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History of the Franks

St Gregory of Tours, tr. Dalton, 1927

Book 6, 18. Of the Envoys of Chilperic, Back from Spain

Now Ansovald and Domegisel, the envoys of King Chilperic who had been sent into Spain to inspect the dowry, returned home. At this time¹ King Leuvigild was with the army against his son Hermangild, from whom he took the city of Merida. I have already set forth² how the prince had allied himself with the generals of the emperor Tiberius; this caused delays, so that the envoys returned late. When I saw them, I was eager to learn whether there was zeal for the faith among the few Catholics³ remaining in that land. Ansovald gave me the following answer: ‘Those now dwelling in Spain keep the Catholic faith unimpaired. But the king seeketh to expel it by a new device. He cunningly pretendeth to pray at the tombs of the martyrs and in our churches; he even saith: “I am well persuaded that Christ is the Son of God, and equal to the Father. But I utterly refuse belief that the Holy Spirit is God, because in no Scriptures is this written.”’ Alas! alas! what wickedness in this opinion, what poison in this belief! How it marks a mind depraved! And where, then, is that saying of the Lord: ‘God is a Spirit’,⁴ and these words of Peter to Ananias: ‘How hath it seemed good to thee to tempt the Holy Spirit? Thou hast lied, not to men, but to God’?⁵ Where also the words of Paul, commemorating the mystical gifts of the Lord: ‘But these worketh one and the self-same Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will’?⁶ For he that doeth according to his own will is plainly in subjection to none. When Ansovald was come to Chilperic, an embassy from Spain followed, which from Chilperic went on to Childebert, and then returned home.

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