Of the immense energy shown by St. Gregory in the exercise of his Principate, of the immense influence wielded by him both in the East and in the West, of the acknowledgment of his Principate by the answers which emperor and patriarch made to his demands and rebukes, we possess an imperishable record in the fourteen books of his letters which have been preserved to us. They are somewhat more than 850 in number. They range over every subject, and are addressed to every sort of person. If he rebukes the ambition of a patriarch, and complains of an emperor's unjust law, he cares also that the tenants on the vast estates of the Church which his officers superintend at a distance should not be in any way harshly treated. He writes to his _defensor_ in Sicily: "I am informed that if anyone has a charge against any clerks, you throw a slight upon the bishops by causing these clerks to appear in your own court. If this be so, we expressly order you to presume to do so no more, because beyond doubt it is very unseemly. If anyone charges a clerk, let him go to his bishop, for the bishop himself to hear the case, or depute judges. If it come to arbitration, let the so-deputed judges cause the parties to select a judge. If a clerk or a layman have anything against a bishop, you should act between them either by hearing the cause yourself, or by inducing the parties to choose judges. For if his own jurisdiction is not preserved to each bishop, what else results but that the order of the Church is thrown into confusion by us, the very persons who are charged with its maintenance. "We have also been informed that certain clerks, put into penance for faults they had committed by our most reverend brother the bishop John, have been dismissed by your authority without his knowledge. If this is true, know that you have committed an altogether improper act, worthy of great censure. Restore, therefore, at once those clerks to their own bishop, nor ever do this again, or you will incur from us severe punishment."[198]