The spouse of Christ cannot be adulterous; she is uncorrupted and pure. She knows one home; she guards with chaste modesty the sanctity of one couch. She keeps us for God. She appoints the sons whom she has born for the kingdom. Whoever is separated from the Church and is joined to an adulteress, is separated from the promises of the Church; nor can he who forsakes the Church of Christ attain to the rewards of Christ. He is a stranger; he is profane; he is an enemy. He can no longer have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother (On the Unity of the Church, 6).

Nor let any deceive themselves by a futile interpretation, in respect of the Lord having said, "Wheresoever two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them ... He placed agreement first; He has made the concord of peace a prerequisite; He taught that we should agree firmly and faithfully. But how can he agree with any one who does not agree with the booty of the Church itself, and with the universal brotherhood? How can two or three be assembled together in Christ's name, who, it is evident, are separated from Christ and from His Gospel? For we have not withdrawn from them, but they from us (On the Unity of the Church, 12).

This excessively displeased Him who had said, "Ask, and ye shall obtain," because the disagreement of the people was out of harmony, and there was not a consent of the brethren one and simple, and a united concord; since it is written, "God who maketh men to be of one mind in a house" ... But if, according to the peace which our Lord gave us, there were agreement among all brethren, we should before this have obtained from the divine mercy what we seek; nor should we be wavering so long in this peril of our salvation and our faith. Yes, truly, and these evils would not have come upon the brethren, if the brotherhood had been animated with one spirit (Epistle 7.3).

You have acted as you usually do, in desiring to inform us of the matter, as being an object of anxiety; for it becomes us all to watch for the body of the whole Church, whose members are scattered through every various province (Epistle 29.4).

For this, my brother, we especially both (Cyprian and Cornelius) labour after, and ought to labour after, to be careful to maintain as much as we can the unity delivered by the Lord, and through His apostles to us their successors, and, as far as in us lies, to gather into the Church the dispersed and wandering sheep which the wilful faction and heretical temptation of some is separating from their Mother; those only being left outside, who by their obstinacy and madness have persisted, and have been unwilling to return to us (Epistle 51.3).

We decided - having obtained by means of the bishops the truth of the matter, and having got a greater authority for the proof of your ordination, and so at length every scruple being got rid of from the breast of every one- that letters should be sent you by all who were placed anywhere in the province; as in fact is done, that so the whole of our colleagues might decidedly approve of and maintain both you and your communion, that is as well to the unity of the Catholic Church as to its charity (Epistle 44.3).

While the bond of concord remains, and the undivided sacrament of the Catholic Church endures, every bishop disposes and directs his own acts, and will have to give an account of his purposes to the Lord (Epistle 51.21).

In spite of the combined and everywhere compacted unity of the Catholic Church, (Novatian) is endeavouring to make a human church, and is sending his new apostles through very many cities, that he may establish some new foundations of his own appointment. And although there have already been ordained in each city, and through all the provinces, bishops old in years, sound in faith, proved in trial, proscribed in persecution, (this one) dares to create over these other and false bishops ... But he could not hold the episcopate, even if he had before been made bishop, since he has cut himself off from the body of his fellow-bishops, and from the unity of the Church (Epistle 51.24).

The case of every one should be heard there where the crime has been committed; and a portion of the flock has been assigned to each individual pastor, which he is to rule and govern, having to give account of his doing to the Lord; it certainly behoves those over whom we are placed not to run about nor to break up the harmonious agreement of the bishops with their crafty and deceitful rashness, but there to plead their cause (Epistle 54.14).

Cyprian to Cornelius his brother, greeting. We have been made acquainted, dearest brother, with the glorious testimonies of your faith and courage, and have received with such exultation the honour of your confession, that we count ourselves also sharers and companions in your merits and praises. For as we have one Church, a mind united, and a concord undivided, what priest does not congratulate himself on the praises of his fellow-priest as if on his own; or what brotherhood would not rejoice in the joy of its brethren? (Epistle 56.1).

Because there can be nothing common to falsehood and truth, to darkness and light, to death and immortality, to Antichrist and Christ, we ought by all means to maintain the unity of the Catholic Church, and not to give way to the enemies of faith and truth in any respect (Epistle 70.2).

We, as far as in us lies, do not contend on behalf of heretics with our colleagues and fellow-bishops, with whom we maintain a divine concord and the peace of the Lord (Epistle 72.26).

It has happened that we who are separated from one another in body are thus united in spirit, as if we were not only occupying one country, but inhabiting together one and the self-same house ... For unity and peace and concord afford the greatest pleasure not only to men who believe and know the truth, but also to heavenly angels themselves (Epistle 74.1-2).

Cyprian was a Carthaginian bishop who deserted his flock no sooner Decius initiated his clampdown on the Christian communities; although the Decian decree was not long enforced, he never regained office. His alleged letters obscurely reported that when a disturbance arose the Lord bade him withdraw. An exile or else a concealed fugitive, his patrimony and his episcopal power stood nonetheless undiminished throughout the epistolary narrative. Both absent and present, he imperturbably ruled the African Church, presided over large councils and played an outstanding role in Roman, Gallic or Iberian conflicts. Sometimes he solemnly declared that bishops were only accountable to God, but on other occasions he urged other prelates, or even the laity, to remove them. A Novatus whom he often mistook for Novatian ruthlessly resisted him. Entirely unaware of the existence of any previous African martyrs –not even in Tertullian’s time– when Valerian selectively persecuted upright churchmen while sparing his schismatic opponents, he proclaimed that such dire events had long been foretold. 

An entirely different perspective is submitted in Did Tertullian really exist? Did Cyprian? Did Hippolytus? , which contends that the aforesaid apologists were no more than literary champions brought down from the preceding century to uphold either of the religious factions that struggled for the control of the churches after Diocletian’s resignation. Whereas 4^th-century African and Roman rigorists denounced an entrenched clergy intent on preserving its former pre-eminence despite the reprehensible conduct of many of its members, the hierarchical organization under attack disparaged them as raging and unmerciful apostates. Caecilian and Donatus fought each other through the writings of Cyprian and Tertullian.

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