Preface.

...swine, scoundrels, and other titles of that kind, overwhelming them with a storm-cloud and hail of violent speech. Athanasius, Nazianzen Gregory of Nazianzus (c. 329–390), a prominent theologian and Archbishop of Constantinople., Basil, Jerome, and others may have done this; they openly maligned those who spoke against their teachings with sharp orations and denunciations steliteuticis From the Greek steliteutikos, referring to a speech intended to publicly shame or "pillar" someone., and exposed them to public disgrace, even though these men were otherwise full of virtues and sometimes commanded respect through their imperial dignity. Those great heroes of immortal memory in the age of our fathers A reference to the leaders of the Protestant Reformation. may have done the same, whose works God was pleased to use to drive away the thickest fog of ignorance and superstition.

For my part, I prefer to blame that harshness of words on the faults of the era and the temperament of those men (for no matter how holy they were, they were still only human) and to forgive it in light of their other great virtues, rather than to use the example of the prophets, the apostles, or even Christ himself to justify it or recommend it for imitation; original Latin/German: in seiner oration, de theologo modesto, welche sich bey dem andern tomo seiner miscellaneorum sacrorum befindet, p. 915. Translated: In his oration, On the Modest Theologian, found in the second volume of his Sacred Miscellanies, p. 915.

But even if these and other faults and abuses—especially the tendency to fall into useless wars of words and academic bickering—are frequently connected with polemical theology polemical theology The branch of theology concerned with defending specific doctrines and refuting opposing views., or are found among those who [set] themselves before others...