_AN HISTORICAL ESSAY ON THEIR TEMPORAL DOMINION, AND THE ABUSE OF THEIR SPIRITUAL AUTHORITY_
TRANSLATORS PREFACE ADVERTISEMENT TO THE THIRD EDITION, ORIGINAL CHAPTER I. ORIGIN OF THE TEMPORAL POWER OF THE POPES CHAPTER II. ENTERPRIZES OF THE POPES OF THE NINTH CENTURY CHAPTER III. TENTH CENTURY CHAPTER IV. ENTERPRISES OF THE POPES OF THE ELEVENTH CENTURY CHAPTER V. CONTESTS BETWEEN THE POPES AND THE SOVEREIGNS OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY CHAPTER VI. POWER OF THE POPES OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY CHAPTER VII. FOURTEENTH CENTURY CHAPTER VIII. FIFTEENTH CENTURY CHAPTER IX. POLICY OF THE POPES OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY CHAPTER X. ATTEMPTS OF THE POPES OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHAPTER XII. RECAPITULATION CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE ENDNOTES AND
TO THE REV. RICHARD T. P. POPE, AT WHOSE SUGGESTION IT WAS UNDERTAKEN, THIS TRANSLATION OF THE PAPAL POWER IS INSCRIBED, AS A SMALL TRIBUTE OF RESPET AND REGARD BY HIS AFFECTIONATE FRIEND, THE TRANSLATOR.
THE Work of which the following is a translation, had its origin in the transactions which took place between Pius VII. and the French Emperor, relative and subsequent to the restoration of the Roman Catholic religion in France. Its object appears to have been, to exhibit to the world the unreasonable pretensions of the Roman Court, and to appeal to public opinion for support in resisting claims deemed incompatible with the independence of the civil power, and derogatory to the honour of the French throne. In pursuance of this object, an investigation was entered into, to ascertain with precision the line of demarcation which separated the recognized authority of the Papal See in France, from the rights appertaining to the civil power, and the indisputable privileges of the French Church. This investigation naturally led the enquiry up to a remote period, and the present work may be considered an epitome of the political history of the Roman Court, and of its relations with the other Courts of Europe, from the period in which its spiritual authority began to merge into temporal power, down to the occasion of the present essay in the pontificate of Pius VII.
In the former period of this enquiry, the pages of early history afforded the materials from which the requisite information was to have been derived. This source was open to all; and the merit of the work is here confined to the discrimination exercised in the selection of the scattered parts, and the judgment with which they may be found combined into an uniform whole.