570
The Great Controversy
such donation. Lorenza Valla in Italy gave a brilliant demonstration
of its spuriousness in 1450. See Christopher B. Coleman’s Treatise
of Lorenzo Valla on the Donation of Constantine (New York, 1927).
For a century longer, however, the belief in the authenticity of the
“Donation” and of the False Decretals was kept alive. For example,
Martin Luther at first accepted the decretals, but he soon said to Eck:
“I impugn these decretals;” and to Spalatin: “He [the pope] does in his
decretals corrupt and crucify Christ, that is, the truth.”
It is deemed established that (1) the “Donation” is a forgery, (2)
it is the work of one man or period, (3) the forger has made use of
older documents, (4) the forgery originated around 752 and 778. As
for the Catholics, they abandoned the defense of the authenticity of
the document with Baronius, Ecclesiastical Annals, in 1592. Consult
for the best text, K. Zeumer, in the Festgabe fur Rudolf von Gneist
(Berlin, 1888). Translated in Coleman’s Treatise, referred to above,
and in Ernest F. Henderson, Select Historical Documents of the Middle
Ages (New York, 1892), p. 319; Briefwechsel (Weimar ed.), pp. 141,
161. See also The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious
Knowledge (1950), vol. 3, p. 484; F. Gregorovius, Rome in the Middle
Ages, vol. 2, p. 329; and Johann Joseph Ignaz von Dollinger, Fables
Respecting the Popes of the Middle Ages (London, 1871).
The “false writings” referred to in the text include also the
Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals, together with other forgeries. The Pseudo-
Isidorian Decretals are certain fictitious letters ascribed to early popes
from Clement (A.D. 100) to Gregory the Great (A.D. 600), incorpo-
rated in a ninth century collection purporting to have been made by
“Isidore Mercator.” The name “Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals” has been
in use since the advent of criticism in the fifteenth century.
Pseudo-Isidore took as the basis of his forgeries a collection of
valid canons called the Hispana Gallica Augustodunensis, thus lessen-
ing the danger of detection, since collections of canons were commonly
made by adding new matter to old. Thus his forgeries were less ap-
parent when incorporated with genuine material. The falsity of the
Pseudo-Isidorian fabrications is now incontestably admitted, being
proved by internal evidence, investigation of the sources, the methods
used, and the fact that this material was unknown before 852. Histori-
ans agree that 850 or 851 is the most probable date for the completion