Apostle in his Epistle thus speaks: "For what if certain of them fell from the faith, does their faithlessness bring to nought the faithfulness of God? God forbid, God is "true, though every man be a liar." The greater and better portion of the confessors stand firm in the strength of its faith, and in the law and teaching of the Lord. Those who feel that God has in the Church thought them worthy to find grace, do not retire from the peace of the Church: but from this very cause the title of their faith becomes more illustrious, because withdrawing from the perfidy of those who had been associated in the fellowship of their profession, they have come out from the contagion of guilt, and being illumined by the true light of the Gospel, and irradiated with pure and spotless lustre from the Lord, their glory is as great in preserving the peace of Christ, as had been their triumph when they fought against Satan.
14.
The duty of withdrawing from Schismatics.
It is my desire, most beloved brethren, and likewise I advise and exhort you, that if it be possible, no brother perish, and that our joyful mother may embrace in her bosom the undivided assemblage of her consenting congregation. But if wholesome counsel is unable to recall to the way of salvation certain leaders of schism and authors of dissension, who stand fast in blind and reckless madness, yet let those others among you, who are either betrayed by simpleness or seduced by error, or deceived by the artifices of some treacherous deception, withdraw from the snares of falsehood, free your wandering steps from error, and recognise the strait path which leads to heaven. These are the words of the Apostle's exhortation: "We command you," saith he, "by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to withdraw from all brethren that walk inordinately, and not according to that tradition which they have received from us." And again he says, "let no man deceive you by vain words; for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience.
