the eyes
of the emperor and the public. When the fatal mandate was proclaimed,
Gregory solicited the aid of some friendly merchants to convey him in
a basket beyond the gates of Rome, and modestly concealed himself some
days among the woods and mountains, till his retreat was discovered, as
it is said, by a celestial light. [Footnote 63: Gregor. l. iii. epist.
24, edict. 12, &c. From the epistles of Gregory, and the viiith volume
of the Annals of Baronius, the pious reader may collect the particles
of holy iron which were inserted in keys or crosses of gold, and
distributed in Britain, Gaul, Spain, Africa, Constantinople, and Egypt.
The pontifical smith who handled the file must have understood the
miracles which it was in his own power to operate or withhold; a
circumstance which abates the superstition of Gregory at the expense of
his veracity.]

[Footnote 64: Besides the epistles of Gregory himself, which are
methodized by Dupin, (Bibliotheque Eccles. tom. v. p. 103--126,) we have
three lives of the pope; the two first written in the viiith and ixth
centuries, (de Triplici Vita St. Greg. Preface to the ivth volume of
the Benedictine edition,) by the deacons Paul (p. 1--18) and John, (p.
19--188,) and containing much original, though doubtful, evidence; the
third, a long and labored compilation by the Benedictine editors, (p.
199--305.) The annals of Baronius are a copious but partial history.
His papal prejudices are tempered by the good sense of Fleury, (Hist.
Eccles. tom. viii.,) and his chronology has been rectified by the
criticism of Pagi and Muratori.]

[Footnote 65: John the deacon has described them like an eye-witness,
(l. iv. c. 83, 84;) and his description is illustrated by Angelo Rocca,
a Roman antiquary, (St. Greg. Opera, tom. iv. p. 312--326;) who observes
that some mosaics of the popes of the viith century are still preserved
in the old churches of Rome, (p. 321--323) The same walls which
represented Gregory's family are now decorated with the martyrdom of St.
Andrew, the noble contest of Dominichino and Guido.]

[Footnote 66: Disciplinis vero liberalibus, hoc est grammatica,
rhetorica, dialectica ita apuero est institutus, ut quamvis eo tempore
florerent adhuc Romae studia literarum, tamen nulli in urbe ipsa
secundus putaretur. Paul. Diacon. in Vit. St. Gregor. c. 2.]

[Footnote 67: The Benedictines (Vit. Greg. l. i. p. 205--208) labor to
reduce the monasteries of Gregory within the rule of their