History of the Catholic Church, vol 1 - J. MacCaffrey (epub ebook reader .TXT) 📗

in his own territories, had succeeded to all the rights and privileges which, according to the divine constitution of the Church, belonged to the Pope.

 

Such a development in the Protestant countries could not fail to produce its effects even on Catholic rulers who had remained loyal to the Church. They began to aim at combining, as far as possible, the Protestant theory of ecclesiastical government with obedience to the Pope, by taking into their own hands the administration of ecclesiastical affairs, by making the bishops and clergy state-officials, and by leaving to the Pope only a primacy of honour. This policy, known under the different names of Gallicanism in France, and of Febronianism and Josephism in the Empire, led of necessity to conflicts between Rome and the Catholic sovereigns of Europe, conflicts in which, unfortunately, many of the bishops, influenced by mistaken notions of loyalty and patriotism, took the side of their own sovereigns. As a result, absolute rule was established throughout Europe; the rights of the people to any voice in government were trampled upon, and the rules became more despotic than the old Roman Emperors had been even in their two-fold capacity of civil ruler and high priest.

 

Meanwhile, the principle of private judgment had produced its logical effects. Many of Luther’s followers, even in his own lifetime, had been induced to reject doctrines accepted by their master, but, after his death, when the influence of Tradition and of authority had become weaker, Lutheranism was reduced to a dogmatic chaos. By the application of the principle of private judgment, certain leaders began to call in question, not merely individual doctrines, but even the very foundations of Christianity, and, in a short time, Atheism and Naturalism were recognised as the hall-mark of education and good breeding.

 

The civil rulers even in Catholic countries took no very active steps to curb the activity of the anti-Christian writers and philosophers, partly because they themselves were not unaffected by the spirit of irreligion, and partly also because they were not sorry to see popular resentment diverted from their own excesses by being directed against the Church. But, in a short time, they realised, when it was too late, that the overthrow of religious authority carries with it as a rule the overthrow of civil authority also, and that the attempt to combine the two principles of private judgment and of royal supremacy must lead of necessity to revolution.

 

*

 

I wish to express my sincere thanks to the many friends who have assisted me, and particularly to the Very Rev. Thomas O’Donnell, C.M., President, All Hallows College. My special thanks are due also to the Rev. Patrick O’Neill (Limerick), who relieved me of much anxiety by undertaking the difficult task of compiling the Index.

 

James MacCaffrey.

 

St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth,

Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

 

HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

 

From the Renaissance to the French Revolution CHAPTER I CAUSES OF THE REFORMATION

 

(a) The Renaissance.

 

Baudrillart, The Catholic Church, The Renaissance, and Protestantism (Tr.), 1908 (chap. i.-iii.). Guirard, L’Eglise et les Origines de la Renaissance, 1902. Burckhardt, Die Cultur der Renaissance in Italien, 11 auf., 1913 (Eng. Trans. by Middlemore, 1878). A Baumgartner, S.J., Geschichte der Weltiteratur, vol.

iv., 1900. The Cambridge Modern History, vol. i. (/The Renaissance/, 1902). Stone, The Reformation and Renaissance, 1904. Janssen, Geschichte des deutschen Volkes, 1887 (Eng.

Trans. by Mitchell and Christie, London, 1896 sqq.). Pastor, Geschichte der Papste im Zeitalter der Renaissance, Freiburg, 1886 sqq. (Eng. Trans. by Antrobus, London, 1891 sqq.). Muntz, La Renaissance en Italie et en France a l’epoque de Charles VIII., 1885. Gasquet, The Eve of the Reformation. Mourret, La Renaissance et la Reforme, 1912.

 

The great intellectual revival, that followed upon the successful issue of the struggle for freedom waged by Gregory VII. and his successors, reached the zenith of its glory in the thirteenth century.

Scholasticism, as expounded by men like Alexander of Hales, Albert the Great, Roger Bacon, St. Bonaventure, and St. Thomas, and illustrated by a wealth of material drawn alike from the Scriptures, the writings of the Fathers, the wisdom of Pagan philosophers, and the conclusions of natural science, was alone deemed worthy of serious attention.

Classical studies either were neglected entirely even in the centres of learning, or were followed merely for the assistance they might render in the solution of the philosophical and theological problems, that engaged men’s minds in an age when Christian faith reigned supreme.

 

The Catholic Church, indeed, had never been hostile to classical studies, nor unmindful of their value, as a means of developing the powers of the human mind, and of securing both breadth of view and beauty of expression. Some few teachers here and there, alarmed by the danger of corrupting Christian youth by bringing it into contact with Pagan ideals, raised their voices in protest, but the majority of the early Fathers disregarded these warnings as harmful and unnecessary.

Origen, St. Clement of Alexandria, St. Gregory of Nazianzen, St.

Basil, and St. Jerome, while not ignoring the dangers of such studies, recommended them warmly to their students, and in the spirit of these great leaders the Catholic Church strove always to combine classical culture and Christian education.

 

With the fall of the Empire, consequent upon its invasion by the barbarian hordes, classical studies were banished to some extent to the Western Isles, Ireland and Britain, from which they were transplanted to the Continent principally during the Carlovingian revival.[1] In the cathedral, collegiate, and monastic schools the classics were still cultivated, though beyond doubt compilations were used more frequently than were the original works; and even in the darkest days of the dark ages some prominent ecclesiastics could be found well versed at least in the language and literature of Rome. It looked, too, for a time, as if the intellectual revival of the twelfth century were to be turned towards the classics; but the example of men like John of Salisbury was not followed generally, and the movement developed rapidly in the direction of philosophy. As a consequence, the study of Latin was neglected or relegated to a secondary place in the schools, while Greek scholarship disappeared practically from Western Europe. The Scholastics, more anxious about the logical sequence of their arguments than about the beauties of literary expression, invented for themselves a new dialect, which, however forcible in itself, must have sounded barbarous to any one acquainted with the productions of the golden age of Roman literature or even with the writings of the early Fathers of the Latin Church. Nor was it the language merely that was neglected. The monuments and memorials of an earlier civilisation were disregarded, and even in Rome itself, the City of the Popes, the vandalism of the ignorant wrought dreadful havoc.

 

So complete a turning away from forces that had played such a part in the civilisation of the world was certain to provoke a reaction.

Scholasticism could not hold the field for ever to the exclusion of other branches of study, especially, since in the less competent hands of its later expounders it had degenerated into an empty formalism.

The successors of St. Thomas and St. Bonaventure had little of their originality, their almost universal knowledge, and their powers of exposition, and, as a result, students grew tired of the endless wranglings of the schools, and turned their attention to other intellectual pursuits.

 

Besides, men’s ideas of politics, of social order, and of religion were changing rapidly, and, in a word, the whole outlook of the world was undergoing a speedy transformation. In the Middle Ages religion held the dominant position and was the guiding principle in morals, in education, in literature, and in art; but as the faith of many began to grow cold, and as the rights of Church and State began to be distinguished, secularist tendencies soon made themselves felt.

Philosophy and theology were no longer to occupy the entire intellectual field, and other subjects for investigation must be found. In these circumstances what was more natural than that some should advocate a return to the classics and all that the classics enshrined? Again, the example set by the tyrants who had grasped the reins of power in the Italian States, by men like Agnello of Pisa, the Viscontis and Francesco Sforza of Milan, Ferrante of Naples, and the de’ Medici of Florence, was calculated to lower the moral standard of the period, and to promote an abandonment of Christian principles of truth, and justice, and purity of life. Everywhere men became more addicted to the pursuit of sensual pleasure, of vain glory, and material comfort; and could ill brook the dominant ideas of the Middle Ages concerning the supernatural end of man, self-denial, humility, patience, and contempt for the things that minister only to man’s temporal happiness. With views of this kind in the air it was not difficult to persuade them to turn to the great literary masterpieces of Pagan Rome, where they were likely to find principles and ideals more in harmony with their tastes than those set before them by the Catholic Church.

 

The thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, then, mark a period of transition from the Middle Ages to modern times. They saw a sharp struggle being waged between two ideals in politics, in education, in literature, in religion, and in morality. In this great upheaval that was characterised by a demand for unrestricted liberty of investigation, a return to the study of nature and of the natural sciences, the rise and development of national literatures, and the appearance of a new school of art, the Humanist movement or the revival of the study of the classics, the literae humaniores, played the fundamental part. In more senses than one it may be called the Age of the Renaissance.

 

Nor was it a matter of chance that this revival of interest in classical studies should have made itself felt first in Italy, where the downfall of the Empire, and the subsequent development of petty states seem to have exercised a magical influence upon the intellectual development of the people. The Italians were the direct heirs to the glory of ancient Rome. Even in the days of their degradation, when the capital deserted by the Popes was fast going to ruin, and when foreigners and native tyrants were struggling for the possession of their fairest territories, the memory of the imperial authority of their country, and the crumbling monuments that bore witness to it still standing in their midst, served to turn their patriotic ardour towards the great literary treasures bequeathed to them by Pagan Rome. Greek literature, too, was not forgotten, though in the thirteenth century few western scholars possessed any acquaintance with the language. Many causes, however, combined to prepare the way for a revival of Greek. The commercial cities of Italy were in close touch with the Eastern Empire, especially since the Crusades; ambassadors, sent by the Emperors to seek the assistance of the Pope and of the Western rulers in the struggle against the Turks, were passing from court to court; the negotiations for a reunion of the Churches, which had been going on since the days of the first Council of Lyons, rendered a knowledge of Greek and of the writings of the Greek Fathers necessary for some of the leading ecclesiastics of the West; while, finally, the fall of Constantinople in 1453 forced many Greek scholars to seek a refuge in Italy or France, and provided the agents sent by the Popes and Italian rulers with a splendid opportunity of securing priceless treasures for the Western libraries.

 

Though Dante (1265-1321) is sometimes regarded as the earliest of the Humanist school[2] on account of his professed admiration for some of