103. Dan. v, 17.
104. St. Optatus evidently thinks that Daniel could not answer Belshazzar on the same day, but gave his interpretation the next day and then accepted the King's gifts with joy! This seems to us an exceedingly odd notion, and curiously enough there is no suggestion of it in the Book of Daniel, so one wonders from what source Optatus derived it.
105. Ez. xxviii, 3.
106. Dan. ii, 27.
107. Eccles. xxix, 15.
108. Dan. iv, 24.
109. i.e. in Ezekiel.
110. C.f. Dan. ii, 27.
111. unde constat Donatum malarum fontem caussarum. (Cf. for caussa in this sense i, 27; iii. 3: 'seminata est caussa'; iii, 14.)
112. qui pauperes ubique dispungerent.
113. singulos.
114. alter Donatus. This word alter used here of Donatus of Bagaia makes it absolutely certain that Optatus knew nothing of the distinction between Donatus of Black Huts and Donatus the Great (cf. note 3, p. 45).
115. circumcelliones agonisticos. St. Augustine ( con. Cresconium, i, 28) describes the conduct of these men, and gives the etymology of the word circumcelliones: ' Quis enim nescit hoc genus hominum in horrendis facinoribus inquietum, ab utilibus operibus otiosum, crudelissimum in mortibus alienis, vilissimum in suis, maxime in agris territans et victus sui caussa cellas circumiens rusticanas, unde et circumcellionum nomen accepit, universo mundo pene famosissimum Africani erroris opprobrium?'
116. tunc Comiti.
117. in Ecclesia corrigi non posse.
118. acciperent disciplinam.
119. A town in Numidia. Amongst the Bishops who were assembled at the Carthaginian Council under St. Cyprian we read of Victor ab Octavo.
120. per dealbatas aras aut mensas potuerunt numerari. That is to say, whitened tombs made in the shape of an altar. As the Donatists pretended to look upon these fanatics, who had been justly put to death for murder and other crimes, as martyrs, they raised altars over their graves. (It is well known that the first Christians used to say Mass on altars erected over the bodies of martyrs, e.g. in the Catacombs.) These altars were sometimes called Tables, as in the Catholic Church of the present day. Thus St. Augustine writes ( Sermo de div. 113): 'Denique, sicut nostis, quicunque Carthaginem nostis, in eodem loco Mensa Dei constructa est, et tamen mensa dicitur Cypriani: non quia ibi est umquam Cyprianus epulatus, sed quia ibi est immolatus, et quia ipsa immolatione sua paravit hanc mensam: non in qua pascat sive pascatur; sed in qua sacrificium Deo, cui et ipse obtains est, offeratur.'
121. A Donatist priest.
122. ut insepultam faceret sepulturam. This phrase shows that St. Optatus was acquainted with Cicero (Phil. i, 1).
123. unde proditum est mandatum fuisse fieri quod factum est. The command ( mandatum ) was, I think, that of the Donatist Bishops. At first the circumcellions erected altars over their dead, but in the open air and not in the churches. The later Donatists, when they honoured these slain circumcellions as martyrs, forgot not only that it was their own Bishops who (after the custom had been introduced of burying them in the churches) had ordered their bodies to be exhumed,but also that these same Bishops had begged Taurinus to repress them, since ecclesiastical discipline had no effect. Therefore they, not the Catholics, were responsible for the massacres (' quod factum est '). Both Casaubon and Du Pin, however, understand mandatum to refer to a command not of Donatist, but of Catholic, Bishops, and think that St. Optatus means to say that prejudice was created against Catholics by the exhumation of the dead circumcellions, and that on this account Catholics were reproached for the alleged massacres. But they seem to forget that Optatus has just stated that this was done by the order of a Donatist Bishop. It is difficult to see how his command carried out by the Donatist priest Clarus could create prejudice against Catholics.
124. sibi percussores in suam perniciem conducebant. (Cf. i, 16.)
125. qui ex altorum montium cacuminibus viles animas proicientes se praecipites dabant. Cf. S. Augustine, Tract. ii. in Ioannem : 'Flammis se donant, aquis se praefocant, praecipitio se collidunt, et pereunt.'
126. Comite.
127. habebant vocatorum infinitam turbam et annonam conpetentem constat fuisse praeparatam.