the medieval mind reveal themselves. To it only the
two extremes are possible, absolute obedience to the
sovereign or absolute obedience in all things to the church.
When the supporters of the latter speak of civil rights they
appear as though their single wish was to carry out what
we should call a constitutional system; it is only when
their correlative doctrine about the prerogative of the
church is known, that we see how far they are removed
from modern ideas : and in the same way it is regularly
their opponents who are the defenders of pure, unrestrained
absolutism, however much they may engage our approval
when they e argue against the temporal pretensions of
the spiritualty with all the attendant inconveniences
of ecclesiastical exemptions and privileges, and urge
a far-reaching reform of the entire church-system, a return
to primitive purity and primitive simplicity.[1]
But it would be an error to suppose that the views of the French publicists, on the relations of church and state, of which du Bois is perhaps the earliest exponent, correspond in more than the object of their common attack with those of the imperial partisans. In the Enquiry touching the Power of the Pope,[2] also probably the work of du Bois, we have a clear statement of the distinction between the relations of a kingdom like France[3] to the pope, and those of the empire. The pope, he says,
- ↑ Compare the earlier instance of Robert Grosseteste in G. Lech- ler, Johann von Wiclif und die Vorgeschichte der Reformation 1. 192-200; 1873.
- ↑ This treatise is printed by Pierre Dupuy in the collection of Acts et Preuves appended to the Histoire du Differend d entre le Pape Boniface VIII et Philippes I le bel, Roy de France, pp. 663-683, 1655 folio.
- ↑ Dr. Riezler speaks of Frank- Ireich und England, as though the [author had abandoned his previous jnotion (see above, p. 226) of the English vassalage. The difference ideed might lead one to conjeeture that the hypothesis of the common authorship of this work and of the Summaria brevis just now described, was not so well grounded as we have affirmed. But the truth is that, instead of ranking England in the same class with France, du Bois expressly distinguishes its position : Ali- quae causae sunt in imperatore quare subditus sit papae in tempo- ralibus, quae non inveniuntur in aliquibus regibus, sicut in regibus Franciae et Hispaniae, et fuit etiam aliquando in rege Angliae, videlicet, usque ad tempus regis loannis, qui dicebatur S- ne terra, &c. : p. 681.
