The Charge Shows the Accusers’ Minds

Now if they had been in their right minds, they would have seen the corner they were in, and that they were running up against their own arguments. But since they have lost all judgment, they are still led on to persecute and seek to destroy, and yet they do not see their own impiety. Perhaps they even dare to accuse Providence itself, for nothing is beyond the reach of their presumption, because it does not hand over to them those they want. And yet it is certain, as our Savior said, that not even a sparrow can fall into the snare without our Father who is in heaven. But when these accursed men get hold of anyone, they at once forget not only everything else but even themselves. Lifting their brows in sheer arrogance, they respect neither times and seasons nor the human nature of those they injure. Like the tyrant of Babylon, they attack all the more furiously. They show pity to no one, but mercilessly, as it is written, “on the aged they lay the yoke very heavily,” and “they add to the grief of those who are wounded.” [a]

If they had not acted this way, if they had not driven into banishment those who spoke in my defense against their slanders, their claims might have looked plausible enough to some people. But they have conspired against so many other bishops of high character. They have spared neither the great confessor Hosius, nor the bishop of Rome, nor so many others from the Spains and the Gauls, from Egypt and Libya and the other countries. They have committed cruel outrages against all who have opposed them on my behalf in any way. Is it not plain, then, that their designs have been aimed at me more than at anyone else, and that they want to destroy me miserably as they have destroyed others? To do this they keep a close watch for an opportunity, and they think themselves wronged when they see safe those whom they did not want to live.