Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/648

 G32 CONCLUSION. reason is the negligence of the Holy See, which of old, as we are told, used to send legates through the kingdoms to look after the condition of religion ; but now this is never done, and they are sent only for worldly objects. AVe see, he says, that it labors without ceasing to slay schismatics, but we never see it solicitous to convert them. The eloquence of Arnaldo de Yilanova was required to persuade Frederic that all this was compatible with the truth of Christianity, and he undertook to introduce a reforma- tion in his own kingdom, commencing with himself.* Marsiglio of Padua may be a suspected witness when he as- sumes, as a universally recognized fact, the corruption of the mass of ecclesiastics. They despoiled the poor, they were insatiable in their greed, and what they wrung from their flocks was wasted in debauchery. Boys, unlettered men, unknown persons, were pro- moted to benefices, and the bishops, by their example, carried to destruction more souls than they saved by their teaching. But his contemporary, Alvaro Pelayo, the Franciscan penitentiary of John XXII., is beyond suspicion, and he describes the Church of his time as completely secularized. There is no act of secular life in which priests and monks are not busy. As for the prel- ates, he can only compare them to the fabled Lamia, with a human head and the body of a beast — a monstrous fury which tears its own offspring to pieces and destroys all within its reach. The prelates, he says, give no teaching to their people, but flay and rend them. The bread due to the poor is lavished on jesters and dogs. Faith and justice have abandoned the earth ; there is no humanity or kindness ; the voracious flame of wrath and envy destroys the Church and skins the poor with fraud and simony. Scripture and the canons are regarded as fables. Through the iniquity of the priests and prelates the evils gather, for they pub- licly pervert the law, they render false judgments, they add blood to blood, for many perish through their frauds and machinations. They gloss and declare the law as they choose. The doctors and prelates and priests shed the blood of the just. They take the broad path that leads to destruction, and will not enter, nor per- mit others to enter, the narrow way that conducts to eternal life. This description is fully borne out by a letter of Benedict XII. to Pelayo, Heterodoxos Espanoles, I. 721-3, 735-6.