offer. Henceforward quiet prevailed, and Boniface ruled as a
stern master in Rome. But he was soon confronted with an
extremely dangerous enemy, in the person of Duke Gian
Galeazzo Visconti of Milan, who was aiming at the sovereignty
of all Italy. In July 1402 he made himself master of Bologna;
and his death in September of the same year was a stroke of
good fortune for the pope. Bologna was now recovered for
the Church (Sept. 2, 1403), and soon afterwards Perugia also
surrendered.
Thus Boniface IX., as a secular prince, occupies an important position; but as pope his activity must be unfavourably judged. Even if Dietrich of Niem frequently painted him too black, there is no question that the means which Boniface employed to fill the papal treasury seriously impaired the prestige of the highest spiritual office and the reverence due to it. His nepotism, again, casts a dark shadow over his memory: but most regrettable of all was his indifference towards the ending of the schism. Yet it should be borne in mind, that, when Clement VII. died suddenly on the 16th of September 1394, and the Avignon cardinals immediately elected the Spaniard Pedro de Luna as anti-pope (under the title of Benedict XIII.), Boniface IX. was left face to face with an extraordinarily skilful, adroit, and unscrupulous antagonist.
On the death of Boniface (Oct. 1, 1404), the Roman cardinals once more elected a Neapolitan, Cosimo dei Migliorati, who, at the age of 65, assumed the name of Innocent VII. Innocent, who was animated by a great love for the sciences and all the arts of peace, enjoyed only a brief Innocent VII., 1404–1406. pontificate, but his reign is not without importance, if only as an example of the generous patronage which the papacy even in its darkest days—has lavished on literature and science. Significant also is the foothold gained at this time in the Curia itself by the humanists—Poggio, Bruni and others. The appointment of these skilled humanist writers to the Chancery was a consequence of the difficult conditions of the time. The crisis which the Catholic Church underwent, during this terrible epoch, was the greatest in all her history: for while everything was thrown into the utmost confusion by the life and death struggles of the rival popes, while the ecclesiastical revenues and emoluments were used almost exclusively for the reward of partisan service, while everywhere the worldliness of the clergy had reached its highest pitch, heretical movements, by which the whole order of the Church was threatened with overthrow, were gaining strength in England, France, Italy, Germany and especially in Bohemia.
The crisis came to a head in the pontificate of Gregory XII. This pope, so distinguished in many respects, owed his election mainly to the circumstance that he was considered a zealous champion of the restoration of unity within the Church: and he displayed, in fact, during the Gregory XII. 1406–1415. earlier portion of his reign, an exalted enthusiasm for this great task. Later his attitude changed; and the protracted negotiations for a conference with Benedict XIII. remained fruitless. The result of this change in the attitude of Gregory was the formation of a strong malcontent party in the College of Cardinals; to counteract whose influence, the pope—faithless to the conditions attached to his election—resorted to the plan of creating new members. Stormy discussions at Lucca followed; but they failed to prevent Gregory from nominating four fresh cardinals (May 9, 1408). The sequel was that seven of the cardinals attached to Gregory's Roman Curia withdrew to Pisa.
At the same period, the relations of Benedict XIII. with France suffered a significant modification. In that country, it became more and more manifest that Benedict and had no genuine desire to heal the schism in the Church, in spite of the ardent zeal for union which Benedict XIII. and France. he had displayed immediately before and after his election. In May 1408 France withdrew from his obedience; and it was not long before French policy succeeded in effecting a reconciliation and understanding between the cardinals of Benedict XIII. and those who had seceded from Gregory XII. Precisely as if the Holy See were vacant the cardinals began to act as the actual rulers of the Church, and issued formal invitations to a council to be opened at Pisa on the Feast Council of Pisa. of the Annunciation (March 25) 1409. Both popes attempted to foil the disaffected cardinals by convening councils of their own; but their efforts were doomed to failure.
On the other hand, the council of the cardinals — though, by the strict rules of canonical law, its convocation was absolutely illegal — attained the utmost importance. But these rules, and, in fact, the whole Catholic doctrine of the primacy were almost entirely obscured by the schism. Scholars like Langenstein, Gerson and Zabarella, evolved a new theory as to ecumenical councils, which from the point of view of Roman Catholic principles must be described as revolutionary. At the synod of the dissident cardinals, assembled at Pisa, views of this type were in the ascendant; and, although protests were not lacking, the necessities of the time served as a pretext for ignoring all objections.
That the council was merely a tool in the hands of the ambitious and adroit Baldassare Cossa, was a fact unsuspected by its members who were animated by a fiery enthusiasm for the re-establishment of ecclesiastical unity; nor did they pause to reflect that an action against both popes could not possibly be lawful. Since whole universities and numerous scholars had pronounced in favour of the new theories, the Pisan synod dismissed all canonical scruples, and unhesitatingly laid claim to authority over both popes, one of whom was necessarily the legitimate pope. It was in vain that Carlo di Malatesta, a stanch adherent of Gregory, sought at the eleventh hour to negotiate a compromise between Gregory and the synod. It was in vain that this cultured prince, imbued with the principles of humanism, represented to the cardinals that this new path would lead quickly to the goal, but that this goal could not be unity but a triple schism. The council declared that it was canonicaUy convened, ecumenical, and representative of the whole Catholic Church; then proceeded immediately to the trial and deposition of Benedict XIII. and Gregory XII. The synod grounded its procedure against the rival popes on a fact, ostensibly patent to all, but actually believed by none — that they were both supporters of the schism, and not merely this, but heretics in the truest and fullest sense of the word, since their attitude had impugned and subverted the article of faith concerning the one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. On the ground of this extremely dubious declaration, designed to compensate for the absence of any authentic and firm foundation in ecclesiastical law, the Pisan assembly on the 5th of June announced the deposition of Gregory XII. and Benedict XIII.,Alexander V., 1409–1410. as manifest heretics and partisans of the schism. The next step was to elect a new pope; and on the 26th of June 1409 the choice fell on the venerable cardinal-archbishop of Milan, the Greek Petros Filargis, who assumed the title of Alexander V.
The premature and futile character of these drastic and violent proceedings at Pisa was only too speedily evident. The powerful following which Gregory enjoyed in Italy and Germany, and Benedict in Spain and Scotland, ought to have shown from the very first that a simple decree of deposition could never suffice to overthrow the two popes. Thus, as the sentence of Pisa found recognition in France and England, as well as in many parts of Germany and Italy, the synod, which was to secure the restoration of unity, proved only the cause for worse confusion — instead of two, there were now three popes.
Alexander V., the pope of the council, died on the 3rd of May 1410. The cardinals at once elected his successor—Baldassare Cossa, who took the name of John XXIII. Of all the consequences of the disastrous Pisan council, the election of this man was the most unfortunate.John XXIII., 1410–1415. True, it cannot be demonstrated that all the fearful accusations afterwards levelled at John XXIII. were based on fact: but it is certain that this cunning politician was so far infected with
