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IN CHRIST'S NAME HERE BEGINS THE FIRST BOOK OF THE HISTORIES As I am about to describe the struggles of kings with the heathen enemy, of martyrs with pagans, of churches with heretics, I desire first of all to declare my faith so that my reader may have no doubt that I am Catholic. I have also decided, on account of those who are losing hope of the approaching end of the world, to collect the total of past years from chronicles and histories and set forth clearly how many years there are from the beginning of the world. But I first beg pardon of my readers if either in letter or in syllable I transgress the rules of the grammatic art in which I have not been fully instructed, since I have been eager only for this, to hold fast, without any subterfuge or irresolution of heart, to that which we are bidden in the church to believe, because I know that he who is liable to punishment for his sin can obtain pardon from God by untainted faith. I believe, then, in God the Father omnipotent. I believe in Jesus Christ his only Son, our Lord God, born of the Father, not created. [I beHeve] that he has always been with the Father, not only since time began but before all time. For the Father could not have been so named unless he had a son ; and there could be no son without a father. But as for those who say: There was a time when he was not," ^ I reject them with curses, and call men to witness that they are separated from the church. I believe that the word of the Father by which all things were made was Christ. I believe that this word was made flesh and by its suffer- ing the world was redeemed, and I believe that humanity, not deity, was subject to the suffering. I beHeve that he rose again on the third day, that he freed sinful man, that he ascended to heaven, ^ A leading belief of Arian Christology. 5