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The DoNATisTs. 553
CHAP. LXVII.
THE DONATISTS.
I. DonatuSy bishop of Curthage. II. A hrief' history of the
Donatists : 1. The f/roiaul oj' the controversy between
them and the catholics. 2. The rise and occasion of the
controversy. 3. Their mimhers. 4. Their persecutions.
III. Donatist writers: 1. J]nonymous author of the Acts
of Saturninns and others. 2. Cresconius. 3. Gaudentius.
4. Macrobins. 5. Parmenian. (). Petilian. 7. Tichom7ts.
8. Vitellius. IV. Their testimony to the scrip-
tures.
I. SAYS Jeroni, ' Donatus/ from whom sprang the Dona-
* tists in Africa, in the time of the** emperors Constantius aud
' Constantine,assertino-, that the scriptures had been betrayed
' to the heathen by our people in the time of the persecution,
* by his plausible speeches deceived almost all Africa, espe-
' cially Numidia. There are extant many small Morks of
' his in support of his own heresy, and a book of the Holy
' Spirit, agreeable to the Arian doctrine.'
I shall now transcribe likewise a part of Augustine's
article in his book of Heresies concerning- the Donatists,
with whom certainly he was well acquainted. I put it down
here, as it has some account of this Donatus, the second
bishop of the party at Carthage, and as a foundation of
farther remarks hereafter.
nils tunc ejus subdiaconus fuerit, et cum illo tradiderit proferens inslrumenta
dominica, etiam quae diligentissirae fuerant occultata, capitulatam argenteam,
et lucemam argenteam. Ep. 53. n. 4.
* Donatus, a quo Donatiani, per Africam sub Constantio Constantinoque
principibus asserens a nostris scripturas in persccutione ethnicis traditas, totam
pene Africam, et maxime Numidiam, sua persuasione decepit. Exstant ejus
multa ad suam haeresim pertinentia opuscula, et de Spiritu Sancto liber Ariano
dogmati congruens. De V. I. cap. 93.
'' * In the times of the emperors Constantius and Constantine.'] Here are
various readings. Soplironius the Greek interpreter has only Constantius. In
Martianay's edition is ' sub Constanfe Constantinoque.' But I imagine the right
reading to be as above: and that by Constantius Jerom intends Constantine's
father ; the Donatian controversy having had its foundation in what happened
near the beginning of Dioclesian's persecution, during the reign of Constan-
tius.