Saint Jerome, Complete Works, Vol. I

it is for them, lest the fruit due to reading be intercepted. A man should not be considered to have borne a useless fruit of labor who has contributed all his strength to adorning a new edition from scratch, but rather one who has performed a task that yields utility and is most necessary for the benefit of scholars. Indeed, anyone who does not apply a completely drowsy mind will easily understand that editions elaborated up to this time are unrefined and incomplete. For although it is primarily useful and convenient to have at hand all the writings collected together that have proceeded from one and the same author, on the contrary, many things are missing from the Hieronymian of Jerome collections, and those are almost the most excellent of all, which it is necessary to repeat from other books of a different nature not without a grave waste of time, and to procure not without great expense. I say nothing of some items previously unpublished, of which nothing at all has been added to the Erasmian collection to this very day, whether because they were not searched for with sufficient anxiety in the libraries where they lay hidden at great cost to ecclesiastical affairs and literature, or because they escaped diligence. Indeed, the very things that have been reprinted more often, and are worn by the hands of students, are disfigured by very many flaws; and those who are well-versed in such studies know full well what a hindrance false readings and the errors of ancient scribes and recent critics are to the progress of readers. To these, many more difficult passages remain obscured by darkness to this day, and many others lead the reader astray, especially since there have been, and are in this latter age, people not entirely illiterate who dare to attribute to Jerome errors that he himself least of all admitted, and with the fault not yet purged and the slander not yet removed, they perhaps impose upon the common herd of the learned.

3. For what reasons we are undertaking a new edition. — I say these things so that no one may think I am recounting these inconveniences for the purpose of diminishing the praise of the most learned men who have labored in revising the writings of Jerome, since I myself experienced this at my own peril when, almost seven years ago, as a very young man, I was entirely devoted to their reading. Often, too, while speaking with learned men who are joined with me in a great society of studies in this very city, I pointed out not unsuccessfully, as it seemed to them, how passages that were by no means public could be restored and deficiencies supplied. From this, they encouraged me to undertake a new edition and to collect what was needed for it, especially when they discovered that in the libraries of Italy, copies of those works which had not been reprinted anywhere for nearly forty years were missing since the Parisian edition of the Benedictine Fathers; nor could they bear for those works to be transcribed without examination and study, which is the sordid laziness of some printers. However, to me as I was hesitating and weaving excuses upon excuses so as not to do this, there came the most illustrious archpriest of the Veronese church, Joannes Franciscus Musellius, who, in addition to other praises, adds an exceptional favor and kindness toward promoting literature and supporting the learned. He, not allowing such a useful proposal to be resolved into nothing, voluntarily promised that he would provide whatever was necessary, whether by advice, by wealth, by books, or by authority, and began to provide it immediately. He ordered me, and with the humanity that is his, he also vehemently encouraged me to take upon myself all the care of preparing the new edition; then those whom it concerned that Jerome should appear in splendid attire, or those who were touched by some concern for my affairs, were great advocates that I should not reject the assigned province. Thus, incited by their exhortations, and especially by the hope of that support, from which I trusted it would come to pass that no small benefit could accrue to the Church and to good literature, and light and ornament to the doctrine of the Holy Father, I did not hesitate to undertake such a burden, surely not equal to my own shoulders, but with a cheerful spirit. Indeed, it is my intention to assist the progress of students to the best of my ability, to whom, if we have been able to be of any benefit by this little work, we have most gladly devoted ourselves; if not, we shall have stirred the minds of more learned men to contribute better things.

4. The triple part of this preface. — Now, before I say what that labor is which I have proposed for myself in adorning this Sparta a reference to the proverb "Sparta is your portion; adorn it," meaning to do the best with the task one is given, some things must be stated more clearly about the ancient collections, both those that are preserved in manuscripts and others much more significant that have appeared since the art of printing; and it must be noted in a few words what others have accomplished before us. Then the character of the Hieronymian works themselves must be explained, and a knowledge of those that have actually perished must be sampled, and we must treat more fully of many other things which, by common judgment, are thought to have suffered the same fate, but which, to us, do not seem to have been labored over at all. For from this, perhaps, more light and utility will accrue to our edition, which evaluates and encompasses everything that is Hieronymian. Finally, we must briefly set forth what aids we have used, with what purpose, in what order, and by what method we have proceeded in the text and in our notes.

PART ONE. In which the manuscripts and printed collections are treated individually.

5. Manuscript collections of the works of Jerome. — It is almost peculiar to the Hieronymian writings that, as they were received most greedily, there were studious men at the very time they were being written who, without the author's knowledge, took care diligently that they be brought forth into public light. In our review, letter XLVIII to Pammachius, which the Holy Doctor inscribed for his own books against Jovinianus, most clearly testifies to this celebrity of his own works among the public, while he attributes it partly to the zeal of friends and partly to the envy of rivals: "I am not," he says, "of such good fortune as many of the writers of this time, that I can correct my trifles when I wish. As soon as I have written something, either my admirers or my enemies, with different zeal, indeed, but with equal contest, disseminate our work among the public." In the same sense elsewhere, which occurs not rarely, he either approves that what he had written should be made of public right, or (to use the phrasing and words of Quintilian, Proemium of Book I) he laments that it was published with the reckless honor of an edition. See on this matter the letter to Desiderius Erasmus.