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Letter CCVIII.
(a.d. 423.)
To the Lady Felicia, His Daughter
in the Faith, and Worthy of Honour Among the Members of Christ,
Augustin Sends Greeting in the Lord.
1. I do not doubt, when I consider both your
faith and the weakness or wickedness of others, that your mind has
been disturbed, for even a holy apostle, full of compassionate
love, confesses a similiar experience, saying, “Who is weak, and
I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not?”2894
Wherefore,
as I myself share your pain, and am solicitous for your welfare in
Christ, I have thought it my duty to address this letter, partly
consolatory, partly hortatory, to your Holiness, because in the
body of our Lord Jesus Christ, in which all His members are one,
you are very closely related to us, being loved as an honourable
member in that body, and partaking with us of life in His Holy
Spirit.
2. I exhort you, therefore, not to be too much
troubled by those offences which for this very reason were foretold
as destined to come, that when they came we might remember that
they had been foretold, and not be greatly disconcerted by them.
For the Lord Himself in His gospel foretold them, saying, “Woe
unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be that
offences come; but woe unto that man by whom the offence
cometh!”2895
These are
the men of whom the apostle said, “They seek their own, not the
things that are Jesus Christ’s.”2896
There are, therefore, some who
hold the honourable office of shepherds in order that they may
provide for the flock of Christ; others occupy that position that
they may enjoy the temporal honours and secular advantages
connected with the office. It must needs happen that these two
kinds of pastors, some dying, others succeeding them, should
continue in the Catholic Church even to the end of time, and the
judgment of the Lord. If, then, in the times of the apostles there
were men such that Paul, grieved by their conduct, enumerates among
his trials, “perils among false brethren,”2897
and yet he did not haughtily cast
them out, but patiently bore with them, how much more must such
arise in our times, since the Lord most plainly says concerning
this age which is drawing to a close, “that because iniquity
shall abound the love of many shall wax cold.”2898
The word which follows, however,
ought to console and exhort us, for He adds, “He that shall
endure to the end, the same shall be saved.”
3. Moreover, as there are good shepherds and bad
shepherds, so also in flocks there are good and bad. The good are
represented by the name of sheep, but the bad are called goats:
they feed, nevertheless, side by side in the same pastures, until
the Chief Shepherd, who is called the One Shepherd, shall come and
separate them one from another according to His promise, “as a
shepherd divideth the sheep from the goats.” On us He has laid
the duty of gathering the flock; to Himself He has reserved the
work of final separation, because it pertains properly to Him who
cannot err. For those presumptuous servants, who have lightly
ventured to separate before the time which the Lord has reserved in
His own hand, have, instead of separating others, only been separated
themselves from Catholic unity; for how could those have a clean
flock who have by schism become unclean?
4. In order, therefore, that we may remain in
the unity of the faith, and not, stumbling at the offences
occasioned by the chaff, desert the threshing-floor of the Lord,
but rather remain as wheat till the final winnowing,2899
and by the
love which imparts stability to us bear with the beaten straw, our
great Shepherd in the gospel admonishes us concerning the good
shepherds, that we should not, on account of their good works,
place our hope in them, but glorify our heavenly Father for making
them such; and concerning the bad shepherds (whom He designed to
point out under the name of Scribes and Pharisees), He reminds us
that they teach that which is good though they do that which is
evil.2900
5. Concerning the good shepherds He thus
speaks: “Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an
hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under
a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that
are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may
see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”2901
Concerning
the bad shepherds He admonishes the sheep in these words: “The
Scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat: all, therefore,
whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye
after their works: for they say, and do not.”2902
When these are listened to, the
sheep of Christ, even through evil teachers, hear His voice, and do
not forsake the unity of His flock, because the good which they
hear them teach belongs not to the shepherds but to Him, and
therefore the sheep are safely fed, since even under bad shepherds
they are nourished in the Lord’s pastures. They do not, however,
imitate the actions of the bad shepherds, because such actions
belong not to the world but to the shepherds themselves. In regard,
however, to those whom they see to be good shepherds, they not only
hear the good things which they teach, but also imitate the good
actions which they perform. Of this number was the apostle, who
said: “Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ.”2903
He was a
light kindled by the Eternal Light, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself,
and was placed on a candlestick because He gloried in His cross,
concerning which he said: “God forbid that I should glory, save
in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.”2904
Moreover, since he sought not his
own things, but the things which are Jesus Christ’s, whilst he
exhorts to the imitation of his own life those whom he had
“begotten through the gospel,”2905
he yet severely reproved those
who, by the names of apostles, introduced schisms, and he chides
those who said, “I am of Paul; was Paul crucified for you? or
were ye baptized in the name of Paul?”2906
6. Hence we understand both that the good
shepherds are those who seek not their own, but the things of Jesus
Christ, and that the good sheep, though imitating the works of the
good shepherds by whose ministry they have been gathered together,
do not place their hope in them, but rather in the Lord, by Whose
blood they are redeemed; so that when they may happen to be placed
under bad shepherds, preaching Christ’s doctrine and doing their
own evil works, they will do what they teach, but will not do what
they do, and will not, on account of these sons of wickedness,
forsake the pastures of the one true Church. For there are both
good and bad in the Catholic Church, which, unlike the Donatist
sect, is extended and spread abroad, not in Africa only, but
through all nations; as the apostle expresses it, “bringing forth
fruit, and increasing in the whole world.”2907
| 2907 Col. i. 6.
The words “καὶ
αὐξανόμενον,” here translated by Augustin, are found in
some Mss. but omitted in the Textus
Receptus. | But those who are separated from
the Church, as long as they are opposed to it cannot be good;
although an apparently praiseworthy conversation seems to prove
some of them to be good, their separation from the Church itself
renders them bad, according to the saying of the Lord: “He that
is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me
scattereth.”2908
7. Therefore, my daughter, worthy of all
welcome and honour among the members of Christ, I exhort you to
hold faithfully that which the Lord has committed to you, and love
with all your heart Him and His Church who suffered you not, by
joining yourself with the lost, to lose the recompense of your
virginity, or perish with them. For if you should depart out of
this world separated from the unity of the body of Christ, it will
avail you nothing to have preserved inviolate your virginity. But
God, who is rich in mercy, has done in regard to you that which is
written in the gospel: when the invited guests excused themselves
to the master of the feast, he said to the servants, “Go ye,
therefore, into the highways and hedges, and as many as ye shall
find compel them to come in.”2909
Although, however, you owe
sincerest affection to those good servants of His through whose
instrumentality you were compelled to come in, yet it is your
duty, nevertheless, to place your hope on Him who
prepared the banquet, by whom also you have been persuaded to come
to eternal and blessed life. Committing to Him your heart, your
vow, and your sacred virginity, and your faith, hope, and charity,
you will not be moved by offences, which shall abound even to the
end; but, by the unshaken strength of piety, shall be safe and
shall triumph in the Lord, continuing in the unity of His body even
to the end. Let me know, by your answer, with what sentiments you
regard my anxiety for you, to which I have to the best of my
ability given expression in this letter. May the grace and mercy of
God ever protect you!
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