Letter 17: Simplicius congratulates Zeno on his good actions in defense of the faith, recalling how the emperor's piety has...

Of Pope Simplicius to the Emperor Zeno. Simplicius, congratulating him on the subjugation of Basiliscus, exhorts Zeno that in turn he restrain [the enemies] of the Church, restore the Alexandrian bishop to his own see, abrogate the impious enactment of Basiliscus, and command that the teaching of Leo and the decrees of Chalcedon remain inviolate. Bishop Simplicius to Zeno Augustus. 1. Among the works of divine providence, which are always pious and just, scarcely any human tongue will suffice to utter the powers of the Lord even in our own times. For who could either grasp in thought or set forth in speech that, at the very crisis of both struggling affairs, He restored you to tranquility both for the public prayers and for the holy religion [the text should read "and of religion," so that both those matters may be understood which are said to have struggled under Basiliscus, namely the commonwealth and religion], save that, in consideration of so great a miracle, one must cry out with the prophet: This is the change of the right hand of the Most High, which mightily humbles those who exalt themselves and clemently exalts those who humble themselves? In which things also, if the measure of the supernal dispensation be weighed more shrewdly, it plainly appears that the destruction of the faithless crept in for this reason: that the faith of your clemency might be proved even amid adversities, and the more it was believed to be pressed by hostile circumstances, so much the more clearly might your magnanimity tower up; and that for this reason your gentleness withdrew from the city of Constantinople [namely, when, with Basiliscus threatening, he fled into Isauria], so that, sought after by the longings of all, you might return with greater glory, and that out of the perils of adversaries it might be known what in you was useful to all: an example, surely, of that virtue of David, by which, yielding with singular patience for a little to the furies of the parricide, immediately, as victor and implored by the prayers of the peoples, he returned into the kingdom at a more excellent height. 2. Rejoice, therefore, venerable emperor, that those were your enemies who stood forth as the enemies of the Godhead, and rejoice that you have struggled together with the Church and have been restored to empire together with the liberty of the catholic faith. And that you may teach in all things that your cause is common with God, leaning manfully upon His help, press on: that, through Him by whom He subdued the public usurpers [that is, the unjust holders of the commonwealth; for as Augustine explains, what one does not hold by right, if he should call it his own, will not be the right of a just possessor but the wickedness of a shameless squatter -- and by this name it is manifest that Basiliscus, the invader of the empire, is designated], He may likewise drive the tyrants from the Church. For just as your piety rightly and correctly trusts, at that time we besought our God for nothing else, suppliantly, than that the rulers of the Roman empire, such as we now speak of, might be restored to us; so you perceive it is awaited that you show by the very quality of your acts that you are such men. Consider, I beg, the constancy, conspicuous to all the world in catholic devotion, of Marcian and Leo of august memory, and weigh with wholesome consideration: that, since those who deviated from their rectitude could not stand in the same place, he without doubt will be the lawful and divinely appointed successor of the royal power who has persisted as an imitator of their faith. You owe, most glorious and most clement son and emperor, reverence to such great men of august memory; you owe a return for the gifts of God. He led you back to the empire of these men: do you render to God a service like to theirs. And because these things, with the blessed apostle Peter teaching us as I lately preached in my humility, have been refuted by those destined to fall, may they, with God favoring, prosper unto a firmness of the kingdom that shall abide. 3. I indeed, receiving in the letters which your clemency dispatched an immense pledge of venerable religiousness, both breathe again with vast rejoicing, and in no way doubt that your mind in divine affairs will perform things far more powerful than I desire; but, mindful of my office, I therefore exhort your clemency in this part with a more extended address, because, out of affection both for your empire and for your salvation alike, I ever long for you to cleave to those causes by which alone both the stability of the present kingdom is guarded and the glory of the eternal one is procured. 4. Wherefore before all things I pray that you decree the Alexandrian church -- freed by the dispositions of your clemency no less from the deadly than from the heretical invader -- to be restored to a catholic and lawful bishop; and that, those being cast out whom he is reported to have ordained with diabolical rashness in diverse churches, you appoint bishops of the right faith to be substituted: so that, just as you have purged your commonwealth from tyrannical domination, so everywhere you may strip the Church of God of the robberies and contagions of heretics, nor allow that to prevail rather which the iniquity of the times has wrought through those whom a rebellious spirit has stirred up not only against your empire but also against God, than what so many and so great pontiffs and, together with the distinguished and orthodox pontiffs, the assent of the universal Church has decreed. The constitutions of the synod of Chalcedon, and those things which my predecessor Leo of blessed memory taught thoroughly by apostolic learning, command that they flourish inviolate: because in no way can that be retracted which was laid to rest by their definition, nor in any way can he be received who has so many times been condemned by one mouth on every side. For this is indeed, as you have learned by experience, the catholic faith, which deposed the powerful while it lay wounded, and, being kept, preserved the humble to be exalted. Wherefore it must be sufficiently labored at by your piety, that He who is to you the author of this gift may Himself be its propagator. Given on the seventh day before the Ides of October, after the consulship of Basiliscus and Armatus.

%^Oct^' Simplicii papae ad Zenonem imperatorem. Gratulatus Simplicius de Basilisco subacto hortatur Zenonem, ut Eccletiae ko9U$ p.1 vicissim comprimat, Alexandrinum episcopum sedi suae restituatj abroget impimm Basilisci sanctionem, ac Leonis doctrinam et Calchedonensia decreia intemeraia esse Jubeat. Simplicius episcopus Zenoni Augusto. 1. Inter opera divinae providentiae, quae pia semper et justa sunt, nostris quoque temporibus eloqui potentias Domim' vix quae- libet humana lingua sufficiet. Quis etenim valeat vel cogitatione complecti vel voce depromere, quod in ipso utriusque rei laborantis articulo et votis publicis et^) religionis sanctae reddidit vos quieti, <) Legcndum et religionis, adcliio et, ut iutcUigatur utraque illa ret, qiui9 sub Basilisco laborasse dicitur, ncmpc res publica ct religio. Ecciesiwm ei EPISTOLAE 5. 6. 187 nisi quod tanti consideratione miraculi clamaudum e^t euni propheta: a. 477. Haec esi muiatio dexterae Excelsi, quae exaltautes semetipsos potenter Pb.76,1i. humiliat et humiliantes se clementer exaltat? lu quibus etiam siLuc.1,52. dispensationis sapemae sagacius mensura libretur, profecto evidenter apparet, ideo perfidorum irrepsisse pemiciem, ut fides clementiae tuae et iuter adversa probaretur, quantoque magis rebus urgeri cre- deretur infestis; tanto clarius vestra magnanimitas immineret; atcjue ob hoc mansuetudinis vestrae de Constantinopolitana urbe prove- nisse discessiun''^), ut universorum desideriis expetiti gloria majore rediretis, et ex contrariorum periculis, quid in vobis esset cunctis atile^ nosceretur'): Davidicae nimirum illius virtutis exempla*), qua singulari patientia cedeus paululum furoribus parricidae, continuo rictor ac populorum precibus imploratus praestantiore fastigio est reversus in regnum. 2. Laetare igitur, venerabilis imperator, eos fuisse tuos hostes, qui exstiterunt Divinitatis inimici^), teque^) gaude cum Ecclesia labo- rasse et cum fidei catholicae libertate imperio restitutum. Atque ut in omnibus doceas causam tibi cum Deo esse communem, ejus ope viriliter fretus insiste: ut per quem publicos incubatores ') subegit, pMicawn Deu9 mirabUi consolatione visitavit, in scqucnti cpistola dc codcni Zcno- ms reditu scrihit Simplicins. ■) scil. quum Basiiisco immincnte in Isauriam confugit. — Mox cditi ut er quod in. •) Antca Zenonem omnibus etiam propinquis suis ob vitac turpituclincm in- Tisum fiiisse Evagrius h. e. III, 3 tradit. Scd populu» Ba^ilisci t^rrannidem non ferenB et fidom in summum discrimcn adduci conspicicns Zcnoncm facilc cxpctiit. Zeuonem contra se ex Isauria cum expcditis copiis advolare didicit, in eccte- profeetus excusavit se Acacio et ciero ac monachis, ... alio edicto ubrogans ^uae prxuM constituerut , ut Theodorus lector h. c. I (cd. Vales. pag. 557) nar- rat. Novum illud edictum item apud Evagrium h. e. III, 7 refertur. ^ h. e. reipublicae i^Justos detentores, Ut enim Augustinus sermon. 50 (al. 15) de diTenifl n. 4 expUcat: quod quis jure non tenet^ si suum esse dixerit, non erit eox jusli possessoris sed impudentis incubatoris improbitas. Idcm sonat 1. 15 Cod. Theod. X, 1 incubaiio diuturna^ et 1. 1 ejd. IV, 18 rei incubarit alienae, et 1. 20 ejd. XVI, 10 /rucius ab incubaloribns exigantur. Eo autcm nomiuc Basiiiscum imj^erii inTasorem deaignari manifestum est. Tyranni hujus tcmpora Hormisda in mc- moriam revocans epist. 32 n. 2 recordamini, inquit, carissimi, quae fuerunt Ba~ siUtco paiaiinam archen incubante tentata. Jam audivimus Simplicium cpist. 3 n. 7 roganiem, ut Alexandrina ecclesia cruentissimi praedonis incubatione libcrarctur. Quam preoem nouc iterans , ut Zeno Eaiesiae depellat tyrannos obsccrat. Utro^ bique enim et praedonis et tyranni nominibus cumdcm Timothcum Aelurum in- dicat. De eodem Leo epist. 169 n. 1 : Cid (Alexandrinac ecclcsiae) praedo nefa- rius imciAabaL a. 477. Ecclesiae quoque depellat tyraunos. Sicut enim pietas yestra merito recteque confidit, illo iios tempore nihil aliud Deum nostrum sup- pliciter implorasse, quam ut uobis Romani imperii praesules*), quales nimc loquimur, redderentur; ita exspectari cemis, ut hujusmodi ros esse ipsorum actuum qualitate monstretis. Respicite, quaeso, ao^^ustae memoriae Marciani atque Leonis omni mundo conspicuam catholica devotione constantiam, et salubri consideratione perpendite: qaiim in eodem loco stare nequiverint, qui ab eorum rectitudine deviarunty successorem regiae potestatis legitimum ac divinitus attributum eom fore sine dubio, qui illorum fidei perstiterit imitator. Debes^ glorio- sissime et clementissime fili imperator, augustae memoriae tantonui virorum taliumqiie reverentiam, debes vices muneribus Dei. IUe te ad istorum reduxit imperium : tu Deo istis similem redde famulaimn. Et quia Iiaec, beato apostolo docente nos Petro mea nuper homili- tate praedicante, refutata sunt a^) casuris, D.eo fautore proficiant in regni soliditate mansuris. 3. Ego quidem litteris, quas vestra clementia destinavit, pignus immensum venerandae religiositatis accipiens, et ingenti gratulatione respiro, et omnino non ambigo mentem vestram in rebus divims gesturam longe potiora quam cupio; sed mei memor officii in hanc partem clementiam tuam ideo prolixiore hortor alloquio, quia im- perii tui pariter et salutis affectu illis te causis inhaerere semper exopto, quibus solis et praesentis regni stabilitas custoditur et aeterni gloria comparatur. 4. Unde ante omnia precor, ut Alexandrinam ecclesiiun non minus a funesto quam ab haeretico pervasore clementiae vestrae dispositionibus liberataiu catholico ac legitimo restitui censeatis an- tistiti ; eisque etiam, quos temeritate diabolica diversis ecclesiis ordi- nasse *®) perliibetur, ejectis, rectae fidei subrogari constituatis episco- pos: ut sicuf rem publicam vestram a tyrannica dominatione pur- <") Ex his plures sequens epistolu n. 3 nominatim iudicat. i EPI8T0LAE 6. 7. 189 gastisy ita ubiqae Ecclesiam Dei ab haereticonim latrociuiis atquea. 477. contagiis exuatis, nec id potius praevalere patiamiui^ quod^*) iniqui- tas temporum per eos, quos non solum in vestrum imperium sed et inDeum quoque rebellis spiritus concitayit, quam quod tot tantique pontifices et cum egregiis orthodoxisque pontificibus universalis Ec- clesiae decrevit assensus. Calchedonensis sjnodi constituta vel ea^ quae beatae memoriae praedecessor meus Leo apostolica eruditione^^) perdocnit^ intemerata vigere jubeatis: quia nec ullo modo retractari potest, quod illorum definitione sopitum est, nec ullatenus recipi . toties nno undique ore damnatus^'). Ipsa est quippe, sicut experti estis, catholica fideS; quae potenies J^ s^^e laesa^^) deposuity et exal-Luc.i,52. tandos humUes custodita servavit. Quare satis agendum est pietati tuae, ut qui hujus tibi ^uctor est doni, sit ipse^^) propagator. Data VII Iduum Octobrium post consulatum Basilisci^^) et Armati. .