72 STATESMEN AND SAGES command that was carried out with great cruelty, and by which more than seven thousand persons, the innocent as well as the guilty, were massacred in the most inhuman manner. The grief of Ambrose on hearing this was extreme ; and, in order to afford the emperor time to reflect, he withdrew from Milan, and ad- dressed him a very touching letter exhorting him to repentance, assuring him at the same time that he, as bishop, would not receive his offerings nor perform the services of religion in his presence till he had done so. The prelate soon after returned to his episcopal city ; and when the emperor appeared at the doors of the church to attend divine services, he forbade him to enter till he had done penance for his crime. Excuses and palliations were of no avail, and when the emperor urged that King David had sinned, he was told that as he had imitated David in his sin, he should also imitate him in his repentance ; and the doors of the church were closed against him. The emperor returned to his palace, where for eight months he did penance for his fault ; and he was not admitted to full communion till he had perfectly complied with the requirements of the bishop. While to the general reader there may appear an unwonted severity, and even a tyrannical vindictiveness in this firmness of the holy prelate, his companions and those who knew his character best find in it an evidence of his zeal for the cause of religion, and his desire for the true conversion of the sinner ; and the man of the world will find in him the champion of the poor and oppressed against the tyranny of power. It is a well-known fact of history that he did not cease, during all this time, to beseech heaven with prayers and tears for the em- peror, whom he sincerely loved. But his character in this, as in all else, has withstood the test of time, and shines with undiminished lustre down the vista of ages. St. Ambrose died about midnight before Holy Saturday, April 4, 397 ; and his body reposes in a vault under the high altar of the basilica of Milan the church that he had served so long and so well. His feast is kept in the Latin Church on December ;th, and he is justly regarded as one of the most illustrious doctors of the Church.
