Section 24
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LIFE OF EUSEBIUS. xvii possible, works of this nature, with which he was engaged, to those concerned in the study of sacred literature. About the same time, Eusebius dedicated a small book to the em peror Constantine, in which was comprised his description of the Jerusalem church, and of the gifts that had been consecrated there. — Which book, together with his tricennalian oration, that he had placed at the close of his Life of Constantine, is not now extant. At the same time, Eusebius wrote five books against Marcellus ; of which the three last, De Ecclesiastica Theologia, he dedicated to Flaccillus bishop of Antioch. Flaccillus entered on that bishopric, a little before the synod of Tyre, which was convened in the consulate of Constantius and Albinus, A. D. 335. It is certain that Eusebius, in his First Book* writes in express words, that Marcellus had been deservedly condemned by the church. Now Marcellus was first con demned in the synod held at Constantinople, by those very bishops that had consecrated Constantine's church at Jerusalem, in the year of Christ 335, or, according to Baronius, 336. Socrates,! indeed, ac knowledges only three books written by Eusebius against Marcellus, namely, those entitled, "De Ecclesiastica Theologia;" but the whole work by Eusebius, against Marcellus, comprised Five Books. The last books written by Eusebius, seem to be the four on the life of Con stantine ; for they were written after the death of that emperor, whom Eusebius did not long survive, since he died about the beginning of the reign of Constantius Augustus, a little before the death of Con stantine Junior, which happened, according to the testimony of So crates' Second J Book, when Acindynus and Proculus were consuls, A. D. 340. We cannot admit, what Scaliger§ has affirmed, that Eusebius's books against Porphyry, were written under Constantius, the son of Constantine the Great, especially since this is confirmed by the tes timony of no ancient writer. Besides, in what is immediately after asserted by Scaliger, that Eusebius wrote his three[| last books of the Evangelic Demonstration, against Porphyry, there is an evident error. St. Jerome says, indeed, that Eusebius in three volumes, (that is, in De Ecclesiastica Theologia, chap. 14. •j-Eccles. Hist, book 2. chap. 20 : where see note k. % Chap. 4 & 5. § In his Animadversions on Eusebius, page 250, last edit } Namely, the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth. 2