St. Jerome as a satirist

"This book illuminates important aspects of the intellectual history of the late fourth century, centering in satire and involving the major social and moral questions which were agitating the best minds of the time. The focal point of the author's investigation is a Christian writer's transformation of a pagan literary genre into a suitable vehicle for Christian propaganda. Amond the writers of his day, St. Jerome was uniquely suited by learning and temperament to combine the inherited body of pagan satire with a new vigorous Christian spirit into a literary attack on the vices of society -- and of personal enemies." [Book jacket].