against the council of Florence, with greater iearning, candour, and perspicuity, than the rest of his countrymen displayed;*

George Gemistius Pletho, a man of eminent iearning, who excited many of the Italians to the study, not only of the Platonic philosophy in particular, but of Grecian literature in general;

solidity of his judgment, as may appear from a work of his, entitled, Conjectures concerning the last Day;"*

John Nieder, whose writings are very proper to give us an accurate notion of the manners and spirit of the age in which he lived, and whose journeys and transactions have rendered. him famous;

George of Trapesond, who translated seve- John Capistran, who was in high esteem at ral of the most eminent Grecian authors into the court of Rome on account of the ardour Latin, and supported the cause of the Latins and vehemence with which he defended the against the Greeks by his dexterous and elo-jurisdiction and majesty of the pontiffs against quent pen; all their enemies and opposers;f

George Codinus, of whom we have yet remaining several productions relating to the Byzantine history.

John Wesselus and Jerome Savanarola, who may justly be placed among the wisest and worthiest men of this age. The former, who was a native of Groningen, and on account of his extraordinary penetration and sagacity was called the Light of the World, propagated several of those doctrines, which Luther afterwards inculcated with greater evi

XXIV. The tribe of Latin writers that adorned or dishonoured this century, cannot easily be numbered. We shall therefore confine ourselves to the enumeration of those who wrote upon theological points; and even of these we shall only mention the most eminent.dence and energy, and animadverted with At their head we may justly place John Ger- freedom and candour upon the corruptions of son, chancellor of the university of Paris, the the Romish church. The latter was a Domi most illustrious ornament that this age could nican and a native of Ferrara, remarkable for boast of, a man of the greatest influence and piety, eloquence, and learning; who touched authority, whom the council of Constance the sores of the church with a heavier hand, looked upon as its oracle, the lovers of liberty and inveighed against the pontiffs with greater as their patron, and whose memory is yet pre- severity. For this freedom he severely suffered. cious to such among the French, as are zealous He was committed to the flames at Florence for the maintenance of their privileges against in 1498, and bore his fate with the most triumpapal despotism. This excellent man pub-phant fortitude and serenity of mind;§ lished a considerable number of treatises that were admirably adapted to reform the corruptions of a superstitious worship, to excite a spirit of genuine piety, and to heal the wounds of a divided church; though, in some respects, he does not seem to have thoroughly understood the demands and injunctions of the Gospel. The most eminent among the other theological writers were,

Nicolas de Clemangis, a man of uncommon candour and integrity, who, in the most eloquent and affecting strains, lamented the calamities of the times and the unhappy state of the Christian church;

Alphonsus Tostatus, bishop of Avila, who loaded the Scriptures with unwieldy and voluminous commentaries, and also composed other works, in which there is a great mixture of good and bad;

Alphonsus Spina, who wrote a book against the Jews and Saracens, which he called Fortalitium Fidei.

To all these we must join the whole tribe of the scholastic writers, whose chief ornaments were, John Capreolus, John de Turrecremata, Antoninus of Florence, Dionysius à Ryckel, Henry Gorcomius, Gabriel Biel, Stephen Bru lifer, and others. The most remarkable aniong the Mystics were, Vincent Ferrerius, Henry Harphius, Laurence Justinianus, Bernardine of Sienna, and Thomas à Kempis, who shone among these with a superior lustre, and to whom the famous book, concerning the imita tion of Christ, is commonly attributed.||

CHAPTER III.

Concerning the State of Religion, and the Doctrine of the Church, during this Century.

I.

Ambrose of Camaldoli, who acquired a high degree of reputation by his profound knowledge of the Greek language, and his uncom-rupt mon acquaintance with Grecian literature, as also by the zeal and industry he discovered in his attempts to effectuate a reconciliation between the Greeks and Latins;

Nicolas de Cusa, a man of vast erudition, and no mean genius, though not famed for the * Rich. Simon, Croyance de l'Eglise Orientale sur la Transubstantiation, p. 87.

† See Du-Pin's Gersoniana, prefixed to the edition of the works of Gerson, which we owe to that laborious author, and which appeared at Antwerp in five volumes folio, in 1705. See also Jo. Launoii Historia Gymnasii Regii Navarreni, part iii. lib. ii. cap. 1. p. 514, tom. iv. p. i. op.-Herm. von der Hardt, Acta Concil. Constant. tom. i. part iv.

THE state of religion had become so coramong the Latins, that it was utterly des

* Bayle, Reponse aux Questions d'un Provincial, tom. ii. cap. cxvи

L'Enfant's Histoire de la Guerre des Hussites, tom. ii. Wadding, Annales Minorum, tom. ix. 1 Jo. Henr. Maii Vita Reuchlini, p. 156.

Jo. Franc. Buddei Parerga Historico-Theologica. The life of Savanarola was written by J. Francis Picus, and published at Paris, with various annotations, letters, and original pieces, by Quetif, in 1674. The same editor published also the Spiritual and Ascetic Epistles of Savanarola, translated from the Italian into Latin. See Echard, Scriptor. Prædicator. tom. i. p. 884.

The late abbe Lenglet du Fresnoy promised the world a demonstration that this work, whose true author has been so much disputed aniong the learn. ed, was originally written in French by a person See Launoii Hist. part iii. lib. ii. cap. iii.-Lon- named Gersen, or Gerson, and only translated inte gueval, Hist. de l'Eglise Gallicane, tom. xiv. p. 436.-Latin by Thomas a Kempis. See Granetus in Lau The works of Clemangis were published by Lydi at Leyden, with a glossary ir 1631.

noianis, part ii. tom. iv. part ii. op. p. 414. The his tory of this celebrated production is given by Vin

iitute of any thing that could attract the || and monks, persuaded that their honours, inesteem of the truly virtuous and judicious part fluence, and riches, would diminish in proporof mankind. This is a fact, which even those tion to the increase of knowledge among the individuals whose prejudices render them un- people, and would receive inexpressible detriwilling to acknowledge it, will never presume ment from the downfall of superstition, vito deny. Among the Greeks and Orientals, gorously opposed every thing that had the rereligion had scarcely a better aspect than motest aspect of a reformation, and imposed among the Latins; at least, if the difference silence upon these importunate censors by the was in their favour, it was far from being con- formidable authority of fire and sword. siderable. The worship of the Deity consisted in a round of frivolous and insipid cere-excited in Bohemia by the ministry of John monies. The discourses of those who instructed the people in public, were not only destitute of sense, judgment, and spirit, but even of piety and devotion, and were in reality nothing more than a motley mixture of the grossest fictions and the most extravagant inventions. The reputation of Christian knowledge and piety was easily acquired; it was lavished upon those who professed a profound veneration for the sacred order, and their spiritual head the Roman pontiff, who studied to render the saints (i. e. the clergy, their ministers) propitious by frequent and rich donations, who were exact and regular in the observance of the stated ceremonies of the church, and who had wealth enough to pay the fines which the papal quæstors had annexed to the commission of all the different degrees of transgression; or, in other words, to purchase indulgences. Such were the ingredients of ordinary piety; but persons who added to these a certain degree of austerity and bodily mortification were placed in the highest order of worthies, and considered as the peculiar favourites of Heaven. On the other hand, the number of those who were studious to acquire a just notion of religion, to nvestigate the true sense of the sacred writings, and to model their lives and manners after the precepts and example of the divine Saviour, was extremely small; and such had much difficulty in escaping the flames, at a time when virtue and sense were deemed heretical.

III. The religious dissensions that had been Huss and his disciple Jacobellus de Misa, were doubly inflamed by the deplorable fate of Huss and Jerome of Prague, and broke out into an open war, which was carried on with unparalleled barbarity. The followers of Huss, who pleaded for the administration of the cup to the laity in the holy sacrament, being persecuted and oppressed in various ways by the emissaries and ministers of the court of Rome, retired to a steep and high mountain in the district of Bechin, in which they held their religious meetings, and administered the sacra ment of the Lord's supper under both kinds. This mountain they called Tabor, from the tents which they at first erected there for their habitation; and in process of time they raised a considerable fortification for its defence, and adorned it with a well-built and regular city. Forming more grand and important projects, they chose for their chiefs Nicolas of Hussinetz, and the famous John Ziska, a Bohemian knight, a man of the most undaunted courage and resolution; and proposed, under the standards of these violent leaders, to revenge the death of Huss and Jerome upon the creatures of the Roman pontiff, and obtain a liberty of worshipping God in a more rational manner than that which was prescribed by the church of Rome. After the death of Nicolas, which happened in 1420, Ziska commanded alone this warlike body, and had the satisfaction to see his army daily increase. During the first tumults of this war, which were no more than a prelude to calamities of a much more dread ful kind, Wenceslaus, king of Bohemia, resign ed his breath in the year 1419.*

II. This miserable state of affairs, this enormous perversion of religion and morality, throughout almost all the western provinces, were observed and deplored by many wise and IV. The emperor Sigismund, who succeeded good men, who all endeavoured, though in dif- him on the throne of Bohemia, employed not ferent ways, to stem the torrent of superstition, only edicts and remonstrances, but also the and to reform a corrupt church. In England terror of penal laws and the force of arms, to and Scotland, the disciples of Wickliffe, whom put an end to these lamentable divisions; and the multitude had stigmatized with the odious great numbers of the Hussites perished, by his title of Lollards, continued to inveigh against orders, in the most barbarous manner. The the despotic laws of the pontiffs, and the licen- Bohemians, irritated by these inhuman protious manners of the clergy.* The Waldenses, ceedings, threw off his despotic yoke in 1420, though persecuted and oppressed on all sides, and, with Ziska at their head, made war against raised their voices even in the remote valleys their sovereign. This famous leader, though and lurking-places whither they were driven deprived of his sight, discovered, in every step by the violence of their enemies, and called he took, such an admirable mixture of prualoud for succour to the expiring cause of re-dence and intrepidity, that his name became a ligion and virtue. Even in Italy, many, and terror to his enemies. Upon his death, which among others the famous Savanarola, had the happened in 1424, the majority of the Hus Courage to declare, that Rome was become the image of Babylon; and this notion was soon adopted by multitudes of all ranks and tonditions. But the greatest part of the clergy centius Thuillierius, in the Opera Posthuma Mabilloni et Ruinarti, tom. iii. p. 54.

*See Wilkins, Concilia Magna Britann. et Hibern. tom. iv.-Wood, Antiq. Oxon. tom. i.

This prince had no sooner begun to execute the decrees of the council of Constance against the Hussites, than the inhabitants of Prague took fire at the proceeding, raised a tumult, murdered the ma gistrates who published the order, and committed other outrages, which filled the court of Wenceslaus with consternation, and so affected that pusillani. mous monarch, that he was seized with an apoplexy, of which he died in a few days.

take of it, and this opinion was adopted by many; while others maintained the contrary doctrine, and confined the privilege in question to persons of riper years.*

sites chose for their general Procopius Rasa, a man also of undaunted courage and resolution, who maintained their cause, and carried on the war with spirit and success. The acts of barbarity, committed on both sides, were shocking VI. The demands of the Taborites, who deand terrible beyond expression; for, notwith-rived their name from a mountain wel known standing the irreconcilable opposition that ex-in sacred history, were much more ample. isted between the religious sentiments of the They not only insisted upon reducing the re contending parties, both agreed in this one gion of Jesus to its primitive simplicity, but horrible point, that it was innocent and lawful required also, that the system of ecclesiastical to persecute and extirpate with fire and sword government should be reformed in the same the enemies of the true religion; and such they manner, the authority of the pope destroyea, appeared to be in each other's eyes. The Bo- the form of divine worship changed: they dehemians maintained, that Huss had been un-manded, in a word, the erection of a new justly put to death at Constance, and conse-church, a new hierarchy, in which Christ alone quently revenged, with the utmost fury, the should reign, and all things should be carried injury which he had suffered. They acknow- on by a divine impulse. In maintaining these ledged it, nevertheless, as an incontestable extravagant demands, the principal doctors of principle, that heretics deserved capital punish- this sect, (such as Martin Loquis, a Moravian, ment; but they denied obstinately that Huss and his followers) went so far as to flatter was a heretic. This pernicious maxim, then, themselves with the chimerical notion, that was the source of that cruelty which disgraced || Christ would descend upon earth, armed with both parties in this dreadful war; and it is, per- fire and sword, to extirpate heresy, and purify haps, difficult to determine, which of the two the church from its multiplied corruptions. carried this cruelty to the greatest height. These fantastical dreams they propagated in V. All those who undertook to avenge the different countries, and taught them even in a death of the Bohemian martyr, set out upon public manner with unparalleled confidence the same principles; and, at the commence- and presumption. It is this enthusiastic class ment of the war, they seemed to agree both in of the Hussites alone, that we are to look their religious sentiments, and in their demands upon as accountable for all those abominable upon the church and government from which acts of violence, rapine, desolation, and murthey had withdrawn themselves. But, as their der, which are too indiscriminately laid to the numbers increased, their union diminished; and charge of the Hussites in general, and of their their army being prodigiously augmented by a two leaders Ziska and Procopius in particular.† confluence of strangers from all quarters, a It must indeed be acknowledged, that a great great dissension arose among them, which, in number of the Hussites had imbibed the most 1420, came to an open rupture, and divided barbarous sentiments with respect to the obligathis multitude into two great factions, which tion of executing vengeance upon their enewere distinguished by the titles of Calixtines mies, against whom they breathed nothing but and Taborites. The former, who were so call-bloodshed and fury, without any mixture of ed from their insisting upon the use of the humanity or compassion. chalice, or cup, in the celebration of the eucharist, were mild in their proceedings, and modest in their demands, and showed no disposition to overturn the ancient system of church government, or to make any considerable changes in the religion which was publicly received. All that they required, may be comprehended under the four articles which follow. They demanded, first, that the word of God should be explained to the people in a plain and perspicuous manner, without the mixture of superstitious comments or inventions; secondly, that the sacrament of the Lord's supper should be administered in both Kinds; thirdly, that the clergy, instead of employing all their attention and zeal in the acquisition of riches and power, should turn their thoughts to objects more suitable to their profession, and be ambitious of living and acting as became the successors of the holy apostles; and, fourthly, that transgressions of a more heinous kind, or mortal sins, should be punished in a manner suitable to their enormity. In this great faction, however, there were some subordinate sects, who were divided upon several points. The administration of the Lord's supper was one occasion of dispute; Jacobellus de Misa, who had first proposed the celebration of that ordinance under both kinds, was of opinion, that infants had a right to par

VII. In the year 1433, the council of Basil endeavoured to put an end to this dreadful war, and for that purpose invited the Bohemians to the assembly. The Bohemians, accepting this

* Byzinii Diarium Hussiticum, p. 130.

Taborites, which may be seen in the Diarium Hussiticum of Byzinius, we may form a just idea of their detestable barbarity: "Omnes legis Christi adversarii debent puniri septem plagis novissimis, ad quarum executionem fideles sunt provocandi-In isto tempore ultionis Christus in sua humilitate et miseratione non est imitandus ad ipsos peccatores, sed in zelo et furore et justa retributione. In hoc tem pore ultionis, quilibet fidelis, etiam presbyter, quantumcunque spiritualis, est maledictus, qui gladium suum corporalem prohibet a sanguine adversariorum legis Christi, sed debet manus suas lavare in eorum sanguine et sanctificare." From men, who adopted such horrid and detestable maxims, what could be expected but the most abominable acts of injustice and cruelty? For an account of this dreadful and calamitous war, the reader may consut (beside the ancient writers, such as Sylvius, Theobaldus, Cochdes Hussites, published at Amsterdam in 1731. To læus, and others) L'Enfant's Histoire de la Guerre this history it will, however, be advisable to add the Diarium Belli Hussitici of Byzinius; a book worthy and impartiality with which it is composed, and of the highest esteem, on account of the candour which Mr. L'Enfant does not seem to have consulted. This valuable production was published, though incomplete, in the sixth volume of the Requi Ludwig. See also Beausobre's Supplement to the Manuscriptorum of the very learned John Peter Histoire de la Guerre des Hussites, Lausanne, 1745

From the following opinions and maxims of the

invitation, sent ambassadors, and among others || here, that these sacred books were, in almost Procopius their leader, to represent them in all the kingdoms and states of Europe, transthat council. But, after many warm debates, || lated into the language of each nation, parthese messengers of peace returned without ticularly in Germany, Italy, France, and Brihaving affected any thing that might even pre- tain. This circumstance naturally excited the pare the way for a reconciliation so long and expectations of a considerable change in the so ardently desired. The Calixtines were not state of religion, and made the thinking few averse to peace; but no methods of persuasion hope, that the doctrine of the church would could engage the Taborites to yield. This be soon reformed by the light that could not matter, however, was transacted with more but arise from consulting the genuine sources uccess by Æneas Sylvius and others, whom of divine truth. the council sent into Bohemia to renew the conferences; for these new legates, by allow-ble ing to the Calixtines the use of the cup in the holy sacrament, satisfied them in the point which they had chiefly at heart, and thus reconciled them with the Roman pontiff. But the Taborites adhered inflexibly to their first principles; and neither the artifice nor the eloquence of Sylvius, nor the threats, sufferings, and persecutions to which their cause exposed them, could vanquish their obstinate perseverance. From this period, indeed, they began to review their religious tenets, and their ecclesiastical discipline, with a view of rendering them more perfect. This review, as it was executed with great prudence and impartiality, produced a very good effect, and gave a rational aspect to the religion of these sectaries, who withdrew themselves from the war, abandoned the doctrines, which, upon serious examination, they found to be inconsistent with the spirit and genius of the Gospel, and banish- | ed from their communion all persons whose disordered brains, or licentious manners, might expose them to reproach.* The Taborites, thus new-modelled, were the same with those Bohemian Brethren (or Picards, i. e. Beghards, as their adversaries called them) who joined Luther and his successors at the reformation, and of whom there are at this day many of the descendants and followers in Poland aud other countries.

IX. The schools of divinity made a miserafigure in this century. They were filled with teachers, who loaded their memory, and that of their disciples, with unintelligible distinctions and unmeaning sounds, that they might thus dispute and discourse, with an appearance of method, upon matters which they did not understand. There were now few remaining, of those who proved and illustrated the doctrines of religion by the positive declarations of the holy scriptures, and the sentiments of the ancient fathers, and who, with all their defects, were much superior to the vain and obscure pedants of whom we have been speaking. The senseless jargon of the latter did not escape the just and heavy censure of some learned and judicious persons, who considered their methods of teaching as highly detrimental to the interests of true religion, and to the advancement of genuine and solid piety. Accordingly, various plans were formed by different individuals, some of which had for their object the abolition of this method, others its reformation, while, in the mean time, the enemies of the schoolmen increased from day to day. The Mystics, of whom we shall have occasion to speak more largely hereafter, were ardently bent upon banishing entirely this scholastic theology out of the Christian church. Others, who seemed disposed to act with greater moderation, did not insist upon its total suppression, but were of opinion, that it VIII. Among the greatest part of the inter- was necessary to reform it, by abolishing all preters of Scripture that lived in this century, vain and useless subjects of debate, by rewe find nothing worthy of applause, if we ex- straining the rage of disputing that had incept their zeal and their good intentions. Such fected the seminaries of theology, and by seaof them as aimed at something higher than soning the subtlety of the schoolmen with a the character of mere compilers, and ventured happy temperature of mystic sensibility and to draw their explications from their own sense simplicity. This opinion was adopted by the of things, did little more than amuse, or rather famous Gerson, who laboured with the utmost delude, their readers, with mystical and alle-zeal and assiduity in correcting and reforming gorical fancies. At the head of this class we may place Alphonsus Tostatus, bishop of Avila, whose voluminous commentaries upon the sacred writings exhibit nothing remarkable but their enormous bulk. Laurentius Valla is entitled to a more favourable judgment; and his small collection of Critical and Grammatical Annotations upon the New Testament is far from being destitute of merit, since it pointed Out to succeeding authors the true method of removing the difficulties that sometimes present themselves to such as study with attention the divine oracles. It is proper to observe

the disorders and abuses which the scholastic divines had introduced into the seminaries,* as also by Savanarola, Petrus de Alliaco, and Nicolas Cusanus, whose treatise concerning Learned Ignorance is still extant.

X. The litigious herd of schoolmen found a new class of enemies equally keen, in the restorers of eloquence and letters, who were not all, however, of the same opinion with respect to the manner of treating these solemn quibblers. Some of them covered the scho||lastic doctrine with ridicule, loaded it with invectives, and demanded its suppression, as

See Adriani Regenvolscii Historia Eccles. provinciar. Sclavonicar. lib. ii. cap. viii. p. 165.-Joach. Rich. Simon. Lettres Choisies, tom. ii. p. 269, Camerarii Historica Narratio de Fratrum Ecclesiis and Critique de la Bibliotheque Ecclesiastique de M. in Bohemia, Moravia, et Polonia.-Jo. Lasitii His-Du-Pin, tom. i. p. 491.-Thomasii Origines Histor. toria Fratrum Bohemicorum, which I possess in Philos. p. 56, and principally Gersonis Methodus manuscript, and of which the eighth book was pub-Theologiam studendi, in Launoii Historia Gyınnas lished at Amsterdam, in 1649. Navarreni, tom. iv. op. part i. p. 330.

VOL. I. 54

a most trifling and absurd system, that was || from the learned book of Marcilius Ficinus ighly detrimental to the culture and im- concerning the Truth of Christianity, Savanaprovement of the mind, and could only pre-rola's Triumph of the Cross, the Natural Thevent the growth of genius and true science. ology of Raymond de Saburde, and other proOthers looked upon this system as supportable, ductions of a like nature. The Jews were reand only proposed illustrating and polishing futed by Perezius and Jerome de St. Foi, the it by the powers of eloquence, thus to render Saracens by Johannes de Turrecremata; and it more intelligible and elegant. Of this class both these classes of unbelievers were opwas Paulus Cortesius, who wrote, with this posed by Alphonso de Spina, in the Fortress view, a commentary on the Book of Proverbs, of Faith. Nor were these pious labourers in the in which, as we learn from himself, he forms defence of the Gospel at all unseasonable or happy union between eloquence and theology, superfluous: on the contrary, the state of and clothes the principal intricacies of scholas- things at this time rendered them necessary. tic divinity with the graces of an agreeable For, on the one hand, the Aristotelian philoand perspicuous style. After all, the scholas- sophers in Italy seemed, in their public instructic theology, supported by the extraordinary tions, to strike at the foundations of all relicredit and authority of the Dominicans and gion; and, on the other hand, the senseless Franciscans, maintained its ground against its subtleties and quarrels of the schoolmen, who various opposers; nor could these two religious modelled religion according to their extravaorders, who excelled in that litigious kind of gant fancies, tended to bring it into contempt. learning, bear the thought of losing the glory Add to all this, that the Jews and Saracens they had acquired by quibbling and disputing lived in many places promiscuously with the in the pompous jargon of the schools. Christians, who were therefore obliged, by the proximity of the enemy, to defend themselves with the utmost assiduity and zeal.

XI. This vain philosophy, however, grew daily more contemptible in the esteem of the judicious and the wise; while the Mystics ga- XIII. We have already taken notice of the thered strength, and saw their friends and ad- fruitless attempts which were made to heal the vocates multiply on all sides. Among these unhappy divisions of the Greek and Latin there were some men of distinguished merit, churches. After the council of Florence, and who are chargeable with few of the errors and the violation of the treaty of pacification by extravagances that were mingled with the dis- the Greeks, Nicolas V. exhorted and entreated cipline and doctrine of that famous sect, such them again to turn their thoughts towards the as Thomas à Kempis, (the author of the Ger- restoration of peace and concord. But his exmanic theology, so highly commended by hortations were without effect; and in about Luther,) Laurentius Justinianus, Savanarola, the space of three years after the writing of and others. There are, on the other hand, this last letter, Constantinople was besieged some writers of this sect, such as Vincentius and taken by the Turks. And from that fatal Ferrerius, Henricus, Harphius, and Bernard period to the present time, the Roman pontiffs, of Sienna, in whose productions we must care- in all their attempts to bring about a reconcifully separate certain notions which were the liation, have always found the Grecian patrieffects of a warm and irregular fancy, as also archs more obstinate and intractable than they the visions of Dionysius, whom the Mystics were when their empire was in a flourishing consider as their chief, from the noble precepts state. Nor is this circumstance so difficult of divine wisdom with which they are mingled. be accounted for, when all things are properly The Mystics were defended against their ad- considered. This obstinacy was the effect of a versaries, the Dialecticians, partly by the Pla-rooted aversion to the Latins and their pontiffs, tonists, who were in general highly esteemed, and partly by some, even of the most eminent scholastic doctors. The former considered Dionysius as a person whose sentiments had been formed and nourished by the study of Platonism, and wrote commentaries upon his writings; of which we have an eminent example in Marcilius Ficinus, whose name adds a lustre to the Platonic school. The latter attempt- || ed a certain sort of association between the scholastic theology and that of the Mystics; and in this class were John Gerson, Nicolas Cusanus, Dionysius the Carthusian, and others. XII. The controversy with the enemies of Christianity was carried on with much more vigour in this than in the preceding ages; and several learned and eminent men seemed now to exert themselves with peculiar industry and zeal in demonstrating the truth of that divine religion, and defending it against the various cbjections of its adversaries. This appears

that acquired, from day to day, new degrees of strength and bitterness in the hearts of the Greeks; an aversion, produced and nourished by a persuasion, that the calamities which they suffered under the Turkish yoke might have been easily removed, if the western prin ces and the Roman pontiffs had not refused to succour them against their haughty tyrants And accordingly, when the Greek writers de plore the calamities that fell upon their devoted country, their complaints are always mingled with heavy accusations against the Latins, whose cruel insensibility to their unhappy situ ation they paint in the strongest and most odious colours.

XIV. We pass over in silence many trifling controversies among the Latins, which have no claim to the attention of our readers. But we must not omit mentioning the revival of that famous dispute concerning the kind of worship that was to be paid to the blood of Christ, which was first kindled at Barcelona. in 1351, between the Franciscans and Domi nicans, and had been left undecided by Cle