STU D I ES
IN
CHEUl RC H H ISTOR Y.
STUDIES
IN
C UPtCRH I STOP Y.
TIIE RISE CF TIHE TEMiIPORAL POWER.-BENEFIT
OF GLE G Y.-EXCOIMIIVI UTICA TION.
BY
IIENRY C.. LEAAhi Costantin, di quanto mal fu mnatre
Non la tua conversion, ma quell] dote,
Che da te prese il primo ricco patre!
Infern7o2o, XIX
P H I L AD EL P E I A:
HI E N R Y C. L E A.
LO N DON:
SAMPSON LOW, SON, & MARSTON,
CROWN BUILDINGS, 188 FLEET ST,
1869.
Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by
HENRY C. LEA,
in the Office of the Clerk of the District Court of the United States in and for
the Eastern District of the State of Pennsylvania.
PREFACE.
HE first of the following essays has already appeared,
in a less extended form, in the North American Review.
It records the establishment of principles of which the
subsequent development is traced in the succeeding essays.
Throughout the whole I have sought rather to present
facts than to draw inferences, and I have endeavored
to confine myself to points which illustrate the temporal
aspect of ecclesiastical history, showing how the church
in meeting the successive crises of its career succeeded in
establishing the absolute theocratic despotism which diverted it so strangely from its spiritual ftunctions.
If in this I have appeared to dwell too exclusively on
the faults and wrong-doing of the church, it has arisen
from no lack of appreciation of the services rendered to
humlianity and to civilization by the organization which in
all ages has assumed for itself the monopoly of the
heritage of Christ. Yet if we ask what would have been
the condition of the world if that organization had not
succeeded in. bearing the ark of Christianity through the
wilderness of the first fifteen centuries, in summing 1p
the benefits which man has derived through the churchl
we mlay also not unreasonablly inquire how mnuchl greater
1.
Vi PR PEFACE.
would have been our advance in all that renders us worthy
of the precepts of the Gospel had that church always been
true to its momentous trust.
Lactantius, rejoicing over the conversion of Constantine,
indulges in glowing anticipations of the approaching regeneration of mankind, when the false gods shall all be
overthrown, and He alone be worshipped whose temples
are not of clay or of stone, but are men fashioned in the
image of their Creator:'1 If God alone were worshipped,
then should wars and dissensions be no mnore, for men
would know that they are all children of the same Divine
Father. Bound together in the sacred and inviolable
bonds of heavenly truth, they would no more plot in secret
against each other, when they should know the punishments prepared for the slayers of souls by ani omniscient
God, to whom all hidden evil and the innermost secrets of
their hearts are revealed. Fraud and rapine would be no
more, for men would have learned of God to be content
with what they have, and to seek for the lasting gifts of
heafven rather than for the perishable things of earth.
Adultery and prostitution would cease whien they were
taaugoht that God had forbidden disorderly appetites; nor
would woman be forced to sell her virtue for a wretched
snbsistence, when men should control their passions, and
charity should minister to all the wants of the poor. These
evils wouldl vanish from the earth if all were brought unto
the law of God, and all should do what now our people
)alone are found to do. How blessed would be that golden
aige among men if throughout the world were love and
klindness and peace and innocence and justice and temperalnce and faith There would then be no need of many
PREFACE. vii
and subtle laws, where innocence would need only the one
law of God. Neither prisons nor the sword of the judge
would be wanted, when the hearts of men, glowing with
the divine precepts, would of themselves seek the works
of justice. If they are evil now, it is through ignorance
of right and truth.T"1
Read after the lapse of fifteen centuries crowded with
crime and misery, these glowing day-dreams of a Christian
who looked for their speedy realization may excite the
sneer of the cynic or the smile of the unbeliever; but no
one who feels the sublime beauty and truth of the precepts
of Christ can fail to mark with sorrow the immeasurable
distance which has ever separated Christendom froln the
ideal of its aspirations. That our imperfect nature should
be able to attain this ideal is of course impossible, but that
we should still be so hopelessly afar from it may not unreasonably be attributed to that organization which assumed to be gifted with supernatural powers as the direct
representative of Christ, and in His name sought and
obtained complete authority over the souls and consciences
of men. Hlad it been true to the law which it professed to
administer; had it spurned the vulgar ambitions of power
and wealth, and had it taught by precept and example the
evangel of love, Christendom would not now, in the nineteenth century after the birth of the eledeemer, be groping
as blindly as ever over the yet insoluble problems of
existence.
PIILADEI.LP:HIA, November, 1869.' Firm. Lactant. Divin. Instit. Lib. v. cap. viii.
CONTENTS.
TIIE SERISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
TEE CHIURCH AND TIEE EAPIRnE.
Subordination of the church under the Christian emperors. 13
Gregory II. defies Leo the Isaurian.... 24
THE CHuRCH AND THE CARLOVINGIANS.
Allegiance of the church transferred from Constantinople to
the Franks 2 9
Alliance between Pepin-le-Bref and Rome.... 30
Charlemagne carries out his father's policy.. 33
But maintains at all points the supremacy of the secular power 3l4
Advantage to the church of reviving the Western Empire o 85
Louis-le-DWbonnaire maintains the subordination of thlle church 38
Lothair I. represses the attempted papal emancipation.. 40
Opportunities of the church in the failure of civil government 41
THE FALSE DECRETALS.
Riculfus of Mainz probably the originator of the False Decretals...o.43.
The Canons of Ingili'am.. 44
Charlemagne disregards the new doctrines. 46
They become established in the anarchy consequent on the
division of the empire 47
Speculations concerning the False Decretals...
Their influence on European institutions... 49
Their pretensions still maintained by the church. 53
CONTENTS.
THE CHURCHr AND TIE STATE.
PAGE
Subordination of the church under the Barbarians... 5
Secular supremacy enforced by Charlemagne and his descendants O D O.... o 5
Adverse theories of the forgeries... 61
Immunity of the clergy from secular accusation and trial 63
Spiritual jurisdiction —its origin and extension.. 68.
Asserted in the Forgeries and favored by the decline of the
royal power.... 76
Episcopal investiture —election in the primitive church 81
Nomination of bishops by the lIerovingians... 83
Ancl by the Carlovingians... 87
Disputed by the church after the middle of the eighth century 91
The popes endeavor to obtain the nominating power 92
The bishops also strive to secure it.... 93
The metropolitans likewise take advantage of the general confusion...96
Division of the spoils between the sovereigns and the papacy 97
Episcopal oaths of fidelity.... 99
Their binding force under Charlenagne..... 100
The bishops endeavor to escape them... 102
THE PAPACY AND THE CHIURCIE
Local autonomy of the prilitive churches.... 104
Causes of the gradually increasing power of Rome... 105
Yet local independence is-preserved in theory.. 109
A central head becomes necessary... 109
General counlcils prove insufficient for this... 110
Opportunities afforded to Rome by the quarrels of the East. 110
The rise of the Constantinopolitan church.... 111
Conflicts between Alexandria, Antioch, and Constantinople. 112
Triumph and downfall of Alexandria..... 113
Failure of Rome to reduce Constantinople to obedience.. 114
It is more successful in tile West.... 115
Vicissitudes of the struggle....117
Universal appellate jurisdciction claimed for Rome... 118
It has no foundation in the primitive church.. 119
But is temporarily granted by the council of Sardica.. 121
The Sardican canons destitute of authority,... 193
Rome attempts to attribute them to the council of Nica. 126
CONTENTS.
PA.GE
Appellate jurisdiction over Gaul obtained by Il oe I. 128
Valentinian III. confers universal jurisdiction on the Roman
churchll 129'3
But it is refused by the East.... 130
And by the Barbarian conquerors of the West. 1
IUse of the Pacdlzft introcluced to strengthen the papal authority 134
St. Boniface endeavors to make the pallirnm obligatory 0 136
Thle Frankish prelates resist its introduction.. 137
Special privileges accorded to render the pallium attractive 139
Application for it enjoined on all metropolitans. 141
Appellate jurisdiction claimed in the False Decretals. 141
Futile attempts to exercise it 1.43
It is vigorously enforced by Nicholas I. 145
Evils of the new system... 147
Efforts of the church to escape from it. 149
Finally established by Innocent III. 10.
Corruptions and injustice wrought by it 151e
PAPAL OMNIPOTENCE.
Applications of the power to bind and to loose 154
Supremacy of the papacy over secular rulers 1... i55,Thle donation of Constantine.. 156
Nicholas I. reduces to practice the principles of the False Dccretals 159
Papal omnipotence established by the case of Lothair and
Teutberga 159
BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
impnortance of the privilege of clerical immulnity 169
Clailll of its origin in the council of Nicmea... 170
Partial and temporary imm-Lunity granted by some of the Emperors 171
Disallow ed by others 171
Justinian allows restricted immunity in certain cases 1. 17
Successful efforts of the popes to obtain it. 174
x11 CONTENTS.
PAGE
It is refused by the Burgundians and Wisigoths,.. 174
Adlnitted by the Christian Britons... 175
And by the Franks.... 176
But is practically disregarded.. 177
Restored in principle by the early Carloyingians... 178
But not admitted in practice.. 179
Charlemagne and Louis maintain the supremacy of secular law 180
Charles-le-Chauve forced to admit clerical immunity. 182
Persistence of the church in asserting its claim to immunity. 183
Finally acceded to throughout Europe... 184
Legislation of England.... 187
Benefit of clergy not abolished until the nineteenth century. 190
Legislation of Germany-triumph of the church. 191
Naples and Sicily —restrictions imposed on immunity 192
Lombardy —tardy recognition of the privilege.. 193
Spain-the privilege finally established..... 194'rance-prolonged struggle to obtain clerical immunity. 196
Abuses of the system-ineffectual efforts at reform.. 198
Compromise between the church and the state.. 200
Cases illustrative of the protection afforded to criminals.. 200
Protests of the church against encroachments of the state. 205
The church maintains its groulnd until the Reformation. 207
Corruption in the church caused by immunity. 208
Attacks of the reformers.. 209
The church attempts internal reform.. 211
[Remonstrances of the orthodox at the council of Trent. 212
Efforts of the council to evade the demand for reform. 213
Conservative policy finally adopted.... 214
Resolute determination to maintain abuses.. 216
Corruption consequently flourishes unchecked.. 217
Indlependclent spirit aroused in the laity-restrictions laid on
clerical immnunity... 218
The church maintains its pretensions to the present time, 219
CONTENTS. xiii
EXCOMMUNICATION.
Power arising from the control of the sacraments... 223
PRI3MITIVE DISCIPLINE.
PAGE
The doctrines of the Gospels..224
Temporary character of the apostolic regulations... 226
Nature of the Eucharist in the primitive church —the agapme. 227
Substantial character of the Eucharistic repast.. 229
It becomes the symbolic bond of union.2.. 31
Its deprivation entails expulsion from the church and segregation 2;e2
Necessity of coercive legislation within the church... 233
Growth and application of spiritual penalties.... 235
The church interposes between man and God. 6. 23
Expulsion from the church entails perdition. 236
Temporal penalties-segregation.... 237
Repentant excommiunicates-penitence....240
Simplicity of penance in the early church. 241
Gradual increase of severity...242
The church assumes the functions of a lawgiver. 243
Prolongation of penitence-disabilities connected with it. 244
Refusal of death-bed commun ion-lvarying policy of the church 246
The church assumes complete control over salvation. 248
Commencement of belief in purgatory... 250
Variation of practice as to death-bed reconciliation. 251
Its insufficiency in cases of recovery..... 252
Excommunication of the dead-varying practice of the church 253
Limitations on use of excolmmunication....255
Formal trial required.2.. 56
Lex talionis applied to unsuccessful prosecutor... 258
Disregard of these rules-abuses... 259
Excommunication clegraded by its frequency... 261
Interference of the state to prevent abuses.... 262
Police of the church-litterse commendatitide 2.. 262
Enforcement of respect for excommunication... 264
Policy of the church towards heretics-persecution.. 265
The organization of the church gradually becomes despotic. 267
Minute supervision of the hierarchy.. 268
2
xiv CONTENTS.
PAGE
Control acquired over potentates-Synesius, Chrysostom. 269
St. Ambrose-excomLmunication of Theodosius.. 272
His example not imitatedl-subordination of the church.. 275
Courtly toleration of imperial sins...276
THIE PAPACY.
Transmutation of spiritual into temporal power... 278
Rendered effective by concentration in the papacy.. 279
Sources of papal authority-original and appellate jurisdictions 279
No supremne jurisdiction in the early church. 280
Gradual assumption of supremacy by Rome. 282'
Ineffectual rivalry of Alexandria... 282
Struggle between Rome and Constantinople... 283
Papal use of excommunication in the East —humiliation of
Constantinople. 283
Papal use of excommunication in the West-Maximus of Salona 288
TIIE CHURCH AND THE BARBARIANS.
Dissociation of the clergy fiom the laity..,. 90
Necessity of supernatural protection for the clergy... 291
Increased use of excommunication consequent thereon.. 293
Miraculous interpositions for the protection of the church. 294
Reverence inculcated for relies and for the Eucharist.. 298
Fearful punishment for disregard of excommunication.. 299
Use of excommunication to control the Merovininans.. 300
Difficulty of enforcing obedience-introduction of the Interdict 301
Commencement of interpellation of secular power... 303
Secularization of the church under the later ilerovingians. 304
CARLOVINGIAN RECON STRUCTION.
Use made of the church as a civilizing agent.. 306
The state undertakes to enforce the censures of the church. 307
Especially with respect to its control over marriages. 308
And to protect it fromn spoliation.. 314
Yet Charlemagne restrains the abuses of excommunication. 315
CHURCH AND STATE.
Louis-le-Debonnaire allows the church to control him.. 316
Confusion of secular and spiritual jurisdiction.. 317
CONTENTS. XV
PAGE
Lothair I. pledges the power of the state to enforce excommunication..318
Increased authority of the church-dclegradation of Louis-le-D6bonnaire. 319
The church claims the right to call upon the secular power. 321
Spiritual censures disregarded in the increasing anarchy.. 323
The state seeks support from the church... 325
And relies on excommunication for enforcement of the law. 327
Yet still controls the jurisdiction of the church... 329
Prerogatives enuring to the church from its alliance with the
state....... 330
THE CHURCH AND FEUDALISM.
Struggle of the church for self-preservation.. 333
Ferocity of anathema arising from desperation. 333
Interposition of Providence to vindicate the anathema. 338
Case of Robert the Pious of France. 339
Opportunities of the church in the reorganization of society. 344
Use made of conflicting interests to break down each in turn
and establish the theories of the Forgeries-Case of
Henry IV... 345
Cases of Hugh of Gapenqais and Philip I. of France 8. 364
Triumph of the church over the empire.. 38
Power acquired to intervene in the affairs of states.. 372
And to nominate to clerical preferment.. 374
Illimitable authority thus conferred on the church.. 375
Concentrated in the person of the pope. 376
Who is regarded as a God on earth.. 377
TEMiPORAL PENALTIES.
Disabilities and punishments inflicted on excommunicates. 379
Segregation-lpenalties for intercourse with excomimulicates. 380
Secular legislation punishing excomlmunicates-in England. 38-14
in France..386
in Spain......... 392
in Germany.. 395
in Italy.. 398
in Poland......400
in Sweden. 401
xvi CONTENTS.
ABUSE OF ExcOM3IUNICATION.
PAGE
Power of oppression conferred by excommunication. 401
Insufficiency of monitions to -be guarded in its use... 402
It is valid however wrongfully abused..403
Its prostitution for private ends.. 404
Secularization of its penalties....40
Refusal of sepulture....40
Subjection of nature to the anathemna. 408
It becomes simply a ban or curse.... 410
Excommunication of animals..410
Its use in supplementing the secular law. 415
Employed for recovery of stolen property.. 417
And for the collection of debts..417
Aggravation of abuses caused by papal supremacy.. 426
And by ipso facto excommunications. 430
EMANCIPATION.
Impossibility of internal reform in the church... 431
Gradual tendency to resistance by the laity. 432
Complaints of the abuses of excommunication... 433
Reactionary spirit of the council of Trent. 436
Conservative character of its reforms.... 437
Rapid growth of insubordination towards the church. 440
Final emancipation of the state... 442
Benefits to the church from the abolition of its temporal power 445
Reactionary efforts of its leaders. 446
THE REFORAIED CHURnCIES.
Inevitable insubordination of heretics.. 44S
WVickliffe's views on excommllllunication..448
Followed by Huss......... 449
Lutheran doctrine and practice..449
Calvinist practice in France..461
in Scotland-abuse of power by the church. 465
The Anglican Church-abuse of power by the state.,. 475
THE RISE
OF THE
TEMPORAL POWAER.
THE CHURCH AND THE EMPIRE.
HTIEN Constantine embraced Christianity, nothing was
further from his intention than to abandcon to thle
Church any portion of his imperial prerogative. He could
not, it is true, be the Pontifex Maximus of his new religion,
but it mattered little whether he personally performed the
sacred rites so long as he retained supreme control over
those who were privileged to do so. By the organic law of
the Empire, the people, from the highest to. the lowest,
were all equally at the mercy of the monarch, whose powers
were only limited by his own sense of prudence and justice,
and against whom the only remedy was assassination or
revolution.'
The church formed no exception to this universal subordination, and fully acquiesced in its condition. Its faith
and discipline, its internal policy and its external privileges, were all subjected to the supremacy of the imperial
power. Even when it gathered together in its most
august and authoritative assemblies, the presumed inspiEven in the sixth century, Justinian asserts autocracy to be the fundamental constitution of the empire.'; Sed et quod principi placuit, legis
habet vigorem, cum, lege regia, qus de ejus imperio lata est, populus ei et
in eum ounnem imperium suum et potestatem concedat."-Institt. I. I. 6.
2
14 TTHE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
ration of the I-Holy Ghost afforded it no exemption fromr
this domination. The confirmation of the sovereign was
requisite to confer validity on the canons of General
Councils, nor was that consent by any means given as a
matter of course. Thus we find Constantius vetoing a
portion of the canons of the synod of Rimini in 360,1
and the acknowledlgment of this subordination was expressed at the council of Tyre, during the heat of the
Arian controversy, in 335, when the Catholic bishops appealed to Count Dionysius, the imperial commissioner,
asking -hin to reserve the questions discussed for the
decision of Constantine, whose prerogative it was to legislate for the church and its members.2 How complete was
the control thus centred in the person of the emperor is
manifest in the rescript of Theodosius II. and Valentinian
III. respecting the disgraceful scenes which marked the
opening of the council of Ephesus in 431, under the lead
of St. Cyril. The tumultuous conduct of the holy fathers
is rebuked, and the intention is expressed of sending an
officer of the palace to review the proceedings, and to set
aside what may prove to be improper, while none of the
bishops are to leave Ephesus, either for the purpose of
returning home or of visiting the court, under pain of the imperial displeasure.3 In fact, the business of general councils
was regulated by imperial commissioners, who were ]aymen,
and when the council of Chalceclon, in 451, had sat from
the 8th to the 30th of October, we find these officials informing the assembled prelates that the work in hand must
be hurried to completion, as grave affairs of state required
their presence elsewhere, and they could not devote more
time to the church.4 Of course, under these conditions, all
general synods were convened by the authority and in the
Lib. XVI. Cod. Theod. Tit. iI., 1. 15.
2 Concil. Tyrium ann. 335 (Harduin. Concil. I. 543).
Conciliab. Ephesin. cap. v. (Hlarduin. I. 1538-9).
4 Concil. Chalced. Act. xii. (Ibid. II. 559.)
TIHE CHURCH AND THE EMPIRE. 15
name of the sovereign;l and the pretensions of the Rlomnan
see to supreme authority in convoking and presiding over
these bodies were too late in their origin and too fraudulent in their proof to merit extended examination. The
lost canon of Niciea —" non debere printer sententiam
Romani Episcopi concilia celebrari" -- might be alleged
on the authority of endless texts drawn from the False
Decretals, but no more substantial proof could be adduced
in its support;2 and if the representative of Leo I., Paschasinus, Bishop of Lilyboeum, had the honor of presiding
nominally over the. council of Chalcedon, it was not in
virtue of any recognized prerogative, but because the
pope had artfully requested it of the Emperor Marcian on
the ground that, as Paschasinus had not been personally
involved in the quarrels connected with the Eutychian
heresy, his appointment would be unexceptionable.3 How
little this presidency amounted to was shown when Eusebius of Dorylieum appealed in the council from the condemnnation inflicted on him by the Robber Synod of
Ephesus, and addressed his prayer, not to the council, but
to the emperor, whose special attribute he asserted to be
the protection of ecclesiastics from injustice,4
That the sovereign should intervene authoritatively in
ecclesiastical disputes was therefore a matter of course.
When, for instance, the apostolic see of Antioch was
claimed by two rival bishops, St. Meletius and Paulinus,
and a synod was held in 377 to decide between their
pretensions, it was Sapor, the imperial representative, to
1 For the proof of this, with respect to the first four general councilsNicsea, Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon-see lardouin, T. I. pp.
345, 807, 1354; T. II. p. 54.
s Pseudo-Juilii Epist. 2; Pseudo-Marcelli Epist. 1; Pseudo-Damasi Epist.
4, cap. 2.-Pseudo-Pelagii II. Epist.; Capitular. Lib. vI. cap. 381.-The
argument in favor of the prerogative may be found briefly stated in Cabassut's
Synopsis Concil. sub. Concil. Chalced.
Leon. PP. I. Epist. 89 (Ed. Ballerin).
Concil. Chalced. Act. I. (THarduin. II. 70.)
16 THE RISE OF THlE TEMPORAL P0OWER.
whom both parties appealed, and who approvedc andc enforced the extraordinary proposition of Meletius which
gave two concurrent patriarchs to the church of the East.'
So, when, a few years earlier, the contested election of
Damasus and Ursinus filled the streets of iRome with carnage, the disgraceful strife was only put an end to by the
Prefect laximin, who pronounced in favor of Damasus and
inflicted severe punishment on both the lay and clerical
adherents of his rival.2 About fifty years later, when a
similar disgraceful quarrel arose between Eulalius and
Boniface I., the decision was referred as a matter of course
to the miserable shadow of an emperor-Honorius —who
appointed a vicar to act as temporary bishop of Rome
during his examination of the matter, and, after settling
it in favor of Boniface, issued an edict to prevent the recurrence of scenes so unchristian, by providing that if two
candidates should be consecrat.ed, both should be driven
from the city.3
The most unequivocal evidence of the imperial autocracy,
however, is to be found in the legislation of the period.
The laws of the Christian emperors, from Constantine to
Leo the Philosopher, manifest the absolute subordination
of the spiritual to the temporal authority. The minutike
of church government, the relations of the clergy among
themselves and to the state, their duties, their morals, and
their actions, monastic regulations, the suppression of
heresies-all the details, in fact, of ecclesiastical life, internal and external, are prescribed with the assurance of
unquestioned power, and with a care which shows how
large a portion of the imperial attention was devoted to
the managoement of the church.
Under this despotic authority, the loftiest prelates were
but subjects, whose first duty was obedience, and a long
succession of feeble and worthless C sars was requisite beTheodoreti Hist. Eccles. Lib. v. cap. 3.
Socrat. Iist. Eccles. Lib. Iv. cap. 29.
Goldast. Const. Imp. T. IIM. pp. 587-92. —Harduin. I. 1238.
THE CHURCH AND THE EMPIRE. 17
fore the able and vigorous men who occupied the bishopric
of Rome could begin to emancipate themselves from the
traditions of imperial authority. The persecution of Liberius by Constantius, for his bold adherence to the Athanasian creed under Arian preponderance, may perhaps be
regarded as exceptional, since it was the work of an A rian;
but no such exception can be taken to the council of Rome
in 378, when, under the lead of St. Ambrose, it petitioned
the Emperor Gratian, as a favor, that the BRoman bishop,
when accused, might always be tried by the imperial council, and urged, as a precedent of binding force, the trial
and acquittal of Sylvester I. by Constantine.1
With the fall of the Western Empire, the church madesome feeble efforts to assert its independence. Thus
Odoacer, king of the Heruli, enacted a law forbidding the
alienation of church property. Great as was this favor,
the fact that it was the act of a layman rankled in the
ecclesiastical mind, and, after the fall of the Barbarian
king, the Roman synod of 502 pronounced it null and void
on the ground that no layman had a right to interfere with
the affairs of the church.2 The absurdity of this protest
was manifest, for four years earlier, when Symmachus and
Laurence contested each other's claims to the pontifical
throne, Theodoric the Ostrogoth had intervened with all the
authority of old, though, as an Arian, he was little better
than a pagan in the eyes of the orthodox. He elevated
Symmachus to the papacy, and gratified with a bishopric
the defeated aspirant; and then, assembling a council, he
caused the adoption of a canon designed to restrain the
crinminal ambition which brought so much dishonor on the
Christian name,2 When, moreover, a synod was convened
1 Epist. Concil. Roman. ad Impp. (Harduin. I. 842.)
2 Synod. Roman. IV. ann. 502, c. 3.
3 Synod. Roman. I. ann. 498.-Cf. Athalar. Const. 10. (Goldast. TII. 95,
613.)
o,
18 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
in 501 to consider certain accusations against Symmachus,
it was done in the name and by the authority of Theodoric,
and when the assembled bishops demurred to sitting in
judgment on their superior, Theodoric reassured them by
stating that Symmachus had requested him to convoke
them for that purpose, thus showing that the pope recognized the power as belonging to the kIing and not to himself. Yet the appointment by Theodoric of an ecclesiastic
as "visitor," with authority to reform the disorders of the
Roman church, was objected to by the synod as subversive
of discipline; and the indignation which could not be gratified on the king was freely poured forth on the unfortunate
visitor, who, in the exercise of his office, had doubtless
earned the ill-will of influential prelates.'
The futility of these pretensions was shown when Theodoric sent Pope John I. on an embassy to the Emperor
Justin, and, being dissatisfied with his performance of its
duties, on his return threw him in prison, where, by opportunely dying, he won the honors of martyrdom.2 The next
Ostrogothic monarch, Athalaric, was no less absolute in his
control of ecclesiastical affairs. Among his constitutions
is one, addressed to John II., respecting the simony prevalent in episcopal and papal elections, in which, under a
thin veil of courtesy, he regulates these tender points of
discipline in a manner sufficiently imperious to show that
the pope was his subject as completely as any other dignitary, and that his jurisdiction over the church was as
unquestioned as over the state.3
Whethler the royal power was wielded by the heretic or
the orthodox made little difference. The kingdom of Italy,
which, under the genius of Theodoric, had for a brief space
Synod. Roman. III. ann. 50l.
Anastas. Biblioth. No. 55. —Cf. Martyrol. Roman. Maii 27.-The assert
tion that John perished under the persecuting zeal of the Arians comes with
an ill grace from those who for thirty years had enjoyed the toleration of
Theodoric-a toleration of which Arians alone were capable.
Calssiodor. TVartr. lib. ix. cap. 15,
THE CHUI-RCH AND THE EMPIRE. 19
rivalled the civilization of former ages, soon became the
battle-field on which Goth and Greek and Lombard by turns
exercised a precarious dominion. When the victorious
lieutenants of Justinian overthrew the Gothic dynasty, the
popes were transferred anew to the sovereignty of the emperors, and the unlucky occupant of the pontifical throne
during the revolution was the sport of both parties. Silverius, who had bribed the Arian Theodatus to force him on
the unwilling iRomans, redeemed his character by refusing
to obey the commands of the orthodox Justinian with regard to the Patriarch Anthemius of Constantinople. His
apocrisarius, or agent, at the imperial court, Vigilius, conspired with the Empress Theodora for his removal. A
charge of treason was readily fabricated, under color of
which Silverius was deposed and exiled by Belisarius; and,
notwithstanding the irregularity of his installation, was
duly canonized as a martyr.l
Theodora fulfilled her bargain with Vigilius, who was
duly installed in the pontifical chair by Belisarius, but he
was no more fortunate than his predecessor. The throne
which he had gained by apostasy, simony, and false witness, he was obliged to secure by murder; and though he
endeavored to elude the payment in gold and heresy
which he had pledged, he was not allowed to escape by
his imperial masters. In 544 the fulfilment of his written
promise was exacted of him, and on his refusal, he was
summoned to Constantinople, where he was subjected by
Justinian to the depth of humiliation. Whether it was for
his contumacy with regard to the Three Chapters, or for
the crimes alleged against him by the Romans, is of little
moment; and if his persecution was due to the vindictiveness of the empress, the degradation was the more bitter,
as inflicted by a courtesan on the successor of St. Peter.2
Anastas. Biblioth. No. 60.
s EjUsd. No. 61.-Victor. Tunenens. Chron. ann. 542-44. —Liberat. Breviar. cap. 22.
20 TIE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
Perhaps the most important feature of his career is the
contradiction which it affords to the pretension that the
concurrence of a pope, either in person or by legate, has
always been requisite to the validity of an (Ecumenic council. The Fifthl General Synod was held in Constantinople
in 553, to condemn Theodore of Mopsuestia and the Three
Chapters. Vigilius was then in the imperial city, and had
assented to the assembling of the council, but, after many
tergiversations, he declined to be present, and refused to
join in the condemnation of Theodore. The council, after
spending a day or two in urging his presence, proceeded to
business without him. The holy fathers not only anathematized Theodore, but also all those who should refuse to
join in the anathema; his defenders were stigmatized as
Jews, and his followers as pagans.1 They registered a
decree of Justinian ordering the removal from the diptychs
of the name of Vigilius, thus excommunicating him,2 and
the canons were issued in the name of Eutychius, Patriarch
of Constantinople. This was so thoroughly at variance
with the claims of spiritual leadership which Rome was
now beginning to assert, that the West hesitated at first
to receive the proceedings of the council as the unquestioned inspiration of the Holy Ghost, but it yielded ere
long, and placed the assembly in the same rank with those
of Nica — and Chalcedon.3
Evren the vigor of Gregory the Great did not venture to
question the supremacy of the temporal power. When the
Emperor M{aurice in 593 issued an edict reviving the old
laws which prohibited the reception of soldiers in monasteries, Gregory felt acutely the blow thus dealt at the inviolability of the monastic vow, but the timid remonstrance
which lhe uttered showed how implicit was the obedience
Concil. Constantinop. II. Collat. III. (Harduin. III. 91.)'o Ejusd. Collat. vII. (Ibid. p. 187.)
Quintum quoque concilium pariter veneror.... Quisquis aliter sapit
anathema sit.-Gregor. PP. I. Lib. I. Epist. 25.
TIIE CHIURCH AND THE EMPIRE. 21
to which he was bound. "Wrhat am I," he exclaimed, butt
a worm and dust, thus to speak to my masters?... I have
done what was my duty in every particular; I have obeyed
the emperor, and have not hushed in silence what I felt to
be due to God I'll
The subordination of the papacy to the Eastern Empire
during this period is further shown by the necessity imposed on the popes of keeping a resident agent, or apocri
sarius, at Constantinople, thus placing them on the same
footing as the patriarchs of the East, whose subjection has
never been questioned. By a law of Justinian, bishops
were required to keep these apocrisarii at the residence of
their metropolitan, and metropolitans with their patriarchls.
Agapet, who ascended the pontifical throne in 535, seems
to have been the first pontiff subjected to this regulation,
which could hardly but be regarded as an humiliation.3
The emperors, moreover, reserved to themselves the right
of confirming the election of the popes, and thus, in most
instances, had practically the power of appointment. In
fact, the election itself, under such circumstances, was
probably as idle a form as that of the Merovingian bishops;
and the number of apocrisarii who attained the papal throne
-Pelagius I., Gregory the Great, Sabinian, Boniface III.,
Mlartin I., &c. —shows how well were understood the opportunities which that position conferred of obtaining the
imperial favor.
When Justinian concluded to provide a successor for
Vigilius without awaiting his death, the application of the
RIomans for Pelagius I. indicates that his appointment was
virtually in the hands of the emperor;4 especially as an
expression of Victor Tunenensis warrants the belief that
the prospect of obtaining this splendid prize converted Pelagius from a stern supporter of the Three Chapters into
Gregor. PP. I. Lib. II. Epist. 65. 2 Novell. 123, cap 25.
3 Thomassin, Ane. Discip. de 1'Eglise, P. II. Lib. 1, chap. 51.
4 Anastas. Biblioth. No. 61.
22 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
a, courtly impugller of their orthodoxy.' The same power
is confessed when Gregory the Great desired to avoid the
bui'den of the papacy, and, to accomplish his object, secretly
entreated the Emperor Maurice to refuse his confirmation
of the election.2
During this disastrous reunion of Italy with the Empire
the interminable Monothelite controversy followed close
upon the Monophysite heresy, and lent its powerful aid in
embittering the relations between Rome and Constantinople. Among the ecclesiastical privileges of the Cesars had
always been assumed the right of dictating to the church its
form of belief; andcl, whether the reigning conscience were
orthodox or Arian, Eutychian or Monothelite, efficacious
means were always found of enforcing conformity on the
part of the hierarchy. The Western Emperors, for the most
part, had troubled themselves but little with the subtleties
of theological speculation, and the Arian Goths had tolerantly respected the established worship of iRome, so
that the popes, as the primates of Latin Christianity, had
gradually come to consider themselves as the guardians of
orthodoxy. When Italy, therefore, found herself under
the despotic rule of the successors of Justinian, the pretensions of the Holy See, as the arbiter of Christian doctrine,
led to long and intricate quarrels. It would be unnecessary
here to enter into these dreary details; suffice it to say
that the arbitrary rule of the sovereign, when it could not
enforce an unworthy submission, had no hesitation in
inflicting exemplary chastisenment, as Martin I. experienced when in 655 he ended his days in exile for anathematizino the Type by which Constans II. endeavored to end
the Monothelite controversy-R-and this in spite of the
miracle which had protected the Holy Father from the first
unhallowed attempt upon his person.3 Yet at the same
t Victor. Tunenens. Chron. ann. 558.
Greg. Turon. Hist. Franc. Lib. x. cap. 1.
3 Anastas. Biblioth. No. 76.
THE CHIURCHI AND TIHE EMPIRE. 23
time the immense extension of ecclesiastical prerogative
accruing to the papacy from the ceaseless wranglings of
the East is shown by the act of the same Martin I., when
in 649 he appointed John Bishop of Philadelphia apostolic
vicar over the dioceses of Antioch and Jerusalem, with
power to consecrate bishops and ordain priests throughout
those extensive regions, at that time devastated by the
conquests of the Saracens.1
If the next Emperor, Constantine Pogonatus, reimitted
to the popes the payment previously exacted of them on
their installation by the emperors, he was careful to retain
the right of confirming their electiol.2 The diminishing
power of Constantinople, however, was manifest in the
failure of Justinian IT., when he endeavored to follow the
example of his grandfather and to punish Pope Sergius for
his contumacy with regard to the acts of the Quinisext in
Trullo; and Sergius enjoyed the rare and holy triumph of
rescuing his intended captor, Zacharius the Protospatharius,
from the enraged Italian soldiery.3
As the power of Greece declined in the West, the influence of the Apostolic See was making steady progress.
The Greeks were foreign masters, exercising an odious despotism, and unable to defend Italy from the constantly
widening ravages of the Lombards. Between the Greek
and the Barbarian, almost equally hateful, stood the
popes, the sole representatives of nationality, the sole defenders against tyranny. As the one permanent institution amid incessant change, the papacy was the only centre
around which a national spirit could rally; and the
increase of its temporal as well as spiritual authority
might well appear to be the only feasible remedy for the
pervading and increasing anarchy. This conviction was
1 Martin, PP. I. Epist. 5. Anastas. Biblioth.:No. 81,
3 Ejusd. No. 86.
24 TIHE RISE OF T'IIE TEMPORAL POWER.
doubtless strengthened by the rule of celibacy which
rendered it impossible for any occupant of the Holy See
to found a dynasty; and the quasi-elective nature of the
office which made the popes in some sort representatives of
the popular feelings, strengthened them in their struggles
for common interests, and diminished the jealousy with
which a new line of hereditary rulers might have been
regarded.
Thus the time at length came for a formal declaration of
independence, and under such leadership independence
meant ecclesiastical supremacy. The occasion was well
chosen, and the leader was not wanting. When Leo the
Isaurian, in his iconoclastic zeal, decreed that image-worship should cease throughout the empire, the obedience
which after some trouble he enforced in the East was refused him in the West. Less accustomed than the Greeks
to mould their religious beliefs on those of the Coesar, the
Italians clung to their venerated symbols and effigies, and
Gregory II. as their chief boldly confronted the sacrilegious
emperor. Times had changed, he boasted, since Martin I.
tamely surrendered himself to the heretical Constans. All
the West now looked upon St. Peter as an earthly deity,
and was united in abhorrence of the wicked sacrilege perpetrated throughout the East. If attempts were made
upon his person, at four and twenty stadia from Rome he
would find himself in safety, where the emperor might as
well pursue the wind.l The open defiance of this address
was not calculated to render agreeable the refusal of obedience, and Leo threatened to break down his rebellious spirit
by force, to which Gregory responded with fiery audacity,
for the crime of the Isaurian could be fitly mnet only with
the most awful anathema in the ecclesiastical armory-' Tyrannically you persecute us with the sword and arm
of flesh.:Naked and unarmed, guarded by no earthly
Gregor. PP. II. Epist. 12.
THE CI-URCH AND TIIE EMPIRE. 25
armies, we invoke the Lord of hosts, Christ on high, leader
of the heavenly virtues, to send unto you a devil, even as
saith the Apostle, To deliver such an one unto Satan for
the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved."'
After this there was little prospect of accommodation, and
at length the fleets and armies of the insulted monarch
sought to reduce the incipient rebellion. Though Gregory
had proudly asserted that his sole reliance was in God, he
did not, when the persecution came, neglect the fleshly arm.
Charles Martel was too busy in consolidating his power
and making head against the Saracenic invasions to heed
the appeal for assistance; but the Lombards declared for
Rome, and when they in turn stood aloof a tempest shattered the forces of Leo, and the orthodox Latins were
enabled to enjoy the peaceful satisfaction of excommunicating the heretical Isaurian and his obsequious hierarchy.
It is true that their orthodoxy cost them the separation of
Southern Italy and Sicily, which were not fully recovered
from the Greeks until the foundation of the Norman kingdom of Naples, some three centuries and a half later.
The breach was evidently complete, and when a restoration of images rendered a reconciliation possible, the popes
no longer looked to the East for their sovereigns. By a
happy stroke of audacious policy, Gregory had thus availed
himself of a strong popular feeling to present himself as
the leader of Italy against the domination of Constantinople. In searching for allies, his keen eye had discerned
the rise of a new power in Gaul and Germany, and the
cherished scheme of Rome thenceforth was to link the fortunes of St. Peter with those of the family of Pepin.2
1 Gregor. PP. II. Epist. 13.
2 It is not a little singular that those to whom Gregory appealed
for protection against the Eastern Iconoclasts, and by whose ilfluence the'Latin church was supported during the quarrel, wcre fitlly
3
26 TIIE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWERe.
as heretical in principle as Leo the Isaurian and Constantine Copronymnus, though not animated with the persecuting zeal which led
the latter to enforce their tenets with such unrelenting ferocity. As
early as the year 305 the council of Elvira in Spain had forbidden
that churches should be ornamented with paintings, or that objects
of adoration should be depicted on the walls.' At the beginning of
the seventh century, Serenus, Bishop of Marseilles, destroyed the
images in the churches to prevent their adoration, whereupon many
of his flock withdrew from his communion. Gregory the Great, in
602, addressed him, approving of his motives but strongly condemning his acts, on the ground that pictures and images were placed in
churches not for adoration but simply to instruct the ignorant in
ecclesiastical history, as a convenient substitute for writing, and
that, therefore, they should not be removed.2 The Synod of Gentilly, held by Pepin le Bref in 767, while allowing pictures and
statues to remain as harmless ornaments in churches, declared that
they should not be objects of any particular respect or veneration.3
Nor was this merely a temporary assertion of independence, for
three hundred bishops in the council of Frankfort, held by Charlemagne in 794, rejected with contemptuous unanimity the canons of
the second general council of Nicmea;4 and Charlemagne himself
lent his all-powerful name to an elaborate refutation of the Roman
teachings on the subject, in the Caroline Books, where he stigmatized the doctrines of the Nicene council as crazy, and his only concession was that lie would not permit the wanton destruction of
images.5 As this council of Nicema had been held for the purpose
of reconciling the Eastern churches with Rome, as it was received
as cecumenic and its acts had been formally approved by Pope
Adrian, this was rank heresy. With all his aggressive energy,
however, Adrian had sufficient discretion to gloss over this spiritual
rebellion on the part of his benefactor, to whom he owed so much,
and to whom lie hoped to owe more, and lie, therefore, contented
himself with a doctrinal refutation of his patron's errors.6 So determinecl was the resistance of the Western churches that when the
reformatory zeal of Claudius, Bishop of Turin, led him to abolish
1 Concil. Eliberitan. ann. 305, can. 36.
o Gregor. PP. I. Regist. Lib. xi. Epist. 13.
3 Goldast. Const. Imp. I. 16-Cf. Harduin. III. 2012.
4 lartzheim Concil. German. I. 324-Goldast, op. cit. I. 18.
Goldast. I. 23-144. Migne's Patrolog. T. 98, pp. 941, sqq.
6 Hadriani PP. I. ad Carolun Epist. (Hiarduin, IV. 773).
TIHE CHURCH AND THIE EMPIRE. 27
all the imnages in his diocese, in spite of the injunctions of Charlemagnce, lie was exposed to nothing more formidable than the dreary
polemics of Theutmir and Dungal.' St. Agobard, of Lyons, who
was superior to so many of the superstitions of his time, was not
disposed to allow them even as ornaments;2 while the council of
Paris, in 825, reaffirmed the doctrines of the synod of Frankfort.3
Louis le Debonnaire endeavored to bring about an accord on the
subject, and in sending to Rome two bishops with the proceedings
of the Paris council he had no scruple in expressing to his envoys
his dread of the "Roman pertinacity," and he cautioned them to
be careful lest by too rigorous an upholding of the Western doctrine they should lead the papal court into irrevocable antagonism.4
Not long afterwards Walafrid Strabo, Abbot of Reichenau, whose
character stood deservedly high for learning, piety, and orthodoxy,
treated of images in a spirit identical with that of the Caroline
Books, showing that the second council of Nicca continued to be
held in utter contempt. He admits the propriety of placing pictures
and statues in churches as objects of art and decoration, but is careful to deprecate the veneration with which they were often foolishly
regarded; he will not concede to them any special sanctity, but
compares them to the ornaments of Solomon's Temple-flowers,
trees, and beasts. At the same time he objects strongly to iconoclasm, and is very severe on Claudius of Turin.s
It is true that the council of Trent draws very delicate distinctions
between worship, adoration, veneration, &c., and points out the
exact quality of respect due to paintings and images witll a refinement not easily appreciated by the popular mind, which naturally
transfers to the representation the veneration clue theoretically only
to the thing represented.6 The organ of the new school of liberal'
Catholics in Italy defines the orthodox doctrine taught by the
Mag. Biblioth. Patrum, Ed. Colon. 1618, Sic. IX. ii. 875.
Agobardi de Pict. et Imagin. This is to be found in the edition of
Papire Masson (Paris, 1605, p. 212), but the edition was consequently at
once put in the Index Expurgatorius, "' donee corrigatur," by decree of Dec.
16, 1605. The treatise was therefore carefully suppressed in the works
of Agobard as given in the Magna Biblioth. Patrum, but may be found in
Migne's Patrologia, Tom. 104.
3 Goldast. Const. Imp. I. 154. The proceedings of this synod are not
admitted into the greatcollections of councils, but Migne gives it (Patrolog.
T. 98, p. 1293), with ample apparatus to correct its heterodoxy.
4 Baluz. I. 663. Walafridl. Strabon. de Rebus Eccles. cap. viii.
G Conoil. Trident. Sess. XXV. De Invoc. Sanctor.
28 TIIE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
church to be that God alone is to be adored, the saints are to be
venerated, and images only to be respected, but it admits that adoration of ilmages is largely practised, and that it is encouraged as a-" useful superstition" by many whose position renders it difficult for the
church to escape responsibility for their acts.' In fact, when special
miraculous powers are attributed to certain images or pictures,
which are thus rendered tile objects of particular veneration, the
worship of the holy subject infallibly merges into the worship of the
representation. The image becomes no longer merely a vehicle to
elevate the grosser intellects incapable of abstraction, and the worship before the specially sacred object becomes so nearly idolatrous
that it is impossible to draw a definite line of demarcation.2 In the
middle ages there was no attempt to draw such a line, nor were
special miracle-working images requisite to call forth authoritative
commands for image worship. How little, indeed, these subtleties
were appreciated previous to the Reformation is manifested in the
oath imposed, in 1396, on the iconoclastic Lollards-" that fro this
day forthward I shall worship ymnages, with praying and offering
unto them in the worschop of the saintes that they be made after."3
And in 1400, at the trial of William Sawtree for Lollardism, by the
convocation of the province of Canterbury, the first article alleged
against him was " that he will not adore the cross on which Christ
suffered, but only Christ suffering on the cross. "4 Not long after,
the clear intellect of Gerson perceived the danger to which the purity
of faith was exposed by these decided tendencies of the ultra orthodox, and in his enumeration of the reforms necessary to the church
he says: "Judge whether it is well to have so great a variety of
pictures and images in the churches, and whether they do not pervert many simple folks to idolatry.'5
During the progress of the Reformation, the council of Frankfort
and the Caroline Books were duly appealed to by the Protestants
in support of their doctrines as to images. At the Colloquy
of Poissy. they formed a prominent subject of debate, when the
Catholics, instead of accepting the principles set forth in them, endeavored to impugn their authenticity, and, moreover, alleged that
Esaminatore, Firenze, 1 Agost. 1867, p. 237.' Mr. Lecky has treated this matter witl his accustomed clearness and
acuteness in his admirable " History of Rationalism," Chap. III.
W3 ilkins, Concil. Anglic. III. 225. Ibid. p. 255' Gersoni Declarat. Defect. Viror. Ecclesiast. No. 67.
THE CHURCH AND THE CARLOVINGIANS. 29
the council was merely provincial and not cecumenic, and that
the tract of Charlemagne hacd never received the approbation of
Adrian I.'
THE CHURCHt AND THE CARLOVINGIANS.
The policy of Gregory II. in seeking the support and
alliance of the Barbarians of the West was fully appreciated
by his successor, Gregory III. After some overtures to
Constantinople, couched in terms which insured their rejection, he followed in the same path. So subordinate, however, was the position of the ecclesiastical power, that, until
after the middle of the century, the Roman councils and the
papal rescripts continue to bear the dates of the reigns of
the heretical emperors. It is true that when, on the death
of Leo, the usurper Artavasdes obtained temporary possession of the throne, the Roman notaries eagerly seized
the opportunity of using the name of an orthodox monarch;
but when the son of Leo put down the rebellion, they
obediently adopted his date in turn, until the Frankish
alliance raised a rival to the elder empire. Up to 772 the
papal documents bear the name and date of the hated
Constantine Copronymus, the vigorous upholder of the
Iconoclastic sacrilege.2
So little thought, indeed, had the popes of maintaining
their position of independence, that a new lord paramount
was immediately sought as soon as they had successfully
defied the heretic Leo. Assuming the disposal of thrones,
Gregory III. offered to Charles Martel the sovereignty of
Rome and of Italy as the price of active assistance agsainst
the encroaching and detested Lombards. The services of
Luitprand, however, were too recent, and their common
1 Lettere del Cardinale di Ferrara (Baluze et Mansi, Miscell. T. IV. pp.
385-6).
Jaeff, Regesta.
3*
30 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
enemy, the Saracens, too active and dangerous, to permit
the wary Frank to dazzle himself with visions of transalpine conquests, and in return for tile keys of St. Peter
laid at his feet he returned only flattering words and rich
preselnts.
Of old the weighty javelin of the Franks had earned for
itself the respect of NIorthern Italy, when the Merovingian
chiefs found leisure amid family dissensions for a wild
foray across the Alps. The empire of Clovis, so long rendered powerless for foreign aggression by ceaseless civil
wars, was now consolidating its forces under the stern and
able hands of its Austrasian dukes, and the time soon came
when common interests and reciprocal services elevated
the aspiring leaders of church and state to the summit of
their respective ambitions. When Pepin le Bref, disdaining
at length the farce of delegated power under which for two
generations his family had ruled the state, sought to unite
the dignity with the reality of royalty, he seems to have
felt that some unusual solemnity was requisite to consecrate to himself and his children the election which placed
a usurper on the Merovingian throne. The facility with
which the allegiance sworn to Childeric was transferred to
a new suzerain was not reassuring to the founder of an
upstart dynasty, and some new sanction was felt to be
necessary to guarantee the perpetuation of a new race.
Every consideration conspired to lead the pope to gratify
the wishes of Pepin. The Lombards were a perpetual
mcnace, and the persuasiveness which had converted King
1Rachis from a conqueror to a monk could hardly be relied
uplon as a safe precedent for the future. To bind a new
aud powerful ally with the strongest ties of gratitude, and
to secure for the successor of St. Peter the disposal of
thrones and the judgment of the destinies of kings, were
advantages not lightly to be despised. When the deputa1 Gregor. PP. III. Epist. 5 (Cod. Carolin.).-Fredegar. cap. 110.-Chron,
S. Bertin. cap. IV. P. ii., cap. v.
TIHE CHURCH AND THE CARLOVINGIANS. 31
tion of the Franks asked the Vicegerent of Christ what
choice was to be made between a king without power and
a king without title, the answer was therefore unhesitating;
and the Carlovingian historians are careful to specify that
the transfer of royalty and the enforced tonsure of the
degraded regal spectre were commanded by the unerring
wisdom of the Supreme Pontiff.' The buckler of the Field
of Mars-the warlike installation of the primitive Frankswas not sufficient for the intruder; the ministry of the
church must sanctify the transfer, and St. Boniface, the
apostle of Germany, consecrated the head appointed by
the pope, thus proclaiming that the suffrages of the nation
were insufficient without the blessing of the priest. Even
this, however, was not enough. When Stephenll II. claimed
the services of his ally, and journeyed into France to implore the aid of the secular arm, after proving the insuffii Eginhart. Annal. ann. 752.-Ejusd. Vit. Car. Mag. cap. l.-Annal.
Fuldens. ann. 752.-Ado Viennens. —How dangerous were the favors of
the church is well exemplified by this. When came the struggle which
eventually laid the empire prostrate at the feet of the papacy, this deposition
of Childeric did not fail to be adduced in proof of the supremacy of the
spiritual over the temporal power. Christendom was hardly prepared for
the extension of jurisdiction claimed by Gregory VII. when, in 1080, he
excommunicated Henry IV., pronounced him to have forfeited the imperial
dignity, and recognized Rodolph of Suabia as his successor; but Gregory
defended his acts by quoting the example of Zachary and Childeric: "Alius,
item Romanus Pontifex, Zacharius videlicet, regem Francorum non tam pro
suis iniquitatibus, quam eo quod tanth potestati non erat utilis, a regno
deposuit, et Pippinum, Caroli Magni imperatoris patremn, in ejus loco substituit, omnesque Francigenas a juramento fidelitatis, quod illi fecerant,
absolvit" (Gregor. PP. VII. Regist. Lib. vIsI. Epist. 21). So Paul of Bernried, in arguing the same question, relies on the same precedent (Pauli
Bernried. Vit. Gregor. VII. No. 86). Honorius III. haughtily refuses to
entertain a doubt upon the question-" Quis ergo, nisi mente captus, ignorat
regiam potestatem pontificibus esse subjectam" (Vit. Gregor. VII. No. 6)showing how complete was by that time the triumph of the papacy. The
Schwabenspiegel (cap. 351., ed. Senckenberg. II. 422), in admitting for the
pope the right to dethrone and excommunicate a heretic emperor, bases it
on the action of Zachary, and asserts the justification of it to have been the
protection accorded to heretics by the deposed monarch "Leschandus."'
32 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
ciency of clerical authority to control the restless and
sacrilegious Lombard, a second coronation by his holy
hands was not only a fresh proof of his supremacy, but
also the price of the assistance which he desired, and he
assumed that Pepin's title was incomplete without this last
ceremony.1 In his eagerness to f6rtify the throne for his
descendants, Pepin little thought how dearly the church
was accustomed to sell her favors, and how that throne
was eventually to be overshadowed by the power based
upon the precedents which he was thus establishing.2
IMeanwhile the alliance prospered, and Pepin hastened
to perform his share of the contract. Two Italian expeditions brought Astulphus the Lombard to reason, restored
to the Holy See-or rather to the Roman Republic-the
territory of which it had been despoiled, and added to
its boundaries important provinces, which the generosity
of the conqueror, careless of such distant acquisitions,
bestowed on him to whom he owed his crown. The union' See his letter to Abbot Hilduin in Regino, Annal. ann. 753.
I think it safe to assume that the coronation of Pepin by Boniface is the
first instance of priestly ministration on such occasions. The allusion to a
similar ceremony performed by St. Remy on the person of Clovis (Testament.
S. Remigii. ap. Flodoard. I-list. Remens. Lib. I. c. 18) is evidently one of
the innumerable forgeries by which the church in those days manufactured
precedents to bolster up its pretensions. Its whole tenor is so completely at
variance with the customs of its assigned period, that it must be admitted
as an interpolation of the ninth or tenth century.
The unforeseen results of Pepin's incautious interpellation of sacerdotal
ministration were instructively manifested in little more than a century.
Pepin's great-grandson, Charles le Chauve, who held his kingdom- of France
by all the rights, hereditary, testamentary, and elective, that were recognized by the public law of the period, was told, after a reign of more than
twenty years, by Hincmar of Rheims, that he owed his sovereignty much
more to the episcopal unction and benediction than to the temporal power
(Ilincmar. pro Eccles. Libertat. Defens. Expos. I.). A century later, St.
Stephen of Hungary, in his instructions to his son, adduces, among other
reasons for rendering special honors to bishops, that without them kings and
princes cannot be elevated to the throne (S. Stephani Hung. Reg. Monit. ad
Filium, c. iii.).
THE CHURCHI AND THE CARLOVINGIANS. 33
thus cemented by mutual benefits was lasting; nor did the
ambitious Frank complain, even if he recognized the fact,
that the papal mnunificence had secured to its dispenser
eventual advantages far greater than those which it had
bestowedl.
Charlemagne inherited his father's alliance. Scarcely
had he reunited the divided kingdom by disinheriting his
brother's children, when, on the invitation of Adrian I.,
he invaded Italy, to put an end to the perennial quarrel
between Rome and Lombardy. The resistance was stubborn, notwithstanding treason in the Lombard camp, but
Charlemagne was not accustomed to leave his work incomplete. The generosity of Pepin was no longer in place, and
the spoils were divided between the royal and sacerdotal
confederates, who mutually confirmed the extension of
territory acquired by the sword of the one and the prayers
or intrigues of the other. The dread inspired by the Lombard must have been intense and the donation splendid,
for the grateful Adrian, calling a council of one hundred
and fifty-three bishops, conferred on his deliverer not only
the Patriciate, but also the privilege of nominating all
future successors to the Holy See.l Charlemagne had received the sacred oil and benediction from the holy hands
of Stephen II. at the same time as his father; but in due
course another generation appeared to clain the same
advantages, and the kingdoms of Italy and Aquitaine were
secured to the royal infants, Pepin and Louis, by the
efficacious ministration of the accommodating Pontiff, who
was equally ready to extend his jurisdiction in another
direction, by excommunicating the rebellious subjects of
his liberal patron.
Step by step the process of mutual aggrandizement went
on, while the subordination of the spiritual to the temporal
power was undisputed. The Patriciate of Rome, to Charles' The authenticity of this grant has been called in question. Its genuineness will be considered hereafter (p. 87).
34 THE RISE OF TIIE TEMPORAL POWER.
Martel an empty honor not worth the responsibilities connectedc with it, had become to his grandson a substantial
dignity, which secured the subjection of the papacy. The
confirmation of the papal elections was in the hands of the
Frankish king, to whom each new pope sent a solemn embassy to offer the emblematic keys and banner, and to ask
the opportunity of rendering the necessary oath of allegiance. Charles was the suzerain of Rome and of its bishop,
who, notwithstanding his primatial rank, was merely a subject, to be addressed in the language of royal command,
and in no way exempt from the jurisdiction exercised over
all other dignitaries of the Frankish dominions. Thus,
when Leo III., in 796, announced his election to Charlemagne, the latter acknowledges with courtly phrase his
pleasure in receiving the assurance of humble obedience
and the pledges of fidelity to the throne offered by the
pope;1 and the instructions to his envoy on the occasion
of Leo's consecration were that he should diligently
admonish the pope to live with propriety and to obey the
canons.2
In fulfilment of his duties as supreme judge, Charlemagne, in the year 800, visited Rome on the solemn errand
of trying Leo III. for offences alleged against him by the
factious Romans. The position of the Pontiff was that of
a subject before his sovereign, a criminal in the presence
of his judge; but the wily Italian by a master-stroke reversed the position, and created for his successors a power
which may almost be said to have secured their ultimate
triumph. After the pre-arranged acquittal of the pope,
while Charles was humbly kneeling at his devotions in the
Basilica of St. Peter, his brows were suddenly encircled by
the imperial crown, confirmed with the papal benediction,
" II Valde, ut fateor. gavisi sumus, seu in electionis unimitate, seu in humilitatis vestrn obedientia, et in promissionis ad nos fidelitate." Epist. ad
Leonem Papam (Baluz.).
2 Carol. Mag. Commonitor. ann, 796 (Baluz. I. 195, Ed. Venet.).
THE CHURCH AND THE CARLOVINGIANS. 35
and the populace shouted for the new Emperor of the
iRomans-"- Carlo Augusto, a Deo coronato, magno et pacifico Imperatori Romanorum, vita et victoria." Whether
this clever coup de theatre was in reality a surprise to the
passive actor in it, or whether it had been rehearsed the
year before at Paderborn, when Leo had laid his griefs
before his protector, is of small importance. If, as Eginhardt asserts, Charlemagne accepted the unexpected dignity
with reluctance,' he only manifested therein his customary
sagacity. To him it was nothing but a nominal dignity,
which in no way enhanced his real power, but which,
among his descendants, proved a source of endless and
ruinous contention.2 The pope, on the other hand, had
revived, motu proprio, the glories of the elder empire. Not
only was Constantinople humiliated and degraded from its
solitary dignity, but throughout the West, as the creator
is always greater than the created, the pope, while no less
a subject than before, had vastly increased the moral
supremacy of his high office.3 His successors learned to
turn the precedent to good account, and the necessity of
papal intervention to convert a king of the Romans into
an emperor on more than one occasionl lurned the scale in
1 Eginh. Vit. Carol. cap. 28.
" Charlemagne may have had a foreshadowing of the evils arising from the
possession of the imperial crown, for in his Clharta Divisioscis of 806, he
makes no allusion to it as being heritable, nor does he bestow it upon any
of his sons. They are all to be kings, and even the sovereignty of Italy confers no additional supremacy on Pepin.
3 How thoroughly this came to be understood is manifest from a passage
in the canons of the Synod of St. Macra, in 881, where the bishops, in contrasting the regal and sacerdotal dignity, give this as the argument for the
supremacy which they claim for the latter —" Et tanto est dignitas pontificum
major quam regum, quia reges in culmen regium sacrantur a pontificibus,
pontifices autem a regibus consecrari non possunt" (Synod. ap. S. Macram,
cap. 1). Even in England, in 1142, during the imprisonment of King
Stephen, when his brother Henry, Bishop of Winchester, called a council of
the clergy, in a speech directed against the king, he spoke of " majori parte
cleri Anglise, ad cujus jus potissimum spectat principem eligere, simulque
ordinare" (Wilkins, Concil. I. 420).
36 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
difficult conjunctures, or enabled the Pontiff to sell his
benediction at his own price, as when the fagot and stake
of Arnold of Brescia purchased the imperial crown for Frederic Barbarossa. Nor was this all, for even as the right of
confirmation practically gave to the emperors the appointment of popes, so, when protracted dissensions reduced
the temporal power, the popes in turn became able to nominate their emperors. Even before the close of the century,
the quarrels between the grandsons of Charlemagne gave
to John VIII. the power to select between them; and he,
who could not defend his own suburbs from the Saracens,
or keep the petty barons of Gaeta or Capua in order, was
able to assume the bestowal of the diadem of Augustus.1
A charter issued by John XII., in 962, a few days after the
coronation of Otho the Great, assumes that the emperor received the imperial crown from St. Peter through the
hands of his representative.2 When Innocent III. declared
that the pope had a right to examine and reject emperors
after their election, if he did not deem them worthy of the
dignity, he took care to base the privilege on the gift of
the imperial crown to Charlemagne by Leo;3 and this
power was too fiequently exercised for it to remain a disputed point. It was the natural result of these principles
that John XXII., in his quarrel with the Emperor Louis of
Bavaria, was able to assume that the imperial authority
and power are derived from the pope, and that he who is
elected King of the Romans cannot, from his election alone,
be really considered emperor, nor exercise power, jurisdiction, or authority before his consecration and coronation
by the pope.4 Charles IV. was obliged to admit all this
when, prior to his election, he swore to the pope that if
elected he would, before asking coronation, submit his perAct. Synod. Pontigonens. cap. 1 (Baluz. II. 345).
o Annal. Saxo, ann. 962.
u Can. 34, Extra, Lib. I. Tit. 6.
4 Ludov. IV. Respons. ([Hartzheim, IV. 323).
THE CIHURCHI AND THE CARLOVINGIANS. 37
son to the papal approbation, which was thus admitted to
be a condition precedent.l Bishop Alvarez Pelayo was,
therefore, justified, in 1335, in proving' from the deeretals
that the emperor was merely the vicar of the pope in temporal affairs and derived from himii the title to the empire.2
Leo had thus, by a simple expedient, succeeded in counterbalancing the imperial supremacy which had existed fromr
the days of Constantile.
The precedent from the first was binding. Although,
when Charlemagne associated his son Louis in the empire,
in 813, he performed the ceremony of coronation himself
at Aix-la-Chapelle, apparently mistrustful of papal or sacerdcotal miniistrat-ion,3 and though the pope was not asked to
ratify the solemnities which marked Louis's accession on his
father's death in 814, yet Stephen IV. seized the opportunity of t-lleir interview at itheims, in 816, to crown and
anoint him emperor with a Cdiademl which he had brought
Juranment. Carol. IV. ann. 1346 (Liinig, Cod. Ital. Diplom. II. 771).
The eagerness with which every incident was turned to account in the long
struggle for supremacy is well illustrated by the fact that when in 1133 Lothair II. reinstated the wandering Innocent II. who had been ejected from
Rome by the antipope. Anaclet, and when he was rewarded with the bestowal
of the imperia-l crown, before his coronation he swore to defend the person
and rights of the pope. The oath, as given by Baronius from the Vatican
MSS. (Annal. ann. 1133, No. 2), is in no sense an oath of homage, but it
pleased the papal court so to regard it, and the popes recorded their assumed
triumph by a painting hung in the Lateran, representing Lothair at the feet
of Innocent, with the explanatory inscriptionRex venit ante fores jurans prius urbis honores.
Post homo fit Pap.e, sumit quo dante coronamn.
When Frederic Barbarossa first entered Rome this excited his indignation,
and he exacted its removal (Radevic. de Gest. Frid. I. Lib. I. cap. 10). In
1157, Adrian IV. renewed the pretension, but the prompt measures of Frederic quickly obliged him to abandon it formally..De Planctu Ecclesiw, Lib. I. Art. 68, No. I.
3 Eginhart. Annal. ann. 813. —Thegan, who, though not so good an authority as Eginhardt, gives a much more detailed account of this ceremony,
asserts that Charlemagne ordered Louis to place the crown on his head with
his own hands (Thegani de Gest. Ludov. cap. 6), which seems to indicate a
suspicion that the priestly alliance might turn out to be an expensive one.
4
38 THE RISE OF TIIE TEMPORtAL POWER.
with him from Italy for that purpose, and Louis's faithfull
biographer is careful not to style him emperor until after
that consecration.' That the ceremony was considered
necessary to perfect the imperial dignity may also be
gathered from an inscription by Ebbo, Archbishop of
1Rheims, Louis's foster-brother, commencing"Ludovicus Ctcsar factus, coronante Stephano." 2
Charlemagne apparently considered the papal assent and
ratification requisite to give binding force to his division
of the empire in 806, and Louis le Debonnaire followed his
example in 817.3 Still, the subordinate position of the
popes as subjects and vassals of the empire continued unaltered. When in 815 a conspiracy was discovered by Leo
III., and he exercised summary justice in dispatching the
criminals, Louis, irritated at this invasion of his jurisdiction, sent his nephew, Bernard, King of Italy, to investigate
the matter, and Leo was obliged to make his peace with
the emperor by a special legation. In the following year,
his successor, Stephen IV., immediately on his election,
hastened to solicit Louis's confirmation, and travelled with
all diligence into France, ostensibly to crown the emperor,
but doubtless, in reality, to secure his position.4 It was
possibly in fulfilment of a condition imposed on him at
this time, that in the same year he caused a canonl to be
adopted in synod providing that for the future no newly
elected pope should be consecrated except in the presence
of imperial delegates sent for that purpose, guarding the
papal rights, however, with a clause that no new form of
oath should be exacted of the Vicegerent t of Christ.' This
Thegani op. cit. cap. 17. Cf. Eginhart. Annal. ann. 816.
Flodoard. Hist. Remens. Lib. II. cap. 19.
3 Eginhart. Annal. ann. 806.-Agobardi de Divis. Imp. Epist.
4 Eginh art. Annal. ann. 816.
5 Gratian. Decret. Dist. 63, can. 28. The genuineness and date of this
have been the subject of no little controversy. An allusion to it, however,
by Nicholas I., in the council of Rome in 862, would seem to settle the
question in favor of its authenticity.
TIIHE CIIURCT AND THE CARLOVINGIANS. 39
was neglected in the case of the next pope, Paschal I., who
was consecrated without waiting for the imperial ratification, but the necessity for it was admitted by a deprecatory
epistle which he prudently dispatched to his suzerain,
asserting that he had been unwillingly forced to undergo
the ceremony, against his strenuous resistance.'
Louis's gentle character was eminently unsuited to the
ferocity of the age, while his sensitive superstition rendered
him the willing slave of his ghostly advisers. Unable to
control the fierce elements of discord around him or to
resist the encroachmlents of ecclesiastical ambition, he
allowed his influence to diminisli rapidly. Emboldened by
this, Paschal soon took another and an important step in
the enhancement of the papal prerogative. In 817, Louis
had crowned his eldest son, Lothair, and had placed
him on the throne as co-emperor, in precisely the same
manner as lie himself had received that dignity at the
hands of Charlemagne. In 823 he sent the young emperor
to Italy, to repress some disorders there. His mission
accomplished, Lothair was about to return, when Paschal
invited him to Rome, received him with all honor, and
solemnly crowned him as Emperor and Augustus —and
this, to all appearance, without the knowledge or consent
of his father. This independence of action was followed
up shortly afterwards, when two officials of high repute in
the papal court were cruelly murdered in the Lateranl, and
Paschal was popularly accused of complicity in the crime.
He endeavored to escape the imperial jurisdiction by hastily
clearing himself of conmplicity by a purgatorial oath before
the arrival of the commissioners dispatched by Louis to
investigate his connection with the murders, but he nevertleless acknowledged his accountability to the emperor by
two legations sent with his explanations.2
These efforts of the Holy See to shake off the imperial
Eginhart. Annal. ann. S17. " Ibid. ann. 823.
40 THE R, ISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER,
domination called fot some cotunter-(demonlistratioin, and it
is probable that the reckless and energetic Lothair was less
willing than his father to permit any curtailment of his ancestral prerogatives. When, therefore, Paschal died during
the following year, and his successor, Eugenius II., after a
hotly contested election, contented himself with sending a
legate to apprise the emperors of his accession, Lothair
proceeded at once to Rome. Eugenius was compelled to
subscribe a written oath of allegiance, and another oath
was administered to all the Roimans, lay- and clerical, in
which they swore not only fidelity to the emperors, but
also that they would never consent to the installation of a
pope elect until after he should have taken a similar oath
before a special imperial commission;1 and Lothair's exercise of sovereign power was further shown by an edict
limiting the extent of stuffrage in future elections.2 These
proceedings had the desired effect for the time, and when,
in 827, the chair of St. Peter was again vacant, the consecration of Gregory IV. was postponed until the arrival of
an envoy with powers to confirm his election. The effort,
however, was too late. Events were hiurrying on which
were destined to render all such measures futile, and Lothair himself was one of the chief instruments in the hands
of Providence by which was accomplished the revolution
"Et ille qui electus fuerit, me consentiente, consecratus pontifex non
fiat, priusquam tale sacramentum faciat in prssentia missi domini imiperatoris et populi, cum juranmento quale dominus Eugenius papa sponte pro
conservatione omnium factum habet per scriptum" (Baluz. I. 438). The
expression "pro conservatione omnium" renders it probable that Lothair
had manifested his indignation by proceedings so violent as to awaken fears
for the safety of the city. The change occurring during the century is well
exhibited by comparing this oath with that taken by the Romans on the
coronation of the Emperor Arnoul, in 896, wherein the papal claim to their
allegiance is expressly reserved-'" salvo honore et lege mea, atque fidelitate
domni Formosi papre, fidelis sumi et ero omnibus diebus vitr mene Arnulfo
imperatori" (Annal. Fnldens. ann. 895.)
2 Baluz. TI. 317.
TIE CHURCH AND THE CARLOVINGIANS. 41
of European institutions, resulting in the power of the
priesthood and the irresponsible autocracy of the pope.
The turbulent ambition of Lothair and his two brothers,
their hatred of their stepmother Judith, and their envy of
their half-brother, Charles le Chauve, the youngest, best,
and most beloved of the children of Louis, filled the rest
of his miserable reign with open war or secret intrigues.
1i-s death added fresh fuel to the flame, and until the
exhausted combatants swore a hollow truce at the Treaty
of Verdun, in 843, the empire was a scene of universal
confuision. This parricidal and fratricidal strife, continuing
with scanty interinission until the close of the century, reduced the royal power to a shadow. Truth, faith, loyalty,
patriotism, all the virtues which lend stability to governments, seemed unknown. Everywhere the chiefs and deputies of the nominal monarch, striving for independence and
hereditary authority, were bartering their allegiance, and
wringing fresh concessions from the infatuated brethren,
as the price of their fidelity or of their treachery. The
only element of universal anarchy lacking was supplied
by the external enemies of the empire. Invited by ceaseless civil conflict, on every-side the Northmen poured in
upon the ungularded coasts, ascended the rivers, and,
gathering confidence from almost uninterrupted success,
ravaged every portion of France and of the fertile Pihinelands. On the West the Bretons, on the East the Wends
anld Serbs, on the South the active and unsparing Saracens,
released from the terror of the invincible Charles, revenged
the wrongs and the humiliations of generations. Faction
in the council, discord in the court, cowardice or treachery
in the field, could offer inadequate resistance to the only
power which maintained its unity, which understood its
aims, and which pursued its purposes with energy and consistency. Nor is it surprising that the people, ground to
the dust by the senseless quarrels of their rulers, exposed
4t*
42 TTHE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
alike to the unchecked tyranny of their immediate masters,
the devastations of neighborhood wars, and the hideous
barbarities of pagan pirates-the people to whom civil government was known only as an instrument of oppression,
and never as a means of defence or redress-should turn
in despair to the church as the only source of consolation
in the present or of hope in the future, should welcome
any change which tended to elevate the spiritual power at
the expense of the temporal, and should give eager credit
to the doctrine which taught that the Vicegerent of Christ
and his ministers were paramount over those who had so
wofully abused their trust2l
THE FALSE DECRETALS.
In this remoulding of European institutions, so necessary
to the interests of Christianity and civilization, one of the
most efficient agencies was the collection of canons known
as the False Decretals. About this period there began to
circulate from hand to hand a collection of Papal Epistles,
on which the names of the early Bishops of Rlome conferred
the authority of the primitive and uncorrupted church, instinct with pure and undisputed apostolic tradition. The
name assumed by the compiler was Isidor Mercator, or
Peccator, and as the original copy was said to have been
1 The manner in which the church at times earned the gratitude of the
masses while extending its power and influence, is well illustrated in the
election of Guido as King of LIombardy, by the bishops assembled at Pavis
in 888 or 889. One of the conditions imposed on him was that no exactions
or oppressions should be inflicted on the people; but that if, in any case of
the kind, the counts did not actively interfere to repress it, they should be
excommunicated by the bishops-thus rendering the latter the legal pro,
teetors and guardians of the liberties of the people. —Widonis Regis Elect
cap... (Muratori Antiq. It;l. Iisset. ITI.)
TIE FALSE DECRETALS. 43
brought from Spain, he was readily confounded with St.
Isidor of Seville, the eminent canonist, who, two centuries
before, had enjoyed a wide and well-merited reputation for
extensive learning anid unquestioned orthodoxy.
Denis the Less, who, in the first half of the sixth century,
made an authoritative collection of canons and decretals,
commences thle latter with Pope Siricius, whose pontificate
reached from 384 to 398; and there are no earlier papal
epistles extant in the nature of decretals. When, therefore,
the decisions and decrees of Imore than thirty apostolic
fathers, of venerable antiquity, were presented under the
sanction of ecclesiastics high in rank and power, and when
these decrees were found to suit most admirably the wants
and aspirations of the church, it is no wonder that they
were accepted with little scrutiny by those whose cause
they served, and who were not accustomed to the niceties
of strict archbeological criticism. It could hardly be expected that a prelate of that rude age would analyze the
rules presented for his guidance, and eliminate the false,
which served his interests or his pride, from the true,
with which they were skilfully intermingled. Some, more
enlightened than the rest, perceiving that, if their own
power was enhanced, at the same time their bonds of subjection to the central head were drawn closer, muttered
faint and cautious doubts; but the vast majority received
the new decretals with unquestioning faith, and though
political causes delayed their immediate adoption, yet soon
after the middle of the century we find them received with
scarcely a dissentient voice.
Riculfus, who occupied the archiepiscopal see of Mainz
from 784 to 814, is credited with the paternity of this, the
boldest, most stupendous, and most successful forgery that
the world has seen. Whether or not it- was brought friom
Spain by him, or constructed under his supervision, there
is little doubt that he employed himself industriously in
44 TIIE RITSE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
disseminating copies.l Another collection, somewhat less
bold in its pretensions, btut equally destitute of authority,
had made its appearance a little earlier, having been given
by Ingilram, Bishop of Metz, to Adrian I., in 785; and
it was likewise extensively circulated and cited, although
tIinc mar of Rlheims condemns it as bearing falsehood on
its face.2 Other documents of various descriptions were
also t-lbricated for the same purpose, and indeed it is
probable that the whole series grew by gradual accretion
under the hands of those who were watching the progress
of events, and who became emboldened by the ease with
which they escaped detection.
An examination of these documents, indeed, leads to
the conclusion that they were not the result of one effort
or the work of one man. Their constant repetitions and
Hincmar, created Archbishop of Rheims in 845, thus describes the introduction of the False Decretals:''Sicut et de libro collectarum epistolaruin
ab Isidoro, quem de Hispania allatum, iiculfus Moguntinus episcopus, in
hujusmodi sicut et in capitulis regiis studiosus, obtinuit et istas regiones ex
illo repleri fecit;" and he evidently considers them as of dubious authority,
when he declines to cite them in support of his argument,. because he had
plenty of authorities from among the popes after Damasus —" superfiuum
duxi non necessaria in medium devocare" (Opusc. adv. Hincm. Laudun.
c:ap. 24). This does not, however, prevent him from using them when later
and more unimpeachable precedents are wanting.'Thus (op. cit. cap. 14)
he adduces an epistle of St. Anacletus, whose pontificate dates within twenty
years of the death of St. Peter, in which is described a complete hierarchy,
such as in the ninth century was regarded as the perfection of church
government-bishops, metropolitans, archbishops, primates, and patriarchs,
with the Roman Pontiff as supreme ruler, issuing without appeal his commands and decrees. (Pseudo-Anaclet. Epist. 1, 2, 4, 5.)
",, Quam dissonue inter se habeantur, qui legit satis intelligit, et quam
diverse a sacris canonibus, et quam discrepantes in qfiibusdam ab ecclesiasticis judiciis habeantur, ut hic qubedam de pluribus ponam, evidenter
manifestatur" (Op. cit. cap. 24).-According to some MSS. it was Adrian
who gave them to Ingilram.
In one of Charlemagne's visits to Rome, in 774, 781, or 787, Adrian gave
him a collection of canons for the government of the Western churches.
This collection is simply the compilation of Denis the Less; containing none
of the false decretals. At that time Adrian, therefore, was evidently ignorant of the forgeries, and the principles and pretensions of Ingilram and
Isidor were as yet unknown in Rome.
TIIE FALSE DECRETALS. 45
their frequent contradictions would seem to prove this and
to show that they were manufactured from time to time,
to meet the exigencies of the moment or to gratify the
feelings of the writers. Had the whole been composed
by one person, with a definite individual purpose in view,
there would be much more unity perceptible throughout.
It is also highly probable that the authors, seeing how
little attention had been excited by the canons of Ingilram,
devised the plan of embodying the same principles in the
form of papal epistles, to which they affixed the names of
the early popes, thus hoping to secure for them additional
authority. At the same time it must be borne in mind
that as yet the spiritual autocracy of the popes had by
no means been admitted to the extent claimed for it in
these decretals, and subsequently acquired through their
influence. When Gelasius in 494 issued the decisions of
the council which regulated the canon of Scripture and
the authority of the Fathers, he was careful to draw the
distinction between the obedience due to the canons of
councils and the doctrines of the early Fathers and that
claimed for papal epistles. The former were to be " et
custodienda et recipienda," the latter merely "'venerabiliter suscipiendas.'l TIincmar enlarges on this difference,
which he declares to be well understood by all familiar
with ecclesiastical rules;2 and, in 872, writing to Adrian IT.
in the name of Charles le Chauve, he begs the pope not to
send any more epistles contrary to the ancient canons of
the church, as all such are to be rejected and confuted as
being devoid of authority.3' This distinction is not found in all the MSS. See the comparison of
texts in Migne's Patrologia, T. 59, pp. 170-2. It is contained, however, in
the canon as given by Ivo of Chartres (Decret. P. Iv. cap. 64) and Gratian
(Deciet. P. 1, Dist. 15, can. 3), and its citation by IHincmar, as mentioned
above, shows its high antiquity and probable genuineness.
o Opusc. adv. Hinem. Laudun. cap. 25.
3 Goldast. Const. Imp. I. 205-6. —Migne's Patrol. T. 124, p. 894. —Iow
completely all this changed in a couple of centuries is well exemplified in a
46 TIlE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
It is true that the success of the forgeries at first was
rather negative than positive, and their earliest practical
promulgation as rules for daily use would appear to be in
the canons compiled for his diocese by Remy, who was
Bishop of Coire from 815 to 830. Charlemagne, indeed,
as early as 806, had admitted one canon into a capitularyl
but in general their influence over his legislation and
government is imperceptible. His power was too absolute
and his temper rendered opposition too dangerous for any
serious attempt to limit his control over ecclesiastical
matters. Though he made full use of clerical influence in
carrying out his designs of a strong and civilizing government, yet obedience to his will was the condition of its
existence; nor, while he labored strenuously to enforce
respect for the church, would he permit it to exercise
interference in affairs not connected with its special office.2
His influence was too profoundly impressed upon the age
to be immediately obliterated, and for some years after his
death the empire maintained the dignified force with which
he had invested it. With Louis le Debonnaire, however,
there came a change. His virtues and weaknesses rendered
his power a prize for whoever had the boldness and ambition
to clutch at a fragment of it, and the penance of Attigny
in 822, while it degraded him in the eyes of the fierce
Frankish warriors, proclaimed to the world that priestly
influence was all-powerful in the state.
It would indeed have been singular if the church had
decllration of Alexander II. to Philip of France in 1065: " Ignorant miseri
quod hujus sanctoe sedis decreta ita pie fide a filiis matris ecclesim accipienda
sint et veneranda ut tanquam regula canonum ab eisdem absque ullo scrupulo admittantur."-Alexandri PP. II. Epist. 95.
1 Capit. Carol. Mag. I. ann. 806, ~ 23.-This, however, may have been
derived from Ingilram, catp. 72.
This jealousy of sacerdotal encroachment is well expressed in a capitulary directing the clergy and the laity not to interfere with one another.
"Hic interrogandum est acutissime quid est quod Apostolus ait NVezo,izzlitans Deo imzplicat se ane eotiis sccltlaribus, vel ad quos sermo iste pertineat."''
-Cnapit. Ciarol. Meg. I. ann. 811, 4.
TIHE FALSE DECRETALS. 4.7
not pressed forward in the path thus thrown open, and
had not claimed all the supremacy to which it was invited.
Accordingly we find that the bishops soon appear as the
ruling order in the state, sitting in judgment on the emperor, deposing, absolving, and reinstating him by turns —
doing, in the name of heaven, that which the reckless
nobles still shrank from assuming as an earthly prerogative. This placed a material power in hands well qualified
to use and extend it; and though, during those busy years
of anarchy and strife, the church had enough to do in protecting her property from the hands of the spoiler, and
was unable to combine her forces seriously and steadily
for the attainment of new privileges and exemptions, still,
the influence of the prelates, as potential members of the
civil government, vastly increased the political weight of
the ecclesiastical body, and placed them in a position
to make good whatever innovations they might seek to
establish. In restoring order after the long and lawless
struggle, it was also comparatively easy to assume that
the pretensions then first seriously advanced were merely
the resuscitation of rights, familiar to past generations,
which had been borgotten and trampled on in the fury
of civil war.' At the same time the partial quiet which
succeeded the Treaty of Verdun soon nmade manifest the
pressing need of a strong ecclesiastical government. The
empire of Charlemagne was then finally divided, and the
nationalities of Europe spontaneously separated themselves into the limits which have virtually been maintained
to the present day. Ilad the church remained, as of old,
under secular control, it would plrobably have been split
into fragments; its unity would have been lost, and the
spiritual tyranny whichl alone could maintain the influence
Jura sacerciotum penitus eversa ruerunt.
Divin-o jam legis amor terrorque recessit,
Et scita jam canonum cunctoruLn calce teruntur.
Florus Diac. de Divis. Imp.
48 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
of religion amid the turmoil of so barbarous an age would
have become impossible. To elevate the sanctity of the
sacerdotal character, the power of the bishops over the
laity and the inferior clergy, the control of the metropolitans over their suffragans; to emancipate all from subjection to the temporal power, and to bind them more
strongly than ever to the foot of the apostolic thronesuch was the only apparent solution to present and prospective difficulties. If it was carried out by fraud and
forgery, we should remember the trials and temptations
of the time before passing too severe a condemnation on
those who planned and executed the scheme.
The date, the author, and thebimmediate object of the
False Decretals have given rise to keen speculation and
fierce dispute, particularly among modern German critics,
whose theories, more or less plausible, it would be useless
to recapitulate or refute here. The views of the Ballerini,
Wasserschleben, Gfrbrer, Walter, Knust, Hefele, Phillips,
and others, may be found well summed up and stated by
Heinrich Denziger;' but the principal interest of the discussion lies merely in its proving how the over-subtle refinements requisite to support a preconceived theory may
mislead intelligent investigators. Those who see in these
forgeries an effort merely to increase the power of the pope,
or, on the other hand, to enlarge the prerogatives of the
imetropolitanis,'or, again, to render the bishops independent,
take a view by far too narrow of the motives and the results
of the attempt. In fact, the philosophizing tendencies of
recent historical criticism have led to the assumption that
the influence of the False Decretals had previously been
greatly overrated. This I take to be an error, easily comnmitted by those to who'm the novelty of a brilliant sophism
is more attractive than the triteness of a commonplace' Ecloge et Epicrisis eorumn quT a recentioribus criticis de Pseudoisidorianis Decretis statute sunt (Migne's Patrolog. T. 130.)
TIIHE FALSE DECRETALS. 49
truth; and though the causes above described contributed
doubtless to the success of the forgeries, it by no means
follows that those causes would have produced the same
effects had not the disturbed elements of society thus been
artificially moulded. It is certain that about the middle
of the century a great and silent revolution in the relations
between church and state commenced, and it may fairly be
assumed that these new canons were the instrument with
which the ecclesiastical party worked upon the general
popular readiness to submit to such a change of masters.
To estimate the influence of these canons and other cognate forgeries requires an attentive examination into the
jurisprudence and legislation of the period, which they
interpenetrate to an extent that shows how thoroughly
they modified the condition of society in all its ramifications. Interpolated into codes of law, adopted and amplified in the canons of councils and the decretals of popes, they
speedily became part and parcel of the civil and ecclesiastical polity of Europe, leaving traces on the institutions
which they affected for centuries. The Carlovingian Capitularies, which they distorted from their original tendency,
were the recognized laws of the western and northern portions of the empire, until swallowed up by the all-pervading
influence of feudalism, and even then they continued to be
appealed to as an authority. As late as the close of the
eleventh century they were cited in a suit between Centulla IV., of Beamn, and the Bishop of Lescar;1 in 1208,
Otho IV., at his election, took an oath with the princes of
the enpire, in which they mutually bound themselves to
preserve intact all the laws of Charlemagne;2 the Schwabenspiegel, which, from the thirteenth century, was the
municipal code of Southern Germany, declares that all law
Mazure et EIatoulet, Fors de Bdarn, p. xxxviii.
2 Ibi Rex primo, deinde cateri principes jurant... omnia etiam jura a
Karolo magno instituta observanda et tuenda.-Godefrid. S. Pantaleon.
Annal. ann. 1208.
5
50 THE RISE OF TIE3 TEMPORAL POWER.
is founded on the legislation of Charlemagne and of the
popes,l and it is itself, to a considerable extent, based on
the Third Book of the Capitularies; while some of the
Capitularies, relating more particularly to ecclesiastical
matters, being drafted into the collections of canon law,
were perpetuated through Burkharclt, Ivo, and Gratian,
during the whole mediaeval period.
If the False I)ecretals thus indirectly left their impress
on secular legislation, their overwhelming force in modifying the organization and position of the church itself may
easily be conceived. The pretensions and privileges which
they conferred on the hierarchy became the most dearlyprized and frequently-quoted portion of the canon law. In
each struggle with the temporal authority it was the arsenal from which were drawn thimost effective weapons, and
after each struggle the sacerdotal combatants had higher
v'antage-ground for the ensuing conflict. The satire of
lRabelais loses its usual extravagance when, dwelling upon
the virtues of the " sacrosainctes Decretales'"-the development and alpplication of the forgeries of the eighth and
ninth centuries-he exclaims: " Qui faict le sainct siege
Apostolicque en Romme de tout temps et auiouiclhuy tant
recloutable en luniuers que il fault, ribon ribaine, que tous
roys, empereurs, potentatz et seigneurs pendent de luy,
tieignent de luy, par luy soyent couronnez, confirmez,
authorisez, vieignent la boucquer et se prosterner a 1a mririficque pantofie de laquelle auez veni le pourtraict? Belles
Decretales de Dieu 1" and when he undertook to describe
"Comment par la vertus des Decretales est l'or subtillement
tyrl de France en Iloomme," he only enlarged upon a theme
whlich was long and keenly appreciated.2 Nor did the
Itaque nullum jus provinciale anut feudale subsistit aliter quamn quatenus.a clero Romano et ex Regis Caroli legibus derivatum est. (Jur. Provin. Alaman. Introit. ~ 31.)' When, in 1583, President d'Espeisses, at that time Advocate General of
France, drew up for IHenry III. an argument against the reception of the
Council of Trent, he dwelt upon the encroachments of the papal power,
TIlE FALSE DECRETALS. 51
hunimbler ballad-singer in his rugged verse fail to seize the
" dent s'est ensuivi les appellations en cour de Rome, les reservations, expectatives, preventions, blles, annates, dispense, indulgence, et anutres
moyens de tirer les deniers de France, et presque Ia France mrme k Rome"
(Le Plat, Monumenta Concil. Trident. VII. 253). In 1372 we find the whole
body of the clergy of Mainz binding themselves by a solemn agreement with
each other not to pay a tithe levied upon them by the papal court, and complainihg with more bitterness than respect of the exactions to which they
were continually exposed —"et propter exactiones papales perplurimas in
his terris clerici ad magnam paupertatem redacti.... Quod sedes ipsa, contra morem veterem sanctornm patrum, ad partes exteras nunquam his temporibus mittit predicatores vel viciorum correctores, sed cottidie mittit bene
pompizantes, et facta sua proprie dirigentes, pecuniarum peritissimos exactores" (Gudeni Cod. Diplom. T. III. p. 509)-and at the same time Frederie, Archbishop of Cologne, promised his clergy to give them all the assistance he safely could in evading the tithe (Hartzheim, Concil. German. T.
IT_. p. 510). More than a century previous, Robert Grosteste, Bishop of
Lincoln, the most prominent ecclesiastic of the period in England, when
lying on his death-bed did not hesitate to stigmatize the papal court as Antichrist, in consequence of the reckless injury to religion wrought by its insatiable avarice (Matt. Paris IIist. Anglix, ann. 1253). Not long before " Golias Episcopus" dwelt upon the same theme with a pertinacity which manifests
the strength of the feeling of the time" Romani capitulum habent in decretis
Ut petentes audeant mnanibus repletis;
D)abis, a.ut non dabitur, petunt qUando petis:
Qua mensurao seminas et eadem metis."
(Poems of Walter Napes, p. 37 Ed. Camden Soc.)
And, earlier still, in the eleventh century, the implacable virtue of St. Peter
Damiani exclaims, with indignant sorrow"Heu Sedes Apostolica
Orbis olim gloria,
Nune, proh dolor! efficeris
Officina Simonis" —(Epist. Ix. Lib. IV.)
That the money value of the papal authority was known and acted upon even
in the Carlovingian period is well illustrated by the fact that when Lupus,
Abbot of Ferri6res, a man of high repute and consideration, was about to visit
the Holy See on business, he begs his friends for presents to take with him,
assuming as a matter of course that nothing could be effected in the papal
court without them —" et quoniam in conficiendis rebus apostolici notitia
indigebo, ea vero sine munerum intercessione inire commode non potest"
(Lupi Ferrar. Epist. 68).
All the incidental prerogatives acquired by the Roman curia were thus
52 TITE RISE OF TLIE TEMPORAL POWER.
popular appreciation of the multiform evils arising from
the same sourceDepuis que decretz eurent ales,
El gens darmes portarent males,
Moines allarent a cheval,
En ce monde abunda tout mal.
For eight centuries the authority of Isidor and Ingilram
was unquestioned, save by bold heresiarchs such as Wickturned into coin. Few popes have left a better reputation than Calixtus
II., and yet the history, recorded by an eye-witness, of the negotiations for
the elevation of Compostella to an archbishopric, reveal a cynicism of
venality almost incredible. Diego Gelmirez, who sought this promotion for
his see, opened negotiations by sending 200 ounces of gold taken from the
tablets of his altars. This was stolen on the road, when he sent 100 more,
of which only 50 reached its destination. He then forwarded a casket of gold
weighing nine marks and a large amount of coin to Calixtus, who had meanwhile succeeded to Gelasius II. His cautious envoy, finding Calixtus hesitate,
only gave him 20 ounces and reserved the rest. Finally Calixtus acceded,
on condition of receiving the reserved funds with 260 marks of silver in addition. To obtain this, the church of Compostella was stripped of its ornaments, and to convey it safely it was confided to some ecclesiastics proceeding to the Crusade, each man receiving absolution of a year of penance for
every ounce of gold that he should succeed in carrying safely. The money
was duly paid, when Calixtus complained that his gold casket was partly
silver, and demanded 20 ounces of gold to make it good; his chamberlain,
moreover, declared that of 200 ounces of gold received one-fourth had proved
to be base metal, so that the exhausted archbishop in expectation was obliged
to furnish 70 ounces more. The narrator of this tissue of swindling simony
relates it all with the utmost composure, as a matter of course, only interrupting his narrative occasionally to express his admiration of the virtues of
the popes who thus sold their spiritual privileges, and of the archbishop who
was so liberal in his bribes (Ilist. Compostell. Lib. II. cap. 4, 6, 10, 16, 20).
The naive account given by Guibert de Nogent (De Vita Sua, Lib. III. cap.
4), of the confirmation by Paschal II. of Gaudri's election to the see of
Laon, in 1107, is an equally instructive illustration of the barefaced plundering and venality with which the papal court exploited the power it had
obtained over the episcopal office. Perhaps the most significant illustration
of the money value of the papacy, however, is the fact that among the documents connected with the proposed canonization of Henry VI., of England,
towards the close of the fifteenth century, is a memorandum of the expenses
connected with obtaining a place in the calendar of saints, amounting in all
to 783 ducats-the first item being a fee to the pope himself of 100 ducats!
(Wilkins, Concil. III. 639.)
THE FALSE DECRETALS. 53
liffe, who had come to an open rupture with Rome;' nor,
when antiquarian research began to discover the anachronisms with which the forgeries were filled, did the church
abandon her champions. The learning of Blondel, it is
true, silenced his adversaries, but the Decretum Gratiani
could not be mutilated, and the true and the false continued
to appear in inextricable juxtaposition. It is not the least
of the troubles of an infallible church that it cannot decently abandon any position once assumed. Having received the False Decretals as genuine, and having based
upon them its claims to universal temporal supremacy,
when it was obligled to abandon the defence of the forgeries
it was placed in a shocking'ly false position. To Ihave
indorsed a lie, from the ninth to the eighteenth century,
was bad enough, but to give up the fruits of that lie, so
industriously turned to profitable account, was more than
could be reasonably expected of human nature, and accordingly we have been authoritatively informed within the
last few years that the church claims still as its undoubted
right all the power and prerogative that it ever enjoyed or
exercised.2 To maintain a position so extravagant it is
requisite to prove that the teachings of the pseudo-Isidor
are in accordance with the history and discipline of the
primitive Apostolic church, and that they were in no way
innovations on the order of things established at the time
of their production. Intrepid controversialists have been
found ready to defend even this desperate position.3 They
Among the Wickliffite errors condemned at the Council of Constance,
was —" Decretales epistolm sunt apocryphe, et seducunt a fide Christi; et
clerici sunt stulti qui student eos." —Artic. Condam. Jo. Wickliff. No. 38
(Concil. Constant. S. V.).
o Among the damnable errors defined in the Syllabus of Dec. 1864, is that
which teaches that " Romani pontifices et concilia cecumenica a limitibus
sum potestatis recesserunt, jura principum usurparunt"' (Syllab. No. xxiii.).
3 D. Georg. Phillips (Kirchenrecht, 1851) assumes this, and draws from
it the conclusion —" Pseudo-Isidoricam collectionem ingenuis juris fontibus
indebite annumerari'' (ap. Denziger).
5S*
54 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
do so by attempting to prove that the pseudo-Isidor was
not compiled until the year 850 or later, and that it was
not known in RIome until long afterwards. The effort is
then made to show, from the acts of Gregory IV., Leo II.,
Nicholas I., and other pontiffs, that the same principles
were in force at a time when the popes are assumed to be
ignorant of the existence of Isidor, and that, therefore, the
latter had no influence in establishing those principles.
There are several gaps in this chain of argument, of which
it will be sufficient to observe that it takes no cognizance
of the fact that the canons of Ingilram existed in the eighth
century; that the principles therein enunciated are nearly
identical with those of the pseudo-Isidor; and that, as soon
as the strong hand of Charlemagne lost its terrors, those
principles became gradually prominent, to be fully invoked
when the tumults of civil war were over.
To show how great was the revolution occurring about
the period when the forgeries appeared, and how intimate
was the connection between those forgeries and the changes
which they were so well designed to create, will require a
detailed examination into a few points relating to the
mutual dependence of the secular and clerical power before
and after the dissemination of the Isidorian doctrines. It
will, I think, be found that the coincidence between the
appearance of the forgeries and the change in the status of
the church is so remarkable that the much-abused argument, post hoC, propter hoe, may fairly be applied to them
as respectively cause and effect.
The lapse of a thousand years has well-nigh obliterated
all traces of this revolution in the relative position of the
secular and ecclesiastical powers. In the new order of
things, the principles then established became the especial
prerogative of the class which controlled all learning and
education; and as those principles claimed obedience only
as founded in divine law, and as in force fromn the earliest
beginnings of Christianity, evidence of their novelty is
THE CHIURCH AND THE STATE. 55
not to be looked for on the surface of monkish chronicle
or papal decretal. It is only by a somewhat minute investigation of laws and canons, and by a comparison of
individually trivial details, that we can roughly trace the
outlines of the struggle and see the origin of those theories
of ecclesiastical superiority which left so profound an impress on the Middle Ages, and which have in no slight
degree moulded our modern civilization.
I should perhaps add that two of the questions thus
presenting themselves for investigation have required so
much space for their consideration, that it has seemed best
to detach them from the rest of the g'roup, and present
them in the form of separate essays on the immunity
claimed by the clergy from secular jurisdiction, and the
use made by the church of its power of excommunication.
THE CHURCH AND THE STATE.
It has been inclicated above that the Carlovingian polity,
inheriting the traditions of the elder empire, rendered the
church completely subordinate to the state. When, indeed,
the monarch regulated the internal affairs of the ecclesiastical establishment, he was only exercising his undoubted
prerogative. The kingly office conferred this authority
even upon the Arianism of the Wisigothic kings, for the
preface to the council of Agde in 506 declares it to be
convened by the permission of Alaric II., and its first
business was to offer up prayers in gratitude for allowing
it to assemble.l The fiesh Christianity of Clovis enjoyed
similar power. An address to him by the council of Orleans in 511 shows that he had convoked the prelates, that
Concil. Agathens. ann. 506, Pirefat.
56 THE RISE OF THIE TEMPORAL POWER.
he presented to them the subjects for discussion, and that
its canons required his confirmation to become authoritative.1 One of these canons, moreover, prohibits the entrance into the church of any layman without the permission
of the secular government.2 The preface to the canons of
another council, held at Orleans in 554, indicates in a similar manner the dependence of the church on the legislative
function of the state.3 A century later there was an attempt
made to escape from this subjection, but it was promptly
repressed by Sigebert II., who laid clown the rule, in
express terms, that no council should be held without his
permissionl; and he consequently forbade the assembling
of one which had been convoked, for the single reason that
his assent had not been asked.4
Charlemagne, concentrating in his Own person both the
Roman and the Frankish traditions, issued his rescripts
on ecclesiastical matters with fully as much authority as
when legislating for concerns purely secular. Adelhard
of Corbie, one of Louis le Debonnaire's chosen counsellors,
has left us a description of the procedure customary at
the assemblies of the Franks, by which we learn'that the
prelates and the nobles sat separately to debate the affairs
appertaining specially to each class; that the capitu!laries
or laws were submitted to them by the emperor for debate,
but that the emperor finally decided for himself, according
to the light thrown upon the subject. INo difference, either
in principle or practice, is therefore recognizable in the
treatment of ecclesiastical and of secular affairs, and as
both the initiative and the decision thus belonged to the
sovereign, his power over both was limited only by the
relations which chanced to exist at the moment between' Epist. Synod. Aurel. I. ann. 511. Ejuscd. can. 4.
3 Coinil. Aurel. V. ann. 554, Prooem.
4 Baluz. I. 101 (ed. Venet.) —" Ut sine nostra scientia conciliumn in regno
nostro not wagtur."
TH-IE CHIURCH AND TIIE STATE. 57
his subjects and himself.l Thus, throughout the whole
body of the capitularies, political and clerical regulations
are so intimately mingled that separation is almost impossible, showing that no thought of distinguishing them
existed at the period, and that no doubt was entertained
of the competency of the crown with regard to either.
We have already seen that the Roman pontiffs were the
subjects of Charlemagne, submitting themselves without
remonstrance to his jurisdiction. The church thus accepted
his sovereignty, and it was exercised impartially over all
ranks of the hierarchy. Alcuin exalts his power as superior in every respect to that of the popes and the Constantinopolitan emperors.2 Paulinus, Archbishop of Aquileia,
in an epistle to Charlemagne, exhorts him to a clue and
vigorous exercise of his authority over the internal affairs
of the church as well as of the state, pointing out certain
matters in the former as especially requiring his attention.3
Even on questions of faith and doctrine this secular power
asserted itself. The decisions of the council of Frankfort
in 794 did not acquire legal force until a capitulary, issued
in the sole name of the monarch, defined the exact amount
of veneration with which images were to be regarded.4
Perhaps, however, the most remarkable instance of his
spiritual authority is to be found in the manner in which
he forced upon the church the well-known alteration in the
Nicene creed, which placed Rome at so much disadvantage
in its contests with Constantinople.
The Nicene symbol, as modified by the First General
IHinemari Instit. Reg. cap. 34, 35. Hincmar alludes to Adelhard as
" inter primos consiliarios" of Louis.' Alcuini Epist. 4 (Canisii Thesaur. II. 392) —" cteris proefatis dignitatibus potentia excellentiorem, sapientia clariorem, regni dignitate sublimiorem.1"
3 Baluz. et Mansi Miscell. II. 11.
4 Carol. Mag. Rescript. de non adorandis imaginibus (Goldast. Const.
Imp. II. 2).
58 TIIE RISE OF TIIE TEMPORAL P-OWER.
Council of Constantinople and confirmed by that of Chalcedon, described the Holy Ghost as proceeding from the
Father. When the Spanish Wisigoths were converted fromi
Arianism, by some accident or oversight the confession of
faith which they adopted ascribed the procession of the
Htoly Ghost to the Son as well as to the Father.l Thus
altered, the symbol gradually spread from Spain into
France, and when Charlemagne took exception to the
proceedings of the Second General Council of Nicma concerning image worship, he also complained that the faith
had been vitiated by not adopting the Frankish creed in
this respect.2 Adrian I., in his answer to Charlemagne,
contented himself with proving from the fathers that the
council was right and the Frankish creed wrong.3 Charlemagne did not yield, and in 809 caused the matter to be
taken up by the council of Aix-la-Chapelle, which insisted
that the addition of " filioque" to the creed, as chanted in
the French churches, was the only Catholic doctrine,4 and
Charlemagne dispatched envoys to argue the matter with
Leo III., sending also a letter in which he insisted on the
correctness of his faith in this respect. Leo was too completely under the imperial domination to contest the point.
He admitted that to believe in the procession of the IHoly
Concil. Toletan. III. ann. 589; IV. ann. 633 (Harduin. III. 469, 579).
2 Lib. Carolin. Lib. III. cap. i., iii.-At the Nicene council, the Patriarch
Tarasius, in defining the faith, had admitted that the Holy Ghost proceeded
from the Father by the Son (Concil. (Ecum. VII. Act. iii.-Harduin. IV. 131).
Charlemagne insisted that it should be from the Father and the Son. The
council, in fact, only formally repeated the Constantinopolitan symbol, which
omits all mention of the Son (Act. vii. Ibid. p. 453-4) —o ix rouv craroc ixqr&Cuovsyovh-but the Latin versions have "q'cui ex Patre Filioqque procedit"
(Ibid. pp. 454, 747). Hardouin, while giving this interpolated version,
frankly admits that it is not so in the MSS., and that the only authority for
it is the assertion of Cardinal Julian at the Council of Florence (where this
point was fiercely argued between the Greeks and Latins) that he had seen
an old MS. with this reading (Ibid. p. 454).
H adriani PP. I. Epist. 52 (Ibid. p. 775).
J fartzheim Concil. German. I. 390.1.
TIIE CIIHURCII AND. THE STATE. 59
Ghost from both Father and Son was requisite for salvation; but, mindful of the anathema launched by the council
of. Chalcedlon against all who should impiously deem the
Constantinopolitan symbol insufficient and dare to change
it,l he refused to authorize the insertion of the words in
the creed, while, after considerable pressure, he agreed
that they might be taught and chanted-an unintelligible/
compromise with his conscience, elucidated, perhaps, b~
his action in having the unadulterated creed engraved onl
silver, in both Greek and Latin, and hung at the portal of
the basilica of St. Peter.2 Charlemagne trimnphed. His
form of the creed was publicly recited in the daily service
of the church throughout the empire, was finally adopted
by Rome itself, and, notwithstanding that it was the leading ostensible cause of the schism between the Eastern and
Western churches, has been adllered to with the tenacity
inseparable from infallibility.3
Louis le Debonnaire, notwithstanding his veneration for
the church, considered himself to be its head and ruler iin
no less degree than had Charlemagne. One of his edicts
addressed to the bishops assumes their episcopal authority
to be derived from him, and that he is personally responsible for their proper exercise of it.4 When his pious zeal
assembled the council of Aix-la-Chapelle in 816, to reform
the corruptions of the church, the stringent canons drawn
up to meet his wishes were promulgated under his authority; his commands enforced obedience to them, and any
infraction of them was punishable by him.' In 828, when
he ordered four councils of his bishops to be held in
various parts of his dominions to consult upon ecclesiastical matters, he instructed them that the results of their' Concil. Chalced. Act v. (1-Harduin. II. 454-5.)
Hartzheinm I. 391-6. —IIarduin. IV. 970 sqq.
3 Concil. Trident. Sess. III. Decret. de Symbol. Fidei.
Capit. Ludov. Pii, ann. 823, cap. 3, 4. Cf. Capitul. Lib. VI. c. 432.
Mirvei Cod. Donat. Piar. c. 13.
60 TIHE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
deliberations should be recorded by sworn notaries, and
not be divulged until the proper time, evidently because,
as he was unable to be present,- he did not wish them made
public until he should sanction them authoritatively; and
at the same time he gave his Uissi Dominici stringent
orders to examine into the lives of the bishops and clergy,
and report to him how they discharged their functions and
fulfilled their duties.l An Imperial Diet, indeed, boldly
affirmed that the emperor's power over the church was
superior to that of the pope himself.2
Even after the civil war, as late as 845, the bishops of
the synod of Thionville addressed Lothair, Louis, and
Charles, entreating them to remove the corruptions of the
church, for the governance of which they were responsible
to God.3 The tottering power of young Charles le Chaauve
still required that the canons of synods, relating solely to
church affairs, should be submitted to him for confirmnation, even as the sanctio of the Roman and Greek Emperors had been requisite to give effect to the dispositio of
the earlier councils. This was not an empty show of unmeaning deference, for on one occasion we find him annulling many of them with his simple veto;4 and in 847 the
Council of Mainz, in appealing to Louis le Germanique for
the confirmation of its canons, employs terms which show
that without it they had little prospect of obedience.5 The
successor of St. Peter. himself, had not yet thought of
escaping from temporal jurisdiction, for in the same year
Capit. Ludov. Pii, ann. 828.
o Imperialem maljestatem plus posse in administranda ecclesia quam pontificiam.-Goldast. I. 188.
3 Si.... ab hac eadem ecclesia, vobis ad gubernandum commissa, pro
qua ex ministerio regali reddituri estis Regi Regum rationem in die judicii,
tam multiplices ac perniciosas corruptionis pestilentias vultis amuovere
(Capit. Carol. Calvi, Tit. ii. cap. 1).
4 Capit. Carol. Calv. Tit. vII. The previous year the synod of Vernon had
suggested various laws respecting ecclesiastical matters to Charles, entreating their enactment (Baluz. II. 13-20).
5 Concil. Mogunt. ann. 847, can. xxxi. (IIartzheim, II. 160).
TH1E CHIURCHI AND THE STATE. 61
we find Leo IV. promilising implicit Obedience to the laws
of thle Emperor Lothair aind of his piredecessorsl1
Ingilhram and Isidclor, however, taught a doctrine very
different from this; and, when the time was ripe, their
authority was dutly brought forward to prevent all further
interference of royalty with sacerdotal legislation. As
early as 833, when Gregory IV. was summoned from Italy
by the sons of Louis to render their father's degradation
complete, and the pope could scarcely nerve himself to the
awNful task, Wala, Abbot of Corbie, the fierce promoter of
the rebellion, endeavored to strengthen his waverinog resolution by producing a collection of papal decretals proving
that the Vicegerent of Christ was empowered to judge
mankind, and was not to be judged of men.2 Gregory was
deliolghted at thus findino himself possessed of powers
hitherto unknown to the papal canonists, and was reacdy
enough to declare that the pontifical power was superior
to the imperial;3 but the son of Charlemagne, even in h-is
adclersity, was heir to too much traditional veneration for
such doctrines to obtain general currency. Gregory, in
spite of his new-found prerogatives, returned to Rome amid
i unseemly derision,4 and his pretentions remained practii De capitulis... vestris... irreflrsgabiliter custodiendis ac conservindis quantum valuinius et vareulus, Christi propitio, et nunc et in toyurm,
nos conservaturos modis omnibus profitenmur (Gratian. Decret. Dist. x.
can. 9).
2 Paschasii Radberti de Vit. Walm Lib. II. cap. 16. The terms in which
Paschasius recounts this and the comfort which these hitherto unknown decretals gave to the shrinking pope leave little doubt that they were the forgeries of Isidor. After describing Gregory's alarm at the threats of Louis's
bishops, he proceeds —' Unde et ei dedimus nonnulla sanctorum patrum auctoritate firmata, prsedecessorunque suorum conscripta, quibus nullus contradicere possit quod.. in eo esset omnis auctoritas beati Petri excellens et
potestas viva, a quo oporteret universos judicari, ita ut ipse a nernine judicandus esset."
Gregor. PP. IV. Epist. de Compar. Regirn. (Migne's Patrolog. T. 104,
p. 299.) Ile cadmitted, however, that lie himself was subject to trial and
judgment.
1Bincmari Epist. xxvii.
62 TIlE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
cally ill abeyance -until those who had provoked them were
ready to be their victims. In 845 appeared the Capitulaties of Benedict the Levite. This compilation purports to
contain the Carlovingian legislation digested in an accessible form, and was for the most part extracted from the collections of Riculfus of Mainz, the sponsor for the Isidorian
canons. The work of Benedict contains a large body of
genuine laws, thickly interspersed with extracts from the
new supposititious clocuments-principally from the canons
of Ingilram, thoulgh Isidor likewise furnishes a considerable number. The object of the whole is so evidently to,ive currency to the new doctrines that some critics have
been led to the conclusion that Benedict must also have
been the real author of the False Decretals.1 These Capitularies were unquestionably received'and used as authoritative, and such customs as they did not simply record
they assuredly did much to introduce and strengthen. In
them the principle is distinctly and repeatedly declared
that the imperial legislation is subordinate to the sacerdotal, and that in any conflict between them the former
must give way. Laws contrary to the decretals of the
popes or of other prelates are asserted to be null and
void;s the anathema is pronounced against any sovereign
who sets aside the canons;: and on tile authority of Pius I.,
an humble Roman bishop of the second century, the broad
assertion is made that the imperial law is to be controlled
by the divine law-a postulate capable of indefinite extension.4 That these were not merely assertions of a theoKnust is of this opinion, and Denziger labors hard to establish it. Of
Benedict's Capitularies, 57, being about five per cent. of the whole, are Isidorian.
Capitul. Lib. vii. c. 346 (Ingilram. cap. 39; Gratian. Dist. Ix. can. 4).
3 Capitul. Lib. vi. c. 322 (Ingilram. can. 80; Gratian. cans. 25, q. 1,
can. 11).
Capitul. Add. III. c. 17 (Gratian, Dist. x. can. 1). The application of
these principles can be traced with great clearness in Iceland, which was
converted after they had become firmly established. In 1053, within less
TILE CHURCH AND THE STATEI. 63
retical prlinciple, but that they were generally enforced and
practically admitted, will be manifest fronl various transactions alluded to hereafter, which show how completely
tile supremacy of royalty was set aside and the superiority
of the spiritual jurisdiction became established.
The recognition of the immunity of the ecclesiastical
body from all liability to the secular tribunals was one of
the principal incidents in this revolution. It forms so
curious an episode in the history of legislation, that its
proper consideration would carry us too far from our
present sulbject, and I therefore design to treat it in a
subsequent essay more at lenoth than would be suitable
here. Suffice it, therefore, for the present, to say that,
in defiance of all precedent, the clergy successfully emancipated themselves -fiom the jurisdiction of the secular
power, and established the principle that an ecclesiastic
could only be tried by ecclesiastics and be judged by
ecclesiastical law. Not content even with this, an attempt
was made to establish the superiority of the church in
another manner by claiming for it inviolable sanctity, so
that the humblest clerk could not even be accused by a
layman. This principle was too monstrous to be successful even in that age of ignorance, and the canons which
express it in the most unqualified manner are mingle(d
with others wvhose careful enumeration of the causes of
incompetency in witnesses shows that the more general
regulations were rejected by the common sense of mankintd.
than half a century after the establishment of Christianity, the sacerdotal
power was already strong enough to procure an enactment that whenever
the popular laws conflicted with the ecclesiastical, the former must give way
(Schlegel, Comment. in Grigels, p. xxiii.). This would seem even to be a
superfluous precaution in view of the fact that in the Li6gretto, or central
high court, when any difference was found to exist in the copies of the code
in the hands of the judges, those in possession of the bishops were held to
present the authentic text (Gr.gfls, Sect. II.).
C64 THE RISE OF TIlE TEMIPORAL POWER.
Bishops were especially the objects of this tender p recantion. As earlly as the fourth century a council of C-arthage
bhad forbidden the reception of accusations against bishops
on the part of disreputable personls, and the. council of
Chalcedon had repeated the prohibition.' At that period
such legislation only affected the internal regulations of
the church; but when the principle was interpolated in
the laws of Charlemagne, it assumed a vastly wider significance, and became applicable to temporal as well as to
spiritual matters.2 It is true that the episcopal dignity
had been protected from false accusations by a constitution
of Valentinian III. in 439, imposing a flue of thirty pounds
of gold as a penalty for such transgressions;3 but this severity was not imitated by the barbarians, and the church
could onlly defend itself by threatening excolnlmunication
in such cases, without appealing for aid to the secular
power. Ingilram, Isidorl and their followers, however,
took much higher ground. St. Clement was made to assert
that Christ had forbidden laymen from accusing their pastors.5 Evaristus, a popie of the fiast century, was authority
for the declaration that 1no bishop could be accused lby
the comlmolln people." Pius I. was cited to show that tihe
sheep slhall not reprove their pastor, nor the people accuse
their bishop, for the disciple is not above his master nor
the slave above his lorcd.7 Calixtus I. was miade responConell. Carthag. III. c. 7.-Concil. Chalced. can. 21.
Ctpit. Carol. Mag. I. ann. 789, ~~ 29, 34; Capit. ann. 794, ~ 34.
Const. 23, Cod. I. 3. 4 Concil. Agathens. ann. 506, c. 32.
Sed et laicos ab eorum accusatione et vexatione semper repellere debere
rogabat, et CUnctos sibi subditos esse prrlcipiebat.... Majores vera a oninoribus nec accusari nec judicari ullatenus posse dicebat.-Pseudo-Clemnent.
Epist. 1.
6 Non est a plebe vel a vulgaribus hominibus arguendus vel aceusandus
episcopus, licet sit inordinatus. -Pseudo-Evarist. Epist. 1 (Gratian. Caus. Ii.
q. 5, can. 1).
Oves pastorem snum non reprehendcant, plebs episcopumn non accuset,
nec vulgus eumll rgua.t, quoniamz non est disciptlus super mlgistrum, neque
servus supra dominum.-Pseudo-Pii Epist. 1 (Gratian. Cans. vi. q. 1, can. 9).
THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 65
sible for the rule that no accusations against prelates were
to be entertained, for children are not to reprove their
fathers nor are slaves to attack their lords;l and St. Cornelius was quoted to show that such accusations were null,
and were therefore harmless to the accused.2 This constant
repetition proves the importance attached to the principle,
and the persistent efforts made to obtain its recognition,
not only as applicable to prelates, but to the whole body
of the clergy. Clerical peccadilloes were declared to be
objects of toleration and not of punishment,3 and a canon
was adopted from Ingilram and Isidor which shielded
priests from all accusations brought by those whose virtue
and orthodoxy were not known and approved.4 Even this
was not enougll, and Ingilramrn produced a canon declaring
as a general principle that the evidence of a layman
against an ecclesiastic was never to be received;5 while
Isidor manufactured the proceedings of a council held in
Rome under Sylvester I., in 325, which repeated the canon
of Ingilram, with the addition that no layman should bring
a charge against a clerk.6 The former of these was formally promulgated as a rule of the church by the council
of Mainz in 847;7 while the latter is adopted in a law
Criminationes contra doctorem nemo suscipiat, quia non oportet filios
patres reprehendere, nec servos dominos lacerare.-Pseudo-C;lixt. Epist. 1
(lyon. Decret. P. v. cap. 234. Cf. Capitul. Lib. vi. c. 357; Lib. v. c. 315).
" Quoniamn tales accusationes vim non habent, neque eis nocere possunt.Pseudo-Cornel. Epist. 2.
3 Pastor ecclesim... pro reprobis moribus mnagis est tolerandus quanm
distringendus.-Pseudo-Anaclet. Epist. 5 (Remnig. Curiens. Episc. can. 17).
Quorum fides, vita, et libertas nescitur non possunt sacerdotes accusare.
-Ingilram. c. 16; Pseudo-Calixt. Epist. 2; Pseudo-Fabian. Epist. 2 (Capitul.
Lib. vI. cap. 359).
Testimonium laici adversus clericum nenro suscipiat.-Ingilram. can. 73.
6 Constitutum est ut nullus laicus crimen clerico audeat inferre... testin onium laici adversus clericumn nemno recipiat.-Pseudo-Sylvester. Cf.
Pseudo-Marcellin. Epist. 3.
Concil. Mogunt. ann. 847, can. 7.-This was, however, unsuccessful, for
another council of Mainz, a few years later, expressly adntsits sgcular accusers,
— Concil. Mogunt. ann. 851, can. 8.
G66 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
attributed to Louis-le-Ddb)onnaire in the Lombard code,
with a chanle which denied to clerks the power of accusing
laymen -thus separating the two classes entirely, and
placing them upon equal ground.' Impolitic as this might
be, it was at all events fair, and it accorded with another
passage in the forgeries,2 but though it subsequently became recognized to some extent, owing to the influence of
the Isidorian decretals33 yet tile clergy were not prepared
to surrender the power which they were rapidly acquiring
over the laity by the extension of their jurisdiction. The
Carlovingian policy employed them as an efficient instrument of civilization, and to deprive them of the right to
accuse would have been to deprive them of much of their
influence. The council of Mainz, in 813, made it the duty
of every priest, under penalty of degradation, to see that
tlhe misdeeds of his parishioners were d(uly punished;4 and
that this power was enlarged rather tha-n restricted will be
seen presently when we come to consider the jurisdiction
of the church.
The inviolability thus claimed for the clerical office was
not left entirely to theoretical declarations of principle.
Charlemagne had been induced to adopt one of the canons
of the Isidorialn council of Rome under Sylvester, according to which it was decreed that for the conviction of a
bishop the testimony of seventy-two witnesses was.requisite, while forty-four were necessary in'the case of a priest,
thirlty-seven in that of'a cardinal-deacon, and seven for
a sulb-deacon-all to be heads of families and professing
L1. Longob. Ludov. Pii Iv. (Lib. ii. Tit. 51, 1. 12.)
2 Pseudo-Fabian. Epist. 2.
Gratian. Cans. 2, q. 7, can. 6.- -In the twelfth century, Alexander IIIoTT.
laid this down as a general rule (Jaffe, Regest. p. 813) i and it seems to have
been in full vigor in the Scottish law. of the fourteenth century. "Approbatione, acquietatione, et testimonio repelluntur... c leripi contral laicos
et e converso." —Roberti I. Scot. Stat. II. cap. 34.
Concil. MIogont. ann: 813, can. 7.
THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 6 [
Christians.1 Louis le D)bonnaire issued a capitula'ry by
which any one offering insult or injury to a prelate was
forced to compound for his life, all his property was confiscated to the church, and in addition he was to pay to
the king the heavy fine of a triple "bannum,"? or sixty
solidi, with the proviso that if unable to make the payment,
he 1becalme a slave of the fise until he could do so-wh-lich
was probably for life.2 Benedict the Levite went even further. According to him, the accusation of a bishop was an
accusation of the ordinance of God, and the calumniator of
his bishop was a homicide, to be dealt with accordin gly.3
These claims were too exaoggcrated to be fully adcmiitted,
though they left their impress in some degree upon the
institutions of the middle ages.4 It was fortunate, indeed,
for the church, that they had not all the success desired
by their authors. The immunity acquired friom secular
jurisdiction was an efficient cause of the all-pervading corruption which eventually infected the church, and had it
been accompanied with immunity firom secular accusation,
the sacerdotal body, thus elevated into a supreme and
inaccessible caste, would have becorme so pestilential that
religion itself might have perished under the infliction, and
Capit. Carol. Mag. vi. ann. 806, ~ 23.-Ingilram. can. 72; Pseudo-Syl..
vester-though the numbers of the witnesses are not precisely the same. A
variation of this regulation occurs among the fragments attributed to Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, towards the close of the seventh century
(Thorpe, Ant. Laws, &c. of England, II. 73)., Capit. Ingelenheim. Lnudov. Pii, cap. 3.-I believe the anuthenticity of
this capitulary has never been called in question, and yet the whole of its
provisions are so'extravagantly in favor of the church that I am inclined to
regard it as supposititious, or at least interpolated.
Capitul. Lib. vII. cap. 167, 203.
In the tenth century, Atto of Vercelli, on the authority of the False
Decretals, asserts for the clergy as a right the immunity from secular accusantion (De Pressuris Eccles. P. I.); and St. Stephen of HI-ungary adopted the
principle as an absolute rule in his laws —" Testimonium laici adversus clericum nemlo recipiat."-Legg. S. Steph. IIung,. cap. iii.
68 THE RISE OF TIIHE TEMPORAL POWtER.
tile progTress of civilization might have been indefinitely
postponed.
While thus throwing off all subjection to the judicial
authority of the state, the church was making rapid progress in acquiring an important share in the general
administration of justice. The functions of the judge are
amonog the miost potential sources of influence, and a class
that can arrogate to itself; as a class-privilege, the rig'ht to
administer the law, has thereby secured to itself no small
portion of the government of the body politic. To comnbine this source of power with the ministrations of religion,
was to control the life, here and hereafter, of every mana prize worth striving for, and for which the ecclesiastics
possessed a favorable base of operations. In the early
days of Christianity, the church was a society of voluntary
cohesion, purified to a considerable extent of worldly and
nnruly elements by the fires of occasional persecution.
Even without the exhortations of St. Paul and the reproof
administered by him to those whose litigious propensities
brought them before heathen judges (1 Corinth. vi.), the
law of Christian love would naturally lead all members to
refer questions arising among themselves to the friendly
arbitration of the elders or bishops, and the prevalence of
this custom is shown by its continuance into the fifth century.' How perfectly natural was this rule at its origin, in
a society holding itself aloof from the institutions almong
which it was placed, is shown by the adoption of a sitmilar
regulation by the French Hug'uenots in the sixteenth century;2 and as long' as the church was thus isolated and
kept pure, there was little risk that any one would incur
the infamy of rejecting the decision of such an arbiter.
1 Constit. Apostol. Lib. II. cap. 49, 50. —Concil. Carthag. III. ann. 397,
can. 9.-Concil. Chalced. can. 9.
2 Synod of Saumur, ann. 1596, chap. iv. Art 35 (Quick, Synodicon in
Gallia Reformanta,).
TIHE CHUIRC H AND THE STATE. 69
WVlhen, however, the despised and oppressed sect grew ricll
and powerl'fid, and when, at length, dominant in the ejnpilre
it became the channel through which atvarice and ambition
might gratifyr their desires, the necessity arose of either
abandoninT the custom or of giving legal validitv to thle
episcopal judgments. Accordingly, a law of Arcadini s and
-onorius, in 398, declares that those who desire to refer
civil suits to the arbitration of bishops shall not be prevented from doing so; and another, in 408, renders final
the decisions in such cases, and directs the civil officials to
execute them.1 It will be observed that these regulatiollns
refer exclusively to powers of alrbitration conferred by the
consent of both parties; and where a prelate enjoyeed a
reputation for sagacity and piety. this arbitrative function
was extensively called into action. The complaints of St.
Augustine are well k]nown, that pleaclers ca-ne before him
in such numbers as sadly to interfere with his legitimate
spiritual dluties, and yet he had done his share in brinoging
a~bout this state of things, for he taught that litigation
between Christians was a sin, pardonable only on condition of being urged before an ecclesiastical judg e.2 His
contemporary, Synesius, was no less harassed with the
worldly character of the occupations in which he thus
found himself involved. Forced unwillingly to accept the
bishopric of Ptolemais, he inveighed particularly against
the judicial functions fastened upon him, which he regarded
as altogether incompatible with the religious duties of his
position, and he requested permission either to resign or
to have a coadjutor mlore fitted for the management of
civil affairs, a magistrate, apparently, being more wanted
than a priest.3 St. Martin of Tours, not long h efore, had
found an expedient for escaping, partially at least, these
interruptions of his pious meditations, for, until he had
1 Const. 7, 8. Cod. I. 4. 2 Augustin. Serm. cccLI. ~ 5.' Synesii Epist. 57.
70 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
celebrated mass each day, he kept himself secluded, and
delegated to his attendant priests the office of deciding such
af-tirs.l Silvanus, Bishop of the Troad, a contemporary
of Synesius and St. Augurstine, adopted the same system;
but he soon found that his priests were gaining filthy lucre
from the judicial powers thus delegated to them, and he
won mluch credit by substitutinog for them a layman of
approved character and experience, whose decisions gave
general satisfaction.2 It is evident that the custom was
widely prevalent.
All prelates, however, were not so disinterested as Silvanlus, and it is evident from his case that money was to be
made by abusing the public confidence thus reposed in the
episcopal character. That power and influence were likewise to be acquired is self-evident, and it is scarcely to be
supposed that the temptation was always resisted. Efforts,
indeed, were constantly macle to convert this friendly jurisdiction into a legal attribute, for Valentinian III., in 452,
found it necessary to put a stop to the discussion of the
sulbject by a constitution which expressly declared that
bishops could only exercise judicial functions with consent
of both parties;3 and Honorius had already felt called upon
to prevent the prelates from trespassing on the functions
of the courts by a law declaring that they had cognizance
of religious matters only, all secular actions belongiing to
the civil tribunals.4 Special cases, it is true, were occasionally referred to them by command of the monarch;5
antd Justinian conferred on them a certain amount of supervisory power. They were instructed to visit the prisons
weekly to see that the prisoners were not harshly treated,
and when interference was necessary they were instructed
1 Sulpie. Sever. Dial. mi. 2 Socrat. Hist. Eceles. Lib. vII. cap. 36.
N3 ovell. Valentin. llI. Tit. 35.
Lib. xvi. Cod. Theocl, Tit. 11, 1. 1. Cf. Tit. 2, 1. 23.' Theodorici Const. 67 (Goldtst. III. 49). Novell. 123, c. 21.
TIHE CIIHURCH AND THE STATE. ]
to report the matter to the Emperor.l Whien unreasonable
delay occurred, the plaintiff in a suit could appeal to his
bishop who might summon the judge to render speedy justice; if the pleader feared partiality he could demand that
the bishop should have a seat on the bench; if dissatisfied
with a judgment he could appeal to the bishop, who thein
heard the case as between judge and plaintiff, and could
condemn the former to make good any damage unjustly
inflicted on the latter, subject to an appeal to the Emperor.2
This power, thouogh not inconsiderable, was exceedingly
limited in its range, but the Western Barbarians were
much more ready to foster the judicial flunctions of the
church; and the alacrity with which this disposition was
welcomed is shown in the commands of St. Patrick to his
new converts to bring all their disputes for settlement to
the church, under penalty of expulsion.3 It is easy to
understand the causes which favored this extension of
power. The rude and imperfect ancestral codes of the Barbarians of course became rapidly unsuited to the wants of
the possessors of the fairest provinces of Rome, creating
the desire for a more complex system of law; and as every
manl was entitled to be judged by the customs of his race,
there must have arisen a confusion of jurisprudence elmbarrassing in the highest degree to the honest, but untutored rachinborg. The impatient Frank, when engaged in
litigation with a Roman, might disdain to submit to the
jurisdiction of a judge of the conquered race, and might
well prefer to lay his case before a bishop whom he regarded with deserved respect; while, on the other hand,
the Roman, in a quarrel with a Barbarian, would likewise desire the sentence of a judge whose decrees miglht
command obedielce when those of a compatriot might be
received with undisguised contempt. We can thus readily
understand the creation of an important voluntary juris1 Const. 22, Cod. I. 4. " Novrell. 86, cap. 1, 2, 4.
3 S. Patric. Synod. I. ann. 456, can. 21.
72 TIIE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
diction, of which the extent can be gathered from the
canons of the council of Tarragona as early as 51.6, forbidding the clergy friom hearing causes on Sundays, or fr'om
entertaining criminal actions, though permitting them at
other times to dispense justice in civil cases with the consent of parties;' while the eleventh council of Toledo, in
675, found it necessary to threaten deposition and perpetual excolimmunication against all ecclesiastics concerned
in rendering sentences of death or mutilationl —a caution
found also in the English canons. of the eighth century.3
The WTisigoths, indeed, were disposed to clothe their
bishops with very extended jurisdiction, copied with additions friom the legislation of Justinian and freed from the
check of the supervision of the sovereign. The laws of
Ricaswind, for instance, empower a plaintiff; who suspects
his judge of partiality, to demand the association of a
bishop with him on the benchl; when bishops were selected
as arbitrators their verdicts were rendered binding', and
the court that refused to execute them was visited witlh a
heavy fine; and, finally, they were authorized to reverse
all unjust (lecisions, either with or without the consent of
the judge.4 There is little evidence, however, that these
Concil. Tarracon. ann. 510, can. 4. " Concil. Toletan. XI. can. G.
Ecgberti Excerpt. cap. 156.
4 LI. Wisigoth. Lib. II. Tit. 1, 11. 23, 29, 30. The first and third of these
laws, by far the most important in the power conferred by them, are retained
in the Fuero Juzgo (Lib. II. Tit. 1, 11. 22, 28), showing how thoroughly the
power of the bishops survived the overthrow of the Gothic monarchy. Yet
unnder the influence of the revival of the Roman law, the judicial power of
the clergy declined there as elsewhere. The code framed in the thirteenth
century by Alphonso the Wise gives the bishops only an admonitory power
over the judges, and orders them to report to the king all unjust decisions
(Las Siete Particldas, P. I. Tit. 6, 1. 48). The same law forbids ecclesiastics
to preside in the adjudication of secular cases, " porque serie vergiienza de
se entremleter del fuero de los legos los que seflialadiemente son dados para
servicio de Dios" —except in certain matters, the careful enumeration of
which reveals consi(eralble jealousy of clerical encroachments. This perhaips was essential when even mlonks assumed judicial functions, and it
TIHE CHtURCIH AND THE STATE. 73
vast lrerogatives, which trenched so closely on tile royal
polwer had muchl practical effect in an age of turbulent
anarchy, though the reverence of legislators might leave
them a place on the statute-book. That they were an innovation on the ancestral customs of the race is shown by
the canons of the fourth council of Toledo in 6o3, not long
previous, in which the supervisory power of the bishops is
limited to the right of reporting to the kingo all arbitrary
perversions of justice; though another canon of the same
council attributes to the yearly provincial councils the duty
of hearing complaints against magistrates and men in
power, both ecclesiastical and secular.1
In France the same tendency to rely upoin the church to
correct the abuses of the secular courts is seen in an edict
of Clotair I. in 560, which directs that in the absence of the
king the bishops shall reprove the judges for any unjust
sentences, in orlder that on further investigoation the wrong Y
may be made right?.2 This, if generally enforced, must
have given to the church a very extensive appellate jurisdiction, which could readily be made the instrument of
immense influence; but that the stricter churchmeln regarded the exercise of judicial functions as incompatible
with thle ecclesiastical character is shown by Gregory of
Tours, who reproaches Badegesilus, the unclerical bishop
of Le Mans, with sitting -as associate judgoe in secular tribunals-evidently considering such proceedings to be as
iregular as the military exploits of that rapacious prelate.3
became necessary to prohibit such violation of their vows (Ibid. P. III. Tit.
4, 1. 4). That this was not uncalled for is shown by its retention in the
Ordenamiento dle Alcal[a, a subsequent body of law remaining in force until
the latter half of the fifteenth century.
C1 oncil. Toletan. IV. can 31, 3. " Const. Chlot. ann. 560, ~ 6.
3 Greg. Turon. Hist. Lib. vIII. cap. 39. The Welsh law also pronounced
ecclesiastics incapable of acting as judges (Dimetian Code, Bk. II. Chap. viii.
12S). HIow thoroughly the views of the church in regard to this became
altered in the course of time, and how completely the opposite prilcilleo
became engrafted on the institutions of ChristendoLm, are well illustrated by
74 TIIE RTISE OF TIIE TEMPORAL POWER.
About this time we also find the church laying hold of
an extensive sphere of jurisdiction, which could not but
prove greatly conducive to the enlargement of its power
and influence. Its duties of charity and benevolence rendered it naturally the protector of the unprotected. The
widow, the orphan, the freedman, who had no other friend,
would look to the minister of Christ for the assistance to
be vainly expected elsewhere in a busy and turbulent world,
and the church would be false to its teachings if it neglected
the cry of the oppressed and friendless. Accordingly, we
find Gregory the Great instructing his legates and bishops
to see that justice was done to these classes of society, in
a manner which shows that he must have been frequently
appealed to, and that throulghout Italy and the Islands an
extensive ecclesiastical jurisdiction was springing up in
civil suits of this nature.1 The same process was developing itself even more rapidly in France, for, in, 585, the
second council of IMacon was able to express as a received
principle of jurisprudence that, in suits involving the right
of freedmen, secular judges had no jurisdiction, and that
where orphans and widows were concerned the judge must
give notice to the bishop, who should himself sit, or send
a deputy to preside along with the civil mlagistrate.2
the long line of ecclesiastical Chancellors of England, extending from the
Saxon period beyond the Reformation, and even into the seventeenth century in the person of Bishop Williams. A relic of it, indeed, is still seen in
the strangely incongruous functions of the Anglican bishops as members of
the House of Lords —the High Court of Justice of the realm. I may add
that the earliest Icelandic code extant, the GrtigS.s, compiled about 1118,
nearly a century after the conversion of the island, shows the bishops as a
portion, e: oficio, of the Liigretto, or chief central court (Grigds, Sect. II.),
besides which they had a limited jurisdiction in their respective districts
(Ibid. Sect. v. Tit. 31). In France this extension of ecclesiastical functions
was checked by Philippe le Bel, who declared clerks to be incapable of acting
as judges for the very good and sufficient reason that the immunity enjoyed
by them rendered them irresponsible for abuse of power (Les Olihm, T. II.
p. 269).
Gregor. PP. I. Lib. I Epist. 13, 61, 62, 63; Lib. II. Epist. 5.
2 Concil. Mlatiscon IT. ann. 585, can. 7, 12.
TIE CHTURTCII AND TI-E STATE. 75
All this passed away ill the anarchy,which accompanlied
the downftall of the AMerovingians, andT was sedulously
avoided in the Carlovingian reconstruction. Any traces,
indeed, that mig(hIt have remained mnust soon have beenc
destroyed by the system of Missi Dominici, which formed
so prominent a feature of' the civilizing and centralizing
institutions of Charlelagne. Any secular jurisdiction
remaining to the bishops nmust have been limited solely to
fiiendly arbitration; and even this the intelligent jealousy
of the emperors was desirous of abolishing, for there is a
capittlary forbidding any one to select ecclesiastical judges
whlen there was a secular tribunal accessible, even if both
parties consented.l It is true that Charlemagne in 813
directed the bishops to inquire, in their diocesan visitations, into all crimes committed within their boundaries,
but he was careful not to accompany this with any authority for trial or punishment.2 The only judicial power,
therefore, remaining was that whiclh frequently attached
to territorial possessions, by which the vassal, whether
laynman or ecclesiastic, had the privilege of administering
justice within his own domains.3 This was a very ancient
privilege, being alluded to in an edict of Childebert I. in 595,
and in one of Clotair II. in 615, while a charter of Clhilperic
II. in 717 declares that all donations from the royal fise
carry with them this imm unity fiom public jurisdiction,
thus ygiving rise to the seignorial "' droits de justice" of the
feudal system.> This privilege, though it conferred the
Capitul. Lib. v. c. 387.-It is evident from this that the claause "ut
episcopi justitias faciant in suas parochias" (Capit. Carol. Mag. ann. 794,
~ 4) refers only to ecclesiastical questions, which, indleedl, may be gathered
fromn the context itself.
" Calpit. Clarol. Mag. Il. ann. 813, cap. 1.
3 See Marculf. Formul. Lib. I. No. 3, 4, 14, 16, 17, etc.' These grants not unfrequently took a wider range, and in process of time
contributed powerfully to render the hierarchy a class of feudal lords. Thus,
in 848, a grant froIm the Emperor Lothair investecd John, Bishop of Trieste,
with all the imperiali rights in that city and in its territory for a. circuit of
76 THE RISE OF TIIE TEMPORAL PO'WER.
power of life and death,l was exclusively a private right,
and, however extensive the possessions of the church mi-lht
be, it was far inferior to the public supremacy ainmlei at
by the authors of the forgeries. [oreover, Charlemlagne,
finding that it interfered with his civilizing efforts, and
that the ecclesiastical benefices were converted thronugh it
into asylums for malefactors, restricted it, in his additions
to the Salic law in 803, by giving to the imperial officials
the right to pursue criminals taking refuge in such territories, with heavy penalties -for all attempts at opposition.2
To obtain for the church, as a recognized right, the
power to administer justice, might well appear to the fabricators of Ingilramn and Isidor an. advantage worthy of
serious effort. It might seem conferred by the broad plerogatives contained in the forged donation of the Western
Empire by Constantine to Sylvester; but that document
claimed too much, and had thus far been treated with
silent contempt. lRecourse was therefore had to a source
of undisputed authority, wherein the presumable ignorance
of laymen might allow falsification to escape detection.
The Theodosian code was held in great irespect throughout
the West, where the legislation of Justinian was comparatively little known. The Wisigoths had even abandoned
nmuch of their ancestral jurisprudence in its favor, and, as
the basis of all law for the populations not strictly Barbarian, it was the " Lex Ptomana qum est omniumr humanarum mater legumni.'3 In this august and authoritative code
three miles, conveying not only the revenues from toll and tribute, but also
the sole jurisdiction in all suits (Liinig, Cod. Ital. Diplom. I. 2489). It was
thus that the central power was parcelled out and the feudal system established.
In some places the clergy were carefully excluded from these privileges.
Thus, the Welsh laws provided that when an ecclesiastic was entitled to a
place on the bench in consequence of territorial possessions, he must leave
it before the rendering of the sentence.-Dimetian Code, Book II. chap. viii.
~ 132 (Owen's Ancient Laws, &c. of Wales, I. 479).
Capit. Carol. Mag. IV. ann. 80), ~ 1.
o Ejusd. Capit. II. ann. 803, ~ 2. 3 Capitul. Addit. iv. cap. 100.
-TIIE CHURCHII AND THIE STATE. 77
a bold interpolation was effected by insertingo amid laws
directly opposite in their tenor, one which authorized either
party in a suit, at any stage of the proceedings, fiom the
first plea to the time of rendering the verdict9 to take the
affair out of court and place it in the hands of a bishop,
even against the protest of his adversary; and the decision
of the holy prelate was to be without appeal, and to be
held inviolate through all time. This monstrous perversion
of justice was then transferred to the capitularies, where
it was prefaced in the nmost solemn manner as having been
adopted by the emperor, with the consent of his subjects,
as part and parcel of the law of the land, binding on all
the nations which owed obedience to the Carlovingian
sceptre.' The False Decretals enforced its application by
Capitul. Lib. vI. cap. 366.-Historians have generally admitted the
genuineness of Charleimagne's promulgation of this regulation. No original
capitulary, however, has been found containing it, nor is it embodied in
the authoritative collection of Ansegise; while its direct opposition to the
leading principles of the Carlovingian policy is, I think, evidence sufficient
to condemn the imperial sanction, as well as the forgery which it indorses.
The latter still occupies its place in the Theodosian Code, and the demonstration of its falsity was reserved for the learned Godefroy, in the seventeenth
century (Lib. xvI. Cod. Theod. Tit. 12).
It thus passed current throughout the middle ages, and was mainly relied
on in 1329 by the bishops when they resisted the efforts of Philip of Va.lois
to curtail the extensive and profitable jurisdiction of the spiritual courts.
They boldly affirmed, indeed, that it was irrepealable-'" imo est privilegiuml
honorabile, toti ecelesive concessum, quod imperator tollere nonl potest, ut
nec alias ecclesis libertates" (Bertra.ndi contra P. de Cngneriis Lib.).
The wide extent of this jurisdiction may be conceived from the limitations
imposed on it in 1464 by Matthias I. of Hiungary-'" Praiter factum testamenti, matrimonii, dotull et rerum pa.raphernaliarulm, perjurii, verberationis
et spoliationis clericorulm et mulieruml, ac priater illas ali as causes qumo prophanwm non essent, in foro spirituali nulla, causa tractetur" (lBatthyani Legg.
Eccles. Hung. I. 503). This was repeated in 1492 by Vladislas II. (Legg.
Uladis. II. c. 14).
Until the revival of the civil law, there can be no question that this extension of ecclesiastical jurisdiction was in the main a benefit to humanity;
but one great source of evil inherent in it was that the papal court constituted a, tribunal of last resort, to which cases could alwnys be carrliecd
by appeal. In process of time this came to be done even froml the secular
7*
78 TIlE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
directing that all questions should be submitted to the
church for adjudication, and that every one feeling himself
wronged should have full liberty of invoking the ecclesiastical tribunals, which would see that he was righted.1
When such doctrines were successfully advanced, it is
no wonder that the text " Spiritualis autem judicat omnia;
et ipse a nerine judicatur"7 (1 Co7'inlth. ii. 15) could be
advanced as a maxim of law, showing that the ecclesiastic
was empowered to judge all men and all things, and was
himself to be judged by none2-and that this pretension
was lmeasurably successful is abundantly manifest. As
the royal power declined, it leaned more and more upon
the church for support. and endeavored to supplement its
waning judicial authority by intrusting it to the hands
of those who might have a better chance of obtaining
obedience by combining the respect due to prelates with that
due to judges. Tlus, in the extradition treaties made by the
sons of Louis le Debonnaire in 857 and 860, providing for
the capture and delivery of all criminals escaping from one
kingdomn to another, it is curious to note that reference
courts, for the authority of the pope was supreme over all human legislation.
The complaints of the council of Constance in 1414 (Concil. Constant. Art.
Reform. cur. Roem. No. vi., vii.) show that vast numbers of cases were thus
carried up by suitors dissatisfied with the decisions of local judges, forming
an abuse of no little magnitude. Yielding to the urgent solicitations of the
council, Martin V. in 1418 issued a decree promising that cases from the
secular courts should no longer be revised at RoIme, but he stoutly maintained his right to review the proceedings of all ecclesiastical tribunals
(Hartzheim. V. 137, 146). The extensive secular jurisdiction enjoyed by
them rendered this an evil keenly felt by the community, as the power
of' thus carrying suits to so distant:a point enabled wealthy pleaders to
dictate terms of settlement to poorer antagonists.
Quscunque ergo contentiones inter Christianos orta fuerint ad ecclesiam deferantur, et ab ecclesiasticis viris terminentur.-Pseudo-Marcellin.
Epist. II.
Omnis enim oppressus libere sacerdotum, si voluerit, appellet judicium,
et a nullo prohibeatur, sed ab his fulciatur et liberetur.-Pseudo-Anaclet.
Epist. I.` Capitul. Add. tII. c. 20.
TIHE CHI-IURCH AND THE STATE. 79
is made only to fugitives from episcopal sentencesl —as
though the functions of the royal courts had been virtually
suspended. This, indeed, almost seems to have been the
case. In 857 we find Charles le Chauve commanding that
all m alefactors throughout the kingdom —m urderers, burglars, robbers, thieves. oppressors, &c.-should be tried by
the bishops, and then handed over to the counts for punishment; while, to render this more efficacious, all priests
were directed to make out lists of the offenders in their
parishes, who were to be brought before the bishops if
recalcitrant under the efforts of their pastors.2 To make
this jurisdiction, if possible, more complete, at the synod of
Pontyon in 876 he invested the bishops with the authority
of royal 1fiissi in their respective parishes.3 Armed with
this power, and under cover of a forged decretal attributed
to Pope Euatychianus, a system of the most minute inquisition became established. In his visitations, the bishop
summoned before him in every parish seven good men and
true, who were sworn under the most solemn adjurations
to answer all questions without fear or favor. A series of
eighty-nine interrog'atories was then put to them as to the
commlission in the parish of all the offences against human
or divine law that the most perverse ingenuity could suggest. A more searching grand inquest could scarcely have
been invented, as it must have elicited all the rumors,
scandals, and surmises that floated around in each little
co mmlunity.4
The church thus absorbed, in theory at least, the whole
administration of criminal justice, with its overwhelming
influence; and, as if this was not sufficient, the power of
sitting in judgment on the king himself, and of deposing
C apit. Carol. Cal. Tit. x. c. 5; Tit. xxxI. c. 5 (Baluz. II. 65, 139).. Capit. Carol. Cal. Tit. xxIv. c. 3, 8.
3 Capit. Carol. Cal. Tit. XLVII. C. 12.
4 Reinon. de Discip. Eccles. Lib. ii. cap. 2, 3, 4, 5.-Burchard. Decret.
Lib. I: c. 90-94.
80 TIHE RISE OF THII TEMPORAL POWER.
him, was not only arlroatedi, but admitted. The sons of
Louis le lelonnaire had thus made use of the episcopal
authority as a stalking-horse in their parricidal chase, and,
with the increase of episcopal prerogative, the invention
returned to plague its inventors. Charles, guiltless in this
respect at least, is seen addressing his prelates in 859, even
in his hour of triumiph after the recovery of his kingdom:
6'I should not be dethroned, at least without being heard
and judged by the bishops, whose ministry consecrated me
as kilng, who are styled the thrones of' God, in whom God
resides, and througtl wrhonm He makes manifest His decrees.
To their paternal admonitions and punishment I amn ready
to submit, and now do submit myself."' This was the
acknowledgcment and legitimate application of the doctrine
attrlibuted by Isidor to the humble Clement, disciple of St.
Peter, commanding princes and peoples to render to priest
and bishop the same obedience as that rendered to God,
under the severest penalties in this world and the next.'
The legitimate result of these principles was seen, when,
in the thirteenth century, the secular lawgivers of Germany, friaming a code for the people, declared that the pope
is the fountain of justice, temporal as well as spiritual, and
that from him is derived the jurisdiction of emperors and
princes, who are bound to execute his decrees.3
Capit. Carol. Cal. Tit. xxx. c. 3.
a Pseudo-Clement. Epist. III.-Also Ejusd. pist. II. —; Quonialm qui eis
resistit, Deo resistit."-Nearly ts extravagant was the principle that the
laity should do nothing without the consent of their bishops. Strangers
were not to settle in a diocese, nor were the inhabitants to leave it, without
episcopal permission-"Animns vero eorum ei creditrt sunt; ideo onlnia ejus
concilio agere debent. et eo inconsulto nihil.' —Pseudo-Clement. Epist. III.
-Remnigii Curiens. Episc. can. 4, 5.
3 Specul. Suevic. Introit. ~~ 22, 23, 24. That this was extracted by the
compiler of the code froml the sermons of Berthold of Ratisbon (Alex. a
Daniels de Saxon Specul. Orig. p. 19), does not render it less an authorized
expression of the recognized doctrine of the period that the pope wss the
source of all human authority. It is somewhat singular, however, to observe
it in a code wherein the revivedc imperial juristprudence is quoted. In 135 we
THE CHURC0 AND THE STATE. 81.Alongside of the secular judicial power thus obtained,
there had gradually sprung' up a spiritual jurisdiction which
was even more potential and more lastiiie in its influence,
and which gave added terrors to the exercise of secular
justice by its command of the next world through the instrumlentality of the dreaded anathemlna. To give to this
important element in ecclesiastical authority the full consideration which it deserves would, however, lead us too
far from our prPesent subject, and it will therefore be treated
in a subsequent essay.
In the comprehensive struggle for independence and
supremacy, of which we have thus traced out some of the
details, but one point was wanting to release the church
from all subjection to the secular authority. As long as
the crown exercised the power of appointing to the high
places in the hierarchy, its control could not be entirely
shaken off, aFnd the inferiority of the ecclesiastic was inmplied as well as expressed. That an effort should be made
to get rid of the royal prerogative of investiture was therefore to be expected.
In the early period of the church the choice of its bishops
was made by popular election, the community as well as
the clergy enjoying the right of suffrage;l and in somne
places the people were held responsible for the misdeeds of
their prelates, because they not only chose them but had
the power to eject the unworthy.2 A certain amount of
concurrent supervision over the fitness of the aspirant was
also exercised by the neighboring bishops, owing to the
necessity of their ministry in the consecration.3 As these
find Bishop Alvarez Pelayo proving the same doctrine from the decretals —
that the emperor is merely the vicar of the pope, and derives from him all
his jurisdiction (De Planctu Eccles. Lib. I. Art. lxviii. No. I.).' Qui prlfuturus est omnibus ab omnibus eligatur. —Leon. PP. I. Epist.
10, cap. 6.
o Cyprian. Epist. 67 (Ed. Oxon).
3 Cyprian. loc. cit.-Concil. Lnodicens. can. 12, 13-Concil. Sardicens.
can. 6-Cf. Chlr. Lupi Scholion in Can. Nicmcn. 4 (Opp. 1. 239).
82 THE RISE OF THE TEMIPORAL POWER.
ven eral principles were everywhere establishedl it is hardcly
worth while to trace the vicissitudes to which they were
exposecl by time or accident, and while the Chlristians cOIntinued a poor and insignificant sect, unrecog'nized by the
law, or recognized only in persecution, no interference with
their choice of ecclesiastical superiors was to be expected
friom the secular magistrates. As the church became wealthy
and powerful, however, common prudence would dictate
to the sovereign the necessity of some colitrol over the
selection of those who were in reality high officers in the
state as well as spiritual dignitaries. While the minor
bishoprics thus might continue to be filled as of old by the
choice of the community, the powerful primatial sees would
naturally fall under the influence of the throne, and we
have seen that eventually the right of confirmation virtually amounted to the right of appointment in the case of
lim who was highest of all.'
The church thus paid the penalty of its worldly aspirations; and the temporalities to which it clung with such
tenacity weighed it to the earth and rendered it the subject of those whom it desired to. master. As its territorial
acquisitions increased, so grew the necessity of royal supervision and control over those who administered them.2
The tribute of military service owed by the lands was in
itself a sufficient reason for the king' to have some part in
the nomination of those who were to render it in person or' Odoacer stretched his prerogative somewhat when he demanded to be
consulted in advance-a presumption which was condemned after his overthrow (Synod. Roman. zv. c. 2), but which was apparently submitted to without remonstrance during his life.
" I have not space to enter upon the history of the territorial aggranndizemnent which rendered the ecclesiastical body so formidable a portion of the
feudal republic. The general facts are well known, and a detailed investigation would require a treatise in itself. A single instance will sufficiently
illustrate the result-that in the eleventh century the Abbey of Fulda held
fiefs which were bound to furnish to the imperial service no less than six
thousand well-app(,inted fighting men. Engelhus. Chron. ed. 1671, p. 199.
THE CHURCII AND THE STATE. 83
by proxy, and though Charlemagne forbade ecclesiastics
firom bearingo arms themselves he took care not to exempt
them from the duty of furlnishing their quota of troops.
The theory therefore was election by the diocese in general,
confirmation by the king, and consecration by the metropolittan and his suffragans; but the right of confirmation
implies the right of rejection, and tile latter, in the hands
of energetic or unscrupulous sovereigns, practically amounts
to the appointing power.
Scarcely had the Franks secured to themselves their
rapid conquest of Gaul when even the zealous piety of recent
conversion could not restlain them from assuming this
right of appointment in its most absolute form as a portion
of the royal prerogative; aind the repeated allusions of
Gregoory of Tours show that it was the rule and not tile
exception. Thus, in the important diocese of Tours we
find, in 520, the singular spectacle of two bisho*ps conjoined,
Theodorus and Proculus, by command of Queen. Clotilda.
In a little more than a year they are succeeded by Dinisius,
chosen by the king; and two years later the see is occupied
by Onmantius, by order of King Clodomir.l The bishoprics were -wealthy; the sovereigns were greedy, and it was
not long before thle royal prerogative was made a source
of revenue. As early as 517, when St. Quintianus was elected
by the people to the see of Auvergne, a certain Apollinaris
hastened to King Thierry, and by heavy bribes secured
the appointment in defiance of. the popular wish.2 It is
true that half a century later Gontran showed his independclence of such considerations when he indignantly rejected the presents offered to induce him to abandon his
intention of bestowing the see of Bourges on Sulpitius,s
but an incidental remark of Gregory of Tours in his life
of St. Gall of Clermont, indicates that simony was already
Greg. Turon. Iist. Franc. Lib. x. cap. 31; Lib. II. cap. 17.
Ibid. Lib. i.l. cap. 2, Ibid. Lib. vi. c. 39.
84 TIIE RISE OF TIIE TEMPORAL POWER.
becoming a recognized custom,l and the condemnation of
such practices by the Council of Orleans, in 549, shows
that they amounted to an evil of magnitude.? Even when
the nomination to bishoprics was not a matter of bargain
and sale, and when the forms of an election were preserved,
it was often nothing more than an acknowledged farce.
On the death of St. Gall of Clermont, about 550, a priest
named Cato was elected his successor. Theodebald the
king was a mere boy, and Cato ventured to assume the
episcopal functions without awaiting the royal confirmation. He quarrelled with and imprisoned his archdeacon,
Cautinns, who managed to escape and fled to the court,
where le found himself the first to announce the death of
St. Gall. Taking advantage of the opportunity lie procured the grant of the bishopric, and when Cato's messengers arrived to ask for confirmation, they found himl already
consecrated. TCautinus took possession of the see, but his
enjoyment of it was troubled by the partisans of Cato, and
to rid himself of the annoyance he procured for his rival
an election to the see of Tours on the death of Gunther in
555. Cato meanwhile had curried favor with Prince Chramnes and had received a promise that on the death of Clotair he should be reinstated in Clermont; so, when the
Tourangeois came to invite him, he hesitated to accept,
and they curtly told him to decide at once, as they had not
clhosen him of their own fiee will, but by order of the king.
Hie let them depart, when they elected Euphronius, and on
presenting his name for appointment to Clotair they were
sternly asked wliy they had disregarded his commands
with respect to Cato. The latter then applied again for
reinstatement in Clermont, but the king only laughed at
him.3
Greg. Turon. de. Sanct. Patr. cap. 3.
e Concil. Aurelianens. V. ann. 549, can. 10. This canon recognizes the
concurrent authority of the sovereign.
Greg. Turon. llist. Franc. Lib. Iv. cap. 5, 6, 7, 11, 15.
THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 85
Such habitual invasions of the primitive liberties of the
church were not submitted to without a struggle. A council of Paris, in 557, protested against the abuse of the royal
power, in a canon which directs that any appointee not
duly elected shall be refused ordination by the metropolitan and his suffragans, and that any episcopal traitor not
keeping the engagement shall be cut off from communion
with the rest.l How impossible it was to maintain this
resolution in opposition to the brute force of the Merovingian kings is exemplified by a transaction occurring a few
years later. A certain Emerius was installed as Bishop of
Saintes by order of Clotair I., under circumstances of peculiar irregularity, the king having dispensed with the services of the metropolitan in the consecration. At the death
of Clotair, the offended Archbishop Leontius, relying on
the presumable weakness of a new king, vindicated the
canon of Paris by assembling a synods deposing the intruder, and sending a new bishop-elect to Charibert for
confirmation. Royalty asserted its rights after its own
fashion. The unhappy expectant, Heraclius, was banished
after undergoing a savage punishment, Emerius was reinstated, and the Archbishop and his prelates were visited
with fines graduated to the utmost possibility of payiment
-and thus, says the historian, the king revenged the insult
offered to his father.l
Yet the endless struggle continued. In 615 a council
of Paris made another effort to achieve independence by
pronouncing null and void the consecration of any candidate not duly elected by the people and clergy, with the
approbation of the provincial bishops;3 but the attempt
was vain, for when Clotair II. gave legal validity to the
canons by publishing them in a royal edict, he introduced
a clause excepting the royal courtiers from the effects of
s Concil. Paris. III. ann. 557, can. 8.
Greg. Turon. Hist. Franc. Lib. iv. cap. 26.
Concil. Paris. V. ann. 615, can. 1.
8
86 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
the prohibition.' The clergy some ten years later gathered
courage to return to the attack, and at the council of
Rheims, in 625, reaffirmed the canon of Paris, with the addition that only inhabitants of a diocese were eligible to its
episcopate-apparently with the view of precluding the
nomination of courtiers-and moreover suspension for
three years was threatened against all who should assist in
the consecration of any one not regularly elected under
these conditions.2 Of how little avail was this we learn
firom a precept of Dagobert I., in 630, conferring the see of
Cahors on Didier his treasurer, who was not even in orders
at the time. It speaks, indeed, of the consent of the people
having been given, but not of their having elected the canclidate; and the terms of the act itself, as also of the order
to the archbishop to consecrate the nominee, are those of
a master exercising his pleasure without a doubt as to its
legality.3 Still the clergy did not abandon the field, ancl
the canon of Paris was re-enacted by the council of Chaions, in 649;4 but the tendencies of the age were against
them, and even Marculfus, in g'iving the formulas for
such occasions, couches them in terms of absolute royal
command, with no allusion to any elective franchise having
been exercised in favor of the recipient, thoupglh a forlnula
of petition from the people asking the approbation of the
king shows that the right of election was occasionally
admlitted in strict subordination to the will of the sovereign.5 A passage in the Bavarian code, revised under
I)agobert, would also indicate that the practice was similar in the Christianized portions of Germany.6 In Spain,
1 Edict. Chloth. II. ~ 1. " Concil. Remens. ann. 625, can. 25.
3 Dagoberti Pracceptum (Bnalz). Didier evidently considered himself indebted to the king and not to the people for his bishopric, when he addresses
DDagobert-" Cadurche ecelesive cui (Deo auctore) ex jussu vestro prm-sideo"'
-Epist. Francor. 41 (Freher. Corp. I-list. Franc.).
" Comcil. Cabillon. ann. 649, can. 10.
a Marculf. Lib. I. No. 5, 6, 7. G L. Baioatr. Tit. I. cap. 11, 1~ 1
TI-E OEtIIROI-I AND TI-E STATE. 87
not long afterl a canon of the twelfth council of Toledo,
held in 681, allowing no right of suffrage whatever to either
clergy or people, shows that the royal power of nomination
was even recognized and admitted by the church.l The
resistance of the Gallican clergy to the prerogative of the
crown also ceased when the anarchy under the Mayors of
the Palace secularized the church and well nigh obliterated
all Christian observances. Charles Martel bestowed without scruple the richest episcopates as prizes on his ruggecld
warriors;2 and when Boniface, as papal legate, undertook
with Carlomnan and Pepin to restore the religion of France,
not only was the royal power of appointment fully recognized by the synods of Leptines and Soissons, but the
mayors were empowered to bestow for a time a portion of
the temporalities of the church to reward their soldiers.'
Boni-face hinmself, the most uncompromisi ng advocate of
ecclesiastical privilege, received the archiepiscopal see of
Mainz from Ihis royal patrons.4
As Charlemagne thus by tradition and prescription had
the right of investiture with respect to all ecclesiastical
dignities, the much-disputed grant of this prerogative by
Adrian in 774 could only serve as a confirmation and not
as a source of the power.5 At all events, he was not disConcil. Toletan. XII. can. 6.
P Religio Christianitatis prone fuit abolita: ita ut episcopis in paucis locis
relictis, episcopia laicis donata, et per eos rebus divisa, exstiterint-llincnsar. Vit. S. Remino. Praef.
3 Lupi Ferrar. Epist. 81. 4 S. Ludgeri Vit. S. Bonif.
5 According to Gratian, Adrian not only gave, as mentioned above (p. 33),
the right of choosing the popes, but also that of confirming and investing all
bishops-" Insuper archiepiscopos et episcopos per singulas provincitas ab
eo investituranm accipere definivit: et ut nisi a rege laudetur et investiatur
episcopus a neriine consecretur" (Gratian. Dist. 63, can. 22).
This expression so exactly suited the pretensions of the emperors in their
quarrel with the popes over the question of the investitures that it has a
somewhat suspicious appearance of fabrication at a time when neither party
hacl much scruple in manufacturing documents to serve their purposes. It
is no wonder, therefore, that Baronius (Ann. 774, No. 10-13) rejects it with
88 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
posed to allow his prerogative to become obsolete, and the
terms in which he is addressed by Leidrad, Archbishop of
indignation, pronouncing it a moral impossibility, and asserting that as
Sigebert of Gemblours (Chronog. ann. 773) is the earliest authority for the
story, it must be an invention of his to assist the imperialist party, which he
favored. At first sight this argument is specious, but the cardinal forgot its
presence in the Panormia of St. Ivo of Chartres (Lib. vIII. cap. 135) anterior
to Sigebert-and neither Ivo nor Gratian was likely to gratuitously depress
the sacerdotal authority. Albericus Trium Fontium, whose assertions are
of weight, on account of his careful selection of authorities, many of whom
have not come down to us, gives the same statement from a certain Elimandus, and refers to Gratian for confirmation (Alberic. Chron. ann. 775). Martin
of Fulda, a writer of the fourteenth century, alludes to it as an undisputed
fact, but assumes that the grant was merely special and temporary, and subsequently withdrawn (Martin. Fuldens. Chron. sub. Gregor. VII.). Jordan,
an Italian chronicler of the same date, likewise assumes its truth (Chron.
Jordani, cap. 218, Partic. 2). During the quarrels between the popes and
the emperors on the subject of the investitures, it was freely invoked as
authority by the imperialists (Walthram. Episc. Neuenburgens. de Invest.
Episc. ann. 1106). In modern times, Baluze, whose orthodoxy is I'believe
admitted, alludes to it as incontestable (Vit. Mauric. Burdin. cap. 16-ap.
Miscellan.); but Peter de Marca pronounces it supposititious, and supports
his opinion with reasons much sounder than those of Baronius (De Concord.
Sacerd. et Imp. Lib. viII. cap. 12).
In 806 we find Leo III. treating Charlemagne's prerogative in these appointments as a matter of course (Leon. PP. III. Epist. I. ap. Cod. Carolin.),
and a century later the authenticity and binding force of the grant itself were
admitted by John X. when intervening in the quarrel between Hilduin aInd
Richarius, contestants for the see of Tongres, in 921, for he expressly states
that Charles the Simple had the right of appointing bishops " sicut priores
suOS antecessores, nostrorum antecessorum auctoritate" (Hartzheim. Concil.
German. II. 597). The very points which seem incredible to Baronius are
included in a similar grant made to Otho the Great by Leo VIII. in 963
(Gratian. Dist. 63, can. 23.-Iron. Panormt. Lib. vIII. cap. 136); and though
Leo is commonly reckoned as an antipope, notwithstanding that he is counted
in the pontifical series, still his bull is incontestably genuine, and as it contains a reference to the previous grant by Adrian-" ad exemplum beati
Adriani sedis apostolici episcopi"-it carries the affirmation of Adrian's act
nearly to the end of the second century from its date. Even before the condemnation of John XII. and elevation of Leo VIII., the Romans had taken
an oath to Otho patterned on those exacted by the earlier Carlovingi:ans"nunquam se papam electuros aut ordinaturos printer consensume et electionem domini imperatoris Ottonis C'esaris Augusti, filiique ipsius regis
THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 89
Lyons, show that he was reygarded as the unquestionablle
dispenser of episcopal preferment.' Whein, therefore, in
803, he granted to the people and clergy of the dioceses
the right of electing their bishops, he did it in terms which
imply that it was a favor of the imperial grace, and not a
simple acknowledgment of a pre-existing privilege. That
it was so regarded is shown by its repetition being procured from Louis le De'bonnaire in 816, shortly after his
accession.2 As there is no allusion in these capitularies
to the imperial assent being required, it has been assumed
Ottonis" (Liudprandi Hist. Otton. cap. 8). }Iow complete was the supremacy
exercised by the Saxon emperors is shown in a charter of Otho III. to Silvester IL, in 999, wherein he remarks: "Dominunm Silvestrum magistrum
nostrum papam eligimus, et Deo volente, ipsumn serenissimum ordinavinns
et creavimus" (Migne's Patrolog. T. 148, p. 840).
At the most, the privileges granted by Adrian were little if any more than
the traditional right possessed by the sovereign of Italy, and the grant itself
was rather a recognition of Charlemagne as king of Italy th'an the specific
donation of power. We have seen how Odoacer and Theodoric and Theodatus exercised it without scruple, Arians as they were, and how the Catholic
emperors of Constantinople followed their example when they fell heir to
the Gothic kingdom —at least with respect to the right of confirmation and
rejection. To minds familiar with a custom of such long duration, it might
readily seem that the protection so earnestly craved at the moment-for the
siege of Pavia was not yet ended —could not be efficient without some corresponding control, and the exact nature of the right bestowed is merely a
question of terms. When the temporal authority was present and active,
confirmation would imply selection; when distant or abased, the privilege
might be merely nominal.
This question affords an instructive illustration of the unconscientiousness
which renders the mediaeval papal historians such insecure guides. The
Archbishop Martinus Polonus, in his Chronol. Pontificum, written in the
thirteenth century, when relating the transaction, by an ingenious transposition of nominative and dative terminations, makes Charles the giver and
Adrian the recipient of control over the Western hierarchy (Chronol. BIartin.
sub Adrian.). Vigilant criticism expunged from his pages the obnoxious
account of Pope Joan, but found nothing to object to in this falsification.
Olim me exiguissimum famulorum vestrorum ad regimen ecclesim Lugdunensis destinare voluistis..... Denique postlualm secundulu jussionem
vestram supedictam ecclesiam suscepi, etc. (Mag. Bib. Pat. T, IX. P. I.
p. 626.) Cf. Monach. S. Gallens. de Vita Carol. Mag. Lib. I. cap. 4, 5, 6.
o Capit. Carol. Miag. I. ann. 80n, cap. 2. —Capit. Ludov. Pii, ann. 816, cap. 2.
8*
90 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
that the right of confirmation was then formally abancloned. This is utterly without foundation. Louis bestowed bishoprics as freely as any other dignities in his
realm.' The sixth council of Paris, in 829, recognizes his
right in the matter, and the corresponding duty incumbent
upon him to exercise the power judiciously.2 When elections were permitted, they took place under the supervision
of an imperial commissioner appointed for that purpose.
If an unworthy choice was made, or if improper arts were
employed to obtain the popular suffrage, not only was the
successful candidate rejected without hesitation, but the
emperor forthwith filled the vacant see without reference
to clergy or people, on the ground that they had forfeited
the franchise by its illjudicious exercise.3
That these powers were rigidly enforced we may readily
believe; for even after the civil wars had reduced the royal
power to comparative insignificance, the privilege of popular election hardly amounted to more than the conyed'elire-that ingenious fiction by which the Anglican
church reconciles apostolic tradition with the supremacy
of the Defender of the Faith. Thus, in 845, the synod of
Thionville requests the sons of Louis to nominate incumbents for the sees then vacant;4 tand soon afterwards the
synod of Vernon petitions Charles le Chauve not to allow
the see of Rheimns to remain longer without a bishop, and
also not to withhold his assent to the installation of Agius,
who a year before had been elected to the diocese of Orleans, and had been consecrated by Wenilo, his archlbishop.5
So, when some irregularity prevented the induction of Wolfadus, bishop-elect of Langres, the synod of Chiersy applied
1 See, for instance, Thegan. Vit. Ludov. Pii, cap. 24, adcl the supplication
of the citizens of Mainz in 835 (Bonif. Epist. 117).
2 Concil. Paris. VI. can. 22. —Capitul. Add. II. cap. 26.' Formul. Proniot. Episcopor. vI. (Baluz. II. 603-4.)
4 Capit. Carol. Cal. Tit. II. cap. 2.
5 Capit. Car(ol. Cal. Tit. ii. cI p. c 9, 10.
THE CHIURCH AND TIIE STATE. 91
to Charles to appoint another; and though the king graciously permitted the synod to make the election, yet they
considered it necessary to obtain the royal approbation of
their choice, aind they appealed to the arch-chaplain Hilduin
for his influence in securing it, in terms which mark how
absolute was the prerogative of the sovereign, and how
little his assent was to be expected as a matter of course.'
The change in tone wrought by a few years is therefore striking, in the bold epistle addressed by the Neustrian bishops, in 858, to Louis le Germanique, then in almost
undisputed possession of his brother's kingdom, where
we find a declaration of independence to the effect that the
churches which they held were not benefices to be bestowed
by the king at his pleasure, or resumed; and when in 880
the unquestionable right of the sovereign to put forward
a candidate for election was stigmatized by lincmnar, in a
letter to the king, as a doctrine belched forth by hell.2 So
Florus Diaconus, shortly after the middle of the century,
stoutly denies the right of the sovereign to dispose of bishoprics, assuming that if his assent is asked, it is only to promote good-feeling —" ad cumnulumn fraternitatis;" while the
imperial authority to supervise papal elections is utterly
repudiated.3 A similar contrast is afforded between Leo
IV. ill 853 humbly asking the Emperors Lothair and Louis
IT. to permit the consecration of Colonus as Bishop of
Itieti, or, if they preferred, to bestow on him the see of
Tuscullum, and Nicholas I. in 863 sternly reproving Kiing
Lothair for using his influence to sway the elections of
bishops in Lotharingia, and forbidding him to allow certain
sees to be filled, until the papal pleasure should be cons ultecl.4
In Italy, indeed, the papal power eagerly grasped at the
Flodoard. Hist. Remens. Lib. III. cap. 24.
C:pit. Carol. Cal. Tit. xxvII. cap. 15. —IIincmari Epist. xix. cap. 3.
Flori Diac. Lib. de Elect. Episc. cap. 4, 6.
Gratian. Dist. 63, can. 16. —Nichol. PP. I. Epist. 58.
92 THE RITSE OF THIE TEMPORAL POWER.
prerog'ative which was escaping firom the sovereignY and
the people were further than ever friomn regaining their
rights. Thus, in 8~9, we find John VIII. threatening Romanus, Archbishop of iRavenna, with condign punishment
for disregarding his orders in filling the see of Sarcina;1
and again in 881 he ordered iRomanus to consecrate a certain Dominic as Bishop of Faenza, with the significant hint
that in case of disobedience lie would himself perform the
ceremony. Romanus thereupon grew restive, and installed
a rival, Constantine, whom John promptly excommunicated, and, treating the transaction as invalid, placed the
bishopric, as a vacancy, under the visitatorial charge of
the Bishop of Cervia.2 As both of these sees belonged to
the province of ItRaenna, and as there is no allusion to
any popular election in favor of the papal nominees, the
terms of absolute command employed by John show how
completely the popes had fallen heir to the imperial prerogatives to which his predecessors had yielded so submissively.3
Had the popes confiied their pretensions in this respect
to Italy, there would have been no great harm done, but
eventually the.y claimed the control of every episcopate in
Christendom with an energy which filled Europe with confusion for centuries. The time had not yet come for this,
however, and Nicholas I. was disinterestedly anxious to
free the church from subjection to the temporal power.
To secure this, he laid down, in 865, the rule that bishops
were to be elected by the clergy alone, thus depriving the
laity of their immelmnorial right of suffrage.5 The bishops,
Johann. PP. VIII. Epist. 199. 2 Ejusd. Epist. 325, 322, 326.
When it suited his politics, however, John freely admitted the rights of
the secular authority. Thus, in 879, when he was anxious to follow up his
excommunicat ion of Anspert of Milan, he attributed to Carloman, King of
Italy, the unrestricted poower of bestowing the bishopric of Verecelli, anld lie
treated as null and void the consecration bestowed on another candidate by
the Archbishop. —Joha.,nn PP. VIII. Epist. 267.
" Nicholai PP. I. Epist. S2, cap. 4.
THE CHURCHI AND THE STATE. 93
too, were eagerly striving to render the necessity of their
ministration a controlling element in the selection of their
fellow-suffragans, and in this they were supported by
various ancient canons which show that it was admitted
to a greater or less extent in the early church,l and by
the more recent authority of the second general council of
Nicea, which in 787 placed the choice exclusively in the
hands of the provincial bishops, and declared null and void
all nominations by the temporal authority.2 Although this
council was received by the Christian world as cecumenic,
still its canons in this respect had received as little attention from Charlemagne as those relating to image worship,
and even in Rome they were soon disregarded, for a synod
held in 826 by Eugenius II. forbade the consecration of any
bishop unless he was regularly demanded by both clergy
and people.3 The eighth general council, however, held at
Constantinople in 869, repeated the commands of that of
Nicea, and endeavored to enforce it by fulminating the
anathema against all temporal princes who should endeavor
to interfere in the selection of bishops.4
These efforts were strictly in accordance with the practice of the East, where, notwithstanding the undisputed
authority in ecclesiastical matters assumed by the Byzantine Emperors, they were accustomed, nominally at last,
to exercise much less control over episcopal elections
than the sovereigns of the West. Except in the case of
the patriarchs, they generally allowed the church to regu1 Concil. Nicrn. I. can. 4, 6.-Laodicens. can. 12.-Antioch. can. 16. —
Carthag. II. can. 12.-Arelatens. II. can. 5, 54. —In the Spanish collection
of Martin of Braga, by an interpolation in the Laodicean canon, the people
were specially excluded from all participation in episcopal elections (Ma'rtin.
Bracar. can. 1). We have already seen, however, that among the Wisigoths
the kings had succeeded in having the appointing power transferred to themselves.
2 Concil. Nicoen. II. can. 3.
3 Pertz, Legum T. II. P. iI. pp. 11-15.
Concil. General. VIII. can. 22.
94 THIE RISE OF TI-IHE TEMPORAL POwER
late for herself the personality of her prelates. Theodosius
the younger had placed in the hands of the Patriarch of
Constantinople the power of confirming all elections to
bishoprics;1 and though in the next century Justin II. had
given rise to great complaint by openly trafficking in episcopal nominations,2 still the rules expressed by the councils of Nic, a and Constantinople were generally respected.
It was reserved for Nicephorus Phocas, about 965, to
assume definitely the disposal of bishoprics, which the historian assures us he sold to those who could pay his price
from exactions on their flocks.3.When, of all the tyrannical acts of the abhorred Nicephorus, this was considered
to be the worst, we may readily conclude that it was an
innovation, although the indignation of the historian is
doubtless to be divided between the despotisml and the
avarice of the emperor. It was not long endured, however,
for when, ill 969, John Zimiskes by midnight assassination sought the crown of his uncle and benefactor, the
pardclon for his crime, which lacked nothing to fill the measure of its atrocity, was purchased by the repeal of the
obnoxious laws of Nicephorus, such being the condition on
which the murderous usurper was crowvlned by thle Patriarch Polyeuctes.4
In the West the bishops were not so fortunate, thoughl
various allusions in the epistles of Lupus of Ferrieres show
that they strenuously struggled to obtain control over the
choice of their associates.5 The necessities of the times
were peculiarly opposed to such pretensions, for the poorer
and more powerless were the kings, the more pressing
became their wants. Services which they could not command had to be bought; and, as the royal fise was for the
most part exhausted, they could be liberal only with tlle
Soerat. I-ist. Eccles. Lib. v~II. cap. 28.
" Evngii. lliist. Eccles. Lib. v. cap, 1.
3 Cedrenus sub. Niceph. 4 Cedrenus sub Johann. Zimisk.
5 Epist. 79, 81, 98, etc.
TIIE CIHURCH AND TIIE STATE. 95
property of others. In those dismal times of anarchy, the
arbitrary acts which plurchasecl the temporary fidelity of
the powerful by spoiling the weak grew more and more
fiequent, and rich bishoprics and fat abbeys were often
the readiest means at hand to silence the hungry horde of
rebellious chieftains. Ill abuses such as these the crown and
the nobles supported each other, and the church could only
submit. The regulations laid down by the Council of Valence, in 855, show that no episcopal election could be held
without the express permission of the sovereign; and that,
if in place of allowing this the king chose to make ani arbitrary appointment, the only resource was an humble remlonstrance in cases of manifest unfitness of the nominee.1
I-low recklessly this power was often exercised is shown
by the appointment, in 856, by Charles le Chauve, of a successor to St. Folcuin, Bishop of Terouane, before that aoed
prelate was dead —an indiscretion rendered the more conspicuous by the frightful effects of the malediction pronounced by the incensed saint on the unlucky interloper —
and scarcely less arbitrary was his action when, in 866, he
cut short the deliberations of a synod on a knotty point of
canon law by appointing on his sole authority Wulfadlus
to the important archiepiscopal see of Blourges.3 When,
indeed, about the same time he bestowed the wealthy
abbacy of Tours on Rtobert-le-Fort, the head of the House
of Capet, lie little tliouoght that he was foundino g a line of
royal hereditary abbots who for eight centuries would wear
the mitre under the crown.4 Yet the pretensions of the
church continued to gain ground notwithstandillng the arbiConcil. Valentin. III. ann. 855, can. 7.
2 Vit. S. Folcuin. cap. 13. - 3 Annal. Bertin. ann. 866.
Abbeys were regularly in the gift of the crown. Though Louis le I)dbonnaire, in 816, conceded the right of election to the monks (Capit. Aquisgranens. ann. 816, ca:p. 5), yet, in 823, we find him issuing his orders-1" Abbatibus quoque et laicis specialiter jubemus ut in monasteriis quan ex zostrc
largitate habent," etc. (Capit. Ludov. Pii, ann. 823, cap. 8.)
96 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
trary exercise of power manifested whenever the incessant
turmoil afforded the sovereign an opportunity of exerting
his ancient prerogative. The acts of the examination of
WVillibert, applying in 868 to be consecrated to the see of
Chalons, show how rigorously a high churchman like lincmar could assert his supervisory functions, even after the
performance of a canonical election followed by the confirmation of the sovereign. In this case, Charles, in place of
commanding the installation of the bishop-elect, simply
prayed that the office might be bestowed on him if he
should be deemed worthy, thus formally recognizing the
power of rejection assumed by the bishops of the province.l
In the general scramble for the fragments,of kingly authority, the Metropolitans, too, endeavored to grasp a share,
and they readily yielded to the temptation of abusing their
supervisory power by acts as arbitrary as those of the sovereigns. Thus, on the death of a Bishop of Vence, the Archbishop of Embrun refused consecration to a candidate duly
elected by the diocese and confirmed by the king, and proceeded to install a favorite of his own, whom he endeavored
to force upon the reluctant flock. John VIII. readily
listened to the complaints of the ejected aspirant, stigmatized the conduct of the archbishop as uncanonical, and
took advantage of the quarrel to make good the claims of
papal supremacy by summoning both parties before him
for examination.2
Still the sovereign struggled to maintain his prerogative,
and was supported by his nobles, for when Charles and his
people provided for the conduct of the state during his
absence in Italy, the celebrated Capitulary of Chiersy
records the agreement that if any bishopric should become
vacant while he was beyond the kingdom, it should remain
unfilled until he could be notified of the fact.3 Yet not1 Baluz. II. 612-6. 2 Johann. PP. VIII. Epist. 101.
3 Capit. Carol. Cal. Tit. LIII. Cap. 8.
THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 97
withstanding this, the bishops continued to press their
advantage and assumed that they had succeeded to all the
powers once possessed by the crown. Thus, about 880,
the people of Beauvais successively elected three bishops
who were one by one rejected by iincmrar and his suffragans. With the assent of the Beauvoisins, Louis le Begue
then urged the nomination of a fourth, but Hinemar, speaking for the synod of St. Macra, laid down the law that the
functions of the consecrating bishops in reality constituted
the election, that the confirmation by the sovereign was a
mere formality, and that the people of Beauvais had forfeited the right to have anything "to say in the matter.1
So, in 895, the interference of Pope Formosus was invoked
to aid a certain Berthair, regularly elected to the see of
Chalons and confirmed by King Eudes, whom Fulk, Archbishop of Rheims, refused to admit. King and pope were
alike powerless in the matter, for Fulk instigated one of
his vassals to drive out and imprison Berthair, and then
he placed the diocese of Chalons under the charge of the
Bishop of Terouane, who was at that time a fugitive from
the ravages of the Northmen.2
No general principles can be deduced from the acts of a
period of anarchv, when the law of the strongest thus
affords the only right; and even when the institutions of
Europe organized themselves under the feudal system the
quarrel over the spoils of the church continued, until the
happy thought of a concordat enabled king and pope to
share the plunder which belonged to neither. How little
the rights of those most concerned were regarded by the
contending parties during the struggle may be learned
from the quarrel over the succession to the see of Bangor
under Thomas'a Becket. Meurig, Bishop of Bangor, died
in 1161, when Owen Prince of Gwynnedd exacted an oath' Hincmar. Epist. xIx. cap. 4, 6.
2 Flodoard. I- ist. HRemens. Lib. III. cap. 3.
9
98 THE IRISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
of the cathedral chapter to elect no one without his approval. St. Thomas denounced this as a flagrant invasion
of the liberties of the church; he procured from the pope, for
the archdeacon and canons, an absolution from their oath,
andl, in announcing this to them as a special favor in their
behalf, he added that if they did not promptly elect his
nominee to the bishopric, he would at once excommunicate
them, and subject thee whole diocese to an interdict.l Placed
thus between t0o fires, the chapter naturally did nothing,
and for nine years Bangor was deprived of a bishop. The
true remedy mwas that suggested by the Emperor Henry V.
when he offered' to surrender all the ecclesiastical righlts
demanded by Rome, if the church would abandon the teniporalities which gave him a claim to the investitures.2 So
thought-Arnold of Brescia, who expiated at the stake his
zealous efforts to purify the temple by clearing it of the
worldly treasures which encumbered it. So, too, thought
Dante when he prophesied that the 1 Veltro" would reform
the abuses which had so utterly perverted the ldesign andc
the principles of Chrisfianity —
"Non fu la sposa di Christo allevata
Del sangue mlio, cli Lin, cdi quel di Cleto,
Per essere ad acquisto dl'oro usata..
In vesta di pastor, lupi rapaci
Si veggion cli quassi per tutti i paselli,..
Ma l'alta providcnza...
Soccorra tosto, si coml' io concipio."
(Paradiso, xxVII.)
And not long after the death of the great Florentine, an
honest Swiss churchman, in deploring the quarrel between
S. Thomm (antuar. Epist. 112-115.
e The church of Liege, in defending itself from the thunders of Paschal IT.,
incurred through its fidelity to Henry V., quotes a passage from St. Ambrose
singularly to the purpose-'- Si Christus non habuit imaginem Cmsaris, cur
dedit censum? Non dle suo dedit; secl redcldidit munclo qua erant mundi.
Et tu si non vis esse obnoxius Coesari, noli hahbere quxe mundi sunt. Sed si
habes divitias, obnoxius es Cwesari. Si vis nihil debere regi terreno, climitte
omnia et sequere Christum."-Udalr. Babenb. Cod. Lib. II. cap. 234.
THE CITURCH AND TIE STATE. 99
Louis of Bavaria andC the papacy, attributes all the disorders and misfortunes of the church to the lust of temporal dominion and wealth excited by the donations of
Constantine and CharlemagneRex Constantinus cum successoribus suis
Si Pape regna tam pinguia non tribuisset,
Tune hlumilis staret, simnplicitate pia...
Sed quia dotavit Ctesar nimis atque ditavit,
Fcrtilibus terris Papas, ideo tumnuerunt,
Et cupide certant carpere plura bona
MeIIe pestis snva causata avaritia.
Ecclesiam numnlnus vilem fecit meretricem,
amll pro ruercede scortuln dat se cupienti.'
Closely connected with the question of investitures was
that of episcopal oaths of fidelity. The same reasons
which enabled the sovereign to claim the right of confirmation warranted him also in demanding from the new incumbent the customary oaths that the power thus intrusted
to him should not be used to the detriment of the state, as
)ersonifiecl in the monarch. We have seen that Charlemagne and Louis exacted this even from the successor of
St. Peter; that prelates of inferior grade were not exempted
becomes, therefore, a matter of course. When, in 802, the
1 Vit.odurani Chron. ann. 1344, p. 69 (Thes. I-list. Helvet.). Vitoduranus
was a good Catholic, and a pions hater of heretics and Jews. The opinions
thus expressed were not singular. Nicholas de Claminges, in treating of the
Great Schism, attributes the evils which afflicted the church to the absorption of the nominating power by Rome. "Si ecclesia illa collationem
onmniumm gradumt ecclesivc universalis nunquam sibi arroga.sset, cuterasque suis jnribus universas ingurgitando ecclesias nequaquam exspoliasset, vel hoc schisma nunquam in illa exorturum fuisse vel non tanto saltem tempore perdurasse" (Nic. de Clamingiis Disput. super Materiem Concil. General. p. 45). So thoroughly did the Holy See eventually monopolize this important source of wealth and influence that when at the council
of Trent the Bishop of Cadiz ventured to assert that bishops properly elected
did not reqcuire papal nomination or confirmation, and supported his proposition by citing the Nicene canons and the cases of St. John Chrysostom. St.
Ambrose, and St. Augustine, the f.athers of the council promptly exclaimed
that he was a heretic, only fit for the stakle.
100 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
emperor caused to be renewed the oath which his subjects
had already taken to him as king, he directed that it shouldcl
be administered to all, laymen and ecclesiastics, without
exception;1 and, though bishops are not specifically mentioned, the fact that they were necessarily included is
shown by an allusion to them in a similar precept by
Pepin, King of Italy, some years previously.2 The form
was in no way less stringent than that of the oath taken by
laymen, being a comprehensive homage to the person of the
monarch, secured by the customary oaths on the gospels, or
on relics of approved sanctity.3 That its binding force was
admitted on all hands is shown in the rebellion of 833, when
even Gregory IV. felt obliged to exculpate himself from the
charge of perjury for the part which he took against Louis
after the oath of fidelity sworn at his installation, and he attempted to j ustify himself only by retorting on the Frankish
bishops the charge of being really guilty of the same crime.4
The church itself even recognized the episcopal dignity as
held only in virtue of this homage, for we find the council
of Aix-la-Chapelle, in 836, declaring that the violation of
the oath shall entail the degradation of the offender and
the forfeiture of his preferment.5 In this the fathers of the
council were merely recording the established usage, for in
1 Capit. Carol. Mag. I. ann. 802, cap. 2.
" Capit. Pippini ann. 793, cap. 36.
"Sic me Deus adjuvet et ista sancta patrocinia." Seethe oath extorted
from HIincmar of Rheims-I-Hincmlari Opp. I. 1125 (Migne's Patrol. T. 125).
4 " Subjungitis, memorem me esse debere jurisjurandi causa fidei factum.
imperatori. Quod si feci in hoc volo vitare perjurium... Vos tamen quia
proculdubio jurastis et rejurastis, prqmittentes ei erga illum omnia fideliter
vos agere, perjuri estis"-Gregor. PP. IV. de Comparat. Utriusq. Regim.
(ap. Agobardi Opp.) The imperial party enunciated the rule in the clearest
mannner —'" Episcopos in causa fidei jusjurandum prasstare solitos imperatori"
(Goldast. I. 188)-which perhaps indicates that the rebel princes were endeavoring to gain ecclesiastical support by favoring the pretensions of the
church to independence.
5 Concil. Aquisgr. II. ann. 836, cap. ii. can. 12. This declaration was
probably called forth by the political reaction of 835.
TIHE CHURCOH AND TIIE STATE. 101
794 a certain Bishop Peter, accused of treasoD, purged
himself by the ordeal, and on thus proving his innocence
it is related that he was restored by Charlemagne to the
position of which he had been cleprived.c
Such being the recognized subjection of the prelates as
vassals of the crown, doinllg homage for their sees, and
liable to deprivation for infidelity to the sovereig1n, we see
the completeness of the revolution when we find the 1Neustrian bishops, in their address to Louis le Germanique in
858, boldly declaring that, unlike laymen, they were not
obliged to perform any act of homage or to take any oaths.2
The effort was temporarily successful, for though, some
fifteen years later, Chlarlesfo reed the reluctant Hincemar of
Rhleims to corroborate his suspected loyalty by the oath
which had not been exacted at his installation, yet the
humiliated prelate had his revenge. IIe takes especial care
to chronicle howv, at the coronation of Louis le BMggue, in
877, the bishops merely performed commendation for the
churches and promised fidelity, while the abbots and nobles
commended themselves, and took the oaths prescribed by
ancestral custom.3 This pretension, however, was too
directly opposed to the tendencies of the age, which was
rapidly resolving all institutions into the nascent feudal
system, to be permanently successful, though it was long
and hotly contested. Yet the declaration of the bishops,
in 858, was a correct index of their position at the time,
and an example or two may serve to mnark the practical
advantages resulting to them within a few years. In 817,
when Bernard of Italy made his fruitless revolt against his
1 Capit. Carol. Mag. ann. 794, cap. 7.
O Capit. Carol. Cal. Tit. xxvII. cap. 15. This claim was founded on the
immunity from judicial and purgatorial oaths, which, on the authority of the
False Decretals, ecclesiastics about this time endeavored to obtain (Gratian.
Cans. II. q. 5, can. 1, 2, 3 —Pseudo-Cornel. Epist. 2). Promissory oa.ths, which
the bishops thus refused, were, however, allowed (Gratian. Caus. xxxii.,
q. 1. can. 1).
Annal. Bertin. ann. 877.
9*
102 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
uncle, there was little ceremony shown in dealing with the
prelates who were his confederates. Anselm of Milan,
Wolwod of Cremona, and Theodulf of Orleans, were deposed by a synod, though their dignity saved them from
the personal punishment adjudged to the secular participants in the rebellion.l So, in 835, when Louis le D6bonnaire was reinstated after the second revolt of his sons, the
bishops of the defeated party were put on trial. The primatial dignity of Lyons could not preserve St. Agobard from
degradation; the traditional veneration for St. Remni did
not save his unworthy successor, Ebbo, while less distinguished prelates sought safety in flight.2 On the other
hand, when, in 859, Charles le Chauve demanded judgment
against Wenilo, Archbishop of Sens, who, under circumstances of peculiar treachery, had been a leading instrument in the usurpation which for a moment placed Louis' Thegan. de Gest. Ludov. c. 22. —Eginh. Anna.l. ann. 818. Theodulf languished in prison for many years, and was only released when Louis, in passing his place of confinement, was touched by hearing him sing a hymn of
his own composition —" Gloria, laus, et honor tibi." In a poetical epistle
addressed from his prison to Modoin, Theodulf emphatically asserts the
irregularity of his confinement —
Servus habet propriam et mendax ancillula legem,
Opilio, pistor, nauta, subulcus, arans.
Proh dolor! amisit hanc solas episcopus, ordo
Qui labefactatur nunc sine lege sua;
Debuit et qui aliis legalia promere jura
Officii perdit jus, sine jure, sui.
Culpa facit seavum confessa perire latronem,
Non est confessus prasul, et ecce perit...
Non ibi testis inest, judex nec idonets ullus,
Non aliquod crimen ipse ego fassus eram.
Esto: forem fassus cUjus censura valeret
Dedere judicii congrua fr'ena mihi?
Solius illud Romani prxlsulis exstat
Cuj us ego accepi pallia sancta manu.
Theodulph. ad Modoin.
It is observable that Theodulf does not disclaim responsibility, but merely
that he had a right to trial by the pope on account of having received the
pallium, of which more hereafter.
2 Astron. Vit. Ludov. Pii, ann. 835.
THE CHURCH AND' THE STATE. 103
le Germanique in possession of his brother's kingdom, the
royal prosecutor could obtain no satisfactory action'-and
the only punishment incurred by the traitor was the tradition which embalmed hIis name, in the Ganelon of the chansons de geste, as the embodiment of falsity.
While thus striking at all the principles which subordinated the church to the state, it must not be supposed that
the sagacious originators of the movement had endeavored
to create a body of irresponsible ecclesiastical despots, each
supreme in his own diocese or province, to become eventually the priest-king of an insignificant territory. Even
as the churchman was elevated above the layman, so was
the power of the hierarchy developed in the comprehensive
scheme of Ingilram. and Isidor. Transmitting step by step
the new powers thus acquired to the supreme head at Rome,
the whole body of the church was rendered compact and
manageable, either for assault or defence; and it acquired
the organization which enabled it not only to preserve most
of the advantages thus gained, but to extend in all directions its influence and authority. Had the bishops maintained their individual independence they could have
accomplished nothing beyond the ends of personal ambition, as did the nobles who were then carving out their
hereditary fiefs; and even this success would have been
temporary, for, in their isolation, they would have succumbed one by one under the attacks of the rapacious
barons who wielded the military power of their provinces.
What the temporal sovereign lost. however, was transmitted
through the hierarchy to the pope, and the church acquired
the unity which was requisite to carry it through the
stormy centuries to come.' Annal. Bertin. ann. 859.
104 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH.
The rise of the Papacy, from the persecuted head of aninsignificant local church to the supreme domination over.
both the spiritual and the temporal hierarchy of Europe, is.
one of the most curious problems in history. One element.
in its solution I have already endeavored to elucidate by,
showing how the church acquired control over the state,.
and it remains to see how the Pope became supreme over.
the church.,;rThen the primitive Christians found that the increase.
of the faithful beganl to render some form of internal.
organization requisite, they naturally divided themselves.
into sections, corresponding with the great prefectures of.
the empire, and these were arranged into provinces accord-.
ing to the civil demarcations, the seat of local government.
being the head of the local church.l As the complexity oA
the system increased with the number of converts, there
thus arose throughout the East a complete hierarchy of
bishops, metropolitans, and exarchs or patriarchs, which
varied as tile political divisions of their territories were
altered; and so complete was the dependence of ecclesiastical arrangements upon the order of civil government,
that, as late as 451, the council of Chalcedon directed that
chawnges in the civil hierarchy should be conformed to by
corresponding alterations in the constitution of the church.2
With all this, however, a certain undefined primacy of
honor was assigned to the three apostolic sees of Rome,
Alexandria, and Antioch.
Rome was thus most favorably situated for vindicating
whatever pretensions she might advance of control over
her sisters. Until the erection of a new imperial city at
Byzantium, she combined the claims of the seat of governConcil. Antioch. ann. 341, can. 9. Concil. Chalced. can. 17.
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH. 105
inent with the traditional episcopate of St. Peter, and from
a very early period her bishopric was the most important
and influential in the Christian world. The number and
character of her church members would generally lead to
the selection of the ablest of the Western Christians to
her episcopal chair, and these successive bishops, from the
weight of their personal character, would transmit a gradually increasing influence. The centralization of wealth in
the Eternal City would also render the Roman see by far
the richest in Christendom, and its gold was liberally
poured forth, during the whole of the first three centuries,
in assisting poorer communities' —a munificence which
could not be solicited or enjoyed without an appreciable
sacrifice of independence on the part of the recipients.
Yet the account given us by iHippolytus, Bishop of Portus,
of his long controversy with Pope Calixtus I. shows that
the Bishop of Rome, in the commencement of the third
century, had no recognized supremacy even over the suburbicarian sees;2 and though, not long before, Ireneus had
declared the ]Roman see to possess a "potiorem principalitatem" in the church, owing to the directness of its
apostolical tradition from Peter and Paul,3 yet his account
of the debates between Polycarp and Pope Anicetus respecting the observance of Easter shows that this was
merely a primacy of honor, and not of authority.4
In the early period of the ecclesiastical commonwealth
it was customary for men eminent in station or piety to
address epistles, hortatory or advisory, to other churches,
either on general subjects of faith or discipline, or on
special questions which presented themselves; and in time
1 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. iv. c. 23; Lib. vII. cap. 6.-To the liberality
recorded in the latter reference may perhaps be attributed the submission
of the Eastern churches to the wishes of Rome in the vexed question of the
rebaptism of heretics.
IIippolytus, Refutation of Heresies, Bk. IX. chap. vii.
3 Ireniei adv. Hacres. Lib. III. cap. iii.
Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. v. c. xxiv.
106 TIIE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
of difficulty, prominent bishops were fiequently appealed
to for advice or assistance in the settlement of doubts.
In the second century we find Dionysius of Corinth thus
volunteering without hesitation his counsel to distant
communities, and even addressing Soter of Roime in terms
which manifest the perfect equality existing between them.l
A century later, when Marcion of Arles became infected
with the Novatian heresy, Faustinus of Lyons writes repeatedly to St. Cyprian of Carthage anid to Stephen I. of
iRomle, imploring their interposition, and Cyprian, in an
epistle to Stephen, urges him to join in counselling the
flock of Marcion to unite in electing another bishop in his
place.2
In these transactions we see the gradual crystallization
of the hierarchical elements. The influence which the more
important churches thus exercised over those in no way
subjected to them is clearly manifested, and we cannot
wonder that the civil predominance of the imperial city
should at an early period have caused its bishops to be
selected as arbitrators or advisers in difficult conjunctures.
The talents and energy of Cyprian give a momentary
prominence to his province, personal, however, in its
nature, and dying with him. Rome, on the other hand,
has certain tundefined and impalpable claiml~s to superiority,
not clearly understood at home or ftully recognized abroad
— disregarded by a man like Cyprian, secure in his own
force and that of the powerful African church —but yet
imposing a certain claim to respect on weaker prelates and
communities. Yet such assumptions of superiority were
watched with jealousy, and were frequently repudiated.
When Victor I., towards the close of the second century,
endeavored to excommunicate the Asian bishops for their
irregular solemnizing of Easter, his threats were set at
nauglht aLnd the other churches interfered in the quarrel in a
Euseb. Ilist. Eccles. Lib. Iv. c. 23. 2 Cypriani Epist. 66 (Ed. Oxon.).
THEI' PAPACY AND THE CHURCH, 107
manner showing that entire equality existed between them.
Iren.Tus, whose reputation was commanding throughout
Gaul, wrote to Victor a letter of reproof and exhortation,
which evidently assumed that there was no pre-eminence
in the see of Rome.l In 269, when the council of Antioch
deposed Paul of Samosata, the epistle in which the result
was announced to the Christian world shows that Dionysius, the existing pope, while named first, as in courtesy
to his position in the capital, had no special influence or
authority.2 The superscriptions of Cyprian's epistles" Cyprianus Cornelio fratri salutem" — manifest perfect
equality, and contrast strangely with the L debitain obedientiain et subjectioneill of the medinval period; and asl
late as 380 we find Sulpicius Severus speaking of Pope
Damasus and St. Ambrose of Milan as the two bishops
who were then of greatest weight in the church —apparently not recognizing that one could have any definite
authority over the other.3
Yet, even under the pagan emperors, the position of the
PRoman bishops near the imperial court gave them constant
opportunities of acquiring influence, as was m anifested
when Patl of Samosata refused obedience to the decree of
the council of Antioch, and persisted in maintaining his
position despite tile appointment of a successor. Finding
it impossible to dislodge him, the church finally appealed
to Aui'elian, whose triumph over Zenobia had deprived
Paul of his protectress. Aurelian contented himself with
ordering that the position should be given to that one of
the contestants who was approved by the bishops of Rome
and of Italy —through whom the appeal had doubtless
Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. v. cap. 24.
" The epistle is addressed'l Dionysio, Maximo, et omnibus ubique in orbe
terrarum collegis, episcopis, presbyteris, diaconis et universs et catholicse
sub celo ecclesie" (Ejusd. Lib. vII. cap. 30). Maximus was Bishop of Alexandria, which, with Romle and Paul's own city of Antioch, constitutedl the
three apostolic sees.
" Hist. Sacrti Lib. II. cap. 48. E Euseb. IIist. Eccles. Lib. viI. cap. 30.
108 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
been made. The pagan Cmesar could scarcely comprehend
subtle disputations on the nature of Christ, but he could
readily appreciate the importance of extending Italian
influence throughout the recently disturbed East. From
this it is fair to presume that if protection was to be
sought from local persecution, exemption to be solicited
from unjust or oppressive burdens, or other favor to be
procured from the imperial court, the Bishop of Rome
would be the natural channel through which the suppliants
would address their master. Indeed, this was laid down
as the rule of the church under the Christian emperors, for
the council of Sardica, in 347, adopted a canon directing
that any prelate visiting Rome to obtain a favor from the
civil government should present his request through the
hands of the Roman bishop;l and when Constantinople
rose into power, the rule was established that no bishop
could obtain an audience of the emperor without the intervention of the patriarch of the New Rome.2
As the Roman church thus was the official mediator
between her sisters and their master, the relations thence
arising tended inevitably to render her the protector of
her nominal equals. When, therefore, she proffered advice,
it was not lightly to be rejected, for the next hour might
render her intervention necessary or her benevolence invaluable; and if her tone gradually grew authoritative,
and counsel imperceptibly assumed the form of command,
she was but yielding to temptations irresistible to human
nature. A passage in Tertullian shows that this took
place at an early period, and also that it was regarded as
an usurpation founded on no acknowledged right;3 but
such assertions of independence only prove the progress
making by the silent encroachments of centralization.' Concil. Sardicens. can. 9. 2 Hormisdeo PP. Epist. 2.
3 Audio etiam edictunm esse propositum, et quidem peremptorium: Pontifex scilicet maximus, episcopus episcoporum dicit, ego et moechine et fornicationis delicta poenitentia functis dimitto.-Tertull. de Pudicit. c. 1.
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCIH. 109
Yet still the theory of church government continued to
be that of perfect and independent autonomy in each circumscription. By the Apostolic Canons, framed towards
the end of the third century, each province is directed to
determine for itself which of its churches shall be deemed
to hold the primacy; the bishops are ordered to supervise
the local concerns of their sees, while the primate is instructed to consult his suffragans in all important matters,
no reference being made to any power outside of his patriarchate.l This continued, nominally at least, for some
time after Christianity became the religion of the state.
In 341 the council of Antioch substantially repeats these
regulations, as the ancient rule of the fathers;' the second
general council, held at Constantinople in 381, expressly
forbids any prelate from interfering with the concerns of
his brethren;3 and in an ancient Arabic version of the
Nicene canons there is one which, though not attributable
to that council, still doubtless represents the ecclesiastical
organization of an early period. It makes each patriarch
supreme in his own province, and strictly forbids any one
from intervening in the concerns of other provinces, unless
specially invited to arbitrate in cases of difficulty; and
when complaints arise against the patriarchs themselves,
on account of either their conduct or faith, it directs the
question to be settled in a council of the provincial bishops
and abbots.4
No sooner, however, did the church emerge from persecution into power, than the necessity was felt of some central authority if its unity was to be preserved. The dissensions of the Arian comltroversy showed this, and Constantine endeavored to supply the want by assembling the
council of Nicea. General councils, however, were only
suited for great occasions, and not for the continually
1 Canon. Apost. No. 35. " Concil. Antioch. ann. 341, can. 9.
3 Concil. Constantinop. ann. 381, can. 2.
4 Sanct. Patrum CCCXVIII. Const. xv. (Harduin. I. 503.)
10
110 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POW:ER.
arising emergencies which called for authoritative settlement; and Rome, in the stormy epoch of the Arian heresy,
made good use of her vantage-ground to assume the position of an arbiter for the whole church. Steadfast in her
orthodoxy she represented Latin Christianity, which found
little attraction in the subtle theological speculations so
dangerously enticing to the Eastern churches, and she thus
was the haven of refuge for the persecuted trinitarians of
Greece and Asia, whom she boldly stood forward to protect.
Yet the clearer heads among the Greeks foresaw the result
of this and strove to check it, as whlen St. Basil dissuaded
Gregory of Nazianzumn from appealing for support to Rome
in one of the phases of the contest; and the contemptuous
way in which the saint speaks of the Latin church shows
how little respect it had won, even amnong the orthodox,
by its vigorous upholding of St. Athanasius.1 Notwithstanding this warning, the bold stand macde by Rome under
the Arian persecution gave her unquestioned prominence,
and the churches which sought her assistance in the hour
of trial could not do so without a sacrifice of independence.
Thus when the Latin half of the council of Sardica, in 347,
endeavored to protect themselves froml the assaults of their
Eastern brethren, they constituted Julius I. an arbiter to
grant appeals in cases of condemnation, feeling secure that
so orthodox a pontiff would not allow the wicked to
triumph. The language of the'canon shows this to have
been a novel privilege, conferred temporarily of their own
free will;2 and it doubtless consoled the pope for the denunciations launched against him by the Eastern portion
of the synod, though neither he nor the Sardican fathers
1 Quale nobis auxilium ab Occidentalium supercilio et fastu aderit? Qui
veritatem neque norunt neque discere sentiunt, verum falsis opinionibus prmpediti, illa nune faciunt que prius in Marcello patrarunt.-S. Basil. Epist.
10 (ap. Chr. Lupi Dissert. de Synod. Sardicens. cap. 6. Opp. I. 325).
Si vestrce dilectioni videtur, Petri Apostoli mnemoriam honoremus ut
ab iis quijudicaverunt scribatur Julio Iomnanorumn episcopo. —Synod. Sardicens. can. 3, 4, 5.
TIHE PAPACY AND THE CHIURCIF. 11
could anticipate the immense jurisdiction which in the
course of ages would be erected on so narrow a foundation.
The perverse ingenuity of Greek theologians continued
to discover fresh points of debate in Christian doctrine,
and gave to Rome the opportunity, always improved to
the utmost, of again and aoain intervening, on each occasion with a more decisive air of authority, as the combatants eagerly sought her alliance in their internecine strife.
M[eanwhile a new element was introduced into the org'anization of the church, which, paradoxical as it may seem,
served to give her an additional chance of humbling her
sisters-the erection of the rival patriarchate of Constantinople.
The council of Nicema, in recording the ancient custom.
of the church, assigned the highest rank to the apostolic
sees of Rome, Alexandria,~ and Antioch, but reserved to
every province the due privileges of its own church.l There
1 Antiqua consuetudo servetur per A-igyptum. Libyam et Pentapolim, ita
ut Alexandrinus episcopus harum omniumn habeat potestatem; quia et urbis
Romai episcopo parilis mlos est. Similiter antem et apud Antiochiam, ceterasque provincias, suis privilegia serventur ecclesiis."'-Concil. Nico n. can. 6.
I give the version of Dionysius Exiguus, as the one authorized by Rome in
the sixth century. The earlier one of Rufinus (Hist. Eccles. Lib. I. cap. 6)
is even less favorable to Rome —" Et ut apud Alexandriamn et in urbe Roma
vetusta consuetudo conservetur, ut vel ille A4gypti vel hic suburbicariarumn
ecclesiarum sollicitudinem gerat." We shall see hereafter that Leo I. endeavored at the council of Chalcedon to substitute a supposititious canon,
but the attempt was abandoned.
It is rather curious that the forged donation of Constantine, fabricated in
the eighth century, should contain a special grant to Rome of supremacy
over the churches of Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Constantinople.
That supremacy was thus attributed to an earthly power, and not to primitive
tradition or to the primacy of St. Peter, and it was admitted, even at that day,
that forgery was necessary to substantiate a claim for which at the same time
an antiquity coeval with the Christian religion was assumed. Wickliffe was
shrewd enough to see the incompatibility of this with the power asserted to
be derived from Christ through St. Peter-" Certum videtur ex chronicis
quod non a Christo sed a Cwsare Constantino Romanus episcopus accepit vel
usurpavit potestatem."-Univ. Oxon. Litt. de Error. Wicklif. art. 114 (Wilkins. Coneil. III. 344).
112 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
is here no mention of Constantinople, but the imperial city,
so rapidly growing on the shores of the Bosphorus, was not
long content to remain in subjection to the province of
Thrace, and it speedily aspired to the primacy of the East.
Accordingly at the second (Ecunmenic Council, held at
Constantinople in 381, a new declaration was made, in
which, after reciting the names of the great provinces of the
church-Alexandria, the East, Antioch, Asia, Pontus, and
Thrace-it adds that the Bishop of Constantinople has the
primacy of honor after the Bishop of Rome, because his
city is the New Rome;' but still no interference is to be
allowed with the autonomy of the several provinces.
As the bishop of the imperial city was the pastor and
spiritual director of the emperor, and as the emperor was
the suzerain who was all-powerful in deciding religious
quarrels and civil and criminal cases, it will readily be perceived what ample opportunities the bishops of Constantinople enjoyed, when they chanced to be on good terms
with their masters, of extending their influence over their
older rivals.2 Of this they made good use. and the upstart
church became the common centre of attack by all the
venerable prelates of the East. In this Alexandria, the
most powerful and wealthy, was the leader, and Theophilus,
Cyril, and Dioscorns filled the first half of the fifth century
with their ceaseless assaults on St. John Chrysostom, Nestorius. and Flavianus, whose principal fault was that their see
was rapidly overshadowing the influence of the traditional
apostolic churches. This rivalry furnishes the key of the
disgraceful contests which constitute the ecclesiastical
history of the time, and we shall see presently how frequent
and how useful were the opportunities which it offered to
RIome, as each rival sought her alliance in the effort to
crush its antagonist.
Verumtamen Constantinopolitnlnus episcopus habeat honoris primnatun
post nomanum episcopum; propterea quod urbs ipsa sit junior Roma. —Concil. Constantinop. I. can. 2.
2 Chr. Lupi Append. ad Ephesin. Latrocin. cnp. 3 (Opp. II. 255).
THE PAPACY AND THIE CHTURCEI 113
It was a timne of confusion when ambitious men were
striving' on every halnd to extend their power, and a minor
quarrel which was in progress between Jerusalemn and
Antioch well illustrates the reckless temper of the period
and the eagerness to attribute to Rome any prerogative
which might seem to serve the interest of the moment.
Juvenal of Jerusalem was anxious to emancipate his see
from the supremacy of Antioch, and even entertained a
wild hope of subjecting the latter to his power when the
Patriarch John of Antioch embraced the cause of Nestorius at the council of Ephesus in 431. IHe accordingly
insisted that John should purge himself before the Bishop
of Rome of the crimes imputed to him, and alleged
ancient custom in behalf of this demand.l The falsity of
this was shown by the absence of any effort on the part of
the offending patriarch to propitiate Pope Celestin, and by
the final patching up of a reconciliation between him and
Cyril and the withdrawal of mutual excomlmnunication,
without any reference of the matter to Rome. Yet Juvenal further endeavored to associate his own see with that
of Rome as possessing jurisdiction over Antioch, and,
accordincl to Leo the Great, sought to substantiate his
claims by producing forged doculments in the coulncil.2
For a time Alexandria triumphed. Theophilus enjoyed,the satisfaction of seeing Chrysostom banished, and the
high-handed. proceeclings of Cyril at the council of Ephesus procured the condemnation of Nestorius. His successor Dioscorus, even more reckless, contrived, with the aid
of intrigues in the imperial court, so to engineer the Robher Synod of Ephesus in 449, as to proclaim the orthodoxy
of the heretic Eutyches and to inflame the bishops to the
murder of the Patriarch Flavianus. Flushed with these successes, Alexandria threatened soon to contest supremlacy
1 Coneil. Ephesin. Act. Iv. (Harduin. I. 1490.)
2 Leon. PP. I. Epist. cxIx. cap. 4.
10*
114 TH-E RISE OF THE TEMIPORnAL POWER.
with iRome. At the Robber Synod Dioscorus presided,
under imperial command, though the legates of Leo were
present,' and soon after the rivals exchanged excommunications; but Dioscorus had been too violent. The rising
influence of Alexandria forced Rome and Constantinople
into alliance. A change of emperors deprived Dioscorus of
support in the palace, and when the council of Chalcedon
assembled in 451, all united eagerly in his downfall, after
which we hear little of the powerful Alexandrian church.
Constantinople at last was in the ascendant, and was little
disposed to gratitude towards Romne for her assistance in
the hour of trouble. Against the protests of the Roman
legates a canon was adopted which gave to her the supremacy of the Eastern churches and placed her on an equality
with:Rome, alleging as a reason that both were imperial
cities.' This struck at the root of the papal claims, as it
not only created a co-equal, but declared that the prerogatives of IRome were based on civil and not on divine attributes, and it was to the last degree distasteful. Something of the kind apparently had been anticipated, for
Paschasinus, the rppresentative of Leo, was provided with
a version of the _Nicene canon which conceded to Rome
undisputed primacy, but when he produced it, he was met
by the Eastern bishops whose copies of the canons contained nothing of the kind,' and the forgery was tacitly
conceded by Rome, for Leo's version never has since been
embodied in the authorized collections of canons.4
The council, however, incidentally bestowed upon Leo
the title of (Ecumnenic Patriarch, but such consolation as
he might derive firom this was neutralized by its being given
indifferently, for a century and a half, to the bishops both of
Rome and Constantinople, without attracting special attenConcil. Chalced. Act. I. (Harduin. II. 79.)
Concil. Chalced. can. 28.
3 Concil. Chalced. Act. xvI.
4 Chr. Lupi Schol. ad Can. Nicmn. vI. (Opp. I. 244.)
THE PAPACY AND TIHE ICHURC H. 115
tion, and Justinian habitually uses it when addressing the
Patriarch of Constantinople, thus showing it to be his official title.l At length the jealousy of Rome was excited,
when, in addition to other movements looking to universal
domination befitting the namae, John the Faster formally,assumed it at the council of Constantinople in 587, and
Pelagius II. and Gregory the Great protested vigorously
against it. The Constantinopolitans were obdurate, however, and persisted in using a title which gratified their
-vanity, notwithstanding the arguments of Gregory, who
did not assume that it was the prerogative of Rome, but
remonstrated that it could properly be bestowed on Christ
alone; and his proud humility bequeathed to his successors
the well-known formula of " the servant of the servants of
God." Yet in his earnest entreaties to his patriarchal
brother not to usurp so proud and so foolish an appellation,
and in his arguments to prove the equality of all bishops,
it is not easy to recognize the representative of a see
which for centuries had lost no opportunity of arrogantly
asserting its domination over sister churches.2
WThile the Papacy had thus virtually failed in its efforts
as respects one-half of Christendom, it had been more
successful with the other half. Western Europe had no
Apostolic sees and no imperial city to rival and to
counterbalance the influence of the mistress of the world.
In Spain, Gaul, and Britain there seem to have been
no recognized primacies, and various sees arrogated to
them.selves and contested with one another a transient
Novell. vI. vII.
Gregor. PP. I. Regest. Lib. v. Epist. 18, 20, 21, 43; Lib. vII. Epist.
4, 27, 31, 33, 34; Lib. Ix. Epist. 68.
It was shortly after this, in 607, that Boniface III., taking advantage of
a favorable political conjuncture, obtained from the usurper Phocas a recognition of the supremacy of Rome over Constantinople (Anastas. Biblioth.
No. 68). This, however, was not long submitted to, and in 692 the Qvi7 bisext in Trtllo repeated the canon of Chalcedon, declaring that Constantinople was equal in privileges though next in rank to Rome (Can. 36).
116 THIIE RISE OF THIE TEM PORAL POWER.
superiority, as the vicissitudes of personal influence or
political fortune affordedt them the opportunity. The proininence of Rome as the seat of governmelnt, however, insensibly led them to recognize anll uncertain degree of
authority as inherent in the Eternal City. Africa, Inder
the lead of Carthage, by turns yielded a qualified obedience
to, or asserted independence of, Rome, as the policy of the
mlomnent was dictated b)y internal or external pressure.
Italy was divided into two vicariates, of which Milan ruled
the northern, and Rome the southern; and so precairious
was the general supremacy of the latter, that in the sixth
century the archbishops of Ravenna affected airs of equality,
in consequence of the residence of the imperial exarchs in
that city, while as late as the eleventh century the Mailanese clergy, appealing to the old traditions of their church,
disclaimed the aLthority of the popes, set them at defiance,
and were forced to abate their pretensions only after a
desperate war of nearly thirty years.
As the Arian controversy and the deplorable dissensions
of the Eastern churches gradually enabled Rome to assume
the tone of a mistress, she naturally sought to make lier
poxver felt throughout the West as well as the East.
Towards the end of the fourth century the decretals of Siricius show the rapid strides of centralization. A local
synod of Rome, such as that of 384, assumes to lay down
rules for the governance of the church at large. Prelates
in Gaul and Spain apply to Rome for the solution of their
doubts, and receive the reply as final. The popes, as the
mouthpiece of the synods, announce the decisions to the
Christian world, and undertake to see to the execution of
the canons promulgated. The high and overbearing spirit
of Innocent I. lent a powerful impulse to this tendency.
In 416 he sharply reproves Aurelius of Carthage for the
admission of unworthy men to bishoprics in the African
church, peremptorily orders its discontinuance, and commlands that the missive be read in all the churches. Its
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH. 117
whole tenor is that of a superior discharging his duty in
enforcing the law upon his inferiors.'
Not long after this we find the historian Socrates complaining that the Bishop of Rome was imitating his brother
of Alexandria in efforts to supplant the temporal authorities.2 The Alexandrian church, indeed, under the lead of
the fiery Cyril, was making rapid strides to independence
and supremacy throughout Egypt and the neighboring
provinces. With his body-guard of turbulent clerks, and
with the savage hordes of Nitrian anchorites at his command, Cyril lorded it over the city, and reduced the Imperial Prefect, Orestes, to a subordinate position.3 The
revolution which he thus organized was attempted by his
successor Dioscorus; his lawless acts were unrepressed,
and he ventured openly to assert that the imperial authority in Egypt was subordinate to his own,4 while the spiritual tyranny that had been erected throughout the province
is manifested when, after his fall in the council of Chalcedon, the Egyptian bishops piteously entreated to be allowed not tb subscribe to the orthodox profession of faith,
since if it should prove unacceptable to the future patriarch of Alexandria, they would all spend the rest of their
days in exile.5 They evidently felt that neither the empire
nor the church at large could afford them protection.
Warned, perhaps, by the fate of Dioscorus, the successors of St. Peter prudently abstained from trespassing
further upon the temporal power, but they continued to
imitate the Alexandrian prelates in extending and confilming their spiritual domination, until, in 495, Gelasius I.
was emboldened to assert it in the most unqualified terms, as
The genuineness of this epistle has been questioned, but Jaff6 considers
it authentic.-Regesta, p. 26.
2 Socrat. Hist. Eccles. Lib. VII. cap. 11.
3 Ibid. cap. 13, 14, 15.
4 Libell. Sophronii ap. Concil. Chalced. Act. IIr.
5 ConCil. Chalced. Act. ix. (Harduin. III. 418-9.)
118 TtHE RISE OF THIE TEMPORAL POWER.
the direct prerogative of St. Peter and his successors;T afnd
when, in the following year, Anastasius IT. announced his
election to the Emperor Anastasius, he couplecld a request
for the imperial assistance with a declaration of the same
nature?2 This was not, however, in all cases tamely submitted to, and occasionally the old spirit of independence
would burst forth, as when, in 550, the African church
launched the thunder of excommunlication against Pope
Vigoilius for his uniworthv conduct in reference to the Three
Chapters. The quarrel between Rome and Constantinople over the churches of Illyricum, includcing those of
Macedonia and Greece proper, affords another instance of
a rebuff administered to the aspiring' spirit of the Universal
Bishop. Though they were undoubtedly at one time in-.
eluded within the jurisdiction of the Popes, yet as tile influence of the Western EImpire declined, the Roman prelate
gradually lost his hold, and as early as 421,a rescript of Theodosius the Younger transferred them to Constantinople in
terms which mark the pretensiols of the upstart patriarchate
to succeed to the walling power of the rival city.4 Yet Rome
did not willingly surrender her rights, until at length a
firuitless strugogle of three centuries ended in transferring
to the Eastern muetropolis the prerogatives once enjoyed
by the West, and Leo the Isaurian was, in this at least,
able to wreak his vengeance on the intrepid Gregory II.
In the vicissitudcles of this long contest for supremacy,
the mail reliance of the popes was the universal jurisdiction which they arrogated to themselves over the Christian
church. If it could once be fairly established that all sente~nces on ecclesiastical offenders were liable to revision and
reversal at the hands of the successor of St. Peter, le beGelasii PP. I. Epist. 13.
2 Anastasii PP. II. ad Annstas. Imp.
3 Victor. Tunenens, Chron. ann. 550,
4 Lib. XVI. Cod. Theod. Tit. ii. 1. 45.
TTIE PAPA.CY AND THE CIHURtCH. 19
came at once the custodian of the canons and the sole and
irresponsible arbiter of all questions, with a corresponding
right to interfere in every transacti6n affecting the internal
governmlent of the church-a power which in skilful hallds
was limited only by the mloderation of the possessor.'
In the earlier ages of the church this appellate power had
no existence. The ecclesiastical sentence of excommnunication could be removed by himn only who had pronounced
it, until the council of Nicaa established courts of appeal
by orderinog the assembling of semi-annual synods in each
province to examine into the cases of those who might consider themselves unjustly treated.3 That Rome originally
made no attempt to assert a superior jurisdiction is shown
by the story of AIarcion the heresiarch, about the year 150.
While leading an ascetic life as a hermit, he fell from grace,
andl committed the heinous offence of seducing a virgin, for
which he was promptly excommunicated by his father, a
bishop of high repute. It is evident that already the influence of the Roman church was widely extended, when IMarcion sought the imperial city and asked to be admitted to
communion; but it also shows that Rome claimed no supervisory power when the request was refused-" We may not
do this without the permission of your venerable father.
We are one in faith and goodwill, and cannot place ourselves in opposition to our good brother."'3
A hundred years later we find the papal court considerably advanced in its assumptions of appellate jurisdiction,
It is upon this appellate power that the pretensions of the Roman see to
supremacy a.re fonnded. In a report of an interview held May 16, 1869,
between the Patriarch-elect of Alexandria and the Roman Catholic Bishop
of the same see, commissioned by the pope to invite him to the approaching
oecumenic council, the papal representative asserted the sovereignty of
Rome by alleging its supreme jurisdiction-" Ma che il Papa e il capo delle
chiese e reso chiaro dal fatto ehe, in ctaso d'appello, si ricorre a lui come
giudice; il diritto di guidicare gli appelli comprende naturalmente la supremazia. " —L'Emancipatore Cattolico, 5 Giugno, 1869.' Concil. Nicaen. can. 5. 3 Epiphan. Panar. 1Hres. 42.
120 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
though the rest of the church was as yet by no means prepared to submit to them. In 253 two Spanish bishops,
Basilides and Martial, were deposed and excommunicated
for idolatrous practices and other offences, and their places
wrere regularly filled. Basilides, in fact, had confessed his
errors, had voluntarily resigned his see, and had expressed
his gratitude for admission to lay communion. Yet he
proceeded to Rome, where he prevailed upon Stephen I. to
receive him into full communion, and both he and his part
ner in guilt claimedrestoration to their episcopal positions.
This shows the influence which Rome was rapidly attaining, but the resistance offered proves that its supremacy
was not recognized. The African church, moreover, took
alarm, and urged its Spanish sister not to yield to the usurpation. In the name of the African bishops, St. Cyprian
addressed a letter to the Spanish churches in which he not'only assumed that the action of Stephen was null and void,
but that Basilides had greatly increased his crime by deceiving the ignorant Roman bishop, who was less to blame
for his negligence than was Basilides for his cunning. I-Ie
declared that they are worthy of death who thus offer an,illegal communion to unrepentant sinners, and he wound
up by exhorting the Spaniards to stand firm and not to join
in the sacrilegious communion of their profane and disgraced bishops.l It would be difficult to conceive of a
more complete denial of all power on the part of Rome to
revise the proceedings of her sister churches.
This was not the first time that Cyprian had been called
upon to rebuke the encroachments of Rome, which he did
with a fearless spirit, though he acknowledged a primacy
of honor in the see of St. Peter and deemed it the source
of catholic unity. In 251 a Carthaginian deacon named
Felicissimus lapsed from the faith under persecution, and
when his restoration was sternly refused by Cyprian he' Cypriani Epist. 67. (Ed. Oxon.)
THE PAPACY AND TIIE CHURCH. 121
appealed to Pope Cornelius, whom he endeavored to overawe with a crowd of graceless wretches carried to Rome
for the purpose by his friend Fortunatus. Cyprian with
little ceremony reproached Cornelius with having been intimidated by these worthless characters, and protested
against any revision of a sentence legally rendered by local
bishops, who had the advantage of ample evidence on the
spot, and thus he formally condemned any attempt by a
criminal to seek a foreign jurisdiction.l
It is true that the dignity of Rome might occasionally
cause its bishop to be chosen as judge in special cases, as
when Constantine nominated Pope Melchiades to preside
over a tribunal for the trial of Cmcilianus, Bishop of Carthage;' but the rescript of the emperor shows that this was
a position conferred by him in a particular instance and
not a prerogative inherent in the Holy See. The Nicene
canon, already alluded to, proves that in ordinary cases
the only appeal lay to a provincial synod. WThen bishops
were concerned, the regulations of the council of Antioch
declare that the unanimous condemnation of a bishop in his
local synod cannot be revised elsewhere, while the careful
provision for the different cases that nmight arise shows that
the customary appeal was to the emperor, and that no
ecclesiastical power existed superior to the synod.3
It p'robably was not found easy in practice to assemble
the semi-annual synods established by the iNicene canon,
and some other device was requisite to neutralize the constantly increasing abuse of the sacerdotal power. The
council of Sardica, in S47, therefore, provided that if a
bishop, through anger, should unjustly deprive any of his
clerks of communion, the latter might appeal to the inetropolitan of the province, or, in his absence, to the metropolitan of the acljoining province.4 There is evidently, thus
Cypriani Epist. 59. 2 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. x. cap. 5.
3 Concil. Antioch. ann. 341. can. 4, 12, 14, 15.
Concil. SIardicens. can. 17.
11
122 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
far, no thought of erecting a court of first or last appeal
in Rome; and yet this same council of Sardica, in its
eagerness to find some mode of escape from the persecution of the Arians, invoked the assistance of Pope Julius
in a manner which, cautious and restricted though it was,
has served as the foundation for the overshadowing supremacy of the Roman see.
That the Sardican canons were adopted temporarily and
for a special purpose is evident both from their provisions
and from the manner in which they long continued to be
treated. The appeal which they create is to Pope Julius
personally, and not to the Bishop of IRome, as though the
Latin churches wished to secure aid in an immediate
danger, without instituting a permanent custom; and,
moreover,. the only intervention which they prescribe is
that, if a bishop considers himself unjustly condemned, the
case may be submitted to Julius, who can either confirm
the judgment or send legates to the spot where a new trial
may be had.l The council seems to have foreseen the evil of
allowing appeals to a distant point, and to have guarded
carefully against the danger of such abuse of the power
which it was granting. The establishment of such authority, to be wielded by an irresponsible court in far-off
1 Concil. Sardicens. can. 3, 4, 7. What are called the canons of the Sardican council seem rather to be minutes of its proceedings; and of the three
canons quoted here, the first is the only one of which the adoption is recorded. The matter apparently led to some debate, and after the adoption
of canon 3, offered by Osius, Gaudentius added a proposition looking to the
new trial being held in Rome, and designed to protect the interest of the
condemned bishop during his absence. This apparently was not passed,
a-nd then Osius suggested the seventh canon, which prescribes that the
second trial shall be held on the spot, permitting the pope, if he thinks fit,
to send deputies to assist as assessors. The whole is evidently an attempt to
frame some new device by which to meet a new danger, and not a record of
a pre-existing custom.
At the most, the whole only represents the action of the Latin half of the
council after it had quarrelled and divided, and but for the use subsequently made of the canons by Rome they would be unworthy of consideration.
THE PAPACY AND TIIE CHURCIH. 123
Rome, vwas a later assumption, which practically gave to
the prerogative its immense power for evil.
That these canons passed completely from memory with
the exigency which caused their adoption is evident from
an epistle addressed to the Emperor Gratian by the council
of Rome in 378, entreating him to put in force a rescript
by which he had granted appellate power to the Roman
church in the existing troubles-a rescript which had met
with scant observance.1 Similar proof is afforded by the
provisions of the second oecumenic council, held in Constantinople in 381, which recognizes no appeal from the
synod of the province, and expressly orders that none
should be made.2 How little the popes themselves believed
that they were invested with any general appellate power,
even when specially called upon, is shown in the case of
Bonosus. Accused of an error of faith respecting the perpetual virginity of the Mother of Christ, his trial was
referred by the council of Capua, in 389, to Anysius,
Archbishop of Thessalonica, and the Macedonian bishops.
These applied to Pope Siricius for his judgment. Siricius
was usually not backward in extending the prerogatives of
his see, and yet he declined, on the ground of incompetency,
to entertain the question, and told the applicants that they
alone could decide it.3 So a lawv of Arcadius and HonoriLs, iii 400, providing penalties for bishops who refused to
submit to sentences of deposition regularly pronounced by
Concil. Roman. ann. 378 (Harduin. I. 840-1.)
2 Concil. Constantinop. I. can. 6. From the tenor of this canon it is evident that appeals were customarily made to the secular power.
3 " Advertimus quod nobis judicandi forma competere non possit....
vestrum est igitur qui hoe accepistis judicium, sententiam ferre de omnibus,
nec refugiendi vel elabendi accusatoribus vel accusato copiam dare." In
the text of this epistle as given by Batthyani (Legg. Eccles. Hung. T. I
p. 21.0) the " non" is omitted from the first clause of this sentence, but the
context shows that this reading is an error, and the authorized editions
give it as quoted. Cf. I-Iarduin. I. 859; Jaffd Regesta, p. 21.
124 THE RISE OF THIE TEMPORAL POWVER
the neighboring prelates, makes no allusion to any appeal
or reference to Rome.l
It is true that Baronius produces, from the inexhaustible
storehouse of the Vatican, a rescript of Gratian and VTalentinian, dated in 381, directing that the decisions of the
PIoman bishop, acting with seven others, shall be final;
that metropolitans shall of necessity be judged by the
pope, and that, when the provincial judges are liable to
suspicion, the accused may demand to be tried by the pope,
or by fifteen neighboring bishops; but that this change of
velnue hadl to be made before the trial, as no appeal from or
revision of a sentence is allowed.' This was probably
issued in response to the request of the synod of 378; it
cautiously withholds all appellate power, and the restricted
jurisdiction which it bestows is merely a temporary one,
granted as a relief to themselves by princes wearied with
the internecine strife between Damasus and his unsuccessful competitor Ursinus, and bewildered with the ceaseless
wrangling of the Arian controversy, for the canons of the
council of Constantinople in the same year show how
anxious were the secular authorities to escape from these
perplexities. That it could only have possessed temporary
validity, is shown by its omission fiom the Theodosian
code, and the conflicting tendency of subsequent legislation. If genuine, moreover, it proves that the Sardican
canons had not succeeded in conferring any permanent
appellate jurisdiction on the Roman court.
It is almost a work of surplusage to pursue further the
proof of the worthlessness of those canons as the basis of
the supervisory power of Rome; and yet another instance,
fully as conclusive, may be cited. St. John Chrysostom,
when the illegal synod ad Querctzum deprived him of the
see of Constantinople, never thought of appealing to the
Lib. xvi. Cod. Theod. Tit. ii. 1. 35.
Baron. Annal. ann. 381, No. 247.
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH. 125
friendly Innocent I., as he would have been entitled to do
had the validity of the Sardican canons been recognized;
but, as he himself states when writing to Innocent, he only
demanded to be tried by a fuller synodcl.l When, moreover,
Innocent interfered, he claimed no special power; though,
curiously enough, his action has been adduced by zealous
Catholics as an evidence that the Sardican Canons were
then in force. So far was he from assuming this that he
told the followers of Chrysostom that the canons of Nicsea
were the only ones entitled to implicit obedience; and
though he alluded to the council of Sardica, it was only to
substantiate his condemnation of the council of Antiocli,
which had been quoted by the persecutors of Chrysostonm.
He based on it no claim to appellate jurisdiction, and
could only advise that an cecumlenic council be held, as the
sole tribunal which could decide on the justice of the condemnation of Chrysostom.2
Yet the earliest claim of a general prerogative to revise
the judgment of provincial synods appears to have been
asserted by Innocent I. An epistle of his to Victricius of
Rouen orders all important cases to be referred to Rome
for revision, after decisions had been rendered on the spot,
and he bases this demand on custom and the synodal decrees-probably alluding to those of Sardica.3 That this,
indeed, was becoming not uncommon is manifested by his
correspondence in 414 with the bishops of Macedonia.
S. Joann. Chrysost. ad Innocent. Epist. I. cap. 2.
Innocent. PP. I. Epist. vII. cap. 2, 3, 4. The absence of legitimate and
recognized authority on the part of the popes to interfere in such matters is
confessed by the fabrication of an epistle in which Innocent is made to
excommunicate Arcadius the emperor, and Eudoxia his wife, for the part
thev had taken in the persecution of the saint; and also of an humble appeal
from them for restoration to communion. As late as the end of the seventeenth century these documents were still cited as genuine (Chr. Lupi
Schol. in Canon. Sardicens. Iv.-Opp. T. I. p. 294)-but they are now universally admitted to be spurious.
Innocent. PP. I. Epist. II. cap. 3.
11*
126 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
Bubalius and Taurianus, after condemnation at home, hadl
exhibited letters purporting to come friom Innocent. Tlhe
Macedonian prelates thereupon complained to him of this
interference, to which he replied that the letters in question
were forgeries —an evidence that the evils of the new system were already beginning to make themselves felt, and
that the church was not as yet prepared to submit.
These pretensions at length aroused resistance, and, as
soon as their basis was investigated, IRome herself was
obliged to confess that they could not be justified. A
priest of Sicca, ill Nullidia, named Apiarius, was deprived
of holy orders after clue investigation and trial by the provincial bishops. He carried his case to Pope Zozimus, who
restored him to coummunion, and sent him back to Africa
with legates to sustain him. At the sixth council of Carthage the matter was solemnly taken up and debated. The
epistle of Zozimus grounded his right of interference on
the Sardican canons, to which he attributed the name of
the venerable council of NiTctea.2 The authority of the first
aecumenic council was irrefragable, and the African fathers
bowed submissively to it; but as the principles advanced
were in such total conflict with the decrees usually attributed to that august body, they only yielded provisionally,
and demanded a fuller investigation. Professing implicit
Innocent. PP. I. Epist. XVIII.
2 The manner in which Zozimus insisted on the authority of these canons
as emanating from the council of Nicea, and the discussions concerning
them in the council of Carthage, show that the importance of the substitution was keenly appreciated at the time, and that it scarcely could have
been accidental. The labored arguments of Baronius (Ann. 419, No. 65-71)
to prove that it was of little moment are their own best refutation. It was
the fashion in Rome to confound the two councils together. Their canons
were all included under the head of Nicea in an ancient collection (Migne's
Patrolog. T. 56, p. 412) which Quesnel thinks was authoritatively used in
Rome dluring this period, but which the Ballerini attribute to Gaul. The
fact is that, in 525, Dionysius Exiguus, in his preface, explains that he
himself had added them, with the African canons, to the authoritative Greek
code, in the collection nimade by him for the Roman court.
THE PAPACY AND THIE CHURCHI-. 127
obedience to the Nicene code of discipline, they forthwith
dispatched messengers to Alexandria and Constantinople
for authentic copies, thinking that their own might possibly be imperfect. Great was their joy on being able to
prove that the obnoxious claim was an unauthorized interpolation, and greater still when Apiarius confessed the
irregularities for which he had been condemned. During
these lengthenedc proceedings, Zozimus had died, and his
successor, Boniface, had likewise passed away, after a pontificate of nearly four years. To Celestin I., therefore,
did the African church communicate the result, in an
epistle remarkable for its spirit of independence. The
pope was requested, with slender show of respect, no more
to entertain appeals from those who had been condemned
at home, for no authority could be alleged in support of
such pretensions. Ample provisions, moreover, existed to
secure impartial justice on the spot- where offences were
committed, and no principle could justify conclusions
formed fiom ex parte statements in distant regions, inaccessible to witnesses and testimony.l Not content with
this, to secure their church from further aggression, the
council revived a canon which threatened excommunication.
against all who should appeal to Rome after undergoing
due trial at home, in terms which show that this was by
no means the first struggle which had taken place on this
question." To appreciate this transaction in its full significance, we must remember that at this period the church
of Africa was the stronghold of orthodoxy, under the
leadership of the brilliant St. Augustine, who took part in
all these proceedings —and further, that when the Sardicanm
canons were traced to their true source, they were treated
by unanimous consent as void of all authority.
Cod. Eccles. African. can. 137 (Concil. Carthag. VI. can. 14).
2 Non provocent ad transmarina judicia, sed ad primates suarum provinciarlum, sicnt et dle eliscopis sqpe constitutumnC7 est. Ad transmarina anutem qui
putaverit appellandulni a nullo inter Aflicarn ad comnlunionem suscipiatur.
— Cod. Eccles. African. can. 28 (Concil. Milevit. ann. 402, can. 22).
128 TIE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
Even while the African church was thus sturdily and
successfully vindicating its independence,:Rome was managing to extend over Gaul the jurisdiction which St. Augustine denied it to possess. In 419 the clergy of Valence
appealed to Boniface I., complaining of their bishop, Maxirnus, whom they accused of Manicheisml and other crimes,
and who had refused submission to the synods assembled
for his trial. Boniface had no scruple in seizing the opportunity thus offered. He ordered another synod to be
convened, in which sentence should be pronounced, whether
Maximus appeared to defend himself or not; but the result
was to be transmitted to Rome, for papal approval.' So
in 428 Celestin I. consoled himself for his vanishing sway
over Africa by writing to the bishops of Vienne and Narbonne, blaming them for the consecration as bishop of a
certain Daniel, whose misdeeds in the East were at that
time undergoing investigation in Rome, and whom he had
been vainly summoning and searching for. He also inveighed against the conduct of a priest of Marseilles, implicated in the murder of a brother, whom he ordered to
be tried by the ecclesiastical authorities.2
The gradual advances thus made culminated under the
energetic management of Leo I. The Barbarian invasions
were daily rendering the transalpine churches more in
need of aid and sympathy, and as the temporal sway of
Rome declined, her spiritual authority grew stronger. The
splendid talents of Leo, his unimpeachable character and
vigorous temper, fitted him to take full advantage of this
conjuncture, and to him the Holy See owes the establishment of its prerogative. The quarrel of St. Hilary, Mietropolitan of Arles, with the Archbishop of Vienne afforded
a fair opportunity, which was improved to the utmost.
Hilary, confident in his own integrity of purpose, the
justice of his cause, and his blameless life, was not disBonifac. PP. I. Epist. 2.
2 Ccelest. PP. 1. Epist. ad Episc. Gall. cap. 3, 6.
THE PAPACY AND THE CHIURCH. 129
posed to submit himself to a domination which he did not
recognize. He was broken in the struggle, and though
the Gallican church did not pay heed to the deprivation
of communlion pronounced against him, iio resistance was
made to his degradation from the primatial see of Gaul.
The trinmph of the apostolic see was completed, and its
supremacy was established, not only by this example of
its power, but by an imperial edict which, in 445, during
the progress of the affair, Leo procured from the feeble
Valentinian III. In this extraordinary document the most
extravagant pretensions of the iRoman church receive the
full sanction of law; its authority is declared competent to
any stretch of power; any attempt at resistance is made a
violation of the obedience due to the emperor himself; the
secular magistrates are (lirected to compel the presence at
Rome of any prelate whose case may be evoked there for
judgment by the pope; and Aetius, the military governor
of Gaul, is directed to levy a fine of ten pounds of gold on
any judge who may infringe the privileges thus bestowed.1
These enormous prerogatives are declared to be in pursuance of the decrees of a synod; but as no special council
is mentioned, we may presume that the Sardican canons
were those used to give color to the usurpation, Valentinian
being more easily imposed upon than St. Augustine.
Arnied. with such a weapon, it is no wonder that Leo
could declare to the prelates of Gaul that his church was
competent to entertain appeals fiom any source, that Hilary
was guilty in denying the obedience which he owed to St.
Peter, and that whoever refused to admit the authority of
the see of Rome condemned himself to hell.2 Encouraoed
by success, he carried his prerogative still further, and
assumned that no sentence could be rendered until the case
should be submitted to him and his pleasure be expressed,
thus erecting the Roman church into a court of first and
Novell. Valentin. III. Tit. xvII. ~~ 2, 3. 2 Leon. PP. I. Epist. x, cap. 2.
130 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
last resort.' The papal decretals, moreover, he declared
to be binding on the whole church, any infringement or
neglect of their commands being an offence for which there
was no pardon.2
How entirely this supreme jurisdiction was the creation
of imperial power was seen when the final death-struggle
between Alexandria and Constantinople seemed to give
Leo the opportunity of coercing both antagonists into
submission, and the East, notwithstanding its distracted
condition, utterly repudiated the pretensions of the West.
When Eutyches was first condemned in the synod of Constantinople in 448, Leo assumed that he appealed to Rome;
but when the matter was investigated in the synod of the
succeeding year, it was proved that, after sentence had
been passed upon him, he had said to the imperial commissioner that he appealed to a council embracing Rome,
Alexandria, Jerusalem, and Thessalonica-that is to say,
to an cecumenic council, which was strictly in accordance
with established precedent.' It is true that when Eutyches
had his revenge in the Robber Synod of Ephesus in 449,
where the deposition of one of his opponents, Theodoret
of Cyrus, was confirmed, the latter sought refuge in Rome,
and appealed to Leo in terms of fulsome supplication,' but
this is not to be admitted as a precedent of any authority.
Supported by the imperial court, Eutychianism for the
moment controlled the East. Leo's legates at Ephesus had
been treated with the scantiest respect, and one of them,
iHilary the Deacon, had been forced to fly for his life.
Rome of course became the haven of refuge for the orthodox Greeks, who were ready to say or do anything to
insure protection for themselves. Leo himself was utterly
Leon. PP. I. Epist. xIv. cap. 1. Ejusd. Epist. Iv. cap. 5.
3 Concil. Chalced- Act. I. (Harduin. II. 198, 207.) Eutyches omitted Antioch purposely, because he considered Domnus, its metropolitan, as tainted
with Nestorianism.
4 Leon. PP. I. Epist. 52.
TIlE PAPACY AND THE CIHURCHI-. 131
without jurisdiction in the premises, and all that he could
do was to join in the council of Chalcedon, when the death
of the Emperor Theodosius rendered it possible to cancel
the proceedings at Ephesus by another synod. Meanwhile,
as Dioscorus of Alexandria, the Eutychian leader, and Leo
had mutually excommunicated each other, the latter had
no hesitation in admitting Theodoret to episcopal communion; and on the strength of this, and the special comniand of the Emperor Marcian, Theodoret, after a sharp
struggle, was admitted to a seat in the council of Chalcedon.' When, however, his case came up in the council,
the action of Leo was treated as null and void. IH-e was
ordered to prove his orthodoxy by anathematizing Nestorius, and on his tergiversating, the holy fathers shouted
" He is a heretic! He is a Nestorian! Turn out the heretic!" It was not until he had thus been forced formally
to curse Nestorius and Eutyches that the council acknowledged him to be orthodox, and then proceeded to decree
his restoration to his see.2 The previous action of Leo on
his appeal went for nothing, and the council, as we have
seen, took care to rebuke the papal aspirations by asserting
the equality of Constantinople with Rome. The failure
-was the more disgraceful, as Leo had imitated Zozimus in
twice attempting during the course of the quairlel to foist
upon tlle Emperor Theodosius the Sardican canons as those
of _Nicea.3
W~hile the East thus vindicated its independence, the
pretensions of Rome were submitted to in the West for
some time with more or less regularity. The epistles of
Leo, and of his successor Hilary, bear ample testimony to
their activity, and to the numerous cases in which the
authority of the Holy See was invoked by the ecclesiastics
of distant provinces. The appeal of the Tarragonensian
bishops, at the synod of Rome, in 465, is couched in terms' Concil. Chalced. Act. I. (Ha rduin. II. 71-4.)
2 Ejusd. Act. viii. (Ibid. pp. 498-9.) 3 Leon. PP. I. Epist. 43, 56.
132 TIIE RISE OF TIIE TEMPORAL POWER.
which abundantly testify to the submission of the Spanish
church to the most imperious assumptions of St. Peter's
superiority.l When in 495 the struggle over the excommunication of Acacius had given a fresh impetus to the pretensions of PRome over her hated rival of Constantinople,
Gelasius I. felt himself warranted in declaring that the
Apostolic see had the power of judging the whole church,
and was to be judged of none; that it would receive appeals from the whole Christian world, and that from its
decisions there was no appeal;2 and when Euphemius, the
successor of Acacius, urged that the excommunication of
the latter by Felix IIl. was irregular, as the act of a single
bishop, without a formal trial, Gelasius indignantly retorted
that such an assertion proved his contempt for the canons
which constituted the see of Peter as the universal judge
of the Christian church.3
Yet this supremacy, so confidently proclaimed, rested
on the most unstable foundation, and was crumbling even
while Gelasius sent his swelling words over Christendom.
The gift of the imperial power, it vanished with that
power, and when the Christianized Franks and Goths
erected new kingdoms in France and Spain, independence
of the temporal authority of Rome brought with it independence likewise of its spiritual domination. The 3Merovingian and Gothic princes were well nigh absolute rulers
over church as well as state, and felt little reverence for
the antagonistic claims of St. Peter.
It is true that when in 534 Contumeliosus, Bishop of
IRiez, was tried for incontinence, the bishops, to relieve
some doubts, applied to John II. for advice, and punished
the criminal in accordance with the papal recommendation,
and that Contumeliosus appealed to the next pope, Agapet
Concil. Roman. ann. 465. —Hilar. PP. Epist. ad Ascanium.
Gelasii PP. I. Epist. ad Episc. Dardan. (Harduin. II. 909.)
E3 jusd. Commonit. ad Faust. Magist. (Ibid. 885.)
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH. 133
I., who ordered a new trial. The whole case, however,,affords a strikiing contrast to the condition of affairs
under Leo and Hilary. John merely transmits canons and
points out what ought to be done in the premises, and
Agapet's epistle is absolutely apologetic in its tone, as
though he felt that he was assuming a novel power which
might be disputed, and which required to be explained.'
Even more significant is the history of the bishops Salonius of Embrun, and Sagittarius of Gap. Their dissolute and riotous conduct becoming unbearable, they were
deposed by the synod of Lyons in 567, and made no pretension to any direct right of appeal. Knowiing, however,
that they were in favor with King Gontran, they invoked
the royal power for permission to carry the matter to Rome.
This was granted, and Gontran moreover furnished them
with special letters to the pope. John III. heard their
story, andi sent to the king —not to the bishops —an order
for their restoration, which was duly accomplished. As
they became more reckless than ever, Gontran sent for
them, when, irritated by an audacious speech, he stripped
them of all their possessions, and threw them into a monastery. This was arbitrary and illegal, but they dared to
take no appeal to PRome, and at length Gontran relented and
restored them. Then, in 579, the synod of Chalons took
up the case.. The accusations of homicide and adultery
brought agcainst them were thought sufficient to j ustify penalnce only, so a charge of treason was framed, upon which
they were condemned and imprisoned in the church of St.
Marcel; and although they succeeded in escaping, other
bishops were installed in their sees, and they never ventured to appeal to Rome.2 This whole story shows how
completely the papal authority had been superseded by the
royal prerogative, and the same is evident in the cases of
Joann. PP. II. Epist. 5, 6. Agapeti PP. I. Epist. 7.
2 Greg. Turon. IFist. Franc. Lib. v. cap. 21, 28.
12
134 THE RISE OF TIE TEMPOPRAL POWER.
Pretextatus of Rouen,l and Giles of Rheims,2 neither of
whom would have failed to appeal to Rolme had he imaginedl that he had any chance of being saved by papal
intervention.
In the numerous councils, moreover, held in France
and Spain during the sixth and seventh centuries, there
are constant enactments of provisions for the settlenment
of ecclesiastical difficulties, while no allusion occurs to any
reference to Rome being customary. Thus, in the second
council of Lyons, held in 567, all questions between bishops
are directed to be finally settled by their provincial
brethren, and any one endeavoring to elude this judgment
is threatened with three months' withdrawal of friendly
intercourse.3 It is true that it was from the decision of
this very council that Contumeliosus appealed to Rome,
but for this action lie found it necessary to invoke the
royal power, and the undeviating action of the frequent
synods shows that the Gallican and Spanish churches were
successfully vindicating their independence of papal jurisdiction as far as concerned their internal affairs.4 This
severance from Rome grew wider and wider, in the
wild disorders of the later AMerovingians, until, as France
passed into the hands of the Mayors of the Palace, it
was separated from Rome almost as effectually as was
Spain by the Saracen conquest.
It is by no means improbable that the custom of bestowing the paclliumn was illtroducecl by the popes in the hope
of arresting this movement of disiltegration. As early
as the fourth century, the Eastern emperors were in the
habit of giving a cope to their prelates as a mark of dig1 Greg. Turon. Lib. v. cap. 19; Lib. YII. cap. 16.
2 Flodoard. H-list. Remens. Lib. II. cap. 2.
3 Concil. Lungdun. II. can. 1.
4 Concil. Aurelianens. III, can. 4.- Concil. Aurelianens. V. can. 3.Concil. Turon. II. can. 2. —Concil. Matiscon. II. can.19.-Concil. Parisiens.
V. can. l1. —Martin. Bracarens. can. 13, etc.
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCI-I. 135
nity. The popes at length adopted the plan of granting
its use to primates and apostolic vicars, as a token of their
possessessing certain privileges, in return for which they were
expected to render peculiar obedience to the Holy See.
This was in some sort a delegation of imperial power,
for in one of the earliest recorded instances of its use,
when Auxanius of Arles applied, in 543, to Vigilius for
the pallium, which had been conceded to his predecessor
by Pope S3ymmachus, Vigilius replies that he cannot do so
without the permission of the emperor. Nearly two years
passed away in obtaining Justinian's consent, and in 545
Vigilius formally authorized Auxanius to wear it, and at
the same time constituted him papal vicar throughout Gaul,
with full exercise of papal prerogatives over the Gallic
hierarchy, excepting that cases of peculiar magnitude andc
intricacy were to be referred to Rome for consultation.' It
was evidently an attempt to retain through a deputy the
nominal possession at least of authority over a region
which was rapidly becoming virtually independent. So in
595, when Gregory the Great transmitted the pallium with
the same dignity to Virgil of Arles, he instructed the latter
that all important cases were to be reserved for settlement by the Holy See.2 It is instructive to observe that
these special efforts were necessary to secure attention for
claims so exceedingly moderate in comparison with the
prerogatives exercised in the preceding century by Leo
and Hilary.
France in the eighth century had become almost a
heathen country, and when, about the year 700, Willibrodc
was deputed as missionary to the Frisians by Pope Sergius, and in 719 Gregory II. encouraged St. Boniface who
was bound to northern Germany on the same pious errand,
a new opportunity was offered to to the papacy to regain its
I Vigilii PP. Epist. 6, 7, 8, 9.
o Gregor. PP. I. Regest. Lib. v. Epist. 53, 54, 55.
136 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
lost ground. The churches founded by these missions were
more dependent than their elder sisters upon the HIoly See,
and the missionaries themselves more full of zeal for the
prerogatives of St. Peter, from whom they derived alike
their inspiration and their authority. The golden opportunity was skilfully improved. When Boniface was recalled
to Rome in 723 to receive the reward of his holy labors in
Thuringia anc Saxony, Gregory consecrated him as bishop,
and administered to him an oath till then unknown in the
observances of the transalpine churches.' On the blessed
relics of the apostle, and under terrible imprecations, Boniface swore faith and obedience to St. Peter and to the pope
as his vicar; and he specially promised that whenever he
was cognizant of irregularities among prelates he would
correct them if possible, and if he were powerless to effect
this, that he would report thlem to Rome.2 Thus bound by
every tie of fealty, he was the missionary equally of St.
Peter and of Christ.
-W6hen Carloman and Pepin undertook to rechristianize
France, Boniface was the instrument providentially at
hand, and he labored not only to restore religion but to
revive the almost forgotten reverence for RPome.' In a
letter to his friend Cuthbert of Canterbury, he dwells at
much lenglth on the proceedings of a synod in which he
made the assembled prelates subscribe a promise of obedience to St. Peter and to his vicar, and that all metropolitans should seek the pallium from the pope-and when this
obligation was received at PRome it caused much rejoicing.
Ile further procured the adoption of a canon by which all' Compare the oath of Boniface with that p1reviously taken by the suburbicarian bishops, as given in the Lib. Diurn. Roman. Pontif. cap. III. Tit. 8.
A clause in the latter swearing fidelity to the temporal sovereign is replaced
in the former by the pledge to report to Rome all recalcitrant prelates.
2 Bonifacii Epist. inter 117 et 118.
3 Ejusd. Epist. 132. Et quantoscunque audientes vel discipulos in ista
legatione mihi Deus donaverit, ad obedientiam apostolisem sedis invitare et
inclinare non cesso.
TIHE PAPACY AND THE CHIURCH. 137
irrepressible disorders were to be reported by the bishops
to their metropolitans andl by them to the pope-a regulaition which Boniface evidently felt to be novel, and which he
endeavored to justify by the example of his own oath.1
It might well seem to Boniface that the fearful laxity of
discipline in the Gallican church could be cured only by
the intervention of a power highler than that of the local
authorities of the kingdom, whether spiritual or temporal,
and he inculcated the invocation of that power with a
directness of appeal unknown in earlier times. Thus we
see him calling in the interference of Stephen II., in his
quarrel with the Archbishop of Cologne, respecting the
ruined see of Maestricht, and his successor St. Lull appealing at once to RIome to repress the insubordination
of a troublesome priest.2 His see of Mrainz thus became
peculiarly connected with the papacy, and we can readily
understand that it was but faithful to its traditions when
it produced the forgeries of Riculfus and Benedict the
Levite.
In the effort to resuscitate the influence of the papacy
over western and northern Europe the pallium again makes
its appearance as a potential instrument. In the synod
above alluded to, the reference to it is significant, showing
how Boniface urged upon his metropolitans the duty of
seeking it at the hands of the supreme pontiff. They
showed themselves, however, fearful of the honor and
chary of the (lignity, evidently dreading to incur the obligations connected with it more than they coveted its attendant advantages. In 743 or 744, Boniface writes to Pope
Zachary that the Frankish prelates objected to sending for
it on account of the expenses assessed upon the applicant
by the papal court-an abuse which they did not hesitate
to stigmatize as simony. Zachary denied this empihatically, and to remove all diffiuenlty promised to abolish the
1 Bonifiacii Epist. 32. EIjusd. Epist. 97, 100.
12*
138 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
fees exacted by his officials.i This concession to the complaints put forward did not seem to remove the deep-seated
mistrust entertained of the dangerous gift, for in 749 we
find Bonifac.e again declaring to the pope that he had made
every effort in his power and that he had not yet been able
to induce the archbishops to apply for it.2 HEow difficult
it was to overcome the repugnance of the Teutonic prelates
is manifest in the fact that St. Lull, the especial disciple
of Boniface, in whose favor the latter exercised the exceptional privilege accorded him of nominating a successor to
his primatial see of MAainz, though appointed in 754 had
not yet sought the pallimn in 772, 9wvhen Adrian I. wrote
to Tilpin of Itheims (the Archbishop Turpin of the Chansons de Geste), ordering him to investigate the doctrine
and virtues of Lull, and, if the result was satisfactory, to
give him a certificate, on the strength of which the pallium
would be sent to himn.3 It was evident that some additional
inducements were necessary to overcome this aversion and
to bind the hierarchy to the throne of St. Peter.
Charlemagne, in reconstructing the civil and ecclesiastical institutions of the empire, was careful not to allow
encroachments on any portion of. his prerogative, and we
have seen above how absolutely he retained in his hands
the jurisdiction over the church as well as over the state.
The appellate power, and the right to interfere in the in1 Bonifacii Epist. 143. The complaints of exaction were probably by no
means unfounded. Nearly two centuries later, Cnut the Great, of England,
in writing from Rome and detailing his efforts to obtain privileges for his
people, states-" Conquestus sum iterum coram domino papa, et mihi valde
displicere dixi, quod mei archiepiscopi in tantum angariebantur imniensitate pecuniarum qum ab eis expetebantur dum pro pallio accipiendo secundum morem apostolicam sedem expeterent; decretumque est ne id deinceps
fiat"-(Florent. Wigorn. ann. 1031). How great a source of revenue it
finally became may be judged from the G'avcnzioza Gerianzicce Vcttionzis in
1510 (Freher. et Struv. II. 702), and the complaints of the Germain archbishops at the Congress of Ems in 1786 (Dalham, Concil. Salisburg. p. 664).
" Bonifac. Epist. 141.
3 Flodoard. Hist. Remens. Lib. II. calp. 17.
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH. 139
ternal concerns of the western church, once arrogated by
the popes, slumberec during his reign and that of his son
as completely as they had during the anarchic period of
Pepin d'Herestal and C harles Martel. Whatever hopes
had been excited by the zealous labors of Boniface had
proved vain, and further efforts were necessary. The first
endeavor seems to have been made through the instrumentality of the pallium.
It is a noteworthy evidence of the desuetude into which
the appellate jurisdiction of Rome had fallen that among
the special privileges now conceded, to ]ender the pallium
attractive, was one which entitled its wearer to appeal to
the pope fiom the judgment of a local synod. The earliest
instance of this that I have noticed occurs in 772, when the
pallium was conferred on Archbishop Tilpin, of Rheims,
and the terms of the grant show that this right of appeal
was a novel privilege and a special indulgence.1 Allusion
has already been made to the case of Theodulf of Orleans,
which shows not only the privileges claimedcl in virtue of
the pallium, but also how little respect they received even
from so religious a monarch as Louis-le-iDeboinnaire. Even
after the principle of appellate jurisdiction in all cases had
been established, as will presently be seen by the vigorous
efforts of Nicholas I., when, about 870, Adrian II. sent the'" Non solum vetera... sed et nova, tibi pro tuo bono studio concedimUS... confermasmus atque solidamus... Et te ant futuris temporibus
Remensem episcopum et primatum illius dioecesis non prmsumat neque valeat
unquam aliquis de episcopatu dejicere sine canonico judicio neque in ullo
judicio sine consensou Romani pontificis, si ad hanc sanctam sedem Romanam.. appellaverit de ipso judicio"-Flodoard. IIist. Remens. Lib. II.
cap. 17.
The privilege thus connected with the pallium will explain some tiansactions of the ninth century, which have been quoted to prove the appellate
jurisdiction of the papacy-see Thomnassin, Discip. de ]'Eglise, P. III., Liv.
1, chap. 1. Thus, Charles-le-Chauve, in 803, admitted the right of Adventius, Bishop of Metz, to appeal to Rome (Goldast. III. 284), for the bishops
of Metz at that time enjoyed the pallium and were styled archbishops,
though they were not metropolitans.
140 THE RISE OF THIE TEMPORAL POWER.
pallium to Actarcdus, Bishop of Nantes, as a personal
reward for his constancy under thile Norman devastations,
the gift was accompanied with the special privilege of
appealing to the pope in last resort.1 From the use made
of the pallium ill after ages, and the difficulty which was
long experienced in forcing the gift upon anl unwilling hierarclly, we may not unreasonably suppose that there was a
double object aimed at in this policy-to extend the prerogative and influence of the Holy See, and to overcome
the repugnance manifested by the prelates to seek the pallium.2 Even this, however, was not sufficient to bring its
1 Adriani PP. II. Epist. 9.
2 The questions connected with the pallium are deserving of fuller treatment than space will here allow. Even before the question of investitures
had definitely arisen between the empire and the papacy, the pallium gave
to the latter control over the nominations to the loftier sees. This was accomplished by means of a forged decretal, attributed to Damasus, by which
all metropolitans, under pain of degradation, were obliged to seek the pallium within three months after consecration. (Burchard. Decret. Lib. i.
cap. 25). Thus when in 1060 the Empress-Regent Agnes appointed Sigfrid
to the see of Maminz and applied for his pallium, she was informed that he
must go to Romne and be examined as to his fitness, so that, if approved, he
should receive it (P. Damliani Lib. vII. Epist. 4). A more effective expedient could hardly be devised, especially when it came to be conceded that
the possession of the palliuml was a prerequisite to the enjoyment of the
archiepiscopal functions. This appears from a petition of the Archbishop
of Calnterbury in 1293,'' Postulat devota vestra filia ecclesia. Christi Cantuarensis concedi pallium de corpore sancti Petri sumptum, electo suo consecrato, ut habeat plenitudinem officii, et pro hac instanter et fortiter supplicat
sanctitati vestra."' (Wilkins, Concil. II. 199.) As though this were not
enough, the applicant was obliged to take a full and regular oath of fidelity
to St. Peter, the Roman church, the pope and his successors, with only the
exception "salvo ordine meo,' no exception being made in favor of any
allegioance clue to the king or other temporal authority. (Wilkins, unbi sup.)
See also the oath exacted of Philip, Archbishop of Cologne, on granting him
the pallium, at the third council of Lateran in 1170 (Hartzheimll, Concil.
German. III. 470).
The progress to this point was gradual, and for a long time considerable
opposition and hesitation were manifested with regard to it. Thus, in
1023, Fulbert of Chartres, one of the best canonists of his timle, writes to
Arnoul, Bishop of Tours, in a strain which manifests how little respect was
THE PAPACY AND THE CHtURCH. 141
use into favor, and in 877 John VIII. endeavored at the
synod of Ravenna to compel its adoption by ordering that
all metropolitans should be ejected who did not apply for
the pallium within three months after consecration'-a
regulation which met with little more respect than previous attempts in the same direction.
The power to be obtained through this dangerous gift
was however only limited and indirect, and the prerogative
of universal appellate jurisdiction, so long and so unavailingly sought, was finally obtained through the instrumentality of the False Decretals. The clear perceptions which
planned and executed the forgeries laid especial stress
upon the appellate power, and lost no opportunity to inpaid to the fabricated decretal of Damasiis at that period —" Si pallium
requisistis a Romano pontifice et vobis illud sine causa legitima denegavit,
propter hoc non est opus dimittere mninisteriunm tuum; et si vestra ta,rditate
nondum est requisitunm, cautela est expectare donec requiratur"' (Fulbert.
Carnot. Epist. 59). The aggressive energy of Gregory VII. vindicated this
assumed prerogative of Rome with the same vigor that he showed in other
cases. When Guillaume Bonne-Ame, the successor of Lanfranc in the
abbacy of Caen, received the Archiepiscopate of Rouen in 1079, and neglected to apply for the pallium, Gregory, in 1081, addressed him with bitter
reproaches for his tardiness, and forbade him to ordain priests or to consecrate bishops or churches until he should have obtained it. (Gregor. PP.
VII. Regist. Lib. ix. Epist. 1.)
The nice questions which arose during the process of enforcing this unfamiliar custom are well illustrated by the case of Peter, Archbishop of
Braga, who, in 1047, was deposed by the Archbishop of Toledo for receiving
the pallium and its attendant privileges from Clement II.; and Braga for
fifty years remained without a bishop.-Bernald. Vit. B. Geraldi Archiep.
Bracarens. cap. 6 (Baluz. et Mansi I. 132).
Even as late as 1786 the Archbishops of Germany, assembled in Congress
at Ems, complained bitterly of the changes in the discipline of the church
introduced on the strength of the False Decretals, and instanced particularly the immense sums exacted by the Roman curia for annates and the
pallium, the payment of which frequently reduced the prelates to insolvency;
and they threatened, if the pallium could not be given to them gratis, that
they would execute their functions without it. (Dalham, Concil. Salisburg.
pp. 659, 664.)' Synod. Ravenn. ann. 877, can. 1, 2. These canons are given in Gratian (P. I. Dist. C. can. 1), where they are attributed to Pelagius I.
142 TIHE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
culcate its necessity and to remove all obstacles to its
exercise in the widest sense. The authority of the primitive church was invoked for new rules by which bishops
under accusation could elect to appear at once before the
papal tribunal, and indeed were directed to do so if they
thought their fellow prelates prejudiced against them —
the warmth of tile invitation justiflying them in the assumption that such a manifestation of filial confidence in the
Holy See might cover a multitude of sins.' Other canons
were promulgated by which the trial of a bishop could be
undertaken only by a synod called for that special purpose
by command of the pope himself;2 and a still further extension of power was assumed by the production of a regulation under which no verdict could be rendered until it
had been submitted to the papal court and there approvecl.3
Indeed a decretal was fabricated under the namle of Elentherius, a pope of the second century, by which the most
exaggerated pretensions of Leo and Hilary were attributed
to the primitive church and were extended to the whole
body of ecclesiastics. Bishops were, it is true, to be allowed to take testimony and pronounce judglment in accusations of their subordinate clergy, because it was physically impossible that all such cases should be attended to
in Rome in the first instance, but no judgment was final
until it should be submitted to the pope for approval or
reversal, and if a sentence of deposition had been rendered
no appointment to the vacant church could be made until
the final decree of the Holy Father was received.4 The
1 Libere apostolicami appellent seclem, atque ad eam quasi ad matrem
confugiant, ut ab ea (sicut semper fui[) pie ffilciantur, defendantur et liberentur (Pseudo-Julii Epist. 3. —Ivon. Decret. P. Iv. can. 257). Cf. Ingilram. c. 23 (Capitul. Lib. vii. cap. 315).-Ingilram. cap. 20 (Capitul. Lib.
vII. cap. 314.)
2 Ingilram. c. 3-Pseudo-Julii Epist. 2; Pseudo-MIarcelli Epist. 1-Capitul. Add. IV. cap. 24.
3 Pseudo-Victor. Epist. I (Remig. Curiens. Episc. carn. 39)-Pseudo-Zephyrini Epist. 1-Pseudo-Fabiani Epist. 3, cap. 5-Pseudo-Sixti Epist. 1, &c.
4 Pseudo-Eleuther. Epist. cap. 2-Cf. Pseudo-Fabian. Epist. 3, cap 3.
TIHE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH. 143
pope was thus pronounced to be the sole judge, in first and
last resort, for every member of the clergy; and as the one
source of justice he simply delegated, for the sake of convenience, to the local prelates, such portion of his power
as would enable them to take testimony and forward it to
him, with their opinion expressed in the form of a verdict.
In fact, the constant iteration of these principles throughout the False Decretals, in every possible variation of
language, shows the importance attached to them and the
magnitude of the change in existing customs which they
involved. When innovations so bold could be confidently
asserted and arrogantly enforced, it is easy to account for
the immense increase of papal prerogative, which brought
under its influence every portion of the ecclesiastical body,
even to its ultimate fibres.
The first attempt to give them practical effect is found
in the epistle attributed to Gregory IV. in 833, evoking to
Rome the case of Aldric, Bishop of Le tMans..Jaff6' expresses himself unable to decide as to its authenticity, but
it is so thoroughly in the style of the forgeries that whether
genuine or not it evidently proceeded from the mlen who
were concerned in them. It purports to be written when
Gregory was returnilig from the Field of Falsehood, while
he was in the hands of Wala and the ambitious churchmen
who had shortly before nerved him to the performance of
their will by proving to him the illimitable prerogatives
attributed to the successor of St. Peter in the False Decretals. Its bold assertions of the authority of Rome, its
lengthened arguments to vindicate that authority, and its
threats against the (lisobedience which was evidently anticipated, all show that it was written to obtain power, and
not merely to exercise it.2
Regest. p. 227.
G2 regor. PP. IV. Epist. 1. A second epistle attributed to Gregory, ordering the restitution of Ebbo of Rheims, is, I believe, admitted on all hands to
be an undoubted forgery.
144 THE RISE OF THI-E TEMPORAL POWER.
Another attempt was made to assert the appellate jurisdiction of Rome by Sergius II., when, il 844, he conferred
the vicariate on Drogo, Archbishop of Metz, and directed
all bishops conceiving themselves unjustlv condemned by
local synods to appeal to Drogo, and through himl to Rome.'
Though Drogo was the son of Charlemagne, this attempt
would appear to have been treated with silent contempt,
and no effort seems to have been made to enforce it. A
glance at two or three transactions of the period, moreover, will show how little respect was paid to these pretensions until after the middle of the century, and how
they were finally realized through the vigoorous action
of Nicholas I. Thus, in the reaction of 835, Ebbo, Archbishop of Rheims, was condemned and deposed by a
synod for his active complicity with Gregory IV. in the
rebellion against Louis-le-Debonlnaire. The insulted majesty of Rome did not interfere, but five years later, when
his patron, the Emperor Lothair, regained power, Ebbo was
forcibly reinstated, and on the defeat of Lothair he was
obliged to fly, after enjoying his recovered dignity for
about a year. After some time he went to Rome and appealed to Sergius II., who only restored him to communion.
}Iincmar, who was installed in the see of Rheims in 845,
made application for the palliulmn, and this gavezi Lothair,
then sutpreme in Italy, the opportunity of forcing Sergius
to inquire into the previous proceedings. The investigationl however, was a lnere farce. Sergius did not venture
to evoke the case before himself, and did not even attempt
to send a legate to France, nor did Ebbo dare to appear
before the synod which assembled for the purpose of verifying Hincmltar's position. The bishops, when convoked,
contented themselves with forbidding Ebbo to assume the
rank from which lie had been degraded, and Sergius withdrew from the affair by sending the pallium to Itincmar.'
1 Sergii PP. II. Epist. alp. THartzheim, Concil. German. II. 145.
2 Flodoard. Hist. Remens. Lib. Ii. carp. 20.
THE PAPACY AND THE CI-IURCH. 145
Twenty years later Nicholas I. heard that Hincmar had
degraded certain priests who owed their ordination to Ebbo
-probably during his term of forcible reinstatement. This
pontiff's vigorous action contrasts strangely with his predecessor's hesitation, for he wrote at once to ilinemar,
asking him to restore them. If he could not conscientiously
do so, he was commanded to summon a council on the
subject, of which the decision, with the testimony on which
it was based, was to be submitted to Nicholas for his final
action-and all this under threats of instant penalties for
disobedience.l In 858, Wenilo, Archbishop of Sens, was
desirous of deposing Herman of Nevers on the ground of
insanity. The favor of Charles-le-Chauve supported the
threatened prelate, and the suffragan bishops hesitated to
assist their metropolitan. To accomplish his purpose,
WTenilo therefore, on the authority of the False Decretals,
referred the matter directly to Nicholas, without risking
a preliminary trial; and the answer of ttie pontiff, coimplimenting him on his reverence for St. Peter, and contrasting it with the insubordinate independence of those
who were not ready to perform such acts of obedience, betrays in every line the joy of one who hopes to gain an
unlooked-for victory, and who is receiving aid as welcome
as it was unexpected.2
Tlhe battle between centralization and independence,
however, was fought in the case of Rothadus, Bishop of
Soissons. A regularly organized synod under Hinlclar
condemned and deposed Rothadus, without seekiing from
Rlome a confirmation of the sentence, or heeding the appeal
of the convicted bishop from the decision, whichl was put
into execution after he had vainly demanded a reference to
the pope.3 This was too flagrant a denial of the new doctrines, and too favorable an opportunity for their vindicaNicolni PP. I. Epist. 89.
2 Lupi Ferrar. Epist. 130.-Nicolai PP. I. Epist. 1.
Annal. Bertin. ann. 862.
13
146 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
tion to be overlooked by the vigilant Nicholas. Branding
the verdict with nullity, he evoked the case to Rome, but
he met a stubborn resistance. Rothadus was not permitted to cross the mountains until after the most vigorous
threats and appeals to the bishops of France, to the king,
and even to the queen.!NTicholas triumphed. Rothadus
at last appeared in Rome, where for nine months he awaited
his accusers. In sullen dignity they held themselves aloof,
and the sentence was reversed. Another struggle ensued
to procure his reinstatementt; but in this, also, by liberal
threats of excommunication, Nicholas was successful, and
the supreme jurisdiction of the Head of the Church was
decisively vindicated.1 The Gallican bishops had maintailled that when,' in the trial of a bishop, questions arose
not provided for in the canons, then, and then only, the
authority of the HIoly See was to be invoked —a reasonable
concession which greatly moved the indignation of Nicholas-and to the last lHincmar asserted that the pope had
usurped a power to which he was not rightfully entitledcl,
stiogmatizing the universal right of appeal as a new law
in conflict with all received custom.3 One argument advanced by Nicholas is fairly illustrative of the kind of
logic which Rome so successfully employed. The council of
Chalcedon (can. 9) directed that where an ecclesiastic had
a complaint against his metropolitan, le should bring it
before the primate of the province or the Patriarch of Constantinople. Nicholas quotes this canon, and argues that
the " primate" can only mean the pope.4 Incidental to the
Nicolai PP. I. Epist. 33-38, 47-49, 71-77. —Anastas. sub Nicol. PP. I.
H inemari Epist. 2. —Annal. Bertin. ann. 865. Hlis expression is " Rothadum a Nicolao Papa non regulariter sed potentialiter restitutum." The
doctrine that appeal to Rome lay only in doubtful cases he adhered to,
notwithstanding the inclignation of Nicholas, andc he again enunciated it in
an epistle to Adrian II., in 872, concerning Ilincmar of Laon.
2 Goldast. Const. Imp. I. 206.
4 Nicolai PP. I. Epist. 73. He developed the argument more fully and
more ludicrously in a letter to the Emperor Michael, during his quarrel with
Photius (Epist. 86).
THE PAPACY AND THE CHURCH. 147
discussion was a dispute by which the authority of the
False Decretals was finally affirmed and enforced. The
Gallican bishops had ventured to cast some doubt, if not
upon their authenticity, at least upon their validity, to
which Nicholas angrily replied that they might as well call
in question the authority of the Old and New Testaments,
because they were not to be found in the ancient collections
of canons.l In this double victory, therefore, we learn
both what the internal regulation of the church had been,
and what it was rapidly becoming under the influences
which were subjecting it to the control of a single mind
for good or for evil.
The evil connected with the new system, indeed, was not
long in making itself felt, and its more superficial effects
became soon the subject of complaint, as interfering with
the local administration ofjustice, destioying all certainty
of punishment, and affording illimitable opportunities for
deception as regards documents emanating from distant
Rome. Even as early as 742, Boniface found that the
papal jurisdiction which he labored so earnestly to establish proved a serious impediment to the reformation which
was his other great object. Prelates whose lives were
passed in open adultery and shameless licentiousness went
to Rome, and, on their return, defied him by exhibiting
papal letters restoring them to the exercise of their functions; and on his complaininl to Zachary, his only comfort was the reply that the thing was impossible.' The
vigorous government of Charlemagne put a stop to all
such abuses, but with the abasement of the civil power,
and the recrudescence of papal pretensions,. they again
flourished to an alarming extent. The conviction soon
became universal that, no matter for what crimes an ecclesiastic might be condemned at home, a valid reversal of
sentence was readily procurable at Rome, which invited' Nicol. PP. I. Epist. 75. 2 Bonifacii Epist: 132, 138.
148 THE RISE OF TIIE TEMPOIRAL POWER.
so pressingly such applications, and doubtless appreciated
fully their pecuniary firuitfulness. The transalpine church
grew restless under the insuborclination and vice naturally
resulting from this state of things, and in 8S8 Charles-leChauve addressed to John VIII. a long and earnest remonstrance, in which he describes the subversion of discipline
which it entailed. He speaks of the bishops who, appealing
fiom the just sentences of their metropolitalns, felt secure
that the distance and dancgers of the journey wo.uld protect
them against the production in Rome of the testilmony
which proved their guilt; of the priests who, after episcopal condemnation, disappeared, no one knew whither, until
their return with a papal letter of acquittal —the genuineness of which, however doubtful, no one dared to disputeshowed that their absence had not been fruitless; and lie
dwells especially on the protection which this system gave
to concubinagoe which for a thousand years has remained
a corroding ulcer of the church.l We see by this that the
appellate jurisdiction of Rome already extended over all
classes of the clergy, and, comparing it with thle legislationl
of Charlemagne designating the royal Court as the ultimate
tribunal in such cases,2 we learn the rapid growth of the
power and influence of the Holy See. Charles might reimonstrate, but the temporal power was subdued by this
time, and he did not venture to put an end to the evils
which he so correctly appreciated. Indeed, the confused
and shifting policy of those tumultuous times occasionally
induced both king and bishops to recognize the pretensions
of Rome, for the purpose of gaining some temporary advantage.3
Yet the church did not submit without occasional remonstrance to these pretensions, which clearly threatened
1 Hincmari Epist. 32, cap. 3, 20, 21, etc.
2 Capit. Carol. Mag. ann. 794, cap. 4.
Goldast. op. cit. III. 284.-Thoinmssin, Discip. de l'Eglise, P. III. liv. I.
cap. 1.
THE PAPACY AND TIIE CIURCH. 149
to subdue the hierarchy to vassalage, and to' surround the
enforcement of discipline with unaccustomed difficulties.
Il 895, for instance, the council of Tribur speaks of the
papal right of appellate jurisdiction as a grievous and
almost insupportable burden, to be borne with such patience as the churches might commandc; but at the same
time it endeavored to counteract in some degree the evil
by another complaint made of the numerous cases in which
clerks brought forward in their defence forged letters purporting to come from Rome, and it empowered the bishops
to imprison all offenders suspected of such practices until
consultation could be had with the Roman court —a regulation evidently intended as an indirect mode of inflicting
punishment on all who appealed from the local tribunals
to the apostolic see. In 1018 the council of Seligenstadt
sought to check the aggressiveness of Rome by a canon
forbidding any one to journey thither without special permission of the bishop or vicar of his diocese.2 The papal
court, however, persisted in enforcing and extending its
supremacy, and its interference called forth constant and
well-founded remonstrances. About 1030 the Bishop of
Angouleme excommunicated one of his flock, and refused
to admit him to penitence until he should have rendered
due satisfaction. The offender travelled to Rome and
brought back a papal letter prescribing a certain penance
for him, and requesting its approval by the bishop. The
latter, however, boldly affirmed the letter to be a forgery,
because it represented the pope as asking of him what it
was his place to ask of the pope, and lie turned the criminal unceremoniously out of the church. About the samne
period the prelates of Aquitaine were much annoyed by
this constant interference with their jurisdiction, which
destroyed all their authority, and in 1031 they assembled
I Concil. Tribur. ann. 895, can. 30.
2 Concil. Salegunstat. ann. 1018, can. 16.
13*
150 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER,
at Limooes, where, after a full debate, they agreed that
tile papal mandate should only be obeyed when the local
tribunal had sent the offender to Rome, as often happened
in d(oubtful cases, with letters asking the papal judgment
as to sentences imposed; and that Rome had no right to
interfere when her intervention was not requested by the
provincial authorities.1 Tlhe popes were not disposed to
admit these claims of local self-government, and the bishops
were loth to yield them, as we see when in 1066 Alexander
II. sharply rebuked Gervase, Archbishop of iRheims, for
delaying two years in restoring to their functions two
clerks who had made a successful appeal to him after
condemnation at home; and the invitation held out by
promising immunity in such cases is well indicated in his
declaration that ";Rome is the only refuge for the oppressed, who are accustomed always to find there redress
for their wrongs (r."2
The Normans in Italy were stubborn on this point, andrefused to admit the right of appeal. until the treaty of
peace in 1156 between William of Sicily and Adrian IV.
granted it for Naples and Calabria, but still wvithheld it for
Sicily.3 The aggressive energy of Innocenit III., however,
and the distractions of the Germanic empire, finally caused
the principle to be recognized in the law of nations. The
charter of Otho IV. in 1209 admitted it in the fullest manner, and forbade any interference with those who desired
to appeal to Romne from sentences in the local ecclesiastical
courts;~ and when the unfortunate Otho was to be overthrown, and his rival, FYrederic II., substituted in his place,
the price exacted of the latter for the papal recognition,
in 1213, was the Golden Bull, or Constitution of Egra, in
which the same formal recognition of the appellate power
was inserted.5 Frederic in 1219 repeated this for the benefit
1 Concil. Lemovicens. II. ann. 1031 (IHarduin. T. VI. P. I. pp. 890-2).
2 Alex. PP. II. Epist. 39. 3 Linig, Cod. Itil. Diplorn. II. 854-5.
4 Ibid. II. 707. 5 Goldast. I. 289.
THIE PAPACY AND THIE CI-HURCHl. 151
of Honorius IIi.; and in 1275 its confirmation formed part
of the concessions whereby Rodolph of HIIapsburg purchased the papal confirmation of the election which transformed him from a needy soldier of fortune to the head of
the Holy Roman Empire.l
The appellate power thus finally became a jurisdiction,
civil as well as criminal, over all cases to which ecclesiastics were parties, constituting Rome a court of last resort for all Christendom. It was not within the ability of
finite intelligence to conduct so vast and complex a business, under its inevitable disadlvantages, without causing
infinite wrong; but abuses were profitable, and the PRoman
court was always needy. Occasionally a pontiff would
admit the evils of the system, but it was never abandoned.
Few confessions more humiliating can be conceived than
that made by Alexander IV. in 1256, when he issued a bull
deploring the impunity afforded to concubinary priests
by the facility with which letters were obtained fiom him
reversingl the judgments rendered against them at home;
but the remeidy devised for this was artfully contrived to
preserve the fees of his court. He directed that no respect
should be paid to any letters which he mig'ht grant, ulless
they set forth the circumstances of the case so fully as to
show that they had not been issued in utter ignorance of
the verdicts which they undertook to set aside2_-thus admnitting his own abuse of the powers assumed, while persisting in committing the wrong', and cheating' those who
bribed him for a pardon by neutralizing it after it had been
paid for. He was willing' that his court should attempt to
do all the mischief that might be profitable, and threw upon
the local prelates the responsibility of limitilg that mischief, by discrediting the power of the keys which he professed to inherit from St. Peter and the Saviour. It would
seem incredible that so shameless a confession could be
Liinig, op. cit. II. 715, 723, 727.
2 Dalham, Concil. Salisburgens. p. 104.
152 THE RISE OF TIIE TEMiPORAL POWER.
mnade by the head of anl infallible church, and yet within
fifteen years the command was repeated in the same terms
by Gregory IX.1
Not only was the appellate power thus fatal in its influence on tile discipline and morals of the church, but it was
necessarily the source of illimitable injustice, enabling, as
it did, a wealthy pleader to dictate terms of settlement to
a poorer antagonist, who might not be able to endure the
expense of carrying on a suit procrastinated amid the perpetually increasing business of distant Rome. All these
evils were keenly felt for ages, and at length, when the
church marshalled itself at Bale against the papacy, they
formed one of the numerous subjects of reform unsuccessfully attempted. The council stigmatized the system as
one of intolerable abuses and vexatious, and descanted
earnestly on the wrongs and endless litigation which it
fostered. The remedy adopted was the conferring of final
jurisdiction on all courts situated at more than four days'
journey from Rome, except in cases specially reserved by
the canon law for papal decision;2 but it is easier to condemn a profitable abuse than to abolish it. Rome paid
little heed to a regulation which would have limited her
harvest of fees to Italian territory, although, after considerable delay, she was forced, in 1446, to give an unwilling consent to the Basilian canons.3 The abuse continued unchecked, and bore with almost equal severity on
the laity and the church. As spokesman for the former,
the Diet of Niirnberg, in 1522, complained of it witht little
ceremony in the list of grievances presented to Adrian VI.;4
while the views of those churchmen who sincerely wished
the purification of the. establishiment found a voice in the
project of reformation drawn up by order of Paul III.,
which denounced in the strongest terms the innumerable' Baluz. et Mansi, III. 117. o Concil. Basil. Sess. xxxi.
3 I-Iartzheim, Concil. German. V. 301.
l4 ravaTmina, art. 60 (Goldast. I. 474).
PAPALr OMNIPOTENCE. 153
scandals caused throughout Christendom by the facility
afforded to ecclesiastics of escaping from the jurisdiction
of their superiors, and of purchasing free pardons at the
papal court.l The council of Trent made some effort to
check the evil,2 but the system was too profitable to be
lightly abandoned, and it is scarce a hundred years since
an honest Gerinan ecclesiastic, looking back with fond
reoret to.the reforms attempted at Bale, laments their
failure — Read, I pray you, these most admirable statutes,
and compare with them the daily abuses arising from appeals!"3 W~hat the Roman court, however, has never been
willing to abandon, was practically abolished by the reconstruction of society which followed the French Revolution.
It can readily be perceived how, during the Middle Ages,
a jurisdiction so universal and so absolute as this gave to
the papacy the unlimited and irresponsible control over
the church and all its members, from the highest to the
lowest.
PAPAL OMNIPOTENCE.
Closely connected with the recognition of this supreme
jurisdiction, springing from the same principles, strengthening it and being strengthened by various mutual reactions, andc extending the papal prerogative over every class
of society, was the privilege of granting dispensation and
absolution, which about the period of Carlovingian decadence commenced to elevate itself into importance. The
power to bind and to loose was one capable of indefinite
1 Concil. de Emend. Eccles. (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 601).
o Coneil. Trident. Sess. xsII. Decret. de Reform. cap. 1, 2, 3.-Sess. xxIv.
Decret. de Reform. cap. 20.
3 Wurdtwein, Concil. Mogunt. p. 18.
154 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
application, and more than human self-control would have
been requisite to abstain from assuming a prerogative so
eagerly ascribed to the papacy by those who saw their own
advantage in procuring its recognition. At the commencement of the ninth century we see but little of it, and the
swift justice of Charlemagne would hardly have stayed
her pace, because her victim had sought refuge and impunity at the feet of Adrian or of Leo. As the secular
power declined, however, and men saw how it shunned a
conflict with the rising influence of St. Peter, they naturally
turned to the latter as an egis ever ready to confer protection on those whose intelligent reverence counterbalanced their misdeeds, while every instance of successful
interference of course attracted numerous additional suppliants for similar favors. In 861, Nicholas I., on the
authority of an Isidorian decretal (Pseudo-Alexandri Eplist.
1), released Thietgaud of Treves and his clergy firom a
disagreeable oath by which they had bound themselves, and
he assumed the power of declaring them discharged fr'om
any civil or criminal liability for the consequences.l When
John VIII. could write to Charles-le-Chauve and the
Bishop of Chartres in favor of a murderer, and declare
that the length of his journey and the depth of his repentance entitled him to a free pardon, to restitution to
all his benefices, and to protection against the family of
the slain,2 it is no wonder that Nicholas I. was able to cxclaim with plide that criminals from all parts of the world
flocked to Rome to obtain pardon and escape retribution
for their deeds.3 That this does not allude merely to
Nicolai PP. I. Epist. 10.
2 Joann. PP. VIII. Epist. 39, 40, Cf. ejusd. Epist. 92; Nicolai PP. I. Epist.
136.
3 Nicola.i PP. I. Epist. 22. " Et quoniam ad hane sanctam Romanam....
Ecclesiam, qua- ob sui privilegii principatum..... de div ersis murndi
partibus quotidie multi sceleris mole oppressi confugiunt, remissionerm scilicet et venialem sibi gratiam tribui supplici et ingenti cordis memrore poscentes."
PAPAL OMNIPOTENCE. 155
spiritual absolution is evident from the occasion on which
it was written, being a demand for the pardonl of Baldwin
of Flanders, who, after carrying off Charles's daughter
Judith, had fled to!Rome to escape the penalties, civil and
ecclesiastical, denounced against him by the justly exasperated father. The immense number of these pilgrimages,
as described by Nicholas, proves that they were not fiuitless, for the experience alone of success would induce mnultitucldes to undergo the perils, privations, and expense of
so long and dangerous a journey; and it is easy to imagine
the effect of the return of a rehabilitated criminal among
his friends, conveying to the remotest corner of Christendom the influence of Rome as overriding the laws and
justice of the secular courts; nor would the inference be
uncharitable that the popes had already discovered in this
prerogative the source of a notable augmentation of thei r
revenues. It seems almost incredible that a power like
this should be formally recognized and admitted by the
secular lawgivers, and yet in the Welsh laws of the ninth
century there is a provision that in some classes of criimes,
such as waylaying and treason, which involved the punishment of death and confiscation, if the criminal could manage to escape to Rome, and return with a papal letter of
absolution, his life should be spared and his property be
restored to him on payment of a fine.'
While thus acquiring unlimited control over the populations, the papacy was likewise rapidly extending its supremacy over the secular rulers. The most efficient
instrument in this was perhaps the forged donation of
Constantine to Sylvester I. In examining this remarkable
document one scarcely knows which most to admire —the
consummate boldness that could anticipate belief in it, or
the credulity that was ready to admit that the first Christ-' Dimetian Code, Bk. Ii. chap. xxiii. ~ 25. (Owen's Ancient Lawvs, &c., of
Wales, I. 551.)
156 THE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
ian Emperor transferred the seat of empire and founded
his new IRome for the single purpose of relinquishing to
the popes the sole and undisputed possession of the West,
and of rendering the successors of St. Peter the legitimate
heirs and successors of Augustus. We read, in the style
of an eighth-century notary, a formal donation-entre-vif.s
of the Western Empire and its appu-rtenances, to be held
and enjoyed with all the imperial rights in independent
sovereignty, as superior to that of the emperors as spiritual thlings were superior to temporal-and all this mingled
with puerile directions as to the trappings and stage-properties of the pope and his spiritual court, crowns, white
horses, linen garments, and felt shoes. Armed with such
title-deeds, and the Leonine constitution, which barred all
alienation of church property, the Roman Pontiff became
the rightful owner of Western Europe, and kings held their
territories only by his sufferance. The gratitude of Adrian
I. for the comparatively insignificant beneficence of Charlemagne was too openly manifested for us to suppose that
ideas of such lmagnificent acquisitiveness could then have
been entertained. Appetite grows by what it feeds on, however, and when, a few years later, in 776, this extraordinary document was produced from the papal manufactory,
it was quoted timidly by Adrian to the Frank as a hint
that he might not improperly imitate a munificence alongside of which his generosity was absolute niggardness.
To this the stern founder of the new empire turned a deaf
ear, nor does his disregard of the claims thus advanced
appear to have interfered with the good understanding
between the respective heads of church and state, whose
mutual suplport was mutually necessary. His successor,
Louis, with all his reverence for ecclesiastical authority,
p)aid as little respect to the extravagant pretensions of tile
grant; and when he, too, in 817, made a donation to the
Holy See, confirming the gifts of Charlemagne and of Pepin,
lie took care to reserve to himself the sovereignty of the
PAPAL OMNIPOTENCE. 157
territories whose usuf ruct he bestowed on St. Peter.' That
this sovereignty was not merely nominal, but active, is
sufficiently established by facts already alluded to; but if
nore be needed, it may be found in the edict of Lothair,
in 824, wherein, while enjoining on the inhabitants of the
Roman territory the utmost respect and obedience to the
pope, his instructions to the dukes, counts, and judges,
with regard to the exercise of their functions, and his appointment of Mlissi to supervise their dispensing of justice,
prove thle complete jurisdiction which he exercised without
protest or objection on the part of Eugenius.2 If the strong
government of the united Franks. however, repressed the
aspirations of ambitious but prudent pontiffs, the dissensions which ensued, and the final disruption of the empile,
afforded the opportunity which was needed. This forgery,
lying latent with those of Ingilram and Isidor, was roused
"Salva super eosdem ducatus nostra, in omnibus dominatione, et illorumn ad nostram partem subjectione" (Decret. Confirmalt. Ludov. Pii). This
clause, and a succeeding one by which the emperor reserves the right of
interference in cases of tyranny and oppression, dispose me strongly to
regard the document as genuine. Had it been fabricated in the eleventh
century, as has been suggested by critics, Catholic as well as Protestant,
these expressions would certainly not hbve been inserted, as they are directly
in conflict with the efforts then making to free Italy from Teutonic domination, and to release the Holy See from the traditional supervision of the
emperors. The abnegation of the right to confirm the papal elections is
probably an interpolation of the latter period, as also the extensive donations of territory in central and southern Italy, which either was retained
by the Carlovingian emperors, or else never belonged to them. These concessions suited exactly the politics of the successors of Gregory VII., and
their insertion has doubtless swelled what was a very simple confirmation
of the benefactions of Charlemagne into the formidable dimensions which
have caused its rejection by candid historians of all parties. Muratori's
apologies for his incredulity (Annali d'Italia., ann. 817) may excite a smile;
but an opposite emotion is aroused by the confident assertion of Baronius
(annn 817, No. 14) that four authentic copies exist in the Vatican MSS. The
attempted extension of territorial acquisition may be classed with the similar
fictitious donation of Charlemiagne, which Anastasius ha.d before him (Anastas. Biblioth. No. 97), but which has since been seen by no one.
Ba.luze, II. 17-20.
14
158 THE RISE OF TIIE TEMPORAL POWER.
from its slumbers; and, though the Saxon emperors might
venture to call it in question, for more than half a thousand
years the imperial liberality of Constantine was received
as an undisputed fact, which it was rank heresy to call in
question.l
The man was not wanting to the opportunity. The circumstances which I have briefly sketched had placed in
the hands of tile church weapons of vast and indefinite
power. The times were ripe for their employment, for the
necessities of the age demanded an intellectual tyranny to
coerce and counterbalance the countless blind and aimless
despotisms of individual chieftains, who were rapidly
crushing out what little mental life was left in Europe.
1 About the year 1100, Otho III., in a grant to Sylvester II., takes occasion to stigmatize the donation of Constantine as a fiction: "'HIc sunt enim
commenta ab illis ipsis inventa, quibus Joannes diaconus, cognomento digitorum mutius (mutilus) praiceptuln aureis litteris scripsit, sub titulo -langni
Constantini longa mendacii tempora finxit... Spretis ergo commenticiis
prmceptis et imaginarniis scriptis, ex nostra liberalitate sancto Petro donamlus
quna nostra sunt, non sibi quam sua sunt veluti nostra conferimus." (Baronius,
-nn. 1191, No. 57.) And not long after, in a donation of St. IIenry II.,
confirming the previous liberalities of the emperors, no mention is made in
the recital of Constantine's gift, showing that it was still regarded as supposititious (Lilnig, Cod. Ital. Diplomn. II. 698).
This soon passed away, however, and any doubt as to the authenticity of
the donation was assumed to spring from unworthy enmity to the just claims
o)f St. Peter. About the year 1150 Geroch of Reichersperg writes: "Memini
enim cum in urbe Romana fu fuissen, fuisse mihi objecturn a quodam causidico
ecclesiao Dei adversario, non esse rata privilegia imperatoris Constantini
ecclesia-tica libertati faventia, eo quod ipse vel baptizatus vel rebaptizatus
fuisset in lmresi Ariana, ut insinuare videtur historia tripartita.." (Geroch.
Expos. in Psalm. LxIV.) The reviving study of the imperial jurisprudence
might well cause a shrewd lawyer to doubt the obsequiousness of a Roman
emperor, but he found it prudent to invent an equally improbable fiction to
excuse his unpallatable criticism.
The stubborn vitality infused into these forgeries by their success in establishing the papal power is shown by the learned Christian Wolff, as late as
the close of the seventeenth century, alluding to the donation of Constantine
with as much confidence as though its authenticity had never been questioned (Chr. Lupi Opp. II. 261).
PAPAL OM N TPOTENCE. 159
The arm to wield these weapons was found when Nicholas
I. ascended the pontifical throne.'rTo the service of the
cause he brought a dauntless spirit, an unconquerable wvill,
an unbending e;ergy, a prudent daring, and a knowledge
of the men and the tendencies with which lie had to deal,
that enabled him to establish as absolute rights the principles which had previously been more or less speculative.1
The history of the Divorce of Teutberga, which marks an
era in ecclesiastical annals, is a fair illustration of the
manner in which he reduced to practice the theories of the
False Decretals, and laid the foundation of that papal omnipotence which was to overshadow Christendom.
On the retirement of the Emperor Lothair, his son of the
same name succeeded to that portion of his dominions which
took from him the appellation of Lotharingia, nmodernized
into Lorraine, and extending from Switzerland to the
mouths of the Rhine. MAarried in 856 to Teutbelrga, the
uncontrolled licentiousness of the young king led hirn
within the next year to abandon her for a succession of
concubines, one of hloln, Waldracla, with whom he had
had relations previous to his marriage, succeeded in permanently captivating his fickle passions and weak understanding. The favorite resolved to share her paramour's
crown, and Lothair, ready to secure her smiles at any cost,
entered eagerly into a disgusting conspiracy. A charge of
the foulest incest was brought against the unhappy queen,
who, by means which can readily l)e guessed, was forced to
a confession. Condemned to perpetual penance in a convent by the Lotharingian prelates at the synod of Metz,
she succeeded in escaping to Frailce, where she was duly
protected by Charles-le-Ch auve, with the trule Carlovingian,desire of nursing trouble for his nephew. MA[eanwhile
Lothair caused anotlkr synod to be assembled at Aix-laThe churchmen of his own period, when not themselves outraged by his
imperious authority, recount his exploits with honest professional pride.
"Regibus ae tyrannis imperavit, eisque acsi dominus orbis terrartum authoritate prmefuit."-Rlegino, ann. 868.
160 TIIE RISE OF TIHE TEMPOR AL POWER.
Chapelle, where, on stating' his piteous case, deprived of
his wife and unable to restrain his paissions, the charitable
bishops, after clue deliberation, declared that a won:man
stained with the crimes confessed by Teutberga was not
canonically a wife, and that he was at liberty to marry.
His nuptials with Waldrada were immediately celebrated.
and Gunthair, Archbishop of Cologne, the instigator and
mllanager of the plot, received his appropriate reward in
the dishonor of a niece, whose promised elevation to the
throne had been the prize held out for his co-operation.
Lothair, in his pollution, might forget the world, but the
world did not forget him.'His uncle, Charles-le-Chauve,
hankering after the fertile plains of Austrasia, began to
hint that his nephew had forfeited all claim to human society, and Teutberga's )powerful family urged her to appeal
to the central arbiter a-t Rome. The occasion was one in
which the common feelings of mankind would excuse any
stretch of avenghing prerogative, and Nicholas seized it
with vigorous joy. The comparison is instructive between
his alacrity and the prudent reticenice of Adrian in the
previous century. A moralist would findc it difficult to
draw the line between the connubial irregularities of Charlemagne and those of Lothair; but Hermengarda found no
puissant pope to force her inconstant husband into the
paths of dissimulation, or to justify wrong by cruelty.
When Charlemagne grew tired of a wife, lie simply put
her aside, nor would Adrian or Leo have thanked the
meddling fool who counselled interference. But times
had changed since then, and other principles had gained
supremacy. According' to Isidor, the holy Calixtus I.
hacd decreed that an unjust decision, rendered under the
pressure of kings or potentates, was void' —an axiom
1 Injustum ergo judicium et definitio injusta, regio metu et jussu, anut
cujusdnam episcopi aut potentis, a judicibus ordinata vel acta, non vnleat. —
Pseudo-Calixti Epist. 1 (Ivon. Decret. P. v. cap. 235). Benedict. the Levite
gives it in a somewhat abbreviated form (Capitul. Lib. v. cap. 405) from
Ingilram, can. 78.
P A PAL T OMNIPOTENCE. 161
which, however morally true, carried with it the dangerous
corollary that, if it meant anything, there must be some
one to decide upon the injustice of the sentence. If a kinog
had procured it, the only arbiter to revise it was the pope,
to whom a canon of Ingilra-ii's had specially attributed
the power of abrogating at will the proceedings of any
local synod.1
As supreme judge of all questions, Nicholas accordingly
addressed himself to the work. To his first legates Lothair simply responded that he had only complied with the
decrees of the national synod; and the legates, heavily
bribed, advised him to dispatch to Rlome Gunthair, with
his tool Thietgaud, Archbishop of Trbeves, who could
readily make all things riglht with the Holy Father. The
legates, on their return, had to seek safety in flight fronm
the indignation of Nicholas; but the two archbishops, in
the self-confidence of craft and stupidity, appeared before
a synod called for the purpose, and presented thle acts of
the synods of Metz and Aix, in the full expectation of
their authoritative confirmatiol. The delilberation was
short; the two archbishlops were recalled to hear sentence
of deposition from their sees, and degradation from the
priesthood; the synod of Metz was stigmatized as " tanquam acldulteris faventern, prostibuluml;" and a sentence of
excommunication was suspended over the heads of all the
Lotharingian plrelates, to be removed only b)y prompt
retractation of tlieir acts, and individual application to the
pope. The proceeding was somewhat violent, as it amounted to condemnation in the absence of the accused, with no
array of witnesses and evidence such as the canons iequired, even the acts of' the Lotharingian synods not
havinlg been acknowledged by the archbishops without
equivocation. Gunthl.ir, breathing furious revenge, anll
Thietgaud, stupefied by the blow, betook themselves at
Ingilram. cap. 42.
14'
162 THIE R'ISE OF TIIE TEMdPORATL POWESI.
once to the Emperor Louis, Lothair's brother. I-e listened
to their story, and eager to avenge his brother, and to
snppress the rising insubordination of the pontiff, he
marched directly on Rome. The fasts and prayers of
Nicholas availed little against the reckless soldiery of
Louis; a massacre ensued, and the pope, escaping in a
boat across the Tiber, lay hidden for two days, without
meat or drink, in the cathedral of St. Peter. A sudden
fever, however, opportunely laid hold of the emperor, and
there were not wantin(g counsellors who attributed it to
the sacrilege which lhe had committed. Louis therefore
sent for Nicholas, macde his l)eace, a.nd withdrew, colnmanding the archbishops to return home and consider
themselves deg:raded. Thietgaud, a'fool rather than a
knave submitted without further resistance; but Gunthair
addressed an epistle to his brother bisllops, exhorting
them to repel the encroachments of the papacy, which was
aspiring to the domination of the world, and retorting on
the pope ]iis sentence of excommunication. This docnment his brother Hilduin, an ecclesiastic, laid on the tomb
of St. Peter, after fordhing an ectrance with arms, anid killing' one of the guards. On their return home, Thietgaud
abstained from officiating, but G unthair, still threatening
vengeance, took possession of his diocese, until the fiightcned Lotharingian bishops induced Lothair to depose him,
while they individually and humbly made their p)eace with
Rlome, by submitting to all the requisitions of the pontiff.
1 It is interesting to mark the contrast between the independence of the
first half of the century and the submission of the second half. When,
thirty years before, Gregory IV. came to the Field of Falsehood in the train
of Louis-le-Ddbonnaire's rebellious sons, the bishops of Louis's parity
stoutly declared that if he came to excommunicate, he should return excommunicated, as he hacl no such authority under the ancient canons of the
church —" nullo modo se velle ejus voluntate succumbere, sed si excoinmmunicaturus adveniret, excommnunicatus abiret, cum nliter ha.beat antiquorum
auctoritas canonumn" (Astron. Vit. Ludov. Pii cap. xiv.). The fact that in
PAPAL (MNIPOTENCE. 163
Another iegate, Arsenius, was sent with instructions to
enforce the threatened excommnunication of Lothair, if he
persisted in iniquity, and with letters to Charles-le-Chauve
and Louis-le-Germanique, denouncing the conduct of their
nephew with an acerbity till then unknown in the intercourse between popes and kings.1 Lothair felt himself
unable to face the storm which he had aroused. He professed himself in all things an obedient son of the church,
lie put away Waldrada, who promised to seek absolution in
Rome, and lie took back the unfortunate Teutberga, tnder
menaces of eternal punishment in the name of God and
St. Peter. Then suddenly all was again confiusion, as
untamed human passions struggled against the unaccustomed bonds. Waldrada escaped firom the custody of
Arsenius and returned to her infatuated lover, while the
queen was subjected to every kind of humiliation and
oppression. But Nicholas was equal to the strife which
be had provoked, and on which he had staked the future
of the papa-cy, and, indeed, of C hristian civilizatio n.'W aldrada he excommunicated. Clharles-le-Chauve, with wvhomn
Teutberg'a had again taken refuge, he encouraged with a
laudatory epistle, mingled with threats concerning a rumored arrangement by which an abandonment of her cause
was to be purchased by a cession of territory; and, in
spite of the interference of the Emperor Louis, he caused
another synod to confirm the degradation of the delinquent
archbishops. Teutberga herself, worn out by seven years
the two cases the respective positions of right and wrong were reversed
between the two parties, makes no difference as regards the question of
obedience and subordination.' Ilinemar, notwithstanding his zeal for the church, and his active sympathy for Teutberga, calls attention to the altered tone of the pontiff towards
crowned heads, and evidently disapproves the bullying invective inaugurated by Nicholas, which subsequently proved so potential —" Non cum
apostolica mansuetudine et solita honorabilitate, sicut episcopi Romani consueverant in suis epistolis honorare, sed cum malitiosa interminatione.
epistolam Nicolai Papme plenam terribilibus et a mnodestia sedis apostolicre
a.ntes[ inauditis maledictionibus"-Annal. Bertin. ann. 865.
164 TIlE RISE OF THE TEMAPORAL POWER.
of persecution, petitioned the pontiff for peace, and begged
to be separated from Lothair, that she mio-lght end her days
in quiet; but the victory was not yet gained, and Nicholas
scornfully refused her request. An endeavor of Lothair
to settle the question by appeal to the wager of battle was
rejected with indignation, and for the third time he ordered
the timid prelates of Lotharingia to enforce the sentence
of excommunication pronounced again st the aspiring concubine. Commands were addressed to Louis-le-Germanique
to join in the pressure oil Lothair, and to desist from his
intercession in behalf of the deposed archbishops, while
the prelates of Germany received a sharp reproof for joining in the appeal.
The opposition of nmonarch and prelate was at last
broken dowin, and WTaldrada was for(ed to Rome; but before
his triumph was complete Nicholas died, leaving to his
successor Adrian II. thle legacy of this quarrel, and the
widening schism of the Greek church, which he had rashly
provoked. Lothair, hoping to find the new pope more
considerate of the regal dignity, intimated a desire to visit
Rome in person, to justify his course, and to be reconciled
to the church. Less imperious than his predecessor,
Adriain welcomed the apparently repentant sinner. The
excommunication of Waldrada was removed on condition
of absolute separation from her lover; and, that Lothair's
journey might be impeded by no pretext, epistles were
addressed to Charles and Louis, commanding them not to
trouble Lotharingia during the pious absence of its king.
An honorable reception awaited Lothair. He was admitted to communion on the oath, which no one believed, that
he had obeyed the commands of Nicholas as though they
had been those of heaven, alnd had abstained from all intercourse withl Waldrada. The victory of the pope was as
complete as the abasement of the king. The sacrament
was administered as an ordeal, in which the courtiers of
Lothair were associated as accomplices in his guilt, and
PAPA L O, Ni POTENCE. 165
both parties separated, equally satisfied with the result.
A still further triumph, however, was reserved for the
church by one of those mysterious occurrences which account for the belief, then universally prevalent, of special
interpositions -of providence. Lothair was scarce fairly
started on his return home, when his progress was arrested
at Piacenza by an epidemic which broke out among his
followers; and tlhere, after a short illness, died the miserable young king and his partners in guilt. Of course, the
effect was prodigious. Divine justice had completely vindicated the acts of Nicholas and Adrian; and God himself
had condescended to execute the sentence of the church on
the hardened adulterer, who had sought to shield himself
by sacrilegious peijury from the punishment due to his
offen ces.l
The papacy had thus triumphed over both church and
state, and Heaven had sanctioned the immense extension
of prerogative. The principle was asserted and maintained, that an appeal to ecclesiastical jurisdiction barred all
subsequent reclamation to the ordinary tribunals2 —a doctrine capable of infinite application and illimitable results.
By deposing and degrading Gunthair and Thietgaud, without a preliminary trial at home, without an accuser, alcId
withlout the orcdinary judicial formalities, Nicholas erected
himself into a jludge of first and last resort, without responsibility and without appeal —the sole arbiter of destiny for
the highest dignitaries of the hierarchy. By annulling the
acts of the Lotharingian synods, and forcing their menmbers not only to submit to this, but humbly to apologize
for the iniquity of their decrees, he established a complete
The Annal. Bertin., Regino, the Epistles of Nicholas I., and the works
of Ilinemar, furnish a.bundant materials for this history, of which I have
only sketched the salient points.
Q " Quia eeelesime refugium quxmrens, et ecclesiasticum judicium semper
expetens, soeculari non debet submitti judicio"-Nicolai PP. I. Epist. 148.
— We here see the practical application of the interpolation of the Theodosian Code, Lib. xvI. Tit. 12.
166 TIHE RISE OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
ascendency over the provincial prelacy, and vindicated the
supremlacy of the Holy See as the only irrefragable authority in the church. Nor was the victory over the
secular power less complete. When Lothair appeared
before the papal legates to answer the appeal of Teutberga,
he acknowledged the jurisdiction of popes over monarchs;
and however he might subsequently dissemble, lie never
afterwards dared to deny it, each step only serving to confirm that jurisdiction in its most absolute sense. And
when Adrian threatened the kings of France and Germany,
and ordered them not to interfere with Lotharingia during
the absence of their nephew; he placed himself at the head
of Christendom, as the self-constituted sovereign of sovereigns. The moral effect was not less decisive. An
unarmed priest, unable to protect his palace or his person
from the brute force of his enemy, Nicholas, under the
guardianship of heaven, walked without swerving along
the path which lie had marked out, over the prostrate
necks of kings and prelates, clothed only in the mysterious attributes of his station, and inivoking the Most
High in the name of truth and justice. What wonder
that the populations should revere him as the Vicegerent
of Christ, as the incarnate representative of God, and that
the most extravagant pretensions ascribed to him by
Ingilramn or Isidor were regarded as his legitimate and
imprescriptible prerogatives?
It will be observed throughout this affair, that the weapon relied upon to enforce obedience in all cases was the
deprivation of communion, involving, in the case of ecclesiastics, degradation from their benefices, and in that of
laymen, exclusion from the Christian church. It was in
this that the power to bind and to loose found its readiest
practical expression, and the control which the church thus
acquired over the life of man in this world aund his salvation in the next, opened out before it a career of boundless
supremacy which will be considered in a subsequent essay.
PAPAL OMNIPOTENCE. 167
Yet it must not be supposed that the vast powers thus
successfully asserted b)y Nicholas and Ad rian descended in
an unbrolken line from them to Innocent III. Society was
still too ru(le and its anarchic elements too tumultuous, to
submit without many struggles to the absolute despotism
of influences purely spiritual and moral. Its protest against
subjection took many and various forms, and the vices and
weaknesses of the clergy seemed at times to postpone indefinitely the ultimate triumph. The tenth century was
yet to see the darkest period in papal annals, infamously
illustrated by Marozia and John XII., when the Holy Father was the puppet of any savage noble who could control
the miserable population of Rome. Whatever wrongs
Italy may have suffered from the Tedeschi, the world yet
owes to them that Teutonic power rescued the papacy from
this degradation, and placed it in hands less incompetent
to discharge the weighty trust. Blindly working for the
present, the Saxon and Franconian Emperors little thought
that the3r were elevating an influence destined to undermilne their own, or that the doctrines of Isidor, in the
mouth of a priest, would break the power of an iron Kaiser,
the warrior of sixty battles.
BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
A MONG the most important and dearly-prized privileges
of the churclh was that which conferred on its members
immunity from the operation of secular law, and relieved
them from the julriscliction of secular tribunals. Not only
did they thus acquire a peculiar sanctity, which separated
them from the people and secured for them veneration, but
the personal inviolability thence surrounding thein gave
them an enormous advantage in all contests with the civil
power. Secure in this panoply of privilege, they could
dare all things. Amenable only to divine law, the statutes
of emperors and kings were to them but the idle breath of
men; the church was independent of the civil power, and
in its aoogressive enterprises it occupied a vantage-ground
of incalculable value.
So priceless a prerogative was not obtained without a
long and resolute struggle. That disputes arisingO between
ecclesiastics should be settled by the arbitration of the
bishops seemed not unreasonable, and friomn an early perliod
it was the established rule of the church that all such questions should be so settled;1 but to ask that a monk or
priest guilty of crime should not be subject to the ordinary
tribunals, and that civil suits between laymen and ecclesiastics should be referred exclusively to courts comlposedl
See, for instance, the elaborate provisions of Coneil. Chalced. can. 9.
15
170 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
of the latter, was a claim too repugnant to the common
sense of mankind to be lightly accorded.
The respect due to the sanctity of the episcopal functions
was the entering wedge, and for this antiquity was claimed,
coeval with the revolution by which Christianity and the
church became recognized by law. If the account given
by Rufinus be correct, when the Nicene council was assembled for the condemnation of Arius, and the holy fathers,
neglecting that duty, busied themselves only with mutual
criininations and accusations, Constantine ordered them to
hand him all their libelli of complaint, and then addressed
them: " God has constituted you His priests, and has
given you authority to judge usS but you are not to be
judged of men. Wherefore await the decision of God between you, and keep your quarrels, whatsoever they be, for
His decision alone. For you are gods, given to us by God,
and it is not fitting that man should pronounce judgment
on gods." Whereupon he ordered the accusations to be
burned without examination, and commanded the bishops
to proceedcl with the business of the council.l It may well
be assumed, however, that IRufilnus has exaggerated what
probably was only a polite form in which the shrewd aLnd
politic emperor veiledl the reproof which he administered,
and the sarcasm which lurked in his deferential assumption
that they were worthy of the tribute which he rendered to
their office. Sozomen, in fact, gives what is doubtless a
truer account, in stating that Constantine merely remarrked
that it did not become him as a man to decide between
them.2 Whatever may have been his precise form of speech,
Rufini I-Iist. Eccles. Lib. I. cap. 2. This blasphemous expression was
embodied textually in the Capitularies of Benedict (Lib. v. cap. 315), and
was made the basis of extravagant pretensions, without apparently observing
that it destroyed ecclesiastical as fully as secular jurisdiction over prelartes.
It continued to be quoted, till after even the Council of Treilt, as the foundation-stone of clerical immunity. See Concil. Salisburgens. ann. 1569,
Const. xxxix. cap. 1.' Hist. Eccles. Lib. I. cap. 16.
IMPERIAL LEGISLATION. 171
he merely desired to expedite the business of the council and
to elude the annoyance of arbitrating in so nmany obscure
quarrels. That he waived the right to treat his bishops
as his subjects is impossible, when we find him not long
afterwards threatening to punish St. Athanasius for disobedience by removing him from the see of Alexandria,
without even the form of a trial, and warningo hiln that he
woulcld be replaced with a more pliable successor.'
It is true that, in 355, Constantius embodied in a law,
the principle that bishops could only be tried by bishops.2
This, however, shows that no such legal custom pre-existed,
and even this was for a temporary purpose, arising, like the
Sardican canons, from the Arian schllism, and it was only
of temporary authority. It cannot have been more, for in
376 a constitution of Gratian expressly reserves to the
secular tribunals all cases concerning ecclesiastics, except
in matters relating to religion and those of trifling importance.3 A law of Ilonorius in 412, and one of Valentinian
III. in 425,4 are more favorable to ecclesiastical pretensions,
and were strenuously uroged in the ninth century to support
the claims of the church to immunity; but the former may
safely be assumed to refer only to ecclesiastical matters,
while the latter was doubtless extorted by the powerful
church party from the youthful emperor and his mother
Placidia immediately after the overthrow of the usurper
John. That it was opposed to the received jurisprudence
of the age and was not long allowed to remain in force is
shown by an edict of the same emperor in 452, which expressly declares that tile imperial laws subject to secular
jurisdiction all classes of the clergy, from bishops down,
the only exception being that a prosecutor, if himself a
t Socrat. Hist. Eccles. Lib. i. cap. 20.
2 Lib. xvI. Cod, Theod. Tit. ii. 1. 12.
3 Ibid. 1. 23. This shows that the law attributed to Constantine by Sozo.
men (Lib. I. cap. 9), granting to clerical clefendants the right to elect episcopal judges, either neverexisted or else was only of temporary authority.
4Ibid. 11. 41, 43.
172 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
layman, was allowed to select an ecclesiastical tribunal in
which to bring' his action;1 and in 468 a law of the Emperor
Leo shows that churchmen were by no means exempt froml
the ordinary j uriscliction.2
Mleanwhile the church had not been lackingl( in efforts to
maintain exclusive jurisdiction over the affairs of its members, and severe penalties were denounced, in 397, by the
third council of Carthage, against all clerks who should
voluntarily appeal to the secular tribunals in either civil
or criminal cases, on account of the clisrespect thus manifestecld towards their own officials. At the same tinme the
council could not control cases in which they were prosecuted by laymen, and as it enumerates bishops among
those who might justify themselves before lay judges the
canon shows that the exemption attributed to Constantine
problably never existed, while the privilege granted by
Constantius had fallen into desuetude, presumably on account of its heretical intent.3 Even in strictly ecclesiastical concerns the church could not maintain an independent
jurisdiction, for at Chalcedon, where its totality was represented in the most potential form, under the boasted presidency of papal legates, the absolution of the five bishops
who abandoned their Entychian tendencies was conducted
by the imperial commissioners acting under direct instructions from the emperor; and tle condemnation of Dioscorus
of Alexandria required the imperial assent before it could
take effect.' Towards the close of the century Gelasius
might gratify himself by asserting that churchmen could
be tried only in ecclesiastical courts;5 but the emptiness
of this boast was shown when Theodoric formally proNovell. Valent. III. Tit. xxxv. ~ 1. A law in the Theodosian Code
(Lib. xvI. Tit. xii. 1. 3) might likewise be cited, but its authenticity is
doubtful.
n Const. 33, Cod. I. 3.
3 Concil. Carthag. III. ann. 397, can. 9.
4 Concil. Chalced. Act. Iv. (Harduin. II. 414).
5 Gratian. caus. xI. q. 1, can. 12.
GRANTED BY JUSTINIAN. 173
claimed that the Bishop of Rome himself was not exempt
from trial and condemnation at the command of his sovereign,D a'principle which the Ostrogoth did not hesitate
to put in force against both Symmachus and John 1. As
an Arian, perhaps, he was not to be expected to have unnecessary reverence for orthodox prelates; but under the
Catholic Justinian there was quite as little scruple when
Belisarius convicted Pope Silverius on a fabricated charge
of treason.2 A step, indeed, had been gained when another
Arian sovereign, Athalaric the Ostrogoth, granted that
any suit or prosecution against a Roman ecclesiastic
should be brouglht before the pope; but it was rendered
virtually nugatory by the fieedom allowed to the plaintiff
to appeal fi'ornom the decision to the secular nagistrates.?
The privilege attributed to Constantine and attempted
by Constantins was finally established by Justinian, who
conceded to the episcopal dignity the right to have episcopal judges; but as he carefully reserved the imperial prerogative to disregard the exemption, the principle of ecclesiastical subordination was preserved intact,4 and the
deposition and banishment of numerous bishops for their
contumacy respecting the Three Chapters, in the exciting
Monophysite controversy, show how freely he exercised
his power, even in matters of faith.5 While thus jealously
guarding the supremacy of the crown, ilowever, he was
disposed to favor the autonomy of the church, and in 539
Goldast. Const. Imp. III. 613. At the same time Theodoric does not
seem disinclined to favor ecclesiastical jurisdiction, for le find him sending
for trial to Eustorgils, Bishop of Milan-'- cujus est et aquitatem moribus
talibus imponere'-some priests charged with perjury and fa;lse witness of
an aggravated character (Goldast. III. 32) -offences which in the legislation
of Justinian were specially reserved for the secular courts.
Anastus Biblioth. No. 60.
3 Athala.r. Const. xvi. (Goldast. III. 9S).
Novell. 123, cap. 8. " Nisi princepsjubeat."
Victor. Tunenens. Chron. ann. 551.
15*
174 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
he placed the monasteries under the sole control of the
bishops, in order that their hallowed precincts should not
be profaned by the sacrilegious intrusion of secular officials.l A few months later, at the solicitation of Mennas,
Patriarch of Constantinople, he ordered that all civil suits
against ecclesiastics should be brought before their bishops,
ewitl recourse to the state tribunals only when the prelate
was unlable to arrive at a decision. Criminal prosecutions,
however, were reserved for the civil magistrates, except in
minor offences;2 and there is nothing to warrant the belief
that a clerical plaintiff could select a judge of his own
order.3 The result of these favors was apparently not
satisfactory, for a few years later the privilege was practically nullified by allowing the largest liberty of appeal to
the secular tribunals from such episcopal decisions.4
In Italy, the popes took care to enunciate with sufficient
frequency the principle that an ecclesiastical defendant was
entitled to be tried in his own court;5 and that they succeeded is shown by an order of Gregory the Great, directing that hospitals shall be placed under the charge of eccelesiastics only, to exempt them from thle jurisdiction of the
secular tribunals which otherwise mllight trouble and pillage
them.Y
The regions subjected to the Burgundians s and Wisigoths, however, adhered more closely to the traditions of
the Roman jurisprudence, and maintained to a great extent the supremacy of the civil law. This was the natural
result of their Arianism; but even when the Goths were
converted to orthodoxy, in 589, they adhered to their ancestral principles. The council of Agde in 506, and that
1 Novell. 79. 2 Novell. 123, cap. 20.
3 Novell. 83. 4 Novell. 123, cap. 21.
5 Gregor. PP. I. Regist. Lib. vI. Epist. 11; Lib. xI. Epist. 77. Gratian.
Cans. xI. q. 1. can. 11, 12, 38, 39, 40.
"Gregor. PP. I. Regist. Lib. iv. Epist. 27. "Religiosi dumtaxat, quos
vexandi judices non habeantipotestatein."
DENIED BY THE WISIGOTHS. 175
of Epaone in 517, while ordering the clergy not to seek
the secular tribunals as plaintiffs, directs them to make no
resistance when summoned as defendants, showing that an
effort had been made to secure the exemption, and that it
had failed.' Even this measure of separation fronm the
civil jurisdiction was not easily maintained, for at the third
council of Toledo, held in 589 to celebrate the abandonment of Arianism, the bishops complained bitterly of the
clergy who were constantly infringing the rules of discipline by carrying their suits before the lay courts.'2 With
the conversion to Catholicism came an effort to secure
complete inmmunity from secular jurisdiction, which was
asserted with so much vigor that about the middle of the
seventh century Chindaswind was obliged to put a stop to
it by a law which imposed a heavy fine on bishops refusing
to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the ordinary tribunals,
and inflicted on the lower orders of the clerg'y the same
penalty as that incurred by the laity for such contempt of
court.3 Even this was not sufficient, and the bishops endeavored to secure, at least for themselves, some immunity
from the law, for the eleventh council of Toledo, in 6T5,
was obliged to declare that for aggravated offences they
should be punished according to the secular code.4
Singularly enough, the ancient British church presents
one of the earliest instances of the formal recognition of
clerical immunity, and this nearly in the form which was
preserved in England until the Reformation. A collection
of Welsh canons, attributed to the seventh century, provides that a clerk prosecuting a layman shall bring his
complaint before the secular judge, but that if the clerk is
Concil. Agathens. can. 32. Concil. Epaonens. can. 11.
Concil. Toletan. III. can. 13.
L1. Wisigoth. Lib. II. Tit. 1. 1. 18. This subjection of the clergy is the
more remarkable as the bishops at that time enjoyed great power and influence.
4 Concil. Toletan. XI., ann. 675, can. 5.
176 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
the defendant the case shall be heard by the bishop, providled that the ecclesiastic has not been previously tried
and convicted, in which case he must be content with
secular law.l
The careless barbarism or the zealous fervor of the newly
converted Franks took little pains to maintain the equality
of the laity and the priesthood. It is easy to understand
this wlhen we consider that under the Frankish domination
all laws were personal and not territorial. The Frank, the
Roman, the Goth, and the Burgundian, however intermingled, had each a right to be tried by his own code, and
it therefore might seem natural that the ecclesiastic should
have the benefit of his canon law, which moreover could
only be expounded by the courts-Christianl familiar with
its peculiarities. As early as 538, even before the carefully guarded grants of Justinian, the third council of
Orleans thus was able to enact a canon rendering episcopal
assent necessary before a clerk could appear in a secular
court, either as plaintiff or defendant.2 This virtually
placed in the hands of the bishops complete control over
all cases in which ecclesiastics were concerned; and the
principle was more fully developed three years later at the
fourth council of Orleans.3 Possibly iin this there was an
undue assumption of power; certainly more was assumed
than could be maintained in times so tumultuous, for subsequent legislation and canons prove that there was no
definite system of procedure. The history of the period
also affords ample evidence that practically there was no
limit to the exercise of the royal power over ecclesiastics,
as confessed by Gregory of Tours, when lie reproved Chilperic I.-"' I any one of us, 0 King, exceeds the limits of
justice, you can punish him, but if you transcend the right,
1 Canones Wallici, c. 40, 41, 44, 45. (IIaddan and Stubbs's Councils of
Great Britain, I. 133-4.)' Concil. Aurelian. III. can. 32.
3 Concil. Aurelian. IV. ann. 541, can. 20.
LEGISLATION OF THE FRANKS. 177
who shall restrain you?"l and not long afterwards he at-e
tributes to divine interposition a serious illness of King
Gontran, who was thus prevented from executing an intention of banishing a number of his bishops.2
It was not only the royal authority, however, that thus
infringed on the immunities claimed by the church. Sometimes, powerless to enforce her own laws, she was forced
to invoke secular assistance, as when in 567 the second
council of Tours appealed to the lay tribunals for aid in
separating from their wives monks who should commit the
indiscretion of marrying.3 The fultility of the endeavor to
enforce the claim of exemption is shown in an ingenious
expedient, devised by the council of Auxerre in 578, by
which a suit against a clerk should be brought against a
brother of the defendant, or some other layman.4 Even
this attempt to save appearances was abandoned by the
council of Macon in 581, which conceded, what it probably could not refuse, to secular judges criminal jurisdiction over clerical offenders.5 The council of Paris, in 615,
sought to withdraw this concession by repeating the injunctions of the councils of Orleans, requiring the assent
of the bishops in all cases;6 but the secular power was not
willing.thus to abandon its jurisdiction, and the edict of
Clotair, which gave legal force to the canons of the council, limited with some strictness this provision, and ordered
a mixed tribunal for the trial of all cases between the
clergy and the laity.7 Even this was probably a greater
favor than the church could secure in practice, for the
council of Chalons, in 649, complains of the civil magistrates as extending their jurisdiction over monasteries and
parishes-;s and about the same period the Bavarian laws,
1 Greg. Turon. Hist. Franc. Lib. v. ca,p. 19.
2 Ejusd. Lib. vIIi. cap. 30. 3 Concil. Turon. II. can. 15.
4 Concil. Autissiodlor. can. 41. 5 Concil. Matiscon I. can. 7.
6 Concil. Paris. V. can. 4. Edict. Chlotar. II. ann. 615, c. 4, 5.
s Concil. Cabillonens. can. 11.
178 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
while exempting the episcopal order from liability to private vengeance, treat it as in every respect amenable to
the royal and popular tribunals.'
Whatever was doubtful in the prevailing custom, however, was eventually construed in favor of sacerdotal immunity. In 755 the acts of the synod of Verneuil, issued
under the authority of Pepin-le-Bref, contain the important
privilege more distinctly enunciated;2 while a capitulary
of Charlemagne, in 769, threatens excommunication for any
secular judge who shall try and condemn an ecclesiastic
without the knowledge of his bishop;3 and another, in
789, denounces heavy penalties against any clerk who
should so far disregard the rights of his order asto obey a
SUlmmons to a secular court as defendant in either a civil
or criminal action.4 Another, in 794, provides a mixed
tribunal for nmixed cases;5 and one, of uncertain date,
gives to the bishops sole jurisdiction in criminal cases
affecting their clergy, while in civil suits a secular judge
could only send a commissioner to see that justice was
done against a clerical defendant in the episcopal court.6
A law of Pepin, King of Italy, in 793, admits the same
principle by authorizing the courts to judge as laymen all
clerks whom the negligence- of their bishops permits to
assume the secular habit.t' LI. Baioar. Tit. I. cap. 11, ~ 2. The clergy, however, were under the
jurisdliction of their bishops, except for incontinence. (Tit. I. cap. 13, ~..)
C Capit. Pippini, ann. 755, cap. 18. About the same time a similar rule
was proclaimed in England-Ecgberti Excerpt. cap. 16.
3 Capit. Carol. Mag. ann. 769, cap. 17.
4 Ejusd. cap. ann. 789, cap. 37.-Cf. Cnpit. ann. 794, cap. 37.
Ejusd. Cnpit. Frankfort. ann. 794, cap. 28. Such regulations were evidently of no practical imnportance, and are only interesting as a manifestation of the expedients resorted to with the hope of reconciling the irreconcilable.
G Ejusd. Capit. incerti anni c. 25 (Hartzlheim, Concil. German. I. 427).
This capitulary probably refers to Italy. Cf. Capit. incerti anni cap. 17
(Baluz. I. 352).
7 Pippini Capit. ex LI. Longobard. cap. 17 (Baluz. II. 371).
WITHIELD BY CHARLEMAGNE. 179
In principle, the point was thus gained, but its practical
enforcement was reserved for a later period; and we may
safely assume that little respect was paid to such prerogatives by warrior-judges, who thought that the safety of
ecclesiastics was amply guarded by investing them with a
double or triple wehr-gild for life or limb.l This, indeed,
is not a mere matter of conjecture. We have already seen
that Charlemagne and Louis-le-Debonnaire held the pope
himself as subject to their jurisdiction, and the latter even
sent a layman as commissioner for the trial of Pascal I.
WVhen, in 815, Leo III. dared to trespass on the imperial
prerogative by executing some conspirators, and Louis
resented this infringement of his rights, Leo, in hlis apology, professed the most profound obedience, admitted his
subjection to the imperial jurisdiction, and eagerly requested the emperor to come or send a commissioner to
sit in judgment on him.2 In 805 a capitulary of Charlemagne orders the public judges to expedite with diligence
the suits of churches, widows, and orphans,3 showinog that
the secular courts were open to ecclesiastical cases, and
were habitually applied to for them, which is confirmed by
an allusion in Flocloard to the custom of Mulfarius, Archbishop of Rheims, and of his successor Ebbo, in conducting personally the causes of their church before the civil
judges.4 A law of 794 shows that the monarch exercised
the right of sitting in ultimate appeal in criminal cases
involving churchmen as freely as in those involving the
laity.5 In 803 we find him summoning to his tribunal the
The second council of Macon, in 585, complains bitterly that the inviolability of episcopal dignity received little respect at the hands of irreligious
judges (Concil. Matiscon. II. can. 9). This is not to be wondered at when
these privileges were disregarded by those who were most interested in
maintaining them. The fifth council of Paris, in 615, found it necessary to
forbid bishops from attackling each other in the secular courts (Concil.
Paris. V. can. 11).
Grantian. caus. IJ. q. 7, cian. 41.
3 Capit. Carol. Mag. II. ann. 805, cap. 2.
Flodoard. Ilist. Remens. Lib. II. cap. 18, 19.
Clapit. Carol. Mag. ann 794, cap. 4.
180 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
monks of St. Martin of Tours, to be tried for contumacy
in refusing to surrender a fugitive clerk condemned by
Theodulf, Bishop of Orleans;' and an edict of 805 directs
the loftiest prelates to be brought before him for judgmlent.2
Even for certain violations of ecclesiastical discipline,
Louis-le-De'bonnaire, in 816, directed that clerical offenders
should be sent to him for punishment. a
Under this conflicting and uncertain legislation attempts
were naturally made to escape subjection to the secular
tribunals, and Charlemagne, in 811, ridicules the idea that
men who sometimes bore arms, and possessed private property, should refuse to answer the appeals of laymen under
such a plea.4 His disapprobation of the pretension is
manifest, and how little it was regarded is evident from
a law of 819, forbidding the duel when both parties to an
action were ecclesiastics, but allowing it when one was a
layman, and, in the former case, referring the matter to
the count of the province, thus showing how complete was
the jurisdiction of the secular tribunals over the clergy.5
The practical exercise of the power thus conceded and.
assumed is further manifested in a supplication to Louis,
about the year 820, from a priest asking for justice against
another priest in a quarrel about tithes. The suitor alleges
that his antagonist's friends had cudgelled him, and then
made him swear on the altar that he would not appeal
either to the emperor or to his mi.ssus. No question could
well be more strictly appropriate to the action of the ecclesiastical courts, and yet there is no allusion to any canonical trial, nor (lid either party seem to think of recourse to
1 Carol. Mag. Epist. ap. Baluz. I. 292.
2Capit. Canrol. Mag. III. ann. 805, cap. 14.
3 Lundov. Pii Epist. ad Archiep. Salisburg. (Mirmi Cod. Donat. Piar.
cap. 13).
Capit. Carol. Mag. II. ann. 811, cap. 8.
Capit. Ludov. Pii ann. 819, cap. 10. Tha.t the church accepted this is
shown by its being included by Regino in his collection of canons-De Discip. Eccles. Lib. II. cap. 334.
OBSOLETE UNDER THE iCARLOVINGIANS. 181
any source of justice save the throne.l The same principle
is developed in a minute account of a trial when the Abbot
of Anisola was endeavoring to escape from the jurisdiction
of the Bishop of Le Mfans. It would seem to be a matter
especially pertinent to a local synod, and yet the case was
heard, in 838, by Louis-le-Do'bonnaire in general assembly;
lie conducted the examination and rendered judgment,
which was confirmed by the assent of all present, both
prelates and nobles. The details are all preserved, and
prove that no immunity from secular jurisdiction was
enjoyed by the church.2
Nor was the supremacy of the sovereign immediately
destroyed by the abasement consequent upon the civil
wars, nor did the throne cease to be the source of all justice. In 845 the synod of Thionville besought the assembled Carlovingi'an princes to employ their authority vigorously in bringing the church back to its former purity,3
and a few months later the synod of Vernon made a special request to Charles-le-Chauve that he would delegate
full powers to commissioners to examine into and punish
the violations of ecclesiastical discipline everywhere rampant.4 About the same time we find Modoin, Bishop of
Autun, employing the secular courts in various quarrels
with the clergy of his metropolis, Lyons, and maintaining
the doctrine that only bishops and abbesses were exempt
from secular jurisdiction, much to the disgust of the Lyonese, who were deprived of their leader by the degradation
of St. Agobard.5 That Modoin was correct would seem
Bonifac. Epist. 107.
2 Gest. Aldrici Cenoman. Episc. cap. 51.
Capit. Carol. Calv. Tit. II. cap. 4.
4 Ejusd. Tit. III. cap. 2.
5 Florus Diaconus vented his indignation at this in a long elegy, soothing
in its monotonous objurgation. I-le describes the doctrine of Modoin" Dicere nullus honos debetur (credite) sacris
Ordinibus; cunctos pulset ubique fora-un.
Nam nisi cceobiiln mater niuliebre gubernans
Et sacer antistes, cwstera pulvis erunt."
16
182 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
evident, for we see in the canons of St. odclolpl, Archbishop of Bourges, a passage permitting the presence of
priests in civil courts, with the assent of their bishops,
when their own cases were on trial.'
It would be useless further to multiply evidence to prove
that ecclesiastics were amenable to secular jurisdiction in
both civil and criminal cases, and that the king was recognized as the fountain of justice, firom whom emanated the
power of punishment and of vindicatingo the majesty of the
law, even when the wrong-doer was a churchman. How
great a change was wrought in a few years we may learn
from a trifling incident at the synod of Soissons in 853,
-where Charles-le-Chauve is described as entering humbly" simnpliciter cumn episcopis resedebat" andc he, the King
of the Franks, and the grandson of Charlemagne, laid a
complaint before the assembled prelates against a petty
clerkl, Deacon RIainfroy of IRheims, whom he accused of
forging the royal signature; and the bishops condescended
to order the accused not to leave RIheims without justifying himself.2 Unimportant as is the occurrence, it registers a victory gained by the lowest in the church over the
highest in the state, and it marks the submission of the
king to the doctrines of the False Decretals.
The fabricators of the forgeries indeedl, were far too,
shrewd not to estimate at its full value the privilege of
exemption from human law. This is asserted throughout
the decretals of Isidor to be the imprescriptible right of
tihe churchl with a fiequency which renders citation impossible, and which reveals the earnest effort made to secure the immunity.3 The Capitularies of Benedict afford a
similar manifestation in the untiring persistence with which
Capit. Rodolf. Buturicens. ca.p. 19.
Capit. Carol. Calv. Tit. xI. act. 6.
E. g. Pseudo-Clement. Epist. 1; Pseudo-Fabian. Epist. 2; Pseudo-Gaii
Epist: 1, cap. 2; Pseudo-Marcellin. Epist. 2, cap. 3;.&c.
ASSERTED BY TIIE CHIURCIH. 183
they enunciate and enforce principle in all its forms.'
Yet though it might be admitted in theory, the revolution
was too great to be at once successful, and the royal power
made various efforts to recover its old supremacy. In 869
Charles endeavored fruitlessly to assert for himself an appellate jurisdiction in quarrels between bishops and laymen,2 the very terms of his edict showing how completely
the jurisdiction had slipped through his hands. Occasionally, too, when feeling momentarily strong, he indulged
in a violent exercise of arbitrary authority, as, when the
restless Hincmar, Bishop of Laon, became involved in a
dispute about a piece of land, Charles evoked the case to a
secular court. Hincmar did not deny the jurisdiction, but
sent an excuse in reoular leoal form for non-appearance on
the day assigned for the first hearing, when the angry
monarch committed the hig'h-handed act of seizing all the
temporalities and revenues of the see of Laon. This drew
Upon him a long and earnest remonstrance fiom the sufferer's uncle, the powerful Hincmar of Rheimls, who stigmatized the royal act as utterly illegal and unexampled in
the history of Christian princes.3
Spasmodic efforts such as this were utterly insufficient to
restrain the progress of ecclesiastical independ(ence. The
church had become thoroughly persuaded that her ministers
were exempt from all subjection to secular laws and judges,
and she maintained this claim with her customary perseverance-in fact, as it had been asserted to be of divine
right handed clown from apostolic times, it was a claim.
which could not be abandoned. In 866, Nicholas I., when
replying to the inquiries of the King of Bulgaria, told him
Capitul. Lib. v. cap. 70, 192, 378; Lib,. v. cap. 11, 164, 434; Lib. vII.
cap. 139, 210, 43S, 469, &c.
2 Capit. Carol. Calv. Tit. XL. cap. 7.
3 " Quod nec in legibus nec in libris ecclesiasticis quemquam Christianorum principum fecisse legimus." IHinemar. pro Eccles. Libert. Defens.
Expos. 1. The Bishop of Laon was finally reinstated, and subsequently
proved a thorn in his uncle's side.
184 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
that neither he nor any other layman had a right to investigate the conduct of ecclesiastics or to judge them,
for all such matters were reserved exclusively to the
bishops, the sacerdotal character being too sacred for discussion by those whose only function was to revere and to
obey.1 In the same spirit the synod of Ravenna, in 877,
forbids clerks and nuns, and orphans and widows under the
guardianship of bishops, from being brought before secular
courts, and threatens with the dread anathema any potentate who may dare to infringe the rule.2 Germany was not
behindhand in proclaiming the same principle, for in 895
the council of Tribur established the bishops as the sole
judges in all cases to which ecclesiastics were parties,
whether as plaintiffs or defenldanlts.3
The persistence of the church, backed up by the unfailing resource of excommunication, finally triumphedl and
the sacred. immunity of the priesthood was acknowledcged,
sooner or later, in the laws of every nation of Europe.4
1Nicolai PP. I. Epist. 97 ~ 70.
2 Synod. Ravennat. ann. 877, can. 4. (Harduin. T. VI. P. I. p. 186.)
Concil. Tribur. ann. 895, can. 21.
B4 racton. Lib. III. Tract. ii. cap. 9.-Laws of Howell Dda, Dimetian Code
Bk. II. chap. viii. ~~ 124, 130 (Owen's Ancient Laws, &c., of Wales, I.
475-9).-Beaunmanoir, chap. xI. ~ 40.-Las Siete Partidas Pt. I. Tit. vi. 1.
61.-Constit. Sicular. Lib. I. Tit. 42.-Assises de Jerusalem, Baisse Court,
cap. 14, 367.-Feudor. Lib. v. Tit. xvii. ~ 4.-Specul. Suevic. cap. 77.Legg. S. Stephan. Ilungaror. R. cap. 3. —Raguald. Ingemnund. Legg. Suecor.
Lib. I. cap. 20.-Constit. Christof. II. Danie, ann. 1320, ~~ 2, 11.-Legg. Opstaalbom. ~ 24.
The Scots aappear to have been somewhat chary of granting the privilege, for though it is expressed in the ancient canons which pass under the
name of the Ecclesiastical Laws of Macbeth (Spelman. Concil. I. 571), yet
the statutes of a Parliament held in the year 1400 (Stat. Robert. III. cap.
5, ap. Skene.) would seem to show that at that period the secular tribunals
had cognizance of ecclesiastical causes.
The early Icelandic church likewise was in this respect exceptional. The
primitive code of ecclesiastical law in force there from 1122 to 1275 provides no exemption for the clergy. Even for ecclesiastical offences they
were tried in the ordinary manner by a jury of the vicinage, and were punishable with the secular penalties of fines, &c. (Kristinrettr Thorlaks oc
IMPUNITY FOR CRaIME. 185
This of course was a source of injury to the community
and of corruption to the church, for the clerks, in emancipating themselves fiom human law, did not obtain exemption from human infirmities, and in the ecclesiastical courts
not only were the facilities of escape through the system
of canonical compurgation vastly greater than in the secular tribunals, but the theory which regarded degradation
from the priesthood as one of the heaviest penalties that
could be inflicted, and the rule which forbade the spiritual
judges from pronouncing sentences of death or mutilation,
rendered their jurisdiction virtually an asylum for offenders
when compared with the atrociously cruel criminal jtirisprudence of the time. In addition to this, there was the
esp~rit de corps which tended to incline the episcopal
officials to seek the acquittal rather than the conviction of
those of the cloth, and it is therefore not surprising that
the laity came to regard the clergy as entitled to a lenity
which amounted almost to impunity for crime.
Thus, as early as 1085, a constitution of the Emperor
tIenry IV., enforcing the l'ruce of God under penalties of
frightful severity, draws a broad line of distinction between
the church and the people. At that time I-Tenry was emancipated from the papacy, and was the political head of a
successfill scllism, so that lie was in a position to legislate
f'or all classes of his subjects. The manner in which he
favored the clergy therefore shows how profound an impression had already been produced in the popular mind
as to the superior privileges of the church. A crime so
unclerical as the violation of the temporary truces which
were placed under the special sanction of God, would
rather seem to claim additional punishment for malefactors
Kettils, cap. ii. xiii. xv. Ed. Thorkelin, Havnive, 1776.) The only allusions in the code to any ecclesiastical jurisdciction are that a priest disobeying
his bishop is to be tried by a synod of neighboring priests; and that questions arising with respect to tithes due to a bishop are to be decided by the
bishop himself. (Ibid. chap. xv. xxxIx.)
16*
1.86 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
whose peaceful profession ought to render it peculiarly
odious, particularly when we reflect that simple degradation would prove but a trifling penalty for offenders who
were so lost to all sense of veneration for their sacred
functions as to come within the provisions of-the edict.
Yet deeds for which laymen were to be decapitated brought
only degradation to clerks; while for lighter infractions of
the law mutilation was inflicted upon laymen, and clerks
were only to be suspended from their functions and subjected to the canonical penance of fasting and the discipline.l In England, in the thirteenth century, the only
punishment provided for clerks was degradation, irrespective of the number and magnlitude of their'crimes;2 and in
the Norman legislation of the same period the ecclesiastical courts visited only with degradation and exile the
offences which in laymen were punished with mutilation
and death3-a provision retained throughout the revisions
of the Coutumier until 1580.4 So in Wales a first offence
is described as only entailing degradation to laymanship, though it is true that one collection of Welsh laws
adds confiscation of property.5
These instances will suffice to show the general tenor
of the principle established in mecdieval legislation. So
serious an interference, however, with the administration
of criminal justice could not but be the cause of perpetual
strife between church and state; and a rapid sketch of its
vicissitudes in some of the leading nations of Christendom
may not be uninteresting.
1 Ienric. IV. Const. Iv. (Migne's Patrol. T. 151 p. 1134).
Bracton, Lib. cII. Trsct. ii. cap. 9 ~ 2.
3 Cod. Leg. Norman. P. iI. cap. 16. (Ludewig, Reliq. Mssctor. VII. 297.)
Anc. Cout. de Normandie, chap. 83 (Bourdot de Richebourg, IV. 33).
See also, Etablissement de Philippe-le-Bel, ann. 1302 (Isambert, Anc. Lois
Frang. II. 748). In 1540, however, Francis I. forbade the Norman ecclesiastical judges to try criminal cases without previous notice to a royal
official appointed to be present and to guard the rights of the sovereign.
(Isambert. XII. 714.)
5 Owen's Anc. Laws, &c., of Wales, II. 341, 669.
LEGISLATION IN ENGLAND. 187
In England the prerogative was not secured without a
struggle, though it was fully recognized in the Anglo-Saxon
legislation.1 Henry II. was too astute a ruler not to perceive the immense evils arising from it, and the limitation
which it imposed upon the royal power by emancipating
so large a class of his subjects from obedience to the laws
of the realm. When in 1164 he endeavored, in the Constitutions of Clarendon, to set bounds to the privileges of
the church, he therefore especially attacked the benefit of
clergy, and declared that ecclesiastics were amenable to the
royal jurisdiction.2 Thomas'a Becket, however, speedily
vindicated the imperilled prerogatives of the church by
excommunicatiiig the sacrilegious men who dared thus to
invade her rights, and the disastrous result of the quarrel
between the king and the archbishop rendered it necessary
to abandon all such schemes of reform. Yet even the
humiliation of John, and the supremacy gained by the
papacy, did not cause this perversion of justice to be implicitly respected, and, a century later, although the principle was unreservedly admitted by Bracton, in practice
the courts were perpetually violating it. Thus in 1261 the
council of Lambeth complained that ecclesiastics, when
accused, were frequently seized and imprisoned by the
secular officials; while, if they refused to obey a sumions,
the royal judges outlawed them without ceremony for contumacy. To punish these infractions of the canon law, the
council proceeded to excommunicate all concerned in such
cases, and to place under interdict their residences and the
localities where clerks were imprisoned, until the sufferers
should be released.3 This action does not appear to have
accomplished its purpose, for in 1275 Edward I. interposed,
and ordered the delivery to the ecclesiastical courts of all
clerks indicted of felony, adding that the episcopal judges
Laws of Cnut, Eccles. cap. 4; Secular, cap. 41, 43.
2 Constit. Clarendon. cap. 3, 16.
3 Concil. Lambethens. ann. 1261 (Harduin. VII. 539).
188 BENErFIT OF CLERGY.
ought not to discharge them without cldue purgation, and
intimating that if they neglected to do their duty, he mig'ht
feel obliged to interfere.' This threat shows that Edward
was not disposed to admnit that he had no control in the
matter; but it was an empty boast. A legal writer of the
time of Edward II. lays down the rule that the judge must
remand to the episcopal court a clerk accused- of a capital
crime, after he shall have proved his clergy (even if he had
made a confession, under 9 Edw. II. c. 15, 16), and instructs
the prosecutor to pursue his action before the spiritual tribunal, quietly addinlg: "Et le clerke, apres clue purgation,
recit toutes ses biens mouvables et fiefs sans difficulty.'2
The immunity thus afforded to offenders bore its natural
results in fostering crilme, and in 1402 there was a clisposition shown in Parliament to curtail the benefit of clergy
in the interest of justice, as the tenderness or connivance
of the ecclesiastical officials allowed offenders, as a general rule, to escape. The church, thus threatened, promised
better behavior for the future, pledged itself that criminals
should not be allowed to go unpunished, and obtained a
continuance of the privilege, which continued to be abused
as before.3 As time passed on, the benefit of clergy gradually extended itself. That the laity were illiterate and the
clergy educated was taken for granted, and the test of
churchmanship came to be the ability to read, so that the
privilege became in fact a free pardon on a first offence for
all who knew their letters. So liberally, indeed, was the
rule expounded, that aliens were provided with books in
their own tongues out of which to prove their clergy, and
blind men escaped the halter by being able to speak Latin
"4congluously." Henry TII. recognized the difference between these putative clerks and men who really were in
orders when he sought to check the prevalence of crime
attributable to this anomalous privilege. By a law of 1487
3 Edward I. cap. 2.
o IIorne's Myrror of Justice, cap. III. sect. 4. 4 Henr. IV. cap. 3.
LEGISLATION IN ENGLAND. 189
he directs that lettered persons not in orders shall enjoy
the benefit of clergy but once, and that after conviction,
before release, murderers shall be branded on the thumb
with the letter M, and other felons with the letter T, so that
on a second conviction they may be known and treated as
laymen. Men in orders, however, were not exposed to this,
and were only required on a subsequent trial to produce
their letters of ordination, on the strength of which they
again escaped.l It is true that in such cases the episcopal
officials were bound to degrade these unworthy members of
the church, but practically this was rarely done, andc the
offender generally was enabled to continue without limit
his evil courses. The ceremony of degradation required
for its due execution a certain number of bishops, and had
to be performed at the place where the crime had been committed. Owing to the difficulty of assemblinig the requisite
number of prelates, the offenders in most instances escaped
the penalty of degradation, and were discharged unpunished and still clothed with the mysterious attributes which
shielded them from human justice. That the church should
continue to protect indefinitely the lawless careers of men
who disgraced their order grew at length to be a scandal
past endurance when the Reformation came to open the
eyes and loosen the tongues of scoffers; and when Cardinal
WTolsey undertook to reform the worst abuses of the Anglican establishment, he sought to check this source of evil
by obtaining from Clement VII. a bull which authorized a
single bishop, with two abbots or other dignitaries, to perform the ceremonial requisite to degradation.2
Henry VIII. followed this up with various laws imposing restrictions on the privilege in atrocious crimes. Before
his rupture with Rome he thus excepted from the benefit
of clergy those who were not actually in orders, and who
were convicted of various felonies, including treason,
1 4 Henr. VII. cap. 13. 2 Rymer, Fcedera, xIv. 239.
190 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
murder, burglary, highway robber, &c., and, after he had
assumed the supremacy of his church, he extended the
same rules to include those who were actually ordained.1
By indirection, Queen Mary obtained tile repeal of these
laws.2 Under Elizabeth, certain heinous offences were
declared felonies without benefit of clergy, and the rule was
adopted that, in all cases where clergy was allowed, the
convict should be branded as required by the law of Henry
VII., and should be deprived of clergy on trial for a subsequent offence. The farce of delivering the released convict to the ordinary, or episcopal official, was disused, and
he was imprisoned at the discretion of the judge for a
period not exceeding a year.3 Much legislation ensued
from time to time affecting the limitation of the privilege
in various offences; and long after it had thus lost all special
reference to the church the ingenuity of lawyers was taxed
to the utmost, in distinguishing between the shades of
crime entitled to the privilege and those for which the
convict was ousted of his plea, rendering this, according
to Sir Matthew Hale, "one of the most involved and
troublesome titles of the law."' Early in the reign of Anne
the benefit of clergy was extended to all malefactors, by
abrogating the reading test, thus placing the unlettered
felon on a par with his better educated fellows, and it was
not until the present century was well advanced that this
remnant of medixval ecclesiastical prerogative was abolished by 7 and 8 Geo. IV. c. 28.
In Germany, before the imperial power was broken in
the contest with the pnpacy, there was a decided disposition
to resuscitate the temporal supremacy enjoyed by Charlemagne andl lost by his descendants. We have seen Henry' 23 Henr. VIII. cap. 1.-25 H. VIII. cap. 3.-28 H. VIII. cap. 1.-32
H. VIII. cap. 3.
I 1 Mary Sess. 1. cap. 1, ~ 5. s 18 Eliz. cap. 7.
Placit. Corona, chap. XLIV-LIV.
LEGISLATION IN GERMANY. 191
IV., towards the close of his strife with Rome, legislating
for the clergy of his dominions; while his grandfather, Conrad the Salic, had the audacity, in 1037, to depose and
banish, without form of trial, the bishops of Vercelli, Cremonla, and Piacenza; and though the chronicler appears
somewhat scandalized at this summary proceeding? it is
rather at its want of formality than at its invasion of ecclesiastical privilege.1 All such pretensions vanished, however, when the triumph of the popes in the long contest
rendered the clerical power supreme; and in 1220 Frederic
II. decreed that no one should clare to drag a clerk before
the secular tribunals, either in civil or criminal actions,
under pain of forfeiture of his claim, while judgments
rendered under such circumstances were declared null and
void, and the presiding judlge was punished by deprivation
of his judicial functions.2 Yet the Schwabenspiegel which
not long afterwards embodied the j urisprucence of Southern
Germany, in regulating civil cases between clerks and laymen, while empowering the clerk to summon an adversary
before the secular court, diminished somewhat the exemptionl which he enjoyed of refusing to appear as a defendant,
by excepting cases of debt firom its operation.3
The long struggle between Louis of Bavaria and the
popes for a time shoolk the foundation of ecclesiastical prerogative, but when Louis passed away, his successor Charles
IV., the creature of the papacy, was eager to preserve the
favor of his patrons by maintaining the threatened prerogatives. When, in 1359, the German clergy complained of
the aggressions of the secular tribunals, he promptly issued
a constitution which punished the imprisonment of a clerk
with outlawry and forfeiture of all possessions, in addition
to the penalties provided by the civil and canon law;4 and
1 Wippo de Vit. Chunrad. ann. 1037.
2 Constit. Frideric. II. ~ 7 (Post Lib. Fendor.).
3 3ur. Provin. Alaman. cap. 77.
Caroli IV. Constit. de Immunit. Cleric. ann. 1359, ~ 5 (Goldast. I. 93).
192 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
this edict was resuscitated and confirmed by M{artin V. in
1418.1 So completely was the church thus emancipated
from all subjection to the secular power that in 1491 we
find a synod of Bamberg threatening with excommunication and deprivation of the fruits of his benefice any ecclesiastic who should obey in any way a summons from the
secular courts in either civil or criminal cases.2
There was one tribunal in Germany, however, which
dared to assert and maintain its jurisdiction over churchmen —that of the terrible Free Judges of Westphalia, whose
wide-spreading power, based upon the terrorism of secrecy,
enabled them to claim and exercise the right. That it was
generally submitted to is shown by the exemptions occasionally granted by the Vehmgericht as a special favor to
particular churches;3 but it was sometimes resisted, for
when the Holy Vehme, in 1448, at the complaint of two
knights, summoned the Primate of Germany, Theodoric,
Archbishop of Mainz, that powerful prince appealed for
protection to the papal legate at the imperial court, and
the Cardinal of San Angelo accordingly lost no time in
denouncing the heaviest spiritual penalties against those
who dclared to disregard the imprescriptible rights which
protected every ecclesiastic from the jurisdiction of the
laity.4 Yet the audacity of the attempt shows the height
to which the power of tlhe Free Judges had risen.
We have seen Frederic II. granting all that the church
could ask in the Empire which it virtually controlled, but
in his hereditary dominions of Naples and Sicily lie was
not quite so obedient. Th-e traditions of independence
handed down from the Norman kings were by no means
Dalham, Concil. Salisburgens. p. 267.
2 Synod. Bamberg. ann. 1491, Tit. xiii. (Ludewig, Script. 1Rer. German.
I. 1206.)
Senckenberg dce Judic. Westphal. cap. xix. ~ 7.
Gudeni Cod. Diplom. IV. 306.
LEGISLATION IN ITALY. 193
extinct, and he preserved and extended the old laws which
held ecclesiastics liable in the secular courts on charges of
high treason and other serious crimes against the sovereign; which retained to the feudal superior the cognizance of cases involving property inherited by clerks and
not belonging to the church, and those which punished
contempt of the royal court, whether committed by laymen
or chl urchmell.
The same disposition to limit clerical privilege existed
at the other extremity of Italy. In 1347, a citizen complained to Lucchino Visconti, Signor of Milan, that a clerical adversary, while alleging the secular law in his favor,
refused to be bound by those statutes which were adverse
to him, whereupon Lucchino proclaimed that the laws of
the state were binding on priest and layman alike.2 In the
same spirit, Gian-Galeazzo Visconti, in 1388, decreed that
all cases should be decided in the court to which the defendant belonged, thus depriving ecclesiastical plaintiffs of
the benefit of their own jurisprudence.3 This gave some
sort of equality between the classes, as regarded civil cases,
while preserving to the church its prerogative in criminal
matters. In accordance with the canon law, the Archbishop of [Milan, in 1352, issued a pastoral reminding his
clergy that the spiritual courts were not to protect them
when detected in crime, unless they wore the clerical habit
and abstained from secular callings, but he added that these
questions -were not to be decided by the secular judges
under pain of excommunication.4 This, as might be anticipated, did not diminish the evil, and in 1381 we find GianGaleazzo complaining of the numerous crimes of those who
wore the tonsure without having taken orders, and were
constantly claimed of the temporal courts by the Archbishop. In a spirit of independence only to be explained
Constit. Sicular. Lib. I. Tit. 42, 65, 66, 72.
2 Antiqua Dueurnm Mediol. Decreta p. 3 (Mediolani, 1654).
Ibid. pp. 136-7. 4 Ibid. pp. 5-6.
17
194 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
by his power and prosperity, he orders his jucSges to disregard such reclamations and to enforce the laws against
all who were not actually in holy orders.' Again, in 1419,
the same trouble rises into view, and Philippo-Maria Visconti was obliged to order that simple tonsured clerks, not
wearing the habit, should be held and reputed as laymene
subject to secular jurisdiction. Yet when Milan lost her
independence, uncler Spanish rule, she was reduced to implicit obedience, for, in 1615, one of her jurisconsults
declares that a clerk wearing secular garments does not
forfeit his benefit of clergy in case of crime until after he
has had three warnings.3
Spain was perhaps the latest country in Europe to succumb to the centralizing sacerdotalism of Rome, and its
long-preserved independence was reflected in its legislation
on the subject of clerical immunity. We have already seen
that in the seventh century the Gothic laws of Chindaswind subjected both prelates and clergy to the jurisdiction
of the secular courts. In the Fuero Juzgo, or Romance
version of the Wisigothic code, in force until the thirteenth
century, the bishops appear to have emancipated themselves from this liability, but the provision remains as to
the other orders of the clergy, who are required to obey
the summons of the civil judges, under the ordinary penalties for contempt of court.4 Yet it is questionable whether,
towards the end of this period, the church had not secured
the immunity of its ministers in ordinary cases, for a
Spanish council of the thirteenth century orders that an
ecclesiastic taken in the act of committing forgery, robbery,
coining, homicide, rape, or other capital crime, shall be
publicly degraded by his bishop;5 and about the same
1 Antiq. Duoum Mediol. Decret. p. 52. 2 Ibid. p. 246.
3 Carpani Leges Ducat. Mediolan., P. I. cap. 44, No. 25 (Mediolan. 1616).
4 Fuero Juzgo, Lib. II. Tit. I. ley 17.
5 Martene et Durand. Thesaur. IV. 171.
LEGISLATION IN SPAIN. 195
period Alphonso the Wise, in the Siete Partidas, describes
the existing' law to be that for such crimes the clerk is to
be tried by the spiritual court, with the penalty of cegradation if convicted, when for a subsequent offence he is
liable to secular law.' Those, however, who fall into
heresy, or propagate heretical opinions, or remain under
excommunication for a year, or disobey their bishops, or
forge papal signatures or seals, come at once under secular
jurisdiction; and forging royal letters is punishable with
degradation and branding.2 In civil suits, moreover, the
episcopal courts have cognizance only when both parties
are ecclesiastics-actions between clerks and laymen
coming before the lay judges;3 and this provision, so
adverse to sacerdotal claims, was preserved in the Recopilacion. Nearly a century later, in 1335, the' Portuguese
bishop, Alvarez Pelayo, distinctly asserts that no ecclesiastic, however mean, can bte subjected to any secular
power, in any case.4 He admits that of old this had not
been the case, even as in his own time tyrants sometimes
infringed on the rights of the church, but that the popes
had won the privilege from the emperors;5 and having thus
conceded that the prerogative was not of divine law, he
proceeds to establish it by scholastic dialectics, proving
that the emperor holds his empire as a fief in vassalage of
the church, and that since no vassal can judge his suzerain
so he cannot judge the church, whence the conclusion is
plain that no inferior potentate can have any jurisdiction
over ecclesiastics, especially as the laity are inferior to the
clergyA.
In France the question of clerical immunity was the
source of endless debate. In 1204 the crown and thle
Las Siete Partidas, P. I. Tit. vi. ley 61.
s Ibid. leyes 59, 60. 3 Ibid. ley 57.
4 Alvari Pelagii de Pla.nctu Eccles. Lib. I. art. 37, No. 5 (Lugduni 1517).
5 Ejusd. Lib. I. art. 44, ~ F. E Ejusd. Lib. I. art. 67, ~ J.
196 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
nobles endeavored to establish the principle that a clerk
convicted of a capital offence in the spiritual court was to
be degraded and abandoned to the temporal power for the
punishment due to his crime,l but the attempt was of no
avail. Towards the close of the century we find Beaumanoir warning the secular judge that any disregard of the
benefit of clergy involved an excommunication removable
only by the pope himself; yet, ill theory at least, the immunity of the clergy was not complete, for the ecclesiastical courts were directed to inflict on their convicts not only
degradation but imprisonment for life'2-a provision, as we
shall see hereafter, but rarely carried into effect.
The revival of the study of the Roman law was creating
a race of jurists who were not disposed to regard the church
with reverence or to submit to the interference which her
pretensions were constantly provoking. Every effort,
therefore, was made to take full advantage of the distinction admitted by canonists between ecclesiastics in orders
devoted to the ministry of the altar and the hordes of
those who sought the lower grades without abandoning
their worldly pursuits. St. Louis thus declared that clerks
who did not wear the tonsure were subject to secular jurisdiction, while their tonsured brethren were exempt, and so
complete was this immunity that even confession before
a lay judge was of no legal value as not being lawfully
made.3 His son, Philippe-le-Hardi, in 12714 carried the distinction still further by subjecting to the civil law those,
whether tonsured or not, who were married or who followed
secular industries.4 Philippe-le-Bel, in 1291, was obliged
to admit that even letters under the royal seal could not
compel an ecclesiastic to appear in a secular court to
answer personal charges j; but in 1300 he ventured to tresEtablissement de 1204, ~~ 2, 6 (Isambert, Anc. Lois Frang. I. 197).
Cout. du Beauvoisis, cap. xI. ~~ 44, 45.
3 Etablissemnents, Liv. I. chap. 84. Isambert, op. cit. II. 655.
s Ibid. p. 686.
FRANCE-ABUSES OF IMMUNINTY. 197
pass on clerrical privileges by an edict declaring that acquittal in the courts-Christian should not protect the possessions of a clerk from confiscation by the royal tribunal
when his crime was notorious.1 Loulis Hutill, in the disturbances which threatened the opening of his reign,
endeavored to propitiate the clergy, in 1315, by enacting
and confirming the constitution of 1220 of Frederic II.,
which guaranteed complete immunity to ecclesiastics;2 blit
the tendency of the age was opposed to such reaction, and
the contest between the crown and the church became constantly more bitter. The power of the feudal lords was
rapidly declining. and the royal jurisdiction was everywhere usurping that of the seignorial courts. In place of
dlealing with the spasmodic violence of the petty seigneurs,
destitute of cohesion or unity, the church found herself
confronted with a system of royal courts, all animated
with an aggressive spirit, co-operating with each other to
produce not anarchy but civilization, and under the general guidance of the able lawyers who composed the royal
Parlement. These men knew what they fought for, and
were rarely mistaken in the means adopted; nor was a
class from which sprang Guillaume de Nogaret, the audacious captor of Boniface VIII., likely to be troubled
with scruples concerning the sanctity of privileges which
in the study of the Pandects and the Code were seen to
be without foundation.
The systematic abuses of clerical privilege were, in fact,
becoming unbearable. They grievously oppressed the
laity, they greatly interfered with the administration of
criminal justice, and they threatened to bring the church
itself rapidly into disrepute. Perplexing- questions constantly arose, and rogues eagerly availed themselves of the
conflict between the secular and clecclesiastical courts to
escape altogether the penalty of their crimes. Some reIsambert, II. p. 725. 2 Ibid. III. 123.
198 BENEFIT OF CLERG~Y.
form was necessary, and the church applied it with a tender
hand, so as not to abancldon the immunity which alone
rendered these abuses possible, while endeavoring to evade
the odium of the criminals who everywhere claimed and
enjoyed her protection. For the purpose of obtaining this
substantial benefit, crowds of worthless wretches entered
the church and took the lower grades, which at that time
did not entail separation from their wives or abandonment
of worldly pursuits, and she was rendered responsible for
their misdeeds, and was called upon to protect them. To
meet this flagrant abuse, Innocent III., as early as 1212,
had decreed that a married acolyte could not be compelled
to wear the tonsure and was not entitled to benefit of
clergy.1 In 1298 Boniface VIII. also endeavored to adjudicate on the vexed questions which constantly arose by
declaring that no lay court was competent to try any one
who was commonly reputed to be a clerk; that even when
there was a reasonable doubt of laymanship, and the
criminal had always conducted himself as a layman, and
had only recently assumed the tonsure and sacerdotal dress,
then all proceedings against him should cease until the
spiritual court could investigate the case and decide as to
which jurisdiction could claim him.2
These concessions, if they can be so calledc, amounted in
reality to nothing. They pretended to touch a few of the
more palpable scandals, but left unreformed the intolerable
abuses which the increasing enlightennment of the age was
not inclined to brook. In 1328, Philip of Valois complained with exceedingo bitterness that murderers and malefactors of all kinds were released from the secular courts
on merely asserting their clergy, and he did not hesitate to
accuse the bishops of adimitting to the tonsure married
men of full age, who applied for it merely to escape the' Can. 7 Extra, Lib. III. Tit. iii.
2 Can. 12 in Sexto, Lib. v. Tit. xi.
FRANCE-ABUSES OF IInMMUNITY. 199
punishment due to their crimes.l Not lonog afterwards
Raymond, Bishop of Nismes, found himself obliged to condemn the prevalent practice of ecclesiastics buying up
doubtful claims, and then wearying out their adversaries
with the endless proceedings of the courts-Christian, to
which they were entitled to carry their cases.2 In 1344
the council of N'oyon pronounced an ipso facto excommunication against the graceless laymen who pretended to be
clerks, and who gave themselves the tonsure3 —an empty
fulmination, for the classes which adopted the expedient
were for the most part far beyond the reach or influence
of spiritual censures. In 1365 the council of Prague deplored the evils arising from the system, both on account
of the ceaseless quarrels to which it gave rise with the
secular power, and the demoralizing influences which it
exercised on the church; but the only remedy which the
wisdom of the assembled fathers could suggest was the
futile one of decreeing that no protection should be extended over criminals who did not wear the tonsure and
the clerical habit4-a precaution which the rogues were not
likely to neglect. In fact, the councils of the period piesent an abundant store of canons directed against the
crowds of -vagabonds who were amenable to no discipline,
and who made no pretence of abandoning their secular
lives, while they confidently claimed protection of the body
which they disgraced. The church could find no cure for
the evil, however, without abandoning some of her most
cherished prerogatives, and she preferred to endure the
scandal rather than to suffer the loss.
Commingled with these friuitless canons are others equally
numerous, directed against the daily increasing efforts of
the laity to free themselves from these evils by encroachI Bib. Mng. Patrum T. XIV. pp. 79-80 (Ed. Colon. 1618).
2 Statut. Eccles. Nemaus. Tit. xv. cap. 14 (Martene, Thesnur).
3 Concil. Novionmens. ann. 1344, can. 14 (Halrduin. VII. 1674).
4 Concil. Pragens. ann. 1365 (Hartzheiln, X. 744).
200 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
ing upon the privileges and jurisdiction of the chlurch. In
1329, Philip of Valois, disregarding the fate of Belshazzar,
which was held up to hinm as a warning, made a vigorous
effort to reform the system.l The church maintained her
ground, however, and refused to abandon a tittle of her
prerogative. The council of Noyon, in 1344, denounced
the severest punishment o01 clerks who tamely submitted
to verdicts taken in the civil courts;2 and that of Paris,
in 1346, laid an interdict on all places where a clerk was imprisoned and was not surrendered on demand.3 The struggle was hard, but the church gradually had to yield, and
in 1375 an agreement was made between Charles-le-Sage
and Aimcry de Maignac, Bishop of Paris, by which the
latter abandoned his claim to jurisdiction over all married and unbeneficecd clerks, while the royal supremacy
was declared in a clause leaving to the bishop his remaining jurisdiction over unmarried cleriks only during the
king's pleasure4-an empty assertion, however, which could
not have been made good.
The records of the Chatelet, or criminal court of Paris,
for the Aears 1389 and 1390 have been preserved, and their
recent publication affords us an instructive insight into
the difficulties which beset the administration of justice,
and the manner in which the church protected the vilest
criminals ill her zeal to preserve her prerogatives. Thus, in
one series of cases occurring in 1389, a band of wretches,
whose lives were all endless series of fearful crimes, were
arrested and brought before the prevot. They claimed
the benefit of clergy, and showed the tonsure to substantiate the claim. Though wholly illiterate, and unable,
under the closest cross-questioning, to give intelligible
accounts of the times and circumstances of their admission
Bertrandi contra P. de Cugneriis Liber.' Concil. Noviomuens. ann. 1344, can. 6, 8.
3 Concil. Parisiens. ann. 1346, can. 1.
4 Cartulaire de l'Eglise de Paris, I. 4.
FRANCE-ILLUSTRATIVE CASES. 201
to the church, or to adduce any evidence in support of
their assertions, yet the swift and relentless justice of the
Chatelet dared not to subject them to the customary procedure of the torture, but gave them various terms of delay
in which to produce their letters of tonsure or other proof,
and in one or two of the cases these delays were repeated.
a iad such proof been attainable they would at once have
been remanded to the bishop's court, as had happened to
some of them before, when they had subsequently been
set free. At length one of them admitted that he was not
a clerk, and made full confession of his guilty career. In
the course of this he stated that after being concerned in
a most brutal murder, his accomplices advised him to assume the tonsure, in order to secure exemption from secular jurisdiction, and they counselled him, moreover, how
to tell the story of his admission to the church, in case he
should be apprehended. He further asserted that some of
the other prisoners, whose cases were then under advisement, were no more clerks than himself. On obtaining this
revelation, the Prevyt of Paris consulted with the chancellor and royal council, and was authorized to torture
such of the others as could not prove their clergy. Some of
them under torture, and others without it, confessed a hideous catalogue of crimes, and stated that they had adopted
the tonsure at the recommendation of their f'elows, in a
manner which shows that it was a recognized measure of
precaution against the hour of trouble among the dangerous
classes. One of them, indeedl, remarked that they had
fountd, when condemned by the ecclesiastical courts, that
they were only subjected to imprisonment, from which they
were sure to be let loose again upon society, sooner or
later, in some general jail-delivery on the accession of a
prelate or other dignitary. This certainly would seem to
be a case in which the church would willingly wash her
hands of her putative children, but when the proceedings
reached the ears of the Bishop of Paris, he claimed the
202 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
prisoners and protested against such interference with the
liberties of the church. After angry negotiation, however, his demands were refused, and a formal order was
made by the royal council that tonsured criminals, who
were wholly illiterate, and who were unable to offer any
evidence to prove their clergy, should be allowed reasonable time to obtain testimony, and that if they failed in this
no heed should be given to the reclamations and protests
of the bishop, but that they should be duly tried and convicted or acquitted as laymen. Fortified with this order,
the authorities of the Chatelet proceeded with renewed
vigor, and speedily brought to justice the whole crew, of
whom seven were convicted and executed.l
A case which occurred in March, 1390, may perhaps be
thought to throw some light on the motives impelling the
bishops to vindicate so energetically their jurisdiction for
the protection of these " gaigneurs d'aventage." Girart
Doffinal, arrested for an attempted larceny, denied the fact
and claimed the benefit of clergy. He wore the tonsure
and asserted that he had received it ten years before at the
hands of the Bishop of Rodez. His letters of tonsure he
declared to be at Barbatenne, near Avignon, and lhe was
given six weeks in which to procure them. The six weeks
were extended to three months, but when again brought
before the court in June, he had no evidence to prove his
claim, and he was accordingly exposed to the torture customary in the trials of laymen. This extorted the confession that he had given himself the tonsure three years before
at Avignon, by way of safeguard, and in the lono array of
robberies which he detailed, he alluded to one for which he
had been convicted in the court of the Bishop of Rodez
and thrown into prison, where lie lay for thirteen months
until his friends procured his release by paying five hundred
Registre Criminel du ChMtelet de Paris, I. 47=114 (Paris, 1861).
FRANCE-ILLUSTRATIVE CASES. 203
francs to the good bishop. The Chatelet did not let him
off so easily, and in a few days he was duly hanoged.1
The tonsure thus was the oegis on which these wretched
men relied for impunity, and so important was it deemed
to make no mistake in the perplexing questions which daily
embroiled the civil and spiritual powers, that the Chlatelet
had among its officials a sworn barber whose duty it was
as an expert to guide the court in its decisions on the obscure cases which were constantly presented. Another
portion of his functions proves the careful respect withl
which the sacred emblem of sacerdotalism was regarded, for
whenever a tonsured man failed to prove his clergy, the
court immediately ordered him to be shaved, before it
would venture to try him, torture him, or execute him.
The symbol of the church must be obliterated ere lie could
be treated as an ordinary criminal.
How useful an official this barber sometimes was, and
how desperately the miserable wretches clung to the protecting influence of the churich, is shown by a case occurring in January 1390, when Fleurent de Saint-Luc was
brought before the Chatelet on a charge of theft. So constant was the claim of clergy that the first proceeding with
a prisoner was to examine him minutely for the tonsure or
other sign of clericature, and none were found on Fleurent.
To prevent collusion he was shut up alone for the n1igt,
and next morning, to the surprise of the court, he boldly
pleaded clergy and exhibited a tonsured head. The barber
was forthwith summoned, and after a careful inspection of
the scalp declared that the tonsure was not produced by
shaving, but by pulling out the hairs one by one —the ingenious expedient of the prisoner during the night, in his
solitary cell. Unfortunately for the success of this device,
lie had admitted to the jailer that he was betrothed in
marriage to a certain Marguerite of Compiegne. The court
1 Registre du Chatelet, I. 244-54.
204 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
therefore had no hesitation in pronouncing him a "purs
bigames;" as a married man he had no right to benefit of
clergy, so his pretended tonsure was promptly destroyed
by shaving, and he was tried and executed.l
A still more perplexing case for the tonsorial expert
occurred in October of the same year, when Jehan Jourge,
a jeweller, was accused by an accomplice of coining. He
pleaded clergy, though he confessed to have been married
for twelve years, and the condition of his scalp seems to
have puzzled the official barber, for a jury of thirteen of
his brethren was summoned to examine the prisoner's
head. Under oath they reported that after full investigation they found him not to be tonsured, though he had
several bald spots. The court decided that as a married
man and untonsured he had no right to plead clergy. The
crime was a heinous one and speedy justice was required,
so within two days of his apprehension he was convictedl,
sentenced, and duly boiled to death.2
The rapidity of these proceedings is perhaps to be explained by the constant efforts of the Bishop of Paris to
reclaim these strayed sheep. Thus, in March of the same
year, Jehannin Menel was accused of theft. He confessed
it, but pleaded clergy, stating that he had received the
tonsure twenty years before. Though wholly illiterate, he
was given the customary six weeks in which to present
proof, and the officers of the episcopal court undertook to
obtain it if possible. The time was extended until June,
when, all efforts failing, he was again brought up. To prolong his miserable days, he averred that one of the bishop's
retainers could vouch for him, whereupon a commission
was appointed to take the alleged testimony. Their report
was not made until August 30th, when it appeared that the
person in question had no knowledge of the prisoner.
Then Menel at length was tortured and confessed that he
1 Registre du Chatelet, I. 201-9. 2 Ibid. I. 480-94.
CONFLICT OF JURISDICTION. 205
had given himself the tonsure fourl years before, ill order
to escape the consequences of a heavy robbery in which he
had been engaged.1
While this was in progress, another case occurred in
which the bishop did not limit himself merely to friendly
aid in seeking for testimony. In July, Ernoul de Lates
was accused of a petty theft. Hle pleaded clergy and
showed the tonsure, but on a searching examination was
forced to admit that he had assumed it only a fortnight
previously, under fear of prosecution. The next dclay tile
court was notified that the bishop had made formal appllication for the prisoner to the Parlement. Ernoul was recalled, and repeated his confession before a royal notary,
who reported it to the Parlem ent, and a decision was
rendered in favor of the jurisdiction of the Chatelet.
Ernoul then confessed the crime laid to his charge, together
with others, and w,,as accordingly condemlneld to deathl when
the persevering bishop again appealed to the Parlement,
and that body, after a second hearing, again confirmed tile
proceedings of the Chatelet.2
It would be useless to multiply these trivial details.
Enough has been given to show the endless conflict between
the civil andl ecclesiastical jurisdictions, thle constant interruption of justice, and the countless evils arising to
society from the practical impunity with which the church
endeavored to shield the vilest criminals. Few judicial
bodies could venture to display the boldness of the IParis
Chatelet, under the immediate protection of the king, and
supported by the Parlement, yet everywhere the royal
courts were seeking -to enforce their jurisdiction, and the.
prelates were battling desperately for tile preservation of
the old abuses. At this very time, in 1389, the council
-of St. Tiberius, at Narbonne, drew up, to be laid before the
pope and the king, a long list of clerical grievances, proRegistre du Chlatelet, I. 398-406. 2 Ibid. I. 294J-301.
18
206 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
ninent among which were the encroachments of the royal
courts on ecclesiastical jurisdiction, the refusal to surrender untonsurecd and married clerks accused of crime, and
the disregard of the interdicts laid on all parishes where
these abuses were conlmmitted.l The times were unpropitious for the church, however, and these complaints
availed but little. The Great Schism had vastly weakened
ecclesiastical influence, especially in France, and the enorinous increase in the royal power under Charles-le-Sage
gave a temporary predominance to the secular element
which threatened the speedy extinction of the church's
dearest prerogatives. This did not last, however. The
church reunited at the council of Constance renewed
its vigor, while the disasters of the miserable reign of
Charles VI., the wars of Henry T., and the civil broils of
the Armagnacs and Bourguignons reduced the temporal
authority almost to a nullity, and rendered it utterly incapable of following up its advantages. It is significant
of reprisals on the part of the church that, during the
English domination, an order of HIenry VI. regulating the
proceedings of the Chatelet of Paris provides that the first
thing to be done on the entrance of a prisoner shall be to
examine whether he is clerk or layman; antd that to prevent encroachments on secular jurisdiction, a special officer
is detailed to be present at every hearing of the ecclesiastical courts of the bishop and chapter, to see that the
royal prerogatives are not invaded.2 As the royal power
recovered itself, however, it resumed its aggressions, and
the Estates of Languedoc in 1456 complained bitterly to
Charles VII. of the little respect pMcad by the sovereign
courts to the immunities of ecclesiastical jurisdiction,
whereupon the monarch dryly responded by asking the
Gravam. Concil. ap. S. Tiber. ann. 1389 (Martene, Thesaur. IV. 345-8).
2 Ordonnance de Poitiers, ann. 1425, 9~ 15, 149 (Isambert, VIII. 701,
723).
STRUGGLE TO MAINTAIN IT. 207
retnonstrants to specify, cases when they should be properly provided for.l
Still the church gallantly held her ground. Il 1468 we
find the Cardinal-Bishop of Autun asserting his sole jurisdiction over all members of the ecclesiastical body, antd
threatening interdcicts for any delay in surrendering them
to him, with all the energy and conscious strength of an
Innocent or a Boniface;' and the administration of jnustice
continued to be impeded as of old. In 1516, Francis I.
complained to Leo X. of the crimes and scandals committed
with impunity by those who were connected with the
church, and the pontiff granted, as a special favor to
France, that unless the tonsure and habit had been worn
within four months of the date of the offence for which a
criminal was arraigned, he might be subject to secular
jurisdiction.3 This was a very imperfect measure of relief,
and, some fifteen years later, Chassanlee, one of the most distinguished jurists of the clay, lays it down as an absolute
principle of law that a clerk is exempt firol secular justice
both before and after conviction; but he couples this with
numerous exceptions, rendering the application of the rule
almost as " involved and troublesome"' as Sir Matthew
Hale described the English law to be, showing how
eagerly the courts and lawyers were laboring to find some
relief fiom the difficulties with which the church surrounded the administration of justice.4
The evils arisi]ng flom this state of things were by uno
means confined to the escape of malefactors who personated
the ecclesiastical character. The impunity conferred by
the benefit of clergy on clerical offenders necessarily exer1 Doldances des Etats de Languedoc, art. 25. (Ibid. IX. 298, 311.)
2 Statut. Synod. Eccles. ZEduens. ann. 1468, cap. 47 (Martene IV. 514-5).
3 Bull. Rormanum decet Pontif. a.p. Chassenai Comment. Consuet. Burgund.
p. 184 (Ed. 1590).
"Chassenmi op. cit. pp. 182-91, 206.
208 BENEFIT OF CLEPRGY.
cised the most unfortunate influence on the church itself,
and was a powerful element in bringing about the corruption of the ecclesiastical body which was the disgrace of
the middle ages. An honiest archdeacon of Salzburg,
writing in 1175, complains that the clergy were restrained
by no fear of punishment, and therefore abandoned themselves to excesses which laymen hardly dared to attempt.
HIowever vile might be their lives, they felt no dread of the
ecclesiastical authorities, for they could not be accused by
the laity, and would not accuse each other, since all were
guilty of the same practices, and each endeavored to protect his companions in sin. In fact7 he adds, they are
surely the scales of Leviathan which cling' to each other so
closely that no weapon can penetrate into its pestiferous
body21 The archdeacon is especially concerned at the iminlnity which was thus conferred on the concubinage and
adultery universal among his clergy, and a practical illust ration of this particular result was afforded a hundred
and fifty years later in Naples, when, in 1317, under IRobert
the Good, an effort was made to enforce a statute imposing
a fine on the concubines of priests who refused, for a year
after excolmmuunication. to abandon their guilty connection.
The priests vigorously assumed the cause of their partners,
andc succeeded in extending the benefit of clergy to their
concubines wlho, as part of the clerical family, they asserted
were liable to prosecution only in the ecclesiastical courts)2
Having established this as a reogular rule of law, they were
liberated from the sterner jurisdiction of the laity, and
felt reasonably secure that their illicit relationships would
not be disturbed. So long' as the benefit of clergy existed,
there was no possibility of purifying' the church; and when
}Hussites negotiated with the council of Bdale for reconciliation, they wisely made its abrogation one of the four
IIenric. Salisburg. Arhclid;nac. de CMalamit. Eccles. Salisb. cap. iXo
Giannone, Apologia, cap. 14.
CORRUPTION OF TIHE CHURCH. 209
conditionS on which they would consent to return to the
foldl.l
On this point the church was immovable; the evil continued unchecked, and it afforded, at the dawn of the IReformation, a fair mark for the indignant eloquence of the
reformers. Thus, in 1521, Luther, in his controversy with
Ambrogio Caterino, exclaims: " Finally, criminals can
neither be reproved, nor accused, nor punished, except by
the pope, who could not if he would, and now does not
wish to. From this prolific source arises their iniquity;
hence the debaucheries, the adulteries, the fornications, the
uncleanness, the avarice, the fraud, the swindling, the universal chaos of crime, which not only abounds but reigns
everywhere, unpunished and unchecked by fear of God or
man. If any one reproves them, he is guilty of sacrilege
and of treason to the pope. All this arises firom those
accursed laws which exempt the clergy and all belonging
to them from secular accusation, trial, and punishment."2
It seems to be the echo of the voice of Henry of Salzburg'
sounding through the interval of three centuries and a
half; and fierce as was the declamation of the sturdy reformer, he was not guilty of exaggeration if we may believe
the formal complaint of the orthodox, addressed in 1522
by the representatives of the empire assembled in the Diet
of Niirnberg to Adrian VI., praying for the reform which
was confidently expected at his hands. This authoritative
document, in enumerating the disorders existing in the
church, asserts that the benefit of clergy was the direct
source of countless cases of adultery, robbery, coining,
homicide, arson, and false witness committed by ecclesiastics, and significantly adds that unless the clergy were
relegated to secular jurisdiction, there was reason to fear
iIartzheim. Concil. German.. 760-73.
Lutheri Opp. T. II. fol. 374 a. (Jene, 1581).
I 8a
210 BENEFIT OF CLERGYo
an uprising of the people, for no justice was to be had in
the spiritual courts against a clerical offender.e
It was not only in the license afforded to individual
criminals that the immunity of the clergy mlade the church
odious to the people, but also in the opportunity which it
afforded of exercising oppression and irresponsible despotismn, for which no redress could be obtained. That this
Nwas not lost sight of by the reformers in their efforts to
arouse the populations to overthrow the hoary structure of
sacerdotalism is shown in Sir David Lyndsay's "1 Satyre
of the Thrie Estaits," where he introduces a im'endicant
recounting the mnisadventures which had reduced him to
beggary. lie had had a mare and three cows, wherewith
he had supported wife and children, besides his aged parents. The father dying, his mare had been seized by the
laird for heriot, while the vicar carried off a'cow. Then
his mother died, and the vicar took another cow. This
diminution of their substance so preyed upon his wife, that
she soon followed, when the vicar claimed as his fee thle
last remaining cow, and the parish clerk seized their movables. His interlocutor asks whether the parson had not
stood his friend, but is told that the latter had excommnunicated him for being in arrears with his tithes, and that
he has but a groat remaining in the world, with which he
is begging his way to St. Andrews to fee a lawyer to see
whether he cannot get justice of those who have plundecled
him of his little all. He is laug'hed at for his pains:"Thou art the daftest fuill that ever I saw.
Trows thou, man, be the law to get remeid
Of men of kirk? Na, nocht till thou be cleici"and presently this last remailing groat is filched from himl
by a pardloner, under promise of remitting' for him a thouGravanm. Nat. German. cap. 21 (Le Piat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II.
178-9)
EFFORTS OF THIE CHURCIH. 211
sand years' penance in purgatory.l The satire is broad,
and yet it has sufficient verisimilitude to explain to us the
bitterness with which the ancient church was regarded by
the peoples which threw off her yoke.
A feeble corrective of these manifold evils was proposed
by Pius III. in his projected Bull of Reformation, prepared
in 1546, to the effect that clerks wearing secular habits,
and refusing to abandon them on due admonition, should
not be entitled to the benefit of clergy, but should share
the wholesome rigor of secular law with their secular
brethren.2 This would have been wholly inadequate to the
necessities of the times, as it left the iniquities of the
clergy at large untouched; but as the bull was prudently
suppressed through the opposition of those whose license
it threatened to curtail, its suggestions are only of interest
as showing the impossibility of enforcing any such distinction as Pius proposed. The rule which lie enunciated
had been the law of the church for three centuries, and its
attempted revival merely shows that it had been completely
neglected and rendered obsolete.
As the church apparently could not or would not reform
itself, the laity grew bolder, and insisted con relief in some
shape. Thus, when Charles VT., feeling himself juggled out
of the reform promised by the council of Trent, undertook
to purify for himself the Teutonic church, the synod which
in 1549 assembled at Salzburg in obedience to his conmmands undertook to complain of the invasionl of clerical
immunity which was daily growing more audacious on
the part of the secular judges. The progress of Lutheranism had weakened the respect felt for the church,
even by the orthodox; and Duke William of Bavaria, zealous Catholic though he was, responded briefly that the' Sir David Lyndsay's Works, P. IV. pp. 451-61 (Early Engi. Text Soc.
1869). It is somewhat remarkable that the " Satyre of the Thrie Estaits"
was repeatedly represented in public as a dramatic performance in 1539,
prior to the first movements of the Reformation in Scotland (Rogers, Scotland, Social and Domestic, p. 204; Grampian Club, 1869).
o Published by Clausen, Copenhagen, 1849.
212 B ENEFIT OF CLERGY.
secular courts would not hlave undertaken to enforce thle
laws on the clergy had they not found that the bishops
habitually allowed clerical offences to remain unpunished.
The synod replied by a series of grievances, among which
were enumerated the infractions of clerical privilege. The
princes concerned were not disposed to listen to these, and
proposed that they should be submitted to the Emperor
Ferdinand, who prudently suppressed them, and no action
was had on the subject for twenty years.1
At length the hopes of the purer portion of the Catholics
grewv high as the final convocation of the council of Trent
in 1562 assembled with plentiful promises of the reformatioln which every one deemed essential to the preservation
of the orthodox faith. One of the principal reforms expected of the council was the removal of the abuses, which,
under guise of clerical immunity, scandalized the faithful
and corrupted the church. This is evident in the projects
submitted to the assembled fathers by the various princes
whose zeal for the faith led them to point out the evils that
rendered their peoples impatient of the yoke. Thus the
honored Bartholomew a Martyribus, Archbishop of Braga,
dlrew up for Sebastian of Portugal a series of articles of
reformation, which was presented in the name of the Portuguese nation. In this it was proposed substantially to
abolish the four lower orders of the priesthood, leavinonothing below the subdiaconate, in order to preserve the
church from the endless scandals arising froln the hordes
who took these lower orders for the single purpose of
abusing the immunity conferred by them.2 The Spanish
bishops asked for a less radical measure, onlyt suglgestingl
that married clerks, who wore secular habits, should not
enjoy the benefit of clergy; and they coupled this with
a request that even papal authority should not be allowed
to sanctionl infractions of clerical privilege.3
1 Dalham, Concil. Salisburg. pp. 328-9. —Hansiz. German. Sacra, II. 618.
Artic. Sebast. R. Portug. No. 39 (Le Plat, op. cit. V. 84).
Artic. Reform. Epise. H-lispan. No. 25, 27 (Ibid. V. 565).
COMPLAINTS OF THE LAITY. 213
The Emperor Ferdinand, who had an intimate acquaintance with the foulness of the Teutonic church, and the
dangers of the aggressive Lutheranismn of the age, was
particularly earnlest in his demands for a thoroug'h reform
which should check thle progress of the Reformation. Uinder his commands, a series of articles was drawn up by
one of his most trusted counsellors, Frederic Staphylus,
whose learning and orthodoxy had won for him the cap of
the doctorate of theology at the hands of the pope himself,
when his marriage had rendered the universities doubtful
about conferring the honor upon himl. In this laper, submitted to the coruncil in the name of the emperorl, the
exemptions of the clergy were denounced with little ceremony. 6" Crimes remain unpunished, which is the greatest
of evils, and ruinous to the public welfare..... A lay
murderer is justly put to death by the law, while an ecclesiastic escapes withl trifling penance, or none at all...
The clergy sin with impunity, whence it arises that they
are a scandal to the children of God, and a pest to the
state."' Hle argoues that these privileges are derived firom
human and not from divine law, and that they can be
abrogated by the secular power, to the manifest advantage
of both church and state.l The sane assertions are made
in another consultation prepared by order of the emperor
to be laid before the council. " The insolence of the clergy
has risen to that point that they think they have a right
to conmmit crimnes which in laymen are punished with the
utmost rigor of the law-."2
The spirit in which these representations were received
is shown in the extraordinary proposition presented by the
papal legates to the ambassadors of the sovereigns, Sept.
23, 1563. Two-thirds of the prelates present at the council
had been induced to pledge themselves that no re-formation
Frid. Staphyli Consil. No. 50-2 (Le Plat, V. 227-8).
2 Consult. Imp. Ferdinand, cap. 13 (Ibid. V. 244).
214 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
of the church should be debated until this paper had been
considered, and no more effectual mode of evading the
pressure for reform could be conceived. It demanded, as a
condition precedent to ecclesiastical reformation, that the
relations between the various princes and the church should
be revised in a sense which swept away all concordats and
pragmatic sanctions, and deprived the sovereigns of what
little control they enjoyed by rendering the church entirely
independent. In this comprehensive scheme, the widest
interpretation was given to the claims of ecclesiastical
jurisdiction; all questions of doubtful clerkship were reserved for the spiritual courts alone; no appeal from them
was allowed to the secular tribunals; the anathema was
denounced against all who should infringe on the ancient
canons, and in general everything that had been gained
by the secular power in a struggle of centuries was swept
away.1 As was expected, the fierce- opposition of the
princes, whose rights of appointment and patronage were
abolished in this scheme, caused it speedily to be dropped,
but its animus is none the less interesting as developing
the policy of 1Rome, and the objects of papal ambition.
Animated by this spirit, it was not likely that the council would lend itself to any searching or adequate reform.
At its previous convocation, in 1551, it had already adopted
a canon declaring that no secular ecclesiastic should be
-withdrawn from the jurisdiction of his bishop on any
pretence2-a rule which infringed upon the judicature by
this time established in some countries, such as France
and the Netherlands.Y Under the protests of the princes,
indeed, it was at last willing to leave to their fate the
hordes of worthless vagabonds who sought by a nominal
affiliation on the church to obtain the immunity from' Le Plat, VI. 228-9, 232-3, 249.
Concil, Trident. Sess. xiv. de Reform. can. 4,
3 See the remnonstrances of the Sovereign Council of Brabant (Le Plat.
VII. 84).
TIHE TRIDENTINE REFORMe 215
punishment consequent on its prerogatives; but no disposition was shown to abandon one tittle of the rights
claimled for those who held a substantial place in the ecclesiastical body. Thus the reform was restricted to forbidding any one from holding a benefice before his fourteenth
year, or untonsured, or not in the lower orders, and no one
could claim benefit of clergy unless he held a benefice, or
wearing the habit and tonsure was employed in the service
of a church, or prosecuted his studies in a seminary. On
the other hand, the customs of those countries which subjected married clerks to the secular courts were disregarded
by reviving a decretal of Boniface VIII., which granted
them the privileges of the clergy, provided they wore the
tonsure and habit.l Another canons regulating the proceedings and jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts, manifested a determination to win back all that had been lost
during the preceding two centuries;2 while a final declaration asserted the continued vitality of all the ancient
canons, decrees of councils, and papal sanctions which
defined the liberties of the church, the immunities of her
members, and the punishments for infringing those immunities; and all emperors, kings, princes and states were
emphatically warned that these penalties would be enforced
with the utmnost rigor?3
This action called forth vigorous remonstrances fromn
the secular powers; and that they were not mistaken in the' Concil. Trident. Sess. xxiII. de Reform. can. 6.-Cf. can. 7 Extra IiI. 3;
can. un. in'Sexto iii. 2. This called forth vehement remonstrances from the
states of the Netherlands and France (Le Plat. VII. 33, 43, 61, 269).
" Concil. Trident. Sess. xxIV. de Reform. can. 20. This likewise gave
occasion to lively reclamations-see Le Plat, VII. 17, 18, 66, 87. The
celebrated lRichardot, Bishop of Arras, responded by a vigorous statement
of the little respect paid by the courts to the claims of clerical immunity
(Ibid. 28, 29). Subsequently, however, in 1566, he deplores the scand.als
caused in the church by the absence of punishment for clerical offenders,
who, according to popular belief, were always enabled to escape by a moderate pecuniary sacrifice. (Ibid. p. 186.)
3 Concil. Trident. Sess. xxv. can. 20,
216 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
belief-that it was intended to maintain and perpetuate
the ancient abuses, is clearly manifested by the action of
the synod of Salzburg, assembled in 1569 to publish the
council of Trent. An elaborate system of church polity
was based on the Tridentine canons, so as to reorganize
the ecclesiastical establishment, define its position and
duties, and adapt it in every respect to the new order of
things. This was formally approved by Gregory XIII. in
1572, and the Emperor M[aximilian was ordered to enforce
it.' As presenting an authoritative exposition of the revised policy of the church, it is therefore worthy of note
that it asserts in the most formal manner the immunity of
the clergy as founded not only on human but on divine
law. Any decision rendered against a clerk by a secular
tribunal, whether in a civil or a criminal case, is pronounced
null and void, and the judge granting it or even endeavoring to compel a clerk to appear before him, is excommnunicated until he renders full satisfaction, pays whatever
damages may have been caused by his action, and undergoes proper penance. The utmost concession allowed is
that when a clerk has committed some crime of a peculiarly
heinous character, and is supposed to be on the point of
absconding, the civil authorities may arrest him on condition of delivering him within twenty-four hours to the
episcopal officials;' who, it is true, are urgedl to perform
their functions without fear or favor, and are prohibited
for the future from taking bribes to allow criminals to
escape.3
iNot only were the officers of secular justice thus forbidden to take cognizance of clerical offences, but even
the people were enjoined to shut their eyes to the sins of
their pastors, no matter how scandalous imight be the lives
Dalhamn Concil. Salisburg. pp. 557, 568.
Concil. Salisburg. XLVI. Const. xxxix. cap. 1, 2, 3. (Dalham, op. cit.
pp. 481-2.)
3 Ejusd. const. lxiii. cap. 1, 2 (op. cit. pp. 5411-2).
CORRUPTION DEFENDED. 217
of the latter. They were warned that the fate of Ham,
and the curse of Canaan awaited those who did not hasten
to conceal the shame of their fathers; and as the priests
were the fathers of the people, it followed that their sins
were not to be commented on or bruited abroad. In fact,
it was asserted that a wicked priest wvas a chosen instrument selected by God to punish a wicked people; he was
therefore to be venerated; and those who suffered from
him were on no account to resist the will of God by
accusing' him of his crimes.1 The full audacity of such
teaching as this can be appreciated only after a fair understanding of thle unspeakable corruption of the whole ecclesiastical body in the sixteenth century, when popes and
councils united in declaring that the laity were vitiated
by their priests, that religion was rendered odious by the
vices of its members, and that the Lutheran heresy was
the natural protest against the clerical vileness which no
system of ecclesiastical discipline could control.2 That
this should be the case was the inevitable result of such
teachings; and though the council promulgated various
regulations to check the prevalent vices of the priesthood,
it is no wonder that when Pius V., not long afterwards,
wrote to the Archbishop of Salzburg, urging him to increased energy in extirpating the concubinage which was
universal among the ministers of the altar, the prelate
sadly responded that he had done everything in his power,
that he had proved utterly unsuccessful, and that he
despaired of being able to effect the desired reform.3
1 Ejusd. const. lvii. cap. 4, 5 (op. cit. pp. 512-3).
See Concil. Coloniens. ann. 1527 (Hartzheim Concil. German VI. 21013)- Concil. Augustan. ann. 1548 (Ibid. VI. 388) —Breve Pii V. ad Archiep.
Salisburg. (Ibid. VII. 231).-Concil. Constant. ann. 1567 (Ibid. VII. 455)Breve Pii V. ad Abbat. Frisingens. ann. 1567 (Ibid. VII. 586).-Even in
the very council which promulgated these doctrines, Christopher Spncdel,
in the closing address, declared that the vices of the clergy had made them
deservedly the objects of popular contempt and detestation (Hiartzheim
VII. 407). 3 Dalham op. cit. pp. 557, 568.
19
218 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
The Tridentine fathers and their obedient prelates might
amuse themselves with adopting and promulgating brave
resolutions proclaiming the imprescriptible rights of the
clerical body, but the inevitable progress of civilization
and enlightenment was against them. The corruptions
which brought about the lReformation had gradually divested the church of its claims to respect, and the Reformation itself had had its influence on the orthodox as well as
on the reformer. Never again could the church hope for
implicit obedience, or expect that men should listen to its
commands as to the oracles of God. Scarcely had the ink
fairly dried on the canons of Trent, when the Polish Diet
of 1565 enacted that a clerk charged with any criminal
offence should be tried by the secular and not by the
spiritual court.l Indeed, even while the council was yet
in session, the French government, despairing of the long
promised reformation, took the matter into its own hands,
and in January, 1563, solved the question by decreeing
that no clerk beneath the grade of sub-deacon should enjoy
the benefit of clergy.2 Some concession was made in 1566
by including within the privileged limit those in orders
actually engaged in the ministry of the church, but this
was counterbalanced by reserving to the civil courts the
proof of clergy.3 Still more significant of the tendencies of
the age was the fact that while France was risking her
existence in the effort to crush her Huguenot children, she
never could be persuaded to accept and publish the council
of Trent, notwithstanding the most urgent and repeated
efforts of the Holy See. While, too, the bigoted Louis XIV.
was enforcing Catholicism with relentless severity, he
manifested complete disregard of the pretensions of the
church by creating, in 1695, mixed tribunals of ecclesias1 Krasinski, Reformation in Poland, I. 131.
2 Ordonnance de Roussillon, Janvier 1563, art. 21 (Isambert, XV. 165).
Ordonn. de Moulins, Fdvr. 1566, art, 40, 55 (Ibid. pp. 200, 203).
PRESENT POLICY OF TE CHI-IURCH. 219
tics and laymen for the trial of clerical offenders.l If,
during the eighteenth century, the benefit of clergy was
still maintained, it was under such limitations and restrictions as showed thlat it existed only by sufferance of the
civil power,2 and in many places it was virtually abrogated. The Revolution of 1789 naturally swept away
what remained of it, with the other shreds and tatters of
class-privilege, and all men at last became once more
equal before the law.
Yet an infallible church cannot abandon a claim. that
has once been made and admitted. If tyrannical princes
and republics insist on the equality of the citizen, and subject clerical offenders to the laws of the land as though
they were ordinary mortals, it is simply an abusive exercise of power, to which the church submits with Christian
meekness when she has no means at hand to assert her
rights. The sacro-sanct council of Trent, under the direct
inspiration of the Holy Ghost, confirmed the privileges
enjoyed for centuries, and announced to all earthly potentates that any invasion of those privileges was punishable
with the dread anathema that bars forever the gates of
salvation. As long as this remains unrepealed by an
assembly equally gifted with the divine power, it is the irrefragable law which overrides all human ordinances. In
fact, it is doubtful whether even an cecumenic council could
undertake to abandon these positions, for Pius IX., in an
apostolic letter of 1851, has condemned as a heresy the
doctrine that clerical immunity drew its origin from the
civil power, and asserts that it is derived from the direct
Ordonn. Avril, 1695, art. 38 (Isambert, XXI. 254).
2 ldricourt, Loix Eccls. de France, E. xix. (Neufchatel, 1774). See also
Dupin, Manuel du Droit Pub. Eccles. Paris, 1845, p. 39.
3 In Bavaria, for instance, the struggle was kept up for two hundred
years, and in 1772 we find the clergy complaining of the secular jurisdiction
exercised over them in criminal matters as a violation of their chartered
rights. —Dalham, Concil. Salisb. p. 644.
220 BENEFIT OF CLERGY.
order of God.1 So when, in May, 1851, the Republic of
lNew Granada dared to abolish the ecclesiastical courts and
to subject the clergy to the secular tribunals, Pius lifted up
his voice and proclaimed to the nations that the act was
null and void, and that all concerned in it had incurred the
censures inevitable upon those who wilfully seek to violate
the imprescriptible rights of the church.2 iNot less energetic and decisive was his action when the Mexican constitution of 1855 proposed to abolish the benefit of clergy;
the constitution was at once declared to be annulled, and its
supporters were warned of the penalties in store f'or them.3
Evidently the church only lacks the power and not the will
to interfere as of old in the civil and political affairs of the
nations. So, in the manifesto of the bishops who assembled
in Rome for the canonization of the Japanese martyrs in
1862, one of the complaints made against the "' Sub-Alpine
Government" was that it licld not hesitate to subject the
priests of God to the unhallowed courts of secular law —
the principal motives for the protest being apparently that
the Italian cabinet had found itself obliged to prosecute
the bishops of Bologna and Fano for issuing circulars
ordering their priests to make use of the confessional for
the purpose of stimulating desertion in the Italian army.
In view of these declarations of principle, it is therefore a
matter of course to find, in the Syllabus of December, 1864,
the immunity of ecclesiastics from secular jurisdiction
claimed as a matter independent of the civil law, and to
see that potentates are warned that they have no right to
curtail the exclusive control of the spiritual courts over
all persons and things appertaining to the church.5
tRome therefore looks back with fond regret to the cldays
Litt. Apostol. lVbetipices inter, x. Jun. 1851.
" Alloc. Acerbissiiutz, 27 Septemrb. 1852.
3 Alloc. lVzqetnam fore, 15 Decemb. 1856.
Declarat. Episc. 8 Junii 1862.
5 Syllab. Dec. 1864, Prop. 30, 31.
PRESENT POLICY OF THE CHURCH. 221
of Innocent III., and eagerly anticipates the time when
opportunity shall enable her to revendicate the rights of
which she has been deprived by the irreligious generations
of the past three centuries. Yet in weighing the countless
blessings which have been vouchsafed to her church during
the eventful past, it would be difficult to find one more
substantial than the "persecution" which has restrained
her from the suicidal gratification of her own inordinate
desires.
EXCO MUNICATION.
N the long career of the church towards universal dcloination, perhaps the most efficient instrument at its comma-and was its control over the sacrifice of the altar.
Through this it opened the gates of heaven to the obedient,
and plunged the rebellious into the pit of hell; and the
generations which implicitly believed in its authority over
the world to come were necessarily rendered docile subjects
in this world. Armed with power so vast and vague, it
could intervene decisively in the dissensions between sovereigns and people, and subdue them both to its designs of
highest state-craft, making each the means to humiliate the
other; while, at the same time, it could control the life of
the obscurest peasant, and bind him helplessly in blind
submission to the behests of its humblest minister. This
despotism so absolute and so all-pervading, which dictated
the action of kings, while it interpenetrated every fibre of
society, was based upon the religion of love, and self-sacrifice, and humility. HIuman history, so fruitful of paradoxes, scarce offers an example more notable of the perversion of good into evil. The divine precepts of charity,
forgiveness, and self-abnegation, distorted by the ignorance,
the passion, and the selfishness of man, became the warrant by which giced and ambition attained the fruition of
their wildest hopes.
To d(escribe minutely the countless vicissitudes by which
224 EXCOMMUNICATION.
these results were reached would greatly transcend the
limits of the present essay. I can only propose to present
such a general view of the subject as may aid the student
in tracing the origin of some of the moral and material
forces which have moulded our civilization, and which, in
a degree somewhat modified, are still at work around us.
The church is infallible; it draws its inspiration from above,
and cannot rightfully be called to account by any earthly
power for the use which it may make of the authority confided to it. Thus autocratic by the organic law of its
being, uncontrolled and uncontrollable by any human
power, even the observer of the present may find profit
in contemplating what was its policy in the past, and the
use which it has macde of the supremacy conceded to it
of old.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE.
When Jesus said to his disciples" Moreover, if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell
him his fault between thee and him alone: if lie shall hear thee,
thou hast gained thy brother.
"BLut if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two
more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may
be established.
" And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church
but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as a
heathen man and a publican.
" Verily I say unto you; whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall
be bound in heaven; and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall
be loosed in heaven." —(ZJatt. xviII. 15-18.)
It would seem as though they at once proceeded to draw
from his words deductions at variance with the exhaustless love and pity which it was his mission to preach to
man, for the sacred narrative proceeds-
PRIMJITIVE DISCIPLINE. 225
" Then came Peter to him and said, Lord, how often shall my
brother sil aoainst me and I forgive him? till seven times?"
And Christ, seeing that his precept was in dalnger of
being misinterpreted, at once detected and rebuked the
hidden thoughts of his disciples —
"I say not unto thee, until seven times; but, until seventy times
seven."
Frail human nature grasped eagerly the reversion of the
symbolical power to bind and to loose, and interpreted it
in the most rigicd and odious form. It rejoiced in the
authority to treat an erring brother as a heathen and a
publican; but with all convenient speed it forgot the limziitation to forgive him seventy times seven.
The teachings of the apostles shared the same fate as
those of the Master. Jesus had said to them (Jotn xIIi.
35)-" By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples,
if ye have love one to another," and they never tired of
inculcating that " God is love; and he that dwelleth in
love dwelleth in God, and God in him" (I. Joh7n IV. 16), and
of preaching forgiveness, meekness, and long-suffering.
Christ had said, Judge not, that ye be not judged,"c and
Paul repeated after him (RomZ. xIv. 10), "For why clost
thou judge thy brother? or why dost thou set at naught
thy brother? for we shall all stand before the judgumentseat of Christ." When one of the faithful had strayed,
he was to be brought back with all gentleness and kindness —" Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye
which are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of
meekness; considering thyself, lest thouialso be tempted"
(Galat. vi. 1). And above all, those to whom the guidance
of their brethren was confided were warned to exercise
their authority meekly and humbly —" In all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience,
in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses" (II. Cor. vI. 4).
"Neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being
ensamlples to the flockl" (I. Peter v. 3).
226 E XCOMMUNICATION.
Yet with all this, the old stern exclusive spirit of his
Jewish training occasionally breaks out in St. Paul, and it
suited the temper of later generations rather to give heed
to his denunciations of punishment than to obey his injunctions of forbearance and forgiveness.
It was no part of -the recognize(] duty of the apostles to
frame an elaborate system of ecclesiastical discipline that
should regulate the church of the future in its development
over the earth. Believing, as they did, that the second
conming of Christ was at hand, temporary regulations alone
seemed necessary for the scanty flock of believers, whose
enthusiasm in submitting themselves to the law of love
was a sufficient guarantee against serious trouble, during
the short time that was to elapse before the Messiah himself should return to govern the world. Accordingly, the
indications which are furnished in the Pauline epistles as
to the nature of the spiritual laws for the control of the
Christian churches are necessarily vague and imperfect.
Still, they show us the existence of two kinds of penalties.
The first and most severe is the mysterious one which has
puzzled so many commentators -" To deliver such an one
unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit
may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus," which is
threatened in - I. Cor. v. for the punishment of a moral
offence, incest, and in I. Tim. I. 20, to repress the spiritual
sin of heresy. The other penalty is segregation from the
church-"6 But now I have written unto you not to keep
company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard,
or an extortioner; with such a one no not to eat" (I. Cor.
v. 11). Yet even this was to be administered in a loving
spirit. and was evidently an infliction of comparatively
trivial import.
"'Now we command you, brethren, in the name of the Lord
Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from any brother that
walketh disorderly, not after the tradition which he received of us.
PR I MITIVE DISCIPLINE. 227
"And if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that
man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed.
"Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a
brother" (II. Thess. iII. 6, 14, 15).'
And even the anathema which subsequently came to have
a significance so awful meant evidently at this time only a
setting aside or separation.1 As we shall see, however, in
process of time all of these penalties became practically
merged into one, combining all the severity of each; and
the offender who was cut off from the church, was delivered
to Satan, not in the flesh for the salvation of the soul, but
in the soul for eternity. That a man believing himself to
possess a power so fearfful could find pleasure in wielding
it, and in condemning his fellow-creatures to a destiny so
unspeakable, is an exhibition of the worst and darkest side
of humnan nature; but when we see this performed daily in
the name and for the honor of a God of love and(] pity,
and for the honest purpose of enforcing the law of charity
and universal brotherhood, we are led to face one of the
mysteries of man's many-sided character which are past
solution by our finite intelligence.
This penalty of simple segregation or expulsion was, of
course, a matter inherently within the power of each congregation of the faithful. A body bound together merely
by the ties of spontaneous aggregation could choose its
own associates, and could refuse to consort with those
whom it might consider unfitted for or unworthy of companionship, and the test of this fellowship became, at an
early period, the act of partaking of the Lord's Supper.
The references to this by St. Paul (I. Cor. x. 16-18; xr.
20-34), combined with some obscure allusions to breaking
bread (Acts II. 41-46; xx. 7-11), would seem to show
that at first this test was eating in common, and that in
obedience to the command, "Whatsoever ye do in word
and deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving
Cf. Rom. ix. 3.-I. Cor. xII. 3; xvI. 22.-Galat. i. 9.
228 E X C O MM U N I C A T I ON.
thanks to God and the Father by him" (Coloss. III. 17), the
early Christians felt that every act of the believer should
be hallowed, that his whole life was a ceaseless dedication
to God, and that his food and drink were the gift of the
Lord, to be taken in thankfulness, as making him one with
the Saviour who had died for him. Yet as the circle of
the faithful enlarged, a celebration of this kind could not
but give rise, among weaker brethren, to occasional scenes
which to devout minds were a disgrace to the church, and
a scandal to the memory of the Crucified. It was apparently to repress these that St. Paul ordered that the
demands of animal hunger and thirst should be satisfied at
home, and that the meal of fellowship in the place of worship should be sober, and worthy of the recollections which
it was designed to excite.
In process of time this celebration seems to have become separated into two —the agape, or love-feast,l and the
ministration of the Eucharist, though the latter long retained its original aspect of a meal, rather than a ceremony
purely religious. Thus, a century later than St. Paul, we
learn firom Justin Martyr that, after prayers and thanksgiving, the attendant deacons distributed among the congregation the bread and wine, which were also carried
home to those prevented by legitimate reasons from attending at worship.2 That the Eucharist still was more than
* The agacpcc, or love-feasts, continued long to be celebrated in the
churches. About the middle of the fourth centtry the council of Leodicewa
endeavored to abolish them by forbidding participation in them to both
clerks and laymen (can. 27, 28). This was unsuccessful, and the attempt
was renewed in 397 by the third council of Carthage (can. 30).
The extreme reformers of the modern Italian church, in their efforts to
restore the primitive simplicity of worship, imitate, or rather exceed, the
absence of ceremony described in the text. According to a recent traveller
who attended one of their conventicles in Florence, the elements were represented by a loaf of bread and a decanter of wine, placed upon a common
table in the midst of the assembly. After various religious exercises, one of
the congregltion arose and broke off a piece of bread, which he ate and
passed the loaf to a neighbor, and it was thus handcled around. Ie also
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 229
the mere symbolical morsel of bread and mouthful of wine
and water, is evident when the same author explains that
it was provided by the voluntary oblations of the faithful.'
The same is shown in tile next century by the reproaches
of Cyprian to an avaricious dame, that she comes to the
Lord's Supper without bringing her share of the sacritice,
and that, although she is rich, she partakes of the Eucharist
which has been contributed by the poor.2 Even towards
the close of the fourth century, a sermon attributed to
St. Augustine echoes the remark of Cyprian in stigmatizing as disgraceful the conduct of a man, able to make
oblations, who receives the communion from the offering
of another.? About the same period there appears to have
arisen the necessity of limiting the nature of the oblations,
which seem to have become varied, leading doubtless to
abuses anci perversions of the rite.4 Such portions of
these eucharistic offerings as were not consumed by those
poured out a tumblerful of wine, took a sip, and it then followed the loaf.
Unimpressive as this may seem, it derives full significance from the intense
religious enthusiasm of the Evangelical Christians, as they call themselves.
This, indeed, may be seen by the hymn which was sung immediately before
the distribution of the elements. I give the first two and the last two
verses:" Giojosi o fratelli, "I1 careo comnpiamo
Sedianmo alla nensa, Precetto divine;
In cui sotto un velo Gustiamo o fratelli,
La fede dispensa Nel pane e nel vine
Le arcane, le saunte Le arcane, le pare
Dovizie d'amor. Dolcezze d'amor.
" I1 pane e il vilne' Si celebri in questo
I simrboli sono Santissimo rito
Di gIrazia perenne, Del nostro riScattO
Di pace e perdono, I1 prezzo infinite,
Del corpo e del sangee In fin che dai cieli
Del nostro Signor. Non torni ii Signor."
Talnaccdge's Religcious Reform in Itacly, London, 1S66, pp. 89-91.' Justin. Martyr. Apol. II.
Cyprian. de Opere et Eleemosyn. cap. xv.
a Augustin. Sermon. Append. Serrn. cclxv. cap. 2. (Ed. Benedict.)' Concil. Carthag. III. can. xxiv.
20
230 EXCOMMUNICATION.
present, or conveyed to the absent, were distributed among
both clergy and laity, especial care being taken in general
that:none should reach the catechumens, who were not
permitted to join in the communion.l It was thus, indeed,
that the poor of the church were fed, showing the substantial nature of the offerings.2 In. some places, also, the
custom obtained, to a comparatively late period, to call in
the school children and feed them on the surplus; and
thus, occasionally, it might reach the unbaptized, as in a
case mentioned by Evagrius, resulting in a miracle.3 The
use thus made of the surplus must have continued until
the ninth century, as we find it forbidden in the False
Decretals.4
The idea of a celebration of this nature was familiar to
all the races from which converts were to be drawn, for
propitiatory and eucharistical feasts formed part of the
religious institutions of Moses (Deut. xiv. 22-9), and the
solemn eating of the sacrifice was, throughout Pagandom,
the bond which manifested the connection between those
who worshipped the same deities. From the very com1 Theoph. Alexandrin. Commonitor. can. vii. (Harduin. I. 1199).
Cyprian de Op. et Eleemos.
Evagrius (Hist. Eccles. Lib. Iv. cap. 35), writing during the reign of
Justinian, describes this as an old custom in Constantinople. That it was
regarded as a religious. rite is evident from the -miracle referred to. It
chanced that a Jewish boy partook of the holy repast, along with his companions, and on his return home mentioned it as an excuse for his delay.
The father, who was a glass-maker, transported with rage, cast his son into
a glass-furnace, where the child remained for three days unharmed amid the
flames, until his mother, who had vainly searched him everywhere, chanced
to hear him answering her call. A beautiful woman, he said, had at once
appeared to him, covering him with a garment impenetrable to the fire, and
supplying him with food when hungry. By order of Justinian the mother
and son were baptized, and the father, proving obdurate, was crucified.
This same story is related by Nicephorus Callistus (Hist. Eccles. Lib. xvII.
cap. 18) and by Gregory of Tours (Mirac. Lib. I. cap. 10). The custom
which gave rise to it was likewise followed in the West, as appears from
Concil. Matiscon. II. ann. 585, can. 6.
4 Pseudo-Clenment. Epist. II.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 231
mencement of Christianity the disciples were earnestly
warned against partaking of the Eic;6}v-ea or sacrificial
meats of the heathen (Acts xv. 29), and during the various
persecutions this became one of the tests employed to discover the faithful, and the infraction of the prohibition one
of the sins most difficult to pardon. That the eucharistic
feast should come to be regarded as the symbolic bond of
union between believers, and of their communion with God,
was therefore inevitable, and every one professing Christianity was required to partake whenever he attended the
meetings for worship.' These meetings, in some churches,
were held regularly twice a day, and it was the duty of the
faithful to be always present;" while in others a daily service only was required, in others weekly, and in others
again several times a week.3 Not satisfied with the frequent opportunities thus afforded of participating in the
communion; pious souls would carry the Eucharist home
with them, that they might enjoy'its benefits at all times;4
and so universal was its administration that infants of the
tenderest years, as soon as they received baptism, were
expected to be brought regularly to the altar, where they
joined unconsciously in the sacred mysteries,5 and an
Canon. Apostol. x.-Concil. Antioch. ann. 341, can. 2.
2 Constit. Apostol. Lib. II. cap. xl. lx]iii.
3 Cyprian de Orat. Domin. cap. 18. —Justin. Martyr. Apol. II. —Tertull. de
Orat. cap. 19.
4 Tertull. de Uxor. Lib. II. cap. v.-Cyprian. de Spectac. cap. 5.
5 Cyprian. de Lapsis, cap. 25.-The veneration which already was bestowed on the Eucharist is manifested by this passage. During the Decian
persecution, a female infant was carried by her nurse before the magistrates,
and made to eat of the pagan sacrificial meats. Her parents, ignorant of
the fact, subsequently took her to church, and when the deacon placed the
holy cup to her lips, she resisted violently. Forced at length to swallow a
mouthful of the sacred wine, she immediately threw it up. As Cyprian
remarks, the Eucharist could not remain in her violated mouth and body;
the draught, sanctified by the blood of the Lord, burst from her polluted
stomach.
The council of Trent anathematized as heresy the belief that participation
232 E XO OM MUNI CATION.
abuse at one time arose by which the holy symbol was even
given to the dead —a profanation sharply reproved by thle
third council of Carthage in. 397.1
Thus, as participation in the Lord's Supper became nniversal, perpetual, and obligatory, it naturally soon was
recognized not only as the bond of union, but as the test
of fellowship among believers. When the expected Second
Advent did not come, and when the necessity for permanent
organization and discipline grew apparent, the Eucharist
thus inevitably assumed a fresh importance as a means of
efficiently enforcing subordination and obedience. As a
society of voluntary cohesion, the church had of course
the right to exipel a refractory member; and if it had
doubted its power, it had sufficient precedent to justify the
assumption. Among the Jews, three degrees of separation
from the synagogue were practised-n-iddzui, cherem, and
sammadidti -to coerce contumnacious offenders, imposing
segregation and disabilities very similar to those which we
will see hereafter adopted by the church, when it acquired
secular as well as spiritual authority.2 Among the Gauls,
also, the theocratic government of the Druids was maintained by an expedient almost precisely similar in its
details and application.2
The standard of morality erected by Christ was so different from that of the hideous society in which the infant
in the Eucharist was essential for children before the age of reason, but
forbore to condemn the practice of the ancient church (Sess. xxI. De Comnmun. cap. Iv. can. 4). Gregory XIII., however, soon after, in 1572, expressed great surprise on learning that the custom was preserved in some of
the German churches, and strictly prohibited it, under threats of punishment. (Dalham, Concil. Salisburg. p. 577.)
Concil. Carthag. III. can. 6.
2 Smith's Bible Diet. Vol. III. Append. p. cx.-Hippolytus (Refutation of
Heresies, Bk. Ix. chap. xix.) asserts that among the Essenes excommunicates sometimes perished of starvation, being refused all aid by their fellows, and at the same time being forbidden by their tenets from partaking
of ordinary food.:: Cs:tr. de Bell. Gall. Lib. VI. cap. 13.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 233
church was nurtured, that a large portion of the offences
of its untrained converts could be restrained only by its
own action, even had it been willing to see its members
brought before the heathen tribunals for trial. Not only,
as we have seen in the previous essay, did the church
seek by every means to keep them from appealing to the
courts in civil cases, but when they were accused and condemned for criminal actions it sedulously held aloof and
abandoned them.l It was thus obliged to exercise a close
supervision over the lives of its followers to repress the
sins which, though heinous in the eyes of the devout
children of the Redeemer, were venial weaknesses, or even
praiseworthy deeds in the opinion of the heathen. There
was an ample field for the exercise of its sternest vigilance,
for, in the incurable corruption of social life under the
empire, neither regeneration by the waters of baptism, nor
the purifying influence of occasional persecution, could
preserve the church from constant and wide-spread contamination. It was not merely the Christian ideal of
purity of character and abstinence from evil thoughts and
desires that were lacking, for even the grossest sins and
crimes were not infiequent. Even in the second century,
IrenmTus consoles himself with the conviction that the
secret evil deeds of those who held higl position in the
church would receive their due reward hereafter; and
when a fraudulent banker like St. Calixtus I. could be elevated to the bishopric of Rome, there could not be any
very elevated standard of morality in the Christian society
of the Eternal City.3 After the Decian persecution, Cyprian
lifts up his voice to proclaim that the sufferinogs of the
church were the just penalty of its ineradicable corruption.
Bishops neglected their sacred functions to devote themnselves to the accumulation of wealth wrung from the poor,
Constit. Apostol. Lib. v. cap. iii.
2 Irenmei contra H-Ires. Lib. Iv. cap. xxvi. ~ 3.
3 I-Iippolytus, Refutation of Heresies, Bk. Ix. chap. 7.
10*
234- EX XCOMMUNICATION.
while possessions gained by fraud were increased by merciless usury. As for the priesthood, it had neither purity
of faith, charity of works, nor discipline of morals; while
the laity were given over to avarice and cheating, blasphemy and slander.l Even the terrible purification administered by Decius was ineffectual, for, ten years later, an
epistle of Gregory Thaumaturgus defines the penance appropriate for the crimes committed by the faithful during
an irruption of the Goths into Pontus. Many Christians
had joined the barbarians, and had aided them in their
ravages, guiding them through the country, pointing out
dwellings to be sacked, and murdering, plundering, and
ravishing. Even after the raid, unfortunate captives
escaping and endeavoring to return to their homes were
seized by Christians and held as slaves, while others obtained possession of their neighbors' property, alid refused
to restore it.2
Human nature, even am10ong the early Christians, thus
evidently fell far short of ideal perfection, and when tried
by the standard of the Gospel its shortcomings demanded
the most earnest efforts at reform. Nor were the offences those against ordinary morality only, for the growth
of Christian theology speedily added a new and interainable class of sins in the deviations of faith which were
regarded as the most unpardonable of crimes against
God. The church thus had ample work to do, and was
obliged to provide for its systematic performance. PFor
this it had full opportunity. Ignored or persecuted by thle
civil power, and forming an independent body in the social
order of the empire, it enjoyed entire autonomy within its
own borders. Each local church could frame its own laws,
fiom the application of which there was no appeal to aly
external or superior power; and thus there gradually grew
up a code, of which the administration fell of necessity into
Cyprian. de Lapsis, cap. 6.
o Greg. Thaumat. Epist. can. 6, 7, 8, 9. (Har(rduin. 1. 194.)
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 235
the hands of the elders, presbyters, or priests of the individual congregations, or the overseers, episcopi, or bishops
of the towns. The penalties provided for in this code were
of course merely moral or spiritual; but to the enthusiastic
Christian these were far more dreadful than the sternest
inflictions of the temporal tribunals. He who failed in his
observance of the rules of the church was admonished and
reproved, or suspended from communion for a period proportioned to the gravity of his offence. PRepentance and
amendment procured his restoration, but the hardened sinner who denied the authority of the church and persisted
in his evil courses was cut off and ejected.
To the sincere Christian no fate could be more deplorable than to be cast out of fellowship, to be pronounced
unworthy of participation in the sacrifice of the Lord's
table, to be deprived of the solace of intercommllunion with
kindred souls, and to be shunned as one who had renlounced
or forfeited his share in the redemption of mankind. To
this it speedily caine. As joining in communion was the
symbol of Christian fellowship and unity, so the church, by
withholding the Eucharist, set upon the sinner the stigma
of condemnation which separated him fi'om the righteous,
which made him an outcast among the faithful, and which,
by expelling him from the church, consigned him to eternal
perdition.
How soon the ministers of God conceived that they
wielded this awful power to determine the destiny of immortal souls it would be difficult to assert with positiveness. It was not until long afterwards that the naked and
abhorrent sentence of direct damnation came to be customary; but that such was the effect of the deprivation of
communion on the unrepentant sinner was assumed and
believed at a comparatively early period. The heretic who
paltered with the faith consigned himself to hell; but it
was the church, through its ministers, which deprived the
unrepentanllt sinner of his share of eternal life in heaven.
236 EXCOMMUNICATION.
In either case, outside of the pale there was no salvation.
At least as early as the time of Cyprian, the church had
thus interposed itself between God and man, and the doctrine was recognized that he who was not in communion
was an enetnv of Christ and could claim no share in the
Atonement. Unless the church was his mother, he could;ilot call God his father, and it was as idle to expect salvation out of the church as to look for safety in the Deluge.except in the ark of Noah.1 Implicit submission to those
who were clothed with this tremendous authority was the
only means of salvatilon.l As under the circumcision of the
flesh, says Cyprian, those who disobeyed the priests an d
judges were put to death (Deut. xvII. 12), now that we
have the circumcision of the spirit, the proud and contumacious are spiritually killed by ejection from the church.
For there is no life or salvation out of the church, and the
Scripture warns us that the disobedient shall perish who
will not yield to wholesome precepts (Prov. xv. 12, 10).
To save them from this awful fate, they should be affectionately entreated before ejection, but if they will not
listen, it is for us to do the work commanded of us by God.2
A little later than Cyprian, the Apostolic Constitutions
develop the same theory. He who is cast out of the church
by its duly constituted ministers is deprived of the glory
of eternal life; in this world he is shunned by the good,
aLnd God has already judged him for the next.3 A century
later, St. John Chrysostom, in deprecating the freedom
with which this fearful power was used on the most trivial
occasions, does not admit that its efficiency was diminished
by its abuse. The man who was anathematized was given
up to the devil. Abandoned by Christ, he had no hope of
Cyprian. de Unitate Ecclesie. This bitter exclusion was directed against
the Novatians, whose only heresy consisted in refusing to receive back those
who had lapsed in the Decian persecution.
2 Ejusd. Epist. Iv. cap. 4, 5, ad Pomnponium (Ed. Oxon.).
3 Constit. Apostol. Lib. II. cap. 51.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 237
salvation; and Chrysostom asks his hearers if they think
it a light matter thus to take upon themselves the office of
Christ, and to pass a sentence of such awful import before
the time and the coming of the judge.l St. Augustine can
find no equivalent for the dread results of excommunication save the expulsion of Adam from Paradise; and in
428, Pope Celestin I., in deprecating the withholding of
the sacraments from the dying sinner, as commanded by
numerous canons, exclaims that their denial is the denial
of salvation.3
While the spiritual effects of expulsion from communion
were so awful, the temporal punishment of the sinner was
by no means neglected. Before the church had been united
with the state undcler the Christian Emperors, it of course
had no power of inflicting legal penalties or disabilities on
its recalcitrant children, but it had nevertheless the opportunity of visiting them with annoyances hardly less severe.
Principal among these was segregation-cutting off the
excommunicate fioim all intercourse with his fellow believers-a penalty which, as we shall see hereafter, added
enormously to the authority of the church during the middle ages. It would seem to be naturally derived from a
similar regulation in the Jewish rules with regard to
excommunicates, and among the apostles this would be
heightened by the exclusiveness which, under the Jewish
law, forbade companionship with the Gentile. As St. Peter
said to Cornelius (Acts x. 28): "Ye know that it is an
unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company
or come unto one of another nation," and the excommunicate being regarded as a leathen might naturally be held
as coming under the same rule by those who were trained
in Jewish traditions. Such an expedient, therefore, suggested itself as a matter of course to St. Paul-" I have
Chrysost. IHomil. de Anathemat. cap. 2, 3.
2 Augustin. de Genesi ad Litteram, Lib. xI. cap. 40.
3 Ccelest. PP. I. Epist. II. cap. 2. (Harduin. I. 1259.)
238 E C O MU N IC A T ION.
written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is
called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater,
or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such a
one no not to eat" (I. Cor. v. 11). The command was a
positive one, and was easily interpreted to extend to all
who had fallen under the ban and had been suspended
from communion. In the earliest record of church customs
that has reached us, the Apostolic Canons, there is a provision that any one praying with an excommunicate in his
own house shall be excomlmunicatedl. This would seem to
cut off even those who were penitently striving to reconcile themselves with an offended God, and its harshness is
condemned by the contemporary and more extended code
known as the Apostolic Constitutions, which warns the
bishops not to avoid the guilty, nor to prohibit them from
the Lord's prayer, nor from living with the faithful, for
Christ did not shun publicans and sinners, nor hesitate to
take food with them. Therefore, it proceeds, should you
live habitually with those who are cut off, helping, comforting, and consoling them, lest they lapse still farther
into sin.2 While thus tender of the penitent, however, it
orders that the impenitent and the heretic be cut off without mercy, and that the faithful be instructed to avoid not
only prayers but even speech with them.' St. Paul had
written "A mran that is an heretic after the first and
second admonition avoid" (Titus III. 10), and Irenudus
asserts that the Apostles carried out this regulation most
rigidly.4 Stephen I., therefore, had warrant for his harshhess when he refused to confer with the Eastern bishops
de)uted by their brethren in 256 to settle the quarrel between Rome and the East on the subject of the rebaptismn
ICanon. Apostol. xI. Cf. Concil. Antioch. can. 2.
Constit. Apostol. Lib. li. cap. 44.
Ibid. loc. cit.; Lib. vI. cap. 18, 26.
Irenw i contra Iteres. Lib. iII. cap. 3.-Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. Iv.
cap. 14.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 239
of heretics, and when he moreover ordered that no one
should receive them to hospitality. He had cut them off
from his communion, but St. Firmilian of Cappadocia
shows by his bitter complaints of these proceedings that
the action adopted by Stephen was, to say the least, a most
unusual one.'
Stephen's example was not immediately followed, for the
frequent prohibitions to allow excommunicates to receive
the communion, which occur in the canons of the fourth
century, prove that the more comprehensive p unishment
of excluding them from all intercourse could not have been
enforced. A distinction drawn by the fourth council of
Carthage in 398 shows the revival of the practice in a
special matter. In one canon it expresses the received
rule that any one communing or praying with an excommunicate shall be excommunicated, while in another it forbids all intercourse with widows who marry after talking
vows of continence.2 Two years later a more general application of the principle is developed by the first council
of Toledo, which suspends from communion any one who
knowingly holds intercourse with a man who is suspended;
and, in the case of nuns who suffer themselves to be
seduced, both the guilty parties, after separation, are condemined to ten years of penance, and excommunication is
threatened against all who may associate with them until
they are admitted to prayer.3 Contemporary with this is
St. Aug'ustine's treatise against the Donatist Parmenianus,
ill which he speaks of this complete segregation as the
established rule of the church, in the case of excommunicates, but prudently counsels that such a sentence be pronounced only against those who are friendless, and who
therefore will not be likely to excite disturbance or to
create schism.4 At a few years' later date we have the
Cypriani Epist. 75 (Ed. O2xon.).
2 Statut. Eccles. Antiq. can. 73, 104.
3 Concil. Toletan. I. ann. 400, can. 15, 16.
Augustin. contra Epist. Parmnenion. Lib. InI. cap. 2, No. 13.
240 EXCO MMUNICATION.
text of an excommunication pronounced by Synesi us,
Bishop of Ptolemais, against Andronicus, Governor of the
Pentapolis, in which he formally cuts off the guilty man
from all intercourse with the faithful: " For this blasphemy the church of Ptolemais gives notice to her sisters
in all lands: Let no temple of God be open to Andronicus,
Thoas and his followers. Let every holy house and cloister
be closed to them. There is no place in Paradise for the
Devil, and if he steals in let him be expelled. I command
all citizens and magistrates that they be with him neither
under the same roof nor at the same table; and all priests
that they neither salute him while living, nor grant him
funeral service when dead."T' Very similar to this is the
sentenice pronounced at the council of Constantinople in
448 against the Archimandrite Eutyches for his heretical
notions as to the nature of Christ: " Sighing and weeping for his utter perdition, we decree, by our Lord Jesus
Christ whom he has blasphemed, that he be d(eprived of all
priestly functions, and of the government of his monastery;
and all who, knowing this, shall converse with him and
consort with him shall be punished with the same excommuniication. 12
By this time, therefore, we may conclude that segregation
was fairly established as one of the penalties of disobedience to the church. All excommunicates, however, were
not exposed to it. The sinner who repented of his misdeeds and sought absolution was required to pass through
a course of probation, varying in length and severity with
the gravity of his offence, before he was again received to
comm-union, and during this time of penance he was not
interdictecd from intercourse with the faithful. If, however,
his patience gave way under the long and weary trial,
which, as we shall see hereafter, was by no means unlikely,
and he ventured to disregard the strict rules imposed on
Synesii Epist. 58. 2 Synod. Chalced. Act. I. (IIarduin. II. 167).
PRIMIITIVE DISCIPLINE. 241
him, the proceedings of various councils held about this
time show that he was then to be rigorously segregated, and
all Christians were strictly forbidden from associating with
him in any manner.1 He was a pariah, cut off from human
society; and though, during the earlier times, when the
Christians were few and scattered, this might have been
but a light infliction on the carnal and worldly-minded, yet
as the religionists multiplied it became more and more
severe, and when paganism was finally overthrown, it was
the destruction of the victim's life and prospects. In this
world the church ruined his career and excluded him from
the company of men, as in the next it ejected him from
that of angels, so that life here and hereafter was equally
within its control.2
Thus terrible was the fate of the recalcitrant who was
too proud to submit, or too weak to endure the penalties of
his transgression; and in time he who earnestly sought
reconciliation and pardon for wrong-doing found his lot
scarcely more endurable.
In the earlier ages of the church, the penance imposed
upon the repentant sinner was a very simple matter.
Cyprian was somewhat scandalized to see those who had
lapsed in the Decian persecution readmitted to communion
with little or no probation, and he remonstrated energetically but vainly against it, though even he was willing to
welcome them back with a very slight amount of penance.3
In the Apostolic Constitutions, likewise, the bishop is directed to smooth the path of the sinner, and after a few
weeks of fasting, to test the sincerity of his repentance, the
fold is again to be thrown open to him, though the impenConcil. Arelatens. II. ann. 441, can. 49.-Synod. II. S. Patric, c. ann
460, can. 1, 2. 4.-Concil. Turon. I. ann. 460, can. 8.-Concil. Venetic. ann
465, can. 3.
2 In the sixth century, however, Gildas seems to argue against the propriety of segregating the excommunicate.-Abedoe et Ethelvolfi canon. Lib.
XXXIx. cap. 4. (Haddan and Stubbs, Councils of Gr. Britain, I. 108.)
Cyprian. Epist. 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 23, 24, 25 (Ed. Oxon.).
21
242 EXCOMMUNICATION.
itent is to be cut off without mercy.l About the same
period Gregory Thaumaturgus describes for us this process of penitence, which was divided into four stages. The
first, or fletus, was the period of weeping, when the penitent stood outside the church door, weeping and begging
the faithful as they entered to pray for him. During the
second, auditio, he was allowed to stand in the vestibule
until the catechumens were dismissed from the congregation. In the third, subjectio, he was admitted inside of the
church amid the catechumens. The fourth period, consistentia, saw him among the faithful and allowed to remain
during the services, but not to partake of the sacrament.2
Throughout this period, however, there had been zealous
puritans who were not disposed to pardon so easily. Montanus taught that there was no power in the church to
forgive atrocious sins, and Novatianus held that the Decian
apostates were not readmissible into the fold. They refused even death-bed communion to those who had lapsed,
and their followers, under the names of Montanists,
Cathari, and Novatians, formed sects of heretics which lasted
for centuries. So, after the final persecution of Maxentius,
the Donatists for more than a hundred years plunged the
African church into confusion because Felix of Aptungis
was allowed to perform the episcopal functions after he
had betrayed the sacred books and vessels of his church
to the heathen. These heresies were stoutly resisted by
1 Constit. Apostol. Lib. II. cap. 19. 45.
2 Gregor. Thaumat. Epist. can. xi. (IIarduin. I 194). Jerome describes
for us the appearance of the noble Roman matron Fabiola, while undergoing
voluntarily the first stage of penitence —" Saccum indueret, ut errorem publice fateretur: et tota urbe spectante Romana ante diem Paschbe in basilica
quondam Laterani..... staret in ordine penitentium, episcopo, presbyferis et omni populo collachrymantibus, sparsum crinem, ora lurida, squalidas manus, sordida colla, submitteret. Qus, peccata fietus iste non purget?"
-Epist. 77 ad Oceanum.
So St. Ambrose-" Volo veniam reus speret, petat eam lachrymis, petat
gernitibus, petat populi toti gemitibus, utignoscatur obsecret. "-De Poenitent.
Lib. I. cap. 16.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 243
the orthodox, but their rise and growth are the evidence
of the tendency which existed in the minds of all the faithful to meet increasing corruption by sterner measures of
repression, and by lodging greater power in the hands of
the hierarchy. The church was fast losing the boundless
charity which it had received from the Redeemer, and was
becoming more and more an organization of worldly forces,
wherein fear was recognized as a much more potent element
than love in enforcing submission.
Thus, within half a century after the I)ecian apostates
had been received back into the bosom of the church with
scarce a question, and Novatianus had been declared a
heretic for refusing to join in communion with them, the
orthodox council of Elvira decrees that to offer sacrifice to
an idol after receiving baptism is a sin which no expiation
can cleanse, and the sinner is denied reconciliation even
upon his death-bed.' Twenty years later the council of
Niciea relaxed somewhat from this severity, and parades its
clemency in limiting the penance of such backsliders to
three years passed in the second stage of penitence, six
years in the third, and two in the fourth, after the contrite
and humble performance of which the guilty one was at
last restored to communion.2
Having once entered into this career the church could
not stop, and as its membership increased in numbers and
deteriorated in righteousness, its functions as a law-giver
became more and more active. A large portion of the
canons of its councils are devoted to establishing a criminal code, which existed side by side with the imperial jurisprudence, and which, while providing for numberless cases
which were not noticed in the civil law, created duplicate
punishments for many offences which were likewise under
the cognizance of the secular tribunals. These canons,
however, were mostly local and tentative in their character,
Concil. Eliberit. ann. 305, can. ].
2 Concil. Nicmn. can. xi.
244 EXCOMMUNICATION.
varying greatly with time and place; and though ample
materials exist for forming a tolerably complete summary
of their leading features, yet space will hardly permit the
consideration of more than two important points which
bear directly upon the future development of our subjectthe disabilities imposed upon penitents and excommunicates, and the questions connected with death-bed absolution and communion.
We have just seen that for apostates the council of NicTea
imposed a penitence of eleven years-increased to twelve
by a IRoman synod in 488.1 Long as this term may seem
it was by no means unusual, for the length was proportioned to the grade of offence committed, and for heinous
sins there are various canons which deny reconciliation
d(uring a lifetime, and only permit on the death-bed.2 This
course of penitence was by no means a mere deprivation
of spiritual privileges, for the church had to deal for the
most part with natures by far too much hardened to be
broken into subjection by penalties so light. In fact, the
council of Vannes, in 465, gives us a curious illustration of
the decline of reverence for the awful privilege of the
Eucharist in providing for drunken ecclesiastics the
alternative of corporal punishment or thirty days' suspension from communaionA Evidently something more
substantial was required, nor was there much scruple in
finding it. Fasting, as we have seen, formed part of the
punishment as early at least as the date of the Apostolic
Constitutions, and as the church obtained influence over
secular life it commenced to interfere with the worldly
pursuits and privileges of its penitents. Thus they were
deprived of the right of acting as prosecutors or of appearFelicis PP. III. Epist. vii.
o Concil. Eliberit. can. 3, 10, 13. —Concil. Ancyrens. can. 21.
Concil. Venctic. ann. 465, can. 13.
PRIMITiVE DISCIPLINE. 245
ing as witnesses;' and guilty prelates took advantage of
this by excommunicating their clergy, to shield themselves
from prosecution, so that it became necessary to provide a
sort of temporary absolution in such cases to procure testimony against bishops who had thus disabled those who
could convict them.2 Not only was marriage prohibited
during penitence,3 but even all connubial intercourse between husband and wife,4 so that, with profound respect
for the rights of both parties, neither could be admitted to
penitence without the consent of the other.5 The penitent,
moreover, was forbidden to bring suit-he was not allowed
the privilege of refusing to appear as defendant, but lie
must not act as plaintiff. This of course cut him off from
all legal defence of his civil rights; but in cases of peculiar
hardship Leo I. astutely suggested that he might be allowed
to appeal to the ecclesiastical tribunals.0 He was likewise
prohibited from rendering military service, and it was even
doubtful whether he could transact business. Leo I. hesitates to enforce this latter regulation, but suggests that
the penitent had much better suffler loss than risk the sin
that is almost inseparable from trade.7 The two or three,
or ten or twelve years spent in penance were evidently not
a pleasant portion of a sinner's life, and as the penance
had to be applied for voluntarily, it is no wonder that an
alternative so fearful as expulsion from human society was
found necessary as the alternative to coerce the recalcitrant.
In many respects, moreover, the penitent when readmitted to communion was not restored to his original condi-' Concil. Constantinop. I. ann. 381, can. 6.-Cod. Eccles. African. can.
128.
- See the case of Ibas of Edessa, ap. Chr. Lupi Append. ad Ephesin.
Latrocin. (Opp. II. 223).
3 Concil. Arelatens. II. ann. 441, can. 21.
4 Siricii PP. Epist. I. cap. v. (Harduin. I. 848).
5 Concil. Arelatens. II. can. 22.
6 Leon. PP. I. Epist. CLXVI. Inquis. 10.
Ibid. Inquis. 11, 12.
21*
246 EXCOMMUNICATI O N.
tion. When the church had once condemned a man, the
mark set upon his brow was indelible, and no subsequent
repentance or expiation could wholly efface it. God might
forgive him wholly and freely, but God's ministers were
not so placable. Any one, whether clerk or layman, who
had once been forced to pass through a course of penitence, became thereafter ineligible to holy orders, and a
bishop knowingly ordaining such a manl forfeited the
power of ordination.1 Hie was likewise, if belonging to the
military profession, forbidden to return to it;2 and the
inquiries made of Leo I., by Rusticus of Narbonne, show
that doubts were even entertained whether it was lawful
for an absolved penitent to engage in business or to marry.3
On this latter point Leo prudently replies that it would be
better for a man who had assumed to undergo penitence
to remain for life chaste in mind and body; but that, if he
fears that youthful ardor may lead him into sin, and therefore takes a wife as a precadtion, the transgression may be
regarded as venial. All this was doubtless intended for
the health of the souls of the faithful, but its efficacy was
quite as great in extending the authority of those who had
so absolute a control over the lives of their fellow-creatures.
The questions connected with the granting or withholding of death-bed communion involved considerations of
more tremendous import. When man assumes to place
himself between his Creator and his fellow-beings, and to
wield, without appeal, supreme authority over eternal life
and death, the contrast between his finite intelligence,' Siricii PP. I. Epist. 1, cap. xiv.-Concil. Roman. ann. 465, can. 3.Gelasii PP. I. Epist. v. cap. iii.-Statut. Eccles. Antiq. can. 68.' Leon. PP. I. Epist. CLXVII. Inquis. 12.
3 Ibid. Inquis. 11, 13.-From a passage in this it is evident that penitence
was sometimes assumed in times of danger or calamity, as an act of propitiation, in the same way that pilgrimages, and other pious performances, were
vowed in subsequent ages.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 247
obscured by human passions, and the infinite power to
which he aspires, would be ludicrous if it were not revolting. To make the salvation of a living soul dependent
upon the ministrations of a fallible fellow-creature, to be
withheld at his caprice, or lost through his malevolence, or
ignorance, or supineness, would seem to be an imposture
too gross for the most fatuous credulity; and yet it has
been for fifteen hundred years, and still is, the belief of a
majority of those who profess faith in their Redeemer, and
in the doctrine of the Atonement. When, in enlightened
France, within a few years, we have seen a priest on his
trial for murder, because in his ignorant zeal he performed
the Coesarian operation, and thus destroyed both mother
and child in the effort to save the unborn babe by the
water of baptism, we can hardly be surprised that in former
ages doctrines so monstrous found ready acceptance in the
minds of all.
The good fathers of the council of Elvira had a stiffnecked generation to deal with, and they doubtless felt
that, in their zeal for the enforcement of morality, they
were merely exercising, under the influence of the Holy
Spirit, the power intrusted to them by Christ, yet they
designated no less than fourteen offences for which the
transgressor was to be cut off fiom all hope of salvation
by refusing him communion even upon his death-bed.
Jesus had pardoned the thief upon the cross, and the Apostle had said, "Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil
with good.... love is the fulfilling of the law" (Romrans
xII. 21, XIII. 10), but those who assumed to speak in His
name, and to act as His direct agents, proclaimed that no
amount of repentance, no subsequent reformation and lifelong remorse could wash out sin, and merit salvation for
a woman who had left her husband and married another;
or for a priest who did not separate himself from an adulterous wife; or for a man who brought a false accusation
248 EXCOMMUNICOATION
against a bishop or priest, and who failed in his proof.'
For these and for many kindred offences the sinner was
cut off in this world and rejected in the next. Christ
had intrusted his ministers with the power to bind and to
loose on earth and in heaven, and they exercised this
authority by giving or withholding the sacraments, of
which they possessed the exclusive control; nor was there
any possible tribunal to which an appeal could be carried
against their decisions, for they spoke in the name and
with the assent of the supreme and omnipotent God.
That men believing themselves armed with so tremendous and fearful a power should exercise it so recklessly,
seems incredible, and yet unfortunately the facts exist
to show beyond the possibility of doubt that those who so
acted were possessed of that belief. The man who died
excommunicate and unreconciled was damned beyond the
hope of redemption. It is true that if he had been admitted to penitence, and had been zealously seeking to merit
forgiveness, and was suddenly cut off by shipwreck or
other unforeseen accident at a distance from priestly aid,
then the church indulged in some doubt as to his perdition. He might possibly be saved, but the presumption
was against him, and his name might not be included in
the prayers of the faithful, for if God had willed his salvation, he would not have been condemned to die afar off from
the saving viaticum2 —though, it is true, some authorities
shrank from so cruel a practical application of the principles which all professed.3 For those not yet reconciled,
l Concil. Eliberit. ann. 305, can. 1, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 17, 18, 63, 64, 65, 66, 70,
7], 72, 73, 75.-Concil. Arelatens. I. ann. 314, can. 22.
2 Leon. PP. I. Epist. CLXVII. Inquis. viii.
3 Thus the fourth council of Carthage, in 398 (can. 79, 81), leaned to the
more merciful view of the matter, and the eleventh council of Toledo, in
675, alluding to the conflict of precedent on this point, concluded in favor
of reconciliation to the church (Concil. Toletan. XI. can. 12). So also did
the Concil. Vasens. I. ann. 442, can. 2.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 249
who expired within reach of ghostly assistance, and who
yet failed of the last sacraments, there was therefore no
hope; and the extreme severity, such as that of the council
of Elvira, which deliberately refused the communion to the
despair of the dying sinner, was rebuked by the less
rigorous portion of the church, not for assuming a power
which did not belong to the ministers of God, but for its
unmerciful abuse. In 428 Celestin I. expresses his horror
at the impiety of those who coldly refused to grant the
entreaties of the dying, and to relieve them of the weight
of the sins that would bear them clown to hell, thus cruelly
killing the soul, and adding a second death to that of the
body.l
The practice of the church, therefore, was by no means
uniform in the exercise of its awful prerogatives. Cyprian mentions that some bishops of his day, as we have
seen them subsequently do, refused to allow penitence or
a chance of forgiveness to adulterers. He himself considers this contrary to the precepts of Christianity; but at
the same time he decides that sinners who have not sought
for penance during health, cannot be listened to when the
approach of death warns them to prepare for the judgmentseat; for he who has lived without thought of death, is not
worthy to be forgiven in death.2
This extreme rigor declined somewhat in time, and the
great council of Nicsea condemned it by restoring the
primitive rule which forbade the viaticumn to be denied to
any one demanding it on his death-bed.3 This view became generally adopted, and is laid down by Siricius about
the vear 385, by the fourth council of Calthage in 3985, by
Innocent I. in 405, by Leo I. in 452, and by the eleventh
I Ccelest. PP. T. Epist. Iv. cap. 2.
2 Cyprian. Epist. 55, cap. 21, 23 (Ed. Oxon.).
Concil. Nicen. I. can. 13.-." Etiamnunc lex antiqua regularisque servabLitu1r."
250 EXCOMMUNICATION.
council of Toledo in 675.1 Yet we have just seen that a
hundred years after the authoritative declaration of the
most venerable first general council, the epistle of Celestin I. shows that its commands continued to be disregarded notwithstanding the efforts made in the interval to
abrogate the abuse. The temptation to employ to the
utmost a power so absolute over their fellow-men was too
much for frail humanity. If God had deigned to share
His authority with His creatures, He had not seen fit to
accompany the grant with the grace requisite to its proper
exercise; and it was, perhaps, some recognition of the
awful responsibility attaching to this power, as well as the
desire to extend the control of the church beyond the
grave, that led to the adoption of the doctrilie of Purgatory-an intermediate state of probation, in which the
sentence of the condemned could still be revoked, and the
deficiencies of the death-bed be made good by prayers or
sacrifices offered on earth. An instructive illustration of
this is to be found in a story related of himself by Gregory
the Great. While he was yet abbot of the monastery of
St. Andrew, three pieces of gold were found, belonging to
one of his monks, then lying in mortal sickness. So gross
a violation of the vow to possess nothing except in common, could not be passed over without exemplary chastisement, and Gregory ordered that all the consolations of
religion should be denied to the dying man, and that when
dead his corpse should be buried in a dung-hill, without
funeral rites. A month after the death of the unhappy
wretch he relented, and commanded that for thirty days
the sacrifice of the Eucharist should be daily offered for
the salvation of the defunct. At the expiration of that
time the spirit of the departed appeared to his brother,
and stated that he had been in torment until that day,' Siricii PP. Epist. I. cap. 5.-Concil. Carthag. IV. ann. 398, can. 76,
77.-Innocent. PP. I. Exsuperio Tolosan. cap. ii.-Leon. PP. I. Epist.
cvmII. cap. 4.-Concil. Toletan. XI. ann. 675, can. 12.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 251
when he had at last been blessed by being admitted to
communion. In coldly recording this solemn warning,
Gregory seems to manifest no sense of the friightful responsibility attendant on the power of thus regulating at
his caprice the salvation or damnation of a human soul.'
All men were not so lenient as Gregory, and indeed there
were other differences besides those already mentioned as
to the employment of these awful prerogatives. The complete reconciliation of the sinner required the sacrament of
penitence, including the imposition of hands by a bishop.
In the sudden emergency of death it is evident that the episcopal ministration could not always be at hand, giving rise
to nice questions as to what was to be done in its absence;
yet a canon of the council of Elvira adopted to settle this
point shows the confusion existing by giving, in the readings of different MSS., instructions diametrically opposite
-one of them insisting on the interposition of a bishop, or
at all events of his authority, while another directs that a
priest, or even a deacon, in cases of necessity, can administer the viaticum to the dying sinner.2 In this conflict of
opinion, we find that the second council of Carthage, in
390, reduces the chances of salvation by directing that the
priest appealed to for absolution by a dying sinner in the
absence of his bishop shall seek that functionary for orders
before granting the request.3 Fortunately, in the African
Gregor. PP. I. Dialog. Lib. iv. cap. 55.-This work of Gregory's shows
us the commencement, in his time, of the belief in a definite condition of
temporary purgation, accessible to the efforts of the church. After relating
various marvellous visions, and other manifestations tending to the establishment of the doctrine, he is asked by his interlocutor why, in these latter
times, so much is revealed to man concerning the future life, which had previously been concealed -" Quid est hoc, queso, quod in his extremis temporibus tam multa de animabus clarescunt qum ante latuerunt?'" To this
Gregory can only give the answer, that, as the end of the world was approaching, our nearness to the world to come rendered its manifestations
more appreciable (Ibid. cap. 40, 41). This belief in the impending destruction of the earth is elsewhere expressed not infrequently by Gregory.
2 Concil. Eliberit. can. 32. 3 Concil. Carthag. II. ann. 390, can. 4.
252 EEX CO MMUNICATIO N.
church of the period, bishops were almost as plentiful as
priests were elsewhere; and possibly the practical inconvenience of such a rule in the larger dioceses of Gaul may
be the reason why the first council of Orange, in 441, decreed that the imposition of hands was unnecessary for the
reconciliation of the dying penitent.l Even in the African
church the interposition of the bishop could not always
have been insisted on, for in 397 the third council of Carthage permits by implication, in cases of pressing necessity,
the absolution of a penitent by a priest whose bishop is
absent;2 and in 398 there is a canon providing that when
a dying man asks to be admitted to penitence, and the
priest on arriving finds him speechless and insensible, the
evidence of those who heard his request shall be sufficient,
and the priest shall open for him the gates of heaven by
pouring the Eucharist down his unconscious throat.3 It
would be difficult to conceive a more complete usurpation
of the divine right of judgment and pardon.
While this death-bed communion washed off all stain
of sin from the soul which sought the judgment-seat of
God, and was amply sufficient' for the tribunal of heaven,
it was remarkable in this that it was insufficient for the
tribunal of man, if the soul was so unihappy as to remain
on earth. Dying siiners sometimes recovered unexpectedly,
and naturally enough supposed that that which had been
assumed to be enough for God might be held to satisfy the
claims of the ministers of God. In this they were mistaken. The church was not disposed thus to abandon its
claims upon its penitents, and nearly all the canons quoted
above contain a clause providing that, in case of recovery,
Concil. Arausican. I. ann. 441, can. 3.
2 Concil. Carthag. III. can. 33.
3 Concil. Carthag. IV. ann. 398, can. 76. In the eighth century, this
proceeding is commanded by Gregory III. (De diversis Crimin. et Remed.
cap. xxxi.) and in the eleventh century by Burckhardt (Decret. Lib. xvIII.
cap. 10).
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 253
full penitence must be performed before the reanimated
sinner can be received again into full colmmunion.
Even those who died in the bosom of the church and
were dismissed with the saving viaticum were not always
safe from a power which extended to the uttermost regions
of the world to come. Their peaceful slumbers might be
broken by posthumous excommunication, and the Almighty
be notified that the zeal of His watchful agents could not
rest satisfied with the judgment that He might already
have pronounced. It is true that the power to bind and
to loose had been delegated only as to things on earth,
and so Gelasius I. decided, saying that the church had no
authority to determine as to the condition of those who
had already passed away, and in 495 a Roman synod confirmed his decision emphatically.' Leo I. in 432 had
already taken the same position, alleging that, for the
dead, God had already passed His judgment, which the
church could not subsequently modify.2 In 401, however,
the fifth council of Carthage had decreed that bishops bequeathing their property to heretics or pagans should be
anathematized after death;3 and a hundred and fifty years
earlier Cyprian chronicles the decision of a council which
deprived of all connection with the church those who in
dying should appoint an ecclesiastic to the guardianship
of their children. In those clays it was a crime to impose
secular cares on the ministers of the altar, and Cyprian
orders the sentence to be enforced in the case of a certainz
Geminius Victor who had nominated a priest named Geminius Faustinus as guardian.4 St. Augustine more than
once offered to the Donatists, in the name of the African
church, that, if they could prove the crimes alleged against
Cecilianus, he should be anathematized, though he had
1 Gelasii PP. I. Epist. 4, 11-Concil. Roman. II.
2 Leon. PP. I. Epist. 108, cap. 3.
Cod. Eccles. African. can. 81.
C4 yprian. Epist. 1 (Ed. Oxon.).
22
254 E XCOMM UNI CATION.
been dead a hundred years.' Theophilus, Patriarch of
Alexandria, actually excommunicated Origen after the
latter had been in his grave for two centuries,2 showing
how little dead sinners could rely upon perpetual immunity,
and that no statute of limitations ran against the rights
of the church, when defended by fearless and persevering
ministers. Such excommunications, indeed, must have
been of common occurrence, for St. John Chrysostom,
about 382, denounces them as an intolerable abuse. He
entreats his hearers not to undertake to decide on that
which God had already reserved for His own judgment,
and assures themn that they are preparing for themselves
the fires of hell.3
The question evidently was a debatable one, with little
prospect of positive proof on either side, but the case of
Theodore of Mopsuestia settled it, at least for a time, in
favor of the largest prerogatives of the church militant.
Theodore had been a bishop of the strictest orthodoxy, a
supporter of St. CJyril of Alexandria, and a zealous persecutor of the Nestorians both in his writings and his actions.
The council of Chalcedon had not doubted his doctrinal
correctness, but the progress of theology, in the course of
a century or more after his death, developed some heretical
tendencies latent in his writings, and the Emperor Justinian
resolved on his condemnation. Pope Vigilius did not attempt to defend the heretic, but stoutly maintained that
the church hacl inherited from the Apostles no power to
condemn any one whom God had taken to his own judgmenlt.4 When a pope and an emperor differed in those
days, it was the pope who had to succumb. The fifth
general council, held in Constantinople in 553, formally
Augustin. Epist. 185, cap. 1, ~ 4.-Epist. 141, ~ 6 (Ed. Benedict.).
Socrat. Ilist. Eccles. Lib. vII. cap. 45.
Chrysost. Iomil. de Anathemate.
4 Vigilii Constit. de Tribus Capitulis, —Cf. Ftecundi Episc. Ilermanicns.
Elpist. in Defens. Trium Capit.
PRT.ITIVE DTISCTPLINE. 255
anathematized not only Theodore of Mopsuestia, but also
all those who should not join in the anathema;l and by
personal ill-treatment Vigilius was forced to subscribe his
hand to the condemnation.2 To the Roman mind, these
proceedings were somewhat irregular, as conducted in spite
of the earnest protests of the Apostolic See, yet Gregory
the Great did not hesitate to acknowledge the acts of the
council as equal in validity and authority to those of its
cecumenic predecessors,3 and it has always been received as
such by the Catholic church. Still, the question of excommunicating the dead was not completely set at rest, but its
further discussion belongs to a period later than that which
we are at present considering.
The power to inflict a penalty so tremendous in its
consequences as excommunication was one not lightly to
be exercised by conscientious men; and, in the earlier
ages of the church, it was guarded and limited by certain
prerequisite formalities. The Apostolic Constitutions
strenuously urge upon the bishops the utmost moderation
and self-command in their dealings with offenders. Every
resource of fatherly exhortation and brotherly love and
kindness is to be exhausted in the effort to bring the sinner
to repentance before recourse is had to the censures of the
church.4 Even then there is to be no condemnation without the ffullest investigation and the evidence of two or
three witnesses, irreproachable in character and not suspected of animosity towards the accused. The bishop is
to have his priests and deacons as assessors; the evidence
is to be carefully sifted, and, if the charge is not sustained,
the accuser is to be punished as a calumniator. After a
careful and formal trial, the guilty man is to be again entreated in secret to repent, and if he still hardens his heart,
I Concil. Constantinop. II. cap. 12.-Cf Collat. viii. bid. Collat. vii.
Gregor. PP. I. Regist. Lib. I. Epist. 25.
Constit. Apostol. Lib. LI. cap. 23.
256 EX CO MMUNICATION.
the sentence is at length to be reluctantly pronounced
in the presence of two or three witnesses. The punishment to be inflicted is proportioned to the magnitude of
the offence, and only in extreme cases is excommunication
allowed. Even then, if the offender repents, he is to be
welcomed back with as much eagerness as a new convert
would be sought for among the heathen.l
In theory, at least, this continued to be the rule of the
church. A trial with not less than two witnesses was held
to be necessary. The third council of Carthage, in 397,
decreed that no ecclesiastic should be suspended friom
communion unless he disobeyed for two months a summons
to trial before his superior. If he neither appeared there
nor before the annual synod to have his cause investigated,
he was held to be self-condemned.2 The fifth council, in
401, modified this to some extent, in deference to a custom
by which churchmen were sometimes suspended for causes
klept secret, either for their own reputation or for that of
the church, and in such cases thev could demand a trial
within a year, failing in which they forfeited their right to
be heardcl.3 About the same period, St. Augustine declares
that no one could be excommunicated except for crime,
either voluntarily confessed or proved in a secular or ecclesiastical court;4 and this confession had to be public. for
in 419 the seventh council of Carthage declared that if a
bishop refused communion on account of a crime revealed
to him in confession, and the excommunicate denied it,
the other bishops should not regard *the sentence, but
should withhold communion from him who had pronounced
it, to teach him not to punish for that which he could not
1 Constit. Apostol. Lib. II. cap. 24, 41, 42, 47, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 50.
2 Concil. Carthag. III. can. 7, 8.
3 Concil. Carthag. V. can. 12.
Agustin. Serm. 351, ~ 10 (Ed. Benedict.) Cf. Innocent. PP. I. Epist.
VI. ~ 10.
PRIMITIVE DXSCIPLINE. 257
prove by evidence.l The council of Vaison, in 442, was not
quite so strict, and permitted, in such cases, the bishop to
decline joining in comulunion with the sinner, but allowed
the latter to enjoy communion with all the rest of the
faithful.2 The council of Niclea, moreover, had provided
an additional safeguard, by ordering a semi-annual synod
of all the bishops of each province, where all cases of excommunication were to be examined and confirimed, if
found justifiable-thus giving to the condemned a court
of appeal and revision.3
As the proceeding thus assumed the form of a regular
judicial process, other limitations and formalities necessarily arose which protected the accused. Both the fourth
council of Carthage and St. Augustine declare that no sentence could be pronounced in the absence of the culprit,
and the judge or bishop violating this rule was threatened
with prosecution4-though of course, as we have just seen,
this did not hold good in cases of contumacy, when
the accused refused to appear. This rule was emphatically
enforced by the council of Chalcedon, when Ibas, Metropolitan of Edessa, complained that he had been excomnmunicated in his absence by the Robber Synod of Ephesus,
and the assembled fathers promptly exclaimed that all
plroceedings in the absence of the accused were void.5
They had already proclaimed this general principle with
still more force when Eustatius of Berytus informed them
that hle had been excomnlmunicated by a synod recently held
in Constantinople, for resisting the division of his province
attempted in favor of Photius of Tyre. "' No one can condemn the absent," they shouted, and Eustatius was reinstated forthwith.6
Cod. Eccles. African., can. 132, 133.
2 Concil. Vasensis I. ann. 442 can. 8. C3 oncil. Nicen. I. can. 5.
4 Concil. Carthag. IV. ann. 398, can. 30.-Augustin. Epist. 43, cap. 3, ~ 11.
5 Concil. Chalcedon. act. x. (Harduin. II. 507).
6 Ejusd. act. Iv. (Ibid. p. 439).
22*
2.58 EX C O EMMUN ICATIO N.
Another approximation to established legal proceedings,
of much value to the accused, was the adoption of the lex
talionis, which provided for an unsuccessful accuser the
same penalty as that to which he had exposed the accused.
Under the Roman law, any one bringing an accusation was
required to inscribe himself, and run the risk, in case of
failure, of undergoing the punishment of the crime charged
in his indictment. This naturally found its way into ecclesiastical jurisprudence. Already, in the Apostolic Constitutions, it is provided that an accuser failing to prove his
case shall be punished as a calumniator; he is to be ejected
from the congregation as a homicide; if repentant, he may
be readmitted after long fasting, and pledging himself not
to repeat the offence; and if guilty a second time, he is to
be cut off without mercy.' The spirit thus imanifested
came naturally, in process of time, to assume the legal
form of the talio, and though this does not seem to have
been often enforced, it was nevertheless kept in view in
formal prosecutions. Thus, in 448, when Eutyches was
first accused of heresy in the synod of Constantinople,
the prosecutor, Eusebius of Doryvleum, manifested great
anxiety in the debate lest the charge should fail, and he be
involved in the fate which he expected for Eutychesdeposition and banishment to the great oasis of Egypt,
which was the customary place of relegation for troublesome ecclesiastics. So, in the next year, at the Robber
Synod of Ephesus, the monks of Eutyches make formal
complaint of their sufferings arising from the condemnation of their archimandrite, and demand that the talio he
enforced against the Patriarch Flavianus for bringing it
about.2 It is true that Flavianus and Eusebius were condemned not for this but for presumed Nestorianism, yet
at the council of Chalcedon we see the process rigorously
adopted, when the accusers of Dioscorus of Alexandclia
I Constit. Apostol. Lib. iI. cap. 47, 54.
2 Concil. Chalced. Act. I. MHarduin. II. 234-5).
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 259
were not admitted to a hearing until they had formally
inscribed themselves.'
Rules like these could be enforced in the political warfare between great sections of the church, where the prize
at stake was supremacy, and a defeated aggressor was
exposed to all that could increase or confirm the triumph
of his opponent. In the innumerable details of daily life,
however, such equitable provisions proved flimsy protection against the showers of excommunications by which
personal interests were to be gratified, or the purity of
faith preserved. It is true that those efficient instruments
of priestly tyranny in mediaval and modern times-the
ex certa scientia, the ex informata conscientia, and more
than all, the excommunication ipso facto, or lata sententia
-had not yet been invented; but their advent was foreshadowed by a remark of St. Augustine, that the discipline
of the church could always be administered when a crime
was notorious, and the criminal not powerful enough to
cause risk of dissension or schism.2 To admit such a
practice was an ominous abandonment of all the principles
which insured impartial justice to the friendless and the
wretched; and there is evidence enough that those who
claimed to be the delegates of Christ in binding and
loosing were already beginning to abuse theii power for
the gratification of worldly passions. In the disgraceful.
contests for supremacy between the leading churches the
anathema was employed as a sort of heavenly artillery for
mutual destruction, reckless of the devastation wrought in
whole provinces of the church, and the spirit in which it
was used is unfortunately often only too evident. When
the Apostles urged the Saviour to destroy the Samaritan
village which refused to receive them, He rebuked the revengeful spirit, saying, " For the Son of Man is not come
to destroy men's lives, but to save them,'" and meekly
Concil. Chalced. Act. III. (Ibid. pp. 322-6).
o Augustin. contra Epist. Parmenion. Lib. III. cap. 2, ~ 13.
260 E XCO M IMU NI CATIO No
turned to seek another resting-place. The church, which
believed itself to speak in the name and by the authority
of Him whom no insult or ill usage could move to anger,
sometimes found that the ordinary process of damnation
was too weak to satisfy its passions, and sought to give a
keener zest to the destruction of anll antagonist. Thus,
during the Monothelite quarrel, when, in 646, a political
revolution had banished Pyrrhus, the Patriarch of Constantinople, firom his see, and he took refuge in Rome, he
recanted his heresy, but relapsed on proceeding to Ravenna. The holy rage of Pope Theodore at this apostasy
could not be quenched by the usual formula of excommlunication. He assembled his clergy at the tomb of St.
Peter, and there launched the thunders of the church at
the unhappy heretic. Then, calling for the sacred cup, he
mingled some of the precious blood of the Lamb of God
with the ink wherewith he signed the sentence which consigned Pyrrhus to degradation and perdition. In 869 the
same hideous device was adopted at the council of Constantinople in the quarrel between Photius and Ignatius.
-Ignatius was reinstated in the patriarchate for a time? and
Photius deposed and excommunicated. The sentence
which condemned Photius and degraded all whom he had
ordained was signed by the assembled bishops with ink
containing the blood of the sacrifice.' Knowing the veneration felt at the time for the elements of the Eucharist,
we might hesitate to believe that such profanation was
possible. if it were not that nothing is sacred from the
wrath of an angry churchman.
It was not, however, only in the strifes which shook the
Christian world that the power to bind and to loose was
shockingly abused. In the minuter ambitions and conflicts
of daily life the control of the Eucharist was employed as
an efficient weapon, and was degraded until there was
Chr. Lupi Dissert. de Sexta Synodo cap. v. (Opp. III. 25.)
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 261
danger that its power of exciting reverence might be exhausted. In his homily on the subject, which is an eloquent
plea for charity and love, Chrysostom sadly declares that
the anathema was distributed around so copiously and so
ignorantly that the very Pagans made of it a mockery for
the Christian faith; and its use had become so general that
to say that such a one had been excommunicated for a certain act excited no more attention than if it had been said
that he had paid his devotions to God. Chrysostom himself does not appear to doubt the power to damn without
appeal, however much that power might be abused, but St.
Augustine was more independent when he declared that if
the name of a Christian was written in the book of life, it
mattered little whether human ignorance struck it off from
the diptychs of the church.2 This was not orthodox, as
may be seen by an epistle of Leo the Great reproving in
the West the same abuses which Chrysostom denounced
in the East. Writing to the bishops of Gaul in 445 he
asserts that he has known men deprived of communion for
light and careless words, and the souls for which Christ
had shed His precious blood delivered helpless to Satan
by a penalty which should be reserved for the gravest sins,
and should only be applied with grief and unwillingness,
not recklessly administered at the pleasure of an angry
priest.s Well meant exhortations such as these, however,
only recognized the evil without curing it; and there seemed
a risk that the misuse of the power of excommunication
might at length deaden the souls of men to its influence.
It was about this period that St. Arsenius was forced to
adopt the policy of separating from the church only old
men whose lively dread of perdition rendered tlhem amen~able to the censure, for he had found by experience that in
the flush of youth sinners were only hardened by it and' Chrysost. Homil. de Anathemate, cap. 1, 2.
S. Augustin. Epist. 78, ~ 4 (Ed. Benedict.).
Leon. PP. I. Epist. 10, cap. 8.
262 E XO MMU NCAT T O No
rendered less susceptible to repentance.l Few ecclesiastics
were so cautious as Arsenius, and the continued growth of
the evil at length called for the interposition of the civil
authority. Human nature could not be expected to wield
with moderation the irresponsible powers claimed by the
church, and the state, in self-defence, was obliged to interfere and assume the control of the sacraments of which
the church had always boasted the exclusive guardianship.
In 541, Justinian accordingly promulgated an edict forbidding all bishops and priests from excommunicating
any one without a regular trial in accordance with the
ancient rules. In cases of contravention of this law the
excommunicate was to be restored to communion by superior ecclesiastical authority, and the excommunicator was
himself to be suspended, under the operation of the lex
talionis, for the same length of time as that to which he
had condemned his victim.2 Under a prince so powerful
as Justinian, this might be attempted, but in the West, as
has been seen in a preceding essay, the revolution which
eventually left the church supreme had commenced long
before.
Exclusion firom communion was not a mere local disability, which could be evaded by emigration from one
diocese to another. The sinner was under the ban of a
Divine law, which operated everywhere, and at an early
period measures of police were adopted by which the sentence of a bishop in further Spain had as much force on the
banks of the Euphrates as at home. No stranger, whether
coming to reside or passing on his way as a traveller,
could be admitted to communion without exhibiting litterw
formalta or commnendatitia friom his bishop, showing him to
be in full communion at home. All bishops were strictly
Socrat. Hist. Eccles. Lib. iv. cap. 23.
N lovell. 1223, cap. xi.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 263
interdicted from absolving the excommunicates of their
brethren, and the rule was universal that the sentence
could be reversed only by him who had plonoutnced itj
except where superior authority existed, as in the synods
created by the council of Niciea for the purpose.
As early as the Apostolic Canons and Constitutions, we
find that -these commendatory letters were fully in vogue,
but also that shameless reprobates had already begun to
take advantage of the system, rendering extreme caution
requisite to avoid imrposition in receiving those which were
forged, or improperly obtainedl-a fact confirmed by the
council of Elvira in 302.3 The council of Antioch repeats
the rule in 341, showing that it was not properly observed,
and adds that only bishops and chorepiscopi could give
general letters, priests being restricted to recommending
their communicants to the bishops of the neighboring
dioceses.4 Notwithstanding the antiquity of these regulations, the first council of Carthage in 348 insists on the
production of such letters in terms which seem to show
that the custom had not been generally observed in the
African churches, and that its enforcement was necessary
to render the sentence of excommunication respected.5
The prohibition of the reception of excomimunicates by
other bishops was repeated with a frequency and vigor
Canon. Apostol. can. xxxiii.-Concil. Eliberit. can. 53.-Concil. Arelatens. I. ann. 314, can. 16.
2 Canon. Apostol. can. xiii. xxxiv.-Constit. Apostol. Lib. II. cap. 62.
3 Concil. Eliberit. ca.n. 58. In the appendix to Marculfus (Formul. No. 12Baluz. II. 304) and in Gratian (P. I. Dist. lxxiii.) will be found the devices
adopted to prevent fraud. The letter was to be headed with the Greek letters wr, v, zc, cc, being the initials of the Trinity, in whose name it was written.
These were repeated at the foot, followed by the initials, also in Greek, of
the writer, the party addressed, the bearer, the city whence written, and the
indiction. If the trouble existed in an age of civilization, it of course must
have increased enormously in the ignorance of the dark ages, when excommunication had become as common as education was rare.
Concil. Antioch. can. 7, 8. 5 Concil. Carthag. I. can. 7.
264 E Xx o MMU N I C AT I O N.
which show how difficult its enforcement was found.1
Various penalties were devised for the prevention of the
abuse. As early as the third century, Cyprian declared
that those who thus joined themselves to the guilty should
not be separated in the punishment.2 The general expression was that they should share in the excommunication;3 though the second council of Carthage is more
precise in specifying for them the penalty of the crime for
which the excommunicate had been condemned.4 In the
form of excommunication used by Synesius we find that
after warning all ecclesiastics to hold no intercourse with
Andronicus and Thoas, he winds up by threatening-"- And
if any one contemns the church of our little city, as though
it were needless to respect the poor, let him know that he
divides the church which Christ made one. And whether
he be deacon, or priest, or bishop, we will hold him as we
hold Andronicus, for never will we take the hand or sit
at the same table-much less partake of the sacred mysteries-with any one who has aught to do with Andronicus
or Thoas."'5 This is mildness, however, compared with the
ferocity manifested by Gelasius I. in his quarrel with the
church of Constantinople over the excommunication of the
Patriarch Acacius. Acacius had been orthodox, though
tolerant, and as the Emperor Zeno was laboring earnestly
to heal the dissensions arising fiom the Nestorian and
Eutychian heresies, he had not refused to join in communion with those who professed these heterodox dogmas.
For this he had been excommunicated by Rome; and when
his successor, Euphemrius, entreated Gelasius to remove' Concil. Nicoen. I. can. 5.-Concil. Sardicens. can. 16.-Synod. Roman.
ann. 384 ad Gallic Episcopos, can. 14, 15.-Concil. Taurinens. ann. 401, can.
7.-Innocent. PP. I. Epist. II. cap. 7.-Concil. Arausican. I. ann. 441, can.
11.-Felicis PP. III. Epist. vII. etc.
2 Cyprian. Epist. 67 (Ed. Oxon.).
3 Concil. Antioch. can. 2.-Statut. Eccles. Antiq. can. 73.' Concil. Carthag. II. can. 7. 5 Synesii Epist. 58.
PRI I T IVE D I S C I LINE. 265
the separation which existed between the churches, the
latter angrily replied: "This would not be stooping to
support the church, but manifestly to plunge into hell.. Was he not, by communing with the successors
of Eutyches, liable to the same fate? And of such it is
written,' Living they descend into hell!',,1
These regulations established an efficient system of
police throughout the church, and organized it as a body
independent of the state. Notwithstandinlgg their occasional,
or even frequent, infraction, ill the vast majority of cases
they rendered the impenitent excommunicate an outcast,
who could associate only with Pagans or heretics. After
the conversion of Constantine the former rapidly dwindled
in numbers, while the latter were soon reduced to a position
endurable only by men who felt that they were suffering
for conscience' sake. As the church was coterminous with
the empire, and as the empire embraced all that was then
considered the civilized world, there was thus no rest for
the disobedient Christian save in recourse to the tender
mercies of the Barbarian. Even this fearful alternative,
however, was often preferred to the endless torments of
existence under the ban of the church; and this may perhaps explain why nearly all conversions to Christianity
among those not subject to the imperial authority were
conversions not to orthodoxy but to heresy —why the
Goths and Vandals and Burgundians were Arians, why
the Christians of Central Asia were Nestorians, and those
of Abyssinia Eutychians.
It was easy under such a code of discipline to break
down the resistance of individual offenders, and to reduce
to obedience the most recalcitrant of believers who were
accessible either to the hopes of ambition in this world or
the fears of perdition in the next. But a different problem
1 elasii PP. I. Epist. 1 (IIarduin. II. 881)
23
266 E XCOOM MUNICATTON.
was presented in the case of those who conscientiously
differed from the majority on some point of faith or observance; who courted excommunication as martyrdom in
the cause of truth, or who themnselves withdrew from communion as from contamination; and who were sufficiently
numerous to establish congregations of their own, with
priests and bishops, where they administered the Eucharist
among themselves with a satisfaction peculiarly exasperating to the orthodox. In such cases the ordinary ecclesiastical censures were of course powerless, but the church
was not therefore obliged to abandon the flock to the
ravages of the wolves. Constituted as it was under the
care and protection of the state, the latter was bound, as
the supreme authority, to supplement its powers when
required for the maintenance of discipline or the purity
of faith. Constantine controlled the sacraments, as he
showed when, deceived by the cunning of Arius into the
belief that that archll-heretic was orthodox, he ordered
Alexander, Bishop of Constantinople, to admit him to
comm union, and the scandal was only prevented by the
sudden and fearful death of the heresiarch while on his
way in triumph to the church where the trembling bishop,
not daring to refuse, awaited his advent.l It was therefore
the duty of the sovereign to preserve the purity of the
sacrament and the unity of the church, and the church
found little difficulty in procuring from the orthodox
emperors whatever legislation seemed requisite to effect
this purpose. The history of persecution is too vast a
subject to be treated here in detail. Suffice it to say that,
with the exception of Constantius, who was an Arian, and
J ulian, who was a Pagan, every Emperor, from Constantine
to Valentinian III., has left endcluring evidence of his zeal
for the suppression of heterodoxy. The Theodosian code
alone has preserved sixty-six edicts, promulgated in little
Socrat. lIist. Eccles. Lib. I. cap. 25.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 267
more than a hundred years, which inflict on those who hold
aloof from the communion of the church every variety of
disability and penalty, fiom the suppression of their religious assemblies to the last resort of capital punishment.1
This alone was wanting to place in the hands of the
hierarchy absolute command over the souls and bodies of
men. Within their communion there was obedience, without it persecution; and the Christian had but the choice
between submission and outlawry. In theory, their power
knew no limit, for they spoke in the name of the Most
High, and practically it was only limited by the autocratic
constitution of the empire, the supremacy of which they
were not as yet prepared to seriously contest. In a sphere
continually widening, they combined the legislative, the
judicial, and the executive functions, for they were at once
the framers, the expounders, and the ministers of the law.
As the church was essentially theocratic, and its discipline was based upon the idea that the supernatural
prerogatives conferred upon its ministers preserved them
from abusing their sacred functions, its organization was
of necessity despotic, excommunication being the weapon
ever at hand to enforce subordination. As early as the
Apostolic Constitutions we find the bishops, priests, and
deacons all intrusted with the power of excommunicating,
the only limitation being that they could not exercise it
upon those higher than themselves in ecclesiastical rank.2
As the organization of the hierarchy grew more complex,
and additional grades were established, the bonds were, if
anything, drawn more tightly. There is extant a curious
set of canons in Arabic, passing under the name of those of
NTicea, and dating probably from the first half of the fifth
century, which embodies a detailed statement of the relations existing between the various grades of the hierarchy
and the laity. The patriarch was supreme within his own' Lib. xvI. Cod. Theod. Tit. v.
2 Constit. Apostol. Lib. vIII. cap. 24.
268 EXOOMMUNICATION.
boundaries, with authority to judge all the faithful, from
metropolitans to laymen, the council of the whole patriarchate being the only tribunal to which he was amenable.
No bishop could excommunicate a brother bishop, all controversies between them being referred to the patriarch.
No wrong could justify a priest in excommunicating a
bishop, and any priest or deacon resisting his superior was
cut off without mercy. Of course no layman could undertake to excommunicate an ecclesiastic; and if he made the
attempt, he was promptly removed from communion, and
not restored until he had satisfied his adversary by lengthened penitence and by embracing a monastic life. He who
was excommunicated, no matter how unjustly or improperly, was obliged to endure it patiently until absolved,
for excommunication lasted either until the death of the
sinner, or until he had confessed his fault and made due
submission.'
These arbitrary and irresponsible powers were never to
be allowed to rust for want of use. As the church assumed
that it had to answer for the souls intrusted to its charge,
it directed its officials to exercise over them the most
mninute and watchful supervision. The bishop was not to
wait for complaints to be brought before him of lapses
in faith or morals of his flock, but was to search out the
infected sheep, and either cure or eject them, lest they
should spread the disease to others; lie was to see that
the righteous preserved their righteousness, and that the
evil were brought to acknowledge and repent their transgressions.2 Thus, when Gregory Thaumaturgus heard of
the ill-deeds of the I'ontic Christians during an inroad of
the Barbarians, he at once ordered commissioners to be
dispatched thither, armed with ample powers to search out
the guilty and inflict on them condign spiritual penalties.3' Sanctum Patrum CCCXVIII. Const. xv. (Harduin. I. 503-4.)
2 Constit. Apostol. Lib. II. cap. 20, 21.-Cf. Sanct. Pat. CCCXVIII. ubi sup.
3 Greg. Thaumaturb. Epist. can. vi. (lHarduin. I. 196.)
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 269
How effective and how untranmmelled by form was this
authority is seen in a canon of the first council of Toledo,
held in 400, which provides that if a powerful man shall
despoil the poor, or the clergy, or monks, and when summoned by his bishop shall disdain to answer, notice shall
be sent to all the bishops of the province, who shall thenceforth hold him excommunicate until he shall submit and
make restoration.l The minuteness of this supervision,
moreover, is shown by the list of occupations which Chris-.
tians were forbidden to follow under pain of expulsion,
embracing not only pimps, procuresses, and prostitutes,
but also actors, charioteers, gladiators, racers, minstrels,
musicians, dancers, tavern-keepers, astrologers, and soothsayers, while soldiers were to promise to be content with
their pay, and abstain from plunderfing or inflictinll un-!
necessary injury.2 But one thing was required to render
this system complete in the control which the church
acquired over the individual, and that was found when the
practice of confession was introduced and enforced, which
occurred at a period comparatively early.3
Nor was it only by regulating the conduct of daily life
among the faithful that the church wielded power so immense. To him who represented the living God, and who
spoke in His name to enforce His laws, the ordinary distinctions of human rank were as naught. Compared with the
majesty of the Almighty, the infinite littleness of humanity
placed all men on the same level, and the proudest potentate was as much subject to the behests of the minister of
Christ as the meanest slave. Before the ineffable mystery
1 Concil. Toletan. I. can. xi. 2 Constit. Apostol. Lib. VIII. cap. 28.
3 I have not investigated the question as to the probable date in which
confession to priests became customary, but already in the year 400 the
council of Toledo (can. vi.) alludes to one of its evils which even then was
making itself felt; and in 416 an epistle of Innocent I. (Epist. I. can. vii.)
shows the system fully developed, the confessor having the power of absolution when satisfied of the contrition of the penitent.
23*
2 70 EX C O M MUNICATION.
of the Eucharist there could be no acceptance of persons,
and the poorest priest held in his hands the salvation of
the ruler of men. This opened to the church a sphere of
influence of which it was not slow to avail itself. Hardly
had Constantine proclaimed his faith by decreeing toleration for Christianity, when we find the council of Arles, in
314, arranging to bring under the direct control of the
church all those whose station gave them importance. It
orders that whenever any Christian is appointed governor
of a province, he shall take with him the customary letters
of communion to the bishop of his seat of government, who
shall exercise supervision over him, and promptly suspend
him from communion in case he shall contravene in any
respect the discipline of the church.l As Constantine, after
his conversion, would naturally seek to strengthen himself
against the Pagan party by intrusting, as far as possible,
all offices of influence to those who were united with him
in the faith, it is easy to see what enormous political influence was thus acquired by ecclesiastics, to be used for good
or ill, for the benefit of humanity or for their own aggrandizement and that of the church.
An instance of the practical power thus accruing to the
church is aflorded by the quarrel already referred to between Synesius of Ptolemnais and Andronicus, Governor
of the Pentapolis.. The latter, a cruel and sanguinary
tyrant, distinguished his rule by savage and lawless oppression. Synesius dared to interpose between the despot
and his victims, but his entreaties and exhortations were
alike unheeded. Finally Andronicus grew restive under
the reproaches of the one man who dared to resist him;
he posted on the church door of Ptolemais an edict closing
it to the faithful, and sacrilegiously boasted that his victims should not escape him, even if they were clinging to
the feet of Christ Hiimself. Whatever doubts Synesius
Concil. Arelatens. I. can. vii.
PRIMITIVE D I S CIPLINE. 271
may have felt as to his power to punish the crimes of the
governor vanished when the man thus dared openly to
beard the church; he hesitated no longer, and promulgated
the full sentence of excommunication against the impious
wretch. At once the haughty defiance of Andronicus gave
way; his friends interceded for him with Synesius, and it
was with difficulty that the latter consented to suspend the
sentence upon pledges of repentance and amendment.1 In
this, Synesius had an illustrious precedent of an excommunication launched not very long before by St. Athanasius against a wicked governor of Libya. The culprit
was a native of Cappadocia, and St. Basil, the metropolitan
of that province, on receiving the circular notification of
excommunication, wrote to Athanasius that no one in that
region should extend to the excommunicate the hospitality
of fire, water, or shelter.2
Even the supremacy of the imperial dignity, approachable by no other power, was not exempt from the jurisdiction
of the church. St. John Chrysostom declares that a manl
who approaches the Eucharist while unabsolved from sinl
is worse than one possessed by the devil, and as there can
be no exception to so general a rule he urges the ministers
of God to refuse it to all who seek it unworthily-" be he
a leader of armies, or a prefect, or even he who wears the
crown, for thou hast a power superior to his."3 This control over the master of the world, however, was rather
theoretical than practical. Constantius the Arian, baptized like his father only on his death-bed, was beyond the
reach of the anathema, as was likewise the pagan Julian,
and the orthodox emperors were surrounded by those who
were rather courtiers than ardent members of the church
militant. At length, however, a man arose whose commanding talents, unbending firmness, and unconquerable
1 Synesii Epist. 57, 58, 72, 89.
2 Basil. Epist. 57 (Ap. Baron. Annal. ann. 370, No. 92).
3 Chrysost. IIomil. 82 in Matt. cap. 6 [Migne's Ed. V. 964-5).
272 EXCOOMMUNICATION.
zeal fitted him to give the world a memorable example of
the superiority of spiritual authority over temporal power.
This was St. Ambrose, the noblest of the Latin fathers.
When the Emperor Gratian, in 383, was put to death by
order of the tyrant Maximus, Ambrose was sent as an
envoy to procure the body of the murdered sovereign. To
most men the mission would have seemed a delicate one,
but the prelate was not disposed to humble himself before
the emperor. Rising to the full height of his supremacy as
the vindicator of the prerogatives of the Most High, he
boldly reproached Maximnus with the crime which stained
him with his sovereign's blood; he excommunicated him,
and ordered him to undergo a due course of penitence if he
desired, for the future, the favor of God; and the pious
biographer and secretary of Ambrose assumes that the
defeat and death of Maximus, which, however, did not
occur until 388, were the direct result of his disregard of
the commands of the mall of God.1
Ambrose had already manifestecl the same contempt for
earthly dignity, when the cause of religion was at stake, in
refiusing to the Empress Justina and her son Valentinian II.,
on account of their Arianism, the use of a church in Milan
wherein to offer their impious devotions. The city was
orthodox, and blindly attached to its bishop. It was not
difficult to persuade the people that the bare toleration of
heresy was persecution of the true faith; and Ambrose, when
threatened for this contumacious resistance to the imperial
commands, responded by tumults which speedily caused the
courtiers and their masters to abandon the unholy design.2
With equal firmness he rebuked the youthful Valentinian II.,
when the latter gave signs of yielding to the Pagan party
in Rome, and of allowing them to restore some of their
Pa.ulini Vit. S. Ambros. cap. 19.-On a second mission to Maximus, in
387, Ambrose states that he refused to enter into communion with the
bishops of the tyrant's court.-Ambrose. Epist. xxIv. cap. 12.
2 Paulini op. cit. cap. 12-18.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 273
altars. Valentinian was as yet only a catechumen, and, not
being admitted to communion, could not be threatened with
excommunication, but Ambrose warned him that he should
be excluded froml the church itself. " You may enter the
church, it is true, yet there you will find either no priests or
those who will withstand you; and what call you reply to
him who shall say,' The church wishes no gifts from hands
like thine, which have aided in adorning the temples of the
false gods?',1
In the hands of a man of dauntless fervor like^Ambrose,
the power conferred by the control of the sacraments was
almost boundless, and the crowning proof of this was given
when he dared to suspend fiorn communion the Emperor
Theodosius the Great; and the world saw with wonder its
imperial master, in the full flush of his splendid victories,
bend submissively before the moral greatness of an unarmed
priest. The spectacle was indeed an impressive one, and
seemed to promise that thenceforth the gospel truths of
mercy and charity should reign supreme, and be at last
acknowledged as the rule of life. The same hasty temperamelit which led Theodosius to permit the slaulghter of
Thessalonica, rendered him equally prompt to deplore it,
and earnest in his remorse. Ambrose was swift to take
advantage of the situation, and he addressed the emperor
in language which must have sounded strangely in ears
accustomed to the slavish adulation of the imperial court.
" Thou art a man, and temptation comes to thee. Conquer
it. Sin is washed away only by tears and repentance.
Angels and archangels can do no more." The time was
not yet, nor was Ambrose the man to suggest it, when the
church's treasures of salvation were to be bought by
splendid'gifts to found monasteries and endow cathedrals.'" The living God, who alone can say I am with you, stays
his hand when we have sinned, only if we truly repent"1 Ambrosii Epist. xvII. cap. 13, 14.-Ejusd. de Obitu Valentin. Consol.
cap. 51.
24 E C O iECOMMUNI C A TION.
and he proceeds, not indeed formally to excommunlicate,
but in a deprecating way to intimate that he cannot admit
the emperor to communion. " I have no reason to be contumacious, but I have reason to fear, and I dare not offer
the sacrifice if you are present." Even this he seems to
feel it necessary to justify. by recounting a recent visiona vision which the character of the man forbids us from
stigmatizing as supposititious, and which was probably a
dream suggested to his ardent mind by pondering over thle
perplexities of the situation.'
However deferential Ambrose may have been in communicating his determination to the emperor, he was none the
less firm in maintaining it. He refused to allow Theodosius to enter the church until he should have performed a
public penance, and when the imperial culprit urged that
David had been guilty of adultery and homicide, he was
met with the reply that if he chose to imitate the Jewish
monarch in sin, he must likewise imitate him in repentance.2
In the splendid panegyric which Ambrose pronounced on
the death of his friend, he does not omit to recount how
" He laid aside all the imperial insignia. He publicly bewailed in the church the crime to which he had been
beguiled by the fraud of others, and prayed with sighs and
tears for pardon. The emperor was not ashamed, as so
many private citizens are, to undergo a public penance;
and until his death there was never a day in which he did
not bewail his fault."3
The somewhat theatrical account of the affair by Theodoret may reasonably be supposed to represent rather the
fancy of the historian than the sober outlines of truth, but
1 Ambrosii Epist. LI. cap. 11-14.'3 Paulini Vit. S. Ambros. cap. 24.
3 Ambros. de Obitu Theodos. Orat. cap. 34.-So delicate was the conscientiousness of Theodosius, that, as Ambrose relates (loc. cit.), when he
had defeated the tyrant Eugenius, he abstained from communion on account
of the slaughter of his enemies, until assured of the favor of God by the
arrival of his sons.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 275
both he and the cooler Sozomen assert that one of the
conditions imposed on Theodosius was the promulgation
of a law prescribing an interval of thirty days between the
rendering of a capital sentence and the signing of the deathwarrant, so as to allow time for revision and reflection; and
there is reason tojbelieve that such was the case.'
HIad the hierarchy been filled with men such as Ambrose,
and the secular power been always in the hands of conscientious Christians like Theodosius, the moral development of mankind might ere now have almost realized the
ideal of the Gospel. Unfortunately neither condition could
be fulfilled, and the splendid example was lost to mankind,
or at most only served as a precedent when Gregory VII.
or Innocent III. desired to break down royal resistance to
papal theocratic supremacy. At the same time it must be
observed that even Ambrose did not dare to enforce the
rules of the church against the imperial criminal. There
was no formal excommunication, no segregation of the
sinner from human society, no prolonged penitence, which
the canons of Ancyra order to continue for five or seven
years for involuntary homicide, and for life in cases of
voluntary slaughter.2 The emperor merely held himself
aloof for a few months, and then on making application
was restored to communion after undergoing a single act
of public penitence.
Such as it was, however, the firmness of Ambrose had no
imitators for centuries, and the highest dignitaries of the
church recognized too well their subordination to their
temporal masters to ildulge in any experiments of the
Theodoreti Hist. Eccles. Lib. v. cap. 18. —Sozomen. Hist. Eccles. Lib.
vII. cap. 24.-The law in question is found in both the imperial codes (Lib.
ix. Cod. Theod. Tit. xl. 1. 13, and Const. 20 Cod. Ix. 47), but it is attributed
to Gratian, under date of 382. Godefroi, however, after weighing the conflicting evidence, is inclined to believe that the date is erroneous, and that
the ecclesiastical historians are correct in attributing it to the influence of
St. Ambrose, at the time of the penance, in 390.
Concil. Ancyrens. can. 21, 22.
2Y6 EXCOMMUNICATION.
kind.1 So thoroughly was this established that even when
the imperial rule was subverted in Italy by the Barbarians,
the awe inspired by the diadem of Constantinople was still
too great to permit the popes to call the emperors to account for even the most flagrant misdeeds. Thus, when
the Eirperor Zeno endeavored to put an end to the quarrels between Eutychianism and orthodoxy by the Henoticon which enjoined mutual toleration, Felix III. in 484
promptly assembled a synod and pronounced the most
extreme sentence of excommunication against the Patriarch Acacius for obeying the edict and joining in corn-
munion with heretics, but Zeno, the real autlhor of the
impiety, was wisely spared.2 Felix, Acacius, and Zeno
passed away, but the quarrel continued between their successors as bitter as ever. Gelasius I. asserted the papal
prerogative more haughtily than any of his predecessors,
and when Euphemius of Constantinople applied for restoration of communion between the churches, he was repulsed
with curses unless he would consent to join in the excommunication of Acacius. This he was unable to do, as the
new emperor, Anastasius, was resolved to maintain the
toleration established by Zeno; but when Gelasius heard
that Anastasius deemed himself included in the anathema,
he hastened to write to his envoy Faustus that nothing
had been further from his thoughts or from those of his
predecessor, and he referred in proof to the letters of congratulation which had been promptly sent to the emperor
on his accession to the throne by Felix, and to those which
he had himself written on his installation in the chair of
St. Peter.3 The sovereignty of Italy was then fiercely disThere are extant epistles in which Innocent I. excommunicates Areadius and Eudoxia, for the persecution of St. John Chrysostom, and the emperor humbly solicits restoration (Migne's Patrol. T. xx. pp. 629-34), but
they are admitted on all hands to be forgeries-one of the innumerable
pious attempts to manufacture evidence that the church from the beginning
enjoyed all that it subsequently claimed.
2 Feiicis PP. III. Epist. vi. 3 Gelasii PP. I. Epist. iv.
PRIMITIVE DISCIPLINE. 277
puted between Theodoric the Goth and Odoacer the Heruliana and the siege of Ravenna was about to terminate in
favor of the former; but the distant power of Constantinople was still near enough to make Gelasius feel that
even this disclaimer to his legate was not sufficient, and
he addressed an humble and adulatory letter to exculpate
himself in the eyes of one who was maintaining the schism
by supporting and communing with excomimunicates.
While not yielding a jot in consigning Acacius and Euphemnius to perdition, and not denying the risk incurred by
the emperor of sharing their fate, he cannot do more than
implore him to beware of the divine judcgment: " I pray,
and entreat, and exhort you not to spurn my petition,
which is that you should rather listen to my entreaties in
this world than be exposed to my accusations in the next.
Be not, I pray you, angry with me if I so love you that I
would wish to assure you the perpetuation of your temporal sovereignty, and that you who govern in this world
may also reign with Christ. But I leave it to your own
conscience whether it is better that we should all acquire
certain life as I desire, or should be devoted to inevitable
death as they propose."'
The courage of Ambrose found more admirers than
imitators. The fate of Vigilius was not reassuring; and
it was not until the eighth century, when Leo the Isaurian
committed the unpardonable sin of image-breaking, that a
Ioman pontiffl' could summon energy to blast the imperial
purple with the withering censures of the church,
Gelasii PP.. I. Epist. viii.
24
278 EX COMM U NIC JCATION.
THE PAPACY.
In the practical development of the principles thus detailed, the church insensibly acquired an enormous power
over its individual members, and an almost dominant influence even in political affairs. Although the supremacy of the state was still admitted, yet the foundation
was laid for that mighty theocratic structuire which in after
ages was to overshadow all secular institutions with a
superiority as assured as that of heaven over earth. In
a religion of which the essence was the regulation of every
thought, every feeling, and every act of the believer, it
was impossible to clefine rigidly the bounds of spiritual
authority, which were capable of indefinite extension as
policy or ambition might dictate. Wre have seen that in
the earlier times the church was so careful to confine itself
to spiritual concerns that it was an unpardonable offence
to nominate an ecclesiastic as executor of a will or as
guardian of children, because it withdrew him to some extent from his proper sphere of action. When such principles prevailed there was comlparatively little danger that
the spiritual power conceded to the ecclesiastical body
would be abused for purposes of agg randizement, individual or general; but when the adoption of Christianity as
a state religion opened to the churchman a career of
worldly ambition, and when the gradual abasement of
the civil authority seemed to invite its replacement by a
theocracy, the primitive conscientious abstention from secular affairs was forgotten~ Insensibly the spiritual jurisdiction widened, and the reconstruction of society under
the Barbarians found the church in possession of prerogatives so elastic that, as opportunity offered, it was easy to
justify the appropriation of any desirable fragment of
power. Among believers, a very simple correlation of
THE PAPACY. 279
forces miglht transmute the authority to condemn or to
save into any other authority that might be wanted. As
early as the close of the fifth century, Gelasius could declare that " there is no sin so great but that the church can
pray for its remission; and, through the power granted to
her by God, absolve him who desists and repents."'l Who,
then, could presume to set bounds to the aspirations of a
body which might withhold the praver or dictate the
penance?
To render this awful power completely effective, however, required its concentration. As long as the autonomy
of the bishops or of the metropolitans was imaintained,
there were constantly clashing interests and a lack of inteiligent direction of the united power of the ecclesiastical
body towards a definite purpose. If the church was to obtain the temporal supremacy which her prerogatives placed
within reach, it was necessary that her efforts should be
directed by unity of purpose and concerted action, and
this could be accomplished only by the subordination of all
to one recognized head. It was the gracldual assumption of
this commanding position by the Holy See that enabled
the church to realize the full benefits derivable from her
control over the sacraments.
There were two principal instrumentalities through which
the supremacy of the representatives of St. Peter was secured-the appellate power authorizing the Bishop of Rome
to revise the sentences of other bishops by absolving their
excommunicates, and the original jurisdiction by which
they could expel from communion those who differed from
them on points of faith or discipline, or who resisted their
pretensions to domlination. The growth of the appellate
power has already been examined with some minuteness
in a preceding essay, and need not now be adverted to except by reminding the reader how it became established,
after a strug'gle which lasted for centuries. As reg'ards the
G elasii PP. T. Tomus de Analthernaltis Vin cilo,
280 EX COMMMUNICATION.
use of excommunication in asserting the supreme originll
jurisdiction of the Holy See, a few words, however, may
not be out of place.
In the organization of the early church there was nothing to prevent any bishop from refusing comlmunion to
any of his brethren whom he might deem to err in faith or
morals. If this action was sustained by the majority of
the churches, the victim was cut off, and if he persisted, he
might be held as a schismatic; while, if the excommunicator was felt to be in the wrong, he incurred the same risk.
For the first three hundred years all the evidence points
to this complete equality between the churches as represented by their several primates. For instance, in the
quarto-deciman controversy, respecting the computation
of Easter, the Asian bishops, under the lead of Polycrates
of Ephesus, maintained their right to celebrate the festival
on the fourteenth day of the moon instead of on Sunday.
Victor of Rome, becoming gradually heated and finding
his arguments fruitless, at length, about the year 190,
endeavored to cut off the Asian churches, and denounced
them as excommunicate on account of their heterodoxy.
For this he was rebukled by many leaders of the faithful,
notably by Irenueus.l His decree of excommunication was
disregarded, and the controversy was not decided until
authoritatively settled against the Asians by the council
of Nicama in 325, followed by that of Antioch in 341.2
A half-century later, Cyprian, in his controversy with
Stephen I. on the subject of the rebaptisim of heretics,
formally asserts this episcopal independence in his opening
address at the council of Carthage, held in 256 —' It remains for each of us to declare his opinion, judging no one
nor presuming to deprive any one of communion for difference of belief. None of us has constituted himself a
bishop of bishops, or has sought by the terror of tyranny
Euseb. Iist. Eccles. Lib. v. cap. 24-26.
Coneil. Antioch. can. 1.
TH -E PAPACY.? 81
to force his colleagues to subjection. In the exercise of
his free authority every bishop has the right of judg'ment,
and he can no more be judged by anothler than he can
judge another. Let us await the universal judgment of
Christ, who alone has the power of placing us over His
church and of judgilg our actions."'
While Cyprian was thus modestly firm, St. Firmilian,
Archbishop of Cappadocian Cesarea, could scarcely find
words to express his contemptuous indignation at the presumption of Stephen in excommunicatilng the Eastern
bishops for differing with him on this question. "I am
justly indignant at this open and manifest folly of Stephen,
who, puffed up by the location of his bishopric, presents
himself as the successor of St. Peter, on whom are built
the foundations of tile church, and brings in many other
stones and builds nmany additions to the church." Then,
addressing Stephen himself, he proceeds: " Truly you are
the worst of all the heretics, for when they, acknowledging
their errors, come to you for the true light of the church,
you add to their errors and increase the darkness of the
night of heresy by hiding the light of religious truth.
AiCnd, great as is your sin, you have still more exaggerated
it by cutting yourself off from so many churches. You,
I repeat, have cut yourself off. Do not deceive yourself,
for if he is a schismatic who apostatizes from the communion of ecclesiastical unity, you, while you think to excommunicate others, only succeed in excommunicating yourself."'2 This vehemlent and uncourtly assertion of equality
with Rome not only did not forfeit Firmilian's distinguished
Cypriani Opp. pp. 229-30 (Ed. Oxon.).
s Cypriani Epist. LXXV. cap. 17, 24, 25. Orthodox catholics have asserted
that this epistle is a forgery, interpolated by some Donatist of the fourth
century, and it was omitted in the Roman edition of Cyprian's works
printed by P. Manutins in 1563. It is given in a1 subsequent editions,
however, and Baluze states that it is contained in twenty-seven ancient MSS.
collated by himrself and previous editors. See his note, T. I. p. 1201, of
Migne's reprint.
24~J*
282 IEXC OMMUNICATI O N
position and influence in the Eastern church, but did not
prevent his enrolment in the catalogue of saints, and to
this day his feast holds its place of October 28th in the
Greek calendar.
The causes which led to tthe gradually increasing power
of the papacy, through its influence over the emperors and
the skilful use made of the dissensions of the Eastern
churches, need not be recapitulated here. As that power
grew, the artillery of excommunication increased in range
and efficiency, and, while it gave expression to the claims
made by Rome for supremacy, it aided largely in establishing those claims. Thus, when in the internecine strife
between Alexandria and Constantinople the former gained
a temporary ascendency by procuring the degradation and
banishment of St. John Chrysostom, the West stood boldly
forth in defence of the persecuted saint, excommunicated
the Eastern churches, and resolutely refused for eight years
to allow the restoration of unity, until Chrysostom should
be restored to his place on the diptychs, and be acknowledged as having been the legitimate Bishop of Constantinople until his death.' As representative spokesman for
the West, Innocent I. found ample opportunity during this
long quarrel to magnify the importance of his office. Thus,
in receiving back the church of Antioch, in 415, he speaks
with the caln supremacy of a master-" I have carefully
inquired whether all the conditions have been fulfilled with
respect to the case of the blessed John, that bishop worthy
of God, and on finding them, according to the statement of
the envoys, all met to my satisfaction, I have received the
communion of your church."2
The successive victories of Theophilus over Chrysostom,
of Cyril over Nestorius, and of Dioscorus over Flavianus,
gave to the see of Alexandria so great a preponderance
that it threatened to overshadow Rome herself, and even
Theodoreti Hist. Eccles. Lib. v. cap. 34.
T Innocent. PP. T. Epist. 19: Cf. Epist. 21, 22.
TIHE PAPACY. 283
to become independent of the imperial power. Rome took
the alarm, and endeavored to strengthen Constantinople
as her least dangerous competitor; but her legates were
treated with contumely at the Robber Synod of Ephesus,
and were utterly powerless to save the Patriarch Flavianus. Leo I., who then wielded the authority of St. Peter,
was not disposed to brook these insults; but when he
solemnly excommunicated Dioscorus as the author of the
troubles, the latter, secure in his overwhelming influence,
and strengthened by his relations with the imperial court,
boldly retorted the excommunication. A sudden change of
dynasty, however, transferred the sceptre from the hands
of the feeble Theodosius II. to Marcian, who, as orthodox
and emperor, was not disposed to encourage either Eutychianism or Alexandrian insubordination. The council of
Chalcedon found no difficulty in condemning Dioscorus.
As the council was nominally presided over by the legates
of Leo, and as one of them, Paschasinus, Bishop of Lilybceum, summed up the accusations against Dioscorus prior
to the vote condemning him, it is no wonder that his
audacity in excommunicating the Apostolic Bishop is enumerated among his crimes, though no mention is made of
it in the sentence itself.'
This defeat broke the power of Alexandria, and left
Rome and Constantinople face to face. The strife between
these rivals was bitter and prolonged, but to enter into its
details would lead us too far from our subject, and I need
only take note of the rupture which for thirty-five years
separated the communions of the East and the West on the
subject of the excommunication of the Patriarch Acacius.
When the Emperor Zeno, in his desire to still the dissensions arising from the monophysite heresy, which the
council of Chalcedon had utterly failed to suppress, issued
his Henoticon commandcing toleration, the orthodoxy of
ConciI. Chalced. Act. TI. (l-Iarduin. II. 343-78.)
9284 EX C OMM UNIATION
lRome was sadly disturbed. When, however, Peter Moggns
of Alexandria, presuminig upon the imperial indifference,
dared to anathematize the sacred decrees of Chalcedon and
the orthodox epistle of Leo, and to restore to the diptychs
of his church the names of Dioscorus and of Timothy.A lurus, and when Acacius was found to remain in communion with so bold a heretic, Rome felt that her patience
was no longer -a virtue. In 484, Felix III. assembled
around him a synod of sixty-seven bishops, and fulminated
against Acacius a decree depriving him of his patriarchal
office and consigoning him to hopeless perdition-; Know
that thou art set apart from all priestly honors, from
Catholic comm-union, and from the flock of the fiaithful;
that thou art deprived of the name and finctions of the
ministry of God, and damned by the judgment of the
Holy Ghost and the authority of the Apostle, never to be
released from the bonds of the curse!"' As Acacius was
supported by the favor of the emperor and.the good-will of
the Constantinopolitans, it was not easy to serve a notice
of this sentence upon him; but at last an ardent monk of
the sleepless monastery of Dios, noted for the violence of
its orthodoxy, was found to undertalke the dangerous office,
but even he only dared to accomplish it by an artifice,
which, when compared with the gravity of the missive, savored strongly of the ludicrous. Mingling -with the crowd
whlich surrounded the patriarch as he entered his church,
the monk succeeded in pining to his bacl the dangerous
document. Even thus, however, the audacious volunteer
was not successful in escaping detection, andi his monastery suffered, in the slaughter of many of its inmates, for
its share in the transaction; while Acacius promptly retorted by excommunicating Felix and his accomplices.2
Rome stood firm, for she had at stake not only the
purity of the faith, but all her own clainms to supremacy.
Felicis PP. III. Epist. vi.
Liberat. Breviar. cap. 18.-iNiceph. Callist. TI. E. Lib. xVI. cap. 17.
TIE PAPACY. 285
Felix and Acaciuss both passed away, but when Euphemihus,
the successor of Acacius, applied to Gelasius Io for a restoration of communion between their churches, it was
haughtily refused, unless he would consent to join in the
condemnation of his predecessor by striking his name from
the diptychs. Acacius had been of unquestioned orthodoxy, but he had not refused to join in communion with
heretics, and his sin admitted neither of extenuation nor
pardon. " Of such it is written,' They are plunged alive
into hell;' for while they seem to live the true and Catholic
life of the just, they suddenly seek the depths of depravity
or the hell of heretical communion.... Dying in his
treachery and damnation, his name can no more be included
in the services of the church than could the contagion of
his living communion."'
The quarrel went drearily on, depending for its issue
much more on the political relations of the imperial court
than on ecclesiastical considerations. Gelasius died in 496,
but his successors, Anastasius II., Symmachus, and Hormisdas, were equally inexorable. The Emperor Anastasius,
whose long reign extended to 518, sturdily supported the
policy of his predecessor. Though himself a believer inl
the council of Chalcedon, and though at times, when sorely
pressed by political complications, he eagerly sought a
reconciliation which would have been of the greatest value
to him, still he persistently refused the only terms which
Rome would listen to-the condemnation of the memory
of Acacius. At length he, too, died, and his throne was
seized by the fiercely orthodox Justin, who hastened to
make his submission to Hormisdas. The triumph of
Rome was complete. The authors and leaders of the
schism, orthodox and heretic alike, Acacius and Euphemius, Timothy _Alurus, Dioscorus II., and Peter of Alexandria, were promptly excommunicated by having their
names erased firom the sacred diptychs, and John the' Gelasii PP. I. Epist. i., vIII.
286 ElXOWI XCOMMUNICATIONe
Patriarch macde his peace by degrading himself in huml)le
obedience to the Apostolic See — I promise for the future
not to recite amid the holy mysteries the names of those
ejected fromn the communion of the Catholic churchthat is. those not agreeing in all things with the Apostolic See. And if in anything I shall endeavor to render
this my profession doubtful, I agree to submit to the
fate of those whom. I thus condemlno')" John did not
long survive this humiliation, and his successor, Epiphanlius, was obliged to admit the supremacy of Rome in the
mnost abject manner. He submitted for the approval of
Hiormisdas a declaration of faith; he solemnly declared
that he did not allow to'be read from the diptychls the
names of those whom Rome had condemned; and, as if
this was not enough, he had to call as witnesses of his'
sincerity the papal legates who had zealously enforced the
cominands of their master.2
This would seem to be sufficient, but a further triumph
was reserved for the policy or the fortune of Hormisdas.
Under Zeno or Anastasius, Rome would have been content
with the simple removal of the name of Acacius fi'om the
diptychs. Now she demanded that all who had remainecd
in communion with him and his successors, and had thus
contracted the contagion of Eutychianism, should be dcleclared excommunicate by the samle process. This was:
strictly logical, but difficult of execution, as it involved
the whole Eastern Empire. Justin vainly endeavored to
enforce it, but the innumerable churches of his dcominions
resisted the attempt to make them coinsign to perdition
such multitudes of venerable prelates whom they had
reverenced while living. With his nephew Justinian, then
consul, he wrote beseechingly to Hormisdas to spare them
1 Libell. Joannis inter Ilormisdmc Epist. (Migne's Patrol. T. LXIII. p. 444).
The signing of this pledge 7was Illmade a condition precedent to adlnission to
communion of all the Eastern bishops (I-Iomisdnm Epist. 51, Ibid. p. 460).
J Relntio Epiphanii (Ibid. pp. 494-5).
THE PAPACY. 281
the necessity of devastating their empire, as neither fire
nor sword, the certainty of torment, nor the fear of death,
could force the congregations, orthodox as they were, thus
to declare their pastors excommunicate.e Letter after
letter was sent, and one envoy after another, but Hormisdas long remained silent. At length he addressed to
Justin an epistle, full of unctuous professions of Christianity, in which the emperor was reminded that he had set
his hand to the plough, and that if he now looked back lie
was not fit for the kingdom. of God; and, not content with
kindling his orthodox zeal, Hormisdas stimulated the ilmperial pride by adroitly suggesting that those who would
not follow the examnple of their sovereign should be forced
to bend to his power. Still, even the pleasure of decimating the fairest provinces of the East in vindication of a
punctilio might be forborne in view of a substantial benefit,
and Hormisdas eluded the difficulty by appointing the
Patriarch Epiphanius his vicar to readmit to communion
those who had forfeited their right. The elaborate instructions with which he accompanied this grant of delegated
power were, if not intended, at least well adapted, to demonstrate that Rome held the keys of heaLven, and that
she alone could point out the path to salvation.' For the
Lime, Constantinople was thoroughly humbled. Her sacrarents were administered at the dictation of the Holy See;
her Patriarch was but the local representative of the Pope,
tnd Rome alone controlled the communion which was the
Christian's only hope of grace.
The proud boast of Gelasius, made thirty years before,,eemed to have received its fulfilment-" Everything is,ommitted to the decision of the Apostolic See. What the
lpostolic See affirms in its synods is to be received.; what
t rejects is to be rejected; and by itself it rescinds whatSee the letters among the Epistles of Hormisdas.
Hormaisdw Epist. 78, 80.
288 E XCOMMUNICATION.
ever is wrongfully decided by any synodical assembly."1
Yet Rome could not foresee how humbly, in little more
than a quarter of a century, she would submit to the denial of all her claims by the second general council of
Constantinople, after the prosperous reign of Justinian
had restored the imperial power; nor that the lonog silent
church of Africa would dare in 550 to excommunicate
Pope Vigilius for his cowardice in the affair of the Three
Chapters.2
The relations of the papacy with the East were thus
chequered until the latter half of the ninth century saw the
rivals separated in permanent schism. In the West, meanwhile, the church was beginning to rally, after the shock of
successive barbarian invasions, and. gradually to acquire
control over its new proselytes. The ecclesiastical organization participated largely in the dislocation of all the
relations of political and civil society, and the supremacy
which Rome had established with infinite pains became
well nigh overthrown. In the protracted effort to reconquer its power, the Holy See found, as before, its most
valuable instrument in its claim of supreme control over
the communion. The process is well illustrated by the
m anner in which Gregory the Great reduced to submission
Maximus, Archbishop of Salona.
On the death of Natalis, Archbishop of Salona (afterwards Spalatro), there was a quarrel over the succession.
Honoratus the archdeacon was elected and approved by
Gregory; but the imperial power, represented by the
troops, preferred Maximus, and a faction was easily formed
to place him in the vacant seat. According to the papal
writers, his reputation was not good —at all events, his
rival was recognized, and Gregory wrote to the bishops of
Dalmatia and Zara, prohibiting them from consecrating
him. Large bribes, it is said, induced them to disregardc
Gelasii Tomus de Anathernatis Vinculo.
2 Victor. Tunenens. Chron. ann. 550.
TIHE PAPACY. 289
this co-mmand, and Maximus was duly installed. Gregory
thenl summoned him to Rome for trial on the charge of
bribery. To this he demurred, asking that a commission
should be sent to Salona to examine into the affair upon
the spot; but to agree to this would have been to risk the
integrity of his envoys, and Gregory refused. Finding that
Maximus was nnyielding, Gregory forbade him to celebrate
mass, and then excommunicated him; but, supported by
the imperial power, the contumacious archbishop disregarded the papal censures, and for seven years maintained
his independent position. During this time, Gregory was
not idle. At first, but two of the clergy of Salona obeyed
the sentence, and abstained from communion with their
prelate, but Gregory attacked them with threats and exhortations; and he likewise threatened the bishops of Zara
andl Dalmatia with excoimmunication unless they should
withdraw from the communion of Maximus, and erase his
name from their diptychs. Terrified at this, they succumbed abandoned Maxilnus, and begged for pardon.
The only support of the recalcitrant archbishop now was
TMIarcellus, the proconsul of Dalmatia, to whom Gregory
then addressed himself, holding him responsible for the
continuance of the strife, and significantly warning him to
make his peftce with God. At length MaJarcellus, too, gave
way, and Maximus was reduced, in the year 600, to ask
the intercession of Callinicus, the Exarch of Ravenna.
The terms granted were- hard, yet Gregory represented
them as a special favor to the Exarch. Marinianus of
Ravenna, and Constantine of Milan, were appointed judges
to examine whether Maximus had acquired his see simoniacally, and whether he had persisted in saying mass when
he knew himself to be excommunicate. The investigation
was a pre-arranged comedy, to the effect that if Miaximnus
should deny, under oath, the guilt of simony, and should
clear hiniself on the relics of St. Apollinaris of the other
crinmes imputed to him, then Marinianus should prescribe
290 E X CO MMU NICATIO N.
the penance for his contulacy —and the understanding in
advance was shown by Castorius the notary bearing from
Gregory the instructions to Marinianus, along with a letter
of reconciliation to be delivered to Maximus after the performance of his allotted part. The penance inflicted was
not prolongedcl, but it was exquisitely humiliating. For
three hours Maximnus prostrated himself in the dust, exclaiminog, " I have sinned before God and the blessed Pope
Gregory," until raised by Marinianus and Castorius; and
then, in their presence, lie performec still greater penance.
HIe retained his see, but Rome had sharply vindicated her
supremlacy.'
THE CHURCH AND THE BARBARIANS.
Under Barbarian rule, the church found itself confronted
by a new series of problems. In the Pagan Empire, the
church consisted of pastors and people, with common interests and sympathies, exposed to the same evils, a,-nd
forming an indivisible whole. Under the Christian Emperors, the clergy, endowed with certain privileges, gradually found their personal interests diverging from those of
the populations who had been converted in masses. Though
technically the church of Christ might still be held to comprehend the laity, yet practically it consisted of the ecclesiastics, with whom naturally the advancement of their
order and the preservation and extension of its immunities
became the first consideration. This divergence between
the clergy and the people was rapidly developed by the
incursions and conversion of the Barbarians. There could
Joann. Diac. Vit. S. Gregor. Lib. IV. cap. 9-15. —Gregor. PP.. Regist.
Lib. v. Epist. 21. —Lib. vI. Epist. 25, 26, 27.-Lib. vII. Epist. 17.-Lib.
VIII.j Epist. 10, 24.-Lib. ix. Epist. 5, 10, 41, 67, 79, 80, 81.
THIE CHURCH AND TEIE BARBARIANS. 291
be little in common between the established clergy of Gaul,
for instance, and the untamed German hordes which presented themselves for Christianization and civilization;
and the antagonism naturally existing under such circumstances left its indelible impress on the character and policy
of the church. The priest who undertook parish duty amid
a clan of wild Frankish converts, however conscientiously
he imight labor for their salvation, could not but feel that
in the flesh they were possible enemies who might at any
moment drive him away or slay him; and the supernatural
prerogatives which, un der Roman civilization, were scarcely
required to enforce respect for his authority, became the
only weapons of self-defence upon which he could rely.
The Barbarian was a man of deeds rather than of words.
His laws were few and simple, and for the most part resolved themselves, in their ultimate analysis, into provisions for the payment of damages, which could be eluded
by an appeal to brute force. RIude as they were, the history of the times shows that these laws could easily be
brushed aside by any one with power and audacity sufficient to disregard them; and it can readily be imagined
how hopeless would be the application to the malluhm, or
court of freemen, by a clerk who wotld be regarded with
double contempt, as a Roman by his conquerors, and as a
man of peace by warriors emulous only of martial renown.
The attempt to escape this danger introduced a further cause
of separation between the clergy and their new converts.
As all law under the Barbarians was personal and not territorial, the church found little difficeulty at an early period
in obtaining for its ministers the advantage of living
under the Roman law, thus securing, nominally at least,
the privileges and immunities granted by the Christian
Emperors;' and in addition to this the safety of the orSecundum Legem Romanan qua ecclesia vivit. —i1. Ripuar. Tit. lviii.
~ 1. This privilege was extended to the Italian church as late as the ninth
century, by Louis-le-DNbonnaire —apit. ex Lege Longobard. (Baluz. I.
292 EXCO I MMUN IC ATION.
dained clergy was provided for by increased wehr-gilds, or
blood-money.L
Yet, notwithstanding these favors, the church was sorely
oppressed by the lawless warriors who found it easier to
pass enact-ments than to observe them or to enforce their
observance. In a previous essay we have seen some of the
means adopted to meet the necessities of this position, in
procuring special privileges with regard to tribunals, and
exemptions from ordinary processes of law. But, while
these concessions served to separate more than ever the
clergy from the laity, they afforded little practical protection from wrong and outrage. What was wanted was some
speedy process that should be prepared for every emergency.
Every fireeman relied on his sword and right hand for selfprotection. If the priest were not to be reduced into hopeless servitude, he too must have some ever ready weapon
like the freeman's sword, which would either prevent oppression by inspiring salutary fear, or avenge it on the
spot.
The only weapon available for these purposes was to be
found in excommunication. By heightening the supernatural attributes of the priest and of the sacrament which
he made and controlled, he was invested with a vague
690). About the same period Florids Diaconus alludes to the enjoyment by
the church of the prerogatives granted by the Christian [Emperors, in his
address to Modoin of Autun, complaining of the oppression of the church
of Lyons —
"le Constantilus reverehdeo munit ab ore;!Me qcuoque Theodosius protegit ore pie,
Arcadio dulci perdulcis IIonorius hIerens,
MBe d alci eloquio laudat, honorat, amnat."
(i:1ge's Patrol. T. CXIX. p. 255.)
I L. Salic. Tit. LXVIII. LxxVII. (Fourth Text of Pardessus). LI. Ripuar.
Tit. xxxvI. —LI. Alaman. Tit. x.-xvi.-For the murder of a bishop, the
]Baioarian laws provide a remarkable penalty. A tunic of lead, suitable for
the murdered prelate, was made, and its weight had to be counterpoised in gold
by the criminal. If he were unable to make good the amount, then he, his
wife, and his children, were delivered to the church in servitude until the
fine was paid.-L1. 13aioar. Tit. I. cap. xi. ~ 1.
THE CHURCH AND THE BARBARIANS. 293
and awe-inspiring sanetity, most conducive to his personal
safety; and if, when no other means of rigllting himself
were to be found, he had recourse to his power over the
Eucharist on every trivial occasion, and distributed damnation freely in avenging every petty insult, we should
remember the precariousness of his position, and the restrictions which debarred him from recourse to the only
other arguments which his untamed flock was likely to
respect. An illustration of this is to be found in the fearful curses which, about this time, came to be attached to
the;charters and privileges granted to monasteries and
other religious foundations. The papal chancery had an
ample store of formulas for these occasions, in which we
see how the audacious violator of the rights of the churchl
was condemned with an anathema which consigned him to
hopeless and eternal hell-fire along with the devil and
Judas Iscariot.' Cursing was the only arm of the defenceless churchman, and if lie cursed with heart and soul, we
can only measure the apparent intensity of his malignity
by the real intensity of his fear.
Even so temperate and sagacious a pontiff as Gregory
the Great yielded to the irresistible necessities of the times,
and was seen to fulminate the Apostolical anathema afgainst
unkniown persons, without a trial, and for a very venial
offence. In 597, Castorius, the papal notary at Ravenna,
was annoyed by an anonymous satirical libel, and Gregory
hastened to his assistance by addressing letters to the
Elavennatese summoning the author to reveal himself and
justify his accusations, in default of which lie, and all privy
to his act, were, in the name of God and Jesus Christ,
deprived of communion. In the event of their remaining
concealed and continuing to receive the prohibited body
Sciat se.... anathematis vinculo innodatum, et crum diabolo et ejus
atrocissimis pompis atque cum Juda traditore... in toternum igne concremandum, simulque in chaos demersus curn impiis deficiat.-Lib. Diurn.
Rollllan. Pontif. cap. viI. tit. 22.- Cf. tit. 2, 5, 1, 18, 19.
25*
294 E x co M AM u N I C A T I O N.
and blood of the Lord, they were anathematized and cut
off from the church, and any papal letters of good wishes
ignorantly addressed to them were declared null and void.1
Yet Gregory could rebuke in others the prostitution of the
power which he himself was ready thus to abuse. On a
previous occasion he had told a priest who had been excommunicated by his bishop without cause that the sentence was void and need not be respected; and at another
time he sternly reproved Januarius, Archbishop of Cagliari,
for excommunicatingl and anathematizing a layman for
some insulting4 words, assuring him that the rules of the
church forbade the use of its censures to avenge personal
injuries.2 If Gregory colcl not restrain himself within
the limits which he thus prescribed for others, it is easy to
see how formidable was the power of every priest who
could thus summon at will the omnipotence of God to
overwhelm his adversary; and it cannot be a matter of
surprise if the majority of ecclesiastics considered it to be
their special office to inspire the laity with a salutary dread
of their supernatural powers, whether exercised justly or
unjustly, for worthy purposes or for considerations purely
selfish.
Under these circumstances it was perfectly natural that
there should spring up a luxuriant growth of miraculous
interpositions of Providence to vindicate the respect clue
to the church and to punish the spoiler of her goods. In
fact, the manufiacture of these miracles became a recognized
armory to which for centuries the ecclesiastical body was
accustomned to resort. They formed part of the education
of the people, who were thus trained to look with awe upon
the priest and his church, with its assortment of relics;
upon the monastery with its tempting vineyards and
orchards, and apiaries, and fields of grain; upon the episcopal plalace and cathedral, with their treasures accumu.-' Gregor. PP. I. Regist. Lib. vI. Epist. 31.
- Ejusd. Lib. III. Epist. 2(i; Lib, n. Epist. 49.
THE ChURCII AND THE BARBARIANS. 295
lated from the piety of generations. The unarmed churchman could ill ouard b)y force the rich and widely-extended
possessions intrusted to his care, and if he busied himself
with imagining and disseminating the marvels which proved
that his person and his property were the peculiar care of
God, we should not too sternly judge and condemn him.
What he repeated of the stories of othiers, lie doubtless
believed, for his training taught him to expect the active
interference of God in behalf of the church. What he
invented he no doubt regarded in the light of wholesome
parables, like those in Holy Writ, to teach the wayward
sons of men the path of righlteousness.'
Thus it is interesting to observe that in Italy, where the
barbarian oppressor with whom the priest had to deal was
generally a heathen or an Arian, and therefore incapable of
excomnmunication, the vengeance of heaven generally overtakes the spoiler either by direct interposition or through
a simple execration. When, for instance, Darida the Goth
overran Samnnium, some of his troops chanced to overtake
Libertinus, prior of the monastery of Fondi, threw him
fiom his horse, and took the animal with them. The holy
man not only offered no resistance, but even handed them
his whip with which to drive the beast, and resumed his
interrupted prayer. The river Voltorno crossed their road
at a short distance, and when they reached the f'ord they
found that no amount of spurring and beating could force
their horses to enter the water. Exhausted by fruitless
efforts, they remembered the priest whom they had just
It is worthy of remark that miracles are very rarely recorded as wrought
by men living at the time of the chronicler. No matter what his age may
be his miracle-workers are almost all of the past generation. In the vast
collection of those instructive stories related by Gregory the Great in his
Dialogues, his interlocutor is made to wonder why men able to perform these
marvels are no longer to be found, to which Gregory replies that though
there are none who do them there are plenty quite equal to those who hd.ll
done them (Greg. Dialog. Lib. I. cap. 12). Each generation thus attributed
its wonders to its predecessor.
296 EXCOMMUNICATION.
despoiled, and taking his horse back, found him still absorbed in prayer. He refused to receive the horse again,
and they were obliged to lift hiin by force upon the animal's back, after which they had no difficulty inl fording
the river.' A more pregnant warning was given at Todi,
under the episcopate of Fortunatus, when some Goths
stopping there on their way to Ravenna requited the hospitality shown them by seizing two boys from a farm of
the church of Todi. Fortunatus sent for the leader and
offered to redeem them at a liberal price, but was refused,
when he quietly assured the barbarian that it would prove
the worse for him. Disregarding the threat, the Goths set
Olut with their captives, but before they had cleared the
town, while passing the church of St. Peter, the horse of
the chief fell, and his rider was disabled with a broken
thigh. Recognizing the cause of his mishap to be the
curse of the bishop, he at once sent him the two boys with
a prayer for mercy. The placable Fortunatus responded
with some holy water, a single application of which restored the Goth to perfect soundness, and' he went on his
way rejoicing.2 But it was not the Barbarians alone who
had cause to dread the anger of these holy men, so peculiarly befiiended of heaven, as was shown by Boniface,
Bishop of Ferentino, when, after saying mass, he had gone
to dine at the house of a noble. As he sat down at the
table, a strolling minstrel with a monkey came to the door
and began striking his cymbals. "Alas, alas I" exclaimed
the prelate, "that miserable wretch is dead. Here have I
seated myself at table, and have not yet opened my mouth
in the praise of God, and he comes with his monkey and
plays with his cymbals. For mercy's sake give him meat
and drink, but I tell you he is dead." The servants
hastened to the vagrant with bread and wine, but, as he
turned to leave the court-yard, a heavy stone fell on him
firom the gateway, inflicting on him a mortal injury of
Gregor. Dialog. Lib. I. cap. 2. 2 Ejusd. Lib. i. cap. 10.
THE CHURCH AND THE BARBARIANS. 29~
which he died the next day-giving, as Gregory remarks,
a fearful warning of the dread with which the saints, the
temples of God, are to be regardedl.l These specimens
will probably suffice as examples of innumerable similar
teachings, by which the priest was exalted above the limits
of humanity, and his weakness was rendered a tower of
strength by the direct favor of God.2
Turning to the France of the same period, we find there
no lack of miracles of the same kind, the very homeliness
of which shows the character of the classes whom they
-were intended to influence, and how thoroughly these
marvels entered into the daily life of the people.3 That
the lesson was sometimes effective is indicated by an incident in the life of St. Sulpicius of Bourges. King Dagobert levied an unlawful tax on the people and churches of
Bourges, and deputed a certain Lull to collect it. Great
excitement followed, and St. Sulpicius sent a hermit to
the king to remonstrate and to threaten him withl speedy
death if he did not recall his impious edict. Dagobert was
duly frightened, repealed the tax, and underwent penance
for the attempt; while the narrowness of his escape was
shown by the fate of Lull who persisted in endeavoring to
exact the tribute, and who consequently died suddenly and
rmiserably.4
In addition to the possession of this formidable power,
the clergy were for the most part the custodians of the
holy relics of martyrs, which, besides curing the blind,
the halt, and the possessed of devils, could protect the
devout believer from the malignity of evil spirits, the
1 Gregor. Dialoo. Lib. I. cap. 9.
The reader who is curious to trace the development of this miraculous
power, which was so efficient during the middle ages, will find an ample
store of these legends in the Dialognes of Gregory. See, for instance, Lib.
I. cap. 3, 4, 9.-Lib. III. cap. 12, 15, 26, 29, 37.-Lib. IV. cap. 21, 23.
" Gregor. Turon. Miracular. Lib. I. cap. 59, 61, 66, 72, 78, 79, 80, 92, 97,
1.05.' Vit. S. Sulpic. Bituric, cap. 24, 25 (Migne's Patrol. T. LXXX. pp. 582-3).
298 EX COIMMUNICATION.
enmity of man, and the unforeseen accidents of nature.
Gregory of Tours gravely relates that when his father,
then a young man, was carried off from Auvergne as a
hostage by Theodebert I., he procured from a friendly
priest some unknown relics, which he thenceforth always
carried about him, and which protected him through life
against the perils of flood and field, the assaults of his
enemies, and the temptations of the flesh. After his death
they passed into the hands of Gregory's mother, and their
value may be estimated by a single one of the numerous
marvels related of them by the historian. The crops had
been gathered and the laborers were at work threshing out
the grain. One day, while all were at dinner, a pile of
chaff left burning by the men communicated to the stacks
of grain; a high north wind was blowing; in a moment the
stacks were ablaze, and the industry of the year seemed
doomed to inevitable destruction, when his mother rushed
from the dinner-table and held up the relics in the face of
the flames. Instantly the fire extinguished itself, and not
a grain of corn was found darnaged, even though the chaff
was burnt off.'
If such was the power of relics, we can readily understand the reverence inculcated for the Eucharist, the body
and blood of the Lord, and for all that was concerned in
its ministry. A count of Britanny, crippled with gout,
and exhausting his revenues ineffectually in physicians and
medicaments, bethought him that if he could lave his feet
in one of the sacred vessels of the altar, he could not fail
of a cure. His rank and influence procured the favor. The
holy vessel was brought, but the strength of his faith which
prompted the act could not palliate the prostitution to such
base uses of the vase dedicated to the service of God. The
malady suddenly increased, and the sick man never again
was able to use his feet. The belief recorded in this story
Greg. Turon. Mirac. Lib. i. cap. 84.
THE CHIURCH AND THE BARBARIANS. 299
must have been wide-spread, for Gregory adds that a similar incident occurred to a chief of the Lombards.'
The reverence enjoined for the Host itself is illustrated
in a judgment which befell Epachius, a priest of Riomn.
On the high festival of Christmas eve, though about to
celebrate the holy mysteries, he could not refrain from
drinking deeply, and, full of wine, he dared to approach the
Lord's Table which is spread only for the fasting. Breaking the Eucharist and distributing it as usual among the
faithful, he took a fragment. No sooner had it touched
his lips than he fell, shrieking, and foaming at the mouth,
in a fit of epilepsy from which he never recovered.2.
When the sacred mysteries and those who controlled
them were invested with these supernatural attributes, we
can readily anticipate the fate of those who, professing
the Catholic faith, refused obedience to the walrnings or
the sentence of the minister of God.
It was a lawless time, and the most terrible examples
were scarce sufficient to influence the indomitable ferocity
of the age. When Maracharius, Count of Angouleme resigned his dignity and entered the church, he was speedily
elevated to the episcopate of the city, while his temporal
position was filled by his nephew LNantinus. Maracharius
was soon after poisoned by some of his clerks, one of whom
succeeded him in the bishopric, but in about a year he too
died, and Heraclius was consecrated in the perilous dignity. Nantinus accused }Ieraclius of being privy to the
death of his uncle, and proceeded to exercise his right of
faidc by spoiling the church and maltreating the ecclesiastics, one of whom he tortured to death. Heraclius duly
excommlunicated him, and a synod being held at Saintes
in 579, INantinus made his peace and was absolved on promise of amendment. Still incorrigible, however, before he
restored to the bishop the lands and houses which he had
Greg. Turon. Mirac. Lib. I. cap. 85. 2 Ibid cap. S7.
300 EX COMMUNICATION.
seized, he devastated and ruined them, for whichi he was
again deprived of communion. IHeraclius dying, however,
he purchased restoration fi'0om some venal bishops, but
this simoniacal transaction availed not for the impenitent
sinner. In a few months he was prostrated with a fearful
disease, in which he continually exclaimed that his vitals
were tortured and burned by Heraclius, who was calling
him to judgment; and after his death his body, burned to
blackness as though with living coals, was a terrible witness to all that the vengeance of the church, however long
delayed, was inevitable.1 Equally signal was the warning
when Charibert, King' of Paris, a year or two before, had set
aside his queen Ingloberga, and had married first AMerofledis
and then her sister Marcovefa. This latter union was peculiarly abominable, for M'areovefa was a nun. St. Germainl Bishop of Paris, could no longer disseimble his indignation, and he excomlmullicated the guilty pair. Disregarding the awful sentence, they soon felt the result. M arcovefBa died almost immediately, and Charibert was not long
in following' her.2
It will be seen from this that the untamed Merovingians
as yet reeked little of the censures of the church, and at the
same time that there were prelates hardy enough to brave
their unbridled anger, and to seek to curb in the name of
God those whom no human laws could restrain. St. Nicetius of Treves was one of these. When Thierry I. King of
3Mletz was succeeded by his son Theodebert, who surrounded,
himself with licentious and lawless parasites, Nicetius
strove to reform the disorders of the state by excommunicating the wicked courtiers. The king, however, still kept
them about his person, till one day, when they attended
him in church, the courageous bishlop refused to consecrate
the host in their presence. The king insisted, when suddenly a youth possessed by the devil commlenced crying
Greg. Turon. Hist. Franc. Lib. v. cap. 37.
2Ejusd, Lib. Iv, cap. 26
THE CIHURCII AND THE BARBARIANS. 301
out in a loud voice, reciting the crimnes of the king and his
followers, and lauding the virtues of' the bishop. After
some further strife, the king dismissed his retinue, and
thenl the youth, whom the stlength of a dozen men had
not sufficed to draog from the pillar which he had embraced,
suddenly loosed his hold at the sign of the cross from the
bishop, andi disappeared to be seen of men no more. This
warning produced some amendment in the court; but when
the kingdom passed into the hands of Clotair I., and the
fearless bishop dared to excommunicate that terrible monarch, he was banished and was not permitted to return
fiom exile until after the death of his persecutor.'
The church evidently had no easy task in thus endeavoring to extend its prerogative and to obtain control over
the ungovernable passions of its new converts; and to its
perplexities may probably be attributed the introduction
of a new practice, which widened the influence and increased
the force of excommunication. We have seen that St. Augusttine deprecated the punishment of the innocent who
might chance to be connected with the guilty, and sharply
reproved a brother prelate for depriving of communion a
whole family of which the head had incurred his censure;2
and Leo the Great had forbidden that the penalty should
be enforced on any who were not partners in the crime.-'
Yet when the church came to deal with those who too
often mocked her thunders and only responded by a defiant
1 Greg. Turon. Vit. Patrum, cap. 17, Q~ 2, 3. About the same period a
reference to excommunication shows the influence which the church hadl acquired in the older Christianity of the Spanish Wisigoths. The fourth council of Toledo in 633 (can. 75) denounces excommunication against those who
should oppose rebellious resistance to the king, and against the king who
should oppress the people. These councils were the parliaments of the nation, and this canon was evidently an agreement between the monarch and
his subjects by which the sanction of the church was invoked for the enforcement of their respective duties.
Augustin. Epist. 250, ~ 1.-Cf. Contra Epist. Parmenion. Lib. III. cap. 2
3 Leon. PP. I. Epist. x. cap. 8.
26
302 EXCOMMUNICATION.
aggravation of wickedness, or by persecuting those who
sought to restrain them, it is no wonder if recourse should
be had to a device by which public indignation might be
brought to bear against them, and the community at large
be interested in compelling their submission. This would,
moreover, be suggested by the structure of society among
thle Barbarian tribes, in which the responsibility of the
family and the sept for the offences of its individual members was the foundation of legal procedure. Under such a
system, the injustice which was reproved by St. Augustine
and St. Leo was no longer apparent, and accordingly we
lind the Interdict beginning to make its appearance among
those who little thought how irresistible a weapon they were
fOrging for the overthrow of monarchs. Thus when in 586
Fredegonda caused Pretextatus, Bishop of Rouen, to be
assassinated at the altar, and a nol)le Frank who reproached
her with the crime to be poisoned, it was evidently useless
to assail the royal Jezabel and to stimulate her to fresh
outrages. Accordingly Leudovald, Bishop of Bayeux,
after consultation with his brother prelates, ordered all
the churches of Rouen to be closed, and the population to
be deprived of the consolations of religion, until a general
search should result in the discovery of the guilty instruments of the crime.l
1IThe church thus with little effect exhausted the resources,
of her authority in the effort to maintain order and to preserve the inviolability of the persons and property of her
ministers. In the early period of the Frankish conquest,
so little could she rely upon the control of the sacraments
1 Gregor. Turon. Hist. Franc. Lib. VIII. cap. 31.-St. Basil of Cmsarea is
sometimes quoted as the inventor of the interdict, towards the close of the
fourth century, because in a case wherein a young girl was carried off, he
not only excommunicated the immediate actors but also the inhabitants of
a town where they had taken refuge (Basil Epist. 144, ap. IIericourt, Loix
Eccles. E. 178). In this case, however, all were guilty, directly or indirectly,
though the transaction was not in strict accordance with the ecclesiastica]l
law of the period.
TIHE CHURCH AND THE BARBARIANS. 303
to insure even the safety of the hierarchy that in 517 the
first council of Lyons adopted a canon providing that
whenever the king should withdraw himself from comrnunion all the bishops of the province should at once take
refuge in monasteries, where they should remain ensconced
until it might please the monarch to promise peace to all.l
Christianity, it is evident, had as yet been able to instil
but little reverence in the Merovingian heart for the
sacraments of the altar or for the venerable men who
administered them, and the process of educating the wild
Teutonic races was slow. Still, the assiduous teachings to
which I have alluded gradually produced their effect, and
the kings came to understand that, however they might
hold themselves above the obedience claimed by the
church, still the traditions of Roman subordination which
she cherished might render her a useful ally in establishing
their own supremacy over the native independence of their
subjects.
In the scanty fragments which remain to us of the legislation of that age we may therefore find some indications
of a disposition to support the censures of the church by
the secular power. Slight as these are, they possess interest as the first indications of the long-existing alliance
between kingcraft and priestcraft, which exercised so
powerful an influence over the development of European
civilization, and which eventually enabled the church to
triumph over both king and people.
Thus, in 585 the second council of Macon adopted various
canons threatening excommunication for sundry offences,
such as the refusal to pay tithes and the oppression of the
poor by the rich; and, more significant still, it commanded
under penalty of suspension from communion that no
mounted layman should meet an ecclesiastic without dismounting and humbly saluting lhim.2 In the same year
Concil. Lugdun. T. ann. 517, can. 3.
2 Concil. Matiscon. I[. ann. 585, can. 4, 5, 14, 15.
304 E X CO MM UN IC AT IO N.
TKing Gontran issued an edict confirming the acts of this
council, which he asserts to have been drawn up at his suggestion. In a manner somewhat vague he threatens that
those who could not be corrected by priestly exhortations
should be coerced by legal proceedings, and he confers by
implication great power on his bishops when he declares
that they share in the sins of those whose evil deeds they
dissemble in silence.' Ten years later, Childebert II. manifested a similar disposition. In a decree forbidding marriages within the prohibitecd degrees, and ordering his subjects to obey the directions of their bishops with regard to
them, he adds that if any one should be excommunicated
for disobedience, he would not only be forever condemned
in the sight of God, but should be banished from the royal
palace and his property be divided among his heirs as a
punishment for refusing to submit to the remedial measures
enjoined by the church.2 Among the Spanish Wisigoths
the same tendency is observable, for about this period St.
Isidor of Seville lays it down as a general rule that where
the ecclesiastical authority is insufficient to command 6bedience it is the duty of the civil power to interfere and enforce the discipline of the chulrch?
These declarations, however, derive their only importance from their significance in foreshadowing the distant
future. They could not, at the tile, save the church froma
the evils to which it wvas daily exposed, and though for
awhile it might seem to gain in power and influence, the
development of events speedily showed the unstable foundations upon which its authority was based. As the house
of Clovis tore itself to pieces and gradually passed away in
Praecept. Guntramni, ann. 585 (Baluz. I. 7. Ed. Venet.).
D Decret. Childebert. circa ann. 595 (Baluz. I. 11). The text as given both
by Baluze and Canciani (II. 116) by the use of the word " crinosis"' would
seem to restrict to the royal line the application of this decree; but Canciani mentions the reading "criminosis" as given by another MS. which
would render its application general.
3 Isidor. Hispaleus. Sentent. Lib. III. cnp. 51, ~~ 4, 5.
CARLOVINGIAN RECONSTRUCTION. 305
the long revolution which ended in establishing the family
of Pepin on the throne, the church almost disappeared in
the dismal anarchy of the period. The episcopates became
filled with warlike Franks who regarded them merely as
offices of secular dignity and power, while the character of
the clergy may be imagined from the denunciations of
Pope Zachary in 743. when he describes them as being
laymen in all but the right to administer the sacraments.'
He especially rebukes the martial ardor which they universally displayed; and so deeply rooted had their warlike
habits become that when, after many attempts to eradicate
them, Charlemagne in 803 made a most solemn and impressive effort in conjunction with Pope Leo to restrain
the unclerical military aspirations of the church, he felt
obliged to accompany the prohibition of bearing arms
with an assurance to the people that this measure was not
intended as preliminary to despoiling the clergy of their
possessions —a rumor to this effect having apparently
found ready believers.2
CARLOVINGIAN RECONSTRUCTION.
In a state of society so lawless, and with a church so
profaned, ecclesiastical censures could have been little employed and less regarded. When, however, the sons of
Charles Martel endeavored to establish the new dynasty
on a firm foundation, the piety of Carloman soon recognizedl that the reformation and rebuilding of the church
1 Bonifacii Epist. 137.
2 Capit. Carol. Mag. VIII. ann. 803. Cf. Capit. incerti anni cap. 1 (Baluz.
I. 288, 357). How little this accomplished in repressing the martial tendencies of the clergy is seen by a similar prohibition as late as 846.-Capit.
Carol. Calvi Tit. VII. cap. 37 (Baluz. II. 24).
92f'*
306 E X COMMUNICA T IO N
was the surest basis on which to establish power; while
Pepin-le-Bref, as soon as he had seized the crown under
papal authority, felt that the fortunes of his house were
indissolubly united with those of the hierarchy. The sagacity of Charlemagne recognized not only this, but also
that the church was the most efficient instrument that he
could use in civilizing the motley aggregation of races
which constituted his empire. Thus the first practical step
taken by Carloman in the reconstruction of society was
the assembling of a council in 742, where he appointed
Archbishop Boniface to the primacy of his church, and
ordered the convention of a yearly synod to reform the
ecclesiastical disorders wllich seenmed to defy all hope of
improvement.' The same spirit is shown throughout all
the legislation of Charlemagne, as, for instance, in the
organization of his Saxon conquests in 7 89. His first act
is to divide his newly-acquired territory into eight dioceses,
for which he at once appoints bishops; and while he declares his new subjects to be free and not liable to taxation,
he orders the strict payment of tithes for the support of
the churches. So, while he decrees the penalty of death for
a number of offences, from conspiring to rebel or refusing
baptism, down to eating meat in Lent without a dispensation, he adds that in all these cases, if the offender shall
voluntarily confess to a priest and submit to penance, the
evidence of the ecclesiastic shall save his life.2
As Charlemagne never for a moment abandoned the
control which he exercised over every ecclesiastic, from
the pope to the monk, he might thus safely make use of the
clergy in the task of reduLcing his rugged subjects to order.
When he could command them never to refuse the viaticum
to the dying sinner,3 he could safely delegate to them a
1 Karolomanni Capit. I. ann. 742, cap. I (Baluz. I. 103).
2 Carol. Mag. Praecept. de Episc. per Saxon. —Prwcept. pro Trutmanno
Comite. —Capit. de Part. Saxon. cap. iii.-xiv. (Baluz. I. 179T-83.)
Carol. Mag. Canpit. Episcopor. ann. 801. (BLlnz. I. 258.)
CARLOVINGIAN RECONSTRUCTION. 307
part of his authority; and to render that authority nmore
efficient, that he might use them to greater advantage, he
could enjoin implicit obedience to them on the part of his
subjects, from the lowest to the highest.'" In truth, he is
more to be feared who can plunge body and soul into Hell
than he who can merely torture the body," and as these
spiritual and distant terrors were not likely to be efficient,
he adds that those who prove incorrigibly disobedient, even
if they be his own sons, shall be proclaimed infamous, their
property be confiscated, and themselves be driven.into
exile.'
When such was the recognized CarlovingianM policy, it is
not surprising that the assistance of the state was lent to
the enforcement of ecclesiastical censures, and that those
who were not to be daunted with threats of spiritual punishment should be brought to reason with more substantial
penalties. The policy doubtless served its purpose for the
moment, nor could the early Carlovingians, struggling
with the gigantic barbarism of the age, see, into the future
when the secular inflictions affixed to excommunication
should become the most efficient weapon of oppression in
the armory of the hierarchy; or that the alliance which
they now formed between the church and state would
enable the former throulgh centuries to dominate the latter
with a despotism unparallelled. It is these results in the
far distant future, of tremendous import in the history
of civilization, that impart interest to the obscure and
ap)parently trivial details of the legislation by which the
church gradually acquired the right to call upon the civil
power to execute her decrees without appeal and without
examination.
I Carol. Mang. Capit. ap. Theodonis Villam (Baluz. I. 305). The terms in
which this capitulary is drawn are so extreme that I ami strongly inclined
to suspect its genuineness. Its general spirit, however, is amply confirmed
by others. Cf. Edict. Domin. c. ann. 800; Capitul. Add. III. cap. 97 (Baluz.
I. 23:6, 587). Also, Concil. Arelatens. VI ann. 813, can. 13. (Ilarduin. IV.
10(t,).
308 EXCO'MMUNICATION
So completely had ecclesiastical discipline been relaxed
during the later Merovingian period that even the meaning and purport of excommunication had become well-nigh
forgotten. In 755, Pepin-le-Bref, at the assembly of Verneuil, was obliged to explain to the people what were the
rules to be enforced on exconamunicates, and even in 802
Charlemagne felt called upon to proclaim that the kingdom
of God was reserved for those who lived and died in the
communion of the church. By successive edicts thus the
old canons of the church were revived —the strict segregation of the impenitent from all intercourse with Christians,
the prohibition to receive him until reconciled by the one
who had ejected him, and the necessity of commendatory
letters for those who travelled or changed their residence.'
Yet the forgotten discipline thus resuscitated was changed
in character, for it was no longer the simple expression of
the internal regulations of the church, but as proclaimed
by the monarch it became the law of the land. Formerly
it could only be enforced by the moral power of the church;
aow it could call upon the irresistible authority of the
state, and the canons of Nicsea, of Sardica, of Antioch, of
Carthage, and of Chalceclon, when quoted and explained
in the capitularies of the sovereign of Western Europe,
acquired a new significance of which the ultimate development was not to be realized for five hundred years.
There were two subjects which attracted particular attention in the civilizing efforts of the Carlovingians, and
which afforded the special incitement in urging the revival
of excommunication and in enforcing its penalties by the
secular power. These were the marriage of persons within
the prohibited degrees, and the spoliation to which the
church was exposed in the general lawlessness of society.
Synod. Vernens. ann. 755, cap. 9.-Capit. Aquisgranens. ann. 789, cap.
1, 3. —Carol. Mag. Capit. I. ann. 802,-cap. 41 (Baluz. I. 122, 155-6, 268).
Also Capitul. Lib. v. ca'p. 62.-Carol. Mag. Capit. in LI. Longobard. In. 26,
1 (Baluz. I. 254.-Canciani I. 166).
CARLOVINGIAN RECONSTRUCTION. 309
WTithout entering into the polemical questions respecting
the sacramental nature of the marriage ceremony, it is easy
to understand why the early Christians, in their horror of
the laxity prevailing among the Gentiles, invested the
marriage rite with peculiar sanctity, and confided its performance to the priest. Those who endeavored to render
every act of life an expression of pious fervor were not
likely to allow so solemn an occasion to be divested of
religious ceremony, and accordingly the sacerdotal benediction was esteemed an essential part of the nuptial celebration at a comparatively early period.' Not only this,
but the supervision exercised by the church over the morality of the faithful aided in giving it especial control over
the delicate questions connected with matrimony, and accordingly some of the earliest canons which have reached
us relate to regulations adopted to prevent what were regarded as improper marriages;2 while the prohibition of
incest in the Mosaic law seemed to render this a matter of
which the church ought to assume the special guardianship.
Therefore when, in 601, St. Augustine of Canterbury applied to Gregory I. for instructions regarding the prohibited
degrees, the latter, while deprecating, on account of its
effect on posterity, the marriages of first cousins permitted
by the Roman law, had no hesitation in prescribing for the
Barbarians rules which he had no power to enforce at home.
He accordingly directed that among the Saxon converts
marriage should not be permitted between parties related
more closely than the third or fourth degree.3 By this
~ Innocent. PP. I. Epist. ii. cap. 6.-Synesius (Epist. 105) speaks of receiving his wife from the holy hands of Theophilus, Archbishop of Alexandria..
Concil. Eliberit. ann. 305, can. 8, 9, 10, 14, 15, 16, 17.
3 Gregor. PP. I. Regist. Lib. xI. Epist. 64. Interrog. 6.-This decree
was of course a stumbling-block to the zealous churchmen who subsequently
extended the prohibition so much further, and it was neutralized by the
usual expedient of forgery. Two epistles were fsbricated-one from Felix,
Bishop of Messina, to Gregory, expressing his surprise at a deciFion so con
310 EXCOMMUNICATION.
time also the church was acquiring fresh authority in these
mnatters by the doctrine of spiritual affinity, preventing or
rendering null the imarriage of those who had connected
themselves as sponsors in baptism, and the shrewd device
is well known by which Fredegonda succeeded in getting
rid of Audovera, the queen of Chilperic, when she desired
to marry him for the second time. A daughter was born to
Audovera during the king's absence on. a military expedition, and the cunning Fredegonda persuaded her that it
would be an agreeable surprise to Chilperic to find on his
return the infant baptized, and that their union would be
rendered dearer and more sacred if she herself would hold.
the child at the font. Audovera consented, and thus contracted a spiritual affinity with her husband which rendered
separation obligatory; she was promptly relegated to a
convent, and Fredegonda triumphed in the success of her
audacious scheme.l
lWe have seen how Gregoory the Great prescribed for the
ignorance of the Saxons restrictions which were not submitted to in Rome; and however difficult it might be to
enforce such regulations, it was easy to decree them.
Gregory's example, therefore, did not lack imitators, and
in the eighth century we find his successor Gregory III.
instructing Boniface to prohibit all marriages as far as the
seventh degree.2 By this time the right of the church to
control such matters was acknowledged, but these instructrary to all the customs of the fathers from the time of the Nicene Council,
and the other a reply from Gregory explaining that he had relaxed the rules
temporarily for the benefit of the rude and barbarous converts of Augustine,
without any intention of introducing this laxity into the church at large.1Regist. Lib. xiv. Epist. 16, 17.
1 Aimoini Hist. Francor. Lib. iII. cap. vi.-In the Icelandic church, which
differed in so many respects from that of the rest of Europe, this rule seems
to have been disregarded. The code of ecclesiastical law in force from 1122
to 1275 expressly declares that a father who under stress of necessity baptizes his own child is not therefore required to separate from his wife.-Kristinrettr Thorlaks oc Kletils, cap. III. (Havuniai 1776, p. 13).
G1regor" J~P. III. Epist. 1, cap. 5.
CARLOVINGIAN RECONSTRUCTION. 311
tions fell upon a hardened and stiff-necked generation. Even
the thunders of the church had not prevented the Merovingians from surrounding themselves with harems, and it
nmattered little whether the inmates bore the title of concubines or wives. Charlemagne's laxity with respect to the
marriage tie is notorious, and so late as the ninth century
we find the Emperor Lothair issuing a law which formally
forbids any one to have two wives at once.l M[en who
cared so little for the plainest precepts of the law regulating matrimony, were not likely to regard a rule which
was so difficult of observance, and which required so nice
an acquaintance with genealogy as was necessary to ascertain the shadow of relationship expressed by the seventh
degree of kinship; and accordingly the enforcement of the
restriction was tacitly admitted to be impossible. Strenuous efforts, however, were made unceasingly to bring
under some sort of control the rebellious natures of the
Franks, and in these we find the earliest traces of the aid
lent by the State to cause the censures of the church to be
respected. These efforts, moreover, are of interest, as
they are the source of the ecclesiastical jurisdiction over
all questions connected with marriage which subsequently
enured so much to the power and profit of the church.
Tlhus already, in 752, Pepin-le-Bref issued a cal)itulary
forbidding marriages as far as the fourth gl'ade, although
parties related in the fourth degoree, if married, were not
to be separated. Even in this modified form, obedience,
apparently, was not expected, for the bishops were instructed to look sharply after such incestuous unions; if
the sinners were obdurate, they were to be expelled from
the church, and if this did not succeed in bringing them to
submission, there was a vague intimation that secular
force would be employed.2 How little success attended' LI. Longobard. II. 13, 7.
Synod. Verimeriens. ann. 752, cap. 1, 9 (;Baluz. I. 118). Cf. Capitul.
Lib. v. c. 165.
312 EX CO MIM NI CATION.
this legislation is shown by decrees of 755 and 7579 in
which persons guilty of these incestuous marriages were
threatened with purely temporal penalties, such as fines,
imprisonment, etc.;1 while another of 755, after denouncing
excommunication as the punishment, adds that if any one
disregards it, and proves too stubborn for his bishop, he
shall be exiled by the royal power.2
One of the earliest laws of Charlemnagne enjoins on the
priesthood especial watchfulness with respect to these prohibited marriages; and ten years later, in 779, he specifically conferred upon the bishops the power to coerce all
incestuous persons.3 These efforts were ineffectual, and in
802 he commanded that no marriage should be celebrated
until the bishop, priests, and elders had carefully examined
into the possible consanguinity of the spouses. If, in
spite of these precautions, such unions took place, the
bishop was directed to separate the parties, and those who
should refuse obedience were to be brought before the
emperor himself, as in the case of a certain Fricco, who
had not long before committed incest by marrying a nun.4
It was an evil generation, and hard to bring into subjection. As Charlemagne's career as a lawgiver had opened,
so it may be said to have closed, with an attempt to enforce
the canon. In 813 the bishops assembled at Tours deplored the multitude of incestuous marriages which no
ecclesiastical censures could prevent, as the sinners made
light of excommunication, and could only be coerced by
the secular power.5 A council held at the same time at
M\Iainz renewed the prohibition of marriage to the fourth
Capit. Metens. ann. 755, cap. 1.-Capit. Compendiens. ann. 757, cap.
1, 2, 19 (Baluz. I. 125, 129).
Synod Vernens. ann. 755, cap. 9.-Cf. Capitul. Lib. v. cap. 62.
Carol. Mag. Capit. ann. 769, cap. 10. Ejusd. ann. 779, cap. 5 (Baluz. I.
137, 141).
4 Carol. Mag. Capit. i. ann. 802, cap. 33, 35, 38 (Baiuz. I. 265-66). Cf.
Capitul. Lib. vII. cap. 432.
5 Concil. Turon. III. ann. 813, can. 41 (-larduin. IV. 1028).-Capiti.
Lib. Hi. cap. 43.
CARLOVINGIAN RECONSTRUCTION. 313
degree, and ordered all persons so united to be separated;
due penance was also enjoined, with a threat of expulsion
from the church for those who refused to undergo it.'
Charlemagne responded but feebly to these appeals. He
contented himself with ordering increased watchfulness on
the subject, and the expulsion from the church of those
who refused the performance of due penitence.2
It is not to be supposed that the manufacturers of the
False Decretals neglected this matter. An epistle attributed to Calixtus I. argues at much length against the
legality of marriages between kindred, slowing how
little had been accomplished by previous efforts.3 The
correspondence forged between Gregory the Great and
Felix of Messina extended the prlohibition to the seventh
degree;4 and a canon attributed to Pope Julius gave increased antiquity to this rule.' At the same time another,
to which the name of Pope Fabian was attached, shows
the confusion which existed, by reducing the prohibition
to the fourth degree, and forbidding the separation of
those already married, being substantially a repetition of
the Carlovingian rule.6 Benedict the Levite was bolder,
and in transferring to his collection of capitularies the
canon of the council of Mainz of 81.3, he adroitly extended
the prohibition from the fourth degree to the fifth and
sixth;7 and subsequently he fabricated others which carried
it to the seventh.' These being copied by Hilinclar, BurConcil. Mogunt. cnn. 813, can. 54 (Harduin. IV. 1016).
Carol. Mag. Capit. I. ann. 813, cap. 8 (Baluz. I. 343).
Pseudo-Calixt. Epist. II.-quoted in Gratian, P. iI, caus. 35, q. ii.
can. 2.
4 Pseudo Felicis et Pseudo-Gregor. Epist. (Regist. Lib. xIv. Epist.
16, 17).
5 Pseudo-Julian. in Gratian. P. II. cans. 35, q. ii. can. 7.
6 Pseudo-Fabian. in Gratian. P. II. cans. 35, q. ii. can. 3.
Capitul. Lib. v. cap. 166.
8 Ibid. Lib. vI. cap. 209. The importance attached to this subject, and
the difficulty of enforcing the rule, are attested by Benedict's endless recur27
31 4 EX C OI UNI C A TI ON.
chardt, Ivo, and Gratian, it was rendered difficult for any
man to know whether he was properly married or not, and,
as we shall see hereafter, there was afforded to the church
the opportunity of intervening effectually in the affairs of
princes and kingdoms.
The other subject which seemed to call especially for the
intervention of the secular power in support of spiritual
censures was the oppression and spoliation to which the
church was exposed as soon as its ministers had been
deprived of the opportunity of self-defence by prohibiting
them from bearing arms. At the same assembly of Worilms
in 803 which asked for this restriction, the nobles petitioned
the emperor to imprison all who might invade the rights of
the church until they should perform public and canonical
penance. As all such offenders were excommunicate, the
petitioners pledged themselves to hold them as infainous,
and not to associate with them in war or in peace, in the
church, in the court, or on the road; to forbid their retainers from consorting with those of the sinners thus proscribed, and even to keep their horses and cattle separate,
for fear of contamination. To this request the emperor
assented, and, with the approval of the estates of his empire, he issued a decree, which the judges were specially
ordered to enforce, denouncing all invasion of church property as liable to the punishments of sacrilege, theft, and
murder. He also ordered the bishops to anathematize the
guilty, so that they might lack Christian burial and be
deprived of the prayers andl sacrifices of the church.l In
another capitulary he denounced the spoilers of the church
as men anathematized, deprived of legal protection and
rence to it. See, for instance, Canpitul. Lib. v. cap. 9, 91, 165, 304; Lib. vI.
cap. 76, 106, 410; Lib. vII. cap. 257, 356, 377, 432, 433, 434, 435; Addit.
III. cap. 124, etc.
Carol. Maig. Capit. viii. ann. 803 (Baluz. I. 285-90).-Cf. Capitul. Lib.
vI. cap. 370; Lib. vII. cap. 142, 143.
CARLOVINGIAN RECONSTRUCTION. 315
of association with the faithful-who were forbidden to
give them bread or water — and, moreover, cut off from the
kingcldom of God if they should die without rendering full
satisfaction to the church which they had wronged.'
Inl all this Charlemagne never abl:ated a jot of his control
over the church, which he strengthened that it might be a
more useful instrument in his hands. In this same year,
803, in a capitulary addressed to his Missi, or Imperial
Commissioners, containing a brief summary of matters requiring their attention, he orders them to check the abuse
of the powers thus confided to ecclesiastics, by preventing
excommunications from being resorted to everywhere and
without cause.2 In 811 he issued another capitulary, which
is a series of sharp and searching questions, probing. to the
quick the excesses and crimes of the church, and among
them. we find that the delegated power over heaven and
hell was already used with effect on the minds of dying
and despairing sinners for the purpose of swelling the
possessions and revenues of the establishment. He asks
whether the world is relinquished by those who seek wealth
through every cunning art, by promising happiness in
heaven and threatening eternal torture in hell, thus playing
on the ignorance of rich and poor alike to gain possession
of their estates, to the exclusion of the rightful heirs,
causing a notable increase of crime by forcing to a life of
robbery and plundcler those who were thus disinherited.3
I Carol. Mag. Capit. III. incerti anni cap. 3, 4, 5 (Baluz. I. 359).
Carol. Mag. Capit. III. ann. 803, cap. 2 (Baluz. I. 277).
Carol. Mag. Capit. II. ann. 811, cap. 5 (Baluz. I. 329-30). This inquisition
of the emperor into the shortcomings of the church led to the assembling of
five councils in 813. Two of these (Concil. Arelatens. VI., Remens. II.)
pay no attention to this special question. That of Tours (C. Turonens. III.
can. 51, Harduin. IV. 1030) states that it has made inquiry, and can find
no one complaining of being disinherited. That of Chalons (C. Cabillonels.
3I. can. 6, Ibid. p. 1033) contents itself with a generial reproof of such practices, without indicating any special penalty for them; and that of Mainz
316 E X CO M'M UNICA TT ON.
This was not the only way in which the money value of the
Eucharist was speculated on, for other modes were speedily
discovered and industriously exploited. By this time, in
the stricter kinds of penitence enjoined, the penitent was
obliged to live on bread and water.1 A regulation accordingly was introduced by which no one was allowed to
invite a penitent to eat flesh or to drink wine without immediately paying a fine of one or two deniers, according to
the severity of the penitence thus infringedl-which was,
apparently, an indirect way of allowing a rich penitent to
purchase exemption from the rules. A similar abuse is
revealed by the complaint of the council of Chalons, in
813, that a spurious charity was encouraged in those who
desired to sin without incurring the penalty of their transgressions.a
CHURCH AND STATE.
The death of Charlemagne marks a new era in the
history of the church. His support had awakened its
ambition, and had armed it with new weapons; while the
piety of Louis-le-D6bonnaire rendered him apt to yield
to the pretensions which it was prompt to put forward.
Charlemagone controlled the thunders of the church; Louis
was their slave, and it is hard to overestimate the effect of
the spectacle which he offered to an astonished world when,
(C. Mogunt. can. 6, Ibid. p. 1010) promises to amend anything of the kind
that might come to the knowledge of its members. The church evidently
was not disposed to relax its pious efforts to increase the patrimony of Christ.
Calpitul. Add. IV. cap. 83. In 813 the second council of Chalons complains that penitents evaded the prohibition of wine and flesh by contriving
dainties agreeable to the palate.-Concil. Cabillonens. II. can. 35 (Harduin.
IV. 1037); Cf. Capitul. Add. III. cap. 60.
s Capitul. Lib. I. cap. 151.-Reginon. Eccles. Discip. Lib. I. cap. 259.
C3 oncil. Cabillonens. II. ann. 813, can. 36 (lIarduin. IV. 1038).-Capitul.
Add. III. cap. 61.
CHURCIt AND STATE. 317
in remorse for the severity with which he had crushed the
rebellion of his nephew, Bernard, King of Italy, the master
of Europe in 822 appeared before the prelates assembled
at the council of Attigny, confessed his sins, asked for absolution through penance, and duly fulfilled the judgment
rendered by appearing in public as a penitent.'
The triumph of the spiritual power was thus foreshadowed, and under the auspices of such a monarch its
progress towards domination was rapid. In 819 Louis
had sought to lead his subjects to submit to episcopal
sentences by guarding with a triple fine the life of a man
during' the performance of penitence'-evidently because
durinlo that period of probation lie was prohibited from
bearing' arms, and could not protect himself. In 826,
also, he published a capitulary which greatly extended
the sphere of spiritual jurisdiction, aind pledged to it the
support of the secular power. For rapine and robbery he
decreed not only the temporal punishment of heavy fines
and restitution, but added the enforcement of canonical
penitence to be publicly performed; while the act, if it had
been committed on church property, was pronounced to
be sacrilege, and the offender was outlawed until he should
have made amends to the satisfaction of the injured church.
For blasphemy, the penalty threatened was imprisonment
by the secular judge, and public penitence until, by the
intercession of the bishop, the offender should be publicly
reconciled and readmitted to the church. The lives of
ecclesiastics, moreover, were protected by a provision that
for a homicide committed on a clerk the criminal was to
undergo penitence of tile severest character, for life, in a
monastery.3 The same confusion of civil and ecclesiastical
Thegan. de Gest. Ludewici Imp. cap. 23.-Eginhart. Vit. Ludov. Pii, ann.
822.-Ast.ron. Vit. Ludov. Pii, cap. xi.
Ludov. Pii Capit. I. ann. 819, cap. 5 (Baluz. I. 406).
Ludov. Pii Capit. Ingilenheim. ann. 826, cap. 1, 2, 5 (Baluz. 439-40).To show the change thus wrought, it may be worth while to allude to a
2 >k
318 EXCOMMUNICATION.
jurisdiction is shown in a law of 829, by which a man putting away or killing his wife without cause was condemned
to undergo public penance, for refusal of which the count
of his district was ordered to imprison him in chains until
the imperial pleasure could be ascertained.1
About this time, also, Lothair I., Louis's eldest son,
gave a fresh impulsion to the progress of priestly control
over the secular power. Sent in 823 to Italy by his father,
he went to Rome, and there Paschal I. solemnly crowned
him as emperor, without the knowledge or assent of Louis.
This, we may assume, threw him to some extent into the
hands of the clerical party, and we therefore need not be
surprised to find him, in 824, issuing the first general command to the counts and ministers of justice to enforce
by secular proceedings all sentences of excommunication.
This decree provides that if any one, for any crimes or
offenbes, shall disregardl admonition until he incurs the
liability of excommunication, then the bishop shall call to
his aid the count of the district, and in their joint names
the offender shall be summoned to submit to the bishop.
If this is ineffectual, then the royal ban or fine shall be
inflicted on him; and if still contumacious, he shall at last
be excommunicated. In case the hardened criminal defies
this, the count slhall seize him and throw him in chains in
a dungeon, where he shall lie until he receives the imperial
sentence; while, if the offender is the count himself, the
bishop shall report him for judgment to the emperor.2
judgment of Pope Gelasius (492-496), by which a priest who had killed his
bishop was only excommunicated for a year and deprived of the ministry of
the altar. Ile persisted in performing his priestly functions, however, and
was thereupon degraded for disobedience.-Gelasii PP. I. Epist. Philippo et
Cassiodoro; Ejusd. Majorico et Joanni.
Capit. pro lege habenda, ann. 829, cap. 3 (Baluz. I. 452).-Capitul. Addit.
Iv. cap. 118, 161.
9 Lothar. I. Capit. Tit. In. caLp. 15 (Baluz. II. 219).-L. Longobard. II. 54,
1, s. Lothar. xv. (Georgisch, 1218-19; Canciani, I. 196). This was, in another
section, applied especially to usurers (Cap. 19 —LI. Longobard. ii. 54, 2).
Abuses, apparently, were not long in mlarkig themselves felt, fo)r another
CHURCH AND STATE. 319
Thus the thunders of the church were adopted by the
state as part of its ordinary criminal machinery, and all
the powers of the state were pledged to support the sentence of the spiritual tribunals.
The scope and the danger of the authority thus successively conferred upon the church were most impressively
manifested when Louis was deposed by his sons. after
the fatal Field of Falsehood in 833, and Lothair desired
to render impossible the restoration of his father to the
throne. The sins imputable to Louis were not such as the
secular law of that turbulent age could take cognizance of,
but the spiritual tribunal could impose penitence for any
infraction of moral obligation; the people had been invited
by Louis himself, eleven years before, at Attigny, to see
the bishops sit in judgment on their monarch; and the
decretals of Siricius and Leo I., forbidding secular employment and the bearing of arms to any one who had undergone public penance, were not so entirely forgotten but
that they might be revived.1 Accordingly, when Lothair
returned to France, dragging his captive father in his train,
he halted at Compiegne, and summoned a council of his
prelates to accomplish the work from which his savage
nobles shrank. With unfaltering willingness they undertook the odious task, declaring their competency throughI
the power to bind and to loose conferred upon their order
as the vicars of Christ and the turnkeys of heaven. They
held the wretched prisoner accountable for all the evils
lwhich the empire had suffered since the death of Charlemagne, and summoned him at least to save his soul by
capitulary of Lothair alludes to bishops and counts who were in the habit of
taking bail from persons accused of incest or of withholding their tithes,
and then dividing the spoils between themn.-Lothar. I. Capit. Tit. v. cap. 41
(Bnluz. II. 232). —LI. Longobard. Iv. 3, 10, s. Lothar. II. cap. I (Georgischo
1247-S).
Capitul. Lib. vi. cap..938; Lib. viI. cap. 61, 62.
320 EXCOMMUNICATION.
prompt confession and penitence, now that his earthly
dignity was lost beyond redemption. Louis submittedhe could not do otherwise-and accepted and signed the
confession which they thrust into his hands, the articles
of which show the dangerous confusion between moral
offences and temporal crimes, so sedulously inculcated by
the mediseval casuists, to the immense extension of spiritual
jurisdiction. He was guilty of sacrilege because he had
not fulfilled the promise of his coronation oath; he was a
perjurer and a suborner of perjury because, after having
parcelled out his empire between his three sons, he had,
after the birth of a fourth, made another allotment; he
had violated his vows and despised religion because he
had once undertaken a military expedition during Lent,
and had held a council on Maundy Thursday; and he was
morally accountable for all the crimes and devastation
committed throughout the empire in the civil dissensions
excited by his turbulent sons. With that overflowing
hypocritical unction which is the most disgusting exhibition of clerical craft, the bishops labored with him for his
own salvation, until, overcome by their eloquent exhortations, he threw himself at their feet, begged the pardon of
his sins, implored their players in his behalf, and eagerly
diemanded the imposition of such penance as would merit
absolution. The request was not denied. In the church
of St. Mary, before the tombs of the holy St. Medard and
St. Sebastian, the discrowned monarch was brought into
the presence of his son, and surrounded by a gaping crowd.
There he threw himself upon a sackcloth and four times
confessed his sins with abundant tears, accusing himself
of offending God, scandalizing the church, and bringing
destruction upon his people, for the expiation of which
he demanded penance and absolution by the imposition of
those holy hands to which had been confided the power to
bind and to loose. Then, handing his written confession
to the bishops, he took off sword and belt and laid them
CHIURCI- AND STATE. 321
at the foot of the altar, where his confession had already
been placed. Throwing off his secular garments, he put
on the white robe of the penitent, and accepted fiom his
ghostly advisers a penance which should inhibit him during
life from again bearing arms.1 The world, however, was
not as yet quite prepared for this spectacle of priestly
arrogance and royal degradation. The disgust which it
excited hastened a counter-revolution, and when Louis was
restored to the throne, Ebbo of Rheims and St. Agobard of
Lyons, the leaders in the solemn pantomime, were promptly
punished and degraded. Yet the piety of Louis held that
the very sentence for the imposition of which they incurred
this penalty was valid until abrogated by equal authority,
and accordingly he caused himself to be formally reconciled to the church before the altar of St. Denis, and abstained fioim resuming his sword until it was again belted
on him by the hand of a bishop.2
During the dreary period of anarchy which filled the
remaining years of Louis's disastrous reign, and which was
prolonged by the ceaseless dissensions of his descendants,
aggravated by the ravages of the Northmen and Saracens,
the church had to endure evils uncounted and indescribable. It is no wonder, therefore, that in her defenceless
state she sought protection in exaggerating her claims to
spiritual dominion, and that she endeavored to awe the
lawless nobles, who scoffed at her censures, by claiming
more and more the right to invoke the temporal power for
their enforcement. Already, in 789, the canons of Ingilrain had proclaimed that any monarch or potentate was
anathema and accursed in the sight of God who permitted
the censures of the canons to be disregardced;3 and those' Episc. Relat. de Exauctor. Iludow. (Migne's Patrolog. T. XCVII. pp.
659-64). —Agobardi Opp. pp. 319-23 (Ed. Migne).
Astron. Vit. Ludov. Pii, ann. 834.
I3 ngilrlsmni cap. 80 (HIartzheim Concil. German. I. 258).-Cf. Capitul.
Lib. vi. c. 321.
322;EXCOMMUNICATION.
who were so busy in fabricating the Isidorian forgeries were
not litlely to lose sight of the importance of thus strengthening themselves by what was left of the central authority.
In the capitularies of Benedict the Levite, we therefore
find abundant traces of the evils of the time and of the means
by which a remedy was sought. As might be expected,
the most prominent position is accorded to the wrongs inflicted on the church when her rich and extensive possessions lay exposed defenceless to the cupidity of every
petty chieftain who might choose to occupy her lands or
gather her harvests. Accordingly this sacrilege is denounced with. an endless iteration which shows at once the
extent of the evil and the inefficacy of the remedy; and
the manner in which the royal power is constantly invoked
to enforce respect for the anathema which was the church's
only weapon of defence, proves how little it was regarded
by the rude warriors trained in the bloody civil wars of
the period, when any lingering reverence for holy things
nust have been sadly shaken by witnessing the success of
the pagan and infidel invaders, whose blows ever fell
heaviest on monastery and cathedral.'
The less the church was respected, therefore, the more
clamorous became her demands for respect. All who refused canonical obedience to their bishops were declared
excommunicate;2 no one while under the ban was to be
allowed to appear before a secular tribunal either as witness or party to a suit; and if he made light of the anathema he was to be exiled, that he might be powerless
to harass the ministers of God.3 Another passage de-, See Capitul. Lib. vi. cap. 370, 381, 390, 392, 394, 395, 402, 404, 405, 406,
407, 427, 428, 431; Lib. vII. cap. 275, 409, 411, 420, 421; Addit. Iv. cap.
84, etc. For an account of the unbridled rapine to which the church was
subjected, see the piteous supplication of the bishops to Charles-le-Chauve at
the council of Verneuil, in 845.-Carol. Calvi Capit. Tit. III. cap. 12 (Baluz.
II. 13-14).
*2 Capitul. Lib. vI. cap. 78.
3 Capitul. Lib. vII. cap. 213.-Baluze cites Pope Stephen in support of
this, but I can find no parallel passage in the Pseudo-Stephani Epist.
CHIURCH AND STATE. 323
clares, in the name of the monarch, that if any criminal is
contumacious or disobedient to the sentence of his bishop,
or priest, or archdeacon, all his property shall be seized
by the count and the agent of the bishop, until he submits
to canonical penance. If still obstinate, the count shall
throw him into a dungeon and keep him in the sternest
imprisonment until the bishop orders his release; while if
the count neglect or refuse this duty, he shall be excommunicated until he performs it; and if this is insufficient, ihe
shall be deprived of both station and comunmnion, and be
brought before the emperor, whose power, conjoined with
the episcopal authority, shall inflict such exemplary chastisement that none shall hereafter dare to commit such
offen ces.l
It is evident, indeed, that something besides the terrors
of mere spiritual censures was requisite, when even ecclesiastics came to disregard them, and they had to be supplemented or supplanted by punishments which appealed
to the senses. Thus drunken clerks were ordered to be
coerced either by excomlmunication for forty days or by
corporal chastisement; those who wandered over the country
without commendatory le.tters were to be excommunicated,
and, if insensible to this, were to be whipped; and the lazy
ones who were tardy in performing their sacred flnctions
had the alternative of excommunication or a beating.2 A
shrewder penalty for such contempt is to be found in a
decree which apparently relates to a case in which a man
produced a title to some lands claimed by the church.
As he disregarded the excommunication launched at him
it is declared that lie shall forfeit the deed under which lie
holds, and that any ecclesiastic 1ay appear against him in
court and reclaiimi the lands with all the mnesne profits.3 In
Capitul. Lib. vii. cap. 432; Addit. III. cap. 123,
Capitul. Lib. vII. cap. 218, 269.-Capit. Herard. Archiepisc. Turon. cap.
131 (Baluz. T. 685).
3Capitul. Addit. Iv. cap. 59.-This is attributed in the text to Gelasius, but
such a passage may be looked for in vain amLong the epistles of that pope.
324 EXCOMMUNICATION.
fact, amid the turbulence of the period, excomlmunicatioLns
were becoming so common that they inevitably lost at
least a portion of their moral influence. Thus John VIII.,
whose pontificate extended from 872 to 882. has left on
record 382 epistles, and of these no less than one hundred
and fifty allude with more or less directness to the anathema which they inflict, threaten, or refer to. Very few
of these exertions of the supreme authority of the Vicar
of Christ have any bearing on the interests of religion.
The political intrigihes of the day, the temporal possessions
of the church, or the subordination of the hierarchy are in
almost all instances the objects of the anathema. How
the awful authority over the souls of men was degraded to
the level of the pettiest interests is seen when some audacious scoundrels stole the horses of the pope during his progress through France. He promptly excoimmunicates the
unknown thieves unless the beasts shall be returned within
three days, and he takes advantage of the opportunity to
include in the curse some knaves who had previously
pilfered his plate while staying at the abbey of Flavignyas he shrewdly suspects, with the connivance of the holy
monks there.1 That bishops were not disinclined to follow
the example of their chief and to use their control over salvation for their personal benefit is apparent from the treatment of royalty in Wales about this time. Tewdwr King
of Brecknock profanely stole Bishop Libiau's dinner from
the abbey of Llancore, when the angry prelate excoimmunicated him and exacted an enormous fine as the price of
reconciliation; and when Brochmael, King of Gwent, and
his family were anathematized by Bishop Cyfeiliawg for
some personal offence, the fee for removing the censure
was a plate of pure gold the size of the bishop's face.2
A power so persistently and so ignobly abused requires
something more than merely moral force to insure respect
and obedience.
Johann. PP. VIII. Epist. 127.
Haddan and Stubbs's Councils of Gr. Britain, I. 207-8.
CH-CURCH AND STATrE. 325
While, in the Carlovingian Empire, the church clamored
to the state for support and protection, the monarchy, in
even worse plight, clung closer to the church, in the vain
hope of preserving its rapidly ebbing strength by a union
with the spiritual power. Its inevitable policy under the
circumstances was to enhance that power as far as possible
with a view to curb the rising independence of the nobles.
In the wild struggle of contending forces the monarchy
virtually disappeared to emerge again in the form of a
feudal lord paramount. The church maintained its organization; the powers conferred on it, however useless at
the moment, were jealously treasured in its archives and
became its imprescriptible rights, so that when the reconstruction of society began they were its most efficient
weapons in controlling feudal noble and feudal king —a
result, unexpected by either party, which lends an interest
to the apparently fruitless struggles of the descendants of
Charlemagne.
With the partition of the empire there arose a new necessitv which soon made itself felt, of guarding against
the immunity of criminals who might escape from one
kingdom to another. Accordingly the sons of Louis-leDe'bonnaire entered into conventions providing for the extradition of fugitive malefactors, and in these the spiritual
tribunals were amply taken care of. If any one guilty of
public crime took refuge in another state to avoid excommunication, or after excommunication to avoid penitence,
his bishop was empowered to make direct application to
the king of the refugee's new country, who was thereupon
bound to diligently make search for him, and when foundl
to deliver him to his bishop that the penitence might be
enforced.' The bishops thus were recognized by interConventus apud Marsnam ann. 851, cap. 5 (Baluz. II. 32). —Conventus
apud Confluentes ann. 860, cap. 5 (Ibid. p. 95). —Cf. Synod. Ravennat. ann.
877, can. xi. (Harduin. T. VI. P. I. p. 187).
28
326 EXCOMMU NICATION.
national law as possessed of an independent jurisdiction,
which was bounded only by the limits of Catholic Christendomr, and they were elevated to the position of public officers
whose writs were to be respected abroad as well as at home,
without the intervention of the representative of the state.
The importance of such a concession to the independence
of the hierarchical organization call hardly be overestimated
in its results.
When a serf refused to undergo penitence, the bishop
was empowered to beat him with rods until he should
submit, and his master, if he interfered, incurred not only
excommunication but heavy fines to the royal fisc.l
The counts and other public officers were directed everywhere to accompany the bishops in their diocesan visitations, and when the prelates were unable to correct offences
by excommunication, the civil officials were ordered to
exercise the plenitnde of the royal authority to reduce the
offenders to penitence and satisfaction.2 So clearly did the
duty of the state to enforce excommunication become recognized under the o07eration of these and similar enactments that, in the sharp letter addressed in 858 by the
Neustrian Bishops to Louis-le-Germanique during his brief
usurpation of France, they request him to order the nobles,
who by their crimes have incurred excommunication, to
render due satisfaction to the churches where they have
sinned, so that the bishops may absolve them; and if he
or his courtiers have been infected by communing with
these criminals, due penitence is indicated for the monarch
and his followers.3
Year by year the royal power grew less able to control
the anarchical elements of society, and, as the strength to
enforce the secular law declined, it relied more and more
Carol. Calvi Capit. ann. 853, Tit. xI. cap. 9 (Baluz. II. 39).-Ejusd. ann.
868, Tit. xxxviiI. cap. 9 (Ibid. p. 141).
2 Loc. cit. cap. 10 (Baluz. II. 40, 142).
Carol. Calvi Capit. ann. 858, Tit. xxvii. cap. 13 (Baluz. II. 78).
CHURCH AND STATE. 327
on what little respect remained for the censures of the
church. In the Capitulary of Pistes, issued in 862, Charlesle-Chauve draws a fearful picture of the rapine and clesolation which pervaded every quarter of his dominions, and,
with a brave assertion of the authority which he knew was
contemned by every petty chieftain, he ordered that by the
first day of the following October all spoliation and robbery and murder should cease. Such malefactors as did
not by that time reform and undergo the penitence clue for
their past misdeeds he commanded to be brought before
him, or their possessions to be seized and themselves to be
excommunicated by the bishops. He recognized the rising
strength of feudalism by holding the nobles responsible
for the submission of their vassals and retainers to the
penitence to be imposed on them, and if they did not bring
their men to the bishops for that purpose they were themselves to be excommunicated. Moreover, if any should
prove so hardened as to be insensible to the fear of God,
contemning the authority of the church and the power of
the crown, he proclaimed that they were by the sacred
canons cut off from the society of Christians and from the
church on earth and in heaven, and that, as enemies of
God and the church, they should be persecuted by the
royal authority and by all good subjects until driven from
the kingdom.1
This curious commingling of secular and spiritual punishments, and the prominence accorded to the latter, show
the fearful perplexities of the monarch and the desperation
with which he sought the aid of the church in the impossible task of resisting the inevitable tendencies of the age.
The crown and the mitre had alike proved false to the
trust confided to them. They had been weighed and found
wanting, and the closest alliance they might form could no
1 Carol. Calvi Capit. ann. 862, Tit. xxxiv. cap. 3, 4 (Baluz. II. 109-12).
Cf. Capit. Tit. xxIII. cap. 7, ann. 857 (p. 61).
328 EXCOMMUNICAT ION.
longer control the lawless ferocity which their selfishness
and greed had allowed to become the dominant element
of the time. Still they fought the losing battle as gallantly
as though they could expect to win, and year by year
Charles leaned more upon his clergy for the support which
he could look for nowhere else. In the Edict of Pistes, for
instance, in 864, in issuing a new coinage and threatening
punishment for its rejection, he instructs his bishops to
watch, through their priests, that the penalty is duly inflicted, and to report to him all cases of non-compliance.
In renewing, also, the laws against the use of false measures, he adds that offenders, after undergoing the legal
punishment, shall be subjected to the further sentence of
their bishops, as it is a crime equivalent to usury and denounced by God and the church.l
All this proves that the administration of the secular
law was becoming so disorganized that Charles could rely
upon it no longer, and that he vainly endeavored to supplement it by means of the clergy. This tendency continued to increase, and twenty years later an edict of his
grandson, Carloman, indicates that the hierarchy had become almost the only instrument through which the nominal ruler could hope to influence his subjects. As a preventive of robbery it is ordered that all priests shall offer free
hospitality to wayfarers, and shall instruct their parishioners to do likewise, and that supplies shall not be charged
to travellers at more than the market price —the priests
agoain being the inspectors to see that the law is obeyed,
and to entertain all appeals from travellers complaining of
extortion. The same edict contains an eloquent description
of the all-pervading rapine and spoliation which devastated
the country, and now at length the royal power confesses
its utter impotence. The bishops alone are relied upon to
cure the incurable by summoning the offenders to repentCarol. Calvi Capit. Tit. xxxvI. cap. 15, 20. (Baluz. II. 122-4)o
CHURCH AND STATE. 329
ance and 1punishing the contumacious by excommunication.
There is scarcely a pretence of threatening the incorrigible
with the king's authority, but the laity and the public
officials are conjured, by the love of God and their fidelity
to the throne, to support the bishops when called upon.1
The rapid progress of decentralization had disintegrated
the work of Charlemagne, and his. descendant was a king
only in name. As the sovereign disappeared, feudalism
and the church were left face to f-ace.
Yet to the last the crown asserted its traditional control
over the mitre. In 860 Charles-le-Chauve still undertook
to regulate the use of excommunication by forbidding his
bishops from employing it without first summoning the
offender to repentance and amendment, and calling upon
the civil power to enforce the summons. It was only after
these formalities had been resorted to and found insufficient
that the prelate was at liberty to eject the obdurate sinner
firom the church.2 Nine years later he repeated these commands with additional details; ancl he ordered further that
those who were unjustly condemned by their bishops
should appeal to him, when, if injustice were proved, the
prelate should be amerced according to the laws of Charlemagne anrd Louis-le-DebonnLaire.3
This right of appeal was the necessary consequence of
the intervention of the secular power, for the church was
as yet not so absolute as to be able to call upon the state
for assistance without thereby authorizing the state to investigate the cases for which its aid was invoked. In a
modified form, indeed, the royal prerogative had long been
held to possess the power of annulling excomlmunication.
In 681, the twelfth council of Toledo deprecates the incongruity of seeing those with whom the king was pleased to
Carolomanni Capit. ann. 884, Tit. IIi. cap. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13
(Baluz. II. 195-8).
J Carol. Calvi Capit. ann. 860, Tit. xxxI. cap. 6 (Baluz. II. 95).
3 Carol. Calvi Capit. ann. 869, Tit. XL. cap. 7, 10 (Baluz. II. 144-5).
330 EX COMMUNIC ATION.
associate remain under the ban of the church. It therefore orders that whoever is received and pardolled by the
king, and admitted to his table, shall not be refused communion by the church.l This rule prevailed extensively
and long remained in force. At the close of the eleventh
century, Ivo of Chartres includes it in his Decretum as
borrowed from the Capitularies (Lib. v. cap. 383), though
it is not to be found there. He considers it good law,
submits to it himself in one case, and counsels submission
to it in another;2 and a century earlier Gerbert of Aurillac
alludes to its being invoked by Arnoul of Rheims.3
If, during these civil dissensions and their attendant
anarchy, the church suffered fearfully in person and property, it yet had ample opportunity of storing up precedents
of the gravest moment for its future supremacy. Its alliance with the state was to enure solely to its own advantage, and its gifts, like the poisoned shirt of Nessus, were
destined to plague the receiver. Thus, when in 876 John
VTIII. assumed the prerogative of bestowing the imperial
crown on Charles-le-Chauve, in return for the perilous and
delusive honor which he bestowed, he received a most
substantial advantage, for Charles proclaimed the supremacy of the See of Rome, acknowledged its right to exercise pastoral care over all the churches, and pledged himself that it should be obeyed by them in all things.4 John
was not long in stretching to the utmost this indefinite
authority, for in 878, when he presided over the synod of
Troyes, Sigebod, Archbishop of Narbonne, called his attention to the Wisigothic code, which omitted to provide any
Concil. Toletan. XII. ann. 681, can. 3.
2 Ivon. Decret. P. xvI. cap. 344.-Epist. 62, 171. That the custom
should remain in force at this period shows that it could coexist with the
wildest pretensions of theocratic supremacy.' Gerberti Epist. Supplem. Epist. 1. (Migne's Ptatrolog. T. 139, p. 265.)
4 Synod. Ticinens. ann. 876, cap. 1, 2. (Baluz. II. 163.)
CHIURCH AND STATE. 331
special penalty for the sacrilege of spoiling the church, and
which, mioreover, declared that no court should entertain
a complaint for offences not therein enumerated, the consequence of which was that the church was left to the ordinary protection of the law. To remove this incongruity,
the pope thereupon issued in his own name an order extending over the Gothic races in Aquitaine and Spain the
Carlovingian penalty of thirty pounds of pure silver for
all offences of the kind.l Yet the man who thus assumed
this enormous power over Christendomn, had so little real
independence at home, that in this same year, 878, we find
Lambert, Duke of Spoleto, asserting that the papacy had
no right to send envoys abroad without his permission.2
From the same transaction between Charles-le-Chauve
and John VIII., there arose another novel precedent, which
foreboded the ultimate triumph of the church over the state.
Seven years before, when the miserable Lothair of Lotharingia died, in 869, without legitimate issue, his uncles
Charles-le-Chauve and Louis-le-Germanique had made
haste to divide his spoils. His brother, the Emperor
Louis II., however, claimed that the kingdom had been
bequeathed to him, and his power in Italy made it not difficult for him to secure for his pretensions the support of
the papacy. Adrian II. accordingly interfered, threatened
with excommunication all who should lay hands on the
heritage, or should render allegiance to the usurpers, and
wrote to Hincmar of Rheims, ordering him to excommunicate his sovereign if he should dare to disobey the mandate. Hincemar's reply to this assumption of supremacy
is couched in terms of scantest courtesy. The kingdoms
of earth, he reminds the pope, are obtained by battle,
and not by the excommunications of pope or bishop; the
Frankish warriors are not disposed to regard the successor' Confirmat. Legis Caroli (Baluz. II. 190).
2 Johann. PP. VIII. Epist. 104.
332 EXC O MMUNIATION.
of St. Peter as both king and pontiff, or to admit that he
has any control over their allegiance, nor do they believe
that their chances of heaven depend upon their selecting
their king at his bidding, for an illegal excommunication
injures only him who utters it, and it is unseemly in a
bishop to deprive a Christian of the sacraments for the
purpose of transferring a kingdom from one monarch to
another.' This was good canonical doctrine, but when
Charles, at the death of Louis II., sought the imperial
crown, which chanced to be virtually at the disposal of the
pope, he was willing to admit all the claims of the church,
in the vain hope of acquiring additional support for the
precarious dignity; and with blind infatuation he sought
and obtained the interference of the papacy in the relations between sovereign and subject. In the Roman synod
of 877, which confirmed his election as Emlperor, Pope
John VIII. gratified him by anathematizing with a per)etual curse all who should dare to resist his authority
or dispute his title, and the synod unanimously responded
"' So be it!"?' Charles gained nothing by thus inviting and
acknowledging the supreme jurisdiction of the church over
the allegiance of nations, but the precedent which he thus
established held good. However much he may at the moment have rejoiced in the additional guarantee of the imperial crown, he found that in effect it availed him little, when
the approach of his nephew Carloman at the head of a German army sent him flying homewards to perish miserably
in a peasant's hut among the Alps, almost before the echoes
of the clergy's 6 Fiat, fiat, fiat!" had died away. For five
hundred years afterwards. however, succeeding emperors
learned the full significance of the interference of the
church between the monarch and his subjects, when they
found that the allegiance which could be enforced by ex1 incmari Remuens. Epist. 27.
2 Sylnod. Roman. ann. 877 (HIarduin. T. VI. P. I. p. 184).
THE CHURCH AND FEUDALISM. 333
communication could likewise be abrogated by the same
means. What the church could give, the church could
take away, and the heedless recipients of her gifts could
only hold them on the tenure of obedience.
THE CHURCH AND FEUDALISM.
As the royal authority crumbled and was virtually lost
in the anarchy which gave birth to feudalism, the church
was left, without protection, to defend itself as best it could,
from the endless and all-pervading assaults of the local
tyrants whose power was the reward of lawless audacity.
This life-and-death struggle and its influence on the character of the ecclesiastical body are fairly illustrated by the
circumstances attending the murder of Fulk, Archbishop
of Rheims, in the year 900. In 893, Baldwin-le-Chauve of
Flanders had endeavored to get possession of the celebrated and wealthy abbey of St. Bertin, but Fulk manaoged
to forestall him, caused himself to be elected, and refused
to surrender it. For seven years Baldwin dissembled his
disappointment, but at length, in the year 900, he dispatched a knight named Winemar to Fulk and Charles-le
Simple to negotiate for the abbey, but Fulk refused to listen
to any propositions, and Charles, who owed his crown to
Fulk, declined to interfere. Winemar, stung by his ill
success, lay in wait for Fulk on his return to Rheims, June
17th, and slew him. His successor Hervey was consecrated
without loss of time on July 6th, and the bishops assembled
at the ceremony thus excommunicated Winemar, with
Everard, Ratfrid, and his other accomplices in the bloody
sacrilege" In the name of God, and by the power of the Holy Ghost, and
the authority divinely granted to bishops by Peter, chief of the
334 EXCOMMUINICATIONo
Apostles, we separate them from the bosom of holy mother church,
and condemn them with the anathema of the eternal curse, that
they may have no help of man nor any converse with Christians.
Let them be accursed in the city and accursed in the country.
Accursed be their barns and accursed their bones; accursed be the
seed of their loins and the seed of their lands, their flocks of sheep
and their herds of cattle. Accursed be they in their entering and
in their outgoing. Be they accursed at home and homeless elsewhere. Let them strain out their bowels and die the death of Arius.
Upon their heads fall all the curses with which God through His
servant Moses threatened the transgressors of the divine law. Let
theml be anathema maranatha, and let them perish in the second
coming of the Lord; and let them, moreover endure whatever of
evil is provided in the sacred canons and the apostolic decrees for
murder and sacrilege. Let the righteous sentence of divine condemnation consign them to eternal death. Let no Christian salute
them. Let no priest say Mass for them, nor in sickness receive
their confession, nor, unless they repent, grant them the sacrosanct
colmulunion even on their death-bed. But let them be buried in the
grave of an ass, and rot in a dunghill on the face of the earth, that
their shame and malediction may be a warning to present and
future generations. And, as these lights which we now cast from
our hands are extinguishecd, so may their light be quenched in
eternal darkness."'
Before we utterly condemn the hideous ferocity of the
curse thus belched forth in the name of the Redeemer, we
should give fair consideration to the rage and fear which
prompted it, and which justified it as fully as so foul an
abuse of powers assumed from God could be justified.
That the church was unarmed and defenceless except in so
far as it could by means like this strike terror into the breasts
of savages was shown by the result. The bishops, feeling
the impotence of their own wrath, procured in addition for
the murderers a special excommunication from the Holy
See itself; but Winemar laughed both to scorn, boasted of
his deed as a proof of his fidelity to his suzerain, and took
no pains to procure absolution, which shows that his lord
Baluz. II. 463-4.
THE CHURCH AND FEUDALISM. 335
and his associates paid no heed to the injunctions of the
anathema. Nay, more; Fulk had been the tried and trusted
friend of Charles-le-Simple, who owed to him his throne;
yet when Baldwin of Flanders claimed of him the coveted
abbey, rendered vacant by this murderous deed, Charles
dared not refuse it to his powerful vassal, and St. Bertin
became hereditary in the House of Flanders, like any other
fief.l
Much may be forgiven to men whose profession forbade
recourse to force in an age when force was the only law
respected; and yet Charity herself might well stand aghast
to see those who represented on earth the Gospel of love
unpack their hearts with curses so heartily that they seem
enamored of the opportunity to consign their fellow-beings
to ruin in this world and to perdition in the next. In the
following formula, for instance, there is a richness of imagination and a particularity of detail which show that its
author fairly revelled in his power of malediction, and rolled
as a sweet morsel under his tongue every torment which
he invoked upon his victim. It was not called forth by
the exigencies of a supreme occasion, such as the murder
of Fulk, but was a general form of malediction for petty
thieves and similar malefactors.
" By the authority of God the omnipotent Father, and of tle
Son, and of the Holy Ghost, and of the sacred canons, and of tl
holy and unsullied Virgin Mary the Mother of God, and of all thf
heavenly Virtues, Angels, Archangels, Thrones, DominationS
Po.wers, Cherubim and Seraphim, and of the holy Patriarchs, Pro
phets, and all the Apostles and Evangelists, and of the holy Inno
Chron. S. Bertin. cap. xx. pp. 1, 3; cap. xxI. p. 1 Folquin. Cartul. S.
Bertin. c. 68. It is true that Richerus (Lib. I. cap. 18) chronicles the terrible death of Winemar as a judgment from heaven to repair the injustice of
man; but though he is a good authority for the events of the end of the
tenth century, the silence of the special historians of the abbey is, I think,
sufficient evidence that his story is merely one of the customary legends so
numerous at that period when spiritual terrorism was the only substitute'or law.
336 EXCOMMUNICATION.
cents who alone are worthy in the sight of the Lamb to sing the
new song, and of the holy martyrs and the holy confessors and
the holy virgins and of all the saints and elect of God, we excommunicate and anathematize this thief, or this malefactor, and we
expel him from the holy church of God, that he may be delivered
over to eternal torment with Dathan and Abiram and with those
who cried to the Lord God,'Away from us, we wish not to know
Thy ways.' And as fire is quenched with water, so may his light
be quenched for ever and ever, unless he repent and render full
satisfaction. Amen. Be he accursed of God the Father, who
created man; accursed of God the Son, who suffered for man; accursed of the Holy Ghost which cometh in baptism; accursed of
the Holy Cross which the triumphant Christ ascended for our salvation; accursed of the Holy Virgin Mary, the Mother of God;
accursed of St. Michael, the receiver of blessed souls; accursed of
the angels and archangels, the princes and powers, and all the
hosts of heaven; accursed of the worthy legion of Prophets and
Patriarchs; accursed of St. John, the forerunner and baptizer of
Christ; accursed of St. Peter and St. Paul and St. Andrew, and all
the apostles of Christ, and the other disciples, and the Four Evangelists who converted the world; accursed of the wonder-working
band of martyrs and confessors whose good works have been pleasing to God; accursed of all the holy virgins who have shunned the
world for the love of Christ; accursed of all the Saints, beloved of
God, from the beginning even unto the end of the world; accursed
of heaven and of earth and of all that is holy therein. Let him be
accursed wherever he be, whether at home or abroad, in the road
or in the path, or in the wood, or in the water, or in the church.
Let hinm be accursed living and dying, eating, drinking, fasting or
athirst, slumbering, sleeping, waking, walking, standing, sitting,
lying, working, idling, —, -, and bleeding. Let him be accursed in all the forces of his body. Let him be accursed outside
and inside; accursed in his hair and accursed in his brain; accursed
in the crown of his head, in his temples, in his forehead, in his ears,
in his brows, in his eyes, in his cheeks, in his jaws, in his nostrils,
in his front teeth, in his back teeth, in his lips, in his throat, in his
shoulders, in his upper arms, in his lower arms, in his hands, in
his fingers, in his breast, in his heart, in his stomach and liver, in
his kidneys, in his loins, in his hips, in his —, in his thighs, in his
knees, in his shins, in his feet, in his toes, and in his nails. Let
him be accursed in every joint of his body. Let there be no health
in him, from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot. May
THE CHIURCIH AND FEIUDALISiM. 337
Christ, the Son of the Living God, curse him throughout His kingdom, and may H-Ieaven with all its Virtues rise up against him to
his dalmnation, unless lie repents and renders due satisfaction.
Amen. So be it. So be it. Amnen!1
This would seem to exhaust every possible resource of
malediction, and yet the infinite variety with which the
church could invoke thle anger of heaven upon her oppressors is shown in another excomlmunicationlaunched about
the year 1014, by Benedict VIII. against some reckless
vassals of William II. Count of Provence, who were endcleaoring to-obtain from the latter the grant of certain
lands claimed by the celebrated monastery of St. Gilles.
aWithout being quite as formal and precise in its details of
cursing as the foregoing, there is a bold comprehensiveness of imaginations about it which befits the supreme head
of Christianity, while it is by no mleans lacking in hearty
vigor of imprecation. After excommunicating in general
terms and consigning to Satan the audacious men who
thus sought to lay unhallowed hands upon the possessions
of the church, the pope proceeds"Let them be accursed in their bodies, and let their souls be delivered to destruction and perdition and torture. Let them be
damned with the damlned: let them be scourged with the ungrateful: let them perish with the proud. Let them be accursed wTith
the Jews who, seeing the incarnate Christ, did not believe but
sougoht to crucify Him. Let them be accursed with tile heretics
who labored to destroy the church. Let theim be accursed with
those who blaspheme the namle of God. Let theml be accursed with
those who despair of the mercy of God. Let them be accursed
with those who lie dalnecl in 1Hell. Let tliem be accursed with
the impious and sinners unless they amnendc their ways, and confess
themselves in fault towards St. Giles. Let them be accursed in the
four quarters of the earth. In the East be they accursed, and in
the West disinherited; in the North interclicted, and in the South
excommunicate. Be they accursed in the day-time and exconlmu1 Baluz. II. 469-70.-This is the curse of Ernuliphus, well known to,l11
Shlhandeanns. Sterne probably obtained it fromn Spelna.n (Glossmar. s. v. ExconmnunicLtio).
29
338 EXCOMMXUN ICATION.
nicate in the night-time. Accursed be they at home and excolimun
nicate abroad; accursed in standing and excommunicate in sitting;
accursed in eating, accursed in drinking, accursed in sleeping, and
excommunicate in waking; accursed when they work and excommunicate when they rest. Let them be accursed in the spring-time
and excommunicate in the summer; accursed in the autumn and
excommunicate in the wvinter. Let tlhem be accursed in this world
and excommunicate in the next. Let their lands pass into the hands
of the stranger, their wives be given over to perdition, and their
children fall before the edge of the sword. Let what they eat be
accursed, and accursed be what they leave, so that he who eats it
shall be accursed. Accursed and excommunicate be the priest who
shall give them the body and blood of the Lord, or who shall visit
them in sickness. Accursed and excommunicate be he who shall
carry them to the grave and shall dare to bury them. Let theml be
excommunicate and accursed with all curses if they do not make
amends and render due satisfaction. AnLd know this for truth, that
after our death no bishop nor count, nor any secular power shall
usurp the seigniory of the blessed St. Giles. And if any presume
to attempt it, borne down by all the foregoing curses, they never
shall enter the kingdom of Heaven, for the blessed St. Giles comlittecd his monastery to the lordship of the blessed Peter."'
Hardened sinners might make light of these impreca_
tions, but their effect on believers was necessarily unutterable, when, amid the gorgeous and impressive ceremonial of
worship, the bishop, surrounded by twelve priests bearing
flaming candles, solemnly recited the awful words which
consigned the evil-doer and all his generation to eternal
torment with such fearful amplitude and reduplication of
malediction, and, as the sentence of perdition came to its
climax, the attending priests simultaneously cast their
candles to the ground and trod them. out as a symbol of
the quenching of a human soul in the eternal night of hell.
To this was added the expectation, amounting almost to a
certainty, that I-Heaven would not wait for the natural course
of events to confirm the judgment thus pronounced, but
that the maledictions would be as effective in this world
as in the next. Those whom spiritual terrors could not
Benedict. PP. VIII. Epist. 32 (Migne's Patrol. T. 139, pp. 1630-2).
TIHE COIURCIH AND FEUDALISM. 339
subdue thus were daunted by the fearful stories of the
judlgment overtaking the hardened sinner who dared to
despise the dread anathema. Long before Otho the Great
had lain in his grave a hundred years, after a life and death
of publicity inseparable from his position as the leading
character of the teLth century, men related with horror
how he had violated the laws of spiritual affinity by marryin g his gossip, Adelaide, Queen of Italy; how his natural
sonl, William, Archbishop of MIainz, had boldly taken him
to task for this incestuous union and had been thrown into
a dungeon by the angrTy father; how wheln released the son
had, in obedience to his duty, excommunicated that father
at Easter, and solemnly warned him that by Pentecost God
should judge between them; how the Emperor disregarded
the sentence, and how, on the high feast of the appointed
dclay, in his imperial robes and surrounded by his splendid
court, he was assisting at nmass, when the avenging Deity
summoned him to the judgment-seat, and prelate and noble
stood aghast at finding their master clead without a sign.'
The infallibility of a pope declared that the excommunicate
could not obtain victory in battle or prosperity in this
world;2 and if these temporal visitations were insufflcient
to curl)b a hardened generation, there was the evidence of
the holy virgin Herluca, to whom the secrets of this world
and the next were freely revealed, and who learned in one
of her visions that the nmost terrible fire in hell was reserved
for those who died unreconciled of excommunication.3
It was not difficult, therefore, to add the spice of mliracle
to the celebrated case of the excommunication of Robert
the Pious of France, who committed, in 995, the indiscretion, attributed to Otho the Great, of transgressing the
limits of affinity, spiritual and carnal, in marrying his
second cousin Bertha, widow of Odo, Count of Blois, whose
son he had held in baptism. Already he was regarded in
1 Pet. Damiani Opusc. xxxiv. cap. vii.
2 Gregor. PP. VII. Regist. Lib. vi. Epist. xvi.
Paul. IBernried. Vit. 1lerlumc Virgin. cap. 25.
340 EXCOMMUNICATION..Rome with little favor, for one of the incidents of the
Capetian revolution had been the deposition and incarceration, in 991, of Arnoul, Archbishop of Rheims, halfbrother of Louis-le-Faineant, the last Carlovingian, for
assisting his uncle, Charles of Lorraine, in an unsuccessful
attempt to resist the usurpation.' Although the proceedings of the council of St. Baseul had been nominally
regular, they were somewhat violent in fact; the immunity
of the ecclesiastical body had been violated, but the new
dynasty was not as yet secure enough to be magnanimous,
and Arnoul languished in prison for six years, while Gerbert of Aurillac occupied his priimatial seat in spite of
remonstrance. The prelates concerned were summoned to
the synod of Pavia to answer for their conduct, but they
prudently held aloof; and when Gregory V. ascended the
pontifical throne, one of his first acts, in 996, was to suspenl them, at a synod held in Rome, and to threaten an
anathema on the whole of Prance. Alarmed at these
demonstrations, and anxious about the objectioins made
to his marriage with Bertha, Robert dispatched St. Abbo
of Fleury to the pope, in the hope of obtaining terms. Gregory at that time had been driven out of R ome by Crescentins, and the excommunication which he had launched at
his enemy had been met by the installation of an antipope;
but the little consideration which he enjoyed at homne did
not abate his tone of command abroad. 1H-e was inflexible,
and Abbo returned without accomplishing the object of his
mission. Hoping' to obtain the confirmation of his marriaoe,
Robert yielded. The dreaded Carlovingian was transferred
from the dungceon of Orleans to the archiepiscopal throne
of lRheims, and Gerbert was ejected, to be gratified with
the see of Ravenna, from which in a few years he was elevated to the papacy.'
Robert's subiission gained him little. The pope who in
Acta Concil. Basoliens.
Udalr. ]3abenb. Cod. Lib. II. cap. 2.-Aimoini Vit.- S. Abbon. Floriac.
cap. 11-12.-Muratori Annal. d'Italia ann. 997 —S.
THE CHURCHI AND FEUDALISM. 341
exile found his thunders so effective was not likelv to be less
aggressive when the arms of Otho III. had gratified him
with the sight of Crescentius' headless trunk, and of his
rival, the Antipope John, blinded, tongueless, and noseless,
parading his misery through the streets of Rome, seated
backwards on an ass, with its tail in his hands.l Hardly
had he been restored to the Vatican when he summoned
another synod, in 998, the first act of which ordered the
separation of the incestuous couple, prescribed for them
seven years of penitence, and threatened them with the
dread anathema if they should dare to resist the decree.
The bishop who had celebrated the marriage, and all the
prelates who had consented to it, were, moreover, suspended
firom communion until they should appear personally at
Rome and render due satisfaction for their infraction of
the canons. At the same time there was no pretence of*
dethroning the obstinate king. It was reserved for another
Gregory to develop such doctrines into practice; and a request from the synod that Robert should not aid Stephen
of Puy, deposed for irregularity of election, shows that no
interference was contemplated with the allegiance clue to
him by his subjects.2
Robert's reverence for the church, his zealous performance of all his religious duties, and the humility and
generosity of his charity gained for him, even during his
lifetime, if we may believe his biographer Hielgaldus, the
power of working miracles. Such a nature could not but
be powerfully impressed with the awful sentence passed
upon him by Rome, and the fearful alternative held out to
him. Yet his love for Bertha held good against it all. EIe
S. Pet. Dainiani Epist. 21, Lib. I. In these movements church and state
were, as usual, inextricably mingled. Gregory's relationship to Otho III.,
and the audacious design of Crescentius to restore Italy to the domination
of Constantinople, lent a sharper edge to the vengeance exacted by the
spiritual and temporal heads of Christendom.
2 Concil. ulnman ann. 998, can. 1, 2, 8 (Harduin. T. VI. P. I. p. 756).
342 EXCOMMUNICATION.
refused to part with her, and the dread excollmmunulicationl
fell upon them both. Times ha(l changed since, a hundred
years before, Inight ~Winenmar and his master Baldwin
laughed to scorn the most elaborate cursing that France
and Rome combined could pour upon them. IRobert's
bishops hurried across the Alps and made their peace as
best they might, and tradition relates that he and his
queen, loving not wisely but too well, stood iforth as lepers
Ipon whom the curse of Heaven had fallen. Gratitude for
past favors, hopes of future benefits, were as nothing when
the church had decreed the segregation of the hardened
sinner; and courtier and parasite, friend and dependant,
fell away from the infected presence of the exconimmiunicate.
Two humble servants alone could be found to perform the
most menial offices brinoingl them into contact with their
master, and these were obliged to consign to the flames
all the dishes used b y the royal pair, lest contamination
should be conveyed to the other memlbers of the household.l
It was impossible that Robert could remlain indefinitely
under excommunication. Under the second of the I-louse
of Capet the royal supremacy was too precarious to endure
a violent and lolng-conti.nued strain and every nmotive of
personal anmbition and state policy counselled submission.
Resistance, indeed, would be fatal to all hopes of founding
a dynasty; for when, to insure the fealty of the great
barons, it was necessary for each king to crown his son
durinog his own lifetime, there could be little hope of transmitting the throne to the offspring of a marriage thus condemoned as null and void; and, according to the manners
of the age, the child of a concubine would have a better
chance than the son of Queen Bertha. Yet Robert clung
to his wife with wonderful pertinacity, and he remained for
at least two years under the ban of the church befbre he
1 S. Pet. Daminni Opuse. xxxIv. cap. 6. It is of course impossible not to
suspect Damiani of n, little righteous exaggeration in describing what ought
to have been, rather than what really occurred.
THE CIIURCHI AND FEUDALISM. 343
could resolve on a separation.' The unanswerable arguments of state policy, and the gradually increasing con-viction of the hopelessness of prolonged resistance, are
armply sufficient to account for his final submission, though
his biographer assures us that it was brought about by the
reckless virtue of St. Abbo of Fleury, who, at the risk of
his life, persisted in arraigning the wickedness of the king,
in public and in private, until the sinner's resolution gave
way, and he put aside the fair partner of his guilt.2 So
simple an explanation, however, of a perfectly nat. ural
result was not suited to the purposes of the church, and a
miracle was invoked to manifest the anger of HIeaven at
the incestuous u.nion1 and at the obstinacy of disobedience
with which it was prolonged. Queen- Bertha gave birth to
-a monster-a boy with the head and neck of a goose —and,
appalled at this evidence of divine wrath, tlhe unhappy
father and mother submitted to the decree of separation,
underwent penance, and were reconciled to the triumphant
church.3 The Eneimory of this prodigy was perpetuated ii
the sight of the people by the statues of the Reine Pedauque-the queen with the goose's foot-w-hich einbellished the portals of so many of the churches of Fralnce.
Even yet the watchful care of Heaven was not exhausted,
and for many years it kept guard over the results of the
victory. About fifteen years after marriage with his second
wife, Constance of Provence, Robert made a pilgrimage to
Rome, and was followed by Bertha, who still hoped that
she mig'ht persuade the successor of St. Peter to restore
her to her husband. When Constance heard of this desperate venture of her unhappy rival, she was consumed with' Some authorities have assumed that the divorce took place almost immediately, but the evidence collected. by Dom IMabillon (Bouquet, Rec. des
lIist. X. 568-9) seems to me to justify the conclusion that it occurred not
earlier than the year 1000, nor later than 1001.
o Helgaldi Vit. Roberti Regis, cap. xvII.
3 S. Pet. Damiani loc. cit. —Frag. Eist. Franc, (Bouquet, X. 211),
Dissert. sur la Ieine Pddauqcue (Bullet, Mythologie Francaise).
344 E:XCOMMUNICATION.
anxiety lest it should prove successful, and at length in a
vision she saw a man of venerable aspect, who assured her
that she would soon be relieved of her grief, and, in answer
to her inquiries, informed her that he was a bishop named
Savinian. Before the third day was over, the king unexpectedly returned, as loving as ever; St. Savinian, a martyr
till then lying unknown and unhonored in the cathedral of
Sens, was gratified with a splendid shrine, and the lucky
clerk who had been able to explain her dream, and direct
her to the relics of her comforter, in due time became
Bishop of Orleans.1
A cause which I-leaven thus manifestly made its own
could not fail to prosper, and when the Franconian emperors had raised the papacy out of the mire into which it
had been plunged by the House of Tusculum, the popes
were prepared to exert their supremacy over princes and
peoples with more energy than ever. For this they had
full opportunity in the growing desire for law and order
developed in the gradual reconstruction of European society as it emerged from the anarchy consequent upon the
fall of the Carlovingian system. Christendom was no
longer ravaged by the Hun, the Saracen, anid the Dane;
feudalism was establishing a recognized code of jurisprudence, which, rude as it was, yet gave in theory to every
main a place in the body politic, and rights which might be
vindicated according to a settled form of procedure; and
some limitations were even beginning to be placed on the
perpetual scourlge of the petty seigniorial wars. As the
elements of human society were thus painfully developing
themselves into an organized system, the vast and indefinite claims of the church, presented in the False Decretals,
and partially recognized in the expiring efforts of the later
Carlovingian legislation, were pressed with lunfaltering'
1 Odortnni Chron. Continuat. (Bouquet, X. 166).
THE CHUIJRC AND FEUDALISM. 345
vigor by the able men who occupied the pontifical throne
after the middle of the eleventh century. It is no wonder
that in such a state of things the trained and disciplined
intellects of the church had a vast advantage over the rude
intelligence of the feudal nobles. With a unity of purpose
that made all its members work to a common end, and
with a perseverance that no discouragement could baffle, the
church pursued its aims undeviatingly. Where so many
rival interests were ever seeking each other's destruction,
it could always find an ally whenever it met with serious
opposition; and that ally invariably found, sooner or later,
that implicit obedience to its pretensions was rigorously
exacted as the price of its assistance. Thus skilfully using
the antagonism of conflicting interests to break down each
in turn, it succeeded in moulding the plastic elements of
civilization into a theocracy such as the world had never
be-fore witnessed.
This process is fairly illustrated by the vicissitudes of
the protracted quarrel between Henry IVT. and the papacy,
which show how the church carried on the apparently
unequal contest, how it made use of the passions and ambitions of that turbulejlt time, and how terribly efficient
was its single spiritual weapon -excommunication.
The vigilant and resolute Emperor Henry III. had worn
out his life in the effort to enforce order among his savage
feucldatories. His early death left his son, Henry IV., an
infant five years old, whom the wise caution of the father
had crowned as his successor a year previous. Removed,
a few years later, by a conspiracy between prelate and
noble, from the tutelage of his mother Agnes to that of
Albert the iMagnificentt, Archbishop of Bremen, the youth
grew up with little trainingo in wisdom or self-control,
even if his passions were not purposely led astray by those
who found their account in rendering him unfit for his
lofty station. The plot, moreover, which had displaced
the Reg'ent Ag'nes, r1eived all the old ambitions which
346 EXCOMMUNICATION.
HIenry III. had so sternly repressed; and when the young
monarch's majority was declared, in his sixteenth year, lhe
found himself without power or friends, confronted by a
horde of turbulent princes who had sedulously taught him
to regard them as his enemies. Forced by them to marry
Bertha of Susa, he not unnaturally, in spite of her beauty
and virtues, regarded her as the badge of his dependent
position, and three years later he essayed to repudiate her.
An assembly convened at Worms in 1069 received the
suggestion with more than coldness, and postponed its
discussion for six months. WVhen the adjourned Diet met
again at Mainz, a legate of the pope was already there to
prohibit the consummation of the project, and that legate
was Peter Damiani, who was not likely to render his mission more acceptable by the imanner of its discharge. We
have seen how the church acquired jurisdiction over the
subject of marriage, and all history, from the time of Lothair and Teutberga to that of Henry VIII. and Katharine
of Arragon, shows the immense influence which it thus
obtained over the affairs of nations and of individuals.
Damiani, accordingly, rebuked Henry without ceremony
before the princes of the empile, and in a manner the most
insulting to his pride as a man and his dignity as a
mlonarch pronounced his project inadmissible, with the
threat that if he persisted in it, he should vainly askl the
imperial crown at the hands of the pope.l Thus humiliated
and defeated in his dearest aspirations, Henry retired with
rage in his heart, prepared to regard the church as an
enemy to his person, as he had long since found it an
enemy to his power.
In 1073 the stern and vigorous Hildebrand succeeded to
the pontifical throne, and lost no time in proclaiming war
to the knife with the two pervading corruptions of the
church-simony and the concubinage of the clergy. For
Lambert. Hersfeld. ann. 1069.
TItE CHURCH AND FEUDALISM. 347
some years Henry, who was maintaining a desperate struggle for life with his powerful and turbulent vassals, preserved the most friendly relations with the new pontiff,
whose moral support was essential almost to his existence.
At length, however, Gregory's reforming energy brought
the two into unavoidable collision. Simonv was universal.
From the highest to the lowest ecclesiastic, every piece of
preferment, and almost every ministerial function, was
bourght and sold more or less openly. Since the death of
Henry III. this demoralizing traffic had been shamelessly
prosecuted throughout Germany, for which Henry IV., as
nlonarch, was nominally responsible, though in his utter
powerlessness he had been helpless to prevent it, and the
sordid gains had passed into other hands. Gregory VII.,
who for more than twenty years had been the leading
spirit in the papal court, had had ample opportunity to
note how impotent were the ordinary agencies of ecclesiastical discipline to eradicate this consuming evil, and he
apparently arrived at the conclusion that, so long as the
secular authorities enjoyed the privilege of conferring ecclesiastical benefices, it would be impossible to prevent their
sale, direct or indirect. Having once reached this conviction he was not the iman to shrink from the means, however violent, that seemed likely to effect a radical cure. In
a preceding essay we have seen how this right of investiture had for five hundred years been claimed and exercised
by the sovereign with scarcely a question; and the immense
extension of church property had by this time rendered
the hierarchy an important portion of the feudal system,
which could not be rendered independent of the lord l)aramount without striking an almost fatal blow at his power.
Yet Gregory did not hesitate abruptly to abrogate the
royal authority over the fiefs of the hierarchy without consultation or negotiation with those whose time-honored
rights he abolished by a single word. That they did not
submit without a contest was natural, and the portentous
348 EX COMM U NICAT TON.
question of the investitures which he thus aroused filled
Christendom with turmoil and bloodshed for many long
and weary years.
In February, 1075, Gregory assembled a synod in PRome,
which adopted a canon forbidding for the future any ecclesiastic from receiving a bishopric, abbacy, or other preferment from the hands of a layman. All investitures thus
conferred were declared null and void; the recipient was
excomllmunicated, and the donor, whether emperor, duke,
marquis, count, or other potentate, was involved in the
same punishment.l By this one audacious stroke Gregory
hoped to secure the independence of the church, so necessary to its unity and purity; and having once advanced
the claim as an,mprescriptible right, he was prepared to
stand by it with all his indomnitable pertinacity, regardless
of opposition and careless of consequences.
This defiance of the temporal power chanced to occur at
a singularly inopportune moment. During the spring and
summer of that year HIenry succeeded in uniting under his
banner enough princes to unlertake a campaign against
the chronic revolt of the Saxons, and the bloody victory
of Hohenberg enabled him to feel for the first time that he
was really a king. In the flush of his successes, with the
Saxon princes, who had so long bearded him, confined in
his dungeons, the support of the papacy seemed no longer
necessary to save him firom destruction, and lie was little
disposed to submit to these new pretensions, so arrogantly
claiming to despoil himl of the rigllts uninterruptedly
elnjoyed by all his predecessors. Still he shrank fi'om an1
open rupture, and contented himself with quietly disregarding the papal edict.;To gain the support of Gozelo,
I)uke of Lower Lorraine, le gave the bishopric of Liege
to Henry, a canon of Verdun, and a near relation to the
I Hugon. Flaviniacens. Chron. Lib. II. ann. 1074. —Cf. Pagi Critica ann.
1075, No. 1.
TIHE CHURCH AND FEUDALISM. 349
duke;' and his conduct with regard to the bishoprics of
Italy was destructive to a cause dearer than perhaps any
other to the heart of Gregory. For nearly twenty years
the Milanese churchl had been distracted with. bloody factions arising from the papal efforts to deprive its clergy
of the privilege of marriage; and at this moment Azzo,
the archbishop recognized by the popes, was a refugee in
Rome, while a rival archbishop, Gotefrido, also shut out
fioml Milan, was carrying on a desultory warfare in the
neighborhood. The city, moreover, lay under an interdict
launched by Gregory himself in 1074. The effort to enforce
this interdict at Easter, 1075, led to a bloody battle in the
streets, in which the military leader of the papalists was
slain; whereupon thle people, tired of the ceaseless broil,
and disregoarding both their archbishops, sent a deputation
to Henry, askingT him to appoint a third. This he promptly
did, in the person of Tedaldo, who maintained possession
of the see until his death, in 1085, exchangilng excommunications with Gregory, and proving the most dangerous
opponent to his enterprises.' Henry could have clone
nothing more aggravating than this to the personal pride
or more damagingo to the politico-religious aspirations of
the pontiff. The bishoprics of Fermo and Spoleto, moreover, becoming vacant, Henry filled them, as a matter of
course, without even asking the assent of Rome; while
bhe rich German abbeys and prelacies which fell in were
>ccupied by his nominees, according to ancient usage.
These irreconcilable pretensions could have but one
result, and Gregory was not backward in provoking the
hneritable conflict. Hardly able to maintain himself in
Rome amid the agitations which pervaded the whole of
[taly, he yet felt serenely secure in the protection of
[leaven and the possession of irresistible power over the
Lambert. TI-ersfeld. ann. 1075.
o Arnulf. Gest. Episc. Mediol. Lib. III. cap. 23; Lib. iv. cap. 2, 3, 4, 5, 9.jandulf. Senior. Lib. 1II. cap. 29; Lib. Iv. cap. 2.
30
350 EXCO MM UNICATIO N.
souls and consciences of men. Towards the close of the
vear 1075 he therefore addressed an epistle to Henry which
is a masterpiece of the peculiarly exasperating style in
which the church was wont to inflict the cruelest blows in
the guise of the most paternal care for the salvation of a
sinner. Henry was informed that lie had incurred excommunication for not removing excomm-unicates from his
court, but that he could still obtain pardon by obedience
and by the performance of such penance as might be prescribed for him. His promises of filial respect for the
church were contrasted with his action in the cases of
Milan, Fermo, and Spoleto, which was pronounced illegal
and void; the decree of the recent council respectinlo investitures was referred to and declared to be unalterable,
but he was invited to send envoys to Rome, to see whether
some device could be adopted to render its enforcement
less unpalatable; and, finally, he was warned to compare
his own transient glory with the infinite power of Heaven,
and cautioned not to allow his pride at his victory over
the Saxons to blind hinm to the duty which lhe owed to
God, lest, like Saul, he might find it to cost him his throne.'
Henry was holding his splendid Christmas court at
Goslar, after the ancient fashion of the emperors, when
Gregory's lecgates presented to him this portentous missive. It could only seem to hinm a piece of insane andI
gratuitous insolence. In Germany he knew that thel
clergy, from the lowest to the higohest, were in a state of
almost open hostility to Rlome on account of Gregory's
determined efforts to deprive thema of their wives and of
the illicit gains of simony. In Italy he saw that, to the
South, Robert Guiscard, being under excommunication,
was apparently a mortal foe to the pope; in Rome itself
Gregory's life had only been preserved as by a miracle
fromn the audacious attempt of Cencio;2 while to the Northl
Gregor. PP. VII. Regist. Lib. III. Epist. 10.
2 Paul. Bernried. Vit. Gregor. VT11 cap. 5.
TIHE C —HURCH AND FEUDALISM. 351
tile Lombard clergy, headed by Tedaldo of Ailan, the
second prelate of Christendom, were arrayed in open
schism, and treated repeated excominunications with contempt. Himself, on the contrary, he believed to have
at length overcome tile enemies who had so long baffled
him. IHe was at last a king, not only in name but in
reality, wirith all Glerlimany submissive at his feet. When
therefore the legates pursued their mission by summoninpg
hiim to trial at a council to be held in Rlome on the 22d of
the approaching February, with the threat that if he failed
to appear ihe should be cut off firoll the church with the
dread aniathema: his indignation knew no bounds at so
novel a pretension of supremacy. The legates were driven
from the royal presence with insult and contumlely; and
gIenry hastily summoned all the prelates of Germany to
meet in council at WTornms on the 1st of February, to consult as to the deposition of a pope who could so mistake
his position ancld exceed his powers.'
The assembly met at thle appointed time and adopted a
letter addressed to Gregory, stigmlatizing his election to
the papacy as irregular and ille al, and recounmting the
various ill-deeds and arbitrary usurpations by which he
was endeavoring to reduce the church to slavery and had
sucaceeded in filling it with confusion andl revolution. It
is curious to observe thiat in thus formally withdrawing
from his obedience, no niention is rmade of his attack upon
the kingg, all the reasons alleged being purely the griefs of
the church and the scandals iluputed to his daily life.2
This letter was sigined individually by all the prelates,
although it is impossible to tell how many did so willing'ly,
and how many under compulsion; certain it is that not a
few lost no time in secretly commumnicating with the politiff,
assturing him of their uinalterable fidelity and asserting that
Lambert. Hersfeld. annn. 1076.-Goldast. Const. Imp. i. 235-6.
Goidast. I. 2307.
352 EXCOMMUNICATION.
tile fear of iimminent dea.th alone had forced their assent to
a document so abominable.'
Ignorant or unmindful of this hidden disaffection, Henry
rushed forward to the conflict. In an angry letter to Gregory, he called upon the pope to come down from the sacred
throne which he defiled, and promisecdthat shortly he would
preside over the election of another pontiff who would fitly
represent the church. Envoys were sent with copies of
this to the schismatic prelates of Lombardy, who eagerly
subscribed to theml; but the lnessenger sent in the name
of all to lay these documents before the synod of Ilome
and to summon the prelates there assembled to wait until
Pentecost for the new pope to be nominated by Henry,
barely escaped with his life, at the earnest interposition of
Gregory himself.2
While Henry, in the fancied plenitude of his power, was
thus disposing of the pontifical throne in anticipation,
Gregory felt sure of his game. Far better than the king
he knew the rmad ambitions and the sullen hate which
devoured the princes of the empire, and which a word from
him could rouse to destructive activity. That word was
spoken. After excommunicating again all the schismatic
bishops of Lombardy and significantly selecting Siegffiid
of Miainz as the only German prelate to be assailed, tlhe
Roman synod called upon the pope not only to cut off the
impious Henry from the church, but also to deprive him of' Annalista Saxo ann. 1076. —Paul of Bernried (Vit. Gregor. cap. vii. No.
56) asserts positively that all who hesitated were threatened with death;
while Limrbert of Hirschfeld (Annal. ann. 1076) asserts that all signed willingly, except Adalbero of Wurzburg and Hermann of Metz —whose names
however are appended to the document as printed by Goldast.
2 Anna.lista Saxo ann. 1076.-At the council of Worms, Cardinal Hugo,
then under papal excommunication, was present, as the representative of
the Itaflian church, and assured the German prelates that all Italy was
anxiously awaiting the expected signal to throw off Gregory's hateful yoke.
-Paul. Bernried. Vit. Gregor. VII. cap. vii. No. 50-9. —La.mlbet. Iersfeld.
ann. 1076.
TIHE C-HIURCH AND FEUDALIS-M. 353
his kinngdom.n. Nothing loth, Gregory promptly fulminated the sentence which marks a new era in the relations
between church and state. In its calm and self-reliant
dignity it affords an instructive contrast to the ferocious
maledictions of Hervey of IRheims and Benedict VII.'"0 blessed Peter, prince of Apostles, -we pray thee bend thy
holy ears to us and hear me thy servant whom thou hast nourished
fiom infancy and to tlhis day hast preserved fioom the wicked who
have hated and hate me for my fidelity to thee. Thou art my witness,
and my lady the Mother of God, and the blessed Paul thy brother,
and all the saints, that thou diclst place the government of thy holy
Ronman church in mny unwilling hands, and that I did not force
myself into thy seat, but rather wished to end my days in pilghrimage
than by worldly means to seize thy place. Therefore I believe that
it has pleased and still pleases thee, through thy grace and not
througll my works, that the Christian people specially comlllmitted.
to thy care shall obey me in thy stead, and by thy grace the power
is granted to me by God of binding and of loosing in heaven and
on earth. Strengthened with this faith, for the honor and defence
of thy church, in the nanle of the omnipotent God the Father, and
of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, and by thy power and authority,
I remlove from HI-enry the King, son of Henry the Emperor, who
wTith unheard-of pride has risen against thy church, all the government of Germany and Italy, and I absolve all Christians from the
oat'hl which they have taken or may take to him, and I prohibit them
from obeying hill as king. For it is proper that lhe who seeks to
diminish the honor of thy church should himself lose the honor
which he seems to possess. And since lie, as a Christian, has disdained
to obey the Lord and to return to Him, whomll lie has abandoned by
communing with excommunicates and by despising the warnings
which, as thou knowest, I have given him fo."r his own benefit, and
by separating himself friom thy church in the vain attempt to divide
it, in thy name I bind himn in the bonds of the anathema, that all
the nations may know aind learn that thou art Peter, the cornerstone on which the Son of the living God llatll built His church,
and that the gates of hell sllal not prevail against thee!"2
Paul. Bernried. op. cit. cap. vii. No. 62.
Conci]. Rolnan. III. ann. 1076 (Tlarduin. T. VI. P. I. p. 1566).
30*
354 E XCOM MU NICATION.
The power of dethroning a king, thus for the first timne
assumed and exercise(i, was founded upon some conveniently
interpolated epistles of Gregory the Great, apparently
manufactured in the time of Chlarles-le-Chauve, in which,
granting privileges to various religious and charitable
foundations in France, he is made to threaten with the loss
of dignity and power any monarch or potentate who may
presume to infringe their rights.' And here another of the
forgeries came in with. singular efficacy, for a capitulary of
Louis-le-Dedbonnaire had been fabricated at some unknown
period, decreeing that any one incurring excommuliticatioin
should be placed under ban, and that if he remained unreconciled ior a year and a day, his possessions should all
be confiscated and himself exiled or imprisoned.2 This the
piety of succeeding ages had accepted and erected into a
law imposing outlawry on any one remaining thus cut off
from the church for a twelvemonth and a day.s The practical application of this rule gave enormous power to the
church, and its bearing on the case of I-enry was not long
in becoming manifest.
In Italy, the effect of Gregory's fulminations was imperceptible. The bishops whom he anathematized quietly
assembled at Pavia, soon after Easter, under the leadership
of Wiberto, Archbishop of RPaveinna, and responded by a
counter excommunication.4 Familiarity had bred contempt, and the Italians knew too much about the papacy
to care much for its censures, unless they were supported
by a secular power comipetent to extort respect. When
even St. Peter iDamiani, not long before, had felt himself
obliged to remonstrate with Alexander II., on the constant
Gregor. PP. I. Regist. Lib. xiiI. Epist. 8, 9, 10; Append. Epist. 4 (Ed.
Benedict.) Cf. Gregor. PP. VII. Regist. Lib. Iv. Epist. 23.-Berthold. Constant. Annal. ann. 1076.- Annalista Saxo ann. 1076.
n Ludov. Pii Capit. Tribur. ann. 822, cap. 6 (Baluz. 1. 426-7).
3 Bonizo. Lib. ad Amnicmni Lib. viii.
4 Ionizo. Ioc. cit.
TIIE CI-URCIH AND FEUDALISM. 355
abuse of the anathe-ma by the papal court,' it was not
likely that the Lombard schismlatics would pay much heed
to the new fulmination which only added another to its
innumerable predecessors. In Germany, however, the case
was widely different. The empire was a tinder-box, awaiting only a spark for an explosion, and that spark Gregory
had resolutely applied. Twice before the powerful Rodolph of Suabia had deemed himself on the point of supplanting Henry, and now, at last, his time seemed to have
comie.
The honest German mind regarded a papal excommnunication with a horror very far removed from the indclifference of the Italians, and its effect throughout the empire
was decided and immediate. Men repeated with blanched
lips how William, iBishop of Utrecht, the trusted adviser
of Henry, became at once an awful example of the punishmnent attendant oil the sacrilege of which he was guilty.
Some related that when at Easter Henry had ordered himn
to retort upon Gregory the excommunication, and he had
obeyed, the Host which he took during the impious ceremony turned to fire within him, and he expired with a foretaste of the endless torments awaiting him. Others declared that he had only derided publicly the excommunication under which both he and Henry labored, but that
this was sufficient to call down upon hilm a mortal disease,
during which visions of devils extorted from him a confession of his unpardonable sin, and he miserably perished,
unhouselled and hopeless of salvation. It chanced that a
number of Henry's supporters died within a short time,
and similarly exaggerated accounts of their deaths were
industriously circulated." Stories such as these, however
lacking in proof, exercised a powerful influence over the
S. Pet. DaLmiani Lib. I. Epist. 12.
2 Hugo. Flaviniac. Chron. Lib. II. ann. 1080.-Lambelt. IIersfeld. ann.
1076.-Annalista Saxo, ann. 1076,
356 EXCOMiMUNICATION.
popular feelings, of which Henry's enemies-and he had
few friendsr —were not slow in taking advantage.
Suddenly the Saxons arose in a fresh rebellion, and
Henry found that the princes of Southern Germany, far
from aiding him, were weaving new conspiracies. Udo of
Treves, fresh from Italy, set the examnple of avoiding the
contamnination of associating with an excommunicate, and
his example was contagious. One after another the king's
friends fell away, declaring that they could not risk their
salvation by intercourse with him. His summons to the
princes and prelates of the empire to meet him in council
were disregarded, and threats and entreaties were alike
powerless.1
A despairing and firuitless expedition against the Saxons
broug'ht on him new humiliations, while the princes of the
empire counselled together as to the speediest and most
effectual plan for his removal. A diet was agreed upon to
be held at Tribur, Oct. 16th, under the presidency of papal
legates, to arrSange for his formal deposition and the election of a successor. When the assembly met, the legates
produced a profound impression by refusing to commune
with any one who had communicated with Henry, until
they should undergo penance and receive absolution. Meanwhile Henry, from Oppenheim on the opposite bank of the
Rhine, sent propositions of submission, each more selfazbasing than the other,/but they were coldly rejected, the
princes replying thiat, bound by their oaths of allegiance,
they had borne with his crimes until released by the action
of the pope, and that now they no longer regarded him as
their sovereign. Hastily collecting some troops, he meditated casting all on the haIzard of an attack, when terms
were offered which he eagerly accepted. He was to abandon his few remaining friends and live privately at Speyer,
al)staining from entering a church, until another asselmbly,
1 Laibert. I-Hersfelcd. ann. 1076.
TIIE CHURCII AND FEUDALISM. 351
to be held at Atugsburgc, Feb. 2d, 1077, under the presidency of Gregory himself, should try him for the offences
whereof he was accused. IHe was warned, moreover, to
procure the removal of the excommunu-iication, for if he allowed the twelvemonth from February, 1076, to expire, he
would fall under the operation of the law.1
Gregory, meanwhile, had admlirably played his part. In
dignified silence he allowed the tempestuous elerments which
lhe had let loose throug'hout Germany to do their inevitable
work. I-e desired the abasement of Henry, but it was no
paqrt of his plans that the monarch already powerless
should be succeeded, without his intervention, by one who
nillht be able to maintain the supremacy of the empire.
With consummate art, therefore, on September 3d he had
acddressed an epistle to the Germans, commanding them to
show mercy rather than strict justice to the sinner. If he
manifested sincere repentance and willingness to amend
his ways, they3 were to smooth his path. If, on. the other
hand, he proved obdurate, then mignht they proceed to elect
another in his place, who, it was to be hoped, mlight prove
worthy of recognition by the Apostolic See.2 Gregory
thus, by a single step, placed himself as the judlge and
arbiter of the two factions, assuming over both a supremacy which ulnder the circumstances neither dared dispute.
Distasteful as this unquestionably was to the ambition of
the revolted princes, they had no choice but submission,
and it was doubtless owing to Gregory's instructions to
his legates that the diet of Tribur, in place of electing an
emperor, was forced to content itself w-ith a postponement
which placed the final (lecision in the hands of Gregory
him self.
In accepting the conditions imposed on him, it became
of the last importance to Henry to obtain absolution in
advance of the assembly of Augsbur'g. After the date set
Annal. Saxo. ann. 1070.-Lamlbert. -Iersfeld. ann. 1076.
Gregor. PP. VII. Regist. Lib. Iv. Epist. 3.
358 EX CO MIJUN ICAT ION.
for thle meeting, but three weeks would remlain to him of
the year of grace, and it was manifestly within the power
of the insurgent princes to protract the proceedings long
beyond the fatal anniversary. His decision therefore was
at once taken to hasten himself to Italy, where, face to face
with his excommnnicator, he might hope to come to terms.
His preparations were soon mnade. His wife, the faithfull
Bertha whom he had sought to repudiate, with their infant
Conrad, then scarcely in his third year, joined him at
Speyer, and they started on their dangerous pilgrimage.
In anticipation of such an enterprise, Roodolph of Suabia,
AWelf of 13avaria, and Berthold of Carinthia had closed all
the passes of the Alps through their territories, and he
was forced to take the longer and more difficult route
through Savoy by Maount Cenis. His Christmas, spent at
Besangon, was in gloomy contrast with that of the previous
year. Then, in his splendid court at Goslar, he imagined
hlimself the unquestioned ruler of Germany, and meditated
revendicatingl the rights of the empire over the hauglhty
theocracy of lRome. Now, practically throneless, lhe was
eagerly seeking, as a last chance of salvation, to move the
pity of the man who had by a single word caused his
downfall. But one noble, and he of obscure extraction,
attended him on his weary pilgrimage, and with difficulty
had he collected the moderate sum requisite for the expenses of the journey. Rfeaching the territory of his wife's
mother, Acelaide, Marchioness of Ivrea, a nlewr diffic>ulty
awaited him. HEe was received with clue honor, but was
told that he would not be allowed to pass unless he ceded
five contiguous bishoprics to the cupidity of his brotherin-law. Time pressed, January was already upon himi and
after a hurried negotiation he abandoned a valuable territory as the toll of the inhospitable mountains. Nature,
however, seemed to vie with man in closing the door of
reconciliation on the unfortunate excommunicate. The
winter was severe beyond the memory of man. From
THE CI-IURCI AND FEUDALISM. 359
MAartinmas till April the fiozen Rhine could bear the
weiglht of horse and rider, and the roots of the vines were
killed in the solid groundc Blockaded with snow and ice,
the pathless mountains seemed to offer an impenetrable
barrier. As there was no footing for beasts, the feet of
the horses were tied, and they were dragged over the snow,
a process which few survived. The men of the party, supported by hardy Inmountaineers, clambered through snowdrifts and slipped and slid down fearful declivities, while
the queen and her attendants were securely wrapped in oxhides, and were dragoged with ropes along the edge of
precipices and over rugged peaks.l
Arrived in Italy, all was changed as if by magic. To
the Lombards, Henry was not the discrowned excommunicate, but the long-expected monarch under whose leadership they hoped for domination and revenge on Rome.
Eagerly they flocked around him with a cordial welcome,
and in a few days he found himself at the head of a formidable army. His misfortunes were too recent, however,
for him to indulge in illusions, and if for a moment he
dreamed of treating with Gregory as a sovereign, he
promptly dismissed the idle notion. Meanwhile the pope
had set out from Rome to be present in Augsbulrg at the
appointed dcla, but hearing that Henry was adcvancing
with a considerable force, he halted and threw himself into
the stronghold of Canosa, with the friendly Countess Matilda. Thither flocked such of the excommunicated bishops
and( nobles of Henry's party as had succeeded in penetrating through the guarded passes of the Alps, and were
admitted to absolution after a somewhat severe trial of
the sincerity of their repentance.
Henry himself lost no time in sending to the pope such
mediators as seemed likely to prove most efficient, but
Gregory at first replied coldly that he would only adjudge
the matter at Augsburg, as had been agreed upon. After
Lanbert. IIersfeld. ann. 1077. Ibid.
360 EXCO MMU NI CATION.
much persuasion. however, he relented so far as to permit
the king to come to Canosa, with the promise that if he
showed evidence of real contrition he mnight be admitted
to expiate his sins by implicit obedience to the church.
Eagerly clutching at this doubtful mercyS, Henry appeared
before the triple walls of the castle on January 25. The
next day he was admitted within the second wall, and
there, barefoot and fasting as a penitent, he stood from
morning to night. A second and a third day he was exposed to the same proof, humbly awaiting the message of
the pontiff. Admitted to the presence on the fourth dayv,
lie accepted without hesitation the terms dictated to him,
rigorous as they were. The pope was to convene an assemlbly of the German princes, and there hear their accusations and Henry's defence, and the latter was to be
restored to his kingdom, or be declared forever incapable
of the crown, according as Gregory might decide by the
laws of the church. Meanwhile he was not to wear the
insignia, or to claim royal honors, or execute any functions whatever of government; lie was to dismiss the faithful followers whose evil counsel hlad led him into crime;
and if he should justify himself sufficiently to be restored
to the throne. he pledged himself to be thereafter in all
things obedient to the Holy See. Finally, the absolution
thus obtained was merely provisional, and a failure strictly
to observe any of the conditions imposed would ip9so facto
renew the excommunication.1 Such were the terms on
which Henry at last was admitted to the sacrament.
It would be wearving to follow out the details of the
struggle which for thirty years longer Henry maintained
with such varying fortune, nor would we learn therefrom
the development of any new principles. At a single
bound Gregory, with equal skill and audacity, had improvedc his opportunity to elevate himself to the position
of the recognized suzerain of Christendom. The princiLambertt. IIersfeld. ann. 1077.
THE CHIURCH AND FEUDALISM. 361
ples which he advanced, and which both parties were
forced to admit, gave to the church the right to intervene
between the monarch and his lieges, and placed at the
mercy of a single man the corner-stone on Which was based
the whole feudal system —the oath of allegiance and
fidelity. The simple anathema thus had become as potential in this world as it was held to be in the next. It was
the most formidable engine of tenmporal as well as spiritual
power, and armed with it, no claim of domination would
seem to be too extravaogant for him who was commissioned
fromln on high to control it.
It is true that these results were not practically enforced
without further resistance. The vicissitudes of Henry's
adventurous career afford ample evidence of the repugnance with which the savage feudal noble submitted to the
unarmed pl'iest; but the precedent was made, and with the
persistency of the church its final triumph was only a matter of time. In Marchl, 1077, Henry saw the Diet of
Forchheim endeavor to supplant him by the election of his
brother-in-law, Rodolph of Suabia, who had long been
intriguing for the vain honor; and Gregory, whom -Ienry's
relations with the Lombards could not fail to disgust, lent
his countenance to the proceeding, without absolutely
committing himself. Thus balancing between the two
rivals, Gregory still endeavored to hold the fate of the
empire in his hands, while Henry, returning across the
Alps, found no difficulty in obtaining possession of all
Southern Germnany, and driving his comlnpetitor into Saxony.
The partisans of Rodolph were bitterly disappointed at
this exhibition of papal policy, and addressed to Gregory
a letter expressing, with scant respect, their surprise at
his tergiversations, and holding him responsible, as in
truth he was, for the ferocious war which ravaged every
corner of their countrly.
Saxonunml Epist. in Greg. PP. I. Epist. Extrlav. (Migne's Patrol, T.
148, p. 746).
31
362 EX C O M MU NICATION.
For three years this state of horrors continued, until
Gregory's position became no longer tenable. At the
synod of Rome in 1080 he therefore formally renewed the
excommunication of Henry, and graciously bestowed the
empire on Roclolph, who had obediently renounced all
claim to the investitures.l Henry had learned much during
his sojourn in Italy, and the equivocal policy of Rome had
developed the ideas of the Teutonic mind, so that for once
the thunders of the church proved futile. Henry assembled at Mainz the bishops of his party, and, finding that he
could rely upon them, let loose the passions of the Lombard prelates, who promptly assembled at B3rixen, deposed
Gregory with a declaration that covered him with scandalous reproaches, and elected Wiberto of Ravenna to the.
perilous dignity of Antipope.2 The death soon after of
Rodolph, who fell in the victory of Volcksheim, seemed to
render the verdict of heaven against Gregory, and Henry
followed it up by an Italian expedition, which enabled him
to receive the iniperial crown at the hands of a pope who
owed everything to him, even to his installation in the
Vatican. As for the unfortunate Romans, they were
offered up as a holocaust for the greater glory of God.
After enduring fiom HIenry the severity of starvation in
their loyalty to Gregory, they were exposed to the extremlity of outrage-massacre, conflagration, and captivity
— at the hands of Gregory's ally, Robert Guiscard. Probably to avoid dwellilg amid the misery and desolation
which he had caused, Gregory followed Robert to Sllerno,
and there in 1085 he died, refusing with the last beat of
his indomitable heart to absolve Henry and Wiberto, with
their followers.3
King Hermann, elected by the papalists as successor to
Rodolph, personally gave Henry little trouble, though
Concil. Roman. V. ann. 1080 (Harduin. T. VI. P. I. p. 1587).
2 Goldast. Const. Imp. I. 236.
Paul. Bernried. Vit. Greg. VII. cap. xIi. qNo. 102.
THE CHURCHI AND FEUDALISM. 363
the long-continued and desolating war reduced the flourishinag provinces of Germany almost to a desert, and retarded
fearfully the progress of civilization. After an inglorious
reign of six years, disgusted with the selfish disloyalty of
his nominal supporters, Hermann in 1088 laid down his
shadowy crown. Anarchy had progressed so far that his
abdication made little practical difference, and Henry with
varying success continued his struggle withl the disaffected
princes and bishops. His gradually increasing strength,
however, is shown by the fact that in 1089 but four of the
German bishops remained in communion with the legitimate
pope, Urban II.; and the Catholic chronicler plaintively
remarks that it was almost impossible for the faithful to
preserve themselves from the contamination of associating
with excommunicates. Urban had lost no time in renewing
the censures of the church on all imperialists, and, in fact,
the anathematized were gradually becoming the majority;
convinced of which fact, the Catholic leaders offered to
return to their allegiance if Henry would abandon his
antipope, Clemlent [II. (WViberto of iRavenna), and receive
absolution fromn Urban; but Henry declined, apparently
not caring to replace upon his neck the yoke which lie had
at last succeeded in shaking off.'
The increasing preponderance of the imperial cause received a serious check w-hen; in 1093, Henry's eldest son,
Conradl Kingl of the Romans, was seduced or terrified into
a rebellion against his father-seduced by the promises
of the king'dom of Italy, or terrified by the prospects of
eternal perdition if he persisted in adhering to one under
ecclesiastical condemniation. The phantom crown bestowed
upon him, however, proved illusory; after he had b)een employed to work, as far as in him lay, his father's ruin, he was
contemptuously cast aside, and lihe died in 1101, in Florence,
of a broken heart. Meanwhile iHenry, recovering from. the
1 Bernold. Constant. Chron. ann. 1089.
364 EX O M MUI I N I C A T I O N.
shock which had nearly prostrated even his well-tried firmless, returned to Germany in 1097, where with skill and
moderation he allayed the weakening passions of revolt.
One after another his old enemies died or submitted to
him, and at length, for the first time since his majority
was proclaimed, he could truly call himself emperor of all
Germnlany.
The frightful abuse of the power of excommunication
seemed at last to have produced its natural result of destroying the respect and fear entertained for the censures
of the church —at least among' the Germans. Elsewhere,
indeed, its prestige had been successfully maintained.
When, for instance, in 1095, the crusade was resolved upon
in a whirlwind of enthusiasm at the council of Clermont,
the powerful Hugh, Count of Gapenlais, was so ill-advised
as to hold aloof. Urban II. consequently excommunicated
him, laid his territories under interdclict, and released his
subjects from their allegiance; whereupon the Counts of
Forcalquier attacked him, and succeeded in annexing the
Gapenpais to their possessions, for so holy a cause could
not fail to be successful.l The miserable PhilipII. of France
had likewise no cause to plume himself on the result of his
resistance to the church. In 1091 he repudiated his wife
Bertha, under pretext of affinity, imprisoning her in the
castle of Montreuil-sur-Mer, and replacing her with Bertacde,
wife of Foulques-Rechin, Count of Anjou. The church, the
only guardian of morality and protector of the weak, could
not long pass unnoticed this double adultery, and, finding
its monitions vain, Hugh of Lyons, the papal legate, excommunicated himl at the synod of Autun, in 1094. The next
year Philip hulnbly sent envoys to the council of Piacenza,
to excuse his non-attendance and to beg time for repentance, shortly after which Urban II., at the council of Clermont, repeated the excommunication, though Bertha by
1 Gautier, IIist. de Ia Ville de G-ap, p. 19.
TIIE CIHURCH AND FEUDALISM. 365
this tiue was dead. In 1096 Philip yielded, and separated
himself fromu Bertrade; but his passion was unconquerable,
and the next year saw thenl again together, and Philip
affected to despise the anathema which he had incurred.
Wherever the guilty pair resided, all the churches were
instantly closed and divine service ceased, to be resullmed
only on their departure; and it is related tlhat when they
were leaving a town, and the church-bells announced the
resumption of religious rites by a joyous peal, Philip
would laugh, and say to his paramour-" Sweet one, dlo
you hear how they are ringing us out?" He was not abandoned to his iniquity, however, and in 1100 the council
of Poitiers again placed him under the ban, for which the
venerable fathers were- cruelly persecuted by William of
Aquitaine. At length Philip succumbed, and at tile council
of Baugency, in 1104, he appeared with his guilty partner
before the papal legate, Richard of Albano, and they both
swore on the Evangels to hold no further intercourse with
each other; yet even this did not suffice to remove the
suspicions of the church, and they were not absolved until
the next year, at the council of Paris, by the direct colmmand of Paschal II. Two years later, when his wretched
life drew to its end, Philip showed how hollow had been
his former bravado, for lhe assumed on his death-bed the
garments of a nmonk, in expiation of his sins; while Bertrade, still in the full flush of her beauty, hid her remorse
in the rigid convent of Fontevraud, where the unaccustomed austerities soon destroyed her.1 Resistance might
be prolonged, but the church eventually triumphed over
the souls as well as the bodies of its enemries.
Urbani PP. II. Epist. 68, 173, 187, 285.-Ivon. Carnotens. Epist. 13, 14,
19, 20, 21, 23, 144, 173.-Grandes Chroniques, T. III. pp. 168, 204, 206.Concil. ifEduens. (Harduin. T. VI. P. II. p. 1711).-Synod. Placentin. (Itarduin. ibid.).-Gaufr. Grossi Vit. Bernard. Tiron. cap. Yv. ~ 48.-IIugon.
Floriac. Lib. ii. ann. 1100. —Concil. Parisiens. inn. 1105 (1Harduin. T. VI.
P. Ti. p. 1875). —Pascal. PP. II. Epist. 116. —Willeln. Malmesb. Gest. Reg.
Angl. Lib. v. ~ 404.
31*
366 EX C O M U N I CATION.
Meanwhile the increasing indifference manifested in
Germany to the fearful sentence of exclusion from salvation beganl to excite the liveliest apprehension. The violence of Gregory and Urban met by the tireless energy of
Henry, had resulted practically in a schism. Urban died
in 1099, and was succeeded by Paschal II. His rival, the
antipope Clement III., followed him in 1100, and was succeeded by Albert, and then by Theodoric. Germany was
independent of Rome, and when Paschal II., in 1102, assembled an imposing council in the Lateran, renewed the
imprecations against Henry, and caused all the attending
bishops to subscribe a declaration anathematizing the lew
heresy of disregarding the papal excommunication, lie
merely proclaimed to the world his own weakness, without
producing a ripple on the surface of events.l
Yet the apparent acquiescence of the Germans in this
unprecedented state of affairs was perhaps less the result
of conviction than of the apathy and exhaustion consequent on the terrible war which for thirty years had
wroughit desolation in every corner of the land. Germany
was not as yet prepared for permanent isolation from the
rest of Christendom, and as the ravages of war became
gradually effaced in the years of comparative tranquillity
which followed the recognition of Henry's supremacy, there
arose a yearning for reunion. It would be curious to speculate as to the result on the progress of civilization had the
schism been perpetuated. On the one hand, Germany
would have become a consolidated hereditary empire, and
the energies of the people, no longer distracted by the
ceaseless commotions incident to the clumsy federation of
independent princes, constantly at war amono themselves
or with their nominal sovereign, would have doubtless
achieved triumphs in the arts of peace and war whiich
might have changed the aspect of Europe. On the other
Concil. Lateran. ann. 11C2 (Harduin. T. VI. P. II. pp. 1861-2).
THE CIURCI-I AND FEUDALISMI. 367
hand, the destruction of the unity of the church would
have destroyed the only power able to neutralize the inherent barbaric violence of feudalism, and humanity would
have been deprived of the countless benefits which the
church, despite her faults and ambition, alone could bestow.
In Germany, especially, the ecclesiastical body must shortly
have become entirely secularized, for already her prelates
were rather warlike barons than shepherds of men, and,
released from the only spiritual power which could control
them, religion itself, confided to such hands, might speedily
have become discredited among a population sedulously
imbru ted.
The indisposition to remain disunited from the rest of
the church, however, renders all such speculations futile,
for it speedily intensified to the point of action. Reconciliation between the emperor and the pope was impossible,
for the one could not forgive or forget the countless ills
inflicted on him in the name of Roman supremacy, and
the other was pledged, by tradition and by conviction, to
the principle that blind obedience was due to the inmprescriptible rights of the Apostolic See, and that while the
church mi ight pardon her rebellious children, it was only
on condition of unconditional submission. No middle
term was possible. Reunion could be purchased only by
subjugation, and this was a truth patent to the eyes of
all.
To this increasing uneasiness was added a more energetic source of disturbance in the growing dissatisfaction
of the nobles. The canker of a long peace was beginning
to grow insupportable to men whose ambition could be
gratified only by war; and the emperor's policy, which
looked to the elevation and protection of the burghers and
serfs-of the people, in fact-was peculiarly distasteful to
the feudal tyrants whose very existence was based on the
maintenance of class-privileges. There can be no doubt
that the existence of this spreading (lissatisfaction was
368 EX C O MMUNICATION.
known to Paschal II., and that he spared no labor to foster
a sentiment which promised advantages so incalculable to
BRome; nor was it difficult to find an instrument by which
these pious intrigues could be developed into action with
the most effective result. There are some crimes over
which, for the sake of humanity, it would be well to draw
the veil of oblivion, even though they may have been perpetrlatedl in the name of Christ, and under the direct supervision of His vicar. Of these is the rebellion of Henry V.
against his unhappy father, and we will therefore dwell
upon it as cursorily as may be compatible with its bearing
on our theme.
Henry V., then a youth of twenty-three years, had been
crowned some time previous as King of the PRomans; and
his father, with that mistrust which had been eaten into
his soul by his countless experiences of treachery, had
exacted of him a solemn oath never to conspire against
him. The way to his succession seemed open and assured,
yet he might well listen to the suggestion that, should his
father die under the ban of the church, the heritage was
liable to confiscation, and any able and powerful prince of
the empire might prove a dangerous competitor for the
throne. Bold, ambitious, and unscrupulous, he lent buh
too ready an ear to such promptings; nor was it difficult
to find, anlong the turbulent nobles, chafing under the
steady rule of the emperor, enough to organize a mo,/t
formidable conspiracy. Towards the close of 1104, therefore, the son secretly left his father, and hastened into
Bavaria, where his friends rapidly gathered around him.
His first care was to dispatch envoys to Rome to demand
whether, without injury to his soul, he could break the
oath sworn to his fatlher. The blessed Urban II., a few
years before, had proclaimed to the world that oaths of
fidelity given to an excommunicate were not to be kept,'' Ubani PP. II. Epist. 256.
THE CHIURCH AND FEUDALISIM. 369
so there was smnall scruple at Rome in sending to the
young parricide all the assurances of which his tender
conscience stood in need; and he was speedily comforted
with the presence of papal legates, who gave to his unnatural enterprise all the sanctity requisite to shield it from
popular abhorrence. From first to last the grovelling
ambitions and pervading selfishness which inspired it
were carefully kept in the background, and zeal for religion was ostentatiously put forward as its sole and only
motive. Funds were raised by inflicting heavy fines on
cathedral chapters for their intercourse with excommunicated bishops. The first care of the young king was to
expel his father's bishops, and to replace them with
his own creatures; he sedulously dug up the bodies of
those who had died and cast them out of consecrated
ground; and he lost no opportunity of proclaiming that
his object was, not to dethrone his father, but to lead him
to the reconciliation with the Apostolic See, necessary to
his own salvation and to that of the empire. His effrontery
of hypocrisy even went so far as to repeat this to the face
of his wretched parent when the latter, abandoned by his
friends, was forced to surrender, and clasped the knees of
his son in agonized pleadings for his life. So the assembly
which was convened at Nordhclasen, in June, 1105, ostensibly confined itself to regulating the religious affairs of
Germany, with a view to removing all traces of the
schismn.L And in the manifesto which, in reply to the complaints of his father, the son published to the world through
the Archbishop of Magdeburg, the only reasons alleged
for the movement were the destruction of the vineyard of
the Lord, and the reduplicated crucifixion of Christ
wrought by the hardened and irreligious heart of the
emperor.
When tHenry, after a vain show of resistance, finding
Goldast. Const. Imp. I. 247-8. 2 Annalista Saxo ann. 1106.
370 EXCOMMMUNIOATION.
nothing but treachery in those whom most he trusted,
gave himself up to his son, it was under a pledge that life
and dignity should be guaranteed him, and the opportunity afforded of reconciling himself with the church.
Yet when he was brought before the legates at Mainz, and
he prostrated himself before his subjects, humbly confessing his rebellious disobedience, and only denying that he
had been guilty of idolatry, he was thrown into close confinement, where, denied all the consolations of religion, he
daily trembled for his life. In the most civilized parts of
his dominions —in the cities, in the Rhinelands, and in
Lorraine-Henry had ever been popular, and he had
merited the affection of those whom he had endeavored to.protect from the scourge of feudal tyranny. When, therefore, the people had recovered somewhat from the stupor
caused by the sudden, audacious, and successful rebellion
of the son, they rallied around the father, in whose favor
all human instincts cried so loudly. Henry escaped from
his imprisonment, and soon was able to make a show of
strength by no means unimposing. Eis faithful citizens
of Cologne gallantly resisted a protracted siege, which
IIenry V. was obliged to raise on the approach of his
father with a heavy force. Fortune seemed to incline
once more in favor of the emperor, and the son sought to
open negotiations for an accommodation, when the weary
mnonarch, after a few days' illness, suddenly died, his last
act being to send the crown and imperial insignia to his
ungrateful son, with the prayer that his body might be
allowed sepulture at Speyer, and that those who had remained faithful to him might be pardoned.l For the sake
of human nature we may well hesitate to credit the assertion that he was poisoned with the cognizance of his son,
but it would be no slander to attribute his end to the
pious zeal of some enthusiastic son of the church. Urban
Annal. HIildesheim, ann. 1104-5; Annalista Saxo ann. 1104-6; Chrono
Reg. Colon. ann. 1105-6.
THE CIHURCH AND FEUDALISM. 371
ban 11. had not long before declared it to be sound doctrine that the slaying of an excommunicate, through ardor
for the church, was not homicide.l Excommunicates had no
rights which the orthodox were bound to respect, and in
an age so faithless, turbulent, and ferocious, it was not
easy, even were it desired, to impose limits on the devotion of those who had staled their own fortunes on the
overthrow of an adversary so formidable to the custodian
of the keys of heaven.
The enmity of Rome would not even allow Henry's wearied
bones to rest quiet in the tomb. Thlie faithful Liegeois had
buried him honorably in the church of St. Lambert, but lihe
had died unreconciled, and his son was warned that if lie
allowed the body of his excommunicated father to lie in
consecrated ground, lie would become his accomplice, and
be liable to the same punishment. The young king was in
the hands of the church; the church was unforgiving, and
exacted of him the final act of parricide. He had done too
lucl to hesitate now, and unflinchingly he ordered his
father's corpse to be dug up and thrust into the earth in an
island of the Rhine, where no religious services were permitted, save that a wandering pilgrim from Jerusalem
lingered at the spot, and chanted a psalm over the grave of
the once mighty kaiser, who had dared to defy the whole
power of the church, and had been broken in the hour of
his triumph.2
The impatient and unscrupulous ambition of Henry V.
had thus thrown away recklessly all the fruits of his
father's thirty years of labor and anguish. Hailed for the
moment as the new Maccabee, and as the deliverer of the
church, he had made himself of necessity the slave of the
church. It was in vain that by personal violence he extorted from his accomplice Paschal II. the abandonment
Urbani PP. II. Epist. 122.
2 Chron. IIildesheinm, ann. 1106. (Leibnitz, Script. Rer. Brunswic. I. 736).
372 EXCOIMM UNICATION.
of the claimn to the investitures. To save himself from
being declared a heretic, the wretched pope was obliged to
disown his own agreement. The chronic rebellion in Germany, revived by Henry, and carefully fostered by the
church, rendered his excommunication in 1115 a fatal
entanglement, from which he failed to extricate himself by
repeating his father's experiment of setting up an antipope. His tool, the unhappy Martin Burcdinus, paid the
penalty of his perilous dignity; and Henry, after prolonging to the last the fruitless struggle, was finally obliged to
yield in 1122. A country ruined by anarchy, and the
abandonmeent of the investitures, were the natural results
of his alliance with the church —the inevitable price paid
for its assistance ini destroying' his father.l
The church had thoroughly won the victory, and thenceforth its behests were to be obeyed and its ministers held
sacred, for they wielded the terrible spiritual sword, always
unsheathed, and always ready to cut off the contumacious
from the joys of earth and the hopes of heaven. Against
it vainly strugglec powerful rmLonarchs like the HIohenstauffens, Henry, and John of England, Philip Augustus,
and Louis of Bavaria; and where these were obliged to
succumb, what chance was there for the humbler sinner?
Not only did it protect the rights, dignities, privileges, and
possessions of the ecclesiastic from open violence or indiscreet examination, but it enabled the church to intervene
decisively in the politics of every state in. Christendom, and
thus to acquire the position of universal arbiter and suzerain. When, in 1253, it was desired to invest the great
charters of English liberty with the most solemn guarantee
possible, no more efficient device could be suggested than
pronouncing a formlal sentence of excomnmunication against
Annal. Saxo ann. 1111-23. The documents may be found in Hartzhelmn Concil. German. T. III. pp. 258 sqq., 275 sqq. —Udalr. Batbenb. Cod.
Lib. II. cap. 259, 265 sqlq., 295, 303.
THLiE CHURIC1!H ANTD FEUDALISM. 373
all who should dare to infringe them;1 and when, in 1297,
Edward I. renewed those charters in return for anl octave
of his subjects' substance, he intensified the security by
ordering that this sentence of excomlmunication should be
pronounced twice a year by every prelate in his dominions.2 Subsequently this rule was extended to embrace the
lower clergy, and until the Reformation in every parish
church in England the priest was required every six months
to include infl'actions of Magna Charta and the Charta de
Foresta among the sins for which he pronounced a formula
of imprecation, with bell, book, and candle, as minute in
its details of malediction as Hervey of Rheims or BIenedict
VIII. could have asked for.
"Than thou thi candclell shalt cast to grounde,
And spet therto the same stouncl
And lete also the belles knylle,
To make her hlartes the mor grylle.'"3
If the church thus at one place could become the guarantor of the people's liberties, it had as niuch right elsewhere,
and as little scruple, in assisting their tyrants. Vhen, in
1141, William II., Count of Montpellier, was driven from
the city by his burghers, with the countenance of Arn'aud,
Archbishop of Narbonne, Innocent II. lost no time in excommunicating the consuls of Montpellier and their abettors, and laying on the city an interdict which prohibited
all religious services except infant baptism and death-bed
penitence. The struggle was kept up for some time, but
the citizens at length were obliged to yield.4
So, too, when evil-disposed monarchs were bold enough
to question the right of the Holy See to dispose at will of
1 Matt. Paris, ann. 1253.
2 Thomson's Magna Charta, London, 1829, p. 371.-Cf. Rymer, Foedera II.
793-4.
I John Myrc's Instructions for Parish Priests, p. 24 (Early English Text
Soc.). See also, in the notes, Ibid. p. 84, an extract from the Sarum Manual
of 1530.
Innocent PP. II. Epist. 509, 51S. —HInglon. Itothomag. Epist. xi.
32
374 EXCOMMUNICATION.
the rich prelacies within their dominions, it cost but a skin
of parchment and an ounce of lead either to- cut off from
the church the ill-advised sovereign, or to lay whole provinces under interdict, until the faithful, tired of living in
graceless deprivation of the consolations of religion, could
prevail upon the stubborn ruler to give way.' Thus Calixtus II. treated Henry of England in 1119, in consequence
of his contumacy with respect to Thurstan of York;2 Innocent II. was equally energetic with Louis-le-Jeune of
France in 1141, with regard to the Archbishop of Bourges;3
and Clement III., in 1188, was as peremptory with William
of Scotland in the case of John, Bishop of St. Andrews.4
If the commands of the Vicegerent of God were not
promptly obeyed, Heaven did not fail to come to the
rescue. Thus Henry was punished for his obstinacy with
respect to Thurstan by the loss of his son William, who
was drowned at sea during the next year; and when Urraca of Castile married Alphonso of Arragon within the
prohibited degrees, and not only refused to separate from
The conditions and regulations of the Interdict varied at different times
and under different circumstances. As described in the council of Limoges
in 1031, the rites of religion were conducted secretly, with closed doors, but
the laity were admitted to the sacralments of baptism, penitence, and the
-Viaticum. They were not allowed to marry, however, during its continuance, nor to shave or have their hair cut, and were obliged to fast as in Lent.
(Concil. Lemovicens. II. Sess. I. —IHairduin. T. VI. P. I. p. 885.) In the
interdict inflicted on England by Innocent III. under King John, which
lasted for six years, three months, and fourteen days, all the rites of religion
ceased except baptism, confession, and the viaticum (Matt. Paris HI-ist. Maj.
ann. 1208, 1214). Subsequently, however, this rigor was somewhat relaxed,
and the faithful were admitted privately to the consolations of religion,
though all public ceremonies were prohibited (Lib. V. Extra, Tit. xxxIII.
cap. 25; Tit. xxxvIIi. cap. 11; Tit. xL. cap. 17.-Lib. V. in Sexto, Tit. xI.
cap. 24). Yet considerable confusion existed in the clerical mind on the
subject, and lawful concessions were frequently refused and unlawful ones
granted (Concil. Bambergens. ann. 14091, Tit. Lx. —IHartzheim. V. 634).
a Calixti PP. II. Epist. 44. 3 Robert. de Monte. ann. 1141.
Roger. Iloved. ann. 1188. Cf. Gesta Itelrici II. pp). 263, 2i5, 276-7 (Rer.
Britain. Script.).
THE CIIURCII AND FEUDALTISM. 375
him, but disregarded the consequent excommnunication, her
sudden death, and the fall of Alphonso in battle with the
lMoors, showed how dangerous it was to trifle with penalties
so awful. So when, in 1199, IThys, King of South Wales,
ill-treated Peter de Leia, Bishop of St. Davids, the latter
promptly excommunicated him and his sons, and laid his
territories under interdict. In a few days Heaven vindicated its servant in the death of Kinug Rhys, when Gryffyth, -his son, promptly made submission, and Bishop Peter
enjoyed the noble revenge of scourging the dead king's
decaying remains before he would allow them to be consigned to Christian sepulture.2
It requires no effort of the imagination to conceive the
almost illimitable powFer conferred upon those who thus
could at any moment strike down their enemies, public or
private, with a weapon so irresistible; and it was only a logical conclusion from such premises when Thomas'a Becket
exclaimed, "Who doubts that the ministers of Christ are
the fathers and masters of kings, and princes, and all the
faithful? Is it not recognized as miserable madness when
the child endeavors to subdue the father, or the disciple
his master, and to impose unjust conditions on him who is
known to have the power of binding and loosing him not
only on earth, but in heaven?"3 So' absolute was this
domination, that in 1497 we see the Abbot of Weissenberg
excommunicating the Elector Philip, Palatine of the Rhine
and Duke of Bavaria, not only without trial, but without
notice, summons, or complaint, and, notwithstandilng the
irregularity of this proceeding, all that the powerful prince
could do was to apply to Maximilian I. to intercede for
him with the pope to have the curse removed.4
The power thus inherent in the humblest member of the
Pascal PP. II. Epist. 307, 349.
2 I-laddan and Stubbs's Councils of Gr. Brit. I. 393.
3 S. Thomma Cantuar. Epist. 73 (Ed. Giles).
4 Epist. Maximil. I. ad Pontif. (Ludewig Reliq Mssctor. T. VI. p. 103).
37 X6 EXCOMMUNICNATION.
hierarchy was concentrated in the person of the pope, whlose
sentence was without appeal, while lie could revoke the iiimprecations of his subordinates; for though the rule that the
ban must be removed by him who had imposed it still held
goodGif thou a mlon a-corset has,
He mote nede be soyled of the9
Whoso pareschen euer he be-'
still it referred of course only to action among equals, and
the punishment could be set aside on appeal to a superior.
The papal prerogative therefore became limited in principle only by the discretion or ability of the wearer of the
tiara; though in practice, of course, there were extremes beyond which it was nlot safe to exercise the rights claimed as
imprescriptible and indefeasible. How far the medixval
casuists were disposed to push their definitions s of papal
omnipotence and irresponsibility is shown in a declaration
of the canon law that if a pope was so lost to the duties
of his high station that through neogligence he drew innumerable multitudes of the faithful with him to hell, yet
was he not to be reproved by any man, for hle was to judge
mankind, and not to be judged by man; therefore the nations were to pray for him9 for on him their salvation depended, next to GodC.2 When such were the teachings of
the church, Matthew of Veandome could well exclaimPapa regit reges, dominos domilnatur, acerbis
Principibus stabili jure jubere jubet.3
The Pope was not only, indeed, the ruler of kings and the
sovereign of monarchs, but he was more than man and
little less than God. As Geoffrey Vinsauf declares, addressing Innocent III. —
1 Myrc's Instructions to Parish Priests, p. 26.
Gratian. Decret. P. I. Dist. 40, can. 6. —This was one of the canons alleged
by Luther in justification of his publicly burning the canon law at Wittemberg in 1520 (Lutheri Opp. Jenm, 1581, T. II. fol. 3173).
Matt. Vindocinens. Colnmendat. Papso (Migne's Patrol. T. 205, p. 980).
THE CHURCH AND FEUDALISM.. 377
Non Deus es, nec homo; sed neuter et inter utrumlque,
Queml Deus elegit sociulll: socialiter egit
Tecum partitus illundum, sibi noluit unus
Ollnia, secl voluit tibi terras et sibi ccelumn.l
This is not to be considered as the delirium of blasphemous
flattery. It was the conviction of the age, and Innocent
himself, in his sermon delivered on his coronation, had no
hesitation in asserting the same of himself — Now you
may see who is the servant who is placed over the family
of the Lord; truly is he the vicar of Jesus Christ, the
successor of Peter, the Christ of the Lord, the God of
Pharaoh; placed in the middle between God and man, on
this side of God, but beyond man; less than God, but
greater than man; who judges all, but is judged of none."2
The character of Innocent forbids us to suppose that he
magnified his office beyond his own honest conviction of
the position assigned to it by God, and his conviction was
that of all faithful Christians. Ile was no charlatan, and
when on the same occasion he expressed his anxiety lest
he should kill the souls that ought to enjoy eternal life, or
give life to those which ought to die, we can measure the
extent to which it was conceded that God had abnlegated
His power and had intrusted it to a mortal.3
Hurter, Iist. du Pape Innocent III., Paris, 1840, T. I. p. 68. Vinsauf
failed in receiving the reward of his adulation, whereupon his facile pen
found no difficulty in decrying the pope as energetically as it had flattered
him.
2 "Vicarius Jesu Christi, Christus Domini, Deus Pharaonis; inter Deum
et hominem medius constitutus, citra Deum sed ultra hominem; minor Deo
sed major homine; qui de omnibus judicat, et a nemine judicatur. " —Innocent. PP. III. Serm. iii. in Consecrat. (Migne's Patrol. T. 217, p. 659).
3 Ibid. p. 658.-Experience of his own fallibility seems in time to have
sobered Innocent somewhat, and towards the close of his pontificate he was
by no means so assured of his omnipotence. In 1212 he admits that the
church may err, and that its judgment may be very different from that of
God-''" Judicium Dei veritati qus non fallit nec fallitur semper innititur;
judicium autem ecclesisa nonnunquain opinionem sequitur, quam et fallere
sspe contingit,'et falli; propter quod contingit interdum ut qui ligatus est
32*
3'78 E X C O U N I A T IO N.
The mnedieval doctors, indeed, could hardcly find worCds
strong enough to express their sense of the irresponsible
omnipotence of the pope. In 1335 Bishop Alvarez Pelayo
lays down the doctrine that as Christ partook of the nature
of God and man, so the pope, as His vicar, participates
with Him in the divine nature as to spiritual things and
in the nature of man a's to temporals,1 so that jhe is not
simply a man, but rather a God on earth.2 When such
opinions were current, it need not surprise us that not long'
after t1'his period the le l author of the Richstich Landrecht,
while defining with jealous care the boundary between
papal and secular legislation, adds that the clergy claim for
the pope the right to alter the doctrines of the Apostles;3
and that good ecclesiastical authority asserted that "The
pope is bound by no forms of law; his pleasure is law.'"
"'The pope makes right of that which is wrong, and can
change the nature of things."'"The pope is all and over
all; he can change square things into round."4 Adrian VT.
was fully of this persuasion wxhen in 1523 fhe sought to withapud Deum, apud ecclesiam sit solutus: et qui liber est apud Deum, ecole
siastica sit sententia innodatus."' (Cap. 28, Extra, v. xxxix.)
The admission of this into the decretals of Gregory IX. shows that the
fallibility of the church in the distribution of its censures was acknowledged,
yet to examine the doctrines of the casuists as to the sentences which were
irrefragable and those which could be set aside by the mercy of God would
occupy too much space. Theoretically it was admitted that the decree of
excommunication did not irreversibly consign its subject to perdition, but
practically the power of the church to regulate at will the future destiny of
the faithful was assumed and acted on.
I Quia sicut Christus est deus et homo.. sic ejus vicarius generalis et
singularis papa participat cull Christo quodiammtodo naturet divinitatis quoad
spiritualia, et humlanitatis quoad temrporalia.-Alvari Pelagii de Planctu
Ececlesiw, Lib. I. Art. 37, Rat. 2 (Lugldun. 1517, fol. viii.).
2 Ejusd. Lib. I. Art. 68, No. J. (fbl. lxix.)-Papa non homo simpliciter sed
quasi dens in terris est.
Richstich Landrecht, Lib. Ir. cap. 24.
Summus pontifex nullis subjacet formis juris, sed quod vult lex est. —
Papa facit jus de eo quod non est jus, et naturam rei immutare potest. —
Papa est om1nia et super omnia... potest omutare quadrata rottndis. —See
the Florence'Esaminattore,"' JLuly 1, 1867, p. 190.
TEMPORAL PENA.TIES. 379
draw the Elector Frederick of Saxony from the support
of Luther; and, to prove that the ecclesiastical body could
not through corruption forfeit its right to the obedience
of the laity, he argued thus —6'Thou art a sheep; presume
not to impugn thy shepherd, nor to judge thy God and
Christ."1 An organization which thus conferred superhuman prerogatives on human frailty invited corruption;
and that it should succumb to the evil influences thus
fostered can surely not be a matter for surprise.
TEMPORAL PENALTIES.
This marvellous structure of theocratic autocracy was
not erected solely on the spiritual powers claimed by the
church. Indeed, had excommunication entailed only the
remote consequence of perdition, it would have been comparatively inert in its effects on the violence of the turbulent races of Europe. Its full significance, however, was
insured by its carrying with it a constantly increasing list
of tenmporal disabilities and penalties. 7We have seen how
Charlemagne lent the power of the state to the church
which he used as an instrument in constructing his evanescent civilization, and how his impotent successors
vainly sought to strengthen themselves by fusing the temporal and spiritual punishments. The power then granted
to the church of calling- upon the state was improved by
the forgery of the Capitulary of Louis-le-Doebonnaire, prescribing a year and a day as the limit beyond which the
disregard of excommunication entailed the severest temporal inflictions, and these rights became the most effective
means of subduing the state, as Henry IV. found by the
Adriani PP. VI. Breve ad Frid. Saxon. (Lutheri Opp. Jena, 1581, T. I.
fol. 543.)
380 E XCOMMUNIC ATION.
bitterest experience. It was gradually recognized in the
jurisprudence of all Europe that the civil power was
bound to aid in the enforcement of ecclesiastical censures;
and thus the jurisdiction of the church became a net,
strong enough to hold the most powerful, yet with meshes
so fine that the smallest and humblest could not escape.
It was bound by no statute of limitations, nor confined by
any territorial circumscription; the sentence pronounced
in Lisbon was equally valid in Copenhagen; to escape it
the criminal must take refuge with the schismatic Greek or
the infidel Moslem; and if he evaded it by opportunely
dying, his bones could be cast forth from their restingplace, and his posterity could be visited with the reversion
of the civil penalties.
The segregation which we have seen practised in the
earlier ages of the church had by this time become a portion of the penalty of excommunication far more serious
to worldly minds than the remote spiritual consequences
which death-bed penitence might haply remove. The liability to share the punishment of an excommunicate for
the simplest offices or greeting tendered to him was universally admitted. No one was even to salute him, and
the confessor was instructed, among the regular questions
addressed to his penitents, to inquire whether they had
exchanged a word or a greeting with any one under the
ban of the church.l Worse than a leper, he was to die
like a dog, and all the promptings of humanity in his behalf were to be sternly repressed. About 1120 a monk of
Flay abandoning his monastery gave as a reason that lie
was a physician, and that his abbot had forced him to exercise his art on excommunicates, for the benefit of the
abbey, to the manifest peril of his soul,-and St. Bernard
Burchard. Decret. Lib. xix. cap. 5, ~ de excommunicat.
TEMPORAL PENALTTESo. 381
esteemed the reason a valid one.' Of course, to supply
the anathematized with the necessaries of life was a heinous
offence, and in the bull published about the year 1420, by
Martin V. against his rival Peter de Luna and his cardinals, the pope declares that if any one shall give or sell them
bread or water, or other assistance, he shall ipso facto be
excommunicate until death, and his descendants, male and
female, to the second generation, shall be subject to the
civil disabilities consequent upon excision from the churchll.2
The excommunicate thus shed around him a contagion
which cut him off from all human society and left him to
perish in misery and starvation. This was no mere theoretical infliction, but a law enforced with all the power of
the church and applied so liberally that it became almost
impossible for the innocent to escape its effects. In the
early part of the fifteenth century, Chancellor Gerson complains of this as an intolerable abuse, and suggests as the
only mode of preserving the conscientious Christian from
ceaseless peril, that accountability should only attach to
associating with those whose excommunication had been
formally pronounced by a regular sentence, and not when
it had merely been incurred by infiringing some rule for
which an ipso facto anathema was the penalty3-as in the
former case there was some chance that the condition of
the criminal might be known, while in the latter it was
almost impossible that those who met him could be aware
of his guilt and its consequences. Flagrantly unlljust as
twas the refusal of this slender concession, yet the ecclesiastical authorities were unwilling to grant it. It was one
of the reforms expected of the council of Constance, but
that body separated without accomplishing any of the
measures for which it had been assembled, except the conI S. Bernardi Epist. 67.
o Ludewig. Reliq. Mssetor. T. V. pp. 424-5.
Joann. Gerson. de Vit. Spirit. Animr, Lect. iv. Coroll. xiv. Prop. 1.
382 EXCOMMTUNICATIONs
detlnation of the Hussites and the extinguishment of the
Great Schism; and the only effort made in this direction
was a clause in the concordat between Martin V. and the
Germans, under the auspices of the council, by which the
very moderate concession suggested by Gerson was provided as a special and merciful grace to the subjects of the
empire, no such clause being inserted in the concordats
proposed with France and England.' The council of Bale
assembled with a more resolute determination to uproot
the abuses which were destroying the church, and it adopted
this provision of the German Concordat as a general rule.2
The well-meant efforts of the council, however, were baffled
by the invincible repugnance to reform manifested by the
papacy, and so little was this decree respected that we find
the limitation -which it thus established as a universal law
of the church granted once more as a special favor to the
French, in 1516, by Leo X. in his concordat with Francis
J.3
All this is very suggestive of the dangers perpetually
surrounding those who had the misfortune to reside where
no such privileges had been graciously accorded, and even
this modified restriction by no means afforded immunity
from the consequences of ignorance. How easily the most
conscientious and obedient sons of the church might incur
the heaviest of ecclesiastical censures is manifested in 1297
by a complaint from the citizens of Berlin to Boniface
VIII., that their town was frequently subjected to interdict in consequence of ignorantly furnishing food and
shelter to wayfarers who subsequently were found to be
excommunicates; and Boniface graciously granted to them
as a special privilege, that the rule should not be enforced
Concil. Constant. Sess. XIII. (Iarduin. VIII. 892). Violence offered
to ecclesiastics, however, was excepted from the benefits of the limitation.' Concil. Basiliens. Sess. xx. cap. 2 (Harduin. VIII. 1194).
3 Concdrdat. Leon. X. Rubr. 9 (Isambert, Anc. Lois Fran9. T. XII. pp.
92Y3).
TEMPORAL PENALTIES. 383
if the outcasts left the town promptly or were forthwith
turned out by the citizens on their guilt becoming known.1
The whole theory of the consequences of excommunication is well developed in the charter of foundation granted
to the church of St. Mary Magdalen, in 1520, by Jerome,
Bishop of Brandenburg. All who dare to infringe its provisions are declared excommunicate, nune pro tune and
tune pro nunc. For ten days the anathema is to be pronounced in the church, against the offender, with bell,
book, and candle, when, if he remains obdurate, the priest
at the head of the citizens is to proceed to his house and
to cast at it three stones in token of eternal damnation. If for another ten days he continues contumacious,
then his friends and relations and servants are to be
warned not to minister to him salt, or food, or drink, or
water, or fire, or to perform any other office of humanity
under pain of sharing his punishment. If this is insutflcient for another ten days, then any place, or town, or
church, or monastery where he may take refuge is laid
under an interdict, lasting until three clays after his departure. If the hardened sinner persists in his impenitence
for ten days more, then all secular authorities, judges,
nobles, and others having jurisdiction are ordered, under
pain of excomlmunication, to seize his person and property,
goods, lands, and chattels, for imprisonment and confiscation.2
It was only by means of the secular power that these
consequences of excommunication could be enforced; and
the secular power, as a rule, was prompt in lending its aid.
1 Lulewig, Reliq. Mssetor. T. XI. p. 61.3.
o Fundationis Eccles. M. Magdal. ~~ 14-22 (Ludewig T. XI. pp. 457-69).
See also the excommunication of Rano von Kannenstein, in 1467, by the
Abbot of Pegau (Ejusd. T. XII. p. 276). The ceremony of stoning the house
of an excommunicate was one of wide extent. It was forbidden in 1337
by the council of Avignon (Concil. Avenion. ann. 1337, can. 8.-Harduin.
VII. 1624-5).
i384 E XC OMMUNICATION.
Almost every code in Europe plecldgoed its assistance to
vindicate the authority of the church, and this was generally done by depriving the excommnunicate of his privileges
as a citizen, or by withdrawing from him all legal protection and rendering him an outlaw —that is a wild beast,
bearing a capuzt lpiEinum —to be tracked and slain by any
on e.
Notwithstandlincg the failure of Henry II. in the constitutions of Clarendonl the English law, after the bitter experience of ecclesiastical tenderness under King John, was
peculiarly jealous of all ecclesiastical interference. Yet
the excommunicate could enter into no legal contracts; he
had no standing in court, either as plaintiff or advocate;
he was denied the wagerl of battle, and no one could eat, or
drink, or speak, or live with him, either publicly or in private.l Indeed, from the time of the Saxons harboring an excommunicate was an offence against the crown which placed
the offender at the king's lercy, both as to person and
property.2 If any one remained under excommunication
for forty clays, the bishop could apply to the king's court
whence immediately a writ was issued to the sheriff commanding him to seize the offender and to imprison him or
hold him in sufficient bail until he gave full satisfaction to
the church, and he could be released only in virtue of an
episcopal declaration of his reconciliation, Lunless, indeed,
he could prove that the ecclesiastical proceedings against
him had been unlawful.3 Disobedience to the king's writ
entailed outlawry, with all its tremendous consequences,
and this was the result of persistent contumacy.4 The
church struggled hard to maintain these privileges, which
were not unfrequently disregarded. In 1261, the council' Horne, Myrror of Justice, cap. ii. ~~ 3, 5, 27; cap. iii. ~ 23.-Bracton,
Lib. v. Tract. v. cap. 23, ~ l.-F'leta, Lib. vI. cap. xv. ~ 2.
" Cnuti L1. Secul. Tit. lxvii.-L1. Henrici I. ~ 1; Tit. x. ~; Tit. si. ~ 14;
Tit. xiii. ~ 10.
Bracton, Lib. v. Tract. v. cap. ii. QI 2, 4; cap. xxiii. ~ 4.
Bracton, Lib. III. Tract. ii. cap. xii. ~ 8.
TEMPORAL PENALTIES. 385
of Laambeth complained that sometimes the writ de excom-?municato capiendo was refused, in which case it orders the
bishop whose application was disregarded to place under
interdict all the royal possessions in his diocese. Sometimes, also, the sheriffs and bailiffs allowed the bishop's
prisoners to be discharged, for which those officials are
ordered to be duly excommunicated.' A century later the
church advanced in its pretensions, for the council of
London in 1342 complains bitterly of imprisoned excommunicates being liberated on bail to answer before the
ecclesiastical courts. It denounces this as an in-terference
with the jurisdiction of the church, but has no remedy to
suggest except further excommunications.2
Yet with all this the independent insular spirit is shown
in the power assumed by the king of commanding the ordinaries, or episcopal officials, to remove excommulnications
within a stated time, and in 1315 Edward II. promised that
lhe would issue no more letters to that effect, except in
cases where the ecclesiastical sentence appeared to infiringe
upon the royal prerocgative.3 It was ominous of the future,
moreover, that when in 1389 the Statute of Provisors,
which deprived the papal court of patronage in the English
church, was revived, it was re-enforced by a provision that
any one bringing into the kingdom any excommunication
for actions arising under the statute should be imprisoned
with liability of life and liimb, and all his lands and goods
be forfeited to the king; while any one pretending to execute such an excommunication, should, if a -prelate, be deprived of his temporalities during the king's pleasure, and,
if of lower degree, be thrown into prison and subjected to
a discretionary fine.'' Concil. LIambeth. ann1. 1261, can. de Excom. capiend. (Hardclin. VII.
539).
2 Concil. London. ann. 1342, can. xiii. (Harduin. VII. 16600).
3 IX. Edw. II. cap. 7. (Staftutes at Large, I. 168, Ed. 176'9).
XIII. Ric. II. cap. 3. (Ibid. p. 395).
33
386 EXCOMMU'NICATION.
Wales was even more prompt in enforcing the sentences
of the ecclesiastical courts, and the law was obliged to
interfere rather for the protection of the excommunicate
under the fearful disadvantages of his outlawed condition.
" If a person be excommunicatedl, whatever the cause for
which he may be excommunicated, and the lord willeth his
spoil on the spot, the law says that he is not to suffer
spoliation until he shall have been excommunicated a
mnonth and a day."' That he should be exposed to the
ordinary disabilities of the outlaw is, therefore, a matter
of course) During the period which preceded the final
absorption of Wales, however, the Normanizing influence
of the prelates led to long and intricate quarrels between
them and the native princes, in which the secular power
fiequently declined to support the censures of the church.
Thus in a settlement of disputed questions made in 1261
between Llywelyn, Prince of Wales, and Richard, Bishop.
of Bangor, there is a clause providing that the former,
when duly called upon, shall arrest excommunicates, which
apparently he had previously refused to do.3
In France the church at first seems to have endeavored
to take the matter into its own hands, by applying both
spiritual and temporal penalties. The eulogist of Geoffrey
of Muret, who was Abbot of Castres in 1110, describes how
in his holy zeal he threw into his dungeons those whom he
had delivered over to Satan if they remained impenitent
for a year, and how his victims recalcitrating against this
double punishment appealed to the secular tribunals, giving rise to a lively quarrel between the two jurisdictions.4
In time, however, the state came to the aid of the church
1 Anomalous Laws, Bk. v. chap. ii. ~ 91; Bk. xI. ch. iii. ~ 23. (Aneurin
Owen's Ancient Laws, &c., of Wales, Vol. II. pp. 75, 411.)
2 Dimetian Code, Bk. III. ch. i. ~ 10. —Anolmalous Laws, Bk. vIII. ch. xi.
19. (Ibid. I. 591; II. 205.)
I HaIddan & Stubbs's Councils of Gr. Brit. I. 490.
4 Du Cange, Observations sur les Memoires de Joinville, P. I. No, 27.
TEMPORAL PENALTIES. 387
as a matter of course, and supported its anathema with
civil inflictions. The first forimal regulation to this effect
appears to have arisen from the efforts to quench the Albigensian heresy, when the Regent Blanche of Castile, in
1228, in an edict addressed to the authorities of Nismes
and Narbonne, deplores the contempt generally felt in
those districts for the sentence of excommunication, and
directs that the avoidance of intercourse with excommunicates shall be strictly observed, while any one remaining
unreconcilecd for a year shall be compelled to seek absolution by the seizure of all his property, real and personal,
which shall not be returned until he shall be reacldmitted to
communion, and not even then without a special mandate
from the crown.' This practically amounted to an absolute
confiscation, as may be seen in the proceedings of various
councils of the period; andc to quicken the sensibilities of
the obdurate, a preliminary mulct of ten livres was added,
to be levied on all excommunicates who allowed forty days
to pass without seeking reconciliation.2
These rules, however, were scarcely applicable to the
whole kingdom, and the customary cautious sagacity of
St. Louis rendered him wary in pledging his power to the
blind support of those who too often used their spiritual
jurisdiction for the gratification of malice or ambition.
About the year 1250 an assembly of the French bishops
held in Paris demanded an interview with St. Louis, and
assured him that he was allowing Christianity to be destroyed. The good king crossed himself and asked how
that could be' when Guy, Bishop of Auxerre, replied that it
was because excommunications were no longer respected,
and men preferred to die under the anathema rather than
to seek absolution. Therefore they requested him to issue
an edict commanding his officers to seize the possessions
of all who remained for a year and a day under the censure' Ordonn. ann. 1228, ~ 7 (Isambert, Anc. Lois Frang. I. 233).
Concil. apud. Copriniacum ann. 1238, can. 17, 18 (Harduin. VII. 319.
-Concil. Biterrens. ann. 1246, can. 36 (Ibid. p. 413).
388 EXCOMMUNICATION.
of the church. To this St. Louis replied that he would
willingly do so in all cases where parties were found to be
in the wrong towards the church or her ministers. The
prelates responded that the secular courts had no authority
to investigate such matters, but the king was firm, illiustrating his position by the case of the Count of Britanny
who remained under excommunication for seven years,
while pleading against his clergy, and finally obtained a
verdict in his favor from the pope himself. Now, said the
king, if I had forced the count to submit at the end of the
first year, I should have done wrong to God and man, anlld
it would be contrary to God's justice were I to constrain
those whom the clergy have wronged to seek absolution
without hearing their appeals. This was unanswerable,
and St. Louis was troubled with no more requests of the
kind.l Joinville describes this scene as an eye-witness, and
his testimony is not to be doubted, yet there is no trace
of any such regulations in the legislation attributed to St.
Louis. In the collection known as the JEtablissements it
is ordered that the royal officers, when summoned by the
bishop. shall seize both person and property of any one
remaining under excommunication for a year and a day,
without providing for any inquest into the circumstances
connected with the case.2 It apparently was not easy to
enforce this, and its observance had to be secured by repeated enactments, such as that of Philip III. shortly after
his father's death in 1274, and of Louis X. in 1315,3 and
complaints of its neglect continually arose. The whole
subject appears to have been one regulated by no settled
principle, for in 1280 the Parlement decided, in a case
between the king and the Archbishop of Tours, that the
royal officers were not bound to coerce excommunicates by' Joinville, HIistoire de Saint Loys.-This has been considered as the
origin of the appellate power exercised by the crown in the capel comme
d'cabis (Isambert I. 358).
2 Eta blissements, Liv. I. chap. 123.
u Isambert, II. 655, III. 123.
TEMPO RAL PENALTIES. 389
the seizure of person and property;' and yet in the same
year, on complaint of the Bishop of Poitiers, it ordered that
excommnunicates should be punished by the secular power
according to custom.2 Under these conflicting decisions
it is no wonder that the royal officials were not alert in
seconding the ecclesiastical courts; and in 1291 we find an
agreement between the king and the Archbishop of Bourges, wherein the latter promises that he will no longer
prosecute the royal bailli to force him to execute the sentence of excommunication on those who happened to have
nothing that could be seized.3 Some, indeed, did not confine themselves to merely the resistance of inertia, for in
1299 Philippe-le-Bel was obliged to command his baillis in
Touraine and Le Mans not to protect excommunicates as
they were in the habit of doing, but to constrain them to
submission according to the laws.4
It thus required repeated enunciations of the principle
to secure its observance, and the church was not idle in
contributing to the good work. It was no easy task, indeed, to keep the faithful in the due condition of obedience.
Occasionally sons of Belial were found who even dared
irreverently to retort the censures of the church, by burlesquing the awful rites which symbolized the destruction
of their souls. With wisps of lighted straw, tallow candles,
pans of burning coals, and other profane contrivances,
they mimicked the condemnation passed upon them, to the
infinite scandal of all believers. Such hopeless sinners
were manifestly beyond the reach of spiritual terrors, and
the council of Avignon, in 1326, was compelled to call upon
the secular authorities to do their duty in compelling all
who remained for two months under excommunication to
Actes du Parl. de Paris, T. I. p. 362, No. 418 (Paris, 1863).
Olim, III. 167.
Actes du Parl. de Paris, T. I. p. 270, No. 2754. Cf. Olim II. 322-3.
For an arrangement with the Bishop of Coutances see Les Olim II. 209.
Litt. Philip. IV. ann. 1299, ~ 6 (Isanbert, II. 721).
33*
390 EXCOIM MUNICATION.
seek absolution. Judges and seigneurs who neglected this
were themselves threatened with the anathema; and if persistently contumacious, their territories were placed under
interdict. As though taught by experience, however, that
this was ilsufficient, the church further took the matter of
temporal penalties into its own hands, and struck at the
pockets of those whose souls were inaccessible, by levying
a monthly fine of five sous of good coin on laymen, ten
sous on the lower clergy, and fifteen sous on priests, as
long as they remained obdurately unider the ban.l All
this seems to have speedily lost its effect, for it had to be
repeated eleven years later by the council of 1337.2 At
length the royal power was obliged again to intervene, and
ini 1363 John II. issued a declaration renewing the old law
that those who persistently remrainec uinder excomnmunication should be constrained to seek reconciliation by seizure
of both person and property.3 This seems to have had
little effect, for in 1371 the archdeacon of Langres represented to Charles V. that many obstinate sinners did not
hesitate to remain excommunicated for ten or even twenty
years, all the while frequenting church, to the great scandal
of the faithful; and Charles in consequence commanded all
judicial officers to coerce offenders to obedience by seizing
their property after they had remnained for a year or more
under excommunication, but lie adds a caution which indicates for us one of the prolific sources of abuse in these
matters, for he warns his representatives to see that the
clerical official does not exact inordinate payment for
reconciling the culprits.4 How determinedly the church
pushed the advantages thus secured is shown in a provision
of the concordat of 1516 between Leo X. and Flrancis I.,
where it is presented as a concession on the part of the
1 Concil. Avenion. ann..1326, can. 7, 41 (IHarduin. VII. 1495, 1508).
o Concil. Avenion. ann. 1337, can. 53 (Ibid. 1633).
Isamlbert, T. V. p. 146.
Ibid. p. 353-5.
TEMPORAL PENALTIES. 391
pope that no place shall be laid under interdict for an
offence committed by one of its inhabitants, unless the
magistrate or seigneur shall, after receiving notice, delay
for forty-eight hours, either compelling the offender to
submit or driving him away from his place of residence.'
7When this was a reform, we may judge how sumlmary had,
been the process by which churchmen had been accustomed
to right themselves for real or imnaginary wrongs.
With regard to the disabilities of excommunicates, St.
Louis provided that they might be heard in lay courts,
both as plaintiffs and defendants, but limited them in the
ecclesiastical tribunals to appearing only as defendantsthat is, they could be prosecuted, but could not prosecute.2
In this, he was mlore liberal than his age, and his legislation
received little attention. Beaumanoir, the recognized expounder of his jurisprudence, expressly states that no one
under excommunication can be witness, pleader, advocate,
or judge; and he adds the very sufficient reason that all
who should hold converse with him would themselves be
excommunicate.3 The proceedings of the Parlement of
Paris show that this was a recognized usage when it requiredcl the proof of excommunication to sustain the refusal
of an answer to a plaintiff, or the rejection of the testimony
of a witness.4 This is manifested in another case which
further suggests the enormous advantage conferred on
ecclesiastics by these regulations. Jean Roisel, Mayor of
St. tiquier, had brought suit against the Abbot of St.
Riquier, and had been thrown out of court on admitting
that he was under excommunication. He then brought
another suit against the abbot in a private quarrel, and
endeavored to sustain himself by the ingenious plea that,
as his excommunication had been incurred in his public
1 Concordat. ann. 1516 Rubr. 10 (Isambert XII. 92-3).
o Etablissements, Liv. I. chb:p. 123.' Contumnes du Beauvoisis, cap. v. ~ 17; cap. xxxix. ~ 63.
4 Olim, I. 738.
392 EXCOMMUNICATION.
character as mayor, it should not prejudice his legal status
as a man, but thle Parlement refused to dissociate the
excommunicated official from the individual, and decided
that he could not be heard in any capacity until he could
bring forward evidence of his absolution.' Constant vigilance on the part of the church, however, was requisite to
enforce the observance of these disabilities. Thus in 1326
we find the council of Avignon renewing the prohibition
of excommunicates serving as judges, baillis, assessors,
consuls, or notaries. Those who appoint such persons are
pronounced excommunicate ipso facto, and if they do not
force the appointee to resign within ten days their territories are declared under interdict.' In the same year, also,
the council of Senlis endeavored to enforce the disabilities
of excommlunicates as plaintiffs and witnesses.3
Spain maintained a greater degree of independence of
the ecclesiastical power than any other state of mediaeval
Europe. Her jurisprudence was founded on the Wisigothic
Code, enacted at a period anterior to the encroachments of
the church, and based on the Roman laws; and the character of her institutions is aptly illustrated by the regulation
of the twelfth council of Toledo, in 681, referred to above,
which released from excommunication any one whom the
king might please to invite to his table. Spain was thus
shielded at the outset from the influences which mouldecl
the Carlovingian legislation,. and after the rise of the
clerical power in the ninth century her internal condition
was comparatively free from the necessities which drove
the descendants of Charlemagne to seek a suicidal alliance
with the hierarchy. Her polity, therefore, retained much of
its original character to a comparatively late period. The
Fuero Juzgo, or Romance version of the Gothic code, which
Olimy, I. 817.
2Concil. Avenion. ann. 1326, can. 16 (IHarduin. VII. 1500).
3 Concil. Silvanect. ann. 1326, can. 4 (Ibid. p. 1532).
TEMPORAL PENALTIES. 393
was not superseded until the thirteenth century, shows no
trace of the effort to enforce the censures of the church by
secular authority. The only recognition, indeed, of the
anathema as aln element in the institutions of the Peninsula,
is the insertion in that Code of various canons firom the
Gothic parliaments, known as the councils of Toledo,
which liberally threaten excommunication against all who
may conspire against the king, or seek to interrupt the
succession of the throne.' The increased preponderance
of the crown, moreover, is manifested by the omission
from one of these of a countervailing sentence of expulsion from the church of any monarch who may illegally
oppress the people, and the substitution for it of a text
inculcating submission to the powers that be, as the represeultatives of God.2
It is easy thus to understand why in Spain the thunders
of the church were comlparatively innocuous, and how
Queen Urraca and her cousin-husband Alphonso of Arragon
could safely defy the papal excommunication to which
RPobert the Pious and Philip I. of France were obliged
humbly to submit. The same independence continued to
be characteristic of Spanish legislation. When, about the
middle of the thirteenth century, Alphonso the Wise drew
up the elaborate code known as the Siete Partidas, he
devoted no less than thirty-eight laws to the subject of
excommunication, thus giving a more complete and detailed
body of jurisprudence with regard to it than can elsewhere
be found among the labors of secular lawgivers of the
period. He professes, indeed, the utmost reverence for
ecclesiastical censures, deriving them from the divine examples of the excommunication of the angels whom God
Fuero Juzgo Prolog. LI. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 16, 17 (Concil. Toletan. IV. ann. 633, can. 75.-V..nn. 636, can. 2, 3, 4-VI. ann. 638, can.
17, 18. —VII. ann. 646, can. 1.-XIII. ann. 683, can. 4.-XVI. ann. 693,
can. I0.-XVII. ann. 694, can. 7).
1 Romans XIII. 1-4, inserted in ley Ix. from Concil. Toletan. IV. can. 75.
394 EX CO M i U NICA T IO N.
changed into devils for their pride, and the excommunication of Adam, when he was ejected from Paradise for
disobedience.1 Yet he gives no intimation of any secular
enforcement, beyond the regulation that a man remaining
for a year under the ban of the church without seeking
reconciliation, if he has been sentenced as a suspected
heretic is to be held confessed of heresy; if he is a noble,
hfs vassals are not bound to obey him while under excommunication; and if possessed of any church patronage or
privileges, he is not to enjoy them while thus remaining in
antagonism with the church.2 Alphonso deprecates, moreover, as improper the reprisals occasionally exercised by
communities while under interdict, in prohibiting their
excommunicator and his men from buying or selling in
their town, grinding corn in their mill, baking in their
public oven, travelling over their roads and bridges, drawing water from their wells and streams, or cutting wood
on their mountains.3 Evidently in Spain there was a spirit
unknown elsewhere which enabled the civil power to treat
on equal terms with the ecclesiastical, and consequently
the effects of excommunication, in this world at least, were
much less fearful than in other lands. Although he who
associated knowingly with an excommunicate incurred the
comparatively light punishment of the minor excommunication, yet even this did not apply to the wife, children,
servants, vassals, and hired laborers of the offender, who
were not debarred from intercourse with him, nor was it
forbidden to give him alms.4
In forcible contrast with the mildness of this leoislation
is the contemporary jurisprudence of Germany. There
Las Siete Partidas, P. I. Tit. ix. Prooem.
2 Ibid. P. I. Tit. ix. ley 32.-Also in Recopilacion Lib. vIII. Tit.'v. 1. 12.
Ibid. P. I. Tit. ix. ley 19.-This device was not confined to Spain. It
is condemned in 1326 by the council of Marsiac in Guyenne (Concil. Marciac.
ann. 1326, can. 47.-(Harduin. VII. 1529).
4 Siete Partidas P. I. Tit. ix. 11. 5, 35.
TEMPORAL PENALTIES. 395
the Carlovingian traditions were regarded with special
reverence, and the constitution and vicissitudes of the Holy
RIoman Empire brought church and state into almost inseparable connection. This, in the middle ages, necessarily
resulted in the supremacy of the church, and consequently
we find in the German law of the period that all the claims
of Gregory VII. and Innocent III. were not only admitted
but enforced by the secular power.
In the Niirnberg decree of 1187, issued by Frederic Barbarossa for the suppression of incendiarism, that crime is
punished with proscription. If this does not secure submission, then the offender is to be excommunicated by his
bishop, and is not to be absolved until he makes full
amends for the damage caused by the arson. On the other
hand, whoever is excommunicated by a bishop shall similarly be proscribed by the secular judges, until he shall
have been reconciled to the church, which is only to be
accomplished by a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, or to the
shrine of St. James of Compostella, involving an absence
fiom the empire of at least a year and a day. If he proves
obstinate and remains ulnder proscription and excommunication for a year and a day, then he becomes an outlaw,
deprived of all legal rights.l The church had succeeded
in humbling the central power and perpetuating the anarchy
of Germany, and the authority which thus was rendered
unable to enforce the law was obliged to implore the assistance of the church, and to pay for that assistance by
placing its forces at the disposal of the spiritual courts.
It is the old story of the Carlovingians repeated at a period
when the church was more fully able to take advantage of
its opportunities.
When Barbarossa's grandson, Frederic II., received the
imperial crown in 1220, at the hands of Honorius III., the
coronation ceremonies were varied by a solemn excommu1 Feudor. Lib. v. Tit. x.-Cf. Conrad. Ursperg. ann. 1187.
396 EX C OMMUNICATION.
iiication, with bell, book, and candle, launched by the pope
against all who should promulgate or enforce laws infringing the privileges of the church. All who were connected
in any way with such laws, from the monarch in whose
name they were issued, to the officers executing them, and
the scribes engrossing them, were declared anathematized
ipso facto, unless within sixty days the laws were annulled
or repealed.1 This was forthwith confirmed by Frederic, in
an edict by which lie surrendered the power of the state
unreservedly, without even asking for an equivalent. Any
one incurring excommunication for infriinging the liberties
of the church, and so remaining for a year, was threatened
with the imperial baiin ntil he should obtain absolution.
If excommunicated for harboring heretics, and not reconciled within a year, he was declared infamous and ineligible
to any office or place of trust, disabled from bequeathing
or receiving inheritance, from bearinog witness, and from
appearing as plaintiff. If a judge, his verdicts were null
and he could try no causes; if an advocate, he had no
standing in court; and if a notary, his official documents
were void.2
When such laws as these were- wrung from monarchs
whose whole lives were consumed in ain internecine conflict with the papal power, it is not surprising to find that
the principles which they thus were compelled to admit
were developed even more fully in the pretensions advancecl by the church. Already, in 1266, the council of
Cologne directs the excommunication of any secular maogistrate who shall refuse or neglect to compel the submission
of any one remaining under excommunication for a yea r;3' This decree was not of mnere momentary force. It was quoted in 1236
as a rule of the church by Gregory IX. to Thibaut of Navarre (Martene,
Thesaur. I. 996).
2 Const. Frid. II. post Lib. Fedeor. ~~ 3, 8.-The latter of these was even
interpolated in the Code of Justinian, Post Const. 4, Cod. I. v.-Cf. Capit.
Gregor. IX. ann. 1235 (Harduin, VII. 163-4).
Concil. Coloniens. ann. 1266, can. 37, 38 (Harduin. VII. 575).
TELPOPRAL PENALTIES. 397
and even this became exceeded in the popular jurisprudence of the empire. The civil and the ecclesiastical powers
were bound together with the closest requirements of mutual support, yet with the supremacy of the spiritual authority fully admitted in tile last resort. Thus, in the Suabian
law, which ruled all Southern Gernmany it is declared to be
in virtue of an agreement entered into between Constantine
the Great anc Sylvester I., that any one remaining under
excommunication for six weeks and a day is to be proscribed
by the lay courts; and similarly proscription, after the same
interval, is to be followed by excommunication; and whichever of the two penalties has been first inflicted is to be removed before the other is removable.' In fact, he who was
either excommunicated or proscribed was held to be both
excommunicated and proscribed; he had no standing in
court except as a defendant; he could neither ask for a
verdict nor appeal fiom one, nor act as a witness or judge
-in fact, he was deprived of all legal protection in both
secular and ecclesiastical tribunals.2 The universality of
spiritual jurisdiction was established by empowerhing the
bishops, at their annual councils, to summon before them
all laymen of their dioceses, from prince to peasant, and
atuthorizing the prelates to excommunicate any one who
neglected or disobeyed the summonso: The supremlacy of
the church, moreover, was admitted by two provisions.
One of these directs the bishops to excommunicate any
prince or potentate who neglects to persecute heresy; if
he remains obdurate for a year, the bishop is then to report
the case to the pope, who is thereupon to deprive him of
his rank and honors, and the secular power shall enforce
1 Juris. Provin. Alaman. Ed. Senckenberg. cap. 1, 2, 3, 100 (Ed. Schilter.
cap. 1, 242, 89).
s Jur. Prov. Alaman. cap. 127, 115, 78, 75 (Ed. Schilter, cap. 272, 165,
15, 68).
I bid. cap. 11 (Ed. SchilLer, cap. 128).
34
398 EXCOMMUNICATION.
the sentence by stripping him of all his possessions.' The
other authorizes the pope to place the emperor under ban
if he deviates from orthodoxy, deserts his wife, or destroys
the churches.2 The severity of the excommunication thus
liberally denounced contrasts strongly with the laxity of
the contemporary Spanish laws. Any one conversing
familiarly with a known excommunicate was likewise excolmmunicated, and if he failed to obtain absolution within
the prescribed period of six weeks and a dclay, he was held
guilty of the crime for which the first excommunication
had been incurred.3 Under legislation such as this the responsibility of the secular authorities for the obedience
of the individual was thorough and complete. In 1465,
George, Bishop of Bamberg, considered it a relaxation of
the strictness of the rule, when he declared that a town was
not necessarily under interdict because one of its inhabitants was excommunicated, and lie mercifully provided that
the authorities should have two clays in which to enforce
his submission or to eject him."
Thus, in Germany, the ecclesiastic was fully armed with
both the spiritual and the temporal sword, and those who
were obdurate to fear of punishment in the life to.conme
could easily be coerced into subjection by the secular
penalties consequent upon disobedience.
In Italy the authority of the church was w-veaker than
elsewhere. According to medieval theory that authority
Jur. Prov. Alaman. cap. 351 (Ed. Schilter, cap. 308). Yet when Leo X.
in 1520 endeavored to enforce this rule, in the Bull Exsurge Domine, against
the protectors of Lutheranism, the German legists declared that it was unconstitutional.
2 Ibid. cap. 29 (Ed. Schilter, cap. 111).
Ibid. cap. 11 (Ed. Schilter, cap. 351). This forms part of a law specially directed against usury, but the terms emlployed are general, and warrant the assumption that it was not confined in its application to that single
offence.' Georgii I. Episc. Bambnlerg. Reform. Consistorii art. xxxiv. (Ludewig,
Script. Rer. Gerlmaln. I. 1179).
TEMPORAL PENALTIES. 399
was derived from the successor of St. Peter, and to the
Italians the pope was invested with little of that awful and
mysterious dignity which rendered his name a word of
power in distant and more barbarous regions. They knew
him as a secular prince, vindicating his claims to obedience
by the arm of flesh as wNell as by the power of the Word,
and they had too often successfiully withstood his pretensions to feel nucl dread of his curses whenl not restrained
by his legions. This is strikingly manifest in the Neapolitan code of the Emperor Frederic II. ~We have seen him,
in 1220, at Roncapglia, in his capacity as emperor, invoke
the aid of the church to uproot heresy, and pledge the fill
power of the state to sustain her censures, both in cases of
suspected faith and of infringement of her liberties. In
the freer air, however, of his hereditary kingdom of Sicily,
he was careful to keep her at arm's length, and jealously
maintained the independence of secular jurisdiction. In
the Sicilian Constitutions there is no allusion to excommunication. The state did not call upon the church to aid in
enforcing the secular law, nor would it allow itself to
be called on to enforce the judgments of the church by
temporal penalties. This is particularly significant when
we find the lawgiver regulating ymany questions as to heresy,
USl'ry tithes, marriage, incest, adultery, pemrjury, sorcery,
testaments, and inheritance which at that period were
generally conceded to belong almost exclusively to ecclesiastical jurisdiction;' and thle intention of the legislator
is rendered unquestionable by the care with which lie limits
the immunity of the clergy from the civil tribunals, and
prohibits thelm from any share in administering the laws.2
Constit. Sicularum Lib. I. Tit. 1, 2, 3, Tit. 5 cap. 2, Tit. 7 cap. 1.Lib. II. Tit. 11, Tit. 38 cap. 2.-Lib. IIi. Tit. 25, Tit. 40 cap. 7. Tit. 42
cap. 2, 3, Tit. 43, 44, 45, 47, 49, 50, 59.-In the whole code the only offence
comnmnitted to the jurisdiction of the church is that of adultery (Lib. III. Tit.. Lib.. Tit. 4 5. Tit. ap. 2. Tit. 72.
" Ibidl. Lib. I. Tit. 40, 08, 05. Tit. GG ca3p. 2. Tit. 72.
400o El XCOMMUNICATION.
At the other extremlity of Italy, when the pressure
from Germany was removed, there was equal alacrity on
the part of the independent states in disregarding the
claims and pretensions of the church. Thus M'ilan, in
1347, decided that the clergy were bound, equally with the
laity, by all the details of municipal law;' and in 1388
Gian Galeazzo Visconti, the first Duke of Miilan, struck a
blow at the whole systemn of excommllnunication by a decree
in which he released all laymen from the necessity of
answerinug a summons from the ecclesiastical co-urtsclerks were to be tried by clerical judges, and laymen by
laymen alone.2 Whatever may have been the motives
which prompted the wily Visconti to this extraordinary
attack upon the jurisdietion and prerogatives of the
church, it was altogether too mnuch in advance of the age
for even his power to sustain it, and ill the following year
we find him limiting the decree in various essential particulars.3 Yet it stands upon the statute-book to show how
precarious in Italy was the hold of the church on those prerogatives which kept the rest of Latin Christendom in
subjection.
Poland was, probably firom its contamination by the
Greek schismatics, even less disposed than Italy to invest
the sentence of excommunication with temporal terrors.
In 1346, the statute of Yislitza declares that if the evidence of an excommunicate was requisite in a suit, and if
the excommlunicator refused absolution, then the testimony
of the witness could be given as freely as though he were
in full communion. This manifests so complete a disregard of the sanctity claimed by the church for all its acts
that we can readily believe the statement that by the commencement of the fifteuenth century the anathemla entailed
Antiqua Ducurn Mediola.ni Decreta (Mediolan. 1664, p. 3).
2 Ibid. p. 136.
3 Ibid. pp. 158-9.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 401
no legal or political disabilities, and was consequently but
little regarded by the people.l
The Northern nations were guilty of no such insubordination. In Sweden, for instance, the inviolability of ecclesiastical censures was protected with relentless ferocity.
By the laws in force until the time of the RIeformation, if a
man remained under excommunication for a year, without
seeking absolution, the bishop reported him to the king,
and the king was bound to put him to death. IHis body
was -denied Christian sepulture, and his relatives could
claiml no wehr-gild or blood nioney, though his heirs were
)not disinherited.2 Amoi-g the free Frisians, any one interfering to prevent the prelates from absolutely coercing
offenders among their flocks was subjected to the heavy
fine of 20 marks.3
Thus supported by the jurisprudence of nearly all
Europe, it is no wonder that the church could assume as
a general principle that all secular magistrates were obliged
to exercise their authority at the call of the bishops, and
that any one neglecting thus to performl his duty in enforcing the mandates of the ecclesiastical power, was, after
three summons, hilmself liable to excommunication.4
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION.
Writh the power of the state thus at command, the authority of the church became almost illimitable. It was
not only available in reducing to submission the proudest
monarchs of Christendom, but it extended to the minutest
Krasinski, Reformation in Poland, I. 109.
Raguald. LI. Suecorum Lib. I. cap. xiv. (Stockholmix, 1614, p. 23).
LI. Opstalbomic,ar. ann. 1323, ~ 4.
C. A. Thesauri de Poenis Eccles., Ferrarise, 1761, p. 169,
32 4
402 EXCOMMUNICATION.
details of (daily life. The canons might repeat with ceaseless iteration that excomnimunication was a spiritual sword
which should only be unsheathed in the cause of God, and
for weighty reasons; but the cause of every churchminan
was tile cause of the church, and the cause of the church
was the cause of God. The rule that no one could be
judge in his own case thns was disregarded in the zeal to
punish the wrongs offered to God in the persons of His
servants, and private enmity gratified itself under the
guise of holy fervor.' It is not in human nature to resist
the tenmptation of abusing a power so tremendous and so
irresponsible, and tile warnings to be temperate in its exercise met with litttle respect from the highest as from the
lowest.
One fertile source of oppression is suggested by the case
above cited of the Abbot of St. Riquier and Mayor RBoisel.
As the excommunicate was what the old English law denomlinated a 6 lawless inanll-one who could claim no
protection under the law —it is easy to see that when a
quarrel arose between a prelate ancl a layman, the former
could fulminate the anathema agaihnst his adversary, who
thenceforth had no standing in court until he could procure absolution from his excommunicator, thus practically
placing him at the mercy of his antagonist, who could
exact his own terms for reconciliation. It nattered not
whether the excommlunication was legal or illeg'al, justifiable or unjustifiable. The False Decretals had promulgated
the doctrine that the episcopal sentence, even when groundless, was to be respected,2 and this principle became freely
admitted in practice. Beaumanoir advises any one sumnumoned to an ecclesiastical court to obey the summons
promptly, whether subject to its jurisdiction or not, for if
lie fails to appear, lie will be exconimunicated- 6et li
escornmeniement t font c douter, coimment qunil soient guete,' Cf. Alvari Pelagii de Planctu Eccles. Lib. Ii. Art xx. cap. 34, 35.
Pseud(o-Urbani Epist. enp. v.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 403
soit a tort, soit a droit."' About the samle period, Alphonso the Wise of Castile, in his code of laws, declares
that though it is a grave sin to excommunicate without
cause, yet he who is thus excommunicated can only submit
until le is absolved." It thus gradually came to be establishedl that however illicit an excommunication might be,
it yet was valid;3 and so thoroughly was the customary
abuse of this tremendous power recognized, that popes
sometimes, in virtue of their supreme authority, granted
as a special privilege the right not to be excommunicatedwithout cause. A bull of this nature is extant, issued by
Celestin III. in 1193, in favor of the monastery of Nieuwerke,4 and another by Innocent III. in 1207, for the protection of an archbishop.5
It could hardly be expected, indeed, that papal monitions
to be moderate in the exercise of power should be heeded
when the papacy itself set the example of the most flagranat
abuse. In the insatiable greed of the Rloman curia, for
instance, not only was the power of confirming the election of bishops turned to account by grasping the annates,
but, in defiance of all the canons against simony, the creatures of the court exacted heavy fees under pretence of free
gifts. In process of time this custom, became so thoroughly
established that those who were niggard or dilatory were
formally excommunicated; and Peter Boerius, Bishop of
Orvieto, in the latter part of the fourteenth century, relates
that no less than seven bishops were thus under the ban
of the church at one time for not gratifying the expectations of the cardinals.6
Coutumes du Beauvoisis, cap. II. ~ 28.
Las Siete Particlas, P. I. Tit. ix. 11. 20, 21.
Avila de Censuris Eccles. P. II. cap. v. Disput. ii. Dub. 1, Conclus. 4.
4 Ludewig, Reliq. Mssetor. T. v. p. 64.
I5 nnocent. PP. III. Regest. Lib. x. Epist. 36.
c Gloss. ad Vit. Pontificum (Baluze et Mansi Miscell. T. I. p. 479). Ecclesiastics seemed to know too much of the muachinery of excomlmunication to
feel for it the implicit respect that was expected of laymen. In 1207 we
404 EXCOMMUNICATION.
When we consider the materials of which the hierarchvy
was composed and the influences which secured preferment
to its highest places, it is therefore no wonder if the trelmendous power thus confided to unworthy hands was
abused for private ends and in the most shocking manner.
Medi'evall history is full of this prostitution of the name
and atuthority of Christ by those who professed to be acting in His name and for His cause, as when in 1253 Henri
de Suze endeavored to levy an illegal tax on the citizens
of Embrun, of which place he was archbishop. The cornmunity resisted so vivaciously that he was forced to leave
town, and the matter was referred to the pope, who appointed the Bishop of Senez as an arbiter. As this prelate
was a suffragan of the archbishop he could hardly be regarded as an impartial judgce, and he naturally was unable
to reconcile the parties. In April, 1254, therefore, the
archbishop excommunicated the inhabitants, but they still
refused submission, and after a year's grace, in lay, 1255,
lie fulminated a more decisive anathema against them,
which is a fair example of the manner in which the spirit
of the Gospel was lost in tile all-absorbing interests of the
temporal power:" I. If the consuls and inhabitants of Elmbrun do not return to
their cluty by St. Johnllll's day they are declared thenceforth infamous,
incapable of thereafter executing testaments, of bearing witness,
or of exercising any public function, and in addition they shall be
banished.
"' II. All those who have served as consuls since the date of excomlllllunication shall be disabled from holding any office of dignity.
All the acts of their consulate are hereby declared null and void.
" III. All citizens who have been candidates for the consulships
or municipal council of Emlbrun are declared infamous and perjured;
find the church of Cologne inquiring of Innocent III. what should be done
in cases where abbots and abbesses bestowed preferment on clerks who were
under excommunication, and how they could be compelled to respect an
interdict.-Innocent. PP. III. Regest. Lib. x. Epist. 62.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 405
and those who have favored them or may favor them are excommunicated. All the inhabitants more than fourteen years of age who
have obeyed the consuls or have been willing' to obey them are likewise declared infamous and excommunicate.
" IV. All ecclesiastics are forbidden to enter the town of Embrun;
and all towns, villages, and hamlets of the diocese are prohibited
from receiving or harboring the inhabitants of Embrun under pain
of sharing in the interdict during their stay.
"V. All testaments, contracts of marriage, and other acts which
may be executed in Embrun and other interdictecl places are declared null and void, especially those to which excommunicates are
parties. All children born of such unions are declared bastard and
not heritable, notwithstanding the ignorance of those who may
have contracted the marriage.
" VI. The curates and chaplains of the Maritime Alps are ordered
to publish these presents on all Sundays and holidays. All who
during the interdict shall frequent the market of Embrun, shall sell
provisions to the inhabitants, or shall assist them in any manner
vwhatsoever, shall appear before the archbishop to answer for their
disobedience.'VII. The present interdict shall be addressed to all bishops,
abbots, priors, convents, and other ecclesiastics, with prohibition to
receive any of the inhabitants of Embrun, or any messenger from
its pretended magistrates. All confessors are moreover forbidden
to absolve any of the said inhabitants without special permission.
" VIII. The bodies of all persons dying under the said excommunication shall be hung upon trees. Any one burying them,
even in the fields, is declared unworthy of sepulture until St. John's
day."t
As during the next year, 1256,. the archbishop is found
in peaceable possession of his city, we may fairly conclude
that even his stubborn flock were unable to maintain their
ground ag'ainst so ruthless a proscription as this.
In sentences of this kind it is worthy of note how comnpletely the spiritual penalties had becolme absorbed in the
temporal punishment. The alliance between church and
state had done its work, and the church, secularized in its' Gautier, Hist. de ha Ville de Gap, Notes, pp. 208-10 (Gap, 1844).
406 EXCOMMUNICATION.
aspirations, relied rather upon the sword of flesh whichl it
had succeeded in grasping than upon the sword of the
spirit which it claimed to have received from the apostles..Thus the power to refuse tile rites of Christian sepulture,
not content with merely denying all funeral ceremonies,
expands into a prohibition even to hide the body of the excommunicate in the bosom of mother eartllh. The corpse is
to be suspended on a tree, and rotting in the air is to carry
dreadful warning and example to the senses of those
whose souls are too hardened or too obtuse to fear the
threat of eternal punislllhent. This was no invention of
the Archbishop of Embrun. It was the recognized penalty
attached by the church to all who died under her censure.
In 1031 the Bishop of Cahors edified the council of Limoges with an account of a miracle that had occurred under
his own supervision, showing that heaven approved of this
regulation. The body of a certain knight who had died
excommunicated for spoiling the church was forcibly buried
by his companions in consecrated ground, but without
funeral rites. Next morning the corpse was found lying
naked on the ground beyond tile cemetery, while the grave
presented no signs of having been touched. On opening it
tile grave-clothes were found; the body was again buried,
and the spot covered with an enormous pile of stones, but
to no effect, for the next clay the body was found thrown
out as before. This was repeated five times, until the noble
friends of the deceased, appalled by the warning, allowed
the body to lie unburied, and soughlt reconciliation to the
church.' WVhen the rule was thus divinely enforced it is
no wonder that the church adhered to it. In 1260 the
council of Cognac prohibited all dead excommunicates
from being covered with stones even above ground;' while
in Iceland the attempt to bury a corpse to which sepulture
1 Concil. Lemovicens. II. Sess. II. (IIarduin. T. VI. p. I. pp. 884-5).
o Concil. Copriniac. ann. 1260, can. 15 (Ilarduin. VII. 532).-Cf. Ducange
s. v. ibabloccatts.
ABUS} E OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 407
had been interdicted was punished with exile.' Tile custom
was observed even when the excommunication itself was
despised. Thus, when in 1239 Gregory IX. anathematized
Frederic II. in the vain hope of staying the progress of his
victorious arms in Italy, and ordered his subjects to elect
another emperor, the Germans treated the papal fulmination with absolute contempt. The Bishop of Passau even
soundly pummelled and cast into jail the nuncio who bore
the apostolic commands, and the whole nation asserted its
independence of Roman control. Yet when Eberhardt of
Salzburg died in 1246 under excommunication for sharing
in this disobedience, although he had quietly exercise(I his
archiepiscopal functions without interruption, his body was
refused sepulture, and lay at Radstadt until 1288, when it
was finally broughlt to Salzburg and magnificently interred.2
Usurers, as being ipso facto excommunlicate, were similarly denied Christian burial, and in 1456 the Bishop of St.
Andree complained to the council of Salzburg that thle
mendicant friars dared to give funeral rites to notorious
offenders of this kind, without exacting satisfaction from
the heirs, to the great injury of the priesthood.3 In process of time, indeed, the strictness of the rule was relaxed
in some places, where the clergy found it more profitable
to be merciful. George, Bishop of Bamberg, issued in 1465
a scale of prices for all the processes of his episcopal court,
to restrain the grasping venality of the officials, and in this
document he defines that the fee for burying the body of
an excommunicate shall be properly proportioned to the
1 Kristinrettr Thorl. oc Ketils, cap. VII. XLVIII. (Havni-e, 1776, pp. 37,
171). In the Icelandic church there were regular fees for sepulture established by law, as well as for other sacerdotal ministrations, even to the consecration of a church by a bishop.-Ibid. cap. v. xIv. xv.
2 Dalham, Concil. Salisburgens. pp. 91-99.' Concil. Salisburg. xxxviii. (Dalham, op. cit. 233). Even as late as
1569 a formal body of ecclesiastical law adopted by a council of Salzburg
forbade Christian sepulture to usurers (Concil. Salisburg. XLVI. const. li.
cip. 9.- DalhaIm, p. 505).
408 EXCOMM MUNI CATION.
estate of the defuLnct.1 It is evident, therefore, that the
absolute refusal of sepulture was no longer rigidly enforced
in his diocese, and doubtless even in earlier times a proceeding so repugnant to all human sensibilities could not
have been universally carried out, for if it had been it
would have demonstrated the falsity of a wide-spread
belief that the corpse of an excommunicate, though it
might decay, was practically indestructible, and would
remain for an indefinite period in a putrid condition.
Adam of Bremen relates a case in which a body thus was
preserved for seventy-five years, until a pious bishop removed the excomnmunication, when it incontinently crumbled into dust; and two centuries later Matthew Paris shows
that the superstition still existed.2
Thus, although the temporal penalties formed the most
efficient feature of excommunication, yet its spiritual and
superhuman effects were by no means abandoned. These
were materialized,. however, to suit the grosser superstitions of the age, and men were taught that nature itself
was subject to the awful and mysterious ban of the church.
Not only were the bodies of the dead rendered imperishaable witnesses of the doom reserved in another world for
the disobedient, but even in this world, if the stubborn
soul of man was insensible, the dreadful curse could
wither into sterility his lands and his flocks, for God had
given the earth to His church, and the blessings of kindly
nature were to be enjoyed only on condition of submission
to its behests.
From time immemorial up to the Revolution of 1789,
an annual tribute of 30 sous Morlaas was regularly paid
by the Valley of Saint-Savin in B1igorre, to the Valley of
Aspe in Bearn. The origin of this custom, as explicitly
Georgii I. Episc. Barnberg. Reform. Consistorii Art. xlii. (Ludewig
Script. Rer. German. I. 1183).
2 Adam. Bremens. Gest. Pontif. HI-amburg. Lib. II. cap. 31. —Iatt. Paris
ann. 1245 (Ed. Paris, 1644, p. a64).
ABUSE OF EXCOMMIUNICATION. 409
set forth in formal legal documents of 1348 and 1592, was
as follows: The people of Aspe made a sudden raid upon
their neighbors of Saint-Savin, when, to arrest the course
of the invaders, an abbot climbed into an elder-tree and so
paralyzed them by his magic arts that they allowed themselves to be slaughtered without resistance. The pope, informed of this shocking carnage, cast an interdict on SaintSavin, and for seven years it was cursed with absolute
sterility-women bore no children, cattle gave no increase,
and the land produced no fruit. To expiate its crime and
to gain absolution the Valley of Saint-Savin at last agreed
to pay tribute to Aspe, and the memory of its punishment
and expiation was thus regularly handed down to modern
times.1
From this example it is not difficult to understand how
the excommunication of animals and inanimate objects
came to be, if not a matter of everyday occurrence, at all
events a recognized portion of the attributes and functions
of the church. Shortly after St. Bernard had founded his
ascetic community at Clairvaux, a monk of a less rigid
order planted a vineyard in the neighborhood. Two of
the Bernardines, regaording this as a scandalous derogation from the austerity of monastic life, after vainly-expostulating with brother Christian the cultivator, informed
him that lie should never taste the fruit of his labors, and
proceeded to excommunicate tle vineyarcl. It never thrived,
and Christian died without seeing it come into bearing.
After years of resultless labor hsd beeh spent upon it, at
length the owner came to St. Bernard and complained of
the curse of barrenness which had been inflicted on it by
the excommunication of his brethren, when the pitying
saint caused a basin of water to be brought, blessed it, and
told the vine-d(resser to sprinkle it over the accursed ground.
The vines thenceforth grew luxuriantly, and bore such
La Greize,!tist. du Droit dans les Pyrdndes, Paris, 1867, p. 339.
35
410 EXCO MM UN ICATI ON.
abundant crops that they were the admiration of all be.
holders.l It will be observed here that it was not the
sanctity of the monks but the anathema itself which' inflicted the curse of barrenness; and such was the fact also
in a case reported by Chassanee, where a priest excommnunicated an orchard of which the tempting fruit enticed
away the children of the vicinage from attendance upon
divine service. It immediately ceased bearing, and remainecd sterile until the curse was removed at the special
request of the Dowager Duchess of Burgundy.2
Excommunication of animals, however, was much more
fiequent than that of inanimate objects. The earliest instance on record, I believe, occurred in 1120, when a bishop
of Laon excommunicated the caterpillars, which were ravaging his diocese, with the same formula as that emploTyed
the previous year by the council of RIheims in cursing the
priests who persisted in marrying in spite of the canons1.
What success attended his efforts is not on record, but
soon afterwards St. Bernard found the remedy effectual
when, preaching in the monastery of Foigny, which he
founded in 1121, he was interrupted by swarms of irreligious flies whose buzzing solely tried the patience of the
orator and the attention of his audience. Wearied beyond
endurance, the saint at last exclaimed to his tormentors,
"' I excommunicate you," and next morning they were
found lying dead upon the floor of the chapel in such multitudes that they had to be swept out.4
In all these cases it is observable how completely the
original idea of excommunication-the depriving a sinner
of participation in a sacrament of which he was unworthyJoann. Eremit. Vit. S. Bernardi Lib. II. cap. 10.
Agnel, Curiositds Judiciaires du Moyen-Age, Paris, 1858, p. 26.
3 Desmnaze, Pdnalitds Anciennes, Paris, 1866, pp. 31-2.
Guillelmi S. Theod. Vit. S. Bernardi, cap. xi. No. 52. Willinam, Abbot
of St. Theodore, was a contemporary of St. Bernard, and his story represents
therefore a living belief of the age, and not merely a. miraculous legend.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 411
is lost in the secon(dary notion of a ban or curse inflicted
on persons or things who never had enjoyed or could enjoy
communion. The church is no longer merely the custodian
of the body and blood of the Redeemer, but has acquired
the attributes of the Deity, the power to bless or to curse,
and excomrmunication is only the traditional form through
which to convey the curse that works woe in this world
and the next. In all ages the saints, peculiarly favored of
God, were enllabled by divine grace to work miracles, but
the formula of excommunication embodied the collective
authority of the church, and it was effectual as an every
day operation of that authority, irrespective of the character of the minister who wielded it.
Hlow thoroughly these excommunications of animals
were assimilated to the reg'ular use of the censures of the
church is manifest by the form which they subsequently
took. Even as the calons, however constantly violated,
forbade the expulsion of a Christian without a formal trial,
so, as civilization advanced, it began to be thought that an
unfair advantage was ttken of the dumb creatures of God
by condemning them unheard, and the practice arose of
affording them the opportunity of defence before the ecclesiastical courts prior to pronouncing the dreadful sentence
against them. Perhaps the best known of these curious
proceedings was that by which the distinguished lawyer,
Bartholomew Chassanee, in 1510, made the reputation
which subsequently elevated him to the post of Premier
President of the Parlement of Aix. The country around
Autun being intolerably infested with rats, whose numbers
resisted all ordinary means of extermination, the inhabitants applied to the bishop to have the vermin regularly
excommunicated. The episcopal court nominated Chassanee to appear as counsel for the rats, in consequence of his
having shortly before printed a consultation of vast erudition on trials of that kind. iHe accordingly undertook the
defence, and proved that the rats had not been properly
412 EXCOMMUUNICATION.
sumimoned to appear, and the trial went over until a formal
citation to the defendants was published by the priests of
all the parishes in the infested district. I-He then moved
for a longer delay, alleging that the time allowed the rats
to put in an appearance was too short, in view of the danger
incurred by them through reason of the cats which rendered
all access to the court dangerous for them; and his learned
argument on the point gained an additional postponement.1
Ie Thou, to whom we are indebted for these curious details,
does not state the conclusion of the trial, but it is fair to
presume that the rats were finally condemned and duly
excommunicated in spite of the learning and ability of
their advocate, for that was the usual result in these cases,
and Chassande in his consultation had admitted its propriety. He argues, after various generalizing reasons, that
religion permits us to lay snares for birds and other animals
destructive of the fruits of the earth, and that the anathema
is the surest and most comprehensive of snares. That to
preserve the harvests, incantations and other forbidden
proceedings are tolerated by the law, and a fortiori it is
permissible to use against destructive vermin the excommunication which is.authorized and employed by the
church itself. In support of this opinion he cites a case in
which the sparrows who soiled the church of St. Vincent
were excommunicated by the bishop, and another where the
rats and caterpillars who swarmed over a wide extent of
country were jointly anathematized by the ecclesiastical
authorities of Autun, Macon, and LTyo1ns.2
Such cases, indeed, were by no means rare. In 1451 the
fish of the Lake of Geneva were threatened with destruction
by the abounding multitudes of leeches. By order of William of Saluces, Bishop of Lausann e, a reegular trial was
held; the leeches were ordered, under pain of excommunication, to confine themselves to a certain spot, and they
De Thou, Hist. Univ. Lib. vI.
o Agnel, Curiosit6s Judiciaires, pp. 25-6.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 413
duily obeyed, no longer venturing to wander beyond the
limits prescribed. In 1480 the spiritual court of Autun,
on complaint of the inhabitants of Mussy and Pernan,
excommunicated. the caterpillars, and ordered the priests
to repeat the anathema from their pulpits until it should
produce the desired effect. In 1481 a similar sentence was
rendered at Macon against the snails, which was repeated
in 1487. Another was delivered in 1488 at Autun against
the caterpillars, and the same year at Beaujeu against the
snails. At Troyes, in 1516, there were similar proceedings
against caterpillars;1 and about the same time against
grasshoppers at Milliere in Normandy. The progress of
enlightenment, however, made itself apparent in 1587 at
Valence, where a plague of caterpillars led to a formal
trial and sentence of banishment under pain of excomnmunication. The obstinate insects refusing obedience, the
grand vicar of the Bishop of Valence was proceeding to
fulminate the threatened anathema, when he was dissuaded
by some discreet lawyers and theologians.2
Cardinal Duperron, who was too vain of his learning to
have much belief in anything but himself, was keenly alive
to the absurdity of these proceedings, and in the ritual of
Evreux in 1606 forbade everything of the kind except
under written permission of the bishop. Yet the superstition was too deeply rooted in the popular belief to be
easily eradicated, nor was the church prepared to abandon
any source of influence over the faithful. Maartin of Arles,
who about this period published a tract against the superstitions of the day, mingles with sensible observations on
the grosser forms of popular credulity a defence of proceedings of this kind, providled they are conducted in
accordance with the established formulas of the church.
The form of acdjuration employed on this occasion may be found in Du
Cange s. v. Excowzq?2miccatio (T. III. p. 137, col. i., Ed. 1844).
a Agnel, op. cit. pp. 26-36.
35*
414 EXCOMMUNICATION.
All destructive vermin he conceives to be the direct emissaries or instruments of the devil, and it is the province of
the church to exorcise and defeat the devil in all his manifestations.l Wlhat were the established forms are to be
found in a manual of exorcisms published by authority at
Antwerp in 1648, which gives the regular ritual provided
for the cursing of noxious vermin. After certain prayers
offered in the fields to be cleansed of them, the priest recited the 9th chapter of the Apocalypse, the llth of Lulke,
and the 49th Psalm, and then proceeded, c " I exorcise and
adjure you, O pestilent worms, by God the omnipotent
Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ -His Son, and by the
I-oly Ghost proceedingo from both, that you at once abandon these fields, meadows, pastures, gardens, vineyards,
andc waters, if the providence of God permit you, still to
live, and that you no longer stay here but betake yourselves
to such places that you may do no harm to the servants of
God. If you are here through the craft of the devil, I
order you in the name of Divine Majesty, of all the Heavenly I-Iost, and of the Church Militant, to decrease and
disappear unless you can add to the glory of God the
comfort of man. WThich may He deign to grant who
cometh to judge the quick and the dead and the world by
fire. Amen!"2
In this there is no mention of excommunication, and if
the latter was employed, it must have been a subsequent
1 D. Martini de Aries Tract. de Superstit. Ed. Francof. ad. M. 1581, pp.
392, sqq. The first edition of this work I believe was published in Rome in
1560.
2 R. D. Max. ab Eynatten Manuale Exorcismorum, Antverpia, 1649, pp.
299-305. I find the same form of exorcism, with a more elaborate litany, in
a manual published in Italy in 1815 (Sannig, Collectio sive Apparatus Absolutionum, Benedictionum, Conjurationum, Exorcismorum, Rituunrr, etc.
Bassani, 1815, p. 217), and it may possibly be used there to this clay.
The same collection has a form of exorcism for powder and ball, to insure
that when used against enemies of the Ctatholic faith evil spirits may not
render them harmless (Ibid. p. 180).
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 415
proceeding on the vermin proving obdurate to the exorcism.
The custom was not obsolete, however, for, fifty years later,
the Canadian colonists used occasionally to seek protection from the ravages of immense flocks of wild pigeons
by getting the Bishop of Quebec to excommunicate them;
and in the early part of the eighteenth century, at the request of the village of Pont-du-Chateau in Auvergne, a
regular process of anathema was resorted to by the ecclesiastical courts against an invasion of caterpillars. In
1713 the good brethren of the monastery of St. Anthony
of Marafion, in Brazil, finding that their provisions were
destroyed and the foundations of their building undermined by an immense colony of ants, went through the
forms of a regular trial, ending in a sentence of banishment under pain of excommunication; and on this being
formally read at the entrance of the ant-holes, the obedient
insects at once took up the line of march in heavy columns
and proceeded to the spot designated for their habitation.
About the same time a similar occurrence is recorded as
taking place.in Peru, where the ravages of a miultitude of
ants threatened to destroy a library,l
These eccentric abuses of the power of excommunication have their importance as showing the impression produced on the human mind by the assiduous teachings of
the church. Not only was the anathema thus believed to
be endowed with almost omnipotent power, but the disposition to resort to it on every occasion when the ordinary
processes of law were at fault was encouraged until it became a universal remedy or panacea. Diego Gelmirez,
Archbishop of Compostella, in the early part of the twelfth
century, could thinkl of no better mode of preserving the
manuscript history of his pontificate than by fulminating
an excommunicationwhich consigned to eternal damnation
with Dathan and Abiram, any sacrilegious wretch who
Agnel, op. cit., pp. 40-46.
416 EXCOMMUNICATION.
miglht steal or mutilate the copy which he deposited in the
archives of his cathedral.l When Clement III. desired
to encourage the rising University of Bologna, he issued a
bull anathematizing ipso facto any one who should offer
higher refnt for lodgings occupied by any teacher or student;
and this became the common law of the church everyvhielre, according to Alphonso the Wise.2 After the invention of printing had given a pecuniary value to literary
labor, and before the invention of the legal protection of
copyright, pirated editions were prevented by accompanying the grant of exclusive publication with an anathema
directed against all who should infringe upon the rights of
the author. Even popes did not disdain thus to fulminate
the papal excommunication, and publishers were able to
defiantly proclaim the eternal punishment awaiting those
who should interfere with their privileges.3 So minute,
indeed, were the applications of the anathema that learned
doctors gravely disputed whether a man who stole a single
bunch of grapes from a vineyard could be excommunicated,
if others followed his example until the vines were stripped; or whether the same penalty could be inflicted for
the theft of a tailor's needle, when the loss of it mnight
throw him out of work.4
This idea of supplementing the defects of human law by
the employment of excommunication was a very fruitfiul
one, and gave immense extension to the jurisdiction of the
church, not only. increasing incalculably the power of the
ecclesiastical body, but providing an endless succession of
fees for its officials. Even as late as the eighteenth century,' Historia Compostellan. Procem. et Comminatio.' Las Siete Partidas, P. I. Tit. ix. 1. 2. Cf. Thesauri de Pmnis Eccles.,
Ferrarim, 1761, p. 83.
3 See the Rituum Ecclesiasticorum Libri III. Venet. 1516.-reprinted in
I-Ioffinann's Nova Script. ac Monument. Collect. T. II. (Lipsi;, 1733).
4 Avila de Censuris Eccles. P. II. Cap. V. Disp. ii. Dub. 3. Conclus. 3.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMIUNICATION. 417
any one suffering fiom a theft could procure episcopal letters of excommunication against the offenders on swearing
that they were unknown, and casuiStS excused this traffic
in the body and blood of Christ by arguing that this process was not intended for the temporal good of the loser,
but for the soul's health of the criminal.' In fact, before
an irreligious generation superseded it with the carnal
device of a detective police, it was regarded as the most
efficient agency for the recovery of stolen property. There
is on record a bull of Paul III., issued in 1542, excommunicating some graceless rascals who had made way with
a portion of the muniments of Montignac in Bigorre. In
the archives of Pan there exist various " monitoires," dating
about the middle of the seventeenth century, addressed by
the episcopal official to the cures of parishes, for the pur'pose of obtaininog the restitution of certain papers belonging to the commune. These monitoires were read from the
pulpits, and after three repetitions, any one neglecting to
reveal any facts within his knowledge bearing on the subject was ipso facto excommunicated. So, also, the records
of Vic-en-Bigorre contain a resolution adopted by the authorities of that town, in 1665, to obtain a papal excoinmunication against certain parties who would not restore
some documents belonging to the comnlne.2
The most instructive example, however, of this extension of the anathema is perhaps to be found in its application to the collection of debts, which was so widely used
and so long continued that we may fairly conclude that it
proved very effectual. The rise of this custom would seem
to be attributable to the efforts of the papacy to protect
the money-lenders of Italy in advancing funds to the mnultitudes attracted to Rome by the innumerable interests
concentrated around the high court of Christendom. A
Avila dcle Censuris Eccles. P. II. cap. v. Disp. ii. Dub. l. Conclus. 2, 3.
n La Greze, lIist. du Droit dans les Pyrdndes, pp. 281, 211.
418 EXCOMMUNICATION.
sojourn in the hIoly City by any one who had a favor to
gain, a preferment to be confirmed, or a cause to be won,
was apt to prove much more costly than the simple Englishman or German had anticipated, and benevolent bankers were not scarce who would cheerfully supply the necessities of any prelate in good credit, to the resultant
profit of the papal officials. The stranger, however, would
sometimes depart without a settlement, and when safely
returned to his native fastnesses would prove unduly oblivious of the florins and byzants accumulated against him
on the books of the obliging Italian. Collections by the
ordinary forms of law were almost hopeless, but it was not
difficult to obtain the friendly interest of the Holy Father,
whose arm was long, and who could reach the debtor, however distant and however high-placed. The earliest instance which I have met with of this occurred in 1180,
when Lucius III. writes to the Archbishop of Canterbury,
whose chancellor had borrowed largely of some Bolognese
on the security of an Italian friend. The money was not
forthcoming, the interest was daily increasing the debt,
and the security was becoming uncomfortable, when the
pope intervened and informed the English primate that if
the transaction was not disputed, the debtor must be forced
to settle by means of ecclesiastical censures.l So in 1207
we find Theodoric, Bishop of Utrecht, making default in
the payment of 1250 marks borrowed of certain citizens of
Rome and Siena, and setting at naught the excommunication launched at him by the Bishop of Prmnleste as papal
legate. At length Innocent iII. wrote to Hugh, Bishop of
Liege, that the sum must be paid within the year, in three
equal instalments, without interest, failing which, Hugh is
formally to anathematize Theodoric with bell, book, and
candle, in all the churches of the province of Cologne, and
the clergy of Utrecht are no longer to render obedience to
Cap. 3, X. Lib. II. Tit. 22.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICAT ION. 419
him; while further contumacy is to be punished with final
deposition.' It is evident that no ecclesiastical rank, however exalted, exempted the debtor from this liability, as
Ulric, Archbishop of Salzburg, found when he was excommunicated in 1262 by Urban IV. for not fulfilling engagements made with the pontiff, amounting to 4000
m1arks.2
In an age when the distinctions of meum and tuum were
too often subordinated to force and fraud, there was a
charming promptness and simplicity about this mode of procedure which recommended it forcibly to the proverbially
defenceless class of creditors. They, therefore, eagerly supported the claims of the church to jurisdiction in such cases,
which was easily effected by making debtors swear to the
punctual discharge of their obligations. Bankruptcy thus
became peijury, which was clearly a case of conscience,
subject to the courts Christian; and gradually the latter
acquired a large and profitable business in collecting desperate debts. Already, by the middle of the thirteenth
century, St. Louis felt himself obliged to restrain the rigor
of these proceedings by enacting that when in such cases
the debtor remained under excommunication for the legal
period of a year and a day, the secular court should seize
only his property and not his person, leaving him, moreover, enough to sustain life, and that on settlement he
should pay a fine of nine livres —three to the temporal and
six to the ecclesiastical court.3 About the same time the
council of Ruffec, on the other hand, sharply reproved the
tenderness of those priests who absolved the dying debtor,
without first taking care to see that his heirs had arranged
to satisfy the creditors, and in all such cases the misplaced
sensibility of the ecclesiastic was punished by making him
responsible for all indebtedness, unless, indeed, the estate
1 Innocent. PP. III. Regest. Lib. vI. Epist. 215.
Dalham, Concil. Salisburg, p. 98.
Etablissements, Liv. I. chap. 123.
420 EXCOMMUNICATION.
of the decedent should prove to be utterly insolvent.1 In
Germany, the tendency of the priesthood seems to have
been towards extreme severity, for the council of Wurzburg,
in 1287, is obliged to forbid the excommunication of the
widows and mothers of dead insolvents. When they inherited property and refused to pay the debts of the deceased, this was allowable, but when they received nothing
the council reasonably enough thought it a hardship that
they should share in the damnation of the defunct.2
In an age when a powerful debtor could be reached in
no other way there was much to be said in favor of this
efficient intervention of the church, and yet the employment of her solemn rites for so purely worldly a purpose
could not fail to be shockingto the spiritually inclined, and
the natural result of'such an abuse of ecclesiastical censures was to dull the sensibilities of the people to their
awful nature. In 1371 Charles-le-Sage issued an edict in
which he recounts that multitudes of wealthy debtors remained unconcernedly under excommunication for long
periods of years, and the church was therefore obliged to
recur to the vulgar expedient of requesting the state to
seize the possessions of such hardened delinquents —a request with which the king hastened to comply.2 In 1302
Boniface VIII. had already called attention to a flagrant
abuse by which, through avarice rather than Christian
charity, whole communities and provinces were laid under
interdict, the living deprived of the sacrament and the
dead refused sepulture, on disputes arising merely from
pecuniary questions, and he forbade such oppressive use of
the power of excommlunication for the future.4 This was
not held, however, to apply to individual cases, and in 1341
we find Benedict XII. collecting in this manner a debt of
Concil. Roffancens. ann. 1250, can. 8 (Ilardcin. VII. 503).'. Concil. Herbipolens. ann. 1287, can. 29 (Ibid. p. 1140).
3 Isambert, V. 353.
Can. 1 in Septimo. Lib. II. Tit. viii.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMIUNICATION. 421
16,200 gold florins due to him by Hiumbert II., the last
Dauphin of Vienne.l Even the restriction as imposed by
Boniface seems to have received little respect, for in 1326
the council of Marsiac was obliged again to forbid the infliction of interdicts on communities for debt, without the
especial license of the HIoly See.2 The council of Avignon
in 1337 sought to check another abuse through which
frauds were frequently practised in such cases, by ordering
creditors, under pain of excommunication, to surrender,
on receiving payment, all obligations and evidences of the
debt discharged, and by prescribing a limitation of ten
yTears, after which all bonds and promises to pay became
invalidcl. In 1456, however, a complaint of the Estates of
Languedoc shows that the roval officials were beginning
to issue injunctions prohibiting excommunication in cases
of debt, and the remonstrances made to Charles VII. received a very unsatisfactory response' —though for a century later the church continued with more or less activity
her functions as a collector.
When a debtor died under the ban of the church we have
seen that the German practice to enforce a settlement was
the simple expedient of excommunicating his heirs. This
does not seem to have generally obtained, and elsewhere
the revival of the ancient Roman custom of refusing sepulture to his corpse was deemed sufficiently effectual —a proceeding which Theodoric the Ostrogotl hclad prohibited
under pain of five years' exile and forfeiture of one-third
of the offending creditor's property.5 Theodoric was an
Arian, however, and his notions of humanity were no rule
for the orthodox, while the indecency of the act seemed
justified by the general principle which denied sepulture to
1 Da Cange s. v. Excomn. ob Debitca.
2 Concil. Marciacens. ann. 1326, can. 55 (Harduin. VII. 1530).
3Concil. AvenIionens. ann. 1337, can. 27, 28 (Ibid. pp. 1627-8).
Isambert. IX. 298, 311.
5 Edict. Theodoric. cap. 75.
36
422 EXCOMIMUNICATION.
the dead excommunicate, and it was found too effectual to
be lightly foregone. A striking example of its efficiency
was afforded in 1356, when Pierre I. Duke of Bourbon fell
valiantly fighting at his sovereign's feet, in the disastrous
clay of Poitiers. He was the great-grandson of St. Louis,
the brother-in-law of Philip of Valois, and the father-inlaw of Charles V. of France, and of Pedro the Cruel of
Castile, yet his creditors were numerous, and, finding no
means of enforcing payment from a man elevated above
the reach of ordinary law, they had obtained a sentence of
excommunication against him. Neither his royal blood,
his lofty station, nor his distinguished services availed
aught against the decrees of the church. lis corpse was
carried from the field of battle to the church of the Jacobins
at Poitiers, where it lay unburied until his son, Louis II.,
a youth of 18, pledged to Innocent VI. all his estates to
satisfy the creditors of his father, when the excommunication was raised, ancl the remains at last were honored with
a splendid funeral.' In 1365 the council of Apt censured
the practice of continuing to proclaim the excommunication of deceased insolvent debtors, and ordered the creditors to have recourse against the heirs, which was probably
directed against the practice of refusing burial in such
cases,2 yet the custom long continued. At the very close
of the fifteenth century we -find the case of Barthelemyy de
Saint-Aunis, who died under excommunication for debt by
the ecclesiastical court of Tarbes, and whose widow, Mlarie
de Castelnau, by a document executed in 1499, pledged
herself to pay his debts, amounting to 52- crowns, at the
rate of four crowns per annum, in order to obtain Christian
burial for him.3 As time passed away, the rigor of refusing inhumation was modified into the lighter penalty of
burial in unconsecrated ground, and in 1542 the court of
Desormeaux, Hist. de la Maison de Bourbon, 1. 285-6.
Concil. Aptens. ann. 1365, can. 23 (Martene, Thesaur. IV. 338).
La G r6ze. Hist. du Droit dans les Pyr6n6es, p. 209.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 423
the Seneschal of Bigorre entertained an appeal from Dominique de la Case, a priest of Tarbes, who had been unable
to obtain Christian sepulture for his cousin Guillaume
Beyric, then five years dead, and lying in unhallowed
ground-his plea being that the non-payment of Guillaume's
debts had arisen from his utter poverty.l
This shows that the church took no count of the debtor's
inability to pay when condemning him to eternal torment,
and also that such inability was thought to be a fair justification to bring before a secular court. This question was
one which received different solutions at different times.
In the earliest extant Coutumier of Britanny, dating probably about the commencement of the fifteenth century,
the subject is discussed at some length. The right of the
church to act in such cases is allowed in opposition to
the opinion of those who held that secular courts alone
had cognizance of such matters, and its jurisdiction is admitted to be a valuable resource against the partiality, negligence, or avarice of the secular tribunals; but the assertion is made that no one ought to be excommunicated if he
has property, real or personal, which can be taken in execution by the lay officers. At the same time, any priest
refusing absolution to a dying debtor, whose poverty is the
excuse for the non-payment of his debts, should be deprived
of his benefice.2 In the early part of the sixteenth century,
Anne of Britanny withdrew actions for debt from ecclesiastical jurisdiction;' and in 1539, Francis I., who endeavored to limit at all points the power of the spiritual courts,
expressly forbade his clergy front citing laymen before
them in secular matters, and prohibited the episcopal
judges from issuing any summons in such cases.4 Yet in
La Greze, op. cit., pp. 209-11.
" Tres Ancien Cout. de Bretagne, cap. 335 (Bourdot de Richebourg. IV.
280).
D'Argentr6, Comment. in Consuet. Britan. App. p. 2.
4 Edit. de Villers:Cotterets, ann. 1539, Art. 1, 2 (Isambert. X]I. 601).Cf. Edit. de Yz-sur-Tille (Oct. 1535), chap. xII. art. 20, 27 (Neron. I. 131).
424 EXCOMMUNICATION.
spite of all this, the revision of the Coutumier in 1539
contains the same provision, permitting excommunication
only in cases where the debtor has no property that can be
seized under judgment, and the right to do so disappears
only in the revision of 1580.1 Bertrand dl'Argentre, writing
in the interval, intimates that the limitation was not strictly
ob)served, and that ecclesiastical censures often served a,
good purpose in aiding the secular courts to deal with
tricky an d fraudulent debtors.2
As the administration of law became systeimatized,
and petty local despots were less able to set it at defiance, the necessity for these proceedings decreased, and
they gradually disappeared; but there can be no doubt
that in preceding ages they were in many instances the
only mode in which substantial justice could be obtained
of the powerful by the weak. At the same time there can
be as little doubt that they frequently opened the door to
frightful abuses. The power thus conferred on the unscrupulous is well illustrated by Blalthazar Cossa, better
lknown as John XXIII. Before his elevation to the
papacy, while yet a cardinal and papal legate at Bologna,
in the opening years of the fifteenth century, he enriched
himself by lending money at the moderate usury of twentyfour per cent. for four months, obliging the borrower to
give security, and to pledge himn-self under the ecclesiastical
penalties and censures. If the loan were not promptly
repaid at maturity, he immediately prosecuted the unlucky
debtor and his sureties before the auditor of the papal
chamber, and had them thrown into prison.o Another
abuse of the system is indicated by a protest in the Ancien
Coutulme de France, to the effect that the rule convicting
of heresy any one remaining for a year under excommuniAncien. Cout. de Bretagne, Tit. I. art. 6.-Cout. cde Bretgne, Tit. i.
art. 6.
13. d"Argentrd, Comment. in Consuet. Britan. p. 17.
3 Theod. a Niemu de Vit. Joann. XXIII.
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 425
cation does not apply to those involved in the censure for
debt.' It is fair to assume, indeed, that the Diet of Niirnberg in 1522 was justified in including among the grievances laid before Adrian VI. this mode of collecting debts,
and that its statement of the wrong and ruin frequently
caused by this incongruous mingling of spiritual and temporal affairs was not exaggerated;2 especially when we find
Clement VII., in 1529, obliged to promulgate afiesh the
decretal of Boniface VIII., prohibiting the interdict of
cities and provinces on account of debts.3
From this rapid sketch of some of the practical applications of the power of excommunication, and of the penalties consequent upon separation from the sacraments of
the church, it is easy to imagine the authority thence
derived to the ecclesiastical body, and the opportunities
for good or evil which it thus acquired. In the social
order of Christendom, no man was so high as to be beyond
its reach, no man so obscure as to escape its observation.
Even the misbelieving Jew could not elude the anathema,
for when he disobeyed the commands of the church lie was
indirectly excommunicated by excommunicating the secular authorities until they compelled his obedience.4 The
network of its organization covered every land, and where
it could not effect its purposes by working on the consciences of men, the whole power of the state was at its
bidding to compel obedience and to crush resistance. In
Languedoc it could marshal irresistible armies to exterminate heresy; in Sweden it could deliver to the execuDu Cange s. v. Excomv. ob Debitca.
" Gravamina Nationis German. cap. 41 (Le Plat, Monument. Concil.
Trident. T. II. pp. 188-9).
3 Can. 3, in Septimo Lib. II. Tit. viii.
4 Synod. Bambergens. ann. 1491, Tit. xliv.-" Ipsi autem Judaei per nos
indirecte per subtractionem communionis fidelium excomnmunicationis sententia compellanltur.'' (Irtzheiml, V. 623.):x)k
426 E XCOMMU NICATION.
tioner the miserable peasant who refused to pay his tithe;
and no matter what was the nature of the offence, as soon
as the church intervened, all crimes became equal when
merged in the one overwhelming sin of disobedience.l
In thus building up an organization able to confront the
savage forces of feudalism, the church unquestionably accomplished vast good. Yet the benefits thus conferred on
civilization were accompanied by inseparable evils. More
occupied with acquiring power than with training those
intrusted with its exercise, the church found its ministers
too often utterly unworthy of the tremendous responsibilities thrust upon them. The authority, indeed, was too
vast and too unll ecked to be safely confided to fallible
human nature, and there was more piety than reason in
the anticipation that God would strengthen the hands to
which so large a portion of His attributes were assigned.
Theoretically, indeed, the system was one of strict accountability, but practically it amounted to irresponsibility. With the growth of the papal power all the active
forces of the church camne gradually to be centred in the
successor of St. Peter. Ile was supreme, and his subordinates everywhere exercised only a delegated authority, to
be set aside or overruled at his pleasure.2 While thus
there lay an appeal to the pope from the sentence of any
ecclesiastical court, 3et this illusory reference to distant' An exception to this must be noted in the case of Iceland, whose church
differed so greatly from the iest of Christendom. In the code of ecclesiastical law drawn up by Bishops Thoralik and Ketill in 1122, which remained
in force until 1275, there is no mention of excommunication save a somewhat doubtful allusion to the interdiction of sepulture. The penalties provided for all offences-infraction of filsts, disregard of Sunday and saints'
days, non-payment of tithes, and even sorcery and paganism-are all purely
temporal, being simply fines or banishment, and all charges were tried
before the secular courts by the regular form of a jury of the vicinage.Kristinrettr Thorlaks oc Ketils, cap. xv. xvi. x xvi. xxx. XXXV.
XXXVI. XXXYII. XL. XLI. XLNII. XLIii. XLIX.
Johann. PP. VIII. Epist. 263. —-Clement. PP. III. Epist. 33.-Gregor.
PP. VIII. Epist. 20.
AB USE OP EXCOMMUNICATION-.'427
IRome was, in most cases, practically to render the local
judgment final, except to wealthy pleaders, at an age when
communication was so tedious and difficult, and perpetual
private wars and robber nobles rendered every pathway
insecure. Even with these obstacles, moreover, the rush
of business of all kinds to the papal court was so enormous
and so various that its equitable dispatch became impossible amid the obstacles to obtaining proper evidence concerning minute details occurring in every corner of Europe.
Setting aside the notorious venality of the Roman curia,
therefore, the organization was one which no human force,
in the existing condition of European society, could carry
on without the commission of perpetual injustice. The
endeavor to create a theocracy, and to concentrate its
power in the visible head of the church, was a brilliant
scheme, but one which only angels could execute. Too
much was attempted, and even the best-intentioned popes
often were unwittingly the cause of aggravating the evils
which they sought to mitigate. Omnipotence can only be
safely directed by omniscience, and the papacy, in grasping
at the former, unfortunately was unable to command the
latter.
Thus the supreme jurisdiction, original and appellate, of
Rome, only added another to the numerous elements of
wrong and extortion wherewith the church afflicted the
faithful. Papal letters were all-powerful everywhere; they
were readily obtainable, and in a system so liable to abuse
they proved a perpetual source of confusion and injustice.
All the prelates of Southern France, assembled in council
at Avignon in 1326, and again in 1337, complain bitterly
of the evils thence arising. Letters were constantly procured fiom the pope or his legates under false pretences;
they were transferred from hand to hand, and were used
for extortion or revenge by enabling the holder to cite his
adversary before d(istant courts, under pain of excommunication, to tlrump up fictitious c'tses, and to wealry him
428 EXCOMMUNICATION.
out with perpetual annoyances and endless expenses.'
The remonstrances of these councils, of course, only deal
in generalities, but fromn an epistle of Innocent III., written
imore than a century earlier, we obtain a glimpse into the
nature of the wrongs thus perpetrated. That pontiff complains of the uses to which certain letters of his had been
put, and endeavors to recall them. The holder of one of
them, failing in his efforts to overcome the virtue of a
young married woman, used the papal authority to cite her
and her friends before an ecclesiastical court, under pretext
of obtaining restitution of certain presents which he claimed
to have made her. Thus, in the name of the pope, he
procured her excommunication, and that of several others,
including a female relative who had refused to act as procuress for him. Several of these unfortunates had died
while under the ban, and had not been buried, while the
young wife herself had only been able to obtain absolution
on her death-bed by paying a heavy bribe to the ecclesiastical judge. It requires no effort of the imagination to
conceive the amount of human misery revealed in this
short and simple story. In another case a cobbler was
cited and excommunicated, by virtue of the same letter, in
a dispute arising about a little thread, valued at- less than
four deniers. The holder of a papal letter endeavoring to
force an entrance into a certain house was prevented by
one of the servants. Soon after the domestic was about to
be married, when the other interposed, declared him excommunicate, and consequently unable to marry, and in
virtue of the powers conferred by the letter, absolved him
after extorting ten sols. The same individual caused two
hundred men to be cited on fraudulent grounllds by an
arch-priest, and then had the arch-priest summoned before
the episcopal court because lie had not shown cldue diligence
in executing the papal mandate; finally forcing him to buy
Concil. Avenion. ann. 132E6, can. 49.-Ejusd. ann. 1337, can. 59 (IIarduin. VII. pp. 1511-12, 1633).
ABUSE OF EXCOMMUNICATION..429
himself off with a heavy fine. With a similar threat of
excommunication he extorted fifteen sols firom a shoemaker
who, he asserted, had made his shoes too small; and.
another sum fiom the owner of a horse which he had hired,
and which by stumbling in a ford had wet his cloak.
Another man he prosecuted for a handful of vegetables,
and obtained ten sols from him. In another case he
harassed with repeated citations a young man who had
causedi him the expenditure of a single denier by not keeping an engagement to visit with him a house of prostitution. Innocent adds that some of the ecclesiastical judges
were understood to share the booty of these nefarious
transactions; that they-purposely cited persons to appear
in places. dangerous to reach, a failure to attend being, by
canon law, punishable with excommunication; and that
they freely signed and sealed letters to their fiiends and
accomplices, empowering them to inflict excommunication
and orant absolutionl —in this, apparently, only following
the example set them by the pontiff himself. If such
abuses could flourish under the lofty ambition and ceaseless vigilance of a man like Innocent, it is easy to imagine
the condition of affairs under popes who were either negligent or corrupt, when Europe was covered with harpies
armed with irresistible and irresponsible powers, tormenting the existence and sucking the life-blood of whom they
pleased. John Gerson, who was second in reputation to
no ecclesiastic of the fifteenth century, states that Urban V.
was in the habit of remarking that the one thing for which
he chiefly congratulated himself in obtaining the papacy
was, that he no longer was in danger of excommunication;
to which Gerson adds, reasonably enough, that if he had
loved his neighbor as himself, he would have used his
power to remove some of the snares and pitfalls which
harassed the lives of others less fortunate. Gerson points
Innocent. PP. III. Regest. Lib. x. Epist. 79.
430 EXCOMMUNICATION.
out, moreover, that while no secular law ventured to kill
the body for simple contumacy, the church, in such cases,
had no hesitation in killing the soul; and he speaks in
vehement terms of the innumerable and incredible troubles
with which the ecclesiastical functionaries vexed the existence of the poor and friendless.1 We can, therefore, well
believe him when he declares that the abuses of excommunication had wrought confusion in the church, contempt
for its spiritual censures, and the ruin rather than the salvation of souls.' It could hardly be otherwise when the
vicegerent of Christ himself openly used, as did Sixtus IV.,
his supreme control over the sacramznents for the purpose of
extorting money from his subordinates, levying arbitrary
and enormous subsidies from the Roman clergy, and enforcing their payment by a liberal use of excommunication.3
T"he only thing that was lacking to complete the atrocity
of the system was found when the canonists devised the
plan of making certain offences punishable with what was
known as excommunication ipso facto, ipso jure, or late
sententiwe. This, as its various names indicate, required
neither judge, trial, nor sentence-the offender was excommunicated by the fact of his offence, and was subjected to
all the consequent penalties without warning. It could be
prescribed even for internal sins as well as for external
acts; for tlioughts which no man knew as well as for crimes
notorious to all;4 and thus the subject of it might be cut
off from the church and deprived of salvation without his
own knowledge or that of others. This fortunate invention
i Jo. Gersoni de Vit. Spirit. Animue Lect. Iv. Corol. xiv. Prop. 2, 5.
2 Ejusd. de Potestate Eccles. Consid. iv.
I Infessurm Diar. Urb. Roman. ann. 1484 (Eccard. Corp. Hist. IT. 1940).
Sixtus, among other devices, would sometimes cause a notice to be affixed to
the doors of a church to the effect that unless a certain sum was forthcoming
at once, the church would be interdicted, and its ministers deprived-ca
financial expedient which was abundantly productive.
4 C. A. Thesaurus, de Poenis Eccles. P. I. cap. iii. iV. v.
EMANCIPATION. 431
gave so much additional efficiency to the spiritual sword
that it became widely employed and was threatened upon
every occasion when the privileges or the property of the
church were in question. In 1491, a synod of Barnberg
made an enumeration of no less than one hundred offences
thus punishable with ipso facto excommunication by the
canon law, and it is curious to observe that in this long
catalogue only twelve are disconnected with the direct
personal interests of the church, while many are of the most
trifling character.l To give a man over without warning to
Satan for collecting toll from an ecclesiastic on crossing a
bridge would seem but a slender exercise of Christian
charity, and yet such was the use made by the church of
the illimitable power which it claimed to enjoy under the
special ordinance of God.
EMANCIPATION.
The warnings of such men as Gerson were unheeded.
Secure in the possession of temporal power, the church
became less and less mindful of its spiritual duties, and
its boundless authority was constantly devoted more and
more exclusively to the purposes of individual ambition
and the oppression of Christendomn. The reform so pompously promised at Constance was easily evaded by the
intrigues of those whose interests it would have compromnised. Better things were expected at Bale, but that
council degenerated into an unseemly squabble between
the head and the body of the church, which exposed both
to contempt, and its efforts to diminish the abuse of excommunication and interdicts were of little avail.2 Yet
Concil. Bamberg. ann. 1491, Tit. LXI. (Hartzheim V. 634-8).
2 Concil. Basiliens. Sess. xx. cap. 2, 3.
432 EXCO3MMIU NICJAT ION.
though tile revolt of the Hussites had shown how infirm was
the basis on which was erected the imposing structure of
sacerdotal Christianity, the sounding promises of reformation extorted from the fears of the hierarchy were sufficient
to postpone the dreaded revolution for nearly a century.
The whole organization of the church, however, was so
thoroughly interpenetrated with corruption that no internal efforts at purification could be successful. The Valley
of the Shadow of Death had to be traversed to compel the
surrender of the vested interests, the privileges, the preroygatives which produced so abundant a revenue and o'ave
such ample liberty for the indulgence of passion and the
exercise of despotic power.
Meanwhile the minds of men were gradually becoming
emancipated. Already, in the passage above cited, Gerson
speaks of the derision to which the jurisdiction of the
spiritual courts was exposed by the selfish use made of it
in purely temporal and worldly affairs; and, as time wore
on, men began to speak more boldly. Even in the fourteenth century the German clergy had complained that
excommunicates were not deprived of standing in the
secular courts, and the Emnperor Charles IV., ill 1359, encleavored to correct this laxity by imposing a fine of fifty
pounds of pure gold on all who showed so little reverence
for the censures of the church.' The tendency, however,
was not to be checked, and the councils of the fifteenth
century frequently remonstrate against the growing indifference with which the anathema was regarded by an irreligious laity. Thus, in 1456, the Bishop of St. Andree
represents to the provincial council of Salzburg that men
remained under excommunication for a year and more without conceiving themselves debarred from frequenting the
churches, and that they deterred, with terrible threats, the
officials from visiting them with the canonical penalties.2
Caroli IV. Constit. dcle Immunit. Cleric. ~~ 2, 7 (Goldast. II. 92-3).
2 Concil. SalisbUrlens. XXVIII. (Dalhamn, Concil. Salisburg. p. 233).
EMANCIPATION. 433
AMore politic, but not more reverential, was the conduct of
the Florentines when excommunicated by one of the worst
pontiffs who has disgraced the tiara. In punishing the
conspiracy of the Pazzi, one of the victims was the Bishop
of Pisa, who was hanged with his accomplices. Sixtus IV.,
who was deeply concerned in the conspiracy, seized this as
an excuse for launching an anathema a.t Florence, but the
community appealed froml the sentence as unjust, saying
that they had hanged him not as bishop but as a traitor
who had conspired against their liberties.l This tendency
did not diminish, and in 1491 we find a synod of Bamzberg
re-echoing the complaint that laymen disregarded the
anathema or visited with savage chastisement the official
messengers who served on them the letters of excommunication; while many priests set at naught the sentences of
other priests and did not hesitate to administer the sacraments to excommunicates. Evidently distrustful of the
penalties which it threatened against such infractions of
the canons, the synod strove to revive the fading terrors of
the anathema by telling the faithful that in primitive times
the disobedient and contumacious who were ejected from
the church were forthwith seized by ravening delons.2
All this was portentous of the future, and at length the
open revolt of Luther stirred up the spirit of insubordination even amonog those who remained orthodox, leading to
the discussion of the oppressions of the sacerdotal sJTstem
with tihe determination to effect their removal. At the
Diet of Niirnberg, for instance, in 1522, a list of grievances
was drawn up to be presented in the name of the German
nation to Adrian VI., from whom so much was expected.
In this catalogue of evils, the abuses of excommunication
occupy a considerable space. The complainants declare
Infessurse Diar. Urb. Roman. ann. 1482 (Eccard. Corp. Iist. II. 1907).
2 Synod. Bamberg. ann. 1491, Tit. xi. xii. liii. (Hartzheinl V. 602, 627) —
6rapido ore dacleonurn trahebantur."'47
434-. E XCOMMUNICATION.
that the anathema was constantly employed by venal episcopal officials from motives of the basest avarice, and that
for filthy gain multitudes of Christians were driven to
desperation, their property confiscated, and their souls
and bodies destroyed. To render their extortions more
pioductive, the officials often included the neighbors of the
excommunicate, so that when he and his family had been
ruthlessly driven into exile, ten or a dozen others were
placed under ban, if they had held the slightest intercourse
with the offender, in order that the required sum might
be more surely exacted.' To all remonstrances that thle
censures of the chutrch are not to be employed for pecuniary
matters, the officials replied that the punishment was not
for the money but for contumacy. If an ecclesiastic was
killed, not only the slayer but the whole town or district
was placed under interdict, until the homicide was avenged
or paid for; and if a quarrel occurred in a cemnetery, resulting in the shedding of a single drop of blood, an interdict
was forthwith proclaimed, until the people raised enough
money to pay for a new consecration of the spot.2 Suspension of communion was mercilessly inflicted on those
whose poverty prevented them from paying their churchclues to the dclay; and at vintage-time the tithers, under
pain of excommuniuation, forbade the gathering of the
In the reformation attempted by George of Bamberg, in 1465, he endeavored to prevent the customary exactions by an established fee bill, in
which the price of removing an interdict of sepulture is fixed at 15 denarii
and one pound of wax, while that for removal of a general interdict is twice
the amount. —Georgii I. Episc. Bamberg. Reform. Consistorii Art. xlii.
(Ludewig Script. Rer. German. I. p. 1183).' This was a complaint of old standing. In 1418 the council of Salzburg
indignantly denounces the audacity which led the laity to persist in burying
their dead in cemeteries under interdict before the fines were paid. All
corpses so interred are ordered to be dug up and thrown out of consecrated
ground.-Concil. Salisb. XXXIV. can. xxxi. (Dalham, pp. 184-5). On the
other hand, in 1465, George, Bishop of Bamberg, condemns the abuse of
exascting payment for sepulture, and orders that thereafter no charge should
be made for burial during interdict.-Op. cit. Art. xxxii. (Ludewig, loc. cit.
1178).
E MANCIPATION. 435
grapes until they could select their share, while from this
delay the wretched peasant frequently saw the ruin of his
crop from frost or rot. The prelates and religious houses
-which were patrons of livings reserved to themselves the
larger part of the stipends, so that the incumbents were
forced to eke out their existence by constant exactions,
grinding their flocks to the verge of destruction, and
enforcing their claims by a liberal use of the anathema.
Other dissolute priests and monks, carrying weapons,
brawling, drinking, and gambling, retained enough of
their sacred character to be able to use the thunders of
the church, and oppressed the miserable laity with impunity, forcing them to submit to all manner of abuses, and
to purchlase on their own terms escape from the dreaded
censure.1. To this had come the ideal theocracy of Hildebrand, aid this terrible condition of society was the
logical result of conferring irresponsible power on the
fallibility of human nature.
That there was little if any exaggeration in this was
shown when the aspirations of the orthodox culminated in
the council of Trent, and the faithful hoped at last for the
thorough reformation so often promised and so long eluded.
As one nation after another presented to the venerable
synod its projects and requests for reform, the abuses of
ecclesiastical censures were dwelt upon with greater or
less insistance, but with a unanimity which showed how
widely spread and deeply felt they were. The Emperor
Ferdinand urged the matter with an iteration which proves
the importance attached to it in the estimation of his
subjects;'and he was supported by the Portuguese, the
Spaniards, the French, and even the Italians, each enumerating their own peculiar grievances.2 It would be mere
1 Gravam. German. Nationis ad Hadr. PP. VI. cap. 22, 23, 24, 36, 63,
66, 70 (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 179-202).' The documents are in Le Plat, T. IV. pp. 657, 759, 762, 766.-T. V.
pp. 85, 230, 243, 261, 266, 566, 617, 641.
436 E X XCOMMUNICATION.
repetition to examine these in detail; their only present
interest lies in their confirmation of what has already been
described at length.
The spirit in which these propositions were received by
the Roman Curia controlling the council may be estimated
by the manner in which the French project of reform was
treated. It was not presented until January 3, 1563, and
the 31st Article declared that as excommunication was the
supreme sword of the church it should not be invoked on
all occasions and for trivial causes, but should be reserved
for offences of the deepest dye, and then be employed only
after three or at least two warnings. In reply the papal
legates presiding over the council admitted that it should
not be made use of constantly, but yet that mature consideration -was requisite lest the church should be deprived of
the censures which were her principal weapon; and with
the same delightful ambiguity, the college of cardinals, to
whom the whole was submitted, responded that the council should decide according to its best judgiment, bearing
in mind the cases in which execution was impossible, and
that censures were the only arm of the church, especially
against the absent and the powerful.'
The demands of the secular powers for a thorough reform
of the church were so reiterated and so pressing that it
finally became difficult to evade them longer, and as the
hierarchy had secured what it desired it was eager to obtain the consent of its imperial and royal patrons to a dissolution of the council. For this purpose the papal legates,
towards the end of September, 1563, shrewdly submitted a
counter-project of reform for sovereigns, so artfully drawn
up that it would have released the church almost entirely
firom secular influence, and have deprived the monarchs of
the rights of patronage which they enjoyed under concordats and pragmatic sanctions. This of course drew from
I Postulata Orat. Reg. Gallic. Art. 31. (Le Plat, V. 641-2).
EMANCIPATION. 437
them a lively protest, and in the confusion thence arising
the council was readily brought to an inglorious conclusion. This project, having served its purpose, was
speedily cast aside, and yet it possesses a certain interest
for us as showing how little the controlling mninds of the
church proposed to abandon the advantages arising from
the use or abuse of excommunication.
It provided that all who appealed to the secular tribunals in cases subject to ecclesiastical jurisdiction should be
ipsocfacto excommunicate, thus perpetuating and intensifying one of the worst excesses of the system which for
certain specified acts subjected men to the anathema without trial and even without notice. The temporal authorities, moreover, were forbidden to demand the absolution
or prohibit the excommunication of any one, thus destroying the supervision which in many places the state was
beginning to exercise over the ecclesiastical courts. In
addition, it forbade, under pain of the anathemta, ipso facto
and without notice, all invasions of the righlits of the
church, all laws and statutes to the contrary notwithstanding which were not in harmony with the decretals of
the popes and the constitutions and. claims of the church;
thus proclaiming excommunicate even the princes themselves for the exercise of the rights which they enjoyed
under their respective concordats.l
Inspired by such a spirit, it is not to be sulpposed that
the fathers of the council were disposed to abandon any
prerogatives or surrender any of the powers of the church.
In the Decree of Reformation, therefore, hurriedly adopted
in December as the council was breaking up, the provisions
respecting excommunication gave little promise of amlendment. A vague command to distribute the censures of the
church with discretion alleges as a reason the contempt to
Cap. de Inmmun. Cleric. et Reform. Principum, cap. 2, 4, 12. (Le Plat,
VI. 228, 229, 233).
o-7:k.
438 EXcoMMIJNI CATIoN.
which their abuse rendered them liable, and their use for
extorting evidence or to obtain the restitution of articles
lost or stolen is to be exercised only by bishops after full
examination and not in petty cases. In either civil or
criminal affairs the episcopal ordinaries are instructed not
to issue excommunications where property real or personal
can be seized in execution, and where this cannot be had
the spiritual sword is only to be unsheathed in cases of
a certain gravity and after two admonitions. The interference of the secular magistrate is strictly prohibited, and
the old rule is revived which authorizes the prosecution
for heresy of any one remaining for a year under the ban
of the church.l
While thus there was a pretence of removing the evils
against which Christendom so loudly protested, there was
the evident determination to maintain intact the pretensions friom which those evils had inevitably sprung. This
is clearly minifested by the council of Salzburg, convened
in 1569 for the publication of the council of Trent, which
issued a series of canons reorganizing the church in accordance with the Tridentine system. In treating of the subject of excommunication it expressly declares that the
ancient power of the church in inflicting its censures is to
be maintained in full vigor, and only concedes thalt the use
of the spiritual sword shall be restricted to cases of importance sufficient to warrant its employmen t.2 The formal
abandonment of the right to inflict excommunication, with
all the prerogatives attendant upon that right, had indleed
not been expected, yet men had hardly anticipated so bold
and so absolute an assertion of their continued and perpetual existence. In some respects, indeed, the Tridentine
canons riveted anew the chains of the faithful, for, with the
freedomn of thought resulting from the Reformation even
1 Concil. Trident. Sess. xxv. Decret. Reform. cap. 3.
2 Concil. Salisburg. XLVI. const. xlvi. cap. 1, 2, 3. (Dalham, op. cit. p.
495).
EMANCIPATION. 439
among the orthodox, there had arisen a general disposition
to curb the abuses of spiritual censures. Thus when Charles
V. despaired of any reformatory results from the longeluded promise of a general council, and endeavored to
reform for himself the church of the Empire, he had forbidden the use of excommunication except in criminal
cases when the offender proved incorrigible, and had commanded that civil matters should. be confined exclusively
to the jurisdiction of the secular tribunals.l In this he
had only given formal expression to customs which were
rapidly spreading, for in many cases the local courts had
begun to set some bounds to the oppression of the courts
Christian in civil matters, and had presumed to forbid excommunication or to command absolution in certain cases
-a presumption which, as we have seen, the Tridentine
canons strictly prohibited for the future. This was a principle of no little importance. The celebrated Richarclot,
Bishop' of Arras, in his address in 1564 to the Duchess of
Parma, urging the adoption of the council of Trent, does
not fail to point out how completely the reception of the
council would liberate the ecclesiastical courts from the
subjection into which they were falling through the corr'uption of the times.2
rrhe civil authorities, also, were prompt to see the fresh
tribulations in store for them under a reformation such as
this. When the Duchess of Parma was striving to obey
the orders of Philip IT., and force the states of the Low
Countries to accept the council, this point was one which
called forth the unanimous remonstrances of the council
of Flanders and of the authorities of Hainault, Artois,
Utrecht, Namur, and Brabant. as contrary to their rights
and privileges and the prerogatives of the crown.3 So in
France, the encroachment of this article on the jurisdiction
Caroli V. ForrnTu. Reformat. cap. xxii. (Goldnst. II. 339).
Le Plat, op. cit. T. VII. p. 28.
Le Pl'at. T. VII. pp. 19, 33-4, 54, 67, 75, 88-9.
440 EXCOMMUNICATION.
of the king and the parlement was one of the reasons
which prevented the reception of the council of Trent.1
The logic of events, however, was more potent than the
rhetoric of the Tridentine fathers. They might seek to
restore and to perpetuate the old order of things, but
nothing could efface, even from the minds of the orthodox,
the effects of the teachings of Luther and Calvin, and the
successful rebellion of the Anglican church. The hoary
belief in the supernatural attributes of sacerdotalism had
received a fatal shock. Men at length felt at liberty to
criticize the scandalous lives of their pastors, and medieTval
veneration was fast disappearing. While such a spirit was
abroad, it could indeed hardly be expected that the old
reverence for the mysteries of religious observance could
be preserved, when, even after the council of Trent, Gregory
XIII. in 1573 had to deplore the fact that in many cathedral
churches throughout Germany the priests and clerks during
divine service occupied themselves with chatting, laughing,
and quarrelling, sometimes even coming to blows; and that
dying Christians frequently were deprived of the saving
viaticum1 because the ministers of the altar were boozing
in taverns, and could not be hunted up in time, or, if found,
were so drunk that they could not administer the sacraments, while through the negligence of priests and bishops
extreme unction had fallen into almost universal disuse.2
When churchmen themselves showed so little sense of re-' See the Report of the President d'Espeisses to Henry III. in 1583, and
the Mdmoire of the Prdsident Le Maistre presented to the Etats assembled
at Paris by the League iu 1593 (Le Plat. VII. 257, 270).
2 Concil. Salisburg. XLVII. (Dalham, p. 576). It would be difficult to
conceive of anything better fitted to destroy the reverence of the people for
the sacrament than another custom condemned by Gregory.. As the rules
of the church forbade administering the Eucharist to those deprived of
reason, the priests, when applied to for communion by idiots or the insane,
saved themselves the trouble of contesting the matter by giving an unconsecrated wafer —a piece of jugglery with the bod'y of Christ which the pope
very properly denounced'in fitting ternis.
EMANCIPATION. 441
sponsibility for the awful functions entrusted to them, the
laity naturally yielded to the infection of the time, and
began to treat the ecclesiastic as an equal and not as a
demigod. However humbly the crown might thereafter
treat the tiara, there was a new and most potential element
introduced in the relations between the church and state,
none the less powerful because not openly declared. The
new order of things was fitly illustrated by Henry IV.,
when, with the mocking effrontery of which he was so consummate a master, he replied in 1605 to one of the innumerable petitions of the Gallican church for the publication
of the council of Trent: "Je souhaite la publication du
concile avec la meime ardeur que vous; mais les raisons
humaines, conime vous venez de le dire fort bien, paroissent oppose'es a la sagesse divine. Cependant, je n' e'pargnerai ni lies soins ni ma vie menme pour faire triompher
l'eglise et la religion."'
Thus Richardot, in an elaborate memorial on the measures necessary to restore the faith, deplores in 1566 the
neglect and derision into which the censures of the church
had fallen, and declares that even the heretics were more
exacting than Catholics in the conditions imposed on sinners and backsliders for readmission into their damnable
conventicles. H-e attributes this to the contempt felt for
excommunication in consequence of its frequency, and recommends limitations on its employment.2 So, in 1565,
the council of Cambrai urged circumspection in the use of
the censure, and complained bitterly of the continued interference of the secular tribunals;3 but when the Bishop
of Namur, as deputy of the council, presented to Margaret
of Parma a long memorial arguing the supremacy of spiritual censures, the duchess contented herself with drily
responding that the lay judges had always undertaken to
Le Plat, T. VII. p. 279. o Ibid. pp. 186-7, 193.
Concil. Camerac. ann. 1565, Tit. xiv. cap. 3, 11 (Hartzheim, Concil.
German. T. VII. p. 111.
442 EX C O:IM UNICATION.
prevent the abuses of excommunication which had been
forbidden at Trent, and that if the clerks would obey the
council strictly they would avoid all occasion for a conflict
of jurisdiction.' Even Philip II. himself, when ordering
Franche Comte, in 1572, to receive and publish the council,
points out the limitations imposed by it on the current
abuses of excommunication, and in order to render them
effectual, directs that in future the sentences of the spiritual
courts shall be intrusted for execution not to their own
officials, but to those of the secular authorities.2 To this
growing tendency of the age is to be attributed the assertion of what were long known as the liberties of the Gallican church, and in 1594 Pierre Pithou was able to
enumerate among them the prohibition of all excommunication for civil matters, except the recovery of things
purposely concealed.3
The influences thus manifested could not, of course, but
grow stronger with the progress of enlightenment and
civilization, and the state at length emancipated itself
wholly from the church. When. for instance, the French
monarchy culminated in the person of Louis XIV., he was
able, in his quarrel with the papacy over the L droit de
regale," to dictate the celebrated declaration of 1682, by
which his obedient clergy proclaimed to the world, " That
St. Peter and his successors, the Vicars of Jesus Christ,
and even the whole church, have received from God power
only over spiritual things, concerning salvation, and not
over temporal and civil matters..... We therefore declare that, under the command of God, princes and kings
are not subjected in temporal affairs to any ecclesiastical
authority; that they cannot be deposed, directly or indirectly, by the power of the keys; that their subjects cannot be released from the allegiance and obedience due to
Le Plat, T. VII. pp. 127-30.
2 Ibid. p. 221.
Pit hou, Libert6s de l'EgI. Gallicane, art. 35.
EMANCIPATION. 443
them, or be absolved from the oath of fidelity; and that
this doetrifle, indispensable to the public peace, and as
advantageous to the church as to the state, must be invariably followed as conforming to the word of God, to the
traditions of the Holy Fathers, and to the examples given
us by the Saints."' Nor was this an empty boast, though
duly anathematized byAlexander VIII. and Innocent XII.,
and though the influences which surrounded the king led
him formally to annul it in 1693.2 When a certain brother
Hyacinth, a Capucin professor of theologyT under the Regency, ventured to indulge in an argument to prove the
legality of interdicts directed against sovereigns, he was
seized and imprisoned, and his brethren had no little difficulty in interceding for his pardon.3 Even Louis, notwithstanding the rapid advancement of his Jesuit-ridden
dotage, had maintained his position with sufficient firmness. An ordonnance of 1695 had defined peremptorily
the limit of ecclesiastical jurisdiction to spiritual matters,
and even in these the "appel comme d'abus" had given
a superior appellate power to the civil courts.4 I-How
thoroughly independent the secular authorities had become
under these inspirations is shown by an affair occurring- in
1698. The "monitoire,"' a proclamation by the episcopal
ordinary, threatening excommunicatioin to extort the revelation of a crime, was strictly forbidden Unless the assent
of the civil tribunals had been obtained. In June, 1698,
the Due de la Meilleraie procured from the Sovereign
Council of Colmar permission to apply for such a document
to the Bishop of Bale, with respect to some trespasses
1 Declarat. Cleri Gallicani, art. 1 (Isambert, XX. 384). —In 1810 this
declaration was made a law of the state by Napoleon, in response to the
excommunication launched at him by Pius VII. (Dupin, Manuel du Droit
Publique Eccl]siastique, p. 119.)
2 Isambert, XX. 380.
s Monteil, Trait6 des Matdriaux MSS. II. 143.
4 Ordonn. d'Avril, 1695, art. 34-37 (Isambert, XXI. 253).
444 EXCOMMUNICATION.
committed on his estates, but he changed his mind and
obtained it of the pope. On causing it to be published,
the council took the matter up as unauthorized, and in
December, 1698, ordered the monitoire to be suppressed,
and directed proceedings to be commenced against all concernecd in its publication.1
Thus gradually came to an end the alliance between
church and state which Charlemagne found so efficient in
his civilizing policy, and which proved so disastrous to his
successors. The pretensions of the False Decretals led so
inevitably to the monopoly of all power by the church,
that when they were once recognized no monarch could
ask its assistance in reducing his subjects to obedience
without himself becoming its slave. We have seen to how
much of petty tyranny and oppression this gave opportunity, yet oin the whole there can be no question that it
advanced the interests of civilizations and that the average
influence of the church was for the benefit of the people.
When Innocent III. boldly stood forward as the sole
defender of Ingeberga of Denmark against her powerful
and resolute husband, Philip Augustus, he taught the
reckless spirit of feudalism that might does not always
make right. In those turbulent ages it was only the
church that could interpose between power and its victims,
and the church could not do this unless armed with the
power to coerce as well as to persuade.
The weightiest evils of this incongruous mingling of
spiritualities and temporalities fell upon the church itself.
As its claims to supremacy became recognized and admitted, it naturally employed its power for its own aggrandizemnent. Its claim to the kingdom of heaven became a
stepping-stone to the kingldom of earth, and its spiritual
Ordonnances d'Alsace, T. I. p. 281. Comp. Arret of 1717, prohibiting
the reception or publication of all papal bulls, letters, &c. (except letters of
penitence), without royal letters patent (Ibid. p. 486).
E'M AN C IPATION. 445
privileges were chiefly valued as they could be employed
for the gratification of worldly ambition. The sheep were
tended that they mlight be shorn. To the covetous and
unscrupulous an ecclesiastical career opened the shortest
avenue to success, and the church accordinglly became
filled with the covetous and unscrupulous, bringing in their
train corruption of every kind, aLind oppression which
rivalled that of the feudal seigniory. When this was at
length carried beyond human enduCrance, EI urope arose
with a universal protest. The bolder spirits emancipated
themselves alike from the dlogmas and the dominion of
Rome; the more conservative preserved their reverence for
the doctrines of Latin Christianity, but plainly showed that
their allegiance was to be secured only by the abandonment of the prerogatives which the critical spirit of inquiry
discovered to be as destitute of authority as they were unsuited to the new requiremlents of modern civilization.
The struggle was long and intricate. For a century or
more the press, the pulpit, and the battle-field waere by
turns or simultaneously the arena on which the new era
and the old contended for mlastery, and when at lengoth
plhysical exhaustion brought about a truce at the peace of
Westphalia, although the Roman church apparently held
her own1 it was no longer on the same terms as before.
The )princes who had fought lher battle had secured their
pay. They were no crusaders who had drawn the sword
unselfishly for thle propagation of the faith, and if they had
preserved her existence, their price for the service had
been emancipation.
Their emancipation proved to be likewise the emancipation of the cliurch. As its temporal authority declined,
its spiritual energy revived. The change, it is true, was
slowv and did not become fully manifest until the Revolution of'89 relieved the hierarchy still further from the
burdlens which kept it weighed down to earth. Since then
it has gained elormiously in all that constitutes real powler
446 EXCOlIMMU N IJ C ATrION.
over the souls and consciences of men. Unfortunately,
however, this has been accomplished in spite of itself, and
it still clings to the old traditions and mourns over the
disgraceful glories of the past.
The spirit of the hierarchy is unchanged and apparently
nuchangeable. According to Pius 1X., in his allocution of
1849, the iimpotence of the church to impose its yoke on
others is bondage and shameful servitude;1 and, careless of
the teachings of the intervening twenty years, he shows
what that yoke is by reviving in 1869, as recorded in thejournals of the day, an obsolete order which requires all
physicians to cease attendance, and abandon to his fate,
any patient dangerously ill, who, within three days after
seeking medical aid, shall not have confessed his sins,
and expressed his willingness to receive extreme unction.
Destined to perdition in the next world, he is to be abandoned helpless to his fate in this, and the voice of humanity is to be stilled for him who cannot be -forced into
dependence onl the spiritual ministrations of the priest.2
When the Vicar of Christ conceives that his duty to God
requires him to use suchl means to reclaim his erring children, we learn the full significance of the principles proclaimed in the Encyclical and Syllabus of December, 1864,
Alloc. Quibus Quantisque, 1849 (Recueil des Alloc. cites dans l'Encyclique et le Syllabus de 1864, Paris, 1865, p. 224).
2 The fourth council of Lateran, in 1215 (can. 22), ordered all physicians,
as soon as they -might be summoned to attend a patient, to urge him to confession, alleging as a reason that disease was frequently the punishment of
sin, and that recovery would be promoted by absolution. In 1566, Pius V.
promulgated the regulation, recently revived by Pius IX., requiring the
physician to cease attendance when the patient neglects, after three clays'
warning, to send for a confessor (cap. 1, Tit. vi. in Septimo, Lib. III.). I
find the observance of this regulation enjoined by Marcus Sitticus, Archbishop of Salzburg, in the instructions drawn up for the visitation of his
province in 1616 (Statut. Visitat. Salisburg. ann. 1616, Tit. I. cap. vi.Dalham, p. 603) at a time when the toleration of Lutheranism by the Duke
of Bavaria rendered the church keen to employ every means for the repression of heresy.
EMANCIPATION. 447
where any denial of the imprescriptible rights at any time
possessed by the church is condemned as absolute heresy.
It is a damnable error to assert that the church has ever
exceeded her rightful prerogatives; that the state should
be independent; or that the church should not be allowed
to coerce into submission all who may disregard her
authority.'
The ideal of Hildebrand is evidently still the ideal of
the ruling hierarchy. The priest is still the supernatural
being set apart by God, wielding the full power of Christ,
who has bestowed His authority on himrn.2 The bishop is
still clothed by divine law with the rigoht to the unlimited
and unqualified obedience of the faithful, while the state
only possesses a limited and qualified claim to the allegiance of the citizen, and, when the two powers conflict;,
divine law of course must override human law, the church,
as a "Divine Institution,' being necessarily the arbiter
4' whose authority the state is bound to respect as supreme
in its sphere."3 As of old, this right to the unquestioning
submission of the faithful is enforced by the control over
the sacraments, through which the gates of heaven are
closed and the portals of hell are opened to the eternal and
changeless destiny of him whose contumacious obstinacy
causes him to die outside of the pale of the church.4 If
the nineteenth century is not subjected to the theocracy
which ruled the thirteenth, it therefore is through no abatement in the claims of the church to universal domination,
Syllab. Prop. 23, 24, 41, 54, 55.
" Potestas enim quxe in Christo inest, eo quod Deus sit, ab Ipso Sacerdotibus communicatulr.'"-Concil. Plenar. Baltimor. II. ann. 1866, Tit. x.
cap. 1, No. 456 (Acta Concil. Plen. Balt. II., Baltimorve, 1868, p. 231).' Pastoral Letter of the Plenary Council of Baltimore, ~~ 2, 3 (Ibid. pp.
cviii.-ix.). The direct application minde of this claim of obedience to the
condemnation of the Fenian movement (ubi sup.) shows that the supremacy
of the bishops is not understood as confined to faith and morals alone, but
extends to the region of politics.
Instruct. Sac. Cong. de Propag. Fide, No. 1 (Ibid. p. cxxxvii.)
44 8 E XC OMM UNICAT I O N o
but because a godless aznd irreligious generation refuses to
render due reverence to the ordinances of God. Yet as
tlhe churlch has gained so much of spiritual vitality in spite
of the reactionary efforts of her rulers, we may not unreasonably hope that her progress may still continue.
Her real friends are those whom she regards as her
worst enemies; and in the possible triumph of her avowed
policy, however mnuch the advance of civilization might be
retarlded, she herself would be tile greatest sufferer.
THII REFORMED CHURCHIES.
In the reformation of the.fifteenth century, the Protestant
churches received the power of excommunlication as part
of thle inheritance which they divided with their elder sister,
and this imperfect sketch can hardly be concluded without
some reference to tthe use which they made of the legacy.
Of course the first conclusion to which a heretic can come
is that the power which seeks to control him is illegitimate
and not entitled to obedience. Thus Wickliffe taught that
no one should be excommunicated by man until after he
had been excommunicated by God, which was placing a
serious obstacle before the ecclesiastical courts. His own
experience had probably led him to the doctrine that any
prelate was a traitor who excommunicated one who had
made an appeal to the king; and he had no hesitation in
asserting that the anathema of pope and prelate alike was
to be condemned.l Wickliffe himself, however, did not
hesitate to threaten others with excommunication, and a
tract which passes under his name simply condemns the
Artic. Dimnat. Joann. Wickliff, No. 11, 12, 13, 20, 30, 34.-Concil. Constantiens. Sess. vII., 1415, Mvaii 4.
THE REFORMED CIIURCItES. 449
abuses of the censure, regarding it purely as a reiedial
measure, and one not to be employed either for revenge or
extortion.' The "Apology for Lollard Doctrines," attributed to Wickliffe, moreover, merely asserts that the
church may not curse except as ordered by Christ, "but
acording that man be cursid, for the honor of God, and
profit of himnsilf, and of the peple, with mani final leful leke
causis os it semith of the peyn of damlllplid men."' A century later, the Scottish heretics known as the Lollards of
Kyle were accused on their trial of asserting that the censures of the church were not to be dreaded.3 In fact,
Wickliffe and his followers only interposed the right of
private judgment by which the offender should decide
whether the condemnation passed upon him. were just or
not —a very natural position for men so circumstanced, but
one which could be accepted by no organization in days
when men relied on force alone.
John HRuss followed inevitably in the same path. IIe
vehemently denounced the abuses of the anathema by which
worldly ecclesiastics filled their purses and oppressed the
people; aid he reasonably enough compared the doctors
who argued that the civil authorities should be employed
in coercing the obdurate to the Scribes and Pharisees who
declared that they could not shed blood, and who therefore
delivered Jesus Christ to Pontits Pilate for punishment.'
It is well known how slowly Luther reached the point
of disclaiming all allegiance to the church of Rome. When
in 1517 he offered to defend in disputation his celebrated
ninety-five propositions, he had been fired by the nameless
abuses of the system of indulgences which he assailed, and
1 Tractat. de Offic. Pastoral, Lib. I. cap. vi. (Leipzig, 1863, p. 14).
Apology for Lollard Doctrines, pp. 17-9 (Camden Soc. 1843).
Spottiswoode, Hist. of Church of Scotland, I. 121 (Edinburgh, 1851).
Concil. Constan. t. art. Damnnat. Joann. Huss, No. 14, 17, 18, 19 (Eiartzheini V. 86-7).
~R.i
4 50:a EXCOMMUNICATION.
he doubtless believed as he professed to do, that the papacy
and the church would encourage him in the good work.
The sacerdotal structure, however, had been erected by
cunning hands, and every stone had been so fitted into its
fellow that none could be disturbed without shaking the
whole edifice. Under the remorseless logic of the scholastic
theology, the most monstrous pretensions of the hierarchy
were the iriefragable conclusions from premises which
could not be overthrown without overthrowing tradition,
canon, and decretal. All that zealous churchmen held
most (lear must be swept away, and the church reduced to
its primitive simplicity, ere Tetzel could be convicted of
blasphemy when he declared that the indulgences offered
for sale would insure eternal salvation, even if the purchaser had committed rape on the person of the Mother of
Godl
Though Tetzel has acquired an infamous notoriety from happening to
be the object which aroused Luther's indignation and thus led to the Reformation, he was no worse than his fellows. The whole system had long been
a scandal to the devout. Even as early as 1402, Boniface IX., under the
guidance of Balthazar Cossa (afterwards John XXIII.), sent into Germany
and Denmark a. number of these vendors of salvation, who, according to an
eyewitness, were wont to declare that St. Peter himself had no more power
than they to procure the remission of sins. In less than two years they
returned with spoils amounting to more than 100,000 golden florins (Theod.
a Niem de Vit. Joann. XXIII.), and this was probably but a small portion
of the amount extracted from the pouches of the faithful. In 1456, the
council of Salzburg complains that for one pound these collectors would buy
from a church a letter of authority to sell indulgences, on which they would
manage to collect forty or fifty pounds a year, squandering the proceeds in
riotous living, to the infinite disgust of all good Christians (Dalham, Concil.
Salisb. p. 239). The evil was inherent in the system, however, and the
synod of Bamberg in 1491 vainly remonstrated against its more flagrant
abuses (Synod. Bamberg, ann. 1491; Tit. lv.-Iartzheim, V. 628), repeating the prohibitions of the council of Vienne in 1311 (Lib. v. Clement. Tit.
ix. can. 2).
The estimation in which these gentry were held in the fourteenth century
is fairly presented in Chaucer's description of his Pardoner"He saide he hadde a gobbet of the seyl
That Seiut Peter had, when that l he went
Upon the see till Jesti Christ hiln hent,
THE REFORMED CHURCHES. 451
Luther took no heed to this, nor did he see how utterly
he was denying the power to bind and to loose, on which
was founded the existing theocracy, when he gave utterance to such propositions as these: " The Pope has neither the power nor the desire to remit any penalties except
such as are imposed by himself or by the canons."'6 The
Pope cannot absolve any sin except in declaring and approving its absolution by God."' The Pope in granting
plenary remission of punishment only means the remission
of that imposed by himself." "The dying are released
from all in dying.'" Those whom he thus attacked were
keener than himself, and easily perceived the conclusions
to be drawn from such premises. WBith all the confidence
of prescriptive right, they therefore conceived that he was
sulfficiently refuted in showing that these principles were
incompatible with the existing practice of the church.
Thus in the counter-propositions put forth in the name of
Tetzel, the latter axiom of Luther was replied to by pointHe had a crois of latan ful of stones,
And in a glas he hadde pigges bones.
But with these relikes, whanne that he fond
A poure persone dwelling up on lond,
Upon a daie he gat him more moneie
Than that the persone gat in monethes tweie.
And thus witll fained flattering and japes
He made the persone and the peple his apes."
scltterbury Tctes, Prologue.
During the Reformation, the Reformers did not neglect the opportunity
which these,angrant swindlers afforded of attacking the system of which
they were the results. Thus Sir David Lyndesay presents one of them as
vending his wares"I am Sir Robert Rome-raker. Weill seald with oster-schellis...
Ane perfite publile pardoner,... The culum of Sanct Bryd's kow;
Admittit be the Paip. The gruntill of Sanct Antonis sow,
Sirs, I sall schow yow for your wage Quilk buir his haly bell.
My pardons and my pilgrimage, Quahever he be heiris this bell clinckQuilk ye sall se and graip. Gif me ane ducat for till drink-.. y patent pardounus ye may se, lie sail never gang to hell."
Cuon fra the cane of Tartarie, Saty're of the Thrie Estaits (Early Eng1.
Text. Soc. I869, pp. 453-55).
Diiput. M. Lutheri, No. 5, 6, 13, 20 (Opp. Jense, 1564, T. I. fol. 2, 3).
452 EX COMM LTEMUNICATION.
ingi out that heretics, schismatics, and traitors were excommunicated and anathematized even after death, and their
buried bones exhumed.1
In the progress of the disputation, Luther could not
help advancing step by step, as the logic of his adversaries
forced him to recur to the basic principles of sacerdotal
theology, since the refutation of their conclusions depended
on destroying their premises. Two sermons preached by
him in 1518 sweep away the whole system of canonical
penitence; and in another series of propositions issued for
public disputation, he advances nearly to his great foundation-element of justification by faith, in denying emphatically the necessity of sacerdotal intervention between God
and man for the remission of sins.2 This would necessarily
break down all the machinery of confession, penitence,
absolution and excommunication on which depended the
whole spiritual and temporal authority of the hierarchyyet Luther was still unprepared for such a revolution.
Another sermon preached about this time on Excommunication reveals to us the transition state of his mind, and
the struggle inevitable between his efforts to liberate himself and the inveterate habit of obedience. Christ himself;
he exclaims, had not during life the power of cutting off a
soul fiom God. Yet excommunication is the maternal and
kindly chastisement inflicted by the church, not to condemn
to hell but to restore to salvation those who are hastenilg
to destruction, and therefore should it be received with
gladness and reverence, and be borne with exhaustless
patience. While rebuking in the strongest terms the
abuses to which it gave occasion, he still declares that
even when undeserved it is to be endured as the lovingly
intended though mistaken punishment inflicted by a tender
mother. Corrupt as may be the hands through which it is
administered —even those of a Herod, a Pilate, an Annas
P1 rimnr Disput. Jonnn. Tetzelii Prop. 38 (Lutheri Opp. T. I. fol, 6 a.)
2 Ibid. fol. 11 sqq. fol. 25 a.
TIE REFORMIED CIIURCIES. 453
or a Caiaphas-yet are not they to be regarded, but only
the motherly church from whose benignant power it flows.
To bear an unjust excommunication is the noblest of good
works. Yet with all this teaching of implicit obedience,
his native independence flashes forth at the end. No excommunication is to be obeyed if obedience leads to sin.
Better to die excommunicate, for what, in comparison with
injustice, is a death-bed without the sacrament and the loss
of funeral rites and Christian sepulture? Blessed for ever
is the just man who dies excomnmunicate for adhering to
the right, for the earthly penalty will be rewarded with an
eternal crown.1
These bold assertions were pregnant with immeasurable
revolt. Here was the right of private judgment asserted
against the universal voice of the church, and her censures
were held to affect the body alone. The soul was beyond
her reach, and dealt directly with the Creator. Yet on
March 5 of the following year, 1519, we find him writing
to Leo X. that he most fully receives the Roman church as
supreme over all, in heaven and earth, except Jesus Christ
alone, and begs him to disregard the lies of those who
would persuade him otherwise.2
Luther might deceive himself as to the extent of his rebellion, but the Roman curia labored under no such delusion. By persuasion or by force he must be suppressed,
and as argument thus far only drew him on to further and
more dangerous positions, the long deferred sentence at
length was pronounced. In the bull of excommunication,
dated June 15th, 1520, among the damnable errors imputed
to him were enumerated that he asserted excommunication
to be only an external punishment, which did not deprive
the convict of his share in the general prayers of the
church; and that Christians should be taught rather to
1 Concio de Virtut. Excom. (Opp. I. fol. 164-66).
~ M. Lutheri Epist. ad Leon. X. (Ibid. fol. 210 b).
454 E X C OMMUNI A T ION
love than to fear it.' These opinions Luther freely acknowledged, saying that they were to be found fully justified in his sermon on excommunication, and that, with all
the rest, he pledged himself to prove these good Christian
doctrine, under pain of eternal malediction.2
Leo X., however, did not propose to trust longer to the
wordy disputations which had already proved so unsatisfactory. In his bull he gave Luther and his followers
sixty days for recantation, after which they were to be held
ipso facto as under the major excommunication, including
deposition and disability for churchmen, while laymen
were visited with forfeiture of all their possessions and the
penalties incident to heresy, treason, and outlawry. No
one was to hold any communication with them, to render
themn any assistance, or supply them with the necessaries
of life.3 All civil and secular powers were ordered, under
the same penalties, to seize and deliver them to the papal
officials, receiving rewards for the service; and all places
whIere they might sojourn were subjected to an interdict
during their stay, and for three days after their departure.'
Though Leo, in sending, July 8th, 1520, a copy of
this bull to Luther's patron, the Elector Frederic, was
careful to inform him that it was drafted under the especial
influence of the Holy Ghost, which never was absent from
the Apostolic See, yet that sagacious prince did not in the
least obey the accompanying command to make Luther
abjure his errors or to deliver him at once to the papal
officers. WVe have Luther's assertion, indeed, that the
Elector received the envoys with scant courtesy and drove
them from his presence with a sharp reproof.' The senI Bull. Exsurge Domine, ~ 2, No. 23, 24 (Mag. Bull. Roman. Lugd. 1692,
T. I. p. 615).
2 Lutheri Opp. T. II. fol. 286-7, 305.' Ulric Hutten's characteristic gloss on this passage is " Etiam matulam
non porrigent" (Lutheri Opp. T. I. fol. 484 a).
4 Bull. Exsurge Domine, ~ ~ 5-19.
M. Lutheri Prefat. (Opp. T. I. —T. II. fol. 257).
THE REFOR{MED CHURCIHES. 455
tence, in fact, contained nothing but what, for at least three
centuries, the church had had an undisputed right to
decree, but people were beginning to think for themselves
and to criticize where once they were content to obey.
Jurists were found to assert that it was. an infringement of
the privileges of the Holy Roman Empire for the pope to
talk about stripping laymen of their fiefs and possessions,
and even Erasmus declared that the ferocity of the bull, so
unworthy of Christian charity, disgusted all right-minded
el e.1
It was not until Oct. 3d that Dr. Eck, the papal nuncio,
officially sent a copy of the bull to the University of Wittemberg, but Luther had already parried the attack after his
own fashion, in his treatise on the seven sacraments, entitled
the Babylonian Captivity of the Church. In considering
the sacrament of ordination he pronounced it a figment,
invented for the oppression of mankind:-" W]e Christians
are all equally priests. Those whom we call priests are
men chosen from among us to act in our name. The priesthood is only a function..... By this figment of sacramental ordination they obtain the power to command, to
threaten, to oppress. It is simply a beautiful device to justify the wrongs which have been and still are perpetrated
in the church. Thus has Christian brotherhood been destroyed, and thus our shepherds become wolves, our servants
tyrants, and our clergy become more than mortals."2 This
was a blow aimed at the heart of the enemy. It deprived
the priest of his supernatural powers; he was no longer a
mall set apart from his fellows by God, and endowed with
some of the attributes of God, and his curse or his blessing was alike impotent. It went even further than this,
however, for it destroyed all the prerogatives and immunities of the church. The ecclesiastical power was no
M M. Lutheri Opp. T. II. fol. 314.
2 De Captiv. Babylon. Eccles. (Opp. T. II. fol. 282 b).
456 E XCOM M IUN1 CAT IO N
longer superior to the secular. The civil government was
reinstated in its old supremacy, and the clergy were its
subjects, to obey its laws and submit to its authority.
If the orthodox expected that, because Luther had inculcated patient submission to unj ust excommunication, he
would meekly endure thle censures of Leo, they e gregiously
mistook the combative spirit of the man. By December
1st he had a hastily prepared answer ready for publication,
in which he pretends to doubt the authenticity of the bull, as
it could only have been drawn up by Antichrist. " What
imore can I ask'," he cries, " than that I may never be absolved, reconciled, or joined in communion with that most
ignorant, most impious, and most ferocious Antichrist?"'
Yet, though his doctrines had swept away the whole
theory of excommunication and of tle anathema, he does
not hesitate, in the blind fury of his wrath, to retort the
curse:-~" If the spirit of Christ and the strength of our
faith be of any avail, by these letters we condelmnl you, if
you persist in your fury; and we deliver you with your
bull and all your decretals unto Satan, to the destruction
of the flesh, that your soul may be saved with ours in the
day of the Lord. In the name of Jesus Christ whom you
persecute, Amen!... And as they, for their sacrilegious
heresy, excommunicate me, so I, for the holy truth of God,
excommunicate them. May Christ be the judge to determine which excommunication is the better, Amen I"1
This was not enough. In Luther's frame of mind it was
easy for him to persuade himself that a more defiant proof
of his contempt for the censure launched against him might
be beneficial to the cause and reassuring to his followers.
The bull had ordered all Lutheran books and writings to
be collected and publicly burned, and this had been done in
many orthodox places. He doubtless therefoire deemed it
an act of poetical justice to retort in kind, and notice was
3M. Lutheri, Op)p. T. II. fol. 286-7, 289 a, 292 a.
THE REFORMED CHURCHES. 457
accordingly given that on December 10th, a holocaust would
be macde of the bull and the papal decretals. On the appointed day the magistrates and citizens of Wittemberg, and
the students of the University, then numbering over five
hundred youths, assembled at the designated spot, near the
poorhouse. Learned professors built the pile and lighted it,
when Luther solemnly cast into the flames the books of canon
law and the bull of excommunication. As the latter left his
hand he exclaimed:'' For that thou hast persecuted the holy
of the Lord, so may the quenchless fire persecute thee!"
The sacred missive of the Vicegerent of God disappeareld
in the flames; the spectators gazed earnestly at this bold
defiance of all the powers of heaven and earth, and when
the fateful ceremony was over, Luther was escorted to his
cell by the nmagistrates of the town and the doctors of the
University.l He had burnt his ships, and retreat was
henceforth impossible.
Vainly might the church invoke the warning example of
Dathan and Abiram. The earth opened not to hide the
perpetrators of the sacrileoe; and Luther, with the ominous words: 11 This is the beginning of the tragedy. Hitherto
I have only played and jested with the pope," published a
manifesto justifying, the auto-da-fe by thirty propositions
drawn from the books of the canon law, which he declared
to be damnable and fit only for the flames.2 That the
papalists should regard the act as the climax of Luther's
wickedness was but natural, and even the constitutional
phlegm of Acdrian VI. described it as " that incredible
madness of that outlaw, that conteminer, and violator of
all law, who dared to commit to the flames the most holy
decretals of the popes and the canons of the church."'
Yet the effect of all this was greatly to a)bate the tone
of papal supremacy, and to encourage the reformers in
Lutheri Opp. T. II. fol. 320 a.
2 Ibid. fol. 319 b.
Adriani PP. VI. Breve ad Frideric. (1Iartzheiml VI. 192).
39
458 ELXCOMXIMUNICATION.
despising the once dreaded censures. When in 1521 the
first rupture took place between Francis I. and Charles V.,
and an excommunication was threatened against the former
by Leo X., the only comment made at the court of the
Elector Frederic was, " 0 foolish king, if he fears such
trifles!"1 The popes felt this, and lowered their peremptory
tone. For four years Frederic of Saxony had been the
protector of Luther, without formally separating himself
from the Catholic church or with drawing his obedience from
Rome. He was solely responsible for the melancholy fact
that Luther had not long before perished at the stake of
John Russ and Jerome of Prague; yet in 1522 Adrian VI.,
in addressing him a long epistle complaining of Luther,
does not dare to remind him that under the bull of Leo X.
he and all his friends are excommunicate, outlawed, and
deprived of lordships and possessions. On the contrary, he
is the pope's dearest son, from wliom the church still hopes
obedience and assistance; and only vague warnings are
thrown out of the fate of Dathan and Abiram, and only
general intimations that, if he continues his protection of
heretics, he cannot expect to escape punishment in this
world and the next. So, at the close of the next year,
Dec. 7th, 1523, Adrian's successor, Clement VII., still addresses the obstinate prince as his well-beloved son, in the
most friendly strain.2 Equally significant is a pastoral
epistle of Jan. 20th, 1524, addressed by the Bishop of
Ermeland to his flock. To withstand the alarming progress of Lutheranism he deals liberally in imprecations and
curses, devoting all backsliders to eternal malediction, blut
he indulges in no threats of the temporal penalties which
had so long served to give a keener edge to the sword of
the spirit.3 In Northern Germany, at least, tle time for
such manifestations had passed.
Spalatin. Ann al. ann. 1521.
2 IIartzhein, VI. 192.-Lutheri Opp. T. II. fol. 571 a.
3 Lutheri Opp. T. I[l. fol. 63b.
THE REFORMIED CHURCOIIES. 459
In the heat of controversy Luther might deny thle
power of excommunication, but when he excommluniicated
the pope he only showed, by unconscious example, that
some power of the kind must be lodged ill every organized
church; and this was recognized when the Protestants,
after completing the work of destruction, commenced that
of reconstruction. Every body of men must have the
right to determine their conditions of fellowship, and the
power of expulsion from their association must be lodged
somewhere, to be used with such moderation and discretion as God may vouchsafe them. This was manifested
when the Lutlierans came to draw up a formal declaration
of faith and discipline in the Augsburg Confession-lthough
it should be borne in mind that this document was framed
in the hope that it might lead to a reconciliation of the
churches, and that it therefore conceded as much as possible to the Catholic views, while its adoption as the recognized standard of German orthodoxy arrested the development of the reform.
The relations between church and state, and the limits
of the sacerdotal power as expressed in the Augsburg
Confession, are the natural results of Luther's doctriies
on the sacrament of ordination quoted above. The old
abuses of the episcopal power, infringing onl the secular
authority, are warmly denounced. The province of the
church is to preach the gospel and administer the sacraments9 not to dethrone kings, usurp temporal power, or
interfere with the laws of the land. Church and state
have each its own sphere, and if the ministers of the
church have at any time exercised authority, its source has
not been divine law, but the pleasure of the secular potentate. To this is to be attributed the supervision of the
bishops over marriage and tithes, with the necessary corollary that what has been given may be withdrawn.
Their only independent jurisdiction is found in the remission of sins, and in examining questions of faith. They
460 E XCOMM U NICATION.
are to cond(emn all doctrine at variance with Scripture,
and to exclude from communion those whose impiety is
notorious; but this must be done by the word alone, without recourse to the arm of flesh. At the same time the
right of private judgment is reserved to the churches,
which have the command of God to refuse obedience to
anything contrary to the gospel.' Melanchthon, in his
apology for the Augsburg Confession, explains this by
saying that to the bishlops belongs the ministry of the
word and of the sacraments, with the power of excommunicating those convicted of crime, and of absolving them
if truly contrite; but they have no power over the law,
and must exercise their jurisdiction according to the word
of Godl.
In 1597, after the Lutherans had had time to perfect
their organization, we find an authoritative exposition of
their doctrine on this subject. The ban of the church was
not to be employed indiscriminately against all sinners
and for all offences, but only against public and notorious
delinquents, who scandalized the church, corrupted others
by their example, and caused the name of God to be blasphemed; and also those who after repeated monitions refused to undergo penitence and to reform their evil lives.
In such cakes, according to the command of Christ, a sentence of public excommunication was to be rendered, ejecting the offender from the church, and le was to be threatened with the wrath of God and eternal damnation for his
obdurate refusal to obtain by repentance the remission of
his sills.3
There was in this all the elements of a new sacerdotal
domination, especially as in principle the princes and rulers
of the land were as liable as the humblest peasant to the
infliction of the censure. By the necessity of the case,, Confess. Augustan. P. II. art. 7.
o Melanchth. Apol. (Lutheri Opp. T. IV. fol. 266 b).
3 Joann. Fechtius, de Excom. Ececles. p. 13 (Rostochii, 1712).
TIIE REFORIMED CHURCHES. 461
however, as well as by the doctrines of Luther aCnd of the
Augsburg Confession, while the state was independent of
the church, the chutrch was dependent on the state, and the
German sovereigns were not likely to subject themselves
to a new ecclesiastical tyranny similar to the one which
they had had so much difficulty in throwing off. The
Thirty Years' War, moreover, while it stopped the extension of Protestantism, was not calculated to raise the influence of the spiritual arm. Excommunication, therefore,
became less and less usual as a resort, and towards the
opening of the eighteenth century some godless men were
found who openly advocated its abandonment, to the great
indignation of the stricter members of the church.l
Theoretically the Lutheran church thus retained thle
machinery of excommunication, but with the advance of
enlightenment and the more regular administration of law,
its employment naturally became rarer. A writer of the
eighteenth century alludes to the minor excomlnmunication,
or suspension from the Eucharist, as a remedy occasionally
employed; but the major excommunication, which deprived
the culprit of all connection with the church except as an
auditor, rendered him incapable of acting as sponsor, and(
excluded himn from Christian burial, though recognized by
canon lawyers as still existing, was practically obsolete.
Only some special occasion, and the consent of the government, could justify proceeding to so severe a penalty.2
The Calvinistic theology, with its views of election and
regeneration, and the d(irect relation which it established
between the believer and the Creator, would seem to render' Fecht's work, just cited, is a long and dreary polemical discourse of four
hundred quarto pages directed against these Indifferentists or liberals. 1-e
deplores greatly the growing obsolescence of the censure.
Willenbergii Tract. de Excess. et Poen. Cleric. Jense, 1740, pp. 46(-7.Only thirty years previous, in the time of Fecht, the minor excommunication involved exclusion from sponsorship and dep;iivation of Christian seplultuire (Op. cit. p. 2).
39*
46 EX CO M M U N I C A T I O N.
excommunication utterly illogical as a punishment to be
inflicted by the church.l Calvin's Confession of Faith
carefully excludes all human devices intended to bind the
conscience; it reduces the sacraments to two, and professes
implicit obedience to the secular power, even if that power
be infidel; but excommunlication it recognizes as instituted
by Christ, " which we do very well approve and acknowledge the necessity thereof and of its appendages."' Calvin's treatment of Servetus, indeed, shows either that he
was unwilling to leave the heretic and blasphemer to the
vengeance of an offended God, or that he was quite willing
to regard the minister of Christ as the chosen instrument
of that vengeance. In either case, predestination and reprobation fared badly.
Among the Huguenots, therefore, excommunication was
an established portion of church discipline; but as their
churches were for the most part persecuted, or, at the best,
were barely tolerated, there was of course no scope for the
temporal extenlsion of spiritual penalties. Even within the
church, the infliction of excommunication was limited with
restrictions carefully devised to prevent abuse. The second
council of Paris, in 1565, drew up a series of regulations
with regard to it which became the established rule of the
church, and were included in its final code of discipline.
An offence committed in private was visited with a brotherly admonition. If this was disregarded, or if the
offence was notorious, then the culprit could be punished
by suspension from communion, but the pastor was not
empowered to decree it upon his own authority. The consistory alone was competent, and careful investigation was
required to precede the sentence. Still careful of the feelings and reputation of the culprit, only in notorious crimes
was the sentence made known to the congregation, and
1 Calvin's Confession of Faith, adopted by the churches of France in 1559,
Arts. xvii. xix. xxi. xxii. (Quick, Synodicon in Gall. Reform. I. pp. x. xi.).
o Ibid. Arts. xxxiii. xxxv. xxxvi. (Quick, I. xiii-xv).
THE REFORMED C r-IUC-HE S. 463
restoration to communion could at any time be obtained
by confession and repentance. If the offender continuled
obdurate and impenitent, however, then at. length excoimmunication could be resorted to: " But, inasmuch as this
is the last and most rigorous of all remedies, it shall never
be used but in case of extremity, when all fair and gentle
means have proved ineffectual." If, after repeatedly striving with his contumacious spirit, the culprit was still found
hardened in guilt, the pastor, on a Sunday, announced
the impending anathema to the congregation, preaching a
sermon on the terrors of expulsion from the church, and
begging the prayers of the faithful for the obstinate sinner,
whose name was still kept concealed. If these prayers
and the warning proved alike unavailinyg, then on two successive Sundays the same was repeated, with the announcement of the name of the offender. At last, on the
fourth Sunday, the pastor, in the name and with the consent of the whole church, declared him excommunicate ancd
cut off; as a rotten member, from the ecclesiastical body;
he was thenceforth deprived of all spiritual privileges, and
the faithful were exhorted not to frequent his company or
to converse familiarly with him. If the excommunicate
repented and applied for readmission, and if on examination by the consistory he showed firuits of repentance, the
pastor announced the glad tidings to the congregation;
the sinner appeared before them, publicly confessed his
trainsgressions, and asked pardon of God and the church,
when he was received back with joy and thanksgiving.'
In the final code of discipline, the consistories were
directed to use great discretion and deliberation in awarding either suspension or excommunication. Suspension
was not to be made public, except in the case of heretics,
despisers of God, rebels against the consistory, traitors,
those convicted of public crimes involvino corporal punSecond Council of Paris, ann. 1565, can. 2 (Quick, I. 57-8).
464 6 X C OMMUNIAT 1 I 0 N.
ishmnent, those married by Catholi6 priests, or who allowed
their children to be baptized in the Roman church or to
mlarry Ronmanists. When an excommunication was impending, the pastor was directed, in his weekly exhortations, to entreat the congregation to pray and use all means
to urge the offender to repentance, so as to avert the
dreadful anathema "' unto which we cannot proceed without
a world of regret and grief."T
While in this there is to be recognized and honored the sincetre desire to deal moderately and hum-lanely with offenders,
aldcl to preclude as far as possible the abuse of the penalty
for the gratification of private vindictiveness, it is evident
that there was also a purpose to heighten in the minds of
the faithful the impression of the awful nature of the
penalty. Indeed, it is curious to observe that, notwithstanding the purely human character of the Calvinist
priesthood, when they spoke in the name of the church
they assumed the power of regulating the salvation of the
wicked as fully as Innocent III., and of delivering himl
over to Satan with as much certainty as the Apostle Paul.
This assumption of the powers of God is complete in the
form of excommunication adopted by the synod of Alez,
in 1620, and embodied as the authorized fbrmula in the
Code of Discipline. After reciting the repeated warnings
and the hardened impenitence of the sinner, it proceeds" Wherefore, we ministers of the Word and Gospel of our Lord.
Jesus Christ, whomi God hath armed with spiritual weapons, mighty
through God to throw down the strongholds which do oppose themselves against Him; to whom the Eternal Son of God hath given
the power of binding and loosing upon earth, declaring that what
we shall bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven, and being willing
thoroughly to purge the House of God, and to free His church of
scandal, and by pronouncing anathema against the wicked one to
glorify the name of our God; In the name and by the authority of
our Lord Jesus, by the advice and authority of the pastors and
Cod. Diseip chap. v. can. xv.-xvii. (Quick, I. pp. xxxi.-ii.).
THE REFORME'D CHURCHES. 465
elders assembled in colloquy, and of the consistory of this church,
we have cut off and do cut off the said N.N. firom the communion
of the church of God. We do excommunicate and deprivelhim of
the fellowship of saints, so that lie may be unto you as a pagan or
publican, and that among true believers he may be an anathema
and execration. Let his company be reputed contagious! and let
his example possess your souls with astonishment, and cause you to
tremble under the mighty hand of God! And this sentence the
Soni of God will ratify and make effectual, until such time as the
sinner being confounded and abased before God, shall glorify Him
by his conversion..... If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ
let him be anathema maranatha! Amen!T"1
Those who in persecution could thus arrogate to themselves the right to speak for God, and could assume that
their acts were His, lacked only the opportunity to become as
tyrannical and domineering as the Latin church in its worst
days. Honestly, but fiercely, fanatical, they were troubled
with as few doubts or misgivings as Damiani or Torquemada, and in a few generations of unresisted domination
their simple form of belief would have resulted in a theocracy
as absolute as that which Hildebrand founded. The rapidity
of this inevitable development was manifested in Scotltand,
as soon as the Catholic cause was fairly subdued. The
consistories of Calvin, composed of the pastor with his
deacons and elders, became the kirk-sessions, which were
virtually the rulers of the land, and which maintained
their power for generations against the assaults of papist
and prelatist on the single basis of excommunication. A
contemporary has sketched these assemblies and their
domination in no friendly spirit: " Every parish had a
tyrant who made the greatest lord in his district stoop to
his authority. The kirk was the place where he kept his
court; the pulpit his throne or tribunal from wl-ich he
issued out his terrible decrees; and twelve or fourteen
sour, ignorant enthusiasts, under the title of elders, composed his council. If any, of what quality soever, had the, Cod. Discip. chap. v. can. xvii. (Quick, I. xxxii.-iii.).
466 EX COMMUNICATION.
assurance to disobey his orders, the dreadful sentence of
excommunication was immediately thundered out against
him, his goods and chattels confiscated and seized, and he
himself being looked upon as actually in the possession of
the devil, and irretrievably doomed to eternal perdition,
all that convened with him were in no better esteem."'
Another contemporary, Sir Andrew Weldon, an English
traveller who visited Scotlald in the early part of the
seventeenth century, pithily describes the spirit with which
this rule was administered: " Their Sabbath exercises are
a preaching in the morning and a persecuting inl the afternoon."2
This sounds like exaggeration, yet, making allowance
for its hostile tone, it gives a reasonably truthful picture
of the Scottish theocracy. While in many respects the
kirk-sessions formed an admirable police system, yet their
petty and all-pervading tyranny must have been inexpressibly galling and odious. All kinds of offenders were
brought before them, and though they transferred to the
criminal tribunals such crimes as theft or murder, yet their
jurisdiction seems to have been practically limited only
by their own discretion. Criminal judges who did not
administer justice to their satisfaction, were promptly
summoned to trial. The private relations of families, the
vices or the evil disposition of the individual were alike
subject to their inquisition and judgment. Their decrees
were virtually irreversible. and without appeal, and behind
all lay the awful power of excommunication, which seemed
to reduce the most hardened to submission. Indeed, they
even assumed legislative as well as judicial functions, and
local presbyteries would pass general laws punishing such
offences as adultery with temporal penalties.3 Rome her1 Memoirs of Lochiell (Spottiswoode Miscellany, II. 229-30).
Rogers's Scotland, Social and Domestic, p. 28 (Grarmpian Club, 1869).
Thus, in 1586, the kirk-sessions of Glasgow ordained that adulterers
should'"satisfy six Sa-lbbaths in the pillory," bare-legged and in sack-cloth,
TtIE REFORMED CIHUIRCHIES. 467
self scarcely dared to organize a sytem of despotism so
minute and so complete; and however disinterested and
ardent in the faith may have been the men who built it up
and admini: -red it, human nature, even in the elect, is too
imperfect for us to imagine that such a theocracy could
exercise its power without causing infinite misery. There
was probably less corruption than under the Spanish Inqilisition, but it may be doubted which rule of the two was
the more easy to be endured. Numerous extracts have been
printed from the registers, still existing, of many kirksessions, which afford us an insight into some of the practical workings of the system, showing that the procedures
established iln the French churches were faithfully observed,
and that the cumbrous process designed to limit the use of
the spiritual sword proved of little avail amnong those who
were unanimously ready to exercise their brief authority.
Thus in the Kirk-Sessions Rlegoister of Perth, published
by the Spottiswoode Society, we find under date of June
29th, 1575: " The whilk day Mr. John Row, minister of
Perthl, denounced Elspeth Carnock excommunicate, in
presence of the whole people, for subtracting herself from
her repentance." A few mnonths later a certain Thomas
Dundclie and his wife had a quarrel. The sessions took up
the matter, adjudged Thomas to be in fault, and or(dered
the three admonitions or warnings to be given him. He
apparently held ou' until the third warning, for after that
there is no f: rther notice of him. Then there is a case of
assault and battery of which the sessions takes cognizance,
ordering the bailies to keep the parties in custody until
they perform the award, under pain of excommunication,
thus showing that the civil power was bound to execute the
spiritual decrees as completely as in Germany under the
and then be carted through the town-i. e., be whipped at the ca!rt's tail.
The same body, in 1.643, decreed that the same offence be punished with
standin, th:,,e hours in the "jaggs," a public whipping, imprisonment in
the j!il,:nu b.l:,isiment from the town.-R-ogers, op. cit., p. 364.
468 EX COMM U NICATIO N.
Schwabenspiegel. Indeed, soon after tlis we find the l)ailies
themselves threatened with excommunication within a fOl'tnight for lunkewarmniiess in executing the judgments of the
sessions; all future bailies were included in the threat, and
the existing ones wisely made their peace and escaped the
anathema by prompt submission. This power over thle
secular magistrates was manifested again a few years later,
when the bailies were ordered, under pain of excommunication, to imprison a certain Thomas Taylor, who had neglectedl the admonition of the sessions; the proceeding was
successful, and the obdurate Thomas was brought before
the kirk and forced to perform due penance. Thus the
terrors of the spiritual and criminal law comb)ined were
wieldcled by thle church, and were brought to bear upon
the most trivial cases as well as upon the most hardened
offenders.l
The kirk-sessions moreover were the principal promoters
of the fearful prosecutions for witchcraft, which pelrhaps
were worse in Scotland than in any other country. They
paid the; pi1ickers" vwho tortured miserable old women to
obtain proof, and they voted supplies of firewood for the
resultant auto-da-Je. While they rigorously prohibited
funerals and marriages on the Sabbath as a profanation of
the sacredness of the day, witch-burnings were deemed a
good work allowable on the Lord's day, and committees
of ministers attended them officially. Zealous ministers,
indeed, sometimes did not content themselves with simply
directing these proceedings. In 1650,'Mr. John Aird,
minister of Stow, reported to his kirk-session his success
in personally convicting a witch by pricking her, having
triumphantly thrust into her shoulder a pin up to the
head." From this supreme crime clown to the pettiest
offence, there was nothing that did not come within their
jurisdiction. They regulated the proceedings at wecddlings,
Spottiswoode Miscellany, TI. 235, 236, 241, 249-50, 268.
2 Rogers, op. cit; pp. 29, 270, 328.
TIHE REFORMED CIIURCHES. 469
they prosecuted pipers and fiddlers for performing at them,
prescribed the number of guests to be invited, and the
quantity of liquor to be drunk; and when the feast was
provided by a publican, they limited the amount of money
to be spent. If the quaint carvings on an old tomb displeased them, they speedily caused its remodelling, as in
the case of Lord Boyd, whom the Presbytery of Irvine, in
1649, ordered. to remove an image from the sepulchre of
his ancestors, under pain of excommunication, and he
incontinently had to obey. If a youth chanced to pass his
father without lifting his bonnet, the apparent disrespect
was made the subject of grave deliberations, as occurred
in the Presbytery of Glasgow in 1598. Tile same body
forbade the marriage of James Armour to Helen Bar,
because the bridegroom was in debt; and it threatened anl
unfortunate piper with excommunication if he did not discontinue playing on his pipes on Sunday. The kiirksessions of Stirling, in 1598, ordered the imprisonment,
on bread and water, of two persons who had played at
dice, and the sessions of Dumfries fined a man in twelve
shillings who had been found card-playing. The sessions
of the Port of Menteith, in 1668, prosecuted three persons
who had drunk a "1 chapon" of ale on Sunday, and sentencecd them 66to sit bair headit beffore the pulpit, and
atier sermon to acknowledge their scandal on their knees."
Perhaps, however, the most capricious exercise of petty
tyranny was in the case of William Howatson, whlo, on.
May 6, 1652, was ordered by the kirk-sessions of Stow
to "humble himself before the session and crave God's
mercy," because, on the preceding Sunday, he had walked
a short distance to visit his sick mother.l
No one could escape the searching inlquisition of the.
system. In 1650 the synod of Fife ordered every parish
to be divided up among the ellders, andI in obedience to the
Rogers, op. cit. pp. 18, 115, 340, 343, 357, 367, 371.
40
470 E X CO M MI- UNICi TION.
act of the General Assembly in 1649, each elder was to
traverse his district carefully at least once a month, and
report to his sessions all cases of disorders or offences
which might come within his knowledge.' To supplement
this minute perqnisition there were the regulations which
prescribed to all constant attendance in church on Sunday,
andc partakino of communion at stated intervals.' Thus as
eaily as 1568 the kirk-sessions of Aberdeen imposed a fine
of sixpence on all absentees from divine service, and of two
shillings on elders and deacons. The sessions of Anstruther, Kilrenny, and Pittenweem commanded the presence of every one, morning and afternoon, withl an ascend —
ing scale of penalties, being twelvepence for the first
offence, two shillings for the second, and five shillings for
tlie third and all after. In 1570 the sessions of St. Andrews decided to withdraw alms from all paupers who did
not present themselves regularly at sermon time; and at
Lasswade, in 1615, a fine was levied of twenty pence Scots
on servants, three shillings and fourpence on. yeomen, and
six shillings and eightpence on gentlemen. To insure the
observance of these reogulations a minute system of supervision was organized. In 1583 the kirk-sessions of Perth
ordered each elder to go around his district every Sunday
forenoon and note all absentees, so as to levy on them the
fine of twenty shillings; and in 1600 the sessions of Glasgow decreed that the deacons of the several crafts should
search among the families of their freemen for absentees,
and report themn for fininog.2
It was the same with respect to attendance at the Lord's
Supper. In 1600 the Scottish Parliament passed an act
ordering every adult to partake of communion at least
twice a year, under penalties graduated according to the
station of the delinquent. Thus for an earl the mulet was
~1000 Scots; for a lord, 1000 merks; for a baron or land
Rogers, op. cit. p. 374.
Ibid. pp. 345, 347.
THE REFORMED C HUtRCIIES. 471
owner, 300 merks; for a yeoman, ~40; and a recordl of
Aberdeen, in 1603, shows that the enforcement of this law
was in tile hands of the kirlk-sessions, and that the fines
were not only collected by legal process, but were increased
at the pleasure of the sessions.' Even in the eighteenth
century, absence fiom the kirk for three consecutive Sabbaths without a proper excuse, leaving church during the
services, or being present at communion without partakin o
of it, were all offences which entailed the censures of the,
churchi.2 It evidently was not easy for the carnal-minded
to escape the watchful supervision of the sessions.
No matter how trivial the offence, it became as of old a
crime of the deepest dye if there was any slackness of
obedience in submitting to the commands of the sessions.
Any one who failed to answer when summoned was at
once proceeded against with the three premonitory warnincgs,3 and no rank or station excused the offender. Thus
in 1612 the Malrquis of iluntley and the Earl of Errol were
excommunicated by the synod of Fife for not communicating; and on January 7th, 1647, the Presbytery of Lismahago convicted the Duke of HIamilton of 1not being faithful
to the covenant and compelled him to acknowledge his
offence upon his knees and to make full confession publicly
in church.4 So in 1638 John Guthrie, Bishop of Moray,
was excommlunicated by the Glasgow assembly because he
lhadl refusecl to perform penance in Edinburg-h for having
preached before Charlies I. in a surpllice.5
The segregation of the excommunicate was strictly enforced. Cases are frequently mentioned of proceedings
takeln against those who frequented with, harbored, or
Rogers, op. cit. pp. 24, 346. The pound Scots was one-twelfth of the
pound sterling; the mlerk was half a pound.' Lauder's Ancient Bishops Considered, chap. viii. Nos. 22, 26, 27, 46
(Edinburgh, 1707).
3 Spottiswoode Miscell. I. 251, 292-5.
Rogers, op. cit. pp. 314-17. 5 Spottiswoode Miscell. 1. 201.
472 E XCOMMUNIC ATION.
even spoke to the recalcitrant wretches who were under
the ban of the kirk. From 1621 to 1645 John Robertson
was minister of Pterth, but notwithstanding this long and
faithful service he was deposed in 1645 by the General
Asseibly for conversing with Montrose, who was then
under excommunication, and though he was readmitted in
1654 he was not restored to his post.l So great was the
dread of holding any relations with a person thus anathematized, that when, in 1611, John Spottiswoode of that ilk
killed in a quarrel his friend Matthew Sinclair of Longformacus, and the Privy Council, by command of King
James, intervened to pacify the feud, the brothers of the
murdered man, in responding to certain offers made by
Spiottiswoode, felt obliged to place on record a protest to
justify themselves for receiving and reading any communications from an excommunicated man. "6 First, we protest
that we recaued thame be commandiemnent of your moist
hounourable Lordschippis sua that na imputatioun justlie
may be attributed to ws for vewing ancl reiding thairof,
proceeding from his Maiestie's rebell and ane excommunicat persone, and sua Godis and his Maiestie's enemye."'
So, when Lord Herries was excommunicated by the Provincial Synod in 1647, two tradesmen who had business
with him were obliged to apply to the kirk-sessions of
Dumfries for permission to visit him before they could
venture to hold converse with him.3
Strange as it may seem, however, the spiritual terrors of
the anathema were more effective than its temporal penalties, and men of thle most hardened natures, who derided
the law, or had nothing further to expect from it, were
brought to subjection by the unknown and awful conseqnences of separation from the church. Thus, in the KirkSessions Register of Perth, under date of November 20th,
1598, there is an entry showing that Thomas Law, a desSpottiswoodc Miscelliny, II. 253, 273-4, 275, 312.
Ibid. I. 27. 3 Rogers, op. cit. p. 375.
THE REFORMED CIHURCHES. 473
perate rebel who had broken jail acld had long defied thle
civil mangistracy, appeared before the sessions and beoggoed
an abandonment of the proceedings for the excommunication which he had deserved, offering to render whatever
satisfaction might be desired by both the bailies and the
sessions.' Equally significant of the immense influence
over nmen's minds of this fearful sentence is an incident
which occurred at the execution, in 1646, at St. Andrews,
of three royalists, serving under Montrose, and taken
prisoners at Philiphaugh, after promise of quarter. One
of them, Major Nathaniel Gordon, is described in Lochiell's
AMemoirs as a gentleman " of great courage and fortitude,"'
vet on the dclay of his execution, when there was no further
hope of reprieve or pardon, he pleaded earnestly for reconciliation to the church, in a written declaration, expressing
his sorrow "for taking up arms and shedding mucth innocent blood in this wicked rebellion against this church and
kingdom, for which I was justly excommunicated by the
kirk; I do therefore hunlbly beg parclon and Lmercy from
God for the samle, thorough a(ndl for the merits of Christ his
sonne, desiring earnestly to be relaxed friom that fearful
sentence of excommunication."9 The request was granted,
andl he malde a most ediifyilng end.
It required, indcee, the combination of tenmporal and
spiritual terrors attendant upon the alternative of excommiunication to compel subjection to the sentences of penance inflicted upon every trivial occasion. This penance
was no light punishment in itself, and was skilfully graduated to suit every species of crime and to serve as a supplement to the ordinary penal laws. Every kirk had its
stool of repentance on which the penitent was obliged to
face the congregation bareheaded while the painful ministel drew from his shamne lessons of edification for the faithful. Some churches had not only a stool but a pillar, on
Spottiswoode Miscell. II. 277. R Ibid. L. 205 —6.
40*
474 E X CO IIMUN ICATION.
which hardened offenders were raised to a bad eminence
for the benefit of the spectators; and all parishes were
required to possess a'lharden-g'own" or "linnens," a coarse
sackcloth cloak in which the penitent was enveloped. Even
as late as 1693 an entry in the sessions register of Kirkmichael records the making of one of these gaiments.
The character of the penitence ordinarily enjoined may be
learned from the sentences rendered in several cases of
adultery recorded. Thus the kirk-sessions of Dumfries
orders two culprits to sit in sackcloth seven Sundays on
the stool and to stand barefoot at the church door oin the
first and last days. At Aberdeen, in 1568, the offenders
were required to stand bare-leg'ged and in sackcloth for
three Sundays at the church door wearing paper crowns
on which their crime was inscribed;'~ when the preacher
begoan his sermon they were to come to the stool of repentance, and, when service was over, to return to the church
door until the congregation had dispersed. In 1642, the
Presbytery of Lanark punished them by compelling themn
to go through all the kirks of the district and stand barelegoged at the door, from the second bell until the last.1
This ingenious cumulation of shamne and disgrace, however, frequently was considered insufficient, and it was
supplemented by physical torments better fitted to subdue
those who had become hardened-C perhaps by undergoing
repeated exhibitions on the stool or pillar. One implement
of torture was called the bran/cs —a sort of helmet composed
of iron bars, secured upon the head with a padlock, and
furnished with a triangular projection which entered the
mouth of the patient. This was particularly provided for
scolds and slanderers, whose penance onl the stool of repentance was renderecd more unendurable by its application. The kirk-sessions of St. Andrews ordered it for
Isobel Lindsay when she was convicted of slandering
Rogers, op. cit. pp. 353, 364-6.
TIE REFORaMED CHURCHES. 475
Archbishop Sharpe; and the sessions register of Dunfermline, Marlch 5th, 1648, records a similar sentence passed on
Margaret Nicholsone for scoldling and drunkenness.
A still more effective means of torment was found in the
jaggs or jougs (jugum), an iron collar which was locked
arounnd the neck of the penitent and securecl to the wall
near the church door at a height to render the attitude of
confinement painful. Sometimes the length of punishment
was only an hour, but it was repeated in aggravated cases,
somue stubborn offenders being jagged every Sunday for six
months. Sometimes the application was prolonged. In
1570 the kirk-sessions of St. Andrews warned Gelis Symson
that she should be jagged for twenty-four hours if she did
not reform her habits of scolding and Sabbath-breaking.
Nor was this severity of punishment at all unlikely, when
in 1606 we see the kirk-sessions of Ayr inflict the jaggs
and pillar of repentance on John M'Crie for saying that
" no bodie had the wyte (blame) of the poore folks but the
devill and the priest."'
This severity of discipline continued until the Scottish
Parliament in 1690 abolished the civil penalties of excommunication.2 A fatal blow then was struck at the temporal
usurpations of the kirk, and the abuses which had flourished
so luxuriantly commenced rapidly to decline.
The Anglican church inherited its discipline from PIome
more directly than any other of the Protestant denominations, and its relations with our subject are therefore easily
comprehended. When Henry VIII. threw off his spiritual
allegiance to Clement VII., his object was to create a
schism, not a heresy, and simply to supplant the tiara l)y
the crown. Assuming to himself the supreme authority
wielded by the pope, it formed no part of his plan to
diminish that authority in any respect, and the power of
excommunication was too precious an addition to the royal
Rogers, op. cit. pp. 354-61.' Ibid. p. 376.
476 EXCOMMUNICATION.
prerogative to be abandoned or even weakened. Transubstantiation, private masses, and the sacrament of penitence
were retainedl which were quite sufficient for that purpose;
and though Henry did not presume to officiate as highpriest himself, his control of those who did so placed thle
salvation of his subjects as completely in his hands as it
had ever been in those of Innocent III. or Boniface VIII.
With the simplification of dogma under Edward VI. this
spiritual autocra~cy disappeared, but excommunication was
retained as a convenient weapon, and as its superhuman
terrors were abated, the temporal pains and penalties
attaching to it under the ancient law were carefully preserved and strengthened. The forty-two articles promulgated in 1552, and the thirty-nine articles of Elizabethl,
which have remained the standard of Anglican orthodoxy,
alike enjoin the treatment as a heathen and a publican of
any excommunicate.2 But this was insufficient. In 1562
the bishops in convocation complained of the negligence
of the sheriffs in imprisoning excommunicates' whereby
the censures and corrections of the church do run in great
contempt; and like daily to grow into more, unless some
speedy remedy be found in that behalf'"3 3What was the
disposition of the more ardent churchmen in this respect
may be gathered from a MS. printed by Strype of propositions to be laid before the convocation, annotations on
wllich in Archbishop Parker's hand show it to be authoritative. It proposed that those who do not communicate
at least thrice a year be severely punished, while persons
not communicating at all, and excommunicates remaining'i
unreconciled for six months, be dealt with as heretics.4
Another liberal proposition made in the satme convocation
was that any one notably neglecting to attend divine
Burnet's Collections, I. 305.
Ibid. II. 217.
3 Strype's Annals, I. 272, 310.
4 Ibid. additions to Vol. I. p. 13 in Vol. II. ad calcem.
THE- REFORMED CHURCHES. 4 T
service or to take communion should be held as excommunicate without further process or promulgation of sentence,
and that during his continuance therein he be deprived of
all benefit of law, having no standing in court except as
defendant.l
The complaints of the bishops were not unheeded. The
writ dcle exconm-tunicato capiendo imprisoned without bail
any one remaining under excommunication for forty days,
and a statute to insure its execution and to correct the
negligence of the sheriffs was passed without delay. These
writs were made returnable to the Court of Queen's Bench,
which was empowered to fine at discretion any sheriff
negligent in the premises. If the party excommunicated
did not surrender himself, a second writ was issued, failure
to obey which within six days was visited with a fine of
~10. A third writ then was issued, carrying with it a fine
of ~20; and as long as the offender was contumacious, an
infinity of these writs followed each other, each bearing its
separate fine of like amount, thus rendering persistent obduracy a luxury too expensive even for the most wealthy.2
This law enumerates the offences entailing excommunication-as heresy, refusing to allow a child to be baptized,
declining to receive communion after the orthodox form,
negligence in attending divine service, dissidence in belief,
in continence, simony, usury, perjury in ecclesiastical cour-ts,
and idolatry. This was a tolerably wide and comprehensive field for censure-mongers, yet its limitations were by
no means strictly observed. We have seen elsewhere the
abuses arising from the subjugation of the state to the
church, and the yet more anomalous Anglican theory of
using the church as a department of the state was fruitful
of the same troubles. WVhen Queen Elizabeth, urged by
the antiquarian tastes of Archbislop Parker, desired to
Strype's Annals, I. 316-7. Cf. Strype's Grindal App. p. 11.
9 5 Eliz. ch. 23 (Statutes at Large, II. 563-5). Cf. Blount!s NomoLexicon, s. v.
478 E XC OMM U N I C AT ION.
put a stop to the iconoclastic tendencies of the people in
defacing imonuments in the churches, breaking stained
windows, and, stealing the bells and lead, she not only
very properly forbade it for the future, but she ordered an
inquisition into the injuries done since the commencement
of her reign, and required that they be made good under
pain of excommunication —and this not by act of Parlianient. but by royal proclamation of Sept. 19, 1559.1 Moreover, while the bishops in the convocation of 1562 were
bemloaningy the slackness of the sheriffs in incarcerating
unlucky exconmmunicates. a canonist of undoubted orthodoxy, Ralph Lever, presented to the queen a memorial
complaining of the abuses practised by bishops and their
officials in excommunicatin g without cause, and in defiance
of both canon and statute law.2 The temper of the times
was against him, however, and we have seen how parliamnent yielded to the demands of the bishops, while the
attempted limitation of the subjects for censure speedily
became a dead letter.
The act of 1562, in fact, was not adapted to diminish
current abuses. They grew and flourished, rendering the
people discontented, and brinaging the church into disrepute. That the rising sect of puritans should protest and
arogue that such censures were without foundation in either
the Old or:New Testament,3 was natural enough, since
they were the principal sufferers by the spiritual sword
thus wielded by the secular arm; but a more cogent evidence of the existing evils is furnished by the convocation
of 1580, when the House of Bishops earnestly asked the
lower house to frame some measure whereby the scandals
that rendered the very name of ecclesiastical censures
odious to the people might be removed. That it was only
the name and not the reality of the penalty that they
desired to change is evident from a paper laid before the
Strype's Annals, I. 185.
Ibid. p. 321. Ibid. pp. 523, 584.
TIHE R.EFOR3MED CHURCHES. 479
body, attributed by Strype to Archbishop Grindal, in
which, after alluding to the extension of excommunication
to petty offences in violation of ancient custom, it is suoggested that, except in cases of heinous crime, the decree of
excommunication shall be altered to a decree of contumacy,
this contumacy carrying with it all the legal penalties and
disabilities of excommunication, except deprivation of the
sacrament, and segregation from the society of the faithful.1 This ingenious proposition was not adopted, and
some six or seven years later another convocation again
deplored the freedom with which excommulnicationi was
decreed, often by persons possessing no ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and in cases purely temporal, such as non-payment
of legacies, tithes, &c. No better remedy than the previous one, however, could be suggested —that of denouncing the offender as contumacious instead of excommunicate.'
The people might complain of oppression, and religion
might be rendered odious by the abuse of its most sacred
mysteries, but the tendency of the governing powers was
towards arbitrary repression, and enlightened liberality
was not to be expected. The royal prerogative sought to
extend itself in every direction, and the crown, in its capacity of sulpreme head of the church, found spiritual censures too convenient an instrument of tyranny to abandon
one jot of the advantage which it thence derived of evadinog
or supplementing the common law. Among his other devices for illegally raising money, Charles I., in 1640, caused
the synods of Canterbury and York to levy a "' benevolence" on the clergy, the payment of which was enforced,
among other penalties, by excommunication; and the sysStrype's Grindal, p. 259; also Append. No. xv.
2 Ibid. Append. No. xvi.
3 This " benevolence" was carefully kept out of the published proceedings of the synods. See the speeches in Parliament against it-IParl. -list.
IX. 80, 85, 91-2, &c.
480 E XC O MMU N IC A TION.
tem was recognized as so intolerable a burden, that when,
a few months later, the Long Parliament met, a petition
from fifteen thousand citizens of London described, among
other grievances, that the ecclesiastical courts " claimed
their calling immediately from the Lord Jesus Christ;
which is against the laws of this kingdom, and derogatory
to his Majesty and his state royal," mid further protested
against " The multitude of canons formerly made; wherein, among other things, excommllunication, ipso facto, is
denounced for speaking of a word against the devices
aforesaid, or subscription thereunto..... XXIII. The
great increase and frequency of whoredoms and adulteries,
occasioned by the prelates' corrupt administration of
justice in such cases, who taking upon themselves the
punishment of it do turn all into monies for the filling of
their purses.... XXIV. The general abuse of that
great ordinance of excommunication, which God hath left
in his church to be the last and greatest punishment the
church can inflict upon obstinate and great offenders; and
the prelates and their officers, who of right have nothing
to do with it, do daily excommunicate men either for doing
that which is lawful, or for vain, idle, and trivial matters;
as working or opening a shop on a holy day; for not appearing, at every beck, upon their summons; not paying
a fee or the like: yea, they have made it as they do all other
things, a hook or instrument wherewith to empty men's
purses, and to advance their own greatness; and so that
sacred ordinance of God, by their perverting of it, becomes
contemptible to all men, and seldom or never used against
notorious offenders, who, for the most part, are'their
favorites."'
Even making allowance for indignant exaggeration,
this shows us how all the abuses which led to the Pleformation were rapidly being revived and systematized in
Panrl. Hist. IX. 114-20.
THIE REFORMED CHURCHES. 481
the new establishment. A sacerdotal church and caste
were growing up on the pattern of the ancient hierarchy,
with the substitution of a king for a pope-the combination
of spiritual with temporal tyranny leading inevitably to
the establishment of a despotism as complete as that of the
Cssars. At this moment, it is true, a fresh impulse had
been given to popular indignation by the action of the synods
of 1640 above referred to; and a glance at the canons there
adopted under the guidance of Laud and promulgated by
royal proclamation under the great seal, will serve to show
how efficiently the censures of the church were being used
in aid of the Star Chamber and the Court of Higl Commission, for the purity of the faith and the supremacy of
the crown.
First in the order of the canons is the declaration that
" The most High and Sacred order of Kings is of Divine
right, being the ordinance of God himself, founded in the
prime laws of nature, and clearly established by expresse
texts both of the Old and New Testaments. A supream
power is given to this most excellent Order by God himself
in the Scriptures..... The care of God's church is so
colnmitted to Kings in the Scripture, that they are commencled whell the Church keeps the right way, and taxed
when it runs amisse, and therefore her government belongs
in chief unto Kings..... For subjects to bear arms against
their Kings, offensive or defensive, upon any pretence whatsoever, is at the least to resist the powers that are ordained
of God: And though they do not invade but only resist,
St. Paul tells them plainly, They shall receive to themselves damnation."' These comfortable doctrines were
ordered to be read at least once a quarter by every parson,
vicar, curate, and preacher in the kingdom, and any one
maintaining the contrary was ordered to be excommunicated by the royal commissioners till he should repent.
1 Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiasticall, No. 1.-Published by his Majesties Authority, London, 1640.
41
482 E X C O MU N IC A T ION.
The precautions for enforcing utniformity of religion
were still more efficacious. All Papists, Socinians, Anabaptists, Brownists, Separatists, Familists, &c., were
warned against absenting themselves for a month fiorn
their parish churches without lawful ilmpediment, and
churchwardclens and sideen were instructed to be on the
watch for those who attended church and listened to the
sermon without joining in the services or taking communion. REecusants were to be reported at the visitations in
order to their due excommun-ication, which was to be repeated
every three months, both in their parish church and in the
cathedral of their diocese. If this proved ineffectual, the
obstinate recusants were to be reported to tthe judges of
assize, and once a year the bishops were ordered to forward to the high court of chancery a list of all who remained under excommunication beyond the time allowed
by law, with a request that writs de excogmmlunicato capiendo should forthwith be issued against them; and the
execution of these writs with promptness and energy was
enjoined on all sheriffs and their deputies. No excommunicate remaining' under censure beyond the legal term
could be absolved by any ecclesiastical court without
making personal appearance, and taking the oath' De
parendo juri et stando mandatis ecclesie," which placed the
unlucky penitent completely at the mercy of his ghostly
persecutors.1
"The pestilent invention of printing was deprived of its
capacity for evil with the same care. Any stationer, printer,
or importer, who might print, buy, sell, or disperse any
book or scandalous pamphlet against the faith, discipline,
or government of the Church of England was excommunicate ipso facto, and his name was ordered to be sent to
the attorney-general for prosecution'according to the late
decree in the Honorable Court of Star Chamber against
1 See the speech in Parliament of Nathaniel Finnes, Rnshworth's Collec.
tions, IV. 109.
TEIE REFORMED cTIUnRCeES. 483
the spreaders of prohibited books." Any preacher who
vented such damnable doctrine in a sermion was to be excommunicated for a first offence, and cideprived for a repetition. Even the possession of such books, except by
doctors of divinity in orders, graduates in divinity, or persons having episcopal or archicliaconal jurisdiction, was
visited with the samne penalties. Some provisions were
added to prevent the decree of excommunication by persons
not properly qualified, but these were counterbalanced by
similar restrictions laid on the granting of absolution.l
Such regulations as these, agreed upon in a conclave of
prelates, and given the force of law by royal. proclamation,
betokened a rapid concentration of spiritual and temporal
despotism to which Englishmen in that age were not likely
to submit. It is no wonder then that one of the first
efforts of the Long Parliament which assembled in Nov.
1640, was directed against them, the chief arguments beeino
levelled at the palpable infringements on the rights of
Parliament. So fierce was the attack that when the matter
came to a vote, Dec. 16th, no one dared to record himself
against a resolution which declared "That the Canons and
Constitutions Ecclesiastical, treated upon by thle Archbishops of Canterbury and York, Presidents of the Convocations for the respective Provinces of Canterbury and
York, and the rest of the Bishops and Clergy of these
Provinces, and agreed upon with the King's Majesty's
license in their several Synods begun at London and York
in the year 1640, do contain in them matter contrary to
the Kin(g's Prerogative, to the fundamental Laws andcl
Statutes of the Realm, to the Rights of P:arliament, to the
Property and Liberty of the Subject, and MAatters tending
to Sedition and of dangerous consequence."1 The proceedings against Straffordc and Laud, with the pressure of
the tumultuous business of that revolutionaryL time, pr1eConstitutions and Canons, Nos. 3, 4, 5, 14, 15.' Rushwlorth, lV. 112.
484 El XCOMMUNICATION.
vented the early action of the Lords on this resolution,
but at length, June 12th, 1641, it received their assent,
notwithstanding that Hall, Bishop of Exeter, endeavored
to shift to the shoulders of the king the whole responsibility: " It is le Roy le veult that of Bills makes Laws.
So was it for us to do in the Matter of Canons; we might
propound some such constitutions as we should think
might be useful; but when we have done we send them to
his majesty, who, perusing them curm avisamnento concilii
sui, and approving them puts Life into them; and of dead
Propositions makes them Canons: as, therefore, the Laws
are the King's laws and not ours, so are the Canons the
King's Canons and not the Clergy's. Think thus of them,
and then draw what conclusions you please."l The conclusions which it pleased the Commons to draw were not
aogreeable to the good bishop, for on August 3d he was impeached, with thirteen others, for their share in the busiless.2
As the puritan cause advanced, its ministers naturally
sought to secure for themselves the powers which were
slipping from the grasp of the heads of the established
church; and the Assembly of Westminster, in 1645,
asserted the power of the keys by divine appointment and
not by the laws of the land with a distinctness worthy
of Rome herself. It framel accordingly a scheme of
church-government which lodged in each congregational
assembly the prerogative which we have seen exercised
by the kirk-sessions of Scotland2. Parliament, however,
was not disposed to abandon any of its riglhts as the
supreme law-making and law-dispensing body, and an
earnest controversy arose between it and the Assembly.
To the great disgust of the extreme puritans this resulted
in the complete assertion of secular control over the
Parl. Hist. IX. 351-3. " Ibid. p. 467.
a Neal's tIst. of Puritans, Vol. II. p. 194, and Append. No. 3 (Ed. 1754).
THE REFORMED CHURCIHES. 485
church. An act was passed conferring on the congregational assemblies the right to suspend from communion
in certain specified cases and in accordance with a prescribed form of trial, but all persons so excomm.unicated
were empowered to appeal to the classical assemblies, the
synods, and finally to Parliament itself'. Thus not only
were the pretensions of the Jus Divinum scouted, but the
very exercise of control over the sacraments was subordinatecl to the civil authority.
It is hardly worth while to pursue the subject further,
for all these questions were practically settled by the G'reat
lebellion; and, when the storm was past, England, inl its
final reconstruction, gradually outgrew the spiritual terrors
which yet lingered on the statute-book. In the openin,
years of the eighteenth century, honest Joseph Binghallm
cleplores the laxity of discipline pervading the church ever
since men's minds had been perverted in the Rebellion.
Three communions per annum were still obligatory, and
the pastor was bound to present as notorious delinquents
all who did not obey the rule; but experience showed that,
especially in country parishes (and Bingoham was a country
parson), it was impossible to force the laity to obey the
law, and that it was equally useless to present them for
the disobedience.2
Yet a legal author of the latter part of the last century
describes all the old forms as being still in force-the writ
de excom'nunicato capiendo being issued after forty days
allowed for relentance, and the excommunicate being dlisabled from executing a will, serving on juries, appearing as
a witness, or bringing an action at law., At length, in 1814,
the chatnge suggested by Grindal in 1580 was made, of sulbstituting a writ de conturmace capiendo for the older form,
but it worked no substantial change in the principles inRushworth, VI. 210-12.
2 Bingham's Antiquities, Chap. ix. ~~ 7, 8.
3 Burn's Law Dictionary, -Dublin, 1792, p. 280.
41'
48G ElEXCOMMUNICATTON.
volved.1 Practically, however, it appears to be little more
than providing for the ecclesiastical courts a counterpart
of the "G contempt" with which the secular tribunals enforce
their jurisdiction. A church which is subjected to a free
state becomes insensibly moulded to suit the average of
public opinion; and those who have been concerned in
the prosecution of Bishop Colenso have probably acknowledged that in the nineteenth century it is not easy to bring
the rig'ors of ecclesiastical law to bear against any main.
From this long history of oppression and wrong we may
learn how easily the greed, the ambition, or the bigotry of
man can convert to the worst purposes the most beneficent
of creeds; and how unequal is our weak human nature to
the exercise of irresponsible authority. Honest fanaticism
and unscrupulous selfishness have vied with each other in
using as a weapon for the subjugation of body and soul
the brightest promises made by a benignant Saviour to his
children; and every increase of power has been marked by
an increase in its abuse. It is a saddening thought that a
religion, so ennobling and so purifying in its essence,
should have accomplished so little for humanity in this
life, and that the ages in which it ruled the heart and
intellect most completely should be those in which its
influence was the least efficient for good and the most
potential for evil. Its great central principles of love,
andc charity, and self-sacrifice seem ever to have found
their most determined enemies in those who had assumed
its ministry and had bound themselves to its service; and
every conquest made by its spirit has bee won won against the
earnest resistance of its special defenders. Even though
the last two centuries have been marked by a development
of true Christianity, still the old arrogance and uncharita53 Geo. III. c. 137, ~ 2 (Wharton's Law Diet. s. v.).
TIHE REFORMED CtIURCIIES. 487
bleness exist. InTdifferentism and irreligion are assuLmed
to be the motives of men who most earnestly strive to obey
the laws of Christ; and it would scarce be safer now than
in the thirteenth century to intrust temporal authority to
those who claim to represent the Redeemer and His
Apostles.
There is much, then, to be done ere the precepts of the
Gospel can truly be said to control the lives and the
characters of men; and all who are earnest, in the good
work can derive from the errors and the follies of the past
not only a noble zeal of indignation to nerve them afresh
for the long struggle, but also hopeful encouragement for
the future in measuring the progress of these latter (lays.
INDEX.
ABBEYS in the gift of thesove- Aimery de Maignac, Bishop of
reign, 95 Paris, 200
Absolution and dispensation, 153 Aird, John, his zeal against
Abuses of clerical exemption, witchcraft, 468
185, 197, 207, 212, 216 Aix-la-Chapelle, council of, in
Abuses of excommunication, 401 809, 58
Acacius, excommunication of, in 816, 59
132, 276, 284 in 836, 100
Accusations of laymen not re- in 862, 160
ceivable against clergy, 63 Alamanni, wehr-gilds of the, 292 st.
Accuser, unsuccessful, punish- Alaric II., his control over the
ment of, 258 church, 55
Adam, excommunication of, 394 Albigenses, legislation against, 387
Adrian I. refutes Charlemagne Alcuin on the secular power, 57
on image worship, 26 ns. Aldric of Le Mans, case of, 143
his grants to Charlemagne, 33, 87 Alez, synod of, in 1620, 464
adopts the canons of Ingilramn, 44 Alexander II. rebukes Gervase
rejectsfilioque from the creed, 58 of Rheims, 150
produces the donation of Con- Alexander III. forbids accusastantine, 156 tions between clerks and layAdrian It. grants privileges with men, 66 s2.
the pallium, 140 Alexander IV. on clerical conadmits Lothair to ordeal, 164 cubinage, 151
asserts papal supremacy, 166 Alexander VIII. anathematizes
assumes to dispose of king- the Declaration of 1682, 443
doms, 331 Alexandria, primacy of, 104
Adrian VI. on papal power, 378 its assaults on Constantinotreatment of the Reformers, 457 pie, 112, 113, 130
Adultery, penitence for, 474 its attempted supremacy,
African church, relations of, to 117, 282
Rome, 116 its power broken, 283
resists usurpations of Rome Alienation of church property
in 253, 120 forbidden by Odoacer, 17
dominated by Innocent I. in Allegiance, oath of, required of
416, 116 the clergy, 99
vindicates its independence secured by excom., 332
in 419, 126 released by excom., 368
excommunicates Pope Vigi- Alphonso of Arragon, case of, 374
lius in 550, 118 Alphonso the Wise on clerical
Agapm, or love feasts, 228 immunity, 195
Agde, council of, in 506, 55, 174 on excom., 393, 403, 416
Agobard, St., on image worship, 27 vs. Alvarez Pelayo defines the impehe aids in degrading the Em - rial power, 37
peror, 321 proves the supremacy of the
he is deposed, 102 church, 81 it.
490 INDEX.
Alvarez Pelayo- Appellate jurisdiction (Papal)
on clerical immunity, 195 granted temporarily by counAmbrose, St., on the trial of popes, 17 cil of Sardica, 122
on temporalities, 98 n. falls into desuetude, 123
on penitence, 242 zs. revived by Innocent I. 125
his excom. of Maximus, 272 denied by African church, 126
his opposition to Justina, 272 admitted by Gaul, 128
his rebuke of Valentinian II. 272 established by Valentinian
his excom. of Theodosius, 273 III., 129
Anastasius (Emp.), his resistance rejected by the East, 130
to Rome, 285 admitted by Spain, 131
Anastasius II., his assertion of rejected by the Western BarRoman supremacy, 118 barians, 132
Anathema, omnipotence of, 361 its recovery attempted with
disregard of, 433 the pallium, 135
Ancyra, council of, in 314, 275 Boniface seeks to revive it, 136
Andronicus of Pentapolis, his ex- the pallium again resorted to, 137
communication, 240, 264, 270 Charlemagne disregards the
Anglo-Saxon laws on benefit of papal claims, 138
clergy, 187 privileges of appeal conceded
Angels, excommunication of, 393 with the pallium, 139
Anglican church, excom. in, 475 jurisdiction established by
abuses of,'' 478 the false decretals, 141
complaints of the people, 480 delay in admitting it, 142
decline of, after the Great established by Nicholas I., 143
Rebellion, 485 case of Rothadus of Soissons, 145
Anicetus (Pope) and Polycarp, 105 evils attendant upon the sysAnimals, excommunication of, 410 tem, 147
Anisola, case of the Abbey of, 181 complaints of the church, 149
Anne, Queen, extends benefit of jurisdiction denied by the
clergy, 190 Neapolitan Normnans, 150
Anne of Britanny stops excom- admitted by the German Emmunication for debt, 423 perors, 150
Anselm of Milan deposed, 102 corruptions entailed by it, 151
Antioch, its quarrel with Jeru- reform attempted by council
salem, 113 of Bale, 152
primacy of, 104 evils continue undiminished,
restored to communion in - 152, 427
415, 282 Apt, council of, in 1365, 422
council of, in 269, 1(07 Arabic version of Nicene canons, 109
council of, in 341, Arbitration in the early church, 68
93 ai,., 104, 109, 231, 263, 280 of bishops, 109
Apiarius, case of, 126 enforced by Honorius, 69
Apocrisarii, papal, 21 Arcadius, his pretended excomApostles, their avoidance of here- munication, 125 ac.
tics, 238 and Honorins, law of, in 400, 123
their teachings of forgive- Arian controversy, advantages
ness, 225 of, to Rome, 109
Apostolic Canons (see Ccnoos). Arius, his excommunication reConstitutions (see Constitu- moved by Constantine, 266
ti6oss). Aries, first council of, in 314, 248, 270
Sees, primallcy of, 104, 111 second council, in 443, 93 sc.
Appellate jurisdiction of Rome, sixth council, in 813,
77zc., 119 307 it., 315?a.
not claimed in the primitive Arnold of Brescia on temporalities, 98
church, 119 is sacrificed by Frederic I., 36
successfully resisted when Arnoul (Emperor), oath of allefirst advancled, 120 giance to him, 40 cn.
INDEX 491
Arnoul of Rheims eludes excom., 330 Bankers, Roman, protected by
his imprisonmnent, 340 excommunication, 417
Arnoul of Tours and the pal- Bankruptcy and perjury, 419
lium, 140 9z. Barbarians, their control over
Arsenius, St., his policy of ex- the church, 55
communication, 261 their independence of Rome, 132
Arson, punishment of, 395 they encourage episcopal juArticles, the 42 and 39, 476 risdiction, 71
Aspe, valley of, 408 troubles of the church with
Assembly of Westminster, 484 - them, -291
Athalaric, his control over the Btrber of the Chhtelet, his funcchurch, 18 tions, 203
encourages immunity of cler- Bartholomew a Martyribus, 212
gy, 173 Baronius on the grant of Adrian,
Athanasisus, excommutnication by, 271 87 Z.
Attigny, penance of, in 822, 317 on the Sardican canons, 126 it.
Atto of Vercelli asserts immunity on the donation of Louis-leof clergy, 67 9c. Debonna-ire, 157 n.
Auditio, in penitence, 242 Basil, St., rejects the authority
Audovera supplanted by Frede- of the West, 110
gonda, 310 on segregation of excommunAugsburg Confession, excom. in, 459 nicates, 271
Augustine, St., on judicial func- he excommunicates a village,
tions of bishops, 69 3i'2 n.
upholds African independ- BEasilides, case of, 120
ence, 127 Baudoin Bras-de-Fer, his appeal
on Eucharistic oblation, 229. to Rome, 155
on the effects of excom., 237 -le-Chauve and the Abbey of
on segregation, 239 St. Bertin, 333
affirms excom. of dead, 253 Baugency, council of, in 1104, 365
on limitations of excom., 256 Bavaria, clerical immunity in, 219?7..
on discipline of church, 259 Bavarian code, appointment of
reproves general excom., 301 bishops under, 86
Aurelian and the See of Antioch, 107 on clerical immunity, 177
Autonomy of the prim. churches, 109 wehr-gilds in the, 292 n.
Autun, synod of, in 1094, 364 Beaunmanoir admits clerical] imBishop of, maintains clerical munity, 184 -i., 196
immnunity, 207 on excommunication, 391, 402
*rats of, excommunicated, 411 Belisarius condemns Silverius, 173
Auxanius of Aries, receives the Benedict the Levite, his capitupal. lium, 135 laries, 62
Auxerre, council of, in 578, 177 supposed to be the author of
Avignon, council of, in 1326, the Pseudo-Isidor, 62
389, 392, 427 on prohibited degrees, 313
in 1337, 421, 427 on spoliation of the church, 322
Azzo of Milan, 349 Benedict XII. collects debts by
excommunication, 420
Benefit of clergy, 169
ADEGESILUS of Le Mans, 73 Benevolences enforced by excom. 479
Bailies, Scottish, subject to Berlin, complaint of, 382
kirk-sessions, 468 Bernard, St., on segregation of
Bale, council of, 152, 382, 431 excolmmunicates, 380
Baltimore, second council of, in restores an accursed vine1866, 447 yard, 409
Baluze, on the grant of Adrian, 88 z. anathematizes flies, 410
Bamberg, synod of, in 1491, Bertha, Queen, repudiation of, 364
192, 374 n.., 431, 433, 450 )i. Berthair, bishop-electof Chalons, 97
Bangor, quarrel over bishopric of, 97 Berthold of Ratisbon, 80 n.
492 INDEX.
Bertin, St., abbey of, quarrel Bishops, election ofover, 333 admitted by the church
Bertrade of Anjou, her excom., 304 up to 850, 90
Bigaimy prohibited by Lothair I., 311 the church endeavors to
Bingham, Joseph, on neglect of throw it off, 91
communion, 485 the papacy seeks to obBishoprics sold by the Merovin- tain it, 91, 96
gians, 83 the laity deprived of
Bishops, political power of, 47 suffrage, 92
Frankish, threaten Gregory efforts to confine it to the
IV., 61 suffra.gans, 93
their power of arbitration in customs of the Greek
the early church, 68, 169 church, 93
their sentences enforced, 69 confusion under Charlescriminal justice intrusted to le-Chauve, 95
them exclusively, 79 the Metropolitans atempowered to demand extra- tempt to gain control, 96
dition, 325 the power absorbed by
their jurisdiction enforced the papacy, 99 a.
by the state, 326 Blanche of Castile, law of, 387
relied on by the state to en- Blind men, provision for, 188
force the law, 328 Blondel exposes the False Deereappeals from their decisions tals, 53
to the throne, 329 Boerius, Peter, on the Roman
empowered to coerce incest- curia, 403
uous persons, 311, 312 Boniface, St., crowns Pepin-lemurder of, in Bavarian law, 292 Bref, 31
immunity of from accusa- his appointment to see of
tions, 64 Mainz, 87
deposed for treason, 102 his efforts to extend papal
reverence paid to them by jurisdiction, 136
Constantine, 170 his troubles with Roman juimmunity granted them by risdiction, 147
Constantius, 171 Boniface I., his election to the
removed by subsequent papacy, 16
emperors, 171 Boniface III. obtains supremacy
restored by Justinian, 173 over Constantinople, 11-5 i.
jurisdiction over clergy Boniface VIII. on clerical immugranted by Justinian, 174 nity, 198
punished for improper excom.329 grants privilege to Berlin, 382
necessity of, in death-bed restricts interdict for debt, 420
absolution, 251 Boniface IX., his sale of indultheir position in Augsburg gences, 450 9.
Confession, 459 Boniface of Ferentino, 296
election of Bonosus, case of, 123
originally by people and Bourbon, Pierre, refused burial, 422
clergy, 81 Bracton admits benefit of clergy,
intervention of the sov- 184 n.
ereign, 82 Braga, Archbishopric of, and the
controlled by the Mero- pallium, 141 gz.
vingians, 83 Branks for penitents, 474
the church endeavors to Brazil, excom. of ants in, 415
assert its independence, 85 Britanny, excom. for debt in, 423
but fails in both France Counts of, cases of, 298, 388
and Spain, 86 British church admits clerical
appointing power exer- immunity, 175
cised by Charlemagne, 87 Brixen, synod of, 362
and by Louis-le-Ddbon., 90 1 Brochmael of Gwent, his excom., 324
INDEX. 493
Burdinus, Martin, antipope, 372 Celestin I.]3urgundians refuse clerical im- on denial of comnmunion, 237, 249
mlunity, 174 Cemetery, interdiction of, 434
Burial denied to excommunicates, Chalcedon, council of, in 451,
369, 371, 406 14, 59, 68, 104, 169, 172, 257, 258
to bankrupts, 421 Chalons, council of, in 579, 133
Burlesque of excommunication, 389 in 649, 86, 177
Byzantine emperors, their control in 813, 315 t,., 316?t.
over episcopal nominations, 93 Charibert, King, his fate, 300
Charlemagne refutes image worship, 26 sc.
C2ECILIANUS, trial of, 12 conquers Italy, 33
Calixtus I. and IHippolytus, 101 his donation to the church, 33
his depravity, 233 grant of Adrian I. to him, 33, 87
Calixtus II., his simnony, 52 9t. his control over the papacy, 34
and Thurstan of York, 374 his coronation as emperor, 35
Calvinist doctrine on excom., 461 associates Louis-le-DdbonCalvin's confession of faith, 462 naire in the empire, 37
code of discipline, 464 his jealousy of sacerdotal inCambrai, council of, in 1565, 441 terference, 46
Canada, pigeons excom. in, 415 permanence of his legislation, 49
Canonization, expenses of, 52 az. his supremacy over the
Canon law, supremnacy of, in the church, 56
False Decretals, 62 adopts one of the Isidorian
burned by Luther, 457 canons, 66
Canons apostolic, on local inde- abolishes the jurisdiction of
pendence, 109 the bishops, 75
on participation in the restricts the territorial jurisEucharist, 231 diction of the church, 76
on segregation, 238 exacts military service fiom
Canosa, interview of, 360 church lands, 83
Canterbury, archbishop of, in his nomination to bishoprics, 87
1293, his petition, 140 mc. he grants the right of elecsynod of, in 1640, 479, 481 tion, 89
Capitularies, how enacted, 56 exacts oaths of fidelity from
of Benedict the Levite, 62 the clergy, 100
Carlonman (Duke) seeks to re- disregards the appellate juform the church, 306 risdiction of Rome, 138
Carlomnan (King) relies wholly and puts an end to its abuses, 147
on the chuirch, 328 his donation to St. Peter, 156
Carlovingian legislation, perma- he disregards the donation
nence of, 49 of Constantine, 156
traditions, reverence for in his matrimonial irregulariGermany, 395 ties, 160
Carlovingians, struggles between his legislation on clerical
the, 41 immunity, 178
Caroline books, 26 nc. he disregards it in practice, 179
Carthage, council of, in 348, 263 he forbids warfare to clerks, 305
in 390, 93 as., 251, 264 he uses the church as a civilin 397, 68, 172, 228 c.., izingr agency, 306
229, 232, 252, 256 his control over the sacrain 398, ments, 306
239, 248, 249, 253, 257 he enforces obedience to the
in 401, 256 church, 307
in 419, 256 prohibits incestuous. marriCautinus, bishop of Clermont, 84 ages, 312
Celestin I., his control over Gal- restrains spoliationm of the
lican churches, 128 church, 314
42
494 INDEX.
Charlemagnes- Chlttelet of Paris, cases in the, 200
prohibits abuse of excom- Chaucer's Pardoner, 450 iz.
munication, 315 Chiersy,'synod of, 90
Charles Martel is appealed to by capitulary of, 96
Gregory II., 25 Childebert II., enforces excom., 304
is offered the kingdom of Children, communion adminisItaly, 29 tered to, 231
his disposal of bishoprics, 87 Chilperic I., reproved by GreCharles-le-Chauve, his tenure of gory of Tours, 176
sovereignty, 32?Z. Chilperic II., extends territorial
his nominations to bishop- jurisdiction, 75
rics, 90, 95, 96 Chindaswind, his law on clerical
gives the abbey of St. Mar- immunity, 175
tin to Robert-le-Fort 95 Christ, his spirit of forgiveness,
enlarges eccles. jurisdic., 79 224, 259
subjects himself to episcopal Christian emperors, their control
jurisdiction, 80 over the church, 13
accuses Wenilo of' Sens, 102 Christians, early, corruptions
complains of appellate juris- among the, 233
diction, 148 Christopher II., of Denmark,
his connection with divorce laws of, 184 tc.
of Teutberga, 160, 163 Chrysostom, St. John, his conobliged to admit clerical im- demnation, 124
munity, 182 avenged by Rome, 282
endeavors.to abrogate it, 183 on perdition of excommuniforbids warfare to clerks, 305 ac. cates'236
his extradition treaties, 325 he denounces excommunicahe enforces excom., 326 tion of the de.ad, 254
he seeks support from the on abuse of excoin., 261
church, 327 he exalts priestly authority, 271
he controls excom., 329 Church, primitive, organization
proclaims the supremacy of of, 104
Rome, 330 its corruption, 233
secures his subjects' allegi- its subjection to the
ance by excom., 332 Christian emperors, 13
Charles-le-Simple, his right to and to the barbarians, 55
investitures admitted, 88 so. to Charlemagne, 56
pardons the murder of Fulkl, 335 to Louis-le-DWbonnaire, 59
Charles V. (France), restricts it protects the people, 42 nc.
clerical immunity, 200 necessity of its unity, 47
his laws on excom., 390 is invited to interfere beon excom. for debt, 420 tween kings and subjects, 332
Charles VII. (France), on cleri- its unprotected condition a.t
cal immunity, 206 the rise of feudalism, 333
sustains the royal courts, 421 its corruptions in the middle
Charles IV. (Enmp.), submits to ages, 208, 428, 434
papacy, 37 Civil cases removed from eccleenforces clerical immunity, 191 siastica.l jurisdiction, 439
fine for neglect of excom., 432 Clarendon, constitutions of, 187
Charles V. (Emp.), seeks to re- Claudius of Turin, 26 so.
form the church, 211, 439 Clement III. and William of
Charles I. (Engl.), his use of ex- Scotland, 374
communication, 479 singular excom. by, 416
Charta de Foresta guaranteed Clement III., antipope, his elecby excommunication, 373 tion, 362
Charters, curses attached to, 293 his death, 366
Chassande on clerical immunity, 207 Clement VII., limits excommuon excom. of animals, 411 I nication for debt, 425
INDEX. 495
Clement VIT. — Conrad, King of the Romans, 3(63
his miildness towards Fred- Consistories, their power of exeric of Saxony, 458 communication, 462
Clergy, benefit of, 169) Constance, council of, 78 i, 381
concubinage of, 148, 151 Constans II. exiles Martin I., 22
despotism of the, 210 Constantine, his control over the
corruption of the, church, 13
208, 233, 428, 434 organizes general councils, 109
their separation from the donation of, 111 e., 155
laity, 290 appoints Pope Melchiades as
their vices the work of God, 217 judge, 121
Clermont, council of, in 1095, 364 admits episcopal immunity, 170
Clotair I., enlarges episcopal ju- threatens Athanasius, 171
risdiction, 73 his control of communion, 266
on episcopal elections, 84, 85 Constantine Copronymus, Roexcommunictated by St. Nice- man documents dated by, 29
tins, 301 Constantine Pogonatus and the
Clotair II. on episcopal elections, 85 popes, 23
his edict of 615, 177 Constantinople, council of, in 448,
Cnut, his laws on benefit of 240, 258
clergy, 187 in 553, 20, 254
on excommunication, 384 9z. in 869, 260
Code of Discipline, Calvinist, 464 Constantinopolitan church,rise of, Il
Cognac, council of, in 1260, 406 originally under province of
Colloquy of Poissy, 28 iz. Thrace, 112
Cologne remains faithful to made second to that of Rome, 112
Henry IV. 370 attacked by Eastern churches, 112
council of, in 1266, 396 temporary triumph of AlexCommunion, original character of, 228 andrid, 113
continues to be a repast, 229 mad e equal to Rome by counbecomes obligatory and fre- cil of Chalcedon, 114, 131
quent, 231 Ronman supremacy admitted
is universally administered, 231 by Phocas, 115 n.
even to the dead, 232 wrests Macedonia from Rome, I 18
becomies an instrument of co- quarrel with Rome over Acaercion, 232 CillS, 132, 276, 284
effects of its deprivation, 235 humiliation of, 287
letters of, 262 symbol, the, 58
controlled by Constantine, 2066 Constantius persecutes Liberius, 17
by Justinian, 262 his la:w in favor of episcopal
by Charleimagne, 306, 315 immunity, 171
by Charles-le-Chauve, 329 Constitutiones Sicularmirm, cleriby royal prerogative, 329 cal immunity in,
reverence inculcated for it, 298 184 s?., 192
its disregard by the barba- excommunication in, 399
rians, 302 Constitutions, Apostolic, reprove
its administration to idiots, 440 litigation, 68
enforced in Scotland, 470 on participation in cormaConcordats of Martin V. 381 nion, 231
of Leo X. 382, 390 on abandonment of convicted
Concubinage encouraged by a.p- criminals, 233
pellate jurisdiction, -148, 151 on perdition of excommuniby clerical immunity, 208 cates, 236
Confession, auricular, 269 on segregation, 238
used to enforce segregation, 380 on penitence. 24l
Confiscation of excommunicates, 383 on limitations of excomn., 255
Conrad the Salic disregards cleri- on lex talionis, 258
cal immunity, 191 rules of excommunication, 267
49, 6 I NDEX.
Constitutions, Apostolic- AGOBERT I. appoints Dicier
occupations forbidden in, 269 of Cahors, 86
Contumacy, severity of penalty threatened by Sulpicius, 297
for, 430 Damasus, his election to the paa substitute for excommuni- pacy, 16
cation, 479 false decretal attributed to, 140 se.
Contumeliosus of Riez, case of, Damiani, St. Peter, on papal si132, 134 mnony, 51?Z.
Convocation, Anglican, of 1562, 476 prohibits divorce of Henry
of 1580, 478 IV., 346
Copyright enforced by excom., 416 reproves abuse of excom., 354
Cornelius rebuked by Cyprian, 121 Dante, on temporalities of church, 98
Coronation, sacerdotal ministra- D'Argentrd, Bertrand,. on excomtion in, 31 munication for debt, 424
of Charlemagne, 34 Dead, excommunication of the, 253
of Louis-le-D6bonnaire, 37 denied by Leo, Gelasius,
of Lothair I., 39 and Chrysostom, 253
Corporal punishment for excom., 323 affirmed by Cyprian,
as alternative for excomn., 244 Augustine and TheoCorruption in the early church, 233 philus. 253
fostered by appellate juris- case of Theodore of Mopdiction, 147 suestia, 254
by clerical immunity, the question remains un185, 197, 207, 212, 216 settled, 255
Cossa, Balthasar, his usury, 424 Death-bed communion, importCouncils, their subordination to ance of, 246
the state, 14 refused for certain offences, 247
Courtly toleration for emperors, 276 essential to salvation, 248
Creed of Nicea., altered by Char- varying practice of the
lemiagne, 57 church, 249
Criminal jurisprudence of church, 243 ceremonial connected with it, 25 1
jurisdiction of kirk-sessions, 467 Death-punishment for heresy, 26 7
Criminals assume tonsure as safe- Debts, collection of, by excom., 417
guard, 200 invented by the popes, 417
clerical immunity for, eagerly adopted by creditors, 419
190, 197, 207, 212, 216 heirs of bankrupts excomn., 420
Curia, Roman, greed of the, restrained by Boniface VIII., 420
51 n., 403 refusal of sepulture to bankCurses to protect church pro- rupts, 421
perty, 293 questions arising from inaCyfeiliawg, Bishop, his use of ex- bility to pay, 423
comnmunication, 324 efforts to abrogate the system,423
Cyprian and Marcion of'Arles, 106 its uses and abuses, 424
his superscription of epistles, 1.07 Declaration of 1682, 442
his resistance to Rome, 120 Decretals, the false (see.Forgeries).
on Eucharistic oblation, 229 papal, their influence, 50
on corruption of the church, 233 burnt by Luther, 457
on perdition of excommuni- Degradation of bishos for trenason,102
cates, 236 Degrees prohibited in imarriage, 309
on penitence, 241 Denis the Less, his collection of
on deathbed communion, 249 canons, 43
on excommunication of dead, 253 Denmark, clerical immunity in, 184?n.
on violation of excom., 264 Denziger, his account of Pseudoon the independence of the Isidorian theories, 48
churches, 280 Deposition of Louis-le-D6bon., 319
Cyril, his attackl on Nestorius, 112, 113 of kings by popes, 353, 354
his efforts for Alexandrian Descendants of excommunicates,
supremacy, 117 punishment of, 381
INDEX. 497
Diego Gelmirez buys an arch- Ecclesiasticsbishopric, 52 it. protection accorded to, 317
excommunication by, 415 their disregard of excom., 403 n.
Diet of Nurnberg complains of Edward I. abrogates clerical imappellate jurisdiction, 152 maunity, 187
of clerical immunity, 209 Edward II., clerical immunity
of excommunication, 433 under, 188
Dimetian Code abolishes ecclesi- on excommunication, 385
astical jurisdiction, 73 n. Egra, constitution of, 150
Dionysius of Corinth, his epistles, 106 Egyptian bishops, their subjecDios, monastery of, 284 tion, 117
Dioscorus, his quarrel with Con- Election of bishops (see Bishops).
stantinople, 112, 113, 114 Elections, papal (see Pclpal elechis tyranny at Alexandria, 117 tious).
he excommunicates Leo I., 283 Elizabeth, Queen, restricts benehis condemnation, 172 fit of clergy, 190
Disabilities of penitents, 244' uses excommunication, 477'
of excommunicates, 391, 397 Elvira, council of, 26 gz.., 247, 251, 263
Discipline, Calvinist code of, 464 Emannncipation of the state, 445
Dispensation and absolution, 153 Embrun, excommunication of, 404
Divorce of Teutberga., 159 archbishop of, 96
Donation of Constantine, 155 Emperors, Roman, their autois presented to Charle- cracy, 13
magne by Adrian I., 156 their power inferior to the
is disregarded by Char- church, 271
lemagne, 156 Empire bestowed on Charlemagne
is rejected byOtho III., by Leo III., 34
158 sz. controlled by papacy, 36
is disregarded by St. Ems, congress of, in 1786, 138 zs.,
HIenry II., 158 aS. 141 as.
its authenticity assumed Encyclical of 1864, 446
by Chr. AVolff, 158. England, benefit of clergy in, 186, 187
of Charlemagne, 156 interdict under John, 374 az.
of Louis-le-)edbonnaire, 157 laws on excommunication, 384
Donatists, their heresy, 242 controlled by the king, 385
Drogo of Metz, appellate power excom. under Henry VIII., 475
conferred on, 144 in the 39 Articles, 476
Druids, excommunication by the, 232 civil penalties of, under
Duperron, Cardinal, forbids ex- Elizabeth, 477
communication of animals, 413 abuses of, 478complaints of the people, 480
protest of the Long ParliaE'AST, Emperors of, lose con- ment, 483
Et trol of papacy, 24 supremacy asserted by it, 484
Easter, divergence as to observ- decline of excomnlunication, 485
ance of, 105 Enslavement for injuries to clergy, 67
Eastern bishops- excommunica- Epaone, council of; in 517, 175
tion of, in 256, 238 Ephesus, council of, in 341, 14
Ebbo of Rheims, 38, 102, 144, 179, 321 Robber synod of,
Eberhardt of Salzburg, 407 1.13, 130, 258, 283
Ecclesiastical jurisdiction, origin Epiphanius of Constantinople
of, 68 submits to Rome, 286
supremacy of, 165 Episcopal elections (see Bishops).
over marriage, 311 oaths, 99, 136
Ecclesiastics not competent as control of coronation, 32 as., 35 a.
judges in Wales, 73 nt.., 76 as. influence in the state, 47
salutes to, enjoined by law, 303 Erasmus condemns the Bull Exmilitary hlabits of 305 surge Domine, 455
42*
498. INDEX.
Ermeland, bishop of, his moderna- Felix of Aptungis, 242
tion, 458 Felix III., his excommunication
d'Espeisses on the exactions of of Acacius, 132, 276, 284
Rome, 50 n. on reception of excom., 264 Z.
Essenes, excom. among the, 232 n. Ferdinand (Emperor), his remnonEtablissements of St. Louis, strances at Trent, 213, 435
196. 388, 391 Feudalism, its recognition by
Eucharist, original nature of the, 228 Charles-le-Chauve, 327
continues to be a repast, 229 Fidelity, oaths of, exacted from
is a bond of union, 231 bishops, 99
frequency of its administra- Filioqe interpolated in creed, 58
tion, 231 Fines imposed on excom., 387, 390
veneration rendered to it, 231 z. for neglect of excom., 432, 477
administered to the dead, 232 for non-observance of Sunbecomes an instrument of day and communion, 470
coercion, 232 Firmilian, his resistance to Rome,
effects of its deprivation, 235 239, 281
decline of reverence for, 244 Flavianus, murder of, 113
administered to the dying, 252 Florentines hang the bishop of
reverence inculcated for, 298 Pisa, 433
money value of, 315 Florus Diaconus on episcopal
administration of, to idiots,440 as. elections, 91
ordeal of; administered to on Modoin of Autun,' 181 tn.
Lothair, 164 on privileges of church, 292 7.
Eucharistic blood, excommunica- Folcuin, St., of Terouane, 95
tion written in, 260 Forchheim, diet of, 361
Eugenius II. takes the oath of Forgeries, the,
~allegiance, 40 Ingilram, canons of, 44
Euphemius, excommunication of, Theodosian code, interpola264, 276, 285 tion of, 76
Eusebius of Dorvlaeum, 15, 258 Donation of Constantine, 155
Eutyches, accusation of, 258 Charlemagne, 157 ln.
his excommunication, 240 Epistles of Innocent I.,
his appeal, 130 125 n., 276
Eutychianism, proscription of, 286 of Gregory I. on marExactions of the papal court, riage, 309 t7., 313
51 n., 137, 138 7c., 140 n. on dethroning kings, 354
Excommunicates, civil disabili- Louis-le-D6bonnaire on penties of, 322 alties of excommunication, 354
exhumation of, 369 of Nicene Canons by Leo I. 114
seizure of, by demons, 433 by Juvenal, Bishop of JeruExcommunication, 223 salem, 113
Expulsion from the church, 227, 232 the False Decretals, 42
Extradition treaties of 857 and 860, 78 disseminated by Riculfus, 43
of excommunicates, 325 relations of the See of
Ma.inz to the, 43, 62, 137
discredited by Hinemar,
1ABIOLA, her penitence, 242 9i. 44 c.
1 Fallibility of church, admit- theories concerning, 48
ted, 377 2. influence of, 49
False Decretals, the (see Forge- exposed by Blondel, 53
c-ies). defended by the church, 53
Fano, bishop of, prosecuted, 220 presented to Gregory
Fasting of penitents, 244 IV. in 833, 61
Fecht on excommunication, 461 attributed to Benedict
Fees for church services, 407 7.. the Levite, 62
for removing interdicts, 434 their doctrines of papal
Felicissimus, case of, 120 supremnficy, 62
INDEX. 499
Forgeries- Fredegonda murders Pretextatus, 302
False Decretals, their doctrines supplants Audovera, 310
of clerical immu- Frederic Barbarossa, sacrifices'
nity, 63, 182 Arnold of Brescia, 36
of ecclesiastical ju- reproves the papal pretenrisdiction, 77 sions, 37
of implicit obedi- enforces excommunication, 395
ence, 80 Frederic II. admits appellate juof immunity from risdiction, 150
oaths, 101 c7. admits clerical immunity, 191
of hierarchical or- limits it, 192
ganization, 103 his German laws on excom. 395
of excom., 402 his Sicilian laws, 399
they render the pallium Frederic of Cologne resists papal
obligatory, 140?z. exactions, 51 ni.
they insist on papal ju- Frederic of Saxony protects Lurisdiction, 141 ther, 454
are quoted by Wenilo of contempt for excommunicaSens, 145 tion at his court, 458
are established by Freedmen protected by the church, 74
Nicholas I. 147, 154 Frisia, enforcement of excom. in, 401
papal supremacy as- Fuero Juzgo, episcopal jurisdicserted by them, 160 tion in, 72?n
prohibit abuse of Eucha- clerical immunity in, 194
ristic oblations, 230 excommunication in, 392
prohibitincestuous mar- Fulbert of Chartres on the pallium,
riages, 313 140 az.
enforcement of their Fulda, Abbey of, extent of its
principles, 344 possessions, 82 7,.
Forged letters of communion, 263 Fulk of Rheims and the bishopric
Formula of excommunication, 373 of Chalons, 97
Huguenot, 464 murder of, 333
Fortunatus of Todi, 296
France, clerical immunity in, 195
limited in 1563, 218 (1ALL, St., of Clermont, 84
restricted in 18th century, 219 G Gallican theory of the juconcordat with Leo X. 382, 390 risdiction of Rome, 146
laws on excommunication, 386 church, liberties of, 442
first legal penalties in 1228, 387 Gaul submits to Roman suprelegislation of St. Louis, 387 macy, 128
difficulty of enforcement, 388 Gauls, excommunication among, 232
disregard of excomi., 389 Gelasius I. his definition of the
laws of John II. Charles V. 390 canons, 45
disabilities of excom., 391 asserts supremacy of Rome,
project of reform at Trent, 436 117, 132, 287
remonstrates against council asserts immunity of clergy, 172
of Trent, 215 as. denies excom. of dead, 253
rejects council of Trent, 439, 441 on communion with excomFranche Comtd, reception of municates, 264, 265
council of Trent in, 442 his toleration for the empeFrancis I. complains of clerical rors, 276
immunity, 207 on homicide of clerks, 318 as.
limits it, 186 Gentilly, synod of, deprecates
limits spiritual jurisdiction, 423 image worship, 26 az.
]Frankfort, council of, in 795, 26 az. Geoffrey Vinsauf on papal power, 376
Frankish legislation, account of, 56 George of Bamberg, reforms of, 434 az.
bishops threaten Gregory IV. 61 on interdict, 398
Franks adclit clerical immunity, 176 his fees for burial, 407
500 INDEX.
Germaiin, St., excom. Charibert, 300 Gregory T.Germany, clerical immunity in, on power to inflict perdition, 250
184 vc., 190 he excommunicates Maximus
laws on excommunication, 394 of Spalatro, 288
weight of Carlovingian tra- his free use of excom., 293
dition, 395 he condemns its abuse, 294
laws of Frederic I. and II., 395 his explanalion as to mira.the Schwa.benspiegel, 397 cles, 295 cz.
powers conferred on the he acknowledges the fifth
chrllch, 398 general council, 255
reft,,rmnation in, 449 forged decretals attributed
separated from Rom. church, 366 to, 309 cn., 313, 354
Geroch of Reichersperg on the Gregory II, renders the papacy
donation of Constantine, 158 ic. independent, 24
Gerson on abuse of segregation, 381 appeals to Charles Martel, 25
on abuse of excom., 429 Gregory III. seeks the Frankish
Gian-Galeazzo Visconti, 193 alliance, 29
Gildas on segregation, 241 cc. on death-bed communion, 252
Giles of Rheims, case of, 134 prohibits marriage in seventh
God invoked to shield clerical degree, 310
vices, 217 Gregory IV. submits his election
Godefroy exposes interpolation in to Louis-le-DNbonnaire, 40
Theodosian code, 77 cz. he aids the rebellious sons of
Golden Bull of Frederic II., 150 Louis, 61.
Golias Episcopus on Roman is driven back to Rome, 61.
simony, 51cc. on oaths of allegiance, 100
Gontran refuses bribes for bish- is threatened with excomoprics, 83 munlication, 162?.
enjoins respect for the church, 304 epistle attributed to, 143
his interference in the case Gregory VII. on subordination
of Salonius, 133 of the empire, 31 c2.
his tyranny towards bishops, 177 insists on use of pallium, 141 cc.
Gordon, Nath., his execution, 473 lie raises the question of the
Gotefrido of Milan, 349 investitures, 347:(rdg6s, the earliest Icelandic his struggle with Henry IV., 349
code, 63 cc., 74 c7c. his death, 362
Gratian, Emperor, grants appel- Gregory IX. and clerical conculate power to Rome, 123 binage, 152
withholds it in 381, 124 on excommunication, 396
his law on capital sentences, excommunicates Frederic II.,407
275 ct. Gregory XIII. approves the SalzGratian, letters of communion in burg code, 216
his Decretunm, 263?c.. condemns infant communion,
Grosteste, Robert, on papal ava- 232 zc.
rice, 51 cc. reproves ecclesiastical abuses, 440
Gregory I.., his submission to the Gregory Thaumaturgus on corsecular power, 20, 22 ruptions in the church, 234
he reproves Serenus of Mar- on the four stages of peniseilles, 26 cc. tence, 242
he protects the widow and investigation ordered by, 268
orphan, 74 Gregory of Nazianzum, 110
on the title of (Ecumenic Gregory of Tours, his relies, 298
Patriarch, 115 he reproves Chilperic I., 176
he bestows palliuml on Virgil Grindal, Archbishop, on excom., 479
of ArIes, 135 Guardianship forbidden to ecclehe maintains clerical imImu- siastics, 253
nity, 174 Guillaume Bonne-Arne and the
on prohibited degrees, 309 palliumn, 141 cc.
INDEX. 501
Guiscard, Robert, his hostility IIermann, King of the Romans, 362
to Gregory VII., 350 Heresy of disregarding excomassists Gregory, 362 munication, 396, 438
Gunthair of Cologne, procures debt is not, 424
the divorce of Teutberga, 160 Heretics, persecution of, 265
is condemned by Rome, 161 in Anglican church, 482
refuses to submit, 162 Hervey of Rheims excommuniis deposed by Lothair, 162 cates Winemar, 333
Guthrie, Bishop of Moray, his Hierarchy, organization of, 267
excommunication, 471 Hilary of Arles, his quarrel with
Guy of Lombardy, his election, 42 is. Leo I., 128
Hilary, Pope, his activity, 131
IIincmar discredits Ingilram and
TIALE, Sir M., on benefit of Isidor, 44
~l clergy, 190 he rejects papal epistles, 45
HIlll, Bishop of Exeter, his im- on royal nominations of
peachlnent, 484 bishops, 91
TItrden. gown for penitents, 474 his rigor in episcopal elections, 96
hteirs of bankrupt, excom. of, 420 on the appointment of bishops, 97
Henoticon of Zeno, 283 oath exacted from, 101
IIenry II. (St.) disregards the *he applies for pallium, 144
donation of Constantine, 158 z. he resists the appellate jurisHenry IV. (Emp.) on clerical diction of Rome, 146
immunity, 185 his disapprobation of papal
his minority, 345 invective, 163 is.
his quarrel with the papacy, 348 he claims clerical immunity, 183
his excommunication, 352 he ridicules papal assumphis submission, 360 tions, 331
exchanges depositions with Hincmar of Laon, case of, 183
Gregory VII., 362 Hippolytus and Calixtus I., 105
recovers his power, 363 Holy Ghost, procession of, 58
his dethronement, 368 Homicide of ecclesiastics, 317
his death, 370 Honorius (Emp.) intervenes in
Henry V. (Emp.) on temporalities, 98 papal contests, 16
rebels against his father, 368 enforces arbitration of bishdigs up his father's body, 371 ops, 69
extorts abandonment of in- but limits their jurisdiction, 70
vestitures, 371 his law in favor of episcopal
submits to Rome, 372 immunity, 171
Henry I. (England), his laws on Honorins III. on subjection of
excomr-munication, 384 2. the empire, 31 n.
his punishment for contu- Hormisdas, his triumph over
macy, 374 Constantinople, 285
Henry VI., his canonization ne- his inflexibility, 287
gotiated for, 52 i. Hospitality enjoined' by law, 328
his regulations respecting Howell Dda, admits benefit of
clerical immunity, 206 clergy, 184in.
Henry VII., his laws on benefit Hugh of Gapengais, case of, 364
of clergy, 188 Hugh of Lyons excommunicates
Henry VIII. limits benefit of Philip of France, 364
clergy, 189 Huguenots discourage litigation, 68
retains the power of the excommunication amnong, 462
church, 475 Humbert of Vienne, excommuniHenry IV. (France) refuses to cated for debt, 421
publish the council of Trent, 441 Hungary, pre-eminence of bishHenry of Salzburg on clerical ops in, 32,a.
corruption, 208 clerical immunity in, 184 i.
Heraclius of Saintes, 85 Hnss, his views on excom., 449
50 2 INDEX.
IIussites seek to abolish clerical Innocent III.illlmmunity, 208 his estimate of papal power, 377
HIyacinth, Brother, case of, 443 uses excom. to collect debts, 418
complains of abuse of his
letters, 428
BAS of Edessa, case of, 257 his treatment of Philip AuIceland, supremacy of canon gustus, 444
law in, 63 n. Innocent XII. anathematizes the
ecclesiastical jurisdiction in, 74 it. Declaration of 1682, 443
clerical immunity not ad- Insane, Eucharist forbidden to,440 t.
mitted in, 184 i. Inscription by accusers, 258
spiritual affinity in, 310 a. Interdict, introduction ofthe, 301, 302
burial refused to excom., 406 regulations of, 374 cc.
fees for church services, 407 n. for roceiving excom., 382, 383
spiritual penalties not used - for non-enforcement of exin, 4260c.. comn., 385, 390, 391, 392, 398
Idiots, communion for, 440 cc. for questions of debt, 420, 425
Illyricum, quarrel over churches abusive use of the,- 434
of, 118 fees for removing, 434 sc.
Image-worship condemned by the against sovereigns, 443
West, 26 cc. Investitures of bishops, 81, 348, 372
Immunity of the clergy, 63 Ipso facto excommunication, 430
clerical (see Beueflt of Clergy). preserved by council of Trent,437
Imperial council the tribunal for Irenmus on Rosnan primacy, 105
the pope, 17 rebukes Victor of Rome, 107, 280
crown, bestowed by the popes, 36 on corruption of the church, 233
consent requisite for the pal- on avoidance of heretics, 238
lium, 135 Isidor Mercator, or Peccator, 42
Impunity conferred by clerical Isidor of Seville on the duty of
immunity, 185, 197, 207, 212, 216 the state, 304
Ineendiarism, punishment of, 395 Italian reformers, modern, 228 cc.
Indestructibility of excommuni- Italy, primitive church of,t; 116
carted corpses, 408 clerical immunity establishIndulgences, abuses of, 450 ed in, 174
Infallibility of church, doubts as disregard of excom. in, 3.54
to, 377 cc. laws on exconlmunication, 398
Infants, conmmunion of, 231 Sicilian Constitutions, 399
Ingilramn of Metz, his canons, 44 Milanese legislation, 400
on the duty of the state, 321 Ivo of Chartres on royal supreInnocent I. and St. John Chry- macy, 330
sostom, 125
asserts appellate power, 125
assumes to rule the African AGGS for penitents 475
church, 116 i Jean II. his laws on excon. 390
asserts supremacy of Rome, 282 Jerome of Brandenburg, chuater
on death-bed communion, 249 of, 383
on requisites for excom., 256 n7. Jerusalem, its quarrel with Anon reception of excom., 264 cc. tioch, 113
on control over marriage, 309 cc. Assises de, clerical immunity
confession alluded to by, 269 cc. in, 184 cc.
Innocent II. and Louis-le-Jeune, 374 Jesus, forgiveness taught by, 224
exacts an oath from Lothair Jews, expulsion from the synaII., 37 iZ. gogue, 232, 237
excosm. Montpellier, 373 indirect excommunication of, 425
Innocent III. establishes appel- John I. sent as envoy by Theolate jurisdiction, 150 doric, 18
limits clerical exemption, 198 John II, his instructions from
lays interdict on England, 374 cz. Athalaric, 18
INDEX. 503
John III. and the case of Salo- Justification by faith, 452
nius, 133 Justin Marxtyr, his account of
John VIII. selects the emperor, 36 Eucharist, 228
assumes control over episco- Justin I. submits to Rome, 285
pal nominations, 92, 96 Justin II. sells episcopal appointinsists on use of pallium, 141 ments, 94
assumes the pardoning power, 154 Justina, Empress, overcome by
his abuse of excom., 324 St. Ambrose, -272
legislates for the Goths, 330 Justinian, his treatment of the
anathematizes rebels, 332 papacy, 19
John X. admits the secular ap- enlarges episcopal jurisdicpointment of bishops, 88 zs. tion, 70
John XII: defines the sources of his legislation on clerical imimperial power, 36 munity, 173
John XXII.. his definition of im- enforces supremacy of the
perial power, 36 state, 173
John XXIII. enforces usury by controls excommunication, 262
excommunication, 424 his delay in authorizing the
John of Antioch, his quarrel with pallium, 135
Jerusalem, 113 Justinian II. fails to subdue the
John the Faster of Constant., 115 papacy, 23
John of C'ple submits to Rome, 286
John of Philadelphia, apostolic
vicar, 23 JrINGS, deposition of by popes, 354
John of England, interdict un- IK divine right of, enforced by.
der, 374 as. excomnmunication, 481
Jougs for penitents, 475 Kirk-sessions, their power and its
Judges, ecclesiastical, corruption exercise, 465
of, 429
Julius I., appellate power conferred on himn, 110, 122 JAITY, their separation from
Jurisdiction, confusion of civil 1. the clergy, 290
and spiritual, 317 not allowed to enter the
ecclesiastical, origin of, 68 church without permission, 56
not favored by Valen- not allowed to accuse the
tinian III., 70 clergy, 63
encouraged by Justinian, 70 deprived of voice in episcoextended under the Bar- pal elections, 92
barians, 71 Lambert of Spoleto and the paespecially by the Wisi- pacy, 331
goths, 72 Lamubeth, council of, in 1261, 187, 385
nnder the Frannks, 73 Languedoc, estates of, their cornobjected to by the church, 73 pla ints, 206, 421
extended over freedmen Laodicaea, council of, in 320,
aand orphans, 74 81, 93 is., 228 az.
abolished by Charle- LatEn Sententi.a excomn., 430
alllgne, 75 Lateran, council of, in 1102, 366
enforced by the forgeries, 77 in 1215, 446?z.
enlarged by Charles-le- Law, secular, subjected to the
Chauve, 79, 328 canons, 62
extent of, in middle ~ supplemented by excom:,416
ages, 77 as. Legislation, imperial, on church
supremacy of, 165 matters, 16
enforced by the state, 326 of the Franks, how conducted, 56
papal, evils arising from, 427 tegislative functions of the
universal, claimed by Romre, 118 church, 243
of the kirk-sessions, 466 J Leo I. and the council of ChalJury of barbers, 204 cedun, 15
504 INDEX.,Leo I.- Libertinus of Foldi, 295
his legates at Ephesus, 114, 130 Libiau, bishop, his use of excom., 324
sends forged canons to Chal- Libya, governor of, his excom., 271
cedon, 114 Liegeois, burial of Henry IV. by
establishes the prerogative the, 371
of Rome, 128 Limoges, second council of, in
his quarrel with Hilary of 1031, 374 n., 406
Arles, 128 Linnens for penitents, 474
his doctrine as to supremacy Litterse formatae, or commendaof St. P-eter, 129 titire, 202
his absolution of Theodoret Llywelyn, Prince of Wales, 386
of Cyrus, 130 Lollards forced to worship imahis fialsiflcation of Sardican ges, 28 s.
canons, 131 of Kyle, 449
his rules for penitents, 245, 246 Lochiell, his description of kirkon death-bed communion, 249 sessions, 465
on abuse of excomn., 261 Lombard law, accusations beaffirms excom. of (lead, 253 tween clerks and laymen
excommunicates Dioscorus, 283 in, 66
forbids general excorn., 301 benefit of clergy in, 178
Leo II. restrains warlike ardor rights of church under,. 291?1.
of clerks, 305 Lombards assist Gregory II., 25
Leo III., his servility to Charle- their reception of Henry IV., 359
magne, 34 Lombardy, clerical immunity in, 193
is tried by Charlemagne, 34 London, council of, in 1342, 385.
crowns Charlemagne, 35 citizens of, complain of exinvades the imperial juris- communication, 480
diction, 38 Lothair I. crowned by Paschal I., 39
vainly resists the insertion reduces Romne to subjection, 40
of filioquee in the creed, 58 receives promise of obedience
admits the secular appoint- from Leo IV., 61
iment of bishops, 88 Im. prohibits bigamy, 311
sub mits to imperial jurisdic- his edict of 824, 157
tion, 179 donation to John of Trieste, 75 sb.
Leo IV. promises obedience to he deposes Louis-le-D6bonthe imperial laws, 61 naire, 319
admits the royal nomination he protects Ebbo of Rheimrs, 144
of bishops, 91 he pledges the state to enLeo X. on clerical immunity, 207 force excommunication, 318
his concordat with France, Lothair II. restores innocent
382, 390 II., 37 ii.
excommunicates Luther, 453 Lothair of Lothanringia forbidden
Leo (Emlp.), his law on clerical to influence episcopal elecimmunity, 172 tions, 91
Leo the Isaurian, 24 his marriage with Teutberga, 159
excom. by Gregory II., 25 he abandons her for Walobtains the churches of Illy- drada, 100
ricum, 118 is arraigned by Nicholas I., 161
Leptines, council of, in 743, 87 submits to the papal decision, 163
Letters of communion, 262 endeavors to elude it, 163
papal, abuses arising from, 427 admitted to ordeal by Adrian
Leudovald of Ba-yeux, first inter- II., 164
diet by, 302 dies at Piacenza, 165
Lever, Ralph, on abuses of ex- Lonis-le-Ddbonnaire declares
communication, 478 against image worship, 27 at.
Lex talionis applied to excom., 258 crowned king of Aquitaine
Liberius, persecuted by Con- by the pope, 33
stantius, 17 crowned emperor, 37
INDEX. 505
Louis-le-Ddbonnaire- Lutherreduces Leo III. to subjec- slow progress made by, 449
tion, 38 his ninety-five propositions, 451
sends Lothair I. to Italy, 39 his sermon on excom., 452
his supremacy over the church, 59 he asserts the right of pridethroned by his sons, 61 vate judgment, 453
forbids accusations between his excommunication, 453
clerks and laymen, 66 his treatise on the captivity
legislation protecting the of the church, 455
clergy, 67 he denies sacramental ordihe grants the right of epis- nation, 455
copal election, 89 he excom-municates the pope, 456
but exercises the right of ap- and burns the bull and canon
pointment, 90 law, 457
disregards the appellate ju- final doctrines of his followrisdiction of Rome, 139 ers, 459
his donation to St. Peter, 156 Lutheran doctrines as to church
his disregard of clerical iml- and state, 459
munity, 179 as to excommunication, 460
ecclesiastical cases tried by Lyndesay, Sir David, on clerical
him, 181 immunity, 210
grants the Roman law to on indulgences, 451 az.
Lombard church, 291 Lyons, council of, in 517, 303
submits to penance at At- in 567, 134
tigny, 316
extends and enforces spiritual
jurisdiction, 317?/ACEDONIA, quarrel over
is degraded and subjected to IY churches of, 118
penitence, 319 bishops of; complain of Rome, 1 25
forged decree attributed to, 354 Macon, council of, in 581, 177
Louis II. attacks Nicholas I., 162 in 585, 74, 179 a,., 303
his claims on Lothbaringia, 331 Magna Chlarta guaranteed by exLouis-le-Germanique, his control communication, 372
over the church, 60 Mainz, see of, its relation to the
Louis-le-Begue, oaths given at forgeries, 43, 62, 137
his coronation, 101 clergy of, resisting Rome, 51 -s.
Louis VII. and Archbishop of council of, in 813, 60, 312, 315 ls.
Bourges, 374 in 847, 60, 65
Louis, St., on clerical immunity, 196 in 851, 65 as.
his laws on excom., 387, 391 Mapes, Walter, on Roman avaon excom. for debt, 419 rice, 51 9t.
Louis X. on clerical immunity, 197 Marca, P. de, on the grant of
on excommllunication, 388 Adrian, 88 as.
Louis XIV. creates mixed tribu- Matrcion, his appeal to Rome, 119
nals, 218 Marcion of Arles, his heresy, 106
his independence of the Marcion (Emp.) and council of
church, 442 Chalcedon, 131
Louis II. of Bourbon procures suppresses Alexandrian inburial for his father, 422 subordination, 283
Lucius III. uses excommunica-.Marcovefa, her fate, 300
tion to collect debts, 418 Margaret of Parma forces the
Lull, his death for disregarding council of Trent on the
the church, 297 Netherlands, 439
Lull, St., appeals to Rome, 137 reproves abuse of excomn., 441
neglects to apply for palliunm, 138 Marriage, relatimons of early
Lupus of Ferrinres on papal si- church to, 309
mnony, 51 z. control gradually acquired
Luther on clerical immunity, 209 over it, 309
43
506 INDEX,.
Marriage- I Miracles necessary for protection
incestuous, prohibited, 312 of church, 294
doctrine of spiritual affinity, 310 character of Italian, 295
prohibited during penitence, 245 of Frankish, 297
during exconm., 405 of the Eucharist, 230 cc., 231?z.
use made by the church.of Modoin of Autun disregards cleits power over, 346 rical immunity, 181
M3arried clerks subjected to secu- Monitoires, 417, 443
lar courts, 198, 200 Montanus on unpardonable sin, 242
immunity granted them at Montpellier, consuls of, excom., 373
Trent, 215 Muratori on the donation of
Marsiac, council of, in 1326, 421 Louis-le-D]bonnaire, 157 9z.
Martial, case of, 120 Murder justified by Urban IT., 371
Martin I., exile of, 22 Myrc's, John, formula of excom., 373
appoints an apostolic vicar, 23
Martin V. on appellate jurisdiction of Rome, 78?z. ]TANTINUS of Angouleme, his
on clerical immunity, 192 IN fatte, 299
excom. Peter de Luna, 38tI Naples, appellate jurisdiction of
his concordats, 382 Rome in, 150
Martin, St., of Tours, delegates clerical immunity in, 192
his judicial functions, 69 excom.munication in, 399
Martin of Arles on excommuni- Napoleon I. adopts the Declaracation of animals, 413 tion of 1682, 443?zo
Martinus Polonus, his Chronol. Nature, excommunication of, 408
Pontificull, 89 9n. Netherlands, remonstrances
Mary Magdalen, church of St., 383 against council of Trent,
"Mary, Queen, restores benefit of in the, 215 7c.
clergy, 190 reception of council of Trent
Matthew of Vendlome on papal in the, 439
power, 376 Neustrian bishops, their letter
Mathia.s of Hungary restricts ec- to Louis le Germanique, 91
clesiastical jurisdiction, 77 9i. on oaths of allegiance, 101
Maurice (Einp.), his control over New Grenada abolishes clerical
the church, 20, 22 immunity, 220
Maximus (Emp.) excommuni- NicTea, council of, in 325,
caited by Ambrose, 272 93cc., 111, 243, 249, 257, 264 7c., 280
Maxilmus of Valence, case of, 128 in 787, 58, 93
Maximus of Spalatro, 288 Arabic canons of, 267
Meilleraie, Duc de la., case of, 443 Nicene creed, alteration in, 57
Melanehthon, his apology for Nicephorus Phocas sells bishopAugsburg Confession, 460 rics, 94
Melchiades (Pope) appointed Nicetins, St., of Treves, 300
judge by Constantine, 121 Nicholas I. asserts the freedom
Meletius, St., of Antioch, 15 of episcopal elections, 91
Merovingians, their contempt for confines them to the clergy, 92
excommunication, 303 his vigor in'the case of Ebbo, 145
their control over the church, 55 in the case of Rothadus, 146
sale of bishoprics by, 83 adopts the False Decretals,
Metz, synod of, condemns Teut- 147, 154
be rga, 159 his domineering spirit, 159 cc.
[Mexico abolishes clerical immu- exalts the pardoning power
nity, 220 of Rome, 154
MIilan, equality of, with Rome, 116 interposes in favor of Teutclerical immunity in, 193 berga, 161
schism in church of. 349 condemns Gunthair and
la.ws of, on excointlmunication, 400 Thietgaud, 161
Military habits of clerks, 305 is attacked by Louis II., 162'
INDEX. 507
Nicholas I.- Otho the Greattriumphs over the Lotharin- legend of his death, 339
gian prelates, 163 Otho III., his control over the
excommunicates Waldrada, 164 papacy, 89?.
establishes supremacy of ec- he denies the donation of
clesiastical jurisdiction, 165 Constantine, 158. ct.
asserts clerical immunity, 1S3 Otho IV. and the laws of CharleNicholas de Claminges on the magne, 49
papacy, 99 se. admits appellate jurisdiction, 150
Norman kings of Naples and the Outlawry of excommunicates,
appellate power, 150 354, 384, 395
Normandy, clerical immunity in, 186 of heretics demanded by Leo
Novatians, their heresy, 236.t., 242 X., 454
Noyon, council of, in 1344, 199, 200 Owen of Gwynnedd and bishopNiirnberg decree of Frederic I., 395 ric of Bangor, 97
diet of, grievances of the
152, 209, 425, 433
D AGAN mockery of excom., 261
X Pallium, use of the, 134
0ATH of a.llegiance esxacted of Pallium introduced in aid of
the popes and Romans 40 papal jurisdiction, 134
exacted of bishops and at first requires consent of
clergy, 99 emperor, 135
its significance, 100 powers bestowed with it, 135
gradcual change in its St. Bonifiace endeavors to
character, 136, 140 n. revive it, 136
release from, by the popes, 154 complaints of papal exactions
Obedience, implicit, claimed for in its bestowal, 137
the church, 80 reluctance of prelates to apenjoined by the state, 304 ply for it, 138
Oblations, Eucharistic, their na- privilege of appeal attached
ture, 229 to it, 139
Occupations forbidden to Chris- alluded to by Theodulf,
tians, 269 102 7t.
Odoacer, his law on church pro- John VIII. tries to make it
perty, 17 obligatory, 141
his control over papacy, 82 az.. its utility in establishing
(Ecumenic patriarch, title of 114 papal supremacy, 140ac.
Opstalboom, clerical immunity in delay in adopting it, 140 7,.
laws of, 184 I. objections to it in 1786, 141 nz.
Orange, council of, in 441, 252, 264n. Papacy rendered independent of
Ordeal of Eucharist administered Constantinople, 24
to Lothair, 164 cause of its elevation in the
Ordenamiento de AlcalI, 73 n. seventh century, 23
Ordination, sacramental, denied its subjection to the Carloby Luther, 455 vingians, 34
Organization of primitive church, 104 strives for independence, 39
Origen excom. after death, 254 concentration of authority
Orleans, council of, in 511, 55 in, 426
in 538, 176 its inevitable abuses, 427
in 541, 176 its pretensions to- day, 447
in 554, 56 Papal a pocrisarii at Constantiin 849, 84 nople, 21
Orphans protected by the church, 74 autocracy denied by Hinemar, 45
Ostrogoths, their control over claims of control over genethe church, 17 ral councils, 15, 20
Otho the Great, his control over over episcopal nominabishoprics, 88 as. tions, 92
508 INDEX.
Papal- Patriarch of Constantinopledegradation in the tenth his relations with empecentury, 167 rols, 112
elections, control of by the Patriciate of Rome, the, 33
sovereign, 17, 18, 19, 21, 23, Patrick, St., enforces episcopal
33, 34, 38, 40, 88 n., 89 n. jurisdiction, 71
exactions, 51 co., 137,138 a.,141?z. Paul, St., encourages arbitration, 68
excommunication despised, his teachings, 226
162 z,, 331, 334 on segregation of sinners, 237
jurisdiction (see Appellate Paul of Samosata, 107
annd Popes). Paul of Bernried on subjection
letters, abuses of, 427 of the empire, 31 zn.
reception of, forbidden Paul III., his project of r:formain France, 444?,. tion, 152
monitoire annulled in Alsace, 443 excommunication by, 417
power of dethronement, 354 Paulinus of Aquileia, 57
supremacy established, 166 Pavia, synod of, in 876, 330
absoluteness of, 376 Pazzi, conspiracy of the, 433
Pardoners, descriptions of, 450 co. Pelagius I. appointed by JustinPardoning power assumed by ian, 21
Rome, 154 decretal attributed to him, 141 b.
conceded by the Welsh Pelayo, Alvarez, 37, 81c., 195, 378
laws, 155 Penitence, 240
Paris, council of in 557, 85 its enforcement, 241
in 615, 85, 177, 179 fe. simplicity of, in early times, 241
in 825, 27 zc. its four stages, 242
in 882, 90 ~ tendency to increased sein 1105, 365 verity, 242
Huguenot council of, in 1565, 462 expands into a criminal code, 243
Parker, Archbishop, on excom., 476 lengthened terms of penance, 244
Parlement of Paris, enforces see- penalties and disabilities
ular jurisdiction, 202, 205 added, 244
on excom., 388, 391 indelible character of, 245
Parliament (Eng.) curtails benefit it enhances sacerdotal auof clergy in 1402, 188 thority, 246
Long, on excommunication, 483 alleviations of, for the rich, 316
retains control over church, 484 inflicted on Louis-le-D6b., 31.9
Parliament, Scotch, removes civil on Henry IV., 360
penalties of excommunication, 475 in Scottish kirk, 473
Partidas, Siete, clerical immu- stool and pillar of repentnity in, 184 as., 195 ance, 473
on eccles. jurisdiction, 72 cc. the harden- gown, 474
on excommunication, 393 the branks, 474
Paschal I. deprecates imperial the jaggs, 475
resentment, 39 Penitents, disabilities of,' 244
crowns Lothair I. 39 ineligible to holy orders, 246
Paschal II., his venality, 52 n. safeguards for, 317
he absolves Philip of France, 365 Pepin-le-Bref and the church, 30
denounces a new heresy, 366 he disapproves of images, 26 n.
releases Henry V. from his his grant to the Roman Reoaths, 369 public, 32
forced to abandon the inves- he confirms clerical immutitures, 371 nity, 178
Paschasinus of Lilybheum, 15, 114 his policy with regard to the
Paschasius Radbertus, his ac- church, 306
count of the forgeries, 61 he enforces excom., 308
Patriarch, powers of the, 267 he prohibits marriage in
of Constant., his legal title, 115 fourth degree, 311
INDEX. 509
Pepin of Italy, crowned by the Pius IS. maintains clerical impope, 33 munity, 219
he requires oath of allegi- forbids mnedical aid to heretics, 446
ance, 100 Poissy, colloquy of, 28.i.
his laws on clerical imm-a- Poitiers, council of, in 1100, 365
nity, 178 Poland, clerical immunity aboPerjury justified by Urban II. 368 lished, 218
Persecution by Christian empe- excommunication in, 400
rors, 26600 Politics, control of the church
Peru, excom. of ants in, 415 over, 447
Peter, St., bestows the imperial Polyearp and Anicetus, 105
crown through the popes, 36 Polycrates of Ephesus asserts
his Jewish exclusiveness, 237 independence, 280
Peter Mougus of Alexandria, 283 Pontyon, synod of, in 876. 79
Peter of Braga and the pallium, Poor of the church, fed on Eucha141 n.. rist, 230
Peter de Luna, excom. of, 381 Popes not consecrated without
Philip I. (France), his excom., 364 consent of emperor, 38
his submission, 365 to be tried by imperial counPhilip II. on clerical immunity, 195 cil, 17
Philip III. on clerical immunity, 196 supreme original jurisdicon excommunication, 388 tion of, 279
Philip IV. declares ecclesiastics not recognized in early
incompetent as judges, 74 ns. church, 280
on clerical immunity, 196 assumed in the dissenon excommunication, 389 sions of the East, 282
Philip VI. restricts ecclesiastical asserted over Constantijurisdiction, 77?Z. nople, 284
complains of clerical immu- abolished by Justinian, 288
nity, 198 asserted in the west, 288
restricts it, 200 case of Maximus of SaPhilip II. (Spain), his control of lona, 289
the church, 442 omnipotence of, 376
Philip Count Palatine, excom- are gods on earth, 378
munication of, 375 Portugal, reforms suggested by,
Philippo-Maria Visconti, 194: at Trent, 212
Phillips defends the Isidorian Powder and ball, exorcism of, 414in.
theories, 53's. Prague, council of, in 1365, 199
Phocas admits the supremacy of Prerogatives, supernatural,
Rome, 115?Z. growth of, 29
Photius, excommunication o'f, 260 Pretextatus of Rouen, 134, 302
Piacenza, council of, in 1095, 364 Priesthood denied by Luther, 455
Pierre of Bourbon, burial refused Primitive church, organization
to, 422 of, 104
Pisa, bishop of, hanged by the Prohibited degrees of marriage, 309
Florentines, 433 Property, church, guarded by
Pistes, capitulary of, in 862, 327 curses, 293
edict of, in 864, 328 excom. for recovery of, 417
Pithou, Pierre, his liberties of Propitiation, penitence assumed
GallicaLn church, 442 as a, 246 q..
Pius III., his Bull of Reforma- Proscription for excom., 397
tion, 211 Provisors, statute of, 385
Pius V. urges the suppression of Pseudo-Isidor (see Forgeries.)
concubinage, 217 Purgatory, rise of doctrine of, 250
forbids medical aid to the Puritans, complain of excom., 478
unconfessed,' 446 c. endeavor to retain it,' 484
Pius VII. excommunicates Na-' Pyrrhus of Constantinople, expoleon, 443 n. communication of, 260
43*
510 INDEX.
UARTODECIMAN contro- Rodolph of Hapsburg admits apQ versy, 280 pellete jurisdiction, 150
Quiqisext ine Trucllo rejects the Rodolph of Suabia, his designs, 355
supremacy of Rome, 115 cc. elected emperor,. 361
Quintianus, St., of Auvergne, 83 his death, 362
Roisel, Jean, case of, 391, 402
Roman bankers protected by exABELAIS on the decretals, 50 communication, 417
Rinfroy of Rheims, case of, 182 Roman bishopric, primacy of, 104
Ravennaz assumes equality with causes of its influence, 105
Rome, 116 honorary rather than
synod of, in 877, 141, 184, 325 nz. potential, 105
Raymond of Nismes on clerical its liberality, 105
abuses, 199 its superiority contested, 106
Reading test in benefit of clergy, its influence with the empe188, 190 rors, 107
Rebellion, the Great, its influence its progress in the Arian conon excommunication, 485 troversy, 110
Reception of excommunicates, 263 its contest with ConstantinoReform, project of, at Trent, 215, 436 ple, 111, 114, 115, 131, 276, 284
character of the Tridentine, 437 its opportunities in the eastReformation attempted by the ern.quarrels, 112
church, 211 supremacy admitted by PhoReformation, controversy on cas in 607, 115
image-worship in the, 28 n. its efforts in the West, 115
gradual progress of, 449 its claim to universal jurisReformers, their assaults on the diction, 118
church, 209 based on the Sardican
Relics, reverence inculcated for, 297 canons, 122
Remission of sins, Luther on, 451 asserted by Innocent I., 125
Remy, St., Testament of, 32 c. denied by the African
Remy of Coire introduces the for- church, 126
geries, 46 submitted to by Gaul, 128
Rheims, council of, in 625, 86 confirmed by ValentiRhys of Wales, excom. of, 375 nian III., 129
Riceaswind, laws of, on episcopal rejected by the East, 130
jurisdiction, 72 established in the West, 131
Richard II. on excommunication, 385 overthrown by the BarRichardot of Arras defends cleri- barians, 132
cal immunity, 215 zc. attempts to resuscitate
urges reception of council of it by the pallium, 135
Trent, 439 endeavors of Bonifface, 136
deplores abuse of excom., 441 Charlemagne disregards
Richstich Landrecht on papal the claim, 138
power, 378 it is renewed by the false
Riculfus of Mainz introduces the decretals, 141
false decretals, 43 established by Nicholas
Rimini, synod of, in 360, 14 I., 145
Ripuarian law, rights of church evils of the system, 147
under, 291 cc., 292 pardoning power assumed
Robber synod of Ephesus, by, 154
113, 130, 258, 383 jurisdiction (see Po pes).
Robert-le-Fort obtains abbey of appellate (see Appellate).
St. Martin, 95 Roman curia, exactions of,
Robert the Good of Naples, 208 51. c., 137, 138 cc., 141 cc.
Rodez, Bishop of, sells pardons, 202 its overgrown business, 427
Rodolph of Bourges perinits civil its spirit at Trent, 436
suits of clergy, 182 Empire, autocracy of, 13
INDEX. 511
Roman — Saxons defeated by IIenry IV., 348
law, church privileged to use fresh rebellion of, 356
the, 291 Saxony, Charletmagne's organizaRepublic restored by Pepin, 32 tion of, 306
Rome, sack of, by Guiscard, 362 School-boys fed on remains of
synod of, in 384, 264 zc. Eucharist., 230
in 488, 244 Schwabenspiegel, founded on laws
in 498 and 502, 17 of Charlemagne, 49
in 501, 18 papal supremacy in, 31 qz.
in 863, 161 clerical immunity in, 1849s., 191
in 877,.332 excommunication in, 397
in 1075, 348 Scotland, accusations between
in 1076, 352 clerks and laymen forbidin 1080, 362 den, 66 sz.
in 1102, 366 clerical immunity in, 184 9.
Rothadus of Soissons, case of, 145 tyranny of kirk-sessions in, 465
Ruffec, council of, 419 civil penalties of excommuRufinus, his account of council nication abolished, 475
of Nitema, 170 Sebastian of Portugal, reforms
suggested by, 212
Secular power, enforcement of
SABBATH, rigidity of, in Scot- excommunication by, 380
land, 469 under Merovingians, 304
Sacerdotal power, commencement under Carlovingians, 307
of the,. 235 in England, 384
intervention denied by Lu- in Wales, 386
ther, 452 in France, 386
Sacrificial meats, 231 in Spain, 392
Sacraments (see Euchaarist and.in Germany, 394
Corzns2Z'nioz c). in Italy, 398
power obtained through the, 223 in Poland, 400
allowed during interdict, 374 e. in Sweden, 401
Sackcloth for penitents, 474 interference of, prohibited at
Sagittarius of Gap, case of, 133 Trent, 438
Salutes, synod of, in 579, 299 resistance to this by the
Salonius of Embrun, case of, 133. state, 439
Salic law, wehr-gilds under, 292 se. Secularization of excom., 405
Salzburg, council of, in 1418, 434 yi. Segregation of excommunicates,
in 1456, 407, 432, 450 t.. 227, 235
in 1548, 211 origin of, 237
in 1569, 438 enforced by Stephen I., 238
its code of discipline, 216 becomes the general practice
in 1573, 440 of the church, 239
Sardica, council of, in 367, examples of it, 240
81, 108, 26491. effects of it, 241
canons of, in favor of Pope revived by Carlovingians, 308
Julius, 110 deprivation of intercourse
nature of the canons, 122 and assistance, 380
they are disregarded, 123 punishment for its infracare revived by Rome, 126 tion, 381
and attributed to council of reforms attempte4 at ConNicsaa, 126, 131 stance and Bale, 382
are rejected by the churches, 127 complaints of citizens of BerSaumur, synod of, in 1596, 68 lin,. 382
Sawtree, Win., tried fdr Lollard- ulterior consequences, 384
ism, 28 9z.. mildness of, in Spain, 394
Saxon emperors, their control, severity of, in Germany, 398
over papacy, 89 it. in Scottish kirk, 471
512 INDEX.
Seignorial "droits de justice," Spoliationorigin of, 75 increases under the later CarSeligenstadt, council of, in 1018, 149 lovingians, 321
Senlis, council of, in 1326, 392 in Gothic code, 330
Sepulture, interdiction of, Spottiswoode, John, his excomi., 472
406, 421, 434 St. Andree, Bishop of, on usuriers, 407
Serenus of Marseilles destroys St. Andrews, kirk-sessions of, 470, 475
images, 26 i. St. Macra, synod of, in 881, 35 9t.
Sergius I. defies the emperors, 23 St. Martin, Abbey of, bestowed
Sergius II. asserts the jurisdic- on the Ca.pets, 95
tion of Rome, 144 monks of, their trial, 180
Sicily, appellate jurisdiction of St. Riquier, Abbot of, case of,
Rome in, 150 391, 402
clerical immunity in, 192 St. Savin, Valley of, 408
excommunication in, 399 St. Tiberius, council of, in 1389, 205
Siegfrid of Mainz and the pal- Staphylus, Fred., his remonstrance
lium, 140 it. at Trent, 213
his excommunication, 352 State, the, seeks support from the
Siete Partidas, las (see Pcartidas). church, 326
Sigebert II., his control over the subjection of, tp the church,
church, 56 in 1869, 447
Sigebod of Narbonne, his com- Statute of Provisors, 385
plaint, 330 Stephen I. appealed to by the
Silvan-us of the Troad, 70 Lyonese, 106
Silverius buys the papacy, 19 his contest with the Spanish
his condemnation, 173 church, 120
Simony of the Roman curia, with Cyprian, 280
51 i., 137, 138 z., 141it. on segregationtof excommuprotected by excom., e 403 nicates, 238
Siricius, authority of his decre- Stephen II. crowns Pepin-le-Bref, 32
tals, 116 and Charlemagne, 33
he disclaims appellate juris- appealed to by Boniface, 137
diction, 123 Stephen IV. crowns Louis-le-Ddon death-bed communion, 249 bonnaire, 37
Sixtus IV., his abuse of excom- Stephen, St., of Rungary, his
munication, 430 reverence for bishops, 32?.
excommnunicates Florence, 433 he forbids accusation of
Soissons, council of, in 744, 87 clergy, 67 wZ.
in 853, 182 he grants clerical immuSpain, ecclesiastical jurisdiction nity, 184 lb.
in, 72 lz. Sterility caused by excom., 409
resistance to Rome in 253,'120 Stoning houses of excom., 383
its submission to Rome,;- 132 Strangers, letters of communion
clerical immunity in, 184:./,` 194 required by, 262
proposes reforms at Trent, 212.Suabian code (see Schszvabeensspiegel).
laws on excommunication in/,392 Sulpicius, St., of Bourges, 297
influence of Gothic laws, — 392 Sulpicius Severus on authority
the Fuero Juzgo, 72wb., 194/393 of bishops, 107
the Siete Partidas, Sunda:y, observance of, in Scot72w9., 184wi., 195, 393 land, 469
Spanish rule ig Milan, 194 Supervision, minute, in the
Spandel, Chris., on clerical vices, church, 268
217 w. in the Scottish kirk, 469
Spiritual affinity, doctrine of, 310 Supremacy, papal, established
authority all deleg'ated from by Adrian II., 166
the pope, 426 Supreme jurisdiction of Rome,.
Spoliation of the church, re- 279, 37 A
pressed hy Charlemagne, 314 Suze, Henri de, excoim. by, 404
INDEX. 513
Swveden, clerical immunity in, 184 c. Theodoric, anti-pope, 366
punishment of excom. in, 401 Theodoric of Mainz summoned
Syllabus of 1864, 220, 446 by the Vehmgericht, 192
Symbol, Nicene, altered by Theodoric of Utrecht excommuCharlemagne, 57 nicated for debt, 418
Symmachus, his.'contest for the Theodorus and Proculus of Tours, 83
papacy, 17 Theodosian code, forgery insertSynesius complains of his judicial ed in, 76
functions, 69 foisted on Charlemagne, 77
excommunicates Andronicus, persecution in, 266
240, 270 Theodosius the Great excommuhis formula, 264 nicated by Ambrose, 273
his conscientiousness, 274 z.
his law on capital punishTALIO, application ofto excom- ment, 275
munication, 258 Theodosius II. on the confirmaTarragona, council of, in 516, 72 tion of bishops, 94
Tarragonensian bishops, their transfers the churches of I1appeal to Rome, 131 lyricum, 118
Tarasius of Constantinople on Theodulf of Orleans, his imprithe creed. 58 n. sonment, 102
Tedaldo of Milan, 349, 351 Theophilus attacks Chrysostom,
Temporal penalties of excom., 477 112, 113
Temporalities of the church, 82 excommunicates Origen, 254
their evil influence, 445 Theutmir and Dungal, 27zi.
Territorial jurisdiction of vassals, 75 Thietgaud of Treves released from
restricted by Charlemagne, 76 his oath, 154
Tertullian, his resistance to Rome, 108 condemned by Roman synod, 16G
Testimony ofexcom. refused, 245, 391 submits to the sentence, 162
Tetzel and his indulgeuces, 450 Thionville, council of, in 845,
Teutberga, the divorce of, 159 60, 90, 181
married to Lothair, 159 Thomas a Becket and Bishopric
divorced by synod of Aix, 160 of Bangor, 98
appeals to Rome, 160 he vindicates clerical iimmuis taken back by order of nity, 187
Nicholas I., 163 asserts clerical supremacy, 375
entreats to be separated from Three Chapters, the, 19, 118, 254
him, 164 Thurstan of Yorlk, case of, 374
Tewdwr of Brecknock, his ex- Tithes, enforced by Charlemagne, 306
communication, 324 by excommunication, 434
Theft, excommunication for, 335, 417 Toledo, council of, in 400,
Theocratic constitution of the 239, 252, 269
church, 267 in 589, 58, 175
inevitable results of, 427 in 675, 72, 175, 248nt, 250
Theodatus imposes Silverius on in 633, 58, 73, 301 i., 393..
the Roman church, 19 in 681, 87, 329, 392, 393 I.
Theodebert of Metz and St. Ni- Tolls, excommunication for colcetius, 300 lecting, 431
Theodora, her treatment of Vi- Tonsure as proof of clerkship, 1J98
gilius, 19 assumed to obtain immuTheodore of Canterbury, 67 I. nity, 199, 201
Theodore of Mopsuestia, case of, 254 respect claimed for it, 203
Theodore (Pope) excom. Pyrrhus, 260 Tours, bishop of, under the MeTheodoret of Cyrus, case of, 130 rovingians, 83
Theodoric controls papal elections, 17 council of, in 567, 177
sends John I. as envoy, 18 in 813, 312, 315 w7.
enforces submission of church, 173 Trade forbidden to penitents, 245
on denial of sepulture, 421 1 to Christians, 269
514 INDEX.
Travellers, letters of communion Valentinian III.required by, 262 confers universal jurisdiction
Trent, council of, on image wor- on Rome, 129
ship, 27 cc. his laws on episcopal immuon appellatejuriscldiction, 153 nity, 171
reforms requested of, Vannes, council of, in 465, 244
212, 435 Vehmgericht disregards clerical
reactionary spirit of, 436 immunity, 192
device for eluding re- - Verberie, synod of, in 752, 311
formation, 213, 436 Vermin, exorcism of, 414
conservative character Verneuil, synod of, in 755,
of reforms, 214, 437 178, 308, 312cc.
opposition to reception in 844, 60, 90, 181, 322 ns.
of the council, 218, 439 Viaticum, not always efficacious, 253
Trial of Leo III. by Charlemagne, 34 control of, by Charlemagne, 306
of animals, 411 neglect of, 440
Tribur, council of, in 895, 149, 184 Vic-en-Bigorre, excommunicadiet of, in 1076, 356 tion procured by, 417
Trieste, jurisdiction of, granted Victor I. and the Asian bishops, 106
to bishop, 75 zc. rebuked for his pretensions, 280
Troyes, synod of, in 878, 330 Vienne, council of, in 1311, 450 gv.
Truce of God, clerical infrac- Vigilius, Pope, his career, 19
tions of, 185 is excommunicated by Africa, 118
Turin, council of, in 401, 264 cc. bestows the pallium on AuxaTyre, council of, in 335, 14 nius, 135
on excommunication of dead, 254
Virgil of Arles receives the palITDO of Treves and Henry IV., 356 lium, 135
U Unction, extreme. neglect of, 440 Visconti, they limit clerical imenforced by Pius IX., 446 munity, 193
Urban II. excommunicates the on excommunication, 400
Imperialists, 363 Vislitza, statute of, 400
excomnmunicates Philip I. of Vitoduranus on temporalities, 99
France, 364 Vladislas II. restricts ecclesiasannuls oaths to excommuni- tical jurisdiction, 77 cs.
cates, 368
justifies murder, 371
Urban IV. uses excommunication RWTAGER of battle offered by
to collect debts, 419 ~V Lothair, 164
Urban V., his dread of excom., 429 forbidden to ecclesiastics, 180
Urraca of Castile, case of, 374 Wala presents the forged decreUrsinus, the antipope, 16 tals to Gregory IV., 61
Utrecht, Bishop of, excommuni- Walafrid Strabo on image worcated for debt, 418 ship, 27 cn.
Waldrada, a concubine of Lothair, 159
AISON, first council of, in is married to him, 160
442, 248, 257 is separated by Nicholas I., 163
Valence, clergy of, appeal to Boni- obliged to go to Rome, 164
face I., 128 Wales, ecclesiastics not competent
council of, in 855, 95 as judges in, 73 cz.
Valentinian II. rebuked by Am- pardoning power of Rome
brose, 272 admitted, 155
Valentinian III. and the council laws on excommunication, 386
of Ephesus, 14 on benefit of clergy, 184 c?1., 186
legislates in favor of bishops, 64 Weddings, regulations of, in Scotlimits the episcopal jurisdic- land, 469
tion, 70 Wehr-gilds for ecclesiastics, 292
INDEX. 515
Weldon, Sir Andrew, on Scottish Witchcraft, persecution of, in
discipline, 466 Scotland,. 468
Weissenberg, Abbot of, 375 Witnesses, numbers of, required
Wenilo of Sens, his treachery, 102 in charges againlst clerks, 66
he appeals to false decretals, 145 penitents ineligible as, 245
Westminster, assembly of, 484 excommunicates ineligible as,
Wiberto of Ravenna, 354 245, 391
becomes antipope, 362'Wolff, Christian, on the donation
his death, 366 of Constantine, 158?t.
Wickliffe, his opinion of decretals, 53 Wolsey endeavors to reform the
of Roman supremacy, 11l a. church, 189
of excommunication, 448 Worms, assembly of, on church
Widows protected by the church, 74 spoliation, 314
Willenberg on excommunication, 461 council of, in 1176, 351
William of Bavaria reproaches Writ de excommunicato capithe church, 211 endo; 384, 477, 482, 485
William II. of Montpellier, 373 de contumace capiendo, 485
William of Scotland, case of, 374 Wulfa.rius of Rheims appears in
William of Sicily admits appel- secular courts, 179
late jurisdiction, 150 Wijrdtwein on appellate jurisciicWillinam of Utrecht, his death, 355 tion, 153
Willibert of Chalons, 96
Willibrod sent as missionary by
Sergius, 1,35 7OIRK, synod of, in 1640, 479, 481
Winchester, council of: in 1142, 35 nz.
Winemar murders Fulk cf Rheims,
333
disregards excommunication, 334 Z/ACHARY, Pope, authorizes
Wisigoths insert filioque in the L the dethronement of the
creed, 58 Merovingians, 31
enlarge episcopal jurisdic-' his description of Frankish
tion, 72 clergy, 305
refuse clerical immunity, 174 Zeno, his HI-enoticon, 283
invoke the church in politi- papal tolerattion for him, 276
cal compacts, 301a. Zimiskes, John, renounces the
on duty of state to enforce sale of bishoprics, 94
censures of church, 204 Zozirnus, his deceit as to Sa.rdilaws on sacrilege, 330 can canons, 126
BY THE SAMBE AUTHOR-Just Published.
I
SUPERSTITION AND FORCE:
ESSAYS ON THE WAGER OF LAW, THE WAGER..F
BATTLE, THE ORDEAL, AND TORTURE.
In one handsome volume, royal 12mo., of 406 pages, extra cloth, $2 50.
The copious collection of facts by which Mr. Lea has illustrated his subject shows
in the fullest manner the constant col:fCt and varying success, the advances and
defeats, by which the progress of humane legislation has been and is still marked.
This work fills up with the fullest exemplification and detail the wise remarks which
we have quoted above. As a book of ready reference on the subject it is of the highest value - Vestmi'aseter Review, Oct. 1S67.
When —half in spite of himself, as it appears-he sketches a scene or character in
the history of legalized error and cruelty, le betrays so artistic a feeling, and a
humor so fine and good, that he makes us regret it was not within his intent, as it
was certainly within his power, to render thle whole of his thorough work mole
popular in mnanner.-Atlantic M7Ionthly, Feb. 1S67.
This is a book of extraordinary research. MIr. Lea has enteired into his subject con
antore: and a more striking record of thle cruel superstitions of our unhappy Middle
Ages could not possibly have been compiled.... As at work of curious inquiry on
certain outlying points of obsolete law, "Superstition and Force," is one of the most
remarkable books we have smet with.-Londo~n Athence'cm, Nov. 3, 1S66.
A scholarly and very eloquent treatise —an excellent gathering of curious thought
put together with enlightened liberality.-London E.Examiner, Oct. 26, 1867.
One of the gloomiest chapters in the history of mankind is that of the miseries
which htave resulted from their errors in the search for truth, and the failse methods
adopted to discover it. And there are few more striking episodes in this chapter thlan
that which Mr. Lea has set before us in his excellent volurne. —iVorth Americann Review, Oct. 1866.
II.
AN HISTORICAL SKETCH
OF
SACERDOTAL CELIBACY IN THE CHRISTIAN CIIURCH.
In one haudsome octavo volume of 600 pages, extra cloth, $3 75.
This subject has recently been treated with very great learning and with admnirable impartiality by an American author, Mr. Henry C. Lea, in his li.sltory of Sarcerdotal Celibacyc, which is certalinly one of the most valuable works thact America has
produced. Since the great history of Dean Silman, I know no work in English which
has thrown more light on the moral condition of the Middle Ages. al)d none wlichl
is more fitted to dispel the gross illusions concerning that period which Positive writers and writers of a certain ecclesiastical school have conspired to sustain.-Leclky's
HIistory of Earoperan loralsC, Chap. V.
In freshness and exactness of detail; in conscientious citation of authorities, in
the impartiality with whiich all possible sources of information have beeon searched,
in learning and scholarly finish, it is absolutely unapprotclhed by any similar treatise which has issued from the American press. Indeed, the number of foreign historical works which have equalled it in these particulcars inight be readclily counted
on the fingers.-Q sar-terly Jocturnal of Psychologiccal 1lecdicicne, Oct. 1867.
Altogether, the work is an extremely creditable addition to the literature of church
history, and may challenge comparison witll the best monograzrphs which the German
scholarship of our day has produced in tlis department. —f. Y. N~atione, June 27,'67.
This exhaustive treatise of Mr. Lea upon ecclesiastical celibacy we take to possess,
like his excellent work upon "Superstition and Force," all tlse capital requisites of
an historical monograplh-an immense body of inforlmation and of reference on the
subject in hand, a sufliciently cool and dispassionate manner of presenting facts, and
a strict adclherence to the central question. The amlount of research, and, indeed, (,f
scholarship, involved in the preparation of the volume is such as to command the
warmest recognition.-Atlantic Monthlpy, Sept. 1S67.
Thus, his chapter on the Anglican church is perhaps the most connected and most
satisftactory account of our own Reformation,, as to the question of celibacy or Isarriage, thIat could be found.-Qvcarterly Review, Oct. 1869.
J, B. LIPPINCOTT & CO.-Philadelphia,