blood which had flowed to satisfy his ambition or his vengeance, wished to subject the emperor, for the sole purpose of afterwards subjugating all the other sovereigns; that his offers proceeded less from a predilection for the French, than from inveterate hatred for Frederick; that he would, however, make inquiry as to the orthodoxy of this prince, and if he proved a heretic, would make the most implacable war against him, as in such case he would not fear doing with the pope himself. This epistle, without doubt, mingled errors of the grossest kind with the expression of the most generous resolutions. What! an assembly of priests possess the right of dethroning a sovereign! What! the religious opinions of a prince be a sufficient motive, with those who did not possess the same, to declare war against him! Yes, such were the indisputable results of those decretals from which the popes had compiled the public law of Christendom. ²³⁵ Concilior. vol. 11, p. 340, 346, 357. ²³⁶ Matt Paris, ann. 1239, p. 444.—Daniels, Hist, of France, vol. 3. p. 210.—Bossuet Def. Cler. Gall. 1. 4. c. 6. But the more deplorable this madness, the greater is the homage due to the prince, who, fettered by the bands of so many prejudices, could find in his own excellent heart a disinterestedness, a loyalty, and a courage, worthy of the happiest periods of history. All the reputation of his exemplary piety was needed by Louis IX. to escape the anathemas of Gregory IX. and even the enterprises of the French bishops; for he repressed the bishops with firmness, whenever his understanding allowed him to perceive the abuses of their spiritual functions which they practised. They were seen, for the most trifling temporal interest, shut the churches, and suspend the administration of the sacraments. Experience had taught them the efficacy of these measures; they obtained by this species of pettishness the various objects of their desires. But a bishop of Beauvais, and an archbishop of Rouen, having employed this system with too little caution, and thinking proper to excommunicate some royal officers, St. Louis had their temporalities seized, and obtained from the pope a bull which forbade the interdiction of the royal chapels.: “He had “for a maxim, never to yield a blind respect to the “orders of the ministers of the church, whom he “knew to be subject to the intemperancies of passion “as well as other men.”