A Source Book for Ancient Church History - Mirrors

494 A Source Book for Ancient Church Historywith Christ by baptism into death.” He does not say, “We havesignified our being buried with Him,” but: “We have been buriedwith Him.” He has therefore given to the sacrament pertainingto so great a transaction no other name than the word describingthe transaction itself.10. Therefore an infant, although he is not yet a believer in thesense of having that faith which includes the consenting will ofthose who exercise it, nevertheless becomes a believer throughthe sacrament of that faith.… The infant, though not yet possessinga faith helped by the understanding, is not obstructing 173 faithby an antagonism of the understanding, and therefore receiveswith profit the sacrament of faith.(e) Augustine, De Correctione Donatistarum, §§ 22 ff. (MSL,33:802.)[451]The argument in favor of using force to compel the Donatiststo return to the Church.Augustine in the early part of the Donatist controversy wasnot in favor of using force. Like the others, e.g., Optatus, hedenied that force had been employed by the Church. About404 the situation changed, and his opinion did likewise.This work, known also as Epistle CLXXXV, was writtencirca 417. Compare Augustine's position with the statementof Jerome, “Piety for God is not cruelty,” cf. Hagenbach,History of Christian Doctrines, § 135:7. The Donatists had173 The expression opponere obicem became in scholastic theology of greatimportance in connection with the ex opere operato nature of the sacramentsof the New Law. On this whole matter of the sacraments in the Fathers, seeSchwanne, Dogmengeschichte, § 93, which is very clear and helpful, especiallyas showing the basis of scholastic theory of the sacraments in the patristicperiod, and that, too, without doing violence to his authorities.