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FREE

William of Holland. It was only with the greatest difficulty that Frederick's son Conrad could hold his own in Germany, since the greater part of the clergy supported the pope. Most of the lay lords, however, remained faithful to the emperor and exhibited an attitude of hostility to the clergy. A contemporary writer describes as follows the situation in 1246: "In- justice reigned supreme. The people were without leaders and Rome was troubled. Clerical dignity was lost sight of and the laity were split into various factions. Some were loyal to the Church and took the cross, others adhered to Frederick and became the enemies of God's religion."

For some time fortune alternately smiled and frowned on Frederick in Italy, but, after completing all his preparations for a decisive battle, he died at Fiorentina in .\pulia, and was buried at Palermo. In German legend he continued to live as the emperor fated to return and reform both Church and State. In more recent times, however, he has had to yield his place in popular legend to Frederick Barbarossa, a figure more in harmony with German sentiment.

ScHiRRMACHER, Kaiser Friedrick IT. (Gottingen, lS.59-65): Huill-\rd-Br6iiolles. Historia diplomatica Frederici secundi (Paris, lSo2);FttEEMAtt, HistorUalEssays (London, 1S86):Win- KELMANN, Reichsannalen, Kaiser Friedrich II.. 1218-1225, 1228- 1233 (Leipzig, 1889): Zeller, Uempereur Fred. II. et la chute de I'empire germanitiue du moyen dge, Conrad IV et Conradin (1S8S); Hampe, Kaiser Friedrich II. in Hislorische Zeilschrift, LXXXIII. .'\mong the Catholic writers see Balan'. Sloria di Gregorio IX e suoi tempi (Modena, 1872-73); Felten, Pap.^t Gregor IX. (Freiburg, 1886); Hergenrother-Kirsch, Kircheu- geschichte, 4th ed. (Freiburg, 1904).

F. K.\MPER.S.

Fredoli, Berenger, Cardinal-Bishop of Frascati; b. at V'erune, France, c. 1250; d. at Avignon, 11 June, l.'i23. He was canon and precentor of Beziers, secu- lar Abbot of Saint-.\phrodise in the same city, canon and archdeacon of Corbieres, and canon of Aix. He later held the chair of canon law at Bologna, and was appointed chaplain to Celestine V, who in 1294 con- secrated him Bishop of Beziers. Fredoli was one of those entrusted by Boniface VIII with the compila- tion of the text of the Decretals, and afterwards known as the "Liber Sextus". He took a prominent part in the negotiations then in progress between the pope and Philip the Fair, and attended the council held in Rome in 13U2. In 1305 Clement V created him car- dinal, with the title of Sts. Xereus and Achilleus, appointed him major penitentiarj-, and in 1309 raised him to the Cardinal-Bishopric of Frascati. The same pontiff employed him in investigating the charges made against the Knights Templars, and also in the enquiry into the peculiar tenets entertained at that time by a section of the Franciscan Order. On the death of Clement V, Fredoli was proposed by the French cardinals for the vacant chair, but ■without success. He continued in favour with the new pope. John XXII, by whose order he deposed the Abbot of Gerald and Hugo, Bishop of Cahors, for conspiring against the pope's life. The works of Fredoli are chiefly concerned with canon law, and include "Oculus", a commentary on the "Summa" of the Cardinal of Ostia (Basle, 1573), "Inventarium juris canonici", and "Inventarium speculi judicialis", abridged from a work of Durand, Bishop of Mendes.

A namesake and nephew of the preceding was Bishop of Beziers in 1309, and Cardinal-Bishop of Porto in 1317. He died in 1323.

Gallia Christiana, VI; TJghelli, Italia Sacra: Tritheim. De Script. Eccles.; Baluze, Vilie paparum Avenionensium (Paris, 1693); Kredtzwald in Kirchenlex., s. v.

H. G. WiNTERSGlLL.

Free Church of Scotland (known since 1900 as the United Free Church), an ecclesiastical organ- ization in Scotland which includes (1908) more than 500,000 of the 1,200.000 inhabitants of that country professing adherence to Presbj'terian principles. The VI.— 17

existence of the Free Church as a separate ecclesias- tical body dates from 1843, when a large number of members, both lay and clerical, of the Established Church of Scotland, severed their connexion with that body as a protest against the encroachment of the civil power on the independence of the Church, espe- cially in the matter of presentation to vacant benefices.

According to the Free-Church view, the Church of Scotland, from the date of its inception in 1560, upon the overthrow of the old religion, had pos.sessed the inherent right of exercising her spiritual jurisdiction through her elected assembly, absolutely free of any interference by the civil power. Such an independence had been asserted by her first leaders, Knox and Mel- ville, and especially laid down and claimed in both her first and second books of discipline, issued in 1560 and 1581. The restoration of "prelacy" (the episcopal form of church government) in 1600 by James I, the revival of the self-governing powers of the Assembly in 1649, its subsequent suspension imder Cromwell in 1653 and again after the Restoration, the Revolu- tion .settlement in 1690, and the .\ct of Queen Anne in 1712 re-establishing the system of private patron- age in the Presbyterian Church, were the principal crises, now favourable, now the reverse, to the cher- ished principles of spiritual independence, through which the Church passed during the first century and a half of its existence. Throughout the eighteenth century a party within the Church continued to pro- test against civil interference with her rights, espe- cially as regarded patronage; but at the same time there grew up the ecclesiastical party known as Mod- erates, who in this and other questions displayed an indifference towards state encroachments which more than neutralized the sentiments of the more fervent section. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, however, the latter was strengthened by the growing force of so-called " Evangelicalism", which was sweep- ing over Scotland as well as England. The views of the two parties, the Evangelical and the Moderate, be- came more and more opposed, the final result being the " Ten Years' Conflict ' ' between them, which ended in the triumph of the former, and in the passing by the General Assembly, in 1S34, of the famous " Veto Act". This act asserted (or rather reasserted, for the prin- ciple had often been declared in previous Assemblies) that it was a fundamental law of the Church that no pastor should be intruded upon a congregation con- trary to the popular will, and that any presentee to a living should be rejected on the dissent of a majority of the heads of families. This direct blow at the rights of private patrons was soon challenged in the civil courts, and was ultimately decided (in 1S3S), in the famous Auchterarder case, against the Church. The decision immediately elicited from the Assembly a still clearer and more outspoken declaration of the in- dependence of the Church; and when it was finally confirmed by the House of Lords, in 1839, the Assem- bly resolved to transmit to the sovereign, through the Lord High Commissioner who presided over its pro- ceedings, a "claim, declaration, and protest" com- plaining of the encroachment of the civil power, and praying for the abolition of patronage. An unfavour- able answer was received, and in response to a petition submitted to the House of Commons, that body re- fused any redress of the grievances complained of. Accordingly, at the ne.xt meetingof theGeneral.\ssem- bly, 396 members, afterwards increased to 474, with- drew in a body, and con.stituted the first .\ssembly of the new Free Church, imder Dr. Thomas Chalmers as moderator. The ministers and professors adhering to the newly constituted body publicly renounced all claim to the benefices which they had held in the Es- tablished Church, thus surrendering an annual income of upwards of £100,000.

A sustentation fund was at once inaugurated for the new organization, and nearly £400,000 was subscribed