d perfidy, so are the same power and
royal authority granted to Rodolph for his humility, his submission, and
his merits."

The envoys of Rodolph hastened back to Saxony, bearing him the Papal
confirmation of his election and the benediction so fervently
pronounced. The king and his army were inspired with the most lively joy
and confidence. Those who before had dreaded the result, no longer
doubted, but deemed the agony of the empire already ended. Mass was
celebrated amid universal rejoicings, and Saxon and Suabian forgot the
desolation of their homes in this presage of victory and peace. The camp
of Henry presented another scene. The excommunicated king abandoned
himself to the most violent transports of fury. He swore the destruction
of the daring Pontiff and the usurper who now went forth as the chosen
champion of the Holy See. He assembled at Mayence thirty bishops and a
proud array of princes and barons.

Here again was acted the solemn farce of the conventicle of Brixen. A
decree was prepared and published, asserting that it was necessary to
cut off from the communion of the faithful, a priest who had been rash
enough to deprive the august person of majesty of all participation in
the government of the Church, and to strike him with anathema. "He is
not the elect of God," runs the instrument, "but owes his elevation to
his own unblushing fraud and corruption. He has ruined the Church--he
has distracted the State; he has embittered the life of a _pious and
peaceful_ monarch, upheld a perjured rebel, and scattered everywhere
discord, jealousy, and adultery. For this, here in final council at
Mayence, we have resolved to depose, expel, and, if he disobey our
command, to doom to eternal condemnation a monster who preaches the
pillaging of churches and assassination, who abets perjury and homicide,
who denies the Catholic and Apostolic faith concerning the Body and
Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ--this accursed Hildebrand, this ancient
ally of the heretic Berengarius, this conjurer and magician, this
necromancer, this monk possessed by a devil, this vile apostate from the
faith of our fathers."

After this violent invective had been launched, Guibert of Ravenna was
unanimously elected anti-pope, under the name of Clement III. Henry next
addressed himself to win the support of England; but Cardinal Lanfranc
condemned his precipitation, and refused to unite in these insults and
outrages.

The brief respite from arm