Pastoral Rule, Dialogues & Letters 414

Gregory to his most beloved sons, the clergy and the nobles dwelling at Salona. It has come to me that certain men of perverse mind, in order to wound the hearts of your charity, have endeavored to insinuate to you that I am moved against Maximus by a kind of hatred, and desire to pursue, not the things that pertain to the canons, but rather those that pertain to fury. But far be this, far be it from a priestly mind, that in any cause it should be moved by private zeal. But I, both providing for your charity

and dreading for my own soul the judgment of Almighty God, desire that the causes of this same Maximus be subtly examined: whether he is not pressed down by any crimes that are contrary to the sacred order, whether he did not attempt to attain to the priestly office through the simoniacal heresy—that is, by offering rewards to certain of those who chose him. Then he will be a free intercessor for you before the Lord, if he comes to the place of intercession unbound by his own faults. Yet already his fault of pride is shown openly in this, that, being summoned to come to us, he resists with diverse excuses, flees, and is afraid. Whence, then, does he tremble, if his conscience does not accuse him of those things of which he is charged?

Behold, your charity has now long been without a pastor, and, as Almighty God knows, I compassionate your destitution vehemently and from the very marrow, with all my heart. For I hear what tearings-apart are taking place in the Lord's flock. But when the pastor is lacking, who keeps watch against the wolves? Therefore urge the aforesaid Maximus to come here to us, so that, if we can find him innocent, we may confirm him. But if the things that have been said of him are shown to be true, then let your charity no longer be so long left destitute through the interposition of his person. For concerning me hold it certain that I am moved against him neither by hatred nor by the zeal of private interest; but whatever shall be canonical and just, with God as author, I decree. Moreover, I have greatly marveled

that among so great a clergy and people of the Church of Salona scarcely two of the sacred orders were found—namely our brother and fellow bishop Paulinus, and our most beloved son Honoratus, archdeacon of the same Church—who would by no means consent to communicate with Maximus, who was seizing the priesthood, and who acknowledged themselves to be Christians. For you ought, most dear sons, to have weighed your orders, and to have recognized as rejected him whom the Apostolic See was rejecting, so that first, if it were possible, he might be cleansed from the crimes laid to his charge; and then your charity might communicate with him, lest you become partakers of his obligation. Yet we are bound toward your charity with the bowels of piety;

and because we have learned that some of you were violently pressed into consenting to him and communicating with him, we beseech the Almighty Lord that He may absolve you from every guilt of your sins and from all bonds of another's obligation, and may both grant you in the present life the grace of His protection, and permit us to rejoice over you in the eternal fatherland. In the month of March, in the fourteenth indiction.