130 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1517.
the world with the sword, and now her priesthood devours it with mummery. Hence the lines —
"'The Roman bites at all, and those he cannot bite, he hates.
Of rich he hears the call, but 'gainst tlie poor he shuts his gates.' "
Following the example of his two predecessors, Innocent excommunicated the Avignon anti-pope and his cardinals, putting them into the same list with heretics, pirates, and brigands. In revenge for his nephew's cold-blooded slaughter of eleven of the chief men of the city, whose bodies he threw out of a window, he was driven from Rome, and after great hardships he reached. Viterbo. But the Romans soon found Innocent's rule preferable to the rule of Ladislaus, king of Naples and papal protector, and he was recalled, the nephew whose hands were reeking with blood making public entry into the Vatican with his uncle.
The lastpope of the Roman lijie^was Gregory XII. Angelo Correr, cardinalof St. Marks^Venica, elected 1406, was surpassed in tenacity as well as ability by the last of the Avignon popes, elected 1394^^iid better koawn as Peter de Luna^f Aragon, one of the cardinals who joined in the revolt against Urban VI. and in the election of Clement VII. at Fondi.
Under these J; wo pontiffs the controversy over the schism grew more and more acute and the scandal more and more Intolerable. The nations of Western Europe were weary of the open and flagitious traffic in benefices and other ecclesiastical privileges, the fulminations of one pope against the other, and the division of sees and parishes between rival claimants. The University of Paris took the leading part in agitating remedial measitj:ps^-«ittdTn the ehd^the matter was taken wholly out of the hands of the two popes. The cardinals stepped into the foreground and, in the face of all canonical precedent, took the course which ultimately resulted in the reunion of the Church under one head.
Before Gregory's election, the Roman cardinals, numbering fourteen, again entered into a compact stipulating that the successful candidate should by all means put an end to the schism, even, if necessary, by the abdication of his office.
§ 14. FURTHER PROGRESS OF THE SCHISM. 131
Gregory was fourscore at the time, and the chief consideration which weighed in his choice was that in men arrived at his age ambition usually runs low, and that Gregory would be more ready to deny himself for the good of the Church than a younger man.
JPeter de Luna, one of the most vigorous personalities who have ever claimed the papal dignity, had the spirit and much of the ability of Hildebrand and his namesake, Gregory IX. But it was his bad star to be elected in the Avignoi^and not in the Roman succession. Had he been in the Roman line, he would probably have made his mark among the great ruling pontiffs. His nationality also was against him. The French had little heart in supporting_a Spaniard and, at Clement's death, the relations between the French king and the Avignon pope at once lost their cordiality. Peter was energetic of mind and in action, a shrewd observer, magnified his office, and never yielded an inch in the matter of papal prerogative. Through the administrations of three Roman pontiffs, he held on firmly to his office, outlived the two Reformatory councils of Pisa and Constance, and yielded not up this mortal flesh till the close of the first quarter of the fifteenth century, and was still asserting his claims and maintaining the dignity of pope at the time of his death. Before his election, he likewise entered into a solemn compact with his cardinals, promising to bend every effort to heal the unholy schism, even if the price were his own abdication.
The professions of both popes were in the right direction. They were all that could be desired, and all that remained was for either of them or for both of them to resign and make free room for a new candidate. The problem would thus have been easily settled, and succeeding generations might have canonized both pontiffs for their voluntary self-abnegation. But it took ten years to bring Gregory to this state of mind, and then almost the last vestige of power had been taken from him. Peter de Luna never yielded.
Undoubtedly, at the time of the_electiorLDf Gregorys XIL, the papacy was passing throughone of the grave_crb=;es in its