Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/657

 DEMORALIZATION OF THE LAITY. 041 was thrown into the dungeon of the abbey, a building without light and ventilation, except a narrow slit through which to pass in food. Here he died, without even the viaticum, his request for a confessor being refused, and when, as he was dying, the abbot and some of the monks entered, the blood flowed copiously from his nose, showing that they were his murderers.* Under the guidance of a Church such as this, the moral condi- tion of the laity was unutterably depraved. Uniformity of faith had been enforced by the Inquisition and its methods, and so long as faith was preserved, crime and sin were comparatively unim- portant except as a source of revenue to those who sold absolution. As Theodoric Vrie tersely puts it, hell and purgatory would be emptied if enough money could be found. The artificial standard thus created is seen in a revelation of the Virgin to St. Birgitta, that a pope who was free from heresy, no matter how polluted by sin and vice, is not so wicked but that he has the absolute power to bind and loose souls. There are many. wicked popes plunged in hell, but all their lawful acts on earth are accepted and con- firmed by God, and all priests who are not heretics administer true sacraments, no matter how depraved they may be. Correct- ness of belief was thus the sole essential ; virtue was a wholly sub- ordinate consideration. How completely under such a system re- ligion and morals came to be dissociated is seen in the remarks of Pius II. quoted above, that the Franciscans were excellent theo- logians, but cared nothing about virtue. f This, in fact, was the direct result of the system of persecution embodied in the Inquisition. Heretics who were admitted to be patterns of virtue were ruthlessly exterminated in the name of Christ, while in the same holy name the orthodox could purchase — Angeli Rumpheri Hist. Formbacb. Lib. n. (Pez, I. iii. 446, 451-2). Tbis is by no means a solitary case. In 1329 the Abbot of La Grasse was by a judgment of the Parlement of Paris deprived for life of haute justice, and the abbey condemned in a fine of thirty thousand livres to the king and six hundred livres damages to victims, for murders committed, illegal tortures, and other crimes.— A. Molinier, Vaissette, fid. Privat, IX. 417. t Gersoni de Reform. Eccles. c. xxiv. (Von der Hardt, I. v. 125-8). — Theod. Vrie Hist. Concil. Constant. Lib. iv. Dist. vii.— Revel. S. Brigitta? Lib. vn. cap. vii. IIL-41
 * Joann. de Trittenheiin Lib. Lugubris de Statu et Ruina Monast. Ord. c. i., iii.