Part 16 (2/2)

[Sidenote: Inadequacy of civil government in the Middle Ages.]

[Sidenote: The Church claims the right to interfere only when necessary.]

These are not the insolent claims of a reckless tyrant, but the expression of a theory of government which has had advocates among some of the most conscientious and learned men of all succeeding ages. Before venturing to criticise Gregory's view of his position we should recollect two important facts. In the first place, what most writers call the _state_, when dealing with the Middle Ages, was no orderly government in our sense of the word; it was represented only by restless feudal lords, to whom disorder was the very breath of life. When, on one occasion, Gregory declared the civil power to be the invention of evil men instigated by the devil, he was making a natural inference from what he observed of the conduct of the princes of his time. In the second place, it should be remembered that Gregory does not claim that the Church should manage the civil government, but that the papacy, which is answerable for the eternal welfare of every Christian, should have the right to restrain a sinful and perverse prince and to refuse to recognize unrighteous laws. Should all else fail, he claimed the right to free a nation which was being led to disaster in this world and to perdition in the next from its allegiance to a wicked monarch.

[Sidenote: Gregory VII puts his theories of the papal power into practice.]

Immediately upon his election as pope, Gregory began to put into practice his high conception of the role that the spiritual head of the world should play. He dispatched legates throughout Europe, and from this time on these legates became a powerful instrument of government.

He warned the kings of France and England and the youthful German ruler, Henry IV, to forsake their evil ways, to be upright and just, and obey his admonitions. He explains, kindly but firmly, to William the Conqueror that the papal and kingly powers are both established by G.o.d as the greatest among the authorities of the world, just as the sun and moon are the greatest of the heavenly bodies.[110] But the papal power is obviously superior to the kingly, for it is responsible for it; at the Last Day Gregory must render an account of the king as one of the flock intrusted to his care. The king of France was warned to give up his practice of simony, lest he be excommunicated and his subjects freed from their oath of allegiance. All these acts of Gregory appear to have been dictated not by worldly ambition but by a fervent conviction of their righteousness and of his duty toward all men.

[Sidenote: Death of Henry III, 1056.]

64. Obviously Gregory's plan of reform included all the states of western Europe, but conditions were such that the most striking conflict took place between him and the emperor. The trouble came about in this way. Henry III had died in 1056, leaving only his good wife Agnes and their little son of six years to maintain the hard-fought prerogatives of the German king in the midst of ambitious va.s.sals such as even Otto the Great had found it difficulty to control.

[Sidenote: Accession of Henry IV, 1065.]

In 1065 the fifteen-year-old lad was declared of age, and his lifelong difficulties began with a great rebellion of the Saxons. They accused the young king of having built castles in their land and of filling them with rough soldiers who preyed upon the people. Gregory felt it his duty to interfere. To him the Saxons appeared a people oppressed by a heedless youth under the inspiration of evil counselors.

As one reads of Henry's difficulties and misfortunes it seems miraculous that he was able to maintain himself as king at all. Sick at heart, unable to trust any one, and forced to flee from his own subjects, he writes contritely to the pope: ”We have sinned against heaven and before thee and are no longer worthy to be called thy son.” But when cheered for a moment by a victory over the rebellious Saxons, he easily forgot his promise of obedience to the pope. He continued to a.s.sociate with counselors whom the pope had excommunicated and went on filling important bishoprics in Germany and Italy regardless of the pope's prohibitions.

[Sidenote: New prohibition of lay invest.i.ture.]

The popes who immediately preceded Gregory had more than once forbidden the churchmen to receive invest.i.ture from laymen. Gregory reissued this prohibition in 1075,[111] just as the trouble with Henry had begun.

Invest.i.ture was, as we have seen, the legal transfer by the king, or other lord, to a newly chosen church official, of the lands and rights attached to the office. In forbidding lay invest.i.ture Gregory attempted nothing less than a revolution. The bishops and abbots were often officers of government, exercising in Germany and Italy powers similar in all respects to those of the counts. The king not only relied upon them for advice and a.s.sistance in carrying on his government, but they were among his chief allies in his constant struggles with his va.s.sals.

[Sidenote: Henry IV angered by the language of the papal legates.]

Gregory dispatched three envoys to Henry (end of 1075) with a fatherly letter[112] in which he reproached the king for his wicked conduct. But he evidently had little expectation that mere expostulation would have any effect upon Henry, for he gave his legates instructions to use threats, if necessary, which were bound to produce either complete subjection or out-and-out revolt. The legates were to tell the king that his crimes were so numerous, so horrible, and so notorious, that he merited not only excommunication but the permanent loss of all his royal honors.

[Sidenote: Gregory VII deposed by a council of German bishops at Worms, 1076]

The violence of the legates' language not only kindled the wrath of the king but also gained for him friends among the bishops. A council which Henry summoned at Worms (in 1076) was attended by more than two thirds of the German bishops. Here Gregory was declared deposed owing to the alleged irregularity of his election and the many terrible charges of immorality and ambition brought against him. The bishops renounced their obedience to him and publicly declared that he had ceased to be their pope. It appears very surprising, at first sight, that the king should have received the prompt support of the German churchmen against the head of the Church. But it must be remembered that the prelates owed their offices to the king and not to the pope.

In a remarkable letter[113] to Gregory, Henry a.s.serts that he has shown himself long-suffering and eager to guard the honor of the papacy, but that the pope has mistaken his humility for fear. ”Thou hast not hesitated,” the letter concludes, ”to rise up against the royal power conferred upon us by G.o.d, daring to threaten to deprive us of it, as if we had received our kingdom from thee. As if the kingdom and the Empire were in thine and not in G.o.d's hands.... I, Henry, King by the grace of G.o.d, together with all our bishops, say unto thee, come down, come down from thy throne and be accursed of all generations.”

[Sidenote: Henry IV deposed and excommunicated by the pope.]

Gregory's reply to Henry and the German bishops who had deposed him was speedy and decisive. ”Incline thine ear to us, O Peter, chief of the Apostles. As thy representative and by thy favor has the power been granted especially to me by G.o.d of binding and loosing in heaven and earth. On the strength of this, for the honor and glory of thy Church, in the name of Almighty G.o.d, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, I withdraw, through thy power and authority, from Henry the King, son of Henry the Emperor, who has risen against thy Church with unheard-of insolence, the rule over the whole kingdom of the Germans and over Italy. I absolve all Christians from the bonds of the oath which they have sworn, or may swear, to him; and I forbid anyone to serve him as king.” For his intercourse with the excommunicated and his manifold iniquities, the king is furthermore declared accursed and excommunicate.[114]

[Sidenote: Att.i.tude of the German princes.]

For a time after the pope had deposed him everything went against Henry.

Even the churchmen now held off. Instead of resenting the pope's interference, the discontented Saxons, and many other of Henry's va.s.sals, believed that there was now an excellent opportunity to get rid of Henry and choose a more agreeable ruler. But after a long conference the great German va.s.sals decided to give Henry another chance. He was to refrain from exercising the functions of government until he had made peace with the pope. If at the end of a year he had failed to do this, he was to be regarded as having forfeited the throne. The pope was, moreover, invited to come to Augsburg to consult with the princes as to whether Henry should be reinstated or another chosen in his stead. It looked as if the pope was, in truth, to control the civil government.

[Sidenote: Henry submits to the pope at Canossa, 1077.]

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