XVI.

(See p, 402, note 8.)

From all which Clement concludes that his two classes of heretics are alike wanderers from Catholic orthodoxy; whether, on the one hand, under divers pretexts glorifying an unreal continence against honourable marriage, or, on the other, persuading themselves as speciously to an unlimited indulgence of their sinful lusts and passions. Once more he quotes the Old Testament and the New, which denounce uncleanness, but not the conjugal relations. He argues with indignation upon those who degrade the estate to which a bishop is called as "the husband of one wife, ruling his own house and children well." Then he reverts to his idea of "the two or three," maintaining that a holy marriage makes the bishop's home "a house of the Lord" (see note 75, p. 1211, ed. Migne). And he concludes the book by repeating his remonstrance against the claim of these heretics to be veritable Gnostics,--a name he will by no means surrender to the enemies of truth.