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ST. GREGORY OF NYSSA

LETTERS

[Letters 1-14 translated by the Rev. H. c. Ogle; letters 15-16 by the Rev.
Henry Austin Wilson, M.A., Fellow and Librarian of Magdalen College,
Oxford; letters 17-18 by the Rev. William Moore, M.A., Rector of Appleton,
Late Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford.]


LETTER I.

TO EUSEBIUS(2).

   WHEN the length of the day begins to expand in winter-time, as the sun
mounts to the upper part of his course, we keep the feast of the appearing
of the true Light divine, that through the veil of flesh has cast its
bright beams upon the life of men: but now when that luminary has traversed
half the heaven in his course, so that night and day are of equal length,
the upward return of human nature from death to life is the theme of this
great and universal festival, which all the life of those who have embraced
the mystery of the Resurrection unites in celebrating. What is the meaning
of the subject thus suggested for my letter to you? Why, since it is the
custom in these general holidays for us to take every way to show the
affection harboured in our hearts, and some, as you know, give proof of
their good will by presents of their own, we thought it only right not to
leave you without the homage of our gifts, but to lay before your lofty and
high-minded soul the scanty offerings of our poverty. Now our offering
which is tendered for your acceptance in this letter is the letter itself,
in which there is not a single word wreathed with the flowers of rhetoric
or adorned with the graces of composition, to make it to be deemed a gift
at all in literary circles, but the mystical gold, which is wrapped up in
the faith of Christians, as in a packet(3), must be my present to you,
after being unwrapped, as far as possible, by these lines, and showing its
hidden brilliancy. Accordingly we must return to our prelude. Why is it
that then only, when the night has attained its utmost length, so that no
further addition is possible, that He appears in flesh to  us, Who holds
the Universe in His grasp, and controls the same Universe by His own power,
Who cannot be contained even by all intelligible things, but includes the
whole, even at the time that He enters the narrow dwelling of a fleshly
tabernacle, while His mighty power thus keeps pace with His beneficent
purpose, and shows itself even as a shadow wherever the will inclines, so
that neither in the creation of the world was the power found weaker than
the will, nor when He was eager to stoop down to the lowliness of our
mortal nature did He lack power to that very end, but actually did come to
be in that condition, yet without leaving the universe unpiloted(4)? Since,
then, there is some account to be given of both those seasons, how it is
that it is winter-time when He appears in the flesh, but it is when the
days are as long as the nights that He restores to life man, who because of
his sins returned to the earth from whence he came,--by explaining the
reason of this, as well as I can in few words, I will make my letter my
present to you. Has your own sagacity, as of course it has, already divined
the mystery hinted at by these coincidences; that the advance of night is
stopped by the accessions to the light, and the period of darkness begins
to be shortened, as the length of the day is increased by the successive
additions? For thus much perhaps would be plain enough even to the
uninitiated, that sin is near akin to darkness; and in fact evil is so
termed by the Scripture. Accordingly the season in which our mystery of
godliness begins is a kind of exposition of the Divine dispensation on
behalf of our souls. For meet and right it was that, when vice was shed
abroad(5) without bounds, [upon this night of evil the Sun of righteousness
should rise, and that in us who have before walked in darkness(6) ] the day
which we receive from Him Who placed that light in our hears should
increase more and more; so that the life which is in the light should be
extended to the greatest length possible, being constantly augmented by
additions of good; and that the life in vice should by gradual subtraction
be reduced to the smallest possible compass; for the increase of things
good comes to the same thing as the diminution of things evil. But the
feast of the Resurrection; occurring when the days are of equal length, of
itself gives us this interpretation of the coincidence, namely, that we
shall no longer fight with evils only upon equal terms, vice grappling with
virtue in indecisive strife, but that the life of light will prevail, the
gloom of idolatry melting as the day waxes stronger. For this reason also,
after the moon has run her course for fourteen days, Easter exhibits her
exactly opposite to the rays of the sun, full with all the wealth of his
brightness, and not permitting any interval of darkness to take place in
its turn(7): for, after taking the place of the sun at its setting, she
does not herself set. before she mingles her own beams with the genuine
rays of the sun, so that one light remains continuously, throughout the
whole space of the earth's course by day and night, without any break
whatsoever being caused by the interposition of darkness. This discussion,
dear one, we contribute by way of a gift from our poor and needy hand; and
may your whole life be a continual festival and a high day, never dimmed by
a single stain of nightly gloom.

LETTER II.

TO THE CITY OF SEBASTEIA(8).

   SOME of the brethren whose heart is as our heart told us of the
slanders that were being propagated to our detriment by those who hate
peace, and privily backbite their neighbour; and have no fear of the great
and terrible judgment-seat of Him Who has declared that account will be
required even of idle words in that trial of our life which we must all
look for: they say that the charges which are being circulated against us
are such as these; that we entertain opinions opposed to those who at
Nicaea set forth the right and sound faith, and that without due
discrimination and inquiry we received into the communion of the Catholic
Church those who formerly assembled at Ancyra under the name of Marcellus.
Therefore, that falsehood may not overpower the truth, in another letter we
made a sufficient defence against the charges levelled at us, and before
the Lord we protested that we had neither departed from the faith of the
Holy Fathers, nor had we done anything without due discrimination and
inquiry in the case of those who came over from the communion of Marcellus
to that of the Church: but all that we did we did only after the orthodox
in the East, and our brethren in the ministry had entrusted to us the
consideration of the case of these persons, and had approved our action.
But inasmuch as, since we composed that written defence of our conduct,
again some of the brethren who are of one mind with us begged us to make
separately(9) with our own lips a profession of our faith, which we
entertain with full conviction(10), following as we do the utterances of
inspiration and the tradition of the Fathers, we deemed it necessary to
discourse briefly of these heads as well. We confess that the doctrine of
the Lord, which He taught His disciples, when He delivered to them the
mystery of godliness, is the foundation and root of right and sound faith,
nor do we believe that there is aught else loftier or safer than that
tradition. Now the doctrine of the Lord is this: "Go," He said, "teach all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of
the Holy Ghost." Since, then, in the case of those who are regenerate from
death to eternal life, it is through the Holy Trinity that the life-giving
power is bestowed on those who with faith are deemed worthy of the grace,
and in like manner the grace is imperfect, if any one, whichever it be, of
the names of the Holy Trinity be omitted in the saving baptism--for the
sacrament of regeneration is not completed in the Son and the Father alone
without the Spirit: nor is the perfect boon of life imparted to Baptism in
the Father and the Spirit, if the name of the Son be suppressed: nor is the
grace of that Resurrection accomplished in the Father and the Son, if the
Spirit be left out(1) :--for this reason we rest all our hope, and the
persuasion of the salvation of our souls, upon the three Persons,
recognized (2) by these names; and we believe in the Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ, Who is the Fountain of life, and in the Only-begotten Son of
the Father, Who is the Author of life, as saith the Apostle, and in the
Holy Spirit of God, concerning Whom the Lord hath spoken, "It is the Spirit
that quickeneth". And since on us who have been redeemed from death the
grace of immortality is bestowed, as we have said, through faith in the
Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, guided by these we believe that
nothing servile, nothing created, nothing unworthy of the majesty of the
Father is to be associated in thought with the Holy Trinity; since, I say,
our life is one which comes to us by faith in the Holy Trinity, taking its
rise from the God of all, flowing through the Son, and working in us by the
Holy Spirit. Having, then, this full assurance, we are baptized as we were
commanded, and we believe as we are baptized, and we hold as we believe; so
that with one accord   our baptism, our faith, and our ascription of praise
are to(3) the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost. But if any one
makes mention of two or three Gods, or of three God-heads, let him be
accursed. And if any, following the perversion of Arius, says that the Son
or the Holy Spirit were produced from things that are not, let him be
accursed. But as many as walk by the rule of truth and acknowledge the
three Persons, devoutly recognized in Their several properties, and believe
that there is one Godhead, one goodness, one rule, one authority and power,
and neither make void the supremacy of the Sole-sovereignty(4), nor fall
away into polytheism, nor confound the Persons, nor make up the Holy
Trinity of heterogeneous and unlike elements, but in simplicity receive the
doctrine of the faith, grounding all their hope of salvation upon the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,--these according to our judgment are
of the same mind as we, and with them we also trust to have part in the
Lord.

LETTER III.

TO ABLABIUS(5).

   THE Lord, as was meet and right, brought us safe through, accompanied
as we had been by your prayers, and I will tell you a manifest token of His
loving kindness. For when the sun was just over the spot which we left
behind Earsus(6), suddenly the clouds gathered thick, and there was a
change from clear sky to deep gloom. Then a chilly breeze blowing through
the clouds, bringing a drizzling with it, and striking upon us with a very
damp feeling, threatened such rain as had never yet been known, and on the
left there were continuous claps of thunder, and keen flashes of lightning
alternated with the thunder, following one crash and preceding the next,
and all the mountains before, behind, and on each side were shrouded in
clouds. And already a heavy(7) cloud hung over our heads, caught by a
strong wind and big with rain, and yet we, like the Israelites of old in
their miraculous passage of the Red Sea, though surrounded on all sides by
rain, arrived unwetted at Vestena. And when we had already found shelter
there, and our mules had got a rest, then the signal for the down-pour was
given by God to the air. And when we had spent some three or four hours
there, and had rested enough, again God stayed the down-fall, and our
conveyance moved along more briskly than before, as the wheel easily slid
through the mud just moist and on the surface. Now the road from that point
to our little town is all along the river side, going down stream with the
water, and there is a continuous string of villages along the banks, all
close upon the road, and with very short distances between them. In
consequence of this unbroken line of habitations all the road was full of
people, some coming to meet us, and others escorting us, mingling tears in
abundance with their joy. Now there was a little drizzle, not unpleasant,
lust enough to moisten the air; but a little way before we got home the
cloud that overhung us was condensed into a more violent shower, so that
our entrance was quite quiet, as no one was aware beforehand of our coming.
But just as we got inside our portico, as the sound of our carriage wheels
along the dry hard ground was heard, the people turned up in shoals, as
though by some mechanical contrivance, I know not whence nor how, flocking
round us so closely that it was not easy to get down from our conveyance,
for there was not a foot of clear space. But after we had persuaded them
with difficulty to allow us to get down, and to let our mules pass, we were
crushed on every side by folks crowding round, insomuch that their
excessive kindness all but made us faint. And when we were near the inside
of the portico, we see a stream of fire flowing into the church; for the
choir of virgins, carrying their wax torches in their hands, were just
marching in file along the entrance of the church, kindling the whole into
splendour with their blaze. And when I was within and had rejoiced and wept
with my people--for I experienced both emotions from witnessing both in the
multitude,--as soon as I had finished the prayers, I wrote off this letter
to your Holiness as fast as possible, under the pressure of extreme thirst,
so that I might when it was done attend to my bodily wants.

LETTER IV.

TO CYNEGIUS(8).

   We have a law that bids us "rejoice with them that rejoice, and weep
with them that weep ": but of these commandments it often seems that it is
in our power to put only one into practice. For there is a great scarcity
in the world of "them that rejoice," so that it is not easy to find with
whom we may share our blessings, but there are plenty who are in the
opposite case. I write thus much by way of preface, because of the sad
tragedy which some spiteful power has been playing among people of long-
standing nobility. A young man of good family, Synesius by name, not
unconnected with myself, in the full flush of youth, who has scarcely begun
to live yet, is in great dangers, from which God alone has power to rescue
him, and next to God, you, who are entrusted with the decisions of all
questions of life and death. An involuntary mishap has taken place. Indeed,
what mishap is voluntary? And now those who have made up this suit against
him, carrying with it the penalty of death, have turned his mishap into
matter of accusation. However, I will try by private letters to soften
their resentment and incline them to pity; but I beseech your kindliness to
side with justice and with us, that your benevolence may prevail over the
wretched plight of the youth, hunting up any and every device by which the
young man may be placed out of the reach of danger, having conquered the
spiteful power which assails him by the help of your alliance. I have said
all that I want in brief; but to go into details, in order that my
endeavour may be successful, would be to say what I have no business to
say, nor you to hear from me.

LETTER V.

A TESTIMONIAL.

   THAT for which the king of the Macedonians is most admired by people of
understanding,--for he is admired not so much for his famous victories(9)
over the Persians and Indians, and his penetrating as far the Ocean, as for
his saying that he had his treasure in his friends;--in this respect I dare
to compare myself with his marvellous exploits, and it will be right for me
to utter such a sentiment too. Now because I am rich in friendships,
perhaps I surpass in that kind of property even that great man who plumed
himself upon that very thing. For who was such a friend to him as you are
to me, perpetually endeavouring to surpass yourself in every kind of
excellence? For assuredly no one would ever charge me with flattery, when I
say this, if he were to look at my age and your life: for grey hairs are
out of season for flattery, and old age is ill-suited for complaisance, and
as for you, even if you are ever in season for flattery, yet praise would
not fall under the suspicion of flattery, is your life shows forth your
praise before words. But since, when men are rich in blessings, it is a
special gift to know how to use what one has, and the best use of
superfluities is to let one's friends share them with one, and since my
beloved son Alexander is most of all a friend united to me in all
sincerity, be persuaded to show him my treasure, and not only to show it to
him, but also to put it at his disposal to enjoy abundantly, by extending
to him your protection in those matters about which he has come to you,
begging you to be his patron. He will tell you all with his own lips. For
it is better so than that I should go into details in a letter.

LETTER VI.

TO STAGIRIUS.

   THEY say that conjurors(10) in theatres contrive some such marvel as
this which I am going to describe. Having taken some historical narrative,
or some old story as the ground-plot of their sleight of hand, they relate
the story to the spectators in action. And it is in this way that they make
their representations of the narrative(1). They put on their dresses and
masks, and rig up something to resemble a town on the stage with hangings,
and then so associate the bare scene with their life-like imitation of
action that they are a marvel to the spectators--both the actors themselves
of the incidents of the play, and the hangings, or rather their imaginary
city. What do I mean, do you think, by this allegory? Since we must needs
show to those who are coming together that which is not a city as though it
were one, do you let yourself be persuaded to become for the nonce the
founder of our city(2), by just putting in an appearance there; I will make
the desert-place seem to be a city; now it is no great distance for you,
and the favour which you will confer is very great; for we wish to show
ourselves more splendid to our companions here, which we shall do if, in
place of any other ornament, we are adorned with the splendour of your
party.

LETTER VII.

TO A FRIEND.

   WHAT flower in spring is so bright, what voices of singing birds are so
sweet, what breezes that soothe the calm sea are so light and mild, what
glebe is so fragrant to the husbandman--whether it be teeming with green
blades, or waving with fruitful ears as is the spring of the soul, lit up
with your peaceful beams, from the radiance which shone m your letter,
which raised our life from despondency to gladness? For thus, perhaps, it
will not be unfitting to adapt the word of the prophet to our present
blessings: "In the multitude of the sorrows which I had in my heart, the
comforts of God," by your kindness, "have refreshed my soul,"(3) like
sunbeams, cheering and warming our life nipped by frost. For both reached
the highest pitch--the severity of my troubles, I mean, on the one side,
and the sweetness of your favours on the other. And if you have so
gladdened us, by only sending us the joyful tidings of your coming, that
everything changed for us from extremest woe to a bright condition, what
will your precious and benign coming, even the sight of it, do? what
consolation will the sound of your sweet voice in our ears afford our soul?
May this speedily come to pass, by the good help of God, Who giveth respite
from pain to the fainting, and rest to the afflicted. But be assured, that
when we look at our own case we grieve exceedingly at the present state of
things, and men cease not to tear us in pieces(4): but when we turn our
eyes to your excellence, we own that we have great cause for thankfulness
to the dispensation of Divine Providence, that we are able to enjoy in your
neighbourhood(5) your sweetness and good-will towards us, and feast at will
on such food to satiety, if indeed there is such a thing as satiety of
blessings like these.

LETTER VIII(6).

TO A STUDENT OF THE CLASSICS.

   WHEN I was looking for some suitable and proper exordium, I mean of
course from Holy Scripture, to put at the head of my letter, according to
my usual custom, I did not know which to choose, not from inability to find
what was suitable, but because I deemed it superfluous to write such things
to those who knew nothing about the matter. For your eager pursuit of
profane literature proved incontestably to us that you did not care about
sacred. Accordingly I will say nothing about Bible texts, but will select a
prelude adapted to your literary tastes taken from the poets you love so
well. By the great master of your education there is introduced one,
showing all an old man's joy, when after long affliction he once more
beheld his son, and his son's son as well. And the special theme of his
exultation is the rivalry between the two, Ulysses and Telemachus, for the
highest meed of valour, though it is true that the recollection of his own
exploits against the Cephallenians adds to the point of his speech(7). For
you and your admirable father, when you welcomed me, as they did Laertes,
in your affection, contended in most honourable rivalry for the prize of
virtue, by showing us all possible respect and kindness; he in numerous
ways which I need not here mention, and you by pelting me with(8) your
letters from Cappadocia. What, then, of me the aged one? I count that day
one to be blessed, in which I witness such a competition between father and
son. May you, then, never cease from accomplishing the rightful prayer of
an excellent and admirable father, and surpassing in your readiness to all
good works the renown which from him you inherit. I shall be a judge
acceptable to both of you, as I shall award you the first prize against
your father, and the same to your father against you. And we will put up
with rough Ithaca, rough not so much with stones as with the manners of the
inhabitants, an island in which there are many suitors, who are suitors(9)
most of all for the possessions of her whom they woo, and insult their
intended bride by this very fact, that they threaten her chastity with
marriage, acting in a way worthy of a Melantho, one might say, or some
other such person; for nowhere is there a Ulysses to bring them to their
senses with his bow. You see how in an old man's fashion I go maundering
off into matters with which you have no concern. But pray let indulgence be
readily extended to me in consideration of my grey hairs; for garrulity is
just as characteristic of old age as to be blear-eyed, or for the limbs to
fail(1). But you by entertaining us with your brisk and lively language,
like a bold young man as you are, will make our old age young again,
supporting the feebleness of our length of days with this kind attention
which so well becomes you.

LETTER IX.

AN INVITATION.

   IT is not the natural wont of spring to shine forth in its radiant
beauty all at once, but there come as preludes of spring the sunbeam gently
warming earth's frozen surface, and the bud half hidden beneath the clod,
and breezes blowing over the earth, so that the fertilizing and generative
power of the air penetrates deeply into it. One may see the fresh and
tender grass, and the return of birds which winter had banished, and many
such tokens, which are rather signs of spring, not spring itself. Not but
that these are sweet, because they are indications of what is sweetest.
What is the meaning of all that I have been saying? Why, since the
expression of your kindness which reached us in your letters, as a
forerunner of the treasures contained in you, with a goodly prelude brings
the glad tidings of the blessing which we expect at your hands, we both
welcome the boon which those letters convey, like some first-appearing
flower of spring, and pray that we may soon enjoy in you the full beauty of
the season. For, be well assured, we have been deeply, deeply distressed by
the passions and spite of the people here, and their ways; and just as ice
forms in cottages after the rains that come in--for I will draw my
comparison from the weather of our part of the world(2),--and so moisture,
when it gets in, if it spreads over the surface that is already frozen,
becomes congealed about the ice, and an addition is made to the mass
already existing, even so one may notice much the same kind of thing in the
character of most of the people in this neighbourhood, how they are always
plotting and inventing something spiteful, and a fresh mischief is
congealed on the top of that which has been wrought before, and another one
on the top of that, and then again another, and this goes on without
intermission, and there is no limit to their hatred and to the increase of
evils; so that we have great need of many prayers that the grace of the
Spirit may speedily breathe upon them, and thaw the bitterness of their
hatred, and melt the frost that is hardening upon them from their malice.
For this cause the spring, sweet as it is by nature, becomes yet more to be
desired than ever to those who after such storms look for you. Let not the
boon, then, linger. Especially as our great holiday(3) is approaching, it
would be more reasonable that the land which bare you should exult in her
own treasures than that Pontus should in ours. Come then, dear one,
bringing us a multitude of blessings, even yourself; for this will fill up
the measure of our beatitude.

LETTER X(4).

TO LIBANIUS.

   I ONCE heard a medical man tell of a wonderful freak of nature. And
this was his story. A man was ill of an unmanageable complaint, and began
to find fault with the medical faculty, as being able to do far less than
it professed; for everything that was devised for his cure was ineffectual.
Afterwards when some good news beyond his hopes was brought him, the
occurrence did the work of the healing art, by putting an end to his
disease. Whether it were that the soul by the overflowing sense of release
from anxiety, and by a sudden rebound, disposed the body to be in the same
condition as itself, or in some other way, I cannot say: for I have no
leisure to enter upon such disquisitions, and the person who told me did
not specify the cause. But I have just called to mind the story very
seasonably, as I think: for when I was not as well as I could wish--now I
need not tell you exactly the causes of all the worries which befel me from
the time I was with you to the present,--after some one told me all at once
of the letter which had arrived from your unparalleled Erudition, as soon
as I got the epistle and ran over what you had written, forthwith, first my
soul was affected in the same way as though I had been proclaimed before
all the world as the hero of most glorious achievements--so highly did I
value the testimony which you favoured me with in your letter,--and then
also my bodily health immediately began to improve: and I afford an example
of the same marvel as the story which I told you just now, in that I was
ill when I read one half of the letter, and well when I read the other half
of the same. Thus much for those matters. But now, since Cynegius was the
occasion of that favour, you are able, in the overflowing abundance of your
ability to do good, not only to benefit us, but also our benefactors; and
he is a benefactor of ours, as has been said before, by having been the
cause and occasion of our having a letter from you; and for this reason he
well deserves both our good offices. But if you ask who are our teachers,--
if indeed we are thought to have learned anything,--you will find that they
are Paul and John, and the rest of the Apostles and Prophets; if I do not
seem to speak too boldly in claiming any knowledge of that art in which you
so excel, that competent judges declares that the rules of oratory stream
down from you, as from an overflowing spring, upon all who have any
pretensions to excellence in that department. This I have heard the
admirable Basil say to everybody, Basil, who was your disciple, but my
father and teacher. But be assured, first, that I found no rich nourishment
in the precepts of my teachers(6), inasmuch as I enjoyed my brother's
society only for a short time, and got only just enough polish from his
diviner tongue to be able to discern the ignorance of those who are
uninitiated in oratory; next, however, that whenever I had leisure, I
devoted my time and energies to this study, and so became enamoured of your
beauty, though I never yet obtained the object of my passion. If, then, on
the one side we never had a teacher, which I deem to have been our case,
and if on the other it is improper to suppose that the opinion which you
entertain of us is other than the true one--nay, you are correct in your
statement, and we are not quite contemptible in your judgment,--give me
leave to presume to attribute to you the cause of such proficiency as we
may have attained. For if Basil was the author of our oratory, and if his
wealth came from your treasures, then what we possess is yours, even though
we received it through others. But if our attainments are scanty, so is the
water in a jar; still it comes from the Nile.

LETTER XI.

TO LIBANIUS.

   IT was a custom with the Romans(7) to celebrate a feast in winter-time,
after the custom of their fathers, when the length of the days begins to
draw out, as the sun climbs to the upper regions of the sky. Now the
beginning of the month is esteemed holy, and by this day auguring the
character of the whole year, they devote themselves to forecasting lucky
accidents, gladness, and wealth(8). What is my object in beginning my
letter in this way? Why, I do so because I too kept this feast, having got
my present of gold as well as any of them; for then there came into my
hands as well as theirs gold, not like that vulgar gold, which potentates
treasure and which those that have it give,--that heavy, vile, and soulless
possession,--but that which is loftier than all wealth, as Pindar says(9),
in the eyes of those that have sense, being the fairest presentation, I
mean your letter, and the vast wealth which it contained. For thus it
happened; that on that day, as I was going to the metropolis of the
Cappadocians, I met an acquaintance, who handed me this present, your
letter, as a new year's gift. And I, being overjoyed at the occurrence,
threw open my treasure to all who were present; and all shared in it each
getting the whole of it, without any rivalry, and I was none the worse off.
For the letter by passing through the hands of all, like a ticket for a
feast, is the private wealth of each, some by steady continuous reading
engraving the words upon their memory, and others taking an impression(10)
of them upon tablets; and it was again in my hands, giving me more pleasure
than the hard(1) metal does to the eyes of the rich. Since, then, even to
husbandmen--to use a homely comparison--approbation of the labours which
they have already accomplished is a strong stimulus to those which follow,
bear with us if we treat what you have yourself given as so much seed, and
if we write that we may provoke you to write back. But I beg of you a
public and general boon for our life; that you will no longer entertain the
purpose which you expressed to us in a dark hint at the end of your letter
For I do not think that it is at all a fair decision to come to, that,--
because there are some who disgrace themselves by deserting from the Greek
language to the barbarian, becoming mercenary soldiers and choosing a
soldier's rations instead of the renown of eloquence,--you should therefore
condemn oratory altogether, and sentence human life to be as voiceless as
that of beasts. For who is he who will open his lips, if you carry into
effect this severe sentence against oratory? But perhaps it will be well to
remind you of a passage in our Scriptures. For our Word bids those that can
to do good, not looking at the tempers of those who receive the benefit, so
as to be eager to benefit only those who are sensible of kindness, while we
close our beneficence to the unthankful, but rather to imitate the Disposer
of all, Who distributes the good things of His creation alike to all, to
the good and to the evil. Having regard to this, admirable Sir, show
yourself in your way of life such an one as the time past has displayed
you. For those who do not see the sun do not thereby hinder the sun's
existence. Even so neither is it right that the beams of your eloquence
should be dimmed, because of those who are purblind as to the perceptions
of the soul. But as for Cynegius, I pray that he may be as far as possible
from the common malady, which now has seized upon young men; and that he
will devote himself of his own accord to the study of rhetoric. But if he
is otherwise disposed, it is only right, even if he be unwilling, he should
be forced to it; so as to avoid the unhappy and discreditable plight in
which they now are, who have previously abandoned the pursuit of oratory.

LETTER XII(2).

ON HIS WORK AGAINST EUNOMIUS.

   WE Cappadocians are poor in well-nigh all things that make the
possessors of them happy, but above all we are badly off for people who are
able to write. This, be sure, is the reason why I am so slow about sending
you a letter: for, though my reply to the heresy(of Eunomius) had been long
ago completed, there was no one to transcribe it. Such a dearth of writers
it was that brought upon us the suspicion of sluggishness or of inability
to frame an answer. But since now at any rate, thank God, the writer and
reviser have come, I have sent this treatise to you; not, as Isocrates
says(3), as a present, for I do not reckon it to be such that it should be
received in lieu of something of substantial value, but that it may be in
our power to cheer on those who are in the full vigour of youth to do
battle with the enemy, by stirring up the naturally sanguine temperament of
early life. But if any portion of the treatise should appear worthy of
serious consideration, after examining some parts, especially those
prefatory to the "trials,"(4) and those which are of the same cast, and
perhaps also some of the doctrinal parts of the book, you will think them
not ungratefully composed. But to whatever conclusion you come, you will of
course read them, as to a teacher and corrector, to those who do not act
like the players at ball(5), when they stand in three different places and
throw it from one to the other, aiming it exactly and catching one ball
from one and one from another, and they baffle the player who is in the
middle, as he jumps up to catch it, pretending that they are going to throw
with a made-up expression of face, and such and such a motion of the hand
to left or right, and whichever way they see him hurrying, they send the
ball just the contrary way, and cheat his expectation by a trick. This
holds even now in the case of most of us, who, dropping all serious
purpose, play at being good-natured(6), as if at ball, with men, instead of
realizing the favourable hope which we hold out, beguiling to sinister(7)
issues the souls of those who repose confidence in us. Letters of
reconciliation, caresses, tokens, presents, affectionate embrace by
letters--these are the making as if to throw with the ball to the right.
But instead of the pleasure which one expects therefrom, one gets
accusations, plots, slanders, disparagement, charges brought against one,
bits of a sentence torn from their context, caught up, and turned to one's
hurt. Blessed in your hopes are ye, who through all such trials exercise
confidence towards God, But we beseech you not to look at our words, but to
the teaching of our Lord in the Gospel. For what consolation to one in
anguish can another be, who surpasses him in the extremity of his own
anguish, to help his luckless fortunes to obtain their proper issue? As He
saith, "Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, saith the Lord." But do you, best
of men, go on in a manner worthy of yourself, and trust in God, and do not
be hindered by the spectacle of our misfortunes from being good and true,
but commit to God that judgeth righteously the suitable and just issue of
events, and act as Divine wisdom guides you. Assuredly Joseph had in the
result no reason to grieve at the envy of his brethren, inasmuch as the
malice of his own kith and kin became to him the road to empire.

LETTER XIII.

TO THE CHURCH AT NIICOMEDIA(8).

   MAY the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, Who disposeth all
things in wisdom for the best, visit you by His own grace, and comfort you
by Himself, working in you that which is well-pleasing to Him, and may the
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ come upon you, and the fellowship of the
Holy Spirit, that ye may have healing of all tribulation and affliction,
and advance towards all good, for the perfecting of the Church, for the
edification of your souls, and to the praise of the glory of His name. But
in making here a defence of ourselves before your charity, we would say
that we were not neglectful to render an account of the charge entrusted to
us, either in time past, or since the departure hence of Patricius of
blessed memory; but we insist that there were many troubles in our Church,
and the decay of our bodily powers was great, increasing, as was natural,
with advancing years; and great also was the remissness of your Excellency
towards us, inasmuch as no word ever came by letter to induce us to
undertake the task, nor was any connection kept up between your Church and
ourselves, although Euphrasius, your Bishop of blessed memory, had in all
holiness bound together our Humility to himself and to you with love, as
with chains. But even though the debt of love has not been satisfied
before, either by our taking charge of you, or your Piety's encouragement
of us, now at any rate we pray to God, taking your prayer to God as an ally
to our own desire, that we may with all speed possible visit you, and be
comforted along with you, and along with you show diligence, as the Lord
may direct us; so as to discover a means of rectifying the disorders which
have already found place, and of securing safety for the future, so that
you may no longer be distracted by this discord, one withdrawing himself
from the Church in one direction, another in another, and be thereby
exposed as a laughing-stock to the Devil, whose desire and business it is
(in direct contrariety to the Divine will) that no one should be saved, or
come to the knowledge of the truth. For how do you think, brethren, that we
were afflicted upon hearing from those who reported to us your state, that
there was no return to better things(9); but that the resolution of those
who had once swerved aside is ever carried along in the same course; and--
as water from a conduit often overflows the neighbouring bank, and
streaming off sideways, flows away, and unless the leak is stopped, it is
almost impossible to recall it to its channel, when the submerged ground
has been hollowed out in accordance with the course of the stream,--even so
the course of those who have left the Church, when it has once through
personal motives deflected from the straight and right faith, has sunk deep
in the rut of habit, and does not easily return to the grace it once had.
For which cause your affairs demand a wise and strong administrator, who is
skilled to guide such wayward tempers aright, so as to be able to recall to
its pristine beauty the disorderly circuit of this stream, that the corn-
fields of your piety may once again flourish abundantly, watered by the
irrigating stream of peace. For this reason great diligence and fervent
desire on the part of you all is needed for this matter, that such an one
may be appointed your President by the Holy Spirit, who will have a single
eye to the things of God alone, not turning his glance this way or that to
any of those things that men strive after. For for this cause I think that
the ancient law gave the Levite no share in the general inheritance of the
land; that he might have God alone for the portion of his possession, and
might always be engaged about the possession in himself, with no eye to any
material object.

   [What follows is unintelligible, and something has probably been lost.]

   For it is not lawful that the simple should meddle with that with which
they have no concern, but which properly belongs to others. For you should
each mind your own business, that so that which is most expedient may come
about [and that your Church may again prosper], when those who have been
dispersed have returned again to the unit of the one body, and spiritual
peace is established by those who devoutly glorify God. To this end it is
well, I think, to look out for high qualifications in your election, that
he who is appointed to the Presidency may be suitable for the post. Now the
Apostolic injunctions do not direct us to look to high birth, wealth, and
distinction in the eyes of the world among the virtues of a Bishop; but if
all this should, unsought, accompany your spiritual chiefs, we do not
reject it, but consider it merely as a shadow accidentally(10) following
the body; and none the less shall we welcome the more precious endowments,
even though they happen to be apart from those boons of fortune. The
prophet Amos was a goat-herd; Peter was a fisherman, and his brother Andrew
followed the same employment; so too was the sublime John; Paul was a tent-
maker, Matthew a publican, and the rest of the  Apostles in the same way--
not consuls, generals, prefects, or distinguished in rhetoric and
philosophy, but poor, and of none of the learned professions, but starting
from the more humble occupations of life: and yet for all that their voice
went out into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world.
"Consider your calling, brethren, that not many wise after the flesh, not
many mighty, not many noble are called, but God hath chosen the foolish
things of the world(11)." Perhaps even now it is thought something foolish,
as things appear to men, when one is not able to do much from poverty, or
is slighted because of meanness of extraction(1), not of character. But who
knows whether the horn of anointing is not poured out by grace upon such an
one, even though he be less than the lofty and more illustrious? Which was
mere to the interest of the Church at Rome, that it should at its
commencement be presided over by some high-born and pompous senator, or by
the fisherman Peter, who had none of this world's advantages to attract men
to him(2)? What house had he, what slaves, what property ministering
luxury, by wealth constantly flowing in? But that stranger, without a
table, without a roof over his head, was richer than those who have all
things, because through having nothing he had God wholly. So too the people
of Mesopotamia, though they had among them wealthy satraps, preferred
Thomas above them all to the presidency of their Church; the Cretans
preferred Titus, the dwellers at Jerusalem James, and we Cappadocians the
centurion, who at the Cross acknowledged the Godhead of the Lord, though
there were many at that time of splendid lineage, whose fortunes enabled
them to maintain a stud, and who prided themselves upon having the first
place in the Senate. And in all the Church one may see those who are great
according to God's standard preferred above worldly magnificence. You too,
I think, ought to have an eye to these spiritual qualifications at this
time present, if you really mean to revive the ancient glory of your
Church. For nothing is better known to you than your own history, that
anciently, before the city near you(3) flourished, the seat of government
was with you, and among Bithynian cities there was nothing pre-eminent
above yours. And now, it is true, the public buildings that once graced it
have disappeared, but the city that consists in men--whether we look to
numbers or to quality --is rapidly rising to a level with its former
splendour. Accordingly it would well become you to entertain thoughts that
shall not fall below the height of the blessings that now are yours, but to
raise your enthusiasm in the work before you to the height of the
magnificence of your city, that you may find such a one to preside over the
laity as will prove himself not unworthy of you(4). For it is disgraceful,
brethren, and utterly monstrous, that while no one ever becomes a pilot
unless he is skilled in navigation, he who sits at the helm of the Church
should not know how to bring the souls of those who sail with him safe into
the haven of God. How many wrecks of Churches, men and all, have ere now
taken place by the inexperience of their heads! Who can reckon what
disasters might not have been avoided, had there been aught of the pilot's
skill in those who had command? Nay, we entrust iron, to make vessels with,
not to those who know nothing about the matter, but to those who are
acquainted with the art of the smith; ought we not therefore to trust souls
to him who is well-skilled to soften them by the fervent heat of the Holy
Spirit, and who by the impress of rational implements may fashion each one
of you to be a chosen and useful vessel? It is thus that the inspired
Apostle bids us to take thought, in his Epistle to Timothy(5), laying
injunction upon all who hear, when he says that a Bishop must be without
reproach. Is this all that the Apostle cares for, that he who is advanced
to the priesthood should be irreproachable? and what is so great an
advantage as that all possible qualifications should be included in one?
But he knows full well that the subject is moulded by the character of his
superior, and that the upright walk of the guide becomes that of his
followers too. For what the Master is, such does he make the disciple to
be. For it is impossible that he who has been apprenticed to the art of the
smith should practise that of the weaver, or that one who has only been
taught to work at the loom should turn out an orator or a mathematician:
but on the contrary that which the disciple sees in his master he adopts
and transfers to himself. For this reason it is that the Scripture says,
"Every disciple that is perfect shall be as his master(6)." What then,
brethren? Is it possible to be lowly and subdued in character, moderate,
superior to the love of lucre, wise in things divine, and trained to virtue
and considerateness in works and ways, without seeing those qualities in
one's master? Nay, I do not know how a man can become spiritual, if he has
been a disciple in a worldly school. For how can they who are striving to
resemble their master fail to be like him? What advantage is the
magnificence of the aqueduct to the thirsty, if there is no water in it,
even though the symmetrical disposition of columns(7) variously shaped rear
aloft the pediment(8)? Which would the thirsty man rather choose for the
supply of his own need, to see marbles beautifully disposed or to find good
spring water, even if it flowed through a wooden pipe, as long as the
stream which it poured forth was clear and drinkable? Even so, brethren,
those who look to godliness should neglect the trappings of outward show,
and whether a man exults in powerful friends, or plumes himself on the long
list of his dignities, or boasts that he receives large annual revenues, or
is puffed up with the thought of his noble ancestry, or has his mind on all
sides clouded(9) with the fumes of self-esteem, should have nothing to do
with such an one, any more than with a dry aqueduct, if he display not in
his life the primary and essential qualities for high office. But,
employing the lamp of the Spirit for the search(10), you should, as far as
is possible, seek for "a garden enclosed, a fountain sealed(11)," that, by
your election the garden of delight having been opened and the water of the
fountain having been unstopped, there may be a common acquisition to the
Catholic Church. May God grant that there may soon be found among you such
an one, who shall be a chosen vessel, a pillar of the Church. But we trust
in the Lord that so it will be, if you are minded by the grace of concord
with one mind to see that which is good, preferring to your own wills the
will of the Lord, and that which is approved of Him, and perfect, and well-
pleasing in His eyes; that there may be such a happy issue among you, that
therein we may rejoice, and you triumph, and the God of all be glorified,
Whom glory becometh for ever and ever.

ETTER XIV(12).

TO THE BISHOP OF MELITENE.

   How beautiful are the likenesses of beautiful objects, when they
preserve in all its clearness the impress of the original beauty! For of
your soul, so truly beautiful, I saw a most clear image in the sweetness of
your letter, which, as the Gospel says, "out of the abundance of the heart"
you filled with honey. And for this reason I fancied I saw you in person,
and  enjoyed your cheering company, from the affection expressed in your
letter; and often taking your letter into my hands and going over it  again
from beginning to end, I only came more vehemently to crave for the
enjoyment, and there was no sense of satiety. Such a feeling can no more
put an end to my pleasure, than it can to that derived from anything that
is by nature beautiful and precious. For neither has our constant
participation of the benefit blunted the edge of our longing to behold the
sun, nor does the unbroken enjoyment of health prevent our desiring its
continuance; and we are persuaded that it is equally impossible for our
enjoyment of your goodness, which we have often experienced face to face
and now by letter, ever to reach the point of satiety. But our case is like
that of those who from some circumstance are afflicted with unquenchable
thirst; for just in the same way, the more we taste your kindness, the more
thirsty we become. But unless you suppose our language to be mere
blandishment and unreal flattery--and assuredly you will not so suppose,
being what you are in all else, and to us especially good and staunch, if
any one ever was,--you will certainly believe what I say; that the favour
of your letter, applied to my eyes like some medical prescription, stayed
my ever-flowing "fountain of tears," and that fixing our hopes on the
medicine of your holy prayers, we expect that soon and completely the
disease of our soul will be healed: though, for the present at any rate, we
are in such a case, that we spare the ears of one who is fond of us, and
bury the truth in silence, that we may not drag those who loyally love us
into partnership with our troubles. For when we consider that, bereft of
what is dearest to us, we are involved in  wars, and that it is our
children that we were compelled to leave behind, our children whom we were
counted worthy to bear to God in spiritual pangs, closely joined to us by
the law of love, who at the time of their own trials amid their afflictions
extended their affection to us; and over and above these, a fondly-loved(1)
home, brethren, kinsmen, companions, intimate associates, friends, hearth,
table, cellar, bed, seat, sack, converse, tears--and how sweet these are,
and how dearly prized from long habit, I need not write to you who know
full well--but not to weary you further, consider for yourself what I have
in exchange for those blessings. Now that I am at the end of my life, I
begin to live again, and am compelled to learn the graceful versatility of
character which is now in vogue: but we are late learners in the shifty
school of knavery;(2) so that we are constantly constrained to blush at our
awkwardness and inaptitude for this new study. But our adversaries.
equipped with all the training of this wisdom, are well able to keep what
they have learned, and to invent what they have not learned. Their method
of warfare accordingly is to skirmish at a distance, and then at a
preconcerted signal to form their phalanx in solid order; they utter by way
of prelude(3) whatever suits their interests, they execute surprises by
means of exaggerations, they surround themselves with allies from every
quarter. But a vast amount of cunning invincible in power(4) accompanies
them, advanced before them to lead their host, like some right-and-left-
handed combatant, fighting with both hands in front of his army, on one
side levying tribute upon his subjects, on the other smiting those who come
in his way. But if you care to inquire into the state of our internal
affairs, you will find other troubles to match; a stifling hut, abundant in
cold, gloom, confinement, and all such advantages; a life the mark of every
one's censorious observation, the voice, the look, the way of wearing one's
cloak, the movement of the hands, the position of one's feet, and
everything else, all a subject for busy-bodies. And unless one from time to
time emits a deep breathing, and unless a continuous groaning is uttered
with the breathing, and unless the tunic passes gracefully through the
girdle (not to mention the very disuse of the girdle itself), and unless
our cloak flows aslant down our backs--the omission of any   one of these
niceties is a pretext for war against us. And on such grounds as these,
they gather together to battle against us, man by man(5), township by
township, even down to all sorts of out-of-the-way places. Well, one cannot
be always faring well or always ill, for every one's life is made up of
contraries. But if by God's  grace your help should stand by us steadily,
we will bear the abundance of annoyances, in the  hope of being always a
sharer in your goodness. May you, then, never cease bestowing on us such
favours, that by them you may refresh us, and prepare for yourself in
ampler measure the reward promised to them that keep the commandments.

LETTER XV.

TO ADELPHIUS THE LAWYER(6)

   I WRITE you this letter from the sacred Vanota, if I do not do the
place injustice by giving it its local title:--do it injustice, I say,
because in its name it shows no polish. At the  same time the beauty of the
place, great as it is, is not conveyed by this Galatian epithet eyes are
needed to interpret its beauty. For I, though I have before this seen much,
and that in many places, and have also observed many things by means of
verbal description in the accounts of old writers, think both all I have
seen, and all of which I have heard, of no account in comparison with the
loveliness that is to be found here. Your Helicon is nothing the Islands of
the Blest are a fable: the Sicyonian plain is a trifle: the accounts of the
Peneus are another case of poetic exaggeration--that river which they say
by overflowing with its rich current the banks which flank its course makes
for the Thessalians their far-famed Tempe. Why, what beauty is there in any
one of these places I have mentioned, such as Vanota can show us of its
own? For if one seeks for natural beauty in the place, it needs none of the
adornments of art: and if one considers what has been done for it by
artificial aid, there has been so much done, and that so well, as might
overcome even natural disadvantages. The gifts bestowed upon the spot by
Nature who beautifies the earth with unstudied grace are such as these:
below, the river Halys makes the place fair to look upon with his banks,
and gleams like a golden ribbon through their deep purple, reddening his
current with the soil he washes down. Above, a mountain densely overgrown
with wood stretches with its long ridge, covered at all points with the
foliage of oaks, worthy of finding some Homer to sing its praises more than
that Ithacan Neritus, which the poet calls "far-seen with quivering
leaves(7)." But the natural growth of wood, as it comes down the hill-side,
meets at the foot the planting of men's husbandry. For forthwith vines,
spread out over the slopes, and swellings, and hollows at the mountain's
base, cover with their colour, like a green mantle, all the lower ground:
and the season at this time even added to their beauty, displaying its
grape-clusters wonderful to behold. Indeed this caused me  yet more
surprise, that while the neighbouring country shows fruit still unripe, one
might here enjoy the full clusters, and be sated with their perfection.
Then, far off, like a watch-fire from some great beacon, there shone before
our eyes the fair beauty of the buildings. On the left as we entered was
the chapel built for the martyrs, not yet complete in its structure, but
still lacking the roof, yet making a good show notwithstanding. Straight
before us in the way were the beauties of the house, where one part is
marked out from another by some delicate invention. There were projecting
towers, and preparations for banqueting among the wide and high-arched rows
of trees crowning the entrance before the gates(8). Then about the
buildings are the Phaeacian gardens; rather, let not the beauties of Vanota
be insulted by comparison with those Homer never saw "the apple with bright
fruit(9)" as we have it here, approaching to the hue of its own blossom in
the exceeding brilliancy of its colouring: he never saw the pear whiter
than new-polished ivory. And what can one say of the varieties of the
peach, diverse and multiform, yet blended and compounded out of different
species? For just as with those who paint "goat-stags," and "centaurs," and
the like, commingling things of different kind, and making themselves wiser
than Nature, so it is in the case of this fruit: Nature, under the
despotism of art, turns one to an almond, another to a walnut, yet another
to a "Doracinus(1)," mingled alike in name and in flavour. And in all these
the number of single trees is more noted than their beauty; yet they
display tasteful arrangement in their planting, and that harmonious form of
drawing--drawing, I call it, for the marvel belongs rather to the painter's
art than to the gardener's. So readily does  Nature fall in with the design
of those who arrange these devices, that it seems impossible to express
this by words. Who could find words worthily to describe the road under the
climbing vines, and the sweet shade of their cluster, and that novel wall-
structure where roses with their shoots, and vines with their trailers,
twist themselves together and make a fortification that serves as a wall
against a flank attack, and the pond at the summit of this path, and the
fish that are bred there? As regards all these, the people who have charge
of your Nobility's house were ready to act as our guides with a certain
ingenuous kindliness, and pointed them out to us, showing us each of the
things you had taken pains about, as if it were yourself to whom, by our
means, they were showing courtesy. There too, one of the lads, like a
conjuror, showed us such a wonder as one does not very often find in
nature: for he went down to the deep water and brought up at will such of
the fish as he selected; and they seemed no strangers to the fisherman's
touch, being tame and submissive under the artist's hands, like well-
trained dogs. Then they led me to a house as if to rest--a house, I call
it, for such the entrance betokened, but, when we came inside, it was not a
house but a portico which received us. The portico was raised up aloft to a
great height over a deep pool: the basement supporting the portico of
triangular shape, like a gateway leading to the delights within, was washed
by the water. Straight before us in the interior a sort of house occupied
the vertex of the triangle, with lofty roof, lit on all sides by the sun's
rays, and decked with varied paintings; so that this spot almost made us
forget what had preceded it. The house attracted us to itself; and again,
the portico on the pool was a unique sight. For the excellent fish would
swim up from the depths to the surface, leaping up into the very air like
winged things, as though purposely mocking us creatures of the dry land.
For showing half their form and tumbling through the air, they plunged once
more into the depth. Others, again, in shoals, following one another in
order, were a sight for unaccustomed eyes: while in another place one might
see another shoal packed in a cluster round a morsel of bread, pushed aside
one by another, and here one leaping up, there another diving downwards.
But even this we were made to forget by the grapes that were brought us in
baskets of twisted shoots, by the varied bounty of the season's fruit, the
preparation for breakfast, the varied dainties, and savoury dishes, and
sweetmeats, and drinking of healths, and wine-cups. So now since I was
sated and inclined to sleep, I got a scribe posted beside me, and sent to
your Eloquence, as if it were a dream, this chattering letter. But I hope
to recount in full to yourself and your friends, not with paper and ink,
but with my own voice and tongue, the beauties of your home.

LETTER XVI.

TO AMPHILOCHIUS.

   I AM well persuaded that by God's grace the business of the Church of
the Martyrs is in a fair way. Would that you were willing in the matter.
The task we have in hand will find its end by the power of God, Who is
able, wherever He speaks, to turn word into deed. Seeing that, as the
Apostle says, "He Who has begun a good work will also perform it(2)", I
would exhort you in this also to be an imitator of the great Paul, and to
advance our hope to actual fulfilment, and send us so many workmen as may
suffice for the work we have in hand.

   Your Perfection might perhaps be informed by calculation of the
dimensions to which the total work will attain: and to this end I will
endeavour to explain the whole structure by a verbal description. The form
of the chapel is a cross, which has its figure completed throughout, as you
would expect, by four structures. The junctions of the buildings intercept
one another, as we see everywhere in the cruciform pattern. But within the
cross there lies a circle, divided by eight angles(I call the octagonal
figure a circle in view of its circumference), in such wise that the two
pairs of sides of the octagon which are diametrically opposed to one
another, unite by means of arches the central circle to the adjoining
blocks of building; while the other four sides of the octagon, which lie
between the quadrilateral buildings, will not themselves be carried to meet
the buildings, but upon each of them will be described a semicircle like a
shell(3), terminating in an arch above: so that the arches will be eight in
all, and by their means the quadrilateral and semicircular buildings will
be connected, side by side, with the central structure. In the blocks of
masonry formed by the angles there will be an equal number of pillars, at
once for ornament and for strength, and these again will carry arches built
of equal size to correspond with those within(4). And above these eight
arches, with the symmetry of an upper range of windows, the octagonal
building will be raised to the height of four cubits: the part rising from
it will be a cone shaped like a top, as the vaulting s narrows the figure
of the roof from its full width to a pointed wedge. The dimensions below
will be,--the width of each of the quadrilateral buildings, eight cubits,
the length of them half as much again, the height as much as the proportion
of the width allows. It will be as much in the semicircles also. The whole
length between the piers extends in the same way to eight cubits, and the
depth will be as much as will be given by the sweep of the compasses with
the fixed point placed in the middle of the side(6) and extending to the
end. The height will be determined in this case too by the proportion to
the width. And the thickness of the wall, an interval of three feet from
inside these spaces, which are measured internally, will run round the
whole building.

   I have troubled your Excellency with this serious trifling, with this
intention, that by the thickness of the walls, and by the intermediate
spaces, you may accurately ascertain what sum the number of feet gives as
the measurement; because your intellect is exceedingly quick in all
matters, and makes its way, by God's grace, in whatever subject you will,
and it is possible for you, by subtle calculation, to ascertain the sum
made up by all the parts, so as to send us masons neither more nor fewer
than our need requires. And I beg you to direct your attention specially to
this point, that some of them may be skilled in making vaulting(7) without
supports: for I am informed that when built in this way it is more durable
than what is made to rest on props. It is the scarcity of wood that brings
us to this device of roofing the whole fabric with stone; because the place
supplies no timber for roofing. Let your unerring mind be persuaded,
because some of the people here contract with me to furnish thirty workmen
for a staler, for the dressed stonework, of course with a specified ration
along with the stater. But the material of our masonry is not of this
sort(8), but brick made of clay and chance stones, so that they do not need
to spend time in fitting the faces of the stones accurately together. I
know that so far as skill and fairness in the matter of wages are
concerned, the workmen in your neighbourhood are better for our purpose
than those who follow the trade here. The sculptor's work lies not only in
the eight pillars, which must themselves be improved and beautified, but
the work requires altar-like base-mouldings(9), and capitals carved in the
Corinthian style. The porch, too, will be of marbles wrought with
appropriate ornaments. The doors set upon these will be adorned with some
such designs as are usually employed by way of embellishment at the
projection of the cornice. Of all these, of course, we shall furnish the
materials; the form to be impressed on the materials art will bestow.
Besides these there will be in the colonnade not less than forty pillars:
these also will be of wrought stone. Now if my account has explained the
work in detail, I hope it may be possible for your Sanctity, on perceiving
what is needed, to relieve us completely from anxiety so far as the workmen
are concerned. If, however, the workman were inclined to make a bargain
favourable to us, let a distinct measure of work, if possible, be fixed for
the day, so that he may not pass his time doing nothing, and then, though
he has no work to show for it, as having worked for us so many days, demand
payment for them. I know that we shall appear to most people to be
higglers, in being so particular about the contracts. But I beg you to
pardon me; for that Mammon about whom I have so often said such hard
things, has at last departed from me as far as he can possibly go, being
disgusted, I suppose, at the nonsense that is constantly talked against
him, and has fortified himself against me by an impassable gulf--to wit,
poverty--so that neither can he come to me, nor can I pass to him(10). This
is why I make a point of the fairness of the workmen, to the end that we
may be able to fulfil the task before us, and not be hindered by poverty--
that laudable and desirable evil. Well, in all this there is a certain
admixture of jest. But do you, man of God, in such ways as  are possible
and legitimate, boldly promise in   bargaining with the men that they will
all meet with fair treatment at our hands, and full payment of their wages:
for we shall give all and keep back nothing, as God also opens to us, by
your prayers, His hand of blessing.

LETTER XVII.

TO EUSTATHIA, AMBROSIA, AND BASILISSA(1)

To the most discreet and devout Sisters, Eustathia and Ambrosia, and to the
most discreet and noble Daughter, Basilissa, Gregory sends greeting in the
Lord.

   The meeting with the good and the beloved, and the memorials of the
immense love of the Lord for us men, which are shown in your localities,
have been the source to me of the most intense joy and gladness. Doubly
indeed have these shone upon divinely festal days; both in beholding the
saving tokens(2) of the God who gave us life, and in meeting with souls in
whom the tokens of the Lord's grace are to be discerned spiritually in such
clearness, that one can believe that Bethlehem and Golgotha, and Olivet,
and the scene of the Resurrection are really in the God-containing heart.
For when through a good conscience Christ has been formed in any, when any
has by dint of godly fear nailed down the promptings of the flesh and
become crucified to Christ, when any has rolled away from himself the heavy
stone of this world's illusions, and coming forth from the grave of the
body has begun to walk as it were in a newness of life, abandoning this
low-lying valley of human life, and mounting with a soaring desire to that
heavenly country(3) with all its elevated thoughts, where Christ is, no
longer feeling the body's burden, but lifting it by chastity, so that the
flesh with cloud-like lightness accompanies the ascending soul--such an
one, in my opinion, is to be counted in the number of those famous ones in
whom the memorials of the Lord's love for us men are to be seen. When,
then, I not only saw with the sense of sight those Sacred Places, but I saw
the tokens of places like them, plain in yourselves as well, I was filled
with joy so great that the description of its blessing is beyond the power
of utterance. But because it is a difficult, not to say an impossible thing
for a human being to enjoy unmixed with evil any blessing, therefore
something of bitterness was mingled with the sweets I tasted: and by this,
after the enjoyment of those blessings, I was saddened in my journey back
to my native land, estimating now the truth of the Lord's words, that "the
whole world lieth in wickedness(4)," so that no single part of the
inhabited earth is without its share of degeneracy. For if the spot itself
that has received the footprints of the very Life is not clear of the
wicked thorns, what are we to think of other places where communion with
the Blessing has been inculcated by hearing and preaching alone(5). With
what view I say this, need not be explained more fully in words; facts
themselves proclaim more loudly than any speech, however intelligible, the
melancholy truth.

   The Lawgiver of our life has enjoined upon us one single hatred. I
mean, that of the Serpent: for no other purpose has He bidden us exercise
this faculty of hatred, but as a resource against wickedness. "I will put
enmity," He says, "between thee and him." Since wickedness is a complicated
and multifarious thing, the Word allegorizes it by the Serpent, the dense
array of whose scales is symbolic of this multiformity of evil. And we by
working the will of our Adversary make an alliance with this serpent, and
so turn this hatred against one another(6), and perhaps not against
ourselves alone, but against Him Who gave the commandment; for He says,
"Thou shalt love thy neighbour and hate thine enemy," commanding us to hold
the foe to our humanity as our only enemy, and declaring that all who share
that humanity are the neighbours of each one of us. But this gross-hearted
age has disunited us from our neighbour, and has made us welcome the
serpent, and revel in his spotted scales(7). I affirm, then, that it is a
lawful thing to hate God's enemies, and that this kind of hatred is
pleasing to our Lord: and by God's enemies I mean those who deny the glory
of our Lord, be they Jews, or downright idolaters, or those who through
Arius' teaching idolize the creature, and so adopt the error of the Jews.
Now when the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, are with orthodox
devotion being glorified and adored by those who believe that in a distinct
and unconfused Trinity there is One Substance, Glory, Kingship, Power, and
Universal Rule, in such a case as this what good excuse for fighting can
there be? At the time, certainly, when the heretical views prevailed, to
try issues with the authorities, by whom the adversaries' cause was seen to
be strengthened, was well; there was fear then lest our saving Doctrine
should be over-ruled by human rulers. But now, when over the whole world
from one end of heaven to the other the orthodox Faith is being preached,
the man who fights with them who preach it, fights not with them, but with
Him Who is thus preached. What other aim, indeed, ought that man's to be,
who has the zeal for God, than in every possible way to announce the glory
of God? As long, then, as the Only-begotten is adored with all the heart
and soul and mind, believed to be in everything that which the Father is,
and in like manner the Holy Ghost is glorified with an equal amount of
adoration, what plausible excuse for fighting is left these over-refined
disputants, who are rending the seamless robe, and parting the Lord's name
between Paul and Cephas, and undisguisedly abhorring contact with those who
worship Christ, all but exclaiming in so many words, "Away from me, I am
holy"?

   Granting that the knowledge which they believe themselves to have
acquired is somewhat greater than that of others: yet can they possess more
than the belief that the Son of the Very God is Very God, seeing that in
that article of the Very God every idea that is orthodox, every idea that
is our salvation, is included? It includes the idea of His Goodness, His
Justice, His Omnipotence: that He admits of no variableness nor alteration,
but is always the same; incapable of changing to worse or changing to
better, because the first is not His nature, the second He does not admit
of; for what can be higher than the Highest, what can be better than the
Best? In fact, He is thus associated with all perfection, and, as to every
form of alteration, is unalterable; He did not on occasions display this
attribute, but was always so, both before the Dispensation that made Him
man, and during it, and after it; and in all His activities in our behalf
He never lowered any part of that changeless and unvarying character to
that which was out of keeping with it. What is essentially imperishable and
changeless is always such; it does not follow the variation of a lower
order of things, when it comes by dispensation to be there; just as the
sun, for example, when he plunges his beam into the gloom, does not dim the
brightness of that beam; but instead, the dark is changed by the beam into
light; thus also the True Light, shining in our gloom, was not itself
overshadowed with that shade, but enlightened it by means of itself. Well,
seeing that our humanity was in darkness, as it is written, 'They know not,
neither will they understand, they walk on in darkness(8)," the Illuminator
of this darkened world darted the beam of His Divinity through the whole
compound of our nature, through soul, I say, and body too, and so
appropriated humanity entire by means of His own light, and took it up and
made it just that thing which He is Himself. And as this Divinity was not
made perishable, though it inhabited a perishable body, so neither did it
alter in the direction of any change, though it healed the changeful in our
soul: in medicine, too, the physician of the body, when he takes hold of
his patient, so far from himself contracting the disease, thereby perfects
the cure of the suffering part. Let no one, either, putting a wrong
interpretation on the words of the Gospel, suppose that our human nature in
Christ was transformed to something more divine by any gradations and
advance: for the increasing in stature and in wisdom and in favour, is
recorded in Holy Writ only to prove that Christ really was present in the
human compound, and so to leave no room for their surmise, who propound
that a phantom, or form in human outline, and not a real Divine
Manifestation, was there. It is for this reason that Holy Writ records
unabashed with regard to Him all the accidents of our nature, even eating,
drinking, sleeping, weariness, nurture, increase in bodily stature, growing
up--everything that marks humanity, except the tendency to sin. Sin,
indeed, is a miscarriage, not a quality of human nature: just as disease
and deformity are not congenital to it in the first instance, but are its
unnatural accretions, so activity in the direction Of sin is to be thought
of as a mere mutilation of the goodness innate in us; it is not found to be
itself a real thing, but we see it only in the absence of that goodness.
Therefore He Who transformed the elements of our nature into His divine
abilities, rendered it secure from mutilation and disease, because He
admitted not in Himself the deformity which sin works in the will. "He did
no sin," it says, "neither was guile found in his mouth(9) ." And this in
Him is not to be regarded in connection with any interval of time: for at
once the man in Mary(where Wisdom built her house), though naturally part
of our sensuous compound, along with the coming upon her of the Holy Ghost,
and her overshadowing with the power of the Highest, became that which that
overshadowing power in essence was: for, without controversy, it is the
Less that is blest by the Greater. Seeing, then, that the power of the
Godhead is an immense and immeasurable thing, while man is a weak atom, at
the moment when the Holy Ghost came upon the Virgin, and the power of the
Highest overshadowed her, the tabernacle formed by such an impulse was not
clothed with anything of human corruption; but, just as it was first
constituted, so it remained, even though it was man, Spirit nevertheless,
and Grace, and Power; and the special attributes of our humanity derived
lustre from this abundance of Divine Power(1) .

   There are indeed two limits of human life: the one we start from, and
the one we end in: and so it was necessary that the. Physician of our being
should enfold us at both these extremities, and grasp not only the end, but
the beginning too, in order to secure in both the raising of the sufferer.
That, then, which we find to have happened on the side of the finish we
conclude also as to the beginning. As at the end He caused by virtue of the
Incarnation that, though the body was disunited from the soul, yet the
indivisible Godhead which had been blended once for all with the subject
(who possessed them) was not stripped from that body any more than it was
from that soul, but while it was in Paradise along with the soul and paved
an entrance there in the person of the Thief for all humanity, it remained
by means of the body in the heart of the earth, and therein destroyed him
that had the power of Death (wherefore His body too is called "the Lord(2)
" on account of that inherent Godhead)--so also, at the beginning, we
conclude that the power of the Highest, coalescing with our entire nature
by that coming upon (the Virgin) of the Holy Ghost, both resides in our
soul, so far as reason sees it possible that it should reside there, and is
blended with our body, so that our salvation throughout every element may
be perfect, that heavenly passionlessness which is peculiar to the Deity
being nevertheless preserved both in the beginning and in the end of this
life as Man(3). Thus the beginning was not as our beginning, nor the end as
our end. Both in the one and in the other He evinced His Divine
independence; the beginning had no stain of pleasure upon it, the end was
not the end in dissolution.

   Now if we loudly preach all this, and testify to all this, namely that
Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God, always changeless, always
imperishable, though He comes in the changeable and the perishable; never
stained Himself, but making clean that which is stained; what is the crime
that we commit, and wherefore are we hated? And what means this opposing
array(4) of new Altars? Do we announce another Jesus? Do we hint at
another? Do we produce other scriptures? Have any of ourselves dared to say
"Mother of Man" of the Holy Virgin, the Mother of God(5): which is what we
hear that some of them say without restraint? Do we romance about three
Resurrections(5)? Do we promise the gluttony of the Millennium? Do we
declare that the Jewish animal-sacrifices shall be restored? Do we lower
men's hopes again to the Jerusalem below, Imagining its rebuilding with
stones of a more brilliant material? What charge like these can be brought
against us, that our company should be reckoned a thing to be avoided, and
that in some places another altar should be erected in opposition to us, as
if we should defile their sanctuaries? My heart was in a state of burning
indignation about this: and now that I have set foot in the City(7) again,
I am eager to unburden my soul of its bitterness, by appealing, in a
letter, to your love. Do ye, whithersoever the Holy Spirit shall lead you,
there remain; walk with God before you; confer not with flesh and blood;
lend no occasion to any of them for glorying, that they may not glory in
you, enlarging their ambition by anything in your lives. Remember the Holy
Fathers, into whose hands ye were commended by your Father now in bliss(8)
, and to whom we by God's grace were deemed worthy to succeed and remove
not the boundaries which our Fathers have laid down, nor put aside in any
way the plainness of our simpler proclamation in favour of their subtler
school. Walk by the primitive rule of the Faith: and the God of peace shall
be with you, and ye shall be strong in mind and body. May God keep you
uncorrupted, is our prayer.

LETTER XVIII.

TO FLAVIAN(9).

   THINGS with us, O man of God, are not in a good way. The development of
the bad feeling existing amongst certain persons who have conceived a most
groundless and unaccountable hatred of us is no longer a matter of mere
conjecture; it is now evinced with an earnestness and openness worthy only
of some holy work. You meanwhile, who have hitherto been beyond the reach
of such annoyance, are too remiss in stifling the devouring conflagration
on your neighbour's land; yet those who are well-advised for their own
interests really do take pains to check a fire close to them, securing
themselves, by this help given to a neighbour, against ever needing help in
like circumstances. Well, you will ask, what do I complain of? Piety has
vanished from the world; Truth has fled from our midst; as for Peace, we
used to have the name at all events going the round upon men's lips; but
now not only does she herself cease to exist, but we do not even retain the
word that expresses her. But that you may know more exactly the things that
move our indignation, I will briefly detail to you the whole tragic story.

   Certain persons had informed me that the Right Reverend Helladius had
unfriendly feelings towards me, and that he enlarged in conversation to
every one upon the troubles that I had brought upon him. I did not at first
believe what they said, judging only from myself, and the actual truth of
the matter. But when every one kept bringing to us a tale of the same
strain, and facts besides corroborated their report, I thought it my duty
not to continue to overlook this ill-feeling, while it was still without
root and development. I therefore wrote by letter to your piety, and to
many others who could help me in my intention, and stimulated your zeal in
this matter. At last, after I had concluded the services at Sebasteia
in(10) commemoration of Peter(1) of most blessed memory, and of the holy
martyrs, who had lived in his times, and whom the people were accustomed to
commemorate with him, I was returning to my own See, when some one told me
that Helladius himself was in the neighbouring mountain district, holding
martyrs' memorial services. At first I held on my journey, judging it more
proper that our meeting should take place in the metropolis itself. But
when one of his relations took the trouble to meet me, and to assure me
that he was sick, I left my carriage at the spot where this news arrested
me; I performed on horseback the intervening journey over a road that was
like a precipice, and well-nigh impassable with its rocky ascents. Fifteen
milestones measured the distance we had to traverse. Painfully travelling,
now on foot, now mounted, in the early morning, and even employing some
part of the night, I arrived between twelve and one o'clock at Andumocina;
for that was the name of the place where, with two other bishops, he was
holding his conference. From a shoulder of the hill overhanging this
village, we looked down, while still at a distance, upon this outdoor
assemblage of the Church. Slowly, and on foot, and leading the horses, I
and my company passed over the intervening ground, and we arrived at the
chapel(2) just as he had retired to his residence.

   Without any delay a messenger was despatched to inform him of our being
there; and a very short while after, the deacon in attendance on him met
us, and we requested him to tell Helladius at once, so that we might spend
as much time as possible with him, and so have an opportunity of leaving
nothing in the misunderstanding between us unhealed. As for myself, I then
remained sitting, still in the open air, and waited for the invitation
indoors; and at a most inopportune time I became, as I sat there, a gazing
stock to all the visitors at the conference. The time was long; drowsiness
came on, and languor, intensified by the fatigue of the journey and the
excessive heat of the day; and all these things, with people staring at me,
and pointing me out to others, were so very distressing that in me the
words of the prophet were realized: "My spirit within me was desolate(3) ."
I was kept in this state till noon, and heartily did I repent of this
visit, and that I had brought upon myself this piece of discourtesy; and my
own reflection vexed me worse than this injury done me by my enemies(4) ,
warring as it did against itself, and changing into a regret that I had
made the venture. At last the approach to the Altars was thrown open, and
we were admitted to the sanctuary; the crowd, however, were excluded,
though my deacon entered along with me, supporting with his arm my
exhausted frame. I addressed his Lordship, and stood for a moment,
expecting from him an invitation to be seated; but when nothing of the kind
was heard from him, I turned towards one of the distant seats, and rested
myself upon it, still expecting that he would utter something that was
friendly, or at all events kind; or at least give one nod of recognition.

   Any hopes I had were doomed to complete disappointment. There ensued a
silence dead as night, and looks as downcast as in tragedy, and daze, and
dumbfoundedness, and perfect dumbness. A long interval of time it was,
dragged out as if it were in the blackness of night. So struck down was I
by this reception, in which he did not deign to accord me the merest
utterance even of those common salutations by which you discharge the
courtesies of a chance meeting(5),--"welcome," for instance, or "where do
you come from?" or "to what am I indebted for this pleasure?" or "on what
important business are you here?"--that I was inclined to make this spell
of silence into a picture of the life led in the underworld. Nay, I condemn
the similitude as inadequate. For in that underworld the equality of
conditions is complete, and none of the things that cause the tragedies of
life on earth disturb existence. Their glory, as the Prophet says, does not
follow men down there; each individual soul, abandoning the things so
eagerly clung to by the majority here, his petulance, and pride, and
conceit, enters that lower world in simple unencumbered nakedness; so that
none of the miseries of this life are to be found among them. Still(6),
notwithstanding this reservation, my condition then did appear to me like
an underworld, a murky dungeon, a gloomy torture-chamber; the more so, when
I reflected what treasures of social courtesies we have inherited from our
fathers, and what recorded deeds of it we shall leave to our descendants.
Why, indeed, should I speak at all of that affectionate disposition of our
fathers towards each other? No wonder that, being all naturally equal(7),
they wished for no advantage over one another, but thought to exceed each
other only in humility. But my mind was penetrated most of all with this
thought; that the Lord of all creation, the Only-begotten Son, Who was in
the bosom of the Father, Who was in the beginning, Who was in the form of
God, Who upholds all things by the word of His power, humbled Himself not
only in this respect, that in the flesh He sojourned amongst men, but also
that He welcomed even Judas His own betrayer, when he drew near to kiss
Him, on His blessed lips; and that when He had entered into the house of
Simon the leper He, as loving all men, upbraided his host, that He had not
been kissed by him: whereas I was not reckoned by him as equal even to that
leper; and yet what was I, and what was he? I cannot discover any
difference between us. If one looks at it from the mundane point of view,
where was the height from which he had descended, where was the dust in
which I lay? If, indeed, one must regard things of this fleshly life, thus
much perhaps it will hurt no one's feelings to assert that, looking at our
lineage, whether as noble or as free, our position was about on a par;
though, if one looked in either for the true freedom and nobility, i.e.
that of the soul, each of us will be found equally a bondsman of Sin; each
equally needs One Who will take away his sins; it was Another Who ransomed
us both from Death and Sin with His own blood, Who redeemed us, and yet
showed no contempt of those whom He has redeemed, calling them though He
does from deadness to life, and healing every infirmity of their souls and
bodies.

   Seeing, then, that the amount of this conceit and overweening pride was
so great, that even the height of heaven was almost too narrow limits for
it(and yet I could see no cause or occasion whatever for this diseased
state of mind, such as might make it excusable in the case of some who in
certain circumstances contract it; when, for instance, rank or education,
or pre-eminence in dignities of office may have happened to inflate the
vainer minds), I had no means whereby to advise myself to keep quiet: for
my heart within me was swelling with indignation at the absurdity of the
whole proceeding, and was rejecting all the reasons for enduring it. Then,
if ever, did I feel admiration for that divine Apostle who so vividly
depicts the civil war that rages within us, declaring that there is a
certain "law of sin in the members, warring against the law of the mind,"
and often making the mind a captive, and a slave as well, to itself. This
was the very array, in opposition, of two contending feelings that I saw
within myself: the one, of anger at the insult caused by pride, the other
prompting to appease the rising storm. When by God's grace, the worse
inclination had failed to get the mastery, I at last said to him, "But is
it, then, that some one of the things required for your personal comfort is
being hindered by our presence, and is it time that we withdrew?" On his
declaring that he had no bodily needs, I spoke to him some words calculated
to heal, so far as in me lay, his ill-feeling. When he had, in a very few
words, declared that the anger he felt towards me was owing to many
injuries done him, I for my part answered him thus: "Lies possess an
immense power amongst mankind to deceive but in the Divine Judgment there
will be no place for the misunderstandings thus arising. In my relations
towards yourself, my conscience is bold enough to prompt me to hope that I
may obtain forgiveness for all my other sins, but that, if I have acted in
any way to harm you, this may remain for ever unforgiven." He was indignant
at this speech, and did not suffer the proofs of what I had said to be
added.

   It was now past six o'clock, and the bath had been well prepared, and
the banquet was being spread, and the day was the sabbath(8), and a
martyr's commemoration. Again observe how this disciple of the Gospel
imitates the Lord of the Gospel: He, when eating and drinking with
publicans and sinners, answered to those who found fault with Him that He
did it for love of mankind: this disciple considers it a sin and a
pollution to have us at his board, even after all that fatigue which we
underwent on the journey, after all that excessive heat out of doors, in
which we were baked while sitting at his gates; after all that gloomy
sullenness with which he treated us to the bitter end, when we had come
into his presence. He sends us off to toil painfully, with a frame now
thoroughly exhausted with the over-fatigue, over the same  distance, the
same route: so that we scarcely reached our travelling company at sunset,
after we had suffered many mishaps on the way. For a storm-cloud, gathered
into a mass in the clear air by an eddy of wind, drenched us to the skin
with its floods of rain; for owing to the excessive sultriness, we had made
no preparation against any shower. However, by God's grace we escaped,
though in the plight of shipwrecked sailors from the waves: and right glad
were we to reach our company.

   Having joined our forces we rested there that night, and at last
arrived alive in our own district; having reaped in addition this result of
our meeting him, that the memory of all that had happened before was
revived by this last insult offered to us; and, you see, we are positively
compelled to take measures, for the future, on our own behalf, or rather on
his behalf; for it was because his designs were not checked on former
occasions that he has proceeded to this unmeasured display of vanity.
Something, therefore, I think, must be done on our part, in order that he
may improve upon himself, and may be taught that he is human, and has no
authority to insult and to disgrace those who possess the same beliefs and
the same rank as himself. For just consider; suppose we granted for a
moment, for the sake of argument, that it is true that I have done
something that has annoyed him, what trial(9) was instituted against us, to
judge either of the fact or the hearsay? What proofs were given of this
supposed injury? What Canons were cited against us? What legitimate
episcopal decision confirmed any verdict passed upon us? And supposing any
of these processes had taken place, and that in the proper way, my
standing(1) in the Church might certainly have been at stake, but what
Canons could have sanctioned insults offered to a free-born person, and
disgrace inflicted on one of equal rank with himself? "Judge righteous
judgment," you who look to God's law in this matter; say wherein you deem
this disgrace put-upon us to be excusable. If our dignity is to be
estimated on the ground of priestly jurisdiction, the privilege of each
recorded by the Council(2) is one and the same; or rather the oversight of
Catholic correction(3), from the fact that we possess an equal share of it,
is so. But if some are inclined to regard each of us by himself, divested
of any priestly dignity, in what respect has one any advantage over the
other; in education for instance, or in birth connecting with the noblest
and most illustrious lineage, or in theology? These things will be found
either equal, or at all events not inferior, in me. "But what about
revenue?" he will say. I would rather not be obliged to speak of this in
his case; thus much only it will suffice to say, that our own was so much
at the beginning, and is so much now; and to leave it to others to enquire
into the causes of this increase of our revenue(4), nursed as it is up till
now, and growing almost daily by means of noble undertakings. What licence,
then, has he to put an insult upon us, seeing that he has neither
superiority of birth to show, nor a rank exalted above all others, nor a
commanding power of speech, nor any previous kindness done to me? While,
even if he had all this to show, the fault of having slighted those of
gentle birth would still be inexcusable. But he has not got it; and
therefore I deem it right to see that this malady of puffed-up pride is not
left without a cure; and it will be its cure to put it down to its proper
level, and reduce its inflated dimensions, by letting off a little of the
conceit with which he is bursting.The manner of effecting this we leave to
God.


Taken from "The Early Church Fathers and Other Works" originally published
by Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. in English in Edinburgh, Scotland, beginning in
1867. (LNPF II/V, Schaff and Wace). The digital version is by The
Electronic
Bible Society, P.O. Box 701356, Dallas, TX 75370, 214-407-WORD.

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