Ecclesiastical History

original: EPISTOLA — A formal dedicatory letter common in early modern scholarly editions.

astical history attentively, would he not be immediately filled with shame, recognize his own error condemned therein, and weep for himself as a limb cut off from the rest of the body? For since Ecclesiastical History contains nothing else but the perpetual succession of the Apostolic sees, the series of Bishops succeeding one another in turn, and finally the illustrious struggles of the Doctors and Martyrs for the sake of piety—of whom some indeed overcame the fury of the Gentiles by the strength of their endurance, while others refuted by their writings the perverse dogmas of the heretics who had risen up against the Church—whoever among the heretics directs his eyes and mind to the reading of this history must necessarily confess that he is utterly alienated from that succession of the Apostles The tradition that church authority is derived through a continuous line of bishops beginning with the original Apostles., from that flock of Doctors and Martyrs, and finally from that communion of Bishops. For by those same successors of the Apostles, who still hold the same seats and Chairs original: Cathedras — The official seat of a bishop, representing his teaching authority. in which the Apostles once sat; by those very men who condemned the Novatians A 3rd-century sect that refused to readmit Christians who had lapsed during persecution. and Donatists A North African sect that argued the validity of sacraments depended on the moral purity of the priest. and the followers of Artemon A 3rd-century teacher who denied the divinity of Christ., they understand their own error to be condemned by a similar judgment. It is therefore right that they should be ashamed of their error and novelty, whenever they behold in Ecclesiastical History, as if in a mirror, the truth and antiquity that stand opposed to the error and novelty of their own dogmas. And let these things be said in passing concerning the chief utility of Ecclesiastical History, for the sake of which especially the care of this new edition was entrusted to me by you.

Nor indeed have you consulted only the advantages of the Church, but also the wishes of all the learned by this edition, many of whom were hitherto deterred from reading our Eusebius, partly by the faults and defects of the Greek text, and partly by the errors of the Latin translators. And lest anyone should perhaps think that this was said by me for the sake of diminishing the glory of others or of praising my own work, I will here set down the testimony of a most learned man, who eighty years ago passed the same judgment on the Greek edition of Eusebius and on the Latin translators. He is Jean Curterius Jean Curterius (c. 1540–1590) was a French classical scholar and translator., who, in the Epistle he prefixed to the Paris edition, addresses Jean de La Rochefoucauld original: Joannem Rupefucaldium — A prominent French Cardinal and reformer (1558–1645). in these words:

“If into that history of the Greek Ecclesiastical authors...”