Translation Hide
Against Vigilantius

8.

Does the bishop of Rome do wrong when he offers sacrifices to the Lord over the venerable bones of the dead men Peter and Paul, as we should say, but according to you, over a worthless bit of dust, and judges their tombs worthy to be Christ’s altars? And not only is the bishop of one city in error, but the bishops of the whole world, who, despite the tavern-keeper Vigilantius, enter the basilicas of the dead, in which “a worthless bit of dust and ashes lies wrapped up in a cloth,” defiled and defiling all else. Thus, according to you, the sacred buildings are like the sepulchres of the Pharisees, whitened without, while within they have filthy remains, and are full of foul smells and uncleanliness. And then he dares to expectorate his filth upon the subject and to say: “Is it the case that the souls of the martyrs love their ashes, and hover round them, and are always present, lest haply if any one come to pray and they were absent, they could not hear?” Oh, monster, who ought to be banished to the ends of the earth! do you laugh at the relics of the martyrs, and in company with Eunomius, the father of this heresy, slander the Churches of Christ? Are you not afraid of being in such company, and of speaking against us the same things which he utters against the Church? For all his followers refuse to enter the basilicas of Apostles and martyrs, so that, forsooth, they may worship the dead Eunomius, whose books they consider are of more authority than the Gospels; and they believe that the light of truth was in him just as other heretics maintain that the Paraclete came into Montanus, and say that Manichæus himself was the Paraclete. You cannot find an occasion of boasting even in supposing that you are the inventor of a new kind of wickedness, for your heresy long ago broke out against the Church. It found, however, an opponent in Tertullian, a very learned man, who wrote a famous treatise which he called most correctly Scorpiacum , ¹ because, as the scorpion bends itself like a bow to inflict its wound, so what was formerly called the heresy of Cain pours poison into the body of the Church; it has P. 421 slept or rather been buried for a long time, but has been now awakened by Dormitantius. I am surprised you do not tell us that there must upon no account be martyrdoms, inasmuch as God, who does not ask for the blood of goats and bulls, much less requires the blood of men. This is what you say, or rather, even if you do not say it, you are taken as meaning to assert it. For in maintaining that the relics of the martyrs are to be trodden under foot, you forbid the shedding of their blood as being worthy of no honour.

Edition Hide
Contra Vigilantium liber unus

8.

Romanus Episcopus super corpora apostolorum offert sacrificia. Vigilantii stulta sententia vel objectio. Eunomius auctor haereseos contra reliquias. Montanus. Tertulliani Scorpiacus liber. Caina haeresis instaurata.—Male facit ergo Romanus episcopus, qui super mortuorum hominum Petri et Pauli, secundum nos ossa veneranda, secundum te vilem pulvisculum, offert Domino sacrificia, et tumulos eorum Christi arbitratur altaria? Et non solum unius urbis, sed totius orbis errant episcopi, qui cauponem Vigilantium contemnentes, ingrediuntur basilicas mortuorum, in quibus pulvis vilissimus et favilla, nescio quae, jacet linteamine convoluta: ut polluta omnia polluat: et quasi sepulcra pharisaica foris dealbata sint cum intus immundo cinere, juxta te, immunda omnia oleant atque sordeant. Et post haec de barathro pectoris sui coenosam spurcitiam evomens, aut dicere: "Ergo cineres suos amant animae martyrum, et circumvolant eos, semperque praesentes sunt; ne forte si aliquis precator [Al. peccator] advenerit, absentes audire non possint?" O portentum in terras ultimas deportandum! Rides de reliquiis martyrum, et cum auctore hujus haereseos Eunomio, Ecclesiis Christi calumniam struis: nec tali societate terreris, ut eadem contra nos loquaris, quae ille contra Ecclesiam loquitur? Omnes enim sectatores ejus basilicas apostolorum et martyrum non ingrediuntur, ut scilicet mortuum adorent Eunomium, cujus libros majoris auctoritatis arbitrantur, quam Evangelia; et in ipso credunt esse lumen veritatis: sicut aliae haereses paracletum in Montanum venisse contendunt, et Manichaeum ipsum dicunt esse paracletum. Scribit adversum haeresim tuam, quae olim erupit adversum Ecclesiam (ne et in hoc quasi repertor novi sceleris glorieris) Tertullianus vir eruditissimus insigne volumen, quod Scorpiacum vocat rectissimo nomine: quia arcuato vulnere in Ecclesiae corpus venena diffundit, quae olim appellabatur Caina haeresis: et multo tempore dormiens vel sepulta, nunc a Dormitantio suscitata est. Miror, quod non dicas, nequaquam perpetranda martyria, Deum enim qui sanguinem hircorum taurorumque non quaerat, multo magis hominum non requirere. Quod cum dixeris; immo et si non dixeris, ita haberis quasi dixeris. Qui enim reliquias martyrum asseris esse calcandas, prohibes sanguinem fundi, qui nullo honore dignus est.