Shall to thy happy coast repair;
Blest isle! with matchless beauty crown'd,
And manly hearts to guard the fair.
Rule, Britannia, rule the waves!
Britons never will be slaves!
XIX. THE FIRST CRUSADE.
DAVID HUME.--1711-1776.
_From_ HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
After Mahomet had, by means of his pretended revelations, united the
dispersed Arabians under one head, they issued forth from their deserts
in great multitudes; and being animated with zeal for their new
religion, and supported by the vigor of their new government, they made
deep impression on the eastern empire, which was far in the decline,
with regard both to military discipline and to civil policy. Jerusalem,
by its situation, became one of their most early conquests; and the
Christians had the mortification to see the holy sepulchre, and the
other places, consecrated by the presence of their religious founder,
fallen into the possession of infidels. But the Arabians or Saracens
were so employed in military enterprises, by which they spread their
empire in a few years from the banks of the Ganges to the Straits of
Gibraltar, that they had no leisure for theological controversy: and
though the Alcoran, the original monument of their faith, seems to
contain some violent precepts, they were much less infected with the
spirit of bigotry and persecution than the indolent and speculative
Greeks, who were continually refining on the several articles of their
religious system. They gave little disturbance to those zealous
pilgrims, who daily flocked to Jerusalem; and they allowed every man,
after paying a moderate tribute, to visit the holy sepulchre, to perform
his religious duties, and to return in peace. But the Turcomans or
Turks, a tribe of Tartars, who had embraced Mahometanism, having wrested
Syria from the Saracens, and having, in the year 1065, made themselves
masters of Jerusalem, rendered the pilgrimage much more difficult and
dangerous to the Christians. The barbarity of their manners, and the
confusions attending their unsettled government, exposed the pilgrims to
many insults, robberies, and extortions: and these zealots, returning
from their meritorious fatigues and sufferings, filled all Christendom
with indignation against the infidels, who profaned the holy city by
their presence, and derided the sacred mysteries in the very place of
their completion. Gregory VII., among the other vast ideas which he
entertained, had formed the design of uniting all the Western Christians
against the Mahometans; but the egregious and violent invasions of that
pontiff on the civil power of princes, had created him so many enemies,
and had rendered his schemes so suspicious, that he was not able to make
great progress in this undertaking. The work was reserved for a meaner
instrument, whose low condition in life exposed him to no jealousy, and
whose folly was well calculated to coincide with the prevailing
principles of the times.
Peter, commonly called the Hermit, a native of Amiens in Picardy, had
made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Being deeply affected with the dangers
to which that act of piety now exposed the pilgrims, as well as with the
instances of oppression under which the Eastern Christians labored, he
entertained the bold, and, in all appearance, impracticable project of
leading into Asia, from the farthest extremities of the West, armies
sufficient to subdue those potent and warlike nations which now held the
holy city in subjection. He proposed his views to Martin II., who filled
the papal chair, and who, though sensible of the advantages which the
head of the Christian religion must reap from a religious war, and
though he esteemed the blind zeal of Peter a proper means for effecting
the purpose, resolved not to interpose his authority, till he saw a
greater probability of success. He summoned a council at Placentia,
which consisted of four thousand ecclesiastics, and thirty thousand
seculars; and which was so numerous that no hall could contain the
multitude, and it was necessary to hold the assembly in a plain. The
harangues of the Pope, and of Peter himself, representing the dismal
situation of their brethren in the East, and the indignity suffered by
the Christian name, in allowing the holy city to remain in the hands of
infidels, here found the minds of men so well prepared, that the whole
multitude suddenly and violently declared for the war, and solemnly
devoted themselves to perform this service, so meritorious, as they
believed it, to God and religion.
But though Italy seemed thus to have zealously embraced the enterprise,
Martin knew, that, in order to insure success, it was necessary to
enlist the greater and more warlike nations in the same engagement; and
having previously exhorted Peter to visit the chief cities and
sovereigns of Christendom, he summoned another council at Clermont in
Auvergne. The fame of this great and pious design being now universally
diffused, procured the attendance of the greatest prelates, nobles, and
princes; and when the Pope and the Hermit renewed their pathetic
exhortations, the whole assembly, as if impelled by an immediate
inspiration, not moved by their preceding impressions, exclaimed with
one voice, _It is the will of God, It is the will of God!_--words deemed
so memorable, and so much the result of a divine influence, that they
were employed as the signal of rendezvous and battle in all the future
exploits of those adventurers. Men of all ranks flew to arms with the
utmost ardor; and an exterior symbol, too, a circumstance of chief
moment, was here chosen by the devoted combatants. The sign of the
cross, which had been hitherto so much revered among Christians, and
which, the more it was an object of reproach among the Pagan world, was
the more passionately cherished by them, became the badge of union, and
was affixed to their right shoulder, by all who enlisted themselves in
this sacred warfare.
Europe was at this time sunk into profound ignorance and superstition.
The ecclesiastics had acquired the greatest ascendant over the human
mind: the people, who, being little restrained by honor, and less by
law, abandoned themselves to the worst crimes and disorders, knew of no
other expiation than the observances imposed on them by their spiritual
pastors: and it was easy to represent the holy war as an equivalent for
all penances, and an atonement for every violation of justice and
humanity. But amidst the abject superstition which now prevailed, the
military spirit also had universally diffused itself; and though not
supported by art or discipline, was become the general passion of the
nations governed by the feudal law. All the great lords possessed the
right of peace and war: they were engaged in perpetual hostilities with
each other: the open country was become a scene of outrage and disorder:
the cities, still mean and poor, were neither guarded by walls nor
protected by privileges, and were exposed to every insult: individuals
were obliged to depend for safety on their own force, or their private
alliances: and valor was the only excellence which was held in esteem,
or gave one man the pre-eminence above another. When all the particular
superstitions, therefore, were here united in one great object, the
ardor for military enterprises took the same direction; and Europe,
impelled by its two ruling passions, was loosened, as it were, from its
foundations, and seemed to precipitate itself in one united body upon
the East.
All orders of men, deeming the Crusades the only road to heaven,
enlisted themselves under these sacred banners, and were impatient to
open the way with their sword to the holy city. Nobles, artisans,
peasants, even priests, enrolled their names; and to decline this
meritorious service was branded with the reproach of impiety, or, what
perhaps was esteemed still more disgraceful, of cowardice and
pusillanimity. The infirm and aged contributed to the expedition by
presents and money; and many of them, not satisfied with the merit of
this atonement, attended it in person, and were determined, if
possible, to breathe their last in sight of that city where their
Saviour had died for them. Women themselves, concealing their sex under
the disguise of armor, attended the camp. The greatest criminals were
forward in a service, which they regarded as a propitiation for all
crimes; and the most enormous disorders were, during the course of those
expeditions, committed by men enured to wickedness, encouraged by
example, and impelled by necessity. The multitude of the adventurers
soon became so great, that their more sagacious leaders, Hugh count of
Vermandois, brother to the French king, Raymond count of Toulouse,
Godfrey of Bouillon, prince of Brabant, and Stephen count of Blois,
became apprehensive lest the greatness itself of the armament should
disappoint its purpose; and they permitted an undisciplined multitude,
computed at 300,000 men, to go before them, under the command of Peter
the Hermit and Walter the Moneyless. These men took the road towards
Constantinople through Hungary and Bulgaria; and trusting that Heaven,
by supernatural assistance, would supply all their necessities, they
made no provision for subsistance on their march. They soon found
themselves obliged to obtain by plunder, what they had vainly expected
from miracles; and the enraged inhabitants of the countries through
which they passed, gathering together in arms, attacked the disorderly
multitude and put them to slaughter without resistance. The more
disciplined armies followed after; and passing the straights at
Constantinople, they were mustered in the plains of Asia, and amounted
in the whole to the number of 700,000 combatants....
After the adventurers in the holy war were assembled on the banks of the
Bosphorus, opposite to Constantinople, they proceeded on their
enterprise; but immediately experienced those difficulties which their
zeal had hitherto concealed from them, and for which, even if they had
foreseen them, it would have been almost impossible to provide a remedy.
The Greek emperor, Alexis Comnenus, who had applied to the Western
Christians for succor against the Turks, entertained hopes, and those
but feeble ones, of obtaining such a moderate supply, as, acting under
his command, might enable him to repulse the enemy: but he was extremely
astonished to see his dominions overwhelmed, on a sudden, by such an
inundation of licentious barbarians, who, though they pretended
friendship, despised his subjects as unwarlike, and detested them as
heretical. By all the arts of policy, in which he excelled, he
endeavored to divert the torrent; but while he employed professions,
caresses, civilities, and seeming services towards the leaders of the
crusade, he secretly regarded those imperious allies as more dangerous
than the open enemies by whom his empire had been formerly invaded.
Having effected that difficult point of disembarking them safely in
Asia, he entered into a private correspondence with Soliman, emperor of
the Turks; and practised every insidious art, which his genius, his
power, or his situation, enabled him to employ, for disappointing the
enterprise, and discouraging the Latins from making thenceforward any
such prodigious migrations. His dangerous policy was seconded by the
disorders inseparable from so vast a multitude, who were not united
under one head, and were conducted by leaders of the most independent
intractable spirit, unacquainted with military discipline, and
determined enemies to civil authority and submission. The scarcity of
provisions, the excesses of fatigue, the influence of unknown climates,
joined to the want of concert in their operations, and to the sword of a
warlike enemy, destroyed the adventurers by thousands, and would have
abated the ardor of men impelled to war by less powerful motives. Their
zeal, however, their bravery, and their irresistible force, still
carried them forward, and continually advanced them to the great end of
their enterprise. After an obstinate siege they took Nice, the seat of
the Turkish empire; they defeated Soliman in two great battles; they
made themselves masters of Antioch; and entirely broke the force of the
Turks, who had so long retained those countries in subjection. The
soldan of Egypt, whose alliance they had hitherto courted, recovered, on
the fall of the Turkish power, his former authority in Jerusalem; and he
informed them by his ambassadors, that if they came disarmed to that
city, they might now perform their religious vows, and that all
Christian pilgrims, who should thenceforth visit the holy sepulchre,
might expect the same good treatment which they had ever received from
his predecessors. The offer was rejected; the soldan was required to
yield up the city to the Christians; and on his refusal, the champions
of the cross advanced to the siege of Jerusalem, which they regarded as
the consummation of their labors. By the detachments which they had
made, and the disasters which they had undergone, they were diminished
to the number of twenty thousand foot, and fifteen hundred horse; but
these were still formidable, from their valor, their experience, and the
obedience which, from past calamities, they had learned to pay to their
leaders. After a siege of five weeks, they took Jerusalem by assault;
and, impelled by a mixture of military and religious rage, they put the
numerous garrison and inhabitants to the sword without distinction.
Neither arms defended the valiant, nor submission the timorous: no age
or sex was spared: infants on the breast were pierced by the same blow
with their mothers, who implored for mercy: even a multitude to the
number of ten thousand persons, who had surrendered themselves
prisoners, and were promised quarter, were butchered in cold blood by
those ferocious conquerors. The streets of Jerusalem were covered with
dead bodies; and the triumphant warriors, after every enemy was subdued
and slaughtered, immediately turned themselves, with the sentiments of
humiliation and contrition, towards the holy sepulchre. They threw aside
their arms, still streaming with blood: they advanced with reclined
bodies, and naked feet and heads, to that sacred monument: they sang
anthems to their Saviour, who had there purchased their salvation by his
death and agony: and their devotion, enlivened by the presence of the
place where he had suffered, so overcame their fury, that they dissolved
in tears, and bore the appearance of every soft and tender sentiment. So
inconsistent is human nature with itself! and so easily does the most
effeminate superstition ally, both with the most heroic courage and with
the fiercest barbarity!
This great event happened on the fifth of July in the last year of the
eleventh century. The Christian princes and nobles, after choosing
Godfrey of Bouillon king of Jerusalem, began to settle themselves in
their new conquests; while some of them returned to Europe, in order to
enjoy at home that glory, which their valor had acquired them in this
popular and meritorious enterprise.
XX. THE BARD.
_A Pindaric Ode._[D]
THOMAS GRAY.--1716-1771.
I. 1.
"Ruin seize thee, ruthless King!
Confusion on thy banners wait;
Though fann'd by Conquest's crimson wing,
They mock the air with idle state.
Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail,
Nor e'en thy virtues, Tyrant, shall avail
To save thy secret soul from nightly fears,
From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears!"
Such were the sounds that o'er the crested pride
Of the first Edward scatter'd wild dismay,
As down the steep of Snowdon's shaggy side
He wound with toilsome march his long array.
Stout Glo'ster stood aghast in speechless trance:
"To arms!" cried Mortimer, and couch'd his quivering lance.
I. 2.
On a rock, whose haughty brow
Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood,
Rob'd in the sable garb of woe,
With haggard eyes the Poet stood;
(Loose his beard, and hoary hair
Stream'd, like a meteor, to the troubled air),
And with a master's hand, and prophet's fire,
Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre.
"Hark, how each giant-oak, and desert cave,
Sighs to the torrent's awful voice beneath!
O'er thee, O King! their hundred arms they wave,
Revenge on thee in hoarser murmurs breathe;
Vocal no more, since Cambria's fatal day,
To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewellyn's lay.
I. 3.
"Cold is Cadwallo's tongue,
That hush'd the stormy main:
Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed:
Mountains, ye mourn in vain
Modred, whose magic song
Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-topt head.
On dreary Arvon's shore they lie,
Smear'd with gore, and ghastly pale:
Far, far aloof the affrighted ravens sail;
The famish'd eagle screams, and passes by.
Dear lost companions of my tuneful art,
Dear, as the light that visits these sad eyes,
Dear, as the ruddy drops that warm my heart,
Ye died amidst your dying country's cries--
No more I weep. They do not sleep.
On yonder cliffs, a grisly band,
I see them sit; they linger yet,
Avengers of their native land:
With me in dreadful harmony they join,
And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line.
II. 1.
"Weave the warp, and weave the woof,
The winding-sheet of Edward's race.
Give ample room, and verge enough
The characters of hell to trace.
Mark the year, and mark the night,
When Severn shall re-echo with affright
The shrieks of death, through Berkley's roof that ring,
Shrieks of an agonizing king!
She-wolf of France, with unrelenting fangs,
That tear'st the bowels of thy mangled mate,
From thee be born, who o'er thy country hangs
The scourge of heaven. What terrors round him wait!
Amazement in his van, with flight combin'd,
And Sorrow's faded form, and Solitude behind.
II. 2.
"Mighty victor, mighty lord!
Low on his funeral couch he lies!
No pitying heart, no eye, afford
A tear to grace his obsequies.
Is the sable warrior fled?
Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead.
The swarm, that in thy noontide beam were born?
Gone to salute the rising morn.
Fair laughs the Morn, and soft the Zephyr blows,
While proudly riding o'er the azure realm
In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes;
Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm;
Regardless of the sweeping Whirlwind's sway,
That, hush'd in grim repose, expects his evening prey.
II. 3.
"Fill high the sparkling bowl,
The rich repast prepare;
Reft of a crown, he yet may share the feast:
Close by the regal chair
Fell Thirst and Famine scowl
A baleful smile upon their baffled guest.
Heard ye the din of battle bray,
Lance to lance, and horse to horse?
Long years of havoc urge their destin'd course,
And through the kindred squadrons mow their way.
Ye towers of Julius, London's lasting shame,
With many a foul and midnight murder fed,
Revere his consort's faith, his father's fame,
And spare the meek usurper's holy head.
Above, below, the rose of snow,
Twin'd with her blushing foe, we spread:
The bristled boar in infant-gore
Wallows beneath the thorny shade.
Now, brothers, bending o'er the accursed loom,
Stamp we our vengeance deep, and ratify his doom.
III. 1.
"Edward, lo! to sudden fate
(Weave we the woof. The thread is spun.)
Half of thy heart we consecrate.
(The web is wove. The work is done.)
Stay, O stay! nor thus forlorn
Leave me unbless'd, unpitied, here to mourn:
In yon bright track, that fires the western skies,
They melt, they vanish from my eyes.
But oh! what solemn scenes on Snowdon's height
Descending slow their glittering skirts unroll?
Visions of glory, spare my aching sight!
Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul!
No more our long-lost Arthur we bewail.
All hail, ye genuine kings, Britannia's issue, hail!
III. 2.
"Girt with many a baron bold
Sublime their starry fronts they rear;
And gorgeous dames, and statesmen old
In bearded majesty, appear.
In the midst a form divine!
Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-line;
Her lion-port, her awe-commanding face,
Attemper'd sweet to virgin-grace.
What strings symphonious tremble in the air,
What strains of vocal transport round her play.
Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear
They breathe a soul to animate thy clay.
Bright Rapture calls, and soaring, as she sings,
Waves in the eye of heaven her many-color'd wings.
III. 3.
"The verse adorn again
Fierce War, and faithful Love,
And Truth severe, by fairy Fiction drest.
In buskin'd measures move
Pale Grief, and pleasing Pain,
With Horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast.
A voice, as of the cherub-choir,
Gales from blooming Eden bear;
And distant warblings lessen on my ear,
That lost in long futurity expire.
Fond impious man, thinks thou yon sanguine cloud,
Rais'd by thy breath, has quench'd the orb of day?
To-morrow he repairs the golden flood,
And warms the nations with redoubled ray.
Enough for me: with joy I see
The different doom our fates assign.
Be thine despair, and sceptred care;
To triumph, and to die, are mine."
He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height
Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.
FOOTNOTES:
[D] This ode is founded on a tradition current in Wales, that Edward
the First, when he completed the conquest of that country, ordered
all the Bards that fell into his hands to be put to death.--GRAY.
XXI. ON AN ADDRESS TO THE THRONE CONCERNING AFFAIRS IN AMERICA.
HOUSE OF LORDS--November 18th, 1777.
LORD CHATHAM.--1708-1778.
I rise, my Lords, to declare my sentiments on this most solemn and
serious subject. It has imposed a load upon my mind, which, I fear,
nothing can remove, but which impels me to endeavor its alleviation, by
a free and unreserved communication of my sentiments.
In the first part of the address, I have the honor of heartily
concurring with the noble Earl who moved it. No man feels sincerer joy
than I do; none can offer more genuine congratulations on every
accession of strength to the Protestant succession. I therefore join in
every congratulation on the birth of another princess, and the happy
recovery of her Majesty.
But I must stop here. My courtly complaisance will carry me no farther.
I will not join in congratulation on misfortune and disgrace. I cannot
concur in a blind and servile address, which approves and endeavors to
sanctify the monstrous measures which have heaped disgrace and
misfortune upon us. This, my Lords, is a perilous and tremendous moment!
It is not a time for adulation. The smoothness of flattery cannot now
avail--cannot save us in this rugged and awful crisis. It is now
necessary to instruct the Throne in the language of truth. We must
dispel the illusion and the darkness which envelop it, and display, in
its full danger and true colors, the ruin that is brought to our doors.
This, my Lords, is our duty. It is the proper function of this
noble assembly, sitting, as we do, upon our honors in this House,
the hereditary council of the Crown. _Who_ is the minister--_where_
is the minister, that has dared to suggest to the Throne the
contrary, unconstitutional language this day delivered from it? The
accustomed language from the Throne has been application to
Parliament for advice, and a reliance on its constitutional advice
and assistance. As it is the right of Parliament to give, so it is
the duty of the Crown to ask it. But on this day, and in this
extreme momentous exigency, no reliance is reposed on our
constitutional counsels! no advice is asked from the sober and
enlightened care of Parliament! but the Crown, from itself and by
itself, declares an unalterable determination to pursue
measures--and what measures, my Lords? The measures that have
produced the imminent perils that threaten us; the measures that
have brought ruin to our doors.