The oldest electoral law in the world is the law by virtue of which the pontifical power has been handed down from St. Peter to the priest who wears the tiara to-day: from that priest you go back from pope to pope till you come to saints who touch Christ; at the first link of the pontifical chain stands a God. The bishops were elected by the general assembly of the faithful; from the time of Tertullian[19], the Bishop of Rome was named the Bishop of Bishops. The clergy, forming part of the people, concurred in the election. As passions exist everywhere, as they debase the fairest institutions and the most virtuous characters, in the measure that the papal power increased, it attempted more, and human rivalries produced great disorders. In Pagan Rome, similar troubles had broken out on the occasion of the election of the Tribunes: of the two Gracchi, one[20] was flung into the Tiber, the other[21] stabbed by a slave in a wood consecrated to the Furies. The nomination of Pope Damasus[22], in 366, led to an affray attended by bloodshed: one hundred and thirty-seven people succumbed in the Sicinian Basilica, known to-day as Santa Maria Maggiore. [Sidenote: History of their election.] We find St. Gregory[23] elected Pope by the Clergy, the Senate and the People of Rome. Any Christian could rise to the tiara: Leo IV.[24] was promoted to the Sovereign Pontificate, on the 12th of April 847, to defend Rome against the Saracens, and his ordination deferred until he had given proofs of his courage. The same thing happened to the other bishops: Simplicius[25] ascended the See of Bourges, layman though he were. To this day (which is not generally known) the choice of the Conclave might fall on a layman, even if he were married: his wife would take the veil, and he would receive all the orders together with the papacy. The Greek and Latin Emperors tried to suppress the liberty of the popular papal election; they sometimes usurped it, and often exacted that the election should at least be confirmed by them: a capitulary of Louis the Débonnaire[26] restores its primitive liberty to the election of the bishops, which was accomplished according to a treaty of the same time, by "the unanimous consent of the clergy and the people."