Faustinus the presbyter.

Chapter XVI.

Faustinus ²⁵⁹⁷ the presbyter wrote to Queen Flaccilla seven books Against the Arians and Macedonians, arguing and convicting them by the testimonies of the very Scriptures which they used, in perverted meaning, for blasphemy. He wrote also a book which, together with a certain presbyter named Marcellinus, he addressed to the emperors Valentinianus, Theodosius and Arcadius, in defence of their fellow Christians. From this it appears that he acquiesced in the Luciferian schism, in that in this same book he blames Hilary of Poitiers and Damasus, bishop of Rome, for giving ill-advised counsel to the church, advising that the apostate ²⁵⁹⁸ bishops should be received into communion for the sake of restoring the peace. For it was as displeasing to the Luciferians to receive the bishops who in the Ariminian council had communed with Arius, as it was to the Novatians to receive the penitent apostates.

Footnotes

389:2597

Flourished about 384.

389:2598

Apostate = prevaricatores.