A HISTORY OF THE CHURCH
To the Eve of the Reformation

by Philip Hughes

Vol. 3: 1274-1520


CHAPTER 5: ‘FACILIS DESCENSUS. . .’ 1471-1517


LEO X

The new pope was only thirty-seven, but a chronic invalid, operated on in the very conclave for a fistula


2. CHRISTIAN LIFE AND THOUGHT, 1471-1517

Just one hundred years separate the beginning of Martin Luther's assault on the papacy from the election of Martin V at Constance, the first pope for forty years