A Key to the Knowledge of Church History Part 15

[1] Especially the Cluniacs, founded by Berno, Abbot of Clugny, A.D.

910, and the Cistercians, founded by Robert of Citeaux, A.D. 1098, and rendered ill.u.s.trious by St. Bernard, afterwards Abbot of Clairvaux (A.D. 1113-A.D. 1153).

[2] The order of Franciscan Friars was founded by St. Francis of a.s.sisi, A.D. 1207, and that of the Dominicans by St. Dominic of Castile, A.D. 1215. They were originally intended to supplement the real or supposed defects of the Clergy and the regular orders, and to aid in the suppression of heresy.

[3] See "Key to the Prayer Book," pp. 1-8.

[4] See "Key to the Bible," pp. 18-23.

[5] The practice of communion in one kind made its way very slowly, especially in England, where it was perhaps never universal. A decree of the Council of Constance in A.D. 1415 gave its first authoritative sanction.

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CHAPTER XI

The Mediaeval History of Continental Churches

A.D. 900-A.D. 1500

[Sidenote: No Mediaeval Church history in Asia or Africa.]

Before proceeding to the consideration of the different European Churches in Mediaeval times, it may be well to remark that from the year 500 the Christian history of Asia and Africa is almost a blank.

Arianism, partly imported into Africa by the Vandals, who crossed thither from Spain, and partly of native growth, as well as the opposite error, Eutychianism, took from the African Church all spiritual life and vigour, so that the apostasy of Mahomet met with no formidable obstacles when in the seventh century it swept like a flood over what had been Christian Africa. It is true that the Copts in Egypt and the native Christians of Abyssinia appear to have preserved the Apostolic Succession, but both these Churches are in a state of great depression, and the Faith they profess is mingled with much ignorance and superst.i.tion, as well as with positive error.

A similar process took place in Asia. Arianism, chiefly in its later development of Nestorianism, with Eutychianism and other errors, ate out the heart of the Church, faith grew weak, and love grew cold, and {121} Mahometanism once more triumphed almost unchecked. Although the Churches of Asia are not all utterly extinct, yet they share more or less in the state of ignorance, superst.i.tion, and depression which is a natural consequence of the serious errors with which their profession of Christianity is intermixed, as well as of the way in which the few despised Christians are mingled with their richer and more numerous Mahometan neighbours.

Section 1. _The Church of Italy._

[Sidenote: Lombard kingdom in Italy.]

The kingdom of the Goths in Italy was not of long duration, and their successors and fellow-Arians, the Lombards, only obtained possession of the northern portion of the Peninsula, whilst Rome and Southern Italy became once more subject to the emperors of the East. Gregory the Great (A.D. 390-A.D. 604) began the work of converting the Lombards to the Catholic Faith, and in the middle of the seventh century Arianism had disappeared from Italy. [Sidenote: Renewal of the tie between East and West.] The renewal of the connexion between the Eastern and Western Empires, and the attempt of the Emperor Justinian to subject the see of Rome to that of Constantinople, placed Gregory under the necessity of vindicating the independence of the Church of Italy, and of denying the right of any one Patriarch to a.s.sume authority over another. St.

Gregory's holiness and learning, and the wisdom of his endeavours to reform corruptions, were most beneficial to the Church over which he ruled. [Sidenote: Its rupture.] The Image-breaking Controversy put an end to the nominal tie between the Eastern emperors and the Church of Italy (about A.D. 730), and almost the whole {122} of the peninsula soon after became part of the dominions of Charlemagne. This great Emperor's influence was used in Italy, as elsewhere, to foster the work of the Church, which however suffered severely from the state of lawlessness and confusion incident on the breaking up of Charlemagne's empire after his death, A.D. 814. [Sidenote: Depression of the Church in Italy.] The Church of Italy in the ninth century had also to undergo the inroads of the Mahometans in the South, and of the heathen Magyars (or Hungarians) on the North, as well as of the Northmen, who ravaged and pillaged the churches and monasteries on the coasts. Other depressing influences were to be found in the secularization of the Bishops of Rome through the increase of their temporal power, and the usurpation by the German emperors of the right of election to the popedom, which properly belonged to the Clergy of Rome. [Sidenote: Gregory VII.'s reforms.] The corruptions which from these and other causes had crept into the Church of Italy, drew towards them the attention of the famous Hildebrand, afterwards Pope Gregory VII. (A.D.

1073-A.D. 1085), and his efforts at reformation were not without a beneficial effect. [Sidenote: Heresies of the Albigenses] Early in the twelfth century the heretical sect of the Albigenses, whose doctrines resembled those of the ancient Manicheans, spread from the South of France into Italy, where they received the name of Paterini.

[Sidenote: and Waldenses.] Both they and the kindred sect of the Waldenses came under the notice of Innocent III. (A.D. 1198-A.D. 1216).

The Albigenses were exterminated with circ.u.mstances of great cruelty[1], but the {123} Waldenses survive to the present day in the valleys of Piedmont. [Sidenote: Evil effects of the residence at Avignon on the Italian Church.] The seventy years' residence of the Bishops of Rome at Avignon (A.D. 1305-A.D. 1376) was felt by the Church of Italy to be an injury and a great evil, and in the forty years'

schism which followed the return of the chief pastor of the Italians to his own episcopal city (A.D. 1378-A.D. 1417), only the kingdom of the Two Sicilies sided with the anti-Popes. [Sidenote: Other depressing influences.] Meanwhile the constant warfare between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines in Italy, the feuds between the different republics, the worldliness and evil lives of too many of the Popes, and the luxury and immorality which increased riches, consequent on increased commerce, brought with them, had all tended to a state of things in which the purifying influences of the Church as "the salt of the earth" were sorely needed. [Sidenote: Desires for reformation.] Longings for a reformation of men's lives and morals were smouldering in many b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and in the city of Florence these hidden wishes were kindled into a flame by the zeal and eloquence of the monk Girolamo Savonarola, who however fell a victim to his zeal, A.D. 1498.

[Sidenote: Liturgy of the Italian Church.]

The ancient Liturgy of the Church of Italy was derived from one bearing the name of St. Peter, and revised by St. Gregory, A.D. 590. This Roman or Gregorian Liturgy, though with certain later additions, is still in use throughout Italy, the only exception to this rule being the cathedral and diocese of Milan, which still preserve a Liturgy known as that of St. Ambrose, who was Bishop of Milan from A.D. 374 to A.D. 397.

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Section 2. _The Church of France._

[Sidenote: Orthodoxy of the Franks.]

The Franks alone of all the barbarians who swept over Europe at the time of the decay of the Western Empire, were Catholic from their first conversion to Christianity; and to this circ.u.mstance the French kings owed their t.i.tle of Eldest Sons of the Church. It was by the influence of a French princess, Bertha, the Christian wife of Ethelbert, king of Kent, that St. Augustine and his companions were favourably received in England; whilst another princess of the same race, Ingunda, who married the son of the Visigoth king of Spain, is said to have brought about the conversion of her husband from Arianism to the Catholic faith, by her own constancy under persecution. [Sidenote: The Church under Charlemagne.] During the reign of the Emperor Charlemagne (A.D.

768-A.D. 814), the French monasteries became seats of learning, and amongst the learned men who a.s.sisted the Emperor in his efforts for the religious and intellectual improvement of his people, may be mentioned the English Alcuin, who held an honourable position at the French court as the instructor and adviser of the monarch and his sons. [Sidenote: The French Liturgy.] The Gallican Liturgy, a branch of the Primitive Liturgy of Ephesus, was entirely disused by order of Charlemagne, and the Roman service used in its stead. [Sidenote: Conversion of the Northmen.] From about A.D. 870 the Northmen, who had long been a scourge to France, began to settle down in that country, and were gradually converted to the Christian Faith, their chief, Rollo, marrying a Christian princess, A.D. 911, and being baptized in the following year. [Sidenote: The Crusades.] A French {125} hermit, Peter of Auvergne, was the instigator of the First Crusade, which was preached by him at Clermont, and joined by a large number of French n.o.bles, the command of the expedition being given to G.o.dfrey de Bouillon, Duke of Lorraine. The system of Crusades thus inaugurated for the defence of Christian pilgrims in the Holy Land, and the winning back of the Holy Places from the hands of the Mahometans, was turned to a cruel and unjustifiable use in the thirteenth century, when Innocent III. proclaimed a Crusade against the Albigenses in the South of France, in which mult.i.tudes of these unhappy and misguided men were slaughtered.

[Sidenote: Rupture between France and the Pope.]

During the reign of Philip IV. (A.D. 1285-A.D. 1314) a collision took place for the first time, between the Church and Kingdom of France and the authority of the Pope. Hitherto the disputes between the Popes and the French monarchs had been on personal rather than on political grounds, and had given no opportunity for defining the exact limits of papal authority in France. [Sidenote: Comparative independence of French Church.] But meanwhile the French Clergy had not lost their feeling of nationality, and the kings of France had been able to use much more independent action in the appointment of Bishops than was the case in other countries. Hence the Bishops and Clergy joined with the king in resisting the sentence of excommunication p.r.o.nounced by the Pope on Philip and his kingdom. Neither King nor Pope appear to have been influenced by any religious feeling in their contest, and after the miserable death of Boniface VIII. (A.D. 1303), and the murder of his successor, Philip's unprincipled interference in the {126} election of Clement V. was productive of great evils. [Sidenote: Evil results of the conduct of Philip IV.] The cruel ma.s.sacre of the Knights Templars, the corruptions of the Papal Court in France, and more indirectly the Great Schism in which the Church of France espoused the cause of the anti-Popes, may all be traced to the conduct of Philip IV.

Section 3. _The Church of Spain and Portugal._

[Sidenote: Conquest of Spain by the Moors.]

Before the end of the sixth century, the Visigoths, who had settled in what is now Spain and Portugal, had been converted from Arianism to the Catholic Faith. In A.D. 711 the Mahometan Moors crossed over from Africa to the South of Spain, and in A.D. 713 all the Peninsula, except the small mountain district of Asturias, had fallen into their hands.

The more independent and hardy amongst the Spanish Christians took refuge in this inaccessible portion of the country, whilst others dwelt amongst the Moors, and appear for a time to have been allowed the exercise of their religion unmolested by any systematic persecution.

[Sidenote: Persecution of the Spanish Church.] About A.D. 830, however, the policy of the Moorish conquerors underwent a change, and during the next hundred years mult.i.tudes of Christians in Spain suffered martyrdom for their faith. [Sidenote: The re-conquest of Spain by the Spaniards.] After the death of Hachem, the last Caliph of Cordova (A.D.

1031), and the subdivision of his dominions, the Christians of Asturias succeeded in making head against their oppressors, and gradually won back from them district after district, until Ferdinand III. (A.D.

1214-A.D. 1252) succeeded in reducing the Moorish possessions to the single province {127} of Grenada. This last remnant of Mahometan dominion was wrested from the Moors A.D. 1492, and Spain, as well as the separate kingdom of Portugal, was once more entirely Christian.

[Sidenote: Effect of national circ.u.mstances on Spanish Christianity.]

It is perhaps hardly to be wondered at, that the continual state of religious warfare in which Spain was so long plunged should have given a somewhat stern character to Spanish Christianity. The Inquisition, when introduced into Spain by the mistaken zeal of the good Queen Isabella towards the end of the fifteenth century, found a readier welcome than elsewhere, and gained an additional tinge of severity in a country which had been brought into such close contact with one of the deadliest forms of unbelief.

[Sidenote: The Spanish Liturgy.]

The original Liturgy of Spain was, like the ancient Liturgy of France, a form of that used at Ephesus. It received the name of Mozarabic, from having been in use by Christians living _in the midst of Arabs_, or Moors, and was not discontinued in the Church of Spain until A.D.

1080, when after much resistance on the part of the Spaniards it was abolished by order of Alphonso VI., King of Castille and Leon, under the influence of Pope Gregory VII., and the Roman rite subst.i.tuted throughout the country.

Section 4. _The Church of Germany._

[Sidenote: Conversion of Germany by French]

The large tract of country which is now comprehended under the name of Germany was won to the Church by a long series of missionary labours.

In the beginning of the seventh century Frankish missionaries laid the foundations of a Church in Bavaria and on the banks of {128} the Danube, thus paving the way for the conversion of Southern Germany.

[Sidenote: and British missionaries,] Central Germany, then called Franconia, was the scene of the labours of Kilian, an Irish missionary (A.D. 630-A.D. 689), whilst the English Bishops Wilfrith (A.D. 677) and Willebrord (A.D. 692-A.D. 741), preached with much success to the Frieslanders in the Northwest of Germany, now included in Holland.

[Sidenote: Labours of St. Boniface] It is, however, to a Devonshire clergyman, Winfrith, better known as St. Boniface (A.D. 715-A.D. 755), that the t.i.tle of Apostle of Germany is generally given, not only on account of his unwearied missionary labours in still heathen districts, but also on account of his success in organizing and consolidating the different branches of the German Church. He became Archbishop of Mentz, and Metropolitan, and at last suffered martyrdom at the hands of some heathen Frieslanders at the age of seventy-five.

The Emperor Charlemagne endeavoured to compel the rude Saxons in the neighbourhood of the Baltic to embrace the Christian faith; but eventually he was induced to trust less to the force of arms for their conversion, and more to the missionary work of the Church. [Sidenote: and of Willehad.] Amongst the prominent members of this Saxon mission, we find another English priest, Willehad, a native of Northumbria, afterwards Bishop of Bremen, who died A.D. 789.

The first attempts to plant the Church in Moravia were made by German missionaries in the ninth century. [Sidenote: Eastern missionaries in Moravia] These do not appear, however, to have been very successful, and about A.D. 860, two Greek monks, Cyril and Methodius, entered upon the same sphere of labour. Methodius was afterwards consecrated Metropolitan of Pannonia {129} and Moravia by the Pope; but there was considerable jealousy on the part of the Latinized Germans towards their Eastern fellow-labourers, and eventually the Moravian Church was subjected to the Bishops of Bohemia.

[Sidenote: and Bohemia.]

The first Christian Duke of Bohemia was converted about A.D. 871, whilst staying at the Moravian court, probably by Methodius; but the Church made very slow progress in Bohemia until after the conquest of that country by Otho the Great (A.D. 950), and the foundation of the Bishopric of Prague by King Boleslav the Pious (A.D. 967-A.D. 999). In Bohemia, as well as in Moravia, the influence of the Greek missionaries made itself felt in the impress it left upon the ritual and usages of the two Churches, especially in the fact that the native Sclavonic language was used in Divine Worship; but in the end German influences prevailed in both countries, and the national "use" gradually made way for the Latinized ritual common in Germany.

[Sidenote: Conversion of North Prussia,]

Until towards the middle of the tenth century, the Church made but very small progress in the northern portion of what is now the kingdom of Prussia. These regions were then occupied by a Sclavonic race called Wends, who yielded an unwilling submission to the Western emperors, and disliked Christianity as being the religion of their conquerors.