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Les prescriptions contre les Hérétiques

XIX.

Il ne faut donc pas en appeler aux Ecritures, ni hasarder un combat où la victoire sera toujours incertaines du moins le paraîtra. Mais quand même ce ne serait point là l'issue de toutes les disputes sur l'Ecriture, l'ordre des choses demanderait encore qu'on commençât par examiner, ce qui va nous occuper, à qui appartiennent les Ecritures, à qui appartient la foi, de qui elle est émanée, par qui, quand et à qui a été donnée la doctrine qui fait les Chrétiens? Car, où nous verrons la vraie foi, la vraie doctrine du Christianisme, là indubitablement se trouvent aussi les vraies Ecritures, les vraies interprétations, les vraies traditions chrétiennes.

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The Prescription Against Heretics

Chapter XIX.--Appeal, in Discussion of Heresy, Lies Not to the Scriptures. The Scriptures Belong Only to Those Who Have the Rule of Faith.

Our appeal, therefore, must not be made to the Scriptures; nor must controversy be admitted on points in which victory will either be impossible, ¹ or uncertain, or not certain enough. ² But even if a discussion from the Scriptures ³ should not turn out in such a way as to place both sides on a par, (yet) the natural order of things would require that this point should be first proposed, which is now the only one which we must discuss: "With whom lies that very faith to which the Scriptures belong. ⁴ From what and through whom, and when, and to whom, has been handed down that rule, ⁵ by which men become Christians?" For wherever it shall be manifest that the true Christian rule and faith shall be, there will likewise be the true Scriptures and expositions thereof, and all the Christian traditions.