The gathering of the forces of the Frankish peoples under a single sceptre marks a new era in the history of Europe. We shall observe especially its influence upon the organization of the coming crusades, whose leaders were no longer feudal chieftains, like Godfrey, Raymond, Bohemond, and Tancred, but royal personages supported by the compact power of the new nationality. The chief advantage from the first crusade fell to the Papacy, which gathered to itself the prestige of the power it had evoked; and rightly, if great prevision ever merits the fruit of the policy it dares to inaugurate. Paschal II., who followed Urban II. in the papal chair (1099-1118), was too weak to uphold the daring projects of his predecessor; but Calixtus II. (1119-24) and Innocent II. (1130-43) showed the genuine Hildebrandian spirit. Although the Concordat of Worms (1123) modified somewhat the claims of the Papacy as against the German empire, the church steadily compacted its power about thrones and people. The authority of the Papacy was especially augmented in this period by its temporary success against a movement whose ultimate triumph was destined to cost the Roman Church its dominance of Christendom, viz., the impulse towards liberal thought. The standard-bearer of this essential Protestantism was Abélard. This astute reasoner placed the human judgment, when guided by correct scholarship, above all traditional authority. The popularity of his teaching was a serious menace to the doctrines of the church, so far as these rested upon the dictation of the popes. The consternation of ecclesiastics was voiced by Bernard, the Abbot of Clairvaux, who declared in his appeal to Pope Innocent II.: “These books of Abélard are flying abroad over all the world; they no longer shun the light; they find their way into castles and cities; they pass from land to land, from one people to another. A new gospel is promulgated, a new faith is preached. Disputations are held on virtue and vice not according to Christian morality, on the sacraments of the church not according to the rule of faith, on the mystery of the Trinity not with simplicity and soberness. This huge Goliath, with his armor-bearer, Arnold of Brescia, defies the armies of the Lord to battle.” The Goliath fell, but by no pebble from the sling of a David. Bernard was justly reputed the greatest mind of the age. He hesitated to enter into a learned controversy with Abélard, but smote him with a thunderbolt of excommunication, which he secured from the hands of the occupant of the Vatican throne.