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.