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Ignatius of Antioch

Epistle to the Romans

Chapter 3

Pray rather that I may attain to martyrdom.

Ye have never envied any one; ye have taught others. Now I desire that those things may be confirmed [by your conduct], which in your instructions ye enjoin [on others]. Only request in my behalf both inward and outward strength, that I may not only speak, but [truly] will; and that I may not merely be called a Christian, but really be found to be one. For if I be truly found [a Christian], I may also be called one, and be then deemed faithful, when I shall no longer appear to the world. Nothing visible is eternal.1 “For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”2 For our God, Jesus Christ, now that He is with3 the Father, is all the more revealed [in His glory]. Christianity is not a thing4 of silence only, but also of [manifest] greatness.

Notes

  1. Some read, “good.”↩
  2. 2 Cor. iv. 18. This quotation is not found in the old Latin version of the shorter recension.↩
  3. Or, “in.”↩
  4. Literally, “work.”↩

Translation by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson and Frederick Crombie: The Ante-Nicene Christian Library, vol. 1: The Apostolic Fathers (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1870).
Text from Project Gutenberg eBook #77576, proofread by Distributed Proofreaders from Internet Archive scans. Public domain.