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| XXXVI.
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XXXVI.
True4858
| 4858
This extract and the next three were discovered in the year 1715 by
[Christopher Matthew] Pfaff, a learned Lutheran, in the Royal Library at
Turin. The mss. from which
they were taken were neither catalogued nor classified, and have now
disappeared from the collection. It is impossible to say with any degree
of probability from what treatises of our author these four fragments
have been culled. For a full account of their history, see
Stieren’s edition of Irenæus, vol. ii. p. 381. [But, in all
candor, let Pfaff himself be heard. His little work is full of learning,
and I have long possessed it as a treasure to which I often recur.
Pfaff’s Irenæi Fragmenta was published at The Hague,
1715.] | knowledge, then, consists in the understanding of
Christ, which Paul terms the wisdom of God hidden in a mystery, which
“the natural man receiveth not,”4859
the doctrine of the cross; of which if any man
“taste,”4860
he will not accede to the
disputations and quibbles of proud and puffed-up men,4861
who go into matters of which they have no perception.4862
For the truth is unsophisticated (ἀσχημάτιστος);
and “the word is nigh thee, in thy mouth and in thy
heart,”4863
as the same apostle declares, being easy of comprehension to
those who are obedient. For it renders us like to Christ, if we
experience “the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of His
sufferings.”4864
For this is the
affinity4865
| 4865 Harvey’s
conjectural emendation, ἐπιπλοκὴ for
ἐπιλογὴ, has been
adopted here. | of the apostolical teaching and the most holy
“faith delivered unto us,”4866
which the
unlearned receive, and those of slender knowledge have taught, not
“giving heed to endless genealogies,”4867
but studying rather [to observe] a straightforward course of
life; lest, having been deprived of the Divine Spirit, they fail to
attain to the kingdom of heaven. For truly the first thing is to deny
one’s self and to follow Christ; and those who do this are borne
onward to perfection, having fulfilled all their Teacher’s will,
becoming sons of God by spiritual regeneration, and heirs of the kingdom
of heaven; those who seek which first shall not be forsaken.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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