280 POLITICAL HERESY.— THE STATE. dence and claim jurisdiction, and he applied to the University for an opinion to support his claims, but the Faculty of Theology re- plied, March 25, 1308, as it could not help doing : the Templars were religious and consequently exempt from secular jurisdiction ; the only cognizance which a secular court could have over heresy was at the request of the Church after it had abandoned the heretic; in case of necessity the secular power could arrest a heretic, but it could only be for the purpose of delivering him to the ecclesiastical court ; and finally the Templar property must be held for the purpose for which it was given to the Order.* Philippe, thus foiled, proceeded to bring a still stronger pressure to bear on Clement. He appealed to his subservient bishops and summoned a national assembly, to meet April 15 in Tours, to delib- erate with him on the subject of the Templars. Already, at the Assemblv of Paris in 1302, he had called in the Tiers-Etat and had learned to value its support in his quarrel with Boniface, and now he again brought in the communes, thus founding the institution of the States-General. After some delay the assembly met in May. In his summons Philippe had detailed the crimes of the Templars as admitted facts which ought to arouse for their pun- ishment not only arms and the laws, but brute cattle and the four elements. He desired his subjects to jmrticipate in the pious work, and therefore he ordered the towns to select each two deputies zealous for the faith. From a gathering collected under such im- pulsion it was not difficult, in spite of the secret leaning of the nobles to the proscribed Order, to procure a virtually unanimous expression of opinion that the Templars deserved death.f With the prestige of the nation at his back, Philippe went from Tours, at the end of May, to Clement at Poitiers, accompanied by a strong deputation, including his brothers, his sons, and his coun-
- Du Puy, pp. 12-13, 84-5, 89, 109, 111-12, 134.— D'Achery Spicileg. II.
199.— Raynouard, p. 238, 306. Jean de S. Victor gives the date of the declaration of the University as the Saturday after Ascension (May 25, ap. Bouquet, XXI. 651), but Du Puy de- scribes the document as sealed with fourteen seals, and dated on Lady Day (March 25). t Archives Administrates de Reims, T. II. pp. 65, 66. — Chassaing Spicile- gium Brivatense, pp. 274-5. — Du Puy, pp. 38-9, 85, 113, 116. — Contin. Naugiac. ann. 1308. — Joann. de S. Victor. (Bouquet, XXI. 650). — Raynouard, p. 42.
