GREGORY THE GREAT

VIII

THE PESTILENCE OF THE YEAR 589 AD

The year 589 was signalized by great disasters and calamities thoughout the length and breadth of the Empire. In the East the Persians defeated the Roman troops and captured Martyropolis, while the Slaves, who had been quiet for a while, made a devastating raid into Thrace. A great portion of the city of Antioch was laid in ruins by a terrific earthquake, and sixty thousand lives were lost. The venerable sanctuary of the Mother of God was destroyed, together with the bishop's palace, the bishop himself escaping death by a miracle. In Italy there was an extraordinary inundation. Throughout Venetia, Liguria, and the north, the streams and mountain-torrents overflowed. Houses and farms were washed away by the tumultuous waters, and thousands of men and animals were drowned. The great post-roads were badly injured by the floods, while many of the lesser tracks were entirely obliterated. In Verona the river Adige rose, and threw down a portion of the city walls. The Church of San Zenone was surrounded by the water, which swelled up as high as the topmost line of windows just below the roof; but it is said that, though the doors were open, and the flood blocked them on the outside like a solid wall, not a drop penetrated the basilica. This miracle of the flood took place in October. Two months later a large part of Verona was destroyed by fire.

In Rome the Tiber overflowed its banks, and a portion of the city was inundated: several ancient buildings—situated presumably on the Campus Martius—were thrown down, and the granaries of the Church were destroyed, with all their store of corn. In the channel of the river, it is recorded, an innumerable multitude of serpents and a dragon of great size were borne past the city to the sea, where they were choked in the salt waves, and polluted all the shores with their putrefying bodies.

One consequence of this inundation was that the pestilence, which during the last fifty years had been devastating Europe at intervals, now broke out in Italy with exceptional fury. This dreadful scourge appears to have originated in Egypt, to have passed thence eastwards over Syria and Persia, and so to have entered Europe, spreading from the coast-line inland. It was remarkable alike for the rapidity of its working, the great mortality it produced, and the utter inability of the physicians to cope with it. Its main characteristics are known to us from the classical descriptions of Thucydides, Procopius, and Boccaccio, from which it appears to have combined "the features of several modern diseases in one," having, for instance, "symptoms in common with typhus fever and with the more malignant forms of measles and small-pox." Gibbon's account of the malady, based on that of Procopius, is worth repeating. The majority of the sufferers, he says, "in their beds, in the streets, in their usual occupations, were surprised by a slight fever; so slight, indeed, that neither the pulse nor the colour of the patient gave any signs of the approaching danger. The same, the next, or the succeeding day, it was declared by the swelling of the glands, particularly those of the groin, of the arm-pits, and under the ear; and when these buboes or tumours were opened, they were found to contain a coal, or black substance, of the size of a lentil. If they came to a just swelling and suppuration, the patient was saved by this kind and natural discharge of the morbid humour. But if they continued hard and dry, a mortification quickly ensued, and the fifth day was commonly the term of his life. The fever was often accompanied with lethargy or delirium; the bodies of the sick were covered with black pustules or carbuncles, the symptoms of immediate death; and in constitutions too feeble to produce an eruption, the vomiting of blood was followed by a mortification of the bowels. To pregnant women the plague was generally mortal; yet one infant was drawn alive from his dead mother, and three mothers survived the loss of their infected foetuses. Youth was the most perilous season, and the female sex was less susceptible than the male; but every rank and profession were attacked with indiscriminate rage, and many of those who escaped were deprived of the use of their speech, without being secure from a return of the disorder."

Among the most distressing features of the malady were the visions and hallucinations which distracted the frenzied imagination of the sufferers. Men fancied that they saw ghastly spectres stalking through the streets and striking with their hands those who were destined to die. Ineffaceable marks appeared upon the houses or the clothes of the doomed persons, and the arrows of divine wrath were seen visibly darting down on them from heaven. The air resounded with the braying of unseen trumpets, and the voices of the dead were heard calling their friends to join them. Those who experienced these phantasms sickened and died, not always immediately but generally within three or four days. Certain who had been brought to the point of death, but had subsequently recovered, related strange visions which they had witnessed in their sickness. A soldier, for instance, who had lain for some time to all appearance lifeless, imagined that his soul left the body and came to a black, smoky river, which emitted an intolerable stench, and which was spanned by the bridge of the dead. On the further side of the stream were pleasant meadows fragrant with flowers, amid which were companies of men apparelled in white. Many separate mansions were also there, all shining with brightness and light, and there was one house being built especially magnificent, the bricks whereof appeared to be of gold; but whose it was he knew not. On the banks of the river also were certain houses, but some of them were touched by the noisome vapour which rose from the ditch. Now, the dead who desired to cross the bridge were subject to the following trial. If a wicked man attempted to go over, he fell down into the dark and foul-smelling waters; but those who were just and unhindered by sin passed over easily to the pleasant places beyond. As the dreamer watched he beheld Peter, the merciless steward of the Pope, thrust into the most filthy place, where he was bound down by a great weight of iron in punishment for his former cruelty; a certain presbyter whom he knew, however, crossed the bridge with great security, inasmuch as his life had been good and upright. After the presbyter, one Stephen, a smith, assayed to go over, but his foot slipped and he hung half on, half off the bridge. Then certain frightful men rose out of the river and tried to drag him downwards by the legs, but somo others in white robes and with beautiful faces strove to carry him up by the arms. And while the good and evil spirits contended together over Stephen, the soul of the dreaming soldier returned to his body, so that he never knew the end of the matter.

Again, in Gregory's own monastery there was a boy named Theodore, who had always been incorrigibly bad. "He could not bear that any one should speak a word to him for the welfare of his soul. He would neither do nor listen to anything that was good. With oaths, with angry words, with scornful laughter, he used to protest that he would never adopt the habit of the holy life." This youth, being stricken with the plague, and being seemingly at the last gasp, called out suddenly to the brethren who were praying round his bed, "Depart, depart! I am given over to a dragon to be devoured, and he cannot devour me because you are here. He has already swallowed my head; let him alone, that he may not torture me longer, but may do what he has to do. If I am given up to be devoured by him, why should you cause me the suffering of this delay?" The frightened monks said, "What meanest thou, brother? Sign thyself with the sign of the cross." But he with terrible cries replied, "I wish to sign myself, but cannot. I am fettered by the coils of the dragon." The monks thereupon threw themselves on the ground, and redoubled their prayers; and in a little while the sick boy suddenly cried out, "Thank God, the dragon to whom I was given up has fled, for he could not abide your prayers. Pray now for my sins, because I am ready to be converted and to quit the secular life entirely." In the end the youth recovered, and thenceforward, says Gregory, "with his whole heart he turned to God."

The mortality in Rome was appalling, and the state of the city, which doubtless resembled that of Constantinople during the visitation of 542, must have been terrible. Men lay dying and dead in their deserted houses, without a friend to soothe their last moments or to attend to their burial. To inter each body separately was impossible. Waggon-loads of corpses were conveyed from the city night by night, and flung promiscuously into deep pits outside the walls. All business was of course at a standstill, traffic ceased, and in the streets and piazzas the few passengers slunk along furtively, avoiding one another. The churches alone were crammed with dense throngs of panic-stricken citizens, and thus became centres from which infection spread. Some persons went insane with terror, and performed strange antics in their madness; a few in despair flung themselves into wild orges of vice; many shut themselves up in their houses and refused to hold communication with any, until the plague pushed in behind the barricaded doors, and they fled out headlong, they knew not whither. A heavy stillness brooded over the city, broken only by the groans and shrieks of the dying, the subdued chant of Misereres, and the rumble of the death-waggons. All the skill of the physicians could do nothing to abate the malady.

To add to the general consternation, Pope Pelagius sickened of the plague and died on the 8th of February, in the year 590. The choice of his successor lay with the clergy and people of Rome, the confirmation of their choice with the Emperor. Without any hesitation, the Romans elected the popular Abbat of St. Andrew's.

In peaceful times the supreme dignity in the Western Church, with its magnificence and wealth and influence, had often been the object of long intrigues and fierce struggles even to bloodshed, but in the hour of suffering and danger there were few men who were willing to undertake the office, and fewer still who were capable of administering it. At a crisis like the present it was generally felt that a man of no ordinary abilities was needed. The Pope who was to pilot the Roman Church through the gathering difficulties and perils must be a man of high character and attainments, a spiritual guide in whom the people could trust, a resolute defender of the rights and pretensions of the Roman See against the encroachments of the Imperial Government and the rivalry of the Patriarchs of Constantinople. He must be a skilful administrator, to manage the vast revenues of the Papacy, on which a large part of the Roman people depended for subsistence. He must be a courageous patriot, to watch with unsleeping vigilance over the safety of the city, to infuse some spirit of resistance into the scanty band of soldiers half mutinous for want of pay, and into the frightened populace who cowered behind the walls. He must be a statesman, finally, who could understand the policy and command the respect both of the Exarch and of the Lombard princes, and one whose personal influence and authority might even induce the Emperor to pay attention to the necessities of the ancient capital of his Empire. Of all the Roman ecclesiastics only one at this time seemed to possess these qualifications. By his high character and noble birth, by the reputation he had acquired among all classes as administrator, as monk, as ambassador, as confidential adviser to the late Pope, Gregory, in the opinion of all but himself, was marked out for the post of supreme honour and peril. Clergy and people—a poverty-stricken, plague-stricken throng—flocked to the monastery on the Caelian, and with loud cries commanded him to ascend the chair of Peter.

In spite of the unanimity and enthusiasm of the Romans, Gregory shrank from the proposed honour. He knew that, when once engaged in the anxious work of the pontificate, he would lose for ever the blessings of the secluded life which he so highly prized. He feared, moreover, that he would prove unequal to the task that was laid upon him, and that he would even suffer in personal character from the distracting influence of worldly cares and anxieties. He therefore resisted the importunities of his fellow-citizens, and actually wrote to the Emperor Maurice, earnestly entreating him not to confirm the election. This letter, however, was intercepted by Germanus, Prefect of the City, who substituted in its stead the formal document of the election. Meanwhile, until a reply should be brought from Constantinople, Gregory—probably in conjunction with the Archpresbyter, the Archdeacon, and the Chief of the Notaries—was entrusted with the administration of the vacant see.

The plague continued to rage. Gregory worked indefatigably to check its progress, but without result. At length he determined to appeal to the people to make a special act of contrition, that the wrath of God, signified by this awful pestilence, might be turned away. He ascended the ambo in the Basilica of St. John Lateran, and there, amid a breathless silence of the people, he preached a sermon, which has fortunately been preserved:

"We ought, my beloved brethren, to have feared the chastisements of God before they came, but let us at all events fear them now that they have come and we have felt them. Let sorrow open the way for us to conversion. Let the punishments we already suffer break up the hardness of our hearts, for as the prophet bears us witness: The sword reacheth unto the soul. Behold, all the people are smitten with the sword of God's wrath, and men are laid low in sudden destruction. There is no interval of weakness before death; death leaves no time for the slow process of decay. Before the sufferer can turn to penitential mourning, he is gone. Think in what plight that man appears before the strict Judge who has had no time to bewail his evil deeds. The inhabitants are taken away; they fall, not one by one, but all together. Houses are left empty, parents see their children buried, their heirs go before them to the grave. Let us then, each one of us, flee for refuge to penitential mourning, while we have time to weep, before the blow falls. Let us summon up before the eyes of the mind the sins we have committed, let us bewail whatever we have done amiss, let us come before His face with confession, and as the prophet admonisheth us, let us lift up our hearts with our hands to God. To lift up our hearts with our hands to God is to heighten the earnestness of our prayers by the merit of good works. He gives, He surely gives us confidence in our fear, who cries to us by His prophet: I have no pleasure in the death of a sinner, but that the wicked turn, from his way and live. Let no one despair for the greatness of his iniquities. The inveterate sins of the Ninevites were purged away by three days of penitence, and the converted robber earned the reward of life in the very moment of his death. Therefore let us change our hearts, and let us feel sure that we have already received what we ask for. The Judge is more quickly swayed by prayer, if the suppliant corrects his evil life. While, then, the stroke of such grievous punishment is still impending, let us persist in importunate prayers. That importunity which displeases men is pleasing in the judgment of the Truth; for the good and merciful God desires that pardon should be claimed from Him by prayer, because He desires not to be angry with us according to our deserts; for so He saith by the Psalmist: Call upon Me in the time of trouble; so will I hear thee, and thou shalt praise Me. He who thus urges men to call upon Him is a witness unto Himself that He will have mercy upon those who call upon Him. Therefore, my beloved brethren, with contrite hearts and amended lives, with devout minds and with tears, let us assemble at early dawn on the fourth day of the week in a sevenfold litany, in the order to be hereafter given, so that when the strict Judge sees that we punish our faults ourselves, He may refrain from passing the sentence of condemnation, now ready to be pronounced against us."

The order of the procession is then indicated. "Let the clergy set out from the Church of SS. Cosmas and Damian the Martyrs, with the priests of the Sixth Region. Let all the abbats with their monks set out from the Church of SS. Gervasius and Protasius the Martyrs, with the priests of the Fourth Region. Let all the abbesses with their congregations set out from the Church of SS. Marcellinus and Peter the Martyrs, with the priests of the First Region; the children from the Church of SS. John and Paul the Martyrs, with the priests of the Second Region ; the laymen from the Church of St. Stephen the Protomartyr, with the priests of the Seventh Region; the widows from the Church of St. Euphemia, with the priests of the Fifth Region; the married women from the Church of St. Clement the Martyr, with the priests of the Third Region. Let us go forth from each of these churches with prayers and tears; let us meet together at the Basilica of the Blessed Mary ever Virgin, Mother of our Lord God Jesus Christ; and let us there persevere in supplications to the Lord, with weeping and groaning, that we may be deemed worthy to receive pardon for our sins."

So in the dim twilight of the spring morning—it was the 25th of April, according to a tradition which dates back to the seventh century—the great procession started. Pale-faced, emaciated, and clad in deepest mourning, the people moved slowly through the desolate streets towards the great basilica on the Esquiline. As the seven trains of priests and mourners wound through the city scarcely a sound was heard save the tramp of feet, and sobs and cries for mercy, and over all the doleful chant of the Kyrie Eleison, deepening in fervour as one person after another dropped plague-stricken from the ranks. For Death kept step with the moving crowds, and, according to the report of a deacon of Tours, who was an eye-witness, in the space of a single hour no less than eighty men fell down and died. Thus at length the Church of the Mother of God was reached, and here again Gregory addressed to the people an earnest exhortation to prayer and penitence, promising that if they would have faith the pestilence should cease.

  With this famous procession is connected a beautiful legend, which, though traced back to a date earlier than the tenth century, is not found in writing till the thirteenth. According to the tradition, Gregory is represented at the head of a great train of penitents, crossing the Bridge of hadrian on his way to St. Peter's. Before his eyes, about a bowshot beyond the Aurelian Gate, rose dazzling in the sunshine the Mausoleum of Hadrian—a high square structure of Parian marble, surmounted by two circular buildings with colonnades, and crowned with a conical cupola and the famous bronze fircone, now in the garden of the Vatican. Though the Tomb of Hadrian had been sadly battered during the Gothic wars, and had lost those master­works of Pheidias and Praxiteles which had once adorned its colonnades, it was still, as in Procopius's time, "a memorable sight" and a splendid monument of the nation's history. As Gregory and his penitents paused before it, they beheld on the summit the Archangel Michael, in the act of restoring to its sheath a flaming sword, in token that the plague was about to cease. From this legend the mausoleum, since the tenth century, has been called by the name of the Castle of the Angel, and for many hundreds of years a figure of an angel has crowned its summit. Four of these statues have at different times been destroyed, the fifth and present one, cast in bronze by Wenschefeld, was set in position during the pontificate of Benedict the Fourteenth. It should be added that one curious relic connected with this legend is still to be seen in the Capitoline Museum. This is an altar dedicated to Isis by some one who had returned safely from a journey, which accordingly bears the conventional emblem of two footprints. The altar at one time stood in the Church of the Aracoeli, and the footprints—described by Philip de Winghe as those of a "puer quinquennis"—were long believed by Roman Christians to be those of the angel seen by Gregory on the summit of Hadrian's Tomb.

Another story of the procession, but less ancient, is found in the notice of Gregory in the Legenda Aurea. Caxton thus quaintly translates the words of the original: "And because the mortality ceased not, he (i.e. Gregory) ordained a procession, in which he did do bear an image of our Lady, which, as is said, St. Luke the Evangelist made, which was a good painter, he had carved it and painted after the likeness of the glorious Virgin Mary. And anon the mortality ceased, and the air became pure and clear, and above the image was heard a voice that sung this anthem: 'Regina coeli laetare,' etc., and St. Gregory put thereto, 'Ora pro nobis, deum rogamus, alleluia'." In memory of this alleged event the great processions from S. Marco were always accustomed to strike up the antiphon "Regina coeli" when they came to the Bridge of Hadrian.

At length, towards the end of August, after the Roman See had been vacant for more than six months, the ratification of Gregory's election came from Constantinople. The long delay must probably be attributed to the difficulties of communication in the disturbed state of Italy. At any rate, it was not due to any unwillingness on the Emperor's part to sanction the elevation of the celebrated deacon, whose election seems to have given the greatest satisfaction at the Byzantine court. Gregory himself, however, was panic-stricken at the news. He sought to hide himself, and, according to a legend which grew up soon after his death, he actually succeeded in escaping from the city, though the gates were guarded, being conveyed out secretly in a basket of merchandise. For three days he remained concealed in a forest cave, but on the third night, in answer to the prayer and fasting of the people, his retreat was revealed by a column of light from heaven. This story, however, can scarcely be historical. It is certainly true, as we know from Gregory himself, that he wished to avoid the dignity thus thrust upon him, and even meditated going into hiding. But his project of flight was never carried out. "While he was preparing for flight and concealment," so writes his contemporary, Gregory of Tours, "he was seized and carried off and dragged to the Basilica of St. Peter, and there, having been consecrated to the Pontifical office, was given as a Pope to the city." The event took place on the 3rd day of September, in the year of our Lord 590.

I may close this chapter with the confession of faith which Gregory made in public at the Fisherman's tomb on the day of his consecration.

"I believe in One God, Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, three Persons, one Substance: the Father un­begotten, the Son begotten, but the Holy Spirit, neither begotten nor unbegotten, but coeternal with and proceeding from the Father and the Son. I acknowledge the only-begotten Son, consubstantial with the Father, and born of the Father without time; Maker of all things visible and invisible, Light of Light, Very God of Very God, the Brightness of His glory, the Image of His Substance: Who remaining the Word before all ages was made perfect Man at the end of the ages, and was conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, and took upon Him our nature without sin: and He was crucified under Pontius Pilate and was buried, and on the third day He rose again from the dead, and on the fortieth day He ascended into heaven, and He sitteth at the right hand of the Father. From thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead, and He shall set before all eyes all the secrets of every heart, and He shall give to the righteous the eternal rewards of the heavenly kingdom, but to the wicked the punishment of everlasting fire, and He shall renew the world by fire at the resurrection of the flesh. I acknowledge one Faith, one Baptism, one Apostolic and Universal Church in which alone sins can be forgiven in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost."