Benedict XIII

“ Yet for all this it were to be wish’d, for the sake of the Ecclesiastical State, that he had been chose Pope in the place of Benedict XIII. But ’tis the Unhappiness of this Country, that its Princes are commonly more harass’d with their bodily Infirmities, than with the Cares of Government: ’Tis pity that the Pope is so old; for he has the very Qualities that constitute a great Prince. Notwithstanding his great Age, he has had the good Luck to make ten Cardinals, tho’ he has not been sixteen Months in the Pontificate ”

“ On the ground of this extremely dubious declaration, designed to compensate for the absence of any authentic and firm foundation in ecclesiastical law, the Pisan assembly on the 5th of June announced the deposition of Gregory XII. and Benedict XIII.,Alexander V., 1409–1410. as manifest heretics and partisans of the schism. The next step was to elect a new pope ”

“ The work, however, was interrupted by a variety of things, and first in thereign of Clement XI there were placed before a council many plans and designs. It was decided upon under Clement XI, and, being intrusted to the faithful care of the Reverend Father Bertrand Monsinat of Toulouse, corrector generalis of the lesser order of St. Francis de Paul, was begun, and finally, Benedict XIII blessedly seated upon the papal chair, was brought to an end in the year of jubilee, 1725. ”

“ Just now we hear of the Death of Pope Benedict XIII. As I never saw a Conclave, and am in the Humour of Travelling, I have an inclination to take a tour to Rome. I shall not resolve on it till I come to Frankfort. Which way soever I go you shall be inform'd, and I will not fail to desire your Commands. Mean time I am always very sincerely, &c. ”

“ The Bishop of Malaga recalls how Clement VIII described them as "the right arm of the Holy See." The Archbishop of Salzburg bitterly resents "the calumnious and defamatory charges against them." And, so, in each one of these communications to the Holy Father, there is nothing but praise for the victims and indignant denunciations of their executioners.
The three Pontiffs who occupied the Chair of St. Peter at that period were Benedict XIV, Clement XIII and Clement XIV. Benedict died on May 3, 1758, eighteen days before Father Ricci was elected General. ”

“ He was not, as some say, "the idol of Rome." The cardinals felt the disdain of them which he often expresses in his letters, and many of the clergy regarded him as too severe on them and too pliant to the laity. Neither was he a genius. Clearness of mind, immense industry, and sober ways are the sources of his output. His works are not read today even by ecclesiastics, and it is ludicrous to represent them as his [Pg 367] title to immortality. Yet Benedict XIV. was a great Pope: a wise ruler of the Church at a time when once more, unconsciously, it approached a world-crisis. ”

“ Benedict now ruled for some time in Rome, while Sylvester III found safety either within some fortified monument in the city or in some Sabine fortress, and continued to call himself pope. A beneficent darkness veils the horrors of this year. Hated by the Romans, insecure on his throne, in constant terror of the renewal of the revolution, Benedict eventually found himself obliged to abdicate. The abbot Bartholomew of Grotta Ferrata urged him to the step, but he unblushingly sold the papacy for money like a piece of merchandise. ”

“ There is no instruction to be had in Aquitaine, and but little in Francia. Lombardy, where I learned most, is the cradle of knowledge.” So the satire makes Benedict speak of himself. Then it makes a monk sketch Benedict’s sojourn at a convent in Angoulême: “He knows more than any man I ever saw. We have heard his chatter the whole day. O quam loquax est! He is never tired. Wherever he may be, standing, sitting, walking, lying, words pour from his mouth like water from the Tigris. He orders the whole convent about as if he were Abbot. Monks, laity, clergy, do nothing without his nod. ”

“ Benedict himself was dependent upon the Emperor for help against Byzantines, Saracens and factions in Rome itself. He could not be called a Pope of spiritual influence, but he was an astute politician, and under him the Papacy not only exercised without question its official power but also moved a little in the direction of church reform. As a ruler with activity and energy in days of darkness and degradation, he regained for the Papacy something of the old international position. ”

“ Rome becomes a vast theatre of disorder, on which the most powerful families in Italy contend for ascendancy—the Counts of Tuscany usually proving victorious. In 1033, this house dares to place upon the pontifical throne, under the name of Benedict the Ninth, a young boy brought up in debauchery. This child of twelve, when pope, continues his ineffable turpitude. [18] A faction elects Sylvester in his stead, and at length Pope Benedict, with a [24] conscience loaded with adultery, and a hand dyed with the blood of murders, [19] sells the popedom to an ecclesiastic of Rome. ”

“ Created cardinal priest of Santa Prisca in 1327 by his uncle John XXII. he was elected his successor on the 20th of December 1334. Benedict made appointments carefully, reformed monastic orders and consistently opposed nepotism. Unable to remove his capital to Rome or to Bologna, he began to erect a great palace at Avignon. In 1336 he decided against a pet notion of John XXII. by saying that souls of saints may attain the fulness of the beatific vision before the last judgment. In 1339 he entered upon fruitless negotiations looking toward the reunion of the Greek and Roman churches. ”

“ Benedict governed Rome quietly for nearly nine years, a somewhat rare thing in those days.
Benedict VIII., pope from 1012 to 1024, was called originally Theophylactus. He was a member of the family of the count of Tusculum, and was opposed by an anti-pope, Gregory, but defeated him with the aid of King Henry II. of Saxony, whom he crowned emperor in 1014. In his pontificate the Saracens began to attack the southern coasts of Europe, and effected a settlement in Sardinia. The Normans also then began to settle in Italy. ”

“ Finding him too austere, they attempt to poison him; but when he makes the sign of the Cross over the cup, it breaks in pieces, and he goes back unharmed to his solitude. Bazzi has made the ill-favoured monk, who was most insistent in urging Benedict to be abbot, the one to offer him the poisoned cup. Then, as many flock to him, he builds the twelve monasteries at Subiaco. In the twelfth fresco, one of the finest of the series, Benedict receives Maurus and Placidus, the young sons of the Roman nobles Equitius and Tertullus, who are accompanied by a splendid troop of retainers. ”

“ Benedict must have possessed even more than the Saint’s usual gift of divine magnetism, for wherever he went eager disciples sprang up around him—many faithful, some few less so, but all irresistibly attracted to the man himself. As it had been at Subiaco, so it was here. Very quickly he converted the poor people of the district, signs and wonders too many to recount “confirming the word,” and his inexhaustible charity making the harried peasants feel that they had found a father, a doctor, a protector, in the benignly gentle monk. ”

“ The silence of the place was like a sleep, So full of rest it seemed; each passing tread Was a reverberation from the deep Recesses of the ages that are dead. For, more than thirteen centuries ago, Benedict fleeing from the gates of Rome, A youth disgusted with its vice and woe, Sought in these mountain solitudes a home. He founded here his Convent and his Rule Of prayer and work, and counted work as prayer; The pen became a clarion, and his school Flamed like a beacon in the midnight air. ”

“ Benedict XI. (Niccolo Boccasini) , pope from 1303 to 1304, the son of a notary, was born in 1240 at Treviso. Entering the Dominican order in 1254, he became lector, prior of the convent, provincial of his order in Lombardy, and in 1296 its general. In 1298 he was created cardinal priest of Santa Sabina, and in 1300 cardinal bishop of Ostia and Velletri. In 1302 he was papal legate in Hungary. On the 22nd of October 1303 he was unanimously elected pope. He did much to conciliate the enemies made by his predecessor Boniface VIII., notably France, the Colonnas and King Frederick II. of Sicily ”

“ Benedict of Nursia was born near Rome at the end of the fifth century. When a boy of fourteen he renounced the world, and, after many changes of abode, finally settled at Monte Cassino, and became the founder of that famous monastery, destroying the temple of Apollo that stood on its site. Benedict died in 543 A.D. Pope Grregory the Great (594-604) , the first real organizer among the popes, pressed the monks into the service of the church. It was the Rule of Benedict that he chose for his guidance, imposing it on a monastery that he himself had founded in Rome. ”

“ This pope now fell in love with his beautiful cousin, daughter of a Tusculan count, and formed the bold resolve to marry her. But the father of the lady refused his consent so long as he was pope. Benedict now sold the papal chair for a thousand pounds of silver to the archdeacon Joannes Gratian. This man, a pious simple individual, in order to save the chair of St. Peter from utter overthrow, took upon himself the disgrace of simony at the bidding of his friends of Clugny, among whom a young Roman monk called Hildebrand, son of poor parents of Soana, in Tuscany, was already most conspicuous. ”

“ But very soon news of him spread beyond the mountain shepherds, and people of all sorts from far and near flocked to see the holy man and ask his prayers and his advice. Sad, wicked people went away with sorrow for their sins, and became good. Cowards went away full of strength and courage. And many people began to learn a new way of serving God truly, always doing their best for love of Him, and never "giving in to themselves."
It was then that God allowed St. Benedict to have a terrible temptation, to test him. ”

“ And gradually people began to call him their saint of the mountain, and to come to him for help in all their troubles. Thus the fame of his goodness spread wider and wider, until a company of monks who lived some way off sent and besought him to come and live with them and be their head.
Benedict was grieved to think of leaving his little cell which he had grown to love, and the simple mountain people, who so often came to him in their need. But he thought this was a call he ought to obey, so he sorrowfully set out and journeyed many miles till he came to the convent of the brothers. ”

“ Walk, my fathers, upon the waves with the help of obedience; you shall find solid support amid the inconstancy of human things. The waves shall have no power to overthrow you, nor the depths to swallow you up; you shall remain immovable, as if all was firm under your feet, and issue forth victorious."
However, Benedict had the ordinary fate of great men and saints. The great number of conversions worked by the example and fame of his austerity, awakened a homicidal envy against him. A wicked priest of the neighbourhood attempted first to decry and then poison him. ”

“ So, bitter Papists and malignants as were he and his wife, their worship for Pope and King did not blind them to coming events; and they had now turned their thoughts to the rising sun. When the news came from the North of the Royalist rout, and was followed by other adverses to the King’s cause, Benedict Hall, like many others of higher rank, hastened to change sides, or, at all events, save himself by “compounding.” ”

“ No institution has contributed as much to the amelioration of human misery or struggled as patiently and persistently to influence society for good as the Christian church. In spite of all that may be said against the followers of the Cross, it still remains true, that they have ever been foremost [pg 149] in the establishment of peace and justice among men.
The problem that confronted the church when Benedict began his labors, was no less than that of reducing a demoralized and brutal society to law and order. Chaos reigned, selfishness and lust ruled the hearts of Rome's conquerors. ”

“ After the completion of his monastery he undertook his fourth journey to Rome; he obtained from the Pope many privileges for the abbey, and returned in the year 680, bringing with him many more valuable books; he was accompanied by John the Chantor, who introduced into the English churches the Roman method of singing. He was also a great amator librorum, and left many choice manuscripts to the monks, which Bede writes "were still preserved in their library." It was about this time that Ecgfrid [246] gave Benedict a portion of land on the other side of the river Wire, at a place called Jarrow ”

“ Benedict ended his life at Monte Cassino, where he lived for fourteen years, occupied, in the first place, with extirpating from the surrounding country the remnants of paganism, afterwards in building his monastery by the hands of his disciples, in cultivating the arid sides of his mountain, and the devastated plains around, but above all, in extending to all who approached him the benefits of the law of God, practised with a fervour and charity which none have surpassed. ”

“ Benedict's successor, Clement VI., was conversant with the world, and accustomed to the splendour of courts. Quite a contrast to the plain rigidity of Benedict, he was courteous and munificent, but withal a voluptuary; and his luxury and profusion gave rise to extortions, to rapine, and to boundless simony. ”