Tertullian

“ Their bodies are not loosed from death, do not
Believe the Lord, who wills to raise His own
295 Works sunken; or else say they that the Good
Wills not, and that the Potent hath not power,—
Ignorant from how great a crime they suck
Their milk, in daring to set things infirm
Above the Strong. [55] In the grain lurks the tree ”

“ Footnotes ↑ I have so frequently had to construct my own text (by altering the reading or the punctuation of the Latin) in this book, that, for brevity’s sake, I must ask the reader to be content with this statement once for all, and not expect each case to be separately noted.↑ The “foe,” as before, is Satan; his “breathing instruments” are the men whom he uses (cf. Shakespeare’s “no breather” = no man, in the dialogue between Orlando and Jacques, As you Like it, act iii. sc. 2) ”

“ If so, we have some indication as to the authorship, if not the date, of the book: for Tertullian himself, though he frequently cites the Epistle, appears to hesitate (to say the least) as to ascribing it to St. Paul.↑ Comp. Isa. vi. 9, 10, with Acts xxviii. 17–29.↑ The reference seems to be to Rom. i. 28; comp., too, Tit. i. 15, 16.↑ The reference is to Gen. ii. 9–14.↑ Fata mortua. This extraordinary expression appears to mean “dead men;” men who, through Adam, are fated, so to speak, to die, and are under the sad fate of being “dead in trespasses and sins.” ”

“ That is, in brief, they all, in celebrating the type, looked forward to the Antitype to come.↑ Immensus.↑ This, again, seems to be the meaning, unless the passage (which is not probable) be corrupt. The flesh, “foul” now with sin, is called the “stained image of the Lord,” as having been originally in His image, but being now stained by guilt.↑ Faith is called so, as being the reflection of divine reason.↑ i.e., the praise of Christ Himself. See Matt. xi. 7–15, with the parallel passage, Luke vii. 24–30; comp. also John v. ”

“ The reference seems to be to Isa. lxiv. 4, quoted in 1 Cor. ii. 9, where the Greek differs somewhat remarkably from the LXX.↑ Unless some line has dropped out here, the construction, harsh enough in my English, is yet harsher in the Latin. “Accipitur” has no subject of any kind, and one can only guess from what has gone before, and what follows, that it must mean “one Testament.”↑ Harsh still. It must refer to the four Gospels—the “coat without seam”—in their quadrate unity; Marcion receiving but one—St. Luke’s—and that without St. ”