History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume II (of 2): Revised EditionDraper, John William
History
History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume II (of 2): Revised Edition
Draper, John William
Europe -- Civilization
[Sidenote: Pecuniary necessities of Rome.] This was the state of affairs
at the commencement of the quarrel between Philip and Boniface. The
Crusades had brought all Europe under taxation to Rome, and loud
complaints were everywhere made against the drain of money into Italy.
Things had at last come to such a condition that it was not possible to
continue the Crusades without resorting to a taxation of the clergy, and
this was the true reason of the eventual lukewarmness, and even
opposition to them. But the stream of money that had thus been passing
into Italy had engendered habits of luxury and extravagance. Cost what
it might, money must be had in Rome. The perennial necessity under which
the kings of England and France found themselves--the necessity of
revenue for the carrying out of their temporal projects--could only be
satisfied in the same way. The wealth of those nations had insensibly
glided into the hands of the Church. [Sidenote: The King of England
compels the clergy to pay taxes.] In England, Edward I. enforced the
taxation of the clergy. They resisted at first, but that sovereign found
an ingenious and effectual remedy. He directed his judges to hear no
cause in which an ecclesiastic was a complainant, but to try every suit
brought against them; asserting that those who refused to share the
burdens of the state had no right to the protection of its laws. They
forthwith submitted. In the nature and efficacy of this remedy we for
the first time recognize the agency of a class of men soon to rise to
power--the lawyers.
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