Page:Readings in European History Vol 1.djvu/114

 Readings in European History The Scrip- tures taken in their literal sense are fitted for the simple- minded, but there is a deeper alle- gorical mean- ing for the wise. Gregory's ill health. Gregory justifies his neglect of grammar and rhetoric. work is prefaced by a letter to a friend who had urged him to undertake it. In spite of the burden of his other responsibilities, Gregory, relying upon God's aid, resolved to attempt to give the deeper allegorical meaning as well as the literal explanation. For as the Word of God, by the mysteries which it con- tains, exercises the understanding of the wise, so it often nourishes the simple-minded by what presents itself on the outside. It presenteth in open day that wherewith the little ones may be fed ; it keepeth in secret that whereby men of a loftier range may be held in wondering suspense. It is, as it were, a kind of river, if I may so liken it, which is both shallow and deep, wherein both the lamb may find a footing and the elephant float at large. . . . This exposition being such as I have described, I have transmitted it to your Blessedness for your inspection, not because I have carried it out as worthily as I should, but because I remember that I promised it at your request. In which whatsoever your Holiness may discover that is languid or unpolished, let it be excused, since, as is well known, I was ill when I prepared it. When the body is worn out with sickness, the mind being also affected, our efforts to express ourselves grow weak. For many years now I have been afflicted with frequent pains in the bowels, and the powers of my stomach being broken down, I am at all times and seasons weakly. Under the influence of fevers, slow, but in constant succession, I draw my breath with difficulty. . . . And perchance it was by Divine Providence designed that I, a stricken one, should set forth Job stricken, and that, through being scourged myself, I should the more perfectly enter into the feelings of one that was scourged. . . . I beg, moreover, that in going through the statements of this work you would not seek the foliage of eloquence therein ; for by the sacred oracles the vanity of a barren wordiness is purposely debarred those that treat thereof.