Among the acknowledged rights of the Crown of France was that of receiving the emoluments of all benefices during vacancy, which was known as the _regale_, but it was a right which depended solely upon custom, and obtained only in the ancient dominions of the Crown of France. In spite of this, in 1673, Louis XIV., pursuing his usual policy of royal aggrandisement, issued an edict asserting that according to law and to custom the _regale_ applied to all the bishoprics of the kingdom. [Sidenote: =Denied by the Pope.=] On this the bishops of Pamiers and Alais, who were theologically opposed to the Jesuit influence dominant in the court, protested and appealed to the Pope, Innocent XI. who at once gave his decision in their favour. This action on the part of the bishops and the Pope raised the question out of the category of a money dispute between the Crown and some of the clergy, into that of a grave constitutional question between the Church of France and the Pope. Men asked themselves in France what right the Pope had to interfere with the emoluments of the Crown, just as in England one hundred and fifty years before they had asked themselves by what right the Pope claimed the first-fruits of English benefices. But Louis XIV. was fortunate enough to find ready to his hand a champion of his cause far more noble than a Cranmer or a Cromwell. To the orthodoxy of Sir Thomas More, Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, added the fervid eloquence of S. Bernard and the learning and taste of Erasmus. In him the flame of patriotism burned at fever heat. Deeply imbued with the principles of his age loyalty was to him the first of virtues, and the king dilated before his dazzled eyes, not as the grasping tyrant that he really was, but as the God-given champion of an oppressed Church. [Sidenote: =The four Resolutions, 1682.=] Bossuet felt that the mantle of Gerson and d’Ailly had descended upon him, and at the bidding of the king, under his leadership, the French clergy set themselves to follow up the work of the council of Constance and put limits to the autocracy of the Roman Pontiff. Constitutionalism once more raised its head for a brief period within the bounds of the Roman obedience. In 1682 the king summoned an assembly of clergy to meet at S. Germain and consider the difficulty. Bossuet at once took the lead, and at his instigation the assembly recognised the right of the king to the _regale_ all over France, and passed four resolutions on the limits of the power of the Pope. (1) That sovereigns are not subject to the Pope in things temporal, neither can they be deposed by him nor their subjects freed from their oaths of allegiance by him. (2) That a general council is superior to the Pope. (3) That the power of the Pope is subject to the regulations and canons of councils, and he cannot decide anything contrary to the rules and constitutions of the Gallican Church.