A Boy's Woeful End

GREGORIUS: Etsi omnes baptizatos infantes, atque in eadem infantia morientes ingredi regnum coeleste credendum est, omnes tamen parvulos qui scilicet jam loqui possunt, regna coelestia ingredi credendum non est, quia nonnullis parvulis ejusdem regni coelestis aditus a parentibus clauditur, si male nutriantur. Nam quidam vir cunctis in hac urbe notissimus, ante triennium filium habuit annorum, sicut arbitror, quinque; quem nimis carnaliter diligens remisse nutriebat. Atque idem parvulus, quod dictu grave est, mox ut ejus animo aliquid obstitisset, majestatem Dei blasphemare consueverat: qui in hac urbe ante triennium mortalitate percussus, venit ad mortem. Cumque eum suus pater in sinu teneret, sicut hi testati sunt qui praesentes fuerunt, malignos ad se venisse spiritus trementibus oculis puer aspiciens, coepit clamare: Obsta, pater, obsta, pater. Qui clamans declinabat faciem, ut se ab eis in sinu patris absconderet. Quem cum ille trementem requireret quid videret, puer adjunxit, dicens: Mauri homines venerunt, qui me tollere volunt. Qui cum hoc dixisset, majestatis nomen protinus blasphemavit, et animam reddidit. Ut enim omnipotens Deus ostenderet pro quo reatu talibus fuisset traditus exsecutoribus, unde viventem pater suus noluit corrigere, hoc morientem permisit iterare; ut qui diu per Divinitatis patientiam blasphemus vixerat, quandoque per Divinitatis judicium blasphemaret, et moreretur; quatenus reatum suum pater ejus agnosceret, qui parvuli filii animam negligens, non parvulum peccatorem gehennae ignibus nutrisset. Sanctus Gregorius Magnus, Dialogi, Liber IV,  Cap XVIII

GREGORY: Although it should be believed that all baptised infants who die in infancy go to heaven, it is not to be believed that all little ones who can speak go to that holy place, because some little ones are denied entrance into heaven by their parents should they raise them wickedly. For a certain man, well known to everyone in this city, some three years ago had a child, who I think was five years old then, whom he raised remissly with excessive carnal affection. And the little one, lamentable though it is to say, so soon as anything went contrary to his mind, was accustomed to blaspheme the majesty of God. This child, in the mortality which struck this city three years ago, came to the point of death, and with his father holding him at that time in his lap, as those who were present testify, the child saw with trembling eyes wicked spirits coming towards him, and he began to cry out: 'Keep them away, father, keep them away' And so crying out, he turned away his face and would have hid himself from them in his father's lap, who demanding of his son what he saw to make him tremble, was told: 'Moorish men have come who want to carry me away.' Which having said he immediately blasphemed God, and so gave up this soul. For that the omnipotent God might show for what crime, for which his father would not correct him while he lived, the boy was delivered to such executioners, he permitted him at his very death to repeat it, so that he who by God's patience had long lived a blasphemer, did by his just judgment blaspheming die, that the father might know his own crime, he who neglecting the soul of his little son raised one not so little in sin for the fires of hell. Saint Gregory the Great, Dialogues, Book 4, Chap 18