PART I.

In Celestine's place was chosen Benedict Gaetani, who, although even older than the worn-out and doting late pope, was still full of strength, both in body and in mind. Benedict (who took the name of Boniface VIII.) is said to have been very learned, especially in matters of law; but his pride and ambition led him into attempts which ended in his own ruin, and did serious harm to the papacy.

In the year 1300 Boniface set on foot what was called the Jubilee. You will remember the Jubilee which God in the Law of Moses commanded the Israelites to keep (Leviticus xxv.). But this new Jubilee had nothing to do with the law of Moses, and was more like some games which were celebrated every hundredth year by the ancient Romans. Nothing of the sort had ever before been known among Christians; but when the end of the thirteenth century was at hand, it was found that people's minds were full of a fancy that the year 1300 ought to be a time of some great celebration. Nay, they were even made to believe that such a way of keeping every hundredth year had been usual from the beginning of the Church, although (as I have said) there was no ground whatever for this notion; and one or two lying old men were brought forward to pretend that when children they had attended a former jubilee a hundred years before!

How the expectation of the jubilee was got up we do not know. Most likely Boniface had something to do with it; at all events, he took it up and reaped the profits of it. He sent forth letters offering extraordinary spiritual benefits to all who should visit Rome and the tombs of St. Peter and St. Paul during the coming year; and immense numbers of people flocked together from all parts of Europe. It is said that all through the year there were two hundred thousand strangers in Rome; for as some went away, others came to fill up their places. The crowd is described to us as if, in the streets and on the bridge leading to the great church of St. Peter's, an army were marching each way.

It is said that Boniface appeared one day in the robes of a pope, and next day in those of an emperor, with a sword in his hand, and that he declared to some ambassadors that he was both pope and emperor. And after all this display of his pride and grandeur, he found himself much enriched by the offerings which the pilgrims had made; for these were so large, that in one church alone (as we are told) two of the clergy were employed day and night in gathering them in with long rakes. If this be anything like the truth, the whole amount collected from the pilgrims at the jubilee must have been very large indeed.