George Fabricius, born at Chemnitz 23 April 1516, became for Saxony what his and Roger Ascham's friend John Sturm was for Strassburg. In early manhood he had the advantage of a long residence in Italy; the stores of the Vatican and of the Laurentian libraries (the latter then under Victorius) supplied materials for many learned works of his later life. Though a zealous Protestant, and one who suffered much for his faith, he is still cited with respect, even by writers of the Vatican communion. When he died, 17 July 1571, his elector exclaimed: Das war ein Mann, den möchte man mit den Nägeln aus der Erde kratzen: 'That was a man: one would like to dig him out of the earth again with one's nails".

For some 170 years the fragment of 165 verses, printed in the editions of Cyprian and Tertullian, in bibliothecae patrum and among the Christian poets,-read no doubt by Milton together with Cl. Mar. Victor and Alcimus Auitus,—represented to the general public the whole of our author's Heptateuch. But one indefatigable explorer had anticipated the discoveries of Martène and Pitra, and yet deliberately refrained from publication. James Sirmond, the Jesuit, whose life of 92 years (1559-1651) seems all too short for the work he crowded into it, says in his edition of Alcimus Auitus (Par. Seb. Cramoisy, 1643, sm. 8vo, notae at end, pp. 62-4)

Sed alia tamen non pauca diuersis de rebus ab eo uersibus scripta docet epistola ad Apollinarem fratrem. de quibus sermo nobis hoc loco non est: sed de iis tantum libris, qui Mosaicam historiam continuantes, Exodum et reliquas Heptateuchi partes persequuntur, atque Alcimi Auiti nomine in nonnullis Bibliothecis reperiuntur. quos ego ut ad Auitum pertinere non abnuerim, adeo tamen rudes passim et impolitos ac mendis scatentes in tribus quae uidi exemplaribus animaduerti, ut religioni sit, opus, quod auctor ipse, ni fallor, hoc habitu premi mallet, in lucem euulgare. singulorum autem librorum initia, si cui animus est cognoscere, ex subiecto indice deprehendet.

1 See his life by Kämmel in the allgem. deutsche Biographie VI (Leipzig 1877) 510-4, who has used the life by J. D. Schreber (Leipz. 1717), J. A. Müller, Gesch. der Fürsten-und Landschule zu Meissen 11, W. Baumgarten-Crusius, de Geo. Fabricii uita et scriptis (Meissen 1839). Baumgarten-Crusius also published the valuable correspondence: Geo. Fabricii Chemn. epistolae ad Wolfg. Meurerum et alios aequales (Leipz. 1845). The itinerum liber unus (Basel 1560) is well worth reading.

Then follow the first verses (from two to four in each case, correctly1) of the books from Exodus to Judges, with the number of lines in each book: E. 1327. L. 308. N. 689. D. 287. Jo. 452. Ju. 695. These numbers do not agree with the books as printed.

The list of Sirmond's works in De Backer's bibliography might be improved, if each work were placed in the order of publication, and the collected works came in their place. One is glad to see that the sturdy Protestant Paul Colomiés honoured our Jesuit with a biography, even as the Puritan Dr Bates inserted in his Vitae (Lond. 1681 4to) the funeral oration on Sirmond by Henri de Valois. Sirmond, Labbe and Pétau, must have been in Selden's thoughts, when he uttered the startling paradox (Table Talk, s. v. ' Learning' n. 3):

The Jesuits, and the lawyers of France, and the Low Countrymen, have engrossed all learning. The rest of the world make nothing but homilies.

How would Selden have defended this position against Casaubon, or Thomas Dempster, or John Price, or Gataker? Indeed, of an age when men of letters said proverbially, stupor mundi clerus Anglicanus, Selden's other dictum occurs to our recollection (ibid. Clergy' n. 4):

All confess there never was a more learned clergy, no man taxes them with ignorance...The clergy have worse faults.

The next contribution to the study of the Heptateuch was a fruit of the old age of Edmond Martène (22 Dec. 1654–— 20 June 1739), the worthy pupil of d'Achery and Mabillon. The year before his devoted colleague Ursin Durand was

1 Lucian Müller (Rhein. Mus. xx1, 1866, 271) cites on Spicileg. 1 229 ver. 184 uerterat in terra as Sirmond's reading. But Sirmond himself p. 63 (or as reprinted in his opera, Ven. 1728, II 218) has rightly interea se cursibus. These notes of Sirmond are to be found in Galland x, in the bibl. max. patr. ix, and in Migne LIX.

2 Vol. Ix praef. § 40 ceterum cum prouectae iam sim aetatis solumque mihi superesse sepulcrum uideatur, multaque dum in humanis fui scripserim et ediderim, me omniaque mea scripta iudicio et censurae sanctae sedis apostolicae subicio, in sinu sanctae Romanae ecclesiae animam efflare peroptans.

3 In Hoefer's Biographie gén. and Wetzer and Welte's Lexikon Durand has no separate article.

xvi GENESIS. MARTÈNE (1733). AREVALO (1792).

banished to Picardy for opposing the bull Unigenitus, appeared in Paris the ninth (concluding) volume of their last joint labour Veterum scriptorum et monumentorum historicorum, dogmaticorum et moralium amplissima collectio. Paris, Montalant. 1724-33. fol.

The Genesis fills columns 13-56 and is thus introduced:

IVVENCI PRESBYTERI HISPANI
LIBER IN GENESIM.

Ex peruetusto codice Corbeiensi ante annos nongentos exarato.
OBSERVATIO PRAEVIA.

Q

VI per saecula minimum tredecim iacuerat in tenebris, prodit tandem in lucem Iuuenci presbyteri liber in Genesim, cuius in sacra euangelia quattuor carminum libros hactenus celebrarunt antiqui recentesque scriptores.

Then follows some account of Iuuencus and a conjecture that he may have written Genesis shortly before or not long after the gospel history.

Ceterum silentio praetermittere non debeo, quattuor prima illius capita iam dudum edita reperiri ad calcem operum cum Tertulliani tum Cypriani, cui incunctanter ea attribuit Pamelius, aitque plures se in eo Cyprianicas dictiones deprehendisse, extareque sub eius nomine in Parisiensi S. Victoris codice manuscripto. e contrario uero Elias Pinius Saluiani presbyteri Massiliensis fetum esse conicit, adducitque in medium Gennadii auctoritatem, qui Saluiani opera recensens, inter alia inquit, in morem Graecorum a principio Genesis usque ad conditionem hominis, composuit uersu quasi hexaëmeron librum unum.

The Genesis was reprinted in 1792, with some useful notes and a few emendations, by the Spanish Jesuit Faustin Arevalo1 (b. 20 July 1747, still living in 1816), who in 1800 became pontifical hymnographer.' He is known as editor of Prudentius (2 vols. 4to, Rome 1788-9), Dracontius (4to, Rome 1791), Sedulius (4to, Rome 1794), Isidorus (7 vols. 4to, Rome 1797 -1803).

See De Backer's Bibliographie 1o 273-7.

In C.VETTI AQVILINI IVVENCI presbyteri Hispani historiae evangelicae libri IV. eiusdem carmina dubia, aut suppositicia

It is singular that Arevalo has no place in Hoefer's Biogr. générale or either edition of Wetzer and Welte.

ad mss. codices Vaticanos, aliosque, et ad veteres editiones recensuit FAVSTINVS AREVALVS (Romae 1792. 4to), pp. 391-447 form appendix I, Liber in Genesin ex peruetusto codice Corbeiensi ante annos nongentos exarato, in quo tribuitur Iuuenco. From time to time Arevalo notes metrical licences unknown to the true Iuuencus; thus 266 aě. 499 ǎ of abl. mitto innumeros alios metri errores.'

In his prolegomena n. 16 p. 10 Arevalo refers for his opinion on the Genesis to his prolegomena to Prudentius c. 25 n. 220. Some, he says, ascribe the poem to Tertullian, others to Cyprian, Du Pin (followed by Allix) to Saluianus by conjecture. Andr. Rivin, who published Tertullian's poetical works Lips. 1651, 8vo, included the fragment of Genesis among them.

n. 17. The editor of the collectio Pisaurensis publishes Genesis as Cyprian's, and declares that the manuscripts ascribe it to that father. He did not know that a more complete copy was extant, under the name of Iuuencus, in Martène's collection, et initium eiusdem in multis editionibus Tertulliani ex mss. (?) repraesentari. The first editors of the Christian poets corrected their authors by the rules of prosody, which they had learnt at school: Martène deserves credit for exactly reproducing his ms.

Iam poema in Genesin, quale ex codice Corbeiensi Martenius exprompsit, ad saeculum VI, aut post, facile reiciet, qui poetarum christianorum stilum et consuetudinem in arte metrica per diuersas eorum aetates probe calleat....p. 11. Quod attinet ad carmen in Genesin, quoniam a multis Iuuenci opus dicitur, referendum illud est inter opera Iuuenci dubia, et mea quidem sententia inter suppositicia: cuius rei non aliud magis efficax argumentum a me proferri potest, quam ipsa contentio huius poematis cum Historia euangelica.

The notes of Martène and Arevalo were reprinted with the text of Genesis in Migne's Patrologia Latina, XIX (1846) col. 345-380, which is the most accessible edition to this day.

For a new fragment of Genesis and for the remaining six books of the Heptateuch we are indebted to the research of Jean-Baptiste Pitra, now Cardinal and Librarian of the Vatican library.

Unfortunately I have not access to a biography of Cardinal Pitra. Modest labour, like his, does not attract the compilers of

Männer der Zeit, and such-like compilations, which enlarge fondly on the virtues of successful novelists and actresses. In Lorenz, Catalogue gén. de la librairie Française, may be seen the titles of Pitra's books. From it I learn that he was born at Chamforgueil near Autun in 1812.

The following list of works already printed or in preparation is taken from the cover of the Analecta Sacra et Classica (1888).

selecta paralipomena.

Histoire de Saint-Léger, évêque d'Autun (2me édition).

VII.

Typis parata.

Hymnographi Graeci ueteres

Études sur les Acta Sanctorum des Bollandistes (2me édition).
La Hollande catholique (2me édition).

In the preface to vol. I of the Spicilegium Solesmense (1852) Pitra claims for his new publication a place in the illustrious succession of Benedictine gleanings, after the spicilegia, analecta, anecdota, cet. of d'Achery (1655-77), Mabillon (1675—89), Montfaucon (1688), Martène and Durand (1717, 1724-33), Pez (1721 -9). Among his patrons he commends Dr Lingard, 'de re Anglorum historica merentissimum... Sed in primis, bona omnium pace, celebrare est, tum spectatissimum V. Alex. Hope, ob insignem eius in nos omnimodamque beneuolentiam, tum ornatissimos editores nostros, cll. FF. Firminos Didot, qui nihil pepercerunt, quominus rei ipsius dignitati et eruditorum fauori, Spicilegium Solesmense cumulate responderet.' Mr Beresford Hope, whose services to art and good learning have never been sufficiently acknowledged, subscribed for three copies.