[196] Potgiesser, op. cit. ii. 4. 5, p. 429. Milman, op. cit. ii. 16.
[197] Potgiesser, op. cit. ii. 10, p. 528 sqq. Du Cange, Glossarium ad scriptores mediæ et infimæ Latinitatis, vi. 451. Robertson, History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles V. i. 274.
[198] Potgiesser, op. cit. iii. 3. 2, p. 612.
[199] Beaumanoir, Coutumes du Beauvoisis, xxxix. 32, vol. ii, 103. Du Cange, op. cit. vi. 452. Potgiesser, op. cit. iii. 3. 1, p. 611.
[200] Potgiesser, op. cit. ii. 2. 10 sq., p. 354 sq.
[201] Ibid. ii. 2. 12, p. 355 sq.
The gradual disappearance of slavery in Europe during the latter part of the Middle Ages has also commonly been in the main attributed to the influence of the Church.[202] But this opinion is hardly supported by facts. It is true that the Church in some degree encouraged the manumission of slaves. Though slavery was considered a perfectly lawful institution, the enfranchisement of a fellow-Christian was deemed a meritorious act, and was sometimes strongly recommended on Christian principles. At the close of the sixth century it was affirmed that, as Christ had come to break the chain of our servitude and restore our primitive liberty, so it was well for us to imitate Him by making free those whom the law of nations had reduced to slavery;[203] and the same doctrine was again proclaimed at various times down to the sixteenth century.[204] In the Carlovingian period the abbot Smaragdus expressed the opinion that among other good and salutary works each one ought to let slaves go free, considering that not nature but sin had subjected them to their masters.[205] In the latter part of the twelfth century the prelates of France, and in particular the Archbishop of Sens, pretended that it was an obligation of conscience to accord liberty to all Christians, relying on a decree of a Council held at Rome by Pope Alexander III.[206] And in one of the later compilations of German mediæval law it was said that the Lord Jesus, by his injunction to render unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar’s and unto God the things that are God’s, indicated that no man is the property of another, but that every man belongs to God.[207] Slaves were liberated “for God’s love,” or “for the remedy” or “ransom of the soul.”[208] In the formularies of manumission given by the monk Marculfus in the seventh century we read, for instance:—“He that releases his slave who is bound to him, may trust that God will recompense him in the next world”;[209] “For the remission of my sins, I absolve thee”;[210] “For the glory of God’s name and for my eternal retribution,” &c.[211] Too much importance, however, has often been attached to these phrases; the most trivial occurrences, such as giving a book to a monastery, are commonly accompanied by similar expressions,[212] and it appears from certain formulas that slaves were not only liberated, but also bought and sold, “in the name of God.”[213] Nor can we suppose that it was from religious motives only that manumissions were encouraged by the clergy. It has been pointed out that, “as dying persons were frequently inclined to make considerable donations for pious uses, it was more immediately for the interest of churchmen, that people of inferior condition should be rendered capable of acquiring property, and should have the free disposal of what they had acquired.” It also seems that those who obtained their liberty by the influence of the clergy had to reward their benefactors, and that the manumission should for this reason be confirmed by the Church.[214] And whilst the Church favoured liberation of the slaves of laymen, she took care to prevent liberation of her own slaves; like a physician she did not herself swallow the medicine which she prescribed to others. She allowed alienation of such slaves only as showed a disposition to run away.[215] The Council of Agatho, in 506, considered it unfair to enfranchise the slaves of monasteries, seeing that the monks themselves were daily compelled to labour;[216] and, as a matter of fact, the slaves of monasteries were everywhere among the last who were manumitted.[217] In the seventh century a Council at Toledo threatened with damnation any bishop who should liberate a slave belonging to the Church, without giving due compensation from his own property, as it was thought impious to inflict a loss on the Church of Christ;[218] and according to several ecclesiastical regulations no bishop or priest was allowed to manumit a slave in the patrimony of the Church unless he put in his place two slaves of equal value.[219] Nay, the Church was anxious not only to prevent a reduction of her slaves, but to increase their number. She zealously encouraged people to give up themselves and their posterity to be the slaves of churches and monasteries, to enslave their bodies—as some of the charters put it—in order to procure the liberty of their souls.[220] And in the middle of the seventh century a Council decreed that the children of incontinent priests should become the slaves of the churches where their fathers officiated.[221]
[202] Clarkson, Essay on Slavery, p. 19, sq. Biot, De l’abolition de l’esclavage ancien en Occident, p. xi. Thérou, Le Christianisme et l’esclavage, p. 147. Martin, Histoire de France jusqu’en 1789, iii. 11, n. 2. Balmes, El Protestantismo comparado con el Catolicismo, i. 285. Blakey, op. cit. p. 170. Yanoski, op. cit. p. 75. Cochin, L’abolition de l’esclavage, ii. 349, 458. Littré, Études sur les Barbares et le Moyen Age, p. 230 sq. Allard, op. cit. p. 490. Tedeschi, La schiavitù, p. 68. Lecky, History of Rationalism in Europe, ii. 216, 236 sqq. Maine, International Law, p. 160. Kidd, Social Evolution, p. 168.
[203] St. Gregory the Great, Epistolæ, vi. 12 (Migne, Patrologiæ cursus, lxxvii. 803 sq.). Gratian, op. cit. ii. 12. 2. 68. Potgiesser, op. cit. iv. 1. 3, p. 666 sq.
[204] Babington, op. cit. p. 180.