I have not lost anything by staying out, for there were three holidays last week, and almost every exercise otherwise excused, and I have made amends by reading hard all the time I have stayed out. I have just finished the fourth volume of Gibbon, and
1 Herman Merivale, C.B., afterwards fellow of Balliol, 1827; Professor of Political Economy at Oxford, 1837; Permanent Undersecretary for the Colonies, 1848, for India, 1859. Brother to the present Dean of Ely. |
| 120 | MEMOIR OF REV. F. HODGSON. |
1 Harry Drury’s sister married Merivale. Their son was in his uncle’s house at Harrow. |
| GIBBON. THE ARIANS. THE MANICHEES. | 121 |
By far the most interesting fact to me, of the history, is that of the Arian controversy. For the review of the different sects and heresies written by a sceptic is necessarily impartial, although he employs the bitterness of his satire against all together. Before I read this I used to think that the Arian system had some affinity to the Unitarian of the present day; and indeed I do not trust thoroughly in Gibbon in his description of it. He speaks of it as the belief that the Son was a part of the Triune Deity, but that the Son and the Holy Ghost were reckoned as subservient to the Father. As I do not thoroughly trust in this explanation of what I never thoroughly understood, the creed of the Arian sect, I think I shall look into Mosheim’s ‘Ecclesiastical History’ for it. I should like to be directed to a good and impartial history of the various heresies that vary from the Catholic belief; it would be one of my most pleasing studies to me. Gibbon touches but lightly on the Manichees and philosophical sects. The extravagances of their belief appear to have chiefly consisted in speculative creeds, and originated in the uniting the Platonic system with the Christian faith.
| 122 | MEMOIR OF REV. F. HODGSON. |
Gibbon is exceedingly severe on the
animosity between the supporters of the
όμοούσιον of the Nicene Creed and
orthodox party, and the partisans of the Semi-Arian
όμοούσιον; and this difference of
a letter does certainly appear at first very ridiculous. But surely there can
be nothing more different than the ideas of consubstantiality and similarity,
which are the import of the two words, though I wish they could have invented
names which would seem to imply greater difference at first. The name of
όμοούσιον probably originated in
the compliance of a part of the Arian sect, and their wish to smooth the
difficulties which separated them from the Catholics; although the upshot was
very different. In one place he asserts that the Arians in adversity did not
probably display as much fortitude as the Homoousians, when the latter were in
subjection to their adversaries, because the Arians, who degraded the Son of
God, had not the same zeal and expectation of favour from Him as the Catholics,
who raised Him to equal dignity with the Father. But as this rests on mere
probability, none of the writings of Arians having been suffered to exist, I
should be disposed to reject the inference, particularly on recollecting that
the Dominicans of the fifteenth century, who rejected the Immaculate LATER CHRISTIAN MIRACLES. 123
| 124 | MEMOIR OF REV. F. HODGSON. |
I do not know whether you like to have the long letters I
write to you filled with this sort of observations on what I read, but I was
encouraged to write this letter, as when I first learnt Italian you desired me
to do the same, and were pleased with the long letters I used to write on that
subject. However, I shall not stay out any longer, and consequently shall not
read so much as I hitherto have, particularly as the fine weather seems to be
beginning again, and I shall be out a great deal; but I shall not give up
reading altogether, and shall be CHATSWORTH. SILIUS ITALICUS. 125
