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Clement XII
1730-1740

Lorenzo Corsini born 1652

We are now to examine the reign of Clement XII, an illustrious countryman of the noble family of Medici.

Clement XII (Lorenzo Corsini), of a most illustrious family of Tuscany, was born at Florence, April 7, 1652.

His father was Bartolomeo Corsini, Marquis of Casigliano; his mother, Isabella Strozzi, sister of the Duke of Bagnuolo.

The Corsini family originated at Florence. It descended from Corsino, whose son was lord of Castelluccio and Poggibonsi, about 1150. Thomas, Philip, John, Peter, Gerard, rose to the dignity of gonfaloniers, supreme magistrates the republic. Thomas was also ambassador to Sienna, Bologna, Milan, and Rome, as well as to the Emperor Wenceslas and the King of Hungary. Philip, his son, was employed in the same embassies and repeatedly sent to France. Peter Corsini, Bishop of Florence, and subsequently cardinal, had been accredited by Urban V as legate to the Emperor Charles IV, from whom he obtained, in 1371, the title Prince of the Holy Empire, in consideration of his services in restoring peace.

Among other glories of the family is that of having given to earth and to heaven Saint Andrew Corsini, a Carmelite, who died in 1374 and was canonized in 1629 by Urban VI. Neri Corsini, who succeeded his brother Andrew in the see of Fiesole, also by his virtues obtained the title of Blessed.

Bartolomeo Corsini, Marquis of Casigliano in Umbria, of Lajatico and Orciatico, and of other places which formerly belonged to the family of the Marquis Malaspina, was son of Philip Corsini and Lucretia Rinuccini, and consequently great-nephew of Clement XI. He became great equerry to the Grand Duke of Tuscany and King of Naples; viceroy of Sicily in 1737; prince assistant to the throne; Duke of Saint Columba in 1738, and grandee of Spain in 1739.

Lorenzo made his first studies in the Roman College, where he was placed at the age of fifteen. He was the fourth pupil of that college who became pontiff. Having received the doctor's cap at Pisa, he went to Rome to complete his studies under the direction of his uncle, Cardinal Neri Corsini. Being recalled by his father, he made a brief stay at Florence. At the age of thirty-three years he returned to Rome, where he abandoned his rights of primogeniture and embraced the ecclesiastical profession.

Under Innocent XI, Lorenzo entered the prelacy and commenced forming a library. In 1691 he was made Bishop of Nicomedia, and was then named for the nunciature at Vienna, to which residence, however, he did not proceed.

On the 17th of May, 1706, he was created cardinal, but, as he filled the post of treasurer-general, he could only hold the title of pro-treasurer.

After the Mass of the Holy Ghost, on the 5th of March, 1730, twenty-six cardinals who were in Rome entered into conclave. On the day of the election the number of cardinals present had increased to fifty-three.

During five months the sacred electors discussed the merits of their colleagues Ruffo, Imperiali, Zondadari, Banchieri, Davia, and Corradini; each of whom seemed to be on the point of obtaining the chair of Saint Peter.

Cardinal Imperiali, who on one day needed only one vote to become pontiff (a cardinal cannot vote for himself), was excluded by Cardinal Bentivoglio, in the name of the King of Spain.

Cardinal Ruffo was then supported with much firmness, but the votes were less favorable when it became known that he was a friend of Cardinal Coscia, the late minister of Benedict XIII.

Cardinal Davia, on the 10th of June, obtained twenty-nine votes, but thirty-six were needed to make two thirds of the fifty-four cardinals then present. On the 16th of June Cardinal Corradini had thirty votes; then Cardinal Bentivoglio. who had expended his exclusion and could not pronounce another, declared that if Corradini were elected the Spanish cardinals and he, Bentivoglio, would instantly leave Rome. A pamphlet appeared upon that subject, under the title of Bellum Corradinum, assailing that cardinal. Moreover, Cardinal Cienfuegos had the emperor's orders to exclude Cardinal Corradini. The question was how to vanquish the repugnance of the imperialists, who for a long time were opposed to the partisans of Corsini; but at length he elected by fifty-two cardinals, on the 12th of July, 1730. was then seventy-eight years old.

He chose the name of Clement XII, in memory of Clement XI, his benefactor, who had given him the purple. Having been crowned on the 16th of July, he took possession of the Basilica of Saint John Lateran on the 19th of November.

The ministers of Benedict XIII had excited the the Romans. Cardinal Coscia, who had abused the power which he held under that pope, had taken shelter at Cisterna, with the Prince of Caserta. The Sacred College sent His Eminence a safe-conduct to enable him to attend the conclave. Scarcely was Clement XII elected when Coscia was deprived of all right of choosing or being chosen in the congregations. Some other members of the court of Benedict were also called to account for their frauds upon the kindliness of Benedict–that pontiff whose excessive good nature was only too well known and too much practised upon. For this trial the pope named a congregation of six cardinals, and gave to it the most ample powers to proceed against the actors in the offence against the most delicate and the most revered of laws. Coscia received an order not to leave the pontifical territory, and he was at the same time notified that he was not to exercise in any manner the archiepiscopal ministry in his diocese of Benevento.

Coscia having refused to renounce that authority, his trial proceeded before the congregation Nonnullis. The government at the same time deemed it necessary to order the arrest of Monsignor Coscia, Bishop of Targa, brother of the cardinal, and several cardinals and other Beneventians who had offended under the former reign.

Cardinal Coscia was condemned to restore to the treasury the sum of two hundred thousand crowns, which he had improperly received in contempt of the Gregorian and Innocentian laws—De Datis and De Acceptis. He solicited from Clement the favor of not being confined in the Castle of Sant' Angelo, which the pontiff generously granted. Cardinal Coscia then begged Cardinal Cienfuegos, minister of the emperor, to give him a passport, and he fled from Rome to Naples, disguised successively as an ecclesiastic, a monk, and a layman. An interdict was the punishment of his disobedience, and all his personal property was sold for the benefit of that apostolic chamber which he had so much plundered.

The pope having subsequently threatened Coscia with excommunication and deprivation of the purple, should he not at once return to Rome, he came back in 1732, and was then confined in the monastery of Saint Praxedes.

Lotteries originated at Genoa, and made their way to many other countries. Innocent XIII had permitted them in the Ecclesiastical States; but Benedict XIII, by his constitution of the 12th of August, 1727, had strictly forbidden them. Clement XII, considering the great amount of money that left Rome for Genoa, allowed the establishment of a lottery, in spite of the dissenting representations of the cardinals; and, in fact, very considerable returns of money accrued. The Papal States drew a considerable revenue from a tax equally objectionable and contrary to sound rules.

Meantime the Corsicans revolted against the government of the republic of Genoa. In order to maintain themselves in their new situation, they sent to Rome, as their agent Paul Orticoni, to invite the pope to take the government the island.

Notwithstanding the titles which so completely justify the offer made by the Corsicans to Pope Clement XII, that pontiff, instead of accepting, thought it more fitting to present himself as a mediator between the disputants. He sent a brief to the Archbishop of Genoa, Nicholas Franchi, whom he directed to communicate the desire of His Holiness to the senate; but the senators repulsed the proposal. The pontiff, who assuredly merited a better reception, manifested his grief.

On the 15th of July, 1731, De Vintimille, Archbishop of Paris, after informing Rome of what had taken place under his own eyes, published a pastoral on a miracle attributed to the intercession of Deacon Paris.

Francis de Paris, deacon of the diocese of Paris, who died on the 1st of May, 1727, had always lived in obscurity, and even, as it was said, in the austerities of penance. He was buried in the little cemetery of the parish of Saint Medard, where, by degrees, his tomb became the meeting-place of a credulous crowd. The attraction of novelty and the success of interested views drew to that cemetery a multitude who, from those motives, were led to believe, upon the slightest possible evidence, whatever was told to them.

One of the first of the alleged miracles was wrought, it is said, on a girl named Lefranc. If we believe the published account, nothing could exceed the frightful state to which he was reduced. Great oppression, a general swelling, spiting of blood, raging fever, total prostration, loss of sleep and of sight, all this disappeared instantly at the tomb of Deacon Paris. Certificates of one hundred and twenty witnesses attested the fact. Who would not deem so well attested a miracle beyond dispute? Yet truth soon dawned. he Archbishop of Paris ordered an official investigation. Forty witnesses were examined, among whom were the mother, brother, and sister of Anne Lefranc, and the surgeons who had attended her. Her disease was not beyond remedy. In fact, the Lefranc family disavowed the miracle and contradicted the alleged facts.

The fraud being discovered at Paris, the Jansenists of Holland endeavored to create a sensation in their favor by some very striking event; and a girl of Amsterdam was cured by kissing the rochet of Barchman, Archbishop of Utrecht, who drew up an official act of this wonder wrought by his intercession.

Finally the Archbishop of Paris published a wise and prudent criticism, followed by a formal ordinance, which first annihilated the prodigies which had been maintained by many rectors; then passed to some other pretended miracles, whose falsehood he demonstrated; denounced the ignomininous pretences of the convulsionists; and ended by declaring the statements destitute of proof and unworthy of belief, and by forbidding the publication of those and other miracles attributed to Deacon Paris.

Unfortunately, two bishops, De Colbert and De Caylus,, partook of those errors. Their writings, condemned at Rome and suppressed by the king's council, were refuted by some of their colleagues.

In 1734 it was made known to Rome that thirty missionaries had been expelled from China. The new emperor withheld from the Catholic religion the protection accorded by his father, the late emperor. Priests had been arrested in various provinces and sent to Canton for not being provided with the imperial patent. They were continually threatened with expulsion from China itself, but the pruder measures taken by the Jesuits at Peking for some time prevented that extreme measure. On the 18th of August the missionaries were ordered to leave Canton and retire to Macao, their protests and entreaties being alike disregarded. They were embarked on the 20th of August on board small craft. One of them died on the passage. Fifty Christians, who had followed the missionaries to Macao, were seized on their arrival by the mandarins, loaded with chains, taken back to Canton, where twelve of them were condemned to be bastinadoed and the rest imprisoned. The residence of the missionaries at Macao still gave offence to the pagans, who feared lest those strangers should find means to return into China. The mandarins, therefore, sent orders that the missionaries should as quickly as possible be sent back to Europe; and even the Jesuits, who resided at Peking as scientific men, were threatened with expulsion. The observatory and other scientific establishments were superintended by Jesuit Fathers, who were not considered as missionaries. In some provinces the Christians were rigorously pursued; in Fu-kien many were fined, imprisoned, whipped, or banished, two missionaries were arrested, and a learned Christian was condemned to death.

At the commencement of the year 1732 the Holy Father redoubled his efforts for the benefit of the Catholic religion. On the 21st of January an edict promised pardon to religious who had abandoned their duties, if within a certain time they returned to the bosom of the faith. The pope, aware that many Protestants in Germany clung to their errors only from views of personal interest, published a bull in which he granted them the peaceful possession of their ecclesiastical benefices, provided they recognized the Catholic faith. That paternal foresight brought back many wanderers, and then that important matter was regulated still better.

On the 31st of the same month the pope approved the constitutions of the Maronite monks of Saint Anthony the abbot, these religious having been called to Rome. Those Maronites have been learned and courageous defenders of the Church; and Rome, in turn, has never ceased to feel a deep interest for those sons of Lebanon.

About the middle of June a patrol of soldiers was going its rounds in the neighborhood of the Venetian palace. Some Dalmatian servants of the ambassador endeavored to prevent the soldiers passing. A tumult ensued in which one soldier and three Dalmatians were killed. The news of that event reached Venice, when the senate recalled the ambassa dor, Zachary Canalis, and dismissed from Venice the pontifical nuncio, Gaetano Stampa, who was not to return until Rome should grant that satisfaction which Venice imperiously demanded. The French ambassador, the Duke of Saint Aignan, interposed to restore concord; and Clement ordered an inquiry for the purpose of ascertaining the exact state of the facts. The inquiry proved that justice was on the Roman side. The pope therefore constantly refused to listen to any demand made by Venice, maintaining that the soldiers were justified in defending themselves, and had only done so when attacked and one of their number killed. The pope also required that his nuncio should return to Venice and be received with all due honors, which was done after some negotiating on the part of Cardinal Quirini. The affair being thus amicably arranged, Clement turned his attention to other labors, and to the care of his health, which at that time caused serious anxiety.

The pope at this time thought it necessary to add to the regulations that had already been made with respect to the conclaves, and deliberately considered that important question. He prescribed to the cardinal electors the utmost temperance, and he put an end to some abuses in introducing the dinners which were sent from the palaces of the cardinals in the most luxurious style and with a needlessly large attendance. The pope strictly limited the number of servants waiting upon the members of the conclave. He gave the majordomo authority over those servants; fixed the salary to be paid for all servants, and declared how they should be occupied during the vacancy of the Holy See; finally, he set limits to the authority of the Camerlinga.

Tibet sent to Rome to ask for missionaries. The Holy Father despatched thither some Capuchins, who zealously fulfilled the wishes of the pope, and revived in that country the veneration it had formerly felt for the Roman court.

In the Oriental missions of the Propaganda, also, some very precious fruit was gathered. Ten thousand Copts were converted, led by the Patriarch of Alexandria, who had always resisted the efforts and entreaties of previous pontiffs. At this same time the patriarch of the Armenians erased the sacred diptychs the impious anathema against the Council of Chalcedon and against the holy pontiff Leo the Great.

Clement XII, after some exertion, induced the Benedictines of Saint Maur, in France, so celebrated for the works of great learning that they have published, and who till then had opposed the bull Unigenitus of Clement XI, to receive the formulary in their chapter celebrated in the month of September of that year.

The pope was greatly rejoiced in 1733 by seeing at his feet Muley Abd-er-Rahman, nephew of the King of Morocco, who had come to Rome to abjure the errors of Mahometanism and embrace the Catholic faith. This Turkish prince sought instruction, studied with great zeal, and was solemnly baptized at Saint Peter's by Cardinal Guadagni, vicar of Rome, under the name of Lorenzo Bartolomeo. The godfather was the pope, in whose name His Holiness's nephew, Bartolomeo Corsini, acted as his sponsor at the baptismal font. Lorenzo Bartolomeo died piously at Rome, and was buried in the Church of Saint Andrew delle Frate, where his tomb is still to be seen.

The death of Frederic Augustus II, King of Poland, which happened on the 1st of February, 1733, rekindled war in Europe. A successor was to be given to the deceased king, and Louis XV thought it a good opportunity to restore to that throne his father-in-law, Stanislas Leczinski, who had been violently driven from it after receiving it from the favor of Charles XII, King of Sweden, on the 12th of July, 1704. While France favored Stanislas, the Emperor Charles objected to the approach to the throne of a prince who was father-in-law to King Louis, and declared in favor of Frederic Augustus, who was son of the deceased King of Poland, and who, moreover, was supported by a strong Muscovite army.

Notwithstanding such resistance, Stanislas was elected almost unanimously on the 12th of September, 1733. Pope Clement, being informed of that choice, recognized Stanislas as King of Poland, and ordered his nuncio to pay the due honors to that prince.

Clement had not long the pleasure of seeing Stanislas master of Warsaw: the united forces of the emperor and of Russia maintained the election of Augustus III, Duke of Saxony, made on the 5th of October. Stanislas, who was in Prussia, abandoned the Polish crown to his rival, and was recompensed in 1736 by the possession of the duchy of Lorraine and Bar.

The emperor still maintained his claim to the kingdom of Naples, and held some places, as well as the whole island of Sicily. He ordered the prince of Santa Croce (Scipio Pub licola) to present to the pope the palfrey, together with the tribute for the fief. At the same time Duke Cesarini, on the part of the infante, Don Carlos of Spain (afterwards Charles III), presented the same tribute. The pope was obliged to offend one of the parties, and could descend to no duplicity. To be the better guided, he submitted the question to a congregation of cardinals, and by their advice accepted the offer of the emperor, and refused that of the infante Don Carlos. because he was not in possession of the whole kingdom and had not received investiture from the Holy See. The court of Spain complained of that decision, and asked Clement why he so long postponed the time for giving that investiture. Clement replied that Spain was guilty of a flagrant usurpation of the States of Parma and Piacenza, belonging by ancient right to the Holy See, on the extinction or male line of the Farnese.

Meantime fortune was favorable to the Spanish arms, Sicily fell, and Charles was crowned at Palermo, and, proceeding to Naples, was there proclaimed sovereign of whole kingdom. Nothing was here wanting to him but intervention by the pope, who had the right of investiture. Clement consulted another council of twelve cardinals, who unanimously decided that the tribute ought not to be accepted from either of the princes till the close of the war. Clement followed the advice and preserved a scrupulous neutrality.

On the 10th of June, 1734, the Parliament of Paris condemned the "Lettres Philosophiques" of Voltaire. Ill-treated by a man of rank, Voltaire challenged him, but by his adversary's court influence was obliged to conceal himself. In 1726 he went to England, carrying with him a deep and bitter feeling of resentment. In that disposition he became the impassioned admirer of the government, laws, and customs of that foreign nation. The liberty which so abounded there upon all subjects was flattering to his mind, and the progress already made there in deism strengthened his inclination towards religious indifference. There, too, he met with Collins, Tindal, Wollaston, Chubb, and other English writers who at that time more or less boldly sought to sap the foundation of Christianity. It was in England that Voltaire put to press his Philosophic Letters, or Letters upon the English, which now, under various titles, are merged in the Philosophic Dictionary. He endeavored but too successfully to transplant to France English deistical teaching. His letters touch upon everything—theology, metaphysics, history, literature, science, morals, and manners. Light in style, but at the same time very decided in tone, this work, by its jests and epigrams, might seduce a frivolous reader, but could not satisfy one who demands argument and proof.

The Parliament also condemned a work called "Consultation upon the Jurisdiction and Approbation which are Necessary for Confession." Travers, the author of that work, prided himself on being an appellant. His object was to establish that any priest not approved by any bishop could properly and often lawfully absolve any penitent. He confessed that his views were opposed to the universal and uniform practice of the Church, but that did not alarm him. Unsound, in his opinion, was the decision of the Council of Trent that the absolution given by a priest to a penitent over whom he had no jurisdiction, ordinary or delegated, is an absolution without weight. Travers absurdly maintains that the decree applied solely to priests then in function, and that literally construed it subjects only the regulars to the approbation of the bishop. With such views all objections are easily got rid of. Such was the work condemned by the Sorbonne and the archbishops of Sens and Embrun.

On the 17th of May, 1735, Julian de Lezardi, a Spanish Jesuit, was massacred by the Chiriguanos, a South American tribe of Indians. He was shot to death with arrows, as was also an Indian catechist named Bonaventure, who accompanied the Father. Father Lezardi had travelled during many years in the missions in Paraguay. His body was recovered and honorably buried in the town of Tarija.

On the 18th of January, 1735, Rome lost that distinguished model of piety, Queen Mary Clementina, daughter of James J Sobieski, prince royal of Poland, and granddaughter of the great King John Sobieski, conqueror of the Turks under the walls of Vienna, and wife of James III, King of England. She died sixteen years after her marriage. Clement never ceased to give proofs of his affection for the house of Stuart, which merited that favor, having sacrificed a crown rather than be untrue to the Catholic religion.

On the 30th of September, 1736, the Maronites in Syria opened a provincial council. That people has preserved the Roman faith intact, in spite of the progress around them of heresy and Mahometanism. They have long been distinguished for their ardent attachment to Catholicism. Simple and poor, they are governed by a patriarch and bishops—the latter, however, in the language of the country, being called archbishops. The dioceses of those prelates are as limited as their revenues. They have under them, as their assistants, priests of the country, and some missionaries sent from the West, who are to be found all over the country, striving to bring schismatics back to the Church. Louis XV had especially favored those establishments, and had exerted his credit at the Ottoman court to obtain increased favor for those missionaries.

To return to the Maronites. Some abuses which had crept into their discipline attracted the attention of the Holy See. Clement, according to their own wishes, sent to them, in quality of ablegate, the prelate Assemani, who was born in that country, and is known by his vast knowledge and by his learned works. He was to induce the archbishops to assemble in council, and concert proper measures to put an end to the abuses complained of. After some delays they did so assemble, and the council held its first session on the 30th of September, 1736.

Joseph Peter Gazeno, the Maronite Patriarch of Antioch, presided. The prelate Assemani subsequently sat with fourteen Maronite archbishops, two Syrians, two Armenians, several abbots of various monasteries, apostolic missionaries, and many rectors and priests of Lebanon. One of the missionaries delivered the opening discourse, and specified the objects that were to be treated in the assembly.

A letter from the sovereign pontiff was read aloud, and the things to be reformed were then agreed upon, and discussed and considered during six successive days. On the 13th of October, in the evening, everything was settled; and the eighth session was closed amidst acclamations of thanksgiving.

The learned ablegate was charged with the drawing up of the acts and regulations of the council, which were to be sent to Rome. Benedict XIV confirmed the decrees of that assembly on the 1st of September, 1741, and subsequently appointed a new ablegate to put them in execution. He compensated the patriarch for some revenues of which those decrees deprived him, and continued to procure, as his predecessors had done, both spiritual and temporal advantages to that faithful and docile people.

In 1737 Clement canonized four saints, two of whom were French. Saint Vincent de Paul, founder of the Priests of the Mission and of the Sisters of Charity, was for forty years director of the nuns of the Visitation, selected for that duty by Saint Francis de Sales. Saint Vincent died in the house of Saint Lazarus, at Paris, on the 27th of September, 1660, at the age of eighty-five years. The Parliament, by sentence, forbade the reception of the bull published by Clement XII for the canonization of that saint. The plea of the Parliament was that the bull was contrary to the liberties of the Gallican Church. It is certain that in that bull the saint was praised for having induced eighty-five French bishops to ask from the sovereign pontiff the condemnation of the five propositions of Jansenius. Further, in the same bull the miracles attributed to Paris are combated. Those were the real reasons which induced the Parliament to give that sentence which the sovereign pontiff condemned and which Cardinal de Fleury caused to be revoked.

The second French saint canonized on that occasion was Saint John Francis Regis, of the Society of Jesus. He took the Jesuit habit at Toulouse on the 8th of September, 1616. His cause had been introduced on the 25th of January, 1698. Clement XI announced that the virtues of Regis had been of the heroic order, and on the 26th of May, 1716, declared him Blessed. Benedict XIII ordered, by decree, that the feast of this saint should no longer be celebrated on the 24th of May, as had been ordered by Clement XII, but on the 16th of June, the anniversary of his canonization.

Peace having been concluded between the emperor and the Spaniards, Clement gave the investiture of the kingdom of the Two Sicilies and of the kingdom of Jerusalem to Charles of Bourbon and his descendants in the direct line, under the obligation solemnly to pay, on Saint Peter's eve every year, as an acknowledgment of the sovereign domain in the Holy See, seven thousand golden ducats and a palfrey richly caparisoned. After that investiture, the nuncio, who had retired to Nola, returned to Naples, and the constable Colonna solemnly presented to the pope the tribute agreed upon, in the usual forms and amounts.

Subsequently, on the marriage of the new King of Naples with Mary Amelia, daughter of Augustus III, King of Poland, the Holy Father sent to the frontier of the Ecclesiastical State, to meet and receive that princess, Monsignor Chigi, with the title of nuncio extraordinary, and that prelate accompanied the princess to the frontiers of Naples.

On the occasion of that marriage King Charles instituted the order of Saint Januarius, which was confirmed by a bull of Clement XII and by another bull of Clement XIV.

Clement deemed it his duty to denounce the Freemasons, who had sprung up in England, under the penalty of excommunication. The bull of condemnation, In eminenti, dated 28th of April, 1737 was renewed on the 14th of January in the following year.

Four leagues from Rimini, and five from Urbino, is the little town of San Marino, which from an early date had subsisted as a republic. Every half-year it elected a captain and the few officers necessary to dispense justice and to receive and expend the small revenue, consisting of taxes upon wine and grain, and a much-frequented cattle-market. Besides the town, the State comprised several small villages.

In former times the republic had been under the protection of the dukes of Urbino; but the ducal house becoming extinct in the seventeenth century, the republic placed itself the protection of the Holy See, who maintained over it a kind of sovereignty. Some of the inhabitants, weary of the tyrannies of their chiefs, applied to Pope Clement, soliciting him to give them the mild government of the Roman Church. They received no reply. They then sent other supplications through Cardinal Alberoni, then legate in Romagna. The Holy Father being warmly urged for a reply, through his secretary of state, directed Cardinal Alberoni to proceed to the frontier of San Marino, and hear all who came to ratify their supplications; then, should it appear that a majority of the inhabitants desired to be in subjection to Rome, the cardinal was to enter San Marino and take possession in the name of the Holy See; otherwise the cardinal was immediately to return to Piacenza. The fiery Alberoni, without waiting for any demonstration of the consent of the people, as the pope ordered, entered San Marino, and took possession on the 5th of October, 1739, placed a governor and prescribed various laws for the government of the country, in spite of the refusal of many of the citizens to take the oath.

Alberoni subsequently committed acts of violence. The people of San Marino complained. The pope knew that Alberoni had disobeyed the orders transmitted by Cardinal Firrao, secretary of state; and as Clement had no design of usurpation, he in good faith condemned the conduct of his legate.

However, some of the people of San Marino persisted in their desire to be subject to the government of Rome; so the Holy Father sent to San Marino the governor of Macerata, Monsignor Enrique Enriquez, to receive the free votes of the people, and to annul any previous acts contrary to the commands of the popes. The commissioner ascertained that the free will of the council, of the city, of the clergy, and of the chief men in the little community, at least for the most part, was in favor of their former liberty; and he restored to that city all the rights and privileges that had been given and confirmed to them by the pontiffs Martin V, Eugene IV, Clement VIII, and Leo X. Clement XII confirmed the resolution of Monsignor Enriquez upon all these points. Hence resulted a glory of no uncommon kind for the pope, and a character of levity and disobedience for Cardinal Alberoni. The latter replied by a manifesto which the Roman court could not possibly approve, as it attacked the ministry of Rome by publishing letters written by the secretary of state.

In 1740, after naming new cardinals, the pope, having recovered from a violent attack of gout, returned to his ordinary routine of pastoral cares. In the month of January he permitted the Most Christian King to nominate to the vacant benefices in the duchies of Lorraine and Bar, as Alexander VII, by a brief of the 11th of December, 1664, had granted to Louis XIV the same faculty for the bishoprics of Metz, Toul, and Verdun, and Clement IX, on the 23d of March, 1668, the benefices of those same bishoprics.

The pope granted to the republic of Genoa the right to extend to the kingdom of Corsica, to the mainland, and to the island of Capua, the laws which the Genoese senate ha passed against homicides.

On the 21st of March, 1732, he approved the rules of the Maronite monks of Saint Anthony, of the congregation of Saint Eliseus; and in January, 1740, he approved the rules of the congregation of Saint Isaiah, in the same order.

At this time Clement condemned Fra Paolo Sarpi's History of the Council of Trent, translated into French, with notes by Courayer.

At the end of the previous year the Holy Father was informed that the University of Paris had received the bull Unigenitus as the dogmatic judgment of the Universal Church, and as a law of the kingdom, and confessed that there was error in opposing it. The pontiff, greatly rejoiced, bestowed much praise upon the rector of the university.

On the 27th of January the pontiff's sufferings from gout became more violent than ever, and it was evident that he could not long bear up under such agony. He asked for the Viaticum, and on the following day for extreme unction. He was unmoved amid the tears of all present. The generals of the various orders, who, according to custom, surrounded him, with Cardinal Petra, penitentiary major, and Father Ridolfi, master of the sacred palace, admired the resignation and the firmness of the patient.

Father Barberini, general of the Capuchins, having reminded the pope that he, perhaps, had to repent of some fault committed in the exercise of his ministry, Clement replied that he had no fault of that kind, because he remembered that he had always endeavored to administer to the best of his ability. "But, Holy Father," replied Barberini, "a pontiff may have some omissions to repent of." "No," replied Clement; "neither on that point do we feel any remorse of conscience."

On the 6th of February, 1740, he ceased to live, nearly eighty-eight years of age, and after governing the Church nine years, six months, and twenty-five days.

During the last eight years of his life he had been almost totally blind, but still rigid with delinquents, very just yet very stern, ever ready to give audience, liberal to the poor, courteous to the humble, and better pleased to hear of self-reform than to be under the necessity of ordering chastisement. Such is the justice that was done to him in the inscription placed upon his catafalque.

He was interred at the Vatican, but only provisionally; being finally removed into the porphyry mausoleum that had been prepared for him during his lifetime.

Clement was of ordinary stature and robust temperament; his features were noble, and the expression of his countenance was agreeable and prepossessing; his complexion was ruddy; his eyes blue, his nose aquiline, and his upper lip prominent. The qualities of heart which distinguished him in life he preserved to the day of his death.

Attaining his throne without losing aught of the caressing familiarity which distinguished him, he named Monday in every week as his day for giving audience. No one had to go away without seeing the pope, or unheard. He also gave audiences on other days when he could escape business earlier than usual. When a petition was just he could not refuse a favor, and petitions often seemed to him to be just; and when he said, "E giusto"—"It is just"—it was settled. He was very liberal with all, but especially so with men of letters and the people under his administration. He gave great attention to the production of silk, a taste worthy of a Florentine. He munificently supplied the constantly recurring needs of the Propaganda. He built a fine library in the convent of Aracceli. The Castle of Sant' Angelo, often ill supplied with wholesome water, he supplied abundantly from the Vatican. He laid the first stone of the facade of Saint John Lateran.

This basilica is the principal church of the Catholic world — "ecclesiarum urbis et orbis, mater et caput." Accordingly, it is the see of the sovereign pontiff, who, after his exaltation, takes possession of it in his capacity of sovereign pontiff. At first it was called the Constantinian Basilica, because it was founded by Constantine the Great. It is described under that name in the regionaries before the seventh century. Anastasius the Librarian gave it the name of Lateranensis, because it was built on the ruins of the palace of the noble house of the Laterani. It was called the Basilica of our Savior after its dedication by Pope Saint Sylvester; Basilica Aurea, from the previous gifts with which it was enriched; and the Basilica of Saint John, because it was dedicated to Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist.

Constantine the Great erected this basilica in the year 324, in the midst of his palace, which, enlarged by new buildings, was granted with the church to the holy pontiff. The popes inhabited that palace up to the time of their going to Avignon. When Gregory XI removed the Holy See back to Rome, the papal residence was fixed at the Vatican.

In 1308, while Clement V resided in Provence, the roofing of the basilica, the sacred vestments, the residence of the canons, the porches, and the whole of the palace, except the chapel known as the Sancta Sanctorum, having been destroyed by fire, that pope, deeming himself exempted from none of his duties towards his capital, sent agents provided with large sums of money, who repaired and sumptuously restored the buildings which the fire had damaged or destroyed.

Gregory XI opened the door of the lateral nave, and Martin V caused the facade to be added. Eugene IV, and afterwards Clement VII, furnished it with elegant ornamentation. To the latter it owes the fine gilt fretwork. He at the same time erected the side facade which was destroyed, and added the two belfries. Sixtus V adorned that facade with a double portico, after the designs of his favorite architect, Fontana. Clement VIII, in the year 1600, restored the upper nave with the aid of James della Porta; and Innocent X, in the year of jubilee, 1650, put the great nave in its present state by the advice of Barromini.

It was on that same occasion the discovery was made that the old walls had no foundations. Moreover, deep quarries were found from which pozzuolana had been taken. Those quarries prove that the site of Saint John Lateran was beyond the inclosure of Servius. Clement XI perfected that nave and rendered it singularly majestic. Finally, Clement XII made the principal facade, after the designs of Alexander Galilei, of the family of the great mathematician. It is one of the most remarkable and magnificent in Rome. Galilei adorned it with four columns and six pilasters of the Composite order, terminating with eleven statues. The arch of the balcony, from which the pope gives the blessing, rests upon four columns of granite; the lower porch is supported by twenty-six pillars, also of the Composite order. In the distance is seen the statue of Constantine. That emperor is represented there in the very centre of the gifts with which he enriched the city of Rome. The bas-reliefs at the bottom of the gates were executed by Bernardine Ludovisi, Maini, and Pietro Bracci. The great bronze gate is from the Church of Saint Adrian at the Roman Forum. It is the only specimen of the four-leaved gates which has come down to us from the ancients. It was enlarged to adapt it to the entrance to which it was destined. The other gate that is closed is only opened in the great years of the jubilee, whence its name of the Holy Gate. The honor of opening that gate is almost always reserved for the dean of the Sacred College. The glasses of the five windows of the facade have the arms of the Corsini, above which triumphs the rose. Those same arms, more largely sculptured, are seen beneath the pedestal of the statue of our Saviour. Beneath that novel ornament are the following words, in very distinct characters: "Clem. XII, anno III Christo Salvatori et Joanni Baptist extr."

In 1734 he constructed the magnificent palace of Monte Cavallo. To favor the studies of scholars, painters, and sculptors, he placed in the Capitol a fine collection of ancient statues, busts, sarcophagi, and inscriptions, acquired in part from Cardinal Alexander Albani. He set apart an edifice in the Capitol for the study of architecture. He erected a new facade to the church of the Florentines. He paved many of the streets of Rome, and restored the consular ways leading to that city, which ways had for a long time been abandoned. He embellished the delightful and imposing fountain of Trevi. The street of the Corso was made straight and rendered the finest in the capital.

This biographical data is from "The Lives and Times of the Popes" by The Chevalier Artaud De Montor. Published by The Catholic Publication Society of New York in ten volumes in 1911. The pictures, included in the volumes, were reproduced from " Effigies Pontificum Romanorum Dominici Basae."