The Dialogue Against the Luciferians

And so, when all had taken their seats, Helladius the luciferian said: I want this answered first: are the Arians Christians, or not? ORTHODOXUS said: I ask more: whether all heretics are Christians? Luciferianus: Said: Whomever you have called a heretic, you have denied to be a Christian. Orthodoxus: Said: Then are all heretics not Christians? Luciferianus: You have already heard above. Orthodoxus: If they are not Christ's, they are the devil's. Luciferianus: No one doubts it. Orthodoxus: But if they are the devil's, it makes no difference whether they are heretics or pagans. Luciferianus: I do not deny it. Orthodoxus: Then we hold it fixed between us, that one must speak of a heretic just as of a pagan. Luciferianus: Plainly fixed. Orthodoxus: Ask now as you please, since it is agreed between us that heretics are pagans. Luciferianus: What my question wished to force out has been made plain, that heretics are not Christians. Now the conclusion remains. If Arians are heretics, and all heretics are pagans, then Arians are pagans.

But if Arians are pagans, and it is agreed that there is no fellowship of the Church with Arians, that is, with pagans, it is manifest that your Church, which receives bishops from the Arians, that is, from pagans, receives not so much bishops as priests of the Capitol; and on this account ought rather to be called the synagogue of Antichrist than the Church of Christ.

Orthodoxus: Behold, the prophecy is fulfilled: He prepared a pit for me, and he himself has fallen into it. Luciferianus: In what way? Orthodoxus: If the Arians, as you say, are pagans, and the assemblies of the Arians are camps of the devil, how do you receive one baptized in the camps of the devil? Luciferianus: I receive him, but as a penitent. Orthodoxus: You do not at all understand what you are saying. Does anyone receive a pagan as a penitent? Luciferianus: I answered simply at the beginning of the discourse that all heretics are pagans; but since that was a captious question, granting you the palm of the first question, I come to the second, in which I say that a layman coming from the Arians ought to be received as a penitent, but a cleric ought not. Orthodoxus: But in the first question, which you say I have won, I have also won the second. Luciferianus: Show how you have won it. Orthodoxus: Do you not know that both laymen and clerics have one Christ?

Nor is God one thing to neophytes and another to bishops? Why then does he not receive clerics as penitents, who receives laymen as penitents? Luciferianus: It is not the same thing to shed tears for one's sins and to handle the body of the Lord. It is not the same thing to fall at the knees of the brethren and to administer the eucharist to the people from a lofty place. It is one thing to mourn for what you were, another—having neglected sin—to live gloriously in the Church. You, who yesterday, a sacrilegious man, were preaching the Son of God to be a creature; who daily, worse than the Jews, were throwing stones of blasphemy at Christ; whose hands are full of blood; whose pen was a soldier's lance—will you, an adulterer, enter the virgin Church after one hour's conversion? If you repent of having sinned, lay down the office of priest; if you are confident that you have not sinned, remain what you were.

Orthodoxus: You are playing the rhetorician; you run out from the thorn-thickets of disputation into the fields of free declamation. But desist, I beg, from commonplaces, and return again to the rank and lines; afterward, if it please you, we shall discuss more broadly. Luciferianus: There is no declamation here. Grief overcomes patience; propose as you please, argue as you please, you will never persuade anyone that a bishop is the same thing as a penitent layman. Orthodoxus: Since you stubbornly hold that the reasoning of a bishop is one thing, and of a layman another, for the sake of shortening the contest, I grant what you demand: nor will it grieve me, since you make the point, to fence with you on this ground. Explain to me why you receive a layman coming from the Arians, but do not receive a bishop? Luciferianus: I receive the layman, who confesses that he has erred; and the Lord prefers the repentance of the sinner rather than his death.

Orthodoxus: Receive then also the bishop, who likewise confesses that he has erred, and the Lord prefers the repentance of the sinner rather than his death. Luciferianus: If he confesses that he has erred, why does he persist as bishop? Let him lay down the priesthood, and I grant pardon to the penitent. Orthodoxus: I will answer you also in your own words. If the layman confesses that he has erred, how does he persist as a layman? Let him lay down the priesthood of the layman, that is, baptism, and I will grant pardon to the penitent. For it is written: He has made us also a kingdom and priests to God his Father. And again, A holy nation, a royal priesthood, a people acquired. Whatever is not lawful for a Christian is common alike to bishop and layman. He who does penance condemns his former state.

If it is not lawful for a penitent bishop to remain what he had been, it is not lawful for a penitent layman either to remain in that for which he confesses penitence. Luciferianus: We receive laymen, because no one will convert if he knows he must be rebaptized; and thus it will happen that we become the cause of their perdition if they are rejected. Orthodoxus: You, in receiving a layman, save one soul by receiving him; and I, in receiving a bishop, unite to the Church not the peoples of one city only, I will not say, but the whole province over which he presides; and if I should reject him, he will drag many with him into ruin. Wherefore I ask you that the reasoning which you think you have for receiving a few, you also grant for the salvation of the whole world.

But if this displeases you, and you are so harsh, nay so irrationally unmerciful, that you consider him who gave the baptism an enemy of Christ, yet think him who received it a son; we do not act against ourselves: either we receive the bishop along with the people whom he makes Christian, or if we do not receive the bishop, we know that the people too must be rejected by us.

Luciferianus: I beg you, have you not read what is said of bishops: You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt has lost its savor, with what shall it be salted? It is good for nothing, except to be cast out and trodden underfoot by men. But also that, that the priest should entreat God for the sinning people, and for the priest there should be no other to intercede. These two chapters of Scripture indeed run together into one meaning. For as salt seasons every food, nor is there anything so pleasant in itself that it can delight the taste without it: so the bishop is the seasoning of the whole world and of his own Church; and if he has become tasteless, whether through denial, or through heresy, or through lust, and, to say it once, through every sin, with what else can he be seasoned, since he himself is the seasoning of all?

Indeed the priest offers his oblation on behalf of the layman, lays his hand upon the subject, invokes the return of the Holy Spirit, and thus reconciles at the altar, after prayer has been offered for the people, him who had been delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit might be saved; nor does he restore one member to health before all the members together have wept. For a father easily forgives his son, when the mother pleads for the fruit of her womb. If then, in the manner we have described, the penitent layman is restored to the Church, and pardon follows there where mourning had preceded, it is manifest that a priest removed from his rank cannot be restored to the same place, because either, being penitent, he will lack the priesthood, or, persisting in honor, he cannot be led back into the Church by the order of a penitent.

You now contaminate the savor of the Church with tasteless salt; you place back upon the altar him who, cast out, ought to lie in the dung, to be trodden underfoot by all men! And where will that precept of the Apostle be: A bishop must be blameless, as a steward of God? And again: Let a man examine himself, and so let him approach? Where is the Lord's warning: Do not cast your pearls before swine? If you understand this to be said generally of all, how much more must one be cautious concerning priests, since even concerning laymen such caution is taken! Separate yourselves, says the Lord through Moses, from the tents of these most hardened men, and touch nothing of what is theirs, lest you perish together in their sin. And again in the twelve Prophets: Their sacrifices are like the bread of mourning; all who eat of them shall be defiled.

And in the Gospel the Lord says: The lamp of the body is the eye, that is, the light of the Church is the bishop. If then your eye is sound, your whole body shall be full of light. For when the priest preaches the true faith, the darkness is dispelled from the hearts of all. And he gives the reason: Neither is a lamp lit and put under a bushel, but upon a lampstand, that it may give light to all who are in the house.

That is, God has for this reason kindled the little flame of his knowledge in the bishop, that it may not shine for himself alone, but profit all. And in what follows: But if, he says, your eye is evil, your whole body is dark. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great will that darkness itself be! And rightly so. For since a bishop is established in the Church for this reason, that he may restrain the people from error, how great will be the error in the people, when he who teaches errs himself! How can he forgive sins, who is himself a sinner? How will a sacrilegious man make something holy? Whence shall light enter into me, when my eye is blind? Alas the sorrow! A disciple of Antichrist governs the Church of Christ. And where is that: You cannot serve two masters? But also that: What communion has light with darkness? What agreement has Christ with Belial?

We read in the Old Testament: A man in whom there is a blemish or defect shall not come near to offer gifts to the Lord. And again: The priests who approach the Lord God to sacrifice shall be clean, lest perhaps the Lord forsake them. And in the same place: And when they come near to minister the holy things, let them not bring guilt upon themselves, lest they die. And there are many other passages, which it would be endless to pursue, and which I omit for the sake of brevity. For it is not the number of testimonies, but their authority, that avails. From these it is shown that you, through a little leaven, have corrupted the whole mass of the Church, and that today you receive the Eucharist from the hand of him whom yesterday you spat upon as an idol.

Orthodoxus: You have indeed said many things from memory and copiously from the sacred Volumes: but when you have run all round the covert, you are enclosed within my nets. Granted, as you wish, that an Arian bishop is an enemy of Christ, that he is salt gone foolish, a lamp without a flame, an eye without a pupil: you will nonetheless arrive at this, that he who does not himself have salt cannot give savour; a blind man does not give light, one extinguished does not kindle. But you, while you devour the food seasoned by him, why do you accuse the seasoner of being unsalted? Does your Church shine from his little flame, and do you charge his lamp with being extinguished? Does he offer you eyes, and is he blind? Wherefore I ask you, either grant him the license of sacrificing, whose baptism you approve; or reject the baptism of him whom you do not consider a priest. For it cannot be that one who is holy in baptism should be a sinner at the altar.

Luciferianus: But I receive a penitent layman by the laying on of hands, and the invocation of the Holy Spirit, knowing that the Holy Spirit cannot be conferred by heretics. Orthodoxus: All the paths of your propositions flow together to one meeting-point, and, like timid deer, while you avoid the empty flappings of feathers, you are entangled in the strongest nets. For since a man baptized in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit becomes a temple of the Lord, since, the old shrine being destroyed, a new sanctuary of the Trinity is built, how do you say that, without the coming of the Holy Spirit, sins can be forgiven among the Arians? How is the soul cleansed of its ancient filth, if it does not have the Holy Spirit? For water does not wash the soul, but it is itself first washed by the Spirit, so that it may be able spiritually to wash others. The Spirit, says Moses, was borne over the waters. From which it appears that baptism is not without the Holy Spirit.

The pool of Bethesda in Judea could not heal bodies weakened in their limbs except by the coming of an Angel: and do you present to me a soul washed by mere water, as if from a bath? Our Lord Jesus Christ himself, who was not so much cleansed by the washing, as he cleansed all waters in his washing, as soon as he raised his head from the stream, received the Holy Spirit—not because he was ever without the Holy Spirit, since indeed he was born in the flesh of the Holy Spirit—but so that it might be shown to us that that baptism is true, upon which the Holy Spirit comes. Therefore if an Arian cannot give the Holy Spirit, neither can he baptize, because the Church's baptism is none at all without the Holy Spirit.

But you, when you receive one baptized by him, and afterward invoke the Holy Spirit, either you ought to baptize him, because he could not have been baptized without the Holy Spirit; or, if he has been baptized in the Spirit, cease to invoke upon him the Spirit which he received when he was baptized.

Luciferianus: I beseech you, have you not read in the Acts of the Apostles, that those who had already been baptized by John, when they had answered the Apostle's question that they had not even heard by report what the Holy Spirit was, afterward obtained the Holy Spirit? Whence it is manifest that someone can be baptized, and yet not have the Holy Spirit. Orthodoxus: I do not think those who hear this are so unskilled in the divine Volumes that a long discourse is needed to resolve this little question. But before I say anything on that point, listen, according to your own view, to how great a confusion of the Scriptures arises. What is this, that John in his baptism could not give the Holy Spirit to others, he who gave it to Christ? And who is this John? The voice of one crying in the desert: Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight the paths of our God.

He who said: Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sin of the world. I say less: he who cried out from his mother's womb: And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? Did he not give the Holy Spirit, whom Philip the deacon gave to the eunuch? Whom Ananias gave to Paul? Perhaps I seem bold in preferring John to all. Hear the Lord speaking: Among those born of women there has risen no one greater than John the Baptist. For it fell to no prophet both to announce Christ and to point him out with the finger. And what need have I to linger in the praises of such a man, since even by God the Father he is called an Angel? Behold, he says, I send my Angel before your face, who shall prepare your way before you.

Clearly an Angel, who, after the shelter of his mother's womb, as a little child played with serpents in the wastes of the desert; who, while his eyes beheld Christ, deigned to look upon nothing else; who trained a voice worthy of God on the sayings of the Lord, which are sweeter than honey and the honeycomb. And not to delay the question, thus it was fitting for the Forerunner of the Lord to grow. Did such and so great a man not give the Holy Spirit, which Cornelius the centurion received before he was baptized? Answer, I ask, why did he not give it? Do you not know? Hear what the Scriptures teach: John's baptism did not so much remit sins, as it was a baptism of repentance unto the remission of sins, that is, unto a future remission, which was afterward to follow through the sanctification of Christ. For it is written: John was in the desert baptizing, and preaching the gospel of repentance unto the remission of sins.

And a little after: And they were baptized by him in the Jordan, confessing their sins. For as he himself was before the Forerunner of the Lord, so also his baptism was a forerunner of the Lord's baptism. He who is of the earth, he said, speaks earthly things; he who comes from above is above all. And again: I baptize you in water, he will baptize in the Spirit. But if John, as he himself confessed, did not baptize in the Spirit, consequently neither did he remit sins, because sins are forgiven to no man without the Holy Spirit. Or if you argue contentiously that John's baptism did remit sins because it was from heaven, then teach what further we obtain in Christ's baptism. That which remits sins frees from Gehenna. That which frees from Gehenna is perfect. But baptism cannot be called perfect except that which is in the cross and resurrection of Christ.

So you, perversely religious, while John himself says: He must increase, but I must decrease—by attributing to the servant's baptism more than it had, you destroy the Lord's, to which you leave nothing further. Where does this assertion tend? Namely, that it should not seem strange to you if those who had been baptized by John afterward received the Holy Spirit through the laying on of the apostles' hands, since it is agreed that they had not even obtained the remission of sins without a subsequent faith. But you, who receive one baptized by the Arians, and grant him a baptism which is perfect, how is it that, as if something small were lacking to him, you call upon the Holy Spirit, since Christ's baptism is none at all without the Holy Spirit? But I have gone too far, and when I could have repelled the adversary's attack with an equal front, I have shot lighter darts.

For John's baptism was so far imperfect that it is established that those who had been baptized by him were afterward baptized with Christ's baptism. For thus the history relates: Now it happened, while Apollo was at Corinth, and Paul was passing through the upper parts of Asia, that he came to Ephesus, and finding certain disciples, he said to them: Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? But they answered: We have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit. And he said to them: Into what then were you baptized? They answered: Into John's baptism. But Paul said: John indeed baptized the people with a baptism of repentance, saying that they should believe in him who was coming after him, that is, in Jesus, unto the remission of sins. Having heard this, they were baptized in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit at once fell upon them.

If therefore they were baptized with the true and lawful baptism of the Church, and afterward thus obtained the Holy Spirit, then you too follow the authority of the Apostles, and baptize those who do not have Christ's baptism, and you will be able to invoke the Holy Spirit.

Luciferianus: Those who thirst while sleeping gulp rivers into their greedy throats. And the more they drink, the more they thirst. So you also seem to me, against the little question I proposed, to have sought arguments from here and there, and nonetheless to persist in the same thirst of questions. Or do you not know that this too is the custom of the Churches, that hands are laid upon those already baptized, and thus the Holy Spirit is invoked? You demand where it is written? In the Acts of the Apostles. Even if the authority of Scripture were not present, the consensus of the whole world on this point would hold the force of a precept.

For many other things too, which are observed in the Churches by tradition, have claimed for themselves the authority of written law, such as dipping the head three times in the font, then, upon emerging, tasting first the mingled milk and honey in signification of infancy, on the Lord's Day and throughout the whole of Pentecost neither to worship kneeling nor to fast, and many other things which reasonable observance has claimed for itself, though not written. From which you observe that we follow the custom of the Church, although it is established that someone was baptized before the invocation of the Spirit.

Orthodoxus: I do not indeed deny that this is the custom of the Churches, that to those who have been baptized by presbyters and deacons far from the greater cities, a bishop hastens to lay on hands for the invocation of the Holy Spirit. But what sort of thing is it, that you should transfer the laws of the Church to heresy, and allow the integrity of your virgin to suffer in the brothels of harlots? If a bishop lays on his hand, he lays it on those who have been baptized in the right faith, who have believed three persons, one substance, in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

But an Arian, since he has believed nothing else (stop your ears, I ask, you who are about to hear, lest you be defiled by the words of so great an impiety) except in the Father alone as true God, and in Jesus Christ as a creature-Savior, and in the Holy Spirit as the servant of both—how shall he receive the Holy Spirit from the Church, who has not yet obtained the remission of sins? For the Holy Spirit dwells in no seat but a clean one, nor does he become the inhabitant of that temple which does not have as its overseer the true faith. But if at this point you ask why one baptized in the Church does not receive the Holy Spirit except through the hands of a bishop—whom we assert to be given in true baptism—learn that this observance descends from that authority, because after the Lord's ascension the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles.

And we find the same thing done in many places, more for the honor of the priesthood than for the law of necessity. Otherwise, if the Holy Spirit flows down only at a bishop's invocation, then those are to be mourned who, in little villages, or in forts, or in more remote places, having been baptized by presbyters and deacons, died before they were visited by bishops. The salvation of the Church hangs on the dignity of the high priest: to whom if a certain exceptional and eminent power over all is not given, as many schisms will arise in the Churches as there are priests. Hence it comes that without chrism and the bishop's command, neither a presbyter nor a deacon has the right of baptizing. Which, however, frequently, if necessity compels, we know is permitted even to laymen.

For as one receives, so also can he give; unless perhaps the eunuch baptized by Philip the deacon is to be believed to have been without the Holy Spirit, of whom the Scripture speaks thus: And they both went down into the water; and Philip baptized him. And as they were coming up out of the water, the Holy Spirit came upon the eunuch. But if you think this should be objected, that, When the apostles who were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, who, when they had come to them, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Spirit, for as yet he had fallen upon none of them. Learn why this was done from what follows. For it says: But they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid hands upon them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

If at this point you also say that you act likewise, because heretics did not baptize in the Holy Spirit, know that Philip was not separated from the apostles, that he held the same Church, that he preached the same Lord Jesus Christ; that he was certainly a deacon of those who afterward laid on hands. But you, who say that among the Arians there is not a Church but a synagogue, nor clergy of God, but worshippers of a creature and of idols—how do you claim to hold the same reasoning in a dissimilar case?

Luciferianus: Bravely indeed, and with firm footing, you repel me while I fight you face to face; but you are being cut down behind your back, and you do not protect your bare flanks from the darts. Grant, indeed, that among the Arians there is not even baptism, and that therefore the Holy Spirit cannot be given by them, because they have not yet received remission of sins; all this serves my victory, and in the wrestling-ground of your arguments, the palm of victory sweats for me. The Arian has no baptism, so how does he have priesthood? Among them there is no layman, so how can there be a bishop? It is not lawful for me to receive a beggar, and you receive a king? You hand over the camp to the enemy; and is a deserter to be rejected by us?

Orthodoxus: If you remembered what came before, you would already know you had been answered; but while you pursue the love of contradiction, you have fallen out of the lines of the question: after the manner of certain talkative rather than eloquent men, who, though they know not how to dispute, nevertheless do not cease to wrangle. For I am not now either condemning or defending the Arians in the present case, but I am going round that same goal of my course, namely, that a bishop is received by us on the same principle by which a layman is received by you. If you grant pardon to one in error, I too forgive one who repents. If a baptizer, baptized in his own faith, could not harm the one baptized, then one who ordains a priest constituted in his own faith did not defile him. Heresy is subtle, and therefore simple souls are easily deceived. The deception is common both to layman and to bishop. But, you say, the bishop could not have erred.

In truth, they are chosen for the episcopate from the very bosom of Plato and Aristophanes! For how many indeed are not thoroughly trained in these matters? In short, whoever among the learned are ordained today, this is their care—not how they may drink deeply of the marrow of the Scriptures, but how they may soothe the ears of the people with the little flowers of declaimers. Add to this, that the Arian heresy accords more with the wisdom of the world, and borrows the streams of its arguments from the springs of Aristotle. Therefore, in the manner of little children contending among themselves, whatever you say, I will say: you will affirm, I will affirm: you will deny, I will deny. The Arian baptizes, therefore he is a bishop: he does not baptize—you reject the layman, and I will not receive the priest. I will follow you wherever you go: either we shall both stick together in the mud, or we shall both get free together.

Luciferianus: But the layman is to be pardoned for this reason, that, thinking it the Church of God, he approached in simplicity, and, believing according to his own faith, was baptized. Orthodoxus: You assert a strange thing, that someone became a Christian by the agency of one who was not a Christian. In going to the Arians, in what faith was he baptized? Surely in that which the Arians held. Or if he himself already believed rightly, and was knowingly baptized by heretics, he deserves no pardon for error. But this is utterly absurd, that a disciple going to a master should be a craftsman before he is taught; that one just converted from the worship of idols should know Christ better than the one who is to teach him. But you say: He believed simply in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and therefore obtained baptism. What, pray, is this simplicity—not to know what you believe? He believed simply. What did he believe?

Surely either, hearing three names, he believed in three gods, and became an idolater; or, believing in a three-named God under three titles, he fell into the heresy of Sabellius. Or, taught by the Arians that the one true God is the Father, he believed the Son and the Holy Spirit to be creatures. Or apart from these, what else he could have believed, I do not know—unless perhaps the man, already instructed, learned the homoousion Trinity amid the heifers in the Capitol! He knew that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are divided not in nature but in persons. He knew both the name of the Son in the Father, and the name of the Father in the Son. It is an utterly ridiculous assertion, that anyone should dispute about the faith before believing; should know the mystery before being initiated; that the one baptizing should think one way about God, and the one baptized another.

Besides, since it is customary in the font, after the confession of the Trinity, to ask: Do you believe in the holy Church? Do you believe in the remission of sins? Which Church do you say he believed in? The Arians'? But they have none. Ours? But being baptized outside it, he could not have believed in that which he did not know.

Luciferianus: Since you quibble at everything, and elude the darts I hurl with the shield of your speech, I will cast one spear, which by its force may pierce the boss of your covering and your crackling words, nor will I any longer suffer strength to be overcome by artifice. A layman, even though baptized in faith outside the Church, is received as a penitent: but a bishop either does not do penance, and is a priest, or, if he does penance, ceases to be a bishop. Therefore we rightly both receive the layman as a penitent, and repudiate the bishop, if he wishes to remain in the priesthood. Orthodoxus: An arrow which is aimed with a taut bowstring is hard to dodge. For it reaches the one at whom it was cast before it can be thwarted by the barrier of a shield. On the other hand, your propositions, since they are cast without a sharp iron point, cannot pierce the enemy.

This spear, then, which you have hurled with all your might, with which you threaten us, I will repel with one little finger, as they say. For the question is not framed in this way—whether a bishop can be a penitent, and a layman can be—but whether a heretic has baptism. If, as is agreed, he does not have baptism, how can he be a penitent, before being a Christian? Prove to me that a layman coming from the Arians has baptism, and then I will not deny him penance. But if he is not a Christian, if he has not had a priest to make him a Christian, how shall a man do penance who does not yet believe?

Luciferianus: I beg you, laying aside the argumentation of the philosophers, to speak with me in Christian simplicity, if indeed you follow not the dialecticians but the fishermen. Does it seem fair to you that an Arian should be a bishop? Orthodoxus: When you approve of the bishop, because you receive from him one who was baptized, you yourself are to be blamed on this account—why you are separated from us by walls, since you agree with us in the faith and in the reception of the Arians. Luciferianus: I have already asked above that you speak with me not philosophically, but as a Christian. Orthodoxus: Do you wish to learn, or do you contend? Luciferianus: Certainly I contend, because I ask you the reason for your action. Orthodoxus: If you contend, you have already been answered. For I receive a bishop from the Arians on the same principle by which you receive a baptized person. If you wish to learn, cross over into my battle-line. For an adversary is conquered, a disciple is taught.

Luciferianus: I cannot be a disciple before I hear the master teaching. Orthodoxus: Since you keep evading, and wish to be taught by me in such a way as to keep your adversary intact, I will teach you according to your own mind. We agree in the faith, we agree in receiving heretics, let us agree also in assembling together. Luciferianus: This is not teaching, but arguing. Orthodoxus: Because you seek peace with a shield, and we insert an olive branch on our sword. Luciferianus: Behold, I raise my hands, I yield, you have won. But though I lay down my arms, I ask the reason for the oath which you compel me to swear.

Orthodoxus: I congratulate you meanwhile, and I give thanks to Christ my God, because with good will you have passed from the falsity of the Sardinians to the savor of the whole world, and you do not say, after the manner of some: Save me, O Lord, for the holy one has failed: whose impious voice empties the cross of Christ, subjects the Son of God to the devil, and understands that lament which was uttered by the Lord concerning sinners as now spoken of all men: What profit is there in my blood, while I go down into corruption? But far be it that God should have died in vain. The strong man is bound, and his vessels have been plundered. The address of the Father has been fulfilled: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession. The fountains of waters have appeared, and the foundations of the world have been laid bare.

He has set his tabernacle in the sun, nor is there any who can hide himself from its heat. Full of God, the Psalmist sings: The swords of the enemies have failed unto the end, and you have destroyed their cities.

And where, I ask, are these men who are excessively religious—nay, rather excessively profane—who assert that there are more synagogues than Churches? How have the cities of the devil been destroyed; and at the end, that is, at the consummation of the ages, have idols fallen? If Christ has no Church, or if he has one only in Sardinia, he has become exceedingly poor. And if Satan possesses the Britains, the Gauls, the East, the peoples of the Indians, the barbarous nations, and the whole world at once—how have the trophies of the Cross been gathered to a corner of the whole earth? Surely the mighty adversary yielded to Christ the Iberian viper: he disdained to possess sallow men and a poor province. But if they flatter themselves with that saying which is written in the Gospel: Do you think that when the Son of man comes, he will find faith on the earth? Let them know that this faith is named of which the Lord himself said: Your faith has made you whole.

And elsewhere concerning the Centurion: I have not found so great faith in Israel. And again to the Apostles: Why are you fearful, O you of little faith? And also in another place: If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, Move, and it shall move. For neither the Centurion nor that little woman who for twelve years was wasting away with a flow of blood had believed in the mysteries of the Trinity, which were manifested to the Apostles after the resurrection of Christ; so that it was not the faith of these things which is in the mystery that was rightly praised, but the simplicity of mind and the soul devoted to its God that was approved: For she said in her heart, If I shall but touch his garment, I shall be made whole. This is the faith which God has pronounced to be rarely found. This is the faith which even among those who believe rightly is found with difficulty in its perfection.

Let it be done to you, says God, according to your faith. This voice I do not wish to hear. For if it should be done to me according to my faith, I shall perish. And certainly I believe in God the Father, I believe in God the Son, and I believe in God the Holy Spirit. I believe in one God, and yet I do not wish it to be done to me according to my faith. For often the enemy comes and sows tares among the Lord's harvest. Nor do I say this as though anything were greater than the faith of the sacrament, than purity of soul: but an undoubting faith toward God is hard to attain.

Let it be said, for example, so that what we mean may be plain: I stand at prayer; I would not pray if I did not believe: but if I truly believed, I would cleanse that heart by which God is seen, I would beat my breast with my hands, I would water my cheeks with tears, I would shudder in body, I would grow pale in countenance, I would lie at the feet of my Lord, and drench them with weeping, wipe them with my hair, I would surely cling to the trunk of the cross, nor let go before I had obtained mercy. But now, very often in my prayer, either I walk about in the porticoes, or I reckon up interest, or, carried off by some shameful thought, I do even things which are shameful to speak of. Where is faith? Do we think Jonah prayed thus? Or the three youths? Or Daniel among the lions? Or surely the thief on the cross?

And these things I have brought forward by way of example, for the sake of understanding the sense. But let each one examine his own heart, and he will find in his whole life how rare it is for a faithful soul to be found, one that does nothing for the desire of glory, nothing for the little rumors of men. For not everyone who fasts, fasts for God, nor does everyone who extends a hand to the poor, lend to God. Vices are neighbors to virtues. It is difficult to be content with God alone as judge.

Luciferianus: You have anticipated my question: for I was reserving this Scripture for the end. And nearly all of our men—nay, now no longer mine—use this as a kind of battering-ram in disputes, which I greatly rejoice to see broken and shattered. But I beg you to explain to me the whole reason why the Church receives those coming from the Arians, not as to an adversary, but as to a disciple. For although I cannot answer you in word, yet in mind I do not yet assent.

Orthodoxus. Under king Constantius, in the consulship of Eusebius and Hypatius, unbelief was written down in the name of unity and faith, as is now recognized. For at that time, nothing seemed so pious, nothing so fitting for a servant of God, as to follow unity, and not to be cut off from the communion of the whole world. Especially since the surface of the exposition presented nothing openly sacrilegious: We believe, they said, in one true God, the Father almighty. This too we confess. We believe in the Only-begotten Son of God, who was born of God before all ages, and before every beginning. But that the Only-begotten alone was born of the Father alone, God of God, like unto his begetter the Father according to the Scriptures; whose nativity no one knows, save he alone who begot him, the Father. Was there here inserted: There was a time when he was not? Or, that the Son of God is a creature made out of things not existing?

It is a perfect faith to believe God of God. And they said that the Only-begotten alone was born of the Father alone. What is "born"? Certainly not "made." His nativity removed the suspicion of createdness. They added further, Who descended from heaven, was conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, crucified under Pontius Pilate, rose again on the third day from the dead, ascended into heaven, sits at the right hand of God the Father, and will come to judge the living and the dead. The words sounded of piety, and amid the honey of so great a proclamation, no one thought that poison had been mixed in.

As for the abolishing of the word "Ousia," a plausible reason was given. Because, they said, it is not found in the Scriptures, and its novelty scandalizes many of the simpler sort, it was resolved that it be removed. The bishops were not concerned about the word, since the sense was safe. Finally, at that very time, when a rumor among the people was stirring that there had been deceit in the exposition, Valens, bishop of Mursa, who had composed it, in the presence of Taurus, prefect of the praetorium, who was present at the synod by the king's order, professed that he was not an Arian, and utterly abhorred their blasphemies. The matter, having been done in secret, had not extinguished the opinion of the common people.

And so on another day, in the church which is at Ariminum, with crowds both of bishops and of laymen assembling together, Muzonius, bishop of the province of Byzacena, to whom by reason of age precedence was accorded by all, spoke thus: We bid that someone read to your holiness those things which have been bandied about publicly and have come even to us, so that whatever things are evil, and ought to be abhorred both by our ears and by our heart, may be condemned with one voice by all. It was answered by all the bishops, It pleases us. And so when Claudius, bishop of the province of Picenum, at the bidding of all, had begun to read the blasphemies attributed to Valens: Valens, denying that they were his own, cried out and said: If anyone denies that Christ the Lord, the Son of God, was begotten of the Father before the ages, let him be anathema. All together responded, Let him be anathema.

If anyone denies that the Son is like the Father according to the Scriptures, let him be anathema. All answered, Let him be anathema. If anyone shall not say that the Son of God is eternal with the Father, let him be anathema. All together cried out, Let him be anathema. If anyone shall say that the Son of God is a creature, as the other creatures are, let him be anathema. Likewise it was said, Let him be anathema. If anyone shall say that the Son is out of things not existing, and not of God the Father, let him be anathema. All cried out, Let him be anathema. If anyone shall say, There was a time when the Son was not, let him be anathema. At this indeed all the bishops together, and the whole Church at once, received the voice of Valens with a kind of applause and rejoicing. But if anyone thinks this to be feigned by us, let him search the public archives.

Full indeed are the church treasuries of these records, and the memory of the matter is still fresh. There survive men who were present at that synod; and, to confirm the truth, the Arians themselves do not deny that these things happened as we have said. When therefore all were lifting Valens to the heavens with praises, and condemning with repentance their suspicion of him; the same Claudius, who had begun the reading above, said: There are still some things which escaped my lord and brother Valens, which, if it seems good to you, lest any scruple remain, let us condemn together. If anyone shall say that the Son of God indeed existed before all ages, but not before every time whatsoever, so as to set anything before him, let him be anathema. All said, Let him be anathema. And many other things which seemed suspect, at Claudius's pronouncement, Valens condemned. Whoever wishes to learn these things more fully will find them in the acts of the synod of Ariminum, from which we too have drawn these things.

These things having been so done, the council was dissolved. All returned joyfully to their provinces. For it had been a concern to the king and to all good men alike, that East and West should be bound together by the bond of communion. But wicked deeds do not long lie hidden, and a scar badly closed over breaks open once the matter festers within. Afterward Valens and Ursacius, and the rest of the partners of their wickedness—excellent priests of Christ, to be sure—began to boast of their victory, saying that they had not denied that the Son was a creature, but only that he was like the other creatures. Then the word "ousia" was abolished; then the condemnation of the Nicene faith was proclaimed with acclamation. The whole world groaned, and was astonished to find itself Arian. Some, therefore, began to remain within their own communion, others began to send letters to those confessors who were in exile under the name of Athanasius; some lamented that the alliance they had entered was worse than despair itself.

A few indeed (such is the nature of men) defended their error as if it had been deliberate counsel. The little ship of the Apostles was in peril, the winds pressed hard, its sides were battered by the waves: no hope now remained: the Lord is roused, he commands the tempest, the beast dies, tranquility returns. Let me speak more plainly. All the bishops who had been driven from their own sees, by the indulgence of the new prince, returned to their churches. Then Egypt received back her Athanasius as a conqueror; then the Church of the Gauls embraced Hilary returning from the battle; then Italy exchanged her mourning garments at the return of Eusebius. Bishops flocked together who, having been ensnared by the tricks of Ariminum, were reputed heretics without their own knowledge, calling to witness the Body of the Lord, and whatever is holy in the Church, that they had suspected nothing evil in their own faith.

We thought, they said, that the sense corresponded with the words; nor did we fear that in the Church of God, where there is simplicity, where there is pure confession, one thing should be shut up in the heart and another brought forth on the lips. A good opinion of evil men deceived us. We did not suppose that priests of Christ would fight against Christ. And many other things they asserted weeping, which for brevity's sake I pass over: ready both to sign anew and to condemn all the blasphemies of the Arians. At this point I ask these overly scrupulous men, what they think ought to have been done about the confessors? Having deposed, they say, the old bishops, new ones should have been ordained. It was attempted. But how many, being conscious of their own good conscience, would suffer themselves to be deposed? Especially since all the peoples, loving their own bishops, all but rushed with stones to kill those attempting to depose them? They should have remained, they say, within their own communion.

This is to say that, by an unreasonable cruelty, they should have handed over the whole world to the devil. Why should they have condemned those who were not Arians? Why should they split the Church, which remained in the concord of the faith? Why, finally, should they by their own obstinacy make Arians of those who believed rightly? For since we know that at the synod of Nicaea, which was assembled on account of the Arian perfidy, eight Arian bishops were received back; and since there is now no bishop in the world except those whom that synod ordained: how could they have acted against that very synod, on account of which they endured exile?

Luciferianus: Were, then, Arians even at that time received? Who, I ask? Orthodoxus: Eusebius, bishop of Nicomedia; Theognius, bishop of Nicaea; Saras, then a presbyter of Libya; Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea in Palestine; and the rest, whom it would be tedious to enumerate. He himself too, the head of these and the cause of the evils, Arius the presbyter, and Ezoius the deacon, who after Eudoxius was bishop of Antioch; and Achillas the reader. These three, indeed, clerics of the church of Alexandria, stood forth as authors of this heresy. Luciferianus: If someone denies that they were received back, how shall he be refuted? Orthodoxus: There survive still men who were present at that synod.

And if this is not enough, because by reason of the antiquity of the time such men are quite rare, and cannot be present as witnesses in every place, let us read the acts and the names of the bishops of the synod of Nicaea; and we shall find that those whom we said above had been received back subscribed to the "homoousion" along with the rest. Luciferianus: If you can, show that after the Nicene synod they turned to perfidy. Orthodoxus: You have proposed the matter rightly. For those who do not believe a thing was done because they do not wish it, are wont to deny it with closed eyes. But how did they not afterward turn aside, those on whose account the synod was assembled? And whose letters and books of impiety, published before the synod, endure to the present day?

Therefore, since at that time three hundred bishops and more received back a few men, whom they could reject without harm to the Church: I marvel that certain persons—certainly followers of the Nicene faith—exist in such hardness of heart, as to think that three confessors returning from exile ought not, out of necessity for the salvation of the whole world, to have done what so many and such men did willingly. But, as we had begun to say, after the return of the confessors, it was afterward decreed in the synod of Alexandria that, except for the authors of the heresy, whom error could not excuse, the penitent should be joined to the Church: not that men who had been heretics could be bishops; but that it should be established that those who were received had not been heretics. The West agreed to this decision: and through so necessary a council, the world was snatched from the jaws of Satan.

We have come to the most difficult point, in which, against my will and purpose, I am compelled to think somewhat otherwise concerning the blessed Lucifer than either his merit or my own regard for him demands. But what am I to do? Truth opens the mouth, and drives the reluctant tongue, and the conscious breast, to speak out. In such a crisis of the Church, amid such raging of wolves, having separated a few sheep, he abandoned the rest of the flock. He was indeed a good shepherd himself, but he left much prey to the beasts. I pass over those things which certain slanderers defend as if sufficiently well-founded—that he did this out of love of glory, and of transmitting his name to posterity: and also out of the rivalry which he had conceived against Eusebius on account of the Antiochene dissension.

None of these things do I believe of such a man: one thing there is which even now I will constantly affirm, that he differs from us in words, not in substance: seeing that he does receive those who obtained baptism from the Arians.

Luciferianus: How far different from, and, as I now understand, tending more to error than to hope, were the things formerly told to me! But I give thanks to Christ God, who has poured the light of truth into my breast; lest I still, with a sacrilegious mouth, cry out that His virgin is a harlot of the devil. One thing remains, which I beg you to explain, what is to be said against Hilary, who does not receive even those baptized by the Arians. Orthodoxus: Since Hilary the deacon has withdrawn from the Church, and, being alone as he thinks, is a crowd unto himself in the world, he can neither confect the Eucharist, having neither bishops nor presbyters, nor administer baptism without the Eucharist. And since the man himself is now dead, with the man his sect likewise perished, because the deacon could ordain no cleric after himself. But the Church is not that which has no priests.

But, setting aside a few insignificant men, who are themselves both laymen and bishops, hear what is to be thought concerning the whole Church. Luciferianus: In three words, as they say, you have resolved so great a question, and indeed, while you speak, I seem to myself to agree with you. But if you fall silent, I do not know what doubt springs up again in me: why those baptized by heretics are received. Orthodoxus: This is what I too said: hear what is to be thought concerning the whole Church. For this doubt, as you say, teases many. And perhaps I shall be somewhat long in explaining it: but the gain of truth is worth so much.

The ark of Noah was a type of the Church, the Apostle Peter saying: In the ark of Noah a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water, which also now saves us, being a like form of baptism. As in that ark there were the kinds of all animals, so also in this one there are men of every nation and every manner of life. As there were leopard and kids, wolf and lambs there, so here too there are both righteous and sinners, that is, vessels of gold and silver dwelling together with vessels of wood and clay. The ark had its nests; the Church has very many dwelling places. Eight human souls were preserved in the ark of Noah. And Ecclesiastes bids us give a portion to seven, and also to eight, that is, to believe in both Testaments.

For this reason certain psalms are inscribed "for the eighth," and through eight verses assigned to each single letter, the righteous man is instructed in the hundred and eighteenth psalm. The beatitudes too, which the Lord, proclaiming them to His disciples on the mountain, used to delineate the Church, are eight in number. And Ezekiel, in the building of the Temple, takes up the number eight. And you will find many other things of this kind signified through the Scriptures. So a raven is sent out from the ark and does not return, and afterward a dove announces peace to the earth. So also in the baptism of the Church, once the most foul bird—that is, the devil—has been driven out, the dove of the Holy Spirit announces peace to our earth. Beginning at thirty cubits, and gradually narrowing down to one cubit, the ark is constructed. Likewise the Church too, consisting of many ranks, ends at last in deacons, presbyters, and bishops. The ark was imperiled in the flood; the Church is imperiled in the world.

Noah, having come out, planted a vineyard, and drinking of it, was made drunk; Christ too, born in the flesh, planted the Church, and suffered. The elder son mocked the father when he was uncovered, and the younger covered him, and the Jews mocked the crucified God, and the Gentiles honored Him. The day would fail me if I set out to expound all the mysteries of the ark in comparison with the Church. Who among us are the eagles, who the doves, who the lions, who the deer, who the worms, who the serpents—as far as concerns the present matter, I will briefly explain. Not only do sheep dwell in the Church, nor do only clean birds fly there; but wheat is sown in the field, and among the flourishing crops burdocks and thistles and barren oats hold dominion. What is the farmer to do? Shall he pull up the darnel? But then the whole harvest together is overthrown.

Daily the farmer's diligence drives off the birds by noise, frightens them with scarecrows: here he cracks a whip, there he sets up figures of dread. Yet still either swift roe-deer or a wanton wild ass rushes in; here mice carry off the grain into dug-out granaries, there the ant plunders the crop with its fervent troop. So it is. No one possesses a field free from care. While the master of the house slept, the enemy sowed weeds among the wheat, and when the servants proposed to go and root them out, the Lord forbade it, reserving to Himself the separation of chaff and grain. These are the vessels of wrath and of mercy which the Apostle proclaims in the house of God. The day will come, therefore, when, the treasury of the Church having been opened, the Lord will bring forth the vessels of His wrath; and as they go out, the saints will say: They went out from us, but they were not of us.

For if they had been of us, they would surely have remained with us. No one can assume to himself the palm of Christ; no one may judge men before the day of judgment. If the Church is already cleansed, what do we reserve for the Lord? There is a way which seems right to men, but its ends lead into the depths of hell. In this error of judgment, what sentence can be certain?

Blessed Cyprian strove to flee broken cisterns, and not to drink of another's water; and for that reason, rejecting the baptism of heretics, he directed an African synod on this matter to Stephen, then bishop of the city of Rome, who was the twenty-second from blessed Peter—but his effort was in vain. For at length those very bishops who had determined with him that heretics were to be rebaptized, having returned to the ancient custom, issued a new decree. What are we to do? So our elders handed down to us, and their elders to them. But why should I speak of later times? While the Apostles were still in Judea, with the blood of Christ still fresh, the Lord's body was being asserted to be a phantasm; the Apostle again travails in birth for the Galatians, led back to observance of the Law; he strives with many arguments to draw the Corinthians, who did not believe in the resurrection of the flesh, to the true way.

Then Simon Magus, and Menander his disciple, asserted themselves to be the powers of God; then Basilides expounded the supreme God, Abraxas, in three hundred and sixty-five volumes; then Nicolaus, who was one of the seven deacons, celebrating marriages day and night, dreamed up obscene unions, shameful even to hear of. I say nothing of the Jewish heretics, who before the coming of Christ scattered the Law that had been handed down: that Dositheus, prince of the Samaritans, repudiated the Prophets; that the Sadducees, springing from his root, also denied the resurrection of the flesh; that the Pharisees, divided from the Jews on account of certain superfluous observances, took their very name from the schism; that the Herodians took up King Herod in place of Christ. I come now to those heretics who tore the Gospels to pieces.

A certain Saturninus, and the Ophites, and the Cainites, and the Sethites, and Carpocrates, and Cerinthus, and his successor Ebion, and the other plagues, most of whom broke out even while the Apostle John was still living—and yet we read of none of them being rebaptized.

Since we have made mention of such a man, let us also prove from his Apocalypse that heretics ought to be granted penance without baptism. To the Angel of Ephesus, abandoned charity is imputed. In the Angel of the Church of Pergamum, the eating of things sacrificed to idols and the doctrine of the Nicolaitans are rebuked. Likewise with the Angel of Thyatira, Jezebel the prophetess is reproved, and the eating of things offered to idols, and fornications. And yet the Lord exhorts all these to repentance, under threat also of a punishment to come, unless they be converted. He would not compel them to repent, if He were not going to grant pardon to those who repent. Did He say, "Let those who were baptized in the faith of the Nicolaitans be rebaptized"? Or, "Let hands be laid upon those who believed at that time among the people of Pergamum, who held to the teaching of Balaam"?

Rather He says: Repent; but if not, I will come to you quickly, and will fight against you with the sword of my mouth.

But if those who have been instructed by Hilary, and who have begun to be sheep without a shepherd, wish to bring forward from the Scriptures those things which blessed Cyprian left in his letters concerning the rebaptizing of heretics, let them know that he did not publish these things with an anathema against those who had refused to follow him. Indeed, he remained in communion with those who had opposed his opinion; rather, he had exhorted, on account of Novatus and the many other heresies then springing up, that no one should be received by him without condemnation of his error. Indeed, he ended the discourse which he delivered on this matter to Stephen, bishop of Rome, with this conclusion: "These things, dearest brother, we have set forth to your conscience, both for the common honor and out of simple love, believing that they will please you also, for the truth of your religion and faith—things which are at once devout and true.

For the rest, we know that certain men are unwilling to lay aside what they have once drunk in, nor easily to change their purpose; but, while preserving the bond of peace and concord among colleagues, they retain certain practices of their own, once adopted among themselves. In this matter we do not use force upon anyone, nor lay down a law, but leave each one free will in the administration of the Church: let each bishop be set over his own charge, to render account of his conduct to the Lord." Writing also to Jubaianus concerning the rebaptism of heretics, he spoke thus at the end of the letter: "These things, dearest brother, we have written briefly according to our poor ability, prescribing to no one, nor prejudging, so that each bishop may do what he thinks right, having free power of his own judgment.

We, so far as in us lies, do not contend with our colleagues and fellow-bishops on account of heretics, with whom we hold divine concord and the Lord's peace, especially since the Apostle says: But if any man seem to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the Church of God. We preserve, patiently and gently, charity of soul, the honor of the college, the bond of faith, the concord of the priesthood."

There is besides another point which we shall bring forward, against which not even Hilary, the Deucalion of the world, would dare so much as to mutter. For if heretics do not have baptism, and are therefore to be rebaptized by the Church, because they were not in the Church, then Hilary himself also is not a Christian. For he was baptized in that very Church which has always accepted the baptism of heretics. Before the Council of Ariminum took place, before Lucifer went into exile, Hilary, as a deacon of the Roman Church, used to receive those coming from heretics on the strength of the baptism they had previously received. Unless perhaps only the Arians are heretics, and it is not lawful to accept baptism from these alone, though it is lawful from others. You were a deacon, O Hilary, and you used to receive those baptized by the Manichaeans. You were a deacon, and you approved the baptism of Ebion. Suddenly, after Arius arose, you began to displease yourself entirely.

You separate yourself with your little slaves, and open a new bath. If some angel or apostle has rebaptized you, I do not challenge what you follow. But if, born in my bosom, nourished with the milk of my breasts, you raise the sword against me—give back what I gave you, and be, if you can, a Christian in some other way. I am a harlot, but still I am your mother. I do not keep the chastity of a single bed; such I was when you were conceived; with Arius I commit adultery, as I did before with Praxeas, with Ebion, with Cerinthus, with Novatus: these you embrace, these, already adulterers, you now receive into your mother's house. I do not know why one adulterer alone should offend you.

But if anyone should think it must be denied that heretics were always received by our elders, let him read the letters of blessed Cyprian, in which he lacerates the error of Stephen, bishop of the city of Rome, and of inveterate custom. Let him also read the very treatises of Hilary himself, which he published against us concerning the rebaptism of heretics, and there he will find Hilary himself confessing that under Julius, Marcus, Sylvester, and the other bishops of old, all heretics were likewise received into penance; and yet this ought not to prejudice the custom of truth in his own case. The Council of Nicaea also, which we mentioned a little earlier, received all heretics, except the disciples of Paul of Samosata. And what is more than this, the bishop of the Novatianists, if he is converted, keeps the rank of the presbyterate. This decision assails both Lucifer and Hilary—since the same man is both a cleric and one who was baptized.

I could have spent the whole day on eloquence of this kind, and dried up all the streams of your propositions with the one sun of the Church. But since we have already discoursed a great deal, and the length of the contest has wearied the zeal of the hearers, I will set forth to you a brief and open judgment of my mind: that one must remain in that Church which, founded by the Apostles, endures to this very day. Wherever you hear those who are called Christians named not from the Lord Jesus Christ, but from some other person—as, for instance, Marcionites, Valentinians, Mountain-men, or Field-men—know that this is not the Church of Christ, but the synagogue of Antichrist. For from this very fact, that they were founded afterward, they show themselves to be those whom the Apostle foretold would come.

Nor let them flatter themselves if they seem to affirm what they say from chapters of Scripture, since even the devil has spoken certain things from Scripture, and the Scriptures do not consist in the reading, but in the understanding. Otherwise, if we follow the letter, we too could compose for ourselves a new dogma: so as to assert that those who wear shoes and have two tunics ought not to be received into the Church.

Luciferianus: Do not suppose that you alone have won; both of us have won, each of us carries off a palm: you of me, and I of error. Would that it might always fall to me to dispute in such a way, that, advancing to better things, I might abandon what I wrongly held. Yet one thing I confess to you: since I know the character of my own people very well, they can be conquered more easily than persuaded.