VI. people of the city, scarce a freeman or a slave is CENT. exempt from fevers. Africa and the East are also full of misery and desolation. I see the end of all things approaching; be therefore less solicitous on account of your own calamities. Study with alacrity that godliness, which has the promise of the life that now is, as well as of that which is to come." In a letter to Eulogius*, bishop of Alexandria, written the year after, he says, "I have been near two years confined to my bed, in constant pain. Often have I been forced to return to my bed, when I scarce had left it, by the violence of pain. Thus I die daily, and yet live. But I am a grievous criminal, and, as such, deservedly shut up in so painful a prison. I daily cry with the psalmist, Bring my soul out of prison, that I may give thanks to thy name.' While he lived, he was frequently thus afflicted; but the vigour of his mind was unabated, and his faculties were unclouded. Another instance of his bodily sufferings shall close this branch of his story. Writing to his friend Venantius, who was likewise afflicted with the gout, he says, "what ought we to do, but to call our sins to remembrance, and to thank God, that he purifies us by afflicting our flesh.-Let us take care, that we pass not from one degree of torment to another, and let us consider the goodness of God, who threatens us with death, that he may imprint in us an edifying fear of his judgments. How many sinners have continued immersed in sin through life without a head-ach, and have suddenly been cast into hell!"all his body, and took away his spirits. By such severe exercises was this good man trained for the kingdom of heaven, and he evidently grew in humility, tender sympathy with others in distress, and ardent breathings for the heavenly country. *This Eulogius, by preaching and writing, strengthened the hands of the godly in the East, and lessened the influence of heretics. He seems, by Gregory's correspondence with him, to have been a wise and pious pastor, such as in Alexandria and the East were rarely to be found. CHAP. V. rejoice to find in this great man the marks of that deep humility, which is known only to true converts, and of that wise improvement of affliction, of which theorists may reason, but which Saints only feel. He concludes thus benevolently and piously to his friend: "May the Lord infuse into your soul these words by the inspiration of his spirit, cleanse you from your iniquities, give you here the joy of his consolation, and eternal reward hereafter*. Gregory having been informed, that Clementina, a woman of quality, had harboured some suspicions against him, wrote to her in a charitable spirit, and with the intention of effacing the disagreeable impressions. He at the same time mildly reproved her for the want of a placable and forgiving temper. He reminds her of the well-known petition in the Lord's prayer, and delivered several weighty sentiments adapted to the subject†. On no occasion was Gregory wanting to impress on men's minds the care of the soul. Two persons having requested his assistance in their temporal difficulties, after having said what the case required, he exhorted them not to murmur at the divine dispensations, nor to undertake any thing unjust under the pretence of necessity; but to fix their hope on the mercy of their Redeemer, who forsaketh not those who trust in him, to occupy their minds with divine things, and to repose on him who gives what we have not, repairs what we have lost, and preserves what he has repaired. The subdeacon was an officer of the Church, who superintended, under the bishop of Rome, the distant bishoprics and parishes which belonged to his jurisdiction. Gregory wrote to Anthemius, the subdeacon of Campania, that he had heard of Paschasius, a bishop, who was so slothful, that he neglected every pastoral duty, admitted of no advice, VI. and gave himself up to the building of a ship. It CENT. seems he used to go down to the sea on this very unclerical employment with one or two of his clergymen, and was held in derision by all the country. Gregory directs his subdeacon to reprimand him in the presence of some presbyters, or gentlemen of the neighbourhood, and try by that method to reform him. Should that prove ineffectual, he enjoins him to send Paschasius to Rome, to answer for himself before Gregory. I know not the result; but it seemed worth while to mention the case, as it illustrates the state of the church-discipline of that day, as well as the vigilant attention of Gregory. That so many should nominally sustain the pastoral character, whose taste and genius, as well as disposition and sentiments, are repugnant to it, and who seem qualified to excel in any thing rather than what is sacerdotal, is matter for lamentation. The profane avarice of parents educating their children for the ministry at all events, is one great cause of it. CHAP. VI. GREGORY'S CONDUCT TOWARD THE EMPERORS VI. It is impossible for any impartial person, who has CHAP. attended to the spirit and conduct of Gregory as exhibited in his pastoral memoirs, not to feel a conviction of the eminent piety, integrity, and humility of this bishop. Yet it has been the fashion to arraign his character with great severity, on account of his conduct in the latter part of his life. He has been accused of great ingratitude toward one excellent and virtuous emperor, and of egregious flattery toward another who was profligate and tyrannical. The evidence already adduced of his disposition and temper should naturally dispose us to receive with much caution such grievous accusations. I shall CHAP throw together into this chapter the facts on which our judgment is to be founded*. VI. A series of events had given Gregory a strong prejudice against the government of Mauritius. Their opposition of sentiment had remarkably alienated their spirits from one another, though they once had the most sincere esteem for each other's character. Gregory had been very acceptable to Mauritius, who had strongly favoured his promotion to the bishopric. Nor is there any reason to doubt of the sincerity of the bishop's professions of a very high regard for the emperor, when he made them. Changes of this sort are common amongst mankind, and the declarations, which men make at different times of the characters of the same persons, however contradictory, are not to be always charged to insincerity. Mauritius made a law, to prohibit men, who had held civil offices under the government, from undertaking the administration of the Church. Of this Gregory approved; but a clause in the same law, which forbad military men to enter into monasteries till the time of their service was expired, or till they were disabled for the profession, met not with the same approbation. Gregory, too fond of monastic institutions, and conceiving them necessary for the souls of some, though not of all, expostulated with the emperor on the impiety of the decree. He does so, however, with all possible decency and respect, and lays open his sentiments with a frankness and modesty, which do honour to his character. Doubtless he was mistaken, and the mistake was common to him with the most pious of those times. He promulged, however, the emperor's decree through Italy, and thus, as he himself says, he was faithful to God, at the same time obedient to his princet. In this transaction, in which it does not appear that he succeeded with the emperor, the zeal of Gregory was quickened by the strong presentiments of See Bower's history of the Popes, Vol. ii. Gregory. VI. the near approach of the day of judgment, which CENT. filled his mind. This mistaken notion seems to have dwelt with Gregory; nor was it in him a mere speculation. He was practically serious in the expectation. I find him pressing it in another letter to the nobles and landholders of the island of Sardinia, whom he reproved for suffering their labourers to remain ina state of idolatry. He justly observes, that they were bound in conscience to take care of the spiritual instruction of those who laboured for them in temporal things, and he earnestly exhorts them to promote the charitable work *. The selfishness and insensibility, with which so many, in modern times, can reap lucrative advantages from the labours of mariners, slaves, and apprentices, with no more attention to their best interests, than if they were of the brute creation, here naturally forces itself on our attention. Other letters of the same kind, demonstrate the zeal of Gregory for the propagation of Christianity among idolaters and infidels. Italy suffered extremely from the Lombards, as has been observed, and we can form no hopeful idea of the real conversion of Aigilulph, the husband of Theodolinda, since he still ravaged the Roman territories, and filled them with misery and desolation. These evils were a constant source of affliction to the tender spirit of Gregory, yet he failed not to improve them, IN HIS HOMILIES, TO THE INSTRUCTION OF HIS FLOCK. Willing to put a stop to the effusion of blood, and averse to shedding even that of the Lombards by nourishing intestine feuds among them, as he might have done, he strove to make peace with Aigilulph, and had even succeeded, when the Exarch of Ravenna, the emperor's governor in Italy, perfidiously brake the peace, and provoked the Lombard king to renew his hostilities. The Exarch himself, finding his own profit in the continuance of the war, was for persevering in it at all events, and his heart was hardened against the sufferings of the * B. III. 23. |