322 THIRD TERIOD, A.D. 311-590.
case occurred several years after (455), when the Yandal king Geiiseric, invited out of revenge by the eni})ress Eudoxia, pushed his ravages to Rome. Leo obtained from him the promise tliat at least lie would spare tlie city the inflictions of murder and fire ; but the barbarians subjected it to a fourteen days' pillage, the enormous spoils of which they transported to Carthage ; "and afterward the pope did everything to alleviate the consequent destitution and suffering, and to restore the churches.'
Leo died in 461, and was buried in the church of St. Peter. The day and circumstances of his death are unknown.*
The literary works of Leo consist of ninety-six sermons and one hundred and seventy-three epistles, including epistles of others to him. They are earnest, forcible, full of thought, churchly, abounding in bold antitheses and allegorical fi-eaks of exegesis, and sometimes heaVy, turgid, and obscure in style. His collection of sermons is the first we have from a Roman bishop. In his inaugural discourse he declared preaching to be his sacred duty. The sermons are short and simple, and were delivered mostly on high festivals and on the annivei*saries of his own elevation.^ Other works ascribed to him, such as that on the calling of all nations," which takes a middle ground on the doctrine of predestination, with the view to reconcile the Semipelagians and Augustinians, are of doubtful genuineness.
' Comp. Leo's 84th Sermon, which was preached soon after the departure of the Vandals, and Prosper, Chron. ad ann. 455.
' The Roman calendar places his name on the 11 th of April. But different writers fix his death on June 28, Oct. 80 (Quesnel), Nov. 4 (Pagi), Nov. 10 (Butler). Butler quotes the concession of Bower, the apostate Jesuit, who, in his Lives of the Popes, says of Leo, that " he was without doubt a man of extraordinary parts, far Buporior to all who had governed that church before him, and scarce equalled by any since."
* Sermoncs de natali. Canisius (in Acta Sanct., 1. c. p. 17) calls Leo "Christianum Pemosthenem.
* De vocatione omnium gentium — a work praised highly even by Erasmus, Luther, Bullinger, and Grotius. Quesnel has only proved the possibility of Leo'a being the author. Comp. Perthel, 1. c. p. 127 sqq. The Sacramentarium Leonis, or a collection of liturgical prayers for all the festival days of the year, coniaini K>me of his prayers, but also many which are of a later date.
/\
§ 64. THE PAPACY FROM LEO I. TO GKEGOEY I. 323
§ 64. The Pajpacy from Leo I. to Gregmnj 1. a. d. 461-590.
The first Leo and the first Gregory are the two greatest bishops of E.ome in the first six centuries. Between them no important personage appears on the chair of Peter ; and in the course of that intervening century tlie idea and the power of the papacy make no material advance. In truth, they went farther in Leo's mind than they did in Gregory's. Leo tliought and acted as an absolute monarch ; Gregory as first among the patriarchs ; but both under the full conviction tliat they were the successors of Peter.
After the death of Leo, the archdeacon Hilary, who had represented him at the council of Ephesus, was elected to his place, and ruled (461-468) upon his principles, asserting the strict orthodoxy in the East and the authority of the primacy in Gaul.
His successor, SiMPLicros (468—483), saw the final dissolution of the empire under E-omulus Augustulus (476), but, as he tpjvcs not the slightest notice of it in his epistles, he seems to have ascribed to it but little importance. The papal power liad been rather favored than hindered in its growth by the imbecility of the latest emperors. Kow, to a certain extent, it stepped into the imperial vacancy, and the successor -of Peter became, in the mind of the Western nations, sole heir of the old Roman imperial succession.
On tbe fall of the empire the pope became the political subject of the barbarian and heretical (for they were Arian) kings ; but these princes, as most of the heathen emperors had done, allowed him, either from policy, or from ignorance or iudiS'erence, entire freedom in ecclesiastical affairs. Li Italy the Catholics had by far the ascendency in numbers and in culture. And the Arianism of the new rulers was rather an outward profession than an inward conviction. Odoacer, who first assumed the kingdom of Italy (476—493), was tolerant toward the orthodox faith, yet attempted to control the papa] election in 483 in the interest of the state, and prohibited. under penalty of the anathema, the alienation of church prop-
324 Tumo PERIOD, a.d. 311-590.
erty by any bishop. Twenty years later a Roman council protested against this intervention of a layman, and pronounced the above prohibition null and void, but itself passed a similar decree against the alienation of church estates.'
Pope Felix II., or, according to another reckoning, III. (483-492), continued the war of his predecessor against the Monophysitism of the East, rejected the Henoticon of the emperor Zeno, as an unwarrantable intrusion of a layman in matters of faith, and ventured even the excommunication of the bishop Acacius of Constantinople. Acacius replied with a counter anathema, with the support of the other Eastern patriarchs ; and the schism between the two churches lasted over thirty years, to the pontificate of Ilormisdas.
Gelasius I. (492-496) clearly announced the principle, that the priestly power is above the kingly and the imperial, and that from the decisions of the chair of Peter there is no appeal. Yet from this pope we have, on the other hand, a remarkable testimony against what he pronounces the " sacrilege " of withholding the cup from the laity, the communio sub una specie.
Anastasius II. (496^98) indulged in a milder tone toward Constantinople, and incurred the suspicion of consent to its heresy.'
His sudden death was followed by a contested papal election, which led to bloody encounters. The Ostrogothic king Theodoric (tlie Dietrich of Bern in the Niehelungenlied), the conqueror and master of Italy (493-52G), and, like Odoacer, an Arian, was called into consultation in this contest, and gave his voice for Symmachus against Laurentius, because Symmachus had received the majority of votes, and had been consecrated first. But the party of Laurentius, not satisfied with this, raised against Symmachus the reproach of gross iniquities, even of adultery and of squandering the church estates. The bloody scenes were renewed, priests were murdered, cloisters were burned, and nuns were insulted. Theodoric, being again
' This was the fifth (al. fourth) council under Symmachus, held in Nov. 602, therefore later thau the synodus palmaris. Comp. Ilefcle, ii. p. 625 sq.
' Dante puts hiin in hell, and Barot iuf ascribes his sudden death to an evidenl jadgmcnt of God.