Bad Advertisement?
Are you a Christian?
Online Store:Visit Our Store
| To Marcellinus
PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP 
Letter CXXXIX.
(a.d. 412.)
To Marcellinus, My Lord Justly
Distinguished, My Son Very Much Beloved and Longed for, Augustin
Sends Greeting in the Lord.
1. The Acts2558
| 2558 Gesta—records of judicial procedure. | which your Excellency promised to
send I am eagerly expecting, and I am longing to have them read as
soon as possible in the church at Hippo, and also, if it can be
done, in all the churches established within the diocese, that all
may hear and become thoroughly familiar with the men who have
confessed their crimes, not because the fear of God subdued them to
repentance, but because the rigour of their judges broke through
the hardness of their most cruel hearts,—some of them confessing
to the murder of one presbyter [Restitutus], and the blinding and
maiming of another [Innocentius]; others not daring to deny that
they might have known of these outrages, although they say that
they disapproved of them, and persisting in the impiety of schism
in fellowship with such a multitude of atrocious villains, while
deserting the peace of the Catholic Church on the pretext of
unwillingness to be polluted by other men’s crimes; others
declaring that they will not forsake the schismatics, even though
the certainty of Catholic truth and the perversity of the Donatists
have been demonstrated to them. The work, which it has pleased God
to entrust to your diligence, is of great importance. My heart’s
desire is, that many similar Donatist cases may be tried and
decided by you as these have been, and that in this way the crimes
and the insane obstinacy of these men may be often brought to
light; and that the Acts recording these proceedings may be
published, and brought to the knowledge of all men.
As to the statement in your Excellency’s
letter, that you are uncertain whether you ought to command the
said Acts to be published in Theoprepia,2559
| 2559 This is supposed to be the name of a Donatist
church in Carthage. | my reply is, Let this be done, if
a large multitude of hearers can be gathered there; if this be not
the case, some other place of more general resort must be provided;
it must not, however, be omitted on any account.
2. As to the punishment of these men, I beseech you
to make it something less severe than sentence of death, although
they have, by their own confession, been guilty of such grievous
crimes. I ask this out of a regard both for our own consciences and
for the testimony thereby given to Catholic clemency. For this is
the special advantage secured to us by their confession, that the
Catholic Church has found an opportunity of maintaining and
exhibiting forbearance towards her most violent enemies; since in a
case where such cruelty was practised, any punishment short of
death will be seen by all men to proceed from great leniency. And
although such treatment appears to some of our communion, whose
minds are agitated by these atrocities, to be less than the crimes
deserve, and to have somewhat the aspect of weakness and
dereliction of duty, nevertheless, when the feelings, which are
wont to be immoderately excited while such events are recent, have
subsided after a time, the kindness shown to the guilty will shine
with most conspicuous brightness, and men will take much more
pleasure in reading these Acts and showing them to others, my lord
justly distinguished, and son very much beloved and longed for.
My holy brother and co-bishop Boniface is on
the spot, and I have forwarded by the deacon Peregrinus, who
travelled along with him, a letter of instructions; accept these as
representing me. And whatever may seem in your joint opinion to be
for the Church’s interest, let it be done with the help of the
Lord, who is able in the midst of so great evils graciously to
succour you. One of their bishops, Macrobius, is at present going
round in all directions, followed by bands of wretched men and
women, and has opened for himself the [Donatist] churches which
fear, however slight, had moved their owners to close for a time.
By the presence, however, of one whom I have commended and again
heartily commend to your love, namely, Spondeus, the deputy of the
illustrious Celer, their presumption was indeed somewhat checked;
but now, since his departure to Carthage, Macrobius has opened the
Donatist churches even within his property, and is gathering
congregations for worship in them. In his company, moreover, is
Donatus, a deacon, rebaptized by them even when he was a tenant of
lands belonging to the Church, who was implicated as a ringleader
in the outrage [on Innocentius]. When this man is his associate,
who can tell what kind of followers may be in his retinue? If the
sentence on these men is to be pronounced by the Proconsul,2560
| 2560 Apringius. See note, p. 471. | or by both
of you together, and if he perchance insist upon inflicting capital
punishment, although he is a Christian and, so far as we have had
opportunity of observing, not disposed to such severity—if, I
say, his determination make it necessary, order those letters of
mine, which I deemed it my duty to address to you severally on this
subject,2561
| 2561 Letters CXXXIII. and CXXXIV. | to be
brought before you while the trial is still going on; for I am
accustomed to hear that it is in the power of the judge to mitigate
the sentence, and inflict a milder penalty than the law prescribes.
If, however, notwithstanding these letters from me, he refuse to
grant this request, let him at least allow that the men be remanded
for a time; and we will endeavour to obtain this concession from
the clemency of the Emperors, so that the sufferings of the
martyrs, which ought to shed bright glory on the Church, may not be
tarnished by the blood of their enemies; for I know that in the
case of the clergy in the valley of Anaunia,2562
| 2562 Anaunia, a valley not far from Trent, destined to
be so famous for the Council held there. In the month of May, 397
A.D., Martyrius, Sisinnius, and Alexander
were killed there by the heathen. | who were slain by the Pagans, and
are now honoured as martyrs, the Emperor granted readily a petition
that the murderers, who had been discovered and imprisoned, might
not be visited with a capital punishment.
3. As to the books concerning the baptism of
infants, of which I had sent the original manuscript to your
Excellency, I have forgotten for what reason I received them again
from you; unless, perhaps, it was that, after examining them, I
found them faulty, and wished to make some corrections, which, by
reason of extraordinary hindrances, I have not yet been able to
overtake. I must also confess that the letter intended to be
addressed to you and added to these books, and which I had begun to
dictate when I was with you, is still unfinished, little having
been added to it since that time. If, however, I could set before
you a statement of the toil which it is absolutely necessary for me
to devote, both by day and by night, to other duties, you would
deeply sympathize with me, and would be astonished at the amount of
business not admitting of delay which distracts my mind and hinders
me from accomplishing those things to which you urge me in
entreaties and admonitions, addressed to one most willing to oblige
you, and inexpressibly grieved that it is beyond his power; for
when I obtain a little leisure from the urgent necessary business
of those men, who so press me into their service2563
that I am neither able to escape
them nor at liberty to neglect them, there are always subjects to
which I must, in dictating to my amanuenses, give the first place,
because they are so connected with the present hour as not to admit
of being postponed. Of such things one instance was the abridgement
of the proceedings at our Conference,2564
| 2564 The Conference presided over by this Marcellinus
at Carthage, in the preceding year. | a work involving much labour, but
necessary, because I saw that no one would attempt the perusal of
such a mass of writing; another was a letter to the Donatist
laity2565
concerning
the said Conference, a document which I have just completed, after
labouring at it for several nights; another was the composition of
two long letters,2566
| 2566 Letters CXXXVII. and CXXXVIII. | one addressed to yourself, my
beloved friend, the other to the illustrious Volusianus, which I
suppose you both have received; another is a book, with which I am
occupied at present, addressed to our friend Honoratus,2567
in regard
to five questions proposed by him in a letter to me, and you see
that to him I was unquestionably in duty bound to send a
prompt reply.
For love deals with her sons as a nurse does with children,
devoting her attention to them not in the order of the love felt
for each, but according to the urgency of each case; she gives a
preference to the weaker, because she desires to impart to them
such strength as is possessed by the stronger, whom she passes by
meanwhile not because of her slighting them, but because her mind
is at rest in regard to them. Emergencies of this kind, compelling
me to employ my amanuenses in writing on subjects which prevent me
from using their pens in work much more congenial to the ardent
desires of my heart, can never fail to occur, because I have
difficulty in obtaining even a very little leisure, amidst the
accumulation of business into which, in spite of my own
inclinations, I am dragged by other men’s wishes or necessities;
and what I am to do, I really do not know.
4. You have heard the burdens, for my deliverance
from which I wish you to join your prayers with mine; but at the
same time I do not wish you to desist from admonishing me, as you
do, with such importunity and frequency; your words are not without
some effect. I commend at the same time to your Excellency a church
planted in Numidia, on behalf of which, in its present necessities,
my holy brother and co-bishop Delphinus has been sent by my
brethren and co-bishops who share the toils and the dangers of
their work in that region. I write no more on this matter, because
you will hear all from his own lips when he comes to you. All other
necessary particulars you will find in the letters of instruction,
which are sent by me to the presbyter either now or by the deacon
Peregrinus, so that I need not again repeat them.
May your heart be ever strong in Christ, my lord
justly distinguished, and son very much beloved and longed for!
I commend to your Excellency our son Ruffinus,
the Provost2568
of
Cirta.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|
