Eugenius I, Pope

Eugenius I, Pope a son of the Roman Rufinianus, was elected by the Romans September 8, 654, as successor to Martin I, who had been sent into banishment to the Thracian Chersonesus by order of the emperor Constans II, who favored the schism of the Monothelites. Martin dying in the following year, Eugenius continued in dispute with the court of Constantinople till he died, June 1, 657, and was succeeded by Vitalianus. In order to reestablish peace with the Greeks, his legates made an arrangement with Peter, the Monothelite patriarch of Constantinople, that instead of one or two wills in Christ three should be assumed — one substantial, the two others natural. — Bower, History of the Popes, 3:70.

II. Pope, a native of Rome, succeeded Paschal I February 14, 824, in the midst of great disorder, which occurred at Rome, owing to the corrupt state of society and mal-administration of that city. To reform these, the emperor Louis the Good sent his son Lotharius to Rome, who corrected many abuses, which, by the account of Eginhardt and other chroniclers, had grown to an enormous extent. He confirmed the right of electing the pope to the clergy and people of Rome; and the Council, of Rome, which he convoked on November 1, 826, issued many beneficent decrees for the restoration of Church discipline, for the establishment of schools, and against the worldly occupations of clergymen. He died August 827. — Herzog, Real-Encyklopadie, 4:214; Bower, History of the Popes, 4:205.

III. Pope. He was a monk of Citeaux, disciple and friend of St. Bernard, and afterwards abbot of St. Anastasius. He was elected to the pontifical chair of Rome February 27, 1145. He appears to have been a year sincere disciple of Bernard, and anxious, like him, to reform the manners of the clergy and consolidate the papal power. Through the greater part of his pontificate, owing to the turbulence of the Roman people SEE ARNOLD OF BRESCIA, he was unable to reside in the city. This circumstance, however, did not hinder his being acknowledged as pope, or his exercising the functions of his office. During his reign the second crusade, under the preaching of St. Bernard, was undertaken. SEE CRUSADERS. Shortly after its mortifying failure the pontiff died at Tivoli, July 8, 1153. See Neander, Bernard und s. Zeit. 190-296; Herzog, Real-Encyklop. 4:214.

IV, Pope, Gabriele Condolmiere, a native of Venice, succeeded Martin V as pope March 3, 1431. At the early age of twenty-four he was made by pope Gregory XII, with whom he was related, bishop of Siena, and soon after (1408) cardinal. "His was a most stormy pontificate. He drove away the powerful family of Colonna, including the nephews of the late pope, from Rome, charging them with having enriched themselves at the expense of the papal treasury. He afterwards made war against the various lords of Romagna, who were supported by the Visconti of Milan. But the greatest annoyance to Eugenius proceeded from in the Council of Basle, which had been convoked by his predecessor, and which protracted its sittings year after year, broaching doctrines very unfavorable to the papal supremacy. SEE BASLE, COUNCIL OF Eugenius, who had been obliged to escape from Rome in disguise on account of a popular revolt, and had taken up his residence at Bologna in 1437, issued a bull dissolving the council, recalling his nuncio who presided at it, and convoking another council at Ferrara. SEE FERRARA. Most of the fathers assembled at Basle refused to submit, and summoned the pope himself to appear before them, to answer the charge of simony schism, and others, and after a time proceeded against him as contumacious, and deposed him. Eugenius meanwhile had opened in person his new council at Ferrara in February, 1438, in which, after annulling all the obnoxious decrees of the Council of Basle, he launched a bull of excommunication against the bishops who remained in that assembly, which he characterized as a 'satanic conclave, which was spreading the abomination of desolation into the bosom of the Church.' The Catholic world was divided between the two councils; that of Basle proceeded to elect a new pope in the person of Amadeus VIII of Savoy, who assumed the name of Felix V, and was solemnly crowned at Basle. Eugenius encouraged the Hungarians and Poles to break the peace they had solemnly sworn with the Turks, under pretense that their oaths were not valid without the sanction of the pope; he even sent cardinal Julian as his nuncio to attend the Christian army. The result was the battle of Varna, 1444, in which the Christians were completely defeated, and king Ladislaus of Poland and cardinal Julian lost their lives. Eugenius died at Rome Feb. 23, 1447. He left the Church in a state of schism between him and his competitor Felix, his own states a prey to war, and all Christendom alarmed at the progress of the Turkish arms" (English Cyclopaedia). SEE BOWER, History of the Popes, 7:238.