Moralia in Job 29

Argument.— 1. The abbot Cyriacus is sent as legate into Gaul. — 2. He comes to Marseilles, where he is ill received by Serenus. — 3. Thence to Arles. Concerning the privileges granted by the Apostolic See at the request of kings. — 4. What St. Gregory replied to Desiderius of Vienne, who was petitioning for the privileges of his church. — 5. He grants to Aregius of Gap the use of the dalmatics. — 6. And the pallium to Syagrius of Autun. Upon what conditions. — 7. Letters to the kings of the Gauls, concerning the correction of the corruptions of the Gallican clergy. With what success. — 8. Concerning the bishop of Maurienne. — 9. The legation of Cyriacus into Spain. — 10. The then happy state of Spain. Concerning Claudius, minister of the kingdom, praised by the pope. — 11. The argument of the letter written to Leander.

He is given the pallium. — 12. The eulogy of King Reccared. He refuses the money offered by the Jews. — 13. Excellent admonitions given to the king. (In the years 598 and 599.) 1. The Gallican Church, ever most dear to our Gregory, especially in this year experienced his fatherly solicitude. For when he had been informed of the various vices and corruptions rampant in Gaul, he was not content merely to admonish the kings and bishops concerning their correction, but judged that a legate should be sent thither: one who might vigorously act with the princes and prelates, so that a council might as soon as possible be celebrated to cut these things away (Book ix, ep. 105 and 120). This was Cyriacus, abbot of St. ...

...Andrew at the Clivus Scauri, who had earlier been sent into Sardinia to collaborate with Bishop Felix in the conversion of the Barbaricini. Whence we understand how greatly that Roman monastery of St. Gregory then flourished; from which, that is, at the same time, so many heralds of the sacred word were taken and sent to the conversion of the English; and a legate of the Apostolic See was chosen, who might transact the gravest affairs both in Gaul and in Spain. (Cf. Mabillon, Annals of the Benedictines, book ix, p. 256.) 2. Cyriacus, fortified with many letters of the pope, came first by sea-journey to Marseilles, where, having greeted Bishop Serenus in the pontiff's name, he delivered the letters admonishing him about the breaking of images, which we mentioned above (Chap. ...

...1, n. 10). That the legate was not received by the bishop with that charity and reverence which was fitting, we infer from this: that, in order that he might more freely vent his anger, Serenus pretended that the pontifical letters presented to him by Cyriacus were forged. This suspicion of forgery, injurious to the legate, St. Gregory afterwards gravely refuted, writing thus to Serenus: 'But from the fact that you doubted concerning our writings which we sent to you, it appeared how incautious you are. For if you had diligently attended to the things which we admonished in brotherly love, not only would you have by no means doubted, but rather you would have recognized what it behooved you to do with priestly gravity.'

'For neither was Cyriacus, formerly an abbot, who was the bearer of our writings, of such a character or of such learning that he himself, as you suppose, would dare to do anything otherwise, or that you should take up against his person this suspicion of falsehood. But while you neglected to weigh the wholesome admonitions, it came about that now you were culpable not only in deed, but even in your questioning' (Book xi, ep. 13). 3. Marseilles having been left behind, we believe that Cyriacus came to Arles and delivered to Virgil the letter of the supreme pontiff, by which he confirmed the privileges once granted by Pope Vigilius to a certain monastery of men. Concerning the privileges granted to this convent we know nothing else than what St. Gregory teaches us (Book ix, Ep. 111);

namely, that Childebert of glorious memory, king of the Franks, had established within the walls of the city of Arles a monastery of men, and had granted certain things for the sustenance of its inhabitants; and lest his will should be brought to naught, and those things which had been arranged for the peace of the monks should be disturbed, he had by his letters sought that these be confirmed by apostolic authority. He had appended to his petition that certain privileges be likewise bestowed upon that same monastery, both in the disposition of its affairs and in the ordination of its abbot: knowing indeed that such reverence was shown by the faithful to the Apostolic See, that whatever things had been arranged by its decree could thereafter be shaken by the molestation of no unlawful usurpation.

Pope Vigilius had assented to the royal petition, and concerning that matter wrote to Bishop Aurelius, or Aurelian. But lest, by the lapse of time, those things which Vigilius had granted should be blotted out by oblivion and be torn away by the bishops of Arles, St. Gregory sent to Virgil a copy of the privilege granted by his predecessor, and signified that he held ratified all that was contained in it. 'For although,' he says, 'those things which have once been sanctioned by the authority of the Apostolic See need no confirmation; yet out of abundance we again by our authority in all things strengthen all that was established by our predecessor for the peace of this matter. Therefore let your Fraternity so conduct itself in guarding these things:'

'so that it may both exclude every occasion of disquiet, and may persuade others to work these things, while it has shown itself solicitous, as is fitting, and devoted in guarding the most pious will of the deceased.' So carefully did that excellent father desire provision to be made for the tranquility of the servants of God. Moreover, these and similar privileges, often granted by the Roman pontiffs to Gallican monasteries, even at the request of kings, prove that even then their authority in Gaul was supreme, since apart from it nothing was held ratified; but by its authority all things stood unshaken. 4. Departing from Arles, Cyriacus perhaps went on to Vienne, and offered to Archbishop Desiderius the letter of St. ...

...Gregory's letter, by which he replies to him also petitioning for privileges. This prelate said that certain privileges had once been granted to his church by the Apostolic See, and that his predecessors had anciently possessed the use of the pallium: which he greatly desired to be restored to himself and to the other bishops of Vienne hereafter. But St. Gregory testifies that nothing was found in the archive of the Roman Church by which faith could be established concerning those privileges once granted; whence he admonishes the archbishop to be diligent in searching out the charters of his church; and if any be found by which what he contended could be proved, that he should take care to transmit them to Rome. 'For we who grant new things,' he says, 'most willingly restore old ones' (Book ix, ep. ...

...112). Whence it is clear that the pallium was not of old granted to all metropolitans. He afterward wrote almost the same things to Aetherius of Lyons (Book xi, ep. 56). 5. That Cyriacus went to Gap is witnessed by the letter written to Bishop Aregius of Gap (Book xi, ep. 107), by which the most holy pontiff both consoles his friend mourning over the death of his kinsmen, and asks that he be present at the synod to be assembled through Syagrius, and that he make him certain concerning all that is transacted in it, since he held the sanctity of so great a man to be well known. Aregius had not long before set out for Rome to visit the thresholds of the holy apostles and to salute St. Gregory; and had petitioned that permission be given to himself and his archdeacon to use dalmatics.

For deacons then did not use these indiscriminately, but tunics which had tight sleeves, whereas the dalmatics had wide ones. We read in the Life of St. Caesarius of Arles that Pope Symmachus, moved by the great dignity of his merits.... caused his deacons to be preeminent in the habit of dalmatics after the pattern of the Roman Church. Aregius, compelled by the infirmity of his men, had hastily departed, not yet having obtained the privilege of using dalmatics. This the pope sent to him through Cyriacus, with the dalmatics themselves also added. (Cf. John the Deacon, book iii, ch. 59.) 6. Having traversed so many cities, the legate at length arrived at Autun, where chiefly matters ecclesiastical had to be treated with Bishop Syagrius. Two letters of St. ...

...Gregory's letters Cyriacus delivered: one as it were an encyclical, common to Syagrius of Autun, Aetherius of Lyons, Virgil of Arles, and Desiderius of Vienne, in which he enumerates the evils rampant in the Gallican churches, namely simony, the over-hasty promotion of neophytes or laymen not yet approved to the priesthood, the cohabitation of women with clerics; and also the neglect of the synods which ought to be held every year; concerning the elimination of which he judges that deliberation must be made in council: the other, in which, thanks first having been given for the labor bestowed upon Augustine, he grants to Syagrius the use of the pallium, and decrees that the Church of Autun should hold the first place in the province after that of Lyons.

Then he commits to Syagrius, as one filling the place of the Apostolic See, the care of assembling the synod. Great was the authority of this bishop with Queen Brunhild and her grandsons Theuderic and Theudebert. And not undeservedly, for he fulfilled the name of priest even in his morals, by the testimony of John the regionary and many others. It had long been since Brunhild had treated with the pope concerning the pallium's being granted to him. But what was the cause that he was more tardily honored with this dignity, learn from the letter, just praised, to the same queen. Indeed, when he granted him the power of using the pallium only for celebrating the solemnities of the Mass, he added a condition:

'Which,' he says, 'we have decreed is to be given you on this condition, if you first promise, by the definition of a synod, to correct those things which we have commanded to be amended.' And further below: 'Wherefore, since we know that our most excellent sons, the kings of the Franks, bestow great love upon you, it is necessary that you act with all zeal and all effort, so that what we have commanded concerning the assembling of a synod may be accomplished by the vigilance of your Fraternity, and that all things there which we have written for the salvation of souls may be decreed; so that through this you may both show your zeal, and how displeasing unlawful things are to you, and we may be seen to have usefully provided, in that we chose your person above others for this' (Book ix, ep. 11). 7.

On the same subject the pope had written both to Brunhild and to the kings Theuderic and Theudebert (Book ix, epp. 109 and 110). The sum of his letters is that many were being ordained through simony, and from laymen suddenly made bishops. Let them take care that a synod be celebrated to correct these things; and moreover let them decree that it be not lawful for Jews to have Christian slaves. Concerning the celebration of a synod he wrote again many letters two years later.

Yet we read that no council for extirpating and eliminating from the Gallican clergy corruptions of this kind—a thing so dear to the most holy pontiff's heart—was held in Gaul at these times, perhaps because the bishops, and especially the metropolitans, refused to obey Syagrius, who had been set over them. 8. No happier outcome had that which he had petitioned from those same kings on behalf of Ursicinus, bishop of Turin, namely, that certain parishes withdrawn from his church be restored (Ibid., epp. 115 and 116). The controversy was especially concerning the people of Maurienne and Susa; which, when King Guntram had occupied them, he was no longer willing to have subject to the bishop of Turin, because that city was under the dominion of the Lombards.

Thus the city of Maurienne began to have its own bishop, who at first was attributed to the metropolitan of Tarentaise, afterward to that of Vienne, which arrangement continues to this day. 9. To Cyriacus the legation among the Spaniards yielded more happily: for by his exertion, as it is fitting to believe, there was celebrated this year, on the Kalends of November, the Council of Barcelona, of which, since there are but four canons, two attack the stain of simony, and the third is framed against the premature ordinations of neophytes. By this name, as we have said, are understood laymen who, not yet approved by assiduous exercise, under the auspices of ambition and with secular power as their guide, dared to leap forward to priesthoods and even to bishoprics themselves. 10.

Happy then was the state of Spain under the excellent king Reccared, who had taken as helpers in the administration of his kingdom upright men; among these Claudius and Leander, bishop of Seville, of whom mention has often already been made. But who and what manner of man Claudius was cannot be better recognized than from the Gregorian letter of which Cyriacus was the bearer: 'Since, after the manner of an ointment, the report of the good is fragrant, the odor of your Glory has reached even to us from the Western parts. Sprinkled indeed with the sweetness of that breeze, I confess that I have greatly loved one whom I knew not, and have seized you within the bosom of my heart with the hand of love: nor did I now love him unknowingly, whose good things I had come to know.'

'For concerning him who is known to me with great earnestness, but remains unknown to the sight of the body, I can without doubt say truly, that I know his person, but I know not his house. And great is the assurance given of your praise, that your Glory is reported diligently to cleave to the excellent king of the Goths: for since the good always displease the wicked, it is certain that you are good, who have pleased a good man' (Book ix, ep. 120). Afterward he exhorts the excellent man to perseverance; and at the end of the letter commends Cyriacus, that, when the things enjoined upon him had been accomplished, no delay in returning might hinder him.

Concerning two other letters carried by this legate into Spain—one to Leander, the other to the king himself, which are indeed excellent—it is not right to keep silent. 11. In the former Gregory wonderfully praises the letter which he had lately received from the holy man: 'Good and wise men,' he says, 'were present when it (this letter) was read, whose inmost hearts were straightway moved to compunction. Each began with the hand of love to seize you in his heart, because in that letter the sweetness of your mind was not a thing to be heard, but to be beheld. They were kindled and marveled one by one, and the very fire of the hearers displayed what had been the ardor of the speaker.' Which things indeed generate a great longing for this lost letter.

One thing in it the pontiff censures—of incredible humility—and grieves that it was written by his friend; namely, that his own life was imitable by all. By this he is provoked to tears over the tranquility of his former life now lost, and over the pontificate now attained: 'For as it were,' he says, 'I was sailing with a prosperous breeze, while I led a tranquil life in the monastery. But a tempest arisen from sudden and stormy commotions seized me in its turbulence, and I lost the prosperity of the voyage: for, my quiet having been lost, I suffered shipwreck of mind. Behold, now I am tossed among the waves, and I seek the plank of your intercession, so that I who did not deserve to arrive rich with the ship whole, may at least, after the losses, be brought back to the shore by a plank' (Book ix, ep. 121).

At the end of the letter he signifies that the pallium was sent to Leander out of the blessing of St. Peter, which was justly owed both to ancient custom, and to his own gravity and goodness, and, by reason of King Reccared's excellent character, who had asked that this honor be granted to his father and master in the Catholic faith (Book ix, ep. 122). 12. In the letter by which St. Gregory replies to the letters received from the king, no less shines forth the supreme lowliness of his soul. For after he had exclaimed in astonishment concerning all the Goths, formerly Arians, converted to the Catholic faith by the exertion of Reccared: 'This is the change of the right hand of the Most High' (Psalm lxxvi, 11); he adds:

'For whose breast, even of stone, upon knowing this so great a work, would not straightway soften into the praises of Almighty God and into love of your Excellency? These things, I confess, which have been done through you, it delights me often to relate to my sons when they gather, and often to marvel at them together with them. These things also for the most part rouse me even against myself, in that I, sluggish and useless, then grow torpid in idle inactivity, when kings labor in the gatherings of souls for the gain of the heavenly homeland. What therefore shall I say to the Judge who comes at that dread examination, if I shall then come thither empty, where your Excellency shall lead after itself flocks of the faithful, whom it has now drawn to the grace of the true faith through zealous and continual preaching' (Book ix, ep. ...

...112). Afterward he gives thanks for the royal gifts sent to blessed Peter (among these was a golden chalice), and especially praises the king for having rejected the immense sum of money which the Jews had offered, that he might repeal the law enacted against them: by which deed he preferred innocence to gold, and emulated David—nay, surpassed him. For if by an armed king the despised water was turned into a sacrifice to God, let us weigh what manner of sacrifice that king offered to Almighty God, who for love of Him disdained to accept not water, but gold. 'Therefore, most excellent son, I will say confidently, that you have poured out gold to the Lord as a libation, which you were unwilling to have against Him. These things are great, and to be ascribed to the praise of Almighty God' (Book ix, ep. 61). 13.

The more excellent were the things which Gregory related concerning the young king, the greater the danger that threatened from the spirit of pride. 'For neither,' he says, 'do highway robbers seek to seize empty travelers on the road, but those who carry vessels of gold or silver.' Therefore against the hidden ambushes of the crafty enemy he judged that the king must be fortified with excellent admonitions and precepts. 'For often,' he says, 'the malignant spirit, that he may destroy the good things which he was not previously able to oppose, comes to the mind of the one working after the work has been performed, and shakes it out by silent thoughts into certain praises of itself; so that the deceived mind marvels how great are the things it has done.'

'Which, while through a hidden swelling it is exalted within itself, is deprived of the grace of Him who bestowed the gift…… What therefore is to be done in these matters, except that, when the malignant spirit brings back to us, in order to elevate our mind, the good things we have done, we should always recall our evils to memory: so that we may both recognize as ours the things we have done by sinning, and as the gifts of Almighty God alone, when we turn away from sins?' In return for the gifts received from the king, St. Gregory repaid with sacred relics. Far more ample gifts Reccared had sent long before, through legates who were abbots from monasteries; but clinging to certain rocks near Marseilles, they scarcely could save their lives (Book ix, ep. 61).

But concerning the Gregorian letter to this king, enough; especially since in the notes upon it his excellency is commended.