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Against the Donatists

St Optatus of Milevis, tr. Vassall-Phillips, 1917

Book 2, 5. The Donatist Authors of Schism, Foes of Peace

Thus do you repudiate the blessedness deserved by him who walked not in the counsel of the wicked, and did not stand in the way of sinners, and sat not on the Chair of Pestilence.¹ Your fathers walked in the counsel of the ungodly, to divide the Church. They also walked in the way of sinners, when they strove to divide Christ, whose garments not even the Jews would rend, though the Apostle Paul cries out and says:
‘Is then Christ divided?’²

Would that your fathers, after having already walked in the evil way, had recognised their sin, and turned back upon themselves; would that they had set right their wicked deeds; would that they had recalled the Peace³ which they had put to flight.

That would have been to turn back on their way, for on the way we have to walk, not stand still. But, since your fathers would not come back, it is certain that they stood in the way of sinners. They, whose steps had been impelled by mad wickedness, were held back, bound and benumbed by the spirit of strife; and, that they might not be able to return to better things, themselves placed the shackles of schism upon themselves, so that with obstinacy they stood in their error, and were not able to come back to the Peace which they had deserted. Nor did they listen to the Holy Spirit speaking in the thirty-third Psalm:
‘Turn away from evil and do good; seek Peace and pursue it’⁴;
but they stood in the way of their sins.

Your fathers also sat on the Chair of Pestilence, which, as we have said above, sends down to death those whom it has beguiled. But you, whilst by your zealous defence you pay homage to your fathers’ error, have made yourselves the heirs of their wickedness, when you might have been, though late, the sons of Peace. For it has been written in the Prophet Ezekiel:
‘Raise thy voice over the son of the sinner, that he follow not in his father’s footsteps, since the soul of the father is Mine and Mine is the soul of the son. The soul which sins, alone shall be punished.’⁵

If you would disown your fathers’ sin, they alone would have to give an account of their own deed.⁶ By acting thus, even you might be blessed and receive praise from the mouth of the Prophet, who says in the first Psalm:
‘Blessed is the man who hath not walked in the counsel of the ungodly nor stood in the way of sinners, and has not sat in the Chair of Pestilence, but has his will in the Law of the Lord.’⁷

What does it mean to have the ‘will in the Law,’ unless both to learn the divine precepts with piety, and fulfil them with fear----to have the will set on that Law in which it has been written (in the Gospel):
‘Peace on earth to men of good will,’⁸
and in another place (in Isaiah the Prophet⁹):
‘I will lay the foundations of peace in Sion,’
and in another (the eighty-fourth Psalm):
‘Let us see what the Lord shall say, for He shall speak peace to His people,’¹⁰
and in yet another (the seventy-fifth Psalm):
‘The Son of God has come, and His place has been set in peace,’¹¹
and again (in the seventy-first Psalm):
‘Let the mountains receive peace for the. people, and the hills justice,’¹²
and in the Gospel:
‘My peace I give to you, My peace I leave to you’¹³;
and Paul says:
‘He who sows peace, peace also shall he reap,’¹⁴
and in all his epistles¹⁵:
‘Let peace abound amongst you in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost’¹⁶;
and in the thirty-third Psalm:
‘Seek peace and thou shalt obtain it.’¹⁷

Peace had been put to flight¹⁸ by your fathers and departed. You ought to seek it as God has commanded, though, until now, you have neither been willing to seek it yourselves, nor to accept it, when it was freely offered to you.

For who is there in so many Provinces that has heard of whom you have been born,¹⁹ and (if there be anyone who had heard this) who is there that does not marvel at your error? Who is there that does not condemn your wickedness? Wherefore, since it is clear, yea, clearer than the light itself, that we are with so many peoples who cannot be numbered, and that so many countries are with us; whilst you see that you are to be found only in a portion of one country; and that you, by your errors, are separated from the Church; in vain do you claim for yourselves alone this name of the Church with her Endowments, which are rather with us than with you.

Now these Endowments are connected one with another, and are distinct, but in such a way, that it may be understood that one cannot be separated from another. For they are numerically distinct, but with one act of the mind we see them joined in their Body,²⁰ as are the fingers on the hand----each of which we perceive to be removed by spaces from the others. Therefore he who possesses one, must possess them all, since not one of them can be apart from its fellows.²¹

We may add that we possess----and that in the strictest sense----not one Endowment alone, but all.

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