Chapter 58.—131. Petilianus said: "It is written, ‘Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.’ When you falsely declare to the kings of this world that we hold your opinions, do you not make up a falsehood?"
132. Augustin answered: If those are not our opinions which you hold, neither were they your opinions which you received from the followers of Maximianus. But if they were therefore yours, because they were guilty of a sacrilegious schism in not communicating with the party of Donatus, take heed what ground you occupy, and with whose inheritance you refuse communion, and consider what answer you can make, not to the kings of this
world, but to Christ your King. Of Him it is said, "He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth."2150
From what
river does it mean,
save that where He was
baptized, and where the
dove descended on Him, that mighty token of
charity and
unity? But you refuse
communion with this
unity, and occupy as yet the place of
unity; and you bring us into disfavor with the kings of this
world in making use of the edicts of the proconsul to expel your schismatics from the place of the party of Donatus. These are not mere words flying at random through the empty
void: the men are
still alive, the
states bear witness to the fact, the archives of the proconsuls and of the several
towns are quoted in evidence of it. Let then the voice of calumny be at length
silent, which would bring up against the whole
earth the kings of this
world, through whose proconsuls you, yourselves a fragment, would not spare the fragment which was separated from you. When then we say that you hold our opinions, we are not shown to be bearing false witness, unless you can show that we are not
in the
Church of
Christ, which indeed you never cease alleging, but never will be able to establish; nay, in real
truth, when you say this, you are bringing a charge of false witness no longer against us, but against the
Lord Himself. For we are in the
Church which was foretold by His own
testimony, and where He bore witness to His witnesses, saying, "Ye shall be witnesses unto me both in
Jerusalem and in all Judea, and in
Samaria, and even in the whole
earth." But you show yourselves to be
false witnesses not only from this, that you
resist this
truth, but also in the very
trial in which you joined issue with the
schism of Maximianus. For if you were acting according to the
law of
Christ, how much more consistently do certain
Christian emperors frame
ordinances in accordance with it, if even pagan proconsuls can follow its behests in passing
judgment? But if you thought that even the
laws of an earthly empire were to be summoned to your aid, we do not
blame you for this. It is
what
Paul did when he bore witness before his
adversaries that he was a
Roman citizen.
2151
But I would ask by what earthly
laws it is
ordained that the followers of Maximianus should be driven from their place? You will find no
law whatever to this effect. But, in point of fact, you have chosen to expel them under
laws which have been passed against
heretics, and against yourselves among their number. You, as though by superior
strength, have
prevailed against the
weak. Whence they, being wholly powerless, say that they are
innocent, like the
wolf in the
power of the
lion. Yet surely you could not use
laws which were passed against yourselves as
instruments against others, except by the aid of false witness. For if those
laws are founded on
truth, then do you come down from the position which you occupy; but if on
falsehood, why did you use them to drive others from the
Church? But how if they both are founded on
truth, and could not be used by you for the expulsion of others except with the aid of
falsehood? For that the judges might
submit to their
authority, they were willing to expel
heretics from the
Church, from which they ought first to have expelled yourselves; but you declared yourselves to be Catholics, that you might escape the severity of the laws which you employed to oppress others. It is for you to determine what you appear to yourselves among yourselves; at any rate, under those laws you are not Catholics. Why then have you either made them false, if they are true, by your false witness,
or made use of them, if they are false, for the oppression of others?
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
