教牧守則·對話錄與書信 第 471 章

Gregory to Theoctista the patrician. That your Excellency, set amid so great a tumult of affairs, is full of the richness of the sacred word, and unceasingly sighs toward eternal joys, for this I give great thanks to the omnipotent God, because I see fulfilled in you that which is written concerning the elect fathers: 'But the children of Israel walked on dry ground through the midst of the sea' (Exod. 15:19). But on the contrary: 'I am come into the depth of the sea, and the tempest hath overwhelmed me' (Ps. 68:3). But you, as I see, walk with dry steps amid the waves of secular affairs toward the land of promise. Let us therefore give thanks to that Spirit who lifts up the hearts He fills, who amid the tumults of men makes a solitude in the mind.

In whose presence no place of a compunct soul is hidden. For you draw in the odour of eternal sweetness, and therefore ardently love the Bridegroom of the soul, so that with the heavenly Bride you can say to Him: 'Draw me after Thee; in the odour of Thy ointments we run' (Cant. 1:3). But in the letters of your Excellency I have found this the less: that you were unwilling to indicate to me concerning the most serene Lady how studiously she reads, or how in reading she is moved to compunction. For your presence ought to profit her much, so that amid the floods of affairs which she continually endures — out of which, willing or unwilling, she is drawn forth — she may ever be called back inwardly to the love of the heavenly fatherland;

and you ought also to investigate this: as often as tears are given to her for her soul, whether she is moved to compunction still out of fear, or now out of love. For there are two kinds of compunction, as you know. One which fears eternal punishments, the other which sighs for heavenly rewards; for the soul, thirsting for God, is first moved to compunction by fear, afterward by love. For first it afflicts itself in tears, because, while it recalls its own evils, it dreads to suffer eternal punishments for them. But when, by long anxiety of grief, the dread has been consumed, a certain security is now born from the presumption of pardon, and the mind is inflamed in the love of heavenly joys.

And he who first wept lest he be led to punishment, afterward begins to weep most bitterly because he is deferred from the kingdom. For the mind contemplates who are those choirs of angels, what is that very fellowship of the blessed spirits, what is the vision of the inner brightness of God; and it laments more that it is absent from perennial good things than it wept before, when it feared eternal evils; and thus it comes to pass that perfect compunction of dread draws the soul to the compunction of love. This is well described in the sacred and truthful history by a figurative narration, which says: 'Axa, the daughter of Caleb, sitting upon the ass, sighed. Her father said to her, What hast thou? But she answered, Give me a blessing. Thou hast given me a southern and dry land; join to it also a watered one.'

'And her father gave her a watered land above and a watered land below' (Josh. 15:18, 19). Axa indeed sits upon the ass, when the soul presides over the irrational motions of its flesh. She, sighing, asks of her father a watered land, because the grace of tears is to be sought from our Creator with great desire. For there are some who have already received as a gift to speak freely for justice, to protect the oppressed, to bestow their own goods on the needy, to have the ardour of faith, but do not yet have the grace of tears.

These indeed have a southern and dry land, but still lack watered lands, because, being set in good works, in which they are great and fervent, it greatly behooves them that, whether out of fear of punishment or out of love of the heavenly kingdom, they daily bewail the sins without which they cannot live. But since, as I said, there are two kinds of compunction, her father gave her a watered land above and a watered land below. The soul receives the watered land above, when it afflicts itself in tears with desire of the heavenly kingdom; but it receives the watered land below, when, weeping, it dreads the punishments of hell. And indeed the lower is given first, and afterward the watered land above.

But since the compunction of love is preeminent in great dignity, it was necessary that the watered land above should be named first, and the watered land below afterward. You therefore, who by experience know both kinds of compunction, the omnipotent Lord working in you, ought daily and solicitously to search out how much you profit through the words of your most serene Lady. And I ask that you take care especially to instruct in good morals the little lords whom you nurse, and to admonish the glorious eunuchs who are appointed to them, that they ought to speak to them such things as may move their minds to compunction in charity toward one another and in gentleness toward their subjects, lest, if they conceive anything of hatred among themselves, it afterward break out in the open.

For the words of those who nurse them will be either milk, if they are good, or poison, if they are evil. Let them therefore now suggest to them such things as may afterward show how good were the things they sucked from the mouth of their nurses. Moreover, my beloved son the deacon Sabinianus has brought the thirty pounds of gold transmitted by your Excellency, to be given for the redemption of captives and distributed to the poor; concerning which I rejoice, but I am greatly afraid for myself, because before the dread Judge I go to render an account not only of the substance of blessed Peter the prince of the Apostles, but also of your goods. But to you may the omnipotent God restore heavenly things for earthly, eternal things for temporal.

I make known, moreover, that from the city of Crotona — which, situated upon the Adriatic sea in the land of Italy, was captured last year by the Lombards — many men and many noble women have been led away as booty, and children have been divided from parents, parents from children, and spouses from spouses, of whom some have already been redeemed. But since they demand heavy prices for them, many have hitherto remained among the most impious Lombards. And I have now transmitted the half of the money which you sent, for their redemption.

But with the other half I have arranged to buy bedding for the handmaids of God, whom you in the Greek tongue call 'monastriae' (nuns), because in their beds, in grave nakedness, they labour amid the most vehement cold of this winter — of whom there are many in this city. For according to the register by which they are provided, three thousand are found. And indeed from the property of blessed Peter the prince of the Apostles they receive eighty pounds yearly. But for so great a multitude, what are these things — especially in this city, where everything is bought at a grievous price? Yet such is their life, and so strict in tears and abstinence, that we believe that, if they themselves were not, none of us could by now have subsisted through so many years in this place amid the swords of the Lombards. (Cf. John the Deacon, book ii, no.

27.) Moreover, I have transmitted, as a blessing of Saint Peter the Apostle, a key from his most sacred body, concerning which key this is the miracle which I relate that was wrought. When a certain Lombard, having entered a city in the regions beyond the Po, had found it, despising it because it was a key of Saint Peter, but wishing, on account of the fact that he saw it was of gold, to make for himself something else out of it, he drew a knife to cut it. He, straightway seized by the spirit, fixed in his own throat the knife with which he wished to cut it into parts, and at that very hour fell dead.

And while the king of the Lombards, Authari, and many others of his men were present there, and he who had struck himself lay dead apart, while this key lay apart on the ground, a most vehement fear came upon all, so that none dared to lift that same key from the ground. Then a certain catholic Lombard, who was known to be given to prayer and almsgiving, Minulf by name, was called, and he himself lifted it from the ground. But Authari, on account of that same miracle, made another key of gold, and transmitted it together with it to my predecessor of holy memory, indicating what miracle had befallen through it.

Therefore I have taken care to send to Your Excellency that very key through which Almighty God struck down the proud and faithless man who had risen against you, so that through it you, who both fear and love Him, may be able to possess both present and eternal salvation. Gregory to Anastasius, bishop of Antioch. I have received the longed-for letter of your most gracious holiness, delivered by our common son the deacon Sabinianus, in which flowed forth words not of the tongue but of the soul. And it is no wonder that he speaks well who lives perfectly. For since through the Spirit as your master you have learned in the school of the heart the precepts of life, to despise all earthly things and to hasten to the heavenly homeland, insofar as you have advanced in goodness, so much do you also think good of others.

But while in the writings of Your Beatitude I heard many praiseworthy things said of me, I understood your intent: that you wished to call to mind not what I am, but what I ought to be. As for your saying that I ought to remember my own ways, and give no occasion, for any cause, to the malignant spirit who seeks to sift souls, I for my part recall that I have not always been of good character, and I strive with all my might to conquer and blot out those very ways within me if I can. Yet if, as you believe, I had any good in me, I trust in the help of Almighty God that I have not forgotten it. But your holiness, as I see, in the foregoing words of sweetness and in this word that follows, wished your letter to be like a bee, which carries both honey and a sting, so that it might both feed me with honey and prick me with the sting.

—to feed me with honey and prick me with the sting. But amid these things I return to meditate on the word of Solomon: for better are the wounds of one who loves than the flattering kisses of an enemy (Prov. 27:6). As for your saying that we ought for no cause to give occasion of scandal, this also your most pious Lord, your son—for whose life we must pray unceasingly—has already written to me quite often; and what he says out of his power, I know that you say to him out of love. Nor did I wonder that you put imperial words in your letters, for love and power have the greatest kinship between them. For both preside as principal, and both always speak with authority.

And indeed, in receiving the synodical letter of our brother and fellow-priest Cyriacus, it was not fitting that I should make delays on account of a profane title, lest I disturb the unity of the holy Church; yet nonetheless I took care to admonish him about that same superstitious and proud title, saying that he could not have peace with us unless he corrected the arrogance of the aforesaid word, which the first apostate invented. You, however, ought not to say that this same cause is nothing, for if we bear this with equanimity, we corrupt the faith of the whole Church. For you know how many, not only heretics but even heresiarchs, have gone forth from the Church of Constantinople.

And to say nothing of the injury to your own honor: if one bishop is called universal, the whole Church falls, if the one universal one falls. But far be this folly, far be this frivolity from my ears! Yet I trust in the Almighty Lord that He will soon fulfill what He has promised: Everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled (Luke 14:11). Occupied with many things, I have answered briefly the words of your letters; for what I ought not now to speak through writings remains marked in my mind. I ask that Your Beatitude may always bring me to remembrance in your holy prayers, that your intercessions may snatch me away from evils both temporal and eternal.

But for our most serene lord the emperor pray earnestly and fervently, for his life is greatly necessary to the world. I cease now from saying more, since I do not doubt that you too know it.