Letters & Polemics (CSEL) 19

You have sent me many things to read, Consentius, my dearest brother; many things you have sent me to read. While I prepare my replies to them, and am pulled this way and that by ever more pressing occupations, a whole year has slipped by and has thrust me into such straits that I must reply somehow or other, lest — now that the season for sailing is already smiling — I should detain any longer the bearer who longs to return.

And so, with all that Leonas the servant of God brought to me from you — both when I first received them, and afterward when I now wished to dictate this, having unrolled and read them through and weighed them with as much consideration as I could — I was greatly delighted by your eloquence, and by your remembrance of the holy Scriptures, and by the shrewdness of your wit, and by the grief with which you sting the negligent Catholics, and by the zeal with which you gnash your teeth against even the hidden heretics. But I am not persuaded that they ought to be dragged out of their hiding-places by our lies. For to what end do we strive to track and hunt them down with such care, unless that, once caught and brought into the open, we may either teach the truth to them themselves, or at least, having convicted them by the truth, may not permit them to harm others?

To this end, then — that their falsehood may be destroyed or guarded against, and God's truth increased. How, then, shall I rightly persecute lies by lying? Or are robberies to be persecuted by robbery, sacrileges by sacrilege, and adulteries by adultery? But if God's truth abounds through my lie, are we then to say, 'Let us do evil, that good may come'? — a thing which, you see, the Apostle detests. For what else is it to say, 'Let us lie, that we may lead lying heretics to the truth,' than 'Let us do evil, that good may come'? Or is a lie ever good, or is a lie ever not evil? Why then is it written: 'Thou hast hated, O Lord, all who work iniquity; thou wilt destroy all who speak a lie'?

For He did not except any, nor speak indefinitely — 'thou wilt destroy those who speak a lie' — so as to allow some, and not all, to be understood; but He pronounced a universal sentence, saying: 'Thou wilt destroy all who speak a lie.' Or, because it is not said, 'Thou wilt destroy all who speak every lie,' or 'who speak any lie whatsoever,' is it therefore to be supposed that some room has been left open for some lie? — so that, forsooth, there might be some lie such that those who speak it God will not destroy, but will destroy all those who speak an unjust lie, not just any lie, because there is found also a just lie, which surely ought to deserve praise, not blame?

Do you not see how greatly this argument aids the very men whom we contrive to catch with our lies, as though for some great hunt? For this is the opinion of the Priscillianists, as you yourself have shown: to prove which they bring forward testimonies from the Scriptures, exhorting their own to lying as though by the examples of the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, angels — not hesitating to add even the Lord Christ Himself, and thinking they can in no other way show their falsehood truthful, unless they call the truth a liar. These things are to be refuted, not imitated; nor ought we to be partakers of the Priscillianists in that evil in which they are proved worse than the rest of the heretics.

For they alone, or at any rate they most of all, are found to dogmatize lying for the concealing of what they think is their truth, and to reckon this so great an evil to be just, because they say that what is true must be kept in the heart, but that to utter falsehood with the mouth to strangers is no sin, and that this is written: 'He that speaketh the truth in his heart' — as though this were enough for righteousness, even if one speak a lie with his mouth, when it is not a neighbor but a stranger that hears it. For this reason they even think that the Apostle Paul, when he had said, 'Putting away lying, speak the truth,' immediately added:

'each one with his neighbor, for we are members one of another' — so that, namely, with those who are not our neighbors in the fellowship of the truth, and who are not, so to speak, fellow-members of ours, it is permitted and even fitting to speak a lie. This opinion dishonors the holy martyrs — nay rather, it takes away holy martyrdoms altogether. For according to these men they would act more justly and wisely if they did not confess to their persecutors that they were Christians, nor make them murderers by their confession, but rather, by lying and denying what they were, both kept safe the advantage of their flesh and the purpose of their heart, and did not permit those others to fulfill the crime conceived in their mind.

For their persecutors were not their neighbors in the Christian faith, such that with them they ought to speak the truth in their mouth which they spoke in their heart; but they were, over and above, enemies of the truth itself. For if Jehu — whom among others they prudently seem to regard as an example of lying — falsely professed himself to be a servant of Baal in order to slay his servants, how much more justly, according to these men's perversity, in a time of persecution would the servants of Christ have lied that they were servants of demons, that the servants of demons might not slay the servants of Christ; and would have sacrificed to idols, that men might not be killed — if that man sacrificed to Baal that he might kill men?

For what harm, according to the excellent doctrine of these lie-mongers, would it have done them, if they feigned the worship of the devil in the body, while the worship of God was preserved in the heart? But the true martyrs, the holy martyrs, did not so understand the Apostle. For they saw and held fast what was said: 'With the heart one believes unto righteousness, but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation,' and, 'In their mouth was found no lie'; and thus they departed blameless, where they will no longer need to beware of being tempted by liars, because they will no more have liars, whether strangers or neighbors, in their heavenly assemblies.

But that Jehu, who by impious lying and sacrilegious sacrifice sought out the impious and sacrilegious to be slain, they would not imitate, not even if that same Scripture had been silent as to what sort of man he was. But since it is written that he had not a heart right with God, what did it profit him that, for a certain measure of obedience which — out of desire for his own dominion — he displayed in the utter destruction of the house of Ahab, he received some passing reward of a temporal kingdom? To the defence rather of the truth-telling sentence of the martyrs I exhort you, brother, that you may be, against liars, not a teacher of lying, but an assertor of the truth. For diligently, I beseech you, attend to what I say, that you may find how much it is to be guarded against.

For it is thought that this may be taught — with a zeal indeed praiseworthy against the impious, that they may be seized and corrected or avoided — but nevertheless too incautiously. There are many kinds of lies, all of which indeed we ought universally to hate. For there is no lie that is not contrary to the truth. For as light and darkness, piety and impiety, justice and iniquity, sin and right action, health and weakness, life and death, so truth and falsehood are contrary to each other. Wherefore, by how much we love the one, by so much we ought to hate the other. Yet there are certain lies which it does no harm to believe — although even by such a kind of lying, to have wished to deceive is hurtful to the liar, not to the believer.

For instance, if that brother, the servant of God, Fronto, had lied in some of the things he reported to you — which God forbid — he would surely have hurt himself, not you, even though you had believed everything, since you did so without any iniquity of your own in believing his narration; because, whether those things were done thus or not thus, they nevertheless contain nothing such that, if anyone should believe them to have been so done, even if they were not so done, he should be judged blameworthy by the rule of truth and the doctrine of eternal salvation. But if anyone should lie about such a matter that, if a man should believe it, he will be a heretic against the doctrine of Christ, then the liar is by so much the more harmful as the believer is the more wretched.

See, then, what sort of thing it is, if against the doctrine of Christ we have lied — the belief of which will destroy whoever believes it — in order to catch the enemies of that same doctrine, whom we would lead to the truth while we ourselves withdraw from it; nay rather, while by lying we catch liars, we teach worse lies. For it is one thing that they say when they lie, another when they are deceived. For when they teach their heresy, they say those things in which they are deceived; but when they say that they hold what they do not hold, or do not hold what they do hold, they say those things in which they lie. And whoever believes them in this, even if he does not find them out, does not himself perish. For he does not withdraw from the Catholic rule who believes to be Catholic a heretic who lyingly professes Catholic doctrines.

And on this account it is not perilous to him, because he is deceived concerning the mind of a man — about which, being hidden, he cannot judge — not concerning faith in God, which he ought to keep implanted in him. But further, when they teach their heresy, whoever believes them, thinking it the truth, will be a partaker as of their error, so also of their damnation. So it comes about that, when they fable forth their wicked dogmas, in which they are deceived with deadly error, then whoever believes perishes; but when we preach Catholic dogmas, in which we hold the right faith, then, if one believes, whoever had perished is found again.

But when, being Priscillianists, in order not to betray their poisons, they lie that they are ours, whoever of us believes them, even while they remain hidden, himself perseveres a Catholic; we, on the contrary, in order to arrive at hunting them out, if we lie that we are Priscillianists — because we are going to praise their dogmas as though they were ours — whoever believes this is either confirmed among them, or transferred to them at once for the meanwhile. But what the coming hour may bring forth — whether afterward those who were deceived while we deceived them may be delivered by our speaking the truth, and whether they will be willing to hear teaching from one whom they have thus experienced lying — who has known this for certain, seeing that he is ignorant that it is uncertain?

From which it is gathered that it is more perniciously — or, to speak more mildly, more perilously — for Catholics to lie in order to catch heretics, than heretics lie in order to lie hidden from Catholics; since whoever believes Catholics tempting him by lying is either made or confirmed a heretic, but whoever believes heretics hiding themselves by lying does not cease to be a Catholic. And that this may become plainer, let us set forth some things by way of example, and those especially from the writings which you sent me to read. Behold, let us set before our eyes a crafty spy approaching one whom he has perceived beforehand to be a Priscillianist, and lyingly praising the life of Bishop Dictinius, whether he knew him, or the reputation of one he did not know;

this is still more tolerable, because that man is thought to have been a Catholic and to have been corrected from that error. Next — for this follows in the art of lying — he is about to make venerable mention of Priscillian, an impious and detestable man, condemned for his abominable crimes and misdeeds. And if perchance, in that venerable mention of him, the one for whom snares of this kind are being laid had not been a firm Priscillianist, by this proclamation he will be made firm.

But when the spy's discourse proceeds to the rest, and he says that he pities those whom the author of darkness has so wrapped in such thick shadows of errors that they do not recognize the honor of their own soul and the splendor of its divine lineage; and then, when he extols with such great praises the book of Dictinius, whose name is 'Libra' — because it is set forth in twelve questions treated like ounces — so that he testifies such a 'Libra' (Scale), in which horrendous blasphemies are contained, to be more precious than many thousands of pounds of gold: surely this cunning of the liar slays the soul of the believer, or plunges and presses it, already slain, down into the same death. 'But,' you will say, 'he will afterward be delivered.' What if

it does not happen — whether because some hindrance intervenes, so that what was begun is not completed, or because of the obstinacy of a heretical mind again denying the same things, even if he had already begun to confess something? Especially since, if he shall have learned that he was tempted by a stranger, by that very fact he will the more boldly strive to conceal by lying the things he holds, when he shall have learned all the more surely, by the very example of his own tempter, that this can be done blamelessly. For with what face, pray, shall we blame in a man, and dare to condemn, this — that he thinks the truth must be hidden by lying — which we ourselves teach? It remains, therefore, that what the Priscillianists hold, according to the wicked falsehood of their heresy, concerning God, concerning the soul,

concerning the body, concerning other matters — what they hold, let us not hesitate to condemn with truthful piety; but that which they hold — namely, that one must lie in order that the truth may be concealed — let this not be, God forbid, a dogma common to us and to them. This is so great an evil that, even if this endeavor of ours, by which we desire through lying to catch and change them, should so prosper that we do catch and change them, by no gains would these losses be compensated, whereby we too, together with them, are corrupted for the sake of their correction.

For through this lie both we shall be perverse on that side, and they but half-corrected — since that very thing which they think ought to be lied for the sake of truth, we do not correct in them, because we ourselves have learned and teach the same, and prescribe that it must be done, in order that we may be able to reach the amending of them. Yet we do not amend them, from whom we do not take away the flaw by which they think the truth ought to be hidden, but rather we ourselves are flawed, when through such a flaw we seek them and do not find them. In what way shall we be able to be believed by them when converted, to whom, while perverse, we have lied — lest perchance what they suffered in order to be caught, they should do once caught, not only because they have been accustomed to do it, but because they find this also in us to whom they come?

And what is more pitiable, even they themselves, now as it were made ours, cannot find how they may believe us. For if they suspect that we speak even the Catholic dogmas themselves lyingly, in order to conceal I know not what else which we think true, surely to one suspecting such things you will say: 'I did that then in order to catch you.' But what will you answer to one who says: 'Whence, then, do I know whether even now you do this, lest you be caught by me?' Or can anyone indeed be persuaded that a man who lies in order to catch does not lie in order not to be caught? Do you see whither this evil tends? — namely, that not only we to them and they themselves to us, but every brother to every brother would, not without cause, seem to be suspect.

And thus, while through lying it is aimed that faith be taught, what is rather accomplished is that faith is to be placed in no one. For if we speak even against God when we lie, what so great evil could be found in any lie, that we ought by every means to shun it as most wicked? But now consider how much more tolerably the Priscillianists lie in comparison with us, when they know that they speak deceitfully to those whom we suppose must be delivered by our lie from those false things in which, erring, they are deceived. The Priscillianist says that the soul is a part of God and of the same nature and substance as He is. Great and detestable is this blasphemy.

For it follows that the nature of God is taken captive, deceived, beguiled, disturbed and defiled, condemned and crucified. But if he too says this, who desires to deliver a man from so great an evil through lying, let us see what difference there is between the two blasphemers. 'A very great one,' you say; for the Priscillianist says this while also so believing, but the Catholic while not so believing, although so speaking. The former, then, blasphemes unknowing, but the latter knowing; the former against knowledge, the latter against conscience; the former has the blindness of thinking false things, but in them he has at least the will of speaking true things; the latter, in hiding, sees true things and, willing, speaks false. 'But the former,' you will say, 'teaches this in order to make men partakers of his error and madness;

but the latter says this in order to free men from that error and madness.' I have indeed already shown above how much this too harms, which is believed to be about to profit; but meanwhile, if we weigh in these two the present evils — since the future goods which the Catholic seeks in the correcting of the heretic are uncertain — who sins more gravely: he who deceives a man unknowing, or he who blasphemes God knowing? Surely he understands which is worse who, with anxious piety, sets God before man. To this is added, that

if God must be blasphemed in order that we may lead men to praise Him, then without doubt we invite men, by our example and doctrine, not only to praise but also to blaspheme God; since those whom we labor to lead to the praises of God through blasphemies of God, if indeed we lead them, will learn not only to praise but also to blaspheme. These are the benefits we confer on those whom we deliver from the heretics by blaspheming — not ignorantly, but knowingly.

And whereas the Apostle handed men over even to Satan himself, that they might learn not to blaspheme, we strive to snatch men from Satan, that they may learn to blaspheme not through ignorance but through knowledge; and we bring upon our very selves, their teachers, this so great ruin, that in order to catch heretics we are first made — which is certain — blasphemers of God, so that we may, for the sake of those who are to be freed — which is uncertain — become teachers of His truth. Since, therefore, we teach our own to blaspheme God, in order that the Priscillianists may believe them to be their own, let us see what evil they themselves say, when they lie for this reason, that we may believe them to be our own. They anathematize Priscillian and detest him at our pleasure;

they say that the soul is a creature of God, not a part; they execrate the false martyrdoms of the Priscillianists; they extol with great praises the Catholic bishops by whom that heresy was stripped bare, assailed, and laid low, and other things of this kind. Behold, they themselves speak true things when they lie — not that the very thing which is a lie can at the same time be this truth, but in one respect they lie, in another they speak true things; for when they lie that they are ours, concerning the Catholic faith they speak true things. And on this account they themselves, lest they be found Priscillianists, lyingly speak true things; but we, in order to find them out, not only speak lyingly, that we may be believed to belong to them, but also speak false things which we have known to pertain to their error.

And so they, when they wish to be thought ours, what they say is partly false and partly true — for it is false that they are ours, but it is true that the soul is not a part of God — whereas we, when we wish to be thought to belong to them, both the things we say are false, that we are Priscillianists and that the soul is a part of God. And so they praise God, do not blaspheme, when they conceal themselves; and when they do not conceal themselves but bring forth their own doctrines, they know not that they blaspheme. Therefore, if they be converted to the Catholic faith, they console themselves, because they can say what the Apostle said, who, when he had said among other things, 'I was formerly a blasphemer,' added, 'I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly.'

We, on the contrary, if we bring forth this as it were just lie for the deceiving and catching of them, in order that they may open themselves to us, surely both say that we belong to the blaspheming Priscillianists, and, in order that they may believe us, blaspheme without the excuse of ignorance. For a Catholic who wishes to be believed a heretic by blaspheming cannot say: 'I did it ignorantly.' Always, brother, in such cases must this be recalled with fear: 'Whosoever shall deny me before men, I will deny him before my Father who is in heaven.' Or does he not deny Christ before men who denies Him before the Priscillianists, in order to strip and catch them, hidden as they are, by a blasphemous lie?

But who doubts, I beseech you, that Christ is denied, when — being such as He truly is — He is said not to be so, and — as the Priscillianist believes Him to be — He is said to be so? 'But,' you will say, 'the hidden wolves, clothed in sheep's clothing and secretly and grievously ravaging the Lord's flock, we cannot find out otherwise.' Whence, then, did the Priscillianists become known, before this hunt of lying was ever devised? Whence was there arrived at the lair of their very author, surely craftier and therefore more hidden than they? Whence were so many and so great ones brought to light and condemned, and countless others, some corrected, some as it were corrected and gathered in by a pitying Church? For the Lord gives many ways, when He has mercy, by which men may arrive at hunting them out:

of which two are more felicitous than the rest, namely that they be pointed out either by those whom they wished to seduce, or by those whom they had already seduced, coming to their senses and being converted. Which happens more easily, if their wicked error is overthrown not by lying enticements but by truthful disputations. On the writing of which it behooves you to spend your labor, since the Lord has granted that you can. These wholesome writings, by which their insane perversity is destroyed, when they shall have become more and more widely known, and shall have been everywhere diffused by Catholics — whether by the bishops who speak among the peoples, or by any zealous men full of the zeal of God — these will be the holy nets by which they are caught truthfully, not hunted lyingly.

For thus caught, they will either of their own accord confess what they had been, and will point out others whom they have known in their evil fellowship, whether in harmony

they will correct them, or in mercy will betray them; or, if they are ashamed to confess what they have covered by long dissimulation, they will be healed by the hidden hand of God working the cure. 'But,' you will say, 'far more easily do we penetrate their hiding-places, if we lie that we are what they are.' If this were lawful or expedient, Christ could have commanded His sheep to come to the wolves clothed in wolves' skins, and to find them out by the deceits of this art.

This he did not say to them, nor when he foretold that he would send them into the midst of wolves. But you will say: they were not then to be sought out, since the wolves were most openly wolves, but their bites and savagery were to be endured. What then? When, foretelling later times, he said that ravening wolves would come in the clothing of sheep, was there not there a place where he might have given this warning and said: And you, in order to find them, take up the clothing of wolves, but within remain sheep? He did not say this. But when he had said: Many will come to you in the clothing of sheep, but within they are ravening wolves, he did not add: by your lies you shall know them, but: by their fruits you shall know them. By truth are lies to be guarded against, by truth captured, by truth slain.

Far be it that we should overcome the blasphemies of the ignorant by knowingly blaspheming; far be it that we should guard against the evils of deceivers by imitating them. For how shall we guard against them, if in order to guard we must possess them? For if, in order that one who blasphemes unknowingly may be caught, I shall blaspheme knowingly, worse is that which I do than that which I catch; if, in order that one who denies Christ unknowingly may be found out, I shall deny Christ knowingly, he whom I have thus found will follow me to perdition, since indeed, in order to find him, I first perish. Or perhaps he who thus strives to find out the Priscillianists does not deny Christ, because he utters with the mouth what he does not believe in the heart? As though indeed — a thing I have already said a little before — when it was said: with the heart it is believed unto righteousness, it was added in vain: with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Did not almost all who denied Christ before their persecutors hold in their heart what they believed about him, and yet by not confessing with the mouth unto salvation perished, except those who by repentance were restored to life? Who would be so vain as to suppose that the apostle Peter had in his heart what he had on his lips, when he denied Christ? Surely in that denial he inwardly held the truth and outwardly uttered a lie. Why then did he wash away with tears what he had denied with his mouth, if what he believed in his heart sufficed for salvation? Why, speaking truth in his heart, did he punish with so bitter a weeping the lie which he had uttered with his mouth, unless because he saw that it was a great ruin, that with the heart indeed he had believed unto righteousness, but with the mouth he had not confessed unto salvation?

Wherefore that which is written: he who speaks truth in his heart, is not to be so understood as though, while truth is retained in the heart, a lie is to be spoken with the mouth. Rather it was said thus, because it can happen that a man may speak truth with the mouth which profits him nothing, if he does not hold it in his heart, that is, if he himself does not believe what he speaks. So heretics do, and the Priscillianists most of all, when they do not indeed believe the catholic truth, yet speak it, that they may be thought to be ours. They speak, therefore, truth in their mouth, not in their heart. For that reason they were to be distinguished from him of whom it is said: he who speaks truth in his heart.

But this truth the catholic, just as he speaks it in his heart because he so believes, so also ought he to have it in his mouth, that he may so preach it; but against that truth let him hold no falsehood, neither in heart nor in mouth, so that both with the heart he may believe unto righteousness and with the mouth make confession unto salvation. For in that psalm also, when it had been said: he who speaks truth in his heart, presently this too was added: who has not wrought deceit with his tongue. And that which the apostle says: putting away lying, speak truth every one with his neighbour, for we are members one of another — far be it that we should so understand it, as though he permitted us to speak a lie with those who are not yet with us members of the body of Christ.

But it was said thus, because each one of us ought to reckon every man as that which he wishes him to become, even if he has not yet become it. Just as the Lord showed the alien Samaritan to be the neighbour of him with whom he did mercy. A neighbour therefore he is to be held, not an alien; one with whom this is to be done, lest he remain an alien; and if, because of that which he is not yet — a partaker made of our faith and sacrament — certain true things are to be hidden from him, not for that reason are false things to be spoken to him. For there were, even in the times of the apostles, some who preached the truth not with truth, that is, not with a truthful mind: of whom the apostle says that they announced Christ not purely, but out of envy and strife.

And by this even then some were tolerated who announced the truth not with a pure mind; yet none were praised as announcing with a pure mind a falsehood. Finally, of them he says: whether in pretence or in truth, let Christ be announced; but in no way would he say, that afterward Christ may be announced, let him first be denied. Wherefore in many ways indeed can hidden heretics be tracked down, without the catholic faith being disparaged and without heretical impiety being praised. But if in no other way at all could heretical impiety be drawn out of its caverns, unless the catholic tongue turned aside from the path of truth, more tolerably would the former be kept hidden than the latter be cast down headlong;

more tolerably would the foxes lie hidden in their dens, than that the hunters, in order to capture them, should fall into the pit of blasphemy; more tolerably would the perfidy of the Priscillianists be covered under the veil of truth, than that the faith of catholics — lest it be praised by lying Priscillianists — should be denied by believing catholics. For if for this reason lies are just — not any sort of lies, but blasphemous ones — because they are done with this intent, that hidden heretics may be uncovered, then in this way, if they be done with the same intent, adulteries could be chaste. What then?

For if some woman from the number of the unchaste Priscillianists should cast her eye upon a catholic Joseph, and should promise him that she would betray their hiding-places, if she obtained defilement from him, and it were certain that she, if consent were given her, would fulfil what she promised, shall we judge that it must be done? Or shall we understand that goods of this kind are by no means to be purchased at such a price? Why then do we not buy heretics to be captured by flesh melting into adultery, and think they must be purchased with a mouth fornicating in blasphemy?

For either it will be lawful to defend both on equal grounds, so that these are said to be not unjust because they were done with the intention that the unjust might be caught; or, if sound doctrine does not wish us, even for the sake of finding heretics, to mingle with unchaste women at least in body, though not in mind, then surely neither does it wish us, even for the sake of finding heretics, at least with our voice, though not with our mind, either to preach the unclean heresy or to blaspheme the chaste catholic faith; because the very command of the mind itself, to which every lower motion of man ought to be obedient, will not lack its deserved reproach, when that is done which ought not to be done, whether by a member or by a word. And yet even when it is done by a word, it is done by a member, since the tongue is a member by which the word is made;

nor is any deed of ours brought forth by any member, except what is first conceived in the heart, or rather, when already conceived within by thinking and consenting, is brought forth outwardly by doing through the member. The mind therefore is not excused from the deed, when something is said to be done not from the mind, which nevertheless would not be done, unless the mind decreed that it must be done. It matters indeed very much for what cause, to what end, with what intention anything is done; but those things which are established to be sins are to be done under no pretext of a good cause, no as-it-were good end, no seemingly good intention. For those works of men which are not sins in themselves, according as they have had good or bad causes, are now good, now bad:

just as to give food to the poor is a good work, if it is done for the cause of mercy with right faith; just as conjugal intercourse, since it is done for the cause of begetting, if it be done with such faith that those born may be born again. These and things of this kind, according to their causes, are works good or evil, because these very same things, if they have evil causes, are turned into sins: as if a poor man is fed for the cause of boasting; or intercourse is had with a wife for the cause of lust; or children are begotten, not that they may be nourished for God, but for the devil. But when the works themselves are already sins, such as thefts, defilements, blasphemies, or other such things, who is there that would say they must be done for good causes, so that either they may not be sins or — what is more absurd — may be just sins? Who is there that would say:

in order that we may have what to give the poor, let us commit thefts against the rich, or sell false testimonies, especially if thereby the innocent are not harmed, but rather the guilty are rescued from judges about to condemn them? For two goods come from the selling of this lie: both that money may be taken whereby the needy is fed, and that the judge may be deceived, that a man may not be punished. Testaments too, if we can — why do we not suppress the true and substitute the false, so that inheritances or legacies may not be had by the unworthy, who work no good from them, but rather by these, by whom the hungry are fed, the naked clothed, strangers received, captives ransomed, churches built? For why should not those evils be done for the sake of these goods, if for the sake of these goods those are not even evils?

But now if some unclean and wealthy women should seem ready even to enrich their lovers and seducers, why should not the merciful man too take up these roles and arts, which he might use for so good a cause, that he may have wherewith to bestow lavishly on the needy, and not hear the apostle saying: let him who stole steal no more; but rather let him labour, working with his hands that which is good, that he may have to give to him who has need? For if so, then not only theft itself, but even false testimony and adultery and every evil work will not be evil, but good, if it be perpetrated for this cause, that there may be wherewith good may be done. Who would say these things, except one who tries to subvert human affairs and all morals and laws?

For what most wicked crime, what most shameful outrage, what most impious sacrilege would not be said to be able to be done rightly and justly, and not only with impunity, but even gloriously, so that in perpetrating it not only would no punishments be feared, but even rewards be hoped for, if once we grant that in all the evil works of men what must be asked is not what is done, but why it is done, so that whatever things are found done for good causes, not even they are to be judged evil? But if justice deservedly punishes a thief, even one who should say and show that he took away the superfluous goods of the rich, in order to supply necessities to the poor;

if it deservedly punishes a forger, even one who should teach that he corrupted another's testament for this reason, that he might be heir who was going to make lavish alms from it, not he who would make none; if it deservedly punishes an adulterer, even one who should demonstrate that he committed adultery out of mercy, in order that through her with whom he did it he might free a man from death; finally — that we may come nearer to the matter about which the question is — if it deservedly punishes him who mingled in adulterous intercourse with some woman of the Priscillianists who was privy to their turpitude, in order that he might reach their hiding-places: I beseech you, since the apostle says:

neither present your members as weapons of iniquity unto sin, and therefore we ought not to present either hand or the genitals of the body or other members to shameful deeds, in order that we may be able to find the Priscillianists — how does the tongue, how does our whole mouth offend, that we should present these as weapons unto sin, and so great a sin, wherein we blaspheme our God without the excuse of ignorance, in order that we may rescue the Priscillianists, once apprehended, from the blasphemies of ignorance? Someone will say: is then any thief to be equated with that thief who steals out of a will to mercy? Who would say this? But of these two, neither is good because the one is worse. For he is worse who steals out of covetousness than he who steals out of mercy;

but if all theft is sin, from all theft one must abstain. For who would say that one must sin, even though one sin be damnable, another venial? But now we ask: if anyone does this or that, who will not sin — or rather, who will sin — not who will sin more gravely or more lightly. For thefts themselves are indeed punished more lightly by the law than defilements; yet both are sins, though some lighter, some graver, so that a theft committed out of covetousness is held lighter than a defilement committed to relieve. For within their own kind, those things are made lighter than other sins of the same kind which seem to be committed with a good mind, while nevertheless they too are found to be graver than sins of another kind that are by their very kind lighter.

For it is graver to commit theft out of avarice than out of mercy, and likewise it is graver to perpetrate defilement out of lust than out of mercy, and yet it is graver to commit adultery out of mercy than to steal out of avarice. Nor is it now dealt with what is lighter or graver, but which things are sins or are not. For no one would say that one ought to have sinned where it is established that there is sin; but we do say that one ought, if it be sinned in this way or that, to be pardoned or not pardoned. Yet, what must be confessed, certain compensatory sins so disturb human minds that they are even thought to deserve praise, and rather to be called rightly done. For who would doubt that it is a great sin, if a father should prostitute his daughters to the fornications of the impious?

And yet there arose a cause whereby a just man judged that he ought to do this, when the Sodomites with a nefarious onslaught of lust were rushing upon his guests. For he says: I have two daughters, who have not known man; I will bring them out to you, and use them as it may please you; only do no wrong to these men, because they have come under the shelter of my roof-beams. What shall we say here? Do we not so shudder at that crime which the Sodomites were attempting to commit against the guests of that just man, that we judge that whatever might be done ought to have been done, so that this should not be done?

Moreover the person of the doer moves us most, who by the merit of righteousness was being delivered from the Sodomites, so that — since it is a lesser evil for women than for men to suffer defilement — even this is said to have pertained to the righteousness of that just man, that he preferred this to be done to his daughters rather than to his guests, not only willing it in mind, but even offering it in word and, if they had assented to him, about to fulfil it in deed. But if we open this way to sins, that we should commit lesser ones lest others commit greater ones, then by a broad boundary — nay rather by no boundary, but with all limits shaken loose and removed — all things will enter over an infinite space and reign.

For when once it has been determined that a man must sin less, lest another sin more, then surely by our thefts the defilements of others will be guarded against, and incests by defilements, and if some impiety should seem even worse than incests, incests too will be said by us to be committed, if it can be managed in such a way that that impiety may not be committed by others:

and in each several kind of sins, thefts for thefts, and defilements for defilements, and incests for incests, and sacrileges for sacrileges will be thought fit to be committed — ours for others', not only lesser for greater, but even, if one comes to the very highest and worst, fewer for more — if the onrush of events so turns itself that some men will not otherwise abstain from sins, unless we sin somewhat less, but nevertheless sin; so that entirely, whenever an enemy who has power of this kind should say: unless you be wicked, I will be more wicked, or: unless you commit this crime, I will do more such things, we should seem to ourselves to commit crime, if we wish to refrain from crime.

To be thus wise, what is it but to be unwise, or rather to be insane? For from my own iniquity, not from another's — whether perpetrated against me or against others — I must guard against damnation; for the soul that has sinned, it shall itself die. If therefore we ought by no means to sin, lest others sin more gravely either against us or against whomsoever, it must be considered in that which Lot did, whether it be an example which we ought to imitate, or rather which we ought to avoid.

For it rather seems that we should attend to and note this: that, when so horrible an evil from the most flagitious impiety of the Sodomites threatened his guests — which he desired to drive away but could not — even so a just man's mind could be so disturbed that he wished to do what the misty tempest of human fear, not the calm serenity of divine law, prompted; whereas divine law, if it be consulted by us, will cry out and command that it ought not to be done, and command rather that we should so guard against our own sins as not to sin through fear of anyone else's sins whatsoever. For that just man, by fearing others' sins — which cannot defile except those who consent — being disturbed, did not attend to his own, whereby he wished to subject his daughters to the lusts of the impious.

When we read these things in the holy Scriptures, let us not, because we believe they were done, therefore believe they are to be done, lest we violate the precepts while we everywhere follow the examples. Or indeed, because David swore that he would slay Nabal and by more considered clemency did not do it, shall we therefore say that he is to be imitated, so that we should rashly swear that we will do what afterward we see ought not to be done? But just as fear disturbed the former, that he wished to prostitute his daughters, so anger disturbed the latter, that he swore rashly. Finally, if it were lawful for us to inquire of both, asking them to say why they did these things, the former might answer: fear and trembling came upon me, and darkness covered me; the latter also might say:

my eye was troubled because of anger — so that we should not wonder that either the former in the darkness of fear, or the latter with a troubled eye, did not see what ought to have been seen, that they should not do what ought not to have been done. And of holy David indeed it could more justly be said, that he ought not even to have been angry, however ungrateful and rendering evil for good; but even if anger crept up on him as on a man, it certainly ought not to have prevailed so far that he should swear he would do what either by raging he would do or by perjuring he would not do; while as for the former, set amid the lustful madnesses of the Sodomites — since who would dare to say:

even if your guests in your house, into which you compelled them to enter by a most violent hospitality, being seized and overpowered by the shameless ones, should suffer effeminate things, fear nothing, care for nothing, be not terrified, shudder not, tremble not? Who, even of those wicked associates, would dare to say this to the pious host? But most rightly indeed it would be said: do whatever you can, that what you rightly fear may not happen, but let not that fear compel you to do what your daughters, if they should be willing, would do with the Sodomites — wickedness by your prompting; but if they should be unwilling, they will suffer from the Sodomites — violence by your prompting. Do not commit your own great crime, while you shudder at another's greater one:

for however much distance there be between your own and another's, this will be yours, that another's. Unless perhaps in defence of this man someone should constrain himself into these straits, so as to say: since it is better to receive than to do injury, and those guests were certainly not going to do injury, but to suffer it, the just man preferred that his daughters should suffer injury rather than his guests — by that right whereby he was lord of his daughters and knew that they would not sin, if it were done, because they would rather, without sin of their own, endure the sinners to whom they would not consent. And finally, they did not offer themselves to be defiled, though women for those men, in place of those guests, lest not the suffering of another's lust, but the consent of their own will, should make them guilty.

Nor did their father permit this to be done to himself, when those attempted to do it to whom he did not betray his guests, although it were a lesser evil that it should be done to one than if it were done to two; but he resisted as much as he could, lest any consent of his own should also defile him — a consent which lustful fury, even if it had prevailed by the body's strength, would nevertheless not have defiled another who did not consent. But in his daughters not sinning, neither did he himself sin, because he did not make them sin if they were overpowered against their will, but made them, being sinned against, to bear it: as if he offered his own servants to be beaten by the wicked, lest his guests should suffer the injury of a beating.

About which matter I will not dispute, because it is long — whether even a master by the right of his own power rightly so uses it upon a servant, that he causes his own innocent servant to be beaten, lest his friend, himself also innocent, be thrashed in his house by the violent wicked. But certainly David is in no way rightly said to have been obliged to swear that he would do what he afterward perceived he ought not to do. Whence it is established that not all things which we read done by holy or just men are we to transfer into our conduct, but even from this to learn how widely it extends and to whom it reaches, that which the apostle says:

Brethren, even if a man be overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual, instruct such a one in the spirit of gentleness, considering yourself, lest you also be tempted. For these are overtakings, in which one trespasses, while either at the moment it is not seen what ought to be done, or he who sees it is overcome, so that the sin is committed, when either the truth lies hidden or infirmity compels. But in all our actions, compensatory sins disturb even the good most of all, so that they are not even reckoned sins, if they have such causes for which they are done, and in which it seems that one rather sins if they are not done.

And especially concerning lies has this prevailed in men's opinion, that those lies are not thought to be sins — nay rather are believed to be even rightly done — when anyone lies for the advantage of him whom it is expedient to deceive, or lest he harm others, who seems about to do harm, unless he be turned away by lies. For defending these kinds of lies, very many examples from the holy Scriptures are thought to lend support. But to conceal the truth is not the same as to bring forth a lie. For although everyone who lies wishes to conceal what is true, yet not everyone who wishes to conceal what is true lies. For most often we hide true things not by lying, but by keeping silent. For neither did the Lord lie, where he says:

I have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. He kept silent about true things, he did not speak false ones, judging them less fit to hear these truths. But if he had not indicated to them this very thing — that is, that they could not bear the things he was unwilling to say — he would nonetheless have concealed something of the truth, but perhaps we would not know that this can rightly be done, or we would not be confirmed by so great an example. Whence those who assert that at times one must lie do not fittingly recall that Abraham did this concerning Sarah, whom he called his sister. For he did not say: she is not my wife, but he said: she is my sister — which was in truth so close in kindred that she could not falsely be called sister.

Which also afterward, when she had been restored to him by the one who had carried her off, he confirmed, answering him and saying: and truly she is my sister by my father, not by my mother — that is, of paternal kindred, not of maternal. Something true, therefore, he kept silent, he did not say something false, when he kept silent that she was his wife, and said she was his sister. This his son Isaac also did; for we know that he too obtained a kinswoman for his spouse. It is not therefore a lie, when by keeping silence the truth is hidden, but when by speaking a falsehood is uttered. But as for what Jacob did at his mother's prompting, so that he seemed to deceive his father, if it be diligently and faithfully attended to, it is not a lie, but a mystery.

If we should call these things lies, then all parables and figures for signifying any things whatsoever — which are not to be taken according to their literal sense, but in which one thing is to be understood from another — will be said to be lies: which be utterly far from us. For whoever thinks this can bring this same charge against all the so very many tropical modes of speech, so that even that which is called metaphor — that is, the transferred use of some word from a proper thing to a thing not proper — could by this reasoning be called a lie.

For when we say 'the crops billow, the vines bud into gems, flowering youth, snowy old age', without doubt, since we do not find billows, gems, flower, snow in those things onto which we have transferred these words from elsewhere, they will by these people be reckoned lies. And 'the rock is Christ' and 'the stony heart of the Jews', likewise 'the lion is Christ' and 'the lion is the devil', and innumerable such things, will be said to be lies. What of this? That this tropical mode of speech even reaches that which is called antiphrasis, so that a thing is said to abound which does not exist, a thing is called sweet which is sour, a grove (lucus) because it does not shine (luceat), the Fates (parcae) because they do not spare (parcant). Whence is that in the holy Scriptures:

if he does not bless you to your face — which the devil said to the Lord about holy Job, and it is understood as 'curse you'. By which word also the fabricated crime of Naboth was named by his slanderers. For it was said that he blessed the king, that is, cursed him. All these modes of speech will be reckoned lies, if figured speech or action is to be counted as a lie.

But if it is not a lie, when things signifying one thing by another are referred to the understanding of the truth, then assuredly not only that which Jacob did or said to his father, that he might be blessed, but neither that which Joseph spoke as if to mock his brothers, nor that David feigned madness, nor other things of this kind, are to be judged lies, but prophetic utterances and actions to be referred to those things which are to be understood as true. Which are for this reason covered over with figurative garments, as it were, so that they may exercise the sense of him who piously seeks, and lest, being naked and ready, they grow cheap. Although those things which we have learned to be said openly and manifestly in other places, when these very things are dug out from hidden places, are in a certain manner renewed in our knowledge, and being renewed grow sweet.

Nor is it grudged to the learners that they are obscured by these modes, but they are rather commended, so that being as it were withdrawn they may be more ardently desired, and being desired may be more delightfully found. Yet true things, not false, are spoken, since true things, not false, are signified, whether by word or by deed. For what are signified are indeed themselves spoken. But they are thought to be lies, because not those true things which are signified are understood to be said, but those things which are false are believed to have been said. That this may become plainer by examples, attend to that very thing which Jacob did. He certainly covered his limbs with kids' skins. If we seek the proximate cause, we shall think him to have lied; for he did this, that he might be thought to be who he was not;

But if this deed is referred to that thing for the signifying of which it was in truth done, then by the goatskins sins are signified, and by him who covered himself with them was signified the One who bore not his own sins but the sins of others. A truthful signification, therefore, can in no way rightly be called a lie. And as it is in the deed, so it is also in the word. For when his father had said to him, 'Who art thou, my son?' he answered, 'I am Esau thy firstborn.' If this be referred to those two twins, it will seem a lie; but if it be referred to that thing for the signifying of which these things were done, spoken, and written down, then He is here to be understood in His body, which is His Church, who, speaking of this matter, says:

'When you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves being cast out. And they shall come from the east and the west and the north and the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God. And behold, they are last who were first, and they are first who were last.' For thus in a certain manner the younger brother took away the birthright of the elder and transferred to himself that of his brother. Since therefore things so true and so truly are signified, what here ought to be thought done or said in a lying way? For since the things that are signified are indeed not lacking in truth, but are either past or present or future, without doubt the signification is true and there is no lie.

But it is too long a task to search out with full precision all things in this prophetic signification, in which the truth holds the palm, since as they were foretold by signifying, so they became manifest by fulfilment. Nor did I undertake this in the present discourse, which pertains rather to you, who have laid bare the hiding-places of the Priscillianists, so far as concerns their false and perverse dogmas, lest they should seem to have been investigated as though they were to be taught and not to be refuted.

Do rather, then, that these things which you have made to lie exposed by disclosure should lie vanquished, lest, while we wish to arrive at tracking down deceitful men, we allow those very falsehoods to remain as if insuperable, when rather we ought both to destroy falsehoods in the hearts of those who lurk, and not, by sparing the falsehoods, to discover deceivers. Furthermore, among those dogmas of theirs which are to be overthrown, this too is certainly one which they lay down as doctrine: that for the concealing of religion the religious ought to lie, to such a degree that not only concerning other matters not pertaining to the teaching of religion, but even concerning religion itself, one must lie, lest it be laid open to strangers—namely, that Christ is to be denied, so that the Christian may be able to lie hidden among his enemies.

This impious and wicked dogma also, I beseech you, overthrow: the dogma for the establishing of which they, arguing from the Scriptures, gather testimonies whereby lies may seem not only to be pardoned or tolerated, but even to be honoured. It pertains, therefore, to you, when you refute this detestable sect, so to show how these testimonies of the Scriptures are to be received, that either you may teach that those are not lies which are thought to be lies, if they be understood in the way in which they ought to be understood; or that even those which are manifestly lies are not to be imitated; or at least, finally, that concerning at least those matters which pertain to the teaching of religion, one must in no way lie. For thus they are truly overthrown from the very foundations, when that is overthrown wherein they take cover:

so that by that very thing they may be judged least to be followed and most to be guarded against, whereby they profess themselves to be liars for the concealing of their heresy. This must first be assailed in them; this, as it were their suitable defence, must be struck with the blows of truth and cast down. Nor is any other hiding-place—which they did not have—to be furnished them, whither they may flee; so that, if perchance they be exposed by those whom they had tried but were unable to seduce, they might say: 'We wished to test them, since we prudent Catholics were taught that this must be done for the finding out of heretics.' But it is fitting that I state somewhat more commendably why this threefold method of disputing seems to me right against those who wish to bring in the divine Scriptures as patrons for their lies:

namely, that first we show that some things which are there thought to be lies are not what they are thought to be, if they be rightly understood; then, that if any lies there are manifest, they are not to be imitated; thirdly, against all the opinions of all men, by which it seems to pertain to the office of a good man to lie at some time, that it must in every way be held that in the teaching of religion one must in no way lie. For these three things I commended and in a certain manner enjoined upon you to carry out a little before. To show, then, that certain things which are thought in the Scriptures to be lies are not what they are thought, if they be rightly understood—let it not seem to you of little avail against those men, that they find their supposed examples of lying not from the apostolic but from the prophetic writings.

For all those things which they mention by name, where anyone lied, are read in those books in which not only many sayings but also many deeds have been written figuratively, because they were also done figuratively. But in figures, what is said as it were as a lie is, when well understood, found to be true. The apostles, however, in their epistles spoke in one way; and in another way were written the Acts of the Apostles, the New Testament being now, of course, revealed, which was veiled by those prophetic figures.

Finally, in so many apostolic epistles and in that so great book itself, in which their acts are narrated with canonical truth, no such liar is found as might be set forth by these men from it as an example for the license of lying—since indeed that dissimulation of Peter and Barnabas, by which they were compelling the Gentiles to judaize, was deservedly rebuked and corrected, both that it might not do harm then and that it might not avail for imitation by those to come. For when the apostle Paul had seen that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel, he said to Peter before all: 'If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of the Gentiles and not as the Jews do, how dost thou compel the Gentiles to judaize?'

But as for that which he himself did, in retaining and performing certain lawful observances after the Jewish custom, so as to show himself not an enemy of the Law and the Prophets—far be it that we should believe he did this in a lying manner. For concerning this matter his well-known opinion suffices, by which it had been established that neither were the Jews, who then believed in Christ, to be forbidden the traditions of their fathers, nor were the Gentiles, when they became Christians, to be compelled to them; so that those sacraments, which it was agreed had been divinely commanded, should neither be shunned as sacrileges, nor yet be thought so necessary, now that the New Testament was revealed, as if without them whoever were converted to God could not be saved.

For there were those who thought and preached this, although the Gospel of Christ had already been received. And to these Peter and Barnabas had feignedly consented, and therefore were compelling the Gentiles to judaize. For this was to compel: so to preach those things as necessary, as though, even the Gospel being received, there were no salvation in Christ without them. This was the error which certain men thought; this the fear of Peter feigned; this the freedom of Paul rebuked. As for what he says, 'I became all things to all men, that I might gain all,' he did this by having compassion, not by lying. For each one becomes as it were the person to whom he wishes to bring aid, when he brings aid with as great a mercy as he would wish aid to be brought to himself, were he himself placed in the same misery.