Letters and Decretals

Having read your letters, I could not restrain my deeply moved feelings from tears. For I wept for joy, because I was able to recognize from the very wording of your letters that you live according to the precepts of the Lord our God; and yet I could not but grieve out of longing for you, because I was being deprived by the greatest injury on your part, had you not sent your letters. Should I then not enjoy such a sister? I call your welfare to witness, I have very often wished to come to you, but hitherto I have been hindered, that one who is accustomed to hinder standing in my way. For I was hastening in my longing to satisfy myself with the sight of you; and it seemed we would in passing be doing the work of our Lord between us, since, comforting one another, treading underfoot the weight of the world, we should live.

But I no longer set a day or a time for coming, because as often as I have set one, I have not been able to fulfill it. I shall await the Lord's will; and I hope that by my prayers and yours he will grant that we reap fruit from our perseverance.

As for the rest, since in all the letters I had sent you, desiring precepts for your life and your faith, I have already through the constancy of my writings used up my words, I can now write nothing new to you that I have not written before. And indeed, by God's favor, you no longer need to be admonished, you who, perfecting your faith from its beginnings, show devoted charity in Christ. One thing, however, I do urge: do not go back over what has been passed, do not long for what has been despised; do not, having put your hand to the plough, turn round and look back. For if that fault should return in you, the furrow must necessarily lose its straightness, and the tiller surely will not receive his wage. Otherwise he does not even attain a part of the reward, if he has ceased in part. For just as one must flee from sin to righteousness, so too he who has entered upon righteousness must take care not to lie open to sin.

For it is written of the just man that on the day he strays, his righteousness will not profit him. In this therefore we must stand firm, in this we must labor, lest we who have escaped sins lose the rewards that are prepared. For the enemy stands ready against us, that he may at once strike us once stripped of the shield of faith. The shield, then, must not be cast aside, lest the side lie open. The sword must not be laid down, lest the enemy begin to have no fear. Moreover, when he sees us armed, he will depart. Nor are we ignorant that it is hard and difficult to fight daily against the flesh and the world. But if you consider eternity, if you weigh the kingdoms of heaven, which the Lord, though we are sinners, will deign to grant us, what suffering, after all, is worthy to merit such great things? The struggle in this world, moreover, is of but a short time. For even if death does not come, old age will come.

Years slip by, times flow on, and, as I hope, the Lord Jesus will soon call us as those longed for by him.

Oh how happy will be that departure of ours, when Christ, having cleansed us from the stain of sin by the conduct of a better life, shall receive us into his own seat! The martyrs and prophets will run to meet us, the apostles will be touched, the angels will rejoice, the archangels will be glad, and Satan, conquered, will grow pale, his mouth bloody though it be; since he shall have lost even our sins, which he had prepared for himself in us. He shall see the glory granted through pardon, merits honored through glory. We shall triumph, the enemy overcome, where then the wise men of this world shall be laughed at; where the greedy man, the adulterer, the impious man, the drunkard, the reviler shall be recognized. What, wretched ones, shall they say in their own defense! "We did not know you, Lord, we did not see you present in the world. You did not send prophets, you gave no law to the age.

We did not see the patriarchs, we did not read the examples of the saints. Your Christ was not on earth, Peter was silent, Paul refused to preach, the Evangelist did not teach, there were no martyrs whose examples we might follow. No one foretold your coming judgment, no one commanded us to clothe the poor, no one enjoined the forbidding of lust, no one persuaded resistance to avarice. We fell through ignorance, doing what we did not know."

Against these, on the other hand, from that choir of saints, the just Noah, first of all, will proclaim: "I, Lord, foretold the flood that was to come upon men because of their sins, and after the flood I furnished an example from myself to the good, that while the wicked perished, they might not perish, so that these might recognize both what salvation there was for the innocent, and what punishment for sinners." After him, faithful Abraham will stand forth: "I, Lord," he says, "founded, about the middle age of that world, the faith by which the human race might believe in you. I was chosen as the father of the nations, whose example they might follow. I did not hesitate, Lord, to offer you Isaac, still a little child, as a victim, that these might recognize that nothing ought to be withheld from the Lord, since they would understand that I spared not even my only son.

I abandoned, at your bidding, my land and my kindred, that for these also there might be an example of abandoning the wickedness of the world and the sins of the age. I, Lord, though in the flesh, first recognized you under an image, and did not hesitate to believe him whom I saw, though you appeared to me in another substance, that these might understand that judgment is to be made not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit." To him blessed Moses will add assent: "I, Lord, at your bidding, delivered the law to all these, that those whom free faith did not hold might at least be restrained by the spoken law. I said: 'You shall not commit adultery', that I might check the license of fornication. I said: 'You shall love your neighbor', that charity might abound. I said: 'You shall serve the Lord alone', lest these sacrifice to idols or allow temples to exist. I forbade that false testimonies be spoken, that I might close their mouths against every lie.

I set forth deeds and words from the beginning of the world, the spirit of your power working in me, that the knowledge of things past might furnish teaching for things to come. I foretold that you would come, Lord Jesus, that it might not be unexpected for these to recognize him whom I had foretold would come."

After him will stand David, worthy of his Lord in offspring: "I, Lord, announced you through all things; I proclaimed that your name alone must be served. I said: 'Blessed is the man who fears the Lord'; I said: 'The saints shall exult in glory'; I said: 'The desire of sinners shall perish', that these might recognize you and cease to sin. I, though endowed with royal power, prostrated myself, sackcloth put under me, dust put under me, having laid aside the insignia of my magnificence and my garments, that these might have an example of gentleness and humility. I spared my enemies who desired to kill me, that I might prove my mercy for these to imitate." After him Isaiah, worthy of the Spirit of God, will not be silent: "I, Lord, forewarned, speaking through my mouth: 'Woe to those who join house to house', that I might set a limit to greed.

I bore witness that your wrath had come upon sinners, that these, if not the hope of rewards, might at least be restrained from their evil deeds by the dread of punishments."

After these and many others who performed for us the offices of teaching, the Son of God himself will say this: "I, indeed, exalted upon my high seat, holding heaven in my palm and earth in my fist, diffused within and without, inward to all things that are begotten, and outward to all things that are moved, infinite in the power of my inestimable nature, invisible to sight, incomprehensible to touch, that among you, to subdue the hardness of your heart and to soften your perfidy with saving teachings, I might become the least of you, deigned to be born in the flesh, and, having laid aside the glory of God, took on the form of a servant, that having shared with you bodily weakness, I might again be admitted to the fellowship of my glory through obedience to a saving precept.

To all the sick and infirm I restored health, hearing to the deaf, sight to the blind, voice to the mute, the use of feet to the lame, that I might move you by heavenly signs, so that you might the more easily believe in me and in what I had preached. I promised you the kingdoms of heaven. I also, that you might have an example of impunity, placed in paradise the thief who confessed me at the time of his death, that you might follow the faith of him who deserved to have his sins forgiven. And that by my example you also might be able to suffer for yourselves, I suffered for you, lest man should hesitate to suffer for himself what God had endured for man. I showed myself after the resurrection, lest your faith be confounded. I warned the Jews in Peter, I preached to the Gentiles in Paul. Nor is there regret. There is fruit of the good.

The good have understood my work, the faithful have perfected it, the just have fulfilled it, the merciful have completed it; and a great part of the martyrs, a great part of the saints, exist. Surely these too were in the same body, they were in the same world. Why do I find no good work in you, race of viper's brood? You have not done penance for your evils even to the last day of your end. But what use is it that you adore me with your lips, if you deny me by your deeds and works? Where now are your riches, where your honors, where your power, where your pleasures? I pronounce no new sentence upon you. You have the judgment which I foretold before."

Then the Evangelist will recite to the wretched that sentence: "Go into the outer darkness, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth". O wretched ones whom these things do not move! They shall see their own punishment and the glory of others. Let them enjoy the world, so long as they do not enjoy that eternity which is prepared for the saints. Let them abound in riches, let them lie upon gold, so long as there they be found needy, there destitute. Let them be rich in the world, so long as in eternity they be poor, of whom it is written: "The rich have suffered want and hunger". And consequently, of the good, Scripture has added: "But they who seek the Lord shall not want any good thing." Therefore, sister, though these mock us, though they call us fools and unhappy, let us rejoice the more happily in the reproaches by which glory is heaped upon us, and punishment upon them.

Nor let us laugh at their folly, but rather grieve at their misfortune, because among them is a great part of our own people, whom, if we can win, our glory is increased. But let them act as they will; let them be to us as the Gentiles and the publicans; but let us keep ourselves safe and unharmed. If they now rejoice at our grieving, we shall afterward rejoice at their grief. Farewell, dearest sister, and most beloved in Christ.

How great a blessedness holy virginity possesses in the heavenly places, besides the testimonies of the Scriptures, we are also taught by the custom of the Church, since we learn that there subsists for it a peculiar merit, since its consecration is special. For although the whole throng of believers receives equal gifts of grace, and all glory in the same blessings of the sacraments, these have something of their own beyond the rest, in that from that holy and immaculate flock of the Church, as though holier and purer victims, they are chosen by the Holy Spirit according to the merits of their own will, and are offered upon God's altar by the high priest. Truly a worthy oblation to the Lord, the offering of so precious a creature, and no victim more pleasing than one made in his own image. For of such as these I think the Apostle chiefly spoke: "I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing to God".

Virginity, then, possesses both what others have and what others do not have, since it obtains both the common and the peculiar grace, and rejoices in its own privilege of consecration, so to speak. For ecclesiastical authority permits us to call virgins the brides of Christ, since it consecrates and veils them for the Lord in the manner of brides, showing that they above all will possess the spiritual marriage who have shunned carnal union. And they are worthily joined spiritually to God, by comparison with marriage, who for love of him have spurned human unions. In these is most fully fulfilled that saying of the Apostle: "He who cleaves to God is one spirit".

It is a great and immortal thing, almost beyond bodily nature, to overcome luxury, and by the virtue of the soul to quench the spasm of desire kindled by the torches of youth, and by spiritual effort to shut out the force of native pleasure, and to live contrary to the law of the human race, to despise the comforts of marriage, to scorn the sweetness of children, and to count as nothing whatever advantages present life can offer, in hope of future blessedness. This, as I have said, is a great and admirable virtue, and not undeservedly is it destined, for the greatness of its labor, to an immense reward. "I will give to eunuchs," says God, "in my house and within my walls a place and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give them an everlasting name that shall not fail". Concerning which eunuchs the Lord in the Gospel repeats, saying: "For there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven".

Great indeed is the labor of chastity, but greater is the reward; temporal is the guarding, but eternal the recompense. Of these also the blessed Apostle John speaks, that they follow the Lamb wherever he goes. Which I think is to be understood thus: that no place in the heavenly hall is to be closed to them, but that all the dwelling-places of the divine mansions are to be opened to them.

But that the merit of virginity may shine forth more illustriously, and that it may be more manifestly understood how worthy it is of God, let this be considered: that our Lord and Savior God, when for the salvation of the human race He deigned to assume man, chose no other than a virginal womb, so as to show that a thing of this kind was most pleasing to Him, and to impress upon both sexes the good of chastity. He who was to remain a virgin had a virgin mother. In Himself He offered to men, and in His mother to women, the example of virginity. Whereby it is shown that blessed integrity in both sexes has deserved to have the fullness of divinity, since whatever He had in the Son was as much in the Mother.

But why do I labor to reveal the excellent and sublime merit of chastity, and to display the good of glorious virginity, when I am not ignorant that many have discoursed on this matter and have proved its blessedness by the clearest arguments, and it cannot come into doubt with any wise person that a thing is of greater merit which is of greater labor? For whoever thinks chastity is of no reward, or of small reward, it is certain that he either is ignorant of, or does not willingly bear, its labor. Hence those always disparage chastity who either do not possess it, or are compelled to possess it unwillingly.

Now therefore, since, however briefly, we have shown both the labor and the merit of integrity, lest a thing which consists of great virtue, and is destined for so great a reward, should lack its fruit, more careful watch must be kept. For the more precious any species is, the greater is the vigilance with which it is guarded. And since there are many things which lack their own proper good unless they are aided by the help of other things—as is the species of honey, which unless it is preserved, or rather (as I would say more truly) nourished, by the guarding of wax and the cells of the honeycombs, loses its natural grace and cannot subsist by itself: just as also the species of wine, which, if it is not kept in vessels of good odor, and often renewed with pitch, loses the genuine sweetness of wine.

Therefore it must be more attentively provided for, lest perhaps to virginity also certain things be necessary, without which it cannot suffice to bring forth fruit; and so great a labor will profit nothing, while it is vainly believed to profit, because it is possessed without the necessary strengths. For unless I am mistaken, the integrity of chastity is preserved for the sake of the reward of the heavenly kingdom, which it is certain no one can attain without the merit of eternal life. But eternal life can be merited only through the entire keeping of the divine precepts, Scripture saying: "If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments". Therefore he does not have life, except him who has kept all the commandments of the law. And he who does not have life cannot be a possessor of the heavenly kingdom, in which not the dead, but the living, shall reign.

Virginity alone therefore will profit nothing to one who hopes for the glory of the heavenly kingdom, unless he also has that other thing to which perpetual life is promised, through which the reward of the heavenly kingdom is possessed. Above all, therefore, to those who preserve chastity and integrity, and who hope for its recompense from the equity of God, the keeping of the commandments is enjoined, lest the labor of glorious chastity and continence be brought to nothing. No wise person versed in the law is ignorant that virginity is above commandment or precept, the Apostle saying: "Now concerning virgins I have no commandment of the Lord, but I give counsel". Since therefore he gives counsel for obtaining virginity, not a commandment, he has professed that it is above commandment and precept. Whoever therefore preserve virginity do more than is commanded. For then it will profit more to have done more than was commanded, if you shall have done what was commanded.

For how will you glory in having done more, if you have not done some lesser thing? Desiring to fulfill the divine counsel, before all things keep the commandment. Wishing to obtain the reward of virginity, embrace the merit of life, that your chastity may be able to be rewarded. For as the observance of the commandments confers life, so conversely their transgression begets death. And he who through transgression shall have been in death cannot hope for the crown of virginity, nor await the reward of chastity, being set in punishment.

For there are three species through which entrance is made into possession of the heavenly kingdom. The first is chastity, the second contempt of the world, and the third justice: which, as when joined together they confer very much on those who possess them, so when separated they can hardly profit; since each of them is required not for its own sake alone, but for the sake of the others. Chastity therefore is sought first, so that contempt of the world may more easily follow, because the world can more easily be despised by those who are not held by the bonds of marriage; and contempt of the world is required so that justice may be preserved, which those can hardly fulfill who are entangled in the desires of worldly goods and the business of worldly pleasures. Whoever therefore possesses the first species of chastity, and does not attain the second, which is contempt of the world, possesses the first almost without cause, since he does not have the second, for the sake of which the first was sought.

And if he has the first and the second, but lacks the third, which is justice, he labors in vain, since the two former are required chiefly for the sake of the third. For what does it profit to have chastity for the sake of contempt of the world, and not to have that for whose sake you should have it? Or for what purpose do you despise the world, if you do not keep justice, for the sake of which it befits you to have chastity and contempt of the world? For as the first species is for the sake of the second, so both the first and the second are for the sake of the third; which if it is not present, neither the first nor the second will profit.

Perhaps you say: Teach me then what justice is, that if I know it, I may more easily be able to fulfill it. I will tell you briefly, as I am able, and I will use the simplicity of common words; because the matter we are dealing with is such that it ought by no means to be obscured by the more polished discourses of eloquence, but should be laid open through narratives of a simpler eloquence. For a matter necessary to all in common ought to be shown in common speech. Justice therefore is nothing other than not sinning; and not sinning is to keep the precepts of the law. But the observance of the precepts is kept in a twofold manner, that you do none of the things which are forbidden, and that you strive to fulfill all the things which are commanded. This is what the Psalmist says: "Turn away from evil, and do good".

For I do not wish you to think that justice consists in this alone, that you do not do evil, since also not to do good is evil, and in both is contained transgression of the law: since he who said, "Turn away from evil," himself also said, "and do good." If you turn away from evil and do not do good, you are a transgressor of the law, which is fulfilled not only in the abomination of evil acts, but also in the perfection of good works. For it is not commanded to you only that you not strip the clothed of their garments, but that you clothe the stripped with your own; not only that you not take away bread from him who has it, but that you gladly share your own with him who has none; not only that you not drive the poor man from his own lodging, but that you receive into your own the one driven out and having none. For it is commanded to us to weep with those who weep.

How do we weep with them, if we share in none of their necessities, and offer them no help in the causes for which they weep? For God does not seek the fruitless moisture of our tears; but because tears are a token of grief, He wills that you feel another's distress as your own. And as you would wish to be helped, were you in such tribulation, so you yourself help another, on account of that saying: "Whatever good things you wish men to do to you, do also to them". For to weep with the weeping, if you bring nothing to the weeper when you are able, is a token of mockery, not of piety. Finally, our Savior wept with Mary and Martha, the sisters of Lazarus, and showed the affection of immense mercy by the testimony of tears. And the tokens of true piety were soon followed by works, when Lazarus, raised, for whom the tears were shed, was restored alive to his sisters.

And this was to weep piously with the weeping—to take away the occasion of weeping. But who is capable of this? You will say. But nothing impossible is commanded to you either. He has fulfilled all things who has done what he was able.

But, as we had begun to say, that it does not suffice for a Christian to abstain from evils, unless he has also fulfilled the duties of good works, is proved especially by that testimony in which the Lord threatens that those will be guilty of eternal fire who, though they have done no evil, have not done all that is good, saying: "Then the King will say to those on the left: Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire which my Father has prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you did not give me to eat, and so on". He did not say, "Depart from me, cursed, because you committed homicide, because you committed adultery, or because you committed theft"; but they are condemned because they did not do good things. These are consigned to the eternal punishments of Gehenna, not because they had committed what had been forbidden, but because they refused to fulfill what had been commanded.

Whence it is to be noted what hope those can have who still do some of the things which are forbidden, since even those are guilty who did not do what is commanded. For I do not want you to flatter yourself in this, if you have not done certain things, since it is written: "Whoever shall keep the whole law, but offend in one point, has become guilty of all". For Adam sinned once, and died. And do you think you can live, committing often that which killed another when he had committed it but once? Or do you think he committed a great crime, for which he was justly and deservedly condemned? Let us see then what he did. Against the commandment he ate of the fruit of the tree. What then? Did God punish man with death for the fruit of a tree? Not for the fruit of the tree, but for the contempt of the commandment. Therefore it is not a matter of the quality of the sin, but of the transgression of the commandment.

And He who told Adam not to eat of the fruit of the tree, He Himself has commanded you not to curse, not to lie, not to slander, and not to listen to slanderers; that you swear not at all, that you covet not, envy not, be not lukewarm, be not avaricious, that you render evil for evil to no one, that you pray for those who slander and persecute you; that to him who strikes your cheek you offer the other; that you not go to law in worldly courts; that if anyone wishes to take what is yours, you yield it gladly; that you admit into your heart neither the evil of wrath nor of jealous envy, that you flee the crime of avarice, that you avoid the evil of all boasting and pride, and live humble and meek after the example of Christ; avoiding the company of the wicked to such a degree that you do not take food with fornicators or the avaricious, or the slanderous or the envious, or backbiters or drunkards, or the rapacious.

If you have despised Him in any of these, if He spared Adam, will He spare you also? Nay rather, Adam ought more to have been spared, who was still untried and new, and was drawn by the example of no one who had sinned before him and died on account of his sin. But as for you, after so many proofs, after the law, after the prophets, after the Gospels, after the apostles, if you wish to transgress, I do not know how it can be forgiven.

Or do you flatter yourself on the prerogative of virginity? Remember that Adam and Eve, though virgins, transgressed, and bodily integrity was of no profit to them as sinners. A virgin who sins is to be compared to Eve, not to Mary. We do not deny that in the present time there is a remedy of penitence; but we exhort rather that reward ought to be hoped for than pardon. For it is shameful that those who look forward to the palm of virginity should ask indulgence for a fault, and that those who have even castrated themselves from things lawful should fall into something unlawful. For it is lawful to enter into the fellowship of marriage. And as those are to be praised who, for the love of Christ and the glory of the heavenly kingdom, have despised the union of marriage, so those are not to be condemned who, not yet devoted to God, make use of the apostolic remedy for the pleasure of incontinence.

Therefore, as we have said, those who forsake marriage spurn not things unlawful but things lawful. But if such as these swear, if they curse, if they detract, if they are found to listen to detractors, if they render evil for evil, if they fall into the crime of coveting what belongs to others or of avarice over their own possessions, if they possess the poisons of envy or of jealousy, if against the precepts of the law and the apostles they either say or think anything unbecoming, if they go forth adorned and decked out in the flesh from a desire to please, and do other things that are wont to be done unlawfully—what will it profit them to have spurned what was lawful, and to practice what is not lawful? If you wish that which you have despised though lawful should profit you, see that you do none of those things which are not lawful.

For it is foolish to have feared the lesser thing, and not to fear the greater; or not to avoid those things that are forbidden, while having fled from those that are permitted. For the Apostle says: “She that is unmarried thinks of the things of the Lord, how she may please God, that she may be holy in body and in spirit”. “The things of the Lord,” he says, “she thinks of”; not the things of the world, not the things of men, but the things of the Lord she thinks of. What then are the things of the Lord? The Apostle says: “Whatsoever things are holy, whatsoever lovely, whatsoever of good report, if there be any virtue, if any praise of discipline”—these are the things of the Lord, which truly holy apostolic virgins meditate and think upon day and night.

The kingdom of heaven also belongs to God; the resurrection of the dead belongs to the Lord; the incorruption of immortality belongs to the Lord; the splendor of the sun that is promised to the saints belongs to the Lord; the many mansions again in the heavens belong to the Lord; the thirtyfold, sixtyfold, and hundredfold fruit belong to the Lord. These things they think of, and they think by what works they may be able to merit the things that are the Lord’s. The law also, of the New and the Old Testament, belongs to the Lord, in which His holy sayings shine forth: and if virgins meditate on these without ceasing, they think on the things of the Lord, and there is fulfilled in them that prophetic word: “The eternal foundations are made firm upon the earth, and the commandments of the Lord are in the heart of a holy woman”.

There follows: how she may please God. God, I say, not men. That she may be holy in body and in spirit. He did not say, that she be holy in her members, or in body only, but, that she be holy in body and in spirit. For a member is one part of the body, but the body is the framework of all its members. Therefore, when he says that she be holy in body, he testifies that she ought to be sanctified in all her members, since the sanctification of the other members will not profit if corruption be found in even one. She will not be holy in body—which consists of all its members—if she has been defiled by the pollution even of one.

But that what I say may become clearer and plainer, let it be granted that she is purged by the sanctification of all her members, and let only her tongue sin, or blaspheme, or bear false witness: will all the other members set free the one, or shall the rest also be judged on account of that one? Therefore if not even the sanctification of the other members will avail when the fault is in one, how much more, if by the crime of divers sins all be corrupted, will the integrity of one member profit nothing!

Hence I beseech you, virgin, do not flatter yourself on chastity alone, nor trust in the integrity of a single member; but according to the Apostle preserve the holiness of your body for God alone. Cleanse your head from all defilements; for it is a crime, after the sanctification of the chrism, to be sullied with the dye or powder of saffron or of any other pigment, or with gold or gems or the semblance of any earthly creature. For it is a great affront to the divine grace to prefer worldly and secular adornment. Cleanse your forehead, that it may blush at human, not divine, works, and receive that confusion which brings forth not sin but the grace of God, as the divine Scripture says: “There is a confusion that brings sin, and there is a confusion that brings the grace of God”. Cleanse your neck, that it not carry necklaces hung with hair woven in gold, but rather wear those ornaments of which Scripture says: “Let not mercy and faith forsake you: bind them about your neck”.

Cleanse your eyes, while you withdraw them from every concupiscence, and never turn them away from the sight of the poor, and keep them free of all paint for the things that are made by God. Cleanse your tongue from lying, because “the mouth that lies kills the soul”; from detraction, from swearing, from flattery, from perjury. Do not think it a preposterous order that I have said the tongue ought to be cleansed from swearing before perjury: because you will more easily escape perjury if you swear not at all. Let that sentence be fulfilled in you: “Keep your tongue from evil, and let your lips speak no guile”. And be mindful of the Apostle who says: “Bless, and curse not”. And also recall frequently that saying: “See that none render evil for evil to any man, nor curse for curse; but on the contrary, blessing, because unto this you are called, that you may inherit a blessing”. And this: “If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man”.

For it is unlawful that those lips by which you confess the Lord, pray, bless, and praise, should be polluted by the filth of any sin. I know not with what conscience anyone prays to the Lord with a tongue with which he either lies, or curses, or detracts. The Lord hearkens to holy lips, and grants swiftly the prayers which an unstained tongue utters. Cleanse your ears, that they lend hearing only to holy and serious discourse, that they never receive obscene or base or worldly words, nor listen to anyone detracting another, on account of what is written: “Hedge your ears about with thorns, and hear not a wicked tongue”; that you may be able to have part with him of whom it is said, that he was righteous in hearing and sight, that is, he sinned neither by his ears nor by his eyes. Cleanse your hands, lest they be stretched out to receive, but closed to give; nor ready to strike, but prompt enough for all works of mercy and piety.

Cleanse your feet, lest they walk the broad and spacious way that leads to the splendid and costly banquets of the world, but rather let them go along the steep and narrow path that tends toward heaven; because it is written: “Make straight paths for your feet”. Know that your members were formed by God the artisan not for vices but for virtues; and when you have cleansed all your limbs from every stain of sin and have been sanctified in your whole body, then understand that chastity will profit you, and with confidence await the palm of virginity.

What it is to be holy in body I think I have set forth briefly, yet fully. Now we must know what follows, and in spirit, that is, that what it is forbidden to do in deed, one should not even conceive in thought. For she is holy both in body and in spirit who transgresses neither in mind nor in flesh; for knowing that God is the observer of the heart, she strives in every way to keep even her mind, along with her body, clean from sin, knowing it is written: “Keep your heart with all watchfulness”. And: “For thus the Lord loves holy hearts, and the undefiled are acceptable to him”. And elsewhere: “Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God”. This I think is said of those whom conscience convicts of no fault of sin; of whom I also suppose John says in his epistle: “If our heart does not reprove us, we have confidence toward God; and whatsoever we shall ask we shall receive of him”.

Do not think that you have escaped the crime of sin, if the deed does not follow the will, since it is written: “Whosoever shall look upon a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart”. Do not say: I have indeed thought it, but not carried it out; since even to desire is wicked, what it is a crime to do. Whence also blessed Peter commands, saying: “Purify your souls”. If he had known no defilement of the soul, he would not have desired it to be purified. But also that passage which contains: “These are they who have not defiled themselves with women, for they remain virgins; these follow the Lamb wherever he goes”, we ought to consider more carefully, and observe whether it is by the merit of integrity and chastity alone that they are joined to that divine company, and range through all the tabernacles of heaven, or whether there are other things which, joined to virginity, attain the glory of so great a blessedness.

But whence can we know this? From what follows, unless I am mistaken, in which it is written: “These were purchased from among men, the firstfruits to God and to the Lamb, and in their mouth was found no lie; they are without blemish before the throne of God”. You see, then, that they are not said to adhere to the footsteps of the Lord in one member only, but they are those who, besides virginity, have led a life unstained by any thought of sin. For this reason let the virgin above all spurn marriage, so that, being more secure, she may more easily guard herself from every fault—which is required also of those who marry—and fulfill all the commandments of the law. For if she does not marry, and yet does those things from which even marriage is bidden to be free, what will it profit her not to have married?

And although it is not lawful for any Christian to sin, and it befits all who are purged by the sanctification of the spiritual laver to run through an unstained life, that they may be joined to the inmost heart of the Church, which is described as being without spot, without wrinkle, or any such blemish; much more is it necessary for the virgin to fulfill this, whom neither husband, nor children, nor any other necessity prevents from perfecting the divine Scripture, nor, if she sins in anything, will she be able to be defended by excuse.

O virgin, keep the purpose destined for you as for a great battle. Excellent before the Lord is the virtue of virginity and chastity, if it be not weakened by other falls of sin and stain. Recognize your state, recognize your place, recognize your purpose. You are called the bride of Christ. See that you commit nothing unworthy of him to whom you are seen to be betrothed. He will quickly write a bill of divorce, if he sees but one adultery in you. For whoever is pledged with the tokens of human betrothal at once diligently and carefully inquires from the household, from the intimates, from the friends and servants of the bridegroom, what manner of character the young man has, what especially he loves, what he accepts, by what habits he lives, by what custom he rules himself, what foods he uses, in what things chiefly he delights and rejoices.

And when she has learned these things, she so tempers herself in all things that her obedience, her cheerfulness, her love, her diligence, her life may agree with the bridegroom's ways. You too, who have Christ as bridegroom, ask his household and intimates concerning the ways of your bridegroom, and diligently and shrewdly inquire in what he chiefly delights, what manner of adornment of clothing he loves in you. Let his closest friend Peter tell you, who permits not even to married women bodily adornment, but spiritual, as he writes in his Epistle: Wives, likewise, be subject to your husbands; that if any believe not the word, they may without the word be won by the behavior of the wives, while they consider your chaste behavior with fear: whose adorning let it not be the outward plaiting of the hair, or the wearing of gold, or the putting on of apparel, but the hidden man of the heart, in the incorruptibility of a quiet and modest spirit, which is rich in the sight of God.

And let another apostle, the blessed Paul, tell you also, who writing to Timothy attests the same discipline for faithful women: Women likewise in modest apparel, adorning themselves with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array; but what becometh women professing chastity through good behavior.

But perhaps you say: Why did the apostles not command these things to virgins? Because they did not judge it necessary; lest such an admonition to virgins should seem rather an injury than a correction. But neither would they ever have believed that virgins would be of such rashness, as to presume upon carnal and earthly ornaments not even conceded to married women. Truly a virgin ought to adorn and compose herself. For how will she be able to please her bridegroom, unless she comes forth composed and adorned? Let her indeed be adorned, but let her be composed with inward and spiritual adornments, not bodily; because the Lord desires in her not the beauty of the body, but of the soul. Therefore you too, whoever desires your soul to be loved by God and inhabited by him, adorn it with all diligence with becoming and spiritual garments. Let nothing unbecoming, nothing foul appear in it.

Let it shine resplendent with the gold of justice, and glitter with the gems of holiness, and gleam with the most precious pearl of chastity: let it be clothed, instead of fine linen and silk, with the tunic of mercy and piety, according to what is written: Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercy, kindness, humility. Let it seek not the beauty of white lead or of any other pigment, but let it have the whiteness of innocence and simplicity, possess the rosy color of modesty and the blush of shame and reverence, let it be washed with the heavenly soap of doctrine, and be cleansed with spiritual washes. Let no stain of malice, no stain of guile be left in it. And lest it ever smell badly with the odor of sin, let it be anointed with the sweetest ointment of wisdom and knowledge.

God seeks adornment of this kind, and desires a soul so composed. Remember that you are called God's daughter, according to that: Hearken, O daughter, and see. But you too, as often as you name God your Father, testify that you are the daughter of God. Therefore if you are a daughter of God, see that you do none of those things which are unbecoming to God the Father; but do all things as befits a daughter of God. Learn how the daughters of the noble of this world conduct themselves, what manners they grow accustomed to, by what disciplines they are trained. In some there is such modesty, such gravity, such reserve, that they exceed the manner of other men in the regard of human nobility, and never through their own lapse brand their honorable parents with the mark of infamy, making for themselves in a certain way, by custom among men, another nature. Do you, too, then, look to your origin, consider your lineage, note the glory of your nobility.

Recognize that you are not merely the daughter of man, but also the daughter of God, and adorned with the nobility of a divine birth. Show yourself such that in you the heavenly birth may be manifest, and that divine nobility may shine forth. Let there be in you a new gravity, admirable honesty, astonishing modesty, wondrous patience, a virginal gait, and the demeanor of true chastity, speech always modest and to be uttered in its due time; so that whoever sees you may marvel and say: What is this new patience of gravity among men, what modesty of shame, what reserve of honesty, what maturity? This is no human institution, no mortal discipline. Something heavenly shines to me in an earthly body. I think that God dwells in certain men. And when he learns that you are the daughter of Christ, he will be held in greater astonishment, and will consider what manner of Lord he is, whose handmaid is such as this.

If therefore you wish to have a part with Christ, you must live by Christ's example, who was so estranged from all malice and wickedness, that he did not even return like for like to enemies, but rather prayed even for them. For I do not wish you to consider those souls Christian who do not hate brothers or sisters, I do not say, but who do not love their neighbors with their whole heart and with the witness of conscience before God, since it is necessary for Christians, by the likeness of Christ, even to love their enemies. If you desire to have the fellowship of the saints, cleanse your breast from the thought of malice and wickedness. Let no one circumvent you, let no one seduce you with deceitful speech. The heavenly court will receive none but the holy and just and simple and innocent and pure: malice has no place before God. It is necessary that whoever desires to reign with Christ be clean from all wickedness and guile.

Nothing is so contrary, nothing so execrable to God as to hate someone, or to wish to harm another; nothing so approved as to love all. Which the Prophet, foreseeing, testifies, saying: You who love the Lord, hate evil.

See that you love no human glory, lest your portion also be reckoned among those to whom it is said: How can you believe, who receive glory one of another? And of whom it is said through the Prophet: Increase evils for them, increase evils for the glorious of the earth. And: Let them be confounded from your glorying, and from reproach in the sight of the Lord. For I would not have you look to those who are virgins of the world, not of Christ, nor who, forgetful of their purpose and profession, rejoice in delights, delight in riches, and glory in the origin of bodily nobility; who, if they truly believed themselves to be daughters of God, would never after their divine birth marvel at human nobility, nor glory in any honored father, if they perceived that they had God as Father. Why do you flatter and please yourself, O foolish one? God made two persons in the beginning, from whom the whole forest of the human race descended.

Worldly nobility is bestowed not by the equity of nature, but by the ambition of covetousness; and there can be no distinction among those whom the second birth has begotten, through which as much the rich as the poor, as much the free as the slave, as much the noble as the ignoble, is made a son of God, and earthly nobility is overshadowed by the splendor of heavenly glory. It no longer appears anywhere at all, since those who were formerly unequal in worldly honors are clothed equally with the nobility of heavenly, divine glory. There is no longer any place there for ignobility; nor is anyone base whom the sublimity of divine birth adorns, except among those who do not think heavenly things ought to be preferred to human.

Or if they do think so, how vain it is that they prefer themselves to those in lesser things, whom they feel to be their equals in greater things, and consider as it were placed below themselves on earth, whom they have believed to be their equals in heavenly things. But you, whoever you are, a virgin of Christ and not of the world, flee all glory of the present life, that you may attain that which is promised in the future.

Avoid words of contention and occasions of ill will, and shun likewise the occasions of discord and strife. For if, according to the Apostle's teaching, it is not fitting for a servant of the Lord to quarrel, how much more for a handmaid of God; whose mind ought to be the more modest, the more modest her sex! Restrain your tongue from evil speech, and put reins of law upon your mouth; and then, if perhaps you speak when silence would be a sin, beware lest you say anything that would come into reproach. A word uttered is a stone let loose: wherefore it must be thought over long before it is uttered. Blessed indeed are the lips which never utter what they would wish to recall.

The speech of a chaste mind ought to be chaste, which should always edify rather than at any time destroy its hearers, according to what the Apostle commands, saying: Let no evil speech proceed out of your mouth; but that which is good, for edifying of faith, that it may give grace to the hearers. Precious to God is the tongue which knows how to frame words only about divine things, and holy the mouth from which heavenly utterances are always brought forth. Deter yourself, by the authority of Scripture, from the detractors of the absent as from the malicious; because the Prophet also recounts this among the virtues of the perfect man, that in the sight of the just the malicious man should be brought to nothing, who has brought forth against his neighbor things not to be approved. It is not permitted to you to hear patiently the vituperation of another, since you do not wish your own to be received by others either.

For it is unjust, whatever is contrary to the Gospel of Christ, if you allow to be inflicted on another what is troublesome to you when done to you by another. Accustom your tongue always to speak of good things, and apply your hearing more to the praise of the good than to the vituperation of the wicked. See that whatever good you do, you do for the sake of God, knowing that you will receive from the Lord as great a reward for that deed as you performed it for the sake of his fear and love. Strive rather to be holy than to seem so; because it profits nothing to be esteemed what you are not, and it is the guilt of a double sin not to have what is believed of you, and to feign what you do not have.

Take delight more in fasts than in feasts, mindful of that widow who did not depart from the temple, serving God with fastings and prayers day and night. And if a widow, and a Jewish one at that, was such, how much more fitting is it that a virgin of Christ be so now? Love rather the banquet of divine love, and long to be filled with spiritual dainties. Seek rather those foods by which the soul is refreshed more than the body. Flee the sight of meat and wine as fuel for heat and incitements to lust. And then, if perhaps you must use a little wine, let it be when the infirmity of the body compels you because of excessive stomach pain. Conquer anger, restrain animosity, and whatever it is that brings on repentance after the deed as for the greatest crime, decline the abomination of your neighbor's fault.

It is fitting that the mind be sufficiently quiet and tranquil, alien from all disturbance of fury, which desires to be the dwelling of God, who testifies through the Prophet and says: Upon whom shall I rest but upon him that is humble and quiet, and trembling at my words? Believe God to be the observer of all your works and thoughts, and beware lest you do or think anything unworthy of the divine eyes. When you desire to perform prayer, show yourself as one who is about to speak with God.

When you sing a psalm, recognize whose words you speak, and delight more in the compunction of the soul than in the sweetness of a ringing voice. For God approves the tears of the one singing psalms more than the charm of the voice, as the Prophet says: Serve the Lord in fear, and rejoice in him with trembling. Where there is fear and trembling, there is no lifting up of the voice, but a tearful and mournful dejection of the soul. Show diligence in all your acts; for it is written: Cursed is he who does the works of the Lord negligently. Let grace increase in you with the years, let righteousness increase with age, and let your faith appear more perfect the older you grow: for the Lord Jesus, who left us an example of living, advanced not only in bodily age, but in wisdom and spiritual grace, before God and men. Reckon that you have lost every span of time in which you have not felt yourself made better.

Preserve the conceived purpose of virginity to the very end; for it belongs to virtue not merely to have begun, but to have completed, as the Lord says in the Gospel: He who shall have persevered to the end, he shall be saved. Take care, then, that you give no one occasion for desire, since your Spouse, God, is a jealous God. She who is Christ's adulteress is more guilty than a wife's. Be, then, a pattern of living for all, be an example. Go before also in act those whom you outstrip in the sanctification of chastity. Show yourself a virgin in all things: let nothing of corruption be alleged against your head. Let your manner of life be inviolable, as your body is whole.

And since, as we have said at the beginning of this letter, you have been made a sacrifice of God, which indeed imparts its own holiness to others also, so that whoever partakes of it worthily is himself made a partaker of sanctification; so also through you, as through a divine victim, let others be sanctified, with whom you must so conduct yourself in all things that whoever comes into contact with your life, whether by hearing or by sight, may feel the power of sanctification, and may understand that so much grace is poured out upon him from your manner of life that, while he longs to imitate you, he himself may become worthy of God's sacrifice.

After I learned that all your cooks had resigned their office in your kitchen, I believe it was because they disdained to lend their service to lowly dishes: I have sent you a young lad from our own workshop, well taught to cook pale beans, and to season lowly beets with vinegar and broth, and to bring in cheap porridge to the hungry throats of monks; ignorant of pepper, unacquainted with laser-root, but familiar with cumin, and especially skilled at urging on the noisy mortar with sweet-smelling herbs. He has one fault, that he is not a peaceable enemy to any garden; so that, if he be admitted, he will mow down whatever is nearest with his sword, nor will he ever be sated with the slaughter of mallows. But in providing firewood for himself he will not be quarrelsome toward you: he will burn whatever is at hand; he will mow, and will not hesitate to lay hands upon the roofs, and to remove the ancient rafters from the household gods.

This lad, then, endowed with such character and virtues, we wish to be to you not a servant, but a son in place of a servant, since you do not blush to be the father of the very least. I would have wished to serve you in his place: but if the will is part of the deed, do this at least—that amid your happy dinners and suppers you remember me; for it is better to be your slave than to be master of others. Pray for me.

Although my lord and brother has asked of your honorable self that you be willing to make the safe man safer still, yet it was not right to commend the same by letter, so that by a doubled petition he might be held safer: for a childish fault and an error of uncertain age might have harmed him, so as to stain the beginnings of his years; but he who did not yet know what was owed to good morals sinned almost without fault: for when he turned himself to a good mind and consideration, he understood that a theatrical life was to be condemned by better counsel; yet full cleansing could not come to him unless he washed away his offenses by an approach to the Divinity: since, changed by the remedy of the Catholic religion, he has renounced for himself the practice of that more shameful place, and has delivered himself from the eyes of the people. My lords, as above.

How then, since both the divine laws and the public faith of the body, and sanctified souls, do not permit dishonorable delights to be displayed, nor common pleasures to be indulged; especially since it seems in some sort an injury to chaste devotion, if one renewed by holy baptism should be recalled to his former wantonness: it is fitting that your praiseworthy selves should favor good resolves, so that he who has obtained by God's benefit a pious gift may not be forced to fall back into the theatrical pit. Yet he does not refuse the judgment of you all, if you should enjoin upon him other duties suitable to the necessity of the common fatherland.

Forensic elevation ought to burn hot with the exercise of the forum; for it befits the sinews of daily contending industry to have terrible movements; but when sounding eloquence has sounded the retreat, and has withdrawn into idle groves and pleasant retreats, it ought to lay aside its useless roarings, and cease to threaten to no effect. For we know that the palm-bearing pairs of horses, once they have withdrawn from the circus, stable most quietly; no yoke frightens them, no doubtful palm disturbs them, but fixed at last to peaceful mangers they no longer know how to fear the driver, drawing sweet forgetfulness of contentious rivalry. And it delights even the glorious soldier, his service accomplished, to hang up his trophies, and to bear old age patiently.

Whether then it is your pleasure to terrify my wretched plowmen, I do not clearly understand; and why you wish to press my country-folk with the fear of a summons, I do not know. As though I did not know how to console them, and to draw them back from fear, and to teach them that there is not so much to fear as you yourself pretend. I confess that while the courtroom used to receive us both, I was often terrified by your eloquence, but I would repair, as best I could, the recurring wounds. With you indeed I learned by what right tenants may be reclaimed, in what order, to whom the action belongs, to whom it does not belong that an action should issue.

You say you wish to bring back the Volusianenses, and often, in anger, you repeat that you will drag my rustics away from my little tower; and you, who, as I hope and desire, are bound to me by old ties of friendship, rashly threaten that you will ruin my men, disregarding our agreement. I ask of your notable prudence, whether advocates have one law, and men in the toga another; or whether justice is one thing at Rome, and another at Mataritae.

Meanwhile I do not know that Volusius was ever lord of the estate: since Dionysius is said to have preserved the rights of that possession, nor did his heirs fail, who, while he lived, aimed many poisoned barbs at those in the shipping business. There was at that time a certain Porphyrius, son of Zibberinus; yet not rightly called the son of Zibberinus. He veiled the question of his birth under military service, and, to drive the cloud from his brow, performed obliging favors and glad services. He spent much time with me both at home and in the forum, since he often employed me as his advocate before my father and as patron before the judge. Sometimes I even restrained Dionysius, on the ground that he ought not, over a matter of twenty acres, to stir up shipping disputes against Porphyrius.

Behold the reason why your notable prudence threatens my agents, that though you are not lord of the place, you everywhere make mention of my tenants. But if you declare yourself the successor of Porphyrius, know that the narrow bounds of twenty acres cannot be worked even by a single tiller; or if it irks you, mindful and guardian of your own dignity, to name yourself heir of Porphyrius, it is certain and manifest that he can bring suit who has the power to bring it, so as to proceed against those who possess nothing from that same land. Moreover, if you look closely, the claim of reclaiming can chiefly be referred to me. Wherefore, my lord and praiseworthy brother, you ought to be at rest, and return to friendship with me, and deign to come to a private conference. Cease, I beg, to disturb the helpless and the fearful, and exercise your boastfulness far away, and consider that I rejoice at your pride rather than am offended by it; for we are neither hard nor unlearned.

At least let Maximianus make you gentle.

The faith and devotion of souls indeed remain the same; but this must be declared by the evidence of letters, so that the increase of charity may grow by the greeting. For just as a fertile field cannot bring forth abundant fruits if cultivation ceases; and the goodness of the land perishes through the idleness of one at rest: so I think the love and grace of the soul can grow numb, unless those who are absent are visited by an epistolary presence. Thanks be to God. Amen.

A faithful interpreter of holy religion arranges all things so that there may no longer be place for sins; for what else do you promise by such great sanctity of manners, than that, with errors set aside, we may lead a blessed life? In which I see the greatest praise agree with your virtues, that you change an untutored mind by pious exhortations, and have drawn it to the best way of thinking. For the rest, it would not seem so wonderful if you had confirmed learned souls by infused wisdom; for prudent men have a kinship with devotion, nor does rusticity readily come to belief.

Thus those who carve figures of living creatures out of stones bear a task of more difficult work, if they strike the hardest rocks with iron tools: but those who have undertaken to work with a softer material feel their hands aided by the ease of shaping; and it is thought fitting that arduous labor should be esteemed with the greatest honor for the craftsman: so to you, my lord, a singular praise is due, in that you have freed unpolished and rustic senses from the darkness of fault, and have made them both perceive human things and know divine things.

No less is that Xenocrates praised, by far the most learned of philosophers, who by his stern exhortations brought about the conquest of luxury: for when a certain Polemo, languid with wine, was wandering publicly from a pre-dawn banquet, and it happened to be the time when Xenocrates's hearers were flocking to the gymnasium, he too entered, and shamelessly sat down among the number of the students in the very attire in which he had come forth from the dinner; for a blooming garland had wreathed his head; nor was he ashamed to appear unlike all the rest, he whose head, which is the seat of health, a long draught had truly overturned.

Then, while the others murmured heavily that an untimely hearer had crept into the multitude of the learned, that teacher was not disturbed even in the least, but rather began to discourse on the discipline of morals and the laws of modesty; and so much did the authority of the teacher prevail, that it drove the mind of that wanton man to the love of decency. And at first indeed Polemo, disturbed, took the garland from his head, and professed himself a disciple; at last he so bent himself to the duty of gravity, and so wholly shaped himself to modesty, that a glorious amendment corrected the habit of his former life. This very thing we admire in your teachings, that by no threats, by no terrors at all, have you turned deranged souls to the worship of God, so that the confused mind might believe this to be most right, to live well and blessedly with all, rather than to hold unjust opinions with the few.

Augustine the bishop, to the honorable lords, deservedly to be received, most dear and most longed-for brothers in every rank of honor, the Cirtensians.

If that which grievously saddened us in your city has been removed; if the hardness of the human heart, resisting a most manifest and, in a certain way, public truth, has been overcome by its force; if the sweetness of peace is savored, and the charity of unity no longer strikes wounded eyes, but enlightens and enlivens sound ones; these are not our works, but God's: I would not attribute these things to human works at all, not even if, when we were with you, so great a conversion of the multitude had come about through our speaking and exhorting. He does and accomplishes this who, through his ministers, admonishes outwardly by signs of things, but teaches inwardly through himself by the very things themselves. Nor ought we for that reason to be slower to move to visit you, since whatever praiseworthy thing has been done among you was done not by us, but by him who alone does wondrous things.

For we ought to hasten far more eagerly to behold the works of God than our own; since we too, if we are anything good, are his work, not that of men. Whence the Apostle said: Neither is he who plants anything, nor he who waters; but God, who gives the increase.

Xenocrates, as you write, and as we ourselves recall from those letters, by disputing about the fruit of temperance, suddenly converted Polemo, who was not only a drunkard but at that very time drunk, to other habits. Although then he, as you have prudently and truthfully understood, was not gained for God, but only freed from the dominion of luxury: yet not even that very thing, which was accomplished for the better in him, would I attribute to human effort, but to the divine. For if there are any goods of the body itself, which is our weakness, such as beauty and strength and health, and whatever is of this kind, these are not but from God the creator and perfecter of nature; how much more can none other than He bestow the goods of the soul!

For what more arrogant or more ungrateful thing can human folly conceive, than to suppose that, while God makes man beautiful in the flesh, man is made chaste in soul by man? This is written in the book of Christian wisdom: When I knew, it says, that no one can be continent unless God grant it; and this itself was a matter of wisdom, to know whose gift this was. If Polemo therefore, having been made continent from a life of luxury, so knew whose gift this was that, having cast off superstitions, he worshipped Him piously, he would have become not only continent, but also truly wise and wholesomely religious: which would have availed him not only for the uprightness of the present life, but also for the immortality of the life to come.

How much less, then, ought I to arrogate to myself that conversion of yours, or of your people, which you have just announced to us; which, without doubt, was wrought by divine power, with me neither speaking, nor even present, in those cases where it was truly wrought! Know this, therefore, above all; think on this piously and humbly. Give thanks to God, brethren, to God give thanks; fear God, lest you fall away; love Him, that you may make progress.

But if the love of man still secretly separates some, and the fear of man deceitfully gathers others together; let such as these observe that they neither deceive nor escape God as witness or as judge, to whom human conscience lies bare. But if anything concerning the question of unity itself moves them, out of concern for their own salvation, let them, as I judge most just, wring this from themselves: that concerning the catholic Church, that is, the Church spread throughout the whole world, they should rather believe what the divine Scriptures say, not what human tongues speak evil of. As for the dissension itself which has arisen among men (who, whatever they may have been, do not at all prejudice the promises of God, who said to Abraham: In thy seed shall all nations be blessed; which was believed when it was heard foretold, and is denied when it is seen fulfilled), let this alone for the present be briefly stated: that this case was either tried in the ecclesiastical judgment overseas, or it was not tried.

If it was not tried there, then the fellowship of Christ throughout all the overseas nations is innocent—the fellowship in whose communion we rejoice; and therefore they are separated from those innocent ones by a sacrilegious rending asunder. But if this case was indeed tried there, who does not understand, who does not perceive, who does not see, that those are the ones defeated in it, whose communion was thereupon separated? Let them choose, then, whether they prefer to believe what the ecclesiastical judges pronounced, or what the defeated litigants murmur. Against this argument, very brief in statement, very easy to understand, attend carefully, in your prudence, how nothing sober can be answered; and yet the evil Polemo is more overturned by the drunkenness of inveterate error. Pardon a letter perhaps more prolix than pleasant, yet, as I think, more useful than flattering, honorable lords and deservedly to be revered, dearest and most longed-for brethren. As for our coming to you, may God fulfill the desire of both parties.

For with what ardor of charity we are inflamed to see you, we cannot explain in words, but we do not doubt that you kindly believe it.