avenged with prompt justice the outrage committed against a holy man, what kind of vengeance, I would ask, must be exacted from kings for indignities offered to the sacraments of Christ, if the limbs of the prophet required such a vengeance because they were exposed to danger? Again, I acknowledge that the king, as indeed is manifest, was a persecutor when he cast the three children into the furnace because they refused to worship his image; but I ask whether he was still a persecutor when he set forth the decree that all who should blaspheme against the one true God should be destroyed, and their whole house laid waste? For if he was a persecutor, why do you answer Amen to the words of a persecutor?3 But if he was not a persecutor, why do you call those persecutors who deter you from the madness of blasphemy? For if they compel you to worship an idol, then they 2 Dan. ii.-vi.
3 This is illustrated by the words of Aujfustin, Epist. 105, ad Donatistas, c. I. 7: "Do ye not know that the words of the king were: ' I thought it good to show the signs and wonders that the high God hatli wrought toward me." How great are His signs! and how mighty are His wonders! His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and His dominion from generation to generation ' (Dan. iv. 2, 3)? Do you not, when you hear this, answer Amen, and by saying this in a loud voice, place your seal on the king's decree by a holy and solemn act?" hi the Gothic liturgy this declaration was made on Easter Eve (when the third chapter of Daniel is still read in the Roman Church), and the people answered " Allien. ' ( Chap. XCVIL] THE LETTERS OF PETILIAN, THE DONATIST.
' are like the impious king, and you are like I u\e three children; but if they are preventing vou from fighting against Christ, it is you v.ho are impious if you attempt to do this.
Ikit what they may be if they forbid this with . terrible threats, I do not presume to say. Do ■ vou find some other name for them, if you V, ill not call them pious emperors.
213. If I had been the person to bring for- ward these examples of Daniel and the three chddren, you would perhaps resist, and declare that they ought not to have been brought from those times in illustration of our days; but God be thanked that you yourself brought j them forward, to prove the point, it is true, i which you desired to establish, but you see tiiat their force was rather in favor of what vou least would wish to prove. Perhaps you will say that this proceeds from no deceit of, vours, but from the fallibility of human nature. Would that this were true! Amend it, then You will not lose in reputation; nav, it marks unquestionably the higher mind to extinguish the fire of aniniosity by a frank confession, than merely to escape the mist of falsehood by acuteness of the understanding.
Chap. 94. — 214. PETiLiANUSsaid: "Where '■; tlie law of God? where is your Christianity, if you not only commit murders and put men to death, but also order such things to be <l..ne?"
215. AuGUSTiN answered: In reply to this, see what the fellow-heirs of Christ say throughout the world. We neither commit murders, and put men to death, nor order such things to be done; and ycu are raging much more madly than those who do such things, in that you put such things into the minds of men in opposition to the hopes of everlasting life.
Chap. 95. — 216. Petilianus said: " If you wish that we should be your friends, why do you drag us to you against our will? But if you wish that we should be your foes, why do you kill your foes? " 217. AuGUSTiN answered: We neither drag you to us against your will, nor do we kill our foes; but whatever we do in our dealings with you, though we may do it contrary to your inclination, yet we do it from our love to you, that you may voluntarily correct yourselves, and live an amended life. For no one lives against his will; and yet a boy, in order to learn this lesson of his own free will,' is I A'a;« ne»io vivit invitus; et ta}nen fnier ut hoc volcns discat, invitiis 7'apula.t. Perhaps a better reading is, " Natn nemo Z'tilt in-'itus; et tauten finer iit vo/ens discat" etc., leaving out "/zcv," which is wanting in the Fleury Mss.: "No one wishes against his will; and yeta boy, wishing to learn, is beaten against his will.'
beaten contrary to his inclination, and that often by the very man that is most dear to him. And this, indeed, is what the kings would desire to say to you if they were to strike you, for to this end their power has been ordained of God, But you cry out even when they are not striking you.
Chap. 96. — 218. Petilianus said: "But what reason is there, or what inconsistency of emptiness, in desiring communion with us so eagerly, when all the time you call us by the false title of heretics?"
219. AuGUSTiN answered: If we so eagerly desired communion with heretics, we should not be anxious that you should be converted from the error of heresy; but when the very object of our negotiations with you is that you should cease to be heretics, how are we eagerly desiring communion with heretics? For, in fact, it is dissension and division that make you heretics; but peace and unity make men Catholics. When, then, you come over from your heresy to us, you cease to be what we hate, and begin to be what we love.
Chap. 97. — 220. Petilianus said: " Choose, in short, which of the two alternatives you prefer. If innocence is on your side, why do you persecute us with the sword? Or if you call us guilty, why do you, who are yourselves innocent, seek for our company? " 221. AuGUSTiN answered: O most ingenious dilemma, or rather most foolish verbosity! Is it not usual for the choice of two alternatives to be offered to an antagonist, when it is impossible that he should adopt both? For if you should offer me the choice of the two propositions, that 1 should say either that we were innocent, or that we were guilty; or, again, of the other pair of propositions, viz., those concerning you, I could not escape choosing either one or the other. But as it is, you offer me the choice of these two, whether we are innocent or you are guilty, and wish me to say which of these two I choose for my reply. But I refuse to make a choice; for I assert them both, that we are innocent, and that you are guilty. I say that we are innocent of the false and calumnious accusation.s which you bring against us, so far as any of us, being in the Catholic Church, can say with a safe conscience that we have neither given up the sacred books, nor taken part in the worship of idols, nor murdered any man, nor been guilty of any of the other crimes which you allege against us; and that any who may have committeil any such offenses, which, however, you have not proved in anv case, have thereby shut the doors of 5S6 5S6 [Book IL the kingdom of heaven, not against us, but against themselves; " for every man shall bear his own burden." ' Here you have your answer on the first head. And I further say that you are all guilty and accursed, — not some of you owing to the sins of others, which are wrought among you by certain of your number, and are censured by certain others, but all of you by the sin of schism; from which most heinous sacrilege no one of you can say that he is free, so long as he refuses to hold communion with the unity of all nations, unless, indeed, he be compelled to say that Christ has told a lie concerning the Church which is spread abroad among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. = And so you have my second answer. See how I have made you two replies, of which you were desirous that we should be reduced to choose the one. At any rate, you should have taken notice that both assertions might be made by us; and certainly, if this was what you wished, you should have asked it as a favor of us that we should choose one or the other, when you saw that it was in our power to choose both.
222. But " if innocence is on your side, why do you persecute us with the sword?" Look back for a moment on your troops, which are not now armed after the ancient fashion of their fathers only with cudgels, but have further added to their equipment axes and lances and swords, and determine for yourselves to which of us the question best belongs, "Why do you persecute us with the sword?" "Or if you call us guilty," say you, "why do you, who are yourselves innocent, seek for our company?" Here I answer very briefly. The reason why you, being guilty, are sought after by the innocent, is that you may cease to be guilty, and begin to be innocent. Here then I have chosen both of the alternatives concerning us, and answered both of those concerning you, only do you in turn choose one of the two. Are you innocent or guilty? Here you cannot choose to make the two assertions, and yet choose both, if so it pleases you. For at any rate you cannot be innocent in reference to the same circumstances in respect of which you are guilty. If therefore you are innocent, do not be surprised that you are invited to be at peace with your brethren; but if you are guilty, do not be surprised that you are sought for punishment by kings. But since of these two alternatives you assume one for yourselves, and the other is alleged of you by us, — for you assume to yourselves innocence, I Gal. vi. 5.
2 Luke j;xiv. 47.
and it is alleged of you by us that you are living impiously, — hear again once more what I shall say on either head. If you are innocent, why do you speak against the testimony of Christ? But if you are guilty, why do you not fly for refuge to His mercy? For His, testimony, on the one hand, is to the unity of the world, and His mercy, on the other, is in brotherly love.
Chap. 98. — 223. pETiLiANussaid: "Lastly, as we have often said before, how great is your presumption, that you should speak as you presume to do of kings, when David says, ' It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man: it is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes?' " ^ 224. AuGUSTiN answered: We put no confidence in man, but, so far as we can, we warn men to place their trust in the Lord; nor do we put confidence in princes, but, so far as we can, we warn princes to put confidence in the Lord. And though we may seek aid from princes to promote the advantage of the Church, yet do we not put confidence in them. For neither did the apostle himself put confidence in that tribune, in the sense in which the Psalmist talks of putting confidence in princes, from whom he obtained for himself that an escort of armed men should be assigned to him; nor did he put confidence in the armed men, by whose protection he escaped the snares of the wicked ones, in any such sense as that of the Psalmist where he speaks of putting confidence in men.* But neither do we find fault with you yourselves, because you sought from the emperor that the basilicas should be restored to you, as though you had put your trust in Julian the prince; but we find fault with you, that you have despaired of the witness of Christ, from whose unity you have separated the basilicas themselves. For you received them at the bidding of an enemy of Christ, that in them you should despise the commands of Christ, whilst you find force and truth in what Julian ordained, saying, " This, moreover, on the petition of Rogatianus, Pontius, Cassianus, and other bishops, not without an intermixture of clergy, is added to complete the whole, that those proceedings which were taken to their prejudice wrongly and without authority being all annulled, everything should be restored to its former position; " and yet you find nothing that has either force or truth in what Christ ordained, saying, " Ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and even in the whole earth." s 5 Acts i. 8.
HAP. XCIX.] THE LETTERS OF PETILIAN, THE DONATIST.
--^7 We entreat you, let yourselves be reformed. Return to this most manifest unity of the whole world; and let all things be restored to their former position, not in accordance with the words of the apostate Julian, but in acicordance with the words of our Saviour Christ. Have pity on your own soul. We are not now comparing Constantine and Julian in order to low how different they are. We are not lying, If you have not placed confidence in a man and in a prince, when you said to a pagan and apostate emperor, that " in him :-.istice only found a place," seeing that the irty of Donatus has universally employed I le prayers and the rescript in which those ''.ords occur, as is proved by the records of the audience; much less ought we to be accused by you, as though we put our confidence in any man or prince, if without any ilasphemous flattery we obtained any request from Constantine or from the other Christian emperors; or if they themselves, without our '■^king for it, but remembering the account liich they shall render to the Lord, under whose words they tremble when they hear —hat you yourself have quoted, " Be wise now \ lerefore, O ye kings," etc., and many other sayings of the sort, make any ordinance of -'leir own accord in support of the unity of *,;e Catholic Church. But I say nothing about ( onstantine. It is Christ and Julian that we >ntrast before you; nay, more than this, it ^ God and man, the Son of God and the son ; hell, the Saviour of our souls and the destroyer of his own. Why do you maintain the rescript of Julian in the occupation of the basilicas, and yet not maintain the gospel of Christ in embracing the peace of the Church? We too cry out, " Let all things that have been done amiss be restored to their ancient condition." The gospel of Christ is of greater antiquity than the rescript of Julian; the unity of Christ is of greater antiquity than the party of Donatus; the prayers of the Church to the Lord on behalf of the unity of the Church are of greater antiquity than the prayers of Rogatianus, and Pontius, and Cassianus, to Julian on behalf of the party of Donatus. Are proceedings wrongly taken when kings forbid division? and are they not wrongly taken when bishops divide unity? Is that wrong action when kings minister to the witness of Christ in defence of the Church "> and is it not wrong action when bishops contradict the witness of Christ in order to deny the Church? We entreat you, therefore, that the words of Julian himself, to whom you thus made supplication, may be listened to, not in opposition to the gospel, but in accord ance with the gospel, and that " all things which have been done amiss may be restored to their former condition."
Chap. 99. — 225. Petilianus said: "On you, yes you, you wretched men, I call, who, being dismayed with the fear of persecution, whilst you seek to save your riches, not your souls, love not so much the faithless faith of the traitors, as the wickedness of the very men whose protection you have won unto yourselves, — just in the same way as sailors, shipwrecked in the waves, plunge into the waves by which they must be overwhelmed, and in the great danger of their lives seek unmistakeably the very object of their dread; just as the madness of a tyrant, that he may be free from apprehension of any person whatsoever, desires to be feared, though this is fraught with peril to himself: so, so you fly for refuge to the citadel of wickedness, being willing to look on the loss or punishment of the innocent if you may escape fear for yourselves. If you consider that you escape danger when you plunge into ruin, truly also it is a faith that merits condemnation to observe the faith of a robber. Lastly, it is trafficking in a madman's gains to lose your own souls in order not to lose your wealtli. For the Lord Christ says, ' If a man shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul, what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?' '' ' 226. AuGUSTiN answered: That exhortation of yours would be useful, I cannot but acknowledge, if any one were to employ it in a good cause. It is undoubtedly well that you have tried to deter men from preferring their riches to their souls. But I would have you, who have heard these words, listen also for a time to us; for we also say this, but listen in what sense. If kings threaten to take away your riches, because you are not Jews according to the flesh, or because you do not worship idols or devils, or because you are not carried about into any heresies, but abide in Catholic unity, then choose rather that your riches should perish, that you perish not yourselves; but be careful to prefer neither anything else, nor the life of this world itself, to eternal salvation, which is in Christ. But if kings threaten you with loss or condemnation, simply on the ground that you are heretics, such things are terrifying you not in cruelty, but in mercy; and your determination not to fear is a sign not of bravery, but of obstinacy. Hear then the words of Peter, where he says, " What glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye take it patiently?"'' so that herein you have neither Matt. xvi. 26.
- I Pet. ii. so.
[Book II.
consolation upon earth, nor in the world to come life everlasting; but you have here the miseries of the unfortunate, and there the hell of heretics. Do you see, therefore, my brother, with whom I am now arguing, that you ought first to show whether you hold the truth, and then to exhort men that in upholding it they should be ready to give up all the blessings which they possess in this present world? And so, when you do not show this, because you cannot, — not that the talent is wanting, but because the cause is bad, — why do you hasten by your exhortations to make men both beggars and ignorant, both in want and wandering from the truth, in rags and contentions, household drudges and heretics, both losing their temporal goods in this world, and finding eternal evils in the judgment of Christ? But the cautious son, who, while he stands in dread of his father's rod, keeps away from the lair of the serpent, escapes both blows and destruction; whereas he who despises the pains of discipline, when set in rivalry with his own pernicious will, is both beaten and destroyed. Do you not now understand, O learned man, that he who has resigned all earthly goods in order to maintain the peace of Christ, possesses God; whereas he who has lost even a very few coins in behalf of the party of Donatus is devoid of heart?
Chap. ioo. — 227. Petilianus said: "But we who are poor in spirit' are not apprehensive for oup wealth, but rather feel a dread of wealth. We, ' as having nothing, and yet possessing all things,' - look on our soul as our wealth, and by our punishments and blood purchase to ourselves the everlasting riches of heaven. So again the same Lord says, ' Whosoever shall lose his substance, shall find it again an hundred fold.' " 228. AuGUSTiN answered: It is not beside the purpose to inquire into the true meaning of this passage also. For where my purpose is not interfered with by any mistake which you make, or any false impression which you convey in quoting from the Scriptures, I do not concern myself about the matter. It is not then written, " Whosoever shall lose his substance," but "Whosoever shall lose his life for rny sake."3 And the passage about substance is not, "Whosoever shall lose," but "Everyone that hath forsaken;"'' and that not only with reference to substance of money, but many other things besides. But you meanwhile have not lost your substance; but whether you have forsaken it, in that you so boast of poverty, I cannot say. And if by any chance ray colleague Fortunatus may know this, being in the same city with you, he never told me, because I had never asked him. However, even if you had done this, you have yet yourself quoted the testimony of the apostle against yourself in this very epistle which you have written: " Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing, "s For if you had charity, you would not bring charges against the whole world, which knows nothing of you, and of which you know no rriore, — no, not even such charges as are founded on the proved offenses of the Africans. If you had charity, you would not picture to yourself a false unity in your calumnies, but you would learn to recognize the unity that is most clearly set forth in the words of the Lord: "even in the whole earth."* But if you did not do this, why do you boast as though you had done it? Are you really so filled with fear of riches, that, having nothing, you possess all things? Tell that to your colleague Crispinus, who lately bought a farm near our city of Hippo, that he might there plunge men into the lowest abyss.' Whence I too know this all too well. You perhaps are not aware of it, and therefore shout out in security, " We stand in fear of riches." And hence I am surprised that that cry of yours has been allowed to pass Crispinus, so as to reach us. For between Constantina, where you are, and Hippo, where I am, lies Calama, where he is, nearer indeed to our side, but still between us. I wonder, therefore, how it was that he did not first intercept this cry, and strike it back so that it should not reach to our ears; and that he did not, in opposition to you, recite in much more copious phrase a eulogy on riches. For he not only stands in no fear of riches, but he actually loves them. And certainly, before you utter anything about the rest, you should rehearse such views to him. If he makes no corrections, then we have our answer ready. But for yourself, if it be true that you are poor, you have with you my brother Fortunatus. You will be more likely with such sentiments to please him, who is my colleague, than Crispinus, who is your own.
Chap. idi. — 229. Petilianus said: "Inasmuch as we live in the fear of God, we have no fear of the punishments and executions which you wreak with the sword; but the only thing which we avoid is that by your most wicked communion you destroy men's souls, according to the saying of the Lord Himself: S I Cor. xiii. 3.
6 Acts i. 8.
7 See above, c. 84.
Chaf. CIL] THE LETTERS OF PETILIAN, THE DOXATIST.
* Fear not them which kill the bod)% but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.' "' 230. AuGUSTiN answered: You do the destruction which you speak of, not with a visible sword, but with that of which it is said, " The sons of men, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword." "" For with this sword of accusation and calumny against the world of which you are wholly ignorant, you destroy the souls of those who lack experience. But if you find fault with a most wicked communion, as you term it, I would bid you presently, not with my words, but with your own, to ascend, descend, enter, turn yourself about, change sides, be such as was Optatus. But if you return to your senses, and shall find that you are not such as he, not because he refused to partake of the sacraments with you, but because you took offense at what he did, then you will acquit the world of crimes which do not belong to it, and you will find yourself involved in the sin of schism.
Chap. 102. — 231. Petilianus said: "You, therefore, who prefer rather to be washed with the most false of baptisms than to be regenerate, not only do not lay aside your sins, but also load your souls with the offenses of criminals. For as the water of the guilty has been abandoned by the Holy Spirit, so it is clearly filled full of the offenses of the traditors. To any wretched man, then, who is baptized by one of this sort, we would say. If you have wished to be free from falsehood, you are really drenched with falsity. If you desired to shut out the sins of the fiesh, you will, as the conscience of the guilty comes upon you, be partakers likewise of their guilt. If you wished to extinguish the flames of avarice, you are drenched with deceit, you are drenched with wickedness, you are drenched also with madness. Lastly, if you believe that faith is identical in the giver and the receiver, you are drenched with the blood of a brother by him who slays a man. And so it comes to pass that you, who had come to baptism free from sin, return from baptism guilty of the sin of murder."
232. AuGUSTiN answered: I should like to come to argument with those who shouted assent when they either heard or read those words of yours. For such men have not ears in their hearts, but their heart in their ears. Yet let them read again and again, and consider, and find out for themselves, not what ■ Matt. X. 28.
2 Ps. Ivii. 4.
5S9 the sound of those words is, but what they mean. First of all, to sift the meaning of the last clause, "So it comes to pass," you say, " that you who had come to baptism free from sin, return from baptism guilty of the sin of murder: " tell me, to begin with, who there is that comes to baptism free from sin, with the single exception of Him who came to be baptized, not that His iniquity should be purged away, but that an example of humility might be given us? For what shall be forgiven to one free from sin? Or are you indeed endowed with such an eloquence, that you can show to U.S some innocence which yet committeth sin? Do you not hear the words of Scripture saying, " No one is clean from sin in Thy sight, not even the infant whose life is but of a single day upon the earth?" ^ por whence else is it that one hastens even with infants to seek remission of their sins? Do you not hear the words of another Scripture, " In sin did my mother conceive me? " ■> In the next place, if a man returns a murderer, who had come without the guilt of murder, merely because he receives baptism at a murderer's hands, then all they who returned from receiving baptism at the hands of Optatus were made partakers with Optatus. Go now, and see with what face you cast in our teeth that we excite the wrath of kings against you. Are you not afraid that as many satellites of Gildo will be sought for among you, as there are men who may have been baptized by Optatus? Do you see at length how that sentence of yours, like an empty bladder, has rattled not only with a meaningless sound, but on your own head?
233, To go on to the other earlier arguments which you have set before us to be refuted, they are of such a nature that we must needs allow that every one returns from baptism endued with the character of him by whom he is baptized; but God forbid that those whom you baptize should return from you infected with the same madness as possesses you when you make such a statement! And what a dainty sound there was in your words. "You are drenched with deceit, you are drenched with wickedness, you are drenched also with madness! '' Surely you would never pour fortli words like this unless you were, not drenched, but filled even to repletion with madness. Is it then true, to say nothing of the rest, that all who come untainted with covetousness to receive baptism at the hands of your covetous colleagues, or the priests of your party, return guilty of covetousness, and that ihose who run in 3 Job XIV. 4, 5; cp. LXX.
■4 Ps. li. 5.
[Book II, soberness to the whirlpool of intoxication to be baptized return in drunkenness? If you entertain and teach such views as this, you will have the effrontery even to quote, as making against us, the passage which you advanced some little time ago: "It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes.'" What is the meanmg of your teaching, I would ask, save only this, that we should put our confidence, not in the Lord, but in man, when you say that the baptized person is made to resemble him who has baptized him? And since you assume this as the fundamental principle of your baptism, are men to place their trust in you? and are those to place their trust in princes who were disposed to place it in the Lord? Truly I would bid them hearken not to you, but rather to those proofs which you have urged against ourselves, ay, and to words more awful yet; for not only is it written, " It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man," but also, "Cursed be the man that trusteth in man.'^^ Chap. 103. — 234. Petilianus said: "Imitate indeed the prophets, who feared to have their holy souls deceived with false baptism. For Jeremiah says of old that among impious men water is as one that lies. ' Water,' he says, ' that lies has not faith.' " 235, AuGUSTiN answered: Any one that hears these words, without being acquainted with the Scriptures, and who does not believe that you are either so far astray as not to know what you are saying, or deceiving in such wise that he whom you have deceived should not know what he says, would believe that the prophet Jeremiah, wishing to be baptized, had taken precautions not to be baptized by impious men, and had used these words with this intent. For what was your object in saying, previous to your quotation of this passage, " Imitate indeed the prophets, who feared to have their holy souls deceived with false baptism?" Just as though, in the days of Jeremiah, any one were washed with the sacrament of baptism, except so far as the Pharisees almost every moment bathed themselves, and their couches and cups and platters, with the washings which the Lord condemned, as we read in the gospel. ^ How then could Jeremiah have said this, as though he desired to be baptized, and sought to avoid being baptized by impious men? He said it, then, when he was complaining of a faithless people, by the corruption of whose morals Ps.
2 Jer. xvii. 5 3 Mark vii. 4.
he was vexed, not wishing to associate with their deeds; and yet he did not separate himself bodily from their congregation, nor seek other sacraments than those which the people received as suitable to that time, according to the law of Moses. To this people, therefore, in their evil mode of life, he gave the name of " a wound," with which the heart of the righteous man was grievously smitten, whether speaking thus of himself, or foreshadowing in himself what he foresaw would come to pass. For he speaks as follows: " O Lord, remember me, and visit me; make clear my innocence before those who persecute me in no spirit of long-suffering: know that for Thy sake I have suffered rebuke from those that scorn Thy words. Make their portion complete; and Thy word shall be unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by Thy name, O Lord God of hosts. I sat not in the assembly of the mockers, but was afraid of the presence of Thy hand; I sat alone, because I was filled with bitterness. Why do those who make me sad prevail against me? My wound is grievous; whence shall I be healed? It is become unto me as lying water, that has no faith."'* In all this it is manifest what the prophet wished to be understood, but manifest only to those who do not wish to distort to their own perverse cause the meaning of what they read. For Jeremiah says that his wound has become unto him as lying water, which cannot inspire faith; but he wished that by his wound those should be understood who made him sad by the evil conduct of their lives. Whence also the apostle says, " Without were fightings, within were fears; "s and again, " Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not?"* And because he had no hopes that they could be reformed, therefore he said, "Whence shall I be healed?'' as though his own pain must needs continue so long as those among whom he was compelled to live continued what they were. But that a people is commonly understood under the appellation of water is shown in the Apocalypse, where we understand "many waters" to mean " many peoples," not by any conjecture of our own, but by an express explanation in the place itself.'' Abstain then from blaspheming the sacrament of baptism from any misunderstanding, or rather error, even when found in a man of most abandoned character; for not even in the lying Simon was the baptism which he received a lying water,® nor do all the liars of your party administer a lying water when they [H.*ftlie ere sei' I' 4 Jer. XV. 15-18; cp. LXX. 5 2 Cor. yii. 5.
Chap. CV.]
"^QI Waptize in the name of the Trinity. For neither do they begin to be Uars only when tiiey are betrayed and convicted, and so forced to acknowledge their misdeeds; but rather they were already liars, when, being adulterers and accursed, they pretended to 1 >i chaste and innocent.
Chap. 104. — 236. Petilianus said:" David also said, ' The oil of the sinner shall not , nomt my head.' Who is it, therefore, that J calls a sinner? Is it I who suffer your violence, or you who persecute the innocent? "