CELESTINE, the name of five popes. 1. SAINT CELESTINE, d. 432, is supposed to have been a near relative of the emperor Valentinian. He held the council of Ephesus in 431, at which the Nestorians were condemned; actively persecuted the Pelagians; struggled for Roman orthodoxy; sent Palladius to Scotland, and Patricius (St. Patrick) to Ireland; raged against the Novatians in Rome, imprisoning their bishop, and forbid ( ing their worship, and was intolerant of the least innovation of the constitutions of his predecessors. His papacy lasted nearly 8+ years. 2. Gum() DI CASTELLO, chosen in 1143; d. 1144, after a reign of 5 months and 13 days. He gave absolution to Louis VII. of France, on the king's humble subjection, and removed the papal interdict from that country. 3. GRACLNTO BOBONE ORSINI, elected Mar. 30, 1191; d. 1198, after ruling nearly 9 years, and was buried in the Lateran; supposed to have been 90 years old when chosen. He crowned the emperor Henry VI. of Germany, and subsequently excommu nicated him for keeping Richard I. of England in prison. In 1192, he confirmed the statutes of the Teutonic order of knights. 4. GOFFREDO CASTIGLIONE of Milan, a nephew of Urban III. He was elected pope by only seven cardinals, Sept. 22, 1241, and occupied the chair only 17 days, dying Oct. 8, before lie was consecrated. He was the author of a history of Scotland, in which country he was once a monk. 5. PIETRO DI MORONE, the son of a peasant- of Naples; became a Benedictine monk, and lived many years in caves after the manner of John the Baptist. Terrible stories are told of
the severity of his penitential discipline. During his hermit life he founded the order that bears his name (see CELESTINES, ante). After the death of Nicholas IV. he was elected pope, but refused to accept until persuaded by a deputation of cardinals rein forced by the kings of Naples and Hungary. He was chosen July 7, 1294, was crowned Aug. 29. He issued two decrees; one confirming that of Gregory X. ordering the shut ting, up of the cardinals when in conclave, and one declaring the right of any pope, to abdicate at pleasure—a right which, after ruling 5 months and 8 days, he exercised, Dec. 13, 1294. In his document of renunciation he assigned as the moving causes "the desire for humility, for a purer life, for a stainless conscience; the deficiencies of his own physical strength; his ignorance, the perverseness of the people, and his longing for the tranquillity of his former life." Having divested himself of every outward sym bol of dignity, be returned to his old solitude; but he was not permitted to remain; his successor, Boniface VIII., sent for him, and, despite his efforts to escape, imprisoned him in a castle, where, after languishing ten months in the infected atmosphere, lie died, May 19, 1296. He, like the first of the name, is recognized as a saint by the Roman church.