De Consideratione

1. The end of the previous book suggests the beginning of this. And so, according to my promise, we must consider the things that are under you. You cannot think it necessary to ask me what they are, Eugenius, best of priests; it were better perhaps to ask what they are not. If a man wishes to discover what does belong to your charge, he must go out of the world. Your progenitors were destined to vanquish the whole world, not certain portions of it. ‘Go ye into all the world’¹ was the command given to them. They indeed sold their garments and bought swords, fiery eloquence, and an ardent spirit, weapons powerful in the sight of God. Whither did not those illustrious conquerors come, those sons of the mighty?² Whither did they not send their sharp arrows with hot scorching coals?³ Indeed their sound went forth into all the earth and their words to the ends of the world.⁴ Those words of flaming fire which the Lord sent into the earth made men's hearts glow in their inmost depths. Those indefatigable warriors fell on the field of battle, but they fell unconquered : even in death they triumphed. Their sovereignty was established beyond measure :⁵ they were made princes in all lands.⁶ You have succeeded to their inheritance. So you are their heir, and the world is your inheritance. But the exact nature of your interest and theirs in this heritage is a matter for sober and careful consideration. For I do not think you have inherited the world absolutely, but with certain limitations ; as it seems to me you have been entrusted with a stewardship over it, not put in possession of it. If you go on to usurp possession, He withstands you who says 'Mine is the world and the fulness thereof'.⁷ You are not the King of whom the prophet speaks—' And all the earth shall be His possession'.⁸ He means Christ, who claims possession both by right of creation, and by the merits of redemption, and by the gift of the Father. For to whom else has it been said, ' Ask of me and I will give thee the Gentiles for thine inheritance, and the utmost bounds of the earth for thy possession' ?⁹ Surrender possession and dominion to Him ; keep for yourself the care thereof. This is your share : put not forth your hand beyond it.

2. ' What ? ' you say, ' You grant me precedence : do you prohibit sovereignty ? ' Most certainly. You speak as if pre-eminence in watchful care were not good pre-eminence. Is not the farm in the care of the steward, and the child, though he be master, subject to the tutor ? Nevertheless, the steward does not own the farm, nor is the tutor master of his master. I would have you also so take precedence that you may provide, counsel, administer, serve. Let your precedence be profitable to others ; ¹⁰ take precedence like a faithful and wise servant ‘whom his Lord hath set over his household’.¹¹ For what purpose ? That you may ‘give them food in due season’ ; in other words, may manage, not command. Do this ; and inasmuch as you too are a man, do not aim at lording it over other men, lest all unrighteousness gain dominion over you.¹² But I have already pressed this upon you more than enough in discussing who you are. Yet I add this much ; for I dread no poison for you, no sword more than the lust of dominion. If you are not greatly deceived, you surely think you have received no more from the great apostle than I have said ; to claim this is to take much upon yourself. Recall the words of him who said ‘I am a debtor both to the wise and to the foolish’.¹³ And if your judgement tells you that the admonition is superfluous, please remember also that the offensive name of ‘debtor’ suits a servant better than a master. The servant in the Gospel was asked ‘How much owest thou unto my Lord ?’¹⁴ So then, if you acknowledge that you are not lord over the wise and the foolish, but a debtor to them, you must be exceedingly careful, and must with unceasing vigilance consider how those who lack wisdom may become wise, how the wise may be prevented from turning to folly, how those who have turned to folly may recover their senses. But no sort of folly, so to speak, is more foolish than unbelief. So then you are a debtor also to the unbelieving, both Jews and Gentiles.

3. We perceive then that you must strive to the utmost that they who have not faith may be turned to faith, that they who have turned may not turn aside, that they who have thus turned may turn back ; moreover, you must see that the perverse ones be set in the paths of uprightness, and the subverted recalled to truth ; that the subverters of men's souls may be convinced by invincible reason, so that they themselves, if possible, may either be cured of their errors, or, if that may not be, they may lose their authority, and the power of subverting other men. You must certainly not allow yourself to be imposed upon by the worst sort of foolish men, I mean heretics and schismatics ; for these are they who are subverted, and subvert ; they are dogs to tear, foxes to deceive. Men, I say, of this sort must be corrected with special care lest they perish, or must be restrained that they may not do damage. As regards the Jews, I grant time may be your excuse ; they have their fixed limit, which cannot be anticipated. The fullness of the Gentiles must first come in. But as regards the Gentiles themselves, what answer do you make ? Nay rather, what is the verdict of your consideration on this long delay ? Why did the fathers resolve to set bounds to the Gospel, and to check the word of faith, while men's hearts are hardening in unbelief ? Why, do we suppose, the word running very swiftly suddenly stopped ?¹⁵ Who was the first to forbid its life-giving progress ? Some unknown cause perhaps hindered them ; perhaps necessity compelled them.

4. Our pretences will not bear examination. Can we with confidence and a good conscience refrain from even offering Christ to those who have Him not ? Do we hold back the truth of God in unrighteousness ? The fullness of the Gentiles must certainly come some day. Are we waiting for the faith to fall from heaven upon them ? Who ever believed by accident ? How shall they believe without a preacher ?¹⁶ Peter was sent to Cornelius,¹⁷ Philip to the Eunuch;¹⁸ and if we seek a more modern instance, Augustine was appointed by Gregory of blessed memory to deliver the mould of faith to the English.¹⁹ Look at things from this point of view. A word more about the obstinacy of the Greeks who are with us, and yet are not with us; united by the bond of faith, and yet not on terms of peace.²⁰ Though, to speak accurately, they have in the matter of faith itself halted and wandered from the right paths. So also respecting heresy, which is quietly creeping in almost everywhere; in some cases is openly raging. For on all sides, and in public too, it is eager to swallow the Church's little ones.²¹ Do you ask where? Your own officials who often visit the South know where these heretics are, and can tell you. They go to and fro in their midst, or right through them, but what good they have so far done we have yet to learn. We might perhaps have heard of some good if the salvation of the people of Spain had not been as nought in comparison with gold. It is your duty to provide a remedy for this scourge also.

5. But there is a species of folly which has already nearly stultified the wisdom of faith itself. It is incredible to what an extent this venom has infected almost the whole Catholic Church. For while we are all of us seeking our own therein, it happens that envying one another, provoking one another, we are harassed till we hate one another, and are moved to do wrong; we arm ourselves for legal strife, quibble and sophisticate, rush into slanderous accusations, burst into maledictions, are oppressed by those who are stronger than ourselves, and in our turn oppress those who are weaker. How worthy and laudable an occupation for the meditation of your heart to discover some antidote for this deadly sort of folly, which you contemplate in possession of the very body of Christ, which is the blessed company of all faithful people! O ambition! the cross of the ambitious, how is it that though you torture all, you please all? Nothing causes more excruciating torment, or more vexing disquietude; and yet nothing creates more bustle and stir among mortal men than its affairs. Is it not true that the thresholds of the apostles are worn more by the footsteps of ambition than by those of devotion? Does not your palace all day long re-echo the tones of its voice? Is not the enriching of ambition the object of the whole toiling practice of the laws and canons? Is not all Italy a yawning gulf of insatiable avarice and rapacity for the spoils it offers? What is it, or rather what else is it, that, I will not even say cuts into, but cuts off your own spiritual pursuits? How often has this restless and disquieting mischief caused your holy and faithful leisure to miscarry! It is one thing for the oppressed to appeal to you; it is quite another for ecclesiastical ambition to make a tool of you by seating itself on the throne. You should not fail the former, nor in the least give way to the latter. Yet how iniquitously ambition is fostered, while the oppressed are scorned! Nevertheless you are a debtor to both, to the oppressed that you may lift them up, to the ambitious that you may put them down.