428 Influence of the Church 



power of the Catholic Church stood in the way of complete revolution, 

 and the Church was already 1 a landowner. Roman traditions died hard, 

 and among them it is interesting to note the exertion of private interest 

 on behalf of individuals and causes in which an honourable patron felt 

 some concern. Thus we find Sidonius writing 2 on behalf of a friend 

 who wants to buy back an ancestral estate with which recent troubles 

 have compelled him to part. Great stress is laid on the point that the 

 man is not grasping at pecuniary profit but actuated by sentimental 

 considerations : in short, the transaction proposed is not a commercial 

 one. The person addressed is entreated to use his influence 3 in the 

 applicant's favour ; and we can only infer that he is asked to put 

 pressure on the present owner to part with the property, probably to 

 take for it less than the market price. Another letter* is to a bishop, 

 into whose district (territorium) the bearer, a deacon, fled for refuge 

 to escape a Gothic raid. There he scratched a bit of church-land and 

 sowed a little corn. He wants to get in his crop without deductions. 

 The bishop is asked to treat him with the consideration usually shewn 

 to the faithful 5 ; that is, not to require of him the season's rent 6 . If this 

 favour is granted him, the squatter reckons that he will do as well as 

 if he were farming in his own district, and will be duly grateful. Very 

 likely a fair request, but Sidonius does not leave it to the mere sense 

 of fairness in a brother bishop. To another bishop he writes a long 

 letter 7 of thanks for his thoughtful munificence. After the devastation 

 of a Gothic raid, further damage had been suffered by fires among the 

 crops. The ensuing distress affected many parts of Gaul, and to relieve 

 it this worthy sent far and wide bountiful gifts of corn. The happy 

 results of his action have earned the gratitude of numerous cities, and 

 Sidonius is the mouthpiece of his own Arverni. The affair illustrates 

 the beneficence of good ecclesiastics in troubled times. For Gaul was 

 not enjoying tranquil repose. The barbarians were restless, and the 

 relations 8 between their kings and the failing empire were not always 

 friendly. Religious differences too played a part in preventing the 

 coalescence of Gallo-Roman and Teuton. The good bishop just referred 

 to is praised by Sidonius as a successful converter of heretics. 



The fine country houses with their vineyards and oliveyards and 

 general atmosphere of comfort and plenty shew plainly that the in- 

 vasions and raids had not desolated all the countryside. The first need 

 of the invaders was food. Wanton destruction was not in their own 

 interest, and the requisitioning of food-stuffs was probably their chief 

 offence, naturally resented by those who had sown and reaped for their 



1 Instances in epist III i. vi 10. 2 epist in 5. 3 suffragio vestro. * epist vi 10. 



6 domesticis fidei, already, it seems, a stereotyped phrase. See Ducange. 



6 debitum glaebae canonem. 7 epist vi 12. 8 See Dill, book IV ch 3. 



