His Patience with Unreasonable Men

Moreover, he bore patiently with some who were angry against him, urging them in mild and gentle words to control themselves and not to stir up trouble. Some of them respected his warnings and stopped. But those who proved incapable of sound judgment he left entirely in the hands of God, and he never himself wished harsh measures to be taken against anyone. So it naturally happened that the discontented in Africa went so far in their violence as to dare open acts of outrage. It seems likely that some evil spirit, jealous of the great prosperity of that time, was driving these men to terrible deeds in order to stir up the emperor’s anger against them. But he gained nothing by this malice. The emperor laughed at what they were doing and declared that it came from the evil one, since these were not the actions of people in their right minds, but of madmen or people possessed by demons. Such people ought to be pitied rather than punished, since to punish the insane is as great a folly as to feel for their condition is the highest kindness to humankind. [a]