Chapter VII (9)

To progress is, everywhere, to combat. The human race maintains a perpetual and tremendous strife with the fatality of material things, whether it be in the form of the stubborn elements, the overwhelming forces of nature, or the subtle, inexorable laws that govern the material world. Barbarism is a defeat, from cowardice of spirit; civilization, a triumph over them. And nowhere else is the conflict more terrible than where it is attempted to control the floods that sweep down the valley of the Mississippi from the very heart of the continent. The forces of the winds and of the ocean are not so irresistible. It is a hand-to-hand combat, in which to be vanquished is to be destroyed. {360} The thousands of miles of levees built on the banks of the Mississippi and its great bayous, at an expense of many million dollars, are the means employed to arrest the watery element. In some places they are between fifteen and eighteen feet high, with a base of one hundred and twenty feet. As the threatening river rises against them, they are put in the best condition, and watched with the utmost care, lest the little crawfish, or accident, a storm, or some malicious enemy should make an opening which, ever so small at first, would rapidly enlarge into a crevasse. Sometimes the river bank caves in, carrying away the levee, and permitting the water to rush in uninterruptedly. In the spring of 1863 the writer of this article rode in a carriage one evening around a point of land a few miles above Baton Rouge, which, to the extent of several acres, disappeared during the night. The following day the fields in the rear resembled a large lake. Shortly after the capture of Port Hudson, a portion of the bank slid into the river with a battery of guns. The famous citadel and many of the rebel earthworks on those historical bluffs have since shared the same fate.

Should the levee, from any cause, give way, every possible effort is made to close the breach. Planters from miles above and below hurry to the crevasse with all their available help. Piles are driven into the ground close together, and in two parallel rows a few feet apart, both above and below the opening, and in such a direction as gradually to have the lines approach each other at no great distance in the rear of the crevasse. Between these rows of piles are thrown sacks of earth, hay, or anything that will arrest the rushing flood. Presently the narrowing space between the dams can be spanned with pieces of timber, and then the torrent is soon checked and the levee replaced.

The State of Louisiana paid last year thirty thousand dollars for closing the Bouligny crevasse, a few miles below New Orleans. Crevasses above the city, owing to their greater magnitude, are, however, rarely closed. An effort was made in 1865 to rebuild the great Chim and Robinson levee, on the right bank of the river, a short distance below Port Hudson. This crevasse occurred in 1863, and was of such enormous extent that, through it, a river more than a mile wide and several feet deep rushed out of the Mississippi. A steamboat, several flatboats and rafts, and vast quantities of driftwood were swept into the irresistible torrent. It required over three hundred thousand cubic yards of earth to replace the levee, and an outlay or nearly one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The tremendous flood of last April broke through the newly constructed work. The levee commissioners refused an offer to close the crevasse for eighty thousand dollars, and in a few days a great part of the new levee was swept away. Deep gulches were cut in the plantations where the disaster occurred. The ditches were filled, sandbanks formed in many places, and the sugar-cane fields covered with the _débris_ of the Mississippi. There were two or three crevasses of nearly equal magnitude between Port Hudson and the mouth of Red river, and upper Louisiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi suffered terribly from the overflow, caused in great part by the breaking away of the newly built levees. The entire valley of Red river, whose bottoms furnish perhaps the best cotton lands in the world, was inundated below Jefferson, Texas. Many of the best buildings in Shreveport and Alexandria were undermined. The planters betook themselves to the upper rooms of their houses, and the cattle crowded together on the little knolls found here and there on the river bank. A friend who came down during the inundation stated that he saw at least twenty thousand animals thus perishing from hunger, and being gradually swept away by the rising flood. At one time thirteen parishes were said to be in great part under water. {361} Many millions' worth of property was destroyed, and the unstinted charity of the Federal government to the sufferers, through the Freedmen's Bureau, was measured only by cargoes of provisions sent to their relief.

But the overflows of the Mississippi have this year been still more disastrous. Instead of pouring out successive floods, Red river, the Arkansas, the Ohio and its great tributaries, and even the upper Mississippi have risen simultaneously and poured their mighty inundations into the lower river. The Mississippi was at one time fifty miles wide at Memphis, and the great alluvial plain or basin became an inland sea several hundred miles in length. There have for some time been but few places where landings could be made between Cairo and the mouth of Red river. Days and even weeks must elapse after the river begins to recede at Cairo before it can be affected at New Orleans or even at Vicksburg, so enormous is the body of water that must find its way to the gulf. The bottom-lands of Mississippi, especially those of the Yazoo region, and of upper Louisiana, were nearly all under water before the delta people suffered from the inundation. But as the irresistible flood swept down toward the gulf, levee after levee gave way, and at present the tracts overflowed can be estimated only by parishes and counties, the plantations only by thousands, and the loss of property only by millions of dollars. There are nearly a dozen crevasses between the mouth of Red river and New Orleans, not one of which it has been possible to stop. The crevasse at Grand Levee, Morganza, is a mile wide, and through it rushes a river twelve feet deep. To restrain the mighty flood would require immense levees through the entire delta, several feet higher than those already constructed.

The parish of Tensas, the finest cotton district of Louisiana, is almost entirely under water. The inundation extends far up the Cortableau and almost to the rich prairies of Opelousas. The sugar plantations of Terrebonne and Lafourche are invaded by the flood, and the Opelousas railroad rendered useless. The rich lands of Grosse Tête, Fordoce, and the Marangouin, for the first time in the memory of Creoles, are almost entirely inundated. Thousands of families have been driven from their homes. Certain districts, overflowed for three successive years, begin to assume the appearance of a wilderness. The garfish, the alligator, and wildfowl have, in fact, resumed possession of many of the choicest portions of the state. Should the waters not soon subside, the product of cotton on the bottom-lands of Louisiana and Mississippi will be very small. April is the month for planting, and from present appearances the floods will not begin to recede before the month of May.

So great is the interest of the Northern States in the cotton and sugar produced an the bottom-lands of the Mississippi, that evidently the general government ought to assume the responsibility of rebuilding the levees on a scale that will insure protection. This policy would be at variance with the traditions of the government as regards internal improvements. But neither the planters who have hitherto been assessed for nearly the entire outlay, nor the impoverished states, are now in a condition to do what is required.

Of the two plans proposed far leveeing the delta of the Mississippi, one consists in increasing the number of the bayous, or lateral outlets, and thereby diminishing the volume of water in the main channel; the other, in closing up all the bayous, and, with levees of sufficient strength, retaining the floods in the natural bed of the river. In some remarks made upon the subject by Mr. Banks in Congress, he expressed his preference for the former theory, and intimated his intention, should the proper occasion occur, of advocating a large appropriation by the general government to put it in practical execution. The general government has, in fact, virtually pledged itself to undertake the work as soon as the Southern States again come into the Union. {362} Mr. Banks is well acquainted with the topography of Louisiana, and can estimate the enormous outlay required for leveeing the bayous Lafourche and Plaquemine, to say nothing of the Atchafalaya, and opening new outlets, upon each of which, however small, the work would have to be done as thoroughly and upon as vast a scale as upon the Mississippi itself. This theory is based upon the false assumption that, in case of a bayou or a crevasse, the depth of the river at any point below the outlet is diminished exactly in proportion to the quantity of water taken by it from the main channel. When the great crevasse, over a mile wide, occurred last spring above Baton Rouge, I could not see that the volume of water at Baton Rouge was much diminished thereby, but the current of the river was materially lessened. When several large crevasses occur, of course, both the volume and the current of the river below must be diminished. And the slower the current, the greater the deposit of sediment on the bed of the river, the effect of which is to lift up the whole body of water and increase the tendency to overflow. The great _desideratum_ is to prevent the formation of deposit, which can be done only by maintaining a certain rapidity of current. The more effective and scientific plan would, therefore, seen to be to confine the floods to a single channel by means of levees built sufficiently far back to prevent their destruction by the caving in of the river banks, and strong enough for any emergency. The work of leveeing would thus be concentrated, vast areas of now useless swamp-land would be made available, and the bayous could be used as canals for internal communication. Nor should it be forgotten that, as the regions bordering the tributaries of the Mississippi are settled and the forests cleared up, the actual quantity of water drained from them is from year to year diminished. The floods of the upper Mississippi have already been notably affected by this general law. But disasters like those of the present year, although exceptional, can be averted only by levees constructed upon a gigantic scale, and, as the wilderness of the great alluvial plain whose swamps now receive such vast quantities of water becomes settled like the delta, the levees will have to be proportionally enlarged.

------

From The Dublin Review;

The Church and the Roman Empire.
[Footnote 112]

[Footnote 112: _L'Eglise et l'Empire romain au l Ve Siécle._ Par
M. Albert de Brogile, de l'Academie Francaise. Troisième
partie--Valentinien et Théodose. Paris: Didier.]

When we opened the two last volumes of this noble work, we fancied that, after devoting a considerable degree of attention and study to the fruitful events of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, we had little to learn about its government, its institutions, manners, customs, and modes of thought. We had felt, indeed, a strange interest in watching the slow but sure development of Christianity, as it tumbled down, one by one, every landmark of ancient heathenism; here forcing back the ugly iceberg into its olden limits, there bringing forth a new and verdant vegetation to conceal the blackening ruins of the past; now enchasing, within its virgin gold, some relic of primitive wisdom, or again planting its wooden cross among the wastes and forests of Germania, as a beacon for a future world. {363} And yet, after all, in these last volumes of Prince de Broglie we have found much to admire and much to remember.

Are there many books of which we could say the same? Or, in other words, are there many that would so amply repay the trouble of perusing them?

Whoever undertakes to read any work of serious importance, whatever its nature and subject, will do well to ask himself, when he comes to the conclusion, How has the author fulfilled his promises? How far has he carried out his plan, how far justified his pretensions to impartiality, if we have to do with a historian? The reader will not therefore be astonished that we should apply the same rule to the work now before us. When Prince Albert de Broglie started upon his now completed undertaking, what was his main view and object he himself shall answer in the words he penned in 1852:

"The mild and intelligent influence of the church was never more striking
than when she came forth for the first time on the stage of the world.
... In the days when Jesus Christ was born in an obscure town of Judaea,
the empire was pacified, the Roman laws established on a sound basis, the
Roman manners polished and refined unto corruption; the Roman empire had
acquired its utmost development beyond the pale of Christianity, under
the shadow of a false worship and of false gods. Everything bore the
stamp of idolatry. The civil and political laws, founded first of all by
those patricians who were alike priests and lawyers, and then by those
Caesars whose supreme pontificate was deemed their prime dignity, were in
every direction pervaded by polytheism. Arts, letters, private manners,
all was heathen. Not a temple but acknowledged the protection of a
divinity--not a poem but embalmed its memory--not a banquet but began
with a libation--not a home but kindled a fire sacred to the Lares. Being
thus totally independent of Christianity, this civilization was
foredoomed to become its enemy--fate, indeed, to which it had not been
found wanting. Roman society, giving up for once its usual habits of
political toleration, had heaped upon Christianity contempt and insults
and persecutions without end. For three long centuries, Christianity had
grown up through ignominy and bloodshed. Wise men had scoffed at it,
politicians chastised it, the mob hooted it fiercely and savagely. The
blood of the martyrs had defiled the basis of the finest edifices in
Rome, whilst the smoke of the burning stake had blackened their crowning
frontispieces.

"So, when the progress of truth, supported by the revolutions of
politics, had at last made the church triumphant with Constantine, what a
favorable opportunity and how many excellent reasons had she for
overthrowing all this profane and sacrilegious civilization! If, on the
very morrow of her triumph, the church had declared open war to Roman
society, if she had fired its monuments, broken to pieces its statues,
burnt its libraries, overthrown its laws--all this would have been but a
lawful deed of reprisal. ... Both means and motives were equally
plentiful for this summary justice. Without any appeal to the ardor of
new converts, the forests of Germany held within their wastes a reserve
of wild auxiliaries, ever ready to undertake the task on their own
account. The empire had already received its death-blow, through its own
internal anarchy, and through the barbarian invasions. The church stood
in no need of dealing the fatal blow--she had but to let it fall. ...
This, however, the prudent and tender mother of the human race did by no
means do. She looked upon Roman civilization not as the cursed gift of an
evil spirit, but as the motley product of human labor. As is the case
with every creation of a fallen being, there must needs be found hidden
behind the mists of error certain rays of light which were not to be
extinguished, but, on the contrary, brought back within the ever-burning
focus of eternal truth. Peacefully settling down in the midst of the
imperial society, taking up her abode in Rome itself, whilst Constantine
flew from the city, as if afraid of the old genius of the republic, the
church, far from destroying anything, adopted all, correcting and
reforming all by her own insensible influence, raising the victorious
sign of the cross above every monument, and breathing the healthy warmth
of Christian inspiration into every law. The fourth century of the
Christian era is not only remarkable for the men of genius by whom it was
illustrated. What is a constant subject of admiration, and what I should
not be astonished to see some future historian investigate hereafter more
deeply, is that slow labor of purification and absorption to which the
Christian religion subjected heathen civilization. It is this
transformation of a whole society, not by any material conquest, but
through the influence of a moral doctrine, which I shall attempt to bring
forth in the following picture." [Footnote 113]

[Footnote 113: V. i., Avertissement, pp. i-v.]

{364}

Most certainly the whole work is but the grand demonstration of the above outline, but nowhere does it come forth in such glowing characters as in the two last volumes. There is hardly a page in which you do not meet with this silent yet ever-rising tide of Christian ascendency, which ends in mastery over every relic of Roman civilization. In vain does the temporal power struggle to maintain its own ground; it is itself hurried on with the stream, and forced to give up the contest in sheer despair. At the distance of sixteen centuries, we are often reminded of what took place at the dawn of our own age; and, could we but change names, we might almost imagine we have before us certain modern figures familiar to every reader. Let us take, for instance, Valentinian I., who ascended the imperial throne in 364 A.C., and chose for associate his brother Valens, as the ruler of the East. Valentinian was a sturdy soldier, an austere Christian, of no original genius, but yet endowed with such qualities as were not unequal to his difficult task.

"Of a cold disposition, inclined to enforce the laws and good order--no
less severe to himself than to others--he was sober, upright, and
chaste. Though a good soldier and a good speaker, he had not the
slightest pretension to wit, nor even to glory. He was a plain
matter-of-fact ruler, governing the empire just as he would have done a
legion, with a simplicity and a roughness of character exclusively
military; showing a harshness that bordered upon cruelty, when he deemed
it necessary to the interests of the public service, and yet by no means
prompt to avenge his own personal injuries; a man, in fact, having but
few wants and no taste for pomp or display, though rigorous beyond
measure to replenish the coffers of the state, and to balance the
receipts with the outlays of the treasury," (pp. 8, 9.)

Valentinian was in the height of manhood when he was clothed with the imperial purple; but if he felt no exultation, he evinced a keen jealousy for the maintenance of his newly acquired power, hardly allowing a mere suggestion as to its use and exercise. That jealousy and mistrust were extended even to the high influence of the church itself. The very first year of his reign offers numerous traces of that spirit of universal toleration which has become the idol of our modern reformers, yet which was so repugnant to the ideas and feelings of the old Roman world.

Succeeding to Jovian, having witnessed the vagaries of Julian, under whom he had even suffered persecution, the new emperor indeed began by relieving his fellow-believers from their sundry disabilities, but at the same time he put every other form of religious belief on a footing of rigorous equality with Christianity. Thus, if he takes from the heathens the temples which the Apostate had bestowed upon them, these temples became state property, instead of being restored to the Christians--Valentinian so establishing, observes Prince de Broglie, a sort of neutral power between the two contending doctrines. Thus, again, the public schools are opened to all, the clerical immunities and privileges are kept within narrow bounds, the heathen sacrifices are scarcely prohibited; in fact, the most assiduous precautions were taken in order to prevent the very appearance of any subordination of the temporal government to sacerdotal influence. This was, doubtless, a new feature in the sovereign, which took every one by surprise, though many considered it to show a sound policy and practical wisdom. And yet, this very attitude of Valentinian toward the church was but a proof of his real weakness, as the general incidents of his reign were destined to show in strong colors. Valentinian's immediate object was to establish the full and total independence of the secular government. In reality, he rendered still more evident in the eyes of the world its utter helplessness to guard and defend its most important privileges. Thenceforward, to stand aloof from the church on the plea of state policy was an utter impossibility. {365} On the contrary, an alliance with the church was a matter of positive necessity, for no other power in the world could, like her, play the part of a most useful and efficient auxiliary. Valentinian was to learn this at the outset of his reign.

He had hardly arrived at Milan, the capital of the western empire, when he had to encounter the insuperable difficulties of his finely balanced system. A contest had arisen between the Arian bishop Auxentius and the great Hilary of Poitiers. The latter used his utmost endeavors to correct the evils attendant upon the persecution lately raised by the Emperor Constans; but Hilary was by no means disposed to overlook the delinquencies of courtier prelates, who changed their belief according to the whim and will of every new sovereign. Such was Auxentius, who after showing himself a zealous Arian, now displayed no less zeal in his recantations, which did not, however, at all deceive his own flock. The Milanese were steadfast in their opposition to the ever-changing prelate, and Hilary no less staunchly encouraged them in their resistance.

According to Valentinian's system, he should and would have remained neutral between the two antagonists. But such an amount of indifference was not in the habits of the Roman administration. There was nothing so contrary to public order, said many an imperial adviser, as these conventicles of the flock against their pastor, above all when backed by the influence of a foreigner. Since Auxentius consented to sign the orthodox formula, and thus to do away with every vestige of past dissensions, why should others obstinately endeavor to perpetuate them? This was a matter of police regulations, not a question of belief. When people were all of the same opinion, why should not they meet together to pray in the same church?

We can almost imagine that we are reading a memoir sent up by a French prefect to his minister, for the purpose of playing the umpire between some priest and his bishop. At any rate, Valentinian found the advice so conformable to his own ideas, that he unwittingly issued an edict prohibiting the Christians to attend at any ceremony of their worship, except in such places as were subjected to the bishop's jurisdiction. Hilary immediately applied to the emperor himself, and soon showed him his error, which was, however, followed by another step of a still graver character. He ordered that the question should be examined by a committee of ten bishops and two secular magistrates. Auxentius, on being confronted with Hilary, made every admission that was required; yet the latter had scarcely turned his back when the equivocating prelate recanted once more his recantations, and maligned the Bishop of Poitiers to the emperor. His aspersions were but too successful, for Hilary was denied a second audience, and was commanded to leave the town immediately.

The prelate obeyed as a subject, but as a bishop he had a right to speak, and he spoke with a freedom worthy of such a man. His letter, apparently addressed to the public, in reality was a bold protest against the emperor's interference in religious affairs. We doubt whether Constantine would have submitted to such language, which, however, is a landmark showing the progress of Christian ideas as to the relations of the spiritual and the temporal power. But it was the last episcopal act of the great pontiff, who died shortly after.

It is not merely in this direction that we see Christianity gradually asserting its ascendency in the Roman world. Slowly, but surely, the patriciate was yielding to its influence. Accustomed, as we are, to consider the Roman aristocracy as totally effete during the latter period previous to the fall of the empire, we can hardly fancy to ourselves that its grandees were anything else but the degenerate posterity of the Cornelii, the Anicii, and other illustrious _gentes_, of ancient Rome. There were, indeed, so many links connecting them with olden forms and idolatrous ordinances, that to couple them with the new belief seems something bordering on anachronism. {366} And yet the fact really stands thus: Partly through the effect of example, partly through ambition, and partly through an imperious conviction, whole races had embraced the doctrines and practices of Christianity, and soon found out, to their own astonishment, that they recovered at once an unexpected share of illustration and power.

"Christianity, says Prince de Broglie, renewed their influence, by
throwing over it a sort of second youth. The day before their baptism,
they were wont to squander away their wealth among a motley _plebs_
to gain the bauble of a useless title; on the morrow their charities,
scarcely more abundant, but distributed by the discerning hand of the
priest, insured them, on the part of the less degraded Christians, a
prouder yet more lasting gratitude. Their slaves being gradually
emancipated, and prepared for freedom by a pious education, soon formed
around them a devoted army. They were no more that vile race of
freed-men, a true scourge to the empire, ever ready to pass from an
abject servility to the basest treachery. They were all the children of
Adam, redeemed by Jesus Christ, in whom their masters revered the
remembrance of a primitive equality and the stamp of a newly restored
dignity. Within a short time, the authority of the Christian patricians
extended far beyond Rome. Having once become members of an association
the most extensive and, indeed, the only one then organized throughout
the empire, they found themselves by the very fact placed at the head of
a powerful party. Since Athanasius, in the days of his exile, had found
an asylum in the dwellings of the Roman senators, the Christians of every
country were in the habit of applying from the depths of Egypt or of
distant Asia to the illustrious families in the capital, whenever they
had a church to build, a convent to establish, some ruin to prevent, or
some disaster to retrieve; and the alms which usually followed the
application were abundantly repaid in popularity and thankfulness. One
might compare them to some old trunks falling into decay through the
effect of time; should their roots, whilst shooting forth, meet with a
rich vein of alluvial soil, they send up a youthful sap, which adorns
with a wreath of verdure their dying branches and their blackening
limbs." (pp. 23, 24.)

Such was the society in which an Ambrose and a Jerome were formed and brought up--the one learning all those arts and traditions that made him hereafter such an attractive compound (if we may be allowed the term) of sanctity and statesmanship; the other of a more ardent and restless disposition, as if he had brought from his native forests of Dalmatia something of the fierce wildness of the barbarian. Jerome, though a sincere Christian, did not then conform his conduct to his belief; he rather yielded alternately to the allurements of pleasure or to the suggestions of a repentant spirit. He himself tells us that be thirsted for knowledge, being ever on the wing, passing from the Capitol to the Catacombs; almost equally impassioned for the Gospel or for Homer; reading by turns the Scriptures with the fervor of an anchoret or the disdain of an Athenian orator. But still he clung with fondness to the best Roman society, where he was an habitual guest and companion. There is hardly any part of the empire, or any one of its institutions, in which we do not find this all-pervading influence of Christianity. But nowhere, perhaps, is it more evident than in the laws. Volumes have been written upon this subject, and the most lamentable pictures have been drawn of the wretched state of the Roman population, ground down at once by heavy taxation, by the oppression of local governors, and exposed to all the horrors of repeated invasions. Their condition was so melancholy that they fled to the barbarians, among whom they enjoyed more real freedom and greater security than under the rule of their lawful sovereign. Valentinian distinguished himself among many other princes by his extreme severity in the enforcement of the fiscal laws; he hardly admitted any plea or excuse when the treasury was to be replenished; far better than anyone he felt the difficulties of his position, when he had to encounter the numberless enemies of his empire. But he had hardly secured by the most severe measures the public resources in men and money when a reaction ensued. An immense complaint and wailing, says our author, ascended to the throne from every region, and the prince was obliged to bind the very wounds he had inflicted--nay, to countermand the measures which he had adopted under the imperious claims of the public security.

{367}

Among these laws or decrees tending to soothe the pangs of a suffering nation, we must note several that bear evident traces of a Christian inspiration. Thus, close to a law binding the tenant to the land on which he is condemned to live and die, we find another defending him against the excessive pretensions of the landowner. Elsewhere, if the authority of the judges is duly enforced, minute precautions are taken against their accidental or interested errors; they are ordered to enact their sentences in public, prohibited from holding property within the limits of their residence, and threatened with severe penalties if they should listen to the insinuations of informers. At the same time, physicians were appointed to attend the poor in large towns at the expense of the treasury, and other measures of a similar character were carried, all betraying a benevolent disposition totally unknown to the heathen world.

We must refer to the author's pages for many other instances of innovations in which we detect the increasing influence of Christianity, and draw the reader's notice to one of the most remarkable institutions of those times, out of which grew perhaps the ecclesiastical principalities of the feudal ages. As there was a constant stream of grievances and claims sent up from the provinces to the crown, Valentinian thought proper to appoint an official defender of their rights, _defensor civitatis_.

"Such was the title of a new office, which appears for the first time in
365, filling an intermediate station between the _curia_, or
municipality, and the treasury. The duties of this new agent were
twofold, and well adapted to the high-pressure mechanism which held the
_curiae_ responsible for the total amount of taxes due to the fiscus
and allowed them at the same time to fall back on the small proprietors
of the city. On the defender incumbs the duty, as a representative of the
curiales, of discussing with the state the amount of the whole
contingent; and then, with the curiales themselves, the aliquot part of
each rate-payer. Himself a stranger to the curia, he is obliged at once
to protect and keep it within bounds; to speak for it and against it; to
defend it, to lighten its burden, and to prevent it from throwing that
burden on other people's shoulders. In fact, the defender was something
like the popular tribune, whose _veto_ is now directed, not against
aristocratical influence, but against the tyranny of the administration.
In its decrepitude, the empire was returning, like many an old man, to
the habits and ways of its childhood," (p. 51, _seq_.)

But the difficulty was to find a man of sufficient integrity, power, and influence to hold this delicate position between the crown and the nation. In the general downfall of public virtue, there was hardly a citizen or a landowner capable of fulfilling such arduous duties. His magistracy was elective; but it was soon found out that the bishop alone had both virtue and power to withstand the fitful caprices of imperial despotism, no less than the raging passions of the barbarians. Did Valentinian dream of such a result when be instituted the _defensores?_ Doubtless not: and this very fact throws a flood of light upon the real state of things at the period we have before our eyes.

It is not merely in the West that we thus meet with the irresistible ascendency of Christianity, making its way both with and against temporal power; the same spectacle awaits us in a still more striking manner in the East. Every one is more or less familiar with the great struggle between Arianism and the illustrious Athanasius. That contest, however, bore more of a purely theological than of a political character, and we shall therefore pass on to scenes of a different nature, and perhaps less known to the general reader. The famous heresy, so like Protestantism in its main features, was fast dwindling into a court intrigue, though fostered by the weak arm of a Valens. Under that degenerate prince the orthodox bishops were once more banished from their sees; but the church had already overcome two recent persecutions, whilst the state had well nigh succumbed to four successive revolutions. {368} Every man could now see with his own eyes where resided true influence and power, so that, even in a worldly view, it was no longer safe to trust solely to the sovereign's whim and pleasure. Valens himself was destined to experience, in his fatal downfall, that he would have to deal alike with a true bishop and a true statesman in the person of St. Basil, who ruled over the diocese of Caesarea.

The importance of Caesarea, as the ecclesiastical metropolis of Asia Minor, was very considerable, extending its jurisdiction over the independent exarchate of Pontus, and even beyond the limits of the empire, over Armenia and certain parts of Persia. Valens was desirous of placing at the head of this large see one of his Arian creatures; but at the very first rumor of such a scandal the whole population called for Basil, who had not yet been raised to the episcopal dignity. Shortly after, however, the old Bishop of Caesarea offered a share of his power to the popular candidate, who thus was brought forth to the foremost rank in the impending struggle between the church and the emperor.

Valens, after many delays, at last set out upon his progress through Asia Minor. He journeyed slowly, in order to make himself acquainted with the real feelings of the surrounding population. To secure a favorable reception, he sent before him his prefect Modestus, who took good care that no hostile figure should meet the eye of the sovereign. On entering any town, with a numerous retinue of courtiers, the prefect immediately sent for the bishop, and questioned him as to his dispositions in regard to the emperor's views. If the answer proved satisfactory, the prelate was loaded with honors and privileges; if, on the contrary, he adhered to the true faith, banishment or even death was awarded against him. The whole of Bithynia and Galatia was thus traversed by the imperial cortége, which met everywhere that silent attitude on the part of the people so often mistaken for a sincere feeling of satisfaction. At last Modestus entered Cappadocia, on his way to the city inhabited, one might almost say governed, by Basil. And here we must give way to our author's narrative, for no words of ours could supply the interest of the following scene:

"On his arrival in town, the prefect sent for the bishop. Basil obeyed
the summons; when he entered the prefect's room, he maintained an
attitude of calm superiority, which gave him, says Gregory Nyssa, far
more the appearance of a physician visiting a patient than that of a
delinquent before his judge. This firmness intimidated the prefect, who
had recourse at first to mildness. 'The emperor is coming,' said he;
'pray beware, for he is highly irritated; and, for a mere scruple about
a dogma, do not jeopardize wantonly the interests of your church: if, on
the contrary, you show yourself submissive, you will feel the effects of
his good-will' 'Pay attention yourself,' replied Basil, 'to the fact
that you have no power over such men as seek for nothing else but the
kingdom of God, and pray do not talk to me as you would to children.'
'Well, but won't you do anything for the emperor?' asked the prefect.
'Is it nothing in your eyes to see the emperor mingling with your flock
and becoming one of your auditors? This is what you may gain by yielding
a little, and by sacrificing one single word of the symbol.' 'Doubtless,
it is a great thing to see an emperor at church, for it is a great thing
to save a soul, not only the soul of an emperor, but the soul of any
man, whatever it may be. And yet, far from adding to or taking from the
symbol one single word, I would not even alter the disposition of the
letters that make up the syllables.' 'What, will you forget so far the
respect you owe to the emperor?' exclaimed Modestus in a loud voice, and
giving way to impatience. 'But in what I do really offend him,' retorted
Basil, 'is more than I can understand.' 'Why, you don't adopt his faith,
when all around you submit to it.' 'But my own emperor wills it not; I
can never worship a creature, having myself been created by God, and
called to become one like unto him.' 'Well, but we who command in this
place, what do you think of us! Are we nothing in your eyes? and would
you not deem yourself happy to be our equal, and to be associated to our
dignity?' 'You may lord it over us, and I by no means dispute your
exalted rank. To be your equal is, doubtless, a fine thing; but I am
already your equal, since you are, like myself, the creature of God, and
since I am likewise the equal, which I deem an honor, of those whom you
rule.' 'At least, don't you fear my power?'
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'What can you do to me?' 'What?--why, inflict upon you any degree of
suffering I may command.' 'Pray speak out clearly and tell me what?'
'Confiscation, banishment, tortures--death itself.' 'None of those
things can reach me; a man who has nothing leaves nothing for
confiscation; a man who is attached to no place, and looks upon himself
everywhere as a stranger, is beyond the reach of banishment. What
tortures can you inflict upon this weak body, when the very first blow
will do for it at once? Indeed, indeed,' added Basil, pointing to his
chest, 'you would do me a good service were you to rid me of this
miserable pair of bellows. As for death, I should deem it a favor, as
leading me to that God for whom I wish to live, and for whose cause I am
already half dead.' 'Nobody ever dared,' interrupted Modestus, 'to speak
to me in this way.' 'Because you never met a bishop.' Bewildered and
angry, yet still afraid of carrying matters to the last extremities,
Modestus put an end to the interview by giving the bishop one day for
reflection. 'To-morrow you will find me what I am to-day,' concluded
Basil, 'and I don't wish that you should yourself change in regard to
me.'

"On the morrow, and on the following days, Valens was expected every
hour. The bishop was besieged with parleys and entreaties of every
description. There was not one noble personage who did not undertake to
argue with the prelate. The head cook, Demosthenes--an influential man,
by the by--returned constantly to the attack. Modestus, on the other
hand, feeling vexed at having no better result to bring before the
emperor, and anxious to avoid any charge of weakness, made public
preparations for an execution. Heralds, lictors, executioners--every
judicial agent was summoned, ready at a signal to seize upon the
factious priest. Having thus taken every precaution, the prefect,
somewhat abashed, yet confident at least in his preventive measures,
repaired to the prince. 'Emperor,' said he, 'I have failed in my
attempt; this man is unmanageable; threats, entreaties, kindness, are
all unavailing with him. This is a matter of stern severity; do but give
the order, and it shall be fulfilled.' But this was exactly what Valens
was not inclined to do. Though no less incensed than bewildered, still
be did not dare to shed such illustrious blood on the path he was about
to enter. He reprieved the execution, and penetrated into the city in a
sort of wavering state of mind, just like a piece of iron, says Gregory
Nyssa, already melting in the fire; but nevertheless still remaining a
bit of iron.

"He continued in this mood, irresolute as to his line of conduct, and
without holding any communication with the bishop's dwelling. A meeting,
however, became unavoidable, for the festival of the Epiphany was
approaching; and, unless he chose to put himself outside of the church,
Valens could not do otherwise than attend at divine service. On the
morning of the feast, he therefore came to a determination, and went to
the temple with an escort of soldiers, himself doubting whether he would
be received peacefully, or would have to force an entry through
violence. He entered: the crowd was most numerous, and had just begun
the choral psalms; the chant was both harmonious and powerful, the whole
service offering that appearance of majesty and order which Basil
excelled in maintaining in his church. At the bottom of the nave stood
Basil himself, facing the people, but motionless like a pillar of the
sanctuary, and with his eyes fixed upon the altar. There he remained
standing, just as the acts of the saints represent him, his tall or
rather towering stature showing off his spare and slender figure, while
his aquiline features were strongly brought forth by his thin, emaciated
cheeks; a latent fire flashed from under his prominent forehead and his
arched eyebrows, whilst now and then a somewhat disdainful smile parted
on each side of his mouth his long white beard. All around him stood his
clergy in an attitude of fear and respect. At this imposing sight Valens
stopped, as if suddenly seized with a sort of bewilderment. The service
continued as though his presence had passed unperceived. At the
offertory, he stepped forward to present the gift which he had prepared;
but no hand was held out to receive it; nobody came forward to meet him.
A cloud passed before his eyes; he staggered on his legs; and, had not
one of the attendants supported him, he would have fallen to the ground.
Basil had pity on his anguish, and waved with his hand that the offering
should be accepted.

"The next day, the emperor having recovered his composure, returned to
the church, and, feeling bolder, resolved to speak to his terrible
antagonist. The service being over, he passed behind the velum where the
officiating priest was wont to retire. Basil received him with kindness,
in the presence of his faithful friend Gregory, who had hastened to his
side. The interview was a long and peaceful one. Basil fully explained
to the monarch his reasons for not conforming to his wishes, and even
entered into many theological developments. By thus flattering his
vanity, and by appearing to set some value on his opinion, he kept him
for several hours spellbound by his lucid and powerful eloquence. This,
by no means, satisfied many of the by-standers, who had already gone
over to Arianism, and some of them endeavored to interfere. Among these
was the unfortunate Demosthenes, who made an attempt at a theological
argument, but in the midst of his demonstration he unwittingly coined a
most ridiculous barbarism. 'Strange,' exclaimed Basil, smiling, 'here we
have caught Demosthenes blundering in Greek!' The emperor departed,
somewhat pacified, and bestowed upon Basil a piece of land for a
hospital which he had founded," (pp. 94-103.)

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What a picture! what a lesson for every one! How it brings home to every mind the fact that a new power had arisen, which was more than a match for worldly rulers, though clothed with even imperial purple. In the present instance, the lesson became still more apparent, when Valens left Caesarea without having dared to sign a decree of banishment against Basil, and fully convinced that a supernatural agency interfered to protect him. In the West, observes Prince de Broglie, Valentinian endeavored to maintain a neutral position between the church and heathenism; but he found it impossible to keep his ground, and his own measures turned against him. In the East, Valens aimed at governing against the church, but was overcome by the sole ascendency of sanctity combined with genius. The time, in fact, was come when the temporal power proved to be utterly helpless to save a crumbling state of society from its utter downfall, and when the fundamental principles on which all society must ever rest were to be recast and remodelled by more skilful hands, though even through a dark, chaotic period, to serve again in future days as the substratum of modern Christendom. Geologists plunging into the bowels of the earth tell us of primitive periods, and primitive creations, that appear to our wondering eyes as the forerunners or foreshadows of our own world. We read something of the same kind in the facts and incidents of the fourth century: the priestly power makes itself already felt in a Basil, or in Augustin, much as it was hereafter displayed in a Gregory I., or a Lanfranc, or an Anselm, or even a Hildebrand. Doubtless, Basil and Ambrose were no Hildebrands, but they are of the same race and genus--there is a family likeness between them all, because, perhaps, the same spirit burns within them, whatever may be their outward figure or robe. To convey our meaning through another simile. You enter a gallery, containing the portraits of some eminent family, whose deeds have left their imprint for ages on the country to which they belong. You take your stand at the founder of the illustrious stock, and probably his large, open, noble figure sinks at once into your memory, as if you had before you some huge relic of the fossil world. And then you go on, following, one by one, each successive representative of the time-honored generations. The ancestral likeness becomes almost extinct, and you vainly endeavor to retrace in the effeminate lineaments of a courtier the eagle-eye and haughty traits of his forefathers. But all of a sudden you are riveted to the spot by the portrait of a youth, who seems to embody within himself every distinctive mark of the whole race. You would almost mistake him for a son of the original founder, and yet he bears so completely about him the peculiarities of his own time that to place him anywhere else would be committing an utter anachronism. Your mind is, as it were, thrown off its balance, and you hardly know how to account for the delusion. Something of the same kind occurs when you compare certain prelates of the middle age, or even of later times, with the last bishops of the Roman empire; and nowhere does this highly interesting fact come forth in stronger relief than in the work before us. It would be easy to demonstrate the assertion by other incidents belonging to the life of St. Basil; we prefer giving a still better proof in St. Ambrose, the celebrated bishop of Milan.

He was the last Roman statesman, just as Theodosius might be termed the first Christian emperor. He had been brought up in the familiarity of Probus, one of the most eminent patricians of the great city. As he himself belonged to a noble family, he had learned at an early age all the traditions and arts of the Roman government, whilst the austerity of his religious principles guarded him against the allurements of pleasure. {371} Of an open, commanding exterior, a good speaker, well versed in literature, no less proficient in the laws of his country, it seemed natural that with such eminent qualifications, backed with excellent connections, he should attract the sovereign's notice. This actually took place, and he was appointed to the consular government of Milan. But the times were dangerous, for the unbending disposition of Valentinian had now become tyrannical. Probus was by no means blind to the peril incurred by his youthful _protégé_; and on taking leave of him the veteran politician simply said, "Child, I have but one piece of advice to give you. Behave, not like a governor, but like a bishop." The advice was characteristic and pithy: Ambrose remembered it well. In the midst of the universal confusion and terror caused by the emperor's cruelty, Milan enjoyed the greatest order and tranquillity. No riots, no insurrections, no complaints; the thing was in itself a wonder, more particularly, if we recollect the dissensions existing between the Arian bishop Auxentius, and the better part of his flock. In fact, a young governor setting an example of chastity, integrity, and humanity--showing himself affable, just, or merciful according to the occasion--never sacrificing to his own ambition or private interests the time and property of others; such a man, says Prince de Broglie, was, in the eyes of the population, fit to grace the episcopal seat far better than the praetorium of the civil magistrate.

The popular election of Ambrose to the episcopacy is too well known for us to relate once more a story that has been so often and so ably told. What we wish particularly to bring forward is the secular character which is constantly enforced upon a bishop of those times, whether he wills it or not, from the very simple reason that he could do what no other could accomplish.

Ambrose had scarcely been consecrated--he had scarcely bestowed the whole of his large fortune upon the poor, he had scarcely given himself up to the absorbing duties of his new position, when be was called upon to guide the first steps of his own sovereign, young Gratian, who had just succeeded to his father Valentinian, and raised Theodosius to the throne of the East. Both these princes were sincere Christians, but Theodosius had been brought up in the camp, had tasted the bitter cup of adversity, and added to the qualities of a good soldier those of a cool judgment and a sound heart. Gratian, on the contrary, was a mere stripling, whose intentions were upright, but who had hardly any experience in public affairs. He thus was naturally disposed to lean on Ambrose, whose advice, both as a pastor and a statesman, might be so eminently useful. That advice was not wanting, and for some time the policy of the Western Empire was in reality the policy of Ambrose. We use the word advisedly, for no other could better answer to our meaning and to the real state of things. At the same time we beg the reader to remember that not for one minute does the bishop separate his strong, manly adherence to the gospel from his views as to the secular government; both are, indeed, so blended, so utterly identified, that it becomes as impossible to distinguish them one from another, as it is to mark where the influence of our bodily organs terminates, and where that of our soul begins. The evils of the times were too frequent, and too poignant, not to require the interference of Ambrose--not to make him bold, even as a bishop, a sort of civil magistracy, of which his flock would have been the very last to complain. Though he had not the slightest idea of using his sober but penetrating eloquence for anything like popular demonstrations, yet he was not the man to refuse the part or an intercessor, if a population, suffering from oppression, claimed his support; or if the sovereign asked of him to strengthen his wavering counsels, he would readily hold out a helping hand.

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And here we may find, with our author, manifest indications of that great Christian doctrine, the "_de jure_" alliance of church and state. Ambrose had been formed from childhood upward to a certain course of ideas, which led him naturally to assume a large share in the direction of public affairs.