SELECTIONS FROM THE EIGHT BOOKS OF MIRACLES ^ Attitude toward Secular Learning (Preface, Book in Honor of the Martyrs) The priest Jerome, next to the apostle Paul the best teacher of the church, tells us that he was brought before the judgment-seat of the eternal Judge and subjected to torture and severely punished because he was in the habit of reading Cicero's clevernesses and Vergil's lies, and that he said in the presence of the holy angels and the very Ruler of all that he would never thereafter read these, but would occupy himself in future only with such [writings] as would be judged worthy of God and suited to the edification of the church. Moreover the apostle Paul says: Let us follow after things which make for peace and things whereby we may edify one another." And elsewhere : " Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth ; but such as is good for edifying, that it may give grace to them that hear." Therefore we too ought to follow after, to write, and to speak the things that edify the church of God, and by holy instruction bring weak minds to a knowledge of the per- fect faith. And we ought not to relate lying tales nor to pursue the wisdom of philosophers that is hateful to God, lest by God's judgment we fall under sentence of eternal death. ^ . . . Observance of the Lord's Day {Ibid., ch. 15) In the territory of this city [Tours] at Lingeais, a woman who lived there moistened flour on the Lord's day and shaped a loaf, and drawing the coals aside she covered it over with hot ashes to
- The following brief selections serve to illustrate Gregory's personality and point
of view. ^ Gregory then goes on to show that the miracles of the saints replace for him the wonders and feats of antique mythology. 249
