some sacrifice of their independence. Yet, even in this act, they exercised the right of disposing of themselves; and the decrees of the senate and people successively invested Charles Martel and his posterity with the honours of patrician of Rome. The leaders of a powerful nation would have disdained a servile title and, subordinate office; but the reign of the Greek emperors was suspended; and, in the vacancy of the empire, they derived a more glorious commission from the pope and the republic. The Roman ambassadors presented these patricians with the keys of the shrine of St. Peter, as a pledge and symbol of sovereignty; with a holy banner, which it was their right and duty to unfurl in the defence of the church and city." In the time of Charles Martel and of Pepin, the interposition of the Lombard kingdom covered the freedom, while it threatened the safety, of Rome; and the patriciate represented only the title, the service, the alliance, of these distant protectors. The power and policy of Charlemagne annihilated an enemy, and imposed a master. In his first visit to the capital, he was received with all the honours which had formerly been paid to the exarch, the representative of the emperor; and these honours obtained some new decorations from the joy and gratitude of pope Adrian the first." No sooner was he informed of the sudden approach of the monarch, than he despatched the magistrates and nobles of Rome to meet him, with the banner, about thirty miles from the city. At the distance of one mile, the Flaminian way was lined with the schools, or national communities, of Greeks, Lombards, Saxons, &c.: the Roman youth were under arms; and the children of a more tender age, with palms and olive branches in their hands, chanted the praises of their great deliverer. At the aspect of the holy crosses, and ensigns of the saints, he dismounted from his horse, led the procession of the nobles to the Vatican, and, as he ascended the stairs, devoutly kissed each step of the threshold of the apostles. In the portico, Adrian expected him at the head of his clergy: they embraced, as friends and equals; but in their march to the altar, the king or patrician assumed the right hand of the pope. Nor was the Frank content with these vain and empty demonstrations of respect. In the twenty-six years that elapsed between the conquest of Lombardy and his imperial coronation, Rome, which had been delivered by the sword, was subject, as his own, to the sceptre of Charlemagne. The people swore allegiance to his person and family: in his name money was coined, and justice was administered; and the election of the popes was ex

n The papal advocates can soften the symbolic meaning of the banner and the keys; but the style of ad regnum dimisimus, or direximus, (Codex Carolin. epist. i. tom. iii, pars ii. p. 76.) seems to allow of no palliation or escape. In the MS. of the Vienna library, they read instead of regnum, rogum, prayer or request, (see Ducange;) and the royalty of Charles Martel is subverted by this important correction. (Catalini, in his Critical Prefaces Annali d'Italia, tom. xvii. p. 95-99.) o In the anthentic narrative of this reception, the Liber Pontificalis observes-obviam illi ejus sanctitas dirigens venerabiles cruces, id est signa; sicut mos est ad exarchum aut patricium suscipiendum, eum cum ingenti honore suscipi fecit, (tom. iii. pars i. p. 185.)

P Paulus Diaconus, who wrote before the empire of Charlemagne, describes Rome as his subject city-vestræ civitates, (ad Pompeium Festum,) suis addidit sceptris, (de Metensis Ecclesiæ Episcopis.) Some

lemagne to the popes.

amined and confirmed by his authority. Except an original and self-inherent claim of sovereignty, there was not any prerogative remaining, which the title of emperor could add to the patrician of Rome.P The gratitude of the Carlovingians Donations of was adequate to these obligations, and Pepin and Char. their names are consecrated, as the saviours and benefactors of the Roman church. Her ancient patrimony of farms and houses was transformed by their bounty into the temporal dominion of cities and provinces; and the donation of the exarchate was the first-fruits of the conquests of Pepin." Astolphus with a sigh relinquished his prey; the keys and the hostages of the principal cities were delivered to the French ambassador; and, in his master's name, he presented them before the tomb of St. Peter. The ample measure of the exarchate might comprise all the provinces of Italy which had obeyed the emperor and his vicegerent; but its strict and proper limits were included in the territories of Ravenna, Bologna, and Ferrara: its inseparable dependency was the Pentapolis, which stretched along the Adriatic from Rimini to Ancona, and advanced into the midland country as far as the ridges of the Apennine. In this transaction, the ambition and avarice of the popes had been severely condemned. Perhaps the humility of a christian priest should have rejected an earthly kingdom, which it was not easy for him to govern without renouncing the virtues of his profession. Perhaps a faithful subject, or even a generous enemy, would have been less impatient to divide the spoils of the barbarian; and if the emperor had intrusted Stephen to solicit in his name the restitution of the exarchate, I will not absolve the pope from the reproach of treachery and falsehood. But in the rigid interpretation of the laws, every one may accept, without injury, whatever his benefactor can bestow without injustice. The Greek emperor had abdicated, or forfeited, his right to the exarchate; and the sword of Astolphus was broken by the stronger sword of the Carlovingian. It was not in the cause of the Iconoclast that Pepin had exposed his person and army in a double expedition beyond the Alps: he possessed, and might lawfully alienate, his conquests: and to the importunities of the Greeks he piously replied, that no human consideration should tempt him to resume the gift which he had conferred on the Roman pontiff for the remission of his sins and the salvation of his soul. The splendid donation was granted in supreme and absolute dominion, and the world beheld for the first time a christian bishop invested with the preCarlovingian medals, struck at Rome, have engaged Le Blanc to write an elaborate, though partial, dissertation on their authority at Rome, both as patricians and emperors. (Amsterdam, 1692. in 4to.)

q Mosheim (Institution Hist. Eccles. p. 263.) weighs this donation with fajr and deliberate prudence. The original act has never been produced but the Liber Pontificalis represents, (p. 171.) and the Codex Carolinus supposes, this ample gift. Both are contemporary records; and the latter is the more authentic, since it has been preserved, not in the papal, but the imperial, library.

Between the exorbitant claims and narrow concessions of interest and prejudice, from which even Muratori (Antiquitat. tom. i. p. 6368.) is not exempt, I have been guided, in the limits of the exarchate and Pentapolis, by the Dissertatio Chorographica Italia Medii Ævi, tom. x. p. 160-180.

rogatives of a temporal prince; the choice of magistrates, the exercise of justice, the imposition of taxes, and the wealth of the palace of Ravenna. In the dissolution of the Lombard kingdom, the inhabitants of the duchy of Spoleto sought a refuge from the storm, shaved their heads after the Roman fashion, declared themselves the servants and subjects of St. Peter, and completed, by this voluntary surrender, the present circle of the ecclesiastical state. That mysterious circle was enlarged to an indefinite extent, by the verbal or written donation of Charlemagne,' who, in the first transports of his victory, despoiled himself and the Greek emperor of the cities and islands which had formerly been annexed to the exarchate. But, in the cooler moments of absence and reflection, he viewed, with an eye of jealousy and envy, the recent greatness of his ecclesiastical ally. The execution of his own and his father's promises was respectfully eluded: the king of the Franks and Lombards asserted the inalienable rights of the empire; and, in his life and death, Ravenna," as well as Rome, was numbered in the list of his metropolitan cities. The sovereignty of the exarchate melted away in the hands of the popes: they found in the archbishops of Ravenna a dangerous and domestic rival: the nobles and people disdained the yoke of a priest; and, in the disorders of the times, they could only retain the memory of an ancient claim, which, in a more prosperous age, they have revived and realized.

stantine.

Fraud is the resource of weakness Forgery of the donation of Con- and cunning; and the strong though ignorant, barbarian, was often entangled in the net of sacerdotal policy. The Vatican and Lateran were an arsenal and manufacture, which, according to the occasion, have produced or concealed a various collection of false or genuine, of corrupt or suspicious, acts, as they tended to promote the interest of the Roman church. Before the end of the eighth century, some apostolical scribe, perhaps the notorious Isidore, composed the decretals, and the donation of Constantine, the two

s Spoletini deprecati sunt, ut eos in servitio B. Petri reciperet et more Romanorum tonsurari faceret. (Anastasius, p. 185.) Yet it may be a question whether they gave their own persons or their country.

The policy and donations of Charlemagne are carefully examined by St. Marc, (Abrégé, tom. i. p. 390-408.) who has well studied the Codex Carolinus. I believe, with him, that they were only verbal. The most ancient act of donation that pretends to be extant, is that of the emperor Lewis the Pions. (Sigonius, de Regno Italiæ, I. iv. Opera, tom. ii. p. 267-270.) Its authenticity, or at least its integrity, are much questioned, (Pagi, A. D. 817, No. 7, &c. Muratori, Annali, tom. vi. p. 432, &c. Dissertat. Chorographica, p. 33, 34.) but I see no reasonable objection to these princes so freely disposing of what was not their

own.

u Charlemagne solicited and obtained from the proprietor, Hadrian I. the mosaics of the palace of Ravenna, for the decoration of Aix-laChapelle. (Cod. Carolin. epist. 67. p. 223.)

The popes often complain of the usurpations of Leo of Ravenna. (Codex Carolin. epist. 51-53. p. 200—205.) Si corpus St. Andreæ fratris germani St. Petri hic humasset, nequaquam nos Romani pontifices sic subjugassent. (Agnellus, Liber Pontificalis, in Scriptores Rerum Ital. tom. ii. pars. i. p. 107.)

y Piissimo Constantino magno, per ejus largitatem S. R. Ecclesia elevata et exaltata est, et potestatem in his Hesperia partibus largiri dignatus est. ... Quia ecce novus Constantinus his temporibus, &c. (Codex Carolin. epist. 49. in tom. iii. part. ii. p. 195.) Pagi (Crítica, A. D. 324, No 16.) ascribes them to an impostor of the eighth century, who borrowed the name of St. Isidore: his humble title of Peccator was ignorantly, but aptly, turned into Mercator; his merchandise was indeed profitable, and a few sheets of paper were sold for much wealth and power.

magic pillars of the spiritual and temporal monarchy of the popes. This memorable donation was introduced to the world by an epistle of Adrian the first, who exhorts Charlemagne to imitate the liberality, and revive the name, of the great Constantine. According to the legend, the first of the christian emperors was healed of the leprosy, and purified in the waters of baptism, by St. Silvester, the Roman bishop; and never was physician more gloriously recompensed. His royal proselyte withdrew from the seat and patrimony of St. Peter; declared his resolution of founding a new capital in the east ; and resigned to the popes the free and perpetual sovereignty of Rome, Italy, and the provinces of the west. This fiction was productive of the most beneficial effects. The Greek princes were convicted of the guilt of usurpation: and the revolt of Gregory was the claim of his lawful inheritance. The popes were delivered from their debt of gratitude; and the nominal gifts of the Carlovingians were no more than the just and irrevocable restitution of a scanty portion of the ecclesiastical state. The sovereignty of Rome no longer depended on the choice of a fickle people; and the successors of St. Peter and Constantine were invested with the purple and prerogatives of the Cæsars. So deep was the ignorance and credulity of the times, that the most absurd of fables was received, with equal reverence, in Greece and in France, and is still enrolled among the decrees of the canon law. The emperors, and the Romans, were incapable of discerning a forgery, that subverted their rights and freedom; and the only opposition proceeded from a Sabine monastery, which, in the beginning of the twelfth century, disputed the truth and validity of the donation of Constantine. In the revival of letters and liberty this fictitious deed was transpierced by the pen of Laurentius Valla, the pen of an eloquent critic and a Roman patriot.c His contemporaries of the fifteenth century were astonished at his sacrilegious boldness; yet such is the silent and irresistible progress of reason, that before the end of the next age, the fable was rejected by the contempt of historians

z Fabricius (Bibliot. Græc. tom. vi. p. 4-7.) has enumerated the several editions of this Act, in Greek and Latin. The copy which Laurentius Valla recites and refutes, appears to be taken either from the spurious Acts of St. Silvester or from Gratian's Decree, to which, according to him and others, it has been surreptitiously tacked.

a In the year 1059, it was believed (was it believed?) by pope Leo IX., Cardinal Peter Damianus, &c. Muratori places (Annali d'Italia, tom. ix. p. 23, 24.) the fictitious donations of Lewis the Pious, the Othos, &c. de Donatione Constantini. See a Dissertation of Natalis Alexander, seculum iv. diss. 25. p. 335-350.

b See a large account of the controversy, (A. D. 1105.) which arose from a private law-suit, in the Chronicon. Farsense, (Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom. ii. pars ii. p. 637, &c.) a copious extract from the archives of that Benedictine abbey. They were formerly accessible to curious foreigners, (Le Blanc and Mabillon,) and would have enriched the first volume of the Historia Monastica Italiæ of Quirini. But they are now imprisoned, (Muratori, Scriptores R. I. tom. ii. pars ii. p. 269.) by the timid policy of the court of Rome; and the future cardinal yielded to the voice of authority and the whispers of ambition. (Qui. rini, Comment. pars ii. p. 123-136.)

e I have read in the collection of Schardins, (de Potestate Imperiali Ecclesiastica, p. 734-780.) this animated discourse, which was composed by the author, A. D. 1440. six years after the flight of pope Eugenius IV. It is a most vehement party pamphlet: Valla justifies and animates the revolt of the Romans, and would even approve the use of a dagger against their sacerdotal tyrant. Such a critic might expect the persecution of the clergy; yet he made his peace, and is buried in the Lateran. (Bayle, Dictionnaire Critique, VALLA; Vossius; de Historicis Latinis, p. 580.)

d See Guicciardini, a servant of the popes, in that long and valuable

images; but I am not inclined to pursue with minute diligence the repetition of the same events. Nicephorus allowed a general liberty of speech and practice; and the only virtue of his reign is accused by the monks as the cause of his temporal and eternal perdition. Superstition and weakness formed the character of Michael the first, but the saints and images were incapable of supporting their votary on the throne. In the purple, Leo the fifth asserted the name and religion of an Armenian; and the idols, with their seditious adherents, were condemned to a second exile. Their applause would have sanctified the murder of an impious tyrant, but his assassin and successor, the second Michael, was tainted from his birth with the Phrygian heresies he attempted to mediate between the contending parties; and the intractable spirit of the catholics insensibly cast him into the opposite scale. His moderation was guarded by timidity; but his son Theophilus, alike ignorant of fear and pity, was the last and most cruel of the Iconoclasts. The enthusiasm of the times ran strongly against them; and the emperors, who stemmed the torrent, were exasperated and punished by the public hatred. After the death of Theophilus, the final victory of the images was achieved by a second female, his widow Theodora, whom he left the guardian of the empire. Her measures were bold and decisive. The fiction of a tardy repentance absolved the fame and the soul of her deceased husband: the sentence of the Iconoclast patriarch was commuted from the loss of his eyes to a whipping of two hundred lashes; the bishops trembled, the monks shouted, and the festival of orthodoxy preserves the annual memory of the triumph of the images. A single question yet remained, whether they are endowed with any proper and inherent sanctity: it was agitated by the Greeks of the eleventh century;" and as this opinion has the strongest recommendation of absurdity, I am surprised that it was not more explicitly decided in the affirmative. In the west pope Adrian the first accepted and announced the decrees of the Nicene assembly, which is now revered by the catholics as the seventh in rank of the general councils. Rome and Italy were docile to the voice of their father; but the greatest part of the Latin christians were far behind in the race of supersti

m See an account of this controversy in the Alexius of Anna Comnena, (l. v. p. 129.) and Mosheim, (Institut. Hist. Eccles. p. 371, 372.)

n The Libri Carolini, (Spanheim, p. 443-529.) composed in the pa lace or winter-quarters of Charlemagne, at Worms, A. D. 790; and sent by Engebert to pope Hadrian I. who answered them by a grandis et verbosa epistola, (Concil. tom. viii. p. 1553.) The Carolines propose 120 objections against the Nicene synod, and such words as these are the flowers of their rhetoric-dementiam.. priscæ Gentilitatis obsoletum errorem..... argumenta insanissima et absurdissima.... derisione dignas nænias, &c. &c.

The assemblies of Charlemagne were political, as well as ecclesiastical: and the three hundred members (Nat. Alexander, sec. viii. p. 53.) who sat and voted at Frankfort must include not only the bishops, but the abbots, and even the principal laymen.

P Qui supra sanctissima patres nostri (episcopi et sacerdotes) omnimodis servitium et adorationem imaginum renuentes contempserunt, atque consentientes condemnaverunt. (Concil. tom. ix. p. 101. Canon ii. Franckfurd.) A polemic must be hard-hearted indeed, who does not pity the efforts of Baronius, Pagi, Alexander, Maimbourg, &c. to elude this unlucky sentence.

q Theophanes (p. 343.) specifies those of Sicily and Calabria, which yielded an annual rent of three talents and a half of gold, (perhaps 70001.

Reluctance of

the Franks, and of Charlemagne,

tion. The churches of France, Germany, England, and Spain, steered a middle course between the adoration A. D. 794, &c. and the destruction of images, which they admitted into their temples, not as objects of worship, but as lively and useful memorials of faith and history. An angry book of controversy was composed and published in the name of Charlemagne ; under his authority a synod of three hundred bishops was assembled at Frankfort: they blamed the fury of the Iconoclasts, but they pronounced a more severe censure against the superstition of the Greeks, and the decrees of their pretended council, which was long despised by the barbarians of the west." Among them the worship of images advanced with silent and insensible progress; but a large atonement is made for their hesitation and delay, by the gross idolatry of the ages which precede the reformation, and of the countries, both in Europe and America, which are still immersed in the gloom of superstition.

Final separation of the popes from the Eastern en

pire,

A. D. 774-800.

It was after the Nicene synod, and under the reign of the pious Irene, that the popes consummated the separation of Rome and Italy, by the translation of the empire to the less orthodox Charlemagne. They were compelled to choose between the rival rations: religion was not the sole motive of their choice; and while they dissembled the failings of their friends, they beheld, with reluctance and suspicion, the catholic virtues of their foes. The difference of language and manners had perpetuated the enmity of the two capitals; and they were alienated from each other by the hostile opposition of seventy years. In that schism the Romans had tasted of freedom, and the popes of sovereignty: their submission would have exposed them to the revenge of a jealous tyrant; and the revolution of Italy had betrayed the impotence, as well as the tyranny, of the Byzantine court. The Greek emperors had restored the images, but they had not restored the Calabrian estates and the Illyrian diocese,' which the Iconoclasts had torn away from the successors of St. Peter; and pope Adrian threatens them with a sentence of excommunication unless they speedily abjure this practical heresy. The Greeks were now orthodox, but their religion

sterling.) Liutprand more pompously enumerates the patrimonies of the Roman church in Greece, Judæa, Persia, Mesopotamia, Babylonia, Egypt, and Libya, which were detained by the injustice of the Greek emperor. (Legat. ad Nicephorum, in Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom. ii. pars i. p. 481.)

The great diocese of the eastern Illyricum, with Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily, (Thomasin, Discipline de l'Eglise, tom. i. p. 145.) by the confession of the Greeks, the patriarch of Constantinople had detached from Rome the metropolitans of Thessalonica, Athens, Corinth. Nicopolis, and Patræ, (Luc. Holsten. Geograph. Sacra, p. 22) and his spiritual conquests extended to Naples and Amalphi. (Giannone, Istoria Civile di Napoli, tom. i. p. 517-524. Pagi, A. D. 730. No. 11.)

In hoc ostenditur, quia ex uno capitulo ab errore reversis in aliis duobus, in eodem (was it the same ?) permaneant errore. ... de diocesi S. R. E. seu de patrimoniis iterum increpantes commonemus, ut si ea restituere noluerit hereticum eum pro hujusmodi errore perseverantia decernemus, (Epist. Hadrian. Papæ ad Carolum Magnum, in Concil. tom. viii. p. 1598.) to which he adds a reason, most directly opposite to his conduct, that he preferred the salvation of souls and rule of faith to the goods of this transitory world.