st. ambrose...was a man of action..
he brought the church up to her proudest position in relation to the state,
setting church and state side by side as equals,
one supreme in spiritual matters (note: as regards themselves alone..hopefully?),
the other in temporal...
theodosius was the last great emperor of the west.
in 410, only a few years after his death, alaric and his goths
entered rome and sacked the sacred city
and from that time only lingered on in the marshes of ravenna
a shadow of the Imperial dignity, till in 476 even that disappeared.
theoretically the western empire was absorbed into the eastern at that date
practically,however, the east ceased to trouble itself with the affairs of italy
and the popes planted themselves on the Imperial throne,
till charlegmagne restored the Imperial dignity
ad created or recreated the Holy Roman Empire.
the ideal of that mediaeval empire is graphically described by freeman (historical essays, VI)
in a review of bryce's 'holy roman empire',
and his description is interesting in the present connection.
'the theory of the mediaeval empire is that of an universal christian monarchy,
the roman empire and the catholic church are two aspects of one society,
a society ordained by the divine will to spread itself over the whole world
of this society, in its temporal character as an empire,
stands the temporal chief of christendom, the roman caesar.
at its head, in its spiritual character as a church,
stands the spiritual chief of christendom, the roman pontiff.
caesar and pontiff rule alike by divine right,
each as God's immediate vicar within his own sphere.
each ruler is bound to the other by the closest ties.
caesar is the advocate of the roman church,
bound to defend her y the temporal arm against all temporal enemies.
the pontiff, on the other hand, though the caesar holds his rank
not of him but by an independent divine commission,
has the lofty privilege of personally admitting the lord of the world to his high office,
of hallowing the Lord's anointed and of making him in some sort
a partaker in the mysterious privilege of the priesthood. '
now, although this is descriptive of a relation between church and state existing some 500 years later,
it is a fair account of what was probably the ideal of both ambrose and theodosius,
except that neither of them yet realized a monarchy over spiritual things,
as represented later by the roman pontiffs.
still, if there was to be one spiritual head,
ambrose would no doubt have conceded the position to rome.
nor did the church consecrate the emperor;
yet by invitation, not by right, the emperor was admitted into the sanctuary.
but the absolute mutual dependence of church and state was fully established
by ambrose and theodosius,
and the supreme authority of each in her own sphere.
theodosius was a spaniard, the son of a general who had done good service to the state
and had then been executed out of jealousy.
he was born in 346 and called by the good sense of gratian in 379
from the retreat he had prudently sought after his father's death,
to assume the purple in the east.
by conviction a catholic he was then baptized and immediately took strong measures against heresy and paganism.
in 380 the edict of thessalonica, addressed to constantinople
in order to strengthen the position of gregory,
stated that the religion which st. peter taught the romans
and which damasus of rome and peter of alexandria professed,
was alone true.
only the adherents of the doctrine that Father, Son and Holy Ghost
should be equally adored were to be called catholics;
all others were heretics,whose places of assembly were not to be called churches
and whose souls were threatened with divine punishment.
in 381 heretics were forbidden to meet for religion
and in 383 they were forbidden tobuild churches or ordain
in 389 the emperor forbade arians to bequeath property or to receive bequests.
as regards paganism in 382 theodosius abolished the Altar of Victory in the senate house,
and confiscated the property of the vestal virgins.
in 389 the christians of alexandria destroyed the serapaeum,
with the magnificent library it contained, when pagans had taken refuge there during a riot.
in 392 an edict of the emperor made all pagan worship illegal.
in the abolition of the altar of victory, which was a symbol
,to the conservative roman, of the whole history of the city,
ambrose took a prominent part
in the suppression of heresy by force he seems to have passively acquiesced.
on two notable occasions, however, he went beyond the emperor,
then a bishop destroyed a synagogue and some riotous monks burnt a gnostic chapel.
as these were acts of insubordination, theodosius would have punished the offenders
had not ambrose condoned their acts.
however, when the emperor maximus put to death the leaders of an obscure sect,
known as the priscillianites, ambrose and martin of tours expressed their strong disapproval
on the ground of persecution.
it is clear that theodosius wielded a temporal arm which was of great value to the church;
but further he submitted himself humbly to a public penance
imposed on a memorable occasion by the archbishop.
theodosius was a great ruler, brave, just and generous;
his chief fault was a violent temper
and this temper twice brought him into antagonism with the church.
first in the matter of antioch described in the chapter on chrysostom
and secondly after the massacre of thessalonica,when he was humbled by ambrose.
ambrose in many respects resembles cyprian,
though they were separated by an interval of more than a century.
both of them were laymen till middle life, cyprian not even a christian.
both held influential positions, cyprian at the bar, ambrose as the governor of a province.
ambrose while still a layman was called by popular acclamation to a bishopric;
cyprian also by popular acclamation only two years after his baptism/
of each of them action was the chief characteristic;
but each of them was also a writer,
whose skill lay less in originality than in a clear,lucid and graceful style,
a definite aim and a practical effect.
but above all they were alike in advancing the sacerdotal theory of church government,
which was always so much more characteristic of the west than the east.
cyprian, in whose days the church could not have contained at most a fifth of the population,
consolidated the sacerdotal principle within the boundaries of the church;
ambrose used it to control the state.
milman calls ambrose 'the founder of sacerdotal authority in the latin church'
but he seems to have gone even further than this and to have aimed at making church and state
one and the same thing.
ambrose was born about 340, his parents being christians and in a high position.
...in 374 we find him governor of liguria and a wise, clement and just governor.
on the death of auxentius he presided over an assembly
called to nominate the new archbishop of milan,
when some child, cried, 'ambrose bishop'
and the cue was taken at once by the people, who insisted on his election.
he tried to evade the post by curious subterfuges,
such as ordering a prisoner to the torture,
causing improper characters to be brought into his house
and finally by flight.
but it was of no avail:the idea appealed to the popular imagination.
he was obviously the right man, and he was forced on to the throne.
he then found himself teaching before he had time to learn,
but he rectified this by the closest study.
his first literary work was 'on the fatih', which he sent to gratian at his request,
that he might be fully instructed in the catholic doctrine.
...in 390 occurred the dramatic scene between ambrose and theodosius,
in which ambrose raised the authority of the church to the point of refusing communion
or even admission to the church, to the emperor,
until he had done penance for a wholesale massacre at thessalonica,
ordered in revenge for the murder by the mob of an unpopular governor.
ambrose met theodosius at the door of the church,
and is said to have actually laid hands on him to prevent his entrance.
the remained for some time in his palace in deep grief and at last,
in preparation for the christmas communion,
divested himself of his Imperial robes,
prostrated himself on the pavement of the church,
spread out his arms in the form of a cross,
and like the humblest penitent repeated the psalm,
'my soul cleaveth unto the dust;
quicken Thou me,o Lord, according to Thy word'.
the result of this was a wise enactment that
no sentence of death or confiscation
should be published for 30 days,
when it was to be reconsidered and, if necessary, revised.
in395 theodosius died and in 397 ambrose followed him.
to the end he was writing his commentaries;
the one on the 43rd psalm was broken off before the last two verses.
paulinus, his secretary, saw 'a globe of flame playing on his forehead.
then it floated on his lips,
after which his face became as white as snow'.
he could do no more work
and on good friday he lay for five hours
with his arms extended in the form of the cross and then died.
...it is generally known that previous to the introduction of gregorian tones by gregory the Great,
some form of church music prevailed in the west known as ambosian.
in fact so thoroughly was st. ambrose identified with the early church music
that at one time a hymn was often called an ambrosian.
but of the ambrosian tones very little is known,
though a great may learned conjectures have been offered.
by some it is though that they were little more than musical speech,
something perhaps like an 'inflected' gospel.
in that case one wonders that they could have moved augustine to tears.
'how did i weep, in thy hymns and canticles, touched to the quickby the voices of
thy sweet attuned church'.
a great number of hymns are associated with the name of ambrose,
but only 12 are given in the benedictine edition as certainly his.
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