J. B. Lightfoot (trans. & notes) · 47 of 106

First Clement · 1 Clem. 46

To such examples as these therefore, brethren, we also ought to cleave.

For it is written; Cleave unto the saints, for they that cleave unto them shall be sanctified.

And again He saith in another place; With the guiltless man thou shalt be guiltless, and with the elect thou shalt be elect, and with the crooked thou shalt deal crookedly.

Let us therefore cleave to the guiltless and righteous: and these are the elect of God.

Wherefore are there strifes and wraths and factions and divisions and war among you?

Have we not one God and one Christ and one Spirit of grace that was shed upon us? And is there not one calling in Christ?

Wherefore do we tear and rend asunder the members of Christ, and stir up factions against our own body, and reach such a pitch of folly, as to forget that we are members one of another?

Remember the words of Jesus our Lord: for He said, Woe unto that man; it were good for him if he had not been born, rather than that at he should offend one of Mine elect. It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about him, and be cast into the sea, than that he should pervert one of Mine elect.

Your division hath perverted many; it hath brought many to despair, many to doubting, and all of us to sorrow. And your sedition still continueth.