Italy was still the Garden of the Empire no less than the Throne of Christ on earth.

After the burghs had wrung what they regarded as their reasonable rights and privileges from Frederick, they laid down their arms, and were content to flourish beneath the imperial shadow.

To raise up a political association as a bulwark against the Holy Roman Empire, and by the formation of this defense to become an independent and united nation, instead of remaining an aggregate of scattered townships, would have seemed to their minds little short of sacrilege.

Up to this point the Church and the Empire had been, theoretically at least, concordant.

They were the sun and moon of a sacred social system which ruled Europe with light and might.