A CHAPTER V. Frederick II., Emperor of Germany, LMOST the first important matter to which David de Bernham had to turn his attention on being created Bishop of St Andrews, was the great controversy that was then raging between Pope Gregory IX. and Frederick II., Emperor of Germany.1 The quarrel, however, between the civil and ecclesiastical powers, began before this. For it commenced as soon as Frederick entered upon public life, and it did not terminate until he was laid in his grave. It was a controversy, therefore, not with one, but with a succession of celebrated Pontiffs, and these often 1 "At the head of all the enemies of Christianity," says Mosheim, (Church Hist., Part I., chap. ii. sect. 3, p. 437), "stood the Emperor Frederick II., if credit is to be given to the sovereign Pontiff Gregory IX., who in the year 1239 charged him before all the kings and princes of Europe with" the language of blasphemy. "This heavy charge the Emperor deemed it necessary to refute by a public profession of his religious faith." in alliance with the Lombard cities of Italy and other enemies of the Emperor. Frederick was again and again excommunicated. But no decree or censure of the Church had the least effect upon his dauntless spirit; and although at last he had to give way, yet it was perhaps rather from the increasing difficulties of his reign—caused by the different nationalities over which he held sway, and with which he had often to contend-than from the power and weapons of the Church. The German Empire at this time—that is, in the thirteenth century-was the dominant power in Europe. It occupied the proud place which Imperial Rome had once held, and which was subsequently occupied by a succession of Frankish monarchs. Although in the tenth and eleventh centuries it was in the zenith of its greatness, yet in the days of Frederick I. (Barbarossa), grandfather of Frederick II., it was without a rival among European States. Not only did it embrace the various nationalities of Germany, but it included within its far-reaching sovereignty Naples, Sicily, and other important portions of Italy. Frederick II. was one of the greatest of German monarchs. Indeed no more conspicuous figure appears on the page of history during the middle ages than this illustrious man. As a sovereign, a statesman, a scholar, and a military commander, he was unsurpassed by any of the other great men of these times. He knew Latin, Greek, French, German, Arabic, and Hebrew—took the greatest interest in architecture-fostered the infancy of Italian sculpture and painting-restored or founded universities and medical schools-was the generous patron of learning, and the patron and friend of literary men. This celebrated monarch was born at Seri, near Ancona, on the 26th December 1194, and elected King of the Romans in 1196. He was the son of Henry VI., Emperor of Germany, by Constance, daughter and heiress of William II., King of Sicily. Henry died in 1197, and Constance in 1198, leaving Frederick, a child of only some four years of age, under the guardianship of the then reigning Pontiff, Innocent III. The young sovereign was well brought up, and an early friendship was formed between him and the head of the Church. But it did not long survive after the former grew up to manhood's years. Frederick had to fight his way to the throne of his ancestors; and as his mental faculties developed, and the stern duties and great responsibilities of his high position became more discernible, he felt himself compelled to differ from the sentiments and wishes of the sovereign Pontiff; so that he who commenced life in warm friendship with the Church, soon became its bitterest foe. Innocent III., Honorius III., Gregory IX., and — passing over the short Pontificate of Celestinus IV.Innocent IV., were all the enemies of Frederick, whom they regarded as the great foe to Christianity. But the independent mind, the great genius, the vast resources of the Emperor, enabled him to overcome all opposition, and for long to baffle the skill and evade the strategies of all his adversaries. In 1239, Gregory IX. excommunicated Frederick, and in the following year, 1240, he summoned a General Council to meet at Rome, with the view of hurling the Emperor from the throne. To this council two Scottish bishops, David de Bernham, Bishop of St Andrews, and William de Bondington, Bishop of Glasgow, were summoned ;1 1 It is evident that the Bishop of Glasgow who accompanied Bishop de Bernham to the General Council at Rome which was called by Pope Gregory IX. in 1240, was William de Bondington, a native of Berwickshire, and formerly rector of [Edelstone] Eddleston, in Peeblesshire. The bishop previously held various offices under Alexander II., was elected Bishop of Glasgow in 1232, "and consecrated in the Cathedral Church by Andrew, Bishop of Moray. Dominica post nativitatem beatæ Mariæ, anno Dom. 1233 [Melros]." This bishop finished the Cathedral Church of and these prelates were far on their way, when Frederick, marshalling his forces, advanced into the States of the Church, captured Ravenna, and other important towns in Italy. Not only so, but learning that the Genoese fleet had been put at the service of the Pope, and that it was being made use of to convey many of the prelates of Christendom by sea to Rome, he, aided by his natural son Enzio, King of Sardinia in 1241, gained a brilliant victory over this fleet, captured it, and having the bishops in his power, threw them into prison. David de Bernham and William de Bondington were no doubt among the prisoners. But the Emperor, not willing to increase the Church's animosity, released them on condition that they would return to their homes. They gave this promise, but sent on their procurations by some ecclesiastic to Rome.1 The two Scottish bishops, along with their brother prelates, being thus dismissed, Frederick proceeded to deal still more vigorously with Gregory; and having Glasgow out of bis own liberality, and in the last year of his life introduced into his diocese the use of the liturgical form of the Church of Sarum or Salisbury. Some say he died in 1257, others in 1283. He was interred in the Abbey Church of Melrose, near the high altar (Keith, Cat. of Scot. Bishops, pp. 238, 239). 1 Mosh., Cent. XIII., Part II., chap. ii. sec. 10; and Spottiswoode, lib. ii. pp. 43, 44. Lond., 1655. |