Among the earlier writings of Augustine, the first work treats the nature of the human soul, its dignity and grandeur. The second discusses the fundamental question of how man acquires knowledge. Each is in the form of a dialogue.
One of Augustine's most important works, written between 388 and 395, this dialogue has as its objective not so much to discuss free will for its own sake as to discuss the problem of evil in reference to the existence of God, who is almighty and all-good.
These treatises date from the last third of the second century. Athenagoras of Athens belonged to that select group of Christian laymen known as the Apologists, who supported the successors of the apostles in the ministry of the faith by defending that faith and pleading for a just hearing before the pagan majority and pagan overlords.
The Symposium, or Banquet, is a dialogue in imitation of Plato, written by Methodius, a teacher and probably a bishop, who flourished in Lycia during the period known as the "little peace of the church." It is perhaps the most beautiful symbolic prose-poem of the early patristic period.
