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$Title{History Of Europe During The Middle Ages
Part X}
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$Author{Hallam, Henry}
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$Subject{council
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Title:       History Of Europe During The Middle Ages
Book:        Book VII: History Of Ecclesiastical Power During The Middle Ages
Author:      Hallam, Henry

Part X

     Though the want of firmness in this emperor's character gave sometimes a
momentary triumph to the popes, it is evident that their authority lost ground
during the continuance of this struggle.  Their right of confirming imperial
elections was expressly denied by a diet held at Frankfort in 1338, which
established as a fundamental principle that the imperial dignity depended upon
God alone, and that whoever should be chosen by a majority of the electors
became immediately both king and emperor, with all prerogatives of that
station, and did not require the approbation of the pope. ^u This law,
confirmed as it was by subsequent usage, emancipated the German empire, which
was immediately concerned in opposing the papal claims.  But some who were
actively engaged in these transactions took more extensive views, and assailed
the whole edifice of temporal power which the Roman see had been constructing
for more than two centuries.  Several men of learning, among whom Dante,
Ockham, and Marsilius of Padua are the most conspicuous, investigated the
foundations of this superstructure, and exposed their insufficiency. ^v
Literature, too long the passive handmaid of spiritual despotism, began to
assert her nobler birthright of ministering to liberty and truth.  Though the
writings of these opponents of Rome are not always reasoned upon very solid
principles, they at least taught mankind to scrutinize what had been received
with implicit respect, and prepared the way for more philosophical
discussions.  About this time a new class of enemies had unexpectedly risen up
against the rulers of the church.  These were a part of the Franciscan order,
who had seceded from the main body on account of alleged deviations from the
rigor of their primitive rule.  Their schism was chiefly founded upon a
quibble about the right of property in things consumable, which they
maintained to be incompatible with the absolute poverty prescribed to them.
This frivolous sophistry was united with the wildest fanaticism; and as John
XXII. attempted to repress their follies by a cruel persecution, they
proclaimed aloud the corruption of the church, fixed the name of Antichrist
upon the papacy, and warmly supported the Emperor Louis throughout all his
contention with the Holy See. ^w

[Footnote u: Quod imperialis dignitas et potestas immediate ex solo Deo, et
quod de jure et imperii consuetudine antiquitus approbata postquam aliquis
eligitur in imperatorem sive regem ab electoribus imperii concorditer, vel
majori parte eorundem, statim ex sola electione est rex verus et imperator
Romanorum censendus et nominandus, et eidem debet ab omnibus imperie subjectis
obediri, et administrandi jura imperii, et caetera faciendi, quae ad
imperatorem verum pertinent, plenariam habet potestatem, nec papae sive sedis
apostolicae aut alicujus alterius approbatione, confirmatione, auctoritate
indiget vel censensu.  Schmidt, p. 513.]

[Footnote v: Giannone, l. xxii. c. 8.  Schmidt, t. vi. p. 152.  Dante was dead
before these events, but his principles were the same.  Ockham had already
exerted his talents in the same cause by writing, in behalf of Philip IV.,
against Boniface, a dialogue between a knight and a clerk on the temporal
supremacy of the church.  This is published among other tracts of the same
class in Goldastus, Monarchia Imperii, p. 13.  This dialogue is translated
entire in the Songe du Vergier, a more celebrated performance, ascribed to
Raoul de Presles under Charles V.]

[Footnote w: The schism of the rigid Franciscans or Fratricelli is one of the
most singular parts of ecclesiastical history, and had a material tendency
both to depress the temporal authority of the papacy, and to pave the way for
the Reformation.  It is fully treated by Mosheim, cent. 13 and 14, and by
Crevier, Hist. de l'Universite de Paris, t. ii. pp. 233-264, &c.]

     Meanwhile the popes who sat at Avignon continued to invade with
surprising rapaciousness the patronage and revenues of the church.  The
mandats or letters directing a particular clerk to be preferred seem to have
given place in a great degree to the more effectual method of appropriating
benefices by reservation or provision, which was carried to an enormous extent
in the fourteenth century.  John XXII., the most insatiate of pontiffs,
reserved to himself all the bishoprics in Christendom. ^x Benedict XII.
assumed the privilege for his own life of disposing of all benefices vacant by
cession, deprivation, or translation. Clement VI. naturally thought that his
title was equally good with his predecessor's, and continued the same right
for his own time; which soon became a permanent rule of the Roman chancery. ^y
Hence the appointment of a prelate to a rich bishopric was generally but the
first link in a chain of translation which the pope could regulate according
to his interest. Another capital innovation was made by John XXII. in the
establishment of the famous tax called annates, or first fruits of
ecclesiastical benefices, which he imposed for his own benefit.  These were
one year's value, estimated according to a fixed rate in the books of the
Roman chancery, and payable to the papal collectors throughout Europe. ^z
Various other devices were invented to obtain money, which these degenerate
popes, abandoning the magnificent schemes of their predecessors, were content
to seek as their principal object.  John XXII. is said to have accumulated an
almost incredible treasure, exaggerated perhaps by the ill-will of his
contemporaries; ^a but it may be doubted whether even his avarice reflected
greater dishonor on the church than the licentious profuseness of Clement VI.
^b

[Footnote x: Fleury, Institutions, &c., t. i. p. 363; F. Paul on Benefices, c.
37.]

[Footnote y: Ibid., c. 38.  Translations of bishops have been made by the
authority of the metropolitan till Innocent III. reserved this prerogative to
the Holy See.  De Marca, l. vi. c. 8.]

[Footnote z: F. Paul, c. 38; Fleury, p. 424; De Marca, l. vi. c. 10; Pasquier,
l. lii. c. 28.  The popes had long been in the habit of receiving a pecuniary
gratuity when they granted the pallium to an archbishop, though this was
reprehended by strict men, and even condemned by themselves.  De Marca, Ibid.
It is noticed as a remarkable thing of Innocent IV. that he gave the pall to a
German archbishop without accepting anything.  Schmidt, t. iv. p. 172.  The
original and nature of annates is copiously treated in Lenfant, Concile de
Constance, t. ii. p. 133.]

[Footnote a: G. Villani puts this at 25,000,000 of florins, which it is hardly
possible to believe.  The Italians were credulous enough to listen to any
report against the popes of Avignon. l. xi. c. 20.  Giannone, l. xxii. c. 8.]

[Footnote b: For the corruption of morals at Avignon during the secession, see
De Sade, Vie de Petrarque, t. i. p. 70, and several other passages.]

     These exactions were too much encouraged by the kings of France, who
participated in the plunder, or at least required the mutual assistance of the
popes for their own imposts on the clergy.  John XXII. obtained leave of
Charles the Fair to levy a tenth of ecclesiastical revenues; ^c and Clement
VI., in return, granted two-tenths to Philip of Valois for the expenses of his
war.  A similar tax was raised by the same authority towards the ransom of
John. ^d These were contributions for national purposes unconnected with
religion, which the popes had never before pretended to impose, and which the
king might properly have levied with the consent of his clergy, according to
the practice of England.  But that consent might not always be obtained with
ease, and it seemed a more expeditious method to call in the authority of the
pope.  A manlier spirit was displayed by our ancestors.  It was the boast of
England to have placed the first legal barrier to the usurpations of Rome, if
we except the insulated Pragmatic Sanction of St. Louis, from which the
practice of succeeding ages in France entirely deviated.  The English barons
had, in a letter addressed to Boniface VIII., absolutely disclaimed his
temporal supremacy over their crown, which he had attempted to set up by
intermeddling in the quarrel of Scotland. ^e This letter, it is remarkable, is
nearly coincident in point of time with that of the French nobility; and the
two combined may be considered as a joint protestation of both kingdoms, and a
testimony to the general sentiment among the superior ranks of the laity.  A
very few years afterwards, the parliament of Carlisle wrote a strong
remonstrance to Clement V. against the system of provisions and other
extortions, including that of first fruits, which it was rumored, they say, he
was meditating to demand. ^f But the court of Avignon was not to be moved by
remonstrances; and the feeble administration of Edward II. gave way to
ecclesiastical usurpations at home as well as abroad. ^g His magnanimous son
took a bolder line.  After complaining ineffectually to Clement VI. of the
enormous abuse which reserved almost all English benefices to the pope, and
generally for the benefit of aliens, ^h he passed in 1350 the famous statute
of provisors. This act, reciting one supposed to have been made at the
parliament of Carlisle, which, however, does not appear, ^i and complaining in
strong language of the mischief sustained through continual reservations of
benefices, enacts that all elections and collations shall be free, according
to law, and that, in case any provision or reservation should be made by the
court of Rome, the king should for that turn have the collation of such a
benefice, if it be of ecclesiastical election or patronage. ^j This devolution
to the crown, which seems a little arbitrary, was the only remedy that could
bee effectual against the connivance and timidity of chapters and spiritual
patrons.  We cannot assert that a statute so nobly planned was executed with
equal steadiness. Sometimes by royal dispensation, sometimes by neglect or
evasion, the papal bulls of provision were still obeyed, though fresh laws
were enacted to the same effect as the former.  It was found on examination in
1367 that some clerks enjoyed more than twenty benefices by the pope's
dispensation. ^k And the parliaments both of this and of Richard II.'s reign
invariably complain of the disregard shown to the statutes of provisors.  This
led to other measures, which I shall presently mention.

[Footnote c: Continuator Gul. de Nangis, in Spicilegio d'Achery, t. iii. p. 86
(folio edition).  Ita miseram ecclesiam, says this monk, unus tondet, alter
excoriat.]

[Footnote d: Fleury, Institut. au Droit Ecclesiastique, t. ii. p. 245.
Villaret, t. ix. p. 431.  It became a regular practice for the king to obtain
the pope's consent to lay a tax on his clergy, though he sometimes applied
first to themselves.  Garnier, t. xx. p. 141.]

[Footnote e: Rymer, t. ii. p. 373.  Collier, vol. i. p. 725.]

[Footnote f: Rotuli Parliament, vol. i. p. 204.  This passage, hastily read,
has led Collier and other English writers, such as Henry and Blackstone, into
the supposition that annates were imposed by Clement V. But the concurrent
testimony of foreign authors refers this tax to John XXII., as the canon law
also shows.  Extravagant.  Communes, l. iii. tit. ii. c. II.]

[Footnote g: The statute called Articuli cleri, in 1316, was directed rather
towards confirming than limiting the clerical immunity in criminal cases.]

[Footnote h: Collier, p. 546.]

[Footnote i: It is singular that Sir E. Coke should assert that this act
recites and is founded upon the statute 35 E. I., De asportatis religiosorum
(2 Inst. 580); whereas there is not the least resemblance in the words, and
very little, if any, in the substance.  Blackstone, in consequence, mistakes
the nature of that act of Edward I., and supposes it to have been made against
papal provisions, to which I do not perceive even an allusion.  Whether any
such statute was really made in the Carlisle parliament of 35 E. I., as is
asserted both in 25 E. III. and in the roll of another parliament, 17 E. III.
(Rot. Parl. t. ii. p. 144), is hard to decide; and perhaps those who examine
this point will have to choose between wilful suppression and wilful
interpolation.]

[Footnote j: 25 E. III. stat. 6.]

[Footnote k: Collier, p. 568.]

     The residence of the popes at Avignon gave very general offence to
Europe, and they could not themselves avoid perceiving the disadvantage of
absence from their proper diocese, the city of St. Peter, the source of all
their claims to sovereign authority.  But Rome, so long abandoned, offered but
an inhospitable reception: Urban V. returned to Avignon, after a short
experiment of the capital; and it was not till 1376 that the promise, often
repeated and long delayed, of restoring the papal chair to the metropolis of
Christendom, was ultimately fulfilled by Gregory XI. His death, which happened
soon afterwards, prevented, it is said, a second flight that he was preparing.
This was followed by the great schism, one of the most remarkable events in
ecclesiastical history. [A.D. 1377.] It is a difficult and by no means an
interesting question to determine the validity of that contested election
which distracted the Latin church for so many years.  All contemporary
testimonies are subject to the suspicion of partiality in a cause where no one
was permitted to be neutral.  In one fact, however, there is a common
agreement, that the cardinals, of whom the majority were French, having
assembled in conclave, for the election of a successor to Gregory XI., were
disturbed by a tumultuous populace, who demanded with menaces a Roman, or at
least an Italian, pope.  This tumult appears to have been sufficiently violent
to excuse, and in fact did produce, a considerable degree of intimidation.
After some time the cardinals made choice of the archbishop of Bari, a
Neapolitan, who assumed the name of Urban VI.  His election satisfied the
populace, and tranquillity was restored.  The cardinals announced their choice
to the absent members of their college, and behaved towards Urban as their
pope for several weeks.  But his uncommon harshness of temper giving them
offence, they withdrew to a neighboring town, and, protesting that his
election had been compelled by the violence of the Roman populace, annulled
the whole proceeding, and chose one of their own number, who took the
pontifical name of Clement VII.  Such are the leading circumstances which
produced the famous schism.  Constraint is so destructive of the essence of
election, that suffrages given through actual intimidation ought, I think, to
be held invalid, even without minutely inquiring whether the degree of illegal
force was such as might reasonably overcome the constancy of a firm mind. It
is improbable that the free votes of the cardinals would have been bestowed on
the Archbishop of Bari; and I should not feel much hesitation in pronouncing
his election to have been void. But the sacred college unquestionably did not
use the earliest opportunity of protesting against the violence they had
suffered; and we may infer almost with certainty, that, if Urban's conduct had
been more acceptable to that body, the world would have heard little of the
transient riot at his election.  This, however, opens a delicate question in
jurisprudence; namely, under what circumstances acts, not only irregular, but
substantially invalid, are capable of receiving a retroactive confirmation by
the acquiescence and acknowledgment of parties concerned to oppose them.  And
upon this, I conceive, the great problem of legitimacy between Urban and
Clement will be found to depend. ^l

[Footnote l: Lenfant has collected all the original testimonies on both sides
in the first book of his Concile de Pise.  No positive decision has ever been
made on this subject, but the Roman popes are numbered in the commonly
received list, and those of Avignon are not.  The modern Italian writers
express doubt about the legitimacy of Urban; the French at most intimate that
Clement's pretensions were not to be wholly rejected.]

     Whatever posterity may have judged about the pretensions of these
competitors, they at that time shared the obedience of Europe in nearly equal
proportions.  Urban remained at Rome; Clement resumed the station of Avignon.
To the former adhered Italy, the Empire, England, and the nations of the
north; the latter retained in his allegiance France, Spain, Scotland, and
Sicily.  Fortunately for the church, no question of religious faith intermixed
itself with this schism; nor did any other impediment to reunion exist than
the obstinacy and selfishness of the contending parties.  As it was impossible
to come to any agreement on the original merits, there seemed to be no means
of healing the wound but by the abdication of both popes and a fresh
undisputed election.  This was the general wish of Europe, but urged with
particular zeal by the court of France, and, above all, by the university of
Paris, which esteems this period the most honorable in her annals.  The
cardinals, however, of neither obedience would recede so far from their party
as to suspend the election of a successor upon a vacancy of the pontificate,
which would have at least removed one-half of the obstacle.  The Roman
conclave accordingly placed three pontiffs successively, Boniface IX.,
Innocent VI., and Gregory XII., in the seat of Urban VI.; and the cardinals at
Avignon, upon the death of Clement in 1394, elected Benedict XIII. (Peter de
Luna), famous for his inflexible obstinacy in prolonging the schism. He
repeatedly promised to sacrifice his dignity for the sake of union. But there
was no subterfuge to which this crafty pontiff had not recourse in order to
avoid compliance with his word, though importuned, threatened, and even
besieged in his palace at Avignon.  Fatigued by his evasions, France withdrew
her obedience, and the Gallican church continued for a few years without
acknowledging any supreme head.  But this step, which was rather the measure
of the university of Paris than of the nation, it seemed advisable to retract;
and Benedict was again obeyed, though France continued to urge his
resignation.  A second subtraction of obedience, or at least declaration of
neutrality, was resolved upon, as preparatory to the convocation of a general
council.  On the other hand, those who sat at Rome displayed not less
insincerity.  Gregory XII. bound himself by oath on his accession to abdicate
when it should appear necessary.  But while these rivals were loading each
other with the mutual reproach of schism, they drew on themselves the
suspicion of at least a virtual collusion in order to retain their respective
stations.  At length the cardinals of both parties, wearied with so much
dissimulation, deserted their masters, and summoned a general council to meet
at Pisa. ^m

[Footnote m: Villaret; Lenfant, Concile de Pise; Crevier, Hist. de
l'Universite de Paris, t. iii.]

     The council assembled at Pisa deposed both Gregory and Benedict, without
deciding in any respect as to their pretensions, and elected Alexander V. by
its own supreme authority.  [A.D. 1409.] This authority, however, was not
universally recognized; the schism, instead of being healed, became more
desperate; for as Spain adhered firmly to Benedict, and Gregory was not
without supporters, there were now three contending pontiffs in the church.  A
general council was still, however, the favorite and indeed the sole remedy;
and John XXIII., a successor of Alexander V., was reluctantly prevailed upon,
or perhaps trepanned, into convoking one to meet at Constance.  [A.D. 1414.]
In this celebrated assembly he was himself deposed; a sentence which he
incurred by that tenacious clinging to his dignity, after repeated promises to
abdicate, which had already proved fatal to his competitors.  The deposition
of John, confessedly a legitimate pope, may strike us as an extraordinary
measure.  But, besides the opportunity it might afford of restoring union, the
council found a pretext for this sentence in his enormous vices, which indeed
they seem to have taken upon common fame without any judicial process.  The
true motive, however, of their proceedings against him was a desire to make a
signal display of a new system which had rapidly gained ground, and which I
may venture to call the whig principles of the Catholic church.  A great
question was at issue, whether the polity of that establishment should be an
absolute or an exceedingly limited monarchy.  The papal tyranny, long endured
and still increasing, had excited an active spirit of reformation which the
most distinguished ecclesiastics of France and other countries encouraged.
They recurred, as far as their knowledge allowed, to a more primitive
discipline than the canon law, and elevated the supremacy of general councils.
But in the formation of these they did not scruple to introduce material
innovations. The bishops have usually been considered the sole members of
ecclesiastical assemblies.  At Constance, however, sat and voted not only the
chiefs of monasteries, but the ambassadors of all Christian princes, the
deputies of universities, with a multitude of inferior theologians, and even
doctors of law. ^n These were naturally accessible to the pride of sudden
elevation, which enabled them to control the strong, and humiliate the lofty.
In addition to this the adversaries of the court of Rome carried another not
less important innovation.  The Italian bishops, almost universally in the
papal interest, were so numerous that, if suffrages had been taken by the
head, their preponderance would have impeded any measures of transalpine
nations towards reformation.  It was determined, therefore, that the council
should divide itself into four nations, the Italian, the German, the French,
and the English, each with equal rights; and that, every proposition having
been separately discussed, the majority of the four should prevail. ^o This
revolutionary spirit was very unacceptable to the cardinals, who submitted
reluctantly, and with a determination, that did not prove altogether
unavailing, to save their papal monarchy by a dexterous policy.  They could
not, however, prevent the famous resolutions of the fourth and fifth sessions,
which declare that the council has received, by divine right, an authority to
which every rank, even the papal, is obliged to submit, in matters of faith,
in the extirpation of the present schism, and in the reformation of the church
both in its head and its members; and that every person, even a pope, who
shall obstinately refuse to obey that council, or any other lawfully
obstinately refuse to obey that council, or any other lawfully assembled, is
liable to such punishment as shall be necessary. ^p These decrees are the
great pillars of that moderate theory with respect to the papal authority
which distinguished the Gallican church, and is embraced, I presume, by almost
all laymen and the major part of ecclesiastics on this side of the Alps. ^q
They embarrass the more popish churchmen, as the Revolution does our English
tories; some boldly impugn the authority of the council of Constance, while
others chicane upon the interpretation of its decrees.  Their practical
importance is not, indeed, direct; universal councils exist only in
possibility; but the acknowledgment of a possible authority paramount to the
see of Rome has contributed, among other means, to check its usurpations.

[Footnote n: Lenfant, Concile de Constance, t. i. p. 107 (edit. 1727).
Crevier, t. iii. p. 405.  It was agreed that the ambassadors could not vote
upon the articles of faith, but only on questions relating to the settlement
of the church.  But the second order of ecclesiastics were allowed to vote
generally.]

[Footnote o: This separation of England, as a co-equal limb of the council
gave great umbrage to the French, who maintained that, like Denmark and
Sweden, it ought to have been reckoned along with Germany.  The English
deputies came down with a profusion of authorities to prove the antiquity of
their monarchy, for which they did not fail to put in requisition the
immeasurable pedigrees of Ireland.  Joseph of Arimathea, who planted
Christianity and his stick at Glastonbury, did his best to help the cause. The
recent victory at Azincourt, I am inclined to think, had more weight with the
council.  Lenfant, t. ii. p. 46.

     At a time when a very different spirit prevailed, the English bishops
under Henry II. and Henry III. had claimed as a right that no more than four
of their number should be summoned to a general council.  Hoveden, p. 320;
Carte, vol. ii. p. 84.  This was like boroughs praying to be released from
sending members to parliament.]

[Footnote p: Id. p. 164.  Crevier, t. iii. p. 417.]

[Footnote q: This was written in 1816.  The present state of opinion among
those who belong to the Gallican church has become exceedingly different from
what it was in the last two centuries.  [1847.]]

     The purpose for which these general councils had been required, next to
that of healing the schism, was the reformation of abuses.  All the rapacious
exactions, all the scandalous venality of which Europe had complained, while
unquestioned pontiffs ruled at Avignon, appeared light in comparison of the
practices of both rivals during the schism.  Tenths repeatedly levied upon the
clergy, annates rigorously exacted and enhanced by new valuations, fees
annexed to the complicated formalities of the papal chancery, were the means
by which each half of the church was compelled to reimburse its chief for the
subtraction of the other's obedience.  Boniface IX., one of the Roman line,
whose fame is a little worse than that of his antagonists, made a gross
traffic of his patronage; selling the privileges of exemption from ordinary
jurisdiction, of holding benefices in commendam, and other dispensations
invented for the benefit of the Holy See. ^r Nothing had been attempted at
Pisa towards reformation.  At Constance the majority were ardent and sincere;
the representatives of the French, German, and English churches met with a
determined and, as we have seen, not always unsuccessful resolution to assert
their ecclesiastical liberties.  They appointed a committee of reformation,
whose recommendations, if carried into effect, would have annihilated almost
entirely that artfully constructed machinery by which Rome had absorbed so
much of the revenues and patronage of the church. But men, interested in
perpetuating these abuses, especially the cardinals, improved the advantages
which a skilful government always enjoys in playing against a popular
assembly.  They availed themselves of the jealousies arising out of the
division of the council into nations, which exterior political circumstances
had enhanced.  France, then at war with England, whose pretensions to be
counted as a fourth nation she had warmly disputed, and not well disposed
towards the Emperor Sigismund, joined with the Italians against the English
and German members of the council in a matter of the utmost importance, the
immediate election of a pope before the articles of reformation should be
finally concluded. These two nations, in return, united with the Italians to
choose the Cardinal Colonna, against the advice of the French divines, who
objected to any member of the sacred college.  The court of Rome were gainers
in both questions.  Martin V., the new pope, soon evinced his determination to
elude any substantial reform.  After publishing a few constitutions tending to
redress some of the abuses that had arisen during the schism, he contrived to
make separate conventions with the several nations, and as soon as possible
dissolved the council. ^s

[Footnote r: Lenfant, Hist. du Concile de Pise, passim; Crevier; Villaret;
Schmidt; Collier.]

[Footnote s: Lenfant, Concile de Constance.  The copiousness as well as
impartiality of this work justly renders it an almost exclusive authority.
Crevier (Hist. de l'Universite de Paris, t. iii.) has given a good sketch of
the council, and Schmidt (Hist. des Allemandes, t. v.) is worthy of
attention.]

     By one of the decrees passed in Constance, another general council was to
be assembled in five years, a second at the end of seven more, and from that
time a similar representation of the church was to meet every ten years, a
second at the end of seven more, and from that time a similar representation
of the church was to meet every ten years.  Martin V. accordingly convoked a
council at Pavia, which, on account of the plague, was transferred to Siena;
but nothing of importance was transacted by this assembly. ^t That which he
summoned seven years afterwards to the city of Basle had very different
results.  [A.D. 1433.] The pope, dying before the meeting of this council, was
succeeded by Eugenius IV., who, anticipating the spirit of its discussions,
attempted to crush its independence in the outset, by transferring the place
of session to an Italian city.  No point was reckoned so material in the
contest between the popes and reformers as whether a council should sit in
Italy or beyond the Alps.  The council of Basle began, as it proceeded, in
open enmity to the court of Rome. Eugenius, after several years had elapsed in
more or less hostile discussions, exerted his prerogative of removing the
assembly to Ferrara, and from thence to Florence.  For this he had a specious
pretext in the negotiation, then apparently tending to a prosperous issue, for
the reunion of the Greek church; a triumph, however transitory, of which his
council at Florence obtained the glory.  On the other hand, the assembly of
Basle, though much weakened by the defection of those who adhered to Eugenius,
entered into compacts with the Bohemian insurgents, more essential to the
interests of the church than any union with the Greeks, and completed the work
begun at Constance by abolishing the annates, the reservations of benefices,
and other abuses of papal authority.  In this it received the approbation of
most princes; but when, provoked by the endeavors of the pope to frustrate its
decrees, it proceeded so far as to suspend and even to depose him, neither
France nor Germany concurred in the sentence.  Even the council of Constance
had not absolutely asserted a right of deposing a lawful pope, except in case
of heresy, though their conduct towards John could not otherwise be justified.
^u This question indeed of ecclesiastical public law seems to be still
undecided.  The fathers of Basle acted, however, with greater intrepidity than
discretion, and, not perhaps sensible of the change that was taking place in
public opinion, raised Amadeus, a retired Duke of Savoy, to the pontifical
dignity by the name of Felix V.  They thus renewed the schism, and divided the
obedience of the Catholic church for a few years.  The empire, however, as
well as France, observed a singular and not very consistent neutrality;
respecting Eugenius as a lawful pope, and the assembly at Basle as a general
council.  England warmly supported Eugenius, and even adhered to his council
at Florence; Aragon and some countries of smaller note acknowledged Felix.
But the partisans of Basle became every year weaker; and Nicholas V., the
successor of Eugenius, found no great difficulty in obtaining the cession of
Felix, and terminating this schism. This victory of the court of Rome over the
council of Basle nearly counterbalanced the disadvantageous events at
Constance, and put an end to the project of fixing permanent limitations upon
the head of the church by means of general councils.  Though the decree that
prescribed the convocation of a council every ten years was still unrepealed,
no absolute monarchs have ever more dreaded to meet the representatives of
their people, than the Roman pontiffs have abhorred the name of those
ecclesiastical synods: once alone, and that with the utmost reluctance, has
the Catholic church been convoked since the council of Basle; but the famous
assembly to which I allude does not fall within the scope of my present
undertaking. ^v

[Footnote t: Lenfant, Guerre des Hussites, t. i. p. 223.]

[Footnote u: The council of Basle endeavored to evade this difficulty by
declaring Eugenius a relapsed heretic.  Lenfant, Guerre des Hussites, t. ii.
p. 98.  But as the church could discover no heresy in his disagreement with
that assembly, the sentence of deposition gained little strength by this
previous decision.  The bishops were unwilling to take this violent step
against Eugenius; but the minor theologians, the democracy of the Catholic
church, whose right of suffrage seems rather an anomalous infringement of
episcopal authority, pressed it with much heat and rashness.  See a curious
passage on this subject in a speech of the Cardinal of Arles.  Lenfant, t. ii.
p. 225.]

[Footnote v: There is not, I believe, any sufficient history of the council of
Basle.  Lenfant designed to write it from the original acts, but, finding his
health decline, intermixed some rather imperfect notices of its transactions
with his history of the Hussite war, which is commonly quoted under the title
of History of the Council of Basle.  Schmidt, Crevier, Villaret, are still my
other authorities.]