The Historians' History of the World 08

THE GREAT COUNCILS OF PISA AND CONSTANCE; JOHN HUSS

[1409-1429 A.D.]

The Council of Pisa, which was designed to heal the wounds of the divided church, unexpectedly inflicted upon her a new wound. On the 5th of June it passed a heavy sentence on each of the pontiffs; for it declared them both to be heretical, perjured, contumacious, unworthy of any honour, and no longer members of the church. As the next step, the council created Pietro Philarghi of Candia sovereign pontiff in their place, on the 26th of June; and he assumed the name of Alexander V. But the two pontiffs spurned the decrees of this council, and continued still to perform their functions. Benedict held a council at Perpignan, and Gregory assembled another at Austria, near Aquileia; but fearing the resentments of the Venetians, he went first to Gaeta, where he threw himself upon the protection of Ladislaus, king of Naples, and then fled, in 1412, to Rimini.

The church was thus divided among three pontiffs, who fiercely assailed each other with reciprocal excommunications, reproaches, and maledictions. Alexander V, who was elected in the Council of Pisa, died at Bologna in 1410. The sixteen cardinals, who were present in the city, immediately filled his place with Baltasare Cossa, a Neapolitan, who took the name of John XXIII, a man destitute of principle and of piety. From this war of the pontiffs vast evils arose which afflicted both the church and the state. Hence the emperor Sigismund, the king of France, and other kings and princes of Europe, spared no pains nor expense to restore harmony and bring the church again under one head. From the pontiffs it was found quite impossible to obtain any personal sacrifice for the peace of the church; so that no course remained but to assemble a general council of the whole church, to take cognisance of this great controversy. Such an assembly John XXIII, being prevailed on by the entreaties of Sigismund and hoping that it would favour his cause, appointed to be held at Constance in 1414. In this council were present the pontiff John, the emperor Sigismund, many princes of Germany, and ambassadors from the absent kings and princes of Europe, and from the republics.

The principal object of this great council was to extinguish the discord between the pontiffs; and this business was accomplished successfully. For having established by two solemn decrees, in the fourth and fifth sessions, that a pontiff is subject to a council of the whole church, and having most carefully substantiated the authority of councils, the fathers, on the 29th of May, 1415, removed John XXIII from the pontificate on account of various offences and crimes; for he had pledged himself to the council to resign the pontificate, and yet withdrew himself by flight. Gregory XII voluntarily resigned his pontificate on the 4th of July in the same year, through Carlo Malatesta. And Benedict XIII, on the 26th of July, 1417, was deprived of his rank as a pontiff by a solemn decree of the council. After these transactions, on the 11th of November, 1417, Otto Colonna was elected pontiff by the unanimous suffrages of the cardinals, and assumed the name of Martin V. Benedict XIII, who resided at Perpignan, resisted indeed, and claimed the rights and the dignity of a pontiff till his death, 1423; and after the death of this obstinate man, under the auspices of Alfonso, king of Sicily, Ægidius (Giles) Nuños, a Spaniard, was appointed to succeed him, by only two cardinals. He assumed the name of Clement VIII, and wished to be regarded as the legitimate pontiff; but in the year 1429 he was persuaded to resign the government of the church entirely to Martin V.

[1407-1416 A.D.]

The things done in this council for the repression and extirpation of heretics are not equally commendable; some of them, indeed, are quite inexcusable. Before the council sat, great religious commotions had arisen in several countries, but especially in Bohemia. There lived and taught at Prague, with much applause, an eloquent and learned man, by name John Huss, who acted as a professor of theology in the university and as a minister of holy things in the church. Vehemently did he declaim against priestly vices of every kind; which was generally done in that age, and no good man disapproved it. He likewise endeavoured, after the year 1408, to detach the university from acknowledging as pontiff Gregory XII, whom Bohemia had hitherto obeyed. This gave great offence to the archbishop of Prague and to the rest of the clergy, who were devoted partisans of Gregory. Hence arose great hostility between Huss and the archbishop, which the former kept up and increased by his discourses against the Romish court and the vices of the clergy.