FURTHER ACCOUNTS OF THE THREE POPES AT ONE TIME (A.D. 1406-1417).
The continuance of two rival Popes in 1406 was felt to be so great a scandal that the rival sets of cardinals were bent on finding a way of reuniting the Papacy in one person. They chose Gregory XII., then eighty years of age, as a likely person to facilitate this object with the other Pope, Boniface; for they thought a person on the verge of the grave might be relied upon to consider the peace and unity of the Church his sole object. He professed well at first, and his supporters brought him to the point of trying to arrange some common plan of action, by which the rival Popes might mutually surrender in favour of a third person who should supersede both. The two rival Popes, however, were evidently averse to strip themselves of power. They played against each a series of perpetual evasions, postponements, and cross-purposes. Their progress to a common ground where they might meet and settle their affairs was a mere game of subterfuges, both the actors being over seventy years of age, and yet exhausting every artifice to ward off the final surrender, each blaming the other and both acting as consummate hypocrites. Their friends called for a general council to meet at Pisa and solve the problem. At this council a leading cardinal (afterwards himself a Pope) thus described the position of the two Popes: “You know how these two wretched men calumniate one another and disgrace themselves by invectives full of rant and fury. Each calls the other antipope, obstructionist, antichrist.” The council at last deposed both, and declared the Papal chair vacant. The cardinals bound themselves so that whichever of them should be elected Pope should keep the council open till all schism was healed. They elected Alexander V., but he proved useless, and dying in 1410, a most dissolute monster of depravity, John XXIII. succeeded, who turned into ridicule and defeated all the schemes of reform then put forward by the best men of the time. The leaders of reform were disgusted, and desired that all the three Popes should resign, and an upright man be chosen in their place. At last the council deposed John also in 1415, and in 1417 Martin V. was elected.
THE DEPOSED POPE, JOHN XXIII. (A.D. 1410).
Pope John XXIII., whose name was Cossa, was all his life a scandalous character, and more fit to be a roystering and swearing trooper than a priest. It was said that he in early life entered the service as a pirate, when Naples and Hungary were at war, and he then contracted the habit of sleeping by day and doing his work by night. He was daring and ingenious in every kind of corruption, buying and selling clerical offices, vending indulgences, imposing hateful taxes, and brutal and licentious in gratifying his lusts. His conduct was deemed so disgraceful that a general demand arose for the Council of Constance to settle the question whether a Pope or a general council be the highest authority in the Church. A meeting of eighteen thousand ecclesiastics met, and charges against John were formulated, and at last this crafty Pope agreed to the proposal that he would resign, if the other two rival Popes would resign. This resolution caused general satisfaction, though at first he refused to act on it. It was at this council that Huss was brought to his mock trial. John was charged with seventy-two offences, including nearly all the vices. He was styled a poisoner, a murderer; he had intended to sell the head of John the Baptist from the church of St. Sylvester to some Florentines for 50,000 ducats. John was at length deposed. He was stripped of the insignia of his office on May 31st, 1415, and at the same time confessed that he had never passed a day in comfort since he had put them on. He was kept in prison at Heidelberg till he made submission to a new Pope, who, out of pity, gave him the dignity of a cardinal bishop, but he died at Florence before he took possession of his see.
AN OWL ATTENDING A CHURCH COUNCIL (A.D. 1412).
After John XXIII. in 1410 mounted the Papal throne through all the grades of bribery and corruption, he convoked in 1412 what he was pleased to call a reformatory council at Rome; but only a few Italian prelates attended and disposed of some trifling matters, besides a condemnation of Wicliff’s writings. What was chiefly remarkable was the advent of a congenial visitor. At the celebration of the Missa Spiritus Sancti, previous to the opening of the council, when the Veni Creator Spiritus was sung according to custom, an owl flew up suddenly, screaming with a startling hoot, into the middle of the church, and perching itself upon a beam opposite to the Pope, whence it stared him sedately in the face. The cardinals ironically whispered to each other, “Only look; can that be the Holy Ghost in the shape of an owl?” His Holiness was greatly annoyed, and turned pale, then red, and in an awkward and abrupt fashion dissolved the meeting. All who were present were, however, singularly impressed, and never forgot what was viewed by each as an evil omen. But at the next session, says Fleury, the owl took up his position again, fixing his eyes on John, who was more dismayed than before, and ordered them to drive away the bird. A singular scene then ensued, the prelates hunting the bird, which insisted on remaining, and flinging their canes at it. At last they succeeded in killing the owl as an incorrigible heretic.
THE SALE OF INDULGENCES (A.D. 1411).
About 1411, after John Huss had published his disputation on indulgences, some priests were engaged in selling these to the highest bidders, when three young men of the artisan class came up and called out to the priest, “Thou liest! Master Huss has taught us better than that. We know that it is all false.” This impious taunt was at once followed up with imprisonment and a summary sentence of death. Huss, on hearing of the matter, used great exertions to save the men, and two thousand students attended him to hear him address the council in mitigation of the sentence. He took on himself the blame, if any there was. He obtained a promise that no blood should be shed, but a few hours later much of the excitement of the mob was over, and the sentence was executed. This created a still greater excitement, and as the men were viewed as martyrs, handkerchiefs were dipped in their blood and cherished as precious relics. A woman present offered white linen as a shroud for the dead bodies; and these were carried to Huss’s chapel, as those of saints, with chanted hymns through the streets, and great solemnities. The chapel was thereafter named the chapel of the Three Saints. The part taken on this popular demonstration was afterwards used as a handle by Huss’s enemies before the council at Constance, which condemned him to be burned alive, after which his ashes were cast into the Rhine, so that nothing might remain of him to pollute the earth.
A BISHOP INVITING HIS OLD MASTER (A.D. 1420).