Letter CCIX.
(a.d. 423.)
To Cælestine,My Lord Most Blessed, and Holy Father Venerated with All Due Affection, Augustin Sends Greeting in The Lord.
1. First of all I congratulate you that our Lord God
has, as we have heard, established you in the illustrious chair
which you occupy without any division among His people. In the next
place, I lay before your Holiness the state of affairs with us, that not only by your prayers, but with your council and aid you may help us. For I write to you at this time under deep affliction, because, while wishing to benefit certain members of Christ in our neighbourhood, I brought on them a great calamity by my want of prudence and caution.
2. Bordering on the district of Hippo, there
is a small town, named Fussala: formerly there was
no bishop there, but, along with the contiguous district, it was
included in the parish of Hippo. That part of the country had few
Catholics; the error of the Donatists held under its miserable
influence all the other congregations located in the midst of a
large population, so that in the town of Fussala itself there was
not one Catholic. In the mercy of God, all these places were
brought to attach themselves to the unity of the Church; with how
much toil, and how many dangers it would take long to tell,—how
the presbyters originally appointed by us to gather these people
into the fold were robbed, beaten, maimed, deprived of their
eyesight, and even put to death; whose sufferings, however, were
not useless and unfruitful, seeing that by them the
re-establishment of unity was achieved. But as Fussala is forty
miles distant from Hippo, and I saw that in governing its people, and gathering together the remnant, however small, of persons of both sexes, who, not threatening others, but fleeing for their own safety, were scattered here and there, my work would be extended farther than it ought, and that I could not give the attention which I clearly perceived to be necessary, I arranged that a bishop should be ordained and appointed there.
3. With a view to the carrying out of this, I sought
for a person who might be suitable to the locality and people, and
at the same time acquainted with the Punic language; and I had in
my mind a presbyter fitted for the office. Having applied by letter
to the holy senior bishop who was then Primate of Numidia, I
obtained his consent to come from a great distance to ordain this
presbyter. After his coming, when all our minds were intent on an
affair of so great consequence, at the last moment, the person whom
I believed to be ready to be ordained disappointed us by absolutely
refusing to accept the office. Then I myself, who, as the event
showed, ought rather to have postponed than precipitated a matter
so perilous, being unwilling that the very venerable and holy old
man, who had come with so much fatigue to us, should return home
without accomplishing the business for which he had journeyed so
far, offered to the people, without their seeking him, a young man, Antonius, who was then with me. He had been from childhood brought up in a monastery by us, but, beyond officiating as a reader, he had no experience of the labours pertaining to the various degrees of rank in the clerical office. The unhappy people, not knowing what was to follow, submissively trusting me, accepted him on my suggestion. What need I say more? The deed was done; he entered on his office as their bishop.