For love is
ever to be held in the mind, and it dictates and determines the measure
of the chastisement, so that the mind does nothing at all beside the
right rule. Thou likewise addest in thy inquiry, how those things should
be compensated which have been taken away from a church by theft. But,
oh! far be it that God's Church should receive with increase what she
seems to let alone of earthly things, and seek worldly gain by vain
things.
Asked by Bishop St. Augustine: At what generation shall Christian people
be joined among themselves in marriage with their kinsfolk?... Answered
by St. Gregory: ... But because there are many in the English nation
[who], while they were then yet in unbelief, are said to have been
joined together in this sinful marriage,[44] now they are to be
admonished, since they have come to the faith, that they hold themselves
off from such iniquities, and understand that it is a heavy sin, and
dread the awful doom of God, lest they for fleshly love receive the
torments of everlasting death. They are not, however, for this cause to
be deprived of the communion of Christ's body and blood, lest this thing
may seem to be revenged on them, in which they through unwittingness
sinned before the bath of baptism.
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