Chapter 13

See Caesar,Bell. Civ.i. 15-23, iii. 102; Plutarch,Pomp.49; Valerius Maximus ix. 14, 4; many letters of Cicero, especiallyAd Fam.i. 1-9.

Lucius Cornelius Lentulus, surnamedCrusorCruscello(for what reason is unknown), member of the anti-Caesarian party. In 61B.C.he was the chief accuser of P. Clodius (q.v.) in the affair of the festival of Bona Dea. When consul (49) he advised the rejection of all peace terms offered by Caesar, and declared that, if the senate did not at once decide upon opposing him by force of arms, he would act upon his own responsibility. There seems no reason to doubt that Lentulus was mainly inspired by selfish motives, and hoped to find in civil war an opportunity for his own aggrandizement. But in spite of his brave words he fled in haste from Rome as soon as he heard of Caesar’s advance, and crossed over to Greece. After Pharsalus, he made his way to Rhodes (but was refused admission), thence, by way of Cyprus, to Egypt. He landed at Pelusium the day after the murder of Pompey, was immediately seized by Ptolemy, imprisoned, and put to death.

See Caesar,Bell. Civ.i. 4, iii. 104; Plutarch,Pompey, 80.A full account of the different Cornelii Lentuli, with genealogical table, will be found in Pauly-Wissowa’sRealencyclopädie, iv. pt. 1, p. 1355 (1900) (s.v. “Cornelius”); see also V. de Vit,Onomasticon, ii. 433.

See Caesar,Bell. Civ.i. 4, iii. 104; Plutarch,Pompey, 80.

A full account of the different Cornelii Lentuli, with genealogical table, will be found in Pauly-Wissowa’sRealencyclopädie, iv. pt. 1, p. 1355 (1900) (s.v. “Cornelius”); see also V. de Vit,Onomasticon, ii. 433.

LENZ, JAKOB MICHAEL REINHOLD(1751-1792), German poet, was born at Sesswegen in Livonia, the son of the village pastor, on the 12th of January 1751. He removed with his parents to Dorpat in 1759, and soon began to compose sacred odes, in the manner of Klopstock. In 1768 he entered the university of Königsberg as a student of theology, and in 1771 accompanied, as tutor, two young German nobles, named von Kleist, to Strassburg, where they were to enter the French army. In Strassburg Lenz was received into the literary circle that gathered round Friedrich Rudolf Salzmann (1749-1821) and became acquainted with Goethe, at that time a student at the university. In order to be close to his young pupils, Lenz had to remove to Fort Louis in the neighbourhood, and while here became deeply enamoured of Goethe’s friend, Friederike Elisabeth Brion (1752-1813), daughter of the pastor of Sesenheim. Lenz endeavoured, after Goethe’s departure from Strassburg, to replace the great poet in her affections, and to her he poured out songs and poems (Die Liebe auf dem Lande) which were long attributed to Goethe himself, as was also Lenz’s first drama, the comedy,Der Hofmeister, oder Vorteile der Privaterziehung(1774). In 1776 he visited Weimar and was most kindly received by the duke; but his rude, overbearing manner and vicious habits led to his expulsion. In 1777 he became insane, and in 1779 was removed from Emmendingen, where J. G. Schlosser (1739-1799), Goethe’s brother-in-law, had given him a home, to his native village. Here he lived in great poverty for several years, and then was given, more out of charity than on account of his merits, the appointment of tutor in a pension school near Moscow, where he died on the 24th of May 1792. Lenz, though one of the most talented poets of theSturm und Drangperiod, presented a strange medley of genius and childishness. His great, though neglected and distorted, abilities found vent in ill-conceived imitations of Shakespeare. His comedies,Der Hofmeister;Der neue Menoza(1774);Die Soldaten(1776);Die Freunde machen den Philosophen(1776), though accounted the best of his works, are characterized by unnatural situations and an incongruous mixture of tragedy and comedy.

Lenz’sGesammelte Schriftenwere published by L. Tieck in three volumes (1828); supplementary to these volumes are E. Dorer-Egloff,J. M. R. Lenz und seine Schriften(1857) and K. Weinhold,Dramatischer Nachlass von J. M. R. Lenz(1884); a selection of Lenz’s writings will be found in A. Sauer,Stürmer und Dränger, ii.; Kürschner’sDeutsche Nationalliteratur, vol. lxxx., (1883). See further E. Schmidt,Lenz und Klinger(1878); J. Froitzheim,Lenz und Goethe(1891); H. Rauch,Lenz und Shakespeare(1892); F. Waldmann,Lenz in Briefen(1894).

LEO,the name of thirteen popes.

Leo I., who alone of Roman pontiffs shares with Gregory I. the surname ofthe Great, pope from 440 to 461, was a native of Rome, or, according to a less probable account, of Volterra in Tuscany. Of his family or early life nothing is known; that he was highly cultivated according to the standards of his time is obvious, but it does not appear that he could write Greek, or even that he understood that language. In one of the letters (Ep.104) of Augustine, an acolyte named Leo is mentioned as having been in 418 the bearer of a communication from Sixtus of Rome (afterwards pope) to Aurelius of Carthage against the Pelagians. In 429, when the first unmistakable reference to Pope Leo occurs, he was still only a deacon, but already a man of commanding influence; it was at his suggestion that theDe incarnationeof the aged Cassianus, having reference to the Nestorian heresy, was composed in that year, and about 431 we find Cyril of Alexandria writing to him that he might prevent the Roman Church from lending its support in any way to the ambitious schemes of Juvenal of Jerusalem. In 440, while Leo was in Gaul, whither he had been sent to compose some differences between Aetius and another general named Albinus, Pope Sixtus III. died. The absent deacon, or rather archdeacon, was unanimously chosen to succeed him, and received consecration on his return six weeks afterwards (September 29). In 443 he began to take measures against the Manichaeans (who since the capture of Carthage by Genseric in 439 had become very numerous at Rome), and in the following year he was able to report to the Italian bishops that some of the heretics had returned to Catholicism, while a large number had been sentenced to perpetual banishment “in accordance with the constitutions of the Christian emperors,” and others had fled; in seeking these out the help of the provincial clergy was sought. It was during the earlier years of Leo’s pontificate that the events in Gaul occurred which resulted in this triumph over Hilarius of Arles, signalized by the edict of Valentinian III.(445), denouncing the contumacy of the Gallic bishop, and enacting “that nothing should be done in Gaul, contrary to ancient usage, without the authority of the bishop of Rome, and that the decree of the apostolic see should henceforth be law.” In 447 Leo held the correspondence with Turribus of Astorga which led to the condemnation of the Priscillianists by the Spanish national church. In 448 he received with commendation a letter from Eutyches, the Constantinopolitan monk, complaining of the revival of the Nestorian heresy there; and in the following year Eutyches wrote his circular, appealing against the sentence which at the instance of Eusebius of Dorylaeum had been passed against him at a synod held in Constantinople under the presidency of the patriarch Flavian, and asking papal support at the oecumenical council at that time under summons to meet at Ephesus. The result of a correspondence was that Leo by his legates sent to Flavian that famous epistle in which he sets forth with great fulness of detail the doctrine ever since recognized as orthodox regarding the union of the two natures in the one person of Jesus Christ. The events at the “robber” synod at Ephesus belong to general church history rather than to the biography of Leo; his letter, though submitted, was not read by the assembled fathers, and the papal legates had some difficulty in escaping with their lives from the violence of the theologians who, not content with deposing Flavian and Eusebius, shouted for the dividing of those who divided Christ. When the news of the result of this oecumenical council (oecumenical in every circumstance except that it was not presided over by the pope) reached Rome, Leo wrote to Theodosius “with groanings and tears,” requesting the emperor to sanction another council, to be held this time, however, in Italy. In this petition he was supported by Valentinian III., by the empress-mother Galla Placidia and by the empress Eudoxia, but the appeal was made in vain. A change, however, was brought about by the accession in the following year of Marcian, who three days after coming to the throne published an edict bringing within the scope of the penal laws against heretics the supporters of the dogmas of Apollinaris and Eutyches. To convoke a synod in which greater orthodoxy might reasonably be expected was in these circumstances no longer difficult, but all Leo’s efforts to secure that the meeting should take place on Italian soil were unavailing. When the synod of Chalcedon assembled in 451, the papal legates were treated with great respect, and Leo’s former letter to Flavian was adopted by acclamation as formulating the creed of the universal church on the subject of the person of Christ. Among the reasons urged by Leo for holding this council in Italy had been the threatening attitude of the Huns; the dreaded irruption took place in the following year (452). After Aquileia had succumbed to Attila’s long siege, the conqueror set out for Rome. Near the confluence of the Mincio and the Po he was met by Leo, whose eloquence persuaded him to turn back. Legend has sought to enhance the impressiveness of the occurrence by an unnecessarily imagined miracle. The pope was less successful with Genseric when the Vandal chief arrived under the walls of Rome in 455, but he secured a promise that there should be no incendiarism or murder, and that three of the oldest basilicas should be exempt from plunder—a promise which seems to have been faithfully observed. Leo died on the 10th of November 461, the liturgical anniversary being the 11th of April. His successor was Hilarius or Hilarus, who had been one of the papal legates at the “robber” synod in 449.

The title ofdoctor ecclesiaewas given to Leo by Benedict XIV. As bishop of the diocese of Rome, Leo distinguished himself above all his predecessors by his preaching, to which he devoted himself with great zeal and success. From his short and pithySermonesmany of the lessons now to be found in the Roman breviary have been taken. Viewed in conjunction with his voluminous correspondence, the sermons sufficiently explain the secret of his greatness, which chiefly lay in the extraordinary strength and purity of his convictions as to the primacy of the successors of St Peter at a time when the civil and ecclesiastical troubles of the civilized world made men willing enough to submit themselves to any authority whatsoever that could establish its right to exist by courage, honesty and knowledge of affairs.

The works of Leo I. were first collectively edited by Quesnel (Lyons, 1700), and again, on the basis of this, in what is now the standard edition by Ballerini (Venice, 1753-1756). Ninety-three Sermones and one hundred and seventy-threeEpistolaeoccupy the first volume; the second contains theLiber Sacramentorum, usually attributed to Leo, and theDe Vocatione Omnium Gentium, also ascribed, by Quesnel and others, to him, but more probably the production of a certain Prosper, of whom nothing further is known. The works of Hilary of Arles are appended.

Leo II., pope from August 682 to July 683, was a Sicilian by birth, and succeeded Agatho I. Agatho had been represented at the sixth oecumenical council (that of Constantinople in 681), where Pope Honorius I. was anathematized for his views in the Monothelite controversy as a favourer of heresy, and the only fact of permanent historical interest with regard to Leo is that he wrote once and again in approbation of the decision of the council and in condemnation of Honorius, whom he regarded as one whoprofana proditione immaculatam fidem subvertere conatus est. In their bearing upon the question of papal infallibility these words have excited considerable attention and controversy, and prominence is given to the circumstance that in the Greek text of the letter to the emperor in which the phrase occurs the milder expressionπαρεχώρησεν(subverti permisit) is used for subvertere conatus est. This Hefele in hisConciliengeschichte(iii. 294) regards as alone expressing the true meaning of Leo. It was during Leo’s pontificate that the dependence of the see of Ravenna upon that of Rome was finally settled by imperial edict. Benedict II. succeeded him.

Leo III., whose pontificate (795-816) covered the last eighteen years of the reign of Charlemagne, was a native of Rome, and having been chosen successor of Adrian I. on the 26th of December 795, was consecrated to the office on the following day. His first act was to send to Charles as patrician the standard of Rome along with the keys of the sepulchre of St Peter and of the city; a gracious and condescending letter in reply made it still more clear where all real power at that moment lay. For more than three years his term of office was uneventful; but at the end of that period the feelings of disappointment which had secretly been rankling in the breasts of Paschalis and Campulus, nephews of Adrian I., who had received from him the offices ofprimiceriusandsacellariusrespectively, suddenly manifested themselves in an organized attack upon Leo as he was riding in procession through the city on the day of the Greater Litany (25th April 799); the object of his assailants was, by depriving him of his eyes and tongue, to disqualify him for the papal office, and, although they were unsuccessful in this attempt, he found it necessary to accept the protection of Winegis, the Frankish duke of Spoleto, who came to the rescue. Having vainly requested the presence of Charles in Rome, Leo went beyond the Alps to meet the king at Paderborn; he was received with much ceremony and respect, but his enemies having sent in serious written charges, of which the character is not now known, Charles decided to appoint both the pope and his accusers to appear as parties before him when he should have arrived in Rome. Leo returned in great state to his diocese, and was received with honour; Charles, who did not arrive until November in the following year, lost no time in assuming the office of a judge, and the result of his investigation was the acquittal of the pope, who at the same time, however, was permitted or rather required to clear himself by the oath of compurgation. The coronation of the emperor followed two days afterwards; its effect was to bring out with increased clearness the personally subordinate position of Leo. The decision of the emperor, however, secured for Leo’s pontificate an external peace which was only broken after the accession of Louis the Pious. His enemies began to renew their attacks; the violent repression of a conspiracy led to an open rebellion at Rome; serious charges were once more brought against him, when he was overtaken by death in 816. It was under this pontificate that Felix of Urgel, the adoptianist, was anathematized (798) by aRoman synod. Leo at another synod held in Rome in 810 admitted the dogmatic correctness of thefilioque, but deprecated its introduction into the creed. On this point, however, the Frankish Church persevered in the course it had already initiated. Leo’s successor was Stephen IV.

Leo IV., pope from 847 to 855, was a Roman by birth, and succeeded Sergius II. His pontificate was chiefly distinguished by his efforts to repair the damage done by the Saracens during the reign of his predecessor to various churches of the city, especially those of St Peter and St Paul. It was he who built and fortified the suburb on the right bank of the Tiber still known as the Civitas Leonina. A frightful conflagration, which he is said to have extinguished by his prayers, is the subject of Raphael’s great work in the Sala dell’ Incendio of the Vatican. He held three synods, one of them (in 850) distinguished by the presence of Louis II., who was crowned emperor on the occasion, but none of them otherwise of importance. The history of the papal struggle with Hincmar of Reims, which began during Leo’s pontificate, belongs rather to that of Nicholas I. Benedict III. was Leo’s immediate successor.

Leo V., a native of Ardea, was pope for two months in 903 after the death of Benedict IV. He was overthrown and cast into prison by the priest Christopher, who installed himself in his place.

Leo VI.succeeded John X. in 928, and reigned seven months and a few days. He was succeeded by Stephen VIII.

Leo VII., pope from 936 to 939, was preceded by John XI., and followed by Stephen IX.

Leo VIII., pope from 963 to 965, a Roman by birth, held the lay office ofprotoscriniuswhen he was elected to the papal chair at the instance of Otto the Great by the Roman synod which deposed John XII. in December 963. Having been hurried with unseemly haste through all the intermediate orders, he received consecration two days after his election, which was unacceptable to the people. In February 964, the emperor having withdrawn from the city, Leo found it necessary to seek safety in flight, whereupon he was deposed by a synod held under the presidency of John XII. On the sudden death of the latter, the populace chose Benedict V. as his successor; but Otto, returning and laying siege to the city, compelled their acceptance of Leo. It is usually said that, at the synod which deposed Benedict, Leo conceded to the emperor and his successors as sovereign of Italy full rights of investiture, but the genuineness of the document on which this allegation rests is more than doubtful. Leo VIII. was succeeded by John XIII.

Leo IX., pope from 1049 to 1054, was a native of Upper Alsace, where he was born on the 21st of June 1002. His proper name was Bruno; the family to which he belonged was of noble rank, and through his father he was related to the emperor Conrad II. He was educated at Toul, where he successively became canon and (1026) bishop; in the latter capacity he rendered important political services to his relative Conrad II., and afterwards to Henry III., and at the same time he became widely known as an earnest and reforming ecclesiastic by the zeal he showed in spreading the rule of the order of Cluny. On the death of Damasus II., Bruno was in December 1048, with the concurrence both of the emperor and of the Roman delegates, selected his successor by an assembly at Worms; he stipulated, however, as a condition of his acceptance that he should first proceed to Rome and be canonically elected by the voice of clergy and people. Setting out shortly after Christmas, he had a meeting with abbot Hugo of Cluny at Besançon, where he was joined by the young monk Hildebrand, who afterwards became Pope Gregory VII.; arriving in pilgrim garb at Rome in the following February, he was received with much cordiality, and at his consecration assumed the name of Leo IX. One of his first public acts was to hold the well-known Easter synod of 1049, at which celibacy of the clergy (down to the rank of subdeacon) was anew enjoined, and where he at least succeeded in making clear his own convictions against every kind of simony. The greater part of the year that followed was occupied in one of those progresses through Italy, Germany and France which form a marked feature in Leo’s pontificate. After presiding over a synod at Pavia, he joined the emperor Henry III. in Saxony, and accompanied him to Cologne and Aix-la-Chapelle; to Reims he also summoned a meeting of the higher clergy, by which several important reforming decrees were passed. At Mainz also he held a council, at which the Italian and French as well as the German clergy were represented, and ambassadors of the Greek emperor were present; here too simony and the marriage of the clergy were the principal matters dealt with. After his return to Rome he held (29th April 1050) another Easter synod, which was occupied largely with the controversy about the teachings of Berengarius of Tours; in the same year he presided over provincial synods at Salerno, Siponto and Vercelli, and in September revisited Germany, returning to Rome in time for a third Easter synod, at which the question of the reordination of those who had been ordained by simonists was considered. In 1052 he joined the emperor at Pressburg, and vainly sought to secure the submission of the Hungarians; and at Regensburg, Bamberg and Worms the papal presence was marked by various ecclesiastical solemnities. After a fourth Easter synod in 1053 Leo set out against the Normans in the south with an army of Italians and German volunteers, but his forces sustained a total defeat at Astagnum near Civitella (18th June 1053); on going out, however, from the city to meet the enemy he was received with every token of submission, relief from the pressure of his ban was implored and fidelity and homage were sworn. From June 1053 to March 1054 he was nevertheless detained at Benevento in honourable captivity; he did not long survive his return to Rome, where he died on the 19th of April 1054. He was succeeded by Victor II.

Leo X.[Giovanni de’ Medici] (1475-1521), pope from the 11th of March 1513 to the 1st of December 1521, was the second son of Lorenzo de’ Medici, called the Magnificent, and was born at Florence on the 11th of December 1475. Destined from his birth for the church, he received the tonsure at the age of seven and was soon loaded with rich benefices and preferments. His father prevailed on Innocent VIII. to name him cardinal-deacon of Sta Maria in Dominica in March 1489, although he was not allowed to wear the insignia or share in the deliberations of the college until three years later. Meanwhile he received a careful education at Lorenzo’s brilliant humanistic court under such men as Angelo Poliziano, the classical scholar, Pico della Mirandola, the philosopher and theologian, the pious Marsilio Ficino who endeavoured to unite the Platonic cult with Christianity and the poet Bernardo Dovizio Bibbiena. From 1489 to 1491 he studied theology and canon law at Pisa under Filippo Decio and Bartolomeo Sozzini. On the 23rd of March 1492 he was formally admitted into the sacred college and took up his residence at Rome, receiving a letter of advice from his father which ranks among the wisest of its kind. The death of Lorenzo on the 8th of April, however, called the seventeen-year-old cardinal to Florence. He participated in the conclave which followed the death of Innocent VIII. in July 1492 and opposed the election of Cardinal Borgia. He made his home with his elder brother Piero at Florence throughout the agitation of Savonarola and the invasion of Charles VIII. of France, until the uprising of the Florentines and the expulsion of the Medici in November 1494. While Piero found refuge at Venice and Urbino, Cardinal Giovanni travelled in Germany, in the Netherlands and in France. In May 1500 he returned to Rome, where he was received with outward cordiality by Alexander VI., and where he lived for several years immersed in art and literature. In 1503 he welcomed the accession of Julius II. to the pontificate; the death of Piero de’ Medici in the same year made Giovanni head of his family. On the 1st of October 1511 he was appointed papal legate of Bologna and the Romagna, and when the Florentine republic declared in favour of the schismatic Pisans Julius II. sent him against his native city at the head of the papal army. This and other attempts to regain political control of Florence were frustrated, until a bloodless revolution permitted the return of the Medici on the 14th of September 1512. Giovanni’s younger brother Giuliano was placed at the head of the republic, but the cardinal actuallymanaged the government. Julius II. died in February 1513, and the conclave, after a stormy seven day’s session, united on Cardinal de’ Medici as the candidate of the younger cardinals. He was ordained to the priesthood on the 15th of March, consecrated bishop on the 17th, and enthroned with the name of Leo X. on the 19th. There is no evidence of simony in the conclave, and Leo’s election was hailed with delight by the Romans on account of his reputation for liberality, kindliness and love of peace. Following the example of many of his predecessors, he promptly repudiated his election “capitulation” as an infringement on the divinely bestowed prerogatives of the Holy See.

Many problems confronted Leo X. on his accession. He must preserve the papal conquests which he had inherited from Alexander VI. and Julius II. He must minimize foreign influence, whether French, Spanish or German, in Italy. He must put an end to the Pisan schism and settle the other troubles incident to the French invasion. He must restore the French Church to Catholic unity, abolish the pragmatic sanction of Bourges, and bring to a successful close the Lateran council convoked by his predecessor. He must stay the victorious advance of the Turks. He must quiet the disagreeable wranglings of the German humanists. Other problems connected with his family interests served to complicate the situation and eventually to prevent the successful consummation of many of his plans. At the very time of Leo’s accession Louis XII. of France, in alliance with Venice, was making a determined effort to regain the duchy of Milan, and the pope, after fruitless endeavours to maintain peace, joined the league of Mechlin on the 5th of April 1513 with the emperor Maximilian I., Ferdinand I. of Spain and Henry VIII. of England. The French and Venetians were at first successful, but on the 6th of June met overwhelming defeat at Novara. The Venetians continued the struggle until October. On the 19th of December the fifth Lateran council, which had been reopened by Leo in April, ratified the peace with Louis XII. and registered the conclusion of the Pisan schism. While the council was engaged in planning a crusade and in considering the reform of the clergy, a new crisis occurred between the pope and the king of France. Francis I., who succeeded Louis XII. on the 1st of January 1515, was an enthusiastic young prince, dominated by the ambition of recovering Milan and Naples. Leo at once formed a new league with the emperor and the king of Spain, and to ensure English support made Wolsey a cardinal. Francis entered Italy in August and on the 14th of September won the battle of Marignano. The pope in October signed an agreement binding him to withdraw his troops from Parma and Piacenza, which had been previously gained at the expense of the duchy of Milan, on condition of French protection at Rome and Florence. The king of Spain wrote to his ambassador at Rome “that His Holiness had hitherto played a double game and that all his zeal to drive the French from Italy had been only a mask”; this reproach seemed to receive some confirmation when Leo X. held a secret conference with Francis at Bologna in December 1515. The ostensible subjects under consideration were the establishment of peace between France, Venice and the Empire, with a view to an expedition against the Turks, and the ecclesiastical affairs of France. Precisely what was arranged is unknown. During these two or three years of incessant political intrigue and warfare it was not to be expected that the Lateran council should accomplish much. Its three main objects, the peace of Christendom, the crusade and the reform of the church, could be secured only by general agreement among the powers, and Leo or the council failed to secure such agreement. Its most important achievements were the registration at its eleventh sitting (19th December 1516) of the abolition of the pragmatic sanction, which the popes since Pius II. had unanimously condemned, and the confirmation of the concordat between Leo X. and Francis I., which was destined to regulate the relations between the French Church and the Holy See until the Revolution. Leo closed the council on the 16th of March 1517. It had ended the schism, ratified the censorship of books introduced by Alexander VI. and imposed tithes for a war against the Turks. It raised no voice against the primacy of the pope.

The year which marked the close of the Lateran council was also signalized by Leo’s unholy war against the duke of Urbino. The pope was naturally proud of his family and had practised nepotism from the outset. His cousin Giulio, who subsequently became Clement VII., he had made the most influential man in the curia, naming him archbishop of Florence, cardinal and vice-chancellor of the Holy See. Leo had intended his younger brother Giuliano and his nephew Lorenzo for brilliant secular careers. He had named them Roman patricians; the latter he had placed in charge of Florence; the former, for whom he planned to carve out a kingdom in central Italy of Parma, Piacenza, Ferrara and Urbino, he had taken with himself to Rome and married to Filiberta of Savoy. The death of Giuliano in March 1516, however, caused the pope to transfer his ambitions to Lorenzo. At the very time (December 1516) that peace between France, Spain, Venice and the Empire seemed to give some promise of a Christendom united against the Turk, Leo was preparing an enterprise as unscrupulous as any of the similar exploits of Cesare Borgia. He obtained 150,000 ducats towards the expenses of the expedition from Henry VIII. of England, in return for which he entered the imperial league of Spain and England against France. The war lasted from February to September 1517 and ended with the expulsion of the duke and the triumph of Lorenzo; but it revived the nefarious policy of Alexander VI., increased brigandage and anarchy in the States of the Church, hindered the preparations for a crusade and wrecked the papal finances. Guicciardini reckoned the cost of the war to Leo at the prodigious sum of 800,000 ducats. The new duke of Urbino was the Lorenzo de’ Medici to whom Machiavelli addressedThe Prince. His marriage in March 1518 was arranged by the pope with Madeleine la Tour d’Auvergne, a royal princess of France, whose daughter was the Catherine de’ Medici celebrated in French history. The war of Urbino was further marked by a crisis in the relations between pope and cardinals. The sacred college had grown especially worldly and troublesome since the time of Sixtus IV., and Leo took advantage of a plot of several of its members to poison him, not only to inflict exemplary punishments by executing one and imprisoning several others, but also to make a radical change in the college. On the 3rd of July 1517 he published the names of thirty-one new cardinals, a number almost unprecedented in the history of the papacy. Some of the nominations were excellent, such as Lorenzo Campeggio, Giambattista Pallavicini, Adrian of Utrecht, Cajetan, Cristoforo Numai and Egidio Canisio. The naming of seven members of prominent Roman families, however, reversed the wise policy of his predecessor which had kept the dangerous factions of the city out of the curia. Other promotions were for political or family considerations or to secure money for the war against Urbino. The pope was accused of having exaggerated the conspiracy of the cardinals for purposes of financial gain, but most of such accusations appear to be unsubstantiated.

Leo, meanwhile, felt the need of staying the advance of the warlike sultan, Selim I., who was threatening western Europe, and made elaborate plans for a crusade. A truce was to be proclaimed throughout Christendom; the pope was to be the arbiter of disputes; the emperor and the king of France were to lead the army; England, Spain and Portugal were to furnish the fleet; and the combined forces were to be directed against Constantinople. Papal diplomacy in the interests of peace failed, however; Cardinal Wolsey made England, not the pope, the arbiter between France and the Empire; and much of the money collected for the crusade from tithes and indulgences was spent in other ways. In 1519 Hungary concluded a three years’ truce with Selim I., but the succeeding sultan, Suliman the Magnificent, renewed the war in June 1521 and on the 28th of August captured the citadel of Belgrade. The pope was greatly alarmed, and although he was then involved in war with France he sent about 30,000 ducats to the Hungarians. Leo treated the Uniate Greeks with great loyalty, and by bull of the 18th of May 1521 forbade Latin clergy to celebrate mass in Greek churches and Latin bishops to ordain Greek clergy.These provisions were later strengthened by Clement VII. and Paul III. and went far to settle the chronic disputes between the Latins and Uniate Greeks.

Leo was disturbed throughout his pontificate by heresy and schism. The dispute between Reuchlin and Pfefferkorn relative to the Talmud and other Jewish books was referred to the pope in September 1513. He in turn referred it to the bishops of Spires and Worms, who gave decision in March 1514 in favour of Reuchlin. After the appeal of the inquisitor-general, Hochstraten, and the appearance of theEpistolae obscurorum virorum, however, Leo annulled the decision (June 1520) and imposed silence on Reuchlin. The pope had already authorized the extensive grant of indulgences in order to secure funds for the crusade and more particularly for the rebuilding of St Peter’s at Rome. Against the attendant abuses the Augustinian monk Martin Luther (q.v.) posted (31st October 1517) on the church door at Wittenberg his famous ninety-five theses, which were the signal for widespread revolt against the church. Although Leo did not fully comprehend the import of the movement, he directed (3rd February 1518) the vicar-general of the Augustinians to impose silence on the monks. On the 30th of May Luther sent an explanation of his theses to the pope; on the 7th of August he was cited to appear at Rome. An arrangement was effected, however, whereby that citation was cancelled, and Luther betook himself in October 1518 to Augsburg to meet the papal legate, Cardinal Cajetan, who was attending the imperial diet convened by the emperor Maximilian to impose the tithes for the Turkish war and to elect a king of the Romans; but neither the arguments of the learned cardinal, nor the dogmatic papal bull of the 9th of November to the effect that all Christians must believe in the pope’s power to grant indulgences, moved Luther to retract. A year of fruitless negotiation followed, during which the pamphlets of the reformer set all Germany on fire. A papal bull of the 15th of June 1520, which condemned forty-one propositions extracted from Luther’s teachings, was taken to Germany by Eck in his capacity of apostolic nuncio, published by him and the legates Alexander and Caracciola, and burned by Luther on the 10th of December at Wittenberg. Leo then formally excommunicated Luther by bull of the 3rd of January 1521; and in a brief directed the emperor to take energetic measures against heresy. On the 26th of May 1521 the emperor signed the edict of the diet of Worms, which placed Luther under the ban of the Empire; on the 21st of the same month Henry VIII. of England sent to Leo his book against Luther on the seven sacraments. The pope, after careful consideration, conferred on the king of England the title “Defender of the Faith” by bull of the 11th of October 1521. Neither the imperial edict nor the work of Henry VIII. stayed the Lutheran movement, and Luther himself, safe in the solitude of the Wartburg, survived Leo X. It was under Leo X. also that the Protestant movement had its beginning in Scandinavia. The pope had repeatedly used the rich northern benefices to reward members of the Roman curia, and towards the close of the year 1516 he sent the grasping and impolitic Arcimboldi as papal nuncio to Denmark to collect money for St Peter’s. King Christian II. took advantage of the growing dissatisfaction on the part of the native clergy toward the papal government, and of Arcimboldi’s interference in the Swedish revolt, in order to expel the nuncio and summon (1520) Lutheran theologians to Copenhagen. Christian approved a plan by which a formal state church should be established in Denmark, all appeals to Rome should be abolished, and the king and diet should have final jurisdiction in ecclesiastical causes. Leo sent a new nuncio to Copenhagen (1521) in the person of the Minorite Francesco de Potentia, who readily absolved the king and received the rich bishopric of Skara. The pope or his legate, however, took no steps to remove abuses or otherwise reform the Scandinavian churches.

That Leo did not do more to check the tendency toward heresy and schism in Germany and Scandinavia is to be partially explained by the political complications of the time, and by his own preoccupation with schemes of papal and Medicean aggrandizement in Italy. The death of the emperor Maximilian on the 12th of January 1519 had seriously affected the situation. Leo vacillated between the powerful candidates for the succession, allowing it to appear at first that he favoured Francis I. while really working for the election of some minor German prince. He finally accepted Charles I. of Spain as inevitable, and the election of Charles (28th of June 1519) revealed Leo’s desertion of his French alliance, a step facilitated by the death at about the same time of Lorenzo de’ Medici and his French wife. Leo was now anxious to unite Ferrara, Parma and Piacenza to the States of the Church. An attempt late in 1519 to seize Ferrara failed, and the pope recognized the need of foreign aid. In May 1521 a treaty of alliance was signed at Rome between him and the emperor. Milan and Genoa were to be taken from France and restored to the Empire, and Parma and Piacenza were to be given to the Church on the expulsion of the French. The expense of enlisting 10,000 Swiss was to be borne equally by pope and emperor. Charles took Florence and the Medici family under his protection and promised to punish all enemies of the Catholic faith. Leo agreed to invest Charles with Naples, to crown him emperor, and to aid in a war against Venice. It was provided that England and the Swiss might join the league. Henry VIII. announced his adherence in August. Francis I. had already begun war with Charles in Navarre, and in Italy, too, the French made the first hostile movement (23rd June 1521). Leo at once announced that he would excommunicate the king of France and release his subjects from their allegiance unless Francis laid down his arms and surrendered Parma and Piacenza. The pope lived to hear the joyful news of the capture of Milan from the French and of the occupation by papal troops of the long-coveted provinces (November 1521). Leo X. died on the 1st of December 1521, so suddenly that the last sacraments could not be administered; but the contemporary suspicions of poison were unfounded. His successor was Adrian VI.

Several minor events of Leo’s pontificate are worthy of mention. He was particularly friendly with King Emmanuel of Portugal on account of the latter’s missionary enterprises in Asia and Africa. His concordat with Florence (1516) guaranteed the free election of the clergy in that city. His constitution of the 1st of March 1519 condemned the king of Spain’s claim to refuse the publication of papal bulls. He maintained close relations with Poland because of the Turkish advance and the Polish contest with the Teutonic Knights. His bull of the 1st of July 1519, which regulated the discipline of the Polish Church, was later transformed into a concordat by Clement VII. Leo showed special favours to the Jews and permitted them to erect a Hebrew printing-press at Rome. He approved the formation of the Oratory of Divine Love, a group of pious men at Rome which later became the Theatine Order, and he canonized Francesco di Paola.

As patron of learning Leo X. deserves a prominent place among the popes. He raised the church to a high rank as the friend of whatever seemed to extend knowledge or to refine and embellish life. He made the capital of Christendom the centre of culture. Every Italian artist and man of letters in an age of singular intellectual brilliancy tasted or hoped to taste of his bounty, while yet a cardinal, he had restored the church of Sta Maria in Domnica after Raphael’s designs; and as pope he built S. Giovanni on the Via Giulia after designs by Jacopo Sansovino and pressed forward the work on St Peter’s and the Vatican under Raphael and Chigi. His constitution of the 5th of November 1513 reformed the Roman university, which had been neglected by Julius II. He restored all its faculties, gave larger salaries to the professors, and summoned distinguished teachers from afar; and, although it never attained to the importance of Padua or Bologna, it nevertheless possessed in 1514 an excellent faculty of eighty-eight professors. Leo called Theodore Lascaris to Rome to give instruction in Greek, and established a Greek printing-press from which the first Greek book printed at Rome appeared in 1515. He made Raphael custodian of the classical antiquities of Rome and the vicinity. The distinguished Latinists Pietro Bembo (1470-1547) andJacopo Sadoleto (1477-1547) were papal secretaries, as well as the famous poet Bernardo Accolti (d. 1534). Writers of poetry like Vida (1490-1566), Trissino (1478-1550), and Bibbiena (1470-1520), writers ofnovellelike Bandello, and a hundred otherliteratiof the time were bishops, or papal scriptors or abbreviators, or in other papal employ. Leo’s lively interest in art and literature, to say nothing of his natural liberality, his nepotism, his political ambitions and necessities, and his immoderate personal luxury, exhausted within two years the hard savings of Julius II., and precipitated a financial crisis from which he never emerged and which was a direct cause of most of the calamities of his pontificate. He created many new offices and shamelessly sold them. He sold cardinals’ hats. He sold membership in the “Knights of Peter.” He borrowed large sums from bankers, curials, princes and Jews. The Venetian ambassador Gradenigo estimated the paying number of offices on Leo’s death at 2150, with a capital value of nearly 3,000,000 ducats and a yearly income of 328,000 ducats. Marino Giorgi reckoned the ordinary income of the pope for the year 1517 at about 580,000 ducats, of which 420,000 came from the States of the Church, 100,000 from annates, and 60,000 from the composition tax instituted by Sixtus IV. These sums, together with the considerable amounts accruing from indulgences, jubilees, and special fees, vanished as quickly as they were received. Then the pope resorted to pawning palace furniture, table plate, jewels, even statues of the apostles. Several banking firms and many individual creditors were ruined by the death of the pope.

In the past many conflicting estimates were made of the character and achievements of the pope during whose pontificate Protestantism first took form. More recent studies have served to produce a fairer and more honest opinion of Leo X. A report of the Venetian ambassador Marino Giorgi bearing date of March 1517 indicates some of his predominant characteristics:—“The pope is a good-natured and extremely free-hearted man, who avoids every difficult situation and above all wants peace; he would not undertake a war himself unless his own personal interests were involved; he loves learning; of canon law and literature he possesses remarkable knowledge; he is, moreover, a very excellent musician.” Leo was dignified in appearance and elegant in speech, manners and writing. He enjoyed music and the theatre, art and poetry, the masterpieces of the ancients and the wonderful creations of his contemporaries, the spiritual and the witty—life in every form. It is by no means certain that he made the remark often attributed to him, “Let us enjoy the papacy since God has given it to us,” but there is little doubt that he was by nature devoid of moral earnestness or deep religious feeling. On the other hand, in spite of his worldliness, Leo was not an unbeliever; he prayed, fasted, and participated in the services of the church with conscientiousness. To the virtues of liberality, charity and clemency he added the Machiavellian qualities of falsehood and shrewdness, so highly esteemed by the princes of his time. Leo was deemed fortunate by his contemporaries, but an incurable malady, wars, enemies, a conspiracy of cardinals, and the loss of all his nearest relations darkened his days; and he failed entirely in his general policy of expelling foreigners from Italy, of restoring peace throughout Europe, and of prosecuting war against the Turks. He failed to recognize the pressing need of reform within the church and the tremendous dangers which threatened the papal monarchy; and he unpardonably neglected the spiritual needs of the time. He was, however, zealous in firmly establishing the political power of the Holy See; he made it unquestionably supreme in Italy; he successfully restored the papal power in France; and he secured a prominent place in the history of culture.

Authorities.—The life of Leo X. was written shortly after his death by Paolo Giovio, bishop of Nocera, who had known him intimately. Other important contemporary sources are the ItalianHistoryof the Florentine writer Guicciardini, covering the period 1492-1530 (4 vols., Milan, 1884); the reports of the Venetian ambassadors, Marino Giorgi (1517), Marco Minio (1520) and Luigi Gradenigo (1523), in vol. iii. of the 2nd series ofLe Relazioni degli ambasciatori Veneti, edited by Alberi (Florence, 1846); and theDiariiof the Venetian Marino Sanuto (58 vols., 1879-1903). Other materials for the biography are to be found in the incompleteRegestaedited by Joseph Cardinal Hergenröther (Freiburg-i-B., 1884 ff.); in the Turin collection of papal bulls (1859, &c.); inIl Diario di Leone X. dai volumi manoscritti degli archivi Vaticani della S. Sede connote di M. Armellini(Rome, 1884); and in “Documenti risguardanti Giovanni de’ Medici e il pontifice Leone X.,” appendix to vol. 1 of theArchivio storico Italiano(Florence, 1842).See L. Pastor,Geschichte der Päpste im Zeitalter der Renaissance u. der Glaubensspaltung von der Wahl Leos X. bis zum Tode Klemens VII.part 1 (Freiburg-i.-B., 1906); M. Creighton,History of the Papacy, vol. 6 (1901); F. Gregorovius,Rome in the Middle Ages, trans. by Mrs G. W. Hamilton, vol. viii., part 1 (1902); L. von Ranke,History of the Popes, vol. i., trans. by E. Foster in the Bohn Library;Histoire de France, ed. by E. Lavisse, vol. 5, part 1 (1903); Walter Friedensburg, “Ein rotulus familiae Papst Leos X.,” inQuellen u. Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven u. Bibliotheken, vol. vi. (1904); W. Roscoe,Life and Pontificate of Leo X.(6th ed., 2 vols., 1853), a celebrated biography but considerably out of date in spite of the valuable notes of the German and Italian translators, Henke and Bossi; F. S. Nitti,Leone X. e la sua politica secondo documenti e carteggi inediti(Florence, 1892); A. Schulte,Die Fugger in Rom 1495-1523(2 vols., Leipzig, 1906); and H. M. Vaughan,The Medici Popes(1908).

See L. Pastor,Geschichte der Päpste im Zeitalter der Renaissance u. der Glaubensspaltung von der Wahl Leos X. bis zum Tode Klemens VII.part 1 (Freiburg-i.-B., 1906); M. Creighton,History of the Papacy, vol. 6 (1901); F. Gregorovius,Rome in the Middle Ages, trans. by Mrs G. W. Hamilton, vol. viii., part 1 (1902); L. von Ranke,History of the Popes, vol. i., trans. by E. Foster in the Bohn Library;Histoire de France, ed. by E. Lavisse, vol. 5, part 1 (1903); Walter Friedensburg, “Ein rotulus familiae Papst Leos X.,” inQuellen u. Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven u. Bibliotheken, vol. vi. (1904); W. Roscoe,Life and Pontificate of Leo X.(6th ed., 2 vols., 1853), a celebrated biography but considerably out of date in spite of the valuable notes of the German and Italian translators, Henke and Bossi; F. S. Nitti,Leone X. e la sua politica secondo documenti e carteggi inediti(Florence, 1892); A. Schulte,Die Fugger in Rom 1495-1523(2 vols., Leipzig, 1906); and H. M. Vaughan,The Medici Popes(1908).

(C. H. Ha.)

Leo XI.(Alessandro de’ Medici) was elected pope on the 1st of April 1605, at the age of seventy. He had long been archbishop of Florence and nuncio to Tuscany; and was entirely pro-French in his sympathies. He died on the 27th day of his pontificate, and was succeeded by Paul V.

See the contemporary life by Vitorelli, continuator of Ciaconius,Vitae et res gestae summorum Pontiff. Rom.; Ranke,Popes(Eng. trans., Austin), ii. 330; v. Reumont,Gesch. der Stadt Rom.iii. 2, 604; Brosch,Gesch. des Kirchenstaates(1880), i. 350.

Leo XII.(Annibale della Genga), pope from 1823 to 1829, was born of a noble family, near Spoleto, on the 22nd of August 1760. Educated at the Accademia dei Nobili ecclesiastici at Rome, he was ordained priest in 1783, and in 1790 attracted favourable attention by a tactful sermon commemorative of the emperor Joseph II. In 1792 Pius VI. made him his private secretary, in 1793 creating him titular archbishop of Tyre and despatching him to Lucerne as nuncio. In 1794 he was transferred to the nunciature at Cologne, but owing to the war had to make his residence in Augsburg. During the dozen or more years he spent in Germany he was entrusted with several honourable and difficult missions, which brought him into contact with the courts of Dresden, Vienna, Munich and Württemberg, as well as with Napoleon. It is, however, charged at one time during this period that his finances were disordered, and his private life not above suspicion. After the abolition of the States of the Church, he was treated by the French as a state prisoner, and lived for some years at the abbey of Monticelli, solacing himself with music and with bird-shooting, pastimes which he did not eschew even after his election as pope. In 1814 he was chosen to carry the pope’s congratulations to Louis XVIII.; in 1816 he was created cardinal-priest of Santa Maria Maggiore, and appointed to the see of Sinigaglia, which he resigned in 1818. In 1820 Pius VII. gave him the distinguished post of cardinal vicar. In the conclave of 1823, in spite of the active opposition of France, he was elected pope by thezelantion the 28th of September. His election had been facilitated because he was thought to be on the edge of the grave; but he unexpectedly rallied. His foreign policy, entrusted at first to Della Somaglia and then to the more able Bernetti, moved in general along lines laid down by Consalvi; and he negotiated certain concordats very advantageous to the papacy. Personally most frugal, Leo reduced taxes, made justice less costly, and was able to find money for certain public improvements; yet he left the finances more confused than he had found them, and even the elaborate jubilee of 1825 did not really mend matters. His domestic policy was one of extreme reaction. He condemned the Bible societies, and under Jesuit influence reorganized the educational system. Severe ghetto laws led many of the Jews to emigrate. He hunted down theCarbonariand the Freemasons; he took the strongest measures against political agitation in theatres. A well-nigh ubiquitous system of espionage, perhaps most fruitful when directed against official corruption, sapped the foundations of public confidence. Leo, temperamentally stern, hard-working in spite of bodily infirmity, died at Rome on the 10th of February1829. The news was received by the populace with unconcealed joy. He was succeeded by Pius VIII.

Back to Index Next