Fruits Of Your Words

Letter 2,9 - to Paul, bishop of Naples. December 591.

"If we administer the priestly office undertaken by us fearlessly, we shall without doubt receive both the help of God and the love of our spiritual sons. On account of this, let your Fraternity be keen to reveal yourself in all affairs, in such a way that the opinion which the clergy of the city of Naples has of you, like that of the nobility and people, may be reinforced by an increase in your goodness.
And so you ought to restrict your occupation to an assiduous encouragement of the aforesaid people. Thus the divine farmer may collect in his granaries the fruit of your word, which you have harvested from them."

Cited from: The Letters of Gregory the Great, trans. John R.C. Martyn (Toronto: PIMS, 2004), I: 198.