A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages; volume III

by Henry Charles Lea

The most audacious of these champions was Marsiglio of Padua. Interpenetrated with the principles of the imperial jurisprudence, in which the State was supreme and the Church wholly subordinated, he had seen in France how the influence of the Roman law was emancipating the civil power from servitude, and perhaps in the University of Paris had heard the echoes of the theories of Henry of Ghent, the celebrated Doctor Solemnis, who had taught the sovereignty of the people over their princes. He framed a conception of a political organization which should reproduce that of Rome under the Christian emperors, with a recognition of the people as the ultimate source of all civil authority. Aided by Jean de Jandum he developed these ideas with great hardihood and skill in his “Defensor Pacis”, and in 1326, when the strife between John and Louis was at its hottest, the two authors left Paris to lay the result of their labors before the emperor. In a brief tract, moreover, “De translatione imperii,” Marsiglio subsequently sketched the manner in which the Holy Roman Empire had arisen, showing the ancient subjection of the Holy See to the imperial power, and the baselessness of the papal claims to confirm the election of the emperors. John XXII. had no hesitation in condemning the daring authors as heretics, and the protection which Louis afforded them added another count to the indictment against him for heresy. Unable to wreak vengeance upon them, all who could be supposed to be their accomplices were sternly dealt with. A certain Francesco of Venice, who had been a student with Marsiglio at Paris, was seized and carried to Avignon on a charge of having aided in the preparation of the wicked book, and of having supplied the heresiarch with money. Tried before the Apostolic Chamber, he stoutly maintained that he was ignorant of the contents of the “Defensor Pacis,” that he had deposited money with Marsiglio, as was customary with scholars, and that Marsiglio had left Paris owing him thirteen sols parisis. Jean de Jandun died in 1328, and Marsiglio not later than 1343, thus mercifully spared the disappointment of the failure of their theories. In so far as purely intellectual conceptions had weight in the conflict they were powerful allies for Louis. In the “Defensor Pacis” the power of the keys is argued away in the clearest dialectics. God alone has power to judge, to absolve, to condemn. The pope is no more than any other priest, and a priestly sentence may be the result of hatred, favor, or injustice, of no weight with God. Excommunication, to be effective, must not proceed from the judgment of a single priest, but must be the sentence of the whole community, with full knowledge of all the facts. It is no wonder that when, in 1376, a French translation of the work appeared in Paris it created a profound sensation. A prolonged inquest was held, lasting from September to December, in which all the learned men in the city were made to swear before a notary as to their ignorance of the translator.[151]

More vehement and more fluent as a controversialist was the great schoolman, William of Ockham. When the final breach came between the papacy and the rigid Franciscans he was already under inquisitorial trial for his utterances. Escaping from Avignon with his general, Michele, he found refuge, like the rest, with Louis, whose cause he strengthened by skilfully linking the question of Christ’s poverty with that of German independence. Those who refused to accept a papal definition on a point of faith could only justify themselves by proving that popes were fallible and their power not unlimited. Thus the strife over the narrow Franciscan dogmatism on poverty broadened until it embraced the great questions which had disturbed the peace of Europe since the time of Hildebrand, nearly three centuries before. In 1324 Ockham boasted that he had set his face like flint against the errors of the pseudo-pope, and that so long as he possessed hand, paper, pens, and ink, no abuse or lies or persecution or persuasion would induce him to desist from attacking them. He kept his promise literally, and for twenty years he poured forth a series of controversial works in defence of the cause to which he had devoted his life. Without embracing the radical doctrines of Marsiglio on the popular foundation of political institutions, he practically reached the same outcome. While admitting the primacy of the pope, he argued that a pope can fall into heresy, and so, indeed, can a general council, and even all Christendom. The influence of the Holy Ghost did not deprive man of free-will and prevent him from succumbing to error, no matter what might be his station. There was nothing sure but Scripture; the poorest and meanest peasant might adhere to Catholic truth revealed to him by God, while popes and councils erred. Above the pope is the general council representing the whole Church. A pope refusing to entertain an appeal to a general council, declining to assemble it, or arrogating its authority to himself is a manifest heretic, whom it is the duty of the bishops to depose, or, if the bishops refuse, then that of the emperor, who is supreme over the earth. But it was not only by the enunciation of general principles that he carried on the war; merciless were his assaults on the errors and inconsistencies of John XXII., who was proved guilty of seventy specific heresies. Thus to the bitter end his dauntless spirit kept up the strife; one by one his colleagues died and submitted, and he was left alone, but he continued to shower ridicule on the curia and its creatures in his matchless dialectics. Even the death of Louis and the hopeless defeat of his cause did not stop his fearless pen. Church historians claim that in 1349 he at last made his peace and was reconciled, but this is more than doubtful, for Giacomo della Marca classes him with Michele and Bonagrazia as the three unrepentant heretics who died under excommunication. It is not easy to determine with accuracy what influence was exercised by the powerful intellects which England, France, and Italy thus contributed to the defence of German independence. Possibly they may have stimulated Wickliff to question the foundation of papal power and the supremacy of the Church over the State, leading to Hussite insubordination. Possibly, too, they may have contributed to the movement which in various development emboldened the Councils of Constance and Basle to claim superiority over the Holy See, the Gallican Church to assert its liberties, and England to frame the hostile legislation of the Statutes of Provisors and Præmunire. If this be so, the hopeless entanglements of German politics caused them to effect less in their own chosen battle-field than in lands far removed from the immediate scene of conflict.[152]

This rapid glance at the larger aspects of the strife has been necessary to enable us to follow intelligently the vicissitudes of the discussion over the poverty of Christ, which occupied in the struggle a position ludicrously disproportionate to its importance. For some time after the issue of the bulls Cum inter nonnullos and Quia quorumdam there was a sort of armed neutrality between John and the heads of the Franciscan Order. Each seemed to be afraid of taking a step which should precipitate a conflict, doubtless secretly felt by both sides to be inevitable. Still there was a little skirmishing for position. In 1325 Michele had summoned the general chapter to assemble at Paris, but he feared that an effort would be made to annul the declarations of Perugia, and that John would exercise a pressure by means of King Charles le Bel, whose influence was great through the number of benefices at his disposal. Suddenly, therefore, he transferred the call to Lyons, where considerable trouble was experienced through the efforts of Gerard Odo, a creature of the pope, and subsequently the successor of Michele, to obtain relaxations of the Rule as regarded poverty. Still the brethren stood firm, and these attempts were defeated, while a constitution threatening with imprisonment all who should speak indiscreetly and disrespectfully of John XXII. and his decretals indicates the passions which were seething under the surface. Not long after this we hear of a prosecution suddenly commenced against our old acquaintance Ubertino da Casale, in spite of his Benedictine habit and his quiet residence in Italy. He seems to have been suspected of having furnished the arguments on the subject of the poverty of Christ in the Protest of Sachsenhausen, and, September 16, 1325, an order was sent for his arrest, but he got wind of it and escaped to Germany—the first of the illustrious band of refugees who gathered around Louis of Bavaria, though he appears to have made his peace in 1330. John seems to have at last grown restive at the tacit insubordination of the Franciscans, who did not openly deny his definitions as to the poverty of Christ, but whom he knew to be secretly cherishing in their hearts the condemned doctrine. In 1326 Michele issued decrees subjecting to a strict censorship all writings by the brethren and enforcing one of the rules which prohibited the discussion of doubtful opinions, thus muzzling the Order in the hope of averting dissension; but it was not in John’s nature to rest satisfied with silence which covered opposition, and in August, 1327, he advanced to the attack. In the bull Quia nonnunquam, addressed to archbishops and inquisitors, he declared that many still believed in the poverty of Christ in spite of his having pronounced such belief a heresy, and that those who entertained it should be treated as heretics. He therefore now orders the prelates and inquisitors to prosecute them vigorously, and though the Franciscans are not specially named, the clause which deprives the accused of all papal privileges and subjects them to the ordinary jurisdictions sufficiently shows that they were the object of the assault. It is quite possible that this was provoked by some movement among the remains of the moderate Spirituals of Italy—men who came to be known as Fraticelli—who had never indulged in the dangerous enthusiasms of the Olivists, but who were ready to suffer martyrdom in defence of the sacred principles of poverty. Such men could not but have been at once excited by the papal denial of Christ’s poverty, and encouraged by finding the Order at large driven into antagonism with the Holy See. Sicily had long been a refuge for the more zealous when forced to flee from Italy. At this time we hear of their crossing back to Calabria, and of John writing to Niccolò da Reggio, the Minister of Calabria, savage instructions to destroy them utterly. Lists are to be made out and sent to him of all who show them favor, and King Robert is appealed to for aid in the good work. Robert, in spite of his close alliance with the pope, and the necessity of the papal favor for his ambitious plans, was sincerely on the side of the Franciscans. He seems never to have forgotten the teachings of Arnaldo de Vilanova, and as his father, Charles the Lame, had interfered to protect the Spirituals of Provence, so now both he and his queen did what they could with the angry pope to moderate his wrath, and at the same time he urged the Order to stand firm in defence of the Rule. In the protection which he afforded he did not discriminate closely between the organized resistance of the Order under its general, and the irregular mutiny of the Fraticelli. His dominions, as well as Sicily, served as a refuge for the latter. With the troubles provoked by John their numbers naturally grew. Earnest spirits, dissatisfied with Michele’s apparent acquiescence in John’s new heresy, would naturally join them. They ranged themselves under Henry da Ceva, who had fled to Sicily from persecution under Boniface VIII.; they elected him their general minister and formed a complete independent organization, which, when John triumphed over the Order, gathered in its recalcitrant fragments and constituted a sect whose strange persistence under the fiercest persecution we shall have to follow for a century and a half.[153]

On the persecution of these insubordinate brethren Michele da Cesena could afford to look with complacency, and he evidently desired to regard the bull of August, 1327, as directed against them. He maintained his attitude of submission. In June the pope had summoned him from Rome to Avignon, and he had excused himself on the ground of sickness. His messengers with his apologies were graciously received, and it was not until December 2 that he presented himself before John. The pope subsequently declared that he had been summoned to answer for secretly encouraging rebels and heretics, and doubtless the object was to be assured of his person, but he was courteously welcomed, and the ostensible reason given for sending for him was certain troubles in the provinces of Assisi and Aragon, in which Michele obediently changed the ministers. Until April, 1328, he remained in the papal court, apparently on the best of terms with John.[154]

Meanwhile the quarrel between the empire and the papacy had been developing apace. In the spring of 1326 Louis suddenly and without due preparation undertook an expedition to Italy, at the invitation of the Ghibellines, for his imperial coronation. When he reached Milan in April to receive the iron crown John sternly forbade his further progress, and on this being disregarded, proceeded to excommunicate him afresh. Thus commenced another prolonged series of citations and sentences for heresy, including the preaching of a crusade with Holy Land indulgences against the impenitent sinner. Unmoved by this, Louis slowly made his way to Rome, which he entered January 7, 1327, and where he was crowned on the 17th, in contemptuous defiance of papal prerogative, by four syndics elected by the people, after which, according to usage, he exchanged the title of King of the Romans for that of Emperor. As the defender of the faith he proceeded to try the pope on the charge of heresy, based upon his denial of the poverty of Christ. April 14 he promulgated a law authorizing the prosecution and sentence in absentia of those notoriously defamed for treason or heresy, thus imitating the papal injustice of which he himself complained bitterly; and, on the 17th, sentence of deposition was solemnly read to the assembled people before the basilica of St. Peter. It recited that it was rendered at the request of the clergy and people of Rome; it recapitulated the crimes of the pope, whom it stigmatized as Antichrist; it pronounced him a heretic on account of his denying the poverty of Christ, deposed him from the papacy, and threatened confiscation on all who should render him support and assistance.[155]

As a pope was necessary to the Church, and as the college of cardinals were under excommunication as fautors of heresy, recourse was had to the primitive method of selection: some form of election by the people and clergy of Rome was gone through on May 12, and a new Bishop of Rome was presented to the Christian world in the person of Pier di Corbario, an aged Franciscan of high repute for austerity and eloquence. He was Minister of the province of the Abruzzi and papal penitentiary. He had been married, his wife was still living, and he was said to have entered the Order without her consent, which rendered him “irregular” and led to an absurd complication, for the woman, who had never before complained of his leaving her, now came forward and put in her claims to be bought off. He assumed the name of Nicholas V., a college of cardinals was readily created for him, he appointed nuncios and legates and proceeded to degrade the Guelfic bishops and replace them with Ghibellines. In the confusion attendant upon these revolutionary proceedings it can be readily imagined that the Fraticelli emerged from their hiding-places and indulged in glowing anticipations of the future which they fondly deemed their own.[156]

Although the Franciscan prefect of the Roman province assembled a chapter at Anagni which pronounced against Pier di Corbario, and ordered him to lay aside his usurped dignity, it was impossible that the Order should escape responsibility for the rebellion, nor is it likely that Michele da Cesena was not privy to the whole proceeding. He had remained quietly at Avignon, and John had manifested no abatement of cordiality until April 9, when, on being summoned to an audience, the pope attacked him on the subject of the Chapter of Perugia, which six years before had asserted the poverty of Christ and the apostles. Michele stoutly defended the utterances of the chapter, saying that if they were heretical then Nicholas IV. and the other popes who had affirmed the doctrine were heretics. Then the papal wrath exploded. Michele was a headstrong fool, a fautor of heretics, a serpent nourished in the bosom of the Church; and when the stream of invective had exhausted itself he was placed under constructive arrest, and ordered not to leave Avignon without permission, under pain of excommunication, of forfeiture of office, and of future disability. A few days later, on April 14, in the secrecy of the Franciscan convent, he relieved his feelings by executing a solemn notarial protest, in the presence of William of Ockham, Bonagrazia, and other trusty adherents, in which he recited the circumstances, argued that the pope either was a heretic or no pope, for either his present utterances were erroneous or else Nicholas IV. had been a heretic; in the latter case Boniface VIII. and Clement V., who had approved the Bull Exiit qui seminat, were likewise heretics, their nominations of cardinals were void, and the conclave which elected John was illegal. He protested against whatever might be done in derogation of the rights of the Order, that he was in durance and in just fear, and that what he might be forced to do would be null and void. The whole document is a melancholy illustration of the subterfuges rendered necessary by an age of violence.[157]

Michele was detained in Avignon while the general chapter of the Order was held at Bologna, to which John sent Bertrand, Bishop of Ostia, with instructions to have another general chosen. The Order, however, was stubborn. It sent a somewhat defiant message to the pope and re-elected Michele, requesting him moreover to indicate Paris as the next place of assemblage, to be held, according to rule, in three years, to which he assented. In view of the drama which was developing in Rome he might reasonably fear for liberty or life. Preparations were made for his escape. A galley, furnished, according to John, by the Emperor Louis, but according to other and more trustworthy accounts, by Genoese refugees, was sent to Aigues-mortes. Thither he fled, May 26, accompanied by Ockham and Bonagrazia. The Bishop of Porto sent by John in hot haste after him, had an interview with him on the deck of his galley, but failed to induce him to return. He reached Pisa on June 9, and there ensued a war of manifestoes of unconscionable length, in which Michele was pronounced excommunicate and deposed, and John was proved to be a heretic who had rightfully forfeited the papacy. Michele could only carry on a wordy conflict, while John could act. Bertrand de la Tour, Cardinal of San Vitale, was appointed Vicar-general of the Order, another general chapter was ordered to assemble in Paris, June, 1329, and preparations were made for it by removing all provincials favorable to Michele, and appointing in their places men who could be relied on. Out of thirty-four who had met in Bologna only fourteen were seen in Paris; Michele was deposed and Gerard Odo was elected in his place; but even under this pressure no declaration condemning the poverty of Christ could be obtained from the chapter. The mass of the Order, reduced to silence, remained faithful to the principles represented by its deposed general, until forced to acquiescence by the arbitrary measures so freely employed by the pope and the examples made of those who dared to express opposition. Still John was not disposed to relax the Franciscan discipline, and when, in 1332, Gerard Odo, in the hope of gaining a cardinal’s hat, persuaded fourteen provincial ministers to join him in submitting a gloss which would have virtually annulled the obligation of poverty, his only reward was the ridicule of the pope and sacred college.[158]

The settlement of the question depended much more upon political than upon religious considerations. Louis had abandoned Rome and established himself in Pisa with his pope, his cardinals, and his Franciscans, but the Italians were becoming tired of their kaiser. It mattered little that in January, 1329, he indulged in the childish triumph of solemnly burning John XXII. in effigy; he was obliged soon after to leave the city, and towards the end of the year he returned to Germany, carrying with him the men who were to defend his cause with all the learning of the schools, and abandoning to their fate those of his partisans who were unable to follow him.[159] The proceedings which ensued at Todi will serve to show how promptly the Inquisition tracked his retreating footsteps, and how useful it was as a political agency in reducing rebellious communities to submission.

The Todini were Ghibelline. In 1327, when John XXII. had ordered Francisco Damiani, Inquisitor of Spoleto, to proceed vigorously against Mucio Canistrario of Todi as a rebel against the Church, and Mucio had accordingly been imprisoned, the people had risen in insurrection and liberated the captive, while the inquisitor had been forced to fly for his life. In August, 1328, they had welcomed Louis as emperor and Pier di Corbario as pope, and had ordered their notaries to use the regnal years of the latter in their instruments; they had, moreover, attacked and taken the Guelf city of Orvieto and, like all the cities which adhered to Louis, they had expelled the Dominicans. In August, 1329, abandoned by Louis, proceedings were commenced against them by the Franciscan, Frà Bartolino da Perugia, the inquisitor, who announced his intention of making a thorough inquest of the whole district of Assisi against all Patarins and heretics, against those who assert things not to be sins which the Church teaches to be sins, or are minor sins which the Church holds to be greater, against those who understand the Scriptures in a sense different from what the Holy Spirit demands, against those who talk against the state and observance of the Roman Church and its teachings, and against those who have detracted from the dignity and person of the pope and his constitutions. Under this searching examinations were made as to the acts of the citizens during the visit of Louis, any sign of respect paid to him being regarded as a crime, and two sets of prosecutions were commenced—one against the Ghibellines of the city and the other against the “rebellious” Franciscans. These latter were summoned to reply to five articles—1, If they believed in, favored, or adhered to the Bavarian and the intrusive antipope; 2, If they had marched with a cross to meet these heretics on their entrance into Todi; 3, If they had obeyed or done reverence to the Bavarian as emperor or to P. di Corbario as pope; 4, If they had taught or preached that the constitutions of John were heretical or himself a heretic; 5, If, after Michele da Cesena was condemned and deposed for heresy, they had adhered to him and his errors. These interrogations show how conveniently the religious and political questions were mingled together, and how thorough was the investigation rendered possible by the machinery of the Inquisition. The proceedings dragged on, and, July 1, 1330, John condemned the whole community as heretics and fautors of heresy. July 7 he sent this sentence to the legate, Cardinal Orsini, with instructions to cite the citizens peremptorily and to try them, according to the inquisitorial formula, “summarie et de plano et sine strepitu et figura” Under this the Todini finally made submission, the cardinal sent Frà Bartolino and his colleague thither, and the city was reconciled, subject to the papal approval. They had been obliged to make a gift of ten thousand florins to Louis, and now a fine of equal amount was levied upon them, besides one hundred lire imposed on each of one hundred and thirty-four citizens. Apparently the terms exacted were not satisfactory to John, for a papal brief of July 20, 1331, declared the submission of the citizens deceitful, and ordered the interdict renewed. The last document which we have in the case is one of June 1, 1332, in which the legate sends to the Bishop of Todi a list of one hundred and ninety-seven persons, including Franciscans, parish priests, heads of religious houses, nobles, and citizens, who are ordered to appear before him at Orvieto on June 15, to stand trial on the inquisitions which have been found against them. That the proceedings were pushed to the bitter end there can be no doubt, for when in this year the General Gerard Odo proposed to revoke the commission of Frà Bartolino, John intervened and extended it for the purpose of enabling him to continue the prosecutions to a definite sentence. This is doubtless a fair specimen of the minute persecution which was going on wherever the Ghibellines were not strong enough to defend themselves by force of arms.[160]