her attention to earthly things. He did not condemn the
temporal power of the popes in plain terms, but both his writings
and his conduct proved that that power was in his opinion difficult
to reconcile with the spiritual mission of the papacy, and
was, moreover, a menace to the future of the institution. (See
Bernard, Saint.)
At the very moment when the papacy thus attained omnipotence, symptoms of discontent and opposition arose. The bishops resisted centralization. Archbishop Hildebert of Tours protested to Honorius II. against the appeals to Rome, while others complained of the exactions of the legates, or, like John of Salisbury, animadverted upon the excessive powers of the bureaucracy at the Lateran. In the councils strange speeches were heard from the mouths of laymen, who were beginning to carry to extreme lengths the spirit of independence with regard to Rome. When a question arose at Toulouse in 1160 as to the best means of settling the papal schism, this audacious statement was made before the kings of France and England: “That the best course was to side with neither of the two popes; that the apostolic see had been ever a burden to the princes; that advantage must be taken of the schism to throw off the yoke; and that, while awaiting the death of one of the competitors, the authority of the bishops was sufficient in France and England alike for the government of the churches.” The ecclesiastics themselves, however, were the first to denounce the abuses at Rome. The treatises of Gerhoh of Reichersberg (1093–1169) abound in trenchant attacks upon the greed and venality of the Curia, the arrogance and extortion of the legates, the abuse of exemptions and appeals, and the German policy of Adrian IV. and Alexander III. In his efforts to make the papal institution entirely worthy of its mission St Bernard himself did not shrink from presenting to the papacy “the mirror in which it could recognize its deformities.” In common with all enlightened opinion, he complained bitterly of the excessive multiplication of exemptions, of the exaggerated extension of appeals to Rome, of the luxury of the Roman court, of the venality of the cardinals, and of the injury done to the traditional hierarchy by the very extent of the papal power, which was calculated to turn the strongest head. In St Bernard’s treatise De consideratione, addressed to Pope Eugenius III., the papacy receives as many reprimands and attacks as it does marks of affection and friendly counsel. To warn Eugenius against pride, Bernard reminds him in biblical terms that an insensate sovereign on a throne resembles “an ape upon a housetop,” and that the dignity with which he is invested does not prevent him from being a man, that is, “a being, naked, poor, miserable, made for toil and not for honours.” To his thinking, poison and the dagger were less to be feared by the pope than the lust of power. Ambition and cupidity were the source of the most deplorable abuses in the Roman Church. The cardinals, said Bernard, were satraps who put pomp before the truth. He was at a loss to justify the unheard-of luxury of the Roman court. “I do not find,” he said, “that St Peter ever appeared in public loaded with gold and jewels, clad in silk, mounted on a white mule, surrounded by soldiers and followed by a brilliant retinue. In the glitter that environs thee, rather wouldst thou be taken for the successor of Constantine than for the successor of Peter.”
Rome, however, had greater dangers to cope with than the indignant reproofs of her friends the monks, and the opposition of the bishops, who were displeased at the spectacle of their authority waning day by day. It was at this period that the Catholic edifice of the middle ages began to be shaken by the boldness of philosophical speculationGrowth of Heretical Sects. as applied to theological studies and also by the growth of heresy. Hitherto more tolerant of heresy than the local authorities, the papacy now felt compelled to take defensive measures against it, and especially against Albigensianism, which had made great strides in the south of France since the middle of the 12th century. Innocent II., Eugenius III. and Alexander III. excommunicated the sectaries of Languedoc and their abettors, Alexander even sending armed missions to hunt them down and punish them. But the preaching of the papal legates, even when supported by military demonstrations, had no effect; and the Albigensian question, together with other questions vital for the future of the papacy, remained unsettled and more formidable than ever when Innocent III. was elected.
3. Period from Innocent III. to Alexander IV. (1198–1261).—Under the pontificates of Innocent III. and his five immediate successors the Roman monarchy seemed to have reached the pinnacle of its moral prestige, religious authority and temporal power, and this development was due in great measure to Innocent III. himself. Between the perhaps excessive admiration of Innocent’s biographer, Friedrich von Hurter, and the cooler estimate of a later historian, Felix Rocquain, who, after taking into consideration Innocent’s political mistakes, lack of foresight and numerous disappointments and failures, concludes that his reputation has been much exaggerated, it is possible to steer a middle course and form a judgment that is at once impartial and conformable to the historical facts. Innocent was an eminent jurist and canonist, and never ceased to use his immense power in the service of the law. Indeed, a great part of his life was passed in hearing pleadings and pronouncing judgments, and few sovereigns have ever worked so industriously or shown such solicitude for the impartial exercise of their judicial functions. It is difficult to comprehend Innocent’s extraordinary activity. Over and above the weight of political affairs, he bore resolutely for eighteen years the overwhelming burden of the presidency of a tribunal before which the whole of Europe came to plead. To him, also, in his capacity of theologian, the whole of Europe submitted every obscure, delicate or controverted question, whether legal problem or case of conscience. This, undoubtedly, was the part of his task that Innocent preferred, and it was to this, as well as to his much overrated moral and theological treatises, that he owed his enormous contemporary prestige. As a statesman, he certainly committed grave faults—through excess of diplomatic subtlety, lack of forethought, and sometimes even through ingenuousness; but it must with justice be admitted that, in spite of his reputation for pugnacity and obstinacy, he never failed, either by temperament or on principle, to exhaust every peaceful expedient in settling questions. He was averse from violence, and never resorted to bellicose acts or to the employment of force save in the last extremity. If his policy miscarried in several quarters it was eminently successful in others; and if we consider the sum of his efforts to achieve the programme of the medieval papacy, it cannot be denied that the extent of his rule and the profound influence he exerted on his times entitle him to be regarded as the most perfect type of medieval pope and one of the most powerful figures in history.
A superficial glance at Innocent’s correspondence is sufficient to convince us that he was pre-eminently concerned for the reformation and moral welfare of the Church, and was animated by the best intentions for the re-establishment in the ecclesiastical body of order, peace and Council, respect for the hierarchy. This was one of the principal objects of his activity, and this important side of his work received decisive sanction by the promulgation of the decrees of the fourth Lateran Council (1215). At this council almost all the questions at issue related to reform, and many give evidence of great breadth of mind, as well as of a very acute sense of contemporary necessities. Innocent’s letters, however, not only reveal that superior wisdom which can take into account practical needs and relax severity of principle at the right moment, as well as that spirit of tolerance and equity which is opposed to the excess of zeal and intellectual narrowness of subordinates, but they also prove that, in the internal government of the Church, he was bent on gathering into his hands all the motive threads, and that he stretched the absolutist tradition to its furthest limits, intervening in the most trifling acts in the lives of the clergy, and regarding it as an obligation of his office to act and think for all. The heretic peril, which increased during his pontificate, forced him to take decisive measures against the Albigenses in the south of France, but
