the age in which they lived, and the true conception which they possessed of what a clergyman should be, contributed to elevate even the more degraded among the priesthood, and to make them sharers in the common spirit of their order."1

§ 232. Church Property (cf. p. 533).

Cf. Raumer, Hist. of the Hohenstaufens, Vol. VI., p. 135 sq. (Possessions of the Church.)

2

The clergy enjoyed exceptional advantages to accumulate wealth during that period of time included between the beginning and end of the Crusades. Many of the crusaders, before setting out from their homes, made over their property to the Church, in the belief that they should probably meet their death in the East; while others, hoping to secure more desirable estates in Palestine, sold those in Europe at quite a low price, and the Church was not unfrequently the purchaser. The tithes also became now more productive, and this source of revenue was again increased by the offerings of the "first-fruits" (one-thirtieth or one-fiftieth). The tithes were, however, frequently contested, not by laymen alone, but by ecclesiastics also, who refused them to others of their own body; and so frequent and complicated were these contests that the reports of them occupy no small proportion of the chronicles stored away in the archives of churches and monasteries.

The Church always persistently refused to accept a salary from the State for her clergy, because, as Pope Honorius III. replied when it was offered by Hugh, king of Cyprus, it would be dangerous to her liberty.3

1 Ch. Hist., Eng. trans., p. 223.

2 Eberhard of Salzburg says, in a document dated 1159: "Tempore quo expeditio Jerosolymitana fervore quodam miro et inaudito a saeculis totum fere commovit Occidentem, coeperunt singuli tanquam ultra non redituri vendere possessiones suas, quas ecclesiae secundum facultates suas suis prospicientes. utilitatibus emerunt." Monum. Boica., T. III., p. 540.

3"Beloved son," said the Pope, "those who receive salaries are subject to those who pay them. Should an employer desire to rid himself of one in his pay, he stops his salary, and the employé must leave off work. If you so secure the revenue of ecclesiastics that no one can deprive them of it, I shall

A great part of the wealth thus accumulated by the Church was spent in founding noble institutions, building hospitals and homes for the poor, providing for orphans and pilgrims, sustaining universities, promoting commercial and industrial interests, and forwarding the growth of civilization. It is all the more to be regretted that she should have been despoiled of her property by rapacious nobles when the proceeds of it were turned to so good account. They not only exercised the right of spoil (jus spolii), but also laid heavy imposts upon the estates of the Church-a practice which was prohibited by many popes after Alexander III.

1

The division among the members of cathedral and collegiate chapters and certain others of the clergy, of property which had heretofore been held and administered in common for the benefit of all by the bishops of the several dioceses, had a most injurious effect. Those who had the administration of ecclesiastical property were sometimes so open and so bold in their methods of plundering2 that it was necessary to appeal to the secular power to have them removed, and thus put a stop to their shameless extortions.

at once send you all the priests you desire." Diomedes, Cronica di Cipro, in Raumer, Vol. VI., p. 135.

1 Vide supra, p. 355.

Cf. Raumer, Vol. VI., p. 381-388. According to the account given by a contemporary, Baldricus, Gottfried, Archbishop of Treves, was treated with the utmost arrogance by Ludovicus, his Vice-Dominus: "Dom. Godofredum Archiepisc. suis artibus tantum sibi subegerat, quod dicebat, se in beneficio tenere palatium atque omnes reditus episcopales in illud deferendos, et quod ipse pascere deberet episcopum cum suis capellanis, etc.; ad episcopum autem dicebat pertinere missas et ordinationes Clericorum et consecrationes ecclesiarum celebrare; sui vero juris dicebat esse terram regere, omniaque in episcopatu disponere et militiam tenere, etc." Hontheim, Hist. Trevir., T. I., p. 468.

CHAPTER III.

FANATICAL AND REFRACTORY SECTS.

Accounts of contemporaries: Ebrardi Flandrensis, e Betunia oriundi, Lib. antihaeresis ed. 1. Jacob. Gretseri (Max. Bibl. PP., T. XXIV.) Ermengardi Opusc. contra eos, qui dicunt et credunt, mundum istum et visibilia omnia non esse a Deo facta, sed a diabolo (ibid). Alani ab insulis (monk of Clairvaux, † 1202), Libb. IV., ctr. haereticos (Waldenses, Judaeos et Paganos) sui temp., Lib. I. et II., ed. Masson., Par. 1612; Libb. III. et IV., ed. C. Vischius. (Bibl. scriptt. Cisterciens. Colon. 1656, p. 411.) Bonacursus (first teacher of the Cathari, then a member of the Catholic Church), Vita haereticor. s. manifestatio haeresis Catharor. (ď' Achéry, Spicileg., T. I., p. 208.) Rainerii Sachon. (first a Waldensis, then a Catholic and Dominican, † 1259), Summa de Catharis et Leonistis s. Pauperib. de Lugduno. (Martene et Durand, Max. Collect., T. V.) Ejusdem vel alius Rainerii lib. adv. Waldens. (Max. Bibl. PP., T. XXV.) — *Du Plessis d'Argentré, Collectio judicior. de novis error. ab initio XII., saec. usque ad a. 1632; Par. 1728, 3 T. f. Fuesslin, New and impartial History of the Heresies of the Middle Ages, Frankfort, 1770, 3 pts. Hahn, Hist. of the Heresies of the Middle Ages, especially from the eleventh to the thirteenth century, Stuttg. 1847 sq., 3 vols. Reuter, Pope Alexander III., Vol. III., p. 647 sq. On the heretics of Italy during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, see Cesare Cantù, Gli eretici d' Italia, Torino, 1865 sq., 2 vols.

§ 233. General View.

When the Church had reached the height of her temporal power and political influence, and had in consequence come into possession of vast land-estates, her position very naturally provoked comment, and she was not unfrequently judged unfairly by reason of the absence of true historical criticism. Those under the influence of partisan feeling, as well as those who believed that their interests had been injured or slighted, brought trivial and exaggerated charges against her. She was reproached with being excessively wealthy and in close alliance with the world, both of which, it must be admitted, are always dangerous to, if not entirely subversive of her most vital interests. Individuals1 scattered

1 See Vol. I., p. 755 sq.

here and there, and particular sects, such as had in early times assailed the constitution of the Church, but whose numbers, now increased with extraordinary rapidity, raised their voices against the tendency of the age, gave in their own lives examples of voluntary poverty and austere morality, and proclaimed in earnest and impassioned language the necessity of going back to the simplicity of apostolic days, when the Church was poor indeed, but free and standing apart from the State. These declamations were all the more effective, inasmuch as they were directed against a clergy, many of whose members were worldly and little solicitous for the spiritual weal of their flocks. They appealed, in justification of their course, to epochs in the history of the Church, when analogous evils were dealt with in a similar way, and to the prophetic warnings of great and saintly men, such as St. Bernard, St. Hildegard, St. Malachy (Archbishop of Armagh), and Joachim of Calabria. The characteristics of these sects

1 Bernardus, de Considerat. ad Eugen. III.; Hildewardis abbatissa, sanctissima Virgo et prophetissa, vita ejus in Bolland. Acta SS., ad 17 m. Septemb. Epp. et opusc. (Max. Bibl., T. XXII1., p. 535 sq.) On St. Malachy, cf. St. Bernard, lib. de vita et reb. gestis St. Malach. u. sermo II. in transitu St. Malach. (Opp. Venet., T. II., p. 663; T. III., p. 326 sq.) The vaticinia Malachiae Hiberni de Papis romanis, also in Gfroerer. prophetae vett. pseudepigraphi. The bibliograhy on this prophecy, see in Fabricii Biblioth. med. et infim. Latin., T. V., sub verbo, Malachias. They consist of enigmatical oracles taken from the Bible, each of which is supposed to contain some reference to the popes from Celestine II. (A. D. 1143) onward to the end of the world. For example, Celestine II. is referred to as "ex Castro Tiberis," Lucius II. as "inimicus expulsus," Eugene III. as "ex magnitudine montis" (supposed to be an allusion to the mountains near Pisa, his native city), and the present pope, Pius IX., as "crux de cruce," after whom it is said there will be eleven more popes, whose characteristics will be Lumen in coelo, Ignis ardens, Religio depopulata, Fides intrepida, Pastor angelicus, Pastor et nauta, Flos florum, De medietate lunae, De labore solis, Gloria olivae; and of the last, Petrus II., it is said: "Pascet oves in multis tribulationibus, quibus transactis civitas septicollis diruetur et judex tremendus judicabit populum suum." St. Bernard, while referring to Malachy's gift of prophecy, in his life of that holy archbishop, makes no mention of these predictions. An attempt was therefore made to fasten their authorship on Malachy, the Irish Franciscan, but as he lived about the opening of the fourteenth century (A. D. 1316), he could have had no connection with them, except as a continuator. Menestrier, S. J., Traité sur les prophéties attribuées à St. Malachie, 1686, endeavors to show that this so-called prophecy had its origin in the conclave of 1590, where the party of Cardinal Simoncelli

were opposition to the constitution of the Church, contempt of her doctrine, disdain of all learning and science, a fierce and gloomy fanaticism, a tendency to pursue one idea without regard to ultimate consequences, a revival of certain forms of the old Gnostic and Manichaean errors, and a coarse and degrading Pantheism. Hence they are called, generally, Cathari or Neo-Manichaeans.

§ 234. Tanchelm, Eon, Peter of Bruis, Henry of Lausanne, and the Passagians.

Sects that had sprung up silently and in private were encouraged, by the hostile attitude of emperors and nobles toward the Church, to come forth from their privacy and openly proclaim their errors. Their origin and development bear a striking analogy to those of the Apostolic age, which, commencing while our Lord was still on earth, gradually issued in the wellknown Judaizing, Gnostic, Manichaean, and Montanistic sects. Tanchelm (A. D. 1115-1124), an illiterate and fanatical layman, like the pseudo-Messiahs of Samaria, became the founder of a sect in Brabant. He proclaimed himself the Son of God, preached against ecclesiastical organizations, had churches erected in his own honor, set up the state of a king, collected around himself a body-guard of three thousand, gave himself the title of Divinity, celebrated his pretended espousal to the Blessed Virgin with great pomp and circumstance, repudiated the sacraments of the Church and her hierarchy, referred to their candidate, Nicholas Sfondrata, afterward Gregory XIV., as designated by the words "de antiquitate urbis," because he was of Milan, which, according to popular tradition, existed four hundred years before Rome. Then, he says, in order that these words might carry with them the force of authority, the prophecy was supplemented backward and carried forward. Apart from a few designations which are quite apposite and significant, as Peregrinus Apostolicus for Pius VI., Aquila rapax for Pius VII. (an allusion to the French eagle, Napoleon I.), and Canis et Coluber for Leo XII., the prophecy is meaningless and enigmatical, and it requires considerable ingenuity to find events in the lives of the several popes to which the corresponding predictions can be made to apply with any sort of appositeness. Cf. Weingarten, The Prophecy of St. Malachy (Theolog. Studies and Criticisms of 1857, nro. 3). Ginzel, St. Malachy and the prophecy attributed to him. (Austr. Quart. of Theol., year 1868, nro. 1.)