Moralia in Job 4 part 7/9

For baldness in a man is wont to occur on the head alone, but the baldness of the eagle occurs over the whole body, because when it has grown very old, its feathers and plumes fall from all its members. She therefore widens her baldness like the eagle, because she has lost her feathers since she has lost her people. For the plumes of her wings have fallen, with which she was accustomed to fly to her prey, because her powerful men, through whom she seized what belonged to others, have been extinguished. Likewise in the second book of the Dialogues: Moreover, he says, the bishop of the church of Canusium was accustomed to come to Benedict, the servant of the Lord, whom, for the merit of his life, he loved greatly as a man of God. So while he was holding conversation with him about the entry of King Totila and the destruction of the city of Rome, he said:

By this king this city shall be destroyed, so that it shall no longer be inhabited. To whom the man of God replied: Rome shall not be exterminated by the nations, but, worn down by tempests, lightnings, whirlwinds, and earthquake, it shall wither away within itself. The mysteries of which prophecy have now become clearer to us than light, we who in this dissolved city behold the shattered walls, the overthrown houses, the destroyed churches; and we see its buildings, wearied by long age, laid low as its ruins ever multiply. (Dialogues, Book II, ch. 15.) Likewise in the letter to John, bishop of Ravenna, after some other things:

If there is in any way a chance sometime of gaining it, let your fraternity act with the exarch, that we may make peace with Ariulf, if we can do anything, because the soldiery has been withdrawn from the city of Rome, as you yourself know. But those of the Theodosian band who have remained here, receiving no pay, scarcely apply themselves even to the guard of the walls; and a city forsaken by all, if it does not have his peace, how shall it subsist? (Register, Book II, Letter 46.) 67.

With so great tumults of cares Gregory was burdened, for the safeguarding alike of souls and of the city, that, falling into mental afflictions, he not only did not (as he had proposed) treat in order the mysteries of Ezekiel, but, weighed down also by hostile incursions and by many bodily infirmities, he desisted altogether from the labor of exposition, and lamented that he had arrived at those days, and demanded with all his efforts the dissolution of his own body. Wherefore to the same bishop John he complains, saying: That I have answered your beatitude on few matters, impute this not to my sloth, but to my sickness:

for, by reason of my sins, at that time when Ariulf, coming to the city of Rome, killed some and mutilated others, I was affected with such great sadness that I fell into a mental affliction. (Ibid.) Likewise in the exposition of the last vision of the prophet Ezekiel: Because, with many cares pressing on, it was not permitted to search through in order before your charity the whole book of the prophet Ezekiel, it pleased your good desires to request that at least his last vision — which was made to him concerning the building set upon the mountain, and which is more obscure than all his visions — should be expounded. And indeed it is necessary for me to obey your will. But there are two things which in this matter disturb my mind.

One, that this same vision is veiled with clouds of such great obscurity that scarcely anything is seen in it, with the understanding shining through only faintly. The other, that we have now learned that Agilulf, king of the Lombards, hastening with all his might to besiege us, has crossed the Po. Whence consider, dearest brethren, in dark and mystical meanings what a wretched mind can avail, occupied by the disturbances of its own fear. For the more it busies itself about earthly things, the less it sees in those things that are heavenly: for this reason, that it is drawn outside itself by its cares, it is far less within itself; because it is written: The earthly habitation presses down the mind that ponders many things (Wisdom ix, 15).

For that which, even when gathered together, does not suffice to penetrate the things above, consider what it can do when divided. But we all know that even a river which is divided into many streams is dried up from its channel. Likewise in the treatises on the same prophet, homily 11: Whether, he says, the righteous man fall into fault, or the sinner into death, the watchman must fear lest his own silence involve him equally in the guilt of those who sin. But meanwhile, while I speak, I wish to turn my eyes away from my very self, and behold, again the divine discourse dashes me against my very self, so that I may see my own negligence, and dread that these things which I hear are said to me. For, as I said above, whose heart, scattered among countless cares, gathers itself to itself?

For when can I both carefully attend to all the things that are around me, and, with a united mind, contemplate my very self? When can I both correct the wickednesses of the wicked by pursuing them, and guard the deeds of the good by praising and admonishing, and show terror to some and sweetness to others? When can I both think on those things that are necessary for the brethren, and bear anxiety against hostile swords in the watches of the City, and provide lest by a sudden incursion the citizens perish, and amid all these things fully and effectively dispense the word of exhortation for the guardianship of souls? For to speak of God belongs to a very quiet and free mind.

For then the tongue is well directed in discourse, when securely the mind has rested in tranquillity: because water when shaken does not render the image of the beholder, but then the face of the one gazing into it is seen, when it is not moved. What exhortation, then, can your watchman make to you, dearest brethren, whom the confusion of so many affairs disturbs? And a little after: A priest, even after compunction and tears, is compelled to take cognizance of whatever things are necessary for his sons, and to hear with patient mind those things which are matter for flight, and after the sighs for heavenly things, to bear the burdens of any carnal men whatever, and often to pour his heart into a different disposition according to those who come upon him. For sometimes he rejoices over spiritual gains;

but when someone mourning comes upon him, unless he takes that man's grief into himself, he does not have compassion on his tribulation. And sometimes he mourns over the losses of souls; but suddenly there come upon him those who rejoice over their own prosperities, and if the priest does not rejoice together with their joy, he is believed to love less the sons in whose joy he does not exult, especially since Paul says: Rejoice with them that rejoice, weep with them that weep (Rom. xii, 15). I see, therefore, nothing so burdensome in the order of priests as to bend the rigor of the mind by compassionating, and to change the disposition according to those who come upon him; and yet this is very necessary.

For when a sinner is brought back to the grace of good work by his preaching, if he who preaches appears ungrateful? (Preface to Book II on Ezekiel.) Likewise at the end of the same volume: Behold, these things, as the Lord bestowing it enabled us, we have searched out before you, dearest brethren. But let no one reproach me if after this discourse I shall cease, because, as you all discern, our tribulations have grown greater. On every side we are surrounded by swords, on every side we fear the imminent peril of death. Some return to us with hands cut off; others are reported captured, others slain. Now I am compelled to hold back my tongue from exposition, for my soul is weary of my life (Job x, 1).

Now let no one require in me the study of the sacred eloquence, for my harp is turned to mourning, and my organ into the voice of those that weep (Job xxx, 31). Now the eye of my heart does not keep vigil in the discussion of mysteries, for my soul has slumbered from weariness (Ps. cxviii, 28). Now less is reading sweet to my mind, for I have forgotten to eat my bread because of the voice of my groaning (Ps. ci, 5). And to him who is not permitted to live, how can it be pleasing to speak of mystical things from the meanings of Sacred Scripture? And I who am compelled daily to drink bitter things, how far can I proffer sweet ones? (Last homily.) Likewise to the patrician Italica and to Venantius, the ex-monk patrician:

Certain persons coming from Sicily I took care to ask, with the affection which I owed, concerning the welfare of your excellency, but they answered me sad tidings about the constancy of your illnesses. But in saying this, neither do I find anything else concerning myself which I ought to report to you, except that, by reason of my sins, behold, it is now eleven months that it is very rare if I have ever been able to rise from my bed. For I am pressed by such great pains of gout, and by such great anguishes of troubles, that life is to me a most grievous punishment. For daily I fail in pain, and I sigh, awaiting the remedy of death.

But among the clergy and people of this city such great languors of fevers have rushed in, that scarcely any freeman, scarcely any slave has remained who could be fit for any office or ministry. And from the neighboring cities the ravages of mortality are daily reported to us. But how Africa is being laid waste by mortality and languors, the nearer you are, the more subtly, I believe, you have learned. But those who come from the East report more grievous desolations. In all these things, therefore, since, as the end of the world draws near, we recognize that there is a general devastation, we ought not to be too much afflicted over our own troubles. (Register, Book IX, Letter 123.) Likewise to Eulogius, patriarch of Alexandria:

A year having passed, I received the most sweet writings of your holiness, to which, on account of the excess of my sickness, I have not until now been able to reply. For behold, now nearly two years are being completed in which I am held to my little bed, and I am afflicted by such pains of gout that scarcely on feast days am I able to rise for the space of three hours to celebrate the solemnities of the Masses. But soon I am compelled by grievous pain to lie down again, so that I cannot endure my torment, with groaning breaking in upon me. This pain is at times milder for me, at times excessive, but neither so mild that it departs, nor so excessive that it kills. Whence it comes that I who am daily in death, am repelled from death.

Nor is it any wonder, for as a grievous sinner I am long held shut up in such a prison of corruption; whence I am compelled to cry out: Bring my soul out of prison, that I may confess to your name, O Lord (Ps. cxli, last verse). But since by my own prayers I do not yet merit to obtain it, I ask that the prayer of your holiness may afford me the help of its intercession, and may render me free from the burden of sin and corruption unto that liberty of the glory of the sons of God, which you know well. (Book X, Letter 35.) Likewise to the same: But I ask that your holiness may pray more earnestly for me, because I am pressed unceasingly by pains of gout, and by the swords of the barbarians, and by the afflictions of cares.

But if you bestow on me the aid of your prayer, I believe that you will bravely help me against all adversities. (Book IX, Letter 78.) Likewise to the same: I ask therefore that you pray more earnestly for me, a sinner, because both bodily pain and bitterness of heart from the afflictions of cares, and the immense devastation of mortality, amid so many swords of barbarians, vehemently afflict me. Amid all these things I seek not temporal but eternal consolation, which I am not able to obtain through myself, but I trust to obtain it through the intercession of your beatitude. (Book XIII, Letter 41.) Likewise to Marinianus, bishop of Ravenna: It is now a long time that I am not able to rise from my bed:

for now the pain of gout tortures me, now I know not what fire with pain spreads itself over my whole body; and it frequently happens that at one and the same time in me heat contends with pain, and in me both body and mind fail. But by how many other necessities, besides these infirmities which I have set forth, I am beset, I am not able to enumerate; but I say briefly: so does the infection of a noxious humor soak into me that to live is a punishment to me, and I longingly await death, which I believe to be the only remedy for my groanings.

Therefore, most holy brother, entreat the mercy of divine goodness for me, that it may propitiously mitigate the scourges of its chastisement toward me, and grant the patience to endure, lest by excessive weariness — which God forbid — my heart break forth into impatience, and lest the fault which could have been healed through the blow should increase through murmuring. (Book XI, Letter 32.) Likewise to the patrician lady Rusticiana: About the trouble of gout which you signified has befallen you, I have been both vehemently saddened and gladdened. Gladdened, because the noxious humor, seeking the lower parts, has assuredly deserted the upper. But saddened, because I fear that you, with a body so very frail, endure excessive pains. For where flesh is lacking, what strength can there be to resist pains?

For me indeed, whom you know what manner of man I have been, bitterness of mind and constant exasperation, and through this the trouble of gout, has so affected, that my body is as if dried up in the grave; whence it comes that I am now rarely able to rise from my bed. (Book XI, Letter 44.) Likewise to the same: I live in such great groaning and occupations, that it grieves me to have arrived at the days which I am living, and the expectation of death is to me a consolation. Whence I ask that you ought to pray for me, that He may the sooner lead me out of this prison of the flesh, lest I be tormented longer by such great labors. (Book XIII, Letter 22.) Likewise to Anastasius of Antioch:

I ask that you pray more earnestly for the infirmity of my heart, that Almighty God, through your intercession, may guard my mind from all evils, and may the sooner snatch me out of so many storms of this tempest, and lead me to the shore of eternal rest. (Book VIII, Letter 2.) 68. Gregory, at length at some time divinely heard amid such great prayers, after he had illustrated the see of the Catholic and Apostolic holy Roman Church for thirteen years, six months, and ten days by most felicitous teachings and works alike, in the second year of the reign of Phocas, in the seventh indiction, on the fourth of the ides of March, was withdrawn from the corruption of the flesh, to be exalted with the glory of perpetual incorruption.

He indeed, throughout all the time of his life, just as he did not at all build new basilicas, so of course he yearly repaired with the utmost zeal the roofs and structures of the old ones that had been built: heaping upon these revenues, lights, offices, and gifts, in the basilica of the blessed apostle Peter he fashioned a canopy of purest silver, which had been transferred by Pope Leo III from the Sistine basilica dedicated to the name of holy Mary; and in the basilica of the blessed apostle Paul, over the altar, he likewise provided another canopy.

Moreover his venerable body, in the outermost portico of the basilica of the blessed apostle Peter, before the then most ancient sacristy — in which, namely, Leo, Simplicius, Gelasius, and Symmachus, bishops of the apostolic see, together with certain others, are buried, and by their epitaphs are proclaimed to this day — was buried, adorned with this inscription: Receive, O earth, a body taken from your own body. That you may render it back, when God gives it life. The spirit seeks the stars; the laws of death shall do no harm, to whom this way is rather the death of another life. In this tomb are enclosed the limbs of the highest pontiff, who may live everywhere forever in his countless good deeds. He overcame hunger with feasts, cold with clothing, and shielded souls from the enemy with sacred admonitions.

And he fulfilled in deed whatever he taught in word, that he might be an example, speaking mystical words. By tender piety he turned the Angles to Christ, acquiring for the faith armies from a new people. This was his labor, this his zeal, this his care, O shepherd, that you might offer to the Lord many gains of your flock. And made hereby God's consul, rejoice in triumphs, for you now hold the reward of your works without end. 69. Now, this most generous shepherd being dead, a most violent famine fell upon that same year; and how great a patron Rome then lost, although the want of resources showed it to almost the whole world, the ferocity of the envious nevertheless in no way acknowledged.

For, as is handed down by our forebears, when the instigators of old calumnies were noisily proclaiming that Gregory was a squanderer and a dissipator of the manifold treasure of the patriarchate, and when their personal grounds failed them, they began alike to pant after burning his books. And when they had already burned some of them, and wished to consume the rest with fire, Peter the Deacon, his most intimate friend, with whom he had discussed the four books of the Dialogues, is believed to have resisted most vehemently, saying that the burning of his books availed nothing toward blotting out his memory, since copies of them, sought by many different people, had penetrated to the whole circuit of the world;

adding that it was a monstrous sacrilege to burn so many and such books of so great a Father, upon whose head he himself had most frequently beheld the Holy Spirit in the likeness of a dove as he was expounding.

And when the Deacon perceived that the once-devoted people were, taking occasion of the times, contending together with the envious, he is said to have moved everyone to this verdict: that if, confirming what he had said by an oath, he should straightway deserve to die, they would desist from the burning of the books; but if he should survive his own testimony, then he too would put his hand to burning the rest. And so the venerable Levite Peter, ascending the ambo with the Gospels, no sooner had he borne witness to Gregory's holiness than, amid the words of his true confession, he breathed out his spirit; and, a stranger to the pain of death, he was found worthy, as a confessor of the truth, to be buried beside the base of the pyre, as is seen to this day. 70.

Hence it is that customarily the Holy Spirit is depicted in the form of a dove above the head of Gregory as he writes, and that the greater part of his expositions, which indeed is remembered to have been burned by the envious, is not extant. Their sum he himself seems to indicate to John, subdeacon of Ravenna, his agent, writing among other things thus: "Because my once most beloved son Claudius had heard certain things that I said concerning the Proverbs, the Song of Songs, the Prophets, and also the books of Kings and the Heptateuch, which I could not commit to writing on account of my infirmity, he himself set them down in his own manner, lest they perish through forgetfulness, so that at a fitting time he might bring these same things to me and they might be dictated more correctly.

And when he had read them to me, I found that the sense of my words had been very unprofitably altered. Wherefore it is necessary that your Experience, setting aside all excuse and delay, should go to his monastery, cause the brethren to assemble, and, in all truth, bring into the open whatever leaves of writing on various Scriptures he brought forth: these do you receive, and transmit to me with all speed." (Register, book xii, letter 24.) For truly, since the diligence of Gregory — who survived after these things nearly three years — could not be deceived, it is certain beyond doubt that he composed more books than are now possessed. The memory of these someone touches upon in his epitaph, saying: "He expounded Job, Ezekiel, the Gospels, and the Pastoral, and many other things."

So that you may understand thereby those which can no longer be found, since in truth they were consumed by fire before they were published, just like his other works which are now kept in the holy Roman Church still under guard, lest they should be altogether divulged. 71. And so, if the whole time of Gregory's labor of composition, in which he expounded the books now possessed, be more carefully weighed, it extends from his diaconate down to the second-to-last year of his pontificate; and although, as the perfidy of the Lombards raged, he desisted from the exposition of the books after the treatises on Ezekiel, yet from the expounding of letters, as long as he was able to live, he never entirely ceased; of which indeed he left behind in his chest as many books as the years he lived on.

Whence he left the fourteenth book of letters, of the seventh indiction, unfinished, since it does not reach to the end of that same indiction. Out of their multitude, in the times of Pope Hadrian the First, certain decretal letters were excerpted according to the several indictions and gathered into two volumes, as is now seen. And Gregory, being long ago placed in the monastery — where the angel of the Lord had found him writing under the guise of a shipwrecked man — had doubtless dictated certain things, so that he might arrive, the readier by so much as he was the more learned through the habit of dictating, at the exposition of that great profundity which he was able to penetrate in the book of Job.

72. Therefore Gregory, during his diaconate, while the responses of the Apostolic See detained him in the city of Constantinople, and while an embassy enjoined upon him for causes of the faith of the Visigoths had brought Leander, the Spanish bishop, thither — at the most urgent insistence of that same Leander (as I recall having said in the first book), together with the brethren who then adhered to Gregory — he began to expound the book of blessed Job (Book i, 27). With these set before him, he delivered the earlier parts of the book by word of mouth; and because he found a somewhat freer time, he dictated the later parts by way of treatise.

And when ampler intervals of time were available to him, adding much, subtracting little, and leaving some things just as they had been found, he composed by way of correction, arranging into books those things which had been excerpted before his eyes as he was speaking. When, now made bishop of Rome, he was dictating the last parts, carefully attending to the style in which he had spoken the first, he brought it about that the things he had spoken, being run through with diligent correction, should be raised, as it were, to the likeness of the dictated portions, and that the things he had dictated should not differ greatly from the language of one speaking in conversation: so that, while this is aimed at, that is drawn toward it, and a matter not dissimilar might be shaped in a somewhat dissimilar manner as published. Yet the third part of that work he left almost just as he had brought it forth in conversation:

because, while the brethren were drawing him on to expound other things, they were unwilling that this part should be more subtly corrected. As, at their many biddings, he endeavored to comply — now through the ministry of exposition, now through the ascent of contemplation, now through the instrument of moral teaching — he completed this work, extended through thirty-five books, in six codices. Copies of these he first distributed throughout the monasteries of the City, but last of all he sent them to that same bishop Leander. 73. But at the very outset of his episcopate, when he had been humbly rebuked by John, bishop of the city of Ravenna, as to why a man so well-suited had wished, by hiding himself, to flee the burdens of pastoral care, he composed the book of the Pastoral Rule:

which, distinguishing it by a fourfold plan, he thoroughly taught to be greatly pondered: when the necessity of affairs demands it, how each one may come to the summit of governance, and, rightly arriving at this, how he may live, and, living well, how he may teach, and, teaching rightly, how he may daily recognize his own weakness with as great consideration as he is able — lest either humility should shun the approach, or one's life contradict his arrival, or teaching desert one's life, or presumption exalt one's teaching. First, then, let fear temper the desire; but afterward let life commend the mastership which is undertaken by one who does not seek it; then it is necessary that the good of the pastor, which is shown by living, be propagated also by speaking;

but at the last it remains that consideration of one's own weakness should press down each and every perfect work, lest the swelling of pride should extinguish these before the eyes of the hidden Judge. And because he had learned that certain unskilled men had conspired toward the priesthood, and foresaw that certain others would so conspire — men who, not knowing how to measure themselves, longed to teach what they had not learned, and who esteemed the weight of mastership the lighter, the more they were ignorant of the force of its greatness —

these he rebuked at the very opening of his book, so that if ever the unlearned and headstrong should aspire to hold the citadel of teaching, they might be driven back from the ventures of their own rashness at the very door of Gregory's discourse. This book Anatolius, a deacon, his apocrisiarius, had once offered to the emperor who sought and commanded it; and the great Anastasius, bishop of Antioch, rendered it into the Greek tongue and procured the venerable work for the Eastern churches. 74. Then, as I have already related in the second book of this work, while Gregory still had sufficient voice and bearing for speaking, going about through the stations he declaimed twenty homilies on the Gospel before the people at various times;

but the remaining homilies of the same number he indeed dictated, yet, with his stomach growing weary from continual illness, he permitted others to pronounce them (Book ix, letter 52): copies of which he sent to Secundus, the servant of God, at his request. 75. And when Gregory was earnestly asked by your household that he should describe some things concerning the miracles of the Fathers, he wrote to Maximianus, bishop of Syracuse, saying: "My brethren, who live intimately with me, in every way compel me to describe briefly some things concerning the miracles of the Fathers which we have heard were done in Italy. For this matter I very greatly need the solace of your charity, that you would briefly indicate to me the things which come back to your memory, and whatever you have chanced to have known.

Now concerning the lord abbot Nonnosus, who was near the lord Anastasius of Pentomis, I remember that you related some things to me which I have committed to forgetfulness. These, therefore, and if there be any others, I ask to be set down in your letters and transmitted to me with speed, if indeed you do not set out to me yourself." (Register, book iii, letter 51.) Hence Gregory, being strengthened, interrupting his deeper pursuit of exposition, distinguished the miracles of the holy Fathers — which he had brought forth by way of inquiry and response with Peter his deacon — merely by a prefacing of names, and arranged them into four books: