: De Catholicac Ecclesiae Unitate: Quae si quis consideret et examinet, tractatu longe atque argumentis opus non est. Probatio est ad fidem facilis compendio veritatis … tu es Petrus et super hanc petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam (Hartel I, 212).
34 ibid. Vol. III, Part II (1844).