Transcriber's notes:
1. Page scan source: http://www.archive.org/details/barbarossaanhis00bolagoog
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by
EUGENE CUMMISKEY,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for
the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
The pleasant historical novel which is now offered to theAmerican public, refers to a period of history very much misrepresented, thoughvery frequently written about, or at least referred to by popular writers. Inthe contest between Pope Alexander III. and the Emperor Frederic Barbarossa, wesee a very important phase of the long struggle between the spiritual and civilpower; a struggle, in which was fought the battle of real liberty, and realChristian civilization, against brute force and Pagan tyranny. Perhaps nothinghas been so badly understood as the real casus belli in this struggle ofcenturies. Most non-Catholics firmly believe that the conflict arose from aneffort of the Church to obtain universal dominion; to make princes and peoplebow to her behests on all matters; to reduce the civil ruler to the condition ofa mere lieutenant of the Pontiff, to be removed at will by that spiritualautocrat, and, of course, to improve the condition of her own officials;securing for them the choicest and fairest portions of all the good things ofthe earth. The Emperors and Kings who were hostile to the Church are painted, onthe other hand, as the assertors of civil liberty, the William Tells thatrefused to salute the tyrant's cap, even though it were called a tiara; theheroes, that in a superstitious age braved the terrors of excommunication,rather than sink into a degraded servitude, to the heartless ambition ofchurchmen.
Nothing can be farther from the truth than this view of thesubject. In reality, what the Church fought for during this long strugglewas--not power, but--liberty. She refused to admit that she was a corporationexisting by the permission, or the creation of the State. She claimed to be aspiritual society, existing by the fiat of the will of God, entirely independentin her own sphere, having a government of her own; executive, legislative, andjudicial rights and duties of her own; an end of her own, far above and beyondthe affairs of this world. It was for this liberty and independence that hermartyrs had died, her confessors languished in prison, her saints prayed andsuffered. When the rulers of the world became Christian, the difficulties in theway of her liberty did not cease; they only assumed a new form. Open oppositionbecame oppression, under the specious name of protection; and the State madeevery effort to restrain and shackle a power, the indomitable energy anddauntless courage of which it imagined it had reason to fear.
This was, indeed, one of the "empty" things which the sons ofmen, crafty in their own generation, allow the