A Source Book for Ancient Church History - Mirrors

537whom I have already mentioned, who, after he had translatedinto Latin above seventy of the books of Origen, which he calledHomilies, and also a certain number of the tomes written on theApostle [the Epistles of St. Paul], since a number of offensivepassages are to be found in the Greek, eliminated and purged,in his translation, all of them, so that the Latin reader will findnothing in these which jar on our faith. Him, therefore, wefollow, not indeed with the power of his eloquence, but as faras we can in his rules and methods: that is, taking care not to [490]promulgate those things which in the books of Origen are foundto be discrepant and contradictory one to the other. The causeof these variations I have set forth fully in the apology whichPamphilus wrote for the books of Origen, to which is appendeda short treatise showing how proofs which, as I judge, are quiteclear in his books have in many cases been falsified by hereticaland evil-disposed persons.(f) Augustine, Ep. 73, Ch. 8. (MSL, 33:249.)The attempt of Augustine to bring about a reconciliationbetween Rufinus and Jerome. Jerome had written someaffectionate words to Augustine to which he alludes in thebeginning of the following passage:When, by these words, now not only yours but also mine, I amgladdened and refreshed, and when I am comforted not a littleby the desire of both of us for mutual fellowship, which has beensuspended and is not satisfied, suddenly I am pierced through bythe darts of keenest sorrow when I consider that between you [i.e.,Rufinus and Jerome] (to whom God granted in fullest measureand for a long time that which both of us have longed for, thatin closest and most intimate fellowship you tasted together thehoney of Holy Scriptures) such a blight of bitterness has brokenout, when, where, and in whom it was not to be feared, since it