the same year, made a great noise, and Clement V. successor to Boniface VIII. revoked and annulled the odious decision of the bull Unam Sanctam, which extends the power of the popes to the temporalities of kings, and condemns as heretics all who do not acknowledge this chimerical power. Boniface's pretension, indeed, ought to be condemned as heresy, according to this maxim of theologians-"Not only is it a sin against the rules of the faith, and a heresy, to deny what the faith teaches us, but also to set up as part of the faith that which is no part of it." (Joan. Maj. m. 3 sent. dist. 37. q. 26.) Other popes, before Boniface VIII. had arrogated to themselves the right of property over different kingdoms. The bull is well known, in which Gregory VII. says to the King of Spain-"I would have you to know, that the kingdom of Spain, by ancient ecclesiastical ordinances, was given in property to St. Pe "We learn that in this church, and under its power, are two swords, the spiritual and the temporal of these, one is to be used by the church and by the handter and the holy Roman church." of the pontiff; the other, by the church and by the hand of kings and warriors, in pursuance of the orders or with the permission of the pontiff. Now, one of these swords must be subject to the other, temporal to spiritual power; otherwise, they would not be ordinate, and the apostles says they must be so. (Rom. chap. xiii. v. 1.) According to the testimony of truth, spiritual power must institute and judge temporal power; and thus is verified with regard to the church, the prophesy of Jeremiah (chap. i. v. 10.) -"I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms." &c. Henry II. of England asked permission of Pope Adrian IV. to invade Ireland. The pontiff gave him leave, on condition that he imposed on every Irish family a tax of one carolus for the Holy See, and held that kingdom as a fief of the Roman church-" For," wrote Adrian, “it cannot be doubted that every island upon which Jesus Christ, the sun of justice, has arisen, and which has received the lessons of the Christian faith, belongs of right to St. Peter and to the holy and sacred Roman church." Bulls of the Crusade and of Composition. On the other hand, Philip the Fair as- If an African or an Asiatic of sense sembled the states-general; and the com- were told, that in that part of Europe mons, in the petition which they presented where some men have forbidden others to to that monarch, said, in so many words eat flesh on Saturdays, the pope gives "It is a great abomination for us to them leave to eat it, by a bull, for the sum hear that this Boniface stoutly interprets of two rials, and that another bull grants like a Boulgare (dropping the and the permission to keep stolen money,-what a) these words of spirituality (Matthew, would this African or Asiatic say? He chap. xvi. v. 19.)- Whatever thou shalt would, at least, agree with us, that every bind on earth, shall be bound in hea-country has its customs; and that in this ven;"-as if this signified that if a man world, by whatever names things may be be put into a temporal prison, God will called, or however they may be disguised, imprison him in heaven." all is done for money. Bull Unigenitus. There are two bulls under the name of La Cruzada-the Crusade; one of the time of Ferdinand and Isabella, the other The bull In cana Domini was an inof that of Philip V. The first of these dignity offered to all catholic sovereigns, sells permission to eat what is called the and they at length proscribed it in their grossura, viz., tripes, livers, kidneys, giz-states; but the bull Unigenitus was a trouble to France alone. The former attacked the rights of the princes and ma zards, sweetbreads, lights, plucks, cauls, heads, necks, and feet.. The second bull, granted by Pope Ur-gistrates of Europe, and they maintained bran VIII gives leave to eat meat throughout Lent, and absolves from every crime except heresy. those rights; the latter proscribed only some maxims of piety and morals, which gave no concern to any except the parties interested in the transient affair; but these interested parties soon filled all France It was at first a quarrel be Not only are these bulls sold, but people are ordered to buy them; and, as is but right, they cost more in Peru and Mexico than in Spain; they are there{tween the all-powerful Jesuits and the resold for a piastre. It is reasonable that the countries which produce gold and silver should pay more than others. mains of the crushed Port-Royal. Quesnel, a preacher of the Oratory, a refugee in Holland, had dedicated a commentary on the New Testament to Cardinal De Noailles, then Bishop of Chalons-sur-Marne. It met the bishop's approbation and was well received by all readers of that sort of books. The pretext for these bulls is, making war upon the Moors. There are persons, difficult of conviction, who cannot see what livers and kidneys have to do with a war against the Africans; and they add, that Jesus Christ never ordered war to be made on the Mahometans on pain of ex-to communication. One Le Tellier, a Jesuit, a confessor Louis XIV. and an enemy to Cardinal De Noailles, resolved to mortify him by having the book, which was dedicated to him, and of which he had a very high opinion, condemned at Rome. The bull giving permission to keep another's goods, is called the bull of Composition. It is farmed; and has long brought considerable sums throughout Spain, the Milanese, Naples, and Sicily. The highest bidders employ the most elo-fertility of expedient for which his fa quent of the monks to preach this bull. Sinners who have robbed the king, the state, or private individuals, go to these preachers, confess to them, and show them what a sad thing it would be to make restitution of the whole. They offer the monks five, six, and sometimes seven per cent., in order to keep the rest with a safe conscience; and, as soon as the composition is made, they receive absolution. This Jesuit, the son of an attorney at Vire in Lower Normandy, had all that The preaching brother who wrote the Travels through Spain and Italy (Voyage d'Espagne et d'Italie), published at Paris, avec privilège by Jean-Baptiste de l'Epine, speaking of this bull, thus expresses himself:-"Is it not very gracious to come off at so little cost, and be} at liberty to steal more, when one has occasion for a larger sum?" ther's profession is remarkable. Not content with embroiling Cardinal De Noailles with the pope, he determined to have him disgraced by the king his master. To ensure the success of this design, he had mandaments composed against him by his emissaries, and got them signed by four bishops; he also indited letters to the king, which he made {them sign. These manœuvres, which would have been punished in any of the tribunals, succeeded at court: the king was soured against the cardinal, and Madame de Maintenon abandoned him. Here was a series of intrigues, in which, from one end of the kingdom to the other, every one took a part. The more unfortunate France at that time be came in a disastrous war, the more the public mind was heated by a theological quarrel. During these movements, Le Tellier had the condemnation of Quesnel's book, of which the monarch had never read a page, demanded from Rome by Louis IV. himself. Le Tellier and two other Jesuits, named Doucin and Lallemant, extracted one hundred and three propositions, which Pope Clement XI. was to condemn. The court of Rome struck out two of them, that it might, at least, have the honour of appearing to judge for itself. Cardinal Fabroni, in whose hands the affair was placed, and who was devoted to the Jesuits, had the bull drawn up by a Cordelier named Father Palerno, Elio Capuchin, Terrovi a Barnabite, and Castelli a Servite, to whom was added a Jesuit named Alfaro. Clement XI. let them proceed in their own way. His only object was to please the King of France, who had long been displeased with him, on account of his recognising the Archduke Charles, afterwards emperor, as King of Spain. To make his peace with the king, it cost him aly a piece of parchment sealed with ad, concerning a question which he lunself despised. Clement XI. did not wait to be solicited; he sent the bull, and was quite astonished to learn that it was received troughout France with hisses and groans. "What !" said he to Cardinal Carpegno, "a bull is earnestly asked of me; I give freely, and every one makes a jest of Every one was indeed surprised to see 2 pope, in the name of Jesus Christ, ndemning as heretical, tainted with wresy, and offensive to pious ears, this position" It is good to read books prety on Sundays, especially the Holy aptures;" and this "The fear of an ⚫st excommunication should not pretes from doing our duty." The partisans of the Jesuits were themMives alarmed at these censures, but they dared not speak. The wise and disinterested exclaimed against the scandal, and the rest of the nation against the absurdity. Nevertheless, Le Tellier triumphed, until the death of Louis XIV.: he was held in abhorrence, but he governed. This wretch tried every means to procure the suspension of Cardinal de Noailles ; but after the death of his penitent, the incendiary was banished. The Duke of Orleans, during his regency, extinguished these quarrels by making a jest of them. They have since thrown out a few sparks; but they are at last forgotten, probably for ever. Their duration, for more than half a century, was quite long enough. Yet, happy indeed would mankind be, if they were divided only by foolish questions unproductive of bloodshed! CÆSAR. Ir is not as the husband of so many women and the wife of so many men,— as the conqueror of Pompey and the Scipios,-as the satirist who turned Cato into ridicule,-as the robber of the public treasury, who employed the money of the Romans to reduce the Romans to subjection,-as he who, clement in his triumphs, pardoned the vanquished,—as the man of learning, who reformed the calendar,-as the tyrant and the father of his country, assassinated by his friends and his bastard son, that I shall here speak of Cæsar. I shall consider this extraordinary man only in my quality of descendant from the poor barbarians whom he subjugated. You will not pass through a town in France, in Spain, on the banks of the Rhine, or on the English coast opposite to Calais, in which you will not find good people who boast of having had Cæsar there. Some of the townspeople of Dover are persuaded that Cæsar built their castle; and there are citizens of Paris who believe that the great châtelet is one of his fine works. Many a country squire in France shows you an old turret which serves him for a dove-cote, and tells you that Cæsar provided a lodging for his pigeons. Each province disputes with its neighbour the honour of having been the first to which Cæsar applied the lash it was not by that road but by this, that he came to cut our throats, embrace our wives and daughters, impose laws upon us by interpreters, and take from us what little money we had. : The Indians are wiser. We have already seen that they have a confused knowledge that a great robber, named Alexander, came among them with other robbers; but they scarcely ever speak of him. An Italian antiquary, passing a few years ago through Vannes in Brittany, was quite astonished to hear the learned men of Vannes boast of Cæsar's stay in their town. "No doubt," said he, "you have monuments of that great man?" Yes," answered the most notable among them, "we will show you the place where that hero had the whole senate of our province hanged, to the number of six hundred!" "Some ignorant fellows, who had found a hundred beams under ground, advanced in the journals, in 1755, that they were the remains of a bridge built by Cæsar; but I proved to them, in my dissertation of 1756, that they were the gallows on which that hero had our parliament tied up. What other town in Gaul can say as much? We have the testimony of the great Cæsar himself. He says, in his Commentaries, that we are fickle, and prefer liberty to slavery.' He charges us with having been so insolent as to take hostages of the Romans, to whom we had given hostages, and to be unwilling to return them unless our own were given up. He taught us good behaviour." had a conference in Alsace with a German king named Ariovistus, and Ariovistus said to him-'I come to plunder Gaul, and I will not suffer any one to plunder it but myself;'-after which these good Germans, who were come to lay waste the country, put into the hands of their witches two Roman knights, ambassadors from Cæsar; and these witches were on the point of burning them and offering them to their gods, when Cæsar came and delivered them by a victory. We must confess that the right on both sides was equal, and that Tacitus had good reason for bestowing so many praises on the manners of the ancient Germaus." This conversation gave rise to a very warm dispute between the learned men of Vannes and the antiquary. Several of the Bretons could not conceive what was the virtue of the Romans, in deceiving one after another all the nations of Gaul, in making them by turns the instruments of their own ruin, in butchering onefourth of the people, and reducing the other three-fourths to slavery. "Oh! nothing can be finer," returned the antiquary. "I have in my pocket a medal representing Caesar's triumph at the Capitol; it is in the best preservation." He showed the medal. A Breton, a little rude, took it and threw it into the river, exclaiming-"Oh! that I could so serve all who use their power and their skill to oppress their fellowmen! Rome deceived us, disunited us, butchered us, chained us; and at this day, Rome still disposes of many of our benefices;-and is it possible that we have so long and so many ways been a country of slaves?" To the conversation between the Italian { antiquary and the Breton, I shall only "He did well," replied the virtuoso, add, that Perrot d'Ablancourt, the trans"his right was incontestable. It was,lator of Cæsar's Commentaries, in his dehowever, disputed; for you know that dication to the great Condé, makes use when he vanquished the emigrant Swiss, of these words" Does it not seem t to the number of three hundred and sixty- you, sir, as if you were reading the lif eight thousand, and there were not more of some Christian philosopher?' Casa than a hundred and ten thousand left, he a Christian philosopher! I wonder h has not been made a saint. Writers of dedications are remarkable for saying fine things, and much to the purpose. CALENDS. way of consecration. This bishop officiated pontifically, and gave his blessing to the people, before whom he appeared bearing the mitre, the crosier, and even the archiepiscopal cross. In those churches which held immediately from the Holy See, a pope of the Fools was elected, who officiated in all the decora THE Feast of the Circumcision, which the church celebrates on the first of Janmary, has taken the place of another called the Feast of the Calends, of Asses, oftions of papacy. All the clergy assisted Fools, or of Innocents, according to the different places where, and the different days on which, it was held. It was most commonly at Christmas, the Circumcision, or the Epiphany. in the mass, some dressed in women's apparel, others as buffoons, or masked in a grotesque and ridiculous manner. Not content with singing licentious songs in the choir, they sat and played at dice on the altar, at the side of the officiator. When the mass was over, they ran, tering obscene words, singing immodest songs, and putting themselves in a thousand indecent postures, sometimes exposing themselves almost naked. They then had themselves drawn about the streets, in tumbrels full of filth, that they might throw it at the mob which gathered round them. The looser part of the seculars would mix among the clergy, that they might play some fool's part in the ecclesiastical habit. In the cathedral of Rouen there was, on Christmas-day, a procession, in which ecclesiastics, chosen for the purpose, re-leaped, and danced about the church, utpresented the prophets of the Old Testament who foretold the birth of the Messiah, and (which may have given the feast its name) Balaam appeared, mounted on a she-ass; but as Lactantius's poem, and the Book of Promises, under the name of St. Prosper, say that Jesus in the manger was recognised by the ox and the ass, according to the passage of Isaiah "The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib" (a circumstance, however, which neither the gospel nor the ancient fathers have remarked) it is more likely that, from this opinion, the Feast of the Ass took its name." Indeed, the Jesuit Theophilus Raynaud testifies that, on St. Stephen's day, there was sung a hymn of the Ass, which was also called the Prose of Fools; and that on St. John's day another was sung, called the Prose of the Ox. In the library of the chapter of Sens, there is preserved a manuscript of vellum, with miniature figures representing the ceremonies of the Feast of Fools. The text contains a description of it, including this Prose of the Ass; it was sung by two choirs, who imitated at intervals, and as the burden of the song, the braying of that animal. There was elected in the cathedral churches a bishop or archbishop of the Fools, which election was confirmed by all sorts of buffooneries, played off by This feast was held in the same manner in the convents of monks and nuns, as Naudé testifies in his complaint to Gassendi, in 1645, in which he relates that, at Antibes, in the Franciscan monastery, neither the officiating monks nor the guardian went to the choir on the day of the Innocents. The lay-brethren occupied their places on that day, and, clothed in sacerdotal decorations, torn and turned inside out, made a sort of office. They held books turned upside down, which they seemed to be reading through spectacles, the glasses of which were made of orange-peel; and muttered confused words, or uttered strange cries, accompanied by extravagant coutortions. The second register of the church o Autun, by the secretary Rotarii, which ends with 1416, says, without specifying the day, that at the Feast of Fools, an ass was led along with a clergyman's |