To the Donatists after the Collation 47–58

But since, terrified by the documents brought forward to be read, they had come to the point of saying that the case had already lapsed by time limits and could not be pleaded, they put to us what had already been settled before: that if we argued from the holy Scriptures, those documents should by no means be read; but if we chose to have them read, they had a valid plea of prescription, so as not to allow at all a case lapsed by time limits to be pleaded. Yet they themselves had not kept what they had promised before, that they would answer our mandate, in which they confessed we had argued the case of the church with testimonies of the Scriptures, likewise with testimonies of the Scriptures, they who contended that the persons of the plaintiffs must be discussed not in the manner of debaters but in the manner of litigants. We answered them, then, that if they preferred nothing else to be dealt with but the question what or where the Catholic Church is, we would argue its case only from the divine testimonies by which it was foretold; but if they brought any charges against men, since they themselves could not show them by divine testimonies but by some other documents of that kind, we too would clear them by documents of that kind. So, while they kept repeating their empty pleas, we repeated these things most perseveringly; so the truth overcame them and bound them, refuted and beaten, to hear what we had brought forward. For they saw that if they charged no crimes of Caecilian against our communion, nothing would remain to them by which to excuse in any way their separation from unity; but if they charged Caecilian’s crimes, these could not be asserted by them nor defended by us except by documents of that kind.

Now, amid these most contentious noises of theirs, at what price must this have been bought: that when we said that what we proposed was that they should prove, if they could, the charges they are accustomed to bring against our communion, which is spread through all nations, so that it might be known from this whether their separation had been just, they answered that we wished to plead another’s case, namely that of the churches overseas, against which they brought no such charges, since this dispute was among Africans; and that those churches should rather wait to join to themselves those who won in this conference, and that these should have the Catholic name with them? Why, then, are you still asking, or doubting, which church you ought to hold? See, you have the church against which your bishops confessed they had no case, the church with which our communion is joined, from which theirs is separated. For if they said now that it should wait so that whichever of us won would be joined to it and hold the Catholic name with it, then surely our forebears already won against their forebears before; that is why they were joined to that church and held the Catholic name in its unity. But if these men were already beaten by our forebears in the person of their forebears, why do they still contend with us? And if they were not beaten, why are they not in communion with that church, against which, unable to deny that it is Catholic, they confessed they had no case? See, the Catholic Church overseas, spread through so many nations, which they said ought to wait so as to join to itself those who won: how ought it to wait to join to itself those who win, unless it is free of the crimes that are being disputed between us? For if it is not free of them, how will it, itself guilty and beaten along with the beaten, join the winners to itself? Further, if it is free of these crimes, as they admit, we too are free of them, who cleave to the same communion. For if, because of this communion, another’s crime contaminates us, our crime also contaminates the church with which we are in communion. But they have admitted that it is not polluted by the crime of Africans, though Africans are joined with it in the communion of the sacraments. There, then, they were convicted that we too could not be polluted by the crime of those with whom we are joined in the communion of the sacraments, since we are entangled by no bond of consent. Moreover, the victorious case of Caecilian himself is very easily shown by the same words of these men. For if, while we contend, the church overseas, free of these crimes, ought to wait so as to join to itself and to the Catholic name those who win, it was waiting then, when their forebears were contending fiercely with Caecilian. So he won then, whom, after the contest, the church which had waited for this joined to itself. Or if it could join him to itself in the communion of the sacraments even though polluted, and, as they have already admitted, remain unpolluted by these crimes, much more have we won, showing from this that each bears his own burden, and that neither does one case prejudice another case nor one person another person.

Again, at what price must it have been bought, that they thought our mandate, in which we had set out the whole case, should be answered not with sudden words but with a written letter? For in this way it was established that they could not answer all the things set down in our mandate, which they did not wish even to touch at all in their letter. For no one can say that they could not keep our statement in memory and for that reason did not wish to answer all the necessary points. Our mandate was issued to them when they asked for it by a notice and alleged this very reason, that they might be prepared to answer everything. And though seven had already been chosen by the rest to do everything for all, they nonetheless brought forward the very letter with which they tried to answer our mandate in the name of their whole council, as a letter given by all of them to the commissioner. If we had wished not to admit it, we would have been fully within our rights. For it was not in order that, after the case had been entrusted to seven men, anything further be done except through those who had been chosen. But so that we would not seem to have feared their letter with our own, we admitted without any hesitation that it be read and entered. For it was something to be wished for, and, as I said, to be bought, that after so many days of postponement, which we had granted at their request, they should bring a labor worked over by lamplight, in which it would be plain enough to those who read both letters that they had not answered our mandate, and it would be established that we had answered that very letter of theirs at once without any postponement. For if people are of such slow wit as to think they said something in those places of our mandate where they did not wish to be silent, I think no one is so stupid as to suppose that they answered anything in those places where they were wholly silent. And these are not small or contemptible matters, since the whole case rests rather on them.

For the testimonies of the Scriptures by which we asserted that the church with which we are in communion, begun from Jerusalem, is spread through the whole world, they passed over as if they had not been said at all, overwhelmed by the great mass of divine authority. Likewise, what was set down in our mandate about the blessed Cyprian, who both admonished by precept and confirmed by his own example that the bad should rather be tolerated in the church than the church be deserted because of them, they did not dare to touch at all; understanding, I believe, that if they tried to undermine Cyprian’s authority in any writing of his, they would be admitting that we too rightly do not yield to his authority in the matter in which they are accustomed to bring forward his opinions or decrees about repeating baptism. Although they did not wish to mention openly even Cyprian’s view on baptism itself, knowing that there too, if they did, they would suffer shipwreck, since Cyprian did not leave unity but remained in it with those who thought differently on this matter. Hence either the church must be said to have perished then, and there was no longer any church from which their Donatus could be born; or, as is true, the church remained, and in it the bad do not contaminate the good, as Cyprian also judged, who remained in the same universal body with those who thought differently. And therefore these men have clothed themselves in the detestable sacrilege of schism, who because of some people’s crimes, unproved, and even if they were true, ought by no means to have separated themselves from the unity spread through the whole world. Foreseeing this, as far as can be understood, they passed over in total silence that testimony of Cyprian which was cited in our mandate.

That too which they themselves declared by their own judgment in the case of the Maximianists, that unity is not to be deserted because of the bad, when they said that Maximian’s associates had not been polluted by Maximian, and received back from there with their honor intact those whom they had condemned, and showed that the baptism of Christ, though given outside the church, is to be recognized rather than destroyed, since they did not dare to baptize again those baptized by Felician in the schism and received back with him afterward: this too, then, when they read it in our mandate, they decided was better kept silent and passed over than rubbed up again by any contradiction. The case of Caecilian also, distinguished in our mandate from the case of the church and yet defended on every side, they did not touch at all in their answer. Who, then, would think they answered that mandate of ours, when against all these things they did not try to say a word, nor even to throw over them the shadow of any answer whatever? As for what they seemed to answer, let anyone who wishes read it and judge, comparing their letter with that same mandate of ours, besides the reply which we gave at once, by which all the machinery of their emptiness was overturned.

Now, if we were giving mountains of gold, when could we have bought this: that when the case of Maximian was put to them, so that they might understand that the council in which seventy bishops pronounced what they wished against the absent Caecilian did not harm him, just as the council did not harm Primian when about a hundred bishops likewise condemned him in his absence in favor of Maximian, they, most violently disturbed and thrust into dreadful straits, answered that neither does one case prejudice another case nor one person another person, confirming with these very few words that our whole case, on which we had been contending with them above, was wholly unconquered? For what else were we doing, showing by so many testimonies of the holy oracles, by such authority of prophets, apostles, bishops, and of our opponents themselves, that the good are not polluted by the bad through communion of the sacraments, if they have different cases and play different persons in heart, will, conduct, and works? What else were we laboring for, but that it should appear that neither does one case prejudice another case nor one person another person? This they themselves said briefly, compelled by utmost necessity, since, when we said it at length, they would not yield to the truth.

With what treasures, what riches, what heaps of precious stones should this too have been bought: that they did not hesitate not only to confess, but even to profess and boast, that their forebears persecuted Caecilian before the emperor Constantine, and even tried, by lying, to assert that he was condemned by the emperor? Where is that cry with which they used to deceive you, stirring up ill will against us because we plead the church’s case before the emperor? Where are Primian’s words stated in the records of the magistrate of Carthage: “They bring the sacred letters of many emperors; we offer only the Gospels”? Where is that splendid praise with which they extol their separation, saying it is the church of truth, which suffers persecution and does not inflict it? It is surely crushed, surely laid low. Their statements are read; they cannot deny them, because their signatures too are read. We hold them confessing, professing, boasting that their forebears gravely persecuted Caecilian before the emperor; we hold them also saying that Caecilian was condemned by the emperor while they persecuted him. So let them no longer cry that their segregation is the church of truth because it does not inflict persecution but suffers it; or let them confess that it was not the church of truth when Caecilian was suffering at the hands of their forebears. For if those who suffer persecution are at once good, Caecilian was good when he suffered; but if it can indeed happen that the bad too suffer persecution, but those who inflict it cannot be good, their forebears were not good when they persecuted Caecilian. Further, if it can happen both that the good inflict it and the bad suffer it, we are not therefore to be blamed, nor these men therefore to be praised, because they suffer something like what they boast that Caecilian suffered at the hands of their forebears. And yet it was by no means established that Caecilian was condemned by the emperor; rather, in his acquittal and clearing, which had been established by the reading of the episcopal and imperial judgment, nothing could afterward be proved to have been changed. So it came about that, with the condemnation of Caecilian removed, about which they lied, there remained the persecution which they confessed their forebears had inflicted.

It was not enough that they dared to boast, by lying, that Caecilian had been condemned by the emperor, and could not prove it by asserting it. Moreover, they even proved, and helped our documents on this point more strongly, that Caecilian’s acquittal had remained most firm, not changed into its opposite by a later judgment of the emperor, as they had lied. For first they asked that Optatus, Catholic bishop of the church of Milevis, be read, promising to prove from him that Caecilian had been condemned by the emperor. When this reading turned out rather against them, no one could keep from laughing. And yet that laughter could not have been added to the written minutes and would have remained wholly unknown, had they not refused to let even it remain unknown, saying, “Let those who laughed hear.” This indeed was written and signed. For what they wished to have read in their favor was ambiguous. So when the commissioner, most rightly, ordered the passage a little above to be read, so that those words might become clear from it if they could, what was read was what they did not want, namely that Caecilian had been cleared, whom they had earlier offered to be read as not condemned, as they were boasting, but held at Brescia for the good of peace. Here, when they said that by those words Optatus had wished to play down Caecilian’s condemnation, they were told to read an evident condemnation of Caecilian from elsewhere, so that it could be shown to have been played down by Optatus, who had written most plainly that Caecilian had been cleared. When they could not do this at all, after interposing and exhausting all the needless windings of delay, they began most plainly to help us. For, as though instructed by us, or as though chosen with us to defend and declare the innocence of Caecilian, when they were asked to show, if they could, what they were saying, that Caecilian was condemned by the emperor in a later judgment, whose letter showing him acquitted we had read, they brought forward a petition of their forebears given to the same emperor Constantine, by which they showed most plainly that it was rather they who had been condemned by his judgment. For there happened to them before the imperial power what happened to the enemies of holy Daniel, who suffered from those same lions what they had wished the innocent man to suffer. Here, when we had briefly pointed out that they had read that petition for us rather against themselves, they added something else, bringing forward the same emperor’s letter given to Verinus, deputy prefect, in which, detesting them severely and leaving them to the judgment of the Lord, who had already begun to avenge himself on them, he released them from exile by a most ignominious indulgence. So it was most clearly established not only that no condemnation of Caecilian followed afterward, but also that his acquittal and clearing were confirmed both by their punishment and by that detestable indulgence. These so excellent documents, it must be confessed, we did not have in hand; but perhaps, if we had heard that they were somewhere from which they could not be given us for nothing, we would have gone to any price to be allowed to copy them. And how much would we give, if it were offered for sale, to have them read for us even by our adversaries themselves?

What could it seem possible to add, for them to help us more abundantly? And yet they added it. For they recalled the case of Felix of Abthugni, by whom Caecilian had been ordained, against whom they had pressed the charge of betrayal. When, after Caecilian’s acquittal, there was pressure to complete unity, they had raised the question about this Felix, thinking that in this way Caecilian, already cleared, could be entangled in others’ crimes. So this case of Felix too was examined in a proconsular judgment, in which Felix’s innocence appeared most clearly. But since a certain Ingentius, who confessed in that judgment that he had committed forgery against Felix, could neither easily be punished, since the case of a bishop was involved, nor easily be released by the proconsul, guilty of so great a crime, without consulting the emperor, at whose instance all these things were being done, the proconsul reported on it, and the emperor wrote back that the same Ingentius should be sent to his court, wishing their forebears, by whom he was pestered daily, to be refuted in person; yet not doubting the clearing at all, but rather confirming it by the plain statement of his own words, as his rescript shows. We had all these documents of Felix’s case in hand and had arranged to hand them over to be read. In this they got ahead of us, and brought forward and read first the same letter of the emperor about sending Ingentius to him, when perhaps we were no longer going to read these, because we thought it enough that Caecilian’s case too had been so concluded that nothing more seemed required. But since our adversaries were bringing it about that the persecution which their forebears inflicted on our forebears before the emperors, and their slanders, overcome, should appear more abundantly, what were we to do but gladly accept what was offered and give thanks to the Lord in everything? So they themselves brought forward Constantine’s letter, they themselves read it. What I say seems incredible, but the minutes testify: their statements were written down, their signatures are held. They themselves, I say, read that Constantine wrote that Aelianus the proconsul had given a competent hearing in Felix’s case and that it had been established that Felix was innocent of the crime of betrayal, but that he wished Ingentius to be sent to his court so that, as he says, “to those who are acting at present and do not stop pestering me day after day, being present and standing before me, it might appear and be made known that they have stirred up ill will against Caecilian in vain and wished to rise up violently against him.” They themselves read it. Which of us would have dared to wish that those whom iniquity had made our accusers, truth would make our defenders? So too that Balaam, whom in ancient times iniquity hired to curse the people of God, truth compelled to bless.

Now as the order of the consuls shows, which the shortness of time did not then allow us to consider (for the books called consular lists were not at hand, nor would anyone have believed that they would raise so empty a matter as to want us to answer what was done after Ingentius was sent, or whether Ingentius was sent at all, when both the proconsul’s sentence had declared Felix’s innocence and the emperor’s reply, brought forward and read by them, had confirmed the same sentence; and they would certainly rather have brought it forward themselves if they had been confident that anything was done in their favor after Ingentius was sent): as the order of the consuls declares, then, first Caecilian was acquitted by the episcopal judgment of Miltiades; then, not long afterward, Felix was established innocent by the proconsul’s judgment; and so later Caecilian was also cleared by the emperor, hearing the case between the parties; then, some years later, his adversaries were released by that ignominious indulgence. For Miltiades judged in the consulship of Constantine for the third time and Licinius for the second, on the sixth day before the Nones of October. Aelianus the proconsul heard Felix’s case in the consulship of Volusianus and Annianus, on the fifteenth day before the Kalends of March, that is, about four months later. Constantine wrote to the deputy prefect Eumalius about the clearing of Caecilian in the consulship of Sabinus and Rufinus, on the fourth day before the Ides of November, that is, after two years and nearly eight months. And the same emperor gave a letter to the deputy Valerius about ending their exile and leaving their fury to God the avenger in the consulship of Crispus and Constantine for the second time, on the third day before the Nones of May, that is, after four years and about six months. From this it is most clearly established, without any windings, that whether Ingentius was sent to the court or not, nothing was afterward judged against Caecilian; rather, he was afterward declared, by imperial judgments too, the victor over his adversaries and persecutors.

Let the party of Donatus go now, so often rejected, so often slanderous, so often lying, so often refuted, so often beaten and confounded in every way: let it still boast that the judge was corrupted by us. As if the defeated were used to any other cry! Indeed, the judge had to be corrupted, so that his authority might undo what they themselves had done well. But I would not say they did badly; on the contrary, they did excellently, who said so much for the truth against their own errors. For if their case is considered, he judged truly against them; but if their statements are read, he judged rather in accordance with them. Or would the one who was in the middle oppose us in a case in which those who stood on the other side said, brought forward, and read so much for us? What should we have had to buy from the judge, when we did not buy from our adversaries those things which would have compelled the judge, even if he had received money from them, to give sentence for us? And yet, if we did not know him to be a man who fears God and loves justice and is far from all filth of this kind, we would have to direct such a suspicion at him, who, seeing them pressed by the truth and not wishing to seem against them, bore too patiently men wandering through empty things and saying so much that was needless and returning so often to the same things already refuted, so that the minutes, loaded with so many volumes, are almost a burden for anyone to unroll and to learn by reading how the case was pleaded. Whether they did this more from lack of truth or from the industry of cunning, I do not know. Yet in this alone could they help in any way so very bad a case, which they ought rather to have abandoned. Finally, if the rest direct an accusation against those who pleaded, and assert rather that they were corrupted by us, so as to help our case and destroy their own by so many statements and readings brought forward by themselves, I do not know how they could defend themselves and clear themselves of this suspicion; unless perhaps they say: “If we had been corrupted, we would also have quickly finished a case so bad and convicted both by us and by them. As it is, believe that we were present with good will and wished to be of some use, at least from this: that we acted by talking a great deal, so that what was done would not easily be read and it would not quickly be known that we were beaten.” If they had not done this, perhaps, even if they and we swore it, it would not be believed that they did for us for nothing everything they said and read, so much and so often, for us and against themselves. Yet we give thanks for this not to them but rather to God. For it was truth that tortured them into bringing out and publishing all these things for our case, by speaking or by reading; it was not love that invited them.

Therefore, brothers, if indeed you are not angry that we call you brothers (for they, when they heard this from us, said on record that it was an insult to them, and, though reminded by our mandate, in which this testimony from the prophet was set down, could not recall that God commanded: “Say, You are our brothers, to those who hate you and who detest you, so that the name of the Lord may be honored and may appear to them in joy, but they themselves will be ashamed”): now, therefore, brothers, let the name of the Lord appear to you in joy, the name which has been invoked over us, and whose sacraments we both carry, so that we are not undeservedly called brothers. Love peace now; abandon at last the quarrelsome and slanderous habit, now convicted and confounded; and do not hate your bishops when, corrected, they come over to us, but when, remaining in wicked error, they still lead you astray. Nor let them think themselves great because we confer on them in unity an honor which they possess to be set free by it; for having it outside unity they are rather to be condemned for it. For military standards are held more ruinously by usurpers than if they were not held at all; yet when those men are corrected and brought back into the emperor’s camp, the standards are not broken or abolished, but begin now to adorn and protect those whom before they betrayed and punished. Why do you still pay attention to their mad complaints and empty lies? The case was finished at night, but so that the night of error might be finished; the sentence was pronounced at night, but shining with the light of truth. They complained that they were shut in as in a prison; we were there too: either a wrong was done to both or care was taken for both. But how can we call it a wrong, when we remember that we were in so spacious, bright, and cool a place? Or how was it a prison, where the judge was too? Finally, we did not know we had been shut in, we who were inside together. How do they know it, unless perhaps they wanted to run away? But who does not see that they would not say these empty things, more to be laughed at than refuted, about such a commissioner, if they could find anything strong to say for their case? We know how many of you, and perhaps all or nearly all, are accustomed to say: “Oh, if they would meet in one place! Oh, if they would at last confer, and the truth would appear as they debated!” See, it has been done; see, falsehood has been convicted; see, the truth has appeared. Why is unity still fled, why is love still despised? What need is there for us to be divided by the names of men? One God created us, one Christ redeemed us, one Spirit ought to unite us. Now let the name of the Lord be honored and appear to you in joy, so that you may recognize your brothers in his unity. Now, in the statements of your bishops, the error that separated us has been defeated: let the devil too be defeated at last in your hearts, and may Christ, who commanded this, be gracious to his flock gathered and at peace.