THE CHURCH.--The Germanic tribes were generally more or less acquainted with the Romans, and were Christians by profession. They were subject to the influences of religion, of law, and of language, in the countries where they settled. Power passed from the Empire to the Church. The Church was strong in its moral force. Its bishops commanded the respect of the barbarians. They were moral and social leaders. In the period of darkness and of tempest, the voices of the Christian clergy were heard in accents of fearless rebuke and of tender consolation. In the cities of Italy and Gaul, the bishops, at the call of the people, informally took the first place in civil affairs. Remarkable men arose in the Church, who were conspicuous as ambassadors and peace-makers, as intercessors for the suffering, and courageous protectors of the injured. Such a man was _Leo the Great._ The barbarians were awed by the kingdom of righteousness, which, without exerting force, opposed to force and passion an undaunted front. There was often a conflict between their love of power and passionate impatience of control, and their reverence for the priest and for the gospel. They could not avoid feeling in some measure the softening and restraining influence of Christian teaching, and learning the lessons of the cross. Socially, the Church, as such, "was always on the side of peace, on the side of industry, on the side of purity, on the side of liberty for the slave, and protection for the oppressed. The monasteries were the only keepers of literary tradition: they were, still more, great agricultural colonies, clearing the wastes, and setting the example of improvement. They were the only seats of human labor which could hope to be spared in those lands of perpetual war." Nevertheless, the religious condition of the West, the condition of the Church and of the clergy, could not fail to be powerfully affected for the worse by the influx of barbarism, and the corrupting influence of the barbarian rulers. A great deterioration in the Church and in its ministry ensued after the first generation following the Germanic conquests passed away. This demoralization was more among the secular clergy than the monastic. The "History of the Franks," by _Gregory of Tours_ (540-594), is an instructive memorial of the times. He was himself an intrepid prelate, who did not quail before _Chilperic I_. and _Fredegunde_, but braved their wrath. Chilperic proposed to establish by his authority a new view of the Trinity of his own devising, but was resisted by Gregory, who told him that no one but a lunatic would embrace such an opinion. A still more crude reform of the alphabet, which the Frankish king contrived, and proposed to put in force by having existing books rewritten, Gregory effectually resisted.