The Church Fathers · 379–397
The Letters
Ambrose of Milan · c. 339–397
What it is
Correspondence including the letters in which a bishop refuses an emperor communion until he does public penance for a massacre.
Why it lasted
The founding precedent for the Western claim that the church may judge the conduct of rulers.
Where to read it
This work is in the public domain and can be read in full, free, at the archives below. The Library catalogues it; it does not host the text.
These open a search on each archive rather than a direct link, which is the honest way to point at an edition nobody here has checked line by line.
Read next