In January 1377 St. Catherine gained her most signal triumph, for Gregory XI, at her persuasion, appeared in Rome and took up his quarters there, so bringing to an end the ‘Babylonish Captivity’. Not long afterwards he died; and the Romans who had rejoiced at his coming were overwhelmed with fear that his successor might be a Frenchman and return to Avignon. ‘Give us a Roman!’ they howled, surging round the palace where the College of Cardinals, or Consistory, as it was called, was holding the election; and the cardinals, believing that they would be torn in pieces unless they at least chose an Italian, hastily elected a Neapolitan, the Archbishop of Bari, who took the name of Urban VI. It was an unfortunate choice. Urban honestly wished to reform the Church, but of Christian charity, without which good deeds are of no avail, he possessed nothing. Arrogant, passionate, and fierce in his frequent hatreds, blind to either tact or moderation, he tried to force the cardinals by threats and insults into surrendering their riches and pomp. ‘I tell you in truth,’ exclaimed one of them, when he had listened to the Pope’s first fiery denunciations, ‘you have not treated the Cardinals to-day with the respect they received from your predecessors. If you diminish our honour we shall diminish yours.’ Rome was soon aflame with the plots of the rebellious college, whose members finally withdrew from the city, declared that they had been intimidated in their choice by the mob, that the election of Urban was therefore invalid, and that they intended to appoint some one else. As a result of this new conclave there appeared a rival Pope, Clement VII, who after a short civil war fled from Italy and took up his residence at Avignon. [Sidenote: The Great Schism] The period that followed is called the Great Schism, one of the times of deepest humiliation into which the papal power ever descended. From Rome and Avignon two sets of bulls, claiming divine sanction and the necessity of human obedience, went forth to Christendom, their authors each declaring himself the one lawful successor of St. Peter, and Father of the Holy Catholic Church. With Clement VII sided France, her ally Scotland, Spain, and Naples; with Urban VI, Germany, England, and most of the northern kingdoms; and when these Popes died the cardinals they had elected perpetuated the schism by choosing fresh rivals to rend the unity of the Church. Thus in the struggle for temporal supremacy reform was forgotten, and the growing spirit of doubt and scepticism given a fair field in which to sow her seed.