of Milan. This is
a very significant fact. It shows the great dignity and power of the
episcopal office at that time: it transcended in influence and power the
governorship of a province. It also shows the enormous strides which the
Church had made as one of the mighty powers of the world since
Constantine, only about sixty years before, had opened to organized
Christianity the possibilities of influence. It shows how much more
already was thought of a bishop than of a governor.

And what is very remarkable, Ambrose had not even been baptized. He was
a layman. There is no evidence that he was a Christian except in name.
He had passed through no deep experience such as Augustine did, shortly
after this. It was a more remarkable appointment than when Henry II.
made his chancellor, Becket, archbishop of Canterbury. Why was Ambrose
elevated to that great ecclesiastical post? What had he done for the
Church? Did he feel the responsibility of his priestly office? Did he
realize that he was raised in his social position, even in the eye of an
emperor? Why did he not shrink from such an office, on the grounds of
unfitness?

The fact is, as proved by his subsequent administration, he was the
ablest man for that post to be found in Italy. He was really the most
fitting man. If ever a man was called to be a priest, he was called. He
had the confidence of both the emperor and the people. Such confidence
can be based only on transcendent character. He was not selected because
he was learned or eloquent, but because he had administrative ability;
and because he was just and virtuous.

A great outward change in his life marked his elevation, as in Becket
afterwards. As soon as he was baptized, he parted with his princely
fortune and scattered it among the poor, like Cyprian and Chrysostom.
This was in accordance with one of the great ideas of the early Church,
almost impossible to resist. Charity unbounded, allied with poverty, was
the great test of practical Christianity. It was afterwards lost sight
of by the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages, and never was recognized
by Protestantism at all, not even in theory. Thrift has been one of the
watchwords of Protestantism for three hundred years. One of the boasts
of Protestantism has been its superior material prosperity. Travellers
have harped on the worldly thrift of Protestant countries. The Puritans,
full of the Old Testament, like the Jews, rejoiced in an outward
prosperity as