PIUS, a name of several pontiffs distinguished in the history of the Catholic church.

Pius H. (Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini) was born on the 18th of October 1405, at Corsigni, in the Siennese, the name of which he afterwards changed into that of Pienza. Aeneas was carefully educated, and made considerable proficiency in the belles lettres. After having finished his studies at Sienna, he in 1431 went to the council of Basil with Cardinal Capranica, surnamed De Ferma, because he was intrusted with the government of that church. Aeneas, who acted as his secretary, was then only twenty-six years of age. He afterwards acted in the same capacity to some other prelates, and to Cardinal Albergati. The council of Basil honoured him with different commissions, in order to recompense him for the zeal with which he had defended that assembly against Pope Eugenius IV. He was afterwards secretary to Frederic HL, who decreed to him the poetical crown, and sent him as ambassador to Rome, Milan, Naples, Bohemia, and other places.' Nicholas V. advanced him to the bishopric of Trieste, which he quitted some time afterwards for that of Sienna. At last, after having distinguished himself as nuncio on various occasions, he was invested withthe Roman purple by Oalixtus HL, whom he succeeded two years afterwards, on the 27th of August 1458. Pius II., now advanced to the holy see, exemplified the proverb, “Honores mutant mores.” From the commencement of his pontificate he appeared to be jealous of the papal prerogatives. In 1460 he issued a bull, declaring appeals from the pope to a council to be null, erroneous, detestable, and contrary to the sacred canons. That bull, however, did not prevent the procurator-general of the parliament of Paris from appealing to a council in defence of the Pragmatic Sanction, which the pope had strenuously opposed. Pius was then at Mantua, whither he had gone to engage the Catholic princes to unite in a war against the Turks. The greater part of them had agreed to furnish troops or money; but others refused both, particularly France, which from that moment incurred his holiness’s aversion. But his aversion abated under Louis XI., whom in 1461 he persuaded to abolish the Pragmatic Sanction, which the parliament of Paris had with so much vigour supported.

The following year, 1462, was rendered famous by a controversy which took place betwéen the Cordeliers and Dominicans, whether or not the blood of Jesus Christ was separated from his body whilst he lay in the sepulchre. It was also made a question whether it was separated from his divinity. The Cordeliers affirmed that it was, but the Dominicans were of an opposite opinion. As usually happens in such disputes, the disputants called each other heretics; and this obliged the pontiff' to issue a bull, forbidding them, under pain of censure, to brand one another with such odious epithets. The bull which his holiness published on the 26th of April, retracting what he had written to the council of Basil when he was its secretary, if it somewhat impeached his consistency, was at least highly honourable to his frankness and candour. “I am a man,” says he, “and as a man I have erred. I am far from denying that a great many things which I have said and written may deserve condemnation. Like Paul, I have preached through deception, and I have persecuted the church of God through ignorance. I imitate the blessed St Augustin, who having suffered some erroneous sentiments to creep into his works, retracted them. I do the Same thing; I frankly acknowledge my ignorance, from a fear lest what I have written in my younger years should be the occasion of any error that might afterwards be prejudicial to the interests of the holy see. For if it be proper for any one to defend and support the eminence and glory of the first throne of the church, it is in a peculiar manner my duty, whom God, out of his mercy and goodness alone, without any merit on my part, has raised to the dignity of vicar of Jesus Christ. For all these reasons, we exhort and admonish you in the Lord, not to give credit to those writings of ours which tend in any degree to hurt the authority of the apostolic see, and which establish opinions that are not received by the Roman church. If you find, then, any thing contrary to her doctrine, either in our dialogues, in our letters, or in other of our works, despise these opinions, reject them, and adopt our present sentiments. Believe me rather now that I am an old man, than when I addressed you in my earlier days. Esteem a sovereign pontiff more than a private person; except against Aeneas Sylvius, but receive Pius II.” It might perhaps be objected to his holiness, that it was his dignity alone which had made him alter his opinion. He anticipates that objection by giving a short account of his life and actions, with the whole history of the council of Basil, to which he went with Cardinal Capranica in 1431; “but,” says he, “I was then a young man, and without any experience, like [7:17:772]a bird just come from its nest.” In the mean time, the Turks were threatening Christendom. Pius, ever zealous in the defence of religion against the infidels, formed the resolution of fitting out a fleet at the expense of the church, and of passing over into Asia himself, to animate the Christian princes by his example. He repaired to Ancona with a design to embark; but he there fell sick from the fatigue of the journey, and expired on the 16th of August 1464, aged fifty-nine. Pius was one of the most learned men of his time, and also one of the most zealous pontiffs; but being of an ambition? disposition, he sometimes sacrificed to that weakness. His principal works are, 1. Memoirs of the Council of Basil, from the Suspension of Eugenius to the Election of Felix; 2. The History of the Bohemians, from their origin to the year 1458; 3. Two books on Cosmography; 4. The History of Frederic HL (whose vice-chancellor he had been), published in 1785, in folio; 5. A Treatise on the Education of Children; 6. A Poem upon the Passion of Jesus Christ; 7. A Collection of four hundred and thirty-two Letters, printed at Milan, 1473, in folio, in which are found some curious anecdotes; 8. The Memoirs of his Own Life, published by John Gobelin Personne, his secretary, and printed at Rome in 1584, in 4to; 9. Historia Ferum Ubicumque Gestarum, of which only the first part was published at Venice in 1477, in folio. His works were printed at Helmstadt in 1700, in folio, with a life prefixed.