He exhorts a bishop desiring to come to Rome to spare himself the labors of so great a journey, 554. — How averse Gregory was from lawsuits, 497, 625, 671, 672. He wishes the goods of the Church, as the goods of the poor, to be defended not by force but by reason, 526. He preserved to each their own rights, 645, 646. Just as in the courts he was unwilling that the privileges of laymen be disturbed, so against those who prejudiced them he resisted by authority, 626, 627. He is pricked by the sting of conscience, because he had removed a servant of God for a fault that was not grave, 594. He wished to have scandal with no man, 663. From the highest to the lowest he wished to give occasion of scandal to no man, 879. — What sort was Gregory's zeal for justice, 937. What was his equity, 619. With what equity he wished cases to be examined, 526, 643, 822.
He defines nothing while the causes remain undiscussed, 627, 643, 975. Nor against a party unheard, 942, 959, 1061. What has once been rightly determined he wishes fulfilled without delay, 1078. He neglects no man's complaint, 960. In others' cases he is not moved by private hatred, 812, 813, 814. For personal love he defends no one, 581, 582. For no one ever does he ask protection, unless justice favors it, 1079. He believes it base to defend that which he has not first established to be just, 1080. He loves men on account of justice; he does not set justice after men, ibid. With him no subreption finds place, 579. He does not consider the person, 644. To the precepts of the Gospel, the institutions of the canons, the advantages of the brethren, he never prefers the person, 746.
— Gregory a prudent physician, 977. In all cases, especially in those which are God's, he is wont to constrain men by reason rather than by power, 723. He so executes outwardly the things of justice that he by no means sets aside the things of love and charity that are within, 852. He does not wish to dissemble crimes and let them go unpunished, 653. That he corrects the faults of others proceeds not from harshness but from fraternal charity, 928, 1090. — Gregory's wonderful humility, 1027, 1028. In describing the character of a pastor, he says that as a foul painter he has depicted a handsome man, 102. He calls himself a poor little man, 152. He confesses himself liable to error, 172. He says he was ignorant of many things which he learned from another monk, 324.
Whether Gregory was the first of all to adorn himself with this title of humility, 'Servant of the servants of God,' 481, 482, 525, 1213, 1294. He acknowledges himself unequal to the pontificate, 492, 507, 514. He takes it ill to be praised, 494, 516, 618, 713, 855. He names himself dust and an unworthy servant of God, 524. He calls himself dust and a worm, 676. He dreads the weight of his own infirmity, and fears the account to be rendered, 610. He says he is pressed into the depths by the weight of his own faults, 680, 879. He says he is prepared to be corrected and amended by all, 617, 618. He professes himself unworthy to pray for others, 712. Or to whom a revelation from God should be granted, 869. He says he is afflicted less than he deserves, 712. He says he does not do what he seems to know, 778.
He says he was always of evil habits, 873. He humbles himself before the monks, 877. He calls himself inferior to a certain presbyter, 879. He acknowledges himself unworthy of the honor of those who preside and of the rank of those who stand, 888. He says he can transact nothing, ibid. — Gregory forbids his writings to be read at table in the presence of strangers, 856. He calls his own writings bran in comparison with the writings of Augustine, 1067. He does not approve that his commentaries on Job be read publicly at vigils, 1195, 1196. He is prepared to render an account of his faith to other bishops, 779. He is prepared to imitate his inferiors in the good, 941. He attributed the conversion of the English to the prayers of Eulogius of Alexandria, 918, 919. He says the bishops are in place his brothers, but in character his fathers, 919.
He calls himself the servant of all priests, insofar as they themselves live in a priestly manner, 749. He refuses to be called universal bishop, 919. He says his honor is the honor of the universal Church and of his brethren, ibid. He professes that through the burdens of the episcopate he has been made the servant of all, 1123. He calls himself lazy and useless, and torpid in idle sloth, 1028. He asks Rusticiana not thenceforth to name herself a handmaid in her letters to Gregory, 1123. He begs the prayers of others, 806, 807, 874, 971, 1091, 1093, 1116. He complains that he was called simple and foolish by Maurice, 765, 766. In what way he is foolish, ibid. — How ready Gregory was in pardoning injuries, 618, 817, 818.
Not only does he inflict no prejudices, but he bears with equanimity those inflicted on himself, 1059. He was unwilling to involve himself in the death of the Lombards, 726. His solicitude for friends, 524, 1079, 1080, 1081. His unconquered constancy, 725, 749. His zeal for sacred reading, 908. He loves a holy work in others, 1029. And in a way makes it his own, ibid., 1031. He pants for the heavenly homeland, 1032, 1064, 1065. His only consolation, the expectation of death, 1233. — Gregory, being unable to fast on Holy Saturday, obtains through the prayers of Eleutherius the power to fast, 352. He suffers from a disease of the stomach, 707. His infirmities, 352, 965, 990, 1032, 1033, 1064, 1065, 1114, 1115, 1116, 1123, 1124. His various calamities and sorrows, 713, 765, 767, 770, 836.
He is prepared to bear any adversity whatever, provided he endure it with the salvation of his soul, 767. By the sorrows of this life he is driven to the love of heavenly things, 770. In those things which others suffer he is disturbed, 1066. Gregory's eulogy, 484, 621. He is called the most beautiful ornament of the Church, 1036. The most august flower of all drooping Europe, ibid. An outstanding watchman, ibid. A spiritual vein of the living fountain, 1039. A living wave of knowledge, ibid. Most holy apostolic pope, 1292. Whose heart was kindled by the grace of the Holy Spirit, 1293. Gregory did not first deliver in homilies even the books which he wrote on Job, 532. This work he published at the request of Leander, bishop of Seville, 532. And sends it to him, 777.
He takes it ill that these commentaries on Job be read publicly at vigils, 1195, 1196. Why he wrote the book of the Pastoral Rule, 1, 103. The encomium of this book, 620, 1040. This book, offered to the emperor and translated into the Greek tongue by Anastasius of Antioch, Gregory receives with reluctance, 1196. He sends it to the presbyter Columbus, 729. And to St. Leander, 777. He promises it to Venantius the bishop, 729. — Gregory called by the Greeks 'Dialogus' on account of the books of the Dialogues most dear to them, 103. On what occasion he published these books, 105, 116. In what place, 116. He composed these with Peter the deacon by questions and answers, 107. Who attribute these books to Gregory, 106, 107, 532. Who deny them, 113. Who approved them, 108.
These books are asserted to be Gregory's, 105ff., 113ff. By whom these books were translated into Greek, 103, 107, 111, 112, 121. Why there is so great a difference among the versions of these books, 112. Various interpretations of the Dialogues, 116, 117, 118. By the Greek schismatics the Greek version was corrupted, 118, 275. The Gregorian Dialogues promoted the conversion of the Lombards not a little, 114. They contain remarkable examples of the virtues, 115. In them many dogmas of the faith are set forth and established, ibid. In them it was Gregory's intention to speak only of the saints who flourished in Italy, 116. In narrating miracles Gregory observes the laws of history, 114.
What Gregory narrates in these he had heard from good and faithful men, or had learned through himself, 152, 153. Something false crept into these Dialogues, 115. Who converses with Gregory in the Dialogues, ibid. With what congratulation that work was received, 116. What was accomplished in this edition of the work, 117, 118, 119. — The excellence of Gregory's letters, 477. What was taken from, what added to the Register of the Letters, 480. Why the summaries of the letters were changed, ibid. Whether the letter to Venerius of Cagliari was altogether rejected, 1303, 1304. Gregory wrote as many books of letters as years he lived in the pontificate, 478, 479. From the Gregorian letters Pope Hadrian I collected two books of Decretals, 479.
Gregory wrote on the Canticle, 140. His other works, 1195. Gregory, a monk from Mount Sinai, in what year and on what occasion he was made bishop of Antioch, 507. He was a man of great virtue, ibid. He ruled the See of Antioch for twenty-three years and left it to his successor, ibid. What was done concerning that Gregory in the synod of John of Constantinople, Pelagius II ratified, 984. Gregory, bishop of Agrigentum, is summoned to Rome to clear himself, 557. At Rome he awaits his accusers, 634. Whom Gregory orders to be quickly sent to Rome, 633. Gregory, bishop of Porto, 1287. Gregory, presbyter and abbot of the monastery of St. Theodore in Sicily, 496. Through his negligence nearly all the monks of this monastery lapsed, 732.
After a long penance he is restored to his place, ibid. Gregory, a monk of the monastery of St. Benedict near Terracina, 384. He saw the soul of his brother Speciosus, a monk, going forth from the body, 385. Gregory, prefect of Italy, 506. Prefect of the City, 521. He is called ex-prefect, 947, 1193. He builds a basilica in honor of the martyrs, 947. After many labors endured in the siege of Rome, he is accused by Maurice, but is excused by Gregory the Great, 767. He takes refuge in the asylum of the Church, 1078. By Gregory the Great he is commended to various bishops and judges alike, 1082, 1083, 1084, 1085. That he came rather late into Sicily is excused, 1085. The flock follows to the precipice a shepherd walking along the steep places, 4.
He who refuses to feed the flock of God, being lawfully called, is convicted of not loving the supreme Shepherd, 6. The flock is called the people under a prelate, 13. The flock advances better by the examples of the shepherd than by his words, 15. The Lord's flock ought not to remain destitute through the lapse or death of the shepherd, 503, 564, 572. See Pastor. Grumentum, a city of Lucania, 1209. The parish of Grumentum, 1209. Gregory asks that the family of the Grussingi be released, 571. Gudwin, duke of Naples, 1268. Guitmund, archbishop of Aversa, cites Gregory's Dialogues in his book on the truth of the Eucharist, 107. Those given to gluttony, who are to be admonished, 61, 62, 63. The companions of the vice of gluttony are loquacity, levity of conduct, and lust, 61, 62. Gulfar, master of the soldiers, 614, 998.
His zeal for recalling schismatics to the Church, 998. Gummarith, duke of the Lombards, 297. Gundeberga, sister of Adaloald, married Arioald, 1271. The small but innumerable drops of the rains fill the deep whirlpools of rivers, 91. H. What it is to dwell with oneself, 216, 217. Pope Hadrian I in his letter to Charlemagne cites the Dialogues under Gregory's name, 107. From the Gregorian letters he collected only two books of Decretals, 479. Having sent relics to Charlemagne, Hadrian is terrified by a revelation, 708. The emperor Hadrian instituted 'comites,' 499, 500. Hadrian, bishop of Thebes, having suffered injury from bishops, takes refuge at Rome, 627, 628, 629. Unjustly deposed, he is restored by Gregory, 628, 630.
He is accused before the emperors by deacons of many crimes, 629. He is compelled to confess the charges laid against him concerning money matters, though false, ibid. Pelagius II had exempted him from the jurisdiction of the metropolitan of Larissa, 630. Gregory again exempts him, ibid. Gregory wishes to examine Hadrian's reconciliation with his accusers, 653. Hadrian, notary of Sicily, 976, 1055, 1137. He is praised for prosecuting enchanters and soothsayers, 1039. He is called chartulary, 1231. See the alphabetical Index of the Letters. Inheritance. Sons do not come to the inheritance except through the scourges of discipline, 50. He who abstains from the inheritance of his parents ought not to sustain the hereditary burdens, 820.
An inheritance is called 'lying' (jacens) which has not yet been entered upon, 821. An inheritance is entered upon either by word or by deed, ibid. An inheritance is passed over when the heir suffers himself to be excluded by lapse of time, ibid. It is repudiated when he to whom it has been conveyed refuses to enter upon it, ibid. An heir is compelled to pay if the one from whom he derives had bequeathed things not his own, 896. What is the heir 'ex asse,' 990. Who is called heir 'in eight or in four ounces,' 990. What is the heir 'in one ounce,' 1189, 1190. Heresy falsely imputed by Catholics with impotent zeal to other Catholics, 803. The truth so neglected by such insidious men that they do not even know the very heresy they impose, 803, 804. Under the pretext of heresy Gregory did not permit anyone professing the true faith to be afflicted, 803.
Not to believe one who truly professes is not to purge heresy, but to make it, 805. He who does not consent to believe a right profession, in that which he condemns another, accuses himself, 804. It is unfaithfulness not to have faith in the faithful, 805. Gregory declares the presbyter Athanasius, after his orthodox profession of faith, to be a Catholic, 843, 844. What those accused of heresy ought to do, 1129. The heads of the heresy which was believed to have recently arisen at Constantinople, 1130ff. It is refuted by St. Gregory, ibid. The first heresy in the Church was the simoniacal. See Simony. Heretics are figured by the pregnant women of Gilead, 72. How heretics turn the law of God into a sacrifice to Satan, 73. They offer to the devil the gifts of God bestowed upon us, ibid.
What admonitions are to be given to heretics, 73. They make discord out of the precepts of peace, ibid. When the vessels of heretics are taken away and offered to the Church, God is said to take no delight in them, just as neither in their temples, 697. Different was the mind of Gregory and of Honoratus, bishop of Novara, 697. By whose questions the Church is instructed by the heretics, 895. The persecution and malice of heretics against the Catholic Church, 559. It is a great grace of God almighty that among heretics there is no unity, 895. The law pursues their depravity, 714. Heretics are always to be restrained by Catholic priests with force and reason, 731. Those who persecute heretics sometimes make heresies, 1132. Heretics under the emperor Maurice were compelled to fall silent, 1134.
Concerning the baptism of heretics inquiry is made, 1167, and the whole Letter 67 of Book XI. With how great gentleness heretics returning to the unity of the Church are to be received, 500. The various modes of reconciling heretics, 1167ff. The form of abjuring heresy, 1300ff. Halitgar, bishop of Cambrai, 1149. Harenata, a place so called, into which the See of Velletri was transferred by Gregory, 578. What Hebdomum signifies, 1301. The dull-witted, who are to be admonished, 40. By the labor of Helena, mother of Constantine, God kindled the hearts of the Romans to the Christian faith, 1113. Helena is commended by St. Gregory, 1104. Eli's false piety toward his sons, ruinous to himself and to them, 23. Elias, presbyter and abbot of Isauria, 763. Gregory sends him the Gospels, ibid.
Gregory outdoes his modest request for aid by his liberality, ibid. And he prays for him all spiritual goods, 764. Helladia, or Hellas, is properly Achaia, 789. The bishops of Helladia were by ancient custom subject to the bishop of Corinth, 790. The Heptaticum or Heptateuch signifies the seven earlier books of sacred Scripture, 596, 597, 865, 867. What is signified by the herbs which nourish some animals and kill others, 33. Herculanus, a most holy man, taken from a monastery to the episcopate of the city of Perugia, 300. Totila's ferocity against the holy bishop, 301f. Ericius. See Ericius. The daughter of Herbert, king of the Franks, ibid. Out of hatred for the faith, despoiled by her father of all things, she is thrust into prison, ibid.
She refuses to receive communion from the hand of an Arian bishop, 345. After her death her sanctity is confirmed by miracles, 345. A solitary swallow led an admirable life upon the mountains of Praeneste, 396. Hiberia. See Iberia. Hieracium, an episcopal city of Calabria, 871. Hierarchicus, that is, a steward, or a bishop-visitor, 691, 692. Cheerfulness in the saints and even in the monks is praised, and is reconciled with penance, 360. St. Hilary, monk of Lérins and archbishop of Arles, 1101. Hilary, whom Gregory commends to Queen Brunhild, 1024. To Vantilo and Arigius, ibid., 1025. Who that Hilary was, is uncertain, 1026. Mention of him still, 648.
Pope Hilarus, immediately after his ordination, sent letters of communion to all the bishops of Gaul, 542. Hilarus, or Hilary, a monk of Africa and chartulary, 561, 566, 612, 1068, 1185, 1199, 1201. He is called notary, 1089. As legate of the Apostolic See he convenes a council, over which he presides, 567. He is called rector of the patrimony, and is commended to Gennadius, exarch of Africa, 560. Hilarus, a subdeacon and calumniator, with what penalties he is to be visited, 1172. Hilarus, from the city of Tauromenium, 821. Hincmar, metropolitan of Reims, delegated visitor-bishops to the desolate Churches of his province, 501. He brings forward very many testimonies from the Gregorian Dialogues in his own works, 107. And from other works of the same Father, 1156, 1235.
Hippolytus, a cleric of Milan, 644. Hippolytus, a notary, 683, 684. Hispalis (Seville), a city of Spain, metropolis of Andalusia, 531. The bishop of Seville, St. Leander. See his title. Spain, formerly called Iberia, 431, 1167. On account of the cause of the Three Chapters, Spain was not divided by schism, 614. The bishops of Istria schismatic in the cause of the Three Chapters, 608. See Schismatics, Bishop of Istria, Providentius, 778. Actors are debarred from the clerical state, 675. For how many years a homicide ought to do penance, 1293. Gregory transmits two copies of his homilies to Secundinus, 971. Man. Nature begot all men equal, but fault places some below others, 20. Man is the work of God, vice the work of man, 772.
Man was so constituted that reason should possess the soul, and the soul the body, 43. Man was created by God as a middle being between angel and brute animal, 373. He has immortality in common with the angel, mortality in common with the brute, ibid. Man standing before sin God admonished to his face, but fallen, from behind, 82. How great was man's felicity in paradise before sin, and how great his misery after sin, 372. Man after sin is like an infant born and reared in prison, ibid. The soul of man died through Adam, 802, 883. Man in sinning turned his back to the face of God, 82. How the destruction of man and of beasts is one, 377. What man has more than the beasts, ibid. The various orders of men, 783.
Homobonus, bishop of Alba, ordained by Gregory, 633. What our honor is, 49. Who gives his honor to strangers, ibid. The distinction between the right and the honor of a bishop, 495. Here honor is understood as the use of the pallium in an archbishop, 518. Those who snatch at honor out of pride Gregory cannot endure, 739. He who wishes to be honored against God merits no honor, 879. While honor is outwardly conferred by men, the mind is plunged into the depths, 880. He who advances in honors and falls in morals is lifted up when he is cast down, 1027. Let the reward of honor be a good life, 1142. Honorata, a handmaid, is summoned to Rome with her son, 596. Thrust into a monastery on account of a second marriage, she is ordered to be recalled thence, 716, 717.
Honoratus, bishop of Novara, converts a temple of idols into a Church, 697. Honoratus, a presbyter to whom the care of the widowed Church of Manium is committed, 565. Honoratus, archdeacon of Salona, that he be cast down from the office of the diaconate to be promoted to the priesthood, 504, 581, 582, 583. He is ordered to be restored to his rank, 504, 581, 583, 584. In his custody were the goods of the Church of Salona, 505. Honoratus is summoned to Rome by Gregory, 581, 583, 584. Natalis, bishop of Salona, having died, Honoratus, absolved of the charges laid against him, is restored to the rank of his order, 647, 812. He is chosen bishop of Salona, 657. But Maximus invades that See, 658. With whom he does not communicate, 812, 813. Honoratus is commended to Maximus, 1034.
Honoratus, deacon of the Roman Church, apocrisiarius in the court of the emperor, 543, 544, 619. To him Gregory gives charge to plead before the emperors on behalf of the vexed Sardinians, 543. To him Venantius is commended for obtaining the documents of ex-consulship, 619. He is deputed to investigate the case of Hadrian the bishop, 628, 630. St. Honoratus, monk and of Lérins, 1101. From his name Lérins is called the island of St. Honoratus, ibid. Honoratus, most zealous for silence and abstinence, 153. His abstinence is confirmed by a miracle, ibid. He built the very ample monastery of Fondi, of which he was also abbot, 153. He frees that monastery from the fall of an overhanging cliff, 156. Taught by the sole teaching of the Holy Spirit, ibid.
He is venerated by his disciple Libertinus, 157. By his little boot a boy is called back from the dead, 160. Honoratus, a disciple of St. Benedict, 208, 240. Pope Honorius I founded the Church of St. Pancras on the Aurelian Way, 697. Honorius, bishop of Taranto, 1232. Horosius, an abbot under whose obedience and rule Gregory places the monks living on the island of Christ's mount, 545. To him is committed the correction of the monks of the island of Gorgona, 546. Who the granary-keepers are, 1205. What a granary is, ibid. Hortanum, commonly Orta, formerly a city of Etruria, now a town of the patrimony of St. Peter, 521. Blandus, bishop of Orta, ibid. Hortona, a city in Italy, 721. The visitation of the Church of Hortona is committed to Barbarus the bishop, ibid.
A gardener-monk, distinguished for his holiness, appointed a serpent to guard his garden, 161. How he caught a thief, ibid. His kindness toward the thief, 164. A gardener as founder of a hospice, 1261. Garden. Who is said to dwell in the gardens of the Church, 75. Hospito, leader of the Barbaricini in Sardinia, 701. Gregory admonishes him to lend aid to Felix and Cyriacus in converting the Barbaricini, 701, 702. The care of guests once lay upon the faithful, and especially upon bishops, 1059, 1116, 1151, 1269. The enemies of God prosper on His left hand and are broken on His right, 77. 'Enemy' means the same as 'army,' 568, 591. Spiritual arms are to be set against hostile swords, 1138ff. A victim will truly be offered to God for us when we have made ourselves the victim, 472.
We shall not need a saving victim after death, if before death we have ourselves been a victim to God, 473. What 'Hualinum' or 'Huelinum' signifies, 1039. The humble are signified by David, 36. How the humble are to be admonished, 58. The humble are imitators of God, 59. Let them not be subject more than is expedient, ibid. Let them seek to lie hidden, yet, that they may profit others, let them be brought forth against their will, 185. It is no great thing to be humble toward those by whom we are honored, 599. He who is least to himself is great before God, 21. As the proud glory in honors, so the humble glory in their own contempt, 176. He truly loves the heights who does not cut off his mind from the root of humility, 1030. Humility is the raising up of the priestly office, 655. Humility arises from the recognition of those better than oneself, 153.
To teach humility alone, God became small even unto the suffering of death, 744. The effects of true humility, 7. How greatly humility avails in the working of miracles, 160. Humility is a sign of the Holy Spirit dwelling in the mind, 156. Those who have learned to despise themselves are under God's keeping, 172. As the proud glory in honors, so the humble glory in their own contempt, 176. Why Christ willed to rise before the humble, He who had willed to die before the proud, 229. We are the more powerful over our own conduct in proportion as we are made one with God through humility, 329. What false humility is, 7, 23. Sloth is veiled under the appearance of humility, 59. Why Paul joins the appearance of humility to superstition, 62.
The connection between humility and charity, 852. A comparison of humility and pride, 744. Obstinacy is opposed to humility, 7. Poverty is the guardian of humility, 184. For the safeguarding of humility, certain blameworthy things are left to the saints, to whom great gifts of grace are granted, 308. The humility of God's servants ought to appear in the time of affliction, 599. We ought especially to be humble toward those from whom we suffer something, ibid. Humility is imperiled on the summit of dignities, 21. Humility is to be preserved in virginity, 83. In prosperity and in adversity, 662. Let uprightness season humility, and let humility render uprightness gracious, 526. Let us be subject in mind even to persons of lesser dignity, 731, 732. Let humility not be timid, 771.
Let it be laid under charity as a foundation, or added as a seasoning, 852. Let humility have confidence joined to it, 1112. We cannot otherwise live in the root of love unless in mind and in deed we hold to humility, 1246. Nothing is more sublime than humility, 59. The humility of Christ. See Christ. The humility of prelates. See Prelate. How necessary humility is to preachers, 1110ff. In what year Hunneric, king of the Vandals, began to reign, 348. What jacinth in the priest's vestment signifies, 15, 509. How the jacinth relates to the carbuncle, 84. Hydruntum or Hydrus, a city of Calabria in Italy, 807. It was under the jurisdiction of the Roman Church, 1003. The people of Hydruntum harassed by Viator the ex-tribune, ibid. Peter, bishop of Hydruntum, 807.
What it is to flee in winter, and why it is forbidden, 523. A hypocrite is one who, by a pretense of discipline, lords it over his subjects, 23. Hypocrites guard against small sins yet commit greater ones, 92. Those who do evil secretly and good publicly are whitewashed sepulchres, 95. Those who do good for the sake of human favor sell a thing of infinite price for a cheap sum, ibid. Hypocrites live for others and die to themselves, 441. He made the confession of his hypocrisy, useless to himself, useful to the brethren present and to us, ibid. Ibas was declared orthodox in the Council of Chalcedon by the legates of the supreme pontiff, 516. His letter is opposed to that same synod, 968. Iberia, a region of Asia, 1167. Iberia was formerly called Hispania, 431, 1167. Gregory writes to the bishops of Iberia, 1166.