any other one man, he laid the foundation-stone of that edifice
which alike sheltered and imprisoned the European nations for more than
a thousand years. He was not a great theologian like Augustine, or
preacher like Chrysostom, but he was a great bishop like Ambrose,--even
far greater, inasmuch as he was the organizer of new forces in the
administration of his important diocese. In fact he was a great
statesman, as the more able of the popes always aspired to be. He was
the associate and equal of princes.

It was the sublime effort of Leo to make the Church the guardian of
spiritual principles and give to it a theocratic character and aim,
which links his name with the mightiest moral movements of the world;
and when I speak of the Church I mean the Church of Rome, as presided
over by men who claimed to be the successors of Saint Peter,--to whom
they assert Christ had given the supreme control over all other churches
as His vicars on the earth. It was the great object of Leo to
substantiate this claim, and root it in the minds of the newly converted
barbarians; and then institute laws and measures which should make his
authority and that of his successors paramount in all spiritual matters,
thus centring in his See the general oversight of the Christian Church
in all the countries of Europe. It was a theocratic aspiration, one of
the grandest that ever entered into the mind of a man of genius, yet, as
Protestants now look at it, a usurpation,--the beginning of a vast
system of spiritual tyranny in order to control the minds and
consciences of men. It took several centuries to develop this system,
after Leo was dead. With him it was not a vulgar greed of power, but an
inspiration of genius,--a grand idea to make the Church which he
controlled a benign and potent influence on society, and to prevent
civilization from being utterly crushed out by the victorious Goths and
Vandals. It is the success of this idea which stamps the Church as the
great leading power of Mediaeval Ages,--a power alike majestic and
venerable, benignant yet despotic, humble yet arrogant and usurping.

But before I can present this subtile contradiction, in all its mighty
consequences both for good and evil, I must allude to the Roman See and
the condition of society when Leo began his memorable pontificate as the
precursor of the Gregories and the Clements of later times. Like all
great powers, it was very gradually developed. It was as long in
r