OF

QUINTUS SEPT. FLOR. TERTULLIANUS.

VOLUME II.

TRANSLATED BY

PETER HOLMES, D.D., F.R.A.S.,

DOMESTIC CHAPLAIN TO THE RIGHT HON. THE COUNTESS OF ROTHES.

EDINBURGH:

T. & T. CLARK, 38, GEORGE STREET.

MDCCCLXX.

LATE LORD BISHOP OF GIBRALTAR, AND FORMERLY BISHOP OF
GLASGOW AND GALLOWAY.

MY DEAR LORD,

In one of our conversations last summer, you were kind enough to express an interest in this publication, and to favour me with some valuable hints on my own share in it. It gives me therefore great pleasure to inscribe your honoured name on the first page of this volume.

I avail myself of this public opportunity of endorsing, on my own account, the high opinion which has long been entertained of your excellent volumes on "The Epistles" and "The Gospels."

Recalling to mind, as I often do, our pleasant days at Pennycross and Mannamead, I remain, my dear Lord, very faithfully yours,

MANNAMEAD, March 10, 1870.

PETER HOLMES.

PREFACE.

HIS volume contains all Tertullian's polemical works (placed in his second volume by Oehler,

whose text we have followed), with the exception

of the long treatise Against Marcion, which has already formed a volume of this series, and the Adversus Judæos, which, not to increase the bulk of the present volume, will appear among the Miscellaneous Tracts.

For the scanty facts connected with our author's life, and for some general remarks on the importance and the style of his writings, the reader is referred to the Introduction of our translation of the Five Books against Marcion.

The treatises which comprise this volume will be found replete with the vigorous thought and terse expression which always characterize Tertullian.

Brief synopses are prefixed to the several treatises, and headings are supplied to the chapters: these, with occasional notes on difficult passages and obscure allusions, will, it is hoped, afford sufficient aid for an intelligent perusal of these ancient writings, which cannot fail to be interesting alike to the theologian and the general reader,—full as they are of reverence for revealed truth, and at the same time of independence of judgment, adorned with admirable variety and fulness of knowledge, genial humour, and cultivated imagination.

P. H.