These two books were written against the Novatian heresy, which
took its name, and to a considerable extent its form, from Novatus,
a priest of the Church of Carthage, and Novatian, schismatically
consecrated bishop at Rome. It was the outcome of a struggle which
had long existed in the Church upon the question of the restitution
to Church privileges of those who had fallen into grievous sin, and
the possibility of their repentance. The severest ground was taken
by the Novatians, who were condemned successively by many councils,
which maintained the power of the Church to admit those guilty of
any sin whatsoever to repentance, and prescribed various rules and
penalties applicable to different cases. The heresy, however,
lasted for some time, becoming weaker in the fifth century, and
gradually fading away as a separate body with a distinctive name.
Novatianism, in the tests which it used, its efforts after a
perfectly pure communion, its crotchetty interpretations of
Scripture, and many other features, presents a striking parallel to
many modern sects. See Dict. Chr. Biog., Blunt, Sects and heresies,
Ceillier, II. 427, etc.] St. Ambrose, in writing against the
Novatians, seems to have had some recent publication of theirs in
his mind, which is now unknown. He begins by commending gentleness,
a quality singularly wanting in the sect; speaks of the power
committed to the Church of forgiving the greatest sins, and points
out how God is more inclined to mercy than to severity, and refutes
the arguments of the Novatians based on certain passages of holy
Scripture. In the second book, after urging the necessity of
careful and speedy repentance, and the necessity of confessing
one's sins, St. Ambrose meets the Novatian arguments based on Heb.
vi. 4-6, from which they inferred the impossibility of restoration;
and on St. Matthew 12:31-32, our Lord's words concerning sin
against the Holy Spirit. As regards the date of this treatise, it
must have been somewhat before the exposition of Ps. xxxvii., which
refers to it, but there is nothing else which can be taken as a
certain guide. Possibly the Benedictine Editors are right in
assigning it to about a.d. 384. Some few persons, probably on
doctrinal grounds, have been led to question the authorship of this
treatise, but it is quoted by St. Augustine, and there has never
been any real doubt on the subject.
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