of England sank rapidly before his superior talents. Richard I. was no hing more than a brave warrior, and unable to compete with the policy of his rival; his successor, John, was neither a soldier nor a statesman; he provoked the resentment of all his subjects, and while assailed in England by the discontented barons, and menaced abroad by the pope, he was deprived of most of his continental dominions by the watchful king of France. Philip's neighbors, and many of his vassals, were alarmed at the vast increase of his power after his conquest of the Norman provinces; they formed a league against him, but at the battle of Bouvines (A. D. 1214), he triumphed over the united forces of the Germans, the English, and the Flemings, and by this victory secured the possession of his acquisitions.

After the death of Nicholas (A. D. 1292), the papacy, as if exhausted by its own excesses, seemed to have fallen into a lethargy. The holy see remained vacant for two years and three months; an interval which the heads of the church might have improved to accommodate the ecclesiastical system to the improved state of intelligence, and the consequent changes in the wants and wishes of Europe But, in an evil hour, they had adopted the doctrine of infallibility, and believed themselves bound to keep their system stationary while everything around was in progress. In a former age the papacy had taken the lead in the advancement of intelligence; the clergy and the friars were the missionaries of knowledge; but the church had now fallen into the rear; kings, not pontiffs, were the patrons of learning; in the new contest between the spiritual and temporal powers, we shall find the latter conquering, because on their side were ranged all who took a share in the advancement of civilization. Intelligence, emancipated from the cloister, found a temporary abode in the palace, and finally spread even to the cottage; the popes became its enemies from the moment it quitted their protection, but they were necessarily vanquished in the struggle; one age beheld monarchs despise the deposing power, the next witnessed the pope's authority a mockery, and his very name a reproach in one half of Europe.

The vacancy in the papacy became the signal for civil wars in Rome, and throughout Italy; superstition attributed these calamities to the cardinals, who left the church without a head: an insane hermit stimulated the populace to menace them with death unless they proceeded to an election, and they chose a feeble, ignorant, old fanatic, who took the name of Celestine IV. Though destitute of any other qualification, Celestine had at least the pride of a pontiff-the bridle of the ass, on which, with blasphemous imitation, he made his public entry into Aquilla, was held by two kings, Charles II., the perjured sovereign of Naples, and his son Charles Martel, nominal king of Hungary. But the cardinals soon became weary of an idiot monk forced upon them by an insane hermit; Benedict Cajetan worked upon the weak mind of Celestine to resign a dignity which he was unable to maintain, and, having previously gained the suffrages of the college, ascended the throne under the name of Boniface VIII.* In its altered circumstances, the

* Almost the only thing memorable in the pontificate of Celestine, is the fabled miracle of the chapel of Loretto, which was said to have been transported by angels from Nazareth to the place where it now stands, that it should not be

papacy thus found a ruler who had fortitude and courage sufficient tc maintain its pretensions against the kings who had now begun to discover their rights; but the defeat of the pontiff added one to the many examples that history affords of the failure of antiquated pretensions when opposed to common sense and common honesty.

SECTION XIII.-Pontificate of Boniface VIII.

Most historians assert that Boniface had recourse to very treacherous artifices, in order to obtain the resignation of Celestine: however this may be, the abdicated pontiff was immediately shut up in a prison, lest his scruples, or his remorse, should trouble his successor. Boniface, to the ambition and despotic character of Gregory VII, added a more crafty manner, and more dissimulation, than had been recently seen in the chair of St. Peter. He aspired to universal sovereignty over ecclesiastics, princes, and nations; and he diligently sought out means for rendering them submissive to his laws. Aware that it would

be impossible to revive the crusading passion in Europe, he resolved to make the recovery of Palestine a pretext for interfering in the quarrels of sovereigns. He wrote to Philip the Fair, king of France, to Edward I. of England, and to Adolphus, emperor of Germany, commanding them, under pain of excommunication, to accommodate their differences; and he mediated a peace between the sovereigns of France and Aragon.

James, king of Aragon, anxious to conciliate the pope, resigned his pretensions to Sicily; but the islanders, detesting the house of Anjou, and despising the commands of a sovereign who had so weakly abandoned his rights, crowned Frederic, the brother of James, at Palermo, and expelled the papal legates. Excommunications were fulminated against the Sicilians, and the sovereign of their choice; even the feeble James was induced to arm against his brother, and aid in his expulsion from the island; and this violation of natural ties was rewarded by the cession of Sardinia and Corsica, over which the pope had not a shadow of right. But the ambition of Boniface was not limited to bestowing islands and Italian principalities; he resolved to establish his authority over the most powerful sovereigns of Europe.

Philip the Fair was one of the most able monarchs in Christendom, resolute in establishing his influence over the great vassals of the crown, he strengthened himself by the support of his people, and resolved that the nobles and the clergy should, henceforth, form classes of his subjects. Feudal anarchy disappeared, and equal jurisdiction was extended over all ranks; the lower classes were delivered from the most galling burdens of vassalage, and the despotism of the sovereign became a blessing to the nation. In the midst of his career he received an embassy from the pope, commanding him to spare a conquered vassal, to abstain from taxing the clergy, and to submit his disputes with the count of Flanders to the arbitration of the holy see. Philip spurned these demands, upon which the pope issued the celebrated bull, called, from the words with which it commences, Clericis polluted by the Saracens. This absurd story was long credited by the Romanists, but it is now derided even in Italy.

laos, excommunicating the kings who should levy ecclesiastical subsidies, and the priests who should pay them; and withdrawing the clergy from the jurisdiction of lay tribunals.

'T'his attempt to establish a theocracy, independent of monarchy excited general indignation. In England, Edward ordered his judges to admit no causes in which ecclesiastics were the complainants, but to try every suit brought against them, averring that those who refused to contribute to the support of the state, had no claim to the protection of the law. This expedient succeeded, and the English ecclesiastics hastened to pay their subsidies, without further compulsion. Philip the Fair exhibited even more vigor; he issued an edict prohibiting the export of gold, silver, jewels, provisions, or munitions of war, without a license; and he forbade foreign merchants to establish themselves in his dominions. Boniface, aware that these measures would destroy the revenue which the court of Rome derived from France, remonstrated in urgent terms, explained away the most offensive parts of his former bull, and offered several advantages to the king if he would modify his edicts. Philip allowed himself to be persuaded; the bull Clericis laicos was rendered less stringent: Louis IX. was canonized, and Philip could boast of having a saint for an ancestor; finally, the pope promised that he would support Charles of Valois, as a candidate for the empire. Dazzled by these boons, the French monarch accepted the arbitration of the pope, in his disputes with the king of England and the count of Flanders. But Boniface, to his astonishment, decided that Guienne should be restored to England, that all his former possessions should be given back to the count of Flanders, and that Philip himself should undertake a new crusade. When this unjust sentence was read in the presence of the French court, by the bishop of Durham, Edward's ambassador, the king listened to it with a smile of contempt; but the count of Artois enraged at such insolence, snatched the bull, tore it in pieces, and flung the fragments into the fire. This was the only answer returned: Philip, heedless of the pope's anger, renewed the war.

Boniface VIII. little dreamed that Philip's resistance would be so energetic, or of such dangerous example; but he prepared for the coming struggle, by securing his authority in Italy, and especially in Rome, where the papal power had been long controlled by the factious nobles. Immediately after his elevation to the pontificate, he had caused himself to be elected senator, but the Ghibellines rendered the dignity of such a magistrate very precarious; it was necessary to destroy them, and in this instance personal vengeance was united to the projects of ambition. The leaders of the Ghibelline faction at Rome were the illustrious family of the Colonna: two cardinals of that name had strenuously resisted the abdication of Celestine, and had long been marked out as victims. Under the pretext of their alliance with the kings of Sicily and Aragon, they were summoned to appear before the papal tribunal; but, justly dreading that their doom was predetermined, they fled to their castles, protesting against the sentence of him whom they denied to be a legitimate pope. Boniface hurled the most terrible anathemas against them, declaring them infamous, excommunicate, and incapable of any public charge, to the fourth generation: he devoted

them to the fires of the Inquisition, and preached a crusade for their de struction. Intimidated for a moment, the Colonnas submitted, and surrendered their town of Palestrina as a pledge of their fidelity. No sooner was Boniface master of this stronghold, than, regardless of his oaths, he levelled the fortress to the ground, forbade it to be rebuilt, renewed his persecutions against the Colonnas, and compelled them to fly from Italy. They sought shelter at the court of France, where they were hospitably received by Philip, who thus gave a signal proof of his independence and his generosity.

Boniface was alarmed, but not dismayed; he resolved to lull the king's vigilance by stimulating his ambition: for this purpose he proposed to dethrone Albert, emperor of Germany, and give the crown to Charles of Valois, whom he had already created imperial vicar, and captain-general of the holy church. Philip turned a deaf ear to this tempting proposal; he even entered into alliance with Albert, and cemented the union by giving his sister in marriage to the emperor's son, Rodolph, duke of Austria. Boniface was enraged at this disappointmen but his attention was diverted by the institution of a jubilee, to mark he commencement of a new century (A. D. 1300). He published a bull, promising full pardon and reinission of all sins to those who, being confessed and penitent, should visit the tombs of the apostles at Rome, during fifteen days. Multitudes of pilgrims, anxious to obtain the benefits of the crusades, without the perils of war, flocked to the city, and, by their liberal expenditure greatly enriched the Romans. This profitable contrivance was renewed by the successors of Boniface, at intervals of fifty years, and proved to be an efficacious means of recruiting the papal treasury.

Scarcely had the jubilee terminated, when the disputes between the pope and the king of France were revived, in consequence of the rival claims for supremacy, between the archbishop and the viscount of Narbonne. The king supported his vassal; the prelate appealed to the pope, and Boniface promptly responded to the call. A legate was sent to Philip, and the choice of an ambassador was almost a declaration of war. The pope's messenger was the bishop of Pamiers, a rebellious subject, whose treasons were notorious, and whose insolence to his sovereign excited general indignation. The seditious prelate was driven from the court; but the king, instead of bringing him to trial, complained to his metropolitan, the archbishop of Narbonne, and demanded justice. Boniface addressed an insolent bull to the king, summoved the French bishops to meet at Rome, to consult respecting the doom that should be pronounced on their sovereign, and invited Philip himself to be present at this unprecedented conclave. But the king, supported by the legists or professors of the law, a body rising rapidly into importance, defied the papal power, and appealed to the good sense of his people. Boniface had sent a bull, known in history by the name Ausculta fili,* to France, in which all the delinquencies of Philip, not only toward the church, but every class of his subjects, were portrayed with apparent moderation, but with great vigor and eloquence. Peter Flotte, the royal chancellor, presented an abridgment of this document to the great council of the nation, craftily culling out those passages in Listen, son," the words with which it commenced.

which the papal pretensions were most offensively put forward. This document, called "the little bull," was as follows:—

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Boniface, bishop, servant of the servants of God, to Philip, king of the Franks. Fear God and keep his commandments. We desire you to know that you are subject to us in temporal as well as in spiritual affairs; that the appointment to benefices and prebends belongs not to you; that if you have kept benefices vacant, the profits must be reserved for the legal successors; and if you have bestowed any benefice, we declare the appointment invalid, and revoke it if executed. Those who oppose this judgment shall be deemed heretics."

Philip ordered this declaration to be publicly burned, and he published a memorable reply, which, however, was probably never sent to Rome. It is a very remarkable proof of the decline of the papal power that such a manifesto should be issued, and presented to the states-general of France, as their monarch's answer to the supreme pontiff. The lette of the king is thus given by historians

Philip, by the grace of God, king of the French, to Boniface, claiming to be pope, little or no greeting. May it please your sublime stupidity to learn, that we are subject to no person in temporal affairs; that the bestowing of fiefs and benefices belongs to us by right of our crown; that the disposal of the revenues of vacant sees, is part of our prerogative; that our decrees, in this respect, are valid, both for the past and for the future; and that we will support, with all our might, those on whom we have bestowed, or shall bestow, benefices. Those who oppose this judgment shall be deemed fools or idiots."

The manifestos sent to Rome by the three orders of the state s-general, the nobles, the clergy, and the commons, are of greater importance to the historian than "the little bull" or the royal reply. That of the French barons was addressed to the college of cardinals; it openly accused the pope of having periled the unity of the church by his extravagant ambition, and it denied, in the strongest terms, his right to appellate jurisdiction over the kingdom of France. The clergy addressed Boniface himself in a measured and respectful tone, but they declared that they had taken a new oath to their sovereign, that they would firmly maintain the independence of his crown. The declaration of the ommons has not been preserved, but like that of the nobles, it appears to have been addressed to the college of cardinals. The court of Rome was alarmed, letters of explanation were sent to the different orders, but the pope declared he would not write to the king, whom he considered subject to the sentence of excommunication,

While Boniface VIII. was thus engaged with France and its ruler, he did not lose sight of his pretensions over other kingdoms. Edward of England, having overcome the feudal turbulence of his vassals, was about to undertake the conquest of Scotland, when the holy see forbade the enterprise. Edward in reply traced his right to Scotland, up to the age of the prophet Samuel, and a synod of the English clergy declared, that the claims of their sovereign were better founded than those of the pontiff. A legate, by command of Boniface, labored to pacify Hungary, which was divided between the grandson of Charles the Lame, king of Naples, and Andrew the Venetian. On the death of the latter prince, the Hungarian barons, fearing the loss of their liberties urxler a king