How much those things which are brought forth by the party of Donatus against us, as if from the authority of blessed Cyprian, make in our favor — that is, in favor of Catholic peace — and how much they are against those by whom they are brought forth, I have proposed to demonstrate with the Lord's help. If, then, some necessity of answering shall compel me again to recall those things which I have already set down in other books — although I do this sparingly — to those who have already read and hold them it ought not to be burdensome, because both those things which are necessary for instruction must more often be impressed upon the slower, and, when the same matters are turned over and treated in many and various ways, they also aid those endowed with more capacious understanding, both toward ease of knowing and toward abundance in discussing.
I know also how it is wont to sadden a reader when, from the book which he holds in his hands, upon falling into some knot of a question, he is sent to another where he may seek its solution — which perhaps he does not possess. Wherefore, whatever we have already said in other books, if the necessity of the present questions should compel me to repeat it briefly, let those who know pardon it, lest those who do not know be offended. For it is better to offer to one who has than to defer one who has not. What, then, do these men say when they are choked by the strength of the truth, to which they are unwilling to consent?
'Cyprian,' they say, 'whose so great merit and so great learning we know, together with many of his fellow bishops who contributed their own opinions in council, decreed that heretics or schismatics — that is, all who are outside the communion of the one Church — do not have baptism, and therefore that whoever is baptized by them and comes to the Church must be baptized in the Church.' The authority of Cyprian does not frighten me, because the humility of Cyprian restores me. Great indeed is the merit we know of Cyprian, bishop and martyr; but is it greater than that of Peter, apostle and martyr? Of whom the same Cyprian in his letter to Quintus speaks thus:
'For not even Peter,' he says, 'whom the Lord chose first, and upon whom He built His Church, when Paul afterward disputed with him about circumcision, claimed anything for himself insolently or arrogantly assumed, so as to say that he held the primacy and that he ought rather to be obeyed by novices and those coming after; nor did he despise Paul because he had formerly been a persecutor of the Church, but admitted the counsel of truth and readily consented to the lawful reason which Paul vindicated — giving us, namely, a lesson of both concord and patience, that we should not pertinaciously love our own opinions, but rather should count as our own those things which are at any time usefully and wholesomely suggested by our brethren and colleagues, if they are true and lawful.'
Behold where Cyprian recalls what we too have learned in the Holy Scriptures — that the apostle Peter, in whom the primacy of the apostles pre-eminently shines with such surpassing grace, was accustomed to act concerning circumcision otherwise than the truth demanded, and was corrected by the later apostle Paul. If, then, Peter could in some point not walk rightly toward the truth of the Gospel, so as to compel the Gentiles to judaize — which Paul writes in that epistle in which he called God to witness that he did not lie; for he says, 'The things which I write to you, behold, before God, I do not lie' (Gal. 1:20), and after this so holy and terrible attestation of God, he narrated all these things in which he said:
'When I saw that they were not walking rightly toward the truth of the Gospel, I said to Peter before them all: If you, being a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how do you compel the Gentiles to judaize?' (Gal. 2:14) — if, I say, Peter could, against the rule of truth which the Church afterward held, compel the Gentiles to judaize, why could not Cyprian, against the rule of truth which the whole Church afterward held, compel heretics or schismatics to be baptized anew? I think that, without any dishonor to himself, Cyprian the bishop is compared to Peter the apostle, so far as pertains to the crown of martyrdom. But rather I ought to fear lest I be dishonoring to Peter. For who does not know that that primacy of the apostolate is to be preferred to any episcopate whatever?
But even if the grace of their chairs differs, one is nevertheless the glory of the martyrs; and if perchance they precede one another in some respect — the hearts of those confessing and dying for the true faith in the unity of charity — the Lord knows, by whose hidden and wondrous dispensation of graces the thief hanging on the cross confesses Him but once and on that very day is sent into paradise, while Peter, following the Lord, denies Him thrice and is deferred from the crown; for us to judge herein is rash. Nevertheless, if anyone now should compel someone to be circumcised after the Jewish manner and thus baptized, the human race detests this kind of thing far more than if someone were compelled to be rebaptized.
Wherefore, since Peter, when doing that thing, was corrected by the later Paul, and, kept in the bond of peace and unity, was promoted to martyrdom, how much more easily and firmly ought that which has been established by the statutes of the universal Church to be preferred either to the authority of a single bishop or to the council of a single province — since this same Cyprian so expressed what seemed good to him, that he willed to be in the peace of unity even with those who thought differently on this matter! This his own first address indicates, at the beginning of that same council which is brought forth by these men. For it runs thus:
When at Carthage, on the Kalends of September, very many bishops from the province of Africa, Numidia, and Mauretania, together with the presbyters and deacons, had assembled into one — a very large part of the people also being present — and the letters of Jubaianus, written to Cyprian, had been read, likewise Cyprian's reply written back to Jubaianus concerning the baptizing of heretics, and what the same Jubaianus had afterward written back to Cyprian, Cyprian said:
You have heard, most beloved colleagues, what our fellow bishop Jubaianus wrote to me, consulting our mediocrity concerning the unlawful and profane baptism of heretics, and what I wrote back to him, judging, namely, what once and again and often we have judged: that heretics coming to the Church ought to be baptized and sanctified by the baptism of the Church. Likewise there have been read to you also other letters of Jubaianus, in which, out of his sincere and religious devotion, writing back to our epistle, he not only consented, but even gave thanks that he had been instructed. It remains that concerning this very matter each of us bring forth what we think, judging no one, nor removing anyone from the right of communion if he should think differently.
For none of us sets himself up as a bishop of bishops, nor by tyrannical terror does he compel his colleagues to the necessity of obedience, since every bishop has, according to the liberty and power granted him, his own free judgment, and can no more be judged by another than he himself can judge another. But let us all await the judgment of our Lord Jesus Christ, who alone has the power both to set us over the governance of His Church and to judge our conduct. Let the proud and swollen necks of the heretics now, if they dare, rear themselves up against the holy humility of these words.
You mad Donatists, whom we desire and long to see return to the peace and unity of the holy Church and to be healed within her — what do you say to this? You are certainly wont to cast up to us the letters of Cyprian, the opinion of Cyprian, the council of Cyprian. Why do you take up the authority of Cyprian on behalf of your schism, yet reject his example on behalf of the peace of the Church?
Who does not know that the holy canonical Scripture, both of the Old and of the New Testament, is contained within its own fixed bounds, and that it is so set above all the later writings of bishops that concerning it there can be no doubt or dispute whatever as to whether what is found written in it be true or right; whereas the letters of bishops, which have been or are being written since the confirmation of the canon, may be reproved — both by the possibly wiser discourse of anyone more skilled in the matter, and by the weightier authority and more learned prudence of other bishops, and by councils — if perchance in them something has strayed from the truth; and that the councils themselves, which are held in individual regions or provinces, must without any evasion yield to the authority of plenary councils, which are formed from the whole Christian world; and that even earlier plenary councils are often amended by later ones, when by some experience of affairs that which was closed is opened and that which lay hidden becomes known — and all this without any bombast of sacrilegious pride, without any puffed-up neck of arrogance, without any strife of livid envy, but with holy humility, with catholic peace, with Christian charity?
Wherefore holy Cyprian, so much the more exalted as he was the more humble, who so loved the example of Peter that he said: 'giving us, namely, a lesson both of concord and of patience, that we should not obstinately love our own opinions, but should rather account as our own whatever is at times usefully and wholesomely suggested by our brethren and colleagues, if it be true and lawful' — Cyprian, I say, sufficiently shows that he would most readily have corrected his own opinion, had anyone demonstrated to him that the baptism of Christ could be given by those who had gone forth outside, in the same way as it could not be lost when they went forth; concerning which we have already said much.
Nor would we ourselves dare to assert anything of the kind unless we were strengthened by the wholly concordant authority of the universal Church; to which he too would undoubtedly have yielded, if already at that time the truth of this question had been clarified and declared and made firm by a plenary council. For if he praises and proclaims that Peter was patiently and harmoniously corrected by one later colleague, how much more readily would he himself, together with the council of his own province, have yielded to the authority of the whole world once the truth was laid open! Indeed, so holy and so peaceable a soul could most easily have assented even to one man speaking and demonstrating the truth. And perhaps this was in fact done, but we do not know.
For not all things that were transacted among the bishops in that time could be committed to memory and to writing, nor do we know all that were so committed. For how could this matter, wrapped in such clouds of controversy, have been brought to the clear illumination and confirmation of a plenary council, unless it had first been thoroughly handled over a longer time throughout the regions of the world by many disputations and conferences of bishops on this side and that?
But this is what the soundness of peace effects: that when certain more obscure matters are inquired into over a longer time, and because of the difficulty of finding the answer they beget diverse opinions in brotherly debate, the bond of unity nevertheless remains until the clear truth is reached, lest in the severed part there remain the incurable wound of error. And therefore something is often revealed less to the more learned, that their patient and humble charity — in which there is greater fruit — may be proved: either how they hold unity when in obscurer matters they hold diverse opinions, or how they receive the truth when they learn that it has been declared against what they had held.
Of these two things we hold one made manifest in blessed Cyprian, namely how he held unity with those from whom he differed in opinion; for he says: 'judging no one, nor removing anyone from the right of communion if he holds a different view.' But the other, namely how he could receive the truth found to be contrary to what he held — though the letters are silent, his merits cry out. If no letter is found, his crown bears witness; if no council of bishops declares it, the fellowship of angels declares it. For it is no small proof of a most peaceable soul to have earned martyrdom in that unity from which, though differing in view, he was unwilling to separate himself. For we are men, and to be of a different mind from how the matter truly stands is a human temptation.
But to reach, by loving one's own opinion too much or by envying those who are better, the sacrilege of cutting off communion and founding a schism or heresy, is a diabolical presumption. But to differ in mind on nothing from how the matter truly stands is angelic perfection. Since therefore we are men, but by hope we are angels of God, to whom we shall be made equal in the resurrection, so long as we do not have the perfection of the angel, let us not have the presumption of the devil. Therefore the Apostle says: 'Let no temptation take hold of you but such as is human.' It is human, then, to be of a different mind about something. For this reason he says in another place: 'Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus minded; and if in anything you are otherwise minded, this also God shall reveal to you.'
But to whom does He reveal, when He wills, whether in this life or after this life, save to those walking in the way of peace and deviating into no severance — not such as these men are, who have not known the way of peace, nor for any other reason have they broken the bond of unity? And therefore the Apostle, when he had said, 'And if in anything you are otherwise minded, this also God shall reveal to you,' lest they should think that what they held otherwise could be revealed to them apart from the way of peace, immediately added: 'Nevertheless, whereunto we have already attained, in that let us walk.'
Walking in which, Cyprian, by his most persevering endurance — with blood not shed but shed within unity (for if he had given his body to be burned and had not charity, it would profit him nothing) — through the confession of martyrdom attained to the angelic light, so that if not before, there at least he might recognize revealed that which, when he held another view, he did not prefer to unity by the bond of a differing opinion. You therefore, Donatists, what do you say to this? If our opinion concerning baptism is true, all who held otherwise in Cyprian's times were not separated from the unity of the Church, until God should reveal to them that which they held otherwise. Why then have you, by a sacrilegious separation, broken the bond of peace?
But if your opinion concerning baptism is true, Cyprian and the rest — with whom you allege that he held such a council — remained in unity with those who held otherwise. Why have you broken the bond of peace? Whichever of these you choose, you are compelled to pronounce sentence against your own severance. Answer: why have you separated yourselves? Why have you raised an altar against the whole world? Why do you not commune with the churches to which you hold and read the apostolic epistles were sent, and according to which you say you live? Answer: why have you separated yourselves? Surely for this reason: lest by communion with the wicked you should perish. How then did Cyprian and so many of his colleagues not perish?
For although they believed that heretics and schismatics did not have baptism, yet when such were received without baptism — though they believed the sins of these to be so monstrous and so sacrilegious as to rest upon them — they nevertheless chose to commune with them rather than to be separated from unity, Cyprian saying: 'judging no one, nor removing anyone from the right of communion if he holds a different view.' If then the righteous perish by such communion with the wicked, then already in Cyprian's times the Church had perished. Whence then arose the origin of Donatus? Where was he catechized, where baptized, where ordained, when the contagion of communion had already extinguished the Church? But if the Church existed, then evil men in one communion could in no way harm the good. Why have you separated yourselves?
Behold, in unity I see Cyprian and his other colleagues, who, having held a council, judged that all who had been baptized outside the communion of the Church did not have it, and that therefore it must be given to them when they come. But behold, again in the same unity I see certain men holding a different view on this matter, and daring not to baptize again those who had come from heretics or schismatics, once the baptism of Christ was recognized in them. All these the catholic unity embraces in her maternal bosom, bearing one another's burdens and being diligent to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, until the Lord should reveal to one party or the other, if in anything they held otherwise. If these held the truth, were they not contaminated by those, or were they contaminated?
If those held the truth, were these not contaminated by them, or were they contaminated? Choose which you will. If they were contaminated, then already at that time there was no Church. Answer: whence did you come forth here? But if the Church endured, then in no way are the good contaminated by the wicked in such communion. Answer: why have you broken the bond? Or perhaps schismatics received without baptism do not contaminate, but betrayers of the holy books do contaminate? That the betrayers were yours, the most manifest records of the deeds bear witness. And if then you had spoken the truth against those whom you accused, you would have persuaded the unity of the whole world of your cause, so that, with you retained, they would be excluded.
But if you attempted to do this and did not prevail, the whole world is innocent, which believed the ecclesiastical judges rather than the defeated litigants. And if you were unwilling to plead your cause, the whole world is innocent, which could not condemn men unheard. Why then have you separated yourselves from the innocent? You are unable to defend the sacrilege of your schism. But I pass these things by; this I say: if the betrayers could contaminate you — betrayers who are not convicted by you, and by whom you have been defeated — much more could the sacrileges of schismatics and heretics, received without baptism according to your opinion, contaminate Cyprian.
Yet he did not separate himself, and because the Church endured, it is manifest that he could not be contaminated. Why then have you separated yourselves — I do not say from the innocent, which is proved, but from those very betrayers, which is not proved? Or, as I had begun to say, are the crimes of betrayers graver than those of schismatics? Let us not bring deceitful balances, where we may weigh what we please and how we please, saying at our own discretion, 'This is grave, this is light'; but let us bring the divine balance from the holy Scriptures, as from the Lord's treasuries, and in it let us weigh what is graver — nay, let us not weigh, but recognize what has been weighed by the Lord.
In that time when the Lord showed that former offences must be guarded against by recent examples of punishments — an idol was fashioned and worshipped, a prophetic book was burned in the wrath of a scornful king, and schism was attempted — idolatry was punished by the sword, the burning of the book by warlike slaughter and foreign captivity, and schism by the gaping of the earth, its authors buried alive and the rest consumed by heavenly fire. Who now would doubt that this was the more wickedly committed which was the more gravely avenged? Those coming from such sacrilegious men without baptism, as you say, did not contaminate Cyprian: how could they contaminate you — betrayers not convicted but fabricated?
Who, even if they had not handed over the books to be burned, but had themselves burned them with their own hands, would assuredly have been guilty of a lesser crime than if they committed schism; because the one was more mildly, the other more gravely avenged — not by human judgment, but by divine. Why then have you separated yourselves? If there is any sense in you, you certainly see that you can find nothing to answer. 'Not to such a degree,' they say, 'have all things failed, that we cannot answer: so we will it. Who art thou that judgest another's servant? To his own lord he standeth or falleth.' They do not understand what was said to them who wished to judge, not concerning manifest deeds, but concerning others' hearts. For how does he himself speak so much concerning the crimes of schisms and heresies?
Or how is it sung in the psalms: 'If you truly love righteousness, judge rightly, O sons of men'? And why does the Lord Himself say: 'Judge not according to appearance, but judge righteous judgment' — if it be not permitted to judge concerning anyone at all? Finally, concerning those very betrayers, about whom they judged falsely, why did they judge at all concerning others' servants? To their own lord they stood or fell. Why, in short, concerning the recent Maximianists, did they not hesitate — with the truthful mouth, as they say, of a plenary council — to pronounce such a judgment as to compare them to those first schismatics whom the earth swallowed alive? Yet some of these — which they cannot deny — they either condemned as innocent or received back though guilty.
But when the truth is spoken, to which they cannot reply, they gnaw with rough murmurings: 'So we will it. Who art thou that judgest another's servant? To his own lord he standeth or falleth.' But when a weak sheep is spied in the wilderness, where the shepherd who might cry out seems absent, their teeth are bared, the feeble throat is broken: 'A good man you would be, if you were not a betrayer; consult your soul, be a Christian.' O wicked madness! When it is said to a Christian, 'Be a Christian,' what else is he taught but to deny himself a Christian? Was there anything else those persecutors of Christians desired to teach, those whom whoever resisted became martyrs? Or is that reckoned lighter which is committed by a threatening sword, than what is committed by an ensnaring tongue?
To these things answer, you ravening wolves, who, desiring to be clothed in sheep's skins, think that blessed Cyprian's letters are on your side: did the sacrilege of schismatics contaminate Cyprian, or did it not contaminate him? If it contaminated him, then already at that time the Church perished — there was none whence you might be propagated. But if it did not contaminate him, by what other's crime can the innocent be contaminated in unity, if they cannot be by the sacrilege of schism? Why then have you separated yourselves? Why, while you flee the lighter things which you fabricate, have you committed the very sacrilege of schism, which is graver than all?
Or perhaps it now pleases you to confess that those were no longer either schismatics or heretics, who had been baptized outside the communion of the Church, either in some schism or in heresy, because by passing over to the Church and anathematizing their former errors they had ceased to be what they were? How then, without baptism, had their crimes not remained upon them?
Or was that the baptism of Christ, but it could not profit them outside the communion of the Church; whereas when they came and, with their past error anathematized, were received into the peace of the Church by the laying on of hands, then, being rooted and grounded in charity — without which the rest are unfruitful — that which they were carrying without fruit outside began to profit both unto the remission of sins and unto the sanctification of life? Do not therefore cast up to us the authority of Cyprian for the repetition of baptism, but hold with us the example of Cyprian for the preservation of unity.
For not yet had that question of baptism been diligently handled; but nevertheless the Church held a most wholesome custom, even in the case of schismatics and heretics themselves, of correcting what was depraved, not repeating what had been given; of healing what was wounded, not curing what was sound. This custom — coming, I believe, from apostolic tradition, just as many things are not found in their writings nor in the councils of their successors, and yet, because they are kept throughout the universal Church, are believed to have been handed down and commended by none but them — this most wholesome custom, then, holy Cyprian says began, as it were, to be corrected through his predecessor Agrippinus;
but as truth more diligently inquired into has taught — truth which after great waves of doubt was brought to the confirmation of a plenary council — it is more truly believed that through Agrippinus it began to be corrupted, not corrected. And so, when so great a question rushed in — concerning the remission of sins and the spiritual regeneration of man, whether it could take place among schismatics or heretics — since the reasoning was rendered difficult, and there went before the authority of Agrippinus and of some men who had agreed with him but were failing in this question, who had preferred to contrive something new rather than to hold a custom whose defence they did not understand — plausible reasonings rushed upon the eyes of the soul and blocked the path of investigating the truth.
Nor do I think that blessed Cyprian, for any other reason, uttered rather freely and stated first whatever he held against the custom, save this: that he might most gladly receive another, if perchance one should arise to whom something better had been revealed, and might show that not only diligence in teaching but also modesty in learning is to be imitated; but that if no one should arise who might bring forward any such thing, whereby all those plausible reasonings by which he was moved might be refuted, he might remain in the same opinion, being well conscious both of the truth which was thought not concealed and of the unity which was loved and retained. For he understood in this sense also what the Apostle says: 'Let the prophets speak, two or three, and let the rest judge. But if anything be revealed to another sitting by, let the first hold his peace.'
In which passage, he says, he taught and showed that many things are revealed to individuals for the better, and that each one ought not to contend obstinately for that which he once imbibed and held, but if anything better and more useful should appear, gladly to embrace it. By these words he not only admonished those who saw nothing better to agree with him, but he also exhorted them — if any could bring forward anything whereby the earlier custom might rather be strengthened for keeping — so that, if it were such as could not be refuted, he himself too might show how truly he had said: that each one ought not to contend obstinately for that which he once imbibed and held, but if anything better and more useful should appear, gladly to embrace it.
But because at that time there existed none save those who opposed the custom to him, while they brought forward no such defences of the custom itself as would move so great a soul, that most weighty man was unwilling that his own reasonings — though not true (which lay hidden from him), yet nevertheless not defeated — should yield to a custom that was indeed truthful but not yet asserted.