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Hear, O Donatists, what the Catholic Church says to you: "O ye sons of men, how long will ye be slow of heart? why will ye love vanity, and follow after lies?" ¹ Why have you severed yourselves, by the heinous impiety of schism, from the unity of the whole world? You give heed to the falsehoods concerning the surrendering of the divine books to persecutors, which men who are either deceiving you, or are themselves deceived, utter in order that you may die in a state of heretical separation: and you do not give heed to what these divine books themselves proclaim, in order that you may live in the peace of the Catholic Church. Wherefore do you lend an open ear to the words of men who tell you things which they have never been able to prove, and are deaf to the voice of God speaking thus: "The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee. Ask of Me, and I shall give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession"? ² "To Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds,' as of many, but as of one, And to thy seed,' which is Christ." ³ And the promise to which the apostle refers is this: "In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." ⁴ Therefore lift up the eyes of your souls, and see how in the whole world all nations are blessed in Abraham's seed. Abraham, in his day, believed what was not yet seen; but you who see it refuse to believe what has been fulfilled. ⁵ The Lord's death was the ransom of the world; He paid the price for the whole world; and you do not dwell in concord with the whole world, as would be for your advantage, but stand apart and strive contentiously to destroy the whole world, to your own loss. Hear now what is said in the Psalm concerning this ransom: "They pierced my hands and my feet. I may tell all my bones; they look and stare upon me. They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture." ⁶ Wherefore will you be guilty of dividing the garments of the Lord, and not hold in common with the whole world that coat of charity, woven from above throughout, which even His executioners did not rend? In the same Psalm we read that the whole world holds this, for he says: "All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord, and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before Thee; for the kingdom is the Lord's, and He is the Governor among the nations." ⁷ Open the ears of your soul, and hear: "The mighty God, even the Lord, hath spoken, and called the earth, from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof; out of Zion, the perfection of beauty." ⁸ If you do not wish to understand this, hear the gospel from the Lord's own lips, how He said: "All things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning Him; and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem." ⁹ The words in the Psalm, "the earth from the rising of the sun unto the going down thereof," correspond to these in the Gospel, "among all nations;" and as He said in the Psalm, "from Zion, the perfection of beauty," He has said in the Gospel, "beginning at Jerusalem."