[9]. Particularly the Carmen adversus paganos written after Eugene's attempt at restoration in 394 A. D. (Riese, Anthol. lat., I, 20) and the Carmen ad senatorem ad idolorum servitutem conversum, attributed to St. Cyprian (Hartel. ed., III, p. 302), which is probably contemporaneous with the former.
[10]. On this point see the judicious reflections of Paul Allard, Julien l'Apostat, I, 1900, p. 35.
[11]. Hera was the goddess of the air after the time of the Stoics (Ἥρα = ἀήρ).
[12]. Cf. supra, pp. [51], [75], [99], [120], [148]. Besides the Oriental gods the only ones to retain their authority were those of the Grecian mysteries, Bacchus and Hecate, and even these were transformed by their neighbors.
[13]. The wife of Praetextatus, after praising his career and talents in his epitaph, adds: "Sed ista parva: tu pius mystes sacris | teletis reperta mentis arcano premis, | divumque numen multiplex doctus colis" (CIL, 1779 = Dessau, Inscr. sel., 1259).
[14]. Pseudo-August. [Ambrosiaster], Quaest. Vet. et Nov. Test., (p. 139, 9-11, Souter ed.): "Paganos elementis esse
subiectos nulli dubium est.... Paganos elementa colere omnibus cognitum est"; cf. 103 (p. 304, 4 Souter ed.): "Solent (pagani) ad elementa confugere dicentes haec se colere quibus gubernaculis regitur vita humana" (cf. Rev. hist. lit. rel., VIII, 1903, p. 426, n. 3).—Maximus of Turin (Migne, P. L., LVII, 783): "Dicunt pagani: nos solem, lunam et stellas et universa elementa colimus et veneramur." Cf. Mon myst. Mithra, I, p. 103, n. 4, p. 108.
[15]. Firmicus Maternus, Mathes., VII prooem: "(Deus) qui ad fabricationem omnium elementorum diversitate composita ex contrariis et repugnantibus cuncta perfecit."
[16]. Elementum is the translation of στοιχεῖον, which has had the same meaning in Greek at least ever since the first century (see Diels, Elementum, 1899, pp. 44 ff., and the Septuagint, Sap. Sal., 7, 18; 19, 17.) Pfister, "Die στοιχεῖα τοῦ κόσμου in den Briefen des Paulus," Philologus, LXIX, 1910, p. 410.—In the fourth century this meaning was generally accepted: Macrobius, Somn. Scipionis, I, 12, § 16: "Caeli dico et siderum, aliorumque elementorum"; cf. I, 11, § 7 ff. Martianus Capella, II, 209; Ambrosiaster, loc. cit.; Maximus of Turin, loc. cit.; Lactantius, II, 13, 2: "Elementa mundi, caelum, solem, terram, mare."—Cf. Diels, op. cit., pp. 78 ff.
[17]. Cf. Rev. hist. litt. rel., VIII, 1903, pp. 429 ff.—Until the end of the fifth century higher education in the Orient remained in the hands of the pagans. The life of Severus of Antioch, by Zachariah the Scholastic, preserved in a Syrian translation [supra, ch. VII, n. [81]], is particularly instructive in this regard. The Christians, who were opposed to paganism and astrology, consequently manifested an aversion to the profane sciences in general, and in that way they became responsible to a serious extent for the gradual extinction of the knowledge of the past (cf. Rev. hist. litt. rel., ibid., p. 431; Royer, L'enseignement d'Ausone à Alcuin, 1906, p. 130 ff.). But it must be said in their behalf that before them Greek philosophy had taught the vanity of every science that did not have the moral culture of the ego for its purpose, see Geffcken, Aus der Werdezeit des Christentums, p. 7, p. 111.