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Matthew and Luke were good enough for barbarian ears like theirs. We need not pause to note the impolicy of an edict which Julian's own admirer Ammianus wishes 'buried in eternal silence. Its effect on the Christians was very marked. Marius Victorinus, the favoured teacher of the Roman nobles, at once resigned his chair of rhetoric.
Then, very skilfully, as one artful in differentiating souls, perceiving that vanity was not yet dead in Augustin, Simplicianus offered him as an example the very translator of those Platonic books which he had just been reading so enthusiastically that famous Victorinus Afer, that orator so learned and admired, who had his statue in the Roman Forum.
Three wild, barefooted Gauls of Verronax's clan shook their heads at all his attempts to send them home, and went running along after him with the same fidelity as poor Celer, whom he had left tied up at the villa as his parting gift to little Victorinus, but who had broken loose, and came bounding to his master, caressing him with nose and tongue at their first halt.
I do not mention the Latin writers, Tertullian, Cyprian, Minutius, Victorinus, Lactantius, Hilarius, lest I be thought not so much defending myself, as accusing others, &c." Op. Tom. 4. p. 2. p.:256. Middleton's Free Enquiry, p. 158. It is remarkable that the names mentioned by Jerom are the names of the early apologists for Christianity.
But when that man of Thine, Simplicianus, related to me this of Victorinus, I was on fire to imitate him; for for this very end had he related it.
Or Lactantius, or Victorinus, Optatus, Hilary, not to speak of the living, and Greeks innumerable? And this, Moses himself, that most faithful servant of God, first did, of whom it is written, that 'he was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians." Let us for a moment pause and see of what these treasures of Egypt consisted, and especially what Plato taught concerning God.
He pictures it as a kind of limitless sea, wherein is a huge sponge bathing the world that it pervades throughout.... He was at this point, when one of his acquaintances, "a man puffed up with immense vanity," gave him some of the Dialogues of Plato, translated into Latin by the famous rhetorician Victorinus Afer.
The poems and hymns which have come down under the name of Bishop Hilary of Poitiers are probably spurious, and a similar doubt attaches to those ascribed to the eminent grammarian and rhetorician, Gaius Marius Victorinus, after his conversion. Before Prudentius published his collection, the hymns of St. Ambrose had been written, and were in use among the Western Churches.
Still, it would scarcely have distressed those sturdy limbs, well developed and preserved by Roman training, never permitted by him to degenerate into effeminacy. And as his fine countenance and well- knit frame testified, Marcus AEmilius Victorinus inherited no small share of genuine Roman blood.
Because of some remains of philosophical pride, and also from fear of offending his friends among the Roman aristocracy, who were still almost altogether pagan, Victorinus was a Christian only in his head. In vain Simplicianus pointed out to him how illogical his conduct was. But suddenly and unexpectedly he decided.
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