Cyprian of Carthage, Treatises Treatise 3

Behold, dearest brothers, peace has returned to the Church, and our safety has been restored by God’s help and vengeance—a thing that recently seemed impossible to unbelievers and the faithless. Joy returns to our minds, and now that the storm of oppression has broken and the cloud has scattered, tranquility and serenity shine forth. We must give praise to God and celebrate his benefits and gifts with thanksgiving, even though our voice never stopped giving thanks even during the persecution. For the enemy cannot be allowed such power that we, who love the Lord with all our heart and soul and strength, would not always and everywhere proclaim his blessings and praises with glory. The day everyone longed for has arrived, and after the horrible, dark night, the world has shone radiant with the Lord’s light. We look upon the confessors, renowned for their good name and glorious for the praises of virtue and faith, with joyful faces; we cling to them with holy kisses and embrace those we have longed for with an insatiable desire. The white cohort of Christ’s soldiers stands here, those who broke the fierce and turbulent fury of persecution by standing firm, prepared for the patience of prison and armed for the endurance of death. You resisted the world bravely, you gave God a glorious spectacle, and you became an example for the brothers who would follow. The religious voice confessed Christ, in whom it confessed it had once believed. Illustrious hands, accustomed only to divine works, refused to take part in sacrilegious sacrifices. Mouths sanctified by heavenly food, after receiving the body and blood of the Lord, rejected profane contagions and the remnants of idols. Your heads remained free from the impious, wicked veil that covered the captive heads of those who sacrificed. Your foreheads, pure with the sign of God, could not bear the devil’s crown; they reserved themselves for the Lord’s crown. How gladly mother Church welcomes you as you return from battle! How blessed and joyfully she opens her gates so that you may enter with assembled ranks, bringing back trophies from the prostrate enemy! Women come with the triumphant men, who, while fighting the world, also conquered their own sex. Virgins come as well, bearing a double glory of their warfare, and boys who surpass their years with virtues. The rest of the multitude of those standing also follows your glory, accompanying your footsteps with badges of praise that are near and almost joined to your own. The same sincerity of heart and the same tenacity of faith are in them. Fixed on the unshaken roots of heavenly precepts and strengthened by evangelical traditions, they were not terrified by prescribed exiles, destined torments, loss of property, or bodily punishments. Days were being set to test their faith. But whoever remembers that he has renounced the world knows no day of the world; nor does he calculate earthly times, he who hopes for eternity from God. No one, dearest brothers, no one should mutilate this glory; no one should weaken the incorrupt firmness of those who stand with malignant detraction. When the day appointed for those who denied has passed, whoever did not profess within that day has confessed himself to be a Christian. The first title of victory is to confess the Lord, seized by the hands of the Gentiles; the second step toward glory is to be reserved for the Lord by a cautious withdrawal. The former is public confession, the latter private. The former conquers the judge of the world; the latter, content with God as his judge, keeps a pure conscience with integrity of heart. There, fortitude is more prompt; here, solicitude is more secure. The one whose hour was approaching was already found mature; the other, perhaps delayed, who abandoned his patrimony, withdrew because he was not going to deny—he certainly would have confessed if he had also been detained.