THE INVESTITURE CONTEST (1056–1125)
Minority of Henry IV.—Regency of Agnes—Rivalry of Adalbert and
Anno—The Saxon Revolt—Election of Gregory VII.—Beginnings of the
Investiture Contest—Canossa and its results—Rudolf of Swabia and
Guibert of Ravenna—The Normans and Gregory VII.—Victor III. and
Urban II.—Last years of Henry IV.—Henry V. and Pascal II.—Calixtus
II. and the Concordat of Worms—Death of Henry V.
While the Cluniac movement had at last attained ascendency over the best
minds of Europe, and a swarm of monastic reformers had prepared the way
for the great revival of spiritual religion and hierarchical
pretensions; while in Italy strong papalist powers, like the Countess
Matilda and the Normans of the south, had arisen to menace the imperial
authority, the long minority of Henry IV. sapped the personal influence
of Cæsar over Italy and brought about a lengthened period of faction and
weak rule in Germany. [Sidenote: The minority of Henry IV., 1056–1072.]
On Henry III.’s death, his son, Henry IV., was a boy of six. The great
Emperor’s power secured the child’s undisputed succession, but was too
personal, too military in its character to prove any safeguard against
the dangers of a long minority. Nor did the choice of ruler during Henry
IV.’s nonage improve the state of affairs. Henry III.’s widow, Agnes of
Poitou, a pious well-meaning lady, acted as regent for her son, but her
weakness of will and inconsistency of conduct gave full scope to
discontented nobles ready to take advantage of a woman’s sway.
[Sidenote: Regency of the Empress Agnes, 1056–1062.] The lay nobles
availed themselves of her helplessness to plunder and despoil the
prelates, while they complained that Agnes neglected their counsels for
those of low-born courtiers and personal favourites. After six years of
confusion the Empress was driven from power. Anno, Archbishop of
Cologne, a vigorous, experienced, and zealous prelate, full of ambition
and violence, joined himself with Otto of Nordheim, the newly appointed
Duke of Bavaria, Count Egbert of Brunswick, and some of the bishops, in
a well-contrived plot to get possession of the young king. [Sidenote:
Abduction of Henry by Anno of Cologne, 1062.] In May 1062 the three
chief conspirators visited the king at his palace of Saint Suitbert’s,
situated on an island in the Rhine, some miles below Düsseldorf, now
called Kaiserswerth. One day after dinner Anno persuaded the boy king to
inspect an elaborately-fitted-up barge. As soon as Henry had entered the
boat, the oarsmen put off and rowed away. Henry was soon frightened and
plunged into the water, but Count Egbert leapt in and rescued him. The
king was pacified by flattery and taken to Cologne. The crowd cried
shame on the treachery of the bishop, but Henry remained in his custody,
and Agnes made no serious attempt to regain her authority, but
reconciled herself with Anno and retired into a monastery. Anno proposed
to the magnates that the regency should be exercised by the bishop of
the diocese in which the king happened to be staying. By carefully
selecting the king’s places of abode, he thus secured the reality of
power without its odium. By throwing over the Antipope he procured the
support of the Hildebrandine party, and was likened by Peter Damiani to
another Jehoiada. But his pride and arrogance soon raised him up
enemies; and young Henry, who never forgave his abduction, bitterly
resented his tutelage.
[Sidenote: Rivalry of Adalbert of Bremen and Anno of Cologne,
1065–1070.]
Adalbert, Archbishop of Bremen, took the lead among Anno’s enemies. He
was a man of high birth, great experience, and unbounded ambition, an
old confidant of Henry III., and filled with a great scheme for making
his archbishopric a permanent patriarchate over the infant churches of
Scandinavia. He made himself personally attractive to the king, who
contrasted his kindness and indulgence with the austerity of Anno. By
Adalbert’s influence Henry was declared of age to govern on attaining
his fifteenth year in 1065. Henceforth Adalbert disposed of all the high
offices in Church and State, and growing more greedy as he became more
successful, excited much ill-will among the religious by plundering the
monasteries right and left. He appropriated to himself the two great
abbeys of Lorsch and Corvey, and sought in vain to propitiate his
enemies by allowing other magnates, including even his rival Anno, to
similarly despoil other monasteries. The king was made so poor that he
hardly had enough to live on. But Adalbert at least sought to continue
the great traditions of statecraft of Henry III., and showed more policy
and skill than the crowd of bishops who had previously shared power with
Anno. At last, in 1066, the nobles combined against Adalbert at a Diet
at Tribur, and Henry was roundly told that he must either dismiss
Adalbert or resign his throne. Adalbert retired to his diocese, and Anno
and Otto of Nordheim again had the chief control of affairs. But neither
party could rule with energy or spirit, and Henry, now nearly grown up,
showed no decided capacity to make things better. The young king was
tall, dignified, and handsome. He was affable and kindly to men of low
rank, with whom he was ever popular, though he could be stern and
haughty to the magnates, whose power he feared. He had plenty of spirit
and fair ability. But he had been brought up so laxly by Archbishop
Adalbert that he was headstrong, irresolute, profligate, and utterly
deficient in self-control. He never formulated a policy, and if he
championed great causes, he did so blindly and in ignorance. Married to
Bertha, daughter of the Marquis Odo of Turin, in 1065, he gave offence
both to her powerful kinsfolk and to the strict churchmen by refusing to
live with her, and talking of a divorce. He had now to put down open
rebellions. In 1069 the Margrave Dedi strove to rouse the Thuringians to
revolt, and in 1070 Otto of Bavaria, the most important of the dukes
surviving, after the death of Duke Godfrey of Lorraine in the previous
year, was driven into rebellion. So divided were the German nobles, so
helpless the German king, that instead of ruling the Italians, there
seemed every prospect of the Italians ruling them. In 1069 Peter Damiani
went to Germany as legate, and compelled Henry to reconcile himself with
Bertha. Peter was horrified at the unblushing simony of the German
bishops, and, on his report, Anno of Cologne and several other of the
greatest prelates of Germany were summoned to Rome and thoroughly
humiliated. Anno atoned for his laxity by his edifying discharge of the
meanest monastic duties in his own great foundation at Siegburg, but his
influence was gone and his political career was at an end. His fall
brought Adalbert back to some of his ancient influence. The death of the
Archbishop of Bremen in 1072 unloosed the last link that connected the
new reign with the old traditions.
[Sidenote: The Saxon Revolt, 1073–1075.]
Henry IV.’s reign now really began. A thorough Swabian, his favourite
ministers were Swabians of no high degree, and he had no faith in the
goodwill or loyalty of the men of the north. He had kept vacant the
Saxon dukedom. On every hill-top of Saxony and Thuringia he built strong
castles, whose lawless garrisons plundered and outraged the peasantry.
There was ever fierce ill-will between northern and southern Germany
during the Middle Ages. The policy of the southern Emperor soon filled
the north with anger, and the Saxon nobles prepared for armed
resistance. In 1073 Henry fitted out an expedition, whose professed
destination was against the Poles. It was believed in Saxony that his
real object was to subdue the Saxons and hand them over to the Swabians.
Accordingly in the summer of 1073 a general Saxon revolt broke out,
headed by the natural leaders of Saxony both in Church and State,
including the Archbishop of Magdeburg, the deposed Duke Otto of Bavaria,
and the fierce Margrave Dedi, already an unsuccessful rebel. The
insurgents demanded the instant demolition of the castles, the dismissal
of Henry’s evil counsellors, and the restitution of their lands that he
had violently seized. On receiving no answer they shut up Henry in the
strong castle of Harzburg, whence he escaped with the utmost difficulty
to the friendly cloister of Hersfeld. In the course of the summer the
rebels destroyed many of the new castles. The levies summoned for the
Polish campaign refused to turn their arms against the Saxons, and Henry
saw himself powerless amidst the general falling away. A meeting at
Gerstungen, where Henry’s friends strove to mediate with the rebels, led
to a suggestion that the king should be deposed. Only at Worms and in
the Swabian cities did Henry receive any real support. He gathered
together a small army and strove to fight a winter campaign against the
Saxons, but failed so completely that he was forced to accept their
terms. However, hostilities were renewed in 1075, when Henry won a
considerable victory at Hohenburg on the Unstrut, and forced the Saxons
to make an unconditional submission. Otto of Nordheim, the Archbishop of
Magdeburg, and the other leaders were imprisoned. On the ruins of Saxon
liberty Henry now aspired to build up a despotism.
[Sidenote: Election of Gregory VII. 1073.]
Hildebrand was now Pope. During the funeral service of Alexander II. at
St. John’s in the Lateran, a great shout arose from the multitude in the
church that Hildebrand should be their bishop. The cardinal, Hugh the
White, addressed the assembly. ‘You know, brethren,’ he said, ‘how,
since the time of Leo IX., Hildebrand has exalted the Roman Church, and
freed our city. We cannot find a better Pope than he. Indeed, we cannot
find his equal. Let us then elect him, who, having been ordained in our
church, is known to us all, and thoroughly approved by us.’ There was
the great shout in answer: ‘Saint Peter has chosen Hildebrand to be
Pope!’ Despite his resistance, Hildebrand was dragged to the church of
St. Peter ad Vincula, and immediately enthroned. The cardinals had no
mind to upset this irregular election, strangely contrary though it was
to the provisions of Nicholas II. The German bishops, alarmed at
Hildebrand’s reputation for severity, urged the king to quash the
appointment, but Henry contented himself with sending to Rome to inquire
into the circumstances of the election. Hildebrand showed great
moderation, and actually postponed his consecration until Henry’s
consent had been obtained. This Henry had no wish to withhold. On 29th
June 1073 Hildebrand was hallowed bishop. By assuming the name of
Gregory VII., he proclaimed to the world the invalidity of the
deposition of his old master at the Synod of Sutri.
[Sidenote: His character and policy.]
The wonderful self-control which the new Pope had shown so long did not
desert him in his new position. Physically, there was little to denote
the mighty mind within his puny body. He was of low stature, shortlegged
and corpulent. He spoke with a stammer, and his dull complexion was only
lighted up by his glittering eyes. He was not a man of much learning or
originality, and contributed little towards the theory of the papal or
sacerdotal power. But he was one of the greatest practical men of the
Middle Ages; and his single-minded wish to do what was right betokened a
dignity of moral nature that was rare indeed in the eleventh century.
His power over men’s minds was enormous, even to their own despite. The
fierce and fanatical Peter Damiani called him his ‘holy Satan.’ ‘Thy
will,’ said he, ‘has ever been a command to me—evil but lawful. Would
that I had always served God and St. Peter as faithfully as I have
served thee.’ Even as archdeacon he assumed so great a state, and lived
in such constant intercourse with the world, that monastic zealots like
Damiani were scandalised, and some moderns have questioned (though
groundlessly) whether he was ever a professed monk at all. Profoundly
convinced of the truth of the Cluniac doctrines, he showed a fierce and
almost unscrupulous statecraft in realising them that filled even Cluny
with alarm. His ideal was to reform the world by establishing a sort of
universal monarchy for the Papacy. He saw all round him that kings and
princes were powerless for good, but mighty for evil. He saw churchmen
living greedy and corrupt lives for want of higher direction and
control. Looking at a world distraught by feudal anarchy, his ambition
was to restore the ‘peace of God,’ civilisation, and order, by
submitting the Church to the Papacy, and the world to the Church. ‘Human
pride,’ he wrote, ‘has created the power of kings; God’s mercy has
created the power of bishops. The Pope is the master of Emperors. He is
rendered holy by the merits of his predecessor, St. Peter. The Roman
Church has never erred, and Holy Scripture proves that it never can err.
To resist it is to resist God.’ For the next twelve years he strove with
all his might to make his power felt throughout Christendom. Sometimes
his enthusiasm caused him to advance claims that even his best friends
would not admit, as when William the Conqueror was constrained to
repudiate the Holy See’s claims of feudal sovereignty over England,
which, after similar pretensions had been recognised by the Normans in
Sicily, Gregory and his successors were prone to assert whenever
opportunity offered. The remotest parts of Europe felt the weight of his
influence. But the intense conviction of the righteousness of his aims,
that made compromise seem to him treason to the truth, did something to
detract from the success of his statecraft. He was too absolute, too
rigid, too obstinate, too extreme to play his part with entire advantage
to himself and his cause. Yet with all his defects there is no grander
figure in history.
Gregory realised the magnitude of his task, but he never shrank from it.
‘I would that you knew,’ wrote he to the Abbot of Cluny, ‘the anguish
that assails my soul. The Church of the East has gone astray from the
Catholic faith. If I look to the west, the north, or the south, I find
but few bishops whose appointments and whose lives are in accordance
with the laws of the Church, or who govern God’s people through love and
not through worldly ambition. Among princes I know not one who sets the
honour of God before his own, or justice before gain. If I did not hope
that I could be of use to the Church, I would not remain at Rome a day.’
From the very first he was beset on every side with difficulties. Even
the alliance with the Normans was uncertain. Robert Guiscard, with his
brother Roger, waged war against Gregory’s faithful vassal, Richard of
Capua; and Robert, who threatened the papal possession of Benevento,
went so far that he incurred excommunication. Philip of France, ‘the
worst of the tyrants who enslaved the Church,’ had to be threatened with
interdict. A project to unite the Eastern with the Western Church broke
down lamentably. A contest with Henry IV. soon became inevitable. But
Gregory abated nothing of his high claims. In February 1075 he held a
synod at Rome, at which severe decrees against simony and the marriage
of clerks were issued. [Sidenote: The Synod of 1075, and the attack on
Simony and Lay Investiture.] The practice of lay investiture, by which
secular princes were wont to grant bishoprics and abbeys by the
conferring of spiritual symbols such as the ring and staff, had long
been regarded by the Cluniacs as the most glaring of temporal
aggressions against the spiritual power. This practice was now sternly
forbidden. ‘If any one,’ declared the synod, ‘henceforth receive from
the hand of any lay person a bishopric or abbey, let him not be
considered as abbot or bishop, and let the favour of St. Peter and the
gate of the Church be forbidden to him. If an emperor, a king, a duke, a
count, or any other lay person presume to give investiture of any
ecclesiastical dignity, let him be excommunicated.’ This decree gave the
signal for the great Investiture Contest, and for the greater struggle
of Papacy and Empire that convulsed Europe, save during occasional
breaks, for the next two centuries.
Up to the issue of the decree as to investitures, the relation between
Gregory and Henry IV. had not been unfriendly. Henry had admitted that
he had not always respected the rights of the Church, but had promised
amendment for the future. [Sidenote: The beginnings of the Investiture
Contest, 1075.] But to give up investitures would have been to change
the whole imperial system of government. He was now freed, by his
victory at Hohenburg, from the Saxon revolt. The German bishops, afraid
of the Pope’s strictness, encouraged his resistance, and even in Italy
he had many partisans. The Patarini were driven out of Milan, and Henry
scrupled not to invest a new archbishop with the see of St. Ambrose.
Even at Rome, Gregory barely escaped assassination while celebrating
mass. In January 1076 Henry summoned a German council to Worms.
[Sidenote: Council at Worms, 1076.] Strange and incredible crimes were
freely attributed to the Pope, and the majority of the German bishops
pronounced him deposed. Henry himself wrote in strange terms to the
Pope: ‘Henry, king not by usurpation but by God’s grace, to Hildebrand,
henceforth no pope but false monk,—Christ has called us to our kingdom,
while He has never called thee to the priesthood. Thou hast attacked me,
a consecrated king, who cannot be judged but by God Himself. Condemned
by our bishops and by ourselves, come down from the place that thou hast
usurped. Let the see of St. Peter be held by another, who will not seek
to cover violence under the cloak of religion, and who will teach the
wholesome doctrine of St. Peter. I, Henry, king by the grace of God,
with all of my bishops, say unto thee—“Come down, come down.”’
[Sidenote: Vatican Synod, 1076.]
In February 1076 Gregory held a great synod in the Vatican, at which the
Empress Agnes was present, with a great multitude of Italian and French
bishops. A clerk from Parma named Roland delivered the king’s letter to
the Pope before the council. There was a great tumult, and Roland would
have atoned for his boldness with his life but for the Pope’s personal
intervention. Henry was now formally excommunicated and deposed.
‘Blessed Peter,’ declared Gregory, ‘thou and the Mother of God and all
the saints are witness that the Roman Church has called upon me to
govern it in my own despite. As thy representative I have received from
God the power to bind and to loose in Heaven and on earth. For the
honour and security of thy Church, in the Name of God Almighty, I
prohibit Henry the king, son of Henry the Emperor, who has risen with
unheard-of pride against thy Church, from ruling Germany and Italy. I
release all Christians from the oaths of fealty they may have taken to
him, and I order that no one shall obey him.’
[Sidenote: Weakness of Henry’s position in Germany.]
War was thus declared between Pope and king. Though the position of both
parties was sufficiently precarious, Henry was at the moment in the
worst position for carrying on an internecine combat. He could count
very little on the support of his German subjects. Those who most feared
the Pope were the self-seekers and the simoniacs, whose energy was small
and whose loyalty less. The saints and the zealots were all against him.
The Saxons profited by his embarrassments to renew their revolt, and
soon chased his garrisons out of their land. The secular nobles, who saw
in his policy the beginnings of an attempt at despotism, held aloof from
his court. It was to no purpose that Henry answered the anathemas of
Gregory with denunciations equally unmeasured, and complained that
Gregory had striven to unite in his hands both the spiritual and the
temporal swords, that God had kept asunder. Hermann, Bishop of Metz, the
Pope’s legate in Germany, ably united the forces against him. At last,
the nobles and bishops of Germany gathered together on 16th October 1076
at Tribur, where the papal legates were treated with marked deference,
though Henry took up his quarters at Oppenheim, on the other bank of the
Rhine, afraid to trust himself amidst his disaffected subjects.
[Sidenote: Diet of Tribur, 1076.] Henry soon saw that he had no
alternative but submission. The magnates were so suspicious of him that
it needed the personal intercession of Hugh, Abbot of Cluny, to prevail
upon them to make terms with him at all. Finally a provisional agreement
was patched up, upon conditions excessively humiliating to Henry.
[Sidenote: Humiliation of Henry.] The barons refused to obey him until
he had obtained absolution from the Pope, who, moreover, had promised to
go to Germany in person and hold a council in the succeeding February.
Pending this, Henry was to remain at Speyer without kingly revenue,
power, or dignity, and still shut off by his excommunication from the
offices of the Church. If Henry could not satisfy the Pope in February,
he was to be regarded as deposed.
Abandoned by Germany, Henry abode some two months at Speyer, gloomily
anticipating the certain ruin to his cause that would follow the Pope’s
appearance in a German council. He realised that he could do nothing
unless he reconciled himself to Gregory; and, hearing good news of his
prospects in northern Italy, thought that his best course was to betake
himself over the Alps, where the Pope might well prove less rigorous, if
he found him at the head of a formidable band of Italian partisans. It
was a winter of extraordinary severity, but any risks were better than
inglorious inaction at Speyer. [Sidenote: Henry’s winter journey through
Burgundy and Lombardy, 1076–77.] Accordingly Henry broke his compact
with his nobles, and towards the end of December secretly set out on his
journey southward. He was accompanied by Bertha and his little son, but
only one German noble was included among his scanty following. He
traversed Burgundy, and kept his miserable Christmas feast at Besançon.
Thence crossing the Mont Cenis at the risk of his life, he appeared
early in the new year amidst his Lombard partisans at Pavia. But though
urged to take up arms, Henry feared the risks of a new and doubtful
struggle. Germany could only be won back by submission. He resolved to
seek out the Pope and throw himself on his mercy.
Gregory was then some fifteen miles south of Reggio, at an impregnable
mountain stronghold belonging to the Countess Matilda, called Canossa,
which crowned one of the northern spurs of the Apennines, and overlooked
the great plain. [Sidenote: Canossa, Jan. 1077.] He had sought the
protection of its walls as a safe refuge against the threatened Lombard
attack which Henry, it was believed, had come over the Alps to arrange.
The Countess Matilda and Hugh of Cluny, Henry’s godfather, were with the
Pope, and many of the simoniac bishops of Germany had already gone to
Canossa and won absolution by submission. On 21st January 1077 Henry
left his wife and followers at Reggio, and climbed the steep snow-clad
road that led to the mountain fastness. Gregory refused to receive him,
but he had interviews with Matilda and his godfather in a chapel at the
foot of the castle-rock, and induced them to intercede with the Pope on
his behalf. Gregory would hear of nothing but complete and unconditional
submission. ‘If he be truly penitent, let him surrender his crown and
insignia of royalty into our hands, and confess himself unworthy of the
name and honour of king.’ But the pressure of the countess and abbot at
last prevailed upon him to be content with abject contrition without
actual abandonment of his royal state. For three days Henry waited in
the snow outside the inner gate of the castle-yard, barefoot, fasting,
and in the garb of a penitent. On the fourth day the Pope consented to
admit him into his presence. With the cry ‘Holy father, spare me!’ the
king threw himself at the Pope’s feet. Gregory raised him up, absolved
him, entertained him at his table, and sent him away with much good
advice and his blessing. But the terms of Henry’s reconciliation were
sufficiently hard. He was to promise to submit himself to the judgment
of the German magnates, presided over by the Pope, with respect to the
long catalogue of charges brought against him. Until that was done he
was to abstain from the royal insignia and the royal functions. He was
to be prepared to accept or retain his crown according to the judgment
of the Pope as to his guilt or innocence. He was, if proved innocent, to
obey the Pope in all things pertaining to the Church. If he broke any of
these conditions, another king was to be forthwith elected.
[Sidenote: Results of Canossa.]
The humiliation of Henry at Canossa is so dramatic and so famous an
event that it is hard to realise that it was but an incident in the
midst of a long struggle. It settled nothing, and profited neither Henry
nor Gregory. Gregory found that his harshness had to some extent
alienated that public opinion on which the Papacy depended almost
entirely for its influence. Henry found that his submission had not won
over his German enemies, but had thoroughly disgusted the anti-papal
party in northern Italy, upon which alone he could count for armed
support. The Lombards now talked of deposing the cowardly monarch in
favour of his little son. But the future course of events rested after
all upon the action of the German nobles, who held their Diet at
Forchheim in March 1077. [Sidenote: Diet of Forchheim, March 1077.] To
this assembly Henry was not even invited; and for the present he
preferred remaining in Italy. The Pope also did not appear in person,
but was represented by two legates. The old charges against Henry were
brought up once more, and the legates expressed their wonder that the
patient Germans had submitted so long to be ruled by such a monster.
Without giving Henry the least opportunity of refuting the accusations,
it was determined to proceed at once to the choice of a new king. The
suffrages of the magnates fell on Duke Rudolf of Swabia. [Sidenote:
Rudolf of Swabia, Anti-Cæsar.] Before his appointment, Rudolf was
compelled to renounce all hereditary claim to the throne on behalf of
his heirs, and to allow freedom of election to all bishoprics. He was
then crowned at Mainz by Archbishop Siegfried.
The news of Rudolf’s election at once brought Henry back over the Alps.
He soon found that he now had devoted partisans in the land that had
rejected him when he was under the ban of the Pope. He was warmly
welcomed in Bavaria, in Burgundy, and especially in the great towns of
the Rhineland, always faithful to the imperial cause. [Sidenote: Civil
war between Rudolf and Henry, 1077–1080.] Rudolf’s own duchy of Swabia
rejected its duke in favour of the prince who had ever loved the
Swabians. Rebel Saxony was alone strongly on Rudolf’s side. Even the
Pope could not make up his mind to ratify the action of his legates and
accept Rudolf as king. For more than two years civil war raged between
Rudolf and Henry. It was substantially a continuation of the Saxon
revolt. At last, in January 1080, a decisive battle was fought at
Flarchheim on the banks of the Unstrut, in which Henry was utterly
defeated. [Sidenote: Battle of Flarchheim, 1080.] During all this time
Gregory had contented himself with offers of arbitration. Though Henry
practised lay investiture as freely as ever, it was not until after his
defeat that the Pope once more declared himself against him. Yielding to
the indignant remonstrances of Rudolf and the Saxons, he convoked a
synod at Rome in March 1080, where he renewed Henry’s excommunication,
and again deprived him of his kingdoms of Germany and Italy. [Sidenote:
Renewed excommunication and deposition of Henry, March 1080.] ‘Act so,’
said Gregory to the assembled prelates, ‘that the world shall know that
ye who have power to bind and to loose in heaven, can grant or withhold
kingdoms, principalities, and other possessions according to each man’s
merits. And if you are fit to judge in things spiritual, ought ye not to
be deemed competent to judge in things temporal?’ Rudolf was now
recognised as king, and another universal prohibition of lay
investitures was issued.
Gregory boasted that, before the next feast of SS. Peter and Paul, Henry
would have lost his throne and his life. But each fresh aggression of
the Pope increased his rival’s power. Henry now showed an energy and
vigour that contrasted strangely with his spiritless action three years
before. Both in Germany and Italy he found himself supported by
partisans as enthusiastic as those of the Pope. The bishops of Germany
declared for him, and the old foes of the Pope in Italy took courage to
continue the contest. [Sidenote: Guibert of Ravenna elected Antipope,
June 1080.] In June Henry met at Brixen the German and Italian bishops
who adhered to his side. This assembly declared Gregory deposed and
excommunicate, and elected Guibert, Archbishop of Ravenna as his
successor.
The new Antipope had in his youth served Henry III., and, as chancellor
of Italy, had striven to uphold the imperial authority during Henry
IV.’s minority. He had once been on friendly terms with Gregory, but had
quarrelled with him, and had for some time been the soul of the
imperialist party in north Italy. He was of high birth, unblemished
character, great abilities, and long experience. He assumed the title of
Clement III., and at once returned to Ravenna to push matters to
extremities against Gregory. The rash violence of the Pope had been
answered with equal violence by his enemies. There were two Popes and
two Emperors. The sword alone could decide between them.
[Sidenote: Battle on the Elster, and death of Rudolf, 15th October
1080.]
Fortune favoured Henry and Clement both in Germany and Italy. On 15th
October 1080 a great battle was fought on the banks of the Elster, not
far from the later battlefields of Lützen. The fierce assault of Otto of
Nordheim changed what threatened to be a Saxon defeat into a brilliant
victory for the northern army. But Rudolf of Swabia was slain, and the
victorious Saxons wasted their opportunity while they quarrelled as to
his successor. It was nearly a year before they could agree upon Hermann
of Luxemburg as their new king. [Sidenote: Hermann of Luxemburg,
Anti-Cæsar.] Before this the back of the revolt had been broken, and
Henry, secure of Germany, had once more gone to Italy. Crossing the
Brenner in March 1081, he went on progress through the Lombard cities,
and abode with Pope Clement at Ravenna. Thence he set out for Rome,
meeting little resistance on his way save from the Countess Matilda.
[Sidenote: Henry’s visit to Italy, 1081.] The Normans of Naples, on
whose help Gregory had counted, made no effort to protect their
suzerain. In May Henry celebrated the Whitsun feast outside the walls of
Rome.
Gregory did not lose his courage even with the enemy at his gate. The
Romans were faithful to him, and Henry, who saw no chance of besieging
the great city successfully, was forced to retreat northwards by the
feverish heat of summer. [Sidenote: War between Henry and Gregory,
1081–1084.] He retired to Lombardy, where his position was unassailable.
Next year he was back again before the walls of Rome, but the occupation
of Tivoli was his greatest success. In 1083 a third attack gave him
possession of the Leonine city, but even in this extremity Gregory would
listen to no talk of conciliation. ‘Let the king lay down his crown and
make atonement to the Church,’ was his answer to those who besought him
to come to terms. In the early months of 1084 Henry invaded Apulia and
kept in check the Normans, who at last were making a show of helping the
Pope. In March he appeared for the fourth time before Rome. This time
the Romans opened their gates, and Gregory was closely besieged in the
castle of St. Angelo. [Sidenote: Coronation of Henry by Guibert, 1084.]
A synod was hastily summoned, which renewed his deposition and
excommunication. On Palm Sunday, 1084, Guibert was enthroned, and on
Easter Day he crowned Henry Emperor at St. Peter’s.
[Sidenote: The Normans come to Gregory’s help, 1084.]
Gregory sent from the castle of St. Angelo an urgent appeal for help to
Robert Guiscard. During the troubles of the last few years, Robert’s
obligations to his suzerain had weighed very lightly upon him, but
Henry’s invasion of Apulia and the certain ruin of the Normans in Naples
if the Pope succumbed, at last brought him to decided action. Hastily
abandoning his Greek campaign, Robert crossed over to Italy, and in May
advanced to the walls of Rome with a large and motley army, in which the
Saracens of Sicily were a prominent element. Henry, who had no force
sufficient to resist, quitted Rome, and soon crossed the Alps. The
Romans tried in vain to defend their city from the Normans. After a four
days’ siege treason opened the gates. [Sidenote: Sack of Rome.] Rome was
ruthlessly sacked, whole quarters were burned down, hideous massacres
and outrages were perpetrated, and thousands of Romans were sold as
slaves. The Normans then marched home. Gregory could not remain in the
desolate city, and followed them to Salerno. The Antipope kept his
Christmas amid the ruins of Rome, but soon abandoned the city for his
old home at Ravenna. Gregory now fell sick at Salerno. The few faithful
cardinals strove to console him by dwelling on the great work which he
had accomplished. [Sidenote: Death of Gregory in exile, 1085.] ‘I set no
store by what I have done,’ was his answer. ‘One thing only fills me
with hope. I have always loved the law of God and hated iniquity.
Therefore I die in exile.’ He passed away on 25th May 1085. Less than
two months afterwards, Robert Guiscard died at Corfu.
For a year after Gregory’s death, the Papacy remained vacant. At last,
in May 1086, the cardinals, profiting by the Antipope’s return to
Ravenna, met at Rome and forced the Papacy on the unwilling Desiderius,
Abbot of Monte Casino. The new Pope (who assumed the name of Victor
III.), was a close friend of Gregory’s and strongly attached to his
ideals. [Sidenote: Victor III., 1086–1087.] But he was too old and too
weak to take up Hildebrand’s task, and three days after his election he
strove to avoid the troublesome dignity by flight to Monte Casino. Next
year he was with difficulty prevailed upon to return to Rome to receive
the tiara. But the partisans of the Emperor and of the Countess Matilda
fought fiercely for the possession of Rome, and Victor again retreated
to his monastery, where death ended his troubles three days after his
return (16th September 1087). Next time the cardinals fixed upon a Pope
of sterner stuff. Driven from Rome by the Antipope, they made their
election at Terracina on 12th March 1088. Their choice fell upon the son
of a baron of Champagne named Odo, who had lived long at Cluny as monk
and sub-prior, and then served the Roman Court as cardinal-bishop of
Ostia. [Sidenote: Urban II., 1088–1099.] Urban II. (this was the title
he took) was a man of ability and force of character, as ardent as
Hildebrand for the Cluniac ideals, but more careful of his means of
enforcing them than the uncompromising Gregory. He made closer his
alliance with the Normans, and, thanks to the help of Duke Roger, Robert
Guiscard’s son and successor, was able to return to Rome and remain
there for some months. But the troops of the Antipope still held the
castle of St. Angelo, and Urban soon found it prudent to retire. He
mainly spent the first years of his pontificate in southern Italy under
Roger’s protection.
Meanwhile, papalists and imperialists fought hard in northern Italy.
Germany was now tolerably quiet, and Henry could now devote his chief
energies to Italy, which he revisited in 1090. [Sidenote: Henry revisits
Italy, 1090.] But Urban united the German with the Italian opposition to
the Emperor by bringing about a politic marriage between the Countess
Matilda and the young son of Welf or Guelf, Duke of Bavaria, the
Emperor’s most powerful adversary in Germany. Despite this combination,
Henry’s Italian campaigns between 1090 and 1092 were extraordinarily
successful. Matilda’s dominions in the plain country were overrun, and
her towns and castles captured. But she held her own in her strongholds
in the Apennines, rejected all compromise, and prepared to fight to the
last. Henry met his first check when he was driven back in disgrace from
an attempted siege of Canossa.
[Sidenote: Conrad of Franconia, Anti-Cæsar, 1093.]
The papalists were much encouraged by Henry’s defeat. Soon after they
persuaded his son Conrad, a weak and headstrong youth, to rise in revolt
against his father. Half Lombardy fell away from father to son. Before
the year was out, Conrad received the Iron Crown at Milan, and Urban
ventured back to Rome. Worse was to follow. Henry’s second wife,
Praxedis of Russia (Bertha had died in 1087), escaped from the prison to
which her husband had consigned her, and taking refuge with the Countess
Matilda, gave to the world a story of wrongs and outrages that destroyed
the last shreds of the Emperor’s reputation. In high glee at the
progress of his cause, Urban set out on a lengthened progress that
reminds us of the memorable tours of Leo IX. [Sidenote: Urban’s Councils
at Piacenza and Clermont, 1095.] After a long stay in Tuscany, he
crossed the Apennines early in 1095, and held a great synod at Piacenza,
at which the laws against simony and married clerks were renewed, while
the Empress publicly declared her charges against Henry, and ambassadors
from the Eastern Emperor pleaded for help, against the growing power of
the Seljukian Turks. In the summer Urban crossed the Alps, and remained
for more than a year in France and Burgundy, being everywhere received
with extraordinary reverence. In November 1095 he held a largely
attended synod at Clermont in Auvergne. Not content with his quarrel
with the Emperor, he here fulminated excommunication against Philip I.
of France, on account of his adultery with Bertrada, Countess of Anjou.
But the famous work of the Council of Clermont was the proclamation of
the First Crusade. [Sidenote: The proclamation of the First Crusade,
1095.] Nothing shows more clearly the strength and nature of the papal
power than that this greatest result of the universal monarchy of the
Church should have been brought about at a time when all the chief kings
of Europe were open enemies of the Papacy. Henry IV. was an old foe,
Philip of France had been deliberately attacked, and William Rufus of
England was indifferent or hostile. But in the eleventh century the
power of even the strongest kings counted for very little. What made the
success of Urban’s endeavour was the appeal to the swarm of small feudal
chieftains, who really governed Europe, and to the fierce and
undisciplined enthusiasm of the common people, with whom the ultimate
strength of the Church really lay.
[Sidenote: Urban’s return to Italy, 1096.]
Flushed with his success at Clermont, Urban recrossed the Alps in
September 1096. Bands of Crusaders, hastening to the East, mingled with
the papal train as he again traversed northern Italy. Rome itself now
opened its gates to the homeless lord of the Church. In 1097 Henry IV.
abandoned Italy in despair. [Sidenote: Henry abandons Italy, 1097.] He
restored the elder Welf to the Bavarian duchy, and easily persuaded the
younger Welf to quit his elderly bride, and resume his allegiance to the
Emperor. Conrad was deprived of the succession, and his younger brother
Henry crowned king at Aachen on taking an oath that he would not presume
to exercise royal power while his father was alive.
[Sidenote: Urban II. in southern Italy, 1098.]
Urban was now triumphant, save that his Norman allies were once more
giving him trouble, and the castle of St. Angelo was still held for the
Antipope. He accordingly again visited southern Italy, and won over
Count Roger of Sicily, by conceding the famous privilege to Roger and
his heirs that no papal legate should be sent into their lands without
their consent, but that the lords of Sicily should themselves act as
legates within their dominions. [Sidenote: Synod at Bari.] In October
1098 the Pope held a synod at Bari, restored to Catholicism by the
Norman conquest in 1071. There, with a view to facilitating the Crusade,
the great point of difference between the Eastern and Western
Churches—the Procession of the Holy Ghost—was debated at length. Among
the prelates attending the council was Anselm of Canterbury, exiled for
upholding against William Rufus the principles which Urban had asserted
against the Emperor and the King of France. Urban, who had been politic
enough not to raise up a third great king against him by supporting
Anselm, atoned for past neglect by the deference he now showed to the
‘Pope of the second world.’ As the council broke up, the good news came
that the castle of St. Angelo had at last been captured. Urban returned
to Rome and devoted himself to the work of the Crusade. On 29th July
1099 he died suddenly. It was his glory that the struggle of Pope and
Emperor, which had absorbed all the energies of Gregory VII., sank
during his pontificate into a second place. [Sidenote: Death of Urban
II., 1099.] Though he abandoned no claim that Gregory had made, he had
the good fortune to be able to put himself at the head of crusading
Europe, while his opponent shrank into powerless contempt. Next year the
Antipope followed Urban to the grave. With Clement, the schism as a real
force died. Three short-lived Antipopes pretended to carry on his
succession until the death of the Emperor, but no one took them
seriously. With the flight of the last pretender in 1106, formal
ecclesiastical unity was again restored.
Driven out of Italy by his rebel son, Henry IV. found Germany equally
indisposed to obey him. Both north and south of the Alps, the real
gainers in the long struggle had been the feudal chieftains, and
Germany, like Italy, was ceasing to be a single state at all. [Sidenote:
Death of Conrad, 1101.] In 1101 the rebellious Conrad died at Florence,
bitterly regretting his treason. Henry’s main object now was to restore
peace to Germany, and to effect a reconciliation with the Church.
[Sidenote: Paschal II., 1099–1118.] But the new Pope, Paschal II.
(Rainerius of Bieda, near Viterbo, elected August 1099), renewed his
excommunication, and was as unbending as his predecessors. Before long
Paschal was able to extend his intrigues into Germany, and in 1104 the
young King Henry raised the Saxons in revolt against his father, and was
recognised as king by the Pope. [Sidenote: Revolt of the young King
Henry, 1104.] But the Emperor had no spirit left for a fresh contest. At
Coblenz he threw himself at his son’s feet, begging only that his own
child should not be the instrument of God’s vengeance on his sins. The
young king asked for forgiveness, and promised to give up his claims
when his father was reconciled with the Church. The Emperor trustfully
disbanded his soldiers, and was promptly shut up in prison by his
twice-perjured son. On 31st December 1105 he formally abdicated at
Ingelheim, and abjectly confessed his offences against the Church. He
was told that absolution could only come from the Pope in person, and
that it was a boon that he was allowed his personal freedom. He fled
from Ingelheim to Cologne, where the goodwill of the citizens showed him
that he still had friends. From Cologne he went to Aachen, and from
thence to Liége, whose bishop, Otbert, supported him. The Duke of
Lorraine declared himself for him, and help was expected from Philip of
France and Robert of Flanders. Henry now declared that his abdication
was forced on him, but offered any terms, compatible with the possession
of the throne, to get absolution from the Pope. [Sidenote: Death of
Henry IV. 1106.] But on 7th August 1106 he died at Liége, before the
real struggle between him and his son was renewed. The enmity of the
Church grudged rest even to his dead body. The Bishop of Speyer refused
to allow the corpse of the excommunicate to repose beside his ancestors
in the stately church which he himself had built, and for five years it
lay in an unconsecrated chapel.
[Sidenote: Henry V., 1106–1125.]
On 5th January 1106 Henry V. was crowned for the second time at Mainz.
The first months of his reign were disturbed by his father’s attempt to
regain power. When he was at last undisputed King of Germany, he found
that his cold-blooded treachery had profited him very little. The
Investiture Contest was still unsettled. Between 1103 and 1107 Anselm of
Canterbury, restored to his see by William Rufus’ death, had been
carrying on a counterpart of the contest with Henry I. of England. But
the personal animosities which had embittered the continental struggle
were absent, and the dispute did not, as abroad, involve the larger
questions of the whole relations of Church and State. It was easy,
therefore, to settle it by a satisfactory compromise. Yet at the very
moment when Henry had agreed to lay aside investiture with ring and
staff, the envoys of Henry V. were informing Paschal that their master
proposed to insist upon his traditional rights in the matter. The result
was that the continental strife was renewed with all its old bitterness.
For two years Henry was engaged in wars against Hungary and Bohemia. In
1110 he resolved to visit Italy to receive the imperial crown, and to
re-establish the old rights of the Empire. Besides a numerous army, he
took with him ‘men of letters able to give reasons to all comers’ for
his acts, among whom was an Irish or Welsh monk named David, who wrote,
at his command, a popular account of how the king had gone to Rome to
extract a blessing from the Pope, as Jacob had extorted the angel’s
blessing.[7] He found Italy too divided to offer effectual resistance.
The Countess Matilda was old, and Paschal was no great statesman like
Gregory or Urban. [Sidenote: Henry’s Roman journey. Paschal renounces
the Temporalities of the Church, 1111.] Early in 1111 the king’s army
approached Rome. The Pope, finding that neither the Romans nor the
Normans would help him, sent to Sutri to make terms. Even in his supreme
distress he would not give up freedom of elections or abate his
hostility to lay investitures; but he offered that if the king would
accept those cardinal conditions he would renounce for the Church all
its feudal and secular property. It was a bold or rash attempt to save
the spiritual rights of the Church by abandoning its temporalities,
lands, and jurisdictions. Henry naturally accepted an offer which put
the whole landed estates of the Church at his disposal, and reduced
churchmen to live on tithes and offerings—their spiritual sources of
revenue. Only the temporalities of the Roman see were to be excepted
from this sweeping surrender.
[Sidenote: Tumult at Henry’s Coronation.]
On Sunday, 12th February, St. Peter’s church was crowded to witness the
hallowing of the Emperor by the Pope. Before the ceremony began the
compact was read, and the Pope renounced in the plainest language all
intervention in secular affairs, as incompatible with the spiritual
character of the clergy. A violent tumult at once arose. German and
Italian bishops united to protest vigorously against the
light-heartedness with which the Pope gave away their property and
jurisdictions, while carefully safeguarding his own. The congregation
dissolved into a brawling throng. The clergy were maltreated, and the
sacred vessels stolen. The coronation was impossible. The king laid
violent hands on Pope and cardinals, and the mob in the streets murdered
any Germans whom they happened to come across. After three days of wild
turmoil, Henry quitted the city, taking his prisoners with him. After a
short captivity, Paschal stooped to obtain his liberty by allowing Henry
to exercise investitures and appoint bishops at his will. ‘For the peace
and liberty of the Church,’ was his halting excuse, ‘I am compelled to
do what I would never have done to save my own life.’ In return Henry
promised to be a faithful son of the Church. On 13th April Paschal
crowned Henry with maimed rites and little ceremony at St. Peter’s.
Canossa was at last revenged. Henry returned in triumph over the Alps,
and solemnly interred his father’s remains in holy ground at Speyer.
[Sidenote: Triumph of Henry over Paschal.]
Henry’s triumph made a deep impression on Europe. The blundering Pope
had betrayed the temporal possessions of the clergy, and the necessary
bulwarks of the freedom of the spiritual power. The event showed that
there were practical limits even to papal infallibility. Paschal was as
powerless to retreat from the position of Hildebrand, as he had been to
renounce the lands of all prelates but himself. The clergy would not
accept the papal decision. In France a movement to declare the Pope a
heretic was only stayed by the canonist Ivo of Chartres declaring that
the Pope, having acted under compulsion, was not bound to keep his
promise. The Italians gladly accepted this way out of the difficulty.
[Sidenote: Paschal repudiates his concessions.] Paschal solemnly
repudiated his compact. ‘I accept,’ he declared, ‘the decrees of my
master, Pope Gregory, and of Urban of blessed memory; that which they
have applauded I applaud, that which they have granted I grant, that
which they have condemned I condemn.’
Even in Germany Henry found that he had gained nothing by his
degradation of the Pope. The air was thick with plots and conspiracies.
His most trusted councillors became leaders of treason. [Sidenote:
Conspiracies against Henry in Germany.] Adalbert, Archbishop of Mainz,
his chief minister, formed a plot against him and was imprisoned. The
Saxons rose once more in revolt under their new Duke Lothair of
Supplinburg. Friesland refused to pay tribute. Cologne rose under its
Archbishop, and Henry found that he was quite unable to besiege it
successfully. The nobles who attended his wedding with Matilda of
England at Mainz, profited by the meeting to weave new plots. Next year
the citizens of Mainz shut up the Emperor in his palace while he was
holding a Diet, and forced him to release their Archbishop.
[Sidenote: Death of the Countess Matilda, 1115, and of Paschal II.,
1118.]
Affairs in Italy were even more gloomy. In 1115 the Countess Matilda
died, leaving all her vast possessions to the Holy See. If this will had
been carried out, Paschal would have become the greatest temporal power
in Italy. Henry therefore crossed the Alps in 1116, anxious, if not to
save Matilda’s allodial lands, to take possession of the fiefs of the
Empire which she had held. In 1117 Henry occupied Rome and crowned his
young English wife Matilda. Even in his exile Paschal had not learnt the
lesson of firmness. He died early in 1118, before he had even definitely
made up his mind to excommunicate Henry.
[Sidenote: Gelasius II. (1118–1119).]
The new Pope, John of Gaeta, a monk of Monte Casino, who took the name
of Gelasius II., was forced to flee from Rome as the Emperor was
entering it. Henry now took the decisive step of appointing a Pope of
his own. Burdinus, Archbishop of Braga, was in some fashion chosen by a
few cardinals, and took the name of Gregory VIII. [Sidenote: The
Antipope Burdinus.] Gelasius at once excommunicated both Antipope and
Emperor. He soon managed to get back to Rome, whence, however, he was
again expelled by the malignity of local faction rather than the
influence of the Emperor. He now betook himself to Marseilles by sea,
and, after a triumphant progress through Provence and Burgundy, held a
synod at Vienne. On his way thence to Cluny he was smitten with
pleurisy, reaching the monastery with difficulty, and dying there on
18th January 1119.
Guy, the high-born Archbishop of Vienne, was chosen somewhat irregularly
by the cardinals who had followed Gelasius to Cluny. He had long been
conspicuous as one of the ablest upholders of Hildebrandine ideas in the
dark days of Paschal II. [Sidenote: Calixtus II. (1119–1124).] The son
of William the Great, Count of imperial Burgundy (Franche-Comté), he was
the kinsman of half the sovereigns of Europe. He was, moreover, a
secular (the first Pope not a monk since Alexander II.), and accustomed
to diplomacy and statecraft. He resolved to make an effort to heal the
investiture strife, and with that object summoned a council to meet at
Reims. [Sidenote: Negotiations for a settlement.] Henry himself was
tired of the struggle. He practically dropped his Antipope, and gave a
patient hearing to the agents of the Pope, who came to meet him at
Strasburg. These were Hugh, Abbot of Cluny, and the famous theologian,
William of Champeaux, now Bishop of Châlons. The two divines pointed out
to Henry that the King of France, who did not employ investiture, had as
complete a hold over his bishops as the Emperor, and that his
father-in-law, Henry of England, who had yielded the point, was still
lord over his feudal vassals, whether clerks or laymen. For the first
time perhaps, the subject was discussed between the two parties in a
reasonable and conciliatory spirit. Before the king and the divines
parted, it was clear that a compromise on the lines of the English
settlement was quite practicable.
[Sidenote: Council of Reims, 1119.]
On 20th October 1119, Calixtus II. opened his council at Reims. Louis
VI. of France, who had married the Pope’s niece, was present, and the
gathering of prelates was much more representative than usual. Next day
the Pope went to Mouzon, a castle of the Archbishop of Reims, hoping to
meet the Emperor. But their agents haggled about details, and mutual
suspicion threatened to break off all chance of agreement. [Sidenote:
Breakdown of the negotiations.] Deeply mortified, and without having
seen the Emperor, Calixtus went back to the council, where the old
decrees against simoniacs and married clerks were renewed, and where a
canon forbidding laymen to invest a clerk with a bishopric or abbey was
passed. But this canon marked a limitation of the Pope’s claim. While
Hildebrand had absolutely forbidden all lay investiture, Calixtus was
content to limit the prohibition to the investiture with the spiritual
office. Yet, before the council separated, the excommunication of
Emperor and Antipope was solemnly renewed. An agreement seemed to be
further off than ever.
[Sidenote: Triumph of Calixtus in Italy, 1120.]
No Pope ever stood in a stronger position than Calixtus when in February
1120 he at last crossed the Alps. He was received with open arms by the
Romans, and with more than ordinary loyalty by the Normans of the south.
The Antipope fled before him, and was soon reduced to pitiful straits in
his last refuge at Sutri. At last he was captured, contemptuously
paraded through the Roman streets, and conveyed to prison, until, after
peace had been restored to the Church, he was released to end his life
obscurely in a monastery.
[Sidenote: Negotiations renewed, 1121.]
The Emperor saw that he had been too suspicious at Mouzon, and again
wished to retire with dignity from a conflict in which his prospects of
complete triumph had long utterly vanished. Things were now going better
in Germany. In 1121 a Diet was held at Würzburg, at which Henry made
peace with Adalbert of Mainz and the Saxon rebels. It was agreed to
refer the investiture question to a German council under the Pope’s
presidency, and direct negotiations with Rome were renewed. The Pope’s
words were now exceedingly conciliatory. ‘The Church,’ he said, ‘is not
covetous of royal splendour. Let her enjoy what belonged to Christ, and
let the Emperor enjoy what belonged to the Empire.’
[Sidenote: Concordat of Worms, 1122.]
On 8th September 1122 the council met at Worms. Calixtus, after some
hesitation, did not attend himself, but sent Lambert, Bishop of Ostia,
as his legate. Lambert was a citizen of Bologna, who had been archdeacon
of his native town, and had learnt from its rival schools of Canonists
and Civilians [see pp. 217–220] the principles involved in both sides of
the controversy. He soon turned his knowledge and skill to good account.
The council lasted little more than a week. The Emperor at first stood
out for his rights, but was soon persuaded to accept a compromise such
as had been suggested previously at Strasburg. On 23rd September the
final Concordat of Worms was ratified, which put an end to the
investiture strife. Two short documents, of three weighty sentences
each, embodied the simple conditions that it had cost fifty years of
contest to arrive at. ‘I, Henry,’ thus ran the imperial diploma, ‘for
the love of God, the holy Roman Church, and of the lord Pope Calixtus,
and for the salvation of my soul, abandon to God, the holy Apostles
Peter and Paul, and to the holy Catholic Church all investiture by the
ring and the staff, and I grant that in all the churches of my Empire
there be freedom of election and free consecration. I will restore all
the possessions and jurisdictions of St. Peter, which have been taken
away since the beginning of this quarrel. I will give true peace to the
lord Pope Calixtus and to the holy Roman Church, and I will faithfully
help the holy Roman Church, whenever she invokes my aid.’ The papal
diploma was even shorter. ‘I, Calixtus, the bishop,’ said the Pope,
‘grant to Henry, Emperor of the Romans, that the elections of bishops
and abbots in the kingdom of Germany shall take place in thy presence
without simony or violence, so that if any discord arise, thou mayst
grant thy approbation and support to the most worthy candidate, after
the counsel of the metropolitan and his suffragans. Let the
prelate-elect receive from thee by thy sceptre the property and the
immunities of his office, and let him fulfil the obligations to thee
arising from these. In other parts of the Empire let the prelate receive
his regalia six months after his consecration, and fulfil the duties
arising from them. I grant true peace to thee and all who have been of
thy party during the times of discord.’[8]
[Sidenote: Character of the compromise.]
Less clear in its conditions than the English settlement, the Concordat
of Worms led to substantially the same result. The Emperor gave up the
form of investiture, and public opinion approved of the temporal lord no
longer trenching on the domain of the spirituality by conferring symbols
of spiritual jurisdiction. But the Emperor might maintain that, if he
gave up the shadow, he retained the substance. The Henries had not
consciously striven for mere forms, but because they saw no other method
of retaining their hold over the prelates than through these forms. The
Pope’s concessions pointed out a way to attain this end in a way less
offensive to the current sentiment of the time. As bishops and abbots,
spiritual men could not be dependent on a secular ruler. As holder of
fiefs and immunities, the clerical lord had no more right to withdraw
himself from his lord’s authority than the lay baron. By distinguishing
between these two aspects of the prelate’s position, the Concordat
strove to give Cæsar what was Cæsar’s and God what was God’s. The
investiture question was never raised again. But in its broader aspect
the investiture question was only the pretext by reason of which Pope
and Emperor contended for the lordship of the world, and sought
respectively to trench upon the sphere of the other. The Concordat of
Worms afforded but a short breathing-space in that controversy between
the world-Church and the world-State—between the highest embodiments of
the spiritual and secular swords—that was still to endure for the rest
of the Middle Ages. Contemporary opinion, unapt to distinguish between
shadow and substance, ascribed to the Papacy a victory even more
complete than that which it really won. [Sidenote: Practical triumph of
the Church.] After all, it was the Emperor who had to yield in the
obvious question in dispute. The Pope’s concessions were less clear, and
less definite. The age looked upon the Concordat as a signal triumph for
the Roman Church. Henceforth the ideals of Hildebrand became part of the
commonplaces of European thought.
[Sidenote: Death of Calixtus II., 1124.]
Neither Henry nor Calixtus long survived the Concordat of Worms.
Calixtus died at Rome in December 1124, having previously held a council
in the Lateran, where the Concordat was confirmed, and a vast series of
canons drawn up to facilitate the establishment of the new order of
things. He strove also to restore peace and prosperity in Rome, which
had long lain desolate and ruinous as the result of constant tumults.
Short as was his reign, it could yet be said of him that in his days
there was such peace in Rome that neither citizen nor sojourner had need
to carry arms for his protection. He had not only made the Papacy
dominate the western world; it even ruled, if but for a time, the
turbulent city that so often rejected and maltreated the priest whom all
the rest of the world revered.
[Sidenote: Last failures and death of Henry V., 1125.]
Henry V.’s end was less happy. The war had taught him that the real
ruler of Germany was not himself but the feudal aristocracy. He planned,
in conjunction with his English father-in-law, an aggressive attack on
Louis VI. of France, but he utterly failed to persuade his barons to
abandon their domestic feuds for foreign warfare. He fought one
purposeless campaign as the ally of England. In May 1125 he died on his
way back, at Utrecht, saddened, disappointed, and worn out before his
time. He is one of the most unattractive of mediæval Emperors.
Cold-blooded, greedy, treacherous, violent, ambitious, and despotic, he
reaped no reward from his treasons, and failed in every great enterprise
he undertook. Yet despite his constant misfortunes, the strong, hard
character of the last Salian Emperor did something to keep up the waning
fortunes of the Empire, and the unity of the German kingdom.