Nevertheless, so far as the civil power was concerned, Basil, after the famous visit of Valens, was left at peace. [184] He had triumphed. Was it a triumph for the nobler principles of the Gospel? Had he exhibited a pride and an irritation unworthy of the Christian name? Jerome, in a passage of doubtful genuineness and application, is reported to have regarded his good qualities as marred by the one bane of pride, [185] a "leaven" of which sin is admitted by Milman [186] to have been exhibited by Basil, as well as uncompromising firmness. The temper of Basil in the encounter with Valens would probably have been somewhat differently regarded had it not been for the reputation of a hard and overbearing spirit which he has won from his part in transactions to be shortly touched on. His attitude before Valens seems to have been dignified without personal haughtiness, and to have shewn sparks of that quiet humour which is rarely exhibited in great emergencies except by men who are conscious of right and careless of consequences to self.
[135] Greg. Naz., Or. xliii. 33.
[136] i.e. the extant reply to his urgent request that Gregory would come to him. Greg. Naz., Ep. xl.
[137] "Persuadé que, s'il échouait c'en était fait de la foi de Nicée en Cappadoce, il deploie toutes les ressources de son dénie, aussi souple que puissant." Fialone, Et. Hist. p. 85. "Personne dans la ville, pas même Basile, malgré son humilité, ne donta que la succession ne lui fût acquise...il fit assez ouvertement ses préparatifs pour sa promotion." De Broglie, L'Eglise et l'Empire R. v. 88. "Basil persuaded himself, and not altogether unwarrantably, that the cause of orthodoxy in Asia Minor was involved in his becoming his successor." Canon Venables in D.C.B. "Erselbst, so schwer er sich anfangs zur Uebernahme des Presbyterates hatte entschliessen können, jetzt, wo er sich in seine Stellung hinein gearbeitet hatte wünschte er nichts sehnlicher al seine Wahl zum Bischof. Böhringer the IVth c. p. 24. "Was it really from ambitious views? Certainly the suspicion, which even his friend entertained, attaches to him." Ullmann, Life of Gregory of Naz., Cox's Trans. p. 117.
[138] "Ne suspicatus quidem in se oculos conjectum iri." Maran, Vit. Bas. "Former une brigue pour parvenir à l'épiscopat était bien loin de sa pensée.´ Ceillier, iv. 354.
[139] Greg. N., Ep. xl. (xxi.).
[140] Or. xliii.
[141] Or. xliii. § 37.
[142] Ep. xli.
[143] Ep. xliii.
[144] Ep. xlvii.
[145] Or. xliii.
[146] Or. xviii., xliii.
[147] Athan., Ad Pall. 953; Ad Johan, et Ant. 951.
[148] This is inferred from the latter part of Ep. xlviii. cf. Maran, Vit. Bas. xiii. 3.
[149] Greg. Naz., Ep. xlv.
[150] Id. Ep. xlvi.
[151] tende tes kathedras timen. Greg. Naz., Or. xliii.
[152] Epp. lviii., lix., lx.
[153] Greg. Naz., Or. xliii. § 40.
[154] Id. § 43.
[155] Basil, Epp. lxvi., lxvii.
[156] Ep. lxix.
[157] Ep. lxx.
[158] Ep. liii.
[159] Hex. Hom. iii. p. 65.
[160] Maran, Vit. Bas. xviii. 4.
[161] Greg. Naz., Ep. lviii. Ep. lxxi.
[162] parasurein. Ib.
[163] oikonomethenai.
[164] Ep. lxxi.
[165] Mr. C.F.H. Johnston (The Book of St. Basil the Great on the Holy Spirit), in noting that St. Basil in the De Sp. Scto. refrained from directly using the term Theos of the Holy Ghost, remarks that he also avoided the use of the term homoousios of the Son, "in accordance with his own opinion expressed in Ep. ix." In Ep. ix., however, he rather gives his reasons for preferring the homoousion. The epitome of the essay of C. G. Wuilcknis (Leipsig, 1724) on the economy or reserve of St. Basil, appended by Mr. Johnston, is a valuable and interesting summary of the best defence which can be made for such reticence. It is truly pointed out that the only possible motive in Basil's case was the desire of serving God, for no one could suspect or accuse him of ambition, fear, or covetousness. And if there was an avoidance of a particular phrase, there was no paltering with doctrine. As Dr. Swete (Doctrine of the H. S., p. 64) puts it: "He knew that the opponents of the Spirit's Deity were watching their opportunity. Had the actual name of God been used in reference to the Third Person of the Trinity, they would have risen, and, on the plea of resisting blasphemy, expelled St. Basil from his see, which would then have been immediately filled by a Macedonian prelate. In private conversation with Gregory, Basil not only asserted again and again the Godhead of the Spirit, but even confirmed his statement with a solemn imprecation, eparasamenos heauto to phrikodestaton, autou tou pneumatos ekpesein ei me seboi to pneuma meta patros kai Uiou hos homoousion kai homotimon." (Greg. Naz., Or. xliii.) In Letter viii. § 11 he distinctly calls the Spirit God, as in Adv. Eunomius, v., if the latter be genuine. In the De S. Scto. (p. 12) Basil uses the word oikonomia in the patristic sense nearly equivalent to incarnation. In the passage of Bp. Lightfoot, referred to in the note on p. 7, he points out how in Ign. ad Eph. xviii, the word has "already reached its first stage on the way to the sense of dissimulation,' which was afterwards connected with it, and which led to disastrous consequences in the theology and practice of a later age." On "Reserve" as taught by later casuists, see Scavini, Theolog. Mor. ii. 23, the letters of Pascal, and Jer. Taylor, Ductor Dubit. iii. 2.
[166] Maran, Vit. Bas. xx. 1.
[167] Epp. lxxiv., lxxv, lxxvi.
[168] Maran, Vit. Bas. xix. 3.
[169] Greg. Nyss., C. Eunom. i.
[170] Theod. iv. 16.
[171] Soc. iv. 16.
[172] cf. Epp. lxviii., cxxviii., ccxliv. and ccli., and Maran, Vit. Bas. xx. 1; possibly the bishops were in Cappadocia as early as the Eupsychian celebration.
[173] Jan. 6, 372. At this time in the Eastern Church the celebrations of the Nativity and of the Epiphany were combined. cf. D.C.A. i. 617.
[174] 1 Sam. xix. 20.
[175] Greg. Naz., Or. xliii., Greg. Nyss., Adv. Eunom. i., Soz. vi. 16, Theod. iv. 16. De Broglie well combines the variations which are not quite easy to harmonize in detail. On the admission within the sanctuary, cf. the concession of Ambrose to Theodosius in Theod. v. 18.
[176] Cæsarea, when sacked by Sapor in 260, is said to have contained 400,000 inhabitants (Zonaras, xii. 630). It may be presumed to have recovered and retained much, if not all, of its importance.
[177] The authority for the personal appearance of Basil is an anonymous Vatican document quoted by Baronius, Ann. 378: "Procero fuit habitu corporis et recto, siccus, gracilis; color ejus fuscus, vultus temperatus pallore, justus nasus, supercilia in orbem inflexa et adducta; cogitabundo similis fuit, paucæ in vultu rugæ, eoeque renidentes, genæ oblongæ, tempora aliquantum cava, promissa barba, et mediocris canities."
[178] Amm. Marc. xxx. 14, 7: "Cessator et piger: nigri coloris, pupula oculi unius obstructa, sed ita ut non eminus appareret: figura bene compacta membrorum, staturæ nec proceræ nec humilis, incurvis cruribus, exstanteque mediocriter ventre." "Bon père, bon époux, arien fervent et zélé, mais faible, timide, Valens était né pour la vie privée, où il eût été un honnête citoyen et un des saints de l'Arianisme." Fialon, Et. Hist. 159.
[179] cf. Theod. v. 16 and note on p. 120 of Theod. in this series.
[180] Theod. iv. 16. Bas., Ep. xciv.
[181] Theod. iv. 16.
[182] Theod. iv. 16. Soz. vi. 17. Soc. iv. 26. Greg. Naz., Or. xliii. Ruf. xi. 9.
[183] Greg. Naz., Or. xliii.
[184] "The archbishop, who asserted, with inflexible pride, the truth of his opinions and the dignity of his rank, was left in the free possession of his conscience and his throne." Gibbon, Chap. xxv. "Une sorte d'inviolabilité de fait demeurait acquise a Basile a Césarée comme a Athanase à Alexandrie." De Broglie.
[185] Quoted by Gibbon l.c. from Jerome's Chron. A.D. 380, and acknowledged by him to be not in Scaliger's edition. The Benedictine editors of Jerome admit it, but refer it to Photinus. cf. D.C.B. i. 288.
[186] Hist. Christ. iii. 45.
VII.--The Breach with Gregory of Nazianzus.
Cappadocia, it has been seen, had been divided into two provinces, and of one of these Tyana had been constituted the chief town. Anthimus, bishop of Tyana, now contended that an ecclesiastical partition should follow the civil, and that Tyana should enjoy parallel metropolitan privileges to those of Cæsarea. To this claim Basil determined to offer an uncompromising resistance, and summoned Gregory of Nazianzus to his side. Gregory replied in friendly and complimentary terms, [187] and pointed out that Basil's friendship for Eustathius of Sebaste was a cause of suspicion in the Church. At the same time he placed himself at the archbishop's disposal. The friends started together with a train of slaves and mules to collect the produce of the monastery of St. Orestes, in Cappadocia Secunda, which was the property of the see of Cæsarea. Anthimus blocked the defiles with his retainers and in the vicinity of Sasima [188] there was an unseemly struggle between the domestics of the two prelates. [189] The friends proceeded to Nazianzus, and there, with imperious inconsiderateness, Basil insisted upon nominating Gregory to one of the bishoprics which he was founding in order to strengthen his position against Anthimus. [190] For Gregory, the brother, Nyssa was selected, a town on the Halys, about a hundred miles distant from Cæsarea, so obscure that Eusebius of Samosata remonstrated with Basil on the unreasonableness of forcing such a man to undertake the episcopate of such a place. [191] For Gregory, the friend, a similar fate was ordered. The spot chosen was Sasima, a townlet commanding the scene of the recent fray. [192] It was an insignificant place at the bifurcation of the road leading northwards from Tyana to Doara and diverging westward to Nazianzus. [193] Gregory speaks of it with contempt, and almost with disgust, [194] and never seems to have forgiven his old friend for forcing him to accept the responsibility of the episcopate, and in such a place. [195] Gregory resigned the distasteful post, [196] and with very bitter feelings. The utmost that can be said for Basil is that just possibly he was consulting for the interest of the Church, and meaning to honour his friend, by placing Gregory in an outpost of peril and difficulty. In the kingdom of heaven the place of trial is the place of trust. [197] But, unfortunately for the reputation of the archbishop, the war in this case was hardly the Holy War of truth against error and of right against wrong. It was a rivalry between official and official, and it seemed hard to sacrifice Gregory to a dispute between the claims of the metropolitans of Tyana and Cæsarea.
Gregory the elder joined in persuading his son. Basil had his way. He won a convenient suffragan for the moment. But he lost his friend. The sore was never healed, and even in the great funeral oration in which Basil's virtues and abilities are extolled, Gregory traces the main trouble of his chequered career to Basil's unkindness, and owns to feeling the smart still, though the hand that inflicted the wound was cold. [199]
With Anthimus peace was ultimately established. Basil vehemently desired it. [200] Eusebius of Samosata again intervened. [201] Nazianzus remained for a time subject to Cæsarea, but was eventually recognized as subject to the Metropolitan of Tyana. [202]
The relations, however, between the two metropolitans remained for some time strained. When in Armenia in 372, Basil arranged some differences between the bishops of that district, and dissipated a cloud of calumny hanging over Cyril, an Armenian bishop. [203] He also acceded to a request on the part of the Church of Satala that he would nominate a bishop for that see, and accordingly appointed Poemenius, a relation of his own. [204] Later on a certain Faustus, on the strength of a recommendation from a pope with whom he was residing, applied to Basil for consecration to the see, hitherto occupied by Cyril. With this request Basil declined to comply, and required as a necessary preliminary the authorisation of the Armenian bishops, specially of Theodotus of Nicopolis. Faustus then betook himself to Anthimus, and succeeded in obtaining uncanonical consecration from him. This was naturally a serious cause of disagreement. [205] However, by 375, a better feeling seems to have existed between the rivals. Basil is able at that date to speak of Anthimus as in complete agreement with him.
[187] Greg. Naz., Ep. xlvii.
[188] cf. Maran, Vit. Bas. xxiii. 4.
[189] Greg. Naz., Or. xliii. 58, and Ep. xlviii. Bas., Epp. lxxiv., lxxv., lxxvi.
[190] It has been debated whether the odium theologicum was here mixed up with the odium ecclesiasticum. Gregory (Orat. xliii. 58) represents Anthimus as defending his seizure of the metropolitan revenues on the ground that it was wrong dasmophorein kakodoxois, to pay tribute to men of evil opinions, and LeClerc (Bibl. Univer. xviii. p. 60) has condemned Anthimus as an Arian. He was undoubtedly Are& 187;os (Greg. Naz., Ep. xlviii.), a devotee of Ares, as he shewed in the skirmish by Sasima; but there is no reason to suppose him to have been Areianos, or Arian. He probably looked askance at the orthodoxy of Basil. Basil would never have called him homopsuchos (Ep. ccx. 5) if he had been unsound on the incarnation. cf. Baronius, Act. Sanc. Maj. ii. p. 394.