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SYMMACHUS

Volume 18 · 116 words · 1797 Edition

a citizen and senator of ancient Rome, and consul in the year 391, has left us ten books of epistles; from which, as well as from other things, we collect, that he was a warm opponent of the Christian religion. He was banished from Rome by Valentinian on some account or other, but afterwards recalled and received into favour by Theodosius. Ammianus Marcellinus speaks of him as a man of great learning and modesty. Scipio, Pareus, and other learned men, have written notes upon the epistles of Symmachus; we know of no later edition of them than that of Frankfort, 1642, 8vo. Ambrose bishop of Milan wrote against Symmachus, and so did the Christian poet, Prudentius.