Aristotle, showed more originality than any of the Arabs--more, indeed, than any one since
Plotinus, or at any rate since Augustine. In politics as in thought, there was the same disguised
originality.
CONFLICT OF EMPIRE AND PAPACYFrom the time of Gregory VII to the middle of the thirteenth century, European history centres
round the struggle for power between the Church and the lay monarchs--primarily the Emperor,
but also, on occasion, the kings of France and England. Gregory's pontificate had ended in
apparent disaster, but his policies were resumed, though with more moderation, by Urban II
( 1088-1099), who repeated the decrees against lay investiture, and desired episcopal elections to
be made freely by clergy and people. (The share of the people was, no doubt, to be purely formal.)
In practice, however, he did not quarrel with lay appointments if they were good.
At first, Urban was safe only in Norman territory. But in 1093 Henry IV's son Conrad rebelled
against his father, and, in alliance with the Pope, conquered North Italy, where the Lombard
League, an alliance of cities with Milan at its head, favoured the Pope. In 1094, Urban made a
triumphal procession through North Italy and France. He triumphed over Philip, King of France,
who desired a divorce, and was therefore excommunicated by the Pope, and then submitted. At
the Council of Clermont, in 1095, Urban proclaimed the first Crusade, which produced a wave of
religious enthusiasm leading to increase of papal power--also to atrocious pogroms of Jews. The
last year of Urban's life he spent in safety in Rome, where popes were seldom safe.
The next Pope, Paschal II, like Urban, came from Cluny. He continued the struggle on
investitures, and was successful in France and England. But after the death of Henry IV in 1106,
the next Emperor, Henry V, got the better of the Pope, who was an unworldly man and allowed
his saintliness to outweigh his political sense. The Pope proposed that the Emperor should
renounce investitures, but in return bishops and abbots should renounce temporal possessions. The
Emperor professed to agree; but when the suggested compromise was