He surrounded himself with French cardinals, and thus prepared the way for the disastrous schism which followed his death. In 1375 the pontifical states broke out in revolt. Desirous of putting a stop to these troubles, Gregory resolved to fulfil the vow which he had secretly made long before, of returning to Rome. Borne in a fleet of thirty-two galleys, the papal court left Avignon in September, 1376, and arrived at Rome in the following January. Gregory died in March, 1378.—T. A.
Gregory XII. (Cardinal Angelo Corraro), born in 1325, was elected in 1406. He was a well-intentioned but weak man, too easily guided by his relatives, through whose influence he broke his engagement to meet the anti-pope, Benedict XIII., at Savona. In 1408, a rupture occurring between him and the sacred college, the cardinals left him and went to Pisa, where they appealed to the future council. The council of Pisa met in 1409, but so far from ending the schism it made matters worse; for neither Gregory nor Benedict regarded the decrees of deposition launched against them by the council, and the new pope whom it set up, Alexander V., only made a third claimant. Gregory, however, was abandoned by most of his adherents, and had to take refuge at Rimini with the Malatesta. At last the schism was terminated in 1415 at the council of Constance. After formally sanctioning all the previous acts of the council Gregory resigned the see. He died in October, 1417.—T. A.
Gregory XIII. (Cardinal Ugo Buoncompagno), a native of Bologna, born in 1502, was elected in May, 1572. He had been much employed under former popes, and, on account of his intimate knowledge of the civil and canon law, had been sent by Pius IV. as a jurisconsult to the council of Trent. He was naturally of an easy, cheerful temperament. According to Ranke, the charge of nepotism which has been brought against him is unjust. He assisted the jesuits in every part of the world, and their college at Rome owed to him its establishment on the magnificent scale on which we now see it. In 1581 he founded the English college at Rome, and provided funds for its maintenance. He also founded a college for christians of the Greek rite; and another in 1584 for the Maronites of the Lebanon. In 1582 he promulgated the reform of the Julian calendar, which was immediately adopted by all catholic countries. His extreme liberality to religious institutions at last embarrassed the Roman finances; and partly owing to this embarrassment, partly to his own too easy disposition, the internal police of his states fell into a condition of frightful disorder. Bands of brigands ranged at large, and carried their depredations almost up to the gates of the capital. He died in April, 1585.—T. A.
Gregory XIV. (Cardinal Nicholas Sfondrati) was elected in December, 1590, and died in the following October. Ranke describes him as "a soul of virgin innocence." He was devoted to the Spanish party and to the French league; and when by his nuncio Landriano he renewed the excommunication of Henry IV., a powerful effect was produced in France. He aided Philip II. both with money and troops.—T. A.
Gregory XV. (Cardinal Alessandro Ludovisio), born in 1554, succeeded Paul V. in February, 1621. He was of infirm health, and the administration of affairs fell into the able hands of his nephew Ludovico. During his pontificate, Gregory gave considerable succours to the Emperor Ferdinand II. against the protestants, and to the king of Poland against the Turks. He published some well-considered regulations, observed to this day, touching the election of popes, by which the practice of secret voting was established in all its strictness. The famous congregation De Propagandâ Fide, planned by Girolamo da Nami, was first brought into operation by this pope. He died in July, 1623.—T. A.
Gregory XVI., originally Mauro Capellari, was born at Belluno, 10th September, 1765, and died at Rome, 1st June, 1846 He rose to be general of the order of monks to which he belonged. In 1826 Leo XII. created him cardinal, and on the 2d February 1831, he was chosen pope. His pontificate was exceedingly troubled, but far from illustrious. He had a reputation for learning and piety, but his intelligence was limited, his views narrow. His chief effort was to hinder progress and suppress thought; lucifer matches, as symbols of improvement, he pertinaciously refused to use; jesuitism he favoured; bible societies he denounced; reforms of every kind he resisted. Both Italy and the catholic church suffered grievously from the influence of a man who was incapable of understanding and unwilling to adapt himself to the times in which he lived; and none have lamented this more than the earnest and enlightened catholics themselves. Soon after Gregory ascended the papal throne, and subsequently, there were violent political commotions in the papal states; they were bloodily put down, but no attempt was made to remedy the evils from which they had arisen. We have neither the wish to draw up an indictment against Gregory XVI., nor to fulminate invectives. But biography is compelled to be honest and impartial, and for this bigoted pope it can never have applauding words. Though opposing all political change, all commercial, agricultural, industrial amelioration, all ecclesiastical reformation, all theological development, he was not a valiant champion of that church of which he was the nominal head. Nowhere is Catholicism so pure, so much a popular power, nowhere has it such interesting aspects, as in Poland. Yet Gregory allowed the Czar Nicholas to treat the Polish catholics with the most signal cruelty, almost without a word of remonstrance. Like most weak men who are raised to a lofty position for which they are unfit, Gregory put his whole confidence in unworthy favourites. His friends and chief agents were eminently contemptible, and stories are circulated in Italy both about him and them, which it would not be edifying to repeat. Making wars on railroads, electric telegraphs, and steam-boats; seeing no remedy for cholera but the exhibition of the heads of Saint Peter and Saint Paul; regarding with the same horror a newly-invented plough, and a freshly-propagated idea; Gregory seemed to think the age of the grand monk Hildebrand could be restored. But the world marched on—most obstinately refused to march back. Gregory XVI. had an extremely robust constitution which by imprudent habits he impaired. He smoked the very strongest tobacco, and brought on thereby a cancer which was the cause of his death. With those admitted to his intimacy he was a pleasant companion. Though looking with suspicion on science, he loved and patronized art. Rome owes him some embellishments. A sincere bigot, a sturdy conservative, he kindled revolutionary passions by the very attempt to vanquish them, and Italy is reaping some of the fruits.—W. M—l.
GREGORY, the name of several celebrated ecclesiastics of the Greek and Latin churches, here arranged in chronological order:—
Gregory Thaumaturgus, born probably between 210 and 215, received the former of these names at his conversion to christianity, and the latter, which signifies the wonder-worker, from the miracles which were said to have been wrought by him. His original name was Theodore, and he was a native of Neocæsarea in Cappadocia, where his father, a man of rank, instructed him till his fourteenth year in the principles of the pagan mythology. At that age he was left under the care of his widowed mother, who gave him the best available means of preparing himself for the profession of an advocate. Having visited Alexandria and Athens in the prosecution of his legal and philosophical studies, he was on the eve of proceeding to f inish them at Rome, when his sister desired his company in her journey to join her husband in Palestine. This incident proved the occasion of a complete change in his character and pursuits. At Cæsarea he met with Origen, who was then lecturing in that city; and under the guidance of the christian sage, the young Cappadocian and his brother Athenodorus were taught to examine more thoughtfully the claims of the Greek philosophy, and to compare it with the wisdom disclosed in the scriptures. His intention of visiting Rome was abandoned; the hope of winning worldly honour gave place to a holier ambition; and after remaining eight years with his preceptor, he returned to his native place a baptized convert to christianity. His self-distrust, however, prompted him to shrink from the responsibilities of the ministerial office; and it was not till Phædimus, bishop of Anaseia, had proceeded with the ceremony of his ordination in his absence, that he undertook the oversight of the infant church at Neocæsarea. He laboured there with such zeal and success that the city which he had found with little more than a dozen christians in it, contained at his death, about 270, only about the same number of heathens. The numerous miracles ascribed to him by his biographer, Gregory of Nyssa, will not obtain in the present day such general credence as was given to them by the churches of an earlier age; but the sincerity of his devotion, the earnestness of his labours, and the magnitude of the service which he achieved, admit of no reasonable question. His principal writings—"Panegyric on Origen,"
