Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Vol. 10 (Ambrose: Select Works and Letters)

all the writings of St. Ambrose and consists of twenty-two addresses to the faithful, each address comprising one division of the Psalm. From various allusions, it would seem that the completed work dates from about A.D. 388.

14. Expositio Evangelii secundum Lucam. The ten books of this commentary consist likewise of sermons in which St. Ambrose explained the Gospel during a period of one or two years, in 386 and 387.

III. ETHICAL WRITINGS.

Among the ethical or moral writings of St. Ambrose, the first place is deservedly assigned to:
1. De Officiis Ministrorum. In three books, which are translated in this series.
2. De Virginibus. Three books concerning Virgins, addressed to his sister Marcellina in the year 377, probably, like most of the treatises of St. Ambrose, revised from addresses, the first of which was delivered on the festival of St. Agnes, January 21. This would seem to have been perhaps the very earliest of the writings of St. Ambrose, judging from the opening chapter. The treatise is referred to by St. Jerome, St. Augustine, Cassian, and others.
3. De Viduis. This shorter work, concerning Widows, was probably written not very long after the last mentioned treatise.
4. De Virginitate. A treatise on Virginity, the date of which cannot certainly be fixed, but the writing De Viduis is referred to in chapter 9.
5. De Institutione Virginis. A treatise on the training and discipline of a Virgin, addressed to Eusebius, either bishop or a noble of Bologna, after St. Ambrose had admitted his niece to the rank of Virgins, probably about A.D. 391 or 392.
6. Exhortatio Virginitatis. A commendation of Virginity preached on the occasion of the consecration of a church at Florence by St. Ambrose, A.D. 393 or 394.

IV. SERMONS AND ADDRESSES.

1. Contra Auxentium. A sermon against Auxentius, concerning giving up the basilicas to the Arians, usually inserted between the twenty-first and twenty-second of the letters of St. Ambrose.
2. De Excessu fratris Satyri. The two addresses on the occasion of the death of St. Ambrose’s brother Satyrus, translated in this volume.
3. De obitu Valentiniani Consolatio. The Emperor Valentinian having been murdered by Arbogastes, Count of Vienne, his body was brought to Milan, and remained two months unburied. At last Theodosius sent the necessary rescript, and at the funeral solemnities St. Ambrose delivered the address entitled the “Consolation.”
4. De obitu Theodosii oratio. A discourse delivered forty days after the death of the Emperor Theodosius before the Emperor Honorius at Milan.

V. THE LETTERS OF ST. AMBROSE.

The Benedictine Editors of St. Ambrose have divided his Epistles into two classes: the first comprising those to which they thought it possible to assign dates; the second those which afford no data for a conclusion. Probably in many cases the exact year is not so certain as the editors have made it appear, but they seem arranged in a fairly probable consecutive order.

1. To the Emperor Gratian, in reply to his request for a treatise on the Faith. Written A.D. 379, before August, as Gratian came to Milan in that month.
2. To Constantius, a bishop, on episcopal duties, and commending to him the care of the vacant see of Forum Cornelii, or Imola. Probably written about A.D. 379.
3, 4. To Cornelius, Bishop of Comum: the first a friendly letter, the second containing also an invitation to the consecration of a church by Bassianus, Bishop of Laus Pompeia, now Lodi Vecchio, near Milan. Written probably after A.D. 381.
5, 6. To Syagrius, Bishop of Verona. On a charge falsely brought against the Virgin Indicia. They may have been written A.D. 380.