chiefly celebrated as an ecclesiastical historian,was a native of Aquitaine (Dialog. 1.20), and flourished towards the close of the fourth century under Arcadius
and Honorius, being a few years younger than his friend Paulinus of Nola, to whose letters, of
which fourteen are addressed to Severus, we are principally indebted for any information we
possess regarding his career. Descended from a noble family he was carefully trained in all
the learning of the age and country to which he belonged, distinguished himself as an orator
at the bar, and married early in life a high-born and very wealthy bride. The untimely death
of this lady produced so deep an impression on his mind that, while yet in the flower of his
years, he resolved to abandon the pursuit of worldly pleasures and honours, and in company
with a few pious friends, to seek tranquillity in seclusion and holy exercises. To this
determination he steadfastly adhered notwithstanding the opposition of his father, by whom he
was in consequence disinherited, a misfortune compensated, however, to a great extent by the
liberality of his mother-in-law Bassula. He eventually became a presbyter of the church, and
attached himself closely to St. Martin of Tours, whom he ever cultivated with peculiar
reverence, imbibing from him many wild and fantastic notions respecting dreams, visions,
miraculous manifestations, and the millennium, which in some measure sullied the brightness of
his orthodoxy. Gennadius, in a passage, whose authenticity has been somewhat unreasonably
disputed, positively asserts that Severus, towards the close of his life, was tainted with the
Pelagian heresy, but that having become sensible of his error, and feeling convinced that he
had been betrayed by a too great love of speaking, maintained silence ever afterwards as an
appropriate atonement for his sin. The precise date of his birth and of his death are alike
unknown. The former has been referred to A. D. 363, the latter variously to Pius, who was the twenty-seventh bishop of Bourges, in the middle of the
seventh century, and contemporary with Gregory of Tours, who dedicated to him his tract on the
Seven Sleepers.
The extant works of Severus are,
Drawn up towards the end of
These three letters are immediately connected with the preceding biography, being
severally entitled,
The
An epitome of sacred history, extending from the creation of the world to the consulship
of Stilicho and Aurelianus, A. D. 400. It was concluded about
Generally divided into three, although that termed the second forms in reality a portion
of the first. They contain a temperate review of the bitter discussions and dissensions
which had arisen among ecclesiastics in the East regarding the tendency of the works of
Origen. Composed about
Several letters to Paulinus and others have been lost, as we gather from the words of Gen nadius.
A letter addressed to Paulinus, and published along with those of Severus in the collection of Dacherius is by some other hand.
Sulpicius Severus was greatly admired by his contemporaries, and his fame stood high with all classes of readers in the middle ages. Their estimate of his merits was far too favourable, for none of his productions exhibit much strength of mind or critical sagacity, nor do they furnish matter possessing any particular interest. His history, moreover, abounds with chronological errors and blunders of all kinds, copied from the old chronicles, whose mistakes he adopted with unsuspecting confidence. But, notwithstanding these grave defects, the polished terseness of his style, and the general purity of his language, have served to maintain his reputation even in modern times. From the general characteristics of his phraseology he has been termed the
Gennad. de Viris. Illust. 19 ; Honorius Augustod. de
Script. Eccles. 3.19; Trithemius, de Script. Eccles. 113 ; Gregor.
Turon. de Mirac. S. Mart. i.; Histor. Franc. 10.31;
Paulin. Nol. Ep. 5.1, 11.5, 23.3, &c.; Hieronym. Comment. in Ezech. 36 ; Augustin. Ep. 205.