A History of The Inquisition of The Middle Ages Volume III Part 19

In Aragon the decision of 1419 was regarded as settling the question.

Royal letters in favor of Lullism were issued by Alonso V. in 1415 and 1449, by Ferdinand the Catholic in 1483 and 1503, by Charles V. in 1526, and by Philip II. in 1597; the latter monarch, indeed, had great relish for Lully's writings, some of which he habitually carried with him on his journeys to read on the way, and in the library of the Escorial many copies of them were found annotated with his own hand. This royal favor was needed in the curious controversy which followed. Lully's name had pa.s.sed into the received catalogues of heretics, and as late as 1608 it was included in the list published by the Doctor of Sorbonne, Gabriel du Preau. Paul IV., in 1559, put it in the first papal _Index Expurgatorius_. When this came to be published in Spain, Bishop Jayme Ca.s.sador and the inquisitors suspended it and referred the matter to the _consejo de la suprema_, which ordered the entry to be _borrado_, or expunged. At the Council of Trent, Doctor Juan Villeta, acting for Spain, presented a pet.i.tion in favor of Lully, which was considered in a special congregation, September 1, 1563, and a unanimous decision was reached, confirming all the condemnations pa.s.sed on Eymerich for falsehood, and ordering the Index of Paul IV. to be expurgated by striking out all that related to Lully. This was a secret determination of the council, and was not allowed to appear in the published acts. It settled the matter for a time, but the question was revived in 1578, when Francisco Pegna reprinted Eymerich's book with the special sanction of Gregory XIII., bringing anew before the world the bull of Gregory XI.

and the errors condemned in Lully's writings. Gregory XIII. ordered Pegna to examine the papal registers for the contested bull. Those in Rome were found imperfect, and the missing portions were sent for from Avignon, but the most diligent search failed to find the desired doc.u.ment, though it was alleged that two volumes of the year 1386 could not be found. Battle was now fairly joined between the partisans of Eymerich and those of Lully. In 1583 the Congregation of the Index determined to include Lully among the prohibited writers, but again Spanish influence was strong enough to prevent it. Under Sixtus V. there was another attempt, but Juan Arce de Herrera, in the name of Philip II., presented an _Apologia_ to the Congregation of the Index, and again the danger was conjured. When the Index of Clement VIII. was in preparation the question was again taken up, June 3, 1594, and rejected out of respect for Spain; at the request of the Spanish amba.s.sador the pope was asked to order a complete set of Lully's works to be sent to Rome for examination, that the matter might be definitely settled; but this was not done, and in March, 1595, it was announced that his name was omitted from the Index. In 1611 Philip III. revived the controversy by applying to Paul V. for the canonization of Lully and the expurgation of Eymerich's _Directorium_; a request which was repeated by Philip IV.

After a confused controversy, it was determined that certain articles admittedly extracted from his books were dangerous, audacious, and savoring of heresy, and some of them manifestly erroneous and heretical.

At a sitting, under the presidency of the pope himself, held August 29, 1619, it was resolved to send this censure to the Spanish nuncio, with instructions to inform the king and the inquisitors that Lully's books were forbidden. Then came an appeal from the kingdom of Majorca begging that the books might be corrected, to which Paul replied, August 6, 1620, imposing silence; and on August 30 Cardinal Bellarmine drew up for the Inquisition a final report that Lully's doctrine was forbidden until corrected, adding his belief that correction was impossible, but that the condemnation was thus phrased so as to mitigate its severity. Thus Lully was branded by the Holy See as a heretic, but, out of respect for the Spanish court, the sentence was never published: the matter was supposed by the public to be undecided, and the wors.h.i.+p of him as a saint continued uninterruptedly. Raynaldus, in fact, writing in 1658, states that the question is still _sub judice_. About the same time certain Jesuits took up his cause against the Dominicans, and in 1662 a translation of his "Triumph of Love" appeared in Paris, on the t.i.tle of which he was qualified as "Saint Raymond Lully, Martyr and Hermit." The Dominican ire was aroused: appeal was made to the Congregation of Rites, which reported that Lully was included in the Franciscan martyrology under March 29, but that he must not be qualified as a saint, and that a careful examination should be made of his works, to prohibit them if necessary--a recommendation which was never carried out. Yet when, in 1688, Doctor Pedro Bennazar issued at Palma a book in praise of Lully, it was condemned by the Inquisition in 1690; and a compendium of his theology, by Sebastian Krenzer in 1755, was put on the Index, although this was not done with the numerous controversial writings which continued to appear, nor with the great edition of his works published from 1721 to 1742, in the t.i.tle of which he was qualified as _Beatus_.

Benedict XIV., in his work _De Servorum Dei Beatificatione_, after carefully weighing the authorities on both sides, says that his claims to sanct.i.ty are to be suspended until the decision of the Holy See. That decision was postponed for a century. In 1847 Pius IX. approved an office of "the holy Raymond Lully" for Majorca, where he had been immemorially wors.h.i.+pped; the office reciting that so fully was he imbued with the divine wisdom that he who had previously been uncultured was enabled to discourse most excellently on divine things. In 1858, moreover, Pius permitted the whole Franciscan Order to celebrate his feast on November 27. Yet the Dominicans had not forgotten their old rancor, for in 1857 there appeared in a Roman journal, published under the approbation of the Master of the Sacred Palace, an argument to prove that the alleged bull of Gregory XI. is still in force, and consequently that Lully's books are forbidden, although they do not appear in the Index. This case and that of Savonarola serve to indicate how dangerously nebulous are the boundaries between heresy and sanct.i.ty.[639]

The example of Raymond Lully ill.u.s.trates the pitfalls which surrounded the footsteps of all who ventured on the dangerous path of theology.

That science a.s.sumed to know and define all the secrets of the universe, and yet it was constantly growing, as ingenious or daring thinkers would suggest new theories or frame new deductions from data already settled.

Hosts of these were condemned; the annals of an intellectual centre like the University of Paris are crowded with sentences p.r.o.nounced against novel points of faith and their unlucky authors. Occasionally, however, some new dogma would arise, would be vehemently debated, would refuse to be suppressed, and would finally triumph after a more or less prolonged struggle, and would then take its place among the eternal verities which it was heresy to call in question. This curious process of dogmatic evolution in an infallible Church is too instructive not to be ill.u.s.trated with one or two examples.

It might seem a question beyond the grasp of finite intelligence to determine whether the souls of the blessed are wafted to heaven and at once enjoy the ineffable bliss of beholding the Divine Essence, or whether they have to await the resurrection and the Day of Judgment.

This was not a mere theoretical question, however, but had a very practical aspect, for in the existing anthropomorphism of belief, it might well be thought that the efficacy of the intercession of saints depended on their admission to the presence of G.o.d, and the guardians of every shrine boasting of a relic relied for their revenues on the popular confidence that its saint was able to make personal appeals for the fulfilment of his wors.h.i.+ppers' prayers. The desired conclusion was only reached by gradual steps. The subject was one which had not escaped the attention of the early Fathers, and St. Augustin a.s.sumes that the full fruition of the Vision of G.o.d can only be enjoyed by the soul after it has been clothed in the resurrected body. Among the errors condemned in 1243 by Guillaume d'Auvergne and the University of Paris were two, one of which held that the Divine Essence is not and will not be seen by either angels or glorified souls; the other, that while angels dwell in the empyrean heaven, human souls, even including the Virgin, will never advance beyond the aqueous heaven. The decision of the bishop and University was cautious as regards the Divine Vision, which was only a.s.serted in the future and not in the present tense, both as regards angels and human souls, but there was no hesitation in declaring that all occupied the same heaven. Thomas Aquinas argues the question with an elaborateness which shows both its importance and its inherent difficulty, but he ventures no further than to prove that the Blessed will, after the resurrection, enjoy the sight of G.o.d, face to face. It must be borne in mind that the prevalent expectation in each successive generation that the coming of Antichrist and the second advent were not far off, rendered of less importance the exact time at which the Beatific Vision would be bestowed, while the development of mystic theology tended to bring into ever more intimate relations the intercourse between the soul and its Creator. Bonaventura does not hesitate to treat as an accepted fact that the souls of the just will see G.o.d, and he a.s.serts that some of them are already in heaven, while others wait confidently in their graves for the appointed time. The final step seems to have been taken soon after this by the celebrated Dominican theologian, Master Dietrich of Friburg, who wrote a tract to prove that the Blessed are immediately admitted to the Beatific Vision, a fact revealed to him by one of his penitents who, by order of G.o.d to solve his doubts, appeared to him ten days after death and a.s.sured him that she was in sight of the Trinity.[640]

Yet the doctrine was not formally accepted by the Church, and the mystical tendencies of the time rendered dangerous a too rapid progress in this direction. The Illuminism of the Brethren of the Free Spirit was a contagious evil, and the Council of Vienne in 1312 refrained from an expression of opinion on the subject, except to condemn the error of the Beghards, that man does not need the light of glory to elevate him to the sight of G.o.d--thus only by implication admitting that with the light of glory the soul is fitted to enjoy the Beatific Vision. When and how the dogma spread that the souls of the just are admitted at once to the presence of G.o.d does not appear, but it seems to have become generally accepted without any definite expression of approbation by the Holy See.

In October, 1326, John XXII. treats as a heresy to be extirpated among the Greeks the belief that the saints will not enter paradise until the Day of Judgment, but not long afterwards he changed his mind, and his pride in his theological skill and learning would not let him rest until he had forced Christendom to change with him. He expressed his doubts as to the truth of the new dogma and indicated an intention of openly condemning it. His temper rendered opposition perilous, and none of the cardinals and doctors of the papal court dared to discuss it with him until, in 1331, an English Dominican, Thomas Walleys, in a sermon preached before him, boldly maintained the popular opinion and invoked the divine malediction on all who a.s.serted the contrary. John's wrath burst forth. Walleys was seized and tried by the Inquisition, cast into jail and almost starved to death, when Philippe de Valois intervened and procured his liberation. Having thus silenced his opponents, John proceeded to declare his opinions publicly. In the Advent of 1331 he preached several sermons in which he a.s.serted that the saints in heaven will not have distinct vision of the Divine Essence before the Resurrection of the body and the Day of Judgment, until which time they will only see the humanity of Christ. "I know," he said, "that some persons murmur because we hold this opinion, but I cannot do otherwise."[641]

It shows the peculiar condition of the human mind engendered by the persecution of heresy that this was a political event of the gravest importance. We have seen how much stress was laid, in the quarrel between the empire and papacy, upon John's innovation on the accepted belief as to Christ's poverty, and the manner in which his resolute purpose had carried that dogma against all opposition. On this occasion he was the conservator of the previously received faith of the Church, but the political conjuncture was against him. Not only was Louis of Bavaria consolidating the empire in resistance to the aggressiveness of the papacy, but France, the main support of the Avignonese popes, was indisposed. Philippe de Valois had been offended by the rejection of his excessive demands in compensation of fulfilling his vows of a new crusade, and had been alienated by John's yielding to the schemes of John of Bohemia, who was endeavoring to secure the imperial territories in Italy. Both monarchs took active steps to turn to the fullest account the papal heresy. It was a received principle that, as a dead man was no longer a man, so a pope detected in heresy was no longer a pope, seeing that he had _ipso facto_ forfeited his office. Nothing better could serve the purpose of Louis of Bavaria and his junto of exiled Franciscans. Under the advice of Michele da Cesena he took steps to call a German national council, for which Bonagrazia drew up a summons based upon the papal heresy, and the plan was approved by Cardinal Orsini and his dissatisfied brethren. This came to nought, however, through the still greater promptness of Philippe de Valois to avail himself of the situation. He made the celebrated William Durand, Bishop of Mende, write a treatise in opposition to the papal views, and protected him when John sought to punish him. He a.s.sembled the University of Paris, which, January 3, 1333, p.r.o.nounced emphatically in favor of the Beatific Vision, and addressed to the pope a letter a.s.serting it without equivocation. Gerard Odo, the time-serving Franciscan General, was despatched, ostensibly to make peace between England and Scotland, but instructed to dally in Paris and endeavor to win over public opinion. He ventured to preach in favor of John's conservative views, but only succeeded in arousing a storm before which he was forced to bow and humbly to declare that his argument was only controversial and not a.s.sertive. Philippe took the boldest and most aggressive position. He wrote to John that to deny the Beatific Vision was not only to destroy belief in the intercession of the Virgin and saints, but to invalidate all the pardons and indulgences granted by the Church, and so firmly was he convinced of its truth that he would take steps to burn all who denied it, including the pope himself. Even Robert of Naples joined in remonstrance. Haughty and obstinate as John had proved himself, he could not resist single-handed the indignation of all Europe, and he yielded.

He purchased peace by political concessions, and wrote humbly to Philippe and Robert that he had never positively denied the Beatific Vision, but had treated it simply as an open question, subject to discussion. Even this was not enough. All his ambitious schemes had broken down. In Germany, Louis of Bavaria was posing as the defender of the faith. In France, even the weak Philippe de Valois had resumed his ascendency over Avignon. In Italy, John's son, Cardinal Bertrand, had been forced to fly, and Lombardy had freed itself. For the wretched old man there was nothing left but to recant and die. He had convoked a consistory for December 2, 1234, to choose a successor to Louis of Bavaria, but before daybreak he was seized with a fatal flux which stretched him hopeless on his bed. Towards evening of the next day he a.s.sembled the cardinals and exhorted them to select a worthy successor to the chair of St. Peter, when his kindred urged him to save his soul and the reputation of the Church by withdrawing from his opinions as to the Beatific Vision. The secrets of that awful death-bed have never been revealed, but after he pa.s.sed away on the 5th, a bull was promulgated over his name in which he professed his belief as to the Divine Vision, and, if he had in that or anything else held opinions in conflict with those of the Church, he revoked all that he might have said or done, and submitted himself to its judgment. Humiliating as was this, Michele da Cesena p.r.o.nounced it insufficient, as he made no formal confession of error and recantation, whence it was to be inferred that he died a contumacious heretic. Even Paris was not satisfied, although conclusions were not expressed so openly.[642]

Benedict XII., who was elected December 20, was a zealous defender of the faith who had manifested his determination to extirpate all forms of heresy when, as Bishop of Pamiers, he had personally conducted for years a very active episcopal Inquisition in co-operation with the labors of Jean de Beaune and Bernard Gui. Such a man was not likely to underrate the importance of his predecessor's error, and in fact he lost no time in correcting it. On the 22d a significant threat to Gerard Odo to beware, for he would tolerate no heresy, was a notice to all who had yielded to John's imperiousness. On February 2, 1335, he preached a sermon on the text, "Behold, the bridegroom cometh," in which he clearly enunciated the doctrine that the saints have a distinct vision of the Divine Essence. Two days later he summoned before the consistory all who had given in their adhesion to the opinion of John and demanded a statement of their motives, by way, we may presume, of admitting them back into the fold as easily as possible. A twelvemonth later, January 29, 1336, he held a public consistory in which he published decisively that the saints enjoy the Beatific Vision, and decreed that all holding the contrary opinion should be punished as heretics. Benedict had earned the reputation of a ruthless upholder of orthodoxy and persecutor of dissent, and no victims were necessary to enforce the reception of the new article of faith. So thoroughly was it received that it pa.s.sed into the formulas of the Inquisition as one of the points on which all suspected heretics were interrogated; and when, at the Council of Florence, in 1439, a nominal union was patched up with the Greek Church, one of the articles enunciated for the acceptance of the latter a.s.serts that souls which after baptism incur no sin, or after sinning have been duly purged, are received at once into heaven and enjoy the sight of the Triune G.o.d. Thus a new dogma was adopted by the Church in spite of the opposition of one of the most arbitrary and headstrong of the successors of St. Peter.[643]

An even more instructive instance of the development of theological doctrine is to be found in the history of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin. Up to the twelfth century it was not questioned that the Virgin was conceived and born in sin, and doctors like St. Anselm found their only difficulty in explaining how Christ could be born sinless from a sinner. With the growth of Mariolatry, however, there came a popular tendency to regard the Virgin as free from all human corruption, and towards the middle of the twelfth century the church of Lyons ventured to place on the calendar a new feast in honor of the Conception of the Virgin, arguing that as the Nativity was feasted as holy, the Conception, which was a condition precedent to the Nativity, was likewise holy and to be celebrated. St. Bernard, the great conservative of his day, at once set himself to suppress the new doctrine. He wrote earnestly to the canons of Lyons, showing them that their argument applied equally to the nativity and conception of all the ancestors of the Virgin by the male and female lines; he begged them to introduce no novelties in the Church, but to hold with the Fathers; he argued that the only immaculate conception was that of Christ, who was conceived of the Holy Ghost, and proved that Mary, who was sprung of the union between man and woman, must necessarily have been conceived in original sin. He admitted that she was born sanctified, whence the Church properly celebrated the Nativity, but this sanctification was operated in the womb of St. Anne, even as the Lord had said to Jeremiah, "Before thou camest out of the womb I sanctified thee" (Jer. I. 5). It ill.u.s.trates the recklessness of theological controversy to find St.

Bernard subsequently quoted as sustaining the Immaculate Conception.

Peter Lombard, the great Master of Sentences, was not willing to concede even as much as St. Bernard, and quotes John of Damascus to show that the Virgin was not cleansed of original sin until she accepted the duty of bearing Christ. To this view of the question Innocent III. lent the authority of his great name by a.s.serting it in the most positive manner.[644]

These irresistible authorities settled the question for a while as one of dogma, but the notion had attractiveness to the people, and in the constant development of Mariolatry anything which tended to strengthen her position as a subordinate deity and intercessor found favor with the extensive cla.s.s to whom her cult was a source of revenue. There is something inexpressibly attractive in the mediaeval conception of the Virgin, and the extension of her wors.h.i.+p was inevitable. G.o.d was a being too infinitely high and awful to be approached; the Holy Ghost was an abstraction not to be grasped by the vulgar mind; Christ, in spite of his infinite love and self-sacrifice, was invoked too often as a judge and persecutor to be regarded as wholly merciful; but the Virgin was the embodiment of unalloyed maternal tenderness, whose sufferings for her divine Son had only rendered her more eagerly beneficent in her desire to aid and save the race for which he had died. She was human, yet divine; in her humanity she shared the feelings of her kind, and whatever exalted her divinity rendered her more helpful, without withdrawing her from the sympathy of men. "The Virgin," says Peter of Blois, "is the sole mediator between man and Christ. We were sinners and feared to appeal to the Father, for he is terrible, but we have the Virgin, in whom there is nothing terrible, for in her is the plenitude of grace and the purity of human life;" and he goes on to virtually prove her divinity by showing that if the Son is consubstantial with the Father, the Virgin is consubstantial with the Son. In fact, he exclaims, "if Mary were taken from heaven there would be to mankind nothing but the blackness of darkness." G.o.d, says St. Bonaventura, could have made a greater earth and a greater heaven, but he exhausted his power in creating Mary. Yet Bonaventura, as a doctor of the Church, was careful to limit her sinlessness to sin arising with herself, and not to include the absence of inherited sin. She was sanctified, not immaculately conceived.[645]

In spite of St. Bernard's remonstrance, the celebration of the Feast of the Conception gradually spread. Thomas Aquinas tells us that it was observed in many churches, though not in that of Rome, and that it was not forbidden, but he warns us against the inference that because a feast is holy therefore the conception of Mary was holy. In fact, he denies the possibility of her immaculate conception, though he admits her sanctification at some period which cannot be defined. This settled the question for the Dominicans, whose reverence for their Angelic Doctor rendered it impossible for them to swerve from his teachings. For a while, strange to say, the Franciscans agreed with their rivals. There is a tradition that Duns Scotus, in 1304, defended the new doctrine against the Dominicans in the University of Paris, and that in 1333 the University declared in its favor by a solemn decree, but this story only makes its appearance about 1480 in Bernardinus de Bustis, and there is no trace in the records of any such action, while Duns Scotus only said that it was possible to G.o.d, and that G.o.d alone knew the truth. There were few more zealous Franciscans than Alvaro Pelayo, penitentiary to John XXII., and he, in refuting the illuminism of the Beghards, makes use of the Virgin's conception in sin as an admitted fact which he employs as an argument; and he adds that this is the universal opinion of the received authorities, such as Bernard, Aquinas, Bonaventura, and Richard de Saint Victor, although some modern theologians, abandoning the teachings of the Church, have controverted it through a false devotion to the Virgin, whom they thus seek to a.s.similate to G.o.d and Christ. Yet as, about this very time, the Church of Narbonne commenced, in 1327, to celebrate the Feast of the Conception, and in 1328 the Council of London ordered its observance in all the churches of the Province of Canterbury, we see how rapidly the new dogma was spreading.[646]

As it was impossible for the Dominicans to change their position, it was inevitable that in time the Franciscans should range themselves under the opposite banner. The clash between them first came in 1387, when the struggle was carried on with all the ferocity of the _odium theologic.u.m_. Juan de Moncon, a Dominican professor in the University of Paris, taught that the Virgin was conceived in sin. This aroused great uproar, and he fled to Avignon from impending condemnation. Then, at Rouen, another Dominican preached similar doctrine, and, as we are told, was generally ridiculed. The University sent to Avignon a deputation headed by Pierre d'Ailly, who claimed that they procured the condemnation of Juan, but he escaped to his native Aragon, while the Dominicans of Paris declared that the papal decision had been in their favor. If the chronicler is to be believed, they preached on the conception of the Virgin in the grossest terms and indulged in the most b.e.s.t.i.a.l descriptions, till the fury of the University knew no bounds.

The Dominicans were expelled from all positions in the Sorbonne, and the Avignonese Clement VII. was too dependent upon France to refuse a bull proclaiming as heretics Juan and all who held with him. Charles VI. was persuaded not only to force the Dominicans of Paris to celebrate every year the Feast of the Conception, but to order the arrest of all within the kingdom who denied the Immaculate Conception, that they might be brought to Paris and obliged to recant before the University. It was not until 1403 that the Dominicans were readmitted to the Sorbonne, to the disgust of the other Mendicants, who had greatly profited by their exile. It was natural that where the Dominicans had authority they should indulge in reprisals. The Lullists were ardent defenders of the Immaculate Conception, which accounts in part for the hostility which they incurred.[647]

The University of Paris was the stronghold of the new doctrine, and as its activity and influence were greatly curtailed by the disturbances which preceded the invasion of Henry V. and by the English domination, we hear little of the question until the restoration of the French monarchy. The belief, however, had continued to spread. In 1438 the clergy and magistrates of Madrid, on the occasion of a pestilence, made a vow thereafter to observe the Feast of the Conception. The next year the Council of Basle, which had long been discussing the matter in a desultory fas.h.i.+on, came to a decision in favor of the Immaculate Conception, forbade all a.s.sertions to the contrary, and ordered the feast to be everywhere celebrated on December 8, with due indulgences for attendance. As the council, however, had previously deposed Eugenius IV., its utterances were not received as the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, and the doctrine, though strengthened, was not accepted by the Church. In fact, the rival Council of Florence, in 1441, in its decree of union with the Jacobines, although it spoke of Christ a.s.suming his humanity in the immaculate womb of the Virgin, showed that this was but a figure of speech, by declaring as a point of faith that no one born of man and woman has ever escaped the domination of Satan except through the merits of Christ.[648]

A new article could not be introduced without creating a new heresy.

Here was one on which the Church was divided, and the adherents on each side denounced the other as heretics and persecuted them as far as they dared where they had the power. In this the Dominicans were decidedly at a disadvantage, as their antagonists had greatly the preponderance and were daily growing in strength. In 1457 the Council of Avignon, presided over by a papal legate, the Cardinal de Foix, who was a Franciscan, confirmed the decree of Basle, and ordered under pain of excommunication that no one should teach to the contrary. The same year the University of Paris was informed that a Dominican in Britanny was preaching the old doctrine. Immediately it held an a.s.sembly, wrote to the Duke of Britanny asking that the friar, if guilty, should be punished as a heretic, and declared its intention of formulating an article on the dogma.[649]

Thus far the popes had skilfully eluded compromising themselves on the subject. In the quarrels between the Mendicant Orders they could not afford to alienate either, and we have seen how, in the wrangle over the blood of Christ, they avoided entanglements and managed to let the dispute die out. The present debate was far too bitter and too extended for them to escape being drawn in, and they endeavored to follow the same line of policy as before. In 1474 Vincenzo Bandello, a Dominican, who was subsequently general of the Order, provoked a fierce discussion on the subject in Lombardy by a book on the Conception. The strife continued for two years with so many scandals that in 1477 Sixtus IV.

evoked the matter before him, when it was hotly debated by Bandello for the Dominicans, or "_Maculistae_" and Francesco, General of the Franciscans, in defence of the Immaculate Conception. The only result seems to have been that Sixtus issued a bull ordering the Feast of the Conception to be celebrated in all the churches, with the grant of appropriate indulgences. This was a decided defeat for the Dominicans, who found it excessively galling to celebrate the feast, and thus admit before the people that they were wrong. They endeavored to elude it in some places by qualifying it as the Feast of the Sanctification of the Virgin, but this was not permitted, and they were forced to submit. In 1481, at Mantua, Fra Bernardino da Feltre was formally accused of heresy before the episcopal court for preaching the Immaculate Conception, but defended himself successfully; and the next year, at Ferrara, the Franciscans and Dominicans preached so fiercely on the subject, and denounced each other as heretics so bitterly, that popular tumults were excited. To quiet matters Ercole d'Este caused a disputation to be held before him, which proved fruitless, and Sixtus IV. was again obliged to intervene. After listening to both sides he issued another bull, in which he excommunicated all who a.s.serted that the feast was in honor of the Sanctification of the Virgin, and also all who on either side should denounce the other as heretics.[650]

As a means of evading a decision without exasperating either Order this policy was successful, but as a measure of peace it was an utter failure. Renewed disturbances forced Alexander VI. to confirm the bull of Sixtus IV., with a clause calling upon the secular arm to keep the peace, if necessary; but in France the University of Paris wholly disregarded the prescriptions of both popes and treated as heretics all who denied the Immaculate Conception. In 1495, on the Feast of the Conception, December 8, a Franciscan named Jean Grillot so far forgot his fealty to his Order as to deny the dogma in preaching in Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois. He was immediately laid hold of and so energetically handled that by the 25th of the same month he made public recantation in the same church. This put the University on its mettle, and on March 3, 1496, it adopted a statute, signed by a hundred and twelve doctors in theology, affirming the doctrine and ordering that in future no one should be admitted into its body without taking an oath to maintain it, when if he proved recreant he should be expelled, degraded from all honors, and treated as a heathen and a publican. This example was followed by the Universities of Cologne, Tubingen, Mainz, and other places, arraying nearly all the learned bodies against the Dominicans, and training the vast majority of future theologians in the doctrine.

Most of the cardinals and prelates everywhere gave in their adhesion; kings and princes joined them; the Carmelites took the same side, and the Dominicans were left almost alone to fight the unequal battle. When in 1501, at Heidelberg, the Dominicans offered a disputation on the subject which the Franciscans eagerly accepted, the aspect of public opinion grew so threatening that they were obliged to get the palsgrave and magistrates to forbid it.[651]

So sensitive did the supporters of the Immaculate Conception become that a Dominican preaching on December 8 had needs be wary in the allusions to the Virgin which were unavoidable on that day of his humiliation. At Dieppe, on the feast of 1496, Jean de Ver, a Dominican, made use of expressions which were thought to oppose the dogma indirectly; he was at once brought to account and forced to confess publicly, and swear that in future he would uphold it. On the next anniversary Frere Jean Aloutier argued that the Virgin had never sinned even venially, although St. John Chrysostom said that she had done so out of vain-glory on her wedding-day. This was regarded as a covert attack, and Frere Jean was disciplined, though not publicly. Soon afterwards another Dominican, Jean Morselle, in a sermon, said it was a problem whether Eve or the Virgin was the fairer; it was apocryphal whether Christ went to meet the Virgin when she was raised to paradise; and that it was not an article of faith that she was a.s.sumed to heaven, body and soul, and that to doubt it was not mortal sin. All this sounds innocent enough as to matters incapable of positive a.s.sertion, but Frere Jean was compelled publicly to declare the first article to be suspect of heresy, the second to be false, and the third to be heretical. It is only this hyperaesthesia of doctrinal sensibility that will explain the rigorous measures taken with Piero da Lucca, a canon of St. Augustin, who, in 1504, at Mantua, in a sermon, said that Christ was not conceived in the womb of the Virgin, but in her heart, of three drops of her purest blood. At once he was seized by the Inquisition, condemned as a heretic, and came near being burned. A controversy arose which greatly scandalized the faithful. Baptista of Mantua wrote a book to prove the true place of Christ's conception. Julius II. evoked the matter to Rome and committed it to the cardinals of Porto and San Vitale, who called together an a.s.sembly of learned theologians. After due deliberation, in 1511 these condemned the new theory as heretical, and the purity of the faith was preserved.[652]

The position of the Dominicans was growing desperate. Christendom was uniting against them. Only the steady refusal of the papacy to p.r.o.nounce definitely on the question saved them from the adoption of a new article of faith which Aquinas had proved to be false. Aquinas was their tower of strength, whom the received tradition of the Order held to be inspired. It never occurred to them, as to his modern commentators, to prove that he did not mean what he said, and, in default of this, to yield on the point of the Immaculate Conception was to admit his fallibility. The alternative was a cruel one, but they had no choice.

They could only hope to secure the neutrality of the papacy and to prolong the hopeless fight against the growing strength of the new doctrine, which their banded enemies propagated with all the enthusiasm of approaching victory. The perplexity of the position was all the more keenly felt, as they claimed the Virgin as the peculiar patroness of their Order; the devotion of the Rosary, in her special honor, was a purely Dominican inst.i.tution. They who had always wors.h.i.+pped her with the most extravagant devotion were forced to become her apparent detractors, and were everywhere stigmatized as "_maculistae_." Would she not condescend to save her devotees from the cruel dilemma into which they had fallen?

Suddenly, in 1507, the rumor spread that in Berne the Virgin had interposed to save her servants. In a convent of Observantine Dominicans she had repeatedly appeared to a holy friar and revealed to him her vexation at the guilt of the Franciscans in teaching the Immaculate Conception. After conception she had been three hours in original sin before sanctification; the teaching of St. Thomas was true and divinely inspired; Alexander Hales, Duns Scotus, and many other Franciscans were in purgatory for a.s.serting the contrary. Julius II. would settle the question and would inst.i.tute in honor of the truth a greater feast than that of December 8. To help towards this consummation the Virgin gave the friar a cross tinged with her son's blood, three of the tears which he had shed over Jerusalem, the cloths in which he was wrapped in the flight to Egypt, and a vial of the blood which he had shed for man, together with a letter to Julius II. in which he was promised glory equal to that of St. Thomas Aquinas in return for what was expected of him, and this letter, duly authenticated by the seals of the Dominican priors of Berne, Basle, and Nurnberg, was sent to the pope. The reports of these divine appearances produced an immense sensation; countless mult.i.tudes a.s.sembled in the Dominican Church to look upon the friar thus favored, and he performed feats of fasting, prayer, and scourging, which increased the reputation for sanct.i.ty acquired by the visitations. After a trance he appeared with the stigmata of Christ; the church was arranged to enable him in his devotions to represent the various acts of the Pa.s.sion, and an immense crowd looked on with awestruck admiration.

Then an image of the Virgin wept, and it was explained that her grief arose from the disregard of her warnings of what would befall the city unless it ceased to receive a pension from France, unless it expelled the Franciscans, and unless it ceased to believe in the Immaculate Conception.

People flocked from all the region around, and the fame of the miraculous apparitions spread, when the magistrates of Berne were surprised by Letser, the favored recipient of the visitations, taking refuge with them, and begging protection from his superiors, who were torturing and endeavoring to poison him. An investigation developed the whole plot. Wigand Wirt, Master of the Observantine Dominicans, and professor of theology, had had, in 1501, a quarrel with a parish priest in Frankfort, in which they abused each other from their respective pulpits. In a sermon the priest thanked G.o.d that he did not belong to an Order which had slain the Emperor Henry VII. with a poisoned host, and which denied the Immaculate Conception. Wirt, who was present, shouted to him that he was a liar and a heretic. An uproar followed, in which the Order sustained Wirt and appealed to Julius II., who appointed a commission. The result was adverse to Wirt, who left Frankfort filled with wrath, and published a savage attack upon his adversaries, which the Archbishop of Mainz caused to be publicly burned, while all his suffragans prohibited its circulation. Greatly excited, the Dominicans, in a chapter held at Wimpffen, resolved to prove by miracle the falsity of the Immaculate Conception. Frankfort was at first selected as the theatre, but was abandoned through fear of the archbishop; then Nurnberg, but the number of learned men there was an obstacle, and Berne was finally chosen as a city populous and powerful, but simple and unlearned. The officials of the Dominican convent there, John Vetter the prior, Francis Ulchi the sub-prior, Stephen Bolshorst the lector, and Henry Steinecker the procurator, undertook to carry out the design, and selected as an instrument a tailor of Zurzach, John Letser, who had been recently admitted to the Order. To suit the taste of the age, it was proved on the trial that they had commenced by invoking the a.s.sistance of the devil and had signed compacts with him in their blood, but their own ingenuity was sufficient for what followed, though we are told that when they produced the stigmata on Letser they first rendered him insensible with a magic potion formed of blood from the navel of a new-born Jew and nineteen hairs from his eyelashes. The victim was carefully prepared by a series of apparitions, commencing with an ordinary ghost and ending with the Virgin. According to his own account he believed in the visions till one day entering Bolshorst's room suddenly he found him in female attire like that of the Virgin, preparing for making an appearance. By threats and promises he had been prevailed upon to continue the imposture a while longer, till, fearing for his life, he escaped and told his tale.

Letser was sent to the Bishop of Lausanne, who heard his story and authorized the magistrates of Berne to act. The four Dominicans were confined separately in chains, and envoys were sent to Rome, where, only after the greatest difficulty, they obtained audience of the pope. A papal commission was sent, but with insufficient powers, and prolonged delays were experienced in procuring another, but finally it came, having at its head Achilles afterwards Cardinal of San Sesto, one of the most learned jurists of the age. Torture was freely used on both Letser and the accused, and full confessions were obtained. These were so damaging that the commissioners desired to keep them secret even from the magistrates, and when the latter were dissatisfied it was determined that they should be shown to a select committee of eight under pledge of secrecy, and that, to satisfy the people, only certain articles sufficient to justify burning should be publicly read. These were four, viz., renouncing G.o.d, painting and reddening the host, falsely representing the weeping Virgin, and counterfeiting the stigmata. The four culprits were abandoned to the secular arm, and eight days afterwards, as Nicholas Gla.s.sberger piously hopes, they were sent to heaven through fire, for they were burned in a meadow beyond the Arar, their ashes being thrown into the river to prevent their being reverenced as relics--not without reason, for the Order promptly p.r.o.nounced them to be martyrs. It is worthy of note that in the published sentence the Immaculate Conception was kept wholly out of sight. In the existing tension between the Mendicant Orders the papal representatives evidently deemed it wise to keep this question in the background. Paulus Langius tells us that the story made an immense sensation, and that the "_maculistae_" endeavored in vain to suppress it, and circulated all manner of distorted and false accounts of it. Julius II., so far from obeying the visions of Letser, confirmed in 1511 the religious order of the Immaculate Conception founded at Toledo in 1484 by the zeal of Beatriz de Silva.[653]

Wigand Wirt did not wholly escape, though he does not seem to have been directly implicated in the fraud. The Observantine Franciscans prosecuted him before the Holy See for his savage tract against his adversaries. The case was heard by two successive commissions of cardinals, until, October 25, 1512, Wirt abandoned the defence and was sentenced to make the most humiliating of retractions. In public he revoked, abolished, repudiated, and extirpated his book as scandalous, insulting, defamatory, useless, and prejudicial; he confessed that in it he had injured theological doctrine and wounded the fraternal charity of many, including the venerable Franciscans, and the honor and fame of Conrad Henselin, Thomas Wolff, Sebastian Brandt, and Jacob of Schlettstadt (Wimpheling); and he declared his belief that those who upheld the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception did not err. Moreover, under penalty of perpetual imprisonment, he promised, within four months after November 1, to repeat his recantation publicly in Heidelberg, after giving three days' notice to the Franciscan convent there; he begged pardon of all whom he had injured, and he obligated himself to undergo perpetual imprisonment if he should in any way, directly or indirectly, repeat the offence. The Dominican general who took part in the sentence, commanded all priors and prelates of the Order to confine him for life, wherever he might be found, in case of non-fulfilment of his pledges. In due course, on Ash-Wednesday, February 24, 1513, in the church of the Holy Spirit of Heidelberg, when the concourse of the faithful was greatest, Wirt appeared and repeated the humiliating retraction. So bitter was the trial that he could not repress an e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n that it was hard to endure. The Franciscans had a notary present who recorded officially the whole proceeding, which was forthwith printed and spread abroad so as to publish far and wide the degradation of the unlucky disputant.[654]

Despite the fate of the martyrs of Berne the Dominicans still held out gallantly against the constantly increasing preponderance of their antagonists. I have before me a little tract, evidently printed by a Dominican about this time as a manual for disputants, in which the opinions of two hundred and sixteen doctors of the Church are collected in proof of the conception of the Virgin in original sin. It presents a formidable array of all the greatest names in the Church, including many popes; and the compiler doubtless felt peculiar pleasure in grouping together the most revered authorities of the Franciscan Order--St.

Antony of Padua, Alexander Hales, St. Bonaventura, Richard Middleton, Duns Scotus, William of Ockham, Nicholas de Lyra, Jacopone da Todi, Alvaro Pelayo, Bartolomeo di Pisa, and others. In spite of this preponderance of authority the Dominicans had a hard struggle in the Council of Trent, but they possessed strength enough, after a keen discussion, to have the question left open, with a simple confirmation of the temporizing bull of Sixtus IV. Still the controversy went on, as heated as ever, causing tumults and scandals, which the Church deplored but could not cure. In 1570 Paul IV. endeavored to suppress them by suppressing public discussion. He renewed the bull of Sixtus IV., pointed out that the Council of Trent permitted every one to enjoy his own opinion, and he allowed learned men to debate it in universities and chapters until it should be decided by the Holy See. All public disputation or a.s.sertion on either side in sermons or addresses was, however, forbidden under pain of _ipso facto_ deprivation and perpetual disability. This endeavor to preserve the peace of the Church was as futile as its predecessors. In 1616 Paul V. deplored that, in spite of the salutary provisions existing on the subject, quarrels and scandals continued and threatened to grow more dangerous. He therefore added to the existing penalties perpetual disability for preaching or teaching, and ordered the bishops and inquisitors everywhere to punish severely all contraventions of these regulations. Yet the scale continued to incline against the Dominicans. A twelvemonth later, in August, 1617, Paul, in a general congregation of the Roman Inquisition, issued another const.i.tution, in which he extended these penalties to all who in public should a.s.sert the Virgin to have been conceived in original sin. He did not reprove the opinion, but left it as before, and ordered those who a.s.serted publicly the Immaculate Conception to do so simply, without a.s.sailing the other side, and, as before, bishops and inquisitors were instructed to punish all infractions. In 1622 Gregory XV. went a step further in suppressing the perpetual discord by a further extension of the penalties to all who in private a.s.serted the Virgin's conception in sin; but at the same time he forbade the use of the word "immaculate" in the office of the Feast of the Conception. The Dominicans grew restive under this gagging, and in a couple of months procured a relaxation of the prohibition in so far as to allow them privately with each other to maintain and defend their opinion. These bulls brought considerable business to the Inquisition, for disputatious ardor could not be restrained. A contemporary manual informs us that in spite of the prohibition of discussion it still continued, and that offenders on both sides were sent to Rome for judgment by the supreme tribunal, care being taken, as far as possible, not to have Dominican witnesses when the offender was Franciscan, and _vice versa_. In spite of this the Dominican, Thomas Gage, who wandered through the Spanish colonies about 1630, speaks of holding public discussions on the subject in Guatemala, in which he maintained the Thomist doctrine against the Franciscan, Scotist, and Jesuit opinions.[655]

So minutely was the question reasoned out that it became heresy to a.s.sert that one would undergo death in defence of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. In 1571 Alonso de Castro, although a Franciscan, uses this as an ill.u.s.tration that it is heretical thus to declare adhesion to a point which is not an article of faith. In the heated controversy everywhere raging ardent polemics showed their zeal by offering to stake their existence upon it, and the question became a practical one for the Inquisition to deal with. A vow or oath to defend the doctrine was declared to be valid, but in 1619 the inquisitors of Portugal, with the a.s.sent of Paul V., condemned as heretical the opinion that one who should die in defence of the Immaculate Conception would be a martyr. As the Inquisition was largely in Dominican hands, it doubtless was used effectually to persecute the too zealous a.s.sertors of the doctrine, and to this probably is attributable the rule that in all such cases the denunciation should be sent to the supreme Inquisition in Rome and its decision be awaited, thus tying the hands of the local inquisitors. From Carena's remarks, it is evident that these cases were not infrequent and that they gave much trouble.[656]

The Jesuits threw the immense weight of their influence in favor of the Immaculate Conception, and in time it became not uncommon among them, at least in certain places, to take the heretical vow to defend it with life and blood. In 1715 Muratori, under the cautious pseudonym of Lamindus Pritanius, published a book attacking this practice. This drew forth a reply, in 1729, from the Jesuit Frances...o...b..rgi, which Muratori answered under the name of Antonius Lampridius. A lively controversy arose which lasted for a quarter of a century or more, and Muratori's second book was in 1765 placed on the Spanish Index. Benedict XIV., in his great work _De Beatificatione_, says that the Church inclines to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, but has not yet made it an article of faith, and he even leaves the question undecided whether one who dies in its defence is to be reckoned as a martyr. Yet when, in 1840, Bishop Peter A. Baines, the Apostolic Vicar in England, spoke inconsiderately on the subject in a pastoral letter, he was sharply reproved and obliged to sign a pledge that on the first fitting occasion he would publicly declare his adhesion to whatever the Holy See might define on the subject. The decision was not long in coming. In 1849 Pius IX. consulted all the bishops as to the expediency of proclaiming the Immaculate Conception as a dogma of the Church. Those of Italy, Spain, and Portugal, about four hundred and ninety in number, were almost unanimously in its favor, while many in other lands hesitated and deprecated such action. The latter were not heeded; December 8, 1854, Pius issued a solemn definition declaring it to be an article of faith, and thus, after a gallant struggle, protracted through five centuries with unyielding tenacity, the Dominicans were finally defeated, and could only console themselves with ingenious glosses on Thomas Aquinas to prove that he had never really denied the doctrine.[657]

It is interesting thus to trace the evolution of dogma, even though the result cannot be regarded as a finality. In the insatiable desire to define every secret of the invisible world every decision is only a stepping-stone to a new discussion. The next point is to ascertain how the Immaculate Conception took place, and this has already been mooted.

In 1876 a condemnation was p.r.o.nounced on Joseph de Felicite (Vercruysse?) among whose errors was the a.s.sertion that Mary was conceived by the operation of the Holy Ghost, without the intervention of St. Joachim.[658] Yet who can say that in the centuries to come this dogma may not also win its place, and the Virgin thus be elevated to an equality with her Son?

One function of the Inquisition remains to be considered--the censors.h.i.+p of the press--although its full activity in this direction belongs to a period beyond our present limits. We have seen how Bernard Gui burned Talmuds by the wagon-load, and the special training of the inquisitors would seem to point them out as the most available conservators of the faith from the dangerous abuse of the pen. Yet it was long before any definite system was adopted. The universities were almost the only centres of intellectual activity, and they usually exercised a watchful care over the aberrations of their members. When some work of importance was to be condemned the authority of the Holy See was frequently invoked, as in the case of Erigena's _Periphyseos, the Everlasting Gospel_, William of St. Amour's a.s.sault upon the Mendicants, and Marsilio of Padua's _Defensor Pacis_. On the other hand, as we have seen, in 1316 the episcopal vicar of Tarragona had no hesitation in a.s.sembling some monks and friars and condemning a number of Arnaldo de Vilanova's writings, and about the same time the inquisitors of Bologna took similar action with respect to Cecco d'Ascoli's commentary on the _Sphaera_ of Sacrobosco. Yet no thought seems to have occurred of using the Inquisition for this purpose as a general agency with power of immediate decision, before Charles IV. endeavored to establish the Holy Office in Germany. The heresy of the Brethren of the Free Spirit was largely propagated by means of popular books of devotion; to check this and the forbidden use by the laity of translations of Scripture in the vernacular, the emperor, in 1369, empowered the inquisitors and their successors to seize and burn all such books, and to employ the customary inquisitorial censures to overcome resistance. All the subjects of the empire, secular and clerical, from the highest to the lowest, were ordered to lend their aid, under pain of the imperial displeasure. In 1376 Gregory XI. followed this with a bull in which he deplored the dissemination of heretical books in Germany, and directed the inquisitors to examine all suspected writings, condemning those found to contain errors, after which it became an offence punishable by the Inquisition to copy, possess, buy, or sell them. No trace remains of any results of these regulations, but they are interesting as the first organized literary censors.h.i.+p. About the same period Eymerich was engaged in condemning the works of Raymond Lully, of Raymond of Tarraga, and others, but he seems always to have referred the matter to the Holy See and to have acted only under special papal authority. When, as we have seen, Archbishop Zbinco burned Wickliff's writings in Prague, a papal commission decided that his act was not justified, and their final condemnation was p.r.o.nounced by the Council of Rome in 1413.[659]

With the gradual revival of letters books a.s.sumed more and more importance as a means of disseminating thought, and this increased rapidly after the invention of printing. It became a recognized rule with the Inquisition that he into whose hands an heretical book might fall and who did not burn it at once or deliver it within eight days to his bishop or inquisitor was held vehemently suspect of heresy. The translation of any part of Scripture into the vernacular was also forbidden. It was not, however, until 1501 that any organized censors.h.i.+p of the press seems to have been thought of, and even then Germany was the only land where the issue of dangerous and heretical books was considered to require it. All printers were ordered in future, under pain of excommunication and of fines applicable to the apostolic chamber, to present to the archbishop of the province or to his ordinary all books before publication, and only to issue those for which a license should be granted after examination, the prelates being commanded on their consciences to make no charge for such license. All existing books in stock, moreover, were to be subject to similar inspection, and of such as should be found to contain errors all copies accessible were to be delivered up for burning.[660]

It shows to what a state of contempt the German Inquisition had fallen, that in this comprehensive measure to restrict the license of the press it seems not to have been even thought of as an instrumentality, and that dependence was placed on the episcopal organization alone. The archbishops, however, were as usual too much engrossed in the temporal concerns of their princely provinces to pay attention to such details, and there is apparently no result to be traced from the effort. The evil continued to increase, and in 1515, at the Council of Lateran, Leo X.

endeavored to check it by general regulations still more rigid in a bull which was unanimously approved, except by Alexis, Bishop of Amalfi, who said that he concurred in it as to new books, but not as to old ones.

After an allusion to the benefits conferred by the art of printing, the bull proceeded to recite that numerous complaints reached the Holy See that printers in many places printed and sold books translated from the Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and Chaldee, as well as in Latin and the vernaculars, containing errors in faith and pernicious dogmas, and also libels on persons of dignity, whence many scandals had arisen and more were threatened. Therefore forever thereafter no one should be allowed to print any book or writing without a previous examination, to be testified by manual subscription, by the papal vicar and master of the sacred palace in Rome, and in other cities and dioceses by the Inquisition, and the bishop or an expert appointed by him. For neglect of this the punishment was excommunication, the loss of the edition, which was to be burned, a fine of a hundred ducats to the fabric of St.

Peters, and suspension from business for a year. Persistent contumacy was further threatened with such penalty as should serve as a warning deterrent to others.[661] The precaution came too late. Except with regard to witches, the machinery of persecution was too thoroughly disorganized to curb the rising tide of human intelligence which speedily swept away all such flimsy barriers. We have seen how prolonged and unsatisfactory was the attempt to silence Reuchlin. The printing-press multiplied indefinitely the satires of Erasmus and Ulric Hutten, and when Luther appeared it scattered far and wide among the people his vigorous attacks on the existing system. It required time and the exigencies of the counter-reformation to perfect a plan by which, in the lands of the Roman obedience, the faithful could be preserved from the insidious poison flowing from the fountain of the printing-press.

CHAPTER IX.

CONCLUSION.

Having thus considered with some fulness what the Inquisition accomplished, directly and indirectly, it only remains for us to glance at what it did not do.

The relations of the Greek Church to the Holy See would almost justify the a.s.sumption that persecution of heresy, far from being a matter of conscience, was one of expediency, to be enforced or disregarded as the temporal interests of the papacy might dictate. The Greeks were not only schismatics, but heretics, for, as St. Raymond of Pennaforte proved, schism was heresy, as it violated the article of the creed "_unam sanctam Catholicam ecclesiam_." We have repeatedly seen that to deny the supremacy of Rome and to disregard its commands was heresy. Boniface VIII., in the bull "_Unam sanctam_," proclaimed it to be an article of faith, necessary to salvation, that every human creature is subject to the Roman pontiff, and he especially includes the Greeks in this.

Besides this, there was the Procession of the Holy Ghost from both the Father and the Son, in which Charlemagne forced Leo III. to modify the Nicene symbol, and which the Greeks persistently refused to receive, rendering them heretics on a doctrinal point a.s.sumed to be of the greatest importance. Yet the Church, when it seemed desirable, could always establish a _modus vivendi_, and exercise a prudent toleration towards the Greek Church. It was thus in southern Italy, which had been withdrawn from Rome and subjected to Constantinople in the eighth century by Leo the Isaurian during the iconoclastic controversy. In 968 the Patriarch of Constantinople subst.i.tuted the Greek for the Roman rite in the churches of Apulia and Calabria, and though some resisted, most of them submitted and retained it even after the conquest of Naples by the Normans. Thus in the see of Rossano in 1092, when a Latin bishop was introduced, the people recalcitrated and obtained from Duke Roger permission to retain the Greek rite. This lasted until 1460, when the Observantine Bishop Matteo succeeded in changing it to the Latin rite.[662]

The Greek churches, which long continued to exist throughout the Slavic and Majjar territories, were subjected to greater pressure, though it was fitful and intermittent. In 1204 Andreas II. of Hungary applied to Innocent III. to appoint Latin priors for the Greek monasteries in his dominions. In the settlement of 1233, after the kingdom had been placed under interdict, an oath was exacted of Bela IV. that he would compel all his subjects to render obedience to the Roman Church, and Gregory IX. forthwith summoned him to enforce his promise with regard to the Wallachians, who were addicted to the Greek rite. In 1248 we find Innocent IV. sending Dominicans to Albania to convert the Greeks, and it would indicate that persuasion rather than force was relied upon, when we see these missionaries empowered to grant the ecclesiastics dispensation for all irregularities, including simony. A hundred years later Clement VI. and Innocent VI. were more energetic, and ordered the prelates of the Balkan Peninsula to drive out all schismatics, calling in the aid of the secular arm if necessary. We have already seen how fruitless were the efforts to exterminate the Cathari in these regions, and that the only result of the effort to enforce uniformity of faith was to facilitate the advance of the Turkish conquest.[663]

The possessions of the Crusaders in the Levant offered a more complex problem. Although Innocent III. had protested against the conquest of Constantinople in 1204, when it was successful he was ardent in his recognition of the mysterious wisdom of G.o.d in thus overthrowing the Greek heresy, and he took prompt action to secure the utmost advantage to be expected from it. He ordered the crusaders to suspend all priests ordained by Greek bishops, and to provide Latin priests for the churches seized, taking care that their property was not dissipated. A hungry horde of clerics speedily precipitated itself on the new possessions, embarra.s.sing those in charge, and Innocent, in answer to inquiries, advised that only those who brought commendatious letters should be allowed to officiate in public. Thus, in the Latin kingdoms of the East a new hierarchy was imposed upon the churches, but the people were not converted, and an embarra.s.sing situation arose concerning which no clearly defined policy could be preserved.[664]

Strictly speaking, all schismatics and heretics were under _ipso facto_ excommunication, but this could be disregarded if it was pol