In which Augustine replies to all the several statements in the letter of Petilianus, as though disputing with an adversary face to face.
Chapter 1
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That we made a full and sufficient answer to the first part of the letter of Petilianus, which was all that we had been able to find, will be remembered by all who were able to read or hear what we replied. But since the whole of it was afterwards found and copied by our brethren, and sent to us with the view that we should answer it as a whole, this task was one which our pen could not escape — not that he says anything new in it, to which answer has not been already made in many ways and at various times; but still, on account of the brethren of slower comprehension, who, when they read a matter in any place, cannot always refer to everything that has been said upon the same subject, I will comply with those who urge me by all means to reply to every point, and that as though we were carrying on the discussion face to face in the form of a dialogue. I will set down the words of his epistle under his name, and I will give the answer under my own name, as though it had all been taken down by reporters while we were debating. And so there will be no one who can complain either that I have passed anything over, or that they have been unable to understand it for want of distinction between the parties to the discussion; at the same time that the Donatists themselves, who are unwilling to argue the question in our presence, as is shown by the letters which they have circulated among their party, may thus not fail to find the truth answering them point by point, just as though they were discussing the matter with us face to face.
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In the very beginning of the letter Petilianus said: “Petilianus, a bishop, to his well-beloved brethren, fellow priests, and deacons, appointed ministers with us throughout our diocese in the gospel, grace be to you and peace, from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.”
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Augustine answered: I acknowledge the apostolic greeting. You see who you are that employ it, but see from what source you have learned what you say. For in these terms Paul salutes the Romans, and in the same terms the Corinthians, the Galatians, the Ephesians, the Colossians, the Philippians, the Thessalonians. What madness is it, therefore, to be unwilling to share the salvation of peace with those very Churches in whose epistles you learned its form of salutation?
Chapter 2
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Petilianus said: “Those who have polluted their souls with a guilty laver, under the name of baptism, reproach us with baptizing twice — than whose obscenity, indeed, any kind of filth is more cleanly, seeing that through a perversion of cleanliness they have come to be made fouler by their washing.”
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Augustine answered: We are neither made fouler by our washing, nor cleaner by yours. But when the water of baptism is given to any one in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, it is neither ours nor yours, but His of whom it was said to John, “Upon whom you shall see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, the same is He which baptizes with the Holy Ghost.”
Chapter 3
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Petilianus said: “For what we look to is the conscience of the giver, to cleanse that of the recipient.”
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Augustine answered: We therefore need have no anxiety about the conscience of Christ. But if you assert any man to be the giver, be he who he may, there will be no certainty about the cleansing of the recipient, because there is no certainty about the conscience of the giver.
Chapter 4
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Petilianus said: “For he who receives faith from the faithless, receives not faith but guilt.”
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Augustine answered: Christ is not faithless, from whom the faithful man receives not guilt but faith. For he believes in Him that justifies the ungodly, that his faith may be counted for righteousness.
Chapter 5
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Petilianus said: “For everything consists of an origin and root; and if it have not something for a head, it is nothing: nor does anything well receive second birth, unless it be born again of good seed.”
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Augustine answered: Why will you put yourself forward in the room of Christ, when you will not place yourself under Him? He is the origin, and root, and head of him who is being born, and in Him we feel no fear, as we must in any man, whoever he may be, lest he should prove to be false and of abandoned character, and we should be found to be sprung from an abandoned source, growing from an abandoned root, united to an abandoned head. For what man can feel secure about a man, when it is written, “Cursed be the man that trusts in man?” But the seed of which we are born again is the word of God, that is, the gospel. Whence the apostle says, “For in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel.” And yet he allows even those to preach the gospel who were preaching it not in purity, and rejoices in their preaching; because, although they were preaching it not in purity, but seeking their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ ‘s, yet the gospel which they preached was pure. And the Lord had said of certain of like character, “Whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not yet after their works: for they say, and do not.” If, therefore, what is in itself pure is preached in purity, then the preacher himself also, in that he is a partner with the word, has his share in begetting the believer; but if he himself be not regenerate, and yet what he preaches be pure, then the believer is born not from the barrenness of the minister but from the fruitfulness of the word.