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The Historians' History of the World 08 [Parthians, Sassanids and Arabs; The Crusades and the Papacy]
- Автор: Gutenberg
- Год: 1905
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: История
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After this the council prosecuted with energy the business upon which it had entered. The legates of the Roman pontiff were now admitted; but not until they had promised under oath to obey the decrees of the council, and particularly the decrees of the Council of Constance, asserting the dominion and jurisdiction of councils over the pontiffs. These very decrees of Constance, so odious to the pontiffs, were renewed in a public meeting of the fathers on the 26th of June, 1434. And on the 9th of June, 1435, annates, as they were called, were abolished, the pontifical legates in vain opposing it. On the 25th of March, 1436, a profession of faith was read, intended for the pope himself on the day of his election. The number of cardinals was reduced to twenty-four; and expectatives, reservations, and provisions were abolished.
Other things coming on little agreeable to the pontiff, Eugenius concluded that this very audacious and troublesome council must either be removed into Italy or be curbed by another council in opposition to it. Therefore, when these fathers decreed, on May 7th, 1437, that on account of the Greeks the council should be held either at Bâle, or Avignon, or in some city of Savoy, the pontiff, on the contrary, by his legates, decided that the council should be held in Italy. Neither party would revoke its decision. Hence a violent conflict, from this time onward, existed between the pontiff and the council. On the 26th of July, 1437, the council ordered the pontiff to appear before them at Bâle, and give account of his conduct. The pontiff, on the other hand, dissolved the council, and appointed another at Ferrara. But the fathers, with the approbation of the emperor, the king of France, and other princes, continued their deliberations at Bâle; and on the 28th of September of the same year pronounced the pontiff contumacious for not obeying the decree of a council.
On the 10th of January of the next year, 1438, Eugenius IV, in person, opened the council which he had summoned to meet at Ferrara; and in the second session of it excommunicated the fathers assembled at Bâle. The chief business of this council was to negotiate a union between the Greeks and Latins. The Greek emperor himself, Joannes Palæologus, the patriarch of Constantinople, Joseph, and the principal theologians and bishops of the nation had come personally to Italy, in order to facilitate the success of this important negotiation. For the Greeks, now reduced to extremities by the Turks, indulged the hope that if their disagreements with the Roman pontiff were removed the Latins would afford them succour. The business proceeded tardily, and with little success at Ferrara; but afterwards rather better at Florence. For Eugenius in the beginning of the year 1439, on account of the pestilence at Ferrara, had ordered the council to remove to Florence. The fathers at Bâle, provoked by these and other acts of Eugenius, proceeded on the 25th of June, 1439, to deprive him of the pontificate; but this bold procedure of theirs was not approved by the kings and princes of Europe. Eugenius, on the 4th of September, by a very severe bull anathematised the Basilian fathers and rescinded all their acts. Despising these thunders, on the 17th of September, 1439, they elected a new pontiff, Amadeus, duke of Savoy, who then led a retired life at Ripaille on the Leman Lake (Lake of Geneva). He assumed the name of Felix V.
[1439-1449 A.D.]
Thus the lamentable schism, which had been extinguished after so much labour and toil at Constance, returned with new and greater misfortunes. For there were not only two pontiffs mutually condemning each other, but likewise, what was worse, two opposing councils, that of Bâle and that of Florence. The greater part of the church, indeed, adhered to Eugenius; but most of the universities, and particularly the first among them, that of Paris, as well as some kingdoms and provinces, chose to follow Felix V. The Council of Bâle continued to deliberate and to pass laws and decrees till the year 1443, notwithstanding all the opposition of Eugenius and his adherents. And although the fathers separated in that year, they nevertheless publicly declared that the council was not at an end, but would assemble again at a proper time, either at Bâle, or Lyons, or Lausanne. The Council of Florence was chiefly occupied in settling the disputes between the Latins and the Greeks. This great business was committed to selected individuals of both parties. The principal one on the part of the Greeks was Bessarion, a very learned man, who was afterwards admitted into the order of cardinals in the Roman church. This man, being gained by the favours bestowed on him by the pontiff, exerted his influence, and the pontiff employed rewards, threats, and promises to induce the other Greeks to accede to the proposed terms of accommodation, and to acknowledge that the Holy Spirit proceeded also from the Son, that departed souls undergo a purgation by fire before they are admitted to the vision of God, that bread which is without leaven may be used in the sacred supper, and lastly, what was most important of all, that the Roman pontiff is the head and the judge of the church universal. One of the Greeks, Mark of Ephesus, could not be persuaded, by entreaties or by bribes, to give his assent. After all, this peace, which was extorted by various artifices, was not stable. For the Greeks, on returning to Constantinople, stated to their fellow-citizens that everything had been carried at Florence by fraud, and they resumed their hostility. The Council of Florence itself put an end to its deliberations on the 26th of April, 1442. There were also negotiations in this council for bringing the Armenians, and the Jacobites, but especially the Abyssinians, into union with the Romish church; which were attended with the same result as those respecting the Greeks.
[1447-1455 A.D.]
The author of this new pontifical schism, Eugenius IV, died in the month of February, 1447, and was succeeded in the month of March by Nicholas V, who was previously Tommaso Parentucelli of Sarzana, bishop of Bologna, a man of learning himself and a great patron of learning, and likewise moderate in temper and disposed for peace. Under him, by means of the persevering labours and efforts of the kings and princes of Europe, especially of the king of France, tranquillity was restored to the Latin church. For Felix V, on the 9th of April, 1449, himself resigned the supremacy of the church, and retired to his former quiet at Ripaille; and the Basilian fathers, being assembled on the 16th of April at Lausanne, ratified his voluntary abdication, and by a solemn decree directed the whole church to obey Nicholas only. On the 18th of June Nicholas promulgated this pacification; and, at the same time, confirmed by his sanction the acts and decrees of the Council of Bâle. This Nicholas was particularly distinguished for his love of literature and the arts, which he laudably exerted himself to advance and encourage in Italy, especially by means of the Greeks that came from Constantinople. He died on the 24th of March, 1455, principally from grief, occasioned by the capture of Constantinople by the Turks.c
At this date Milman closes his splendid work on The History of Latin Christianity. It will be profitable to quote his summing up of the point reached by Nicholas V, eight and a half centuries after Gregory the Great.a
MILMAN ON NICHOLAS V AND THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE
[1447-1458 A.D.]
The pontificate of Nicholas V is the culminating point of Latin Christianity. The papal power indeed had long reached its zenith. From Innocent III to Boniface VIII it had begun its decline. But Latin Christianity was alike the religion of the popes and of the councils which contested their supremacy. It was as yet no more than a sacerdotal strife whether the pope should maintain an irresponsible autocracy, or be limited and controlled by an ubiquitous, aristocratic senate. The most ardent reformers looked no further than to strengthen the hierarchy. The prelates were determined to emancipate themselves from the usurpations of the pope, as to their elections, their arbitrary taxation by Rome, the undermining of their authority by perpetual appeals; but they had no notion of relaxing in the least the ecclesiastical domination. It was not that Christendom might govern itself, but that themselves might have a more equal share in the government. They were as jealously attached as the pope to the creed of Latin Christianity. The council, not the pope, burned John Huss. Their concessions to the Bohemians were extorted from their fears, not granted by their liberality. The Vulgate was their Bible, the Latin service their exclusive liturgy, the Canon Law their code of jurisprudence.