READING HALLTHE DOORS OF WISDOM |
BOOK IV.
FROM THE
ELECTION OF GREGORY THE GREAT TO THE DEATH OF CHARLEMAGNE,
A.D. 590-814
CHAPTER V.
SAINT BONIFACE A.D. 715-755.
Among the missionary enterprises of the Anglo-Saxons
had been some attempts to convert the nations of Northern Germany. Suidbert, one of the original companions of Willibrord, was
consecrated in England during his master’s first visit to Rome, and went forth
to preach to the Boructuarians, who occupied a
territory between the Ems and the Yssel; but the
disorders of the country obliged him to withdraw from it, and he afterwards
laboured on the lower Rhine. Two brothers named Hewald,
and distinguished from each other by the epithets White and Black, are also
celebrated as having penetrated into the country of the Old Saxons, and having
there ended their lives by martyrdom. But no great or lasting missionary
success had been achieved to the east of the Rhine in the lower part of its
course until the time of Boniface.
This missionary, whose original name was Winfrid, was
born at Crediton, in Devonshire, of a noble and wealthy family, about the year
680. It was intended that he should follow a secular career; but the boy was
early influenced by the discourse of some monks who visited his father's house,
and at the age of seven he entered a monastery at Exeter, from which he
afterwards removed to that of Nutscelle (Nutshalling or Nursling) in Hampshire. Here he became
famous for his ability as a preacher and as an expositor of Scripture. He was
employed in important ecclesiastical business, and had the prospect of rising
to eminence in the church of his own country; but he was seized with an earnest
desire to labour for the extension of the gospel, and, with two companions, he
crossed the sea to Frisia, in the year 716. The state of things in that country
was unfavourable for his design. Charles, who in later ages was called Martel,
the son of Pipin of Heristal by a concubine, had possessed himself of the
mayoralty of the palace in Austrasia, and was now engaged in war with Radbod of
Frisia, who had made an alliance with Ragenfrid, the
mayor of the Neustrian palace. The pagan prince had destroyed many churches and
monasteries, and, although he admitted Boniface to an interview, he refused him
permission to preach in his dominions. Boniface therefore returned to Nutscelle, where the monks, on the occurrence of a vacancy
in the headship of their house, were desirous to elect him abbot. But his
missionary zeal induced him to withstand their importunities; and, having
secured the appointment of another abbot, through the assistance of his bishop,
Daniel of Winchester, he set out for Rome in the spring of 717. A letter from
Daniel procured him a kind reception from Gregory II, who held many conferences
with him during the following winter; and in 718 Boniface left Rome, carrying
with him a large supply of relics, with a commission by which the pope
authorized him to preach to the heathens of Germany wherever he might find an
opportunity. After having surveyed Bavaria and Thuringia, he was induced by
tidings of Radbod's death to go again into Frisia, where for three years
he laboured under Willibrord. The aged bishop wished to appoint him his
successor; but Boniface declined the honour, on the ground that, as he was not
yet fifty years old, he was unfit for so high an office, and that he must
betake himself to the sphere for which the pope had especially appointed him.
He therefore took leave of Willibrord, and passed into Hessia.
Two local chiefs, Detdic and Dierolf, who, although
professing Christianity, were worshippers of idols, granted him leave to
establish himself at Amanaburg, on the Ohm (Amana),
where in a short time he reclaimed them from their heathenish practices, and
baptized many thousands of Hessians. On receiving a report of this success,
Gregory summoned Boniface to Rome, and, after having exacted a formal
profession of faith, ordained him as a regionary bishop, at the same time
binding him to the papal see by an oath, which was a novelty as imposed on a
missionary, although, with some necessary changes, it was the same which had
long been required of bishops within the proper patriarchate of Rome. Standing
at the tomb of St. Peter, to whom the oath was addressed, Boniface solemnly
pledged himself to obey the apostle, and the pope as his vicar; in no wise to
consent to anything against the unity of the catholic church; in all things to keep
his faith to the apostle, and to the interests of the Roman see; to have no
communion or fellowship with bishops who might act contrary to the institutions
of the holy fathers; but to check such persons, if possible, or otherwise to
report them faithfully to his lord the pope.
The bishop received from the pope a code of
regulations for the government of his church (probably the collection of
Dionysius Exiguus); and, having learnt by experience the importance of securing
the countenance of princes for missionary undertakings, he carried with him a
recommendation from Gregory to Charles Martel, who, under the name of the
effete descendants of Clovis, was the virtual sovereign of their kingdom. He
was also furnished by the pope with letters to the nations among which his
labours were to be employed. Charles Martel received the missionary coldly;
such enterprises as that of Boniface had no interest for the rude warrior, nor
were the clergy of his court likely to bespeak his favour for one whose life
and thoughts differed widely from their own. Boniface, however, obtained from
Charles the permission which he desired, to preach beyond the Rhine, with a
letter of protection which proved to be very valuable
In Hessia and Thuringia, the
countries to which he now repaired, Christianity had already been long
preached, but by isolated teachers, and without any regular system. The belief
and the practice of the converts were still largely mixed with paganism;
Boniface even speaks of presbyters who offered sacrifices to the heathen gods.
The preachers had for the most part proceeded from the Irish church, in which
diocesan episcopacy was as yet unknown, and the jurisdiction was separate from
the order of a bishop; they had brought with them its peculiar ideas as to the
limitation of the episcopal rights; they were unrestrained by any discipline or
by any regard for unity; they owned no subjection to Rome, and were under no
episcopal authority. Boniface often complains of these preachers as fornicators
and adulterers—words which may in some cases imply a charge of real immorality,
but which in general mean nothing more than that the Irish missionaries held
the doctrine of their native church as to the lawfulness of marriage for the
clergy. He speaks, too, of some who imposed on the people by pretensions to
extraordinary asceticism—feeding on milk and honey only, and rejecting even
bread. With these rival teachers he was involved in serious and lasting
contentions.
Among the collection of Boniface’s correspondence is a
letter from his old patron, Daniel of Winchester, containing advice for the
conduct of his missionary work. The bishop tells him that, in discussions with
the heathen, he ought not to question the genealogies of their gods, but to
argue from them that beings propagated after the fashion of mankind must not be
gods but men. The argument is to be urged by tracing back the genealogies to
the beginning; by asking such questions as— “When was the first god generated?
To which sex did this god belong? Has the generation of gods come to an end? If
it has ceased, why? Is the world older than the gods? If so, who governed it
before they existed?”. The missionary must argue mildly, and must avoid all
appearance of insult or offence. He must contrast the truth of Christianity
with the absurdities of the pagan mythology. He must ask how it is that the
gods allow Christians to possess the fairest places of the earth, while their
own votaries are confined to cold and barren tracts; he is to dwell on the
growth of the Christian church from nothing to the predominance which it has
already attained.
It would seem, however, that Boniface rarely had
occasion to enter into arguments of this sort, but was obliged to rely on
others of a more palpable kind. He found that an oak near Geismar, sacred to
the thunder-god Donar, was held in great reverence by the Hessians, and that
the impression which his words made on the people was checked by their
attachment to this object of ancestral veneration. He therefore, at the
suggestion of some converts, resolved to cut down the tree. A multitude of
pagans assembled and stood around, uttering fierce curses, and expecting the
vengeance of the gods to show itself on the missionary and his companions. But
when Boniface had hardly begun his operations, a violent gust of wind shook the
branches, and the oak fell to the ground, broken into four equal pieces. The
pagans at once renounced their gods, and with the wood of the tree Boniface
built a chapel in honour of St. Peter.
After this triumph the success of his preaching was
rapid. He founded churches and monasteries, and was reinforced by many monks
and nuns from his own country, who assisted him in the labours of conversion
and Christian education. Gregory III, soon after being raised to the popedom,
in 732, conferred on him the pall of an archbishop; and when in 738 Boniface
paid a third visit to Rome, he was received with the honour due to a missionary
who had by that time baptized a hundred thousand converts. On his return
northwards, he was induced by Odilo, duke of Bavaria, to remain for a time in
that country, where he had already laboured about three years before. He found
there a general profession of Christianity; but there was only one bishop, Vivilus by name; there was no system of ecclesiastical
government; and, as in other parts of Germany, he had to contend with the
rivalry of the irregular missionaries from Ireland. Boniface divided the
country into four dioceses—Salzburg, Passau (which was assigned to Vivilus), Ratisbon, and Freising; and, having thus
organized the Bavarian church, he returned to the more especial scene of his
labours.
The name of Charles Martel is memorable in the history
of the church and of the world for having turned back the course of Mahometan
conquest. The Saracens of Spain had overrun the south of France, had made their
way as far as the Loire, and were marching against Tours, with the intention of
plundering the treasures which the devotion of centuries had accumulated around
the shrine of St. Martin, when they were met by Charles, at the head of
an army collected from many races—Franks, Germans, Gauls,
men of the north, and others. His victory near Poitiers (although the slaughter
has been greatly exaggerated by legendary writers) put a stop for ever to the
progress of their arms towards the north; and while they were further weakened
by internal dissensions, Charles, following up his advantage, succeeded in
driving them back beyond the Pyrenees. But the vast benefit which he thus
conferred on Christendom was purchased at a cost which for the time pressed
heavily on the church of France. In order to meet the exigencies of the war, he
seized the treasures of churches, and rewarded the chiefs who followed him with
the temporalities of bishoprics and abbeys; so that, notwithstanding his great
services to the Christian cause, his memory is branded by the French ecclesiastical
writers as that of a profane and sacrilegious prince, and a synod held at Quiercy, in the year 858, assured one of his descendants
that for this sin Eucherius, bishop of Orleans, had seen him tormented “in the
lower hell”.
Boniface, although he found the name of the Frankish
mayor a powerful assistance in his labours beyond the Rhine, was thwarted at
the Frankish court by the nobles who had got possession of ecclesiastical
revenues, and by the rude, secular, fighting and hunting bishops, who were most
congenial to the character of Charles. In a letter to Daniel of Winchester, he
complains of being obliged to have intercourse with such persons. The bishop in
reply wisely advises him, on scriptural authority, to keep himself pure, and to
bear with such faults in others as it may not be in his power to amend.
Both Gregory III and Charles Martel died in 741. The
new pope, Zacharias, extended Boniface’s power by authorizing him to reform the
whole Frankish church. The sons of Charles were glad to avail themselves of the
assistance of Rome in a work of which they felt the necessity; and from
Carloman, who had succeeded to the mayoralty of Austrasia, while Pipin held
that of Neustria, Boniface received an amount of support which he had hitherto
in vain endeavoured to obtain. He now erected four bishoprics for Hesse and
Thuringia; and in 742, at the request of Carloman (as he says), was held a
council for the reformation of the church—the first Austrasian council which
had met for eighty years. This council was for some years followed by others,
collected from one or from both divisions of the Frankish territory. They were
not, however, composed of ecclesiastics only, but were mixed assemblies of the
national estates; and, while Boniface was acknowledged in his high office as
the pope's commissioner, the decrees were set forth by the Frankish princes in
their own name, and appointments which had been already made by the papal
authority were again made, afresh and independently, by the secular power. Even
the jurisdiction of Boniface over other bishops was thus granted anew to him.
The canons of these assemblies were directed towards the establishment of order
in the church, by providing for annual synods, by forbidding ecclesiastics to
hunt, to hawk, to serve in war; by the enforcement of celibacy on the clergy;
by subjecting the clergy to the bishops and discountenancing such as were under
no regular discipline. An attempt was made to recover to their proper uses the
ecclesiastical revenues which had been alienated by Charles Martel. The first
council ordered their restoration, but this was not to be so easily effected.
The council of the following year was reduced to attempt a compromise, by
allowing that, in consideration of the wars and of other circumstances, the
property should for a time be retained by the lay holders, but that for each casata a solidus should be paid
to the ecclesiastical owners. But in the later councils the subject does not
appear, and it would seem that the attempt was given up as hopeless. The
councils also made enactments for the suppression of heathen practices, such as
divination, the use of amulets, need-fire (i.e. the production of
fire by the friction of wood and tow), and the offering of sacrifices, whether
to the old pagan deities, or to the saints who with some converts had taken
their place—practices of which some, with a remarkable tenacity, have kept their
hold on the northern nations even to our own day.
In 742 Boniface laid the foundation of the great abbey
of Fulda, through the agency of Sturmi, a noble
Bavarian, whom he had trained up in his seminary at Fritzlar.
The original intention was unconnected with educational or missionary plans—to
provide a place for ascetic retirement. Sturmi and
his companions were charged to seek out a remote and lonely position in the Buchonian forest, between the four nations to which their
master had preached; and when they had chosen a suitable spot, on the banks of
the river Fulda, they had to clear it by cutting down trees, which furnished
them with materials for a little chapel. Sturmi was
afterwards sent to Monte Cassino and other Italian monasteries, in order that
he might become acquainted with the best monastic systems, and the rule
established at Fulda was more rigid than that of St. Benedict. The monks were
never to eat flesh; their strongest drink was to be a thin beer, although wine
was afterwards allowed for the sick. They were to have no serfs, but were to
subsist by the labour of their own hands. The new foundation soon became
important, and was extended to purposes beyond those which Boniface had had in
view. Princes and nobles enriched it with gifts of land, and both from the
Frankish kings and from the popes it enjoyed special privileges; although grave
doubts have been cast on the documents by which some of these are said to have
been conferred, and especially on the grant by which Zacharias is represented
as exempting it from all jurisdiction save that of the apostolic see.
Boniface continued to meet with difficulties. His
scheme of a regular organization, by which bishops were to be subject to
metropolitans, and these to the successor of St. Peter, did not find favour
with the Frankish prelates. Of three on whom the pope intended to confer the
pall, and who had been persuaded to apply for it, two afterwards refused it,
probably in consequence of having further considered the obligations to Rome
which it involved. And he still had to encounter the opposition of irregular or
heretical teachers, whom he describes as far more numerous than those of the
catholic communion, and as stained in many cases with the most infamous vices.
Of these opponents the most noted were Adelbert and
Clement. Adelbert was of Gaulish descent, and had obtained uncanonical
consecration as a bishop from some ignorant members of the order. He is
described as affecting extraordinary sanctity, and the accounts of him lead us
to suppose him a person of fanatical character. He relied much on a letter
which was written in the name of the Saviour and was said to have been sent
down from heaven. He said that an angel had brought him some relics of
surpassing sanctity from the ends of the earth. In opposition to the regular
bishops and clergy, he held meetings in fields and at wells; and in such places
he set up crosses and built little oratories. He opposed the practice of
pilgrimage to Rome. He prayed to angels of names before unknown, such as Tubuel, Sabuoc, and Simiel. He is
said to have disparaged the saints and martyrs, refusing to dedicate churches
in their honour, while, with a self-importance which, however inconsistent, is
certainly not without parallels, he dedicated them in his own name instead. A
life of him, filled with tales of visions and miracles, was circulated;
and—whether from vanity or in order to ridicule the relics which Boniface had
brought from Rome—he distributed the parings of his own nails and hair among
his admirers. These, it is said, spoke of his merits as something on which they
might rely for aid ; and, when they prostrated themselves at his feet, for the
purpose of confessing their sins, he told them that it was needless—that he knew
all things and had forgiven ail their misdeeds, so that they might go home in
peace, with the assurance of pardon.
While Adelbert gathered his sect in Austrasia, Clement
was preaching in the German territory. Of this person, who was a Scot from
Ireland, we are told that he set at nought all canons and all ecclesiastical
authority; that he despised the writings of the most esteemed fathers, such as
Jerome, Augustine, and Gregory; that he had two sons born in “adultery” (i.e. in
wedlock), and yet considered himself to be a true Christian bishop; that he judaically held marriage with a brother’s widow
to be lawful; that he believed our Lord’s descent into hell to have delivered
the souls of unbelievers as well as believers; and that on the subject of
predestination he held horrible opinions contrary to the catholic faith.
Boniface brought the case of Adelbert before a
Neustrian council at Soissons in 744, and obtained a condemnation of the
heretic, with an order that the crosses which he had erected should be burnt.
But in the following year Adelbert as well as Clement appear to have been in
full activity. Boniface procured a censure of both from another council, and
reported the matter for investigation to pope Zacharias, whom he requested to
obtain from Carloman an order that they should be imprisoned and debarred
from communication with all faithful Christians. In consequence of this
application, the documents of the case were examined by a Roman synod, which
sentenced Adelbert to be deposed, put to penance, and, in case of obstinacy,
anathematized with all his followers; while Clement was to be forthwith
subjected to deposition and anathema. Two years later, however, the two again
appear; it would seem that, besides enjoying a great amount of veneration with
the common people, who had persecuted Boniface for his proceedings against
Adelbert, they even had some influence over Carloman himself; and it was
probably in consequence of this that Zacharias now advised a course of dealing
with them which is hardly consistent with the decided condemnation before
passed on them. The further history of Clement is utterly unknown; as to
Adelbert it is stated by a writer of questionable authority that he was
imprisoned at Fulda, and made his escape from the abbey, but was murdered by
some swineherds whom he met with in his flight.
Another person with whom Boniface came into collision
was an Irish ecclesiastic named Virgil. Virgil, when ordered by him to
rebaptize some persons at whose baptism the words of administration had been
mutilated by an ignorant priest, appealed to Rome against the order, and
Zacharias pronounced that the sacrament was valid, inasmuch as the mistake did
not proceed from heresy, but only from grammatical ignorance. Some time after
this, Virgil was nominated to the see of Salzburg, when Boniface objected to
him that he held the existence of another world below ours, with a sun, a moon,
and inhabitants of its own. Zacharias condemned the opinion, and summoned
Virgil to Rome, but it would seem that he was able to clear his orthodoxy, as
he was allowed to take possession of Salzburg, and eventually attained the
honour of canonization.
The German church had now advanced beyond that stage
in which its primate might fitly be a missionary, without any determinate see.
Boniface wished to fix himself at Cologne—probably with a view to Frisia,
which, since the death of Willibrord, in 739, he had regarded as included
within his legatine care; and to this he obtained the consent of the Frankish
chiefs, and the sanction of Pope Zacharias. But before the arrangement could be
carried into effect, events occurred which caused it to be set aside. In 744,
the same year in which Cologne became vacant by the death of Raginfrid, Ceroid, bishop of Mentz (Mayence),
was slain in a warlike expedition against the Saxons, and his son Gewillieb, who until then had been a layman of Carloman’s
court, was consecrated to the see. In the following year the new bishop
accompanied the mayor of the palace to war, with a resolution to avenge his
father's death; he discovered the Saxon by whose hand it had been caused, and,
while the Frankish and the Saxon armies were encamped on opposite banks of the
Weser, invited him to a conference in the midst of the stream. The two rode
into the water, and at their meeting, the bishop stabbed the Saxon—an act which
was the signal for a battle, in which the Franks were victorious. Gewillieb returned to his see as if he had done nothing
inconsistent with his episcopal character; nor does it appear that any
disapprobation of it was felt by Carloman or his nobles. But Boniface, after
having so lately exerted himself to procure the enactment of canons against
clerical warriors, now felt himself bound to enforce them, and submitted the
case of Gewillieb to a council, which declared the
bishop guilty of blood. Gewillieb yielded, resigned
his see, and spent the remainder of his life in the enjoyment of some lesser
benefices; and Boniface was unwillingly obliged by the Frankish nobles to
accept the bishopric thus vacated as the seat of his metropolitan jurisdiction,
instead of that which he had himself chosen. The pope acquiesced in the change,
and subjected to him, as archbishop of Mayence, the
dioceses of Worms Spires, Tongres, Cologne, and
Utrecht, with all the nations of Germany which had received the gospel through
his labours.
In 747 Carloman resigned his power, and became a monk
on Mount Soracte, from which, on finding himself
disquieted by the visits of his countrymen, he afterwards withdrew to Monte
Cassino. This change, by which the whole power of the Frankish kingdom was
thrown into the hands of Pipin, would seem to have operated to the disadvantage
of Boniface. It has been very generally believed that he officiated at the
coronation of Pipin at Soissons, when the mayor of the palace at length assumed
the name of king (A.D. 752); but the evidence of this is open to some doubt,
and it has even been argued that, instead of promoting, he opposed the
revolution which transferred the crown from the descendants of Clovis to
another dynasty. The duties of his office began to weigh heavily on him. He had
still to struggle against much opposition on the part of bishops and clergy,
while his labours were greatly disturbed by the frequent incursions of pagans,
by whom he reported to Pope Stephen in 752 that thirty churches in his diocese
had been burnt or demolished. He had, with some difficulty, obtained permission
from Rome to nominate a successor to the see of Mayence when he should feel the approach of death, and, with Pipin’s consent, he now
raised to it his countryman and disciple Lull, who, however, had a much more
limited authority than Boniface, and did not receive the pall until twenty
years later.
It had been Boniface’s intention to spend his last
days in his monastery of Fulda, but he felt himself once more attracted to
Frisia, the scene of his early labours. He again set forth as a missionary
bishop, descended the Rhine, and, having consecrated Eoban to the see of
Utrecht, laboured with his assistance among the Frisian tribes. Many thousands
were baptized, and Boniface had appointed the eve of Whitsunday for the meeting
of a large number of converts at a place near Dockum, in order that he might bestow
on them the rite of confirmation. But instead of the neophytes whom he
expected, an armed band of pagans appeared and surrounded his tent. The younger
members of his party were seizing weapons for defence, but he exhorted them to
give up the thoughts of preserving the life of this world, and to submit to
death in the hope of a better life. The pagans massacred the whole company
—fifty-two in number. They carried off from the tent some chests which they
supposed to be full of treasure, but which in reality contained books and
relics; and it is said that, having drunk up a quantity of wine which they
found, they were excited to quarrel about the division of the fancied spoil,
and avenged the martyrs by almost exterminating each other. Eoban had shared the
fate of Boniface, but their missionary labours were continued by Gregory, abbot
of Utrecht, another disciple of the great missionary, and before the end of the
century, the conversion of the Frisians was completed by Lebuin, Liudger, and
others.
The body of Boniface was conveyed up the Rhine to Mayence (Mainz), and thence, in compliance with a wish
which he had often expressed, was carried to the abbey of Fulda; and, although
no miracles are related of him during his lifetime (unless the destruction of
the oak of Geismar be reckoned as an exception), it is said that his remains
were distinguished by profuse displays of miraculous power, both on the way to
their resting-place and after they had been deposited there. His name for ages
drew pilgrims and wealth to Fulda, and he was revered as the apostle of Germany—a
title which he deserved, not as having been the first preacher of the gospel in
the countries where he laboured, but as the chief agent in the establishment of
Christianity among the Germans, as the organizer of the German church. The
church of Saxon England, from which he proceeded, was immediately, and in a
more particular manner than any other, a daughter of the Roman. Teutonic by
language and kindred, Latin by principles and affection, it was peculiarly
fitted to act in the conversion of the German nations and to impress its
converts with a Roman character. And this was especially the work of Boniface.
He went forth to his labours with the pope’s commission. On his consecration to
the episcopate, after his first successes, he bound himself by oath to reduce
all whom he might influence to the obedience of St. Peter and his
representatives. The increased powers and the wider jurisdiction bestowed on
him by later popes were employed to the same end. He strove continually, not
only to bring heathens into the church, but to check irregular missionary
operations, and to subject both preachers and converts to the authority of
Rome. Through his agency the alliance naturally prompted by the mutual interest
of the papacy and the Frankish princes was effected. And, whether he shared or
not in the final step by which the papal sanction was used to consecrate the
transference of the crown from the Merovingian to the Carolingian line, his
exertions had undoubtedly paved the way for it. To him belongs in no small measure
the authorship of that connexion with the northern rulers which encouraged the
popes to disown the sovereignty of Constantinople; and, on the other hand, to
him is to be traced the character of the German church in its submission to
Rome from the time of the first council held under Carloman in 742.
But these facts afford no warrant for the charges
brought against Boniface by writers of the last century. One who, after having
passed his seventieth year, resigned the primacy of the Frankish church to set
out as a simple missionary to the barbarous Frisians, with an expectation (as
it would seem) of the violent death which he found, may safely be acquitted not
only of personal ambition, but of having been a missionary of the papacy rather
than of Christianity. His labours for the papacy were really performed because,
trained as he had been under the influences communicated to his native church
by Theodore and Wilfrid, he believed the authority of Rome to be the true means
of spreading Christianity among the heathen, and of reviving it from decay in
countries where it was already established. It may have been that in his zeal
for unity he made too little allowance for the peculiar tempers and positions
of men, or that he was sometimes guilty of injustice towards his opponents; nor
can it be pretended that his opinions were in advance of the age in which he
lived, whereas ingenious conjecture may ascribe to the sectaries Adelbert and
Clement all the spiritual enlightenment of modern Heidelberg or Berlin. But let
it be considered how little such men, however highly they may be estimated,
could have effected in the circumstances with which Boniface had to deal; how
powerless such teaching, the offspring of their personal discoveries or
fancies, must have been for the great work of suppressing heathenism; how distracting
to the heathen must have been the spectacle of rival and discordant types of
Christianity; how necessary the operation of one uniform and organized system
must have reasonably appeared to Boniface, whether for the extension of the
gospel or for the reform of the church, for an effective opposition to the
rudeness, the violence, the lawless passions with which he had on all sides to
contend. That Boniface ever used force as an instrument of conversion there is
no evidence whatever; his earnestness in the promotion of education proves how
thoroughly he desired that understanding should accompany the profession of
belief. And that the knowledge which he wished to spread by his educational
instructions was to be drawn from the Scriptures, of which he was himself a
diligent student, appears from the eagerness with which he endeavoured to
obtain as many copies as possible of the sacred books for the instruction of
his converts. His letters and other writings give us the impression, not only
of a great missionary, but of a man abounding in human feelings and affections.
Strenuous as Boniface was in the cause of the papacy,
his conception of it was far short of that which afterwards prevailed. He
regarded the pope as the supreme ecclesiastical judge, the chief conservator of
the canons, the highest member of a graduated hierarchy, superior to
metropolitans, as metropolitans were to ordinary bishops, but yet not as
belonging to a different order from other bishops, or as if their episcopacy
were derived from him and were a function of his. Much has been said of the
strange questions on which he sometimes requests the pope’s advice—as to
the lawfulness of eating horseflesh, magpies, and storks; as to the time when
bacon may be eaten without cooking, and the like. Such questions have been
regarded as proofs of a wretched scrupulousness in themselves, and the
reference of them to Rome has been branded as disgraceful servility.
But—(besides that we are not in a condition to judge of the matter without a
fuller knowledge of the circumstances)—it is easy to discover some grounds of justification
against these charges. Thus the horse was a favourite victim of the gods among
the northern nations, so that the eating of horseflesh was connected with the
practice of heathen sacrifice. And the real explanation of such questions would
seem to be, not that Boniface felt himself unable to answer them, or needed any
direction from the pope, but that he was desirous to fortify himself with the
aid of the highest authority in the church for his struggle against those
remnants of barbaric manners which tended to keep up among his converts the
remembrance of their ancient idolatry.
If Boniface’s zeal for Rome was strong, his concern
for religion and morality was yet stronger. He remonstrated very boldly against
some regulations as to marriage which were said to have the authority of Rome,
but which to him appeared to him immoral; he denied that any power on earth
could legalize them. He remonstrated also against the Roman view which regarded
“spiritual affinity”—i.e., the connection formed by sponsorship at
baptism—as a bar to marriage. He strongly represented to Zacharias the scandal
of the heathenish rejoicings and banqueting which were allowed at Rome at the
beginning of the year, and the manner in which persons who had visited Rome
referred to these as a warrant for their own irregularities. He protested
against the simoniacal appearance of the charges
exacted for palls by the papal officials, whether with or without their
master’s knowledge. And, as a counterpoise to all that is said of Boniface’s
deference to popes, we must in fairness observe (although his assailants have
not adverted to it) the tone of high consideration in which Zacharias answers
him, and the earnestness with which the pope endeavours to vindicate himself
from the suspicion of countenancing abuses—a remarkable testimony to the
estimation in which the apostle of Germany was held. Nay, if an anonymous
biographer may be believed, Boniface, towards the end of his life, protested
against Stephen II for having, during his visit to France, consecrated a bishop
of Metz—an act which the archbishop regarded as an invasion of the
metropolitical privileges of Treves; and Pipin’s mediation was required to heal
the difference between the pope and him whom many writers have represented as
the abject slave of Rome.
The spirit of unfair disparagement, however, has now
passed away; and both the church from which Boniface went forth and the nations
among which he ministered may well combine to do honour to his memory.
CHAPTER VI.PIPIN AND CHARLEMAGNE.A.D. 741-814.
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