THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
as he quotes incidentally from Justin's treatise against Marcion and from a polemical poem directed against Marcus.
Of a considerable number of other works of Irenaeus what is known is gathered from scattered citations in Eusebius and others. They 3. Other may be briefly enumerated as follows: Writings. (1) An admonition to Florinus "On the Divine Sovereignty, or God not the Author of Evil," written when Florinus was still in the communion of the Church, for he is warned that his teachings are irreconcilable with its doctrine, and that " not even heretics outside the Church have ventured to assert such things." (2) A " Treatise on the Ogdoad," occasioned by Florinus, but not addressed to him. The loss of this work is specially regrettable, since Irenaeus seems in it to have dwelt in detail on his relation to the first post-apostolic generation. (3) An epistle to a certain Blastus in Rome " On Schism." According to the pseudo- Tertullian this man was a Quartodeciman, according to Pacian a Greek by birth and a Montanist. (4) Among, or connected with, the letters which Irenaeus wrote to various bishops at the time of the paschal controversy may be placed that which, according to a Syriac fragment, " he wrote to an Alexandrian, showing that it was right to celebrate the feast of the Resurrection on Sunday." (5) The letter to Victor of Rome concerning this same controversy. (6) A letter " On Faith " to Demetrius, a deacon of Vienne. (7) According to Eusebius (v. 26), an apology, addressed to the Greeks, " On Knowledge." (8) A treatise, mentioned in Eusebius, Hist, eccl., V xxvi., dedicated to a certain Marcianus, possibly the author of the Martyrium Polycarpi, on the apostolic preaching. [This work, which is of the nature of a dogmatic discussion of the apostolic teaching, and is quite an extensive work, has been discovered in Armenian translation in the Church of the Mother of God in Eriwan, and edited with German translation by Ter-Mekerttschian and Ter-Minassiantz in TU, xxxi. 1 (1907). The manuscript dates from the second half of the thirteenth century, and contains about two-thirds of the entire work. From what language the translation was made is not clear, but Syriac is indicated.] (9) A book of various discourses.
(10) Oecumenius gives an extract from a work in which Irenaeus is supposed to relate the martyrdom of Sanctus and Blandina. Allowing for a confusion of Blandina and Biblias, this agrees with the letter of the church of Lyons on the martyrdoms of 177, of which he may well have been the author, though Eusebius (V., xiv.-xix. 25) did not think it necessary to mention the fact.
(11) A treatise against the theory that matter is eternal. The exposition of Canticles, of which a Syriac fragment exists, is of doubtful authenticity, while the four fragments published in 1715 by Pfaff, chancellor of Tubingen, have been finally shown by Harnack to be forgeries of Pfaff's. It is not known whether Irenaeus carried out his intention (expressed III., xii. 12) of writing a special treatise against Marcion.
The extent and variety of the interests of which a glimpse has been given renders it impossible to
attempt here a complete exposition of the theology
and church polity of Irenaeus. It is unfortunate
that, outside of scanty fragments, only
4. His a single polemical work of his is Theology extant, and that for the most part
and Polity, not in the original. Here he appears as a stout defender of church doctrine against Gnosticism^ If he is compared with the other members of the school to which he belonged, with Papias or with Polycarp, the manner appears striking in which he combines with firm adhesion to the faith of these simple men a remarkable accessibility to the most varied elements of culture that were within his reach. He makes no parade of secular learning; he declines to be a teacher of " barbaric philosophy " like other apologists from Aristides to Clement; but he surpasses them all in soundness of judgment, acuteness of perception, and clearness of exposition. In fact, he is the first writer of the post-apostolic period who deserves the title of a theologian. In pure theology he stands far above Athanasius and Cyril, and can be compared only with Origen and Augustine. The balanced security of his attitude is remarkable. When the Phrygian peasants disturbed first the scene of his early years, and then the whole Church with their fanatical prophecies and their preaching of a gloomy penance, he did not lose his head. In union with the Church of Lyons and its imprisoned confessors, he warned Eleutherus of Rome not to condemn without examination a religious movement which linked itself to the age of the apostles by valuable inheritances. When the Alogi, in opposition to Montanism, attempted to banish from the Church all prophecy, and the Apocalypse with it, he took a firm stand against them; but he did not become a Montanist. Again, in his judgment of the pagan polity, he did not desert the line marked out by Christ himself and by Paul, and followed (as he points out) by John in the Apocalypse. The Roman Empire is to him no more Antichrist than the world and the flesh necessarily belong to the devil. As a practical churchman he was no less admirable than as a theologian. His sermons are lost; but that a collection of them should have
5. His been in existence 150 years after his Position death is enough to show that he de-
as a serves a prominent place in the history Practical of homiletics. He learned Celtic in Church- order to speak to the heathen about man. Lyons, and thus has a place also in the history of missionary effort. His devotion to the immediate duties of his restricted and outlying diocese did not prevent him from having much at heart the welfare of the Church at large, from feeling at home in Rome or Ephesus. His evident love for the ancient Church of his native home did not blind him to the special significance and vocation of the Church at Rome, based upon the position and history of the city. In the paschal controversy he deserted the traditional custom of the Church of his boyhood, because he saw that the Western practise was more appropriate to the essential center-point of the Easter celebration; but he stood out firmly against over-emphasizing such differences, and against the combined ignorance