For though I made you sorry with a letter, I do not regret, though I did regret: for I perceive that the same epistle has made you sorry, though it were but for a time.
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Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
Moreover, even sorrow, the emotion for which, the Stoics claim, there can be found in the soul of a wise man no corresponding “attitude,” is a word used in a good sense, especially in Christian writings. The apostle, for example, praises the Corinthians because they were sorrowful according to God. Of course, someone may object that the apostle congratulated the Corinthians because their sorrow led them to repentance and that such sorrow can be experienced only by those who have sinned. What he says is this: “Seeing that the same letter did for a while make you sorry, now I am glad; not because you were made sorry but because your sorrow led you to repentance. For you were made sorry according to God, that you might suffer no loss at our hands. For the sorrow that is according to God produces repentance that surely tends to salvation, whereas the sorrow that is according to the world produces death. For behold this very fact that you were made sorry according to God, what earnestness i...
For though I made you sorry with a better. Although in my First Epistle I made you sorry by rebuking your vices, nevertheless it was good for us, and it stirred you to repentance, which brought you at once peace and joy.
Though it were but for a season. My Epistle saddened you but for a short time, and it led you to repentance; therefore I rejoice both over my letter and your repentance.
So that though I made you sorry with my letter, I do not regret it, though I did regret.
He goes on to apologize for his Epistle, when, (the sin having been corrected,) to treat them tenderly was unattended with danger; and he shows the advantage of the thing. For he did this indeed even before, when he said, For out of much affliction and anguish of heart, I wrote unto you: not that you should be made sorry, but that you might know the love which I have toward you. 2 Corinthians 2:4 And he does it also now, establishing this same point in more words. And he said not, 'I regretted indeed before, but now I do not regret:' but how? I regret not now, though I did regret. 'Even if what I wrote,' he says, 'was such as to overstep the [due] measure of rebuke , and to cause me to regret; still the great advantage which has accrued from them does not allow me to regret.' And this he said, not as though he had rebuked them beyond due measure, but to heighten his praises of them. 'For the ame...
