ITALY AND HER INVADERS.
BOOK VI
.
CHAPTER IX.
THE PAPAL PEACE.
The year 595 has been generally looked upon as a turning-point in the
history of Gregory’s papacy. It was not only in that year that he began
seriously to prepare his scheme for the conversion of England, but it was also
then that he formally entered the lists to dispute the pretensions of the
Patriarch of Constantinople. For we must always bear in mind the double
character of the warfare which a Bishop of Rome, at that period of the world's
history, deemed himself bound to wage. Locally, as the first citizen of Rome,
as one who looked forth from her walls on the Sabine hills and the Ciminian forest, he felt himself to be, as he continually
repeats, “between the swords of the Lombards”; but, ecclesiastically, he had to
defend the contest so-called rights of Peter, Prince of the Apostles, against
the ever-menacing encroachments of the see of Constantinople. It has been
already shown, and the proof need not be repeated here, how the claim of Old
Rome to the ecclesiastical primacy of the world was interwoven with her old
Imperial dominion, and how this claim was threatened when Constantinople became
the political centre of the Empire, and her bishops the intimate friends and
spiritual advisers of the Emperor. Now, the very fact that Italy was becoming
more and more hopelessly lost to the Empire, and that the Bishop of Rome, if he
retained any connection whatever with ‘the Roman Republic,' must live a most
precarious life ‘between the swords of the Lombards,' to some extent imperilled
even his ecclesiastical position. Pope and Exarch already found their interests
diverging; those interests would probably diverge yet more in future. Yet
greater in all probability would be the ever-widening gulf between Pope and
Emperor; while, on the other hand, the Bishop of Constantinople, living under
the shadow of the Imperial greatness, and with the hard fate of the outspoken
Chrysostom ever present to his mind, tended more and more to become the mere
private chaplain of the Byzantine Augustus. No wonder, therefore, that whenever
a dispute arose between the First and the Second in authority in the Universal
Church, the Emperor was always ready to look askance at the pretensions of Rome
and to favour those of Constantinople.
The holy man, John the Faster, whose elevation to the patriarchal throne
Gregory had witnessed in 582 during his residence at Constantinople, had
revived for his own benefit a dormant claim to a title which had been conceded,
as a matter of courtesy, to some of his predecessors, that of Ecumenical, or
Universal, Bishop. In the year 588 (two years before Gregory's accession) a
synod was held at Constantinople in reference to the affairs of the see of
Antioch, and when the Acts of this synod were received at Rome they were found
to contain frequent mention of the name of John of Constantinople, with the
unwelcome addition ‘Universal Bishop'. Against this title Pelagius II, probably
by the advice of Gregory, who knew the temper of the Eastern Patriarch, energetically
protested, forbade his responsalis to
communicate with the usurping prelate, and even went so far as to declare the
Acts of the Council null and void by reason of this irregularity.
Apparently the controversy slumbered during the first five years of
Gregory's pontificate; but in 595, John the Faster, with an ingenuity in
annoyance such as might be looked for in a man so holy and so abstinent,
addressed to his brother of Rome a letter in which ‘almost in every line he
called himself Ecumenical Patriarch'. By this letter all the wrath of
Gregory—not naturally a sweet-tempered man, and already sufficiently tortured
by dyspepsia, gout and Lombards—was aroused against the aspiring Patriarch. The
messenger who was speedily dispatched to the Imperial court took with him a
heavy packet of letters, all relating to this ‘wicked word' ecumenical.
To the offending Patriarch himself Gregory wrote, as he says, sweetly
and humbly admonishing him to cure his desire of vainglory. Yet even this sweet
and humble letter cannot have been altogether pleasant to receive.
“I am astonished” says the Pope, “that you, who fled in order that you
might escape the honour of the Patriarchate, should now bear yourself in it so
proudly that you will be thought to have coveted it with ambitious desire. In
the days of my predecessor, Pelagius, a letter was sent to you in which the
acts of the synod about Bishop Gregory were disallowed because of the proud
title attributed to you therein, and the Archdeacon sent to the Emperor was
forbidden to celebrate mass with you on account of it. That prohibition I now
repeat: my responsalis Sabinianus is not to
communicate with you till you have amended this error.
“The Apostle Paul rebuked the spirit which would shout, “I am of Paul
and I of Apollos.” You are reviving that spirit and rending the unity of the
body of Christ. The Council of Chalcedon offered this title of universalis to
the Roman Pontiff, but he refused to accept it, lest he should seem thereby to
derogate from the honour of his brother bishops.
“It is the last hour: Pestilence and the sword are raging in the world.
Nation is rising against nation, the whole fabric of things is being shaken.
Cities with their inhabitants are swallowed up by the yawning earth. All the
prophecies are being fulfilled. The King of Pride is nigh at hand,
and—inexpressible shame—priests are serving in his army. Yes, they are raising
the haughty neck of pride who were chosen that they might set an example of
humility.
“Our Lord humbled Himself for our sakes, and He who was inconceivably
great wore the lowly form of manhood, yet we bishops are imitating, not His
humility, but the pride of His great foe. Remember that He said to His
disciples, Be not called Rabbi, for one is your Master, even Christ, and all ye
are brethren.” He said, “Woe to the world because of offences! Woe to him by
whom the offence cometh!” Lo! from this wicked word of pride offence has come,
and the hearts of all the brethren are provoked to stumbling by it.”
Gregory then quotes the words of Christ (Matt, XVIII. 15-17) about
telling a brother his fault “between him and thee alone,” and continues, “I
have, by my responsalis, once and twice told you your
fault, and am now writing to you myself. If I am despised in this endeavour to
correct you, it will only remain to call in the Church.
“I have received the very sweet and kind letters of your Holiness about
the causes of John and Athanasius, about which, with the Lord's help, I will
reply to you in my next, because under the weight of so great tribulations,
surrounded as I am by the swords of the barbarians, I am so oppressed that I
cannot say much, nay can hardly breathe.”
So ran the letter to the arch-offender. To his responsalis,
Sabinianus, the Pope wrote, saying that he had addressed his most reverend
brother John with a proper admixture of frankness and courtesy, but, if he
persisted, another letter would be addressed to him which his pride would not
relish. “But I hope in Almighty God,” said Gregory, “that his hypocrisy will
soon be brought to nought by the Supernal Majesty. I marvel, however, that he
should have been able so to deceive you, dear friend, that you should allow our
Lord the Emperor to be persuaded to write, admonishing me to live in peace with
the Patriarch. If he would act justly, he should rather admonish him to give up
that proud title, and then there would be peace between us at once. You little
thought, I can see, how craftily this was managed by our aforesaid brother
John. Evidently he did it in order to put me in this dilemma. Either I must
listen to our Lord the Emperor, and so confirm the Patriarch in his vanity, or
not listen, and so rouse the Imperial mind against me.
“But we shall steer a straight course in this matter, fearing none save
God Almighty. Wherefore, dear friend, tremble before no man; for the truth's
sake despise all whom you may see exalting themselves against the truth in this
world; confide in the favour of Almighty God and the help of the blessed Peter;
remember the voice of Truth which says: Greater is He that is in you than he
that is in the world and do with fullest authority, as from us, whatever has to
be done in this affair.
“For after we have found that we could in no way be defended [by the
Greeks] from the swords of our enemies, after we have lost, for our devotion to
the Republic, silver, gold, slaves and raiment, it is too disgraceful that we
should, through them, lose our faith also. But to consent to that wicked word
is nothing else than to lose our faith. Wherefore, as I have written to you in
previous letters, you must never presume to communicate with him.”
It will be seen from this letter that the aspiring Patriarch had invoked
the assistance of the Emperor against the Pope, even before the latter had
received the extreme provocation of the letter which bristled with the
obnoxious word ecumenical. Evidently John of Constantinople had
represented his brother of Rome—not altogether without truth—as exacting and
quarrelsome; and Maurice, sincerely desirous for peace in the Church, had
addressed Pope Gregory in language similar to that which Constantine employed
to the contending prelates at Nicaea. To Maurice, therefore, the Pope addressed
a long and eloquent letter praising his zeal for the peace of the Church, but
insisting that the whole trouble arose from the pride of the Patriarch of
Constantinople. Yes, the pride of the clergy was the real cause of the
disasters of the Empire, of the triumphs of the barbarians. To disarm
criticism, Gregory appears to associate himself with the sins of which he
accuses his rival, but this is evidently a mere rhetorical artifice, and when
he says ‘we’, he means the obnoxious Faster alone.
‘When we leave the position which befits us, and devise for ourselves
unbecoming honours, we ally our own sins to the forces of the barbarians; we
depress the strength of the Republic and sharpen against us the swords of her
enemies. How can we excuse ourselves, who are preaching one thing to our
flocks, and ourselves practising the opposite? Our bones are worn away with
fasting and our hearts are swollen with pride: our body is clothed with vile
raiment, and in the elation of our souls we surpass the purple of emperors. We
lie in ashes, and we nourish proud fancies. Teachers of the lowly and generals
of pride, we hide a wolf's teeth behind a sheep’s visage. But God sees our
spirits, and is putting it into the heart of the Most Pious Emperor to restore
peace to the Church.
“This is not my cause, but the cause of God Himself. It was to Peter,
the Prince of the Apostles, that the Lord said, “Thou art Peter, and on this
rock will I build my Church.” He who received the keys of the kingdom of
heaven, he to whom the power of binding and loosing was entrusted, was never
called the Universal Apostle; and yet that most holy man, my fellow bishop
John, strives to get himself called the Universal Bishop. When I see this I am
compelled to cry out, “O tempora! O mores!”
“Lo! all Europe is handed over to the power of the barbarians; cities
are destroyed, villages overthrown, provinces depopulated; no tiller cultivates
the soil; idolaters rage and rule, daily murdering the faithful; and yet the
priests, who alone should have thrown themselves on the pavement and wept in
sackcloth and ashes, are seeking for themselves names of vanity and flaunting
new and profane titles.”
The Pope then enlarges on the undoubted fact that Bishops of
Constantinople had been more than once convicted of heresy1, and after touching
on some of the arguments brought forward in the accompanying letters, he tries
to excite the Emperor's resentment by hinting that the hated word implied a
covert attack on his own crown and dignity.
“We are all suffering from the scandal of this thing. My Most Pious Lord
must coerce this proud man, who is disobeying the canons of the Church, and is
even setting himself up against the honour of your Imperial dignity by this
proud private word.
“Let the author of this scandal return to a right life and all the
quarrels of bishops will cease. I am myself the servant of priests, so long as
they live priest-like lives. But as for this man, who in his swelling vainglory
raises his neck against Almighty God and against the statutes of the fathers, I
trust in God that he shall never bend my neck, no, not with swords.”
So wrote the first citizen of Old Home to the Monarch of the New; and
his words, though uttered in the bland tone of the Churchman, had in them a
ring which reminds us of Regulus and Coriolanus.
Lastly, Gregory wrote to the Empress Constantina, thanking her for
having thrown her influence on the side of St. Peter against some who were
proudly humble and feignedly meek. For this she would be rewarded both in this
life and in the life to come, when she would find the benefit of having made
him who had the power of binding and loosing, her debtor. ‘Do not let any
hypocrisy,' he says, ‘prevail against the truth. There are some who, by sweet
speeches and fair words, deceive the hearts of the simple: shabby in dress, but
proud in heart, they seem as if they despised everything in this world, yet
they are scheming to obtain all this world's treasures. They profess themselves
the unworthiest of men, yet they are trying to acquire titles which proclaim
them worthier than all others.
“I have received my Most Pious Lord's letters, telling me to live
peaceably with my brother John. It is quite fitting that a religious Emperor
should send such instructions to his bishops. But when my brother, by a new and
unheard-of presumption, calls himself “Universal Bishop,” it is a hard thing in
my Most Serene Lord to correct, not him whose pride is the cause of all the
trouble, but me, who am defending the rights of the Apostle Peter and the
canons of the Church.
“In my brother's pride I can only see a sign that the days of Antichrist
are at hand. He seems to imitate him who said, “I will set my throne above the
stars of heaven : I will sit on the mount of the covenant on the sides of the
north, I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the Most
High.” Do not suffer this perverse word to be used. Perhaps the sins of Gregory
may have deserved such a humiliation, but Peter has not sinned; and it is Peter
who will be the sufferer again I say: see that the honour paid by your pious
predecessors to Peter suffers no diminution, and Peter will be your helper here
in all things, and hereafter will discharge your sins.
“It is now seven and twenty years that we have been living in this City
between the swords of the Lombards. How much we have had to pay daily from the
Church's treasury, in order that we might be able even to live among them,
cannot be calculated. Briefly, I will say that as my Lords have at Ravenna an
officer called Paymaster of the First Army of Italy, who, as necessity arises,
provides for the daily expenditure, so in this City in such matters I am their
Paymaster. Yet this Church, which is incessantly spending such vast sums on the
clerics, on the monasteries, on the poor, on the people, and on the Lombards
also, must be further oppressed by the affliction of the other Churches, all of
which groan over this man's pride, though they do not dare to express their
feelings.”
Such was the tenor of the letter to the Empress. Let it not be thought
that in drawing so largely from this correspondence we are devoting too much
time to a mere ecclesiastical squabble, which might find a place in the history
of the Church but scarcely concerns the history of Italy. Besides its valuable
incidental allusions to the miseries inflicted by the ravages of the Lombards,
this correspondence is of truly ‘ecumenical' importance in its bearing on the
relations of East and West, of the Tiber and the Bosphorus. It was the growing
estrangement between the Churches which prepared the way for the separation of
the Empires. Had there been any real cordiality through the sixth, seventh and
eighth centuries between Pope and Patriarch, it is not probable that the
descendant of a Frankish Mayor of the Palace would ever have been hailed as
Augustus in the streets of Rome.
In this particular case the dispute between the two sees ended in
something like a drawn battle. In the very year in which the fierce
correspondence quoted above had taken place, perhaps only a few weeks after
Gregory's angriest letter had arrived at Constantinople, John the Faster died.
When the Universal Conqueror had thus mowed down the Universal Bishop, one
element which had lent peculiar acrimony to the dispute, namely, the emulation
of austerity between the two chief combatants, disappeared. The Emperor,
sincerely anxious for the peace of the Church, lingered for some time over his
choice of a successor to the Faster, and at length selected Cyriacus, a man
apparently of gentle and unassuming nature, who had been a friend of Gregory
during his residence at Constantinople. The two responsales whom the new Patriarch dispatched to Rome were cordially received, and
unhesitatingly admitted to communion with the Pontiff; “for why,” as Gregory
himself argued, “should the fact that I forbade my representative to accept the
sacred mysteries at the hands of one who had fallen into the sin of pride and
elation, or who had failed to correct that sin in others, prevent his ministers
from receiving them at the hands of one who, like myself, has not fallen into
that sin?”. After five months' residence at Rome the messengers of
Constantinople were at length reluctantly and affectionately dismissed.
To the Emperor Gregory wrote thanking him for his delay in choosing
John's successor, and for his final appointment of Cyriacus. To the new
Patriarch himself the Pope wrote a few letters, in a gradually diminishing tone
of affection, as it became more and more manifest that the ‘wicked word'
Ecumenical, though not obtruded by him, would not be abandoned. But though
Gregory still emphatically asserted that whoever called himself ‘Ecumenical
Bishop’ was the precursor of Antichrist, the correspondence on the subject lost
much of its former heat, and we may perhaps say that, the title having been
claimed by Cyriacus for the honour of Constantinople, and protested against by
Gregory for the honour of Rome, the personal relations of the two Patriarchs
became friendly, if not cordial.
The issue of the controversy, which shall be finally stated here, was so
illogical as to be almost amusing. Notwithstanding a decree of Phocas, the
successor of Maurice, confirming in strong terms the primacy of the see of
Rome, the Patriarchs of Constantinople continued to use the objectionable
title, and at length the Roman Pontiffs, finding that they could not inhibit
the use of it by their rivals, decided to adopt it for themselves. About the
year 682 the Popes began to style themselves, and to allow others to style
them, Ecumenical Bishops or Ecumenical Popes; and in the two succeeding
centuries the title, as used by or of the bishops of Rome, was of frequent
occurrence. The world had thus the curious spectacle of two rulers of the
Church, each of whom claimed universal jurisdiction, though not yet at open war
with one another; and the Church of Rome saw Pope after Pope assuming a title
which, in the judgment of their greatest predecessor, was a distinct note of
the precursor of Antichrist.
So much for the ecclesiastical war of Patriarchates. We return to the
endeavours which Gregory was making, with praiseworthy perseverance, to secure
peace to Italy. Throughout the year 595, and at least the first half of 596, he
was sore in spirit because of the continued hostility of the Exarch Romanus. “Most
Exarch holy brother,” he wrote to Bishop Sebastian, “the things which we suffer
in this country from the influence of your friend, the lord Romanus, are such
as we cannot describe. Briefly, I may say that his malice towards us is
decidedly worse than the swords of the Lombards, so that the enemies who slay
us outright seem kind in comparison with the rulers (judices) of the
Republic who consume us by their spite, their rapine, and the treachery of
their hearts. But to have simultaneously to support the care of the bishops and
clergy, of the monasteries and the people, to watch with anxious vigilance
against the snares of the enemy, to have always to defend oneself as a
suspected person against the tricks and malice of the [Imperial] generals:—what
labour and what grief this is, your Brotherhood who loves me so well and so
purely, will be able truly to conjecture.”
Moreover the cowardice or the licentiousness of the clergy demoralised
their flocks, and so made the work of the invaders easier. In the beginning of
596 Gregory wrote to his representative in Campania that it had come to his
ears that Pimenius, bishop of Amalfi, was not content
to dwell in his own Church, but was roaming about to different places, and that
his flock, following his bad example, were deserting their own village. All
this was simply inviting the enemy to make depredations on their homes, and therefore Pimenius must be sharply rebuked and ordered to
remain thenceforward in his own Church, where a bishop ought to be. If
disobedient, he was to be shut up in a monastery, in which case Gregory would
take measures for the appointment of a successor.
Castorius the Papal chartularius, who was much
employed by the Pope about this time in certain ecclesiastical matters
concerning the succession to the see of Ravenna, became also a person of
considerable political importance, as one acquainted with the views of the Pope
on the subject of peace, and as the intermediary between him and Agilulf. It
was he who brought to Rome the report of the negotiations which his colleague
Secundus had been carrying on with the Lombard king. But his activity in this
negotiation did not render him popular with the citizens of Ravenna. Shut up in
their impregnable city, they could afford to despise the sufferings of the coloni of Campania—those sufferings which tore the
heart of Gregory—and could boast, with easy courage, that they would have
nothing to do with any surrender to the barbarian. A curious letter of the Pope’s,
which was probably written in the spring of 596, states that ‘some person, at
the instigation of a malign spirit, has in the silence of the night affixed a
placard in a public place at Ravenna, speaking of Castorius in libellous terms,
and even bringing crafty insinuations against ourselves in reference to the
conclusion of peace. Hereupon all the priests and Levites, the generals, the
nobles, the clerics, the monks, the soldiers and the people of Ravenna, at home
or abroad, are called solemnly to witness that the author of this libel, unless
he shall come forth in public and confess his sin, is excluded from
participation in the body and blood of Jesus Christ. If he presume to partake
thereof after this denunciation, it shall be anathema unto him, and if the
unknown writer be a person to whom, in our ignorance, we have sent letters of
congratulation, the good wishes contained in those letters will be null and
void. The only condition upon which the offender can be restored to the
communion of the Church, and relieved from this awful curse, is that he shall
come forth in public either to prove his assertions or to retract them.
As the ill-timed obstinacy of the Imperial government, backed up as it
evidently was by the public opinion of Ravenna, still prevented the conclusion
of the peace so necessary for Italy, Gregory exerted himself at least to lessen
the miseries of war by promoting the redemption of some out of the many
captives carried off in the train of each Lombard army. Writing to his
Campanian representative Anthemius, he said1, ‘How great is the sorrow and
affliction of our heart, arising from the events which have happened in the
regions of Campania, we cannot describe, but you will imagine, from the
greatness of the calamity. To remedy this, we are sending you money by the
hands of Stephen, Vir magnificus, which we desire you
diligently to employ in the immediate liberation of such freemen as are not
able to pay their own ransoms, also of all those slaves whose masters are too
poor to redeem them, and especially of such slaves on the Church's estates as have
perished [fallen into the hands of the enemy] through your negligence. Make a
careful list of the names, occupations, dwelling places, birthplaces, of all
whom you redeem. Give your best attention to this work, that those who are to
be redeemed may not incur any peril through your negligence, nor you hereafter
undergo our vehement displeasure. Especially strive to redeem the captives at
as low a price as possible, and send us the list above mentioned with all
speed.
For this pious work of the liberation of captives, Gregory thankfully
accepted the help of the powerful and wealthy friends whom he had made at
Constantinople. In two letters, written about the middle of June 597 to his old
allies, Theoctista, the Emperor's sister, and Theodore, his physician, he
gratefully acknowledges the large sums which they have sent him for the
redemption of captives and the relief of the poor. The physician's contribution
is not mentioned; that of Theoctista amounted to 30 lbs. of gold (£1200). In
his letters to the latter, after congratulating her on her generosity, and
pitying himself for the added responsibility thus brought upon him, he says :—
“I will mention to you, however, that from the city of Crotona on the
Adriatic, which was taken by the Lombards in the past year, many men and many
noble women were led away as booty: and sons were divided from their parents,
husbands from their wives : but because they ask heavy ransoms for them, many
to this hour have remained among the unutterable Lombards. However, I at once
remitted for their liberation half of the money which I received from you, but
out of the other half I have arranged to buy bed-clothes for the maids of God
(whom you call in Greek monastriae), because they
suffer sadly from the cold in our City from the scantiness of their bedclothes.
Of these maids there are many in this City, for according to the memorandum of
distribution there have been found 3000 of them, and they receive from the Patrimony
of St. Peter 80 lbs. annually. But what is that among such a multitude,
especially in this City, where everything is sold at such a high price? But
their life is of such a kind, so strictly passed in fasting and in tears, that
we believe if it were not for them, none of us would have been able to exist
for so many years between the swords of the Lombards [i.e. we owe our lives to
their sanctity and prayers].”
To each of his friends, in return for their munificent offerings,
Gregory sent his usual present of a golden key which had lain by the body of
St. Peter, and which contained some filings from his chains; and to Theoctista
he told the story of a miracle which connected her key with the Lombard king
Authari:—
“A certain Lombard who had entered a city beyond the Po, found this key,
and despised it as being a key of St. Peter, but seeing that it was golden
desired to make something out of it, and took out his knife that he might cut
it. But at once, being arrested by the Spirit, he stuck that same knife into
his throat and fell dead the same hour. Autharith [sic], king of the Lombards, came up, with many of his men, found the dead man
lying on the ground, and the key lying by itself, and they were all at once
struck with grievous fear, so that none of them dared to lift that key from the
earth. Then a certain Catholic Lombard, Mimiulf by
name, who was known to be given to prayer and almsgiving, was called, and he
raised it from the ground. But in remembrance of such a miracle, Autharith caused another golden key to be made, and sent it
along with this one to my predecessor of blessed memory, relating what a
miracle it had wrought. I therefore wished to send it to your Excellency, that
the same instrument through which Almighty God killed a proud infidel may bring
present and eternal salvation to you who love and fear Him.”
The letter to Theoctista, a very long one, from which these quotations
have been made, is also interesting, not only as containing some of Gregory's
most beautiful thoughts, and a specimen of his most extravagantly allegorizing1
interpretation of Scripture, but also as giving us a glimpse of the Imperial
nursery as presided over by the Patricia, the aunt of the young princes:—
“I beg also that you will take care to train the little lords whom you
are nursing, in excellent morals, and to warn the Glorious Eunuchs, who are
charged with their education, to speak to them in such fashion, that their
hearts may be softened towards one another in mutual love and tenderness, and
that if they have conceived any passion of hatred among themselves, it should
not break forth into a quarrel.”
In the same year, probably, in which these letters were written to
Constantinople, one great obstacle to peace was removed by the death of the
Exarch Romanus. He was succeeded by a man of less difficult disposition, and
more statesmanlike intellect, whose true name was Callinicus; but it is
characteristic of the increasing divergence between the two divisions of the
Empire that this regularly formed Greek name, which had been borne by
rhetoricians, martyrs, and bishops in the eastern world, was now evidently a
stumbling-block to western Romans, and was gradually converted by them into the
barbarous Gallicinus.
Already, in May 597, we find a more hopeful tone in Gregory’s letters.
Writing to his representative in Sicily, the deacon Cyprian, he mentions the
case of a certain Libertinus, Vir magnificus,
who had apparently filled the office of Praetor of Sicily, and had received a
hostile summons to Ravenna, there to give an account of his stewardship.
Gregory's language is not very clear, but he seems to say, “Do not let Libertinus distress himself. We have received a letter from
Ravenna which we enclose for your perusal, and which shows that his enemies
will not get the upper hand. Bid him therefore to be of good cheer, for we
believe that our most excellent son the Exarch will do nothing to grieve him.
We did not forget to write about his business; but as the said Exarch is now
busied in the valley of the Po, we have not yet received his reply.” There can
be little doubt that we are here dealing with a new regime. The Pope’s most
excellent son is the new and friendly Exarch Callinicus, and his occupations in
the valley of the Po have possibly something to do with negotiations for peace.
But all the members of the new Exarch’s suite were not equally friendly
with himself, and in a letter written about the same time as the last to his
old ally the scholasticus Andreas at Ravenna, we find
Gregory saying : “Moreover, I thank you for putting me on my guard about two
persons who have come with the Glorious Callinicus, although we have already
had some very disagreeable experience of the person first named by your
Excellency. But inasmuch as the times are evil, we bear all things—with a groan.”
In the year 598 no great change seems to have occurred in the position
of affairs. Pope Gregory’s letters for this year are few in number, suggesting
the probability that communications with the other parts of Italy may have been
unusually disturbed by hovering swarms of Lombards. Certainly the language
employed by the Pope to the bishop of Terracina shows that the inhabitants of
that city, though only sixty miles from Rome, and close to the friendly sea,
were still harassed by war’s alarms :— “We have heard that many are excusing
themselves from sentry duty on the walls : and we therefore wish you to take
anxious heed that no one, either in our own name or in that of the Church,
obtains exemption from this duty, but that all collectively be compelled to
undertake it: so that by the vigilance of all, and by Divine help, the guarding
of the city may be secured.”
In the midst of all the terror which filled the rest of Italy, the City
of Rome itself remained not only unharmed, but apparently unmenaced; an
immunity which was doubtless due to the spiritual ascendency which Gregory had
obtained over the minds of Ariulf and Agilulf. This special security granted to
Rome is much insisted upon by the Pope in a letter written the summer of 598 to Rusticiana, a great lady of Constantinople. He thanks
her for the 10 lbs. of gold which she has sent him for the redemption of
captives. He gently chides her for tarrying so long at Constantinople, and
postponing indefinitely her visit to Rome, ‘a visit which would greatly redound
to her profit hereafter in the life eternal. (And here we observe in passing
that Rome, the Babylon of the Apocalypse, which was to become the hold of every
unclean and hateful bird, is already, by the end of the sixth century, become a
sacred City, a pilgrimage to which confers spiritual benefits on the
traveller.) ‘The Gospel orders us,' says Gregory, ‘to love even our enemies.
Think then what a grave fault it must be to love too little those who love us.
Your servant will tell you how great desire we all have to behold your face. If
any one tells us that he loves us, we know very well that no one loves those
whom he does not care to visit. But if you are afraid of the swords and the
wars of Italy, you ought to see for yourself how great is the protection
vouchsafed by Peter, prince of Apostles, to this City, in which, without any
great number of people, and without help from soldiers, we have by God's help
been preserved for so many years unhurt between the swords of the enemy. All
this we say to you because we love you. May Almighty God grant you whatsoever
He may see to be for the everlasting benefit of your soul, as well as for the
present reputation of your household.”
In the autumn of 598 the long pending negotiations for peace at length
began to assume a favourable aspect. Gregory's representative at the Lombard
court was now the abbot Probus, and the Pope heard from him in the month of
September that the terms of the peace might be considered as settled, both King
and Exarch having given their consent. Our chief information as to this crisis
of the negotiations is derived, curiously enough, from a letter of the Pope to
Januarius, bishop of Sardinia. That strange and silly old man had not only to
be restrained from sallying forth from his cathedral just after the celebration
of mass to plough up his neighbour's harvest-field—but also to be warned of the
continued necessity of vigilance against the Lombards. Both he and Gennadius
the Exarch of Africa, to whose province Sardinia belonged, had been already in
vain admonished by the Pope to put the island in a proper state of defence; and
their carelessness had been punished by an attack of the barbarians (possibly
on Caralis the capital), by which, though no permanent settlement had been
effected, much injury had been done to the property of the islanders. The Pope
expressed his hope that Januarius would learn a lesson from this misadventure,
and keep a better guard in future, and he promised that for his part he would
omit nothing which might be of service to the islanders in their preparations
for defence. “Know, however,” said he, “that the abbot, whom a long time ago we
sent to Agilulf, has by God's favour arranged a peace with him according to the
most excellent Exarch's letters to us. And therefore till the actual signing of
the articles for the confirmation of peace, cause the sentinels on your walls
to discharge their duty with anxious vigilance, lest by chance in this time of
delay our enemies should think to make another visit to your parts. We trust in
our Redeemer's power that the assaults or the stratagems of our adversaries
will work you no further harm.”
In a later letter the Pope seems to speak of the peace as now actually
concluded. But as it was for a limited time—we learn from other sources that it
was only concluded for two years— he warns Januarius of the probability that at
the end of that time Agilulf would renew the war.
“As we have no less concern for your safety than for our own, we thought
it right at once to point out to you that when this peace is ended, Agilulf,
king of the Lombards, will not make [another] peace. Wherefore it is necessary
that your Brotherhood, while you still have liberty, should cause your city and
other places to be more strongly fortified, and should take care that abundant
store of provisions be laid up in them, so that when the enemy, by God's wrath
against him, arrives there, he may not find anything that he can injure, but
may go away disappointed.”
The peace negotiations seem after all not to have been finally concluded
till the spring of 599. The reason for such an inordinate delay (which reminds
us of the prolonged negotiations of Munster or of Utrecht), is partly disclosed
to us by a letter of the Pope to Theodore the Curator (or, as we should say,
the Mayor) of Ravenna. From this we learn that after Agilulf the King and
Callinicus the Exarch had been brought to agree as to the terms of peace, a
difficulty arose as to its signature on the part of Ariulf and Arichis, the Dukes of Spoleto and Benevento, and strange to
say on the part of Gregory also, who, when the object of his earnest strivings
for seven years seemed at length within his grasp, displayed either a strain of
morbid conscientiousness left in him by his cloister life, or else an ignoble
desire to shield himself from responsibility, and make others his instruments
for extracting the advantage by which he was to profit. Whatever the motive, he
declined himself to sign the peace, offering one of his suffragan bishops, or
at any rate an archdeacon, as a substitute. The part of the letter which is
important for our purpose is as follows:—
“Our responsales have always brought us
tidings about you which have gladdened our hearts, but now pre-eminently our
son the abbot Probus has told us so much about your Glory's liberal expenditure
on behalf of peace, and the earnest desire which you have manifested for the
same (a desire which was never displayed by any previous citizen of Ravenna),
that we can only pray that your labours for the common weal may be abundantly
repaid to your own soul hereafter. We observe therefore that Ariulf has sworn
for the preservation of peace not [unconditionally] as the king himself swore,
but only on condition (1) that there shall be no act of violence committed
against him, and (2) that no one shall march against the army of Arichis. As this is altogether unfair and deceitful, we
look upon the case precisely as if he had not sworn at all, for he will always
find something to complain of as “an act of violence against himself,” and the
less suspicious we are of him the more easily he will deceive us. Wamilfrida too, by whose counsel, or as I might say
no-counsel, Ariulf is ruled in all things, absolutely refused to swear. And thus
it has come to pass that from that peace from which we expected so much, we in
these parts shall receive practically no remedy, because the enemies by whom we
have hitherto been chiefly suspected will in future continue to suspect us.
“Your Glory ought also to know that the king's men who have been passed
on hither insist that we ought to sign the agreement for peace. But remembering
the reproaches which Agilulf is said to have addressed to Basilius, Vir clarissimus, tending through us to the injury of blessed
Peter (though Agilulf himself entirely denies having thus spoken), we
nevertheless decide to abstain from signing, lest we who have been suitors and
mediators between him and our most excellent son the lord Exarch, if by chance
anything is privately carried off, should seem to fail in any point, and so our
own promise should be brought into doubt. Thus should any similar occasion
arise in future (which God forbid), he will make an excuse for not granting our
petition. We therefore beg of you, as we have already begged of our aforesaid
most Excellent son, that you will, with your wonted goodness to us, bring it to
pass that when the king's men return from Arichis he
shall speedily send them writings which are to be brought to us, and in which
he shall command them not to ask for our signature. If that be conceded we will
cause our brother Gloriosus, or one of the bishops,
or at any rate an archdeacon, to sign the pact.”
In reading this letter we cannot but be struck by the distrust of Ariulf
which is evidently displayed by the Pope. Had he himself come round to the
opinion of the Emperor and did he look upon himself as fatuus for having seven
years before listened to the fair words of the duke of Spoleto? The Pope's
relations with King Agilulf, too, seem far from friendly. The Vir clarissimus Basilius, whoever he may have been—probably
some great Byzantine official— had made mischief between King and Pontiff by
repeating some unguarded words of the former which Gregory chose to understand
as reflecting injuriously on his honour, and through him on that of the blessed
Peter.
But this was not the permanent relation of the two potentates The
influence of the devout Theudelinda was being ever exerted to smooth away
asperities and to make her husband and her unknown friend Gregory kindly
disposed one towards the other. It was probably through her influence that the
difficulties which had arisen at the last moment, and which seemed so menacing,
were smoothed away. The dukes of Spoleto and Benevento must have been persuaded
to acquiesce in the proposed arrangement; the Pope's guarantee must have been
either obtained or dispensed with. In some way or other the weary negotiations
were brought to a close and peace was concluded between Agilulf and Callinicus.
This chapter, devoted to the story of a peace which formed a
turning-point in the history of Lombard Italy, may be fittingly ended by a
translation of the two letters which the Pope addressed shortly before the
conclusion of the peace to the king and queen of the Lombards.
“To Agilulf, king of the Lombards:—
“We render thanks to your Excellency that you have heard our petition,
and justified the confidence which we had in you, by arranging a peace which
will be profitable to both parties. Wherefore we greatly praise the wisdom and
goodness of your Excellency, because in loving peace you have proved that you
love God who is the author of peace. For if it had unhappily not been made,
what else could have followed but the sin and danger of both parties,
accompanied by the shedding of the blood of the miserable peasants whose labour
is serviceable to both? But in order that we may feel that peace, as you have
made it, we pray, while saluting you with fatherly love—that whenever
opportunity offers, you will by your letters order your Dukes who are
commanding in various districts. But especially in these parts, to keep this
peace in its integrity, according to your promise, and not to look out for
occasions of strife or unpleasantness. Thus doing you will earn from us yet
ampler gratitude.
“We have received the bearers of these presents, as being truly your
servants, with proper affection: since it was right that we should give a
loving greeting and farewell to wise men who announced the peace made by the
favour of Almighty God.'
“To Theudelinda, queen of the Lombards:—
“We have learned, by the report of our son the abbot Probus, how kindly
and zealously, according your wont, you have exerted yourself for the
conclusion of peace. We knew that we might reckon on your Christianity for
this, that you would by all means apply your labour and your goodness to the
cause of peace. Therefore we render thanks to Almighty God, who has so ruled
your heart as not only to bestow on you the true faith, but to cause you to
accomplish His own decrees.
“Do not think, most excellent daughter, that it is any trifling reward
which you will reap from staying the effusion of blood on both sides. Therefore
while thanking you for your willing help in this thing, we pray our
compassionate God to give you His recompense for your good deeds both in body
and soul, both here and hereafter.
“Saluting you, moreover, with fatherly love, we exhort you to use your
influence with your most excellent consort that he may not reject the alliance
of the Christian Republic. For, as we think you know, it is in many ways
expedient that he should be willing to accept its friendship. Do you therefore,
according to your custom, ever study all that tends to grace and the
reconciliation of foes, and when you have such an opportunity of earning
reward, labour that you may yet more conspicuously recommend your good deeds
before the eyes of Almighty God.”
