flaves*. Againft all who have offended them, or dared to refift their will, they have armed themselves with thunders, denouncing 1 fruit of it. Spondan. Epif. tome 3. Hift. du Droit, etc. p. 103, etc. Baron, ann. 1096, &c. Moreri le Grand Dia. Hift. tome i. p. 35. Innet's O, igines Anglicana, vol. ii. * Gregory conferred the royal dignity on Demetrius duke of Croatia and Dalmatia, upon condition of his paying a yearly tribute of 200 pieces of gold. In the year 1179 Alexander bestowed the royal title and badges upon Alphonfo duke of Portugal, who just before had rendered his property a fief of the Roman See. Innocent III. in the year 1204 conferred the fame dignity upon Primiflaus duke of Bohemia; as he did alfo by his legate upon Johannicius duke of Bulgaria and Wallachia. In 1220 Stephen, great Jucan of Servia, was crowned king of Servia by the authority of Honorius III. Cafimir fon of Miciflaus, having been chofen king of Poland, after he had entered into a monaftery, would not take the title of king, or engage in the exercise of the government, without a warrant and difpenfation from the Pope, which was granted upon condition that the Polanders fhould pay every year a penny a head, the nobility and clergy excepted, for maintaining a lamp in the church of St. Peter at Rome; and farther, that they should cut their hair above their ears, in the manner of the monks. Boliflaus, the fon and fucceffor of Cafimir, having been excommunicated firft by the bishop of Cracow, and afterwards by the Pope, was not only deprived of his authority, but the Pope discharged the people from chufing a fucceffor without his confeat, and prohibited any after him from taking the title of king: which last mandate, out of reverence or dread of the Roman mitre, was for some time complied with. Roger count of Sicily was declared, by the fame authority, the first king of Sicily; and it likewife proclaimed him duke of Apulia and Calabria, and prince of Capua, confirming him in all thefe titles as the feudatory of the church. The emperor foon after having feized Apulia, and given the government of it to Reginald in the quality of duke, a warm contest enfued betwixt the Pope and emperor about the ceremony of the creation of the duke, which could no otherwise be terminated but by their agreeing, both of them to lay their hand at the fame time upon the staff or enfign which was prefented to the new Duke; according to the manner then used when a lord gave inveftiture to his vaffal. Alexander IV. intending to difpoffefs Manfred, who had made himself sovereign of Sicily, offered that kingdom to Edward fon to the King of England: the offer was accepted but without effect, on account of the difcontents arifing in England occafioned by the im pofts laid on the people for afferting his frivolous title. This failing, Urban the fucceffor of Alexander ordered a croifade to be preached against Manfred with the ufual encouragements. This having little better fuccefs, he revoked the gift of that kingdom made to Edmund, and bestowed it upon Charles of Anjou, brother to Lewis the Saint. He accepted the donation, though they had rejected with fcorn an offer of the empire made by the fame authority some time before. denouncing anathemas upon anathemas; facrilegioufly profaning facred inftitutions, to which they have added others of their own invention, to gratify their luft of dominion, their, before, Clement IV. fucceeding, ratified all that his predeceffor had done, and allowed Charles to take a tithe of the clergy in France: that prince, coming to Rome with an army, was there declared fenator, or governor and fovereign judge, under the Pope; and in the year 1266 was crowned, king of Sicily, on condition" that he should pay every year, to Clement and his fucceffors, 8000 66 ounces of gold, and fend him yearly a white jennet, etc. Charles, having defeated and slain his rival, took poffeffion of his new dominions, and was declared by the Pope lieutenant-general of the empire-in I aly. Yet foon after, Nicolas III. joined with the king of Arragon, whose grandfather Peter II, had been crowned king by Innocent III, upon surrendering his territories tost he church, in order to difpoffels Charles, which produced the cruel maffacre of the French on Eafter-eye, known by the name of the Sicilian Vefpes. However, the fucceeding Pope, not long after, took part against the king of Arragon, forbade him to bear the title of king, deprived him of all his dominions, and put them under an interdict: " To the intent," faid he in the cull," that 66 our threatenings be not contemned, by this fentence paffed with the advice "of our brethren the cardinals, we deprive Peter III. of the kingdom of Ar66 ragon, of all his other territories, and of the royal dignity, and we expof his "eftates to be poffeffed by the Catholic princes, according as the Holy See shall "difpofe of them, declaring his fubjects abfolved from their oath of fidelity, "forbidding him to interfere in any manner in the government of the faid "kingdom, and all perfons of every condition, fecular or ecclefiaftic, to favour "him in this defign, or to acknowledge him as king, or render him any obe"dience or duty whatever." Nor was this Pope (Martin IV.) long in difpo fing of the kingdom which he had confifcated; for, by his legate, he entered into a treaty with the French king, wherein it was agreed, "That the legate, in name of the Pope, should confer on one of the young princes the kingdom of Arragon to be held and possessed by him and his heirs for ever; that no treaty "should be made for the reftitution of Arragon without the confent of the "Pope, and that the new king and his fucceffors fhould acknowledge them"felves the Pope's vassals, take an oath of fidelity to him, and pay yearly to St. Peter 500 livres of quit-rent." Thus princes, by accepting fuch gifts from the hand of the Pope, recognized his authority to depose themselves nd difpofe of their kingdoms. Sicily and Naples have all along been claimed as fiefs depending upon the Tiara; and the former fhameful homage, rendered to the Pope for them, has continued to the prefent age, being paid with very pompous formality, on the feast of St. Peter; by him who bears the title of King of the tavo Sicilies, as formerly by the emperor, and ftill, I fuppofe, by the princes of the house of Spain, who were put in poffeffion of them in the year 1735After a grand proceffion, in which appears the white horse richly caparisoned, bearing G their diabolical pride, refentment, and revenge: times without number have they excommunicated princes.", depofing bearing at his neck, in a red velvet purfe, the bill for 7000 ducats, these are offered, by the ambassador on his knees, in his majesty's name, as the tribute due to the Holy See for the kingdom of Naples. The Pope, having received this compliment in the Spanish language, in return expreffes, in Latin, his acceptance of the tribute, and beftows upon his tributary king, and all belonging to him, his apostolic benediction in the name of the Father, &c. The apoftolic notary being prefent, enters upon the foot the tranfiction in the apoftolic regiNers, &c. Spanbei. Moreri. Puffend. Introd. to the Hift. of Eur. cb. 10. Oite Trifingb. Chron. b. vii. ch. 20. Rotoles Abregé de l'Hift. de l'Emp. p. 121, 122. Hifi. du Dr. pub. Ecclef. Fr. some i. p. 356, et fuiv. Amelot de la Houssaye, Memoir, biflor, tame ì. p. 271, Memoir. de Baron Polnitz, tome ii. p. 298, etc. • So many inftances occur in hiftory of the excommunication and pretended depofition of princes, that we fall only give the following lift of the soft noted, which every one will acknowledge to be fufficiently large, though it may not be complete. The first column contains the Popes, the fecond the princes excómmunicated, etc, by them. PRINCES excommunicated, etc. 21 Calixtus II. Gelafius II. - Adrian IV. Alexander II. Celestine III. Innocent III. Henry V Henry V. Semperors 31 Henry V, William king of Sicily; Philip, emperors 'John king of England; Ladiflaus king of Poland; Lewis VIII.kings of France; POPES. them from their government, interdicting their dominions, or transferring them to others: abfolving fubjects from al Pius V. Sixtus V. Gregory XIV. Innocent XI. Lewis of Anjou; Edward, Wenceslaus emperor; Ladislaus, Ladislaus, king of Naples, Ladislaus king of Bohemia; Stenon king of Sweden; Henry VIII, king of England; D Elizabeth queen of England; Henry III. king of France; Henry king of Navarre; Henry IV. king of France and Navarre; Ambassador of Lewis XIV. king of France. * Of all the numerous cenfures and penalties which have been inflicted by the church of Rome, and with which her canon law is burdened, the interdict is perhaps the moft extraordinary and unjuft. By this whole parishes, cities, provinces or kingdoms, were deprived at once of the use and benefit of holy legiance, exciting them to revolt, and authorizing them to depofe or murder their excommunicated fovereigns; and their things; the clergy were prohibited from exercifing their functions, and every office of religion was made to ceafe, except fo far as the spiritual tyrants faw meet in their fentences to permit. Hereby the innocent were involved with the guilty; fubjects punished for the real or supposed faults of their rulers, and communities made fufferers for the offences of a few. Interdicts fometimes went before, fometimes accompanied,, and fometimes followed after the perfo nal excommunication of princes by name. For excommunication a divine warrant could ftill be pretended: for however much it was proftituted and abused in the Romish church, being inflicted in the most irregular and unchriftian manner, and ufually for caufes frivolous, foreign, doubtful, or unjust, yet the cenfure is in itself lawful, neceffary, tremendous, and at the fame time falutary not a damning fentence, nor a cenfure affecting men's natural or civil privileges, or diffolving the bonds of human fociety, as the church of Rome hath made it, and as fome Proteftants would fill reprefent it to be. It is a power inherent in the conftitution of the church, abfolutely neceffary for her prefervation, and accordingly has been in use in the first and pureft ages; but for an interdict there is not the fmallest warrant in the Scriptures, nor a precedent in all antiquity. It appears to have been introduced in the ninth century, in order to render the ecclefiaftic cenfures, which otherwife were in danger of being contemned by the great, more formidable; and evidently with a view to fupport the furpations of Popes and bishops, and to enable them to manage the conteft with temporal lords and fovereigns more fuccefsfully. And for this purpofe it was an engine admirably fitted: murmurings, tumults, infurrections and revolts, could not fail foon to arife among a people fubjected to fuch a eenfure. To have all public prayers, preaching, maffes, marriages, feftivals, confeffion and abfolution, except in the cafe of the dying, ceafing;-to have every church and church-yard fhut up, the altars ftript of their ornaments, and the very bells, which were then holy things, rendered filent; to have the dead buried with the burial of an ass, cast out into the fields or ditches ;-it is inconceivable what effects fuch things must have produced in times of ignorance and fuperftition. It has required all the precaution and art of rulers, feconded by the highest exertions of their authority, to preferve the public peace, and themselves from ruin, in fuch dangerous circumstances: and when the clergy and thofe in orders have been difpofed to obferve fuch interdicts, as they have ever fhewed themselves too ready to do; often in contempt of the most peremptory injunctions and threatenings to the contrary, they have found it impoffible for them to fland their ground. Thefe fentences were at firft confined to narrower limits; but, as Papal tyranny increased, were afterwards extended to the largest societies, and became the fcourge of nations, and the terror of kings. Hinemar, abp. of Rheims, inter ́dicted a parish in 870. In 964 the churches and monafteries of the diocese of Limoges were interdicted by Adrian the bishop. In the council of Limoges in |