Calixtus on those who never hear: Cornelius and the eunuch of Candace
Thesis XIV. He puts this question to himself: 'How will people come to faith who neither live among Christians nor have ever heard a word about Christians, from whom alone one can hear the word? Are they not lost without any carelessness on their part, simply because God did not provide for them to hear the word as other nations do?'
Among other things he replies that 'all people keep some powers of intellect and will and some natural knowledge. If any have used these rightly, cared for their salvation, and worked at it as far as they can, God will provide them with means to bring them to a fuller and more complete knowledge, one that rests on divine revelation.' He finds an example of this in Cornelius the centurion and in the eunuch of Queen Candace.
Latin
XIV. Postquam enim hanc sibi quaestionem proposuit, Quomodo ad fidem pervenient, qui neque inter Christianos degunt, neque fando unquam quicquam acceperunt de Christianis; a quibus, scilicet, solis verbum audire datur: annon illi sine ulla suae negligentiae culpa pereunt, ideo quod iis Deus non prospexerit, quo verbum sicut aliae gentes audire possent? Inter alia Respondet, Omnibus hominibus superesse aliquas intellectus & voluntatis vires, & naturales notitias, quibus si qui recte usi fuerint, salutis suae curam habuerint, & de ea quantum possunt laboraverint, iis Deum de mediis prospecturum, quibus ad pleniorem & perfectiorem, adeoque revelationi divinae innixam cognitionem deducantur. Cujus rei exemplum nos habere existimat in Cornelio Centurione, & in Eunucho reginae Candaces.