Frederick II., nothing was done to arrest the development of the Roman hierarchy in an ever-increasingly absolutist sense. The German rulers also made but slight attempts to enlist to their side the popular feeling then strongly opposed to the Roman hierarchy, many of whose members were believed by the people to be haughty, avaricious, and devoid of all morality.
In the subsequent struggle between the papacy and the kings of France, matters were different. Writers such as John of Paris and Egydius Colonna, Archbishop of Bourges, strongly opposed the papal claims, and the latter went so far as to deny to the pontiff all right to temporal power.[1] In this struggle the kings of France were victorious, and it was one of the results of their victory that the papal court was transferred to Avignon, a city in the immediate vicinity of the French territory, and which was under the rule of a relation of the King of France. During this struggle between papacy and the rulers of France, the University of Paris played a very great part, and it became for a time the central authority in France on questions of theology; its position was somewhat similar to that of the University of Prague at the beginning of the Hussite wars. The University of Paris thus acquired great fame and students flocked to it from all parts of Europe. Among them was Matthew of Janov, one of the earliest Bohemian church-reformers, whose name will be frequently met in these pages.
The successful struggle of France against papacy was no doubt one of the causes of the energetic resistance offered to Rome by Louis of Bavaria, King of the Germans. A man of moderate intelligence, he entirely overlooked the immense difference between the position of a ruler of Germany, where
- ↑ Egydius writes: “Tertio declarandum est quod Christus in institutione spiritualis potestatis nullum commisit vel potius promisit Dominium terrenorum. . . . Ecce Christus Jesus, Rex Regum Dominus dominantium regale fugit dominium et fastuosum fastigium. Iqitur qua ratione vel autoritate vicarius ejus vindicabit sibi culmen vel nomen Regiae dignitatis?” (Goldast., Monarchia Imperii Romani, tom. ii. p. 95 and ff.)
