CENTURY FIFTEENTH.

PART I.

THE EXTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH.

CHAPTER I.

THE PROSPEROUS EVENTS IN THE HISTORY OF

THE CHURCH.

1. Tur new members added to the kingdom of Christ were altogether unworthy the name of Christians, unless we apply the appellation to all who make any kind of profession of Christianity. Ferdinand the Catholic, king of Spain, by the conquest of Granada in 1492, entirely subverted the dominion of the Moors or Saracens in Spain. Not long after he ordered an immense multitude of Jews into banishment, and to escape this evil a great number of them made an insincere profession of Christianity. It is generally known that to this present time Spain and Portugal are full of Jews who pretend to be Christians. The Saracens who remained in vast numbers, were at first solicited by exhortations and discourses to embrace the Christian religion. But as few would yield to these efforts, the great Ximenes, archbishop of Toledo and prime minister of the kingdom, deemed it necessary to employ civil penalties. But even this severity induced only a small part of the nation to renounce Mohammed.2

carried

among

2. The light of Christianity was also the inhabitants of Samogitia and the neighbouring provinces, but with very little success.3 Near the end of the

! Jo. de Fereras, Hist. Générale d'Espagne, tome viii. p. 123, &c. p. 132, et alibi.

Flechier, Hist. du Cardinal Ximenes, p. 89, &c.; Mich. Geddes, History of the Expulsion of the Moriscoes, in his Miscellaneous Tracts, vol. i. p. 8, &c.Prescott's History of Ferdinand and Isabella, respecting the Jews in vol. i. chap. vii. vol. ii. chap. xvii.; respecting the Moors in vol. 1. chap. viii. vol. ii. chap. vi. of the 2d edition, London, 1839.-Mur. [See also M'Crie's Reformation in Spain, p. 70-73, and particularly p. 89-105; and what is still more striking, see a brief notice of the persecutions of the Moors in Valencia by Charles V. in 1524, to compel them to become Christians, in Ranke's Hist. of the Reformation, Mrs. Austin's translation, vol. iii. p. 120.-R.

9 Hottinger's Hist. Eccles. sec. xv. p. 856. [In these countries the Teutonic Knights distinguished themselves by their zeal to convert pagans; but their zeal was neither so pure nor so disinterested as it should be

4

century the Portuguese navigators penetrated to India and Ethiopia, and soon after A.D. 1492, Christopher Columbus opened a islands of Hispaniola, Cuba, Jamaica, and passage to America and discovered the some others. Amerigo Vespucci, a citizen of Florence, now reached the [American] continent. These modern Argonauts thought it their duty to impart the light of Christian truth to the inhabitants of these regions previously unknown to the Europeans. The first attempt of the kind was made by the Portuguese among the Africans of the kingdom of Congo, whose king with all his subjects in the year 1491, received the Romish religion without hesitation. But all good and considerate men

tonic order for subjecting to themselves various coun

to deserve commendation. We have in Von der Hardt's Acta Concil. Constant. tom. iii. p. 9, &c. [a curious dem. Cracov. rectoris, legati regis ad concilium, Demonpaper entitled] "Pauli Voladimini de Cracovia, Acastratio, Cruciferis de Prussia opposita; Infideles Armis et Bello non esse ad Christianam fidem Convertendos, die 6 Julii proposita." In the first chapter of this paper nec eorum bona Invadenda, in Constant. concil. 1415, Christ the unbelieving have no rights, no honours, and is a confutation of the opinion, that since the advent of no legitimate dominion over their lands. The second chapter treats of the devices and pretexts of the Teutries, under the plea of religion. And the writer says: "The pagans have now ceased to invade us; but these twice a year invade the territories of the infidels, whom pagan princes have received baptism through the ministhey call Reisas (giants). The most powerful of the try of the Poles, and a great multitude are still reconverts lest the object of their inroads should fail." ceiving it; yet the Crossbearers invade still the new Mrs. Austin's transl. tells us that "in Lithuania [or Schl. [Ranke, Hist. of the Reformation, vol. i. p. 245, Samogitia, now Wilna in Russia] the ancient worship and 16th centuries, and was even invested with a poliof the serpent endured through the whole of the 15th tical significancy. Eneas Silvius, De Statu Europa, cap. xx.; Alexander Guagninus. in Resp. Polonia, Elz. p. 276." Guagnini's Compendium Rerum Polonicarum.This last reference ought probably to be to i. p. 64, &c. 4 See Charlevoix, Hist. de l'Isle de St. Domingo, tome

also

in Italian but translated into German. [See
5 See Bandini's Life of Americus Vespuccius, written
Washington Irvine's Life and Voyages of Columbus,
App. no. 10, vol. il. p. 246, &c. where it is shown tha
American continent.-Mur.
Amerigo Vespucci was not the first discoverer of the

p. 366; Lafitau's Hist. des Découvertes et conquêtes des
6 Labat's Relation de l'Ethiopie Occidentale, tome ii.
Portugais dans le Nouveau Monde, tome i. p. 72, &c.

PART II.

THE INTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH. CHAPTER I.

THE STATE OF LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.

1. THE tyranny of the Mohammedans almost silenced the Grecian and Oriental muses. Among the Latins on the contrary,

2

Nicolaus V. stood prominent. Many of For in consequence of this art, the works the kings and princes also aided literary of the best Greek and Latin authors, which men by their protection and extraordinary before had lain concealed in the libraries munificence; among whom the illustrious of the monks, were now put into the hands family of Medici in Italy, Alphonsus VI. of the people; and while they awakened in king of Naples, and the other Neapolitan very many a laudable desire of emulating sovereigns of the house of Aragon, 3 acquired their excellencies, they purified the taste of permanent fame by their liberality and at- innumerable individuals of a literary turn.' tachment to learning. Hence universities 2. The fall of the Greek empire likewise were erected in Germany, France, and contributed much to the promotion of Italy; libraries were collected at great ex-learning in the West. For the most pense, and young men were excited to study learned men of that nation, after the capby proffered rewards and honours. To ture of Constantinople, emigrated to Italy; all these means was added the incomparable advantage resulting from the art of printing, first with wooden blocks and then with metal types, which was invented at Mentz about the year 1440 by John Gutenberg.

1 Gibbon has done justice to the character and claims of this pope, as an encourager of learning and a patron of learned men, by which "he sharpened those weapons which were soon pointed against the Roman church," Decl. and Fall. vol. xii. p. 131-2. See Georgius, Vita Nicolai Quinti, Rom. 1742, 4to, and Hallam's Intro. to the Hist. of Liter. 1st edit. vol. i. p. 196, &c. There are also some interesting notices of this enlightened pope in Shepherd's Life of Poggio Bracciolini, 4to, p. 381, and especially chap. x. p. 405, &c.-R.

2 A treatise expressly on the great merits of the house of Medici, in regard to all the liberal arts and sciences,

is given us by Joseph Bianchini de Prato, Dei Gran Duchi di Toscana della reale Casa de Medici, Protettori delle Lettere et delle Belle Arti, Ragionamenti

Historici, Venice, 1741, fol. [In addition to the several Italian works on the literary merits of this princely family, the English reader may consult Roscoe's well-known Lives of Lorenzo de Medici and of Leo X.-R.

628, &c.; Anton. Panormit. Dicta et Facta Memora

and thence a part of them were dispersed into the other countries of Europe. These men faithfully taught the Greek language and Grecian learning everywhere for their own support; and they diffused a taste for literature and science over nearly the whole Latin world. Hence there was no considerable city or university in which some one or more of the Greeks were not employed in this century as teachers of the liberal arts." But they were nowhere more numerous than in Italy, where they were encouraged and honoured by the munificence and the ardent zeal for useful learning of the Medicean family, and by several Italian cities; and hence those who thirsted for knowledge in other countries were accustomed to repair to that country for study."

3. The greater part of the learned men 3 See Giannone, Hist. de Naples, tome iii. p. 500, in Italy, which was the chief seat of learnbilia Alphonsi I. second ed. by Meuschen, Vita Eru-ing, were engaged in publishing, correctditor. Viror. tom. ii. p. 1, &c. ing, and elucidating the Greek and Latin authors, in forming both a prose and poetic style after their model, and in illustrating antiquities. And in these departments many attained such eminence that it is very difficult to come up to their standard. Nor were the other languages and sciences neglected. In the university of Paris a public teacher of the Greek and Hebrew languages was now established." In Spain and Italy there were many who were eminent for their knowledge of Hebrew and oriental literature. Germany was renowned for John Reuchlin or Capnio, John Trithemius, and others, eminent

art.

Maittaire's Annales Typographici; Marchand's Histoire de l'Imprimerie, Hague, 1740, 4to, &c. [Schöpflin's Vindiciae Typographica, Strasb. 1760, 4to; Meerman's Origines Typographica, Hague, 1763, 2 vols. 4to; Breitkopf, über die Geschichte der Buchdruckerkunst, Lips. 1779, 4to. There has been much debate where and by whom printing was first executed. Haerlem, Mentz, and Strasburg, each claim the honour of being the first seat of the art; and Laurence Coster, John Gensfleisch or Gutenberg, and John Faust, besides others, have been honoured as inventors of the Hacrlem with carved wooden blocks (much in the Chinese manner), on or before the year 1430; that Gutenberg invented forged metal types at Strasburg, A.D. 1436 or later; and that afterwards forming a partnership with Faust and others at Mentz, Faust invented the cast types, one Peter Schoeffer having devised the iron matrices and punches to facilitate the casting of the types, and the company began to print in 1450, and in 1459 printed Durand's Rationale Divinor. Officior. at Mentz. See Schroeckh's Kirchengesch. vol. xxx. p. 175, and Rees' Cyclopædia, art. Printing. -Mur. [Aluminous and correct summary of this controversy may be seen in Hallam's Intro. to the Hist. of Liter. vol. i. p. 206, &c. Some additional facts have been recently furnished by M. Léon de Laborde in his Debuts de l'Imprimerie a Mayence et Bamberg, Paris, 1840, 4to, in which he brings to light several printed Letters of indulgence, with blanks for the insertion of the purchasers' names, which were issued by pope Nicolas V. in 1454. In page ii. of the preface, the reader will find a pretty full catalogue of the best works on the origin of this invaluable art. See also his Debuts de Imprimerie à Strasbourg, Paris, 1840, 8vo, in which he refers the first attempts of Gutenberg in that city to the year 1436.-R.

The probability is that Coster first printed at

5 Maius, Vita Reuchlini, p. 11, 13, 19, 28, 152, 153, 165, &c.; Barth on Statius, tom. ii. p. 1008; Bulæus, Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. v. p. 691.

Happily illustrative of these facts is Humphrey Hody's book, De Græcis Illustribus Literarum Instauratoribus, edited by Jebb, Lond. 1742, 8vo. Very interesting and accurate is Boerner, De Doctis Hominibus Græcis Literarum Græcarum in Italia Instauratoribus, Lips. 1750, 8vo; Battier, Oratio de Instauratoribus Gracar. Literarum, in the Museum Helveticum, tom. iv. p. 163, &c.

7 Simon, Crit. de la Biblio. Ecclés. par M. Du Pin, tome i. p. 502, 512, &c.; Bulæus, Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. v. p. 852, &c.

8 Colomesius, Italia Orientalis, p. 4, &c. and Hispania Orientalis, p. 212.

both in those languages and in other | 5. A middle course between the two branches of knowledge.1 Latin poetry parties was taken by certain eminent men was revived, especially by Anthony Panor- among both the Greeks and Latins, such mitanus who had many followers.2 The as John Francis Picus, Bessarion, Hermoprincipal collector of ancient monuments, coins, gems, and inscriptions, among the Italians, was Cyriacus of Ancona, whose example prompted others to do the same.

3

laus Barbarus, and others, who indeed honoured Plato as a kind of oracle in philosophy, yet did not wish to see Aristotle trodden under foot and despised, but rather contemplated a union of the two. Both in their manner of teaching and in their doctrines or principles, these teachers followed the later Platonic school which originated with Ammonius. This kind of philosophy was for a long time held in high estimation, and was especially prized by the mystic theologians; but the scholastic and disputatious divines were better pleased with the Peripatetic school. Yet these Platonists were not truly wise, for they were not only infected with anile superstition, but they abandoned themselves wholly to the guidance of a wanton imagination.

4. It is not necessary to speak particularly of the other branches of learning, but the state of philosophy deserves a brief notice. Before the Greeks came to Italy Aristotle alone was in repute with all; he was extolled so immoderately that many were not ashamed to compare him absurdly with the precursor of Jesus Christ.1 But about the time of the council of Florence some of the Greeks, and especially the celebrated Gemistius Pletho, recommended to certain great men of Italy, instead of the contentious philosophy of the Peripatetics, what they called the divine and mild wisdom of Plato. And these Italians, being 6. These Platonists however were not charmed with it, took pains to have a num- so bad as their opponents, the Aristotelians, ber of noble youths imbued with it. The who had the upper hand in Italy and inmost distinguished among them was Cosmo structed the youth in all the universities. de Medicis, who after hearing Pletho formed For these, and especially the followers of the design of establishing a Platonic school Averroes, by maintaining (according to at Florence. For this purpose he caused the opinion of Averroes) that all men have Marsilius Ficinus, the son of his physician, one common soul, cunningly subverted the to be carefully educated and instructed, in foundations of all religion, both natural order to translate the works of Plato from and revealed, and approximated very near the Greek into Latin. He therefore first to the impious tenets of the pantheists, published a Latin version of Hermes Trisme- who hold that the universe, as consisting gistus, and then of Plotinus, and finally of of infinite matter and infinite power of Plato. This same Cosmo prompted other thought, is the deity. The most noted learned men, as Ambrose of Camalduli, among this class was Peter Pomponatius, Leonardo Bruno, Poggio, and others, to a philosopher of Mantua, a crafty and engage in similar labours, that is, to trans-arrogant man, who has left us many writlate Greek authors into Latin. In conse-ings prejudicial to religion; yet nearly quence of these efforts there soon appeared all the professors of philosophy in the two schools of philosophy in Italy, which Italian universities coincided with him in for a long time contended zealously with each other, whether Plato or Aristotle ought to hold the pre-eminence in philosophy.

1 Simon, Lettres Choisies, tome i. p. 262, tome iv. p. 131, &c. p. 140, and in other passages.

2 Bayle, Dictionnaire, art. Panormita, tome iii. p. 2162. [His name was Antonius Beccatellus of Palermo, or Panormitanus. Mosheim has overrated him as the reviver of Latin poetry. This honour belongs rather to Petrarch in the preceding century, and among the Latin poets of the fifteenth century Politian must be preferred to Beccatellus, who was his contemporary.-R.

8

sentiment. When pressed by the Inquisitors, these philosophers craftily discriminated between philosophical truth and Belles Lettres, tome iv. p. 381; Launoi, De Faria Furtuna Aristotelis, p. 225; Leo. Allatius, De Georgiis, p. 391; La Croze, Entretiens sur Divers Sujets, p. 384, &c. Joseph Bianchini, in his preface to his Dei Gran Duchi di Toscana, &c. quoted in a previous note. Brücker's Hist. Critica Philos. tom. iv. p. 62, &c. [It was not only the respective merits of these two philosophers which was debated in this controversy; the principal question was, which of their systems was most conformable to the doctrines of Christianity, and here the Platonic most certainly deserved the prefer3 See the Itinerarium of Cyriacus Anconitanus, pub-ence, as was abundantly proved by Pletho and others. lished from a manuscript with a preface, notes, and the epistles of this first antiquary, by Mehus, Florence, 1742, 8vo.--Add Leonard Aretin's Epistolæ, tom. ii. lib. ix. p. 149, recent edition, Florence. [On all these interesting topics the reader should again refer to Hallam's Intro. to the Liter. of Eur. vol. i. chap. iii.-R. 4 See Heumann's Acta Philosophorum, in German, tom. iii. p. 345.

5 On this subject see Sieveking, Geschichte d. Platonischen Akademie zu Florentz. Götting. 1812.-R.

It is well known that many of the opinions of Aristotle lead directly to atheism.-Macl. [On the character of Pletho and on this controversy, see also Hallam, ubi supra, vol. i. p. 203.-R.

7 See Bessarion's Letter, in the Hist. de l'Acad. des Inscript. et des Bell. Lett. tome v. p. 456; Thomasius, De Syncretismo Peripatetico, in his Orationes, p. 340. [Seo Tenneman's Manual of the Hist. of Phil. Johnson's transl. p. 273, &c.-R.

Bovin, in the Hist. de l'Acad. des Inscript. et des ❘ &c.

8 See Brücker's Hist. Crit. Philos. tom. iv. p. 158,

theological; and said their doctrines were | kind, were obliged to hear with a placid only philosophically true, that is, accor- countenance, and even to commend those dant with sound reason; but they would bold orators who publicly maintained that not deny that they ought, when viewed there was nothing sound in either the head theologically, to be accounted false. On or the members of the church, and who this impudent subterfuge, Leo X. in the called for the amputation of the infected Lateran council held in the following cen- parts. And indeed he only was accounted tury, at length laid restrictions. an honest and useful man who, fearlessly and vehemently, declaimed against the court of Rome, the pontiff, and all his adherents.5

7. In France and Germany the philosophical sects of Realists and Nominalists had everywhere fierce contests with each other, in which they employed not only ratiocina- 2. At the commencement of the century, tion and argument, but also accusations, the Latin church had two heads or ponpenal laws, and the force of arms. There tiffs, Boniface IX. at Rome, and Benedict was scarcely a university which was undis- XIII. resident at Avignon. On the death turbed by this war. In most places how- of Boniface the cardinals of his party ever the Realists were more powerful than elected, A.D. 1404, Cosmat de Meliorati, the Nominalists, or the Terminists as they who took the name of Innocent VII. were also called.1 In the university of And he dying after two years, or A.D. Paris, so long as John Gerson and his im- 1406, his place was filled by Angelo Cormediate pupils lived, the Nominalists were rari, a Venetian, who assumed the name in high authority; but when these were of Gregory XII. Both of them promised dead, A.D. 1473, Lewis XI. the king of under oath that they would voluntarily France, at the instigation of the bishop of resign the pontificate if the interests of Avranches who was his confessor, prohi- the church should require it, and they bited the doctrine of the Nominalists by a both violated their promise. Benedict severe edict, and ordered all books com- XIII. being besieged at Avignon by the posed by men of that sect to be seized and king of France, A.D. 1408, fled into Calocked up from the public.2 But he miti-talonia, his native province, and thence gated his decree in the year 1474, and removed to Perpignan. Hence eight or allowed some books of the Nominalists to nine cardinals of his party, finding thembe let out of prison. And in the year selves deserted by their pontiff, joined the 1481 he restored all the books of the cardinals of the party of Gregory XII. and Nominalists to liberty, and reinstated the in conjunction with them, in order to put sect in its former privileges and honours in the university.

3

CHAPTER II.

5 Flacius, in his valuable Catalogus Testium V'eritatis, has collected many such testimonies. Still more may be found in Peter de Alliaco's tract De Reformatione Ecclesiæ, and in the tract of Matthew of Cracovia, bishop of Worms, De Squaloribus Romance Curiæ, both

HISTORY OF THE TEACHERS AND GOVERN- of which tracts were published by Weissemburg, at

MENT OF THE CHURCH.

1. No teacher or writer of any eminence in this century can be named who does not plainly and greatly lament the miserable state of the Christian church, and anticipate its ruin unless God should interpose for its rescue. The vices and faults both of the prelates and of the other clerical orders were so manifest, that no one dared to censure such complaints. And even prelates of the highest rank, who spent their lives in idleness and vice of every

1 See Brücker, ubi supra, tom. v. p. 904; Salabert's Philosophia Nominalium Vindicata, cap. 1.; Baluze, Miscellanea, tom. iv. p. 531, &c.; Argentre, Collectio Documentor. de Novis Erroribus, tom. i. p. 220, &c.

* Naude, Additions à l'Hist. de Louis XI. p. 203; Bulæus, Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. v. p. 678, 705, 708, &c.; Launol, Hist. Gymnasii Navarr. in his Opp. tom. iv. par. i. p. 201, 378.

3 Bulæus, Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. v. p. 710. 4 The documents are published by Salabert, Philosophia Nominal. Vindicata, cap. i. p. 104. Add Bulæus, ubi supra, tom. v. p. 739, 747.

Basil, 1551; likewise in the same Weissemburg's Antilogia Romana, Basil, 1555, 8vo; in Wolf's Lectiones Memorabiles, tom. 1. and especially in the Monumenta Medii Evi, by Walch, where we have, tom. i. fascic. i. p. 1, the tracts De Squaloribus Curiæ Romanæ, and p. 101, the Gravamina Nationis German. adversus Curiam Pontificis Rom. Legato, exhibita; and p. 156, JunterRomanam, Joanni Cardinali S. Angeli, Nicolai V. berg's tract, De Negligentia Prælatorum, besides many of the speeches made in the council of Constance, which are in the second fasciculus, and are of a similar import. Even at the council of Constance itself, which assembled to reform the church and in which so many testimonies were exhibited of its corrupt state, there were present a great number of buffoons, prostitutes, and public girls (joculatores, meretrices, and virgines wig's Reliquiae Manuscript. tom. vi. p. 127.-Schl. [and publica). See the Diarium Belli Hussitici, in LudVon der Hardt's Concilium Constantiense, vol. v. par. ii. p. 50, Geb. Dacherius closes his enumeration of the persons present at the council, taken by order of the Elector of Saxony, with this notice "Mulieres communes quas reperi in domibus, et ultra et non minus, exceptis aliis, DCC."-R.

Besides the common writers see especially, in regard to Innocent VII. Aretinus, Epistolæ, lib. i. ep. iv. v. p. 6, 19, 21, lib. ii. ep. ii. p. 30, and Calluccius Salutatus, Epistola, lib. ii. ep. i. p. 1, or p. 18, ed. Florence; in regard to Gregory, the same Aretinus, Epistolæ, lib. ii. ep. iii. p. 32, ep. vii. p. 39, 41, 51, lib. ii. ep. xvii. p. 54, 56, 59; Lami, Delicia Eruditor. tom. x. p. 494.