BOOK XVII.
——
CRUSADES AGAINST THE TURKS.
A.D. 1453-1481.
The West had heard of the dangers which threatened the Greek empire with indifference; but on learning the last triumph of the arms of Mahomet, all the Christian nations were seized with terror; and it was believed that the janissaries were already overturning the altars of the Gospel in the richest provinces of Germany. People trembled at the idea of one day hearing the Koran preached in the churches of Rome, changed into mosques. Murmurs arose on all sides against the Pope, Nicholas V., who was reproached with not having preached a crusade, to prevent the misfortune which all Christendom deplored. Assistance sent before the siege might, in fact, have saved Constantinople; but the city once in the power of the barbarians, the evil became irreparable. A union of all the Christian powers alone could wrest their conquests from the hands of the Turks, and against this union fresh obstacles arose daily.
In vain, to excite the West once more, the eloquence of Christian orators was addressed sometimes to the grief, and at others to the piety, of the faithful; in vain, by turns, the ascendancy of religious ideas and that of chivalry were employed: everybody deplored the progress of the Turks, but a blind resignation, or rather a cruel indifference, soon took place of the general consternation.
A short time after the taking of Constantinople, Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, assembled at Lille, in Flanders, all the nobility of his states; and in a festival of which history has preserved a faithful account, he endeavoured to awaken the zeal and valour of the knights, by the spectacle of everything that could at that period affect their chivalric imagination. In the first place, a great number of pictures and curious scenes were exhibited to the spectators, among which were the labours of Hercules, the adventures of Jason and Medea, and the enchantments of Melusina.[73] After these, an elephant was led into the banquetting-hall by a Saracen giant; on the back of the elephant was a tower, from which issued a lady clothed in mourning, representing the Christian Church. The elephant having arrived in front of the table of the duke of Burgundy, the lady recited a long complaint, in verse, upon the evils with which she was afflicted; and addressing herself to the princes, dukes, and knights, she complained of their tardiness and their indifference in assisting her. Then appeared a herald-at-arms, who carried in his hand a pheasant, a bird which chivalry had adopted as the symbol and the prize of bravery. Two noble demoiselles, and several knights of the order of the Golden Fleece, approached the duke, and presented to him the bird of the brave, praying him to hold them in remembrance. Philip the Good, who knew, says Oliver de la Marche, with what intention he held this banquet, cast a look of compassion upon the Lady Holy Church,[74] and drew from his bosom a writing, which the herald-at-arms read with a loud voice. In this writing, the duke vowed in the first place by God his Creator, and by the holy Virgin, and next by the ladies and the pheasant, “that if it pleased the king of France to expose his body for the defence of the Christian faith, to resist the damnable enterprize of the Grand Turk, he would serve him with his person and his power in the said voyage, in the best manner that God would give him grace; if the said king committed this expedition to any prince of his blood, or other great lord, he swore to obey him; and if, on account of his great affairs, he was nut disposed to go or to send, and other potent princes would take the cross, he offered to accompany them as soon as he possibly could. If, during the holy voyage, he could by any means or manner learn or know that the said Grand Turk would be willing to meet him body to body, he, Philip, for the sake of the said Christian faith, would willingly fight with him, with the help of the all-powerful God, and of his very sweet Virgin Mother, whom he always called upon to aid him.”
The Lady Holy Church thanked the duke for the zeal he showed for her defence. All the lords and knights who were present, invoked, in their turns, the names of God and the Virgin, without forgetting the ladies and the pheasant, and swore to consecrate their wealth and their lives to the service of Jesus Christ, and of their very redoubtable lord the duke of Burgundy. All expressed the most ardent enthusiasm. Some distinguished themselves by the whimsicality and the singularity of their promises. The count d’Etampes, nephew to Philip the Good, engaged himself to offer a challenge to any of the great princes and lords of the Grand Turk’s company, and promised to fight them body to body, two to two, three to three, four to four, five to five, &c. The bastard of Burgundy swore to fight with a Turk in any manner he might please, and engaged to have his challenge sent to the hostel of the Turk. The lord of Pons swore never to sojourn in any city till he had met with a Saracen with whom he might fight body to body, by the help of our Lady, for the love of whom he would never sleep in a bed on a Saturday, before the entire accomplishment of his vow.
Another knight undertook, from the day of his departure, never to eat anything on a Friday that had been killed, until he had exchanged blows with one or many enemies of the faith; if the banner of his lord and that of the Saracens were unfurled as the signal for fight, he made a vow to go straight to the banner of the Grand Turk, and to strike it to the earth, or die in attempting to do so.[75] The seigneur de Toulongeon, on his arrival in the country of the infidels, vowed to challenge one of the men-at-arms of the Grand Turk, and fight him in the presence of his lord, the duke of Burgundy; or if the Saracen were not willing to come, he proposed to go and fight him in the presence of the Grand Turk, provided he might have good assurance of safety.
All these promises, which were never accomplished, serve at least to show us the spirit and the manners of chivalry. The simple confidence which the knights had in their arms, proves how little they were acquainted with the enemies against whom they declared war in this fashion.[76]
When each one had pronounced his vows, a lady clothed in white, bearing upon her back this inscription in letters of gold,—Grace-Dieu, came and saluted the assembly, and presented twelve ladies with twelve knights. These ladies personated twelve virtues or qualities, the name of which each wore upon her shoulder:—Faith, Charity, Justice, Reason, Prudence, Temperance, Strength, Truth, Bounty (largesse), Diligence, Hope, Valour,—such were the chivalric virtues that were to preside over the crusade.
After this ceremony, says the chronicler we have quoted, the ladies began to dance like mummers, and to give themselves up to gaiety, in order to carry on the festival more joyously.
The details of this chivalric feast make us perceive a great change in the spirit and the manners of Europe. When we call to our minds the Council of Clermont, the preachings of Peter the Hermit and of St. Bernard, with the grave enthusiasm and the austere devotion which presided at the taking of the oaths of the early Crusaders; and when we afterwards behold the brilliant solemnities of chivalry, the half-profane and half-religious promises of the knights, in short, all the worldly spectacles amidst which a holy war was proclaimed, we can fancy ourselves transported not only into another age, but amongst new nations. The religion which had precipitated the West upon Asia had no longer an empire, unless the ladies were its interpreters. It was less piety, or the desire of obtaining heavenly crowns, than the sentiment of gallantry with which they were animated in tournaments, that brought knights beneath the standard of the cross.
We likewise know that this kind of preaching produced only a transient effect upon the minds of the warriors; and that they had not any influence whatever upon the multitude. This observation must convince us of one truth, which is, that the most active and powerful motive among men will always be the spirit of religion, and that no other motive, emanating from human passions, could have excited the world like that which produced and kept up the crusades.
Some pious men, however, made incredible efforts to revive the spirit of the early times of the holy wars. John Capistran, a monk of St. Francis, and Æneas Sylvius, bishop of Sienna, neglected no means that they thought would inflame the minds of the people, and reanimate religious enthusiasm. The first, who passed for a saint, travelled through the cities of Germany and Hungary, describing to the assemblies of the people, the perils of the faith, and the threats of the wicked. The second, one of the most enlightened bishops of his age, versed in Greek and Latin literature, an orator and a poet, exhorted princes to take up arms to keep off invasion from their own states, and save the Christian republic from approaching destruction.
Æneas Sylvius wrote to the sovereign pontiff, and endeavoured to rouse his zeal by telling him, that the loss of Constantinople would weaken his credit and tarnish his name, if he did not use every effort to destroy the power of the Turks. The pious orator repaired to Rome, and preached the crusade in a consistory; and to show the necessity for a holy war, he quoted by turns, before the pope and cardinals, the authority of Greek philosophers, and that of fathers of the Church. He deplored the captivity of Jerusalem, the cradle of Christianity; and the slavery of Greece, the mother of the sciences and the arts. Æneas celebrated the heroic courage of the Germans, the noble devotion of the French, the generous pride of the Spaniards, and the love of glory which animated the nations of Italy. The king of Hungary, whose kingdom was threatened by Mahomet, was present at this assembly. The orator of the crusade, pointing out this monarch to the sovereign pontiff and the prelates, conjured them to have pity on his tears.
Frederick III., emperor of Germany, at the same time wrote to Pope Nicholas V., to implore him to save Christendom. “The words that issue from the mouth of man cannot give an idea of the calamity the Catholic Church has just experienced, or make known the ferocity of the people who are now desolating Greece, and who menace the West.” The emperor pressed the pope to unite all the Christian powers against this formidable enemy; announcing that he himself was about to convoke the princes and states of Germany. The pope applauded the intentions of the emperor, and legates were sent to the diets of Ratisbon and Frankfort. Æneas Sylvius again preached the crusade against the Turks in these two assemblies. The duke of Burgundy, who was present at both, renewed, in the presence of the princes and states of the German empire, the vow he had made to God, to the Blessed Virgin, to the ladies, and to the pheasant. Hungarian deputies came to announce that the banks of the Danube and the frontiers of Germany were about to be invaded by the Turks, if Christians did not hasten, in all parts, to take up arms to repel them.
The diet decreed that ten thousand horse and thirty thousand foot should be sent against the Turks; but as nothing was decided as to the manner of levying this army, or as to how it should be maintained, the enthusiasm for the crusade soon declined, and nobody put himself forward to oppose the progress of the Ottomans. Æneas Sylvius explains to us, in one of his letters, the causes of this indifference and inaction of Christendom. “The Christian republic was nothing but a body without a head; they who ought to have been the leaders had nothing great about them but the name; Europe was divided into a crowd of inimical or rival states; discords that could not be appeased, diversity of interests, languages, and customs, left no hope of raising a common army, or of carrying on an active and regular war against the Turks.”
Æneas Sylvius thus demonstrated the impossibility of a crusade, and yet, carried away by his zeal, he passed his whole life in preaching one. Whilst he was uselessly haranguing the princes of Germany, the pope was endeavouring to establish concord among the states of Italy. The ascendancy of the pontifical authority was not sufficient to calm angry spirits, and peace was the work of a poor hermit, whose words exercised a supreme authority over the hearts of the faithful. Brother Simon issued all at once from his retreat, perambulated the cities, and addressing both princes and people, exhorted them to unite against the enemies of Jesus Christ: at the voice of the holy orator, Venice, Florence, and the duke of Milan, laid down their arms, and a league was formed, into which most of the republics and principalities of Italy entered.
Advantage might have been taken of this union to declare war against the Turks. But the confederation had no leader capable of directing it. Two men were able to set both Germany and Italy in motion,—the Emperor Frederick and Pope Nicholas. They alone could have insured success to a crusade which they themselves had preached: but the one was restrained by the avarice and indolence of his character; the other, passionate in the pursuit of learned antiquity, always surrounded by scholars, employed himself much more earnestly in collecting the literary treasures of Greece and Rome, than in promoting attempts for the deliverance of the city of Constantine. When the Turks took Byzantium, he was causing translation to be made, at great expense, of the most celebrated Greek authors; and it would not be harsh to believe that the tenths levied for the crusade, were sometimes employed in the acquisition of the masterpieces of Plato, Herodotus, or Thucydides.
Nicholas confined himself to a few exhortations addressed to the faithful, and died without having removed any of the difficulties which opposed themselves to the undertaking of a holy war. Calixtus III., who succeeded him, showed more zeal, and at the very commencement of his pontificate, he sent legates and preachers throughout Europe, to proclaim a crusade and levy tenths. An embassy from the pontiff went to solicit the kings of Persia and Armenia, and the khan of the Tartars, to unite with the Christians of the West, to make war against the Turks. Sixteen galleys, constructed with the produce of the tenths, put to sea under the command of the patriarch of Aquileia, and displayed the banner of St. Peter in the Archipelago, and on the coasts of Asia Minor; Æneas Sylvius harangued the pope in the name of the emperor of Germany, and promised him the concurrence of all the powers of Christendom, if his holiness opened the treasures of the Church, and, by his evangelical exhortations, called all the workmen to the harvest. Calixtus III. thanked the head of the empire for his advice, and pressed him to set the example. But the indolent Frederick contented himself with renewing his promises; and whilst the emperor was thus exhorting the pope to maintain a crusade, and that the pope, on his side, was urging the emperor to take arms, the Ottomans penetrated into Hungary, and advanced against Belgrade.
This city, one of the bulwarks of the West, received no succour from Christendom. There remained no hope for it but in the valour of Hunniades, and in the apostolic zeal of John of Capistran. The one commanded the troops of the Hungarians, and excited them by his example; the other, who, by his preachings had got together a great number of German Crusaders, animated the Christian soldiers, and inspired them with an invincible ardour.
Contemporary chronicles inform us, that at this period a hairy comet appeared blazing in the east. The Christian nations believed they saw in this phenomenon a prophetic signal of the greatest evils; and as the evil then most to be dreaded was the invasion of the Turks, Calixtus was desirous of profiting by this feeling of the people, to revive the idea of a crusade. He exhorted the Christians to penitence; and pointed out the holy war as a means by which they might expiate their sins and appease the anger of Heaven.
In no country, notwithstanding, did the people arm, except in those that were immediately menaced by the Turks. It was at this time that the pope ordered that every day at noon, the bells should be rung in all parishes, to call upon the faithful to pray for the Hungarians, and for those who were contending with the Turks. Calixtus granted indulgences to all Christians who, at this signal, would repeat the Dominical prayer and the angelic salutation three times. Such was the origin of the Angelus, which the customs of the Church have consecrated, and continued to modern times.
Heaven was doubtless touched by these fervent prayers, which arose at the same time and together, from all parts of Christian Europe. On the 6th of August, 1456, the Turks were defeated under the walls of Belgrade, which they had besieged forty days, and which they had threatened to treat in the same manner as they had treated the Greek capital. The presence of Hunniades and the ardent zeal of John Capistran had so excited the valour of the Hungarians, that they destroyed the Ottoman fleet, which covered the Danube and the Save, and the army commanded by Mahomet himself. More than twenty thousand Mussulmans lost their lives in the battle; the sultan was wounded amidst his janissaries, and escaped the pursuit of the victors with much difficulty. All Europe returned Heaven thanks for a victory, for the obtaining of which it had only concurred by its prayers, and which it must have considered a miracle. The tent and the arms of Mahomet were sent to the pope, as a trophy of the holy war, and as a homage rendered to the father of the faithful. Religion celebrated by its ceremonies, a day in which its most cruel enemies had been vanquished. The festival of the Transfiguration, instituted by a bull of the pope, and marked to take place on the 6th of August, reminded the universal Church, every year, of the defeat of the Turks before Belgrade.
Hunniades and Capistran did not long survive their triumphs; but both died whilst Christendom was still mixing their names with hymns of gratitude. The passion of jealousy empoisoned their last moments; and the scarcely evangelical warmth with which each of them claimed the honour of having saved Belgrade, left a stain upon their renown. Æneas Sylvius, when commending their memory to the esteem of posterity, celebrates the virtues of Capistran, and expresses astonishment that an humble cenobite, who had trampled under-foot all the riches of this world, should not have had sufficient strength to resist the charms of glory.
Whilst the Hungarians were beating the Turks before Belgrade, the pope’s fleet gained some advantages in the Archipelago. Calixtus took care not to neglect to remind the faithful of the exploits and triumphs of the patriarch of Aquileia; persuaded that the news of victories gained over the Mussulmans would restore hope and courage to all those whom the reverses of the Christians had discouraged and terrified. A fresh crusade was preached in France, England, Germany, and even in the kingdoms of Castile, Arragon, and Portugal. The people everywhere listened with pious seriousness to the preachers of the crusade; but murmurs generally arose against the levying of the tenths. The clergy of Rouen, with the university and parliament of Paris, opposed the impost openly. In Germany complaints were more violent than elsewhere. In proportion as the spirit of the holy wars cooled, the means employed by the popes to renew these distant expeditions were judged with greater severity. It must likewise be admitted, that there were great abuses in the collection and the employment of the tenths. An open traffic of the indulgences of the court of Rome for the crusade was carried on, and the tribunal of penitence, on certain occasions, seemed to be nothing but a means of levying taxes upon the faithful. It was only by money that the favours of the Church and the mercies of Heaven could be obtained; the sins of Christians might be said, in some sort, to have a tariff; and we find in the history of Arragon, that disobedience to the decrees of the pope even had become the source of a new tribute. It may be remembered that the sovereign pontiffs had frequently forbidden Christians to convey munitions or arms to the infidels. The trade of the maritime cities often braved the menaces of the Holy See, and avarice led the merchants to transgress the severest orders on this point. A sum of money was then required, in the name of the pope, of all who were accused of this offence. They were condemned to pay the fourth or the fifth of the profits arising from their illicit commerce. Commissaries were appointed to levy this impost, and decrees regulated the collection of it, as in that of all other public revenues.
But that which most completely exposes the spirit of this age, and particularly that of the court of Rome, is, that in the preachings of the crusades, the faithful were much less earnestly exhorted to take arms than to pay a tribute in money. The levies raised in the name of the Holy See, were termed succours for the Hungarians; and as the Hungarians always stood in need of being succoured, the levying of the tenths became a permanent state of things, which the people and the clergy endured every day with less patience and resignation.
We ought likewise to add, that the Holy See did not always receive the produce of the tribute it imposed upon the Christians. Princes, under pretence of making war against the Turks, sometimes took possession of it; and the tenths destined for the holy war were too often employed in carrying out the quarrels of ambition.
At length the complaints of the Germans against the commissaries and agents of the court of Rome became so serious and so numerous, that the pope found himself obliged to reply to them. In his apology, drawn up by Æneas Sylvius, he declared that Scanderberg and the king of Hungary had received numerous succours; that fleets had been armed against the infidels, and that vessels and munitions of war had been sent to Rhodes, Cyprus, and Mytilene; that, in a word, the money levied for the defence of the faith and of Christendom upon the faithful, had never been otherwise employed. The apologist of the pope, after having thus justified him, felicitated him with having saved Europe.
This apology, which explains nothing, and which finishes with an eulogy, too strongly resembles that of the ancient Roman, who, upon being accused of having embezzled the public money, as his only reply, proposed that they should go to the Capitol, and give thanks to the gods for the victories he had gained over the enemies of the republic. It must, however, be admitted, that that which Æneas Sylvius said was not totally void of truth; and history can but applaud the zeal which the sovereign pontiff displayed, in order to arrest the progress of Mahomet, and save a crowd of victims from the tyranny of the Ottomans.
Calixtus never ceased soliciting the Christian princes to unite with him, and was particularly anxious to kindle the warlike enthusiasm of the French against the Turks. “If I were but seconded by the French,” said he, “we would destroy the race of the infidels.” He spared neither prayers nor promises to induce Charles VII. to succour Hungary, and defend the barriers of Europe. He sent him that golden rose which the popes were accustomed to bless on the fourth Sunday of Lent, and of which they made a present to Christian princes, as a particular mark of esteem and affection. These caresses and these civilities of the pontiff were a great change from the times in which the heads of the Church only spoke to monarchs in the name of irritated Heaven; and only exhorted them to take the cross whilst reproaching them with their sins, and recommending them to expiate them by the holy war. The popes, when preaching the crusades, were no longer the interpreters of dominant opinions; their wishes were no longer laws, and princes made ample use of the faculty they possessed of not obeying. Charles VII., who was in constant dread of the enterprises of the English, resisted the reiterated entreaties of Calixtus. It was in vain that the dauphin, who afterwards reigned under the title of Louis XI., and was then living at the court of Burgundy, openly declared himself favourable to the crusade, and wished to create a party for himself in the kingdom, by taking the cross; France remained uninterested in the war preached against the infidels, and Charles contented himself with permitting the levy of the tenths in his states, upon the express condition that he should superintend the employment of them.
Whilst the pope was imploring the assistance of Christendom for the Hungarians, Hungary was a prey to troubles created by the succession of Ladislaus, who was killed at the battle of Warna. The family of Hunniades was proscribed, and the ambition of the princes disputed the possession of the provinces threatened by the Turks. Calixtus employed the paternal authority of the Holy See to appease the furies of discord, and to reconcile the pretensions of the emperor of Germany with the rights of justice and with the rights of nations; and these generous efforts at length succeeded in reëstablishing peace. His conduct appeared less praiseworthy, and particularly less disinterested, when the succession of Alphonso, king of Naples, brought fresh wars upon Italy. History relates that the sovereign pontiff, on this occasion, forgot the perils of Christianity, and employed the treasures collected for the holy war in the defence of a cause which certainly was not that of religion.
But the indefatigable orator of the crusades, Æneas Sylvius, succeeded Calixtus III. in the chair of St. Peter. The tiara appeared to be the reward of his zeal for the war against the Turks, and everything gave reason for hope that he would neglect nothing to execute himself the projects he had conceived; and awaken among the nations of Christendom, that warlike enthusiasm, that religious patriotism, which breathed in his discourses.
Mahomet II. continued to follow up the course of his victories, and his power every day became more redoubtable. He was then employed in despoiling all the Greek princes who had escaped his first invasions, and whose weakness was concealed under the pompous titles of emperor of Trebizond, king of Iberia, and despot of the Morea. All these princes, to whom acts of submission cost nothing, provided they enabled them to reign a few days longer, had been eager, a short time after the taking of Constantinople, to send ambassadors to the victorious sultan, to congratulate him upon his triumphs; and the fierce conqueror saw nothing in them but a prey which it would be easy for him to devour,—enemies that he could subdue at leisure. Most of them dishonoured the last moments of their reign or their existence, by all that ambition, jealousy, and the spirit of discord could inspire that was perfidious, cruel, or treacherous. When the Mussulmans penetrated into the Greek provinces, stained with all the crimes of civil war, it might have been believed that they were sent to accomplish the menaces of heavenly anger.
Mahomet did not deign to put forth all his strength against the pusillanimous tyrants of Greece. Other enemies were worthy of employing his arms; he had but to speak a word, to pull the throne from under the prince of Synope or the emperor of Trebizond; and if all that remained of the family of the Comnenas were massacred by his orders, he, in this circumstance, was less obedient to the fears of a dark policy than to his natural ferocity. Seven years after the taking of Byzantium, he led his janissaries into the Peloponnesus: at his approach, all the princes of Achaia either took to flight, or became his slaves. Meeting with scarcely any resistance, he gathered with disdain the fruits of an easy conquest. He meditated projects more vast than such conquests; and when he unfurled the banner of the cross amidst the ruins of Sparta and Athens, he fixed his eyes earnestly upon the Sea of Sicily, and wished to find a route that might conduct him to the shores of Italy.
The first care of Pius II. was to proclaim the fresh dangers of Europe. He wrote to all the powers of Christendom, and convoked a general assembly at Mantua, to deliberate upon the means of arresting the progress of the Ottomans. The bull of the pontiff reminded the faithful, that the Church of Christ had often been beaten by the tempest, but that He who commands the winds was ever watchful over its safety. “My predecessors,” added he, “have declared war against the Turks, both by land and by sea; it is for us now to carry it on; we will spare neither labour nor expense for a war so useful, so just, and so holy.”
All the states of Christendom promised to send ambassadors to Mantua. Pius II. went thither himself; and in his opening discourse, he expatiated with strength against the indifference of princes and sovereigns. He pointed to the Turks then ravaging Bosnia and Greece, and ready to extend, like a rapid conflagration, their devastations over Italy, Germany, and all the countries of Europe. The pontiff declared he would not quit Mantua before the Christian princes and states had given him pledges of their devotion to the cause of Christendom; and at length protested, that if he were abandoned by the Christian powers, he would alone maintain this glorious struggle, and would die in defending the independence of Europe and of the Church.
The language of Pius II. was full of religion, and his religion was full of patriotism. When Demosthenes and the Greek orators mounted the tribune to press their fellow-citizens to defend the liberties of Greece against the enterprises of Philip, or the invasions of the great king, they spoke, without doubt, with more eloquence; but never were they inspired by greater interests or nobler motives.
Cardinal Bissarion, to whom Greece had given birth, and whom the Church of Rome had adopted, spoke after Pius II., and declared that the whole college of cardinals was animated by the same zeal as the father of the faithful. The deputies of Rhodes, Cyprus, Epirus; those of Illyria, Peloponnesus, and of several of the countries the Turks had invaded, made, before the council, a lamentable recital of all the evils the Christians were suffering under the domination of the Mussulmans; but the ambassadors of the great powers of Europe were not yet arrived; and this delay announced but too plainly the indifference of the Christian monarchs for the crusades. The debates which afterwards arose relative to the pretensions of the families of Anjou and Arragon to the kingdom of Naples; and then the disputes upon etiquette and precedence, which occupied the council during several days, completely proved that the minds of the assembly were not sufficiently impressed by the dangers of Christian Europe, and that no generous resolution would be there taken to prevent them.
The pope proposed to levy for the crusade a tenth upon the revenues of the clergy, a twentieth upon the Jews, and a thirtieth upon princes and seculars. He proposed at the same time, to raise an army of a hundred thousand men in the different states of Europe, and to intrust the command of this army to the emperor of Germany. These propositions, in order to be executed, required the approbation of the sovereigns, and most of the ambassadors made only vague promises. A great number of conferences were held; the council lasted many months, and the pope quitted Mantua without having done anything decisive for the enterprise he meditated. He returned to Rome, whence he wrote again to the Christian princes, conjuring them to send ambassadors, to deliberate afresh upon the war against the Turks.
Constantly pursued by the thought of delivering the Christian world, and losing hope daily of being able to affect the West, he conceived the strange idea of addressing Mahomet II. himself, and of employing all the powers of reasoning and eloquence to convert the Mussulman prince to Christianity. His letter, which we still possess, presents a complete treatise of the philosophy and the theology of the time. The pontiff opposes to the apostles of Islamism, the authority of the prophets and the fathers of the Church, and the profane authority of Lycurgus and Solon. Aiming particularly at interesting the ambition of the Ottoman emperor, he proposes to him the example of the great Constantine, who obtained the empire of the world on receiving baptism, and investing himself with that sign by which it was given to him to conquer. The sultan had only to acknowledge the God from whom all authority comes, to have the Abyssinians, the Arabs, the Mamelukes, the Persians, with all the nations of Asia, submit to his domination; and if the intercession of the court of Rome were necessary for him to reign over the East, the head of the Church promised him the assistance of his prayers, and the support of the pontifical sovereignty.
In this singular negotiation with Mahomet II., the pope was not more fortunate than with the Christian princes. The latter, when he urged them to defend their own states, answered by vain protestations. Mahomet, to whom he offered the conquest of the world, contented himself with replying, that “he was innocent of the death of Jesus Christ, and that he thought with horror of those who had fastened him to the cross.”
The Ottoman emperor had just obtained possession of Bosnia, and had caused the king of that unfortunate country, who had submitted to his arms, to perish in the midst of tortures. Ottoman troops ravaged the frontiers of Illyria, and threatened the city of Ragusa. The dangers of Italy became every day more pressing. The pope assembled his consistory, and represented to the members, that the time was come to stop the progress of the Turks, and to commence the holy war he had preached. “The duke of Burgundy and the Venetian republic were ready to second his enterprise. Whilst the Hungarians and the Poles were preparing to fight the Ottomans on the Dniester and the Danube, the Epeirots and the Albanians were about to raise the standard of liberty among the Greeks: in Asia, the sultan of Caramania and the king of Persia would attack the Turks, and second the united efforts of the Christians. The pontiff declared that he was resolved to march himself against the infidels. When the Christian princes should behold the vicar of Jesus Christ setting out for the holy war, would they not be ashamed to remain inactive? Loaded with years and infirmities, he had but a few moments to live; it would be hastening to an almost certain death; but of what consequence was the hour or the place of his decease, provided he died for the cause of Christ, and for the safety of Christendom.”
The cardinals gave a unanimous assent to the resolution of Pius II. From that time the pope employed himself in preparations for his departure, and addressed an exhortation to the faithful to engage them to second his designs. After having, in this apostolic exhortation, retraced, with lively eloquence, the misfortunes and the perils of the Christian Church, the pontiff expressed himself thus:—
“Our fathers lost Jerusalem and all Asia; we have lost Greece and a great part of Europe. Christendom is now nothing but a corner of the world. In this extreme peril, the common father of the faithful is himself going to meet the enemy. Doubtless, war is ill suited to the weakness of old age, or to the character of pontiff; but when religion is ready to succumb, who could restrain us? We will take our place during fight, either upon the poop of a vessel, or upon a lofty hill, pouring our benedictions upon the soldiers of Christ, and invoking for them the God of armies. Thus the patriarch Moses prayed upon the mountain, and raised his hands towards heaven, whilst Israel combated with the nations whom God had reproved. We shall be followed by our cardinals, and by a great number of bishops; we will march with the standard of the cross displayed, with the relics of saints, with Jesus Christ himself in his eucharist. What Christian will refuse to follow the vicar of God, going with his holy senate, and all the revered train of the Church, to the defence of religion and humanity?
“What war was ever more just or more necessary? The Turks attack all that we hold most dear, all that Christian society considers most holy. If you are men, can you be wanting in compassion for your fellow-men? If you are Christians, religion commands you to carry succour to your brethren. If the misfortunes of others touch you not, think of your own safety—have pity on yourselves. You imagine yourselves to be in safety, because you are as yet at a distance from peril: to-morrow the sword will be suspended over your heads. If you convey not assistance to those who are before you, those who are behind you will, in like manner, abandon you in the hour of danger.
“Do you feel yourselves strong enough to support the opprobrium and the humiliation of a barbarous domination? Remain in your dwellings, await your enemies there; await there those vile Asiatics, who are not even men, and yet have the insolent pretension to govern all the nations of Europe. But if you possess a noble heart, an elevated mind, a generous character, a Christian soul, you will follow the banners of the Church; you will send us succours; you will aid the army of the Lord.
“Such as will aid us, God will bless them; but such as remain indifferent shall have no part in the treasures of divine mercy. May the wicked and the impious, who shall trouble the public peace, be accursed of God! May Heaven pour upon them the scourges of its wrath! Let them live in unceasing fear, and may their life be as if suspended by a thread! Neither power nor riches shall defend them; the arrows of remorse shall reach them everywhere; the flames of the abyss shall consume their hearts.”
The pontiff addressed this exhortation to the princes, the nobility, and the people of all nations. He fixed upon the city and port of Ancona as the place of meeting for the Crusaders. He promised the remission of their sins to all who would serve, during six months, at their own expense, or who would maintain one or two soldiers of the cross during the same space of time. He had nothing to bestow in this world upon the faithful who should take part in the crusade; but he conjured Heaven to direct all their steps, to multiply their days, to preserve and increase their kingdoms, their principalities, and their possessions. On terminating his apostolical discourse, he addressed the Omnipotent God: “Oh thou, who searchest reins and hearts, thou knowest if we have any other thought than that of combating for thy glory, and for the safety of the flock thou hast committed to our charge. Avenge the Christian blood which flows beneath the sword of the Turks, and which on all sides rises up towards thee. Turn a favourable eye upon thy people; guide us in the war undertaken for the triumph of thy faith. Do so, that Greece may be restored to thy worship, and that all Europe may bless thy name!”
This bull of the pope was sent throughout all the West, and read publicly in the churches. The assembled faithful shed tears at the recital of the misfortunes of Christendom. The cross and arms were taken in countries apparently most secure from the invasions of the Turks, even in the remotest north of Europe. Some repaired to Ancona; others directed their course towards Hungary, to join the army of Matthias Corvinus, ready to set out on its march against the Turks.
The pope wrote to the doge of Venice, to entreat him to assist in person in the war about to be made against the infidels. He told him that the presence of princes in armies inspired confidence in the soldiers and terror in their enemies. As the doge was advanced in years, Paul reminded him that his own hair was blanched by time,[77] and that the duke of Burgundy, who promised to accompany the Crusaders to the East, had attained the days of old age. “We shall be,” added the holy father, “three old men at the head of an army of Christians. God takes delight in the number three, and the Trinity which is in heaven, will not fail to protect this trinity upon earth.”
These singular expressions of the pope belonged to the bad taste of the age. But in presenting old age as the only mover and the last hope of the crusade, they painted sufficiently clearly the spirit of the times with regard to holy wars, and might be believed to presage the little success of an enterprise, which, in order to succeed, stood in need of the ardour and activity that are only to be found in youth. The doge of Venice hesitated to embark; but as the republic was at war with Mahomet II., and as it was of importance to mix its interests with those of the crusade, it threatened to employ force, in order to compel the doge to follow the pontiff of Rome. The duke of Burgundy, who had been the first of all the Christian princes to swear to go and combat with the infidels, showed no inclination to join the Crusaders. The pope, in his letters, reminded him of his solemn promises, and reproached him with having deceived men,—with having deceived God himself. He added, that his breach of faith would throw the whole of Christendom into mourning, and might bring about the entire failure of the enterprise. Philip, in spite of the severe remonstrances of Pius II., could not make up his mind to leave his states, but contented himself with sending two thousand men-at-arms to the Christian army. He was at that time in dread of the crooked policy of Louis XI., who, when he was dauphin, was eager to fight the Turks; but having ascended the throne of France, had no other enemies but his neighbours.
Pius II., after having implored the protection of God, in the basilic of the holy Apostles, left Rome in the month of June, 1464. Being attacked by a slow fever, and fearing that the sight of his infirmities might discourage the soldiers of the cross, he concealed his sufferings, and desired his physician to be silent on the subject of his malady. All along his route the people put up prayers for the success of his enterprise. The city of Ancona received him in triumph, and saluted him as the liberator of the Christian world.
A great number of Crusaders had arrived in this city; but most of them were without arms or stores, and were almost naked. The earnest exhortations of the pope had had no effect upon the knights and barons of Christendom. The poor, and men of the lowest class of the people, appeared to have been more struck with the dangers of Europe than the rich and the great of the earth.[78] The crowd of Crusaders collected at Ancona resembled a troop of vagabonds and mendicants much more than an army. Every day, want and disease made martyrs of them. Pius II. was touched with their misery; but as he could not provide for their maintenance, he retained such as were in a condition to go to the war at their own expense, and dismissed the others with the indulgences of the crusade.
The Christian army was to direct its course to the coasts of Greece, and join Scanderberg, who had recently beaten the Ottomans in the plains of Ocrida. Deputies were sent to the Hungarians, the king of Cyprus, and to all the enemies of the Turks in Asia, without forgetting the king of Persia, to warn them to hold themselves in readiness to commence the war against the followers of Mahomet.
The little city of Ancona attracted the attention of all Europe. In fact, what spectacle could be more interesting than that of the father of the faithful braving the perils of war and of the seas, to go into distant countries, for the purposes of avenging outraged humanity, breaking the chains of Christian captives, and visiting his children in their affliction? Unfortunately, the physical strength of Pius II. was not equal to his zeal, and would not permit him to perfect his sacrifice. The fleet was ready to set sail, when the fever which he had had on leaving Rome, aggravated by the fatigues of the voyage and his subsequent anxiety, became a mortal malady. Feeling his end approach, he called the cardinals around him, and made them swear to prosecute the war against the infidels. He died whilst commending the Christians of the East to their care; and the last looks he cast upon earth were directed towards Greece, then labouring under the oppression of the enemies of Christ.
Paul II., who was elected pope, promised, amidst the conclave, to follow the example of his predecessor. But the Crusaders assembled by Pius II. were already returned to their homes. The Venetians, left alone, carried the war into the Peloponnesus, without being able to obtain any great advantages over the Turks. They devastated the country they went to deliver; and the most remarkable of their trophies was the pillage of Athens. The Greeks of the canton of Lacedæmon and some other cities, who, in the hope of being succoured, had raised the standard of liberty, could not stand against the janissaries, and fell victims to their devotion to the cause of religion and patriotism. Scanderberg, whose capital the Turks besieged, came himself to solicit the assistance of the pope. Being received by Paul II. in presence of the cardinals, he declared before the sacred college, that there was no longer in the East any place but Epirus, and in Epirus only his little army, that still fought for the cause of the Christians. He added, that if he succumbed, nobody would be left to defend the routes to Italy. The pope bestowed the greatest praises upon Scanderberg, and made him a present of a sword which he had blessed. He at the same time wrote to the princes of Christendom, to persuade them to assist Albania. In a letter addressed to the duke of Burgundy, Paul II. lamented the fate of the nations of Greece, driven from their country by the barbarians; he deplored the exile and the misery of the Greek families coming to seek refuge in Italy, dying with hunger and in nakedness, crowded together upon the seashore, holding their hands up to Heaven, and supplicating their brothers the Christians to succour them or to avenge them. The head of the Church reminded them of all that his predecessors had done, and of all he himself had done, to avert such great misfortunes. He blamed the indifference of both monarchs and nations; and menaced Europe with the same calamities, if they did not speedily take up arms against the Turks. The exhortations of the pope remained without effect; Scanderberg, carrying nothing back with him but some sums of money which he had obtained from the Holy See, returned to his kingdom, then ravaged by the Ottomans, and a short time afterwards died at Lissa, covered with glory, but despairing of the noble cause for which he had fought all his life.
Such was the ascendancy of one great man, that under his banners the Greeks, for such a length of time degenerate, recalled the remembrance of the brightest days of the military glory of their country; the little province of Albania resisted during twenty years the whole power of the Ottoman empire. The death of Scanderberg threw his companions in arms into despair. “Hasten, brave Albanians,” cried they in the public places, “redouble your courage; for the ramparts of the empire and of Macedon are now crumbled into dust.” These words were at once the funeral oration of a hero and that of his people. Two years had scarcely passed away before most of the cities of Epirus fell into the power of the Turks; and, as Scanderberg himself had foretold to the pontiff of Rome, not a soldier of Christ remained east of the Adriatic Sea.
All enterprises against the infidels were from that time confined to a few maritime expeditions of the Venetians and the Knights of Rhodes. These expeditions were not sufficient to arrest the progress of the Ottomans. Mahomet II. never ceased to meditate an invasion of Germany and Italy. Resolved to aim one last blow at his enemies, he determined, after the example of the Roman pontiffs, to employ the ascendancy of religion, to excite the bravery and the enthusiasm of the Mussulmans. In the midst of a solemn ceremony, and in the presence of the divan and the mufti, he swore “to renounce all pleasures, and never to turn his countenance from the West to the East, until he had overthrown and trampled under the feet of his horses the gods of the nations,—those gods of wood, brass, silver, gold, and painting, that the disciples of Christ made with their hands.” He swore “to exterminate the iniquity of the Christians from the face of the earth, and to proclaim, from the rising to the setting, the glory of the God of Sabaoth and of Mahomet.” After this threatening declaration, the Turkish emperor pressed all the circumcised nations that followed his laws to join him, in order to obey the command of God and his prophet.
The oath of Mahomet II. was read in all the mosques of the empire, at the hour of prayer. The Ottoman warriors flocked to Constantinople from all parts. An army of the sultan’s was already ravaging Croatia and Carniola; and soon a formidable fleet issued from the canal, and attacked the island of Eubœa or Negropont, separated by the Euripus from the city of Athens, which the Turkish historians call the city or the country of the philosophers. At the first news of the danger, the pope ordered public prayers in the city of Rome. He himself walked barefooted in procession before the image of the Virgin; but Heaven, says one of the annalists of the Church, did not deign to listen to the prayers of the Christians; Negropont fell into the hands of the Turks, and the entire population of the island was either exterminated or dragged into slavery. A great number of those who had defended their country with courage expired in tortures. Fame soon carried to Europe an account of the excesses of Ottoman barbarity, and all Christian nations were filled with horror and fright.
After the last victories of the Turks, Germany had reason to dread a prompt invasion, and the coasts of Italy were at the same time threatened. Cardinal Bessarion addressed an eloquent exhortation to the Italians, and conjured them to unite against the common enemy. The pope did everything in his power to appease discord, and at length succeeded in forming a league among the Italian states, similar to that which was entered into after the taking of Constantinople. His legates solicited the assistance of the kings of France and England. Upon his pressing request, Frederick convoked a diet at Ratisbon, and afterwards at Nuremberg, in which appeared the deputies of Venice, Sienna, Naples, Hungary, and Carniola, who described the ravages of the Turks, and painted in the most striking colours the misfortunes which menaced Europe. In these two assemblies, several resolutions were formed for war against the Mussulmans; but not one of them was executed. Such was the general blindness, that neither the exhortations of the pope, nor the frightful progress of the Turks, were able to awaken the zeal of princes or people. The chronicles of the times speak of several miracles by which God manifested his power in these unfortunate days; but there can be no doubt that the greatest miracle of Providence was, that Italy and Germany did not fall into the hands of the Ottomans, when not a human hand was raised to defend them.
After the death of Paul II., who had not time to achieve his work, and did not witness the effect of his preachings, his successor, Sextus IV., neglected nothing for the defence of Christendom. When scarcely seated on the pontifical throne, he deputed cardinals to several states of Europe, to preach peace among Christians and war against the Turks. The legates were specially intrusted to press the levying of the tenths for the crusade. They were authorized to launch the thunders of excommunication against those who should oppose this impost, or who misapplied the produce of it. This severity, which occasioned troubles in England, and still more in Germany, succeeded in other countries, and furnished the sovereign pontiff with means for preparing for war. But none of the princes of the West took up arms, and Christendom was still exposed to the greatest perils, when fortune sent succour it had no reason to look for from the depths of Asia.
Of all the powers that had promised to combat the Ottomans, the only one that did not fail, was the king of Persia, to whom Calixtus III. had sent a missionary, and who declared himself the faithful ally of the Christians. In his reply, the king of Persia bestowed the greatest praises on the pope, encouraged him in his resolution of attacking Mahomet, and announced to him that he himself would commence hostilities. At the time his letter was received at Rome, his troops were already crossing Armenia, and several Ottoman cities had fallen into the hands of the Persians. Mahomet was obliged to abandon or to suspend his projects of conquest on the side of Europe, to march against these new enemies, with the greater part of the strength of his empire.
Great advantage might have been taken of this powerful diversion of the Persians. But the Venetians, the king of Naples, and the pope, alone put themselves forward to make war against the Ottomans. The sovereign pontiff had caused twenty-four galleys to be built with the produce of the tenths levied for the crusade. This fleet, commanded by Cardinal Caraffa, and collected in the Tiber, after having been blessed by Sextus IV., went to join that of Venice and Naples, and cruised along the coasts of Ionia and Pamphylia, to the great terror of all the maritime Ottoman cities. The Venetians did not fail to direct the operations of the Christian fleet against the cities whose wealth and commerce gave them any cause for jealousy. Satalia and Smyrna were given up to the horrors of war; the first of these, situated on the coast of Pamphylia, was the entrepôt for the productions and the merchandise of India and Arabia. The second, situated in the Ionian Sea, possessed rich manufactures and a flourishing trade. The Christian soldiers committed in these two cities all the kinds of excess with which the Turks were then reproached. After this piratical expedition, the fleet regained the ports of Italy, and Cardinal Caraffa returned triumphant to Rome, followed by twenty-five captives mounted upon superb horses, and by twelve camels, loaded with the spoils of the enemy. The ensigns taken from the Mussulmans, and the chain of the port of Satalia, were solemnly suspended over the gate and in the vaulted roof of the Vatican.
Whilst these poor advantages over the Mussulmans were being celebrated at Rome, Mahomet was inflicting terrible blows upon his enemies; and when he returned to Constantinople, he had destroyed the armies of the king of Persia. That which gave the Turkish emperor an immense advantage over the powers which took up arms against him, was that they never acted in concert, either for defence or attack. Discord was not long in being revived among the Christian princes, and particularly among the states of Italy. The pope himself forgot the spirit of peace and union he had preached; he forgot the holy war; and Venice, left alone in the struggle against the Ottomans, was obliged to sue to Mahomet for peace.
The Ottomans took as much advantage of peace as of war to increase their power. There now remained nothing of the sad wreck of the Greek empire. Venice had lost all its possessions in the Archipelago and Greece; Genoa at length lost the rich colony of Caffa, in the Crimea. Of all the conquests of the Crusaders, the Christians had only preserved the kingdom of Cyprus and the isle of Rhodes.
During more than a century, the kings of Cyprus had implored the assistance of the West, and contended with some successes against the Saracens, particularly the Mamelukes of Egypt. The maritime cities of Italy protected a kingdom from which trade and navigation derived great advantage. Every day fresh warriors from Europe afforded it the support of their arms. A few years after the taking of Constantinople, history remarks Jacques Cœur, who had obtained the restitution of his wealth, establishing himself in the isle of Cyprus, and consecrating his fortune and his life to the defence of the Christians of the East. After his death, there was to be seen, in a church at Bourges which he had founded, this inscription:—“The Seigneur Jacques Cœur, Captain-general of the Church against the infidels.”[79]
The kingdom of Cyprus, after having resisted the Mussulmans for a long time, became at last the theatre and the prey of revolutions. Abandoned, in some sort, by the Christian powers, and obliged to defend itself against the Turks, it placed itself under the protection of the Mamelukes of Egypt. In time of trouble, the malcontents retired to Cairo, and procured the protection of a power which had a great interest in keeping up discord. The family of Lusignan being nearly extinct, a daughter, the only scion of many kings, at first married a Portuguese prince, and afterwards Louis, count of Savoy. But the sultan of Cairo and Mahomet II. would not permit a Latin prince to wear the crown of Cyprus, and caused a natural son of the last king to be elected. James, whose illegitimate birth kept him from the throne, and who had disturbed the kingdom by his ambitious pretensions, was crowned king of Cyprus in the city of Cairo, under the auspices and in the presence of the Mamelukes. That which must have greatly added to the scandal of this coronation was, that the new king promised to be faithful to the sultan of Egypt, and to pay five thousand gold crowns for the support of the great mosques of Mecca and Jerusalem. It was upon the Gospel that he swore to keep this promise, and to omit nothing that the Mamelukes required. “If I break my word,” added he, “I shall be an apostate and a forger; I shall deny the existence of Jesus Christ, and the virginity of his mother; I shall slay a camel upon the font of baptism, and I shall curse the priesthood.” Such were the words which a desire of reigning placed in the mouth of a prince who was about to govern a kingdom founded by the soldiers of Jesus Christ. He died a short time after having taken possession of the supreme authority. His people thought the days of his life and his reign were shortened by divine justice.
The republic of Venice, which adopted Catherine Cornaro, the widow of James, then took possession of Cyprus, which it defended against the Mamelukes and against the Turks, and held it till the middle of the following century.
The eyes of the whole Christian world were fixed upon the isle of Rhodes. This isle, defended by the Knights of St. John, recalled to the faithful the remembrance of the Holy Land, and prevented the extinction of the hope of one day seeing the standard of Christ again floating over the walls of Jerusalem. The martial youth of all the countries of the West unceasingly flocked thither, and, in some sort, revived the ardour, the zeal, and the exploits of the first crusades. The order of the Hospitallers, faithful to its first institution, always protected pilgrims repairing to Palestine, and defended Christian vessels against the attacks of Turks, Mamelukes, and pirates. At the commencement of his reign, Mahomet II. summoned the grand-master to pay him a tribute, as to his sovereign. The latter contented himself with answering: “We only owe the sovereignty of Rhodes to God and our swords. It is our duty to be the enemies, and not the tributaries, of the Ottomans!” This reply wounded the pride of the sultan; but he dissembled his anger, persuaded that victory would soon give that which was refused, and at the same time avenge him for the noble disdain of the Knights of St. John.
The Ottoman emperor, after having triumphed over the Persians, returned to Constantinople with fresh projects for conquests in Europe, and with increased animosity against the Christians; and the whole of his empire prepared to minister to his ambition and his anger. If the Turks had not till that period carried their invasions into the West, it was because the difference of religion and manners kept them from all communication with the Christian nations; and because they were entirely ignorant of the state and dispositions of Christendom, of the forces that might be opposed to them, and even of the best routes for them to pursue. They became gradually acquainted with the frontiers of Europe, and with the sea-coasts; and, like the lion of Holy Writ, which prowls constantly about in search of its prey, were ever on the watch for favourable opportunities. They secured advanced posts, and marched with precaution towards the country they wished to conquer, as an army draws round a place it is about to besiege. By frequently-repeated incursions, they spread terror among the nations they intended to attack; and by the ravages they exercised, they weakened the means of resistance of their enemies. Mahomet at first made himself master of Scutari and Negropont, in order to dominate, in a manner, over the coasts of the Adriatic and the Sea of Naples; on the other side, several of his armies directed their course towards the Danube, to lay open the routes to Germany; and Ottoman troops had penetrated, with fire and sword, as far as Friuli, to terrify the republic of Venice, and reconnoitre the avenues that lead to Italy.
When everything was ready for the execution of his terrible designs, the leader of the Ottoman empire resolved to attack Christendom at several points at once. A numerous army set out on its march to invade Hungary, and all the countries in the vicinity of the Danube. Two numerous fleets, with a vast number of troops on board, were despatched, one against the Knights of Rhodes, whose bravery Mahomet dreaded; and the other against the coast of Naples, the conquest of which would open the way towards Rome and southern Italy. In such a pressing danger, the hopes of the Germans, and even of a portion of the Italian states, reposed entirely upon the Hungarians. The king of Hungary was then considered as the guardian of the frontiers of Europe; and to be always in a condition to meet the Turks, he received every year succours in money from the republic of Venice and the emperor of Germany. The pope added to these succours a part of the tenths levied for the crusade, and his legates and missionaries were always present to excite the valour of the Hungarian soldiers.
At the approach of the Ottoman army, all Hungary, governed by Matthias Corvinus, son of Hunniades, flew to arms. The Hungarian army met the Turks in the plains of Transylvania, and gave them battle. Victory was obtained by the Christians, who, in a single battle, destroyed the enemy’s army. Contemporary chronicles take less pains to describe this terrible conflict, than to exhibit the joy of the conquerors after their triumph. The entire victorious army assisted at a banquet prepared upon the field of battle, still covered with dead, and all smoking with carnage. The leaders and the soldiers mingled their songs of joy with the cries of the wounded and the dying, and in the intoxication of victory and festivity performed barbarous dances upon the bloody carcasses of their enemies.
The war between the Christians and the Turks became every day more cruel, and presented nothing but scenes of barbarity and destruction. The menaces of Mahomet; the constant violation by the Turks, in peace as well as in war, of the rights of nations and the faith of oaths; many thousands of Christians condemned to die in tortures for having defended their country and their religion, with twenty years of combats and misfortunes, had altogether excited the hatred of the soldiers of the cross; the thirst of vengeance rendered them sometimes as ferocious as their enemies; and in their triumphs they too frequently forgot that they were fighting in the cause of the Gospel.
Whilst the Turkish army experienced a sanguinary defeat upon the Danube, the fleet of Mahomet, which was directed against the isle of Rhodes, was destined to find, in the Knights of St. John, enemies not less intrepid or less to be dreaded than the Hungarians. The pacha who commanded this expedition, belonged to the imperial family of Palæologus, whose humble prayers had so frequently solicited the aid of Christian Europe. After the taking of Constantinople, he embraced the Mussulman religion, and from that time only sought to second Mahomet in his project of exterminating the race of the Christians in the East.
Several historians have related at great length the events of the siege of Rhodes; and this is, perhaps, a fitting opportunity to repair a great injustice committed upon one of the writers who have preceded us. An expression, escaped from the Abbé de Vertot, and with which criticism has armed itself, has proved sufficient to deprive him of the noblest reward of the labours of an historian,—the reputation for veracity.[80] After having examined with much care the historical monuments we possess, and according to which the author of the History of the Knights of Malta has described the siege of Rhodes, we feel great pleasure in rendering homage to the fidelity of his account, and we do not hesitate to refer our readers to it. In this elegant historian will be found the heroic constancy of Aubusson, grand-master of the order of St. John, and the indefatigable intrepidity of his knights, defending themselves amidst ruins, against a hundred thousand Mussulmans, armed with all that the art of sieges and the genius of war had invented. At the approach of the Turks, the grand-master of Rhodes implored the arms and aid of the Christian princes; but all the succours that were sent them consisted of two Neapolitan vessels, which did not arrive till after the siege was raised, and some sums of money which were the produce of a jubilee ordered by the pope at the request of Louis XI.
The third expedition of Mahomet, and the most important for his projects of conquest, was that which was to have been directed against the kingdom of Naples. The Ottoman fleet stopped before Otranto. After a siege of a few days, this city was taken by assault, given up to pillage, and its population massacred or dragged away into slavery. This invasion of the Turks, which was quite unexpected, spread terror throughout Italy. Boufinius informs us that the pope entertained for a moment the thought of quitting the city of the Apostles, and of going beyond the Alps, to seek an asylum in the kingdom of France.
It is probable that if Mahomet II. had united all his forces in an invasion of the kingdom of Naples, he might have pushed his conquests as far as Rome. But the loss of his army in Hungary, and the check experienced by his best troops before the city of Rhodes, must have suspended or stopped the execution of his projects. Sextus IV., when recovered from his first terrors, implored the assistance of Christendom. The sovereign pontiff addressed all the ecclesiastical and secular powers, as well as the Christians of all conditions; he conjured them, by the mercy and sufferings of Christ; by the last judgment, in which every one would be placed according to his works; by the promises of baptism; by the obedience due to the Church,—he supplicated them, to preserve among themselves, at least during three years, charity, peace, and concord. He sent legates in all directions, charged to appease the troubles and wars which divided the Christian world. These legates were instructed to act with moderation and prudence; to lead nations and kings, by means of persuasion, to the true spirit of the Gospel, and to resemble, in their pious courses, the dove which came back to the ark, bearing the pacific olive-branch. In order to encourage princes by his example, the pontiff ordered the galleys he had destined to succour Rhodes, to set sail for the coast of Naples. At the same time he commanded public prayers to be put up; and, to draw down the blessings of Heaven upon the arms of the Christians, and excite the piety of the faithful, he directed that the octave of All Saints should be celebrated in the universal Church, to begin with the year 1480, which he called in his bull the “Octave of the age.”
Previously to the taking of Otranto, Italy had been more divided than ever. The heat of factions and the animosities which were created by jealousy had so perverted men’s minds, that several states and many citizens only contemplated in an invasion of the Turks the ruin of a neighbouring state or of a rival faction. Venice was accused of having drawn the Ottoman troops into the kingdom of Naples. We must, however, in justice, say that the presence of danger, and particularly the account of the cruelties practised by the fierce conquerors of Otranto, awakened generous sentiments in all hearts; and when the sovereign pontiff, addressing the Italians, said that the moment was come to rise in arms, if they wished to defend their lands, their families, their faith, their liberty, all Italy listened to his exhortations, and united as one man against the common enemy.
The discourses and the prayers of the head of the Church did not produce the same effect in England, Germany, or France. The legates were everywhere received with respect, but they could not put an end to the war between England and Scotland, or stifle the germs of a quarrel always ready to break out between Louis XI. and the emperor Maximilian. In a Germanic diet which was convoked, as usual, pathetic speeches were made upon the calamities which threatened Christian Europe; but no one took up arms.
The Ottomans, shut up in Otranto, had not, it is true, strength enough to advance into Italy; but they might every day expect reinforcements. After having raised three armies, the Turkish emperor levied a fourth in Bithynia, to be employed, according to circumstances, against the Mamelukes of Egypt, or against the Christians of the West. But even these preparations, or the fresh invasions which they had reason to fear, were not able to remove the general indifference. The nations and the princes who did not believe themselves threatened with approximate danger, returned to their divisions and their quarrels. They had abandoned the safety of Christendom to the care of Providence, when they learnt the death of Mahomet II.; this news appeared to be spread everywhere at once, and was received like the announcement of a great victory, particularly in the countries which were in dread of the Ottoman invasions. At Rome, where the dread had been most lively, the pope ordered prayers, festivals, and processions, which lasted three days; and during those three days, the pacific artillery of the castle of St. Angelo never ceased to thunder forth the intelligence of the deliverance of Italy.
This joy of the Christians paints better than the long recitals of history the ambition, the genius, the fortune, and the policy of the barbarous hero of Islamism. During the course of this reign,[81] five pontiffs had succeeded to the chair of St. Peter; all had employed the ascendancy of their spiritual and temporal power in endeavouring to check the progress of his arms, and all died with the grief of seeing the growth and extension of that empire, before which all the East trembled, and of whose invasions the West was in constant dread.