except implicitly, and no mention of Anomœanism, that extreme Arianism which pro- nounced the Son unlike the Father81. This can be explained only in one way. We have seen that Hilary thinks Arianism worth attack because it is an ’inward evil;’ that he does not, except in early and leisurely work such as book ii., pay any attention to heresies which were obviously outside the Church and had an organization of their own. We have seen also that the Ho- moeans cast out their more holiest Anomœan brethren in 359. The latter made no attempt to retrieve their position within the church; they proceeded to establish a Church of their own, which was, so they protested, the true one. It was under Jovian (a.d. 362–363) that they consecrated their own bishop for Constantinople82; but the separation must have been visible for some time before that decisive step was taken. Thus, when the De Trinitate took its present form, Apollinarianism was risen above the Church’s horizon and Anomœanism was sunk below it. We cannot, therefore, put the completion of the work earlier shall the remission of Hilary’s exile; we cannot, indeed, suppose that he had leisure to make it perfect except in his home. Yet the work must have been for the most part finished before its writer reached Italy on his return; and the issue or reissue of its several portions was a natural, and certainly a powerful, measure towards the end which he had at heart. There remains the first book, which was obviously, as Erasmus saw, the last to be com- posed. It is a survey of the accomplished task, beginning with that account of Hilary’s spir- itual birth and growth which has already been mentioned. This is a piece of writing which it is no undue praise to rank, for dignity and felicity of language, among the noblest examples of Roman eloquence. Hooker, among English authors, is the one whom it most suggests. Then there follows a brief summary of the argument of the successive books, and a prayer for the success of the work. This reads, and perhaps it was meant to read, as though it were a prayer that he might worthily execute a plan which as yet existed only in his brain; but it may also be interpreted, in the more natural sense, as a petition that his hope might not be xxxiv frustrated, and that his book might appear to others what he trusted, in his own mind, that it was, true to Scripture, sound in logic, and written with that lofty gravity which befitted the greatness of his theme. After speaking of the construction of the work, as Hilary framed it, something must be said of certain interpolations which it has suffered. The most important are those at the end of book ix. and in x. 8, which flatly contradict his teaching83. They are obvious intrusions, imperfectly attested by manuscript authority, and condemned by their own character. Hilary was not the writer to stultify himself and confuse his readers by so clumsy a device as that of appending a bald denial of its truth to a long and careful exposition of his characteristic 81 This heresy is not even mentioned in xii. 6, where the opening was obvious. 82 Dr. Gwatkin, Studies of Arianism, p. 226. 83 Cf. Gore’s Dissertations, p. 134. 49 The Life and Writings of St. Hilary of Poitiers.