You Leave Me No Room for Silence

I admit that I set to work at once to answer the insinuations aimed at me, and tried with all my might to prove that I was no heretic. I sent these books of my Apology to those whom your book had hurt, so that your poison might be followed by my antidote. In reply you sent me your earlier books, and now you send me this latest letter, full of insults and accusations. My good friend, what do you expect me to do? Keep silent? That would be to admit my guilt. Speak? But you hold your sword over my head, and threaten me with an indictment, no longer before the church but before the courts of law. What have I done that deserves punishment? How have I injured you? Is it that I have shown that I am not a heretic? Or that I could not think myself worthy of your praises? Or that I laid bare in plain words the tricks and false oaths of the heretics? What is all this to you, who boast that you are a man of truth and a catholic, and who show more zeal in attacking me than in defending yourself? Must I be thought to be attacking you because I defend myself? Or is it impossible for you to be orthodox unless you prove me a heretic? What help can it give you to be linked with me, and what is the meaning of what you are doing? You are accused by one set of people, and your only answer is to attack another. You find yourself attacked by one man, and you turn your back on him and attack another who was willing to leave you alone.