buted to him their misfortunes and sufferings, and could scarcely tolerate his presence. The unhappy old man fled hastily to Salerno, and there, borne down by the weight of years, and heart-broken by the calamities of his old age, he expired on the twenty-fifth of May, 1085. His end was in perfect keeping with his life. He earnestly and repeatedly besought his friends to continue the policy he had begun. Being asked to absolve, ere he died, the multitude on whom he had pronounced the censures of the church, he sternly replied, "With the exception of Henry, styled the king, and of Guibert, the usurper, and of those who abet their designs, I absolve and bless all men who unfeignedly believe me to possess the power as the representative of St. Peter and St. Paul." His last words were significant of the mortified pride of his soul: "I have loved justice," he murmured, "and hated iniquity, and therefore I die in exile." And so he breathed out his spirit.

We must do Gregory the justice to remember that his ambition was devoid, as much as that passion can be, of all sordid selfishness. It was the aggrandizement of the church, and not of himself, that he sought. But when this abatement is made, it is sufficient to place the character of this greatest of the popes by the side of that of his Divine Master to convince us that the true spirit of Christianity had altogether passed from the system which now usurped its name.

CHAPTER VII.

IMMEDIATE SUCCESSORS OF GREGORY VIL-URBAN COMMENCES THE CRUSADES.

A.D. 1085–1099.

THE years immediately following the death of Gregory were not filled with events of a momentous nature. The papal party had carried their efforts as far as the state of society would at present admit. They had indeed gained a decisive victory, but were not yet in a position to enjoy the advantages of their success. The victory was a moral one—one of opinion. They had won the world to approve of their object, and henceforward the emperor was looked on as far inferior to the pope. In truth, the imperial power was dwindled to a petty sovereignty, whilst the influence of the pontiff was felt in all the courts of Europe. By his legates, who were established at all of these courts, he made known his will, and so widely spread was the sway of the priesthood, so completely did it embrace all ranks in society, that few monarchs dared treat with contempt the advice of a papal legate.

As yet, however, the true state of public opinion, and the real might which the popes had acquired, was only partially discovered. The emperor continued for some years to contend against the growing evil, and a series of anti-popes disturbed Italy by the struggles which they carried on, when both Gregory and

Guibert were laid in their graves. VICTOR III., who followed Gregory, was a man of considerable learning, but his bookish habits adapted him far more for the cloisters of Monte Cassino, which he reluctantly left, than for a prominent position in public life. After his consecration, he hurried back to his convent in great trepidation, and Rome was left in the possession of Guibert and his partisans for nearly two years, at the end of which Victor died. In 1088, Otho, the bishop of Ostia, and a personal friend of the countess Matilda, succeeded to the papal throne by the title of URBAN II. He had been educated at Cluni, and afterwards trained for ecclesiastical life, under the superintendence of Gregory, and was both desirous and capable of prosecuting the plans of his instructor. The policy of Gregory, both within and without the church, was as vigorously pursued as the troubled state of the times would permit. At the council of Placenza, held in 1095, it was decreed that no ecclesiastic should receive any church dignity at the hands of a layman; that no prince should confer the investiture; that celibacy was binding on the priesthood; and that transubstantiation was the orthodox doctrine respecting the Lord's supper; decisions, all of them tending to the aggrandizement of the church, and the furtherance of papal domination.

The multitudes that now began to attend at the papal councils, sufficiently attest the grow ing influence of the priesthood over the popular

From

mind. The council of Placenza was so large that it could only be held in the open air; and that of Clermont, which was summoned in the same year, numbered two hundred bishops, four thousand of the inferior clergy, and more than thirty thousand of all ranks of the laity. But the occasion which brought such multitudes together at the council of Clermont demonstrates yet more clearly that the twelfth century was to open a new era to the world, the triumph of a corrupted religion, and the reign over nearly all Europe, not so much of feudal monarchs as of popish priests. the age of Leo the Great, the system of private confession to priests had tended much to increase the influence of that order, and as the morals of society degenerated during the "dark ages," and in the large commixture of barbariar. with civilized nations, that influence greatly advanced; for penances were appointed, of so painful a nature, and of such enormous magnitude, that for some crimes a whole life might be wearily worn away before the sin was expiated, according to the priestly code. Interrogating the penitent respecting his minutest secrets, the priest not only compelled him to account for his words, actions, and thoughts, but also prescribed the terms of his acceptance with God. To every sin some penance was allotted, which might last from forty days to seven years. So that the remark of a shrewd but sarcastic writer is obviously true, that "in those times of anarchy and vice, a modest sinner

might easily incur a debt of three hundred years."

Thus the penances of the longest life were far from adequate, and it was to meet this difficulty that the ingenious but unscriptural system of indulgences was invented. The poor might compound for their penances by severe bodily mortifications; the rich by the payment of fines. A year's penance was taxed to the former at three thousand lashes, and to the latter at four pounds sterling. But other means of commutation were employed; and military service in defence of the pope, or a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, was often preferred to a voluntary infliction of stripes. In the eleventh century, these pilgrimages had greatly multiplied; and a journey to Jerusalem was naturally held to be more efficacious than a visit to the shrine of any mere martyr or saint.

The

Christian turns away in mingled horror and disgust from the perverted notions of atonement that meet him at every step as he traverses this gloomy period, and blesses God that the blood of Christ alone has abundant power to cleanse him from all sin.

From such a pilgrimage there returned to Italy, in the year 1093, a man of singular character and eccentric appearance. He was popularly known by the name of Peter the Hermit. This pilgrim came bearing letters from the patriarch of Jerusalem, complaining of the grievous abuses which devout pilgrims endured at the hands of the new masters of