Gregorius II. p. 154. Gregorius III. p. 158. Zacharias, p.
161. Stephanus III. p. 165.; Paulus, p. 172. Stephanus IV. p. 174.
Hadrianus, p. 179. Leo III. p. 195.) Yet I may remark, that the true
Anastasius (Hist. Eccles. p. 134, edit. Reg.) and the Historia Miscella,
(l. xxi. p. 151, in tom. i. Script. Ital.,) both of the ixth century,
translate and approve the Greek text of Theophanes.]

[Footnote 32: With some minute difference, the most learned critics,
Lucas Holstenius, Schelestrate, Ciampini, Bianchini, Muratori,
(Prolegomena ad tom. iii. pars i.,) are agreed that the Liber
Pontificalis was composed and continued by the apostolic librarians
and notaries of the viiith and ixth centuries; and that the last and
smallest part is the work of Anastasius, whose name it bears. The style
is barbarous, the narrative partial, the details are trifling--yet
it must be read as a curious and authentic record of the times. The
epistles of the popes are dispersed in the volumes of Councils.]

Chapter XLIX: Conquest Of Italy By The Franks.--Part II.

Two original epistles, from Gregory the Second to the emperor Leo, are
still extant; [33] and if they cannot be praised as the most perfect
models of eloquence and logic, they exhibit the portrait, or at least
the mask, of the founder of the papal monarchy. "During ten pure and
fortunate years," says Gregory to the emperor, "we have tasted the
annual comfort of your royal letters, subscribed in purple ink, with
your own hand, the sacred pledges of your attachment to the orthodox
creed of our fathers. How deplorable is the change! how tremendous
the scandal! You now accuse the Catholics of idolatry; and, by the
accusation, you betray your own impiety and ignorance. To this ignorance
we are compelled to adapt the grossness of our style and arguments: the
first elements of holy letters are sufficient for your confusion; and
were you to enter a grammar-school, and avow yourself the enemy of our
worship, the simple and pious children would be provoked to cast
their horn-books at your head." After this decent salutation, the pope
attempts the usual distinction between the idols of antiquity and
the Christian images. The former were the fanciful representations of
phantoms or daemons, at a time when the true God had not manifested
his person in any visible likeness. The latter are the genuine forms
of Christ, his mother, and his saints, who had approved, by a crowd
of miracles, the inn