separates the practicable from the ideal that at Canossa he humiliated
Henry beyond all hope of reconciliation, and he died in exile because
he would not listen to any compromise which might be an acknowledgment
that he had exaggerated his own claims. Thus, despite the undoubted
purity of his life and the ultimate loftiness of his ideals, he is to
be regarded rather as a man of immense force of character than as a
great ecclesiastical statesman, rather as the stirrer-up of divine
discontent than as a creative mind which gives a new turn to the
desires and impulses of the human race.

[Sidenote: His activity in Europe.]

All this is borne out by his dealings outside Germany and Italy. He
conducted a very extensive correspondence with princes as well as
ecclesiastics all over Europe. Indeed this, as much as the despatch of
legates and the annual attendance of bishops at the Lenten Synod, was
one of the means by which the Papacy strove to make itself the central
power of Christendom. These letters deal with all kinds of subjects
and bear ample witness to his personal piety and high moral aims. But
alongside of these come arrogant assertions of papal authority. He
claims as fiefs of St. Peter on various grounds Hungary, Spain,
Denmark, Corsica, Sardinia; he gives the title of King to the Duke of
Dalmatia; he even offers to princes who belong to the Eastern Church a
better title to their possessions as held from St. Peter.

[Sidenote: His policy in France.]

Gregory's great contest with the Empire has been described without
interruption, as if it were the only struggle of his time, instead of
being merely the most important episode in a very busy life. And if we