Funeral Oration on the Great S. Basil, Bishop of Cæsarea in Cappadocia.

S. Basil died January 1, a.d. 379.  A serious illness, in addition to other causes, prevented S. Gregory from being present at his funeral (Epist. 79).  Benoît holds that an expression (Epitaph, cxix. 38) in which S. Gregory says that his “lips are fettered” proves that he was still in retirement at Seleucia.  This is an unwarranted deduction.  In this Oration, § 2, the Saint, alluding to his illness in disparaging terms, alleges his labours at Constantinople as a more pressing reason for his absence:  and says that he undertook the task according to the judgment of S. Basil.  This implies that S. Gregory went to Constantinople before the death of S. Basil, or that he had then been influenced by his friend’s advice and was on the point of setting out—more probably the former, as we may be sure that, if S. Gregory had been still at Seleucia, no reason but physical incapacity would have kept him from his friend’s side.  His pressing duties at Constantinople and the difficulties of the long journey were the “other causes” of his letter to S. Gregory of Nyssa:  and we know that he suffered from serious illness at Constantinople (Carm. xi. 887.  Orat. xxiii. 1).  S. Gregory left Constantinople in June, a.d. 381, and Tillemont places the date of this Oration soon after his return to Nazianzus.  Benoît thinks that it was probably delivered on the anniversary of S. Basil’s death.  The Oration, as all critics are agreed, is one of great power and beauty.  Its length (62 pages folio), the physical weakness of the speaker, and the limits of the endurance of even an interested audience, incline us to suppose that it was not spoken in its present form.  We cannot well set aside expressions which clearly point to actual delivery, but it may have been amplified later.

1.  It has then been ordained that the great Basil, who used so constantly to furnish me with subjects for my discourses, of which he was quite as proud as any other man of his own, should himself now furnish me with the grandest subject which has ever fallen to the lot of an orator.  For I think that if anyone desired, in making trial of his powers of eloquence, to test them by the standard of that one of all his subjects which he preferred (as painters do with epoch-making pictures), he would choose that which stood first of all others, but would set aside this as beyond the powers of human eloquence.  So great a task is the praise of such a man, not only to me, who have long ago laid aside all thought of emulation, but even to those who live for eloquence, and whose sole object is the gaining of glory by subjects like this.  Such is my opinion, and, as I persuade myself, with perfect justice.  But I know not what subject I can treat with eloquence, if not this; or what greater favour I can do to myself, to the admirers of virtue, or to eloquence itself, than express our admiration for this man.  To me it is the discharge of a most sacred debt.  And our speech is a debt beyond all others due to those who have been gifted, in particular, with powers of speech.  To the admirers of virtue a discourse is at once a pleasure and an incentive to virtue.  For when⁴³⁹⁷

4397 For when, etc.  This seems to be the sense of an admittedly difficult sentence.

2.  These are the reasons which have urged me to speak, and to address myself to this contest.  And at my late appearance, long after his praises have been set forth by so many, who have publicly and privately done him honour, let no one be surprised.  Yea, may I be pardoned by that divine soul, the object of my constant reverence!  And as, when he was amongst us, he constantly corrected me in many points, according to the rights of a friend and the still higher law; for I am not ashamed to say this, for he was a standard of virtue to us all; so now, looking down upon me from above, he will treat me with indulgence.  I ask pardon too of any here who are among his warmest admirers, if indeed anyone can be warmer than another, and we are not all abreast in our zeal for his good fame.  For it is not contempt which has caused me to fall short of what might have been expected of me:  nor have I been so regardless of the claims of virtue or of friendship; nor have I thought that to praise him befitted any other more than me.  No! my first reason was, that I shrunk from this task, for I will say the truth, as priests⁴³⁹⁸

4398 As priests, or, more generally, “as those who approach our temples.”  In the E. there were lavers at the entrance to the churches for the ablutions of intending worshippers.

4399 Of the task, i.e., of restoring the orthodox faith in Constantinople.

4400 Fetter, i.e., the body.

3.  Had I seen him to be proud of his birth, and the rights of birth, or any of those infinitely little objects of those whose eyes are on the ground, we should have had to inspect a new catalogue of the Heroes.  What details as to his ancestors might I not have laid under contribution!  Nor would even history have had any advantage over me, since I claim this advantage, that his celebrity depends, not upon fiction or legend, but upon actual facts attested by many witnesses.  On his father’s side Pontus offers to me many details, in no wise inferior to its wonders of old time, of which all history and poesy are full;⁴⁴⁰¹

4401 History and poesy, e.g., Xenophon, Polybius, and Apollonius.

4402 Renowned, etc.  Cf. Homer, Od. ix. 27.

4.  But since our subject is a man who has maintained that each man’s nobility is to be judged of according to his own worth, and that, as forms and colours, and likewise our most celebrated and most infamous horses, are tested by their own properties, so we too ought not to be depicted in borrowed plumes; after mentioning one or two traits, which, though inherited from his ancestors, he made his own by his life, and which are specially likely to give pleasure to my hearers, I will then proceed to deal with the man himself.  Different families and individuals have different points of distinction and interest, great or small, which, like a patrimony of longer or shorter descent, come down to posterity:  the distinction of his family on either side was piety, which I now proceed to display.

5.  There was a persecution, the most frightful and severe of all; I mean, as you know, the persecution of Maximinus, which, following closely upon those which immediately preceded it, made them all seem gentle, by its excessive audacity, and by its eagerness to win the crown of violence in impiety.  It was overcome by many of our champions, who wrestled with it to the death, or well-nigh to the death, with only life enough left in them to survive their victory, and not pass away in the midst of the struggle; remaining to be trainers⁴⁴⁰³

4403 Trainers, lit. “anointers”—those who physically and by their advice prepared athletes for their exercises.

6.  But since their strife must needs be lawful, and the law of martyrdom alike forbids us voluntarily to go to meet it (in consideration for the persecutors, and for the weak) or to shrink from it if it comes upon us; for the former shows foolhardiness, the latter cowardice; in this respect they paid due honour to the Lawgiver; but what was their device, or rather, to what were they led by the Providence which guided them in all things?  They betook themselves to a thicket on the mountains of Pontus, of which there are many deep ones of considerable extent, with very few comrades of their flight, or attendants upon their needs.  Let others marvel at the length of time, for their flight was exceedingly prolonged, to about seven years, or a little more, and their mode of life, delicately nurtured as they were, was straitened and unusual, as may be imagined, with the discomfort of its exposure to frost and heat and rain:  and the wilderness allowed no fellowship or converse with friends:  a great trial to men accustomed to the attendance and honour of a numerous retinue.  But I will proceed to speak of what is still greater and more extraordinary:  nor will anyone fail to credit it, save those who, in their feeble and dangerous judgment, think little of persecutions and dangers for Christ’s sake.

7.  These noble men, suffering from the lapse of time, and feeling a distaste for ordinary food, felt a longing for something more appetising.  They did not indeed speak as Israel did,⁴⁴⁰⁴

4404 Exod. xvi. 2 et seq.

4405 1 Cor. x. 10.

4406 Exod. xvi. 13.

4407 Ib. xiv. 21.

4408 Josh. iii. 16; x. 12.

8.  O what a wonder!  They were themselves stewards of the chase; what they would, was caught by the mere will to do so; what was left, they sent away to the thickets, for another meal.  The cooks were extemporised, the dinner exquisite, the guests were grateful for this wonderful foretaste of their hopes.  And hence they grew more earnest in their struggle, in return for which they had received this blessing.  Such is my history.  And do thou, my persecutor, in thy admiration for legends, tell of thy huntresses,⁴⁴⁰⁹

4409 Huntresses, esp. Artemis, a passion for whom was fatal to Orion and Actæon.

4410 The maiden, Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnon.

9.  The union of his parents, cemented as it was by a community of virtue, no less than by cohabitation, was notable for many reasons, especially for generosity to the poor, for hospitality, for purity of soul as the result of self-discipline, for the dedication to God of a portion of their property, a matter not as yet so much cared for by most men, as it now has grown to be, in consequence of such previous examples, as have given distinction to it, and for all those other points, which have been published throughout Pontus and Cappadocia, to the satisfaction of many:  in my opinion, however, their greatest claim to distinction is the excellence of their children.  Legend indeed has its instances of men whose children were many and beautiful, but it is practical experience which has presented to us these parents, whose own character, apart from that of their children, was sufficient for their fair fame, while the character of their children would have made them, even without their own eminence in virtue, to surpass all men by the excellence of their children.  For the attainment of distinction by one or two of their offspring might be ascribed to their nature; but when all are eminent, the honour is clearly due to those who brought them up.  This is proved by the blessed roll of priests and virgins, and of those who, when married, have allowed nothing in their union to hinder them from attaining an equal repute, and so have made the distinction between them to consist in the condition, rather than in the mode of their life.

10.  Who has not known Basil, our archbishop’s father, a great name to everyone, who attained a father’s prayer, if anyone, I will not say as no one, ever did?  For he surpassed all in virtue, and was only prevented by his son from gaining the first prize.  Who has not known Emmelia, whose name was a forecast of what she became, or else whose life was an exemplification of her name?  For she had a right to the name which implies gracefulness, and occupied, to speak concisely, the same place among women, as her husband among men.  So that, when it was decided that he, in whose honour we are met, should be given to men to submit to the bondage of nature, as anyone of old has been given by God for the common advantage, it was neither fitting that he should be born of other parents, nor that they should possess another son:  and so the two things suitably concurred.  I have now, in obedience to the Divine law which bids us to pay all honour to parents, bestowed the firstfruits of my praises upon those whom I have commemorated, and proceed to treat of Basil himself, premising this, which I think will seem true to all who knew him, that we only need his own voice to pronounce his eulogium.  For he is at once a brilliant subject for praise, and the only one whose powers of speech make him worthy of treating it.  Beauty indeed and strength and size, in which I see that most men rejoice, I concede to anyone who will—not that even in these points he was inferior to any of those men of small minds who busy themselves about the body, while he was still young, and had not yet reduced the flesh by austerity—but that I may avoid the fate of unskilful athletes, who waste their strength in vain efforts after minor objects, and so are worsted in the crucial struggle, whose results are victory and the distinction of the crown.  The praise, then, which I shall claim for him is based upon grounds which no one, I think, will consider superfluous, or beyond the scope of my oration.

11.  I take it as admitted by men of sense, that the first of our advantages is education; and not only this our more noble form of it, which disregards rhetorical ornaments and glory, and holds to salvation, and beauty in the objects of our contemplation:  but even that external culture which many Christians ill-judgingly abhor, as treacherous and dangerous, and keeping us afar from God.  For as we ought not to neglect the heavens, and earth, and air, and all such things, because some have wrongly seized upon them, and honour God’s works instead of God:  but to reap what advantage we can from them for our life and enjoyment, while we avoid their dangers; not raising creation, as foolish men do, in revolt against the Creator, but from the works of nature apprehending the Worker,⁴⁴¹¹

4411 Rom. i. 20; 25.

4412 2 Cor. x. 5.

12.  In his earliest years he was swathed and fashioned, in that best and purest fashioning which the Divine David speaks of as proceeding day by day,⁴⁴¹³

4413 Ps. cxxxix. 16.

4414 Centaur.  Alluding to Chiron, the tutor of Achilles.

13.  When sufficiently trained at home, as he ought to fall short in no form of excellence, and not be surpassed by the busy bee, which gathers what is most useful from every flower, he set out for the city of Cæsarea,⁴⁴¹⁵

4415 Cæsarea, the Cappadocian city, as seems plain from the context.  Yet Tillemont and Billius incline to think Cæsarea in Palestine is meant.

4416 Chair, etc., Before he had studied rhetoric and philosophy.

14.  Thence to Byzantium, the imperial city of the East, for it was distinguished by the eminence of its rhetorical and philosophic teachers, whose most valuable lessons he soon assimilated by the quickness and force of his powers:  thence he was sent by God, and by his generous craving for culture, to Athens the home of letters.  Athens, which has been to me, if to any one, a city truly of gold, and the patroness of all that is good.  For it brought me to know Basil more perfectly, though he had not been unknown to me before; and in my pursuit of letters, I attained to happiness; and in another fashion had the same experience as Saul,⁴⁴¹⁷

4417 1 Sam. ix. 3.

15.  We were contained by Athens, like two branches of some river-stream, for after leaving the common fountain of our fatherland, we had been separated in our varying pursuit of culture, and were now again united by the impulsion of God no less than by our own agreement.  I preceded him by a little, but he soon followed me, to be welcomed with great and brilliant hope.  For he was versed in many languages, before his arrival, and it was a great thing for either of us to outstrip the other in the attainment of some object of our study.  And I may well add, as a seasoning to any speech, a short narrative, which will be a reminder to those who know it, a source of information to those who do not.  Most of the young men at Athens in their folly are mad after rhetorical skill—not only those who are ignobly born and unknown, but even the noble and illustrious, in the general mass of young men difficult to keep under control.  They are just like men devoted to horses and exhibitions, as we see, at the horse-races; they leap,⁴⁴¹⁸

4418 They leap, etc.  This passage refers to the spectators who unite in sympathy with, and imitate as far as possible, in their excitement, the actions of, those who drive the chariots in the races.

16.  Whenever any newcomer arrives, and falls into the hands of those who seize upon him, either by force or willingly, they observe this Attic law, of combined jest and earnest.  He is first conducted to the house of one of those who were the first to receive him, or of his friends, or kinsmen, or countrymen, or of those who are eminent in debating power, and purveyors of arguments, and therefore especially honoured among them; and their reward consists in the gain of adherents.  He is next subjected to the raillery of any one who will, with the intention I suppose, of checking the conceit of the newcomers, and reducing them to subjection at once.  The raillery is of a more insolent or argumentative kind, according to the boorishness or refinement of the railer:  and the performance, which seems very fearful and brutal to those who do not know it, is to those who have experienced it very pleasant and humane:  for its threats are feigned rather than real.  Next, he is conducted in procession through the market place to the bath.  The procession is formed by those who are charged with it in the young man’s honour, who arrange themselves in two ranks separated by an interval, and precede him to the bath.  But when they have approached it, they shout and leap wildly, as if possessed, shouting that they must not advance, but stay, since the bath will not admit them; and at the same time frighten the youth by furiously knocking at the doors:  then allowing him to enter, they now present him with his freedom, and receive him after the bath as an equal, and one of themselves.  This they consider the most pleasant part of the ceremony, as being a speedy exchange and relief from annoyances.  On this occasion I not only refused to put to shame my friend the great Basil, out of respect for the gravity of his character, and the ripeness of his reasoning powers, but also persuaded all the rest of the students to treat him likewise, who happened not to know him.  For he was from the first respected by most of them, his reputation having preceded him.  The result was that he was the only one to escape the general rule, and be accorded a greater honour than belongs to a freshman’s position.

17.  This was the prelude of our friendship.  This was the kindling spark of our union:  thus we felt the wound of mutual love.  Then something of this kind happened, for I think it right not to omit even this.  I find the Armenians to be not a simple race, but very crafty and cunning.  At this time some of his special comrades and friends, who had been intimate with him even in the early days of his father’s instruction, for they were members of his school, came up to him under the guise of friendship, but with envious, and not kindly intent, and put to him questions of a disputations rather than rational kind, trying to overwhelm him at the first onset, having known his original natural endowments, and unable to brook the honour he had then received.  For they thought it a strange thing that they who had put on their gowns, and been exercised in shouting, should not get the better of one who was a stranger and a novice.  I also, in my vain love for Athens, and trusting to their professions without perceiving their envy, when they were giving way, and turning their backs, since I was indignant that in their persons the reputation of Athens should be destroyed, and so speedily put to shame, supported the young men, and restored the argument; and by the aid of my additional weight, for in such cases a small addition makes all the difference, and, as the poet says, “made equal their heads in the fray.”⁴⁴¹⁹

4419 Homer Il. xi. 72.

4420 Ib. xi. 496.

18.  Their efforts having thus proved fruitless, while they severely blamed their own rashness, they cherished such annoyance against me that it broke out into open hostility, and a charge of treachery, not only to them, but to Athens herself:  inasmuch as they had been confuted and put to shame at the first onset, by a single student, who had not even had time to gain confidence.  He moreover, according to that human feeling, which makes us, when we have all at once attained to the high hopes which we have cherished, look upon their results as inferior to our expectation, he, I say, was displeased and annoyed, and could take no delight in his arrival.  He was seeking for what he had expected, and called Athens an empty happiness.  I however tried to remove his annoyance, both by argumentative encounter, and by the enchantments of reasoning; alleging, as is true, that the disposition of a man cannot at once be detected, without a long time and more constant association, and that culture likewise is not made known to those who make trial of her, after a few efforts and in a short time.  In this way I restored his cheerfulness, and by this mutual experience, he was the more closely united to me.

19.  And when, as time went on, we acknowledged our mutual affection, and that philosophy⁴⁴²¹

4421 Philosophy, here, a truly Christian life.

20.  Such were our feelings for each other, when we had thus supported, as Pindar⁴⁴²²

4422 Olymp. Od. vi. 1.

We were impelled by equal hopes, in a pursuit especially obnoxious to envy, that of letters.  Yet envy we knew not, and emulation was of service to us.  We struggled, not each to gain the first place for himself, but to yield it to the other; for we made each other’s reputation to be our own.  We seemed to have one soul, inhabiting two bodies.  And if we must not believe those whose doctrine is “All things⁴⁴²³

4423 All things, etc., i.e. Empedocles and Anaxagoras.

21.  Two ways were known to us, the first of greater value, the second of smaller consequence:  the one leading to our sacred buildings and the teachers there, the other to secular instructors.  All others we left to those who would pursue them—to feasts, theatres, meetings, banquets.  For nothing is in my opinion of value, save that which leads to virtue and to the improvement of its devotees.  Different men have different names, derived from their fathers, their families, their pursuits, their exploits:  we had but one great business and name—to be and to be called Christians of which we thought more than Gyges⁴⁴²⁴

4424 Gyges is said to have had a ring by means of which he could make himself invisible, and by thus using it was able to seize on the Kingdom of Lydia.

4425 Midas, said to have had the power granted of turning everything he touched to gold.  Accordingly, as this power took effect on his food, he died of hunger.

4426 Abaris, a Hyperborean priest of Apollo, who was said to have given him an arrow, on which he rode through the air.

4427 Pegasus, called Argive, because caught near to Argos, the winged horse, by the aid of which Bellerophon was said to have destroyed the Chimæra.

4428 A river, etc.  The Alpheus, a river of Arcadia.

4429 Animal.  The salamander, a lizard said to be impervious to the action of fire.  Plin. N. H. x. 67.

22.  And, best of all, we were surrounded by a far from ignoble band, under his instruction and guidance, and delighting in the same objects, as we ran on foot beside that Lydian car,⁴⁴³⁰

4430 Lydian car, proverbial expression for anything whose speed distances all competitors.

4431 Orestes and Pylades, types of close comradeship in Greek tragedies.

4432 Sons of Molione, Eurytus and Cteatus, Hom. Il. ii. 621.  Their father was Actor.

23.  Who possessed such a degree of the prudence of old age, even before his hair was gray?  Since it is by this that Solomon defines old age.⁴⁴³³

4433 Wisd. iv. 8.

4434 Which breathes, a phrase used Hom. Il. vi. 182 of the Chimæra.

4435 Labyrinths, the mythical mazes of Crete, the home of the Minotaur.

4436 Minos and Rhadamanthus, Kings of Crete and Lycia, fabled to have been made judges in the lower world because of their justice when on earth.

24.  Such was the case, and his galleon was laden with all the learning attainable by the nature of man; for beyond Cadiz⁴⁴³⁷

4437 Beyond Cadiz.  The Atlantic Ocean beyond Cadiz was reputed impassable by the ancients.

25.  Upon our return, after a slight indulgence to the world and the stage, sufficient to gratify the general desire, not from any inclination to theatrical display, we soon became independent, and, after being promoted from the rank of beardless boys to that of men, made bold advances along the road of philosophy, for though no longer together, since envy would not allow this, we were united by our eager desire.  The city of Cæsarea took possession of him, as a second founder and patron, but in course of time he was occasionally absent, as a matter of necessity due to our separation, and with a view to our determined course of philosophy.  Dutiful attendance on my aged parents, and a succession of misfortunes kept me apart from him, perhaps without right or justice, but so it was.  And to this cause I am inclined to ascribe all the inconsistency and difficulty which have befallen my life, and the hindrances in the way of philosophy, which have been unworthy of my desire and purpose.  But as for my fate, let it lead whither God pleases, only may its course be the better for his intercessions.  As regards himself, the manifold love of God toward man,⁴⁴³⁸

4438 Tit. iii. 4.

26.  For I do not praise the disorder and irregularity which sometimes exist among us, even in those who preside over the sanctuary.  I do not venture, nor is it just, to accuse them all.  I approve the nautical custom, which first gives the oar to the future steersman, and afterward leads him to the stern, and entrusts him with the command, and seats him at the helm, only after a long course of striking the sea and observing the winds.  As is the case again in military affairs:  private, captain, general.  This order is the best and most advantageous for their subordinates.  And if it were so in our case, it would be of great service.  But, as it is, there is a danger of the holiest of all offices being the most ridiculous among us.  For promotion depends not upon virtue, but upon villany; and the sacred thrones fall not to the most Worthy, but to the most powerful.  Samuel, the seer into futurity, is among the prophets:  but Saul, the rejected one, is also there.  Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, is among the kings, but so also is Jeroboam, the slave and apostate.  And there is not a physician, or a painter who has not first studied the nature of diseases, or mixed many colours, or practised drawing:  but a prelate is easily found, without laborious training, with a reputation of recent date, being sown and springing up in a moment, as the legend⁴⁴³⁹

4439 The legend, i.e., of Cadmus who sowed at Thebes the dragon’s teeth from which sprung giants.

27.  Not so our great and illustrious Basil.  In this grace, as in all others, he was a public example.  For he first read to the people the sacred books, while already able to expound them, nor did he deem himself worthy of this rank⁴⁴⁴⁰

4440 This rank, i.e., the office of Lector, or Reader.

4441 Ps. cvii. 32.

28.  There arose a disagreement between him and his predecessor⁴⁴⁴²

4442 His predecessor, Eusebius, Archbishop of Cæsarea.

4443 Nazarites, i.e., the monks.

4444 Their chief, i.e., Basil.

4445 His opponent, lit. “the man who was vexing him,” i.e., Eusebius.

4446 Bishops.  It is uncertain who these bishops were.  Clémencet thinks they were Lucifer and Eusebius of Vercellæ.  But a separation had ere this taken place between them in consequence of Lucifer’s rash action at Antioch.  Nor is it certain that Eusebius had not already returned to Italy.

29.  What then did our noble friend, the disciple of the Peaceable One?  It was not his habit to resist his traducers or partisans, nor was it his part to fight, or rend the body of the Church, which was from other reasons the subject of attack, and hardly bestead, from the great power of the heretics.  With my advice and earnest encouragement on the point, he set out from the place with me into Pontus, and presided over the abodes of contemplation there.  He himself too founded one⁴⁴⁴⁷

4447 One, a monastery.  The rule of S. Basil is widely observed to this day in Eastern monasteries.  Cf. § 34.

4448 John, Saint John Baptist.

30.  While we were thus engaged, there suddenly arose a cloud full of hail, with destructive roar, overwhelming every Church upon which it burst and seized:  an Emperor,⁴⁴⁴⁹

4449 An Emperor, Valens.

4450 Madness, cf. ii. 37, Note.

4451 Glory.  The word δόξα means both “doctrine” and “glory.”

4452 Properties.  ἰδιότητες.  Petav. de Trin. iv. Proem. § 2 gives other Greek equivalent terms.  The Latin terms are “notiones” (S. Thom. Aq. Summa. I. xxxii. qu. 2), “proprietates” or relationes.  They denote those relative “attributes ad intra” which distinguish the Persons, if they do not actually constitute the Personality of each of the Three Divine Persons.  They are five in number, Unbegottenness, Paternity, Filiation, active and passive Spiration.  Perhaps the nearest English equivalent is “characteristic (or distinctive) relations.”—Cf. Orat. xlii. 15.

31.  Such was his mind, and with such impiety he took the field against us.  For we must consider it to be nothing else than a barbaric inroad which, instead of destroying walls, cities and houses, and other things of little worth, made with hands and capable of restoration, spent its ravages upon men’s souls.  A worthy army joined in his assault, the evil rulers of the Churches, the bitter governors of his world-wide Empire.  Some of the Churches they now held, some they were assaulting, others they hoped to gain by the already exercised influence of the Emperor, and the violence which he threatened.  But in their purpose of perverting our own, their confidence was specially based on the smallness of mind of those whom I have mentioned, the inexperience of our prelate, and the infirmities which prevailed among us.  The struggle would be fierce:  the zeal of numerous troops was far from ignoble, but their array was weak, from the want of a leader and strategist to contend for them with the might of the Word and of the Spirit.  What then did this noble and magnanimous and truly Christ-loving soul?  No need of many words to urge his presence and aid.  At once when he saw me on my mission, for the struggle on behalf of the faith was common to us both, he yielded to my entreaty; and decided by a most excellent distinction, based on spiritual reasons, that the time for punctiliousness (if indeed we may give way to such feelings at all) is a time of security, but that forbearance is required in the hour of necessity.  He immediately returned with me from Pontus, and as a zealous volunteer took his place in the fight for the endangered truth, and devoted himself to the service of his mother, the Church.

32.  Did then his actual efforts fall short of his preliminary zeal?  Were they directed by courage, but not by prudence, or by skill, while he shrank from danger?  Or, in spite of their unexampled perfection on all these points, was there left in him some trace of irritation?  Far from it.  He was at once completely reconciled, and took part in every plan and effort.  He removed all the thorns and stumbling blocks which were in our way, upon which the enemy relied in their attack upon us.  He took hold of one, grasped another, thrust away a third.  He became to some a stout wall and rampart,⁴⁴⁵³

4453 Jer. i. 18.

4454 Ib. xxiii. 29.

4455 Ps. cxviii. 12.

33.  Thus the enemy failed, and, base men as they were, for the first time were then basely put to shame and worsted, learning not to be ready to despise the Cappadocians, of all men in the world, whose special qualities are firmness in the faith, and loyal devotion to the Trinity; to Whom is due their unity and strength, and from Whom they receive an even greater and stronger assistance than they are able to give.  Basil’s next business and purpose was to conciliate the prelate, to allay suspicion, to persuade all men that the irritation which had been felt was due to the temptation and effort of the Evil one, in his envy of virtuous concord:  carefully complying with the laws of obedience and spiritual order.  Accordingly he visited him, with instruction and advice.  While obedient to his wishes, he was everything to him, a good counsellor, a skilful assistant, an expounder of the Divine Will, a guide of conduct, a staff for his old age, a support of the faith, most trusty of those within, most practical of those without, in a word, as much inclined to goodwill, as he had been thought to hostility.  And so the power of the Church came into his hands almost, if not quite, to an equal degree with the occupant of the see.  For in return for his good-will, he was requited with authority.  And their harmony and combination of power was wonderful.  The one was the leader of the people, the other of their leader, like a lion-keeper, skilfully soothing the possessor of power.  For, having been recently installed in the see, and still somewhat under the influence of the world, and not yet furnished with the things of the Spirit, in the midst of the eddying tide of enemies assaulting the Church, he was in need of some one to take him by the hand and support him.  Accordingly he accepted the alliance, and imagined himself the conqueror of one who had conquered him.

34.  Of his care for and protection of the Church, there are many other tokens; his boldness towards the governors and other most powerful men in the city:  the decisions of disputes, accepted without hesitation, and made effective by his simple word, his inclination being held to be decisive:  his support of the needy, most of them in spiritual, not a few also in physical distress:  for this also often influences the soul and reduces it to subjection by its kindness; the support of the poor, the entertainment of strangers, the care of maidens; legislation⁴⁴⁵⁶

4456 Legislation.  Cf. § 30.

4457 Prayers.  The liturgy of S. Basil together with that of S. Chrysostom are still the authorized liturgies of the Eastern Church.

4458 Prov. xix. 17.

4459 Ib. xi. 26.

35.  He indeed could neither rain bread from heaven by prayer,⁴⁴⁶⁰

4460 Exod. xvi. 15.

4461 Ps. lxxviii. 24.

4462 1 Kings xvii. 14.

4463 S. Matt. xiv. 19.

4464 1 Cor. xiv. 22.

4465 Isai. lviii. 7.

4466 Ps. cxxxii. 15.

4467 Ib. xxxiii. 19.

4468 Ib. cvii. 9; S. Luke i. 53.

36.  Such was our young furnisher of corn, and second Joseph:  though of him we can say somewhat more.  For the one made a gain from the famine, and bought up Egypt⁴⁴⁶⁹

4469 Gen. xli. 1 et seq.

4470 Ps. lxxviii. 25.

4471 Ib. lxiii. 1; S. Matt. v. 6.

4472 Amos viii. 11.

37.  After these and similar actions—why need I stay to mention them all?—when the prelate whose name⁴⁴⁷³

4473 Name, Eusebius, i.e., “pious,” “godly.”

4474 Men.  Eusebius of Samosaba and S. Gregory the Elder.

38.  Having thus been deemed worthy of the office of prelate, as it is seemly that men should who have lived such a life, and won such favour and consideration, he did not disgrace, by his subsequent conduct, either his own philosophy, or the hopes of those who had trusted him.  But he ever so far surpassed himself as he has been shown hitherto to have surpassed others, his ideas on this point being most excellent and philosophic.  For he held that, while it is virtuous in a private individual to avoid vice, and be to some extent good, it is a vice in a chief and ruler, especially in such an office, to fail to surpass by far the majority of men, and by constant progress to make his virtue correspond to his dignity and throne:  for it is difficult for one in high position to attain the mean, and by his eminence in virtue raise up his people to the golden mean.  Or rather to treat this question more satisfactorily, I think that the result is the same as I see in the case of our Saviour, and of every specially wise man, I fancy, when He was with us in that form which surpassed us and yet is ours.  For He also, the gospel says, increased in wisdom and favour, as well as in stature,⁴⁴⁷⁵

4475 S. Luke ii. 52.

39.  He first of all made it plain that his office had been bestowed upon him, not by human favour, but by the gift of God.  This will also be shown by my conduct.  For in what philosophic research did he not, about that time, join with me?  So every one thought that I should run to meet him after what had happened, and show my delight at it (as would, perhaps, have been the case with any one else) and claim a share in his authority, rather than rule beside him, according to the inferences they drew from our friendship.  But, in my exceeding anxiety to avoid the annoyance and jealousy of the time, and specially since his position was still a painful and troubled one, I remained at home, and forcibly restrained my eager desire, while, though he blamed me, Basil accepted my excuse.  And when, on my subsequent arrival, I refused, for the same reason the honour of this chair, and a dignified position⁴⁴⁷⁶

4476 Dignified position, known later as that of Vicar General.  Thomassin.  Disc. Eccl. I. ii. 7. § 3.

40.  His next task was to appease, and allay by magnanimous treatment, the opposition to himself:  and that without any trace of flattery or servility, but in a most chivalrous and magnanimous way; with a view, not merely to present exigencies, but also to the fostering of future obedience.  For, seeing that, while tenderness leads to laxity and slackness, severity gives rise to stubbornness and self-will, he was able to avoid the dangers of each course by a combination of both, blending his correction with consideration, and gentleness with firmness, influencing men in most cases principally by his conduct rather than by argument:  not enslaving them by art, but winning them by good nature, and attracting them by the sparing use, rather than by the constant exercise, of his power.  And, most important of all, they were brought to recognize the superiority of his intellect and the inaccessibility of his virtue, to consider their only safety to consist in being on his side and under his command, their sole danger to be in opposition to him, and to think that to differ from him involved estrangement from God.  Thus they willingly yielded and surrendered, submitting themselves, as if in a thunder-clap, and hastening to anticipate each other with their excuses, and exchange the intensity of their hostility for an equal intensity of goodwill, and advance in virtue, which they found to be the one really effective defence.  The few exceptions to this conduct were passed by and neglected, because their ill-nature was incurable, and they expended their powers in wearing out themselves, as rust consumes itself together with the iron on which it feeds.

41.  Affairs at home being now settled to his mind, in a way that faithless men who did not know him would have thought impossible, his designs became greater and took a loftier range.  For, while all others had their eyes on the ground before them, and directed attention to their own immediate concerns, and, if these were safe, troubled themselves no further, being incapable of any great and chivalrous design or undertaking; he, moderate as he was in all other respects, could not be moderate in this, but with head erect, casting his mental eye about him, took in the whole world over which the word of salvation has made its way.  And when he saw the great heritage of God, purchased by His own words and laws and sufferings, the holy nation, the royal priesthood,⁴⁴⁷⁷

4477 1 Pet. ii. 9.

4478 Ps. lxxx. 9.

42.  For what could be more distressing than this calamity, or call more loudly on one whose eyes were raised aloft for exertions on behalf of the common weal?  The good or ill success of an individual is of no consequence to the community, but that of the community involves of necessity the like condition of the individual.  With this idea and purpose, he who was the guardian and patron of the community (and, as Solomon says with truth, a perceptive heart is a moth to the bones,⁴⁴⁷⁹

4479 Prov. xiv. 30 (LXX.).

4480 Jonah iv. 8.

4481 Ps. cxxxii. 4.

43.  One of his devices was of the greatest service.  After a period of such recollection as was possible, and private spiritual conference, in which, after considering all human arguments, and penetrating into all the deep things of the Scriptures, he drew up a sketch of pious doctrine, and by wrestling with and attacking their opposition he beat off the daring assaults of the heretics:  overthrowing in hand to hand struggles by word of mouth those who came to close quarters, and striking those at a distance by arrows winged with ink, which is in no wise inferior to inscriptions on tablets; not giving directions for one small nation only like that of the Jews, concerning meats and drinks, temporary sacrifices, and purifications of the flesh;⁴⁴⁸²

4482 Heb. ix. 10.

4483 2 Tim. iv. 2.

4484 Exod. xxxi. 2.

44.  Why need I enter into further detail?  We were assailed again by the Anti-Christian Emperor,⁴⁴⁸⁵

4485 Emperor.  Valens.

4486 S. Luke xi. 24.

45.  It is said that the King⁴⁴⁸⁷

4487 King.  Xerxes.

4488 Ps. lxxiii. 9.

46.  Furious indeed were his first acts of wantonness, more furious still his final efforts against us.  What shall I speak of first?  Exiles, banishments, confiscations, open and secret plots, persuasion, where time allowed, violence, where persuasion was impossible.  Those who clung to the orthodox faith, as we did, were extruded from their churches; others were intruded, who agreed with the Imperial soul-destroying doctrines, and begged for testimonials of impiety, and subscribed to statements still harder than these.  Burnings⁴⁴⁸⁹

4489 Burnings, a.d. 370.  Eighty ecclesiastics, sent on a mission to Valens at Nicomedia, were by his orders sent to sea off the coast of Bithynia, and, the vessel being set on fire, were burnt to death.

4490 Jacob, i.e., Athanasius.  Esau = George.

4491 Rom. ix. 11.

47.  Accordingly, when, after passing through all quarters, he made his attack in order to enslave this impregnable and formidable mother of the Churches, the only still remaining unquenched spark of the truth, he discovered that he had been for the first time ill advised.  For he was driven back like a missile which strikes upon some stronger body, and recoiled like a broken hawser.  Such was the prelate of the Church that he met with, such was the bulwark by which his efforts were broken and dissipated.  Other particulars may be heard from those who tell and recount them, from their own experience—and none of those who recount them is destitute of this full experience.  But all must be filled with admiration who are aware of the struggles of that time, the assaults, the promises, the threats, the commissioners sent before him to try to prevail upon us, men of judicial and military rank, men from the harem, who are men among women, women among men, whose only manliness consisted in their impiety, and being incapable of natural licentiousness, commit fornication in the only way they can, with their tongues; the chief cook Nebuzaradan,⁴⁴⁹²

4492 Nebuzaradan.  Demosthenes, a creature of Valens, sent to persuade Basil to yield to the Emperor.

48.  Who has not heard of the prefect⁴⁴⁹³

4493 Prefect.  Modestus.

49.  Then indeed the prefect became excited, and rose from his seat, boiling with rage, and making use of harsher language.  “What?” said he, “have you no fear of my authority?  “Fear of what?” said Basil, “How could it affect me?”  “Of what?  Of any one of the resources of my power.”  “What are these?” said Basil, “pray, inform me.”  “Confiscation, banishment, torture, death.”  “Have you no other threat?” said he, “for none of these can reach me.”  “How indeed is that?” said the prefect.  “Because,” he replied, “a man who has nothing, is beyond the reach of confiscation; unless you demand my tattered rags, and the few books, which are my only possessions.  Banishment is impossible for me, who am confined by no limit of place, counting my own neither the land where I now dwell, nor all of that into which I may be hurled; or, rather, counting it all God’s, whose guest and dependent I am.  As for tortures, what hold can they have upon one whose body has ceased to be?  Unless you mean the first stroke, for this alone is in your power.  Death is my benefactor, for it will send me the sooner to God, for Whom I live, and exist, and have all but died, and to Whom I have long been hastening.”

50.  Amazed at this language, the prefect said, “No one has ever yet spoken thus, and with such boldness, to Modestus.”  “Why, perhaps,” said Basil, “you have not met with a Bishop, or in his defence of such interests he would have used precisely the same language.  For we are modest in general, and submissive to every one, according to the precept of our law.  We may not treat with haughtiness even any ordinary person, to say nothing of so great a potentate.  But where the interests of God are at stake, we care for nothing else, and make these our sole object.  Fire and sword and wild beasts, and rakes which tear the flesh, we revel in, and fear them not.  You may further insult and threaten us, and do whatever you will, to the full extent of your power.  The Emperor himself may hear this—that neither by violence nor persuasion will you bring us to make common cause with impiety, not even though your threats become still more terrible.”

51.  At the close of this colloquy, the prefect, having been convinced by the attitude of Basil, that he was absolutely impervious to threats and influence, dismissed him from the court, his former threatening manner being replaced by somewhat of respect and deference.  He himself with all speed obtained an audience of the Emperor, and said:  “We have been worsted, Sire, by the prelate of this Church.  He is superior to threats, invincible in argument, uninfluenced by persuasion.  We must make trial of some more feeble character; and in this case resort to open violence, or submit to the disregard of our threatenings.”  Hereupon the Emperor, forced by the praises of Basil to condemn his own conduct (for even an enemy can admire a man’s excellence), would not allow violence to be used against him:  and, like iron, which is softened by fire, yet still remains iron, though turned from threatening to admiration, would not enter into communion with him, being prevented by shame from changing his course, but sought to justify his conduct by the most plausible excuse he could, as the sequel will show.

52.  For he entered the Church attended by the whole of his train; it was the festival of the Epiphany, and the Church was crowded, and, by taking his place among the people, he made a profession of unity.  The occurrence is not to be lightly passed over.  Upon his entrance he was struck by the thundering roll of the Psalms, by the sea of heads of the congregation, and by the angelic rather than human order which pervaded the sanctuary and its precincts:  while Basil presided over his people, standing erect, as the Scripture says of Samuel,⁴⁴⁹⁴

4494 1 Sam. xix. 20.

53.  As for the wisdom of his conference with the Emperor, who, in his quasi-communion with us entered within the veil to see and speak to him, as he had long desired to do, what else can I say but that they were inspired words, which were heard by the courtiers and by us who had entered with them?  This was the beginning and first establishment of the Emperor’s kindly feeling towards us; the impression produced by this reception put an end to the greater part of the persecution which assailed us like a river.

54.  Another incident is not of less importance than those I have mentioned.  The wicked were victorious, and the decree for his banishment was signed, to the full satisfaction of those who furthered it.  The night had come, the chariot was ready, our haters were exultant, the pious in despair, we surrounded the zealous traveller, to whose honourable disgrace nothing was wanting.  What next?  It was undone by God.  For He Who smote the first-born of Egypt,⁴⁴⁹⁵

4495 Exod. xii. 29.

4496 2 Sam. xii. 16.

55.  The same mischance is said to have befallen the prefect.  He also was obliged by sickness to bow beneath the hands of the Saint, and, in reality, to men of sense a visitation brings instruction, and affliction is often better than prosperity.  He fell sick, was in tears, and in pain, he sent for Basil, and entreated him, crying out, “I own that you were in the right; only save me!”  His request was granted, as he himself acknowledged, and convinced many who had known nothing of it; for he never ceased to wonder at and describe the powers of the prelate.  Such was his conduct in these cases, such its result.  Did he then treat others in a different way, and engage in petty disputes about trifles, or fail to rise to the heights of philosophy in a course of action which merits no praise and is best passed over in silence?  By no means.  He who once stirred up the wicked Hadad against Israel,⁴⁴⁹⁷

4497 1 Kings xi. 14.

4498 The prefect.  Eusebius.

56.  The assessor of a judge was attempting to force into a distasteful marriage a lady of high birth whose husband was but recently dead.  At a loss to escape from this high-handed treatment, she resorted to a device no less prudent than daring.  She fled to the holy table, and placed herself under the protection of God against outrage.  What, in the Name of the Trinity Itself, if I may introduce into my panegyric somewhat of the forensic style, ought to have been done, I do not say, by the great Basil, who laid down the law for us all in such matters, but by any one who, though far inferior to him, was a priest?  Ought he not to have allowed her claim, to have taken charge of, and cared for, her; to have raised his hand in defence of the kindness of God and the law which gives honour to the altar?  Ought he not to have been willing to do and suffer anything, rather than take part in any inhuman design against her, and outrage at once the holy table, and the faith in which she had taken sanctuary?  No! said the baffled judge, all ought to yield to my authority, and Christians should betray their own laws.  The suppliant whom he demanded, was at all hazards retained.  Accordingly, in his rage, he at last sent some of the magistrates to search the saint’s bedchamber, with the purpose of dishonouring him, rather than from any necessity.  What!  Search the house of a man so free from passion, whom the angels revere, at whom women do not venture even to look?  And, not content with this, he summoned him, and put him on his defence; and that, in no gentle or kindly manner, but as if he were a convict.  Upon Basil’s appearance, standing, like my Jesus, before the judgment seat of Pilate, he presided at the trial, full of wrath and pride.  Yet the thunderbolts did not fall, and the sword of God still glittered, and waited, while His bow, though bent, was restrained.  Such indeed is the custom of God.

57.  Consider another struggle between our champion and his persecutor.  His ragged pallium having been ordered to be torn away, “I will also, if you wish it, strip off my coat,” said he.  His fleshless form was threatened with blows, and he offered to submit to be torn with combs, and he said, “By such laceration you will cure my liver, which, as you see, is wearing me away.”  Such was their argument.  But when the city perceived the outrage and the common danger of all—for each one considered this insolence a danger to himself, it became all on fire with rage; and, like a hive roused by smoke, one after another was stirred and arose, every race and every age, but especially the men from the small-arms factory and from the imperial weaving-sheds.  For men at work in these trades are specially hot-tempered and daring, because of the liberty allowed them.  Each man was armed with the tool he was using, or with whatever else came to hand at the moment.  Torch in hand, amid showers of stones, with cudgel’s ready, all ran and shouted together in their united zeal.  Anger makes a terrible soldier or general.  Nor were the women weaponless, when roused by such an occasion.  Their pins were their spears, and no longer remaining women, they were by the strength of their eagerness endowed with masculine courage.  It is a short story.  They thought that they would share among themselves the piety of destroying him, and held him to be most pious who first laid hands on one who had dared such deeds.  What then was the conduct of this haughty and daring judge?  He begged for mercy in a pitiable state of distress, cringing before them to an unparalleled extent, until the arrival of the martyr without bloodshed, who had won his crown without blows, and now restrained the people by the force of his personal influence, and delivered the man who had insulted him and now sought his protection.  This was the doing of the God of Saints, Who worketh and changeth all things for the best, who resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble.⁴⁴⁹⁹

4499 S. James iv. 6.

58.  This was the end and fortunate close, in the Providence of God, of the war with the world, a close worthy of his faith.  But here at once is the beginning of the war with the Bishops, and their allies, which involved great disgrace, and still greater injury to their subjects.  For who could persuade others to be temperate, when such was the conduct of their prelates?  For a long time they had been unkindly disposed towards him, on three grounds.  They neither agreed with him in the matter of the faith, except in so far as they were absolutely obliged to yield to the majority of the faithful.  Nor had they altogether laid aside the grudge they owed him for his election.  And, what was most grievous of all to them, though they would have been most ashamed to own it—he so far outshone them in reputation.  There was also a further cause of dissension which stirred up again the others.  When our country had been divided into two provinces and metropolitical sees, and a great part of the former was being added to the new one, this again roused their factious spirit.  The one⁴⁵⁰⁰

4500 The one, i.e., Anthimus, Bishop of Tyana.

4501 The other, i.e., Basil.

4502 Revenues.  The dues and offerings of the people of the diocese.

4503 Orestes.  A chapel dedicated to S. Orestes at the foot of Mt. Taurus, where the offerings were collected.

59.  The holy man of God however, metropolitan as he was of the true Jerusalem above, was neither carried away with the failure of those who fell, nor allowed himself to overlook this conduct, nor did he desire any inadequate remedy for the evil.  Let us see how great and wonderful it was, or, I would say, how worthy of his soul.  He made of the dissension a cause of increase to the Church, and the disaster, under his most able management, resulted in the multiplication of the Bishops of the country.  From this ensued three most desirable consequences; a greater care for souls, the management by each city of its own affairs, and the cessation of the war in this quarter.  I am afraid that I myself was treated as an appendage to this scheme.  By no other term can I readily describe the position.  Greatly as I admire his whole conduct, to an extent indeed beyond my powers of expression, of this single particular I find it impossible to approve, for I will acknowledge my feelings in regard to it, though these are from other sources not unknown to most of you.  I mean the change and faithlessness of his treatment of myself, a cause of pain which even time has not obliterated.  For this is the source of all the inconsistency and tangle of my life; it has robbed me of the practice, or at least the reputation, of philosophy; of small moment though the latter be.  The defence, which you will perhaps allow me to make for him, is this; his ideas were superhuman, and having, before his death, become superior to worldly influences, his only interests were those of the Spirit:  while his regard for friendship was in no wise lessened by his readiness then, and then only, to disregard its claims, when they were in conflict with his paramount duty to God, and when the end he had in view was of greater importance than the interests he was compelled to set aside.

60.  I am afraid that, in avoiding the imputation of indifference at the hands of those who desire to know all that can be said about him, I shall incur a charge of prolixity from those whose ideal is the golden mean.  For the latter Basil himself had the greatest respect, being specially devoted to the adage “In all things the mean⁴⁵⁰⁴

4504 The mean, etc.  A saying of Cleobulus, one of the seven Sages.

4505 Crates.  He made this proclamation when he had stripped himself of all his possessions.

4506 In a tub, like Diogenes, the Cynic.

61.  A wondrous thing is temperance, and fewness of wants, and freedom from the dominion of pleasures, and from the bondage of that cruel and degrading mistress, the belly.  Who was so independent of food, and, without exaggeration, more free from the flesh?  For he flung away all satiety and surfeit to creatures destitute of reason, whose life is slavish and debasing.  He paid little attention to such things as, next to the appetite, are of equal rank, but, as far as possible, lived on the merest necessaries, his only luxury being to prove himself not luxurious, and not, in consequence, to have greater needs:  but he looked to the lilies and the birds,⁴⁵⁰⁷

4507 S. Matt. vi. 26.

4508 2 Cor. viii. 9.

62.  A great thing is virginity, and celibacy, and being ranked with the angels, and with the single nature; for I shrink from calling it Christ’s, Who, though He willed to be born for our sakes who are born, by being born of a Virgin, enacted⁴⁵⁰⁹

4509 Enacted by his religious rule, or as some say by a treatise on Virginity.

4510 S. Matt. xxv. 2.

4511 Cells, etc.  This passage strongly favours the view of Clemencet that S. Gregory uses μοναστήρια in the literal sense of “the abodes of solitaries,” and that there is no great distinction between κοινωνικοί and μιγάδες.  Cf. ii. 29. xxi. 10–19.

63.  What more?  A noble thing is philanthropy, and the support of the poor, and the assistance of human weakness.  Go forth a little way from the city, and behold the new city,⁴⁵¹²

4512 New city—a hospital for the sick.

4513 S. Matt. vi. 19.

4514 Thebes, etc.  The “seven wonders of the world.”

64.  As to all this, what will be said by those who charge him with pride and haughtiness?  Severe critics they are of such conduct, applying to him, whose life was a standard, those who were not standards at all.  Is it possible that he who kissed the lepers, and humiliated himself to such a degree, could treat haughtily those who were in health:  and, while wasting his flesh by abstinence, puff out his soul with empty arrogance?  Is it possible to condemn the Pharisee, and expound the debasing effect of haughtiness, to know Christ, Who condescended to the form of a slave, and ate with publicans, and washed the disciples’ feet, and did not disdain the cross, in order to nail my sin to it:  and, more incredible still, to see God crucified, aye, along with robbers also, and derided by the passers by, impassible, and beyond the reach of suffering as He is; and yet, as his slanderers imagine, soar himself above the clouds, and think that nothing can be on an equality with him.  Nay, what they term pride is, I fancy, the firmness and steadfastness and stability of his character.  Such persons would readily, it seems to me, call bravery rashness, and the circumspect a coward, and the temperate misanthropic, and the just illiberal.  For indeed this philosophic axiom is excellent, which says that the vices⁴⁵¹⁵

4515 The vices.  This was the doctrine of Menander and Aristotle.

4516 1 Cor. ix. 22.

4517 Eccles. iii. 1.

65.  But what are these to his renown for eloquence, and his powers of instruction, which have won the favour of the ends of the world?  As yet we have been compassing the foot of the mountain, to the neglect of its summit, as yet we have been crossing a strait, paying no heed to the mighty and deep ocean.  For I think that if any one ever has become, or can become, a trumpet, in his far sounding resonance, or a voice of God, embracing the universe, or an earthquake of the world, by some unheard of miracle, it is his voice and intellect which deserve these titles, for surpassing and excelling all men as much as we surpass the irrational creatures.  Who, more than he, cleansed himself by the Spirit, and made himself worthy to set forth divine things?  Who was more enlightened by the light of knowledge, and had a closer insight into the depths of the Spirit, and by the aid of God beheld the things of God?  Whose language could better express intellectual truth, without, as most men do, limping on one foot, by either failing to express his ideas, or allowing his eloquence to outstrip his reasoning powers?  In both respects he won a like distinction, and showed himself to be his own equal, and absolutely perfect.  To search all things, yea, the deep things of God⁴⁵¹⁸

4518 1 Cor. ii. 10.

66.  The sun is extolled by David for its beauty, its greatness, its swift course, and its power, splendid as a bridegroom, majestic as a giant;⁴⁵¹⁹

4519 Ps. xix. 6.

4520 Ps. xix. 5.

4521 Rom. x. 18.

67.  I will only say this of him.  Whenever I handle his Hexaemeron, and take its words on my lips, I am brought into the presence of the Creator, and understand the words of creation, and admire the Creator more than before, using my teacher as my only means of sight.  Whenever I take up his polemical works, I see the fire of Sodom,⁴⁵²²

4522 Gen. xix. 24.

4523 Chalane.  LXX. for Babel.

4524 Gen. xi. 4.

4525 Ps. xlii. 8.

68.  Since I have mentioned theology, and his most sublime treatises in this science, I will make this addition to what I have already said.  For it is of great service to the community, to save them from being injured by an unjustifiably low opinion of him.  My remarks are directed against those evil disposed persons who shelter their own vices under cover of their calumnies against others.  In his defence of orthodox teaching, and of the union and coequal divinity of the Holy Trinity, to use terms which are, I think, as exact and clear as possible, he would have eagerly welcomed as a gain, and not a danger, not only expulsion from his see, in which he had originally no desire to be enthroned, but even exile, and death, and its preliminary tortures.  This is manifest from his actual conduct and sufferings.  For when he had been sentenced to banishment on behalf of the truth, the only notice which he took of it was, to bid one of his servants to take his writing tablet and follow him.  He held it necessary, according to the divine David’s advice, to guide his words with discretion,⁴⁵²⁶

4526 Ib. cxii. 5.

4527 Economy.  In refraining from the express assertion “The Holy Ghost is God”—some have blamed S. Basil for this:  but his conduct has the approval of S. Athanasius.  Ep. ad Palladium.

69.  That he, no less than any other, acknowledged that the Spirit is God, is plain from his often having publicly preached this truth, whenever opportunity offered, and eagerly confessed it when questioned in private.  But he made it more clear in his conversations with me, from whom he concealed nothing during our conferences upon this subject.  Not content with simply asserting it, he proceeded, as he had but very seldom done before, to imprecate upon himself that most terrible fate of separation from the Spirit, if he did not adore the Spirit as consubstantial and coequal with the Father and the Son.  And if any one would accept me as having been his fellow labourer in this cause, I will set forth one point hitherto unknown to most men.  Under the pressure of the difficulties of the period, he himself undertook the economy, while allowing freedom of speech to me, whom no one was likely to drag from obscurity to trial or banishment, in order that by our united efforts our Gospel might be firmly established.  I mention this, not to defend his reputation, for the man is stronger than his assailants, if there are any such; but to prevent men from thinking that the terms found in his writings are the utmost limit of the truth, and so have their faith weakened, and consider that their own error is supported by his theology, which was the joint result of the influences of the time and of the Spirit, instead of considering the sense of his writings, and the object with which they were written, so as to be brought closer to the truth, and enabled to silence the partisans of impiety.  At any rate let his theology be mine, and that of all dear to me!  And so confident am I of his spotlessness in this respect, that I take him for my partner in this, as in all else:  and may what is mine be attributed to him, what is his to me, both at the hands of God, and of the wisest of men!  For we would not say that the Evangelists are at variance with one another, because some are more occupied with the human side of the Christ, and others pay attention to His Divinity; some having commenced their history with what is within our own experience, others with what is above us; and by thus sharing the substance of their message, they have procured the advantage of those who receive it, and followed the impressions of the Spirit Who was within them.

70.  Come then, there have been many men of old days illustrious for piety, as lawgivers, generals, prophets, teachers, and men brave to the shedding of blood.  Let us compare our prelate with them, and thus recognize his merit.  Adam was honoured by the hand of God,⁴⁵²⁸

4528 Gen. i. 27.

4529 Ib. ii. 8.

4530 Ib. ii. 16.

4531 Ib. iv. 26.

4532 Ib. v. 21.

4533 Gen. vi. 13.

71.  Abraham was a great man, a patriarch, the offerer of the new sacrifice,⁴⁵³⁴

4534 Ib. xxii. i.

4535 Ib. xviii. 10.

4536 Ib. xxiv. 3.

4537 Ib. xxviii. 12.

4538 Defeat or “loss of generative power.”

72.  Joseph was a provider of corn,⁴⁵³⁹

4539 Gen. xli. 40.

4540 Job i. 1.

4541 Ps. xcix. 6.

4542 Exod. vii. 8. et seq.

4543 Ib. xxix. 4.

4544 Heb. viii. 2.

4545 Ib. xi. 9.

4546 Tit. ii. 14.

4547 2 Cor. iii. 3.

4548 Exod. xxiv. 8; Heb. ix. 19.

4549 Josh. i. 2.

4550 Exarch or Metropolitan.

4551 Eph. ii. 8.

4552 Ps. xvi. 6.

4553 Ib. xxxi. 16.

73.  Further, to run over the Judges, or the most illustrious of the Judges, there is “Samuel among those that call upon His Name,”⁴⁵⁵⁴

4554 Ib. cxix. 6.

4555 1 Sam. i. 20.

4556 Ib. xvi. 13.

4557 Cf. 1 Sam. ii. 19.

4558 2 Sam. v. 1.

4559 Ps. cxxxii. 1 (LXX.).

4560 1 Kings iv. 29.

74.  Do you praise the courage of Elijah⁴⁵⁶¹

4561 2 Kings i. 1.

4562 Ib. ii. 11.

4563 Ib. ii. 13; 15.

4564 Exod. iii. 1.

4565 Dan. iii. 5.

4566 Jonah ii. 1.

4567 Dan. vi. 22.

4568 2 Macc. vii. 1.

75.  I now turn to the New Testament, and comparing his life with those who are here illustrious, I shall find in the teachers a source of honour for their disciple.  Who was the forerunner of Jesus?⁴⁵⁶⁹

4569 S. Luke i. 76.

4570 Ib. iii. 4.

4571 S. John v. 35; i. 8.

4572 S. Luke ii. 41.

4573 S. Matt. xiv. 10.

4574 S. Matt. xi. 11.

4575 Ib. iii. 5.

76.  He emulated the zeal of Peter,⁴⁵⁷⁶

4576 Acts iv. 8.

4577 S. Matt. xvi. 1.

4578 Rom. xv. 1.

4579 Acts vii. 58.

77.  So great was his virtue, and the eminence of his fame, that many of his minor characteristics, nay, even his physical defects, have been assumed by others with a view to notoriety.  For instance his paleness, his beard, his gait, his thoughtful, and generally meditative, hesitation in speaking, which, in the ill-judged, inconsiderate imitation of many, took the form of melancholy.  And besides, the style of his dress, the shape of his bed, and his manner of eating, none of which was to him a matter of consequence, but simply the result of accident and chance.  So you might see many Basils in outward semblance, among these statues in outline, for it would be too much to call them his distant echo.  For an echo, though it is the dying away of a sound, at any rate represents it with great clearness, while these men fall too far short of him to satisfy even their desire to approach him.  Nor was it a slight thing, but a matter with good reason held in the highest estimation, to chance to have met him or done him some service, or to carry away the souvenir of something which he had said or done in jest or in earnest:  as I know that I have myself often taken pride in doing; for his improvisations were much more precious and brilliant than the laboured efforts of other men.

78.  But when, after he had finished his course, and kept the faith,⁴⁵⁸⁰

4580 2 Tim. iv. 7.

4581 Phil. i. 23.

4582 Deut. xxxii. 49.

79.  He lay, drawing his last breath, and awaited by the choir on high, towards which he had long directed his gaze.  Around him poured the whole city, unable to bear his loss, inveighing against his departure, as if it had been an oppression, and clinging to his soul, as though it had been capable of restraint or compulsion at their hands or their prayers.  Their suffering had driven them distracted, all were eager, were it possible, to add to his life a portion of their own.  And when they failed, for it must needs be proved that he was a man, and, with his last words “Into thy Hands I commend my spirit,”⁴⁵⁸³

4583 Ps. xxxi. 6.

80.  The saint was being carried out, lifted high by the hands of holy men, and everyone was eager, some to seize the hem of his garment,⁴⁵⁸⁴

4584 S. Luke viii. 44.

4585 Acts v. 15.

81.  Come hither then, and surround me, all ye members of his choir, both of the clergy and the laity, both of our own country and from abroad; aid me in my eulogy, by each supplying or demanding the account of some of his excellences.  Regard, ye occupants of the bench, the lawgiver; ye politicians, the statesman; ye men of the people, his orderliness; ye men of letters, the instructor; ye virgins, the leader of the bride; ye who are yoked in marriage, the restrainer; ye hermits, him who gave you wings; ye cenobites, the judge; ye simple men, the guide; ye contemplatives, the divine; ye cheerful ones, the bridle; ye unfortunate men, the consoler, the staff of hoar hairs, the guide of youth, the relief of poverty, the steward of abundance.  Widows also will, I imagine, praise their protector, orphans their father, poor men their friend, strangers their entertainer, brothers the man of brotherly love, the sick their physician, whatever be their sickness and the healing they need, the healthy the preserver of health, and all men him who made himself all things to all that he might gain the majority, if not all.

82.  This is my offering to thee, Basil, uttered by the tongue which once was the sweetest of all to thee, of him who was thy fellow in age and rank.  If it have approached thy deserts, thanks are due to thee, for it was from confidence in thee that I undertook to speak of thee.  But if it fall far short of thy expectations, what must be our feelings, who are worn out with age and disease and regret for thee?  Yet God is pleased, when we do what we can.  Yet mayest thou gaze upon us from above, thou divine and sacred person; either stay by thy entreaties our thorn in the flesh,⁴⁵⁸⁶

4586 2 Cor. xii. 7.

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