, the employment of papal
apocrisiarius (or envoy) at the imperial court at Constantinople. Here
he became intimate with the chief ecclesiastics, with Anastasius, who
had been deposed from the patriarchal see of Antioch, and who came to
regard him as "the very mouth and lantern of the Lord," with Leander of
Seville, who had come to lay the needs of the Catholic cause in Spain
before the emperors,[4] and with the imperial family. [Sidenote:
Gregory as abbat.] About 586 he returned to Rome, and became abbat of
the monastery in which he had formerly served. It was there that he
completed his commentary, or _moralia_, on the book of Job, which he
had delivered as lectures at Constantinople, an epitome of Christian
theology and morals. It was then that he saw the bright lads from
Deira, who first turned his thoughts to the conversion of England.[5]
The controversy of the Three Chapters was still lingering on in Italy,
and it was Gregory who was given the task of inducing the Istrian {64}
bishops to accept the decisions of the Fifth General Council.
[Sidenote: Gregory elected Pope, 590.] So skilful did he prove himself
as a controversialist, as an administrator, and as an adviser of
Pelagius, that he was elected with enthusiasm to succeed that pope in
590.

[Sidenote: The pastoral rule.]

His ideal of the pastoral office is set forth in that golden book, the
_Liber regulae pastoralis_, in which he describes the life of a true
shepherd of the Christian people. A life of absolute purity and
devotion as therein sketched was that which made Gregory's pontificate
notable for its wisdom, its discretion, and its wise governance. The
pastoral office to him was one even more of the cure of souls than of
government, and that idea is shown in all his letters. He wrote to
kings, abbats, individual Christians, with the spirit of direct
encouragement and admonition, as a wise teacher dispensing instruction.
In the Lateran he lived, as he had lived on the Caelian hill, a life of
strict ascetic rule, wearing still his monastic dress, and living in
common with his clerks and monks. [Sidenote: Gregory's life.] John the
Deacon, who wrote his biography nearly two centuries after his death,
says that "the Roman Church in Gregory's time was like that Church as
it was under the rule of the apostles, or the Church of Alexandria when
S. Mark was its bishop." Charity was by him developed into a great
scheme of benevolence organised with the