Chap. XII.
50. Listen to the testimony which through me is addressed to you by those who are the Lord's wheat, suffering meanwhile until the final winnowing, [2272] among the chaff in the Lord's threshing-floor, i.e. throughout the whole world, because "God hath called the earth from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof," [2273] and throughout the same wide field the "children praise Him." [2274] We disapprove of every one who, taking advantage of this imperial edict, persecutes you, not with loving concern for your correction, but with the malice of an enemy. Moreover, although, since every earthly possession can be rightly retained only on the ground either of divine right, according to which all things belong to the righteous, or of human right, which is in the jurisdiction of the kings of the earth, you are mistaken in calling those things yours which you do not possess as righteous persons, and which you have forfeited by the laws of earthly sovereigns, and plead in vain, "We have laboured to gather them," seeing that you may read what is written, "The wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just;" [2275] nevertheless we disapprove of any one who, availing himself of this law which the kings of the earth, doing homage to Christ, have published in order to correct your impiety, covetously seeks to possess himself of your property. Also we disapprove of any one who, on the ground not of justice, but of avarice, seizes and retains the provision pertaining to the poor, or the chapels [2276] in which you meet for worship, which you once occupied in the name of the Church, and which are by all means the rightful property only of that Church which is the true Church of Christ. We disapprove of any one who receives a person that has been expelled by you for some disgraceful action or crime, on the same terms on which those are received who have lived among you chargeable with no other crime beyond the error through which you are separated from us. But these are things which you cannot easily prove; and although you can prove them, we bear with some whom we are unable to correct or even to punish; and we do not quit the Lord's threshing-floor because of the chaff which is there, nor break the Lord's net because of bad fishes enclosed therein, nor desert the Lord's flock because of goats which are to be in the end separated from it, nor go forth from the Lord's house because in it there are vessels destined to dishonour.
Chap. XIII.
51. But, my brother, if you forbear seeking the empty honour which comes from men, and despise the reproach of fools, who will be ready to say, "Why do you now destroy what you once laboured to build up?" it seems to me to be beyond doubt that you will now pass over to the Church which I perceive that you acknowledge to be the true Church: the proofs of which sentiment on your part I find at hand. For in the beginning of your letter which I am now answering you have these words: "I knew you, my excellent friend, as a man devoted to peace and uprightness, when you were still far removed from the Christian faith, and were in these earlier days occupied with literary pursuits; but since your conversion at a more recent time to the Christian faith, you give your time and labour, as I am informed by the statements of many persons, to theological controversies." [2277] These words are undoubtedly your own, if you were the person who sent me that letter. Seeing, therefore, that you confess that I have been converted to the Christian faith, although I have not been converted to the sect of the Donatists or of the Rogatists, you unquestionably uphold the truth that beyond the pale of Rogatists and Donatists the Christian faith exists. This faith therefore is, as we say, spread abroad throughout all nations, which are according to God's testimony blessed in the seed of Abraham. [2278] Why therefore do you still hesitate to adopt what you perceive to be true, unless it be that you are humbled because at some former time you did not perceive what you now see, or maintained some different view, and so, while ashamed to correct an error, are not ashamed (where shame would be much more reasonable) of remaining wilfully in error?
52. Such conduct the Scripture has not passed over in silence; for we read, "There is a shame which bringeth sin, and there is a shame which is graceful and glorious." [2279] Shame brings sin, when through its influence any one forbears from changing a wicked opinion, lest he be supposed to be fickle, or be held as by his own judgment convicted of having been long in error: such persons descend into the pit alive, that is, conscious of their perdition; whose future doom the death of Dathan and Abiram and Korah, swallowed up by the opening earth, long ago prefigured. [2280] But shame is graceful and glorious when one blushes for his own sin, and by repentance is changed to something better, which you are reluctant to do because overpowered by that false and fatal shame, fearing lest by men who know not whereof they affirm, that sentence of the apostle may be quoted against you: "If I build again the things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor." [2281] If, however, this sentence admitted of application to those who, after being corrected, preach the truth which in their perversity they opposed, it might have been said at first against Paul himself, in regard to whom the churches of Christ glorified God when they heard that he now "preached the faith which once he destroyed." [2282]
53. Do not, however, imagine that one can pass from error to truth, or from any sin, be it great or small, to the correction of his sin, without giving some proof of his repentance. It is, however, an error of intolerable impertinence for men to blame the Church, which is proved by so many Divine testimonies to be the Church of Christ, for dealing in one way with those who forsake her, receiving them back on condition of correcting this fault by some acknowledgment of their repentance, and in another way with those who never were within her pale, and are receiving welcome to her peace for the first time; her method being to humble the former more fully, and to receive the latter upon easier terms, cherishing affection for both, and ministering with a mother's love to the health of both.
You have here perhaps a longer letter than you desired. It would have been much shorter if in my reply I had been thinking of you alone; but as it is, even though it should be of no use to yourself, I do not think that it can fail to be of use to those who shall take pains to read it in the fear of God, and without respect of persons. Amen.
[2141] Ps. cviii. 5.
[2142] Jer. ii. 30.
[2143] John xiii. 36.
[2144] Prov. xxvii. 6.
[2145] Gen. xii., xxvi., xlii., and xliii.
[2146] 2 Cor. xii. 7-9.
[2147] Matt. v. 45.
[2148] Luke xiv. 23.
[2149] John vi. 44.
[2150] Gen. xvi. 5.
[2151] Gal. iv. 29.
[2152] Ex. v. 9 and xxxii. 27.
[2153] 1 Kings xviii. 4, 40.
[2154] Matt. xxvi. 52.
[2155] Acts xvi. 22, 23, and xviii. 17.
[2156] paredoken.
[2157] Rom. viii. 32.
[2158] paradontos.
[2159] Gal. ii. 20.
[2160] parado.
[2161] John xiii. 2.
[2162] Acts xxi. 23, 24.
[2163] 1 Cor. v. 5.
[2164] 1 Tim. i. 20.
[2165] Matt. v. 10.
[2166] Ps. ci. 5.
[2167] Ps. ii. 10, 11, 1, 2.
[2168] Rom. x. 2, 3.
[2169] Matt. v. 40.
[2170] See Letter LXXXVIII. § 2.
[2171] "Quod volumus sanctum est."--Tychonius.
[2172] Matt. xiii. 24-30.
[2173] Phil. i. 15, 18.
[2174] Col. iii. 5.
[2175] Prov. ix. 9.
[2176] Prov. xxix. 19.
[2177] John x. 16.
[2178] Gen. xxvi. 4.
[2179] Ps. l. 1.
[2180] Ps. lxxii. 8.
[2181] Dan. vi. 23, 24.
[2182] Prov. xxvi. 27.
[2183] Rom. xiii. 1-3.
[2184] Ps. l. 20.
[2185] Mal. i. 11.
[2186] Ps. lxxii. 17-19.
[2187] Luke xxiv. 44-47.
[2188] Acts i. 15, 8, and ii.
[2189] Ps. xix. 4; Rom. x. 18.
[2190] Typhus morticinæ pelliculæ.
[2191] Ps. l. 20.
[2192] 1 Cor. viii. 11.
[2193] 1 Cor. iii. 2.
[2194] Matt. xxiv. 14.
[2195] Luke xvii. 8.
[2196] Gal. i. 8.
[2197] Luke xxiv. 46.
[2198] Præter.
[2199] Luke xxiv. 47.
[2200] Gal. i. 9.
[2201] Meridie; at noon, E. V. Cant. i. 7.
[2202] Now Tunis.
[2203] Meridie.
[2204] Ps. xlviii. 2.
[2205] Cant. i. 7.
[2206] Josh. xxii. 9-12.
[2207] Gal. iv. 27.
[2208] Quoslibet is obviously the true reading.
[2209] Cant. ii. 2.
[2210] Ps. lxi. 2.
[2211] In this and the other passages quoted, Augustin translates from the LXX.
[2212] Ps. cxix. 53 and 158.
[2213] Cant. i. 7.
[2214] Ps. xc. 12.
[2215] Cant. ii. 2.
[2216] Ps. lv. 14, 15.
[2217] Nisi cognoveris temetipsam.
[2218] Gregum.
[2219] Cant. i. 8.
[2220] Matt. v. 14.
[2221] Isa. ii. 2.
[2222] Ps. xlv. 11-16.
[2223] 1 John ii. 19.
[2224] John xxi. 17.
[2225] John x. 16.
[2226] Matt. vii. 14.
[2227] Gen. xxii. 14.
[2228] Matt. viii. 11.
[2229] Tit. ii. 14; periousios being translated by Augustin "abundans," where our version has "peculiar."
[2230] Rev. vii. 9.
[2231] en skotomene, LXX.
[2232] Ps. xi. 2.
[2233] Vincentius had quoted from Hilary's work, De Synodis adversum Arianos, a sentence to the effect that, with the exception of a very small remnant, the ten provinces of Asia in which he was settled were truly ignorant of God.
[2234] Gal. iii. 1, 3.
[2235] Gal. iv. 19.
[2236] Gal. ii. 11-21.
[2237] Matt. xiii. 24-39.
[2238] 1 Cor. xv. 12.
[2239] 1 Cor. xv. 33, 34.
[2240] 1 Cor. iii. 3.
[2241] 1 Cor. i. 4-7.
[2242] 1 Cor. ii. 14.
[2243] 1 John v. 19.
[2244] 1 John ii. 2.
[2245] Matt. iii. 12.
[2246] Matt. xxiv. 31.
[2247] Ps. xii. 1.
[2248] Matt. xxiv. 12, 13.
[2249] Ps. xii. 7.
[2250] Eph. v. 27.
[2251] Agrippinus, successor of Cyprian in the see of Carthage.
[2252] Phil. iii. 15, 16.
[2253] Ps. lxvii. 1, 2.
[2254] See Ante-Nicene Fathers, Am. ed. vol. v. p. 379.
[2255] Held at Carthage, A.D. 256.
[2256] Prov. xxx. 12, ekgonon kakon dikaion eauton krinei, ten d' exodon autou ouk apenipsen.
[2257] 1 Pet. iv. 8.
[2258] John xv. 2.
[2259] 1 Cor. xiii. 3.
[2260] Letter LI. 21. Ante-Nicene Fathers, Am. ed. vol. v. p. 332.
[2261] P. 387.
[2262] This Council at Carthage is not elsewhere mentioned.
[2263] Ps. lv. 18, Septuagint.
[2264] Acts xix. 5.
[2265] Matt. xxi. 25.
[2266] Phil. i. 15, 17.
[2267] 1 Cor. i. 14.
[2268] 1 Cor. iii. 6.
[2269] Gal. v. 19-21.
[2270] Jas. iv. 6.
[2271] Luke xviii. 8.
[2272] Matt. iii. 12.
[2273] Ps. l. 1.
[2274] Ps. cxiii. 1-3.
[2275] Prov. xiii. 22.
[2276] Basilicæ.
[2277] Disputationibus legalibus.
[2278] Gen. xxii. 18.
[2279] Ecclus. iv. 21.
[2280] Num. xvi. 31-33.
[2281] Gal. ii. 18.
[2282] Gal. i. 23, 24.