To the Empress Pulcheria, by the Hand of Theoctistus

Leo the bishop to Pulcheria Augusta. [a]

I recognize in everything the devout care that your clemency never stops giving to the catholic faith, and I thank God to see you take such an interest in the universal church. So I can confidently suggest what I think agrees with justice and kindness, so that what your devout zeal has thus far accomplished without reproach, through the mercy of Christ, may the sooner be brought to a conclusion we shall be thankful for, most noble Augusta. Your clemency has commanded that a synod be held at Nicaea, and has gently refused my request that it be held in Italy, so that all the bishops of our regions might be summoned and assemble, if the state of affairs had allowed them. I have received this in a spirit so far from scorn that I have named two of my fellow bishops and two of my fellow presbyters to represent me. I have also sent the venerable synod a suitable letter, from which the brotherhood assembled there might learn the standard that must be kept in their decision, so that no rashness may do harm either to the rules of the faith, or to the provisions of the canons, or to the remedies that the spirit of loving kindness requires. [b]

For, as I have stated very often in letters from the beginning of this matter, I have wanted such moderation to be kept amid conflicting views and fleshly jealousies that, while nothing is allowed to be taken from or added to the purity of the faith, the remedy of pardon is still granted to those who return to unity and peace. For the works of the devil are most effectively destroyed when people’s hearts are called back to the love of God and of their neighbors. But how contrary to my warnings and entreaties their actions were at that time would be a long story to explain, nor is there any need to set down in the pages of a letter all that was allowed to be done at Ephesus, in that meeting not of judges but of robbers. There the leading men of the synod spared neither the brothers who opposed them nor those who agreed with them. To break down the catholic faith and strengthen a detestable heresy, they stripped some of their rightful rank and stained others with a share in the guilt. And surely their cruelty was worse toward those whom they turned away from innocence by persuasion than toward those whom they made blessed confessors by persecution. [c]

And yet, because such men have harmed themselves most by their wrongdoing, and because the greater the wounds, the more carefully the remedy must be applied, I have never in any letter maintained that pardon must be withheld even from them if they came to their right mind. Although we unchangeably abhor their heresy, which is the greatest enemy of the Christian religion, yet if the men themselves amend their ways beyond any doubt and clear themselves by full assurances of repentance, we do not judge them to be outcasts from the unspeakable mercy of God. Rather, we lament with those who lament, “we weep with those who weep,” and we obey the demands of justice in deposing without neglecting the remedies of loving kindness. And this, as your piety knows, is not a promise in words only, but is also borne out by our actions. Nearly all who had been either misled or forced into agreeing with the presiding bishops have, by revoking what they had decreed and condemning what they had written, obtained complete release from guilt and the gift of apostolic peace. [d]

If, then, your clemency is pleased to reflect on my motives, you will be satisfied that I have acted throughout with the aim of abolishing the heresy without losing a single soul. In the case of the authors of these cruel disturbances, I have somewhat moderated my practice, so that their slow minds might be roused by some feeling of heartfelt sorrow to ask for lenient treatment. For although, since their decision, which is no less blasphemous than unjust, they cannot be held in such honor by the catholic brotherhood as they once were, they still keep their sees and their rank as bishops. Before them lies the prospect either of receiving the peace of the whole church after true and necessary signs of repentance, or, if (God forbid) they persist in their heresy, of reaping the reward of their false belief. Dated the 20th of July, in the consulship of the illustrious Adelfius (in the year 451). [e]