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ZACIIARIAS— Pope

ZACHARIAS— Pope

Afagn.') says the change was made u jussu,” and“ auctoritate ” of the Roman pontiff; but suchlanguage does not imply any theory then heldas to the pope’s power to dispose, on his ownmere motion, of earthly thrones. The chroni-cler’s purpose is to justify the change as nothaving been made without the sanction of thehighest ecclesiastical authority. The reply ofZacharias being favourable, Ohilderic was sentinto a monastery, having had his long hair, thetoken of royalty, cut off• and Pippin wasformally elected as king, elevated on a shield,according to the custom of the race, and alsoanointed at Soissons by the Frank clergy;—bySt. Boniface, according to some accounts, thoughthis is doubtful. (See Bonjeacius MOGinm-NKK8IS.) The pope’s action in thus sanctioningthe usurpation of Pippin is not likely to offendany of the present day, except such as stillbelieve in a divine right inherent in all kingsof ancient dynasty. The Merovingian dynastyseems at that time to have outlived its useful-ness, and its retention to have become a farce ;and it was evidently best for the kingdom whichdesired it that the real rulers should be recog-nised as having the right to rule, and that thetheory of allegiance to a useless shadow shouldcease. Nor is it fair to accuse Zacharias ofhaving been actuated by interested motives.True it is that his action was politic: for itbcund the Carlovingian kings more firmly thanever to the Roman see; and Pippin may be sup-posed to have been in a great measure moved bygratitude, when he afterwards rescued the ex-archate from the Lombards, and bestowed it onSt. Peter in the person of pope Stephen III.Zacharias may have foreseen some such possibleresult; but still, if his verdict was justifiablein itself, he should be allowed the credit ofdisinterested motives. He had shown previouslyno desire to usurp the rights of the emperorover the exarchate. He had saved it from beingtaken possession of by Luitprand, with no appa-rent design of alienating it from the emperor, towhom he had left it to hold it as he could. Norare the popes before and after him to be justly*reproached, as they are by some Protestantwriters, for seeking or accepting dominion whichbelonged of right to the emperor, whose subjectsthey were. Gregory III. had indeed invitedCharles Martel to come to the rescue, offeringhim the title of patrician of Rome, and theallegiance which had been in former times dueto Constantinople; but this was when the onlyhope of rescue was from France, and when theemperor could or would do nothing for him.Stephen afterwards accepted gratefully fromPippin temporal dominion over territory thathad been once the emperor’s; but it was thenno longer his. It had been wrested from himby the Lombard king, and then from him byPippin ; and, if it had been nominally restoredto the emperor, he would have been powerlessto retain it. These were the only two practicalalternatives; that of the pope becoming a sub-ject of the Lombard king, or that of his becom-ing a temporal potentate under the protection ofthe king of the Franks. And the popes aresurely not to blame for preferring the latteralternative, whatever may be thought of thesubsequent results of the “damnosa haereditas ”thus acquired.

The deposition of Childeric was probably inthe year 751. Four years previously (a.d. 747)Carloman the brother of Pippin (who, aftertheir father Charles Martel’s death, had sharedwith him the government of the kingdomruling over Austrasia, Alamannia, and Thu-ringia) had resigned his dominion to his brother,and gone to Rome to devote himself to monasticlife. His renuuciation of the world was notdue to any incapacity for the position he held(for he is said to have been an efficient ruler,and successful in war), but to religious aspira-tions, induced by his intercourse with St. Boni-face, whom he had supported and aided in hiswork of evangelization, and whose disciple hehad been. We are told (in Vit. Bonifac. lib. 1,c. 36, apud Sur. 10, 3, die 5 Jun .) that, beforereceiving instruction from the saint, “ he hadknown little of the Christian religion, but thatthrough his exhortations he so advanced in thefear and love of God that he learnt to administeralike wisely divine and human things, andbecame aware that secular powers profitednothing apart from the celebration of divineworship, to which the monastic life is joined.”His conversion and retirement from the worldillustrate the influence of St. Boniface in thekingdom of the Franks, and the increasedreverence which would thence accrue towardsthe Roman See. According to Anastasius (mVit. Zachar.) Carloman went first to Rome,where he offered himself to St. Peter, and wasby pope Zacharias himself devoted to monasticlife. Thence, according to the Frank annalists,he went in the first place to the monastery onmount Soracte, which he restored from thestate of ruination to which it had been reducedby the Lombards, and remained there someyears; but, being disturbed and annoyed bythe visits of Frank nobles on their way to Rome,he escaped by night with only one companion,and knocked for admission at the door of theBenedictine monastery on mount Cassino with-out revealing his name, but representing him-self as a homicide, and guilty of all manner ofcrimes, who craved a place of penitence. Therehe was for some time subjected to severe proba-tion, as being an unknown novice of barbarianrace, was sent to work in the kitchen, and beatenby the cook. At length his companion who hadentered the convent with him, having retaliatedon the cook by hitting him with all his forcewith a pestle, and having been called to accountin consequence, revealed the unknown stranger’sname and rank. The terrified monks fell downat his feet, imploring pardon; but he in returnfell down at theirs, declaring that he was notCarloman, but a sinner and a homicide. Afterthis, we are told, he was treated with greatreverence, but continued to lead the life of ahumble and obedient monk. (Eginhard, in Vit.Car . Aiagn.; Regino, in Chron. an. 576 ; LeoOstiens. in Chron. Cassin. 1. 1, c. 7.)' For hissubsequent journey to France in obedience tohis abbat’s orders, and his death in a monasteryat. Vienne, see under Stephanus III.

Many interesting letters, that passed betweenpope Zacharias and Boniface, remain, showingthe close intercourse kept up between them.In 742 Boniface wrote to the new pope, pro-fessing his devout obedience to him, and hisdesire to maintain the unity of the church

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