Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/338

 322 POLITICAL HERESY. — THE STATE. explaining that it was necessary to propitiate his dear son, the King of France. If the popular belief was that the sentence was rendered by Philippe's command, it was not without justification. Thus, after all this cruelty and labor, the Order was abolished without being convicted. There can be little doubt that the coun- cil acquiesced willingly in this solution of the question. The individual members were thus relieved of responsibility, and they felt that the Order had been so foully dealt with that policy re- quired injustice to be carried out to the bitter end.* The next point to be determined was the disposition of the Templar property, which gave rise to a long and somewhat bitter debate. Various plans were proposed, but finally Clement suc- tres ineditesde Philippe le Bel, p. 179. — Chron. Cornel. Zantfliet ann. 1307 (Mar- tene Ampl. Coll. V. 154). — Bull. Vox in excelso (Van Os, pp. 75-77). — Bern. Guidon. Flor. Chron. (Bouquet, XXI. 721).— Wilcke, II. 307.— Gurtleri Hist. Templarior. Arastel. 1703, p. 365.— Vertot. Hist, des Chev. de Malthe, Ed. 1755, Tom II. p. 136.— Contin. Guill. Xangiac. ann. 1311-12.— Martin. Polon. Contin. (Eccard. I. 1438).— Trithem. Chron. Hirsaug. ann. 1307. When, in 1773, Clement XIV. desired to abolish the Order of Jesuits by an arbitrary exercise of papal power, he did not fail to find a precedent in the sup- pression of the Templars by Clement V. — as he says in his bull of July 22, 1773, u Etiamsi concilium generale Viennense, cui negotium examinandum commiserat, a formali et definitiva sententia ferenda censuerit se abstinere." — Bullar. Roman. Contin. Prati, 1847, V. 620. The wits of the day did not allow the affair to pass unimproved. Bernard Gui cites as current at the time the Leonine verse, ;i Res est exempli destructa superbia Templi." 1 Hocsemius quotes for us a chronogram by P. de Awans, pos- sibly alluding to the treasure which Philippe gained — "Excidium Templi nimia pinguedine rempli Ad LILIVM duo C consocianda doce." To minds of other temper there were not lacking portents to prove the anger of Heaven, whether at the crimes of the Order or at its destruction — eclipses of sun and moon, parabulia, paraselenae, fires darting from earth to heaven, thunder in clear sky. Xear Padua a mare dropped a foal with nine feet; flocks of birds of an unknown species were seen in Lombard? ; throughout the Paduan terri- tory a rainy winter was succeeded by a dry summer with hail-storms, so that the harvests were a failure. No Etruscan haruspex or Roman augur could wish for clearer omens : it reads like a page of Livy. — Albertini Mussati Hist. August. Rubr. x. xi. (Muratori S. R. I. X. 377-9).— Cf. Ptol. Lucens. Hist. Eccles. Lib. xxiy. (lb. XI. 1233) ; Pr. Jordan. Chron. ann. 1314 (Muratori Antiq. XI. 789).
 * Jo. Hocsemii Gest. Episcc. Leodiens. (Chapeaville, II. 345). — Baudouin. Let-