Chapter 2 [II.]—He Receives with a Kindly and Patient Feeling the Books of a Young and Inexperienced Man Who Wrote Against Him in a Tone of Arrogance. Vincentius Victor Converted from the Sect of the Rogatians.

I am somewhat pained, however, at being thus far less understood by your Holiness than I should like to be; forasmuch as you supposed that I should so receive your communication, as if you did me an injury, by making known to me what another had done. You may see, indeed, how far this feeling is from my mind, in that I have no complaint to make of having suffered any wrong even from him. For, when he entertained views different from my own, was he bound to preserve silence? It ought, no doubt, to be even pleasant to me, that he broke silence in such a way as to put it in our power to read what he had to say. He ought, I certainly think, to have written simply to me, rather than to another concerning me; but as he was unknown to me, he did not venture to intrude personally on me in refuting my words. He thought there was no necessity for applying to me in a matter on which he seemed to himself least of all liable to be doubted, 2    [The Edinburgh translator conjectures minime dubitandam here: “on which he seemed to himself to be holding no doubtful, but a perfectly well-known and certain opinion.”—W.] but to be holding a perfectly well-known and certain opinion. He moreover, acted in obedience to a friend of his by whom he tells us he was compelled to write. And if he expressed any sentiment during the controversy which was contumelious to me, I would prefer supposing that he did this, not with any wish to treat me with incivility, but from the necessity of thinking differently from me. For in all cases where a person’s animus towards one is indeterminate and unknown, I think it better to suppose the existence of the kindlier motive, than to find fault with an undiscovered one. Perhaps, too, he acted from love to me, as knowing that what he had written might possibly reach me; being at the same time unwilling that I should be in error on such points as he especially thinks himself to be free from error regarding. I ought, therefore, to be grateful for his kindness, although I feel obliged to disapprove of his opinion. Accordingly, as regards the points on which he does not entertain right views, he appears to me to deserve gentle correction rather than severe disapproval; more especially because, if I am rightly informed, he has lately become a catholic—a matter in which he is to be congratulated. For he has freed himself from the schism and errors of the Donatists (or rather the Rogatists) in which he was previously implicated; and if he understands the catholic verity as he ought, we may really rejoice at his conversion.

CAPUT II.

2. Sed hinc angor paululum, quod adhuc tuae Sanctitati minus quam vellem cognitus sum: quandoquidem putasti me sic accepturum, quasi tu mihi injuriam feceris, notum faciendo quod alius fecit. Quantum autem hoc absit ab animo meo, vide, ut ne ab illo quidem me passum injuriam conquerar. Cum enim aliter quaedam quam ego saperet, numquidnam debuit reticere? Unde mihi gratum esse debet, quod ita non tacuit, ut id etiam legere possimus. Deberet quidem tantum scribere potius ad me, quam ad alterum de me: sed quod mihi esset ignotus, non est ausus se mihi ingerere in meorum refutatione dictorum. Nec consulendum me putavit, ubi sibi videtur minime dubitandum, sed plane cognitam et certam tenere sententiam. Obtemperavit autem amico suo, a quo se, ut scriberet, dicit esse compulsum. Et si quid inter disputandum, quod in meam contumeliam redundaret, 0476 expressit; non eum conviciantis voluntate crediderim, sed diversa sentientis necessitate fecisse. Ubi enim mihi animus erga me hominis ignotus est et incertus, melius arbitror meliora sentire, quam inexplorata culpare. Fortassis enim amore mei fecit, sciens ad me pervenire posse quod scripsit; dum in eis rebus errare me non vult, in quibus se potius errare non putat. Et ideo debeo etiam ejus habere gratam benevolentiam, cujus me necesse est improbare sententiam: ac per hoc in eis quae non recte sapit, adhuc leniter corrigendus mihi videtur, non aspere detestandus; praesertim quia, sicut audio, nuper catholicus factus est, quod ei gratulandum est. Caruit enim Donatistarum vel potius Rogatistarum divisione et errore, quo antea tenebatur: si tamen catholicam veritatem sicut oportet intelligat, ut vere de illius conversione gaudeamus.