Care And Correction

Ne dicas in animo, quid ad me pertinet, sive bene, sive male faciat? Ubi est charitas, si errantem corrigere non curas? Memento Apostulum dicentem: Quis scandalizatur et ego non uror? Alterius peccatum, suum fecit dolorem. Quid habes Redemptori tuo et Judici omnium in die mangno ostendere, si animas non habes, tuo labore redemptas a diaboli servitute, ostendendas? Quantas in hoc exsilio tuis doctrinis ab iniquitate revocas, et in viam veritatis reducis, procul dubio tantas recipies mercedes in die illa. Ideo non cesset charites operandi bona omnibus: non cesset lingua loquendi de bonis ad omnes, hoc precibus persuadens, illos severitate castigans, secundum modum uniuscujusque aetatis vel personae. Esto lucerna in domo Dei, et per te plurimi illuminentur, et a tenebris vitiorum in viam perpetuae lucis revocantur. Alcuinus, Epistola LXXIII, Ad Calvinus Source: Migne PL 100.248b-c

Do not say in your soul, 'What does it matter to me if he does good or evil?' Where is love if you do not care to correct the the one who errs? Remember the Apostle said, 'Who is scandalised and I do not burn?' 1 He makes the sin of another his own grief. What will you have to show your Redeemer and Judge on that great day, if you have no souls which you have saved from the servitude of the devil to show? Your teaching should call back many in this exile from iniquity and return them to the way of truth; without doubt you shall receive your reward on that day. Therefore do not cease to do good works to all, let not your tongue cease to speak of the good to all; some persuade with entreaties, some reprove with severity, according to the age and the character of each. Be a light in the house of God and through you let many be illuminated, and from the darkness of vice into the way of the eternal light recall them. Alcuin of York, from Letter 73, To Calvinus. 1 2 Cor 11.29