CYPRIAN

From the beginning of my episcopacy, I made up my mind to do nothing on my own private opinion, without your advice and without the consent of the people.

Knowing that there is one Baptism, we who hold the head and root of the One Church know for certain that to him who is outside the Church nothing is lawful.

Custom is often only the antiquity of error.

And according as we say, "Our Father," because He is The Father of those who understand and believe; so also we call it "our Bread," because Christ is The Bread of those who are in union with His Body. And we ask that this Bread should be given to us daily, that we who are in Christ, and daily receive The Eucharist for the Food of Salvation, may not by the interposition of some heinous sin...be separated from Christ's Body.

In proportion to the size of the vessel of faith, brought by us to the Lord, is the measure we draw out of His overflowing grace.

"If any man thirst, let him come and drink from the rivers of living water" (cf. John 7:38). Where shall he who thirsts come? To heretics where the fountain and river of water is in no way life-giving? Or to the Church, which is One?

If He prayed who was without sin, how much more it becometh a sinner to pray!

Murder, considered a crime when people commit it singly, is transformed into a virtue when they do it en masse.

If a murder is committed privately it is considered a crime. But if it happens with the authority of the state, they call it courage.

Before all things, the Teacher of Peace and the Master of Unity would not have prayer made singly and individually, as for one who prays only for himself. For we do not say, "My Father, who art in heaven"... Our prayer is public and common; and when we pray, we pray not for one, but for the whole people, because we the whole people are one.

The beard must not be plucked. Ye shall not deface the figure of your beard.

Baptism pertains to the Church alone.

Let us, then, who in Baptism have both died and been buried in respect to the carnal sins of the old man, who have risen again with Christ in the heavenly regeneration, both think upon and do the things that are Christ's.

None of us offers resistance when he is seized, or avenges himself for your unjust violence, although our people are numerous and plentiful...it is not lawful for us to hate, and so we please God more when we render no requital for injury...we repay your hatred with kindness.

Custom, though never so ancient, without truth, is but an old error.

Think not that you are thus maintaining the Gospel of Christ when you separate yourselves from the flock of Christ.

Their property held them in chains...chains which shackled their courage and choked their faith and hampered their judgment and throttled their soul...If they stored up their treasure in heaven, they would not now have an enemy and a thief within their own household...They think of themselves as owners, whereas it is they rather who are owned: enslaved as they are to their own property, they are not the masters of their money but its slaves.

For the helmsman is recognized in the tempest; in the warfare the soldier is proved.

Whereas there can be but one Baptism, they think they can Baptize; they have abandoned the fountain of life, yet promise the life and grace of the waters of salvation. It is not cleansing which men find there, but soiling; their sins are not washed away, but only added to. That being "born again" does not bring forth sons to God but to the Devil. Born of a lie, they cannot inherit the things which Truth has promised; begotten by the faithless, they are deprived of the grace of faith.

It is a persistent evil to persecute a man who belongs to the grace of God. It is a calamity without remedy to hate the happy.

Persevere in labors that lead to salvation. Always be busy in spiritual actions. In this way, no matter how often the enemy of our souls approaches, no matter how many times he may try to come near us, he'll find our hearts closed and armed against him.

When we pray to God with entire assurance, it is Himself who has given us the spirit of prayer.

The world is going mad in mutual extermination, and murder, considered as a crime when committed individually, becomes a virtue when it is committed by large numbers. It is the multiplication of the frenzy that assures impunity to the assassins.

Peter, in showing that the Church is one and that only those who are in the Church can be saved, said: "In the Ark of Noah certain persons, numbering only eight, were saved by water, which Baptism effects in like manner for you" (1 Peter 3:20). He proves and demonstrates that the solitary Ark of Noah was the figure of the One Church. If, at the time of this Baptism of the world anyone could have been saved without having been in the Ark of Noah, then he who is outside the Church could now be brought to life by Baptism.

Men imitate the gods whom they adore, and to such miserable beings their crimes become their religion.