§137. THE AGE PASSING JUDGMENT UPON ITSELF. 891
and spiritual repose. Is this judgment justified or is the older Protestant view the right one that the Middle Ages handed down nothing distinctive which has been of perma nent value; but, on the contrary, many of the superstitions and false doctrines now prevailing in the Church are an inheritance from the Middle Ages, and it would have been better if the Church had passed directly from the patristic age and skipped the mediaeval.1
Neither judgment is right. A more just opinion is begin ning to prevail, and upon a modification of the extreme views of Protestants and Roman Catholics on the subject depends to a considerable extent the closer fellowship between the ecclesiastical communions of the West. Much chaff will be found there mixed with the wheat. On the other hand, in this mediaeval period were also sown the seeds of religious ideas and institutions which are now in their period of bloom or awaiting the time of full fruitage.
The achievement of absolute power by the papacy, mag nificent as it was, represents an ideal utterly at fault, whether we consider the teaching of Scripture or the prevailing judg ment of the present time. Ambition, pride, avarice, were mingled in popes with a sincere belief that the Roman see inherited from the Apostle plenitude of authority in all realms. Europe, more enlightened, cannot accept such a claim and the moral degeneracy and spiritual incompetency of the popes, in the period following this, were an experimental proof that the theory was wrong.
As for the priesthood and hierarchy, evidence enough has been adduced to show that ordination did not insure devotion to office and personal purity. Dante's hell contains more than one pontiff of this period. The nearer we approach Rome, the more numerous the scandals are. The term "the Romans " was synonymous with unscrupulous greed. Greg ory X. in 1274 declared that "the prelates were the ruin of Christendom. " Frederick II., though pronounced a. poor
1 For a terse description of the social, religious, and moral condition of mediaeval England and the prevalence of disease, see Jessopp, Coming of the Friars, p. Ill, etc.
892 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1049-1294.
churchman, was a keen observer and no doubt indicated a widespread discontent with the lives the clergy were leading when he declared that, if they would change their mode of living, the world might again see miracles as in the days of old.1
The distinctively mediaeval ideal of a religious life has little attraction to-day. The seclusion of the monastery pre sents a striking contrast to the active career demanded of a Christian profession in this age. The example of St. Bernard and his praise of monasticism, as the praise of other writers, are so weighty that one cannot deny that the best men saw in monastic solitude the highest advantage. Monastic institutions had a most useful part to play as a leavening force in the wild and unsettled society of that time. But the discipline and ardor of monastic orders quickly passed away, in spite of the devotion of Francis d'Assisi and other monastic founders. Simplicity yielded to luxury, and spiritual devo tion to sloth and pride. It was the ardent Franciscan, Bonaventura, who instances the vices which had crept into his order and Jacques de Vitry, cardinal-bishop, d. 1240, who said that a girl's virtue was safe under no Rule except the Cister cian. What can be said of the ideal of human life as it is set forth in the tale of St. Brandon, not to speak of innumerable similar tales told by Jacob de Voragine, archbishop of Genoa, d. 1298 ! What shall be thought of the example of the Blessed St. Angela of Foligno, admired and praised by so many Franciscan writers, who on her " conversion " prayed to be relieved of the impediments of obedience to husband, re spect to mother and the care of children and rejoiced to have her request granted by their deaths !
If we desire priestly rule, there was enough of it to satisfy any one. But with the rule of the priesthood came the loss of individual freedom and the right of the soul to determine its own destiny in the sight of the Creator. De Voragine2 speaks of Thomas a Becket, by great abstinence
1 M. Paris, Luard's ed., IV. 538 sq.
2 Legenda, Temple Classics ed., II. 189.