Writings of Basil - The Letters
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The Letters
Of Saint Basil the Great, Archbishop of Cæsaria,
Translated with Notes by
The Rev. Blomfield Jackson, M.A.
Vicar of Saint Bartholomew's, Moor Lane, and Fellow of King's College, London.
Under the editorial supervision of Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D.,
Professor of Church History in the Union Theological Semimary, New York,
and Henry Wace, D.D., Principal of King's College, London
Published in 1895 by T&T Clark,
Edinburgh
Letter L. [2172]
To Bishop Innocentius. [2173]
Whom, indeed, could it better befit to encourage the timid, and rouse
the slumbering, than you, my godly lord, who have shewn your general
excellence in this, too, that you have consented to come down among
us, your lowly inferiors, like a true disciple of Him Who said, "I am
among you," not as a fellow guest, but "as he that serveth." [2174]
For you have condescended to minister to us your spiritual gladness,
to refresh our souls by your honoured letter, and, as it were, to
fling the arms of your greatness round the infancy of children. We,
therefore, implore your good soul to pray, that we may be worthy to
receive aid from the great, such as yourself, and to have a mouth and
wisdom wherewith to chime in with the strain of all, who like you are
led by the Holy Spirit. Of Him I hear that you are a friend and true
worshipper, and I am deeply thankful for your strong and unshaken love
to God. I pray that my lot may be found with the true worshippers,
among whom we are sure your excellency is to be ranked, as well as
that great and true bishop who has filled all the world with his
wonderful work.
Footnotes
[2172] Placed at the beginning of the Episcopate.
[2173] The Benedictine title runs, Basilius gratias agit Episcopo
cuidam, and a Ben. note points out that the common addition of "of
Rome" to the title must be an error, because Damasus, not Innocent,
was Bishop of Rome at the time. Combefis supposed that the letter was
written to Innocent, then a presbyter, and that the allusion at the
end of the letter is to Damasus; the Ben. note says absurde. Innocent
did not become Bishop of Rome till 402, three years after Basil's
death. Whatever was the see of the recipient of this letter, it was
one of importance. cf. Letter lxxxi.
[2174] Luke xxii. 27.
Letter LI. [2175]
To Bishop Bosporius. [2176]
How do you think my heart was pained at hearing of the slanders heaped
on me by some of those that feel no fear of the Judge, who "shall
destroy them that speak leasing"? [2177]I spent nearly the whole
night sleepless, thinking of your words of love; so did grief lay hold
upon my heart of hearts. For verily, in the words of Solomon, slander
humbleth a man. [2178]And no man is so void of feeling as not to be
touched at heart, and bowed down to the ground, if he falls in with
lips prone to lying. But we must needs put up with all things and
endure all things, after committing our vindication to the Lord. He
will not despise us; for "he that oppresseth the poor reproacheth his
Maker." [2179]They, however, who have patched up this new tragedy
of blasphemy seem to have lost all belief in the Lord, Who has
declared that we must give account at the day of judgment even for an
idle word. [2180]And I, tell me, I anathematized the right blessed
Dianius? For this is what they have said against me. Where? When?
In whose presence? On what pretext? In mere spoken words, or in
writing? Following others, or myself the author and originator of the
deed? Alas for the impudence of men who make no difficulty at saying
anything! Alas for their contempt of the judgment of God! Unless,
indeed, they add this further to their fiction, that they make me out
to have been once upon a time so far out of my mind as not to know
what I was saying. For so long as I have been in my senses I know
that I never did anything of the kind, or had the least wish to do
so. What I am, indeed, conscious of is this; that from my earliest
childhood I was brought up in love for him, thought as I gazed at him
how venerable he looked, how dignified, how truly reverend. Then when
I grew older I began to know him by the good qualities of his soul,
and took delight in his society, gradually learning to perceive the
simplicity, nobility, and liberality of his character, and all his
most distinctive qualities, his gentleness of soul, his mingled
magnanimity and meekness, the seemliness of his conduct, his control
of temper, the beaming cheerfulness and affability which he combined
with majesty of demeanour. From all this I counted him among men most
illustrious for high character.
However, towards the close of his life (I will not conceal the truth)
I, together with many of them that in our country [2181] feared the
Lord, sorrowed over him with sorrow unendurable, because he signed the
creed brought from Constantinople by George. [2182]Afterwards, full
of kindness and gentleness as he was, and willing out of the fulness
of his fatherly heart to give satisfaction to everyone, when he had
already fallen sick of the disease of which he died, he sent for me,
and, calling the Lord to witness, said that in the simplicity of his
heart he had agreed to the document sent from Constantinople, but had
had no idea of rejecting the creed put forth by the holy Fathers at
Nicæa, nor had had any other disposition of heart than from the
beginning he had always had. He prayed, moreover, that he might not
be cut off from the lot of those blessed three hundred and eighteen
bishops who had announced the pious decree [2183] to the world. In
consequence of this satisfactory statement I dismissed all anxiety and
doubt, and, as you are aware, communicated with him, and gave over
grieving. Such have been my relations with Dianius. If anyone avers
that he is privy to any vile slander on my part against Dianius, do
not let him buzz it slave-wise in a corner; let him come boldly out
and convict me in the light of day.
Footnotes
[2175] Placed at the beginning of Basil's episcopate, c. 370.
[2176] Bosporius, an intimate friend of Basil and of Gregory of
Nazianzus, was bishop of Colonia, in Cappadocia Secunda. Basil left
Cæsarea in 360 in distress at hearing that Dianius had subscribed the
creed of Ariminum, but was hurt at the charge that he had
anathematized his friend and bishop. Dianius died in Basil's arms in
362.
[2177] Ps. v. 6.
[2178] sukophantia andra tapeinoi, for Eccles. vii. 7, LXX.
sukophantia periderei sophon: oppression maketh a wise man mad, A.V.;
extortion maketh a wise man foolish, R.V.
[2179] Prov. xiv. 31.
[2180] Matt. xii. 36.
[2181] Here Cæsarea appears to be called patris. cf. Ep. viii. Vide
Proleg.
[2182] i.e.the Homoean creed of Ariminum, as revised at Nike and
accepted at the Acacian Synod of Constantinople in 360. George is
presumably the George bp. of Laodicea, who at Seleucia opposed the
Acacians, but appears afterwards to have become reconciled to that
party, and to have joined them in persecuting the Catholics at
Constantinople. cf. Basil, Ep. ccli.
[2183] kerugma. cf. p. 41.
Letter LII. [2184]
To the Canonicæ. [2185]
1. I have been very much distressed by a painful report which reached
my ears; but I have been equally delighted by my brother, beloved of
God, bishop Bosporius, [2186] who has brought a more satisfactory
account of you. He avers by God's grace that all those stories spread
abroad about you are inventions of men who are not exactly informed as
to the truth about you. He added, moreover, that he found among you
impious calumnies about me, of a kind likely to be uttered by those
who do not expect to have to give the Judge in the day of His
righteous retribution an account of even an idle word. I thank God,
then, both because I am cured of my damaging opinion of you, an
opinion which I have derived from the calumnies of men, and because I
have heard of your abandonment of those baseless notions about me, on
hearing the assurances of my brother. He, in all that he has said as
coming from himself, has also completely expressed my own feeling.
For in us both there is one mind about the faith, as being heirs of
the same Fathers who once at Nicæa promulgated their great decree
[2187] concerning the faith. Of this, some portions are universally
accepted without cavil, but the homoousion, ill received in certain
quarters, is still rejected by some. These objectors we may very
properly blame, and yet on the contrary deem them deserving of
pardon. To refuse to follow the Fathers, not holding their
declaration of more authority than one's own opinion, is conduct
worthy of blame, as being brimful of self-sufficiency. On the other
hand the fact that they view with suspicion a phrase which is
misrepresented by an opposite party does seem to a small extent to
relieve them from blame. Moreover, as a matter of fact, the members
of the synods which met to discuss the case of Paul of Samosata [2188]
did find fault with the term as an unfortunate one.
For they maintained that the homoousion set forth the idea both of
essence and of what is derived from it, so that the essence, when
divided, confers the title of co-essential on the parts into which it
is divided. This explanation has some reason in the case of bronze
and coins made therefrom, but in the case of God the Father and God
the Son there is no question of substance anterior or even underlying
both; the mere thought and utterance of such a thing is the last
extravagance of impiety. What can be conceived of as anterior to the
Unbegotten? By this blasphemy faith in the Father and the Son is
destroyed, for things, constituted out of one, have to one another the
relation of brothers.
2. Because even at that time there were men who asserted the Son to
have been brought into being out of the non-existent, the term
homoousion was adopted, to extirpate this impiety. For the
conjunction of the Son with the Father is without time and without
interval. The preceding words shew this to have been the intended
meaning. For after saying that the Son was light of light, and
begotten of the substance of the Father, but was not made, they went
on to add the homoousion, thereby showing that whatever proportion of
light any one would attribute in the case of the Father will obtain
also in that of the Son. For very light in relation to very light,
according to the actual sense of light, will have no variation. Since
then the Father is light without beginning, and the Son begotten
light, but each of Them light and light; they rightly said "of one
substance," in order to set forth the equal dignity of the nature.
Things, that have a relation of brotherhood, are not, as some persons
have supposed, of one substance; but when both the cause and that
which derives its natural existence from the cause are of the same
nature, then they are called "of one substance."
3. This term also corrects the error of Sabellius, for it removes the
idea of the identity of the hypostases, and introduces in perfection
the idea of the Persons. For nothing can be of one substance with
itself, but one thing is of one substance with another. The word has
therefore an excellent and orthodox use, defining as it does both the
proper character of the hypostases, and setting forth the
invariability of the nature. And when we are taught that the Son is
of the substance of the Father, begotten and not made, let us not fall
into the material sense of the relations. For the substance was not
separated from the Father and bestowed on the Son; neither did the
substance engender by fluxion, nor yet by shooting forth [2189] as
plants their fruits. The mode of the divine begetting is ineffable
and inconceivable by human thought. It is indeed characteristic of
poor and carnal intelligence to compare the things that are eternal
with the perishing things of time, and to imagine, that as corporeal
things beget, so does God in like manner; it is rather our duty to
rise to the truth by arguments of the contrary, and to say, that since
thus is the mortal, not thus is He who is immortal. We must neither
then deny the divine generation, nor contaminate our intelligence with
corporeal senses.
4. The Holy Spirit, too, is numbered with the Father and the Son,
because He is above creation, and is ranked as we are taught by the
words of the Lord in the Gospel, "Go and baptize in the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost." [2190]He who, on the
contrary, places the Spirit before the Son, or alleges Him to be older
than the Father, resists the ordinance of God, and is a stranger to
the sound faith, since he fails to preserve the form of doxology which
he has received, but adopts some new fangled device in order to be
pleasing to men. It is written "The Spirit is of God," [2191] and if
He is of God, how can He be older than that of which He is? And what
folly is it not, when there is one Unbegotten, to speak of something
else as superior to the Unbegotten? He is not even anterior, for
nothing intervenes between Son and Father. If, however, He is not of
God but is through Christ, He does not even exist at all. It follows,
that this new invention about the order really involves the
destruction of the actual existence, and is a denial of the whole
faith. It is equally impious to reduce Him to the level of a
creature, and to subordinate Him either to Son or to Father, either in
time or in rank. These are the points on which I have heard that you
are making enquiry. If the Lord grant that we meet I may possibly
have more to say on these subjects, and may myself, concerning points
which I am investigating, receive satisfactory information from you.
Footnotes
[2184] Placed at the beginning of St. Basil's episcopate, c. 370.
[2185] Canonicæ, in the early church, were women enrolled in a list in
the churches, devoted to works of charity, and living apart from men,
though not under vows, nor always in a coenobium. In Soc., H.E.i. 17
they are described as the recipients of St. Helena's hospitality. St.
Basil is supposed to refuse to recognise marriage with them as
legitimate in Ep. cclxxxviii. The word kanonikon may stand for either
gender, but the marriage of Canonici was commonly allowed. Letter
clxxiii. is addressed to the canonica Theodora.
[2186] Vide the Letter li.
[2187] kerugma. On Basil's use of this word and of dogma, vide note
on p. 41.
[2188] i.e.the two remarkable Antiochene synods of 264 and 269, to
enforce the ultimate decisions of which against Paul of Samosata
appeal was made to the pagan Aurelian. On the explanation of how the
Homoousion came to be condemned in one sense by the Origenist bishops
at Antioch in 269, and asserted in another by the 318 at Nicæa in 325,
see prolegomena to Athanasius in Schaff and Wace's ed. p. xxxi. cf.
Ath.,De Syn. § 45, Hil., De Trin. iv. 4, and Basil, Cont. Eunom. i.
19. "Wurde seiner Lehre: `Gott sey mit dem Logos zugleich Eine
Person, hen prosopon wie der Mensch mit seiner Vernunft Eines sey,'
entgegengehalteh, die Kirchenlehre verlange Einen Gott, aber mehrere
prosopa desselben, so sagte er, da auch ihm Christus eine Person
(nämlich als Mensch) sey, so habe auch sein Glaube mehrere prosopa,
Gott und Christus stehen sich als homoousioi, d. h. wahrscheinlich
gleich persönliche gegenüber, Diese veratorische Dialektik konnte zwar
nicht täuschen; wohl aber wurde das Wort homoousios, so gebraucht und
auf die Person überhaupt bezogen, dadurcheine Weile verdächtig (man
fürchtete nach Athan. De Syn. Ar. et Sel. c. 45, eine menschliche
Person nach Paul in die Trinität einlassen zu müssen), bis das vierte
Jahrhundert jenem Wort bestimmten kirchlichen Stempel gab." Dorner,
Christologie. B. i. 513. Vide also Thomasius, Christliche
Dogmengeschichte, B. 1, p. 188.
[2189] cf. Luke xxi. 30.
[2190] Matt. xxviii. 19.
[2191] 1 Cor. ii. 12.
Letter LIII. [2192]
To the Chorepiscopi. [2193]
1. My soul is deeply pained at the enormity of the matter on which I
write, if for this only, that it has caused general suspicion and
talk. But so far it has seemed to me incredible. I hope then that
what I am writing about it may be taken by the guilty as medicine, by
the innocent as a warning, by the indifferent, in which class I trust
none of you may be found, as a testimony. And what is it of which I
speak? There is a report that some of you take money from candidates
for ordination, [2194] and excuse it on grounds of religion. This is
indeed worse. If any one does evil under the guise of good he
deserves double punishment; because he not only does what is in itself
not good, but, so to say, makes good an accomplice in the commission
of sin. If the allegation be true, let it be so no more. Let a
better state of things begin. To the recipient of the bribe it must
be said, as was said by the Apostles to him who was willing to give
money to buy the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, "Thy money perish with
thee. [2195]It is a lighter sin to wish in ignorance to buy, than
it is to sell, the gift of God. A sale it was; and if you sell what
you received as a free gift you will be deprived of the boon, as
though you were yourself sold to Satan. You are obtruding the traffic
of the huckster into spiritual things and into the Church where we are
entrusted with the body and blood of Christ. These things must not
be. And I will mention wherein lies an ingenious contrivance. They
think that there is no sin because they take the money not before but
after the ordination; but to take is to take at whatever time.
2. I exhort you, then, abandon this gain, or, I would rather say,
this approach to Hell. Do not, by defiling your hands with such
bribes, render yourselves unfit to celebrate holy mysteries. But
forgive me. I began by discrediting; and now I am threatening as
though I were convinced. If, after this letter of mine, any one do
anything of the kind, he will depart from the altars here and will
seek a place where he is able to buy and to sell God's gift. We and
the Churches of God have no such custom. [2196]One word more, and I
have done. These things come of covetousness. Now covetousness is
the root of all evil and is called idolatry. [2197]Do not then
price idols above Christ for the sake of a little money. Do not
imitate Judas and once more betray for a bribe Him who was crucified
for us. For alike the lands and the hands of all that make such gain
shall be called Aceldama. [2198]
Footnotes
[2192] Placed in the beginning of the episcopate.
[2193] "A class of ministers between bishops proper and presbyters,
defined in the Arabic version of the Nicene canons to be `loco
episcopi super villas et monasteria et sacerdotes villarum;' called
into existence in the latter part of the third century, and first in
Asia Minor, in order to meet the wants of episcopal supervision in the
country parts of the now enlarged dioceses without subdivision: first
mentioned in the Councils of Ancyra and Neo-Cæsarea a.d. 314." D.C.A.
i. 354. Three mss. give the title "to the bishops under him." The
Ben. Ed. remarks: "Liquet Basilium agere de episcopis sibi subditis.
Nam qui proprie dicebantur chorepiscopi, manus non ponebant, sed clero
inferiores ministros ascribebant, ut videre est in epist. sequenti.
Sed tamen ipsi etiam episcopi, qui Ecclesias metropoli subjectas
regebant, interdum vocabuntur chorepiscopi. Queritur enim Gregorius
Naz. in carmine De vita sua. quod a Basilio, qui quinquaginta
chorepiscopos sub se habebat, vilissimi oppiduli constitutus episcopus
fuisset. toutois m' ho pentekonta chorepiskopois stenoumenos dedoken
Hoc exemplo confirmatur vetustissimorum codicum scriptura quam secuti
sumus.
[2194] cf. note on Theodoret, iv. 20, p. 125.
[2195] Acts viii. 20.
[2196] cf. 1 Cor. xi. 16.
[2197] cf. Col. iii. 5.
[2198] cf. Acts i. 19.
Letter LIV. [2199]
To the Chorepiscopi.
I am much distressed that the canons of the Fathers have fallen
through, and that the exact discipline of the Church has been banished
from among you. I am apprehensive lest, as this indifference grows,
the affairs of the Church should, little by little, fall into
confusion. According to the ancient custom observed in the Churches
of God, ministers in the Church were received after careful
examination; the whole of their life was investigated; an enquiry was
made as to their being neither railers nor drunkards, not quick to
quarrel, keeping their youth in subjection, so as to be able to
maintain "the holiness without which no man shall see the Lord."
[2200]This examination was made by presbyters and deacons living
with them. Then they brought them to the Chorepiscopi; and the
Chorepiscopi, after receiving the suffrages of the witnesses as to the
truth and giving information to the Bishop, so admitted the minister
to the sacerdotal order. [2201]Now, however, you have quite passed
me over; you have not even had the grace to refer to me, and have
transferred the whole authority to yourselves. Furthermore, with
complete indifference, you have allowed presbyters and deacons to
introduce unworthy persons into the Church, just any one they choose,
without any previous examination of life and character, by mere
favoritism, on the score of relationship or some other tie. The
consequence is, that in every village, there are reckoned many
ministers, but not one single man worthy of the service of the
altars. Of this you yourselves supply proof from your difficulty in
finding suitable candidates for election. As, then, I perceive that
the evil is gradually reaching a point at which it would be incurable,
and especially at this moment when a large number of persons are
presenting themselves for the ministry through fear of the
conscription, I am constrained to have recourse to the restitution of
the canons of the Fathers. I thus order you in writing to send me the
roll of the ministers in every village, stating by whom each has been
introduced, and what is his mode of life. You have the roll in your
own keeping, so that your version can be compared with the documents
which are in mine, and no one can insert his own name when he likes.
So if any have been introduced by presbyters after the first
appointment, [2202] let them be rejected, and take their place among
the laity. Their examination must then be begun by you over again,
and, if they prove worthy, let them be received by your decision.
Drive out unworthy men from the Church, and so purge it. For the
future, test by examination those who are worthy, and then receive
them; but do not reckon them of the number before you have reported to
me. Otherwise, distinctly understand that he who is admitted to the
ministry without my authority will remain a layman.
Footnotes
[2199] Placed at the same time as the foregoing.
[2200] Heb. xii. 14.
[2201] The Ben. note runs, "Ministros, sive subdiaconos, sacratorum
ordini ascribit Basilius. Synodus Laodicena inferiores clericos
sacratorum numero non comprehendit, sed numerat sacratos a presbyteris
usque ad diaconos, apo presbuteron heos diakonon, can. 24, distinguit
canone 27, hieratikous, e klerikous e laikous, sive sacratos, sive
clericos, sive laicos. Et can. 30. ;'Oti hou dei hieratikon e
klerikon e asketen en balaneio meta gunaikon apolouesthai, mede panta
Christianon e laikon. Non oportet sacratum vel clericum aut ascetam
in balneo cum mulieribus lavari. sed nec ullum Christianum aut
laïcum. Non sequuntur hujus synodi morem ecclesiastici scriptores.
Basilius, epist. 287, excommunicato omne cum sacratis commercium
intercludit. Et in epist. 198, hierateion intelligit coetum
clericorum, eique ascribit clericos qui epistolas episcopi
perferebant. Athanasius ad Rufinianum scribens, rogat eum ut
epistolam legat hieratei& 251; et populo. Gregorius Nazianzenus
lectores sacri ordinis, hierou tagmatos, partem esse agnoscit in
epist. 45. Notandus etiam canon 8 apostolicus, ei tis episkopos e
etc. presbuteros e diakonos e ek tou hierarikou katalogon, etc. Si
quis episcopus vel presbyter vel diaconus, vel ex sacro ordine. Hæc
visa sunt observanda, quia pluribus Basilii locis, quæ deinceps
occurrent, non parum afferent lucis." The letter of the Council in
Illyricum uses hieratikon tagma in precisely the same way. Theod.,
Ecc. Hist. iv. 8, where see note on p. 113. So Sozomen, On the
Council of Nicæa, i. 23. Ordo, the nearest Latin equivalent to the
Greek tagma, was originally used of any estate in the church, e.g. St.
Jerome, On Isaiah v. 19, 18. On the testing of qualifications for
orders, cf. St. Cyprian, Ep. lxviii.
[2202] meta ten proten epinemesin. 'Epinemesis is in later Greek the
recognized equivalent for "indictio" in the sense of a period of
fifteen years (Cod. Theod. xi. 28. 3). I have had some hesitation as
to whether it could possibly in this passage indicate a date. But
epinemesis does not appear to have been used in its chronological
sense before Evagrius, and his expression (iv. 29) tous periodous ton
kuklon kaloumenon epinemeseon looks as though the term were not yet
common; epinemesis here I take to refer to the assignment of
presbyters to different places on ordination. I am indebted to Mr. J.
W. Parker for valuable information and suggestions on this question.
Letter LV. [2203]
To Paregorius, the presbyter.
I have given patient attention to your letter, and I am astonished
that when you are perfectly well able to furnish me with a short and
easy defence by taking action at once, you should choose to persist in
what is my ground of complaint, and endeavour to cure the incurable by
writing a long story about it. I am not the first, Paregorius, nor
the only man, to lay down the law that women are not to live with
men. Read the canon put forth by our holy Fathers at the Council of
Nicæa, which distinctly forbids subintroducts. Unmarried life is
honourably distinguished by its being cut off from all female
society. If, then, any one, who is known by the outward profession,
in reality follows the example of those who live with wives, it is
obvious that he only affects the distinction of virginity in name, and
does not hold aloof from unbecoming indulgence. You ought to have
been all the more ready to submit yourself without difficulty to my
demands, in that you allege that you are free from all bodily
appetite. I do not suppose that a man of three score years and ten
lives with a woman from any such feelings, and I have not decided, as
I have decided, on the ground of any crime having been committed. But
we have learnt from the Apostle, not to put a stumbling block or an
occasion to fall in a brother's way;" [2204] and I know that what is
done very properly by some, naturally becomes to others an occasion
for sin. I have therefore given my order, in obedience to the
injunction of the holy Fathers, that you are to separate from the
woman. Why then, do you find fault with the Chorepiscopus? What is
the good of mentioning ancient ill-will? Why do you blame me for
lending an easy ear to slander? Why do you not rather lay the blame
on yourself, for not consenting to break off your connexion with the
woman? Expel her from your house, and establish her in a monastery.
Let her live with virgins, and do you be served by men, that the name
of God be not blasphemed in you. Till you have so done, the
innumerable arguments, which you use in your letters, will not do you
the slightest service. You will die useless, and you will have to
give an account to God for your uselessness. If you persist in
clinging to your clerical position without correcting your ways, you
will be accursed before all the people, and all, who receive you, will
be excommunicate throughout the Church. [2205]
Footnotes
[2203] Placed at the beginning of the Episcopate.
[2204] Rom. xiv. 13.
[2205] On the subject of the subintroductæ or suneisaktoi, one of the
greatest difficulties and scandals of the early church, vide the
article of Can. Venables in D.C.A. ii. 1937. The earliest prohibitive
canon against the custom is that of the Council of Elvira, a.d. 305.
(Labbe i. 973.) The Canon of Nicæa, to which Basil refers, only
allowed the introduction of a mother, sister, or aunt. The still more
extraordinary and perilous custom of ladies of professed celibacy
entertaining male suneisaktoi, referred to by Gregory of Nazianzus in
his advice to virgins, arsena pant' aleeine suneisakton de malista,
may be traced even so far back as "the Shepherd of Hermas" (iii.
Simil. ix. 11). On the charges against Paul of Samosata under this
head, vide Eusebius, vii. 30.
Letter LVI. [2206]
To Pergamius. [2207]
I naturally forget very easily, and I have had lately many things to
do, and so my natural infirmity is increased. I have no doubt,
therefore, that you have written to me, although I have no
recollection of having received any letter from your excellency; for I
am sure you would not state what is not the case. But for there
having been no reply, it is not I that am in fault; the guilt lies
with him who did not ask for one. Now, however, you have this letter,
containing my defence for the past and affording ground for a second
greeting. So, when you write to me, do not suppose that you are
taking the initiative in another correspondence. You are only
discharging your proper obligation in this. For really, although this
letter of mine is a return for a previous one of yours, as it is more
than twice as bulky, it will fulfil a double purpose. You see to what
sophisms my idleness drives me. But, my dear Sir, do not in a few
words bring serious charges, indeed the most serious of all.
Forgetfulness of one's friends, and neglect of them arising from high
place, are faults which involve every kind of wrong. Do we fail to
love according to the commandment of the Lord? Then we lose the
distinctive mark imprinted on us. Are we puffed to repletion with
empty pride and arrogance? Then we fall into the inevitable
condemnation of the devil. If, then, you use these words because you
held such sentiments about me, pray that I may flee from the
wickedness which you have found in my ways; if, however, your tongue
shaped itself to these words, in a kind of inconsiderate
conventionality, I shall console myself, and ask you to be good enough
to adduce some tangible proof of your allegations. Be well assured of
this, that my present anxiety is an occasion to me of humility. I
shall begin to forget you, when I cease to know myself. Never, then,
think that because a man is a very busy man he is a man of faulty
character.
Footnotes
[2206] Placed at the beginning of the Episcopate.
[2207] A layman, of whom nothing more is known.
Letter LVII. [2208]
To Meletius, Bishop of Antioch. [2209]
If your holiness only knew the greatness of the happiness you cause me
whenever you write to me, I know that you would never have let slip
any opportunity of sending me a letter; nay, you would have written me
many letters on each occasion, knowing the reward that is kept in
store by our loving Lord for the consolation of the afflicted.
Everything here is still in a very painful condition, and the thought
of your holiness is the only thing that recalls me from my own
troubles; a thought made more distinct to me by my communication with
you through that letter of yours which is so full of wisdom and
grace. When, therefore, I take your letter into my hand, first of
all, I look at its size, and I love it all the more for being so big;
then, as I read it, I rejoice over every word I find in it; as I draw
near the end I begin to feel sad; so good is every word that I read,
in what you write. The overflowing of a good heart is good. Should
I, however, be permitted, in answer to your prayers, while I live on
this earth, to meet you face to face, and to enjoy the profitable
instruction of your living voice, or any aids to help me in the life
that now is, or that which is to come, I should count this indeed the
best of blessings, a prelude to the mercy of God. I should, ere now,
have adhered to this intention, had I not been prevented by true and
loving brothers. I have told my brother Theophrastus [2210] to make a
detailed report to you of matters, as to which I do not commit my
intentions to writing.
Footnotes
[2208] Placed in the year 371.
[2209] This letter, the first of six to Meletius of Antioch, is
supposed to be assigned to this date, because of Basil's statement
that the state of the Church of Cæsarea was still full of pain to
him. Basil had not yet overcome the opposition of his suffragans, or
won the position secured to him after his famous intercourse with
Valens in 372. Meletius had now been for seven years exiled from
Antioch, and was suffering for the sake of orthodoxy, while not in
full communion with the Catholics, because of the unhappy Eustathian
schism.
[2210] This Theophrastus may be identified with the deacon
Theophrastus who died shortly after Easter a.d. 372. (cf. Letter
xcv.) The secret instructions given him "seem to refer to Basil's
design for giving peace to the Church, which Basil did not attempt to
carry out before his tranquilization of Cappadocia, but may have had
in mind long before." Maran, Vit. Bas. chap. xvi.
Letter LVIII. [2211]
To Gregory my brother. [2212]
How am I to dispute with you in writing? How can I lay hold of you
satisfactorily, with all your simplicity? Tell me; who ever falls a
third time into the same nets? Who ever gets a third time into the
same snare? Even a brute beast would find it difficult to do so. You
forged one letter, and brought it me as though it came from our right
reverend uncle the bishop, trying to deceive me, I have no idea why.
I received it as a letter written by the bishop and delivered by you.
Why should I not? I was delighted; I shewed it to many of my friends;
I thanked God. The forgery was found out, on the bishop's repudiating
it in person. I was thoroughly ashamed; covered as I was with the
disgrace of cunning trickery and lies, I prayed that the earth might
open for me. Then they gave me a second letter, as sent by the bishop
himself by the hands of your servant Asterius. Even this second had
not really been sent by the bishop, as my very reverend brother
Anthimus [2213] has told me. Now Adamantius has come bringing me a
third. How ought I to receive a letter carried by you or yours? I
might have prayed to have a heart of stone, so as neither to remember
the past, nor to feel the present; so as to bear every blow, like
cattle, with bowed head. But what am I to think, now that, after my
first and second experience, I can admit nothing without positive
proof? Thus I write attacking your simplicity, which I see plainly to
be neither what generally becomes a Christian man, nor is appropriate
to the present emergency; I write that, at least for the future, you
may take care of yourself and spare me. I must speak to you with all
freedom, and I tell you that you are an unworthy minister of things so
great. However, whoever be the writer of the letter, I have answered
as is fit . Whether, then, you yourself are experimenting on me, or
whether really the letter which you have sent is one which you have
received from the bishops, you have my answer. At such a time as this
you ought to have borne in mind that you are my brother, and have not
yet forgotten the ties of nature, and do not regard me in the light of
an enemy, for I have entered on a life which is wearing out my
strength, and is so far beyond my powers that it is injuring even my
soul. Yet for all this, as you have determined to declare war against
me, you ought to have come to me and shared my troubles. For it is
said, "Brethren and help are against time of trouble." [2214]If the
right reverend bishops are really willing to meet me, let them make
known to me a place and time, and let them invite me by their own
men. I do not refuse to meet my own uncle, but I shall not do so
unless the invitation reaches me in due and proper form. [2215]
Footnotes
[2211] Placed in 371.
[2212] Three mss. give the title Gregorio episkopo kai adelpho, but,
as is pointed out by the Ben. Ed., the letter itself is hardly one
which would be written to one with the responsibilities of a bishop.
Basil seems to regard his brother as at liberty to come and help him
at Cæsarea. Gregory's consecration to the see of Nyssa is placed in
372, when his reluctance had to be overcome by force. cf. Letter
ccxxv. On the extraordinary circumstance of his well meant but futile
forgery of the name of his namesake and uncle, bishop of an unknown
see, vide Prolegom.
[2213] Bishop of Tyana, estranged from Basil, cf. Letters cxx., cxxi.,
cxxii., and ccx.
[2214] Eccles. xl. 24.
[2215] Negat Basilius se adfuturum, nisi decenter advocetur, id est,
nist mittantur qui eum in indictum locum deducant. Erat Basilius, ut
in ejus modi officiis exhibendis diligentissimus, ita etiam in
reposcendis attentus. Meletius Antiochenus et Theodorus
Nicopolitanus, cum Basilium ad celebritatem quamdam obiter advocassent
per Hellenium Nazianzi Peræquatorem, nec iterum misissent qui de
visdem admoneret aut deduceret; displicuit Basilio perfunctoria
invitandi ratio, ac veritus ne suspectus illis esset, adesse noluit."
Note by Ben. Ed.
Letter LIX. [2216]
To Gregory, his uncle. [2217]
1. "I have long time holden my peace. Am I to hold my peace for
ever? [2218]Shall I still further endure to enforce against myself
the hardest punishment of silence, by neither writing myself, nor
receiving any statement from another? By holding fast to this stern
determination up to the present time I am able to apply to myself the
prophet's words, "I endure patiently like travailing woman." [2219]
Yet I am ever longing for communication either in person or by letter,
and ever, for my own sins' sake, missing it. For I cannot imagine any
reason for what is happening, other than what I am convinced is the
true one, that by being cut off from your love I am expiating old
sins; if indeed I am not wrong in using such a phrase as "cut off" in
your case, from any one, much less from me, to whom you have always
been as a father. Now my sin, like some dense cloud overshadowing me,
has made me forget all this. When I reflect that the only result to
me of what is going on is sorrow, how can I attribute it to anything
but to my own wickedness? But if events are to be traced to sins, be
this the end of my troubles; if there was any intended discipline in
it, then your object has been very completely attained, for the
punishment has been going on for a long time; so I groan no longer,
but am the first to break silence, and beseech you to remember both me
and yourself who, to a greater degree than our relationship might have
demanded, have shewn me strong affection all my life. Now, I implore
you, show kindness to the city for my sake. Do not on my account
alienate yourself from it.
2. If, then, there is any consolation in Christ, any fellowship of
the Spirit, any mercy and pity, fulfil my prayer. Put a stop to my
depression. Let there be a beginning of brighter things for the
future. Be yourself a leader to others in the road to all that is
best, and follow no one else in the way to what is wrong. Never was
any feature so characteristic of any one's body as gentleness and
peace are of your soul. It were well becoming such a one as you are
to draw all others to yourself, and to cause all who come near you to
be permeated with the goodness of your nature, as with the fragrance
of myrrh. For though there be a certain amount of opposition now,
nevertheless ere long there will be a recognition of the blessings of
peace. So long, however, as room is found for the calumnies that are
bred of dissension, suspicion is sure to grow from worse to worse. It
is most certainly unbecoming for the rest to take no notice of me, but
it is especially unbecoming in your excellency. If I am wrong I shall
be all the better for being rebuked. This is impossible if we never
meet. But, if I am doing no wrong, for what am I disliked? So much I
offer in my own defence.
3. As to what the Churches might say in their own behalf, perhaps it
is better for me to be silent: they reap the result of our
disagreement, and it is not to their gain. I am not speaking to
indulge my grief but to put a stop to it. And your intelligence, I am
sure, has suffered nothing to escape you. You will yourself be better
able to discern and to tell to others points of far greater importance
than I can conceive. You saw the mischief done to the Churches before
I did; and you are grieving more than I am, for you have long learnt
from the Lord not to despise even the least. [2220]And now the
mischief is not confined to one or two, but whole cities and peoples
are sharers in my calamities. What need to tell what kind of report
will spread about me even beyond our borders? It were well for you,
large hearted as you are, to leave the love of strife to others; nay
rather, if it be possible, to root it from their hearts, while you
yourself vanquish what is grievous by endurance. Any angry man can
defend himself, but to rise above the actual anger belongs only to
you, and any one as good as you, if such there be. One thing I will
not say, that he who has a grudge against me is letting his anger fall
on the innocent. Do then comfort my soul by coming to me, or by a
letter, or by inviting me to come to you, or by some means or other.
My prayer is that your piety may be seen in the Church and that you
may heal at once me and the people, both by the sight of you and by
the words of your good grace. If this be possible it is best; if you
determine on any other course I shall willingly accept it. Only
accede to my entreaty that you will give me distinct information as to
what your wisdom decides.
Footnotes
[2216] Placed in 361, at about the same time as the preceding.
[2217] Vide n. on preceding page.
[2218] Isa. xlii. 14, LXX.
[2219] Isa. xlii. 14, LXX.
[2220] cf. Matt. xviii. 10.
Letter LX. [2221]
To Gregory his uncle.
Formerly I was glad to see my brother. Why not, since he is my
brother and such a brother? Now I have received him on his coming to
visit me with the same feelings, and have lost none of my affection.
God forbid that I should ever so feel as to forget the ties of nature
and be at war with those who are near and dear to me. I have found
his presence a comfort in my bodily sickness and the other troubles of
my soul, and I have been especially delighted at the letter which he
has brought me from your excellency. For a long time I have been
hoping that it would come, for this only reason, that I need not add
to my life any doleful episode of quarrel between kith and kin, sure
to give pleasure to foes and sorrow to friends, and to be displeasing
to God, Who has laid down perfect love as the distinctive
characteristic of His disciples. So I reply, as I am indeed bound,
with an earnest request for your prayers for me, and your care for me
in all things, as your relative. Since I, from want of information,
cannot clearly understand the meaning of what is going on, I have
judged it right to accept the truth of the account which you are so
good as to give me. It is for you of your wisdom to settle the rest,
our meeting with one another, the fitting time and a convenient
place. If your reverence really does not disdain to come down to my
lowliness and to have speech with me, whether you wish the interview
to take place in the presence of others or in private, I shall make no
objection, for I have once for all made up my mind to submit to you in
love, and to carry out, without exception, what your reverence enjoins
on me for the glory of God.
I have not laid my reverend brother under the necessity of reporting
anything to you by word of mouth, because on the former occasion what
he said was not borne out by facts.
Footnotes
[2221] Of the same time as the preceding.
Letter LXI. [2222]
To Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria. [2223]
I have read the letter of your holiness, in which you have expressed
your distress at the unhappy governor of Libya. I am grieved that my
own country should have given birth to and nurtured such vices. I am
grieved too that Libya, a neighbouring country, should suffer from our
evils, and should have been delivered to the inhumanity of a man whose
life is marked at once by cruelty and crime. This however is only in
accordance with the wisdom of the Preacher, "Woe to thee O land when
thy King is a child;" [2224] (a still further touch of trouble) and
whose "Princes" do not "eat" after night but revel at mid-day, raging
after other men's wives with less understanding than brute beasts.
This man must surely look for the scourges of the righteous Judge,
repaid him in exact requital for those which he himself has previously
inflicted on the saints. Notice has been given to my Church in
accordance with the letter of your reverence, and he shall be held by
all as abominable, cut off from fire, water and shelter, if indeed in
the case of men so possessed there is any use in general and unanimous
condemnation. Notoriety is enough for him, and your own letter, which
has been read in all directions, for I shall not fail to show it to
all his friends and relatives. Assuredly, even if retribution does
not reach him at once, as it did Pharaoh, certainly it will bring on
him hereafter a heavy and hard requital.
Footnotes
[2222] Placed in 370 or 371.
[2223] This, the first of Basil's six extant letters to Athanasius, is
placed by the Ben. Ed. in 371. It has no certain indication of date.
Athanasius, in the few years of comparative calm which preceded his
death in May, 373, had excommunicated a vicious governor in Libya, a
native of Cappadocia, and announced his act to Basil. The intercourse
opened by this official communication led to a more important
correspondence.
[2224] Eccles. x. 16.
Letter LXII. [2225]
To the Church of Parnassus. [2226]
Following an ancient custom, which has obtained for many years, and at
the same time shewing you love in God, which is the fruit of the
Spirit, I now, my pious friends, address this letter to you. I feel
with you at once in your grief at the event which has befallen you,
and in your anxiety at the matter which you have in hand. Concerning
all these troubles I can only say, that an occasion is given us to
look to the injunctions of the Apostle, and not to sorrow "even as
others which have no hope." [2227]I do not mean that we should be
insensible to the loss we have suffered, but that we should not
succumb to our sorrow, while we count the Pastor happy in his end. He
has died in a ripe old age, and has found his rest in the great honour
given him by his Lord.
As to the future I have this recommendation to give you. You must now
lay aside all mourning; you must come to yourselves; you must rise to
the necessary management of the Church; to the end that the holy God
may give heed to His own little flock, and may grant you a shepherd in
accordance with His own will, who may wisely feed you.
Footnotes
[2225] Placed about 371.
[2226] A town in Northern Cappadocia, on the right bank of the Halys,
on or near a hill whence it was named, on the road between Ancyra and
Archelais. The letter appears to Maran (Vita S. Bas. xvi.) to have
been written before the encouragement given to the Arians by the visit
of Valens in 372. The result of Basil's appeal to the Parnassenes was
the election of an orthodox bishop, expelled by the Arians in 375, and
named Hypsis or Hypsinus. cf. Letter ccxxxvii., where Ecdicius is
said to have succeeded Hypsis; and ccxxxviii., where Ecdicius is
called Parnassenos.
[2227] 1 Thess. iv. 13.
Letter LXIII. [2228]
To the Governor of Neocæsarea.
The wise man, even if he dwells far away, even if I never set eyes on
him, I count a friend. So says the tragedian Euripides. And so, if,
though I have never had the pleasure of meeting your excellency in
person, I speak of myself as a familiar friend, pray do not set this
down to mere empty compliment. Common report, which loudly proclaims
your universal benevolence, is, in this instance, the promoter of
friendship. Indeed since I met the highly respectable Elpidius,
[2229] I have known you as well, and I have been as completely
captured by you, as though I had long lived with you and had practical
experience of your excellent qualities. For he did not cease telling
me about you, mentioning one by one your magnanimity, your exalted
sentiments, your mild manners, your skill in business, intelligence,
dignity tempered by cheerfulness, and eloquence. All the other points
that he enumerated in his long conversation with me it is impossible
for me to write to you, without extending my letter beyond all
reasonable bounds. How can I fail to love such a man? How could I
put such restraint upon myself as not loudly to proclaim what I feel?
Accept then, most excellent Sir, the greeting which I send you, for it
is inspired by true and unfeigned friendship. I abhor all servile
compliment. Pray keep me enrolled in the list of your friends, and,
by frequently writing to me, bring yourself before me and comfort me
in your absence.
Footnotes
[2228] Of about the same date as the preceding.
[2229] Another reading is Helladius. cf. Letters lxiv., lxxvii., and
lxxviii. The identification of these Elpidii is conjectural. The
name was common.
Letter LXIV. [2230]
To Hesychius. [2231]
From the beginning I have had many points in common with your
excellency, your love of letters, everywhere reported by all who have
experienced it, and our old friendship with the admirable Terentius.
But since that most excellent man, who is to me all that friendship
could require, my worthy brother Elpidius, has met me, and told me all
your good qualities, (and who more capable than he at once to perceive
a man's virtue and to describe it?) he has kindled in me such a desire
to see you, that I pray that you may one day visit me in my old home,
that I may enjoy your good qualities, not merely by hearing of them,
but by actual experience.
Footnotes
[2230] Of about the same date as the preceding.
[2231] cf. Letter lxii.
Letter LXV. [2232]
To Atarbius. [2233]
If I continue to insist on the privileges to which my superior age
entitles me, and wait for you to take the initiative in communication
, and if you, my friend, wish to adhere more persistently to your evil
counsel of inaction, what end will there be to our silence? However,
where friendship is involved, to be defeated is in my opinion to win,
and so I am quite ready to gave you precedence, and retire from the
contest as to which should maintain his own opinion. I have been the
first to betake myself to writing, because I know that "charity
beareth all things...endureth all things...seeketh not her own" and so
"never faileth." [2234]He who subjects himself to his neighbour in
love can never be humiliated. I do beg you, then, at all events for
the future, show the first and greatest fruit of the Spirit, Love;
[2235] away with the angry man's sullenness which you are showing me
by your silence, and recover joy in your heart, peace with the
brothers who are of one mind with you, and zeal and anxiety for the
continued safety of the Churches of the Lord. If I were not to make
as strenuous efforts on behalf of the Churches as the opponents of
sound doctrine make to subvert and utterly destroy them, you may be
quite sure that there is nothing to prevent the truth from being swept
away and destroyed by its enemies, and my being involved in the
condemnation, for not shewing all possible anxiety for the unity of
the Churches, with all zeal and eagerness in mutual unanimity and
godly agreement. I exhort you then, drive out of your mind the idea
that you need communion with no one else. To cut one's self off from
connexion with the brethren is not the mark of one who is walking by
love, nor yet the fulfilling of the commandment of Christ. At the
same time I do wish you, with all your good intentions, to take into
account that the calamities of the war which are now all round about
us [2236] may one day be at our own doors, and if we too, like all the
rest, have our share of outrage, we shall not find any even to
sympathise with us, because in the hour of our prosperity we refused
to give our share of sympathy to the wronged.
Footnotes
[2232] Placed about 371, or, at all events, according to Maran, before
the year 373, when the ill will of Atarbius towards Basil was
violently manifested.
[2233] Atarbius is recognised as bishop of Neocæsarea, partly on the
evidence of the Codices Coislinanus and Medicæus, which describe him
as of Neocæsarea, partly on a comparison of Letters lxv. and cxxvi.,
addressed to him, with the circumstances of the unnamed bishop of
Neocæsarea referred to in Letter ccx. Moreover (cf. Bp. Lightfoot,
D.C.B. i. 179) at the Council of Constantinople he represented the
province of Pontus Polemoniacus, of which Neocæsarea was metropolis.
On the authority of an allusion in Letter ccx. sec. 4, Atarbius is
supposed to be a kinsman of Basil.
[2234] 1 Cor. xiii. 7 and 8.
[2235] cf. Gal. v. 22.
[2236] i.e. the attacks of Valens on the Church.
Letter LXVI. [2237]
To Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria.
No one, I feel sure, is more distressed at the present condition, or,
rather to speak more truly, ill condition of the Churches than your
excellency; for you compare the present with the past, and take into
account how great a change has come about. You are well aware that if
no check is put to the swift deterioration which we are witnessing,
there will soon be nothing to prevent the complete transformation of
the Churches. And if the decay of the Churches seems so pitiful to
me, what must--so I have often in my lonely musings reflected--be the
feelings of one who has known, by experience, the old tranquillity of
the Churches of the Lord, and their one mind about the faith? But as
your excellency feels most deeply this distress, it seems to me only
becoming that your wisdom should be more strongly moved to interest
itself in the Church's behalf. I for my part have long been aware, so
far as my moderate intelligence has been able to judge of current
events, that the one way of safety for the Churches of the East lies
in their having the sympathy of the bishops of the West. For if only
those bishops liked to show the same energy on behalf of the
Christians sojourning in our part of the world [2238] which they have
shewn in the case of one or two of the men convicted of breaches of
orthodoxy in the West, our common interests would probably reap no
small benefit, our sovereigns treating the authority of the people
with respect, and the laity in all quarters unhesitatingly following
them. [2239]But, to carry out these objects, who has more capacity
than yourself, with your intelligence and prudence? Who is keener to
see the needful course to be taken? Who has more practical experience
in working a profitable policy? Who feels more deeply the troubles of
the brethren? What through all the West is more honoured than your
venerable gray hairs? [2240]O most honoured father, leave behind
you some memorial worthy of your life and character. By this one act
crown your innumerable efforts on behalf of true religion. Despatch
from the holy Church placed under your care men of ability in sound
doctrine to the bishops in the West. Recount to them the troubles
whereby we are beset. Suggest some mode of relief. Be a Samuel to
the Churches. Share the grief of the beleaguered people. Offer
prayers for peace. Ask favour from the Lord, that He will send some
memorial of peace to the Churches. I know how weak letters are to
move men in matters of such importance; but you yourself no more need
exhortation from others than the noblest athletes need the children's
cheers. It is not as though I were instructing one in ignorance; I am
only giving a new impulse to one whose energies are already roused.
For the rest of the affairs of the East perhaps you may need the aid
of more, and we must wait for the Westerns. But plainly the
discipline of the Church of Antioch depends upon your reverence's
being able to control some, to reduce others to silence, and to
restore strength to the Church by concord. [2241]No one knows
better than you do, that, like all wise physicians, you ought to begin
your treatment in the most vital parts, and what part is more vital to
the Churches throughout the world than Antioch? Only let Antioch be
restored to harmony, and nothing will stand in the way of her
supplying, as a healthy head, soundness to all the body. Truly the
diseases of that city, which has not only been cut asunder by
heretics, but is torn in pieces by men who say that they are of one
mind with one another, stand in need of your wisdom and evangelic
sympathy. To unite the sundered parts again, and bring about the
harmony of one body, belongs to Him alone Who by His ineffable power
grants even to the dry bones to come back again to sinews and flesh.
But the Lord always works His mighty works by means of them that are
worthy of Him. Once again, in this case too, we trust that the
ministry of matters so important may beseem your excellency, with the
result that you will lay the tempest of the people, do away with the
party superiorities, and subject all to one another in love, and give
back to the Church her ancient strength.
Footnotes
[2237] Placed in 371. cf. Letter lxii.
[2238] huper tes paroikias ton kath' hemas meron. On the use of
paroikia in this sense, cf. Bp. Lightfoot, Ap. Fathers I. ii. 5. So
Apollon. in Eus., H.E. v. 18. he hidia paroikia, of the Christian
society. Thus the meaning passes to parochia and parish.
[2239] "Them" is referred by the Ben. Ed. not to the sovereigns (ton
kratounton they understand to mean Valens) but to the Western bishops.
[2240] A various reading ("Tres mss. et secunda manu Medicoeus," Ben.
Ed.) for polias reads politeias "the life and conversation of your
Holiness."--Athanasius was now about 75. His death is placed in 373.
[2241] To end the schism caused by the refusal of the Eustathian or
old Catholic party to recognise Meletius as bishop of the whole
orthodox body. The churches of the West and Egypt, on the whole,
supported Paulinus, who had been ordained by Lucifer of Cagliari,
bishop of the old Catholics. The Ben. Ed. supposes the word
oikonomesai, which I have rendered "control," to refer to Paulinus.
The East supported Meletius, and if the oikonomia in Basil's mind does
refer to Paulinus, the "management" meant may be management to get rid
of him.
Letter LXVII. [2242]
To Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria.
In my former letter it seemed to me sufficient to point out to your
excellency, that all that portion of the people of the holy Church of
Antioch who are sound in the faith, ought to be brought to concord and
unity. My object was to make it plain that the sections, now divided
into several parts, ought to be united under the God-beloved bishop
Meletius. Now the same beloved deacon, Dorotheus, has requested a
more distinct statement on these subjects, and I am therefore
constrained to point out that it is the prayer of the whole East, and
the earnest desire of one who, like myself, is so wholly united to
him, to see him in authority over the Churches of the Lord. He is a
man of unimpeachable faith; his manner of life is incomparably
excellent, he stands at the head, so to say, of the whole body of the
Church, and all else are mere disjointed members. On every ground,
then, it is necessary as well as advantageous, that the rest should be
united with him, just as smaller streams with great ones. About the
rest, [2243] however, a certain amount of management is needed,
befitting their position, and likely to pacify the people. This is in
keeping with your own wisdom, and with your famous readiness and
energy. It has however by no means escaped your intelligence, that
this same course of procedure has already recommended itself to the
Westerns who are in agreement with you, as I learn from the letters
brought to me by the blessed Silvanus.
Footnotes
[2242] Of the same year as the preceding.
[2243] i.e. Paulinus and his adherents.
Letter LXVIII. [2244]
To Meletius, bishop of Antioch.
I wished to detain the reverend brother Dorotheus, the deacon, so long
at my side, with the object of keeping him until the end of the
negociations, and so by him acquainting your excellency with every
detail. But day after day went by; the delay was becoming protracted;
now, the moment that some plan, so far as is possible in my
difficulties, has occurred to me concerning the course to be taken, I
send him to approach your holiness, to make a personal report to you
on all the circumstances, and show you my memorandum, to the end that,
if what has occurred to me seems to you to be likely to be of service,
your excellency may urge on its accomplishment. To be brief, the
opinion has prevailed that it is best for this our brother Dorotheus
to travel to Rome, to move some of the Italians to undertake a voyage
by sea to visit us, that they may avoid all who would put difficulties
in their way. My reason for this course is that I see that those, who
are all powerful with the Emperor, are neither willing nor able to
make any suggestion to him about the exiled, but only count it so much
to the good that they see no worse thing befalling the Churches. If,
then, my plan seems good also to your prudence, you will be good
enough both to indite letters and dictate memoranda as to the points
on which he must enlarge, and as to whom he had better address
himself. And so that your despatches may have weight and authority,
you will add all those who share your sentiments, even though they are
not on the spot. Here all is uncertain; Euippius [2245] has arrived,
but so far has made no sign. However, he and those who think with him
from the Armenian Tetrapolis and Cilicia are threatening a tumultuous
meeting.
Footnotes
[2244] Of the same time.
[2245] cf. Letter ccli.
Letter LXIX. [2246]
To Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria.
1. As time moves on, it continually confirms the opinion which I have
long held of your holiness; or rather that opinion is strengthened by
the daily course of events. Most men are indeed satisfied with
observing, each one, what lies especially within his own province; not
thus is it with you, but your anxiety for all the Churches is no less
than that which you feel for the Church that has been especially
entrusted to you by our common Lord; inasmuch as you leave no interval
in speaking, exhorting, writing, and despatching emissaries, who from
time to time give the best advice in each emergency as it arises.
Now, from the sacred ranks of your clergy, you have sent forth the
venerable brother Peter, whom I have welcomed with great joy. I have
also approved of the good object of his journey, which he manifests in
accordance with the commands of your excellency, in effecting
reconciliation where he finds opposition, and bringing about union
instead of division. With the object of offering some contribution to
the action which is being taken in this matter, I have thought that I
could not make a more fitting beginning than by having recourse to
your excellency, as to the head and chief of all, and treating you as
alike adviser and commander in the enterprise. I have therefore
determined to send to your reverence our brother Dorotheus the deacon,
of the Church under the right honourable bishop Meletius, being one
who at once is an energetic supporter of the orthodox faith, and is
earnestly desirous of seeing the peace of the Churches. The results,
I hope, will be, that, following your suggestions (which you are able
to make with the less likelihood of failure, both from your age and
your experience in affairs, and because you have a greater measure
than all others of the aid of the Spirit), he may thus attempt the
achievement of our objects. You will welcome him, I am sure, and will
look upon him with friendly eyes. You will strengthen him by the help
of your prayers; you will give him a letter as provision by the way;
you will grant him, as companions, some of the good men and true that
you have about you; so you will speed him on the road to what is
before him. It has seemed to me to be desirable to send a letter to
the bishop of Rome, begging him to examine our condition, and since
there are difficulties in the way of representatives being sent from
the West by a general synodical decree, to advise him to exercise his
own personal authority in the matter by choosing suitable persons to
sustain the labours of a journey,--suitable, too, by gentleness and
firmness of character, to correct the unruly among us here; able to
speak with proper reserve and appropriateness, and thoroughly well
acquainted with all that has been effected after Ariminum to undo the
violent measures adopted there. I should advise that, without any one
knowing anything about it, they should travel hither, attracting as
little attention as possible, by the sea, with the object of escaping
the notice of the enemies of peace.
2. A point also that is insisted upon by some of those in these
parts, very necessarily, as is plain even to myself, is that they
[2247] should drive away the heresy of Marcellus, [2248] as grievous
and injurious and opposed to the sound faith. For up to this time, in
all the letters which they write, they are constant in thoroughly
anathematizing the ill-famed Arius and in repudiating him from the
Churches. But they attach no blame to Marcellus, who propounded a
heresy diametrically opposite to that of Arius, and impiously attacked
the very existence of the Only begotten Godhead, and erroneously
understood the term "Word." [2249]He grants indeed that the Only
begotten was called "Word," on coming forth at need and in season, but
states that He returned again to Him whence He had come forth, and had
no existence before His coming forth, nor hypostasis [2250] after His
return. The books in my possession which contain his unrighteous
writings exist as a proof of what I say. Nevertheless they nowhere
openly condemned him, and are to this extent culpable that, being from
the first in ignorance of the truth, they received him into the
communion of the Church. The present state of affairs makes it
specially necessary that attention should be called to him, so that
those who seek for their opportunity, may be prevented from getting
it, from the fact of sound men being united to your holiness, and all
who are lame in the true faith may be openly known; that so we may
know who are on our side, and may not struggle, as in a night battle,
without being able to distinguish between friends and foes. Only I do
beseech you that the deacon, whom I have mentioned, be despatched by
the earliest possible packet, that at least some of the ends which we
pray for may be accomplished during the ensuing year. One thing,
however, even before I mention it, you quite understand and I am sure
will give heed to, that, when they come, if God will, they must not
let loose schisms among the Churches; and, even though they find some
who have personal reasons for mutual differences, they must leave no
means untried to unite all who are of the same way of thinking. For
we are bound to regard the interests of peace as paramount, and that
first of all attention be paid to the Church at Antioch, lest the
sound portion of it grow diseased through division on personal
grounds. But you will yourself give more complete attention to all
these matters, so soon as, by the blessing of God, you find every one
entrusting to you the responsibility of securing the peace of the
Church.
Footnotes
[2246] Of the same period as the preceding.
[2247] i.e. the Romans; specially the proposed commissioners. It was
a sore point with Basil that Marcellus, whom he regarded as a trimmer,
should have been "received into communion by Julius and Athanasius,
popes of Rome and Alexandria." Jer., De Vir. Illust. c. 86.
[2248] On the heretical opinions attributed to Marcellus of Ancyra,
cf. Letters cxxv. and cclxiii.
[2249] Although he strongly espoused the Catholic cause of Nicæa later
in attacking the errors of Asterius, he was supposed to teach that the
Son had no real personality, but was merely an external manifestation
of the Father.
[2250] huphestanai.
Letter LXX. [2251]
Without address. [2252]
To renew laws of ancient love, and once again to restore to vigorous
life that heavenly and saving gift of Christ which in course of time
has withered away, the peace, I mean, of the Fathers, is a labour
necessary indeed and profitable to me, but pleasant too, as I am sure
it will seem to your Christ-loving disposition. For what could be
more delightful than to behold all, who are separated by distances so
vast, bound together by the union effected by love into one harmony of
members in Christ's body? Nearly all the East (I include under this
name all the regions from Illyricum to Egypt) is being agitated, right
honourable father, by a terrible storm and tempest. The old heresy,
sown by Arius the enemy of the truth, has now boldly and unblushingly
reappeared. Like some sour root, it is producing its deadly fruit and
is prevailing. The reason of this is, that in every district the
champions of right doctrine have been exiled from their Churches by
calumny and outrage, and the control of affairs has been handed over
to men who are leading captive the souls of the simpler brethren. I
have looked upon the visit of your mercifulness as the only possible
solution of our difficulties. Ever in the past I have been consoled
by your extraordinary affection; and for a short time my heart was
cheered by the gratifying report that we shall be visited by you.
But, as I was disappointed, I have been constrained to beseech you by
letter to be moved to help us, and to send some of those, who are like
minded with us, either to conciliate the dissentient and bring back
the Churches of God into friendly union, or at all events to make you
see more plainly who are responsible for the unsettled state in which
we are, that it may be obvious to you for the future with whom it
befits you to be in communion. In this I am by no means making any
novel request, but am only asking what has been customary in the case
of men who, before our own day, were blessed and dear to God, and
conspicuously in your own case. For I well remember learning from the
answers made by our fathers when asked, and from documents still
preserved among us, that the illustrious and blessed bishop Dionysius,
conspicuous in your see as well for soundness of faith as for all
other virtues, visited by letter my Church of Cæsarea, and by letter
exhorted our fathers, and sent men to ransom our brethren from
captivity. [2253]But now our condition is yet more painful and
gloomy and needs more careful treatment. We are lamenting no mere
overthrow of earthly buildings, but the capture of Churches; what we
see before us is no mere bodily slavery, but a carrying away of souls
into captivity, perpetrated day by day by the champions of heresy.
Should you not, even now, be moved to succour us, ere long all will
have fallen under the dominion of the heresy, and you will find none
left to whom you may hold out your hand.
Footnotes
[2251] Of the same period as the preceding.
[2252] "This letter is obviously addressed to Pope Damasus."--Ben. Ed.
[2253] The Ben. Ed. points out that what is related by Basil, of the
kindness of the bishops of Rome to other churches, is confirmed by the
evidence both of Dionysius, bishop of Corinth (cf. Eusebius, Hist.
Ecc. iv. 23), of Dionysius of Alexandria (Dionysius to Sixtus II. Apud
Euseb., Ecc. Hist. vii. 5), and of Eusebius himself who in his history
speaks of the practice having been continued down to the persecution
in his own day. The troubles referred to by Basil took place in the
time of Gallienus, when the Scythians ravaged Cappadocia and the
neighbouring countries. (cf. Sozomen, ii. 6.) Dionysius succeeded
Sixtus II. at Rome in 259.
Letter LXXI. [2254]
Basil to Gregory. [2255]
1. I have received the letter of your holiness, by the most reverend
brother Helenius, and what you have intimated he has told me in plain
terms. How I felt on hearing it, you cannot doubt at all. However,
since I have determined that my affection for you shall outweigh my
pain, whatever it is, I have accepted it as I ought to do, and I pray
the holy God, that my remaining days or hours may be as carefully
conducted in their disposition towards you as they have been in past
time, during which, my conscience tells me, I have been wanting to you
in nothing small or great. [But that the man who boasts that he is
now just beginning to take a look at the life of Christians, and
thinks he will get some credit by having something to do with me,
should invent what he has not heard, and narrate what he has never
experienced, is not at all surprising. What is surprising and
extraordinary is that he has got my best friends among the brethren at
Nazianzus to listen to him; and not only to listen to him, but as it
seems, to take in what he says. On most grounds it might be
surprising that the slanderer is of such a character, and that I am
the victim, but these troublous times have taught us to bear
everything with patience. Slights greater than this have, for my
sins, long been things of common occurrence with me. I have never yet
given this man's brethren any evidence of my sentiments [2256] about
God, and I have no answer to make now. Men who are not convinced by
long experience are not likely to be convinced by a short letter. If
the former is enough let the charges of the slanderers be counted as
idle tales. But if I give license to unbridled mouths, and
uninstructed hearts, to talk about whom they will, all the while
keeping my ears ready to listen, I shall not be alone in hearing what
is said by other people; they will have to hear what I have to say.]
2. I know what has led to all this, and have urged every topic to
hinder it; but now I am sick of the subject, and will say no more
about it, I mean our little intercourse. For had we kept our old
promise to each other, and had due regard to the claims which the
Churches have on us, we should have been the greater part of the year
together; and then there would have been no opening for these
calumniators. Pray have nothing to say to them; let me persuade you
to come here and assist me in my labours, particularly in my contest
with the individual who is now assailing me. Your very appearance
will have the effect of stopping him; directly you show these
disturbers of our home that you will, by God's blessing, place
yourself at the head of our party, you will break up their cabal, and
you will shut every unjust mouth that speaketh unrighteousness against
God. And thus facts will show who are your followers in good, and who
are the halters and cowardly betrayers of the word of truth. If,
however, the Church be betrayed, why then I shall care little to set
men right about myself, by means of words, who account of me as men
would naturally account who have not yet learned to measure
themselves. Perhaps, in a short time, by God's grace, I shall be able
to refute their slanders by very deed, for it seems likely that I
shall have soon to suffer somewhat for the truth's sake more than
usual; the best I can expect is banishment, or, if this hope fails,
after all Christ's judgment-seat is not far distant. [If then you ask
for a meeting for the Churches' sake, I am ready to betake myself
whithersoever you invite me. But if it is only a question of refuting
these slanders, I really have no time to reply to them.]
Footnotes
[2254] Placed in the same period.
[2255] When Gregory, on the elevation of Basil to the Episcopate, was
at last induced to visit his old friend, he declined the dignities
which Basil pressed upon him (tende tes kathedras timen, i.e. the
position of chief presbyter or coadjutor bishop, Orat. xliii. 39), and
made no long stay. Some Nazianzene scandal-mongers had charged Basil
with heterodoxy. Gregory asked him for explanations, and Basil,
somewhat wounded, rejoins that no explanations are needed. The
translation in the text with the exception of the passages in
brackets, is that of Newman. cf. Proleg. and reff. to Greg. Naz.
[2256] proaireseos , as in three mss.
Letter LXXII. [2257]
To Hesychius. [2258]
I know your affection for me, and your zeal for all that is good. I
am exceedingly anxious to pacify my very dear son Callisthenes, and I
thought that if I could associate you with me in this I might more
easily achieve my object. Callisthenes is very much annoyed at the
conduct of Eustochius, and he has very good ground for being so. He
charges the household of Eustochius with impudence and violence
against himself. I am begging him to be propitiated, satisfied with
the fright which he has given the impudent fellows and their master,
and to forgive, and end the quarrel. Thus two results will follow; he
will win the respect of men, and praise with God, if only he will
combine forbearance with threats. If you have any friendship and
intimacy with him, pray ask this favour of him, and, if you know any
in the town likely to be able to move him, get them to act with you,
and tell them that it will be specially gratifying to me. Send back
the deacon so soon as his commission is performed. After men have
fled for refuge to me, I should be ashamed not to be able to be of any
use to them.
Footnotes
[2257] Placed at about the same period as the preceding.
[2258] cf. Letter lxiv. Letters lxxii. and lxxiii. illustrate the
efforts made by Basil to mitigate the troubles caused by slavery, and
to regulate domestic as well as ecclesiastical matters.
Letter LXXIII. [2259]
To Callisthenes.
1. When I had read your letter I thanked God; first, that I been
greeted by a man desirous of doing me honour, for truly I highly
estimate any intercourse with persons of high merit; secondly, with
pleasure at the thought of being remembered. For a letter is a sign
of remembrance; and when I had received yours and learnt its contents
I was astonished to find how, as all were agreed, it paid me the
respect due to a father from a son. That a man in the heat of anger
and indignation, eager to punish those who had annoyed him, should
drop more than half his vehemence and give me authority to decide the
matter, caused me to feel such joy as I might over a son in the
spirit. In return, what remains for me but to pray for all blessings
for you? May you be a delight to your friends, a terror to your foes,
an object of respect to all, to the end that any who fall short in
their duty to you may, when they learn how gentle you are, only blame
themselves for having wronged one of such a character as yourself!
2. I should be very glad to know the object which your goodness has
in view, in ordering the servants to be conveyed to the spot where
they were guilty of their disorderly conduct. If you come yourself,
and exact in person the punishment due for the offence, the slaves
shall be there. What other course is possible if you have made up
your mind? Only that I do not know what further favour I shall have
received, if I shall have failed to get the boys off their
punishment. But if business detain you on the way, who is to receive
the fellows there? Who is to punish them in your stead? But if you
have made up your mind to meet them yourself, and this is quite
determined on, tell them to halt at Sasima, and there show the extent
of your gentleness and magnanimity. After having your assailants in
your own power, and so showing them that your dignity is not to be
lightly esteemed, let them go scot free, as I urged you in my former
letter. So you will confer a favour on me, and will receive the
requital of your good deed from God.
3. I speak in this way, not because the business ought so to be
ended, but as a concession to your agitated feelings, and in fear lest
somewhat of your wrath may remain still raw. When a man's eyes are
inflamed the softest application seems painful, and I am afraid lest
what I say may rather irritate than calm you. What would really be
most becoming, bringing great credit to you, and no little cause of
honour to me with my friends and contemporaries, would be for you to
leave the punishment to me. And although you have sworn to deliver
them to execution as the law enjoins, my rebuke is still of no less
value as a punishment, nor is the divine law of less account than the
laws current in the world. But it will be possible for them, by being
punished here by our laws, wherein too lies your own hope of
salvation, both to release you from your oath and to undergo a penalty
commensurate with their faults.
But once more I am making my letter too long. In the very earnest
desire to persuade you I cannot bear to leave unsaid any of the pleas
which occur to me, and I am much afraid lest my entreaty should prove
ineffectual from my failing to say all that may convey my meaning.
Now, true and honoured son of the Church, confirm the hopes which I
have of you; prove true all the testimony unanimously given to your
placability and gentleness. Give orders to the soldier to leave me
without delay; he is now as tiresome and rude as he can well be; he
evidently prefers giving no cause of annoyance to you to making all of
us here his close friends.
Footnotes
[2259] Of the same date as the preceding.
Letter LXXIV. [2260]
To Martinianus. [2261]
1. How high do you suppose one to prize the pleasure of our meeting
one another once again? How delightful to spend longer time with you
so as to enjoy all your good qualities! If powerful proof is given of
culture in seeing many men's cities and knowing many men's ways,
[2262] such I am sure is quickly given in your society. For what is
the difference between seeing many men singly or one who has gained
experience of all together? I should say that there is an immense
superiority in that which gives us the knowledge of good and beautiful
things without trouble, and puts within our reach instruction in
virtue, pure from all admixture of evil. Is there question of noble
deed; of words worth handing down; of institutions of men of
superhuman excellence? All are treasured in the store house of your
mind. Not then, would I pray, that I might listen to you, like
Alcinous to Ulysses, only for a year, but throughout all my life; and
to this end I would pray that my life might be long, even though my
state were no easy one. Why, then, am I now writing when I ought to
be coming to see you? Because my country in her troubles calls me
irresistibly to her side. You know, my friend, how she suffers. She
is torn in pieces like Pentheus by veritable Mænads, dæmons. They are
dividing her, and dividing her again, like bad surgeons who, in their
ignorance, make wounds worse. Suffering as she is from this
dissection, it remains for me to tend her like a sick patient. So the
Cæsareans have urgently appealed to me by letter, and I must go, not
as though I could be of any help, but to avoid any blame of neglect.
You know how ready men in difficulties are to hope; and ready too, I
ween, to find fault, always charging their troubles on what has been
left undone.
2. Yet for this very reason I ought to have come to see you, and to
have told you my mind, or rather to implore you to bethink you of some
strong measure worthy of your wisdom; not to turn aside from my
country falling on her knees, but to betake yourself to the Court,
and, with the boldness which is all your own, not to let them suppose
that they own two provinces instead of one. They have not imported
the second from some other part of the world, but have acted somewhat
in the same way in which some owner of horse or ox might act, who
should cut it in two, and then think that he had two instead of one,
instead of failing to make two and destroying the one he had. Tell
the Emperor and his ministers that they are not after this fashion
increasing the empire, for power lies not in number but in condition.
I am sure that now men are neglecting the course of events, some,
possibly, from ignorance of the truth, some from their being unwilling
to say anything offensive, some because it does not immediately
concern them. The course likely to be most beneficial, and worthy of
your high principles, would be for you, if possible, to approach the
Emperor in person. If this is difficult both on account of the season
of the year and of your age, of which, as you say, inactivity is the
foster brother, at all events you need have no difficulty in writing.
If you thus give our country the aid of a letter, you will first of
all have the satisfaction of knowing that you have left nothing undone
that was in your power, and further, by showing sympathy, if only in
appearance, you will give the patient much comfort. Would only that
it were possible for you to come yourself among us and actually see
our deplorable condition! Thus, perhaps, stirred by the plain
evidence before you, you might have spoken in terms worthy alike of
your own magnanimity and of the affliction of Cæsarea. But do not
withhold belief from what I am telling you. Verily we want some
Simonides, or other like poet, to lament our troubles from actual
experience. But why name Simonides? I should rather mention
Æschylus, or any other who has set forth a great calamity in words
like his, and uttered lamentation with a mighty voice.
3. Now we have no more meetings, no more debates, no more gatherings
of wise men in the Forum, nothing more of all that made our city
famous. In our Forum nowadays it would be stranger for a learned or
eloquent man to put in an appearance, than it would for men, shewing a
brand of iniquity or unclean hands, to have presented themselves in
Athens of old. Instead of them we have the imported boorishness of
Massagetæ and Scythians. And only one noise is heard of drivers of
bargains, and losers of bargains, and of fellows under the lash. On
either hand the porticoes resound with doleful echoes, as though they
were uttering a natural and proper sound in groaning at what is going
on. Our distress prevents our paying any attention to locked gymnasia
and nights when no torch is lighted. There is no small danger lest,
our magistrates being removed, everything crash down together as with
fallen props. What words can adequately describe our calamities?
Some have fled into exile, a considerable portion of our senate, and
that not the least valuable, prefering perpetual banishment to
Podandus. [2263]When I mention Podandus, suppose me to mean the
Spartan Ceadas [2264] or any natural pit that you may have seen, spots
breathing a noxious vapour, to which some have involuntarily given the
name Charonian. Picture to yourself that the evils of Podandus are a
match for such a place. So, of three parts, some have left their
homes and are in exile, wives and hearth and all; some are being led
away like captives, the majority of the best men in the city, a
piteous spectacle to their friends, fulfilling their enemies' prayers;
if, that is, any one has ever been found to call down so dire a curse
upon our heads. A third division yet remains: these, unable to
endure abandonment by their old companions, and at the same time
unable to provide for themselves, have to hate their very lives.
This is what I implore you to make known everywhere with an eloquence
all your own, and that righteous boldness of speech which your manner
of life gives you. One thing distinctly state; that, unless the
authorities soon change their counsels, they will find none left on
whom to exercise their clemency. You will either prove some help to
the state, or at least you will have done as Solon did, who, when he
was unable to defend his abandoned fellow citizens on the capture of
the Acropolis, put on his armour, and sat down before the gates, thus
making it plain by this guise that he was no party to what was going
on. [2265]Of one thing I am assured, even though at the present
moment there may be some who do not approve of your advice, the day is
not far distant when they will give you the greatest credit for
benevolence and sagacity, because they see events corresponding with
your prediction.
Footnotes
[2260] About the same date as the preceding.
[2261] A dignitary of Cappadocia otherwise unknown, whom Basil asks to
intercede with the Emperor Valens to prevent that division of
Cappadocia which afterward led to so much trouble. Basil had left
Cæsarea in the autumn of 371, on a tour of visitation, or to
consecrate his brother bishop of Nyssa (Maran, Vit. Bas. Cap. xix.),
and returned to Cæsarea at the appeal of his people there.
[2262] cf. the opening of the Odyssey, and the imitation of Horace, De
Arte Poet. 142: "Qui mores hominum multorum vidit et urbes."
[2263] Now Podando, in Southern Cappadocia, made by Valens the chief
town of the new division of the province.
[2264] So the Spartans named the pit into which condemned criminals
were thrown. Pausanias, Book IV. 18, 4. Thucyd., i. 134. Strabo,
viii. 367.
[2265] i.e. on the seizure of the Acropolis by Pisistratus, Solon,
resisting the instance of his friends that he should flee, returned
them for answer, when they asked him on what he relied for protection,
"on my old age." Plutarch, Solon 30. The senate being of the faction
of Pisistratus, said that he was mad. Solon replied: Deixei de manien
men emen Baios chronos astois, Deixei aletheies es meson erchomenes.
Diog. Laert. 1-49
Letter LXXV. [2266]
To Aburgius. [2267]
You have many qualities which raise you above the common run of men,
but nothing is more distinctly characteristic of you than your zeal
for your country. Thus you, who have risen to such a height as to
become illustrious throughout all the world, pay a righteous
recompense to the land that gave you birth. Yet she, your mother
city, who bore you and nursed you, has fallen into the incredible
condition of ancient story; and no one visiting Cæsarea; not even
those most familiar with her, would recognise her as she is; to such
complete abandonment has she been suddenly transformed, many of her
magistrates having been previously removed, and now nearly all of them
transferred to Podandus. The remainder, torn from these like
mutilated extremities, have themselves fallen into complete despair,
and have caused such a general weight of despondency, that the
population of the city is now but scanty; the place looks like a
desert, a piteous spectacle to all who love it, and a cause for
delight and encouragement to all who have long been plotting for our
fall. Who then will reach out a hand to help us? Who will drop a
tear of pity over our faith? You have sympathised with a stranger
city in like distress; will not your kindly excellency feel for her
who gave you birth? If you have any influence, show it in our present
need. Certainly you have great help from God, Who has never abandoned
you, and has given you many proofs of His kindness. Only be willing
to exert yourself in our behalf, and use all the influence you have
for the succour of your fellow citizens.
Footnotes
[2266] About the same date as the preceding.
[2267] cf. Letters xxxiii. cxlvii. clxxviii. cxcvi. and ccciv.
Letter LXXVI. [2268]
To Sophronius the Master. [2269]
The greatness of the calamities, which have befallen our native city,
did seem likely to compel me to travel in person to the court, and
there to relate, both to your excellency and to all those who are most
influential in affairs, the dejected state in which Cæsarea is lying.
But I am kept here alike by ill-health and by the care of the
Churches. In the meantime, therefore, I hasten to tell your lordship
our troubles by letter, and to acquaint you that never ship, drowned
in sea by furious winds, so suddenly disappeared, never city shattered
by earthquake or overwhelmed by flood, so swiftly vanished out of
sight, as our city, engulfed by this new constitution, has gone
utterly to ruin. Our misfortunes have passed into a tale. Our
institutions are a thing of the past; and all our men of high civil
rank, in despair at what has happened to our magistrates, have left
their homes in the city and are wandering about the country. There is
a break therefore in the necessary conduct of affairs, and the city,
which ere now gloried both in men of learning and in others who abound
in opulent towns, has become a most unseemly spectacle. One only
consolation have we left in our troubles, and that is to groan over
our misfortunes to your excellency and to implore you, if you can, to
reach out the helping hand to Cæsarea who falls on her knees before
you. How indeed you may be able to aid us I am not myself able to
explain; but I am sure that to you, with all your intelligence, it
will be easy to discover the means, and not difficult, through the
power given you by God, to use them when they are found.
Footnotes
[2268] Of the same date as the preceding.
[2269] i.e. magister officiorum. cf. Letters xxxii., xcvi., clxxvii.,
clxxx., cxciii., cclxxii.
Letter LXXVII. [2270]
Without inscription: about Therasius. [2271]
One good thing we have certainly gained from the government of the
great Therasius and that is that you have frequently paid us a visit.
Now, alas! we have lost our governor, and we are deprived of this good
thing too. But since the boons once given us by God remain immovable,
and, although we are parted in body, abide fixed by memory in the
souls of each of us, let us constantly write, and communicate our
needs to one another. And this we may well do at the present moment,
when the storm for a brief space has cried a truce. I trust that you
will not part from the admirable Therasius, for I think that it is
very becoming to share his great anxieties, and I am delighted at the
opportunity given you both of seeing your friends and of being seen by
them. [2272]I have much to say about many things, but I put it off
till we meet, for it is, I think, hardly safe to entrust matters of
such importance to letters.
Footnotes
[2270] Of the same date as the preceding.
[2271] Perhaps to Elpidius. Therasius is probably the governor
referred to in Letter xcvi. to Sophronius.
[2272] The text is here corrupt. The Ben. Ed. say "corruptissimus."
Letter LXXVIII. [2273]
Without inscription, on behalf of Elpidius.
I have not failed to observe the interest you have shown in our
venerable friend Elpidius; and how with your usual intelligence you
have given the prefect an opportunity of showing his kindness. What I
am now writing to ask you is to make this favour complete and suggest
to the prefect that he should by a particular order set over our city
the man who is full of all possible care for the public interests.
You will therefore have many admirable reasons to urge upon the
prefect for his ordering Elpidius to remain at Cæsarea. There is at
all events no need for you to be taught by me, since you yourself know
only too well, what is the position of affairs, and how capable
Elpidius in administration.
Footnotes
[2273] Of the same date.
Letter LXXIX. [2274]
To Eustathius bishop of Sebastia. [2275]
Even before receiving your letter I knew what trouble you are ready to
undergo for every one, and specially for my humble self because I am
exposed in this struggle. So when I received your letter from the
reverend Eleusinius, and saw him actually before my face, I praised
God for bestowing on me such a champion and comrade, in my struggles
on behalf of true religion by the aid of the Spirit. Be it known to
your exalted reverence that I have hitherto sustained some attacks
from high magistrates, and these no light ones; while both the prefect
and the high chamberlain pleaded with sympathy for my opponents. But,
so far, I have sustained every assault unmoved, by that mercy of God
which supplies to me the aid of the Spirit, and strengthens my
weakness through Him.
Footnotes
[2274] Also of the year 371.
[2275] cf. Letter cxix. Sebaste is Siwas on the Halys. On Eustathius
to Basil a type at once of the unwashable Ethiopian for persistent
heresy (Letter cxxx. 1) and of the wind-driven cloud for shiftiness
and time-serving, (Letter ccxliv. 9.) Vide proleg.
Letter LXXX. [2276]
To Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria.
The worse the diseases of the Churches grow, the more do we all turn
to your excellency, in the belief that your championship is the one
consolation left to us in our troubles. By the power of your prayers,
and your knowledge of what is the best course to suggest in the
emergency, you are believed to be able to save us from this terrible
tempest by all alike who know your excellency even to a small extent,
whether by hearsay or by personal experience. Wherefore, cease not, I
implore, to pray for our souls and to rouse us by your letters. Did
you but know of what service these are to us you would never have lost
a single opportunity of writing. Could I only, by the aid of your
prayers, be deemed worthy of seeing you, and of enjoying your good
qualities, and of adding to the story of my life a meeting with your
truly great and apostolical soul, then I should indeed believe that I
had received from God's mercy a consolation equivalent to all the
afflictions of my life.
Footnotes
[2276] Placed in 371 or early in 372.
Letter LXXXI. [2277]
To Bishop Innocent. [2278]
I was delighted to receive the letter your affection sent me; but I am
equally grieved at your having laid on me the load of a responsibility
which is more than I can carry. How can I, so far removed as I am,
undertake so great a charge? As long as the Church possesses you, it
rests as it were on its proper buttress. Should the Lord be pleased
to make some dispensation in the matter of your life, whom, from among
us here can I send to take the charge of the brethren, who will be in
like esteem with yourself? That is a very wise and proper wish which
you express in your letter, that while you are yet alive you may see
the successor destined after you to guide the chosen flock of the Lord
(like the blessed Moses, who both wished and saw). As the place is
great and famous, and your work has great and wide renown, and the
times are difficult, needing no insignificant guide on account of the
continuous storms and tempests which are attacking the Church, I have
not thought it safe for my own soul to treat the matter perfunctorily,
specially when I bear in mind the terms in which you write. For you
say that, accusing me of disregard of the Churches, you mean to
withstand me before the Lord. Not then to be at issue with you, but
rather to have you on my side in my defence which I make in the
presence of Christ I have, after looking round in the assembly of the
presbyters of the city, chosen the very honourable vessel, the
offspring [2279] of the blessed Hermogenes, who wrote the great and
invincible creed in the great Synod. [2280]He is a presbyter of the
Church, of many years standing, of steadfast character, skilled in
canons, accurate in the faith, who has lived up to this time in
continence and ascetic discipline, although the severity of his
austere life has now subdued the flesh; a man of poverty, with no
resources in this world, so that he is not even provided with bare
bread, but by the labour of his hands gets a living with the brethren
who dwell with him. It is my intention to send him. If, then, this
is the kind of man you want, and not some younger man fit only to be
sent and to discharge the common duties of this world, be so good as
to write to me at the first opportunity, that I may send you this man,
who is elect of God, adapted for the present work, respected by all
who meet him, and who instructs with meekness all who differ from
him. I might have sent him at once, but since you yourself had
anticipated me in asking for a man of honourable character, and
beloved by myself, but far inferior to the one whom I have indicated,
I wished my mind in the matter to be made known to you. If therefore
this is the kind of man you want, either send one of the brethren to
fetch him at the time of the fast, or, if you have no one able to
undertake the journey to me, let me know by letter.
Footnotes
[2277] Placed in 372.
[2278] cf. Letter l. The see of this Innocent is unknown. cf. Letter
lxxxi. and note. To the title of this letter one manuscript adds "of
Rome," as the Ben. Ed. note "prorsus absurde."
[2279] ekgonos, i.e. the spiritual offspring of Hermogenes, by whom he
had been ordained.
[2280] Bishop of Cæsarea, in which see he preceded Dianius. cf.
Letters ccxliv. 9 and cclxiii. 3. "The great Synod" is Nicæa.
Baronius on the year 325 remarks that Basil's memory must have failed
him, inasmuch as not Hermogenes but Leontius was present at Nicæa as
Bishop of Cæsarea. But Hermogenes may have been present in lower
orders. cf. Stanley, East. Ch. pp. 105, 140.
Letter LXXXII. [2281]
To Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria.
When I turn my gaze upon the world, and perceive the difficulties by
which every effort after good is obstructed, like those of a man
walking in fetters, I am brought to despair of myself. But then I
direct my gaze in the direction of your reverence; I remember that our
Lord has appointed you to be physician of the diseases in the
Churches; and I recover my spirits, and rise from the depression of
despair to the hope of better things. As your wisdom well knows, the
whole Church is undone. And you see everything in all directions in
your mind's eye like a man looking from some tall watch tower, [2282]
as when at sea many ships sailing together are all dashed one against
the other by the violence of the waves, and shipwreck arises in some
cases from the sea being furiously agitated from without, in others
from the disorder of the sailors hindering and crowding one another.
It is enough to present this picture, and to say no more. [2283]
Your wisdom requires nothing farther, and the present state of affairs
does not allow me freedom of speech. What capable pilot can be found
in such a storm? Who is worthy to rouse the Lord to rebuke the wind
and the sea? Who but he who from his boyhood [2284] fought a good
fight on behalf of true religion? Since now truly all that is sound
among us is moving in the direction of fellowship and unity with those
who are of the same opinion, we have come confidently to implore you
to send us a single letter, advising us what is to be done. In this
way they wish that they may have a beginning of communication which
may promote unity. They may, peradventure, be suspected by you, when
you remember the past, and therefore, most God-beloved Father, do as
follows; send me the letters to the bishops, either by the hand of
some one in whom you place trust in Alexandria, or by the hand of our
brother Dorotheus the deacon: when I have received these letters I
will not deliver them till I have got the bishops' answers; if not,
let me "bear the blame for ever." [2285]Truly this ought not to
have struck more awe into him who first uttered it to his father, than
into me who now say it to my spiritual father. If however you
altogether renounce this hope, at least free me from all blame in
acting as I have, for I have undertaken this message and mediation in
all sincerity and simplicity, from desire for peace and the mutual
intercourse of all who think alike about the Lord.
Footnotes
[2281] Placed at the end of 371 or the beginning of 372.
[2282] The fitness of this figure in a letter to the bishop of
Alexandria will not escape notice. At the eastern extremity of the
island of Pharos still stood the marble lighthouse erected more than
600 years before by Ptolemy II., and not destroyed till after the
thirteenth century.
[2283] On Basil's use of this nautical metaphor, cf. De Spirtu Sancto,
chap. xxx. It is of course a literary commonplace, but Basil's
associations all lay inland.
[2284] The story of "the boy bishop" will be remembered, whose serious
game of baptism attracted the notice of Alexander and led to the
education of Athanasius in the Episcopal palace. Soc., Ecc. Hist. i.
15. Rufinus i. 14. cf. Keble, Lyra Innocentium, "Enacting holy
rites."
[2285] Gen. xliii. 9.
Letter LXXXIII. [2286]
To a Magistrate. [2287]
I have had only a short acquaintance and intercourse with your
lordship, but I have no small or contemptible knowledge of you from
the reports through which I am brought into communication with many
men of position and importance. You yourself are better able to say
whether I, by report, am of any account with you. At all events your
reputation with me is such as I have said. But since God has called
you to an occupation which gives you opportunity of showing kindness,
and in the exercise of which it lies in your power to bring about the
restoration of my own city, now level with the ground, it is, I think,
only my duty to remind your excellency that in the hope of the
requital God will give, you should show yourself of such a character
as to win a memory that cannot die, and be made an inheritor of
everlasting rest, in consequence of your making the afflictions of the
distressed hard to bear. I have a property at Chamanene, and I beg
you to look after its interests as though they were your own. And
pray do not be surprised at my calling my friend's property my own,
for among other virtues I have been taught that of friendship, and I
remember the author of the wise saying a friend is another self.
[2288]I therefore commend to your excellency this property
belonging to my friend, as though it were my own. I beg you to
consider the misfortunes of the house, and both to grant them
consolation for the past, and for the future to make the place more
comfortable for them; for it is now left and abandoned on account of
the weight of the rates imposed upon it. I will do my best to meet
your excellency and converse with you on points of detail.
Footnotes
[2286] Placed in 372.
[2287] Censitor, i.e. the magistrate responsible for rating and
taxation in the provinces.
[2288] cf. Aristotle Eth. Nic. viii. 12, 3; and Cic. Loel. xxi. So,
amicus est tanquam alter idem.
Letter LXXXIV. [2289]
To the President. [2290]
1. You will hardly believe what I am about to write, but it must be
written for truth's sake. I have been very anxious to communicate as
often as possible with your excellency, but when I got this
opportunity of writing a letter I did not at once seize the lucky
chance. I hesitated and hung back. What is astonishing is, that when
I got what I had been praying for, I did not take it. The reason of
this is that I am really ashamed to write to you every time, not out
of pure friendship, but with the object of getting something. But
then I bethought me (and when you consider it, I do hope you will not
think that I communicate with you more for the sake of a bargain than
of friendship) that there must be a difference between the way in
which one approaches a magistrate and a private man. We do not accost
a physician as we do any mere nobody; nor a magistrate as we do a
private individual. We try to get some advantage from the skill of
the one and the position of the other. Walk in the sun, and your
shadow will follow you, whether you will or not. Just so intercourse
with the great is followed by an inevitable gain, the succour of the
distressed. The first object of my letter is fulfilled in my being
able to greet your excellency. Really, if I had no other cause for
writing at all, this must be regarded as an excellent topic. Be
greeted then, my dear Sir; may you be preserved by all the world while
you fill office after office, and succour now some now others by your
authority. Such greeting I am wont to make; such greeting is only due
to you from all who have had the least experience of your goodness in
your administration.
2. Now, after this prayer, hear my supplication on behalf of the poor
old man whom the imperial order had exempted from serving in any
public capacity; though really I might say that old age anticipated
the Emperor in giving him his discharge. You have yourself satisfied
the boon conferred on him by the higher authority, at once from
respect to natural infirmity, and, I think, from regard to the public
interest, lest any harm should come to the state from a man growing
imbecile through age. But how, my dear Sir, have you unwittingly
dragged him into public life, by ordering his grandson, a child not
yet four years old, to be on the roll of the senate? You have done
the very same thing as to drag the old man, through his descendant,
again into public business. But now, I do implore you, have mercy on
both ages, and free both on the ground of what in each case is
pitiable. The one never saw father or mother, never knew them, but
from his very cradle was deprived of both, and has entered into life
by the help of strangers: the other has been preserved so long as to
have suffered every kind of calamity. He saw a son's untimely death;
he saw a house without successors; now, unless you devise some remedy
commensurate with your kindness, he will see the very consolation of
his bereavement made an occasion of innumerable troubles, for, I
suppose, the little lad will never act as senator, collect tribute, or
pay troops; but once again the old man's white hairs must be shamed.
Concede a favour in accordance with the law and agreeable to nature;
order the boy to be allowed to wait till he come to man's estate, and
the old man to await death quietly on his bed. Let others, if they
will, urge the pretext of press of business and inevitable necessity.
But, even if you are under a press of business, it would not be like
you to despise the distressed, to slight the law, or to refuse to
yield to the prayers of your friends.
Footnotes
[2289] Placed in the year 372.
[2290] Probably Elias. cf. Letters xciv. and xcvi. The orphan
grandson of the aged man in whose behalf Basil writes had been placed
on the Senatorial roll, and the old man in consequence was compelled
to serve again.
Letter LXXXV. [2291]
That the oath ought not to be taken. [2292]
It is my invariable custom to protest at every synod and to urge
privately in conversation, that oaths about the taxes ought not to be
imposed on husbandmen by the collectors. It remains for me to bear
witness, on the same matters, in writing, before God and men, that it
behoves you to cease from inflicting death upon men's souls, and to
devise some other means of exaction, while you let men keep their
souls unwounded. I write thus to you, not as though you needed any
spoken exhortation (for you have your own immediate inducements to
fear the Lord), but that all your dependents may learn from you not to
provoke the Holy One, nor let a forbidden sin become a matter of
indifference, through faulty familiarity. No possible good can be
done them by oaths, with a view to their paying what is exacted from
them, and they suffer an undeniable wrong to the soul. For when men
become practised in perjury, they no longer put any pressure on
themselves to pay, but they think that they have discovered in the
oath a means of trickery and an opportunity for delay. If, then, the
Lord brings a sharp retribution on the perjured, when the debtors are
destroyed by punishment there will be none to answer when summoned.
If on the other hand the Lord endures with long suffering, then, as I
said before, those who have tried the patience of the Lord despise His
goodness. Let them not break the law in vain; let them not whet the
wrath of God against them. I have said what I ought. The disobedient
will see.
Footnotes
[2291] Placed in the year 372.
[2292] The distress of the Cappadocians under the load of taxes is
described in Letter lxxiv. An objectionable custom arose, or was
extended, of putting the country people on oath as to their inability
to pay.
Letter LXXXVI. [2293]
To the Governor. [2294]
I know that a first and foremost object of your excellency is in every
way to support the right; and after that to benefit your friends, and
to exert yourself in behalf of those who have fled to your lordship's
protection. Both these pleas are combined in the matter before us.
The cause is right for which we are pleading; it is dear to me who am
numbered among your friends; it is due to those who are invoking the
aid of your constancy in their sufferings. The corn, which was all my
very, dear brother Dorotheus had for the necessaries of life, has been
carried off by some of the authorities at Berisi, entrusted with the
management of affairs, driven to this violence of their own accord or
by others' instigation. Either way it is an indictable offence. For
how does the man whose wickedness is his own do less wrong than he who
is the mere minister of other men's wickedness? To the sufferers the
loss is the same. I implore you, therefore, that Dorotheus may have
his corn returned by the men by whom he has been robbed, and that they
may not be allowed to lay the guilt of their outrage on other men's
shoulders. If you grant me my request I shall reckon the value of the
boon conferred by your excellency in proportion to the necessity of
providing one's self with food.
Footnotes
[2293] Of the same date as the preceding.
[2294] Probably to Elias. Three manuscripts add "of recommendation on
behalf of presbyters about the carrying off of corn."
Letter LXXXVII. [2295]
Without address on the same subject. [2296]
I am astonished that, with you to appeal to, so grave an offence
should have been committed against the presbyter as that he should
have been deprived of his only means of livelihood. The most serious
part of the business is that the perpetrators transfer the guilt of
their proceedings to you; while all the while it was your duty not
only not to suffer such deeds to be done, but to use all your
authority to prevent them in the case of any one, but specially in the
case of presbyters, and such presbyters as are in agreement with me,
and are walking in the same way of true religion. If then you have
any care to give me gratification, see that these matters are set
right without delay. For, God helping you, you are able to do this,
and greater things than this to whom you will. I have written to the
governor of my own country, [2297] that, if they refuse to do what is
right of their own accord, they may be compelled to do so on pressure
from the courts.
Footnotes
[2295] Of the same date as the preceding.
[2296] Probably to Elias.
[2297] Patris. The Ben. Ed suppose the reference to be here to
Annesi. cf. Letters viii. and li.
Letter LXXXVIII. [2298]
Without address on the subject of the exaction of taxes.
Your excellency knows better than any one else the difficulty of
getting together the gold furnished by contribution. [2299]We have
no better witness to our poverty than yourself, for with your great
kindness you have felt for us, and, up to the present time, so far as
has lain within your power, have borne with us, never departing from
your own natural forbearance from any alarm caused by superior
authority. Now of the whole sum there is still something wanting, and
that must be got in from the contribution which we have recommended to
all the town. What I ask is, that you will grant us a little delay,
that a reminder may be sent to dwellers in the country, and most of
our magistrates are in the country. If it is possible for it to be
sent in short of as many pounds as those in which we are still
behind-hand, I should be glad if you would so arrange, and the amount
shall be sent later. If, however, it is absolutely necessary that the
whole sum should be sent in at once, then I repeat my first request
that we may be allowed a longer time of grace.
Footnotes
[2298] Of the same date
[2299] chrusion pragmateutikon, Lat. aurum comparatitium. The gold
collected for the equipment of troops. Cod. Theod. vii. 6. 3. The
provinces of the East, with the exception of Osroene and Isauria,
contributed gold instead of actual equipment. The Ben. note quotes a
law of Valens that this was to be paid between Sept. 1 and April 1,
and argues thence that this letter may be definitely dated in March,
372, and not long before Easter, which fell on April 8.
Letter LXXXIX. [2300]
To Meletius, bishop of Antioch.
1. The eagerness of my longing is soothed by the opportunities which
the merciful God gives me of saluting your reverence. He Himself is
witness of the earnest desire which I have to see your face, and to
enjoy your good and soul-refreshing instruction. Now by my reverend
and excellent brother Dorotheus, the deacon, who is setting out, first
of all I beg you to pray for me that I be no stumbling block to the
people, nor hindrance to your petitions to propitiate the Lord. In
the second place I would suggest that you would be so good as to make
all arrangements through the aforementioned brother; and, if it seems
well that a letter should be sent to the Westerns, because it is only
right that communication should be made in writing even through our
own messenger, that you will dictate the letter. I have met Sabinus
the deacon, sent by them, and have written to the bishops in Illyria,
Italy, and Gaul, and to some of those who have written privately to
myself. For it is right that some one should be sent in the common
interests of the Synod, conveying a second letter which I beg you to
have written.
2. As to what concerns the right reverend bishop Athanasius, your
intelligence is already aware of what I will mention, that it is
impossible for anything to be advanced by my letters, or for any
desirable objects to be carried out, unless by some means or other he
receives communion from you, who at that time postponed it. He is
described as being very anxious to unite with me, and to be willing to
contribute all he can, but to be sorry that he was sent away without
communion, and that the promise still remains unfulfilled. [2301]
What is going on in the East cannot have failed to reach your
reverence's ears, but the aforementioned brother will give you more
accurate information by word of mouth. Be so good as to dispatch him
directly after Easter, because of his waiting for the answer from
Samosata. Look kindly on his zeal strengthen him by your prayers and
so dispatch him on this commission.
Footnotes
[2300] Placed in the year 372.
[2301] It is the contention of Tillemont that this cannot apply to the
great Athanasius, to whom Meletius is not likely to have refused
communion, but is more probably to be referred to some other unknown
Athanasius. Maran, however, points out (Vit. Bas. xxii.) not only how
the circumstances fit in, but how the statement that communion was
refused by Meletius is borne out by Letter cclviii. § 3, q.v.
Athanasius was in fact so far committed to the other side in the
unhappy Antiochene dispute that it was impossible for him to recognise
Meletius. cf. Newman, Church of the Fathers, chap. vii.
Letter XC. [2302]
To the holy brethren the bishops of the West. [2303]
1. The good God Who ever mixes consolation with affliction has, even
now in the midst of my pangs, granted me a certain amount of comfort
in the letters which our right honourable father bishop Athanasius has
received from you and sent on to me. For they contain evidence of
sound faith and proof of your inviolable agreement and concord,
showing thus that the shepherds are following in the footsteps of the
Fathers and feeding the people of the Lord with knowledge. All this
has so much gladdened my heart as to dispel my despondency and to
create something like a smile in my soul in the midst of the
distressing state of affairs in which we are now placed. The Lord has
also extended His consolation to me by means of the reverend deacon
Sabinus, my son, who has cheered my soul by giving me an exact
narrative of your condition; and from personal experience of his own,
will give you clear tidings of ours, that you may, in the first place,
aid me in my trouble by earnest and constant prayer to God; and next
that you may consent to give such consolation as lies in your power to
our afflicted Churches. For here, very honourable brethren, all is in
a weak state; the Church has given way before the continuous attacks
of her foes, like some bark in mid-ocean buffeted by successive blows
of the waves; unless haply there be some quick visitation of the
divine mercy. As then we reckon your mutual sympathy and unity an
important blessing to ourselves, so do we implore you to pity our
dissensions; and not, because we are separated by a great extent of
country, to part us from you, but to admit us to the concord of one
body, because we are united in the fellowship of the Spirit.
2. Our distresses are notorious, even though we leave them untold,
for now their sound has gone out into all the world. The doctrines of
the Fathers are despised; apostolic traditions are set at nought; the
devices of innovators are in vogue in the Churches; now men are rather
contrivers of cunning systems than theologians; the wisdom of this
world wins the highest prizes and has rejected the glory of the
cross. Shepherds are banished, and in their places are introduced
grievous wolves hurrying the flock of Christ. Houses of prayer have
none to assemble in them; desert places are full of lamenting crowds.
The elders lament when they compare the present with the past. The
younger are yet more to be compassionated, for they do not know of
what they have been deprived. All this is enough to stir the pity of
men who have learnt the love of Christ; but, compared with the actual
state of things, words fall very far short. If then there be any
consolation of love, any fellowship of the Spirit, any bowels of
mercy, be stirred to help us. Be zealous for true religion, and
rescue us from this storm. Ever be spoken among us with boldness that
famous dogma [2304] of the Fathers, which destroys the ill-famed
heresy of Arius, and builds up the Churches in the sound doctrine
wherein the Son is confessed to be of one substance with the Father,
and the Holy Ghost is ranked and worshipped as of equal honour, to the
end that through your prayers and co-operation the Lord may grant to
us that same boldness for the truth and glorying in the confession of
the divine and saving Trinity which He has given you. But the
aforenamed deacon will tell you every thing in detail. We have
welcomed your apostolic zeal for orthodoxy and have agreed to all that
has been canonically done by your reverences.
Footnotes
[2302] Placed in 372.
[2303] By Newman, who translates the first paragraphs, this letter, as
well as xcii., is viewed in close connection with Letter lxx.,
addressed to Damasus.
[2304] kerugma. cf. note on the De Sp. Sancto. p. 41.
Letter XCI. [2305]
To Valerianus, Bishop of Illyricum. [2306]
Thanks be to the Lord, Who has permitted me to see in your unstained
life the fruit of primitive love. Far apart as you are in body, you
have united yourself to me by writing; you have embraced me with
spiritual and holy longing; you have implanted unspeakable affection
in my soul. Now I have realized the force of the proverb, "As cold
water is to a thirsty soul so is good news from a far country." [2307]
Honoured brother, I really hunger for affection. The cause is not
far to seek, for iniquity is multiplied and the love of many has grown
cold. [2308]For this reason your letter is precious to me, and I am
replying by our reverend brother Sabinus. By him I make myself known
to you, and beseech you to be watchful in prayers on our behalf, that
God may one day grant calm and quiet to the Church here, and rebuke
this wind and sea, that so we may be freed from the storm and
agitation in which we are now every moment expecting to be submerged.
But in these our troubles one great boon has God given us in hearing
that you are in exact agreement and unity with one another, and that
the doctrines of true religion are preached among you without let or
hindrance. For at some time or other, unless the period of this world
is not already concluded, and if there yet remain days of human life,
it must needs be that by your means the faith must be renewed in the
East and that in due season you recompense her for the blessings which
she has given you. The sound part among us here, which preserves the
true religion of the Fathers, is sore stricken, and the devil in his
wiliness has shattered it by many and various subtle assaults. But,
by the help of the prayers of you who love the Lord, may the wicked
and deceitful heresy of the Arian error be quenched; may the good
teaching of the Fathers, who met at Nicæa, shine forth; so that the
ascription of glory may be rendered to the blessed Trinity in the
terms of the baptism of salvation.
Footnotes
[2305] Placed in 372.
[2306] Or, in some mss., the Illyrians. Valerianus, bishop of
Aquileia, was present at the Synod held in Rome in 371 (Theodoret,
Hist. Ecc. ii. 2.) and also at the Synod in the same city in 382.
(Theod. Ecc. Hist. v. 9, where see note.) Dorotheus or Sabinus had
brought letters from Athanasius and at the same time a letter from
Valerianus. Basil takes the opportunity to reply.
[2307] Prov. v. 25.
[2308] cf. Matt. xxiv. 12.
Letter XCII. [2309]
To the Italians and Gauls.
1. To our right godly and holy brethren who are ministering in Italy
and Gaul, bishops of like mind with us, we, Meletius, [2310] Eusebius,
[2311] Basil, [2312] Bassus, [2313] Gregory, [2314] Pelagius, [2315]
Paul, Anthimus, [2316] Theodotus, [2317] Bithus, [2318] Abraamius,
[2319] Jobinus, Zeno, [2320] Theodoretus, Marcianus, Barachus,
Abraamius, [2321] Libanius, Thalassius, Joseph, Boethus, Iatrius,
[2322] Theodotus, Eustathius, [2323] Barsumas, John, Chosroes,
Iosaces, [2324] Narses, Maris, Gregory, [2325] and Daphnus, send
greeting in the Lord. Souls in anguish find some consolation in
sending sigh after sigh from the bottom of the heart, and even a tear
shed breaks the force of affliction. But sighs and tears give us less
consolation than the opportunity of telling our troubles to your
love. We are moreover cheered by the better hope that, peradventure,
if we announce our troub