The  court  of  Rome  had  grown  into  the  final  court  of
appeal  for  all  Christendom ;  the  Pope  was  expected  to  be
the  universal  referee,  arbitrator,  and  peacemaker  of  Europe,
to  hold  the  balance  between  contending  parties,  to  pene-
trate and  disentangle  the  intricacies  of  political  situations
which  baffled  the  skill  of  the  most  experienced  diplo-
matists,^ to  exercise  a  sort  of  equitable  jurisdiction  on  a
vast  scale  over  the  whole  range  of  political  as  well  as
social  life."*


^  Ep.  306  to  Louis  of  France  to  put  down  a  private  war  for  the  sake
of  the  good  order  of  his  kingdom.  Cf.  ep.  1102,  July  21,  an.  11 73-4,
to  Henry,  archbishop  of  Rheims,  and  others  to  strive  to  extinguish
the  enmity  between  France  and  England,  "  so  harmful  to  Christendom,
and  especially  to  the  Christian  cause  in  the  East''  See  also  epp.  1 136,
and  965,  urging  Louis  of  France  to  have  his  son  crowned  to  ensure  a
peaceful  succession  to  the  kingdom.
2  England  under  the  Angevin  Kings^  ii.  50.
^  And  at  the  same  time  to  be  troubled  with  men  who  forged  his
signature  or  falsified  his  words.     Cf,  Jaifc^,  12,253  (S227).
*  "  Earlier  and  later  pontiffs,'*  she  continues,  "  may  have  voluntarily
brought  this  burthen  upon  themselves.  .  .  .  Unprincipled  as  their
policy  often  seemed,  there  was  not  a  little  justice  in  the  view  of  John
of  Salisbury,  that  a  position  so  exceptional  could  not  be  brought  within
the  scope  of  ordinary  rules  of  conduct,  and  that  only  those  who  had
themselves  felt  all  its  difficulties  could  be  really  competent  to  judge
it  at  all."


238  ALEXANDER  III.
