-- 145. Petilianus said: "Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.' You, our butchers, are the cause of mourning in others: you do not mourn yourselves."

146. Augustin answered: Consider for a short space to how many, and with what intensity, the cry of "Praises be to God," proceeding from your armed men, has caused others to mourn. [2159] Do you say again, What is that to us? Then I too will rejoin again your own words, What is that to us? What is it to all the nations of the earth? What is it to those who praise the name of the Lord from the rising of the sun to the setting of the same? What is it to all the earth, which sings a new song? What is it to the seed of Abraham, in which all the nations of the earth are blessed? [2160] And so the sacrilege of your schism is chargeable on you, just because the evil deeds of your companions are not chargeable on you; and because you are from this that the deeds of those on whose account you separated from the world, even if you proved your charges to be true, do not involve the world in sin.

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Footnotes:

[2159] The older editions have, "Quam multum et quantum luctum dederint Deo" (Erasmus alone ideo) laudes amatorum vestrorum:" "How much and how great grief have the praises of your lovers caused to God?" The Benedictines restored the reading translated above ("Quam multis...Deo laudes armatorum vestrorum"), Deo laudes being the cry of the Circumcelliones. Cp. Aug. in Psalm 132:6: "A quibus plus timetur Deo laudes quam fremitus leonis;" and ib.: "Deo laudes vestrum plorant homines."

[2160] Genesis 22:18.