Testimonia

{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p>9. Or is it perhaps that schismatics, when received without\r\nbaptism, bring no infection, but that it is brought by those\r\nwho deliver up the sacred books?<a id=\"FNanchor_82_82\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_82_82\">[82]</a> For that there were\r\n<i>traditors</i> of your number is proved by the clearest testimony\r\nof history. And if you had then brought true evidence\r\nagainst those whom you were accusing, you would have proved\r\nyour cause before the unity of the whole world, so that you\r\nwould have been retained whilst they were shut out. And if\r\nyou endeavoured to do this, and did not succeed, the world is\r\nnot to blame, which trusted the judges of the Church rather\r\nthan the beaten parties in the suit; whilst, if you would not\r\nurge your suit, the world again is not to blame, which could\r\nnot condemn men without their cause being heard. Why,\r\nthen, did you separate yourselves from the innocent? You\r\ncannot defend the sacrilege of your schism. But this I pass\r\nover. But so much I say, that if the <i>traditors</i> could have\r\ndefiled you, who were not convicted by you, and by whom, on\r\nthe contrary, you were beaten, much more could the sacrilege\r\nof schismatics and heretics, received into the Church, as you\r\nmaintain, without baptism, have defiled Cyprian. Yet he did\r\nnot separate himself. And inasmuch as the Church continued\r\nto exist, it is clear that it could not be defiled.\r\nWherefore, then, did you separate yourselves, I do not say\r\nfrom the innocent, as the facts proved them, but from the\r\n<i>traditors</i>, as they were never proved to be? Are the sins\r\nof <i>traditors</i>, as I began to say, heavier than those of schismatics?\r\nLet us not bring in deceitful balances, to which we\r\nmay hang what weights we will, and how we will, saying to\r\nsuit ourselves, \"This is heavy and this is light;\" but let us\r\nbring forward the sacred balance out of holy Scripture, as\r\nout of the Lord's treasure-house, and let us weigh them by<span class=\"pagenum\"><a id=\"Page_41\">[Pg 41]</a></span>\r\nit, to see which is the heavier; or rather, let us not weigh\r\nthem for ourselves, but read the weights as declared by the\r\nLord. At the time when the Lord showed, by the example\r\nof recent punishment, that there was need to guard against\r\nthe sins of olden days, and an idol was made and worshipped,\r\nand the prophetic book was burned by the wrath of a scoffing\r\nking, and schism was attempted, the idolatry was punished\r\nwith the sword,<a id=\"FNanchor_83_83\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_83_83\">[83]</a> the burning of the book by slaughter in war\r\nand captivity in a foreign land,<a id=\"FNanchor_84_84\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_84_84\">[84]</a> schism by the earth opening,\r\nand swallowing up alive the leaders of the schism, while the\r\nrest were consumed with fire from heaven.<a id=\"FNanchor_85_85\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_85_85\">[85]</a> Who will now\r\ndoubt that that was the worse crime which received the\r\nheavier punishment? If men coming from such sacrilegious\r\ncompany, without baptism, as you maintain, could not defile\r\nCyprian, how could those defile you who were not convicted\r\nbut supposed betrayers of the sacred books?<a id=\"FNanchor_86_86\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_86_86\">[86]</a> For if they had\r\nnot only given up the books to be burned, but had actually\r\nburned them with their own hands, they would have been guilty\r\nof a less sin than if they had committed schism; for schism is\r\nvisited with the heavier, the other with the lighter punishment,\r\nnot at man's discretion, but by the judgment of God.</p>","headings":["WRITINGS IN CONNECTION WITH THE DONATIST CONTROVERSY.","BOOK SECOND."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg45843-paragraph-83"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"ba8d85551077be442b96a429ec27b97e5ce8146011ed1360892e254eea90dab2","edition_title":"Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy","edition_translators":["John Richard King"],"edition_year":1872,"explicit_reference_candidates":[],"headings":[],"id":"pg45843-Footnote_84_84","license_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html","public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"original-editor-translator-note","review_required":["work and recension attribution","original-work chronology","Bible reference numbering and citation kind","English edition rights and attribution"],"review_status":"needs_review","rights_evidence":"Provider catalog reports public domain in the USA. Title leaves identify J. R. King, T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1872; catalog identifies translator John Richard King (1835-1907). Gutenberg credits Internet Archive/American Libraries without an exact scan identifier. Full provider license preserved with acquired original; republication and per-work metadata remain unreviewed.","source_anchor":"Footnote_84_84","source_ebook":45843,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\">\n<p><a id=\"Footnote_84_84\"></a><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#FNanchor_84_84\"><span class=\"label\">[84]</span></a> Jer. xxxvi.</p></div>","source_sha256":"a7a04003f4d3c49eb73db6c5936713979fcecadd86884373a9914ac54373ac5b","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/45843/pg45843-images.html#Footnote_84_84","text_sha256":"5b27701e0150e2b5cd59d3fd7092ae497dc2c83fdb7c493fc099d069935486ff","verified":false,"work_id":null}

references: [] | work_id: | origin: existing-private-derived-record | source: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/45843/pg45843-images.html#Footnote_84_84