hrone.[52]

[Sidenote: The Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges.]

The Pragmatic Sanction, as it is often called by way of pre-eminence, is
the magna charta of the liberties of the Gallican Church. Founded upon
the results of the discussions of the Council of Basle, it probably
embodies all the reformatory measures which the hierarchy of France was
desirous of effecting or willing to accept. How far these were from
administering the needed antidote to the poison which was at work and
threatened to destroy all true religious life--if, indeed, that life was
not already too near extinction--may readily be understood when it is
discovered that, with the exception of a few paragraphs relating to
ecclesiastical discipline and worship, the following comprise all the
important provisions:

The Pragmatic Sanction establishes the obligation of the Pope to convene
a general council of the church at least every ten years. The decisions
of the Council of Basle are declared to be of perpetual force. Far from
deriving its authority from the Holy See, the Oecumenical Council, it
is affirmed, depends immediately upon Christ, and the Pope is no less
bound than all other Christians to render due obedience to its
decisions. The right of appeal from the Pope to the future council--a
claim obnoxious in the last degree to the advocates of papal
supremacy--is distinctly asserted. The Pope is declared incapable of
appointing to any high ecclesiastical dignities, save in a few specified
cases; in all others recourse is to be had to election. The pontiff's
pretensions to confer minor benefices are equally rejected. No abuse is
more sharply rebuked and forbidden than that of _expectatives_--a
species of appointment in high favor with the papal chancery, whereby a
successor to ecclesiastical dignities was nominated during the lifetime
of the incumbent, and in view of his decease.

The Pragmatic Sanction restricts the troublesome and costly appeals to
Rome to cases of great importance, when the parties in interest reside
at a distance of more than four days' journey from that city. At the
same time it prescribes that no one shall be vexed by such appeals after
having enjoyed actual possession of his rank for three years. Going
beyond the limits of the kingdom, it enters into the constitution of the
"Sacred College," and fixes the number of the cardinals at twenty-four,
while placing the minimum age of candidates for the hat at thirty
years. The exactio