Psalms 91:11

For he has given his angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. This passage the devil interpreted concerning the Lord. For at the time when he tempted the Lord, "If," he says, "you are the Son of God, cast yourself down. For it is written concerning you, that he has given his angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. In their hands they shall bear you up, lest perhaps you dash your foot against a stone." The devil said nothing more than this: For he has given his angels charge concerning you, that in their hands they may bear you up, lest perhaps you dash your foot against a stone. He left out the middle part. For here it is said, For he has given his angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. This he did not say, To guard you in all your ways: for he knew it was against himself. For the Lord could have answered him: If the Lord guards me in all my ways, then I am guarded from you too. He was silent, therefore, about what he knew was against himself, and set down what was in his favor.

And note: do you think it was as though inferior to the angels, or needing the help of angels, that the Savior said: or do you think that I cannot ask my Father, and he will furnish me more than twelve legions of angels? — or was it perhaps according to the estimation of Peter, who wished to bring him help and brought forth the sword and cut off the servant's ear, that he spoke such things? For rather do the angels have need of the help of the only-begotten Son of God than he of theirs. For this reason, that which is written, "for he shall give his angels charge concerning you, to keep you in all your ways", is understood to be said not of the only-begotten Son of God, but either in the person of Christ concerning every just man, whom Christ was bearing in his body, or concerning Christ according to his human nature. And finally, that which he says, he will deliver you "from ruin and the noonday demon", in no way befits the Son of God; but also what he says, "you shall not fear the terror of the night, the arrow that flies by day, the trouble that walks about in the darkness", befits a just man rather than the Son of God. Since therefore he could receive the legions, he was unwilling to receive them, so that through his patience the Scriptures prophesying about him might be fulfilled, since it befitted him thus to suffer.

Well, the Donatists are not false Christians. They are quite simply not Christians at all, since they listen to what the devil suggested and do not listen to the answer Christ gave him. How, after all, did the Lord, our teacher and savior, answer the devil's suggestion of such things? "Get back, Satan, for it is written: You shall not tempt the Lord your God." The devil, as a matter of fact, had taken his suggestion from Scripture, and the Lord replied from Scripture. The devil had said to the Lord, you see, "Since it is written, He will instruct his angels about you; they will lift you up in their hands, lest you should hurt your foot on a stone." "Hurl yourself down," he said, "and if you are the Son of God, the angels are there to catch you; what are you afraid of?" The Lord could indeed both have cast down his body and not allowed it to die; but what the devil was suggesting to Christ at that time is the sort of thing Christ was not teaching future Christians. This, you see, is exactly what the devil is also suggesting to the Donatists, saying, "Hurl yourselves down, the angels are there to catch you. With such a death you do not go to punishment, but you win through to a crown." They would be Christians if they give an ear to Christ and did not trust the devil, who first separated them from the peace of the church and later on gave them cliff-jumpers.