Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/513

Rh P P E D M 493 down to those of Anastasius II. in his own day. The letters of the popes were thus placed on a level with the rescripts of the emperors, and in conjunction with the canons formed the basis of the canon law, which afterwards assumed such importance in connexion with the history of the church. The negative value of the collection formed by Dionysius may be said, however, almost to equal that of its actual contents ; for, from the simple fact that it does not contain those yet earlier decretals subsequently put forth by the pseudo-Isidorus, it affords the most con vincing disproof of their genuineness. its The substitution of the rule of the Greek emperors for )- that of the Gothic monarchs was inimical in almost every ] respect to the independence and reputation of the pope- ( dom. For a short interval before Justinian landed in r.-ors. Italy, AGAPETUS (535-536), appearing as the emissary of Theodotus to the Eastern court, assumed a bearing which inspired the emperor himself with respect, and his influ ence was sufficiently potent to procure the deposition of one patriarch of the Eastern capital and to decide the election of another. But, after Belisarius entered Rome and the city had been reduced to subjection, the pontiff was seen to be the mere vassal of the emperor, and not only of the emperor but of the courtezan on the imperial throne. The deposition of SILVERITJS (536-540), and his mysterious fate at Pandataria, together with the elevation of VIGILIUS (540-555), the nominee of the abandoned Theodora and her pliant slave, completed the degradation of the Roman see. Each successive pope was now little more than a puppet which moved at the pleasure of the Eastern court ; and the apocrisiarius or deputy whom he maintained at that court was generally (as in the case of Pelagius I., Gregory I., Sabinian, Boniface III., Martin) his own successor an honour purchased, it can hardly be doubted, by systematic compliance with the imperial wishes. In the career and fate of Vigilius the papal office was dis honoured as it had never been before, at once by the signal unworthiness of its bearer and by the indignities heaped upon him by the savage malice of his foes. So sinister, indeed, had become the relations between the Roman bishop and the Eastern court that PELAGIUS I. (555-560) is said to have besought Narses to send him to prison rather than to Constantinople. ajn In the year 568 the Lombards invaded Italy. Like the Goths they become converts to Arianism ; but they were ^ also far less civilized, and looked with little respect on Roman institutions and Roman habits of thought, while their arrogance, faithlessness, and cruelty gained for them the special detestation of the Roman see. Their conquests did not extend over all Italy. Ravenna and the Penta- polis, Venice, Rome and its duchy (as the surrounding district was then termed), Naples, Calabria, and Sicily remained subject to the empire. In the peninsula the pope was, after the exarch of Ravenna, the most powerful potentate, and the presence of a common foe caused the relations between himself and the empire to assume a more amicable character. The emperor, indeed, continued to control the elections and to enforce the payment of tribute for the territory protected by the imperial arms ; but, on the other hand, the pontiff exercised a definite authority within the Roman duchy and claimed to have a voice in the appointment of the civil officers who administered the local government. From the time of Constantino the Great the church had possessed the right of acquiring landed property by bequests from indi viduals, and the Roman see had thus become greatly enriched. Some of its possessions lay far beyond the con fines of Italy. It was one of the last acts of Celestine I. to address to the emperor Theodosius II. an appeal for the imperial protection of certain estates in Asia, which a lady named Proba had bequeathed to the Roman see for the maintenance of &quot;the clergy, the poor, and cer tain monasteries&quot; (Constant, ed. Schoenemann, p. 879). &quot;Ever since the restriction of the Western empire,&quot; says Mr Bryce, &quot;had emancipated the ecclesiastical potentate from secular control, the first and most abiding object of his schemes and prayers had been the acquisition of territorial wealth in the neighbourhood of his capital. He had indeed a sort of justification, for Rome, a city with neither trade nor industry, was crowded with poor, for whom it devolved on the bishop to provide.&quot; The motives for acquiring such wealth did not, accordingly, cease to actuate the pontiff, even when the paralysing influences of the imperial despotism were again very sensibly felt ; but the territory thus gained, known as the &quot;patrimonium Petri,&quot; must not be supposed to have involved that claim to temporal sovereignty put forth at a later period. Ori ginally bestowed mainly for the relief of the sick and desti tute, the patrimonial revenues came, in course of time, to be applied to the maintenance of the pope himself and the clergy of his diocese, and to the erection and repair of churches. They were strictly inalienable ; and the pontiff himself was regarded simply as the steward, for the time being, of the estate. Under GREGORY I. (590-604), commonly known as Gregory &quot;the Great,&quot; this territorial wealth became largely aug- the Great, mented ; and, although, amid the universal demoralization and widespread misery of his age, he professed to discern the unmistakable signs of the approaching end of the world, the efficient administration of the estates of the church was an object of his unceasing solicitude. Of noble descent, great wealth, and considerable learning, he possessed also a capacity for administration not inferior to that of his predecessor Leo, and his best energies were devoted to the interests of his diocese and the alleviation of the want and misery of which it was the constant scene. His Letters, which constitute a remarkable picture both of the man and his age, and attest the minute and unwearied care which he bestowed on everything relating to the affairs of his see, appear to have been taken as the model for the Liber Diurnus, or journal of the Roman curia, which was commenced in the following century. In other respects his genius for administration, his good sense and tact, are equally conspicuous. Through his influence with Theude- linda, the wife of Agilulf, the Lombard monarch, he not only succeeded in averting another siege of Rome, but he also managed to bring about the establishment of amicable relations between the Lombards and the Roman popula tion. With the Byzantine court he did his best to maintain a friendly intercourse, although in his zeal on behalf of monasticism he withdrew his ajiocrisiarius from Constan tinople, when the emperor Maurice forbade his soldiers to assume the monastic life. It is perhaps the greatest blot on Gregory s memory that, when the emperor and his family were cruelly murdered by Phocas, who seized upon the imperial dignity, Gregory was not above congratulating the usurper on the circumstances of his accession, an act of adulation but insufficiently extenuated by his panegyrists, as taking its rise in feelings of genuine, though mistaken, religious enthusiasm. His efforts on behalf of primary edu cation, which have caused him to take rank in the Roman calendar as the patron saint of school festivals, are deserv ing of high praise ; but, on the other hand, his illiberal condemnation of the pagan literature (in striking contrast to the Benedictine traditions of a later time) diminishes not a little our impression of his real greatness. He stands, however, among the foremost of the popes, and the impress of his character and teaching must be held to have permanently modified the views and policy of the Roman curia.