History of the World/History of the World (Bureau Development, Inc.)(1992).BIN/dp/0189/01895.txt

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$Pretitle{}
$Title{History Of The Intellectual Development Of Europe
Chapter III. Part I.}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Draper, John William M.D., LL.D.,}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{pope
king
boniface
france
rome
brought
church
philip
god
papacy}
$Date{1876}
$Log{}
Title:       History Of The Intellectual Development Of Europe
Book:        Volume II
Author:      Draper, John William M.D., LL.D.,
Date:        1876

Chapter III. Part I.

The Age Of Faith In The West - (Continued), Overthrow Of The Italian System By
The Combined Intellectual And Moral Attack.

Progress of Irreligion among the mendicant Orders. - Publication of heretical
Books. - The Everlasting Gospel and the Comment on the Apocalypse.

Conflict between Philip the Fair and Boniface VIII. - Outrage upon and death
of the Pope.

The French King removes the Papacy from Rome to Avignon. - Postmortem Trial of
the Pope for Atheism and Immorality. - Causes and Consequences of the Atheism
of the Pope.

The Templars fall into Infidelity. - Their Trial, Conviction, and Punishment.

Immoralities of the Papal Court at Avignon. - Its return to Rome. - Causes of
the great Schism. - Disorganization of the Italian System. - Decomposition of
the Papacy. - Three Popes.

The Council of Constance attempts to convert the papal Autocracy into a
constitutional Monarchy. - It murders John Huss and Jerome of Prague. -
Pontificate of Nicolas V. - End of intellectual influence of the Italian
System.

     About the close of the twelfth century appeared among the mendicant
friars that ominous work, which under the title of "The Everlasting Gospel,"
struck terror into the Latin hierarchy.  It was affirmed that an angel had
brought it from heaven, engraven on copper plates, and had given it to a
priest called Cyril, who delivered it to the Abbot Joachim.  The abbot had
been dead about fifty years, when there was put forth, A.D. 1250, a true
exposition of the tendency of his book, under the form of an introduction, by
John of Parma, the general of the Franciscans, as was universally suspected or
alleged.  Notwithstanding its heresy, the work displayed an enlarged and
masterly conception of the historical progress of humanity.  In this
introduction, John of Parma pointed out that the Abbot Joachim, who had not
only performed a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, but had been reverenced as a
prophet, received as of unimpeachable orthodoxy, and canonized, had accepted
as his fundamental position that Roman Christianity had done its work, and had
now come to its inevitable termination.  He proceeded to show that there are
epochs or ages in the Divine government of the world; that, during the Jewish
dispensation, it had been under the immediate influence of God the Father;
during the Christian dispensation, it had been under that of God the Son; and
that the time had now arrived when it would be under the influence of God the
Holy Ghost; that, in the coming ages, there would be no longer any need of
faith, but that all things would be according to wisdom and reason. It was the
ushering in of a new time.  So spake, with needful obscurity, the Abbot
Joachim, and so, more plainly, the General of the Franciscans in his
Introduction.  "The Everlasting Gospel" was declared by its adherents to have
supplanted the New Testament, as that had supplanted the Old - these three
books constituting a threefold revelation, answering to the Trinity of the
Godhead.  At once there was a cry from the whole hierarchy.  The Pope,
Alexander IV., without delay, took measures for the destruction of the book.
Whoever kept or concealed a copy was excommunicated.  But among the lower
mendicants - the Spiritualists, as they were termed - the work was held in the
most devout repute.  With them it had taken the place of the Holy Scriptures.
So far from being suppressed, it was followed, in about forty years, A.D.
1297, by the Comment on the Apocalypse, by John Peter Oliva, who, in Sicily,
had accepted the three epochs or ages, and divided the middle one - the
Christian - into seven stages; the age of the Apostles; that of the Martyrs;
that of Heresies; that of Hermits; that of the Monastic System; that of the
overthrow of Anti-Christ, and that of the coming Millennium.  He agreed with
his predecessors in the impending abolition of Roman Christianity, stigmatized
that Church as the purple harlot, and with them affirmed that the pope and all
his hierarchy had become superfluous and obsolete - "their work was done,
their doom sealed." His zealous followers declared that the sacraments of the
Church were now all useless, those administering them having no longer any
jurisdiction.  The burning of thousands of these "Fratricelli" by the
Inquisition was altogether inadequate to suppress them.  Eventually, when the
Reformation occurred, they mingled among the followers of Luther.

     To the internal and doctrinal troubles thus befalling the Church,
material and foreign ones of the most vital importance were soon added.  The
true reason of the difficulties into which the papacy was falling was now
coming conspicuously into light.  It was absolutely necessary that money
should be drawn to Rome, and the sovereigns of the Western kingdoms, France
and England, from which it had hitherto been largely obtained, were determined
that it should be so no longer.  They had equally urgent need themselves of
all that could be extorted.  In France, even by St. Louis, it was enacted that
the papal power in the election of the clergy should be restrained; and,
complaining of the drain of money from the kingdom to Rome, he applied the
effectual remedy of prohibiting any such assessments or taxations for the
future.

     We have now reached the pontificate of Boniface VIII., an epoch in the
intellectual history of Europe.  Under the title of Celestine V. a visionary
hermit had been raised to the papacy - visionary, for Peter Morrone (such was
his name) had long been indulged in apparitions of angels and the sounds of
phantom bells in the air.  Peter was escorted from his cell to his supreme
position by admiring crowds; but it very soon became apparent that the life of
an anchorite is not a preparation for the duties of a pope.  The conclave of
cardinals had elected him, not from any impression of his suitableness, but
because they were evenly balanced in two parties, neither of which would give
way.  They were therefore driven to a temporary and available election. But
scarcely had this been done when his incapacity became conspicuous and his
removal imperative.  It is said that the friends of Benedetto Gaetani, the
ablest of the cardinals, through a hole perforated in the pope's chamber wall,
at midnight, in a hollow voice, warned him that he retained his dignity at the
peril of his soul, and in the name of God commanded him to abdicate. And so,
in spite of all importunity, he did.  His abdication was considered by many
pious persons as striking a death-blow at papal infallibility.

     It was during his pontificate that the miracle of Loretto occurred.  The
house inhabited by the Virgin immediately after her conception had been
converted on the death of the Holy Family into a chapel, and St. Luke had
presented to it an image, carved by his own hands, still known as our Lady of
Loretto.  Some angels chancing to be at Nazareth when the Saracen conquerors
approached, fearing that the sacred relic might fall into their possession,
took the house bodily in their hands, and, carrying it through the air, after
several halts, finally deposited it at Loretto in Italy.

     So Benedetto Gaetani, whether by such wily procurements or not, became
Pope Boniface VIII., A.D. 1294.  His election was probably due to King
Charles, who held twelve electoral votes, the bitter personal animosity of the
Colonnas having been either neutralized or overcome.  The first care of
Boniface was to consolidate his power and relieve himself of a rival.  In the
opinion of many it was not possible for a pope to abdicate.  Confinement in
prison soon (A.D. 1296) settled that question.  The soul of Celestine was seen
by a monk ascending the skies, which opened to receive it into heaven; and a
splendid funeral informed his enemies that they must now acknowledge Boniface
as the unquestioned pope.  But the princely Colonnas, the leaders of the
Ghibelline faction in Rome, who had resisted the abdication of Celestine to
the last, and were, therefore, mortal enemies of Boniface, revolted.  He
published a bull against them; he excommunicated them.  With an ominous
anticipation of the future - for they were familiar with the papal power, and
knew where to touch it to the quick - they appealed to a "General Council."
Since supernatural weapons did not seem to avail, Boniface proclaimed a
crusade against them.  The issue answered his expectations.  Palestrina, one
of their strongholds, which in a moment of weakness they had surrendered, was
utterly devastated and sown with salt.  The Colonnas fled, some of them to
France.  There, in King Philip the Fair, they found a friend, who was destined
to avenge their wrongs, and to inflict on the papacy a blow from which it
never recovered.

     This was the state of affairs at the commencement of the quarrel between
Philip and Boniface.  The Crusades had brought all Europe under taxation to
Rome, and loud complaints were everywhere made against the drain of money into
Italy.  Things had at last come to such a condition that it was not possible
to continue the Crusades without resorting to a taxation of the clergy, and
this was the true reason of the eventual lukewarmness, and even opposition to
them.  But the stream of money that had thus been passing into Italy had
engendered habits of luxury and extravagance.  Cost what it might, money must
be had in Rome.  The perennial necessity under which the kings of England and
France found themselves - the necessity of revenue for the carrying out of
their temporal projects - could only be satisfied in the same way.  The wealth
of those nations had insensibly glided into the hands of the Church.  In
England, Edward I. enforced the taxation of the clergy.  They resisted at
first, but that sovereign found an ingenious and effectual remedy.  He
directed his judges to hear no cause in which an ecclesiastic was a
complainant, but to try every suit brought against them; asserting that those
who refused to share the burdens of the state had no right to the protection
of its laws.  They forthwith submitted.  In the nature and efficacy of this
remedy we for the first time recognize the agency of a class of men soon to
rise to power - the lawyers.

     In France, Philip the Fair made a similar attempt.  It was not to be
supposed that Rome would tolerate this trespassing on what she considered her
proper domain, and accordingly Boniface issued the bull "Clericis laicos,"
excommunicating kings who should levy subsidies on ecclesiastics.  Hereupon
Philip determined that, if the French clergy were not tributary to him, France
should not be tributary to the pope, and issued an edict prohibiting the
export of gold and silver from France without his license.  But he did not
resort to these extreme measures until he had tried others which perhaps he
considered less troublesome.  He had plundered the Jews, confiscated their
property, and expelled them from his dominions.  The Church was fairly next in
order; and, indeed, the mendicant friars of the lower class, who, as we have
seen, were disaffected by the publication of "The Everlasting Gospel," were
loud in their denunciations of her wealth, attributing the prevailing
religious demoralization to it.  They pointed to the example of our Lord and
his disciples; and when their antagonists replied that even He condescended to
make use of money, the malignant fanatics maintained their doctrines, amid the
applause of a jeering populace, by answering that it was not St. Peter, but
Judas, who was intrusted with the purse, and that the pope stood in need of
the bitter rebuke which Jesus had of old administered to his prototype Peter,
saying, "Get thee behind me, Satan; for thou savourest not of the things that
be of God, but of the things that be of men" (Mark viii. 33). Under that
authority they affirmed that they might stigmatize the great culprit without
guilt.  So the king ventured to put forth his hand and touch what the Church
had, and she cursed him to his face.  At first a literary war ensued: the pope
published his bull, the king his reply.  Already the policy which Philip was
following, and the ability he was displaying, manifested that he had attached
to himself that new power of which the King of England had taken advantage - a
power soon to become the mortal enemy of the ecclesiastic - the lawyers.  In
the meantime, money must be had in Rome; when, by the singularly felicitous
device of the proclamation of a year of jubilee, A.D. 1300, large sums were
again brought into Italy.

     Boniface had thus four antagonists on his hands - the King of France, the
Colonnas, the lawyers, and the mendicants.  By the latter, both high and low,
he was cordially hated.  Thus the higher English Franciscans were enraged
against him because he refused to let them hold lands.  They attempted to
bribe him with 40,000 ducats; but he seized the money at the banker's, under
the pretence that it had no owners, as the mendicants were vowed to poverty,
and then denied the privilege.  As to the lower Franciscans, heresy was fast
spreading among them.  They were not only infected with the doctrines of "The
Everlasting Gospel," but had even descended into the abyss of irreligion one
step more by placing St. Francis in the stead of our Saviour.  They were
incessantly repeating in the ears of the laity that the pope was Anti-Christ,
"The Man of Sin." The quarrel between Philip and Boniface was every moment
increasing in bitterness.  The former seized and imprisoned a papal nuncio,
who had been selected because he was known to be personally offensive; the
latter retaliated by the issue of bulls protesting against such an outrage,
interfering between the king and his French clergy, and citing the latter to
appear in Rome and take cognizance of their master's misdoings.  The monarch
was actually invited to be present and hear his own doom.  In the lesser bull
- if it be authentic - and the king's rejoinder, both parties seem to have
lost their temper.  This was followed by the celebrated bull "Ausculta Fili,"
at which the king's indignation knew no bounds.  He had it publicly burnt in
Paris at the sound of a trumpet; assembled the States-General; and, under the
advice of his lawyers, skilfully brought the issue to this: Does the king hold
the realm of France of God or of the pope?  Without difficulty it might be
seen how the French clergy would be compelled to act: since many of them held
fiefs of the king, all were in fear of the intrusion of Italian ecclesiastics
into the rich benefices.  France, therefore, supported her monarch.  On his
side, Boniface, in the bull "Unam Sanctam," asserted his power by declaring
that it is necessary to salvation to believe that "every human being is
subject to the Pontiff of Rome." Philip, foreseeing the desperate nature of
the approaching conflict, and aiming to attach his people firmly to him by
putting himself forth as their protector against priestly tyranny, again
skilfully appealed to their sentiments by denouncing the Inquisition as an
atrocious barbarity, an outrage on human rights, violating all law, resorting
to new and unheard-of tortures, and doing deeds at which men's minds revolt
with horror.  In the South of France this language was thoroughly understood.
The lawyers, among whom William de Nogaret was conspicuous, ably assisted him;
indeed, his whole movement exhibited the extraordinary intelligence of his
advisers.  It has been affirmed, and is, perhaps, not untrue, that De
Nogaret's father had been burnt by the Inquisition.  The great lawyer was bent
on revenge.  The States-General, under his suggestions, entertained four
propositions: 1. That Boniface was not the true pope; 2. That he was a
heretic; 3. That he was a simoniac; 4. That he was a man weighed down with
crimes.  De Nogaret, learning from the Colonnas how to touch the papacy in a
vital point, demanded that the whole subject should be referred to a "General
Council" to be summoned by the king.  A second meeting of the States-General
was held.  William de Plaisian, the Lord of Vezenoble, appeared with charges
against the pope.  Out of a long list, many of which could not possibly be
true, some may be mentioned: that Boniface neither believed in the immortality
nor incorruptibility of the soul, nor in a life to come, nor in the real
presence in the Eucharist; that he did not observe the fasts of the Church -
not even Lent; that he spoke of the cardinals, monks, and friars as
hypocrites; that the Holy Land had been lost through his fault; that the
subsidies for its relief had been embezzled by him; that his holy predecessor,
Celestine, through his inhumanity had been brought to death; that he had said
that fornication and other obscene practices are no sin; that he was a
Sodomite, and had caused clerks to be murdered in his presence; that he had
enriched himself by simony; that his nephew's wife had borne him two
illegitimate sons.  These, with other still more revolting charges, were sworn
to upon the Holy Gospels.  The king appealed to "a general council and to a
legitimate pope."

     The quarrel had now become a mortal one.  There was but one course for
Boniface to take, and he did take it.  He excommunicated the king.  He
deprived him of his throne, and anathematized his posterity to the fourth
generation.  The bull was to be suspended in the porch of the Cathedral of
Anagni on September 8; but William de Nogaret and one of the Colonnas had
already passed into Italy.  They hired a troop of banditti, and on September 7
attacked the pontiff in his palace at Anagni.  The doors of a church which
protected him were strong, but they yielded to fire.  The brave old man, in
his pontifical robes, with his crucifix in one hand and the keys of St. Peter
in the other, sat down on his throne and confronted his assailants.  His
cardinals had fled through a sewer.  So little reverence was there for God's
vicar upon earth, that Sciarra Colonna raised his hand to kill him on the
spot; but the blow was arrested by De Nogaret, who, with a bitter taunt, told
him that here, in his own city, he owed his life to the mercy of a servant of
the King of France - a servant whose father had been burnt by the Inquisition.
The pontiff was spared only to be placed on a miserable horse, with his face
to the tail, and led off to prison.  They meant to transport him to France to
await the general council.  He was rescued, returned to Rome, was seized and
imprisoned again.  On the 11th of October he died.

     Thus, after a pontificate of nine eventful years, perished Boniface VIII.
His history and his fate show to what a gulf Roman Christianity was
approaching.  His successor, Benedict XI., had but a brief enjoyment of power;
long enough, however, to learn that the hatred of the King of France had not
died with the death of Boniface, and that he was determined not only to pursue
the departed pontiff's memory beyond the grave, but also to effect a radical
change in the papacy itself.  A basket of figs was presented to Benedict by a
veiled female.  She had brought them, she said, from the Abbess of St.
Petronilla.  In an unguarded moment the pontiff ate of them without the
customary precaution of having them previously tasted.  Alas! what was the
state of morals in Italy?  A dysentery came on; in a few days he was dead.
But the Colonnas had already taught the King of France how one should work who
desires to touch the popedom; the event that had just occurred was the
preparation for putting their advice into operation.  The king came to an
understanding with Bernard de Goth, the Archbishop of Bordeaux.  Six
conditions were arranged between them: 1. The reconciliation between the
Church and the king; 2. The absolution of all persons engaged in the affair of
Boniface; 3. Tenths from the clergy for five years; 4. The condemnation of the
memory of Boniface; 5. The restoration of the Colonnas; 6. A secret article;
what it was time soon showed.  A swift messenger carried intelligence to the
king's partisans in the College of Cardinals, and Bernard became Clement V.
"It will be long before we see the face of another pope in Rome!" exclaimed
the Cardinal Matteo Orsini, with a prophetic instinct of what was coming when
the conspiracy reached its development.  His prophecy was only too true.  Now
appeared what was that sixth, that secret article negotiated between King
Philip and De Goth.  Clement took up his residence at Avignon in France.  The
tomb of the apostles was abandoned. The Eternal City had ceased to be the
metropolis of Christianity.

     But a French prelate had not bargained with a French king for the most
eminent dignity to which a European can aspire without having given an
equivalent.  In as good faith as he could to his contract, in as good faith as
he could to his present pre-eminent position, Clement V. proceeded to
discharge his share of the obligation.  To a certain extent King Philip was
animated by an undying vengeance against his enemy, whom he considered as
having escaped out of his grasp, but he was also actuated by a sincere desire
of accomplishing a reform in the Church through a radical change in its
constitution.  He was resolved that the pontiffs should be accountable to the
kings of France, or that France should more directly influence their conduct.
To reconcile men to this, it was for him to show, with the semblance of pious
reluctance, what was the state to which morals and faith had come in Rome. The
trial of the dead Boniface was therefore entered upon, A.D. 1310.  The
Consistory was opened at Avignon, March 18.  The proceedings occupied many
months; many witnesses were examined.  The main points attempted to be
established by their evidence seem to have been these: "That Boniface had
declared his belief that there was no such thing as divine law - what was
reputed to be such was merely the invention of men to keep the vulgar in awe
by the terrors of eternal punishment; that it was a falsehood to assert the
Trinity, and fatuous to believe it; that it was falsehood to say that a virgin
had brought forth, for it was an impossibility; that it was falsehood to
assert that bread is transubstantiated into the body of Christ; that
Christianity is false, because it asserts a future life, of which there is no
evidence save that of visionary people." It was in evidence that the pope had
said, "God may do the worst with me that he pleases in the future life; I
believe as every educated man does, the vulgar believe otherwise.  We have to
speak as they do, but we must believe and think with the few." It was sworn to
by those who had heard him disputing with some Parisians that he had
maintained "that neither the body nor the soul rise again." Others testified
that "he neither believed in the resurrection nor in the sacraments of the
Church, and had denied that carnal gratifications are sins." The Primicerio of
St. John's at Naples, deposed that, when a cardinal, Boniface had said in his
presence, "So that God gives me the good things of this life, I care not a
bean for that to come.  A man has no more a soul than a beast.  Did you ever
see any one who had risen from the dead?" He took delight in deriding the
blessed Virgin; "for," said he, "she was no more a virgin than my mother." As
to the presence of Christ in the Host, "It is nothing but paste." Three
knights of Lucca testified that when certain venerable ambassadors, whose
names they gave, were in the presence of the pope at the time of the jubilee,
and a chaplain happened to invoke the mercy of Jesus on a person recently
dead, Boniface appalled all around him by exclaiming, "What a fool, to commend
him to Christ!  He could not help himself, and how can he be expected to help
others?  He was no Son of God, but a shrewd man and a great hypocrite." It
might seem impossible to exceed such blasphemy: and yet the witnesses went on
to testify to a conversation which he held with the brave old Sicilian
admiral, Roger Loria.  This devout sailor made the remark, in the pope's
presence, that if, on a certain occasion, he had died, it was his trust that
Christ would have had mercy on him.  To this Boniface replied, "Christ! he was
no Son of God; he was a man, eating and drinking like ourselves; he never rose
from the dead; no man has ever risen.  I am far mightier than he.  I can
bestow kingdoms and humble kings." Other witnesses deposed to having heard him
affirm, "There is no harm in simony.  There is no more harm in adultery than
in rubbing one's hands together." Some testified to such immoralities and
lewdness in his private life that the pages of a modern book cannot be soiled
with the recital.

     In the meantime, Clement did all in his power to save the blackened
memory of his predecessor.  Every influence that could be brought to bear on
the revengeful or politic king was resorted to, and at last with success.
Perhaps Philip saw that he had fully accomplished his object.  He had no
design to destroy the papacy.  His aim was to revolutionize it - to give the
kings of France a more thorough control over it; and, for the accomplishment
of that purpose, to demonstrate to what a condition it had come through the
present system.  Whatever might be the decision, such evidence had been
brought forward as, notwithstanding its contradictions and apparent
inconsistencies, had made a profound impression on every thinking man.  It was
the king's consummate policy to let the matter remain where it was.
Accordingly, he abandoned all farther action.  The gratitude of Clement was
expressed in a bull exalting Philip, attributing his action to piety,
exempting him from all blame, annulling past bulls prejudicial to him,
revoking all punishments of those who had been concerned against Boniface
except in the case of fifteen persons, on whom a light and nominal penance was
inflicted.  In November, A.D. 1311, the Council of Vienne met.  In the
following year three cardinals appeared before it to defend the orthodoxy and
holy life of Pope Boniface.  Two knights threw down their gauntlets to
maintain his innocence by wager of battle.  There was no accuser! no one took
up the gage; and the council was at liberty quietly to dispose of the matter.

     How far the departed pontiff was guilty of the charges alleged against
him was, therefore, never fairly ascertained.  But it was a tremendous, an
appalling fact that charges of such a character could be even so much as
brought forward, much more that a succeeding pontiff had to listen to them,
and attribute intentions of piety to the accuser.  The immoralities of which
Boniface was accused were such as in Italy did not excite the same indignation
as among the more moral people beyond the Alps' the heresies were those
everywhere pervading the Church.  We have already seen what a profound
impression "The Everlasting Gospel" had made, and how many followers and
martyrs it had.  What was alleged against Boniface was only that he had taken
one step more in the downward course of irreligion.  His fault lay in this,
that in an evil hour he had given expression to thoughts which, considering
his position, ought to have remained locked up in his inmost soul.  As to the
rest, if he was avaricious, and accumulated enormous treasures, such as it was
said the banditti of the Colonnas seized when they outraged his person, he was
no worse than many other popes.  Clement V., his successor, died enormously
rich; and, what was worse, did not hesitate to scandalize Europe by his
prodigal munificence to the beautiful Brunisard, the Countess of Talleyrand,
his lady.

     The religious condition of Boniface, though not admitting of apology, is
capable of explanation.  By the Crusades all Europe had been wrought up to a
fanatical expectation, doomed necessarily to disappointment.  From them the
papacy had derived prodigious advantages both in money and power.  It was now
to experience fearful evils.  It had largely promised rewards in this life,
and also in the world to come, to those who would take up the Cross; it had
deliberately pitted Christianity against Mohammedanism, and staked the
authenticity of each on the issue of the conflict.  In face of the whole world
it had put forth as the true criterion the possession of the holy places,
hallowed by the life, the sufferings, the death, the resurrection of the
Redeemer.  Whatever the result might be, the circumstances under which this
had been done were such that there was no concealing, no dissembling. In all
Europe there was not a family which had not been pecuniarily involved in the
Crusades, perhaps few that had not furnished men.  Was it at all to be
wondered at that everywhere the people, accustomed to the logic of trial by
battle, were terror-stricken when they saw the result?  Was it to be wondered
at that even still more dreadful heresies spontaneously suggested themselves?
Was it at all extraordinary that, if there had been popes sincerely accepting
that criterion, the issue should be a pope who was a sincere misbeliever? Was
it extraordinary that there should be a loss of papal prestige?  It was the
papacy which had voluntarily, for its own ends, brought things into this evil
channel, and the papacy deserved a just retribution of discredit and ruin.  It
had wrought on the devout temper of religious Europe for its own sinister
purposes; it had drained the Continent of its blood, and perhaps of what was
more highly prized - its money; it had established a false issue, an
unwarrantable criterion, and now came the time for it to reap consequences of
a different kind - intellectual revolt among the people, heresy among the
clergy.  Nor was the pope without eminent comrades in his sin.  The Templars,
whose duty it had been to protect pilgrims on the way to Jerusalem - who had
therefore been long and thoroughly familiar with the state of events in
Palestine - had been treading in the same path as the pope.  Dark rumours had
begun to circulate throughout Europe that these, the very vanguard of
Christianity, had not only proved traitors to their banner, but had actually
become Mohammedanized.  On their expulsion from the Holy Land, at the close of
the Crusades, they spread all over Europe, to disseminate by stealth their
fearful heresies, and to enjoy the riches they had acquired in the service
they had betrayed.  Men find a charm in having it mysteriously and secretly
divulged to them that their long-cherished opinions are all a delusion. There
was something fascinating in hearing privately, from those who could speak
with authority, that, after all, Mohammed was not an impostor, but the author
of a pure and noble Theism; that Saladin was not a treacherous assassin, a
despicable liar, but a most valiant, courteous, and gentle knight.  In his
proceedings against the Templars, King Philip the Fair seems to have been
animated by a pure intention of checking the disastrous spread of these
opinions; yet William de Nogaret, who was his chief adviser on this matter as
on that of Boniface, was not without reasons of personal hatred. It was said
that he divided his wrath between the Templars and the pope. They had had some
connexion with the burning of his father, and vengeance he was resolved to
wreak upon them.  Under colour of the charges against them, all the Templars
in France were simultaneously arrested in the dawn of one day, October 13,
A.D. 1307, so well devised were the measures.  The grand master, Du Molay, was
secured, not, however, without some perfidy.  Now were openly brought forward
the charges which struck Europe with consternation. Substantiation of them was
offered by witnesses, but it was secured by submitting the accused to torture.
The grand master, Du Molay, at first admitted their guilt of the crimes
alleged.  After some hesitation, the pope issued a bull, commanding the King
of England to do what the King of France had already done, to arrest the
Templars and seize their property.  His declaration, that one of the order, a
man of high birth, had confessed to himself his criminality, seems to have
made a profound impression on the mind of the English king, and of many other
persons until that time reluctant to believe.  The Parliament and the
University of Paris expressed themselves satisfied with the evidence.  New
examinations were held, and new convictions were made.  The pope issued a bull
addressed to all Christendom, declaring how slowly, but, alas! how certainly,
he had been compelled to believe in the apostacy of the order, and commanding
that everywhere proceedings should be instituted against it.  A papal
commission assembled in Paris, August 7, A.D. 309.  The grand master was
brought before it.  He professed his belief in the Catholic faith, but now
denied that the order was guilty of the charges alleged against it, as also
did many of the other knights.  Other witnesses were, however, brought
forward, some of who pretended to have abandoned the order on account of its
foul acts.  At the Porte St. Antoine, on many pleasant evenings in the
following May, William de Nogaret revelled in the luxury of avenging the shade
of his father.  One hundred and thirteen Templars were, in slow succession,
burnt at stakes.  The remorseless lawyer was repaying the Church in her own
coin.  Yet of this vast concourse of sufferers all died protesting their
innocence; not one proved an apostate. Notwithstanding this most significant
fact - for those who were ready to lay down their lives, and to meet with
unshaken constancy the fire, were surely the bravest of the knights, and their
dying declaration is worthy of our most reverent consideration - things were
such that no other course was possible than the abolition of the order, and
this accordingly took place.  The pope himself seems to have been satisfied
that the crimes had been perpetrated under the instigation or temptation of
Satan; but men of more enlarged views appear to have concluded that, though
the Templars were innocent of the moral abominations charged against them, a
familiarity with other forms of belief in the East had undoubtedly sapped
their faith.  After a weary imprisonment of six years, embittered by many
hardships, the grand master, Du Molay, was brought up for sentence.  He had
been found guilty.  With his dying breath, "before Heaven and earth, on the
verge of death, when the least falsehood bears like an intolerable weight on
the soul," he declared the innocence of the order and of himself.  The
vesper-bell was sounding when Du Molay and a brother convict were led forth to
their stakes, placed on an island in the Seine.  King Philip himself was
present.  As the smoke and flames enveloped them they continued to affirm
their innocence.  Some averred that forth from the fire Du Molay's voice
sounded, "Clement! thou wicked and false judge, I summon thee to meet me
within forty days at the bar of God." Some said that he also summoned the
king.  In the following year King Philip the Fair and Pope Clement the Fifth
were dead.

     John XXII., elected after an interval of more than two years spent in
rivalries and intrigues between the French and Italian cardinals, continued
the residence at Avignon.  His movements took a practical turn in the
commencement of a process for the recovery of the treasures of Clement from
the Viscount de Lomenie.  This was only a part of the wealth of the deceased
pope, but it amounted to a million and three quarters of florins of gold. The
Inquisition was kept actively at work for the extermination of the believers
in "The Everlasting Gospel," and the remnant of the Albigenses and Waldenses.
But all this had no other result than that which eventually occurred - an
examination of the authenticity and rightfulness of the papal power.  With an
instinct as to the origin of the misbelief everywhere spreading, the pope
published bulls against the Jews, of whom a bloody persecution had arisen, and
ordered that all their Talmuds and other blasphemous books should be burnt.  A
physician, Marsilio of Padua, published a work, "The Defender of Peace." It
was a philosophical examination of the principles of government, and of the
nature and limits of the sacerdotal power.  Its democratic tendency was
displayed by its demonstration that the exposition of the law of Christianity
rests not with the pope nor any other priest, but with a general council; it
rejected the papal political pretensions; asserted that no one can be
rightfully excommunicated by a pope alone, and that he has no power of
coercion over human thought; that the civil immunities of the clergy ought to
be ended; that poverty and humility ought alone to be their characteristics;
that society ought to provide them with a decent sustenance, but nothing more:
their pomp, extravagance, luxury, and usurpations, especially that of tithes,
should be abrogated; that neither Christ nor the Scriptures ever gave St.
Peter a supremacy over the other apostles; that, if history is to be
consulted, St. Paul, and not St. Peter, was bishop of Rome - indeed, it is
doubtful whether the latter was ever in that city, the Acts of the Apostles
being silent on that subject.  From these and many other such arguments he
drew forty-one conclusions adverse to the political and ecclesiastical
supremacy of the pope.

     It is not necessary to consider here the relations of John XXII. to Louis
of Bavaria, nor of the antipope Nicholas; they belong merely to political
history.  But, as if to show how the intellectual movement was working its
way, the pontiff himself did not escape a charge of heresy. Though he had so
many temporal affairs on his hands, John did not hesitate to raise the great
question of the "beatific vision." In his opinion, the dead, even the saints,
do not enjoy the beatific vision of God until after the Judgment-day.  At once
there was a demand among the orthodox, "What! do not the apostles, John,
Peter, nay, even the blessed Virgin, stand yet in the presence of God?" The
pope directed the most learned theologians to examine the question, himself
entering actively into the dispute.  The University of Paris was involved.
The King of France declared that his realm should not be polluted with such
heretical doctrines.  A single sentence explains the practical direction of
the dogma, so far as the interests of the Church were concerned: "If the
saints stand not in the presence of God, of what use is their intercession?
What is the use of addressing prayers to them?" The folly of the pontiff
perhaps might be excused by his age.  He was now nearly ninety years old.
That he had not guided himself according to the prevailing sentiment of the
lower religious orders, who thought that poverty is essential to salvation,
appeared at his death, A.D. 1334.  He left eighteen millions of gold florins
in specie, and seven millions in plate and jewels.

     His successor, Benedict XII., disposed of the question of the "beatific
vision:" "It is only those saints who do not pass through Purgatory that
immediately behold the Godhead." The pontificate of Benedict, which was not
without many good features, hardly verified the expression with which he
greeted the cardinals when they elected him, "You have chosen an ass." His was
a gay life.  There is a tradition that to him is due the origin of the
proverb, "As drunk as a pope."

     In the subsequent pontificate of Clement VI., A.D. 1342, the court at
Avignon became the most voluptuous in Christendom.  It was crowded with
knights and ladies, painters and other artists.  It exhibited a day-dream of
equipages and banquets.  The pontiff himself delighted in female society, but,
in his weakness, permitted his lady, the Countess of Turenne, to extort
enormous revenues by the sale of ecclesiastical promotions.  Petrarch, who
lived at Avignon at this time, speaks of it as a vast brothel.  His own sister
had been seduced by the holy father, John XXII.  During all these years the
Romans had made repeated attempts to force back the papal court to their city.
With its departure all their profits had gone.  But the fatal policy of
electing Frenchmen into the College of Cardinals seemed to shut out every
hope.  The unscrupulous manner in which this was done is illustrated by the
fact that Clement made one of his relatives, a lad of eighteen, a cardinal.
For a time the brief glories of Rienzi cast a flickering ray on Rome; but
Rienzi was only a demagogue - an impostor.  It was the deep impression made
upon Europe that the residence at Avignon was an abandonment of the tomb of
St. Peter, that compelled Urban V. to return to Rome.  This determination was
strengthened by a desire to escape out of the power of the kings of France,
and to avoid the free companies who had learned to extort bribes for sparing
Avignon from plunder.  He left Avignon, A.D. 1367, amid the reluctant grief of
his cardinals, torn from that gay and dissipated city, and in dread of the
recollections and of the populace of Rome.  And well it might be so; for not
only in Rome, but all over Italy, piety was held in no respect, and the
discipline of the Church in derision.  When Urban sent to Barnabas Visconti,
who was raising trouble in Tuscany, a bull of excommunication by the hands of
two legates, Barnabas actually compelled them, in his presence, to eat the
parchment on which the bull was written, together with the leaden seal and the
silken string, and, telling them that he hoped it would sit as lightly on
their stomachs as it did on his, sent them back to their master!  In a little
time - it was but two years - absence from France became insupportable; the
pope returned to Avignon, and there died.  It was reserved for his successor,
Gregory XI., finally to end what was termed, from its seventy years' duration,
the Babylonish captivity, and restore the papacy to the Eternal City, A.D.
1376.

     But, though the popes had thus returned to Rome, the effects of King
Philip's policy still continued.  On the death of Gregory XI., the conclave,
meeting at Rome - for the conclave must meet where the pope dies - elected
Urban VI., under intimidation of the Roman populace, who were determined to
retain the papacy in their city; but, escaping to Fondi, and repenting of what
they had thus done, they proclaimed his election void, and substituted Clement
VII. for him.  They were actually at one time on the point of choosing the
King of France as pope.  Thus began the great schism.  It was, in reality, a
struggle between France and Italy for the control of the papacy.  The former
had enjoyed it for seventy years; the latter was determined to recover it.
The schism thus rested originally on political considerations, but these were
doubtless exasperated by the conduct of Urban, whose course was overbearing
and even intolerable to his supporters.  Nor did he amend as his position
became more consolidated.  In A.D. 1385, suspecting his cardinals of an
intention to seize him, declare him a heretic, and burn him, he submitted
several of them to torture in his own presence, while he recited his breviary.
Escaping from Nocera, where he had been besieged, he caused the Bishop of
Aquila to be killed on the roadside.  Others he tied in sacks, and threw into
the sea at Genoa.  It was supposed, not without reason, that he was insane.