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She was asked if she had received letters from the Comte d'Armagnac, asking to know which of the three existing Popes he ought to obey; she answered that she had his letter, and had replied to it, saying among other things that when she was in Paris and at rest she would answer him; and added that she was on the point of mounting her horse when she gave that reply.

A remarkable career was that of Frederick II. of Germany, grandson of the great Barbarossa, crowned in 1215 under the immediate auspices of the papacy, yet during all the remainder of his life in constant and bitter conflict with the popes.

The popes who for two hundred years had preceded him were a scandal and a reproach to their exalted position. These heirs of Saint Peter wasted their patrimony in pleasures and pomps. At no period of the papal history was the papal chair filled with such bad or incompetent men. Of these popes two were murdered, five were driven into exile, and four were deposed.

I hoped that an apologist would arise forthwith, and, taking his stand upon the Scriptures, the Fathers, the canons, and the councils and constitutions of the Popes, would demonstrate that the church always has maintained the doctrine of equality, and would attribute to temporary necessity the contradictions of its discipline.

Theodorick, the hermit of Engaddi, had, in that character, been the correspondent of popes and councils; to whom his letters, full of eloquent fervour, had described the miseries imposed by the unbelievers upon the Latin Christians in the Holy Land, in colours scarce inferior to those employed at the Council of Clermont by the Hermit Peter, when he preached the first Crusade.

To lie like a dog in the manger over South America, and say snarling, 'None of you shall trade here, though I cannot! what Pope or body of Popes can sanction such a procedure? Had England had a Head, instead of Wigs, amid its diplomatists, England, as the chief party interested, would have long since intimated gently to such dog in the manger: 'Dog, will you be so obliging as rise!

His successors took up their residence in the town of Avignon, just outside the French frontier of those days. There they built a sumptuous palace in which successive popes lived in great splendor for sixty years. The prolonged exile of the popes from Rome, lasting from 1305 to 1377, is commonly called the Babylonian Captivity of the Church, on account of the woes attributed to it.

"It is a marriage our great Archbishop at Lambeth Palace will uphold against a hundred popes and kings," said the chaplain with importance. "You are no priest, but holy peddler!" cried Gabord roughly. "This is not mating as Christians, and fires of hell shall burn aho! I will see you all go down, and hand of mine shall not be lifted for you!"

It was some time, however, before these decrees could be enforced, and even the Popes found themselves compelled to deal leniently with offending clergy. Thus Pascal II allowed to Archbishop Anselm that a married priest not only might, but must, if applied to, minister to a dying person.

She admitted, however, that during the sixteenth century the Christian faith had much fallen into decay, and that Martin Luther was not to be blamed for his exhortations against the evil practices of popes and cardinals. Now that the Church had been reformed it was altogether different. She told us how she became converted.