From which it is concluded with how great consideration Saint Gregory, rightly teaching, daily recognized his own infirmity. Argument.—1. Concerning the temperance of Gregory.—2. He withdrew from John, bishop of Ravenna, the use of the pallium and of the mappulae (little napkins).—3. To the same, humbly requesting the use of the pallium, he granted it four times a year through the public squares.—4. Having rebuked the same for various vices, he foretold the day of his summoning (death).—5. When John had died, he committed the church of Ravenna to a visitor; and when Marinianus had been consecrated bishop, he granted the use of the pallium in like manner.—6. To Andrew, petitioning for the pallium, he prescribed an oath.—7. When Marinianus was unable to defend the custom of the pallium as had been agreed, Gregory remained in his sentence.—8.
He reproved the deacons of Catania for the usurpation of the campagi (a kind of episcopal footwear).—9. Concerning Maximus, the invader of the church of Salona.—10. He defended the authority of his pontificate against the tyrant emperor.—11. Excommunicating Maximus with his accomplices against the imperial wish, he compelled his bishops to return to the Church.—12. He ordered the case of Maximus to be aired at Ravenna.—13. Maximus, prostrate on the ground, tearfully begs pardon.—14. Gregory decrees that Maximus, making satisfaction before the body of Saint Apollinaris, is to be shown mercy.—15. To Maximus, humbly making satisfaction, he restores the grace of communion, and promises that he will give him the pallium.—16. With what didactic responses he terrified the proud emperor.—17.
Death by the sword threatens Maurice, who was raging against Gregory.—18. Maurice, repenting, sees in dreams himself, with his wife and children, delivered by divine judgment to the soldier Phocas.—19. When a sedition had broken out, Maurice, by the order of Phocas, is slain together with all his kindred.—20. Having received the imperial portrait, he wisely enumerates the vices of Maurice to the emperor Phocas.—21. He sends him an Apocrisiarius (legate) according to custom.—22. With a great weight removed, he declares that the imperial yoke has been rendered lighter.—23. He directed his synodical letter according to custom, and (notes) that the Orientals receive no one's name in the diptychs until they have known the synodical letter of his faith.—24. Having received the decrees of the Milanese, he consented that a bishop be ordained for them.—25.
He restored Anastasius of Antioch to his throne after many years.—26. Restoring Hadrian, bishop of Thebes, to his order, he withdrew his diocese from the power of the bishop of Larissa.—27. Except for manifest crimes, he deposed no one, but deprived them of communion.—28. With what strictness he handled the suits of accusers, and what things he decreed concerning the orders of judgments.—29. He confirmed the authorities of other bishops by his own authority; he did not diminish them.—30. Preserving to all bishops their proper rights, he willed that executors be appointed, and that judges be chosen by the accused.—31. He punished false informers with the like penalty (talio).—32.
He did not suffer crimes once brought forward to pass unexamined, and with what penalties he punished accusers of sins.—33. He ordered the accustomed stipends to be administered even to infirm clerics.—34. He confirmed the bonds made to their clerics by bishops, and ordered that their fourth (portions) be given to them in full.—35. He absolved those bound by others.—36. He received those purging themselves from heresy.—37. He took care to invite schismatics to Rome to undertake satisfaction.—38. He compelled Severus, bishop of Aquileia, to come to Ravenna; who, after he had returned to unity, running back again to his schism and afflicting the catholic priests, became the cause of the perpetual division of his diocese.—39.
On account of bodily sickness he gave no one a successor, and (it is noted) that to those renouncing their sees he did not deny successors, and ordered that suitable provisions be administered to them from the resources of the same (see).—40. He ordered a woman who had been violated to be taken in marriage by her violator.—41. He commanded that a man already tonsured be restored to his wife.—42. He decreed that no force be brought upon the Jews.—43. He judged that Christians ought on no occasion to be subjected to them.—44. He ordered Christians to be violently taken away from them; and of those who could not be taken away, he decreed that they be redeemed.—45. He forbade their slaves who took refuge in the Church to be given back.—46. He decreed that their pagan slaves wishing to come to the faith were not to be given back.—47.
He ordained that Jews' slaves who preceded their masters to the faith should by no means be reduced to their servitude, even if they themselves should follow them to the grace of baptism.—48. He permitted no one of the pagans to be circumcised.—49. He decreed that gifts from the Jews were not to be received.—50. In what manner the Jews were treated by the Roman pontiffs.—51. Gregory ordered that the Sabbath not be observed, and permitted washing on the Lord's Day.—52. Of how great compassion he was in the infirmities of the bishops Castorius, Eulogius, and Marinianus, or of the patrician lady Rusticiana.—53. On account of the barbarian incursions he willed that a litany be held.—54. He had the spirit of prophecy.—55. He foretold that future things would be worse than the former.—56. He permitted no one to be unjustly defended by the Church.
—57. He ordered that to those taking refuge in the Church the sacraments be furnished, concerning the justices to be preserved for them.—58. He called all priests brothers and fellow-ministers; other clerics indeed his most beloved sons; but laymen of either sex he called lords.—59. He gave satisfaction both to the faithful Theudelinda, the queen, and to his own subdeacon.—60. He records himself unworthy of the revelation of God.—61. Comparing himself to a presbyter, he pronounces that man superior and better.—62. He confesses himself unworthy of another's favor.—63. To a monk prostrating himself before him, he cast himself down to the ground.—64. Being accused, he set forth his innocence.—65. What he felt concerning the end of the age.—66. What things he wrote concerning the affliction of the City (Rome).—67. On account of the barbarian incursions he desisted from expounding the (sacred) books.
—68. Concerning his death, and the silver crowns (or facings) prepared by him, as well as the place of his burial, or its inscription.—69. By what means, when rivals were plotting to burn his books, Peter the Deacon defended them by dying.—70. How much Claudius learned from his words: and that Gregory dictated many things which now cannot be found.—71. He left twelve books of his letters, from which, in the time of Pope Hadrian, two volumes are seen to have been excerpted.—72. In his diaconate he began the Moralia, and how he arranged it into books during his episcopate, and directed it to Leander, bishop of Seville, at his request.—73. At the beginning of his episcopate, expounding the book of the Pastoral Rule to John, bishop of Ravenna, he restrained the unskilled.
—74. Running through the stations (churches), he dictated forty homilies, which he sent to Secundus, the servant of God, at his request.—75. He wrote the four books of the Dialogues, which afterward Zacharias, bishop of the Apostolic See, translated into the Greek tongue.—76. At the request of his citizens, he treated the first and last parts of the prophecy of Ezekiel in twenty-two homilies.—77. How humbly he himself felt concerning his own treatises, which are proclaimed most eloquent by later teachers.—78. Calling his own books, in comparison with the treatises of Augustine, mere bran, he forbade them to be read as long as he lived.—79. With how great consideration he daily recognized the infirmity of his own heart.—80. His body was translated by Pope Gregory IV:
and concerning his antiquity, or his mediocrity (of stature), and his regular special character.—81. Not knowing Greek, he discovered false treatises entitled under his name.—82. The monks who were sent by him into Saxony were bound to the rules of Saint Benedict.—83. Concerning the forms and garments of his father and mother.—84. Concerning his own form and habit, or his distich.—85. Saturninus, a monk, drew images of the apostles beside his effigy.—86. Concerning John, the provost, who contended with the devil before Christ; and concerning the revelation and terrible passing away of the same.—87. Concerning the torments of Andrew, the contractor, who professed that he had sold the monastery's charters to the same provost.—88.
Concerning the presage of the death of Athanasius the steward, who defrauded the customary allowances of the poor.—89. Concerning the devil driven out of the cloister of the monastery, who had struck a monk lying down.—90. Concerning the vision of a monk who foresaw twelve men who would die within the same number of days.—91. Concerning the conversion and passing away of Lucidus, bishop of Ficulnea.—92. Concerning the revelation of a monk who, through the shedding of tears, learned of the recovery and return of a certain enclosed presbyter, his brother.—93. Concerning the demon cast out from the estate of Barbilianum, who, killing the contractor and the herdsmen, had persecuted Caucus.—94. Concerning the vision about Tergaudus, once bishop of Trier, who was driven from the monastery by the blessed Gregory.—95.
Concerning the rebuke of Faraldus, who was suspended by demons the whole night.—96. Concerning Indulfus, a deserter of the monastery, struck by an old man: and concerning the revelation of a cleric, and the digression about Suppo.—97. Concerning the presbyter Cednicus, who had uncovered the Gregorian spring, being bound and beaten, and concerning his miserable passing away.—98. Concerning the modius (measure) of the monastery, and the diversity of its overflowing, as well as the miracle of bread divinely multiplied.—99. How frequently Gregory is shown forth in diverse places.—100. Concerning the division (portion) of a scribe, who could be frightened by a rival, and who deserved to be consoled by the blessed Gregory. 1. This is Gregory's sentence, full of reason and humility, concerning the refusal of the title "universal."
He indeed knew how to use prudently the cunning of the serpent against the proud, and by no means departed from the simplicity of the dove toward the humble. Wherefore, conscious of his own temperance, he says to Dominicus, bishop of Carthage, after other matters: Concerning ecclesiastical privileges, as to what your fraternity writes, let it hold this, all doubt set aside: that just as we defend our own, so we preserve to each and every church its own rights. Nor, by the favor of grace, do I impart to anyone beyond what he deserves; nor will I derogate from anyone that which is of his own right, when ambition goads. But I desire to honor my brethren in all things, and I so strive that each be advanced in honor, provided there be nothing which can by right be objected to one by another. (Letter,
Book II, Letter 47.) Likewise he writes to Eulogius of Alexandria and Anastasius of Antioch, the patriarchs, saying: Since the excellent preacher says: "As long as indeed I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I will honor my ministry" (Romans 11:13), who again elsewhere says: "We were made little ones in the midst of you" (1 Thessalonians 2:7): he shows us without doubt an example to follow, that we should both hold humility in mind, and yet preserve the dignity of our order in honor: so that in us humility be not timid, nor exaltation proud, and so forth. (Book V, Letter 43.) Which Gregory, as can most manifestly be gathered from what precedes and follows, both did and said. 2.
For John, bishop of Ravenna, who through a swelling of pride frequently wore the pallium, and permitted his presbyters and deacons to proceed with the mappulae (little napkins), he first familiarly rebuked through Castorius the chartulary; afterward, when he pertinaciously defended these things as having been granted to him by custom or privilege, he penalized him, after certain matters, with such a sentence. "That I may briefly gather together," he says, "the things I said above: I admonish that, unless you shall have shown these things to have been attributed to you by privilege through the munificence of my predecessors, you presume not to use it in the public squares any further: lest you begin not to have even at Mass that which you audaciously usurp even in the squares.
But concerning the sacristy, that your fraternity both sat with the pallium and received the sons of the Church, and both did it and excused it—for now, in the meantime, we make no complaint: because, following the sentence of the synods, we refuse to avenge lesser faults which are denied. This, however, since it has been done once and again, we have come to know, but we forbid it to be done further. Let your fraternity, moreover, be altogether solicitous lest this, which is now yielded to a presumption while it is just beginning, be more grievously punished in one who advances in it." And after a few things: "But as to that which you wrote concerning the mappulae to be used by your clergy, it was strongly opposed by our clerics, saying that this had never been granted to any other church whatever;
nor did the Ravennate clergy, either there or in the city of Rome, presume any such thing with their (own) conscience (aware). Nor, if it had been attempted, would a prejudice (precedent) be generated for themselves from a furtive usurpation; but even if this had been presumed in any church whatever, they assert it ought to be corrected; because it is presumed not by the concession of the Roman pontiff, but by mere stealthy encroachment. But we, preserving the honor to your fraternity—although against the will of our aforesaid clergy—nevertheless permit your chief deacons, whom certain persons have testified to us to have used them even before, to use the mappulae, but only in your service. At another time, however, or for other persons, we most vehemently forbid this to be done." (Book III, Letter 56.) 3.
This sentence the man, most desirous of vainglory, bearing most grievously, most vigorously demanded through whomever he could that the use of the pallium be restored to him. To him Gregory wrote thus: I find your fraternity greatly saddened because you are forbidden by the censure of reason to don the pallium in the litanies (processions); but through the most excellent Roman patrician, and through the most eminent prefect, and through other noble men of your city, you importunately seek that this ought to be granted.
But we, solicitously inquiring from Adeodatus, formerly a deacon of your fraternity, have learned that it was never the custom for your predecessors to use the pallium in the litanies, except on the solemnity of the blessed John the Baptist, of the blessed Apostle Peter, and of the blessed martyr Apollinaris. And this indeed we ought by no means to have believed, because many representatives (responsales) from the city of your fraternity have often been (here), who profess that they never saw any such thing; and in this matter one ought rather to believe the many than the one attesting something for his own church. But because we (grieve to) sadden your fraternity...
We are unwilling to frustrate the petition of our sons in any way; therefore, until we come to know something more subtle and true, we grant the use of the pallium at the solemn litanies, that is, on the birthday of the blessed John the Baptist, and of the blessed Apostle Peter, and of the blessed martyr Apollinaris, and at the celebration of your ordination. But in the sacristy, according to the ancient custom, when the sons of the Church have been received and dismissed, your Fraternity ought to put on the pallium and thus proceed to the solemnities of the Mass, and to arrogate to himself nothing further out of the daring of rash presumption: lest, while in outward bearing something is inordinately seized, those things which might have been lawful be lost even when done in due order. (Book V, letter 11.)
But this same John, curbed from the ambition of vainglory by the rein of apostolic moderation, turned himself wholly to the disparagement of the pontiff. Whence the most prudent pontiff admonishes him thus, saying: First, this grieves me, that your Fraternity writes to me with a double heart, displaying certain flatteries in his letters, while showing other things in a worldly manner with his tongue. Next, it is grievous to me that those mockeries which notaries still boys are accustomed to indulge in, my brother John to this day retains upon his tongue, speaks bitingly, and as it were takes delight in such cunning. To friends present he flatters; about the absent he speaks ill.
In the third place, it is grievous and altogether detestable to me that upon his servants, in the hour when he rages, he imposes shameful accusations, so that they are called effeminate, and still more grievously and openly so. After this it came about that there is no discipline for guarding the life of the clergy, but he shows himself merely as lord to his clerics. But the last matter—which by the weight of pride is nevertheless the first—concerns the use of the pallium outside the church, which in the times of my predecessors no one ever presumed to do, nor was it ever presumed by his predecessors, as our envoys testify, except when relics were being deposited:
yet concerning the relics, only one person could be found to say that in my days, to my contempt, he not only did it with the utmost audacity but even did it frequently. From all these things I find that the honor of your episcopate is wholly in outward show, not in the mind. And indeed I give thanks to Almighty God that at the time when this reached me—which never reached the ears of my predecessors—the Lombards were positioned between me and the city of Ravenna. For perhaps I would have had to show men how strict I know how to be.
But lest you should believe that I wish your church to be burdened or diminished in anything, recall in the solemnities of the Roman Masses where the deacon of Ravenna used to stand, and inquire where he stands today: and you will recognize that I desire to honor the church of Ravenna. But that anyone should seize whatever he pleases out of pride—this I cannot tolerate. Nevertheless, on this matter I have already written to our deacon at Constantinople, that he should make inquiry through all who have under them even thirty or forty bishops. And if this usage exists anywhere, that in litanies they walk with pallia, far be it that through me the honor of the church of Ravenna should seem to be diminished in anything. Therefore consider all these things which I have said above, dearest brother; attend to the day of your calling;
consider what account of the burden of the episcopate you are to render. Amend those manners of a notary; see what befits a bishop in tongue and in deed. Be wholly pure toward your brethren. Do not speak one thing and hold another in your heart; nor seek to appear more than you are, that you may be able to be more than you appear. (Book V, letter 15.) 5. Because John, in the arrogance of pride, scorned to amend these things, in that same year, according to what Gregory had foretold him, he ran headlong—while he did not heed it—into the day of his calling; and, swollen, he burst before he had deserved to be satisfied with the vesture of the pallium.
For which reason Gregory, committing the visitation of the church of Ravenna to Severus, bishop of Ficulum, according to the ancient custom, consecrated Marinianus, a monk, his own intimate, as bishop for the people of Ravenna; and he directs the pallium to him, writing: Prompted by the benevolence of the Apostolic See and by the order of ancient custom, we have foreseen that the use of the pallium is to be granted to your Fraternity, who are known to have undertaken the office of governance in the church of Ravenna; and you must remember to use it in no other way than in the church of your own city, when, the sons already dismissed, you proceed from the salutatory to the sacred solemnities of the Mass to be celebrated. But when the Masses are finished, you will take care to lay it aside again in the salutatory.
But outside the church we permit you to use it no further, except four times in the year in the litanies which we specified for your predecessor John. (Book V, letter 5; Book V, letter 56.) 6. But Marinianus, softened by the suggestions of his clerics, importunately demanded—both through Andreas, a distinguished man, and through whomever he could—that the use of the pallium be restored to his church. Wherefore Gregory writes to Castorius the chartulary, among other things, saying: Let your Experience regard no one's person, no one's words: let it hold before its eyes the fear of God alone and rectitude;
and let it summon the elder persons, and the archdeacon of that same church—whom I do not suspect of perjuring himself for another's honor—and others of greater age who were in sacred orders before the times of Bishop John, or if any are of riper years outside the sacred orders; and let them come before the body of Saint Apollinaris, and, having touched his tomb, let them swear what the custom was before the times of Bishop John: because, as you know, that same man was a great presumer, and strove through pride to arrogate many things to himself; and whatever shall have been sworn by the more faithful and weightier men, according to the schedule which is annexed below, this we wish to be preserved in that same church.
But see that you do not act negligently, lest anyone corrupt your fidelity or devotion in this cause. For I know your zeal. Act carefully, yet in such a way that the aforesaid church be not burdened contrary to justice; but that the usage which existed before the times of Bishop John be preserved for it. Do not summon two or three persons to give you satisfaction, but as many of greater age and more weighty as you shall find for it: so that we may neither deny what was the more ancient usage of that same church, nor grant what has been sought after by new audacity. But do everything gently and sweetly, so that both your action may be strict and your tongue mild. "I therefore, N., swear
by the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Trinity of inseparable divine power, and by this body of the blessed martyr Apollinaris, that I testify for the favor of no person, nor with any advantage intervening; but these things I know, and through my very self I have come to know, that before the times of the late Bishop John, the bishop of Ravenna, in the presence of this or that apocrisiary of the Apostolic See, on these and those days, had the custom of using the pallium: and I have not known that he usurped this secretly or without the apocrisiary." (Book VI, letter 61.) 7. This oath Gregory had commanded in the fourteenth indiction.
Because this, as the outcome of the matter makes plain, remained undone for three continuous years since the testimonies were lacking, Marinianus, again compelled by the suggestion of his own people, was confident that he could obtain by the importunity of prayers the use of the pallium which he could not vindicate by custom as had been agreed. Wherefore Gregory, remaining in the same judgment, writes to that same chartulary in the second indiction, saying: While Florentius, deacon of the church of Ravenna, was pleading before us on behalf of our most reverend brother and fellow-bishop Marinianus concerning the use of the pallium, being asked by us what the ancient custom was, he answered: that in all litanies the bishop of Ravenna used the pallium.
That this is not so, we have both learned from others, and it appeared evidently from the letters of the late Bishop John, which we caused to be shown to him; but he asserted this because he was bidden to say it. For at the time when this same John, the late bishop, was forbidden by you to presume to use the pallium inordinately and rashly, he wrote to us that this had been the ancient custom, that the bishop of that city should use the pallium in the solemn litanies: copies of which letters we have transmitted to you for your information.
But Adeodatus, deacon of the aforesaid church, when he was with us at the time he was here, likewise striving earnestly to plead concerning the same use of the pallium, we—wishing to know the truth—likewise took care to have inquiry made of him what the custom was. He, that he might persuade us to trust him and might be able to obtain from us what he sought, testified under oath that it had been the ancient custom that the bishop of his city should use the pallium in four or five solemn litanies. Let your Experience therefore diligently keep watch, and with all solicitude inquire how many solemn litanies there have been from antiquity; and let it not seek to inquire by naming them 'solemn,' but 'the greater ones':
so that, by this—which the aforesaid deacon Adeodatus has testified to us, and the letter of the aforesaid Bishop John confirms—when it shall be established how many the solemn litanies were, we, knowing how often he used to be vested with the pallium in the litanies, may most gladly grant it; but let it not seek this from those who are put forward by ecclesiastical persons, but from others whom it shall know to be without partiality to either side; and let it subtly inform us of what it shall have discovered by careful investigation: so that, the truth being known, as we have said, we may relieve the mind of our most reverend brother and fellow-bishop Marinianus. (Book VII, letter 77, now Book VI, letter
34.) But because the ancient custom, subtly investigated by our own men, could in no way be proven by the men of Ravenna, that Gregory remained in his own judgment is shown beyond doubt by this, that neither on this account—so far as can be discerned from his writings—was he solicited by anyone, nor, moved of his own accord, did he write anything further at all. 8. Not only in great matters did Gregory turn the eyes of his solicitude, but also, lest greater things should at some time be presumed with impunity, he most carefully guarded against this in the smallest matters. Whence he writes to John, bishop of Syracuse, saying: The order of ecclesiastical vigor is thrown into confusion, if either things unlawful are rashly presumed, or things not conceded are attempted with impunity.
It has therefore come to us that the deacons of the church of Catania have presumed to walk shod with campagi. Which you well recall has hitherto been permitted to no one throughout all Sicily, except only to the deacons of the church of Messina, to whom it is not doubted to have been granted long ago by our predecessors. Since therefore the daring of so great a rashness is not to be lightly regarded, let your Fraternity investigate this whole matter with all subtlety: and if it shall find it to be so, as has come to us, whether they presumed this of themselves or by anyone's authority, let it subtly make it known to us, so that, the truth being known, we may determine what ought to be done. For if we negligently pass over those things which are wrongly usurped, we open the way of excess to others.