Chapter 18.—20. He says: "You who are a most abandoned traditor have come out in the character of a persecutor and murderer of us who keep the law." If the followers of Maximianus kept the law when they separated from you, then we may acknowledge you as a keeper of the law, when you are separated from the Church spread abroad throughout the world. But if you raise the question of persecutions, I at once reply: If you have
suffered anything unjustly, this does not concern those who, though they disapprove of men who act in such a way,1949
| 1949 Qui talia facientes quamvis improbent. A comparison of the explanation of this passage in Contra Crescon. III. 41, 45, shows the probability of Migne’s conjecture, "quamvis improbe," "who endure the men that act in such a way, however monstrous their conduct may be."
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yet
endure them for the
peace that is in
unity, in a manner deserving of all
praise. Wherefore you have nothing to bring up against the
Lord’s
wheat, who
endure the
chaff that is among them till the last winnowing, from whom you never would have separated yourself, had you not shown yourself lighter than
chaff by flying away under the blast of
temptation before the coming of the Winnower. But not to leave this one example, which the
Lord hath thrust back in their teeth,
to close the mouths of these men, for their correction if they will show themselves to be
wise, but for their confusion if they remain in their
folly: if those are more just that
suffer persecution than those who
inflict it, then those same followers of Maximianus are the more just, whose basilica was utterly
overthrown, and who were grievously maltreated by the military following of Optatus, when the mandates of the proconsul, ordering that all of them should be shut out of the basilicas,
were manifestly procured by the followers of Primianus. Wherefore, if, when the
emperors hated their
communion, they ventured on such violent measures for the persecution of the followers of Maximianus, what would they do if they were enabled to
work their will by being in
communion with kings? And if they did such things as I have mentioned for the correction of the
wicked, why are they surprised that Catholic
emperors should
decree with greater
power that they
should be
worked upon and corrected who endeavor to rebaptize the whole
Christian world, when they have no ground for differing from them? seeing that they, themselves bear witness that it is right to bear with
wicked men even where they have true charges to bring against them in the cause of
peace, since they received those whom they had themselves
condemned, acknowledging the
honors conferred among themselves, and the
baptism administered in
schism. Let them at length consider what treatment
they deserve at the
hands of the
Christian powers of the
world, who are the
enemies of
Christian unity throughout the
world. If, therefore, correction be
bitter, yet let them not fail to be ashamed; lest when they begin to read what they themselves have written, they be overcome with laughter, when they do not find in themselves what they wish to find in others, and fail to recognize
1950
| 1950 Nec in se agnoscunt. The reading of the Louvain edition gives better sense, "Et in se agnoscunt," "and discover in themselves."
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in their own case what they find fault with in their neighbors.
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