before proscribing them he spent ten years (1198–1208) in
endeavouring to convert the disbelievers, and history should not
The Albigensian Crusades.
forget the pacific character of these early efforts. It
was because they did not succeed that necessity and
the violence of human passions subsequently forced
him into a course of action which he had not chosen and which
led him further than he wished to go. When he was compelled
to decree the Albigensian crusade he endeavoured more than
once to discontinue the work, which had become perverted, and
to curb the crusading ardour of Simon de Montfort. Failing in
his attempt to maintain the religious character of the crusade,
he wished to prevent it from ending secularly in its extreme
consequence and logical outcome. On several occasions he
defended the cause of moderation and justice against the fanatical
crusaders, but he never had the energy to make it prevail.
It is very doubtful whether this was possible, and an impartial
historian must take into account the insuperable difficulties
encountered by the medieval popes in their efforts to stem the
flood of fanaticism.
It was more particularly in the definitive constitution of the temporal and political power of the papacy, in the extension of Papal what may be called Roman imperialism, that chance favoured his efforts and enabled him to pursue his under conquests farthest. This imperialism was undoubtedlyPapal Imperialism under Innocent III. of a special nature; it rested on moral authority and political and financial power rather than on material and military strength. But it is no less certain that Innocent attempted to subject the kings of Europe by making them his tributaries and vassals. He wished to acquire the mastery of souls by unifying the faith and centralizing the priesthood, but he also aspired to possess temporal supremacy, if not as direct owner, at least as suzerain, over all the national crowns, and thus to realize the idea with which he was penetrated and which he himself expressed clearly. He wished to be at once pope and emperor, leader of religion and universal sovereign. And, in fact, he exercised or claimed suzerain rights, together with the political and pecuniary advantages accruing, over the greater number of the lay sovereigns of his time. He was more or less effectively the supreme temporal chief of the kingdom of Sicily and Naples, Sardinia, the states of the Iberian peninsula (Castile, Leon, Navarre and Portugal), Aragon (which, under Peter II., was the type of vassal and tributary kingdom of the Roman power), the Scandinavian states, the kingdom of Hungary, the Slav states of Bohemia, Poland, Servia, Bosnia and Bulgaria, and the Christian states founded in Syria by the crusaders of the 12th century. The success of Roman imperialism was particularly remarkable in England, where Innocent was confronted by one of the principal potentates of the West, by the heir of the power that had been founded by two statesmen of the first rank, William the Conqueror and Henry II. In Richard I. and John he had exceptionally authoritative adversaries; but after one of the fiercest wars ever waged by the civil power against the Church, Innocent at length gained over John the most complete victory that has ever been won by a religiousInnocent III. and John of England. potentate over a temporal sovereign, and constrained him to make complete submission. In 1213 the pope became not only the nominal suzerain but, de facto and de jure, the veritable sovereign of England, and during the last years of John and the first years of Henry III. he governed England effectively by his legates. This was the most striking success of Innocent’s diplomacy and the culminating point of his secular work.
The papacy, however, encountered serious obstacles, at first at the very centre of the papal empire, at Rome, where the pope had to contend with the party of communal autonomy for ten years before being able to secure the mastery at Rome. His immense authority narrowly escaped destruction Rome and but a stone’s-throw from the Lateran palace; butInnocent III., Rome and Italy. victory finally rested with him, since the Roman people could no* dispense with the Roman Church, to which it owed its existence. Reared in the nurture of the pope, the populace of the Tiber renounced its stormy liberty in 1209, and accepted the peace and order that a beneficent master gave; but when Innocent attempted to extend to the whole of Italy the regime of paternal subjection that had been so successful at Rome, the difficulties of the enterprise surpassed the powers even of a leader of religion. He succeeded in imposing his will on the nobles and communes in the patrimony of St Peter, and, as guardian of Henry VI.’s son Frederick, was for some time able to conduct the government of the kingdom of the Two Sicilies, but in his claims on the rest of Italy the failure of the temporal power was manifest. He was unable, either by diplomacy or force of arms, to make Italian unity redound to the exclusive benefit of the Holy See. Nor was his failure due to lack of activity or energy, but rather to the insuperable obstacles in his path—the physical configuration of Italy, and, above all, the invincible repugnance of the Italian municipalities to submit to the mastery of a religious power.
As far as the Empire was concerned, chance at first favoured Innocent. For ten years a Germany weakened and divided by the rivalry of Philip of Swabia and Otto of Brunswick left his hands free to act in Italy, and his pontificate marks a period of comparative quiet in the ardent conflict between pope and emperor which continued throughoutInnocent III. and the Empire. the middle ages. Not until 1210, when Otto of Brunswick turned against the pope to whom he owed his crown, was Innocent compelled to open hostilities; and the struggle ended in a victory for the Curia. Frederick II., the new emperor created by Innocent, began by handing over his country to Rome and sacrificing the rights of the Empire to the union of the two great authorities of the Christian world. In his dealings with Frederick, Innocent experienced grievous vicissitudes and disappointments, but finally became master of the situation. One nation only—the France of Philip Augustus—was able to remain outside the Roman vassalage. There is not a word, in the documents concerning the relations of Philip Augustus with Rome, from which we may conclude that the Capetian crown submitted, or that the papacy wished to impose upon it the effective suzerainty of the Holy See. Innocent III. had been able to encroach on France at one point only, when the Albigensian crusade had enabled him to exercise over the southern fiefs conquered by Simon de Montfort a political and secular supremacy in the form of collections of moneys. Finally, Innocent III. was more fortunate than his predecessors, and, if he did not succeed in carrying out his projected crusade and recovering the Holy Places, he at least benefited by the Franco-Venetian expedition of 1202. Europe refused to take any direct action against the Mussulman, but Latin feudalism,Latin Conquest of Constantinople. at Venice, diverted the crusade by an act formal disobedience, marched on Constantinople, seized the Greek Empire and founded a Latin Empire in its place; and Innocent had to accept the fait accompli. Though condemning it on principle, he turned it to the interests of the Roman Church as well as of the universal Church. With joy and pride he welcomed the Byzantine East into the circle of vassal peoples and kingdoms of Rome bound politically to the see of St Peter, and with the same emotions beheld the patriarchate of Constantinople at last recognize Roman supremacy. But from this enormous increase of territory and influence arose a whole series of new and difficult problems. The court of Rome had to substitute for the old Greek hierarchy a hierarchy of Latin bishops; to force the remaining Greek clergy to practise the beliefs and rites of the Roman religion and bow to the supremacy of the pope; to maintain in the Greco-Latin Eastern Church the necessary order, morality and subordination; to defend it against the greed and violence of the nobles and barons who had founded the Latin Empire; and to compel the leaders of the new empire to submit to the apostolic power and execute its commands. In his endeavours to carry out the whole of this programme. Innocent III. met with insuperable obstacles and many disappointments. On the one hand, the Greeks were unwilling to abandon their religion and national cult, and scarcely recognized the ecclesiastical supremacy of the papacy. On the other hand, the upstart Latin emperors, far from proving
