Care And Correction

Quod si emendare neglegis cum videas emendandum, adversus caritatem facis: si autem tibi emendandus propterea non videtur, quia putas eum recte ista sensisse; adversus veritatem sapis. Et ideo ille melior, qui emendari est paratior, si non defuerit emendator, quam tu, si vel sciens irridenter contemnis errantem, vel nesciens pariter sectaris errorem. Omnia itaque in eisdem libris ad te scriptis et tibi traditis sobrie vigilanterque considera, et plura quam ego invenies fortasse culpanda. Et quaecumque ibi sunt approbanda atque laudanda, si quid in eis revera forsitan ignorabas, atque isto disserente didicisti, evidenter profitere quid illud sit; ut de hoc te gratias egisse, non de his quae illic improbanda tam multa sunt, omnes noverint, qui vel recitante illo tecum simul audierunt, vel eosdem postea libros legerunt: ne in eius ornato eloquio tamquam in pretioso poculo te invitante, etsi non bibente, venenum bibant, si tu quid inde biberis, et quid non biberis nesciunt, et propter laudem tuam omnia illic bibenda salubriter arbitrantur. Quamvis et audire, et legere, et quae dicta sunt haurire memoria, quid est nisi bibere? Sed praedixit Dominus de fidelibus suis, quod et si mortiferum quid biberint, non eis nocebit. Ac per hoc qui cum iudicio legunt, et secundum regulam fidei approbanda approbant, et improbant improbanda; etiamsi commendant memoriae quae improbanda dicuntur, nulla venenata sententiarum pravitate laeduntur. Haec me Gravitatem et Religionem tuam, sive mutua, sive praevia caritate monuisse vel commonuisse minime poenitebit, Domino miserante, quomodolibet accipias, quod tibi praerogandum putavi. Agam vero ei uberes gratias, de cuius misericordia saluberrimum est fidere, si ab his pravitatibus et erroribus, quos ex libris huius hominis ostendere his litteris potui, alienam atque integram fidem tuam, vel invenerit epistola ista, vel fecerit. Sanctus Augustinus Hipponensi, De Anima et eius Origine, Liber II, Caput XXIII Source: Migne PL 44.510

If you neglect to correct another when you see something that requires amendment, you act in opposition to love, but if it does not appear to you that another requires correction because you think that he is right in his understanding, you are wise against the truth. And thus he is a better man than you who is prepared to be corrected if a corrector is not lacking, if either aware that he errs you scorn him in derision, or being ignorant you also follow after the error. Therefore with sobriety and vigilance consider everything in the books another addressed and sent to you, and you will perhaps find more things there that are flawed than I have. And as for whatever is approvable and praiseworthy, if perhaps by his instruction you have learnt something in them that you did not know, openly declare what it is, so that all may know it was for this you thanked him and it was not for the many things which are worthy of reproof, things which many heard spoken at the time, or later read in the same books, lest because of his ornate style it be as if they drink poison from a precious goblet which you offer to them, even if you do not partake, those who do not know if you have tasted it or not, but because of your good character judge that they shall be drinking for the good of their health. Hearing and reading and drawing things once said from the memory, what are they but drinking? But the Lord foretold to his faithful ones that even if they drank something fatal it would not harm them. 1 Because of this, they who read with discernment and according to the rule of faith give their approval to what is approvable and disapprove of what is not, and even if they commit to memory what is not approved, they suffer no harm from the depraved poison of such things. That I have given your earnest and pious self warning and counsel because of our mutual and long standing love, which I have thought to be my first duty to you, by the Lord's mercy I shall not regret however you should receive it. But I shall give abundant thanks to Him in whose mercy it is most salutary to trust, if from these depravities and errors which I have been able to show in this man's books, this letter finds your faith far distant and unharmed by them, or it makes it so. Saint Augustine of Hippo, On the Soul and its Origin Book 2, Chapter 23 1 Mk 16.18