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590] men of all classes and of all characters which is evidence how well fitted was the writer for dealing with all sorts and conditions of men. And how he dealt with them may be found out from the fourteen books of his epistles, that wonderful storehouse of Roman religion and diplomacy laid up by the first of the great popes. The register of his letters is known to have been in existence not long after his death. It was known in later years to Bede and Boniface, and formed the basis of the latest collection and arrangement. In this many details of policy may be followed, and the main aims and methods of the great pope may be studied. Each alike, the treatise and the letters, shews the same ideal of the pastoral office, that it is a work of governance of men to be exercised by those who have intimate knowledge of men's hearts and are skilled in the treatment of their souls. Politics are but a branch of the dealing with men on behalf of God which belongs of obligation to a bishop of Christ's Church. And this thought, almost as much as any necessary assertion of orthodox faith and profession of brotherly kindness, is to be seen in the synodical letter in which he announced to the patriarchs of Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, and Jerusalem his accession to the Roman bishopric, and his belief in the doctrine of the Four General Councils, as also in that of the more recent Fifth. The practical expression of this ideal in the life of the new pope could be read by all men who came in contact with him. He lived ascetically, as he had lived in his own monastery, and while nuncio at Constantinople: he surrounded himself with grave and reverend men, dismissing the curled and exquisite fops who had thronged the courts of earlier popes, a gang of self-indulgent scholars and servants obnoxious to the stern man who had not so learned Christ; Of himself the words of his early biographer Paul the Deacon present a vivid picture; "He was never at rest. Always was he busy in taking care for the interests of his people, or in writing some treatise worthy of the Church, or in searching out the hidden things of heaven by the grace of contemplation." His daily audiences, his constant sermons, filled up the burden of his continual correspondence. And all through the fourteen years of his pontificate he struggled against the illnesses which had perhaps their beginning in his ascetic rigours. If his letters breathe a spirit of sternness and make high demands upon men of commonplace intellect and low ideals, there was no one with whom he was more stern, no one before whom he set higher ideals, than himself.

Gregory's policy towards the whole Christian world radiated from the centre. There, at Rome, men could see his life of strict rule: they could see him reconsecrating Arian churches to Catholic use, could hear him preaching, could watch his elaborate measures for the relief of the poor. "Other pontiffs," says his biographer, "gave themselves to building churches and adorning them with gold and silver; but Gregory, while he did not altogether neglect this duty, was entirely