Page:Vactican as a World Power.djvu/130

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PETER IN CHAINS

had risen in the time o the Montanists and Donatists. Leo conceded the point but insisted all the more strongly upon the strict observance o celibacy by those ordained. All Roman women who had co- habited with priests were declared serfs of the Church of the Lateran.

The Pope, who was the Emperor's most dependable friend, viewed his office with as much veneration as did Henry. With undaunted vigour he removed the Roman nationalist element from the Curia and gave this a universalist stamp in conformity with the spirit of Cluny, which extended its influence to the point which the growing opposi- tion between Church and world in Western culture could not reach. There was plenty of reason on evety side to battle for the cleanness of the spirit against its misuse and enslavement through lust for power and pleasure. Nor did the spiritual Church, the new leaven, lack men of constructive ability. Leo knew how to use them. When he went to France in 1049, ^ e brought back with him the Burgundians Humbert and Halinard to serve in the Curia. Though they were of different temperaments, they were of one mind in so far as their la- bours in Rome for the ideas of Cluny were concerned. Humbert, the more gifted of the two, was a fighter who showed no quarter. He became a cardinal; and as a writer and politician he hurled his pro- phetic utterances at an unsettled world during and after Leo's reign. Halinard, Archbishop of Lyons, knew many languages. He had himself once refused the Papal dignity and now proved Leo's intimate associate and sometimes his representative until his death by poison at the hand of an enemy. Hugo, Abbot of Cluny, who like Hum- bert and Halinard was descended from Burgundian noblemen, like- wise stood close to Leo. He lived long and saw nine Popes occupy the throne. Meanwhile he earned for his monastery its world-wide reputation, a symbol of which was that basilica of five naves and seven towers which he caused to be erected during his old age. Well into the twelfth century he was looked upon as the exemplar of cul- tural creativeness based on a religious attitude eager to find expression. He was averse to all brusque action; and during the dawning struggle for power between Pope and Emperor he remained friendly to both. As one who would reconcile the world and the Church, the Papacy and the Empire, he held in himself the tragedy of all non-tragic na- tures who seek to bring about harmony. In order that the Gordian


HILDEBRAND