or the spirit of the prohibition.

And as the obligations which wedded life involves were felt by the vicious to be irksome, it was far more common to keep the letter of the law and still violate its spirit, than to risk the dangers of a formal and legal marriage.

Cunibert, bishop of Turin, had, on the other hand, given permission to his clergy to marry, and even Hildebrand's party were constrained to admit that the diocese was greatly superior to others in the purity and intelligence of its spiritual guides. But the celibacy of the priesthood was an essential part of Hildebrand's scheme for strengthening and aggrandizing the order; for how could they be sufficiently wedded to each other, and their party interests pursued at the expense of society, if permitted to entangle themselves with society by matrimonial ties? The simple Leo thought celibacy virtuous-the subtle Hildebrand knew it to be expedient; and so, with one motive or another, the whole band of reformers, with the pope and the cardinal at their head, set themselves to denounce and prohibit both simony and marriage as crimes of an equal dye.

Engrossed with this project, hardly a month had passed away since his instalment in office, before the new pontiff commenced a vigorous onslaught upon the twin corruptions of the church. In April, 1049, Leo summoned a council at Rome, and plainly announced his intention of suspending all prelates guilty of simoniacal practices. He was shamelessly met

by the assertion, that this measure would be destructive of the whole church, as none could be found who were not culpable to a greater or less degree. And so true was the statement, that Leo found himself obliged to moderate his zeal, or, at least, to limit its exercise. Yet, during the three following years, the pope held councils in many different cities, both Italian and Transalpine, and in all of them simony and marriage were the special objects of his indignation, censure, and punishment.

But, in the year 1052, the labours of Leo were turned in another direction, and we behold the austere and ascetic priest transformed into the armed and aggressive warrior. It is the natural consequence, righteously retributive, of the Roman bishop's blending the two incongruous characters of a spiritual and a secular chief, that he is often compelled to be inconsistent with himself; and Leo, who, at the synod of Rheims, in 1049, had enacted that the clergy should never bear arms in war, is found four years later leading in person a hostile expedition against the Norman settlers in the south.

No spectacle is more pitiable than that of an apparently sincere man vainly struggling to arrive at truth. And this seems to have been the condition of Leo and a large portion of the reforming party in the church. They had closed the Scriptures, and trusted with blind confidence to the counsels of fathers and popes. And without the guidance of that word which

is a "lamp unto our feet, and a light unto our path," no wonder that at every step they plunged deeper in the mire. Their very efforts at reform were violations of the Divine commands, and naturally involved them in grosser corruption than ever.

CHAPTER II.

THE PSEUDO-REFORMATION DEVELOPED : HILDEBRAND'S

TACTICS.

A.D. 1052-1061.

THE mighty Charlemagne, it is said, shed tears on one occasion, as he beheld the ships of the Northmen sailing past the coast of France, and predicted that those bold mariners would some day quit their Scandinavian wilds to assail, and perhaps overturn the empire he had laboured so hard to establish. This prediction had been long since fulfilled in part, and the Normans had established a strong kingdom in France itself, when their adventurous spirit tempted them, in the eleventh century, to visit new scenes, and to acquire, if possible, new possessions in the Italian peninsula.

Tancred, whose chivalry is immortalized in Tasso's "Jerusalem Delivered," had sent forth twelve valiant sons to win laurels and rewards still more substantial on this classic, but ill-fated soil. Lower Italy was in a most unsettled state, and furnished the best field in the world for the prowess of soldiers of fortune. The

Lombard chiefs dwelt on their castled heights; the more ancient inhabitants governed themselves in petty civic republics; and the piratical Saracens had established more than one flourishing sea port, from which they could issue at pleasure to molest and despoil their neighbours. With such an accumulation of combustible elements, it is no wonder that Southern Italy was perpetually involved in the flames of civil war.

It was in one of these affrays, in the year 1016, that some Norman pilgrims from the Holy Land, tarrying for a time at Bari, so distinguished their valour in the aid they gave to the citizens, as to receive an earnest invitation to bring over from Normandy a strong company of their countrymen, to dwell in lasting alliance with the natives; and it was in response to this, or a similar invitation, that the sons of Tancred, amongst whom Robert Guiscard and William of the Iron Arm are especially eminent, took up their abode in Italy. They shortly became so prosperous as to establish an independent government, the metropolis of which was Melfi, and the first prince William of the Iron Arm.

It did not, however, belong to Norman genius to cultivate the arts of peace, and the warlike habits which at first made them welcome in Italy, soon proved them her most terrible scourge. Tidings at length reached the ear of the pope of the outrages they openly committed, and what no doubt chiefly

provoked him, of the injuries inflicted on the estates of the churches and abbeys by their marauding expeditions.

Resolved to rid Italy of so dangerous a guest, Leo hastened across the Alps to the emperor, and implored the assistance of German discipline and arms. But Henry was fully occupied in quelling the revolts of his own subjects, and was unwilling to undertake the settlement of so remote, and to him so uninteresting a quarrel. Nevertheless, at the earnest entreaty of the pontiff, he furnished him with a guard of seven hundred Germans. This insignificant army was increased, but not strengthened, by the adhesion of a multitude of Italians, who flocked to the standard of the pope in his progress from Mantua to Beneventum; and with such a promiscuous array Leo took the field in the spring of 1053.

The Normans were at first desirous of conciliating their spiritual chiefs, and offered to hold the lands they had acquired as humble vassals of the Roman see. But the pontiff, confiding in his large army, spurned all conditions of peace except the total and absolute relinquishment of all their estates. To this they gave an unhesitating refusal, and Leo, issuing from the gates of Civitella, gave instant signal for battle.

The conflict was soon over. The "rabble rout," which Leo had gathered around him, fled at the first assault, leaving the handful of German allies to cope alone with the enemy.