Letter 255: Augustine refuses to promise a Christian girl to a pagan groom.

To my dearly loved son Rusticus, deservedly praiseworthy and respected: Augustine sends greetings in the Lord. Although I wish every good thing for you and your whole household - not only the goods that belong to happiness in this present age, but also those that belong to the future and eternal life, which you have not yet been persuaded to believe - still, I wrote back to my holy brother and fellow bishop Benenatus about what moves me not yet to dare promise anything concerning the girl you seek. I wrote as much as seemed sufficient, my dearly loved and venerable son. For if you, although you know with complete certainty that even if any girl whatever were under our full power to give in marriage, a Christian girl could not be given by us except to a Christian, still refused to promise me anything of this kind about your son, whom I hear is still pagan, how much less should I promise anything about that girl's marriage because of the things you will be able to read in my brother's letter? This would be true even if I held not merely a promise, but rejoiced that what I said about your son had already been done.

EPISTOLA 255 Scripta post a. 395. A. Rustico, denegans puellam in matrimonium filio adhuc pagano. DOMINO DILECTISSIMO, ET MERITO PRAEDICABILI AC SUSPICIENDO FILIO RUSTICO, AUGUSTINUS, IN DOMINO SALUTEM. 1. Quamvis tibi et universae domui tuae omnia bona optem, nec tantum ad felicitatem praesentis saeculi pertinentia, verum etiam ad vitam futuram atque sempiternam, quae tibi nondum credenda persuasa est; tamen quae me moveant, ut de puella quam petis, nihil adhuc audeam polliceri, quantum sufficere visum est, sancto fratri et coepiscopo meo Benenato rescripsi, domine dilectissime et venerabilis fili. Si enim tu, cum certissime noveris, etiamsi nostrae absolutae sit potestatis quamlibet puellam in coniugium tradere, tradi a nobis christianam nisi christiano non posse; nihil tamen mihi tale de filio tuo, quem adhuc paganum audio, promittere voluisti: quanto magis ego, propter illa quae in epistola memorati fratris mei legere poteris, quidquam de illius puellae connubio spondere non debeo, etiamsi quod dixi de filio tuo non tantum promissum tenerem, sed iam etiam factum esse gauderem?