Sermons & Letters 240

1. Often and much have I pondered this with myself: whether the affairs of the Eastern Church brought more of grief or of gladness to the soul of Leo the Great—first because of the Eutychian heresy and its abettors, by which they were so greatly disturbed and well-nigh brought to ruin; and then, with full tranquillity, with the triumph and glory of the catholic faith, by pontifical labor and zeal, happily settled, so that the virgin Church, the spouse of the one man Christ, might seem to be tainted by no error at all through the frauds of the wicked. Yet I have not dared to determine the question.

Therefore, lest my labor be spent on uncertain inquiries, I shall now affirm only this: that Leo's soul was affected with much gladness when he understood that his past labors and griefs had already greatly profited ecclesiastical liberty and the administration of divine affairs. Proofs of this pontifical gladness are furnished to us, among others, by those letters which the holy Pope wrote to Marcian, to Pulcheria, and to Anatolius of Constantinople, having now received the fullest report of the Council of Constantinople, which Abundius and the other legates sent to Rome.

Therefore, considering the very great benefits conferred upon the catholic Church by the divine bounty, he first, without any delay, gives a letter to Marcian to signify the pleasure of his soul that the integrity of the faith had been more safely defended from the snares of enemies by imperial protection; and he confesses that he renders him many thanks, which he could understand not by words, but from the benefits he had conferred on the Church. He adds that he could not then write more lengthy letters, since the clergy whom Anatolius had sent with his profession of faith were about to depart from the City. 'But more fully' (he adds) 'concerning all things that pertain to my care for the state of the Churches and the concord of the Lord's priests, we have directed our writings through our legates.'

That he had sent new legates to Constantinople is disclosed by those last words. Yet since the cause of this new delegation is not indicated in this letter, it is necessary that we seek it out from other subsequent ones. For at first I thought (since the writings indicated there are wanting) that he had decreed a solemn legation to Marcian, to congratulate him on the Roman empire he had obtained, and to claim greater patronage for himself and for the affairs of the Church. But that the legates of whom he there makes mention were directed to another aim, Leo's writings to the emperor, and the letters written on the same day to Pulcheria, to Anatolius, and to Julian, bishop of Cos, not obscurely declare. And first of all, St. [Leo],

Leo, writing on the same day to Pulcheria, praises her piety, by which, supported by the protection of divine mercy, she sustained labors, so that the two heresies, namely the Nestorian and the Eutychian, should neither lie hidden nor gradually undermine the hearts of catholics. That he wished to indicate this by these words: 'And it is most certain that those who had chosen for themselves the several parts of the twofold impiety fell prostrate before the one truth of the catholic faith.' Chiefly, after recounting in the preceding context Pulcheria's efforts to break the obstinacy of the Nestorians, he immediately subjoined that there was due to her a second crown of triumph and a palm for the destruction of the error of Eutyches. Wherefore to her and to the emperor, in the following chapter of the letter,

continues to congratulate them in the name of the Church, for the works of faith and the supports which they had afforded to the legates of the Apostolic See. By which, namely, 'you have brought back the catholic priests cast out from their Churches by the unjust sentence of Dioscorus,' or because 'the relics of holy memory Flavian you caused to be brought back with due honor to the Church which he well governed.' He also subjoined other things, which pertained either to the fallen bishops—if, retracting their own evil deeds against the faith, they should subscribe—as to be received into communion; or which regarded the Church of Dorylaeum, whose legitimate pastor Eusebius was then dwelling at Rome, a partaker of the pontifical communion, while the aforesaid Church was being laid waste by an intruding robber.

Whence he deservedly seizes the occasion of commending the Church of Dorylaeum to imperial protection; as also Julian, bishop of Cos, and the clergy of Constantinople, who already adhered to Flavian with faithful services. This is the sum of the letter to Pulcheria Augusta, to which we judge that one was not dissimilar which he confessed to have sent through his legates to Marcian, since we hold it ascertained that Leo always corresponded to himself in transacting affairs, especially when on the same day he was compelled to send letters to the East about one and the same business.

2. Something rather peculiar occurs to be noted in two other subsequent letters, likewise sealed on the same day, one of which he directed to Anatolius, the other indeed to Julian of Cos. But the whole diversity of the letters arose from no other cause than the diversity of the offices by which they were joined in the Church. After, therefore, he had congratulated Anatolius on the profession of faith issued according to the rules prescribed by himself and signed with his own hand, he says that he is sending back to the East three legates, clergy of the Church of Constantinople, who had brought the praised writings, and, the names and grades of these same legates being explained:

'That therefore the mind of your Charity might in turn be confirmed by our discourses, we have sent back our sons Casterius (or Castorius) the presbyter, Patricius and Asclepiades the deacons, who brought your writings to us, after the venerable day of the Paschal feast.' To Anatolius then, as to the prelate of the Church of Constantinople, he gives mandate to take care that in transacting divine matters none of the presbyters or bishops dare to recite at the sacred altar the names of Dioscorus, Juvenal, and Eustathius, because our men (understand: the legates) appointed there had said this ought to be done.

Furthermore, if Quesnel had attended to these words, I scarcely know whether he could have affirmed that that synod, or assembly of bishops, was convened by Anatolius and not by the pontifical legates—on which matter see what we have already noted above in the preceding chapter. The rest, finally, which he writes in the third chapter of that letter, correspond exactly to those things which we have already recounted from the letter to Pulcheria. 3. But as for what concerns Julian, bishop of Cos, nothing occurs for us to say beyond what we understand can be gathered from these same letters. For it is plain to all that Julian gave letters again and again to the Roman Pontiff on the occasion of the Nestorian and Eutychian heresy.

But since all his letters are wanting, as even Paschasius Quesnel described in his catalogue of monuments pertaining to St. Leo, we can speak of them only led by conjectures. Meanwhile, however, what Julian wrote to St. Leo, and on what occasion, toward the close of the year 450 or the beginning of 451, has been indicated to us by the letter formerly numbered 41, now in Quesnel 61, which the Reverend Father [Leo] began with these words: 'I have received the letters of your fraternity's greeting, in which you signify that you were burdened with great tribulations.' For Julian the bishop was held in hatred by the Eutychian faction for many causes. For he discharged the vicarial power among the Easterns on behalf of the Apostolic See.

In the Robber-Council of Ephesus he resisted Dioscorus as much as he could, never departing from the nods of the pontifical legates, as can be gathered from another preceding letter of St. Leo written to him on the Ides of October in the year 449. But another cause for which he was odious to the Eastern heretics and schismatics arose perhaps from his own native country. For since he was an Italian, the Easterns did not willingly hear his name, taking it very ill that a man of a foreign nation should exercise authority over them; and one who with the utmost vigilance gave heed that the ecclesiastical rules should not be neglected, diligently acting that the mandates of the Apostolic See should be carried out and its rights not violated.

Wherefore, compelled to undergo most grievous labors among the insolent adversaries of the catholic faith, and since his soul, immovably cleaving to the truth, was being too greatly wearied, constrained by a certain necessity he longed to present himself to Leo and to his native land. 'Which' (says St. Leo) 'I had truly hoped would come to pass, that I might more openly learn from your mouth the windings of all the heretics. Nevertheless, fortified by divine protection, when he had escaped unharmed from the hands of the impious enemies, that he might be able to bring help to the causes of the Church, it was free for him to dwell among those whose approvable assent has become known to us, just as the writings of our brother Anatolius profess, and as the acts which have been transacted before him in the presence of our men demonstrate.'

After these things he renders him the exchange of greeting, and exhorts him to apply a circumspect and persevering diligence against the cunning devices of falsehood, 'since both your own mind and our authority support you to this end.' To some, nevertheless, our opinion may seem less safe, by which we affirm that Julian of Cos was an Italian by birth, led chiefly by the opinion of the most illustrious Stephen Baluze, who, treating in his new collection of Councils of this bishop of Cos, legate of the Apostolic See, affirms that the man was a Greek; and this through a slip of Baronius and Henri de Valois, who, sometimes led by corrupt readings of the manuscripts, confounded him with Julius, bishop of Puteoli, whom St. [Leo],

Leo had sent off to the Robber-Synod with others. He therefore asserts that Julian, bishop of Cos, was a Greek man, to whom it was first committed by Leo to render into Greek the letter written to Flavian, who (he says) doubtless had some little knowledge of the Latin tongue; it was not difficult in a slight and small piece of work. Then after the Council of Chalcedon the same Leo commits to him to bestow Latinity upon the synodal acts of Chalcedon written in Greek. 'But of greater labor' (he says) 'was it to turn that most ample set of acts from the Greek speech into Latin; especially for a Greek man, who, although a legate of the Apostolic See among the Greeks, nevertheless could not have a full knowledge of the Latin tongue.'

But pardon must be granted to so great and diligent a man, who did not attend to the letter of Leo explained above. 4. The emperor Marcian, meanwhile, considering in earnest that the felicity of the empire he had obtained depended chiefly on the affairs of religion, and seeing that the affairs of the Churches of the East, on account of the various factions and the hatreds of the bishops, could be brought to ruin, unless a general synod, as St. Leo had already decreed, were gathered, wrote letters to the holy Pontiff, that he would deign to come to the East, to hold a council there, and to decree all things that were believed profitable to religion.

'But if this should seem burdensome to him' (he adds), 'let his Holiness make this very thing known by his own letters, so that into all the East, and into Thrace itself, and Illyricum, imperial letters might be directed, that all the most holy bishops might assemble at some appointed place, and might declare by his arrangement what things they bring forth as profitable to the religion of Christians and the catholic faith, as your Holiness (he says), according to the ecclesiastical rules, shall have defined.' This letter Titianus, prefect of the city of Rome, delivered to Leo, as we gather from the response which Leo himself made to the emperor.

In this letter, indeed, having praised the zeal of Marcian himself, he congratulates him that he was endeavoring to repair the affairs of faith and of the empire, so that, namely, God being made propitious through one confession, both heretical falsehood and barbarian hostility might be destroyed together. But since the Pontiff judged it very difficult to transact the business of holding a new synod through letters sent back and forth, he first indicates to the emperor that the matter to be dealt with concerned only those in error, but by no means the faith or the Scriptures, which he reckoned it impious to interpret otherwise than the holy Fathers had;

therefore he responds to the imperial solicitude by means of a legation, which (he says) 'will come at once to your Clemency, God granting; whatever I judge to pertain to the advantage of the cause shall be more fully and more opportunely suggested.' The Pontiff himself did not long delay to give new letters to the emperor, perhaps because within the interval of forty-seven days he received new letters from the emperor.

For he affirms that on the seventh day before the Ides of June he took confidence to write back, both from the emperor's own letters, and from the report made to him by Abundius and the other legates returning from the East, who, not by mere assertion of words, but by the very effects of works, demonstrated that for the defense of the catholic faith the divine (he says) 'protection is vigorous in you.' Among the other things which he there subjoins, he relates that he had already directed Lucentius the bishop, and Basil the presbyter, who (he says) 'might be able to fulfill the parts of my solicitude,' as he had promised in the preceding letter.

But he sent these off to discharge that office for the reconciling of the fallen bishops, lest the desires of these penitents should be wearied by longer delay, nor lest an injurious facility should receive them rashly and without discretion. He confesses that he himself had requested a general synod, as the emperor had suggested. But the necessity of that time by no means permitted that the priests of all the provinces should be gathered, because of the wars breaking out, which would not allow certain bishops, especially those most needing to be summoned, to depart from their Churches. Therefore he judges that the convocation of bishops must be reserved to another time. On the same day he wrote a not dissimilar letter to Pulcheria Augusta, to whom he commends the praised legates; he condemns the Eutychian blasphemy;

finally he asks the Augusta that Eutyches himself be transferred to more distant places, and that a catholic abbot be set over his monastery, who might be able both to free that congregation of the servants of God from the depraved dogma, and to imbue them with the institutions of truth. 5. When he had applied these diligences with Marcian the emperor and Pulcheria Augusta, the holy Pontiff did not desist from the work he had begun.

But on the same day he likewise wrote to Anatolius, whom he had previously received into communion, by ratifying and confirming his election as bishop of Constantinople; to whom he suggests the necessity which impelled him to send new legates into the East, Lucentius the bishop and Basil the presbyter; he suggests that the fallen penitents be received to reconciliation through satisfaction and an indubitable profession of faith; yet with this moderation observed, that neither the parts of benevolence nor of justice be neglected, but, without respect of persons, the divine judgment be considered in all things.

But in another chapter of the same letter, treating of those who sinned more grievously in the Robber-Synod, claiming for themselves a higher place in that unhappy synod: 'Of these' (he says), 'if such satisfaction is forthcoming as may seem not to be refused, he orders the cause to be reserved for the more mature counsels of the Apostolic See,' so that, all things being examined and weighed, it may be estimated from their very actions what ought to be determined concerning them; he finally forbids their names to be recited at the altar, until the course of events should show what ought to be determined concerning them. Nor only from this reservation made to himself—lest the chiefs of the heretics be admitted to reconciliation—does the authority of the Roman See in judging the causes of the Easterns outside of a council become most clearly known;

but also from those things which he wrote in another chapter of the letter, in which he gives mandate that 'if it should happen that some other causes need to be more fully deliberated, let a report be quickly directed to us, so that, the quality of the causes being thoroughly handled, our solicitude may determine what ought to be observed.' 6. Here, therefore, two things, unless my opinion deceives me, are to be attended to, which both present sure and clear proofs of the supreme governance exercised by the Roman Pontiffs in the affairs of the Eastern Churches. The one regards those penitents who had fallen, led by fear. For their reception Leo himself prescribes those rules which would by no means contradict justice, nor favor indulgence with injury to justice.

But for the reconciling of these he sent the two praised legates, Lucentius and Basil, to whom, when he had given the necessary admonition and instructions, it could be lawful for no one—not even for Anatolius himself, bishop of Constantinople—to recede from these even slightly. Therefore, as many of the fallen from this order as were to be restored to their former ecclesiastical offices, dignities, and grades, could be absolved only by the authority of the Apostolic See, and were granted to enjoy their ancient honors.

But the rest, who were regarded as authors of the schism, whose cause was harder and graver, by Leo's sanction it was provided that, under whatever sign and testimony of satisfaction, they should be received to honors and grades, to communion and reconciliation, or be denied them; since the supreme Pontiff reserved to himself a more mature judgment concerning these and other causes that might arise. These two things indeed it must be reckoned that Quesnel studiously dissembled. Led, namely, by this reason: lest he be compelled to confess the things which everywhere, in setting forth the Works of the holy Pontiff, he denies;

so many and so great violent interpretations being always employed, which he reckoned sufficient for himself to abolish the authority of the Roman Pontiffs in judging the causes of the Easterns. That he studiously dissembled the arguments of this letter is betrayed by the annotations to the Leonine letters which he appended at the end of the second volume. For this one, among the others, as though unworthy of his notes and observations, he wholly passed over. Yet what then? Leo himself, who needs no interpreter, on the same day left to posterity, in letter 67, still clearer proofs of this supreme authority in judgments concerning the trying of the causes of the Easterns.

For when, while Flavian was still living, two presbyters of the Church of Constantinople, namely Basil and John, had been accused either of the Eutychian or the Nestorian heresy, they came to Rome to wipe out this brand of infamy. When therefore both had cleared themselves before the Apostolic See, about to return afterward to the East, the holy Pontiff writes to Anatolius, giving testimony that they, after undertaking the labor of a long pilgrimage, had laid open the sense of their heart in the Apostolic See, 'condemning' (he says) 'both heresies, of which we made mention above.' Wherefore, closing this very brief letter, the holy Pope thus addresses Anatolius:

'Through these, therefore, dearest brother, returning to their own with our testimony, we have directed our writings to your Charity, confidently praying that those who are adorned with the grace of the Apostolic See may also rejoice to be aided by its favor in all things.' Nor indeed does it escape me that those who seek a knot in a bulrush could contend that this letter is less fitting for proving our assumption, on account of those harsh words, 'confidently praying,' which seem to ill-befit the authority of a judge. But the contention is settled either by the variety of readings, or by the fragment of Flavian's letter unearthed from the Vatican library, not yet made public, which we shall exhibit in the following volume.

For very many codices, and Grimani himself, as Quesnel wrote in the margin of his edition, have 'confidently exhorting.' Next, the business of the two presbyters must be referred back to the year 449. And although the whole entire series of the Leonine letters is wanting, nevertheless from that single fragment of Flavian's letter written in their cause it becomes known that St. Leo performed the true parts of a judge; that those two presbyters came to Rome to render an account of the faith; and finally that not out of any indulgence, but the matter being known and proved, Leo received them into communion and declared them innocent.

That fragment which we have indicated contains in itself nothing other than Flavian's report to St. Leo concerning the faith and morals of the presbyters Basil and John, as we shall more conveniently explain. The holy pontiff wrote this letter on the thirteenth day before the Kalends of July, a little before he appointed legates to the new general council and sent them from the City into the East. Now indeed, as for what follows, since these are as it were the preliminaries of the Council of Chalcedon — for the bringing together and canonical ordering of which the zeal of the holy Pontiff Leo was diligently engaged — we therefore reserve our remarks upon them for the chapters of the following book.