Cyprian & Lactantius · a new plain-English translation from the original language
Letter 35. Cyprian to the presbyters and deacons residing at Rome, his brothers, greeting. Both our shared affection and plain reason demand, dearest brothers, that I withhold nothing from your knowledge of what is happening among us, so that we may share a common counsel regarding the good order of the church's administration. For after I sent you a letter by way of our brothers Saturus the reader and Optatus the subdeacon, a conspiracy of reckless daring arose among certain of the lapsed, who refuse to do penance and make satisfaction to God; they sent me a letter demanding not that peace be granted them but claiming it as though already granted, on the ground that, as they claim, Paul granted everyone peace — a claim you will find set out in their letter, a copy of which I have sent you. At the same time I have sent you what I briefly wrote back to them for the moment, and also the letter I subsequently sent to the clergy, so that you might know its contents; a copy of this too I have sent you. But if their recklessness is not checked by either my letters or yours, nor yields to wholesome counsel, we shall do what the Lord has commanded us to do according to the gospel. I wish you, dearest brothers, ever good health. Farewell.
Letter 36. The presbyters and deacons residing at Rome to Cyprian, their father, greeting. When we had read through your letter, brother, which you sent by Fortunatus the subdeacon, we were struck by a double grief and overwhelmed by a twofold sorrow: that no rest at all was granted you amid such pressing trials of persecution, and that the unrestrained insolence of the lapsed brothers was to be noted, carried as far as a dangerous recklessness of words. Yet although these things we have mentioned weighed heavily upon us and our spirit, still your vigor and the severity you have applied, in keeping with the gospel's discipline, tempers so grave a burden of our grief, since you both justly restrain the shamelessness of some and, by exhorting them to penance, show the way of lawful salvation. We were greatly astonished, indeed, that they wished to leap so far forward that, at so pressing and untimely and bitter a moment, amid so vast and immense a crime and offense, they did not so much seek peace for themselves as claim it — nay, even declared that they already possessed it in heaven. But if they have it, what are they asking for that they already hold? And if it is proved, by this very asking, that they do not have it, why do they not submit to the judgment of those from whom they thought peace — which plainly they do not have — must be sought? But should they suppose that they possess, from some other quarter, a special privilege of communion, they ought to weigh it against the gospel, so that only if it does not clash with the gospel's law will it stand secure. Yet how can what seems to stand against the gospel's decree offer a communion in keeping with the gospel? For since every privilege looks toward the grant of indulgence only insofar as it does not disagree with the one to which it seeks to be joined, it is necessary that, because it disagrees with the one to which it seeks to be joined, it lose the indulgence and privilege of that fellowship. Let them weigh, then, what it is they are undertaking here. Should they claim the gospel laid down one rule and the martyrs another, the martyrs themselves, by clashing with the gospel, would stand endangered on two fronts. For the gospel's majesty would seem already shattered and collapsed, were some newly invented decree able to override it; and the martyrs' heads would be stripped of confession's glorious crown, were it discovered that they had not won it through observing the gospel, the very source from which martyrs come — so that, rightly, no one has less standing to rule against the gospel than someone striving to earn the martyr's title by means of that same gospel. We should also like to have this made clear: supposing martyrs are made martyrs solely because, by declining to sacrifice, they held fast to the church's peace at the cost of their own blood being poured out, for fear that, worn down by the pain of torment, they would forfeit salvation along with that peace — on what basis, then, do they imagine that the salvation they themselves believed they would have forfeited by sacrificing should now be handed over to men reported to have sacrificed, when in others' cases they owe the very rule they had earlier appeared to set for themselves? In this matter we observe that the very thing they thought they were doing in their own favor they have in fact turned against themselves. For if the martyrs thought peace ought to be given to these people, why did they not give it themselves? Why did they judge that they should be referred back to the bishop, as they themselves say? For the one who orders a thing done is certainly able to do the very thing he orders done. But, as we understand it — indeed, as the matter itself speaks and cries out — the most holy martyrs judged that a measure of both modesty and truth should be applied on both sides. For since they were being pressed hard by many, in referring them to the bishop they thought they should have regard for their own sense of shame, so as not to be troubled any further; and by not themselves granting communion to these people, they judged that the untouched integrity of the gospel's law should be preserved. You, however, brother, for your own charity's sake, should never cease to temper the minds of the lapsed and to offer the healing of truth to those who err, even though a sick mind is apt to spurn the diligence of those who tend it. This wound of the lapsed is still fresh, and the injury is still rising into swelling. And therefore we are confident that, as time draws on and this violent impulse grows old, they will come to love this very medicine as trustworthy, once it has been applied to them — provided only that there are none to arm them for their own peril, and who, instructing them wrongly, demand for them, in place of the healthful remedies of delay, the deadly poisons of a hastened communion. For we do not believe that all of them would have dared to claim peace for themselves so insolently without some instigation from certain persons. We know the faith of the church of Carthage, we know its training, we know its humility. Hence we were also surprised that we had to note certain things inserted rather harshly among you in a letter, when we have often learned, by many examples of reciprocal affection, of your mutual love and charity for one another. It is time, then, for them to do penance for their offense, to prove the sorrow of their fall, to show shame, to display humility, to exhibit modesty, so that submission on their part might summon God's clemency, and honor rendered to his priest might draw divine mercy down upon them. Their plea, indeed, would have carried far greater weight had the humility of those still standing firm reinforced the prayers made for them, for a petition succeeds all the more readily when the one on whose behalf it is offered truly merits its success. As for the matter concerning Privatus of Lambaesis, you have acted after your custom, wishing to report to us a matter that gave you concern; for it is fitting that all of us keep watch over the whole body of the church, whose members are spread through the several provinces. But even before your letter, the deceit of that cunning man could not remain hidden from us. For when a certain agent of his wickedness, Futurus, his standard-bearer, had come here before and tried fraudulently to draw a letter out of us, he did not go unrecognized, nor did he obtain the letter he wanted. We wish you ever good health.
Letter 37. Cyprian to Moyses and Maximus, presbyters, and the rest of the confessors, brothers, greeting. Celerinus, on his arrival, presented all of you together and each of you singly to our affections, dearest brothers — companion of your faith and courage, and glorious soldier of God in your struggles. We beheld all of you present in him as he came, and as he spoke to us warmly, again and again, about your affection toward me, hearing his words was hearing you yourselves. I rejoice greatly and abundantly whenever such news is brought to me by such men. We too are with you there in prison in a certain sense; we believe we share in the ornaments of divine favor along with you, we who cling so closely to your hearts. Your undivided love binds us to your honor; the Spirit does not allow affection to be separated. Confession encloses you there, affection encloses me here. And indeed we are mindful of you day and night, and whenever we offer prayer in the sacrifices along with many others, and when in private we pray in seclusion, we ask for you the Lord's full favor along with crowns and praises. But to return you the like, our own mediocrity falls short. You give more when you remember us in prayer — you who, hoping now only for heavenly things and meditating only on the divine, ascend by the very delay of your suffering to loftier heights, and by the long passage of time do not diminish your glories but increase them. A first and single confession makes one blessed; yet each time you are invited to quit the prison and instead choose it anew through faith and courage, you confess all over again. Your praises are as many as your days; as many circuits of the months, so many increases of merit. Whoever suffers a single blow wins victory only once; but the one who stays continually amid his torments, grappling with pain yet never overcome, earns a fresh crown each day. Let the magistrates now, and the consuls or proconsuls, glory in the emblems of their yearly rank and their twelve fasces: behold, a heavenly rank has been marked in you with the splendor of an annual honor, and, through the enduring span of a victory's glory, it has now outlasted the cycle of a full year come round again. Sun rising and moon coursing once lit the world; yet within your prison, he who fashioned sun and moon alike shone on you as a brighter light, and in your hearts and minds the brightness of Christ, shining out, poured its eternal and radiant light upon the darkness of that place of punishment, dreadful and deadly to others. Winter passed through the changing months; but you, shut in, weighed the season of winter against the winter of persecution. After winter came the mild air of spring, glad with roses and crowned with flowers; but for you roses and flowers came from the delights of paradise, and heavenly garlands crowned your heads. Behold, summer is now fruitful with the abundance of harvest, and the threshing floor is full of grain; but you, who sowed glory, reap the fruit of glory, and, set upon the Lord's threshing floor, you watch the chaff being burned with unquenchable fire, while you yourselves, already tested and stored like cleansed grains of wheat and precious kernels, count the shelter of your prison as a granary. Nor does autumn lack, for you, the grace of a spiritual season for performing its offices. Outside, the vintage is being pressed and the grape trodden in the winepresses for wine that will fill future cups; you, rich clusters from the Lord's vineyard, grapes already ripe with fruit, trodden by the assault of this world's oppression, feel our winepress in the twisting of your prison, and instead of wine you pour out blood — strong for the endurance of suffering, you gladly drain the cup of martyrdom. So the year unfolds among the servants of God; so the turning of the seasons is kept with spiritual merits and heavenly rewards. Blessed enough are those among you who, passing through these traces of glory, have already departed from this world, and, having finished their course of courage and faith, have come to the embrace and kiss of the Lord, the Lord himself rejoicing. But your glory too is no less — you who, still standing in the contest and destined to follow the glories of your companions, wage the battle a long while, and, unshaken and unmoved in steady faith, offer to God each day a spectacle through your virtues. The longer your fight, the loftier your crown; it is one contest, but built up out of a manifold number of battles. You conquer hunger and despise thirst, and by the strength of your vigor you tread down the squalor of the prison and the horror of that place of punishment. There, pain is subdued, torment is crushed, and death is not feared but desired, for the prize of immortality naturally overpowers it, granting the victor the honor of everlasting life. What a spirit is now in you, how lofty, how capacious a breast, where such and so great things are turned over, where nothing is thought of but the commands of God and the rewards of Christ! There the will is only God's, and though you are still placed in the flesh, the life now being lived is no longer that of the present age but of the age to come. Now, most blessed brothers, be mindful of me, so that among your great and divine thoughts you turn us too over in mind and spirit, and let me be present in your prayers and petitions, when that voice, illustrious through the purity of confession and praiseworthy through the steady course of its own honor, reaches the ears of God, and, with heaven opened to it from these subjugated parts of the world, and, sent upward to the realms above, secures from the Lord's goodness whatever it requests. Indeed, is there anything you might seek from the Lord's kindness that you would fail to merit — you who have so kept the Lord's commands, who have held to the gospel's discipline with the sincere vigor of faith, who, standing firm with the Lord's precepts and his apostles in the uncorrupted honor of courage, have, through the genuineness of your martyrdom, steadied many an unsteady believer? True witnesses to the gospel, and true martyrs of Christ, rooted in its foundations, built upon the rock with solid mass, you have joined discipline with courage, you have summoned others toward reverence for God, turning your own martyrdoms into models for them. I wish you, most courageous and most blessed brothers, ever good health, and that you remember us.
Letter 38. Greeting from Cyprian, addressed jointly to the presbyters, the deacons, and the whole assembled people. When ordaining clergy, dearest brothers, we are accustomed to let divine testimonies go before you first. Our brother Aurelius, an illustrious young man — one the Lord has already approved and God holds dear — is still young in years but advanced in the praise of courage and faith — lesser in the endowment of his age but greater in honor — has fought a double contest: he has confessed twice, and twice been made glorious by the victory of his confession. When he conquered in the first course, he was driven into exile; and when he fought again in a still fiercer contest, he emerged both triumphant and victorious from that struggle of suffering. Every time the adversary chose to test God's servants, this most eager and most courageous soldier met the challenge and won. Merely having contended earlier, when only a few looked on, at the time of his being sent into exile, was not enough for him; he earned the right to contend also in the public forum with more distinguished courage, so that after the magistrate and proconsul he might conquer, and after exile overcome torments too. Nor can I decide which deserves greater praise in him: the splendor of his wounds, or the humility of his bearing; whether he is more notable for the honor of his courage or more praiseworthy for the admiration his shame deserves — so exalted is he in dignity and so humble in modesty, that he seems to have been kept back by providence as a model for the rest, teaching the church's discipline — how God's servants win by courage in confession, then distinguish themselves afterward by how they conduct their lives. He has read the words of Christ, source of all martyrs, and now mounts the reader's platform after having stood in the arena of torture; there he was a spectacle before a crowd of pagans, here he is seen by his own brothers; there his voice drew the astonishment of onlooking strangers, here it draws the delight of the brotherhood. Be assured, then, dearest brothers, that I have ordained him along with the colleagues present with me — news I know you will welcome gladly, wishing that our church might ordain as many men of this sort as it can. And because gladness is always eager and joy cannot tolerate waiting, he has already read for us on the Lord's day — that is, he has inaugurated peace, in dedicating the reading. Keep steadfastly at your prayers, and support our petitions with your own, so that the Lord's mercy, favoring us, may soon restore both a priest safe and sound to his people, and, along with the priest, a reader who is a martyr. I wish you, dearest brothers, ever good health, in God the Father and Christ Jesus.