Epistola ad Jovianum

In the year of Christ 256. The Epistle of St. Cyprian to Jubaianus On the Baptism of Heretics. (Erasm. p. 322. Pamel. Rigalt. Baluz. Oxon. Lips. LXXIII.) ARGUMENT.—In the year of Christ 256, shortly after the seventh Council of Carthage, Cyprian wrote a long epistle to Bishop Jubaianus; he had consulted Cyprian about baptism and at the same time had sent an epistle, not written by himself but by another, against Cyprian’s opinion. Cyprian refutes this epistle and with the utmost zeal gathers whatever he thinks may serve to defend his own cause. He also sends to Jubaianus a copy of the epistle to the Numidians and to Quintus, as well as perhaps the decrees of the recent synod. Cyprian to Jubaianus, his brother, greeting. You have written to me, dearest brother, desiring that the movement of my mind be signified to you, as to what seems to us concerning the Baptism of heretics, who, placed outside and constituted outside the Church, claim for themselves a thing neither of right nor of power. Which we can neither consider ratified nor legitimate, since it is manifest that among them this is unlawful. And since we have already expressed in our letters what we think on this matter, to make a compendium, I have sent you a copy of those same letters, what we decreed in the council, when a good many of us were present, and likewise what I afterwards wrote back to Quintus, our colleague, when he inquired on the same matter.

And now also, when we had assembled together, the bishops of both the province of Africa and Numidia, seventy-one in number, we have again confirmed this same thing by our judgment, establishing that there is one baptism which is constituted in the Catholic Church, and accordingly that those who come from adulterous and profane water are not to be rebaptized, but are to be baptized by us, to be washed and sanctified by the truth of the saving water. II. Nor does it move us, dearest brother, what you have included in your letter, that the Novatianists rebaptize those whom they entice away from us, since it does not pertain to us at all what the enemies of the Church do, provided that we ourselves maintain the honor of our authority and the firmness of reason and truth. For Novatian, after the manner of apes, which, though they are not men, yet imitate human actions, wishes to claim for himself the authority and truth of the Catholic Church, when he himself is not in the Church, but rather has even stood forth as a rebel and enemy against the Church. For knowing that there is one baptism, he claims this one for himself, so that he may say that the Church is with him and make us heretics. But we, who hold the head and root of the one Church, know for certain and affirm that nothing is permitted to him outside the Church, and that the baptism which is one is with us, where he himself had previously been baptized, when he still held to the reason and truth of divine unity.

But if Novatian thinks that those baptized in the Church must be rebaptized outside the Church, he ought to have begun with himself, so that he might first be rebaptized with a foreign and heretical baptism, he who, after the Church and even against the Church, holds that those to be baptized are outside. What kind of thing is it, then, that because Novatian dares to do this, we should think it ought not to be done? What then? Because Novatian also usurps the honor of the priestly chair, must we therefore renounce the chair? Or because Novatian unlawfully strives to set up an altar and offer sacrifices, must we cease from the altar and sacrifices, lest we seem to celebrate things equal and similar with him? It is utterly vain and foolish that, because Novatian outside the Church claims for himself the image of truth, we should abandon the truth of the Church. III. Among us, however, it is not a new or sudden thing that we judge that those who come from heretics to the Church are to be baptized, since many years have now passed and a long age since, under Agrippinus, a man of good memory, very many bishops assembling together decreed this, and from that time to the present day, so many thousands of heretics in our provinces, converted to the Church, have not been spurned nor hesitated, but have been reasonably and willingly embraced, so that they might obtain the grace of the life-giving and salutary baptismal washing. For it is not difficult for a teacher to instill what is true and legitimate into one who has condemned heretical depravity and discovered ecclesiastical truth.

He comes for this purpose: to learn; he learns for this purpose: to live. We ought not to increase the stupor of heretics by the patronage of our consent, since they willingly and promptly obey the truth. IV. Clearly, since I have found in the letter, a copy of which you sent to me, that it is written that it is not to be asked who baptized, when the one who was baptized could receive the remission of sins according to what he believed, I did not think this passage should be passed over, especially since I have observed in the same letter that mention is also made of Marcion, so that it says that even those coming from him ought not to be baptized, because they already appear to have been baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Therefore we must consider the faith of those who believe outside, whether according to that same faith they can obtain any grace. For if the faith is one for us and for heretics, the grace can also be one. If the Patripassians, Anthropians, Valentinians, Apelleans, Ophites, Marcionites, and the other pestilences and swords and poisons of heretics for subverting the truth confess with us the same Father, the same Son, the same Holy Spirit, the same Church, then baptism can also be there, if the faith is also one.

V. And, lest it be tedious to run through all heresies and to recount the follies or the ravings of each, since it is not pleasant to say what one either shudders at or is ashamed to know, let us examine, concerning Marcion alone, whose mention was made in the letter sent to us by you, whether the rationale of his baptism can stand. For the Lord, after the resurrection, sending his disciples, instructed and taught them how they ought to baptize, saying: All power has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:18, 19). He indicates the Trinity, by whose sacrament the Gentiles would be baptized. Does Marcion hold this Trinity? Does he assert the same Father Creator as we do? Does he know the same Son Christ, born of the Virgin Mary, who became flesh as the Word, who bore our sins, who conquered death by dying, who first initiated the resurrection of the flesh through himself, and showed to his disciples that he had risen in the same flesh? Far different is the faith with Marcion, and also with the other heretics. Indeed, among them there is nothing but perfidy and blasphemy and contention, hostile to sanctity and truth. How, therefore, can it seem that one who is baptized among them has obtained the remission of sins and the grace of divine indulgence through his own faith, when he has not had the truth of that faith itself?

For if, as it seems to some, a person could receive something outside the Church according to his own faith, then surely he received what he believed. But believing falsely, he could not receive what is true, but rather received what is adulterate and profane, according to what he believed. VI. The prophet Jeremiah subtly touches upon this matter of profane and adulterate baptism, saying: "Why do those who grieve me prevail? My wound is solid; whence shall I be healed? While it is being done, it has become to me like a lying water having no faith" (Jer. 15:18). The Holy Spirit makes mention through the prophet of a lying water that has no faith. What is this lying and faithless water? Surely it is that which counterfeits the image of baptism and, by a feigned simulation, frustrates the grace of faith. For if, according to a perverse faith, a person could be baptized outside and obtain remission of sins, then according to that same faith he could also obtain the Holy Spirit, and there would be no need for him, when coming, to have hands laid upon him so that he might obtain the Holy Spirit and be sealed. For either he could have obtained both outside by his own faith, or he who was outside received neither.

It is clear, however, where and through whom the remission of sins can be given, which is given, namely, in baptism. For the Lord first gave this power to Peter, upon whom He built the Church, and from whom He established and showed the origin of unity, that what he would loose on earth would be loosed in heaven. And after the resurrection also He speaks to the apostles, saying: "As my Father sent me, so I send you." When He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them: "Receive the Holy Spirit. If you remit anyone's sins, they will be remitted; if you retain anyone's, they will be retained" (John 20:21). From this we understand that it is permitted only to those set over the Church and established in the evangelical law and the Lord's ordinance to baptize and to give remission of sins, but that outside it nothing can be bound or loosed where there is no one who can bind or loose anything. Nor, dearest brother, do we propose this without the authority of divine Scripture, in saying that all things are divinely arranged by a fixed law and a proper ordinance, and that no one can usurp for himself against the bishops and priests anything that is not of his own right and power. For Korah, Dathan, and Abiram attempted to usurp for themselves the license of sacrificing against Moses and the priest Aaron; yet they did not do with impunity what they unlawfully dared. And the sons of Aaron, who placed alien fire upon the altar, were immediately struck down in the sight of the indignant Lord.

What punishment awaits those who falsely bring alien water to baptism, so that divine judgment may avenge and vindicate what heretics do against the Church, which only the Church is permitted to do. IX. But as for what some say about those who had been baptized in Samaria, that when the apostles Peter and John arrived, only hands were laid upon them so that they might receive the Holy Spirit, and that they were not rebaptized—this passage, dearest brother, we see does not pertain at all to the present case. For those who had believed in Samaria believed with true faith, and had been baptized within the Church, which is one, and to which alone the grace of baptism and the remission of sins is permitted, by Philip the deacon, whom the same apostles had sent. And therefore, because they had received a legitimate and ecclesiastical baptism, it was not necessary for them to be baptized again, but only what was lacking was done by Peter and John, namely, that after prayer was offered for them and hands were laid, the Holy Spirit was invoked and poured upon them. This is also done among us now, so that those who are baptized in the Church are presented to the bishops of the Church, and through our prayer and the laying on of hands they receive the Holy Spirit and are perfected by the Lord's seal.

X. Therefore, dearest brother, we must not think that we should yield to heretics, so that we might consider surrendering baptism, which was given to the one and only Church alone. It is the duty of a good soldier to defend the camp against the rebels and enemies of his emperor. It is the glory of a general to preserve the standards entrusted to him. It is written: "Your Lord God is a jealous God" (Deut. 4:24). We who have received the Spirit of God ought to have zeal for the divine faith. With this zeal Phinehas was pleasing, and by meriting God, he appeased the wrath of the indignant one while the people perished. Why do we receive as acceptable that which is adulterous, alien, and hostile to divine unity, we who know only one Christ and his one Church? The Church, expressing the likeness of paradise, encloses within its walls fruitful trees, from which those that do not bear good fruit are cut down and thrown into the fire. It waters these trees with four rivers, that is, the four Gospels, by which it bestows the grace of saving baptism in a heavenly flood. Can one who is not wholly in the Church water from the Church's springs? Can one who is perverse and self-condemned, and who, banished outside the springs of paradise, has withered and failed from the drought of eternal thirst, impart wholesome and salutary drinks of paradise to anyone?

XI. The Lord cries out that whoever thirsts should come and drink from the rivers of living water which have flowed from His womb (John 8:37). Where is the one who thirsts to go? To the heretics, where there is no fountain or river of life-giving water at all, or to the Church, which alone is founded upon the one who received her keys, by the Lord’s own voice? She is the one who holds and possesses all the power of her Spouse and Lord. In her we preside; for her honor and unity we fight; her grace and glory alike we defend with faithful devotion. By divine permission we water the thirsty people of God; we guard the boundaries of the life-giving springs. If, therefore, we hold the right of our possession, if we acknowledge the sacrament of unity, why are we considered traitors to the truth, why betrayers of unity? The water of the Church is faithful, salutary, and holy; it cannot be corrupted or adulterated, just as the Church herself is incorrupt, chaste, and pure. If heretics are devoted to the Church and established within the Church, they may use her baptism and other salutary goods. But if they are not in the Church—indeed, if they act against the Church—how can they baptize with the baptism of the Church?

XII. For it is no small or trivial matter that is conceded to the heretics, when we accept their baptism as valid, since from it begins the origin of all faith, and the saving entrance to the hope of eternal life, and the divine condescension for purifying and quickening the servants of God. For if one could be baptized among the heretics, he could certainly also obtain the remission of sins. If he has obtained the remission of sins, he has also been sanctified, and has become a temple of God; if he has been sanctified, if he has become a temple of God, I ask, of which God? If of the Creator, he could not, because he did not believe in Him. If of Christ, he could not become a temple of Him who denies that Christ is God. If of the Holy Spirit, since the three are one, how can the Holy Spirit be appeased toward him who is an enemy of either the Son or the Father? XIII. Therefore, those who are overcome by reason vainly oppose custom to us; as if custom were greater than truth, or as if in spiritual matters that which has been revealed for the better by the Holy Spirit were not to be followed. For pardon can be granted to one who errs simply, as the blessed apostle Paul says of himself: “I who at first,” he says, “was a blasphemer and a persecutor and a wrongdoer, yet I merited mercy, because I acted in ignorance” [1 Tim. 1:13]. But after inspiration and revelation have been given, he who persists in what he erred in, knowingly and wittingly, sins without the excuse of ignorance. For he strives with presumption and a certain obstinacy, even when he is overcome by reason.

Let no one say that we follow what we received from the apostles, since the apostles handed down only one Church and one baptism, which is established only in that same Church, and we find no one who, having been baptized among heretics, was admitted by the apostles in that same baptism and communicated with them, so that the apostles might seem to have approved the baptism of heretics. XIV. For as to what some say, as if it pertains to the support of heretics that the apostle Paul said: "Nevertheless, in every way, whether by occasion or by truth, Christ is announced" (Phil. 1:18), we find that this can avail nothing for the patronage of those who support and applaud heretics. For Paul was not speaking in his Epistle about heretics or about their baptism, so that he might be shown to have set down anything pertaining to this matter. He was speaking about brethren who either walk disorderly and contrary to ecclesiastical discipline, or who preserve the evangelical truth in the fear of God.

And some of them he set forth as having spoken the word of the Lord with constancy and intrepidity, but some as having been involved in envy and dissension, some as having preserved a benevolent charity towards themselves, but others as having had malevolent dissension, yet he himself patiently endured, provided that either in truth or by occasion the name of Christ, which Paul was preaching, might come to the knowledge of the many, and the still new and unformed sowing of the word might increase through the preaching of the speakers. Moreover, it is one thing for those who are within the Church to speak concerning the name of Christ, and another for those who are outside and act against the Church to baptize in the name of Christ. Therefore, those who patronize heretics should not bring forward what Paul set forth concerning the brethren, but should show whether he thought anything ought to be conceded to a heretic, or whether he approved their faith and baptism, or whether he established that the faithless and blasphemous could receive remission of sins outside the Church.

XV. But if we consider what the apostles thought about heretics, we find that in all their epistles they execrate and detest the sacrilegious depravity of heretics. For when they say that their speech creeps like a cancer (2 Tim. 2:14), how can that speech grant remission of sins, which creeps like a cancer into the ears of hearers? And when they say that there is no participation between justice and iniquity, no communion between light and darkness (2 Cor. 6:14), how can either darkness illuminate or iniquity justify? And when they say that they are not of God, but are of the spirit of Antichrist (1 John 4:3), how can those who are enemies of God, and whose breasts the spirit of Antichrist has possessed, perform spiritual and divine acts? Therefore, if, setting aside the errors of human contention, we return with sincere and religious faith to evangelical authority and apostolic tradition, we will understand that nothing is permitted to them for ecclesiastical and salutary grace, who, scattering and attacking the Church of Christ, are called adversaries by Christ Himself, and Antichrists by His apostles.

XVI. But there is no reason for anyone to oppose the name of Christ to Christian truth in order to circumvent it, by saying that in the name of Jesus Christ, wherever and however they are baptized, they have obtained the grace of baptism, when Christ Himself speaks and says: “Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 7:21), and again warns and instructs that no one be easily deceived by false prophets and false Christs in His name: “Many,” He says, “will come in my name saying, I am Christ, and will deceive many”; and afterwards He added, saying: “But you, beware. Behold, I have foretold you everything” (Mark 13:6). Hence it is clear that not everything that is vaunted in the name of Christ is to be immediately accepted and embraced, but only what is done in the truth of Christ. XVII. For when the name of Jesus Christ is introduced in the Gospels and in the Epistles of the apostles for the remission of sins, it is not as if the Son alone could benefit anyone either without the Father or against the Father, but so that the Jews, who boasted of having the Father, might be shown that the Father would profit them nothing unless they believed in the Son, whom He had sent. For those who knew God the Father as Creator also ought to know the Son Christ, lest they flatter themselves and boast of the Father alone without knowledge of His Son, who also said: “No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).

Moreover, the same one makes clear that the knowledge which saves is of two, saying: "This, however, is eternal life: that they know you alone and the true God, and the Christ whom you sent" (John 17:3). Therefore, since from Christ's own preaching and testimony the Father who sent is to be known first, and then Christ who was sent, and there can be no hope of salvation unless both are known together, how are those who are said to be baptized in the name of Christ among heretics, without knowing—indeed, while blaspheming—God the Father, judged to have obtained the remission of sins? For the case of the Jews under the apostles was one thing, and the condition of the Gentiles another. They, because they had already received the most ancient baptism of the Law and of Moses, were also to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, according to what Peter says to them in the Acts of the Apostles: "Repent, and let each of you be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For this promise is for you and your children and for all whom our Lord God will hereafter call" (Acts 2:38). Peter makes mention of Jesus Christ, not as if the Father were omitted, but so that the Son might also be joined to the Father.

XVIII. Finally, after the resurrection, when the apostles are sent to the Gentiles by the Lord, they are commanded to baptize the Gentiles in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. How, then, do some say that outside the Church—indeed, against the Church—a Gentile, baptized anywhere and in any manner in the name of Jesus Christ, can obtain remission of sins, when Christ himself commands that Gentiles be baptized in the full and united Trinity? Unless perhaps he who denies Christ is denied by Christ, but he who denies His Father, whom Christ Himself confessed, is not denied, and he who blasphemes against Him whom Christ called His Lord and God receives from Christ remission of sins and the sanctification of baptism as a reward. But by what power can he obtain remission of sins in baptism who denies God the Creator, the Father of Christ, when Christ Himself received from that same Father the very power by which we are baptized and sanctified—whom He called greater, from whom He sought to be glorified, whose will He fulfilled even to the point of drinking the cup and undergoing death? What else, then, is it but to become a sharer with blaspheming heretics, to wish to defend and assert that one who blasphemes grievously and sins against the Father and Lord and God of Christ can receive remission of sins in the name of Christ?

What then is the nature of this, that he who denies the Son of God does not have the Father, and he who denies the Father seems to have the Son, when the Son Himself testifies and says, "No one can come to me, unless it has been given to him by the Father" (John 6:65); so that it is manifest that no remission of sins in baptism can be received from the Son which it is certain the Father has not given, especially when He repeats and says again: "Every planting which my heavenly Father has not planted shall be rooted up" (Matthew 15:13). XIX. But if the disciples of Christ are unwilling to learn from Christ how much veneration and honor is due to the name of the Father, let them at least learn from earthly and secular examples, and know that Christ has not without the greatest reproach set forth: "The sons of this world are wiser than the sons of light" (Luke 16:8). In this world, if someone has insulted another's father, if he has been abusive and insolent, tearing at his modesty and honor with a slanderous tongue, the son is indignant and angry, and tries to avenge the injury to his injured father with whatever strength he can. Do you think that Christ grants impunity to the impious and sacrilegious and to those who blaspheme against His Father, and that He remits sins to them in baptism, when it is certain that they, even after being baptized, still heap the same curses upon the person of the Father and sin by the ceaseless crime of a blaspheming tongue? Can a Christian, can a servant of God, either conceive in his mind, or believe in faith, or utter such a thing?

And where will the precepts of divine law be, which say, "Honor your father and mother" (Exod. 20:12), if the name of father, which is commanded to be honored in a human being, is violated with impunity in God? Where will that be which Christ Himself sets forth in the Gospel and says, "He who curses his father or mother shall die the death" (Matt. 10:4), if He who orders those who curse their carnal parents to be punished and put to death Himself gives life to those who are abusive toward the heavenly and spiritual Father and enemies of the mother Church? An abominable and detestable thing is asserted by some outright: that He who threatens that one who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will be guilty of eternal sin is said to sanctify blasphemers against the Bread of God with saving baptism. And now those who think that such persons coming to the Church should be admitted to communion without baptism do not consider that they are sharing in the sins of others, indeed in eternal sins, by admitting without baptism those who can only lay aside the sins of their blasphemies in baptism.

XX. How vain and perverse it is, moreover, that when the heretics themselves, having repudiated and abandoned the error or crime in which they previously were, acknowledge the truth of the Church, we should mutilate the rights and sacrament of that same truth, and say to those coming and repenting that they have obtained remission of sins, when they themselves confess both that they have sinned and that for this reason they come to the indulgence of the Church. Therefore, dearest brother, we must firmly hold and teach the faith and truth of the Catholic Church, and through all evangelical and apostolic precepts show the reason of the divine dispensation and unity. XXI. Can the power of baptism be greater or stronger than confession, than martyrdom, so that someone confesses Christ before men and is baptized in his own blood? And yet this baptism does not benefit a heretic, even if he has confessed Christ and been killed outside the Church; unless the patrons and advocates of heretics proclaim heretics killed in a false confession of Christ as martyrs, and, contrary to the testimony of the Apostle, who says that they, even if burned and killed, can avail nothing (1 Cor. 13:3), assign to them the glory and crown of martyrdom.

If to a heretic even the baptism of public confession and blood cannot avail for salvation, because salvation is not outside the Church, how much more will it profit him nothing if, hidden away and in a den of thieves, stained by the contagion of adulterated water, he has not only not put off his old sins, but has rather heaped up new and greater ones? Therefore baptism cannot be common to us and to heretics, with whom neither the Father God, nor the Son Christ, nor the Holy Spirit, nor the faith, nor the Church herself is common. And so those who come from heresy to the Church must be baptized; so that those who are prepared by the legitimate, true, and only baptism of the holy Church for the kingdom of God through divine regeneration may be born by both sacraments, because it is written: Unless one is born again from water and Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God (John 3:3). XXII. At this point some, as if they could empty the truth of the evangelical proclamation by human argumentation, set catechumens against us: if one of them, before being baptized in the Church, is seized and killed in confession of the name, does he lose the hope of salvation and the reward of confession, because he was not first born again from water?

Let such persons, then, who are advocates and supporters of heretics know that those catechumens first hold the complete faith and the truth of the Church, and proceed from the divine camp to do battle with the devil with a full and sincere knowledge of God the Father, of Christ, and of the Holy Spirit; and that they are not deprived of the sacrament of baptism, especially since they are baptized most gloriously and with the greatest baptism of blood, concerning which the Lord also said that he had another baptism with which to be baptized (Luke 12:50). Moreover, the same Lord declares in the Gospel that those baptized in their own blood and sanctified by passion are perfected and obtain the grace of the divine promise, when he speaks to the thief who believed and confessed at the very moment of his passion, and promises that he will be with him in paradise. Therefore, we who are set over faith and truth ought not to deceive and mislead those who come to faith and truth and, doing penance, beg that their sins be remitted, but rather, after correcting and reforming them, to instruct them in the celestial disciplines for the kingdom of heaven.

XXIII. But someone says: What then will become of those who in the past, coming from heresy to the Church, were admitted without baptism? The Lord is able, by His mercy, to grant indulgence and not to separate from the gifts of His Church those who, having been simply admitted to the Church, have fallen asleep in the Church. Yet, because error was once committed, it is not therefore always to be committed, since it is more fitting for the wise and God-fearing to obey willingly and unhesitatingly the truth when it is revealed and perceived, than to struggle stubbornly and obstinately against brothers and fellow priests on behalf of heretics. XXIV. And let no one think that heretics, because baptism is opposed to them, as if scandalized by the term of a second baptism, are delayed from coming to the Church. On the contrary, by this very fact they are driven more to the necessity of coming, by the testimony of the truth shown and proven to them: for if they see that by our judgment and sentence it is decreed and established that the baptism by which they are baptized is considered just and legitimate, they will think that they also justly and legitimately possess the Church and the other gifts of the Church; and there will be no reason for them to come to us, when, having baptism, they seem also to have the rest.

Furthermore, when they recognize that there is no baptism outside and that remission of sins cannot be given outside the Church, they hasten to us more eagerly and readily, and implore the gifts and benefits of Mother Church, certain that they cannot at all attain to the true promise of divine grace unless they first come to the truth of the Church; nor will heretics refuse to be baptized among us with the legitimate and true baptism of the Church, when they have learned from us that those who had already been baptized by John’s baptism were also baptized by Paul, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 19). XXV. And now among some of our own, the baptism of heretics is asserted to be taken up, and with a certain ill will, as if rebaptizing, it is considered a sin to baptize after the enemies of God, when we find that those whom John had baptized were baptized—that John who was considered greater among the prophets, that one filled with divine grace while still in his mother’s womb, that one supported by the spirit and power of Elijah, who was not an adversary of the Lord, but his forerunner and preacher, who not only foretold our Lord in words but also pointed him out with his eyes, who baptized Christ himself, through whom others are baptized.

But if a heretic could obtain the right of baptism because he baptized first, then baptism would no longer belong to the possessor, but to the one who seizes it first; and since baptism and the Church cannot at all be separated and divided from each other, whoever could first seize baptism has likewise seized the Church, and you begin to appear to that heretic as one who, having been anticipated, have become the later one, who by yielding and giving way have abandoned the right which you had received. How dangerous it is, however, in divine matters for anyone to yield his own right and authority, the holy Scripture declares, when in Genesis Esau lost his birthright in this way, nor could he afterwards receive back what he had once yielded (Gen. 25; Heb. 12:16). XXVI. These things we have briefly written back to you, according to our limited ability, dearest brother, prescribing or prejudging nothing to prevent each bishop from doing what he thinks fit, having free power of his own judgment. We, as far as in us lies, do not contend with our colleagues and fellow bishops on account of heretics, with whom we maintain divine concord and Dominical peace; especially since the Apostle also says: "But if anyone is contentious, we do not have such a custom, nor does the Church of God" (1 Cor. 11:6). By us the charity of spirit, the honor of the college, the bond of faith, and the concord of the priesthood are preserved patiently and gently.

For this reason also we have now written a little book on the Good of Patience, as far as our mediocrity could accomplish, with the Lord permitting and inspiring, which we have sent to you out of mutual affection. I desire that you, dearest brother, always be well.