Not until 1310, however, did the first formal burning alive by the Inquisition take place in France. The Manichean holocaust, formal enough in a practical sense, appears to have been an irregularity. On May 30 of that year a woman who had advocated free love and other heresies died at the stake with such devotion that the spectators were moved to tears. The sect to which she belonged, the Brethren of the Free Spirit, furnished a good many victims in the course of the next few years, when the Inquisition reached the height of its power. But with the growth and consolidation of the authority of the Crown the Inquisition was absorbed by the secular courts till it became little more than a department of the State. Its comparative impotence was made more perceptible by the removal of the Holy See from Rome to Avignon, and by the Great Schism (1378-1447) which shook the Papacy to its foundations. The wars with the English, which were then so frequent and prolonged, also made conditions unfavourable to the Inquisition by causing the withdrawal of the royal stipend; and the University of Paris to a large extent took its place as an investigator of heresy cases. When the wars were over an attempt was made by Pope Nicholas V in 1451 to revive and increase the activity of persecution, but with no permanent success. So far had the Holy Office become out of touch with the spirit of the times that the roving commissions which were frequently granted to special Inquisitors also failed to re-establish the authority of the institution. The people of Lyons in 1458 were even bold enough to throw their Inquisitor into prison, and it was only with difficulty that he was released. A few years later Jean Laillier, a priest in Paris, spoke his mind freely about the clergy, and the Inquisition did not feel strong enough to burn him. Two other priests, who at mass threw the Host on the floor and trampled on it, committed an unpardonable crime, and duly suffered at the stake.