DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.63447#0090
74
THE HISTORICAL PAST OF ITALY.
believed.” The Eastern Emperor could scarcely have
used a more positive language than this.
On the subject of images, however, Charles went to a
still greater length. Leo IV. the son of Constantine
Copronymus, as zealous as his father for the extirpation
of images, had banished his wife Irene, a beautiful and
ambitious woman, merely because she concealed images
under her pillow. On the death of her husband, however,
when Irene became Regent during the minority of her
son, Constantine Porphyrogenitus, she re-established the
worship to which she clung so firmly. The Second
Council of Nice accordingly decreed that “ an honorary
worship should be accorded to images, whilst a real
adoration should be yielded to God alone.”
The translation of the Acts of this Council, sent to
France by Adrian, were so garbled that the sense of the
article relating to images seemed to run thus : “ I
receive and honour images, according to that adoration
which I pay to the Trinity.”
This was too much for Charles’s patience. Incensed
at such impiety, he composed, with the aid of the clergy,
the so-called “ Caroline Books,” in which the “ Council
of Nice ” is treated with the utmost contempt. He sent
these books to the Pope, requesting him at the same
time to excommunicate the Empress Irene and her
son.
Adrian, however, excused himself from launching
spiritual thunders on the score of image-worship, making
the King at the same time aware of the true bearing of
the misinterpreted passage. But he insinuated he would
condemn the Empress Irene and her son as “ heretics,
unless they would consent to restore certain lands which
belonged to the Church”-—at the same time alluding to
plans which he, the Pontiff, had formed for the “ Exalta-
tion of the Latin Church, and of the Monarchy of
France.” The exaltation of the Monarchy was indeed
nigh ; but Adrian did not live to be the instrument of it.
A high game was now about to be played, in which
the Tiara and the Crown figured together, and thence-
THE HISTORICAL PAST OF ITALY.
believed.” The Eastern Emperor could scarcely have
used a more positive language than this.
On the subject of images, however, Charles went to a
still greater length. Leo IV. the son of Constantine
Copronymus, as zealous as his father for the extirpation
of images, had banished his wife Irene, a beautiful and
ambitious woman, merely because she concealed images
under her pillow. On the death of her husband, however,
when Irene became Regent during the minority of her
son, Constantine Porphyrogenitus, she re-established the
worship to which she clung so firmly. The Second
Council of Nice accordingly decreed that “ an honorary
worship should be accorded to images, whilst a real
adoration should be yielded to God alone.”
The translation of the Acts of this Council, sent to
France by Adrian, were so garbled that the sense of the
article relating to images seemed to run thus : “ I
receive and honour images, according to that adoration
which I pay to the Trinity.”
This was too much for Charles’s patience. Incensed
at such impiety, he composed, with the aid of the clergy,
the so-called “ Caroline Books,” in which the “ Council
of Nice ” is treated with the utmost contempt. He sent
these books to the Pope, requesting him at the same
time to excommunicate the Empress Irene and her
son.
Adrian, however, excused himself from launching
spiritual thunders on the score of image-worship, making
the King at the same time aware of the true bearing of
the misinterpreted passage. But he insinuated he would
condemn the Empress Irene and her son as “ heretics,
unless they would consent to restore certain lands which
belonged to the Church”-—at the same time alluding to
plans which he, the Pontiff, had formed for the “ Exalta-
tion of the Latin Church, and of the Monarchy of
France.” The exaltation of the Monarchy was indeed
nigh ; but Adrian did not live to be the instrument of it.
A high game was now about to be played, in which
the Tiara and the Crown figured together, and thence-