Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 11.djvu/504

 PAPAL

45"4

PAPAL

does not really continue the teaehing of his preilo- cessors.

Eventually, the Concordat of Worms (23 Sept., 1122) took u]) and handed down the average me- dieval political ijractice, without satisfying the extreme representatives of papal or imjicrial claims. Greg- ory, however, developed the contractual idea of the Coronation oath. This he declared to be, as were all other oaths, under the Church's dominion, and con- sequently could be annulled by jiapal authority, thus releasing subjects from obedience to their sovereign (Decretum. causa xv, Q. (5, c. 2; Stephen of Tournai, "Summa Decretorum", causa xv, Q. 6, c. 2. Auctorit. iii). The next great papal ruler. Innocent III (1198- 1216), did not take the same attitude toward tem- poral power, though in personal exercise of authority he exceeded Gregory. He says explicitly: "We do not exercise any temporal jiuisdiction except indi- rectly" (Epistola;, IV, 17, 13). He interfered, it is true, to annul the election of Philip of Suabia and to confirm Otto in the imperial dignity, but he was at pains to point out that his legate was only a denun- ciator, or declarer of worthiness, not a cognitor or elector. The pope could not override the electoral system of the empire, he could only judge, confirm, and, in divided elections only, decide on the candidate (Decretals, 1, 6, 34; Carlyle, "History of Mediaeval Political Thought", II, 217; Barry, "Papal Mon- archy", XVIII, 292).

Again in the dispute between the French and En- glish Kings, Innocent III distinctly declares that he makes no claim to settle matters of fiefs {nan enim in- temdimus judicare de feudo cujus ad ipfsum special judicium, Decretals, ii, I, 13). Nor had he any in- tention of diminishing the royal authority. His whole justification rests on three grounds: (a) the English king had appealed to him against his brother- king on the Gospel principle, for it was a matter of sin, i. e. again.st peace; (b) Philip had himself appealed earlier against Richard I ; (c) A treaty had been made, confirmed by oaths, then broken. This therefore lay within the pope's jurisdiction. On another occasion, he even went so far as to order the Bishop of Vercelli to declare null and void any letters produced from the Holy See dealing with matters that belonged to the secular courts of Vercelli, as he would only interfere on appeal, especially since the imperial dignity was at the moment vacant (Decretals, ii, 2, 10; cf. Al- exander Ill's action in a similar case. Decretals, ii, 2, 6). Even excommunication was in his hands no arbitrary power, for, if it were applied unjustly or even unreasonably, he protested that it would be null and void (Decretals, v, 39, 28). He retained of course in his own hands the right to decide whether a particular matter came within the cognizance of the spiritual courts or not (Ibid., iv, 17, 13).

After Innocent's death, the attitude of Gregory VII was revived by Boniface VIII (1294-1303) and John XXII (1316-34). Though some twenty j'ears sepa- rate their reigns, these two pontiffs held practically the same attitude towards temporal rulers and gave rise to a large polemical literature, which is practically continuous for some fifty years (see Scholz and Riezlcr, infra, bibliography). It seemed to those times that either pope or emperor must be supreme. The writers who defend the lay side are of many shades of feeling: Pierre du Bois (Wailly, "Summaria Brevis", 1849, "M6moires de rAcad(?miedes Inscriptions" etc., 435-94); Marsilius of Padua (Poole, "Illustrations of the History of Mediicval Thought", 276 el passim); William of Ockham (ibid. 260); John Wycliff (De civili dominio, 1 cap., 17 fol., 40, c, ibid. 284). Not merely do they protest agaiast papal interference, but, as a counterblast, endeavour to make the king or emperor — accorrling a.s they defend Philip the Fair, Edward I, or Louis of Bavaria — take the most im- portant place in the working of the Church's internal

organism (cf. Baldus de Ubaldis, 1327-1400, in his "Consiha", 228, n. 7: Imperator esl dominus lotius mundi el Deus in terra, i. e. the emperor is lord of the whole world and God on earth).

Certain defenders of the Holy See are no less ve- hement. They rightly forbid Caesar to meddle with matters within the spiritual sphere of life; but, not content with this, they endeavour to put the em- peror directly under the pope. Augustinus Trium- phus (De potestate ecclesiastica XXXVIII, 1, 224), and ^gidius Colonna (De ecclesiastica potestate, II, 4) assert that all temporal rule comes ultimately from the pope, that he alone has the supreme plenitude of power, and that none can be absolved from his high jurisdiction. While these high claims, the inheri- tance of ages of universal faith when the popes were really the saviours of popular liberties, were being thus set forth, the power of the civil authority had de facto enormously increased. The theorizing of Marsilius of Padua, Ockham, and others led to the doctrine of unrestrained royal absolutism (Poole, loc. cit., 2.59). The German princes with their territo- rializing ideals, the French kings with their strong and efficient monarchy, and the English Tutlor sovereigns no longer brooked interference from Rome even in purely spiritual matters. The phrase of the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) cujus regio ejus religio, i. e. the religion of the prince is the religion of the land, sums up the secular reply to the ecclesiastical order.

After the Reformation had served, even in coun- tries like France and Spain which did not adopt the new religion, the purpose of fettering conscience even more than before, the State had in actual practice put the Church under its heel. The State continued to claim, because it exercised, the power to interfere and rule in all matters, whether spiritual or temporal. The Church claimed, though it no longer freely exer- cised, the right to independence, nay supremacy, in all matters affecting religion, and to be in some way the fountain of all temporal dominion (St. Thomas, "Quodlibet", 12, Q. xiii, a. 19, ad 2um: Reges sunt vasalli Ecclesioe). Suarez and later theologians cer- tainly moderate the vehemence of Augustinus Tri- umphus and his companions. It is true of course that the post-tridrntine writers expound what has been called "the indirect power" of the pope in civil affairs, while they curb in various ways the growing civil absolutism of the times. The name of sover- eignty was withdrawn, but its substitute was suzer- ainty, which meant little less than the other (Figgis, "From Gerson to Grotius", VI, 181). Hence the un- deniable tendency of Catholic theologians to repeat in clear language the cases in which rulers may lawfully be put to death. Hence also their unqualified de- fence of popular rights. Says Filmer ("Patriarcha", I, i, 2, 1880) concerning the i)ower of the people to de- prive or correct the sovereign: "Cardinal Bellarmine and Calvin both look asquint this way".

No doubt in this long controversy both ecclesiasti- cal and secular writers went too often to extremes. It is in the rights that each allows the other, that we must look for the more workable hjTJothesis. Thus when the lay writers describe the spiritual rule of the Papacy (Dante, "De Monarchia"; Ockham, "Octo Ques- tiones", q. 1, c. 6, ad 2), they depict almost literally the position of a Leo XIII or a Pius X, prophesying the greatness of such an office. And when the eccle- siastico-political writers sketch their theory of a state (Nicolas of Cusa, " Concordantia Catholica"; Schard- ius, "Syntagma"), directing, ordering, educating the free lives of free citizens, they are no less prophets of a desirable order. Moreover Pius IX expressly de- clared that, for their execution in the temporal sphere, the ecclesiastical ideals depended no less than the lay ideals on the consent and custom of the people, in the absence of which the papacy no longer claims to exercise power and rights, that pubhc law and com-