ADRIAN I., (POPE) the son of Theodore, a Roman nobleman, was raised to the pontificate A.D. 772. 11 is steady attachment to Charlemagne, in opposition to De siderius king of the Lombards, was rewarded by the protection, munificence, and homage of the French mo narch. Charlemagne, successfully defended him against the arms of Desiderius ; visited him at Rome ; con firmed and extended the grants, which his father Pepin had made to the popedom ; formed a perpetual alliance between the French monarchy and the supreme eccle siastical power ; and expressed his reverence for the established religion by the humiliating ceremony of kissing Adrian's feet, and each of the steps by which he ascended to the church of St Peter. He afterwards de livered the pope from the encroachments of the bishop of Ravenna, who claimed and had seized the exarchate and dukedom of Ferrara ; and in recompense for this service, was proclaimed king of the Lombards, and in vested with the rights of temporal sovereignty in the territories of the Roman See. Though the general council held at Constantinople, A. D.754, bad condemn ed the worship of images, the empress Irene had no sooner assumed the regency, during the minority of her son, than she determined to re-establish this idolatry ; and, on applying for Adrian's concurrence, obtained his consent to the calling of another council. It met first at Nice, A. D. 786, but being dispersed by an insurrec tion of the citizens, the decree restoring this idolatrous worship was not passed till the following year. But though Adrian gave his approbation to this decree, and succeeded in establishing its dogmas in Italy, it was op posed by the churches of Franoe, Gtrinany, England. and Spain. Your books, calls i I.ihri CuriAni, contain
in• one hundred and twenty objections against the Ni cone council, were published .0.; the work of Ghillie magne, and sent by him to A(!rian. They execrate the council, and it the title of ecumenical ; pour dr most insolent abuse both on Irene a:id her son ; and en deavour to turn into ridicule the argunn•nts in favour ol images. Adrian wrote an answer to Charlemagne, in which lie evidently temporizes on the subject, appear ing- afraid to avow his real sentim, ins, lest he shot'id incur the displeasure of his illustrious patron and friei.d. Another council was held, A. D. 794, at Frankfort on the Maine, when image worship was again condemned But Adrian did not live to see the termination of the contest, for he died in 795, after reigning nearly twen ty-four years. Though Ile made no pretensions to lite rature, the walls of Rome, the sacred patrimony, thy ruin of the Lombards, and the friendship of Charle magne, were the trophies of his fame. lie secretly edi fled the throne of his successors, and displayed in a narrow space time virtues of a great prince. His and hopes are slimmed up in an epitaph of thirty-eight verses, of which Charlemagne declares himself the au thor. (Concil. t0111. \ iii. p. 520.) Post patrem lacrymans Carolus hies carmina scrips:.
Tu mihi duleis to modo plango pater — Noliona jwigo ainwl titulis, clarissime, nost•a Adrianus, Carolus, rex ego, fugue pater.
The poetry might be supplied by Alcuin ; but the tear, the most glorious tribute, can belong only to Charle magne. See Gibbon, chap. xlix. vol. ix. p. 171. P/a tin. de Pony: M. Fleury, Mist. Rcc/. tom. ix. (d)