AN INTRODUCTION TO THE CREEDS AND TO THE TE DEUM

BY A. E. BURN, B.D. TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE RECTOR OF KYNNERSLEY, WELLINGTON, SALOP EXAMINING CHAPLAIN TO THE LORD BISHOP OF LICHFIELD
First published Methuen & Co 1899.
This Edition prepared for katapi by Paul Ingram 2003.

CHAPTER VIII

THE APOSTLES' CREED IN THE FOURTH CENTURY

THE path along which we may trace the growth of the ancient historic faith, dignified from the fourth century by the name of "the Apostles' Creed," now widens out considerably.
Many forms demand attention, and it is difficult to compress within the limits of a single chapter all that may be said about them.
A line of cleavage begins from the middle of the century between Eastern and Western forms.
The Eastern Churches began to adapt their forms of Baptismal Creed, as we have seen in the case of our Nicene Creed, by the insertion of Nicene terms. Eventually it obtained universal currency as the Creed of the Fathers. 

Beginning with the Creeds of Rome and Aquileia, upon which Rufinus commented, we may extend our survey to the Creeds of Milan, Africa, Spain, and Gaul.
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I. the Old Roman Creed

We must pick up again the thread of the history of the Old Roman Creed at the point where we dropped it.
We discussed the text quoted in Greek by Marcellus, and in Latin by Rufinus.
We were in search of a complete form from which to look back.
Now we seek to reverse the process, and trace the stages by which this normal type of historic faith was enlarged.

In Rome itself the type was most carefully preserved, and remained unaltered possibly for two centuries to come.
Rufinus gives two reasons for this:

1. that no heresy had its origin there;
2. that the candidates for baptism were made to rehearse their creed publicly, and no alterations were allowed. 
   The author of the Explanatio ad initiandos writes to the same effect:
   "Where faith is whole, the precepts of the apostles suffice."

We may now bring forward some corroborative evidence, gleaned from MSS. of a later date than the fourth century, which preserve the ancient text most correctly.

For the Greek text we may use the so-called Psalter of Aethelstan (B.M., Galba, A. xviii.), which was written by an Anglo-Saxon hand in Latin letters of the ninth century.
Here the creed is found, with collects, a litany, the Lord's Prayer, and the Sanctus, also in Greek. 
It probably represents the Greek text of the Old Roman Creed brought to England by Roman missionaries. 
I will denote its variant readings by A, those of Marcellus by M.

For the Latin text we may use:

1. The celebrated Cod. Laudianus, 35 (L), in the Bodleian Library, best known as Cod.E of the Acts of the Apostles. 
   Of the story of its wanderings it must suffice to say that it was written most probably in Italy at the end of the sixth century, was brought to Sardinia, and thence to England, where it came into the hands of the Venerable Bede by the beginning of the eighth century.
2. A MS. in the British Museum (2 A xx.), called by Kattenbusch [i. pp. 74 f.]  Cod. Swainsonii (S), of the eighth century, contains sections from the Gospels, the Lord's Prayer, and the creed, with Saxon versions, canticles, and prayers. 
   The title, Symbolum Apostolorum, has been added in a later hand;
   and in the margin the names of Jesus Christ and eleven apostles (excluding Andrew) have been assigned to the Twelve Articles.
3. An interesting form has been published by Dom.Morin [Rev. Ben., Nov. 1897, p.486.], from a sermon in Cod. Sessorian.52 (V), of the eleventh or twelfth century, now in the Victor Emmanuel Library at Rome.
   The collection in which it is found will come under our notice again, (p.232), and was made probably in Rome.  
   The sermon begins: "Simbolum enim in greca lingua"; and ends: "paenas corporis et animae."

These MSS. enable us to check the text, which may be gleaned from Rufinus (E).
It is true that they are of a later date, and that they are not free from interpolations, e.g. catholicam, SV; uitam aeternam, V.
Their general agreement, however, is decisive in favour of Deum Patrem omnipotentem, in place of the ablatives quoted by Rufinus from the Creed of Aquileia, and implicitly suggested for that of Rome;
also in favour of et in Art.3, and qui in Art.4.
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THE OLD ROMAN CREED

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II. Αquileia

The creed, which Rufinus quotes as the creed of his native town, is distinguished by some important additions, for convenience of comparison, I will print with it the Creeds of Milan and Africa, to be discussed in succeeding sections.

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The other Aquileian Creeds, printed in Hahn,⁸ pp. 43 ff., cannot be used to confirm this text, since their testimony is doubtful, and they lack its chief characteristics.
The first is ascribed to a patriarch Lupo of the ninth or tenth century.
The second is the Creed of Venantius Fortunatus, who came from Aquileia, and ended his days as Bishop of Poitiers, at the beginning of the seventh century.
In Art.6 they both read in coelum. Lupo adds, in Art. 5,uiuens;
[Cf. the Creeds of Niceta, the Spanish Church from the sixth century, Theodulf of Orleans, and some old English translations which add ad uitam.]
in Art.10, cathoIicam;
and at the end, et uitam, aeternam.
Fortunatus records the descent into hell, but in the form ad infernum;
and in Art. 8 reads iudicaturus.
It is quite plain that these are not forms derived from the Aquileian Creed.

The town of Aquileia was destroyed by Attila in 452, and it is possible that when it was rebuilt much that belonged to its old life was altered. [Kattenbusch, i. p. 107.]

Rufinus was careful to explain that the preposition in is reserved to distinguish belief in the Three Divine Persons from belief in created beings and mysteries.
He does not seem to attach any importance to the use of the ablative case.
In fact, from this time onwards ablatives and accusatives seem to have been used indifferently, and in the early Middle Ages no consciousness seemed to remain of any difference of case.
But in Latin translations of our Nicene Creed, which had in repeated before unam ... ecclesiam, the distinction required by Rufinus was kept up by the use of the Ablative to denote the Divine Persons.

The words inuisibili et impassibili were an unfortunate addition, intended to guard against Sabellianism, but made use of by the Arians to their own purpose.
This objection was clearly pointed out by S. Ambrose.
[Explanatio ad initiandos, quoted on p. 207 infra.
Rufinus is careful to guard against the Arian inference.]
The clause descendit in inferna is not found in any earlier Baptismal Creed, though it occurs in the manifestoes of three Arian Synods during this century.
Rufinus calls attention to the fact that it is not in the Roman or any Eastern Creed.

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Mark of Arethusa drew up the first of these, the famous Dated Creed of Sirmium.
It is based on the fourth Creed of Antioch, which he and a few other bishops had drawn up to take to Constans in 340.
It is said to have been translated rather freely from a Latin original now lost. [Kattenlusch, i. p.261, n.16; Zahn, p.72.]  
But this has not been actually proved, and the connection with the fourth Creed of Antioch tends, on the contrary, to confirm the suggestion that it was Mark's composition.
The reference to the descent into hell, coupled with the quotation of Job xxxviii.17,
(LXX. Πυλωροὶ δὲ ᾅδου ἰδόντες σε ἔπτηξαν)
seems to have been introduced as equivalent to "buried," which is here omitted.
This is exactly in harmony with the teaching of Cyril of Jerusalem, "whose influence is seen in other features of the Sirmian ecthesis." [Swete, pp. 56 f] 
Cyril refers to the descent in several of his lectures, but in his list of ten dogmata it appears as subordinate to the burial, or rather as an explanation of it.
[Swete goes too far in saying that he made it "one of his ten primary credenda."]
Thus he says

(Cat. iv. II):
Κατῆλθεν εἰς τὰ καταχθόνια ἵνα κακεῖθεν λυτρώσηται τοὺς δικαίους;

and at the beginning of the following section on the Resurrection (ib.12):

'Αλλ' ὁκαταβὰς εἰς τὰ καταχθόνια πάλιν ἀνῆλθε, καὶ ὁ ταφεὶς 'Ιησοῦς πάλιν ἀνέστη τὸ τριήμερον ἀληθῶς.

Zahn suggests that the Sirmian Creed was drawn up with some reference to the Creed of the Church in that part of Pannonia, and that we may conclude that this clause has already found a place in it. 
It is true that Martin, Bishop of Bracara, a native of Pannonia, who came into Spain in the seventh century, had these words in his creed.
But it is easy to account for them at that date as derived from a Gallican or Spanish source, and it must be remembered that they are only found in one of Gaspari's three MSS. (Cod. Toletanus).
This suggestion cannot be regarded as yet proved.

The Creeds of Nike and Constantinople are dependent upon the Dated Creed, and need not be considered apart from it.
Indeed, it is doubtful whether the reference to these Synods throws any light on the history of the Aquileian Creed, in which the clause had probably stood for two centuries when Rufinus wrote.
"At any rate" (says Dr. Swete), "Rufinus had lost the clue."
He regards it merely as a gloss on sepultus: "uis tamen uerbi eadem uidetur esse in eo quod sepultus dicitur." 
Compared with the dramatic descriptions common in the fourth century, the clause seems severely simple;
but it is scriptural, for descendit in infernum (ad infernum, ad inferna) are old Latin and Vulgate renderings of LXX., εἰς ᾄδου κατέβη;  
e.g. Ps.liv.(Iv.)16, and xvi.(xv.)10, quoted by S. Peter (Acts ii.27). [Swete, p. 59]

It may therefore have been added in protest against docetic denials of the Lord's true death at the end of the second century, for the Church of Aquileia claimed a high antiquity, or it may have been added, without reference to false teaching, to express what reverent Christian imagination has always held, that the Lord by sharing sanctified the condition of departed souls.

One more variation in the Creed of Aquileia needs mention, huius carnis resurrectionem, "possibly a relic of some early struggle of the Aquileian Church with docetic Gnosticism.
Rufinus interprets huius carnis as teaching the absolute identity of the future with the present body." [Swete, pp.95 f.]
This was the popular teaching of the time of Jerome and the latter writings of Augustine, and it is emphasised in several creeds, e.g. of Phoebadius, Niceta, and others.
It ministers, however, to a materialistic view which is opposed, as Origen had pointed out long before, to S. Paul's teaching;
for the apostle's illustration from the growth of a seed points to continuity of life under changed and glorified conditions:
"First that which is natural, and afterwards that which is spiritual."
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III. Milan

We look instinctively to the writings of the great bishop and statesman Ambrose for information about the Creed of Milan. 
Caspari [II.48; III.196.] has restored to a place among them a very interesting sermon, Explanatio symboli ad initiandos. 
It is found in three MSS., and he has analysed their mutual relations with great care.
The best, in which the authorship is ascribed to Ambrose, has come from Bobbio to the Vatican (Cod. Vat. 5760, saec.ix., x.).
It is a copy of what might be called rough notes taken down by a hearer. 
The other MSS. (Cod. iamb. saec.i., from the monastery of Lambach, and Cod.8.Gall.188, saec.vii., viii.) depend upon a common archetype, and represent a more polished recension of the text.
They ascribe the authorship to Maximus of Turin and Augustine.
The claims of Maximus are easily set aside by reference to a sermon which he preached on the delivery of the creed, and which contains the Old Roman Creed. [Hahn,³ p.40.]
Nor is the style in the least like that of Augustine, of whose sermons on the creed several specimens survive.

On the other hand, the authorship of Ambrose is confirmed by a number of small points:-

1. The preacher argues against alterations of the text of the creed, which he affirms is identical with that of the Church in Rome:

   "Hoc autem est symbolum quod Romana ecclesia tenet."

In a letter of Ambrose to Pope Siricius the same opinion is expressed:

"Credatur symbolo Apostolorum, quod ecclesia Romana intemeratum semper custodit et seruat." [Ep.42.]

As a matter of fact, when we compare his creed with the Roman, the only variation of any importance [The order lesus Christus, and the repetition of in before ecclesiam and remissionem (God. Vat.), might be due to copyists.] is the addition of the word passus, which is in any case implied in crucifixus.

2. Arianism, when the sermon was preached, was still a power to be combated.
3. The author shows acquaintance with the Creed of Aquileia, and argues that it was a mistake to add in it the words inuisibilis et impassibilis, because the Arians argue therefrom that the Son, on the contrary, is visible and passible.
   When we remember that Ambrose presided over a Council at Aquileia in 382 which deposed the Arian Bishops Palladius and Secundianus, we see at once how natural the references to Arianism and to the Aquileian Creed would be from his mouth.
4. Some of the phrases repeated in this short discourse may be proved to be favourite words of Ambrose in the anti-Arian treatises, de Fide, de Spiritu Sancto, de Incarnationis Dominicae Sacramento, e.g. the use of derogare, accipere, videre, and denique.[Caspari, ii.pp.82 ff.]

These arguments have been opposed by Kattenbusch, [i.pp.84-91] who admits that the rhetorical style is like that of Ambrose, but thinks that it would be easy to imitate.
This is true, and no doubt it was a common thing to attach the name of a great man to any anonymous writing, but the fact remains that it is the oldest text in this case which preserves the name Ambrose.
The reference to Arianism as a present power which is fatal to the claims of Maximus, who wrote before and after 450, when, as Kattenbusch admits, "Arianism had long been conquered in the Church of the Roman Empire," [P86.] would seem to be equally fatal to the claims of the unknown Italian prelate of the beginning of the fifth century whom he postulates as the author.
His strongest point is the assertion that the author quoted the Commentary of Rufinus.
He goes so far as to say that the preacher first understood his position when he had read Rufinus, and found a creed that contained the additions to be forced upon his Church that the door might be opened to Arianism.
But he at once admits in a note [P. 87, n. 7.] that this may be to read too much into the words of the sermon.
And it is difficult to understand how, if the author was dependent upon Rufinus, he failed to quote the written words more exactly,
e.g. the emphatic and repeated "Constat."
The passages are of interest in themselves, and I will therefore quote them in full:-

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It is surely impossible to prove a "literary relationship" from such parallels.  
In the second case, as Kattenbusch admits, the point of view is different, though both writers maintain that in the text of the creed unicus is to be connected with Filius.
But the author of the Explanatio permits the teaching of unicus dominus against Sabellianism, while Rufinus connects it with the Lord's work of redemption. 
On the other hand, it is easy to explain how Rufinus, an admirer of Ambrose, might have quoted what had been handed down as the teaching of Ambrose, though not in the exact words.

Another authority for the Creed of Milan is Augustine, the disciple of Ambrose,
who in his writings quotes two Creeds of Milan and Africa, the former in Sermons 212, 213, 214.

The authorship of 213, denied by Pearson and suspected by Heurtley, has been confirmed by Caspari's discovery of the only known MS. in the University Library at Breslau (Cod. I.Q. 344, saec.xv.).
The three sermons contain a creed-text practically identical with that of the Explanatio. 
It is true that in 212 the words "inuisibilem, immortalem, regem saeculorum, uisibilium et inuisibilium creatorem," follow the first article, but not in the correct order of the African Creed, as in Sermon 215, and the phrases passus and in coelum show that he is quoting the Creed of Milan. [For 213 Cod. Breslau has "et uirgine Maria"; cf. Baumer, p.63, n.2, and Cod. lat. Monac., 8826 f. 326 f.]

From a dogmatic point of view the creed is chiefly interesting as the Baptismal Creed of Augustine.
It only differs from the Roman Creed by the addition of the word passus,
which is so plainly included in the idea of the word crucifixus following,
that no one would regard it as a departure from the teaching there set forth.
In many short Interrogative Creeds (see p.232) passus is used to sum up all the teaching of the Lord's passion and burial.
Possibly it came into the Milanese Creed under the influence of the writings of Irenaeus,
in whose Rule of Faith it had a prominent place.
Once established in that form, it may, in return, have influenced the later Gallican Creed. 
In his researches, the Abbe Duchesne has tried to prove that the Church of Milan had considerable influence in the development of liturgical forms in Gaul. 
It is possible that passus came into the Gallican Creeds of the fourth century from the Milanese, but it is more probable the writings of Irenaeus were the source in both cases.

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IV. Africa

The following passages from the letters of S. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, c. AD255, witness to the use of an African form, though only a fragment is quoted.
[Lumby, Hist. Creeds,² p.115, n.1, remarks with reason that "we cannot suppose that Cyprian's Creed was shorter than that of his 'Master,' Tertullian," and proposes to combine the forms in restoring the Creed of Carthage (p.28).
Elsewhere, pp.8, 115, he argues that the form as quoted is complete.]
The varying order of articles 10-12, which was stereotyped in the later African form, may have come through the interrogatories used at baptism. [Kattenbusch, i.p.136.]

Ep.69.7, ad Magnum:
" Quodsi aliquis illud opponit ut dicat, eandem Novatianum legem tenere, quam catholica ecclesia teneat, eodem symbolo quo et nos baptizare, eundem nosse.
Deum Patrem, eundem Filium Christum, eundem Spiritum Sanctum, ac propter hoc usurpare eum potestatem baptizandi posse, quod uideatur in interrogatione baptismi a nobis non discrepare, sciat quisquis hoc opponendum putat, primum non esse unam nobis et schismaticis symboli legem, neque eandem interrogationem.
Nam cum dicunt: Credis in remissionem peccatorum et uitam aeternam per sanctam ecclesiam? 
mentiuntur in interrogatione, quando non habeant ecclesiam.
Tunc deinde uoce sua ipsi confitentur, remissionem peccatorum non dari nisi per sanctam ecclesiam posse;
quam non habentes ostendunt, remitti illic peccata non posse."

Ep.70.2, ad Januariam:
"Sed et ipsa interrogatio, quae fit in baptismo, testis est ueritatis.  
Nam cum dicimus:
Credis in uitam aeternam et remissionem peccatorum per sanctam ecclesiam?
intelligimus, remissionem peccatorum non nisi in ecclesia dari."

S. Augustine's writings form a connecting link at this period between the Churches of Milan and Africa.
There is some uncertainty about the form or forms of creed embedded in them.
In the Sermons 212, 213, 214, which have been quoted above, he used the Creed of the Church of Milan, where he had been baptized. 
On the whole he seems to have kept closely to it.
But there is one sermon (215) that manifestly contains an African text, and some small variations in other passages point to the influence of this African type.  
Surely this is what might be expected.
Anyone who is familiar with two forms will find words come into his mind that do not belong to the form which he is expounding.
"We must keep before our minds the possibility of subsequent alteration of the text by copyists, and the strong objection which S. Augustine expresses to any writing out of the creed with ink and pen. [Serm.212, see p.281 infra.]
Indeed, in his book de fide et Symbolo, an address originally delivered as a presbyter to the Council of Hippo Regius in 393, he says distinctly that the exact form given to the catechumens is not repeated.
This address was afterwards, as he tells us in his Retractations (i.17), published by request.
But it would be unwise to lean much on the text found in this book.
Heurtley reads unigenitum, which is indeed found in a corresponding passage of de Genesi ad literam. 
In this passage it is immediately explained by unicum, and appears to be due to the context, possibly to a reminiscence of the Nicene Creed:

"Filium Dei Patris unigenitum id est unicum."

In Sermon 57 there is the following definite quotation:

"Filius Dei Dominus noster lesus Christus docuit nos orationem,
et cum ipse sit dominus sicut in symbolo accepistis et reddidistis filius Dei unicus tamen uoluit esse unus."

Perhaps it would be simplest to exhibit the variations in the de fide et Symbolo, de Genesi, Sermo ad catechumenos, and Enchiridion (written within the last ten years of his life), by means of a table:

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The preposition per in Art.3 is a unique use;
ex showing an approximation to African usage like the omission of passus.
But the fact that in none of these cases does he quote the last three articles in the African order, shows that the Milanese type was dominant in his mind.

When we come to Sermon 215, we find the African type shown by the addition of words in Art.1 and by the altered order of the concluding articles familiar to us from the time of Cyprian.

This type may be tested by comparison with some Ps.-Augustinian sermons, [Ed. Hahn,³ p.60, from Aug., ed. Bened. viii.1609-1648.] which, from the strong language used against the Arians, appear to belong to the period of the Vandal persecutions at the end of the fifth century. 
We may also use the creed proposed by Fulgentius, Bishop of Ruspe, [Fragm. xxxvi., Hahn,³ p. 61.] at the beginning of the sixth century.  
It is preserved in a fragment of his treatise against the Arian Fabianus.

AUG. Serm. 215 (A); Ps.-AUG. Serm. (B); FULG. c. Fab. Ar. Frag. xxxvi. (F).

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There are several readings in this restored African type that need explanation. 
Did S. Augustine himself use the plural Oredimus, which is found in Sermon 215?
His ordinary use was undoubtedly the singular, and in the repeated use of Credo in this sermon, where credits would be more natural, if it stood in the text, I find a hint of this:

"Crede ergo Filium Dei crucifixum sub Pontio Pilato et sepultum."

Upon this quotation I rely also for the exclusion of mortuus, which has been inserted by Lumby [P.155.] in his text of the creed extracted from this sermon. 
In this passage, mortuus, if not a copyist's addition, may be said to belong to the comment. 
The insuper introduced precludes the idea of exact quotation. 
Some lines below in the transition to resurrexit we read "crucifixus sub Pontio Pilato et sepultus est," and mortuus again follows in a comment.
Here I have the support of Kattenbusch.
[I. p.137, n.4, "Dass das Symbol nicht etwa ein 'mortuus' auf'genommen habe, darf ohne Umstand prasumiet worden."]

Both Lumby and Heurtley add mortuus to the text of the creed quoted in Sermo ad Catechumenos.
There, also, it seems to belong rather to the exposition.
After the definite quotation, "passus sub Pontio Pilato," follows in the comment, "passus est, crucifixus mortuus et sepultus," the last four words being repeated.

As to the order resurrectionem carnis, it may be pointed out that the form of the sentence is artificial:
"per ipsam remissionem ... per ipsam resurrectionem ... per ipsam uitam."
This would explain the repetition of the words in that order in 9, though it must be admitted that it would not explain the order in the Sermo ad Catechumenos and the Enchiridion.

The addition uitam oeternam had been in use in the African Church since the third century, and it is interesting to note how frequently S. Augustine introduces it in his comment, when the Milan type of creed is before his eyes.
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V. Spain

The type of creed used at this time in Spain may be partially restored from the quotation found in the writings of Priscillian:

The peculiar tenets of Priscillian are manifested in this version of the creed. His Sabellianism is shown by the position of the words Holy Spirit after the Virgin Mary, and as subordinate to the idea of Holy Church.

We gather that the Spanish Creed was almost identical with that of Milan, though it seems that Dei and Patris had already been added in Art.7. ludicaturus is confirmed by the reading of the Mozarabic Liturgy.
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VI. Gaul

The Creed of the Church in Gaul at this period is of great importance, in view of the development of its form in the following century, when it attained almost the full form of our Textus receptus.  
It may be conjecturally restored from the writings of Phoebadius and Victricius.

i. Phoebadius (+ after 392), Bishop of Agen in the Church province of Bordeaux, was the author of a vigorous polemical treatise against the Arian Second Creed of Sirmium.
He was one of the most stalwart Orthodox bishops at Ariminum in 359, and is supposed [By the Benedictines of S. Maur, Hahn,³ p.208.] to have written the formulary issued by them, which is quoted by Jerome. [Dial. adv. Lucif. c.17.]
The following extract is interesting, as it contains the earliest appearance of the phrase "conceived of the Holy Ghost."
But it is not to be depended on as quoting a Gallican form of creed, since it does not contain the word "suffered," for which there is other evidence:

Credimus in unum uerum Deum,
Patrem omnipotentem.
Credimus in unigenitum Dei Filium,
qui ante omnia saecula et ante omne principium natus est ex Deo,
natum autem unigenitum solum ex solo Patre,
Deum ex Deo,
sirailem genitori suo Patri secundum scripturas,
cuius natiuitatem nullus nouit nisi qui solus eum genuit Pater.
Qui de coelo descendit,
conceptus est de Spiritu Sancto,
natus ex Maria uirgine,
crucifixus a Pontio Pilato,
tertia die resurrexit a mortuis ascendit in coelum,
sedet ad dexteram Dei Patris,
uenturiis iudicare uiuos et mortuos.

A more important form of confession, also attributed to Phoebadius, subsequently obtained a wide popularity, under the title, "The Faith of the Romans."
This theory of authorship was first suggested by the Benedictines of S. Maur, and has been confirmed by Kattenbusch, [i.p.171 ff.] who quotes the following words from the writing of Phoebadius, de Fide Orth. c.8:

"Quem etsi passum credimus et sepultum ...
tertia quoque die resurrexit ...
ascendit in coelos ...
consedit ad dextram Patris."

The confession is found in the 50th oration of Gregory Nazianzen, where it is called de Fide Nicaena Ruffino presbytero interprete tractatus.
Also among the writings of Vigilius of Thapsus, in the 7th Book, "On the Trinity" attributed in the Middle Ages to S. Athanasius.
In this way it came to be quoted by Hincmar as "The Faith of S. Athanasius."
It is also found in no less than eight collections of canons, comprising a very large number of MSS., in some of which it is divided into two parts, the second having the title of Sermo.
The greater part was quoted in the apocryphal Acts of Liberius, which were written not later than the fifth century.
[O. Marucchi, Le memorie dei SS. apostoli, p.108, Rome, 1894.
I owe this reference to Dom. G. Morin.]
They are contained in six collections of canons, the earliest of which, that of S. Blasien, was completed in the sixth century. [Maassen, p.504.]
It is also quoted in a composite document, known as the Creed of Damasus (p.244 infra), and in a mixed text in which the two creeds are combined. 
Thus we have striking testimony to its popularity.

I am able to print a critical text from the following MSS:-

FIDES ROMANORUM.

ii. Another confession of great interest is found in the treatise by Victricius, Bishop of Rouen (+409), On the Praise of Saints. 
He was probably by birth a Briton, and an enthusiastic missionary among the neighbouring tribes. 
It may be compared with the Creed of Pelagius. Kattenbusch first notified his quotation of the Apostles' Creed.
[i.p.174. I have quoted more of this confession on p.130.]

We may compare the forms to be extracted from these writings, thus:

The net result is a creed almost identical with that of Milan. 
It is doubtful whether the phrase unigenitum of Art.2 belonged to the underlying Baptismal Creed of Phoebadius.
The influence of Nicene phraseology is apparent throughout, and would suffice to account for it. 
Or it may be a translation from a Greek text of the Apostles' Creed. 
Certainly it reappears in the Creed of Cyprian of Toulon in the sixth century.  
The participial accusatives (natum, passum, etc.) also look like a translation from a Greek text. 
In Art.3 ex reminds us of the African Creed. 
In Art.4 mortuum et is, as Kattenbusch says, uncertain. 
In Article 6 the reading coelum is preserved by the MSS.V and M₂ only, but confirmed by the text of Victricius.  
The Vatican MS. alone preserves Patrem in the first line, which, with the evidence of Irenaeus in the background, we are constrained to insert in Art.1.

The only variations to be noticed in the Creed of Victricius are the addition of Dei in Art.7 (cf. the Creed of the Orthodox at Ariminum, quoted by Jerome), and the Ablative Spiritu Sancto.  
The probable fact that Victricius was a Briton suggests that this may have been a variation adopted by the Church in Britain as in Spain (cf. the Creed of Pelagius).  
In any case, communications were frequent between the Gallican and British Churches.
Victricius went on a mission to Britain in 393, probably of the same kind as that of Germanus and Lupus twenty years later.
Their creeds were probably identical.  
Victricius addressed his treatise, de Laude Sanctorum, to S. Ambrose, and the remarkable agreement which I have pointed out between the Creeds of Phoebadius and Victricius and that of Milan offers further confirmation of the theory of the Abbe Duchesne, as to the influence of the Church of Milan in liturgical matters over the Church in Gaul.

The conclusions to be drawn from these six Western creeds are not in themselves very important.
At least we have met with three of the additions to the Old Roman Creed, familiar to us in our own Baptismal Creed,
the words "suffered," "descended into hell," "eternal life."
Of a fourth, the word "dead," we cannot speak so confidently, though we have found it in the expositions of Phoebadius and Augustine.
Without hesitation we may express our indebtedness to the Churches of Milan, Spain, and Gaul for the word, which reminds us of the moral aspect of the crucifixion of our blessed Lord, who "suffered for our sins," as He "rose again for our justification."
To the Church of Aquileia belongs the merit of preserving in a creed the simple primitive teaching of the descent into hell, though we shall find reason to doubt whether this was the source from which the clause ultimately passed into our creed. 
The words "eternal life" had stood from the days of Cyprian in the Creed of Africa, and it may be as long in the Creed of Jerusalem.
They come down to us from the days of the great persecutions, to explain the secret of the courage and the constancy with which Christians faced death.
In the words of Cyril [Cat. iv, 28.]:

"Ours is no trifling aim;
eternal life is the object of our pursuit."

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