[87]Page 219.
[87]Page 219.
THE POPES RETURN TO ROME.
A.D.1367-1377.
While the popes lived at Avignon, Rome suffered very much from their absence. There was nothing like a regular government. The great Roman families (such as the Colonnas, whom I have mentioned in speaking of Boniface VIII.) carried on their quarrels with each other, and no one attempted or was strong enough to check them. Murders, robberies, and violences of all sorts were common. The vast and noble buildings which had remained from ancient times were neglected; the churches and palacesfell to decay; even the manners of the Romans became rough and rude, from the want of anybody to teach them better and to show them an example.
And not only Rome, but all Italy missed the pope's presence. The princes carried on their wars by means of hired bands of soldiers, who were mostly strangers from beyond the Alps. These bands hired out their services to any one who would pay enough, and, although they were faithful to each employer for the time that was agreed on, they were ready at the end of that time to engage themselves for money to one who might be their late master's enemy. The most famous captain of such hireling soldiers was Sir John Hawkwood, an Englishman, who is commonly said to have been a tailor in London before he took to arms; but this I believe to be a mistake. He fought for many years in Italy, and a picture of him on horseback, which serves for his monument, is still to be seen in Florence Cathedral.
The Romans again and again entreated the popes to come back to their city. The chief poet and writer of the age, Petrarch, urged them both in verse and in prose to return. But the cardinals, who at this time were mostly Frenchmen, had grown so used to the pleasures of Avignon that they did all they could to keep the popes there. At length, in 1367, Urban V. made his way back to Rome, where the emperors both of the East and of the West met to do him honour; but after a short stay in Italy he returned to Avignon, where he soon after died (A.D.1370). His successor, Gregory XI., however, was more resolute, and removed the papacy to Rome in 1377; and this was the end of what was styled the seventy years' captivity in Babylon.[88]
NOTES
[88]See page 240.
[88]See page 240.
THE GREAT SCHISM.
A.D.1378-1410.
Gregory XI. died in 1378, and the choice of a successor to him was no easy matter. The Romans were bent on having a countryman of their own, that they might be sure of his continuing to live among them. They guarded the gates, they brought into the city a number of rough and half-savage people from the hills around, to terrify the cardinals; and, when these were shut up for the election, the mob surrounded the palace in which they were, with cries of "We will have a Roman, or at least an Italian!" Day and night their shouts were kept up, with a frightful din of other kinds. They broke into the pope's cellars, got drunk on the wine, and were thus made more furious than before. At length, the cardinals, driven to extreme terror, made choice of Bartholomew Prignano, archbishop of Bari, in south Italy, who was not one of their own number. It is certain that he was not chosen freely, but under fear of the noise and threats of the Roman mob; but all the forms which follow after the election of a pope, such as that of coronation, were regularly gone through, and the cardinals seem to have given their approval of the choice in such a way that they could not well draw back afterwards.
But Urban VI. (as the new pope called himself), although he had until then been much esteemed as a pious and modest man, seems to have lost his head on being raised to his new office. He held himself vastly above the cardinals, wishing to reform them violently, and to lord it over them in a style which they had not been used to. By such conduct he provoked them to oppose him. They objected that he had not been freely chosen, and also that he was not in his right mind; and a party of them met atFondi, and chose another pope, Clement VII., a Frenchman, who settled at Avignon.
Thus began what is called the Great Schism of the West. There were now two rival popes—one of them having his court at Rome, and the other at Avignon; and the kingdoms of Europe were divided between the two. The cost of keeping up two courts weighed heavily on the Christians of the West; and all sorts of tricks were used to squeeze out fees and money on all possible occasions. As an instance of this, I may mention that Boniface IX., one of the Roman line of popes, celebrated two jubilees, with only ten years between them, although in Boniface VIII.'s time it had been supposed that the jubilee was to come only once in a hundred years.
The princes of Europe were scandalized by this division, and often tried to heal it, but in vain; for the popes, although they professed to desire such a thing, were generally far from hearty in saying so. At length it seemed as if the breach were to be healed by a council held at Pisa in 1409, which set aside both the rivals, and elected a new pope, Alexander V. But it was found that the two old claimants would not give way; and thus the council of Pisa, in trying to cure the evil of having two popes, had saddled the Church with a third.
Alexander did not hold the papacy quite eleven months (June, 1409, to May, 1410). He had fallen wholly under the power of a cardinal named Balthasar Cossa; and this cardinal was chosen to succeed him, under the name of John XXIII. John was one of the worst men who ever held the papacy. It is said that he had been a pirate, and that from this he had got the habit of waking all night and sleeping by day. He had been governor of Bologna, where he had indulged himself to the full in cruelty, greed, and other vices. He was even suspected of having poisoned Alexander; and, although he must no doubt have been a very clever man, it is not easy to understand how the other cardinals can have chosen one who was so notoriously wicked to the papacy.
JOHN HUSS.
A.D.1369-1414.
It would seem that after a time Wyclif's opinions almost died out in England. But meanwhile they, or opinions very like them, were eagerly taken up in Bohemia. If we look at the map of Europe, we might think that no country was less likely than Bohemia to have anything to do with England; for it lies in the midst of other countries, far away from all seas, and with no harbours to which English ships could make their way. And besides this, the people are of a different race from any that have ever settled in this country, or have helped to make the English nation, and their language has no likeness to ours. But it so happened that Richard II. of England married the Princess Anne, granddaughter of the blind king who fell at Cressy, and daughter of the emperor Charles IV., who usually lived in Bohemia. And when Queen Anne of England died, and the Bohemian ladies and servants of her court went back to their own country, they took with them some of Wyclif's writings, which were readily welcomed there; for some of the Bohemian clergy had already begun a reform in the Church, and Wyclif's name was well known on account of his writings of another kind.
Among those who thus became acquainted with Wyclif's opinions was a young man named John Huss. He had been an admirer of Wyclif's philosophical works; but when he first met with his reforming books, he was so little taken with them that he wished they were thrown into the Moldau, the river which runs through Prague, the chief city of Bohemia. But Huss soon came to think differently, and heartily took up almost all Wyclif's doctrines.
Huss made many enemies among the clergy by attacking their faults from the pulpit of a chapel called Bethlehem,where he was preacher. He was, however, still so far in favour with the archbishop of Prague, that he was employed by him, together with some others, to inquire into a pretended miracle, which drew crowds of pilgrims to seek for cures at a place called Wilsnack, in the north of Germany. But he afterwards fell out of favour with the archbishop who had appointed him to this work, and he was still less liked by later archbishops.
From time to time some doctrines which were said to be Wyclif's were condemned at Prague. Huss usually declared that Wyclif had been wrongly understood, and that his real meaning was true and innocent. But at length a decree was passed that all Wyclif's books should be burnt (A.D.1410), and thereupon a grand bonfire was made in the courtyard of the archbishop's palace, while all the church bells of the city were tolled as at a funeral. But as some copies of the books escaped the flames, it was easy to make new copies from these.
Huss was excommunicated, but he still went on teaching. In 1412, Pope John XXIII. proclaimed a crusade against Ladislaus, king of Naples, with whom he had quarrelled, and ordered that it should be preached, and that money should be collected for it all through Latin Christendom. Huss and his chief friend, whose name was Jerome, set themselves against this with all their might. They declared it to be unchristian that a crusade should be proclaimed against a Christian prince, and that the favours of the Church should be held out as a reward for paying money or for shedding of blood. One day, as a preacher was inviting people to buy his indulgences (as they were called) for the forgiveness of sins, he was interrupted by three young men, who told him that what he said was untrue, and that Master Huss had taught them better. The three were seized, and were condemned to die; and, although it would seem that a promise was afterwards given that their lives should be spared, the sentence of death was carried into effect. The people were greatly provoked by this, and when the executioner, after having cut off theheads of the three, proclaimed (as was usual), "Whosoever shall do the like, let him look for the like!" a cry burst forth from the multitude around, "We are ready to do and to suffer the like." Women dipped their handkerchiefs in the blood of the victims, and treasured it up as a precious relic. Some of the crowd even licked the blood. The bodies were carried off by the people, and were buried in Bethlehem chapel; and Huss and others spoke of the three as martyrs.
By this affair his enemies were greatly provoked. Fresh orders were sent from Rome for the destruction of Wyclif's books, and for uttering all the heaviest sentences of the Church against Huss himself. He therefore left Prague for a time, and lived chiefly in the castles of Bohemian noblemen who were friendly to him, writing busily as well as preaching against what he supposed to be the errors of the Roman Church.
We shall hear more of Huss by-and-by.
THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE.
A.D.1414-1418.
PART I.
The division of the Church between three popes cried aloud for settlement in some way; and besides this there were general complaints as to the need of reform in the Church. The emperor Sigismund urged Pope John to call a general council for the consideration of these subjects; and, although John hated the notion of such a meeting, he could not help consenting. He wished that the council should be held in Italy, as he might hope to manage it more easily there than in any country north of the Alps; and he was very angry when Constance, a town on a large lake in Switzerland, was chosen as the place. It seemedlike a token of bad luck when, as he was passing over a mountain on his way to the council, his carriage was upset, and he lay for a while in the snow, using bad words as to his folly in undertaking the journey; and when he came in sight of Constance at the foot of the hill, he said that it looked like a trap for foxes. In that trap Pope John was caught.
The other popes, Gregory XII. and Benedict XIII., did not attend, although both had been invited; but some time after the opening of the council (which was on the 5th of November, 1414), the emperor Sigismund arrived. He reached Constance in a boat which had brought him across the lake very early on Christmas morning, and at the first service of the festival, which was held before daybreak, he read the Gospel which tells of the decree of Cæsar Augustus that all the world should be taxed. For it was considered that the emperor was entitled to take this part in the Christmas service of the Church.
It was proposed that all the three popes should resign, and that a new pope should be chosen. In answer to this, John said that he was ready to resign if the others would do the same; but it soon became clear that he did not mean to keep his promise honestly. He tried by all manner of tricks to ward off the dangers which surrounded him; and, after he had more than once tried in vain to get away from Constance, he was able to escape one day when the members of the council were amusing themselves at a tournament given by a prince whom John had persuaded to take off their attention in this way. The council, however, in his absence went on to examine the charges against him, many of which were so shocking that they were kept secret, out of regard for his office. John, by letters and messengers, asked for delay, and did all that he could for that purpose; but, notwithstanding all his arts, he was sentenced to be deposed from the papacy for simony (that is, for trafficking in holy things),[89]and forother offences. On being informed of this, he at once put off his papal robes, saying, that since he had put them on he had never enjoyed a quiet day (May 31, 1415).
PART II.
John Huss, the Bohemian reformer, had been summoned to Constance, that he might give an account of himself, and had been furnished with a safe-conduct (as it was called), in which the emperor assured him of protection on his way to the council and back. But, although at first he was treated as if he were free, it was pretended, soon after his arrival, that he wished to run away; and under this pretence he was shut up in a dark and filthy prison. Huss had no friends in the council; for the reforming part of the members would have nothing to do with him, lest it should be thought that they agreed with him in all his notions. And when he was at length brought out from prison, where his health had suffered much, and when he was required to answer for himself, without having been allowed the use of books to prepare himself, all the parties in the council turned on him at once. His trial lasted three days. The charges against him were mostly about Wyclif's doctrines, which had been often condemned by councils at Rome and elsewhere, but which Huss was supposed to hold; and when he tried to explain that in some things he did not agree with Wyclif, nobody would believe him. Some of his bitterest persecutors were men who had once been his friends, and had gone with him in his reforming opinions.
After his trial, Huss was sent back to prison for a month, and all kinds of ways were tried to persuade him to give up the opinions which were blamed in him; but he stood firm in what he believed to be the truth. At length he was brought out to hear his sentence. He claimed the protection of the emperor, whose safe-conduct he had received (as we have seen). But Sigismund had been hard pressed by Huss's enemies, who told him that apromise made to one who is wrong in the faith is not to be kept; and the emperor had weakly and treacherously yielded, so that he could only blush for shame when Huss reminded him of the safe-conduct.
Huss was condemned to death, and wasdegradedfrom his orders, as the custom was; that is to say, they first put into his hands the vessels used at the consecration of the Lord's Supper, which were the signs of his being a priest; and by taking away these from him, they reduced him from a priest to a deacon. Then they took away the tokens of his being a deacon, and so they stripped him of his other orders, one after another; and when at last they had turned him back into a layman, they led him away to be burnt. It is said that, as he saw an old woman carrying a faggot to the pile which was to burn him, he smiled and said, "O holy simplicity!" meaning that her intention was good, although the poor old creature was ignorant and misled. He bore his death with great patience and courage; and then his ashes and such scorched bits of his dress as remained were thrown into the Rhine, lest his followers should treasure them up as relics (July 6, 1415).
About ten months after the death of Huss, his old friend and companion, Jerome of Prague, was condemned by the council to be burnt, and suffered with a firmness which even those who were most strongly against him could not but admire (May 30, 1416).
PART III.
When Pope John had been got rid of, Gregory XII., the most respectable of the three rival popes, agreed to resign his claims. But the third pope, Benedict XIII., would hear of no proposals for his resignation, and shut himself up in a castle on the coast of Spain, where he not only continued to call himself pope, but after his death two popes of his line were set up in succession. The council of Constance, however, finding Benedict obstinate,did not trouble itself further about him, and went on to treat the papacy as vacant.
There was a great dispute whether the reform of the Church (which people had long asked for), or the choice of a new pope, should be first taken in hand; and at length it was resolved to elect a pope without further delay. The choice was to be made by the cardinals and some others who were joined with them; and these electors were all shut up in the Exchange of Constance—a building which is still to be seen there. While the election was going on, multitudes of all ranks, and even the emperor himself among them, went from time to time in slow procession round the Exchange, chanting in a low tone litanies, in which they prayed that the choice of the electors might be guided for the good of the Church. And when at last an opening was made in the wall from within, and through it a voice proclaimed, "We have a pope: Lord Otho of Colonna!" the news spread at once through all Constance. The people seemed to be wild with joy that the division of the Church, which had lasted so long, was now healed. All the bells of the town pealed forth joyfully, and it is said that a crowd of not less than 80,000 people hurried at once to the Exchange. The emperor in his delight threw himself at the new pope's feet; and for hours together vast numbers thronged the cathedral, where the pope was placed on the high altar, and gave them his blessing. It was on St. Martin's day, the 11th of November, 1417, that this election took place; and from this the pope styled himself Martin V. But the joy which had been shown at his election was more than the effect warranted. The council had chosen a pope before taking up the reform of the Church; and the new pope was no friend to reform. During the rest of the time that the council was assembled, he did all that he could to thwart attempts at reform; and when, at the end of it, he rode away from Constance, with the emperor holding his bridle on one side and one of the chief German princes on the other, while a crowd of princes, nobles, clergy, and others, as many as 40,000, accompaniedhim, it seemed as if the pope had got above all the sovereigns of the world.
The great thing done by the council of Constance was, that it declared a general council to be above the pope, and entitled to depose popes if the good of the Church should require it.
NOTES
[89]See page 185.
[89]See page 185.
THE HUSSITES.
A.D.1418-1431.
The news of Huss's death naturally raised a general feeling of anger in Bohemia, where his followers treated his memory as that of a saint, and kept a festival in his honour. And when the emperor Sigismund, in 1419, succeeded his brother Wenceslaus in the kingdom of Bohemia, he found that he was hated by his new subjects on account of his share in the death of Huss.
But, although most of the Bohemians might now be called Hussites, there were great divisions among the Hussites themselves. Some had lately begun to insist that in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper both the bread and the wine should be given to all the people, according to our Lord's own example, instead of allowing no one but the priest to receive the wine, according to the Roman practice. These people who insisted on the sacramental cup were calledCalixtines, from the Latincalix, which means acuporchalice. But among those who agreed in this opinion there were serious differences as to some other points.
In the summer of 1419, the first public communion was celebrated at a place where the town of Tabor was afterwards built. It was a very different kind of ceremony from what had been usual. There were three hundred altars, but they were without any covering; the chaliceswere of wood, the clergy wore only their every-day dress; and a love-feast followed, at which the rich shared with their poorer brethren. The wilder party among the Hussites were calledTaborites, from Tabor, which became the chief abode of this party. They now took to putting their opinions into practice. They declared churches and their ornaments, pictures, images, organs, and the like, to be abominable; and they went about in bands, destroying everything that they thought superstitious. And thus Bohemia, which had been famous for the size and beauty of its churches, was so desolated that hardly a church was left in it; and those which are now standing have almost all been built since the time when the Hussites destroyed the older churches.
The chief leader of the Taborites was John Ziska, whose name is said by some to meanone-eyed; and at least he had lost an eye in early life. Ziska had such a talent for war, that, although his men were only rough peasants, armed with nothing better than clubs, flails, and such like tools, which they had been accustomed to use in husbandry, he trained them to encounter regular armies, and always came off with victory. He taught his soldiers to make their flails very dangerous weapons by tipping them with iron; and to place their waggons together in such a way that each block of waggons made a sort of little fortress, against which the force of the enemy dashed in vain. But Ziska's bravery and skill were disgraced by his savage fierceness. He never spared an enemy; he took delight in putting clergy and monks to the sword, or in burning them in pitch, and in burning and pulling down churches and monasteries. In the course of the war he lost his remaining eye; but he still continued to act as general with the same skill and success as before. His cruelty became greater continually, and the last year of his life was the bloodiest.
Ziska died in October, 1424. It is said that he directed that his skin should be taken off his body, and made into the covering of a drum, at the sound of which he expectedall enemies to flee in terror; but the story is probably not true. At his death, a part of his old companions called themselvesorphans, as if they had lost their father, and could never find another. But other generals arose to carry on the same kind of war, while their wild followers were wrought up to a sort of fury which nothing could withstand.
On the side of the Church a holy war was proclaimed, and vast armies, made up from all nations of Europe, were gathered for the invasion of Bohemia. One of these crusades was led by Cardinal Beaufort, bishop of Winchester, and great-uncle of King Henry VI. of England; another, by a famous Italian cardinal, Julian Cesarini. But the courage and fury of the Bohemians, with their savage appearance and their strange manner of fighting, drove back all assaults, with immense loss, in one campaign after another; until Cesarini, the leader in the last crusade, was convinced that there was no hope of putting the Bohemians down by force, and that some other means must be tried.
COUNCILS OF BASEL AND FLORENCE.
A.D.1431-9.
It had been settled at the council of Constance that regularly from time to time there should be held a general council, by which name was then meant a council gathered from the whole of the Western Church, but without any representatives of the Eastern Churches; and according to this decree a council was to meet at Basel, on the Rhine, in the year 1431. It was just before the time of its opening that Cardinal Cesarini was defeated by the Hussites of Bohemia, as we have seen. Being convinced that some gentler means ought to be tried with them, he begged thepope to allow them a hearing; and he invited them to send deputies to the council of Basel, of which he was president.
The Bohemians did as they were asked to do, and thirty of them appeared before the council,—rough, wild-looking men for the most part, headed by Procopius, who was at once a priest and a warrior, and was called the great, in order to distinguish him from another of the same name. A dispute, which lasted many weeks, was carried on between the leaders of these Bohemians and some members of the council; and, at length, four points were agreed on. The chief of these was, that the chalice at the Holy Communion should not be confined to the priest alone, but might be given to such grown-up persons as should desire it. This was one of the things which had been most desired by the Bohemian reformers. We need not go further into the history of the Hussites and of the parties into which they were divided; but it is worth while to remember that the use of the sacramental cup was allowed in Bohemia for two hundred years, while in all other churches under the Roman authority it was forbidden.
Soon after the meeting of the council of Basel, the pope, whose name was Eugenius IV., grew jealous lest it should get too much power, and sent orders that it should break up. But the members were not disposed to bear this. They declared that the council was the highest authority in the Church, and superior to the pope; and they asked Eugenius to join them at Basel, and threatened him in case of his refusal. Just at that time Eugenius was driven from Rome by his people, and therefore he found it convenient to try to smooth over differences, and to keep good terms with the council; but after a while the disagreement broke out again. The pope had called a council to meet at Ferrara, in Italy, in order to consult with some Greeks (at the head of whom were the emperor and the patriarch of Constantinople) as to the union of the Greek and Latin Churches; and he desired the members of theBasel council to remove to Ferrara, that they might take part in the new assembly. But only a few obeyed; and those who remained at Basel were resolved to carry on their quarrel to the uttermost. First, they allowed Eugenius a certain time, within which they required him either to appear at Basel or to send some one in his stead; then, they lengthened out this time somewhat; and as he still did not appear, they first suspended him from his office, then declared him to be deposed, and at length went on to choose another pope in his stead (Nov. 17, 1439).
The person thus chosen was Amadeus, who for nearly thirty years had been duke of Savoy, but had lately given over his dukedom to his son, and had put himself at the head of twelve old knights, who had formed themselves into an order of hermits at Ripaille, near the lake of Geneva. The new pope bargained that he should not be required to part with the long white beard which he had worn as a hermit; but after a while, finding that it looked strange among the smooth chins of those around him, he, of his own accord, allowed it to be shaved off. But this attempt to set up an antipope came to very little. Felix V. (as the old duke called himself on being elected) was obliged to submit to Eugenius; and the council of Basel, after dwindling away by degrees, and being removed from one place to another, died out so obscurely that its end was unnoticed by any one.
Eugenius held his council at Ferrara, and afterwards removed it to Florence (A.D.1438-9); and it seemed as if by his management the Greeks, who were very poor, and were greatly in need of help against the Turks, were brought to an agreement with the Latins as to the questions which had been so long disputed between the Churches. The union of the Churches was celebrated by a grand service in the cathedral of Florence. But, as in former times,[90]the Greeks found, on their return home, that their countrymen would not agree to what had been done; andthus the breach between the two Churches continued, until a few years later Constantinople was taken by the Turks, and so the Greek Empire came to an end.
NOTES
[90]See page 232.
[90]See page 232.
NICOLAS V. AND PIUS II.
A.D.1447-1464.
The next pope, Nicolas V., was a man who had raised himself from a humble station by his learning, ability, and good character. He was chiefly remarkable for his love of learning, and for the bounty which he spent on learned men. For learning had come to be regarded with very high honour, and those who were famous for it found themselves persons of great importance, who were welcome at the courts of princes, from the Emperor of the West down to the little dukes and lords of Italy. But we must not fancy that these learned men were all that they ought to have been. They were too commonly selfish and jealous, vain, greedy, quarrelsome, unthrifty; they flattered the great, however unworthy these might be; and in religion many of them were more like the old heathen Greeks than Christians.
In the time of Nicolas, a terrible calamity fell on Christendom by the loss of Constantinople. The Turks, a barbarous and Mahometan people, had long been pressing on the Eastern empire, and swallowing up more and more of it. It was the fear of these advancing enemies that led the Greeks repeatedly to seek for union with the Latin Church, in the hope that they might thus get help from the West for the defence of what remained of their empire. But these reconciliations never lasted long, more especially as the Greeks did not gain that aid from their Western brethren for the sake of which they had yielded in matters of religion. One more attempt of this kind was made afterthe council of Florence; but it was vain, and in 1453 the Turks, under Sultan Mahomet II., became masters of Constantinople.
A great number of learned Greeks, who were scattered by this conquest, found their way into the West, bringing with them their knowledge and many Greek manuscripts; and such scholars were gladly welcomed by Pope Nicolas and others. Not only were their books bought up, but the pope sent persons to search for manuscripts all over Greece, in order to rescue as much as possible from destruction by the barbarians. Nicolas founded the famous Vatican library in the papal palace at Rome, and presented a vast number of manuscripts to it. For it was not until this very time that printing was invented, and formerly all books were written by hand, which is a slow and costly kind of work, as compared with printing. For in writing out books, the whole labour has to be done for every single copy; but when a printer has once set up his types, he can print any number of copies without any other trouble than that of inking the types and pressing them on the paper, by means of a machine, for each copy that is wanted. The art of printing was brought from Germany to Rome under Nicolas V., and he encouraged it, like everything else which was connected with learning.
Nicolas also had a plan for rebuilding Rome in a very grand style, and began with the Church of St. Peter; which he intended to surround with palaces, gardens, terraces, libraries, and smaller churches. But he did not live to carry this work far.
One effect of the new encouragement of learning was, that scholars began to inquire into the truth of some things which had long been allowed to pass without question. And thus in no long time the story of Constantine's donation and the false Decretals[91]were shown to be forged and worthless.
The shock of the loss of Constantinople was felt allthrough Christendom, and Nicholas attempted to get up a crusade, but died before much came of it. When, however, the Turks, in the pride of victory, advanced further into Europe, and laid siege to Belgrade on the Danube, they were driven back with great loss by the skill of John Huniades, a general, and by the courage which John of Capistrano, a Franciscan friar, was able by his exhortations and his prayers to rouse in the hearts of the besieged.
Nicolas died in 1455, and his successor, Calixtus III., in 1458. The next pope, Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini, who took the name of Pius II., was a very remarkable man. He had taken a strong part against Pope Eugenius at Basel, and had even been secretary to the old duke-antipope Felix. But he afterwards made his peace by doing great services to Eugenius, and then he rose step by step, until at the death of Calixtus he was elected pope. Pius was a man of very great ability in many ways; but his health was so much shaken before he became pope, that he was not able to do all that he might have done if he had been in the fulness of his strength. He took up the crusade with great zeal, but found no hearty support from others. A meeting which he held at Mantua for the purpose had little effect. At last, although suffering from gout and fever, the pope made his way from Rome to Ancona, on the Adriatic, where he expected to find both land and sea forces ready for the crusade. But on the way he fell in with some of the troops which had been collected for the purpose, and they turned out to be such wretched creatures, and so utterly unfit for the hardships of war, that he could only give them his blessing and tell them to go back to their homes. And, although, after reaching Ancona, he had the pleasure of seeing twenty-four Venetian ships enter the harbour for his service, he was so worn out by sickness that he died on the next day but one (Aug. 14, 1464). And after his death the crusade, on which he had so much set his heart, came to nothing.
NOTES
[91]See page 192.
[91]See page 192.
JEROME SAVONAROLA.
A.D.1452-1498.
PART I.
There is not much to tell about the popes after Pius II. until we come to Alexander VI., who was a Spaniard named Roderick Borgia, and was pope from 1492 to 1503. And the story of Alexander is too shocking to be told here; for there is hardly anything in all history so bad as the accounts which we have of him and of his family. He is supposed to have died of drinking, by mistake, some poison which he had prepared for a rich cardinal whose wealth he wished to get into his hands.
Instead, therefore, of telling you about the popes of this time, I shall give some account of a man who became very famous as a preacher—Jerome Savonarola.
Savonarola was born in 1452 at Ferrara, where his grandfather had been physician to the duke; and his family wished him to follow the same profession. But Jerome was set on becoming a monk, and from this nothing could move him. He therefore joined the Dominican friars, and after a while he was removed to St. Mark's, at Florence, a famous convent of his order. He found things in a bad state there; but he was chosen prior (or head) of the convent, and reformed it, so that it rose in character, and the number of the monks was much increased. He also became a great preacher, so that even the vast cathedral of Florence could not hold the crowds which flocked to hear him. He was especially fond of preaching on the dark prophecies of the Revelation, and of declaring that the judgments of God were about to come on Florence and on all Italy because of sin; and he sometimes fancied that he not only gathered such things from Scripture, but that they were revealed to him by visions from heaven.
At this time a family named Medici had got the chief power in Florence into their hands; and Savonarola always opposed them, because he thought that they had no right to such power in a city which ought to be free. But when Lorenzo, the head of the family, was dying (A.D.1492), he sent for Savonarola, because he thought him the only one of the clergy who would be likely to speak honestly to him of his sins, and to show him the way of seeking forgiveness. Savonarola did his part firmly, and pointed out some of Lorenzo's acts as being those of which he was especially bound to repent. But when he desired him to restore the liberties of Florence, it was more than the dying man could make up his mind to; and Savonarola, thinking that his repentance could not be sincere if he refused this, left him without giving him the Church's absolution.
But, although Savonarola was a very sincere and pious man, he did not always show good judgment. For instance, when he wished to get rid of the disorderly way in which the young people of Florence used to behave at the beginning of Lent, he sent a number of boys about the city (A.D.1497), where they entered into houses, and asked the inhabitants to give up to them anyvanitieswhich they might have. Then these vanities (as they were called) were all gathered together, and were built up into a pile fifteen stories high. There were among them cards and dice, fineries of women's dress, looking-glasses, bad books, musical instruments, pictures, and statues. The whole heap was of great value, and a merchant from Venice offered a large sum for it. But the money was refused, and he was forced to throw in his own picture as an addition to the other vanities. When night came, a long procession under Savonarola's orders passed through the streets, and then the pile was set on fire, amidst the sound of bells, drums, and trumpets, and the shouts of the multitude, who had been worked up to a share of Savonarola's zeal.
But the wiser people were distressed by the mistakes of judgment which he had shown in setting children to searchout the faults of their elders, and in mixing up harmless things in the same destruction with those which were connected with deep sinfulness and vice. And this want of judgment was still more shown a year later, when, after having repeated the bonfire of vanities, Savonarola's followers danced wildly in three circles around a cross set up in front of St. Mark's, as if they had been so many crazy dervishes of the East.
PART II.
Savonarola had raised up a host of enemies, and some of them were eagerly looking for an opportunity of doing him some mischief. At length one Francis of Apulia, a Franciscan friar, challenged him to what was called theordeal(or judgment) of fire, as a trial of the truth of his doctrine; and after much trouble it was settled that a friend of each should pass through this trial, which was supposed to be a way of finding out God's judgment as to the truth of the matter in dispute. Two great heaps of fuel were piled up in a public place at Florence. They were each forty yards long and two yards and a half high, with an opening of a yard's width between them; and it was intended that these heaps should be set on fire, and that the champions should try to pass between the two, as a famous monk had done at Florence in Hildebrand's time, hundreds of years before. But when a vast crowd had been brought to see the ordeal, they were much disappointed at finding that it was delayed, because Savonarola's enemies fancied that he might perhaps make use of some magical charms against the flames. There was a long dispute about this, and, while the parties were still wrangling, a heavy shower came down on the crowd. The magistrates then forbade the trial; the people, tired and hungry from waiting, drenched by the rain, provoked by the wearisome squabble which had caused the delay, and after all balked of the expected sight, broke out against Savonarola; and he had great difficulty in reaching St. Mark's under the protection of some friends, who closed around him and kept off the angry multitude. Two dayslater, the convent was besieged; and when the defenders were obliged to surrender it, Savonarola and the friar who was to have undergone the ordeal on his side were sent to prison.
Savonarola had a long trial, during which he was often tortured; but whatever might be wrung from him in this way, he afterwards declared that it was not to be believed, because the weakness of his body could not bear the pain of torture, and he confessed whatever might be asked of him. This trial was carried on under the authority of the wicked Pope Alexander VI.
Although no charge of error as to the faith could be made out against Savonarola, his enemies were bent on his death; and he and two of his companions were sentenced to be hanged and burnt. Like Huss, they had to go through the form of being degraded from their orders; and at the end of this it was a bishop's part to say to each, "I separate thee from the Church militant" (that is, from the Church which is carrying on its warfare here on earth). But the bishop, who had once been one of Savonarola's friars at St. Mark's, was very uneasy, and said in his confusion, "I separate thee from the Church triumphant" (that is, from the Church when its warfare has ended in victory and triumph). Savonarola saw the mistake, and corrected it by saying, "from the militant, not from the triumphant; forthatis not thine to do."
Savonarola's party did not die out with him, but long continued to cherish his memory. Among those who were most earnest in this was the great artist, Michael Angelo Buonarotti, who had been one of his hearers in youth, and even to his latest days used to read his works with interest, and to speak of him with reverence.
JULIUS II. AND LEO X.
A.D.1503-1521.
Alexander VI. was succeeded by a pope who took the title of Pius III., and lived only six and twenty days after his election. And after Pius came Julius II., who was pope from 1503 to 1513, and Leo X., who lived to the year 1521.
Julius, who owed his rise in life to the favour of his uncle Sixtus IV. (one of the popes who had come between Pius II. and Alexander VI.), was desirous to gain for the Roman see all that it had lost or had ever claimed. He was not a man of religious character, but plunged deeply into politics, and even acted as a soldier in war. Thus, at the siege of Mirandola, in the winter of 1511, he lived for weeks in a little hut, regardless of the frost and snow, of the roughness and scantiness of his food; and when most of those around him were frightened away by the cannon-balls which came from the walls of the fortress, the stout old pope kept his place, and directed the pointing of his own cannon against the town.
His successor, Leo, who was of the Florentine family of Medici,[92]was fond of elegant pleasures and of hunting. His tastes were costly, and continually brought him into difficulties as to money. The manner of life in Leo's court was gay, luxurious, and far from strict. He had comedies acted before him, which were hardly fit for the amusement of the chief bishop of Christendom. He is famous for his encouragement of the arts; and it was in his time that the art of painting reached its highest perfection through the genius of Michael Angelo Buonarotti (who has been already mentioned as a disciple of Savonarola)[93]and of RaphaelSanzio. In the art of architecture a great change took place about this time. For some hundreds of years it had been usual to build in what is called theGothicstyle, of which the chief mark is the use of pointed arches. Not that there was no change during all that time; for there are great differences between the earlier and the later kinds of Gothic, and these have since been so carefully studied that skilful people can tell from the look of a building the time at which every part of it was erected. But a little before the year 1500, the Gothic gave way to another style, and one of the greatest works ever done in this new style was the vast church of St. Peter, at Rome. I have mentioned that Nicolas V. thought of rebuilding the ancient church, which had stood since the time of Constantine the Great, and that he had even begun the work.[94]But now both the old basilica[95]and the beginning of a new church which Nicolas had made were swept away, and something far grander was designed. There were several architects who carried on the building of this great church, one after another; but the grand dome of St. Peter's, which rises into the air over the whole city, was the work of Michael Angelo, who was not only a painter, but an architect and a sculptor. It was by offering indulgences (or spiritual favours, forgiveness of sins, and the like) as a reward for gifts towards the new St. Peter's, that Julius raised the anger and disgust of the German reformer, Martin Luther. And thus it was the building of the most magnificent of Roman churches that led to the revolt which took away from the popes a great part of their spiritual dominion.
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