Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/674

 the Father and the Son; so that the Father has never been without the Son, nor the Son without the Father, nor the Father and the Son without the Spirit. Thus the unchangeable Deity of the blessed Trinity is one in substance, undivided and inseparable in operation, concordant in will, alike in power, equal in glory." "What the Father is, that is the Son, and that is the Holy Spirit"; and what the Father does, that does the Son, and that does the Holy Spirit. There was no beginning to the operation of the Holy Spirit upon man since his creation. The descent at Pentecost was not the "beginning of a gift, but the addition of fulness" ("adjectio largitatis") (Serm. lxxvi. 3). The difference has lain not in the virtue and reality of the gifts, but in their measure (cf. on the unity of divine purpose and love, from first to last of the divine economy, the end of c. 3 of "the tome").

Leo holds that the "merits" of saints can work wonders and aid the church on earth (Serm. v. 4). He often speaks of St. Peter assisting his people with his prayers (xii. xiii. xvi. ad. fin., etc.) and with his merits (lxxi. 4). So also of St. Laurence (lxxxv.). He attributes the deliverance of the city from the barbarians to the "care of the saints" (lxxxiv. 1). The Leonine Sacramentary, which certainly contains much of Leo's age, is full of such prayers as "adjuva nos, Domine, tuorum prece sanctorum, ut quorum festa gerimus sentiamus auxilium" (cf. Ep. lviii. init.; ci. 3, for similar sentiments). But he never speaks of the blessed Virgin as aiding, nor of any saints but St. Peter, St. Paul (Serm. lxxxii. fin.), and St. Laurence; nor does he invoke them, or direct them to be invoked, though he believes that they are aiding the church by their patronage, prayers, or merits. Elsewhere, distinguishing the value of the deaths of the saints from that of Christ, he very zealously guards the prerogative of Christ as the real source of merit.

To relics he makes no allusion, except where he rejoices that those of St. Flavian had been brought back to Constantinople (Ep. lxxix. 2), and perhaps when, writing to Eudocia and Juvenal in Palestine, he seeks to stir their faith through the local memorials of Christ's passion (Epp. cxxxix. 2; cxxiii.). Comparing his works with Gregory's, we are struck by the total absence of superstition in Leo. His sermons "are singularly Christian—Christian as dwelling almost exclusively on Christ: His birth, His passion, His resurrection" (Milman, Lat. Christ. i. p. 233). We find constant reference to the special dangers and wants of his time—e.g. warnings against the prevalent Manicheism. When he converted a number of Manicheans, he at once applied his sermon, regardless of repeating himself, to instruct them (Serm. xxv. 1). He reproves the people for forsaking the commemoration of the deliverance of the city, probably from Genseric, which he had instituted on the feast of SS. Peter and Paul, for games and spectacles, and he exhorts them to gratitude to God (lxxxiv.). He reproves idolatrous practices in the church. Magic, charms, cabalistic doctrines, even a worship of the rising sun, were in vogue. Christians, on their way into St. Peter's basilica, would turn and bow to the sun (lxxxiv. 2; xxvii. 4). This worship, which, as he says, was half pagan, akin to that of the Priscillianists and Manicheans, and half due to ignorance in people who really meant to worship the Creator, but which in any case was akin to idolatry, he deeply deplores and earnestly prohibits.

Leo especially urges purity, strictness, and severity of life, in an age no longer disciplined by persecutions. "Kings now," he says, "do not so much pride themselves on being born to empire as rejoice that they are reborn in baptism." The devil tries by avarice and ease those whom troubles could not alienate (xxxvi. 3). Hence the interest of his sermons in Lent and at the other fasts of the "Quattuor Tempora" and those (on almsgiving) "de Collectis." Prayers, fasting, and almsgiving are, in his view, the three chief parts of Christian duty. "By prayer the mercy of God is sought; by fasting, the lusts of the flesh are extinguished; by almsgiving, our sins are atoned for ['redimuntur']." "The most effectual petition for pardon lies in alms and fasting, and the prayer which is assisted by such suffrages rises more speedily to the ears of God" (xii. 4, xvi. 21. He uses almsgiving in a large sense almost equivalent to love (xliv. z). "Alms destroy sins" (Serm. vii., quoted from Ecclus. iii. 30), "abolish death, extinguish the penalty of eternal fire" (x.). It is a grace without which we can have no other (x.). "He who has cleansed himself by almsgiving need not doubt that even after many sins the splendour of the new birth will be restored to him" (xx. ad fin.). But we must look how we give, so as not, e.g., to overlook the retiring; we must "understand about" the poor (ix. 3; "Beatus qui intelligit super,"Ps. xl. 1). Our gifts should go to those who do not yet believe as well as to Christians (xli. 3), and special thoughtfulness is enjoined for slaves. What God looks to is, he often insists, not the amount, but the spirit of the gift: "ibi censetur qualitus actionis, ubi invenitur initium voluntatis" (xciv. 1); "nulli parvus est census, cui magnus est animus" (Serm. xl. 4); and gifts given not in the spirit of faith, though ever so large, avail nothing (xliv. 2). Love, he insists, is the fulfilling of the law. Truth and mercy, faith and love, go together. "There is no love without faith, no faith without love" (cf. esp. Serm. xlv.). Fasting, too, is constantly enjoined. Virtue is a very narrow mean (xliii. 2), and strict self-discipline is ever absolutely necessary. But fasting is a means, not an end. It must not proceed from any belief in matter being evil in itself. "No substance is evil, and evil in itself has no nature" (xlii. 4). The object of fasting is to make the body apt for pure, holy, and spiritual activity—to subject the flesh to the reason and spirit. "A man has true peace and liberty when the flesh is ruled by the judgment of the mind, and the mind is directed by the government of God" (xxxix. 2; xlii. 2). He insists strongly on this dominion of the mind. Otherwise "parum est si carnis substantia tenuatur et animae fortitudo non alitur"; "continendum est a cibis