Henry VI., who had preached the crusade, only viewed this distant expedition as a means and an opportunity for increasing his power and extending his empire; whilst the West put up prayers for the success of a holy war, of which he was the life and soul, he prosecuted an impious war, desolated a Christian people for the purpose of subjecting them to his laws, and threatened the empire of Greece.[32] The son of Tancred was deprived of his sight, and cast into prison, and the daughters of the king of Sicily were carried away into captivity. Henry’s barbarities were so excessive, that he irritated his neighbours, and created enemies in his own family. When he died, a report prevailed in Europe that he had been poisoned; the nations that he had rendered miserable could not believe that so many cruelties could remain unpunished, and they asserted that Providence had employed the wife of the emperor to be his executioner, and to avenge all the calamities he had inflicted upon the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily. At the approach of death, Henry remembered that he had persecuted Richard; that he had detained a prince of the Crusaders in chains, in spite of the solicitations of the father of the faithful; and he hastened to send ambassadors to the king of England, charged with the task of making him a solemn reparation for so great an outrage. After his death, as he had been excommunicated, it was thought necessary to address the sovereign pontiff to obtain permission to bury him in the Holy Land; and the pope coolly replied, that they were at liberty to bury him among Christians, but before they did so, they must offer up many prayers to mitigate the anger of God.
In taking possession of the beautiful and rich territories of Italy by perfidy and violence, Henry prepared for that unfortunate country a series of revolutions, to be renewed from age to age. The odious war he had made against the family of Tancred, naturally gave birth to other wars injurious to his own family.[33] In removing so far from Germany with his armies, Henry afforded opportunity for the formation of powerful parties, which, at his death, disputed the imperial sceptre with some success, and at length gave rise to a war in which the principal states of Europe were involved. Thus, whilst the other holy wars had contributed to maintain or establish public peace in Europe, this fourth crusade produced divisions among the states of Christendom, without at all diminishing the power of the Saracens, and only served to introduce trouble and confusion into many kingdoms of the West.
BOOK X.
——
FIFTH CRUSADE.
A.D. 1198-1204.
“Christian troops,” says J. J. Rousseau, in his “Contrat Social,” “are, as they say, excellent; I deny it; show me such; for my part, I know no Christian troops.” The events we have just related, and those we are about to make known, will, there is no doubt, suffice to refute this strange paradox of J. J. Rousseau. The author of the “Social Contract” does not dissemble, it is true, the objections that may be made to him from the history of the crusades; but, ever faithful to his system, and taking no account of historical truths, he answers, that “the Crusaders, far from being Christians, were citizens of the Church; that they fought for their spiritual country, which the Church had rendered temporal nobody knows how.” Strange abuse of reasoning, which confounds the sense of words, and refuses the title of Christians to those who fought in the name of Christ! In representing the Crusaders as citizens of the Church, Rousseau doubtless, meant to say that the popes were the origin of the crusades, and that the soldiers of the cross defended the temporal power of the popes. We at once reply that the crusades owed their birth and growth to the religious and warlike enthusiasm that animated the nations of the West in the twelfth century, and that without this enthusiasm, which was not the work of the heads of the Church, the preachings of the Holy See would not have been able to collect a single army under the banners of the cross. We may further add that, during the holy wars, the sovereign pontiffs were frequently driven from Rome and despoiled of their states, and that they did not summon the Crusaders to the defence of the power or temporal country of the Church. Not only were the Crusaders not always the blind instruments of the Holy See, but they sometimes resisted the will of the popes, and yet in their camps were no less models of valour united with Christian piety. No doubt, the leaders were often seduced by ambition, the love of glory, and a passion for war; but religion, well or ill understood, acted upon the greater number; the Christian religion which they defended, or believed they defended, by inspiring them with a desire for the blessings of heaven and a contempt for life, elevated them above all perils, and enabled them to brave death on every occasion. Here is the whole truth; but this truth is too simple for such as disdain common routes, and cannot form a judgment upon human affairs without displaying all the parade of a proud and austere philosophy. For ourselves, who are persuaded that true philosophy consists in studying the human heart and the spirit of societies, not in vain theories, but in the faithful history of past ages; we will not refute brilliant sophisms by long arguments; but to show in all its splendour the valour of Christian soldiers, we will content ourselves with pursuing our recital, and making known with impartiality the labours, the reverses, and the victories of the soldiers of the cross.[34]
The departure of the German Crusaders plunged the eastern Christians into grief and consternation; the colonies, when left to their own resources, were only protected by the truce concluded between the count de Montfort and Malek-Adel. The infidels had too great a superiority over their enemies to respect, for any length of time, a treaty which they considered as an obstacle to the progress of their power. The Christians, threatened by new perils, again turned their eyes to the West. The bishop of Ptolemaïs, accompanied by several knights, embarked for Europe, in order to solicit the aid of the faithful. The vessel in which he embarked had scarcely quitted the port, when it was swallowed up by the waves, and the bishop and every person of his suite perished. Other ships, that set sail a short time afterwards, were surprised by the tempest, and forced to return to the port of Tripoli; so that the prayers and complaints of the Christians of Palestine could not reach the ears of their brethren of the West. Nevertheless, the afflicting news of the situation of the feeble kingdom of Jerusalem soon became generally known; some pilgrims, escaping from the perils of the sea, described, on their return, the triumphs and threats of the Saracens; but in the state of Europe at that moment, nothing could be more difficult than to induce nations to undertake a new crusade. The death of the Emperor Henry VI. divided the princes and prelates of Germany, and Philip Augustus was still at war with Richard of England. One of the sons of Bela, king of Hungary, who pretended to take the cross, only assembled an army to agitate the kingdom, and get possession of the crown. Amidst the fierce contentions that disturbed Europe, the Christian people seemed to have forgotten the tomb of Christ: a single man was touched with the misfortunes of the faithful of the East, and was not without hope of alleviating them.