"Explain to me how the Crusades are expected to bring about the results that you consider needful, and that the exhortations of the papal emissaries are to invoke."
"Is it not evident that, for every thousand serfs who will leave Gaul to fight in Palestine, barely a hundred will arrive as far as Jerusalem? Those wretches, departing penniless, in rags, without provisions, carrying wife and children in their train, ravaging the regions they traverse—Germany, Hungary, Bohemia, Bulgaria, the countries of the Danube—because, in the course of so long a voyage, such multitudes cannot live without pillage along the route, three-fourths of them will have been exterminated by the inhabitants of the countries that they must cross, or will die of hunger and fatigue before being able to reach Jerusalem. The small number of them that will arrive before the Holy City will be still further decimated by the Saracens. It is safe to say that hardly any of those who leave will return. Thus we shall be rid of this vile and dangerous populace that dares rise against its masters, especially against the Church."
"It remains to be seen, Jeronimo, whether this plebs mass will be senseless enough to venture upon so distant and perilous a journey."
The monk answered: "Is not the lot of the villeins and the serfs on the lay or ecclesiastical seigniories the most wretched? And, of all the yokes, is not that of the glebe the heaviest, which forbids them to cross the boundaries of their own seigniory. When the Church will say to those myriads of people, chained down to the glebe: 'Go! You are free! March off to fight the Saracens in Palestine, the country of miracles, where you will gather an immense booty! Take no heed of provisions for the journey, God will provide! Above all, you will accomplish your eternal salvation!' the serfs will depart in mass, drawn by the desire to be free, the thirst for booty, the spirit of adventure, and by the pious ardor to deliver the Holy Sepulchre from the defilement of the infidels!"
"Jeronimo," rejoined the Bishop of Nantes, "the craving after freedom, the spirit of adventure, the hope of booty, may, perhaps, drive those wretches to Palestine. But desire to avenge the tomb of the Saviour from the pretended defilement of the infidels, is, meseems, too feeble a motive. We shall fail there."
"When this holy cause, thrice holy and eloquently preached by the Church, is furthermore backed by the thirst for freedom, the hope of booty, the certainty of gaining Paradise, and curiosity regarding the future, that, though unknown, could not be worse than the present, the attraction of the populace for Palestine will become irresistible."
"I grant it. But will the seigneurs consent to have their lands thus depopulated by allowing the serfs to depart for the Crusades?"
"As much as ourselves do the seigneurs dread the revolt of the serfs. In that we two have a common interest. Moreover, that plebs overflow, which it is the part of wisdom to empty out abroad, constitutes, at the highest, only one-third of the serfs. Only that third will depart."
"And who guarantees that many more will not yield to the attraction, that you consider irresistible, and will not go along?"
"This plebs mass has become craven through the habit of slavery that weighs it down since the Frankish conquest. Only a part of the village and country populations is sufficiently disposed to revolt. It is those very ones who are most impatient of the yoke, the most intelligent, the most venturesome, the most daring, and, consequently, the most dangerous, who will be the first to start for Palestine. Thus shall we be rid of those inciters of rebellion."