The instigator and prompter of writing this book for Augustine was Quodvultdeus, a deacon of Carthage. To this the following letters pertain: the first is from Quodvultdeus, asking Augustine to issue a catalogue of heresies, embracing in brief the particular errors and rites of each; the second is from Augustine, excusing the difficulty of the work and advising that the thing had already been attempted by others. Quodvultdeus writes back, vehemently urging him not to deny this service to his petition, indeed to the universal desire. Then at last Augustine, overcome, takes upon himself the labour and care of writing about heresies, as far as his other occupations might allow.
For now he testifies that, the necessity of refuting Julian having been imposed upon him, he is also being called away from the revision of his own little works which he had begun (a matter he judges most necessary); and he adds that he has already completed two volumes of this revision, all his books having been reviewed. We observe these two volumes to have been finished about the year of Christ 427, in the first tome: and since the very book on Heresies is later than these, it seems it must be referred to about the year 428. Possidius in his Index, chapter 5, notes 'On Heresies, addressed to the deacon Quodvultdeus, an unfinished work.' And Isidore, On Illustrious Men, chapter [9]...
in chapter 9 says: 'Primasius, an African bishop, composed in scholastic style three books On Heresies, addressed to bishop Fortunatus, explaining in them what the blessed Augustine had once left unfinished in his book On Heresies, death intervening.' Namely, the other part of the work—to show what makes a man a heretic—Augustine promises at the end of the preface, which part, forestalled by death, he did not reach. Concerning the same book there are four letters. LETTER 221. To the lord deservedly venerable, and truly most blessed father, bishop AUGUSTINE, from QUODVULTDEUS, deacon. 1. Long was I anxious, and several times I deferred this daring of mine; but what chiefly emboldened me, as is wont to be said, was the goodwill of your blessedness, approved by all.
And while I considered it, the more I feared lest, by not asking, I be judged proud by the Lord; by not seeking, slothful; by not knocking, lazy. I would have believed it enough for me to have merely such a will, if I could not obtain the fruit: but since I know for certain that the door of the divine word, which heavenly grace has opened to your Reverence, your holy mind which Christ possesses is ready not only to open to all who are willing, but even to persuade the unwilling that they not be loth to enter—I will make no delay by superfluous wordiness upon your Reverence's occupation, but will briefly indicate the desire of my entreaty. 2. That there are in the clergy even of this most ample city some unlearned, I conjecture from myself.
And how much profit there will be to that whole order from what I seek, I offer to the consideration of your Holiness to be weighed. For I presume that I too, though unworthy, shall obtain it by the privilege of all who deserve this from your spiritual labours, O lord deservedly venerable and truly most blessed father. I therefore beseech your Blessedness to deign to set forth: from the time the Christian religion received the name of the promised inheritance, what heresies there have been and are; what errors they have brought in and bring in; what they have held and hold against the Catholic Church—concerning the faith, the Trinity, Baptism, penance, the man Christ, the God Christ, the resurrection, the New and Old Testament, and absolutely all things in which they dissent from the truth.
Which of them have Baptism and which do not; and after which persons the Church baptizes yet does not rebaptize; in what manner she receives those who come; and what she should answer to each by law, authority, and reason—deign to expound. 3. Nor let your Blessedness believe me to be of such folly as not to perceive with how many and how huge volumes there is need, that these things may be resolved. But this I do not seek to be done; for I do not doubt that it has been done in manifold fashion: but I ask that briefly, concisely, and summarily the opinions of any heresy whatever be set forth, and what the Catholic Church holds against them, so far as is enough for instruction, be subjoined.
So that, as by a kind of compendium conceived out of all things, if anyone should wish to know any objection or refutation more amply, more fully, and more plainly, he might be referred to the rich and magnificent volumes which it is agreed were elaborated by various authors, and especially by your Reverence, for this very purpose. Such an admonition will suffice, as I think, for the learned and the unlearned, the leisured and the busy, and for those promoted from anywhere to the ministry of the Church of any rank whatever; while both he who reads much recalls the same things briefly, and the ignorant is instructed by a summary, so that he may know what to hold, what to avoid, what to shun lest he do it, what to attain that he may do it. But perhaps,
if indeed what I think is true, even against the malignant minds and crafty lips of slanderers this small work, among your other wondrous achievements, will not be lacking to the testimony of your crown: so that those to whom a more abundant field of slandering lies open, hemmed in by the strong and on every side enclosed boundaries of the faith, driven about by every kind of the weapons of truth, and suddenly laid low by a single many-formed javelin, may not dare to breathe out their carrion spirits. 4. I see how burdensome I am proving to one who is contemplating better things and arranging greater ones, a holy old man who also endures the complaints of the body.
But through Christ the Lord I ask—who granted that you should be without envy a partaker of his wisdom—that you give this grace to the unlearned of the Church, you who acknowledge yourself a debtor to the wise and the foolish (Rom. 1:14), deservedly and rightly about to say: 'See that I have not laboured for myself alone, but for all who seek out the truth' (Ecclus. 24:47, and 33:18). I could still have offered humble and manifold prayers, and enlisted with me crowds of the unlearned: but I preferred now to hear you dictating, rather than to occupy you reading. LETTER 222. To his most beloved son and fellow-deacon QUODVULTDEUS, from bishop AUGUSTINE. 1.
Having received the letter of your Charity, wherein you requested of me with most ardent zeal that I write something briefly about all the heresies which have sprung up after the coming of the Lord and Saviour against his doctrine—how difficult this is, I wrote back at once when the occasion was found, through my son Philocalus, a leading citizen of Hippo; but soon this other occasion too was offered, by which I now write back, and briefly show the difficulty of that work. 2. A certain Philastrius, bishop of Brescia, whom I myself also saw at Milan together with holy Ambrose, wrote a book on this; and not omitting even those heresies which existed among the Jewish people before the coming of the Lord, he recorded twenty-eight of them, and after the Lord's coming a hundred and twenty-eight.
On this Epiphanius too, the Cypriot bishop, laudably renowned in the teaching of the Catholic faith, wrote in Greek: but he, gathering the heresies of both periods, comprised eighty. Since therefore both wished to do what you ask of me, yet you see how greatly they differ between themselves as to the number of the sects: which surely would not have happened, unless one thing seemed to be a heresy to one of them, and another thing to the other. For it is not to be supposed that Epiphanius was ignorant of any which Philastrius knew, since we have found Epiphanius far more learned than Philastrius; so that we ought rather to say that very many escaped Philastrius, if the one comprised so many more, and the other fewer.
But without doubt, in that question where it is disputed what a heresy is, it did not seem the same to both; and in truth this is altogether difficult to define: and therefore one must beware, when we attempt to reduce them all to a number, lest we omit some, although they be heresies; or count some, when they are not heresies. See therefore whether perhaps I ought to send you the book of holy Epiphanius: for I judge that he spoke more learnedly than Philastrius on this matter; and it could be rendered at Carthage into the Latin tongue more easily and conveniently, so that you might rather furnish us what you seek from us. 3. The bearer I commend much. He is a subdeacon of our diocese; from the estate, moreover, of the honourable man, and most dear to us, Orontius.
On his behalf, moreover, and on behalf of his father, by whom he was adopted, I have also written to the man himself; which letters, when your Christian Benignity shall have read them, I ask that you deign to assist them with your intercession before the said man. I have sent with him also a man of the Church, lest access to your Holiness be difficult for him: for I am not a little anxious about him, from which anxiety the Lord, as I hope, will free me through the urgency of your charity. I ask also that you not find it irksome to write back to me how that Theodosius stands in the Catholic faith, by whom certain Manichaeans were betrayed; and those very ones whom we suppose to have been betrayed by him, whether they have been corrected. If you have perhaps heard anything also about the departure of the holy bishops, see that they may know it.
May you live to God. LETTER 223. To the lord deservedly venerable, and most blessed holy father, bishop AUGUSTINE, from QUODVULTDEUS, deacon. 1. One admonition indeed of your Reverence, which you deigned to dispatch by an ecclesiastic, I have received. For that which your Blessedness signified had been sent earlier, by the honourable man Philocalus, has not yet reached me. But although I have always been conscious of my own sins, now nevertheless I have plainly recognized that, in attaining for myself that gift which I entreated, my person is a hindrance to the whole Church.
But I altogether trust that he who, through the grace of his Only-begotten, deigned to blot out the crimes of the human race, will not permit my own [person] to prevail to the destruction of all, but will rather, where sin abounded, make grace to superabound (Rom. 5:20), O lord deservedly venerable and most blessed father. The difficulty of the work, which through your beneficence I suppliantly entreated to be furnished for the instruction of us most unlearned, I myself not being ignorant of it foretold beforehand; but I presumed, with a truthful heart, upon the abundance of the divine fount which the Lord has bestowed upon you. 2. For although Philastrius and Epiphanius, venerable bishops, are recorded to have written some such thing—which without doubt, among other matters, indeed as all things, is hidden from me—
yet I do not think they applied this care and diligence, so as to join to each several opinion the contrary opinions also, and to subjoin the rites; then finally, whatever sort that work of either may be, it perhaps does not have that brevity which I desire. In vain too is Greek eloquence delegated to a man who has not learned Latin; for I asked not only counsel, but help for him. But why should I admonish your Reverence of the not only difficulty, but also obscurity of the translators, when you yourself judge this the more and fully? It is added to the case that some heresies are taught to have emerged even after their death, of which they made no mention. 3.
Wherefore I flee to the special patronage of your piety, and with my own voice, but with universal desire, I appeal to the sacrosanct breast of piety, ready for mercy; with strange relishes set aside, having considered the text of my former letter, do not deny to one knocking late and suffering hunger the African bread which our province is wont to have as its choicest, seasoned also with heavenly manna. For indeed I too will not cease to knock, until you yourself grant: so that what a privilege does not obtain where there is no merit, at least untiring importunity may earn. LETTER 224. To the lord sincerely most beloved, brother and fellow-deacon QUODVULTDEUS, from bishop AUGUSTINE. 1.
When the occasion for writing these things was offered to me through the presbyter of Fussala, whom I commend to your Charity, I reviewed your letter, in which you ask that I write something concerning the heresies that have been able to arise from the time when the Lord's coming in the flesh began to be proclaimed. This I did so that I might see whether I ought now to undertake the work itself, and from it send you something; whereupon you would consider that it is the more difficult the briefer you wish it to be made. But not even this could I do, hindered by such cares coming upon me, from which I could in no way excuse myself: for they turned me away even from what I had in hand. This is when I am replying to the books of Julian, which he recently published after those four to which I had previously responded.
For when brother Alypius had received these at Rome, he had not yet transcribed them all when, unwilling to let slip the occasion offered, he sent me five of them through it; promising that he would soon send the other three, and urging strongly that I should not delay to reply. Compelled by his insistence, I have been obliged to pursue more slowly what I was doing; so that I might fail neither work, giving the days to the one and the nights to the other, whenever I was spared from other occupations that did not cease to come upon me from this side and that. Yet I was engaged in a most necessary task: for I was reviewing my own little works, and if anything in them offended me, or could offend others, I labored partly by reproving, partly by defending, at what ought and could be read.
And I had already completed two volumes, having reviewed all my books, whose number I did not know: and I found them to be two hundred and thirty-two. There remained the letters, and then the popular discourses, which the Greeks call homilies. And I had already read very many of the letters, but had as yet dictated nothing from them, when these books of Julian also began to occupy me, to whose fourth I have now begun to reply. When therefore I shall have finished that, and replied to the fifth, if the three do not arrive, I intend (if God will) to begin also what you ask, doing both at once—namely this, and that concerning the review of my little works—with the night and day hours distributed to each.
I have made this known to your Holiness for this reason, that just as your desire for receiving what you ask is great, so the more ardently you may ask of the Lord help for me, whereby I may serve your praiseworthy zeal, and the benefit of those whom you judge it will profit, my lord most sincerely beloved brother. I commend again the bearer, and the business for which he has gone there; if you learn before whom the matter must be pursued, I beg that it not weary you to help. For we cannot abandon the needs of men of this kind, who are not our tenants, but—what is greater—are brothers, and in the charity of Christ belong to our care. May you live in God.