necessarily the Pope, already like other bishops a functionary charged
with important secular duties, took upon himself the protection and
government of Rome and the surrounding duchy, when the rulers of
Byzantium shook off these unprofitable responsibilities. Naturally and
excusably he claimed, over his vast Italian estates, the powers of
jurisdiction which every landowner was assuming as a measure of
self-defence against oppression or unbridled anarchy. In the time of
Pepin the Short a further step was taken. The Frank, unwilling to
involve himself in Italy yet anxious to secure the Holy See against the
Lombards, recognized Pope Stephen II as the lawful heir of the derelict
imperial possessions. And Charles the Great, both as King and as
Emperor, confirmed the donation of his father. To make the Pope an
independent sovereign was indeed a policy which he refused to entertain.
His ideal was that of the Eastern Emperors: himself as the head of State
and Church, the Pope as the Patriarch of all the churches in the Empire,
elected with the Emperor's approval, ruling the clergy with the
Emperor's counsel, enjoying over the lands of his see the largest
privileges bestowed on any bishop, but still in all secular affairs a
subject of the Empire. But on the other hand arose at Rome a different
conception of the Pope's prerogative. Long ago Pope Gelasius had
formulated the principle, more useful to his remote successors than
himself, of the Two Powers, Church and State, both derived from God and
both entitled to absolute power in their respective spheres. On this
principle the State should not interfere with episcopal elections, or
with matters of faith and discipline; it should not exercise
jurisdiction over the priesthood who are servants of the Church, or over
Church estates since they are held in trust for God and the poor. This
view was proclaimed to the world by Leo III, who caused to be set up in
the Lateran a mosaic representing in an allegory his relations to the
Empire. St. Peter sits enthroned above; Charles and Leo kneel to right