Roman Letters

Letter 252: Augustine delays a decision about an orphan girl entrusted to the church.

Augustine of Hippo→Felix, correspondent of Augustine|c. 400 AD|Augustine of Hippo|From Hippo Regius|AI-assisted
orphanschurch carefamilyguardianship
Source-visible Augustine letter absent from the New Advent/NPNF English index; modern English is a first-time Roman Letters translation from Latin.
◆

To my dearly loved, deservedly honorable, and distinguished brother Felix: Augustine sends greetings in the Lord.

Your Religiousness knows very well what care the church and bishops owe in protecting all people, and especially orphans. For that reason, after receiving your letters and the copy of the letter of our brother, a man of respectable rank, I neither could nor should entrust the girl indiscriminately to anyone, especially because he commended her to the church, my dearly loved, deservedly honorable, and distinguished brother.

So I am waiting for her arrival, so that if anything ought to be done, I may consider it in her presence and do what the Lord inspires should be done.

AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.

Latin / Greek Original

EPISTOLA 252

Scripta post a. 395.

A. Felici commendans pupillam quamdam, Ecclesiae tutelae commissam.

DOMINO DILECTISSIMO MERITOQUE HONORABILI, ET PRAEFERENDO FRATRI FELICI, AUGUSTINUS, IN DOMINO SALUTEM.

1. Novit optime Religio tua quam curam tuendis cum omnibus hominibus, tum maxime pupillis Ecclesia vel episcopi debeant. Unde receptis litteris tuis, et exemplo litterarum viri spectabilis fratris nostri, nec potui nec debui passim puellam cuiquam committere: praesertim quia eam Ecclesiae commendavit, domine dilectissime meritoque honorabilis, et praeferende frater. Proinde adventum eius exspecto, ut si quid fieri oporteat, eius praesentia deliberem, et faciam quod Dominus faciendum esse inspiraverit.

Text source →View original manuscript →

Revision history

  1. 2026-05-27v2.2.34-import

    Initial corpus import from modern augustine missing batch2 latin v1.

    Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://www.augustinus.it/latino/lettere/lettera_261_testo.htm

Related Letters

Paulinus of Nola→Amandusc. 401 AD · paulinus nola #12

I confess I am amazed at the holy generosity and patience of your love — that from my letters, which I tend to write...

Isidore of Pelusium→Babroobas Boreibtzc. 405 AD · isidore pelusium #186

I define the wise — and I offer this as my view, not as law — as those adorned with the virtues of the reasoning...

Isidore of Pelusium→Leontius (correspondent of Isidore of Pelusium)c. 404 AD · isidore pelusium #174

Truly, as you have written, many disturbances have swept through the churches.

Libanius→Paulus, correspondent of Libaniusc. 390 AD · libanius #961

Libanius congratulates Paulus and rejects the rumor that he is angry with him.

Augustine of Hippo→Simpliciusc. 392 AD · augustine hippo #37

1. I received the letter which your Holiness kindly sent — a letter full of occasions of much joy to me, because assuring me that you remember me, that you love me as you used to do, and that you take great pleasure in every one of the gifts which the Lord has in His compassion been pleased to bestow on me. In reading that letter, I have eagerly...