So let them keep quiet, let them now see that the real Hercules is the God to whom the faithful say, God, who is like you? Do not keep silent, or grow gentle, God. What I had undertaken was to show how do not grow gentle means rooting out errors, not people. He does not grow gentle, so he gets angry. But he is God, so he also takes pity. He gets angry, and he takes pity. He gets angry and strikes; he takes pity and heals. He gets angry and does to death; he takes pity and brings to life. In one person he does this. It is not that he does some people to death and brings others to life, but in the same people he is both angry and gentle. He is angry with errors; he is gentle with bad habits put right. I will strike, and I will heal; I will kill, and I will make alive.^[1] One and the same Saul, afterward Paul, he both laid low and raised up. He laid low an unbeliever, he raised up a believer. He both laid low a persecutor, he raised up a preacher.

When Leontius^[1] perceived this,^[2] he did not think it safe to try to prevent them, for he saw that the people were exceedingly well-disposed toward these excellent men. However, speaking in a courteous manner, he requested that they would perform this act of worship [antiphonal singing] in the churches. They were perfectly well aware of his evil intent. Nevertheless they set about obeying his request and readily summoned their choir to the church, exhorting them to sing praises to the good Lord. Nothing, however, could induce Leontius to correct his wickedness,^[3] but he put on the mask of moderation and concealed the iniquity of Stephanus and Placidus.^[4] People who had accepted the corruption of the faith of priests and deacons, although they had embraced a life of vile irregularity, he added to the roll;^[5] while others adorned with every kind of virtue and firm adherents of apostolic doctrines, he left unrecognized. Thus it came to pass that among the clergy were numbered a majority of men tainted with heresy, while the mass of the laity were champions of the faith, and even professional teachers lacked courage to lay bare their blasphemy. In truth the deeds of impiety and iniquity done by Placidus, Stephanus and Leontius, in Antioch are so many as to want a special history of their own, and so terrible as to be worthy of the lament of David; for of them too it must be said, For your enemies make a murmuring, and they that hate you lift up their head. They have imagined craftily against the people and taken counsel against your secret ones. They have said, ‘Come and let us root them out that they be no more a people: and that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.’

Moreover, one must know that the word gnōmē, or opinion, is used in many ways and with many meanings. Thus, it sometimes means advice as when the divine apostle says, Now, concerning virgins, I have no commandment of the Lord; but I give counsel.^[1] Sometimes it implies design, as when the prophet David says, They have taken a malicious counsel against your people. Sometimes it means judgment, as when Daniel says: Why so cruel a sentence has gone forth.^[2] And sometimes it is used in the sense of faith, or notion, or of intent—to put it simply, the word has twenty-eight different meanings.

What does he mean by this?^[1] As I take it, that goodness can with difficulty gain a hold on human nature, like fire on green wood; while most people are ready and disposed to join in evil, like stubble, I mean, ready for a spark and a wind, which is easily kindled and consumed from its dryness. For a person will engage more quickly and fully in evil with the slightest inducement than in good with only little encouragement.

O my God, make them like a wheel. Notice the mercy of the prophet; he does not pray against them but for them. See what he says: My God, who is the God of all, my very own God, O my God, make them like a wheel. They who lay their foundation in malice, let them have no foundation at all, but let them roll back and forth and never remain fixed in their malice.