Simplician

ON ST. SIMPLICIAN, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR,

AT MILAN IN INSUBRIA,

In the year 400.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

His cult, native country, age, and condition before the episcopate.

Simplician, confessor, at Milan (St.)

BY J. B. S.

That a man so famous, most highly praised by SS. Ambrose and Augustine, should be commemorated in no ancient sacred calendars, not a few before me have already wondered: First inscribed in the calendars by Belinus, certainly he does not obtain a place even among the older supplements of Usuard, so that the first who makes mention of him is Belinus, when he writes thus of him, not on this day, but on the XIII of this month: On the same day, the deposition of St. Simplician, bishop and confessor. A little more distinctly and fully the edition of Greven: At Milan, the deposition of blessed Simplician, bishop and confessor. Who, on account of the famous report of his sanctity, succeeding blessed Ambrose from being a hermit worn out with age, even as in the solitary life he had been specially devoted to the Lord, so, being taken to the government of the church, he showed himself a strenuous imitator of St. Ambrose. Molanus copied Belinus word for word; Maurolycus, if not in the same words, certainly also marked him on the XIII day. Ghini adorns the Saint on this day with a eulogy which we have thought fit to transcribe, although he has wrongly determined the year of his death. It runs thus:

[2] He is adorned with a eulogy by Ghini; At Milan, the deposition of St. Simplician the bishop, famous by the testimony of SS. Ambrose and Augustine. Who, shining with the remarkable brightness of Christian virtues, was held in honor both by all other pious men and especially by St. Ambrose himself, to such a degree that the latter cherished him in the place of a father. By the example and exhortation of his life both the same St. Augustine at Milan and Victorinus the great rhetorician at Rome betook themselves to the true faith of Christ the Lord. And as bishop he succeeded in the place of St. Ambrose; abounding in divine virtues in the episcopal charge, he increased the church of Milan in religion and in the institutes of piety: and when he had piously and illustriously administered that church for four years, and his sanctity had been declared from heaven in many matters, he fell asleep in the Lord in the year of salvation 405. He is not alone in erring in setting down the year of his death, as will presently appear from Ferrarius, who declares of the Saint after this manner:

[3] Simplician, born at Milan, as they say, of the Catania family, and there educated, Concerning the Saint's native country gave himself from tender years to letters and to religion, and for the sake of piety traveled through many cities. At Rome he converted Victorinus, an excellent rhetorician, to Christ. Returning to Milan, he brought with him relics of the holy Apostles. And he shone with such sanctity, learning, and virtues that he was more than once praised by SS. Ambrose and Augustine. Almost worn out with age, he succeeded St. Ambrose in the bishopric, to whom he had at the beginning been given as helper by Damasus, and which he ruled most holily under the supreme Pontiff Anastasius. He ordained St. Gaudentius bishop of Novara. He received the legates of the council of Carthage, who had come to consult him. He enlarged the rite of the ecclesiastical Office of the church of Milan. After these and other illustrious deeds he fell asleep in the Lord on the XVII of the Kalends of September, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation 409, Innocent I being Pontiff. His body was laid in St. M., and afterwards translated into a church dedicated to his name.

[4] These things concerning St. Simplician Ferrarius; in whom not only the year of death set down displeases, and his Roman priesthood, but chiefly what he observes in his note: That Simplician was a Milanese by birth is contrary to what St. Augustine says in book 8 of the Confessions, chapter 2, according to Baronius in the Annals at the year of the Lord 376. For, as Baronius there writes, since St. Ambrose had been ordained bishop contrary to the rule of the Church, Pope Damasus gave him Simplician, a presbyter of the Roman Church, as helper and monitor. What Ferrarius here alleges from St. Augustine and Baronius I really do not sufficiently understand: that St. Simplician was a presbyter of the Roman Church, there is no one who denies; but can it, I pray, be rightly inferred thence that he was also a Roman by race, and not a Milanese? By a like argument, surely, someone would say that I too am a Roman and not a Belgian, because I was initiated into the priesthood not in Belgium but at Rome. That I make no mention here of Tamayo no one will wonder who has deigned to consult his absurdities at their very source.

[5] It must also be noted here that concerning the very day of his death no small discrepancy occurs in the Martyrologies; and likewise concerning the day of his death. inasmuch as the Saint is placed on the Ides of August in that of the Augustinian Saints: At Milan, the birthday of St. Simplician, bishop and Confessor, who exhorted our holy Father Augustine to the monastic life, and who, once a nursling of the Roman Church, stood by St. Ambrose in his struggle against the Arians, and, afterwards substituted in his place, conspicuous for sanctity and learning, rested in peace. But in the Roman Martyrology on this day it is read thus: At Milan, the deposition of St. Simplician the bishop, famous by the testimony of SS. Ambrose and Augustine: so that it seems in some manner to be insinuated that the Saint died on the XIII of August, but on this day was laid away or buried, contrary to what the Martyrologists cited above have written, who with others attach the deposition to the very Ides already mentioned. Galesinius, thinking otherwise, announces the Saint on the XIV of this month. The brief eulogy of Braut alludes to his name:

Simplician was simple, like a white dove,       Who was worthy to come to the throne of Ambrose.

[6] A little more polished and more vigorous is what Ennodius, bishop of Pavia, sang for him after this manner: The metrical eulogy of Ennodius.

Ambrose, leaving the charge of a widowed people,       Transferred it, Simplician, to thy care. The wealth of the successor, the heart of a despoiled realm,       Increased by the merit of another season. And as the aged ash, when the west winds scatter it,       Is made firm by long rest, that it fear not the storm; So the happy recruit, called in white hairs to his first lessons,       Did not, degenerating, bend down his ancient height. The bishop's virtue, with soul fervent in chill marrow,       Feared nothing: his old age has the bloom of a flower. He who pressed the earthly plains with an upright and open course       Touched the stars by his character and his worship.

[7] Concerning the disputed age of the Saint, Let enough have been said of his cult and native country; from his Life the matter will be more plainly understood. But as concerns his age, it is likewise the common opinion that he returned to Milan already growing old, whether of his own accord, or sent by Pope Damasus as a helper to St. Ambrose: and that he was old and grave in years when he was given as successor to the same Saint, in the year, as the opinion of most has it, 397, contrary to what our Elders have established in the special Dissertation before volume 1 of April, and in another Preliminary to volume VII of May. However it may be, it cannot be denied that

he flourished chiefly at Rome in the time of Pope Liberius, and also at the beginning of the pontificate of Damasus. Nor would I doubt that he was much more than forty years old when he so gloriously triumphed over Victorinus the rhetorician, bringing him, to the astonishment of Rome, to the Christian faith; so that it seems to follow that he was born about the year 320. And now, as I have said, he was growing old when he was sent to St. Ambrose, who had been ordained bishop from being prefect, having returned to his native place in the year 374; so that he was most illustrious in sanctity and learning, and most intimate with the holy Doctor, when in the year 384 St. Augustine came thither, whom he himself also taught the faith as a master.

[8] and concerning the year of his death. Concerning the year of St. Simplician's death we have already seen Ghini and Ferrarius going astray, so that they would have him prolong his life to the year 405, nay to 409, whom our Elders long ago showed to have held the see not a full three years, namely from the month of April 398 to August 400, in which very year St. Venerius succeeded St. Simplician, as you have also in volume 1 of May, page 494. And so much for the Saint's age. There remains only the controversy which it will be enough to indicate, namely whether he was a Hermit or a Canon Regular of St. Augustine, or a Carmelite; on which question Bosca frankly confesses that he had no leisure days to examine the weight of such great matters. Concerning the Carmelites everything has long ago been sufficiently examined; nor does he seem able to be very aptly ascribed to the Augustinians, since we know that he was older than St. Augustine and his instructor, so that St. Augustine might more rightly be called of the Order of Simplician, if ever such an Order existed, than St. Simplician of the Augustinian. Hear the words of the rhythm in Ferrarius concerning St. Augustine on the XXVIII of August:

Ambrose baptizes him, And thunders forth "We praise Thee, O God"; Simplician gives him the monk's Habit and the girdle.

[9] Now we proceed to the Life itself, published, so far as I know, by Mombritius alone, in volume 2; of what writer or of what age it is, I have not thus far been able to ascertain. The Life, I judge it sufficiently genuine, since it is gathered chiefly from St. Ambrose and from St. Augustine. In the more obscure places the later Life expounded by Ripamonti will supply the office of our annotations, Puccinelli being disregarded, who involves the Saint's deeds in almost continual digressions: concerning which the discourse will more than once recur hereafter in the Acts of SS. Ambrose and Augustine. In the Ambrosian Missal the memory of St. Simplician is not kept, neither on the XIII nor on this day, but on the XV of August together with the translation of the holy martyrs Sisinnius, Martyrius, and Alexander; concerning whom and concerning the said translation, made from Trent to Milan under St. Simplician, volume VII of May, at the XXIX day, from page 38, may be seen. That we may not do over again what has been done, we have thought fit to prefix only the lesson from the Milanese Breviary, which on this day is of this kind, under the solemn rite:

[10] Simplician, given to studies from his early years, lived so holily to God Lesson of the Milanese Breviary. that afterwards he traveled through many regions also for the sake of piety. Having set out for Rome, by the example of his life and by his teachings and pious diligence he converted Victorinus the rhetorician, flourishing in authority among the Romans, from an impure superstition to the faith of Christ. Thence returning to Milan, he brought relics of the Apostles. And he shone with so great virtue that the holy men Augustine and Ambrose ascribed much to him. The latter, when he lay grievously sick and was not far from death, uttering his voice three times, judged him worthy to be his successor. Being made archbishop, therefore, he enriched the church committed to him with the rites of the divine Offices and with the ornaments of piety. He consecrated Gaudentius the first bishop of Novara. And he was so illustrious for the name of learning and of sanctity that the fathers of the synod of Carthage consulted him upon a doubtful matter. At length, having discharged many labors for the glory of God, laden with merits he passed to the Lord. Behold now the Legend of Mombritius, slightly polished by us.

\* Rather 375.

THE LIFE

From Bonino Mombritius, volume 2

Simplician, confessor, at Milan (St.)

BHL Number: 7786

FROM THE PRINTED BOOKS.

CHAPTER I.

The Saint's illustrious progress in studies and virtues, especially at Rome, where he brings the famous rhetorician Victorinus, to the astonishment of the City, to the faith.

Born in the territory of Milan The blessed confessor of Christ Simplician, as we have learned by the relation of certain truthful men, who confess that they found these things in certain most ancient writings, was most illustrious both in character and in family, being sprung, as is reported, from his father Ludovicus and his mother Senedruga, in the district of Bettola. And being given over by his parents to liberal studies, he seemed there so to have exercised his boyhood that he shone above all of his time with the splendor of philosophy.

[2] But with how great labor in his adolescence and youth he pursued both divine and human letters, he was well instructed in letters not only at Rome, where he chiefly dwelt, but also through the world, as though pursuing letters that fled from him, his venerable old age testifies, which for his holy knowledge and his true wisdom deserved, God so ordaining, to be crowned with the pontifical mitre in so famous a church, as will be shown in what follows. And lest my weakness should seem to have added anything here of its own, let us bring forward into the midst the testimony of that most excellent doctor Ambrose, archbishop of the holy church of Milan, whose venerable mouth, filled with the salt of wisdom, is wont to give forth no insipid savor.

[3] as St. Ambrose, whom he succeeded, sufficiently proves. For indeed, as befits the Saints of God, being often asked most subtle questions of exhortation or of familiarity, blessed Ambrose in a certain letter of his, writing back to the same venerable Simplician, among other things answers thus: But how is it that thou thyself shouldst doubt and inquire of us, when for the sake of faith and of gaining the divine love thou hast traveled through the whole world, and hast assigned all the time of this life to daily reading by turns of night and day — especially with so keen a wit even for things not intelligible, inasmuch as thou art wont to show that even the books of philosophy, and very many of them, are empty, so that the discourse of the writers failed in their writings sooner than their life.

[4] No less conspicuous in virtue But leaving meanwhile those things which befell him in his old age, let us see those which he did while still a young man, and of what honesty or sanctity he was. Now the confessor of the Lord Simplician, even before he discharged any ecclesiastical office, was a man in all things moderate, humble in dress, composed in gait, swift to hear, slow to speak, discreet in silence, temperate in word, provident in counsel, eminent in chastity, sparing to himself, bountiful to the poor, assiduous in reading, continual in prayer, eminent in contemplation, full of the love of God and of his neighbor.

[5] he shines also at Rome while yet young, With such and so great virtues did the man of the Lord strive to adorn his holy youth: whence it came about that step by step he was worthily promoted to the sacred orders, and was loved not only by all the clergy of the Roman Church, but his reputation was proclaimed by almost all Catholics throughout the world. During that same time, while Liberius enjoyed the honor of the supreme Pontificate, and the Roman empire was ruled by Constantius, heresies of many kinds were springing up throughout the whole world, and chiefly in the Church of the Apostolic see.

[6] where the rhetorician Victorinus, Simplician therefore, of blessed memory, discharging in that chief church the office of prayer and of the love of God, labored according to his strength, and so more diligently provided for the Church of God, that the talents committed to him by God were doubled, and many were led by him to the worship of the true faith, the word of God being sown abroad: among whom was a certain Victorinus, a rhetorician of the city of Rome, an African by nation, who had so polluted almost the whole city with his sect that the servants of God were slain by divers punishments, not only in the streets, but even in the churches. And he himself, with the whole people favoring him, had set up a statue in the Roman forum to be adored. Moreover he had also brought it about that the aforesaid Pope Liberius was carried away into exile.

[7] who had thrown many things there into confusion, But at the last, stupefied by excessive fear, he yielded to the heretics and communicated with them. And as these and other innumerable straits of the Church of God grew thick, the blessed man of God Simplician strove, with loins girt and girded with the twofold sword of the love of God and of his neighbor, to set himself as a wall, and to stand in the battle for Israel in the day of the Lord. Whence it came about that blessed Simplician, following first of all the truthful sentence of the Lord, rebuked the rhetorician Victorinus more secretly and familiarly, and in rebuking admonished him, and in admonishing persuaded him, that he should desist from so great bloodshed, and search the holy Scriptures, that he might be able to return to the way of truth.

[8] Therefore, as the divine page testifies, where the Holy Spirit is present as teacher there is no delay in learning: immediately after he had searched the holy Scripture, and had most studiously examined all Christian writings with blessed Simplician, he thus addressed holy Simplician: Know that I am now a Christian. To whom blessed Simplician answered: I will not believe it, nor will I reckon thee among the Christians, unless I see thee in the church. But Victorinus laughed at him, saying: Do walls, then, make a Christian? Blessed Simplician said: I did not say this because walls make a Christian, although Christians rather confess God and acknowledge their offense in the church itself; but as by the prompting of the devil thou hast made almost all forget the way of truth, so by thy solemn example thou shouldst teach them to be turned back to the path of truth.

[9] But Victorinus often said this to him, that he was already a Christian, he at length brought to the faith. and blessed Simplician often gave that answer, and often the mockery about the walls was repeated by him: for he feared to offend his friends, the proud worshipers of demons, and his own household subject to him, from the height of whose Babylonian dignity, as from the cedars of Lebanon which the Lord had not yet broken, he judged that enmities would fall grievously upon him.

\ Read secundum*.

CHAPTER II.

Victorinus being duly instructed and baptized, he returns to Milan famous with many praises, where he converts St. Augustine, and on the death of St. Ambrose succeeds him.

All being happily overcome, But after by reading and by eager longing with blessed Simplician he had gained firmness, and feared to be denied by Christ before the Angels of God if he feared to confess Him before men, and appeared to himself guilty of a great crime — in blushing at the sacrament of the humility of Thy Word because of the sacrilege of the proud demons, which he had proudly received from his imitators — he ceased to be ashamed before vanity, and blushed before the truth. And suddenly and unexpectedly he said to blessed Simplician: Let us go into the Church, and I will yield to thee; I desire to become a Christian.

[11] And blessed Simplician, kindled with great joy and exceeding gladness, went along the way, he professes himself a catechumen, leading him in and glorifying God, the maker of all good things. And when he had been imbued with the first Sacraments of instruction, not long after he also gave in his name, that he might be regenerated by Baptism, Rome marveling, the Church rejoicing: the heretics were proud and angry, gnashed with their teeth and pined away. But to His servant Victorinus the Lord God was his hope, and he did not look upon vanities and lying follies.

[12] At length, when the hour had come for professing

the faith, and with the greatest edification which in certain fixed words, conceived and held in memory, are wont to be rendered at Rome from a higher place in the sight of the faithful people by those who are about to approach grace, they said that it had been offered to Victorinus by the presbyters that he should render it privately, as it was the custom to offer to some who seemed likely to tremble with bashfulness. But it is established that he preferred, by the admonition of the pious father Simplician, to make his profession in the sight of so great a multitude.

[13] being brought to the church And so, when he went up to render the symbol of the holy faith in the sight of so great a multitude, all called out to one another, his name resounded from the noise of congratulation, and with a subdued sound through the mouths of all who rejoiced together, "Victorinus, Victorinus," they quickly sounded with exultation, because they saw him; and quickly they were silent with attention, that they might hear him. He pronounced the true faith with noble confidence, and all wished to snatch him into their hearts, and they did snatch him by loving and rejoicing and by receiving the grace of the Holy Spirit the Paraclete.

[14] he is initiated by Baptism And so it came about that blessed Simplician cleansed the City of the error of the aforesaid Victorinus, and by his holy admonitions converted Victorinus himself, with a vast multitude, to the Catholic faith. Hence it comes about that the Church of God, torn with many wounds, was made whole again and restored to her former goods; and that blessed Simplician, held by all the clergy and people to be an excellent preacher and prelate at Rome, was extolled with great praises.

[15] amid the applause of the City, But if anyone desires to know more fully of what sort and how great Victorinus was, and of what authority; or in what order, enlightened by divine grace and by the aiding merits of blessed Simplician, he was converted to the faith of Christ; or how, after a long conversion of heart and his most true confession, he was renewed at the font of baptism — let him seek the eighth book of the Confessions of blessed Augustine, bishop of Hippo. There indeed he will be able to find the entire truth of all these things.

[16] of which St. Augustine is a witness, But when a few seasons had rolled by, in the reign of Valentinian with his brother Valens, that renowned man Ambrose was sent to Milan, by the predestination of the divine clemency, to destroy the perfidy of the Arians; and after him followed the venerable man Simplician, an adversary of the aforesaid doctrine of perfidy. During that same time, when Auxentius, bishop of the Arian perfidy, was dead, who had governed the church while Dionysius, a bishop of most venerable memory, was destined to exile, blessed Ambrose received the praise of his episcopate out of the mouth of infants and sucklings: and by all the brethren of the church of Milan blessed Simplician was venerated in the office of the archdeaconate.

[17] whom on his return to Milan We indeed, hastening to other things, taste a few things out of many. Nevertheless, since we have made mention of the Confessions of St. Augustine, let us hear what he himself in that book, confessing to God, relates concerning blessed Simplician. For he says among very many things: O Thou, God, didst put into my mind a good vision, that I should go to blessed Simplician, who appeared to me a good servant of Thine, and Thy grace shone in him. For I heard that from his youth he had lived most devoutly to Thee.

[18] he also instructs paternally, I went therefore to the same blessed Simplician, the father of Ambrose, then bishop, in the receiving of grace, whom he truly loved as a father. But at that time he had already grown old, and by his long age in so good a pursuit of following Thy way he seemed to me to have experienced much and to have learned much. And truly so it was. Whence I wished that, as I conferred with him about my tumults, he would bring forth for me what fitting manner there might be for one affected as I was to walk in Thy way. I told him the circuits of my error.

[19] and by the example of Victorinus But when I mentioned that I had read certain books of the Platonists, which Victorinus, formerly rhetorician of the city of Rome, whom I had heard to have died a Christian, had translated into the Latin tongue, he congratulated me that I had not fallen upon the writings of others, full of fallacies and deceptions according to the elements of the world. But that in those books God and His Word are insinuated in all uncertain ways. Then, that blessed Simplician might exhort me to the humility of Christ, hidden from the wise and revealed to little ones, he called to mind Victorinus himself, whom, when he was at Rome, he had known most familiarly.

[20] Concerning him he told me, and by admonishing me made known his conversion. he wholly converts. But when blessed Simplician told these things about the rhetorician Victorinus, I burned to imitate him. For to this end he had told them to me. By these and very many other words which are related by blessed Augustine in the aforesaid book of the Confessions, we manifestly prove that blessed Simplician contributed very much to the conversion of St. Augustine, and prevailed with him so far that he was baptized by blessed Ambrose of Milan. Nor is it any wonder if, while he was still held entangled in the snares of the heresy of the Manichees, he was often admonished by blessed Simplician to forsake the heresy and be converted to the Catholic faith.

A SECOND LIFE

From Joseph Ripamonti,

History of the Church of Milan, book VI.

Simplician, confessor, at Milan (St.)

FROM THE PRINTED BOOKS.

Setting out from Milan to Rome Simplician follows Ambrose, imbued with his character and institutions, with vigor of soul and the other virtues, in such a manner that he seemed almost alone able to revive a city sorrowful and dismayed with longing. He was a Milanese by native place, born in an honorable station of that family which the Caesars called by the title of honor "Capitanea." In his earliest years, after he had given himself to those arts by which the minds of young men are formed to humane culture, he desired to see the manners and cities of many men, and dwelt chiefly at Rome. Victorinus there in those days, eloquent to evil purpose, was striving to draw away very many from the Catholic religion, and by that endeavor was bringing the greatest damage upon the Christian cause. Nor did anyone easily go to meet him, whether because they everywhere hung upon a certain admiration of his genius, or because his favor with a few powerful men cast terror upon all, or because he artfully scattered his poisons and by hidden ways made his way to the destruction of souls.

[2] He did not terrify or deceive Simplician. But he kept eluding him, he assails the rhetorician Victorinus until they came to single combat. In that combat, when for some while the fight had been as it were on equal terms, at last truth and Simplician were superior, nor did Victorinus refuse the light offered him, and he himself conquered while he was conquered. Straightway, having sought Baptism, he is enrolled among the Christians, from that day a most vehement waster of the empty gods and of insane heathenism. And so great was his constancy that, when Julian, surnamed the Apostate, had brought in a law by which the public charge of teaching or expounding was forbidden to Christian men, he at once, forsaking a most ample position, chose Christ and salvation and the straitness of his household means before the prince and glory and riches. His fame for wisdom had earned him the honor of a public statue, and it was set up in the forum of Trajan.

[3] So much the more did men marvel that he, so great and so renowned, had yielded to a stranger, and had brought it about that the highest honor which he had attained should, by the anger of the prince, be turned into reproach. and, with Rome applauding, brings him to the faith. Before the light of Christian truth his chief labor had been to exhibit Plato speaking Latin. Afterwards he engaged his pen upon a holier theme, and among other things which he wrote with a now Catholic spirit, he pursued in elegant verse the fortitude of the Maccabees, having by chance been delighted with their end while reading. Therefore, this bulwark being joined to the Catholic Church, Simplician came to be on men's lips, to be celebrated with the praises of all, and especially to be strong in favor and authority with the Prince of sacred things himself, and to be held illustrious and great.

[4] Sent back thence to Milan This, in fact, was the reason why he was sent as it were a colleague and master to Ambrose, since the latter, at first raw and new to ecclesiastical affairs, seemed to require such a helper and counselor. But he behaved with so great submission and modesty that he preferred to seem to have found one fit for the Pontifical charge rather than to have made him. A priest now great in years, and worn with the practice and discipline of sacred things, he venerated Ambrose in the place of a master, and of his own accord consulted him concerning divine things and the government of the church, to whom he himself had been appointed as master and moderator. This moderation and virtue of the man Ambrose himself relates with equal virtue, and many prudent men of that age understood the greatness of his soul.

[5] he wondrously assists St. Ambrose, So true is it that glory unsought returns the more abundantly, and that no one ever diminished his fame and name by submitting himself. But besides so great a modesty, such as in this age you will not easily find in any mortal, there were also many other great and rare praises of Simplician. These chiefly are recorded. Sleepless at psalmody; attentive to disclosing to the bishop the corruptions of the whole city; ready to relieve want, with as great solicitude as each man seeks the things necessary for himself. Watchful likewise and restless until he had joined to Christ any whom he had chanced to detect as estranged or rebellious.

[6] and instructs St. Augustine. He had assuredly also won Augustine to the Church, when he had introduced him to Ambrose, and they had conversed together about the faults and vanity of the Platonic philosophy. By these merits he came into the place of Ambrose in the three hundred and ninety-ninth year \* after we were redeemed. There were eminent at that time grave men in the clergy of Milan, whom no one would despise as Presidents of the Church and Pastors of souls. Felix and Theodulus among the rest were held excellent, both by the discipline and imitation of the Pontiff Ambrose and by their own virtues, and worthy of that charge, had not Simplician himself been worthier.

[7] He is given as successor to St. Ambrose: For the rest, the brief space of life that followed gave no great matter or harvest of glory. And had not the sanctity and virtue of his former age come down to the ages, there would be almost nothing which we could record of Simplician. For besides the scanty remnants of life which he brought to the pontificate, other causes also brought it about that that prudence and that governing spirit should be shut within narrow bounds. Ambrose had so departed as to leave no field even to a long-lived Pontiff succeeding him. He had handed on the state of the Church established through fair and through foul, he the discipline of the clergy, he the manners of the people perfectly amended. Simplician had not fallen upon such a prince as either his own depraved spirit or the goads of those about him should stir up to the losses and disasters of the Church; so that either by exposing his life to dangers he might find the title of brave and unconquered, or by bending and amending impiety itself the title of wise and provident.

[8] For indeed, Theodosius being dead, as has been recorded, with Honorius' help he provides for the church: Honorius ruled over us. He, both by his own disposition and by his father's, moderate and pious, would rather endure all extremities than in any way disturb sacred things and sacred persons. Besides, Stilicho, of the first authority after Caesar himself, was likewise of singular piety, and drew the whole court into his own manners. Thus for Simplician all was safe and quiet, and there was now no care to the most placid old man save such as either the salvation of souls or the love of perfect virtue brought upon him. And if anyone should wish to compare the pontificate of Simplician with the pontificate of Ambrose, and the life of the one with the life of the other, he will have used a most apt summary if he shall call the one the pattern of an exercised and busy pontificate, the other of a quiet and untroubled one.

[9] But although at home there was quiet and leisure, abroad

honor and the celebrity of fame nevertheless fell to Simplician. He is consulted by the council of Carthage. The Donatists had brought certain boys with sacrilegious hands to the sacred font, and that matter had cast a scruple and a religious doubt upon the Fathers, whether that Baptism ought to be held valid. At Carthage a council was held upon that business, and the deliberation wavered; whether one denied or affirmed, there were at hand reasons and grounds which would approve the opinion. When no issue could be found to that controversy, the Fathers had recourse at last to this, that they should commit the whole matter to Simplician to be decided, intending to hold whatever he should answer as valid and holy.

[10] When foreigners attributed so much to this Man's fame, The decree of Honorius by which bishops one may thence conjecture how much authority he obtained among his own. This was declared chiefly by the acts and decrees of Honorius himself, by which, for the sake of Simplician, he increased and adorned the ecclesiastical estate; and hence takes its beginning that matter which, granted to sanctity and merits and favor, stirred up a mass of dissensions and tumults, and which interrupts apostolic quiet, and does not suffer that peace, so greatly commended by Christ the author and head, to stand firm in the Church.

[11] While Honorius was residing at Milan, and many things of this kind fell out daily, are declared judges of forensic suits. so that the arbitration and sentence of the pontiff Simplician had to be interposed in suits and causes, the prince, judging that this pertained to the ordering and advantage of the commonwealth, of his own accord brought in a law by which he enacted that it should be lawful for common people and laymen to go to law before the bishop, and that whatever sentences and valuations of suits, causes, and property they should carry away thence should be held valid and lawful, just as if they had been pronounced in the other court. This very thing that Constantine had already ordained before, who from his virtue had the surname of the Great, and he had granted appeal from the magistrates and prefects of cities to the Pontiffs and bishops, with a grave denunciation if anyone should dare to diminish or violate that power of the Church. But since, with the age varying and changing all things, much of that authority had passed away from the ecclesiastical court, and a law full of pious feeling was being abrogated by mere disuse, Honorius confirmed and restored it at Milan out of admiration for the virtue which shone forth, namely, in the pontiff Simplician. The law was written on the VI of the Kalends of August, in the consulship of Honorius Augustus for the fourth time and Eutychianus.

[12] He takes care that the idols be overthrown Presently the same Honorius enacted by another law that as many temples as stood in all the world to the empty gods should either be given to destruction or transferred to the worship and religion of the true God, if indeed they were of such a plan and structure as could easily be adapted to the custom and use of a church. That law struck and confounded the remnants of the whole heathen world with indignation, shame, and fear. For at that time they had by chance lifted up their spirits, deceived and mocked by the lies of the oracles, and in their madness were prophesying that the end of the Christian cause was at hand. I should not doubt that the basilica of the martyr Lawrence, which had been the temple of Hercules, by that law left behind its empty name and passed into the possession of the church.

[13] and provides for the modesty of the clergy: he dies in the year 400. And these laws indeed were passed for the dignity and increase and enlargement of the Catholic religion: that other one pertained to the modesty and discipline which the most grave Fathers introduced at the same time in the fourth council of Carthage, and it was of this kind: Let clerics not nourish a beard nor long hair; let them go about with shaven face and shorn heads. That law was both then easily brought into the custom of the church of Milan, and in our own age at length, when after a long interval it was recalled, it caused no small commotions of mind; and it is well enough known that, while some shaved obediently and readily, certain persons displayed a useless burden upon an obstinate chin. So much do mortals please themselves even in deformity, and we are stubborn in futility, contemptible in pride. Through these most weighty acts and decrees by which the age of the great Simplician grew famous, there was coming on the four hundredth year from Christ's birth, which was Simplician's last, when Sisinnius, Martyrius, and Alexander increased the number of the martyrs. The contest of these Martyrs, and their translation to Milan, we have already said above are illustrated in volume VII of May, at the XXIX day, from page 38. That this writer above wrongly noted St. Simplician to have succeeded St. Ambrose in the year 399, we have already abundantly corrected at number 6 in the margin. We have also noted above that this later Life is here subjoined that those things which in the former are somewhat obscure may be more clearly explained.

\* Read 397 or 398.