Letters of Boniface I

Bishop Boniface to Patroclus, Remigius, Maximus, Hilary, Severus, Valerius, Julian, Castorius, Leontius, Constantine, John, Montanus, Marinus, Mauricius, and the other bishops established throughout the Gauls and the Seven Provinces.

The clergy of the city of Valence have approached us, setting out in a petition the crimes which they assert, with the whole province as witness, that Maximus has committed; that, though the hearing was so often delegated, he always evaded the appointed judgments, and did not hasten, trusting in his conscience, so that, if innocent, he might be cleared after everything had been examined; and we have learned from the record of our own papers too that this was so often decreed. He, on the contrary, proved what was said about him, since, when summoned to refute it, though the charges were countless, by the provincial hearing delegated by my predecessors, he is even said to have avoided it and to have been quite unwilling to appear. And no one doubts that the guilty man evades judgment just as the innocent man seeks it in order to be acquitted. But the cunning quibbling of those who think one should act by crafty counsels will never receive the name of innocence. For whoever thinks he can escape judgment by delays confesses to everything. Let the man who is reported to be such come forward at last: it does not profit him to have hidden so often, to have evaded so often, when his acts and offences, the crimes laid against him, if they are true, pursue him wherever he flees. I ought indeed now to have pronounced a fitting sentence for his acts, accused in our judgment, since he thought he could mock the hearing and the decreed judgment by often declining it: but lest anyone perhaps judge it premature, and lest the absent man, though sought by us, say that nothing had been reserved for him, we preferred that it be put off, with an interval of time given; since his accusers also asserted this, that Maximus, thus secure about their charges and about his own conduct, commits things the more worthy of condemnation the later he presents himself before the appointed judgment. They charge that, wrapped in the darkness of the Manichaeans, he once so soiled his soul with that foul sect that it cannot be washed out, bringing synodal proceedings as proof of the charge; and that, wrapped all round in committed crimes, he had no regard for amendment. They charge that in his fury and mad rashness he came even before the tribunals of secular judges and was subjected to torture, which is most shameful even in a low person, and they assert, bringing proceedings forward, that he was condemned for homicide; and they complain with excessive grief that such a man, after so many and such great offences, still claims the name of bishop for himself in his hiding places, to the disgrace of his own city, and wishes to pollute a holy name by claiming it.

And therefore, dearest brothers, since he has not been willing to present himself to be heard, lest, convicted perhaps by the clergy accusing him, he might at last, presented before the episcopal judgment, be struck with the sentence of a fitting pronouncement (though, when this is pronounced against him, what loss of this name can there be for one who is said never to have had the modesty of the priesthood and not to have kept his place even for a little time?), we have nevertheless granted a delay, and have decreed that your judgment ought to be within the province, and that a synod be assembled before the Kalends of November: so that, if he wishes to be present, he may answer the charges in person, if he is confident; but if he neglects to be present, he may not gain a postponement of the sentence from his absence. For it is plain that he confesses to the crime who does not use the opportunity of clearing himself when a judgment has been granted and so often delegated. For it makes no difference whether everything said is proved in a present examination, since his absence, so often contrived, is established as a confession. We are sending letters throughout all the provinces, lest he plead ignorance as an excuse, so that he may be compelled to come to the province and present himself there before the appointed judgment. Whatever your charity thinks should be decreed in this case, when it has been reported to us, must, as is fitting, be confirmed by our authority. Dated on the Ides of June [13 June 419], in the consulship of Monaxius, a most distinguished man.

Boniface to his most beloved brother Rufus.

The blessed apostle Peter, to whom the citadel of the priesthood was granted by the Lord’s voice, is exalted beyond measure in rejoicing whenever he sees that he has sons who guard unblemished the peace of the honour granted him by the Lord. For what should he weigh with greater joy than recognizing that the rights of the power he received are kept unharmed? For truly the consultation sent by various people on any matters requires an immovable foundation, when it consults the inner counsel of his see, which is known to have been raised up by the favour of the spiritual rock.

Frequently, then, as the records of our archive show, letters have flowed from his spring to your charity, by which it is certain that the care of the churches situated in Macedonia and Achaea has been entrusted to your brotherhood, which we know keeps church discipline by knowledge of the canons. Nor do we think this was done without reason. For the apostolic see bestows this grace on your love in the office of one who cares. Hence it is that we make your holiness aware of this business, which has been brought to our ears, sent from that province whose care was long ago committed to your prudence.

For the Corinthians, once praised by the preaching of the blessed Paul, whose prayers we have thought should rather be attached than narrated, desire not so much to receive as to keep as priest of their city Perigenes, a holy man strong in the quality of an excellent way of life, as the letter sent long ago by the holy synod about his name testifies. If I think the course of his ordination should be set out in full order, it must be an increase of his praise; and it will surely profit him if we make mention, in the right way, both of the one who ordained and of the one ordained. Who … doubts that it should be credited to his merits; who … that it was of God that he was therefore not received by the people of Patras, and was long held in suspense, with great deliberation, over the church first assigned, so that he might become shepherd of this fold in whose pens he had spent his life from the cradle? “The judgments of God are a great deep”: we fittingly apply this example; and no one would have believed that he could at some time be put in the place of the one who ordained him, because he had been ordained by others. I do not doubt that this was then a sentence from heaven.

By this, or by the consent of those who represented the authority of the apostolic see there, we receive him into the number of our own; and against those who are said, after this, without our people’s knowledge, to be stirring up the peoples against our act, we must put forth the vigour of censure if they persist. We wish your love too to do this against them by our command, so that we may restrain the licence of those to whom we entrusted nothing of the kind.

Boniface to his most beloved brother Rufus.

We believed that after our letters sent for the observance of church discipline the way would be closed to all presumptions, since we had given your love’s consultation the answer due in view of the cases, decreeing that what church discipline requires must be kept. But as your holiness’s report has now revealed to us, what we wrote has prevailed with most; with some, however, we have learned that our admonition was ineffective. Nor can we impute this to your brotherhood, since we perceive from your actions and your letters that you are anxious for the care of the churches entrusted to you. We praise the diligence of your vigilance, since, lest you seem to neglect what is entrusted to you, you do not omit to indicate by letter what the censure of the apostolic see ought to correct: professing to have that fear of our God which it befits most wisely to be in a priest, who will then be able to have glory, if we find that what has been entrusted to your care benefits the churches. For the most blessed apostle Peter, as you yourself have faithfully said in your letter, watches with his own eyes how you use the office of chief ruler. Nor can he fail to be near you, he who has been appointed perpetual shepherd of the Lord’s sheep; nor can he fail to care for any church placed anywhere, in whom we read that the foundation of the universal church was laid.

On you, then, dearest brother, rests all the care of the churches, which you will recognize have been entrusted by us to you in the place of the apostolic see: so that you may correct what is crooked and set in order what is scattered; and if any cases arise between bishops, you may decide them under the fear of the divine judgment: so that you may use the helm entrusted to you by the apostolic see justly and prudently against all the waves of rising storms.

You have said that you delivered our letters to the knowledge of each of those to whom we had already written what course they ought to keep: to which very many priests, mindful of the sacred traditions, professed to lend due consent; whom we have embraced with brotherly charity. We recognize as such our fellow bishop Adelphius and our brother Perigenes, to whom the word of the blessed council came long ago as a supporter. The judgment of God, I say, was already calling him to the watchtower of the episcopate, God whose benefits we often believe to be adverse; and we turn into adversity what we afterwards recognize to have been profitable. The example of the present business continues this. Our fellow bishop Perigenes was no doubt sad when no one received him after he was ordained. Was it not expedient for him that the peoples of Patras kept him from their city with a united voice of opposition? But the lower he was bowed when no one received him after ordination, the more exalted he is now, when he is asked for by his own, who had been rejected by strangers. For it is an evident and manifest judgment of God, who wished him to wait for that time when he would deserve to preside over this church, in which he is said to have been both born and reborn.

Dearest brother, since the weight of what has been enjoined and delegated rests on your prudence, the petition of the suppliants looks to you, whether because of your diligence, chosen long ago, or because of nearness. We read this petition not without surprise, because it lacked your letter. When everything has been carried out in the order the matters require, send us some letter: for we do not wish to send our page to our fellow bishop Perigenes before we receive your letter, to whom everything concerning his ordination is seen to have been delegated. You will hasten to do this because of the desire of the petitioners. For you deign to know better that they burn in this petition, as I think, only with devotion to religion; especially since they assert that he remained blameless for countless years in the honour of the presbyterate, and came to the highest summit not by an undue leap but step by step. For the fullness of the confirmation of his episcopate only this remains: that he has not yet received our greetings in his honour. I do not doubt that your charity understands that it is not without surprise that we seem neither to have sent our page to him nor to have given an answer to the petitioners. This has been done by us so that both the authority of the apostolic see and the honour of your love might be kept. Dated the thirteenth day before the Kalends of October [19 September 419], in the consulship of Monaxius, a most distinguished man.

Bishop Boniface to Honorius Augustus.

The care of my church, to which our God assigned my priesthood while you rule human affairs, constrains me, though I am still held back by bodily infirmity, not to be absent from the ears of the most Christian prince on its behalf, approached as I am by all the priests and clergy and stirred by the disturbances of the Christian people. For if anything should happen otherwise than it should, it will not seem that you did it, who settle all things with fair moderation, but that we, keeping silent through our sloth, admitted what can overturn the quiet of the city and the peace of the church. For since you, a worshipper of the divine religion, preside over human affairs with the Lord’s favour, it will be our fault if, under your glory, which is known always to have favoured divine things with a readier mind, what held good through so long a course of years, even under those princes whom no care for our religion bound, that is, the heathen, is not kept by firm and stable right, and if, under the rule of your Clemency, unlawful things are not dreaded. For the church itself, most Christian emperor, appeals to your devotion, in my words indeed, but with its own venerable affection; the church which Christ our God, the faithful ruler and governor of your empire, keeps as a virgin betrothed to himself alone and untouched, that you may not allow the waves of plotting storms to dash against it, nor its quiet face to be troubled by the swelling of an unaccustomed tempest, most glorious and most serene emperor Augustus. This church, then, which, though betrothed to one, is yet your mother, appeals to your piety by this embassy which it has committed to its priests, and recalls the past and the present. While you rule religiously, it says, the people is now safe, as faithful to God as to you, a Christian prince. For see, amid the very mysteries, amid the prayers it offers for the happiness of your empire, with Saint Peter as witness, before whom and about whose see the matter is being dealt with, it cries out with anxious voices for the observance of religion: with anxious petition prayer is mingled, that discord, once torn into various factions, may not, at the tempter’s urging, draw them away from their accustomed worship. It would plead at greater length, most Christian prince, were it not secure of its causes before you, and had it not, by your faith, always prevailed in suppressing idols and correcting heretics, with divine worship flourishing together with the empire. It has a refuge: the mind of your gentleness, joined with veneration of religion: since whatever benefits it, you do; confer with my brothers and fellow priests, most approved men, sent to you by me and by all who make up this church: and, as they pursue the cause of sacred religion, we pray that, in the city, with the same mind with which you grant what is asked, you may provide for the state of the universal church for ever. Dated the Kalends of July [1 July 420].

Boniface, bishop of the city of Rome, to Hilary, bishop of Narbonne.

We do not readily lend credence to complaints whose intent attacks priests of the Lord, especially when they say that they have attempted something against the statutes of the fathers: but often, as now, a multitude of complainants asserts them. For see, as your charity will recognize from the attached documents, the order of the clergy and people of the church of Lodève have sent us their prayers and tears, with great grief, so far as can be understood, saying that our fellow bishop Patroclus, without their petition, ordained someone or other in the place of their deceased bishop, in another’s province, passing over the metropolitan, against the rules of the fathers. This we can by no means bear patiently: for it befits us to be diligent guardians of the fathers’ sanctions. For the constitution of the synod of Nicaea seems unknown to no one, which commands thus, that we may set down its very words: that in each province the metropolitans individually ought to have the right, and no one is to have two subject to him. This they decreed, at the suggestion of the Holy Spirit, was to be kept by themselves, for it is not to be believed otherwise.

Therefore, dearest brother, if things are so, and the boundary of your province includes the church mentioned, admonished by our authority to do what you ought to do of your own accord, having regard to the desires and the will of the petitioners, go to the place where such an ordination is said to have been celebrated, fortified by the right of the metropolitan and relying on our instructions: understanding that whatever must be done according to the rules of the fathers has been granted by us to your judgment; so that, when everything is completed, whatever you decide may become clear to the apostolic see by your report, the see to which it is plain that the ordering of the whole province has been entrusted [to you]. Let no bold violator, then, cross their boundaries, nor let anyone defend, to their injury, parts that do not seem to have been granted him. Let the presumption of those who extend themselves beyond the lawful limit of their dignity cease, suppressed by our authority. We say this so that your charity may notice that we keep the precepts of the canons so far that our constitution too determines that each province always awaits the ordination of its own metropolitan in all things. Dated the fifth day before the Ides of February [9 February 422], in the consulship of our lords Honorius for the thirteenth time and Theodosius for the tenth time, Augusti.

Boniface to his most beloved brother Rufus.

What was enjoined of old on your predecessors concerning the provinces of the apostolic see must be fulfilled diligently by your charity. For the cases of the churches situated in those provinces are to be cared for with watchful attention. For the blessed apostle Peter, in his own stead, so entrusted everything to the church of Thessalonica that it understands that the care of many rests on it: which new attempts, that can have no strength, ought not to make less. For we must not yield to the zeal of those whom novelty and the desire of undue dignity inflame: but we must labour and strive, with our God granting favour, so that whoever strives against what is lawful may find himself opposed in everything. Therefore, dearest brother, relying on the authority you received long ago, arm yourself as a fit soldier of our God against the hostile troops. You will fear nothing doubtful here, you will dread no uncertain outcome. You have the blessed apostle Peter, who can fight before you by his own strength. I do not want you to be frightened by the disturbance of a stirred-up sea. For the faith which you carry in the secret of your breast is certainly greater than all things. In nothing will the whirlwind, in nothing at all will the storm trouble you. That fisherman does not allow the privilege of his see to perish while you labour. All the swelling of the waves, every storm, will cease, with his favour on your efforts, to whom alone the sea was passable. He will surely be present and, God being the author, will restrain the violators of the canons and the enemies of church law, he who always frustrates the wishes of such minds.

Exercise the right of the power granted you against the other obstinate men also. For you see that no place has been left idle by us. We have sent the Thessalians a letter full of threat and rebuke. To the synod which is said to be unlawfully assembling (at Corinth) concerning the case of our brother and fellow bishop Perigenes, whose standing we have written can by no means be disturbed, we have sent such a letter as will make all the brothers understand, first, that they ought not to have met without your knowledge; then, that what was our judgment is not to be reconsidered. For it has never been lawful to deal again with what has once been decided by the apostolic see. In that page of ours, as was fitting, we have kept the honour due to your holiness, as your charity will learn by reading it.

As for the business of our fellow bishop Perrevius, of which the petition he sent us informed us, to whom his fellow priests are said to be very troublesome, so much so that they believe he should be driven out of his church: we wish your charity to hear it diligently, summoning the fellow bishops mentioned, whose violence he laments that he endures. Then at last, so that they may understand that anything they have done against custom must first be annulled, let your charity hasten, when everything has been investigated, to report to us, so that the judgment given by your brotherhood may be strengthened by our sentence.

Indeed, we wish you to recognize what we have written in the letter sent to the Thessalian brothers: that Pausianus, Cyriacus and Calliopus are to be wholly removed from our communion, so that they may know that their only remedy is the favour of your intervention. As for Maximus, whom your charity reported was wrongly ordained, we decide that he is to be wholly deprived of the honour of the priesthood.

It is for your charity, when everything is done, to send back with all speed Severus, notary of the apostolic see, most welcome to our mind, sent from our own side, so that we may learn the course of events when he returns more quickly. Dated the fifth day before the Ides of March [11 March 422], in the consulship of Honorius for the thirteenth time and Theodosius for the tenth time, Augusti.

Boniface to his most beloved brothers, all the bishops established throughout Thessaly.

The institution of the universal church at its birth took its beginning from the honour of blessed Peter, in whom its government and its sum consist. For from him, as from a spring, church discipline flowed through all the churches as the practice of religion was already growing. The precepts of the synod of Nicaea testify nothing else: so much so that it did not dare to decree anything over him, since it saw that nothing could be conferred above his merit: in short, it knew that everything had been granted to him by the word of the Lord. It is certain, then, that this [church] is to the churches spread throughout the world as the head of its members: from which whoever cuts himself off becomes an exile from the Christian religion, since he has not begun to be in the same frame.

I hear that some of the bishops, despising apostolic right, are attempting something new, properly against the precepts of Christ, since they are striving to separate themselves from the communion, and to speak more truly, from the power, of the apostolic see, seeking the help of those to whom the sanction of the church’s rules did not give greater power. For the precepts of the elders are read; and we find to whom they gave any right over the churches. He is already a violator of church discipline who, when nothing is owed him, creeps into its laws, claiming for himself what is seen to have been denied him by the fathers.

Receive, then, our admonition and our rebuke, of which we show the one to the bishops, the other to those who dissent. For this is why the Apostle says: “What do you wish? Shall I come to you with a rod, or in love and in a spirit of gentleness?” For you know that both are possible to blessed Peter, that is, to correct the gentle in gentleness and the proud with the rod.

Keep, therefore, the honour due to the head: for we do not wish the members to fight among themselves so that their contest reaches all the way to us, while you think our brother and fellow bishop Rufus worthy of contempt, to whom our authority grants nothing new, following the favour of our predecessors, by which the care of the churches is seen often to have been enjoined on him. We wish this arrangement to be kept unblemished in the future, as the form of this disposition has been kept by the fathers. It does not befit brothers to be stung by another’s dignity. Certainly, if his rebuke was seen in anyone’s case to go beyond what was due, since the apostolic see holds the primacy precisely so that it may freely accept the complaints of all, it would have been fitting to appeal to us about this by sending an embassy, since you see that the care of all things rests on us. Let the novel presumption cease. Let no one dare to hope for what is not lawful. Let no one strive to violate what was done by the fathers and kept through so long a time. Let whoever recognizes himself a bishop obey our ordinance. Let no one presume to ordain bishops throughout Illyricum without the knowledge of our fellow bishop Rufus, etc. Dated the fifth day before the Ides of March, in the consulship of Honorius for the thirteenth time and Theodosius for the tenth time, Augusti.

Boniface to his most beloved brothers Rufus and the other bishops established throughout Macedonia, Achaea, Thessaly, Old Epirus, New Epirus, Praevalis and Dacia.

The care of the universal church, received from the Lord’s sentence, rests with the blessed apostle Peter; for he knows, with the gospel as witness, that it is founded on him; nor can his honour ever be empty of cares, since it is certain that the sum of things hangs on his deliberation. This matter extends my mind as far as the regions of the East, which in a way we see through this very care. For I ask without ceasing of everyone who comes from there about the peace of the brothers, that is, about the quiet of the bishops, which is usually disturbed by someone’s presumption whenever the devil envies it. Since, then, report had until now brought us that everything was kept in its order, we were greatly surprised, astonished at the thing, as the account of the reports demanded, which a novel attempt has ventured to the injury of the fathers.

For we have learned from a sure informant that at Corinth, which we say has been stirred up, a synod is to be assembled to discuss the standing of him whom the apostolic see, after everything was examined and discussed, appointed priest for the Corinthians; following the will of God, which willed this very man, as far as the delays of time show, to be shepherd of the fold in which he had grown up and for which he had grown. If your charity were ignorant of his ordination, I would gladly unfold from its origin what was done about him in the past, so that it might become clear by manifestation to those whose view of his business is wrapped in darkness not through ignorance but through partisanship, that the sentence about him was specially divine, by which, as we said, the heavenly judgment kept him for the church of the Corinthians as its own nursling. This the assent of all the citizens and clergy earnestly asked of us. Yet our command did not decree it abruptly: but, as church discipline required, we ordered our brother and fellow bishop Rufus to search out more carefully the inner parts of the business and weigh the substance of the petition with his own moderation from nearby; so that nothing premature might seem to be done by this see, which has often suppressed the presumptions of others. After some time, letters came to us about this from our bishop mentioned (Rufus), saying that they agreed with the desires set out before: following their most evident reasoning, we gave him as bishop to that church in which he had spent his past life through the several grades of honours.

To accomplish this I directed my [letter] at once to the bishop mentioned, … and confirmed by my authority, following my predecessors, who, as the record of the archives affirms, held the church of Thessalonica, always close to them and serving in the charity of the college, worthy of this honour. This the favour of the apostolic see grants to brother Rufus for the future also; following the Lord, who exalts the humbled and always humbles the exalted, while he gives grace to the former and resists the latter.

How great, then, is the gift of humility, which is weighed on the scale of divine grace? And how great is the punishment of pride, which the Lord and ruler of the whole world specially opposes? I leave it rather for your brotherhood to understand who is the master of humility and who of pride. But far be it from the Lord’s priests that any of them fall into this guilt, so that, by attempting something by novel usurpation, he makes the decrees of the elders hostile to himself: knowing that he has as his special rival him with whom our Christ placed the sum of the priesthood. Whoever rises up to insult him cannot be a dweller in the heavenly kingdoms. “To you,” he says, “I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven,” into which no one will enter without the favour of the doorkeeper. “You are Peter,” he says, “and on this rock I will build my church.” Whoever, then, desires to be counted worthy of the dignity of the priesthood before our God also, since one comes to God with Peter receiving him, on whom, as we mentioned above, it is certain that the universal church is founded, ought to be meek and humble of heart: lest, a contumacious disciple of him whose pride he imitated, he begin to undergo the punishment of his teacher.

A synod is being assembled, then, to return to the cause of this injury, which … the hidden purpose of the council; and there will come about, what can by no means be done according to the rules, that the honour of our brother and fellow bishop Perigenes, whom our sentence placed in the see of the church mentioned, will be doubtful and uncertain. Who then is this accuser, raw and perhaps only now returning from abroad, who assails him? Which of the bishops, certainly, ordered that a crowd of brothers should assemble, after our letters had been read? Since the place requires it, if you please to review the sanctions of the canons, you will find what is the second see after the Roman church, and which is the third. By them the order of things is seen to have been so distinguished that the bishops of the other churches, under one and the same priesthood, may know to whom, keeping charity, they ought to be subject for the sake of church discipline. And indeed this sentence of the canons has lasted from antiquity, as it lasts until now, with our Christ’s favour. No one has ever boldly raised his hands against the apostolic summit, whose judgment may not be reconsidered: no one has been a rebel in this except one who wished to be judged about himself. The great churches mentioned, Alexandria and Antioch, keep their dignities through the canons, having knowledge of church law. They keep, I say, the statutes of the elders, deferring in all things, and receiving in return that grace which they know they owe to us in the Lord, who is our peace.

But since the matter requires it, it must be proved by documents that the greatest churches of the East, in great matters in which there was need of a greater discussion, have always consulted the Roman see, and, whenever need required, asked for its help. Athanasius and Peter of holy memory, priests of the church of Alexandria, asked for the help of this see. When the church of Antioch laboured for a long time, so that journeys were often made from there on this very account, it is plain that the apostolic see was consulted, first under Meletius, later under Flavian. No one doubts that, by its authority, after many things done by our church, Flavian received the grace of communion, which he would have lacked for ever had letters on this matter not flowed from here. The prince Theodosius of most clement memory, thinking that the ordination of Nectarius did not have firmness because it was not within our knowledge, sent courtiers from his side with bishops and asked that a letter of communion be sent to him by the Roman see in due form, to strengthen his priesthood. A short time ago, that is, under my predecessor Innocent of blessed memory, the bishops of the Eastern churches, grieving that they were separated from the communion of blessed Peter, asked for peace through legates, as your charity remembers. At that time the apostolic see granted everything without difficulty, obeying that master who says: “If you have forgiven anyone anything, I also; for if I have forgiven anything, it was for your sake in the person of Christ, so that we may not be possessed by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his devices”: that is, because he always rejoices in dissension.

Since, then, I think the examples we have given suffice to prove the truth, dearest brothers, though more are held in your knowledge, we wish, without injury to the brotherhood, to oppose your assembly by this letter, which you see has been sent by us through Severus, notary of the apostolic see, most welcome to our mind, sent from our side; admonishing you, brothers, as is fitting, that no one who wishes to remain in our communion bring the name of our brother and fellow bishop Perigenes again into the open for discussion: whose priesthood the apostle Peter has already once confirmed at the suggestion of the Holy Spirit, leaving no question about it for the future, since it is clear that nothing at all was charged against him when he was appointed by us during the time the see was vacant. Let the accusation cease, whose author we prove to be envy. Let the machine of falsehood built against him be dismantled; for he came to the priesthood with the favour of our God and of all good men.

Indeed, since a place must be kept for an accuser, lest we seem to provoke audacity altogether, if anything is reported to have been committed by him against discipline and the purpose of the priesthood after he was appointed bishop by our authority, our fellow bishop Rufus, to whom we entrust everything in our stead, will take care to hear the business with the other brothers whom he himself chooses; he will report to our knowledge whatever the course and order of things show to his inquiry.

This too, since our authority ought not to lack its customary admonition, we urge and command with words often repeated: that you lend obedience to this man in all his dispositions. Let no one, as we have often said, presume to celebrate anyone’s ordination without the knowledge of him to whom, as was said above, we entrust everything in our stead. The authors of this presumption will certainly have themselves to blame in the future, when they see themselves exiles from apostolic charity. Dated the fifth day before the Ides of March [11 March 422], in the consulship of Honorius for the thirteenth time and Theodosius for the tenth time, Augusti.