Letters (of Lucifer and others) (complete)

Letter 1. Lucifer, Pancratius and Hilarius to Bishop Eusebius. To the most honourable lord Eusebius, bishop, Lucifer, bishop, Pancratius, presbyter, and Hilarius. Now that the head of the devil and his wicked suggestions have been trodden down, holy lord, we ask you not to neglect the grace granted to you by our Lord, but to deign to make haste now, so that by your coming the doctrine of the Arians may be put to flight as quickly as possible. For the Lord and his Christ know that, as at the coming of the most blessed apostles the name of God was glorified in the fall of Simon, so, with Valens driven out, at your coming the machinery of the blaspheming Arians will be broken up and destroyed. From the first day we came to Vercelli until today, most holy lord, we have longed for your Reverence, and we ask the Lord that all the saints may praise a lasting restoration in this church and attend your spiritual power with the praise it deserves. We believe this will come about, for we trust that the passion of the Saviour cannot be overcome. May Christ the Lord keep you glorious, most holy and most blessed.

Letter 2. Pope Liberius to Lucifer, placed in exile. Liberius, bishop, to his most beloved brother Lucifer. Although under the guise of peace the enemy of the human race seems to have raged the more violently against the members of the church, yet your outstanding and singular faith, priests most acceptable in the Lord, has both shown you approved by God here and has already marked you out as martyrs for the glory to come. With what proclamation of praise, then, with what exultation of voice I might set forth the merits of your virtue, placed as I am between grief at your absence and joy at your glory, I cannot find at all, except that I know I offer you more acceptable consolation if you believe that I have been thrust into exile together with you. Indeed, I am much saddened that I, still hanging in that very expectation, am for the present kept apart from your company by a harsher necessity. For I had wished, most devoted brothers, to be spent first for all, so that your love might rather follow the example of glory through me. But let this be the palm of your merits, that you came first, through perseverance in the faith, to the illustrious glory of confession. I beg your love, then, to believe that I am present with you, to feel that I am not absent from you in affection, and to understand that I grieve much at being for the present separated from your company. How great a glory you have attained you can know the better from this: if those who were crowned in persecution could feel only the bloody swords of the persecutor, you, soldiers of God devoted in all things, who have found even false brothers to be enemies, have carried off the victory over faithlessness; and the more their violence could grow in the world, the greater the rewards of praise that are found to be conferred on holy priests. Be secure, therefore, of the heavenly promise; and since you have been made nearer to God, lift me up to the Lord by your prayers, me, your fellow priest and a servant of God, so that I may bear tolerably the attacks that are coming, which, as they are announced day by day, inflict heavier wounds; so that, with the faith inviolate and the state of the catholic church safe, the Lord may deign to make me equal to you. And since I wish to know more faithfully what was done at that encounter itself, I beseech your Holiness to deign to report everything faithfully by letter, so that either my mind, which is tormented by various rumours, or the strength of my body, which is already worn down, may feel a greater increase from your encouragement. [In another hand:] May God keep you safe, my lord brothers.

Letter 3. Florentius to Lucifer. To the most kind lord Lucifer, Florentius. Someone presented a book in your name to our lord and Augustus; he has ordered it to be brought to your Holiness and wishes to know whether this book was sent by you. You must therefore write what is true, in good faith, and send the book back, so that it may be presented again to his Eternity.

Letter 4. Lucifer to Florentius. To Florentius, master of offices, Lucifer, bishop. The bearer of the book, who, as your Honour mentions, approached the emperor in my name, was sent by my Mediocrity; and the book itself, as you deigned to advise, has been carefully examined and handed to Bonosus, agent in rebus, to be delivered. Of these things your religious prudence had to be informed, dearest son. It will now be for your nobility to defend without any hesitation that it has been acknowledged by me. For we, by God's favour, stand joyful against what is being prepared for our death, as he will find when he begins to examine the reasons why I wrote in such a way.

Letter 5. Athanasius to Lucifer. To his most beloved lord and brother Lucifer, bishop and confessor, Athanasius, greeting in the Lord. Being well in body, by God's favour, we have now sent again our dearest Eutyches the deacon, so that your religious Holiness also may deign to make us more certain of your safety and that of all yours, which is what we wish and long for. For we believe that through you confessors and true servants of God the state of the catholic church is being renewed, and that what the heretics tried to tear apart our Lord Jesus Christ is restoring to wholeness through you. For although the forerunners of the Antichrist have done everything through the power of this world to put out the lamp of truth, yet the Godhead, through your confession, has shown its light the more clearly, so that their deceit can be hidden from no one. Before, they could still pretend; now they are called antichrists. For who would not curse them? Who would not flee their communion like a stain and a snake's venom? Every church everywhere mourns, every city groans, aged bishops toil in exile, and the heretics dissemble; while they deny Christ, they have made themselves tax collectors, sitting in the churches and exacting tolls. O new kind of men, and new kind of persecution, which the devil has invented, that he should use the very ministers for wrongdoing and for such cruelty! But though they do such things and have stretched out their pride and their blasphemies, your confession, religion and wisdom are no small but the greatest comfort and a great consolation to the brotherhood. For word has reached us that your Holiness has written to Constantius Augustus, and we wonder more and more that, living as it were in the midst of scorpions, you still use freedom of spirit, so as to bring those who err to the light of truth by warning, teaching or correcting them. I ask, therefore, and all the confessors ask with me, that you deign to send us a copy, so that all may see, not only by hearsay but from the writings themselves, the strength of your soul and the confidence and freedom of your faith. Those who are with me greet your Holiness; I greet all who are with you. May the Godhead keep you safe and vigorous and ever mindful of us, most beloved lord and truly a man of God.

Letter 6. Athanasius to Lucifer. To his most glorious and deservedly most longed-for fellow bishop Lucifer, Athanasius, greeting in the Lord. Although I believe that news has reached your Holiness too of the persecution which the enemies of Christ, seeking our blood, have tried even now to carry on against the brotherhood, our dearest ones can nevertheless also report it to your Reverence. For they have dared to extend their rage through soldiers so far that they not only drove away the clergy of the city but even went out into the deserts and laid their deadly hands on the monks. So it came about that I too withdrew further away, so that those who had received us should not suffer trouble from the same men. For whom will the Arians spare, who have not spared their own souls? And when can they draw back from their wicked deeds, as long as they persist in denying the Lord Christ, the only Son of God? This is the root of their depravity; on this sandy foundation they build their perverse ways, as we find written in the thirteenth psalm: “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God,’” and soon there follows: “They are corrupt and have become abominable in their works.” Hence the Jews, denying the Son of God, deserved to hear: “Woe, sinful nation, a people full of sins, an evil seed, lawless children.” Why lawless? Because you have forsaken the Lord. Hence the most blessed Paul, when he had begun not only to believe in the Son of God but also to preach his Godhead, wrote: “I am conscious of nothing evil in myself.” So, following your confession, we too desire, holding the apostolic tradition, to live according to the commandments of the divine law, so that we may be found with you in that choir in which patriarchs, prophets, apostles and martyrs now rejoice. Although, then, the Arian madness, with an outside power behind it, so bestirred itself that the brothers were not allowed, as far as those men raged, even to see the open air freely, yet in answer to your prayers, by God's favour, though with toil and danger, I was able to see the brother who usually forwards both necessary things and letters, from your Holiness as from others. So we received the letters and books of your most religious and most wise soul, in which we saw the apostolic image, prophetic confidence, the teaching of truth, the doctrine of the true faith, the heavenly way, the glory of martyrdom, triumphs over the Arian heresy, the whole tradition of our fathers, the right rule of church order. O true Lucifer, who, as your name says, bearing the light of truth, have set it on the lampstand to shine for all! For who, except the Arians, does not see clearly from your teaching the true faith, and the stain of the Arians? Greatly and admirably, as light is separated from darkness, so you have separated the truth from the cunning and hypocrisy of the heretics; you have defended the catholic church, you have proved the words of the Arians to be nothing but fantasy, you have taught that the devil's gnashings must be trampled underfoot. How good and pleasant your exhortations to martyrdom; how greatly to be desired you have shown death for Christ, the Son of God, to be; how much love of the age to come and of the heavenly life you have made plain! You seem to be a true temple of the Saviour, who, dwelling in you, himself speaks these things through you, he who has given such grace to your words. You were already beloved by all before, but now the love of your affection is lodged so deeply in the hearts of all that they call you the Elijah of our times. And no wonder; for if those who are seen to please God are called sons of God, much more is it fitting that confessors be called partakers of the prophets, and above all you. Believe me, Lucifer, it is not you alone who have spoken these things, but the Holy Spirit with you. For whence such a memory of the Scriptures, whence an understanding and grasp of them so whole? Whence so well-ordered a style? Whence such exhortations to the heavenly way? Whence confidence against the devil and proofs against the heretics, unless the Holy Spirit were lodged in you? Rejoice, then, seeing clearly that you are already in that place where your predecessors, now martyrs, are, that is, in the choir of the angels. We too rejoice, having you as an example of virtue, patience and freedom. As for what you wrote about my name, I blush to say anything, lest I seem a flatterer; but I know and believe that the Lord himself, who revealed all knowledge to your holy and religious mind, will repay you for this labour too with a reward in the kingdom of heaven. Since, then, you are such a man, we ask you to be an intercessor for us through prayers to the Lord, that, merciful as he is, he may now deign to look upon the catholic church and rescue all his servants from the hands of the persecutors, so that all those too who have fallen through fear of the moment may at last be able to raise themselves up and return to the way of righteousness, from which they have been led astray and wander, wretched men, not knowing in what pit they are. And I ask especially that, if anything here has been said too poorly by me, you deign to pardon it; for from so great a fountain my lack of skill could scarcely draw what it could. As for our brothers, if I was not able to see them, again I ask your pardon. For the truth itself is witness that I wished and desired to obtain this, and that I felt great grief that I could not; for tears did not cease from my eyes nor groans from my soul, because we are not allowed even to see the brothers. [God] is witness too that I have not been able even to see the parents I have, since they began persecuting us. For what do the Arians not do? They watch the roads, they keep an eye on those setting out and leaving the city, they search the ships, they go round the deserts, they disturb houses, they harass the brothers, they contrive troubles for each one. But thanks be to God: while they do these things, they are cursed by all more and more, and are truly recognized, as your Holiness has said, as slaves of the Antichrist; and they themselves, wretched men, while they are held in hatred, persist in their malice until, like their Pharaoh, they too are condemned in death. Those who are with me greet your Reverence; deign to greet those who are with you. May the divine grace of God keep you safe, mindful of us, ever blessed, deservedly man of God, servant of Christ, partaker of the apostles, comfort of the brotherhood, teacher of the truth, and in all things most longed-for.

Letter 7. Letter of Liberius. To the most glorious Constantius Augustus, Liberius, bishop. I wish, most tranquil emperor, that your Clemency would lend me kindly ears, so that I may open the purpose of my mind to your Mildness. From a Christian emperor and son of Constantine of holy memory I should deserve to obtain this very thing without hesitation; but I see that I struggle at this point, that by repeated satisfaction I cannot recall to favour towards me your mind, which is placable even towards the guilty. For the speech of your Piety sent some time ago to the people wounds me deeply, though I must bear all things patiently; but that your mind, which is always given to gentleness, which never, as it is written, keeps anger until the setting of the day, should keep its indignation against me is a wonder to me. For I, most religious emperor, seek with you a true peace, one not composed of words with an inner design of deceit, but reasonably confirmed by the precepts of the Gospels. Not the affair of Athanasius alone but many other matters have come into the open, on account of which I had begged your Mildness that a council be held, so that, above all, as the sincere devotion of your mind towards God especially desires, when the cause of the faith, in which our first hope towards God lies, had been diligently treated, the affairs of those who ought to admire our reverence towards God could be settled. And it would have been worthy of a worshipper of God, worthy of your empire, which is ruled and increased by the piety of Christ, that your Clemency should grant us this very thing, especially out of reverence for the holy religion to which you are wisely devoted. But many are in haste to tear the members of the church, who have made up the story that I suppressed letters, so that the crimes of him whom they were said to have condemned should not be plain to all: as though I had suppressed those letters of the Eastern and Egyptian bishops in which the same charges against Athanasius were contained in all. But it is clear enough to all, and no one denies it, that we made known the letters of the Easterners, read them to the church, read them to the council, and replied to the Easterners as well; we did not lend them our faith and judgment, because at the same time the judgment of seventy-five Egyptian bishops concerning Athanasius stood against theirs, which we likewise read out and made known to the bishops of Italy. Hence it seemed contrary to the divine law to give consent in any part, when the number of bishops for Athanasius was the greater. These writings Theosebius, who had been sent and was hurrying to Africa, left with us; yet all these writings were afterwards carried to Arles by Vincentius, who had been sent as legate with the others, lest they be lacking for obtaining a council. Your prudence sees, then, that nothing has entered my mind that it would not be fitting for servants of God to think. God is my witness, the whole church with its members is witness, that in faith and fear towards my God I trample and have trampled all worldly things underfoot, as the teaching of the Gospel and the apostle has prescribed: not with rash fury, but by the divine law, established and observed. And while living in another church ministry I did nothing that pertained to the law out of boasting, nothing out of desire for glory; and I came to this office (my God is my witness) unwillingly, in which I desire to remain without offence to God as long as I am in the world. And I have always seen to it that not my own decrees but the apostolic ones were always confirmed and kept. Following the custom and order of our forebears, I have added nothing to the episcopate of the city of Rome and have allowed nothing to be diminished; and keeping that faith which has come down through the succession of so many bishops, many of whom became martyrs, I always desire that it be kept unimpaired. Now, then, concern for the church and devotion itself persuade me to open my cause to your Piety. The Easterners indicate that they wish to be joined to our peace. What peace is this, most clement emperor, when there are four bishops from those very parts, Demophilus, Macedonius, Eudoxius and Martyrius, who eight years ago at Milan, refusing to condemn the heretical opinion of Arius, walked out of the council in anger? Your fairness and clemency will be able to judge what it would be, and what it entails, to lend consent to their judgments, if that were lawful. It is nothing new that is now being attempted subtly, under the pretext of the name of Athanasius. There still exist the letters of Bishop Alexander, sent long ago to Silvester of holy memory, in which it is made known that before the ordination of Athanasius they expelled from the church eleven men, both presbyters and deacons, because they followed the heresy of Arius; some of these, now placed outside the catholic church, are said to have found conventicles for themselves, with whom George in Alexandria too is asserted to communicate by letter. What peace, then, can there be, most tranquil emperor, if bishops are brought forward, as has now been done throughout Italy, and compelled to obey the judgments of such men? Hear something else, since your Tranquillity admits it patiently. There exist the letters of the legates who had been sent to your Clemency, which arrived recently, in which they indicate that because of the disturbance of all the churches they had indeed been willing to yield to the judgments of the Easterners, but had nevertheless proposed a condition: that if these same men condemned the heresy of Arius, they would on that basis be inclined to obey their judgments. The agreement, as they themselves indicate, is confirmed by written evidence. They went into the council; after deliberation they received the answer that the others could not condemn the doctrine of Arius, but that Athanasius, the one thing they demanded, must be deprived of communion. From this let your Clemency consider whether, with the law of the catholic religion rightly kept, the matter ought to be treated for the sake of one man diligently and thoroughly. Therefore again and again I ask your Mildness, your mind devoted to God, by the power of him who has shown all mortals how great he is in your defence, keeping before your eyes the benefits of him who rules your empire in all things: have these things treated diligently with all consideration in an assembly of bishops, so that, the times having been made peaceful through you by God's favour, and with your Tranquillity's consent, everything may be examined in such a way that what has been confirmed by the judgment of the priests of God (once it is established that all have agreed to the exposition of faith that was confirmed among so many bishops at Nicaea in the presence of your father of holy memory) may be kept by its example in the future; so that the Saviour himself, who looks from above on the purpose of your mind, may rejoice, in so great a settlement of affairs, that you have not undeservedly placed the cause of faith and peace before even the needs of the state. To entreat your Mildness, then, to deign to hear our pleas with a kindly mind, it has been decided that my brother and fellow bishop, the holy man Lucifer, should set out with Pancratius my fellow presbyter and Hilarius the deacon; we believe they can obtain from your Clemency without difficulty a council for the peace of all the catholic churches. May the clemency of almighty God keep you for us, most clement and most religious Augustus.

Letter 8. Letter of Athanasius. Athanasius to those who pursue the solitary life and are made strong in the faith of God, most beloved brothers, greeting in the Lord. I give thanks to the Lord, who has granted you to believe in him, so that with the saints you too may have eternal life. But since there are some who hold the views of Arius and go round the monasteries for no other purpose than to lead the simple astray, as though they were coming to you from us and returning; and there are others who affirm that they do not hold the views of Arius, yet go and pray together with them, I have been obliged, at the urging of most sincere brothers, to write, so that, keeping the pious faith which the grace of God works in us sincerely and without guile, you may give no occasion of stumbling to the brothers. For when someone sees you, the faithful in Christ, communicating with such men or praying together with them, they will surely think this a matter of indifference and fall into the mire of impiety. So that nothing of the kind may happen, let it be your care, dearest brothers, to turn away those who hold the views of the Arian impiety, and to avoid those who are thought not to hold the views of Arius yet pray with the impious, especially since it is fitting to flee the communion also of those whose opinions we detest. If anyone comes to you, then, and brings the right teaching, as blessed John says, say “greeting” to him and receive such a one as a brother; but if anyone pretends to confess the right faith yet is seen to communicate with those men, urge such a man to abstain from such company, and if he promises, hold him too as a brother; but if he persists with a contentious mind, avoid him too. I could have extended the letter at length, setting out from the divine Scriptures the pattern of such teaching; but since, being prudent, you are ahead of those who write, and, being more intent on self-discipline, are fit to teach others too, I have dictated briefly, as one who loves to those who love, trusting that, living thus, you will keep the faith pure and sincere, and that those men, seeing that you do not pray with them, will gain benefit, fearing lest they be reckoned as impious and as men who hold their views.