Pope Gregory, or The Great

The dates of the pontificate of this Gregory are 590-604. Thus a hundred and fourteen years intervened between the death of Leo The Great and the commencement of Gregory's career as Pontiff. In these intervening years, the successors of Leo in the papal chair were more or less unimportant persons. Some of them were not alone mediocre but carnal as well. Men they were whose administrations are among the darkest in the annals of the papacy. As we saw, Leo The Great laid claim to a universal...