Letter 1006: It is perfectly clear how great is the grace of God in your merit, or how great a sum of virtues may be inferred,...

Avitus, bishop, to Bishop Apollinaris. It appears clearly how great the grace of God is in your merit, or how great a heap of virtues ought to be inferred, where the very error is so holy. For while the just man, as accuser of himself, strives to convict himself of what he could not have sinned in, the humility of one confessing grows toward merit, not the truth of the confession toward guilt. You have exceeded custom, I admit, but by an increase of piety. The day which you deign to remember has always come from us to you as a sweet solicitude, yet forgetfulness did not incomparably anticipate it. For without doubt, with the observance preserved, the effect appears the less. But you have shown with how great a spirituality it delights you to exert yourself, in that it grieved you so to have let it pass. Truly a holy revelation followed the dignity of your transgression: and such a punishment was found in the sleeper as had been the sin in the waking man. Behold, I speak the truth in Christ, I do not lie [Romans 9:1]: when, with eyes bringing forth tears, I had read the dream which you saw, every recollection of the obligations laid upon us came over my mind, by which I understood that we were admonished to pay honor through your visitation. Moreover, what I have felt about the revelation itself, I set forth in simplicity. You say, then, thus: For on that very holy night, namely on which the burial of our common sister was being commemorated, something or other had clung to my hands, which, sitting beside me, a dove most resplendent, but of an unusual reddish color, was plucking away. But indeed, when your devotion settled beside you with swift recollection and not flying far off, it was the debt that you most holily, you most loving of kinsmen, you, I say, deservedly perceived as this dove: most resplendent, since you shine so with simplicity; reddened with an unusual color, since, singularly innocent, you blush as though pricked by your own goads. You have therefore indeed enlarged, as was said above, the accustomed interest. Nor yet was that wanting to custom which you supposed; for to that very night, which it was not permitted you, with Christ rousing you, to forget, your offering nonetheless still shone forth from the abundance of the former year. Thus from a certain watering of heavenly blessing, which you expend each single year, there is enough for many. I beseech God that your devotion may one day pay this also to me.

Avitus episcopus Apollinari episcopo. Apparat liquido, quanta sit in vestri merito gratia dei aut quantus conici debeat virtutum cumulus, ubi error ipse tam sanctus est. Nam dum iustus accusator sui conatur in se convincere, quod peccare non potuit, confitentis humilitas crescit ad meritum, non confessionis veritas ad reatum. Excessistis fateor consuetudinem, sed pietatis augmento. Semper diei, cuius meminisse dignamini, dulcis vobis venit a nobis sollicitudo, sed non incomparabiliter praevenit oblivio. Minus enim procul dubio salva observatione apparet effectus. Sed ostendistis, quanta spiritalitate vos exercere delectet, quod praeterisse sic doluit. Vere secuta est dignitatem delicti vestri sancta revelatio: et tale repertum est in dormiente supplicium, quale fuerat in vigilante pec- catum. Ecce veritatem dico in Christo, non mentior. Cum parturientibus lacrimas oculis legissem somnium, quod vidistis, omnis mentem meam subiit necessitu- dinum recordatio praemissarum, quibus per visitationem vestram honorem dependere nos admonitos intellexi. Porro autem de ipsa revelatione quid senserim, in simplici- tate depromo. Sic ergo inquis: Nam in ipsa nocte sancta, in qua scilicet ger- manae communis depositio celebrabatur, nescio quid manibus meis haeserat, quod considens iuxta me fulgentissima, sed inusitato colore rubea columba vellebat. At vero cum iuxta te pietas tua nec longe avolans celeri recordatione consedit, debitum quod sanctissime tu, piissime propinquorum, tu inquam merito haec columba sentires, fulgentissima, cum simplicitate sic luceas, inusitato colore rubrata, cum innocens singulariter quasi propriis compuncta stimulis erubescas: ampliastis ergo quidem, ut supra dictum est, faenus adsuetum. Nec illud tamen con- suetudini defuit, quod putastis; nam nocti ipsi, quam vos excitante Christo non licuit oblivisci, adhuc de abundantia superioris anni vestra nihilo minus luxit oblatio. Sic ex quodam supernae benedictionis irriguo, quod impenditis annis singulis, sufficit multis. Deum quaeso, ut hoc etiam mihi pietas vestra quandoque dependat.