Galatians 6:5

5. Here perhaps you will be disposed, under the exigencies of debate, to attempt to defend Optatus. Do not so, I beseech you; do not so, my brother: it would not become you; and if it would perchance be seemly for any one to do it (though, in fact, nothing is seemly which is wrong), it assuredly would be unseemly for Emeritus to defend Optatus. Perhaps you reply that it would as little become you to accuse him. Granted, by all means. Take, then, the course which lies between defending and accusing him. …

54. Or do you say, Theft is one thing, delivery of the sacred books or persecution is another? I grant there is a difference, nor is it worth while now to show wherein that difference consists. But listen to the summary of the argument. If he could not make you a thief, because his thieving was displeasing in your sight, who can make men traditors or murderers to whom such treachery or murder is abhorrent? First, then, confess that you share in all the evil of Optatus, whom you knew, and even so reproach me with any evil which was found in those whom I knew not. And do not say to me, But my charges are serious, yours but trifling. You must first acknowledge them, however trifling they may be in your case, not before I on my side confess the charges against me, but before I can allow you to say these serious things about me at all. …

84. Augustin answered: As a matter of fact, not only do you not prove us to be traditors , but neither did your fathers prove that our fathers were guilty of that sin; though, even if that had been proved, the consequence would have been that they would not be our fathers, according to your earlier assertion, seeing that we had not followed their deeds: yet neither should we on their account be severed from the companionship of unity, and from the seed of Abraham, in which all nations of the earth are blessed. …

221. Augustin answered: O most ingenious dilemma, or rather most foolish verbosity! Is it not usual for the choice of two alternatives to be offered to an antagonist, when it is impossible that he should adopt both? For if you should offer me the choice of the two propositions, that I should say either that we were innocent, or that we were guilty; or, again, of the other pair of propositions, viz., those concerning you, I could not escape choosing either one or the other. But as it is, you offer me the choice of these two, whether we are innocent or you are guilty, and wish me to say which of these two I choose for my reply. But I refuse to make a choice; for I assert them both, that we are innocent, and that you are guilty. …

Chapter 5. 6. Do you, therefore, holy scions of our one Catholic mother, beware with all the watchfulness of which you are capable, in due submission to the Lord, of the example of crime and error such as this. With however great light of learning and of reputation he may shine, however much he may boast himself to be a precious stone, who endeavors to lead you after him, remember always that that brave woman who alone is lovely only to her husband, whom holy Scripture portrays to us in the last chapter of the Book of Proverbs, is more precious than any precious stones. Let no one say, I will follow such an one, for it was even he that made me a Christian; or, I will follow such an one, for it was even he that baptized me. …

Chapter 39. 45. But as for you, when the case of the followers of Maximianus is brought up against you, who, after being condemned by the sentence of a Council of 310 bishops; after being utterly defeated in the same Council, quoted in the records of so many proconsuls, in the chronicles of so many municipal towns; after being driven forth from the basilicas of which they were in possession, by the order of the judges, enforced by the troops of the several cities, were yet again received with all honor by you, together with those whom they had baptized outside the pale of your communion, without any question respecting their baptism, when confronted, I say, with their case, you can find no reply to make. …

72. And there are many other words which do not retain one uniform signification, but are introduced so as to suit a variety of connections, and thus are understood in a variety of ways, and sometimes, indeed, are adopted along with an explanation. We have an example in the saying, “Be not children in understanding; howbeit in malice be ye little children, that in understanding ye may be perfect.” For here is a sentence which, in a brief and pregnant form, might have been expressed thus: “Be ye not children; howbeit be ye children.” The same is the case with the words, “If any man among you thinketh himself to be wise in this world, let him become a fool that he may be wise.” For what else is the statement there but this: “Let him not be wise, that he may be wise”? Moreover, the sentences are sometimes so put as to exercise the judgment of the inquirer. …

But if thou sayest, “What? hath he no understanding?” thou shalt hear from me that he hath not: drunken as he is with his passion. For if in the heathen courts of justice, those who are injured must not speak for themselves while glowing with wrath; (although there be no fault in that kind of sympathy;) how much more those whom evil habit holds in subjection. Wherefore I say that manifold as his wisdom may be, he hath not his mind awake. For what can be wiser than David, the man who said, “The dark and the hidden things of Thy wisdom Thou hast made known unto me?” ( Ps. li. 6 . ap. LXX. l. 6.) But when he looked on the wife of the soldier with unjust eyes, then according to what he himself said ( Ps. cvii. 27 .) of those who sail on the raging sea, “all his wisdom was swallowed up;” and he stood in need of others to correct him, and did not even perceive amidst what evils he was. …

Ver. 5 . “For each man shall bear his own burden.” He appears to state a reason prohibitory of boasting against another; but at the same time he corrects the boaster, to that he may no more entertain high thoughts of himself by bringing to his remembrance his own errors, and pressing upon his conscience the idea of a burden, and of being heavily laden.