Gilberti Cognati Nozereni aliquot epistolae

impiety he hated. Finally, Paul commands us to test all things, but to hold fast to what is good. I have sometimes consorted with those who are mortally hostile to the Roman Pontiff. Anyone who has lived in Germany, where everything is full of them, will not be able to avoid that. For the state of that region is such that if anyone wishes to flee their company entirely, he must move into some solitude. As for me, if I perceived any who were powerlessly addicted to atheism, or Anabaptism, or some condemned faction, I removed them from my company as if they were beyond hope: which was very easy for me, since they themselves voluntarily avoided my company diligently. However, those only lightly brushed by these fatal contagions I did not turn away if they offered themselves: and through this civility and these conversations of mine, I healed many, men neither of the lowest rank nor of the lowest learning. Which I still do today, so much so that among some it has now passed into a proverb, if someone begins to be more alienated from such factions: that is, if, as they say, he has defected from them, they say, "He has been with Cognatus." I think this is more magnificent than to accuse. For as I see the affairs of mortals, I hope more truly than I expect, to speak frankly of what I feel, for a happy outcome to the cruelty with which many think one must act. However, it is most difficult in this most turbulent century to moderate