Letter 38: 1. As for my spirit, I am well, through the Lord's good pleasure, and the strength which He condescends to impart; but as for my body, I am confined to bed. I can neither walk, nor stand, nor sit, because of the pain and swelling of a boil or tumour.

Augustine to Profuturus, greetings. I am writing to you about a matter that weighs on me constantly — the controversy over the Priscillianists and the way in which certain bishops have handled it. You know, I think, how deeply the situation disturbs me. Not because I have any sympathy for Priscillian's errors — they are grave enough, mixing Manichaean fantasies with Christian language in a way that poisons the faith. But because the manner of dealing with heretics matters almost as much as the fact of dealing with them. When bishops summon the secular power to execute heretics, they set a precedent that troubles me profoundly. The Church's weapons are persuasion, excommunication, and the patient work of teaching the truth. When we reach for the executioner's sword, we become something other than what Christ intended us to be. I know this is not a popular view in some quarters. But I would rather be unpopular and honest than popular and silent. The Lord himself told the parable of the wheat and the tares: let them grow together until the harvest, lest in pulling up the weeds you uproot the wheat along with them [Matthew 13:29-30]. This does not mean we tolerate error — it means we fight it with the right instruments. Pray for me, brother. These are questions without easy answers, and I need the light of God more than my own reasoning. Farewell. [Context: Priscillian was a Spanish bishop whose ascetic movement was condemned as heretical. In 385 AD, he became the first Christian heretic to be executed by the secular authorities — a decision that scandalized many in the church, including Martin of Tours and Ambrose of Milan. Augustine's early position, reflected here, was deeply uneasy about using state violence against heretics, though his views would later evolve under the pressure of the Donatist crisis.]

Letter 38 (A.D. 397) To His Brother Profuturus Augustine Sends Greeting. 1. As for my spirit, I am well, through the Lord's good pleasure, and the strength which He condescends to impart; but as for my body, I am confined to bed. I can neither walk, nor stand, nor sit, because of the pain and swelling of a boil or tumour. But even in such a case, since this is the will of the Lord, what else can I say than that I am well? For if we do not wish that which He is pleased to do, we ought rather to take blame to ourselves than to think that He could err in anything which He either does or suffers to be done. All this you know well; but what shall I more willingly say to you than the things which I say to myself, seeing that you are to me a second self? I commend therefore both my days and my nights to your pious intercessions. Pray for me, that I may not waste my days through want of self-control, and that I may bear my nights with patience: pray that, though I walk in the midst of the shadow of death, the Lord may so be with me that I shall fear no evil. 2. You have heard, doubtless, of the death of the aged Megalius, for it is now twenty-four days since he put off this mortal body. I wish to know, if possible, whether you have seen, as you proposed, his successor in the primacy. We are not delivered from offenses, but it is equally true that we are not deprived of our refuge; our griefs do not cease, but our consolations are equally abiding. And well do you know, my excellent brother, how, in the midst of such offenses, we must watch lest hatred of any one gain a hold upon the heart, and so not only hinder us from praying to God with the door of our chamber closed, Matthew 6:6 but also shut the door against God Himself; for hatred of another insidiously creeps upon us, while no one who is angry considers his anger to be unjust. For anger habitually cherished against any one becomes hatred, since the sweetness which is mingled with what appears to be righteous anger makes us detain it longer than we ought in the vessel, until the whole is soured, and the vessel itself is spoiled. Wherefore it is much better for us to forbear from anger, even when one has given us just occasion for it, than, beginning with what seems just anger against any one, to fall, through this occult tendency of passion, into hating him. We are wont to say that, in entertaining strangers, it is much better to bear the inconvenience of receiving a bad man than to run the risk of having a good man shut out, through our caution lest any bad man be admitted; but in the passions of the soul the opposite rule holds true. For it is incomparably more for our soul's welfare to shut the recesses of the heart against anger, even when it knocks with a just claim for admission, than to admit that which it will be most difficult to expel, and which will rapidly grow from a mere sapling to a strong tree. Anger dares to increase with boldness more suddenly than men suppose, for it does not blush in the dark, when the sun has gone down upon it. Ephesians 4:26 You will understand with how great care and anxiety I write these things, if you consider the things which lately on a certain journey you said to me. 3. I salute my brother Severus, and those who are with him. I would perhaps write to them also, if the limited time before the departure of the bearer permitted me. I beseech you also to assist me in persuading our brother Victor (to whom I desire through your Holiness to express my thanks for his informing me of his setting out to Constantina) not to refuse to return by way of Calama, on account of a business known to him, in which I have to bear a very heavy burden in the importunate urgency of the elder Nectarius concerning it; he gave me his promise to this effect. Farewell! About this page Source. Translated by J.G. Cunningham. From Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 1. Edited by Philip Schaff. (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1887.) Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. <https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102038.htm>. Contact information. The editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org. (To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback — especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.