Chapter 19.—25. Wherefore, as regards those who received the persons who came from heresy in the same baptism of Christ with which they had been baptized outside the Church, and said "that they followed ancient custom," as indeed the Church now receives such, it is in vain urged against them "that among the ancients there were as yet only the first beginning of heresy and schisms,1518
| 1518 Apud veteres hæreses et schismata prima adhuc fuisse initia; that among the ancients heresies and schisms were yet in their very infancy. Benedictines suggest: "hæresis et schismatum." Hartel reads: apud veteres hæreseos et schismatum prima adhuc fuerint initia.
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so that those were involved in them who were seceders from the
Church, and had originally been
baptized within the
Church, so that it was not necessary that they should be
baptized again when they returned and did penance." For so soon as each several
heresy existed, and departed from the
communion of the Catholic
Church, it was possible that, I will not even say the next day, but even on that very day, its votaries might have
baptized some who
flocked to them. And
therefore if this was the old
custom, that they should be so received into the
Church (as could not be denied even by those who maintained the contrary part in the discussion), there can be no doubt in the
mind of any one who pays careful attention to the matter, that those also were so received who had been
baptized without in
heresy.
26. But I cannot see what show of reason there is in this, that the name of "erring sheep"1519
should be denied to one whose lot it has been that, while seeking the
salvation which is in
Christ, he has fallen into the error of
heretics, and been
baptized in their body; while he is held to have become a
sheep already within the body of the Catholic
Church herself, who has
renounced the
world in words and not in
deeds, and has received
baptism in such falseness of
heart as this. Or if such an one also does not become a
sheep unless after
turning to
God with a true
heart, then, as he is not
baptized at the time when he becomes a
sheep, if he had been already
baptized, but was not yet a
sheep; so he too, who comes from the
heretics that he may become a
sheep, is not then to be
baptized if he had been already
baptized with the same
baptism, though he was not yet a
sheep. Wherefore, since even all the bad that are within—the covetous, the envious, the drunkards, and those that
live contrary to the
discipline of
Christ—may be
deservedly called
liars, and in
darkness, and dead, and
antichrists, do they yet therefore not
baptize, on the ground that "there can be nothing common between
truth and
falsehood, between
light and
darkness, between
death and immortality, between
Antichrist and
Christ?"
1520
27. He makes an assumption, then, not "of mere custom," but "of the reason of truth itself,"1521
when he says that the sacrament of
God cannot be turned to error by the error of any men, since it is declared to exist even in those who have erred. Assuredly the
Apostle John says most plainly, "He that hateth his
brother is in
darkness even until now;"
1522
and again, "Whosoever hateth his
brother is a murderer;"
1523
and why, therefore, do they baptize those within the Church whom Cyprian himself declares to be in the envy of malice?
1524
| 1524 Cypr. Ep. lxxiii. 14.
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