THE WORLDS EPOCH-MAKERS Francis and Dominic and The Mendicant Orders By John Herkless, D. D. Proftmr of Ecclesiastical History m the University of St. Andrews New York. Charles Scribners Sons 1901 CONTENTS 11 AP. TA. GK I, INTRO BIT CTIQN ...... I II. ST. FRANCIS, . . . . .16 III. ST. FRANCIS ....... 45 IV. ST. DOMINIC ....... 81 V. PROGRESS QJ THE ORDERS ..... Ill VI. THE MENDICANTS AND THE INQUISITION . . 139 VII THE MENDICANTS AND SCHOLASTICISM . . . 163 VIII. THE DEGRADATION OF THB ORDKRS ., . .192 LITERATURE, , .... 227 INDEX ., . . . . .231 6CO2G87 FRANCIS AND DOMINIC CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION MEDIEVALISM is a record o spiritual, mental, and polit ical slavery but it is also the fascinating story of the Churchs supremacy, of the Crusades with their forlorn hopes and splendid legends, of the piety which raised the Gothic cathedrals, of the universities with their weight of learning, of the friars poor for Christs sake, of the scholastics justifying the dogma, of the mystics blessed with the vision of God. One of the charms of Medievalism is that the stage is vast the chief actors are of epic stature. The emperor. Otto the Great or Frederick Barbarossa, was pre-eminent among the kings of the Western world the pope, Gregory vii. or Innocent ill., was not a prisoner of his palace, but was a rival for the sovereign place in Europe. Around the emperor was the majesty of Rome, while the pope was vested with the sanctity of religion. The centuries, however, were furnishing the Roman pontiff with temporal splendour. In the fourth century Christianity became the recognised 2 FRANCIS AND DOMINIC religion of the Roman State, and the first Christian emperor, having built a city on the JBosphorus, made it the centre of his government. Ancient Koine was left to its bishops, who step by step advanced to prominence in Italy. In the, eighth century the Roman Church, harassed by the Lombards, called the Franks to its aid and on Christmas Day, 800 A. IX, he who claimed to be the ecclesiastical heir of St. Peter be stowed the imperial crown on the alleged successor of Augustus. Whether the empire of Charlemain was a new creation or was a revival or a continuation of that of Augustus is a constitutional question but whatever the answer, it remains that the strongest king in the West accepted the symbol of imperial power from the hands of a priest of the Church of Christ. Charlemains empire foil to the ground amid the divisions of his sons. In the tenth century Otto the Great united Germany and Italy, and was crowned emperor at Rome, This union, on which the, right to the imperial title was based, had more than a political interest. The theory gained general acceptance, 1, that the 4, emperor was Gods representative in things temporal, as the pope was representative in things spiritual Frederick Barbarossa, however, in days when Church and State were at strife, used the phrase Holy Roman Empire in order to show that his power wan not derived from the pope but flowed directly from God. The phrase, too, though Harbarowsa had other intention, emphasised the fact that the empire was holy in the sense of being an alliance between Church and State. This alliance, which had its symbol m tin imperial coronation by the hands of the Bishop of Koine, was one of equality Yet who was to mark the limits of INTRODUCTION 3 the secular and spiritual, to decree the dominion of emperor and pope While Ottothe Great lived, and throughout the period preceding the power of Hilde brand, the Church was in subjection. It was the ideal of that pope, and ho did not altogether fail, to destroy the subjection, to establish the supremacy of the Church over all causes, and to exalt the Bishop of Eome to universal dominion...