At the same time, fanaticism, raising her head, sent forth her votaries, and the consequences were fatal and unfortunate in more ways than one.
A fierce persecution of the Jews at once commenced in France and other countries where they were to be found. Accused by the populace of having caused the plague by poisoning the rivers and fountains, the unhappy Hebrews were hunted, burnt, and massacred by thousands. Never has the multitude been animated by so savage a spirit as then urged them on to cruelty and bloodshed. Every Jew appeared to be marked out for destruction; and the spirit of persecution, spreading daily, became so fierce and general that the Jews, having no hope of escape elsewhere, crowded towards Avignon, and sought safety—nor in vain—in the territories of the Church and under the protection of the Pope.
Meanwhile it was prophesied that, for one hundred years, people with iron scourges were to come to destroy the Jews; and now there appeared, in Germany, a sect of enthusiasts, of both sexes, who carried the iron scourges, but who, instead of applying them to the backs of the Jews, applied them to their own. Finding their way from Germany into Flanders, and from Flanders into England, these men and women—known as Flagellants—travelled in companies, and set reason and decency at defiance. Believing, or pretending to believe, that their sufferings were agreeable to the Divinity, they appeared in the squares and public places of cities and towns, naked to the girdle, and, while chanting, in a piteous tone, canticles of the nativity and passion of the Redeemer of Mankind, scourged themselves with their iron hoops, to expiate, as they said, the sins of the world.
In the midst of all this confusion, and persecution, and fanaticism, an event occurred which produced consequences of importance. One August day that pale spectre, which visits the castles of kings as impartially as the cottages of the poor, appeared at Nogent-le-Roi, where Philip of Valois then was. In his palace at that town, which is situated on the Eure, five leagues from Chartres, Philip, at the age of fifty-eight, breathed his last. Immediately his eldest son, John, previously known as Duke of Normandy, was hailed as King of France, and a new scene opened.
[CHAPTER XLIV]
JOHN, KING OF FRANCE
Memorable as the name of John of Valois will ever be in history, as associated with a terrible defeat, and with the countless woes which that defeat entailed upon the nation he aspired to rule, he yet deserves the praise of the valiant for his personal courage, for his chivalrous character, and for his noble saying, that, "if truth and good faith were banished from all the world, they should yet be found in the breasts of kings."
At the time when Philip of Valois, leaving his kingdom exhausted by war and humiliated by disaster, expired at Nogent-le-Roi, John had reached the age of thirty, and won renown as one of the foremost knights of his day. His education in youth had been carefully conducted; he was thoroughly instructed in all the laws of chivalry; and he was not without experience in war. At Cressy, indeed, his sword had not shone in the battle so fatal to the princes of France and the potentates of Europe. But from his twentieth year he had figured as a leader of armies; and in Hainault, in Brittany, and in Gascony he had been matched against warriors of skill and valour. Nature, however, while endowing him with high qualities, had not only denied him those which make a fearless knight a great war chief, but given him many which prevented him from acting with calmness and judgment. Brave, gallant, dauntless in fight, and with a hand strong to smite, he lacked discretion and the faculty of calculating chances; and he was too proud, rash, vindictive, and impetuous to hearken in hours of danger to the counsel of those who were wiser than himself.
Such being the faults and failings of John of France, even flattery itself could not represent him as a man capable of playing for kingdoms and crowns with England's famous king, or with England's king's gallant son. But it was with no lack of confidence in himself, and with little apprehension as to the future, that, after having laid his father at rest among the old Kings of France near the altar of the church of St. Denis, he repaired to be crowned at Rheims.