llocution. Its peculiar scriptural style (wrongly supposed
to have been invented by the Puritans, who merely learnt it from the old
Roman clergy), as well as the self-conceit, which fancies the fate of the
whole world to depend on the prosperity of a small half-ruined city in
Italy, will be to you sufficient marks of the Roman hand. But you will
be somewhat mistaken. It is hardly an epistle from the successor of St.
Peter. It professes to be an epistle from St. Peter himself, and sent by
him through the hands of Pope Stephen III. to Pepin the king of the
Franks, in the year 755. You will have concluded also from it, that
Catholic Christianity is in its extreme agony; that the worship and name
of our Lord, and the fountains of sacramental grace are about to be
extinguished for ever, and that nothing but heresy or heathendom can
follow. Then you will be quite mistaken. These Lombards are pious
Catholics. Builders of churches and monasteries, they are taking up the
relics of the Roman martyrs, to transfer them to the churches of Milan
and Pavia. They have just given Pope Stephen the most striking proof of
their awe of his person and office. But they are quarrelling with him
about the boundaries of his estates for the patrimony of St. Peter. They
consider that he and his predecessors have grossly wronged them at
different times; and now last of all, by calling in foreign invaders; and
they are at the gates of Rome laying waste the country, and demanding a
poll-tax as ransom. That is all.

The causes which led to this quarrel must be sought far back in history.
The original documents in which you will find the facts will be Paulus
Diaconus, as far as King Luitprand's death; then the Life and Writings of
Gregory the Great; and then Baronius' Annals, especially his quotations
from Anastasius' Life of Stephen III., bearing in mind that, as with the
Ostrogoths, we have only the Roman Papal story; that the Lombards have
never stated their case, not even through Paulus Diaconus, who, being a
clergyman, prudently holds his tongue about the whole matter. But by far
the best account is to be found in Dean Milman's 'Latin Christianity,'
Vols. I. and II. Rome, you must understand, has become gradually the
patrimony of St. Peter; the Popes are the practical kings of Rome,
possessing, in the name of the Church, much land round Rome, and many
estates scattered throughout Italy, and even in Sicily, Gaul, Africa, and
the East-