_The Progress of Chivalry in Europe--Exploits--That some great Enterprise
was necessary to give Chivalry an extensive and permanent Effect--That
Enterprise presented itself in the Crusades--Pilgrimage to Jerusalem--
Haroun Al Raschid--Charlemagne--Cruelties of the Turks--Pilgrimages
continued--Peter the Hermit--Council of Clermont._
The picture which I have just attempted to draw of the various customs of
Chivalry must be looked upon rather as a summary of its institutions and
feelings, as they changed through many ages and many nations, than as a
likeness of Chivalry at any precise period, or in any one country.
Previous to the age of the crusades, to which I now propose to turn as
speedily as possible, the state of Chivalry in Europe had made but little
progress. It had spread, however, as a spirit, to almost all the nations
surrounding the cradle of its birth. In Spain Alphonso VI.[74] was already
waging a completely chivalric war against the Moors, and many of the
knights of France, who afterward distinguished themselves in the Holy
Land, had, in the service of one or other of the Spanish princes, tried
their arms against the Saracens.
In England we have seen that there is reason to suppose the institution of
knighthood was known to the Saxons,[75] though the indiscriminate manner
in which the word _miles_ is used in the Latin chronicles of the day
renders it scarcely possible to ascertain at what period the order was
introduced. The same difficulty indeed occurs in regard to the Normans,
though from various circumstances connected with the accounts given by
William of Jumieges,[76] of the reigns of William I. and Richard I., Dukes
of Normandy, we are led to believe that Chivalry was very early introduced
among that people. At all events it seems certain that after the accession
of Richard to the ducal dignity, A. D. 960, knightly feelings made great
progress among the Normans, and in 1003, we find an exploit so purely
chivalrous, performed by a body of forty gentlemen from Normandy, that we
cannot doubt the spirit of knighthood in its purest form had already
spread through that country.
"Forty Norman gentlemen," says Vertot, "all warriors, who had
distinguished themselves in the armies of the Duke of Normandy, returning
from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, disembarked in Italy without arms.
Having learned that the town of Salerno was besieged by the Saracens,
their zeal for religion caused them instantly to throw themselves into
that place. Guimard, the Prince of Salerno, had shut himself up in the
town, to defend it to the last against the infidels; and he immediately
caused arms and horses to be given to the Norman gentlemen, who made so
many vigorous and unexpected sallies upon the Saracens, that they
compelled them to raise the siege." In Italy we find many traces of
Chivalry at an early date, and it would appear that the institution which
took its rise in France was no sooner known than adopted by most other
nations. The Normans, whom we have seen above succouring the Prince of
Salerno in his necessity, did not remain a sufficient length of time in
Italy to spread the chivalrous spirit; but it is said that Guimard, after
using every effort to induce them to stay, sent deputies after them to
Normandy, praying for aid from the nobles of that country against the
Saracens. Several large bodies of Norman adventurers, in consequence of
his promises and persuasions, proceeded to establish themselves in Apulia
and Calabria, defeated the Saracens, cleared the south of Italy and part
of Greece of those locust-like invaders, and re-established the Greek and
Italian princes in their dominions. These princes, however, soon became
jealous of their new allies, and employed various base means to destroy
them. They, on the other hand, united for mutual defence, and under the
famous Robert Guiscard, one of twelve brothers who had left Normandy for
Italy together, they speedily conquered for themselves the countries which
they had restored to ungrateful lords. Guiscard was now universally
acknowledged as their chief, and thus began the chivalrous Norman empire
in Italy.
Nothing, perhaps, more favoured the general progress of Chivalry than the
state of religion in that day; which, overloaded with superstitions, and
decked out with every external pomp and ornament, appealed to the
imagination through the medium of the senses, and woke a thousand
enthusiasms which could find no such fitting career as in the pursuits of
knighthood. The first efforts of the feudal system, too, gradually
extending themselves to every part of Europe, joined to make Chivalry
spread through the different countries where they were felt, by raising up
a number of independent lords who--each anxious to reduce his neighbours
to vassalage, and to preserve his own separate lordship--required
continual armed support from others, to whom he offered in return honour
and protection.
Thus, for about a century, or perhaps a little more, after the first
institution of knighthood, Chivalry slowly gained ground, and by each
exploit of any particular body of knights (such, for instance, as we have
recorded of the Normans) the order became more and more respected, and its
establishment more firm, decided, and regular. It wanted but one great
enterprise commenced and carried through upon chivalrous principles alone
to render Chivalry, combined as it was with religion and the feudal
system, the great master power of Europe--and that enterprise was at hand.
The natural reverence for those countries, sanctified and elevated by so
many miracles, and rendered sublimely dear to the heart of every
Christian, as the land in which his salvation was brightly but terribly
worked out, had from all ages rendered Palestine an object of pilgrimage.
In the earliest times, after the recognition of the Christian faith by
Constantine, the subjects of the Roman empire had followed the example of
the empress Helena, and had deemed it almost a Christian duty to visit the
scenes of our Saviour's mortal career. For many ages while the whole of
Judea remained under the sway of the Cesars, the journey was an easy one.
Few difficulties waylaid the passenger, or gave pilgrimage even the merit
of dangers encountered and obstacles overcome.
Towards the seventh century, the eastern provinces of the Roman empire,
already weakened by many invasions, had to encounter the exertions of
another adversary, who succeeded in wresting them from their Christian
possessors. The successors of Mahomet, who from a low station had become a
great legislator, a mighty conqueror, and a pretended prophet, carried on
the conquest which he had begun in Arabia, and one by one made themselves
masters of Syria, Antioch, Persia, Medea, and in fact the greater part of
the rich continent of Asia.
It is not here my purpose to trace the progress of these conquerors, or to
examine for a moment the religion they professed. Suffice it, that in the
days of Charlemagne the fame of that great prince produced from the calif
Haroun al Raschid many liberal concessions in favour of the Christian
pilgrims to Jerusalem, now in the hands of the unbelievers.
Particular ages seem fertile in great men; and it is very rare to find one
distinguished poet, monarch, or conqueror standing alone in his own
century. Nay more;--we generally discover--however different the country
that produces them, and however opposite the circumstances under which
they are placed--that there is a similarity in the character of the mind,
if I may so express myself without obscurity, of the eminent persons
produced in each particular age. This was peculiarly the case in the age
of Charlemagne. It seemed as if the most remote corners of the earth had
made an effort, at the same moment, to produce from the bosom of barbarism
and confusion a great and intelligent monarch--an Alfred, a Haroun, and a
Charlemagne. The likeness seemed to be felt by the two great emperors of
the east and the west; and a reciprocation of courtesy[77] and friendship
appears to have taken place between them, most rare in that remote age.
Various presents were transmitted from one to the other; and the most
precious offering that the Christian monarch could receive, the keys of
the Holy City, were sent from Bagdad to Aix, together with a standard,
which has been supposed to imply the sovereignty of Jerusalem resigned by
Haroun to his great contemporary. Nothing could afford a nobler proof of a
great, a liberal, and a delicate mind, than the choice evinced by the
calif in his gift. Charlemagne took advantage so far of Haroun's
liberality,[78] as to establish an hospital and a library for the Latin
pilgrims.
The successors of Haroun, and more particularly Monstacer Billah,
continued to yield tolerance at least, if not protection, to the
Christians of Jerusalem. The pilgrims also were more or less protected
during the reigns that followed, both from motives of liberal feeling and
of interest, as the great influx of travellers, especially from Italy,
brought much wealth and commerce into Syria.
Under the califs of the Fatemite race several persecutions took place; and
when at length the invasion of the Turkish hordes had brought the whole of
Palestine under the dominion of a wild and barbarous race, Jerusalem was
taken and sacked; and while the Christian inhabitants were treated with
every sort of brutal cruelty, the pilgrims were subject to taxation[79] on
their arrival, as well as liable to plunder by the way.
A piece of gold was exacted for permission to enter the Holy City; and at
that time, when the value of the precious metals was infinitely higher
than in the present day, few, if any, of the pilgrims on their arrival
possessed sufficient to pay the cruel demand.
Thus, after having suffered toils unheard of--hunger, thirst, the parching
influence of a burning sky, sickness, danger, and often robbery, and
wounds; when the weary wanderer arrived at the very entrance of the city,
with the bourn of all his long pilgrimage before him, the enthusiastic
object of all his hopes in sight, the place of refuge and repose for which
he had longed and prayed within his reach--unless he could pay the
stipulated sum, he was driven by the barbarians from the gates, and was
forced to tread back all his heavy way unfurnished with any means, and
unsupported by any hope, or to die by the roadside of want, weariness, and
despair.
The pilgrimages nevertheless continued with unremitting zeal; and the
number of devotees increased greatly in the tenth and eleventh centuries.
In the tenth, indeed, the custom of pilgrimage became almost universal,
from a misinterpretation[80] of a prophecy in the Apocalypse. A general
belief prevailed that at the end of the tenth century, the thousand years
being concluded, the world was to be judged; and crowds of men and women,
in the frantic hope of expiating their sins by the long and painful
journey to the Holy Land, flocked from all parts of Europe towards
Jerusalem.
Many of the more clear-sighted and sensible of the Christian prelates had
from time to time attempted to dissuade the people from these dangerous
and fatal pilgrimages; but the principle of bodily infliction being
received as a mark of internal penitence and a means of obtaining
absolution, had been so long inculcated by the church of Rome, that the
current of popular opinion had received its impulse, and it was no longer
possible to turn it from its course. No penance could be more painful or
more consistent with the prejudices of the multitude, than a pilgrimage to
the Holy Land; and thus the priests continued often to enforce the act,
while the heads of the church themselves, as religion became corrupted,
learned to see this sort of penitence in the same light as the people, and
encouraged its execution. They found the great efficacy of external
excitements in stimulating the populace to that superstitious obedience on
which they were fast building up the authority of the Roman church, and
probably also were not without a share in the bigoted enthusiasm which
they taught. Thus in the tenth century the pilgrimages which fear lest the
day of judgment should be approaching induced many to undertake in
expiation of their sins, met but little opposition; while various meteoric
phenomena, of a somewhat awful nature, earthquakes, hurricanes, &c.,
contributed to increase the general alarm.
When these had passed by, and the dreaded epoch had brought forth nothing,
the current still continued to flow on in the course that it had taken;
and during the eleventh century several circumstances tended to increase
it. Among others the terror spread through France by the Papal Interdict,
called forth by the refractory adherence of Robert I. to his queen[81]
Bertha, brought more pilgrims than usual from that country.
Of many thousands who passed into Asia,[82] a few isolated individuals
only returned; but these every day, as they passed through the different
countries of Europe on their journey back, spread indignation and horror
by their account of the dreadful sufferings of the Christians in Judea.
Various[83] letters are reported as having been sent by the emperors of
the east to the different princes of Europe, soliciting aid to repel the
encroachments of the infidel; and if but a very small portion of the
crimes and cruelty attributed to the Turks by these epistles were believed
by the Christians, it is not at all astonishing that wrath and horror took
possession of every chivalrous bosom. Pope Sylvester II. had made an
ineffectual appeal to Christendom towards the end of the tenth century,
bringing forward the first idea of a crusade;[84] but the age was not then
ripe for a project that required a fuller developement of chivalrous
feelings. Gregory VII. revived the idea, and made it the subject of a very
pompous epistle; but he himself was one of the first to forget the
miseries of his fellow-christians in Palestine, in the pursuit of his own
aggrandizement.
Still, the persecution of the Christians in Palestine, and the murder and
pillage of the pilgrims continued; still the indignation of Europe was fed
and renewed by repeated tales of cruel barbarity committed in the Holy
Land--sufferings of the church--insults to religion--and merciless
massacres of countrymen and relations: still, also, the spirit of Chivalry
was each day spreading further and rising more powerfully, so that all was
preparing for some great and general movement. The lightning of the
crusade was in the people's hearts, and it wanted but one electric touch
to make it flash forth upon the world.
At this time a man, of whose early days we have little authentic
knowledge, but that he was born at Amiens, and from a soldier had become a
priest,[85] after living for some time the life of a hermit, became seized
with the desire of visiting Jerusalem. He was, according to all
accounts,[86] small in stature and mean in person; but his eyes possessed
a peculiar fire and intelligence, and his eloquence was powerful and
flowing. The fullest account of his manners and conduct is to be found in
Robert the Monk, who was present at the council of Clermont, and in
Guibert of Nogent, who speaks in the tone of one who has beheld what he
relates.
The first of these authors describes Peter the Hermit,[87] of whom we
speak, as esteemed among those who best understand the things of earth,
and superior in piety to all the bishops or abbots of the day. He fed upon
neither flesh nor bread, says the same writer, though he permitted himself
wine and other aliments, finding nevertheless his pleasure in the greatest
abstinence.
Guibert, or Gilbert, of Nogent, speaks still more fully of his public
conduct.[88] "He set out," says the writer, "from whence I know not, nor
with what design; but we saw him at that time passing through the towns
and villages, preaching every where, and the people surrounding him in
crowds, loading him with presents, and celebrating his sanctity with such
high eulogiums, that I never remember to have seen such honours rendered
to any other person. He showed himself very generous, however, in the
distribution of the things given to him. He brought back to their homes
the women that had abandoned their husbands, not without adding gifts of
his own, and re-established peace between those who lived unhappily, with
wonderful authority. In every thing he said or did, it seemed as if there
was something of divine; so much so, that people went to pluck some of the
hairs from his mule, which they kept afterward as relics; which I mention
here not that they really were so, but merely served to satisfy the public
love of any thing extraordinary. While out of doors he wore ordinarily a
woollen tunic, with a brown mantle, which fell down to his heels. He had
his arms and his feet bare, eat little or no bread, and lived upon fish
and wine."
Such was his appearance after his return: prior to that period it is
probable that this hermit had made himself remarkable for nothing but his
general eloquence and his ascetic severity. Great and extraordinary men
are often long before opportunity gives scope for the display of the
particular spirit whose efforts are destined to distinguish them. I mean
not to class Peter the Hermit among great men; but certainly he deserves
the character of one of the most extraordinary men that Europe ever
produced, if it were but for the circumstance of having convulsed a
world--led one continent to combat to extermination against another, and
yet left historians in doubt whether he was madman or prophet, fool or
politician.
Peter, however, accomplished in safety his pilgrimage to Jerusalem,[89]
paid the piece of gold demanded at the gates, and took up his lodging in
the house of one of the pious Christians of the Holy City. Here his first
emotion[90] seems to have been indignant horror at the barbarous and
sacrilegious brutality of the Turks. The venerable prelate of Tyre
represents him as conferring eagerly with his host upon the enormous
cruelties of the infidels, even before visiting the general objects of
devotion. Doubtless the ardent, passionate, enthusiastic mind of Peter had
been wrought upon at every step he took in the Holy Land, by the miserable
state of his brethren, till his feelings and imagination became excited to
almost frantic vehemence. After performing the duties of the pilgrimage,
visiting each object of reputed holiness,[91] and praying in those
churches which had the fame of peculiar sanctity, Peter, with his heart
wrung at beholding the objects of his deepest veneration in the hands of
the church's enemies, demanded an audience of the patriarch, to whom some
Latin friend presented him.
Simeon the patriarch, though a Greek, and consequently in the eyes of
Peter a heretic, was still a Christian, suffering in common with the rest
of the faithful in the Holy Land, and the hermit saw in him that character
alone. The union--the overflowing confidence with which the hermit and the
prelate appear to have treated each other--raises them both in our
estimation; but it also throws an historical light upon the character of
Peter, which places him in a more elevated situation than modern
historians have been willing to concede to him. The patriarch Simeon, a
man as famous for his good sense as for his piety, would not, surely, have
opened his inmost thoughts to a wandering pilgrim like Peter, and
intrusted to him a paper sealed with his own seal, which, if taken by the
Turks, would have ensured death to himself and destruction to Christianity
in Palestine, had he not recognised in the hermit "a man,"[92] to use the
words of William of Tyre, "full of prudence and experience in the things
of this world."
This, however, was the case; and after long conversations, wherein many a
tear was shed over the hapless state of the Holy Land, it was determined,
at the suggestion of Peter, that the patriarch should write to the pope
and the princes of the west, setting forth the miseries of Jerusalem and
of the faithful people of the Holy City, and praying for aid and
protection against the merciless sword of the Saracen. Peter, on his part,
promised to seek out each individual prince, and to show, with his whole
powers of language, the ills of the Christians of Palestine.
From these conversations Peter went again and again to pray in the church
of the Resurrection, petitioning ardently for aid in the great undertaking
before him. On one of these occasions it is said that he fell asleep,[93]
and beheld the Saviour in a vision, who exhorted him to hasten on his
journey, and persevere in his design.
Without searching for any thing preternatural, the vision is not at all
difficult to believe, though the place of its occurrence seems to have
been fictitious. Nothing could be more natural than for Peter the Hermit,
with his mind full of the mission he was about to undertake, to dream that
the Being in whose cause he believed himself engaged appeared to encourage
him, and to hasten his enterprise; and it is easy to conceive that, with
full confidence in this manifestation of heavenly favour, he should set
forth upon his journey with enthusiastic zeal.
Bearing the letter of the patriarch, Peter now returned in haste to Italy,
and sought out the pope, to declare the miseries of the church in the Holy
Land, and to propose the means of its deliverance. Urban II., who then
occupied the apostolic chair, had inherited from Gregory wars and
contestations with the emperor Henry IV., and was at the same time
embroiled with the weak and luxurious Philip I. of France, on the subject
of that king's adulterous intercourse with Bertrade. He, as well as
Gregory, had taken refuge in Apulia and Calabria, and had thrown himself
upon the protection of the famous Robert Guiscard, who readily granted him
the aid of that powerful mind which made the utmost parts of the earth
tremble.[94]
It does not correctly appear at what place Urban sojourned at the time of
Peter's arrival in Italy.[95] His whole support was, evidently, still in
the family of Guiscard; and it seems that with Boemond, Prince of
Tarentum, the gallant and chivalrous son of Robert, he first held council
upon the hermit's[96] great and interesting proposal, before he determined
on the line of conduct to be pursued.
One of the historians of the crusades,[97] attributing perhaps somewhat
too much the spirit of modern politics to an age whose genius was of very
different quality, supposes that the course determined on by the pope and
his ally was, in fact, principally a shrewd plot to fix Urban firmly in
the Vatican, and to forward Boemond's ambitious views in Greece. It seems
to me, however, that such a supposition is perfectly irreconcilable with
the subsequent conduct of either. The pope shortly after threw himself
into the midst of his enemies, to hold a council on the subject of the
crusades; and Boemond abandoned every thing in Europe to carry on the holy
war in Palestine. It is much more natural to imagine that the spirit of
their age governed both the prelate and the warrior--the enthusiasm of
religion the one, and the enthusiasm of Chivalry the other.
However that may be, Peter the Hermit met with a most encouraging
reception from the pope. The sufferings of his fellow-christians brought
tears from the prelate's eyes; the general scheme of the crusade was
sanctioned[98] instantly by his authority; and, promising his quick and
active concurrence, he sent him on, the pilgrim to preach the deliverance
of the Holy Land through all the countries of Europe. Peter wanted neither
zeal nor activity[99]--from town to town, from province to province, from
country to country, he spread the cry of vengeance on the Turks, and
deliverance to Jerusalem! The warlike spirit of the people was at its
height; the genius of Chivalry was in the vigour of its early youth; the
enthusiasm of religion had now a great and terrible object before it, and
all the gates of the human heart were open to the eloquence of the
preacher. That eloquence was not exerted in vain; nations rose at his word
and grasped the spear; and it only wanted some one to direct and point the
great enterprise that was already determined.
In the mean time the pope did not forget his promise; and while Peter the
Hermit spread the inspiration throughout Europe,[100] Urban called
together a council at Placentia, to which deputies were admitted from the
emperor of Constantinople, who displayed the progress of the Turks, and
set forth the danger to all Christendom of suffering their arms to advance
unopposed. The opinion of the assembly was universally favourable to the
crusade; and trusting to the popularity of the measure, and the
indications of support which he had already met with, the pope determined
to cross the Alps and to hold a second council in the heart of Gaul.
The ostensible object of this council was to regulate the state of the
church, and to correct abuses; but the great object was, in fact, the
crusade. It is useless to investigate the motives which gave Urban II.
courage to summon a council, destined, among other things, to solemnly
reprobate the dissolute conduct of Philip of France, in the midst of
dominions, if not absolutely feudatory to the crown[101] of that monarch,
at least bound to it by friendship and alliance. Whether it arose from
fortitude of a just cause, or from reliance on political calculation, the
prelate's judgment was proved by the event to be right. After one or two
changes in regard to the place of meeting, the council was assembled at
Clermont, in Auvergne,[102] and was composed of an unheard-of multitude of
priests, princes, and nobles, both of France and Germany, all willing and
eager to receive the pope's injunctions with reverence and obedience.
After having terminated the less important affairs which formed the
apparent business of the meeting, and which occupied the deliberation of
seven days, Urban, one of the most eloquent men of the age, came forth
from the church[103] in which the principal ecclesiastics were assembled,
and addressed the immense concourse which had been gathered into one of
the great squares, no building being large enough to contain the number.
The prelate[104] then, with the language best calculated to win the hearts
of all his hearers, displayed the miseries of the Christians in the Holy
Land. He addressed the multitude as a people peculiarly favoured by God,
in the gift of courage, strength, and true faith. He told them that their
brethren in the east were trampled under the feet of infidels, to whom
God had not granted the light of his Holy Spirit--that fire, plunder, and
the sword had desolated completely the fair plains of Palestine--that her
children were led away captive, or enslaved, or died under tortures too
horrible to recount--that the women of their land were subjected to the
impure passions of the pagans, and that God's own altar, the symbols of
salvation, and the precious relics of the saints were all desecrated by
the gross and filthy abomination of a race of heathens. To whom, then, he
asked--to whom did it belong to punish such crimes, to wipe away such
impurities, to destroy the oppressors, and to raise up the oppressed? To
whom, if not to those who heard him, who had received from God strength,
and power, and greatness of soul; whose ancestors had been the prop of
Christendom, and whose kings had put a barrier to the progress of
infidels? "Think!" he cried, "of the sepulchre of Christ our Saviour
possessed by the foul heathen!--think of all the sacred places dishonoured
by their sacrilegious impurities!--O brave knights, offspring of
invincible fathers, degenerate not from your ancient blood! remember the
virtues of your ancestors, and if you feel held back from the course
before you by the soft ties of wives, of children, of parents, call to
mind the words of our Lord himself: 'Whosoever loves father or mother more
than me, is not worthy of me. Whosoever shall abandon for my name's sake
his house, or his brethren, or his sisters, or his father, or his mother,
or his wife, or his children, or his lands, shall receive an hundredfold,
and shall inherit eternal life.'"
The prelate then went on to point out the superior mundane advantages
which those might obtain who took the Cross. He represented their own
country as poor and arid, and Palestine as a land flowing with milk and
honey; and, blending the barbarous ideas of a dark age with the powerful
figures of enthusiastic eloquence, he proceeded--"Jerusalem is in the
centre of this fertile land; and its territories, rich above all others,
offer, so to speak, the delights of Paradise. That land, too, the Redeemer
of the human race rendered illustrious by his advent, honoured by his
residence, consecrated by his passion, repurchased by his death,
signalized by his sepulture. That royal city, Jerusalem--situated in the
centre of the world--held captive by infidels, who deny the God that
honoured her--now calls on you and prays for her deliverance. From
you--from you above all people she looks for comfort, and she hopes for
aid; since God has granted to you, beyond other nations, glory and might
in arms. Take, then, the road before you in expiation of your sins, and
go, assured that, after the honour of this world shall have passed away,
imperishable glory shall await you even in the kingdom of heaven!"
Loud shouts of "God wills it! God wills it!" pronounced simultaneously by
the whole people, in all the different dialects and languages of which the
multitude was composed, here interrupted for a moment the speech of the
prelate: but, gladly seizing the time, Urban proceeded, after having
obtained silence, "Dear brethren, to-day is shown forth in you that which
the Lord has said by his evangelist--'When two or three shall be assembled
in my name, there shall I be in the midst of them;' for if the Lord God
had not been in your souls, you would not all have pronounced the same
words; or, rather, God himself pronounced them by your lips, for he it was
that put them in your hearts. Be they, then, your war-cry in the combat,
for those words came forth from God.--Let the army of the Lord, when it
rushes upon his enemies, shout but that one cry, 'God wills it! God wills
it!'[105]
"Remember, however, that we neither order nor advise this journey to the
old, nor to the weak, nor to those who are unfit to bear arms. Let not
this way be taken by women, without their husbands, or their brothers, or
their legitimate guardians, for such are rather a burden than an aid. Let
the rich assist the poor, and bring with them, at their own charge, those
who can bear arms to the field. Still, let not priests nor clerks, to
whatever place they may belong, set out on this journey without the
permission of their bishop; nor the layman undertake it without the
blessing of his pastor, for to such as do so their journey shall be
fruitless. Let whoever is inclined to devote himself to the cause of God,
make it a solemn engagement, and bear the cross of the Lord either on his
breast or on his brow till he set out; and let him who is ready to begin
his march place the holy emblem on his shoulders, in memory of that
precept of the Saviour--'He who does not take up his cross and follow me,
is not worthy of me.'"
The pontiff thus ended his oration, and the multitude prostrating
themselves before him, repeated the _Confiteor_[106] after one of the
cardinals. The pope then pronounced the absolution of their sins, and
bestowed on them his benediction; after which they retired to their homes
to prepare for the great undertaking to which they had vowed themselves.
Miracles are told of the manner in which the news of this council, and of
the events that distinguished it, spread to every part of the world; but
nevertheless it did spread, as may easily be conceived, with great
quickness, without any supernatural aid; and, to make use of the words of
him from whom we have sketched the oration of the pope, "Throughout the
earth, the Christians glorified themselves and were filled with joy, while
the Gentiles of Arabia and Persia trembled and were seized with sadness:
the souls of the one race were exalted, those of the others stricken with
fear and stupor."
Great, certainly, was the influence which the zeal and eloquence of Urban
gave him over the people. Some authors, with a curious sort of historical
puritanism, which leads them to judge of ages past only by the principles
of the day in which they themselves exist, have reproached the pope with
not using the means in his hands for purposes which would have needed the
heart of a Fenelon to conceive properly, and the head of a Napoleon to
execute. They say that, with the powers which he did possess, he might
have reformed a world! It is hardly fair, methinks, to require of a man in
a barbarous, ignorant, corrupted age the enlightened visions of the
nineteenth century.
Pope Urban II., at the end of the eleventh century, showed a great
superiority to the age in which he lived, and at the council of Clermont
evinced qualities of both the heart and the mind which have deservedly
brought his name down to us with honour. His first act in the council was
to excommunicate, for adulterous profligacy, Philip, monarch of the very
ground on which he stood; and, in so doing, he made use of the only
acknowledged authority by which the kings of that day could be checked in
the course of evil. Whether the authority itself was or was not
legitimate, is not here the question; but, being at the time undisputed,
and employed for the best of objects, its use can in no way fairly be
cited as an instance either of pride or ambition. The pope's conduct in
preaching the crusade is equally justifiable. His views were of course
those of the age in which he lived, and he acted with noble enthusiasm in
accordance with those views. He made vast efforts, he endangered his
person, he sacrificed his ease and comfort, to accomplish what no
churchman of his day pretended to doubt was a glorious and a noble
undertaking. In thus acting, he displayed great qualities of mind, and
showed himself superior to the century in powers of _conducting_, if he
was not so in the powers of _conceiving_ great designs.
It would be very difficult to prove, also, that the pope, had he even
possessed the will, could, by the exertion of every effort, have produced
the same effect in any other cause that he did in favour of the crusades.
I have already attempted to show that all things were prepared in Europe
for the expedition to the Holy Land, by the spirit of religious and
military enthusiasm; and the task was light, to aid in pouring on the
current of popular feeling in the direction which it had already begun to
take, when compared with the labour necessary to have turned that current
into another channel. He who does not grasp the spirit of the age on which
he writes, but judges of other days by the feelings of his own, is like
one who would adapt a polar dress to the climate of the tropics.
Before closing this chapter, one observation also must be made respecting
the justice of the crusade, which enterprise it has become somewhat
customary to look upon as altogether cruel and unnecessary. Such an
opinion, however, is in no degree founded on fact. The crusade was not
only as just as any other warfare of the day, but as just as any that ever
was waged. The object was, the protection and relief of a cruelly
oppressed and injured people--the object was, to repel a strong, an
active, and an encroaching enemy--the object was, to wrest from the hands
of a bloodthirsty and savage people territories which they themselves
claimed by no right but the sword, and in which the population they had
enslaved was loudly crying for deliverance from their yoke--the object
was, to defend a weak and exposed frontier from the further aggression of
a nation whose boast was conquest.
Such were the objects of the crusades; and though much of superstition was
mingled with the incitements, and many cruelties committed in its course,
the evils were not greater than ordinary ambition every day produces; and
the motives were as fair as any of those that have ever instigated the
many feuds and warfares of the world.