persecutions from Nero to Diocletian and points to the miserable deaths of
the tyrannical Emperors as a just chastisement for their cruelties.
Lactantius died soon afterward 317, the exact time and place being
unknown.
Extracts
The Divine Institutions (Inter 304-310 AD):
4, 13, 1
“He was made both Son of God in the spirit and Son of man in the flesh: that is,
both God and man.”
4, 29, 3
“When we speak of God the Father and of God the Son, we do not speak of them as
diverse, nor do we separate them from each other; for without the Son the Father
cannot be; nor separated from the Father, can the Son be. Indeed, without the Son,
the Father cannot be so named, nor can the Son be generated without the
Father…both have one mind, one spirit, one substance.”
4, 30, 11
“Whether they be called Phrygians, or Novatians, or Valentinians, or Marcionites,
or Anthropians, or whatever else, having lost the name of Christ, they have ceased
to be Christians, and have put on human and foreign names…It is therefore, the
Catholic Church alone which retains true worship. This is the fountain of truth;
this, the domicile of faith; this, the temple of God. Whoever does not enter there or
whoever does not go out from here, he is a stranger to the hope of life and
salvation...Because, however, all the various groups of heretics are confident that
they are the Christians, and think that theirs is the Catholic Church, let it be
known: that is the true Church, in which there is confession and penance, and
which takes a salubrious care of the sins and wounds to which the weak flesh is
subject.”
6, 23, 33
“Lest anyone think that he can circumvent the divine commands, these points are
added in order to remove all occasion of chicanery or deceit: he is an adulterer,
who married a woman divorced from her husband, or who divorced a wife on
account of any crime except adultery, so that he might marry another; for God did
not wish the body to be broken and torn apart.”
7, 21, 3
“The Holy writings teach us, however, that the impious are to be given
punishments. Because they committed sins in their bodies, they will again be
 |
 |
 |