PART II.

The Internal HISTORY of the Church.

CENT. they received from the pontifs, of preaching to XIII. the multitude, hearing confession, and pronouncing absolution, without any licence from the bishops, and even without consulting them; to which we may add the treasure of ample and extensive Indulgences, whose distribution was committed by the popes to the Franciscans, as a mean of subsistence, and a rich indemnification for their voluntary poverty [y]. These acts of liberality and marks of protection, lavished upon the Dominican and Franciscan friars with such an ill-judged profusion, as they overturned the ancient discipline, of the church, and were a manifest encroachment upon the rights of the first and second orders of the ecclesiastical rulers, produced the most unhappy and bitter dissensions between the Mendicant orders and the bishops. And these dissensions, extending their contagious influence beyond the limits of the church, excited throughout all the European provinces, and even in the city of Rome [x], under the very eye of the pontifs, the most dreadful disturbances and tumults. The measures taken by the popes to appease these tumults were various, but ineffectual; because their principal view was to support the cause of their faithful servants and creatures, the Mendicant friars, and to maintain them in the possession of their honours and advantages [a].

XXVII.

[y] See BALUZI1 Miscellan. tom. iv. p. 495. tom. vii. P. 392.-It is well known that no religious order had the distribution of so many and such ample indulgences as the Franciscans. Nor could these good friars live and multiply as they did,without some source of profit, since, by their institution, they were to be destitute of revenues and possessions of every kind. It was therefore in the place of fixed revenues, that such fat indulgences were put into their hands.

[*] BALUZII Miscellan. tom. vii. p. 441.

[a] See Jo. LAUNOII Explicata Ecclesie Traditio circa Canonem: Omnis utriusque Sexus, tom. i. part I. Opp. p. 247RICH. SIMON, Critique de la Bibliotheque des Auteurs Ecclesias

tiques,

XIII.

The dispute

that between Do- the Domiwas nicans and

the univer

XXVII. Among all the controversies which CENT. were maintained by the Mendicants, whether PART II. against the bishops, abbots, schools, or other religious orders, none was so famous, as which arose, in the year 1228, between the minicans and the university of Paris, and prolonged, with various success, until the year sity of 1259. The Dominicans claimed, as their un- Paris. questionable right, two theological classes in that celebrated university, one of which had been taken from them, and an academical law passed, that no religious order should have what the Dominicans demanded. These latter, however, persisted obstinately in reclaiming the professorship they had lost; while the doctors of the university, perceiving the restless and contentious spirit that animated their efforts, excluded them from their society, and formed themselves into a separate body. This measure was considered as a declaration of war; and, accordingly, the most vehement commotions arose between the contending parties. The debate was brought before the tribunal of the Roman pontif in the year 1255; and the decision, as might well have been expected, was in favour of the monks. ALEXANDER IV. ordered the university of Paris not only to restore their Dominicans to their former place in that learned society, but moreover to make a grant to them of as many classes or professorships as they should think proper to demand. This unjust and despotic sentence was opposed by the university with the utmost vigour, and thus the contest was renewed with double fury. But the magistrates of Paris were, at length, so terrified

and

tiques, par M. DU PIN, tom. i. p. 336.-LENFANT, Histoire du Concile de Pise, tom. i. p. 310. tom. ii. p. 8.-ECHARDI Scriptores Dominicani, tom. i. p. 4°4. The circumstances of these flaming contests are mentioned by all the writers both of this and the following centuries.

PART II.

CEN T. and overwhelmed with the thundering edicts and XIII. formidable mandates of the exasperated pontif, that, in the year 1259, they yielded to superior force, and satisfied the demands not only of the Dominican, but also of the Franciscan order, in obedience to the pope, and to the extent of his commands [b]. Hence arose that secret enmity, that silent ill-will, which prevailed so long between the university of Paris and the Mendicant orders, especially the Dominicans, and which are not yet entirely extinguished.

The Domi

XXVIII. In this famous debate none pleaded nicans meet the cause of the university with greater spirit, and midable ad-asserted its rights with greater zeal and activity, versary. than GUILLAUME DE ST AMOUR, doctor of the

with a for

Sorbonne, a man of true genius, worthy to have lived in better times, and capable of adorning a more enlightened age. This vigorous and able champion attacked the whole Mendicant tribe in various treatises with the greatest vehemence, and more especially in a book Concerning the perils of the latter times. He maintained publicly, that their discipline was in direct opposition to the precepts of the gospel; and that, in confirming and approving it, the popes had been guilty of temerity,and the church was become chargeable with error [c.] What gave occasion to the remarkable title of this famous book, was the author's being entirely persuaded that the prophecy of St Paul, relating to the perilous times that were to come in the last days [d], was fulfilled in the establishment

of

[b] See CAS. EGASS. DU BOULAY, Histor. Acad. Paris. tom. ii. p. 138. 240. 244. 248. 266, &c.-Jo. CORDESII, or (to mention him by the name he assumes) Jo. ALITOPHILI Pref. Histor. et Apologetica ad Opera Guilielmi de S. Amore.ANTOINE TOURON, Vie de S. Thomas, p. 134.-WADDINGI Annal. Minor. tom. iii. p. 247. 366. tom. iv. p. 14. 52. 106. 263.-MATTH. PARIS, Histor. Major, ad An. 1228, & NANGIS Chronicon. apud DACHERIUM; Spicilegii, tom. iii. p. 33. [c] 2 Timothy iii. 1.

[d] 2 Timothy iii. 1.

XIII. PART II.

of the Mendicant friars. This notion St AMOUR CENT. maintained in the warmest manner, and proved it, principally, from the book called the Ever lasting Gospel, which was explained publicly by the Dominicans and Franciscans, and of which we shall have occasion to speak more fully hereafter. The fury and resentment of the Mendicants were therefore kindled, in a peculiar manner, against this formidable adversary, whom they persecuted without interruption, until, in the year 1256, ALEXANDER VI. ordered his book to be publicly burnt, and banished its author out of France, lest he should excite the Sorbonne to renew their opposition to these ghostly beggars. St AMOUR submitted to the papal edict, and retired into the Franche Comte, which was the place of his birth; but, under the pontificate of CLEMENT IV. he returned to Paris, where he illustrated the tenets of his famous book in a more extensive work, and died universally esteemed and regretted by all ranks and orders of men, except the Mendicants [d].

XXIX.

[d] The doctors of the university of Paris, profess still a high respect for the memory of St AMOUR, esteem his book, and deny obstinately that he was ever placed in the list of heretics. The Dominicans, on the contrary, consider him as a heretic of the first magnitude, if we may use that expression. Such of his works as could be found were published in 4to, in the year 1632, at Paris (though the title bears Constantia), by CORDESIUS, who has prefixed to them a long and learned Preface, in which he defends the reputation and orthodoxy of St AMOUR in a triumphant manner. This learned editor, to avoid the resentment and fury of the Mendicants, concealed his real name, aud assumed that of Jo. ALITOPHILUS. This did not, however, save his book from the vengeance of these friars, who obtained from LEWIS XIII. in the year 1633, an edict for its suppression, which TOURON, a Dominican friar, has published in his Vie de St Thomas, p. 164.-For a farther account of the life of this famous doctor, see WADDING, Annal. Minor. tom. iii. p. 366.-BOYLAY, Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. iii. p. 266.--Nat. ALEX. Hist. Eccles. Sæc. xiii. cap. iii. Art. vii. p. 95.-RICH. SIMON. Critique de la Biblioth. Eccles. de M. Du PIN, tom. i. P. 345.

XIII.

and arro

gánce of

dicants.

CENT. XXIX. While the pontifs accumulated upon PART II, the Mendicants the most honourable distinctions, and the most valuable privileges which they had The pride to bestow, they exposed them still more and more to the envy and hatred of the rest of the clergy; the Men- and this hatred was considerably increased by the audacious arrogance that discovered itself every where in the conduct of these supercilious orders. They had the presumption to declare publicly, that they had a divine impulse and commission to illustrate and maintain the religion of JESUS ; they treated with the utmost insolence and contempt all the different ranks and orders of the priesthood; they affirmed, without a blush, that the true method of obtaining salvation was revealed to them alone, proclaimed with ostentation the superior efficacy and virtue of their indulgences, and vaunted, beyond measure, their interests at the court of heaven, and their familiar connexions with the Supreme Being the Virgin MARY, and the saints in glory. By these impious wiles, they so deluded and captivated the miserable and blinded multitude, that they would not entrust any others but the Mendicants with the care of their souls, their spiritual and eternal concerns [e]. We may give as a specimen of these notorious frauds, the ridiculous fable, which the Carmelites impose upon the credulous, relating to SIMON STOCKIUS, the general of their order, who died about the beginning of this century. To this ecclesiastic, they tell us that the Virgin MARY appeared, and gave him a solemn promise, that the souls of such as left the world with the Carmelite cloak or scapulary upon their shoulders, should be infallibly preserved from eternal damnation

[e] See MATTH. PARIS, ad A. 1246, Histor. Major. p607. 630, &c.