The Historians' History of the World 08

Having obtained what they wanted from Pepin and Charlemagne, it was still their interest to pursue the same policy; to compound for their own independence, as they did with Charlemagne and his successors, by defending the pretences of foreign kings to the sovereignty of the rest of Italy. This has been their policy for centuries. It is their policy still; and that policy has been the curse of Italy. This fatal gift of the patrimony of St. Peter—as Dante saw, as Machiavelli saw, as all clear-sighted Italians have seen—has kept her divided, torn by civil wars, conquered and reconquered by foreign invaders. Unable, as a celibate ecclesiastic, to form his dominions into a strong hereditary kingdom; unable as the hierophant of a priestly caste to unite his people in the bonds of national life; unable, as Borgia tried to do, to conquer the rest of Italy for himself, and form it into a kingdom large enough to have weight in the balance of power, the pope was forced, again and again, to keep himself on his throne by intriguing with foreign princes, and calling in foreign arms; and the bane of Italy, from the time of Stephen III to that of Pius IX, was the temporal power of the pope. But on the popes, also, the Nemesis came. In building their power on the Roman relics, on the fable that Rome was the patrimony of Peter, they had built on a lie; and that lie avenged itself.

Having committed themselves to the false position of being petty kings of a petty kingdom, they had to endure continual treachery and tyranny from their foreign allies—to see not merely Italy, but Rome itself, insulted and even sacked by faithful Catholics, and to become more and more, as the centuries rolled on, the tools of those very kings whom they had wished to make their tools.

True, they defended themselves long, and with astonishing skill and courage. Their sources of power were two, the moral and the thaumaturgic, and they used them both; but when the former failed, the latter became useless. As long as their moral power was real; as long as they and their clergy were on the whole, in spite of enormous faults, the best men in Europe, so long the people believed in them, and in their thaumaturgic relics likewise. But they became by no means the best men in Europe. Then they began to think that after all it was more easy to work the material than the moral power—easier to work the bones than to work righteousness. They were deceived. Behold! when the righteousness was gone, the bones refused to work. People began to question the virtue of the bones, and to ask, “We can believe that the bones may have worked miracles for good men, but for bad men? We will examine whether they work any miracles at all.” And then, behold, it came out that the bones did not work miracles, and that possibly they were not saints’ bones at all; and then the storm came; and the lie, as all lies do, punished itself. That salt had lost its savour. They who had been the light of Europe, became its darkness; they who had been first, became last; a warning to mankind until the end of time, that on truth and virtue depends the only abiding strength.h

FOOTNOTES

[91] Another ecclesiastic of the same name was elected by the people immediately after the death of Zacharias; but he did not live to enjoy his elevation. On the third morning after his election he was struck with apoplexy, and as he had not been consecrated, he is sometimes omitted in the pontifical calendar. See Platina,i p. 152, and Fleury.j Baroniusk appears to say that the omission of his name is wrong.

CHAPTER III. THE HIGH NOON OF THE PAPACY

[985-1305 A.D.]

During the minority of Otto III the Tuscan party exercised undisputed sway in Rome, without any check from without. No sooner was Otto II dead than Boniface VII reappeared from exile, and having seized his rival John XIV, and put him to death by starvation, for two years occupied unresisted the papal chair. Nevertheless Boniface VII was not a friend of the Tuscan party. By the people his dead body was treated with insults. Boniface’s successor, John XV, not proving as pliant as Crescentius the consul desired, was driven from Rome and reduced to the necessity of again appealing to the imperial authority. He was permitted to return.b