Until then, the Emperor had listened in silence, although his features betrayed the violent emotions of his inner self. Suddenly interrupting the Chancellor, he exclaimed,-- "By my faith, the reasoning is highly logical! The Church rules all! She can make and depose both emperors and princes!--All must passively obey her mandates!--What arrogance!--Princes are naught but simple vassals of the Pope!" "Absolutely nothing else," replied Rinaldo; "the Pope is the sun, the Emperor the moon, who receives from His Holiness light and brilliancy and power." "Enough! enough!" cried Frederic, angrily; "mark the place and close the book--the reading of such enormities is an insult to the Imperial dignity." A crafty smile played around the Chancellor's lips as he replied,-- "Great men, unluckily, make great blunders; but for your unfortunate oversight, no Pope would have ventured to make such an extravagant claim to universal sovereignty." "Was it not the duty of Charles to defer to the request of Rome?" "Most certainly! but his liberality to the Church might have been more measured, and the honors conceded more judiciously denned. Hold the Pope's stirrup!--yes, the Emperor must even stoop to that--although it is, in reality, a mere idle form," added the Chancellor, hurriedly, as Frederic's face colored up. "Surely none can blame the Popes if they construe what was a mere form into an obligation of importance." "When I held the stirrup of His Holiness, my lord Chancellor," said Barbarossa with great dignity, "it was the homage paid by a Christian to the chief of Christendom." "A most excellent reason, Sire," replied the Chancellor, in an insinuating tone. "The fulfilment of a Christian's religious duties can but honor an Emperor. But I have yet to learn in what way those duties interfere with the prerogatives of a Sovereign." "Well!--you would elevate then the monarch's rights above the Christian's responsibilities?" The smiling glance of the statesman dwelt for an instant upon his sovereign, who had given his minister to understand that he regarded his opinions as somewhat heretical and very difficult of realization. Barbarossa was willing to admit, to a certain extent, the superiority of the temporal over the spiritual power, but he still hesitated before the impiety of claiming the supremacy.