Psalm against the Party of Donatus

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. The abundance of sins is wont to trouble the brothers. For this reason our Lord willed to warn us beforehand, comparing the kingdom of heaven to a net cast into the sea, gathering many fish of every kind from here and there. When they had drawn them to the shore, then they began to sort them: the good they put into vessels, the rest, the bad, into the sea. Whoever knows the gospel, let him recognize it with fear. He sees that the net is the church, he sees that this world is the sea; the mixed kind of fish is the righteous with the sinner; the world’s end is the shore: then is the time to sort; those who have now broken the nets have loved the sea too much; the vessels are the seats of the saints, where they cannot come.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. A good listener perhaps asks who broke the net. Men very proud, who say that they are righteous. So they made both a split and altar against altar. They handed themselves over to the devil when they fight about the handing over, and the crime that they committed they want to transfer onto others. They themselves handed over the books, and they dare to accuse us, so as to commit a worse crime than they committed even before. Those who could have excused the matter of the books as done from fear, since Peter denied Christ while he was terrified of death, now, how will they excuse the setting up of altar against altar, and, with Christ’s peace torn apart, putting their hope in a man? What persecution did not do, they themselves did in peace.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Our guardian, great God, you can deliver us from these false prophets, who seek to devour us. They cover an accursed wolfish heart with a sheep’s skin. The name of the righteous is the sheep’s skin; schism is in the wolfish heart. Those who do not know the Scriptures they are wont to deceive; for they hear ‘traitors’ and do not know what was done before. If I say to them, ‘Prove it’, they have nothing to answer. They say they believed their own people: I say those lied; for we too believed our own, who say that they handed over. Do you want to know who speak falsely? Those who are not in unity. The case was closed long ago; the trouble is that you do not stand in peace.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Our forebears spoke, and wrote books about it, they who heard the case then, when they could prove it while it was fresh: there were certain traitors of the books of the holy law, bishops from Numidia, and not just anyone from the common people. When they had come to Carthage to ordain a bishop, they found Caecilian already ordained in his own see. They were angry because they themselves had not been able to ordain. There were Botrus and Caelestius, bitter enemies of Caecilian, impious, thieves, proud, of whom it would be long to tell. They all joined together to stir up a charge against him; they say that his ordainer had handed over the holy books. So they broke the nets of peace and now wander through the sea.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell in one! Hear the voice of the prophet, so that you may be in unity. Who has proved against us the old crime of handing over? Who charged it in a court? Who sat to judge? By what witnesses did he convict? Who dared to affirm it? But this they gladly invented, because they knew they had done it themselves. For rumour was already talking about the handing over of the books, but those who had done it were hidden in that confusion; so they defamed others, in order to conceal themselves. Through them the other leaders of that same party went astray, because they thought it shameful not to believe their colleagues. Now, brothers, let the error be ended, and let us be in unity.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. They did what they wanted then, in that blindness. No judges sat together, no bishops according to custom, as they are wont to assemble and judge in great cases; no accuser and defendant stood in the inquiry, no witness, no document by which they could prove the crime, but rage, deceit, uproar, which reign in falsehood. Let the proceedings be produced for us, which are usually kept in a council; let us see what thing forced altar to be set against altar. If the bishop was bad, he should have been deposed first; if he could not be deposed, he should have been tolerated within the net, just as you now openly tolerate so many bad men; and you who bear them with pious rage would have borne one for the sake of peace.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. It would be a great joy to us if you had not been willing to go astray then; but if the truth was not seen then, at least now, having learned by experience, see it. You now have many crooked men who greatly displease you, and yet you do not separate them from your communion. I do not speak of those sins which you can even deny: clubs, fires, deaths, I mean, which your people commit in broad daylight, and yet you put up with them, from error or from fear. How small a thing it would have been for your fathers to bear one man for unity, if the uproar was so great that they could not degrade him. Add that he was innocent, and they could prove nothing. But so that the crime should not be looked for where they saw it lay, they made themselves out to be exceedingly righteous, since they wanted to throw everything into confusion.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Whoever seeks empty honours does not want to reign with Christ, like the leader of this evil, from whose party they are named. For Donatus then wanted to hold all Africa; then he asked the emperor for judges from overseas. But this so righteous petition did not come from love. The truth itself cries this out, which I now wish to relate. For the emperor consented and sent men to sit at Rome, bishops who could then hear Caecilian with him. The case was pleaded, nothing was proved: he dared even to appeal, and after the court of his colleagues to be heard by the emperor. From this it is proved that that petition was not from love. Then, beaten everywhere, he began to rebaptize Christians.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. If you wish to follow justice, consider the whole case. What Donatus did later, why was it not done before? The bishops disagreed throughout the whole region of Africa: bishops from overseas could have judged it. Why did you run to schism and altar against altar, so that what was judged later you could no longer hear, and were forced to appeal from your own judges, while you wish by any means to establish the reign of error? And now you too know the whole of it, but pretend not to know, and when the truth presses you, you say your fathers erred, as if anyone forbade you now to withdraw from error. But pride has bound you in the seat of pestilence.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Whoever has the love of Christ cannot hate peace. You at least, O peoples, listen now and agree with us, you who do not hold a bishop’s chair for which to fight unjustly. If now your bishops from some one region had a dispute among themselves, whom would you want to judge except men of other regions who were not part of the dispute? But when these had examined the case and pronounced for one side, you would never communicate with those who refused to agree with them. Why then did you communicate with these men, who did this before? For they too did not agree with the verdict of the overseas bishops, who judged in our favour; for they are joined to us today. If Christ the judge says this, what have you to answer?

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. If the light of the heart is in you, you can see the truth. There are the petitions of Donatus and the proceedings: by them prove what has been said. If you do not wish to believe these, produce something here yourselves. If we too do not believe those, there will be a quarrel without end. Let us therefore embrace peace. What is it to us what was done before? You charge the handing over: we answer that you did it. You cry out about Macarius: and we about the circumcellion. That of ours is already past: yours do not stop even today. Our threshing floor has chaff: you want it to be this alone; for you do not want peace. Those men threaten with the club: and would that they only threatened and did not beat every day. If these of yours drive them out, they have no one through whom to reign.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. If Macarius exceeded the measure written in the Christian law, at least he was carrying out the law of the king, so as to fight for unity. I do not say that he sinned in nothing, but that yours are worse. For who commanded them to rage like this throughout Africa? Not Christ, not the emperor, is shown to have permitted these things, private clubs and fires and madness without law. Because it is written, ‘Put back your sword’, they do not think it a crime with a club, not so that a man dies, but so that he is badly battered and afterwards dies of it, already tortured by weakness. But yet if they take pity, they kill even with one blow of the club. They call the clubs ‘Israels’, which they said as an honour, so that they lay waste the name itself more than the body they beat with them.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Do not, brothers, charge us any more with the time of Macarius. If those men were cruel, they greatly displease us too; but if they tell lies about them, God can judge. Let us love the peace of Christ, let us rejoice in unity. If there are bad men in the church, they can do us no harm. If they cannot be with us, let them be excluded, peace being kept. If they cannot be excluded, let them be excluded at least from the heart. Holy Ezekiel said that certain men were sealed, who groan over the sins of their brothers and do not separate themselves from them. So let us not be separated from our mother on account of bad brothers, as impious men did then, raising an altar outside, so that they now have worse men than those they pretend to have fled.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Everyone who reads the Scriptures knows what I wish to open up. John the Baptist said then plainly to the Jews that Christ could winnow them as his threshing floor. He sent workers into the harvest, the disciples, to preach; through them the threshing floor was gathered and winnowed by the cross. Then the righteous, like the wheat, filled the churches chastely, selling what they possessed and saying farewell to the world. They were like seed, which has been scattered through the whole world, so that another harvest might rise, which is to be winnowed at the end. This grows among the weeds, because there are heresies everywhere; its chaff are the unrighteous, who are not in unity. If Macarius was one of these, why do you want to rebaptize us?

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Picture two threshing floors in your heart, so that you can see what I say. Certainly the former people too had saints, as the Scriptures show. For God said that he had left seven thousand men, and in the law many priests and kings are righteous. There you have so many prophets, you have many also from the common people. Tell me which of the righteous then set up an altar apart for himself. That unrighteous people committed many crimes: sacrifice was made to idols, so many prophets were killed, and yet none of the righteous withdrew from unity. The righteous bore with the unrighteous until the winnower should come; they were mingled in one temple, but they were not mingled in heart; they said such things against them and had one altar.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. What do you think of this? The second harvest, that of the church, which grows through the whole world, must bear more: it has already the Lord’s example in Judas the traitor. Him he bore among the good, him he also sent to preach. A bad servant was preaching, but Christ was in the faith, because those who believed the judge did not care about the herald. When he gave the holy supper, not even then did he exclude him from it, and he could have been betrayed through him even if Judas had gone out from there before. But to us an example was given to tolerate bad brothers, so that, when they cannot be excluded, we are separated only by the heart.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. I ask you, answer us: why do you want to rebaptize? You drive your fallen bishops from communion, and yet no one after them has dared to rebaptize, and all whom they baptized are in communion with you today. What did they receive from them, if those had nothing to give? Read how adulterers are punished in the holy law; for they cannot say that they sinned from fear. If only the holy baptize, rebaptize after these men. Why do you slander us because we are in unity, we who were not yet born in that persecution? It is written that the sins of the fathers do not pertain to the sons, but no one bears good fruit if he is cut off from the vine.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. You know what the Catholic is, and what is cut off from the vine. If there are any prudent among you, let them come, let them live in the root; before they dry up too much, let them now be freed from the fire. We do not rebaptize for this reason, that there is one sign in the faith, not because we see that you are holy, but that you hold only the form; for the branch that is cut off from the vine has the very form. But what does the form profit it, if it does not live from the root? Come, brothers, if you are willing, that you may be grafted into the vine. It is a grief when we see you lying so, cut off. Count the bishops even from the very see of Peter, and in that order of fathers see who succeeded whom: that is the rock which the proud gates of the underworld do not conquer.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. If someone comes to you like this, full of the Catholic faith, such as we are accustomed to hear all those holy men were, and says to you: ‘Brother, why do you want to rebaptize me? What was done before I do not know; but now I am in the faith of Christ. If what I do not know stains me, show what sort of man you are now: see, I look at your face; I do not know what is in your heart. If what I do not know stains me, perhaps you stain me, and if I believe you are holy, see with whom you communicate. If what we do not know stains, you can no longer be holy, you whom so many sins stain, which your people commit in secret. But if you do not care about what you do not know, neither do I about what was done before.’ And yet you dare to rebaptize such a Christian.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Woe to you who strive so unjustly for your bishops’ chairs. You cry out that you alone are holy; you say something else in your heart, because you see that among you too many bad men abound everywhere. Can you say, ‘We are mixed within the net’? For the answer to you is that you have already broken it. Nor can you say that you bear with the chaff; for again we answer: you should have done this before as well. For those men were not worse than Judas the traitor, with whom the apostles received the first sacrament of the supper, when they already knew that one guilty of so great a crime was among them; and yet the filth in another’s heart did not defile them. And yet you dare to rebaptize Christian brothers.

All you who rejoice in peace, now judge what is true. Listen, brothers, to what I say, and do not be angry with me. Because what you hear is not false, you can also consider it. What if mother church herself should address you in peace and say: ‘O my sons, why do you complain of your mother? Why have you deserted me? I want to hear it from you now. You accuse your brothers, and I am greatly torn. When the nations pressed me hard, I bore much with grief. Many deserted me, but they did it in fear; but no one forced you to rebel against me like this. You say you are with me, but you see that it is false. I am called Catholic, and you are of the party of Donatus. The apostle commanded me to pray for the kings of the world; you are envious that the kings are now in the Christian faith. If you are sons, why are you envious that my prayers have been heard? For when they sent gifts, you refused to accept them, and you forgot the prophets, who foretold long before that great kings of the nations would send gifts to the church. When you spurned those gifts, you showed that you are not my sons, and you forced Macarius to avenge his grief. But what have I done to you, I, your mother throughout the whole world? I expel the bad whom I can; those I cannot I am compelled to bear; I bear them until they are healed or are separated at the end. Why have you abandoned me, so that I am tormented by your death? If you hate the bad so much, see what sort you have. If you too tolerate the bad, why not in unity, where no one rebaptizes and there is no altar against altar? You tolerate such bad men, but for no good reward, because what you ought to bear for Christ, you choose to bear for Donatus.’ We have sung peace to you, brothers, if you are willing to hear. Our judge is coming: we give, he will exact.