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received great marks of kindness from Berenger, who had even condescended to be godfather to his infant son. Flamberti was insensible to the feelings of affection, or gratitude, and conspired with the Bishop of Milan and others against the king's life. Berenger, receiving private intelligence of the plot, remembered the frank conduct of Luitprand in similar circumstances, and called Flamberti into his presence. He reminded him of the uniform kindness he had shown him, reproved him for his ingratitude, and, presenting him with a golden cup, said "Let this goblet be the pledge of my forgiveness and of your repentance. Take it, and do not forget that he who is your emperor is also the sponsor of your child." He then wished the disconcerted courtier a good evening; and to show him how little he feared treachery, instead of passing that night in his fortified palace, he ordered, in Flamberti's hearing, a bed to be prepared in a small summer-house; where he slept unattended.

Flamberti, instead of being touched by this generous dependence on his honour, was only more eager to execute his design.

On the following morning, he assembled a band of followers, and encountering the emperor on his

"Se Tito augusto hai potuto obbliar, di Tito amico come non ti sovvenne?"-METASTASIO.

way to mass, he ran up to him with open arms, as if to embrace him, and stabbed him to the heart!

Berenger, however, did not fall unavenged: Milo, Count of Verona, rushed to the rescue with his attendants; and though too late to save him, the assassin and his companions were slain on the spot.

The fate of Berenger and of Luitprand afford a singular contrast to each other. Yet the balance is on the side of virtue; for there were two penitent courtiers, and but one Flamberti.

THE POPES.

WHILE the northern division of Italy was governed by kings, Romagna was under the temporal sway of popes, whose spiritual jurisdiction extended far beyond its bounds.

Pope is a corruption of the word papa, signifying father, and was formerly given to all the bishops of the Christian church, until in the eleventh century Gregory the Seventh commanded that it should belong only to the Bishop of Rome.

In the days of the Apostles, when the customs observed among the Christians were plain and simple, certain persons were appointed for the accommodation of different congregations, for the

purpose of giving their time and attention to the concerns of their churches, by public teaching, keeping up order and discipline, visiting the sick, instructing the young, &c. These persons were called bishops, elders, or overseers, and performed their good offices for the love of their religion, without claiming the reputation of any superior holiness or charity. They were assisted in their numerous duties by young men, called deacons ; and by widows and other poor women, deprived of their natural relations, who were willing to nurse the sick, receive strangers, and perform other charitable offices within their ability, in return for a trifling allowance to keep them from want.

The Christians were in those days like one large family. They travelled from place to place, spreading their doctrines, without taking thought "what they should eat or what they should drink,” secure that wherever they found a Christian professor, they should find a hospitable home. They were one large family;-but a family, however affectionate and united in itself, needs a father and a master. It was soon found by the elders of each church, that they should more easily manage their affairs if they appointed one of themselves to superintend the rest. They gave the person thus appointed the title of bishop, which, for distinction's

sake, they laid down themselves, and only reserved the name of presbyters, continuing the same employments as before, under the direction of their head. This bishop had no power or office greater than his brethren, except what they gave him for convenience; neither did he require any. In those virtuous days, each one thought more of what good he might do to others, than what honour or advantage he might secure to himself.

It has been mentioned that the bishops were also known by the name of popes, or fathers. This simple and affectionate title, apparently too humble to awake jealousy and contention, became, as the bishops advanced in power and lost sight of their original simplicity, the subject of violent dispute.

The popes of Rome gradually rose in power from the establishment of Christianity in Italy to the reign of the Emperor Valentinian; when (A.D. 444) they obtained a great triumph over their brethren. Leo, Bishop of Rome, procured a law from the emperor, dictated, many believed, by himself, commanding that, "as the merit of St. Peter, who was the prince of bishops, and the dignity of the city of Rome, had established the supremacy of the apostolical see, nothing should be attempted against its authority; that neither the bishops of Gaul, nor of any other provinces, should do any

thing without the authority of the venerable pope of the eternal city; that whatever he should order should be a law to all others," &c.*

Thus was taken the first decisive step towards the aggrandizement of the popes of Rome, at the expense of their provincial brethren. But at the time this law was made, the eastern empire was under the superintendence of a pope of its own, the Bishop of Constantinople, who claimed equal privileges with the Roman pontiff; nor was it till the end of the eleventh century that Gregory the Seventh decreed that the title of pope should belong solely to the Bishop of Rome, as father of the whole Christian church.

Gregory the Second was the first Pope of Rome who openly renounced his allegiance to the Emperor of the West, and stirred up the citizens of his capital to rise against the government. In the time of his successor, the Roman citizens threw off all subjection to the emperor, formed themselves into a kind of republic, chose their own magistrates, and yielded submission only to the pope.

* Priestley's Church History.

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