SOURCES.

FOOTNOTES:

[510:1] See [Ch. XI.]

[510:2] See [Ch. XVIII.]

[510:3] Migne, vol. 204, pp. 1005-1046.

[511:1] Milman, Lat. Christ., bk. viii., ch. 4.

[511:2] Mabillon, Life and Letters, 2 vols.; Ogg, § 43, 44.

[511:3] Storrs, Bernard of Clairvaux; Eales, St. Bernard; Eales, The Works of St. Bernard, 4 vols. See [Chap. XX.]

[512:1] Dict. of Nat. Biog.

[513:1] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 266. Privileges granted by Anastasius IV. in 1154.

[513:2] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 265a.

[515:1] Lea, Hist. of Sacer. Celib.

[516:1] Lea, Hist. of the Inq., i., 39, 53, 54.

[516:2] Ibid., i., 70.

[516:3] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 267.

[516:4] Lea, Hist. of the Inq., i., 35.

[517:1] Lea, Hist. of the Inq., i., 36, 37.

[517:2] Ibid., i., 37, 38.

[517:3] Ibid., i., 34.

[517:4] Ibid., i., 268.

[518:1] Sabatier, 28 ff.

[518:2] Mon. Ger., xx., 537; Jaffé, i., 404; Hausrath, Arnold of Brescia; Franke, Arnold of Brescia; Gregorovius, Rome in M. A.

[519:1] Migne, 193, 194; Mon. Ger., iii., 131-525; Wattenbach, Geschichtsquellen, ii., 308, 520.

[519:2] Lea, Hist. of the Inq., i., 244.

[519:3] Ibid., i., 75.

[519:4] See [Chap. XVIII.]

[519:5] Lea, Hist. of the Inq., i., 246.

[520:1] Mosheim, The Beghards and Beguins. In 1311 Clement V. suppressed both orders.

[521:1] Milman, Lat. Christ., bk. ix., 250. See Drane, Hist. of St. Dominic, Lond., 1891, who narrates all these legends as true.

[521:2] Afterwards transferred to Salamanca.

[521:3] It is related that at Toulouse, Dominic's host was an Albigensian and that the young religious enthusiast spent the night in converting him.

[522:1] Milman, Lat. Christ., bk. ix., 242.

[523:1] The Inquisition was not organised until 1215. See Drane, 109; Lea, Hist. of the Inq., i., 300.

[523:2] Lea, Hist. of the Inq., i., 250.

[524:1] In the dream the Pope saw the great Roman Church about to fall had not Dominic upheld it.

[524:2] Conway, Frachet's Lives of the Brethren.

[525:1] The "Soldiers of Jesus Christ" later became the "Order of Penance" and is now known as "The Third Order." There are many editions in English of the Tertiary Daily Manual.

[525:2] Moeller, ii., 412 ff.

[526:1] Jameson, Legends of Monastic Orders as Represented in the Fine Arts.

[526:2] Sabatier, 8.

[527:1] Robinson, Readings, i., 387.

[528:1] Matt. x., 7-10.

[528:2] Sabatier, 70.

[528:3] See Ogg, § 63.

[529:1] Matthew of Paris, ed. by Watson, 340.

[529:2] Henderson, Hist. Docs., 344; Thatcher and McNeal, No. 269.

[530:1] Lea, Hist. of Inq., vol. i., 264. See his curious prayer to Christ.

[530:2] Read the legend of St. Clara in Butler, Lives of Saints.

[530:3] Milman, iv., 270.

[530:4] Maclear, Hist. of Christ. Missions in the M. A., ch. 16.

[531:1] Milman, iv., 267.

[531:2] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 270; Robinson, Readings, i., 392; Ogg, § 64, gives the will of St. Francis.

[531:3] See Sabatier, 443 ff., Hase, and other authorities.

[531:4] Lea, Hist. of Inq., i., 260. See Jessopp, The Coming of the Friars, 47 ff.

[532:1] Robinson, Readings, i., 391.

[532:2] Read his "Song of Creation" in Mrs. Oliphant's Biography.

[532:3] Milman, iv., 268, 269.

[533:1] Moeller, i., 405.

[533:2] Lea, Hist. of Inq., i., 273.

[534:1] Lea, Hist. of Inq., i., 266.

[535:1] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 271, 272, 273. Cf. No. 268.

[535:2] Lea, Hist. of Inq., i., 274.

[535:3] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 271, 272, 273.

[535:4] Ibid., 299.

[537:1] Lea, Hist. of Inq., i., 266.

[537:2] Ibid., i., 304.

[537:3] Ibid., 295.

[538:1] See letter of Innocent III., about monastic simony in 1211. Thatcher and McNeal, No. 267.

[538:2] Muzzy, The Spiritual Franciscans.

CHAPTER XXII
INNOCENT III. AND THE CHURCH AT ITS HEIGHT

OUTLINE

I.—Antecedent preparation for this period. II.—Career of Innocent III. up to 1198. III.—Innocent III.'s plans and ideals as Pope. IV.—Condition of Europe at the close of the twelfth century. V.—Innocent III. makes himself the political head of Europe. VI.—Innocent III.'s efforts to root out heresy and reform the Church. VII.—Innocent III.'s character and the general results of his pontificate. VIII.—Sources.

Many antecedent forces prepared the way for the ascendency of the Church under the greatest of all the Popes, Innocent III. The promulgation of the Petrine theory and its development for many centuries afforded the fundamental groundwork upon which the Church at its height was built. The Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals furnished the constitutional basis for the work of this master Pope and their most complete realisation culminated under his rule. The Hildebrandine reformation, inspired by the Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals, was largely attained under Innocent III. The reorganisation of the College of Cardinals tended to purify papal elections. The administrative reforms of Hildebrand restored order in the Church and subjected the councils and clergy to the Pope. The moral reforms attempted sought: (1) to enforce clerical celibacy and, although a failure immediately, ultimately were successful; (2) to abolish

simony—a task that was left for the great Innocent; (3) and to annihilate lay investiture which was partly successful in the Concordat of Worms formed in 1122. Gregory VII. had sought also, to subject the state to the Church. Some of his successors, notably Urban II., Pascal II., Calixtus II., and Alexander III.,[545:1] strove valiantly to realize this same purpose. The complete realisation of all these hopes, however, was left for Innocent III.

Innocent III. was born in 1160 at Anagni and bore the name Lothario. He was the fourth son of a rich noble Italian family named Conti.[545:2] His father was Count Trasimundo of Segni and his mother belonged to the noble Roman Scotti family which had given the Church nine Popes and thirteen cardinals. It is not unreasonable to believe, therefore, that the young Lothario inherited from his ancestors both a capacity and a desire for an important position in the Church. His education was the best obtainable at that day and was begun under the direction of two cardinal uncles. He was sent to Rome to one of the schools attached to all the churches and there received his elementary education and likewise his preparation for the university. When properly qualified he entered the University of Paris where he studied philosophy and theology under the celebrated Peter of Corbeil. While there he probably visited England in order to make a pilgrimage to the shrine of Thomas à Becket. From Paris he was sent to Bologna University where he studied civil law and especially canon law, then a very popular subject. He mastered the whole system of

decretal lore and made it his guide for the rest of his life. In 1181 he returned to Rome, a university graduate, only twenty-one years of age, yet celebrated for his theological and legal erudition.

Everything pointed him toward a career in the Church—his character, his birth as the youngest son of a noble, his family connections with the Church, his education, and his natural inclination. It is no surprise, consequently, to learn that upon his return to the Eternal City he was made a canon of St. Peter's (1181). Gregory VIII. (1187), promoted him to the office of subdeacon and Clement III. (1190), his maternal uncle, made him cardinal-deacon. He now became the chief papal adviser, was a recognised leader in the College of Cardinals, though only twenty-nine years of age, and was generally known as a second Hildebrand. Upon the election of Pope Celestine III. (1191-1198), the leader of a rival party, the young churchman deserted practical church work and church politics to devote himself to study and literary work. He wrote several books of importance which reveal his deep and extensive culture, his ascetic spirit resembling that of Hildebrand and Luther, his lofty ideals of the Papacy, and his mediæval theology.[546:1]

Celestine III. died January 8, 1198, urging the cardinals to elect his nephew John, Cardinal of St. Paul's, as his successor. But the sacred college at once unanimously elected Cardinal Lothario, the youngest of their number, only thirty-seven, as Pope and saluted him as Innocent III. His ability and life had marked

him out for several years as the next occupant of St. Peter's See. Being only in deacon's orders he was first advanced to the priesthood (Feb. 21) then consecrated bishop and crowned Pope with an elaborate ceremony of installation (Feb. 22).[547:1]

Innocent III. came to the papal chair with a belief in man's utter depravity and in the Pope's power to pardon all sin and to remit all penances. After his election, but before coronation, he declared:

As God . . . hath set in . . . the heavens two great lights, the greater to rule the day, the lesser to rule the night, so also hath He set up in His Church . . . two great powers: the greater to rule the day, that is the souls; the lesser to rule the night, that is the bodies of men. These powers are the pontifical and royal: but the moon, as being the lesser body, borroweth all her light from the sun both in the quantity and quality of the light she sends forth, as also in her position and functions in the heavens. . . . The royal power borrows all its dignity and splendour from the pontifical.[547:2]

Again

the Lord hath fashioned His Church after the model of the human body placing the Roman Church at the head, thereby subjecting, in obedience to himself and her, all churches as members of the one body . . . but the Church without the Pope were a body without a head.[547:3]

His whole policy was summed up in a remarkable consecration sermon from Luke 12:42:

Who is this steward? It is he to whom the Lord Omnipotent said, Thou are Peter, etc. This foundation cannot be

shaken . . . for Christ himself is on board; . . . Christ is the rock upon which the Holy See is founded; . . . this chair is not established by man but by God alone. . . . Therefore I fear not, for I am that steward whom the Lord hath placed over His household to give them their meat in due season. . . . Therefore my desire is to serve, not to rule. . . . As the Lord's steward . . . I must be established in the faith. . . . But faith without works is dead. My works, therefore, must be wise as well as faithful. . . . The high-priest of the Old Testament was the type and pattern of the Pope. . . . I am he whom the Lord hath placed over His household; yet who am I that I should sit on high above kings and above all princes? For of me it is written in the prophets (Jer. 1:10): This steward is the viceroy of God, the successor of Peter; he that standeth in the midst between God and man. He is the judge of all, but is judged by no one . . . Now His Household is the whole church and this household is one . . . out of which, if anyone remain, he and all his shall surely perish in the flood.

The germs of these ideas were found in the Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals. They were formulated by Hildebrand and it now became the passionate purpose of Innocent III. to realise them in their entirety. To that end he adopted Hildebrand's reform program to abolish abuses and corruptions of all sorts, to enforce celibacy, to subject the clergy to the head of the Church, and to make the Church supreme above the state.

The situation in Europe at the close of the twelfth century was such as to aid Innocent in his great plans. The Crusades, now in progress for a century, had aroused a terrific religious enthusiasm, enriched the Church, increased the Pope's power, weakened rival secular authority, and paved the way for the successful

realisation of Hildebrand's ideals by Innocent III. The Papacy was well established. Its dogmas were expressed in canon law, its machinery was completed, and its right to exist as a state resting upon a territorial basis was recognised. In the Empire Henry VI. had died in 1197, Naples was ruled by a child, the Guelphs and Ghibellines were at war in the Lombard cities and the whole Empire was distracted and almost reduced to anarchy by the rival claimants to the imperial throne. In France Philip Augustus, a tyrannical ruler, ambitious to overthrow the English king, greedy to swallow up the larger fiefs, was on the throne. He had divorced his Danish wife and had remarried. At this time he was violently opposed by both the nobles and the people. In Spain the lack of a strong central power led to quarrelling among the rival kings and compelled the Pope to interfere. In England the brutal, boisterous, immoral Richard I. died in 1199 and was succeeded by the tyrannical and feeble King John who was at war with his own nobles. In the East the Slavic nations were ready to accept Roman rule while the Eastern Empire was tottering and ready to fall. In general parties in all countries were crying out to the Pope for assistance. All Europe was ripe for just such a man as Innocent III. with just such a policy.

The first step in Innocent's plan was to make himself the political head of Europe. In Italy he first made himself absolute sovereign of Rome by removing all vestiges of imperial rule. The senators and the prefect, who held their commissions from the Emperor, were required to take oaths to him as their sovereign.[549:1]

The imperial judges were also replaced by his own appointees. By persuasion or tactful diplomacy he gained a mastery over the warring Roman nobles. From Rome he gradually extended his sway over the rest of Italy. He was made regent of Frederick II., the youthful son of Henry VI.,[550:1] now King of Sicily. He forced the Tuscan cities to recognise his suzerainty[550:2] instead of that of the German Emperor, and subdued the March of Ancona and the Duchy of Spoleto.[550:3] He posed as the champion of Italian independence and liberty against foreign rule. His leadership was generally recognised and he was called "The Father of His Country." "Innocent III. was the first Pope who claimed and exercised the rights of an Italian Prince."[550:4] When Emperor Otto IV. ceded all the lands claimed by the Papacy under grants from former rulers, an indisputable title to the papal states was established.

In Germany, before the imperial throne was made vacant by the death of Henry VI. (1197), the princes had been persuaded to choose his infant son, Frederick, King of the Romans. But the election had been set aside, and now the imperial crown was claimed by two rival claimants: Otto of Brunswick and Philip of Hohenstaufen, a brother of Henry VI. The civil war which ensued in Germany between these rival claimants gave Innocent III. his opportunity. Both claimants appealed to the Pope, but Otto was the more submissive. The Pope assumed the function of arbiter and issued a famous bull favouring Otto.[550:5]

Otto promised on oath protection of the possessions and rights of the Roman Church, and obedience and homage such as pious Emperors had formerly shown towards the Chair of Peter (1201). Still victory did not come to Otto and the Pope, until after ten years of civil strife followed by the assassination of Philip. In 1208 Otto was coronated by Innocent in St. Peter's, Rome, but was soon caught in deeds of treachery to the Pope and excommunicated and deposed (1210), and died forgotten seven years later.

Frederick of Sicily was anxious to become King of Germany and also Emperor. The Hohenstaufen party in Germany invited him to visit them and in this Frederick was encouraged by Innocent III. Frederick made some important concessions to the Holy See[551:1] (1213), was victorious in Germany, and was crowned Emperor at Aachen after the Lateran Council in 1215. After a most remarkable career he died, however, a rebel against the Church (1250). When death smote down Innocent III., he had created two Emperors, he was recognised as lord paramount over the Empire, and he ruled personally over a larger domain in the Empire than any preceding Pope.

In France Philip Augustus had been excommunicated by Pope Celestine III. (1196) for having divorced his wife, a Danish Princess in order to marry, with the sanction of the French clergy, Mary, the daughter of the Duke of Bohemia. Immediately after his election and before his coronation, Innocent III. took up this case. He ordered Philip to put away his concubine and to take back his lawful wife under the threat of pronouncing his children bastards and of putting his

land under an interdict. Since the king turned a deaf ear to these demands, the Pope excommunicated him, declared France under an interdict,[552:1] and punished the French bishops. As a result Philip was compelled to submit, and agreed to take back his wife and to restore confiscated Church lands. This was a great and significant victory for the Pope.

In Spain the King of Leon had married a cousin contrary to canon law. The Pope immediately annulled the marriage. The king refused at first to give up his wife, but was forced to submission by excommunication.[552:2] The Kings of Navarre and Castile were compelled to make peace and to unite against the Saracens. Portugal was declared a fief of the Holy See and the king was commanded to hurry up the payment of tribute.[552:3] The King of Aragon was crowned by the Pope at Rome as a feudal vassal.[552:4]

In England King John, who had succeeded Richard I. in 1199, had embittered against him nobles, clergy, and common people by extortions and tyrannical acts of all sorts. He aroused the wrath of Innocent III. by making a treaty of peace with Philip Augustus of France, while that ruler was still under the ban for repudiating his first wife and marrying another. John had likewise boldly ousted the Bishop of Limoges, confiscated his lands, and revived the Constitutions of Clarendon.[552:5] Innocent III. immediately called John to account for these misdemeanours[552:6] and forced the stubborn king to promise to make a crusade to atone

for his sins. The Pope demanded the immediate reinstatement of the Bishop of Limoges in his office and lands.[553:1] He treated the Constitutions of Clarendon as if they had been repealed and waited for his opportunity to humble the haughty English ruler.

In 1205 (July 13), Hubert the Archbishop of Canterbury died. That same night the monks of the Cathedral elected their sub-prior as archbishop and hurried him off to Rome for papal confirmation. King John, backed by the suffragan bishops of the diocese, appointed and invested the Bishop of Norwich as archbishop and he also started for Rome to get the papal sanction. Here was the opportunity for which Innocent III. was looking. Both elections were declared void and the fifteen monks of Canterbury were brought to Rome where they were forced to choose Cardinal Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury.[553:2] The Pope consecrated Langton to the new office and demanded King John's approval. John's rage was unbounded. He impeached the monks for treason and expelled them from England on pain of death. He confiscated the property of the see and the chapter of Canterbury and told the Pope bluntly that he would never permit the illegally elected stranger to set foot on English soil. The Pope first threatened the king with an interdict, which merely produced angry and obstinate counter threats from John, and then in 1208 actually published the interdict.[553:3] The king retaliated by seizing Church property, abusing the clergy, exiling

the bishops, and confiscating the estates of their relatives.

Determined to humble the stubborn monarch, Innocent III. in 1210 formally excommunicated John and deposed him from the kingship.[554:1] The English crown was given to Philip II. of France who at once prepared an army to invade England. At the same time John's followers deserted him and in this desolation he was compelled to accept humiliating terms of unconditional surrender.[554:2] He agreed to reinstate all prelates to office and property; to pay a full indemnity to all laity and clergy, eight thousand pounds being paid down as a guarantee; to make the Pope arbiter about all sums of restitution; to give the Pope all right to Church patronage in England; to reverse all outlawries; and to surrender his crown and kingdoms of England and Ireland to the Pope and then to receive them back as the sworn vassal of Rome, paying therefore the annual sum of one thousand marks of silver.[554:3]

When the English barons wrested from the stubborn king the great Magna Charta in 1215,[554:4] Pope Innocent III. championed the cause of the king, his vassal, against the barons. He called a council, annulled the Magna Charta, issued a manifesto against the barons, and ordered the bishops to excommunicate them.[554:5] He suspended Archbishop Langton from office for siding with the barons against the king and directly appointed

the Archbishop of York. At the same time Prince Louis of France, who had invaded England with an army, was summarily excommunicated for having entered a domain of the Holy See. As a result of the Pope's policy King John of England became a suppliant vassal of Rome, the English clergy were subjected to the Pope, the resources of England were put at the Pope's command, the nobles and the people were thwarted in their efforts to check John in his tyranny, and Magna Charta was declared illegal though not invalidated.

In the East the Latin rulers in Palestine and at Constantinople were papal vassals. The Pope asserted his supremacy over the Eastern Empire in refusing to restore the Isle of Cyprus and in demanding a council to heal the schism.[555:1] Leo, King of Armenia, threw both his church and his kingdom into the Pope's arms for protection.[555:2] Bulgaria was won away from the Greek Church and her king was given a crown independent of the Eastern Empire.[555:3] Hungary was treated as a vassal kingdom and papal protection was extended to her king.

In the North the King of Norway had been slain by a priest who then compelled the bishops in 1184 to crown him king. Innocent III. took up the case and appointed the King of Denmark and the Archbishop of Norway a court to try the murderer on the charge of having forged papal bulls to favour his coronation. His supporters were excommunicated, he himself was put under the ban, and all places giving him shelter were interdicted. Even the Bishop of Ireland was

rebuked for having permitted his clergy to communicate with the "accursed apostate." The Pope reorganised the northern churches and tied the clergy to St. Peter's Chair. In Poland the archbishop was censured for neglecting to draw the spiritual sword in favour of Duke Bolesas who had been ill treated by his subjects. The Duke of Holland, a faithful vassal, was in turn assisted against his rebellious subjects.

No occupant of St. Peter's Chair was more sincerely impressed with the beauty and necessity of rescuing the Holy Land from the infidels than Innocent III. He sent preachers all over Europe to stir up a holy war. He laboured incessantly to pacify and unite all rulers under his guidance in this great enterprise. He attempted to eliminate the mercenary character of the crusade by forbidding the Venetians to traffic with the Mohammedans.[556:1] But he strove in vain to prevent the secular diversions and consequent failure of the Fourth Crusade. When the crusaders in fulfilment of their bargain with the Venetians,[556:2] left Venice to attack Zara, a Christian city, he threatened them with excommunication. After the deed was done, however, he granted conditional pardon.[556:3] The capture of Constantinople was likewise censured but in the end lauded,[556:4] although he strongly urged the crusaders to fulfil their original vow.[556:5] So skillfully did he manipulate affairs that both Greek and Latin Emperors recognised his overlordship, the Greek Church was

subjected to Rome, and the appointment of the Patriarch of Constantinople was in his hands.

Since this phase of the fourth crusade fell so far short of its original aim, Innocent summoned the Lateran Council in 1215 to proclaim an ideal crusade for June 1, 1216.[557:1] The Pope intended to direct the movement in person or by legates. The usual privileges were granted to crusaders and a variety of financial regulations were published authorising the clergy to sell or mortgage Church lands for three years in order to raise necessary funds; urging kings, nobles, cities, and rural districts to contribute money and men, and levying a tax on the cardinals and the head of the Church. In addition the Pope contributed out of his private possessions thirty-three thousand pounds of silver and a large ship. A truce for four years was enjoined on all Christian princes on pain of excommunication and interdict. Through the untimely death of the Pope, however, while he was going to persuade Pisa to join in the crusade, the crusade did not mature, but later the Popes were not slow in claiming the leadership granted in this instance by the council to Innocent III.

In no direction did Innocent III. accomplish more than in his uncompromising attack on heresy. It must never be forgotten that heresy was the greatest crime of the Middle Ages. God had planted His Church on earth, appointed the Pope as vice-gerent, and prescribed laws and dogmas in the Bible and the canons to govern the Church. Any violation of these laws, or disbelief in the dogmas, was heresy. Consequently, heresy was treason against both the

Church and God. A heretic was like a man with a dangerous, infectious disease. Not only was he himself in mortal danger, but he might inoculate the whole community and carry it too, down to perdition. It was the duty of the Church, therefore, to get rid of that diseased person either by curing him through recantation, or ending his power for evil by death.

The existence of heresy parallels the whole history of the Church and suggests a universal mental attribute. The causes for the remarkable growth of heresy are to be found in the departure of the Church from its earlier teachings and practices, in the failure of the Church to make its theory and practice harmonise,[558:1] in the remnants of earlier doctrines and heresies, and in the mental awakening of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries[558:2] due to the crusades and other influences.[558:3] Among the leading heretics of this period were:

1. Tanchelm, who carried on a heretical movement in Flanders (1108-1126), teaching the historical origin of the hierarchy, the pollution of the Eucharist in the hands of a bad priest, the illegality of tithes and the congregational view of church government.[558:4]

2. Eon de l'Etoile in Brittany who declared that he was the son of God sent to reform the Church (1145-1148).[558:5]

3. Pierre de Bruys who preached in Vallonise until he was burned (1106-1126), declaring infant baptism useless, offerings, prayers, and masses for the dead of no avail since each one would be judged by his own merits,

churches unnecessary, the use of the cross idolatry, the Eucharist a mere historical incident and the Papacy with its hierarchy of officials a blatant fraud.[559:1]

4. Henry of Lausanne who deserted his monastery and became a reformer in various districts in France (1116-1147). He rejected the invocation of saints, taught asceticism, denounced the vice of the clergy, discarded the Eucharist, denied the sanctity of the priesthood, declared tithes to be illegal, opposed attendance at Church, and aroused an intense zeal for purity and piety. Whole congregations left their churches and joined him. At last the Church secured his arrest and condemnation to imprisonment for life, but he appears to have died shortly after.[559:2]

5. Arnold of Brescia, a pupil of Abelard, who travelled in various parts of Italy, France, and Germany, denouncing infant baptism, rejecting the Eucharist, assailing the wealth of the Church, lashing the vices of the clergy, and organising associations of "Poor Men" until he was finally hanged, then burnt, and his ashes thrown into the Tiber.[559:3]

6. Peter Waldo of Lyons, a rich but ignorant merchant, who from a study of the New Testament was led, after providing for his family, to give all his possessions to the poor.[559:4] He became an ardent preacher, won converts, and sent them out as proselyting missionaries. He and his followers refused obedience to Pope and prelates saying all good men were priests, permitted women to preach, declared God and not man should be obeyed, rejected masses and prayers for the

dead as useless, denied purgatory, assailed indulgences, advocated non-resistance, denounced war and homicide, attacked all the vices of the day, and organised "The Poor Men of Lyons" which order soon spread under the name Waldenses all over Europe.[560:1]

7. The Catharists who appeared during the Middle Ages in Lombardy in the eleventh century and soon spread over western Europe and became very powerful. They were dualists believing in God and Satan, the spiritual and the physical, the good and the bad. They held that Christ came to overthrow Satan and that the Roman Church was the latter's seat. They rejected the authority and doctrines of the Church and had a distinct ritual of their own. Soon they broke up into different sects with different names and were known in southern France as Albigenses.[560:2]

Innocent III.'s theory of the Papacy clearly indicated his duty about heresy and the co-operation which he might demand of the secular powers.[560:3] In the first year of his pontificate (1198) heretics were offered the choice of recantation or death.[560:4] The clergy were likewise ordered to mend their ways in order to remove the cause of heresy.[560:5] Two Inquisitors-General were sent to Spain and France where the clergy were directed to give them information about heresy, and the rulers and laity were asked to help the "Persecution."[560:6] As a result a number of heretics were put to death in Spain, southern France, and Italy. The following year (1199) the Pope appointed an additional Inquisitor-General

for Italy and added a third for France and Spain. They were all kept very busy.

In 1207 Innocent in person led a force against the heretics at Viterbo in Italy. The heretics fled but their houses were torn down, their property confiscated, and a search made for suspects. An edict was also passed decreeing that heretics should be treated as outcasts, that they should be seized and given up to secular rulers, that their property should be confiscated, that their hiding places should be razed to the ground, that their protectors or sympathisers should forfeit one fourth of their property and be outlawed, and that rulers refusing to execute the decree should be excommunicated.[561:1] The same year a similar edict was issued against the heretics in southern France. To all who executed the decree were offered indulgences like those given devout visitors to the shrines of the Apostles Peter and James. On the other hand those who aided heretics were to suffer the same punishment.[561:2]

Innocent appointed a fourth Inquisitor-General and sent him to the French King to urge him to help exterminate the heretics. The powers of the Inquisitors at the same time were enlarged. The Pope now decreed a general war against "the enemies of God and man." The King of France was called upon to draw the sword, while the nobles and people were summoned to the new crusade with promises of the same indulgences as given to those who went as soldiers to Palestine.[561:3] Count Raymond of Toulouse was harshly excommunicated and deposed. This new holy

war with Simon de Montfort as leader, was preached amidst much enthusiasm. A bloody war of extermination was carried on for some years in southern France until the Albigenses were all but extinct. As a result, the Pope's authority was greatly increased, Simon de Montfort was made Count of Toulouse, while Raymond was exiled to England, the precedent for using the crusading machinery against heretical regions was established, and the Inquisition was founded. The Lateran Council in 1215 defined heresy and formulated complete regulations for its suppression.[562:1]

Not only was Innocent III. a great defender of Church dogmas, a master-organiser of the hierarchy, and an administrator without a peer in Church history, but he was also a far-reaching and sincerely intelligent reformer. The judicial reforms were necessary to round out Innocent's theory of Church government. He claimed immediate, personal jurisdiction over all "causæ majores," such as disputes of the clergy, and all questions involving the interests of the Church or of churchmen. Consequently, the power of secular rulers over the clergy was curtailed. An appalling number of cases was sent for settlement to the curia at Rome and cases there were decided with a speed and punctuality hitherto unknown. Innocent III. personally "held court" three days each week, heard all important cases and rendered the decisions.[562:2] On the other hand unimportant cases were turned over to committees under his eye. He insisted upon having honest judges all over Christendom for minor cases and enforced his will by making an appeal to Rome simple, easy, and inexpensive.[562:3] All bribes and gifts to

judges were strictly prohibited. The Lateran Council of 1215 modified the trial of clerical offenders by insisting upon trial in the presence of the accused, a clear statement of the charges, a list of witnesses for the accused, and no appeal before the rendering of a decision in an inferior court.[563:1] Innocent III. also took all treaties between nations under the protection of the Church,[563:2] and insisted on acting as supreme arbiter in all wars and civil feuds.[563:3]

The necessity of moral reformation was recognised by Innocent III. from the beginning of his pontificate. From the year of his election he endeavoured to abolish all those debilitating corruptions which prevented the realisation of his ideal priesthood; namely, pluralism, luxury, rapacity, pride, arrogance, and other evils. The clergy were emphatically commanded to free themselves of these abuses and severe orders were given to his legates to root out these evils.[563:4] In 1215 the Lateran Council was called for the "extirpation of vices, the planting of virtues, the correction of abuses, and the reformation of morals." All the clergy were urged to note the evils needing amendment and to correct the same.[563:5] In a sermon opening this remarkably representative council the Pope urged the clergy to reform themselves so that they could the better lead their flocks aright.[563:6] Many reformatory measures were enacted by this Council. Nepotism was prohibited, monastic abuses were corrected; pluralities were forbidden; the extravagant use of relics was curtailed;

the extortions and simony of the clergy were abolished and renewed stress was laid on the canons of celibacy.[564:1]

The doctrinal changes instituted by Innocent III. were likewise important. The dogma of transubstantiation was canonised by the Lateran Council in 1215. Before that time there had been many and divergent views concerning this important subject. The leading motive which actuated Innocent in having this doctrine carefully defined was to destroy heresy. In consequence of the new dogma the sacerdotal body was elevated by being given a holier character while each individual priest employed this new power as a badge of divine dignity. All discussion about transubstantiation now ceased. Heresy was more clearly defined than ever and the Inquisition was canonised. At the same time the unity of the Church on its doctrinal side was given greater emphasis. The canonical restrictions on marriage were relaxed. The earlier rigid law had led to grave abuses, since the clergy annulled marriages and bastardised the offspring while the laity made it an excuse for divorce and licentious passion. The prohibition of marriage between the relative of a second wife and a first was removed. The degree of consanguinity and affinity was reduced from the seventh to the fourth canonical degree. Secret marriages were prohibited. The publication of the bans was made necessary. Confession and penitential satisfaction were prescribed as obligatory at least once a year under the penalty of excommunication. Physicians were likewise required to send all the sick to the priest first to have their souls cured before any effort was

made to heal the body. The penalty for disobedience was exclusion from the communion.

The administrative reforms of Innocent III. embraced a wide range of measures. Honorary precedence was granted to the Patriarch of Constantinople. Elections to vacancies in the Church were reduced to three forms: (1) A committee of three of the electors was to take the votes and to declare who had received "the greater and sounder" number; (2) a committee was to be empowered to appoint for the whole body of electors; (3) a choice was to be made by acclamation. All lay interference was excluded, otherwise the election would be ipso facto illegal. Papal confirmation and the right of revision were carefully guarded. Pluralities were strictly prohibited. Tithes were given precedence over all other taxes and dues, and the clergy were urged to guard the property and to collect all monies of the Church.[565:1] The right to transfer ecclesiastics was reserved to the Pope alone.[565:2] Finally the Inquisition was instituted for the purpose of suppressing heresy, of enforcing doctrines and ordinances, and of reforming the Church.

Innocent III. as head of the great Church easily outranked every ruler of his day and stands high among the greatest leaders of the Middle Ages and of all ages. A contemporary describes him as "A man of wonderful fortitude and wisdom—one who had no equal in his own day; whereby he had been able to do acts of miraculous power and greatness." If Hildebrand was the Julius, Innocent was the Augustus of the Papal Empire. He seldom miscalculated—his clear intellect never missed an opportunity—his calculating spirit rarely erred—and

he combined forbearance with vigour. "Order, method, unswerving resolution, inexorable determination, undaunted self-assertion, patience, vigilance, and cunning, all co-operating to the accomplishment of a single well-defined object—and that object the unlimited extension of the political power of the Pontiff of Rome—had achieved a signal triumph over the irregular, the selfish, and the impulsive political opposition of the secular powers."[566:1]

The moral character of his reign was variously viewed by contemporaries. The English clergy generally disliked him and a writer of the day asserted that his death, July 26, 1216, caused more joy than sorrow. St. Luitgarde, the prioress of a Cistercian Convent in Brabant, said that in a vision she had seen him in purgatory enveloped in flames for his sins.[566:2] The crimes of ambition, cruelty, deceit and treachery were charged against him as a shrewd political intriguer. The practical charity and genuine humility of an earlier day—when he washed and kissed the feet of twelve poor men taken from the street every Saturday[566:3]—seemed to disappear in the multiplied duties of a world ruler. His piety, honesty of purpose, and sincere conviction of his great mission cannot be questioned. Yet for some reason the Church, for which he did so much, has never seen fit to canonise this great Pope.

No other wearer of the papal tiara has left behind him so many results pregnant with good and ill for the future of the Church. Under him the Papacy reached the culmination of its secular power and prerogatives. The principles of sacerdotal government

were fully and intelligently elaborated. The code of ecclesiastical law was completed and enforced. All the Christian princes of Europe were brought to recognise the overlordship of the successor of St. Peter. All the clergy obeyed his will as the one supreme law. Heresy was washed out in blood. The Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals and the dreams of Hildebrand had been realised. Yet in this very greatness, wealth, and strength, were the germs of weakness and disease which were eventually to overthrow the great structure reared by Innocent III. and his predecessors.