Marius, Mercator

Marius, Mercator a layman in the Church of the 4th century, flourished at Constantinople after 421. Dr. Murdock, the editor of Mosheim, says that Marius Mercator " was undoubtedly a layman, a friend and admirer of Augustine, and an active defender of his doctrines from A.D. 418 to the year 451." Dr. Schaff (Ch. Hist. vol. iii), however, speaks of Marius Mercator first as a layman (p. 716), and later (p. 784) mentions him as a learned Latin monk in Constantinople (A.D. 428-451). Marius Mercator was, so supposes his biographer Baluze (Prafat. in Mercat. p. 7), an African by birth, who went to Rome about 417, when Julius and the other Pelagian chiefs were disputing in the Eternal City, and then and there produced a work against the Pelagian heresy, which is probably the Hypognosticon, printed in the Appendix of vol. 10 of the works of St. Augustine (comp. Ceillier, Hist. des Aut. Stc. 8:498 sq.). Ceillier gives us 421 (p. 501) as the date of Marius Mercator's arrival at Constantinople, and as the date of his decease 449 (p. 507); and says, "On ne voit pas qu'il ait ete employe dans le ministere ecclesiastique, et il ne. prend d'autre qualite dans ses ecrits que celle de serviteur de Jesus-Christ." Marius Mercator's works as collected are almost wholly translations from the Greek fathers, particularly Nestorius, Theodosius of Mopsuestia, Cyril of Alexandria, Proclus, Theodoret, etc., accompanied with prefaces and notes or strictures by the translator. Himself one of the most bitter opponents of Pelagianism (q.v.), his writings are all designed to confute either the Pelagian or Nestorian errors. They were edited, with notes, by Joh. Garnier (Paris, 1673, folio), and still better by Stephen Baluze (Opera, Stephanus Baluzius ad fidem veterum codicum MSS. emendavit, et notis illustravit, Paris, 1684, 8vo). (J. H. W.)