TERMS OF THE CONCORDAT
The concordat drew a distinction between spiritual and lay investiture. The emperor renounced investiture by the ring and crosier—the emblems of spiritual authority—and permitted bishops and abbots to be elected by the clergy and confirmed in office by the pope. On the other hand the pope recognized the emperor's right to be present at all elections and to invest bishops and abbots by the scepter for whatever lands they held within his domains. This reasonable compromise worked well for a time. But it was a truce, not a peace. It did not settle the more fundamental issue, whether the Papacy or the Holy Roman Empire should be supreme.
167. POPES AND EMPERORS, 1122-1273 A.D.
FREDERICK I, EMPEROR, 1152-1190
Thirty years after the signing of the Concordat of Worms the emperor Frederick I, called Barbarossa from his red beard, succeeded to the throne. Frederick, the second emperor, of the Hohenstaufen dynasty [37] was capable, imaginative, and ambitious. He took Charlemagne and Otto the Great as his models and aspired like them to rule Christian Europe and the Church. His reign is the story of many attempts, ending at length in failure, to unite all Italy into a single state under German sway.
FREDERICK AND THE PAPACY
Frederick's Italian policy brought him at once into conflict with two powerful enemies. The popes, who feared that his success would imperil the independence of the Papacy, opposed him at every step. The great cities of northern Italy, which were also threatened by Frederick's soaring schemes, united in the Lombard League to defend their freedom. The popes gave the league their support, and in 1176 A.D. Frederick was badly beaten at the battle of Legnano. The haughty emperor confessed himself conquered, and sought reconciliation with the pope, Alexander III. In the presence of a vast throng assembled before St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice, Frederick knelt before the pope and humbly kissed his feet. Just a century had passed since the humiliation of Henry IV at Canossa.
PONTIFICATE OF INNOCENT III, 1198-1216 A.D.
The Papacy reached the height of its power under Innocent III. The eighteen years of his pontificate were one long effort, for the most part successful, to make the pope the arbiter of Europe. Innocent announced the claims of the Papacy in the most uncompromising manner. "As the moon," he declared, "receives its light from the sun, and is inferior to the sun, so do kings receive all their glory and dignity from the Holy See." This meant, according to Innocent, that the pope has the right to interfere in all secular matters and in the quarrels of rulers. "God," he continued, "has set the Prince of the Apostles over kings and kingdoms, with a mission to tear up, plant, destroy, scatter, and rebuild."