of the week, and from the series of the Homilies, as well as from the silence of Chrysostom,
there seems plainly to be an interval of some days between the tenth and eleventh Homilies.
In this Homily, moreover, after much premised on that calamity of Antioch, he comes down
to the former argument concerning man’s creation, and concludes his discourse by an ex-
hortation after his manner on avoiding oaths.
The fourteenth Tillemont thinks ought to be placed after the eighteenth; influenced by
this reason, that Chrysostom says at the beginning, “Not a little did the devil yesterday disturb
our city, but God hath also not a little comforted us again.” These words, he observes, denote
that the arrival of Hellebichus, and of news from Constantinople, had already occurred. But
these are mere conjectures spoken at random.988 How many suspicions and terrors think
you were cast abroad among the people of Antioch, whilst they hung in doubt, and were
ignorant to what result so unhappy an affair might lead? But how can we possibly argue
respecting these terrors and reports, when we are doubtless ignorant of the greater part of
them, and have so obscure a perception of what we do know, that we can scarcely gather
from thence any indication of the time? This Homily is almost wholly on the subject of
avoiding oaths.
The fifteenth Homily, Tillemont would have it, was delivered between the tenth and
eleventh, both for the reasons above mentioned, and because Chrysostom has these words
at the commencement, Εδει καὶ τήμερον καὶ τῳ προτ™ρῳ σαββ€τῳ τὸν περὶ νηστείας
κινησαι λόγον. “It had been right both to-day and on the former Sabbath, to let the discourse
turn on the subject of fasting.” Where he understands the expression, τῳ προτ™ρῳ, as though
it were τῳ πρώτῳ,—the first Saturday in Lent, entertaining however some doubts on the
point. But we, as well as Bernard Brixianus, understand it of the earlier or preceding one.989
325
And we have already proved in a former paragraph, that no other Homily can be placed
between the tenth and the eleventh. On the occasion of the dread with which the people of
Antioch990 were affected, he enlarges on the advantage of fear, and at the end he preaches
against the custom of swearing, and of requiring an oath from others.
The sixteenth Homily was delivered when all were deliberating upon making their escape
from the city, in consequence of a certain report, that a sack was to take place. Tillemont
endeavours also to change the position of this Homily, and to place it between the tenth
and eleventh, which, however, as we have said in our remarks upon the twelfth, it cannot
admit of. Tillemont further supports his argument by these words: in No. 6, the holy Doctor
says, “We have passed through the second week of the fast.” He infers, therefore, that two
988 And dependent on the erroneous notions, that Hom. XVII. was delivered immediately on the arrival of
the commissioners.
989 It may be that, or the first in Lent, considered as the last on which he had preached.
990 Πριντεδ, Χονσταντινοπλε.
449
Preface to the Benedictine Edition.