Augustine, Sermones 164-170 (Classis I, de Scripturis)

Sermon CLXIV. On the words of the Apostle, Gal. 6:2-5, Bear one another's burdens: and on these, Each one shall bear his own burden. Against the Donatists, delivered shortly after the Conference held at Carthage.

Chapter I. — 1. The law of Christ is fulfilled by those who bear one another's burdens. Truth admonishes all of us through the Apostle that we should bear one another's burdens: and in the very place where it admonishes us to bear one another's burdens, it shows with what fruit we are to do this, adding and saying, And so you will fulfil the law of Christ: which will not be fulfilled unless we bear one another's burdens. What these burdens are, and how they are to be borne,

since indeed we all ought, according to our strength, to try to fulfil the law of Christ, I shall try, with the Lord's help, to show. What I have proposed to demonstrate, remember to demand of me; and when I have paid it, do not demand it again. This is what I have proposed to demonstrate, with the Lord helping my intention and your prayers for me: what are the burdens which the Apostle bids us bear for one another, and how they are to be borne. If we do this, that in which he placed the fruit will follow of its own accord, namely that we fulfil the law of Christ.

2. The burdens are to be distinguished. Someone says: So the apostle spoke obscurely, that you should try to explain what these burdens are, or how they are to be borne for one another? There is a question there which compels us to distinguish the burdens. For indeed in that very chapter of the reading you have it set down there: But each one will bear his own burden. So now it occurs to your minds: If each one will bear his own burden, how does he say, Bear your burdens for one another? Only because the burdens are to be distinguished, lest the Apostle be thought to say things contrary to himself. For not far off, not in another Epistle, not in this very one far above or below, but in that very place, so that the same words are adjacent to each other, he set down both: both that each one will bear his own burden, and what he admonished and exhorted, that we bear our burdens for one another.

Chapter II. — 3. Two kinds of burdens. There are, then, some burdens in which each one bears his own, and one does not bear them with another, nor throw them onto another; and there are other burdens in which you rightly say to a brother, I bear with you, or, I bear for you. If, then, there is need of distinction, the understanding is not easy. Against those, then, who thought that a man could be defiled by the sins of others, the Apostle answered, Each one will bear his own burden. Again, against those into whom negligence might creep through this, so that, made as it were secure because they would not be defiled by the sins of others, they would care to correct no one, Bear your burdens for one another. It has been said briefly and distinguished briefly; and, as far as I judge, this has not hindered the manifestation of the truth. For you both heard it briefly and understood it quickly. Your hearts I have not seen, but I have heard your voices, the witnesses of your hearts. Now, then, as being secure about what has been understood, let us discuss it somewhat more broadly; not so that something to be understood may be instilled, but so that what has been understood may be commended.

4. Each one's own burdens are his sins. Christ the preacher to the world. The burdens which each one bears as his own are sins. To men carrying these packs of detestable burdens and sweating under them in vain, the Lord says: Come to Me, all you who labour and are burdened, and I will refresh you. How does He refresh those burdened with sins, except by the forgiveness of sins? The preacher to the world cries out from a kind of watchtower of lofty authority: Hear, O human race; hear, sons of Adam; hear, race full of toil and without fruit: I see your labour, see My gift. I know, you labour and are burdened; and, what is more wretched, you bind pernicious packs upon your shoulders; and besides this, what is worse, you ask that burdens be added to you, not laid down.

Chapter III.—5. The burden of avarice. The burden of sloth. Which of us can in a short time discuss the multiplicity and variety of these packs? Yet let us call a few of them to mind, and from these let us infer the rest. See a man loaded with the pack of avarice; see him under this pack sweating, panting, thirsting, and by labouring adding to the pack. What do you expect, O avaricious man, embracing your burden and binding the evil pack upon your shoulders with the chains of cupidity? What do you expect? Why do you labour? What do you gape after? What do you covet? To satisfy avarice, surely. O empty wishes and most wicked deeds! So you expect to satisfy avarice? It can weigh you down; you cannot satisfy it. Or perhaps it is not heavy? Have you lost even your senses to such a degree under this pack? Is avarice not heavy? Why then does it rouse you from sleep, it which sometimes does not even let you sleep? And perhaps you have along with it another burden, that of sloth, and these two most wicked burdens, fighting each other as well, weigh you down and tear you apart. For they do not command the same things, they do not order like things. Sloth says, Sleep; avarice says, Get up. Sloth says, Do not endure cold days; avarice says, Bear even storms at sea. The one says, Rest; the other does not let you rest. It orders not only, Go forth, but also, Sail across the sea, seek lands you do not know. Goods must be carried to India: you do not know the language of the Indians, but the speech of avarice seems intelligible. You will come, unknown, to one unknown; you give, you receive, you buy, you carry; through dangers you arrived, with dangers you return; tossed by a storm at sea you cry out, God, deliver me. Do you not hear Him answering, Why? Did I send you? Avarice ordered you to acquire what you did not have; I ordered you to give to a poor man, without labour, before your own door, what you had. It sent you to the Indians to bring back gold; I placed Christ at your door, from Whom you might buy the kingdom of heaven. You labour at the order of avarice; at my order you do not labour. We both gave orders; you did not hear me: let the one you obeyed deliver you.

Chapter IV.—6. In place of the packs of cupidity, the packs of charity are to be taken up. How many carry these packs? How many, set beneath them, cry out as I now speak against those very packs? With packs they came in, with packs they go out: avaricious they entered, avaricious they depart. I have laboured in speaking against these packs. If you cry out, put down what you carry. Finally, do not listen to me; listen to your Commander crying out, Come to me, all you who labour and are burdened. For you do not come unless you cease labouring. You wish to run to me, but with heavy packs you cannot. Come, He says, to me, all you who labour and are burdened, and I will refresh you. I grant pardon for past sins, I will take away what was pressing on your eyes, I will heal what has harmed your shoulders. I will indeed take away the packs, but I will not send you away empty of packs: I will take away the bad packs and put on good ones. For when He had said, And I will refresh you, He added, Take my yoke upon you. Cupidity had subjugated you to your harm; let charity subjugate you to your salvation.

7. What Christ the teacher wishes to be learned from Him. The burden of Christ is light.—Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me. If every human teaching, of whatever kind, has lost its worth for you, learn from Me. Christ the teacher cries out, the only Son of God, alone truthful, true, the Truth cries out, Learn from Me. What? Because in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and all things were made through Him (John 1:1–3)? Shall we be able to learn this from Him: to fashion the world, to fill heaven with lights, to order the alternations of day and night, to command times and ages to run their course, to give power to seeds, to fill the earth with animals? None of these things does the heavenly teacher bid us learn: these He does as God.

Chapter V. — But since He who is God deigned also to be man, in that He is God, listen so that you may be restored; in that He is man, listen so that you may imitate. Learn, He says, from Me; not to fashion the world and to create natures: nor indeed those other things which He performed here, God hidden, man made manifest; nor does He say, Learn from Me to drive fevers out of the sick, to put demons to flight, to raise the dead, to command winds and waves, to walk upon the waters: nor does He say this, Learn from Me. For these things He gave to some of His disciples, and to some He did not give them: but this, Learn from Me, He says to all; from this precept let no one excuse himself: Learn from Me, for I am meek and humble of heart. Why do you hesitate to carry this burden? Is this burden heavy, humility and piety? Is this burden heavy, faith, hope, charity? For these make one humble, these make one meek. And see that you will not be weighed down, if you listen to Him. For My yoke is gentle, and My burden is light (Matt. 11:28–30). What does is light mean? What if it has weight, but less? Avarice has more, justice less? I do not want you to understand it so. This burden is not the weight of one weighed down, but the wings of one about to fly. For birds too have the burdens of their feathers. And what do we say? They carry them, and they are carried. They carry them on the earth, they are carried by them in the sky. If you should wish to show mercy to a bird, especially in summer, and should say, Its feathers weigh down this poor little bird, and should take away this burden, the bird you wished to help will remain on the ground. Carry therefore the feathers of peace, take up the wings of charity. This is the burden; thus will the law of Christ be fulfilled.

Chapter VI. — 8. Each one carries the burden of his own cupidity or of his own charity. The burdens are distinct. See now, some avaricious man or other comes in: you know him to be avaricious, he stands beside you, and you are not avaricious; but you are merciful as well, you give to the poor what you have, you do not gape after the things you do not have; you hear the Apostle saying, Charge the rich of this world not to be high-minded, nor to hope in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God, Who provides us with all things abundantly to enjoy: let them be rich in good works, let them give readily, let them share, let them treasure up for themselves a good foundation for the future, so that they may lay hold of true life (1 Tim. 6:17–19). You have heard, you have recognized, you have learned, you have held fast, you have done it. Do what you are doing, do not grow sluggish,

do not cease. He who has persevered to the end, he shall be saved (Matt. 10:22). You have done good to a man, and the man is ungrateful: do not repent of having done good, lest by repenting you pour out what you filled by showing mercy. Say in your heart: He does not see, this man for whom I did it; He sees, for Whose sake I did it; for if this man saw, if he were not ungrateful, he would profit himself rather than me. Let me hold fast to God, from Whom what I do is not hidden; not only what I do, but also what I do in the heart: let me hope for Him as rewarder, Who does not seek a witness of my deed. You are such a man, and perhaps among the people of God there stands beside you a greedy robber, gaping after the things of others. You know him to be such, and he is one of the faithful, or rather he is called one of the faithful; you cannot drive him out of the church, you have no means of access to correct him by chastising and rebuking, and he is about to come up to the altar with you: do not fear; Each one shall carry his own burden. Remember the Apostle, so that you may come up free of care: Each one shall carry his own burden. Only let him not say to you, Carry with me. For if you are willing to share avarice with him, the burden will not be lessened, but two will be weighed down. Let him therefore carry his own pack, and you yours: since when your Lord shook such a pack from your shoulders, He laid on another; He shook off the pack of cupidity, He laid on the pack of charity. Therefore, according to evil desires, each one carries his own pack, the evil man an evil one, the good man a good one.

Chapter VII. — 9. The burdens that are to be shared. Poverty, a burden. Riches, a burden. Turn now also to that precept, Carry one another's burdens. For you have the pack of Christ; with it you may carry along with another his own burden. He is poor, you are rich: his burden is poverty; you do not have such a burden. See that perhaps, when the poor man appeals to you, you do not say, Each one shall carry his own burden. Here hear the other precept: Carry one another's burdens. Poverty is not my burden, but it is my brother's burden. See that riches are not a greater burden of yours. For you do not have poverty as a burden, but you have riches as a burden. If you attend well, it is a burden. He has one burden, you have another. Carry with him, and let him carry with you, so that you carry one another's burdens. What is the burden of poverty? Not to have. What is the burden of riches? To have more than is needful. Both he is burdened and you are burdened. Carry with him his not having, let him carry with you your having more; so that your packs may become equal. For if you give to the needy man, you lessen for him who does not have his own burden, which was not having: if you give to him, he begins to have; his burden, which is called not having, has been lessened; and he too has lessened your burden, which is called having more. You two are walking the way of God in the pilgrimage of this world: you were carrying great and superfluous provisions; he, however, had no provisions: he has attached himself to you, desiring to be your companion; do not neglect him, do not spurn him, do not abandon him. Do you not see how much you are carrying? Give something from it to him who carries nothing and has nothing, and you will both help your companion and relieve yourself. The Apostle's saying has, I think, been sufficiently expounded.

10. The Donatists obstinate in schism after the Conference. Let those not sell you smoke who say: We are holy,

we do not carry your burdens, therefore we do not communicate with you. These bigger ones carry burdens of division, the bigger ones carry burdens of severance, burdens of schism, burdens of heresy, burdens of dissension, burdens of animosity, burdens of false testimonies, burdens of slanderous accusations. These burdens we have tried, and are trying, to lay down from the shoulders of our brethren. They love them, holding them to themselves; they do not want to be smaller, because they have swollen up with those very burdens. For indeed whoever puts down a burden which he was carrying on his neck becomes, as it were, smaller; but he has put down a weight, not his stature.

11. He who tolerates the wicked does not by that very fact communicate in their sins. But, you say, I do not communicate in the sins of others. As if I were saying this to you: Come, communicate in the sins of others. I do not say this; I know what the Apostle says: but this is what I say. On account of the sins of others, even if they were true, and not rather your own, you ought not to desert the flock of God mixed with sheep and goats; you ought not to abandon the Lord's threshing-floor while the chaff is being threshed; you ought not to break the Lord's nets while they are drawing good and bad fish to the shore. And how, you say, should I bear one whom I know to be wicked? Would it not be better for you to bear him than to carry yourself outside? See how you would bear him: if you paid heed to the Apostle saying, Each one shall bear his own load, that sentence would set you free. For you would not be sharing avarice with him, but sharing the table of Christ with him. And what harm would it do you if you shared the table of Christ with him? The Apostle says: For he who eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgement to himself (1 Cor. 11:29). To himself, not to you. Of course, if you are a judge, if you have received the power of judging by ecclesiastical rule, if he is accused before you, if he is convicted by true documents and witnesses, restrain, rebuke, excommunicate, degrade. Let tolerance so keep watch that discipline does not sleep.

Chapter VIII. 12. Caecilianus condemned in his absence and innocent. Laws of the Emperors against the Donatists. Caecilianus thrice acquitted. Primianus. But Caecilianus, they say, was condemned. Condemned? By whom? In the first place, absent; then, innocent, by traditors. These things have been alleged, inserted in the Acts, proved. They did indeed try to weaken the strength of the truth, and they strove, as much as they could, to cloud its clearness with the fogs of empty proceedings. The Lord was present; His clearness overcame their fogs. And see how, without knowing it, they acquitted the Church of the whole world, in whose communion we rejoice, whatever sort we may be in it. Not ourselves, but her do we protect, defend, uphold; in defending the Lord's threshing-floor, on behalf of the Lord's threshing-floor I cry out. What sort I may be in it, I do not want you to concern yourself with: I await the winnowing-fan (Matt. 3:12). I do not want you, I say, to concern yourself with this: or if you wish to concern yourself, do not do so with strife, so that you may be able to heal your brother. Take care of the chaff, if you can: but do not abandon the wheat, if you cannot take care of the chaff. Sometimes even chaff is shaken out of the Lord's threshing-floor; at times grains too, but not far. But there are workmen

who are good; they go around the threshing-floor, and the things that have been shaken out outside they drag with certain cleaning instruments and call back into the floor, whether by dragging or by compelling. The cleaning instruments are these laws of the world. Call it back; even drag the wheat along with the earth, lest the wheat perish because of the earth. 'Caecilian was condemned,' they say. He was condemned once when absent; he was acquitted three times when present. We answered them; and, unteachable men though they were, we briefly reminded them, as far as we could, of their own deeds, and we said: Why do you recite against Caecilian a council of seventy bishops pronouncing sentences against an absent man? More sentences were pronounced by the council of the Maximianists against the absent Primian. We said: Caecilian was condemned in his absence by those men; Primian was condemned in his absence by these. Just as these do not prejudge the absent Primian, so those too could not prejudge the absent Caecilian.

Chapter IX. — 13. The Donatists condemned by their own sentence. What do you think they answered in this tight spot? For what could they say? By what way could they escape, shut in by the nets of truth? To break these nets by violence, what did they say, briefly and absolutely, in our favour? Indeed many things, and almost everything, in our favour, as the Acts will show, which your Charity, once they are set before you, is now about to read. But at this point I ask you, and I beseech you through Christ, that you hold it fast, say it, and always have it in your mouth. For no briefer, surer and clearer sentence could have been pronounced in our favour. What then did he say, when we objected this: These do not prejudge Caecilian in the same way as those do not prejudge Primian? And that defender of theirs said: Neither does case prejudge case, nor person person (Brevic. Collationis cum Donatistis, day 3, ch. 16, n. 28). O answer brief, clear, true! For he did not know what he said; but like Caiaphas, since he was high priest, he prophesied (John 11:49): Neither does case prejudge case, nor person person. If neither case prejudges case nor person person, then each one carries his own burden. Let him go now and object Caecilian to you: not to you, any man whatever, but let him object Caecilian to the whole world itself. When he does so, he objects an innocent man to innocent men. The Acts will show it altogether most clearly. Caecilian was cleared. But suppose him not cleared, suppose him found guilty; hear your own voice from the whole world: Neither does case prejudge case, nor person person. Heretical soul, incurable, spiteful, when you pronounce sentence upon yourself, why do you accuse the judge? If I corrupted him so that he would judge in my favour, who corrupted you so that you would condemn yourself?

Chapter X. — 14. What keeps the Donatists in error. Would that they might at some time think of these things, think of them even late, think of them as their animosity subsides; let them return to themselves, question themselves, examine themselves, answer themselves; for the sake of truth let them not fear those to whom they have for so very long sold falsehood. For it is these they fear to offend; they blush before human weakness, and do not blush before most invincible truth. Certainly they fear this, lest it be said to them: Why then did you deceive us? why did you lead us astray? why did you say such evil and false things? They ought to answer, if they feared God: It was human to err, diabolical