tice. But this simplicity was gradually changed by the Dominicans, to whom experience suggested several new methods of augmenting the pomp and majesty of their spiritual tribunal, and who made such alterations in the forms of proceedings, that the manner of taking cognisance of heretical causes became totally different from that which was usual in civil affairs. These friars were, to say the truth, entirely ignorant of judicial matters, nor were they acquainted with the procedures of any other tribunal, than that which was called in the Roman church, the Tribunal of Penance. It was therefore after this that they modelled the new court of Inquisition, as far as a resemblance between the two was possible; and hence arose that strange system of inquisitorial law, which, in many respects, is so contrary to the common feelings of humanity, and the plainest dictates of equity and justice. This is the important circumstance by which we are enabled to account for the absurd, imprudent, and iniquitous proceedings of the inquisitors, against persons that are accused of holding what they call heretical opinions.

and privileges

vi. That nothing might be wanting to render this spiThe rights ritual court formidable and tremendous, the Rogranted to the man pontiffs persuaded the European princes, Inquisition. and more especially the emperor Frederic II. and Lewis IX. king of France, not only to enact the most barbarous laws against heretics, and to commit to the flames, by the ministry of public justice, those who were pronounced such by the inquisitors, but also to maintain the inquisitors in their office, and grant them their protection in the most open and solemn manner. The edicts to this purpose issued out by Frederic II. are well known; edicts every way proper to excite horror, and which rendered the most illustrious piety and virtue incapable of saving from the cruellest death such as had the misfortune to be disagreeable to the inquisitors. These abominable laws

h The records published by the Benedictines in their Histoire Gener. de Languedoc, tom. iii. p. 371, show the simplicity that reigned in the proceedings of the Inquisition at its first institution.

i The law of the emperor Frederic, in relation to the inquisitors, may be seen in Limborch's History of the Inquisition, as also in the epistles of Pierre de Vignes, and in Bzovius, Raynaldus, &c. The edict of St. Lewis, in favour of these ghostly judges, is generally known under the title of cupientes; for so it is called by the French lawyers on account of its beginning with that word. It was issued out in the year 1229, as the Benedictine monks have proved sufficiently in their Hist. Generale de Languedoc. tom. iii. p. 378, 575. It is also published by Catelius, in his Histor. Comit. Tolosanor.

425

were not however sufficient to restrain the just indignation of the people against these inhuman judges, whose barbarity was accompanied with superstition and arrogance, with a spirit of suspicion and perfidy, nay, even with temerity and imprudence. Accordingly they were insulted by the multitude in many places, were driven, in an ignominious manner, out of some cities, and were put to death in others; and Conrad of Marpurg, the first German inquisitor, who derived his commission from Gregory IX. was one of the many victims that were sacrificed upon this occasion to the vengeance of the public, which his incredible barbarities had raised to a dreadful degree of vehemence and fury.'

Severer me

ployed against

VII. When Innocent III. perceived that the labours of the first inquisitors were not immediately attended with such abundant fruits as he had fondly ex-thods are em pected, he addressed himself, in the year 1207, the beretics. to Philip Augustus, king of France, and to the leading men of that nation, soliciting them by the alluring promises of the most ample indulgences, to extirpate all, whom he thought proper to call heretics, by fire and sword." This exhortation was repeated with new accessions of fervour and earnestness, the year following, when Pierre de Castelnau, the legate of this pontiff, and his inquisitor in France, was put to death by the patrons of the people, called heretics." Not long after this, the Cistercian monks, in the name of this pope, proclaimed a crusade against the heretics throughout the whole kingdom of France, and a storm seemed to be gathering against them on all sides; Raymond VI. earl of Toulouse, in whose territories Castelnau had been massacred, was solemnly excommunicated,

p. 340, and in many other authors. This edict is as severe and inhuman, to the full, as the laws of Frederic II. For a great part of the sanctity of good king Lewis consisted in his furious and implacable aversion to heretics, against whom he judged it more expedient to employ the influence of racks and gibbets, than the power of reason and argument. See Du Fresne, Vita Ludovici a Joinvillio scripta, p. 11, 39.

k The life of this furious and celebrated inquisitor has been composed from the most authentic records that are extant, and also from several valuable manuscripts, by the learned John Herman Schminkius. See also Wadding. Annal. Minor. tom. ii. p. 151, 355, and Echard, Scriptor. Dominican. tom. i. p. 487.

The Abbe Fleury acknowledges the brutal barbarity of this unrelenting inquisitor, who, under the pretext of heresy, not only committed to the flames a prodigious number of nobles, clerks, monks, hermits, and lay persons of all ranks, but moreover caused them to be put to death the very same day they were accused, without appeal. See Fleury, Hist. Eccles. livr. lxxx. § 24.

m Innocentii III. Epistolæ, lib. x. Epist. 49.

n Id. ibid. lib. xi. Ep. 26, 27, 28, 29. Acta Sanctor, Mart. tom. i. p. 411.

VOL. II,

54

and to deliver himself from this ecclesiastical malediction, changed sides, and embarked in the crusade now mentioned. In the year 1209, a formidable army of crossbearers commenced against the heretics, who were comprehended under the general denomination of Albigenses, an open war which they carried on with the utmost exertions of cruelty, though with various success, for several years. The chief director of this ghostly war was Arnald, abbot of the Cistercians, and legate of the Roman pontiff; and the commander in chief of the troops, employed in this noble expedition, was Simon, earl of Montford. Raymond VI. earl of Toulouse, who, consulting his safety rather than his conscience, had engaged in the crusade against the heretics, was obliged to change sides, and to attack their persecutors. For Simon, who had embarked in this war, not so much from a principle of zeal for religion, or of aversion to the heretics, as from a desire of augmenting his fortune, cast a greedy eye upon the territories of Raymond, and his selfish views were seconded and accomplished by the court of Rome. After many battles, sieges, and a multitude of other exploits conducted with the most intrepid courage and the most abominable barbarity, he received from the hands of Innocent III. at the council of the Lateran, A. D. 1215, the county of Toulouse and the other lands belonging to that earl, as a reward for his zeal in supporting the cause of God and of the church. About three years after this, he lost his life at the siege of Toulouse. Raymond, his valiant adversary, died in the year

1222.

o The term Albigenses is used in two senses, of which the one is general, and the ⚫ other more confined. In its more general and extensive sense, it comprehends all the various kinds of heretics who resided at this time in Narbonne Gaul, i. e, in the southern parts of France. This appears from the following passage of Petrus Sarnensis, who, in the Dedication of his History of the Albigenses to Innocent III. expresses himself thus, "Tolosani et aliarum civitatum, et castrorum hæretici, et defensores eorum generaliter Albigenses vocantur." The same author divides afterward the Albigenses into various sects, cap. ii. p. 3, and 8, of which he considers that of the Waldenses as the least pernicious. "Mali erant Waldenses, sed comparatione aliorum hæreticorum longe minus perversi." It was not however from the city of Albigia, or Albi, that the French heretics were comprehended under the general title of Albigenses, but from another circumstance, to wit, that the greatest part of Narbonne Gaul was, in this century, called Albigensium, as the Benedictine monks have clearly demonstra ted in their Histoire Generale de Languedoc, tom. iii. not. xiii. p. 552. The term Albigenses, in its more confined sense, was used to denote those heretics who inclined toward the Manichæan system, and who were otherwise known by the denominations of Catharists, Publicans, or Paulicians, and Bulgarians. This appears evidently from many incontestable authorities, and more especially from the Codex Inquisitionis Tolasana, published by Limborch, in his History of the Inquisition, and in which the Albigenses are carefully distinguished from the other sects that made a noise in this cen

tury.

The fruitless op

Toulouse to the

Roman pontiff.

VIII. Thus were the two chiefs of this deplorable war taken off the scene; but this removal was far from extinguishing the infernal flame of perse- position made cution on the side of the pontiffs, or calming the year of restless spirit of faction on that of the pretended heretics. Raymond VII. earl of Toulouse, and Amalric, earl of Montford, succeeded their fathers at the head of the contending parties, and carried on the war with the utmost vehemence, and with such various success as rendered the issue for some time doubtful. The former seemed at first more powerful than his adversary, and the Roman pontiff Honorius III. alarmed at the vigorous opposition he made to the orthodox legions, engaged Lewis VIII. king of France, by the most pompous promises, to march in person with a formidable army against the enemies of the church. The obsequious monarch listened to the solicitations of the lordly pontiff, and embarked with a considerable military force in the cause of the church, but did not live to reap the fruits of his zeal. His engagements however with the court of Rome, and his furious designs against the heretics, were executed with the greatest alacrity and vigour by his son and successor Lewis the Saint; so that Raymond, pressed on all sides, was obliged, in the year 1229, to make peace upon the most disadvantageous terms, even by making a cession of the greatest part of his territories to the French monarch, after having sacrificed a considerable portion of them, as a peace-offering to the church of Rome." This treaty of peace gave a mortal blow to the cause of heresy, and dispersed the champions that had appeared in its defence; the Inquisition was established at Toulouse, and the heretics were not only exposed to the pious cruelties of Lewis, but what was still more shocking, Raymond himself, who had formerly been their patron, became their persecutor, and treated them upon all occasions, with the most inhuman

Pp It was in consequence of this treaty, of which the articles were drawn up at Meaux, and afterward confirmed at Paris, in presence of Lewis, that the university of Toulouse was founded, Raymond having bound himself thereby to pay the sum of four thousand silver marcs, in order to the support of two professors of divinity, two of canon law, two of grammar, and six of the liberal arts, during the space of ten years. We must also observe, that what Dr. Mosheim says of the cession that Raymond made of his lands is not sufficiently clear and accurate. These lands were not to be transferred till after his death, and they were to be transferred to the brother of Lewis IX. who, according to the treaty, was to espouse the daughter of Raymond. See Fleury, Hist. Eccles. liv. lxxix. § 50.

severity. It is true, this prince broke the engagements into which he had entered by the treaty above mentioned, and renewed the war against Lewis and the inquisitors, who abused their victory and the power they had acquired in the most odious manner. But this new effort in favour of the heretics, was attended with little or no effect; and the unfortunate earl of Toulouse, the last representative of that noble and powerful house, dejected and exhausted by the losses he had sustained, and the perplexities in which he was involved, died in the year 1249, without male issue. And thus ended a civil war, of which religion had been partly the cause, and partly the pretext, and which, in its consequences, was highly profitable both to the kings of France and to the Roman pontiffs."

The brethren

IX. The severity which the court of Rome employed in the extirpation of heresy, and the formidable and sisters of arguments of fire and sword, racks and gibbets, the free spirit. with which the popes and their creatures reasoned against the enemies of the church, were not sufficient to prevent the rise of new and most pernicious sects in several places. Many of these sects were inconsiderable in themselves, and transitory in their duration, while some of them made a noise in the world, and were suppressed with difficulty. Among the latter we may reckon that of the brethren and sisters of the free spirit, which about this time gained ground secretly and imperceptibly in Italy,

q Many writers both ancient and modern have related the circumstances of this religious war, that was carried on against the earls of Toulouse and their confederates, and also against the heretics, whose cause they maintained. But none of the historians, whom I have consulted on this subject, have treated it with that impartiality which is so essential to the merit of historical writing. The Protestant writers, among whom Basnage deserves an eminent rank, are too favourable to Raymond and the Albigenses; the Roman catholic historians lean with still more partiality to the other side. Of these latter the most recent are Benedict, a Dominican monk, author of the Histoire des Albigeois, des Vaudois, et des Barbets, published at Paris, in 1691, in two volumes 12mo. J. Bapt. Langlois, a Jesuit, who composed the Histoire des Croisades contre les Albigeois, which was published in 12mo. et Rouen, in 1703, to which we must add, Jo. Jac. Percini, Monumenta Conventus Tolosani Ordinis FF. Prædicator, in quibus Historia hujus Conventus distribuitur, et refertur totius Albigensium facti narratio, Tolosa, 1693, fol. These writers are chargeable with the greatest partiality and injustice in the reproaches and calumnies they throw out so liberally against the Raymonds and the Albigenses, while they disguise, with a perfidious dexterity, the barbarity of Simon of Montford, and the ambitious views of extending their dominions that engaged the kings of France to enter into this war. The most ample and accurate account of this expedition against the heretics is that which is given by the learned Benedictines Claude le Vic and Joseph Vaissette, in their Histoire Generale de Languedoc. Paris, 1730, tom. iii. in which however there are several omissions, which render that valuable work deLectire.