Page:William of Malmesbury's Chronicle.djvu/244

 guarded. Swarms of thieves beset every path, nor could the traveller devise any method of escaping them. Their rage was equally bent against the poor and the rich; entreaty or resistance were alike unavailing. The journey to Rome was discontinued by every nation, as each had much rather contribute his money to the churches in his own country, than feed a set of plunderers with the produce of his labours. And what was the state of that city which of old was the only dwelling-place of holiness? Why there an abandoned set of knaves and assassins thronged the very forum. If any one by stratagem eluded the people who lay in wait upon the road, from a desire even at the peril of destruction to see the church of the apostle; yet then, encountering these robbers, he was never able to return home without the loss either of property or of life. Even over the very bodies of the holy apostles and martyrs, even on the sacred altars were swords unsheathed, and the offerings of pilgrims, ere well laid out of their hands, were snatched away and consumed in drunkenness and fornication. By such evils was the papacy of Gregory beset. At first he began to deal gently with his subjects; and, as became a pontiff, rather by love than by terror; he repressed the delinquents more by words than by blows; he entreated the townsmen to abstain from the molestation of pilgrims, and the plunder of sacred offerings. The one, he said, was contrary to nature, that the man who breathed the common air could not enjoy the common peace; that Christians surely ought to have liberty of proceeding whither they pleased among Christians, since they were all of the same household, all united by the tie of the same blood, redeemed by the same price: the other, he said, was contrary to the command of God, who had ordained, that "they who served at the altar, should live by the altar;" moreover, that "the house of God ought to be the house of prayer, not a den of thieves," nor an assembly of gladiators; that they should allow the offerings to go to the use of the priests, or the support of the poor; that he would provide for those persons whom want had compelled to plunder, by giving them some honest employment to procure their subsistence; that such as were instigated by avaricious desire, should desist immediately for the love of God and the credit of the world. He invited, by mandates