27. homo est malus, id est diabolus.
28. inportuna peccata. In contrast with the wholesome precepts ('praecepta salutaria') of Christ, concerning which Optatus has just written. (Christ's precepts save us; sins harm us cruelly.) Inportunitas has been used in the sense of inmanitas in ii, 18 (cf. however iii, 7, where inportune is used for unseasonably, which may perhaps be the meaning here----'unseasonable sins').
29. per tenebras.
30. nascuntur diversa semina.
31. in Ecclesia non est similis turba animarum.
32. adductos, sc. ad Ecclesiam Catholicam (cf. last chapter: 'ad Ecclesiam Catholicam . . . non sine voluntate Dei adductos').
33. nutritos.
34. una pluvia nutritos. Thus Du Pin. Ziwsa places a comma after pluvia, making una pluvia depend not upon nutritos, but upon preceding natos = 'born with us from one water----that is to say, nourished from the one Baptism.' It must be admitted that, strictly speaking, not nourishment but birth comes from Baptism, but on the other hand seeds are not born from rain. For this reason I prefer on the whole Du Pin's punctuation, and have translated accordingly.
35. 7 sine exterminio.
36. aliena.
37. in agro Suo per totum orbem terrarum, in quo est Una Ecclesia.
38. post crementa communia. Crementum (literally increase ) is an unusual Low Latin variant of incrementum.
39. quid est Suum et quid alienum.
40. in horreo.
41. destinet.
42. interminata.
43. repraesentet.
44. si sibi totum vindicet. The context tells us that the totum here refers to the power of judgement and especially of separation. If any Bishop were now to separate all sinners from the Visible Church, there could not be that separation by Christ, on the Day of Judgement, of the tares from the wheat, and of the goats from the sheep, of which we read in the Gospels. It is hardly necessary to say that the Church has never at any time claimed to judge in foro interno, that is, concerning the conscience or interior state and fixture lot of any man.
45. professio.
46. The words in square brackets are only to be found in C and Codex Tilianus.
47. unitatis adsequi formam. Unitatis forma = the idea of unity presented by Christ and externally realised in the Visible Church. It is very difficult to translate forma, as used by St. Optatus, into English (cf. v, 5 formam baptizandi; i, 21 exemplorum formam; v, 3 formam humilitatis; vii, 6 iudicandi formam; v, 14 quam formam habet mens). It is obviously impossible to render forma in these passages by the same English word, though the idea is the same in all of them----a rule or concept, clothed, as it were, before our eyes, in order that we may adhere to it.
48. forma unitatis retinendae vel faciendae.
49. vindictae suae.
50. vindicare.