Chapter 53.—121. Petilianus said: "If you make prayer to God, or utter supplication, it profits you absolutely nothing whatsoever. For your blood-stained conscience makes your feeble prayers of no effect; because the Lord God regards purity of conscience more than the words of supplication, according to the saying of the Lord Christ, ‘Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom
of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.’2141
The will of
God unquestionably is good, for therefore we
pray as follows in the holy prayer, ‘Thy will be done in
earth, as it is in
heaven,’
2142
that, as His will is good, so it may confer on us whatever may be good. You therefore do not do the will of
God, because you do what is
evil every day."
122. Augustin answered: If we on our side were to utter against you all that you assert against us, would not any one who heard us consider that we were rather insane litigants than Christian disputants, if he himself were in his senses? We do not, therefore, render for railing. For it is not fitting that the servant of the Lord should strive; but he should be gentle unto all men, willing to learn, in
meekness instructing those that oppose themselves.2143
If, therefore, we
reproach you with those who
daily do what is
evil among you, we are
guilty of striving unbefittingly, accusing one for the
sins of another. But if we
admonish you, that as you are
unwilling that these things should be brought against yourselves, so you should
abstain from bringing against us the sins of other men, we then in meekness are instructing you, solely in the hope that some time you will return to a better mind.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
