Louis was the last of the European princes that embarked in the holy war; the dangers and difficulties, the calamities and disorders, and the enormous expenses that accompanied each crusade, disgusted the most zealous, and discouraged the most intrepid promoters of these fanatical expeditions. In consequence of this, the Latin empire in the east declined apace, notwithstanding the efforts of the Roman pontiffs to maintain and support it; and in the year 1291, after the taking of Ptolemais by the Mohammedans, it was entirely overthrown.* It is natural to inquire into the true causes that contributed to this unhappy revolution in Palestine; and these causes are evident. We must not seek for them either in the councils or in the valour of the infidels, but in the dissensions that reigned in the Christian armies, in the profligate lives of those who called themselves the champions of the cross, and in the ignorance, obstinacy, avarice, and insolence, of the pope's legates.

IX. Christianity had not yet tamed the ferocity, or conquered the pagan superstitions and prejudices, that still prevailed in some of the western provinces. Among others, the Prussians, a fierce and savage nation, retained the idolatrous worship of their ancestors with the most obstinate perseverance; nor did the arguments and exhortations employed by the ecclesiastics, who were sent from time to time to convert them, produce the least effect upon their stubborn and intractable spirits. The brutish firmness of these Pagans induced Conrad, duke of Masovia, to have recourse to more forcible methods than reason and argument, in order to effect their conversion. For this purpose, he addressed himself, in the year 1230, to the knights of the Teutonic order of St. Mary, (who, after their expulsion from Palestine, had settled at Venice,) and engaged them, by pompous promises, to undertake the conquest and conversion of the Prussians. The knights accordingly arrived in Prussia, under the command of Herman de Saltza, and, after a most cruel and obstinate war of fifty years with that resolute people, obliged them to acknowledge the sovereignty of the Teutonic order, and to embrace the Christian faith. After having established Christianity, and fixed their own dominion in Prussia, these booted apostles made several incursions into the neighbouring countries, and particularly into Lithuania, where they pillaged, burned, massacred, and ruined all before them, until they forced the inhabitants of that miserab province to profess a feigned submission to the Gospel, or rather to the furious and unrelenting missionaries, by whom it was propagated in a manner so contrary to its divine maxims, and to the benevolent spirit of its celestial author.‡

*Ant. Matthæi Analecta veteris ævi, tom. v.Jac. Echardi Scriptor. Dominican. tom. i.-Imola in Dantem, in Muratorii Antiq. Italicæ medii ævi, tom. i. See Matthæi Analecta vet. ævi, tom. iii. p. 18. tom. v. p. 684-689.-Chronicon Prussia, by Peter of Duisburg. Hartknock's History of the Prussian Church, written in the German language, book i. chap. i., and Antiquitates Prussia, Diss. xiv.-Baluzii Miscellanea, tom. vii.-Wadding's Annales Minor. tom. iv.-Histoire de Pologne par Solignac, tom. ii.

Beside the authors mentioned in the preceding!
VOL. I.43

X. In Spain the cause of the Gospel gained ground. The kings of Castile, Leon, Navarre, and Arragon, waged perpetual war with the Saracen princes, who held still under their dominion the kingdoms of Valencia, Granada, and Murcia, together with the province of Andalusia; and this war was carried on with such success, that the Saracen dominion declined apace, and was daily reduced within narrower bounds, while the limits of the church were extended on every side. The princes who chiefly contributed to this happy revolu tion were Ferdinand, king of Leon and Castile, who, after his death, obtained a place in the kalendar, his father Alphonso IX., king of Leon, and James I., of Arragon.* The last, more especially, distinguised himself eminently by his fervent zeal for the advancement of Christianity; for no sooner had he made himself master of Valencia, in the year 1236, than he employed, with the greatest pains and assiduity, every possible method of converting to the faith his Arabian subjects, whose expulsion would have been an irreparable loss to his kingdom. For this purpose he ordered the Dominicans, of whose ministry he principally made use in this salutary work, to learn the Arabic tongue; and he founded public schools at Majorca and Barcelona, in which a considerable number of youths were educated in a manner that might enable them to preach the Gospel in that language. When these pious efforts were found to be ineffectual, pope Clement IV. exhorted the king to drive the Mohammedans out of Spain. The obsequious prince attempted to follow the counsel of the inconsiderate pontiff; in the execution of which, however, he met with great difficulty, from the opposition of the Spanish nobles on one hand, and from the obstinacy of the Moors on the other.t

CHAPTER II.

Concerning the Calamitous Events that happenea to the Church during this Century.

I. THE accounts we have already given of the Tartarian conquests, and of the unhappy issue of the crusades, will be sufficient to suggest a lively idea of the melancholy condition to which the Christians were reduced in Asia; and, if the Saracens had been infected with the same odious spirit of persecution that possessed the crusards, there would not perhaps have remained a single Christian in that part of the world. But, though these infidels were chargeable with various crimes, and had frequently treated the Christians in a rigorous and injurious manner, they looked with horror_upon those scenes of persecution, which the Latins exhibited as the exploits of heroic piety, and considered it as the highest and most atrocious mark of injustice and cruelty, to force unhappy men, by fire and sword, to abandon their religious principles, or to put them to death merely because they refused to change their

note, see Ludwig's Reliquiæ Manuscriptorum omnis
ævi, tom. i.

*See Joh. Ferreras, History of Spain, vol. iv.
† See Geddes' History of the Expulsion of the My
escoes, in his Miscellaneous Trac.s vol. i.

III. If the accusations brought against Fre deric II. by pope Gregory IX. deserve any cre dit, that prince may be ranked among the most inveterate and malignant enemies of the Christian religion, since he was charged by the pontiff with having said, that the world had been deceived by three impostors, Moses,

answered by a solemn and public profession of his faith, which the emperor addressed to all the kings and princes of Europe, to whom also had been addressed the accusation brought against him. The charge, however, was founded upon the testimony of Henry Raspon, landgrave of Thuringia, who declared that he had heard the emperor pronounce the abominable blasphemy above mentioned. It is, after all, difficult to decide with sufficient evidence upon this point. Frederic, who was extremely passionate and imprudent, may, perhaps, in a fit of rage, have suffered some such expression as this to escape his reflection; and this is rendered probable by the company he frequented, and the number of learned Aristotelians who were always about his person, and might sug gest matter enough for such impious expres sions, as that now under consideration. It was this affair that gave occasion, in after-times, to the invention of that fabulous account, which supposes the detestable book concerning the three impostors to have been composed by the emperor himself, or by Peter de Vineis, a native of Capua, a man of great credit and authority, whom that prince§ had chosen for his prime minister, and in whom he placed the highest confidence.

opinions. After the destruction of the kingdom of Jerusalem, many of the Latins remained still in Syria, and, retiring into the dark and solitary recesses of mount Libanus, lived there in a savage manner, and lost, by degrees, all sense of religion and humanity, as appears from the conduct and characters of their descendants, who still inhabit the same unculti-Christ, and Mohammed.* This charge was vated wilds, and who seem almost entirely destitute of all knowledge of God and religion.* II. The Latin writers of this age complain r. many places of the growth of infidelity, of daring and licentious writers, some of whom publicly attacked the doctrines of Christianity, while others went so far as atheistically to call in question the perfections and government of the Supreme Being. These complaints, however they might have been exaggerated in some respects, were yet far from being entirely destitute of foundation; and the superstition of the age was too naturally adapted to create a number of infidels and libertines, among men who had more capacity than judgment, more wit than solidity. Persons of this character, when they fixed their attention only upon that absurd system of religion, which the Roman pontiffs and their dependants exhibited as the true religion of Christ, and maintained by the odious influence of bloody persecution, were, for want of the means of being better instructed, unhappily induced to consider the Christian religion as a fable, invented and propagated by greedy and ambitious priests, in order to fill their coffers, and to render their authority respectable. The philosophy of Aristotle, which flourished in all the European schools, and was looked upon as the very essence of right reason, contributed much to support this delusion, maintain, that all things, and even the crimes of the and to nourish a proud and presumptuous spi- wicked, are the effects of an absolute and irresistible necessity. Add to these authors, Tempier's Indicu rit of infidelity. This quibbling and intricate lus Errorum, qui a nonnullis Magistris Lutetiæ pab philosophy led many to reject some of the lice privatimque docebantur, Anno 1277, in Biblio most evident and important doctrines both of theca Patrum Maxima, tom. xxv. p. 233; as also natural and revealed religion, such as the doc- Boulay's Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. iii. p. 433, and Gerard du Bois' Hist. Eccles. Paris, tom. ii. p. 501. The trine of a divine providence governing the uni- tenets of these doctors will, no doubt, appear of a verse, the immortality of the soul, the scriptu- surprising nature; for they taught, "that there was ral account of the origin of the world, and only one intellect among all the human race; that all things were subject to absolute fate or necessity; various points of less moment. Not only were that the universe was not governed by a divine pro these doctrines rejected, but the most perni-vidence; that the world was eternal and the soul cious errors were industriously propagated in opposition to them, by a set of Aristotelians, who were extremely active in gaining proselytes to their impious jargon.†

mortal;" and they maintained these and the like monstrous errors, by arguments drawn from the philosophy of Aristotle. But, at the same time, tc avoid the just resentiment of the people, they held up, as a buckler against their adversaries, that most dangerous and pernicious distinction between theo* A certain tribe called Derusi, or Drusi, who inha- logical and philosophical truth, which has been since bit the recesses of the mounts Liban and Anti-Li-used, with the most cunning and bad faith, by the ban, pretend to a descent from the ancient Franks, who were once masters of Palestine. This derivation is, indeed, doubtful. It is however certain, that there still remain in these countries descendants of those whom the holy war led from Europe into Palestine, though they do very little honour to their ancestors, and have nothing of Christians but the

name.

† See Sti. Thomæ Summa contra Gentes, and Bernardi Monetæ Summa contra Catharos et Waldenses. The latter writer, in the work now mentioned, combats, with great spirit, those enemies of Christianity who appeared in his time. In the fourth chapter of the fifth book, p. 416, he disputes, in an ample and copious manner, against those who af firmed, that the soul perished with the body; refutes, in the eleventh chapter, p. 477, those Aristotelian philosophers, who held, that the world had existed from all eternity, and would never have an end; and, in the fifteenth chapter, p. 554, he attacks those, who, despising the authority of the sacred writings, deny the existence of human liberty, and

more recent Aristotelians of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. "These things," say they, (as we learn from Tempier, who was bishop of Paris.) "are true in philosophy, but not according to the catholic faith." Vera sunt hæc secundum philosophiam, non secundum fidem catholicam.

*Matthew Paris, Historia Major, p. 408, 459.Petr. de Vineis Epistolar. lib. i.

† Herm. Gigantis Flores Temporum, p. 126.-Chr Fred. Ayrmann, Sylloge Anecdotor. tom. i. p. 639.

See Casim. Oudini Comment. de Scriptor. Eccle siasticis, tom iii. p. 66.-Alb. Henr. de Sallengre, Memoires d'Histoire et de Literature, tom. i. part i

p. 386.
The book entitled Liber de iii. Impostoribus
sive Tractatus de Vanitate Religionum, is really &
book which had no existence at the time that the
most noise was made about it, and was spoken of by
multitudes before it had been seen by any one per
son. Its supposed existence was probably owing to
an impious saying of Simon Tournay, doctor of di
vinity in the university of Paris in the thirteenth

PART II.

THE INTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH.

CHAPTER I.

tury produced, was Gregory Abul-Faraj, pri

Cancerning the state of Learning and Philosophy mate of the Jacobites, a man of true genius

during this Century.

and universal learning, who was a judicious divine, an eminent historian, and a good philosopher.* George Elmacin, who composed the history of the Saracens, was also a writer of no mean reputation.

II. The sciences carried a fairer aspect in the western world, where every branch of erudition was cultivated with assiduity and zeal, and, in consequence, flourished with increas ing vigour. The European princes had learned, by a happy experience, how much learning and the arts contribute to the grandeur and happiness of a nation; and therefore they invited into their dominions learned men from all parts of the world, nourished the arts in their bosoms, excited the youth to the love of letters, by crowning their progress with the most noble rewards, and encouraged every ef‐ fort of genius, by conferring, upon such as ex

I THE Greeks, amidst the dreadful calamites, discords, and revolutions, that distracted and perplexed their unhappy country, had neither that spirit, nor that leisure, which are necessary for the culture of the arts and sciences. Yet, under all these disadvantages, they retained a certain portion of their former spirit, and did not entirely abandon the cause of learning and philosophy, as appears from the writers that arose among them during this century. Their best historians were Nicetas Choniates, Georgius Acropolita, Gregorius Pachymeres, and Joel, whose Chronology is yet extant. We learn from the writings of Gregory Pachymeres, and Nicephorus Blemmida, that the Peripatetic philosophy was not without its admirers among the Greeks, though the Platonic was most in vogue. The greatest part of the Gre-celled, the most honorable distinctions. Among cian philosophers, following the example of these patrons and protectors of learning, the the later Platonists, whose works were the emperor, Frederic II. and Alphonso X. king of subject of their constant meditation, were in- Leon and Castile (two princes as much distinclined to reduce the wisdom of Plato and the guished by their own learning, as by the ensubtilties of the Stagirite into one system, and||couragement they granted to men of genius,) to reconcile, as well as they could, their jarring || acquired the highest renown, and rendered principles. It is not necessary to exhibit a their names immortal. The former founded list of those authors, who wrote the lives and the academy of Naples, had the works of Aris discourses of the saints, or distinguished them-totle translated into Latin, assembled about selves in the controversy with the Latin church, or of those who employed their learned labours in illustrating the canon law of the Greeks. The principal Syrian writer, which this cen

century, which amounts to this: "That the Jews

his person all the learned men whom he could engage by his munificence to repair to his court, and gave other undoubted proofs of his zeal for the advancement of the arts and sciences. The latter obtained an illustrious and

permanent renown by several learned produc

* See Bayle's Dictionary, at the article Abulpharage; as also Jos. Simon. Assemani Bibliotheca Orientalis, Vatican. tom. ii. caput xlii. p. 244.

were seduced out of their senses by Moses, the Christians by Jesus, and the Gentiles by Mohammed." This, or some expressions of a similar kind, were impated to the emperor Frederic, and other persons, perhaps without any real foundation; and the imaginary book to which they have given rise, Abulpharagius, or Abul-Faraj, was a native has been attributed by different authors to Frederic, of Malatia, a city in Armenia, near the source of to his chancellor Peter de Vineis, to Alphonso, king the river Euphrates, and acquired a vast reputation of Castile, to Boccace, Poggio, the Aretins, Pompo- in the east, on account of his extensive erudition. nace, Machiavel, Erasmus, Ochinus, Servetus, Ra- He composed an Abridgment of Universal History belais, Giordano Bruno, Campanella, and many from the beginning of the world to his own times, others. In a word, the book was long spoken of be- which he divided into ten parts or dynasties. The fore any such work existed; but the rumour that was first comprehends the history of the ancient patrispread abroad encouraged some profligate traders in archs from Adam to Moses. The second, that of licentiousness to compose, or rather compile, a bun- Joshua and the other judges of Israel. The third, dle of miserable rhapsodies, under the famous title fourth, fifth, and sixth, contain the history of the of the Three Impostors, in order to impose upon such kings of Israel, of the Chaldean princes, of the Peras are fond of these pretended rarities. Accordingly, sian Magi, and of the Grecian monarchs. The sethe Spaccio della Bestia Triomphante of Giordano venth relates to the Roman history; the eighth to Bruno, and a wretched piece of impiety called the that of the Greek emperors of Constantinople. In Spirit of Spinoza, were the ground-work of mate- the ninth he treats of the Arabian princes; and in rials from which these hireling compilers, by modi- the tenth of the Moguls. He is more to be depended fying some passages, and adding others, drew the upon in his history of the Saracens and Tartars, than book which now passes under the name of the Three in his accounts of other nations. The learned Dr. Impostors, of which I have seen two copies in ma- Edward Pocock translated this work into Latin, and nuscript, but no printed edition. See La Monnoye's published his translation in 1663-4, with a suppleDissertation sur le Livre des Trois Imposteurs, pub. ment, which carries on the history of the oriental lished at Amsterdam in 1715, at the end of the fourth princes, where Abul-Faraj left it. The same learn volume of the Menagiana. See also an answer to ed translator had obliged the public, in 1650, with an this Dissertation, which was impudently exposed to abridgment of the ninth dynasty, under the followthe public eye, in 1716, from the press of Scheurleering title: "Specimen Historiæ Arabum, sive Gregoat the Hague, and which contains a fabulous story rii Abulfaragii Malatiensis de Origine et Moribus of the origin of the book in question. Whoever is Arabum succincta Narratio." desirous of a more ample and a very curious account of this matter, will find it in the late Prosper Marchand's Dictionaire Historique, vol. ii. at the article Imposteurs.

Boulay, Hist. Acad. Paris. tom. iii. p. 115. Gi annone, Historia di Napoli, tom. ii. p. 497. Add to these the observations of Jo Alb. Fabricius, Bibli oth. Latin. medii Evi tom r. 618.

Mapes,* Matthew of Vendosme, Alain de || l'Isle, Guntherus, James of Vitri, and several others, who wrote with ease, and were not altogether destitute of elegance. Among the historians, the first place is due to Matthew Paris, a writer of the highest merit, both in point of knowledge and prudence, to whom we may add Roderic Ximenes, Rigord, Vincent of Beauvais, Robert of St. Marino,§ Martinus, a native of Poland, Gervase of Tilbury, Conrad of Lichtenau, and William Nangius, whose names are worthy of being preserved from oblivion. The writers who have laboured to transmit to posterity the lives and exploits of the saints, have rather related the superstitions and miseries of the times, than the actions of those holy men. Among these biographers, James of Vitri, mentioned above, nakes the greatest figure; he also composed a History of the Lombards, that is full of insipid and trifling stories.¶

vinced of this, we have only to cast an eye upon the productions of Alexander de Villa Dei, who was looked upon as the most emi nent of them all, and whose works were read in almost all the schools from this period until the sixteenth century. This pedantic Franciscan composed, in the year 1240, what he called a Doctrinale, in Leonine verse, full of the most wretched quibbles, and in which the rules of grammar and criticism are delivered with the greatest confusion and obscurity, or, rather, are covered with impenetrable darkness.

VII. The various systems of philosophy that were in vogue before this century, lost their credit by degrees, and submitted to the triumphant doctrine of Aristotle, which erected a new and despotic empire in the republic of letters, and reduced the whole ideal world under its lordly dominion. Several of the works of this philosopher, and more especially his_metaphysical productions, had been, so early as the beginning of this century, trans

VI. Roger Bacon,** John Balbi, and Robert Capito, with other learned men, whose number, however, was inconsiderable, applied them-lated into Latin at Paris, and were from that selves to the study of Greek literature. The Hebrew language and theology were much less cultivated; though it appears that Bacon and Capito, already mentioned, and Raymond Martin, author of an excellent treatise, entitled, Pugio Fidei Christianæ, or, The Dagger of the Christian Faith, were extremely well versed in that species of erudition. Many of the Spaniards, and more particularly the Dominican friars, made themselves masters of the Arabian learning and language, as the kings of Spain had charged the latter with the instruction and conversion of the Jews and Saracens who resided in their dominions. As to the Latin grammarians, the best of them were extremely barbarous and insipid, and equally destitute of taste and knowledge. To be con* Jo. Wolff, Lectiones Memorabil. tom. i. p. 430. † Called in Latin, Alanus ab Insulis.

See the Histoire de l'Academie des Inscriptions et des Belles Lettres, tom. xvi. p. 243, which also gives an ample account of William of Nangis, page 292.

§ See Le Bœuf, Memoires pour l'Histoire d'Auxerre, tom. ii. p. 490, where there is also a learned account of Vincent of Beauvais, p. 494.

Gervase of Tilbury was nephew to Henry II., king of England, and was in high credit with the emperor Otho IV., to whom he dedicated a description of the world and a Chronicle, both of which he had himself composed. He wrote also a History of England, and one of the Holy Land, with several treatises upon different subjects.

time explained to the youth in the public
schools. But when it appeared, that Almeric†
had drawn from these books his erroneous sen-
timents concerning the divine nature, they
were prohibited and condemned as pernicious
and pestilential, by a public decree of the
council of Sens, in the year 1209. The logic
of Aristotle, however, recovered its credit some
years after this, and was publicly taught in the
university of Paris in the year 1215; but the
natural philosophy and metaphysics of that
great man were still under the sentence of
condemnation.§_
_It was reserved for the em-
peror Frederic II. to restore the Stagirite to
his former glory, which this prince effected by
employing a number of learned men, whom

* Franc. Patricii Discussiones Peripatetica, tom. i. lib. xi. p. 145. Jo. Launoius de varia Aristot. fortuna in Acad. Parisiensi, cap. i. p. 127, ed. Elswich. It is commonly reported, that the books of Aristotle here mentioned, were translated from Arabic into Latin. But we are told positively, that these books were brought from Constantinople, and translated from Greek into Latin. See Rigord's work de gestis Philippi regis Franc. ad annum 1209, in Andr. Chesnii Scrip. Hist. Franc. p. 119.

† Almeric, or Amauri, does not seem to have He held, that entertained any enormous errors. every Christian was obliged to believe himself a member of Jesus Christ, and attached, perhaps, some extravagant and fanatical ideas to that opinion; but his followers fell into more pernicious notions, and adopted the most odious tenets, maintain

¶ See Schelhornii Amanitates, Literariæ, tom. xi.ing, that the power of the Father continued no lon

p. 324.
**This illustrious Franciscan, in point of ge-
nius and universal learning, was one of the great-
est ornaments of the British nation, and, in general,
of the republic of letters. The astonishing discove
ries he made in astronomy, chemistry, optics, and
mathematics, made him pass for a magician in the
ignorant and superstitious times in which he lived,
while his profound knowledge in philosophy, theolo-
gy, and the Greek and Oriental languages, procured
him, with more justice, the title of the admirable
or wonderful doctor. Among other discoveries, he is
said to have made that of the composition and force
of gunpowder, which he describes clearly in one of
nis letters; and he proposed much the same correc-
tion of the calendar, which was executed about 300
years after by Gregory III. He composed an extra-
ordinary number of books, of which a list may be
seen in the General Dictionary.

tt See Rich. Simon's Lettres Choisies, tom. iii. p. 112. and Nic. Antonii B'bliotheca vetus Hispanica.

ger than the Mosaic dispensation; that the empire of the Son extended only to the thirteenth century; and that then the reign of the Holy Ghost commenced, when all sacraments and external worship were to be abolished, and the salvation of Christians was to be accomplished merely by internal acts of illuminating grace. Their morals also were as infamous as their doctrine was absurd; and, under the name of charity, they comprehended and committed the most criminal acts of impurity and licentious

ness.

Dr. Mosheim has fallen here into two slight mistakes. It was at Paris, and not at Sens, and in the year 1210, and not 1209, that the metaphysica. books of Aristotle were condemned to the flames. The works quoted here by our author, are those of Launoy, de varia Aristotelis fortuna in Acad. Paris cap. iv. p. 195, and Syllabus rationum quibus Duran di causa defenditur, tom. i. op.

§ Nat. Alexander, Select. Histor. Ecclesiast. C'an ta, tom. viii. cap. iii. sect. 7. page 76.